Harold MacGrath - Arms and the Woman

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ARMS AND THE WOMAN

A Romance

by

HAROLD MacGRATH

New York
Doubleday Page & Company
1905
Copyright, 1899, by
S. S. Mcclure Co.
Copyright, 1899, by
Doubleday and Mcclure Co.

To her, that is to say, to the hand that rocked the cradle.

ARMS AND THE WOMAN

CHAPTER I

The first time I met her I was a reporter in the embryonic state and
she was a girl in short dresses. It was in a garden, surrounded by
high red brick walls which were half hidden by clusters of green vines,
and at the base of which nestled earth-beds, radiant with roses and
poppies and peonies and bushes of lavender lilacs, all spilling their
delicate ambrosia on the mild air of passing May. I stood, straw hat
in hand, wondering if I had not stumbled into some sweet prison of
flowers which, having run disobedient ways in the past, had been placed
here by Flora, and forever denied their native meadows and
wildernesses. And this vision of fresh youth in my path, perhaps she
was some guardian nymph. I was only twenty-two--a most impressionable
age. Her hair was like that rare October brown, half dun, half gold;
her eyes were cool and restful, like the brown pools one sees in the
heart of the forests, and her lips and cheeks cozened the warm
vermilion of the rose which lay ever so lightly on the bosom of her
white dress. Close at hand was a table upon which stood a pitcher of
lemonade. She was holding in her hand an empty glass. As my eyes
encountered her calm, inquiring gaze, my courage fled precipitately,
likewise the object of my errand. There was a pause; diffidence and
embarrassment on my side, placidity on hers.

"Well, sir?" said she, in a voice the tone of which implied that she
could readily understand her presence in the garden, but not mine.

As I remember it, I was suddenly seized with a great thirst.

"I should like a glass of your lemonade," I answered, bravely laying
down the only piece of money I possessed.

Her stern lips parted in a smile, and my courage came back cautiously,
that is to say, by degrees. She filled a glass for me, and as I gulped
it down I could almost detect the flavor of lemon and sugar.

"It is very good," I volunteered, passing back the glass. I held out
my hand, smiling.

"There isn't any change," coolly.

I flushed painfully. It was fully four miles to Newspaper Row. I was
conscious of a sullen pride. Presently the object of my errand
returned. Somewhat down the path I saw a gentleman reclining in a
canvas swing.

"Is that Mr. Wentworth?" I asked.

"Yes. Do you wish to speak to him? Uncle Bob, here is a gentleman who
desires to speak to you."

I approached. "Mr. Wentworth," I began, cracking the straw in my hat,
"my name is John Winthrop. I am a reporter. I have called to see if
it is true that you have declined the Italian portfolio."

"It is true," he replied kindly. "There are any number of reasons for
my declining it, but I cannot make them public. Is that all?"

"Yes, sir; thank you;" and I backed away.

"Are you a reporter?" asked the girl, as I was about to pass by her.

"Yes, I am."

"Do you draw pictures?"

"No, I do not."

"Do you write novels?"

"No," with a nervous laugh.

There is nothing like the process of interrogation to make one person
lose interest in another.

"Oh; I thought perhaps you did," she said, and turned her back to me.

I passed through the darkened halls of the house and into the street.

I never expected to see her again, but it was otherwise ordained. We
came together three years later at Block Island. She was eighteen now,
gathering the rosy flowers of her first season. She remembered the
incident in the garden, and we laughed over it. A few dances, two or
three evenings on the verandas, watching the sea, moon-lit, as it
sprawled among the rocks below us, and the even tenor of my way ceased
to be. I appreciated how far she was above me; so I worshipped her
silently and from afar. I told her my ambitions, confidences so
welcome to feminine ears, and she rewarded me with a small exchange.
She, too, was an orphan, and lived with her uncle, a rich banker, who,
as a diversion, consented to represent his country at foreign courts.
Her given name was Phyllis. I had seen the name a thousand times in
print; the poets had idealised it, and the novelists had embalmed it in
tender phrases. It was the first time I had ever met a woman by the
name of Phyllis. It appealed to my poetic instinct. Perhaps that was
the cause of it all. And then, she was very beautiful. In the autumn
of that year we became great friends; and through her influence I began
to see beyond the portals of the mansions of the rich. Matthew Prior's
Chloes and Sir John Suckling's Euphelias lost their charms. Henceforth
my muse's name became Phyllis. I took her to the opera when I didn't
know where I was going to breakfast on the morrow. I sent her roses
and went without tobacco, a privation of which woman knows nothing.

Often I was plunged into despair at my distressed circumstances. Money
to her meant something to spend; to me it meant something to get. Her
income bothered her because she could not spend it; my income was
mortgaged a week in advance, and did not bother me at all. This was
the barrier at my lips. But her woman's intuition must have told her
that she was a part and parcel of my existence.

I had what is called a forlorn hope: a rich uncle who was a planter in
Louisiana. His son and I were his only heirs. But this old planter
had a mortal antipathy to my side of the family. When my mother, his
sister, married Alfred Winthrop in 1859, at the time when the North and
South were approaching the precipice of a civil war, he considered all
family ties obliterated. We never worried much about it. When mother
died he softened to the extent of being present at the funeral. He
took small notice of my father, but offered to adopt me if I would
assume his name. I clasped my father's hand in mine and said nothing.
The old man stared at me for a moment, then left the house. That was
the first and last time I ever saw him. Sometimes I wondered if he
would remember me in his will. This, of course, was only when I had
taken Phyllis somewhere, or when some creditor had lost patience. One
morning in January, five years after my second meeting with Phyllis, I
sat at my desk in the office. It was raining; a cold thin rain. The
window was blurred. The water in the steam-pipes went banging away. I
was composing an editorial which treated the diplomatic relations
between this country and England. The roar of Park Row distracted me.
Now and then I would go to the window and peer down on the living
stream below. A dense cloud of steam hung over all the city. I swore
some when the copy boy came in and said that there was yet a column and
a half to fill, and that the foreman wanted to "close up the page
early." The true cause of my indisposition was due to the rumors rife
in the office that morning. Rumors which emanate from the managing
editor's room are usually of the sort which burden the subordinate ones
with anxiety. The London correspondent was "going to pieces." He had
cabled that he was suffering from nervous prostration, supplementing a
request for a two months' leave of absence. For "nervous prostration"
we read "drink." Our London correspondent was a brilliant journalist;
he had written one or two clever books; he had a broad knowledge of men
and affairs; and his pen was one of those which flashed and burned at
frequent intervals; but he drank. Dan's father had been a victim of
the habit. I remember meeting the elder Hillars. He was a picturesque
individual, an accomplished scholar, a wide traveller, a diplomatist,
and a noted war correspondent. His work during the Franco-Prussian war
had placed him in the front rank. After sending his son Dan to college
he took no further notice of him. He was killed while serving his
paper at the siege of Alexandria, Egypt. Dan naturally followed his
father's footsteps both in profession and in habits. He had been my
classmate at college, and no one knew him better than I, except it was
himself. The love of adventure and drink had ended the life of the
one; it might end the life of the other.

The foreman in the composing room waited some time for that required
column and a half of editorial copy. I lit my pipe; and my thoughts
ran back to the old days, to the many times Dan had paid my debts and
to the many times I had paid his. Ah, me! those were days when love
and fame and riches were elusive and we went in quest of them. The
crust is hyssop when the heart is young. The garret is a palace when
hope flies unfettered. The most wonderful dreams imaginable are dreamt
close to the eaves. And when a man leaves behind him the garret, he
also leaves behind the fondest illusions. But who--who would stay in
the garret!

And as my thoughts ran on, the question rose, Whom would they send in
his place--Dan's? I knew London. It was familiar ground. Perhaps
they might send me. It was this thought which unsettled me. I was
perfectly satisfied with New York. Phyllis lived in New York. There
would be time enough for London when we were married. Then I began to
build air castles. A newspaper man is the architect of some splendid
structures, but he thoughtlessly builds on the sand when the tide is
out. Yes, foreign corresponding would be all well enough, I mused,
with Phyllis at my side. With her as my wife I should have the envy of
all my fellow craftsmen. We should dine at the embassies and the
attaches would flutter about us, and all London would talk of the
beautiful "Mrs. Winthrop." Then the fire in my pipe-bowl went out.
The copy boy was at my elbow again.

"Hang you!" said I.

"The foreman says he's coming down with an axe," replied the boy.

It was like churning, but I did manage to grind the copy. I was
satisfied that the United States and Great Britain would not go to war
over it.

The late afternoon mail brought two letters. I opened the one from
Phyllis first. It said:

"DEAR JACK--Uncle Bob has a box for the opera to-night, but he has been
suddenly called to Washington; politics, possibly, but he would not
say. Aunty and I want you to go with us in his stead. Ethel and her
fiance, Mr. Holland, will be together, which means that Aunty and I
will have no one to talk to unless you come. Carmen is to be sung.
Please do not fail me.

"PHYLLIS."

Fail her! I thought not.

Then I read the second letter. I read it three or four times, and even
then I was not sure that I was not dreaming. I caught up my pipe
again, filled it and lit it. I read the letter once more. I was
solemnly informed that my uncle was dead and that I was mentioned in
the will, and that if I would kindly call at the Hoffman House the
following morning a certain sum of money would be given to me. I
regretted that I had reached that age when a man's actions must be
dignified, although alone; otherwise I dare say I should have danced
the pas seul. Whatever my uncle's bequest might be, I believed that it
would make me independently rich. I am ashamed to admit that I did not
feel sorry at the news of his sudden departure from this life. It is
better to be rich than to be ambitious. It is better to have at hand
what you want than to work for it, and then not get it. Phyllis was
scarcely an arm's length away now. I whistled as I locked up my desk,
and proceeded down stairs and sang a siren song into the waxen ears of
the cashier.

"You have only twenty coming this week, Mr. Winthrop," said he.

"Never mind," I replied; "I'll manage to get along next week." It was
only on very rare occasions that I drew my full pay at the end of the
week.

I dined at a fashionable restaurant. As I sipped my wine I built one
of my castles, and Phyllis reigned therein. There would be a trip to
Europe every summer, and I should devote my time to writing novels. My
picture would be the frontispiece in the book reviews, and wayside
paragraphs would tell of the enormous royalties my publishers were
paying me. I took some old envelopes from my pocket and began figuring
on the backs of them as to what purposes the money should be put. It
could not be less than $50,000, perhaps more. Of course my uncle had
given a harbor to a grudge against me and mine, but such things are
always forgotten on the death bed. It occurred to me that I never had
known before what a fine world it was, and I regretted having spoken
ill of it. I glanced across the way. The sky had cleared, and the
last beams of the sun flamed in the windows of the tall buildings.
Fortune, having buffeted me, was now going to make me one of her
favorite children. I had reached the end of the long lane.

As I left the restaurant I decided to acquaint Phyllis with my good
luck and also my desire that she should share of it. I turned into a
florist's and had a dozen roses sent up to her. They were American
Beauties. I could afford it now.

I found Phyllis thrumming on the piano. She was singing in a low voice
the aria from "Lucia." I stood on the threshold of the drawing-room
and waited till she had done. I believed her to be unaware of my
presence. She was what we poets call a "dream of loveliness," a
tangible dream. Her neck and shoulders were like satin, and the head
above them reminded me of Sappho's which we see in marble. From where
I stood I could catch a glimpse of the profile, the nose and firm chin,
the exquisite mouth, to kiss which I would gladly have given up any
number of fortunes. The cheek had that delicate curve of a rose leaf,
and when the warm blood surged into it there was a color as matchless
as that of a jack-rose. Ah, but I loved her. Suddenly the music
ceased.

"There is a mirror over the piano, Jack," she said, without turning her
head.

So I crossed the room and sat down in the chair nearest her. I vaguely
wondered if, at the distance, she had seen the love in my eyes when I
thought myself unobserved.

"I thank you for those lovely roses," she said, smiling and permitting
me to press her hand.

"Don't mention it," I replied. It is so difficult for a man to say
original things in the presence of the woman he loves! "I have great
news for you. It reads like a fairy tale, you know; happy ever
afterward, and all that."

"Ah!"

"Yes. Do you remember my telling you of a rich uncle who lived in the
South?"

"Is it possible that he has left you a fortune?" she cried, her eyes
shining.

"You have guessed it."

"I am very glad for your sake, Jack. I was beginning to worry about
you."

"Worry about me?"

"Yes. I do not understand how a newspaper man can afford to buy roses
four or five times a week--and exist." She had the habit of being
blunt and frank to her intimate friends. I secretly considered it an
honor when she talked to me like this. "I have told you repeatedly to
send me flowers only once a week. I'd rather not have them at all.
Last week you spent as much as $30 on roses alone. Mr. Holland does
not do that for Ethel, and he has a million."

"I'm not Holland," I said. "He doesn't--that is--I do not think he--."
Then I foundered. I had almost said: "He doesn't care as much for
Ethel as I do for you."

Phyllis pretended not to note my embarrassment. The others came in
then, and conversation streamed into safer channels.

When we entered the box at the opera the curtain had risen. Phyllis
and I took the rear chairs. They were just out of the glare of the
lights.

"You are looking very beautiful to-night," I whispered lowly. I was
beginning business early. There was no barrier at my lips.

"Thank you," she replied. Then with a smile: "Supposing I were to say
that you are looking very handsome?"

"Oh," said I, somewhat disconcerted, "that would be rather
embarrassing."

"I do not doubt it."

"And then it would not be true. The duty we men owe to a beautiful
woman is constantly to keep telling her of it."

"And the duty we women owe to a fine-looking man?" a rogue of a dimple
in her cheeks.

"Is to explicitly believe all he says regarding your beauty," I
answered, evading the question. "A man may tell a woman that she is
beautiful, but a woman may not tell a man that he is fine-looking, that
is, in public."

"The terms are not fair."

"That may be true, but they make the wheels of the social organization
run smoother. For instance, if I met a strange woman and she told me
that I was handsome, I shouldn't be able to speak again the whole
evening. On the other hand, a beautiful woman, after you say that you
are delighted to meet her, expects the very next remark to concern her
good looks."

"Your insight is truly remarkable," she said, the dimple continuing its
elusive manoeuvres. "Hush; here comes Carmen."

And our voices grew faint in the swell of melody. Mrs. Wentworth was
entranced; her daughter was fondly gazing at the back of her fiance's
head; Phyllis had turned her face from me to the stage. As for myself,
I was not particularly interested in the cigarette girl. It was
running through my head that the hour had arrived. I patted my gloves
for a moment, then I drew a long breath.

"Phyllis!" said I. There was a quaver in my voice. Perhaps I had not
spoken loud enough. "Phyllis!" said I again.

She turned quickly and gave me an inquiring and at the same time
nervous glance.

"What is it?"

"I want to tell you something I have never dared to tell you till now,"
I said earnestly. The voice on the stage soared heavenward. "I love
you. Will you be my wife?"

Ah, me! where were those drooping eyelids, that flush, that shy, sweet
glance of which I had so often dreamt? Phyllis was frowning.

"Jack, I have been afraid of this," she said. "I am so sorry, but it
cannot be."

"Oh, do not say that now," I cried, crushing my gloves. "Wait awhile;
perhaps you may learn to love me."

"Jack, I have always been frank to you because I like you. Do you
suppose it will take me five years to find out what my heart says to
any man? No. Had I loved you I should not have asked you to wait; I
should have said yes. I do not love you in the way you wish. Indeed,
I like you better than any man I know, but that is all I can offer you.
I should be unkind if I held out any false hopes. I have often asked
myself why I do not love you, but there is something lacking in you,
something I cannot define. Some other woman will find what I have
failed to find in you to love."

I was twisting my gloves out of all recognition. There was a singing
in my ears which did not come from the stage.

"Look at it as I do, Jack. There is a man in this world whom I shall
love, and who will love me. We may never meet. Then he shall be an
ideal to me, and I to him. You believe you love me, but the love you
offer is not complete."

"Not complete?" I echoed.

"No. It would be if I returned it. Do you understand? There is in
this world a woman you will truly love and who will return your love in
its fulness. Will you meet? That is in the hands of your destinies.
Shall I meet my ideal? Who knows? But till I do, I shall remain an
old maid."

I nodded wearily. A dissertation on affinities seemed ill-timed.

"And now," she said, "this beautiful friendship of ours must come to an
end." And there were tears in her eyes.

"Yes," said I, twisting and untwisting the shreds of my gloves. It
seemed as though the world had slipped from under my feet and I was
whirling into nothingness. "My heart is very heavy."

"Jack, if you talk like that," hastily, "you will have me crying before
all these people."

Unfortunately Ethel turned and saw the tears in her cousin's eyes.

"Mercy! what is the matter?" she asked.

"Jack has been telling me a very pathetic story," said Phyllis, with a
pity in her eyes.

"Yes; something that happened to-night," said I, staring at the
programme, but seeing nothing, nothing.

"Well," said Ethel, "this is not the place for them," turning her eyes
to the stage again.

The concluding acts of the opera were a jangle of chords and discords,
and the hum of voices was like the murmur of a far-off sea. My eyes
remained fixed upon the stage. It was like looking through a broken
kaleidoscope. I wanted to be alone, alone with my pipe. I was glad
when we at last entered the carriage. Mrs. Wentworth immediately began
to extol the singers, and Phyllis, with that tact which is given only
to kind-hearted women, answered most of the indirect questions put to
me. She was giving me time to recover. The direct questions I could
not avoid. Occasionally I looked out of the window. It had begun to
rain again. It was very dreary.

"And what a finale, Mr. Winthrop!" cried Mrs. Wentworth,

"Yes, indeed," I replied. To have loved and lost, and such a woman,
was my thought.

"The new tenor is an improvement. Do you not think so?"

"Yes, indeed." No more to touch her hand, to hear her voice, to wait
upon her wishes.

"It was the most brilliant audience of the season."

"Yes, indeed," I murmured. Those were the only words I could
articulate.

The carriage rumbled on.

"Does Patti return in the fall?"

"Yes." Five years of dreaming, and then to awake!

And then the carriage mercifully stopped.

Mrs. Wentworth insisted that I should enter and have some coffee. I
had so few words at my command that I could not invent even a flimsy
excuse. So I went in. The coffee was tasteless. I put in four lumps
of sugar. I stirred and stirred and stirred. Finally, I swallowed the
contents of the cup. It was very hot. When the agony was past I rose
and made my adieu.

Phyllis came to the door with me.

"Forget what I have said," I began, fumbling the door-knob. "I suppose
I was an ass to think that you might love me. They say that it is a
malady. Very well. With a few prescribed remedies I shall recover."

"You are very bitter."

"Can you blame me," clicking the latch back and forth, "when all the
world has suddenly grown dark?"

"There are other eyes than mine," gently.

"Yes; but they will light other paths than those I shall follow."

"Jack, you are too manly to make threats."

"That was not a threat," said I. "Well, I shall go and laugh at myself
for my presumption. To laugh at yourself is to cure. There is no more
wine in the cup, nothing but the lees. I'll have to drink them. A wry
face, and then it will all be over. Yes, I am bitter. To have dreamed
as I have dreamed, and to awake as I have! Ah, well; I must go on
loving you till--"

"Till she comes," supplemented Phyllis.

"You wrong me. It is only in letters that I am versatile. Forgive my
bitterness and forget my folly."

"Oh, Jack, if you knew how sorry I am! I shall forgive the bitterness,
but I will not forget what you term folly. It's something any woman
might be proud of, the love of an honest, dear, good fellow. Good
night." She held her hand toward me.

"Good night," I said, "and God bless you!" I kissed the palm of her
hand, opened the door, and then stumbled down the steps.

I do not remember how I reached home.

It was all over.

My beautiful castle had fallen in ruins about my ears.

CHAPTER II

In my bedroom the next morning there was a sad and heavy heart. The
owner woke up, stared at the ceiling, then at the sun-baked bricks
beyond his window. He saw not the glory of the sun and the heavens.
To his eyes there was nothing poetic in the flash of the distant
church-spires against the billowy cloudbanks. The gray doves, circling
about the chimneys, did not inspire him, nor the twittering of the
sparrows on the window ledge. There was nothing at all in the world
but a long stretch of barren, lonely years. And he wondered how,
without her at his side, he ever could traverse them. He was driftwood
again. He had built upon sands as usual, and the tide had come in; his
castle was flotsam and jetsam. He was drifting, and he didn't care
where. He was very sorry for himself, and he had the blue devils the
worst kind of way. Finally he crawled out of bed and dressed because
it had to be done. He was not particularly painstaking with the
procedure. It mattered not what collar became him best, and he picked
up a tie at random. A man generally dresses for a certain woman's
approval, and when that is no longer to be gained he grows indifferent.
The other women do not count.

My breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee; and as the generous nectar
warmed my veins my thoughts took a philosophical turn. It is fate who
writes the was, the is, and the shall be. We have a proverb for every
joy and misfortune. It is the only consolation fate gives us. It is
like a conqueror asking the vanquished to witness the looting. All
roads lead to Rome, and all proverbs are merely sign posts by which we
pursue our destinies. And how was I to get to Rome? I knew not. Hope
is better than clairvoyance.

Was Phyllis right when she said that I did not truly love her? I
believed not. Should I go on loving her all my life? Undoubtedly I
should. As to affinities, I had met mine, but it had proved a
one-sided affair.

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