CHAPTER II
She looked up when he entered, and there was in her young girl face the very slightest shade of recognition. She could not help it, for Clemency was candor itself. Then she bowed very formally, and shook hands sedately when Doctor Gordon introduced James as Doctor Elliot, his new assistant, and carried off her part very well. James was not so successful. He colored and was somewhat confused, but nobody appeared to notice it. Clemency went on relating how glad she was that Uncle Tom met her as she was coming home from Annie Lipton's. "I am never afraid," said she, and her little face betrayed the lie, "but I was tired, and besides I was beginning to be cold, for I went out without my fur."
"You should not have gone without it. It grows so cold when the sun goes down," said Mrs. Ewing. Then a chime of Japanese bells was heard which announced dinner.
"Doctor Elliot will be glad of dinner," [pg 044] said Doctor Gordon. "He has walked all the way from Gresham."
Clemency looked at him with approval, and tried to look as if she had never seen him walking in her life. "That is a good walk," said she. "Twenty-five miles it must be. If more men walked instead of working poor horses all the time, it would be better for them."
"That is a hint for your Uncle Tom," said Gordon laughingly.
"I never hint," said Clemency. "It is just a plain statement. Men are walking animals. They could travel as well as horses in the course of time if they only put their minds to it."
"Well, your old uncle's bones must be saved, even at the expense of the horse's," said Doctor Gordon.
"Bones are improved by use," said Clemency severely, as she took her seat at the dinner-table. They all laughed. The girl herself relaxed her pretty face with a whimsical smile. It was quite evident that Clemency was the spoiled and petted darling of the house, and that she traded innocently upon the fact. The young doctor, although his first impression of the elder woman was still [pg 045] upon him, yet realized the charm of the young girl. The older woman was, as it were, crowned with an aureole of perfection, but the young girl was crowned with possibilities which dazzled with mystery. She looked prettier, now that her outer garments were removed, and her thick crown of ash-blonde hair was revealed. The lamp lit her eyes into bluer flame. She was a darling of a young girl, and more a darling because she had the sweetest confidence in everybody thinking her one.
However, James Elliot, sitting in the well-appointed dining-room, which was more like a city house than a little New Jersey dwelling, did not for a second retreat from his first impression of Mrs. Ewing. Behind the coffee-urn sat the woman with whom he had not fallen in love, that was too poor a term to use. He had become a worshipper. He felt himself, body and soul, prostrate before the Divinity of Womanhood itself. He realized the grandeur of the abstract in the individual. What was any spoiled, sweet young girl to that? And Mrs. Ewing was, in truth, a wonderful creature. She was a large woman with a great quantity of blue-black hair, which had the ripples one sees in antique [pg 046] statues. Her eyes, black at first glance, were in reality dark blue. Her face gave one a never-ending surprise. James had not known that a woman could be so beautiful. Vague comparisons with the Greek Helen, or Cleopatra, came into his head. Now and then he stole a glance at her. He dared not often. She did not talk much, but he was rather pleased with that fact, although her voice was so sweet and gracious. Speech in a creature like that was not an essential. It might even be an excrescence upon a perfection. It did not occur to the dazed mind of her worshipper that Mrs. Ewing might have very simple and ordinary reasons for not talking—that she might be tired or ill, or preoccupied. But after a number of those stolen glances, James discovered with a great pang, as if one should see for the first time that the arms of the Venus were really gone, when his fancy had supplied them, that the woman did not look well. In spite of her beauty, there was ill-health evident in her face. James was a mere tyro in his profession as yet, but certain infallible signs were there which he could not mistake. They were the signs of suffering, possibly of very great suffering. She ate very little, James noticed, although [pg 047] she made a pretense of eating as much as any one. James saw that Doctor Gordon also noticed it. When the maid was taking away Mrs. Ewing's plate, he spoke with a gruffness which astonished the young man. "For Heaven's sake, why don't you eat your dinner, Clara?" said he. "Emma, replace Mrs. Ewing's plate. Now, Clara, eat your dinner." To James's utter astonishment, Mrs. Ewing obeyed like a child. She ate every morsel, although she could not restrain her expression of loathing. When the salad and dessert were brought on she ate them also.
Doctor Gordon watched her with what seemed, to the young man, positive brutality. His mouth under his heavy beard quivered perceptibly whenever he looked at his sister eating, his forehead became corrugated, and his deep-set eyes sparkled. James was heartily glad when dinner was over, and, at Doctor Gordon's request, he followed him into his office.
Doctor Gordon's office was a small room at the back of the house. It had an outer door communicating with a path which led to the stable. Two sides of the room were lined with medical books, and two with bottles containing [pg 048] diverse colored mixtures. A hanging lamp was over the center of a long table in the middle of the room. Around it dangled prisms, which cast rainbow colors over everything. The first thing which struck one on entering the room was the extraordinary color scheme: the dull gleams of the books, the medicine bottles which had lights like jewels, and over all the flickers of prismatic hues. The long table was covered with corks, empty bottles, books, a medicine-case, and newspapers, besides a mighty inkstand and writing materials. There were also a box of cigars, a great leather tobacco pouch, and, interspersed among all, a multitude of pipes. The doctor drew a chair beside this chaotic table lit with rainbow lights, and invited James to sit down. "Sit down a moment," he said. "Will you have a pipe or a cigar?"
"Cigar, please," replied James. The doctor pushed the box toward him. James realized immediately a ten-cent cigar at the least when he began to smoke. Doctor Gordon filled a pipe mechanically. His face still wore the gloomy, almost fierce, expression which it had assumed at table. He was a handsome man in a rough, sketchy fashion. His face was blurred with a gray grizzle of [pg 049] beard. He wore his hair rather long, and he had a fashion of running his fingers through it, which made it look like a thick brush. He dressed rather carelessly, still like a gentleman. His clothes were slouchy, and needed brushing, but his linen was immaculate.
Doctor Gordon smoked in silence, which his young assistant was too shy to break. The elder man finished his pipe, then he rose with an impatient gesture and shook himself like a great shaggy dog. "Come, young man," said he, "we don't want to spend the evening like this. Get your hat and coat."
James obeyed, and the two men left the office by the outer door which opened on the stable. As they came around by the front of the house Clemency stood in the doorway.
"Are you going out, you and Doctor Elliot, Uncle Tom?" she called.
"Yes, dear; why?"
"Patients?"
"No; we are going down to Georgie K.'s. Tell your mother to go to bed at once."
When the two men were out in the street, walking briskly in the keen frosty air, James ventured a question. "Mrs. Ewing is not well, is she?" he said. He fairly started at the way in which his question was received. [pg 050] Doctor Gordon turned upon him even fiercely.
"She is perfectly well, perfectly well," he replied.
"She does not look—" began James.
"When you are as old as I am you can venture to diagnose on a woman's looks," said Gordon. "Clara is perfectly well."
James said no more. They walked on in silence under a pale sky. Above a low mountain range on their right was a faint light which indicated the coming of the moon. The ground was frozen in hard ridges. James walked behind the doctor on the narrow blue stone walk which served as sidewalk.
"This town has made no provision whatever for courting couples," said Doctor Gordon suddenly, and to James's astonishment his whole manner and voice had changed. It was far from gloomy. It was jocular even.
James laughed. "Yes, it would be difficult for two to walk arm in arm, however loving," he returned.
"Just so," said the doctor, "and the funny part of it is that this narrow sidewalk was intentional."
"Not for such a purpose?"
"Exactly so. It was given to the town by [pg 051] a rich spinster who died about twenty years ago. It was given in her will on condition that it should not be more than two feet wide."
"For that reason?"
"Just that reason. She had been jilted in her youth, and her heart had been wrung by the sight of her rival passing her very window where she sat watching for her lover, arm in arm with him. It was in summer, and the dirt sidewalk was dry. She made up her mind, then and there, that that sort of thing should be prevented."
They had just reached a handsome old house standing close to the narrow sidewalk. In fact, its windows opened directly upon it.
"This is the house," the doctor said in corroboration. James laughed, but he wondered within himself if he were being told fish tales. Doctor Gordon made him feel so very young that he resented it. He resented it the more when he realized the new glow of adoration in his heart for that older woman whom they had left behind. He began wondering about her: how much older she was. He said to himself that he did not care if she were old enough to be his mother, his grandmother even, there was no one in the whole world like her.
Then they came to the hotel, the Evarts House. It was rather pretentious, well built, with great columns in front supporting double verandas. It was also well lighted. It was evidently far above the usual order of a road house. Doctor Gordon entered, with James at his heels. They went into the great low room at the right of the door, which was the bar-room. Behind the bar stood an enormous man, yellow haired and yellow bearded, dispensing drinks. The whole low interior was dim with tobacco smoke, and scented with various liquors and spices. There was on one side a great fireplace, in which stood earthen pitchers, in which cider was being mulled with red-hot pokers, eager vinous faces watching. Nobody was intoxicated, but there was a general hum of hilarity and gusto of life about the place, an animal enjoyment of good cheer and jollity. It was in truth not respectable to get entirely drunk in Alton. It was genteel to become "set up," exhilarated, but the real gutter form of inebriety was frowned upon to a much greater extent than in many places where there was less license.
"Hullo!" sang out Doctor Gordon as he entered. Immediately a grin of comradeship [pg 053] overspread the pink face of the yellow-haired giant behind the bar. "Hullo!" he responded. "Just step into the other room, and I'll be there right away."
James followed Doctor Gordon into what was evidently the state parlor of the hotel. There was haircloth furniture, and a mahogany table, with various stains of conviviality upon its polished surface. There was a fire on the hearth, and on the mantel stood some gilded vases and a glass case of wax-flowers, also a stuffed canary under a glass shade, pathetic on his little twig. Doctor Gordon pointed to the flowers and the canary. "Poor old man lost his wife, when he had been married two years," he said. "She and the baby both died. That was before I came here. Damned if I wouldn't have pulled them through. That was her bird, and she made those fool flowers, poor little thing. I suppose if the hotel were to take fire Georgie K. would go for them before all the cash in the till."
"He hasn't married again?"
"Married again! It's my belief he'd shoot the man that mentioned it."
Then Georgie K. entered, his rosy face distended with a smile of the most intense hospitality, [pg 054] and before Doctor Gordon had a chance to introduce James, he said, "What'll you take, gentlemen?"
"This is my new assistant, from Gresham, Doctor Elliot," said Gordon. Georgie K. made a bow, and scraped his foot at the same time with a curiously boyish gesture. "What'll you take?" he asked again. That was evidently his formula of hospitality, which must never be delayed.
"Apple-jack," responded Doctor Gordon promptly. "You had better take apple-jack too, young man. Georgie K. has gin that beats the record, and peach brandy, but when it comes to his apple-jack—it's worth the whole State of New Jersey."
"All right," answered James.
Soon he found himself seated at the stained old mahogany table with the two men, and between two glasses, a bottle, and a pitcher of hot water. Doctor Gordon dealt a pack of dirty cards while the hotel keeper poured the apple-jack. James could not help staring at the elder doctor with more and more amazement. He seemed to assimilate perfectly with his surroundings. The tormented expression had gone from his face. He was simply convivial, and of the same sort as Georgie K. He no [pg 055] longer looked even a gentleman. He had become of the soil, the New Jersey soil. As they drank and played, he told stories, and roared with laughter at them. The stories also belonged to the soil, they were folk lore, wild, coarse, but full of humanity. Although Doctor Gordon drank freely of the rich mellow liquor, it did not apparently affect him. His cheeks above his gray furze of beard became slightly flushed, that was all.
James drank rather sparingly. The stuff seemed to him rather fiery, and he remembered the goddess in the doctor's house. He could imagine her look of high disdain at him should he return under the influence of liquor. Besides, he did not particularly care for the apple-jack.
It was midnight before they left. Georgie K. went to the door with them, and he and the doctor shook hands heartily. "Come again," said Georgie K., "and the sooner the better, and bring the young Doc. We'll make him have a good time."
Until they were near home, Doctor Gordon continued his strangely incongruous conversation, telling story after story, and shouting with laughter. When they came in sight of the house Gordon stopped suddenly and [pg 056] leaned against a great maple beside the road. He stared at the house, two of the upper windows of which were lighted, and gave a great sigh, almost a groan. James stopped also and stared at him. He wondered if the apple-jack had gone to the doctor's head after all. "What is the matter?" he ventured.
"Nothing, except the race is at a finish, and I am caught as I always am," replied Doctor Gordon.
"The race—" repeated James vaguely.
"Yes, the race with myself. Myself has caught up with me, God help me, and I am in its clutches. The time may come when you will try to race with self, my boy. Let me tell you, you will never win. You will tire yourself out, and make a damned idiot of yourself for nothing. I shall race again to-morrow. I never learn the lesson, but perhaps you can, you are young. Well, come along. Please be as quiet as you can when you go into the house. My sister may be asleep. She is perfectly well, but she is a little nervous. I need not repeat my request that you do not mention your adventure with Clemency this afternoon to her."
"Certainly not," said James. He walked on beside the doctor, and entered the house, [pg 057] more and more mystified. James was not sure, but he thought he heard the faintest little moan from upstairs. He glanced at Doctor Gordon's face, and it was again the face of the man whom he had seen before going to Georgie K.'s.