Atlantic Narratives: Modern Short Stories Part 21

II

True to his resolve, John Scidmore took an early train to San Francisco next morning, although he could not have said why. It was as impossible to place insurance at eight-thirty as it was at three A.M., since no self-respecting insurance office opened until nine. Still there is a certain comfort in even futile activity when one has the fidgets.

It was a beautiful October morning such as often veils the Berkeley hills in faint purple and draws a soft glamour over the city of San Francisco; and as Scidmore walked briskly down the elm-shaded streets of Berkeley toward the train, he felt elusively happy, notwithstanding the ripples below the surface of his content.

The office-boy was taking books out of the safe when he arrived at the office. In a corner by the wash-basin one of the stenographers stood, fluffing up her hair. A janitor dusted the desks with casual attention.

As Scidmore entered he noticed a woman sitting near the counter. She rose instantly, lifting her veil, smiling a welcome at him. He crossed over to her--it was Julia Norris. His heart began to beat violently, but the next moment he had recovered himself and was able to smile back at her in perfect self-control.

'You are early,' he said, offering her his hand.

'Yes, and I'm in trouble. You know those flats I insured last week--they burned down early this morning. They tell me there isn't a stick left standing.'

His hand fell as if a blow had wilted it. 'The flats you insured last week--' he echoed, sparring for time. 'I don't believe I--understand.'

'Why, didn't you get my telephone message? I 'phoned last Tuesday. I thought I talked to _you_. I was sure it was your voice. Could I have rung up the wrong office?'

Her uncertainty steadied him. Unconsciously she opened a door of escape.

Scidmore laid his hat on the counter. Julia Norris fluttered back to her seat and he sat down beside her.

'I suppose I've bungled things again,' she went on. 'Usually I leave everything to Mr. Rice, but this insurance matter I took into my own hands. I wanted you to have the business, so I left positive instructions with Mr. Rice to let me know when the next insurance policy expired. That was last Friday. I 'phoned you at once. I can't imagine--'

As she rattled on, pointing an accusing finger at herself, John Scidmore grew surer and surer of his next step. There was not the faintest note of calculation in his att.i.tude; confused and dazed he merely followed her lead.

'And you never received any policy?' he questioned. 'Not after a week?

You must have thought we were rather inattentive--or slow.'

She shook her head. 'I forgot the whole transaction--until this morning.

Rice 'phoned me at eight o'clock.'

'But there may still be a chance,' Scidmore suggested, shamed by the very ease with which he was escaping. 'Perhaps another clerk got the message. I'll question them all. Or--maybe you rang up the Falcon's office direct.'

She laid a gloved hand on his arm as she shrugged.

He shook his head. 'You can't imagine how this bothers me,' he went on.

He began to feel a certain boldness, such as thieves feel when they put over a sharp trick. He wanted to prolong the discussion, to dally with danger. 'To think that in trying to be of service to me you should have gone astray. I wouldn't have had it happen for--Let me see, what was the amount of your order?'

'Ten thousand dollars.'

'_Ten thousand dollars!_ That's a lot of money.'

'Yes,' she admitted slowly, as she moved toward the door. 'I'm pretty comfortable, but n.o.body likes to throw money into the street.'

He thrust his hands into his pockets in an effort at nonchalance. He could feel his temples throbbing. But his confusion cleared before Julia Norris's unruffled smile, deepening a growing sense of irritation. She was not greatly concerned, first, because she did not have to be, and second, because her faith in his integrity was unshaken. Her complacency and trustfulness enraged him. What was ten thousand dollars to her?

In the midst of his musings, her voice, curiously remote, roused him.

'I'm going to have lunch with Kitty,' she said, almost gayly.

'Lunch with Kitty?' he echoed. Then, floundering with mingled consternation and embarra.s.sment, he finished, 'Oh, yes,--won't that be fine! Yes, by all means do!'

And yet, unnerved as he was, he went through the conventional motions of courtesy, bowing her to the door, pressing her hand cordially, sweeping her a good-bye with exaggerated warmth. Even when she was gone her unperturbed smile mocked him. She did not have the slightest suspicion of his unworthiness, and therein lay the essence of the sudden and unqualified hate he began to feel for her.

John Scidmore questioned all the clerks as they entered the office. Had any one received a telephone message about a week ago from Mrs. Julia Norris? He was playing his game so earnestly that he would not have been surprised to find somebody acknowledging the transaction. The manager came in at ten o'clock; Scidmore even presented the case to _him_: Mrs.

Julia Norris, a client of his, had telephoned an order for insurance over a week ago. n.o.body remembered it. The property to be insured had burned up. Of course, Mrs. Norris might have been mistaken (she admitted as much), but there was just a chance--

The manager, instantly interested, adjusted his gla.s.ses. A ten-thousand-dollar line neglected! Incredible! He began to investigate personally, calling up one clerk after another, while Scidmore listened like a highwayman, tempting chance from a spirit of sheer bravado.

n.o.body remembered, even under the most searching cross-examination. The private exchange operator, who was usually very keen about such matters, could not place the call.

Then came a discussion as to how to prevent such a lapse should one occur. Scidmore sat at the manager's desk, quite the hero of the hour--a very important personage, whose ten-thousand-dollar client had come to grief. It was years since he had figured in a question of office policy.

Gradually the uniqueness of his position pushed Julia Norris and her loss into a hazy background.

He returned to his routine work with a gay spirit. Several times during the morning the manager called him for further conference and inquiry.

Finally a letter was drafted to Mrs. Julia Norris, to the effect that the California Insurance Brokers' Company regretted exceedingly to inform her that upon closer examination no trace could be found of her telephone message. They could only conclude that she inadvertently had rung up the wrong office. Inquiry at the Falcon Company's office, however, developed that no such insurance had been placed, even by a rival firm. They hoped that this unfortunate occurrence would not stand in the way of other favors at her hands, and so forth.

John Scidmore signed the letter with a flourish.

All morning the fiction of Julia Norris's mistake still persisted. Why had she not taken greater precautions? The idea of telephoning in a line of insurance and not inquiring the name of the person who took the message! Common sense would dictate such a course. He began to feel abused, as if Julia Norris had betrayed him in some way.

III

It was not until John Scidmore had scrambled aboard the ferryboat on his way home and had seated himself in his usual place, under the pilot-house, that his inflated spirits began to collapse. The afternoon had been spent in a mad rush of business,--an avalanche of petty orders and details such as periodically afflicts an insurance broker's office.

The sense of security which had enveloped him all day fell away before a vague uneasiness. Before an audience, he had played his part spiritedly; without the spur of interested auditors his performance lagged. There was an element of excitement in serving moral fiction to unsuspecting listeners, but hoodwinking himself proved a boresome task. The boldest highwayman had a cleaner record: at least such an outlaw made bold plays and took great chances. He had not risked so much as his little finger on his enterprise, and his victim's cheek was still warm with the kiss of betrayal. Lies, thievery, murder--one by one these suggestions of outlawry mentally pa.s.sed in review and sank into insignificance before this sinister word--_betrayal_. In all the calendar of human weaknesses, John Scidmore could recall none that served so contemptible an end as betrayal. And he, John Scidmore, had been guilty of this crowning meanness.

If the memory of Julia Norris's confidence stabbed him, what of the att.i.tude of his superiors at the office? _They_ had never even thought of questioning him. As he looked back on the events of the morning he was appalled. It seemed that all these years he had built up barriers of moral responsibility only to see them swept away before a freshet of fears.

A tramping of feet warned him that the boat was swinging into the slip.

He rose mechanically. The exertion of following the scrambling crowd and finding himself a seat on the train interrupted his self-accusation. By the time he was comfortably settled again, he mentally had begun his defense.

Why should he make such an absurd fuss over confessing his fault to Julia Norris? She was rich; her husband had left her a cool million. Ten thousand dollars didn't matter, and besides, she was Kitty's friend. Had he the right to purchase a quiet conscience at the expense of Kitty's pride?

What had he given Kitty in the fifteen years of their wedded life? Had he played the game boldly and well? Did she hold her head high at the mention of his name? No, he had fallen short of his own standards. How much more must he have fallen short of her hopes for him! And now he was lacking the courage to swallow his medicine. He was ready to whimper and whine at the load which his own inefficiency had forced upon his conscience. He argued that strong men made bold plays and d.a.m.ned the consequence; in other words, they took a chance. But his soul was tricking itself out in a dramatic subterfuge. What he really had discovered was something to excuse his weakness, and this something loomed up conveniently in the person of Kitty Scidmore, his wife.

When Scidmore arrived home, he went directly to his room and closed the door. The thought of meeting Kitty troubled him. But after he had slipped on an old coat and freshened up, he felt better.

At the dinner table he noticed a tired, pinched look about his wife's mouth. Julia Norris was every day as old as his wife, but time had dealt kindly with her. Her face was still fresh and rosy; there was not even a glint of gray in her hair. Resentment began to move him, resentment at Julia Norris, at her fortune, at her friendship for his wife, at every detail connected with his memory of her.

Kitty began to talk. Scidmore sat silent, crumbling his bread. Finally the dread subject came to life. Kitty looked up and said,--

'Julia was late to-day, as usual. Poor dear Julia, what a generous soul she is!'

Scidmore began to fidget. 'Late? How did that happen? She left our office long before ten o'clock.'

'Oh, but you don't know Julia! She did a thousand and one things before she arrived here. And such a disheveled creature as she was! And so full of apologies and troubles! Nothing to speak of--she laughed them all away in five minutes.'