IV
His father!
Separated by the width of the show case whose edges both gripped suddenly. Nathan and Johnathan gazed into each other’s suddenly ashen faces.
“You!” cried Johnathan. “You! My—son!”
Johnathan had grown stouter but he had aged twenty years. Remorse, loneliness, self-pity and the ever-present realization that he was an exile had eaten into his features like acid. Both temples were white but it was a weak, rusted, moth-eaten whiteness. His eyes were more watery than ever and his mouth as loose, excepting for the petulant knots of muscles in each corner.
“Father!” the boy gasped huskily.
Madelaine frowned, then looked on wide-eyed. From his son’s bronzed, muscular face, Johnathan’s gaze leaped to Madelaine’s, then back again. Ivory carvings were forgotten.
“What—are you—doing—out here?”
“I’m on my way back home from Russia,” Nathan answered mechanically. His mind was still stunned with the drama of it.
“You have—been—to—Russia?”
“Siberia! Yes! I’ve been up there almost a year and a half, working among the Czechs.”
Johnathan’s body had not moved. Only his eyes and face. Again the father’s eyes sought Madelaine.
“Up in Siberia? Alone?”
“Yes. But I’m not going back alone. This is a very dear friend of mine. Madelaine, apparently I can introduce my father. Father, this is Miss Theddon. She is—going to be—my wife.”
“Your—wife? What’s become of——”
“Of Mildred? She died some time ago.”
“My God!” cried Johnathan weakly. He rubbed the back of a puffy hand across his forehead. Down back of the counter he moved unsteadily to reach the intersection where he could come out from behind the cases. He had not acknowledged Madelaine or the introduction, by the way. It was a distressing moment for Madelaine but she recovered as Johnathan came up.
“I’m sure I’m delighted to meet Nathan’s father,” she said.
Johnathan gave her a slight nod and turned at once to his son. In so far as he was concerned, she might have been marooned on a ring around Saturn.
The tears were streaking down Johnathan’s face. He raised his hands and gripped the boy by his elbows.
“How long have you been in Yokohama?” he cried hoarsely.
“Ten days. But I lived here three months before I went to Siberia.”
“And you never looked me up!”
“I tried hard enough. But nobody knew any Johnathan Forge——”
Johnathan started at the pronouncement of his name. He shot a frightened glance around.
“My name is Smith!” he cried—“John Smith!”
“I couldn’t know that, of course,” returned Nathan dryly. He was beginning to recover from the shock of the encounter.
“You must come with me!” declared the father. “You must tell me all about Paris and—home. I will find a place for you to——”
“I’m sorry, father. But Miss Theddon and I are sailing for San Francisco at two o’clock.”
“Not to-day!”
“To-day, yes.”
“But—but—we’ve only just found each other.”
“That’s lamentable, of course. But I can’t help——”
“You must put off your sailing.” Johnathan said it as though he had settled the entire matter.
Nathan shook his head.
“Sorry, father,” he answered. “It’s impossible! We’ve been lucky enough to secure immediate passage, and we must get back. Miss Theddon is not in the best of health and I’ve got a New York job waiting that can’t go begging another moment.”
“My Lord! You’re not going to run after we’ve just found each other! Not that, Natie, not that!”
“I’m not running. But I’ve been away from home a year and a half and we’re expected back June first without fail.”
Johnathan looked around frantically, desperately.
“No,” he said after a time. “I don’t suppose you would stay, not for me! I never cut much of a figure in your life, anyhow, did I, Nathan? You and your plans never took much account of your father, did they? Maybe if they had, I’d never have left home in the first place.” Again Johnathan smeared the back of his hand across his forehead. He turned to Madelaine. “For twenty-five years it was just like this!” he told her. “And you see what it’s done to me.” He submitted himself abjectly for general compassion and sympathy. Madelaine’s voice was courteous enough but a bit icy as she responded:
“Your son has told me the whole story, Mr. Forge. I understand perfectly.”
Johnathan was pitying himself too much in this closing phase of his domestic drama to interpret her sentiment correctly. He assumed that Madelaine was sympathizing with him against Nathan.
“He always was headstrong,” began Johnathan promptly. “Went right along demanding his own way even as a beardless boy that couldn’t——”
“Pardon, Mr. Forge. You misunderstood. I said your son has told me the whole story and therefore I recognize exactly where the blame lies.”
Johnathan gaped for a moment. There was no mistaking her calm hostility. He turned to his son.
“Nathan!—For God’s sake, don’t go!—Don’t desert me now when I’ve just found you again. I never deserted you, Nathan; for twenty-five years I did my duty——”
It was awkward to have his father suddenly begin to act so. Other customers had entered the shop and were beholding. Madelaine read on her lover’s face the distress he was seeking a way to ameliorate, somehow. Her indignation rose.
“Really, Mr. Forge, is it quite fair to appeal to Nathan so? Because I’ve been under the impression you did desert him—and left him to face a somewhat cruel set of circumstances.”
“What do you know about it?” snapped Johnathan. “You’re a stranger to us Forges——”
“Father! That’ll be enough of addressing Miss Theddon so, please! And I suggest we find a place less public where we may talk.”
“Yes, yes!” agreed Johnathan. “The back office here. They’ll leave us alone. Come into the back office, Natie.”
Nathan glanced at Madelaine. She nodded. They moved toward the back office.
“Your woman friend will excuse us,” suggested the father curtly. “We have much to talk over in private, Nathan.”
“Oh, no,” responded the son. “I don’t care to discuss anything I do not wish Miss Theddon to hear.” And Nathan stood aside for Madelaine to precede him into the cluttered little workshop. Johnathan was not so courteous.
Johnathan, in fact, was piqued. In Madelaine he sensed an adversary. Immediately he took no care to keep concealed his estimate of her, of all women. They seated themselves, a smile of grim humor lurking about Madelaine’s pretty mouth.
“First you will cancel your passage,” began Johnathan doggedly. “You must promise me, Nathan! Remember, you’ll never have but one father.”
“I cannot and will not delay our sailing, father.” Nat’s voice was kind but firm. “Now that’s settled, what about home do you especially wish to know?”
Johnathan produced a soiled handkerchief and blew his nose. But he saw that because of the influence of a “female” undoubtedly, the son was the same adamant, bigoted colt he had always been.
“You might tell me about yourself,” he said lamely, petulantly. “You had a wonderful little wife, Nathan. What happened to her?” Johnathan said this for Madelaine. And he did not miss the pallor which took the humorous lip-smile from the girl’s features as he said it. He had a way to wound the girl, perhaps drive a wedge between her and his boy. “And your child, Natie! Little Mary was one of the sweetest tots I ever saw. What became of her?”
“She was killed by a truck a year before Milly died,” was the son’s rejoinder. He said it stiffly. He wondered—if his father was to be deliberately mean—if it might not have been better after all to ask Madelaine to wait until the visit was ended.
“That’s hard, Natie. It must have been awful; you thought so much of her. And Milly? I always loved Milly. She was such a wonderful little woman and did so much for you. I remember she was the only one who stuck by us in the factory the time you had that trouble with the help and they all walked out on you.”
“Milly was untrue to me,” returned Nathan with continued stiffness. “She ran away with that Plumb fellow and was killed—when a munitions plant exploded in Russellville, New Jersey.”
Johnathan assimilated this after a time. He murmured philosophically, “The ways of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. Blessed be the name of the Lord!”
Nathan grimaced.
“What else do you wish to know, father?” he asked—and waited.
“And now you’re plunging into matrimony again so quick! I don’t see how you can do it, Natie—out of respect to Milly’s memory if nothing else.”
Nathan kept his temper admirably. He could apologize to Madelaine for the insult afterward—an entire lifetime of apology.
“I owe Milly nothing. I told you she ran away with Plumb. Anyway, we won’t talk about that. You’re only dwelling upon it because you see it annoys Miss Theddon. What other information can I give you?”
Johnathan’s manner changed.
“How about your mother?” he demanded like a challenge.
“Mother had a bitter time after you left us. She sold the Longstreet house but a smooth oil-stock salesman cheated her out of the money. At present she’s living with Edith.”
Johnathan turned to Madelaine.
“And among the things my son has told you,” he demanded, “did he include, perhaps, an account of the twenty-five years of hell I lived with his mother? For twenty-five years she was my trial and my cross. I couldn’t stand it finally. I had to get out. There was no other escape but flight. Human flesh and blood couldn’t stand it, I tell you! Wait till you get to know her. Then you’ll sympathize with me. There’s righteousness and justice in this world somewhere and the wicked get their deserts.”
Madelaine made no comment. The pause which ensued angered Johnathan.
“From the very night I was married,” he went on in a trifle higher tone, “the tussle began. Never once did she try to help me or stand back of me in my battle with the world. She nagged me and she fought me. She——”
“Possibly, Mr. Forge,” interrupted Madelaine. “But why tell me about it?”
“You’re marrying into the family, ain’t you? There’s—things—which you should know.”
“I’m merely marrying Nathan,” responded Madelaine.
The interview was going badly. Great tears continued to roll down Johnathan’s face and he blew his nose again and again.
“What business are you in, Natie?” he finally asked. He was an injured man. There was not a doubt about it. All the world had it in for him.
“I secured a position with the Thorne knitting mills,” returned Nathan. “I traveled for them a year and a half. Then they sent me out here to the Orient. I’m going back as manager of their New York office.”
“Well, Natie, you have your father to thank for that! If it hadn’t been for the business training I gave you, no firms would ever be offering you any New York managements at your age. Why, when I was your age I was lucky to draw twelve dollars a week. We worked for our money in those days.”
Nathan finally felt it time to put a few inquiries himself.
“How does it happen you’re working here, father? Money give out?”
Johnathan turned quickly and looked through the window into a dismal yard.
“The curse of us Forges, Natie,” he finally responded, “has always been women. You’ll learn it one of these days!”
“How does it happen you’re working here? Money give out?” Nathan repeated.
“I started to tell you, if you’ll be respectful and wait a moment. Don’t be so hot-headed. Hot-headedness and lack of respect always were your faults, Natie!”
Nathan waited as patiently as possible.
“I came out here,” Johnathan went on, “seeking love and surcease from all I’d suffered. I met a woman. I thought she was in every way a woman to be desired, Nathan. I married her——”
“You married her! You were never divorced from mother!”
“Oh, yes, I was! Do you think I’m a bigamist? I got a divorce from your mother under the Japanese laws——”
“Mother never knew about it.”
“I can’t help that.”
“The divorce laws of Japan, Nathan,” explained Madelaine with a faint smile, “are very simple. When a man grows tired of his wife in Japan he may dispense with her by merely walking out and leaving her, first informing the police to that effect, I believe. Then he contracts a new marriage by going to live with his paramour and duly informing the police to that effect also, giving his new residence. One of the Y. W. C. A. girls explained it to me.”
Johnathan ignored Madelaine. He went on:
“I got a divorce from your mother under the laws of Japan. I married what I supposed was a woman who’d be the wife I deserved—after all I’d been through back in the States. But she was like all women. I lived with her just two days. I was fool enough to intrust my bank account to her. The third day she was missing and so was the money. I’ve never got trace of either, since. I had to take a job.”
Nathan flushed again with the new insult to Madelaine. But for an instant his anger was arrested by the announcement that his father had been flimflammed by an adventuress.
“Edith has six children now,” he essayed, after a painful moment.
But Johnathan was not interested in the fact that Edith had six children. He went on in the same whine:
“I’m living from hand to mouth, Natie. I’ve been here the last three years—waiting on trade, interpreting for my employers because I learned how to speak a little Japanese. Think of it, Natie—waiting on trade for a godless heathen—me!”
“Under the circumstances it ought to be a very good position,” observed the son.
The visit continued in this strain until noontime. Then they went out together to a small restaurant and had tiffin. Johnathan managed to get Nathan alone.
“Son,” he cried brokenly, “you must loan me some money. I’m at the end of my rope. Some days I think there’s nothing left but to jump in the Bay.”
“How much money do you need?”
“All you can spare me,” was Johnathan’s modest request.
“I’m low on funds, father. I’ve got just about enough to get me back to Vermont. I wanted to buy Miss Theddon a diamond but have had to wait until——”
“Could you let me have a thousand yen, say? That’s only five hundred and ten dollars!—in cash!”
“It’s out of the question, just now. I’ve only a hundred and eighty dollars with me and my passage across America will use up a hundred of that.”
Ultimately Nathan gave his father twenty-five dollars,—fifty-five ten-yen notes. Johnathan took them rather sourly. He placed more stock in the money Nathan promised to wire when he reached Vermont.
“Oh, my boy, my boy! What are you doing?” he next cried, anent Madelaine. “You’re fortunate enough for your first wife to die on you. Straightaway you go putting your head in the halter again! After all I tried to save you from! After all your father’s example! Oh, well! You deserve nothing but the misery coming to you! This is a just world!”
“Let’s not talk about Miss Theddon, father. She’s the sort of lady I’m afraid you wouldn’t understand.”
“Wouldn’t I, though? Don’t try to tell me there’s any kind of female I don’t understand! I’m older than you and therefore must know better. And never mind how many miles of land and water separate us, young man, remember I am always your father. I am always your father!”
“Just what has that to do with an understanding of womanhood?” asked Nathan quietly. The old, old feeling of groping in a fog the moment he came in contact with his father came over him. He wanted to fight it savagely.
“Just you wait till you’re married to her a spell—long enough for the ‘new’ to wear off! You’ll see! You think she’s fine and grand now, just because she’s got a pretty face! But you wait! You’ll be sorry not taking your wise father’s advice. Just as you did once before. Wait till you see her running around in broken corsets or dirty underclothes——”
“Father, you’re disgusting. Please change the subject!”
“You can’t tell me nothing about women, young man! Didn’t I live twenty-five years with one! They’re all alike! And ninety-nine per cent. of ’em are bad—bad clean through to the spleen. But I’ll pray for you, my son—I’ll never cease praying for you!”