Flint Part 21

In vain did he try to concentrate his attention upon the Condition of the Finances, the Great Strike in Pittsburg, or the Latest Dynamite Plot in Russia. Between him and the printed page rose the vision of cool, translucent waves crawling up the long reach of damp sand to break at last upon the little shelf of slippery stones. Could it be that only yesterday he was tumbling about in that surf, and to-day _here_? He thought vaguely what a good moral the contrast would have pointed to the sixteenthly of one of his great ancestor's sermons; then he fell to wondering if the old gentleman's theology would have stood the strain of an experience like this. Fancy even this carful doomed to an eternal August journey! Ah, the car is moving again!

Thank Heaven for that! Purgatory after h.e.l.l approaches Paradise.

On and on the train jogs, over flat marshes, past white-spired churches, and factory chimneys belching forth their quota of heat and smoke. The twin rocks, which guard New Haven, loom in view at last; and Flint feels that he is drawing towards home. If it were not for the square, flat package, he would get out and stretch his legs by a walk on the platform. As it is, he picks up the package tenderly, and transports it to the smoking-car. The air here, although filled with smoke, seems more bearable. The leather seats, too, are more tolerable, as his hand falls on them, and, best of all, he can light his pipe here. With the first puff dawns a serenity with which neither faith nor philosophy had been able to endue the journey hitherto.

After all, what are two weeks?--a mere trifle; and he can make it up by a run down to the Virginia Springs in October. This will give a good quiet time too, for the foreign "Review" critiques. The libraries are empty at this time of year, and he can study in peace. Of course there will be a pile of letters waiting for him.

With that reflection, came, irresistibly, the thought of Winifred Anstice, and their curious, mutually deceptive correspondence. In the swiftly thronging events of the last twenty-four hours, he had scarcely had time to let his mind dwell upon that strange clearing up between them last night. He smiled, unconsciously, as he remembered the look of utter bewilderment in those great eyes of hers.

"Candy, sir, peanuts, oranges, and gingerbread! Popcorn in papers!

Take some home?" With this the train-boy, quite oblivious that this was the same person who had met his advances so cavalierly in the other car, again held out an olive branch, this time a cornucopia marked "Ridley, best broken candy."

To his own surprise, Flint felt himself fingering in his pocket for a dime, and heard himself say, "That's all right, I don't want the stuff. Take it in to that little chap in a striped suit, in the next car,--dirty little beggar, wriggled like an eel all day. This will probably make him wriggle all night. Never mind, serves him right."

The boy grinned.

A pa.s.senger in the next seat turned round.

"It is pleasant," he said with a smile, "to see such kindness of heart survive on a day like this."

"Sir," answered Flint, "don't mistake me for a philanthropist. I make a small, but honest livelihood at a different calling."

The man's smile died out in a little disappointment; and he turned again to his paper. Imperfect sympathies! Flint took up his paper also, and read until the sudden shutting off of light warned him that the train had entered the tunnel. Through the checkered darkness, he made his way back; his flat, square package under his arm, to the other car, where all was in the confusion of preparation for arrival.

The pale little mother of the wriggling boy looked up, as he entered.

"Thank you, sir," she began; "it was very kind in you--"

"Not at all, madam; the boy would have been much better without it,"

Flint answered. The art of being thanked gracefully is a difficult one, and Flint had never acquired it.

The train came to a standstill with a jerk which, but for Flint's hand put out to steady her, would have thrown the pale little woman to the floor. He stopped at the car-steps, lifted her and her bundles, her boy and her bird-cage, to the platform, then, touching his hat hurriedly, as if in nervous fear of being thanked again, he made off at full speed to the outlet, where his ears were greeted with the familiar sounds of--

"Cab, sir? Cab? Cab? Have a cab?" which sounded like the chorus of a Chinese opera. "No, I won't have a cab, unless you intend to treat me to a free ride," Flint remarked, ironically, to the nearest applicant, and then swung himself aboard the yellow car at the corner.

As it made its way downtown, he was struck with the strangeness which the city had a.s.sumed, after so short an absence. It did not look like New York at all; and he could not remember noticing before how large a part of the population lived on the street. It reminded him of Naples. He was forced to admit, too, that it had a certain charm of its own,--a charm which deepened as he reached "The Chancellor," the bachelor apartment-house which did duty for a home to a score of unmarried men. He was met by the janitor with a cordiality born of the remembrance of many past gratuities. Yes, his telegram ("wire," the man in uniform called it) had been received, and his rooms were in order. He pulled out his latch-key and turned it in the lock. The door opened on an interior pleasantly familiar, yet piquantly removed from the dulness of every-day acquaintance. The matting was agreeable to his foot. The green bronze Narcissus in the corner beckoned invitingly; above all, the porcelain tub in the bath-room beyond, with its unlimited supply of water, and sybaritic variety of towels, appealed to him irresistibly. Into it he plunged with all despatch, and emerged more cheerful, as well as less begrimed.

An hour later, clad in fresh linen, white vest, and thin summer suit, he sallied forth in search of dinner. He felt that he had earned a good one, and did not intend to scrimp himself. After a moment's deliberation, he turned into Fifth Avenue, and, at Twenty-sixth Street, made his way through the open door of Delmonico's. He saw with pleasure that his favorite table (the second from the corner on the street, not too conspicuous, and yet commanding the avenue) was vacant. He slipped into the chair which the waiter drew out for him, and took up the bill of fare. With the sight of the menu, he felt his flickering appet.i.te revive; but it was still capricious, and would not brook the thought of meat. Little-Neck clams, of course. They seemed to convey a delicate intimation to the waiting stomach of favors to come. Soup? No, too hot for soup. Frogs' legs a la McVickar? Yes, he would have those, though he did not exactly know what "a la McVickar"

indicated, and felt that he should lose caste with the waiter by inquiring. When that functionary recommended a bite of broiled tenderloin, prepared with Madeira sauce, and the addition of fresh mushrooms and a small sweetbread, he allowed himself to be persuaded.

An English snipe, with chicory salad and some cheese, with coffee, completed his order. Oh, and a pint of Rudesheimer with it!

The waiter departed; and Flint, not hungry enough to be impatient, settled back in his chair with the damp evening paper unopened beside him. The sigh he gave was one of satisfaction, rather than regret. His gastronomic taste was to some extent feminine. He cared as much for the service as for the thing served, and found a carnal gratification in the shining gla.s.s and the table linen, smoothed to the verge of slipperiness. Really, he wondered how he could have endured the Nepaug Inn so long.

A hand laid upon his shoulder caused him to turn his head quickly.

"Halloa, Graham! You here?"

"Yes, we sail on the 'Etruria' to-morrow,--only in town over night.

Beastly hot, isn't it? My wife is here. Come over, won't you, and let me present you?"

Now Mr. Jonas Harrington Graham, though one of the most fashionable, was by no means the best beloved of Flint's acquaintance; and it was with an inward conviction of perjury that he murmured, "Most happy, I'm sure," and made his way to the table by the centre window which the Grahams had selected. The lady already seated there was sleek and well appointed. Flint noticed that the people at the other tables did her the honor to prolong their casual glance to an instant's critical inspection. The women studied her costume of black with white lace as if wondering whether the confection of a Parisian artist might not be successfully duplicated by a domestic dressmaker (as it never can, ladies). The men's gaze generalized more, but had in it a hint of approbation which Flint found offensive. He did not relish the idea of making one of a restaurant party which challenged observation; but he perceived at once that it was unavoidable. Mrs. Graham was very gracious, and insisted, with much emphasis, that he should take his dinner with them.

"You _must_ come and dine with us at our table. You look _so_ lonely over there," she remarked. "I have some sympathy with bachelors. My husband was one once."

"Yes," answered Flint; "I knew him in those pre-madamite days."

This allusion was too occult for Mrs. Graham. She smiled the smile of a.s.sent without apprehension, and asked if Flint had been at Bar Harbor this summer. He should have been; it was _so_ pleasant. The young man felt a wild desire to set forth the rival charms of Nepaug, and urge her to try it next season. The thought of her and her husband settled at the inn made him smile as he saw her lift a roll in her delicately ringed fingers, and smooth back the lace of her cuffs. What would happen, he wondered, if she were seated before a Nepaug dinner, with a Nepaug tablecloth and napkin?

"I have not been so far afield as Mount Desert," he answered, with an irrepressible smile at his own thoughts. "I stayed in town till July, and then I went to Nepaug. Perhaps you never heard of that delightful summer resort?"

"Nepaug? Nepaug?" repeated Mrs. Graham, with as near an approach to reflection as she ever permitted herself. "Why, that's where Winifred Anstice was going! Do you know Winifred Anstice?"

"Do _you_ know her?" Flint questioned in his turn, in some surprise.

"Oh, dear, yes; we met her one summer when we were travelling in the West. We were visiting on the same ranch. Mr. Graham quite lost his head over her; didn't you, dear?"

"Well, I was a little touched. She showed up uncommonly well out there,--rode a broncho, and beat all the men firing a pistol."

"Yes," his wife added, "and then so clever--so _frightfully_ clever.

Why, I've seen her _reading_ before breakfast, and not a novel either.

You and she must have enjoyed each other; for Mr. Graham tells me you are--"

"Frightfully clever, too? Don't believe any such slander, I beg of you, Mrs. Graham! It is not fair to blast a man's reputation like that at the very outset. What chance would there be for me in society, if such a rumor got abroad?"

"Well," responded Mrs. Graham, "there's a great deal of truth in what you say. It's very nice of course to be lively and good company, and all that; but when it comes to right down cleverness, and particularly bookish cleverness, it does stand in a man's way socially. At the smartest houses, they don't want to be talked down, and still less to be written up afterward. I don't feel so myself. I just _dote_ on literary people; but then I am called positively blue."

"What was there to do at Nepaug?" asked Mr. Graham, who had not followed the intricacies of his wife's remarks. "Any good shooting?"

"I'm afraid not, unless you rode a cow and shot at a goat," Flint answered, and was rather relieved to have the conversation drift away on to the comparative merits, as hunting-grounds, of the different sections of the country. The subject was not specially exciting to Flint; but it was at least impersonal, and he felt an unaccountable aversion to hearing any further discussion of Winifred Anstice.

The diners had advanced to the meat course,--Graham having complimented Flint so far as to duplicate his order, with the addition of an ice for Mrs. Graham and Pommery Sec for the party,--when a noise was heard further up the avenue. The sound drew nearer, and the notes of a bra.s.s band tooted a lively tune which re-echoed from the walls of the Brunswick, and drew a crowd from the benches of the square.

Several people in the restaurant left their places, and came to the window to investigate the commotion. Flint himself rose, napkin in hand, and stood under the blaze of the lights, looking out.

"Oh!" exclaimed Mrs. Graham, raising her lorgnon as the procession came in sight, "it's that horrid Salvation Army!"

"Bless me! so it is," a.s.sented her husband, adjusting his eye-gla.s.s.

"Pretty girl, though, that--in the front row with the tambourine."

Flint's eyes followed his companion's, and saw Nora Costello walking a few paces in advance of her comrades, the electric light from the northern edge of the square falling on her pale face and rings of dark, curling hair.

The tambourines jangled discordantly; the bra.s.s instruments were out of tune; the rag-tag crowd surged about, some jeering, some cheering,--everything in the environment was repellent, but in the midst shone that pale face like a star.

Attracted by the brilliant lights within, or perhaps impelled by that curious psychic law which arrests the attention of one closely watched, the girl turned her head as she pa.s.sed their corner, and her eyes met those of Flint; she smiled gravely, and he bowed.

Graham saw the interchange of glances, and looked at the man beside him, with the raised eyebrows of amused comprehension. Flint could have shot him.

"I don't see," said Mrs. Graham, returning to her venison, "why they let those creatures go about like that, making everybody uncomfortable. They are very annoying."

"Yes, very. So were the early Christians," murmured Flint, as he helped himself to the mushrooms.

"I never studied church history," said Mrs. Graham, a little repressively. She felt that the conversation was bordering on blasphemy, and sought to turn it into safer channels. She begged Flint, whom, she looked upon, in spite of his denials, as alarmingly cultivated, to recommend a course of reading for the steamer, so that she might be "up" on the a.s.sociations of the English lakes.