After all, RoBards thought, justifying his seeming anarchy: who is truly guilty of anything? Who would shoot or poison another except under the maddening torment of some spiritual plague?
And if one must say, as the pious pleaded, that Heaven was all-wise and all-merciful and all-loving even though it sent cancer and cholera and mania and jealousy to prey upon helpless humans, why should one abhor a human being who followed that high example and destroyed with ruthlessness?
In this ironic bitterness, RoBards saved from further punishment many a scandalous rebel and felt that he was wreaking a little revenge on the hateful world for its cruelty to Patty, saving other wretches from the long, slow tortures she endured.
But nothing mattered much. His riches annoyed him, since they came too late to make Patty happy with luxuries. It was another sarcasm of the world.
It amused him dismally to furnish old Mrs. Lasher with money to spend; with a coat of paint and new shingles for her house, and credit at A. T. Stewart’s big store. This gave her a parting glimpse of the life she had missed; and when she died, he provided her with a funeral that put a final smile on her old face.
This was not in penance for what he had done to her son. That was only a dim episode now, with condemnation, forgiveness, and atonement all outlawed beyond the statutory limitations. Time does our atoning for us by smoothing sins and virtues to one common level.
Aletta was a more profitable investment for money. He made her so handsome that she attracted suitors. And one day she tearfully confessed that she was in love with a man who besought her in marriage. This meant that Mrs. David RoBards, Junior, would cease to keep that sacred name alive, and when Junior’s daughter should grow up she would also shed the family name.
But nothing mattered much—except that people should get what they wanted as fully and as often as possible. He made over to Aletta a large sum of money, on the condition that she should keep its source a secret.
The habit of secrecy concerning deeds of evil grew to a habit of secrecy concerning deeds of kindliness. He tended more and more to keep everything close, the least important things as well as the most.
He could not be generous often to his son Keith; Keith was too proud of his own success to take tips. He had chosen wisely when he made a career of hydraulic engineering, for water seemed to be the one thing that New York could never buy enough of.