Athalie

"Mr. Wahlbaum has just died," he said.

In the sudden shock and consternation she had risen from her chair, and stood there, one hand resting on her desk top for support.

"Pneumonia," nodded Mr. Grossman. "Sam he smoked too much all the time. That is what done it, Miss Greensleeve."

Her hands crept to her eyes, covered them convulsively. "Oh!" she breathed – "Oh!"

And, for a moment was not aware of the arm of Mr. Grossman around her waist, – until it tightened unctuously.

"Dearie," he murmured, "don't you take on so hard. You ain't goin' to lose your job, because I'm a-goin' to be your best friend same like he was – "

With a shudder she stepped clear of him; he caught her by the waist again and kissed her; and she wrenched herself free and turned fiercely on him as he advanced again, smirking, watery of eye, arms outstretched.

Then in the overwhelming revulsion and horror of the act and of the moment chosen for it when death's shadow already lay dark upon this vast and busy monument to her dead friend, she turned on him her dark blue eyes ablaze; and to her twisted, outraged lips flew, unbidden, the furious anathema of her ragged childhood:

"Damn you!" she stammered, – "damn you!" And struck him across the face.

Which impulsive and unconsidered proceeding left two at home out of work, herself and Doris. Also there was very little more for Catharine to do, the dull season at Winton's having arrived.

"Any honest job," repeated Doris when she and Athalie and Catharine met at evening after an all-day's profitless search for that sort of work; but honest jobs did not seem to be very plentiful in June, although any number of the other sort were to be had almost without the asking.

Doris continued to haunt agencies and theatrical offices, dawdling all day from one to the next, sitting for hours in company with other aspirants to histrionic honours and wages, gossiping, listening to stage talk, professional patter, and theatrical scandal until her pretty ears were buzzing with everything that ought not to concern her and her moral fastidiousness gradually became less delicate. Repetition is the great leveller, the great persuader. The greatest power on earth, for good or evil, is incessant reiteration.

Catharine lost her position, worked at a cheap milliner's for a week, addressed envelopes for another week, and was again left unemployed.

Athalie accepted several offers; at one place they didn't pay her for two weeks and then suggested she take half the salary agreed upon; at another her employer became offensively familiar; at another the manager made her position unendurable.

By July the financial outlook in the Greensleeve family was becoming rather serious: Doris threatened gloomily to go into burlesque; Catharine at first tearful and discouraged, finally grew careless and made few real efforts to find employment. Also she began to go out almost every evening, admitting very frankly that the home larder had become too lean and unattractive to suit her.

Doris always went out more or less; and what troubled Athalie was not that the girl had opportunities for the decent nourishment she needed, but that her reticence concerning the people she dined with was steadily increasing.

"Oh, shut up! I can look out for myself," she always repeated sullenly. "Anyway, Athalie, you are not the one to bully me. Nobody ever presented me with a cosy flat and – "

"Doris!"

"Didn't your young man give you this flat?"

"Don't speak of him or of me in that manner," said Athalie, flushing scarlet.

"Why are you so particular? It's the truth. He's given you about everything a man can offer a girl, hasn't he? – jewellery, furniture, clothing – cats – "

"Will you please not say anything more!"

But Doris was still smarting under recent admonition, and she meant to make an end of Athalie's daily interference: "I will say what I like when it's the truth," she retorted. "You are very free with your unsolicited advice. And I'll say this, and it's true, that not one girl in a thousand who accepts what you have accepted from Clive Bailey, is straight!"

Athalie's tightening lips quivered: "Do you intimate that I am not straight?"

"I didn't say that."

"You implied it."

There was a silence; Catharine lounged on the sofa, watching and listening with interest. After a moment Doris shrugged her young shoulders.

"Does it matter so much, anyway?" she said with a short, unpleasant laugh.

"Does what matter – you little ninny!"

"Whether a girl is straight."

"Is that the philosophy you learn in your theatrical agencies?" demanded Athalie fiercely. "What nauseating rot you do talk, Doris!"

"Very well. It may be nauseating. But what is a girl to do in a world run entirely by men?"

"You know well enough what a girl is not to do, don't you? All right then, – leave that undone and do what's left."

"What is left?" demanded Doris with a mirthless laugh. "There's scarcely a job that a girl can hold unless she squares some man to keep it – and keep – her!"

"Shame on you! I held mine for over five years," said Athalie with hot contempt.

"Yes, and then along came the junior partner. You wouldn't square him: you lost your job! There's always a junior partner in every business – when there isn't a senior. There's nothing to it if you stand in with the firm. If you don't – good night!"

"You managed to remain at the Egyptian Garden during the entire season."

"But the fights I had, my dear, and the tricks I employed and the lies I told and the promises I made! Oh, it's sickening – sickening! But – " she shrugged – "what are you to do? Thousands of girls go queer because they're forced to by starvation – "

"Nonsense!" cried Athalie hotly, "that is all stage twaddle and exaggerated sentimentalism! I don't believe that one girl in a thousand is forced into a dishonourable life!"

"Then why do girls go queer?"

"Because they want to; that's why! When they don't want to they don't!"

Catharine, very wide-eyed, said solemnly: "But think of all the white slaves – "

"They'd be that if they had been born to millions!" retorted Athalie. "Ignorance and aptitude, that is white slavery. It's absolutely nothing else. And in cases where the ignorance is absent, the aptitude is there. If a girl has an aptitude for becoming some man's mistress she'll probably do it whether she's ignorant or educated."

Doris, who had taken to chewing-gum furtively and in private, discreetly rolled a morsel under her tongue.

"All I know is that your salary is advanced and you're given a part at the Egyptian Garden if you stand in with Lewenbein or go to supper with Shemsky. Of course," she added, "there are theatres where you don't have to be horrid in order to succeed."

"Then," said Athalie drily, "you'd better find work in those theatres."

Doris glanced sideways at Catharine, who silently returned her glance as though an understanding and sympathy existed between them not suspected or shared in by Athalie.

It was not very much of a secret. Some prowling genius of the agencies whom Doris had met had offered to write a vaudeville act for her and himself if she could find two other girls. And she had persuaded Catharine and Genevieve Hunting to try it; and Cecil Reeve and Francis Hargrave had gaily offered to back it. They were rehearsing in Reeve's apartments – between a continuous series of dinners and suppers.

And it had been her sister's going to Reeve's apartments to which Athalie had seriously objected, – not knowing why she went there.

This was one of many scenes that torrid summer in New York, when Athalie intuitively felt that the year which had begun so happily for her with the entrance of Clive into her life, was growing duller and greyer; and that each succeeding day seemed to be swinging her into a tide of anxiety and mischance, – a current as yet merely perceptible, but already increasing in speed toward something swifter and more stormy.

Already, to her, the future had become overcast, obscure, disquieting.

Steer as she might toward any promising harbour, always she seemed to be aware of some subtle resistance impeding her.

Every small economy attempted, every retrenchment planned, came to nothing. Always she was met at some corner by an unlooked-for necessity entailing further expense.

No money was coming in; her own and her sister's savings were going steadily, every day, every week.

There seemed no further way to check expenditure. Athalie had dismissed their servant as soon as she had lost her position at Wahlbaum and Grossman's. Table expenses were reduced to Spartan limits, much to the disgust of them all. No clothes were bought, no luxuries, no trifles. They did their own marketing, their own cooking, their own housework and laundry. And had it not been that the apartment entailed no outlay for light, heat, and rent, they would have been sorely perplexed that spring and summer in New York.

Athalie permitted herself only one luxury, Hafiz. And one necessity; stamps and letter paper for foreign correspondence.

The latter was costing her less and less recently. Clive wrote seldom now. And always very sensitive where he was concerned, she permitted herself the happiness of writing only after he had taken the initiative, and a reply from her was due him.

No, matters were not going very well with Athalie. Also she was frequently physically tired. Perhaps it was the lassitude consequent on the heat. But at times she had an odd idea that she lacked courage; and sometimes when lonely, she tried to reason with herself, tried to teach her heart bravery – particularly during the long interims which elapsed between Clive's letters.

As for her attitude toward him – whether or not she was in love with him – she was too busy thinking about him to bother her head about attitudes or degrees of affection. All the girl knew – when she permitted herself to think of herself – was that she missed him dreadfully. Otherwise her concern was chiefly for him, for his happiness and well-being. Also she was concerned regarding the promise she had made him – and to which he usually referred in his letters, – the promise to try to learn more about this faculty of hers for clear vision, and, if possible, to employ it for his sake and in his unhappy service.

This often preoccupied her, troubled her. She did not know how to go about it; she hesitated to seek those who advertised their alleged occult powers for sale, – trance-mediums, mind-readers, palmists – all the heterogeneous riffraff lurking always in metropolitan purlieus, and always with a sly weather-eye on the police.

As usual in her career since the time she could first remember, she continued to "see clearly" where others saw and heard nothing.

Faint voices in the dusk, a whisper in darkness; perhaps in her bedroom the subtle intuition of another presence. And sometimes a touch on her arm, a breath on her cheek, delicate, exquisite – sometimes the haunting sweetness of some distant harmony, half heard, half divined. And now and then a form, usually unknown, almost always smiling and friendly, visible for a few moments – the space of a fire-fly's incandescence – then fading – entering her orbit out of nothing and, going into nothing, out of it.

Of these episodes she had never entertained any fear. Sometimes they interested her, sometimes even slightly amused her. But they had never saddened her, not even when they had been the flash-lit harbingers of death. For only a sense of calmness and serenity accompanied them: and to her they had always been part of the world and of life, nothing to wonder at, nothing to fear, and certainly nothing to intrude on – merely incidents not concerning her, not remarkable, but natural and requiring no explanation.

But she herself did not know and could not explain why, even as a child, she had been always reticent regarding these occurrences, – why she had always been disinclined to discuss them. Unless it were a natural embarrassment and a hesitation to discuss strangers, as though comment were a species of indelicacy, – even of unwarranted intrusion.

One night while reading – she had been scanning a newspaper column of advertisements hoping to find a chance for herself or Catharine – glancing up she again saw Clive's father seated near her. At the same moment he lifted his head, which had been resting on one hand, and looked across the hearthstone at her, smiling faintly.

Entirely unembarrassed, conscious of that atmosphere of serenity which always was present when such visitors arrived, the girl sat looking at what her eyes told her she perceived, a slight and friendly smile curving her lips in silent response.

Presently she became aware that Hafiz, too, saw the visitor, and was watching him. But this fact she had noticed before, and it did not surprise her.

And that was all there was to the incident. He rose, walked to the window, stood there. And after a little while he was not there. That ended it. And Hafiz went to sleep again.

CHAPTER XIII

IN September Athalie Greensleeve wrote her last letter to Clive Bailey. It began with a page or two of shyly solicitous inquiries concerning his well-being, his happiness, his plans; did not refer to his long silence; did refer to his anticipated return; did not mention her own accumulating domestic and financial embarrassments and the successive strokes of misfortune dealt her by those twin and formidable bravos, Fate and Chance; but did mention and enumerate everything that had occurred in her life which bore the slightest resemblance to a blessing.

Her letter continued:

"My sisters Doris and Catharine have gone into vaudeville with a very pretty act called 'April Rain.'

"That they had decided to do this and had been rehearsing it came as a complete surprise to me. Genevieve Hunting is also in it, and a man named Max Klepper who wrote the piece including lyrics and music.

"They opened at the Old Dominion Theatre, remained there a week, and then started West. Which makes it a trifle lonely for me; but I don't really mind if they only keep well and are successful and happy in their venture. Their idea and their desire, of course, is to return to New York at the earliest opportunity. But nobody seems to have any idea how soon that may happen. Meanwhile the weather is cooler and Hafiz remains well and adorable.

"I have been out very little except to look for a position. Mr. Wahlbaum is dead and I left the store. Sunday morning I took a few flowers to Mr. Wahlbaum's grave. He was very kind to me, Clive. In the afternoon I took a train to the Spring Pond Cemetery. Father's and mother's graves had been well cared for and were smoothly green. The four young oak trees I planted are growing nicely. Mother was fond of trees. I am sure she likes my little oaks.

"It was a beautiful, cool, sunny day; and after I left the Cemetery I walked along the well remembered road toward Spring Pond. It is not very far, but I had never been any nearer to it than the Cemetery since my sisters and I went away.

"Such odd sensations came over me as I walked alone there amid familiar scenes: and, curiously, everything seemed to have shrunk to miniature size – houses, fields, distances all seemed much less impressive. But the Bay was intensely blue; the grasses and reeds in the salt meadows were already tipped with a golden colour here and there; flocks of purple grackle and red-winged blackbirds rose, drifted, and settled, chattering and squealing among the cat-tails just as they used to do when I was a child; and the big, slow-sailing mouse-hawks drifted and glided over the pastures, and when they tipped sideways I could see the white moon-spot on their backs, just as I remembered to look for it when I was a little, little girl.

"And the odours, Clive! How the scent of the August fields, of the crisp salt hay, seemed to grip at my heart! – all the subtle, evanescent odours characteristic of that part of Long Island seemed to gather, blend, and exhale for my particular benefit that afternoon.

"The old tavern appeared to me so much smaller, so much more weather-beaten and shabby than my recollection of it. The sign still hung there – 'Hotel Greensleeve' – and as I walked by it I looked up at the window of my mother's room. The blinds were closed; nobody appeared to be around. I don't know why, Clive, but it seemed to me that I must go in for a moment and take one more look at my mother's room… I am glad I did. There was nobody to stop me. I went up the stairs on tiptoe and opened her door, and looked in. She was there, sewing.

"I went in very softly and sat down on the carpet by her chair… It was the happiest moment I have known since she died.

"And when she was no longer there I rose and crept down the stairs and through the hallway to the bar; and peeped in. An old man sat there asleep by the empty stove. And after a moment I decided it was Mr. Ledlie. But he has grown old – old! – and I let him sleep on in the sunshine without disturbing him.

"It was the same stove where you and I sat and nibbled peach turnovers so many years ago. I wanted to see it again.

"So I went back to New York in the late golden afternoon feeling very peaceful and dreamy, – and a trifle tired. And found Hafiz stretched on the lounge; and stretched myself out beside him, taking the drowsy, purring, spoiled thing into my arms. And went to sleep to dream of you who gave me Hafiz, my dear and beloved friend.

"Write me when you can; as often as you desire. Always your letters are welcome messengers.

"Athalie."

CHAPTER XIV

IN her letters Athalie never mentioned Captain Dane; not because she had anything to conceal regarding him or herself; but she seemed to be aware that any mention of that friendship might not evoke a sympathetic response from Clive.

So, in her last letter, as in the others, she had not spoken of Captain Dane. Yet, now, he was the only man with whom she ever went anywhere and whom she received at her own apartment.

He had a habit of striding in two or three evenings in a week, – a big, fair, broad-shouldered six-footer, with sun-narrowed eyes of arctic blue, a short blond moustache, and skin permanently burned by the unshadowed glare of many and tropic days.

They went about together on Sundays, usually; sometimes in hot weather to suburban restaurants for dinner and a breath of air, sometimes to roof gardens.

Why he lingered in town – for he seemed always to be at leisure – she did not know. And she wondered a little that he should elect to remain in the heat-cursed city whence everybody else she knew had fled.

Dane was a godsend to her. With him she went to the Bronx Zoological Park several times, intensely interested in what he had to say concerning the creatures housed there, and shyly proud and delighted to meet the curators of the various departments who all seemed to know Dane and to be on terms of excellent fellowship with him.

With him she visited the various museums and art galleries; and went with him to concerts, popular and otherwise; and took long trolley rides with him on suffocating evenings when the poor slept on the grass in the parks and the slums, east and west, presented endless vistas of panting nakedness prostrate under a smouldering red moon.

Every diversion he offered her helped to sustain her courage; every time she lunched or dined with him meant more to her than he dreamed it meant. Because her savings were ebbing fast, and she had not yet been able to find employment.

Some things she would not do – write to her sisters for any financial aid; nor would she go to the office of her late employers and ask for any recommendation from Mr. Grossman which might help her to secure a position. Never could she bring herself to do either of these things, although the ugly countenance of necessity now began to stare her persistently in the face.

Also she was sensitive lest Dane suspect her need and offer aid. But how could he suspect? – with her pretty apartment filled with pretty things, and the luxurious Hafiz pervading everything with his incessant purring and his snowy plume of a tail waving fastidious contentment. He fared better than did his mistress, who denied herself that Hafiz might flourish that same tail. And after a while the girl actually began to grow thinner from sheer lack of nourishment.

It never occurred to her to sell or pawn any of the furniture, silver, furs, rugs, – anything at all that Clive had given her. And there was one reason why she never would do it: she refused to consider anything he had given her as her own property to dispose of if she chose. For she had accepted these things from Clive only because it gave him pleasure to give. And what she possessed she regarded as his property held in trust. Nothing could have induced her to consider these things in any other light.

One souvenir, only, did she look upon as her own. It had no financial value; and, if it had, she would have starved before disposing of it. This was the first thing he ever gave her – his boy's offering – the gun-metal wrist-watch.

And her only recent extravagance had been a sentimental one; she had the watch cleaned and regulated, and a new leather strap adjusted. The evening it was returned to her she wore it; and that night she slept with the watch strapped to her wrist.

So much for a young girl's sentiment! – for no letter came from him on the morrow although the European mail was in. None came the next day; nor the next.

Toward the end of the week, one sultry evening, when Athalie returned from an unsuccessful tour of job-hunting, and nearer depression than ever she had yet been, Captain Dane came stalking in, shook hands with his usual decision, picked up Hafiz who adored him, and took the chair nearest to the lounge where Athalie lay.

"Suppose we dine somewhere?" he suggested, fondling the purring Angora and rubbing its ears.

"Would you mind," she said, "if I didn't?"

"You're very tired, aren't you, Miss Greensleeve?"

"A little. I don't believe I have the energy to go out with you."

Still fondling the willing cat he said: "What's wrong? Something's wrong, isn't it?"

"No indeed."

He turned and gave her a square look: "You're quite sure?"

"Quite."

"Oh; all right. Will you let me have dinner here with you?"

She said without embarrassment: "I neglected my marketing: there's very little in the pantry."

"Well," he said, "I'm hungry and I'm going to call up the Hotel Trebizond and have them send us some dinner."

She seemed inclined to demur, but he had his way, went to the telephone and gave his orders.

The dinner arrived in due time and was excellent. And when the remains of the dinner and the waiter who served it had been cleared out, Athalie felt better.

"You ought to go to the country for two or three weeks," he remarked.

"Why don't you go?" she asked, smilingly.

"Don't need it."

"Neither do I, Captain Dane. Besides I have to continue my search for a position."

"No luck yet?"

"Not yet."

He mused over his cigar for a few moments, lifted his blond head as though about to speak, but evidently decided not to.

She had taken up her sewing and was now busy with it. From moment to moment Hafiz took liberties with her spool of thread where he sprawled beside her, patting it this way and that until it fell upon the floor and Dane was obliged to rescue it.

It had grown cooler. A breeze from the open windows occasionally stirred her soft hair and the smoke of Dane's cigar. They had been silent for a few moments. Threading her needle she happened to glance up at him, and saw somebody else standing just behind him – a tall man, olive-skinned and black-bearded – and knew instantly that he was not alive.

Serenely incurious, she looked at the visitor, aware that the clothes he wore were foreign, and that his features, too, were not American.

And the next moment she gazed at him more attentively, for he had laid one hand on Dane's shoulder and was looking very earnestly across at her.

He said distinctly but with a foreign accent: "Would you please say to him that the greatest of all the ancient cities is hidden by the jungle near the source of the middle fork. It was called Yhdunez."

"Yes," she said, unconscious that she had spoken aloud.

Dane lifted his head, and remained motionless, gazing at her intently. The visitor was already moving across the room. Halfway across he looked back at Athalie in a pleasant, questioning manner; and she nodded her reassurance with a smile. Then her visitor was there no longer; and she found herself, a trifle confused, looking into the keen eyes of Captain Dane.

Neither spoke for a moment or two; then he said, quietly: "I did not know you were clairvoyant."

"I – see clearly – now and then."

"I understand. It is nothing new to me."

"You do understand then?"

"I understand that some few people see more clearly than the great majority."

"Do you?"

"No… There was a comrade of mine – a Frenchman – Jacques Renouf. He was like you; he saw."

"Is he living? – I mean as we are?"

"No."

"Was he tall, olive-skinned, black-bearded – "

"Yes," said Dane coolly; "did you see him just now?"

"Yes."

"I wondered… There are moments when I seem to feel his presence. I was thinking of him just now. We were on the upper Amazon together last winter."

"How did he die?"

"He'd been off by himself all day. About five o'clock he came into camp with a poisoned arrow broken off behind his shoulder-blade. He seemed dazed and stupefied; but at moments I had an idea that he was trying to tell us something."

Dane hesitated, shrugged: "It was no use. We left our fire as usual and went into the forest about two miles to sleep. Jacques died that night, still dazed by the poison, still making feeble signs at me as though he were trying to tell me something… I believe that he has been near me very often since, trying to speak to me."

"He laid his hand on your shoulder, Captain Dane."

Dane's stern lips quivered for a second, then self-command resumed control. He said: "He usually did that when he had something to tell me… Did he speak to me, Miss Greensleeve?"

"He spoke to me."

"Clearly?"

"Yes. He said: 'Would you please say to him that the greatest of all the ancient cities is hidden by the jungle near the source of the middle fork. It was called Yhdunez.'"

For a long while Dane sat silent, his chin resting on his clenched hand, looking down at the rug at his feet. After a while he said, still looking down: "He must have found it all alone. And got an arrow in him for his reward… They're a dirty lot, those cannibals along the middle fork of the Amazon. Nobody knows much about them yet except that they are cannibals and their arrows are poisoned… I brought back the arrow that I pulled out of Jacques… There's no analysis that can determine what the poison is – except that it's vegetable."

He leaned forward, as though weary, resting his face between both hands.

"Yhdunez? Is that what it was called? Well, it and everything in it was not worth the life of my friend Renouf… Nor is anything I've ever seen worth a single life sacrificed to the Red God of Discovery… Those accursed cities full of vile and monstrous carvings – they belong to the jaguars now. Let them keep them. Let the world's jungles keep their own – if only they'd give me back my friend – "

He rested a moment as he was, then straightened up impatiently as though ashamed.

"Death is death," he said in matter-of-fact tones.

Athalie slowly shook her head: "There is no death."

He nodded almost gratefully: "I know what you mean. I dare say you are right… Well – I think I'll go back to Yhdunez."

"Not this evening?" she protested, smilingly.

He smiled, too: "No, not this evening, Miss Greensleeve. I shall never care to go anywhere again – "… His face altered… "Unless you care to go – with me."

What he had said she would have taken gaily, lightly, had not the gravity of his face forbidden it. She saw the lean muscles tighten along his clean-cut cheek, saw the keen eyes grow wistful, then steady themselves for her answer.

She could not misunderstand him; she disdained to, honouring the simplicity and truth of this man to whom she was so truly devoted.

Her abandoned sewing lay on her lap. Hafiz slept with one velvet paw entangled in her thread. She looked down, absently freeing thread and fabric, and remained so for a moment, thinking. After a while she looked up, a trifle pale:

"Thank you, Captain Dane," she said in a low voice.

He waited.

"I – am afraid that I am – in love – already – with another man."

He bent his head, quietly; there was no pleading, no asking for a chance, no whining of any species to which the monarch man is so constitutionally predisposed when soft, young lips pronounce the death warrant of his sentimental hopes.

All he said was: "It need not alter anything between us – what I have asked of you."

"It only makes me care the more for our friendship, Captain Dane."

He nodded, studying the pattern in the Shirvan rug under his feet. A procession of symbols representing scorpions and tarantulas embellished one of the rug's many border stripes. His grave eyes followed the procession entirely around the five-by-three bit of weaving. Then he rose, bent over her, took her slim hand in silence, saluted it, and asking if he might call again very soon, went out about his business, whatever it was. Probably the most important business he had on hand just then was to get over his love for Athalie Greensleeve.

For a long while Athalie sat there beside Hafiz considering the world and what it was threatening to do to her; considering man and what he had offered and what he had not offered to do to her.

Distressed because of the pain she had inflicted on Captain Dane, yet proud of the honour done her, she sat thinking, sometimes of Clive, sometimes of Mr. Wahlbaum, sometimes of Doris and Catharine, and of her brother who had gone out to the coast years ago, and from whom she had never heard.

But mostly she thought of Clive – and of his long silence.

Presently Hafiz woke up, stretched his fluffy, snowy limbs, yawned, pink-mouthed, then looked up out of gem-clear eyes, blinking inquiringly at his young mistress.