Collected Works of Booth Tarkington

by Booth Tarkington

  “I sent thee late a rosy wreath, Not so much honoring thee, As giving it the hope that there It might not withered be.”

  Perhaps, just then, Vanrevel would have wished to hear him sing anything in the world rather than that, for on Crailey’s lips it carried too much meaning tonight, after the voice in the garden. And Tom lingered no more near the betraying sliver of light beneath the door than he had by the gap in the hedge, but went steadily on his way.

  Not far from the hotel he passed a small building brightly lighted and echoing with unusual clamors of industry: the office of the Rouen Journal. The press was going, and Mr. Cummings’s thin figure crossed and recrossed the windows, while his voice could be heard energetically bidding his assistants to “Look alive!” so that Tom imagined that something might have happened between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande; but he did not stop to ask the journalist, for he desired to behold the face of none of his friends until he had fought out some things within himself. So he strode on toward nowhere.

  Day was breaking when Mr. Gray climbed the stairs to his room. There were two flights, the ascent of the first of which occupied about half an hour of Crailey’s invaluable time; and the second might have taken more of it, or possibly consumed the greater part of the morning, had he received no assistance. But, as he reclined to meditate upon the first landing, another man entered the hallway from without, ascended quickly, and Crailey became pleasantly conscious that two strong hands had lifted him to his feet; and, presently, that he was being borne aloft upon the new-comer’s back. It seemed quite a journey, yet the motion was soothing, so he made no effort to open his eyes, until he found himself gently deposited upon the couch in his own chamber, when he smiled amiably, and, looking up, discovered his partner standing over him.

  Tom was very pale and there were deep, violet scrawls beneath his eyes. For once in his life he had come home later than Crailey.

  “First time, you know,” said Crailey, with difficulty. “You’ll admit first time completely incapable? Often needed guiding hand, but never — quite — before.”

  “Yes,” said Tom, quietly, “it is the first time I ever saw you quite finished.”

  “Think I must be growing old and constitution refuses bear it. Disgraceful to be seen in condition, yet celebration justified. H’rah for the news!” He waved his hand wildly. “Old red, white, and blue! American eagle now kindly proceed to scream! Starspangled banner intends streaming to all the trade winds! Sea to sea! Glorious victories on political thieving exhibition — no, expedition! Everybody not responsible for the trouble to go and get himself patriotically killed!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Water!” said the other, feebly. Tom brought the pitcher, and Crailey, setting his hot lips to it, drank long and deeply; then, with his friend’s assistance, he tied a heavily moistened towel round his head. “All right very soon and sober again,” he muttered, and lay back upon the pillow with eyes tightly closed in an intense effort to concentrate his will. When he opened them again, four or five minutes later, they had marvellously cleared and his look was self-contained and sane.

  “Haven’t you heard the news?” He spoke much more easily now. “It came at midnight to the Journal.”

  “No; I’ve been walking in the country.”

  “The Mexicans crossed the Rio Grande on the twenty-sixth of last month, captured Captain Thornton and murdered Colonel Crook. That means war is certain.”

  “It has been certain for a long time,” said Tom. “Polk has forced it from the first.”

  “Then it’s a devil of a pity he can’t be the only man to die!”

  “Have they called for volunteers?” asked Tom, going toward the door.

  “No; but if the news is true, they will.”

  “Yes,” said Tom; and as he reached the hallway he paused. “Can I help you to undress?”

  “Certainly not!” Crailey sat up, indignantly. “Can’t you see that I’m perfectly sober? It was the merest temporary fit, and I’ve shaken it off. Don’t you see?” He got upon his feet, staggered, but shook himself like a dog coming out of the water, and came to the door with infirm steps.

  “You’re going to bed, aren’t you?” asked Tom. “You’d much better.”

  “No,” answered Crailey. “Are you?

  “No. I’m going to work.”

  “You’ve been all up night, too, haven’t you?” Crailey put his hand on the other’s shoulder. “Were you hunting for me?”

  “No; not last night.”

  Crailey lurched suddenly, and Tom caught him about the waist to steady him.

  “Sweethearting, tippling, vingt-et-un, or poker, eh, Tom?” he shouted, thickly, with a wild laugh. “Ha, ha, old smug-face, up to my bad tricks at last!” But, recovering himself immediately, he pushed the other off at arm’s length, and slapped himself smartly on the brow. “Never mind; all right, all right — only a bad wave, now and then. A walk will make me more a man than ever.”

  “You’d much better go to bed, Crailey.”

  “I can’t. I’m going to change my clothes and go out.”

  “Why?”

  Crailey did not answer, but at that moment the Catholic church-bell, summoning the faithful to mass, pealed loudly on the morning air; and the steady glance of Tom Vanrevel rested upon the reckless eyes of the man beside him as they listened together to its insistent call. Tom said, gently, almost timidly:

  “You have an — engagement?”

  This time the answer came briskly. “Yes; I promised to take Fanchon to the cemetery before breakfast, to place some flowers on the grave of the little brother who died. This happens to be his birthday.”

  It was Tom who averted his eyes, not Crailey.

  “Then you’d best hurry,” he said, hesitatingly; “I mustn’t keep you,” and went downstairs to his office with flushed cheeks, a hanging head, and an expression which would have led a stranger to believe that he had just been caught in a lie.

  He went to the Main Street window, and seated himself upon the ledge, the only one in the room not too dusty for occupation; for here, at this hour, Tom had taken his place every morning since Elizabeth Carewe had come from the convent. The window was a coign of vantage, commanding the corner of Carewe and Main streets. Some distance west of the corner, the Catholic church cast its long shadow across Main Street, and, in order to enter the church, a person who lived upon Carewe Street must pass the corner, or else make a half-mile detour and approach from the other direction — which the person never did. Tom had thought it out the first night that the image of Miss Betty had kept him awake — and that was the first night Miss Carewe spent in Rouen — the St. Mary’s girl would be sure to go to mass every day, which was why the window-ledge was dusted the next morning.

  The glass doors of the little corner drug-store caught the early sun of the hot May morning and became like sheets of polished brass; a farmer’s wagon rattled down the dusty street; a group of Irish waitresses from the hotel made the boardwalk rattle under their hurried steps as they went toward the church, talking busily to one another; and a blinking youth in his shirt-sleeves, who wore the air of one newly, but not gladly, risen, began to struggle mournfully with the shutters of Madrillon’s bank. A moment later, Tom heard Crailey come down the stairs, sure of foot and humming lightly to himself. The door of the office was closed; Crailey did not look in, but presently appeared, smiling, trim, immaculate, all in white linen, on the opposite side of the street, and offered badinage to the boy who toiled at the shutters.

  The bell had almost ceased to ring when a lady, dressed plainly in black, but graceful and tall, came rapidly out of Carewe Street, turned at the corner by the little drug-store, and went toward the church. The boy was left staring, for Crailey’s banter broke off in the middle of a word.

  He overtook her on the church steps, and they went in together.

  That afternoon Fanchon Bareaud told Tom how beautiful her betrothed had been to her; he had brought her a great b
ouquet of violets and lilies-of-the-valley, and had taken her to the cemetery to place them on the grave of her baby brother, whose birthday it was. Tears came to Fanchon’s eyes as she spoke of her lover’s goodness, and of how wonderfully he had talked as they stood beside the little grave.

  “He was the only one who remembered that this was poor tiny Jean’s birthday!” she said, and sobbed. “He came just after breakfast and asked me to go out there with him.”

  CHAPTER XII. The Room in the Cupola

  MR. CAREWE RETURNED, one warm May afternoon, by the six o’clock boat, which was sometimes a day late and sometimes a few hours early; the latter contingency arising, as in the present instance, when the owner was aboard. Nelson drove him from the wharf to the bank, where he conferred briefly, in an undertone, with Eugene Madrillon; after which Eugene sent a note containing three words to Tappingham Marsh. Marsh tore up the note, and sauntered over to the club, where he found General Trumble and Jefferson Bareaud amicably discussing a pitcher of cherry bounce.

  “He has come,” said Tappingham, pleased to find the pair the only occupants of the place. “He saw Madrillon, and there’s a session to-night.”

  “Praise the Lord!” exclaimed the stout General, rising to his feet. “I’ll see old Chenoweth at once. My fingers have the itch.”

  “And mine, too,” said Bareaud. “I’d begun to think we’d never have a go with him again.”

  “You must see that Crailey comes. We want a full table. Drag him, if you can’t get him any other way.”

  “He won’t need urging,” said Jefferson.

  “But he cut us last time.”

  “He won’t cut tonight. What hour?”

  “Nine,” answered Tappingham. “It’s to be a full sitting, remember.”

  “Don’t fear for us,” laughed Trumble.

  “Nor for Crailey,” Jefferson added. “After so long a vacation you couldn’t keep him away if you chained him to the court-house pillars; he’d tear ’em in two!”

  “Here’s to our better fortunes, then!” said the old soldier, filling a glass for Tappingham; and, “Here’s to our better fortunes!” echoed the young men, pouring off the gentle liquor heartily. Having thus made libation to their particular god, the trio separated. But Jefferson did not encounter the alacrity of acceptance he expected from Crailey, when he found him, half an hour later, at the hotel bar. Indeed, at first, Mr. Gray not only refused outright to go, but seriously urged the same course upon Jefferson; moreover, his remonstrance was offered in such evident good faith that Bareaud, in the act of swallowing one of his large doses of quinine, paused with only half the powder down his throat, gazing, nonplussed, at his prospective brother-in-law.

  “My immortal soul!” he gasped. “Is this Crailey Gray? What’s the trouble?”

  “Nothing,” replied Crailey, quietly. “Only don’t go, you’ve lost enough.”

  “Well, you’re a beautiful one!” Jefferson exclaimed, with an incredulous laugh. “You’re a master hand; you, to talk about losing enough!”

  “I know, I know,” Crailey began, shaking his head, “but—”

  “You’ve promised Fanchon never to go again, and you’re afraid Miss Betty will see or hear us, and tell her you were there.”

  “I don’t know Miss Carewe.”

  “Then you needn’t fear; besides, she’ll be out when we come, and asleep when we go. She will never know we’ve been in the house.”

  “That has nothing to do with it,” said Crailey, impatiently; and he was the more earnest because he remembered the dangerous geography of the Carewe house, which made it impossible for anyone to leave the cupola-room except by the long hall which passed certain doors. “I will not go, and what’s more, I promised Fanchon I’d try to keep you out of it hereafter.”

  “Lord, but we’re virtuous!” laughed the incredulous Jefferson. “I’ll come for you at a quarter to nine.”

  “I will not go, I tell you.”

  Jefferson roared. “Yes, you will. You couldn’t keep from it if you tried!” And he took himself off, laughing violently, again promising to call for Crailey on his way to the tryst, and leaving him still warmly protesting that it would be a great folly for either of them to go.

  Crailey looked after the lad’s long, thin figure with an expression as near anger as he ever wore. “He’ll go,” he said to himself.

  “And — ah, well — I’ll have to risk it! I’ll go with him, but only to try and bring him away early — that is, as early as it’s safe to be sure that they are asleep downstairs. And I won’t play. No, I’ll not play; I’ll not play.”

  He paid his score and went out of the hotel by a side door. Some distance up the street, Bareaud was still to be seen, lounging homeward in the pleasant afternoon sunshine, he stopped on a corner and serenely poured another quinine powder into himself and threw the paper to a couple of pigs who looked up from the gutter maliciously.

  “Confound him!” said Crailey, laughing ruefully. “He makes me a missionary — for I’ll keep my word to Fanchon in that, at least! I’ll look after Jefferson tonight. Ah, I might as well be old Tom Vanrevel, indeed!”

  Meanwhile, Mr. Carewe had taken possession of his own again. His daughter ran to the door to meet him; she was trembling a little, and, blushing and smiling, held out both her hands to him, so that Mrs. Tanberry vowed this was the loveliest creature in the world, and the kindest.

  Mr. Carewe bowed slightly, as to an acquaintance, and disregarded the extended hands.

  At that, the blush faded from Miss Betty’s cheeks; she trembled no more, and a salutation as icy as her father’s was returned to him. He bent his heavy brows upon her, and shot a black glance her way, being, of course, immediately enraged by her reflection of his own manner, but he did not speak to her.

  Nor did he once address her during the evening meal, preferring to honor Mrs. Tanberry with his conversation, to that diplomatic lady’s secret anger, but outward amusement. She cheerfully neglected to answer him at times, having not the slightest awe of him, and turned to the girl instead; indeed, she was only prevented from rating him soundly at his own table by the fear that she might make the situation more difficult for her young charge. As soon as it was possible, she made her escape with Miss Betty, and they drove away in the twilight to pay visits of duty, leaving Mr. Carewe frowning at his coffee on the veranda.

  When they came home, three hours later, Miss Betty noticed that a fringe of illumination bordered each of the heavily curtained windows in the cupola, and she uttered an exclamation, for she had never known that room to be lighted.

  “Look!” she cried, touching Mrs. Tanberry’s arm, as the horses trotted through the gates under a drizzle of rain, “I thought the room in the cupola was empty. It’s always locked, and when I came from St. Mary’s he told me that old furniture was stored there.”

  Mrs. Tanberry was grateful for the darkness. “He may have gone there to read,” she answered, in a queer voice. “Let us go quietly to bed, child, so as not to disturb him.”

  Betty had as little desire to disturb her father as she had to see him; therefore she obeyed her friend’s injunction, and went to her room on tip-toe. The house was very silent as she lit the candles on her bureau. Outside, the gentle drizzle and the soothing tinkle from the eaves were the only sounds; within, there was but the faint rustle of garments from Mrs. Tanberry’s room. Presently the latter ceased to be heard, and a wooden moan of protest from the four-poster upon which the good lady reposed, announced that she had drawn the curtains and wooed the rulers of Nod.

  Although it was one of those nights of which they say, “It is a good night to sleep,” Miss Betty was not drowsy. She had half-unfastened one small sandal, but she tied the ribbons again, and seated herself by the open window. The ledge and casement framed a dim oblong of thin light from the candles behind her, a lonely lustre, which crossed the veranda to melt shapelessly into darkness on the soggy lawn. She felt a melancholy in the softly falling rain and wet, black fol
iage that chimed with the sadness of her own spirit. The night suited her very well, for her father’s coming had brought a weight of depression with it. Why could he not have spoken one word to her, even a cross one? She knew that he did not love her, yet, merely as a fellow-being, she was entitled to a measure of courtesy; and the fact that she was his daughter could not excuse his failure to render it. Was she to continue to live with him on their present terms? She had no intention to make another effort to alter them; but to remain as they were would be intolerable, and Mrs. Tanberry could not stay forever, to act as a buffer between her and her father. Peering out into the dismal night, she found her own future as black, and it seemed no wonder that the Sisters loved the convent life; that the pale nuns forsook the world wherein there was so much useless unkindness; where women were petty and jealous, like that cowardly Fanchon, and men who looked great were tricksters, like Fanchon’s betrothed. Miss Betty clenched her delicate fingers. She would not remember that white, startled face again!

  Another face helped her to shut out the recollection: that of the man who had come to mass to meet her yesterday morning, and with whom she had taken a long walk afterward. He had shown her a quaint old English gardener who lived on the bank of the river, had bought her a bouquet, and she had helped him to select another to send to a sick friend. How beautiful the flowers were, and how happy he had made the morning for her, with his gayety, his lightness, and his odd wisdom! Was it only yesterday? Her father’s coming had made yesterday a fortnight old.