Chapter 8

by William Dean Howells

　　"No, I don't think so. It's decent. Tom had found out--withoutconsulting the landscape, which I believe proclaims it everywhere----""Hideous!""That it's really a good thing; and he thinks that he has some ideas inregard to its dissemination in the parts beyond seas.""Why shouldn't he go into something else?" lamented the mother."I believe he has gone into nearly everything else and come out of it.So there is a chance of his coming out of this. But as I had nothingto suggest in place of it, I thought it best not to interfere. Infact, what good would my telling him that mineral paint was nasty havedone? I dare say YOU told him it was nasty.""Yes! I did.""And you see with what effect, though he values your opinion threetimes as much as he values mine. Perhaps you came up to tell him againthat it was nasty?""I feel very unhappy about it. He is throwing himself away. Yes, Ishould like to prevent it if I could!"The father shook his head."If Lapham hasn't prevented it, I fancy it's too late. But there maybe some hopes of Lapham. As for Tom's throwing himself away, I don'tknow. There's no question but he is one of the best fellows under thesun. He's tremendously energetic, and he has plenty of the kind ofsense which we call horse; but he isn't brilliant. No, Tom is notbrilliant. I don't think he would get on in a profession, and he'sinstinctively kept out of everything of the kind. But he has got to dosomething. What shall he do? He says mineral paint, and really I don'tsee why he shouldn't. If money is fairly and honestly earned, whyshould we pretend to care what it comes out of, when we don't reallycare? That superstition is exploded everywhere.""Oh, it isn't the paint alone," said Mrs. Corey; and then sheperceptibly arrested herself, and made a diversion in continuing: "Iwish he had married some one.""With money?" suggested her husband. "From time to time I haveattempted Tom's corruption from that side, but I suspect Tom has aconscience against it, and I rather like him for it. I married forlove myself," said Corey, looking across the table at his wife.She returned his look tolerantly, though she felt it right to say,"What nonsense!""Besides," continued her husband, "if you come to money, there is thepaint princess. She will have plenty.""Ah, that's the worst of it," sighed the mother. "I suppose I couldget on with the paint----""But not with the princess? I thought you said she was a very pretty,well-behaved girl?""She is very pretty, and she is well-behaved; but there is nothing ofher. She is insipid; she is very insipid.""But Tom seemed to like her flavour, such as it was?""How can I tell? We were under a terrible obligation to them, and Inaturally wished him to be polite to them. In fact, I asked him to beso.""And he was too polite.""I can't say that he was. But there is no doubt that the child isextremely pretty.""Tom says there are two of them. Perhaps they will neutralise eachother.""Yes, there is another daughter," assented Mrs. Corey. "I don't seehow you can joke about such things, Bromfield," she added."Well, I don't either, my dear, to tell you the truth. My hardihoodsurprises me. Here is a son of mine whom I see reduced to making hisliving by a shrinkage in values. It's very odd," interjected Corey,"that some values should have this peculiarity of shrinking. You neverhear of values in a picture shrinking; but rents, stocks, realestate--all those values shrink abominably. Perhaps it might be arguedthat one should put all his values into pictures; I've got a good manyof mine there.""Tom needn't earn his living," said Mrs. Corey, refusing her husband'sjest. "There's still enough for all of us.""That is what I have sometimes urged upon Tom. I have proved to himthat with economy, and strict attention to business, he need do nothingas long as he lives. Of course he would be somewhat restricted, and itwould cramp the rest of us; but it is a world of sacrifices andcompromises. He couldn't agree with me, and he was not in the leastmoved by the example of persons of quality in Europe, which I allegedin support of the life of idleness. It appears that he wishes to dosomething--to do something for himself. I am afraid that Tom isselfish."Mrs. Corey smiled wanly. Thirty years before, she had married the richyoung painter in Rome, who said so much better things than hepainted--charming things, just the things to please the fancy of a girlwho was disposed to take life a little too seriously and practically.She saw him in a different light when she got him home to Boston; buthe had kept on saying the charming things, and he had not done muchelse. In fact, he had fulfilled the promise of his youth. It was agood trait in him that he was not actively but only passivelyextravagant. He was not adventurous with his money; his tastes were assimple as an Italian's; he had no expensive habits. In the process oftime he had grown to lead a more and more secluded life. It was hardto get him out anywhere, even to dinner. His patience with theirnarrowing circumstances had a pathos which she felt the more the moreshe came into charge of their joint life. At times it seemed too badthat the children and their education and pleasures should cost somuch. She knew, besides, that if it had not been for them she wouldhave gone back to Rome with him, and lived princely there for less thanit took to live respectably in Boston."Tom hasn't consulted me," continued his father, "but he has consultedother people. And he has arrived at the conclusion that mineral paintis a good thing to go into. He has found out all about it, and aboutits founder or inventor. It's quite impressive to hear him talk. Andif he must do something for himself, I don't see why his egotismshouldn't as well take that form as another. Combined with the paintprincess, it isn't so agreeable; but that's only a remote possibility,for which your principal ground is your motherly solicitude. But evenif it were probable and imminent, what could you do? The chiefconsolation that we American parents have in these matters is that wecan do nothing. If we were Europeans, even English, we should takesome cognisance of our children's love affairs, and in some measureteach their young affections how to shoot. But it is our custom toignore them until they have shot, and then they ignore us. We arealtogether too delicate to arrange the marriages of our children; andwhen they have arranged them we don't like to say anything, for fear weshould only make bad worse. The right way is for us to schoolourselves to indifference. That is what the young people have to doelsewhere, and that is the only logical result of our position here.It is absurd for us to have any feeling about what we don't interferewith.""Oh, people do interfere with their children's marriages very often,"said Mrs. Corey."Yes, but only in a half-hearted way, so as not to make it disagreeablefor themselves if the marriages go on in spite of them, as they'repretty apt to do. Now, my idea is that I ought to cut Tom off with ashilling. That would be very simple, and it would be economical. Butyou would never consent, and Tom wouldn't mind it.""I think our whole conduct in regard to such things is wrong," saidMrs. Corey."Oh, very likely. But our whole civilisation is based upon it. Andwho is going to make a beginning? To which father in our acquaintanceshall I go and propose an alliance for Tom with his daughter? I shouldfeel like an ass. And will you go to some mother, and ask her sons inmarriage for our daughters? You would feel like a goose. No; the onlymotto for us is, Hands off altogether.""I shall certainly speak to Tom when the time comes," said Mrs. Corey."And I shall ask leave to be absent from your discomfiture, my dear,"answered her husband.The son returned that afternoon, and confessed his surprise at findinghis mother in Boston. He was so frank that she had not quite thecourage to confess in turn why she had come, but trumped up an excuse."Well, mother," he said promptly, "I have made an engagement with Mr.Lapham.""Have you, Tom?" she asked faintly."Yes. For the present I am going to have charge of his foreigncorrespondence, and if I see my way to the advantage I expect to findin it, I am going out to manage that side of his business in SouthAmerica and Mexico. He's behaved very handsomely about it. He saysthat if it appears for our common interest, he shall pay me a salary aswell as a commission. I've talked with Uncle Jim, and he thinks it's agood opening.""Your Uncle Jim does?" queried Mrs. Corey in amaze."Yes; I consulted him the whole way through, and I've acted on hisadvice."This seemed an incomprehensible treachery on her brother's part."Yes; I thought you would like to have me. And besides, I couldn'tpossibly have gone to any one so well fitted to advise me."His mother said nothing. In fact, the mineral paint business, howeverpainful its interest, was, for the moment, superseded by a morepoignant anxiety. She began to feel her way cautiously toward this."Have you been talking about your business with Mr. Lapham all night?""Well, pretty much," said her son, with a guiltless laugh. "I went tosee him yesterday afternoon, after I had gone over the whole groundwith Uncle Jim, and Mr. Lapham asked me to go down with him and finishup.""Down?" repeated Mrs. Corey. "Yes, to Nantasket. He has a cottagedown there.""At Nantasket?" Mrs. Corey knitted her brows a little. "What in theworld can a cottage at Nantasket be like?""Oh, very much like a 'cottage' anywhere. It has the usual allowanceof red roof and veranda. There are the regulation rocks by the sea;and the big hotels on the beach about a mile off, flaring away withelectric lights and roman-candles at night. We didn't have them atNahant.""No," said his mother. "Is Mrs. Lapham well? And her daughter?""Yes, I think so," said the young man. "The young ladies walked medown to the rocks in the usual way after dinner, and then I came backand talked paint with Mr. Lapham till midnight. We didn't settleanything till this morning coming up on the boat.""What sort of people do they seem to be at home?""What sort? Well, I don't know that I noticed." Mrs. Corey permittedherself the first part of a sigh of relief; and her son laughed, butapparently not at her. "They're just reading Middlemarch. They saythere's so much talk about it. Oh, I suppose they're very good people.They seemed to be on very good terms with each other.""I suppose it's the plain sister who's reading Middlemarch.""Plain? Is she plain?" asked the young man, as if searching hisconsciousness. "Yes, it's the older one who does the reading,apparently. But I don't believe that even she overdoes it. They liketo talk better. They reminded me of Southern people in that." Theyoung man smiled, as if amused by some of his impressions of the Laphamfamily. "The living, as the country people call it, is tremendouslygood. The Colonel--he's a colonel--talked of the coffee as his wife'scoffee, as if she had personally made it in the kitchen, though Ibelieve it was merely inspired by her. And there was everything in thehouse that money could buy. But money has its limitations."This was a fact which Mrs. Corey was beginning to realise more and moreunpleasantly in her own life; but it seemed to bring her a certaincomfort in its application to the Laphams. "Yes, there is a pointwhere taste has to begin," she said."They seemed to want to apologise to me for not having more books,"said Corey. "I don't know why they should. The Colonel said theybought a good many books, first and last; but apparently they don'ttake them to the sea-side.""I dare say they NEVER buy a NEW book. I've met some of these moneyedpeople lately, and they lavish on every conceivable luxury, and thenborrow books, and get them in the cheap paper editions.""I fancy that's the way with the Lapham family," said the young man,smilingly. "But they are very good people. The other daughter ishumorous.""Humorous?" Mrs. Corey knitted her brows in some perplexity. "Do youmean like Mrs. Sayre?" she asked, naming the lady whose name must comeinto every Boston mind when humour is mentioned."Oh no; nothing like that. She never says anything that you canremember; nothing in flashes or ripples; nothing the least literary.But it's a sort of droll way of looking at things; or a droll mediumthrough which things present themselves. I don't know. She tells whatshe's seen, and mimics a little.""Oh," said Mrs. Corey coldly. After a moment she asked: "And is MissIrene as pretty as ever?""She's a wonderful complexion," said the son unsatisfactorily. "Ishall want to be by when father and Colonel Lapham meet," he added,with a smile."Ah, yes, your father!" said the mother, in that way in which a wife atonce compassionates and censures her husband to their children."Do you think it's really going to be a trial to him?" asked the youngman quickly."No, no, I can't say it is. But I confess I wish it was some otherbusiness, Tom.""Well, mother, I don't see why. The principal thing looked at now isthe amount of money; and while I would rather starve than touch adollar that was dirty with any sort of dishonesty----""Of course you would, my son!" interposed his mother proudly."I shouldn't at all mind its having a little mineral paint on it. I'lluse my influence with Colonel Lapham--if I ever have any--to have hispaint scraped off the landscape.""I suppose you won't begin till the autumn.""Oh yes, I shall," said the son, laughing at his mother's simpleignorance of business. "I shall begin to-morrow morning.""To-morrow morning!""Yes. I've had my desk appointed already, and I shall be down there atnine in the morning to take possession.""Tom," cried his mother, "why do you think Mr. Lapham has taken youinto business so readily? I've always heard that it was so hard foryoung men to get in.""And do you think I found it easy with him? We had about twelve hours'solid talk.""And you don't suppose it was any sort of--personal consideration?""Why, I don't know exactly what you mean, mother. I suppose he likesme."Mrs. Corey could not say just what she meant. She answered,ineffectually enough--"Yes. You wouldn't like it to be a favour, would you?""I think he's a man who may be trusted to look after his own interest.But I don't mind his beginning by liking me. It'll be my own fault ifI don't make myself essential to him.""Yes," said Mrs. Corey."Well," demanded her husband, at their first meeting after herinterview with their son, "what did you say to Tom?""Very little, if anything. I found him with his mind made up, and itwould only have distressed him if I had tried to change it.""That is precisely what I said, my dear.""Besides, he had talked the matter over fully with James, and seems tohave been advised by him. I can't understand James.""Oh! it's in regard to the paint, and not the princess, that he's madeup his mind. Well, I think you were wise to let him alone, Anna. Werepresent a faded tradition. We don't really care what business a manis in, so it is large enough, and he doesn't advertise offensively; butwe think it fine to affect reluctance.""Do you really feel so, Bromfield?" asked his wife seriously."Certainly I do. There was a long time in my misguided youth when Isupposed myself some sort of porcelain; but it's a relief to be of thecommon clay, after all, and to know it. If I get broken, I can beeasily replaced.""If Tom must go into such a business," said Mrs. Corey, "I'm glad Jamesapproves of it.""I'm afraid it wouldn't matter to Tom if he didn't; and I don't knowthat I should care," said Corey, betraying the fact that he had perhapshad a good deal of his brother-in-law's judgment in the course of hislife. "You had better consult him in regard to Tom's marrying theprincess.""There is no necessity at present for that," said Mrs. Corey, withdignity. After a moment, she asked, "Should you feel quite so easy ifit were a question of that, Bromfield?""It would be a little more personal.""You feel about it as I do. Of course, we have both lived too long,and seen too much of the world, to suppose we can control such things.The child is good, I haven't the least doubt, and all those things canbe managed so that they wouldn't disgrace us. But she has had acertain sort of bringing up. I should prefer Tom to marry a girl withanother sort, and this business venture of his increases the chancesthat he won't. That's all.""''Tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door, but 'twillserve.'""I shouldn't like it.""Well, it hasn't happened yet.""Ah, you never can realise anything beforehand.""Perhaps that has saved me some suffering. But you have at least theconsolation of two anxieties at once. I always find that a greatadvantage. You can play one off against the other."Mrs. Corey drew a long breath as if she did not experience thesuggested consolation; and she arranged to quit, the followingafternoon, the scene of her defeat, which she had not had the courageto make a battlefield. Her son went down to see her off on the boat,after spending his first day at his desk in Lapham's office. He was ina gay humour, and she departed in a reflected gleam of his goodspirits. He told her all about it, as he sat talking with her at thestern of the boat, lingering till the last moment, and then steppingashore, with as little waste of time as Lapham himself, on thegang-plank which the deck-hands had laid hold of. He touched his hatto her from the wharf to reassure her of his escape from being carriedaway with her, and the next moment his smiling face hid itself in thecrowd.He walked on smiling up the long wharf, encumbered with trucks andhacks and piles of freight, and, taking his way through the desertedbusiness streets beyond this bustle, made a point of passing the doorof Lapham's warehouse, on the jambs of which his name and paint werelettered in black on a square ground of white. The door was stillopen, and Corey loitered a moment before it, tempted to go upstairs andfetch away some foreign letters which he had left on his desk, andwhich he thought he might finish up at home. He was in love with hiswork, and he felt the enthusiasm for it which nothing but the work wecan do well inspires in us. He believed that he had found his place inthe world, after a good deal of looking, and he had the relief, therepose, of fitting into it. Every little incident of the momentous,uneventful day was a pleasure in his mind, from his sitting down at hisdesk, to which Lapham's boy brought him the foreign letters, till hisrising from it an hour ago. Lapham had been in view within his ownoffice, but he had given Corey no formal reception, and had, in fact,not spoken to him till toward the end of the forenoon, when he suddenlycame out of his den with some more letters in his hand, and after abrief "How d'ye do?" had spoken a few words about them, and left themwith him. He was in his shirt-sleeves again, and his sanguine personseemed to radiate the heat with which he suffered. He did not go outto lunch, but had it brought to him in his office, where Corey saw himeating it before he left his own desk to go out and perch on a swingingseat before the long counter of a down-town restaurant. He observedthat all the others lunched at twelve, and he resolved to anticipatehis usual hour. When he returned, the pretty girl who had beenclicking away at a type-writer all the morning was neatly putting outof sight the evidences of pie from the table where her machine stood,and was preparing to go on with her copying. In his office Lapham layasleep in his arm-chair, with a newspaper over his face.Now, while Corey lingered at the entrance to the stairway, these twocame down the stairs together, and he heard Lapham saying, "Well, then,you better get a divorce."He looked red and excited, and the girl's face, which she veiled atsight of Corey, showed traces of tears. She slipped round him into thestreet.But Lapham stopped, and said, with the show of no feeling but surprise:"Hello, Corey! Did you want to go up?""Yes; there were some letters I hadn't quite got through with.""You'll find Dennis up there. But I guess you better let them go tillto-morrow. I always make it a rule to stop work when I'm done.""Perhaps you're right," said Corey, yielding."Come along down as far as the boat with me. There's a little matter Iwant to talk over with you."It was a business matter, and related to Corey's proposed connectionwith the house.The next day the head book-keeper, who lunched at the long counter ofthe same restaurant with Corey, began to talk with him about Lapham.Walker had not apparently got his place by seniority; though with hisforehead, bald far up toward the crown, and his round smooth face, onemight have taken him for a plump elder, if he had not looked equallylike a robust infant. The thick drabbish yellow moustache was whatarrested decision in either direction, and the prompt vigour of all hismovements was that of a young man of thirty, which was really Walker'sage. He knew, of course, who Corey was, and he had waited for a manwho might look down on him socially to make the overtures towardsomething more than business acquaintance; but, these made, he wasreadily responsive, and drew freely on his philosophy of Lapham and hisaffairs."I think about the only difference between people in this world is thatsome know what they want, and some don't. Well, now," said Walker,beating the bottom of his salt-box to make the salt come out, "the oldman knows what he wants every time. And generally he gets it. Yes,sir, he generally gets it. He knows what he's about, but I'll beblessed if the rest of us do half the time. Anyway, we don't till he'sready to let us. You take my position in most business houses. It'sconfidential. The head book-keeper knows right along pretty mucheverything the house has got in hand. I'll give you my word I don't.He may open up to you a little more in your department, but, as far asthe rest of us go, he don't open up any more than an oyster on a hotbrick. They say he had a partner once; I guess he's dead. I wouldn'tlike to be the old man's partner. Well, you see, this paint of his islike his heart's blood. Better not try to joke him about it. I'veseen people come in occasionally and try it. They didn't get much funout of it."While he talked, Walker was plucking up morsels from his plate, tearingoff pieces of French bread from the long loaf, and feeding them intohis mouth in an impersonal way, as if he were firing up an engine."I suppose he thinks," suggested Corey, "that if he doesn't tell,nobody else will."Walker took a draught of beer from his glass, and wiped the foam fromhis moustache."Oh, but he carries it too far! It's a weakness with him. He's just soabout everything. Look at the way he keeps it up about thattype-writer girl of his. You'd think she was some princess travellingincognito. There isn't one of us knows who she is, or where she camefrom, or who she belongs to. He brought her and her machine into theoffice one morning, and set 'em down at a table, and that's all thereis about it, as far as we're concerned. It's pretty hard on the girl,for I guess she'd like to talk; and to any one that didn't know the oldman----" Walker broke off and drained his glass of what was left in it.Corey thought of the words he had overheard from Lapham to the girl.But he said, "She seems to be kept pretty busy.""Oh yes," said Walker; "there ain't much loafing round the place, inany of the departments, from the old man's down. That's just what Isay. He's got to work just twice as hard, if he wants to keepeverything in his own mind. But he ain't afraid of work. That's onegood thing about him. And Miss Dewey has to keep step with the rest ofus. But she don't look like one that would take to it naturally. Sucha pretty girl as that generally thinks she does enough when she looksher prettiest.""She's a pretty girl," said Corey, non-committally. "But I suppose agreat many pretty girls have to earn their living.""Don't any of 'em like to do it," returned the book-keeper. "Theythink it's a hardship, and I don't blame 'em. They have got a right toget married, and they ought to have the chance. And Miss Dewey'ssmart, too. She's as bright as a biscuit. I guess she's had trouble.I shouldn't be much more than half surprised if Miss Dewey wasn't MissDewey, or hadn't always been. Yes, sir," continued the book-keeper,who prolonged the talk as they walked back to Lapham's warehousetogether, "I don't know exactly what it is,--it isn't any one thing inparticular,--but I should say that girl had been married. I wouldn'tspeak so freely to any of the rest, Mr. Corey,--I want you tounderstand that,--and it isn't any of my business, anyway; but that'smy opinion."Corey made no reply, as he walked beside the book-keeper, whocontinued--"It's curious what a difference marriage makes in people. Now, I knowthat I don't look any more like a bachelor of my age than I do like theman in the moon, and yet I couldn't say where the difference came in,to save me. And it's just so with a woman. The minute you catch sightof her face, there's something in it that tells you whether she'smarried or not. What do you suppose it is?""I'm sure I don't know," said Corey, willing to laugh away the topic."And from what I read occasionally of some people who go aboutrepeating their happiness, I shouldn't say that the intangibleevidences were always unmistakable.""Oh, of course," admitted Walker, easily surrendering his position."All signs fail in dry weather. Hello! What's that?" He caught Coreyby the arm, and they both stopped.At a corner, half a block ahead of them, the summer noon solitude ofthe place was broken by a bit of drama. A man and woman issued fromthe intersecting street, and at the moment of coming into sight theman, who looked like a sailor, caught the woman by the arm, as if todetain her. A brief struggle ensued, the woman trying to free herself,and the man half coaxing, half scolding. The spectators could now seethat he was drunk; but before they could decide whether it was a casefor their interference or not, the woman suddenly set both handsagainst the man's breast and gave him a quick push. He lost hisfooting and tumbled into a heap in the gutter. The woman faltered aninstant, as if to see whether he was seriously hurt, and then turnedand ran.When Corey and the book-keeper re-entered the office, Miss Dewey hadfinished her lunch, and was putting a sheet of paper into hertype-writer. She looked up at them with her eyes of turquoise blue,under her low white forehead, with the hair neatly rippled over it, andthen began to beat the keys of her machine.