Читать книгу Where the Souls of Men are Calling - Credo Fitch Harris - Страница 3

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Hillsdale is "somewhere in the United States of America"—but there are hundreds of Hillsdales!

This particular Hillsdale is no less, no more, than the others. It contains the usual center of business activity clustering about a rather modern hotel. One of its livery stables has been remodelled into a moving-picture house, the other into a garage; one of its newspapers has become a daily, the other still holds to a Friday issue. In its outlying districts will be found hitching racks before the stores. Altogether, Hillsdale might be said to be "on the fence," with one leg toward progressiveness, the other still lingering in the past.

Its residences have not grown beyond the rambling, mellow kind, that drowse in poetic languor amidst flowering vines and trees. These trees, that also line the streets, meeting in cathedral arches overhead, might be stately elms of New England, poplars of the middle-west, or live-oaks of the south; for it must be strictly borne in mind that Hillsdale is "somewhere in the United States."

One mild day in early April, 1917, in the side yard of a corner house well away from traffic noises, two trim little women, Miss Sallie and Miss Veemie Tumpson, were delicately uncovering their tulip beds when Colonel Hampton, passing on his way down town, stopped and raised his hat. An imperceptible agitation rustled their conventional exteriors, since it was an occasion of pleasure when Colonel Hampton paused at anyone's fence. They noticed, however, that his usual geniality was lacking; that the kindly seams in his face were set into lines of sternness.

"Well, m'em," he thundered, "their damned outrages continue!"

Miss Sallie gasped and stared at him, while her more timid sister was too much taken aback to move. In the forty-odd years of their acquaintance with this agreeable product of the mid-Victorian era, this was the first time they had heard an oath pass his lips—without an immediate apology; and the apology had not been forthcoming.

"Yes, m'em," he cried, striking the ferrule of his cane on the sidewalk, "their damned outrages continue!"

"Why, Colonel," Miss Veemie faltered, "whatever can have happened?" She was a trifle deaf, but she had no difficulty whatever in understanding the irate gentleman before her.

"Colonel Hampton," Miss Sallie, as was her habit, took the offensive, "what do you mean, sir!"

"Mean enough, and happened enough!" The cane again added emphasis. "Those German vipers have torpedoed another of our ships! The de-humanized outcasts, the blood-crazed toads, have wantonly destroyed more American lives! I tell you, m'em, our President is getting damned tired of it, and we'll have war as certain as your tulips are sure to be the fairest in our proud city, m'em!"

The cheeks of the little ladies flushed at this dull prophecy, but for quite a minute the three remained silent.

"Mercy, I hope not," Miss Veemie sighed at last—meaning the war, of course. "It's terrible!"

"And peace can be terrible," the Colonel thundered. "A country that buys peace at the price of dishonor is no better than a frump who sells her soul for gewgaws and furbalows! When posterity shall read of how the diseased mind of a single lunatic has stabbed history's richest pages with a sword of murder, rapacity and lust, it will turn a lip of contempt toward every nation that stood upon a vacuous neutrality. To hell with neutrality, when a madman stalks abroad!"

Miss Veemie now felt that she had been silenced for the rest of time, and Miss Sallie's delicate hands, incongruously housed in heavy garden gloves, became expressive of horrified amazement.

"What?" he demanded, looking more than ever furious.

The little ladies jumped, and Miss Sallie made haste to say:

"Why—why nothing."

He eyed them for a moment; not suspiciously, but with anger at everything in the universe—themselves, perhaps, excepted.

"Where's Jeb?" he asked.

"He went into the country again with his rifle this morning," Miss Sallie answered. "He feels as you do, Colonel, that the time has come to strike and we must be preparing for it."

"But I wish you'd speak to him," Miss Veemie imploringly added. "He's bent on getting ready and being among the first, if the time comes, and—and——"

"And he'll do it in splendid style, rest assured of it, m'em! Jeb will make a fine soldier!—he comes from a line of soldiers!"

Tears filled Miss Veemie's eyes.

"We've never seriously thought that Jeb——" she began, but could get no farther and relapsed into a sorrowful contemplation of the tulip bed.

"There, there; I know, I know," the old gentleman interrupted gently. "I know how you feel about him; I know how you've both been more than mothers to him!"

"We've done our best," there was a tightness in Miss Sallie's voice. "He never remembered his own mother, and was so little when dear brother Jebediah died."

"I know, I know," he murmured. "How old is Jeb?"

"Twenty-six."

Another silence fell upon them. Then the Colonel sighed, turned and started on his way downtown, still muttering to himself as he went:

"I know, I know. All the same, that Kaiser's a damned murderer, and we've got to smash him if it takes the last drop of blood in Hillsdale; yes, sir, the last precious drop!" So by the time he reached the hotel his step was vigorous and the ferrule of his cane struck the sidewalk with military precision. Fifty-three years ago he had marched that way with Grant—or was it with Lee? Hillsdales do spread over such a lot of territory!

"Did you ever!" Miss Sallie gasped, breaking the silence.

"Sakes alive," Miss Veemie whispered, calling upon her nearest approach to profanity. But they continued to stare after him, by unspoken accord moving to the fence and leaning over it, farther and farther, to keep him in sight as long as possible.

It was while they were so occupied that a girl stepped out upon the side veranda. She hesitated an instant, poising lightly in surprise at their rather unusual attitudes, and biting her lips to keep from laughing outright. Then coming down into the garden, she asked:

"Is the parade in sight yet?"

Turning, they rushed at her.

"Marian! When did you get home? How did you get in without our seeing you?"

Her parasol fell to the ground before their onslaught of affectionate greetings, as they held her off, only to draw her close to them.

"Why," she laughed, somewhat out of breath, "the front door was open—as usual; so I came on through—as usual—looking for you!"

"When did you get home?" they insisted. "Is it really you?"

"You little dears," she cried. "Oh, but it's good to see you!"

"But when did you come?"

"Last night!"

"And you're going to stay?"

"Hm-hm," she laughed, kissing them upon the cheeks. "I suppose I'll have to, unless Daddy has a change of heart and lets me go to France."

"France, nonsense! Stand off, and let's see you," Miss Sallie commanded. "My! My! And you're really a trained nurse?"

"Really a trained nurse," she answered enthusiastically.

"I could never understand why you wanted to be," Miss Veemie faltered, looking at her as though she were convinced that contact with the big cities and hospitals and surgical cases must surely have left an unfavorable impress. "But you haven't changed—I do believe! Why, child, you're even prettier! Is that taffeta, my dear? How much did you pay for it?"

"Sister Veemie," Miss Sallie interrupted with a shade of annoyance, "for pity sake don't begin to talk dresses—though it is becoming, my dear," she turned to Marian. "Have you seen Jeb?"

The girl hesitated, yet not exactly in embarrassment, and answered slowly:

"No. Is he well?"

"More than well—and simply daft with his preparations for the war!"

"Preparations for the war?" she asked, not understanding.

"Why, my child, he goes into the country every day to shoot his rifle, he's so in earnest! I do believe that if Congress could hear half he thinks about the insults we are forced to swallow, they'd declare war to-morrow!"

"Sister Sallie thinks he should have been named Patrick Henry," Miss Veemie sighed, "but I'm sure I can't imagine why! Jebediah is much prettier."

Miss Sallie ignored this, and in a more confidential tone continued:

"When he was a little boy, a fortune teller said——"

"Oh, I know," Marian laughed, "—said he might be President some day!"

"Well, my dear, I really shouldn't wonder! But, oh, why have you stayed away from us so long! Did nursing take so much time to learn? Now that you're back," her voice grew tender, "I do hope you and Jeb—well, you know that it was your dear mother's wish, and his dear mother's wish, Marian."

"Please don't," the girl interrupted hastily. "I've heard that a thousand times. Besides, Jeb and I were only four months old when our mothers died; and besides that," she smiled prettily, "Jeb has surely recovered from his silly notions by now."

"Jeb will entertain whatever notions I tell him to," Miss Sallie declared with vigor.

"Then I don't want to see him," Marian laughed, though with not enough conviction, perhaps, to keep Miss Sallie from darting a look of encouragement at her sister, who, failing to understand it, observed:

"Colonel Hampton just passed before you came; did you see him?"

"No!—bless his old heart! How is he?—quite as foolishly angry with my father as ever, I suppose?"

"He's not all to blame for that." Miss Sallie compressed her lips. "Your father, my dear, is as good a hater as he is an editor."

"Which is going some," Marian laughed.

"Going how?" Miss Veemie asked, protestingly.

"I must say," Miss Sallie interposed, "that the Colonel has been a devoted friend to Jeb!"

"And I'm devoted to the Colonel," Marian quickly replied, as though her loyalty had been challenged. "You both know how I've deplored that quarrel—why, it started long, long before I was born, and I'm sure they've forgotten its origin!"

"Politics! Wretched politics," Miss Sallie sighed. "I've often thought, my child, how easily you might re-cement their friendship." She looked wistfully at the girl, who asked in all sincerity:

"How?"

"The Colonel is so fond of Jeb, and you are your father's only child! Can't you just fancy them clasping hands beneath a wedding bell of beautiful lilies?"

"It's easier to fancy them quarreling again the next day! No," she began to laugh delightedly, "if you're so set on having a wedding, marry them to each other; then they can fuss to their heart's content and nobody will mind. There, forgive me!" she cried, putting her arms about Miss Veemie, who was taking this seriously, and almost gasping for breath, "I was horrid to joke about it! But you mustn't let Miss Sallie put those silly thoughts on Jeb and me, really! Remember, I've been away two years—two years this very sixth of April—and see how we've both improved!"

There might have been a slight suspicion of yearning that somehow got into her voice as she said this; at any rate, Miss Sallie thought so, and wisely decided to let the subject rest awhile.

Marian walked to the fallen parasol, picked it up and opened it.

"I suppose I ought to be going," she said. "Father expects me about twelve. Your tulips are looking well, for this early," she continued evenly. "Do you still have the scarlet ones in this bed? And, oh, I wonder if I can see the courthouse clock from your fence, as I used to!"

She leaned over the pickets, looking; then glanced up the street in the other direction. Miss Sallie did not miss the significance of this, and smiled.

"What time is it?" she asked, as Marian turned around.

"I—I really; isn't that funny? I've forgotten!" And to hide a very genuine embarrassment she leaned again over the pickets; glancing, as before, up and down the street where the courthouse was, and was not, but now giving a little exclamation of pleasure.

"He's coming! Your spoiled nephew is at the corner."

She glanced at Miss Sallie, and found that little lady beaming pleasantly with a "bless you, my children," countenance that sent the blood flying to her cheeks. She felt suddenly afraid to stay and face the man from whom, at the last moment and as a last resort, she had fled to keep from giving a certain answer to his insistent pleadings. She knew that he would plead again, even after two years of waiting; and, in a sense, she wanted him to plead, though not just at this spot, nor until she had gathered up her forces with which she might artfully resist him awhile longer.

"Well, goodbye, everybody," she said quickly. "I must hurry downtown."

"Without seeing Jeb?" Miss Sallie exclaimed.

"Oh, I'll see him soon. We can't escape each other very long in Hillsdale," she laughed.

"But, my child, it will only be a minute! You surely——"

Jeb, having entered by the front way, was now heard whistling as he came through the house, and the next moment he stepped out on the side veranda; then stopped, crying joyously:

"Marian!"

"Hello, Jeb," she said, advancing with a candor that belied the look Miss Sallie had surprised half a minute before.

"Oh, Jeb," Miss Veemie glided toward him, "I've been so worried for fear your gun had exploded and done something! Are you tired, dear?"

This adulation had been a daily occurrence in Jeb's life since he was four years old, when these adoring aunts had taken him beneath their roof. Usually he met it half way, but now, with an indifference that in a moment of less excitement would have been pronounced, he passed her and caught Marian's hand, crying:

"This is a surprise! Did you drop out of the trees?"

"That savors horribly of monkeys, Jeb," she laughed, quietly withdrawing her hand. "You used to do better!"

"I meant to ask how long since you dropped down from heaven, angel," he smiled. "My word, but you're looking fit! For a three times winner, you just about take the cake!"

"Cake, dear?" Miss Veemie sweetly inquired. "Certainly you shall!" And, turning, she hurried busily into the house, Miss Sallie following with an expression about her mouth which said as plainly as words that her well-meaning sister would not emerge with cake, or anything else, to interrupt a tête-à-tête so promising.

Jeb waited until they had quite disappeared, then he crossed to Marian, asking soberly:

"Why did you run away, just when you promised to tell me what I wanted to hear?—and why didn't you answer my letters?"

"I wonder," she said, turning toward the flower beds, "if the tulips will be in bloom soon! I'd so love to see them again!"

He laughed tenderly, but persisted:

"Why did you run away?—why didn't you answer my letters?"

"Oh, those things happened two years ago, Jeb. Haven't you advanced at all?—do you always live in the past like a silly old man? You didn't write but three times, anyway!"

"Good Lord, how many times did you expect me to write without getting an answer?" he cried.

"Oh," she answered indifferently, "as many times as you thought it was worth doing. I might have answered the fourth; one can never tell about those things. Miss Sallie says you're getting ready to fight, Jeb. Are you thinking of going over to join the British or French?"

"Not for me," he laughed, disregarding, somewhat to her surprise, the subject of letters and answers. "They can peg along with their own scrap; I'm getting in shape for this country, if it becomes involved! You ought to see the hikes I take, Marian! Twelve miles in a forenoon—easy! And my shooting is really—look here!" He began fumbling in his pocket and brought out several paper targets which he unfolded and held before her. "What d'you think of that for three hundred yards!—five centers! Here's the four hundred!—look, Marian! Isn't it a peach? By Jove, if ever I get a crack at those Huns, there'll be a few less!"

From the targets, over which he was now bending in feverish interest, she glanced up at him without being observed, her face somewhat puzzled. She felt extremely gratified that Jeb had made these perfect scores, and her spirit thrilled with his martial fervor; but, on the other hand, he had just been talking about a certain question which she had evaded two years ago by running away to take a hospital course in nursing, and it seemed to her that he was dismissing it rather abruptly. Yet she knew Jeb's temperament, as any girl will know a man with whom she has been a play-fellow since childhood; and, although hardly prepared for it just at this moment, she read aright that his love of self, his thirst for praise, had in no wise diminished. Had she been asked for a direct answer she could have told that his enthusiasm for target practice in the woods, where for hours he pretended to be shooting Germans, was vital to his abnormally active imagination; for Jeb, although a giant in strength and a god in grace, possessed the brow and eyes of an inveterate dreamer.

Formerly his dreams had run to adventure of a milder form, sometimes to verse, once or twice or thrice or more to love. He had, as a matter of fact, for short periods loved nearly all the girls in Hillsdale who were pretty enough, and clever enough; never becoming really serious—unless it was with her! But she had laughed at him then, sympathetically and sweetly, reminding him that they had grown up together, besides being each of them twenty-four.

Not that she believed these were serious obstacles, but at the time they served; for, if the strict truth be told, Marian understood Jeb too well to confess how much she cared. His exceptional charm, fascinating her beyond anything she had experienced, was, on the other hand, marred by his inordinate vanity. His extreme courtesy, urban manner and quick instinct for thoughtful attentions to old and young alike, she read truly as superficial, rather than sincere, kindnesses. The casual acquaintance would not have discovered this—but Marian had grown up with him! She could love him, she had more than a hundred times told herself—God, yes! Alone in the nights when his warm bronze coloring of perfect health seemed near to her, she had admitted this. Yet by day she laughed at it; and laughed at Jeb. Thereupon Jeb had settled down in earnest to win her.

Miss Sallie and Miss Veemie had watched through a prayer-glass the beginning of that ardent affair. From their lofty place of vantage twenty-four and twenty-four might not have been quite suitable, but years could stand for naught against the tower of mental strength and character with which they knew Marian to be possessed. They would gladly have greeted her as one of themselves, one to mother Jeb, to see that he was warmly clothed and did not eat imprudently. He had always been a child to them! Many times, in the bygone days, Miss Sallie would hint at this ideal mating, till at last the daughter of Amos Strong had wrapped the little woman in her arms, saying sweetly that she preferred something in life besides "mothering an overgrown, selfish boy."

It had cost her something to say this, for in her heart she was just beginning to know how adoringly she could be these things and more to him. As a child she mothered him; at ten he bullied her; in their 'teens she had bossed and mothered him again! Love him? She admitted it through tears to her mirror—and yet, withal, she had understood him just a shade too well!

Then came the day—as such days will—when she was cornered, pinioned, made captive!—when she could no longer fight, and knew that surrender was but a matter of hours. Much of that night (she remembered every minute of it now!) she had lain awake watching her heart and her level judgment wage their last battle; and the next afternoon, an hour before he was to come, she quietly left for Baltimore, or New York—or it may have been Chicago—to take the course in nursing.

Her eyes now swept him with tenderness as the memory of that day came rushing back, but a shadow of disappointment crossed them as she saw that he was still looking, fascinated, at the proof of his skill. Was her return, after an absence of two years, so meaningless that he could be engrossed by a few sheets of inert paper while she stood within touch of him?

"You shoot very well, Jeb," she said, casually.

"Don't I though!" he cried. "See, Marian—here's the five hundred!"

"I should think," she said, glancing at it indifferently, "that you'd join the regular army."

"You bet I will, if the time ever comes when we've got to fight! I wouldn't ask for anything better! Gee, I wish we'd declare war to-morrow!"

"I rather think," she slowly replied, "that your wish is very near fulfillment, Jeb."

He turned quickly and stared at her.

"What makes you say that?" he asked, tensely.

Had her eyes been looking at him then she might have seen something in his drawn face and blanched cheeks that would have struck dismay into her very soul; but, as it was, she attributed the question purely and simply to his eagerness for service, and answered with a suggestion of sharpness that was not lost on him:

"Because there's a limit, Jeb, to the patience of a country, just as there is to the patience of men and women. Even the mildest of us reach the end of our endurance, sooner or later," she added, not knowing whether she wanted to laugh or be furious.

"Oh, come," he cried, squaring his shoulders. "I thought maybe you had some inside news from your father! Don't be a gloom, Marian! The war's three thousand miles away from us, and that's where it's going to stay—take my word for it!"

"But I thought you were crazy for it," she turned on him in surprise.

He shifted uneasily, but his voice rang strong and true as he answered:

"I am crazy for it! What d'you suppose I've been getting ready for all these months? But you leave wars and that sort of thing to us men! You haven't anything to do with 'em!"

"We have to nurse you in wars, Jeb, just as we do in times of peace," she laughed. "Really, I don't see how such big babies as some men I know can conduct a first class war, anyhow!"

This was the old Marian again; lightly bantering, deliciously good to look upon. He moved close to her, and asked earnestly:

"Why did you run away from me?"

"I wanted to be a nurse," she answered.

"But why did you decide so quickly to be a nurse?"

She hesitated, then smiled:

"It was better than the other alternative."

"Now that you are a nurse, can't you accept the other alternative, too? You know I want you just as much."

His voice, deep and resonant with a timbre that went to women's hearts, thrilled her delightfully. But she had not forgiven him for the paper target episode, wherein she had been pushed aside to make way for his skill. There were, moreover, plans that had been fermenting in her mind for many months—plans of which marriage should not be a part—and she answered him frankly:

"I really don't know at all, Jeb—I haven't had time to think. Of course, should our country get into this war, daddy has promised to let me go across at once; otherwise he insists that I can't. Still, if I go to France, you will, too, for that matter," she added brightly. Then the color flew to her cheeks. "Maybe when I saw you in uniform, Jeb, and realized that you—that we might neither of us get back, then I might—we might——"

She was looking down, unable to go farther without assistance; but he offered none, and they stood for several moments in absolute silence—for a quick spasm of fright had shot across his soul! The sublimity of her partial surrender, contingent only upon his transportation to a foreign battlefield, suddenly brought the war from three thousand miles away to his very door. But his next feeling was one of self-contempt, and squaring his shoulders with a jerk he said:

"I love your pluck! Then it's all settled."

"Oh, it isn't all settled by a great deal," she laughed; but, seeing his face, gasped in mock astonishment. "Heavens! Which is making you look so like a ghost—marriage or war?"

"They're quite synonymous," he replied, trying to match her banter. "May I speak to your illustrious father?"

"That reminds me that I've an engagement with him right now," she exclaimed. "For the present, you may say good-bye to Miss Sallie and Miss Veemie for me."

With a pretty smile and toss of her head she swept him a little courtesy, then turned to the gate, but he called after her:

"Wait! I'll go with you—and show him my targets!"

She stopped, looking back as though she had not heard aright.

"Targets?" she asked, slightly arching her brows.

"Why, these, of course," he cried, drawing them again from his breast pocket. "I always hunt him up, or the Colonel, when I've made a cracker-jack score! It tickles 'em to death!"

He sprang to the gate and held it open for her to pass, apparently having forgotten everything but a desire to reap praise from one or the other of these old gentlemen; who in their turns, although separately, had never failed to be genially appreciative. The flavor of war, which filled the air as a restless spirit since diplomatic relations with Germany had come to an end—the numb fear with which he had been obsessed but a moment ago—were completely relegated to the limbo of forgetfulness as he now issued forth in search of praise wherewith to feed his vanity.

Whenever it so happened that he failed to get a sufficient amount of this from one or the other of these men, or from his adoring aunts, he drew it from himself. He could not have named a night for months that he had fallen asleep without first thinking of the splendid soldier he would make. He would let his imagination run riot and live through battle after battle, leading his men intrepidly—men who loved the very ground on which he trod. Into the thickest places where old veterans could not have stood the gaff, he went with calm indifference. Victory followed victory—complete, hilarious victories! Dead Germans, prisoners, and cannon which Jeb flung into the game bag of his waking dreams, if put side by side, would have reached around the world.

'Tis true, that this top-lofty state of mind suffered a complete relapse when Bernstorff got his papers, and for the first time Jeb seriously felt the cold fingers of fear reach out and touch him. It had been a peculiar change, that for awhile startled him more than the imminence of war. He might have been thrilled over the wild race, the reckless dash, as of unbridled horses, with which a nation long in suspense hurtled toward a finality; but it was an elation thoroughly dampened by dread. As the days had passed, however, and nothing more terrible happened, his courage came creeping back, even growing into modest bravado. Excursions to the country with his rifle became frequent again. He began to feel himself stiffen-up when Miss Sallie would tell a neighbor how he was getting ready for the possible war; this neighbor told other neighbors, and he was soon basking in admiring looks which were as meat and drink to him. It was on this crest of popularity that Marian found him when she returned to Hillsdale.

With a face utterly devoid of expression she watched him now while he held back the gate with one hand while trying to stuff the bulkily folded targets into his pocket.

"Maybe you'd rather carry them, Marian," he said, "and we can look at them again on the way downtown!"

She did not answer.

"I always take them down to your father, you know," he said again.

"I should think daddy would be immensely flattered," she observed, passing out to the street.

Scarcely had the gate closed after them when Miss Sallie and Miss Veemie, guilt written in every line of their radiant faces, tiptoed from the house, stepped into the garden and ran to the fence. As they had formerly done while watching Colonel Hampton stalk angrily townward, they now, also, leaned farther and farther over the pickets, keeping the young people who comprised their hope in view to the very last.