Chapter 20

WHEN Elias professed to recognize that, no matter how detestable his marriage might now have become to him, he was bound in all honor and decency to do nothing that could make his wife unhappy, he certainly, so far as he was conscious of his own intentions, meant what he said. Of his free will, he had married a perfectly innocent woman. He must not allow the burden of his guilt to bear in the slightest degree upon her shoulders. He must abide exactly by the letter, and, to the best of his ability, by the spirit, of his marriage vows. He purposed to do so; and, so far as he had fathomed it, his purpose was honest and earnest. Yet, at the same time, inevitably, his life at home galled and irked him more than a little. His daily association with Tillie, with Mrs. Morgenthau, and with the rabbi, was both irritating and enervating. He had constantly, as he put it, to wear a mask; to sham, to play a part, to act a lie. He had to counterfeit emotions and interests which he was very remote from feeling, and to conceal with utmost, unflagging vigilance those that actually dominated his heart. He had to pretend to be cheerful and sympathetic. He had to keep the one vital reality of his existence closely locked down, a secret prisoner in his breast. Shamming, through practiced in a laudable cause, is, as those who have tried it can testify, a sufficiently sorry and thankless business. Elias sickened of it. The never-relaxing guard that he was obliged to maintain over himself, on the perpetual qui-vive lest by some momentary inadvertence he should betray himself, wearied and discouraged him. He became impatient, restive. In certain moods, he would reflect: “It is a part of my punishment. I have brought it upon myself. I deserve it. I must submit to it unrebelliously, in silence.” But Elias was not by temperament a Spartan; and more frequently, longing ardently for respite, he would cry: “If only for a little while I could escape! If only I could go away, and, in solitude, for a little while, give the rein to my own true self—live my own true life, without this eternal necessity of suppression and deceit!” The actor wanted to withdraw for a moment out of view, behind the scenes, there, for a moment, to drop his stage-smile and stage-manner. Not unnaturally, it may be conceded. But the question was one of method. How? Consistently with his resolution not to make his wife unhappy, how could it be done? Gradually a plan, simple of conception, and easy of execution, got shaped in Elias’s mind. The plan itself, to be sure, involved a certain amount of falsehood; but falsehood which, Elias concluded, was innocuous, and, under the circumstances, justifiable.

On Monday, February 16, 1885, at the breakfast table, he made the following announcement to the persons there assembled: “To-morrow I am going out of town. I am going down into the country on Long Island, to do a little winter landscape painting. I shall be gone perhaps a week, perhaps a fortnight.”

No opposition was offered. Such questions as were asked, he had anticipated, and so answered with consummate glibness. Next morning a carriage drew up before the door. Elias, with his trunk and his traps, got into it, and was driven off. As the carriage turned the corner, he could see Tillie lingering on the stoop, looking after him. His conscience smote him gently for an instant; and he renewed his vow never to do any thing that could bring sorrow upon his wife. “Poor, little, light-hearted thing,” he soliloquized. “It is easy to satisfy her—‘pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.’” And then he dismissed her from his mind. It is probable that, so long as he lived, he never once thought of her again.

“I don’t know why it is,” the light-hearted and easily satisfied Tillie, as she re-entered the house, confessed to her mother, “but I feel just as blue as if he had gone away forever, instead of only for a fortnight. I feel just perfectly wretched. I’ve been feeling bad enough for ever and ever so long; but this is just the last straw. I don’t believe he cares for me the least bit in the world.” And she buried her face in her mother’s bosom, and had a good, long cry.

Elias’s carriage drove neither to a railway-station, nor to a steamboat-pier. It drove to a lofty, red-brick apartment-house (for bachelors), in West Forty-second Street, “The Reginald,” where Elias had hired a furnished suite of rooms by the month. The falsehood involved by his plan had consisted in saying that he was going to the country. He had no idea of quitting the city. Just so long as Christine Redwood remained in New York, New York would be the only habitable spot on earth to Elias Bacharach.

The clerk of the apartment-house conducted Elias to his quarters, and left him there.

Elias locked his door behind the clerk. Then, suddenly, he flung himself full length upon the floor, and gave vent to a great sigh of relief. At last he was alone, all alone, and free. At last he had got clear of the disguise, which, like a strait-waistcoat, he had been compelled to wear for upwards of a year. I don’t know how long he continued to lie there upon the floor! I don’t know how many times he sobbed out her name: “Christine! Christine! Christine!”

Finally, however, he rose to his feet, brushed off and smoothed down his clothing, and descended to the office of the establishment, where he had some business to transact with the proprietor. Afterward, he meant to go for a walk, and feast his eyes for a while upon the house in which she dwelt. He knew this house very well. It was in Forty-eighth Street, between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. Many and many a time, during the past few months, he had gone there, after nightfall, and watched the lights glow in the windows, and wondered which of the lights was hers. By day, he never approached nearer than the nearest corner. He did not wish to be seen by her. He conjectured that the sight of him might distress her. Now, he meant, after finishing his business with the proprietor, to go and stand on that corner for awhile, and enjoy the luxury of staring at the chocolate-colored fa?ade of her dwelling-house.

He found the proprietor engaged in conversation with a gentleman. He took a position, therefore, at a respectful distance, and waited till their colloquy should end. He paid no heed to the gentleman’s appearance; but afterward he recalled him vaguely as tall, fair-complexioned, rather athletic-looking, and presumably in the neighborhood of thirty years of age. Pretty soon the gentleman put on his hat, and left the room.

“Did you notice that party I was talking with?” the proprietor inquired of Elias.

“Not especially,” Elias replied. “Why?”

“Handsome chap, and one of the whitest in this town. Civil Engineer, of the name of Hosmer—R. E. Hosmer. Got an office down in the Astor House. He’s lived here with me going on three years. But this is his last day. To-morrow he gets married.”

“Ah?” returned Elias, with a perfunctory affectation of interest.

“Yes, sir, gets married, and sets up house-keeping. So I lose him; and I’m mighty sorry to, I can tell you. He’s a gentleman, from the word go. But he’s caught a stunning pretty girl for a wife, now, and don’t you forget it. He had her here one night, along with some friends, to dinner; and he took me up, and introduced me to her. She’s what I call a daisy, straight out. Well, sir, tomorrow morning they’re going to be married; and he said he’d have invited me to the wedding, only it’s strictly private. No admittance except on business, you understand. No guests; nothing. Well, that’s all right, I suppose, if people like it that way. No law against it, any how. But you see, I wanted to send her some sort of a little present, being so friendly with him, you understand; and so I thought awhile, and finally I got this.” (The proprietor went to his safe, and, coming back in a minute, exhibited a necklace of amber beads.) “I got this. Tidy, ain’t it? But do you know, I’ll be hanged if I hadn’t forgotten to ask him for her address, until just this instant. There’s time yet, however; and I’ll send it up by one of the boys right away. Let’s see. Ah, yes; here it is. He wrote it out on this envelope.”

Elias took the envelope which his communicative landlord offered him, and glanced indifferently at it. In large, clear letters, was written:

“Miss Christine Redwood,

“No.— West 48th Street,

“City.”

Elias did not start, nor exclaim, nor indeed make any sign by which an observer could have guessed that what he had just read had been of any special import to him. He turned perhaps a little pale. Perhaps his lips twitched a little. Perhaps his attitude assumed a certain rigidity. But it was with an air of perfect composure that he said to the proprietor, “Oh, by the way, I forgot something. I must go back to my room The matter I wanted to speak to you about—I’ll be down again about it, later.” With an air of perfect composure; for, at this moment, like a man who has been shot, Elias was conscious of very little, save a sudden daze and bewilderment. He knew in a dull way that something serious had happened to him. There had been, all at once, a shock, a thrill that pierced and transfixed him; and then had come a strange stunned feeling; and now—now, he must get away, by himself, back in his own room, at once.

He entered the elevator, and was carried upstairs.

Automatically, he heard the elevator-man say: “Fine day, sir.”

Automatically, he responded, “Yes.”

“But cold. Coldest of the season, I guess. Below zero, sir.”

“Indeed.”

“Well, here you are, sir. Sixth.”

“Thanks.”

Automatically, he stepped out of the elevator, and found his way through the corridor to his door. Automatically, he unlocked the door, passed it, locked it behind him. But then, of a sudden, his strength deserted him, his sensations rushed upon him, and overpowered him. He dropped upon the first chair he came to, and sat there, all huddled up, and staring blindly, like a drunken man. Indeed, it was not unlike a drunken man that he felt. He felt deathly sick. He felt an oppression upon his lungs, and had to labor hard for his breath. His head sagged forward heavily upon his chest; his brain went spinning furiously round and round. His ears rang. A blackish, half-opaque mist hung before his eyes, in which the objects about him swam dimly, bewilderingly, to and fro. The house seemed to be rocking on its foundations. In his breast—something—a lump, big and hot, like a coal of fire—was struggling frantically, in spasmodic leaps, as if to break away, and get outside. At one instant he thought it would choke him; it had sprung up into his throat. Again, he thought it would rend his very bone and flesh asunder, with such force it dashed itself against the walls that shut it in. Then, for another instant, it fell back, and was quiet; but then he thought it would burn him up, with its intense, angry heat. Liquid fire went circling through his veins, scalding them, and causing the uttermost parts of his body to throb and tingle.

So, for it may have been a half hour, he sat there upon that chair, limp, motionless, like one stricken impotent and senseless by too much wine. In the end, however, all at once, as if stung, he sprang up, and began striding wildly, with unsteady gait, back and forth across his floor. He moaned aloud. Sometimes he would wring his hands together. Sometimes he would press them to his temples. By and by he began to talk to himself. His voice was husky, his articulation indistinct. His words came in spurts. A spectator would certainly have put him down for drunk.

“She is going to be married.... married.... do you understand? Going to become the wife of another man. Another man is going to possess her.... do you understand? That man.... you saw him down stairs.... he is going to possess her. She.... Christine.... oh, God help me!.... Perhaps he has seen her, been in her presence, heard her voice, looked into her eyes, touched her hand, kiss.... yes, very likely.... kissed her.... this very day. Perhaps he is with her at this instant.... now.... he, with her.... do you understand? While you.... I.... I.... Oh, have mercy on me. Strike me dead.... And to-morrow morning she is going to marry him, to-morrow morning.... going to be married.... Well, well, it’s all right It’s none of my business. Yes, it’s all right. She can do as she pleases. I can’t help it. It’s not my affair.... Only.... only, I want to know.... I want to know, why? Why is she going to marry him? Only tell me that: why does she want to marry him? Not for love. No! She can’t love him. It would be impossible that she should love him. Don’t tell me she loves him. No, no! Why, I say, look—look at how she loved me—how passionately, how entirely—with what complete, absolute surrender of herself! Why, after a woman has loved one man that way, I tell you, it is impossible, it is not in nature, for her ever to love another—really love another.... No!.... I don’t care what her feeling toward me may be.... hatred.... indifference.... I don’t care what.... I know she does not.... I know she never can.... love him.... love any body else. I know it. It would be against nature—impossible.... Oh, it’s laughable. The idea! that she should ever feel toward any one as she felt toward me! Such perfect confidence.... such perfect giving of herself!.... Christine! Oh, do you remember, Christine? Do you remember how you loved me? How your eyes burned with love, and your fingers clung with love, and your bosom rose and fell with love, and your voice thrilled with love? And all our unutterable intimate joy? And how you said it was like anguish, it was so keen? And.... and.... Do you remember! And now, do you mean to say that you can ever be like that with another man—not me—with him—with any body? Like that? Loving like that? Oh, no, no! Monstrous! Impossible. No, no, you don’t love him like that. Nobody could love twice like that. You never can love any one like that—any one but me. Me! I am the only man who has ever tasted that sweetness—who ever shall taste it. He—oh, the poor fool and beggar! He may be married to you a thousand years. He will never taste that—which I have tasted—never get even the perfume of it. Never—never!.... And yet.... and yet, she is going to marry him. Oh, Christine, tell me—for mercy’s sake, tell me—why do you marry him? Why does she want to marry him? Oh, there may be a hundred reasons. But not for love. I am sure, not for love. Is marriage a proof of love? Did I marry for love? She pities him. That’s it. He loves her. He has worked upon her sympathies. In despair—hopeless of any happiness for herself—out of pity—she has consented to marry him. He has importuned her—tired her with his entreaties—until she has consented.....But not for love.... Don’t tell me she loves him—that my own beautiful Christine—dark-eyed Christine—loves another man—that man. Oh, the fool, the complacent fool, if he dares to imagine that! That she—my glorious Christine—mine, I say—once mine, always mine—my own—wholly mine—weren’t our very souls burned together, into one?—that she loves him! Why, it makes me laugh! The poor, fatuous fool!.... And yet.... she.... she is going to marry him.... to be his wife.... He is going to possess her.... have the right to see her, hear her, touch her, every day.... while I—I—Oh, no! He thinks so, does he? I will show him. I will defeat him yet. It is not yet too late. I will go to her—I—now—at once—I will go to her—to Christine—yes—and see her, and speak to her, and touch her—take her in my arms—oh, God!—and tell her how I love her—and how I have suffered—and how I have never ceased to love her—. and pour it all out at her feet—all my love and sorrow and remorse—at her feet—now—to-day—before it is too late—and she—she will forgive me, and forget all the pain I have caused her—all the pain and shame—poor Christine, sweet little Christine, whom I hurt so!—she will forgive me, and—and love me again—she will love me—she does love me—she must love me, I tell you—yes—she will come to me, and love me—and we—she and I—we will go away together—to Europe—to South America—somewhere—anywhere—she and I—Christine and I—together—we will go away together, and—and.... Oh, what am I saying? God forgive me! What a low, miserable wretch I am! As if I had any power, any right! No, no! she will marry him. He will be happy. Perhaps he will make her happy. Why not? He is good and honest and well-to-do. He loves her, and will be kind to her. Why shouldn’t he make her happy? Oh, Christine. I hope he will. If you will only be happy, then I shan’t mind. God bless her, and make her happy. She will marry him, and she will love him in a certain way, in a quiet, peaceful way, and she will have children, and be contented, and live in comfort and peace—quietly—gently—forgetting me, and the pain I caused her, and—Oh, God! Oh, God! My punishment is greater than I can bear.”

He fell in an inert mass upon the floor, and covered his face with his hands, and moaned again incoherently; until again, all at once, he sprang to his feet, and, striding back and forth, as before, again began to talk to himself.

“I must see her. I must see her, and let her know. I must see her to-day—before to-morrow morning—before she is married. After, that, after she is married, as she will be to-morrow morning—after that, I can never see her. She will have no right to let me see her—no right to think of me, to hear from me—a married woman—another man’s wife.... The letter—the letter I have been writing to her—she will never read it. Waste time—waste paper—waste effort. No use sending it. No use finishing it. After to-morrow morning, after she is married, she will have no right to receive it—to receive any thing from me.......Oh, I say, I must see her. If I am ever to see her, ever to let her know, it must be to-day. To-day, or never. After to-day—to-morrow—a married woman—she can never let me approach her—never—never.... Yes, to-day—right away—at once. I must see her right away, at once.... Oh, Love! To think of seeing you—really seeing you—and speaking to you! Oh, Christine—to-day, this very day, at last!.... There, there! Let me be calm. Let me think. How shall I—how can I manage it? To see her? Let me think.”

He pressed his hands hard against his brow, beneath which his brain seemed to have become a whirlpool, sucking into black confusion every faculty for thought he had. He repeated two or three times: “Let me think;” and kept crushing his brow between his hands, to subdue, if he could, that dizzy, stupid feeling. At last he went on, stammeringly, and in a voice which, from husky, had grown thin and feeble:—

“I must not go to see her at her house. No, that would not do. That would not be fair to her. What would people think, who saw me? They might overhear what I said to her. I might not be able to see her alone. I might—I might meet him there. No, I must not go to her house. But this is what I will do. I will write her a note—a little short note—asking her—begging her—to let me have five minutes’ speech with her—to come and give me five minutes’ speech with her—in Central Park—among our pine-trees in Central Park. She will do it. It is such a little thing, I am sure she will do it. She can’t have the heart to refuse to do it. No, no!.... There! I will write the note, and send it at once. In half an hour she will receive it. She will come right away. Within two hours—within two hours from now—I—I shall—I shall see her!”

With about as clear a realization of what he was doing as he might have had if he had indeed been the worse for drink, so dazed and bewildered did he feel, he opened his trunk, and took from it the materials for writing. Then, seating himself at the table, with a drunken man’s comprehension of what he wrote, upon paper that swayed boisterously up and down under his eyes, he dashed off the following note:—

“Christine: Just learned I have just learned that to-morrow morning that you are going to be married to-morrow morning. Please read this note through. There is nothing in it which will harm you to read. It is essential to my peace of mind that, before you are married, I should say something to you, see you and say something, five words, which it will not take me take five minutes for me to say, and which it will harm no one for you to hear, neither you, nor your future husband, but will be a great mercy to me. In mercy, in common pity to a suffering human being, I beg of you, let me see you, and say this to you. In mercy to one who is suffering all the agony of hell in life, which I know I deserve, only that does not make it any easier to bear, in mercy, give me a chance to speak with you. I don’t come to your house, because it would not do, would not be fair to you, for if he should see me there, it would be unpleasant for you. So, at once, as soon as you receive this, come to the rock among the pines in Central Park, and give me five minutes’ speech with you. It will be as great a mercy as if you were to give a cup of water to a man dying tortured by thirst. I promise to say nothing which it will be wrong for you to hear, or for me to say. Don’t be afraid of me. I shall never hurt you any more, I shall not try to dissuade you from marrying him. On the contrary, marry him, and be happy, if you can. Any thing so long as you are happy. I dare say he will make you happy. I pray God that he may. Only, for pity’s sake, you who have a kind and pitiful heart, for pity’s sake, in mercy to me, for the sake of the love that was between us, Christine, grant me this one request, which will harm no living man or woman, neither him nor you, nor my wife, and come to the rock among the pines in Central Park. I shall be willing to die after I have seen you and spoken to you. God! I would rather die now than have you refuse. Come at once. I shall go there right away, immediately, and I shall wait there until you come. My soul is burning up with something which I must say to you, which you must let me say to you, Christine, and you can not be so hard, so cruel, as not to come, you who have such a tender, kind heart, Christine. My agony is so great, and you can relieve it so easily, by simply coming for five minutes. Look, you are going to give him your whole life—years and years. Can’t you give me five minutes? He can afford to let me have five minutes, he who is going to have years and years. Come. It is the only favor I shall ever ask of you. My head is so confused, queer, as though all my wits were scattered, I don’t know how to put it so as to move you to come. I seem to have it on the tip of my tongue, the thing to say that will persuade you, and then when I try to grasp it, and write it down, it is gone. If you understood why and how much I want you to come, I know you would come. I do not believe that you can be so hard as to refuse this to a man who is broken-hearted, and almost crazy with remorse, and who promises by all that is sacred, before God, gives you his solemn word of honor, not to say a thing which it would be wrong for you to hear, who are going to be married, or for me to say, who am married already. Gives you his solemn word of honor. Only, before you are married, and so eternally separated from me, worse than death, to-morrow, before that, come and let me speak five words. If there is any mercy in your heart, you won’t disappoint me. Come at once. I am going there right away, now, to wait for you. The rock among the pines. You know. Christine! Christine! For God’s sake!—Elias Bacharach.”





This note, without stopping to read it over, he enveloped, and addressed. Then, in great haste, donning his hat, he left his room, and, too impatient to wait for the elevator, ran down stairs to the office, where he bade the clerk summon a messenger.

“Yes, sir,” said the clerk; and, with a click-click-whir-r-r, off went the summons from the instrument. After which, the clerk returned to the dirty paper novel he had been reading. Elias wondered, in a dull, hazy way, how any body could have the heart to read a novel.

Pending the messenger’s arrival, he paced restlessly hither and thither about the broad, marble-paved entrance-hall of the house, and tried to get the better of that queer, confused feeling in his head. Tried in vain, however; for, from moment to moment, it grew more pronounced: a feeling of congestion, as though his brain was solidifying, turning into stone; as though gradually and simultaneously his different senses were being sealed up.

By and by, as if through a deadening medium of some sort, as if through a thick blanket, he heard a lusty young voice shout: “Call?”

He looked. As if through a veil, he saw a boy in brass buttons standing in front of him.

“Yes,” said Elias; and it required a great effort of will to concentrate his mind sufficiently to find, and to regulate his organs of speech sufficiently to shape, the words: “Yes, come with me.”

He led the boy to the corner of Seventh Avenue and Forty-eighth Street. The sun shone brightly. There was no wind. But it was very cold. Elias thought: “Perhaps it is the cold that makes me feel so strangely. I feel exactly as though my brain were being frozen, as hard as ice.”

When they had reached the corner, he said: “Now, young man, I want you to take this note to this address, No.—, right on this block—that house, over there, just beyond the lamp post—and I want you to ask to see the lady to whom it is directed—Miss Redwood—to see her in person; do you understand? See her in person, and deliver this note into her own hands, and to nobody else. And then you come back here to this corner, where I shall wait for you. Now, hurry.”

“Yes, sir,” replied the boy, with a sagacious wink; “I catch on, sir;” and started off.

Elias watched him—down and across the street, and up her stoop—till he vanished in her vestibule. For what seemed an eternity, the boy remained out of sight. Then, presently, he reappeared; and in a minute or two was again at his employer’s side.

“Well,” questioned Elias, “well, did—did you see her?”

“Yes, sir; sawr ’er.”

It made Elias’s heart beat to realize that this boy had just stood in his lady’s presence, had looked full upon her, breathed the atmosphere that she glorified, listened to the celestial music of her voice. It was with something akin to reverence for the young barbarian, that he repeated: “You saw her, you actually saw her!”

“Well, so I remarked, sir,” replied the boy.

“And—— and you gave her the note?”

“That’s what I done, sir.”

“What did she say?”

“Say? She didn’t say nawthing.”

“Nothing at all? Not a word?”

“Well, sir, here’s how it was. I says, ‘Redwood?’ and she says, ‘Yes;’ and I says, ‘Sign;’ and she signed; and that’s all there was to it.”

“She signed? Have—have you got her signature?”

“Why, certainly. Here you are,”

The boy exhibited a bit of pink paper, upon which, in the hand that he knew so well, Elias, with a breath-taking thrill, read her name: “Christine Redwood.” He took the paper between his fingers. It was like a talisman. Her touch, scarcely a moment since, had warmed it, her face shadowed it. He had to struggle with himself, to keep from carrying it to his lips, and kissing it, then and there.

“What—how much—will you take for this paper?” he demanded of the boy.

“Nawthing. Got to return it to the office.”

“I’ll give you a dollar for it.”

“Jimminy! You must want it pretty bad.”

“Well, will you part with it for a dollar?”

The boy reflected; wrestled with temptation for an instant; in the end said: “Well, sir, all is, you’ll have to sign me another; that’s all, sir. Let’s have the dollar.” He produced a duplicate bit of pink paper, upon which Elias executed the only forgery of which he was ever guilty. Then a bright silver dollar changed hands. Our hero pocketed his invaluable purchase, and set his face toward Central Park.