Home > Authors Index > George Barr McCutcheon > From the Housetops > This page
From the Housetops, a novel by George Barr McCutcheon |
||
Chapter 19 |
||
| < Previous |
Table of content |
Next > |
|
________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER XIX Two days later George Tresslyn staggered weakly into Simmy Dodge's apartment. He was not alone. A stalwart porter from an adjacent apartment building was supporting him when Dodge's man opened the door. "This Mr. Dodge?" demanded the porter. "Mr. Dodge's man. Mr. Dodge isn't at 'ome," said Baffly quickly. "All right," said the porter, pushing past the man and leading George toward a couch he had observed from the open door. "This ain't no jag, Johnny. He's sick. Out of his head. Batty. Say, don't you know him? Am I in wrong? He said he wanted to come here to—" George had tossed himself, sprawling, upon the long couch. His eyes were closed and his breathing was stertorous. "Of course I know him. What—what is the matter with him? My Gawd, man, don't tell me he is dying. What do you mean, bringing 'im 'ere? There will be a coroner's hinquest and—" "You better get a doctor first. Waste no time. Get the coroner afterward if you have to. You tell Mr. Dodge that he came into our place half an hour ago and said he wanted to go up to his friend's apartment. He was clean gone then. He wanted to lick the head porter for saying Mr. Dodge didn't live in the buildin'. We saw in a minute that he hadn't been drinkin'. Just as we was about to call an ambulance, a gentleman in our building came along and reckonised him as young Mr. Tresslyn. Friend of Mr. Dodge's. That was enough for us. So I brings him around. Now it's up to you guys to look after him. Off his nut. My name's Jenks. Tell it to Mr. Dodge, will you? And git a doctor quick. Put your hand here on his head. Aw, he won't bite you! Put it _here_. Ever feel anything as hot as that?" Baffly arose to the occasion. "Mr. Dodge 'as been hexpecting Mr. Tresslyn. He will also be hexpecting you, Mr. Jenks, at six o'clock this evening." "All right," said Mr. Jenks. Baffly put George Tresslyn to bed and then called up Mr. Dodge's favourite club. He never called up the office except as a last resort. If Mr. Dodge wasn't to be found at any one of his nine clubs, or at certain restaurants, it was then time for calling up the office. Mr. Dodge was not in the club, but he had left word that if any one called him up he could be found at his office. "Put him to bed and send for Dr. Thorpe," was Simmy's order a few minutes later. "I've put 'im to bed, sir." "Out of his head, you say?" "I said, 'Put 'im to bed, sir,'" shouted Baffly. "I'll be home in half-an-hour, Baffly." Simmy called up Anne Thorpe at once and reported that George had been found and was now in his rooms. He would call up later on. She was not to worry,—and good-bye! It appears that George Tresslyn had been missing from the house near Washington Square since seven o'clock on the previous evening. At that hour he left his bed, to which Dr. Bates had ordered him, and made off in the cold, sleety night, delirious with the fierce fever that was consuming him. As soon as his plight was discovered, Anne called up Simmy Dodge and begged him to go out in search of her sick, and now irresponsible brother. In his delirium, George repeatedly had muttered threats against Braden Thorpe for the cruel and inhuman "slashing of the most beautiful, the most perfect body in all the world," "marking for life the sweetest girl that God ever let live"; and that he would have to account to him for "the dirty work he had done." Acting on this hint, Simmy at once looked up Braden Thorpe and put him on his guard. Thorpe laughed at his fears, and promptly joined in the search for the sick man. They thought of Lutie, of course, and hurried to her small apartment. She was not at home. Her maidservant said that she did not know where she could be found. Mrs. Tresslyn had gone out alone at half-past seven, to dine with friends, but had left no instructions,—a most unusual omission, according to the young woman. It was a raw, gusty night. A fine, penetrating sleet cut the face, and the sharp wind drove straight to the marrow of the most warmly clad. Tresslyn was wandering about the streets, witless yet dominated by a great purpose, racked with pain and blind with fever, insufficiently protected against the gale that met his big body as he trudged doggedly into it in quest of—what? He had left Anne's home without overcoat, gloves or muffler. His fever-struck brain was filled with a resolve that deprived him of all regard for personal comfort or safety. He was out in the storm, looking for some one, and whether love or hate was in his heart, no man could tell. All night long Dodge and Thorpe looked for him, aided in their search by three or four private detectives who were put on the case at midnight. At one o'clock the two friends reappeared at Lutie's apartment, summoned there by the detective who had been left on guard with instructions to notify them when she returned. It was from the miserable, conscience-stricken Lutie that they had an account of George's adventures earlier in the night. White-faced, scared and despairing, she poured out her unhappy tale of triumph over love and pity. The thing that she had longed for, though secretly dreaded, had finally come to pass. She had seen her former husband in the gutter, degraded, besotted, thoroughly reduced to the level from which nothing save her own loyal, loving efforts could lift him. She had dreamed of a complete conquest of caste, and the remaking of a man. She had dreamed of the day when she could pick up from the discarded of humanity this splendid, misused bit of rubbish and in triumph claim it as her own, to revive, to rebuild, to make over through the sure and simple processes of love! This had been Lutie Tresslyn's notion of revenge! She saw George at eight o'clock that night. As she stood in the shelter of the small canvas awning protecting the entrance to the building in which she lived, waiting for the taxi to pull up, her eyes searched the swirling shadows up and down the street. She never failed to look for the distant and usually indistinct figure of _her man_. It had become a habit with her. The chauffeur had got down to crank his machine, and there was promise of a no inconsiderable delay in getting the cold engine started. She was on the point of returning to the shelter of the hallway, when she caught sight of a tall, shambling figure crossing the street obliquely, and at once recognised George Tresslyn. He was staggering. The light from the entrance revealed his white, convulsed face. Her heart sank. She had never seen him so drunk, so disgusting as this! The taxi-cab was twenty or thirty feet away. She would have to cross a wet, exposed space in order to reach it before George could come up with her. She realised with a quiver of alarm that it was the first time in all these months that he had ventured to approach her. It was clear that he now meant to accost her,—he might even contemplate violence! She wanted to run, but her feet refused to obey the impulse. Fascinated she watched the unsteady figure lurching toward her, and the white face growing more and more distinct and forbidding as it came out of the darkness. Suddenly she was released from the spell. Like a flash she darted toward the taxi-cab. From behind came a hoarse cry. "Lutie! For God's sake—" "Quick!" she cried out to the driver. "Open the door! Be quick!" The engine was throbbing. She looked back. George was supporting himself by clinging to one of the awning rods. His legs seemed to be crumbling beneath his weight. Her heart smote her. He had no overcoat. It was a bare hand that gripped the iron rod and a bare hand that was held out toward her. Thank heaven, he had stopped there! He was not coming on. "Lutie! Oh, Lutie!" came almost in a wail from his lips. Then he began to cry out something incoherent, maudlin, unintelligible. "Never mind him," said the driver reassuringly. "Just a souse. Wants to make a touch, madam. Streets are full of 'em these cold nights. He won't bone you while I'm here. Where to?" He was holding the door open. Lutie hesitated. Long afterwards she recalled the strange impulse that came so near to sending her back to the side of the man who cried out to her from the depths of a bottomless pit. Something whispered from her heart that _now was her time_,—_now_! And then came the loud cry from her brain, drowning the timid voice of the merciful: "Wait! Wait! Not now! To- morrow!" And while she stood there, uncertain, held inactive by the two warring emotions, George turned and staggered away, reeling, and crying out in a queer, raucous voice. "They'll get him," said the driver. "Who will get him?" cried Lutie, shrilly. "The police. He—" "No! No! It must not be _that_. That's not what I want,—do you hear, driver? Not that. He must not be locked up—Oh!" George had collapsed. His knees went from under him and he was half-prostrate on the curb. "Oh! He has fallen! He has hurt himself! Go and see, driver. Go at once." She forgot the sleet and the wind, and stood there wide-eyed and terrified while the man shuffled forward to investigate. She hated him for stirring the fallen man with his foot, and she hated him when he shook him violently with his hands. "I better call a cop," said the man. "He's pretty full. He'll freeze if—I know how it is, ma'am. I used to hit it up a bit myself. I—" "Listen!" cried Lutie, regaining the shelter of the awning, where she stopped in great perturbation. "Listen; you must put him in your cab and take him somewhere. I will pay you. Here! Here is five dollars. Don't mind me. I will get another taxi. Be quick! There is a policeman coming. I see him,—there by—" "Gee! I don't know where to take him. I—" "You can't leave him lying there in the gutter, man," she cried fiercely. "The gutter! The gutter! My God, what a thing to happen to—" "Here! Get up, you!" shouted the driver, shaking George's shoulder. "Come along, old feller. I'll look out for you. Gee! He weighs a ton." Tresslyn was mumbling, half audibly, and made little or no effort to help his unwilling benefactor, who literally dragged him to his feet. "Is—is he hurt?" cried Lutie, from the doorway. "No. Plain souse." "Where will you take him?" The man reflected. "It wouldn't be right to take him to his home. Maybe he's got a wife. These fellers beat 'em up when they get like this." "A wife? Beat them up—oh, you don't know what you are saying. He—" At this juncture George straightened out his powerful figure, shook off the Samaritan and with a loud, inarticulate cry rushed off down the street. The driver looked after the retreating figure in utter amazement. "By Gosh! Why—why; he ain't any more drunk than I am," he gasped. "Well, can you beat that? All bunk! It beats thunder what these panhandlers will do to pick up a dime or two. He was—say, he saw the cop, that's what it was. Lord, look at him go!" Tresslyn was racing wildly toward the corner. Lutie, aghast at this disgusting exhibition of trickery, watched the flying figure of her husband. She never knew that she was clinging to the arm of the driver. She only knew that her heart seemed to have turned to lead. As he turned the corner and disappeared from view, she found her voice and it seemed that it was not her own. He had swerved widely and almost lost his feet as he made the turn. He _was_ drunk! Her heart leaped with joy. He _was_ drunk. He had not tried to trick her. "Go after him!" she cried out, shaking the man in her agitation. "Find him! Don't let him get away. I—" But the policeman was at her elbow. "What's the matter here?" he demanded. "Panhandler," said the driver succinctly. "Just a poor wretch who—who wanted enough for—for more drink, I suppose," said Lutie, warily. Her heart was beating violently. She was immensely relieved by the policeman's amiable grunt. It signified that the matter was closed so far as he was concerned. He politely assisted her into the taxi-cab and repeated her tremulous directions to the driver. As the machine chortled off through the deserted street, she peered through the little window at the back. Her apprehensions faded. The officer was standing where she had left him. Then came Thorpe and Simmy Dodge in the dead hour of night and she learned that she had turned away from him when he was desperately ill. Sick and tortured, he had come to her and she had denied him. She looked so crushed, so pathetic that the two men undertook to convince her that she had nothing to fear,—they would protect her from George! She smiled wanly, shook her head, and confessed that she did not want to be protected against him. She wanted to surrender. She wanted _him_ to protect her. Suddenly she was transformed. She sprang to her feet and faced them, and she was resolute. Her voice rang with determination, her lips no longer drooped and trembled, and the appeal was gone from her eyes. "He must be found, Simmy," she said imperatively. "Find him and bring him here to me. This is his home. I want him here." The two men went out again, half an hour later, to scour the town for George Tresslyn. They were forced to use every argument at their command to convince her that it would be highly improper, in more ways than one, to bring the sick man to her apartment. She submitted in the end, but they were bound by a promise to take him to a hospital and not to the house of either his mother or his sister. "He belongs to me," she said simply. "You must do what I tell you to do. They do not want him. I do. When you have found him, call me up, Simmy, and I will come. I shall not go to bed. Thank you,—both of you,—for—for—" She turned away as her voice broke. After a moment she faced them again. "And you will take charge of him, Dr. Thorpe?" she said. "I shall hold you to your promise. There is no one that I trust so much as I do you." Thorpe was with the sick man when Simmy arrived at his apartment. George was rolling and tossing and moaning in his delirium, and the doctor's face was grave. "Pneumonia," he said. "Bad, too,—devilish bad. He cannot be moved, Simmy." Simmy did not blink an eye. "Then right here he stays," he said heartily. "Baffly, we shall have two nurses here for a while,—and we may also have to put up a young lady relative of Mr. Tresslyn's. Get the rooms ready. By Jove, Brady, he—he looks frightfully ill, doesn't he?" His voice dropped to a whisper. "Is he likely to—to—you know!" "I think you'd better send for Dr. Bates," said Braden gravely. "I believe his mother and sister will be better satisfied if you have him in at once, Simmy." "But Lutie expressly—" "I shall do all that I can to redeem my promise to that poor little girl, but we must consider Anne and Mrs. Tresslyn. They may not have the same confidence in me that Lutie has. I shall insist on having Dr. Bates called in." "All right, if you insist. But—but you'll stick around, won't you, Brady?" Thorpe nodded his head. He was watching the sick man's face very closely. Half an hour later, Lutie Tresslyn and Anne Thorpe entered the elevator on the first floor of the building and went up together to the apartment of Simeon Dodge. Anne had lifted her veil,—a feature in her smart tribute to convention,—and her lovely features were revealed to the cast-off sister- in-law. For an instant they stared hard at each other. Then Anne, recovering from her surprise, bowed gravely and held out her hand. "May we not forget for a little while?" she said. Lutie shook her head. "I can't take your hand—not yet, Mrs. Thorpe. It was against me once, and I am afraid it will be against me again." She detected the faintest trace of a smile at the corners of Anne's mouth. A fine line appeared between her eyes. This fine lady could still afford to laugh at her! "I am going up to take care of my husband, Mrs. Thorpe," she added, a note of defiance in her voice. She was surprised to see the smile,—a gentle one it was,—deepen in Anne's eyes. "That is why I suggested that we try to forget," she said. Lutie started. "You—you do not intend to object to my—" she began, and stopped short, her eyes searching Anne's for the answer to the uncompleted question. "I am not your enemy," said Anne quietly. She hesitated and then lowered the hand that was extended to push the button beside Simmy's door. "Before we go in, I think we would better understand each other, Lutie." She had never called the girl by her Christian name before. "I have nothing to apologise for. When you And George were married I did not care a pin, one way or the other. You meant nothing to me, and I am afraid that George meant but little more. I resented the fact that my mother had to give you a large sum of money. It was money that I could have used very nicely myself. Now that I look back upon it, I am frank to confess that therein lies the real secret of my animosity toward you. It didn't in the least matter to me whether George married you, or my mother's chambermaid, or the finest lady in the land. You will be surprised to learn that I looked upon myself as the one who was being very badly treated at the time. To put it rather plainly, I thought you were getting from my mother a great deal more than you were worth. Forgive me for speaking so frankly, but it is best that you should understand how I felt in those days so that you may credit me with sincerity now. I shall never admit that you deserved the thirty thousand dollars you took from us, but I now say that you were entitled to keep the man you loved and married. I don't care how unworthy you may have seemed to us, you should not have been compelled to take money for something you could not sell—the enduring love of that sick boy in there. My mother couldn't buy it, and you couldn't sell it. You have it still and always will have it, Lutie. I am glad that you have come to take care of him. You spoke of him as 'my husband' a moment ago. You were right. He _is_ your husband. I, for one, shall not oppose you in anything you may see fit to do. We do not appear to have been capable of preserving what you gave back to us—for better or for worse, if you please,—so I fancy we'd better turn the job over to you. I hope it isn't too late. I love my brother now. I suppose I have always loved him but I overlooked the fact in concentrating my affection on some one else,—and that some one was myself. You see I do not spare myself, Lutie, but you are not to assume that I am ashamed of the Anne Tresslyn who was. I petted and coddled her for years and I alone made her what she was, so I shall not turn against her now. There is a great deal of the old Anne in me still and I coddle her as much as ever. But I've found out something new about her that I never suspected before, and it is this new quality that speaks to you now. I ask you to try to forget, Lutie." Throughout this long speech Lutie's eyes never left those of the tall young woman in black. "Why do you call me Lutie?" she asked. "Because it is my brother's name for you," said Anne. Lutie lowered her eyes for an instant. A sharp struggle was taking place within her. She had failed to see in Anne's eyes the expression that would have made compromise impossible: the look of condescension. Instead, there was an anxious look there that could not be mistaken. She was in earnest. She could be trusted. The old barrier was coming down. But even as her lips parted to utter the words that Anne wanted to hear, suspicion intervened and Lutie's sore, tried heart cried out: "You have come here to _claim_ him! You expect me to stand aside and let you take him—" "No, no! He is yours. I _did_ come to help him, to nurse him, to be a real sister to him, but—that was before I knew that you would come." "I am sorry I spoke as I did," said Lutie, with a little catch in her voice. "I—I hope that we may become friends, Mrs. Thorpe. If that should come to pass, I—am sure that I could forget." "And you will allow me to help—all that I can?" "Yes." Then quickly, jealously: "But he _belongs_ to me. You must understand that, Mrs. Thorpe." Anne drew closer and whispered in sudden admiration. "You are really a wonderful person, Lutie Carnahan. How _can_ you be so fine after all that you have endured?" "I suppose it is because I too happen to love myself," said Lutie drily, and turned to press the button. "We are all alike." Anne laid a hand upon her arm. "Wait. You will meet my mother here. She has been notified. She has not forgiven you." There was a note of uneasiness in her voice. Lutie looked at her in surprise. "And what has that to do with it?" she demanded. Then they entered the apartment together. _ |
||