“I know.”
Alfred put aside his cigarette. “I know that there is no question of your loyalty, Philip. I have faith in your judgment. Whatever you do could not be questioned from a moral point of view. It is just a matter of good taste.”
“I think it would be a matter of very bad taste had I insulted a child,” suggested Philip gently, “or been discourteous to a woman who had been kind to me, and who had given me a mother’s love, even if it had been only for a short time.”
Alfred looked at the cigarette smouldering in its silver tray. “You are right, of course,” he said, almost inaudibly. “It is very difficult.” He hesitated. “But one can be careful not to encounter difficult situations, to avoid any opportunity for them. Heaven knows, there are situations which it is impossible to avoid. But to seek them out, to lay one’s self open to them—that is a different matter.”
“I did not seek out this encounter,” Philip reminded his father. “If the child had not found me, I should have said nothing, I think. They were there some time before I was discovered.”
Alfred inclined his head. “Yes. Yes, of course. You did what was expected of a gentleman. But—you will avoid similar occasions, I am sure.”
Philip was silent. But he gazed at his father penetratingly.
“We have lived here for quite a number of years now, Philip, and this is the first—encounter. I am sure we’ll spend many more years here, and not have a repetition.”
Philip said quietly: “I have been invited to Hilltop. I accepted the invitation tentatively. I may go up.”
Alfred turned to him quickly, as if incredulous. “Philip, did I hear you correctly?”
“Yes.” Philip’s voice was determined, but still gentle. “I am remembering that you own a half interest in that house, and that—later—that interest will come to me. I was born there; it is my home. My mother died in one of its rooms. My happiest memories live within its walls. Sometimes I feel exiled.” He paused. “I want to see my old home again. I want to see the hawthorn tree I planted in the garden. Uncle William gave me a corner where I planted white roses. I feel they are mine. It is our home, too, as much as it is Jerome’s. More so, in fact.”
Alfred stared at him in confusion. He was overcome with a flood of conflicting emotions. He saw Hilltop clearly in his mind, its brick garden walks, its red wall in the rear, its old dark trees, the light of the sun on its old windows. And he was filled with an intense nostalgia and sadness.
He said: “Yes, I can understand your feelings, Philip. This house is too new. In a hundred years or so, it might acquire the mellowness of a true home. But not yet, I am afraid, and not in our lifetime. That is something we must leave for our heirs. Yes, I understand.”
Philip said, with deliberate hypocrisy: “I want to see Hilltop again. I want to walk in its rooms. I want to look at the things which belonged to us, which still belong to us. Perhaps I am sentimental. And I know that there are many who would despise such sentimentality, and probably they are right.”
“No, no,” said Alfred confusedly. He rubbed his lined forehead. “It is not sentimentality. A man’s deepest instincts are rooted in his home. It is natural. I am only trying to recall to your memory who are now living in that house.”
“They have no right to drive us out, to keep us out,” said Philip artfully. “The house is ours, too. We have a lawful right to enter whenever we wish; thanks to your wisdom in not selling Jerome your share, Father.”
Alfred was distressed, but he was also strangely pleased and touched. His tired hazel eyes brightened with satisfaction as he looked at his son. “I had to preserve your birthright, Philip. I shall never let anyone take it away from you.”
Philip nodded with a strong affectation of grimness. “Thank you, Father.”
Alfred really did not know whether he should be annoyed or pleased. “I did not think that you were so—implacable, my boy.”
“Oh,” said Philip easily, “I am just a seething pot of implacability. I want what is mine, and I intend to have it, to enjoy it.”
Alfred leaned back in his chair and considered the whole distressing situation with confusion and pain and uncertainty. “You could,” he suggested doubtfully, “arrange with—them—to let you go through the house and gardens, say, every few weeks. And doubtless they will be considerate and tactful enough to remove themselves during those hours, or to keep out of your way.”
Philip repressed a smile. But, as usual, his father’s naivete filled him with tenderness. “That would be awkward,” he said consideringly. “That might give certain people an occasion for amusement, at our expense. I think, perhaps, it would be best if I simply went up there easily and naturally and looked about, without previous notification of my coming.”
Alfred frowned suddenly. “That would be the least awkward, I admit. But there is another thing: he—he might be there. He might insult you, attempt to drive you away. That is something I could not endure.” And his folded hands suddenly parted, became large and threatening fists, and his eyes, staring before him, burned darkly.
He will always hate Jerome, thought Philip. And it is something more than Amalie; it is of many years’ growth, years crowded with hatreds and jealousies and insults and hostilities. It is instinctive, inherent, between them.
He said calmly: “How will this be? I will never go up there when I suspect Jerome might be on the premises.”
Alfred relaxed his savagely knotted hands, but he said nothing and only looked before him fixedly.
Philip spoke with wiliness. “I have always admired one thing about you, Father, more than any other. You have always been just.” He reflected, with cynical sadness, that a man must have one prideful and conscious virtue, and “justice” was his father’s. It was a fetish with him.
At the beloved word, Alfred’s last dull rage smouldered out. He regarded Philip consideringly.
“You could have made it so disagreeable for Jerome that he would have been compelled to leave the house. You could have hounded him there, subjected him to mortifications and endless harassments. But you did not. For that, he ought to be grateful. And in return, he ought not to object to my visiting my old home whenever I wish.”
“He dare not object!” said Alfred strongly.
Philip nodded with satisfaction. “No, he dare not. And, besides, there is another matter. Once a year you have the place inspected by your attorneys and agents. I think I could do a better job for you. I can look for things which might escape the casual eyes of those who are not much interested. After all, I must help preserve the property.”
Alfred said, softly: “I have been informed that Hilltop is in excellent condition. He—he has added many improvements, and beautified the grounds, too. One must be just.”
Again, Philip reflected on the one supreme virtue which every man possesses. And he began to wonder, from these visible evidences of deep-seated pain, whether that chosen virtue did not cause its writhing possessor more anguish than it was worth, and whether or not it was completely alien to that possessor’s real nature. A kind of self-flagellation, thought Philip, the gentle cynic. Each man to his individual hairshirt. What was his own? Deliberate self-sacrifice. The ugliest of the “virtues.” Sometimes it made a dangerous creature of the man who harbored it.
Alfred got up and went to a window. He kept his back to his son. “Of course, you need waste no words on—anyone—on your tours of inspection, Philip.” He was silent then, but Philip felt his pathetic waiting.
“Only as many as courtesy demands,” Philip conceded. He lit another cigarette. He said casually: “The little girl is very pretty indeed. There is a quality about her which strongly reminds me of Uncle William. She has his eyes and his coloring, and the expression of her mouth is his also. She is all New England. Not in the least like her mother, or her father either.”
Alfred did not turn or speak. But Philip felt his tenseness.
“A very cool and somewhat silent child,” said Philip, medit
atively. “A puzzle to her mother. I had the slight impression that all is not happiness for Amalie.”
“I am really not interested in—” said Alfred, in a muffled tone. But he did not move.
Philip went on, as if he had not heard his father: “Amalie has not changed much. She has some white threads in her hair. But who is completely happy, anyway? She told me of her little boy, who is named for Uncle William.” He paused. He said, with a soft and affected hesitation: “She begged me to tell her that you did not hate her.”
Alfred made an abrupt movement at the window, an involuntary movement of pain. Then he was still again. Philip saw the massive lines of his broad shoulders, and they had a touchingly softened look about them, an eager and waiting look.
“I said,” Philip continued gently, “that I didn’t believe you had ever hated her. She seemed happy, then, and relieved.” Philip did not mind lies that gave pleasure or peace to anyone, so he uttered a very large one without scruple: “She asked about you in detail, Father. I did not enlighten her much, except to tell her that you were well and content. That, too, gave her obvious happiness. She said that she always remembered how kind you were, and how good. Did you know that she has a pair of binoculars?” Philip added.
“Binoculars!” said Alfred faintly.
Philip laughed. “Yes. She admitted she spends considerable time looking down here. And not at me, I suspect.”
Alfred was silent again, then he swung sharply about. His face had changed, become revivified with a kind of youthful intensity. “You are not joking, Philip?” he said, and the tone of his voice moved Philip to an aching pang of compassion.
“No, Father, I am not joking,” he said. “It is true: she has binoculars.” He stood-up and regarded his father with grave earnestness.
They stood and looked at each other in a long and searching silence.
Then Alfred said, as if speaking from some inner compulsion: “I shall never forget Amalie. I have held her—almost—guiltless.”
Good God, thought Philip, with pity, does he believe Jerome raped her? Well, let him believe it if his vanity, his love, his loneliness, can so be assuaged.
Much of Alfred’s somberness and weariness had lightened. He lifted his head. He put his hand on Philip’s shoulder. He smiled, almost excitedly. He said: “Philip, I know I can trust your good taste, your discretion. You have always been so good. I am grateful. And we have grown so close together in these years—”
He pressed Philip’s shoulder strongly. Then, still smiling, he went away. His step on the stairs was quick and light.
I hope, thought Philip, uneasily, that I haven’t said too much.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
The Riversend Bank of Commerce, scornfully stigmatized by Dorothea as “that grinning monstrosity,” was not in the least monstrous, nor, in its deliberately lofty dignity, did it “grin.”
It was, however, designed to overshadow the Lindsey bank. There was much of the stage manager in Jerome; he knew the value of overpowering “properties.” As he was also an artist, he understood the psychic impact of mass and proportion, the effect of angles, the helpless inability of the human eye to refrain from travelling up a soaring column. He knew that the English mind preferred smallness, solidity and unpretentiousness, and that the Englishman had a tendency to respect grimness and compactness. But the-American mind, already affected by the vast skies and great plains and immense vistas of the new country, loved monoliths. America, he realized, was ripe for an architecture peculiarly its own: great gleaming walls, dazzling smoothness, clean strong angularity. The South had first demonstrated this new trend, in an individual architecture. Jerome intended to use these proportions of line and alabaster-like massiveness, and adapt them to the more pale and clarified light of the North.
So, the Riversend Bank of Commerce was easily the largest commercial establishment in Riversend. It had taken long over a year to build. Jerome had selected two acres of land less than an eighth of a mile from the old Lindsey bank, and had torn down the small shops and stables on that site. He ruthlessly cleared away all clutter, all brush, all spindly second-growth timber, all walls and fences. Everything was levelled, laid open to the sky. Then, in this square center of windy space, the bank was built. Pure white granite was brought in from Vermont, huge blocks carefully fitted together to form wide square walls of brilliant austerity. Hating the narrow, slit-like windows of his era, Jerome specified windows that were both wide and tall. Four enormous white columns of the granite graced the stern façade, stretching the complete height of three stories. The doors, quite gigantic, were of dully polished bronze, with grills.
The grounds were heavily seeded with grass, so that in the second summer the shining bank stood on a great square of bright, smooth green. No flower beds marred this greenness. There were no trees except two beautiful cypresses at the foot of the three low, wide, white steps that led to the doors of the bank.
General Tayntor had called the bank a “fine example of bastard Greek.” But, as Jerome pointed out, there was no valid objection to adapting the noblest form of architecture to American taste. Indeed, if an impartial eye studied the bank for a few moments, it was evident that the Greek influence was only in the effect of the mass and the columns.
Riversend had been stupefied by this new addition to its somewhat insular and English architecture, all red brick, dull gray granite, or wood. It seemed to shrink back from it, to huddle away, both in suspicion and awe. It stood high and white and wide, and there was hardly a section of mid-Riversend that did not have a view of it. It took Riversend nearly five years to accept it, to come to admire it. And by that time Jerome had become so established, so much the power of the community, that had the bank indeed been a “grinning monstrosity” it would still have seemed beautiful in the eyes of the townsmen.
Promptly after the reading of his father’s will, and his marriage to Amalie, Jerome had gone to New York with his bride. There he went into long conferences with his old friend, Jay Regan, and the latter’s friend, Gordon Livingston, of Livingston, Hatfield and Company, bankers and investors. Mr. Livingston was a gentleman who listened with attention and sympathy to Jerome, for he was much interested in industrial banking. Jerome informed his friends of his plan, the establishing of a bank to be known as the Riversend Bank of Commerce, and that he intended to attract to Riversend as many new industries as possible. He himself intended to enter the field of financing and underwriting such industries. There was much uninvested money in the old Lindsey bank, but before he could persuade the owners to invest with him, he must prove that industrial financing and the investment of money in such enterprises as railroads, mining, and other industries of national scope, could bring a greater return than local farming and the financing of small shops. Frankly, then, Jerome asked his friends to recommend to him those securities which he, in turn, could recommend to the investors of Riversend and which he could buy himself.
He invested heavily, following the advice of these friends.
Upon his return to Riversend he began to build his bank.
While the bank was being built, he cleverly disseminated rumors to the effect that “Jerome Lindsey has got onto some good things in New York.” He allowed it to be circulated that he was a clever investor, that he was well on the way to doubling, if not tripling, his fortune. The big industrial and financial boom that followed the war lent verity to these rumors.
For a while, the offended gentry of Riversend kept their distance from the man who had so flouted all their pet conventions and their Victorian sense of respectability. They would have none of him. They watched his bank rising, and jeered. They saw his carriage in the streets, and turned aside. He was a pariah. But Jerome smiled to himself. The strong pungency of money covered, he knew, all other smells.
When he heard the rumor which General Tayntor was now spreading about him he laughed aloud—but secretly, In exultation. For it seemed the rumor related that Jerome had never had any intention of
marrying Amalie, wife of Alfred, but that Alfred had himself forced a “shot-gun” marriage on him. Jerome, said the General, had been much in love with Sally Tayntor, but the girl, once the scandal became public property, jilted him, much to his despair.
So, thought Jerome, with satisfaction, the old devil is saving his pride and preparing the way for his forgiveness of me and his approach to me. It will be all magnanimity. He himself made no overtures to his old friends. He merely waited.
The bank was not yet finished before the General found a way to accost him “accidentally” in front of the General’s own home. It was a frigid meeting, a reserved one. They mentioned no personalities. The General only remarked that he had recently returned from New York where he had heard rumors that Jerome was one of the cleverest speculators on the Street. “Of course,” said the General, “that is very foolish and precarious, and I hope the rumors are untrue, for the sake of your father’s memory.” This remark had the ring of a covertly eager question.
Knowing that the General was the most valuable gossip in Riversend, very avaricious, and only too anxious to have the “rumors” substantiated, Jerome immediately invited his old friend to dine with him at the Riversend Hotel, that very noon. The General demurred stiffly, finally allowed himself to be persuaded. They created a minor sensation when they met together in the hotel dining-room less than three hours later.
The two carefully ignored the subdued amazement about them, and drank several glasses of whiskey before dining. By that time the General had mellowed. His fondness for Jerome had always been sincere; it came to the surface now with much laughter and many exclamations of “my dear boy!” A drink or two later, the General’s arm was about Jerome’s shoulder, and their heads were together, exchanging sentimental reminiscences of William Lindsey.
Two hours later they were still in the dining-room, where Jerome had ordered a very good dinner. The General had always believed that Jerome was “cagy.” He now listened to Jerome’s “confidences,” feeling very cunning himself, and very astute. He was certain that all the sentimentalizing, and the whiskey, had loosened Jerome’s cautious tongue, and did not question the things which Jerome confided to him. Moreover, they had the ring of truth.
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