An American Suffragette Part 4

She smiled at this, but was not quite ready to drop the former subject.

"Jack, dear, did you take Miss Holland home at one o'clock in the morning?"

He laughed at her this time, as he bent to kiss her. "I really believe you are jealous, you little nymph. Of course I took her home. She could not stay there all night, and there was no one else to take her."

She looked very serious. "No, I don't know what jealousy is," she slowly and emphatically said, "but I don't want to know people who do the things that Miss Holland does, and I don't want you to know them."

"My dear child," he said, taking her hands in his and catching her eyes with his own steady glance. "I must know whoever is thrown into my path either in a professional or a social way. All people are intensely interesting to me, for we are, after all, but one great family of human beings, trying to carve out lives that are worth while, and this we can do better by getting the best there is from each other." He hesitated a moment, still looking steadily at her. She quivered slightly, but he was dimly conscious of the colossal character of the will she was summoning to her aid. Then very slowly, but with all the earnestness of his nature, he added, "You must get away from these views, for they are dwarfing and not becoming to you, and if you do not we shall be very unhappy. Miss Holland is a remarkable young woman. She is destined to fill a great place in our American social and political life. She is well worthy of your friendship."

She withdrew her hands, but still kept her eyes fixed on his. Her brow contracted and with emphasis she said: "Miss Holland has forfeited her place in our set by her conduct; why, Jack, you don't know how she is criticized by our friends or you would not suggest such a thing."

He arose with a shrug of his shoulders. Fortunately, Mrs. Kimball appeared at this moment and they motored to the Plaza for luncheon, which was a somewhat formal and unsatisfactory affair, in spite of all his efforts to make it otherwise. The young man could not but feel that Mrs. Kimball shared her daughter's views--was, in fact, their author--and that in the eyes of his future mother-in-law he had been guilty of a breach of etiquette far more serious than an infraction of the moral law. He left them with the understanding that he would accompany them to the theatre in the evening.

CHAPTER VII

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE AND SURGERY

The days of a militant suffragette are full to overflowing, and Silvia Holland was not able to see Mrs. Bell and her little daughter early the following morning as she had planned. It must have been well toward the middle of the afternoon when she entered the modest apartment, and going to the bed, visible in the alcove, kissed the child and put a great, dewy bunch of violets in her hand. She took them, and hugged them tight in her thin little arms, while her eyes looked into Silvia's wonderingly, and her mother turned away to hide the sudden tears.

The apartment was well though not expensively furnished, and both mother and child had the unmistakable air of good birth and refinement. As Silvia glanced at Mrs. Bell she was conscious of something in her face at once baffling and appealing. She had the indefinable look of one who dwells with a sorrow for which there is no cure.

"Are you quite sure there is nothing I can do for either of you to-day?"

Silvia asked, a trifle diffidently, for she did not want to offend by overzeal.

"You and Dr. Earl have placed us under so many obligations that we can never hope to repay them," Mrs. Bell said quietly. "If I do not speak more freely of what I feel, it is because I have no words for its expression."

"Don't speak or think of obligations," Silvia said lightly, "and here is my card, so that if at any time I might be of service to you I hope you will not hesitate to call on me. I live at the Whittier Studios." The card which she gave Mrs. Bell read:

SILVIA HOLLAND, Attorney and Counsellor-at-Law, City Investment Building, New York City.

Mrs. Bell looked at it curiously. "Oh, it isn't possible that you are _that_ Miss Holland, _the_ Miss Holland!" she said incredulously.

Silvia laughed. "Don't I look as if I could say 'Gentlemen of the jury'

with sufficient gravity?" she said. "Probably I shall do better when we say 'Ladies of the jury,' too."

"You look like what you are, a beautiful and fashionable lady," Mrs.

Bell answered. "Surely no one would ever take you for a professional woman."

"Must a fashionable lady be a listless parasite? Even if she wishes merely to be a queen of society, would she not be more queenly if she knew the trials and afflictions of others, and, better still, knew how to help them? Would she be less a queen if she were not dependent upon some man for her daily bread----"

A sudden flash of something, she could not tell whether it was pain or rebellion or despair, crossed Mrs. Bell's face, and Silvia hesitated and then went on rather hurriedly, as if, knowing she had struck a false note, she sought to distract the other woman's thought from it. "I am trying to demonstrate the glorious mission that belongs to woman when she fills her predestined sphere of economic independence and political freedom."

"Political freedom will come first and easiest," said the woman slowly.

She raised her eyes, filled with trouble, and looked full into Silvia's.

"The other is the greater boon, and will be harder to win. Some day I may need to consult a lawyer; there is no one I would so gladly trust; it is a personal matter and may adjust itself, if not----"

"If not, telephone to make sure that I am in, and I shall be glad to see you at any time," answered Silvia.

There was the sound of a quick, firm step in the hall, and the bell rang. Mrs. Bell opened the door and admitted Dr. Earl. After a few questions and the exchange of greetings, he went over to the bedside of his small patient. He found the child doing admirably, and glanced hastily about the room, trying to make up his mind whether he might offer any other a.s.sistance than that of a professional character. He decided that he could not, and realized with a sense of pleasure and relief that Miss Holland would be able to attend to such details with more tact and skill than he could. Nor could he help the glow of gratification that they should be a.s.sociated in so vital a matter, one that he felt swept away the petty conventionalities of society, and placed them on a footing of understanding and common sympathy not to have been acquired by months, or even years, of the ordinary social amenities. After a few directions for the care of the small patient, and a promise to look in the following day, he told Mrs. Bell how to find him in case of any sudden need and took up his hat and stick.

"Were you going, Dr. Earl? Can I set you down anywhere? My car is at the door."

He bowed, and followed her out. "We have an embarra.s.sment of riches," he said, "for my car is also here." Then, rather boyishly, moved by an impulse he would have found it hard to explain, he said, "Suppose we dismiss them both, and walk up through the Park?"

She acquiesced, and a few moments later they were strolling up the Avenue, rather silently, considering that each had many things to say.

As usual, it was the woman who broke the silence.

"Tell me about all this. I never was more interested in anything in my life," she said, looking up at him with a glance that carried the subtlest flattery, and, while her query was vague, he understood and made no attempt to evade it.

"It is a long story," he said; "have you time for it to-day? And it is really no more remarkable than the effect you produced in your parade yesterday, and I think the causes are the same. The world is full of mystery, but before honest, earnest purpose of any kind the storehouses of mystery will eventually open. The fact is, that the present tremendous progressive movement in the world is spiritual and every phase of it is interdependent upon every other element. The thoughtless call these things 'fads.' In reality, each one of them marks a crystallization of centuries of thought and hope and dream for the advancement and elevation of the human race. The world, as usually happens in spiritual matters, awakened to the importance of all of them at the same time." He paused, as if realizing for the first time how personal was the story for which she had asked. "You will think me an egregious egotist, Miss Holland, I fear."

"No, whatever you may be, or I may think you, you need have no fears on that score." She answered simply, directly. "Please tell me--if you think I deserve so great a confidence."

He bowed gravely; there was no hint of coquetry in her manner.

"Directly after my graduation at Harvard, three years ago, I opened offices in New York, intending to specialize in surgery, for I had prepared for that, though I desired to obtain a general practice for a while to put into effect and improve my theoretical knowledge. In a misty way I soon realized that neither my own efforts nor those of my colleagues were crowned with the success that should attend a profession founded upon strictly scientific principles, as modern surgery is. The chief cause of disturbance with me was that so many operations were performed which subsequent developments showed might have been avoided, but which at the time seemed imperative. I redoubled my studies of _materia medica_, hoping to find a way by which this difficulty might be obviated or overcome, and while my constant researches helped, I still found much difficulty in arriving at accurate conclusions before attempting an operation. I found nothing that satisfied me. I was also greatly bothered and baffled by the large number of cases which the surgeon encounters, controlled or dependent upon nervous conditions and the futility of the drugs ordinarily given.

"While in this mood a friend of mine called at my office one Wednesday evening by appointment. He was the general manager of a large utility company that has to do with the people of every section of the civilized world, and a man of rare judgment, knowledge of the world, and poise. We were on most intimate terms, and I had already told him something of these perplexities. This evening, I had supposed that he was coming to see me professionally, and I had made other engagements.

As soon as he stepped into my private office, he said: 'Doctor, cancel every engagement you have for this evening. I need you very badly in affairs of my own. You are to ask no questions, but do as I request and send me your bill to-morrow.'

"Of course I could not refuse him, so I arranged to go with him, and then asked whether I should require surgical instruments or only a medicine case. He replied that I would need neither, and I could gain nothing from his manner, for he was very grave. At his suggestion we walked, going up Fifth Avenue to the Park, and then across the Park to the corner of 96th Street and Central Park West, where there stands a great church. The rolling notes of the organ filled the quiet with an impressiveness I had never felt before, and the congregation was singing an old hymn with an earnestness and depth of feeling quite different from most congregational singing. We entered and were shown to seats in the balcony, in the front row, where we had an excellent view of most of those below. 'You will find many of your acquaintances here,' he said, and on looking around I was surprised at the great number of prominent New York men and women in the audience.

"After the preliminary proceedings those that desired to do so were invited to tell their experiences in combating disease, or other adverse conditions. What I heard was a revelation. This experience, corroborating, as it did, my own observations, emphasized how little of the field of suggestive and mental therapeutics the ordinary medical pract.i.tioner really filled, and I determined to explore that field before going any further with my practice. I thanked my friend for taking me to this place, and within a month I decided to go abroad. I visited the inst.i.tutions of note in Europe, where suggestive therapeutics are practiced, and then went to India, where I spent many months. There I found the original source of suggestive, mental and spiritual treatment.

"If the Yogi of India could supplement his method of training the subconscious mind with the knowledge which our regular physicians possess, and could apply both with discriminating skill, we would have the greatest human healing power ever known. The best I could hope for was to apply as much of the wisdom of the Yogi and other cults in India and Europe as I could master in the brief time at my disposal, and that I am attempting to do. With all the perfection of system in training the subconscious mind that characterizes a comparatively few of the inhabitants of India, the millions are left without any appreciable benefits therefrom, just as the millions here are left without the full benefits of the special training of the few.

"We are but touching the borderland of this mysterious realm of the occult, the subconscious and the spiritual forces that have such an important bearing upon all phases of human life, and which, when intelligently applied to the child in school and the direction of the individual in his career, promise so much for the elevation, longevity and achievements of the human race.

"The world is just waking up to the vast significance of the spiritual teachings of Jesus Christ, and their bearing upon all phases and activities of human life. When Christ told the Pharisees that 'the kingdom of G.o.d is within you,' he carried the lesson, though little understood then, and so fully comprehended now, that Christianity, citizenship, government, health, happiness and progress are all dependent upon the character of the ideals and purposes and daily life of the individual.

"When Christ told the lawyer that to 'love thy neighbor as thyself' was one of the essentials of salvation, he laid the corner-stone for a pure and honest democracy, without which underlying principle there can be no lasting democratic government. We now know, in medicine, that much of longevity and good health and power of recuperation depend upon the ideals of the individual, and their inspiring influence.

"It is too bad that with all our tremendous progress we allow bigotry and prejudice to hamper us in getting the most out of the wisdom around us as well as that of the ages, all of which is correlated. Yet very often the orthodox Christian, who believes that Christ not only healed the sick but also raised the dead, decries the Christian Scientist who only professes to restore the sick on the theory that disease cannot exist in an individual properly imbued with Christ's teachings. Too often the orthodox doctor of medicine denounces the healer who overcomes apparent disease through mental suggestion or arrests a nervous breakdown in a patient by teaching that patient how to relax, when the doctor himself does not hesitate to give bread pills in the first instance and to recommend a sanitarium where relaxation is the only thing attempted in the second. And I presume this quotation from the Dhamma-pada, which is many centuries older than the Christian religion, would be denounced as heresy by some of the Christian Scientists, although it embodies the spirit and almost the words of their own teachings: 'All that we are is the result of what we have thought. It is founded on our thoughts; it is made up of our thoughts. If a man speak or act with an evil thought, pain follows him as the wheel follows the foot of the ox that draws the carriage.'"

Presently Dr. Earl hailed a pa.s.sing taxi-cab, and gave the order to be taken to the Whittier Studios. The drive home was silent. Once or twice Silvia looked at her tall companion. She was frankly curious about the Paris case, but something in the quiet, self-contained face of the man beside her did not invite questions. On his part, John Earl was asking himself why he should have given his confidence to this comparative stranger, and the longer he thought about it the less able was he to answer his question.

CHAPTER VIII

THE OMNIPRESENT EYES OF FIFTH AVENUE

The source of gossip in a village is the corner grocery store; in a small city, what goes on about the public square; in the medium-sized city, what transpires in the leading cafe; in New York, Fifth Avenue and Central Park are the all-abounding sources of gossip. The Avenue has a thousand curious eyes; those on the sidewalk peering into automobiles and carriages for sensations; those being whirled along in vehicles, straining their power in the quest of salacious information among the throng beyond the curbstone. All New York pa.s.ses along Fifth Avenue at some time or another. All of one's friends are always pa.s.sing along that way when one does not particularly wish to be seen by them. If one is walking, the friends are invariably driving; if one is driving, of course the ubiquitous acquaintances are out for a stroll. Sometimes people have been known to escape two-thirds of the omnipresent eyes that line the sidewalks, pack the Avenue and infest the highways of Central Park, but no person has ever been heard of who escaped all of them.