IV
It is fitting and fortunate that a young woman in a large city, who has given her happiness into the keeping of a man with his own way to make, should be ignorant of her peril, and that charmed by love she should take for granted that he will succeed. But the rest of the world has no excuse for being equally blind, since the rest of the world is aware that there is no recipe by which a girl of twenty can secure a guaranty either of domestic happiness or ability on the part of her lover to hold his own in the competition for a livelihood. It is easy for the moralist of society, writing at his desk, to utter the solemn truth that young people should not rush hastily into matrimony. Assuredly they should not. But after all, is it to be wondered at that so many of them do? Love is the law of life. The renewal of the race through the union of the sexes is an instinct which asserts itself in spite of code and thesis, and the institution of lawful wedlock is the bit by which civilization regulates it. Let us, says the modern scientist, isolate the degenerate members of society, the diseased, the vicious, and the improvident, and prevent them from having offspring. But still the priest of Rome, eager for fresh converts, but wise, too, in his knowledge of the law of sex, whispers to his flock "marry early," and adds under his breath, "lest ye sin." It is a part of religion, perhaps, for the daughters of the well-to-do, who have been screened from contact with the rough world, and who sit in judgment on several lovers in the paternal drawing-room, to weigh and ponder and to call in the brain to assist, or if needs be, silence the heart. Yet even they sometimes elope instead with the wrong man against whom they have been warned, and are unhappy—or happy—ever afterward. But when we turn from these privileged young persons—the pretty, daintily dressed young women in their Easter bonnets, who worship at our fashionable churches—and from some height look out over wide stretches of streets with every house alike, the homes of the average working population, and reflect that every house shelters the consequences of a marriage, shall we ask pitilessly, "How came ye so?" And if the answer of some be "we met and loved and married, and now we are miserable," shall we draw ourselves up and tell them that the fault is theirs, that marriages are (or should be) made in heaven, and that they ought to have discovered before they plighted their troth that John would be a rascal or Mary a slattern? Is it not the privilege and the blessing of the young to trust? Shall we blame them if, in the ignorance of youth and under the spell of the law of their beings, they mistake unworthy souls for their ideals?
The firm of Stuart & Robinson, dealers in lumber, had started with a small capital, but the senior partner had confidence in his capacity to do a large business. His late employers, Toler & Company, according to his opinion, had been old fogies in their methods. To adopt his own metaphor, instead of getting up early and shaking the trees, they expected to have ripe peaches served to them on Sevrès china, or, in other words, they let great opportunities slip through their fingers. He proceeded during the first year to carry out several enterprises which he had vainly called to their attention while in their service, and he had the satisfaction of proving his wisdom and of doubling the firm's assets at the same time. Emil's plans were essentially on a large scale, and he was confessedly cramped even after this success. He explained to his wife that if only he had the necessary capital, he would be able at one fell swoop to control the lumber yards and lumber market of Benham. As it was, he must wait and probably see others appropriate ideas which he had suggested by his novel and brilliant operations. The prophecy indeed proved true, and Emil saw with a morose eye what he called his harvest gleaned by others. This vindictive attitude toward the successful was the invariable frame of mind into which he relapsed when he was not carrying everything before him, and as a result those in the trade presently began to speak of him as a crank. His quick comprehension was admitted, but his associates shook their heads when his name was mentioned, and hinted that he was a dangerous man, who would bear watching. It was almost inevitable that a lean period should follow Emil's series of clever undertakings. Toward the end of the second year, he found himself in a position where he had not the means to enlarge the scope of his operations. His working capital was locked up in sundry purchases which he had expected would show quick profits, but which hung fire. If he liquidated, it must be at a loss, and the idea of a loss was always bitter to him. During a number of months he was obliged to renounce certain plans which he had in view and to remain inactive. A falling lumber market added to his complications. Prompt to act when he was convinced of error, he sold out at last his accumulated stock at a loss, which would have been much greater had he delayed a week longer. But he was left almost in the same position as when he started; the previous profits had been cut in two. This was wormwood to his restless soul. It made him moody and cynical at home, where one child and the near advent of another foreshadowed increasing expenses. He had expected by this time to be on the high road to fortune, and to be imitating the swift progress of certain individuals in Benham, who even in the short period since he had been a citizen, had risen by their superior wits from poverty to affluence and power.
But Emil's fits of depression were invariably succeeded by intervals of buoyancy. Though he still talked bitterly at home of the methods by which cold-hearted capital squeezed the small man to the wall and robbed him of his gains, he began to scheme anew, and to argue that the assets in his control were still ample for a great success if shrewdly handled. The lumber market was in the doldrums, dull and drooping. It began to look as though some of the industries of Benham had been developed too rapidly, and as though a halt, or what financiers call a healthy reaction in values, were in order. Could it be possible that all prices in Benham were inflated? The idea occurred to Emil one day, and he jumped at it eagerly. It took possession of him. He feverishly began to examine statistics, and found that Benham had experienced only one period of depression since its birth as a city at the close of the Civil War. It was time for another, and the men who were clever enough to anticipate it would reap the reward of their sagacity. What were the staples of Benham? Oil, pork, and manufactured iron. These were the industries which had given the chief impetus to the city's growth, and were its great source of wealth. Emil pondered the situation and decided to sell pork short. If a general shrinkage in values was impending, the price of pork was certain to decline. He had hitherto felt so confident of making money in his own line of business that he had never done more than cast sheep's eyes at the stock market or the markets in grain, oil, and pork futures. It had been his expectation to try ventures of this sort as soon as his capital was large enough for important transactions. It was a favorite notion of his that after he had acquired the first one hundred thousand dollars, he would be able to quadruple it in a very short time by bold dealings in stocks or commodities. He knew now that he had merely to step into a broker's office and sell pork in Chicago by wire. It was a simple thing to do and the shrewd thing, considering his own business offered no opportunity at the moment for brilliancy.
To speak to his partner seemed to Emil unnecessary. He promised himself that after he had put the firm on its feet again he would deal generously with Robinson. Since their late reverses the partnership was not borrowing much money, so its credit was not exhausted. Emil obtained from his bank as large a loan as he dared to ask for, and began to sell pork short on the strength of the proceeds. It was a process which requires small capital at the outset. That is, he had simply to keep his margin good in case the pork which he sold rose in value. To begin with he sold only a few hundred barrels, and within a fortnight the price fell smartly. Not only the price of pork, but of stocks, grain, and merchandise. Emil congratulated himself. Evidently he was correct in his judgment that a period of lower speculative values was at hand. The proper thing would be to sell everything and reap a huge fortune before the dull general public awoke to the truth. His own limited resources forbade this, which was irritating. Still, he could go on selling pork short, and this he continued to do.
The proceeding elated him, for the sudden and large profit was in a sense a revelation. He regretted that he had never before tried this method of demonstrating his business shrewdness. He felt that it suited him admirably. He would be no rash-headed fool; he would sell boldly, but intelligently; he would keep his eye on the general market, and not cover his shorts until the general situation changed. If a serious decline in the prices of everything were in store for Benham—and the indications of this were multiplying from week to week—the price of pork might drop out of sight, so to speak, and he win a fortune as a consequence. It was the chance of a lifetime. He reasoned that he would keep cool and make a big thing of it; that a small fellow would be content with a few thousands and run to cover, but he intended to be one of the big fellows. Why take his profit when the whole financial horizon was ominous with clouds, and money was becoming tighter every day?
Emil's reasoning was perfect. The course of prices was exactly as he had predicted; that is, the price of everything except pork. The unexpected happened there, and this from a cause which no shrewd person could have foreseen. One day when, in the parlance of trade, the bottom seemed to be dropping out of all the markets, a despatch appeared in the newspapers stating that a peculiar disease had broken out among the hogs in Western Illinois. The pork market stiffened, but became flat at the advance after somebody declared the story to be a canard invented by the bulls to bolster up their holdings. Emil, adopting this explanation, and certain that this cunning stratagem to check the decline would prove unavailing, sold more pork.
A week later—one Saturday preceding a Monday which was to be a holiday—there were rumors in Chicago, just before the close of the Exchange, that the disease among the hogs was no mere local manifestation; that it was spreading rapidly, and had already shown itself in Indiana and Ohio. Pork in the last fifteen minutes bounded upward and closed ominously strong. Before the market opened on the following Tuesday it was definitely known that the hogs of the country were in the grasp of an epidemic, the precise character of which, to quote the press, was not yet determined, but which, in the opinion of those most competent to judge, would render the flesh of the animals attacked by the dread disease unfit for food, and their lard unwholesome. When the market opened, the price of pork was so high that Emil's margin of protection was wiped out as thoroughly as the tide wipes out the sand dyke which a child erects upon the beach. He was unable to respond to the demand made on him for money to keep his account with his broker good, and was sold out before night at a loss—a loss which left him in debt. He went home knowing that he was bankrupt, and that his firm must fail the moment his note at the bank became due, even if the broker to whom he owed five thousand dollars over and above his margins did not press him. There was no escape from ruin and humiliation.
He disclosed the truth to Constance with the repressed bitterness of a Prometheus. He explained to her with the mien of a wounded animal at bay the cruelty of the trick of destiny which had crushed him. How had he been at fault? He had been shrewd, far-seeing and prompt to act. The wisdom of his course had been demonstrated by the fall in prices. He was on the high road to fortune, and fate had stabbed him in the back. Could any intelligent man have foreseen that the hogs of the country would be stricken with disease? And more galling still, why had luck played him false by singling out the only possible combination of events which could have done him harm?
"An all-wise Providence!" he ejaculated with a scornful laugh. "A man looks the ground over, uses his wits and is reaping the benefit of his intelligence when he is struck in the head with a brick from behind a hedge, and is then expected to glorify the hand which smote him. How could it have been helped? How was I to blame?" he reiterated with a fierce look at his wife.
Constance could not answer the question. The details of business were a sealed book to her. The brief account of the disaster in pork, which he had just given, was confusing to her, and had left her with no conviction save pity for her husband. She was ready to take his word, and to believe that this overwhelming misfortune was the result of ill-luck which could not have been guarded against. What was uppermost in her mind was the impulse to help and comfort him. It pained her that he should inveigh against fate, though she recognized that the provocation was severe. But he needed her now more than ever. She would be brave and let him see that her love was at his command.
"You mustn't mind too much, Emil," she said. "We have to start again, that's all. I can economize in lots of ways, and we shall manage somehow, I'm sure. We have the house, you know. If it's necessary—in order to set you up in business—we can mortgage that. We've always had that to fall back on."
She knew as she spoke that from the standpoint of prudence the offer of the house was unwise. If that were gone, what would become of her children? Yet she felt a joy in tendering it. Why did her husband look at her with that malevolent gaze as though she had contributed to his distress?
"If you had put a mortgage on the house when I first started in business, and had given me the benefit of a larger capital, then we shouldn't be where we are to-day. I wanted it at the time, but you didn't offer it."
"Oh, Emil. I never dreamt that you wished it. To mortgage our home then would have been rash, surely. Besides, if I had given it to you, wouldn't it have been lost with the rest now?"
"Don't you understand," he said, roughly, "that if I had not been hampered at the start by my small capital, I should never have been forced to go outside the lumber business in order to support my family? Another five thousand dollars would have made all the difference."
His glowering look seemed to suggest that he had persuaded himself that she was partly to blame for what had happened. Constance was ready to make every allowance for him, but his mood offered fresh evidence of the crankiness of his disposition, a revelation to which her devotion could not altogether blind her.
"I don't understand anything about the business part," she answered, putting her arm around his neck. "Oh, Emil, Emil, I'm so sorry for you! I wish to do everything I can to help you and show my love for you. This is a dreadful sorrow for you to bear—for us both to bear. But it has come to us, and we mustn't be discouraged. God will give us strength to bear it if we let him."
"God?" he blurted. "You may leave God out of the question so far as I am concerned."
"Oh, Emil, it grieves me to hear you talk like that."
"And it grieves me that you should aggravate my trouble by cant which I thought you had outgrown."
"I shall never outgrow that," she murmured, appreciating suddenly that the substitute which he offered her for spiritual resignation was a cell bounded by four stone walls. She had reached the limit of her apostacy, and she shrank irrevocably from the final step.
"Of course the rich and the powerful and the fortunate," he was saying, "encourage the delusion that if a man's knocked out as I am he ought to believe it's for the best, because rubbish of that sort keeps together the social system on which they fatten. Do the poor in the tenements in Smith Street over there," he asked with a wave of his hand, "believe it's for the best that they should go hungry and in rags while Carleton Howard and his peers imitate Antony and Cleopatra? Ask the operatives in the factories across the river what they think of the justice of the millionaire's God? The time has passed when you can fool the self-respecting workingman with a basket of coals and a tract on the kingdom of heaven. They may have their heaven, if they'll give us a fair share of this earth." Emil folded his arms as one issuing an ultimatum.
Constance realized that he was in no mood to be reasoned with. She had made clear that she could not subscribe to his doctrine of despair, and save in that respect she was eager to be sympathetic. She could not deny the inequalities and apparent injustice of civilization, and Emil's plea that he had been crushed by an accident which he could not have avoided not only wrung her heart, but filled it with a sense of hostility to an industrial system which permitted its deserving members to be crushed without fault of their own. But she felt instinctively that the best sort of succor which she could bring was of the practical kind. To-morrow was before them, God or no God, and they must adjust themselves to their altered circumstances, take thought and build their hopes anew.
She put her arm around his neck again and kissed him silently. Then she began with quiet briskness to make preparations for the evening meal. It was the maid's afternoon out, and Constance moved as though she were glorying in the occupation. Presently she said:
"Of course I'll dismiss Sophy to-morrow. I am proud to be a workingman's wife, Emil. We'll soon be on our feet again, never fear."
The suggestion of the servant's dismissal deepened the gloom on Emil's face. "I've half a mind to pull up stakes and move to New York," he muttered.
"And give up our home?"
He frowned at the involuntary concern in her voice. "What use is a home in a place where a man is cramped and circumvented in every big thing he attempts? I ought to have moved long ago."
"I am ready to live wherever you think best, Emil. And you mustn't forget, dear, that my trust and faith in you are as great as ever."
Despondent as he was, his habit of buoyancy was already groping for some clue to a brighter vision, to which his wife's words of encouragement now helped him. He was sitting with his elbows resting on the table and his head clasped between his hands. "I'll make a fresh start—here," he said. "They've got me down, but, damn them, I'll show them that they can't keep me there."
Presently he arose, and walking out to the kitchen reappeared with a goblet and two bottles of beer. One of these he uncorked and poured the contents ostentatiously so that the froth gathered. Raising the glass he buried his mouth in the beer and eagerly drank it off. He set down the goblet with a sigh of satisfaction.
"And what's more," he said, "they can't deprive me of that."
Constance watched him with a troubled look. She shrank at this time of his distress from intimating that she regarded the indulgence of this appetite as a poor sort of solace. Besides, a glass of beer was in itself nothing, and he might well take offence at her solicitude as an invasion of his reasonable comfort. Yet observation had taught her that he was becoming more and more fond of seeking a respite from care in liberal potations of this sort.
She restrained her inclination to interfere, but she saw him with concern consume four bottles in the course of the evening. The serenity of temper which this produced—the almost indifferent calm following the storm—was by no means encouraging. To be sure his ugly side seemed entirely in abeyance. Indeed, he took down his fiddle and played on it seductively until he went to bed, as though there were no such things as business troubles. But somehow the very mildness of his mood, gratifying as it was to her from the momentary personal standpoint, disturbed her. Was this good nature the manly, Christian resignation of the victim of misfortune putting aside his grief until the morrow? It suggested to her rather the relaxation of a baffled soul exchanging ambition for a nepenthe of forgetfulness—a fuddled agitator's paradise—and her heart was wrung with dread.