The One Woman Part 29

"But, my son, new theology or old theology, Bible or no Bible, Heaven or no Heaven, h.e.l.l or no h.e.l.l, G.o.d or no G.o.d, it is right to do right!" Again his high nervous voice rang like a silver trumpet.

"I am trying to do right."

"Yet greater wrong than this can no man do on earth--lead, captivate the soul and body of a gracious and innocent girl, teach her the miracle of love in motherhood, and then desert her for a fairer and younger face."

"But, father, I cannot live a lie."

"Then you will cherish, honour, love and protect your wife until death; and the old marriage ceremony read, 'until death us depart.'

Your vow is eternal and goes beyond the physical incident of death itself."

"Yet how can I control the beat of my heart? We must go back to the reality of Nature and her eternal laws, in spite of illusions and theories," maintained the younger man.

"Ah, my boy, these things you call illusions I call the great faiths of our fathers, the revelation of G.o.d. Call them what you will, even if we say they are illusions, they are blessed illusions.

They are the steel bars behind which we have caged the crouching, blind and silent forces of nature, fierce, savage and cruel as death."

His voice sank to a whisper, he leaned over and placed his trembling hand on Gordon's arm and added:

"I once felt the impulse to kill a man. It was natural, elemental and all but overpowering. Remember that civilisation itself is impossible without tradition. I know that progress is made only by its modification in growth. But growth is not destruction, and progress is never backward to beast or savage. Marriage is not a mere convention between a man and a woman, subject to the whim of either party. It is a divine social ordinance on which the structure of human civilisation has been reared. It cannot be broken without two people's consent and the consent of society, and then only for great causes which have destroyed its meaning."

"But I have begun to question, father, whether our civilisation is civilised and worth preserving?"

"And would you civilise it by giving free rein to impulses of nature that are subconscious, that lead direct to the reign of l.u.s.t and murder? Is not man more than brute? Has he not a soul? Is the spirit a delusion? Ah, my boy, do you doubt my love?"

"I know that you love me."

"Yes, with a love you cannot understand. You can touch no depths to which I will not follow with that love. But I'd rather a thousand times see you cold in death than hear from your lips the awful words you have spoken in this room here this morning with the face of Jesus looking down upon us from your walls."

He seemed to sink into a stupor for several moments, and was silent as he gazed into the glowing grate.

At length he said:

"You must take me to your house. I will spend a few days with Ruth and the children."

Gordon could not face the meeting between his father and Ruth. He accompanied him to the door and gently bade him good-by, promising to call the next day.

A singularly beautiful love the old man had bestowed on Ruth, and she on him; for he was resistless to all the young. When he kissed her as Frank's bride he seemed to have first fully recovered his spirits from the shadows of his own tragedy. In her great soft eyes with the lashes mirrored in their depths, her dimpled chin and sensitive mouth, her refined and timid nature, the grace and delicacy of her footsteps, he saw come back into life his own lost love. Above all, he was fascinated by her spiritual charm, haunting and vivid. He had never tired of boasting of his son's charming little wife, and he loved her with a devotion as deep as that he gave his own flesh and blood.

When she entered the room, in spite of his efforts at control, he burst into tears as he kissed her tenderly and slipped his arm softly around her.

"Ruth, my sweet daughter!" he sobbed.

"Father, dear!"

"You must cheer up, my little one; I've come to help you."

"You must not take it so hard, father. It will all come out for the best. G.o.d is not dead; He will not forget me. I'm a tiny mite in body, but you know I've a valiant soul. You must cheer up."

She led him gently to a seat.

"I'll bring the children now; they'll be wild with joy when I tell them grandfather is here."

But at the sight of the children the old man broke completely down and sat with his great head sunk on his breast.

He drew Ruth down and whispered:

"Take them away, dear. It's too much. I--can't see them now."

When she returned from the nursery, he said:

"Come, Ruth, sit beside me and tell me about it, and I'll see my way clearer how to help you."

She drew a stool beside his chair, leaned her head against his knee, took one of his hands in hers, and, while his other stroked her raven hair, she gently and without reproach told him all.

When she had finished, his eyes were heavy with grief beyond the power of tears.

"And my boy told you to--take--this--money, Ruth?" he slowly and sorrowfully asked.

"Yes, father."

"Do you know an honest lawyer, dear?"

"Yes; an old friend of mine, Morris King."

"Call him over your telephone immediately, and take me to your desk. My fortune is not large, as the world reckons wealth--perhaps fifty thousand dollars carefully saved during the past thirty years of frugal living. It shall be yours, my dear."

"But, father, you must not take it from yourself in your age!"

"Are you not my beloved daughter? And do not your babies call me grandfather? It's such a poor little thing I can do. I've enough in bank to last me to the journey's end, and I'll stay near to watch over you. I can have no other home now."

The lawyer came within an hour, and the will was duly witnessed.

He handed it to Ruth and she kissed and thanked him.

He wandered about the house in a helpless sort of way for half an hour, sighing. His great shoulders for the first time in his long life lost their military bearing and drooped heavily.

Ruth watched him pace slowly back and forth with his hands folded behind him, his head sunk in a stupor of dull pain, wondering what she could do or say to cheer him, when he suddenly stopped and sank into a heap on the floor.

The doctor came and shook his head.

"He may regain consciousness, Mrs. Gordon, but he cannot live."

Ruth called the hotel and summoned Frank. He was out and did not get the message until five o'clock. When he reached the house, she was by the bedside. The old man was holding her hand and talking in a half-delirious way to his friends, explaining to them how impossible that these wild reports could be true about his son.

Soon after Gordon came he regained consciousness. Taking him by the hand he said:

"Well, my boy, my work is done. I have fought a good fight. I have kept the faith. I love you always. You will not forget--right or wrong, you are my heart's blood and your mother's, dearer to me than life. When I go from this lump of clay, if you will open my breast you will find an old man's broken heart, and across the rent your name will be written in the ragged edges. How handsome you are to-night! How fair a lad you were! Such face and form and high-strung soul, the heart of an ancient knight come back to earth, I used to boast! G.o.d's grace is wonderful, His ways past finding out. When we seem forsaken, He is but preparing larger blessings on some grander plan whose end we do not see. He is my shepherd; I shall not want. He leadeth me--I rest in Him."

As the twilight wrapped the great city in its gray shadows, slowly deepening into night, he fell asleep.