Phases of an Inferior Planet Part 45

"Perfectly."

"By the way, I didn't know that you felt enough interest in the elections to induce you to parade the streets on their account."

"Oh, it was the doctor's fault. He got me into the medley, and then deserted because he found it too democratic."

"It is democracy turned upsidedown that I object to," remarked Salvers.

"There seems a lack of decency about it--as if we were to awake some morning to find the statue of Liberty on its head, with its legs in the air. I believe in the old conservative G.o.ddess of our fathers--Freedom shackled by the chains of respectability."

"So did Father Algarcife once," said Nevins. "He had an oration ent.i.tled 'The Jeffersonian Principles' which he used to deliver before the mirror when he thought I was asleep."

"I believe in it still," interrupted Father Algarcife, "but I no longer deliver orations. Greater wisdom has made me silent. Well, I suppose the result of last night was hardly a surprise."

"Hardly," responded Nevins. "What can one expect when everybody who knows the value of an office is running for it, and everybody who doesn't is blowing horns about the runners. But I won't keep you.

Good-day."

"Good-day."

Nevins turned back.

"By the way," he said to Father Algarcife, "I wish you would drop in and look at that portrait the first chance you have. I am waiting for your criticism."

"Very well. Congratulate Ardly for me."

And they separated, Salvers motioning to his coachman to follow him to the church.

Upon going inside, Father Algarcife found his princ.i.p.al a.s.sistant, a young fellow with a fair, fresh face, like a girl's, and a high forehead, surmounted by waves of flaxen hair. His name was Ellerslie, and his devotional sincerity was covered by a shy and nervous manner.

He greeted the elder priest with a furtive deprecation, the result of an innate humility of character.

"I went by the rectory as soon as I had seen the morning papers," he said. "Thank G.o.d you escaped unhurt!"

The irritation with which Father Algarcife had replied to Nevins's solicitude did not appear now.

"I hope you were not troubled by the report," he answered. "There was absolutely nothing in it except that I was struck by a vehicle and stunned slightly. But the exaggerated accounts have caused me a great deal of annoyance. By the way, John," and his face softened, "I have not told you how much I liked your last sermon."

The other flushed and shook his head. "They fall so far short," he returned, and his voice trembled. "I know now that I shall never be able to speak. When I face the people there is so much that I want to say that I grow dumb. My feeling is so strong that my words are weak."

"Time may change that."

"No," said Ellerslie; "but if I may listen to you I am content. I will serve G.o.d in humble ways. It is the service that I love, after all, and not the glory."

"Yes, yes," responded Father Algarcife, gently.

He went into the sacristy, where he sat for a few moments in reverie, his head resting upon his hand. Then he rose and shook himself free of the thought which haunted him.

For several weeks after this he paid no calls except among his poor. The houses of his richer parishioners he appeared to shun, and his days were spent in active work in the mission districts. At all hours his calm black figure and virile face might be seen pa.s.sing in and out of the grimy tenements or along the narrow streets. He had opened, in connection with his mission-house, a lodging for waifs, and it was his custom to spend several evenings of the week among its inmates. The house had been founded by funds which, until his call to the church, had been expended in Asiatic missions, but which, before his indomitable opposition, had been withdrawn. As the work went on it became of special interest to him, and a good half of his personal income went yearly to its support.

"It is not a charity," he had once said to Salvers. "I disapprove of such charities. It is merely a house where lodgings are let in as business-like a manner as they are around the corner, for five cents a spot; only our lodgings are better, and there is a bath thrown in."

"And a dinner as well," Salvers had answered, "to say nothing of breakfast and a bed to one's self. By the way, is your system of serving newsboys and boot-blacks on credit successful?"

Father Algarcife smiled.

"I have found it so," he replied; "but, you know, our terms are long, and we give good measure for the money."

It was in this work that he was absorbing himself, when, one day in early December, he received a note from Mrs. Ryder:

"I have secured a box at the opera for Thursday night," (she wrote), "that I might beg you to hear Madame Cambria, who sings Ortrude in 'Lohengrin.' Her contralto is superb, and I wish to engage her for our Christmas services, but I hesitate to do so until I have had your verdict upon her voice. This is a new charitable appeal, and one which I trust you will not refuse.

"Believe me to be, "Always sincerely yours, "FLORENCE VAN HORNE RYDER.

"The De Reszkes sing also."

He sent an acceptance, and the following day received an urgent request that he should dine quietly with Mr. Ryder and herself on Thursday evening. To this he consented, after some hesitation; and when the evening came he presented himself, to find Mrs. Ryder awaiting him with the pretty, vivacious young woman of the dinner-party, who was a guest in the house.

Mrs. Ryder crossed the room, with her large white hand outstretched, her satin gown rustling as she moved, and the lamplight shimmering over her ma.s.sive shoulders in their setting of old lace. The vivacious young woman, whose name was Darcy, greeted him with a smile which seemed to blend in a flash of brightness her black eyes and white teeth.

"Mr. Ryder is a little late," his wife explained, "but he will not delay us long." And she pa.s.sed to the subject of the Christmas services and the contralto she wished to secure.

While she was speaking, Ryder came in with his usual cordial pleasantries. He was looking fresh and a little flushed, as if he had just left a Turkish bath, and was dressed with an immaculateness of detail which carried a suggestion of careful polish. His sensitive skin, beneath which the purplish flush rose, was as fine as a child's, and his round, smooth hands had a suffusion of pink in the palms.

In a moment dinner was served, and they went into the dining-room. Ryder was easy and affable. He talked pleasantly about the events of the past few weeks, describing as if for the hundredth time the success of the Horse Show, and stating good-natured objections to the awards of the judges.

"It is a farce," he said--"a mere farce. They don't recognize the best horse-flesh when they see it." Then he smiled at his wife. "But who can blame them? It was really a puzzle to decide which were the most worth looking at, the horses or the women. It is hard to say where the blue ribbon belonged. Ah, father, you miss a great deal by being a saint."

Miss Darcy interrupted him with a pretty protest. "I am sure a saint may look at a horse," she said, "and a woman." And she added: "I have always forgotten to ask you who the lady in violet and silver-fox was who sat in Mr. Buisson's box? I did not recognize her."

Ryder's eyes narrowed slightly, but he answered easily, "Oh, that was Mrs. Gore, I believe."

Miss Darcy flashed a smile.

"The Englishwoman I have heard so much about? Why, I thought she was called a beauty!"

Ryder laughed.

"She is a beauty when you know her," he said, "or, rather, you get the idea that she is. But she isn't English, you know. She married an Englishman."

Then he changed the subject and drew Father Algarcife into a discussion of church decorations.

When dinner was over, Mrs. Ryder's maid appeared, bearing the opera-wraps, and the two women trailed down the steps and into the carriage. When Father Algarcife had stepped inside, Ryder closed the door and made his excuses.

"I'll look in a little later," he said; "but if Mr. Nevins finds you you won't need me, and a whole evening of it tires my nerves."

Then he lighted a cigar and strolled off leisurely, while the carriage started.

When they entered the opera-house the curtain had risen, and the tenor was singing his farewell to the swan.

As Father Algarcife seated himself in the shadow of the box and looked over Mrs. Ryder's superb shoulders at the stage and the glittering foot-lights, he felt a quick impulse to rush away from it all. He hated the noise and the heat and the glare. The heavy atmosphere seemed oppressive and unnatural, and the women, sparkling brilliantly in the tiers of boxes, looked like beautiful exotics, fragrant with the perishable bloom of a hot-house. It was with a sensation of relief that he recalled the dull mission in the slums, where he had spent the morning.