SMOKE and talk filled the dining-room of the Heterogeneous Club, one of those small, intimate clubs of reasonably liberal professional men and women one finds here and there in New York City. Alone, in his accustomed corner, Saunders Rook alternately sipped black coffee and fingered a wan mustache. He was on the fringe of an animated group, in it without being of it, and on this, as on other evenings, was taking an inconspicuous, nodding part in the conversation, sometimes going so far as to say “Not really?” to which the speaker would reply perfunctorily, “Yes, really,” and go on as before.
Nobody knew much about Saunders Rook, and he aroused little, if any, curiosity. It was assumed by the other members, on what grounds no one could say, that he was an artist of some kind; perhaps he wrote music criticism for one of the more pallid of the weeklies; maybe he contributed notes on birds to an ornithological review; again, it might be that he was an architect, specializing in designing ornamental drinking-fountains; perhaps he gave lessons on the flute. His pepper-and-salt suits, his silent neckties, his manner gave no hint. Yet he was not an enigma; he’d gladly have told all about himself had anyone cared to ask him.
The members must have seen Saunders Rook scores of times before that fateful evening, but had you asked any of them to describe him, the reply doubtless would have been:
“Oh, yes, Saunders Rook. I believe there is such a fellow around the club. Let me see. No, I don’t think he’s very tall or very short or very dark or very light. In fact, I don’t believe he’s very anything.”
How and when he had become a member of the club no one knew, and presumably no one had ever been concerned about knowing. Perhaps he was a friend of a friend of a member now deceased. He dined at the club four or five times a week and paid his bills. No one remembered having seen his face anywhere else. The Heterogeneous Club is proud of the range and brilliance of its talk but until this night it had never discussed Saunders Rook. After this night it could talk of little else.
Saunders Rook was not a glum, sullen, aloof soul; he was not unnoticed by choice; evening after evening he was on the edge of the circle of talk, listening, as politely attentive as a well-trained collie. He may even have ventured on one or two occasions to come out with something positive; but if he ever did so, it made no impression on the members of the club, and they were a not unimpressionable lot.
On this night, as he sat over his coffee, Saunders Rook from time to time moistened his lips with his tongue and cleared his throat as if he were making ready to say something important, and then compressed his lips as if he had decided that it was not worth saying.
The truth was that Saunders Rook was afflicted with “cab-wit,” that he was one of those unfortunates who think of the bright things they might have said only while on their way home in a taxicab. He was oppressed by the knowledge that if he did say anything, it would probably be as colorless and unoriginal as he suspected himself to be. He was oppressed mildly, for he was mild in all things, by the certainty that he could not compete with the witty Max Skye or the sparkling Lucile Davega, who could always quote something arresting from Krafft-Ebing. He did not enjoy being ignored any more than any other man does, and he had his full share of man’s natural desire for a beam of the limelight. A craving for attention had of late been growing more insistent within him. His mind began to play with ideas, which, he reasoned, if uttered in a loud enough voice, might bring his hearers to their, and his, feet. He wanted just for once to cause a stir. Just once, he told himself, would appease him.
Then came the lull that always comes from time to time when groups are talking, and Saunders Rook found himself saying distinctly:
“On the Fourth of July I shall commit suicide.”