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 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 THE PAGANS. 
 
 Bound in Cloth, $i. In Ticknor's Paper Series, 50 cents. 
 
 " It provoked a wide and bitter discussion. . . . These Pagans 
 are young artists, musicians, and writers, heartsick of a sur- 
 rounding deadwall of purely Boston conventionality and Philis- 
 tinism." — Brooklyn Times. 
 
 *' Good, conscientious, artistic, American work." — Boston 
 Herald. 
 
 " The novel is an unique one in both motive and execution. 
 Its transcripts of what mav be called artistic life, or, rather, the 
 life of people with the artistic temperament, are most interesting; 
 and the choice beauty of its style, its delicate yet often keen 
 satire, its refined feeling and forcible contrasts of individuality, 
 characterize a novel that holds perennial interest." — Boston 
 Traveller. 
 
 PATTY'S PERVERSITIES. 
 
 Bound in Cloth, $1. In Ticknor's Paper Series, 50 cents. 
 
 *' The passages throughout the story are exceedingly bright, 
 and are told in a manner enchantingly vivid ; there is no clause 
 nor page of it that flags for a moment in interest; and the reader 
 will cherish the book with pleasure for the pastime it has afforded 
 him." — JVezu York Star. 
 
 " The story is an exceedingly pleasant and readable one, full 
 of real humor, bubbling over with the saucy talk of clever young 
 people, presenting keen delineations of New England people 
 and scenes." — Art hiterchange. 
 
 " A captivating narrative. The plot is decidedly well woven, 
 and finely wrought out, and there is a notable array of epigram- 
 matic sayings, while Bathalina Clemens is one of the best New 
 England delineations that we have ever met." — T. S, Collier. 
 
 Sent, post paid, on receipt 0/ price, by the publishers. 
 
 TICKNOR & CO., BOSTON. 
 
THE PHILISTINES 
 
 BY 
 
 ARLO BATES 
 
 The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together. 
 
 All's Well that Ends Well; iv. — 3 
 
 BOSTON 
 TICKNOR AND COMPANY 
 
 2X1 Crcmont Siixtti 
 
Copyright, 1888, by Arlo Bates. 
 
 A II rigJits reserved. 
 
 Electrotyped by 
 
 C. J. Peters & Son, Boston, 
 
 U. S. A. 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 To my three friends who, by generously acting as amanuenses, 
 have made it possible that the book should be finished, I take 
 pleasure in gratefully dedicating 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 iw8t;304 
 
" This is no square temple to the gate of which thou canst 
 arrive precipitately ; this is no mosque to which thou canst come 
 with tumult but without knowledge." 
 
 Persian Religions Hymn, 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 I. In place and in account nothing . .' . . ii 
 
 II. Some speech of marriage 19 
 
 III. In way of taste 29 
 
 IV. Now he is for the numbers 43 
 
 V. 'Twas wondrous pitiful 52 
 
 VI. The inly touch of love 60 
 
 VII. This deed unshapes me 70 
 
 VIII. A necessary evil 80 
 
 IX. This is not a boon 96 
 
 X. The bitter past 107 
 
 XI. The great assay of art 119 
 
 XII. Whom the fates have marked 131 
 
 XIII. This " would " changes 146 
 
 XIV. The shot of accident 156 
 
 XV. Like covered fire 170 
 
 XVI. Weighing delight and dole 185 
 
 XVII. The heavy middle of the night 197 
 
 XVIII. He speaks the mere contrary 210 
 
 XIX. How chances mock 219 
 
 XX. Voluble and sharp discourse 232 
 
 XXI. A mint of phrases in his brain 248 
 
 XXII. His pure heart's truth 260 
 
 XXIII. As false as stairs of sand 274 
 
 XXIV. There begins confusion 285 
 
 XXV. After such a pagan cut 298 
 
 XXVI. O, WICKED WIT AND GIFT 3IO 
 
 9 
 
lO 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 XXVII, Upon a church bench 324 
 
 XXVIII. Bedecking ornaments of praise .... 336 
 
 XXIX. Cruel proof of this man's strength . . 346 
 
 XXX. The world is still deceived 359 
 
 XXXI. Parted our fellowship 369 
 
 XXXII. Heart-burning heat of duty 382 
 
 XXXIII. A bond of air 392 
 
 XXXIV, What time she chanted ....... 400 
 
 XXXV. Heartsick with thought 412 
 
 XXXVI. Farewell at once, for once, for all and 
 
 ever . 422 
 
 XXXVII. A sympathy of woe . 436 
 
THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 IN PLACE AND IN ACCOUNT NOTHING. 
 
 I Henry IV.; v. — i. 
 
 WHEN Arthur Fenton, the most outspoken of 
 all that band of protesting spirits who had 
 been so well known in artistic Boston as the Pa- 
 gans, married Edith Caldwell, there had been in 
 his mind a purpose, secret but well defined, to turn 
 to his own account his wife's connection with the 
 Philistine art patrons of the town. Miss Cald- 
 well was a niece of Peter Calvin, a wealthy and 
 well-meaning man against whom but two grave 
 charges could be made, — that he supposed the 
 growth of art in this country to depend largely 
 upon his patronage, and that he could never be 
 persuaded not to take himself seriously. Mr. Cal- 
 vin was regarded by Philistine circles in Boston 
 as a sort of re-incarnation of Apollo, clothed upon 
 with modern enlightenment, and properly arrayed 
 in respectable raiment. Had it been pointed out 
 that to make this theory probable it was necessary 
 to conceive of the god as having undergone men- 
 
 11 
 
12 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 tally much the same metamorphosis as that which 
 had transformed his flowing vestments into trou- 
 sers, his admirers would have received the remark 
 as highly complimentary to Mr. Peter Calvin. To 
 assume identity between their idol and Apollo would 
 be immensely flattering to the son of Latona. 
 
 Fenton understood perfectly the weight and ex- 
 tent of Calvin's influence, yet, in determining to 
 profit by it, he did not in the least deceive himself 
 as to the nature of his own course. 
 
 *' Honesty," he afterward confessed to his friend 
 Helen Greyson, who scorned him for the admis- 
 sion, " is doubtless a charming thing for digestive 
 purposes, but it is a luxury too expensive for me. 
 The gods in this country bid for shams, and shams 
 I purpose giving them." 
 
 So well did he carry out his intention, that in 
 a few years he came to be the fashionable portrait- 
 painter of the town ; the artist to whom people 
 went who rated the worth of a picture by the 
 amount they were required to pay for it, and the 
 reputation of the painter in conventional circles ; 
 the man to whom a Boston society woman inevita- 
 bly turned when she wished the likeness of her 
 charms preserved on canvas, and when no foreigner 
 was for the moment in vogue and on hand. 
 
 The steps by which Fenton attained to this 
 proud eminence were obvious enough. In the 
 first place, he persuaded Mr. Calvin to sit to him. 
 Mr. Calvin always sat to the portrait painters 
 
IN PLACE AND IN ACCOUNT NOTHING. 13 
 
 whom he endorsed. This was a sort of official 
 recognition, and the results, as seen in the need- 
 lessly numerous likenesses of the gentleman which 
 adorned his Beacon Hill mansion, would have 
 afforded a cynic some amusement, and not a little 
 food for reflection. Once launched under distin- 
 guished patronage, Fenton was clever enough to 
 make his way. He really was able to paint well 
 when he chose, a fact which was, on the whole, of 
 less importance in his artistic career than were the 
 adroitness of his address, and his ready and persua- 
 sive sympathy. The qualifications of a fashionable 
 doctor, a fashionable clergyman, and a fashionable 
 portrait-painter are much the same ; it is only in 
 the man-milliner that skill is demanded in addition 
 to the art of pleasing. 
 
 As usually happens in such a case, Fenton's old 
 friends avoided him, or found themselves left in the 
 distance by his rapid strides toward fame and for- 
 tune. Then such of them as still came in contact 
 with him made his acquaintance in a new charac- 
 ter, and learned to accept him as a wholly different 
 man from the one they had supposed themselves 
 to know in the days when he was never weary of 
 pouring forth tirades against the Philistinism he 
 had now embraced. They admired the skill with 
 which he painted stuffs and gowns, but among 
 themselves they agreed that the old-time vigor and 
 sincerity were painfully lacking in his work ; and 
 if they grumbled sometimes at the prices he got, 
 
14 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 it is only just to believe that it was seldom with 
 any real willingness to pay, in the sacrifice of con- 
 victions and ideals, the equivalent which he had 
 given for his popularity. 
 
 Fenton was one morning painting, in his luxuri- 
 ously appointed studio, the portrait of a man who 
 was in the prime of life, and over whom vulgar 
 prosperity had, in forming him, left everywhere her 
 finger marks plainly to be seen. He was tall and 
 robust, with light eyes and blonde whiskers, and a 
 general air of insisting upon his immense superi- 
 ority to all the world. That he secretly felt some 
 doubts of the perfection of his social knowledge, 
 there were indications in his manner, but on the 
 whole the complacency of a portly bank account 
 overcame all misgivings of this sort. His charac- 
 ter might have been easily inferred from the man- 
 ner in which he now set his broad shoulders ex- 
 pansively back in the armchair in which he was 
 posing, and regarded the artist with a patronizing 
 air of condescending to be wonderfully entertained 
 by his conversation. 
 
 *' You are the frankest fellow I ever saw," he 
 said, smiling broadly. 
 
 " Oh, frank," Fenton responded ; ** I am too 
 frank. It will be the ruin of me sooner or later. 
 It all comes of being born with a habit of being 
 too honest with myself." 
 
 ** Honesty with yourself is generally held up as 
 a cardinal virtue." 
 
IN PLACE AND IN ACCOUNT NOTHING. 
 
 5 
 
 " Nonsense. A man is a fool who is too frank 
 with himself ; he is always sure to end by being 
 too frank with everybody else, just from mere 
 habit." 
 
 Mr. Irons smiled more broadly still. He by no 
 means followed all Fenton's vagaries of thought, 
 but they tickled his mental cuticle agreeably. 
 The artist had the name of being a clever 
 talker, and with such a listener this was more 
 than half the battle. The men who can distin- 
 guish the real quality of talk are few and far to 
 seek ; most people receive what is said as wit and 
 wisdom, or the reverse, simply because they are 
 assured it is the one or the other ; and Alfred 
 Irons was of the majority in this. 
 
 Fenton painted in silence a moment, inwardly 
 possessed of a desire to caricature, or even to 
 paint in all its ugliness, the vulgar mouth upon 
 which he was working. The desire, however, was 
 not sufficiently strong to restrain him from the 
 judicious flattery of cleverly softening and refin- 
 ing the coarse lips, and he was conscious of a 
 faint amusement at the incongruity between his 
 thought and his action. 
 
 "And there is the added disadvantage," he 
 continued the conversation as he glanced up and 
 saw that his sitter's face was quickly, in the silence, 
 falling into a heavy repose, '' that frankness be- 
 gets frankness. My sitters are always telling 
 me things which I do not want to know, just 
 
1 6 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 because I am so beastly outspoken and sympa- 
 thetic." 
 
 " You must have an excellent chance to get 
 pointers," responded the sitter, his pale eyes kin- 
 dling with animation. " You've painted two or 
 three men this winter that could have put you 
 up to a good thing." 
 
 *' That isn't the sort of line chat takes in a 
 studio," Fenton returned, with a slight shrug. 
 "It isn't business that men talk in a studio. 
 That would be too incongruous." 
 
 Irons sneered and laughed, with an air of conse- 
 quence and superiority. 
 
 '' I don't suppose many of you artist fellows 
 would make much of a fist at business," he ob- 
 served. 
 
 " Modern business," laughed the other, amused 
 by his own epigram, ** is chiefly the art of trans- 
 posing one's debts. The thing to learn is how to 
 pass the burden of your obligations from one man's 
 shoulders to those of another often enough so that 
 nobody who has them gets tired out, and drops 
 them with a crash." 
 
 His sitter grinned appreciatively. 
 
 •' And they don't tell you how to do this t " 
 
 '' Oh, no. The things my sitters tell me about 
 are of a very different sort. They make to me 
 confidences they want to get rid of ; things you'd 
 rather not hear. Heavens ! I have all I can do to 
 keep some men from treating me like a priest and 
 confessing all their sins to me," A 
 
IN PLACE AND IN ACCOUNT NOTHING. ly 
 
 Mr. Irons regarded the artist closely, with a 
 curious narrowing of the eyes. 
 
 *' That must give you a hold over a good many 
 of them," he said. *' I shall be careful what I 
 say." 
 
 Fenton laughed, with a delightful sense of supe- 
 riority. It amused him that his sitter should be 
 betraying his nature at the very moment when he 
 fancied himself particularly on his guard. 
 
 '* You certainly have no crimes on your con- 
 science that interfere with your digestion," was 
 his reply; ''but in any case, you may make your- 
 self easy; I am not a blackmailer by profession." 
 
 *' Oh, I didn't mean that," Mr. Irons answered, 
 easily ; " only of course you are a man who has his 
 living to make. Every painter has to depend on 
 his wits, and when you come in contact with men 
 of another class professionally it would be natural 
 enough to suppose you would take advantage 
 of it." 
 
 The '* lady's finger " in Fenton's cheek stood 
 out white amid the sudden red, and his eyes 
 flashed. 
 
 *' Of course a sitter," he said in an even voice, 
 which had somehow lost all its smooth sweetness, 
 " is in a manner my guest, and the fact that his 
 class was not up to mine, or that he wasn't a 
 gentleman even, wouldn't excuse my taking ad- 
 vantage of him." 
 
 The other flushed in his turn. He felt the 
 
1 3 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 keenness of the retort, but he was not dexterous 
 enough to parry it, and he took refuge in coarse 
 bullying. 
 
 " Come, now, Fenton," he cried with a short, 
 explosive laugh, "you talk like a gentleman." 
 
 But the artist, knowing himself to have the bet- 
 ter of the other, and not unmindful, moreover, of 
 the fact that to offend Alfred Irons might mean a 
 serious loss to his own pocket, declined to take 
 offence. 
 
 " Of course," he answered lightly, and with the 
 air of one who appreciates an intended jest so 
 subtile that only cleverness would have compre- 
 hended it, " that is one of the advantages I have 
 always found in being one. I think I needn't 
 keep you tied down to that chair any longer 
 to-day. Come here and see how you think we 
 are getting on." 
 
 And the sitter forgot quickly that he had been 
 on the very verge of a quarrel. 
 
II 
 
 SOME SPEECH OF MARPIAGE. 
 
 Measure for Measure ; v. — i. 
 
 WHEN dinner was announced that night, Mrs. 
 Arthur Fenton had not appeared, but presently 
 she came into the room with that guilty and 
 anxious look which marks the consciousness of 
 social misdemeanors. She was dressed in a gown 
 of warm primrose plush, softened by draperies of 
 silver-gray net. It was a costume which her hus- 
 band had designed for her, and which set off beau- 
 tifully her brown hair and creamy white skin. 
 
 " I hope I have not kept you waiting long," she 
 said, " but I wanted to dress for Mrs. Frostwinch's 
 before dinner, and I was late about getting home." 
 
 There was a certain wistfulness in her manner 
 which betrayed her anxiety lest he should be vexed 
 at the trifling delay. Arthur Fenton was too well 
 bred to be often openly unkind to anybody, but 
 none the less was his wife afraid of his displeasure. 
 He was one of those men who have the power of 
 making their disapproval felt from the simple fact 
 that they feel it so strongly themselves. The most 
 oppressive of domestic tyrants are by no means 
 those who vent their ill-nature in open words. 
 
 19 
 
20 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 The man who strenuously insists to himself upon 
 his will, and cherishes in silence his dislike of what- 
 ever is contrary to it, is oftener a harder man to 
 live with than one who is violently outspoken. 
 Fenton was hardly conscious of the absolute des- 
 potism with which he ruled his home, but his wife 
 was too susceptible to his moods not to feel keenly 
 the unspoken protest with which he met any in- 
 fringement upon his wishes or his pleasure. To- 
 night he was in good humor, and his sense of 
 beauty was touched by the loveliness of her ap- 
 pearance. 
 
 *' Oh, it is no matter," he answered lightly. 
 '^ How stunning you look. That topaz," he con- 
 tinued, walking toward her, and laying his finger 
 upon the single jewel she wore fastened at the 
 edge of the square-cut corsage of her gown, "is 
 exactly right. It is so deep in color that it gives 
 the one touch you need. It was uncommonly nice 
 of your Uncle Peter to give it to you." 
 
 *' And of you to design a dress to set it off," re- 
 turned she, smiling with pleasure. ** I am glad 
 you like me in it." 
 
 *' You are stunning," her husband repeated, kiss- 
 ing her with a faint shade of patronage in his 
 manner. "Now come on before the dinner is as 
 cold as a stone. A cold dinner is like a warmed- 
 over love affair ; you accept it from a sense of duty, 
 but there is no enjoyment in it." 
 
 Mrs. Fenton smiled, more from pleasure at his 
 
SOME SPEECH OF MARRIAGE. 2 1 
 
 evident good nature than from any especial amuse- 
 ment, and they went together into the pretty din- 
 ing-room. 
 
 Fenton acknowledged himself fond of the re- 
 finements of life, and his sensitive, sensuous nature 
 lost none of the delights of a well-appointed home. 
 He lived in a quiet and elegant luxury which would 
 have been beyond the attainment of most artists, 
 and which indeed not infrequently taxed his re- 
 sources to the utmost. 
 
 The table at which the pair sat down was 
 laid with exquisite damask and china, the dinner 
 admirable and well served. The dishes came 
 in hot, the maid was deft and comely in appear- 
 ance, and the master of the house, who always 
 kept watch, in a sort of involuntary self-con- 
 sciousness, of all that went on about him, was 
 pleasantly aware that the most fastidious of his 
 friends could have found nothing amiss in the 
 appointment or the service of his table. How 
 much the perfect arrangement of domestic af- 
 fairs demanded from his wife, Fenton found it 
 more easy and comfortable not to inquire, but 
 he at least appreciated the results of her man- 
 agement. He never came to accept the smallest 
 trifles of life without emotion. His pleasure or 
 annoyance depended upon minute details, and 
 things which people in general passed without 
 notice were to him the most important facts of 
 daily life. The responsibility for the comfort of so 
 
22 . THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 highly organized a creature, Edith had found to be 
 anything but a light burden. Only a wife could 
 have appreciated the pleasure she had in having 
 the most delicate shades in her domestic manage- 
 ment noted and enjoyed ; or the discomfort which 
 arose from the same source. It was delightful to 
 have her husband pleased by the smallest pains 
 she took for his comfort ; to know that his eye 
 never failed to discover the little refinements of 
 dress or cookery or household adornment ; but 
 wearing was the burden of understanding, too, that 
 no flaw was too small to escape his sight. Mrs. 
 Fenton's friends rallied her upon being a slave to 
 her housekeeping ; few of them were astute 
 enough to understand that, kind as was always his 
 manner toward her, she was instead the slave of 
 her husband. 
 
 The room in which they were dining was one in 
 which the artist took especial pleasure. He had 
 panelled it with stamped leather, which he had 
 picked up somewhere in Spain ; while the ceiling 
 was covered with a novel and artistic arrangement 
 of gilded matting. Among Edith's wedding gifts 
 had been some exquisite jars of Moorish pottery, 
 and these, with a few pieces of Algerian armor, were 
 the only ornaments which the artist had admitted 
 to the room. The simplicity and richness of the 
 whole made an admirable setting for the dinner 
 table, and as the host when he entertained was 
 willino: to take the trouble of overlooking his 
 
SOME SPEECH OF MARRIAGE. 23 
 
 wife's arrangements, the Fentons' dinner parties 
 were among the most picturesquely effective in 
 Boston. 
 
 " I have two big pieces of news for you," Mrs. 
 Fenton said, when the soup had been removed. " I 
 have been to call on Mrs. Stewart Hubbard this 
 afternoon, and Mr. Hubbard is going to have you 
 paint him. Isn't that good t " 
 
 Her husband looked up in evident pleasure. 
 
 " That isn't so bad," was his reply. " He'll 
 make a stunning picture, and the Hubbards are 
 precisely the sort of people one likes to have deal- 
 ings with. Is he going at it soon } " 
 
 *' He is coming to see you to-morrow, Mrs. 
 Hubbard said. The picture is to be her birth- 
 day present. I told her you were so busy I didn't 
 know when you could begin." 
 
 " I would stretch a point to please Mr. Hub- 
 bard. I am almost done with Irons, vulgar old 
 cad. I wish I dared paint him as bad as he really 
 looks." 
 
 '' But your artistic conscience won't let you } " 
 she queried, smiling. " He is a dreadful old crea- 
 ture ; but he means well." 
 
 *' People who mean well are always worse than 
 those who don't mean anything ; but I can make 
 it up with Hubbard. He looks like Rubens' St. 
 Simeon. I wish he wore the same sort of 
 clothes." 
 
 ** You might persuade him to, for the picture. 
 
24 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 But my second piece of news is almost as good. 
 Helen is coming home." 
 
 " Helen Greyson ? " 
 
 " Helen Greyson. I had a letter from her to- 
 day, written in Paris. She had already got so far, 
 and she ought to be here very soon." 
 
 '' How long has she been in Rome "i " Fenton 
 asked. 
 
 He had suddenly become graver. He had been 
 intimate with Mrs. Greyson, a sculptor of no mean 
 talent, in the days when he had been a fervid 
 opponent of people and of principles with whom 
 he had later joined alliance, and the idea of her 
 return brought up vividly his parting from her, 
 when she had scornfully upbraided him for his 
 apostasy from convictions which he had again and 
 again declared to be dearer to him than life. 
 
 '* It is six years," Mrs. Fenton answered. 
 " Caldwell was born the March after she went, 
 and he will be six in three weeks. Time goes 
 fast. We are getting to be old people." 
 
 Fenton stared at his plate absently, his thoughts 
 busy with the past. 
 
 '' Has Grant Herman been married six years ? " 
 he asked, after a moment. 
 
 " Grant Herman } Yes ; he was married just 
 before she sailed ; but what of it } " 
 
 Fenton laid down the fork with which he had 
 been poking the bits of fish about on his plate. 
 He folded his arms on the edge of the table, and 
 regarded his wife. 
 
SOME SPEECH OF MARRIAGE. 25 
 
 " It is astonishing, Edith," he observed, " how 
 well one may know a woman and yet be mistaken 
 in her. For six years I have supposed you to be 
 religiously avoiding any allusion to Helen's love 
 for Grant Herman, and it seems you never knew 
 it at all." 
 
 It was Mrs. Fenton's turn to look up in sur- 
 prise. 
 
 " What do you mean } " she asked. 
 
 Her husband laughed lightly, yet not very joy- 
 ously. 
 
 ** Nothing, if you will. Nobody ever told me 
 they were in love with each other, but I am as 
 sure that Helen made Herman marry Ninitta as 
 if I had been on hand to see the operation." 
 
 *' Made him marry her } Why should he marry 
 her if he didn't want to } " 
 
 ** Oh, well, I don't know anything about it. I 
 know Ninitta followed Herman to America, for 
 she told me so ; and I am sure he had no idea of 
 marrying her when she got here. Anybody can 
 put two and two together, I suppose, especially if 
 you know what infernally Puritanical notions 
 Helen had." 
 
 " Puritanical .? " 
 
 The artist leaned back in his chair and smiled 
 at his wife in his superior and tantalizing fashion. 
 
 " She thought she'd outgrown Puritanism," he 
 returned, ''but really she was, in her way, as 
 much of a Puritan as you are. The country is 
 
26 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 full of people who don't understand that the 
 essence of Puritanism is a slavish adherence to 
 what they call principle, and who thinlc because 
 they have got rid of a certain set of dogmas they 
 are free from their theologic heritage. There 
 never was greater rubbish than such an idea." , 
 
 Mrs. Fenton was silent. She had long ago 
 learned the futility of attempting any argument 
 in ethics with Arthur, and she received in silence 
 whatever flings at her beliefs he chose to indulge 
 in. She had even come hardly to heed words 
 which in the early days of her married life would 
 have wounded her to the quick. She had read- 
 justed her conception of her husband's character, 
 and if she still cherished illusions in regard to 
 him, she no longer believed in the possibility of 
 changing his opinions by opposing them. 
 
 Her thoughts were now, moreover, occupied 
 with the personal problem which would in any 
 case have appealed more strongly to the feminine 
 mind than abstract theories, and she was consid- 
 ering what he had told her of Mrs. Greyson and 
 Grant Herman, a sculptor for whom she had a 
 warm admiration, and a no less strong liking. 
 
 However we busy ourselves with high aims, 
 with learning, or art, or wisdom, or ethics, per- 
 sonal human interests appeal to us more strongly 
 than anything else. Human emotions respond 
 instinctively and quickly to any hint of the emo- 
 tional life of others. Nothing more strikingly 
 
SOME SPEECH OF MARRIAGE. 
 
 27 
 
 shows the essential unity of the race than the 
 readiness with which all minds lay aside all con- 
 cerns and ideas which they are accustomed to 
 consider higher, to give attention to the trifling 
 details of the intimate history of their fellows. 
 Quite unconsciously, Edith had gathered up many 
 facts, insignificant in themselves, concerning the 
 relations of Mrs. Greyson and Herman, and she 
 now found herself suddenly called upon to recon- 
 sider whatever conclusions they had led her to in 
 the light of this new development. The sculptor's 
 marriage with an ex-model had always been a 
 mystery to her, and she now endeavored to decide 
 in her mind whether it were possible that her 
 husband could be right in putting the responsibil- 
 ity upon Helen Greyson. The form of his remark 
 seemed to her to hint that the Italian's claim upon 
 Herman had been of so grave a nature as to imply 
 serious complications in their former relations ; 
 but she strenuously rejected any suspicion of evil 
 in the sculptor's conduct. 
 
 **I am sure, Arthur," she said, hesitatingly, 
 "there can have been nothing wrong between Mr. 
 Herman and Ninitta. I have too much faith in 
 him." 
 
 "To put faith in man," was his answer, "is 
 only less foolish than to beUeve in woman. I 
 didn't, however, mean to imply anything very 
 dreadful. The facts are enough, without specu- 
 lating on what is nobody's business but theirs. I 
 
28 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 wonder how he and Helen will get on together, 
 now she is coming home ? Mrs. Herman is a 
 jealous little thing, and could easily be roused up 
 to do mischief." 
 
 *'I do not believe Helen had anything to do 
 with their marriage," Edith said, with conviction. 
 '' It was a mistake from the outset." 
 
 " Granted. That is what makes it so probable 
 that Helen did it. Grant isn't the man to make a 
 fool of himself without outside pressure, and in 
 the end a sacrifice to principle is always some 
 ridiculous tomfoolery that can't be come at in any 
 other way. However, we shall see what we shall 
 see. What time are you going to Mrs. Frost- 
 winch's } " 
 
 " I am going to the Browning Club at Mrs. 
 Gore's first. Will you come 1 " 
 
 "Thank you, no. I have too much respect for 
 Browning to assist at his dismemberment. I'll 
 meet you at Mrs. Frostwinch's about ten." 
 
Ill 
 
 IN WAY OF TASTE. 
 
 Troilus and Cressida ; iii. — 3. 
 
 /^NE of the most curious of modern whims in 
 ^ Bo^ston has been the study of the poems of 
 Robert Browning. All at once there sprang up 
 on every hand strange societies called Browning 
 Clubs, and the libraries were ransacked for Brown- 
 ing's works, and for the books of whoever has had 
 the conceit or the hardihood to write about the 
 great poet. Lovely girls at afternoon receptions 
 propounded to each other abstruse conundrums 
 concerning what they were pleased to regard as 
 obscure passages, while little coteries gathered, 
 with airs of supernatural gravity, to read and dis- 
 cuss whatever bore his signature. 
 
 A genuine, serious Boston Browning Club is 
 as deliciously droll as any form of entertainment \ 
 ever devised, provided one's sense of the ludicrous . \ 
 be strong enough to overcome the natural indig- \ 
 nation aroused by seeing genuine poetry, the high 
 gift of the gods, thus abused. The clubs meet 
 in richly furnished parlors, of which the chief 
 fault is usually an over-abundance of bric-a-brac. 
 The house of Mrs. Gore, for instance, where 
 
 29 
 
so 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Edith was going this evening, was all that money 
 could make it ; and jn^a.ssing it may be noted 
 that Boston clubs are seldom of constitution!" 
 sufficiently vigorous to endure unpleasant sur- 
 roundings. The fair sex predominates at all 
 these gatherings, and over them hangs an air of 
 expectant solemnity, as if the celebration of some 
 sacred mystery were forward. Conversation is 
 carried on in subdued tones ; even the laughter 
 is softened, and when the reader takes his seat, 
 there falls upon the little company a hush so deep 
 as to render distinctly audible the frou-frou of 
 silken folds, and the tinkle of jet fringes, stirred 
 by the swelling of ardent and aspiring bosoms. 
 
 The reading is not infrequently a little dull, 
 especially to the uninitiated, and there have not 
 been wanting certain sinister suggestions that 
 now and then, during the monotonous delivery 
 of some of the longer poems, elderly and corpu- 
 lent devotees listen only with the spiritual ear, 
 the physical sense being obscured by an ab- 
 straction not to be distinguished by an ordinary 
 observer from slumber. The reader, however, is 
 bound to assume that all are listening, and if some 
 sleep and others consider their worldly concerns 
 or speculate upon the affairs of their neighbors, 
 it interrupts not at all the steady flow of the 
 reading. 
 
 Once this is finished, there is an end also of 
 inattention, for the discussion begins. The cen- 
 
IN WAY OF TASTE. ^j 
 
 j;ral and vital principle of all these clubs is that a 
 poem by Robert Browning is a sort of prize en- 
 igma, of which the solution is to be reached rather 
 by wild and daring guessing than by any common- 
 place process of reasoning. Although to an ordi- 
 nary and uninspired intellect it may appear 
 perfectly obvious that a lyric means simply and 
 clearly what it says, the true Browningite is better 
 informed. He is deeply aware that if the poet 
 seems to say one thing, this is proof indisputable 
 that another is intended. To take a work in 
 straightforward fashion would at once rob the 
 Browning Club of all excuse for existence, and 
 while parlor chairs are easy, the air warm and 
 perfumed, and it is the fashion for idle minds to 
 concern themselves with that rococo humbug 
 Philistines call culture, societies of this sort must 
 continue. 
 
 Once it is agreed that a poem means something 
 not apparent, it is easy to make it mean anything 
 and everything, especially if the discussion, as is 
 usually the case, be interspersed with discursions 
 of which the chief use is to give some clever per- 
 son or other a chance to say smart things. When 
 all else fails, moreover, the club can always fall 
 back upon allegory. Commentators on the poets 
 have always found much field for ingenious quib- 
 bling and sounding speculation in the line of alle- 
 gory. Let a poem be but considered an allegory, 
 and there is no limit to the changes which may be 
 
32 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 rung upon it, not even Mrs. Malaprop's banks of 
 the Nile restraining the creature's headstrong 
 ranging. Only a failure of the fancy of the inter- 
 preter can afford a check, and as everybody reads 
 fiction nowadays, few people are without a goodly 
 supply of fancies, either original or acquired. 
 
 Although Fenton had declined to go to Mrs. 
 Gore's with his wife, he had finished his cigar 
 when the carriage was announced, and decided to 
 accompany her, after all. The parlors were filling 
 when they arrived, and Arthur, who knew how 
 to select good company, managed to secure a 
 seat between Miss Elsie Dimmont, a young and 
 rather gay society girl, and Mrs. Frederick Stagg- 
 chase, a descendant of an old Boston family, who 
 was called one of the cleverest women of her set. 
 
 " Is Mr. Fenwick going to read t " he asked of 
 the latter, glancing about to see who was present. 
 
 " Yes," Mrs. Staggchase answered, turning 
 toward him with her distinguished motion of the 
 head and high-bred smile. " Don't you like 
 him.?" 
 
 " I never had the misfortune to hear him. I 
 know he detests me, but then I fear, that like 
 olives and caviare, I have to be an acquired 
 taste." 
 
 " Acquired tastes," she responded, with that air 
 of being amused by herself which always enter- 
 tained Fenton, '' are always the strongest." 
 
 ** And generally least to a man's credit," he 
 
IN WAY OF TASTE. 33 
 
 retorted quickly. "■ What is he going to inflict 
 upon us ? " 
 
 "Really, I don't know. I seldom come to this 
 sort ofthin^ Ldon't think it pays." 
 
 " Oh, nothing pays, of course," was Fenton's 
 reply, " but it is more or less amusing to see peo- 
 ple make fools of themselves." 
 
 The president of the club, atjthis moment, called 
 the assembly to order, and announced that Mr. 
 Fenwick had kindly consented — " Readers al- 
 ways kindly consent," muttered Fenton aside to 
 Mrs. Staggchase — to read. Bishop Blougrarns 
 Apology, to which they would now listen. There 
 was a rustle of people settling back into their 
 chairs ; the reader brushed a lank black lock from 
 his sallow brow, and with a tone of sepulchral 
 earnestness began : 
 
 " ' No more wine ? then we'll push back chairs, and talk.' " 
 
 For something over an hour, the monotonous 
 voice of the reader went dully on. Fenton drew 
 out his tablets and amused himself and Miss 
 Dimmont by drawing caricatures of the company, 
 ending with a sketch of a handsome old dowager, 
 who went so soundly to sleep that her jaw fell. 
 Over this his companion laughed so heartily that 
 Mrs. Staggchase leaned forward smilingly, and 
 took his tablets away from him ; whereat he pro- 
 duced an envelope from his pocket and was about 
 to begin another sketch, when suddenly, and ap- 
 
34 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 parently somewhat to the surprise of the reader, 
 the poem came to an end. 
 
 There was a joyful stir. The dowager awoke, 
 and there was a perfunctory clapping of hands 
 when Mr. Fenwick laid down his volume, and peo- 
 ple were assured that there was no mistake about 
 his being really quite through. A few murmurs 
 of admiration were, heard, and then there was an 
 awful pause, while the president, as usual, waited 
 in the never-fulfiHed hope that the discussion 
 would start itself without help on his part. 
 
 " How cleverly you do sketch," Miss Dimmont 
 said, under her breath ; " but it was horrid of you 
 to make me laugh." 
 
 " You are grateful," Fenton returned, in the 
 same tone. " You know I kept you from being 
 bored to death." 
 
 *' I have a cousin, Miss Wainwright," pursued 
 Miss Dimmont, " whose picture we want you to 
 paint." 
 
 " If she is as good a subject as hei- cousin," 
 Fenton answered, '' I shall be delighted to do it." 
 
 The president had, meantime, got somewhat 
 ponderously upon his feet, half a century of good 
 living not having tended to increase his natural 
 agility, and remarked that the company were, he 
 was sure, extremely grateful to Mr. Fenwick, for 
 his very intelligent interpretation of the poem read. 
 
 '' Did he interpret it } " Fenton whispered to 
 Mrs. Staggchase. '' Why wasn't I told ? " 
 
IN WAY OF TASTE. 35 
 
 " Hush ! " she answered, " I will never let you 
 sit by me again if you do not behave better." 
 
 '' Sitting isn't my metier, you know," he re- 
 torted. 
 
 The president went on to say that the lines of 
 thought opened by the poem were so various and 
 so wide that they could scarcely hope to explore 
 them all in one evening, but that he was sure there 
 must be many who had thoughts or questions they 
 wished to express, and to start the discussion he 
 would call upon a gentleman whom he had ob- 
 served taking notes during the reading, Mr. Fen- 
 ton. 
 
 **The old scaramouch!" Fenton muttered, 
 under his breath. " I'll paint his portrait and send 
 it to Punch!' 
 
 Then with perfect coolness he got upon his feet 
 and looked about the parlor. 
 
 " I am so seldom able to come to these meet- 
 ings," he said, " that I am not at all familiar with 
 your methods, and I certainly had no idea of say- 
 ing anything ; I was merely jotting down a few 
 things to think over at home, and not making 
 notes for a speech, as you would see if you exam- 
 ined the paper." 
 
 At this point Miss Dimmont gave a cough which 
 had a sound strangely like a laugh strangled at its 
 birth. 
 
 "The poem is one so subtile," Fenton continued, 
 unmoved; '*it is so clever in its knowledge of 
 
36 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 human nature, that I always have to take a certain 
 time after reading it to get myself out of the mood 
 of merely admiring its technique, before I can 
 think of it critically at all. Of course the bit 
 about ' an artist whose religion is his art ' touches 
 me keenly, for I have long held to the heresy 
 that art is the highest thing in the world, and, 
 as a matter of fact, the only thing one can depend 
 upon. The clever sophistry of Bishop Blougram 
 shows well enough how one can juggle with theol- 
 ogy ; and, after all, theology is chiefly some one 
 man's insistence that everybody else shall make 
 the same mistakes that he does." 
 
 Fenton felt that he was not taking the right 
 direction in his talk, and that in his anxiety to 
 extricate himself from a slight awkwardness he 
 was rapidly getting himself into a worse one. It 
 was one of those odd whimsicalities which always 
 came as a surprise when committed by a man who 
 usually displayed so much mental dexterity, that 
 now, instead of endeavoring to get upon the right 
 track, he simply broke off abruptly and sat down. 
 
 His words had, however, the effect of calling out 
 instantly a protest from the Rev. De Lancy Can- 
 dish. Mr. Candish was the rector of the Church 
 of the Nativity, the exceedingly ritualistic organ- 
 ization with which Mrs. Fenton was connected. 
 He was a tall and bony young man, with abundant 
 auburn hair and freckles, the most ungainly feet 
 and hands, and eyes of eager enthusiasm, which 
 
IN WAY OF TASTE. ^7 
 
 showed how the result of New England Puritanism 
 had been to implant in his soul the true martyr 
 spirit. Fenton was never weary of jeering at Mr. 
 Candish's uncouthness, his jests serving as an out- 
 let, not only for the irritation physical ugliness 
 always begot in him, but for his feeling of opposi- 
 tion to his wife's orthodoxy, in which he regarded 
 the clergyman as upholding her. The rector's 
 self-sacrificing devotion to truth, moreover, 
 awakened in the artist a certain inner dis- 
 comfort. To the keenly sensitive mind there is 
 no rebuke more galling than the unconscious re- 
 proof of a character which holds steadfastly to 
 ideals which it has basely forsaken. Arthur said 
 to himself that he hated Candish for his ungainly 
 person. " He is so out of drawing," he once told 
 his wife, *' that I always have a strong inclination 
 to rub him out and make him over again." In 
 that inmost chamber of his consciousness where 
 he allowed himself the luxury of absolute frank- 
 ness, however, the artist confessed that his ani- 
 mosity to the young rector had other causes. 
 
 As Fenton sank into his seat, Mrs. Staggchase 
 leaned over to quote from the poem, — 
 
 " ' For Blougram, he believed, say, half he spoke.* " 
 
 The artist turned upon her a glance of compre- 
 hension and amusement, but before he could reply, 
 the rough, rather loud voice of Mr. Candish ar- 
 rested his attention. 
 
3S - THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " If the poem teaches anything," Mr. Candish 
 said, speaking according to his custom, somewhat 
 too warmly, *' it seems to me it is the sophistry of 
 the sort of talk which puts art above religion. 
 The thing that offends an honest man in Bishop 
 Blougram is the fact that he looks at religion 
 as if it were an art, and not a vital and eternal 
 necessity, — a living truth that cannot be trifled 
 with." 
 
 ** Ah," Fenton's smooth and beautiful voice 
 rejoined, " that is to confound art with the arti- 
 ficial, which is an obvious error. Art is a pas- 
 sion, an utter devotion to an ideal, an absolute 
 lifting of man out of himself into that essential 
 truth which is the only lasting bond by which 
 mankind is united." 
 
 Fenton's coolness always had a confusing and 
 irritating effect upon Mr. Candish, who was too 
 thoroughly honest and earnest to quibble, and far 
 from possessing the dexterity needed to fence with 
 the artist. He began confusedly to speak, but 
 with the first word became aware that Mrs. Fen- 
 ton had come to the rescue. Edith never sawi'a 
 contest between her husband and the clergyman 
 without interfering if she could, and now she in- 
 stinctively spoke, without stopping to consider 
 where she was. 
 
 ** It is precisely for that reason," she said, "that 
 art seems to me to fall below religion. Art can 
 make man contented with life only by keeping his 
 
IN WAY OF TASTE. 
 
 39 
 
 attention fixed upon an ideal, while religion recon- 
 ciles us to life as it really is." 
 
 A murmur of assent showed Arthur how much 
 against the feeling of those around him were the 
 views he was advancing. 
 
 " Oh, well," he said, in a droll sotto voce, " if it 
 is coming down to a family difference we will con- 
 tinue it in private." 
 
 And he abandoned the discussion. 
 
 **It seems to me," pursued Mr. Candish, only 
 half conscious that Mrs. Fenton had come to his 
 aid, "that Bishop Blougram represents the most 
 dangerous spirit of the age. His paltering with 
 truth is a form of casuistry of which we see al- 
 together too much nowadays." 
 
 " Do you think," asked a timid feminine voice, 
 ** that Blougram was quite serious t That he 
 really meant all he said, I mean t " 
 
 The president looked at the speaker with de- 
 spair in his glance ; but she was adorably pretty 
 and of excellent social position, so that snubbing 
 was not to be thought of. Moreover, he was 
 thoroughly well trained in keeping his temper 
 under the severest provocation, so he expressed 
 his feelings merely by a deprecatory smile. 
 
 "We have the poet's authority," he responded, 
 in a softly patient voice, "for saying that he 
 believed only half." 
 
 There was a little rustle of leaves, as if people 
 were looking over their books, in order to find the 
 
40 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 passage to which he alluded. Then a young girl 
 in the front row of chairs, a pretty creature, just 
 on the edge of womanhood, looked up earnestly, 
 her finger at a line on the page before her. 
 
 *' I can't make out what this means," she an- 
 nounced, knitting her girlish brow, — 
 
 " * Here, we've got callous to the Virgin's winks 
 That used to puzzle people wholesomely.' 
 
 Of course he can't mean that the Madonna winks ; 
 that would be too irreverent." 
 
 There were little murmurs of satisfaction that 
 the question had been asked, confusing explana- 
 tions which evidently puzzled some who had not 
 thought of being confused before ; and then an- 
 other girl, ignoring the fact that the first difficulty 
 had not been disposed of, propounded another. 
 
 ''Isn't the phrase rather bold," she asked, 
 '' where he speaks of ' blessed evil .'* ' " 
 
 "Where is that } " some one asked. 
 
 "On page io6, in my edition," was the reply; 
 and a couple of moments were given to finding 
 the place in the various books. 
 
 " Oh, I see the line," said an old lady, at last. 
 "It's one — two — three — five lines from the 
 bottom of the page : 
 
 " ' And that's what all the blessed evil's for.' " 
 
 "You don't think," queried the first speaker, 
 appealing personally to the president, " that Mr, 
 
/iV IFAV OF TASTE. ^i 
 
 Browning can really have meant that evil is 
 blessed, do you ? " 
 
 The president regarded her with an affectionate 
 and fatherly smile. 
 
 "I think," he said, with an air of settling every- 
 thing, "that the explanation of his meaning is to be 
 found in the line which follows, — 
 
 " ' It's use in Time is to environ us.' " 
 
 " Heavens ! " whispered Fenton to Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase ; "fancy that incarnate respectability en- 
 vironed by ' blessed evil ! ' " 
 
 " For my part," she returned, in the same tone, 
 " I feel as if I were visiting a lunatic asylum." 
 
 " Yes, that line does make it beautifully clear," 
 observed the voice of Miss Catherine Penwick ; 
 "and I think that's so beautiful about the exposed 
 brain, and lidless eyes, and disemprisoned heart. 
 The image is so exquisite when he speaks of their 
 withering up at once," 
 
 Fenton made a droll grimace for the benefit of 
 his neighbor, and then observed with great appar- 
 ent seriousness, — 
 
 " The poem is most remarkable for the intimate 
 knowledge it shows of human nature. Take a 
 Ime like 
 
 ' Men have outgrown the shame of being fools ; ' 
 
 We can see such striking instances of its truth all 
 about us." 
 
42 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 *' How can you ? " exclaimed Elsie Dimmont, 
 under her breath. 
 
 Fenton had not been able wholly to keep out of 
 his tone the mockery which he intended, and sev- 
 eral people looked at him askance. Fortunately 
 for him, a nice old gentleman who, being rather 
 hard of hearing, had not caught what was said, 
 now broke in with the inevitable question, which, 
 sooner or later, was sure to come into every dis- 
 cussion of the club : 
 
 ** Isn't this poem to be most satisfactorily un- 
 derstood when it is regarded as an allegory ? " 
 
 The members, however, did not take kindly to 
 this suggestion in the present instance. The 
 question passed unnoticed, while a severe-faced 
 woman inquired, with an air of vast superiority, — 
 
 " I have understood that Bishop Blougram is 
 intended as a portrait of Cardinal Wiseman ; can 
 any one tell me if Gigadibs is also a portrait ? " 
 
 "■ Oh, Lord ! " muttered Fenton, half audibly. 
 " I can't stand any more of this." . 
 
 And at that moment a servant came to tell him 
 that his carriage was waiting. 
 
IV 
 
 NOW HE IS FOR THE NUMBERS. 
 
 Romeo and Juliet ; ii. — 4. 
 
 WHEN Mr. and Mrs. Fenton were in the car- 
 riage, driving from Mrs. Gore's to Mrs Frost- 
 winch's, Arthur broke into a pleasant little laugh, 
 as if a sudden thought had amused him. 
 
 "Why in the world, Edith," he asked, "couldn't 
 you let that moon-calf Candish fight his own 
 battle to-night } He would have tied himself 
 all up in two moments, with a little judicious 
 help I should have been glad to give him." 
 
 "I knew it," was her answer, "and that is pre- 
 cisely why I wanted to stop things. What possi- 
 ble amusement it can be to you to get the better 
 of a man who is so little a match for you in argu- 
 ment, I don't understand." 
 
 " I never begin," Fenton responded. " Of 
 course if he starts it I have to defend myself." 
 
 The stopping of the carriage prevented further 
 discussion, and the pair were soon involved in the 
 crowd of people struggling toward the hostess 
 across Mrs. Denton Frostwinch's handsome draw- 
 ing-room, Mrs. Frostvvinch belonged, beyond the 
 possibility of any cavilling doubt, to the most 
 exclusive circle of fashionable Boston society. 
 
 43 
 
44 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Boston society is a complex and enigmatical 
 thing, full of anomalies, bounded by wavering and 
 uncertain lines, governed by no fixed standards, 
 whether of wealth, birth, or culture, but at times 
 apparently leaning a little toward each of these 
 three great factors of American social standing. 
 
 It is seldom wise to be sure that at any given 
 Boston house whatever, one will not find a more 
 or less strong dash of democratic flavor in general 
 company, and there are those who discover in this 
 fact evidences of an agreeable and lofty republi- 
 canism. At Mrs. Frostwinch's one was less likely 
 than in most houses to encounter socially doubt- 
 ful characters, a fact which Arthur Fenton, who 
 was secretly flattered to be invited here, had once 
 remarked to his wife was an explanation of the 
 dulness of these entertainments. 
 
 For Mrs. Frostwinch's parties were apt to be 
 anything but lively. One was morally elevated by 
 being able to look on the comely and high-bred 
 face of Mrs. Bodewin Ranger, but that fine old 
 lady had a sort of religious scruple against saying 
 anything in particular in company, a relic of the 
 days of her girlhood, when cleverness was not the 
 fashion in her sex and when she had been obliged 
 to suppress herself lest she outshine the high- 
 minded and courtly but dreadfully dull gentleman 
 she married. 
 
 One had here the pleasure of shaking one of 
 the white fingers of Mr, Plant, the most exquisite 
 
NOW HE IS FOR THE NUMBERS. 
 
 45 
 
 gourmet in Boston, whose only daughter had made 
 herself ridiculous by a romantic marriage with a 
 country farmer. ,' The Stewart Hubbards, who 
 were the finest and fiercest aristocrats in town, 
 and whose ancestors had been possessed not only 
 of influence but of wealth ever since early colonial 
 days, were old and dear friends of Mrs. Frost- 
 winch and always decorated her parlors on gala 
 nights with their benign presence. Mr. Peter 
 Calvin, the leader of art fashions, high priest of 
 Boston conservatism, and author of numerous 
 laboriously worthless books, seldom failed to 
 diffuse the aroma of his patronizing personality 
 through the handsome parlors of this hospitable 
 mansion when there was any reasonable chance of 
 his securing an audience to admire him ; and in 
 general terms the company was what the news- 
 papers call select and distinguished. 
 
 For Mrs. Frostwinch was entitled to a leading 
 place in society upon whichever of the three great 
 principles it was based. She was descended from 
 one of the best of American families, while her 
 good-tempered if somewhat shadowy husband was 
 of lineage quite as unexceptional as her own. She 
 was possessed of abundant wealth, while in clever- 
 ness and culture she was the peer of any of the 
 brilliant people who frequented her house. She 
 was moderately pretty, dressed beautifully, was 
 sweet tempered, and possessed all good gifts and 
 graces except repose and simplicity. She perhaps 
 
46 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 worked too hard to keep abreast of the times in 
 too many currents, and her mental weariness in- 
 stead of showing itself by an irritable temper 
 found a less disagreeable outlet in a certain 
 nervous manner apt to seem artificial to those 
 who did not know her well. She was a clever, 
 even a brilliant woman, who assembled clever' and 
 brilliant people about her, although as has been 
 intimated, the result was by no means what might 
 have been expected from such material and such 
 opportunities. The truth is that there seems to 
 be a fatal connection between exclusiveness and 
 dulness. The people who assembled in Mrs. 
 Frostwinch's handsome parlors usually seemed to 
 be unconsciously laboring under the burden of 
 their own respectability. They apparently felt 
 that they had fulfilled their whole duty by simply 
 being there ; and while the list of people present 
 at one of Mrs. Frostwinch's evenings made those 
 who were not there sigh with envy at thought of 
 the delights they had missed, the reality was far 
 from being as charming as their fancy. 
 
 " I wish somebody would bring Amanda Welsh 
 Sampson here," murmured Arthur in his wife's 
 ear, as the Fentons made their way toward their 
 hostess. " It would be too delicious to see how 
 she'd stir things up, and how shocked the old 
 tabby dowagers would be." 
 
 But there were some social topics which were 
 too serious to Edith to be jested upon. 
 
ATOfF HE IS FOR THE NUMBERS. 
 
 47 
 
 " Mrs. Sampson ! " she returned, with an ex- 
 pression of being really shocked. " That dread- 
 ful creature ! " 
 
 The rooms were well filled ; the clatter of in- 
 numerable tongues speaking English with that 
 resonant dryness which reminds one of nothing 
 else so much as of the clack of a negro minstrel's 
 clappers indefinitely reduplicated, rang in the ears 
 with confusing steadiness. An hour was spent in 
 fragmentary conversations, which somehow were 
 always interrupted at the instant the interesting 
 point was reached. The men bestirred themselves 
 with more or less alacrity, making their way about 
 the room with a conscientious determination to 
 speak to everybody whom duty called upon them 
 to address, or more selfishly devoting themselves 
 to finding out and chatting with the pretty girls. 
 Fenton found time for the latter method while 
 being far too politic to neglect the former. He 
 was chatting in a corner with Ethel Mott, when 
 Fred Rangely, whose successful novel had made 
 him vastly the fashion that winter, joined them. 
 
 " When wit and beauty get into a corner to- 
 gether," was Rangely's salutation, " there is sure 
 to be mischief brewing." 
 
 " It isn't at all kind," Miss Mott retorted, " for 
 you to emphasize the fact that Mr. Fenton has all 
 the wit and I not any." 
 
 " It is as kind," Fenton said, " as his touching 
 upon the plainness of my personal appearance." 
 
48 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ''Your mutual modesty in appropriating wit and 
 beauty," Rangely returned, ** goes well toward 
 balancing the account." 
 
 " One has to be modest when you appear, Mr. 
 Rangely," Miss Mott declared, saucily, '' simply to 
 keep up the average." 
 
 "Come," Fenton said, *'this will serve as an 
 excellent beginning for a quarrel. I will leave 
 you to carry it on by yourselves. I have got too 
 old for that sort of amusement." 
 
 Rangely looked after the artist as the latter 
 took himself off to join Mrs. Staggchase, who 
 was holding court not far away. 
 
 " You may follow if you want to," Ethel said, 
 intercepting the glance. 
 
 Rangely laughed, a trifle uneasily. 
 
 " I don't want to," he replied, " if you will be 
 good natured." 
 
 " Good natured } I like that ! I am always 
 good natured. You had better go than to stay 
 and abuse me. But then, as you have been at 
 Mrs. Staggchase's all the afternoon, you ought to 
 be pretty well talked out." 
 
 The young man turned toward her with an air 
 of mingled surprise and impatience. 
 
 " Who said I had been there .'' " he demanded. 
 
 " It was in the evening papers," she returned, 
 teasingly. " All your movements are chronicled 
 now you have become a great man." 
 
 " Humph ! I am glad you were interested in my 
 whereabouts." 
 
A'OIV HE IS FOR THE NUMBERS. ^g 
 
 " But I wasn't in the least." 
 
 " Are you sparring as usual, Miss Mott ? " asked 
 Mr. Stewart Hubbard, joining them. ''Good 
 evening, Mr. Rangely." 
 
 **0h, Mr. Hubbard," Miss Mott said, ignoring 
 the question, " I want to know who is to make the 
 statue of America. It is going to stand opposite 
 our house, so that it will be the first thing I shall 
 see when I look out of the window in the morn- 
 ing, and naturally I am interested." 
 
 ** Mr. Herman is making a study, and Mr. Irons 
 has been put up to asking this new woman for a 
 model. What is her name .'* The one whose 
 Galatea made a stir last year." 
 
 " Mrs. Greyson," Rangely answered. " I used 
 to know her before she went to Rome." 
 
 " Is she clever } " demanded Miss Mott, with a 
 sort of girlish imperiousness which became her 
 very well. " I can't have a statue put up unless 
 it is very good indeed." 
 
 " She might take Miss Mott as a model," Mr. 
 Hubbard suggested, smiling. 
 
 " For America } Oh, I am too little, and al- 
 together too civilized. I'd do better for a model 
 of Monaco, thank you." 
 
 " There is always a good deal of chance about 
 you," Rangely said in her ear, as Mr. Staggchase 
 spoke to Mr. Hubbard and drew his attention 
 away. 
 
 Mr. Staggchase was a thin, wintry man, looking. 
 
50 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 as Fenton once said, like the typical Yankee 
 spoiled by civilization. He had always in a scene 
 of this sort the air of being somewhat out of place, 
 but of having brought his business with him, so 
 that he was neither idle nor bored. It was upon 
 business that he now spoke to Hubbard. 
 
 " Did you see Lincoln to-day } " he asked. 
 " He has got an ultimatum from those parties. 
 They will sell all their rights for $70,000." 
 
 **For $70,000," repeated Mr. Hubbard, thought- 
 fully. " We can afford to give that if we are sure 
 about the road ; but I don't know that we are. If 
 Irons gets hold of any hint of what we are doing 
 he can upset the whole thing." 
 
 "But he won't. There is no fear of that." 
 
 A movement in the crowd brought Edith Fen- 
 ton at this moment to the side of Mr. Hubbard. 
 She was radiant to-night in her primrose gown, 
 and the gentleman, with whom she was always a 
 favorite, turned toward her with evident pleasure. 
 
 ** Isn't it a jam," she said. " I have ceased to 
 have any control over my movements." 
 
 ** That is unkind, when I fancied you allowed 
 yourself to give me the pleasure of seeing you," 
 returned he with elaborate courtesy. *' Let me 
 take you in to the supper- room." 
 
 *' Thank you," Edith replied, taking his arm. 
 "I do not object to an ice, and I want to ask a 
 favor. Haven't you some copying you can give a 
 protegee of mine } She's a lovely girl, and she 
 
ArOPF HE IS FOR THE NUMBERS. 51 
 
 really writes very nicely. I assure you she needs 
 the work, or I wouldn't bother you." 
 
 They made their way into the hall before he an- 
 swered. Then he asked, with some seriousness, — 
 
 " Are you sure she is absolutely to be trusted.^ " 
 
 "Trusted.? Why, of course. I'd trust her as 
 absolutely as I would myself." 
 
 " I asked because I do happen to have some 
 copying I want done ; but it is of the most serious 
 importance that it be kept secret. It is the 
 prospectus of a big business scheme, and if a hint 
 of it got on the air it would all be ruined." 
 
 Edith looked up into his face and smiled. 
 
 "Her name," she said, "is Melissa Blake, and 
 
 you will find her Or, wait; what time shall I 
 
 send her to your office to-morrow } " 
 
 Her companion smiled in turn. They had 
 reached the door of the supper-room, where the 
 clatter of dishes, the popping of champagne corks, 
 and the rattle of silver were added to the babble of 
 conversation which filled the whole house. About 
 the tables was going on a struggl.e which, however 
 well-bred, was at least sufficiently vigorous. 
 
 " You take a good deal for granted," he said. 
 " However, it will do no harm for me to see the 
 young woman. She may come at eleven. What 
 shall I bring you .-^ " 
 
V 
 
 'TWAS WONDROUS PITIFUL. 
 
 Othello; i. — 3. 
 
 " jTjEAR JOHN, I will give it up any day you 
 
 ^ say, and go back to Feltonville and live on 
 the farm ; but you know " — 
 
 Melissa Blake broke off and left her chair to 
 take a seat on the corner of that on which her 
 betrothed, John Stanton, was sitting, a proceeding 
 which made it necessary for him to put his arm 
 about her trig waist to support her. 
 
 " Don't think I don't understand, dear," she 
 said, nestling up to him, "how hard it is, and what 
 a long drag it has been, but we should neither of 
 us ever feel quite satisfied to give it up. We can 
 hold on, can't we, as long as we are together." 
 
 He kissed her fondly, but with a certain air of 
 distraction which showed how full was his mind 
 of the matter which troubled him. Two y^ears 
 before, he had come to Boston, and obtained work 
 as a carpenter, determined to pay the debts left 
 by his dead father, before he would marry and 
 settle down on the small farm which belonged to 
 his betrothed, and which, while it might be made 
 to yield a living, could by no means be looked to 
 
 52 
 
'TIVAS WOiYDROUS PITIFUL. 53 
 
 for more. For the sake of being near him, Melissa 
 had given up the school teaching of which she was 
 fond, and come to the city also, and although she 
 had found the difficulty of earning the means of 
 support far greater than she had anticipated, she 
 had still clung to the fortunes of her lover, to 
 whom her steadfastness and unfailing cheer were 
 of a value such as men realize only when it is lost. 
 
 ** I got a letter to-day," John went on, while 
 Melissa stroked his fingers fondly, " about the 
 meadows. The time for redeeming them is up 
 this month, and if I try to do it I can't pay any- 
 thing on the debts this winter. The truth is " — 
 
 Melissa sat up suddenly. 
 
 **John!" she exclaimed. 
 
 " Why, what — what is the matter } " 
 
 She looked at him with wide open eyes, draw- 
 ing in her under lip beneath her white teeth, with 
 the air of profound meditation. Then she freed 
 herself abruptly from his arms and went hastily to 
 the table upon which were her writing materials. 
 She had been at work copying when her lover 
 came in, and her papers lay still open, with ink 
 scarcely dry, where she had stopped to welcome 
 him. She took one sheet up and studied it 
 eagerly, and then turned toward him with shin- 
 ing eyes, her whole face aglow. 
 
 " Oh, John !" she exclaimed. 
 
 He regarded her in puzzled silence. Then in 
 an instant the glad light faded from her eyes, and 
 
54 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 her lips lost their smile. An expression of pain 
 and almost of terror replaced the look of joy. 
 There had suddenly come to Melissa a sense of 
 what she was doing. In the paper she held was 
 written the plan of the formation of a syndicate 
 to purchase the very range of meadows along the 
 river in Feltonville of which those mentioned by 
 John formed a part. At Mrs. Fenton's direction, 
 Melissa had gone to see Mr. Hubbard, and had 
 by him been employed to copy these papers for 
 use at a meeting of the proposed stockholders, 
 which was to take place in a few days. 
 
 " Mrs. Fenton tells me," he had said, "that you 
 are to be trusted. It is absolutely essential that 
 you do not mention these plans to any living 
 being. Perfect secrecy is expected from you, and 
 it is only because Mrs. Fenton is your guarantee 
 that I run the risk of putting them into your 
 hands." 
 
 " I think you can trust me," she had answered ; 
 "even if," she had added, with the ghost of a 
 smile, "there were anybody that I know who 
 would be at all likely to be interested." 
 
 And now the temptation had come to her in a 
 way of which she had never dreamed. She had 
 gone on with her copying, smiling to herself at 
 the coincidence which put into the hands of a 
 Feltonville girl this plan for the metamorphosis 
 of the sleepy old village into a bustling manufac- 
 turing town, but she had not considered that this 
 
'TWAS WONDROUS PITIFUL. 
 
 55 
 
 scheme might have important bearing upon the 
 fortunes of her lover. She knew that Stanton's 
 father had owned meadows along the river where 
 the new factories were to lie, and she knew also 
 that when old Mr. Stanton died these had been 
 sold with a condition of redemption, but until this 
 moment she had not connected the facts. She 
 did not understand business, and had been puz- 
 zling her brain as she wrote, to understand what 
 was meant by the statement that a certain com- 
 pany would sell a "six months' option at seventy 
 thousand dollars " on a water-power for two thou- 
 sand dollars. She did understand now, however, 
 that were John in possession of the secret of the 
 syndicate's plans, he could redeem his father's 
 meadows with the money he had saved toward 
 the payment of the debts which had forced the 
 old man into the bankruptcy that broke his heart, 
 and once he owned these lands lying in the midst 
 of the desirable tract, John could command his 
 own price for them. She held in her hand the 
 secret which would free her lover from the heavy 
 burden of years, and bring quickly the wedding- 
 day for which they had both waited and longed so 
 patiently. 
 
 The blood bounded so hotly in Melissa's veins 
 as she realized all this, that she could scarcely 
 breathe ; but like a lightning flash a thought fol- 
 lowed which sent the tide surging back to her 
 heart, and left her cold and faint. She remem- 
 
56 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 bered that this knowledge was a trust. That she 
 had given her word not to betray it. With 
 instant recoil, she leaped to the thought that 
 advising her lover to redeem these meadows was 
 not betraying the secret. Like a swift shuttle 
 flew her mind between argument and defence, 
 between temptation and resistance, between love 
 and duty. 
 
 "■ Why, what is it, Milly } " John demanded, 
 starting up and coming to her. '* What in the 
 world makes you act so funny } Are you sick } 
 Why don't you speak t " 
 
 It is not easy to express the force of the strug- 
 gle " which went on in poor Milly's mind. It 
 seemed to her at that moment as if all the hopes 
 of her life were set against her honesty. The 
 material issues in any conflict between principle 
 and inclination are of less importance than the 
 desire which they represent. The few thousand 
 dollars involved in the redemption of the Stanton 
 meadows was little when compared to the magnifi- 
 cent scheme of which this would be a mere trifling 
 accident, but the sum represented all the desires 
 of Milly Blake's life, while over against it stood 
 all her faith, her honesty, and her religion. 
 
 For an instant she wavered, standing as if by 
 some spell suddenly arrested, with arms half 
 extended. Then she flung down the paper and 
 threw herself upon her lover's breast with a burst 
 of tears. 
 
TIVAS WONDROUS PITIFUL. 
 
 57 
 
 "Why, Milly," he said, soothingly. '' Milly, 
 Milly." 
 
 He was unused to feminine vagaries. His be- 
 trothed was of the outwardly quiet order of Women, 
 and an outburst like this was incomprehensible to 
 him. He could only hold the weeping girl in his 
 strong embrace, soothing her in helpless mas- 
 culine fashion, awkward, but exactly what she 
 needed. 
 
 " There, John," she cried at last, giving him a 
 tumultuous hug, and looking up into his face 
 through her tears, '• I always told you you were 
 engaged to a fool, and this is a new proof of it." 
 
 " But what in the world," Stanton asked, look- 
 ing down into her eyes with mingled fondness 
 and bewilderment, *' is it all about } What is the 
 matter ? " 
 
 *'It is nothing but my foolishness," she an- 
 swered, leading him back to the chair from which 
 he had risen. " I was going to show you some- 
 thing in a paper I am copying, and just in time I 
 remembered that I had particularly promised not to 
 show it to anybody." 
 
 He regarded her curiously. 
 
 " But why," he asked, with a certain deliberate- 
 ness which somehow made her uneasy, '' did you 
 want to show it to me." 
 
 " Because — because — " 
 
 She could not equivocate, and her innocent soul 
 had had little training in the arts of evasion. 
 
58 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " Because what ? " 
 
 Stanton leaned back in his chair, holding her by 
 the shoulders as she sat upon his knee, and 
 searching her face with his strong brown eyes. 
 Milly's glance drooped. 
 
 " Don't ask me, John," she responded, putting 
 her hand against his cheek, wistfully. '* Don't 
 you see I couldn't tell you without letting you 
 know what is in the paper, and that is precisely 
 the thing I promised not to do." 
 
 There are few men in whom a woman's open 
 refusal to yield a point, no matter how trifling, 
 does not arouse a tyrannous masculine impulse to 
 compel obedience. Stanton had really no great 
 curiosity about the secret, whatever it might be, 
 but he instinctively felt that it was right to demand 
 the telling because his betrothed refused to speak. 
 His face grew more grave. The hands upon 
 Milly's shoulders unconsciously tightened their 
 hold. The girl intuitively felt that a struggle was 
 coming, although even yet the signs were hardly 
 tangible. She grew a little paler, putting her 
 hand beneath her lover's bearded chin, and hold- 
 ing his face up so that she could look straight 
 into his fearless, honest eyes. 
 
 ''Dear John," she said, wistfully, "you know I 
 never have a secret of my own that I keep from 
 you in all the world." 
 
 " But why," demanded he, '' can it do any harm 
 for you to give me some reason why you ever 
 
'TWAS WONDROUS PITIFUL. 
 
 59 
 
 thought of telling me this ; and just at a time, 
 too, when we were talking of business." 
 
 " Because," she answered, thoughtlessly, '* it 
 was about business." 
 
 A new light came into Stanton's face. His 
 lips subtly changed their expression. 
 
 " It must have been a chance to make some 
 money," he said. 
 
 She grew deadly pale, but she did not answer 
 him. He searched her face an instant, and then he 
 lifted her in his strong arms, rising from the 
 chair, and seating her in his place. He took a 
 step forward, and stretched out his hand to take 
 the paper she had thrown upon the table. With a 
 cry of terror she sprang up and caught his arm. 
 
 " John ! " she exclaimed. " Oh, for pity's sake, 
 don't look at it." 
 
 He turned and regarded her with a more un- 
 kind glance than she had ever seen upon his face. 
 
 ** Will you tell me .? " he asked. 
 
 " I can't, I can't ! " she answered, half sobbing. 
 
 He looked at the paper, and then at his sweet- 
 heart. Then with a rough motion he shook off 
 her fingers from his arm, and without a word went 
 abruptly from the room. 
 
 Milly looked toward the door which had closed 
 after him as if she could not believe that he had 
 really gone ; then she sank down to the floor, and, 
 leaning her head upon a chair, she sobbed as if 
 her heart were broken. 
 
VI 
 
 THE INLY TOUCH OF LOVE. - 
 
 Two Gentlemen of Verona ; ii. — 7. 
 
 GRANT HERMAN looked across the breakfast 
 table at his Italian wife thoughtfully a mo- 
 ment, considering, as he often did, what was 
 likely to be the effect of something he was about 
 to say. In six years of married life he had not 
 learned how to adapt himself to the narrower 
 mind and more personal views of his wife. He 
 perhaps fell into the error, so common to strong 
 natures, of being unable to comprehend that by 
 far the larger part of the principles which influ- 
 ence broad minds do not for narrow ones exist 
 at all. He continually tried to discover what pro- 
 cess of reasoning led Ninitta to given results, but 
 he was never able to appreciate the fact that often 
 it was by no chain of logic whatever that certain 
 conclusions had been arrived at. A mental habit 
 of catching up opinions at haphazard, of acting 
 simply from emotions, however transient, instead 
 of from convictions, was wholly outside his mental 
 experience, and equally unrealized in his compre- 
 hension. 
 
 He regarded Ninitta, whose foreign face and 
 60 
 
THE IiVLY TOUCH OF LOVE. 5i 
 
 beautiful figure looked as much out of place be- 
 hind the coffee urn as would the faun of Praxiteles 
 at an afternoon reception, and a smothered sigh 
 rose to his lips with the thought how utterly he 
 was at a loss to comprehend her. It happened in 
 the present case, as it often did, that his failure to 
 understand arose chiefly from the fact that there 
 was nothing in particular to understand, and, when 
 he spoke, Ninitta received his remark quite simply. 
 
 *' Mrs. Greyson is at home again," he said. 
 
 " Mrs. Greyson," she echoed, her dark eyes light- 
 ing up with genuine pleasure. " Oh, that is in- 
 deed good. Where is she.'* Have you seen her .'*" 
 
 There shot through Herman's mind the reflec- 
 tion that since his wife could not know that he 
 married her out of love not for herself but for 
 Helen Greyson, it was absurd to have fancied that 
 Ninitta would be jealously displeased at Helen's 
 return ; and the inevitable twinge of conscience 
 at his wife's trusting ignorance followed. 
 
 "I haven't seen her," he answered; "she only 
 arrived yesterday. Mrs. Fenton told me when I 
 met her at the Paint and Clay Exhibition last 
 night." 
 
 Ninitta folded her hands on the edge of the ta- 
 ble, with a gesture of childish pleasure. 
 
 *' I wonder what she will say to Nino," she said 
 musingly, her voice taking a new softness. 
 
 A sudden spasm contracted the sculptor's throat. 
 His whole being was shaken by the return of the 
 
62 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 woman to whom all the passionate devotion of his 
 manhood was given, and he never heard that soft, 
 maternal note with which his wife spoke of his 
 boy without emotion. 
 
 " She may say that the young rascal ought to be 
 out of his bed in time for breakfast," he retorted 
 with affected brusqueness. "■ He has all the Italian 
 laziness in him." 
 
 He pushed back his chair as he spoke, and rose 
 from the table. He hesitated a moment, as if 
 some sudden thought absorbed him, then he went 
 to his wife and kissed her forehead. 
 
 *' Good-by," he said. "I sha'n't come up for 
 lunch. Don't coddle the boy too much." 
 
 " But when," his wife persisted, as he turned 
 away, " shall I see Mrs. Greyson ? I want to 
 show her the bambino!' 
 
 She always spoke in Italian to her husband and 
 her child, and indeed her English had never been 
 of the most fluent. 
 
 " The bambino!' the father repeated, smiling. 
 *' He will be a bambino to you when he is as big as 
 I am, I suppose. I do not know about Mrs. Grey- 
 son, but I will find out, if I can." 
 
 He left the room and went to the chamber 
 where his swarthy boy of five lay still luxuriously 
 in his crib, although he was fully awake. Nino 
 gave a soft cry of joy at the sight of his father, 
 and greeted him rapturously. 
 
 " Papa/' he asked in Italian, *' does the kitty 
 
THE INLY TOUCH OF LOVE. 
 
 63 
 
 know how much she hurts when she scratches ? 
 she made a long place on my arm, and it hurt like 
 fire." 
 
 " Do you know how much you hurt her to make 
 her do it ? " his father returned, smiling fondly. 
 
 '' Oh, but she is so soft and so little, of course I 
 don't hurt her," Nino answered, with boyish logic. 
 " Anyway, she ought not to hurt me. I don't like 
 to be hurt." 
 
 The foolish, childish words came back to Her- 
 man's mind a couple of hours later, as he waited in 
 the boarding-house parlor for Helen Greyson. He 
 smiled with bitterness to think how perfectly they 
 represented his own state of mind. He said to 
 himself that he was tired of being hurt, and rose 
 at the moment to take in both his hands the hands 
 of a beautiful woman, to his eyes no older and no 
 less fair than when he had said good-by to her on 
 his wedding morning, six years before. He tried 
 to speak, but tears came instead of words ; choked 
 and blinded, he turned away abruptly, struggling 
 to regain his composure. 
 
 The meeting after long years of those who have 
 loved and been separated, may, for the moment, 
 carry them back to the time of their parting so 
 completely that all that lies between seems an- 
 nihilated. The old emotion reasserts itself so 
 strongly, the past lives again so vividly, that there 
 seems to have been no break in feeling, and they 
 stand in relation to one another as if the parting 
 
64 
 
 THE PHIL IS TIiVES. 
 
 were yet to come. When they had been together 
 a little, the time which lay between them would 
 once more become a reality ; but at the first touch 
 of their hands those bitter days of loneliness 
 ceased to exist, and they seemed to stand together 
 again, as when they were saying good-by six years 
 before. 
 
 With her old time self-control, it was Helen w^ho 
 spoke first, and her words recalled him from the 
 past and its passion, to the present and its duty. 
 
 '' Tell me how Ninitta is," she said, *' and the 
 boy. I do so want to see that wonderful boy." 
 
 The sculptor commanded his voice by a power- 
 ful effort. 
 
 ''They are both well," he answered. "The boy 
 is a wonderful little fellow, although perhaps I am 
 not an unprejudiced judge. Ninitta is crazy to 
 show him to you. She has pretty nearly effaced 
 herself since he came, and only lives for his 
 benefit." 
 
 '' She is a happy woman," Helen said, assuming 
 that air of cheerfulness which is one of the first 
 accomplishments that women are forced by life to 
 learn. " I should know she would be devoted 
 to her children." 
 
 There were a few moments of silence. Both 
 cast down their eyes, and then each raised them 
 to study whatever changes ti-me might have made 
 in the years that lay between them. Helen's 
 heart was beating painfully, but she was deter- 
 
THE INLY TOUCH OF LOVE. 
 
 65 
 
 mined not to lose her self-control. She knew of 
 old how completely she could rule the mood of her 
 companion, and she felt that upon her calmness 
 depended his. She had been schooling herself for 
 this interview from the moment she began to con- 
 sider whether she might return to America, and 
 she was therefore less unprepared than was Her- 
 man for the trying situation in which she now 
 found herself ; yet it required all her strength of 
 mind and of will not to give way to the tide of love 
 and emotion which surged within her breast. 
 
 Herman fixed his eyes resolutely on an un- 
 gainly group in pinkish clay which represented an 
 American commercial sculptor's idea of Romeo 
 and Juliet at the moment when the Nurse sepa- 
 rates them with a message from Lady Capulet. 
 With artistic instinct he noted the stupidity of the 
 composition, the vulgarity of the lines, the cheap 
 ugliness of the group. In that singular abstrac- 
 tion which comes so frequently in moments of 
 high emotion, he let his glance wander to the 
 pictures on the wall, the enormities in embroidery 
 which adorned the chair backs, the garish hues of 
 the rug lying before the open grate. Then it oc- 
 curred to him, with a vague sense of amusement, 
 how great was the incongruity between such a 
 setting as this vulgar boarding-house reception- 
 room, and the woman before him. The idea 
 brought to his mind the contrast between the life 
 to which Helen had come, and the life at Rome, 
 
56 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 artistic, rich, and full of possibilities, which she had 
 left. 
 
 The thought of Rome recalled instantly the old 
 da3^s there, almost a score of years ago, when he 
 had first known Ninitta. So vivid were the memo- 
 ries which awakened, that he seemed to see again 
 the Roman studio, the fat old aunt, voluble and 
 sharp eyed, who always accompanied her niece 
 when the girl posed ; and most clearly of all did 
 his inner vision perceive the fresh, silent maiden 
 whose exquisite figure was at once the admiration 
 and the despair of all the young artists in Rome. 
 He remembered how Hoffmeir had discovered the 
 girl drawing water from an old broken fountain he 
 had gone out to sketch ; and the difficulties that 
 had to be overcome before she could be persuaded 
 to pose. The Capri maidens are brought up to be 
 averse to posing, and Ninitta had not long enough 
 breathed the air of Rome to have overcome the 
 prejudices of her youth. He reflected, with a bit- 
 terness rendered vague by a certain strange imper- 
 sonality of his mood, how different would have 
 been his life had Hoffmeir been unable to over- 
 come the girl's scruples. He wondered whether 
 the fat old aunt, and the greasy, good-natured little 
 priest with whom she had taken counsel, would 
 have urged Ninitta to take up the life of a model, 
 could they have foreseen all the results to which 
 this course was to lead in the end. 
 
 Then, with a sudden stinging consciousness, the 
 
THE INLY TOUCH OF LOVE. 67 
 
 thouo:ht came of all that her decision had meant 
 to his life. The old question whether he had done 
 right in marrying Ninitta forced itself upon him as 
 if it were some enemy springing up from ambush. 
 He raised his eyes, and his glance met that of Mrs. 
 Greyson. 
 
 " It is no use, Helen," he broke out, impulsively, 
 "■ we must talk frankly. It is idle to suppose that 
 we can go on in an artificial pretence that we have 
 nothing to say," 
 
 She put up her hand appealingly. 
 
 " Only do not drive me away again," she pleaded. 
 " Don't say things that I have no right to hear ! " 
 
 A dark red stained Herman's cheek, and the 
 tears came into his eyes. 
 
 *• No," he returned. ** if any one is to be driven 
 away it shall not be you." 
 
 ** But why need we trouble the things that are 
 past," she went on, with wistful eagerness. '' Why 
 cannot we accept it all in silence, and be friends." 
 
 He looked at her with a passionate, penetrating 
 glance. She felt a wild and foolish longing to 
 fling herself upon the floor and embrace his feet ; 
 but the old Puritan training, the resistant fibre 
 inherited from sturdy ancestors, still did not fail 
 her. 
 
 " You have your wife," she hurried on, " your 
 home, your boy. That is enough. That " — 
 
 ''That is not enough," he interrupted, with an 
 emphasis, which seemed stern. *' Helen, I shall 
 
68 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 not talk love to you. I am another woman's hus. 
 band, I made a ghastly mistake when I married 
 Ninitta, but it is done. She loves me ; she is 
 happy, and I love " — his voice faltered into a 
 wonderful softness more eloquent than words, — 
 ''I love Nino." 
 
 She would not let him go on. She sprang up 
 and ran to him, taking his hands in hers with a 
 touch that made his blood rush tingling through 
 his veins. 
 
 **Yes," she cried, *'you love Nino! Think of 
 that ! Think most of all that whatever you are, 
 good or bad, you are for your son, for Nino ! 
 Come ! There is safety for us in that. We will 
 go and talk with Nino between us. Then we 
 shall say nothing of which we can be ashamed or 
 regret." 
 
 There came to Herman a vision of his boy 
 clasped in Helen's arms which made him feel as 
 if suffocating with the excess of his emotion. He 
 rose blindly, only half conscious of what he was 
 doing ; and without giving time for objections 
 Helen hastened to dress herself for the street, and 
 in a few moments they were walking together 
 toward the sculptor's house. 
 
 To Herman's surprise, his wife was absent when 
 he reached home. The maid did not know where 
 she had gone. She often went out in the morning 
 without saying where she was going, and of course 
 the servant did not ask. 
 
THE INLY TOUCH OF LOVE. 
 
 69 
 
 ''That is odd," Herman said; ''but she has 
 probably gone shopping or something of the sort. 
 It is too bad, she had so set her heart on showing 
 you the bambmo, as she calls him, herself." 
 
 But it proved that Nino also was out, having 
 been taken for a walk ; and so Helen, who returned 
 home at once, saw neither of them. 
 
VII 
 
 THIS DEED UNSHAPES ME. 
 
 Measure for Measure ; iv. — 4. 
 
 AJINITTA had not gone shopping. She was 
 -'- ' posing for Arthur Fenton, at his studio. Even 
 the presence of her boy could not wholly make up 
 to the Italian for the loss of all the old interest 
 and excitement of her life as a model. The boy 
 was with his nurse or at the kindergarten for long 
 hours during which Ninitta, who had few of the 
 resources with which an educated woman would 
 have filled her time, mingled longings for her old 
 life with blissful gloatings over Nino's beauty and 
 cleverness. Her husband was always kind, but 
 since his marriage delicacy of sentiment had made 
 him shrink from having his wife pose even for 
 himself, while naturally no thought of her doing so 
 for another would have been entertained for a 
 moment. 
 
 Ninitta had been so long in the life, to pose had 
 been so large a part of her very existence, that she 
 hardly knew how to do without the old-time flavor. 
 Mrs. Fenton had perceived something of this with- 
 out at all appreciating the strength of the feeling 
 of the sculptor's wife, and she had at one time 
 
 70 
 
THIS DEED UNS RAPES ME. 71 
 
 tried to interest Ninitta in what might perhaps be 
 called missionary work among the models of Bos- 
 ton, a class of whose calling Edith held views 
 which her husband was not wholly wrong in call- 
 ing absurdly narrow. She was met at once by the 
 difficulty that it was impossible to make Ninitta 
 see that missionary work was needed among the 
 models, and the effort resulted in nothing except 
 to convince Mrs. Fenton that she could do little 
 with the Italian. 
 
 Just how Arthur Fenton had persuaded her to 
 pose without her husband's knowledge, Ninitta 
 could not have told ; and the artist himself would 
 have assured any investigator, even that specula- 
 tive spirit which held the place left vacant by the 
 dismissal of his conscience, that he had never delib- 
 erately tried to entice her. He had talked to her 
 of the picture he was painting for a national com- 
 petitive exhibition, it is true, and dwelt upon the 
 difficulty of procuring a proper model ; he had met 
 her on the street one day and taken her into his 
 studio to see it ; he had regretted that it was 
 impossible to ask her ; and of a hundred apparently 
 blameless and trivial things, the result was that this 
 morning, while Helen and Herman were walking 
 across the Common to find her, Ninitta was lying 
 amid a heap of gorgeous stuffs and cushions in 
 Fenton's studio, while he painted and talked after 
 his fashion. 
 
 It is as impossible to trace the beginnings of 
 
72 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 any chain of events as it is to find the mystery of 
 the growth of a seed. Whatever Arthur Fenton's 
 faults, he certainly believed himself to be one who 
 could not betray a friend. The ideal which he 
 vaguely called honor, and which served him as 
 that ultimate ethical standard which in one shape 
 or another is necessary to every human being, for- 
 bade his taking advantage of any one whose friend- 
 ship he admitted. His instinct of self-indulgence 
 had, how^ever, made him so expert a casuist that 
 he was able to silence all inner misgivings by 
 arguing that the demands of art were above all 
 other laws. He reasoned that Ninitta's posing 
 could do no possible harm to Grant Herman, 
 while the success of his Fatiina depended upon it ; 
 and since art was his religion, he came at last to 
 feel as if he were nobly sacrificing his prejudices 
 to his highest convictions in violating for the sake 
 of art his principle which forbade his deceiving her 
 husband. 
 
 Least of all, in asking the Italian to pose, had 
 Fenton been actuated by any intention of tempt- 
 ing her to evil. He needed a model for the 
 Fatima as he needed his canvas and brushes ; and 
 his satisfaction at having induced Ninitta to serve 
 his purpose was in kind much the same as his 
 pleasure that his brushes and canvas were exactly 
 what he wanted. 
 
 But it is always difficult to tell to what an action 
 may lead ; and most of all is it hard to foresee the 
 
THIS DEED UNSHAPES ME. 
 
 73 
 
 consequences which will follow from the violation 
 of principle. Perhaps the air of secrecy with 
 which Ninitta found it necessary to invest her 
 coming, had an intoxicating effect upon the artist ; 
 perhaps it was simply that his persistent egotism 
 moved him to test his power. Men often feel the 
 keenest curiosity in regard to the extent of their 
 ability to commit crimes into which they have yet 
 not the remotest intention of being betrayed ; and 
 especially is this true in their relations to women. 
 Men of a certain vanity are always eager to dis- 
 cover how great an influence for evil they could 
 exercise over women, even when they have not 
 the nerve or the wickedness to exert it. A man 
 must be morally great to be above finding pleas- 
 ure in the belief that he could be a Don Juan if 
 he chose ; and moral grandeur was not for Arthur 
 Fenton. 
 
 From whatever cause, the fact was, that as he 
 painted this morning and reflected, with a compla- 
 cency of which he was too keen an analyst not to 
 know he should have been ashamed, how he had 
 secured the model he desired despite her husband, 
 the speculation came into his mind how far he 
 could push his influence over Ninitta. At first a 
 mere impersonal idea, the thought was instantly, 
 by his habit of mental definiteness, realized so 
 clearly that his cheek flushed, partly, it is to be 
 said to his credit, with genuine shame. He looked 
 at the beautiful model, and turned away his eyes. 
 
74 
 
 THE PHILISTINES, 
 
 Then, hardly conscious of what he was doing, he 
 laid down his palette, and took a step forward. 
 
 At that instant the studio bell rang sharply. 
 He started with so terrible a sense of being dis- 
 covered in a crime, that his jaw trembled and his 
 knees almost failed under him. 
 
 Then instantly he recovered his self-possession, 
 although his heart was beating painfully, and 
 looked up at the clock. 
 
 "Heavens!" he exclaimed. "I had no idea 
 how late it was ! It is that beastly Irons for his 
 last sitting. I'd forgotten all about him." 
 
 Ninitta rose from her position and hurried 
 toward the screen behind which she dressed. 
 
 "Don't let him in," she said. "He knows me." 
 
 The bell rang again, as they stood looking at 
 each other. 
 
 " I will try to send him off," Arthur said. 
 "Dress as quickly as you can." 
 
 She retreated behind the screen while he went 
 to the door and unlocked it. Instantly Irons 
 stepped inside. 
 
 "You must excuse me," the artist said. "I'll 
 be ready for you in fifteen minutes. I have a 
 model here, and got to painting so busily that I 
 forgot the time. Come back in a quarter of an 
 hour." 
 
 "Oh, I don't mind," Irons said, advancing into 
 the studio. " I'll look round until you are ready." 
 
 " But I never admit sitters when I have a 
 
THIS DEED UNSHAPES ME. 
 
 n 
 
 model," Fenton protested, standing before him. 
 ''I shall have to ask you to go." 
 
 The other stopped and looked at the artist with 
 suspicion in his eyes. 
 
 '' What a fuss you make," he commented 
 coarsely. *' No intrigue, I suppose } " 
 
 A hot flush sprang into Fenton's face. He 
 tried to assume a haughty air, but the conscious- 
 ness of being entrapped in a misdemeanor had not 
 left him. The need of getting Mrs. Herman out 
 of the studio unseen would have been awkward at 
 any time ; when to this was added the sense of 
 guilt and shame which was begotten of the base 
 impulse to which he had almost yielded, the situa- 
 tion became for him painfully embarrassing 
 
 " I am not in the habit of carrying on intrigues 
 with my models," he replied, haughtily. " Or," 
 he added, regaining self-possession, *' of discussing 
 my affairs with others." 
 
 Mr. Irons laughed in a significant way which 
 made Arthur long to kill him on the spot, and, 
 stepping past Fenton, he walked further into the 
 studio. 
 
 ''Don't put on airs with me," he said. "Your 
 looks give you away. You've been up to some 
 mischief." 
 
 He paused an instant before the unfinished 
 picture on the easel, then when the artist coolly 
 took the canvas and placed it with its face to the 
 wall, he turned with deliberate rudeness and 
 
1^ 
 
 THE PHILISTINES, 
 
 craned his neck so that he could look behind the 
 screen. A leering smile came over his coarse 
 features. Without a word he went over to the 
 most distant corner of the studio, where he ap- 
 parently became absorbed in studying a sketch 
 hanging on the wall. 
 
 There was a dead silence of some moments. 
 Fenton was literally speechless with rage, yet, 
 too, his quick wit was busy devising some way of 
 escape from the unpleasant predicament in which 
 he found himself. He did not speak, nor did Mr. 
 Irons turn until Ninitta had completed her toilet 
 and slipped hastily out. As the door closed after 
 her, Irons wheeled about and confronted the 
 indignant artist with a smile of triumphant glee. 
 
 " Sly dog ! " he said. 
 
 Fenton advanced a step toward his tormentor 
 with his clenched hand half raised as if he would 
 strike. 
 
 '' What do you mean } " he demanded. " Do 
 you call yourself a gentleman 1 " 
 
 "Oh, come, now," the other responded, with an 
 easy wave of the hand, ''no heroics, if you please. 
 They won't go down with me. She's a devilish 
 fine woman, and I don't blame you." 
 
 *' I tell you," began Fenton, "you" — 
 
 " Oh, of course, of course. I know all that. 
 But sit down while I say something to you." 
 
 As if under the constraining influence of a 
 nightmare, Fenton obeyed when Mr. Irons, having 
 
THIS DEED UNSHAPES ME. 
 
 77 
 
 seated himself in an easy chair, waved him into 
 another with a commanding gesture. The artist 
 felt himself to have lost his place as the stronger 
 of the two, of which he had hitherto been proudly 
 conscious, and he sat angrily gnawing his lip 
 while his tormentor regarded him with smiling 
 malice. 
 
 ** Do you remember telling me one day," Irons 
 asked, fixing his narrow eyes on the other's dis- 
 turbed face, "that you could make your sitters 
 tell you things V 
 
 Fenton stared at his questioner in angry silence, 
 but did not answer. 
 
 "Now, if," continued Irons; "I say if, you 
 observe, — if Stewart Hubbard should chance to 
 tell you where the new syndicate mean to locate 
 their mills, it might be a mighty good thing for 
 you." 
 
 Still Fenton said nothing, but his regard became 
 each moment more wrathful. 
 
 " Of course," the sitter continued, with an 
 assumption of airy lightness which grated on 
 every nerve of the hearer, " you are not in a posi- 
 tion to turn such .knowledge to advantage; but I 
 am, and I am always inclined to help a bright 
 fellow like you when there is a good chance. So 
 if you should come to me and say that the mills 
 are to be so and so, I'd do all I could to make 
 things pleasant for you. I happen to belong to a 
 syndicate myself that has bought a mill privilege 
 
78 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 at Wachusett, and it is important to us to have 
 the new railroad go our way, and we'd like to 
 know how far the other fellows' plans are danger- 
 ous to our interests, don't you see." 
 
 Still Fenton did not speak. He had grown 
 very pale, and his lips were set firmly together. 
 His hands clasped the arms of his chair so strongly 
 that the blood had settled under the middle of the 
 nails. Mr. Irons looked at him with narrow, 
 piercing eyes. He paused a moment and then 
 went on. 
 
 *' You are perfectly capable of keeping a secret," 
 he said in a hard, deliberate tone, " so I don't in 
 the least mind telling you what we should do. 
 Your sitters always tell you things, you know • 
 and you are to be trusted. The case is here ; our 
 syndicate stand in with the railroad corporation 
 and ask the Railroad Commissioners for a certifi- 
 cate of exigency, to authorize laying the new 
 branch out through Wachusett. Now we have 
 information that Staggchase and Stewart Hub- 
 bard and that set, are planning to spring a petition 
 asking for special legislation locating the road 
 somewhere else. Of course, they'll have to get 
 it in under a suspension of the rules, but they 
 can work that easily enough. The Commissioners 
 will have to hold on, then, until the Legislature 
 finishes with that petition." 
 
 He paused again, with an air which convinced 
 the artist that he was going on with this elaborate 
 
THIS DEED UiYSHAPES ME. 
 
 79 
 
 explanation to cover his awkwardness. Fenton 
 did not speak, and his visitor continued, — 
 
 "The Commissioners might settle the matter 
 now, but they won't, and we've got to have the 
 fight, I suppose ; so, of course, you can see how it 
 is for our interest to know just what we are 
 fighting." 
 
 He rose as he spoke, and with an air of delibera- 
 tion, buttoned his overcoat, which he had not re- 
 moved. 
 
 " I don't think you feel like painting this morn- 
 ing," he observed, " and I'll come in again. I'll 
 leave you to think over what I have said." 
 
 Fenton rose also, regarding him with fierce, 
 level eyes. 
 
 "And suppose," he said, "that I call you a 
 damned scoundrel, and forbid you ever to set foot 
 in my studio again ? " 
 
 The other laughed, with the easy assurance of a 
 bully who feels himself secure. 
 
 " Oh, you won't," he repHed. " If you did, — 
 well, I am on the committee for the new statue, 
 and have to see Herman now and then you know, 
 and I should, perhaps, ask him why his wife poses 
 for you. Good morning." 
 
 And with a chuckling laugh, he took himself 
 out. 
 
VIII 
 
 A NECESSARY EVIL. 
 
 Julius Caesar ; ii. — 2. 
 
 *'/^H, I assure you that my temper has been such 
 
 ^ for a week that my family have threatened to 
 have me sent to a nervine asylum," Ethel Mott 
 observed to Fred Rangely, who was calling on her, 
 ostensibly to inquire after her health, some trifling 
 indisposition having kept her housed for a few 
 days. " What with my cold and my vexation at 
 losing things I wanted to go to, I have been posi- 
 tively unendurable." 
 
 " That's your way of looking at it," he re- 
 sponded ; "but I hardly fancy that anybody else 
 found it out. But what has there been to lose, 
 except the Throgmorton ball ? " 
 
 ''Well, first there was the concert Saturday 
 night." 
 
 " Do you care so much about the Symphonies, 
 then ? I thought you were the one girl in Boston 
 who doesn't pretend to care for music." 
 
 " Oh, but we have lovely seats this year, and the 
 nicest people all about us, you know. Thayer 
 Kent and his mother are directly behind us." 
 
 " Where he can lean forward and talk to you," 
 interrupted Rangely, jealously. 
 
 80 
 
A NECESSARY EVIL. 8l 
 
 "Yes," she said, nodding with a gleam of mis- 
 chievous laughter in her dark eyes. "And I do 
 have a nice time at the Symphonies. Besides, I 
 don't in the least object to the music, you know." 
 
 Fred fixed his gaze on a large old-fashioned oil 
 painting on the opposite wall, a copy from some 
 of the innumerable pastorals which have been 
 made in imitation of Nicholas Poussin. It was of 
 no particular value, but it was surrounded by a 
 beautiful carved Venetian frame, and was one of 
 those things which confer an air of distinction 
 upon a Boston parlor, because they are plainly the 
 art purchases of a bygone generation. 
 
 " But you have, of course, had no end of girls 
 running in to see you," he observed. 
 
 " Yes ; but, then, that didn't make up for the 
 Throgmorton ball. You ask what else there was 
 to lose ; I should think that was enough. Why, 
 Janet Graham says she never had such a lovely 
 time in her life." 
 
 " Is Miss Graham engaged to Fred Gore } " 
 Rangely asked. 
 
 Ethel's gesture of dissent showed how little she 
 would have approved of such a consummation. 
 
 " No, indeed," she returned. " Fred Gore only 
 wants Janet's money, anyway ; and she can't 
 abide him, any more than I can." 
 
 " Then, you have the correct horror of a mar- 
 riage for money." 
 
 " I think a girl is a fool to let a man marry her 
 
82 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 for her money. She'd much better give him her 
 fortune and keep herself back. Then she'd at 
 least save something. I don't approve of people's 
 marrying for money anyway ; although, of course," 
 she added, with a twinkle in her eye, " I think it 
 is wicked to marry without it." 
 
 There shot through Rangely's mind the reflec- 
 tion that Thayer Kent had not an over-abundance 
 of this world's goods ; and to this followed the less 
 pleasant thought that he was himself in the same 
 predicament. 
 
 " But Jack Gerrish hasn't anything," he said, 
 aloud. 
 
 " But Janet has enough, so she can marry any- 
 body she wants to," was the reply ; " and Jack 
 Gerrish is too perfectly lovely for anything." 
 
 The visitor laughed, but he was evidently not at 
 his ease. He was always uncomfortably conscious 
 that Ethel had not the slightest possible scruple 
 against laughing at him, and he w^as not a little 
 afraid of her well-known propensity to tease. 
 Ethel regarded him with secret amusement. A 
 woman is seldom displeased at seeing a man dis- 
 concerted by her presence, even when she pities 
 him and would fain put him at his ease. It is a 
 tribute to her powers too genuine to be disputed, 
 and while she may labor to overcome the man's 
 feeling, her vanity cannot but be gratified that he 
 has it. 
 
 " Did you ever know anything like the way Elsie 
 
A NECESSAJiY EVIL. 
 
 83 
 
 Dimmont is going on with Dr. Wilson ? " Ethel 
 said, presently, by way of continuing the conversa- 
 tion. " I can't see what she finds to like in him. 
 He's as coarse as Fred Gore, only, of course, he's 
 cleverer, and he isn't dissipated." 
 
 " Wilson isn't a half bad fellow," Rangely re- 
 plied, rather patronizingly. " Though, of course, I 
 can understand that you wouldn't care for that 
 kind of a man." 
 
 " Am I so particular, then } " 
 
 " Yes, I think you are." 
 
 " Thank you for nothing." 
 
 " Oh, I meant to be complimentary, I assure 
 you. Isn't it a compliment to be thought particu- 
 lar in your tastes t " 
 
 ** That depends upon how you are told. Your 
 manner was not at all calculated to flatter me. 
 It said too plainly that you thought me cap- 
 tious." 
 
 " But I don't." 
 
 " Of course you wouldn't own it," Ethel re- 
 torted, playing with a tortoise-shell paper-cutter 
 she had picked up from the table by which she 
 sat; ''but your manner was not to be mistaken. 
 It betrayed you in spite of yourself." 
 
 Rangely knew how foolish he was to be affected 
 by light banter like this, but for his life he could 
 not have helped it. The fact that Ethel knew 
 how easily she could tease him lent a tantalizing 
 sparkle to her eyes. She smiled mockingly as he 
 
84 
 
 THE PH/LIS TINES. 
 
 vainly tried to keep the flush from rising in his 
 cheeks. 
 
 ** You are singularly fond of teasing," he ob- 
 served, in a manner he endeavored to make cool 
 and philosophical. 
 
 ** Now you are calling me singular as well as 
 captious." 
 
 "The girl who is singular," returned he, in an 
 endeavor to turn the talk by means of an epigram 
 which only made miatters worse for him, '* the girl 
 who is singular runs great risk of never becoming 
 plural." 
 
 Ethel laughed merrily, her glee arising chiefly 
 from a sense of the chance he was giving her to 
 work up one of those playful mock quarrels which 
 amused her and so thoroughly teased her admirer. 
 
 " Upon my word, Mr. Rangely," she said, as- 
 suming an air of indignant surprise, ''is it your 
 idea of making yourself agreeable to tell an unfor- 
 tunate girl that she is destined to be an old maid } 
 I could stand being one well enough, but to be 
 told that I've got to be is by no means pleasant." 
 
 He knew she w^as playing with him, but he 
 could not on that account meet her on her own 
 ground. He endeavored to protest. 
 
 " You are trying to make me quarrel." 
 
 "Make you quarrel.?" she echoed. "I like 
 that ! Of course, though, to be so full of faults 
 that you can't help abusing me is one way of 
 making you quarrel." 
 
A NECESSARY EVIL. 
 
 85 
 
 "How you do twist things around !" exclaimed 
 he, beginning to be thoroughly vexed. 
 
 She pursed up her lips and regarded him with an 
 expression more aggravating than words could 
 have been. She had been for several days de- 
 prived of the pleasure of teasing anybody, and her 
 delight in vexing Rangely made his presence a 
 temptation which she was seldom able to resist. 
 She was unrestrained by any regard for the young 
 author which should make her especially con- 
 cerned how seriously she offended him ; and when 
 she now changed the conversation abruptly, it 
 was with a forbearing air which was anything but 
 soothing to his nerves. 
 
 ** Don't you think," she asked, "that Mr. Berry 
 was absurd in the way he acted about playing at 
 Mrs. West's .^ " 
 
 " No, I can't say that I do," the caller retorted 
 savagely. " Mrs. West gives out that she is going 
 to give the neglected native musicians at last a 
 chance to be heard, and then she invites them to 
 play their compositions in her parlor. West- 
 brooke Berry isn't the man to be patronized in any 
 such way. Just think of her having the cheek to 
 give to a man whose work has been brought out 
 in Berlin an invitation which is equivalent to 
 saying that he can't get a public hearing, but she'll 
 help him out by asking her guests to listen to 
 him. Heavens ! Mrs. West is a perfectly incred- 
 ible woman." 
 
86 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Ethel smiled sweetly. In her secret heart she 
 agreed with him ; but it did not suit her mood to 
 show that she did so. 
 
 " You seem bound to take the opposite view of 
 everything to-day," she said, in tones as sweet as 
 her smile ; " or perhaps it is only that my temper 
 has been ruined by my cold. I told you it had 
 been bad." 
 
 He rose abruptly. 
 
 *' If everything is to put us more at odds," he 
 said, rather stiffly, *' the sooner I withdraw, the 
 better. I am sorry I have fallen under your dis- 
 pleasure ; it is generally my ill luck to annoy 
 you." 
 
 And in a few moments he was going down the 
 street in a frame of mind not unusual to him after 
 a call upon Miss Mott, from whose house he was 
 apt to come away so ruffled and irritated that 
 nothing short of a counteracting feminine influ- 
 ence could restore his self-complacency. 
 
 This office of comforter usually fell to the lot of 
 Mrs. Frederick Staggchase. Indeed, his fondness 
 for this lady was so marked as to give rise to some 
 question among his intimates whether he were not 
 more attached to her than to the avowed object of 
 his affection. 
 
 An hour after he had made his precipitate re- 
 treat from Ethel's, he found himself sitting in the 
 library at Mrs. Staggchase's, with his hostess 
 comfortably enthroned in a great chair of carved 
 
A NECESSARY EVIL. 
 
 87 
 
 oak on the opposite side of the fire. The con- 
 versation had somehow turned upon marriage. 
 There is always a certain fascination, a piquant if 
 faint sense of being upon the borderland of the 
 forbidden, which makes such a discussion attrac- 
 tive to a man and woman who are playing at mak- 
 ing love when marriage stands between them. 
 
 ''But, of course," Rangely had said, "two mar- 
 ried people can't live at peace when one of them 
 is in love with somebody else." 
 
 Mrs. Staggchase clasped with her slender hand 
 the ball at the end of the carved arm of the chair 
 .in which she was sitting, looking absently at the 
 rings which adorned her fingers. She possessed 
 to perfection the art of being serious, and the air 
 with which she now spoke was admirably calcu- 
 lated to imply a deep interest in the subject under 
 discussion. 
 
 " I do not understand," she observed, thought- 
 fully, " why a man and woman need quarrel be- 
 cause they happen to be married to each other, 
 when they had rather be married to somebody 
 else. It wouldn't be considered good business 
 policy to pull against a partner because one might 
 do better with some other arrangement ; and it 
 does seem as if people might be as sensible about 
 their marriage relations as in their business." 
 
 Her companion glanced at her, and then quickly 
 resumed his intent regard of the fire beside which 
 he sat. 
 
88 THE PHILISTIXES. 
 
 " But people are so unreasonable," he remarked. 
 
 Mrs. Staggchase assented, with a characteristic 
 bend of the head, and a movement of her flexible 
 neck. She looked up with a smile. 
 
 '* I think Fred and I are a model couple," she 
 said. *.' Fred came into my room this noon, just 
 as I had finished my morning letters. * Good- 
 morning,' he said, ' I hope you weren't fright- 
 ened.' — ' Frightened } ' I said, ' what at .^ ' — 'Do 
 you mean to say you didn't know I was out 
 all night V — 'I hadn't an idea of it,' said I. 
 He'd been playing cards at the club all night, and 
 had just come in. He says that the next time, he 
 shan't take the trouble to expose himself." 
 
 Rangely laughed in a somewhat perfunctory 
 way. 
 
 " But if that is a model fashion of living, what 
 becomes of the old notions of kindred souls, and 
 all that sort of thing } " he asked. " I shouldn't 
 want my wife " — 
 
 He paused, rather awkwardly, and Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase took up the sentence with a smile of amuse- 
 ment, in which there was no trace of annoyance. 
 She was too well aware how com.pletely she was 
 mistress of the situation, in dealing with Rangely, 
 to be either vexed or embarrassea in talking with 
 him. 
 
 " To be as frank with another man as I am with 
 you } " she finished for him. " Oh, very likely 
 not. You have all the masculine jealousy which 
 
A NECESSARY EVIL. 
 
 89 
 
 is aroused in an instant by the idea that a woman 
 should be at liberty to like more than one man. 
 You are half a century behind us. Marriage as 
 you conceiv^e it is the old-fashioned article, for the 
 use of families in narrow circumstances intellect- 
 ually as well as pecuniarily. Love in a cottage is 
 necessary, because people under those conditions 
 can't live unless they are extravagantly devoted to 
 each other. Marriage with us is just what it 
 ought to be, an arrangement of mutual conve- 
 nience. Fred and I suit each other perfectly, and 
 are sufficiently fond of each other ; but there are 
 sides of his nature to which I do not answer, and 
 of mine that he does not touch. He finds some- 
 body who does ; I find somebody on my part. 
 You, for instance." 
 
 Rangely leaned back in his chair, and clasped 
 his plump white fingers, regarding Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase with a smile of amusement and admiration. 
 
 '* You are so awfully clever," was his response, 
 " that you could really never be uncommonly fond 
 of anybody. You'd analyze the whole business 
 too closely." 
 
 She laughed slightly, and went on with what she 
 was saying, without heeding his interruption. 
 
 " Fred and I make good backgrounds for each 
 other, and, after all, that is what is required. 
 You answer to my need of companionship in 
 another direction, and since that side of my na- 
 ture is unintelligible to my husband, he is not 
 
QO THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 defrauded, while I should be if I starved my desire 
 for such friendship, to please an idea like yours, 
 that a wife should find her all in her husband. 
 Fortunately, Mr. Staggchase is a broader man 
 than you are." 
 
 " Thank you," Rangely retorted, with a faint 
 tinge of annoyance visible, despite his air of jocu- 
 larity. " Arthur Fenton says a broad man is one 
 who can appreciate his own wife. If Mr. Stagg- 
 chase does that " — 
 
 " Come," interrupted Mrs. Staggchase, smiling 
 with the air of one who has had quite enough of 
 the topic, " don't you think the subject is getting 
 to be unfortunately personal t I have a favor to 
 ask of you." 
 
 Rangely was too well aware of the uselessness 
 of trying to direct the conversation to make any 
 attempt to continue the talk, which, moreover, had 
 taken a turn not at all to his liking. He settled 
 himself in his chair, in an attitude of easy atten- 
 tion. 
 
 " I am always delighted to do you a favor," he 
 said. " It isn't often I get a chance." 
 
 The relations between these two were not easy 
 to understand, unless one accepted the simplest 
 possible theory of their friendship. It was, on the 
 part of Mrs. Staggchase, only one of a succession 
 of platonic intimacies with which her married life 
 had been enriched. She found it necessary to her 
 enjoyment that some man should be her devoted 
 
A N-ECESSARY EVIL. qI 
 
 admirer, always quite outside the bounds of any 
 possible love-making, albeit often enough she per- 
 mitted matters to go to the exciting verge of a 
 flirtation which might merit a name somewhat 
 warmer than friendship. She was a brilliant and 
 clever woman who allowed herself the luxury of 
 gratifying her vanity by encouraging tha ardent 
 attentions of some man, which, if they ever be- 
 came too pressing, she knew how to check, or, if 
 necessary, to stop altogether. She was fond of 
 talking, and she frankly avowed her conviction 
 that women were not worth talking to. She liked 
 an appreciative masculine listener with whom she 
 could converse, now in a strain of bewildering 
 frankness, now in a purely impersonal and intel- 
 lectual vein, and who, however he might at times 
 delude himself by misconstruing her confidences 
 into expressions of personal regard, was clever 
 enough to comprehend the little corrective hints 
 by which, when necessary, she chose to undeceive 
 him. 
 
 Analyzed to its last elements, her feeling, it 
 must be confessed, was pretty nearly pure selfish- 
 ness ; but she was able, without effort, and by half- 
 unconscious art, to throw over it the air of being 
 disinterested friendship. Such a nature is essen- 
 tially false, but chiefly in that it gives to a passing 
 mood the appearance of a permanent sentiment, 
 and, while seeking only self-gratification, seems 
 actuated by genuine desire to give pleasure to 
 another. 
 
Q2 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 The attitude of Rangely toward Mrs. Staggchase 
 was, perhaps, no more unselfish, and was certainly 
 no more noble, but his sentiment was at least more 
 genuine. He was flattered by her preference, and 
 he was bewildered by her cleverness. He liked to 
 believe himself capable of interesting her, and 
 without in the most remote degree desiring or an- 
 ticipating an intrigue, he was ready to go as far as 
 she would allow in his devotion. He was con- 
 stantly tormented by a vague phantom of conquest, 
 which danced with will-o'-the-wisp fantasy before 
 him, and from day to day he endeavored to dis- 
 cover how deeply in love she was willing he should 
 fall. He was really fond of her, a fact that did 
 not prevent his entertaining a half-hearted passion 
 for Ethel Mott, the result of this mixture of emo- 
 tion being that he was the slave, albeit with a dif- 
 ference, of either lady with whom he chanced to 
 be. That he was the plaything of Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase's fancy he was far from realizing, although 
 from the nature of things he naturally regarded 
 his fondness for Miss Mott as the permanent factor 
 in the case. He even felt a certain compunction 
 for the regret he supposed Mrs. Staggchase would 
 feel when he should decide formally to transfer his 
 allegiance to her rival ; a misgiving he might have 
 spared himself had he been wise enough to appre- 
 ciate the situation in all its bearings. The lady 
 understood perfectly how matters stood, but 
 Rangely was her junior, and, besides, no man in 
 
A NECESSARY' EVIL. ^3 
 
 such a case ever comprehends that he is being 
 played with. 
 
 ** It is in regard to the statue of America that I 
 want you to be useful," Mrs. Staggchase said, re- 
 plying to her visitor's proffer of service with a 
 smile. " Do you know what the chances are in 
 regard to the choice of a sculptor ? " 
 
 " Why, I suppose Grant Herman will have the 
 commission." 
 
 ''But I think not." 
 
 *' You think not } Who will then .? " 
 
 *'That is just it. Mr. Hubbard has been back- 
 ing Mr. Herman ; and Mr. Irons, who never will 
 agree to anything that Mr. Hubbard wants, is put- 
 ting up the claims of this new woman, just to be 
 contrary." 
 
 " What new woman } Mrs. Grey son } " 
 
 '* Yes. Mrs. Frostwinch told me all about it 
 yesterday. Now there is a young man that we 
 are interested in " — 
 
 " Who is ' we ' } " interrupted Rangely. 
 
 " Oh, Mrs. Frostwinch, and Mrs. Bodewin Ran- 
 ger, and a number of us." 
 
 "■ But whom have you got on the committee } " 
 
 " Mr. Calvin ; and don't you see that Mr. Cal- 
 vin's name in a matter of art is worth a dozen of 
 the other two." 
 
 " Yes," Rangely assented, rather doubtfully, ** in 
 the matter of giving commissions it certainly is." 
 
 Mrs. Staggchase smiled indulgently, playing 
 
94 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 with the ring in which blazed a splendid ruby, and 
 which she was putting on and off her finger. 
 
 " If you think," she said, '' that you are going to 
 entrap me into a discussion of the merits of art 
 and Philistinism, you are mistaken. I told you 
 long ago that I was a Philistine of the Philistines, 
 deliberately and avowedly. The true artistic 
 soul which you delight to call Pagan is only the 
 servant of Philistinism, and I own that I prefer to 
 stand with the ruling party. As, indeed," she 
 added, with a mischievous gleam in her eye, "do 
 many who will not confess it." 
 
 Rangely flushed. The thrust too closely re- 
 sembled reproaches which in his more sensitive 
 moments he received at the hand of his own inner 
 consciousness, so to speak, not to make him wince. 
 He felt himself, besides, becoming involved in a 
 painful position. He had long been the intimate 
 friend of Grant Herman, and felt that the sculptor 
 had a right to expect whatever aid he could gi\'e 
 him in a matter like this. 
 
 "But who," he asked, "is yoMX protege f 
 
 " His name," Mrs. Staggchase replied, " is Orin 
 Stanton. He is a fellow of the greatest talent, 
 and he has worked his way " — 
 
 Rangely put up his hand in a gesture of impa- 
 tience. 
 
 "I know the fellow," he said. "He made a 
 thing he called Hop Scotch^ of which Fenton said 
 the title was far too modest, since he'd not only 
 scotched the subject but killed it." 
 
A XECESSARY EVIL. 
 
 95 
 
 ** One never knew Mr. Fenton to waste the 
 chance of saying a good thing simply for the sake 
 of justice," Mrs. Staggchase observ^ed, with un- 
 abated good humor. " But you are to help us in 
 the Daily Observer, and there is to be no discus- 
 sion about it. Since you know you are too good- 
 natured not to oblige me in the end, why should 
 you not do it gracefully and get the credit of being 
 willing." 
 
 And then, being a wise woman, she disregarded 
 Rangely's muttered remonstrance and turned the 
 conversation into a new channel. 
 
IX 
 
 THIS IS NOT A BOON. 
 
 Othello; iii. — 3. 
 
 TF the old-time opinion that a woman whose 
 ^ name is a jest with men has lost her claims to 
 respect, Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson might be 
 supposed to have little ground for the inner anger 
 she felt at the scantness of the courtesy with 
 which she was treated by Mr, Irons. That gen- 
 tleman was calling upon her in her tiny suite of 
 rooms at the top of one of those apartment hotels 
 which stand upon the debatable ground between 
 the select regions of Back Bay and the scorned 
 precincts of the South End, and he was appar- 
 ently as much at home as if the sofa upon which 
 he lounged were in his own dwelling. 
 
 The apartment of Mrs. Amanda Welsh Samp- 
 son gave to the experienced eye evidences of a 
 pathetic struggle to make scanty resources furnish 
 at least an appearance of luxury. The walls 
 were adorned with amateur china painting in 
 the shape of dreadful placques and plates in 
 livid hues ; there was abundance of embroidery 
 that should have been impossible, in garish tints 
 
 96 
 
THIS IS NOT A BOON. c)y 
 
 and uneven stitches ; much shift had been made to 
 produce an imposing appearance by means of cheap 
 Japanese fans and the inexpensive wares of which 
 the potteries at Kioto, corrupted by foreign in- 
 fluence, turn out such vast quantities for the foreign 
 market. Against the wall stood an upright piano 
 — if a piano could be called upright which habi- 
 tually destroyed the peace of the entire neighbor- 
 hood — and over it was placed a scarf upon which 
 apparently some boarding-school miss had taken 
 her first lesson in painting wild flowers. 
 
 The room was small, and so well filled with 
 furniture that there seemed little space for the 
 long limbs of Alfred Irons, who, however, had 
 contrived to make himself comfortable by the 
 aid of various cushions covered with bright- 
 colored sateens. He had lighted a cigar without 
 thinking it necessary to ask leave, and had even 
 made himself more easy by putting one leg across 
 a low chair. 
 
 Mrs. Sampson was fully aware that in her strug- 
 gles with life she had sometimes provoked laughter, 
 often disapproval, and now and then given rise to 
 positive scandal, yet she was still accustomed to at 
 least a fair semblance of respect from the men 
 who came to see her ; women, it is to be noted, 
 being not often seen within her walls, since those 
 who were willing to come she did not care to 
 receive, and those whom she invited seldom set 
 her name down on their calling lists. Among 
 
98 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 themselves, at the clubs or elsewhere, the men 
 speculated more or less coarsely and unfeelingly 
 upon the foundations of the numerous scandals 
 which had from time to time blossomed like brill- 
 iant and life-sapping parasites upon the tree of 
 Mrs. Sampson's reputation. Her name, either 
 spoken boldly or too broadly hinted at to be mis- 
 understood, adorned many a racy tale told in 
 smoking-rooms after good dinners, or when the 
 hours had grown small in more senses than one ; 
 and her career was made to point more than one 
 moral drawn for the benefit of the sisters and 
 daughters of the men who joked and sneered con- 
 cerning her. 
 
 CMrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson was born of a good 
 old Boston family, to which she clung with a desper- 
 ate clutch which her relatives ignored so far as with 
 dignity they were able. Her father had been a 
 lawyer of reputation, and his portrait was still 
 displayed prominently in the daughter's parlor, a 
 circumstance which had given Chauncy Wilson 
 opportunity for a jest rather clever than elegant 
 concerning Judge Welsh's well-known fondness in 
 life for watching the progress of criminal cases. 
 Of her husband, the late Mr. Sampson, there was 
 very little said, and not much was known beyond 
 the fact that having run away from school to 
 marry him, Amanda had shared a shady and it 
 was whispered rather disreputable existence for 
 three years, at the end of which she was fortu- 
 
THIS IS NOT A BOON 
 
 99 
 
 nately relieved from the matrimonial net by his 
 timely decease ; an event of which she sometimes 
 spoke to her more intimate male friends with un- 
 disguised satisfaction. 
 
 It might not have been easy to tell how far Mrs. 
 Sampson's subsequent career was forced upon her 
 by circumstances, and how far it was the result of 
 her own choice. She always represented herself 
 as the victim of a hard fate : but her relatives, 
 one of whom was Mr. Staggchase, declared that 
 Amanda had no capabilities of respectability in 
 her composition. Mrs. Staggchase, upon whom 
 marriage had conferred the privilege of expressing 
 her mind with the freedom of one of the family, 
 while it happily spared her from the responsibility 
 of an actual relative, declared that everything had 
 been done to keep Mrs. Sampson within the 
 bounds of propriety, but all in vain. The income 
 from the estate of the late Judge Welsh was not 
 large, and as Mrs. Sampson's tastes, especially in 
 dress, were somewhat expensive, it followed that 
 she was often reduced to devices for increasing 
 her bank account which were generally adroit and 
 curious, but often not of a character to be openly 
 boasted of. She had had some business transac- 
 tions already with Irons, who was at this moment 
 laying out the plan of work in a fresh operation 
 where she might make herself useful. > 
 
 "Of course," he said, "all the men from 
 Wachusett way are on our side, and the men 
 
100 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 from the other part of the county will be 
 against us." 
 
 " What other part of the county ? " Mrs. Samp- 
 son inquired. 
 
 She had laid down her sewing and was listening 
 intently, with a look of keen intelligence, the tips 
 of her long and rather large fingers pressed 
 closely together. She hated Irons devoutl}^, but 
 his scheme meant financial profit to her, and vari- 
 ous bills were troublesomely overdue. 
 
 " That's what we have to discover. When we 
 find out, I'll let you know. The other syndicate 
 have been deucedly close-mouthed about their 
 plans, but of course they can't keep dark a great 
 while longer ; and in any case I am on the track 
 of the information." 
 
 '^ And what," Mrs. Sampson asked, with an air 
 of innocence too obviously artificial, '' am I ex- 
 pected to do .'' " 
 
 Irons glanced at her with a wink, taking in her 
 plain, vivacious face with its sparkling eyes, her 
 fine figure, and stylish, if somewhat too pro- 
 nounced, presence. 
 
 "The old game," he said. "■ Show a tender and 
 sisterly interest in a few of the country members. 
 There are one or two men from the western part 
 of the state that we want to capture at once before 
 the thing is started. Do you know anybody in 
 that region } " 
 
 " My father, Judge Welsh," she answered with 
 
THIS IS NOT A BOON. lOi 
 
 an amusing touch amid her frankness of the air 
 with which she always mentioned her ancestors in 
 society, ''had numerous connections there." 
 
 ''Ah, that is good," the visitor responded, with 
 evident satisfaction. • 
 
 He knocked the ashes from his cigar into a tiny 
 bronze which Mrs. Sampson had put within his 
 reach when he showed signs of throwing them 
 upon the carpet, and then plunged into a discus- 
 sion of the members of the State Legislature with 
 whom it was possible for Mrs. Sampson to estab- 
 lish an acquaintance, and whom she was likely to 
 be able to influence. He drew from his pocket a 
 list of men, and with quite as business-like an air 
 his hostess produced a similar document from her 
 desk ; the pair being soon deep in consultation 
 over the schedules. 
 
 Lobbying in Massachusetts is not by the public 
 recognized as a well-organized business, and yet 
 any one who desires to secure personal influence 
 to aid or to hinder legislation is seldom at a loss 
 to find people well experienced in such work. 
 The lobby to the eyes of the public, moreover, 
 consists entirely of men, if one excepts the group 
 of foolish intriguers in favor of the vagaries of 
 proposed law-making by which it is supposed the 
 distinctions of sex may be abolished, l There are 
 in the city, however, women who by no means 
 lack experience in manipulating the votes of coun- 
 try members, and who are but too willing to sell 
 
I02 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 their services to whoever can make it to their 
 pecuniary interest to favor a bill. 
 
 Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson was extremely 
 adroit and careful in concealing her connection 
 with ithe law-making of the State. She was in 
 evidence in most public places ; at the theatres, 
 the concert halls, the County Club races, and at 
 every fashionable entertainment to which her 
 cleverness could procure her admission, her con- 
 spicuous figure, made more prominent by a cer- 
 tain indefinable loudness of style, a marked dash 
 of manner, and gowns in a taste rather daring than 
 refined, was too conspicuous to be overlooked. 
 Yet it is doubtful if she had ever been up the 
 steps leading to the gilded-domed capitol in her life. 
 She went about much ; and the unchaperoned life 
 which in virtue of her widowhood and her love 
 of freedom she chose to lead, the width of the 
 circle over which her acquaintance extended, 
 allowed her to carry on her work unobserved ; so 
 that while a great variety of stories of one sort of 
 queerness or another were told of Mrs. Sampson, 
 this particular side of her career was almost un- 
 known. 
 
 ''There is Mr. Greenfield," Mrs. Sampson ob- 
 served, tapping her teeth with her pencil. '* His 
 wife was a cousin of my husband. I don't know 
 them at all, but I could easily ask him to come and 
 see me. It would be only proper to offer him 
 the hospitality of the town, you know." 
 
THIS IS NOT A BOOX. IO3 
 
 " Good ! " cried Mr. Irons, slapping his open 
 palm down on his knee. '* Greenfield's the hard- 
 est nut we've got to crack in the whole business. 
 He's the sort of man you can't talk to on a square 
 business basis. You've got to mince things 
 damned fine with him, and he's chairman of the 
 Railroad Committee, you know. He'd have a 
 tremendous amount of influence, anyway." 
 
 " He's a little tin god at Fentonville, I've heard," 
 Mrs. Sampson responded, laughing in the mechan- 
 ical way which was her habit. '' When he's at home 
 they say the sun doesn't rise there till he's given 
 his permission." 
 
 Irons in his excitement took his leg down from 
 its supporting chair and sat up straight, dropping 
 his list of members to the floor and clasping his 
 knees with his heavy hands. 
 
 •* Now look here, old lady," he said, '' here's a 
 chance to show your mettle. If you'll manage 
 Greenfield, I'll run the rest of the hayseed crowd, 
 and I'll make it something handsomer than you 
 ever had in your life." 
 
 The woman smiled a smile of greed and cun- 
 ning. 
 
 "I'll take care of him," she said. "And he 
 shall never know he has been taken care of 
 either." 
 
 Irons laughed with coarse jocoseness. 
 
 "A man has very little chance that falls into 
 your clutches," he observed, "but in this particu- 
 
104 '^^^^ PHILISTImYES. 
 
 lar case you've got a heavy contract on hand. 
 Greenfield's got his price, of course, like every- 
 body else, but I'm hanged if I know what it is. 
 If you offered him tin he'd simply fiy out on the 
 whole thing and nobody could hold him. There 
 isn't any particular pull in politics on him. This 
 new-fashioned independence has knocked all that 
 to pieces ; and Greenfield is an Independent from 
 the word go. I don't know what you're to bait 
 your hook with, unless it's your lovely self." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson began a laugh, and then recover- 
 ing herself, she frowned. 
 
 "Don't be personal," she said. "I won't stand 
 it." 
 
 She began to feel that the circumstances were 
 such as to make her important to her caller's 
 schemes, and her air by insensible degrees became 
 more assured and less subservient. She knew 
 her man, and she was prepared for his becoming 
 proportionately more respectful. He dusted a 
 little heap of ashes from the small table beside 
 him and scattered them with, his foot, in a well- 
 meant attempt to cover the traces of his previ- 
 ous untidiness. She watched him with a covert 
 si>.eer. 
 
 ^'Even so difficult a problem as that," she said, 
 with a slight toss of the head, a bit of antique 
 coquetry which impressed him with a new sense 
 of her thorough self-possession, and imposed itself 
 upon his untrained mind as the air of a true 
 
THIS IS NOT A BOOX. jqc 
 
 woman of the world ; \" I fancy I can solve. 
 Leave him to me. I'll find out what can be 
 done with him." 
 
 "■ If he can be got hold of," Irons remarked, 
 reflectively, '' he will carry the whole thing 
 through. They'd believe him up at Feltonville 
 if he told them it was right to walk backward and 
 vote to give their incomes to the temperance 
 cranks." 
 
 He rose to go as he spoke, unconsciously assum- 
 ing wdth the overcoat he put on that air of stiff- 
 ness and immaculate propriety which he wore 
 always in public. LHe seldom allowed himself 
 the undignified freedom which marked his inter- 
 course with Mrs. Sampson, and he liked the rest 
 he found in being for a time his vulgar, ill-bred 
 self with no restraints of artificial manner?^ 
 
 "Well, good afternoon," he said, extending his 
 large hand, into which she laid hers with a certain 
 faint air of condescension. '* I've got to go to a 
 meeting of the committee on the new statue. 
 They've got a new fellow they are trying to 
 push in, a young unlicked cub that Peter Cal- 
 vin's running. I'll let you know anything that's 
 for our advantage." 
 
 When he was gone, Mrs. Sampson produced a 
 brush and a dustpan from behind the books on a 
 whatnot and carefully collected the scattered 
 ashes of his cigar. 
 
 "Vulgar old brute ! " she muttered. "To think 
 
I06 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 of my having to clean up after him ;Lhis mother 
 was my grandmother's laundress."! 
 
 Then she smiled contemptuously, and added by 
 way of self-consolation, — 
 
 ''But it will all count in the bill, Al Irons." 
 
X 
 
 THE BITTER PAST. 
 
 All's Well That Ends Well ; v. — 3. 
 
 " T^O you see much of Mrs. Herman ? " Helen 
 
 ^ Greyson asked of Edith Fenton, as they sat 
 at luncheon together in the latter's pretty dining- 
 room. 
 
 " Why, no," was the somewhat hesitating an- 
 swer. '* I really see very little of her. ^The fact 
 is we have so little common ground to meet on. — 
 You know Arthur says I am dreadfully narrow, 
 and I am sometimes afraid he is right. I have 
 tried to know her, but of course I couldn't take 
 her into society. She wouldn't enjoy it, and she 
 wouldn't feel at home, even if she'd go with me."^ 
 
 Helen smiled with mingled amusement and 
 wistfulness. r- 
 
 "No," she responded. *Vx_ can't exactly fancy 
 Ninitta in society. She'd be quite out of her 
 element. > My master in Rome, Flammenti, had 
 a way of saying a thing was like the pope at a 
 dancing-party, and I fancy Ninitta at an afternoon 
 tea would be hardly less out of place." 
 
 "But she must be very lonely," Edith said, stir- 
 ring her coffee meditatively. " She used to have 
 
 107 
 
I08 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 a few Italians come to see her ; people she met 
 that time she ran away, you remember, and we 
 brought her home, but they don't come now." 
 
 '' Why not ? " 
 
 Edith smiled and raised her eyebrows. 
 
 ^A question of caste, I believe." 
 
 caste.-'" echoed Helen. *'What do you 
 
 (iTof 
 
 mean t " 
 
 " When her son was born," Edith responded, 
 " she told them that the bambino was born a gen- 
 tleman, and couldn't associate with them." 3 
 
 Helen laughed lightly ; then her face clouded, 
 and she sighed. 
 
 "Poor Ninitta ! " she said. "There is some- 
 thing infinitely pitiful in her devotion and faithful- 
 ness to her youthful love." 
 
 Edith's face assumed an expression of mingled 
 perplexity and disquiet. With eyes downcast she 
 seemed for a moment to be seeking a phrase in 
 which properly to express some thought which 
 troubled her. Then she looked up quickly. 
 
 " I don't know that I ought to say it," she re- 
 marked, " but I can't help feeling that Ninitta is 
 not so fond of her husband as she used to be. Of 
 course I may be mistaken, but either I overesti- 
 mated her devotion before they were married, or 
 she cares less for him now." 
 
 An expression of pain contracted Helen's 
 brow. 
 
 "Isn't it possible," she suggested, "that her 
 
THE BITTER PAST. IO9 
 
 being more demonstrative in her love for the boy 
 makes her seem cold toward her husband ? " 
 
 " No," returned Edith, shaking her head, " it is 
 more than that. I fancy sometimes that she un- 
 consciously expected to be somehow transformed 
 into his equal by marrying him ; and that the dis- 
 appointment of being no more on a level with him 
 when she became his wife than before, has made 
 her somehow give him up, as if she concluded that 
 she could never really belong to his life. Of course 
 I don't mean," she added, "that Ninitta would 
 reason this out, and very likely I am all wrong, 
 anyway, but certainly something of this kind has 
 happened." 
 
 "Poor Ninitta," repeated Helen, "fate hasn't 
 been kind to her." 
 
 " But Mr. Herman t " Edith returned. " What 
 do you say of him t I think his case is far harder. 
 What a mistake his marriage was. I cannot con- 
 ceive how he was ever betrayed into such a dics- 
 alliatice. She cannot be a companion to him ; she 
 does not understand him : she is only a child who 
 has to be borne with, and who tries his patience 
 and his endurance." 
 
 Edith had forgotten her husband's suggestion 
 that her companion was responsible for Grant 
 Herman's marriage ; but Helen, who for six years 
 had been questioning with herself whether she 
 had done well in urging the sculptor to marry his 
 model, heard this outburst with beating heart and 
 
I JO THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 flushing cheek. Had Helen allowed Herman to 
 break his early pledge to Ninitta, and marry his 
 later love, it is probable that all her life would 
 have been shadowed by a consciousness of guilt. 
 The conscience bequeathed to her, as Fenton 
 rightly said, by Puritan ancestors, would ever have 
 reproached her with having come to happiness over 
 the ruins of another woman's heart and hopes. 
 Having in the supreme hour of temptation, how- 
 ever, overcome herself and given him up, it was 
 not perhaps strange that Helen unconsciously fell 
 somewhat into the attitude of assuming that this 
 sacrifice gave her not only the right to sit in judg- 
 ment upon Ninitta, but also that of having done 
 somewhat more than might justly have been de- 
 manded of her. She had often found herself won- 
 dering whether she had been wise ; whether her 
 devotion to an ideal had not been overstrained ; 
 and if she ought not to have considered rather the 
 happiness of the man she loved than devotion to 
 an abstract principle. 
 
 It was also undoubtedly true, although Helen 
 had not herself reflected upon this phase of the 
 matter, that her half a dozen years' residence in 
 Europe had softened and broadened her views. In 
 the present age of the world there is no method 
 possible by which one can resist the whole ten- 
 dency of modern thought and prevent himself from 
 moving forward with it, unless it be active and 
 violent controversy. No man can be a fanatic 
 
THE BITTER PAST. lU 
 
 without opposition, either real or vividly fancied, 
 upon which to stay his resolution, and it is equally 
 difficult to maintain a stand at any given point of 
 faith unless one has steadily to fight with vigor for 
 the right to possess it. 
 
 It is probable that to-day Helen might have 
 found it more difficult than six years before to 
 urge Herman to marry Ninitta, since besides the 
 self-sacrifice then involved would now be a doubt- 
 fulness of purpose. She sat silent some moments, 
 reflecting deeply, while her hostess watched her 
 with a loving admiration which was growing very 
 strongly upon her. 
 
 " But what is to be done now," Helen asked 
 slowly. " You would not have him cast her off .-^ " 
 
 "Oh, no," returned Edith, in genuine conster- 
 nation. " Now, it is six years too late." 
 
 *' I am afraid I do not wholly agree with your 
 point of view," answered Mrs. Greyson, roused by 
 the doubt in her own mind to a need to combat 
 the assumption that the marriage was a mistake. 
 '* I certainly do not feel that the mere ceremony is 
 the great point. See ! " she continued, becoming 
 more animated, and half involuntarily saying aloud 
 what she had so often said in her own mind ; *' a 
 man makes a woman love him. As time goes on, 
 he outgrows her. It is no fault of hers. Why 
 should the fact that he has or has not come into 
 the marriage relations affect her claims on him ? 
 Isn't he in honor bound to marry her ? " 
 
112 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " But suppose," Edith returned, ** that he has 
 not only outgrown her but made some other woman 
 love him too ? " 
 
 It was merely a chance shot of argument, but it 
 smote Helen so that she trembled as she sat. 
 
 " Is not that woman to be considered ? " Edith 
 continued. '' Is the good of the man to count for 
 nothing } Mr. Herman is sacrificed to an old 
 mistake. Perhaps it is right that he should pay 
 the price of his error ; and that in the end it will 
 be overruled for his good, we may hope. But it 
 is hard to have patience now with the state of 
 things." 
 
 Helen tapped her teaspoon nervously against 
 her cup. 
 
 "But what can be done.-*" 
 
 " Nothing," Mrs. Fenton said, without the 
 slightest hesitation. " You and I may think these 
 things, but it would be a crime for Mr. Herman 
 to think them." 
 
 '' It might be cowardice to yield to them," re- 
 sponded Helen ; " but how crime t And how can 
 one help the thoughts from turning whithersoever 
 they will } " 
 
 Edith pushed back her plate, leaned forward with 
 folded arms resting upon the edge of the table. 
 She flushed a little, as she did sometimes when 
 she felt it her duty to say something to her hus- 
 band which it was hard to utter. 
 
 " I do not think you and I agree in this," she 
 
THE BITTER FAST. U^ 
 
 said, in a voice which her earnestness made some- 
 what lower than before. " Marriage is to me a 
 sacrament, and this very fact gives it a nature dif- 
 ferent from ordinary promises. We promise to 
 love until death do us part. To me that is as 
 imperative as any vow I can make to God and 
 man." 
 
 *' But love," Helen urged, with a somewhat per- 
 plexed air, *' is not a thing to be coerced." 
 
 '* It must be," Edith returned, inflexibly. " Even 
 if my husband ceased to love me, that does not 
 absolve me. I must fulfil my promise and my 
 duty." 
 
 *' But," Helen responded, doubtfully and slowly, 
 " it seems to me a sacrilege to live with a man 
 after one has ceased to love him." 
 
 " But I would love him," Edith broke in almost 
 fiercely. "That is just the point. One must re- 
 fuse to cease to love him." 
 
 " But if he ceased to love her } " 
 
 A flush came into Edith's clear cheek, and her 
 eyes shone. Half unconsciously to herself, she was 
 fighting with the doubts which would now and 
 then rise in her own mind of her husband's affec- 
 tion. 
 
 ** Then," she said, in a low voice, *' one must 
 still be worthy of his love ; one must do one's 
 duty. Besides," she added, looking up with a 
 gleam of hope, *' when one has made a solemn 
 vow, as a wife vows to love her husband until 
 
114 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 death part them, I firmly believe that strength to 
 keep that vow will not be withheld." 
 
 Helen was silent a moment. She by no means 
 agreed to the position Edith took. She had no 
 belief in those promises in virtue of which the 
 sacraments of the church took on a peculiar sanc- 
 tity ; she did not at all trust to any special help 
 bestowed by higher powers. She did not, how- 
 ever, care to argue upon these points, and she 
 said more lightly, — 
 
 '' You task womanhood pretty heavily." 
 
 " A little woman who is a protegee of mine," 
 Edith returned, in the same -manner, " said rather 
 quaintly the other day, that women were made so 
 there should be somebody to be patient with men. 
 She's having trouble with her lover, I suspect, and 
 takes it hardly." 
 
 "But," Helen persisted more gravely, "it seems 
 to me that you set before the unloved wife a task 
 to which humanity is absolutely unequal." 
 
 " You remember St. Theresa and her tw^o sous," 
 Edith replied, her eyes shining with deep inner 
 feeling ; " how she said, ' St. Theresa and two 
 sous are nothing, but St. Theresa and two sous 
 and God are everything.' I can't argue, but for 
 myself, I could not live if I should give up my 
 ideal of duty." 
 
 As often it had happened before, Helen found 
 herself so deeply moved by the fervor and the 
 genuineness of Edith's faith, that she felt it im- 
 
THE BITTER PAST. 
 
 15 
 
 possible to go on with an argument which could 
 convince only at the expense of weakening this 
 rare trust. She brought the conversation back to 
 its starting point. 
 
 '' But about Ninitta," she said. "• I saw her 
 yesterday, and she acted as if she had something 
 on her mind. She somehow seemed to be trying 
 to tell me something. I told her that the bam- 
 bino, as she calls Nino, must keep her occupied 
 most of the time, and she said the nurse stole him 
 away half of the day ; she has the peasant instinct 
 to take entire charge of her own child." 
 
 '' If that is a peasant instinct," Edith rejoined 
 laughing, " I am afraid I am a peasant." 
 
 " Oh, but you are reasonable about it, and know 
 that it is better for the boy to have change and so 
 on. She acts as if she felt it to be a conspiracy 
 between the nurse and her husband to steal the 
 child's affections from her. Really, I felt as if she 
 was coming to love Nino so fiercely that she had 
 fits of almost hating her husband." 
 
 The ringing of the door bell and the entrance of 
 the servant with a card interrupted the conversa- 
 tion, and Helen had only time to say, — 
 
 " Of course on general principles you know I do 
 not agree with you. Indeed, I should find it hard 
 to justify what I consider the most meritorious acts 
 of my life if I did. But I do want to say that, given 
 your creed, your view of marriage seems to me 
 the noble — indeed, the only one." 
 
Il6 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 As Helen walked home in the gray afternoon, 
 sombre with a winter mist, she thought over the 
 conversation and measured her life by its principles. 
 
 ''If one accepts Edith's standard," she reflected, 
 "■ it is impossible not to accept her conclusions. 
 She is a St. Theresa, with her strict adherence to 
 forms and her loyalty to her convictions. But 
 surely one's own self has some claims. My first 
 duty to whatever the highest power is, — the All, 
 perhaps, — must be to do the best I can with my- 
 self. It could not be my duty to go on living with 
 Will " — 
 
 She stopped, with a faint shudder, raising her 
 eyes and looking abcut upon the wet and dreary 
 landscape with an almost furtive glance, as if she 
 were oppressed by the fear that the eyes of the 
 husban 1 'v'th whom she had found it impossible to 
 live, and v.ho for six years had been under the sod, 
 dead by his own hand, might be watching her una- 
 wares. It was one of those moments when a 
 bygone emotion is so vividly revived, as if some 
 long hidden landscape were revealed by a sudden 
 lightning flash. The years had brought her 
 immunity from the poignancy of the pain of old 
 sorrows, but for one brief and bitter instant she 
 cowed with the old fear, she trembled with the old- 
 time agony. 
 
 Then she smiled at the unreasonableness of her 
 feeling, and dropping her eyes, walked on with 
 slightly quickened steps. 
 
THE BITTER PAST. 
 
 117 
 
 " It cannot be a woman's duty to go on living 
 with a man who is dragging her down, or even who 
 prevents her from realizing her best ; and yet, there 
 is the influence. That is a trick of my old Puritan 
 training, of course, but after all it is right to con- 
 sider. One must count influence as a factor if one 
 believes in civilization, and I do believe in civiliza- 
 tion ; certainly, I would not go back to barbarism. 
 But is a woman to be tied down — oh ! how a woman 
 is always tied down ! limitation — limitation — 
 limitation ; that is the whole story of a woman's 
 life ; and the harder she struggles to get away 
 from her bonds the more she proves to herself by 
 the pain of the wrist cut by the fetters how impos- 
 sible it is to break them. Women contrive to 
 deceive men sometimes into believing that they 
 have overcome the limitations of their sex ; and 
 they even deceive themselves ; but they never 
 deceive each other. A woman may believe that 
 she herself has accomplished the impossible, but 
 she knows no one of her sisters has." 
 
 She smiled sadly and yet humorously, pausing a 
 moment on the curbstone before crossing the wet 
 and icy street. Then as she went on and a coach- 
 man pulled up his horses almost upon their 
 haunches to let her pass, she took up the thread of 
 her reflections once more, — 
 
 " Yet surely women must not rebel against civil- 
 ization. Civilization is after all quite as largely as 
 anything else a determined ignoring and combat- 
 
Il8 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ting on the part of mankind of the cruel disadvan- 
 tages under which nature has put women. No ; we 
 must look at it in the large ; we must hold to the 
 conventional even, rather than fight against civiliza- 
 tion, however wrong and illogical and heartless 
 civilization may be. It is the best we have and we 
 go to the wall without it." 
 
 She had reached her boarding-house and fitted 
 her latch-key into the lock. As she opened the 
 door she looked back into the gathering dusk of the 
 misty afternoon, and her thought was almost as if 
 it were a last word flung to some presence to be 
 left behind and shut out, a personality with whom 
 she had argued, and who had logically defeated 
 but not convinced her. 
 
 "And yet," she said inwardly, with a sudden 
 swelling of defiance and conviction, "not for all 
 the universe could I have done it. I could not go 
 on living with Will, — though," she added, a sud- 
 den compunction seizing her, " I was fond of him in 
 a way, poor fellow." 
 
 And the door closed. 
 
XI 
 
 THE GREAT ASSAY OF ART. 
 
 Macbeth ; iv. — 3. 
 r- 
 
 I nPHE inner history of the effigies which in Boston 
 V 1 do duty as statues would be most interesting 
 reading, amusing or depressing as one felt obliged 
 to take it. To know what causes led to the pro- 
 duction and then to the erection of these monstros- 
 ities could hardly fail to be instruct4¥ei although 
 the knowledge might be rather dreary.^ ^ 
 
 The subject has been too much discussed to 
 make it easy to touch it, but all this examination 
 has by no means resulted in general enlighten- 
 ment, as was sufficiently evident at the meeting 
 of the committee in charge of the new statue of 
 America about to be erected in a properly select 
 Back Bay location. The committee consisted of 
 Stewart Hubbard, Alfred Irons, and Peter Calvin, 
 three names which were seldom long absent from 
 the columns of the leading Boston daily news- 
 papers. Mr. Irons had been strongly objected to 
 by both his associates, neither of whom felt quite 
 disposed to assume even such equality as might 
 seem to follow from joint membership of the com- 
 mittee. That gentleman had, however, sufficient 
 
 H9 
 
I20 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 influence at City Hall to secure appointment, a 
 whim which had seized him to pose as a patron of 
 art being his obvious motive ; and neither Mr. 
 Hubbard nor Mr. Calvin was prepared to go quite 
 to the length of declining to serve with the obnox- 
 ious parvenu. 
 
 Y^Stewart Hubbard was a most admirable example 
 of the best type of an American gentleman. 
 Arthur Fenton once described him as *' a genuine 
 old Beacon street, purple window-glass swell ; " a 
 description expressive, if not especially elegant. 
 Tall and well-built, with the patrician written in 
 every line of his handsome face, his finely shaped 
 head covered with short hair, snowy white although 
 he had hardly passed middle age, his clear dark 
 eyes straightforward and frank in their glances, he 
 was a striking and pleasing figure in any company. 
 He had graduated, like his ancestors for three or 
 four generations, at Harvard ; and if he knew less 
 about art than his place on the committee made 
 desirable, he at least had a pretty fair idea of what 
 authorities could be trusted. ^ 
 
 Peter Calvin's place in Boston art matters has 
 already been spoken of. He took himself very 
 seriously, moving through life with a sunny-faced 
 self-complacency so inoffensive and sincere as to 
 be positively delightful. He was too good-natured 
 and in all respects of character too little virile to 
 meet Irons with anything but kindness, but as he 
 was a trifle less sure of his social standing than 
 
THE GREAT ASSAY OF ART. 121 
 
 Hubbard, he was naturally more annoyed at the 
 choice of the third member of the committeej He 
 made not a few protests to his friends, and gently 
 represented himself as a martyr to his devotion to 
 the cause of art from having accepted the place 
 \\^ held. 
 
 \\Vhen one considered, however, the way in which 
 committees upon art matters are made up at City 
 Hall, it becomes evident that the wonder was not 
 that the present body was no better, but that it 
 should be so good. The truth was that the choice 
 of Hubbard and Calvin had been considered a great 
 concession to the unreasonable prejudices of the 
 self-appointed arbitrators of art affairs in town. A 
 short time before, a committee consisting of a 
 butcher, a furniture dealer and a North End ward 
 politician, had been sent to New York on a mat- 
 ter connected with a public monument, and their 
 action had been so egregiously absurd as to bring 
 down upon their heads and upon the heads of those 
 who appointed them such a torrent of ridicule 
 that even the tough hide of City Hall could not 
 withstand it. It was felt that the public was more 
 alive on art matters than had been suspected ; and 
 when a South Boston liquor-dealer manifested a 
 singular but unmistakable desire to be appointed 
 on the America committee, he had been promptly 
 suppressed with the information that this was to 
 be "a regular bang-up, silver-top committee," and 
 was forced to soothe his disappointed ambition 
 
122 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 with such consolation as lay in the promise that 
 next time he should be counted in. , 
 
 When the committee had been named, a hint 
 was dropped in one or two newspaper offices that 
 the powers which work darkly at City Hall ex- 
 pected due credit for the self-sacrifice involved in 
 putting on two men at least from whom no reward 
 was to be expected. The journals improved the 
 opportunity, and praised highly the choice of all 
 three of the members. When this called out a 
 protest from the artists, because no artist had 
 been appointed, City Hall had no words adequate 
 to the expression of its disgust. 
 
 "That's what comes of trying to satisfy them 
 fellows," one City Father observed, in an indignant 
 and unstilted speech to his colleagues. " They 
 ja^ant the earth, and nothing else will satisfy them, 
 (^^hat if they ain't got no artist on the committee ; 
 everybody knows that Peter Calvin's a man who's 
 published a lot of books about art, and it stands to 
 reason he's a bigger gun than a feller that just 
 paints. '^3 
 
 The committee paid no attention to the discus- 
 sion concerning their fitness, of which indeed they 
 did not know a great deal, but came together in a 
 matter-of-fact way, precisely as they would have 
 assembled to transact any other business. 
 
 " I don't know what you think," Mr. Irons ob- 
 served, as the three gentlemen settled themselves 
 in the easy-chairs of Mr. Hubbard's private office 
 
THE GREAT ASSAY OF AK7\ 123 
 
 and lighted their cigars, " but it seems to me we 
 had better try to come to some reasonably definite 
 idea of what we want this monument to be before 
 we go any farther. It will be time enough to talk 
 about who*^s to get the order when we've made up 
 o^r minds what the order is to be." 
 LBoth the words and the manner rasped the 
 nerves of Mr. Calvin almost beyond endurance. 
 He was accustomed to phrasing his views with 
 elegance, and although in truth his ideas in the 
 matter on hand were not widely different from 
 those of Mr. Irons, the latter had stated the propo- 
 sition with a boldness which made it impossible 
 for him to agree with it. By^ birth, by instinct, 
 and by lifelong training a faithful servant of the 
 god Dagon, he yet seldom professed his allegiance 
 frankly. He sheltered his slavish adherence to 
 conventions under a decent show of following con- 
 victions ; so that the pure and straightforward 
 Philistinism which Mr. Irons professed from sim- 
 ple lack of a knowledge of the secrets of what 
 might perhaps be called the priestly cult of Phil- 
 istia,* appeared to Peter Calvin shockingly crude 
 and offensive. \ 
 
 ** Perhaps," he said, with a smile which was 
 hardly less sweet than usual, so well trained were 
 the muscles of his face in producing it, " it can 
 hardly be said that we can decide. The artist 
 after all cannot be expected to accept too many 
 limitations if he is to produce a work of art. His 
 genius must have full play." 
 
124 THE PHlLISTIiVES. 
 
 Secretly, Irons had a most profound respect for 
 the other's art knowledge, and he was too anxious 
 to appear well in his capacity as a member of the 
 statue committee to be willing to run any risks by 
 attempting to controvert ^-ny aesthetic proposition 
 laid down by Mr. Calvin. -He was by no mc . s 
 fond of the man, however, and to his dislike his 
 envy of Calvin's reputation, socially and aestheti- 
 cally, added venom. ^He hastened now, with quite 
 unnecessary vigor, to defend himself from the 
 mildly implied attack. 
 
 *' I suppose we have got to give an order — or a 
 commission, if the word suits you better — of 
 some sort ; and whatever it is to be it needs to be 
 defined." 
 
 His manner was so evidently belligerent that 
 Mr. Hubbard hastened to interpose. 
 
 "That is pretty well defined for us, isn't it.?" 
 he said. *' We were directed to give a commission 
 for a single figure representing America, to be 
 executed in bronze and not to exceed a fixed sum 
 in cost. That does not leave much latitude, so 
 far as I can see, beyond the right of selecting or 
 rejecting models shown us. For my own part, I 
 may as well say at once, I am in favor of giving 
 Mr. Herman whatever terms he wants to make a 
 model, and trusting everything to him. Of course 
 we should still have the right to veto the arrange- 
 ment if the figure he made should not prove satis- 
 factory." 
 
THE GREAT ASSAY OF ART. 
 
 125 
 
 Mr. Hubbard spoke with a certain elegant delib- 
 eration and precisiorijvhich Irons supposed himself 
 to regard^s affected, while secretly he thoroughly 
 envied it. _3 
 
 ** Oh, we all know what Herman would do," 
 Irons retorted. " He'd make one of those things 
 that nobody could understand, and then say it was 
 artistic. We want something to please folks." 
 ijrons was more concerned about his popularity 
 than even in regard to the reputation as an art 
 patron he was laboriously striving to build up. 
 He was an inordinately vain man, but he was an 
 exceedingly shrewd one. His self-esteem was 
 gratified by seeing his name among those of men 
 influential in art matters ; he bought pictures 
 largely for the pleasure of being talked of as a man 
 who patronized the proper painters, and he was 
 looked upon as likely at no distant day to be- 
 come president of a club which Fenton dubbed 
 the Discourager of Art ; but he realized that for 
 a man who still had some political aspirations 
 there was a substantial value in popular favor not 
 to be found in any reputation for culture, however 
 delightful the latter might be. He distinctly 
 intended to please the public by his action in re- 
 gard to the statue, a resolution which was rendered 
 the more firm by the fact that he vastly over-esti- 
 mated the interest which the public was likely to 
 take in the matter. He trimmed the ashes from 
 his cigar as he spoke, with an air which was in- 
 
126 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 tended to convey the idea that he would stand no 
 nonsense'.^ 
 
 "Won't Mr. Herman enter a competitive trial ?" 
 Calvin asked. " We might ask two or three others 
 and then select the best model." 
 
 "He won't go into a competition. He says it's 
 beneath an artist's dignity." 
 
 " Damned nonsense ! " blustered Irons, sitting 
 up in his chair in excitement over such an extra- 
 ordinary proposition. " Don't we all go into com- 
 petitions whenever we send in sealed proposals.'' 
 Beneath his dignity ! Great Scott ! The cocki- 
 ness of artists is enough to take away a man's 
 ^reath." 
 
 i Mr. Hubbard, who was a lawyer chiefly occupied, 
 as far as business went, in managing his own large 
 property and certain trust funds, and Mr. Calvin, 
 who had never in his life soiled his aristocratic 
 hands with any business whatever, smiled in the 
 mutual consciousness that " sealed proposals " 
 were as much outside their experience as con^peti- 
 tions were foreign to that of Grant Herman. \The 
 thought, passing and trivial as it was, moved their 
 sympathy a little toward the sculptor's view of the 
 matter, although since secretly Mr. Calvin was 
 determined that the commission should be given 
 to Orin Stanton, the fact made little difference. 
 
 " You evidently don't want to undergo the gen- 
 eral condemnation that has fallen on whoever has 
 had a share in the Boston statues thus far," Mr. 
 
THE GREAT ASSAY OF ART 
 
 27 
 
 Calvin observed, glancing at Irons with a genial 
 smile. ** If you are going to set yourself to hit the 
 popular taste and keep yourself clear of the claws 
 of the critics at the same time, I fear you've a 
 heavy task laid out." 
 
 "The critics always pitch into everything," 
 Irons responded with a growl. \M[t's the taste of 
 the people I want to please. I believe in art as a 
 popular educator, and people can't be educated by 
 things they won't look at." ; 
 
 "Oh, as to that," Stewart Hubbard rejoined, 
 with a twinkle in his eye, " conventionality is 
 after all the consensus of the taste of mankind." 
 
 Peter Calvin was at a loss to tell whether his 
 friend was in earnest or was only quizzing Irons, 
 so he contented himself with an appreciative look, 
 and a smile of dazzling warmth. Irons, on the 
 other hand, looked toward the speaker with sus- 
 picion. 
 
 *Vl haven't much sympathy with a good deal of 
 the stuff artists talk," he continued, following his 
 own train of thought, f" It doesn't square very well 
 with common sense and ain't much more than 
 pure gassing, I think. The truth is, genius is 
 mostly moonshine. The man I call a genius is the 
 one that makes things work practically.") 
 
 " In other words," said Calvin, spurred to emu- 
 late Hubbard's epigram, and involuntarily glan- 
 cing toward the latter for approval, " you think a 
 genius is a man who is able to harness Pegasus to 
 
128 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 the plough, and make him work without kicking 
 things to pieces," 
 
 *' That's about it," Irons assented ; " and I 
 think Herman is too toploftical and full of cranky 
 theories. They say Mrs. Greyson has hit the nail 
 exactly on the head in that statue she showed 
 in Paris last year. That pleased the critics and 
 the public both, and that's exactly what we are 
 after. I think we ought to ask her to make a 
 design." 
 
 Mr. Calvin saw and seized the opportunity easily 
 to introduce his own especial candidate. 
 
 " If each of you have a sculptor," he said, 
 lightly, " I can hardly do less than to have one, 
 too. There's an exceedingly clever fellow just 
 home from Rome, that I want to see given a 
 chance. He's done some very promising work, 
 and I look upon him as the coming man." 
 
 The two men regarded him with some interest, 
 as one who has introduced a new element into a 
 game. Mr. Hubbard leaned back in his chair, and 
 sent a puff of cigar smoke floating upward, before 
 he answered. 
 
 " I can't enter my man for the triangular con- 
 test," said he. *' He won't go into a competition 
 unless he's paid for making the design. He says, 
 in so many words, that he doesn't want the com- 
 mission to make the statue unless he can do it in 
 his own way. He will be unhindered, or he will 
 let the whole thing- alone." 
 
THE GREAT ASSAY OF ART. 
 
 129 
 
 ^* For my part," Mr, Irons responded, settling 
 himself in his chair, with a certain air of determi- 
 nation, •' I don't take a great deal of stock in this 
 letting an artist have his own way. He might 
 put up a naked woman, or any rubbish he hap- 
 pened to think of. The amount of the matter is 
 that it isn't such a devilish smart thing to make a 
 figure as they try to make out. Any man can do 
 it that has learned the trade, and I haven't any 
 great amount of patience with the fuss these fel- 
 lows make over their statues." 
 
 Neither of his companions felt inclined to enter 
 into a general discussion of the principles under- 
 lying art work, and, although neither agreed with 
 this broad statement, there was no direct response 
 offered. Calvin and Hubbard looked at each other, 
 and the latter asked, — 
 
 " Have you any notion what Mrs. Greyson 
 would do .'^ " 
 
 '* No, I have never talked with her." 
 
 " Very likely she'd give us another figure like 
 those that are stuck all over Boston, like pins in a 
 pincushion," Hubbard objected. ** Some carpet- 
 knight, with a face spread over with a grin as 
 inane as that of Henry Clay on a cigar-box cover." 
 
 Irons laughed contemptuously, and rose, throw- 
 ing away his cigar stub. 
 
 " Well, I must go," he announced. " We don't 
 seem to be getting ahead very fast. I'll try and 
 find out if she'll go into a competition, and you 
 
I30 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 two had better do the same with your folks. Then 
 we shall at least have something to go upon. 
 The Daily Observer has already begun to ask why 
 something isn't done, and I'd like to get the thing 
 finished up, myself.'* 
 
 The two others rose also, and it was thereby 
 manifest that this unproductive sitting of the 
 committee was at an end. 
 
XII 
 
 WHOM THE FATES HAVE MARKED. 
 
 Comedy of Errors ; i. — i. 
 
 NEVER was a man more utterly wretched than 
 was Arthur Fenton, after the luckless day 
 when Mr. Irons had lighted upon the presence of 
 Mrs. Herman at the studio. He raged against 
 himself, against chance, most of all against the 
 unmannerly and coarse-minded fellow who had 
 forced himself into the studio, and then persisted 
 in imagining: evil which had never existed. He 
 experienced all the acute anguish of finding him- 
 self in the toils, and of the added sting from 
 wounded vanity, since he felt that he had been 
 wanting in adroitness and presence of mind. It 
 is to be doubted if he did not suffer more than 
 would have been the case had the injurious suspi- 
 cions of Irons been correct. To a vain man, it is 
 often harder to be entrapped through stupidity or 
 awkwardness than throusfh crime. 
 
 Fenton realized well enough how impossible it 
 was now to correct the evil that had been done. 
 He might have explained away the fact that 
 Ninitta had been his model, but his own bearing 
 
 131 
 
132 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 under the accusation had produced an impression 
 not to be eradicated. The wavering before his 
 eyes, for a single instant, of the will-o'-the-wisp fire 
 of sudden temptation had blinded him, so that he 
 had been guilty of a cursed piece of folly, which 
 had put him at once in the power of Irons. He 
 knew enough of the latter to be pretty sure that 
 he was capable of keeping his threat to enlighten 
 Herman concerning his wife's visit to the studio, 
 and disgrace in the eyes of Herman meant more 
 than Arthur dared to think. Sensitive to the last 
 fibre of his being, the artist grew faint with 
 exquisite pain at the thought of what he must 
 endure from a scandal spread among his friends. 
 An accusation without foundation would~ have 
 been almost more than he could bear, but one 
 supported by such circumstantial evidence as lay 
 behind the story Irons would tell if he set himself 
 to make trouble, — the bare idea drove Fenton 
 wild. 
 
 Fenton had always prided himself upon his 
 superiority to public opinion, but without public 
 respect he could not but be supremely miserable. 
 It is true that he valued his own good opinion 
 above that of the world. It was his theory that 
 the ultimate appeal in matters of conduct was 
 always to the man's inner consciousness, and in 
 this highest court only the man himself could be 
 present, all the world being shut out. It fol- 
 lowed that a person's own opinion of his acts was 
 
ll^HOM THE FATES HAVE MARKED. 133 
 
 of infinitely more weight tlian that of any or all 
 other people whosoever. 
 
 **A11 standards are arbitrary," he was accus- 
 tomed to say, " and all terms are relative. Every 
 man must make his own ethical code, and nobody 
 but the man himself can tell how far he lives up 
 to it. Why should I care whether people who do 
 not even know what my rules of conduct are, con- 
 sider my course correct or not ? Very likely the 
 things they condemn are the things it has cost me 
 most struggle and self-denial to achieve. We 
 have outgrown old ethical systems, because the 
 world has become enlightened enough to perceive 
 that every mind must make its own code ; to real- 
 ize that what a man is must be his religion." 
 / This course of reasoning was one shared by 
 many of Fenton's friends, and indeed by a 
 goodly company of nineteenth century thinkers. 
 Fenton was in reality only going with the major- 
 ity of liberalists in regarding sincerity to personal 
 conviction as the highest of ethical laws ; and he 
 was generally pretty logical in choosing the ap- 
 proval of his inward knowledge to that of the 
 world outside^) Yet his vanity was keenly sensi- 
 tive to disapprobation, and when the censure of 
 the world coincided with the condemnation of his 
 own reason he suffered. To self-contempt was 
 added a baffled sense of having been discovered ; 
 and as his imagination now ran forward to picture 
 the effects of Irons's disclosure, the suffering he 
 endured was really pitiful. 
 
134 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " Nobody will understand," he said to himself 
 one day, half in bitter self-contempt and half in 
 self-defence, ''that I couldn't help doing as I did ; 
 no cruelty surpasses that of holding weak and 
 sensitive natures accountable for shortcomings 
 they are born incapable of avoiding." 
 
 And having accomplished an epigram at his 
 own expense, he felt as if he had to some degree 
 atoned for his fault, just as a flagellant looks upon 
 his self-scourging as expiatory. 
 
 How to act in the position in which he had been 
 placed by Irons's insulting proposal was a question 
 which he found more difTficult to answer than ac- 
 cording to his theories, it should have been. When 
 a man becomes his own highest law he is con- 
 stantly exposed to the danger of finding his theories 
 of conduct utterly confounded by a change in self- 
 interest ; and Fenton began to have a most pain- 
 ful sense of being ethically wholly at sea. He 
 had not yielded to temptation, however. He had 
 given Stewart Hubbard a couple of sittings, and 
 so great had been his fear lest he should inadver- 
 tently gather from his sitter some hint of the 
 knowledge he had been urged to obtain, that he had 
 half unconsciously been reserved and silent. The 
 picture was going badly, and the sitter wondered 
 what had come over the witty and vivacious artist. 
 
 Besides these vexations the artist had, moreover, 
 other causes for uneasiness at this time. His 
 financial affairs were by no means in satisfactory 
 
WHOM THE FATES HAVE MARKED. 135 
 
 condition. He had been filling a good many 
 orders and getting excellent prices for his work, 
 yet somehow he had been all the year running 
 behindhand. He lived beyond his means, priding 
 himself upon being the one Boston artist who had 
 been born, bred, and educated a gentleman, as he 
 chose to put it to himself, and who was able to live 
 as a man of the world should. His summer had 
 been passed at Newport, a place which Edith by 
 no means liked, and where her ideas of propriety 
 and religion were constantly offended, especially 
 in regard to the sanctity of marriage. He enter- 
 tained sumptuously, spent money freely at the 
 clubs, and, in a word, tried to be no less a man of 
 fashion than an artist. 
 
 The result was be2:innino- to be disastrous. 
 Living pretty closely up to his income, a few 
 losses and a speculation or two which turned out 
 unlucky, were sufficient to embarrass him seri- 
 ously. It was the old trite and dreary story of 
 extravagance and its inevitable consequence ; and 
 as Fenton had no talent for finance, his struggles 
 rather made matters worse than bettered them, as 
 the efforts of a fly to escape from the web, even 
 although they may damage the net, are apt to end 
 also in binding the victim more securely. 
 
 The truth was that the painter, like many another 
 man endowed with imaginative gifts, had little prac- 
 tical knowledge of affairs beyond a talent for spend- 
 ing money ; and it is amazing how stupid a clever 
 
l^ 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 man can contrive to be when he is taken out of his 
 sphere. For such men there is no safety save in 
 keeping out of debt, and once the balance was on 
 the wrong side of his account, Fenton, self-poised 
 as he was, lost his head. It troubled and worried 
 him to be in debt even when he could see his way 
 clear to paying everything, and now that matters 
 began to get too complicated to be settled by plain 
 and obvious arithmetic, he was miserable. 
 
 In the midst of these unhappy complications, he 
 was one morning working upon the portrait of 
 Miss Damaris Wainwright, whose cousin and 
 aunts, the Dimmonts, had induced her to have it 
 painted, although she was in deep mourning. He 
 was interested in the lovely, melancholy girl, and 
 he felt that he was doing some of the best work 
 of his life in her portrait. He sometimes was 
 proud of his skill, and at others he was unreasona- 
 bly vexed that this picture should be so much 
 better than that of Mr. Hubbard promised to be. 
 
 He had been talking this morning half-absently, 
 and merely for the sake of keeping his sitter inter- 
 ested. He had not noticed that her whole being 
 was keyed up to a pitch of intense feeling, and he 
 had almost unconsciously accomplished the really 
 difificult task of putting his sitter at her ease and 
 making her ready to talk. 
 
 Suddenly, after a brief silence, she said, — 
 
 "You provoke confidences." 
 
 Some note in her voice and the closeness of 
 
WHOM THE FATES HAVE MARKED. 
 
 137 
 
 connection between her words and the thought in 
 his own mind that he certainly must be able to do 
 what Irons asked, arrested Fenton's attention. 
 
 " Yes," he returned, his air of sincerely mean- 
 ing what he said being by no means wholly un- 
 real ; ''that is because I am unworthy of them." 
 
 Miss Wainwright smiled. The self-detraction 
 seemed delicate, and the unexpectedness of the 
 reply amused her. 
 
 ** That is perhaps a modest thing to say, Mr. 
 Fenton," she responded, " but the truth must be 
 
 — if you'll pardon my saying anything so personal 
 
 — that you are very sympathetic." 
 
 The artist moved backward a step from his 
 easel, regarding his work with that half-shutting 
 of the eyes and turning of the head which seems 
 to be an essential of professional inspection. 
 
 ** Even so," persisted he, *' a sympathetic person 
 is one whose emotions are fickle enough to give 
 place to whatever others any sudden accident 
 brings up ; and if one's feelings are so transient, 
 how can he be worthy of confidence V 
 
 "■ I can't argue with you," Damaris replied, 
 smiling and shaking her head, "■ but all the same I 
 don't agree with what you say." 
 
 **Oh, I hoped you wouldn't when I said it," 
 Fenton threw back lightly. 
 
 He went on with his work, outwardly tranquil, 
 as if he had no thought beyond the perfect shad- 
 ing of the cheek he was painting ; but his mind 
 
138 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 was in a tumult. He thought how easy it is to 
 deceive ; how constantly, indeed, we do deceive 
 whether we will or no ; how foolish it is to rule 
 our lives by standards which rest so largely on 
 mere seeming; how — Bah! Why should he pre- 
 tend to himself ? He was not really concerned 
 with generalities or great moral principles. He 
 was trying to decide whether he should worm a 
 secret out of Hubbard to throw as a sop to that 
 vile cursed cad, Irons, to keep his foul mouth 
 shut about Ninitta. Heavens ! What a tangle he 
 had got into simply because he wanted a decent 
 model for his picture ! The abominable prudery 
 and hypocrisy of the time lay behind the whole 
 matter. But this would never do. He must 
 work now ; not think of these exciting things. It 
 was hardly a brief moment before to his last 
 words he added aloud, — 
 
 "Did what you said mean that I was to be 
 favored with a confidence .'* " 
 
 A painful, deep problem v/as weighing upon her 
 heart, wearing away her reason and her life alike. 
 She had almost been ready to ask advice of the 
 artist, although she by no means knew him well 
 enough to render so intimate a conversation other 
 than strange. 
 
 " Not necessarily," was her reply to Fenton's 
 question. 
 
 She found it after all impossible to utter any- 
 thing definite upon the subject which lay so near 
 
WHOM THE FATES HAVE MARKED. 130 
 
 her heart. She even felt a dim wonder whether 
 she had really ever seriously contemplated speak- 
 ing of it, even never so remotely. 
 
 *' I was thinking," she continued, ''of the point 
 the conversation had reached this mornins: when 
 I left my friend at the door downstairs." 
 
 " It was some great moral problem, I think you 
 said," Fenton responded, trying to recall accu- 
 rately what she had told him earlier in the sitting 
 of a talk she had had with a friend on her way to 
 the studio. "The object of life, or something of 
 that sort. Well, the object of life is to endure 
 life, I suppose, just as the object of time is to kill 
 time." 
 
 '* We had got so far in our talk as to decide," 
 Miss Wainwright went on, too much absorbed in 
 recalling the interview she was relating to notice 
 the painter's words, " he decided, that is, not I — 
 that the only thing to do is to enjoy the present 
 and to let the future go ; but I object that one 
 cannot help dreading what might come." 
 
 She spoke, of course, solely with reference to 
 her own inner experiences, but Fenton, with the 
 egotism which is universal to humanity, received 
 the words in their application to his own case. If 
 he could but determine what would come, he might 
 decide how to act in this hard present. Yet, what- 
 ever that future might be, he must at any cost 
 extricate himself from this coil which pressed so 
 cruelly upon him. 
 
J 40 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ''Even so he would be right," he answered her 
 words. " Happiness in this world consists, at 
 best, in a choice of evils, and at least one may 
 make of the present a ^dMco^ pi quant e to cover the 
 flavor of the dread of the future." 
 
 " You take a more desperate view of the matter 
 than my friend," Miss Wainwright said, sighing 
 bitterly. " His only fear is that I shall lose every- 
 thing by not making sure of whatever present 
 happiness is possible." 
 
 Fenton glanced at her curiously, aware no less 
 from her tone and manner than from her words 
 that the conversation was touching her as well as 
 himself through some keen personal experience. 
 A feeling of sharp and irritating remorse stung 
 him from the thought that he, whose whole sensu- 
 ous nature strove for selfish joyousness in life, was 
 discussing this question from his own standpoint, 
 while the pale, lovely girl before him was regard- 
 ing the whole problem from the high plane of 
 duty. Instinctively he set himself to justify his 
 position against hers ; to demonstrate that his 
 Pagan, selfish philosophy was the true guide. 
 
 " Oh," he cried out with sudden vehemence, 
 waving his palette with a gesture of supreme 
 impatience, " I do take a desperate view ! Life is 
 desperate, and the most absurd of all the multi- 
 tudinous ways of making it worse is to waste the 
 present in dreading the future. I've no patience 
 with the notion that seems to be so many people's 
 
JVIIOM THE FATES HAVE MARKED. j^j 
 
 creed, that we can do nothing nobler than to be 
 as miserable as possible. It is a dreadful remain- 
 der of that awful malady of Puritanism. Besides, 
 where is the logic of supposing we shall be better 
 prepared for any misfortune that may come if we 
 can only contrive to dread it enough beforehand. 
 Good heavens ! We all need whatever strength we 
 can get from happiness whenever it comes, as 
 much as a plant needs the sunshine while it lasts. 
 You wouldn't prepare a delicate plant for cloudy 
 days by keeping it in the shadow ; and I think 
 one is simply an idiot who keeps in the shade to 
 accustom himself to-day after to-morrow's storm." 
 His excitement increased as he went on. He 
 was arguing against the coward sense that he had 
 deserved the troubles which had come upon him. 
 He was saying in as plain language as the condi- 
 tions of the conversation would allow, that he had 
 been right in gratifying his desires ; in living as 
 he wished without too closely considering the con- 
 sequences which were likely to follow. He spoke 
 with a bitter earnestness born of the intense 
 strain under which he was laboring ; and he did 
 not consider how his words miorht or mig^ht not 
 affect his hearer. The thought came into his 
 mind how he had deliberately sacrificed his con- 
 victions in marrying Edith Caldwell and going 
 over to Philistinism ; and he reflected that this 
 decision had shaped his life. Already his course 
 was determined ; it was idle to iornore the fact. 
 
142 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Why should he hesitate from squeamish scruples 
 to do what Irons asked when to meet the conse- 
 quences of the latter's anger would not only be 
 supremely disagreeable but contrary to his whole 
 theory of life ? 
 
 It was one of Fenton's peculiarities that he 
 never knowingly shrank from telling himself the 
 truth about his thoughts and actions with the 
 most brutal frankness. Indeed, it might not be 
 too much to say that this self-honesty was a sort 
 of fetish to which he made expiatory sacrifices in 
 the shape of the most cruelly disagreeable admis- 
 sions before his inner consciousness. He con- 
 stantly settled his moral accounts by setting down 
 on the credit side "■ Self-contempt to balance," a 
 method of mental bookkeeping by no means rare, 
 albeit seldom carried on in connection with such 
 clear powers of moral discrimination as Fenton 
 possessed when he chose to exercise them. 
 
 " If you chance on ill-luck," he ran on, arguing 
 aloud with himself concerning the possible conse- 
 quences of betraying Mr. Hubbard's trust, ''you'll 
 be glad you were happy while it was possible ; 
 and if the fates make you the one person in a 
 million, by letting you get through life decently, 
 you surely can't think it would be better to spend 
 it moping until you are incapable of enjoying 
 anything." 
 
 The form of his speech was still that of one 
 talking simply from the point of view of his 
 
WHOM THE FA TES HA VE MARKED. 1 43 
 
 hearer. It did not for a moment occur to 
 Damaris Wainwright that in all he had said there 
 had been anything but a perfectly disinterested 
 discussion of the principles involved in her own 
 questions and in her own perplexities. Yet, as a 
 matter of fact, his words were but the surface 
 indications of the conflict going on in his own 
 mind. He was arguing down his disinclination 
 to accept the obvious and dishonorable means of 
 escaping from an unpleasant position ; he was 
 fighting against the better instincts of his nature, 
 and trying to convince himself that the easy 
 course was the one to be chosen, the one logically 
 following from the conclusions forced upon him 
 by his study of life. ^ 
 
 " But duty ! " she interposed, rather timidly, as 
 he paused. 
 
 She was confused by his persistent ignoring of 
 all the standards by which she was accustomed to 
 judge, and she threw out the question as one in 
 desperation brings forward a last argument, half 
 foreseeinsT that it will be useless. 
 
 " Duty ! " he echoed, fiercely. " Life is an out- 
 rage, and what duty can take precedence of right- 
 ing it as far as we can. That old fool of a Ruskin 
 — I beg your pardon. Miss Wainwright, if you're 
 fond of him — did manage to say a sensible thing 
 when he told a boarding-school full of girls that 
 their first duty was to want to dance. To allow 
 that there is any duty above making the best of 
 life is a species of moral suicide." 
 
144 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 She looked at him with an expression of pro- 
 foundest feeling. She was too little used to argu- 
 ments of this sort to discern that the whole matter 
 was involved in the definition one gave to the 
 phrase "■ The best of life," and that to assume 
 that this meant mere selfish or sensuous enjoy- 
 ment, was to beg the whole question. She was 
 carried away by the dramatic fashion in which he 
 ended, dashing down his palette and throwing 
 himself into a chair. 
 
 "There ! " he exclaimed, with an air of whimsi- 
 cal impatience. ''Now I've got so excited that I 
 can't paint ! That's what comes of having con- 
 victions." 
 
 The struggle was over. He brushed all doubts 
 and questions aside. There was but one thing to 
 do, and, disagreeable as it might be, he must 
 accept the situation. The mention of the word 
 "duty" reminded him that he had long ago 
 settled in his own mind the folly of being bound 
 down by superstitions masquerading under grand 
 names as ethical principles. The duty of self- 
 preservation was above all others. He must 
 defend himself, no matter if he did violate the 
 principles by which fools allowed their lives to be 
 narrowed and hampered. He would- set himself 
 to work upon Hubbard to-morrow, and get this 
 unpleasant thing over. 
 
 His sitter came down from the dais upon which 
 she had been sitting, and held out her hand. 
 
WHOM tub: fates have marked. 
 
 145 
 
 ** You have decided my life for me," she said, in 
 a low voice, ** and I thank you." 
 
 Those who knew her perplexities had argued 
 with her in vain ; and this stranger, talking to his 
 own inner self, had said the final word which had 
 moved her to a conclusion they had not been able 
 to force upon her. 
 
 He looked up with a smile, as he pressed her 
 hand, but he said nothing ; refraining from adding, 
 as he might have done truthfully, — 
 
 "And I have decided my own." 
 
XIII 
 
 THIS "WOULD" CHANGES. 
 
 Hamlet ; iv. — 7. 
 
 ATELISSA BLAKE was growing paler in these 
 ^^ days, worn with the ache of a hurt love. 
 Since the night on which he had parted from her 
 in anger, John had been to see her only on brief 
 errands which he could not well avoid, and while 
 he had made no allusion to the difference which 
 separated them, it was evident that he still 
 brooded over his fancied grievance. 
 
 This phase of John's character, its least amia- 
 ble characteristic, which mail^ed it amid many 
 excellent qualities, was not wholly unknown to 
 Melissa. She was by far the more clear-headed 
 of the two, and she understood her lover with 
 much greater acuteness than he was able to bring 
 to the task of comprehending her. It was from 
 intelligent perception and not merely from the 
 feminine instinct for making excuses, that she 
 said to herself that John was worn out with 
 the strain of burdens long and uncomplainingly 
 borne ; and she was, it might be added, near 
 enough to the primitive savagery of the rustic 
 New Englanders of the last generation, to find it 
 146 
 
THIS ''IVOULD'' CHANGES. 
 
 147 
 
 perfectly a matter of course that a man should 
 make of his womenfolk a sort of scapegoat upon 
 whom to visit his wrath against the sins alike of 
 fate and of his fellows. 
 
 She waited for John to relent from his unjust 
 anger, but she did not protest, and when he chose 
 once more to be gracious unto his handmaiden he 
 would be met only with faithful affection and with 
 no reproaches. From the abstract standpoint, noth- 
 ing could be farther astray than the fulness and 
 freedom of Milly's forgivenesses ; practically, this 
 illogical feminine weakness made life easier and 
 happier, not alone for everybody about her, but for 
 herself as well. Doubtless such a yielding dispo- 
 sition tempted her lover to injustices he would 
 never have ventured with a more spirited woman, 
 but after all her forgiveness was so divine as 
 almost to turn the transgression into a virtue for 
 causing it. 
 
 When the account of Milly's life was made up, 
 there must be put into the record long, wordless 
 stretches of uncomplaining and prayerful patience, 
 hidden from the eyes of all mankind. The capa- 
 bilities of women of this sort for quiet suffering 
 are as infinitely pathetic as they are measureless ; 
 and, although she was silent, the dark rings under 
 her eyes and the lagging step told how her sorrow 
 was wearing upon her. She went on faithfully 
 with her work ; she held still to the faith that 
 somehow help was sure to come ; and as only such 
 
148 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 women can be, she was patient with the patience 
 of a god. 
 
 Milly was surprised one afternoon by a visit 
 from Orin Stanton, the half brother of John. The 
 sculptor had never before come to see her, and, 
 although Milly was little given to censoriousness, 
 she could not avoid the too-obvious reflection 
 that, in one known to be so consistently self-seek- 
 ing as was Orin, the probability was that some 
 selfish motive lay behind the call. Orin had 
 never been especially fond of Milly, and since his 
 return from Europe, where he had been maintained 
 by the liberality of an old lady, who, in a summer 
 visit to Feltonville, had been attracted by his 
 talent for modelling in clay, he had avoided as far 
 as possible all intercourse with his townspeople. 
 The old lady, who took much innocent pleasure 
 in imagining herself the patroness of a future 
 Phidias, died suddenly one day, leaving the will 
 by which provision was made for young Stanton's 
 future unhappily without signature ; a fact which 
 ever after furnished him with definite grounds 
 upon which to found his accusations against society 
 and fate. 
 
 It was largely in virtue of this interesting and 
 pathetic story that Mrs. Frostwinch and Mrs. 
 Bodewin Ranger had taken ijt upo^ themselves to 
 better the fortunes of Stanton. ',^__Large-hearted 
 ladies in Boston, as elsewhere in the world, find 
 no difficulty in discovering signs of genius in a 
 
THIS ''WOULD'' CHANGES. j^q 
 
 work of art where they deliberately look for it ; 
 and being moved by the sculptor's history, — in 
 which, to say sooth, there was nothing remarkable, 
 and, save the disappointment in regard to the will, 
 little that was even striking — his patronesses were 
 not slow in coming to regard his productions with 
 admiration curiously resembling momentary vener- 
 ation. yThey in a mild way instituted a Stanton 
 cult, as a minor interest in lives already richly full, 
 and when more weighty matters did not interfere, 
 Mrs. Frostwinch, in varying degrees of enthusiasm, 
 could be charming in her praises of the sculptor, 
 whom she designated as ''adorably ursine," and 
 of his work, which in turn, she termed " irresisti- 
 bly insistent," whatever that might mean. 
 
 Bearish, Orin Stanton certainly was, whether 
 one did or did not find the quality adorable. He 
 was heavy in mould, with a face marked by none 
 of the delicacy one expects in an artist and to 
 which his small eyes and thick lips lent a sensual 
 cast. Milly had always found his countenance 
 repulsive, strongly as she strove not to be affected 
 by mere outward appearances. He wore his hair 
 long, its coarse, reddish masses showing conspicu- 
 ously in a crowd, when he got to going about 
 among such people as hunt lions in Boston. 
 
 Mrs. Bodewin Ranger patronized him from afar, 
 and could not be brought to invite him to her 
 house. 
 
 " Really, my dear," the beautiful old lady said to 
 
I^O ^■^^^' PHILISTINES. 
 
 her husband ; "it seems to me that people are not 
 wise in asking Mr. Stanton about so much./ It 
 only unsettles him, and he should Us left to asso- 
 ciate with persons in his own class. "^ 
 
 " I quite agree with you," her husband replied, 
 as he had replied to every proposition she had 
 advanced for the half century of \)i^x married life. 
 
 Mrs. Frostwinch was less rigid, [it is somewhat 
 the fashion of the more exclusive of the younger 
 circles of Boston to make a more or less marked 
 display of a democracy which is far more apparent 
 than real. Partly from the genuine and affected 
 respect for culture and talent which is so charac- 
 teristic of the town, and partly from some remnants 
 of the foolish superstition that the persons who 
 produce interesting w^orks of art must themselves 
 be interesting, the social leaders of the town are, 
 as a rule, not unwilling to receive into a sort of 
 lay-brotherhood those who are gifted with talent 
 or genius. No fashion of place or hour, however, 
 can change the essential facts of life ; and it is 
 perhaps quite as much the incompatibility of aim, 
 of purpose in life, as any instinctive arrogance on 
 either side, that makes any intimate union impossi- 
 ble. It is inevitable that members of any exclusive 
 circle shall regard others concerning whose admis- 
 sion there has been question with some shade of 
 more or less conscious patronage, and sensitive 
 men of genius are very likely as conscious of ''the 
 pale spectrum of the salt " as was Mrs. Brown- 
 
THIS ''WOULD'' CHAXGES. 
 
 151 
 
 ing's poet Bertram, invited into company where he 
 did not belong, because it was socially too high and 
 intellectually and humanely too low. The members 
 of what is awkwardly called fashionable society are 
 too thoroughly trained in the knowledge of the 
 principles of birth, wealth, and mutual recognition 
 upon which their order is founded, to be likely to 
 lose sight of the fact that artists and authors and 
 actors, not possessing, however great their clever- 
 ness in other directions, these especial qualifica- 
 tions, can only be received into the charmed ring 
 on sufferance ; and nothing could be more absurd 
 or illogical than to blame them for recognizing this 
 
 Mrs. Frostwinch, at least, was in no danger of 
 forgetting where she stood in relation to such lions 
 as she invited to her house. She understood ac- 
 curately how to be gracious and yet to keep them" 
 ln_their place. Indeed, she did this instinctively, 
 so thoroughly was she imbued with the spirit of 
 her class. She did not open her doors to many 
 people on the score of their talent, and least of all 
 did she encourage lions of appearance so coarse 
 and uncouth as Orin Stanton. She found the 
 role of lady patroness amusing, however, and, al- 
 though she would not have put the sculptor's 
 name on the lists of guests for a dinner or an 
 evening reception, she did invite him to a Friday 
 afternoon, when sha-,knew Stewart Hubbard was 
 likely to be present ; land a glowing knowledge of 
 
52 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 this honor was in Orin's mind when he went to 
 call on Melissa. 
 
 "I've no doubt you're surprised to see me," 
 Orin said, brusquely, as he seated himself, still in 
 his overcoat. " The truth is, I don't run round a 
 great deal, and if I do, it's where it will do me 
 some good." 
 
 Milly smiled to herself. She was not without a 
 sense of humor. 
 
 " Naturally, I don't expect you to waste your 
 time on me," she answered. " You must be very 
 busy, and I suppose you have lots of engage- 
 ments." 
 
 " Oh, of course," he returned, with an obvious 
 thrill of self-satisfaction. *' The Boston women 
 are always interested in art, and I could keep 
 going all the time, if I had a mind to. I'm going 
 to Mrs. Frostwinch's to-morrow. She wants to 
 introduce me to Mr. Hubbard, one of the com- 
 mittee on the new statue." 
 
 To Orin's disappointment this fact seemed to 
 make little impression upon Milly, who was far too 
 ignorant of Boston's social distinctions to realize 
 that an invitation to one of Mrs. Frostwinch's 
 Fridays was an honor greatly to be coveted. 
 
 " I am glad if people are interesting themselves 
 in your work, Orin," she said, with a manner she 
 tried not to make formal. 
 
 She had never been able to like Orin, and since 
 the time when he had not only utterly refused to 
 
THIS ''WOULD'' CHANGES. 
 
 153 
 
 share with John the burden of their father's debts 
 but had scoffed at what he called his brother's 
 "idiocy" in paying them, Milly had found comfort 
 in having a definite and legitimate excuse for dis- 
 liking him. She regarded him as greatly gifted ; 
 in the eyes of Feltonville people, Orin's talents, 
 since they had received the sanction of substantial 
 patronage, had loomed into greatness somewhat 
 absurdly disproportionate to their actual value. 
 She was not insensible of the honor of being con- 
 nected, as the betrothed of John, with so distin- 
 guished a man as she felt Orin to be ; but she 
 neither liked nor trusted him. 
 
 '' Oh, there are some people in Boston who 
 know a good thing when they see it," the young 
 man responded, intuitively understanding that 
 here he need not take the trouble to affect any 
 artificial modesty. " It's about that that I came 
 to talk to you." 
 
 "About — I don't think I understand." 
 
 " I want your help." 
 
 " My help } How can I help you } " 
 
 The sculptor tossed his hat into a chair, and 
 leaned forward, tapping on one broad, thick palm 
 with the fingers of the other hand. 
 
 "They tell me," he said, "that you know Mrs. 
 Fenton pretty well ; Arthur Fenton's wife, — he's 
 an awful snob, I hate him." 
 
 " Mrs. Fenton has been very kind to me," Milly 
 responded, involuntarily shrinking a little, and 
 speaking guardedly. 
 
54 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " Well, put it any way you like. If she's inter- 
 ested in you, that's all I want," Stanton went on, 
 in his rough way. '' You'll have a pull on her 
 through the church racket, I suppose." 
 
 Melissa looked at him with pain and disgust in 
 her eyes. She always shrank from Orin's rough 
 coarseness ; and she always felt helpless before 
 him. She made no reply, but played nervously 
 with the pen she had laid down upon his entrance. 
 He regarded her curiously. 
 
 " You see," he said, with a clumsy attempt at 
 easy familiarity, '' Mrs. Fenton's a niece of Mr. 
 Calvin, who is on the statue committee. Mrs. 
 Frostwinch says Mr. Calvin's the man who has 
 most influence in the committee, and it occurred 
 to me that it would be a good thing if you'd put 
 Mrs. Fenton up to taking my part with Calvin. 
 You see," he continued, in an offhand manner, 
 " artists don't get any show nowadays unless they 
 keep their eyes open, and I mean to be wide 
 awake. I'm ready to do a good turn, too, for any- 
 body that helps me. John told me the other day 
 that you and he had had a row, and if you can do 
 me a good turn in this, I may be able to pay you 
 by smoothing John down." 
 
 Milly flushed painfully. Her delicacy was out- 
 raged, but, too, her combative instinct was roused 
 to defend her lover. 
 
 ''John and I haven't quarrelled," she said, in a 
 voice a little raised ; '' he is worried about the 
 
THIS ''WOULD'' CHANGES. 
 
 55 
 
 debts and that makes him out of sorts, sometimes, 
 that is all." 
 
 A look of shrewd cunning came into Orin's 
 narrow eyes. He suspected the allusion to John's 
 determination to clear his father's memory from 
 dishonor to be a clever device to win a concession 
 from him. He looked upon the remark as a state- 
 ment from Milly of the price of her aid. 
 
 " If I get this commission," he said, watching 
 the effect of his words, '' I shall be in a position 
 to help John pay off those debts, and I shall tell' 
 him he has you to thank for my helping him out 
 in his foolishness, — for it is foolishness to waste 
 money on dead debts." 
 
 A glad light sprang into Milly's face. She was 
 too childlike to suspect the thought which led 
 Orin to make this proffer, and the hope of having 
 John aided at once and of being able to contribute 
 to the bringing about of this result, made her 
 heart beat joyfully. 
 
 " You know how glad I shall be if I can help 
 you," she said quickly. ** I will speak to Mrs. 
 Fenton when I see her to-morrow ; though I do 
 not see what good I can do you," her honesty 
 forced her to add, with sudden self-distrust. 
 
 ** Oh, you just put in and do your level best," 
 Orin responded, with the smile which Mrs. Frost- 
 winch had once called his *' deplorably Satanic 
 grin," "and it is sure to come out all right. 
 There are other wires being pulled." 
 
XIV 
 
 THE SHOT OF ACCIDENT. 
 
 Othello; iv. — i. 
 
 IT was not often that Arthur Fenton permitted 
 himself to be ill-tempered at home. He had 
 too keen an appreciation of good taste to allow 
 his dark humors to vent themselves upon the 
 heads of those with whom he lived. 
 
 ''A man is to be excused for being cross abroad," 
 he was wont to observe, '' but only a brute is 
 peevish at home." 
 
 On the morning following his conversation with 
 Damaris Wainwright, however, he was decidedly 
 out of sorts, and proved but ill company for his 
 wife at the breakfast table. She ventured some 
 simple remark in relation to a plan which Mr. 
 Candish had for the re-decoration of the Church 
 of the Nativity, and her husband retorted with an 
 open sneer. 
 
 " Oh, don't talk about Mr. Candish to me," he 
 said. *' He is that obsolete thing, a clergyman." 
 
 "I supposed," Edith responded good-naturedly, 
 " that a question of artistic decoration would inter- 
 est you, even if it was connected with a church." 
 
 ''I hate anything connected with a religion," 
 156 
 
thp: shot of accident. 
 
 T57 
 
 Fen ton observed savagely. *' A religion is simply 
 an artificial scheme of life, to be followed at the 
 expense of all harmony with nature." 
 
 It was evident to Edith that her husband was 
 nervous and irritable, and with wifely protective 
 instinct she attributed his condition to overwork. 
 She did not take up the challenge which he in a 
 manner flung down. She seldom argued with him 
 now ; she cast about in her mind for a safe topic 
 of conversation, and, by ill-luck, hit upon the one 
 least calculated to restore Arthur to good humor 
 and a sane temper. 
 
 " Helen was in last evening," she said. " She 
 is troubled about Ninitta ; but I think it is because 
 she isn't used to her ways." 
 
 Fenton started guiltily. 
 
 *' What about Ninitta '^. " he demanded. 
 
 "Helen says she acts strangely, as if she had 
 something on her mind ; and that she complains 
 bitterly that her husband doesn't care for her." 
 
 Arthur shrugged his shoulders. He was on his 
 guard now, and perfectly self-possessed. 
 
 " No .'* " he said, inquiringly. " Why should 
 he } " 
 
 " Why should he } " echoed his wife indignantly. 
 Then she recovered herself, and let the question 
 pass, saying simply : " That would lead us into one 
 of our old discussions about right and wrong." 
 
 "Those struggles and quibbles between right 
 and wrong," Fenton retorted contemptuously. 
 
158 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 "have ceased to amuse me. They were inter- 
 esting when I was young enough for them to 
 have novelty, but now I find grand passions and 
 a strong will more entertaining than that form 
 of amusement." 
 
 Edith raised her clear eyes to his with a calm- 
 ness which she had learned by years of patient 
 struggle. 
 
 "And yet," she answered, "the people whonT I 
 have found most true, most helpful, and even most 
 comfortable, have been those who believed these 
 questions of right and wrong the most vital things 
 in the universe." 
 
 " Oh, certainly," was the reply. " A supersti- 
 tion is an admirable thing in its place." 
 
 He rose from the table as he spoke, and stood 
 an instant with his hand upon the back of his 
 chair, looking at her in apparent indecision. She 
 saw that he was troubled, and she longed to help 
 him, but she had learned that his will was definite 
 and unmanageable, and she secretly feared that her 
 inquiry would be fruitless when she asked, — 
 
 "What is it that troubles you this morning, 
 Arthur } Has anything gone wrong t " 
 
 " Things are always wrong," replied he. Then, 
 with seeming irrelevance, he added : " People are 
 so illogical ! They so insist that a man shall think 
 in the beaten rut. They are angry because I 
 don't like the taste of life. Good Heavens ! Why 
 haven't I the same right to dislike life that I have 
 
THE SHOT OF ACCIDENT 
 
 159 
 
 to hate sweet champagne ? If other people want 
 to live and to drink Perrier Jouet, I am perfectly 
 willing that they should, but, for my own part, I 
 don't want one any more than the other." 
 
 What he said sounded to Edith like one of the 
 detached generalities he was fond of uttering, and 
 if she had learned that beneath his seemingly ir- 
 relevant words always lay a connecting thread of 
 thought, she had learned also that she could sel- 
 dom hope to discover what this cord might be. 
 To understand his words, now, it would have been 
 necessary for her to be aware of the net spread 
 for him by Irons, the struggle in his mind as he 
 talked with ]\Iiss Wainwright, and the effort he 
 was now making to bring himself up to the firm- 
 ness needed for the important interview with Mr. 
 Hubbard which lay before him. In the sleepless 
 hours of the night, Fenlpn had gone over the 
 ground again and again ;[_he had painted to him- 
 self the baseness of the thing he meant to do, and 
 all his instincts of loyalty, of taste, of good-breed- 
 ing, rose against it ;Jbut none the less did he cling 
 doggedly to his determination. His purpose never 
 wavered. His decision had been made, and this 
 summing up of the cost did not shake him ; it only 
 made him miserable by the keen appreciation it 
 brought him of the bitter humiliation fate — for so 
 he viewed it — was heaping upon his head. 
 
 The strength and weakness which are often 
 mingled in one character, like the iron and clay 
 
l6o THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 in the image of the prophet's vision, make the 
 most surprising of the many strange paradoxes of 
 human life. Fenton was sensuous, selfish, yield- 
 ing, yet he possessed a tenacity of purpose, a 
 might of will, which nothing could shake. He 
 looked across the table now, at his sweet-faced, 
 clear-eyed wife, with a dreadful sense of her purity, 
 her honor, her remoteness ; it cut him to the quick 
 to think that the breach of trust he had in view 
 would fill her mind with loathing ; yet the possi- 
 bility of therefore abandoning his purpose did not 
 occur to him. Indeed, such was his nature, that 
 it might be said that the possibility of abandoning 
 his deliberately formed intention, on this or on 
 any other grounds, did not for him exist. 
 
 It was one of the peculiarities which he shared 
 with many sensitive and sensuous natures, that his 
 first thought in any unpleasant situation was al- 
 ways a reflection upon the bitterness of existence. 
 He always thought of the laying down of life as 
 the easiest method of escape from any disagreeable 
 dilemma. He was infected with the distaste of 
 life, that disease which is seldom fatal, yet which 
 in time destroys all save life alone. He thought 
 now how he hated living, and the inevitable reflec- 
 tion came after, how easy it were to get out of the 
 coil of humanity. A faint smile of bitterness 
 curled his lips as he recalled a remark which 
 Helen Greyson had once quoted to him as having 
 been made of him by her dead husband. " He'll 
 
THE SHOT OF ACCIDENT. j^j 
 
 want to kill himself, but he won't. He's too soft- 
 hearted, and he'd never forget other people and 
 their opinions." He had acknowledged to himself 
 that this was true, and he wondered whether Mrs. 
 Greyson appreciated its justice. 
 
 The thought of Helen brought up the old days 
 when he had been so frankly her friend that he 
 had told her everything that was in his heart ex- 
 cept those things which vanity bade him conceal 
 lest he fall in her estimation. 
 
 It was so long since he had known a friend on 
 those intimate terms under which it makes no 
 especial difference what is said, since even in 
 silence the understanding is perfect, and the pleas- 
 ure of talking depends chiefly on the exchange of 
 the signs of complete mutual comprehension, that 
 the old days appealed to him with wonderful 
 power. There is an immeasurable and soothing 
 restfulness in such intercourse, especially to a 
 man like Fenton, in whom exists an inner neces- 
 sity always to say something when he talks ; and 
 as he recalled them now, something almost a sob 
 rose in Arthur's throat. Many men suppose them- 
 selves to be cultivating their intellect when they 
 are only, by the gratification of their tastes, quick- 
 ening their susceptibilities ; and Fenton's whole 
 self-indulged existence had resulted chiefly in ren- 
 dering him more sensitive to the discomforts of a 
 universe in the making of which other things had 
 been considered besides his pleasure. 
 
1 62 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 He looked across the breakfast table at his wife. 
 He noted with appreciation the beautiful line of 
 her cheek outlined against the dark leather of the 
 wall behind her. He felt a twinge of remorse for 
 coming so far short of her ideal of him. He knew 
 how resolutely she refused to see his worst side, 
 and he reflected with philosophy half bitter and 
 half contemptuous, that no woman ever lived who 
 could wholly outgrow the feeling that to believe 
 or to disbelieve a thing must in some occult way 
 affect its truth. At least she had fulfilled all the 
 unspoken promises, so much more important than 
 vows put into words could be, with which she had 
 married him. A remorseful feeling came over his 
 mind, and instantly followed the instinctive self- 
 excuse that she could never suffer as keenly as he 
 suffered, no matter how greatly he disappointed 
 her. 
 
 ** People are to be envied or pitied," he said 
 aloud, '* not for their circumstances, but for their 
 temperaments." 
 
 Edith looked up inquiringly. He went round to 
 where she was sitting, smiling to think how far she 
 must be from divining his thought. 
 
 *' I stayed at the club too late last night," he 
 said, stooping to kiss her smooth white forehead in 
 an unenthusiastic, habitual way which always 
 stung her. " Some of the fellows insisted upon 
 my playing poker, and I got so excited that I 
 didn't sleep when I did get to bed." 
 
THE SHOT OF ACCIDENT. 
 
 163 
 
 Edith sighed, but she made no useless remon- 
 strances. 
 
 Walking down to his studio, carefully dressed, 
 faultlessly booted and gloved, and, as Tom Bently 
 was accustomed to say, ** too confoundedly well 
 groomed for an artist," Fenton tried in vain to 
 determine how he should manage the important 
 conversation with Mr. Hubbard. He had racked 
 his brains in the night in vain attempts to solve 
 this problem, but in the end he was forced to 
 leave everything for chance or circumstances to 
 decide. 
 
 When Stewart Hubbard sat before him, Fenton 
 was conscious of a tingling excitement in every 
 vein, but outwardly he was only the more calm. 
 A close observer might have noticed a nervous 
 quickness in his movements, and a certain shrill- 
 ness in his voice, but the sitter gave no heed to 
 these tokens, which he would have regarded as of 
 no importance had he seen them. The talk was 
 at first rather rambling, and was not kept up with 
 much briskness on either side. Fenton, indeed, 
 was so absorbed in the task which lay before him 
 that he hardly followed the other's remarks, and 
 he suddenly became aware that he had lost the 
 thread of conversation altogether, so that he could 
 not possibly imagine what the connection was 
 when Hubbard observed, — 
 
 *' Yes, it is certainly the hardest thing in the 
 world for one being to comprehend another." 
 
1 64 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Fenton rallied his wits quickly, and retorted 
 with no apparent hesitation, — 
 
 " It is so. Probably a cat couldn't possibly 
 understand how a human mother can properly 
 bring up a child when she has no tail for her off- 
 spring to play with." 
 
 ** That wasn't exactly what I meant," the other 
 returned, laughing ; "■ but what a fellow you are to 
 give an unexpected turn to things." 
 
 " Do you think so } " the artist said. Then, 
 with a painful feeling of tightness about the 
 throat, and a soberness .of tone which he could 
 not prevent, he added, — VlJThat is a reason why I 
 have always felt that I was one of those compara- 
 tively rare persons whom wealth would adorn, if 
 somebody wpuld only show me an investment to 
 get rich on."y 
 
 " You are one of those still rarer persons who 
 would adorn wealth," Mr. Hubbard retorted, ig- 
 noring the latter part of the artist's remark. 
 " Only that you are so astonishingly outspoken, 
 that you might cause a revolution if you had Van- 
 derbilt's millions to add weight to your words. It 
 doesn't do to be too honest." 
 
 The sigh which left Fenton's lips was almost 
 one of relief, although he felt that this first at- 
 tempt to turn the talk into financial channels had 
 failed. 
 
 " No," he replied. " Civilized honesty consists 
 largely in making the truth convey a false impres- 
 
THE SHOT OF ACCIDF.XT. 
 
 65 
 
 sion, so that one is saved a lie in words while tell- 
 ing one in effect." 
 
 "■ It is strange how we cling to that old idea 
 that as long as the letter of what we say is true it 
 is no matter if the spirit be false," was Mr. Hub- 
 bard's response. " I thought of it yesterday at the 
 meeting of the committee on the statue, when we 
 were all sitting there trying to get the better of 
 each other by telling true falsehoods." 
 
 " How does the statue business come on } " 
 Fenton asked. 
 
 " Not very fast. I am sure I wish I was out of 
 it. America always was a trouble, and this time 
 is no exception to the rule." 
 
 "I hope," Arthur said, speaking with more seri- 
 ousness, '' that Grant Herman will be given the 
 commission. He's all and away the best man." 
 
 He had secretly a feeling that he was putting 
 an item on the credit side of his account with the 
 sculptor in urging his fitness for this work. 
 
 " It is hard to do anything with Calvin and 
 Irons. I've always been for Herman, but I don't 
 mind telling you in confidence that I stand alone 
 on the committee." 
 
 " Isn't there any way of helping things on .'* 
 Wouldn't a petition from the artists do some 
 good } " 
 
 "■ It might. But if you get up one don't let me 
 know. I'd rather be able to say that I had no 
 knowledsfe of it if it came before us." 
 
1 66 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Fenton smiled and continued his painting. 
 With a thrill half of triumph, half of rage, he 
 became aware that he was this morning succeed- 
 ing admirably in getting just the likeness he 
 wanted in the sitter's portrait. He had feared 
 lest his excitement should render him unfit for 
 work, but it had, on the contrary, spurred him up 
 to unusual effectiveness. The thought came into 
 his mind of the price at which he was buying this 
 skill, and it was characteristic that the reflection 
 which followed was that at least, if he caused 
 Hubbard to lose money by betraying the secret 
 he hoped to get from him, he was, to a degree, 
 repaying him by painting a portrait which could 
 under no other circumstances be so good. 
 
 It was no less characteristic of Fenton's mental 
 habits that he looked upon himself as having com- 
 mitted the crime against his sitter which had yet 
 to be carried out. In his logic, the legitimate, 
 however distorted, legacy from Puritan ancestors, 
 the sin lay in the determination ; and he would 
 have held himself almost as guilty had circum- 
 stances at this moment freed him from the disa- 
 greeable necessity of going on with his attempt. 
 Doubtless in this fact lay in part the explanation 
 of the firmness of his purpose. He would still 
 have suffered in self-respect, since abandonment of 
 his plan, even if voluntary, would not alter the 
 fact that he had in intention been guilty. He 
 would have said that theoretically there was no 
 
THE SHOT Of ACCIDENT. 
 
 y67 
 
 difference between intention and commission, and 
 however casuists might reason, he took a curious 
 delight in being scrupulously exacting with him- 
 self in his moral requirements, the fact that he 
 held himself in his actions practically above such 
 considerations naturally making this less difficult 
 than it otherwise would have been. Every man 
 has his private ethical methods, and this was the 
 way in which Arthur Fenton's mind held itself in 
 regard to that right of which he often denied the 
 existence. 
 
 " I suppose," he remarked at length, with delib- 
 erate intent of entrapping Hubbard into some 
 inadvertent betrayal of his secret, "that you busi- 
 ness men have no sort of an idea how ignorant a 
 man of my profession can be in regard to business. 
 I had a note this morning from a broker whom 
 I've been having help me a little in a sort of 
 infantile attempt at stock gambling, and he ad- 
 vises me to find a financial kindergarten and 
 attend it." 
 
 " I dare say he is right," the other returned, 
 smiling. '* You had better beware of stock gam- 
 bling, if you are not desirous of ending your 
 days in a poorhouse." 
 
 " But what can one do } It is only the men of 
 large experience and so much capital that they do 
 not need it who have a chance at safe invest- 
 ments." 
 
 He felt that he was bungling horribly, but he 
 
1 68 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 knew no other way of getting on in his attempt. 
 He was terrified by the openness of his tactics. 
 It seemed to him that any man must be able to 
 perceive what he was driving at, but he desper- 
 ately assured himself that after all Hubbard could 
 not possibly have any reason to suspect hiin of 
 a design of pumping him. 
 
 "Oh, there are plenty of safe investments," the 
 sitter said, as if the matter were one of no great 
 moment. Then, looking at his watch, he added, 
 " I must go in fifteen minutes. I have an engage- 
 ment." 
 
 Fenton dared not risk another direct trial, but 
 he skirted about the subject on which his thoughts 
 were fixed. His attempts, however, though in- 
 genious, were fruitless ; and he saw Hubbard 
 step down from the dais where he posed, with a 
 baffled sense of having failed utterly. 
 
 *'The country is really beginning to look quite 
 spring-like," he said, as he stood by while his 
 sitter put on his overcoat. 
 
 He spoke in utter carelessness, simply to avoid 
 a silence which would perhaps seem a little awk- 
 ward ; but the shot of accident hit the mark at 
 which his careful aim had been vain. 
 
 " Yes, it is," the other responded. " I was out 
 of town with Staggchase yesterday, looking at 
 some meadows we talk of buying for a factory site, 
 and I was surprised to see how forward things are." 
 
 Yesterday Mrs. Staggchase had casually men- 
 
THE SHOT OF ACCIDENT. 
 
 169 
 
 tioned to Fred Rangely that her husband had 
 gone to Feltonville ; and at the St. Filipe Club in 
 the evening, as they were playing poker, Rangely 
 had excused the absence of Mr. Staggchase, who 
 was to be of the party, by telling this fact. 
 
 After Hubbard was gone, Fenton stood half 
 dizzy with mingled exultation and shame. He 
 exulted in his victory, but he felt as if he had 
 committed murder. 
 
 And that evening Mrs. Amanda Welsh Samp- 
 son received a note from Mr. Irons, in which Fel- 
 tonville was mentioned. 
 
XV 
 
 LIKE COVERED FIRE. 
 
 Much Ado about Nothing ; iii. — 2. 
 
 MRS. AMANDA WELSH SAMPSON was 
 playing a somewhat difficult game, and she 
 was playing it well. She was entertaining Mr. 
 Greenfield, the Feltonville member, and she had 
 also as a casual guest for the evening, Mr. Erastus 
 Snaffle, and successfully to work the one off against 
 the other was a task from which the cleverest of 
 society women might be excused for shrinking, 
 even had it been presented to her in terms of 
 her own circle. 
 
 Greenfield was an honest, straightforward coun- 
 tryman ; big, and rather burly, with a clear eye 
 and a curling chestnut beard. He was a man at 
 once of great force of character, and of singular 
 simplicity. He exerted a vast influence in his 
 country neighborhood in virtue of the respect 
 inspired by his invincible integrity, a certain 
 shrewdness which was the more effective at short 
 range from the fact that it was really narrow in 
 its spread, and perhaps most of all of his bluff, 
 demonstrative kindliness. Tom Greenfield's hearty 
 laugh and cordial handshake had won him more 
 
 170 
 
LIKE COVERED FIRE. j^j 
 
 votes than many a more able man has been able 
 to secure by the most thorough acquaintance with 
 the questions and interests with which election 
 would make it the duty of a man to be concerned ; 
 but it must be added that no man ever used his 
 influence more disinterestedly and honestly, or 
 more conscientiously fulfilled the duties of his 
 position, as he understood them. 
 
 Such a man was peculiarly likely to become the 
 victim of a woman like Mrs. Sampson. The plea 
 of relationship on which she had sought his ac- 
 quaintance disarmed suspicion at the outset. His 
 country manners were familiar with family ties as 
 a genuine bond, and he had no reason whatever to 
 suppose that any ulterior motive was possible to 
 this woman who affected to be so ignorant of poli- 
 tics and public business. 
 
 In the weeks which had elapsed since her 
 interview with Alfred Irons, Mrs. Sampson had 
 been making the most of the fraction of the sea- 
 son which remained to her. She had offered 
 excuses which Greenfield's simple soul found sat- 
 isfactory why she had not sought her cousin's 
 acquaintance early in the winter, and the very 
 irksomeness of the enforced absence from his 
 country home which seized him as spring came 
 on, made him the more susceptible to the blan- 
 dishments of the mature siren who, with cunninji 
 art, was meshing her nets about him. 
 
 He had quite fallen into the habit of passing his 
 
1/2 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 unoccupied evenings with the widow, and she in 
 turn had denied herself to some of her familiar 
 friends on occasions when she had reason to ex- 
 pect him. Had she known he was likely to come 
 this evening, she would have taken care to guard 
 against his meeting with SnafBe ; but as that gen- 
 tleman was first in the field, she had her choice 
 between sending Greenfield away and seeing them 
 together. Like the clever woman she was, she 
 chose the latter alternative, and found, too, her 
 account in so doing. 
 
 j^Erastus Snaffle was more familiarly than favor- 
 ably known in financial circles of Boston, as the 
 man who had put afloat more wild-cat stocks than 
 any other speculator on the street. It might be 
 supposed that his connection with any scheme 
 would be enough to wreck its prospects, yet what- 
 ever he took hold of floated for a time. There 
 was always a feeling among his victims that at 
 length he had come to the place where he must 
 connect himself with a respectable scheme for the 
 sake of re-establishing his reputation ; but this 
 hope was never realized. Perhaps whatever he 
 touched ceased from that moment to be either 
 reliable or respectable. However, since Snaffle 
 was possessed of so inexhaustible a fund of plausi- 
 bility that he never failed to find investors who 
 placed confidence in his wildest statements, it 
 after all made very little difference to him what 
 his reputation or his financial standing might be.l 
 
LIKE COVERED FIRE. 
 
 173 
 
 By one of those singular compensations in 
 which nature seems now and then to make a 
 struggle to adjust the average of human charac- 
 teristics with something approaching fairness, 
 Snaffle was hardly less gullible than he was skil- 
 ful in ensnaring others. He was continually mak- 
 ing a fortune by launching some bogus stock or 
 other, but it seemed always to be fated that he 
 should lose it again in some equally wild scheme 
 started by a brother sharper. Perhaps between 
 his professional strokes he was obliged to practise 
 at raising credulity in himself merely to keep his 
 hand in ; perhaps it was simply that the habit of 
 believing financial absurdities had become a sort 
 of second nature in him ; or yet again is it possi- 
 ble that he felt obliged to assume credulity in 
 regard to the falsehoods of his fellow sharpers, 
 as a sort of equivalent for the faith he so often 
 demanded of them ; but, whatever may hav^e been 
 the reason, it was at least a fact that his money 
 went in much the same way it came. 
 
 In person, Erastus Snaffle was not especially 
 prepossessing. His face would have been more 
 attractive had the first edition of his chin been 
 larger and the succeeding ones smaller, while the 
 days when he could still boast of a waist were so 
 far in the irrevocable past that the imagination 
 refused so long a flight as would be required to 
 reach it. His eyes were small and heavy-lidded, 
 but in them smouldered a dull gleam of cunning 
 
74 
 
 THE 2UIILISTINES. 
 
 that at times kindled into a pointed flame. His 
 dress was in keeping with his person, and his 
 manner quite as vulgar as either. 
 
 He was sitting to-night in one corner of the 
 sofa, his corpulent person heaped up in an un- 
 shapely mass, talking with a fluency that now and 
 then died away entirely, while he paused to specu- 
 late what sort of a game his hostess might be 
 playing with Mr. Greenfield. 
 
 "The fact is," Mrs. Sampson was saying, as 
 Snaffle recalled his attention from one of these fits 
 of abstraction, ''that I don't know what I shall do 
 this summer ; and I don't like to believe that sum- 
 mer is so near that I must decide soon." 
 
 "You were at Ashmont last year, weren't you } " 
 Snaffle asked. " Why don't you go there again." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson shot him a quick glance which 
 Snaffle understood at once to mean that he was to 
 second her in something she was attempting. 
 He did not yet get his clew clearly enough to 
 understand just how, but the look put him on the 
 alert, as the hostess answered, — 
 
 " Oh, it is all spoiled. The railroad has been 
 put through and all the summer visitors are giving 
 it up. I'm sure I don't know what will become of 
 all the poverty-stricken widows that made their liv- 
 ing out of taking boarders. That railroad has been 
 an expensive job for Ashmont in every way." 
 
 Greenfield smiled, his big, genial smile which 
 had so much warmth in it. 
 
LIKE COVERED FIRE, 
 
 175 
 
 " That isn't usually the way people look at the 
 effect of a railroad on a town." 
 
 This time the look which Mrs. Sampson gave 
 Snaffle told him so plainly what she wanted him 
 to do that he spoke at once, her almost impercep- 
 tible nod showing him that he was on the right 
 track. 
 
 "Oh, a railroad is always the ruin of a small 
 town," he said, "unless it is its terminus. It 
 sucks all the life out of the villages along the way. 
 You go along any of the lines in Massachusetts, 
 and you will find that while the towns have been 
 helped by the road, the small villages have been 
 knocked into a cocked hat. All the young people 
 have left them ; all the folks in the neighborhood 
 go to some city to do their trading, and the stuff- 
 ing is knocked out of things generally." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson looked at Snaffle with a thorough- 
 ly gratified expression. 
 
 " I don't know much about the business part of 
 the question, of course," she said, " but I do know 
 that a railroad takes all the young men out of a 
 village. A woman I boarded with at Ashmont 
 last year wrote to me the other day in the greatest 
 distress because her only son had left her. She 
 said it was all the railroad, and her letter was 
 really pathetic." 
 
 " Oh, that's a woman's way of looking at it," 
 rejoined Greenfield, the greatest struggle of whose 
 life, as Mrs. Sampson was perfectly well aware. 
 
1/6 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 was to keep at home his only child, a youth just 
 coming to manhood. " It is easy enough for boys 
 to get away nowadays, and just having a railroad 
 at the door wouldn't make any great difference." 
 
 *' It does, though, make a mighty sight of dif- 
 ference," Snaffle said, rolling his head and putting 
 his plump white hands together. "■ Somehow or 
 other, the having that train scooting by day in and 
 day out unsettles the young fellows. The whistle 
 stirs them up, and keeps reminding them how easy 
 it is to go out West or somewhere or other. I've 
 seen it time and again." 
 
 "Well," Greenfield returned, a shadow over his 
 genial face, " I have a youngster that's got the 
 Western fever pretty bad without any railroads 
 coming to Feltonville. But what you say is only 
 one side of the question. When a railroad comes 
 it always brings business in one way or another. 
 The increase of transportation facilities is sure to 
 build things up." 
 
 " Oh, yes, it builds them up," Snaffle chuckled, 
 as if the idea afforded him infinite amusement, 
 " but how does it work. There are two or three 
 men in the town who start market gardens and 
 make something out of it. They sell their pro- 
 duce in the city and they do their trading there ; 
 they hire Irish laborers from outside the village ; 
 and how much better off is the town, except that 
 it can tax them a trifle more if it can get hold of 
 the valuation of their property." 
 
LIKE COVERED FIRE. lyy 
 
 *' Which it generally can't," interpolated Green- 
 field grimly, with an inward reminder of certain 
 experiences as assessor. 
 
 '' Or somebody starts a factory," Snaffle went on, 
 " and then the town is made, ain't it ? Outside 
 capital is invested, outside operatives brought in 
 to turn the place upside down and to bring in all 
 the deviltries that have been invented, and all the 
 town has to show in the long run is a little advance 
 in real estate over the limited area where they 
 want to build houses for the mill-hands. There's 
 no end of rot talked about improving towns by 
 putting up factories, but I can't see it myself." 
 
 Snaffle sometimes said that he believed in noth- 
 ing but making money, and there was never any 
 reason to suppose he held an opinion because he 
 expressed it. He said w^hat he felt to be politic, 
 and a long and complicated experience enabled 
 him to defend any view with more or less plausi- 
 bility upon a moment's notice. He was clever 
 enough to see that for some reason the widow 
 wished him to pursue the line of talk he had taken, 
 and he was ready enough to oblige her. He never 
 took the trouble to inquire of himself what his 
 opinions were, because that question was of so 
 secondary importance ; he merely exerted himself 
 to make the most of any points that presented 
 themselves to his mind in favor of the side it was 
 for his advantage to support. 
 
 " 'Pon my word," Greenfield said, with a laugh, 
 
lyS THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " you talk like an old fogy of the first water. I 
 wouldn't have suspected you of looking at things 
 that way." 
 
 " Mr. Snaffle is always surprising," Mrs. Samp- 
 son said, with her most dazzling smile, ''but he is 
 generally right." 
 
 "Thank you. I can't help at any rate seeing 
 that there are two sides to this thing, and I am 
 too old a bird to be caught with the common chaff 
 that people talk." 
 
 Mr. Greenfield settled himself comfortably in 
 his chair and laughed softly. The discussion was 
 so purely theoretical that he could be amused 
 without looking upon it seriously. 
 
 " For my part," he remarked, his big hand 
 playing with a paper-knife on one of the little 
 tables, which, to a practised eye, suggested cards, 
 "I am of the progressive paity, thank you. I 
 believe in opening up the country and putting 
 railroads where they will do the most good. A 
 few people get their old prejudices run against, 
 but on the whole it is for the interest of a town 
 to have a railroad, and it is nonsense to talk any 
 other way." 
 
 Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson leaned forward 
 to lay her fingers upon the speaker's arm. 
 
 ''That is just it, Cousin Tom," she said, with a 
 languishing glance. " You always look at things 
 in so large a way. You never let the matter of per- 
 sonal interest decide, but think of the public good," 
 
LIKE COVERED EIRE. i^q 
 
 The flattery was somewhat gross, but men will 
 swallow a good deal in the way of praise from 
 women. They are generally slow to suspect the 
 fair sex of sarcasm, and allow themselves the lux- 
 ury of enjoying the pleasure of indulging their 
 vanity untroubled by unpleasant doubts concern- 
 ing the sincerity of compliments which from mas- 
 culine lips would offend them. Greenfield laughed 
 with a perceptible shade of awkwardness, but he 
 was evidently not ill pleased. 
 
 " Oh, well," he returned, '' that is because thus 
 far it has happened that my personal interests 
 and my convictions^have worked together so well. 
 You might see a difference if they didn't pull in 
 the same line." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson considered a moment, and then 
 rose, bringing out a decanter of sherry with a 
 supply of glasses and of biscuit from a convenient 
 closet in the bottom of a secretary. 
 
 ''That's business," Snaffle said, joyously. 
 *' Sherry ain't much for a man of my size, but 
 it's better than nothing." 
 
 *' It is a hint though," the hostess said, filling 
 his glass. 
 
 " A hint ! " he repeated. 
 
 "Yes ; a hint that it is getting late, and that I 
 am tired, and you must go home." 
 
 ** Oh, ho ! " he laughed uproariously ; " now I 
 won't let you in for that good thing on the Prince- 
 ton Platinum stock. You'll wish you hadn't 
 
l8o THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 turned me out of the house when you see that 
 stock quoted at fifty per cent above par." 
 
 "Ah, I know all about Princeton Platinum," 
 she responded, showing her white teeth rather 
 more than was absolutely demanded by the occa- 
 sion ; *' besides, I've no money to put into any- 
 thing." 
 
 "What about Princeton Platinum.'*" Greenfield 
 asked, turning toward the other a shrewd glance. 
 ** I've heard a good deal of talk about it lately, 
 but I didn't pay much attention to it." 
 
 " Princeton Platinum," the hostess put in before 
 Snaffle could speak, " is Mr. Snaffle's latest fairy 
 story. It is a dream that people buy pieces of 
 for good hard samoleons, and " — 
 
 " Good wJiat ? " interrupted the country 
 member. 
 
 "Shekels, dollars, for cash under whatever 
 name you choose to give it ; and then some fine 
 morning they all wake up." 
 
 "Well.''" demanded Snaffle, to whom the jest 
 seemed not in the least distasteful. " And what 
 then.?" 
 
 " Oh, what is usually left of dreams when one 
 wakes up in the morning "^ " 
 
 The fat person of the speculator shook with 
 appreciation of the wit of this sally, which did not 
 seem to Greenfield so funny as from the laughter 
 of the others he supposed it must really be. 
 The latter rose when Snaffle did and prepared 
 
LIKE COVERED FIRE. jgi 
 
 to say good-night, but Mrs. Sampson detained 
 him. 
 
 " I want to speak with you a moment," she 
 said. '' Good-night, Mr. Snaffle. Bear us in mind 
 when Princeton Platinum has made your fortune, 
 and don't look down on us." 
 
 " No fear," he returned. *' When that happens, 
 I shall come to you for advice how to spend it." 
 
 There was too much covetousness in her voice 
 as she answered jocosely that she could tell him. 
 The struggle of life made even a jesting supposi- 
 tion of wealth excite her cupidity. She sighed as 
 she turned back into the parlor and motioned 
 Greenfield to a seat. Placing herself in a low, 
 velvet-covered chair, she stretched out her feet 
 before her, displaying the black silk stocking upon 
 a neat instep as she crossed them upon a low 
 stool. 
 
 "I am sure I don't know how to say what I 
 want to," she began, knitting her brows in a per- 
 plexity that was only part assumed. ** Something 
 has come to me in the strangest way, and I think 
 I ought to tell you, although I haven't any inter- 
 est in it, and it certainly isn't any of my busi- 
 ness." 
 
 Her companion was too blunt to be likely to 
 help her much. He simply asked, in the most 
 straightforward manner, — 
 
 ''What is it.^" 
 
 " It's about public business," she said. " Why ! " 
 
1 82 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 she added, as if a sudden light had broken upon 
 her. " I really believe I was going to be a lobby- 
 ist. Fancy me lobbying ! What does a lobbyist 
 do?" 
 
 '' Nothing that you'd be likely to have any hand 
 in," returned Greenfield, smiling at the absurdity 
 of the proposition. " What is all this about ? " 
 
 " I suppose I should not have thought of it 
 but for the turn the talk took to-night," she re- 
 turned with feminine indirectness. " It was odd, 
 wasn't it, that we should get to talking of the 
 harm railroads do, when it was about a railroad 
 that I was going to talk." 
 
 ** There's only one railroad scheme on foot this 
 spring that I know anything about, and that's for 
 a branch of the Massachusetts Outside Railroad 
 through Wachusett. That isn't in the Legislature 
 either." 
 
 "That's the one. It's going to be in the Legis- 
 lature. There's going to be an attempt to change 
 the route." 
 
 " Change the route '^. " 
 
 "Yes, so it will go through — but will you 
 promise not to tell this to a living mortal .^ " 
 
 '-' Of couise." 
 
 " I suppose," she said, regarding her slipper 
 intently, "that I really ought not to tell you ; but 
 I can't help it somehow. Your name is to be 
 used." 
 
 " My name t " 
 
LIKE COVERED EIRE. 
 
 183 
 
 "Yes, the men who are planning the thing say 
 that it will be so evident that you'd want the road 
 to go this new way, that if you vote with the 
 Wachusett interest they'll swear you are bought." 
 
 '* Swear I'm bought ? Pooh ! Tom Greenfield is 
 too well known for that sort of talk to hold water." 
 
 " But through your own town " — 
 
 Mrs. Sampson regarded her companion closely 
 as she slowly pronounced these words. They 
 roused him like an electric shock. 
 
 "Through Feltonville } " 
 
 She nodded, compressing her lips, but saying 
 nothing. 
 
 " Phew ! This is a tough nut to crack. But 
 are you sure that is to be tried } " 
 
 " Yes ; there is a scheme for a few monopolists 
 to buy up mill privileges and run factories at 
 Feltonville ; and they mean to make the road 
 serve them, instead of its being put where the 
 public need it." 
 
 "So that's what Lincoln's been raking up in 
 Boston," Greenfield said to himself. " I knew he 
 was up to some deviltry. Wants to sell off those 
 meadows he's been gathering in on mortgages." 
 
 " Of course you'll want to help your town," 
 Mrs. Sampson said, regretfully. "The men that 
 voted for you'll expect you to do it ; but it's help- 
 ing on a sly scheme at the expense of the state. 
 Pm sorry you've got to be on that side." 
 
 " Got to be on that side } " he retorted, starting 
 
1 84 
 
 THE PHILISriNES. 
 
 up. " Who says I've got to be on that side ? 
 we'll see about that before we get through. The 
 men that voted for me expect me to do what is 
 right, and I don't think they'll be disappointed 
 just yet." 
 
 And all things considered, Mrs. Amanda Welsh 
 Sampson thought she had done a good evening's 
 work. 
 
XVI 
 
 WEIGHING DELIGHT AND DOLE. 
 
 Hamlet; i. — 2. 
 
 " f\H, this is completely captivating," Mrs. Frost- 
 Vy winch said, as she sat down to luncheon in 
 Edith Fenton's pretty dining-room, and looked at 
 the large mound-like bouquet of richly tinted 
 spring leaves which adorned the centre of the 
 table. " That is the advantage of having brains. 
 One always finds some delightful surprise or other 
 at your house." 
 
 ''Thank you," Edith returned, gayly ; "but at 
 your house one always has a delightful surprise in 
 the hostess, so you are not forced to resort to 
 makeshifts." 
 
 Helen Greyson, the third member of the party, 
 smiled and shook her head. 
 
 ** Really," she said, " is one expected to keep up 
 to the level of elaborate compliment like that ? I 
 fear I can only sit by in admiring silence while 
 you two go on." 
 
 *' Oh, no," the hostess responded. " Mrs. 
 Frostwinch is to talk to you. That is what you 
 people are here for. I am only to listen." 
 
 1S5 
 
1 86 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Edith had invited Helen and Mrs. Frostwinch 
 to take luncheon with her, and she had really done 
 it to bring these two more closely together. She 
 was fond of them both, and the effect of her life 
 in the world into which her marriage had intro- 
 duced her had been to render her capable of judg- 
 ing both these women broadly. She admired 
 them both, and while her feeling of affection had 
 by circumstances been more closely cemented 
 with Helen, she felt that a strong friendship was 
 possible between herself and Mrs. Frostwinch 
 should the lines of their lives ever fall much to- 
 gether. 
 
 The modern woman, particularly if she be at all 
 in society, has generally to accept the possibilities 
 of friendship in place of that gracious boon itself. 
 The busy round of life to-day gives ample oppor- 
 tunity for judging of character, so that it is well 
 nigh impossible not to feel that some are worthy 
 of friendship, some especially gifted by nature 
 with the power of inspiring it, while, on the other 
 hand, there are those who repel or with whom the 
 bond would be impossible. But friendship, how- 
 ever much it be the result of eternal fitness and 
 the inevitable consequence of the meeting of two 
 harmonious natures, is a plant of slow growth, and 
 few things which require time and tranquillity for 
 their nourishment flourish greatly in this age of 
 restlessness and intense mental activity. The 
 radical and unfettered Bohemian, or such descend- 
 
WEICIIIKC DELIGHT AND DOLE. 
 
 187 
 
 ants of that famous race as may be supposed still 
 to survive, attempts to leap over all obstacles, to 
 create what must grow, and to turn comradeship 
 into friendship simply because one naturally grows 
 out of the other ; the more conservative and logi- 
 cal Philistine recognizes the futility of this atti- 
 tude, and in his too careful consistency sometimes 
 needlessly brings about the very same failure by 
 pursuing the opposite course. 
 
 Edith was not of the women who naturally 
 analyze their own feelings toward others over 
 keenly, but one cannot live in a world without 
 sharing its mental peculiarities. /The times are 
 too introspective to allow any educated person to 
 escape self-examination. The century which pro- 
 duced that most appalling instance of spiritual ex- 
 posure, the ^'Journal Intime,'' which it is impossi- 
 ble to read without blushing that one thus looks 
 upon the author's soul in its nakedness, leaves 
 small chance for self-unconsciousness. \ Edith 
 could not help examining her mentai"" attitude 
 toward her companions, and it was perhaps a 
 proof of the sweetness of her nature that she 
 found in her thought nothing of that shortcoming in 
 them, or reason for lack of fervor in friendship 
 other than such as must come from lack of inter- 
 course. 
 
 Perhaps some train of thought not far removed 
 from the foregoing made her say, as the luncheon 
 progressed, — 
 
1 88 THE PHILISTIXES. 
 
 (J^Really, it seems to me as if life proceeded at a 
 pace so rapid nowadays that one had not time even 
 to be fond of anybody.""^ 
 
 " It goes too fast for one to have much chance 
 to show it," Helen responded ; " but one may 
 surely be fond of one's friends, even without 
 se&ing them." 
 
 (^If you will swear not to tell the disgraceful 
 fact," Mrs. Frostwinch said, " I'll confess that I 
 abhor Wal^\Vhitman ; but tha^vone dreadful, dis- 
 reputably slangy phrase of his/j_I loaf and invite 
 my soul,' echoes through my brain like an invita- 
 tion to Paradise." \ 
 
 Edith smiled. 
 
 "If Arthur were here," she returned, *'he would 
 probably say that you think you mean that, but 
 that really you don't." 
 
 " My dear," Mrs. Frostwinch answered, with her 
 beautiful smile and a characteristic undulation of 
 the neck, " your husband, although he is clever to 
 an extent which I consider positively immoral, is 
 only a man, and he does not understand. Men do 
 what they like ; women, what they can. There 
 may be moral free will for women, although I've 
 ceased to be sure of that even ; but socially no 
 such thing exists. Do we wear the dreadful 
 clothes we are tied up in because we want to } Do 
 we order society, or our lives, or our manners, or 
 our morals } Do we " — 
 
 ''There, there," interrupted Helen, laughing and 
 
WEIGHIXG DELIGHT AXD DOLE. 
 
 89 
 
 putting up her hand. " I can't hear all this with- 
 out a protest. If it is true I won't own it. I had 
 rather concede that all women are fools " — 
 
 " As indeed they are," interpolated Mrs. Frost- 
 winch. 
 
 *' Than that they are helpless manikins," con- 
 tinued Helen. " In any other sense, that is," 
 she added, " than men are." 
 
 " My dear Mrs. Greyson," the other said, lean- 
 ing toward her, " you take the single question of 
 the relation of the sexes, and where are we } I 
 wouldn't own it to a man for the world, but the 
 truth is that men are governed by their will, and 
 women are governed by men ; and, what is more, 
 if it could all be changed to-morrow, we should be 
 perfectly miserable until we got the old way back 
 again ; and that's the most horribly humiliating 
 part of it." 
 
 " It is easy to see that you are not a woman 
 suffragist," commented Edith. 
 
 ** Woman suffrage," echoed the other, her voice 
 never for an instant varied from its even and high- 
 bred pitch ; '' woman suffrage must remain a 
 practical impossibility until the idea can be eradi- 
 cated from society that the initiative in passion is 
 the province of man." 
 
 ** Brava ! " cried the hostess. " Mr. Herman 
 ought to hear that epigram. He asked me last 
 night if he ought to put an inscription in favor of 
 woman suffrag-e on the hem of the America he is 
 modelling." 
 
TQO 
 
 THE PHILISTI.KF.S. 
 
 Helen turned toward her quickly. 
 
 " Is Mr. Herman making a model of the Amer- 
 ica ? " she asked. *' Has he the commission ? " 
 
 ** He hasn't the commission, because nobody 
 has it, but he has been asked by the committee to 
 prepare a model." 
 
 " That is " — began Helen, " Strange," she was 
 going to say, but fortunately caught herself in 
 time and substituted " capital. It is good to think 
 that Boston will have one really fine statue." 
 
 " Aren't you in that, Mrs. Greyson } " Mrs. 
 Frostwinch asked. 
 
 ** No," Helen answered. '' I am really doing 
 little since I came home. I am waiting until the 
 time serves, I suppose." 
 
 She spoke without especial thought of what she 
 was saying, desiring merely to cover any indications 
 which might show the feeling aroused by what 
 she had just heard and the decision she had just 
 taken to have nothing to do with the contest for 
 the statue of America, although she had begun a 
 study for the figure. 
 
 " I admire you for being able to make time serve 
 you instead of serving time like the rest of us," 
 Mrs. Frostwinch said. 
 
 " I shouldn't hear another call you a time server 
 without taking up the cudgels to defend you," re- 
 sponded Edith. 
 
 Mrs. Frostwinch smiled in reply to this. Then 
 she turned again to Helen. 
 
WEIGHING DELIGHT AND DOLE. 
 
 19 
 
 ** To tell the truth, Mrs. Greyson," she observed, 
 " I am glad you are not concerned in this statue, 
 for I am myself one of a band of conspirators who 
 are pushing the claims of a new man." 
 
 *' Is there a new sculptor.?" Helen asked, smil- 
 ing. ''That is wonderful news." 
 
 "Yes; we think he is the coming man. His 
 name is Stanton ; Orin Stanton." 
 
 "Oh," responded Helen, with involuntary frank- 
 ness in her accent. 
 
 Mrs. Frostwinch laughed with perfect good 
 nature. 
 
 "You don't admire him.?" she commented. 
 " Well, many don't. To say the truth, I do not 
 think anybody alive, if you will pardon me, Mrs. 
 Greyson, knows the truth about sculpture. Per- 
 haps the Greeks did, but we don't, even when we 
 are told. I know the Soldiers' Monument on the 
 Common is hideous beyond words, because every- 
 body says so ; but they didn't when it was put up. 
 Only a few artists objected then." 
 
 " And the fact that a few artists have brought 
 everybody to their opinion," Edith asked, "doesn't 
 make you feel that they must be right ; must have 
 the truth behind them .? " 
 
 " No ; frankly, I can't say that it does," Mrs. 
 Frostwinch responded. 
 
 She leaned back in her chair, a soft flush on her 
 thin, high-bred face. Her figure, in a beautiful 
 gown of beryl plush embroidered with gold, seemed 
 
192 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 artistically designed for the carved, high-backed 
 chair in which she sat, and both her companions 
 were too appreciative to lose the grace of the pic- 
 ture she made. 
 
 " I cannot see that it is bad," she went on. 
 *' Mr. Fenton has proved it to me, and even Mr. 
 Herman, who seems, so far as I have seen him, 
 the most charitable of men, when I asked him how 
 he liked it, spoke with positive loathing of it. I 
 can't manage to make myself unhappy over it, 
 that's all. And I believe I am as appreciative as 
 the average." 
 
 To Helen there was somethi^ig at once fascinat- 
 ing and repellent in this talk. v Sh e was attracted 
 by Mrs. Frostwinch. The perfect breeding, the 
 grace, the polish of the woman, won upon her 
 strongly, while yet the subtile air of taking life 
 conventionally, of lacking vital earnestness, was 
 utterly at variance with the sculptor's temperament 
 and methods of thought. She no sooner recog- 
 nized this feeling than she rebuked herself for 
 shallowness and a want of charity, yet even so the 
 impression remained. To the artistic tempera-^ 
 ment, enthusiasm is the only excuse for existence. \ 
 
 "I think Mrs. Fenton is right," she said. *'The 
 few form the correct judgment, and the many 
 adopt it in the end because it is based on truth. 
 It seems to me," she continued, thoughtfully, 
 " that the prime condition of effectiveness is con- 
 stancy, and only that opinion can be constant that 
 
WEIGHING DELIGHT AND DOLE 
 
 93 
 
 has truth for a foundation, because no other basis 
 would remain to hold it up." 
 
 ''That may be true," was the reply, " if you take 
 matters in a sufficiently long range, but you seem 
 to me to be viewing things from the standpoint of 
 eternity." 
 
 The smile with which she said these last words 
 was so charming that Helen warmed toward her, 
 and she smiled also in replying, — 
 
 " Isn't that, after all, the only safe way to look 
 at things ? " 
 
 "What deep waters we are getting into," Edith 
 commented. "And yet they say women are 
 always frivolous." 
 
 r'The Boston luncheon," returned Mrs. Frost- 
 winch, "is a solemn assembly for the discussion of 
 mighty themes. Yesterday, at Mrs. Bodewin Ran- 
 ger's, we disposed of all the'4tnotty problems re- 
 lating to the lower classes." Js * 
 
 " I didn't know but it might be something about 
 my house. The last time Mrs. Greyson lunched 
 here we solemnly debated what a wife should do 
 whose husband did not appreciate her." 
 
 She spoke brightly, but there was in her tone, 
 an undercurrent of feeling which touched Helen, 
 and betrayed the fact that this return to the old 
 theme was not wholly without a cause. Mrs. 
 Greyson divined that Edith was not happy, and 
 with the keenness of womanly instinct she divined 
 also that there was not perfect harmony between 
 
194 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Mrs. Fenton and her husband. She looked up 
 quickly, with an instinctive desire to turn the con- 
 versation, but found no words ready. 
 
 Edith had at the moment yielded to a woman's 
 craving for sympathy. An incident which had 
 happened that forenoon troubled and bewildered 
 her. She had been down town, and remembering 
 a matter of importance about which she had neg- 
 lected to consult her husband in the morning, she 
 had turned aside to visit his studio, a thing she 
 seldom did in his working hours. She found him 
 painting from a model, and she was kept waiting 
 a moment while the latter retired from sight. She 
 thought nothing of this, but as she stood talking 
 with Arthur, her glance fell upon a wrap which 
 she recognized as belonging to Mrs. Herman, and 
 which had been carelessly left upon the back of a 
 chair in sight. Even this might not have troubled 
 her, had it not been that when she looked ques- 
 tioningly from the garment to her husband, she 
 caught a look of consternation in his eyes. His 
 glance met hers and turned aside with that almost 
 imperceptible wavering which shows the avoidance 
 to be intentional ; and a pang of formless terror 
 pierced her. 
 
 All the way home she was tormented by the 
 wonder how that wrap could have come in her 
 husband's studio, and what reason he could have 
 for being disturbed by her seeing it there. She 
 was not a woman given to petty or vulgar jealousy, 
 
WEIGHING DELIGHT AND DOLE. iq? 
 
 and she had from the first left the artist perfectly- 
 free in his professional relations to be governed by 
 the necessities or the conveniences of his profes- 
 sion. She could not to-day, however, rid herself 
 of the feeling that some mystery lay behind the 
 incident of the morning. She began to frame 
 excuses. She speculated whether it were possible 
 that Arthur were secretly painting the portrait of 
 his friend's wife, to produce it as a surprise to 
 them all. She said to herself that Ninitta naturally 
 knew models, and might easily have enough of a 
 feeling of comradeship remaining from the time 
 when she had been a model herself, to lend or give 
 them articles of dress. Unfortunately, she knew 
 how Ninitta kept herself aloof from her old asso- 
 ciates since the birth of her child, and the expla- 
 nation did not satisfy her. 
 
 No faintest suspicion of positive evil entered 
 Edith's mind. She was only vaguely troubled, the 
 incident forming one more of the trifles which of 
 late had made her very uneasy in regard to her 
 husband. She told herself that she had confidence 
 in Arthur ; but the woman who is forced to reflect 
 that she has confidence in her husband has already 
 begun, however unconsciously, to doubt him. 
 
 "The question is profound enough," Mrs. Frost- 
 winch answered Edith's words in her even tones, 
 which somehow seemed to reduce everything to a 
 well-bred abstraction. " Of course the thing for a 
 woman to do is to remain determinedly ignorant 
 
196 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 until it would be too palpably absurd to pretend 
 any longer ; and then she must get away from him 
 as quietly as possible. The evil in these things is, 
 after all, the stir and the talk, and all the unpleas- 
 ant and vulgar gossip which inevitably attends 
 them." 
 
 Poor Edith cringed as if she had received a 
 blow, and to cover her emotion she gave the sig- 
 nal for rising from the table. But as she did so, 
 her eyes met those of Helen, and the truth leaped 
 from one to the other in one of those glances in 
 which the heart, taken unaware, reveals its joy or 
 its woe with irresistible frankness. Whatever 
 words Edith and Helen might or might not ex- 
 change thereafter, the story of Mrs. Fenton's mar- 
 ried life and of the anguish of her soul was told 
 in that look ; and her friend understood it fully. 
 
XVII 
 
 THE HEAVY iMIDDLE OF THE NIGHT. 
 
 Measure for Measure ; iv. — lo. 
 
 THE temper of clubs, like that of individuals, 
 chancres from time to time, however constant 
 
 I 
 remains its temperament. -Those who reflected 
 
 upon such matters noticed that at the St. Filipe 
 Club, where a few years back there had been much 
 talk of art and literature, and abstract principles, 
 there had come to be a more worldly, perhaps a 
 Philistine would say a more mature, flavor to the 
 conversation. There were a good many stories 
 told about its wide fireplaces, and there was much 
 running comment on current topics, political and 
 otherwise. There_was, perhaps, a more cosmopol- 
 itan air to the talk. ) 
 
 That the old-time flavor could sometimes reap- 
 pear, however, was evident from the talk going on 
 about nine o'clock on the evening of the day of 
 Edith's luncheon. The approach of the time set 
 for an exhibition of paintings in the gallery of the 
 club turned the conversation toward art, and as 
 several of the quondam Pagans were present, the 
 old habits of speech reasserted themselves some- 
 what. 
 
 197 
 
198 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " I understand Fenton's going to let us see his 
 new picture," somebody said. 
 
 ^* He is if he gets it done," Tom Bently an- 
 swered. '* He's painting so many portraits nowa- 
 days that he didn't get it finished for the New 
 York exhibition." 
 
 *' He must be making a lot of money," Fred 
 Rangely observed. 
 
 *' He needs to to keep his poker playing up," 
 commented Ainsworth. 
 
 " He's lucky if he makes money in these days 
 when it's the swell thing to have some foreign 
 duffer paint all the portraits," Bently said. " It 
 makes me sick to see the way Englishmen rake in 
 the dollars over here." 
 
 " How would you feel," asked Rangely, " if you 
 tried to get a living by writing novels, and found 
 the market glutted with pirated English reprints } " 
 
 ** Oh, novels," retorted Tom, " they are of no 
 account any way. VjVlodern novels are like modern 
 investments ; they are all principle and no in- 
 terest. "\^ 
 
 *' I like that," put in Ainsworth, " when most of 
 them haven't any principle at all." 
 
 " Neither have investments in the end," Bently 
 returned. *'At least I know mine haven't." 
 
 " If you were a writer you'd be spared that 
 pain," was Rangely's reply, **' for want of anything 
 to start an investment with." 
 
 " I've about come to the conclusion," another 
 
THE HEAVY MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT. 
 
 199 
 
 member said, *' that a man may be excused for 
 making literature his practice, but that he is a fool 
 to make it his profession. It does very well as an 
 amusement, but it's no good as a business." 
 
 *' The idea is correct," Rangely replied, ringing 
 the bell and ordering from the servant who re- 
 sponded, " although it does not strike me as being 
 either very fresh or very original." 
 
 There was a digression for a moment or two 
 while they waited for their drinks and imbibed 
 them. And then Fred, with the air of one who 
 utters a profound truth, and answers questions 
 both spoken and unspoken, observed as he set 
 down his glass, — 
 
 ** There's one thing of which I am sure ; Ameri- 
 can literature will never advance much until 
 women are prevented from writing book reviews." 
 
 ** Meaning," said Arthur Fenton, entering and 
 with his usual quickness seizing the thread of con- 
 versation at once, *' that some woman critic or 
 other hit the weak spot in Fred's last book." 
 
 *' Hallo, Fenton," called Bently, in his usual 
 explosive fashion. "I haven't seen you this long 
 time. I did not know whether you were dead or 
 alive." 
 
 '' Oh, as usual, occupying a middle ground 
 between the two. Are you coming upstairs, 
 Fred.?" 
 
 A smile ran around the circle. 
 
 "At it again, Fenton.?" Ainsworth asked. 
 
200 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 *' You'll have to go West and be made a senator 
 if you keep on playing poker every night." 
 
 "If I don't have better luck than I've been 
 having lately," Fenton rejoined, as he and 
 Rangely left the room, '' I should have to have 
 a subscription taken up to pay my travelling 
 expenses." 
 
 The card-rooms were upstairs, and Fenton and 
 Rangely went to them without speaking. The 
 artist was speculating whether a ruse he had just 
 executed would be successful ; his companion was 
 thinking of the news he had just had from New 
 York, that a girl with whom he had flirted at the 
 mountains last summer was about to visit Boston. 
 
 Around a baize-covered table in the card-room 
 sat three or four men, in one of whom Rangely 
 recognized the corpulent and vulgar person of Mr. 
 Erastus Snaffle. He nodded to him with an air 
 of qualifying his recognition with certain mental 
 reservations, while Fenton said as he took his 
 place beside Chauncy Wilson, who moved to 
 make room for him, — 
 
 " Good evening, Mr. Snaffle. Have you come 
 up to clean the club out again t " 
 
 Mr. Snaffle looked up as if he did not fully 
 comprehend, but he chuckled as he answered, — 
 
 ** I should think it was time. I was never 
 inside this club that I didn't get bled." 
 
 The men laughed in a somewhat perfunctory 
 way, and the cards having been dealt, the game 
 
THE HEAVY MIDDLE OE THE NIGHT. 2OI 
 
 went on. They were all members of the club 
 except Snaffle, and they all knew that this rather 
 doubtful individual had no business there at all. 
 There had of late been a good deal of feeling in 
 the club because the rule that forbade the bring- 
 inof of strano^ers into the house had been so often 
 violated. The St. Filipe was engaged in the per- 
 fectly fruitless endeavor to enforce the regulation 
 that visitors might be admitted provided the same 
 person was not brought into the rooms twice 
 within a fixed period. Some of the members 
 violated the rule unconsciously, since it was awk- 
 ward to invite a friend into the club and to qual- 
 ify the courtesy with the condition that he had 
 not been asked by anybody else within the pre- 
 scribed period, and it was easy to forget this 
 ungracious preliminary. Some few of the mem- 
 bers -t^since in every club th^e will be men who 
 are gentlemen but by brevet,^y- deliberately took 
 advantage of the uncertainty which always arises 
 from so anomalous a regulation, and the result 
 of deliberate and of involuntary breaches of the 
 rule had been that the club house was made free 
 with by outsiders to a most unpleasant extent. 
 
 Not yet ready to do away with the by-law, 
 since many members found it convenient and 
 pleasant to take their friends into the club-house, 
 the managers of the affairs of the St. Filipe were 
 making a desperate effort to discover all offenders 
 who were intentionally guilty of violating the 
 
202 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 regulation. They had their eye on several out- 
 siders who made free with the house, and it was 
 understood that certain men were in danger of 
 being requested not to continue their visits to a 
 place where they had no right. Snaffle, who had 
 been first brought to the club by Dr. Wilson to 
 play poker, was one of these, and the men who sat 
 playing with him to-night were secretly curious 
 to know how he happened to be there on this 
 particular occasion. He had come into the card- 
 room alone, with the easy air of familiarity which 
 usually distinguished him, and appearances seemed 
 to point to his having taken the liberty of walking 
 into the house in the same way. The men liked 
 well enough to have him in the game, because he 
 played recklessly and always left money at the 
 table, but not one of them, even Dr. Wilson, who 
 was more recklessly democratic in his habits and 
 instincts than any of the rest, would have cared 
 to be seen walking with Erastus Snaffle on the 
 streets by daylight. 
 
 When Snaffle entered the club house, the ser- 
 vant whose duty it was to wait at the outer door, 
 had gone for a moment to the coat-room adjoining 
 the hall. Here Snaffle met him and offered him 
 his coat and hat. The servant extended his hand 
 mechanically, but he looked at the new-comer 
 so pointedly that the latter muttered, by way of 
 credentials, — 
 
 "I came with Mr. Fenton." 
 
THE HE A VY MIDDLE OE THE NIGHT. 203 
 
 The servant made no comment, but as Mr. 
 Snaffle went upstairs, he reported to the steward 
 that the intruder was again in the house and had 
 been introduced by Mr. Fenton. The steward in 
 turn reported this to the Secretary, and before 
 Arthur himself came in, a rod was already pre- 
 paring for him in the shape of a complaint to 
 be made before the Executive Committee. 
 
 It was thus that precisely the thing happened 
 which Fenton had with his usual cleverness en- 
 deavored to guard against. Impudent as Mr. 
 Snaffle was capable of being, he would never have 
 ventured uninvited into the precincts of the St. 
 Filipe Club, where even when introduced he 
 found himself somewhat overpowered by the 
 social standing and the lofty manners of those 
 around him. This feeling of awe showed itself 
 in two ways, had any one been clever enough to 
 appreciate the fact. It rendered him unusually 
 silent, and it induced him to play high, as if he 
 felt under obligations to pay for his admission 
 into company where he did not belong. 
 
 It was to this last fact that he owed his invita- 
 tion to be present on this particular evening. 
 Arthur Fenton was going to the club to play 
 poker, urged partly by the love of excitement 
 and perhaps even more by the hope of raising a 
 part or the whole of the fifty dollars of which he 
 had pressing need, when he encountered Snaffle 
 standing on a street corner. Fenton's acquaint- 
 
204 THE PIIILISTIXES. 
 
 ance with the man had been confined to their 
 meetings in the card-room of the St. Filipe, but 
 he had once or twice carried home in his pocket 
 very substantial tokens of Snaffle's reckless play. 
 Almost without being conscious of what he did, 
 Fenton stopped and extended his hand. 
 
 *'Good evening," he said. "What is up.? Are 
 you ready for your revenge.?" 
 
 '' Oh, I'm always ready for a good game," 
 Snaffle answered. " I was going to see my best 
 girl, but I don't mind taking a hand instead." 
 
 Fenton smiled as the other turned and walked 
 with him toward the club, but inwardly he loathed 
 the fat, vulgar man at his side. His sense of the 
 fitness of things was outraged by his being obliged 
 to associate with such a creature, and that the 
 obligation arose entirely from his own will, only 
 showed to his mind how helpless he was in the 
 hands of fate. He was outwardly gracious enough, 
 but inwardly he nourished a bitter hatred against 
 Erastus Snaffle for constraining him to go through 
 this humiliation before he could win his money. 
 
 As they neared the club, Fenton recalled the 
 fact that there had been some talk about visitors, 
 and that the presence of this very man had been 
 especially objected to, and reflected that in any 
 case he had no desire to be seen going in with 
 him. As they entered the vestibule the door was 
 not opened for them, and Fenton's quick wit 
 appreciated the fact that the servant who should 
 
THE HEAVY MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT. 205 
 
 be sitting just inside, was not in his place. With 
 an inward ejaculation of satisfaction at this good 
 fortune, he put his hand to his breast pocket. 
 
 ** Oh, pshaw ! " he exclaimed. " There are 
 those confounded letters I promised to post. 
 You go in, Mr. Snaffle, and I'll go back to the 
 letter box on the corner. You know the way, and 
 you'll find the fellows in the first card-room." 
 
 He opened the door as he spoke, and as Snaffle 
 entered and closed it after him, Fenton ran down 
 the steps and walked to the next corner. He had 
 no letters to mail, but it was characteristic of his 
 dramatic way of doing things that he walked to 
 the letter-box, raised the drop and went through 
 the motion of slipping in an envelope. He was 
 accustomed to say that when one played a part it 
 could not be done too carefully, and it amused 
 him to reflect that if he were watched his action 
 would appear consistent with his words, while if 
 he were timed he would be found to have been 
 gone from the club house exactly long enough. 
 Not that he supposed anybody was likely to take 
 the trouble to do either of these things, but Fenton 
 was an imaginative man and he found a humor- 
 ous pleasure in finishing even his trickery in an 
 artistic manner. 
 
 It was Saturday night, and just before midnight 
 a servant opened the card-room door. The room 
 was full of smoke, empty glasses stood beside the 
 players, and piles of red and blue and white 
 
2o6 ^^-^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 ''chips" were heaped in uneven distribution along 
 the edges of the table. 
 
 '' It is ten minutes of twelve, gentlemen," the 
 servant said, and retired. 
 
 "Jack-pots round," said Rangely, dealing rap- 
 idly. " Look lively now." 
 
 He and Fenton had been winning, the pile of 
 blue counters beside the latter representing nearly 
 thirty dollars, with enough red and white ones to 
 cover his original investments. The first jack- 
 pot and the second were played. Dr. Wilson win- 
 ing one and Snaffle the other on the first hand. 
 On the third, Fenton bet for a while, holding three 
 aces against a full hand held by the fifth man. 
 
 " It's all right," Fenton remarked, as Rangely 
 chaffed him. "I am waiting for the *kittie-pot.' 
 See what a pile there is to go into that. I always 
 expect to gather in the ' kittie.' " 
 
 The fourth pot was quickly passed, and then 
 Wilson, who had been managing the " kittie," put 
 upon the table the surplus, which to-night chanced 
 to be unusually large. The cards were dealt and 
 dealt three times again before the pot could be 
 opened, and then Rangely started it. Arthur 
 looked at his hand in disgust. He held the nine 
 of hearts, the five, six, eight, and nine of spades, 
 and as he said to himself he never had luck in 
 drawing to either straight or flush. Still the 
 stake was good, and he came in, discarding his 
 heart. He drew the seven of spades. Rangely 
 
THE HEAVY MIDDLE OE THE XIGHT. 207 
 
 was betting on three aces, and Wilson on a full 
 hand, so that the betting ran rather high. 
 
 ** Twelve o'clock, gentlemen," the servant said 
 at the door. 
 
 And when Fenton began his Sunday by winning 
 the pot on his straight flush, he found himself 
 more than sixty dollars to the good on his even- 
 ing's work. 
 
 "You've regularly bled me, Fenton," Snaffle 
 observed with much jocularity, as the players 
 came out of the club house. " I've hardly got a 
 car fare left to take me home. I'm afraid the St. 
 Filipe is a den of thieves." 
 
 " I don't mind lending you a car fare, Mr. 
 Snaffle," the artist returned, endeavoring to speak 
 as pleasantly as if he did not object to the famil- 
 iarity of the other's address. '' But don't abuse 
 the club." 
 
 "• I think I'll go to church," Dr. Wilson said 
 with a yawn. " It must be most time." 
 
 ''Church-going," Fenton returned, sententiously, 
 " is small beer for small souls." 
 
 ''There, Fenton," retorted Rangely, as at this 
 minute they came to the corner where they sepa- 
 rated, " don't feel obliged to try to be clever. 
 You can't do it at this time of night." 
 
 Snaffle continued his walk with the artist almost 
 to Fenton's door, although the latter suspected 
 that it was out of his companion's way. Arthur 
 was willing, however, to give the loser the com- 
 
2o8 THE PIIJLISTINES, 
 
 pensation of his society as a return for the green- 
 backs in his pocket, and his natural acuteness was 
 so far from being as active as usual that when he 
 found Mr. Snaffle speaking of Princeton Platinum 
 stock he did not suspect that he was being angled 
 for in turn, and that the gambling for the evening 
 was not yet completed. He listened at first with- 
 out much attention, but the man to whom he list- 
 ened was wily and clever, and after he was in bed 
 that night the artist's brain was busy planning how 
 to raise money to invest in Princeton Platinum. 
 
 *' I never saw such luck as yours," Snaffle 
 observed admiringly. '* The way you filled that 
 spade flush on that last hand was a miracle. It is 
 just that sort of luck that runs State street and 
 Wall street." 
 
 Fenton smiled to himself in the darkness, the 
 proposition was so manifestly absurd, but he was 
 already bitten by the mania for speculation, and 
 when once this madness infects a man's brain the 
 most improbable causes will increase the disease. 
 Snaffle, of course, was too shrewd to ask his com- 
 panion to buy Princeton Platinum stock, and 
 indeed declared that although he had charge of 
 putting it upon the market, he was reluctant to 
 part with a single share of it. He added with 
 magnanimous frankness, that all mining stock w^as 
 dangerous, especially for one who did not thor- 
 oughly^ understand it. 
 
 But his negatives, as he intended, were more 
 
THE HE A VY MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT. 
 
 209 
 
 effective than affirmatives would have been, and 
 the bait had been safely swallowed by the unlucky 
 fish for whom the astute speculator angled. Fen- 
 ton had invited him to the club to be eaten, 
 but the wily visitor secretly regarded the money 
 he lost at the poker table as a paying invest- 
 ment, believing that in the end it was not the 
 bones of plump Erastus Snaffle which were des- 
 tined to be picked. 
 
XVIII 
 
 HE SPEAKS THE MERE CONTRARY. 
 
 Love's Labor's Lost; i. — i. 
 
 MRS. AMANDA WELSH SAMPSON sat in 
 her bower, enveloped in an unaccustomed air 
 of respectability, and in a frame of mind exceed- 
 ingly self-satisfied and serene. She had secured a 
 visit from a New York relative, a distant cousin 
 whose acquaintance she had made in the moun- 
 tains the summer before, and she hoped from this 
 circumstance to secure much social advantage. 
 For at home Miss Frances Merrivale moved in 
 ^:ircles such as her present hostess could only gaze 
 at from afar with burning envy. In her own 
 city. Miss Merrivale would certainly never have 
 consented to know Mrs. Sampson, relationship or 
 no relationship ; but she chanced to wish to get 
 away from home for a week or two, she thought 
 somewhat wistfully of the devotion of Fred 
 Rangely at the mountains last summer, and she 
 was not without a hope that if she once appeared 
 in Boston, the Staggchases, who should have in- 
 vited her to visit them long 'ago, she being as 
 nearly related to Mr. Staggchase as to Mrs. Samp- 
 
HE SPEAKS THE MERE CONTRARY. 211 
 
 son, might be moved to ask her to come to stay 
 with them. 
 
 It cannot be said that Mrs. Amanda Welsh 
 Sampson, dashing, vulgar social adventurer that 
 she was, had much in common with her guest. 
 Miss Merrivale, it is true, had the incurable dis- 
 ease of social ambition as thoroughly as her host- 
 ess Abut the girl had, at least, a recognized and 
 very comfortable footing under her feet, while the 
 unfortunate widow kept herself above the surface 
 only by nimble but most tiresome leaps from one 
 precarious floating bit to another. In these mat- 
 ters, moreover, a few degrees make really an im- 
 mense difference. There is all the inequality 
 which exists between the soldier who wields his 
 sword in a disastrous hollow, and one who strikes 
 triumphant blows from the hillock above. The 
 elevation is to be measured in inches, perhaps, 
 but that range reaches from failure to success. 
 Whether social ambition is proper pride or vulgar 
 presumption depends not upon the feeling itself 
 so much as upon the grade from which it is exer- 
 cised, and Miss Merrivale very quickly understood 
 that while she was placed upon one side of the 
 dividing line between the two, herJio^tess was 
 unhappily to be found upon the other. )>- 
 
 Indeed Miss Frances had hardly recognized 
 what Mrs. Sampson's surroundings were until she 
 found herself established in the little apartment 
 as a guest of that lady. Her newly found cousin 
 
212 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 had at the mountains spoken of her father, the 
 late judge, and of her own acquaintances among 
 the great and well known of Boston, with an air 
 which carried conviction to one who had not 
 known her too long. She spoke with playful 
 pathos of her poverty, it is true, but when a 
 woman's gowns wdll pass muster, talk of poverty 
 is not likely to be taken too seriously. Miss Mer- 
 rivale knew, moreover, that the widow, like her- 
 self, could boast a connection with the Staggchase 
 family. 
 
 Now she found herself at the top of an apartment 
 house in a street of Nottingham lace curtains care- 
 fully draped back to show the Rogers' groups on 
 neat marble stands behind their precise folds. 
 
 LThe awful gulf which yawned between this South 
 End location and the region where abode those 
 whom she counted her own kind socially, was 
 apparent to her the moment she arrived and 
 looked about her.\ Fred Rangely had called, but 
 Mrs. Sampson had regaled her guest with such 
 tales of his devotion to Mrs. Staggchase that 
 Miss Merrivale received him with much coldness, 
 and his call was not a success. Now she was 
 impatiently v/aiting for the appearance of Mrs. 
 Staggchase, who, it did not occui to her to doubt, 
 would of course call. She was curious to see her 
 relative, and her fondness for Rangely, such as it 
 was, was marvellously quickened by the presence 
 of a rival in the field. Instead of the appearance 
 
HE SPEAKS THE MERE COXTKARY 
 
 213 
 
 of Mrs. Staggchase, however, came a note asking 
 Miss Merrivale to dine, whereat that young woman 
 was angry, and her hostess, although she was 
 too clever to show it, was secretly furious. 
 
 This invitation was the result of a conversation 
 between Mr. and Mrs. Richard Staggchase, which 
 had begun by that gentleman's asking his wife at 
 dinner when she was going to call upon Miss 
 Merrivale. 
 
 '*Not at all, my dear," Mrs. Staggchase an- 
 swered, "as long as she is visiting that dreadful 
 Mrs. Sampson. I'm not sure, Fred, but that if I 
 had known that creature could claim a cousinship 
 to you, I should have refused to marry you." 
 
 " She is a dose," Mr. Staggchase admitted. *' I 
 wonder where she lives now. Didn't Frances 
 jVLe«ivale send her address .-* " 
 /^She lives on Catawba Street, at the top of a 
 speaking tube in one of those dreadful apartment 
 houses where you shout up the tube and they open 
 the door for you by electricity. I wonder how 
 soon it will be, Fred, before you'll drop in a nickel 
 at the door of an apartment house and the person 
 you waijt to see will be slid out to you on a plat- 
 form." Jl 
 
 " Gad ! That wouldn't be a bad scheme," her 
 husband returned, with an appreciative grin. 
 " But, really now, what are you going to do about 
 this girl. She's a sort of cousin, you know, and 
 she's a great friend of the Livingstons." 
 
214 '^^^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 *' We might ask her to come here after she gets 
 through with that woman. I'll write her if you 
 like." 
 
 " Without calling } " Mr. Staggchase asked, lift- 
 ing his eyebrows a little. 
 
 " My dear," his wife responded, " I try to do my 
 duty in that estate in life to which I have been 
 appointed, and I am willing to made all possible 
 exceptions to all known rules in favor of your 
 family ; but Mrs. Sampson is an impossible ex- 
 ception. I will do nothing that shows her that I 
 am conscious of her existence." 
 
 **But it will be awfully rude not to call." 
 
 *' One can't be rude to such creatures as Mrs. 
 Sampson," returned Mrs. Staggchase, with un- 
 moved decision. " She is one of those dreadful 
 women who watch for a recognition as a cat 
 watches for a mouse. I've seen her at the 
 theatre. She'd pick out one person and run 
 him down with her great bold eyes until he had 
 to bow to her, and then she'd stalk another in the 
 same way. Call on her, indeed ! Why, Fred, 
 she'd invite you to a dinner tete-a-tete to-day, if 
 she fhought you'd go." 
 
 Mr. Staggchase laughed rather sig;nificantly. 
 
 " Gad ! that might be amusing. She is of the 
 kittle cattle, my 4ear, but you must own that she's 
 a well-built craft." > 
 
 "Oh, certainly," replied his better half, who was 
 too canny by far to show annoyance, if indeed she 
 
HE SPEAKS THE MERE CONTRARY. 
 
 215 
 
 felt any, when her husband praised another woman. 
 " If everybody isn't aware of her good points, it 
 isn't that she is averse to advertising them. She 
 has taken up with young Stanton, the sculptor, just 
 because some of us have been interested in him." 
 
 " Is he o'oinsf to make the America statue 1 " 
 
 " That is still uncertain, but for my part I half 
 hope he won't, if that Sampson woman is his kind." 
 
 Mr. Staggchase dipped his long fingers into his 
 finger bowl, wiped them with great deliberation and 
 then pushed his chair back from the table. It was 
 very seldom that his wife denied a request he made 
 her, but when she did he knew better than to con- 
 tend in the matter. 
 
 "Very well," he said, ''you may do whatever 
 you please. Whether you women are so devilish 
 hard on each other because you know your own sex 
 is more than I should undertake to say." 
 
 *' Are you going out t " 
 
 '' Yes," he answered, " I have got to go to a 
 meeting of the Executive Committee of the St. 
 Filipe. There is some sort of a row ; I don't know 
 what. How are you going to amuse yourself." 
 
 " By doing my duty." 
 
 " Do you find duty amusing then ; I shouldn't 
 have suspected it." 
 
 " Oh, duty's only another name for necessity. 
 I'm going to the theatre with Fred Rangely. He 
 wrote an article for the Observer in favor of that 
 great booby Stanton's having the statue. It was 
 
2i6 ^-^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 a very lukewarm plea, but I asked him to do it, 
 and as a reward " — 
 
 " He is allowed the inestimable boon of taking 
 you to the theatre," finished her husband. " I 
 must say, Dian, that you are, on the whole, the 
 shrewdest woman I know." 
 
 ''Thank you. I must be just, you know," she 
 returned smiling as brilliantly as if her husband 
 W£re to be won again. 
 
 Y^It was not without reason that Mrs Staggchase 
 had spoken of herself and her husband as a model 
 couple. Given her theory of married life, nothing 
 could be more satisfactory and consistent than the 
 way in which she lived up to it. Her ideal of 
 matrimony was a sort of mutual laisser faire, con- 
 ducted with the utmost propriety and politeness. 
 She made an especial point of being as attractive 
 to her husband as to any other man ; and she had 
 the immense advantage of never having been in 
 love with anybody but herself and of being philo- 
 sophical enough not to consider the good things 
 of conversation wasted if they were said for his 
 exclusive benefit. She had no children, and 
 had once remarked in answer to the question 
 whether she regretted this, "There must be some 
 pleasure in having sons old enough to flirt wdth 
 you ; but I don't know of anything else I have lost 
 that I have reason to regret, y^ 
 
 Her husband, thorough man of the world as 
 he was, and indeed perhaps for that very reason, 
 
HE SPEAKS THE MERE CONTRARY 
 
 217 
 
 never outgrew a pleased surprise that he found his 
 wife so perennially entertaining. He was not 
 unwilling that she should exercise her fascinations 
 on others when she chose, since he had no feeling 
 toward her sufficiently warm to engender anything 
 like jealousy ; but he appreciated her to the full.^ 
 
 He rose from his seat and walked to the side- 
 board, where he selected a cigar. 
 
 " I must say," he observed, between the puffs 
 as he lighted it, " that you are justice incarnate. 
 You have always kept accounts squared with me 
 most beautifully." 
 
 Mrs. Staggchase laughed softly, toying with 
 the tiny spoon of Swiss carved silver with which 
 she had stirred her coffee. Her husband had 
 expressed perfectly her theory of marital relations. 
 She balanced accounts in her mind with the most 
 scrupulous exactness, and was an admirable debtor 
 if a somewhat unrelenting creditor. She had a 
 definite standard by which she measured her obli- 
 gations to Mr. Staggchase, and she never allowed 
 herself to fall short in the measure she gave him. 
 She was fond of him in a conveniently mild and 
 reasonable fashion, and a marriage founded upon 
 mutual tolerance, if it is likely never to be 
 intensely happy, is also likely to be a pretty com- 
 fortable one. Mrs. Staggchase paid to her hus- 
 band all her tithes of mint and anise and cumin, 
 and she even sometimes presented him with a 
 propitiatory offering in excess of her strict debt ; 
 
2i8 ^^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 only such a gift was always set down in her 
 mental record as a gift and not as a tribute. 
 
 '* This Stanton is an awful lout, Fred," she 
 observed. llllPerhaps he can make a good statue 
 of America, but if he can it will be because he is so 
 thoroughly the embodiment of the vulgar and push- 
 ing side of American characteri^ 
 
 " Then why in the world are you pushing him } " 
 
 " Oh, because Mrs. Ranger and Anna Frost- 
 winch want him pushed. I don't know but they 
 may believe in him. Mrs. Ranger does, of course, 
 but the dear old soul knows no more about art than 
 I do about Choctaw. As to the statues, I don't 
 think it makes much difference, they are always 
 laughed at, and I don't think anybody could make 
 one in this age that wouldn't be found fault with." 
 
 " Nobody nowadays knows enough about sculp- 
 ture to criticise it intelligently," Staggchase 
 remarked, somewhat oracularly, *'and the only 
 safe thing left is to find fault." 
 
 ** That is just about it, and so it may as well be 
 this booby as anybody else that gets the commis- 
 sion. It isn't respectable for the town not to have 
 statues, of course." 
 
 Mr. Staggchase moved toward the door. 
 
 "Well," he said, "I don't know who's in the 
 fight, but I'll bet on your side. Good night. I 
 hope virtue will be its own reward." 
 
 *' Oh, it always is," retorted his wife. '' I 
 especially make it a point that it shall be." 
 
XIX 
 
 HOW CHANCES MOCK. 
 
 n Henry IV.; iii.— i. 
 
 A MAN often creates his own strongest tempta- 
 tions by dwelling upon possibilities of evil ; 
 and it is equally true that nothing else renders a 
 man so likely to break moral laws as the con- 
 sciousness of having broken them already. The 
 experience of Arthur Fenton was in these days 
 affording a melancholy illustration of both of these 
 propositions. The humiliating inner consciousness 
 of having violated all the principles of honor of 
 his fealty to which he had been secretly proud be- 
 got in him an unreasonable and unreasoning im- 
 pulse still further to transgress. When arraigned 
 by his inner self for his betrayal of Hubbard, it 
 was his instinct to defend himself by showing his 
 superiority to all moral canons whatever. He felt 
 a certain desperate inclination to trample all prin- 
 ciples underfoot, as if by so doing he could destroy 
 the standards by which he was being tried. 
 
 Fenton was not of a mental fibre sufficiently 
 robust to make this impulse likely to result in 
 any violent outbreak, and, indeed, but for circum- 
 stances it would doubtless have vapored itself away 
 219 
 
220 '^^HE PHILISTINES. 
 
 in words and vagrant fancies. He had once re- 
 marked, embodying a truth in one of his frequent 
 whimsically perverse statements, that the worst 
 thing which could be said of him was that he was 
 incapable of a great crime, and only the constant 
 pressure of an annoyance, such as the threats of 
 Irons in regard to Ninitta, or the presence of an 
 equally constant temptation, such as that to which 
 he was now succumbing in allowing his relations 
 with Mrs. Herman to become more and more inti- 
 mate, would have brought him to any marked 
 transgression. 
 
 In a nature such as that of Fenton there is, 
 with the exception of vanity and the instinct of 
 self-preservation, no trait stronger than curiosity. 
 The artist was devoured by an eager, intellectual 
 greed to know all things, to experience all sensa- 
 tions, to taste all savors of life. He made no dis- 
 tinction between good and bad ; his zeal for knowl- 
 edge was too keen to allow of his being deterred 
 by the line ordinarily drawn between pain and 
 pleasure. His affections, his passions, his morals 
 were all subordinate to this burning curiosity, and 
 only his instinct of self-preservation subtly mak- 
 ing itself felt in the guise of expediency, and his 
 vanity prettily disguised as taste, held the thirst 
 for knowledge in check. 
 
 It was by far more the desire to learn whether 
 he could bend Ninitta to his will than it was pas- 
 sion which carried Fenton forward in the danger- 
 
HOIV CHAXCES MOCK. 221 
 
 ous path upon which he was now well advanced ; 
 and it was perhaps more than either a half-un- 
 conscious eagerness to taste a new experience. 
 Even the double wickedness of betraying the wife 
 of a friend and of enticing a woman to her 
 fall had for Fenton, in his present mood, an un- 
 holy fascination. He was too self-analytical to 
 deceive himself into a supposition that he was in 
 love with Ninitta, and even his passion was so 
 much under the dominion of his head that he 
 could have blown it out like a rushlight, had he 
 really desired to be done with it. He looked at 
 himself with mingled approbation, amusement, 
 and horror, as he might have regarded a favorite 
 and skilful actor in a vicious role ; and the man 
 whose mind is to him merely an amphitheatre, 
 where games are played for his amusement, is 
 always dangerous. 
 
 As for Ninitta, the processes of her mind were 
 probably quite as complex as those of his, although 
 they appeared more simple, in virtue of their being 
 more remote. She had, in the first place, a curi- 
 ous jealousy of her husband because of his pas- 
 sionate fondness for Nino, and a dull resentment 
 at the secret conviction that the father had the 
 gifts and powers which were sure to win more love 
 than the child would bestow upon her. She could 
 better bear the thought that the boy should die, 
 than that he should live to love anybody more 
 than he loved her. 
 
222 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 It was also true that Grant Herman, large- 
 hearted and generous as he was, did not know 
 how to make his wife happy. He was patient and 
 chivalrous and tender ; but he was hardly able to 
 go to her level, and as she could not come to his, 
 the pair had little in common. He felt that some- 
 how this must be his fault ; he told himself that, 
 as the larger nature, it should be his place to make 
 concessions, to master the situation, and to secure 
 Ninitta's happiness, whatever came to him. He 
 had even come to feel so much tenderness toward 
 the mother of his child, the woman in whose 
 behalf he had made the great sacrifice of his life, 
 that a pale but steadfast glow of affection shone 
 always in his heart for his wife. But his patience, 
 his delicacy, his steadfastness counted for little 
 with Ninitta. She had been separated from him 
 for long years of betrothal, during which he had 
 developed and changed utterly. She had clung to 
 her love and faith, but her love and faith were 
 given to an ardent youth glowing with a passion 
 of which it was hardly possible to rekindle the 
 faint embers in the bosom of the man she married. 
 Even Ninitta, little given to analysis, could not 
 fail to recognize that her husband was a very dif- 
 ferent being from the lover she had known ten 
 years before. One fervid blaze of the old love 
 would have appealed more strongly to her peasant 
 soul than all the patience and tender forbearance 
 of years. 
 
HOW CHANCES MOCK. 223 
 
 Indeed, it is doubtful whether Ninitta might not 
 have been better and happier had Herman been 
 less kind. Had he made a slave of her, she would 
 have accepted her lot as uncomplainingly as the 
 women of her race had acquiesced in such a fate 
 for stolid generations. She could have understood 
 that. As it was, she felt always the strain of be- 
 ing tried by standards which she did not and could 
 not comprehend ; the misery of being in a place 
 for which she was unfitted and which she could 
 not fill, and the fact that no definite demands were 
 made upon her increased her trouble by the double 
 stress of putting her upon her own responsibility, 
 and of leaving her ignorant in what her failures lay. 
 
 There was, too, who knows what trace of hered- 
 ity in the readiness with which Ninitta tacitly 
 adopted the idea that infidelity to a husband was 
 rather a matter of discretion and secrecy ; whereas 
 faithfulness to her lover had been a point of the 
 most rigorous honor. And Ninitta found Arthur 
 Fenton's silken sympathy so insinuating, so sooth- 
 ing ; the tempter, merely from his marvellous 
 adaptability and faultless tact, so satisfied her 
 womanly craving, and fostered her vanity ; she was 
 so completely made to feel that she was under- 
 stood ; she was tempted with a cunning the more 
 infernal because Fenton kept himself always up to 
 the level of sincerity by never admitting to himself 
 that he intended any evil, that it was small won- 
 der that the time came when her ardent Italian 
 
224 
 
 THE PHILISTIXES. 
 
 nature was so kindled that she became involunta- 
 rily the tempter in her turn. 
 
 It was one of the singular features of Fenton's 
 present attitude that even he, with all his clear- 
 sightedness, failed to see the error of supposing 
 that his departure from the paths of rectitude 
 was nothing but a temporary episode. He fully 
 expected to take up again his former attitude 
 toward life when he would have scorned such a 
 contemptible action as the betrayal of Hubbard, 
 or the m.ore trifling, but perhaps even more humili- 
 ating act of smuggling Snaffle into the club that 
 he might win his money. He even had a certain 
 vague feeling that if he had any viciousness to get 
 through he must do it at once, lest the resumption 
 of his former respectability should deprive him of 
 the opportunity. He maintained before the world, 
 indeed, a perfect propriety of deportment, partly 
 from the force of habit and partly from the instinct- 
 ive cunning which always tried to preserve for him 
 the means of retreat ; but so complete was his aban- 
 donment, for the time being, to the enjoyment of 
 evil, that he was constantly assailed with the 
 temptation to -make some public demonstration of 
 his state of feeling. He secretly longed to shock 
 poeple with blasphemous or imprudent expres- 
 sions ; to outrage all honor by stealing his host's 
 spoons when he dined out ; his fancy rioted in 
 whimsical evil of which, of course, he gave no out- 
 ward sign. 
 
HO IV CHANCES MOCK'. 
 
 225 
 
 He had a scene with Alfred Irons, one morning, 
 at his studio. Irons came in with a look on his 
 face which secretly enraged the artist, who was 
 almost rude in the coldness of his greeting, 
 although the caller only grinned at this evidence 
 of his host's irritation. 
 
 ''Well, Fenton," he said, with bluff abruptness, 
 " I suppose it is time for us to square accounts, 
 isn't it ? " 
 
 '' I was not aware that we had any accounts to 
 square," the other returned, with his most icy 
 manner. 
 
 Irons laughed, and looked about the studio. 
 
 '' That's your new picture, I suppose " he ob- 
 served, settling himself back in his chair, with the 
 determined mien of a man who recognizes the fact 
 that he has a battle to fight, but is perfectly will- 
 ing to join the fray. 
 
 The significance of his air, as he nodded toward 
 the big canvas on the easel, so plainly brought up 
 the unfortunate hold which the Fatima had griven 
 Irons over the artist, that Fenton flushed in spite 
 of himself. 
 
 '' It is a picture," he returned ; " and it is un- 
 finished." 
 
 Irons chuckled. 
 
 "Very well," he said. ** We 'won't fence. I 
 thought you might be interested to know that 
 we've got our railroad business into first-rate 
 shape ; and there's no doubt that the Wachusett 
 
226 ^-^-^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 route will carry the day. I tell you we had a hot 
 time in the Senate yesterday," he went on, warm- 
 ing with the excitement of his subject. " We 
 made a pretty stiff fight in the Railroad Commit- 
 tee to get them to report * not expedient ' on the 
 Feltonville petition. I tell you Staggchase fought 
 like a bull tiger at the hearing, and those fellows 
 must have put in a pot of money. But we beat 
 'em. Thfen the fight came to get the report 
 accepted in the Senate. Everybody said that 
 Tom Greenfield would settle the thing with a big 
 broadside in favor of his own town ; and I'll own 
 that I was scared blue myself. But we haven't 
 been cooking Tom Greenfield all this time for 
 nothing. I don't mind telling you that your help 
 in the matter was of the greatest value ; and when 
 Greenfield got up in the Senate yesterday, and 
 put in his best licks for the Wachusett route, you'd 
 have thought they'd been struck by a cyclone. We 
 got a vote to sustain that report that buries the 
 Feltonville project out of sight ; and now there's 
 no doubt that the Railroad Commissioners will give 
 us our certificate without any more trouble." 
 
 During this rather long and not wholly coherent 
 speech, Fenton sat with his eyes coldly fixed upon 
 his visitor, without giving the slightest sign of 
 interest. 
 
 " I am glad," he said, in a manner as distant as 
 he could make it, " that your business is likely to 
 succeed to your mind," 
 
>/OlV CHANCES MOCK. 227 
 
 " Oh, it must succeed. The Commissioners 
 only suspended operations till the Legislature dis- 
 posed of the question of special legislation. Now 
 they're all ready to give us what we want." 
 
 " And all this," Fenton said, " is of what inter- 
 est to me } " 
 
 Irons flushed angrily. 
 
 ** You were good enough," he returned, drawing 
 his lips down savagely, "■ to give us a bit of infor- 
 mation which we found of value. Very likely we 
 might have hit upon it somewhere else, but that's 
 no matter, as long as we did get it through you. 
 We've no inclination to shirk our debt. Now 
 what's your price "i " 
 
 Fenton rose from his chair, with an impulsive 
 movement ; then he controlled himself and sat 
 down again. He looked at his visitor with eyes 
 of fire. 
 
 *• I am not aware," he returned, " that I have 
 ever been in the market, so that I have not been 
 obliged to consider that question." 
 
 Alfred Irons was silent for a moment. He felt 
 somewhat as if he had received a dash of ice- 
 water in the face. He wrinkled up his narrow 
 eyes and studied the man before him. He could 
 not understand what the other was driving at. 
 He was little likely to be able to follow the subtile 
 changes of Fenton's imaginative mind, and he 
 could at present see no explanation of the way in 
 which his advances were met, except the theory 
 
228 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 that the artist was fencing to insure a larger 
 reward for his treachery than might be given him 
 if he accepted the first offer in silence. 
 
 Fenton, on his part, was so filled with rage that 
 it was with difficulty that he restrained himself. 
 The length to which his intimacy with Ninitta had 
 now gone, however, made it absolutely necessary 
 that he should avoid a quarrel in which her name 
 might be brought up ; and he had, moreover, put 
 himself into the hands of Irons, by giving him the 
 information in regard to the plans for Feltonville. 
 
 " Oh, well," Irons said at length, rising with the 
 air of one who cannot waste his time puzzling over 
 trifles ; " have it your own way. It's only a mat- 
 ter of words," 
 
 He took out his pocket-book, and with delibera- 
 tion turned over the papers it contained. He 
 selected one, read it carefully, and then held it out 
 to Fenton. 
 
 " Our manufacturing corporation is practically 
 on its legs now," he said, '' and the stock will be 
 issued at once. That entitles you to ten shares. 
 They will be issued at sixty, and ought to go to 
 par by fall. Indeed, in a year's time, we'll make 
 them worth double the buying price, or I am 
 mistaken." 
 
 Fenton looked at the paper as if he were read- 
 ing it, but its letters swam before his eyes. He 
 needed money sorely, and had this gift come in a 
 shape more readily convertible into cash, he might 
 
I/O IV CHAXCES MOCK. 229 
 
 have found it impossible to resist it. As it was, 
 he allowed himself to be fiercely angry. He was 
 furious, but he was consciously so. He raised his 
 eyes, flashing and distended, and fixed them upon 
 the mean, hateful face before him. He paused an 
 instant to let his gaze have its effect. 
 
 *' And I understand," he said, with a slow, care- 
 ful enunciation, ''that in consideration of the ser- 
 vice I have done you, you give me your promise 
 never to mention the fact that you saw a lady in 
 my studio." 
 
 " Certainly," Irons returned. 
 
 Fenton's look made him uncomfortable. l^The 
 artist .was^ reasserting- the. old superiority^.over him 
 which the visitor had found so irritating, and it 
 was Iron's instinct to meet this by an air of 
 bluster. J 
 
 " Very well," Arthur said. " We may then con- 
 sider what you are pleased to call our account as 
 closed." 
 
 He walked forward deliberately and laid the 
 paper he held on the heap of glowing coals in the 
 grate. It curled and shrivelled, and before Irons 
 could even compress his thick lips to whistle, 
 nothing remained of the document but a quivering 
 film. 
 
 "Well," Irons commented, "you are a damned 
 fool ; but then that's your own business." 
 
 The artist bowed gravely. 
 
 " Naturally," he replied. 
 
230 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 He Stood waiting as if he expected his caller to 
 go, and, despite himself, Irons felt that he was 
 being bowed out of the studio. He took his leave 
 awkwardly, feeling that he had somehow been 
 beaten with trumps in his hand, and hating Fenton 
 ten times more heartily than-£ver. 
 [^"The confounded snob!"Jhe muttered under 
 his breath, as he went down the stairs of Studio 
 Building. *' He puts on damned high-headed airs ; 
 but I'm not done with him yet." 
 
 And Fenton meanwhile stood looking at that 
 thin fluttering film on the red coals with despair in 
 his heart. He had taken the money which he im- 
 peratively needed to pay notes soon due, and in- 
 vested in Princeton Platinum, with which the 
 obliging Erastus Snaffle had supplied him out of 
 pure generosity, if one could credit the seller's 
 statements ; and he had been secretly depending 
 for relief upon this very gift from Irons which he 
 had destroyed. His affairs were every day becom- 
 ing more inextricably involved, and Fenton, it has 
 already been said, with all his cleverness, had no 
 skill as a financier. 
 
 **Well," he commented to himself, shrugging 
 his shoulders, '* that is the end of that ; but I did 
 make good play." 
 
 The satisfaction of having well acted his part, 
 and of having got the better of Irons, did much 
 toward restoring the artist's naturally buoyant 
 spirits. He fell to reckoning his resources, and by 
 
HOW CHANCES MOCK'. 
 
 231 
 
 dint of introducing into the account several pleas- 
 ing but most improbable possibilities, he succeeded 
 in building up between himself and ruin a fanciful 
 barrier which for the moment satisfied him ; and 
 beyond the moment he refused to look. 
 
XX 
 
 VOLUBLE AND SHARP DISCOURSE. 
 
 Comedy of Errors ; ii. — i. 
 
 MRS AMANDA WELSH SAMPSON had in 
 the course of a varied, if not always dignified 
 career, learned many things. There are people 
 who seem compelled by circumstances to waste 
 much of their mental energy in attending to the 
 trivial and sordid details of life, and the widow 
 often r^epined that she was one of these unfortu- 
 nates, j She secretly fretted not a little, for in- 
 stance, over the fact that she was compelled to 
 be gracious to servants, to butcher and baker and 
 candlestick maker, from unmixed reasons of policy. 
 To be gracious in the role of 2. grande dame wouldr^. 
 have pleased her, but she resented the necessity \ — \ 
 and she avenged herself upon fate by gloating 
 upon the stupidity of that power in wasting her 
 energies in these petty things, when results so 
 brilliant might have been attained by a more wise 
 utilization of her cleverness. 
 
 This morning, for instance, when Mrs. Sampson 
 chatted affably with the carpenter who had come 
 to do an odd job in the china closet of her tiny 
 dining-room, she really enjoyed the talk. She 
 
VOLUBLE AND SHARP DISCOURSE. 
 
 ^33 
 
 was one of those women who cannot help liking 
 to chat with a man, and John Stanton was both 
 good looking enough and intelligent enough to 
 make her willing to exert herself for his entertain- 
 ment. This did not, however, prevent her being 
 inwardly indignant that she felt herself compelled 
 to converse with Stanton because experience had 
 taught her that a little amiability properly exhib- 
 ited was sure to increase the work and lessen the 
 bill at the same time. She did not forego the 
 pleasure of pitying herself because she chanced 
 to find the task imposed upon her an agreeable 
 one. There are few people in this world who are 
 sufficiently just and sufficiently sane to deny 
 themselves the luxury of self pity merely because 
 the occasion does not justify that feeling. 
 
 Stanton, with his coat off and his strong arms 
 bare to the elbow, was planing down a shelf to 
 make it fit into its place, and as he paused to 
 shake the long creamy shavings out of his plane, 
 he looked up to say apologetically, — 
 
 ''I'm making an awful litter, ma'am, but I don't 
 see how I can help it." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson laughed. 
 
 ** Oh, it isn't of the least consequence," she 
 answered. " If I was inclined to complain it 
 would be because after keeping me waiting for six 
 weeks for this work, you come just when I have 
 company staying with me, and gentlemen coming 
 to dine." 
 
''34 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 She had walked into the room with a not illy 
 simulated air of having come with the intention of 
 going out again immediately, and stood well posed, 
 so that her fine figure came out in relief against a 
 crimson Japanese screen. 
 
 " I haven't anything to do with that, ma'am," 
 Stanton replied. " The boss makes out the orders, 
 and we go where we are sent." 
 
 *'Well," the widow said, smiling brilliantly, and 
 moving across the room to the table where the 
 dishes taken from the closet were piled, "it can't 
 be helped, I suppose ; but I hope you will let me 
 get things cleared up in time for dinner." 
 
 " Oh, I'll surely get through by eleven or half 
 past." 
 
 *' And I don't have dinner till half past six." 
 
 The carpenter looked up questioningly. Then 
 he went on with his work. 
 
 " I never can get used to city ways," he observed. 
 " I don't see how folks can get along without hav- 
 ing dinner in the middle of the day when it's 
 dinner time." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson busied herself with the plates, 
 arranging things on the sideboard ready for even- 
 ing. Her guest. Miss Merrivale, was out driving 
 with Fred Rangely, and the widow's resources in 
 the way of servants were so limited that it was 
 necessary that the hands of the mistress should 
 attend to many of the details of the housekeeping. 
 She enjoyed talking to this stalwart, vigorous 
 
VOLUBLE A. YD SHARP DISCOURSE. 035 
 
 fellow. She was alive to the last fibre of her 
 being to the influence of masculine perfections, 
 and Stanton was a splendidly built type of man- 
 hood. She utilized the moments and secured an 
 excuse for lingering by going on with her work 
 while the carpenter continued his, carrying out 
 her theory of getting the most out of a laborer by 
 personal supervision, and withal gratifying her 
 intense and instinctive fondness for the presence 
 of a magnificent man. 
 
 "You are not city bred, perhaps," she answered 
 his last remark, for the sake of saying something. 
 
 " Oh, no, ma'am," John answered. " I was 
 raised at Feltonville." 
 
 The widow became alert at once. 
 
 *' Feltonville t " she repeated. ** Why, I have 
 a cousin living there, the Hon. Thomas Green- 
 field." 
 
 " Oh, Tom Greenfield, Everybody knows Tom 
 Greenfield," John said, his face lighting up. *' We 
 call him * Honest Tom ' up our way. He's here 
 in the Legislature now." 
 
 *' Yes, I know he is. He's coming here to din- 
 ner to-night." 
 
 '' Is he } He's an awful smart man, and he's a 
 good one, too, as ever walked. He's awful inter- 
 ested in Orin's getting the job to make the new 
 statue of America. Orin," he added in explanation, 
 " Orin Stanton, he's the sculptor and he's my 
 brother ; my half-brother, that is. You've heard 
 of him } " 
 
236 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 "Oh, of course," she answered, warmly. 
 
 Mrs. Sampson knew little of Orin Stanton, but 
 she did know that Alfred Irons was on the com- 
 mittee having in charge the commission for the 
 new statue, and the fact that Mr. Greenfield had 
 an interest, however indirect, in the same matter, 
 was a hint too valuable not to be acted upon. 
 
 Despite the confidence with which he had spoken 
 to Fenton, the railroad business was by no means 
 settled. The Staggchase syndicate had rallied to 
 raise objections to prevent the Railroad Commis- 
 sioners from authorizing the other route. A hear- 
 ing had been granted, and for it elaborate prepara- 
 tions were being made. The Irons syndicate were 
 extremely anxious that Greenfield should speak at 
 this hearing, but there had been so much feeling 
 aroused at Feltonville by his action in the Senate 
 that he was not inclined to do so ; and Mrs. Samp- 
 son, who had already proved so successful in influ- 
 encing her relative, had been requested to continue 
 her efforts. 
 
 The widow had pondered deeply upon the tac- 
 tics she should use, and it is to be noted that she 
 set down the amount of the obligation incurred by 
 Irons as the greater because she had really become 
 in a way fond of Greenfield, and she was too 
 clever not to understand the fact, to which the 
 senator with singular perversity remained obsti- 
 nately blind, that he could not but injure his 
 political prestige by the course he was taking. 
 
VOLUBLE AXD SHARP DISCOURSE. 
 
 237 
 
 She had aroused his combativeness by telling him 
 that if his convictions forced him to vote against 
 the Feltonville interest, people would say he was 
 bought. She knew that now this was said, and 
 that openly; — indeed, despite all her shrewdness 
 and knowledge of human nature, she had moments 
 when she wondered whether the charge might not 
 be true, so incomprehensible did it seem that a 
 man should throw away his own advantage. She 
 had no sentiment strong enough to make her hesi- 
 tate about going on to sacrifice Greenfield to her 
 own interests, but she distinctly disliked the fact 
 that Irons should also profit by the senator's 
 loss. 
 
 All day the widow pondered deeply on the situa- 
 tion, and the result of the chance disclosure of 
 John Stanton was that when her guests arrived 
 she made an opportunity to take Irons aside for a 
 moment's confidential talk. 
 
 The widow's dinner-party was a somewhat sing- 
 ular one to give in compliment to a young girl, 
 there being no one of the guests near Miss Merri- 
 vale's own age except Fred Rangely. The widow's 
 acquaintance among women whom she could ask to 
 meet the New Yorker was limited, and having de- 
 cided upon inviting Greenfield, Irons, and Rangely 
 to dinner, the hostess sat gnawing her stylographic 
 pen in despair a good half hour before she could 
 decide upon a fourth guest. A woman she must 
 have, and few women whom she wished to ask 
 
238 '^^E PHILISTINES. 
 
 would come to her house even to call. When she 
 now and then gathered at an afternoon tea a hand- 
 ful of people whose names she was proud to have 
 reported in the society papers, she did it by secur- 
 ing a lion of literary or of theatrical fame, whose 
 unwary feet she entangled in her cunningly laid 
 snares before he knew anything about social con- 
 ditions in Boston. There were many people, 
 moreover, who would go to see a celebrity at a 
 house like that of Mrs. Sampson much as they 
 would have gone to the theatre, when they would 
 have received neither the guest of honor nor the 
 hostess, the latter of whom, to their thinking, 
 stood for the time being much in the position of 
 stage manager. 
 
 Mrs. Sampson never set herself to a problem 
 like this without a feeling of bitterness. To con- 
 sider what woman of any standing could be in- 
 duced to eat her salt brought her true social posi- 
 tion before her with painful vividness. She could 
 not, in face of the facts which then forced them- 
 selves upon her, shut her eyes to the truth that 
 her painful struggles for position had been pretty 
 nearly fruitless. She did now and then get an 
 invitation to a crush in a desirable house, some 
 over-sensitive woman who had been to stare at one 
 of Mrs. Sampson's captures thus discharging her 
 debt, and at the same time virtually wiping her 
 hands of all intercourse with the dashing widow. 
 As for asking her to their tables or going to hers, 
 
VOLUBLE AND SHARP DISCOURSE. 
 
 239 
 
 everybody understood that that was not to be 
 thought of. 
 
 With the cleverness born of desperation, Mrs. 
 Sampson solved her difficulty by askings JVIiss 
 Catherine Penwick to fill the vacant place. CjVliss 
 Catherine Penwick was the last forlorn and flut- 
 tering leaf on the bare branches of a lofty but 
 expiring family tree. The Penwicks had come 
 over in the Mayflower, or at a period yet more 
 remote, and the acme of the prosperity and social 
 distinction of the name was coincident with the 
 second administration of President Washington. 
 Since that time its decadence had been steady ; at 
 first slow, but later with the accelerating motion 
 common to falling bodies, until nothing remained 
 of the family revenues, little but a tradition of the 
 family greatness, and none of the race but this 
 frostbitten old lady, poor and forsaken in her deso- 
 late old age. \ 
 
 Miss Penwick was one of the learned ladies of 
 her generation, a^fact^ which counted for less in 
 the erudite day into which it was her misfortune 
 to linger than in those of her far-away youth. She 
 struggled against the tide with pathetic bravery, 
 endeavoring to eke out some sort of a livelihood by 
 giving feeble lectures on Greek art, which no liv- 
 ing being wished to hear, or could possibly be 
 supposed to be any better for hearing, but to 
 which the charitably disposed subscribed with 
 spasmodic benevolence. The poor creature, with 
 
240 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 her antique curls quivering about her face, yellow 
 and wrinkled now, its high-bred expression sadly 
 marred by the look of anxious eagerness which 
 comes of watching, like the prophet, for the ravens 
 to bring one's dinner, was but too glad to be in- 
 vited to sit at any table where she could get a 
 comfortable meal and be allowed to play for the 
 moment at being the grand lady her ancestresses 
 had been in reality. 
 
 ** I hope you don't mind my asking Miss Pen- 
 wick as the only lady," Mrs. Sampson said to her 
 guest ; *' but she is such a dear old creature, and 
 our family and hers have been intimate for centu- 
 ries. She is getting old, poor dear, and she hasn't 
 any money any more, just as I haven't. But you 
 know she is wiser than Minerva's owl, and quite 
 the fashion in Boston. One really is nobody who 
 doesn't know Miss Penwick ; and she is so well 
 bred." 
 
 Miss Penwick, dear old soul, had a feeling that 
 Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson was somehow too 
 hopelessly modern for one of her generation ever 
 to be really in sympathy with the widow ; but 
 Mrs. Sampson had been born a Welsh, and Miss 
 Catherine was too unworldly to be aware of all the 
 gossip and even scandal which had made the name 
 of the dashing adventuress of so evil savor in the 
 nostrils of people like Mrs. Frederick Staggchase. 
 
 And it must be confessed also, that to such petty 
 economies was the last of the Penwicks reduced 
 
VOLUBLE AND SHARP DISCOURSE. 
 
 ^4 
 
 by poverty that a dinner was an object to her. 
 She could not afford to lose an opportunity of din- 
 ing at the price of two horse-car tickets, and so 
 promptly at the moment she presented herself in 
 the dainty elegance of bits of real old lace, with 
 family miniatures and locks of hair from the illus- 
 trious heads of great-great-grandmothers and grand- 
 fathers decorously framed in split pearls, the lustre 
 of the jewels, like that of their wearer, tarnished 
 by time. 
 
 Miss Merrivale did feel that the company assem- 
 bled was an odd one, although she lived too far 
 away to appreciate the fact that none of the guests, 
 with the possible exception of Rangely, were ex- 
 actly what she would have been asked to dine 
 with at home. A country member, a self-made 
 vulgarian, an antiquated spinster, and a literateur 
 who, after all, was received rather upon sufferance 
 into such exclusive houses as he entered at all, 
 made up a group of which Miss Merrivale, with 
 feminine instinct, felt the inferiority, despite the 
 fact that she had no means of placing the guests. 
 Miss Penwick appreciated the social standing of 
 her fellow-diners, but she had by a long course of 
 social humiliations come to accept unpleasant con- 
 ditions where getting a dinner was concerned ; 
 and she was, moreover, somewhat relieved that at 
 Mrs. Sampson's she was not obliged to meet any- 
 body worse. Her instincts were keen enough, 
 after all her melancholy experiences, to enable her 
 
242 ^-^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 to recognize the fact that Tom Greenfield was the 
 most truly a gentleman of the three men, and she 
 was pleased that he should take her in to dinner. 
 
 Mrs. Sampson, as she went in on the arm of 
 Irons, contrived to let him know what she had 
 heard that morning from young Stanton of Green- 
 field's interest in the young sculptor ; adding a 
 hint or two of the use to be made of this infor- 
 mation. Rangely, just behind her, was chatting 
 with Miss Frances in that half amorous badinage 
 which some girls always provoke, perhaps because 
 they expect and keenly relish it. 
 
 " Oh, no," he observed, just as Mrs. Sampson 
 was able to give an ear to what was being said by 
 the young people. '^ I am not fickle. I am con- 
 stancy itself, but when you are in New York and 
 I am in Boston, you really can't expect me to sigh 
 loud enough to be heard all that distance." 
 
 " I know you too well to suppose you will sigh 
 at all," she returned, with a coquettish air. " Es- 
 pecially with the consolations I am given to un- 
 derstand that you have near at hand." 
 
 *' What consolations .'' " he asked, visibly discon- 
 certed. 
 
 " What has that confounded widow been telling 
 her.'" he wondered inwardly. ''Is it Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase or Ethel Mott she's aiming at '^. " 
 
 Miss Merrivale tossed her head, as they paused 
 in the doorway of the tiny dining-room a moment 
 to give Mr. Irons opportunity to convey his un- 
 
VOLUBLE AND SHARP DISCOURSE. 243 
 
 gainly length into its proper niche. Her shot had 
 been purely a random one and, unless one believes 
 in telepathy, so was the question by which she 
 abruptly changed the subject. 
 
 "Do you know my cousin, Mrs. Frederick 
 Staggchase .^ " 
 
 He held himself in hand wonderfully. 
 
 "Oh, yes," was his reply. ** I know Mrs. 
 Staggchase very well, but I didn't know she was 
 your cousin. All the good gifts of life seem to 
 fall to her lot." 
 
 " Thanks for nothing. She has not been to see 
 me. She invited me to dine and I declined, and 
 then she wrote and asked me to visit there when 
 I finished my stay here." 
 
 '' Shall you do it .? " 
 
 The thought with which Rangely asked this 
 question was one oddly mingled of regret and of 
 hope. He had flirted too seriously with Miss 
 Merrivale to wish to meet her at Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase's, although he had never seriously cared 
 for her ; and he reflected with a humorous sense 
 of relief that if the pretty New Yorker should 
 really visit her cousin, he was likely to be put in 
 a position to give his undivided attention to woo- 
 ing Miss Mott, a consummation for which he 
 wished without having the strength of mind to 
 bring it about. As she let his question pass in 
 silence, he smiled to himself at the ignominious 
 manner in which he must retreat from his attitude 
 
244 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 as the devoted admirer of Mrs. Staggchase and of 
 Miss Merrivale, feeling that to set about the earn- 
 est attempt to win Ethel would be quite consola- 
 tion enough to enable him to reconcile himself to 
 even this. The comfort of having circumstances 
 make for him a decision which he should make for 
 himself, is often to a self-indulgent man of far more 
 importance than the decision itself. 
 
 As the dinner progressed, Miss Penwick, warm- 
 ing with the good cheer — for Mrs. Sampson was 
 too thoroughly a man's woman not to appreciate 
 the value of palatable viands — become decidedly 
 loquacious ; and at last, by a happy coincidence 
 for which her hostess could have hugged her on 
 the spot, she introduced the name of Orin Stanton. 
 
 "■ I hear you are on the America committee, Mr. 
 Irons," she said. '' We ladies are so much inter- 
 ested in that just now. I called on Mrs. Bodewin 
 Ranger yesterday, and she is really enthusiastic 
 over this young Stanton that's going to make it. 
 He is going to make it, isn't he t " 
 
 Irons laughed his vulgar laugh, which Fenton 
 once said was the laugh of a swineherd counting 
 his pigs. 
 
 '* It has not been decided," he answered. 
 "Stanton seems to have a good many friends." 
 
 " Oh, he has, indeed," responded Miss Penwick 
 eagerly. ''He is a young man of extraordinary 
 genius. I saw a beautiful notice of him in the 
 Daily Observer the other morning, Mr. Rangely," 
 
VOLUBLE AXD SHARP DISCOURSE. 
 
 245 
 
 she continued, turning to Fred, "and Mrs. Frost- 
 winch said she thought you wrote it. It was very 
 appreciative." 
 
 ** Yes, I wrote it," he responded, not very 
 warmly. " Mr. Stanton is endorsed by Mr. Cal- 
 vin, you know, Mr. Irons ; and Mr. Calvin is our 
 tghest authority, I suppose." 
 Of those present no one except the hostess was 
 surprised at this admission, which marked the 
 great change in Rangely's position since the days 
 when, like Arthur Fenton, he was a pronounced 
 Pagan and denounced Peter Calvin as the incarna- 
 tion of Philistinism in art. On one occasion 
 Rangely had boldly reproached his friend with 
 having gone over to the camp of the Philistines ; 
 and he had been met with the retort, — 
 
 *' We have found it pleasant in the camp of 
 Philistia, have we not } " 
 
 '*We.^" Rangely had echoed, with an accent of 
 indignation. 
 
 " Yes," Arthur had replied, with cool scorn. 
 " You Pagans pitched into me because I made my 
 way over ; but I am not so stupid as not to see_ 
 that there has been considerable §neakin^ after 
 m_e/' 
 
 " But at least," Fred had urged, " we fellows 
 preserved the decency of a respect for the princi- 
 ples we had professed." 
 
 "Ah, bah! The principles we had professed^ 
 were the impossible dreams of extreme youth._ 
 
;46 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Honesty is a weakness that is outgrown by any 
 man who has brains enough to do his own think- 
 ing. You still profess the principles, and betray 
 them, while I boldly disavow them at the start." 
 
 ''At least," Rangely had said, driven to his last 
 defences, " if we have fallen off, we have done it 
 unconsciously, and you " — 
 
 " I," Fenton had flamed out in interruption, 
 "have, at least, made it a point to be honest with 
 myself, whether I was with anybody else or not. 
 I find it easier to be mistaken than to be vague, 
 and I had far rather be." j 
 
 The thought of Fenton floated through Fred's 
 mind as he endorsed Peter Calvin, and with no 
 especial thought of what he was saying, he ob- 
 served, — 
 
 "• Arthur Fenton wants Grant Herman to have 
 the commission, and I must say Herman would be 
 sure to do it well." 
 
 " If Fenton wants Herman," Irons returned, 
 with an attempt at lightness which only served to 
 emphasize the genuine bitterness which under- 
 laid his words, "that settles my voting for him." 
 
 "Don't you and Mr. Fenton agree.-*" the host- 
 ess asked. " I supposed you were one of his ad- 
 mirers or you wouldn't have had him paint your 
 portrait." 
 
 " I admire his works more than I do him," Irons 
 answered, adding with clumsy jocularity " I am 
 waiting for offers from the friends of candidates." 
 
VOLUBLE AXD SHARP D IS COURSE. 247 
 
 *' I am interested in young Stanton," Mr. Green- 
 field said ; ** I might make you an offer." 
 
 ** Oh, to obHge you," the other responded, ** I 
 will consent to support him without money and 
 without price." 
 
 The talk meant little to any one save the hostess 
 and Irons, but they both felt that this move in 
 their game, slight as it seemed, was both well 
 made and important. Later in the evening Irons 
 took occasion to assure Greenfield that he would 
 really support Stanton in the committee, adding that 
 with the vote of Calvin this would settle the mat- 
 ter. When a few days later Irons asked the deci- 
 sion of Greenfield in regard to the railroad matter, 
 he found that the attitude of the chairman of the 
 committee was satisfactory. And honest Tom 
 Greenfield had the satisfaction of believing that 
 he had been instrumental in furthering the inter- 
 ests of Orin Stanton, in whose success he felt the 
 pride common to people in a country district when 
 a genius has appeared among them and secured 
 recognition from the outside world sufficient to 
 assure them that they are not mistaken in their 
 admiration. Nor was the mind of the country 
 member disturbed by any suspicion that he had 
 been managed and deceived, and that he had 
 really played into the hands of that most unscrup- 
 ulous corporation, the Wachusett Syndicate. 
 
XXI 
 
 A MINT OF PHRASES IN HIS BRAIN. 
 
 Love's Labor's Lost; i. — i. 
 
 IT was a peculiarity which the St. Filipe shared 
 with most other clubs the world over, that the 
 doings of its committees in private session were 
 always known within twenty-four hours and dis- 
 cussed by the knot of habitues of the house who 
 kept close watch upon its affairs. It did not long 
 remain a secret therefore, that the Executive Com- 
 mittee had taken a firm stand in regard to the 
 troublesome matter of introducing strangers ille- 
 gally, and that Fenton had been summoned to 
 appear before them to answer to the charge of in- 
 troducing Snaffle. 
 
 The excitement was intense. Fenton was a 
 man whose affairs always provoked comment, and 
 while there was much discussion in regard to whcit 
 would be done, there was quite as much as to how 
 he would take it. The men who had been in the 
 card-room on the night in question chanced not 
 to be on hand to say that Snaffle had appeared 
 alone, and the word of the servant was accepted 
 as conclusive. 
 
 ''Fenton's a queer fellow anyway," one man ob- 
 
 2<i8 
 
A MIXT OF PHRASES IN HIS BRAIN. 
 
 249 
 
 served reflectively. '' He's a damned arrogant 
 cuss." 
 
 " He has not only the courage of his convic- 
 tions," Ainsworth responded, "but he has also 
 the courage of his dislikes," 
 
 " He will never give up the assumption that he 
 is above all rules," the first speaker continued. 
 " He feels that he is being bullied if he is ever 
 asked to submit to a law of any kind." 
 
 " The committee are bound to put things 
 through this time. They've been waiting for a 
 chance to jump on somebody for a long time, and 
 Fenton put a rod in pickle for himself when he 
 tried to run Rangely in for secretary last election." 
 
 ''One thing is certain," Ainsworth said, rising 
 and buttoning his coat ; " Fenton isn't an easy 
 man to tackle, and if we don't have some music 
 out of this before we are done, I shall be sur- 
 prised." 
 
 There was a general feeling that something un- 
 usual would come of this action on the part of the 
 Executive Committee. Fenton was a man of so 
 much audacity, so fertile in resource, and so per- 
 sistent in his efforts, that while nobody knew what 
 he would do, it was generally supposed that he 
 would make a fight ; and expectation was alive to 
 see it. 
 
 As to Fenton, he was at first completely over- 
 whelmed by the summons from the committee. 
 Disgrace, reproof, — even examination was a horri- 
 
250 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ble and unspeakable humiliation, which it seemed 
 to him impossible to bear. He hated life and was 
 so thoroughly wretched as to be physically almost 
 prostrated, although his strong will kept him upon 
 his feet still. 
 
 As he reflected, however, the hopeful side of the 
 situation presented itself to his mind. He had 
 been confident that his tracks were so well hidden 
 that his share in introducing Snaffle into the Club 
 would not be suspected, unless the guest had him- 
 self mentioned it. He made the Princeton Plati- 
 num stock a pretext for calling upon the specula- 
 tor, and endeavored to discover whether the latter 
 had spoken, but he learned nothing. He was not 
 quite ready to ask frankly whether Snaffle had be- 
 trayed him, and short of doing so he could not 
 discover. Still Fenton told himself that the only 
 thing he had to fear was some hearsay that might 
 have reached the ears of the Executive Commit- 
 tee, and he trusted to his cleverness to answer 
 this. 
 
 He presented himself at the meeting of the 
 committee with a bold front and an air of re- 
 strained indignation, which became him very well. 
 All his histrionic instincts were aroused by such 
 an occasion as this. He delighted to act a part, 
 and the fact that real issues were the stake of his 
 success, added a zest which he could not have found 
 on the boards. He spoke to the gentlemen pres- 
 ent or replied to their greeting with a manner of 
 
A MIXT OF PHRASES IN HIS BRAIN. 
 
 251 
 
 dignity which was effective because it was not in 
 the least overdone, and then sat down very quietly 
 to await what might be said. 
 
 He had not long to wait. The Secretary of the 
 St. Filipe heartily disliked Fenton, chiefly because 
 Fenton openly disliked him. He was a man who 
 was petty enough to take advantage of his office 
 to gratify his personal spite, and shallow enough 
 not to perceive that he had done so. His whole 
 fat person quivered with indignant gratification as 
 he saw Fenton in the role of a culprit, and he bent 
 his look upon the notes spread out before him be- 
 cause he was aware that his eyes showed more sat- 
 isfaction than was by any means decorous. 
 
 The meeting partook of that awkward unofficial 
 nature which makes matters of discipline so hard in 
 a social club. The men present were Fenton's 
 companions and associates, and the dignity with 
 which their position invested them was hardly 
 sufficient to put them at their ease. They heartily 
 wished to be done with the disagreeable business, 
 and were not without a feeling of personal vexation 
 against the culprit for forcing upon them anything 
 so unpleasant as sitting in judgment upon him. 
 
 The chairman, Mr. Staggchase, opened the case 
 by saying in an offhand manner, that they were all 
 very sorry for the turn things had taken, but that 
 the evil of having strangers introduced into the 
 club had grown to proportions which made it im- 
 possible longer to overlook it, and that this was 
 
252 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 especially true of the bringing into the house men 
 who not only were there in violation of the rules, 
 but who were of a character which made it more 
 than a violation of good taste to introduce them 
 into the club at all. He added that he was con- 
 vinced that the present case was the result of a 
 misunderstanding, and he hoped the gentleman 
 who had been asked to meet the committee would 
 comprehend that he was there rather to assist the 
 government of the club in maintaining discipline, 
 than for any other reason. 
 
 He looked at Fenton and smiled as he concluded, 
 and the artist bowed to him with a glance of an- 
 swering friendliness. Thus far all had been pleas- 
 ant, so pleasant indeed that the corpulent Secretary 
 had ceased smiling. The remarks of Mr. Stagg- 
 chase had been conciliatory and gracious, and 
 showed so distinct a leaning toward the accused, 
 that the Secretary felt himself to be personally at- 
 tacked in this slighting way of holding charges which 
 he had given. He drew his thin lips together and 
 cleared his throat in a preparatory cough, rustling 
 his papers as if to call attention to them. 
 
 ** If the Secretary is ready," Mr. Staggchase 
 said, ''he may read the memorandum of the 
 matter about which we wished to consult Mr. 
 Fenton." 
 
 "The charge against Mr. Fenton," the Secre- 
 tary responded, with deliberate insolence, ''is that 
 on the evening of March 13th he brought Mr. 
 
A MLVT OF P//RASES /.V HIS BA\4/X. 
 
 253 
 
 Erastus Snaffle into the club house, knowing that 
 that individual had already been several times in 
 the club within the time specified by the by-laws, 
 and knowing him to be a man unfit to be intro- 
 duced into a gentleman's club at any time." 
 
 *' I have the hbnor of Mr. Erastus Snaffle's 
 acquaintance," Fenton interpolated, in a perfectly 
 cool, self-controlled voice, " in virtue of having 
 had him presented to me by the Secretary of this 
 club in the pool-room upstairs." 
 
 The members of the committee smiled, but the 
 Secretary flushed with anger. The statement was 
 literally true, and he could not at the moment go 
 into the rather lengthy explanation which would 
 have made it evident that his thus standing spon- 
 sor for Mr. Snaffle was entirely the result of a 
 provoking accident rather than of his choice. He 
 hurried on to cover the awkward interruption. 
 
 •* Mr. Fenton further broke a rule of the club 
 in neglecting, or I should say omitting to register 
 his guest, and his share in the matter might not 
 have been known had not Mr. Snaffle told the 
 servant at the door that he came at Mr. Fenton's 
 invitation." 
 
 Arthur had settled himself in an attitude of 
 placid attention, secretly enjoying the clever 
 thrust he had given his adversary. At these 
 last words he sat upright. 
 
 " Mr. Staggchase," he said, turning toward the 
 chairman, and speaking with sudden gravity, ''do 
 
254 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 I understand that I have been summoned before 
 this committee in consequence of the report of a 
 servant." 
 
 " I think such is the fact, Mr. Fenton," was the 
 reply, " but of course your simple word will be 
 received as ample exoneration." 
 
 " Exoneration ! " echoed Fenton, starting to his 
 feet, his face pale with excitement which easily 
 passed for virtuous indignation, '* Do you fancy 
 I would stoop to exonerate myself from such a 
 charge ? Since when has the testimony of ser- 
 vants been received in a club of gentlemen ? " 
 
 He had his cue, and he felt perfectly safe in 
 letting himself go. He was frightened at the 
 possible consequences of the coil in which he had 
 become involved, since he foresaw easily enough 
 that while his only course was to carry things 
 through with a high hand, his words had already 
 bitterly incensed the Secretary and might in the 
 end set the committee also against him. He ex- 
 perienced a wild delight, however, in giving vent 
 to his excitement in any form, and this simulation 
 of burning indignation served to relieve his pent- 
 up nervousness. He did believe the principle 
 upon which with so much quickness he had hit 
 as his best defence, and could with all his force 
 sustain it. He looked about the room in silence a 
 moment, but nobody was quick enough to pin him 
 down to facts and insist upon his denying or allow- 
 ing the charge brought against him. The indis- 
 
A MINT OF PHRASES IN HIS BRAIN. 055 
 
 putable correctness of his position that a servant's 
 testimony could not be taken against a member in 
 a club of gentlemen confounded them, and before 
 any one thought of the right thing to say, Fenton 
 continued, with growing indignation, — 
 
 '' Why I personally should be chosen for insult 
 by this committee I will not attempt to decide, 
 although the source of the malice is to be guessed 
 from the manner in which the evidence was 
 brought to their notice. When the Secretary has 
 a charge to bring against me that a gentleman 
 would bring, I shall be ready to answer it. A 
 charge like this it is an insult to expect me to 
 notice." 
 
 He walked toward the door, as he finished, 
 and turned to bow as he put his hand on the 
 latch. 
 
 *' Oh, come now, Fenton," Mr. Staggchase 
 said confusedly, '* don't go off that way. Of 
 course " — 
 
 He hesitated, not knowing how to continue, 
 and another member took up the word. 
 
 '* All that is nonsense, of course. If the ser- 
 vant was mistaken, why can't you say so, and put 
 yourself right with the committee V 
 
 " Because," Fenton answered, throwing up his 
 head, **I prefer retaining my self-respect even to 
 putting myself right with this or any other com- 
 mittee. Good morning." 
 
 He went out quickly. He felt that this was a 
 
256 
 
 THE PHILISTIXES. 
 
 good point for an exit, and he wished to get away 
 lest he should be unable to keep up to the level of 
 the scene as he had played it. So thoroughly was 
 his whole attitude consciously theatrical, that he 
 smiled to himself outside the door as the whimsi- 
 sical reflection crossed his mind that he really 
 deserved a call before the curtain. Then he 
 remembered how awkward he should find it to be 
 called back ; and with a smile he ran down stairs 
 to get his hat and coat, and hurried out of the 
 house into the darkening spring afternoon. 
 
 When Fenton had gone, the members of the 
 committee sat looking at each other in that condi- 
 tion of bewilderment which could easily turn to 
 either indignation or contrition as the direction 
 might be determined by the first impulse. Un- 
 fortunately for Fenton, it was his enemy the Sec- 
 retary who spoke first. 
 
 "Heroics are all very well," he sneered, ''but 
 they don't change facts. He's evidently played 
 poker enough to know how to bluff in good 
 shape." 
 
 There was a rustle of impatience in the room. 
 The men seemed to be reminded that a very high 
 tone had been taken with them, and that they had 
 all come in for a share of the rebuke which Fen- 
 ton had administered. They were irritated by 
 the minolinfi of a secret concurrence with the 
 artist's position that a member of the club should 
 not be impeached on the testimony of a servant, 
 
A MINT OF PHRASES IN HIS BRAIN. 257 
 
 and the conviction that Fenton was really guilty 
 of the charge brought against him, so that it was 
 contrary to both justice and common sense to 
 allow him to escape on a mere technicality. 
 
 " Fenton is so hot-headed," Mr. Staggchase 
 began ; and then he added : *' I can't say that I 
 blame him so very much, though. I don't fancy I 
 should be very amiable myself if I were brought 
 up on the word of one of the servants." 
 
 "• But it was the duty of the servant to inform 
 me," the Secretary returned doggedly, "and why 
 shouldn't the committee take action on informa- 
 tion which comes to it that way as well as any 
 other. We didn't set the servant to spy on the 
 members, and I can't for the life of me follow any- 
 thing so fine spun as Fenton's theory. He only 
 set it up, in my opinion, to get himself out of a 
 bad box." 
 
 •' He might at least have had the grace to deny 
 it, if he could," another man said. '' It leaves us 
 in a devilish awkward fix as it is. We can't drop 
 the matter, and if he shouldn't be guilty" — 
 
 "Oh, he's guilty, fast enough," the Secretary 
 interrupted, his little green eyes shining under 
 their fat hds. ''He's one of the set that have 
 been playing poker in the club until it's begun 
 to be talked about outside, and I saw him go out 
 with Snaffle that night myself." 
 
 There was some deliberation, some doubting, 
 and some hesitation in regard to the proper course 
 
258 ^^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 in such a case. The committee felt that their own 
 dignity had suffered, that their authority should be 
 asserted, and their majesty avenged. Mr. Stagg- 
 chase was the most lenient in his views of the sit- 
 uation, and even he admitted that whether Fenton 
 were innocent of the offence with which he was 
 charged or not, he had at least treated the com- 
 mittee most cavalierly, and against the ground 
 taken by most of the members, that if Fenton had 
 been able to deny the charge he would have done 
 so, he could only reply, — 
 
 *' I don't think that at all follows. In the first 
 place he wasn't asked. He is just the man to feel 
 that a summons before this committee is in itself a 
 pretty severe reprimand, as plenty of men would. 
 He's high spirited and sensitive as the devil, and 
 there was nothing in what he said to-day that 
 wasn't compatible to my mind with his being 
 perfectly innocent. Indeed, I don't believe he 
 has cheek enough to carry it off so, if he were not 
 sure of his position." 
 
 ** Oh, as to cheek," retorted the Secretary, ven- 
 omously, " Arthur Fenton has enough of that for 
 anything. And, as for that matter, almost any 
 man will fight when he is cornered.'* 
 
 In the end the Secretary prevailed, and the 
 committee, albeit somewhat doubtingly, passed a 
 vote of censure upon Fenton. The Secretary was 
 directed to communicate this fact to the artist, and 
 he took it upon himself also to include the infor- 
 
A MINT OF PHRASES IN HIS BKAIN 
 
 259 
 
 mation in the printed notices of the monthly meet- 
 ing which were sent out a few days later, an 
 innovation which stirred the club to its very 
 depths and became town talk within twenty-four 
 hours. 
 
XXII 
 
 HIS PURE HEART'S TRUTH. 
 
 Two Gentlemen of Verona ; iv. — 2. 
 
 HELEN GREYSON was at work in her studio 
 modelling the hand of a statue. The pretty 
 hand of Melissa Blake lay before her, so near that 
 Milly's face came close to her own as she sat 
 beside the modelling stand. It was one of those 
 anomalies of which nature is fond the world over, 
 and in which she displays nowhere more whimsical 
 wilfulness than in New England, that Melissa, born 
 of a race of plain country farmers, should have the 
 hand of a princess. It was slender and beautiful, 
 with exquisite taper fingers which had not as yet 
 been spoiled by hard work, although were the 
 present generation of New England maidens called 
 upon to labor as vigorously as did their grand- 
 mothers the girl's hands would hardly have re- 
 tained their comeliness so long. 
 
 Helen was working silently, absorbed in thought, 
 and going on with her modelling mechanically. 
 She was pondering the old question, whether she 
 had done well in coming back to America, or 
 whether she should have still kept the ocean 
 between herself and Grant Herman. While she 
 
 260 
 
HIS PURE HEART'S TRUTH. 26 1 
 
 was in Europe, the longing to see him, to feel that 
 he was near, to breathe the same air, had become 
 ever more strenuous, until at last it could not be 
 resisted. The sense of safety she had while so far 
 away prevented her from appreciating that she was 
 returning to the same danger from which she had 
 fled. She told herself that time had so softened 
 and changed her feelings, that Herman with wife 
 and son was so different from the lonely man 
 who had sought her love, and whom she had 
 bravely renounced from a stern sense of duty, 
 whether wise or not, that there could be no 
 danger. She was a woman, and she had kept 
 temptation at a distance until the nerve of resis- 
 tance was worn out ; then she had come home. 
 
 Now she asked herself what she had gained. 
 She had renounced the passive acquiescence which 
 she had won by years of hard struggle, and she 
 had in exchange only a fierce unrest which was 
 well-nigh unendurable. To be near Herman and 
 yet to be as far removed from him as if the uni- 
 verse were between was a torture such as she had 
 not dreamed of. All the old love awoke, and 
 something of the old conviction which had made 
 renunciation possible had failed her with time. 
 
 Nothing is more common than for the con- 
 science half unconsciously to assume that a heroic 
 self-sacrifice has been of so great efficacy that 
 even the conditions which made it right are 
 thereby altered. Without realizing it, Helen's 
 
262 ^-^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 mental attitude was that in giving up Herman's 
 love and bringing about his marriage to Ninitta 
 that his honor might be unstained, she had accom- 
 plished a self-denial so tremendous that even the 
 need of making it was thereby destroyed. The 
 idea was paradoxical, but that a proposition is 
 paradoxical is no obstacle to its being held firmly 
 by the feminine mind. 
 
 But by coming home Helen had also been put 
 in a position where she could not avoid seeing 
 something of Herman's married life, and it was at 
 once impossible for her to help perceiving that it 
 was a failure, or to evade the conclusion that if it 
 were a failure she was to blame for the part she 
 had taken in bringing it about. It is always dan- 
 gerous to judge of actions by their results, since 
 by so doing one refers them to the code of expe- 
 diency rather than to that of ethics. Helen was 
 not prepared to pronounce her old decision wrong ; 
 but the feeling that her renunciation had been vain 
 forced itself more and more strongly upon her. 
 
 She was losing sight of her conviction that the 
 need of doing what one felt to be right was in 
 itself so imperative that no course of action could 
 be wrong which was based upon this principle. 
 The truth is that all mortals, and perhaps women 
 especially, feel that a virtuous resolution, a noble 
 self-denial, must bring with it a spiritual uplifting 
 which will render it possible to hold to it. The 
 hour of self-conquest is one of inner exaltation 
 
HIS rURE HEARTS TRUTH. 
 
 263 
 
 which is so vivid that it is impossible to realize 
 that it can be otherwise than perpetual ; a life of 
 self-conquest is a continuous struggle against the 
 double doubt which is the ghost of the short-lived 
 exaltation that promised to be immortal. 
 
 From her reverie, Helen was aroused by a ques- 
 tion of Melissa which almost seemed as if sug- 
 gested by thought transference. 
 
 "Do you know," Melissa asked, "why the com- 
 mission was not given to Mr. Herman } " 
 
 "The commission .'* " Helen repeated, so startled 
 by the mention of the name which had been in her 
 mind that for the moment she did not comprehend 
 the question. 
 
 " Why, for the America,'' returned Melissa. " I 
 thought you knew Mr. Herman, and Orin said that 
 you had withdrawn." 
 
 Helen looked at her with a puzzled air. 
 
 " I did withdraw," she said, " but I did not 
 know the matter had been decided. Who is Orin } 
 Orin Stanton } " 
 
 "Yes, he is to make the statue." 
 
 "Did he tell you so.?" 
 
 " Yes, he thinks I helped him by speaking to 
 Mrs. Fenton ; but she said Mr. Calvin already 
 wanted Orin, so it made no difference." 
 
 " How long has it been decided '^. " asked Helen. 
 
 " He showed me the letter from Mr. Calvin day 
 before yesterday. The committee hadn't met, but 
 Mr. Irons had promised his vote, and he and Mr. 
 
264 ^^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 Calvin make a majority. Orin had been afraid Mr. 
 Irons would vote for Mr. Herman, and I did not 
 know but what you could tell. We are all so much 
 interested in the statue." 
 
 Helen laid down her tools with an air of sudden 
 determination. 
 
 "Why are you .-^ " she asked, rather absently. 
 " When Mrs. Fenton told me she had asked you 
 to let me model your hands, she didn't mention 
 your being interested in my art." 
 
 " Oh, I don't know anything about it," returned 
 the other, with the utmost frankness, ''only that 
 Orin's a sculptor." 
 
 Helen smiled at the girl's naivete. 
 
 " And am I to congratulate you on Orin's 
 success } " 
 
 Melissa blushed. 
 
 "Of course I am pleased," she answered, "es- 
 pecially for John's sake." 
 
 "And John.''" Helen pursued, finishing her 
 preparations for leaving her work. 
 
 " John is Orin's half-brother," Milly replied, in a 
 voice and with a manner which made it unneces- 
 sary for Mrs. Greyson to question farther. 
 
 " I shall not work any more this morning," she 
 said. " I have to go out." 
 
 She dressed herself for the street, and, for the 
 first time in six years, took the well-remembered 
 way toward Herman's studio down among the 
 warehouses and wharves. She was indignant at 
 
HIS PURE HEART'S TRUTH. 265 
 
 the action of the committee, of which she felt that 
 Herman should be told. As, however, she neared 
 the place, old associations and feelings made her 
 heart beat quickly. When she put aside the great 
 Oran rug and entered the studio, she felt a choking 
 sensation in her throat, and the tears sprang to 
 her eyes. She remembered so vividly the day 
 when she had stood in this very spot and parted 
 from her lover, that it almost seemed to her for 
 the moment as if she had come to enact that scene 
 again. 
 
 The place was more bare than of old. The pic- 
 tures from the walls and many of the ornaments 
 had been removed to the house which Herman had 
 fitted up on his marriage with Ninitta ; but in his 
 usual place stood the sculptor, at work by his 
 modelling stand, and over the rail of the gallery 
 above, toward which her eyes instinctively turned 
 as the old memories wakened, she saw the sculp- 
 tured edge of a marble Grecian altar. The recol- 
 lections were too poignant, and she started forward 
 quickly, as if to escape an actual presence. 
 
 The studio was so large that Herman had fallen 
 into the way of saving himself the trouble of 
 answering the bell by putting up the sign " Come 
 in " upon the door, and he was not aware of 
 Helen's presence until he saw her standing with 
 her hand upon the portiere, as he had seen her six 
 years before when she had renounced him, placing 
 his honor before their love. With an exclamation 
 
266 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 that was almost a cry, he dropped his modelling 
 tool and started forward to meet her. 
 
 "Helen ! " he cried, and the intensity of his feel- 
 ings made it impossible for him to say more. 
 
 Yet, however strong the emotions which were 
 aroused by this meeting, — and for both of them 
 the moment was one of keenest feeling, — they 
 were schooled to self-control, and after that first 
 exclamation the sculptor was outwardly calm as he 
 went to greet his visitor. Even for those who are 
 not guided by principle, self-restraint comes as the 
 result of habit, and none of us in this age of 
 the world assert the right of emotion to vent itself 
 in utterance. The Philoctetes of Sophocles might 
 shriek to high heaven, and Mars vent the anguish 
 of his wounds in cries and sobs, but we have 
 changed all that. Even the muse of tragedy is 
 self-possessed in modern days ; good breeding has 
 conquered even the fierce impulse of passion to 
 find outlet in words. 
 
 Both Herman and Helen were alive to the 
 danger of the situation, and their meeting was one 
 of perfect outward calm. 
 
 " Good morning," she said, " it seemed so natu- 
 ral to walk in, that I should almost have done it if 
 your card hadn't been on the door." 
 
 She held out her hand as she spoke. 
 
 " I cannot shake hands," he said, *' I am at 
 work, vou see." 
 
 She answered by a little conventional laugh 
 
HIS PURE HEART'S TRUTH. 267 
 
 which might mean anything. Both of them hesi- 
 tated a moment, their real feeling being too deep 
 for it to be easy quickly to call to mind conven- 
 tionalities of talk. Then the sculptor turned to 
 lead the way up the studio, waving his hand as 
 he did so toward the place where he had been 
 working. 
 
 " You couldn't have come more opportunely," 
 remarked he. "You are just in time to criticise 
 my model for America. I was just looking it over 
 for the last touches." 
 
 "It was that I came to talk about," Helen re- 
 turned, moving forward toward the modelling stand 
 on which was a figure in clay. *' I have just 
 learned that the commission has already been 
 awarded ; and I thought you ought to know how 
 the committee is acting." 
 
 " I do know," he answered. " Mr. Hubbard 
 came and told me, although the committee meant 
 to keep the decision quiet until after the models 
 were in." 
 
 " But you are finishing yours." 
 
 " Yes, I declined to enter a competition and was 
 hired to make a model. Of course I finish that, 
 whatever the decision of the committee. Mr. Hub- 
 bard told me because he had before assured me of 
 his support, and he wished to avoid even the sus- 
 picion of double dealing." 
 
 " The action of the committee is outrageous ! " 
 Helen protested, indignantly. "They might as 
 
268 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 well put up a tobacconist's sign as the thing Orin 
 Stanton will make. It shows that you are right 
 in refusing to enter a competition, since they have 
 decided without even seeing the models they asked 
 for." 
 
 ''Yes," was Herman's reply. He paused a 
 moment, and added, "■ Was that the reason you 
 withdrew } " 
 
 Helen flushed slightly, and turned her face aside. 
 
 " It hardly seemed worth while," she began ; 
 but he interrupted her. 
 
 " I would not have gone in," he said, '' even as 
 I did, if I had known there was a chance of your 
 competing." 
 
 She turned toward him, and her eyes uncon- 
 sciously said what she had been careful not to put 
 into words. 
 
 "Ah!" he exclaimed, with sudden comprehen- 
 sion. " You knew I was in it and that is why you 
 withdrew." 
 
 " Well," she said, trying to laugh lightly, '' it 
 would not have been modest for me to compete 
 against my master." 
 
 She moved away as she spoke. She had a ting- 
 ling sense of his nearness, a passionate yearning 
 to turn toward him and to break down all barriers 
 which made her afraid. She felt that she had been 
 rash in coming to the studio, and had overesti- 
 mated her own strength. She glanced around 
 quickly, as if in search of something which would 
 
HIS PC RE Hearts Truth. 
 
 269 
 
 help to bring the conversation to conventional 
 levels ; but her eye fell upon a terra-cotta figure 
 which sent the blood surging into her head so 
 fiercely that a rushing sound seemed to fill her 
 ears. It was the nude figure of a soldier lying 
 dead upon a trampled mound, with broken poppies 
 about him, while across the pedestal ran the in- 
 scription, — 
 
 " I strew these opiate flowers > 
 Round thy restless pillow." 
 
 It was the figure beside the clay model of 
 which, yet wet from his hand, the sculptor had told 
 her, that day long ago, of her husband's death. 
 In the years since, she had believed herself to 
 have worn her love into friendship, to have beaten 
 her passion into affection ; but every woman, even 
 the most clear-headed, deceives herself in matters 
 of the heart, and now Helen knew what pitiful 
 self-deception her belief had been. 
 
 Over and over and over again has it been noted 
 how great a part in human life and action is played 
 by trifles, and despite this constant reiteration the 
 fact remains both true and unappreciated. And 
 yet it is, after all, more exact to consider that the 
 thing is simply our habit of noticing the obvious 
 trifles rather than the underlying causes, as it is 
 the straws on the surface of the current that 
 catch our eye rather than the black flood which 
 sweeps them along. It was the chance sight of 
 the figure of the dead soldier which now broke 
 
270 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 down Helen's self-control, but the true explanation 
 of her outburst lay in long pent up and well-nigh 
 resistless emotion?. 
 
 She turned toward her companion with a pas- 
 sionate gesture. 
 
 '* It is no use," she broke forth, " I did wrong to 
 come home. I should have kept the ocean be- 
 tween us. I must go back." 
 
 Herman grasped the edge of the modelling stand 
 strongly. 
 
 "■ Helen," he said, in a voice of intensest feeling ; 
 " We may as well face the truth. We were wrong 
 six years ago." 
 
 " Stop ! " she interrupted piteously, putting up 
 her hand. "You must not say it. Don't tell me 
 that all this misery has been for nothing, and that 
 we have sacrificed our lives to an error. And, be- 
 sides," she went on, as he regarded her without 
 speaking, "however it was then, surely now 
 Ninitta has claims on you which cannot be gain- 
 said." 
 
 " Yes," he said bitterly, " and of whose mak- 
 ing?" 
 
 She looked at him, pale as death, and with all 
 the anguish of years of passionate sorrow in her 
 eyes. He faltered before the reproach of her 
 glance, but he would not yield. The disappoint- 
 ment of his married life, his sorrow in the years of 
 separation, the selfish masculine instinct which 
 makes all suffering seem injustice, asserted them- 
 
HIS PURE HEART'S TRUTH. 
 
 71 
 
 selves now. The effect of the fact that he was 
 forbidden to love this woman was to make him 
 half consciously feel as if he had now the right to 
 consider only himself. He almost seemed absolved 
 from any claims for pity which she might once 
 have had upon him. Even the noblest of men, 
 except the two or three in the history of the race 
 who have shown themselves to be possessed of a 
 certain divine effeminacy, instinctively feel that a 
 disappointment in passion is an absolution from 
 moral obligation. 
 
 " See," he said, with a force that was almost 
 brutal ; '* we loved each other and we have made 
 that love simply a means of torture. My God ! 
 Helen, the besotted idiots that fling themselves 
 under the wheels of Juggernaut are no more mad 
 than we were." 
 
 She hurried to him and clasped both her hands 
 upon his arm. 
 
 " Stop ! " she begged, her voice broken with 
 sobs, '' for pity's sake, stop ! It is all true. I have 
 said it to myself a hundred times ; but I will not 
 believe it. Don't you see," she went on, the tears 
 on her cheek, " that to say this is to give up every- 
 thing, that if there is no truth and no right, there 
 is nothing for which we can respect each other, 
 and our love has no dignity, no quality we should 
 be willing to name." 
 
 He looked at her with fierce, unrelenting eyes. 
 
 ''Ah," he retorted cruelly, *' my love is too 
 strong for me to argue about it." 
 
2^2 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 She loosed her hold upon his arm and stepped 
 backward a little, regarding him despairingly. 
 She did not mind the taunt, but the moral fibre of 
 her nature always responded to opposition. She 
 broke out excitedly into irrelevant inconsistency. 
 
 ''It is right," she cried. " We were right six- 
 years ago, and you shall not break my ideal now. 
 I must respect you, Grant. Out of the wreck of 
 my life I will save that, that I can honor where I 
 love." 
 
 She stopped to choke back the sobs which 
 shook her voice, and to wipe away the tears which 
 blinded her. The sculptor stood immovable ; but 
 his face was softened and full of yearning. 
 
 "And, oh," Helen said, the memory of sorrow- 
 ful years surging upon her, "you would not try to 
 shake my conviction if you realized how absolutely 
 it has been my only support. It is so bitter to 
 doubt whether the thing that wrings the heart is 
 really right after all." 
 
 Herman made a sudden movement as if he 
 would start forward, then he restrained himself. 
 
 " Forgive me," he said, in a strangely softened 
 voice. "You have forgiven me for being cruel 
 before. To have done a thing because you believe 
 it is right is of more consequence than anything 
 else can be. The truth is in the heart, not the 
 thing." 
 
 She tried to smile. She felt as if she were act- 
 ing again an old scene, the trick of taking refuge 
 
HIS PURE HEART'S TRUTH. 
 
 273 
 
 from too dangerous personal feeling in the expres- 
 sion of general truths carrying her back to ihe 
 time when the expedient had served them both 
 before. 
 
 ''But people who have faith," she said, ''who 
 believe creeds and doctrines, can have little con- 
 ception how much harder it is for us than for them 
 to do what we think is the right." 
 
 He did not answer her, and a moment they stood 
 in silence with downcast looks. Then she moved 
 slowly down the great studio toward the door, and 
 he followed by her side. 
 
 As she put her hand upon the Oran rug to lift 
 it, she raised her eyes and met his glance. The 
 blood rushed into their faces. They remembered 
 their parting embrace and the burning kisses of 
 long ago. 
 
 " Good-by," she said, and even before he could 
 answer her she had gone out swiftly. 
 
XXIII 
 
 AS FALSE AS STAIRS OF SAND. 
 
 Merchant of Venice ; v. — 2, 
 
 C T^HE fact that her mother was a Beauchester 
 VJ- Mrs. Staggchase never forgot, although she 
 seldom spoke of it. It formed what she would 
 have called a background to her life, and gave her 
 the liberty of doing many things which would 
 have been unallowable to persons of less distin- 
 guished ancestry. It was, perhaps, in virtue of 
 her Beauchester blood, for instance, that she 
 made the somewhat singular selection of guests 
 brought together at a luncheon which she gave in 
 honor of Miss Frances Merrivale when that young 
 lady came to pay her a visit, at the conclusion of 
 her stay with Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson. J 
 
 Miss Merrivale had been in doubt whether she 
 could properly accept this invitation, in view of 
 the fact that her cousin's wife had neglected to 
 call upon her since her arrival in Boston. The 
 reflection, however, that this visit to the Stagfor. 
 chase's was the chief object of her becoming Mrs. 
 Sampson's guest at all had decided the young 
 lady upon overlooking considerations of etiquette, 
 
 274 
 
.■IS FALSE AS STAIKS OF SAND. 
 
 75 
 
 and from the flat of the widow she had removed 
 to the more aristocratic region of Back Bay. 
 
 Miss Frances had been shrewd enough to fore- 
 stall all possible objections by accepting the invita- 
 tion before mentioning it to Mrs. Sampson ; and 
 however deep the chagrin of that enterprising 
 individual, she was too astute to protest against 
 the inevitable. Mrs. Sampson even, in her secret 
 heart, considered the advisability of calling upon 
 her late guest in her new quarters, but reluctantly 
 abandoned the idea as being likely, on the whole, 
 to be productive of no good results socially. 
 That Miss Merrivale would probably forget her as 
 quickly as possible she was but too well assured, 
 and it pretty exactly indicates the position of the 
 widow toward society that this prospective ingrati- 
 tude moved her to no indignation. It was so 
 exactly the course which in similar circumstances 
 she herself would have pursued, that no question 
 of its propriety presented itself to her mind. 
 Even the faint air of conscious guilt with which 
 the girl announced her intention did not arouse in 
 Mrs. ^ampson any feeling of surprise or bitter- 
 ness.L^Society to her mind was a ladder, and being 
 so, to climb it wa^^but to follow the use for which 
 it was designed. J^ 
 
 Miss Merrivale was of better stuff, and if not 
 well bred enough to live up to the obligations she 
 had assumed by becoming Mrs. Sampson's guest, 
 she was at least conscious of them ; and she 
 
276 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 said good-by with an air of apologetic cordiality, 
 quieting her conscience by the secret determina- 
 tion some time to repay the widow's kindness in 
 one way or another, although she should be 
 obliged to repudiate her socially. Had she known 
 Mrs. Staggchase better, and been aware how 
 much she fell in that lady's estimation by throw- 
 ing Mrs. Sampson overboard, her decision might 
 have been different. 
 
 '* She is coming, my dear," Mrs. Staggchase 
 had said to her husband, on receiving Miss Merri- 
 vale's acceptance of her invitation. " I shouldn't 
 have expected it of one of your family." 
 
 ''You know we can't all be born Beauchesters," 
 he had returned, with good-natured sarcasm. 
 
 Once at Mrs. Staggchase's, Miss Merrivale 
 began to see_3oston society under very differ- 
 ent auspices. L_She had been at a luncheon at 
 Ethel Mott's, given in compliment to herself, 
 where she had sat nearly speechless for an hour 
 and a half while half a dozen young ladies had 
 discussed the origin of evil with great volubility, 
 and what seemed to her, however it might have 
 impressed metaphysicians, astounding erudition 
 and profundity. She had assisted at that sacred 
 rite of musical devotees, the Saturday night 
 Symphony concert, where a handful of people 
 gathered to hear the music, and all the rest of 
 the world crowded for the sake of having been 
 there. She had been taken by Miss Mott to a 
 
AS FALSE AS STAIRS OF SAATD. 
 
 77 
 
 select sewing-circle — that peculiar institution by 
 means of which exclusive Boston society keeps 
 tally of the standing of all its young women. 
 She was somewhat bewildered, but enjoyed what 
 might be called a hallowed consciousness that she 
 was doing exactly the right thing ; and it was, 
 perhaps, only a delicate consciousness of the fit- 
 ness of things that made her answer all questions 
 as to the time of her arrival in Boston with the 
 date of her coming to Mrs. Staggchase, ignoring 
 her previous visit to a woman of whose existence 
 it was only proper to assume her new acquain- 
 tances to be entirely unaware, j 
 
 Fred Rangely was shrewdly and humorously ap- 
 preciative of her attitude, being the more keenly 
 conscious of the exact situation because he him- 
 self made a point of ignoring his acquaintance 
 with Mrs. Sampson. He had debated in his mind 
 what change in his conduct was advisable now 
 that Miss Merrivale was visiting Mrs. Staggchase. 
 He had astutely decided that the latter, at least, 
 would make no remarks about him to her guest ; 
 and, in view of the fact that it was scarcely possi- 
 ble to conceal his flirtation with the New Yorker 
 from the penetration of her hostess, he decided to 
 content himself with hiding from the stranger his 
 devotion to his older friend. He still assured 
 himself that his serious intentions were directed 
 toward Miss Mott, and he secretly smiled to him- 
 self with the foolish over-confidence of a vain man, 
 
2/8 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 when, from time to time, he heard allusions to the 
 devotion of Thayer Kent to Ethel. Kent had 
 been in the field before Rangely presented him- 
 self as a rival candidate for the damsel's good 
 graces ; and the novelist might have been less 
 confident had not personal interest blinded him to 
 a state of things which he would have apprehended 
 easily enough where another was concerned. The 
 easy familiarity, born of long friendship and per- 
 fect understanding, which Ethel showed toward 
 Kent, Fred mistook for indifference. His own 
 sudden popularity had somewhat turned his head, 
 so that he failed to distinguish between the atten- 
 tions shown to the author and those bestowed» 
 upon the man, and constantly felt himself to be 
 making personal conquests when he was simply 
 being lionized. 
 
 Mrs. Staggchase invited the guests for her 
 luncheon before she spoke of them to Miss 
 Merrivale. 
 
 ^ I have asked Mrs. Bodewin Ranger," she 
 explained, " although she is old enough to be 
 your grandmother, because she is the nicest old 
 lady in Boston, and it is a liberal education to 
 meet her.",, ^ 
 
 The other guests were Mrs. Frostwinch, Ethel 
 Mott, and Elsie Dimmont. 
 
 " Elsie Dimmont," Mrs. Staggchase observed, 
 " needs to be looked after. She is either going 
 to make a fool of herself by marrying that odious 
 
^.V FALSE AS STAIRS OF SAND. 
 
 279 
 
 Dr. Wilson or she is allowing herself to be made 
 a fool of by him, which is quite as bad." 
 
 Secretly Mrs. Staggchase, for all her Beau- 
 chester blood, had a good deal of sympathy for 
 the girl who was defying her family in receiving 
 the attentions of a man of no antecedents, al- 
 though, having done the same thing herself, she 
 was the more strongly bound outwardly to dis- 
 countenance any such insubordination. 
 
 Guests may be selected on the principle of 
 harmony of taste and feeling, or simply with an 
 eye to variety ; in the present instance it was dis- 
 tinctly the latter method which had obtained ; and 
 it was perhaps to be regarded as no mean triumph 
 of social civilization that a harmony apparently so 
 perfect resulted from the strange combination 
 which the hostess had brought about. L_Whether 
 from a secret intention of rebuking Miss Dimmont 
 for her associations with one socially so impossi- 
 ble as Chauncy Wilson, or with the less amiable 
 design of disciplining Miss Merrivale for her friend- 
 ship with Mrs. Sampson, the hostess adroitly and 
 deliberately turned the conversation to social 
 themes, and thence on to what perhaps were best 
 described as the proprieties of caste._] 
 
 She was too clever a woman to do this crudely, 
 and indeed would have seemed to any but the 
 most acute observer to follow the conversation 
 rather than to lead it. Ethel and Elsie chatted 
 briskly of the current gossip of the day, and it was 
 
28o THE PHTLTSTTNES. 
 
 Mrs. Bodewin Ranger who was skilfully led on to 
 stpijce the keynote of the talk by saying, — 
 
 [^Doesn't it seem to you that the modern fashion 
 of admitting artists into society is mixing up things 
 terribly ? Nowadays one is always meeting queer 
 people everywhere, and being told that they are 
 writers or painters."^ 
 
 The fine old lady smiled so genially that one 
 seeing her benign countenance framed in its beau- 
 tiful snowy curls, must know her well to realize 
 that in truth she meant exactly what she said. 
 Mrs. Frostwinch's answering smile was not with- 
 out a tinge of sarcasm, — 
 
 "It is worse than that," she said. "You even 
 meet actors in quite respectable houses." 
 
 " Oh, actors ! " threw in Ethel Mott, briskly ; 
 " nowadays they even go below the level of human- 
 ity _and invite those things called elocutionists." 
 
 (^ut of course," ventured Miss Merrivale, wish- 
 ing to put herself on record and striking a false 
 note, as usually happens in such cases, " one 
 doesn't really know these people. They are only 
 broA^ght in to amuse." ^ 
 
 'lOne never knows undesirable people, my 
 dear,"jMrs. Staggchase responded, without the 
 faintest shadow of the sarcastic intent which her 
 guest yet secretly felt in her words. 
 
 " Bless me ! " broke in Elsie Dimmont, with 
 characteristic explosiveness. " What an aban- 
 doned creature I must be ! I am actually going 
 to the Fenton's to dine to-night." 
 
AS FALSE AS STAIRS OF SAXD. 28 1 
 
 ** Mr. Fenton," Mrs. Bodewin Ranger re- 
 sponded, in her soft voice, " is a gentleman by 
 birth, and his wife was a Caldwell ; her mother 
 was a Calvin, you know." 
 
 Ethel Mott laughed. 
 
 "And so he passes," she said, "in spite of his 
 being an artist. How pleased he would be if he 
 knew it." 
 
 " It would be worth while to tell him," Mrs. 
 Frostwinch interpolated, " just to hear his com- 
 ments." 
 
 " We owe Arthur Fenton more scores than we 
 can ever settle," observed the hostess, "for the 
 things he says about women. He said to me the 
 other day that the society of lovely woman is 
 always a delight except when a man was In earnest 
 about something." 
 
 "I said to him, one night," added Elsie Dim- 
 mont, " that Kate West wasn't in her first youth. 
 * Oh, no ! ' he said, * her third or fourth at least.' " 
 
 The others smiled, except Mrs. Ranger. 
 
 " Poor Kate ! " she said ; " all you girls seem to 
 dislike her somehow. Mrs. West was a somebody 
 from Washington," she added, reflectively, as if 
 she unconsciously sought in the girl's pedigree 
 some explanation of her unpopularity. 
 
 " Is it so dreadful to come from Washington .^ " 
 asked Miss Merrivale ; and then wondered if she 
 ought to have said it. 
 
 " It is not the coming from Washington," was 
 
282 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Mrs. Frostwinch's reply, delivered in the same 
 faintly satirical manner which she had maintained 
 throughout the discussion ; " it is the being 
 merely a somebody instead of having a definite 
 family name behind her." 
 
 "■ It is all very well for you to make fun of my 
 old-fashioned notions, Anna," Mrs. Ranger re- 
 turned, good-naturedly. ''You think just as I do." 
 
 " I should be sorry not to think as you do about 
 everything," was the answer. " And, to be per- 
 fectly honest, I can't help being a little ashamed 
 that a cousin of mine has gone on to the stage. 
 She was always dreadfully headstrong." 
 
 ** Has she. talent } " asked Mrs. Staggchase. 
 
 " Yes, she has talent ; but is anything short of 
 genius an excuse for taking to the boards .** " 
 
 *' I wish I could act," put in Miss Dimmont, 
 emphatically. '* I'd go on to the stage in a min- 
 ute." 
 
 Mrs. Ranger looked shocked and grieved as 
 well. 
 
 " My dear," she said, " you can't realize what 
 you are saying. The stage has always been a hot- 
 bed of immorality from the very beginning of the- 
 atrical art, and nothing can reform it." 
 
 "■ Reform it," echoed Mrs. Staggchase, suavely ; 
 ** we don't want to reform it. Nothing would so 
 surely ruin the actor's art as the reformation of 
 his morals." 
 
 "Oh, my dear !" remonstrated Mrs. Ranger. 
 
AS FALSE AS STAIRS OF SAND. 
 
 283 
 
 " Really, Diana," Mrs. Frostwinch said, good- 
 naturedly, '' your sentiments are too shocking for 
 belief." 
 
 " But she doesn't mean them," added Mrs. 
 Ranger. 
 
 "■ I am sorry to shock anybody," the hostess 
 responded, "but I really do mean what I say. 
 Not that I can see," she added, '* that society can 
 afford to be too squeamish on the question of 
 morals." 
 
 A look of genuine distress began to shadow 
 Mrs. Ranger's face, and it deepened as Miss Mer- 
 rivale said, flippantly, — 
 
 ^Is Boston such an abandoned place } " 
 
 " Really, Diana," the old gentlewoman re- 
 marked, with a manner in which playfulness and 
 earnestness were pretty equally mingled, " I don't 
 think you ought to talk so before these girls. 
 When I was your age, half a century ago, it 
 wouldn't have been considered at all proper." 
 
 Mrs. Staggchase laughed softly. 
 
 "But, nowadays," she returned, "the girls are 
 so sophisticated that what we say makes no differ- 
 ence." 
 
 There was a moment of silence while the 
 servant changed the plates, and then Miss Dim- 
 mont broke out, saying, with unnecessary force, — 
 
 " I don't care who people are if they only amuse 
 me, and I'll know anybody I like, whether they 
 had any grandfathers or not." 
 
284 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " Since when ? " Ethel whispered significantly 
 into her ear. 
 
 Elsie crimsoned, but she gave no other sign 
 that she had heard or understood the thrust. 
 
 ''Then there is Fred Rangely," Mrs. Stagg- 
 chase remarked, in a tone so even that it showed 
 she meant mischief. " He comes here to see 
 Frances, and you can't think, Mrs. Ranger, that 
 it's my duty to be rude to him just because he 
 writes for the newspapers." 
 
 " It is impossible to imagine Mrs. Staggchase 
 being rude to anybody," quickly interpolated 
 Ethel, with smiling malice ; " and I supposed Mr. 
 Rangely had won at least a brevet right to be 
 considered in the swim from his long intimacy 
 with social leaders." 
 
 The hostess was too old a hand not to be pleased 
 with a clever stroke, even at her own expense, 
 and she took refuge in an irrelevant generality 
 which might mean anything or nothing. 
 
 '' One learns so much in life," she said, '' and of 
 it appreciates so little." 
 
 And Frances Merrivale looked from Miss Mott 
 to Mrs. Staggchase with an uncomfortable wonder 
 what allusions to Fred Rangely lay behind this 
 talk, which she could not understand. 
 
XXIV 
 
 THERE BEGINS CONFUSION. 
 
 I Henry VI. ; iv. — i. 
 
 FRED RANGELY began to find himself in the 
 condition of being controlled by circum- 
 stances, instead of himself controlling them. Nor 
 with all his astuteness could he decide how far he 
 was being managed by Mrs. Staggchase, or led on 
 by Miss Merrivale. He went about in a state of 
 continual astonishment at the extent to which he 
 had committed himself with the latter, and fell into 
 that dangerous mental condition where one seems 
 passively to regard his own actions rather than to 
 direct them. 
 
 Rangely had been so long settled in the convic- 
 tion that he was to marry Ethel Mott, even the 
 not infrequent rebuffs of. that lady producing in 
 his mind only temporary misgiving, that his pres- 
 ent doubts bewildered him. He was less of a cox- 
 comb than might seem to follow from this state- 
 ment, albeit there was no timidity and little burn- 
 ing passion in his feeling toward her. His was 
 simply the cool masculine assurance of a man self- 
 ish enough to regard even love in a cold-blooded 
 manner. He approved of his own choice socially, 
 
 285 
 
286 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 financiallyj and aesthetically ; and since he loved 
 himself rather more for having selected Ethel, he 
 fell into the not unnatural error of supposing him- 
 self to be in love with her. 
 
 His entanglement with Miss Merrivale, on the 
 other hand, was largely a matter of vanity. What 
 had begun as an idle flirtation, designed to kill the 
 leisure of summer days in the mountains, was con- 
 tinued from a half-conscious fear that he should 
 appear at a disadvantage by breaking it off. It so 
 keenly wounded Rangely's self-love to be thought 
 ill of by a woman, that he was often forced to play 
 at devotion which he not only did not feel but of 
 which the simulation was almost wearisome to 
 him. Nevertheless he was not, in this instance, 
 without a shrewd appreciation of all the possibili- 
 ties of the situation. He said to himself philoso- 
 phically, that if worst came to worst and the fates 
 had really decided to marry him to Miss Merrivale, 
 she had money, good looks, and a fair position, and 
 might on the whole prove more manageable as a 
 wife than one so clever and so high spirited as 
 Ethel. 
 
 Miss Merrivale, on her part, was foolishly and 
 fondly in love with the broad-shouldered egotist. 
 She had made up her mind from a variety of causes 
 that she should, on the whole, prefer to marry in 
 Boston, although in reality this meant simply that 
 she wanted to marry Fred Rangely. She pored 
 over his books in secret, talked to him of them 
 
THERE BEGINS CONFUSION. 287 
 
 with a want of comprehension only made tolerable 
 by the fervor of her admiration, and took pains to 
 show him that she regarded him as the literary 
 hope of his generation of novelists. In vulgar 
 parlance, she flung herself at his head ; and in 
 such a case a girl's success may be said to depend 
 almost wholly on opportunity and the extent of 
 her lover's vanity. 
 
 Rangely had vanity enough and ]\Irs. Stagg- 
 chase supplied the opportunity. If a feminine 
 mind could ever properly be called spherical, that 
 epithet should be applied to Mrs. Staggchase's 
 inner consciousness. She was so sufficient unto 
 herself, she so absolutely scored success or failure 
 simply as a matter of her own sensations that her 
 self-poise was perfect. She had even the quality, 
 rare in a woman, of being almost indifferent 
 whether others shared her opinions or not. She 
 was content with the knowledge that she had 
 succeeded in doing what she wished, while often 
 the results and effects were so subtile and remote 
 as to be imperceptible to others. Life was to her 
 a toy with which she amused herself, and she 
 found her chief enjoyment in trying experiments 
 upon it of which the results were intangible to all 
 but herself. 
 
 In the present case it amused Mrs. Staggchasc 
 and gave her some feminine satisfaction as well, 
 to think that Rangely should marry Frances Mer- 
 rivale. By promoting this marriage into which 
 
288 T^E- PHILISTINES. 
 
 she was aware that he had no intention of being 
 drawn, she avenged herself upon him for having 
 presumed to show attentions to another while she 
 honored him with her intimate friendship. It was 
 not so much the nature of the punishment which 
 pleased her as the fact that she was able to con- 
 strain him to her will. She found an ungenerous 
 satisfaction in proving to herself that it lay within 
 her power to do with him what she would ; and if 
 this conclusion did not inevitably follow from the 
 premises, her logic was at least satisfactory to 
 herself, and that was sufficient to determine her 
 course of action. She found some pleasure, too, 
 in feeling that she was taking away a lover from 
 Ethel Mott, for whom she had a dislike \vhich in 
 another woman would have been petty but which 
 in Mrs. Staggchase was merely intellectual, since 
 she was not a woman without understanding that 
 one of her sex must feel the loss of even an 
 admirer for whom she has no love. She did not 
 share Rangely's mistake of supposing that Ethel 
 would marry him, 3^et it was distinctly her inten- 
 tion that Miss Mott should not have the satisfac- 
 tion of undeceiving him, but that Fred should 
 carry through life the regretful and tantalizing 
 conviction that he had thrown away this chance. 
 It required only a little cleverness in bringing 
 together the young man and Miss Merrivale, 
 with a little skill in dropping now and then a word 
 assuming his devotion to her guest, and Mrs. 
 
THERE BEGINS COXFUSIOX. 289 
 
 Staggchase's plan was evidently in a fair way of 
 accomplishment. 
 
 On the morning of the clay of her luncheon, for 
 instance, she had managed that Rangely should 
 take Frances to some of the studios. The girl 
 had little acquaintance with artistic life, but it at- 
 tracted her by that romantic flavor which it is so 
 apt to have for the uninitiated. 
 
 " I should think," she observed, as they walked 
 along in the bright sunny morning, "that you 
 would want to go to the studios all the time, if 
 you know so many artists. I'm sure I should." 
 
 " Oh, it very soon gets to be an old story," 
 was his answer. " One studio is very like 
 another." 
 
 " But their work ? That must be awfully inter- 
 esting." 
 
 *' Yes, to a novice, but that soon gets to be an 
 old story too. An artist is only a man who puts 
 paint or charcoal on cardboard or canvas with 
 more or less cleverness, just as an author is a man 
 who has more or less skill in getting ink on to 
 paper." 
 
 Miss Merrivale laughed, with more glee than 
 comprehension. 
 
 ** You are always so witty," she said. " I don't 
 wonder your books sell. I think that girl who 
 couldn't tell which man she liked best was just too 
 funny for anything. I can't for the life of me see 
 how you think of such things, anyway." 
 
290 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " The trouble isn't to think what to say, but to 
 tell what not to say." 
 
 " I'm sure I don't know what you mean. Now 
 of course an artist just sees things, and all he has 
 to do is to make pictures of them ; but you have 
 to make up things." 
 
 ''But we see things too," the novelist responded, 
 smiling upon her, and reflecting that she was look- 
 ing uncommonly pretty that morning. 
 
 " Oh, but that's different. Now you never 
 knew a girl who was hesitating which of two 
 lovers to choose, and she wouldn't tell you how 
 she felt if you did ; but there it is all in your 
 book so natural that every girl says to herself 
 that's just the way she should feel." 
 
 The flattery was too evidently sincere not to be 
 pleasing. So long as praise is genuine, few men 
 are so exacting as to insist that it be also intelli- 
 gent. 
 
 " Thank you," he said ; '' you at least under- 
 stand the art of saying nice things. Though 
 that," he added, with his warmest smile, '* is per- 
 haps only natural in one who must have had so 
 many nice things said to her." 
 
 She laughed, her ready, girlish laugh, which 
 always seemed to him so young ; and they climbed 
 the crooked stairs of Studio Building, their breath 
 hardly being any longer sufficient for much speech. 
 
 " I'm going to take you to Arthur Fenton's 
 first," Rangely observed, as they paused to rest 
 
THERE BEGINS CONFUSION. 20 1 
 
 on one of the landings. ** These stairs are awful. 
 I wonder how he gets his elderly sitters up here." 
 
 Miss Merrivale seated herself upon a bench 
 benevolently placed on the landing. 
 
 ** They sit down here, of course," she responded. 
 
 "This is a sort of life-saving station," he re- 
 marked, seating himself beside her. 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Rangely, how awfully funny you are." 
 
 " It's my trade ; I have to be to earn my living. 
 Now you and I are the only survivors from a 
 wreck." 
 
 " Alone on a desert island } " 
 
 " Life-saving stations are not generally on 
 desert islands ; but I hope you wouldn't mind so 
 very much if it were." 
 
 She looked at him with bright eyes, and then 
 let her glance fall. 
 
 "That would depend," she responded demurely. 
 
 " Upon what } How I behaved .? " 
 
 " Oh, of course you'd behave well." 
 
 " Of course ; but how would I have to behave to 
 make you contented on a desert island } " 
 
 She shot him a keen quick glance from beneath 
 her bent brows. 
 
 "I never said I should be contented." 
 
 " But you implied it." 
 
 She whirled her muff over and over upon her 
 two hands like the wheel of a squirrel cage, re- 
 garding it intently with her pretty head on one 
 side. 
 
2Q2 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ''No, I didn't imply it either. I don't believe I 
 could be contented." 
 
 "■ Not even with me ? '* 
 
 She flushed, but evidently not with displeasure. 
 
 ** Why with you more than anybody else V she 
 softly inquired, with great apparent artlessness. 
 
 " Because," he began, " I should " — He was 
 going to add, " be so fond of you," but reflected 
 that this was perhaps going a little too fast and too 
 far, and concluded instead — '' take such good care 
 of you." 
 
 Perhaps it was because approaching footsteps 
 sounded on the stairs below them ; perhaps it was 
 because her subtile feminine sense appreciated 
 the fact that he was on his guard ; but for some 
 reason or for no reason she tossed her head and 
 rose to her feet. 
 
 " I am fortunately not obliged to go so far as a 
 desert island to get taken care of," sha said. 
 
 Her companion was not unwilling that the talk 
 should be broken in upon. He smiled to himself 
 as he followed her lead, and in a moment more he 
 was knocking at the door of Fenton's studio, 
 which was well up toward the roof. There was 
 no response, and, as Fred rapped the second time, 
 a carpenter who was at work on the casing of a 
 door near by looked up, and said, — 
 
 **Mr. Fenton has a sitter, sir." 
 
 " He is in then t " said Rangely. 
 
 " Yes," answered John Stanton, straightening 
 
There begins coxfusion. 293 
 
 himself up, with his plane in his hand, " but since 
 Mrs. Herman went in half an hour ago, he hasn't 
 opened the door to anybody." 
 
 ** Mrs. Herman ? " echoed Rangely, in astonish- 
 ment. 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 It was a capricious fate which brought John 
 Stanton to tangle the web of Fenton's life. His 
 brother Orin's relations with artists had given 
 John a sort of acquaintanceship with them at 
 second-hand, a kind of vicarious proprietorship in 
 the privileges of art circles. He had long known 
 Fenton by sight, while that he recognized Mrs. 
 Herman also was the result of accident. He 
 had been standing with Orin a few days before on 
 a street corner, when the sculptor had lifted his 
 hat to Mrs. Herman and named her in answer to 
 John's question. There had not been in his honest 
 mind the faintest tinge of suspicion when he saw 
 her enter the studio, and he never had any intima- 
 tion of the mischief he had done in mentioning her 
 name to Rangely. 
 
 Fred and Miss Merrivale went on to Tom Bent- 
 ley's curio-crowded rooms, while the sound of their 
 knock still lingered in the double ears of the two 
 people who sat confronting each other within the 
 studio, with looks on the one hand sullen ; on the 
 other, pleading, Fenton's picture of Fatima was 
 finished, yet Ninitta continued to come to the 
 studio. His brief passion, which had been more 
 
!94 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 than half mere intellectual curiosity how far his 
 power over the Italian could go, had ended with 
 that curiosity. In its place was a gradually in- 
 creasing hatred for this woman, who seemed to 
 assert a claim upon him, this model whom he never 
 had loved, and whom he could now scarcely toler- 
 ate, since he had ceased to respect her. He cursed 
 himself vehemently after the fashion of such of- 
 fenders, when eager, vibrating passion has given 
 place to a sense of irksome obligations, but more 
 vigorously still did he upbraid fate, to whose score 
 he set down all annoyance. 
 
 As for Ninitta, she, perhaps, no more truly 
 loved Fenton than he had cared for her, but she 
 clung to him as a frightened child might clutch the 
 arm of one with whom it has wandered into the 
 darkness of some vault beset with pitfalls. Nin- 
 itta's moral sense was of the most rudimentary 
 character. She was, perhaps, incapable of appreci- 
 ating an ethical principle, and her spiritual life 
 never soared beyond the crudest emotions and the 
 simplest questions of personal feeling. She had 
 come to live without the guidance of a priest, and 
 this fact, in itself, had left her without moral sup- 
 port. She had now no particular consciousness of 
 having done wrong, although she was moved by the 
 fear of the consequences of the discovery of her 
 transgression. 
 
 It has been said that Ninitta's affection for her 
 husband might have been more enduring had he 
 
THERE BEGINS COiY FUSION. 295 
 
 been less gentle with her. She came of a race 
 of peasants whose women understood masculine 
 superiority in the old brutal, physical sense, and 
 whenever Herman bore patiently with his wife's 
 caprices he lessened a respect which he could 
 have retained only at the expense of a blow. 
 With all Arthur Fenton's soft and caressing ways 
 toward Ninitta, there was always an instinctive 
 masterfulness in his attitude toward any woman 
 and especially since he had tired of her did he 
 keep Mrs. Herman figuratively at his feet. The 
 more strongly her appealing attitude seemed to 
 press upon him claims w^hich he could not satisfy 
 and had no mind to acknowledge, the more harsh 
 he became, and the more she bent before him. 
 The language of brutality was one which she un- 
 derstood by inherited instinct. 
 
 " But why," Fenton was saying impatiently, 
 when Rangely's knock startled them, '' do you 
 come here, when I haven't sent for you .^ There's 
 somebody at the door, now, and we haven't even 
 the shadow of an excuse, since the picture is 
 done." 
 
 " I wanted to see you," Ninitta answered 
 humbly, her plain face working with her effort 
 to keep back the tears. '' It is so lonely at 
 home, and they take even Nino away from me." 
 
 The artist started up impatiently, and took his 
 wet palette from the stand beside him. 
 
 ''Well ! " he said, answering as she had spoken, 
 
296 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 in Italian, " you must be anxious that your hus- 
 band shall know of your coming here, or you 
 would not take such pains to have him find it 
 out." 
 
 He began painting sullenly, putting in the last 
 touches upon the background of the portrait of 
 a beautiful girl. The lovely face of Damaris 
 Wainwright, so pathetic, so pure, and so noble, 
 looking at him from the canvas stung him in- 
 wardly into an impotent fury. His fine sense of 
 the fitness of things was outraged by the presence 
 of Ninitta beside the spiritual personality which 
 shone upon him from the portrait. He could 
 even feel the incongruity between himself and 
 his work, though this appealed to his sense of 
 humor as the other aroused his anger. 
 
 Ninitta watched in silence a moment ; then she 
 rose from her seat, her wrap falling away from her 
 shoulders. Her tears were done, and a white look 
 of intense feeling showed the despair that she felt. 
 All the isolation which tortured her, that pain 
 which souls like hers, blind, groping, and helpless, 
 are least able to bear, had left its stamp upon her. 
 Perhaps even her sin had been a desperate and 
 only half-conscious attempt once more to draw in 
 sympathy really near a human heart. She had 
 learned little from the changed conditions into 
 which the fates of her life had brought her, but 
 she had been separated, in mind no less than in 
 body, from her own kind without being fitted for 
 
THERE BEGINS CONFUSION. 297 
 
 Other companionship. She was utterly and fatally 
 alone, and a terrible sense of her remoteness from 
 all human fellowship smote her now at Arthur's 
 cruelty. She hesitated an instant, supporting her- 
 self by the arms of the big carved chair in which 
 she had been sitting ; then, with an impulsive 
 gesture, she threw her arms above her head, 
 wringing her hands together. 
 
 '♦ Oh, my God ! " she cried, '' what shall I do } " 
 
 Fenton turned quickly toward her. 
 
 " Oh, mon Dieii ! " was his inward comment ; 
 *' what a divine pose ! What a glorious figure ! But 
 ah, how tiresome she is ! " Then, aloud, he said : 
 " Come, come, don't be foolish, Ninitta ! You 
 know as well as I do that there is no danger, if 
 you are only careful." 
 
 And putting aside his palette again, he soothed 
 her with soft words until she was calm enough to 
 be sent home. 
 
 When she was gone, he shrugged his shoulders, 
 and spread out his hands with a deprecatory 
 gesture. 
 
 "After all," he soliloquized aloud, "it is difificult 
 for civilization to get on without the sultan's sack 
 and bowstring." 
 
XXV 
 
 AFTER SUCH A PAGAN CUT. 
 
 Henry VIII. ; i. — 3. 
 
 THE announcement by the Secretary of the 
 St. Filipe Club that a vote of censure had been 
 passed upon Fenton had not only caused a tempest 
 of excitement, but had brought about the unex- 
 pected result of eliciting testimony to prove that 
 the charge against him was without foundation. 
 Men came forward to testify that Snaffle entered 
 the club alone on the evening when Fenton was 
 said to have brought him there, while Tom Bently, 
 Ainsworth, and others had seen the artist come in 
 afterward, and had spoken with him before he went 
 upstairs with Fred Rangely to the card-room. 
 The Executive Committee found itself in a most 
 awkward predicament, and its members took what 
 comfort they could in pitching upon the Secretary, 
 who had, without authorization, announced the 
 vote of censure on the call for the monthly meet- 
 ing. He was now directed to write to Mr. Fenton 
 a letter of apology, which he did with such small 
 grace as he could command, taking the precaution 
 to mark the note "confidential." 
 
 The artist experienced more than a feeling of 
 298 
 
AFTER SUCH A PAGAN CUT. 
 
 299 
 
 conscious virtue at being thus exonerated from a 
 fault which he had committed ; and it was with 
 mingled glee and a certain dare-devil desperation 
 that he resolved upon his own course of action. 
 
 The monthly meeting of the St. Filipe came on 
 the evening of the day when Mrs. Staggchase gave 
 her luncheon. By a misunderstanding of Kenton's 
 wishes, his wife had invited friends to dine that 
 night. He meant to excuse himself after dinner 
 and go to the club for a short time, returning to 
 his guests after he had said a few words upon 
 which he had determined. 
 
 The guests were Mr. and Mrs. Stewart Hub- 
 bard, Helen Greyson, Ethel Mott, Miss Catherine 
 Penwick, Thayer Kent, the Rev. De Lancy Cand- 
 ish, and Fred Rangely. It was wholly by chance, 
 and without malicious intent that Edith assigned 
 Ethel to Mr. Kent, while Rangely took Mrs. Grey- 
 son in to dinner. Mrs. Fenton, of course, knew 
 that gossip had sometimes connected the names of 
 Ethel and Rangely in a speculative way, but she 
 partly suspected and partly knew by feminine in- 
 tuition that Fred was practically out of the run- 
 ning, and that Ethel's heart was given to Thayer 
 Kent. It was hardly to be expected that Rangely 
 should be pleased at the sight of his rival's advan- 
 tage ; but having passed the morning in squiring 
 Miss Merrivale, his conscience was hardly case- 
 hardened enough to have made him at his ease had 
 he been able to exchange places with Kent. 
 
;oo 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 To Mr. Candish was given the care of Miss 
 Penwick, since with her Edith knew that his sen- 
 sitive awkwardness would be as comfortable as 
 was possible with any one ; and the guests were so 
 arranged that the clergyman sat upon his hostess's 
 left hand, being thus in a manner intrenched be- 
 tween her and Miss Penwick against the raillery 
 which Mrs. Fenton knew her husband would press 
 as far as his position as host would allow. Edith 
 always made it a point to do all that she could for 
 Mr. Candish's comfort, and it was largely on his 
 account that she had included Miss Penwick in the 
 list of guests. She had a certain tenderness for 
 the forlorn old lady, but it might not have found 
 active expression had not the rector's pleasure 
 come into the question. Arthur had laughed when 
 the proposed arrangement was submitted to him. 
 
 "Does your care for your pastor's spiritual wel- 
 fare go so far," he asked jocosely, '' that you don't 
 dare trust him with a young woman 1 Really, it 
 looks as if you were jealous of the red-haired 
 angel." 
 
 " Mr. Candish is not a young woman's man," 
 had been Edith's answer ; whereat her husband 
 laughed again. 
 
 The talk at dinner was less animated than was 
 usual at Fenton's table. The host was preoccu- 
 pied, despite his efforts not to appear so, and the 
 company was somehow not fully in touch. No 
 conversation could be wholly dull, however, which 
 
AFTER SUCH A PAG AX CUT. 301 
 
 Arthur led; and while the "lady's finger" in his 
 cheek told his wife and Helen that he was laboring 
 under some intense excitement, he held himself 
 pluckily in hand. 
 
 The conversation at first was between neighbors, 
 but soon the host, according to his fashion, began 
 to answer any remark that his quick ears caught, 
 no matter from whose lips. 
 
 " You talk about marriage like a Pagan," he 
 heard Helen say to Rangely. 
 
 "■ Oh, no," Fenton broke in, " he doesn't go 
 half far enough for a Pagan. The Pagan position 
 is that matrimony is a matter of temperament and 
 convenience ; it is essentially Philistine to consider 
 that a marriage ceremony imposes eternal obliga- 
 tions." 
 
 " There, Mr. Fenton," Mrs. Hubbard rejoined, 
 *' I haven't heard you say anything so heathenish 
 for half a dozen years. I hoped your wife had 
 reformed you." 
 
 " Or that he had come to years of discretion," 
 suggested Mr. Hubbard, with his charming smile. 
 
 *' Oh, but I find years of indiscretion so much 
 more interesting," Fenton retorted. 
 
 A moment later Helen said something about the 
 truth, and Rangely retorted, — 
 
 *' Truth is generally what one wishes to be- 
 lieve." 
 
 " Except in Puritanism," broke in Arthur, ''there 
 it was whatever one didn't wish to believe." 
 
302 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ''Don't you think," questioned Mr. Hubbard, 
 "that you are always a little hard on the Puritans? 
 You must admire their conviction and their bra- 
 very." 
 
 "Oh, yes," was Fenton's reply; "there is some- 
 thing superb in the earnestness of the Puritans, 
 and their absorption in one idea ; but that idea 
 has left its birthmark of gloom on all their de- 
 scendants, and one cannot forget that Puritanism 
 was the soil from which sprang the unbelief of to- 
 day." 
 
 " Bless us ! " cried Rangely, " is Saul also among 
 the prophets ? Are you also condemning un- 
 belief .? " 
 
 " Not at all," said Fenton, coolly, " I only want 
 those who defend Puritanism to accept its legiti- 
 mate results." 
 
 " It seems to me," protested Mr. Candish, who 
 had become very red according to his unfortunate 
 wont ; " that if you argue in that way, you must 
 always condemn good, because evil may come 
 after it." 
 
 " Oh, I do," retorted Fenton, airily. 
 
 Everybody except the clergyman laughed at the 
 unexpectedness of this reply ; but Mr. Candish 
 was wounded by the most faint suspicion of any- 
 thing like trifling with sacred things. 
 
 " My husband is utterly abandoned, as you see, 
 Mr. Candish," said Edith, coming to the rescue, 
 as she always did when Arthur showed signs of 
 
AFTER SUCH A PAGAN CUT. 
 
 303 
 
 baiting the rector. '' Is the decision made in 
 regard to the America ? " she continued, turning 
 to Mr. Hubbard, by way of changing the subject. 
 
 ** Yes," he answered, *' the commission is to be 
 given to Orin Stanton." 
 
 ".Orin Stanton .^ " asked Kent. *' Who is he ? " 
 
 '*' Oh, he," returned Fenton, "■ is a man that had 
 the misfortune to be born with a wooden toothpick 
 in his mouth instead of a silver spoon." 
 
 " Is he^Uisi^^Il 
 
 " No, but he ought to be to have won favor in 
 the sight of a conimittee appointed by the Boston 
 City Government. "J) 
 
 ''Come," said Helen; "that is rather severe 
 when Mr. Hubbard is on the committee." 
 
 ''Oh, I don't mind," returned Hubbard. "I 
 know Fenton wouldn't lose a chance of having his 
 fling at the Irish." 
 
 " Well," Fenton explained, defensively, " I am 
 always irritated at the pity of the United States 
 having expended so much blood and treasure to 
 free itself from the dominion of the whole of Great 
 Britain simply to sink into dependence upon so 
 insignificant a part of that kingdom as Ireland." 
 
 " Mercy ! " exclaimed Miss Penwick. " What ex- 
 treme sentiments ! " 
 
 They smiled at the old lady's words, and then 
 Edith went back to the statue. 
 
 " I fancy young Stanton hasn't been above some 
 wire-pulling," she remarked. "He sent his pros- 
 
304 
 
 THE rniLisriNES. 
 
 pective sister-in-law, Melissa Blake, to ask me to 
 use my influence with Uncle Peter in his behalf." 
 
 '' He needn't have troubled," Mr, Hubbard re- 
 turned. "■ Mr. Calvin supported him from the 
 first." 
 
 " Oh, yes," Ethel said ; " Mrs. Frostwinch and 
 Mrs. Bodewin Ranger chose Stanton long ago and 
 persuaded Mr. Calvin to help them." 
 
 " I can't fancy Mr. Calvin as anybody's tool," 
 commented Kent, who would have regarded his 
 companion's words as a trifle too frank to be 
 spoken at the table of Mr. Calvin's niece, had his 
 mind been in a condition to take exception to any- 
 thing that she said. 
 
 *' Isn't that Melissa Blake," asked Mr. Hubbard 
 of Edith, '' the one you recommended to me as a 
 copyist } " 
 
 " Yes, I hope you found her satisfactory." 
 
 Mr. Hubbard smiled somewhat grimly. 
 
 " Indeed he did not," broke in Mrs. Hubbard 
 speaking for him. *' She broke confidence." 
 
 " Broke confidence ! " echoed Edith, in aston- 
 ishment. '' Melissa Blake } " 
 
 *' Yes," Hubbard returned. " I really didn't 
 mean to tell you, but my wife, you see, has all 
 the indignation of a woman against a woman." 
 
 "But how did she break confidence?" de- 
 manded Edith. '' I would trust her as implicitly 
 as I would myself." 
 
 ''The papers she copied," was the reply, "were 
 
AFTER SUCH A PAG AX CUT. 305 
 
 the plans for a syndicate to put up mills at 
 Fentonville. We kept the scheme quiet until 
 the route of the new railroad should be decided, 
 and when we came before the Committee of the 
 House, the whole thing had been given away, and 
 the Wachusett men had even secured the chair- 
 man, Tom Greenfield. He lives in Fentonville 
 himself, and we had counted him at least as sure." 
 
 "That must have been the thing," placidly ob- 
 served Miss Penwick to Rangely, *' that Mr. Irons 
 was talking to Mrs. Sampson about, the night we 
 dined there to meet Miss Merrivale." 
 
 Rangely glanced up in vexation, to see if Miss 
 Mott were listening, and caught a gleam of mis- 
 chievous intelligence from her eyes. 
 
 " I don't remember it," he answered ambigu- 
 ously. 
 
 " But how do you know," persisted Edith, " that 
 the information came from Miss Blake } " 
 
 "Because Mr. Staggchase found out at Fenton- 
 ville afterward that she came from there, and that 
 a young man she is engaged to had just forfeited 
 on a mortgage some of the meadows our company 
 was to buy." 
 
 "The evidence doesn't seem to me conclusive," 
 remarked Fenton, "and simply as a matter of 
 family unity I am bound to believe in my wife's 
 proteges!' 
 
 Even the faint sense of humor which he felt at 
 the situation could not prevent him from experi- 
 
3o6 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 encing the sting of self-shame. Had it been an 
 equal who was unjustly accused of a fault he had 
 committed he would have felt less humiliated. 
 To the degradation of having betrayed Hubbard, 
 the addition of this last touch of having also un- 
 consciously injured an inferior came to him like 
 the exquisite irony of fate. He wondered in an 
 abstract and dispassionate way whether the ghost 
 of all his misdeeds were continually to rise before 
 him. '' Really," he said to himself with a smile 
 that curled his lips " in that case I shall become 
 a perfect Macbeth." And at that instant the 
 ghost most dreadful of all rose at the feast like 
 that of Banquo as Rangely said, — 
 
 " I knocked at your studio this morning but 
 couldn't get in." 
 
 There flashed through Teuton's mind all the 
 possibilities of discovery and disaster that might 
 lie behind this remark, and his one strong feeling 
 was that it would be unsafe to venture on a defi- 
 nite statement ; he took refuge in the vaguest of 
 general remarks. 
 
 " I am sorry not to have seen you," he said. 
 
 He tried to reflect, while Edith said something 
 further in defence of Melissa. He joked with 
 Ethel about the probable appearance of the statue 
 young Stanton would make, which was to be set 
 up directly opposite her father's house. He no- 
 ticed that Helen was very silent, and he even 
 reflected how handsome a man was Thayer Kent ; 
 
AFTER SUCH A PAG AX CUT. 
 
 307 
 
 but through it all he seemed to hear the echo of 
 that knock upon his studio door and a foreboding 
 which he could not shake off made him reflect 
 gloomily how utterly defenceless he should be in 
 case of discovery. 
 
 A brief silence suddenly recalled him to his 
 duties as host, and he caught quickly at the first 
 topic which presented itself to his mind, going 
 back to the question of the America, which had 
 been much discussed because the funds to pay for 
 it had been bequeathed to the city by a woman of 
 ptominent social position. 
 
 \^I suppose," he observed, turning to Hubbard, 
 "that with two such lights of the art world as 
 Peter Calvin and Alfred Irons on the committee, 
 the new statue will be regarded as the flower of 
 Boston culture. Of all droll things," he added, 
 "nothing could be funnier than coupling those 
 two men. It is more striking l^ian the lion and 
 the lamb of Scriptural prophecy.' ; 
 
 "Who is the lion and who the lamb?" asked 
 Candish. 
 
 " It is your place to apply Scripture, not mine," 
 retorted Fenton. 
 
 " I represent the minority of the committee," 
 was Hubbard's reply to his host's question. 
 " There is no other position so safe in matters of 
 art as that of an objector." 
 
 " That is because art appeals to the most sensi- 
 tive of human characteristics," Arthur retorted 
 smiling, — " human vanity." 
 
3o8 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 '' Vanity ? " echoed Mrs. Hubbard. 
 
 " That from you } " exclaimed Miss Mott. 
 
 "Really, Mr. Fenton," protested Miss Penwick, 
 in accents of real concern, '• you shouldn't say 
 such a thing ; there are so many people who would 
 suppose you meant it." 
 
 The simple old creature knew no more of the 
 real meaning of art than she did of that of the 
 hieroglyphics on an Egyptian obelisk, but she had 
 lectured on it, and she felt for it the deep rever- 
 ence common to those who label their superstition 
 with the name "culture." 
 
 " But I do mean it," returned Fenton, becoming 
 more animated from the pleasure of defending an 
 extravagant position. " What is the object of art 
 but to perpetuate and idealize the emotions of the 
 race ; and how does it touch men, except by flat- 
 tering their vanity with the assumption that they 
 individually share the grand passions of mankind." 
 
 A chorus of protests arose ; but Arthur went on, 
 laughingly over-riding it. 
 
 "Really," he said, "we all care for the Apollo 
 Belvidere and the Venus of Milo because it tickles 
 our vanity to view the physical perfection of the 
 race to which we belong ; it is our own possibili- 
 ties of anguish that we pity in the Laocoon and 
 the Niobe ; it is " — 
 
 "Oh, come, Fenton," interrupted Rangely ; 
 " we all know that you can be more deliciously 
 wrongheaded than any other live man, but you 
 
AFTER SUCH A PAGAN CUT. 
 
 309 
 
 can't expect us to sit quietly by while you abuse 
 art." 
 
 ''That is more absolute Philistinism," put in 
 Hubbard, " than anything I have heard from Mr. 
 Irons even." 
 
 " Oh ; Philistinism," was Fenton's rejoinder, 
 " is Jiot nearly so bad as the inanities that are 
 talked about it." 
 
 "That sounds like a personal thrust at Mr. 
 Hubbard," Kent observed ; and as Arthur dis- 
 claimed any intention of making it so, Mrs. Fenton 
 gave the signal for rising. 
 
XXVI 
 
 O, WICKED WIT AND GIFT. 
 
 Hamlet ; i. — 5. 
 
 IT was fortunate for Fenton's plans that most of 
 his guests had early engagements that evening, 
 and by nine o'clock he was able to leave the house 
 with Rangely to take his way to the meeting of 
 the Club. As they came out of the house, Thayer 
 Kent w^as just saying good-by to Miss Mott after 
 putting her into her carriage. Fenton's fear lest 
 he should be too late for the business meeting had 
 made him follow rather closely in the steps of his 
 departing guests, and he and Rangely were just in 
 time to hear Ethel say, — 
 
 '* But I am going that way and I will drop you 
 at the club." 
 
 Kent hesitated an instant, and then followed her 
 into the carriage. Fenton laughed as they drove 
 away. 
 
 " With Ethel Mott," he said, " that is equivalent 
 to announcing an engagement." 
 
 "Nonsense!" protested Fred, incredulously. 
 
 Fenton laughed again, a little maliciously. 
 
 '* Oh, I've been looking for it all winter," he 
 310 
 
(9, WICKED WIT AND GIFT. 3 1 j 
 
 said. ** Ever since you devoted yourself to Mrs. 
 Staggchase, and gave Thayer his innings. Well, 
 since you didn't want her, I don't know that she 
 could have done better." 
 
 Fenton pretty well understood the truth of the 
 matter in regard to Rangely's relations to Ethel, 
 and this little thrust was simply an instalment 
 toward the paying of sundry old scores. He had 
 never forgiven Fred for having taunted him, long 
 ago, with going over to Philistinism ; especially, 
 as he inwardly assured himself, that the difference 
 between their cases was that he had had the frank- 
 ness openly to renounce Paganism, while his com- 
 panion would not acknowledge his apostasy even 
 to himself. In Fenton's creed, self-deception was 
 put down as the greatest of crimes, and he had 
 fallen into the way of half unconsciously regarding 
 his inner frankness as a sort of expiation for what- 
 ever faults he might commit. 
 
 He chuckled inwardly at the discomfort which 
 he knew his remark brought to Fred, humorously 
 acknowledging himself to be a brute for thus tak- 
 ing advantage of circumstances with a man who 
 had just eaten his salt. The excitement of the 
 thing he was about to do had mounted into his 
 head like wine, and he hastened toward the club 
 with a feeling of buoyancy and exhilaration such 
 as he had not known for months. He laughed 
 and joked, ignoring Rangely's unresponsiveness ; 
 and when he entered the club parlors his cheeks 
 
312 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 were flushed and his eyes shone as in the old 
 Pagan days. 
 
 He was just in season. The monthly business 
 meeting was about being completed, and Fenton 
 had scarcely time to recover his breath before the 
 President said, — 
 
 " If there is no other business to come before 
 this meeting we will now adjourn." 
 
 Then P^enton stepped forward. 
 
 '' Mr. President," he said, in his smooth, clear 
 voice, only a trifle heightened in pitch by excite- 
 ment. 
 
 The President put up his eyeglasses and recog- 
 nized him. 
 
 "Mr. Fenton." 
 
 There was an instant hush in the room. Every 
 member of the club knew of the vote of censure, 
 which had excited much talk, and of which the 
 propriety had been violently discussed. A few 
 were awar(fthat the censure had been withdrawn, 
 and all were sufficiently well acquainted with Fen- 
 ton's high-spirited temperament to feel that some- 
 thing exciting was coming. 
 
 Fenton was too keenly alive to what he would 
 have called the stage effect to fail of appreciating 
 to the utmost the striking situation. He threw up 
 his head with a delicious sense of excitement, the 
 pleasing consciousness of a vain man who is pro- 
 ducing a strong and satisfactory impression, and 
 who feels in himself the ability to carry through 
 
6>, WICKED WIT AXD GIFT. 313 
 
 the thing he has undertaken. With a sort of 
 tingling double consciousness he felt at once the 
 enthusiasm of injured virtue at last triumphant, 
 and the mocking scorn of a Mephistopheles who 
 bejuggles dupes too dull to withstand him. He 
 looked around the meeting, and in a swift instant 
 noted who of friends or foes were present ; and 
 even tried to calculate in that brief instant what 
 would be the effect upon one and another of what 
 he was going to say. 
 
 "Mr. President," he began, deliberately, '* if I 
 may be pardoned a word of personal explanation, 
 I wish to say that the motion I am about to make 
 is not presented from personal motives. I might 
 make this motion as one who has the right, having 
 suffered ; but I do make it as one who believes in 
 justice so strongly that I should still speak had my 
 own case been that of my worst enemy. I move 
 you, sir, that the St. Filipe Club pass a vote of 
 unqualified censure upon its Executive Committee 
 for admitting in the investigation of an alleged 
 violation of its rules the testimony of a servant, 
 thereby assuming that the word of a gentleman 
 could not be taken in answer to any question the 
 committee had a right to ask." 
 
 He had grown pale with excitement as he went 
 on, and his voice gained in force until the last 
 words were clear and ringing to the farthest 
 corners of the 100m. 
 
 A universal stir succeeded the silence with 
 
314 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 which he had been heard. Half a dozen men were 
 on their feet at once amid a babble of comment, 
 protestation, and approval. The Secretary man- 
 aged to get the floor. 
 
 ''Mr. President," he said, his round face flushed 
 with anger, and his fat hands so shaking with 
 excitement that the papers on the table before 
 him rustled audibly, " since it must be evident 
 that the gentleman's remarks are instigated by 
 anger at the committee's treatment of himself, it 
 is only justice to the committee to state what 
 many of the members may not know, that a letter 
 of ample apology has been sent by them to Mr. 
 Fenton." 
 
 The men who had been eager to speak paused 
 at this, and everybody looked at the artist. 
 
 *' Mr. President," he said, with a delightful 
 sense of having himself perfectly in hand, and of 
 being in an unassailable position, " I have been in- 
 sulted by the committee under cover of a charge 
 which they now acknowledge to be false ; and, 
 contrary to the usage of the club, a printed notice 
 of this has been sent to every member. I have 
 received a note of apology from the Secretary." 
 
 He paused just long enough to let those who 
 were taking sides against him emphasize their 
 satisfaction at this acknowledgment by half-sup- 
 pressed exclamations ; then, in a voice of cutting 
 smoothness, he continued, — 
 
 "■ At the head of that note was the word * con- 
 
0, WICKED WIT AND GIFT. 3 i 5 
 
 fidential,' which forbade me, as a gentleman, to 
 show it. This was evidently the committee's idea 
 of reparation for the outrage of that printed cir- 
 cular." 
 
 He paused again, and the impression that he 
 was making was evident from the fact that nobody 
 attempted to deprive him of the floor ; then he 
 went on again, — 
 
 " I have already said that my motion was not a 
 personal matter ; if my case serves as an illustra- 
 tion, so much the better, as long as the principle 
 is enforced." 
 
 **The motion," interposed the President, gather- 
 ing his wits together, " has not been seconded, 
 and is therefore not debatable." 
 
 " I second it," roared Tom Bently in his big 
 voice, adding sotto voce : " We won't let the fun 
 be spoiled for a little thing like that." 
 
 The half laugh that followed this sally seemed 
 to recall men from the state of astonishment into 
 which they had been thrown by the audacity of 
 Fenton's attack. There were plenty of men to 
 speak now; — men who thought Fenton's position 
 absurd ; — men who believed in upholding the dig- 
 nity of the Executive Committee; — men, more 
 revolutionary, who were always pleased to see the 
 existing order of things attacked; — men who 
 wanted explanations, and men who offered them ; 
 — men who rose to points of order, and men who 
 proposed amendments ; with the inevitable men 
 
3i6 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 who are always in a state of oratorical effervescence, 
 and who speak upon every occasion, quite without 
 reference to having anything to say. 
 
 Fenton was keenly alive to everything that was 
 said, and in his excitement fell into the mood not 
 uncommon with people of his temperament of re- 
 garding the whole debate from an almost im- 
 personal standpoint. His sense of humor was 
 constantly appealed to, and he laughed softly to 
 himself with a feeling of amusement scarcely 
 tinged by concern for the result of the contest 
 when Mr. Ranger, stately and ponderous, got 
 upon his feet. He could have told with reason- 
 able precision the inconsequent remarks which 
 were to come ; and the interruption which they 
 made appealed to his sense of the ludicrous as 
 strongly as it irritated many impatient members. 
 
 "I am confident," began Mr. Ranger with digni- 
 fied deliberation, *' that all the excitement which 
 seems to be manifest in many of the remarks that 
 have been made is wholly uncalled for. I am sure 
 no member of this club can suppose for an instant 
 that its Executive Committee can have intention- 
 ally been guilty of any discourtesy, and far less of 
 any wrong to a member. And we all have too 
 much confidence in their ability to suppose that 
 they could fall into error in so important a thing 
 as a matter of discipline. And I need not add," 
 he went on, not even the real respect in which he 
 was held being able wholly to suppress the move- 
 
6>, WICKED WIT AND GIFT. 317 
 
 ment of impatience with which he was heard, 
 *' that we all must hold Mr. Fenton not only as 
 blameless but as painfully aggrieved." 
 
 *' Mr. Facing-both-ways," said Fenton to himself 
 as the speaker paused, apparently to consider what 
 could be added to his lucid exposition of the situa- 
 tion. 
 
 One or two men had the hardihood to rise, but 
 the President had too much respect for Mr. 
 Ranger's hoary locks to deprive him of the floor. 
 
 " It seems to me," the speaker continued, 
 placidly, ** that this is a matter which is better 
 adjusted in private. The discipline of the club 
 must be maintained, and individual feeling should 
 be respected ; but where we all have the welfare 
 of the club at heart, it seems to me that members 
 would find no difficulty in amicably adjusting their 
 differences with the club officials in private con- 
 ference." 
 
 He gazed earnestly at the opposite wall a 
 moment, as if seeking for further inspiration. 
 Then as no handwriting appeared thereon, he 
 resumed his seat with the same deliberate dignity 
 that had marked his rising. 
 
 Mr. Staggchase, alert and business-like as usual, 
 next obtained the floor. 
 
 " As chairman of the Executive Committee," he 
 said, ** perhaps I am too much in the position of a 
 prisoner at the bar for it to be in good taste for 
 me to speak on this motion. Naturally I do know 
 
3i8 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 something, however, about the circumstances of 
 this case, and I am willing to say frankly that I 
 cannot blame Mr. Fenton for feeling aggrieved at 
 the painful position in which he has been placed 
 entirely without fault on his part. It is only just 
 to the committee, however, to state that the 
 charge as presented to them in the first place 
 was supported by evidence which appeared to 
 them convincing ; that Mr. Fenton never denied 
 it ; and that I and, I presume, every member of 
 the committee supposed until this evening that 
 the letter of apology sent him had been ample and 
 satisfactory. That it was marked ' confidential ' 
 was certainly not the fault of the committee, who 
 now learn this fact for the first time." 
 
 This statement evidently produced a strong im- 
 pression, Fenton felt that it told against him, 
 yet he was more irritated at what he considered 
 the stupidity of the members in not seeing that 
 Mr. Staggchase had not touched upon the point at 
 issue at all, than he was by the injury done to his 
 cause. In the midst of the excitement raging 
 about him he sat, outwardly perfectly calm and 
 collected. He refused to admit to himself that 
 after all there was little probability of his motion's 
 being carried ; although in truth at the outset he 
 had intended nothing more than to take this strik- 
 ing method of stating his grievance against the 
 committee. He was amused and delisrhted at the 
 commotion he had caused. He likened himself 
 
O, WICKED WIT AND GIFT. 31Q 
 
 to the man who had sown the dragon's teeth, and 
 while listening keenly to what was being said, he 
 rummaged about in his memory for the name of 
 that doughty classic hero. 
 
 It was with a shock that it came upon him all 
 at once that the tide was turning against him. 
 There had been warm expressions of sympathy 
 with himself and of disapprobation at the course 
 of the committee ; and Grant Herman had an- 
 nounced his intention of offering another motion, 
 when this should have been disposed of, to the 
 effect that a printed notice of the removal of the 
 vote of censure be sent to each member of the 
 club ; but it was evident that there was a general 
 feeling that Fenton's attitude was too extreme. 
 The club was evidently willing to exonerate him 
 and to offer such reparation as lay in its power, 
 but it was not prepared formally to rebuke its com- 
 mittee. The debate had continued nearly an hour, 
 and speakers were beginning to say the same 
 things over and over. At the farther end of the 
 room some men began to call ''question." The word 
 brought Fenton to his feet like the lash of a whip ; 
 he put his hands upon his chest as if he were 
 panting for breath, his eyes were fairly blazing 
 with excitement, and when he spoke his voice 
 shook with the intensity of his emotion. 
 
 "Mr. President," he began, "it seems to me 
 that the honor of this club is in question. It had 
 not occurred to me to regard this so much a per- 
 
320 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 sonal affront as an insult to the club which has 
 elected me to its membership. It is forced upon 
 me by the remarks that have been made to look 
 at the personal side of the matter. Gentlemen 
 have been insisting that I am seeking reparation 
 for an insult which they acknowledge has been 
 offered me ; which they acknowledge has been 
 gratuitous, and to which all the publicity has been 
 given which lay within the power of the officers of 
 this club. Very well, then, far as it was from my 
 original intention, I present my personal grievance 
 and I claim redress. The vote of censure which 
 the committee has passed upon me I regard as 
 merely a stupid and offensive blunder ; the impli- 
 cation conveyed by listening to a servant in rela- 
 tion to a charge against a member is an insult to 
 him as a gentleman, which, to me personally, 
 seems too intolerable to be endured. I came into 
 this club as to a body of gentlemen, and I have a 
 right to claim at your hands that I shall be treated 
 as such by its officers." 
 
 Fenton had many enemies in the St. Filipe, but 
 the splendid dash and audacity of his manner, even 
 more than his words, produced a tremendous 
 effect. There was an instant's hush as he ended, 
 and then the voice of Tom Bently, big and vibrat- 
 ing, rang through the room in defiance of all rules 
 of order and of all the proprieties as well. 
 
 "■ By God ! He is right ! " said Tom, and a burst 
 of applause answered him. 
 
O, WICKED IVIT AND GIFT. 321 
 
 The day was won, and although there were a few 
 protests, they were silenced by cries of " Question ! 
 Question ! " and the motion was carried by a ma- 
 jority which, if not overwhelming-, was large 
 enough to be without question. 
 
 '* The motion is carried," announced the presi- 
 dent. 
 
 Fenton rose to his feet again. 
 
 ''Gentlemen," he said, ''I cannot resist the 
 temptation personally to thank you. Mr. Presi- 
 dent, I have now the honor to tender you my res- 
 ignation from the St. Filipe Club." 
 
 He bowed and turned to walk from the room. 
 He was full of a wild exultation over his success, 
 and he reasoned quickly with himself that even if 
 his resignation were accepted, he retired in good 
 order. He had, too, a half-defined feeling that in 
 thus tempting fate still further, he made a sort of 
 expiatory offering for his actual guilt. He said to 
 himself, with that lightning-like quickness which 
 thought possesses in a crisis, that since the princi- 
 ple for which he contended stood above the ques- 
 tion of his individual transgression, it was but just 
 that the motion should have been carried, and that 
 now he was ready to take his punishment by losing 
 his membership in the St. Filipe. 
 
 But before he had gone half a dozen steps, two 
 or three men had called out impulsively, — 
 
 " Mr. President ! I move this resignation be not 
 accepted." 
 
322 THE PHILISTIXES. 
 
 There were plenty of men there who would 
 gladly have seen Fenton leave the club ; the 
 members of the Executive Committee were smart- 
 ing under the rebuke he had brought upon them ; 
 but the excitement of the moment, the admiration 
 which courage and dash always excite, carried all 
 before them. The motion was voted with noise 
 enough to make it at least seem hearty, and with 
 no outspoken negatives to prevent its appearing 
 unanimous. His friends dragged him back and 
 insisted upon drinking with him, the formalities of 
 adjournment being swallowed up in the uproar. 
 His triumph could not have been more complete, 
 and its celebration, with much discussion, much 
 congratulation and not a little wine, lasted until 
 midnight. 
 
 And all the while, as he talked and jested and 
 argued and laughed and drank, his brain was 
 playing with the question of right and wrong as 
 a child with a shuttlecock. Without a hearty 
 conviction of the absolute justice of the principle 
 for which he contended, it is doubtful if Fenton 
 could have acted the lie of assumed innocence. 
 He had entangled the question of his guilt with 
 that of the propriety of the action of the committee 
 so inextricably that one could scarcely be taken 
 up without the other. He admired himself as an 
 actor, he approved of himself as a logician, and 
 he despised himself — without any heart-burning 
 bitterness — as a liar. He was too clear-headed 
 
O, WICKED WIT AND GIFT. 323 
 
 to be able to bejuggle himself with the reasoning 
 that he had not been guilty of falsehood because 
 he had never specifically and in word denied the 
 charge of the committee. Yet with all his pride 
 in his self-comprehension, he really deceived him- 
 self. He supposed himself to have been animated 
 by the desire to establish a principle in which he 
 really believed, to conquer and humiliate the Sec- 
 retary, and to please himself by acting an amus- 
 ing role ; while in truth he had been instigated by 
 his dominant selfish instinct of self-preservation. 
 But he thoroughly enjoyed his triumph, and by 
 the time he left the house he seemed to have 
 established himself on quite a new footing of 
 friendship with even the members of the Execu- 
 tive Committee. 
 
 As he went down the steps of the club, starting 
 for home, Chauncy Wilson said to him, with his 
 usual rough jocularity, — 
 
 *' I'll bet you a quarter, Fenton, you did bring 
 Snaffle in that night, after all. By the way, did 
 you know that Princeton Platinum had gone all to 
 flinders?" 
 
XXVII 
 
 UPON A CHURCH BENCH, 
 
 Much Ado about Nothing ; iii. — 3. 
 
 WHEN Fenton went to the club that night he 
 left Helen Greyson and Mr. Candish, both 
 of whom were sufficiently familiar to excuse the 
 informality. The combination of the clergyman 
 and the sculptor might seem likely to be incon- 
 gruous, but the two had much more in common 
 than at first sight appeared. Fenton had been 
 right in declaring that Helen was by instinct a 
 Puritan. It was true that she had shaken herself 
 free from all the fetters of old creeds and that her 
 religious beliefs were of the most liberal. The 
 essence of Puritanism, however, was not its 
 dogmas, but its strenuous earnestness, its exalta- 
 tion of self-denial, and its distrust of the guidance 
 of the senses. ^ 
 
 The original Puritans made their religion satisfy 
 their aesthetic sense, even while they were insist- 
 ing upon the virtue of starving that part of their 
 nature. To believe literally and with a realizing 
 sense of its meaning the creed of Calvin, would 
 have been impossible without madness to any 
 324 
 
UPON A CHURCH B-KXCH. 
 
 325 
 
 nature short of the incarnate inhumanity of a 
 Jonathan Edwards. The aesthetic sense of hu- 
 manity demands that the imagination shall be 
 nourished ; and the imagination is fed by receiving- 
 things as only ideally true. The Puritans were 
 right in declaring that art was hostile to religion 
 as they conceived it ; but they failed to perceive 
 that this hostility arose from the fact that the 
 acceptance of their theology was only possible in 
 virtue of the very faculties to which art appealed. 
 They were obliged to deprive the imagination of 
 its natural food, in order that it should be forced 
 to feed upon that the assimilation of which they 
 conceived to be a moral obligation. It may, at 
 first sight, seem a bold assertion that our Puritan 
 ancestors believed their creed, however uncon- 
 sciously, simply in the sense in which we believe 
 in the bravery of the heroes of Homer or in the 
 loves and sorrows of the heroines of Shakespeare. 
 It is to be reflected, however, that those unhappy 
 creatures who attempted to receive Calvinism 
 literally and absolutely paid for their mistake 
 with madness ; and that it did not enter into the 
 minds of generations of Puritans, who lived and 
 died in the error that they believed with their un- 
 derstanding what they really received only with 
 the imagination, to take this view, in no way affects 
 its truth. 
 
 Helen's position differed from that of her Puri- 
 tan grandmothers from the fact of her having 
 
326 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 turned her imagination back to art ; but she 
 shared with them the temperament which made 
 Puritanism possible. The aesthetic sense, which 
 is as universal in mankind as the passions, clung 
 in her case to sensuous beauty, while that of Mr. 
 Candish clung to what he considered beauty 
 moral and spiritual ; but the controlling force in 
 the life of both was the stinging inspiration of a 
 fixed idea of duty. They were thus able, although 
 rather as a matter of unconscious sympathy than 
 of deliberate understanding, to comprehend each 
 other ; and if Helen had the broader sight, Mr. 
 Candish possessed the greater power of ignoring 
 self. 
 
 Edith stood on a middle ground between the 
 two. At the time of her marriage she had been 
 much nearer to the position occupied by the 
 clergyman ; and she would have been startled and 
 shocked had she realized how much her views had 
 been modified during the six years of her life 
 with Fenton. She had certainly been led into 
 no toleration of moral laxity, and indeed the effect 
 of her husband's cynical Paganism had been to 
 make her dread more acutely any infringement 
 upon moral laws. She had been constantly learn- 
 ing, however, the enjoyment and appreciation of 
 beauty, not merely in a conventional and Philistine 
 sense, but as a pure Pagan asstheticism. The 
 change showed itself chiefly in her increased tol- 
 erance of views less rigid than her own, which 
 
UPO.V A CHURCH BKXCH. 
 
 27 
 
 made possible the perfecting of the intimacy with 
 Helen, which had begun simply from her sense of 
 pity for the sadness of the other's life. 
 
 "Isn't it charming," Edith said to-night, as the 
 three sat before the fire after Arthur had gone 
 out, "to see Mr. and Mrs. Hubbard together. 
 It's not only that they are so fond of each other, 
 but they are so perfectly in accord. It seems to 
 me an ideal marriage." 
 
 Helen looked at her with an inward sigh. 
 
 " It is much the fashion, nowadays," she said, 
 " to insist that the ideal marriage is no marriage 
 at all." 
 
 Mr. Candish looked at her inquiringly. 
 
 " Or, in other words," she explained, with a 
 passing thought of his want of quickness of appre- 
 hension, "that no marriage can be ideal." 
 
 " Or anything else, for that matter," put in 
 Edith quickly. "The iconoclasts of this genera- 
 tion will spare absolutely nothing." 
 
 " These objectors don't take into account," 
 observed Mr. Candish, " that if we once begin to 
 give up things because their possibilities are not 
 realized, we shall soon end by having nothing left. 
 Plenty of people do not live up to the possibilities 
 of marriage, but the fact is that the trouble is with 
 themselves. The blame that they lay on the 
 institution really belongs on their own shoulders." 
 
 "Yes," agreed Edith; "like everything else it 
 comes back to a question of egotism." 
 
328 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " And egotism," added Helen, smiling, yet wist- 
 fully, "is the supreme evil." 
 
 Mr. Candish nodded approvingly. 
 "I don't know," he said, "that a bachelor like 
 myself has any right to discuss marriage, except 
 on general principles ; but certainly, even with- 
 out taking the religious view of it, one can see 
 that the very objections brought against wedlock 
 are reasons in its favor." 
 
 "Yes," Edith returned, but she moved uneasily 
 in her chair, and Helen divined that the subject 
 was painful to her. 
 
 "The difficulty is," she said, with an air of 
 dismissing the whole subject, "that most people 
 marry for the honeymoon and very few for the 
 whole life." 
 
 She fell to thinking in an absorbed mood which 
 was not wholly free from irritation, how constantly 
 this question of marriage met one at every turn, as 
 if the whole fabric of life, social and ethical, de- 
 pended entirely upon this institution. She sighed 
 a little impatiently, looking into the fire with 
 mournful eyes. She thought of the marriages with 
 which her destiny had been most intimately con- 
 nected, her own ill-starred mating, the union of 
 Herman and Ninitta, that of Fenton and Edith. 
 She had long ago settled in her own mind that 
 wedlock was not only the mainstay of society, but 
 that it was largely a concession to the weakness 
 of her sex ; and yet instinctively she protested ; 
 
UPON A CHURCH BENCH. 329 
 
 that revolt against being a woman which few of her 
 sex have failed at one time or another to experi- 
 ence taking the form of a revolt against matri- 
 mony. 
 
 '' Indeed," she broke out, half humorously and 
 half pathetically, *'the most joyful promise for the 
 Christians hereafter is that they shall neither 
 marry nor be given in marriage." 
 
 Mr. Candish looked a little shocked ; but Edith 
 said softly, — 
 
 ''That is only possible when they become as 
 the Sons of God." 
 
 Helen spread out her hands in a deprecatory 
 gesture. 
 
 ** Come, Edith," she said, " that isn't fair, to take 
 the discussion into regions where I can't follow 
 you." 
 
 Edith smiled, but made no rejoinder in words. 
 Turning to Mr. Candish she remarked, with an 
 abrupt change of subject, — 
 
 " When may I tell Melissa Blake about the 
 Knitting School.?" 
 
 ** I see no reason," he answered, " why she 
 shouldn't know at once. We shall be ready to 
 begin operations in a month at most, and ought to 
 know her decision." 
 
 " Isn't it capital .'' " Edith explained, turning 
 toward Helen. ''The Knitting School is really to 
 be started. Mrs. Bodewin Ranger guarantees the 
 funds for a year, and we have contracts for work 
 
330 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 to be delivered in the fall that will keep from a 
 dozen to twenty girls busy all summer ; while the 
 matron's salary will put Melissa Blake on her feet 
 very nicely. It's such a relief to have some of 
 those girls provided for." 
 
 " That's the Melissa Blake, isn't it," Helen 
 asked, " that Mr. Hubbard spoke of at dinner } " 
 
 " Yes," answered Edith, " but it is impossible 
 that he should be right." 
 
 Helen replied only by that look of general sym- 
 pathy which does duty as an answer when one has 
 no possible interest in the subject under discus- 
 sion, but Mr. Candish, who knew Melissa, shook 
 his head with an air of conviction. 
 
 *' No," he observed, " Miss Blake has too 
 much principle to be guilty of a breach of 
 confidence. I am sure Mr. Hubbard must be 
 mistaken." 
 
 ''And yet," commented Helen, "there is such a 
 general feeling that if one keeps the letter of his 
 word he may do as he pleases about the spirit, 
 that she may have contrived to give her lover a 
 hint without actually breaking her promise as she 
 would understand it." 
 
 ''I don't know," Edith returned earnestly, "that 
 we have any right to judge other people more 
 harshly than we should ourselves. If one of our 
 friends had betrayed Mr. Hubbard's plans we 
 should say he was a rascal because we should as- 
 sume that he knew what he was doing; and we 
 
UrOX A CHURCH BENCH. 331 
 
 wouldn't believe such a charge unless we knew he 
 vvas really bad." 
 
 Cj* But," persisted Helen, with an unconscious 
 irony which Fenton would have keenly appreciated 
 had he but been there to hear, " in our class of 
 course it's different. A nice sense of honor is 
 after all very much a social matter nowadays. 
 That may sound a bit snobbish, but don't you 
 think it is true V \ 
 
 "It is and it isn't," was Mr. Candish's reply. 
 " It would undoubtedly be true if religious princi- 
 ple did not come into the matter ; but religious 
 principle is stronger in what we call the middle 
 classes than among their social superiors." 
 
 Mrs. Greyson was not sufficiently interested to 
 continue the discussion, and she let the matter 
 drop, while Edith contented herself with reiterat- 
 ing her conviction in Melissa's perfect trustworthi- 
 ness. 
 
 They chatted upon indifferent subjects for a 
 little while, and then Mr. Candish went to keep 
 an appointment at the bedside of a sick parishioner ; 
 so that Helen and Edith were left alone. 
 
 They sat together a little longer, and then 
 Helen asked casually, — 
 
 " By the way, Edith, how long has Arthur been 
 painting Ninitta t " 
 
 " Painting Ninitta ? " echoed Edith. 
 
 She remembered the wrap she had seen in the 
 studio, with the wavering evasion of her husband's 
 
332 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 eyes when her glance had sought his in question, 
 and painful forebodings against which she had 
 striven, lest they should become suspicions, were 
 awakened by Helen's words. 
 
 '' Yes," the other went on. " Fred Rangely told 
 me at dinner to-night that he couldn't get into the 
 studio this morning because Arthur was painting 
 Mrs. Herman." 
 
 "What did you say to him } " asked Edith. 
 
 " I said," her companion returned, looking up in 
 surprise at her tone, " that I fancied the picture 
 must be intended as a surprise for Mr. Herman 
 and he'd better not speak of it." 
 
 " But," Edith objected, ''if Arthur told him she 
 was there " — 
 
 " He didn't," interrupted Helen ; *' a man outside 
 the door said he had seen her go in." 
 
 Edith grew pale as ashes. She evidently made 
 a strong effort at self-control ; and then, burying 
 her face in her hands, she burst into violent weep- 
 ing. Helen bent forward and put her arms about 
 her. She drew the quivering form close, resting 
 Edith's beautiful head upon her bosom. She did 
 not speak, but with soft, caressing touch she 
 smoothed the other's hair. She remembered 
 vividly the time, six years before, when Edith, 
 who had left her at nis-ht in indisrnation and dis- 
 approval, had come to her on the morning after 
 her husband's death. She could almost have said 
 to this weeping woman, the words with which she 
 remembered the other had then greeted her, — 
 
UPON A CHURCH BEA'CH. 33^ 
 
 **You must feel so lonely." 
 
 She dared not speak now. She feared to ask the 
 cause of this outburst, both lest Edith might be 
 led to say what she would afterward wish un- 
 spoken, and because she dreaded to hear unpleas- 
 ant truths in regard to Arthur. 
 
 "Oh, Helen," Edith sobbed. "Life is too 
 hard ! Life is too hard ! " 
 
 Still Helen did not answer, save by the caress 
 of her fingers. The tears were in her own eyes. 
 One woman instinctively appreciates the tragedy 
 of another's life, and her unspoken sympathy was 
 balm to Edith's soul. 
 
 " Come," she said, patting Edith's shoulder as 
 one might soothe a weeping child, " you're all 
 tired out. I can't take the responsibility of letting 
 you have hysterics ; Arthur would never leave you 
 alone with me again." 
 
 She spoke with as much lightness of tone as she 
 could command, while her embrace and her ca- 
 resses conveyed the sympathy she would not put 
 into words. 
 
 Presently Mrs. Fenton disengaged herself from 
 her companion's arms and sat up, wiping away her 
 tears. 
 
 "I must be tired," she said, "or I shouldn't be 
 so foolish." 
 
 " You do too much," Helen returned. Then, 
 with the design of giving her friend a chance to 
 retreat from their dangerous nearness to confi- 
 dences, she added, — 
 
334 
 
 THE PHILISTIXES. 
 
 "Now tell me what you've done to-day." 
 
 " I have done a good deal," the other replied, 
 smiling faintly and showing the recovery of her 
 self-possession by sundry little touches to the 
 crushed roses in her gown. '* At nine o'clock I 
 went to the Saturday Morning Club, to hear Mr. 
 Jefferson's paper on 'The Over-Soul in Budd- 
 hism ' ; then, at eleven, I went to Mrs. Gore's to 
 see an example of the way they teach deaf and 
 dumb children to read lip language ; then Arthur 
 and I went to luncheon at Christopher Plant's, and 
 at half past three was the meeting of the com- 
 mittee on the Knitting School ; then there was 
 the reception at Uncle Peter's, and the tea at 
 Mrs. West's, before I came home to dress for 
 dinner." 
 
 Helen leaned back in her chair and laughed 
 musically. She felt, with mingled relief and a 
 faint sense of disappointment, that her effort to 
 avoid a confidence had been successful. 
 
 " I should think," she said, " that you Boston 
 women would be worn to shreds, and I don't won- 
 der that you have a leaning toward hysterics. 
 Did you carry a clear idea of the Buddhistic over- 
 soul through all the things that came after it in 
 the day t " 
 
 She rose as she spoke, with the desire to hasten 
 away. She had little mind to know more than she 
 must of the causes of Edith's unhappiness. She 
 was glad to help her friend, but she felt that she 
 
UPON A CHURCH BENCH. 
 
 335 
 
 could do so no better from knowing anything 
 Edith could tell her ; and she was, moreover, sure 
 that Mrs. Fenton's loyal soul would bitterly regret 
 it if she were by the emotion of the minute be- 
 trayed into revelations that involved her husband. 
 
 "No," Edith answered, rising in her turn; *' I 
 am not even sure whether the Buddhists believe 
 themselves to have an over-soul. But why must 
 you go ? Wait, and let Arthur walk home with 
 you." 
 
 " Oh, I shall take a car," Helen said. '' I don't 
 in the least mind going alone; and it's time both 
 of us were in bed. Good-night, dear ; do try and 
 get rested." 
 
XXVIII 
 
 BEDECKING ORNAMENTS OF PRAISE. 
 
 Love's Labor's Lost ; ii. — i = 
 
 EDITH FENTON did not, however, follow 
 Helen's advice and go to bed. She went to 
 her room and exchanged her dinner gown for a 
 wrapper, and then sat down before the wood fire 
 in her chamber to wait for Arthur's return. 
 
 It is a dismal vigil when a wife watches for her 
 husband and questions herself of the love be- 
 tween them. It was Edith's conviction that it is 
 a wife's duty to love her husband till death ; 
 not alone to fulfil her wifely obligations, to pre- 
 serve an outward semblance of affection, but to 
 love him in her heart according to the vows she 
 has taken at the altar. Had one told her that 
 the limit of human power lay at self-deception, 
 and that, while it was possible to cheat one's self 
 into the belief of loving, affection could not be con- 
 strained, she would with perfect honesty have re- 
 plied as she had answered Helen in her allusion 
 to St. Theresa. She said to herself to-night, with 
 unshaken conviction and the concentration of all 
 her will, that she would not cease to love Arthur ; 
 
BEDECKING ORNAMENTS OF PRAISE. 
 
 337 
 
 but she could not wholly ignore the difference be- 
 tween the unquestioning affection she had once 
 given him and this love whose force lay in her 
 will. 
 
 A picture of Caldwell, painted a year ago just 
 before his long hair had been sacrificed at his boy- 
 ish entreaties, hung over her mantel. She looked 
 up at it while her lip quivered and her eyes filled 
 with tears. The keenly sensitive soul instead of 
 becoming hardened to suffering feels it more and 
 more sharply. The powers of endurance become 
 worn out, and to the pain is added a sense of 
 injustice. Since it suffered yesterday the heart 
 claims the right to be happy to-day, and feels 
 wronged that this is denied it. With all her 
 endurance, and with all her faith, Edith could 
 scarcely repress the feeling of passionate protest 
 which rose in her bosom. She said to herself that 
 she had done all, and been all, that lay in her 
 power ; that there was no sacrifice in life she was 
 not ready to make to preserve her husband's love ; 
 and the most cruel pang of all she felt in think- 
 ing of her boy. For herself, it seemed to her, she 
 could have borne anything ; but that the atmos- 
 phere of the home in which her son was reared 
 should fall short in anything of the utmost ideal 
 possibilities caused her intolerable anguish. It 
 seemed to her a cruel wrong to Caldwell that the 
 love and confidence between his parents should 
 not be perfect. It is probable that more of her 
 
338 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 personal pain was covered by this pity for her son 
 than she was aware ; but as she looked up at his 
 picture she felt almost as if he were half-orphaned 
 by this estrangement between herself and Arthur, 
 which it were vain for her to attempt to ignore. 
 
 It was after midnight when she heard the street 
 door open and close ; and a moment later came her 
 husband's tap. 
 
 '*I saw the light in your room, as I came down 
 street," he said. " What on earth kept you up 
 so late.?" 
 
 " I was waiting," Edith replied, " to talk with 
 you." 
 
 He came across the chamber, and regarded her 
 a moment curiously; then he turned away with a 
 slight shrug of the shoulders. 
 
 "You will perhaps excuse me," he said, "if I 
 make myself comfortable. I am pretty tired." 
 
 He went to his dressing-room, coming back a 
 moment later in smoking jacket and slippers, cut- 
 ting a cigar as he walked. The reaction from the 
 excitement of the evening already showed itself 
 in the darkened circles beneath his eyes, and the 
 pallor of his lips. 
 
 "Do you mind my smoking .-^ " he asked, care- 
 lessly. " We've been having the deuce of a time 
 at the club, and my nerves have all gone to pieces. 
 I tell you, Edith," he went on, a sudden spark of 
 excitement showing in his' eyes, " I've had a tre- 
 mendous row, but I've beaten. I made them pass 
 
BEDECKIXG ORNAMENTS OE PRAISE. 
 
 339 
 
 a vote of censure on the ICxecutive Committee, 
 and then Herman got them, to instruct the 
 Secretary to send out a printed notice taking 
 back that vote of theirs ; and then I offered my 
 resignation, and they voted unanimously not to 
 accept it." 
 
 *• I am so glad ! " Edith responded warmly. 
 " That censure was so outrageous. Tell me all 
 about it." 
 
 She was so pleased to find herself talking cor- 
 dially and intimately with her husband that she 
 forgot for the moment what she had meant to say 
 to him. She listened with eager interest while 
 he gave her a picturesque version of the exciting 
 scene at the club. Edith hardly realized how 
 little of the old familiarity there was now between 
 herself and Arthur. It was his nature to be com- 
 municative. He enjoyed talking, partly from his 
 pleasure in words and the delight he found in 
 effective and picturesque phrasing, and partly 
 because it pleased his vanity to excite attention 
 and to produce striking effects. He had an invet- 
 erate habit of telling his most intimate and inner 
 experiences in some sort of fantastic disguise. 
 The very vain man is apt to be either extremely 
 reticent or very communicative. The only secrets 
 which Fenton kept well were those which his 
 vanity guarded. As desire for admiration and 
 attention provoked him to continual revelations, 
 so the fear that the disclosure of a secret would 
 
340 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 react to his disadvantage could cause him to be 
 silent. 
 
 From the feeling that his wife disapproved of 
 much that he told her had grown up in Fenton's 
 mind, at first, an irritated desire to shock and 
 startle her as much as possible. As there came 
 into his life, however, things which he knew she 
 would view not only with disapproval but with 
 abhorrence, and especially since his entanglement 
 with Ninitta, he had grown constantly more 
 guarded in his speech. Edith felt keenly the loss 
 of the old familiar talks, though, womanlike, she 
 invented a thousand excuses to prevent herself 
 from believing in the growing estrangement of her 
 husband. To-night she yielded herself to the 
 pleasure of the moment, and she had almost for- 
 gotten both the sad thoughts of her vigil and the 
 fear that troubled her, as she listened to Arthur's 
 animated words. It was not until he rose as if 
 to say good-night, that her mind came back sud- 
 denly to the matter of which she wished to speak. 
 It was in a very different mood, however, from 
 that in which she would have spoken half an hour 
 before, that she now brought up the thing that 
 had been troubling her. She hesitated a little 
 how to question her husband without seeming to 
 jar upon the friendly tone in which they had been 
 talking. He was watching her keenly, wondering 
 why she had waited for his coming, and speculat- 
 ing whether it were possible that she might alto- 
 
BEDECKIXG ORNAMENTS OF PRAISE. 
 
 341 
 
 gether have forgotten what she meant to say. 
 He thought she was about to speak, and antici- 
 pated her by saying, — 
 
 " Really, Edith, it would be hard to find, even 
 in Boston, a more incongruous company than we 
 gathered together at dinner to-night." 
 
 *' There was a good deal of variety," she re- 
 turned ; adding defensively, " but then they fitted 
 together pretty well." 
 
 '' What a funny old party Miss Penwick is," 
 Arthur went on, inwardly gathering himself up 
 for a rapid retreat. '* Almost as soon as she had 
 said, * how do you do ' she asked me what I 
 thought the object of life was." 
 
 " How very like her; what did you tell her.-*" 
 
 " Oh, I said I supposed the object of life is to 
 transform the crude animal and vegetable sub- 
 stances of our food into passions and petty senti- 
 ments." 
 
 Edith laughed absently, her thoughts elsewhere. 
 
 " And she looked dreadfully puzzled," Fenton 
 continued, " as to whether she ought to be 
 shocked or not. But bless me, how late it is ! 
 Good-night, my dear." 
 
 He stretched up his arms in a yawn. Edith 
 turned quickly toward him. 
 
 "Arthur," she said abruptly, but with the kind- 
 ness of her softened mood, " are you painting 
 Ninitta.?" 
 
 He gave her a startled glance and sat down 
 
342 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 again in his chair. There ran through his mind a 
 sudden pang of fear, but he said to himself in- 
 stantly that Edith was not one to suspect evil, and 
 she could not possibly know the truth. 
 
 ** Painting Ninitta.?" he returned. ''Why do 
 you ask that.^" 
 
 "Because Fred Rangely told Helen at dinner 
 to-night that you were." 
 
 " Where did he get his information } " asked 
 Fenton, with a feeling of tightness in his throat 
 as he remembered how Rangely had knocked at 
 his door that morning. 
 
 "He said," was Edith's answer, "that a carpen- 
 ter told him Mrs. Herman was in the studio 
 to-day ; and I remembered seeing her wrap there 
 last week." 
 
 Fenton felt the insecurity of a man about whom 
 all things totter in the shock of an earthquake, 
 but he refused to yield to fear. He wondered 
 how much was to be inferred from the fact that 
 an unknown mechanic was aware of Mrs. Her- 
 man's visits. He had an overwhelming sense of 
 being trapped, and he inwardly gnashed his teeth 
 with rage against Ninitta and against fate. 
 
 But he felt the supreme importance of self- 
 control, and he was outwardly collected as he 
 asked, — 
 
 "What did Helen say to him } '* 
 
 " She said," answered Edith, with an exquisite 
 note of sadness in her voice, " that you must 
 
BEDECA'LVG ORNAMEXTS OF PRAISE. 3^3 
 
 be making a portrait for a surprise to her hus- 
 band." 
 
 The artist's heart gave a bound and he caught 
 eagerly at this suggestion, which afforded him a 
 means of escape. 
 
 " Helen is too shrewd by half," he said, with a 
 smile. *' It is for Grant's birthday and nobody was 
 to know. As a matter of fact," he added, his 
 invention quickly leaping to the refinements of 
 details in his falsehood, " I fancy Ninitta really 
 wants it for the bambino, as she calls him." 
 
 He smiled with relief as he went on, and rose 
 again to his feet. 
 
 '* Deception," he observed, with his natural 
 lightness of manner, "■ is the bane of married 
 life, but marital felicity is impossible without dis- 
 creet reserves. It wasn't my secret, you see, so I 
 didn't feel at liberty to tell you." 
 
 " You were perfectly right," she answered, 
 ''The truth is," she continued, hesitatingly, "I 
 was afraid you had persuaded Ninitta to sit for the 
 Fatima, you know you said once that she was the 
 only model in Boston who was what you wanted." 
 
 " Did I say that .'* What a dreadful memory 
 you have. I should expect Grant to make a burnt 
 sacrifice of me if I had beguiled her into such an 
 indiscretion. He won't even have her sit to him- 
 self since she was married." 
 
 '* Of course not," rejoined Edith, emphatically. 
 " Poor Grant ! He can't be very happy with 
 
344 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Ninitta. She never can get the taint of Bohemia 
 out of her blood." 
 
 Arthur laughed and flung his cigar end into the 
 fire. 
 
 "You speak," he said, "as if that were a hope- 
 less poison." 
 
 He stood smiling to himself an instant. He 
 had pushed off one slipper and was endeavoring 
 to pick it up, using his foot like a hand. He was 
 in that state of high excitement when he would 
 have found relief in the wildest and most boister- 
 ous actions ; and it pleased him to be able still to 
 retain the appearance of his ordinary calm. 
 
 " Modern civilization," he observed, " consists 
 largely in learning to live without the use of either 
 truth or the toes. Good-night, my dear. I want 
 to get a nap before the church bells begin to 
 ring." 
 
 He stooped and kissed her, and went to his 
 chamber. He closed the door and began to re- 
 cite with exaggerated gestures a fragment from 
 Macbeth. The varied emotions of the evening 
 had set every nerve quivering. He was so ex- 
 cited that he was not even despondent over the 
 collapse of Princeton Platinum stock, although 
 this meant to him desperate financial straits. He 
 knew that he was in no condition to consider any- 
 thing calmly ; but half the remainder of the night 
 he tossed upon a sleepless bed, reacting the scene 
 at the club, reflecting upon his narrow escape from 
 
BEDECKING ORNAMENTS OF PRAISE. 
 
 345 
 
 the discovery of his relations with Ninitta, resolv- 
 ing to begin her portrait at once, and thinking a 
 thousand confused things which made his brain 
 seem to him filled with whirling masses of fiery 
 thought-clouds. 
 
 It was really only just before the church bells 
 began to ring that he fell asleep at last, to dreams 
 hardly less vivid than his waking reflections. 
 
XXIX 
 
 CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAN'S STRENGTH. 
 
 As You Like It ; i. — 2. 
 
 ORIN STANTON had been tolerably sure of 
 getting the commission for the America, and 
 had been busily at work preparing his model for 
 the figure. By the time the decision of the com- 
 mittee was reached, his study was practically com- 
 plete, and only a day or two after he had been 
 ofificially notified that the choice had fallen upon 
 him the public were invited to his studio to view 
 the statue. 
 
 Whatever else Orin might or might not be, he 
 was undeniably energetic. He missed no oppor- 
 tunities through neglect, and he never left undone 
 anything which was likely to tell for his own ad- 
 vantage. He had once before called upon the 
 world to adtaire his work on the completion of his 
 masterpiece^^a figure called Hop Scotch^ represent- 
 ing according to Bently " a tenement-house girl 
 having a fit on the sidewalk." <■ He therefore un- 
 derstood well enough the usual methods of manag- 
 ing these affairs, and as the ladies who had taken 
 him up felt bound to make a point of patronizing 
 the exhibition, the affair succeeded capitally. 
 
 346 
 
CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAN'S STRFNGTIf. 
 
 347 
 
 Stanton had no regular studio in Boston, and 
 had for this work secured a room on the ground 
 floor of a business building. The light, to be sure, 
 was not all that might have been desired, but it 
 was abundant, window screens were cheap and the 
 sculptor not over sensitive to subtile gradations of 
 values. He made no attempt to decorate the 
 room for his exhibition, partly from a certain in- 
 difference to its bareness, and partly from a native 
 shrewdness which enabled him to feel both the 
 difficulty of doing this adequately, and the fact 
 that the statue appeared better as things were. 
 There were a few benches, scantily cushioned, two 
 or three chairs, not all in perfect repair, with the 
 paraphernalia essential to his work. A few 
 sketches in crayon and pencil were pinned to 
 the wall, and among them the artist had had the 
 fatuity to pin up a photograph of that most beau- 
 tiful figure, the Winged Victory of Paionios. 
 
 The study for America^ which was of colossal 
 size, represented a woman seated, leaning her left 
 hand upon a rock. The right hand held slightly 
 uplifted a bunch of maize and tobacco plant ; her 
 head wore a crown in which the architectural em- 
 battlements not uncommon in classic headdresses 
 had been curiously and wonderfully transformed 
 into the likeness of the domed capitol at Washing- 
 ton. The figure was completely draped, only the 
 head, the left hand and the right arm to the elbow 
 emerging from the voluminous folds in which it 
 
348 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 was wrapped, save that the tip of one sandalled 
 foot was visible, resting upon a ballot box. Half 
 covered by the hem of the robe were seen a toma- 
 hawk, an axe, a printer's stick, a calumet, and 
 various other emblems of American life, civilized 
 and barbarous. 
 
 A secret which Stanton did not impart to the 
 public and which, with a boldness allied to impu- 
 dence, he trusted to their never discovering, was 
 the fact that his figure had been stolen bodily from 
 an antique. There exists in the museum of the 
 Vatican a statuette representing a work by Euty- 
 chides of Sikyon. Bas-reliefs of the same figure 
 exist also on certain coins of Antioch still extant. 
 The figure represented the city goddess Tyche 
 resting her foot upon the shoulder of the river god 
 OroiitcSy who seems to swim from beneath the 
 rock upon which she is seated. Stanton had a 
 sketch of the statuette which he had made in 
 Rome, and from this he had modelled his America, 
 replacing the god Orontes by a ballot-box, chang- 
 ing the accessories and adding as many symbolical 
 articles as he could crowd around the feet. He 
 was not wholly untroubled by an inward dread 
 lest the source of his inspiration should be dis- 
 covered ; but when he had been complimented by 
 Peter Calvin upon the marked originality of the 
 design, he threw his fear to the winds and deliv- 
 ered himself up to the enjoyment of receiving the 
 praises of his visitors. 
 
CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAN'S STRENGTIL 34c) 
 
 There was a strange mixture of people present. 
 Stanton had invited the artists, members of the 
 press, and all the people that he knew, whether 
 they knew him or not. Mrs. Frostwinch was 
 there, Mrs. Staggchase, Elsie Dimmont, and Ethel 
 Mott ; and although Mrs. Bodewin Ranger was 
 not actually present, she in a manner lent her 
 countenance by sending her carriage to the door 
 to call for one of her friends. Fred Rangely was 
 present, talking in a satirical undertone to Miss 
 Merrivale and viewing the statue with a wicked look 
 in his eye which boded little good to the sculptor. 
 Melissa Blake was there, rather overpowered by 
 the crowd and clinging tightly to the arm of her 
 companionj^ girl whose acquaintance she had 
 made in her boarding-house, and who was much 
 given to an affectation of profound culture as rep- 
 resented by attendance upon stereopticon^ lectures 
 and the exhibitions of the local art clubs. 3 
 
 " Oh, I should think," this young lady said to 
 Melissa, in a simpering rapture, "you'd be just too 
 proud for anything, to know Mr. Stanton. It 
 must be too lovely to know a real sculptor." 
 
 " I don't know him so very well," returned the 
 conscientious Melissa. 
 
 " But you really know him," persisted the other, 
 "and he's been to call on you. Isn't it funny how 
 some men can make things just out of their heads 
 without anything to go by .-* " 
 
 Rangely, who was standing close by, caught the 
 
350 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 remark and secretly made a grimace for the bene- 
 fit>9^f Miss Merrivale. 
 
 u' ThqjJ' said he in her ear, *'is genuine Boston 
 culture."-^ 
 
 She laughed softly, not in the least knowing 
 what to say. The statue meant nothing whatever 
 to her, and had the original of Eutychides been 
 placed by its side she would have been unable to 
 understand that in copying it Stanton had trans- 
 formed its dignity into clumsiness, its grace into 
 vulgarity. Had she been at home in New York, 
 she would have said frankly that she neither knew 
 nor cared anything about the America; being in 
 Boston, she had a superstitious feeling that such 
 frankness would be ill-judged, and she therefore 
 contented herself with non-committal laughter. 
 
 " How do you do, Miss Merrivale t " at this 
 moment said a cheery voice close by her. 
 
 She looked up to see the merry eyes and corn- 
 colored beard of Chauncy Wilson. 
 
 " I say, Fred," went on the doctor, confidentially, 
 ** don't you think this thing is beastly rubbish } 
 It looks like an old grandmother wrapped up in 
 her bedclothes. And what has she got that toy 
 village on her head for } " 
 
 ** Oh, Doctor Wilson ! " exclaimed Miss Merri- 
 vale, in a manner that might mean reproval or 
 amusement. 
 
 Miss Frances was having a very good time. 
 Although Mrs. Staggchase had been throwing her 
 
CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAN'S STRKXGTH. 
 
 351 
 
 guest and Rangely together for motives of her own, 
 the result to Miss Merrivale had been as pleasing 
 as if her hostess had been purely disinterested. 
 It is true, the time for her return to New York 
 drew near, but visions of the pleasure of imparting 
 to her family and friends the news of her engage- 
 ment to the brilliant young novelist did much to 
 alleviate her regret at departing from Boston. 
 She had a pleasant consciousness that afternoon, 
 of sharing in the attention which Rangely received 
 in public nowadays, especially since his novel 
 had been violently attacked in the Loiidofi Specta- 
 tor and defended in the Saturday Review. She 
 noted the glances that were cast at him, receiving 
 their homage with a certain secret feeling of hav- 
 ing a share in it. 
 
 But bliss in this world is always transient, and at 
 her happiest moment Miss Merrivale looked up to 
 perceive Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson bearing 
 down upon her. Mrs. Sampson was accompanied 
 by the Hon. Tom Greenfield, who both felt and 
 looked utterly out of place ; and who was dragged 
 along in the wake of his companion quite as much 
 by his unwillingness to be left to his own devices 
 in a crowd of strangers, as by any particular de- 
 sire to follow her. 
 
 " My dear Frances," the widow said effusively, 
 kissing Miss Merrivale on both cheeks. *' I am so 
 glad to see you. Really it is perfectly cruel that 
 you haven't been to see me. But then, I know," 
 
352 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 she ran on without giving the other time to speak, 
 *' how busy you've been. I've seen your name in 
 the Gossip, and 3'ou've been everywhere." 
 
 " Yes, I have," returned Aliss Merrivale, catch- 
 ing rather awkwardly at the excuse suppUed to 
 her. 
 
 Chauncy Wilson laughed significantly. He 
 never felt it necessary to treat the widow with 
 any especial respect. 
 
 ''Mrs. Sampson passes the whole of Sunday 
 forenoon committing the society columns of the 
 Gossip to memory, and wishing her name was 
 there," he chuckled, with a jocoseness which 
 seemed to that lady extremely ill-timed. 
 
 But she kept her temper beautifully, long years 
 of social struggle having taught her at least this 
 art of self-restraint. 
 
 *' Dr. Wilson is nothing if not satirical," she re- 
 turned, with a conventional smile. 
 
 It would not have been displeasing to I\Iiss 
 Merrivale had the floor at that particular instant 
 opened and engulfed her former hostess. It needs 
 unusual breadth of mind to forgive those toward 
 whom we have been discourteous. On the other 
 side of the statue, Frances saw Mrs. Staggchase 
 watching the encounter with a sort of quiet amuse- 
 ment. It flashed across her mind that if she were 
 to become Mrs. Rangcly, and live in Boston, it 
 would be necessary to drop Mrs. Sampson from 
 her calling list, and the reflection instantly fol- 
 
CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAN'S STRENGTH. 
 
 353 
 
 lowed that the sooner the process of breaking the 
 acquaintance were begun the better. Her face 
 insensibly hardened a little. 
 
 "Of course," she said, "one can't help being 
 put into the Gossip, but I should never think of 
 reading it." 
 
 Mrs. Sampson understood that this was a snub, 
 and her cheek flushed. Wilson laughed mali- 
 ciously. 
 
 " Oh, everybody reads the Gossip,'' Rangely in- 
 terposed, good-naturedly coming to the rescue ; 
 "although it's to the credit of humanity that 
 everybody has the grace to be ashamed of it." 
 
 There was a bustle and stir in the crowd as 
 Tom Bently pushed his way up to the group. 
 
 " By Jove, Rangely," he said, " have you got on 
 to that statue ^ Do you know what it's cribbed 
 from } " 
 
 " No," returned Fred ; " is it from anything in 
 particular ^ I supposed it was just a general steal 
 from the antique, and Stanton appropriates only to 
 destroy." 
 
 " I don't know what it is," was Bently's reply, 
 "but I know there's a cut of it in a book I've got 
 at the studio." 
 
 Rangely's eyes flashed. 
 
 " Good," said he, " I'll come round to-night and 
 we'll look it up. I'm going to do a notice of the 
 America for the Observer ^ 
 
 The two exchanged significant glances, laughing 
 
354 ^^^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 inwardly at the discomfiture of the unfortunate 
 sculptor. 
 
 " But don't you admire the figure ? " asked Mrs. 
 Sampson, eagerly seizing an opportunity to get 
 into the conversation. 
 
 '' It's the kind of thing I should have hked when 
 I was young," Bently returned. *' I was taught to 
 like that sort of thing ; but all the preliminary 
 rubbish that was plastered on to me when I was a 
 youngster, I have shed as a snake sheds its skin." 
 
 The movement in the crowd gave Miss Merri- 
 vale an excuse for changing her position ; and she 
 improved the opportunity to turn away from the 
 widow until the latter could see little except her 
 back. Mrs. Sampson flushed angrily, but she cov- 
 ered her discomfiture, as well as she was able, by 
 turning her attention to the statue, and descant- 
 ing upon its beauties to Greenfield. 
 
 " How exquisitely dignified the drapery is," she 
 remarked, "and so beautifully modest." 
 
 ''Big: thino:, ain't it," said the strident voice of 
 Irons, close to her ear. " I think we've hit some- 
 thing good this time. I'm really obliged to you, 
 Greenfield, for putting me up to vote for Stanton. 
 I like a statue with some meaning to it. Now 
 just look at the significance of all those emblems 
 of American progress." 
 
 "Yes, it is very fine," admitted Greenfield, with 
 a helpless air. " I'll work it into a speech, some- 
 time," he added, his face brightening with the re- 
 
CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAX'S STREXGTH. 
 
 355 
 
 lief of having an idea ; " there's the ballot-box at 
 the bottom as a foundation, and you work up 
 through all the industries till you get to the capi- 
 tol, the centre of government, at the top." 
 
 ** Hear ! hear ! " exclaimed the widow, clapping 
 her hands very softly and prettily ; '' really you 
 must speak at the unveiling of the statue." 
 
 " Capital idea," exclaimed Irons, to whose grati- 
 tude for Greenfield's aid in the railroad matter was 
 added the politic forecast that he might some time 
 need his help again ; " there's Hubbard over there 
 now ; I'll go and ask him whether our committee 
 chooses the orator." 
 
 He started to make his way through the crowd, 
 followed by the admiring looks of various young 
 women who had been frankly listening to the con- 
 versation, although they were strangers. 
 
 ''Oh, isn't the statue just too lovely for any- 
 thing," gushingly remarked one of them, with 
 startling originality; ''it's so noble and — . And, 
 oh," she broke off suddenly, the light of a new 
 discovery shining in her face, "just see, girls, 
 that's corn in her hand." 
 
 " Oh, yes, and cotton," responded her com- 
 panion. " See, it really is cotton, and something 
 else." 
 
 "Yes, that must be maize," returned the other, 
 oracularly ; "it's all so beautifully American." 
 
 The crowd moved and swayed and changed, un- 
 til Ethel Mott stood close to the Ajucrica, with her 
 
356 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 back turned squarely upon the figure. She evi- 
 dently found more pleasure in looking at her com- 
 panion than in studying the work of the sculptor, 
 which she had nominally come to see. 
 
 " I think it will be too cold, Thayer, to go out in 
 the dog-cart," she said, with one of those glances 
 whose meaning not even a poet could put into 
 words. 
 
 *' Oh, no," Kent answered. " I have a tremen- 
 dously heavy rug, and you can wrap up." 
 
 " Well," was her answer, " if it's pleasant, and 
 the sun shines, and I don't change my mind, and 
 I feel like it, perhaps I'll go. At any rate you 
 may come round about ten o'clock." 
 
 Rangely was too far away to catch, amid the 
 babble of the crowd, a single word of this conver- 
 sation, but he noted the looks which the pair ex- 
 changed. 
 
 "■ Oh, do come along," a corpulent lady in the 
 crowd observed to her companion. " We've seen 
 everybody here that we know, and I want to go 
 down to Winter Street and get some buttons for 
 my grey dress. Miranda wanted me to have them 
 covered with the cloth, but I think steel ones 
 would be prettier." 
 
 "Yes, they say steel's going to be awfully fash- 
 ionable this spring. Are they going to put that 
 statue up just as it is 1 " 
 
 " Oh, they bake it or paint it or something," 
 was the lucid answer, as the corpulent lady threw 
 
CRUEL PROOF OF THIS MAN'S STRENGTH. 
 
 357 
 
 herself against Mr. Hubbard, nearly annihilating 
 him in her effort to clear a path through the 
 crowd. 
 
 *' I think, my dear," Hubbard observed to his 
 wife, " unless you've designs on my life insurance, 
 you'd better take me out of this crowd." 
 
 " But we haven't seen the statue," she re- 
 turned. 
 
 "I have," he retorted grimly, "and I assure 
 you you haven't lost anything. You'll see it 
 enough when it's set up, and you'll go about per- 
 juring your soul by denying that I was ever on 
 the committee." 
 
 '' Hush," she said, " do be quiet ; people will 
 think you're cross because you were overruled." 
 
 On the other side of the statue the sculptor had 
 been receiving congratulations all the afternoon, 
 and now Mr. Calvin and Mrs. Frostwinch chanced 
 to approach him at the same time to take their 
 leave. 
 
 '' I am so glad to have seen the statue," was 
 the latter's form of adieu, " it is distinctly inspir- 
 ing. Thank you so much." 
 
 He bowed awkwardly enough, stammering some 
 unintelligible reply, and the lady moved away with 
 Mr. Calvin, who observed as the pair emerged into 
 the open air : 
 
 " It is such a relief to me that this statue has 
 turned out so well. There has really been a good 
 deal of feeling and wire-pulling, anc] some New 
 
358 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Yurk friends of mine will never forgive me that 
 the commission was not given to one of their men. 
 I really feel as if the thing had been made almost 
 a personal matter." 
 
 ''It must be a great satisfaction to you," his 
 companion returned, "that he has succeeded." 
 
 "It is," was Calvin's reply. "I meant to see 
 Mr. Rangley and ask him to say a good word in 
 the Observer^ but everybody is so much pleased 
 that I think he may be trusted to be." 
 
 " Oh, he must be," she answered. 
 
 And as she spoke Tom Bently passed by, quietly 
 smiling to himself. 
 
XXX 
 
 THE WORLD IS STILL DECEIVED. 
 
 Merchant of Venice ; iii. — 2. 
 
 ON the evening following his reception, Orin 
 Stanton presented himself at the rooms of 
 Melissa. He was fairly beaming with self-com- 
 placency and gratification. He had been awarded 
 the commission, the exhibition of his model had 
 been attended, as he assured Melissa, " by no end 
 of swells," and five thousand dollars had been paid 
 over to him as an advance upon which to begin 
 his work. He felt as if the world were under his 
 feet and he spoke to Melissa with an air of lofty 
 condescension which should have amused her, but 
 which she received with the utmost humility. 
 
 " Well," he said, " what do you think of that for 
 a crowd ? Wasn't that a swell mob } Didn't you 
 notice what a lot of bang-up people there were at 
 the studio this afternoon ? " 
 
 " Of course I didn't know many of them," Me- 
 lissa returned humbly ; " but I could see that 
 there were a lot of people that everybody seemed 
 to know. I'm glad that you were pleased." 
 
 Orin pulled out a big cigar and bit the end off 
 it excitedly. 
 
 359 
 
36o 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 "Pleased!" he echoed. "I was more than 
 pleased — I was delighted. All the committee 
 were there, of course, and half the fashionable 
 women of Boston." 
 
 *' I heard a lady telling another who the artists 
 were," Milly observed, glad to find a subject upon 
 which she could talk to Orin easily. 
 
 ** O yes, there were a lot of artists there, but 
 they don't count for much in getting a fellow com- 
 missions." 
 
 Stanton had evidently no intention of being 
 satirical, but spoke with straightforward plainness 
 what he would have regarded, had he given the 
 matter any thought at all, as being a truth too 
 obvious to need any disguises.\ His Philistinism 
 was of the perfectly ingrained, iabarn_S£)rt, which 
 never having appreciated that it is naked has 
 never felt the need of being ashamed ; and he let 
 it be seen on any occasion with a frankness which 
 arose from the fact that it had never occurred to 
 him tha-t there was any reason why he should con- 
 ceal itl He was one of those artists who never 
 would be able wholly to separate his idea of the 
 muse from that of a serving-maid ; and he viewed 
 art from the strictly utilitarian standpoint which 
 considers it a means toward the payment of butcher 
 and baker and candlestick maker. ) He was not 
 indifferent to the opinion of his fellow sculptors ; 
 but the criticism of Alfred Irons, which he knew 
 to be backed by a substantial bank account, would 
 
FHE WORLD IS STILL DECEIVED. 361 
 
 have outweighed in his mind the judgment of 
 Michael Angelo or Phidias. 
 
 Milly, of course, had no ideas about art beyond 
 a faint sentimental tendency to regard it as a mys- 
 terious and glorious thing which one could not 
 wholly escape in Boston ; while her thrifty 
 New England nurture enabled her to appreciate 
 perfectly the force of the considerations Orin 
 brought forward. 
 
 "I am glad you are getting commissions," she 
 said, " but it must be nice to have the artists like 
 your work, for after all, don't you think rich people 
 depend a good deal upon what the artists say .-^ " 
 
 " Oh yes, they do, some," admitted the sculptor. 
 
 He puffed his cigar, and with the aid of a pen- 
 knife performed upon his nails certain operations 
 of the toilet which are more usually attended to 
 in private. Milly sat nervously trying to think of 
 something to say, and wondering what had brought 
 the sculptor to visit her. She was too kindly to 
 suspect that possibly he had come because in her 
 company he could enjoy the pleasure of giving 
 free rein to his self-conceit. The words of her 
 companion of the afternoon had given her a new 
 sense of the honor of a visit from her prospective 
 brother-in-law, although this increased her diffi- 
 dence rather than her pleasure. 
 
 ** Was Mr. Fenton there this afternoon } " she 
 asked, at length, simply for the sake of saying 
 something. 
 
362 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 The face of her companion darkened. 
 
 " Damn Fenton ! " he returned, with coarse bru- 
 taUty. " He's a cad and a snob ; he says Herman 
 ought to have made the America^ and he abuses 
 my model without ever having seen it." 
 
 The remark of Fenton's which had given of- 
 fence to Stanton had been made at the club in 
 comment upon a photograph of the model which 
 somebody was showing. 
 
 ''The only capitol thing about it," Fenton had 
 said, ''is the headgear." 
 
 The remark was severe rather than witty, and 
 it was its severity which had given it wings to 
 bear it to the sculptor's ears. 
 
 " I don't like Mr. Fenton very well," Milly ad- 
 mitted, "but Mrs. Fenton is perfectly lovely ; she's 
 been awfully good to me." 
 
 By way of reply the sculptor, with a somewhat 
 ponderous air, unbuttoned his coat and produced 
 a red leather pocket-book. This he opened, took 
 out a handful of bills, and proceeded to count 
 them with great deliberation. Melissa watched 
 while he counted out a sum which seemed to have 
 been fixed in his mind. He smoothed the package 
 of bills in his hand, then he glanced up at her 
 furtively as if to ascertain whether she knew how 
 much he had laid out. She involuntarily averted 
 her glance. Instantly Orin gathered up several 
 of the bills quickly, conveying them out of sight 
 with a guilty air as if he were purloining them. 
 
THE WORLD IS STILL DECEIVED. 363 
 
 Then he held the remainder toward his com- 
 panion. 
 
 " There," he said, " I should have kept my 
 promise if you hadn't hinted by speaking of Fen- 
 ton. Of course you understand that I can't give 
 you anything very tremendous, but there's a hun- 
 dred and fifty dollars." 
 
 Melissa flushed and drew back. 
 
 " I had no idea of hinting," was her reply. '* Of 
 course I thank you very much, but you ought to 
 give the money to John, not to me." 
 
 "No," Orin insisted, "you helped me with Mrs. 
 Fenton, and John might as well know that I 
 wouldn't put this money into a hole just to please 
 him. I know John. He'll set more by you if the 
 money comes through you." 
 
 " But I don't believe," protested she, " that 
 what I said to Mrs. Fenton really made any differ- 
 ence." 
 
 But in Orin's abounding good nature her dis- 
 claimer passed unheeded. He pressed the money 
 upon her, and went away full of the consciousness 
 of having exercised a noble philanthropy. 
 
 It is possible that had he waited to read Fred 
 Rangely's criticism upon his America which ap- 
 peared in the Daily Observer next morning he 
 might never have made this contribution toward 
 paying his father's debts. With Bently's help 
 Rangely had discovered the original of the statue, 
 and had then written a careful comparison between 
 
3^4 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 the work of Eutychides and that of Stanton. It 
 hardly need be added that the result was not at 
 all flattering to the latter. Rangely possessed a 
 very pretty gift of sarcasm, and it was his humor 
 to consider that in attacking the sculptor he was 
 to a certain degree settling scores with Mrs. 
 Staggchase for her change in attitude toward him 
 after Miss Merrivale came. He served up the 
 unlucky statue and its more unlucky maker with a 
 piquancy and a zest which made his article town 
 talk for a month. The sculptor sheltered himself, 
 so far as he could, by keeping out of sight, while 
 Peter Calvin, unable to endure the jibes and 
 laughter which everywhere met him, abandoned 
 the cause of his protege and the town together, by 
 starting two months earlier than -he had intended 
 on a trip to Europe. 
 
 Rangely was angry with himself for having 
 been persuaded by Mrs. Staggchase to write an 
 article sustaining Stanton's claims in the first place, 
 and not having signed it, he endeavored to give to 
 this criticism a tone which should indicate, without 
 its being specifically stated, that he had not writ- 
 ten the former paper. He understood perfectly 
 well that Mrs. Staggchase would regard his posi- 
 tion as a declaration of independence, and indeed 
 when the lady read the Observe?' that morning she 
 smiled with an air of comprehension. 
 
 " That's an end to that," she said to herself. 
 *' When you've known a man as long as I have 
 
THE WORLD IS STILL DECEIVED. 365 
 
 Fred Rangely, he's like a book that's been read ; 
 you've got all the good there is in him. There 
 are other men in the world." 
 
 When Orin had gone, Milly stood turning over 
 and over in her hand the roll of bills he had given 
 her. Then she spread them out upon the table, 
 counting them and gloating over them, with a de- 
 light which arose quite as largely from her foretaste 
 of John's pleasure and the joy of having helped to 
 cause it, as it did from mere love of money. She 
 had just taken the precious roll to put it away, 
 when her lover himself appeared. 
 
 John Stanton was really of more kindly dispo- 
 sition than might have been inferred from his mis- 
 understanding with his betrothed. He had been 
 half a dozen weeks coming to his right mind, but 
 whatever he did he did thoroughly, and in the end 
 he had reached a point where he was willing to 
 acknowledge himself wrong, and to make whatever 
 amends lay in his power. He came in to-night 
 with the determined air of one who has made up 
 his mind to get through a disagreeable duty as 
 speedily as possible. 
 
 Milly opened the door for him, and stood back 
 to let him pass ; she had learned in these weeks 
 of their estrangement to restrain the manifesta- 
 tion of her joy at his coming. It was with so 
 great a rush of blissful surprise that she now 
 found herself suddenly caught up into his arms, 
 that she clung closely to his neck for one joy- 
 
366 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ful instant, and then burst into a passion of 
 weeping. 
 
 *' There, there," her lover said, caressing her ; 
 "■ don't cry, Milly. I've been a brute, and I know 
 it ; but if you'll forgive me this time I'll see that 
 you never need to again." 
 
 He moved toward a chair as he spoke, half car- 
 rying her in his arms. In her excitement she 
 loosened her hold upon the roll of money, which 
 was still in her hand, and the bills were scattered 
 on the floor behind him as he walked. He sat 
 down and took her in his lap, stroking her hair 
 and soothing her as well as he was able. By a 
 strong effort she controlled herself, dried her tears, 
 and sat up, half laughing. 
 
 ''I'm getting to be dreadful teary," she said. 
 « J " 
 
 "What in the world," he interrupted her in 
 amazement, '* is that on the floor } " 
 
 She turned and saw the money, and burst into a 
 peal of laughter. Springing down from his knee, she 
 ran and gathered up the bills in her two hands ; then, 
 dancing up to him, half wild with delight, her cheeks 
 flushed, her eyes shining, she scattered the precious 
 bits of green paper fantastically over his head and 
 shoulders. 
 
 " ' Take, oh take, the rosy, rosy crown ! ' " 
 
 she sang, in the very abandonment of gayety. 
 
 " Are you gone crazy } " he demanded, clutching 
 the floating bills, and then catching her about the 
 
THE WORLD IS STILL DECEIVED. 367 
 
 waist. " You act like a witch ! Where did all this 
 money come from ? The savings-bank ? " 
 
 " No," she returned, becoming quiet, and nest- 
 ling close to him. " The Lord sent it by the hand 
 of your brother Orin." 
 
 It was some time before John could be made to 
 understand the whole story ; and when it had been 
 told, he instantly leaped to the conclusion that the 
 whole credit of Orin's getting the commission 
 belonged of right to Milly, a conviction in which 
 he remained steadfast despite all her disclaimers. 
 
 At last she gave up protesting, and shut his 
 mouth with a kiss. Since John, as well as Orin, 
 thought so, she felt that her part must have been 
 more important than she had realized ; but she was 
 too modest to bear so much praise. 
 
 "John," she said at length, "I have something 
 awful to confess. I've been keeping a secret from 
 you." 
 
 *' I'm afraid I've been too much of a bear for it 
 to have been safe to tell me," returned her lover, 
 smiling. 
 
 His own heart was filled with the double joy of 
 reconciliation, and of having brought it about him- 
 self by a manly confession of his fault. 
 
 " It wasn't that at all," she protested. '' It was 
 because I wasn't sure about it ; and then I wanted 
 to surprise you if I got it." 
 
 *' Got what } You speak as if it was the small- 
 pox. Is it anything catching } " 
 
368 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " Oh, no," answered Milly, laughing gleefully at 
 his sally, which to her present mood seemed the 
 most exquisite wit. '' You needn't be afraid ; it's 
 only the matronship of the new Knitting School, 
 thank you, with a salary of five hundred dollars a 
 year." 
 
 " Really, Milly .? " 
 
 " Really, John ; and don't you think " — 
 
 " Think what .? " 
 
 She had made up her mind to say it even before 
 this blessed agreement had come about, but now 
 that the moment came, the habits and trammels of 
 generations held her back. 
 
 "Why," she stammered, blushing and hesitating, 
 "don't you think, — wouldn't it seem more appro- 
 priate if a matron was " — Her voice failed utterly. 
 She flung her arms convulsively about her lover's 
 neck, and drew his ear close to her lips. *' Surely, 
 now, John, dear," she whispered, "we could 
 affordto" — 
 
 She finished with a kiss. 
 
 "If you can put up with me, darling," he 
 answered her, with a mighty hug ; " we'll be mar- 
 ried in a week, or, better still, in a day." 
 
 " I think in a month will do," responded Mis- 
 tress Milly, demurely, sitting up to blush with 
 decorum. 
 
XXXI 
 
 PARTED OUR FELLOWSHIP. 
 
 Othello; ii. — i. 
 
 THE news of the collapse of Princeton Platinum 
 stock, which Dr. Wilson had given Arthur on 
 Saturday night, proved to be somewhat premature. 
 On Sunday it was decided at the club, where the 
 matter was discussed in a cold-blooded and leis- 
 urely fashion, that the whole scheme had gone to 
 pieces ; and of course this decision was accompanied 
 by the statement, in various forms, that everybody 
 knew that there was nothing substantial behind 
 the certificates. On Monday, however, the stock 
 took an unexpected rise, and for two or three days 
 held its own with a firmness which greatly encour- 
 aged its holders. 
 
 Fenton had bought the bulk of his shares at two 
 and seven-eights, and still held them, notwithstand- 
 ing the rumors of disaster in the air. With a folly 
 that would be incredible were it not one of the 
 most common things in amateur stock transactions, 
 the artist had by this time put the bulk of his little 
 fortune into this wild-cat stock, which he now held 
 with a desperate determination not to sell below 
 the figure at which he had purchased. He could 
 
 369 
 
370 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 SO little afford the least loss, that, with the genu- 
 ine instinct of the gambler, he trusted to luck, 
 and ran the risk of utter ruin for the sake of the 
 chance of making a brilliant stroke, or at least of 
 coming out even. Having made up his mind to 
 hold on, he clung to the position with his custom- 
 ary obstinacy, even dismissing the matter, as far 
 as was possible, from his thoughts. 
 
 He was very busy preparing an exhibition of 
 pictures at the St. Filipe club. The matter had 
 been left in his hands by the other members of the 
 Art Committee, of which he was chairman ; but 
 his attitude toward the club had prevented his 
 taking any steps until after the meeting on Satur- 
 day night. Now, he was particularly anxious to 
 make the exhibition a brilliant success, to give a 
 signal instance of the value of his services. 
 
 He had gone to his studio on Sunday after- 
 noon and sketched in a head of Ninitta, and upon 
 this he worked, now and then, with a desperate 
 energy born of the feeling that it substantiated his 
 story to Edith. He had been seized with grave 
 doubts as to the advisability of exhibiting the 
 Fatima just now ; but he did not see his way 
 clear to spare so large and important a picture 
 from the collection, and he comforted himself with 
 the thought that the face was different, and that 
 if the model were recognized he would be supposed 
 to have worked up old sketches taken when Ninitta 
 had posed for him before her marriage. 
 
PARTED OUR FELLOWSHfr. 3^1 
 
 He worked with all his marvellous energy, col- 
 lecting pictures, directing their hanging, soothing 
 artists whose canvases were not placed to their 
 liking, making out the catalogue, and arranging 
 all the details which in such a connection are 
 fatiguing and well-nigh innumerable. 
 
 The exhibition was opened on Wednesday even- 
 ing with a reception to ladies, and by nine o'clock 
 the gallery began to fill. Fenton had decorated the 
 rooms a little, chiefly with live pampas grass and 
 palms and India-rubber trees. It is difficult to see 
 how mankind in the nineteenth century could exist 
 without the India-rubber tree. If that plant were 
 destroyed, civilization would be left gasping, help- 
 less and crippled ; and of late years, not content 
 with making it serviceable in every department of 
 practical life, men have brought the shrub into the 
 domain of aesthetics by using it for decorative 
 purposes. 
 
 The collection of paintings was an interesting 
 one, made up of the work of the best artists in 
 town. Fenton had spared no pains either in pro- 
 curing what he wanted, or in arranging the gallery. 
 The Fatima hung in a position of honor opposite 
 the main entrance. The selection of so prominent 
 a place for his own work offended Fenton's taste, 
 and annoyed him with an uncomfortable sense of 
 how strongly the picture was in evidence. The 
 exigencies of hanging, and the fact that the canvas 
 was the most important one in the room forced 
 
37^ 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 him to place it as he did ; and Bently, whom he 
 called to his assistance, laughed at his scruples. 
 None of the artists had seen the picture, and 
 Bently was quite carried away by his admiration 
 of it. 
 
 " By Jove ! Fenton," he said, " I didn't know 
 you had it in you. It's perfectly stunning. But 
 it's beastly wicked," he added. "Perhaps that's 
 the reason it's so good." 
 
 *' Come," Fenton said with a laugh, " that 
 sounds quite like the old Pagan days." 
 
 "■ But how in the dickens," Tom went on, " did 
 you get Mrs. Herman to pose for you t " 
 
 "Great Heavens!" ejaculated Fenton, "don't 
 say that to anybody else. I had no end of studies 
 of her, made long ago ; but I didn't suppose I had 
 followed them closely enough for it to be recog- 
 nized." 
 
 " You don't mean," Tom returned, " that that 
 side and arm are done from old studies ! " 
 
 Fenton had a delicate dislike to literal false- 
 hood. It was not a question of morality directly, 
 but one of taste. Albeit, since taste is simply 
 morality remote from the springs of action, it per- 
 haps came to much the same thing in the end. 
 He felt now, however, that the time for the selfish 
 indulgence of his individual whims was past, and 
 that he owed to Ninitta the grace of a downright 
 and hearty falsehood. 
 
 " Why, of course," he said, " I had one or two 
 
Parted our fellowsiiip. 
 
 373 
 
 models to help me out ; but the inspiration came 
 from the old studies." 
 
 " And she didn't pose for you ? " Tom persisted 
 increduously. 
 
 '* Pose for me ? " echoed Fenton, impatiently. 
 ** Why, man alive, think what you're saying ! Of 
 course, she didn't pose for me. She never has 
 posed for anybody since she was married." 
 
 " And a devilish shame it is, too," responded 
 Tom. 
 
 This conversation, which took place Wednesday 
 afternoon, made Fenton extremely uneasy. Fate 
 seemed to have worked against him. He had 
 painted the picture to go to the New York Exhibi- 
 tion, where he hoped it would be sold without ever 
 coming under the eye of Herman at all. He re- 
 flected now that Ninitta had posed for Helen and 
 for several of his brother painters, while it was 
 scarcely credible that the likeness which Bently 
 had perceived at a glance should escape the 
 trained artist's eye of her husband ; and it seemed 
 to him now, little less than madness to have 
 brought the picture here at all. 
 
 Upon second thought, however, he reflected that 
 even were the picture recognized, no great harm 
 would probably come of it. No one would be 
 likely to speak on the subject to Herman, and, 
 least of all, was there a probability that the latter 
 would confess that he was aware of what his wife 
 had done. Herman's condemnation, Fenton said 
 
374 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 to himself with a shrug, he must, if worst came to 
 worst, endure ; this was to be set down with other 
 unpleasantnesses which belong to the unpleasant 
 conditions of life as they exist in these days. 
 As long as there was no open scandal, he could 
 ignore whatever lay beneath the surface, and he 
 assured himself that in any event it were wisest, 
 as he had long ago learned, to carry things off 
 with a high hand. 
 
 It was about half past nine when Fenton 
 brought Edith into the gallery. The crowd had 
 by this time become pretty dense, and just inside 
 the door they halted, exchanging greeting with the 
 acquaintances who appeared on every side, (jhe 
 St. Filipe was an old club, and for more than a 
 quarter of a century had maintained the reputation 
 of leading in matters of art and literature. Its 
 influence had, on the whole, been remarkably even 
 and intelligent ; but of late it began to be felt, 
 among those who were radical in their views, that 
 
 the club was coming under Philistine influence ' 
 
 Half a dozen years before, when Fenton had pro- 
 posed Peter Calvin for membership, even the 
 social influence of the candidate did not save him 
 from a rejection so marked that Arthur had 
 threatened to resign his own membership. Now, 
 however, Peter Calvin was not only a member of 
 the St. Filipe, but he was on the Election Com- 
 mittee. The club was held in favor in the circles 
 over which his influence extended, and although 
 
PARTED OCR FKLLOn'SIIIP. 
 
 375 
 
 workers in all branches of art were still included 
 among the members, they were pretty closely 
 pushed~i)y the more fashionable element of the 
 town, (^"'enton was not far from right in asserting, 
 as he did one day to Mrs. Greyson, after her return 
 from Europe, that the change in his own attitude 
 toward art was pretty exactly paralleled by the 
 alteration which had taken place in that of Boston. \ 
 
 The character of the membership of the club 
 was indicated to-night by the brilliancy of the 
 company present. It was one of those occasions 
 when everybody is there, and the scene, as the new 
 comers looked over the gallery, was most bright 
 and animated. Although the ladies had evidently 
 labored under the usual uncertainty in regard to 
 the proper dress which seems inseparable from an 
 art exhibition in Boston, and were in all varieties 
 of costume from street attire to full evening 
 toilette, there were enough handsome gowns to 
 supply the necessary color. There was also abun- 
 dance of pretty and of striking faces, and the 
 crowd had that pleasant look of familiarity which 
 one gets from recognizing acquaintances all 
 through it. 
 
 One of the first persons the Fentons saw was 
 Ethel Mott, who, under the chaperonage of Mrs. 
 Frostwinch, was making the tour of the gallery 
 with Kent, and paying far more attention to her 
 companion than to the pictures. 
 
 "Oh, Arthur," Edith whispered, "I saw Mrs. 
 
376 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Staggchase in the dressing-room, and shie told me 
 that Ethel's engagement is out to-day." 
 
 Arthur smiled, remembering his perspicacity 
 when Ethel had driven away from his dinner with 
 Kent in her carriage. 
 
 " Isn't the crowd dreadful ? " the voice of Mrs. 
 Bodewin Ranger said, at Edith's elbow. '' I'm 
 really getting too old to trust myself in such a 
 crush." 
 
 While Edith chatted with her, the steward called 
 Fenton away, in connection with some question 
 about the catalogues, and when Mrs. Ranger 
 moved on, Edith found herself for an instant 
 alone. The mention of her husband's name be- 
 hind her caught her ear and her attention. 
 
 "Fenton's cheeky enough for anything!" said 
 an unknown voice. " But he makes a point of his 
 good taste, and I think it's beastly poor form for 
 him to show that picture here." 
 
 "Bently says," returned another voice, also 
 strange to Edith, ''that Fenton says she didn't 
 pose for him, but that he worked it up from old 
 studies." 
 
 " I don't care if he did," was the response. '* All 
 the fellows know it, and Herman must feel like 
 the deuce." 
 
 "• But you can't suppress every picture that has 
 a study of her in it." 
 
 " Hush," said the other voice, " there comes 
 Herman himself." 
 
FARTED OUR FELLOWSHIP 
 
 m 
 
 It seemed to Edith that this brief dialogue had 
 been shouted out so that it could not be inaudible 
 to any one in the room. She looked about for her 
 husband. Her ears rang with the meaningless 
 babble of voices, the jargon of human sounds con- 
 veying far less impression of intelligence than the 
 noise of water on the shore, or the sound of the 
 wind in the tree-tops. All about her were faces 
 wreathed in conventional smiles, the inevitable 
 laughter, the usual absence of earnestness, and in 
 the midst of all, with a shock hardly less painful 
 than that of the discovery she had just made, she 
 heard the voice of Herman bidding her good 
 eveninsr. 
 
 She held out her hand to him with a hasty, 
 excited gesture. She was painfully conscious that 
 he had but to lift his eyes to see the Fativia hang- 
 ing on the opposite wall of the gallery, and she 
 instinctively felt that she must draw his attention 
 away. 
 
 " How do you do, Mr. Herman," she said, with 
 eager warmth. " Is Mrs. Herman with you .? 
 
 She moved half around him as she spoke, as if 
 compelled by the shifting of the crowd to change 
 her position ; and while she shook hands managed 
 to bring herself almost face to the picture, so that 
 his back was toward it. 
 
 *' No," he answered, "■ she never comes to these 
 things if she can possibly help it. I hear your 
 husband has outdone himself on this exhibition." 
 
78 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 Edith looked about despairingly for Arthur. 
 She felt herself unequal to the emergency, and 
 longed for his clever wits to contrive some means 
 of escape from the cruel dilemma in which his act 
 had placed her and his friend. Indignation, 
 shame, and sorrow filled her heart. She recog- 
 nized that Arthur had not told her the truth in 
 regard to Ninitta. The dread and the suspicion 
 which she had felt on the night of the dinner 
 returned to her with tenfold force. But the 
 greatest triumph of modern civilization is the 
 power it has bestowed upon women of concealing 
 their feelings. The pressing need of the moment 
 was to show to Herman a smiling and untroubled 
 face, and to avoid arousing his suspicion that any- 
 thing was wrong. 
 
 ''The truth is," she returned, ''that I haven't 
 seen the exhibition. It's impossible to see pict- 
 ures in such a crowd, don't you think .'' I know 
 Arthur has worked very hard. I've hardly seen 
 him this week." 
 
 " He has a most tremendous power of accom- 
 plishing what he undertakes," Herman said heart- 
 ily. " But tell me about yourself. You're looking 
 tired." 
 
 " It is the time of year to look tired. I believe 
 I am feeling a little anxious that spring should 
 arrive." 
 
 She was struggling in her thoughts for a means 
 of preventing the discovery, which it seemed to 
 
PARTED OUR FELLOWSHIP. 
 
 379 
 
 her must be inevitable the moment she ceased to 
 engage Herman in conversation and he turned 
 away. Over his shoulder she could see the beau- 
 tiful, sensuous Fatima lying with long sleek limbs 
 amid bright-hued cushions. Now that she knew 
 the truth, she could see Ninitta in every line, and 
 her whole soul rose in indignant protest. It was 
 her friend, the wife of this man she honored, who 
 was delivered up on the wall yonder to the curious 
 eyes of all these people. The stinging blush of 
 shame burned in Edith's cheeks, and, as at this 
 instant she turned to find her husband beside her, 
 the glance which darted from her eyes to his was 
 one of righteous scorn and indignation. 
 
 His wife's burning look showed Arthur that she 
 knew ; and, reflecting quickly, he decided that 
 Herman did not. It was characteristic of him 
 that he instantly chose the boldest policy. 
 
 ** Come," he said to Herman as soon as they 
 had greeted each other, *' I know you haven't seen 
 my Fatima. The boys say its the best thing I've 
 do#e, but I couldn't get a decent model, and had 
 to depend so much on old studies, that, for the 
 life of me, I can't tell whether it's good or not." 
 
 Like two blows at once came to Edith a sense 
 of shame that she could even involuntarily have 
 wished for her husband's aid, and an overwhelming 
 consciousness of the readiness and boldness of his 
 falsity. She saw the face of Grant Herman, nobly 
 instinct with truth in every line, and, as he turned 
 
38o 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 at her husband's word, everything blurred before 
 her vision. She believed she was going to faint, 
 and she rallied all her self-command to hold her- 
 self steady. The lights danced, and the sound of 
 voices faded as into the distance. Then, with a 
 supreme effort of will, she rallied, and the voices 
 rolled back upon her ear with a noise like the roar 
 of an incoming wave. 
 
 A sphere of silence seemed to envelop Herman 
 and Arthur and herself in the very midst of the 
 crowd, as for an instant which seemed to her 
 cruelly long she stood waiting for what the sculp- 
 tor should say. 
 
 " Your friends are right, Fenton," Herman said, 
 at length, in a voice so changed from its previous 
 cordiality that it was idle to suppose the likeness 
 had escaped him. "You have never painted any- 
 thing better." 
 
 "Thank you," Fenton responded, brightly. "I 
 am awfully glad you like it. I fancy," he 
 added, with a laugh, "that the tabby-cats will be 
 shocked." 
 
 His companion made no reply, and the ap- 
 proach of Rangely afforded Arthur a chance to 
 change the conversation. 
 
 " I say, Fred," he demanded, " have you con- 
 gratulated Thayer Kent yet } " 
 
 " Congratulated him } " echoed Rangely. 
 
 "Yes. Didn't you know his engagement is 
 out.?" 
 
PARTED OUR FELLOWSHIP. 
 
 381 
 
 Rangely might have been said to take a page 
 out of Fenton's own book, as he answered, — 
 
 " But what's the etiquette of precedence ? " 
 
 "Of precedence ? " echoed Arthur, in his turn. 
 
 *' Yes," Rangely returned. '* Which of us 
 should congratulate the other first } Only," he 
 added, hitting to his own delight upon a position 
 which might save him from some awkwardness in 
 the future, ** of course my engagement can't be 
 announced until Miss Merrivale gets home to her 
 mother." 
 
 "Well," Arthur said, "marriage is that cere- 
 mony by which man lays aside the pleasures of 
 life and takes up its duties. I congratulate you 
 on your determination to do anything so virtuous." 
 
 " Sardonic, as usual," retorted Fred, laughing ; 
 and then he went to find Miss Merrivale, con- 
 vinced that under the circumstances the sooner he 
 proposed to her the better. 
 
XXXII 
 
 HEART-BURNING HEAT OF DUTY. 
 
 Love's Labor's Lost; i. — i, 
 
 A LL the world feels the pathos of helplessness 
 -^ hurt and wounded ; but only some recognize 
 how this applies to a great and noble nature 
 attacked by unscrupulousness. In an encounter 
 with dishonesty, nobility of soul may be, in its 
 effect for the moment, utter weakness. Assailed 
 by deceit or treachery the great heart has often 
 no resource but endurance ; and while endurance 
 may save, it cannot defend. 
 
 The moment Grant Herman's eyes fell upon the 
 Fatimay he understood fully why Fenton had so 
 volubly remarked that he had painted the picture 
 from old studies. He tried to fight with his con- 
 viction that what the artist said was false, although 
 even as he did so he could not crush down the 
 feeling of having been wounded by the hand of a 
 friend. It seemed to him incredible that Fenton, 
 even though the painter's defection from the 
 Pagans had caused something of a breach between 
 them, could have been guilty of this outrage. He 
 choked with an intolerable sense of shame for 
 himself, for the artist, and for Ninitta. A terrible 
 382 
 
HEART-BUKN/NG HEAT OE DUTY. 383 
 
 anguish wrung his heart as he looked across the 
 crowded gallery gay with lights, with the rich 
 dresses, with laughter, and with the beauty of 
 women, to where hung the picture of the mother 
 of his boy. an image of sensuous enticement. 
 The fact that Fenton had substituted another 
 face for that of Ninitta did not, for the moment, 
 console him. To his sculptor's eye, form was the 
 important thing, and the fact that he recognized 
 the model bore down all else. He remembered 
 how marked had been Ninitta's unwillingness to 
 accompany him to the exhibition, and the possible 
 connection between this and the picture forced 
 itself upon his mind. 
 
 With all the instinctive generosity of his soul, 
 however, Herman strove to believe that the Fatiina 
 had been painted, as Fenton said, from old studies, 
 and that his wife had not been guilty of the pain- 
 ful indecorum of posing. He compelled himself 
 to answer the artist calmly, although he could not 
 make his manner cordial. And as he spoke, his 
 eye, searching the picture for confirmation of his 
 hope or of his fear, recognized among the draper- 
 ies a Turkish shawl he had himself sriven his wife 
 
 o 
 
 after their marriage. 
 
 He made his way out of the gallery and out of 
 the club house. He felt that he must get away 
 from the innumerable eyes by which he was sur- 
 rounded. He started toward home, but before he 
 had gone a block, he stopped, hesitated a moment. 
 
384 
 
 THE PHILISTINES, 
 
 and struck off into a side street. He was not 
 ready to go home. He had said to himself too 
 often, reiterating it in his mind constantly for six 
 years, that in dealing with his wife his must be the 
 wisdom, the patience, and the forbearance of both. 
 He remembered a night long ago, when he had 
 gone to Ninitta's room, in a mood of contrition, to 
 renew the troth of his youth, and had fallen in- 
 stead into a fit of bitter anger. With no evident 
 reason, came back to him to-night the beautiful 
 weeping figure of the Italian as she had cast her- 
 self at his feet and implored his forgiveness. He 
 would not go to her now until he was calmer, and 
 until he had considered carefully all the points of 
 the situation. 
 
 In that whirl which comes in desperate circum- 
 stances before the startled and bewildered thoughts 
 can be reduced to order, Herman wandered on, not 
 thinking where he was going, until he found him- 
 self leaning against a railing and looking over the 
 waters of the Charles River. It was a beautiful 
 starlight night with a wavering wind that came 
 in uncertain gusts only to die away again. The 
 water was like a flood of ink, across which streamed 
 thin tremulous lines of brightness, and over which 
 were strewn the flickering reflections of the stars. 
 The gas jets of the city across the flood, the rows 
 of lamps which marked the bridges, the distant 
 horse cars which rumbled between Cambridge and 
 Boston with their colored lights, the green and 
 
HEART-BURNING HEAT OF DUTY, 385 
 
 red lanterns that glowed from the railroad tracks 
 farther down the river, all suggested the busy life 
 of men with its passions, its greed, and its heart- 
 lessness ; but the darkness held all remote, as if 
 the world of men were a dream. And overhead 
 the immovable stars, like the unpitying gods, 
 hung above the city and were reflected in the 
 water, and wounded the soul of the lonely man 
 with the terrible sense of power inimitably re- 
 moved, of passionless strength which served to 
 humanity but as a measure of its own weakness 
 and triviality. The misfortunes of life might be 
 endured ; its disappointments, its anguish, even its 
 inviolable loneliness might be supported, but a 
 sense of the awful futility of existence crushes 
 man to the depths of impotent despair. 
 
 A review of the past is usually a protest against 
 fate, and manly as Herman was it was inevitable 
 that into his reverie should come a sense that the 
 wrong and suffering of his life had been thrust 
 upon him undeserved. He could not be blind to 
 the fact that it had been through his virtues that 
 he had been wounded. A sense of injustice comes 
 with the consciousness of having suffered through 
 merit. Many a man is too noble basely to avoid 
 the consequences of his acts, but few can wholly 
 rid themselves of the feeling that the uncomplain- 
 ing acceptance of painful results should serve as 
 expiation for the deeds which caused them. The 
 nobility of his nature, the purity of his intentions 
 
386 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 had made of a boyish folly the curse of a lifetime. 
 With whatever tenderness the sculptor regarded 
 Ninitta as the mother of his son, it was vain for 
 him to attempt to deceive himself in regard to his 
 love for her. A man with whom cordiality was 
 instinctive, who was born for the most frank and 
 intimate domestic relations, he found in his wife 
 small sympathy and less comprehension. He had 
 married her, believing that she had a right to claim 
 happiness at his hands because he had taught her 
 to love him. He had long since been obliged to 
 own to himself that he had done this at the ex- 
 pense of his own peace, and he now questioned 
 whether the experiment had succeeded better in 
 her case than in his. If she had not been able to 
 comprehend his aims and to enter into his scheme 
 of life, it was equally true that she must have found 
 in him little response to the calls of her own 
 nature. The bitterness of the sigh which wrung 
 his bosom, as he stood with his hand upon the rail- 
 ing and looked over the water with the lights re- 
 flected on its blackness, was as much for her as for 
 himself. 
 
 Yet he would not have been human had he not 
 felt thrills of anger when he thought of th^ Fatima, 
 No faintest suspicion crossed his mind of any 
 darker shame which might lie behind the fact that 
 his wife had posed for Fenton. This he could not 
 doubt that she had done. This explained her fre- 
 quent absences from home in the morning, to 
 
HEAKT-BL'KXIXG HEAT OF DUTY. 
 
 387 
 
 which he had before given no thought. He re- 
 membered, too, that for weeks a furtive restless- 
 ness, poorly concealed, had been evident in 
 Ninitta's manner. He had attributed it to hei 
 intense opposition to Nino's being sent to school ; 
 but now he read it differently. He could not but 
 be angry, yet his pity was greater than his wrath ; 
 and he resolved not only to be forbearing with 
 his wife, but hereafter to use greater endeavors to 
 enrich her colorless life. He was too thoroughly 
 an artist himself not to feel and appreciate how 
 much the old love of posing, the longing for the 
 air of a studio, and the art instinct might have 
 had to do with Ninitta's fault. 
 
 But in regard to Fenton his heart burned with 
 that rage which is largely grief. It was like the 
 anger, which is half astonishment, of a child who 
 is unexpectedly struck by its playmate. The fact 
 that he was incapable of comprehending how it 
 was possible to betray a friend made him confused 
 in thinking of the artist's share in the transaction ; 
 and the fact that he could vent upon Fenton his 
 righteous indignation enabled him to free his feel- 
 ings toward Ninitta of almost all animosity. 
 When at last he turned to go home, it was with a 
 profound pity that he thought of his wife. 
 
 It was a little after eleven when he reached his 
 house. The gas was burning in his chamber and 
 Ninitta lay apparently sleeping. The wretched 
 woman feigned a slumber which she had in vain 
 
388 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 courted. She was convinced that her husband 
 could not see the Fatima without discovering her 
 secret, and the guilty knowledge in her heart filled 
 her with growing fears as the moments went on. 
 
 When at last she heard Herman's step, she had 
 started up in bed like a wild creature, her heart 
 fluttering, her ears strained as if to catch from the 
 sound some clue to his mood. But instantly she 
 had lain down again, and, with an instinct like 
 that of the timorous animals whose nature it is to 
 feign death when they cannot flee, had composed 
 herself into the appearance of slumber. 
 
 Herman paused a moment, just inside the cham- 
 ber door, and looked at his wife. Something in 
 her pose suggested to him so vividly the Fatima 
 that, despite his self-conquest on the bridge, a 
 flood of anger swelled within him. The masculine 
 instinct, nourished through a thousand generations, 
 that no palliation gives the wife a right to claim 
 forgiveness from her husband for the shame she 
 has put upon him by a violation of modesty, surged 
 up within him. He drew in a deep inspiration and 
 started forward with an inarticulate sound as if he 
 could throw himself upon this woman and tighten 
 his fingers on her throat. 
 
 Ninitta raised herself in bed with an exclama- 
 tion of fear. Her black hair streamed loose, and 
 her dark eyes shone. Her swarthy passionate 
 face was an image of terror. She was not far 
 enough away from her peasant ancestors not to be 
 
HEART-BUKNIXG HEAT OF DUTY. 
 
 389 
 
 moved by the size and strength of her husband's 
 large and vigorous frame. Many generations and 
 much subtlety of refinement must lie between 
 herself and savagery before a woman can learn in- 
 stinctively to fear the soul of a man rather than 
 his muscles in a crisis like this. Husband and wife 
 confronted each other as he walked quickly across 
 the chamber. Her cowering attitude, the fear 
 which was written in every line of her face, fed 
 his anger, until, in his blind rage, all pity and self- 
 restraint seemed to be swept away. 
 
 But just as he neared the bed, when in his burn- 
 ing look Ninitta seemed already to feel his hands 
 clutching her with cruel force, his foot struck 
 against something which lay on the floor. It was 
 one of Nino's wooden soldiers. The father stopped, 
 and his look changed. He remembered how Nino 
 had come in from the nursery while he was dress- 
 ing that night, bringing his arms full of more or 
 less shattered figures which he had appealed to 
 his father to put to rights for a grand battle which 
 was to be fought in the morning. Herman looked 
 down at the toy and forgot his anger. He looked 
 up at his wife and she saw with wonder the change 
 in his face. It had been full of indignation against 
 the wife who had deceived him ; on it now was 
 written reproachful anguish, and pity for the 
 mother of his son. 
 
 " Ninitta," he said. " How could you do it ? " 
 She cowered down in the bed, burying her face 
 
390 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 in her hands. She could not answer, and there 
 came over him a painful sense of the uselessness 
 of words. 
 
 " Everybody must recognize Fenton's picture," 
 he said. " If you did not remember me, Ninitta, 
 how could you forget Nino ? How will he feel 
 when he is old enough to realize what you have 
 done .-* " 
 
 The frightened woman burst into convulsive 
 sobs mixed with moans like those of a hurt animal. 
 In the last hours she had been thinking no less 
 than her husband ; but where he had considered 
 her, she had thought chiefly of her boy. Mingled 
 with the fear of her husband's anger had been the 
 nobler feeling, that she was no longer worthy to 
 be with her son. The very passion of the love she 
 bore him moved her now with the determination 
 to leave him. It was always Ninitta's instinct to 
 run away in trouble, and now, added to the im- 
 pulse to escape from her husband was the deter- 
 mination forming itself with awful stress of anguish 
 in her soul, to go away from Nino ; to take away 
 from her son whom she loved better than life it- 
 self, this woman who had no right in his pure 
 presence. She did not look upon it as an expia- 
 tion of her fault ; it was only that maternal love 
 gathered up whatever was noble in her nature, in 
 this supreme sacrifice for her son. 
 
 To Herman, looking down upon the cowering 
 figure of his wife, with a heartbreaking sense of 
 
HEART-BURNING HEAT OF DUTY. 
 
 391 
 
 the impossibility of effecting anything by words, 
 she was simply a cowardly woman who took refuge 
 in tears from the reproaches which her conduct de- 
 served. Could he have known what was passing in 
 her heart, it would have moved him to a deeper re- 
 spect and a keener pity than he had ever felt for 
 her. No more than a dumb animal had she any 
 language in which she could have made him under- 
 stand her feelings had she tried ; and at last he 
 turned away with a choking in his throat. 
 
XXXIII 
 
 A BOND OF AIR. 
 
 Troilus and Cressida ; i. — 3. 
 
 THE stock of the Princeton Platinum Company 
 was issued in ten-dollar shares, it being the 
 conviction of Erastus Snaffle, deduced from a more 
 or less extensive experience, that the gullible por- 
 tion of the public is more likely to buy stock of a 
 low par value. On the morning after the exhibi- 
 tion at the St. Filipe Club, the shares were quoted 
 at two dollars and an eighth. 
 
 Arthur Fenton read the stock reports at break- 
 fast. He laid the paper down calmly, drank his 
 coffee in silence, and absently played with his fork, 
 while his wife attended to Caldwell's breakfast and 
 her own. He said nothing until the boy, whose 
 mind was intent upon some new toy or other, hav- 
 ing hastily finished his meal, asked to be excused. 
 
 "Don't be in a hurry, Caldwell," his mother 
 said, gently. " I want you to learn to wait for 
 older people." 
 
 " Let him go, Edith," his father interposed. 
 " I want to talk to you." 
 
 The boy jumped down quickly and ran to give 
 his father a hasty kiss. He had learned to look 
 
 392 
 
A BOND OF AIR. 
 
 393 
 
 to Fenton to help him in evading his mother's at- 
 tempts at discipline, and Edith noted with pain, as 
 she had too often noticed before, the' knowing 
 smile which came into the child's face at her hus- 
 band's words. Caldwell evidently regarded his 
 father's remark merely as a convenient excuse, 
 and it hurt Edith to see how in subtile ways her 
 son was learning to distrust the honesty of his 
 father. 
 
 On this occasion, however, Arthur had meant 
 what he said. When the door had closed behind 
 the little fellow, he looked up to observe in the 
 most matter-of-fact tone, — 
 
 " I suppose it is only fair, Edith, that I should 
 tell you that we are ruined." 
 
 She looked at him with a puzzled face. 
 
 *' What do you mean } " she said. 
 
 " I mean," he returned, '* that I have been get- 
 ting into no end of a mess, and that some stock I 
 bought to help myself out of it, has gone down 
 and made things ten times worse." 
 
 She folded her hands in her lap and regarded 
 him wistfully. She had been so often repressed 
 when she had tried to gain his confidence in regard 
 to business matters that she hesitated to speak 
 now. 
 
 " Should I understand if you told me about it }'' 
 she asked. 
 
 "Oh, very likely not," he returned, coolly; 
 "but I don't in the least mind telling you, if it's 
 
394 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 any satisfaction to you. It isn't any great matter, 
 only that I live so near the ragged edge that a 
 dollar or two either way makes all the difference 
 between poverty and independence." 
 
 Edith breathed more freely. Her husband's 
 self-possessed manner, and the fact that she knew 
 him to be so given to exaggeration, made her feel 
 that things were not so hopeless as his vv^ords had 
 at first implied. 
 
 " I have three thousand shares of Princeton 
 Platinum stock," Fenton went on, with the con- 
 descending air of one who elaborately explains de- 
 tails which he knows will not be understood. " I 
 bought at two and seven-eighths, with money that 
 should go to pay notes due on Saturday. The 
 stock was worth two and an eighth last night and 
 very likely by to-night won't be worth anything." 
 
 "Then why didn't you sell yesterday .'^ " Edith 
 asked. 
 
 Arthur smiled at the feminine turn of her words. 
 
 " Because, my shrewd financier, I don't want to 
 sell at a loss, and Mr. Irons assures me that there 
 will be a rise before the final collapse." 
 
 He did not add, as he might have done, the sub- 
 stance of the talk between himself and Irons. 
 That wily financier had said to him one day, — ■ 
 
 " Fenton, you were almighty toploftical about 
 those railroad shares, and I'll give you another 
 chance. I've had four thousand shares of Prince- 
 ton Platinum turned over to me on an assignment. 
 
A BOND OF A JR. 
 
 395 
 
 It cost me two, and you may have it at that figure, 
 though it's worth two and a half in the market 
 to-day." 
 
 ''You are too generous, by half," Fenton had 
 answered. 
 
 " Well, the fact is," Irons had responded, *' I 
 hate infernally to be under obligations. Princeton 
 Platinum is wild-cat fast enough, but it will touch 
 four before they let the bottom drop out. That I 
 happen to know. This will give you a chance to 
 make a neat thing out of it, and it will square off 
 the obligation our syndicate's under to you." 
 
 "Thank you," was Fenton's answer; *' but the 
 obligation, such as it is, I prefer to have stand, 
 and I haven't any money to put into stock of any 
 kind now." 
 
 '' Well, think it over. Don't let your senti- 
 ments interfere too much with business. I'll hold 
 the stock for you for three days. If you're fool 
 enough to miss your opportunity after that I'm 
 not responsible." 
 
 Naturally, this portion of the conversation Fen- 
 ton did not impart to his wife. 
 
 Edith's look became more perplexed as her talk 
 with her husband continued ; and the matter-of- 
 fact way in which he spoke of approaching disas- 
 ter was to her unintelligible. 
 
 " What is going to collapse } " she asked at 
 length. ''The stock.?" 
 
 "Certainly, my dear. There isn't anything 
 
396 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 behind it. | I doubt if there ever was any Prince- 
 ton Platinum mine, but I did think the men who 
 were managing it were clever enough to get it to 
 four or four and a half before they let go," 
 
 "But how could they get it to four or four and 
 a half, if there isn't any mine ? " 
 
 " By gulling fools like me, my dear ; that's the 
 way these things are always done." 
 
 A troubled look came over Mrs. F'enton's face, 
 and her lips closed a little more tightly. 
 
 "Well," demanded her husband impatiently, 
 "what is it .^ Moral scruples.-*" 
 
 "It doesn't seem to me to be very honest stock 
 to be dealing in," Edith replied, timidly. 
 
 " To discuss the morality of stock speculation," 
 he replied, with coolly elaborate courtesy, " is 
 much like eating a fig. You may be biting the 
 seeds all day without being sure you've finished 
 
 them."3 
 
 She was silenced, and cast down her eyes wait- 
 ing for what he might choose to say next. 
 
 " The situation," he continued, after a pause, 
 " is merely this. I haven't the cleverness prop- 
 erly to manage being in debt. I don't know how 
 those notes are to be paid Saturday, and have 
 been given to understand that there are reasons, 
 doubtless judicious, but extremely inconvenient, 
 why they will not be renewed." 
 
 His manner was as calm as ever, but there was 
 a growing hardness in his tone and a cruel tight- 
 
A BOXD OF AIR. 
 
 397 
 
 ening of his lips. His restraint had much of the 
 calmness of despair. His was a nature which 
 always outran actualities with imagined possibili- 
 ties, and thus found in even the fullest joy a sense 
 of loss and failure ; while in misfortune, it magni- 
 fied all evils until it was overwhelmed with the 
 burden of their weight. He suffered the more 
 acutely because he endured not only the sting of 
 the present evil, but of all those which he foresaw 
 might follow in its wake. He felt at this moment 
 a growing necessity to find some one against whom 
 he might logically turn his anger ; and while he 
 was firmly determined not to vent his displeasure 
 upon his wife, his attitude toward her became con- 
 stantly more stern. 
 
 " If Uncle Peter were at home," Edith began, 
 after a pause, " he might " — 
 
 " He might not," interrupted Arthur, roughly. 
 " In any case he has taken the light of his counte- 
 nance abroad, so he's out of the question." 
 
 *' But some of your friends, Arthur, might lend 
 you the money you want." 
 
 " My dear Edith, do you fancy that within the 
 past month I have failed to go over the list of my 
 friends, backward and forward } Don't say those 
 tiresome, obvious things. I'll fail and have an 
 auction, and give up the house, and lose caste, and 
 have a pleasant tea-party generally. That's the 
 only thing there is to do." 
 
 Edith rose from her seat, and went around to 
 
398 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 where he was sitting. Standing behind his chair 
 she laid her hands on his shoulders, and, bending 
 forward, kissed his cheek. 
 
 " I dare say, Arthur," she said, *' that we should 
 be quite as happy if we gave up trying to live in a 
 way that we can't afford ; but meanwhile there is 
 godmamma." 
 
 '' Mrs. Glendower } " 
 
 " Yes. You know she has left me five thousand 
 dollars in her will ; and she told me once that if 
 the time came that I needed the money desper- 
 ately I should have it for the asking." 
 
 " That is kind of her," was her husband's com- 
 ment, " but it would be kinder to let you get it at 
 once in the natural way. The comfort about a 
 bequest is that you don't have to feel grateful to 
 any live man for it." 
 
 His words were brutal enough, but there was a 
 new lightness in his tone. He caught instantly at 
 this hope of relief, and he showed his appreciation 
 of his wife's cleverness in devising this scheme by 
 caressing the hand which lay upon his shoulder. 
 
 " You can go to New York to-night," remarked 
 Edith thoughtfully, ignoring his words, " and be 
 back by Saturday morning. If you didn't so 
 much dislike going to New York in the day time, 
 you might get there in time to see godmamma 
 to-night." 
 
 " To-morrow will be time enough," he answered. 
 " You are a brick, Edith, to help me out of this 
 
A BOND OF AIR. 
 
 399 
 
 scrape, and the magnitude of the moral reforms 
 I'll institute in honor of my deliverance will as- 
 tonish you." 
 
 He sprang up as light-heartedly as a boy. The 
 means of escaping the annoyance of the present 
 moment had been found, and his buoyant spirits 
 lifted him above the doubts and troubles of the 
 future. 
 
 They discussed together the details of his com- 
 ing: interview with Mrs. Glendower, and the terms 
 of the letter which Edith should write to her. 
 There was something most touching in the tender 
 eagerness with which Edith prolonged the talk 
 and clung to the occasion which had brought her 
 and her husband, for the moment, together. She 
 even forgot to deplore the misfortune which had 
 given rise to this confidence, and, in her desire to 
 be helpful to Arthur, she did not even remember 
 that once her pride would have risen in rebellion 
 at the bare suggestion of taking advantage of Mrs. 
 Glendower's offer. All day long she went about 
 with a happier smile on her lips than had been 
 there for many a long day. The danger of im- 
 pending ruin seemed to have brought her consola- 
 tion instead of grief ; and in the prayers which she 
 murmured in her heart as she stood with her arms 
 clasped about Caldwell, when Fenton drove away 
 that night, there was not a little thanksgiving 
 mingled with her supplications. 
 
XXXIV 
 
 WHAT TIME SHE CHANTED. 
 
 Hamlet ; iv. — 7. 
 
 THE stock report which caused Fenton such 
 unpleasant sensations was read that same 
 morning by Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson with 
 keen satisfaction of a sort seldom known to the 
 truly virtuous. Mrs. Sampson was engaged in 
 financial transactions of which the very magnitude 
 caused her naive satisfaction, while the possible 
 results made her bosom glow with unwonted emo- 
 tion. Mrs. Sampson's affection for Alfred Irons 
 was neither deep nor tender in its nature, and in 
 settling the bill for services rendered in the rail- 
 road case there was no sentiment likely to restrain 
 her from making the best possible bargain. The 
 bargain she made was of a nature to send her 
 about her flat singing songs of triumph such as 
 Deborah sang over the slaughter of the unfortu- 
 nate Sisera. 
 
 The wily but impressible Erastus Snaffle, 
 
 cheered by the widow's wine, warmed by her 
 
 smile, and smitten by her amiable conversation, 
 
 had bestowed upon her, merely as a tribute which 
 
 400 
 
WHAT TIME SHE CHAxWTED. ^qI 
 
 mammon might pay to the ever-womanly, three 
 thousand shares of Princeton Platinum stock. He 
 had done this at a time when it seemed doubtful 
 whether even his adroitness could make the scheme 
 a success ; and it somewhat mars the lustre of 
 his generosity to record that he afterward re- 
 gretted his impulsive open-handedness. He had 
 been able to prevent Mrs. Sampson from realizing 
 on her stock, very reasonably feeling that he was 
 making philanthropic endeavors to benefit an un- 
 grateful world rather against its will, and he did not 
 mean that she should make a stumbling-block for 
 him of his own generosity by putting this gift on 
 the market when he wished to supply all buyers 
 himself. 
 
 When it was quoted at three, the high-water 
 mark so far, he had beguiled the widow with a 
 cock-and-bull story about the formalities of trans- 
 ferrence on the books of the company of stocks 
 which had been given away ; and by the time Mrs. 
 Sampson had cleared her mind from the entangle- 
 ments of this ingenious fiction the bottom had 
 dropped out of the market. 
 
 In the midst of her disappointment in seeing 
 what to her would have been almost a fortune 
 meltins: into thin air, the fertile brain of Mrs. 
 Sampson had given birth to what was nothing less 
 than an inspiration. She had gone to see Alfred 
 Irons, and delicately but firmly insinuated that it 
 was high time she received substantial tokens of 
 
402 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 the gratitude of the Wachusett Syndicate, for her 
 efforts in their behalf with the Hon. Thomas 
 Greenfield. Mr. Irons had answered, as she had 
 expected him to, that she had presented no bill. 
 To this her reply was ready. She was prepared to 
 state what would satisfy her. She explained that 
 she felt the delicacy of her position, since, if any 
 consideration passed to her directly from the cor- 
 poration, it was sure to be known, and unpleasant 
 comment made. She had in her possession, she 
 continued, certain stock, of which the market value 
 was somewhere between two and two and a half, 
 which, it struck her, might serve admirably to 
 veil the generosity which had been promised her. 
 Her proposition, in brief, was that Irons should 
 take her three thousand shares of stock at four 
 dollars, the difference between this and the mar- 
 ket value, of course, being refunded to him by 
 the company. 
 
 " By Gad ! you're a cheeky one ! " had been 
 Iron's comment, more expressive than elegant, 
 when the widow had laid her scheme wholly be- 
 fore him. 
 
 The railroad matter had, however, been settled 
 to the satisfaction of the syndicate. Mr. Green- 
 field's support of the Wachusett scheme at the 
 hearing had been of the utmost importance, espe- 
 cially as Mrs. Sampson had been able to persuade 
 " Honest Tom " that a perfectly fair proposition 
 made to him by Mr. Staggchase was in the nature 
 
WHAT TIME SHE CHAiVTED. 
 
 403 
 
 of a high-handed bribe. This proposition had been 
 presented in a somewhat scandalous light, and in 
 the face of it Hubbard had induced his associates 
 to throw up the whole Feltonville scheme. The 
 Railroad Commissioners had issued the coveted 
 certificate for the Wachusett route, and the rest 
 was easy. Irons was therefore grateful to the 
 widow, and he at length agreed to consult his 
 associates, and he did not deny Mrs. Sampson's 
 observation that it was as much for the benefit of 
 the corporation as of herself that money passing 
 between them should be covered by some such 
 disguise as that of this stock operation. 
 
 The widow had returned home not over san- 
 guine, and her astonishment was scarcely less 
 than her pleasure when, on Wednesday afternoon, 
 she received a note from Irons, assenting to her 
 proposition with the modification that the pur- 
 chasing figure should be three dollars instead of 
 four. It was a fact as far beyond the limits of the 
 widow's knowledge as it was beyond that of his 
 colleagues, that Irons meant to make this transac- 
 tion the means of increasing a revenge which he 
 already had in train. That gentleman had never 
 forgiven Fenton for burning the order for railroad 
 bonds, and when accident threw the Princeton 
 Platinum stock into his hands he determined 
 to make it the means of the artist's discomfiture. 
 It was only the day after he had offered Fenton 
 his four thousand shares that Mrs. Sampson ap- 
 
404 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 peared with her offer of three thousand more, 
 He had no doubt of his abiHty to entrap Fenton 
 into buying, the one weak spot in his plan being 
 the fact, of which he was in complete ignorance, 
 that Fenton already held stock and had nothing 
 whatever with which to buy more. He was will- 
 ing to let the widow's bribe pass to her under so 
 plausible a disguise, and he said to himself with 
 a chuckle that he had far rather sell Fenton the 
 seven thousand shares than four. 
 
 If he were unable to sell to Fenton it appeared 
 to Irons as on the whole highly probable that he 
 could dispose of the stock for the corporation at a 
 price which would materially lessen the amount of 
 their bonus to the widow ; or if the market should 
 chance to look promising, he might find it worth 
 while to buy it from his colleagues with a view to 
 realizing something on it himself. 
 
 Perhaps it was because he was doing business 
 with a woman, perhaps it was the consciousness of 
 the bribe which the bargain covered and a desire 
 to leave as little record of it as possible, perhaps 
 it was only the carelessness of extreme haste, that 
 caused Irons to send to the widow so ambiguous 
 and dangerous a note as the following, — 
 
 "Dear Mrs. Sampson, — I am suddenly called to New York, 
 and leave to-night. I will take all your Princeton Platinum stock 
 at three dollars. Please deliver it at my office to-morrow with 
 this note as a voucher. Yours truly, 
 
 "Alfred Irons." 
 
WHAT TIME SHE CHAXTED. 
 
 405 
 
 It was the misfortune of Alfred Irons that Mrs. 
 Sampson took an extra cup of coffee that evening 
 and could not sleep ; and in the watches of the 
 night, either the devil or her own soul — the in- 
 spirations of the two being too similar for one 
 rashly to venture to discriminate between them — 
 said to her, " Amanda ! Now is your chance." 
 Thereafter, no fumes of coffee were necessary to 
 keep the widow awake for the remainder of the 
 night ; and on Thursday morning before she 
 presented herself at Irons's office she had an inter- 
 esting interview with no less a personage than Mr. 
 Erastus Snaffle himself. 
 
 Mrs. Sampson began by declaring that she 
 wished to purchase a certain amount of Princeton 
 Platinum stock, but before long the need she felt 
 of having her feminine guile supported by mascu- 
 line intelligence had led her to make a clean 
 breast of the situation. She showed Mr. Snaffle 
 Mr. Irons's note, calling his attention particularly 
 to the ill-chosen word "all " which seemed to her 
 to afford the means of unloading indefinitely at 
 the expense of the absent financier. Her enthusi- 
 asm received a cruel shock when Snaffle retorted 
 with a burst of ill-bred laughter, — 
 
 " Oh Lord ! You must think Irons is a dog- 
 goned fool ! " 
 
 "But," the widow persisted, "it says 'all' the 
 stock, doesn't it .? " 
 
 " Do you think you could make his firm buy up 
 
406 ^^-^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 all the Princeton on that flimsy dodge ? " retorted 
 Snaffle contemptuously. 
 
 "We'll see," Amanda declared, nodding her 
 head determinedly. " The question is how much 
 do you think they will stand ? A man ought to 
 know that better than a woman." 
 
 A new look of cunning came into the fat face 
 of the speculator, and his numerous superfluous 
 chins began to be agitated as if with excitement. 
 
 "Well," he said, "if you can stick them for any 
 I don't see why you can't for a lot. I've just four 
 thousand shares left, and you might as well run 
 them all in on the old man." 
 
 The widow laughed with malicious glee. 
 
 " I don't know," she replied, "how this will 
 turn out, but if I wasn't going to get a cent from 
 it, I'd try it just for the sake of getting even with 
 Al Irons." 
 
 " Oh, its your opportunity," he said, with agile 
 change of base, " and as for getting ahead of him, 
 I'm blessed if I wouldn't bet on you every time. 
 Seven thousand shares isn't much for a house like 
 theirs. We put the stock at ten dollars on pur- 
 pose so folks could handle a lot of it and talk big 
 without having much money in. Come, you just 
 clear out the whole thing for me, and I'll let you 
 have it at two and a half, just for your good 
 looks." 
 
 " Thank you for nothing," was the reply of the 
 redoubtable widow. " I took the trouble to find 
 
WHAT TIME SHE CHANTED. 
 
 407 
 
 out the market price on my way down here and 
 anybody can buy plenty of it for two and an eighth, 
 without being good looking at all." 
 
 Erastus chuckled, rubbing his fat hands to- 
 gether in delighted appreciation of his compan- 
 ion's wit. 
 
 " Come," he pleaded, *' when you get to making 
 eyes at that clerk, he'll buy anything you offer, no 
 matter what Irons told him. I wouldn't give 
 much for the man that would let a little memoran- 
 dum stand in the way of obliging a lady." 
 
 Amanda did not have good blood in her veins 
 without appreciating the coarse vulgarity of Snaf- 
 fle ; but neither had she associated for years with 
 his kind without having the edge of her distaste 
 worn away. She was, besides, a woman and a 
 vain one, and the undisguised admiration with 
 which he regarded her put her in excellent humor. 
 It confirmed the verdict of her mirror that the 
 care with which she had arrayed herself for this 
 expedition had not been wasted. She smiled as 
 she answered him, tapping her chin with her well- 
 gloved forefinger. 
 
 " But, of course," she observed, dispassionately, 
 " if I bought of you at all I should buy condition- 
 ally. I'll give you two for the stock, and take it 
 if I can sell it to Irons." 
 
 "Oh, don't rob yourself," Snaffle returned, with 
 good-natured sarcasm. *' What's to hinder my 
 selling it for two and an eighth myself } " 
 
408 ^^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 ** Two and an eighth asked and no buyers is what 
 they told me ! " retorted the widow imperturbably. 
 " I don't know much about stocks, but I know 
 that if you could have sold for almost any price 
 you'd have done it long ago." 
 
 " Right you are," admitted SnafHe, good-na- 
 turedly, "if I'd nobody to consider but myself; 
 but just the same, I sha'n't kick the bottom out of 
 the market before it falls out of itself." 
 
 "Then I understand," said the widow, with an 
 air, gathering herself together as if to depart, 
 " that you won't take my offer." 
 
 "Oh, come now," protested Snaffle, " why don't 
 you ask me to give it to you as I did the other ? " 
 
 "So delicate of him," murmured the widow, 
 confidentially to the universe at large, "to fling 
 that at me." 
 
 " I ain't flinging it at you," Snaffle returned, 
 unabashed. " But, come now, let's talk business. 
 If I give you an option on this, so long as you are 
 going to sell it at three dollars, of course you 
 ought to pay me more than the market price. I'll 
 be d'ed if I let you have it less than two and a 
 half." 
 
 "One doesn't know which to admire most, Mr. 
 Snaffle, your politeness to ladies or your gen- 
 erosity." 
 
 "Oh, don't mention it," was the speculator's 
 grinning reply. "Come, now, don't be a pig. 
 Twenty per cent profit ought to satisfy anybody." 
 
WHAT TIME SHE CHANTED. 
 
 409 
 
 "I'll give you two," said Mrs. Sampson, with 
 feminine persistency. 
 
 Snaffle turned on his heel with a word seldom 
 spoken in the presence of ladies. 
 
 ''Well, you might as well get out of this, then," 
 he remarked, brusquely. " You're a beauty, but 
 you don't know anything about business." 
 
 Amanda regarded him with an inscrutable glance 
 for an instant, evidently making up her mind that 
 he meant what he said. 
 
 " Well," she observed ; " if you want to rob me, 
 I'm only a woman with nobody to take my part, 
 and I shall have to give you what you ask." 
 
 " Gad ! " he ejaculated. " If one man in ten was 
 as well able to take his own part as you are, things 
 'd be some different from what they are now." 
 
 And the smile of Mrs. Amanda Welsh Sampson 
 indicated that even so high-flavored a compliment 
 as this was not wholly displeasing to her. 
 
 The certificates of stock were produced and 
 duly endorsed, and, tucking them into her hand- 
 bag, the widow went on her way attended by 
 wishes for her success which were probably the 
 more genuine because the transaction was only 
 conditional. 
 
 " Well," Snaffle communed with himself after 
 she had departed ; " there ain't no flies on the 
 widow, and I guess she'll manage that clerk. 
 She's a clever one, but if she'd been a little 
 cleverer, so as to appreciate that I couldn't put 
 
4IO 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 that amount of stock on the market without send- 
 ing the price down to bed rock, she might have 
 had the lot at her own figure. I'd have been glad 
 to take one fifty for it." 
 
 Meanwhile the widow had pursued her schem- 
 ing way toward State Street, The moral support 
 of Snaffle's testimony to her ability and his admi- 
 ration for her personal appearance probably upheld 
 her during her interview with Mr. Iron's clerk. 
 That young man, an exquisite creature, who 
 had the appearance of giving his mind largely to 
 his collars, was overwhelmed by the amount of 
 stock which Mrs. Sampson produced. He ex- 
 plained with some confusion that in the hurry 
 incident upon Mr. Iron's unexpected departure, he 
 had neglected to make a memorandum, but that 
 he understood that he w^as to receive three thou- 
 sand shares of Princeton Platinum with Mr. Iron's 
 letter as a voucher. 
 
 "I may have been mistaken," he observed, apol- 
 ogetically. " Mr. Irons was called away in a great 
 hurry, and I did get some of his directions con- 
 fused. It's singular that he didn't name the 
 amount in the letter." 
 
 " I'm very sorry he didn't," returned the widow, 
 with an engaging air of appealing to the other's 
 generosity. " It puts me in a very awkward 
 position, just as if I were trying to impose on 
 you. Mr. Irons knew just what I had and said 
 he'd take it all." 
 
WHAT TIME SHE CHANTED. 41 1 
 
 " Oh, I didn't mean for an instant," the clerk 
 protested, blushing with confusion, " that you were 
 trying to impose on us." 
 
 The clerk was young and susceptible, the widow 
 was mature and adroit ; he was confused and un- 
 certain, she was definite and determined. Mr. 
 Irons had, moreover, given the young man to 
 understand that the transaction was a confidential 
 and personal one, which involved more than 
 appeared on the surface. Confronted by the 
 phraseology of Mr. Iron's note, backed by Mrs. 
 Sampson's insinuating manner and unblushing 
 statements, the clerk laid aside his discretion, and 
 in the end allowed himself to fall a victim to the 
 wiles of the astute widow, who walked away con- 
 siderably richer than she came, besides being able 
 to bring joy to the heart of Erastus Snaflfie by a 
 neat sum of ready cash, which she delivered after 
 another prolonged discussion over the price she 
 should pay him for the stock. 
 
 And on the following morning when she read in 
 the stock reports that Princeton Platinum had 
 fallen to one and a half, she remembered her 
 stroke of yesterday with a conscience which if 
 not wholly clear was thoroughly satisfied. 
 
XXXV 
 
 HEARTSICK WITH THOUGHT. 
 
 Two Gentlemen of Verona; i. — i. 
 
 FENTON'S forenoon at his studio was broken by 
 a visit from Ninitta. His mind full of his trip 
 to New York, and of speculations concerning his 
 interview with Mrs. Glendower, he had let the 
 whole question of the Fatima and his entangle- 
 ment with its model slip from his mind, and when 
 he opened the door to find Mrs. Herman standing 
 there, the shock of his surprise was a most painful 
 one. Ninitta's eyes were swollen with weeping, 
 and the sleepless night had made her plain face 
 haggard and ugly. With a quick, irritated gesture, 
 the artist put his hand upon her arm and drew her 
 impatiently into the studio. Closing the door, he 
 stood confronting her a moment, studying her ex- 
 pression, as if to discover the cause of her distur- 
 bance. 
 
 " Well," at length he said, harshly, '' have you 
 betrayed me 1 " 
 
 Ninitta answered his look with one of helpless 
 and confused despair. The anguish of the long 
 hours during which she had been making up her 
 mind what to do in the emergency that had arisen, 
 
 412 
 
HEARTSICK WITH THOUGHT 413 
 
 had stupefied her so that she could not think 
 clearly. She still suffered, and Fenton's brutal 
 manner brought tears to her eyes, but she was be- 
 numbed and dazed, and could neither think nor 
 feel clearly. 
 
 " Grant found out himself," she said, *' that I 
 posed." 
 
 " Well ? " Fenton demanded, with an intensity 
 that made his smooth voice hoarse. 
 
 "That's all," Ninitta responded dully. '' I'm 
 going away." 
 
 " Going away } " echoed Fenton, the words 
 arousing again his fears that the worst might have 
 been discovered. " Then Herman does know } " 
 
 " He only knows that I posed," repeated 
 Ninitta ; " but he says Nino would be ashamed, 
 and I am going away." 
 
 " But where are you going } " 
 
 ** Home ; to Capri." 
 
 The artist looked at her with an impatient feel- 
 ing that it was idle to reason with her, and that 
 she had somehow passed beyond his control. He 
 moved away a few steps, and sat down in an old 
 carved monkish chair, while his visitor leaned, as 
 if for support, against the casing of the door. He 
 looked at her curiously, wondering what her 
 mental processes were like, and saying to himself, 
 with mingled chagrin and philosophy, that it was 
 impossible to deal with a creature so irrational, 
 but that fortunately he was not responsible for her 
 
414 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 movements His glance wandered about the stu- 
 dio, noting with artistic appreciation the pleasant 
 coloring of a heap of cushions thrown carelessly 
 on the divan. He wondered if it would have been 
 better had he arranged that blue one in a fuller 
 light, as a background for the beautiful shoulder 
 of his Faliina, yet reflected that on the whole the 
 value he had chosen better brought out the qual- 
 ity of the flesh-tones. What a splendid picture 
 the Fatinia was. It was worth some inconve- 
 nience to have achieved such a success, and, after 
 all, he would not be so foolish as to begrudge the 
 price he must pay for his triumph. 
 
 And yet, and yet — He turned back with a 
 movement of impatience toward that sad, silent 
 figure standing just inside his door. A wave of 
 anoer rose within him. He felt that he had a 
 right to consider himself aggrieved by her per- 
 sistent presence. Why must his will, his happi- 
 ness, his artistic powers be hampered and thwarted 
 by this woman who was only fit to serve his art 
 and be laid aside, like his mahl-stick and palette. 
 
 " It seems to me," he burst out, more harshly 
 than ever, "that you might have had the sense to 
 keep away from here, at least until Herman gets 
 over his anger." 
 
 *' But I am going away," she said, "and I came 
 to you for some money." 
 
 He stared at her in fresh amazement an in- 
 stant ; then he burst into derisive laughter. 
 
HEARTSICK WITH THOUGHT. 
 
 415 
 
 " Well," he said, " I like that. Why, I'm going 
 to New York myself to-night, to try to beg 
 enough to keep me out of the poor-house." 
 
 " But I can't ask Mr. Herman," Ninitta said, 
 beseechingly. 
 
 " In Heaven's name, Ninitta," exclaimed Fen- 
 ton, *' don't be an idiot. There's no sense in run- 
 ning away. Besides, what are you afraid of .^ " 
 
 '' But it might hurt Nino if I stayed," returned 
 poor Ninitta. 
 
 Through the bitter watches of the night, she 
 had been saying that over and over to herself. 
 With all her weakness and her sin, her mother- 
 love stood the supreme test. As she had been 
 able to give up her Italian friends when the boy 
 was born, because, as she said, Nino was born a 
 gentleman and must not associate with them ; 
 now, when she was convinced that he would be 
 better without her, she was able to give him up, 
 although with a breaking heart. Many times she 
 had been forced to confess to herself that Nino's 
 mother was not a lady like Mrs. Fenton or Helen 
 Greyson, or others of her husband's friends ; and 
 although she had always comforted herself with 
 the reflection that at least no boy had a mother 
 who loved him more than she did her son, the 
 thought that her child might be better without 
 her had more than once forced itself upon her 
 mind. It was idle for Fenton to argue ; Ninitta's 
 decision had passed beyond argument, and perhaps 
 
4i6 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 her understanding was, for the time being, too be- 
 numbed by suffering clearly to follow her compan- 
 ion's reasoning. 
 
 "At least," she said at last, utterly ignoring his 
 earnest endeavor to shake her resolution, " if you 
 cannot let me have any money, you will write a 
 note for me to tell Mr. Herman that I am gone, 
 and to say good-by to the bmnbino!' 
 
 '' Good God, Ninitta ! Are you mad } " Fenton 
 cried, jumping up and coming to confront her. 
 " Why should you mix me up in this business } 
 He knows my writing, and think what he might 
 suspect if I wrote such a note." 
 
 His voice insensibly softened as he spoke. He 
 could not but be touched by the utter helpless- 
 ness, the anguish, the baffled weakness so evident 
 in her face and manner. He was cruel only from 
 selfishness and the instinct of self-defence, and 
 his pity was sharply aroused by Ninitta's suffering 
 and her miserable condition. 
 
 "Come," he said gently, laying his hand on her 
 arm, "you are tired and frightened. There is no 
 need for you to go away and, besides, you could 
 not live without the bambino. Think, you would 
 have no letters ; you would never even hear from 
 him." 
 
 A spasm of pain contracted Ninitta's features. 
 She pressed her hands upon her bosom with inter- 
 laced fingers working convulsively. 
 
 " Oh, Mother of God ! " she moaned, in a voice 
 
HEARTSICK WITH THOUGHT. 
 
 4^7 
 
 of intensest agony, which thrilled Fenton with a 
 keen pang that yet did not prevent his remember- 
 ing how like was the cry to that of a great tragic 
 actress as he had heard it in Phedre. 
 
 •'Don't, Ninitta," he pleaded, unlocking her 
 hands and taking them in his. " I " — 
 
 "You will write me ?" she interrupted eagerly. 
 " You will tell me about Nino ? I shall find some- 
 body to read it to me. Oh, you are good. That 
 is the best kindness you could do me." 
 
 She pressed his hands eagerly, a divine yearn- 
 ing, a gleam of passionate hope shone in her dark 
 eyes. Fenton tried to smile, but despite himself 
 his lip trembled. He had hard work to control 
 himself, but he reflected that with him lay the 
 responsibility of dissuading Ninitta from her mad 
 project. 
 
 "But it will be better still," he urged, "to be 
 with him. What can a boy do without his 
 mother .? " 
 
 She bent her head forward, gazing into his eyes 
 as if she were trying to read his very soul ; then 
 she threw it backward with a sharp moan, shaking 
 his hands from hers with a tragic gesture." 
 
 " He would be ashamed," she said. " Now he 
 is too young to know that he is better without his 
 mother." 
 
 She looked around the familiar studio with a 
 sweeping, panting glance ; then she turned again 
 to Fenton, clasping both his hands with one of 
 hers. 
 
4i8 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ''Think of what I have done for you," she said ; 
 "and write me about him. I shall die if you do 
 not." 
 
 And there shot through Fenton's mind a sense 
 of the terrible tragedy which lay in such an appeal 
 for such an end. 
 
 When she was gone, Fenton consoled himself 
 with the reflection that the lack of money would 
 prevent Ninitta from carrying out her wild whim. 
 He, of course, could not know that soon after 
 Nino's birth Herman had started a fund for him 
 in a savings bank, and to the mother's intense 
 gratification had the deposits made in her name as 
 trustee. He had taught Ninitta to sign her 
 name ; and great had been her pleasure in watch- 
 ing the little fund grow. It indicated the desper- 
 ateness of her resolve, that now she broke into 
 this cherished fund, drawing barely enough money 
 to take her back to Capri. She was going away 
 for Nino's sake she argued with herself, and that 
 justified even this. 
 
 All through the day she busied herself with 
 preparations for departure. She would take noth- 
 ing but the barest necessities ; only that the 
 hand-satchel into which she compressed her few 
 belongings held Nino's first baby socks, a lock 
 of his hair, his picture, a broken toy, and other 
 dear trifles, each of which she packed wet with 
 tears and covered with kisses. 
 
 Late in the afternoon she took Nino into her 
 
HEARTSICK WITH THOUGHT. ^iq 
 
 chamber alone to bid him good-by. Her limbs 
 failed her as the door closed and he stood looking 
 at her in innocent wonder. She^sank into a chair, 
 faint and trembling, soul and body rent with an 
 intolerable anguish so great that for a moment 
 she wondered if she were not dying. 
 
 "What is the matter, mamma.-*" Nino cried 
 out in his musical Italian, running across the 
 room to stand by her knee. 
 
 He took one of her hands in his, stroking it 
 softly and looking up into her face with pity and 
 wonder. 
 
 " I am going away, Nino," she said, speaking 
 with a mighty effort. " You must be a good boy 
 and always mind and love papa. And, oh ! " she 
 cried, her self-control breaking down, *'love me 
 too, Nino; love me, love me." 
 
 She clasped her arms convulsively about his 
 neck, but she choked the first sob that rose in 
 her throat. She did not dare give way. She 
 instinctively knew that she needed all her strength 
 to carry her through what she had undertaken. 
 She kissed the startled child with burning fervor. 
 She drew him into her lap and held him close to 
 her. Her very lips were white. 
 
 ** Nino," she said, " can you remember some- 
 thing to say to papa } " 
 
 " Oh, yes," he answered. "■ I am quite old 
 enough for that. Don't you remember how I 
 repeated, — 
 
420 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 " ' Qucsto dfl77ianda del pan ; 
 Qtiesto disc, no ghc «V; 
 Questo disc conie faremo ; 
 QuelP altro disc ; rtibaremo ; 
 II mignolo dise ; chi ruba ''mpicca, ''inpicca ! ' " 
 
 It was a folk rhyme she had taught him to say, 
 telling oii his chubby fingers one by one ; and she 
 remembered how proud the boy had been when he 
 had repeated it to his father. Her mouth twitched 
 convulsively, but she w^ent on steadily. 
 
 *' You remembered it beautifully, Nino," she said, 
 ** and you are to say to papa, ' Mamma has gone 
 away to Italy for my sake, and she leaves you her 
 love.* Say it over, Nino." 
 
 "'Mamma has gone away to Italy for my sake,' " 
 repeated the child. " But, mamma," he broke in, 
 " I don't want you to go." 
 
 She embraced him as if in her death struggle 
 the waters of the sea were closing over her. 
 
 "Say it, Nino," she repeated. " Say it all." 
 
 The child did as she bade him. She knew she 
 could not prolong this interview, and still have 
 strength to carry out her resolution. She em- 
 braced and kissed her child so frantically that he 
 became frightened and began to cry. Then she 
 soothed him and led him to the chamber door. 
 She put her hand on the latch. She looked at 
 him, her Nino, her baby. She tottered as she 
 stood. But the force of character which had given 
 her strength to fight her way for ten years and 
 across half the world to seek Nino's father gave 
 
HEARTSICK WITH THOUGHT. 
 
 421 
 
 her power now. She opened the door and put the 
 boy out gently. She could not trust herself to 
 kiss him again, or even again to say good-by. 
 
 But when the door was closed, she rolled upon 
 the floor in agony, stifling her moans lest they 
 should be heard outside, beating her breast and 
 biting her arms like a mad creature. 
 
 When Herman came home to dinner that night 
 his wife was gone, and Nino gave him her message. 
 
XXXVI 
 
 FAREWELL AT ONCE, FOR ONCE, FOR ALL AND 
 EVER. 
 
 Richard II. ; ii. — 2. 
 
 FENTON'S reflections as he sat in the train 
 that evening, bound for New York, were 
 varied rather than pleasing. There are crises in 
 a man's life when it is perhaps quite as wise that 
 he should not attempt to reason ; he cannot do 
 better than to keep his attention occupied with 
 indifferent subjects, trusting to that instinct or 
 higher self, or whatever it may be within us which 
 works independently of our outer consciousness, 
 to settle all perplexities. Some idea of this sort 
 was in Arthur's mind as he sped along towards 
 the Sound steamer. He could not prevent himself 
 from thinking more or less of the situation of his 
 affairs, but he made no attempt to consider them 
 reasonably or in order. 
 
 ** It would have saved me an awkward inter- 
 view," he reflected, '* if Mrs. Glendower could 
 have taken herself opportunely out of the world. 
 If we may trust the usual form of mortuary reso- 
 lutions, Divine Providence is habitually pleased 
 
 422 
 
FAREWELL AT ONCE. 423 
 
 with the removal of mortals from this sublunary 
 sphere ; and in this case I should share the senti- 
 ment." 
 
 His musings took on a darker tone as time went 
 on. He thought with bitterness of the failure of 
 his past, and he loathed himself for what he was. 
 The hateful mystery of life tormented him with 
 its poisonous uncertainty. He groaned inwardly 
 at the curse that one day should still follow 
 another. Then the phrasing of his thought 
 pleased him, and with veering fancy he went on 
 stringing epigrams in his brain. 
 
 "After all," he thought, " what we call a fool in 
 this world is a man who has his own way at the 
 expense of the wise. There's Candish, now; I 
 call him a fool and he goes ahead and is damned 
 virtuous and stupid and exasperating, and gets 
 through life beautifully; while I, who wouldn't be 
 such an idiot for any money, am always in some 
 confounded scrape or other. I wonder, by the 
 way, what's the connection between sanctity and 
 a waistcoat put on hind side before. Candish and 
 Edith wouldn't make a bad pair. She wouldn't 
 mind his ugly mug in the least, and his idiocies 
 of temperament would be rather pleasing to her. 
 Heaven knows it was an ill day for her when she 
 fell into my clutches. I can't say that it seems 
 to have been any great advantage to any woman 
 to be fond of me. Helen was awfully cut up 
 when I went back on the Pao^ans, and as for 
 
424 
 
 THE PHILISTINES, 
 
 Ninitta, I've played the very dickens with her. 
 Upon my word I have my doubts if I could be 
 really respectable without cutting my own acquain- 
 ance." 
 
 Fenton retired to his stateroom almost as soon 
 as he went on board the steamer. He was tired 
 with the strain of the last weeks, he hated the 
 vulgar crowd one met in travelling, so that to 
 sleep and avoid his companions seem.ed the only 
 course desirable under the circumstances. 
 
 He was dimly conscious of the progress of the 
 boat, the bustle in the saloon, which gradually 
 subsided as the evening wore on ; and then his 
 slumber grew deeper. Even the frequent whist- 
 ling which the ever-increasing fog made neces- 
 sary only caused him, now and then, to turn un- 
 easily in his berth. His stateroom was well aft, 
 and in his drowsy, half-waking moments, he was 
 conscious that the sea was running heavily. He 
 remembered that the wind had been east all day, 
 and that he had seen the danger-signal floating 
 that afternoon. 
 
 Toward morning he grew more wakeful. The 
 whistling of the fog-signal, which had now become 
 almost constant, vanquished at length his inclina- 
 tion toward slumber. He found his watch, but it 
 was too dark to tell the time. He raised himself 
 up in his berth, and, pulling open the window 
 blind, was able with difficulty to make out that it 
 was almost four o'clock. Outside, he saw a bank 
 
FAREWELL AT ONCE. 
 
 425 
 
 of fog, as impenetrable to the eye as a wall. He 
 pulled the blind to, with an impatient sigh. 
 
 *' This confounded fog," he thought, " will make 
 us late, and I sha'n't have time to see those pict- 
 ures at the Academy." 
 
 He lay back in his berth, broad awake, with an 
 objurgation at the whistle, which was shrieking 
 furiously, and which, he suddenly became aware, 
 was being answered by the dull bellow of a fog 
 horn blown near at hand. At that moment the 
 engines of the boat stopped, with that cessation 
 of the quivering jar which is so terrifying. Fen- 
 ton could feel the steamer losing its headway, and 
 being more heavily tossed about by the waves as 
 it did so. He sat up in his berth with a startled 
 consciousness of danger, and at the same instant 
 something struck the steamer with a terrific crash 
 which seemed powerful enough to rend every 
 timber apart. A tumult of sound broke forth, 
 amid which a piercing human shriek rang out with 
 awful sharpness. Fenton was thrown from his 
 berth by the shock, and landed on the floor, 
 bruised and half-stunned, but otherwise unhurt. 
 His valise was dashed against him, but after the 
 first concussion there was no further violent move- 
 ment, and, as soon as he was able to recover him- 
 self, he had no difficulty in getting to his feet. 
 The terrible cries which continued, reinforced by 
 a babel of screams and confused noises, seemed 
 to him to come from some stateroom near at hand. 
 
426 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 It was evident that some one had been seriously 
 hurt in the collision which must have occurred. 
 The trampling of feet, the voices of men and 
 women and children, the sound of the wind and of 
 the water, and those formless noises which are 
 the more terrifying because it is impossible to 
 tell whence they arise, filled the air on every side, 
 and told Fenton that some serious calamity had 
 befallen the steamer. 
 
 He felt about in the darkness for his clothing, 
 then pulled open the shutter hastily, and dressed 
 himself in the dim light as well as he was able. 
 He was excited but not panic-stricken, yet the 
 time seemed long, although in reality it was but a 
 few moments before he was ready to open his door 
 into the saloon. As he came out he had a startled 
 impression of finding himself in an unexpected 
 place, and then he realized that the side of the 
 boat had been broken in clean through the range 
 of staterooms, and that he was looking out into the 
 heavy wall of fog through a hole made by the col- 
 lision. He could see dimly the shape of a ship's 
 prow, and the broken end of a bowsprit was not 
 yet wholly disentangled from the rent in the side 
 of the steamer. The two vessels, locked together 
 like a pair of sea-monsters that had perished in the 
 death grapple of a desperate encounter, tossed up 
 and down on the long swell, swayed by the wind 
 which seemed to be increasing in fury every mo- 
 ment. 
 
FAREWELL AT ONCE. 427 
 
 On the floor of the saloon just before him, Fen- 
 ton saw a wounded man, ghastly with blood, and 
 moaning terribly. Half-dressed people hovered 
 about him in utter bewilderment, while others con- 
 tinually hurried up simply to hasten away again 
 in frantic confusion. The wounded man was in his 
 night clothes, and a half-dressed old woman, her 
 gray hair straggling about her face, seemed to be 
 attempting to stanch the blood which was flowing 
 freely. She was evidently a stranger, since from 
 time to time she appealed to those around to take 
 her place, and let her go and look after her own 
 folk, but the kindly old creature plainly could not 
 bring herself, even in that hour of peril, to desert 
 one hurt and helpless. 
 
 On every side were the evidences of panic. 
 Stateroom doors were open, people in all stages 
 of disarray were hurrying wildly along, or clinging 
 frantically to each other. The hysterical sobs of 
 women, piercing cries from the thin voices of chil- 
 dren, deep-toned curses and wild ejaculations from 
 men sounded on every hand. People were don- 
 ning life-preservers, some putting on two or three 
 in their eagerness and fear ; and here and there 
 fighting for the possession of an extra one in a 
 mad fury. The whole saloon was filled with a 
 wild and terrifying tumult. It was a frenzied 
 scene of fear and aw^ful bewilderment. 
 LHowever great his mental pluck, Fenton was 
 physically a coward, and he knew it. The New 
 
428 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 England climate and life have given to most of her 
 children, of any degree of cultivation, a nervous 
 organization too acutely sensitive to pain for them 
 to be physically brave ; but to this disposition the 
 New England training, the inherited manliness of 
 sturdy ancestors, has added a splendid moral en- 
 ergy to overcome this weakness. ' 
 
 In the first terrible shock of fear which followed 
 his discovery that the steamer had been run down, 
 Fenton's body trembled with terror. He felt a 
 wild and dizzy impulse to rush somewhere madly ; 
 but in a moment his will reasserted itself. He was 
 intensely frightened, but he beat down his fear 
 with the lash of self-scorn, as he would have 
 whipped a hound that refused to do his bidding. 
 He steadied himself for a moment against the 
 doorway with tense muscles, setting his teeth to- 
 gether. He drew a deep breath, turned back into 
 his stateroom, and put on a cork jacket. He was 
 cool enough. Before he buckled it he transferred 
 his wallet and papers from the pocket of his coat 
 to that on the inside of his waistcoat. Then he 
 hurried out through the saloon on to the afterdeck. 
 The place was crowded, and the confusion was in- 
 describable. Fenton's first impulse was to put his 
 hands over his ears, to shut out the horrible din. 
 . The officers were shouting orders and getting the 
 boats manned, for even in this short time the 
 steamer was settling. The hissing swash of the 
 waves beating into the breach, the prayers, the im- 
 
FAREIVELL AT ONCE. 
 
 429 
 
 precations, the hysterical sobs, the agonized cries of 
 the struggling- passengers, the darkness, the terror, 
 the yawning abyss of death beneath them, — com- 
 bined to sweep away all human feelings save the 
 instinct of self-preservation. The brute side of 
 human nature revealed itself with a hideousness 
 more horrible than the terror of the night and 
 the sea. Unprotected women were crushed and 
 trampled, and as the boats were lowered a fierce 
 hand-to-hand conflict ensued, men fighting like 
 wild cats to force their way into them. The offi- 
 cers beat them back, and made way for the 
 women as well as they could, struggling at the 
 same time with the difficult task of maintaining 
 discipline among the crew. 
 
 Shrill amid the uproar, a child's cry smote Fen- 
 ton's ear as he came out upon the deck. Directly 
 before him a man was trying to pull a life-preserver 
 off from a boy, while a woman fought with him in 
 a desperate endeavor to shield her child. The lad 
 was about the size of Caldwell and in the confused 
 light not wholly unlike him. With a sob and a 
 curse, Fenton struck the man full in the face with 
 all his force, sending the brute reeling backward 
 into the crowd which was too dense to allow of his 
 falling. The mother hurriedly pulled the child into 
 the dense stream of people crowding toward the 
 boats, and Fenton saw the pair disappear over the 
 side of the steamer, helped by one of the officers. 
 
 There ran through his mind a momentary spec- 
 
430 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 ulation of their chances of escape, and the thought 
 brought him back to the consideration of his own 
 situation. A sudden unreasonable disgust of the 
 conditions which made his salvation so improbable 
 seized upon him. He reflected that he might still 
 baffle fate by taking his own life, and for an instant 
 the idea of thus escaping from all the vexations 
 which surrounded him presented itself to his mind 
 in alluring colors. The idea of self-destruction 
 was one with which he had played so often that he 
 entertained it without a shock ; and he realized 
 now, almost with a conviction that the fact forced 
 him to suicide for the sake of consistency, that 
 his death under these circumstances would surely 
 be attributed to accident. He even began to fum- 
 ble with the buckles of his life-preserver ; then 
 with a smile of bitter scorn he looked down at his 
 hands, of which the fingers were trembling with 
 nervous fear. 
 
 "Bah," he said to himself, "why should I pose 
 to myself } Fate is too much for me ; if a gentle 
 and beneficent Providence intends to make away 
 with me, so be it. I haven't the nerve to antici- 
 pate it." 
 
 He started toward the boats, and at that instant 
 he caught sight of the face of Ninitta. She was 
 standing perfectly quiet, with her arm around one 
 of the small pillars supporting the covering to the 
 deck. She was fully dressed, though her head was 
 uncovered and the rings of hair clung about her 
 
FAREWELL AT ONCE. 
 
 431 
 
 face. Fentoii forgot everything else at sight of 
 her. In a moment of supreme egotism there 
 flashed through his mind the consequences of 
 Ninitta's being here. The consciousness of all 
 that lay between them made him keenly alive to 
 the evil construction which might be placed upon 
 her having fled from home on the same boat which 
 carried him. He realized, with a profound feeling 
 of impotence, that if they were lost together he 
 should be forever unable to explain or to dispel 
 the suspicion to which her presence might give 
 rise ; he felt with keen bitterness how useless 
 would be all his cleverness, and his heart swelled 
 with rage at the thought that his adroitness would 
 be wasted for lack of opportunity. 
 
 He forgot the danger, the terror of the wreck, the 
 shrieking of the women, the brutality of the men, 
 and, for the moment, felt with the keen despera- 
 tion of enormous vanity the danger to his reputa- 
 tion. He forced his way madly across the deck 
 and confronted her in the ghastly light of the 
 swinging lantern and the gray foregleams of the 
 coming dawn, 
 
 " You followed me ! " he cried with bitter harsh- 
 ness. 
 
 She looked at him in a calm, stunned way, as if 
 she were past suffering and almost past feeling. 
 The recognition in her eyes came slowly, as if she 
 were dazed or as if some powerful mental stress 
 held her attention. 
 
432 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 "Now," he began, "your boy" — He was 
 going to add, "will grow up to believe you ran 
 away with me ; " but his manliness asserted itself 
 and he could not continue. It was like striking a 
 woman, and the brutal words died on his lip. 
 
 At the mention of her boy a sudden passion 
 flamed in her eyes. She loosed her hold upon the 
 pillar and a sudden lurch of the sinking ship threw 
 her into Fenton's arms. She clung to him franti- 
 cally. 
 
 " My boy ! " she moaned. " My boy ! " 
 
 Like quickly shifting pictures, there ran through 
 Fenton's mind the images of Nino, of the boy 
 whose life-preserver he had saved, and of his own 
 son, asleep in safety in his nursery at home. With 
 a quick revulsion of feeling came the desire to 
 save Ninitta, and with instinctive quickness he hit 
 upon a possible means of escape. As he came 
 through the saloon he had seen a man, a dim shape 
 in the fog, clambering through the shattered state- 
 rooms to climb over the broken bowsprit into the 
 vessel that had run them down. Hastily drawing 
 Ninitta along, he forced his way back into the 
 saloon. The body of the man who had been hurt 
 in the collision lay dead and deserted on the floor. 
 He lifted his companion over it and made his way 
 to the side of the steamer. Others had discovered 
 this road to safety and he had to fight for his foot- 
 hold amid the waves that now washed over his 
 feet. The men on the stranger vessel were sawing 
 
FAREWELL AT ONCE. 
 
 433 
 
 off the broken spar which was entangled under the 
 steamer's upper deck, lest their craft should be 
 dragged down by the sinking boat. He urged 
 Ninitta forward, swinging her by main force up 
 into the tangled rigging. 
 
 " No, no," she cried, endeavoring to throw herself 
 back. ** I do not want to go. It will be better for 
 Nino." 
 
 The sublimity of her self-sacrifice smote him 
 like a lash. He could not stop to argue, but he 
 forced her forward, and one of the men above, 
 feeling himself in safety, caught her by the arm to 
 drag her up. But at that instant the spar, cut 
 nearly through, broke with a sharp crack like the 
 sound of a gun. The end fell, and with it the 
 wretched woman was carried down. She shrieked 
 as she went, the water cutting short her cry of 
 mortal anguish. Fenton saw her face an in- 
 stant, and then in the fog and the darkness the 
 lapping water closed over her. 
 
 An awful sickening shudder ran through him, 
 a fear too great to be resisted. There rose 
 from his heart a despairing prayer ; and the unbe- 
 liever has sounded the depth of agony when he 
 calls upon God. 
 
 At that instant a beam loosened from the upper 
 deck, dragged downward by the ropes of the 
 falling bowsprit, fell with a crash, dashing him 
 downward into the gulf below. He felt the awful 
 stinging pain of the blow, like the thrust of a 
 
434 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 spear ; a mighty wave seemed to mount upward to 
 meet and to engulf him. Then he lost all per- 
 ception of what he was doing or of what happened 
 to him ; and it might to his consciousness have 
 been either moments or hours before he found 
 himself struggling in the icy water. He swam 
 instinctively, and he even remembered to try to 
 increase his distance from the steamer, that he 
 might not be caught in the eddy when it went 
 down. He heard still the cries and shrieks, but 
 the noise of the sea at his ears was like a mighty 
 uproar confusing all. He could not tell in which 
 direction lay the vessel ; a mighty pressure crushed 
 his chest, and innumerable lights twinkling against 
 a background of intensest black seemed to shine 
 before his eyes. He was past thinking clearly. 
 His memory was like a broken mirror whose 
 shattered fragments reflected a thousand bits 
 from his past life, confused, detached, and mean- 
 ingless. 
 
 Then with a last supreme effort his strong will 
 asserted itself in a command upon his conscious- 
 ness. For one intense instant, briefer than the 
 flash of the tiniest spark, he realized everything, 
 save that the blow or the nearness of death 
 seemed to have dulled all sense of fear. The 
 most vivid thought of all was the reflection that 
 he mio^ht have been saved but for his efforts 
 to help Ninitta. The grim humor of the situation 
 
FAREWELL AT ONCE. 435 
 
 tickled his fancy, and in the very flood of death 
 he faintly smiled at the irony of fate which thus 
 balanced accounts. And this flash of cynical 
 amusement was the last gleam of his earthly con- 
 sciousness. 
 
XXXVII 
 
 A SYMPATHY OF WOE. 
 
 Titus Andronicus ; iii. — i. 
 
 FORTUNATELY Ninitta had made no secret 
 of her departure except to conceal it from her 
 husband. She had been to see some Italian 
 friends of former days to ask about people she 
 had known in Italy, and from them her husband 
 learned pretty nearly what her plans had been, 
 Fenton might have spared himself his fears lest 
 she be suspected of going with him. Such a 
 thought did not for an instant enter into Herman's 
 mind. The sculptor found himself appreciating 
 better than ever before the strength of his wife's 
 character. The knowledge of Ninitta's faults 
 died with her, and her memory was transmitted to 
 her son enriched with the halo of a martyr who 
 has died in the path of supreme self-sacrifice. 
 Nino's father understood fairly well the train of 
 reasoning which had led his wife to the tragic re- 
 solve to leave their boy. Ignorant of her fault, 
 he blamed himself for the reproach by which he 
 feared he had forced her to believe that it were 
 better for her son to be freed from her presence. 
 His generous nature forgot, too, all anger 
 436 
 
A SYMPATHY OF WOE. 
 
 437 
 
 against Fenton. To the noble soul, death, by a 
 reasoning which is above logic, seems to settle 
 all accounts. He remembered the artist's bright- 
 ness, his quick sympathy, his keen imagination, 
 and his ready adaptability. The flippancy that 
 had often shocked him, the treachery to principles 
 which he held sacred that had wounded him, his 
 kind memory put out of sight, as one wipes the 
 stains from a crystal ; and in the mind of the man 
 he had wronged, the remembrance of Arthur Fen- 
 ton remained fair and gracious, and nobler than 
 the nature whose monument it was. 
 
 He went to see Mrs. Fenton, but when he met 
 her he at first could say nothing. He stammered 
 brokenly, tears choking his voice, holding her 
 hand in his, and vainly striving to put into words 
 the sympathy he felt. Then he stooped suddenly 
 and kissed her hand. 
 
 '' Our boys," — he said, with awkward phrasing, 
 but with an instinct which reached to the ground 
 of their deepest sympathy. "It might comfort 
 them a little to play together." 
 
 The widow clung with both her small hands to 
 the large strong one which had clasped hers ; and 
 bending down over it she burst into convulsive 
 sobs. He stood silent a moment, his \\\) trembling 
 then with grave kindness, he said, — 
 
 *' I know how hard it is ; but you have the com- 
 fort of being able to tell the boy that his father 
 was a genius and a noble man. Do you know that 
 
438 
 
 THE PHILISTINES. 
 
 a woman who was rescued says that your husband 
 saved her boy, a little lad like Caldwell. Arthur 
 knocked down the man that was trying to rob him 
 of his life-preserver. The Captain told her after- 
 ward who it was." 
 
 He was perfectly sincere in what he said. It 
 was difficult for him to think evil of the living ; of 
 the dead it was impossible. 
 
 After he had gone, Edith took Caldwell on her 
 knee and told him the story. It was the brightest 
 ray of comfort in all that sad time to be able thus 
 to glorify his father in the eyes of her son. The 
 incident dwelt in her mind, and her loving fancy 
 added to* it a hundred details and drew from it 
 numberless deductions with which to enrich the 
 memory of her dead. It came in time to be the 
 most prominent thing in her remembrance of her 
 husband. It was the fact which she could recall 
 with the most unmixed satisfaction, which needed 
 no evasions, no mental reservations, no warpings 
 of belief, to appear wholly noble. In the light of 
 this deed, the impulse of a moment, Fenton stood 
 in her memory as a hero ; and in viewing him 
 thus, she was able to lose sight of everything which 
 she must forgive, of everything which she wished 
 to forget. 
 
 Edith was happily spared the harassing com- 
 plications of financial difficulty which it had 
 seemed must inevitably result from the condition 
 in which her husband's affairs were left. 
 
A SYMPATHY OF WOE. 
 
 439 
 
 On Mr. Iions's return from New York, he had 
 been astounded and enraged to find that he had 
 been outwitted by the combined cleverness of Mrs. 
 Sampson and the stupidity of his clerk, and that 
 he was in possession of eleven thousand shares of 
 Princeton Platinum stock. For seven thousand 
 shares he had paid at the rate of three dollars, and 
 the stock was now quoted at one and three eighths 
 asked, with no particular reason for supposing that 
 the putting of even half his shares on the market 
 would not reduce it to zero. Irons blasphemed 
 prodigiously and emphatically, discharged his clerk, 
 and went to call on Mrs. Sampson, whom he threat- 
 ened with all sorts of condign punishments if she 
 did not disgorge her ill-gotten gains. The widow 
 received him affably, and laughed in his face at 
 this proposal, a course of action which won his 
 respect more fully than any other which she could 
 have chosen. There was evidently nothing left 
 but to do what he could with the market, and by 
 methods best known to himself he succeeded in 
 bulling the stock so that he was able to unload 
 at three dollars and a half. 
 
 The brokers in whose hands Fenton had left 
 his stock had been watching their opportunity, and 
 closed it out at the top of the market, a consum- 
 mation for which Fenton had so devoutly longed 
 that it seemed cruel he could not have lived to see 
 it. The returns from this and from her husband's 
 life insurance secured to Edith and her son a 
 
^O ^-^^ PHILISTINES. 
 
 small income, which was considerably increased by 
 the sale of Fenton's pictures which was soon 
 after organized by the artists of the St. Filipe 
 Club. 
 
 It was about a month after Ninitta's death that 
 Grant Herman went to visit Helen. He had 
 chosen to see her at her studio rather than at her 
 home. Poignant memories of the past were less 
 likely to be aroused by the unfamiliar appearance 
 of this room which he had never before entered. 
 It was late in the afternoon, and Helen was stand- 
 ing by the figure of a child upon which she had 
 been working. She gave him her hand impul- 
 sively, forgetting that the fingers were stained 
 with clay. 
 
 " I beg your pardon," she said. 
 
 " It is no matter," he returned, and the com- 
 monplace phrases bridged the awkwardness which 
 belongs to the meeting of two people whose 
 minds are full of intense feeling which they are 
 not prepared to speak. Helen led him toward 
 another modelling stand. 
 
 "I want you to see this bust," she remarked. 
 " It's quite in the manner which you used to say 
 was my best." 
 
 He stood watching her with a swelling heart 
 as she removed the damp wrappings which kept 
 the clay moist. Keen in the minds of both was 
 the knowledge that now there were no barriers be- 
 tween them ; that the time had come at last when 
 
A SYMPATHY OF WOE. 
 
 441 
 
 they were free to love each other and to unite 
 their lives. The closeness of Ninitta's deatli 
 kept this wholly from their words, but it could 
 not banish the exultation, so sharp as to be almost 
 pain, which would arise from the mere fact of 
 their being together. Both understood that how- 
 ever great the sorrow at her death which he was 
 too noble-hearted not to feel, he must rejoice 
 in the risfht to follow the dictates of his love 
 at last. 
 
 He forced himself to examine the bust critically, 
 and to speak of it calmly ; but he soon turned 
 away from it, and stood looking at her a moment, 
 as if trying to find speech in which to phrase 
 what he had come to say. She waited for him to 
 speak, meeting his glance frankly. Her head was 
 thrown backward a little, and he noted with pity- 
 ing eagerness that she was paler than of old, and 
 that there were dark circles beneath her eyes. 
 He thought of the years in which their lives had 
 been separated, and sorrow for her suffering made 
 his heart swell. 
 
 " Helen," he said, ** I have come to ask a favor. 
 I want you to look after Nino a little. He has 
 been given up to servants too much, and I am 
 perfectly helpless when it comes to managing his 
 nurse. Is there any way in which you can do 
 anything for him ? " 
 
 " Of course there is," she answered. " I will 
 come in and see him every day and find out how 
 
442 
 
 THE FHILISTINES. 
 
 things go with him ; then, if anything is wrong, I 
 can let you know." 
 
 "Thank you," he returned simply. "I was 
 sure you would help me. But do you think," 
 he added, hesitating, " that it will be in any way 
 awkward for you } " 
 
 She smiled on him and she could not keep out 
 of her eyes the joy she felt at being able to serve 
 him. 
 
 '* Do you think," was her reply, '* that I am 
 likely to let that consideration stand in my way ? 
 It is rather late m life for me to begin to let 
 conventionality interfere with what I think it 
 right to do. Besides," she continued, dropping 
 her eyes, though without a shade of self-con- 
 sciousness, " I shall go when you are at the 
 studio." 
 
 ** And it will not be too much trouble ? " 
 
 "I shall love to do what I can for Nino." 
 
 ** I thank you," he said again. 
 
 Then without more words he held out his hand. 
 
 " Good-night," he said. 
 
 '* Good-night," she repeated. 
 
THE PAGANS. 
 
 By ARLO BATES. 
 
 16mo. In cloth, $1.00; in Ticknor's Paper Series, 50 cents. 
 
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 ventional standards, but deeply serious and moral in its 
 fundamental idea. In this day, too, its entire decency, coupled 
 with its entire intellectual freedom, is pleasantly unique. It 
 is a book whose characters are supposed to be witty and clever, 
 and, unlike most such books, the conversations are really as 
 brilliant as they are supposed to be." — Bostofi Gazette. 
 
 "Mr. Bates is a pronounced advocate of romantic fiction, 
 and vet the fact remains that in practice he has been unable 
 to withstand the modern fascination of realism. ' The Pagans,' 
 like all his novels, is valuable more as a picture of certain 
 phases of life and intricacies of character than as a story. 
 The plot is easy, hardly unknown and a trifle Howellsesque 
 in motif, although far from that in technique and develop- 
 ments. The character portraitures are of purely modern and 
 American cleverness." — Brooklyn Times. 
 
 " The novel is a unique one in both motive and execution. 
 Its transcripts of what may be called artistic life, or, rather, 
 the life of people with the artistic temperament, are most 
 interesting; and the choice beauty of its style, its delicate yet 
 often keen satire, its refined feeling and forcible contrasts of 
 individuality, characterize a novel that holds perennial in- 
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 vividness of Kenyon's studio in the ' Marble Faun.' The 
 appearance of this Boston novel in popular form is a pleasant 
 event to chronicle." — Boston Traveller. 
 
 "This is a very dramatic tale of the circumstances sur- 
 rounding a party of artists in Boston. While all will not 
 enjoy the sentiments and views of what the world knows as 
 morals, no one, we think, will fail to enjoy the delicacy 
 where delicacy is needed, and force where vigor is needed, 
 with which Mr. Bates has painted his pictures. It is, alto- 
 gether, a notable contribution to American fiction." — 
 American Storekeeper. 
 
 Sent, postpaid, on receipt of price, by the Publishers., 
 
 TICKNOR «fe CO., BOSTON. 
 
A BEIGHT NOVEL BY ARLO BATES. 
 
 PATTY'S PERVERSITIES. 
 
 1 Vol., 16mo, $1.00. In Ticknor's Paper Series, 50 Cents. 
 
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 manner enchantingly vivid ; there is no clause nor page of it that flags for a mo- 
 ment in interest ; and the reader will cherish the book with a degree of pleasure 
 for the pastime it has afforded him. There is a humor also apparent throughout, 
 impersonated in the Yankee servant, added with a dialect that is decidedly real 
 and lifelike." — New York Star. 
 
 " The real heroine of the book is the ' help,' Bathalina Mixon, nee Clemens, 
 whose remarkable speeches, wise and other\vise, and singular experience as wife 
 and widow are most laughable. The story is an exceedingly pleasant and readable 
 one, full of real humor, bubbhng over with the saucy talk of clever young people, 
 presenting keen delineations of New England people and scenes, and fully re- 
 taining thQ prestige with which this admirable series started." — Art Interchange. 
 
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 There is a lesson in the love episode, and we commend the book as one that will 
 be found a genial and pleasant companion." — S. Collier. 
 
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 a dozen people, amons them Mrs. Julia Schayer, the author of ' Tiger Lily' ; Miss 
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 of Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney." — Boston Courier. 
 
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 sketched characters, some of which are as novel and clever as anything smce 
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 . . . It is unique and original." — Providence Press. 
 
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