The Manhattaners: A Story of the Hour

by Edward S. Van Zile

In certain respects Percy-Bartlett was an ideal clubman. He was a member of several exclusive clubs, but he frequented only one. He took more interest in the welfare of this organization than he did in the growth of the West or the opening of Africa to civilization. Philanthropists might have called him narrow-minded. He would have been astonished at the accusation. He subscribed liberally to the fund of his church for foreign missions and had once helped to equip a Polar expedition. A man who could open his purse to enterprises of this character would never look upon himself as an individual restricted in his sympathies. Cannot a man be a broad-minded benefactor of his race without seeking the companionship of those beneath him in the social make-up? Percy-Bartlett never imagined for a moment that in confining his intercourse to those whom he considered his equals, he was putting himself out of touch with the age and world in which he lived. Theoretically, he acknowledged the brotherhood of man. Practically, he found satisfaction only in the companionship of men who were eligible to membership in his favorite club. He devoted a tithe of his fortune to charity; why should he not have the privilege of giving most of his time to clubdom? Percy-Bartlett, like a good many Americans, acknowledged the grandeur of the Declaration of Independence, but did not feel that that instrument had established a ritual.

It is said that a man cannot serve both God and Mammon. However this may be,—and there are clever individuals who seem to fight under both banners,—it is certain that it takes genius for a man to do his duty equally well to his club and to his home. Percy-Bartlett was not a genius. He was a thorough gentleman, of fair ability, who had found himself inclined, at one time, to sacrifice his club for the sake of his home. But, other things being equal, a man, in the long run, will take the path in which he finds the readiest and most pronounced sympathy. Percy-Bartlett was appreciated at his true worth at his club. He realized vaguely that at his home he was in an atmosphere that was not wholly congenial, and that he did not hold the high place in the bosom of his family that assures to a husband the domestic felicity that is, in the end, fatal to prominence in club life. A companionable husband, like anything else worth having, is the product of assiduous cultivation. The converse is also true; and a man cannot enjoy the intercourse of a thoroughly congenial woman unless he has the tact and perseverance necessary to the production of this rare and priceless blossom of the social flora. Marriage is like a garden, in which two plants are set aside to tend each other. If one of them is neglectful of the task imposed upon it, they both suffer equally; and the garden in which they have been placed grows narrow and distasteful in their sight. If you grasp the full significance of this illustration, O gentle reader, you will be able to understand why it is that in these progressive times not only married men but married women have their clubs. We all crave sympathy, and an outlet for the unrest that is in us. If we cannot find them at home, we must go to our club, where we may meet some one who understands us, and who will offer us a relief-pipe for the pent-up individuality that so sorely chafes us. And thus it is that both men and women need their clubs to-day. The end of the last century found the world emphasizing the brotherhood of man. The end of the present century is busy underscoring the sisterhood of woman. Is it strange that the last years of the eighteenth century were not more disturbing to the institution of marriage than are the closing days of the nineteenth century? The only conclusion that seems deducible to the student of contemporary social unrest is that the millennium will not be reached until the problem of how to make a home a club is solved.

Percy-Bartlett was not especially happy, although such an admission was the last that he would willingly have made to himself. He had grown accustomed to deceiving himself into the belief that he thoroughly enjoyed life. Surely it had done much for him. He had wealth, position, friends, and a beautiful and accomplished wife. But slowly the fine flavor of existence had passed away, and sometimes the unwelcome thought would force itself upon him that he was a tired and lonely man. Never by word or look did he hint at this suspicion, even to his most intimate friends. They had noticed of late that he had lost his spirits and looked ill and weary; but he had spoken of his recurrent attacks of indigestion, and they had seen that he had become very abstemious in the use of alcohol and tobacco. That there was anything radically wrong with him neither he nor they suspected.

Percy-Bartlett was in a more cheerful mood than usual when he left his club on Tuesday evening at an earlier hour than was his wont to return home. The future looked brighter than it had appeared for some time past. He had placed his affairs in such shape that he could take a long vacation without worrying about the details of his personal interests. He walked rapidly down the avenue, anxious to have a long chat with his wife before retiring. They would be obliged to rise early in the morning to take the steamer, which left her pier at eleven o’clock.

There was a smile of contentment on his face as he thought that a change of scene and the excitement of travel might do much to draw his wife closer to him. She would have no time on the journey, he reflected, to become wholly absorbed in her musical pursuits. That he had grown jealous of Richard Stoughton he had never acknowledged to himself, but he had long resented the rivalry of his wife’s piano, and he rejoiced at the fact that she could not take it with her.

Furthermore, he realized that his precarious health demanded from him a long rest and a thorough change of scene. He was not over-fond of travel, but in these days the possession of wealth insures to the tourist an amount of comfort that is almost equal to that obtained from his club. From all points of view, the immediate future looked bright to Percy-Bartlett as he slowly mounted the steps of his house, and puffing slightly from the exertion, quietly opened the hall-door with a night-key. He would come upon his wife quietly and enjoy the expression of surprise on her face at his early return. That there would be a warm welcome in her smile he hardly dared to hope. But it is very easy to fall into the habit of expecting from those we love the reflection of the mood that we happen to be in. That Percy-Bartlett had often been disappointed in obtaining from his wife the sympathy he craved had not made him despair of sometime winning from her the response to his affection that he knew she had the power to give.

The moment seemed to him to be favorable for breaking down the barriers that had so long appeared to separate him from his wife. He would find her in the music-room. Diplomate that he was, he would ask her to sing one or two of her own songs to him, and then he would tell her of the outlines of their journey that he had prepared, and would make whatever changes in the itinerary that she suggested. He could see her, in imagination, closing her piano for the last time, and turning to him with a bright smile on her face when she had locked the instrument and put the key in her pocket.

His heart beat with stifling rapidity as he quietly entered the drawing-room. He smiled as the thought flashed through his mind that he was more in the mood of a young lover, staking his life’s happiness on a few burning words, than in that of a middle-aged husband about to discuss the prosaic details of a European trip with his wife.

The drawing-room was dimly lighted, and the portières at the entrance to the music-room were closely drawn. He approached them noiselessly, somewhat surprised that his rival, the piano, was not taking advantage of his absence to strengthen its hold upon his wife.

Gently he laid his trembling hand upon the heavy hangings, and looked into the music-room. Then he dropped the portière and turned away, his face ghastly in its pallor, and his eyes wild with sudden pain. He staggered forward across the drawing-room, making an heroic effort to avoid stumbling against the furniture. Strangely enough, the one overpowering fear that possessed him at the moment was that, by some accident, he should make his presence known in the music-room. He looked, as he actually skulked toward the hall, like a man who had committed some awful crime, and who was making a desperate effort to avoid detection. Great beads of perspiration had broken out upon his brow. His face was drawn and set, and his lips were pressed against his teeth in a way that gave his countenance an expression of ghastly mirth.