Chapter XLV

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

　　Kreis came to Martin one day - Kreis, of the "real dirt"; andMartin turned to him with relief, to receive the glowing details ofa scheme sufficiently wild-catty to interest him as a fictionistrather than an investor. Kreis paused long enough in the midst ofhis exposition to tell him that in most of his "Shame of the Sun"he had been a chump."But I didn't come here to spout philosophy," Kreis went on. "WhatI want to know is whether or not you will put a thousand dollars inon this deal?""No, I'm not chump enough for that, at any rate," Martin answered."But I'll tell you what I will do. You gave me the greatest nightof my life. You gave me what money cannot buy. Now I've gotmoney, and it means nothing to me. I'd like to turn over to you athousand dollars of what I don't value for what you gave me thatnight and which was beyond price. You need the money. I've gotmore than I need. You want it. You came for it. There's no usescheming it out of me. Take it."Kreis betrayed no surprise. He folded the check away in hispocket."At that rate I'd like the contract of providing you with many suchnights," he said."Too late." Martin shook his head. "That night was the one nightfor me. I was in paradise. It's commonplace with you, I know.But it wasn't to me. I shall never live at such a pitch again.I'm done with philosophy. I want never to hear another word ofit.""The first dollar I ever made in my life out of my philosophy,"Kreis remarked, as he paused in the doorway. "And then the marketbroke."Mrs. Morse drove by Martin on the street one day, and smiled andnodded. He smiled back and lifted his hat. The episode did notaffect him. A month before it might have disgusted him, or madehim curious and set him to speculating about her state ofconsciousness at that moment. But now it was not provocative of asecond thought. He forgot about it the next moment. He forgotabout it as he would have forgotten the Central Bank Building orthe City Hall after having walked past them. Yet his mind waspreternaturally active. His thoughts went ever around and aroundin a circle. The centre of that circle was "work performed"; itate at his brain like a deathless maggot. He awoke to it in themorning. It tormented his dreams at night. Every affair of lifearound him that penetrated through his senses immediately relateditself to "work performed." He drove along the path of relentlesslogic to the conclusion that he was nobody, nothing. Mart Eden,the hoodlum, and Mart Eden, the sailor, had been real, had been he;but Martin Eden! the famous writer, did not exist. Martin Eden,the famous writer, was a vapor that had arisen in the mob-mind andby the mob-mind had been thrust into the corporeal being of MartEden, the hoodlum and sailor. But it couldn't fool him. He wasnot that sun-myth that the mob was worshipping and sacrificingdinners to. He knew better.He read the magazines about himself, and pored over portraits ofhimself published therein until he was unable to associate hisidentity with those portraits. He was the fellow who had lived andthrilled and loved; who had been easy-going and tolerant of thefrailties of life; who had served in the forecastle, wandered instrange lands, and led his gang in the old fighting days. He wasthe fellow who had been stunned at first by the thousands of booksin the free library, and who had afterward learned his way amongthem and mastered them; he was the fellow who had burned themidnight oil and bedded with a spur and written books himself. Butthe one thing he was not was that colossal appetite that all themob was bent upon feeding.There were things, however, in the magazines that amused him. Allthe magazines were claiming him. Warren's Monthly advertised toits subscribers that it was always on the quest after new writers,and that, among others, it had introduced Martin Eden to thereading public. The White Mouse claimed him; so did The NorthernReview and Mackintosh's Magazine, until silenced by The Globe,which pointed triumphantly to its files where the mangled "SeaLyrics" lay buried. Youth and Age, which had come to life againafter having escaped paying its bills, put in a prior claim, whichnobody but farmers' children ever read. The Transcontinental madea dignified and convincing statement of how it first discoveredMartin Eden, which was warmly disputed by The Hornet, with theexhibit of "The Peri and the Pearl." The modest claim ofSingletree, Darnley & Co. was lost in the din. Besides, thatpublishing firm did not own a magazine wherewith to make its claimless modest.The newspapers calculated Martin's royalties. In some way themagnificent offers certain magazines had made him leaked out, andOakland ministers called upon him in a friendly way, whileprofessional begging letters began to clutter his mail. But worsethan all this were the women. His photographs were publishedbroadcast, and special writers exploited his strong, bronzed face,his scars, his heavy shoulders, his clear, quiet eyes, and theslight hollows in his cheeks like an ascetic's. At this last heremembered his wild youth and smiled. Often, among the women hemet, he would see now one, now another, looking at him, appraisinghim, selecting him. He laughed to himself. He rememberedBrissenden's warning and laughed again. The women would neverdestroy him, that much was certain. He had gone past that stage.Once, walking with Lizzie toward night school, she caught a glancedirected toward him by a well-gowned, handsome woman of thebourgeoisie. The glance was a trifle too long, a shade tooconsiderative. Lizzie knew it for what it was, and her body tensedangrily. Martin noticed, noticed the cause of it, told her howused he was becoming to it and that he did not care anyway."You ought to care," she answered with blazing eyes. "You're sick.That's what's the matter.""Never healthier in my life. I weigh five pounds more than I everdid.""It ain't your body. It's your head. Something's wrong with yourthink-machine. Even I can see that, an' I ain't nobody."He walked on beside her, reflecting."I'd give anything to see you get over it," she broke outimpulsively. "You ought to care when women look at you that way, aman like you. It's not natural. It's all right enough for sissy-boys. But you ain't made that way. So help me, I'd be willing an'glad if the right woman came along an' made you care."When he left Lizzie at night school, he returned to the Metropole.Once in his rooms, he dropped into a Morris chair and sat staringstraight before him. He did not doze. Nor did he think. His mindwas a blank, save for the intervals when unsummoned memory picturestook form and color and radiance just under his eyelids. He sawthese pictures, but he was scarcely conscious of them - no more sothan if they had been dreams. Yet he was not asleep. Once, heroused himself and glanced at his watch. It was just eighto'clock. He had nothing to do, and it was too early for bed. Thenhis mind went blank again, and the pictures began to form andvanish under his eyelids. There was nothing distinctive about thepictures. They were always masses of leaves and shrub-likebranches shot through with hot sunshine.A knock at the door aroused him. He was not asleep, and his mindimmediately connected the knock with a telegram, or letter, orperhaps one of the servants bringing back clean clothes from thelaundry. He was thinking about Joe and wondering where he was, ashe said, "Come in."He was still thinking about Joe, and did not turn toward the door.He heard it close softly. There was a long silence. He forgotthat there had been a knock at the door, and was still staringblankly before him when he heard a woman's sob. It wasinvoluntary, spasmodic, checked, and stifled - he noted that as heturned about. The next instant he was on his feet."Ruth!" he said, amazed and bewildered.Her face was white and strained. She stood just inside the door,one hand against it for support, the other pressed to her side.She extended both hands toward him piteously, and started forwardto meet him. As he caught her hands and led her to the Morrischair he noticed how cold they were. He drew up another chair andsat down on the broad arm of it. He was too confused to speak. Inhis own mind his affair with Ruth was closed and sealed. He feltmuch in the same way that he would have felt had the Shelly HotSprings Laundry suddenly invaded the Hotel Metropole with a wholeweek's washing ready for him to pitch into. Several times he wasabout to speak, and each time he hesitated."No one knows I am here," Ruth said in a faint voice, with anappealing smile."What did you say?"He was surprised at the sound of his own voice.She repeated her words."Oh," he said, then wondered what more he could possibly say."I saw you come in, and I waited a few minutes.""Oh," he said again.He had never been so tongue-tied in his life. Positively he didnot have an idea in his head. He felt stupid and awkward, but forthe life of him he could think of nothing to say. It would havebeen easier had the intrusion been the Shelly Hot Springs laundry.He could have rolled up his sleeves and gone to work."And then you came in," he said finally.She nodded, with a slightly arch expression, and loosened the scarfat her throat."I saw you first from across the street when you were with thatgirl.""Oh, yes," he said simply. "I took her down to night school.""Well, aren't you glad to see me?" she said at the end of anothersilence."Yes, yes." He spoke hastily. "But wasn't it rash of you to comehere?""I slipped in. Nobody knows I am here. I wanted to see you. Icame to tell you I have been very foolish. I came because I couldno longer stay away, because my heart compelled me to come, because- because I wanted to come."She came forward, out of her chair and over to him. She rested herhand on his shoulder a moment, breathing quickly, and then slippedinto his arms. And in his large, easy way, desirous of notinflicting hurt, knowing that to repulse this proffer of herselfwas to inflict the most grievous hurt a woman could receive, hefolded his arms around her and held her close. But there was nowarmth in the embrace, no caress in the contact. She had come intohis arms, and he held her, that was all. She nestled against him,and then, with a change of position, her hands crept up and restedupon his neck. But his flesh was not fire beneath those hands, andhe felt awkward and uncomfortable."What makes you tremble so?" he asked. "Is it a chill? Shall Ilight the grate?"He made a movement to disengage himself, but she clung more closelyto him, shivering violently."It is merely nervousness," she said with chattering teeth. "I'llcontrol myself in a minute. There, I am better already."Slowly her shivering died away. He continued to hold her, but hewas no longer puzzled. He knew now for what she had come."My mother wanted me to marry Charley Hapgood," she announced."Charley Hapgood, that fellow who speaks always in platitudes?"Martin groaned. Then he added, "And now, I suppose, your motherwants you to marry me."He did not put it in the form of a question. He stated it as acertitude, and before his eyes began to dance the rows of figuresof his royalties."She will not object, I know that much," Ruth said."She considers me quite eligible?"Ruth nodded."And yet I am not a bit more eligible now than I was when she brokeour engagement," he meditated. "I haven't changed any. I'm thesame Martin Eden, though for that matter I'm a bit worse - I smokenow. Don't you smell my breath?"In reply she pressed her open fingers against his lips, placed themgraciously and playfully, and in expectancy of the kiss that of oldhad always been a consequence. But there was no caressing answerof Martin's lips. He waited until the fingers were removed andthen went on."I am not changed. I haven't got a job. I'm not looking for ajob. Furthermore, I am not going to look for a job. And I stillbelieve that Herbert Spencer is a great and noble man and thatJudge Blount is an unmitigated ass. I had dinner with him theother night, so I ought to know.""But you didn't accept father's invitation," she chided."So you know about that? Who sent him? Your mother?"She remained silent."Then she did send him. I thought so. And now I suppose she hassent you.""No one knows that I am here," she protested. "Do you think mymother would permit this?""She'd permit you to marry me, that's certain."She gave a sharp cry. "Oh, Martin, don't be cruel. You have notkissed me once. You are as unresponsive as a stone. And thinkwhat I have dared to do." She looked about her with a shiver,though half the look was curiosity. "Just think of where I am.""I could die for you! I could die for you!" - Lizzie's words wereringing in his ears."Why didn't you dare it before?" he asked harshly. "When I hadn'ta job? When I was starving? When I was just as I am now, as aman, as an artist, the same Martin Eden? That's the question I'vebeen propounding to myself for many a day - not concerning youmerely, but concerning everybody. You see I have not changed,though my sudden apparent appreciation in value compels meconstantly to reassure myself on that point. I've got the sameflesh on my bones, the same ten fingers and toes. I am the same.I have not developed any new strength nor virtue. My brain is thesame old brain. I haven't made even one new generalization onliterature or philosophy. I am personally of the same value that Iwas when nobody wanted me. And what is puzzling me is why theywant me now. Surely they don't want me for myself, for myself isthe same old self they did not want. Then they must want me forsomething else, for something that is outside of me, for somethingthat is not I! Shall I tell you what that something is? It is forthe recognition I have received. That recognition is not I. Itresides in the minds of others. Then again for the money I haveearned and am earning. But that money is not I. It resides inbanks and in the pockets of Tom, Dick, and Harry. And is it forthat, for the recognition and the money, that you now want me?""You are breaking my heart," she sobbed. "You know I love you,that I am here because I love you.""I am afraid you don't see my point," he said gently. "What I meanis: if you love me, how does it happen that you love me now somuch more than you did when your love was weak enough to deny me?""Forget and forgive," she cried passionately. "I loved you all thetime, remember that, and I am here, now, in your arms.""I'm afraid I am a shrewd merchant, peering into the scales, tryingto weigh your love and find out what manner of thing it is."She withdrew herself from his arms, sat upright, and looked at himlong and searchingly. She was about to speak, then faltered andchanged her mind."You see, it appears this way to me," he went on. "When I was allthat I am now, nobody out of my own class seemed to care for me.When my books were all written, no one who had read the manuscriptsseemed to care for them. In point of fact, because of the stuff Ihad written they seemed to care even less for me. In writing thestuff it seemed that I had committed acts that were, to say theleast, derogatory. 'Get a job,' everybody said."She made a movement of dissent."Yes, yes," he said; "except in your case you told me to get aposition. The homely word job, like much that I have written,offends you. It is brutal. But I assure you it was no less brutalto me when everybody I knew recommended it to me as they wouldrecommend right conduct to an immoral creature. But to return.The publication of what I had written, and the public notice Ireceived, wrought a change in the fibre of your love. Martin Eden,with his work all performed, you would not marry. Your love forhim was not strong enough to enable you to marry him. But yourlove is now strong enough, and I cannot avoid the conclusion thatits strength arises from the publication and the public notice. Inyour case I do not mention royalties, though I am certain that theyapply to the change wrought in your mother and father. Of course,all this is not flattering to me. But worst of all, it makes mequestion love, sacred love. Is love so gross a thing that it mustfeed upon publication and public notice? It would seem so. I havesat and thought upon it till my head went around.""Poor, dear head." She reached up a hand and passed the fingerssoothingly through his hair. "Let it go around no more. Let usbegin anew, now. I loved you all the time. I know that I was weakin yielding to my mother's will. I should not have done so. Yet Ihave heard you speak so often with broad charity of the fallibilityand frailty of humankind. Extend that charity to me. I actedmistakenly. Forgive me.""Oh, I do forgive," he said impatiently. "It is easy to forgivewhere there is really nothing to forgive. Nothing that you havedone requires forgiveness. One acts according to one's lights, andmore than that one cannot do. As well might I ask you to forgiveme for my not getting a job.""I meant well," she protested. "You know that I could not haveloved you and not meant well.""True; but you would have destroyed me out of your well-meaning.""Yes, yes," he shut off her attempted objection. "You would havedestroyed my writing and my career. Realism is imperative to mynature, and the bourgeois spirit hates realism. The bourgeoisie iscowardly. It is afraid of life. And all your effort was to makeme afraid of life. You would have formalized me. You would havecompressed me into a two-by-four pigeonhole of life, where alllife's values are unreal, and false, and vulgar." He felt her stirprotestingly. "Vulgarity - a hearty vulgarity, I'll admit - is thebasis of bourgeois refinement and culture. As I say, you wanted toformalize me, to make me over into one of your own class, with yourclass-ideals, class-values, and class-prejudices." He shook hishead sadly. "And you do not understand, even now, what I amsaying. My words do not mean to you what I endeavor to make themmean. What I say is so much fantasy to you. Yet to me it is vitalreality. At the best you are a trifle puzzled and amused that thisraw boy, crawling up out of the mire of the abyss, should passjudgment upon your class and call it vulgar."She leaned her head wearily against his shoulder, and her bodyshivered with recurrent nervousness. He waited for a time for herto speak, and then went on."And now you want to renew our love. You want us to be married.You want me. And yet, listen - if my books had not been noticed,I'd nevertheless have been just what I am now. And you would havestayed away. It is all those damned books - ""Don't swear," she interrupted.Her reproof startled him. He broke into a harsh laugh."That's it," he said, "at a high moment, when what seems yourlife's happiness is at stake, you are afraid of life in the sameold way - afraid of life and a healthy oath."She was stung by his words into realization of the puerility of heract, and yet she felt that he had magnified it unduly and wasconsequently resentful. They sat in silence for a long time, shethinking desperately and he pondering upon his love which haddeparted. He knew, now, that he had not really loved her. It wasan idealized Ruth he had loved, an ethereal creature of his owncreating, the bright and luminous spirit of his love-poems. Thereal bourgeois Ruth, with all the bourgeois failings and with thehopeless cramp of the bourgeois psychology in her mind, he hadnever loved.She suddenly began to speak."I know that much you have said is so. I have been afraid of life.I did not love you well enough. I have learned to love better. Ilove you for what you are, for what you were, for the ways even bywhich you have become. I love you for the ways wherein you differfrom what you call my class, for your beliefs which I do notunderstand but which I know I can come to understand. I shalldevote myself to understanding them. And even your smoking andyour swearing - they are part of you and I will love you for them,too. I can still learn. In the last ten minutes I have learnedmuch. That I have dared to come here is a token of what I havealready learned. Oh, Martin! - "She was sobbing and nestling close against him.For the first time his arms folded her gently and with sympathy,and she acknowledged it with a happy movement and a brighteningface."It is too late," he said. He remembered Lizzie's words. "I am asick man - oh, not my body. It is my soul, my brain. I seem tohave lost all values. I care for nothing. If you had been thisway a few months ago, it would have been different. It is toolate, now.""It is not too late," she cried. "I will show you. I will proveto you that my love has grown, that it is greater to me than myclass and all that is dearest to me. All that is dearest to thebourgeoisie I will flout. I am no longer afraid of life. I willleave my father and mother, and let my name become a by-word withmy friends. I will come to you here and now, in free love if youwill, and I will be proud and glad to be with you. If I have beena traitor to love, I will now, for love's sake, be a traitor to allthat made that earlier treason."She stood before him, with shining eyes."I am waiting, Martin," she whispered, "waiting for you to acceptme. Look at me."It was splendid, he thought, looking at her. She had redeemedherself for all that she had lacked, rising up at last, true woman,superior to the iron rule of bourgeois convention. It wassplendid, magnificent, desperate. And yet, what was the matterwith him? He was not thrilled nor stirred by what she had done.It was splendid and magnificent only intellectually. In whatshould have been a moment of fire, he coldly appraised her. Hisheart was untouched. He was unaware of any desire for her. Againhe remembered Lizzie's words."I am sick, very sick," he said with a despairing gesture. "Howsick I did not know till now. Something has gone out of me. Ihave always been unafraid of life, but I never dreamed of beingsated with life. Life has so filled me that I am empty of anydesire for anything. If there were room, I should want you, now.You see how sick I am."He leaned his head back and closed his eyes; and like a child,crying, that forgets its grief in watching the sunlight percolatethrough the tear-dimmed films over the pupils, so Martin forgot hissickness, the presence of Ruth, everything, in watching the massesof vegetation, shot through hotly with sunshine that took form andblazed against this background of his eyelids. It was not restful,that green foliage. The sunlight was too raw and glaring. It hurthim to look at it, and yet he looked, he knew not why.He was brought back to himself by the rattle of the door-knob.Ruth was at the door."How shall I get out?" she questioned tearfully. "I am afraid.""Oh, forgive me," he cried, springing to his feet. "I'm notmyself, you know. I forgot you were here." He put his hand to hishead. "You see, I'm not just right. I'll take you home. We cango out by the servants' entrance. No one will see us. Pull downthat veil and everything will be all right."She clung to his arm through the dim-lighted passages and down thenarrow stairs."I am safe now," she said, when they emerged on the sidewalk, atthe same time starting to take her hand from his arm."No, no, I'll see you home," he answered."No, please don't," she objected. "It is unnecessary."Again she started to remove her hand. He felt a momentarycuriosity. Now that she was out of danger she was afraid. She wasin almost a panic to be quit of him. He could see no reason for itand attributed it to her nervousness. So he restrained herwithdrawing hand and started to walk on with her. Halfway down theblock, he saw a man in a long overcoat shrink back into a doorway.He shot a glance in as he passed by, and, despite the high turned-up collar, he was certain that he recognized Ruth's brother,Norman.During the walk Ruth and Martin held little conversation. She wasstunned. He was apathetic. Once, he mentioned that he was goingaway, back to the South Seas, and, once, she asked him to forgiveher having come to him. And that was all. The parting at her doorwas conventional. They shook hands, said good night, and he liftedhis hat. The door swung shut, and he lighted a cigarette andturned back for his hotel. When he came to the doorway into whichhe had seen Norman shrink, he stopped and looked in in aspeculative humor."She lied," he said aloud. "She made believe to me that she haddared greatly, and all the while she knew the brother that broughther was waiting to take her back." He burst into laughter. "Oh,these bourgeois! When I was broke, I was not fit to be seen withhis sister. When I have a bank account, he brings her to me."As he swung on his heel to go on, a tramp, going in the samedirection, begged him over his shoulder."Say, mister, can you give me a quarter to get a bed?" were thewords.But it was the voice that made Martin turn around. The nextinstant he had Joe by the hand."D'ye remember that time we parted at the Hot Springs?" the otherwas saying. "I said then we'd meet again. I felt it in my bones.An' here we are.""You're looking good," Martin said admiringly, "and you've put onweight.""I sure have." Joe's face was beaming. "I never knew what it wasto live till I hit hoboin'. I'm thirty pounds heavier an' feeltiptop all the time. Why, I was worked to skin an' bone in themold days. Hoboin' sure agrees with me.""But you're looking for a bed just the same," Martin chided, "andit's a cold night.""Huh? Lookin' for a bed?" Joe shot a hand into his hip pocket andbrought it out filled with small change. "That beats hard graft,"he exulted. "You just looked good; that's why I battered you."Martin laughed and gave in."You've several full-sized drunks right there," he insinuated.Joe slid the money back into his pocket."Not in mine," he announced. "No gettin' oryide for me, thoughthere ain't nothin' to stop me except I don't want to. I've bendrunk once since I seen you last, an' then it was unexpected, bein'on an empty stomach. When I work like a beast, I drink like abeast. When I live like a man, I drink like a man - a jolt now an'again when I feel like it, an' that's all."Martin arranged to meet him next day, and went on to the hotel. Hepaused in the office to look up steamer sailings. The Mariposasailed for Tahiti in five days."Telephone over to-morrow and reserve a stateroom for me," he toldthe clerk. "No deck-stateroom, but down below, on the weather-side, - the port-side, remember that, the port-side. You'd betterwrite it down."Once in his room he got into bed and slipped off to sleep as gentlyas a child. The occurrences of the evening had made no impressionon him. His mind was dead to impressions. The glow of warmth withwhich he met Joe had been most fleeting. The succeeding minute hehad been bothered by the ex-laundryman's presence and by thecompulsion of conversation. That in five more days he sailed forhis loved South Seas meant nothing to him. So he closed his eyesand slept normally and comfortably for eight uninterrupted hours.He was not restless. He did not change his position, nor did hedream. Sleep had become to him oblivion, and each day that heawoke, he awoke with regret. Life worried and bored him, and timewas a vexation.