Why had this thing come on him? Talk about your thunderbolts out of a clear sky—this love-affair was a million times worse! It was mysterious—and it is well known in Wall Street that a mystery is worse than nitroglycerine—infinitely more dangerous.
What was this love-affair? How far had it gone? Just where was the dynamite stored? Who was she? Why did not Tom say something? Why could not Tom have fallen in love safely? Why could he not have married a good girl who would help him and help E. H. Merriwether help both by minding her own business—to wit, a few little male Merriwethers?
It was time Tom became his father's successor-to-be. E. H. Merriwether had loved to do his own work his own way all his life. It was his pleasure. But the work suddenly took on an aspect of far greater importance than the worker. The work was the work of the Merriwethers—not of one Merriwether; not even of the great E. H., but of all the Merriwethers, living and to be.
Tom must be trained not only to be the son of a Merriwether, but to be himself a Merriwether. And therefore E. H. must cease to be a railroad expert toward Tom; he must become Tom's father, the trainer of a successor—flesh and blood the same; the fortune the same.
And, as a sense of impending loss always heightens values, E. H. Merriwether suddenly realized how important to him and to his happiness Tom was. He loved Tom, who was not only his only son, but the only Merriwether. That told everything: He loved Tom.
VI
After his father and Dr. Frauenthal left the house Tom tried to feel that he had finished his breakfast—that is to say, he attempted to read the newspapers. But the printed letters failed to combine themselves into intelligible forms, and even when he read a word here and there his mind did not record it. Obeying an unexplained impulse, he rose.
Then he sat down merely because he had been standing. Then he tried to reason why he was sitting and what sitting there thinking of himself in that particular position meant. But the sky was too blue! It called to him in an azure voice that made him long for the sunshine and the open air, and the rooflessness of outdoors that permits ten million fancies to soar unchecked.
Also, he longed for something; and, though he knew that he longed, he did not know exactly what it was he longed for, because it was not his mind that desired it, but all of him; and all of him did not think with precision. Young men are apt to feel like that in the springtime—also young women. Also widowers and relicts and canaries and heifers and burros—and even bankers!
Therefore Tom swore at that nothing which is always something and gave up trying to make himself think that he wanted to read the morning papers. His nervous system coined a proverb for him: “When in doubt, walk out!” So he walked out of the house and crossed the Avenue.