Tracy Park: A Novel

by Mary Jane Holmes

'And,' he continued, addressing his brother, 'it ill becomes you to take this course against me—you, who have enriched yourself at my expense, while I have held my peace. Suppose I require you to give an account of all the money which you have considered necessary for your support and salary—would you like to do it? Would the world consider you strictly honorable, or would they call you a lunatic on the subject of money and not responsible for your acts? But I have no wish to harm you. I have money enough, and cannot forget that you are my brother. But molest me, and I shall molest you. If I go to the asylum you will leave Tracy Park. If I am allowed to stay here in peace, you can do so, too—at least, until Gretchen comes, when it will, perhaps, be better for us to separate. Two masters may manage to scramble along in the same house, but two mistresses never can, and Dora and Gretchen would not be congenial. Good morning, gentlemen!' and he bowed himself from the room, leaving Frank covered with confusion and shame as he felt that he was beaten.

The physicians did not think it a case in which they were warranted to interfere. Neither could conscientiously sign a certificate which should declare Arthur a lunatic, and their advice to Frank was that he should suffer his brother to have his own way in his own house, and when he felt that he could not bear with his idiosyncracies he could go elsewhere. But it was this going elsewhere which Frank did not fancy; and, after a consultation with his wife, he decided to let matters take their course for a time at least, or until Gretchen came, if she ever did.

Arthur's allusion to the sums of money his brother had appropriated to his own use had warned Frank that he was not quite so indifferent or ignorant of his business affairs as he had seemed, and this of itself served to keep him quiet and patient during the confusion which ensued, as walls were torn down, and doors and windows cut, while the house was filled with workmen, and the sound of the hammer and saw was heard from morning till night.

It was in the middle of October when Arthur fairly commenced his repairs, but so many men did he employ, and so rapidly was the work pushed on, that the first of January found everything finished and Arthur installed in his suite of rooms, which a prince might have envied, so richly and tastefully were they fitted up. Beautiful pictures and rich tapestry covered the walls in the first room, where the floor was inlaid with colored woods in lovely Mosaic designs, and the centre was covered with a costly Oriental rug, which Arthur had bought at a fabulous price in Paris, where it had once adorned a room in the Tuileries. But the gem of the whole was the library, where the statuary stood in the niches, and where, from the large bow-window at the south, a young girl's face looked upon the scene with an expression of shy surprise and half regret in the soft blue eyes, as if their owner wondered how she came there, and was always thinking of the fields and forests of far-away Germany. For it was decidedly a German face of the higher type, and such as is seldom found among the lower or even middle classes. And yet you instinctively felt that it belonged to the latter, notwithstanding the richness of the dress, from the pearl-embroidered cap set jauntily on the reddish golden hair to the velvet bodice and the satin peasant waist. The hands, small and dimpled like those of a child, were clasped around a prayer-book and a bunch of wild flowers which had evidently just been gathered. It was a marvelously beautiful face, pure and sweet as that of a Madonna, and the workmen involuntarily bowed their heads before it, calling it, not without some reason, a memorial window, for the name Gretchen was under the picture, and one unconsciously found himself looking for the date of birth and death. But only the one word 'Gretchen' was there, with no sign to tell who she was, or where, if living, she was now, or what relation she bore to the strange man who often stood before her whispering to himself:

'Poor little Gretchen! Will you never come?'

For a few days after the rooms were completed, they were thrown open to such of Arthur's friends as cared to see them, and the question 'Who is Gretchen?' was often asked, but the answer was always the same: 'She is Gretchen. I am expecting her every day.'

But if he were expecting her, he no longer asked that the carriage be sent to meet her. That had been one of the proofs of his insanity as alleged by his brother, and Arthur was sane enough and cunning enough to avoid a repetition of that offence, but he often went himself to the station, when the New York trains were due, for it was from the west rather than the east that he was now looking for her.

Frank, who watched him nervously, with all his senses sharpened, guessed what had caused the change and grew more nervous and morbid on the subject of Gretchen than ever. At first his brother, who was greatly averse to going out, had asked him to post his letters; business letters they seemed to be, for they were addressed to business firms in New York, London, and Paris, with all of which Arthur had relations. But one morning when Frank went as usual to his brother's room asking if there was any mail to be taken to the office, Arthur, who was just finishing a letter, replied:

'No, thank you, I will post this myself. I have been writing to Gretchen.'

'Yes, to Gretchen?' Frank said, quickly, as he advanced nearer to the writing desk, hoping to see the address on the envelope.