Book V: Chapter III

by Sherwood Anderson

　　One evening three weeks after the great murder trial McGregor took along walk in the streets of Chicago and tried to plan out his life. Hewas troubled and disconcerted by the event that had crowded in uponthe heels of his dramatic success in the court room and more thantroubled by the fact that his mind constantly played with the dream ofhaving Margaret Ormsby as his wife. In the city he had become a powerand instead of the names and the pictures of criminals and keepers ofdisorderly houses his name and his picture now appeared on the frontpages of newspapers. Andrew Leffingwell, the political representativein Chicago of a rich and successful publisher of sensationalnewspapers, had visited him in his office and had proposed to make hima political figure in the city. Finley a noted criminal lawyer hadoffered him a partnership. The lawyer, a small smiling man with whiteteeth, had not asked McGregor for an immediate decision. In a way hehad taken the decision for granted. Smiling genially and rolling acigar across McGregor's desk he had spent an hour telling stories offamous court room triumphs.

　　"One such triumph is enough to make a man," he declared. "You have noidea how far such a success will carry you. The word of it keepsrunning through men's minds. A tradition is built up. The remembranceof it acts upon the minds of jurors. Cases are won for you by the mereconnection of your name with the case."

　　McGregor walked slowly and heavily through the streets without seeingthe people. In Wabash Avenue near Twenty-third Street he stopped in asaloon and drank beer. The saloon was in a room below the level of thesidewalk and the floor was covered with sawdust. Two half drunkenlabourers stood by the bar quarrelling. One of the labourers who was asocialist continually cursed the army and his words started McGregorto thinking of the dream he had so long held and that now seemedfading. "I was in the army and I know what I am talking about,"declared the socialist. "There is nothing national about the army. Itis a privately owned thing. Here it is secretly owned by thecapitalists and in Europe by the aristocracy. Don't tell me--I know.The army is made up of bums. If I'm a bum I became one then. You willsee fast enough what fellows are in the army if the country is evercaught and drawn into a great war."

　　Becoming excited the socialist raised his voice and pounded on thebar. "Hell, we don't know ourselves at all," he cried. "We never havebeen tested. We call ourselves a great nation because we are rich. Weare like a fat boy who has had too much pie. Yes sir--that's what weare here in America and as far as our army goes it is a fat boy'splaything. Keep away from it."

　　McGregor sat in the corner of the saloon and looked about. Men came inand went out at the door. A child carried a pail down the short flightof steps from the street and ran across the sawdust floor. Her voice,thin and sharp, pierced through the babble of men's voices. "Tencents' worth--give me plenty," she pleaded, raising the pail above herhead and putting it on the bar.

　　The confident smiling face of Finley the lawyer came back intoMcGregor's mind. Like David Ormsby the successful maker of ploughs thelawyer looked upon men as pawns in a great game and like theploughmaker his intentions were honourable and his purpose clear. Hewas intent upon making much of his life, being successful. If heplayed the game on the side of the criminal that was but a chance.Things had fallen out so. In his mind was something else--theexpression of his own purpose.

　　McGregor rose and went out of the saloon. In the street men stoodabout in groups. At Thirty-ninth Street a crowd of youths scuffling onthe sidewalk pushed against the tall muttering man who passed with hishat in his hand. He began to feel that he was in the midst ofsomething too vast to be moved by the efforts of any one man. Thepitiful insignificance of the individual was apparent. As in a longprocession the figures of the individuals who had tried to rise out ofthe ruck of American life passed before him. With a shudder herealised that for the most part the men whose names filled the pagesof American history meant nothing. The children who read of theirdeeds were unmoved. Perhaps they had only increased the disorder. Likethe men passing in the street they went across the face of things anddisappeared into the darkness.

　　"Perhaps Finley and Ormsby are right," he whispered. "They get whatthey can, they have the good sense to know that life runs quickly likea flying bird passing an open window. They know that if a man thinksof anything else he is likely to become another sentimentalist andspend his life being hypnotised by the wagging of his own jaw."

　　* * * * *In his wanderings McGregor came to an out-of-door restaurant andgarden far out on the south side. The garden had been built for theamusement of the rich and successful. Upon a little platform a bandplayed. Although the garden was walled about it was open to the skyand above the laughing people seated at the tables shone the stars.

　　McGregor sat alone at a little table on a balcony beneath a shadedlight. Below him along a terrace were other tables occupied by men andwomen. On a platform in the centre of the garden dancers appeared.

　　McGregor who had ordered a dinner left it untouched. A tall gracefulgirl, strongly suggestive of Margaret Ormsby, danced upon theplatform. With infinite grace her body gave expression to themovements of the dance and like a thing blown by the wind she movedhere and there in the arms of her partner, a slender youth with longblack hair. In the figure of the dancing woman there was expressedmuch of the idealism man has sought to materialise in women andMcGregor was thrilled by it. A sensualism so delicate that it did notappear to be sensualism began to invade him. With a new hunger helooked forward to the time when he would again see Margaret.

　　Upon the platform in the garden appeared other dancers. The lights atthe tables were turned low. From the darkness laughter arose. McGregorstared about. The people seated at the tables on the terrace caughtand held his attention and he began looking sharply at the faces ofthe men. How cunning they were, these men who had been successful inlife. Were they not after all the wise men? Behind the flesh that hadgrown so thick upon their bones what cunning eyes. There was a game oflife and they had played it. The garden was a part of the game. It wasbeautiful and did not all that was beautiful in the world end byserving them? The arts of men, the thoughts of men, the impulsestoward loveliness that came into the minds of men and women, did notall these things work solely to lighten the hours of the successful?The eyes of the men at the tables as they looked at the women whodanced were not too greedy. They were filled with assurance. Was itnot for them that the dancers turned here and there revealing theirgrace? If life was a struggle had they not been successful in thestruggle?

　　McGregor arose from the table and left his food untouched. Near theentrance to the gardens he stopped and leaning against a pillar lookedagain at the scene before him. Upon the platform appeared a wholetroupe of women-dancers. They were dressed in many-coloured garmentsand danced a folk dance. As McGregor watched a light began to creepback into his eyes. The women who now danced were unlike her who hadreminded him of Margaret Ormsby. They were short of stature and therewas something rugged in their faces. Back and forth across theplatform they moved in masses. By their dancing they were striving toconvey a message. A thought came to McGregor. "It is the dance oflabour," he muttered. "Here in this garden it is corrupted but thenote of labour is not lost. There is a hint of it left in thesefigures who toil even as they dance."

　　McGregor moved away from the shadows of the pillar and stood, hat inhand, beneath the garden lights waiting as though for a call out ofthe ranks of the dancers. How furiously they worked. How the bodiestwisted and squirmed. Out of sympathy with their efforts sweatappeared on the face of the man who stood watching. "What a storm mustbe going on just below the surface of labour," he muttered."Everywhere dumb brutalised men and women must be waiting forsomething, not knowing what they want. I will stick to my purpose butI will not give up Margaret," he said aloud, turning and half runningout of the garden and into the street.

　　In his sleep that night McGregor dreamed of a new world, a world ofsoft phrases and gentle hands that stilled the rising brute in man. Itwas a world-old dream, the dream out of which such women as MargaretOrmsby have been created. The long slender hands he had seen lying onthe desk in the settlement house now touched his hands. Uneasily herolled about in bed and desire came to him so that he awakened. On theBoulevard people still passed up and down. McGregor arose and stood inthe darkness by the window of his room watching. A theatre had justspat forth its portion of richly dressed men and women and when he hadopened the window the voices of the women came clear and sharp to hisears.

　　The distracted man stared into the darkness and his blue eyes weretroubled. The vision of the disordered and disorganised band of minersmarching silently in the wake of his mother's funeral into whose liveshe by some supreme effort was to bring order was disturbed andshattered by the more definite and lovely vision that had come to him.