“Oh yes!—I have every reason to be.”
“Is there anything I can buy for you?”
“Nothing.”
She stood watching him drive off and waved her hand. It was well-known in their circle that the Garrisons were a very devoted couple.
Floyd leaned back in the car, puffing at a cigar. The years had changed him; the sensitive boy had become a man of affairs, a Capitalist. He was very sane; his Puritan instincts rebelled against the rioting emotions of the Latins. His life was made up of facts and figures; ultimately he would have become an image of clay, like his father’s statues, but there was a secret element of his life, of which no one had the slightest clue. The Past had ceased to torture him; it became a consolation. He lived over and over again the Romance of his youth, the agony, the passion, his first years with Julie, the rage of the murderer, the whole tragedy, but it didn’t hurt him now; Martin was dead, forgiven. We count the years we have lived to know how old we are—correct mathematics, but our age corresponds to other numbers. Heart swings are the rhythm of our seasons, recording in spiritual time, the real life.
The car stopped in Twelfth Street. Floyd jumped out, stood for a moment looking up at the imposing twenty-story office building which he had erected on the site of his old home. It had rented well. There was not a room empty. He had retained an office for himself on the third floor. He sat down to his desk, read his mail. He was about to sell the building—the psychological moment had come to “turn it over” and get a handsome profit. He never kept any real estate very long. New York neighborhoods change and values fluctuate. Then it occurred to him quite suddenly that the room in which he sat was about the height of his father’s workshop in the little house where he was born. There was no emotion, but it was strange he had never thought of it before. He looked at the heavy safe, the walls lined with repositories, where contracts were kept—and saw—clay images. He looked down at his desk; it was littered with old rags, bits of arms, legs—a young man, with an agonized face, dropped a candle.
He smiled. What courage youth has! It was well done. The home of his childhood was still his; he had not desecrated it. He saw Mary flying past him up the stairs; she had become a world figure, the head of an international organization of nurses. When Julie’s “headaches” came on, Mary was always there. He’d go softly to the door and wait; he didn’t knock; he knew she’d come out.
“Mrs. Garrison is much better; I’m sure she’ll be all right in the morning.” Then the worn face, dim eyes, streaked hair would vanish. She stood again at the window in her bare room, where they had loved each other for a moment.
The telephone at his elbow startled him. Julie’s voice—would he order some flowers for the dinner table.
“Certainly, and a bunch for you. Anything else?”