Queed: A Novel

by Henry Sydnor Harrison

Yet did these people really believe their doctrine of the saved body and the saved soul? They said they did, but did they? If they believed it surely, as they believed that this night would be followed by a new day, if they believed it passionately as they believed that money is the great earthly good, then certainly the biggest of their worldly affairs would be less than a grain of sand by the sea against the everlasting glories that awaited them. Yet ... look at them all about him in the car, these people who told themselves that they had started Fifi on the way to be a saint, in which state they expected to remeet her. Did they so regard their worldly affairs? By to-morrow they would be at each other's throats, squabbling, cheating, slandering, lying, fighting desperately to gain some ephemeral advantage—all under the eye of the magnificent guerdon they pretended to believe in and knew they were jeopardizing by such acts. No, it was pure self-hypnosis. Weak man demanded offsets for his earthly woes, and he had concocted them in a world of his own imagining. That was the history of man's religions; the concoction of other-worldly offsets for worldly woes. In their heart of hearts, all knew that they were concoctions, and the haruspices laughed when they met each other.

Supper was early at Mrs. Paynter's, as though to atone for the tardiness of yesterday. The boarders dispatched it not without recurring cheerfulness, broken now and again by fits of decorous silence. You could see that by to-morrow, or it might be next day, the house would be back in its normal swing again.

Mr. Queed withdrew to his little chamber. He trod the steps softly for once, and perhaps this was why, as he passed Mrs. Paynter's room, his usually engrossed ear caught the sound of weeping, quiet but unrestrained, ceaseless, racking weeping, running on evermore, the weeping of Rachel for her children, who would not be comforted.

The little Doctor shut the door of the Scriptorium and lit the gas. So far, his custom; but here his whim and his wont parted. Instead of seating himself at his table, where the bound Post for January-March, 1902, awaited his exploration, he laid himself down on his tiny bed.

If he were to die to-night, who would weep for him like that?

The thought had come unbidden to his mind and stuck in his metaphysics like a burr. Now he remembered that the question was not entirely a new one. Fifi had once asked him who would be sorry if he died, and had answered herself by saying that she would. However, Fifi was dead, and therefore released from her promise.

Yes, Fifi was dead. He would never help her with her algebra again. The thought filled him with vague, unaccountable regrets. He felt that he would willingly take twenty minutes a night from the wrecked Schedule to have her come back, but unfortunately there was no way of arranging that now. He remembered the night he had sent Fifi out of the dining-room for coughing, and the remembrance made him distinctly uncomfortable. He rather wished that he had told Fifi he was sorry about that, but it was too late now. Still he had told her that he was her friend; he was glad to remember that. But here, from a new point of view, was the trouble about having friends. They took your time while they lived, and then they went off and died and upset your evening's work.

Clearly, Fifi left behind many sorrowful friends, as shown by her remarkable funeral. If he himself were to die, Tim and Murphy Queed would probably feel sorrowful, but they would hardly come to the funeral. For one thing, Tim could not come because of his duties on the force, and Murphy, for all he knew, was undergoing incarceration. About the only person he could think of as a probable attendant at his graveside was William Klinker. Yes, Buck would certainly be there, though it was asking a good deal to expect him to weep. A funeral consisting of only one person would look rather odd to those who were familiar with such crowded churches as that he had seen to-day. People passing by would nudge each other and say that the dead must have led an eccentric life, indeed, to be so alone at the end.... Come to think of it, though, there wouldn't be any funeral. He had nothing to do with those most interesting but clearly barbaric rites. Of course his body would be cremated by directions in the will. The operation would be private, attracting no attention from anybody. Buck would make the arrangements. He tried to picture Buck weeping near the incinerator, and failed.

Then there was his father, whom, in twenty-four years' sharing of the world together, he had never met. The man's behavior was odd, to say the least. From the world's point of view he had declined to own his son. For such an unusual breach of custom, there must be some adequate explanation, and the circumstances all pointed one way. This was that his mother (whom his boyhood had pictured as a woman of distinction who had eloped with somebody far beneath her) had failed to marry his father. The persistent mystery about his birth had always made him skeptical of Tim's statement that he had been present at the marriage. But he rarely thought of the matter at all now. The moral responsibility was none of his; and as for a name, Queed was as good as any other. X or Y was a good enough name for a real man, whose life could demonstrate his utter independence of the labels so carefully pasted upon him by environment and circumstance.

Still, if he were to die, he felt that his father, if yet alive, should come forward and weep for him, even as Mrs. Paynter was weeping for Fifi down in the Second Front. He should stand out like a man and take from Buck's hand the solemn ceremonies of cremation. He tried to picture his father weeping near the incinerator, and failed, partly owing to the mistiness surrounding that gentleman's bodily appearance. He felt that his father was dodging his just responsibilities. For the first time in his life he perceived that, under certain circumstances, it might be an advantage to have some definite individual to whom you can point and say: "There goes my father."