University of Virginia Library

26. CHAPTER XXVI.
NIGHT THOUGHTS.

Dennis passed out of the heavy, massive entrance to
the wealthy brewer's mansion with a sense of relief as if
escaping from prison. The duskyness and solitude of
the street seemed a grateful refuge, and the night wind
was to his flushed face like a cool hand laid on a feverish
brow. He was indeed glad to be alone, for his was one
of those deep, earnest natures that cannot rush to the
world in garrulous confidence when disturbed and perplexed.
There are many sincere but shallow people who
must tell of and talk away every passing emotion. Not
of the abundance of their hearts, for abundance there is
not, but of the uppermost thing of their hearts their
mouths must speak, even though the subjects be of the
delicate nature that would naturally be hidden. Such
mental constitutions are at least healthful. Concealed
trouble never preys upon them like the canker in the bud.
Everything comes to the surface and is thrown off.

But at first Dennis scarcely dared to recognize the
truth himself, and the thought of even telling his mother,
was repugnant. For half an hour he walked the streets
in a sort of stupor. He was conscious only of a heavy,
aching heart and a wearied, confused brain. All the time,
however, he knew an event had occurred that must for
good or evil affect his entire existence; but he shrank
with nervous dread from grappling with the problem. As
the cold air refreshed and revived him, his strong, practical

mind took up the question almost without volition on
his part, and by reason of his morbid, wearied state, only
the dark and discouraging side was presented. The
awakening to his love was a very different thing to Dennis,
and to the majority in this troubled world, from the
blissful consciousness of Adam when for the first time he
saw the fair being whom he might woo at his leisure, amid
embowering roses, without fear or thought of a rival.

To Dennis the fact of his love, so far from promising
to be the source of delightful romance and enchantment,
was clearly seen the hardest and most practical question
of a life full of such questions.

In his strong and growing excitement he spoke to himself
as to a second person,

“O, I see it all now. Poor, blind fool that I was to
think that by coveting and securing every moment in her
presence possible, I was only learning to love art. As I
saw her to-night, so radiant and beautiful, and yet in the
embrace of another man, and evidently an ardent admirer,
what was art to me! As well might a starving man seek
to satisfy himself by wandering through an old Greek
temple, as for me to turn to Art alone. One crumb of
warm, manifested love from her would be worth more
than all the cold, abstract beauty in the universe. And
yet what chance have I? What can I hope for more than
a passing thought and a little kindly condescending interest?
Clerk and man-of-all-work in a store, poor and
heavily burdened, the idea of my loving one of the most
wealthy, admired, and aristocratic ladies in Chicago! It
is all very well in story books for peasants to fall in love
with princesses, but in practical Chicago the fact of my
attachment to Miss Ludolph would be regarded as one of
the richest jokes of the season, and such a proof of country
rusticity and folly by Mr. Ludolph, as would at once
secure my return to pastoral life.”

Then hope whispered, “But you can achieve position
and wealth as others have, and then can speak your mind
from the standpoint of equality.”

But Dennis was in a mood to see only the hopeless
side that night, and exclaimed almost aloud—“Nonsense!
Can it be even imagined that she, besieged by
the most gifted and rich of the city, will wait for a poor
unknown admirer? Mr. Mellen, I understand approaches
her from every vantage ground save that of a noble character,
but in the fashionable world how little thought is
given to this draw-back,” and in his perturbation he strode
rapidly and aimlessly on, finding some relief in mere physical
activity.

Suddenly his hasty steps ceased, and even in the dusk
of the street, his face gleamed out distinctly, so great was
its pallor. Like a ray of light, a passage from the Word
of God revealed to him his situation in a new aspect. It
seemed to him almost that some one had whispered the
words in his ear, so distinctly did they present themselves—

“Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers.”

Slowly and painfully he said to himself, as if recognizing
the most helpless barrier that had yet been dwelt
upon—

“Christine Ludolph is an infidel.”

Not only the voice of reason, and of the practical
world, but also the voice of God seemed to forbid his
love, and the conviction that he must give it all up, became
as clear as it was painful. The poor fellow leaned his
head against the shaggy bark of an elm that stood in a
shadowy square which the street lamps could but faintly
penetrate, and watered the gnarled roots with many hot
tears.

The night wind swayed the budding branches of the
great tree and they sighed over him as if in sympathy.

The struggle within his soul was indeed bitter, for
though thus far he had spoken hopelessly, he had not
been altogether hopeless, but now that conscience raised
its impassable wall high as heaven, which he must not
break through, his pain was so great as to almost unman
him, and only such tears as men can weep fell from his
eyes. In anguish he exclaimed—

“That which might have been the chief blessing of
life has become my greatest misfortune.”

Above him the gale caused two fraying limbs to appear
to moan in echo of the suffering beneath.

“This then must be the end of my prayers in her behalf—my
ardent hope and purpose to lead her to the
truth—she to walk through honored sunny paths to everlasting
shame and night, and I through dark and painful
ways to light and peace, if in this bitter test I remain
faithful. Surely there is much to try one's faith. And
yet it must be so as far as human foresight can judge.”

Then a great pity for her swelled his heart, for he felt
that her case was the saddest after all, and his tears flowed
faster than ever.

Human voices now startled him—some late revellers
passing homeward. The tears and emotion, of which we
never think of being ashamed when alone with Nature
and its Author, he dreaded to have seen by his fellows,
and hastily wiping his eyes, he slunk into the deeper
shadow of the tree, and they passed on. Then, an old
trait asserting itself, he condemned his own weakness and
wavering spirit. Stepping from the sheltering trunk
against which he was leaning, he stood strong and erect.

The winds were hushed as if expectant in the branches
above—

“Dennis Fleet,” he said, “you must put your foot on
this folly here and now.”

He bared his head and looked upward.

“O God,” he said solemnly, “if this is contrary to
Thy will—Thy will be done.”

He paused a moment reverently, and then turned on
his heel and strode resolutely homeward.

A gust of wind crashed the branches overhead together
like the clash of cymbals in victory.

The early Spring dawn was tinging the eastern horizon
before the mansion of the rich brewer was darkened and
the gay revel ceased. All the long night, light airy music
had caused late passers by to pause a moment to listen,
and to pity or envy the throng within as disposition might
dictate. Mr. Brown was a man who prided himself on
lavish and rather coarse hospitality. A table groaning
under costly dishes, and every variety of liquor that
diseased appetite could crave, was the crowning feature,
the blissful climax of all his entertainments; and society
from its highest circles furnished an abundance of anxious
candidates for his suppers, who ate and criticised, drank
to, and disparaged, their plebeian host.

Mrs. Brown was heavy in every sense of the word, and
with her huge person encased in acres of silk and festooned
with no end of black lace, she waddled about and smiled
and nodded good-naturedly at everybody and everything.

It was just the place for a fashionable revel, where the
gross repulsive features of coarse excess are veiled and
masked somewhat by the glamour of outward courtesy
and good-breeding.

At first Christine entered into the dance with great
zest and a decided sense of relief.

She was disappointed and out of sorts with herself.
Again she had failed in the object of her intense ambition,
and though conscious that through the excitement of the
occasion, she had never sung better, yet she plainly saw in

the different results of her singing and that of Dennis
Fleet that there was depth in the human heart which she
could not touch. She could secure only admiration, superficial
applause. The sphere of the true artist who can
touch and sway the popular heart, seemed beyond her ability.
By voice or pencil she had never yet reached it. She
had too much mind to mistake the character of the admiration
she excited, and was far too ambitious to be satisfied
with the mere praise bestowed on a highly accomplished
girl. She aspired—determined to be among the first, and
to be a second rate imitator in the world of Art was to her
the agony of a disappointed life. And yet to imitate with
accuracy and skill, not with sympathy, was the only power
she had as yet developed. She saw the limitations of her
success more clearly than any one else, and chafed bitterly
at the invisible bounds she could not pass.

The excitement of the dance enabled her to banish
thoughts that were both painful and humiliating. Moreover
to a nature so active and full of physical vigor, the
swift, graceful motion was a source of keen enjoyment.

But when after supper many of the ladies were silly,
and the gentlemen were either stupid or excited, as might
be the action of the “invisible spirit of wine” upon their
several constitutions—when after many glasses of champagne
Mr. Mellen began to effervesce in frothy sentimentality,
and a style of love-making simply nauseating to one
of Christine's nature, she looked around for her father in
order to escape from the scenes that were becoming revolting.

Though of earth only in all the sources of her life and
hopes, she was not earthy. If her spirit could not soar and
sing in the sky, it also could not grovel in the mire of gross
materiality.

Some little time therefore before the company broke up,
on the plea of not feeling well, she lured her father away

from his wine, cigars, and a knot of gentlemen who were
beginning to talk a little thick and incoherently, and making
their adieux amid many protestations against their
early departure, drove homeward.

“How did you enjoy yourself?” asked her father.

“Very much the early part of the evening, not at all
the latter part. To sum up, I am disgusted with Mr. Mellen
and these Browns in general, and myself in particular.”

“What is the matter with Mr. Mellen? I understand
that the intriguing mammas consider him the largest game
in the city.”

“When hunting degenerates into the chase and capture
of insects, you may style him game. Between his champagne
and silly love-making, he was as bad as a dose of
ipecac.”

Christine spoke freely to her father of her admirers,
usually making them the themes of satire and jest.

“And what is the trouble with our entertainers?”

“I am sorry to speak so of anyone whose hospitality I
have accepted, but unless it is your wish I hope never to
accept it again. They all smell of their beer. Everything
is so coarse, lavish, and ostentatious. They tell you as
through a brazen trumpet on every side `We are rich.'”

“They give magnificent suppers,” said Mr. Ludolph in
apology.

“More correctly, the French cook they employ gives
them. I do not object to the nicest of suppers, but prefer
that the Browns be not on the carte de menu. From the
moment our artistic programme ended, and the entertainment
fell into their hands, it began to degenerate into an
orgy. Nothing but the instinctive restraints of good breeding
prevents such occasions from ending in a drunken
revel.”

“You are severe. Mr. Brown's company is not a bad
type of the entertainments that prevail in fashionable life.”

“Well it may be true, but they never seemed to me so
lacking in good taste and refinement, before. Wait till we
dispense choice viands and wines to choicer spirits in our
own land, and I will guarantee a marvellously wide difference.
Then the eye, the ear, the mind, shall be feasted,
as well as the lower sense.”

“Well I do not see why you should be disgusted with
yourself. I am sure that you covered yourself with glory,
and was the belle of the occasion.”

“That is no great honor, considering the occasion.
Father, strange as it may seem to you, I envied your man-of-all-work,
to-night. Did you not mark the effect of his
singing?”

“Yes, and felt it in a way that I cannot explain to
myself. His tones seemed to thrill and stir my very heart.
I have not been so affected by music for years. At first I
thought it was surprise at hearing him sing at all, but I
soon found that it was something in the music itself.”

“And that something I fear I can never grasp—never
attain.”

“Why, my dear, they applauded you to the echo.”

“I would rather see one moist eye as the tribute to my
singing, than to be deafened by noisy applause. I fear I
shall never reach high art. Men's hearts sleep when I do
my best.”

“I think you are slightly mistaken there, judging from
your train of admirers,” said Mr. Ludolph turning off a disagreeable
subject with a jest. The shrewd man of the
world guessed the secret of her failure. She must feel
herself, before she could touch feeling. But he had systematically
sought to chill and benumb her nature, meaning
it to awake and revive at just the time, and under just the
circumstances, that should accord with his controlling ambition.

Then reverting to Dennis he continued,

“It won't answer for Fleet to sweep the store any
longer, after the part he played to-night. Indeed I doubt
if he would be willing to. Not only he, but the world will
know that he is capable of better things. What has occurred
will awaken inquiry, and may soon secure him good
business offers. I do not intend to part readily with so
capable a young fellow. He does well whatever is required,
and therefore I shall promote him as fast as is prudent.
I think I can make him of great use to me.”

“That is another thing that provokes me,” said Christine.
“Only yesterday morning he seemed such a useful
humble creature, and last evening through my own folly
he developed into a fine gentleman; and I shall have to
say `By your leave, sir;' `Will you please do this?'—if I
dare ask anything at all.”

“I am not so sure of that,” said her father. “My impression
is that Fleet has too much good sense to put on
airs in the store. But I will give him more congenial
work; and as one of the young gentleman clerks, we can
ask him up now and then to sing with us. I should much
enjoy trying some of our German music with him.”