The man disappeared. Then Strone’s heart throbbed. Though he dared not speak or move toward her it seemed to him that they were alone. He watched her breathlessly. A white jeweled hand played for a moment with the ornament which held her roses—then they came dropping into the darkness, a little shower of white blossoms. Almost immediately the young man rejoined her, the fan in his hand. With a single bound Strone cleared the road, picked up the roses one by one with hot, dry fingers, and regained his shelter with the echo of a woman’s soft laugh ringing in his ears.
He chose a safe place and watched her go by an hour or so later, leaning back in the carriage with half-closed eyes, as though asleep, and a cloud of drooping white lace around her shoulders. It was only a glimpse. Then he lit his pipe and trudged homeward across the hills. With the gray dawn he turned upon his madness and fought it.
Day by day he rode backward and forward from his hillside cottage to Gascester, through the misty dawn and the white moonlight. Like a man at bay he fought his madness—he, the grimy mechanic in grease-stained clothing, who had drawn an evil poison into his veins. Heart and soul he flung himself with grim determination into his great work. The wheels of his models whirred and the great pistons throbbed with life. Out of chaos there resolved itself before him a problem to be solved—beyond was fortune immeasurable. So he toiled, not discouraged by many failures, grim and unswerving in his resolve to struggle through into the light.
It was in those days that Strone’s ambition, kindled long enough ago, burst suddenly into full flame. He neglected his reading and his solitary country rambles for a spell of downright hard work. Many nights he remained at the works long after the workpeople had left, locked in his shed, with a single light burning—laboring always at the same apparently confused collection of wheels and strangely shaped pieces of metal which were to do the work of ten machines or a hundred men. His progress was slow, and a less forceful man would long ago have been discouraged. There was a point beyond which movement seemed impossible. Ever he was hammering away, as many others had done before him, at a problem which seemed insoluble.
He rode backward and forward like a man in a dream. Ever those wheels seemed flying round before his eyes, and somewhere between them and the piston rod there was a link—but where? He told himself plainly that the thing was possible. Some day it would come to him. He had always told himself that. Only whereas a few months ago he had contemplated the end with a sort of leisurely curiosity, he felt himself impelled to work now with a feverish haste, as though time had suddenly closed in upon him.
At last the day came when Strone lay on the short turf, smoking quietly, looking out upon the glimmering world with new eyes. Sphinxlike he gazed with an impassivity somewhat to be wondered at, for an hour ago he had finished his task. Those silent days, those long spells of work, when day had become fused into night and night into day, had left their mark upon him. His face was thinner, his eyes almost brilliant, a slight feverishness had flushed his cheeks. The man’s sense of power had grown and deepened. For he had faced great problems, he had bent great forces to his will. He had succeeded where other men had failed.
He looked out into the world and tried to apprise himself rightly. He wanted to know where he stood. There was a place which he could claim. Where? How high up, how low down? How far could wealth take him? What was the value of his brains in the world’s esteem? He tried to reckon these things up, and he found it difficult. It was a kaleidoscopic, misty wilderness into which he looked. He was trying to deal with his future from a wholly new point of view, and felt very much at sea.
Those moments of introspective thought became moments of self-confession. He realized, and admitted, the change in himself. The old ideals were unshaken, but they no longer held paramount sway. The gift of his brains to humanity, the betterment of his fellows, the inauguration of certain carefully conceived labor schemes no longer appealed to him with that wonderful enthusiasm which seemed to have almost sanctified his work. They were still dear to him, the end and aim of his practical efforts, but they were no longer all-controlling. A new thing had come to him, a new emotion, quickening, irresistible, delirious! He was no longer completely master of himself—a stray memory could set his heart thumping, could scatter his thoughts to the four winds of heaven. A touch of madness, this, yet sweeter even than his sense of triumph. Such madness, too! What had he, Enoch Strone, to do with fair women and white roses, though the woman had smiled for a moment upon him, and the perfume of the roses still hung about his little room. Yet—wealth was transfiguring—omnipotent. The words were her own. And in his hand was the golden key.
During the weeks that followed, the great change in Strone’s temporal fortunes which as yet he had only dreamed of actually came to pass. The model spoke for itself and patents had been applied for in every country of the world. Already an offer was forthcoming for the American rights the amount of which sounded to Strone like a fairy tale. It was a hundred thousand pounds and the syndicate would resell for a quarter of a million—but it was cash and the miracle crane would make his fortune. With the offer for the first time he realized in some measure his altered position in life. A golden key had come into his hands, many doors in the pleasure house of the world would fly open now at his touch. Pictures, statuary, a library, travel—these things for which he had always craved were now within his reach. It had come with a magical suddenness—it was hard even now to realize. Where was he to draw the line? Where were the limits of the things which he might set himself to win?