"What I want," I said, "is you. I'm an old hen whose chickens have
grown up and left her, and I want something to mother. Your
wonderful social world is just a bother to me, because it keeps me
from gathering you into my arms as I'd like to. So what you do is to
think of some role for me to play, so that I can come to see you;
let me be advising you about your proposed day-nursery, or let me
be a tutor of something, or a nice, respectable sewing-woman who
darns the toes of your silk stockings!"
She laughed. "If you suppose that I'm allowed to wear my stockings
until they have holes in them, you don't understand the perquisites
of maids." She thought a moment, and then added: "You might come to
trim hats for me."
By that I knew that we were really friends. If it does not seem to
you a bold thing for Sylvia to have made a joke about my hat, it is
only because you do not yet know her. I have referred to her
money-consciousness and her social-consciousness; I would be
idealizing her if I did not refer to another aspect of her which
appalled me when I came to realise it--her clothes-consciousness.
She knew every variety of fabric and every shade of colour and every
style of design that ever had been delivered of the frenzied
sartorial imagination. She had been trained in all the infinite
minutiae which distinguished the right from the almost right; she
would sweep a human being at one glance, and stick him in a pigeon
hole of her mind for ever--because of his clothes. When later on she
had come to be conscious of this clothes-consciousness, she told me
that ninety-nine times out of a hundred she had found this method of
appraisal adequate for the purposes of society life. What a curious
comment upon our civilization--that all that people had to ask of
one another, all they had to give to one another, should be
expressible in terms of clothes!
16. I had set out to educate Mrs. Douglas van Tuiver in the things I
thought she needed to know. A part of my programme was to find some
people of modern sympathies whom she might meet without offence to
her old prejudices. The first person I thought of was Mrs. Jessie
Frothingham, who was the head of a fashionable girls' school, just
around the corner from Miss Abercrombie's where Sylvia herself had
received the finishing touch. Mrs. Frothingham's was as exclusive
and expensive a school as the most proper person could demand, and
great was Sylvia's consternation when I told her that its principal
was a member of the Socialist party, and made no bones about
speaking in public for us.
How in the world did she manage it? For one thing, I answered, she
ran a good school--nobody had ever been heard to deny that. For
another, she was an irresistibly serene and healthy person, who
would look one of her millionaire "papas" in the eye and tell him
what was what with so much decision; it would suddenly occur to the
great man that if his daughter could be made into so capable a
woman, he would not care what ticket she might vote.
Then too, it was testimony to the headway we are making that we are
ceasing to be dangerous, and getting to be picturesque. In these
days of strenuous social competition, when mammas are almost at
their wits' end for some new device, when it costs incredible sums
to make no impression at all--here was offered a new and inexpensive
way of being unique. There could be no question that men were
getting to like serious women; the most amazing subjects were coming
up at dinner-parties, and you might hear the best people speak
disrespectfully of their own money, which means that the new
Revolution will have not merely its "Egalit� Orleans," but also some
of the ladies of his family!
I telephoned from Sylvia's house to Mrs. Frothingham, who answered:
"Wouldn't you like Mrs. van Tuiver to hear a speech? I am to speak
next week at the noon-day Wall Street meeting." I passed the
question on, and Sylvia answered with an exclamation of delight:
"Would a small boy like to attend a circus?"
It was arranged that Sylvia was to take us in her car. You may
picture me with my grand friends--an old speckled hen in the company
of two golden pheasants. I kept very quiet and let them get
acquainted, knowing that my cause was safe in the hands of one so
perfectly tailored as Mrs. Frothingham.
Sylvia expressed her delight at the idea of hearing a Socialist
speech, and her amazement that the head of Mrs. Frothingham's should
be so courageous, and meantime we threaded our way through the
tangle of trucks and surface-cars on Broadway, and came to the
corner of Wall Street. Here Mrs. Frothingham said she would get out
and walk; it was quite likely that someone might recognise Mrs.
Douglas van Tuiver, and she ought not to be seen arriving with the
speaker. Sylvia, who would not willingly have committed a breach of
etiquette towards a bomb-throwing anarchist, protested at this, but
Mrs. Frothingham laughed good-naturedly, saying that it would be
time enough for Mrs. van Tuiver to commit herself when she knew what
she believed.
The speaking was to be from the steps of the Sub-treasury. We made a
_d�tour,_ and came up Broad Street, stopping a little way from the
corner. These meetings had been held all through the summer and
fall, so that people had learned to expect them; although it lacked
some minutes of noon, there was already a crowd gathered. A group of
men stood upon the broad steps, one with a red banner and several
others with armfuls of pamphlets and books. With them was our
friend, who looked at us and smiled, but gave no other sign of
recognition.
Sylvia pushed back the collar of her sable coat, and sat erect in
her shining blue velvet, her eyes and her golden hair shining
beneath the small brim of a soft velvet hat. As she gazed eagerly at
the busy throngs of men hurrying about this busy corner, she
whispered to me: "I haven't been so excited since my _d�but_ party!"
The crowd increased until it was difficult to get through Wall
Street. The bell of Old Trinity was tolling the hour of noon, and
the meeting was about to begin, when suddenly I heard an exclamation
from Sylvia, and turning, saw a well-dressed man pushing his way
from the office of Morgan and Company towards us. Sylvia clutched my
hand where it lay on the seat of the car, and half gasped: "My
husband!"
17. Of course I had been anxious to see Douglas van Tuiver. I had
heard Claire Lepage's account of him, and Sylvia's, also I had seen
pictures of him in the newspapers, and had studied them with some
care, trying to imagine what sort of personage he might be. I knew
that he was twenty-four, but the man who came towards us I would
have taken to be forty. His face was sombre, with large features and
strongly marked lines about the mouth; he was tall and thin, and
moved with decision, betraying no emotion even in this moment of
surprise. "What are you doing here?" were his first wor
ds.
For my part, I was badly "rattled"; I knew by the clutch of Sylvia's
hand that she was too. But here I got a lesson in the nature of
"social training." Some of the bright colour had faded from her
face, but she spoke with the utmost coolness, the words coming
naturally and simply: "We can't get through the crowd." And at the
same time she looked about her, as much as to say: "You can see for
yourself." (One of the maxims of Lady Dee had set forth that a lady
never told a lie if she could avoid it.)
Sylvia's husband looked about, saying: "Why don't you call an
officer?" He started to follow his own suggestion, and I thought
then that my friend would miss her meeting. But she had more nerve
than I imagined.
"No," she said. "Please don't."
"Why not?" Still there was no emotion in the cold, grey eyes.
"Because--I think there's something going on."
"What of that?"
"I'm not in a hurry, and I'd like to see."
He stood for a moment looking at the crowd. Mrs. Frothingham had
come forward, evidently intending to speak. "What is this, Ferris?"
he demanded of the chauffeur.
"I'm not sure, sir," said the man. "I think it's a Socialist
meeting." (He was, of course, not missing the little comedy. I
wondered what he thought!)
"A Socialist meeting?" said van Tuiver; then, to his wife: "You
don't want to stay for that!"
Again Sylvia astonished me. "I'd like to very much," she answered
simply.
He made no reply. I saw him stare at her, and then I saw his glance
take me in. I sat in a corner as inconspicuous as I could make
myself. I wondered whether I was a sempstress or a tutor, and
whether either of these functionaries were introduced, and whether
they shook hands or not.
Mrs. Frothingham had taken her stand at the base of Washington's
statue. Had she by any chance identified the tall and immaculate
gentleman who stood beside the automobile? Before she had said three
sentences I made sure that she had done so, and I was appalled at
her audacity.
"Fellow citizens," she began--"fellow-buccaneers of Wall Street."
And when the mild laughter had subsided: "What I have to say is
going to be addressed to one individual among you--the American
millionaire. I assume there is one present--if no actual
millionaire, then surely several who are destined to be, and not
less than a thousand who aspire to be. So hear me, Mr. Millionaire,"
this with a smile, which gave you a sense of a reserve fund of
energy and good humour. She had the crowd with her from the
start--all but one. I stole a glance at the millionaire, and saw
that he was not smiling.
"Won't you get in?" asked his wife, and he answered coldly: "No,
I'll wait till you've had enough."
"Last summer I had a curious experience," said the speaker. "I was a
guest at a tennis match, played upon the grounds of a State
insane-asylum, the players being the doctors of the institution.
Here, on a beautiful sunshiny afternoon, were ladies and gentlemen
clad in festive white, enjoying a holiday, while in the background
stood a frowning building with iron-barred gates and windows, from
which one heard now and then the howlings of the maniacs. Some of
the less fortunate of these victims of fate had been let loose, and
while we played tennis, they chased the balls. All afternoon, while
I sipped tea and chatted and watched the games, I said to myself:
'Here is the most perfect simile of our civilization that has ever
come to me. Some people wear white and play tennis all day, while
other people chase the balls, or howl in dungeons in the
background!' And that is the problem I wish to put before my
American millionaire--the problem of what I will call our lunatic-
asylum stage of civilization. Mind you, this condition is all very
well so long as we can say that the lunatics are incurable--that
there is nothing we can do but shut our ears to their howling, and
go ahead with our tennis. But suppose the idea were to dawn upon us
that it is only because we played tennis all day that the lunatic-
asylum is crowded, then might not the howls grow unendurable to us,
and the game lose its charm?"
Stealing glances about me, I saw that several people were watching
the forty-or-fifty-times-over millionaire; they had evidently
recognised him, and were enjoying the joke. "Haven't you had enough
of this?" he suddenly demanded of his wife, and she answered,
guilelessly: "No, let's wait. I'm interested."
"Now, listen to me, Mr. American Millionaire," the speaker was
continuing. "You are the one who plays tennis, and we, who chase the
balls for you--we are the lunatics. And my purpose to-day is to
prove to you that it is only because you play tennis all day that we
have to chase balls all the day, and to tell you that some time soon
we are going to cease to be lunatics, and that then you will have to
chase your own balls! And don't, in your amusement over this
illustration, lose sight of the serious nature of what I am talking
about--the horrible economic lunacy which is known as poverty, and
which is responsible for most of the evils we have in this world
to-day--for crime and prostitution, suicide, insanity and war. My
purpose is to show you, not by any guess of mine, or any appeals to
your faith, but by cold business facts which can be understood in
Wall Street, that this economic lunacy is one which can be cured;
that we have the remedy in our hands, and lack nothing but the
intelligence to apply it."
18. I do not want to bore you with a Socialist speech. I only want
to give you an idea of the trap into which Mr. Douglas van Tuiver
had been drawn. He stood there, rigidly aloof while the speaker went
on to explain the basic facts of wealth-production in modern
society. She quoted from Kropotkin: "'Fields, Factories and Work-
shops,' on sale at this meeting for a quarter!"--showing how by
modern intensive farming--no matter of theory, but methods which
were in commercial use in hundreds of places--it would be possible
to feed the entire population of the globe from the soil of the
British Isles alone. She showed by the bulletins of the United
States Government how the machine process had increased the
productive power of the individual labourer ten, twenty, a hundred
fold. So vast was man's power of producing wealth today, and yet the
labourer lived in dire want just as in the days of crude
hand-industry!
So she came back to her millionaire, upon whom this evil rested. He
was the master of the machine for whose profit the labourer had to
produce. He could only employ the labourer to produce what could be
sold at a profit; and so the stream of prosperity was choked at its
source. "It is you, Mr. Millionaire, who are to blame for poverty;
it is because so many millions of dollars must be paid to you in
profits that so many millions of men must live in want. In other
words
, precisely as I declared at the outset, it is your playing
tennis which is responsible for the lunatics chasing the balls!"
I wish that I might give some sense of the speaker's mastery of this
situation, the extent to which she had communicated her good-humour
to the crowd. You heard ripple after ripple of laughter, you saw
everywhere about you eager faces, following every turn of the
argument. No one could resist the contagion of interest--save only
the American millionaire! He stood impassive, never once smiling,
never once betraying a trace of feeling. Venturing to watch him more
closely, however, I could see the stern lines deepening about his
mouth, and his long, lean face growing more set.
The speaker had outlined the remedy--a change from the system of
production for profit to one of production for use. She went on to
explain how the change was coming; the lunatic classes were
beginning to doubt the divine nature of the rules of the asylum, and
they were preparing to mutiny, and take possession of the place. And
here I saw that Sylvia's husband had reached his limit. He turned to
her: "Haven't you had enough of this?"
"Why, no," she began. "If you don't mind--"
"I do mind very much," he said, abruptly. "I think you are
committing a breach of taste to stay here, and I would be greatly
obliged if you would leave."
And without really waiting for Sylvia's reply, he directed, "Back
out of here, Ferris."
The chauffeur cranked up, and sounded his horn--which naturally had
the effect of disturbing the meeting. People supposed we were going
to try to get through the crowd ahead--and there was no place where
anyone could move. But van Tuiver went to the rear of the car,
saying, in a voice of quiet authority: "A little room here, please."
And so, foot by foot, we backed away from the meeting, and when we
had got clear of the throng, the master of the car stepped in, and
we turned and made our way down Broad Street.
And now I was to get a lesson in the aristocratic ideal. Of course
van Tuiver was angry; I believe he even suspected his wife of having
known of the meeting. I supposed he would ask some questions; I
supposed that at least he would express his opinion of the speech,
his disgust that a woman of education should make such a spectacle
of herself. Such husbands as I had been familiar with had never
hesitated to vent their feelings under such circumstances. But from
Douglas van Tuiver there came--not a word! He sat, perfectly
straight, staring before him, like a sphinx; and Sylvia, after one
or two swift glances at him, began to gossip cheerfully about her
plans for the day-nursery for working-women!
So for a few blocks, until suddenly she leaned forward. "Stop here,
Ferris." And then, turning to me, "Here is the American Trust
Company."
"The American Trust Company?" I echoed, in my dumb stupidity.
"Yes--that is where the check is payable," said Sylvia, and gave me
a pinch.
And so I comprehended, and gathered up my belongings and got out.
She shook my hand warmly, and her husband raised his hat in a very
formal salute, after which the car sped on up the street. I stood
staring after it, in somewhat the state of mind of any humble rustic
who may have been present when Elijah was borne into the heavens by
the chariot of fire!
19. Sylvia had been something less than polite to me; and so I had
not been home more than an hour before there came a messenger-boy
with a note. By way of reassuring her, I promised to come to see her
the next morning; and when I did, and saw her lovely face so full of
concern, I forgot entirely her worldly greatness, and did what I had
longed to do from the beginning--put my arms about her and kissed
her.
"My dear girl," I protested, "I don't want to be a burden in your
life--I want to help you!'"
"But," she exclaimed, "what must you have thought--"
"I thought I had made a lucky escape!" I laughed.
Sylvia's Marriage Page 5
