“And what is the trouble with our entertainers?”
“I am sorry to speak so of anyone whose hospitality I have accepted, but unless it is your wish I hope never to accept it again. They all smell of their beer. Everything is so coarse, lavish, and ostentatious. They tell you as through a brazen trumpet on every side, ‘We are rich.’ ”
“They give magnificent suppers,” said Mr. Ludolph, in apology.
“More correctly, the French cook they employ gives them. I do not object to the nicest of suppers, but prefer that the Browns be not on the carte de menu. From the moment our artistic programme ended, and the entertainment fell into their hands, it began to degenerate into an orgy. Nothing but the instinctive restraints of good-breeding prevents such occasions from ending in a drunken revel.”
“You are severe. Mr. Brown’s social effort is not a bad type of the entertainments that prevail in fashionable life.”
“Well, it may be true, but they never seemed to me so lacking in good taste and refinement before. Wait till we dispense choice viands and wines to choicer spirits in our own land, and I will guarantee a marvellously wide difference. Then the eye, the ear, the mind, shall be feasted, as well as the lower sense.”
“Well, I do not see why you should be disgusted with yourself. I am sure that you covered yourself with glory, and were the belle of the occasion.”
“That is no great honor, considering the occasion. Father, strange as it may seem to you, I envied your man-of-all-work tonight. Did you not mark the effect of his singing?”
“Yes, and felt it in a way that I cannot explain to myself. His tones seemed to thrill, and stir my very heart. I have not been so affected by music for years. At first I thought it was surprise at hearing him sing at all, but I soon found that it was something in the music itself.”
“And that something I fear I can never grasp—never attain.”
“Why, my dear, they applauded you to the echo.”
“I would rather see one moist eye as the tribute to my singing than to be deafened by noisy applause. I fear I shall never reach high art. Men’s hearts sleep when I do my best.”
“I think you are slightly mistaken there, judging from your train of admirers,” said Mr. Ludolph, turning off a disagreeable subject with a jest. The shrewd man of the world guessed the secret of her failure. She herself must feel, before she could touch feeling. But he had systematically sought to chill and benumb her nature, meaning it to awake at just the time, and under just the circumstances, that should accord with his controlling ambition. Then reverting to Dennis, he continued: “It won’t answer for Fleet to sweep the store any longer after the part he played tonight. Indeed, I doubt if he would be willing to. Not only he, but the world will know that he is capable of better things. What has occurred will awaken inquiry, and may soon secure him good business offers. I do not intend to part readily with so capable a young fellow. He does well whatever is required, and therefore I shall promote him as fast as is prudent. I think I can make him of great use to me.”
“That is another thing that provokes me,” said Christine. “Only yesterday morning he seemed such a useful, humble creature, and last evening through my own folly he developed into a fine gentleman; and I shall have to say, ‘By your leave, sir’; ‘Will you please do this’?—If I dare ask anything at all.”
“I am not so sure of that,” said her father. “My impression is that Fleet has too much good sense to put on airs in the store. But I will give him more congenial work; and as one of the young gentleman clerks, we can ask him up now and then to sing with us. I should much enjoy trying some of our German music with him.”
XXV
Darkness
The next morning Christine did not appear at the late breakfast at which her father with contracted brow and capricious appetite sat alone. Among the other unexpected results of the preceding day she had taken a very severe cold, and this, with the reaction from fatigue and excitement, caused her to feel so seriously ill that she found it impossible to rise. Her father looked at her, and was alarmed; for her cheeks were flushed with fever, her head was aching sadly, and she appeared as if threatened with one of those dangerous diseases whose earlier symptoms are so obscure and yet so much alike. She tried to smile, but her lip quivered, and she turned her face to the wall.
The philosophy of Mr. Ludolph and his daughter was evidently adapted to fair weather and smooth sailing. Sickness, disease, and the possible results, were things that both dreaded more than they ever confessed to each other. It was most natural that they should, for only in health or life could they enjoy or hope for anything. By their own belief their horizon was narrowed down to time and earth, and they could look for nothing beyond. In Mr. Ludolph’s imperious, resolute nature, sickness always awakened anger as well as anxiety. It seemed like an enemy threatening his dearest hopes and most cherished ambition, therefore the heavy frown upon his brow as he pushed away the scarcely tasted breakfast.
To Christine the thought of death was simply horrible, and with the whole strength of her will she ever sought to banish it. To her it meant corruption, dust, nothingness. With a few drawbacks she had enjoyed life abundantly, and she clung to it with the tenacity of one who believed it was all. With the exception of some slight passing indisposition, both she and her father had been seldom ill; and for a number of years now they had voyaged on over smooth, sunny
