The Titan 12 страница

⇐ ПредыдущаяСтр 28 из 61Следующая ⇒

was the one that was being gored. What if he should find some

one whom he could want more than he did her? Dear heaven, how

terrible that would be! What would she do? she asked herself,

thoughtfully. She lapsed into the blues one afternoon--almost

cried--she could scarcely say why. Another time she thought of

all the terrible things she would do, how difficult she would make

it for any other woman who invaded her preserves. However, she

was not sure. Would she declare war if she discovered another?

She knew she would eventually; and yet she knew, too, that if

she did, and Cowperwood were set in his passion, thoroughly

alienated, it would do no good. It would be terrible, but what

could she do to win him back? That was the issue. Once warned,

however, by her suspicious questioning, Cowperwood was more

mechanically attentive than ever. He did his best to conceal his

altered mood--his enthusiasms for Mrs. Sohlberg, his interest in

Antoinette Nowak--and this helped somewhat.

But finally there was a detectable change. Aileen noticed it first

after they had been back from Europe nearly a year. At this time

she was still interested in Sohlberg, but in a harmlessly flirtatious

way. She thought he might be interesting physically, but would

he be as delightful as Cowperwood? Never! When she felt that

Cowperwood himself might he changing she pulled herself up at

once, and when Antoinette appeared--the carriage incident--Sohlberg

lost his, at best, unstable charm. She began to meditate on what

a terrible thing it would be to lose Cowperwood, seeing that she

had failed to establish herself socially. Perhaps that had something

to do with his defection. No doubt it had. Yet she could not

believe, after all his protestations of affection in Philadelphia,

after all her devotion to him in those dark days of his degradation

and punishment, that he would really turn on her. No, he might

stray momentarily, but if she protested enough, made a scene,

perhaps, he would not feel so free to injure her--he would remember

and be loving and devoted again. After seeing him, or imagining

she had seen him, in the carriage, she thought at first that she

would question him, but later decided that she would wait and watch

more closely. Perhaps he was beginning to run around with other

women. There was safety in numbers--that she knew. Her heart,

her pride, was hurt, but not broken.

Chapter XVIII

The Clash

The peculiar personality of Rita Sohlberg was such that by her

very action she ordinarily allayed suspicion, or rather distracted

it. Although a novice, she had a strange ease, courage, or balance

of soul which kept her whole and self-possessed under the most

trying of circumstances. She might have been overtaken in the

most compromising of positions, but her manner would always have

indicated ease, a sense of innocence, nothing unusual, for she had

no sense of moral degradation in this matter--no troublesome

emotion as to what was to flow from a relationship of this kind,

no worry as to her own soul, sin, social opinion, or the like.

She was really interested in art and life--a pagan, in fact. Some

people are thus hardily equipped. It is the most notable attribute

of the hardier type of personalities--not necessarily the most

brilliant or successful. You might have said that her soul was

naively unconscious of the agony of others in loss. She would

have taken any loss to herself with an amazing equableness--some

qualms, of course, but not many--because her vanity and sense of

charm would have made her look forward to something better or as

good.

She had called on Aileen quite regularly in the past, with or

without Harold, and had frequently driven with the Cowperwoods or

joined them at the theater or elsewhere. She had decided, after

becoming intimate with Cowperwood, to study art again, which was

a charming blind, for it called for attendance at afternoon or

evening classes which she frequently skipped. Besides, since

Harold had more money he was becoming gayer, more reckless and

enthusiastic over women, and Cowperwood deliberately advised her

to encourage him in some liaison which, in case exposure should

subsequently come to them, would effectually tie his hands.

" Let him get in some affair, " Cowperwood told Rita. " We'll put

detectives on his trail and get evidence. He won't have a word

to say. "

" We don't really need to do that, " she protested sweetly, naively.

" He's been in enough scrapes as it is. He's given me some of the

letters--" (she pronounced it " lettahs" )--" written him. "

" But we'll need actual witnesses if we ever need anything at all.

Just tell me when he's in love again, and I'll do the rest. "

" You know I think, " she drawled, amusingly, " that he is now. I

saw him on the street the other day with one of his students--rather

a pretty girl, too. "

Cowperwood was pleased. Under the circumstances he would almost

have been willing--not quite--for Aileen to succumb to Sohlberg

in order to entrap her and make his situation secure. Yet he

really did not wish it in the last analysis--would have been grieved

temporarily if she had deserted him. However, in the case of

Sohlberg, detectives were employed, the new affair with the flighty

pupil was unearthed and sworn to by witnesses, and this, combined

with the " lettahs" held by Rita, constituted ample material wherewith

to " hush up" the musician if ever he became unduly obstreperous.

So Cowperwood and Rita's state was quite comfortable.

But Aileen, meditating over Antoinette Nowak, was beside herself

with curiosity, doubt, worry. She did not want to injure Cowperwood

in any way after his bitter Philadelphia experience, and yet when

she thought of his deserting her in this way she fell into a great

rage. Her vanity, as much as her love, was hurt. What could she

do to justify or set at rest her suspicions? Watch him personally?

She was too dignified and vain to lurk about street-corners or

offices or hotels. Never! Start a quarrel without additional

evidence--that would be silly. He was too shrewd to give her

further evidence once she spoke. He would merely deny it. She

brooded irritably, recalling after a time, and with an aching

heart, that her father had put detectives on her track once ten

years before, and had actually discovered her relations with

Cowperwood and their rendezvous. Bitter as that memory was

--torturing--yet now the same means seemed not too abhorrent to

employ under the circumstances. No harm had come to Cowperwood

in the former instance, she reasoned to herself--no especial harm

--from that discovery (this was not true), and none would come to

him now. (This also was not true. ) But one must forgive a fiery,

passionate soul, wounded to the quick, some errors of judgment.

Her thought was that she would first be sure just what it was her

beloved was doing, and then decide what course to take. But she

knew that she was treading on dangerous ground, and mentally she

recoiled from the consequences which might follow. He might leave

her if she fought him too bitterly. He might treat her as he had

treated his first wife, Lillian.

She studied her liege lord curiously these days, wondering if it

were true that he had deserted her already, as he had deserted his

first wife thirteen years before, wondering if he could really

take up with a girl as common as Antoinette Nowak--wondering,

wondering, wondering--half afraid and yet courageous. What could

be done with him? If only he still loved her all would be well

yet--but oh!

The detective agency to which she finally applied, after weeks of

soul-racking suspense, was one of those disturbingly human implements

which many are not opposed to using on occasion, when it is the

only means of solving a troublous problem of wounded feelings or

jeopardized interests. Aileen, being obviously rich, was forthwith

shamefully overcharged; but the services agreed upon were well

performed. To her amazement, chagrin, and distress, after a few

weeks of observation Cowperwood was reported to have affairs not

only with Antoinette Nowak, whom she did suspect, but also with

Mrs. Sohlberg. And these two affairs at one and the same time.

For the moment it left Aileen actually stunned and breathless.

The significance of Rita Sohlberg to her in this hour was greater

than that of any woman before or after. Of all living things,

women dread women most of all, and of all women the clever and

beautiful. Rita Sohlberg had been growing on Aileen as a personage,

for she had obviously been prospering during this past year, and

her beauty had been amazingly enhanced thereby. Once Aileen had

encountered Rita in a light trap on the Avenue, very handsome and

very new, and she had commented on it to Cowperwood, whose reply

had been: " Her father must be making some money. Sohlberg could

never earn it for her. "

Aileen sympathized with Harold because of his temperament, but she

knew that what Cowperwood said was true.

Another time, at a box-party at the theater, she had noted the

rich elaborateness of Mrs. Sohlberg's dainty frock, the endless

pleatings of pale silk, the startling charm of the needlework and

the ribbons--countless, rosetted, small--that meant hard work on

the part of some one.

" How lovely this is, " she had commented.

" Yes, " Rita had replied, airily; " I thought, don't you know, my

dressmaker would never get done working on it. "

It had cost, all told, two hundred and twenty dollars, and Cowperwood

had gladly paid the bill.

Aileen went home at the time thinking of Rita's taste and of how

well she had harmonized her materials to her personality. She was

truly charming.

Now, however, when it appeared that the same charm that had appealed

to her had appealed to Cowperwood, she conceived an angry, animal

opposition to it all. Rita Sohlberg! Ha! A lot of satisfaction

she'd get knowing as she would soon, that Cowperwood was sharing

his affection for her with Antoinette Nowak--a mere stenographer.

And a lot of satisfaction Antoinette would get--the cheap upstart

--when she learned, as she would, that Cowperwood loved her so

lightly that he would take an apartment for Rita Sohlberg and let

a cheap hotel or an assignation-house do for her.

But in spite of this savage exultation her thoughts kept coming

back to herself, to her own predicament, to torture and destroy

her. Cowperwood, the liar! Cowperwood, the pretender! Cowperwood,

the sneak! At one moment she conceived a kind of horror of the man

because of all his protestations to her; at the next a rage--bitter,

swelling; at the next a pathetic realization of her own altered

position. Say what one will, to take the love of a man like

Cowperwood away from a woman like Aileen was to leave her high and

dry on land, as a fish out of its native element, to take all the

wind out of her sails--almost to kill her. Whatever position she

had once thought to hold through him, was now jeopardized. Whatever

joy or glory she had had in being Mrs. Frank Algernon Cowperwood,

it was now tarnished. She sat in her room, this same day after

the detectives had given their report, a tired look in her eyes,

the first set lines her pretty mouth had ever known showing about

it, her past and her future whirling painfully and nebulously in

her brain. Suddenly she got up, and, seeing Cowperwood's picture

on her dresser, his still impressive eyes contemplating her, she

seized it and threw it on the floor, stamping on his handsome face

with her pretty foot, and raging at him in her heart. The dog!

The brute! Her brain was full of the thought of Rita's white arms

about him, of his lips to hers. The spectacle of Rita's fluffy

gowns, her enticing costumes, was in her eyes. Rita should not

have him; she should not have anything connected with him, nor,

for that matter, Antoinette Nowak, either--the wretched upstart,

the hireling. To think he should stoop to an office stenographer!

Once on that thought, she decided that he should not be allowed

to have a woman as an assistant any more. He owed it to her to

love her after all she had done for him, the coward, and to let

other women alone. Her brain whirled with strange thoughts. She

was really not sane in her present state. She was so wrought up

by her prospective loss that she could only think of rash, impossible,

destructive things to do. She dressed swiftly, feverishly, and,

calling a closed carriage from the coach-house, ordered herself

to be driven to the New Arts Building. She would show this rosy

cat of a woman, this smiling piece of impertinence, this she-devil,

whether she would lure Cowperwood away. She meditated as she rode.

She would not sit back and be robbed as Mrs. Cowperwood had been

by her. Never! He could not treat her that way. She would die

first! She would kill Rita Sohlberg and Antoinette Nowak and

Cowperwood and herself first. She would prefer to die that way

rather than lose his love. Oh yes, a thousand times! Fortunately,

Rita Sohlberg was not at the New Arts Building, or Sohlberg, either.

They had gone to a reception. Nor was she at the apartment on the

North Side, where, under the name of Jacobs, as Aileen had been

informed by the detectives, she and Cowperwood kept occasional

tryst. Aileen hesitated for a moment, feeling it useless to wait,

then she ordered the coachman to drive to her husband's office.

It was now nearly five o'clock. Antoinette and Cowperwood had

both gone, but she did not know it. She changed her mind, however,

before she reached the office--for it was Rita Sohlberg she wished

to reach first--and ordered her coachman to drive back to the

Sohlberg studio. But still they had not returned. In a kind of

aimless rage she went home, wondering how she should reach Rita

Sohlberg first and alone. Then, to her savage delight, the game

walked into her bag. The Sohlbergs, returning home at six o'clock

from some reception farther out Michigan Avenue, had stopped, at

the wish of Harold, merely to pass the time of day with Mrs.

Cowperwood. Rita was exquisite in a pale-blue and lavender

concoction, with silver braid worked in here and there. Her

gloves and shoes were pungent bits of romance, her hat a dream of

graceful lines. At the sight of her, Aileen, who was still in the

hall and had opened the door herself, fairly burned to seize her

by the throat and strike her; but she restrained herself sufficiently

to say, " Come in. " She still had sense enough and self-possession

enough to conceal her wrath and to close the door. Beside his

wife Harold was standing, offensively smug and inefficient in the

fashionable frock-coat and silk hat of the time, a restraining

influence as yet. He was bowing and smiling:

" Oh. " This sound was neither an " oh" nor an " ah, " but a kind of

Danish inflected " awe, " which was usually not unpleasing to hear.

" How are you, once more, Meeses Cowperwood? It eez sudge a pleasure

to see you again--awe. "

" Won't you two just go in the reception-room a moment, " said Aileen,

almost hoarsely. " I'll be right in. I want to get something. "

Then, as an afterthought, she called very sweetly: " Oh, Mrs.

Sohlberg, won't you come up to my room for a moment? I have something

I want to show you.

Rita responded promptly. She always felt it incumbent upon her

to be very nice to Aileen.

" We have only a moment to stay, " she replied, archly and sweetly,

and coming out in the hall, " but I'll come up. "

Aileen stayed to see her go first, then followed up-stairs swiftly,

surely, entered after Rita, and closed the door. With a courage

and rage born of a purely animal despair, she turned and locked

it; then she wheeled swiftly, her eyes lit with a savage fire, her

cheeks pale, but later aflame, her hands, her fingers working in

a strange, unconscious way.

" So, " she said, looking at Rita, and coming toward her quickly and

angrily, " you'll steal my husband, will you? You'll live in a

secret apartment, will you? You'll come here smiling and lying to

me, will you? You beast! You cat! You prostitute! I'll show you

now! You tow-headed beast! I know you now for what you are! I'll

teach you once for all! Take that, and that, and that! "

Suiting action to word, Aileen had descended upon her whirlwind,

animal fashion, striking, scratching, choking, tearing her visitor's

hat from her head, ripping the laces from her neck, beating her

in the face, and clutching violently at her hair and throat to

choke and mar her beauty if she could. For the moment she was

really crazy with rage.

By the suddenness of this onslaught Rita Sohlberg was taken back

completely. It all came so swiftly, so terribly, she scarcely

realized what was happening before the storm was upon her. There

was no time for arguments, pleas, anything. Terrified, shamed,

nonplussed, she went down quite limply under this almost lightning

attack. When Aileen began to strike her she attempted in vain to

defend herself, uttering at the same time piercing screams which

could be heard throughout the house. She screamed shrilly,

strangely, like a wild dying animal. On the instant all her fine,

civilized poise had deserted her. From the sweetness and delicacy

of the reception atmosphere--the polite cooings, posturings, and

mouthings so charming to contemplate, so alluring in her--she had

dropped on the instant to that native animal condition that shows

itself in fear. Her eyes had a look of hunted horror, her lips

and cheeks were pale and drawn. She retreated in a staggering,

ungraceful way; she writhed and squirmed, screaming in the strong

clutch of the irate and vigorous Aileen.

Cowperwood entered the hall below just before the screams began.

He had followed the Sohlbergs almost immediately from his office,

and, chancing to glance in the reception-room, he had observed

Sohlberg smiling, radiant, an intangible air of self-ingratiating,

social, and artistic sycophancy about him, his long black frock-coat

buttoned smoothly around his body, his silk hat still in his hands.

" Awe, how do you do, Meezter Cowperwood, " he was beginning to say,

his curly head shaking in a friendly manner, " I'm soa glad to see

you again" when--but who can imitate a scream of terror? We have

no words, no symbols even, for those essential sounds of fright

and agony. They filled the hall, the library, the reception-room,

the distant kitchen even, and basement with a kind of vibrant

terror.

Cowperwood, always the man of action as opposed to nervous cogitation,

braced up on the instant like taut wire. What, for heaven's sake,

could that be? What a terrible cry! Sohlberg the artist, responding

like a chameleon to the various emotional complexions of life,

began to breathe stertorously, to blanch, to lose control of himself.

" My God! " he exclaimed, throwing up his hands, " that's Rita! She's

up-stairs in your wife's room! Something must have happened. Oh--"

On the instant he was quite beside himself, terrified, shaking,

almost useless. Cowperwood, on the contrary, without a moment's

hesitation had thrown his coat to the floor, dashed up the stairs,

followed by Sohlberg. What could it be? Where was Aileen? As he

bounded upward a clear sense of something untoward came over him;

it was sickening, terrifying. Scream! Scream! Scream! came the

sounds. " Oh, my God! don't kill me! Help! Help! " SCREAM--this

last a long, terrified, ear-piercing wail.

Sohlberg was about to drop from heart failure, he was so frightened.

His face was an ashen gray. Cowperwood seized the door-knob

vigorously and, finding the door locked, shook, rattled, and banged

at it.

" Aileen! " he called, sharply. " Aileen! What's the matter in there?

Open this door, Aileen! "

" Oh, my God! Oh, help! help! Oh, mercy--o-o-o-o-oh! " It was the

moaning voice of Rita.

" I'll show you, you she-devil! " he heard Aileen calling. " I'll

teach you, you beast! You cat, you prostitute! There! there! there! "

" Aileen! " he called, hoarsely. " Aileen! " Then, getting no response,

and the screams continuing, he turned angrily.

" Stand back! " he exclaimed to Sohlberg, who was moaning helplessly.

" Get me a chair, get me a table--anything. " The butler ran to obey,

but before he could return Cowperwood had found an implement.

" Here! " he said, seizing a long, thin, heavily carved and heavily

wrought oak chair which stood at the head of the stairs on the

landing. He whirled it vigorously over his head. Smash! The sound

rose louder than the screams inside.

Smash! The chair creaked and almost broke, but the door did not

give.

Smash! The chair broke and the door flew open. He had knocked the

lock loose and had leaped in to where Aileen, kneeling over Rita

on the floor, was choking and beating her into insensibility.

Like an animal he was upon her.

" Aileen, " he shouted, fiercely, in a hoarse, ugly, guttural voice,

" you fool! You idiot--let go! What the devil's the matter with

you? What are you trying to do? Have you lost your mind? --you crazy

idiot! "

He seized her strong hands and ripped them apart. He fairly dragged

her back, half twisting and half throwing her over his knee, loosing

her clutching hold. She was so insanely furious that she still

struggled and cried, saying: " Let me at her! Let me at her! I'll

teach her! Don't you try to hold me, you dog! I'll show you, too,

you brute--oh--"

" Pick up that woman, " called Cowperwood, firmly, to Sohlberg and

the butler, who had entered. " Get her out of here quick! My wife

has gone crazy. Get her out of here, I tell you! This woman doesn't

know what she's doing. Take her out and get a doctor. What sort

of a hell's melee is this, anyway? "

" Oh, " moaned Rita, who was torn and fainting, almost unconscious

from sheer terror.

" I'll kill her! " screamed Aileen. " I'll murder her! I'll murder

you too, you dog! Oh" --she began striking at him--" I'll teach you

how to run around with other women, you dog, you brute! "

Cowperwood merely gripped her hands and shook her vigorously,

forcefully.

" What the devil has got into you, anyway, you fool? " he said to

her, bitterly, as they carried Rita out. " What are you trying to

do, anyway--murder her? Do you want the police to come in here?

Stop your screaming and behave yourself, or I'll shove a handkerchief

in your mouth! Stop, I tell you! Stop! Do you hear me? This is

enough, you fool! " He clapped his hand over her mouth, pressing

it tight and forcing her back against him. He shook her brutally,

angrily. He was very strong. " Now will you stop, " he insisted,

" or do you want me to choke you quiet? I will, if you don't.

You're out of your mind. Stop, I tell you! So this is the way you

carry on when things don't go to suit you? " She was sobbing,

struggling, moaning, half screaming, quite beside herself.

" Oh, you crazy fool! " he said, swinging her round, and with an

effort getting out a handkerchief, which he forced over her face

and in her mouth. " There, " he said, relievedly, " now will you

shut up? " holding her tight in an iron grip, he let her struggle

and turn, quite ready to put an end to her breathing if necessary.

Now that he had conquered her, he continued to hold her tightly,

stooping beside her on one knee, listening and meditating. Hers

was surely a terrible passion. From some points of view he could

not blame her. Great was her provocation, great her love. He

knew her disposition well enough to have anticipated something of

this sort. Yet the wretchedness, shame, scandal of the terrible

affair upset his customary equilibrium. To think any one should

give way to such a storm as this! To think that Aileen should do

it! To think that Rita should have been so mistreated! It was not

at all unlikely that she was seriously injured, marred for life

--possibly even killed. The horror of that! The ensuing storm of

public rage! A trial! His whole career gone up in one terrific

explosion of woe, anger, death! Great God!

He called the butler to him by a nod of his head, when the latter,

who had gone out with Rita, hurried back.

" How is she? " he asked, desperately. " Seriously hurt? "

" No, sir; I think not. I believe she's just fainted. She'll be

all right in a little while, sir. Can I be of any service, sir? "

Ordinarily Cowperwood would have smiled at such a scene. Now he

was cold, sober.

" Not now, " he replied, with a sigh of relief, still holding Aileen

firmly. " Go out and close the door. Call a doctor. Wait in the

hall. When he comes, call me. "

Aileen, conscious of things being done for Rita, of sympathy being

extended to her, tried to get up, to scream again; but she couldn't;

her lord and master held her in an ugly hold. When the door was

closed he said again: " Now, Aileen, will you hush? Will you let

me get up and talk to you, or must we stay here all night? Do you

want me to drop you forever after to-night? I understand all about

this, but I am in control now, and I am going to stay so. You

will come to your senses and be reasonable, or I will leave you

to-morrow as sure as I am here. " His voice rang convincingly.

" Now, shall we talk sensibly, or will you go on making a fool of

yourself--disgracing me, disgracing the house, making yourself

and myself the laughing-stock of the servants, the neighborhood,

the city? This is a fine showing you've made to-day. Good God! A

fine showing, indeed! A brawl in this house, a fight! I thought

you had better sense--more self-respect--really I did. You have

⇐ Предыдущая 23 24 25 26 272829 30 31 32 Следующая ⇒