The Whirligig of Time Part 31

Harry was as little elated by the praise of the foreigner as he was cast down by the condemnation of his countrymen. His demeanor all along, ever since the day of his interview with Miss Bensel, had been characterized by an observant calmness. He dissuaded as many of his relations and friends as he could from being present at the first performance of the play and ignored those who insisted on being there. He himself occupied an obscure seat in the gallery and listened with the greatest attention to the comments of those about him. He thereby began to form an idea of what the general public thought of his work; knowledge which, as he himself realized, would be of inestimable value if he could put it to use in his next play.

A letter Harry wrote to his Uncle Giles just after the play was taken off expresses his state of mind at this time. "'Chances' has gone by the board," he wrote; "that splendid American inst.i.tution, the Tired Business Man, would have none of it, and it has ceased to be Drama and has become merely Literature. But I have learned a lot during its brief existence, and this knowledge I shall, please G.o.d, make use of if I ever write another play. Which is a mere figure of speech, as I have started one already.

"I have learned the point of view of the Tired Business Man. That was what I wanted to know from the very first--not what the critics thought.

They could do no more than say it was good, and I knew that already. And what the T. B. M. said was substantially, that my play was nice enough, but that it had no _punch_. I don't know whether you recognize that expression or not; it is one of those vivid American slang words that English people are so fascinated by. People thought the play wasn't interesting enough, and that is the simple truth about it. Therefore it wasn't a good play. For my idea is that to be really good a play must hold the stage, at least at the time it is written. And if we are ever going to build up such a thing as the 'American drama' our critics are continually bellowing about, we've got to begin with our foundations. We can't create a full-fledged literary drama and then go to work and make the people like it; we've got to begin with what the people like and build up our drama on that. That's the way all the great 'dramas' of history have grown up--the Greek, the French, the Spanish and the Elizabethan; and it is interesting to notice that the drama that came nearest to being the product of a mere literary cla.s.s, the French, is the weakest of the lot and is standing the test of time worst of them all.

"I may never write a more successful play than 'Chances'; I may never get another play on the stage at all. But one thing I am sure of; I shall never offer another play to the public without being convinced that it is a better stage play than 'Chances.'"

Of course that a mere boy, fresh from college, with no practical experience of the stage whatever, should get a play produced at all was an unusual and highly gratifying thing. Harry became quite a lion that autumn, in a small way. He remained in New York till after the play was taken off, living with the James Wimbournes, and was the guest of honor at one or two of Aunt Cecilia's rather dull but eminently important dinners. He became the object of the attention of reporters, and also of that section of metropolitan _literati_ who live in duplex apartments and wear strings of pearls in their hair and can always tell Schubert from Schumann. He was especially delighted with these, and determined some day to write a play or a novel portraying the inner side of their painstaking spirituality.

He saw a good deal of James during those weeks; more than he had seen of him since their college days. James had been rather sparing of his week-end visits to New Haven since moving to New York; Harry noticed that. He was sorry, for he now found James a great help and stimulus. He discovered that a walk or a motor ride with James between the hours of five and seven would obliterate the effects of the caviar-est of luncheons and the pinkest of teas and give him strength with which to face evenings in the company of people who appeared unable even to perspire anything less exalted than pure Pierian fluid.

"Well, it's nice to meet some one who doesn't smell of Russian cigarettes," he observed one day as he took his place in the long, low, slightly wicked-looking machine in which James whiled away most of his leisure moments. "Do you know, sometimes I actually rush into the nursery at Aunt Cecilia's and kiss the youngest and bread-and-b.u.t.teryest child there, just to get the Parna.s.sian odors out of my lungs. Next to a rather s...o...b.. child, though, I prefer the society of an ex-All-American quarter-back."

"Half," said James.

"Oh, were you? Well, you don't smell of anything aesthetic-er than the camphor b.a.l.l.s you put that coat away for the summer in.... James, if you go round another corner at eighty miles an hour I shall leap out and telephone for a policeman!"

"Oh, that's all right. They all know me, anyway. They know I don't take risks."

"Hm.... Well, it's all over for me next week, thank Heaven. I'm going back to Aunt Selina and Sunday night suppers, and I _shall_ be glad!"

"Well, I will say," said James slowly and carefully, with the air of one determined to do the most meticulous justice, "that you have kept your head through it all pretty well."

"Oh, it's not hard, when you come right to it," said Harry, laughing.

"Of course there are moments when I wonder if I'm not really greater than Shakespeare. And it does seem funny to realize that the rising genius, the person people are all talking about, and poor little Me are the same. But then I remember what a failure my play was, and shrivel into the poor graduate student.... After I've written a successful play, though, I won't answer for myself. And after I've written 'Hamlet,' as I mean to some day, I shall be simply unbearable. You won't own me then."

"Watch-chain round your neck?" suggested James.

"Oh, worse than that--diamond bracelets! And corsets--if necessary. I saw a man wearing both the other day, I really did."

"A man?"

"Well, an actor. That's the sort of thing they run to now-a-days. Long hair and general sloppiness are quite out of date--among the really ultra ones, that is."

"Well," said James, "I give you permission to be as ultra as you like, after you've written 'Hamlet.'"

"That helps, of course. I daresay I'm lacking in proper seriousness, but it seems to me that if the choice were offered me, right now, between being the author of 'Hamlet' and being also an ultra, and not writing 'Hamlet' and staying as I am, I would choose the latter. I don't know what my point of view may be at some future time, but that's what it is now, or at least I think it is. And after all, n.o.body can get nearer the truth than saying what he thinks his point of view at any given moment is, can he, James?"

CHAPTER III

NOT TRIa.s.sIC, CERTAINLY, BUT NEARLY AS OLD

To return again to the events attendant on the "Beggar's Opera." Harry slept late the morning after the performance, and when he awoke it was with a mind rested and vacant except for an intangible conviction that something pleasant had happened. He yawned and stretched delectably, and in a leisurely sort of way set about discovering just what it was.

"Let's see, now, what can it be?" he argued pleasantly. "Oh, yes, the 'Beggar's Opera.' It's all over, thank Heaven, and it went off creditably well. The wigs arrived in time and the prison set didn't fall over, and n.o.body lost a cue--so you could notice it." He lay back for a moment to give full rein to the enjoyment of these reflections. "There was something else, though." His mind languidly returned to the pursuit, as a dog crosses a room stretching at every step. "I'm sure there was something else...."

"Oh, yes, of course," he said at last; "I remember now. Madge Elliston."

If, say, ten seconds sufficed for enjoyment of the recollection of the "Beggar's Opera," how long should you say would be necessary for the absorption of the truth contained in those two words? A lifetime? An honest answer; we won't undertake to say it's not the right one. Harry, at least, seemed to be of that opinion.

"After all, though, it would be rather absurd to spend a whole lifetime in bed," he observed, after devoting twenty minutes to the subject. Then he jumped out of bed and pulled up the shade.

Vague flittings of poetry and song buzzed through his brain. One little phrase in particular kept humming behind his ears; a sc.r.a.p from a song he had heard Madge herself sing often enough:--"What shall I do to show how much I love her?" The thing rather annoyed him by its insistence. He stood by the open window and inhaled a few deep breaths of the quickening March air. "What shall I do to show how much I love her!"

sang the air as it rushed up his nose and became breath and out again and became carbon dioxide. "I really don't know, I'm sure," he answered, impatiently breaking off and starting on some exercises he performed on mornings when he felt particularly energetic and there was time. Their rhythm was fascinating; he found he could do them in two different ways:--What shall--I do--to show--how much--I love her, or, What shall I--do to show--how much I--? "Oh, hang it!" He suddenly lost all interest in them. With one impatient, dramatic movement he tore off the upper half of his pajamas, ripping off three b.u.t.tons as he did so. With another slightly more complicated but even more dramatic, he extricated himself from the lower half, breaking the string in the process.

"Ts! ts! More work for somebody!" he said, making the sound in the roof of his mouth indicative of reproof. He kicked the damaged garments lightly onto the bed and sauntered into the adjoining bathroom.

He turned on the water in the bathtub and stood watching it a moment as it gushed out in its noisy enthusiasm.

"WhatshallIdotoshowhowmuchIloveher?" it inquired uncouthly. "Oh, do stop bothering me," said Harry, turning disgustedly away; "I've got to shave."

He lathered his face and took the razor in his right hand, while with his left he delicately lifted the end of his nose, so as to make a taut surface of his upper lip. It was a trick he had much admired in barbers.

"Somehow it's not so effective when you do it to yourself," he said regretfully, watching the effect in the mirror. It helped his shaving, however, and shaving helped his thinking. He was able to think quite clearly and seriously, in fact, in spite of the roaring of the water nearby.

"I suppose I might keep away from her for a while," he said presently.

That really seemed a good idea; the more he thought of it the better he liked it. "I'll go down and stay with Trotty," he said as he sc.r.a.ped the last strip of lather off his face, remembering how fervently Trotty, recovering from a severe illness on the Trotwood estate in North Carolina, had begged him to come down and cheer his solitude. "And I won't come back until I know," he continued. "One must be sure.

Absolutely."

He plunged into his bath and the stimulus of the cold water set his brain working faster. "I'll start this very morning. Let's see; I've missed the ten-thirty, but I can catch the twelve-three, if I look alive, and get the three-fifty from New York.... No, on second thoughts, I'd better have lunch and pack comfortably and start this afternoon.

That'll be better; it never does to be in too much of a hurry!"

It never did; he became even more convinced of that when he remembered at breakfast the many post-mortem arrangements to be made in connection with the "Beggar's Opera." However, he spent an active afternoon in completing what he could of these and delegating the remainder to subordinates, with the calm explanation that he was called away on business, and started for southern climes the next morning.

As soon as he had telegraphed Trotty and was actually on his way he became inclined to fear he had not done the right thing. It was so confoundedly quiet down there; he would have nothing to do but think about her. He should have plunged himself into some all-absorbing activity; he should have traveled or taken a nine-till-five clerkship or gone to New York for a while. This suspicion continued through his journey and even survived, though in a mangled form, Trotty's enthusiastic welcome of him. But after he had pa.s.sed a few days among those pine-clad solitudes he began to see that he had done the wisest possible thing. Trotty was required to be out-of-doors practically the whole time, and the two drove endless miles in a dogcart through the quickening oaks and pines, or lay on fragrant carpets of needles, content with mere sensuous enjoyment of the wind and sun, sky and landscape.

Somehow these things brought calm and conviction to the heart of Harry.

They seemed to rest and purge his soul from the fatigues of the past months; the anxiety and effort of the autumn before, the pangs of composition that had marked the winter, the hurry and worry to which these had given place during the last few weeks, and to give coherence and sanct.i.ty to the tremendous discovery of that Friday night. He could not tell why it was that the sight of a flock of feathery clouds scurrying across a blue sky or the sound of warm wind among pine needles should work this change in him, but it was so. "You're quite right,"

they seemed to say; "perfectly right. The thing has come, and it's not distracting or disturbing or frightening, as you feared it might be; it's just simple and great and unspeakably sweet. And you were quite right to come to us to find out about it; you can learn among us a great deal better than in all that hectic scrambling up north. So lay aside every thought and worry and ambition and open your whole heart and soul to us while we tell you how to take this, the greatest thing that ever was, is, or shall be!"

Trotty was also a source of comfort to him; Trotty had lost nothing of his former singular faculty of always rubbing him the right way. Not that either of them made any open or covert allusion to Harry's state of mind, for they did not, but there was something particularly rea.s.suring, something strangely in tune with the great natural forces about them in his silent presence. For they would drive or read or simply lie about together for hours without speaking, after the manner of certain types of people who become very intimate with each other.

Whether these silences were to Trotty merely the intimate silences of yore or whether they had taken on for him also something of the character that colored them for Harry is not particularly clear; it is probable that he guessed something, but no more. As much might be gathered, at least, from the one occasion upon which their conversation even touched on anything vital.

This occurred on the eve of Harry's departure. For of course he had to leave some time. The birds and trees and sky were all very well for a while, but after three weeks the thought forced itself into his mind that any more time spent among them would smack of laziness if not of cowardice.

"Trotty," said he, "I'm going north on the twelve-fifty to-morrow."

"Oh," replied Trotty. "Bad news?"

"No."

"In love?"