Vandover and the Brute

by Frank Norris

On the last evening which he was to spend in his home, Vandover cast up his accounts and made out a schedule as to his monthly income.

Rent from realty, net average	$ 84.00
Rent from homestead property on California Street	125.00
Interest on U.S. bonds, 4 per cent.	23.00
	_______
Total	$232.00
In small iron safe	$170.00
Received from sale of office effects	$500.00
	_______
	$670.00
Expenses, outstanding bills, lawyer's fees, undertaker's
bill, expenses for collecting, etc.	587.00
	_______
Balance, January 16th	$83.00

Then with a shrug of the shoulders he dismissed the whole burdensome business from his mind. Brunt would manage his property, sending him regularly the monthly statement in order to keep him informed. The English gentleman of the fruit syndicate would add his hundred and twenty-five, and the 4 per cents., faithfully brooding over his eighty-nine hundred in the dark of the safety deposit drawer, would bring forth their little quota of twenty-three with absolute certainty. Two thirty-two a month. Yes, he was comfortably fixed and was free now to do exactly as he pleased.

His first object now was to settle down for the winter in some pleasant rooms. He had decided that he would look for a suite of three—a bedroom, studio, and sitting-room. The bedroom he was not particular about, the studio he hoped would have plenty of light from the north, but the sitting-room must be sunny and overlook the street, else what would be the use of a window-seat? As to the neighbourhood, he thought he would prefer Sutter Street anywhere between Leavenworth and Powell.

In the downtown part this street was entirely given over to business houses; in the far, uptown quarter it was lined with residences; but between these two undesirable extremes was an intermediate district where the residences had given place to flats, and the business blocks to occasional stores. It was a neighbourhood affected by doctors, dentists, and reputable music-teachers; drug stores occupied many of the corners, here and there a fine residence still withstood the advance of business, there were a number of great apartment houses, and even one or two club buildings.

It was a gay locality, not too noisy, not too quiet. The street was one of the great arteries of travel between the business and the residence portions of the city, and its cable-cars were frequented by ladies going to their shopping or downtown marketing or to and from the matinées. Acquaintances of Vandover were almost sure to pass at every hour.

He took rooms temporarily at the Palace and at once set about locating on Sutter Street. He had recourse again to Brunt, who furnished him with a long list of vacancies in that neighbourhood. Apartment-hunting was an agreeable pastime to Vandover, though in the end it began to bore him. Altogether, he visited some fifteen or twenty suites, in each case trying to fit himself into the rooms, imagining how the window-seat would look in such a window, how the pipe-rack would show over such a mantel, just where on such walls the Assyrian bas-reliefs could be placed to the best advantage, and if his easel could receive enough steady light from such windows. Then he considered the conveniences, the baths, the electric light, and the heat.

After a two weeks' search, he had decided upon one of two suites; both of these were in the desired neighbourhood but differed widely in other respects.

The first was reasonable enough in the matter of rent, and had even been occupied by an artist for some three or four years previous. However, the room that Vandover proposed to use as a sitting-room was small and had no double windows, thus making the window-seat an impossibility. There did not seem to be any suitable place for the Assyrian bas-reliefs, and the mantelpiece was of old-fashioned white marble like the mantelpiece in Mrs. Wade's front parlour, a veritable horror. It revolted Vandover even to think of putting a pipe-rack over it. These defects were offset by the studio, a large and splendid room with hardwood floors and an enormous north light, the legendary studio, the dream of an artist, precisely such a studio as Vandover had hoped he would occupy in the Quarter.

The other suite was in a great apartment house, a hotel in fact, but very expensive, with electric bulbs and bells, and with a tiled bathroom connecting with the bedroom. The room which he would be obliged to use as his studio was small, dark, the light coming from the west. But the sitting-room was perfect. It had the sun all day long through a huge bay window that seemed to have been made for a window-seat; there were admirable, well-lighted spaces on the walls for casts and pictures, and the mantelpiece was charming, extremely high, and made of oak; in a word, the exact sitting-room that Vandover had in mind. Already he saw himself settled there as comfortably and snugly as a kernel in a nutshell. It was true that upon investigation he found that the grate had been plastered up and the flue arranged for a stove. But for that matter there were open-grate stoves to be had that would permit the fire to be seen and that would look just as cheerful as a grate. He had even seen such a stove in the window of a hardware store downtown, a tiled stove with a brass fender and with curious flamboyant ornaments of cast-iron—a jewel of a stove.