The Titan 36 страница

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there the game must lie; but he had not by any means attained the

height of his ambition. He was not yet looked upon as a money

prince. He could not rank as yet with the magnates of the East

--the serried Sequoias of Wall Street. Until he could stand with

these men, until he could have a magnificent mansion, acknowledged

as such by all, until he could have a world-famous gallery, Berenice,

millions--what did it avail?

The character of Cowperwood's New York house, which proved one of

the central achievements of his later years, was one of those

flowerings--out of disposition which eventuate in the case of men

quite as in that of plants. After the passing of the years neither

a modified Gothic (such as his Philadelphia house had been), nor

a conventionalized Norman-French, after the style of his Michigan

Avenue home, seemed suitable to him. Only the Italian palaces of

medieval or Renaissance origin which he had seen abroad now appealed

to him as examples of what a stately residence should be. He was

really seeking something which should not only reflect his private

tastes as to a home, but should have the more enduring qualities

of a palace or even a museum, which might stand as a monument to

his memory. After much searching Cowperwood had found an architect

in New York who suited him entirely--one Raymond Pyne, rake,

raconteur, man-about-town--who was still first and foremost an

artist, with an eye for the exceptional and the perfect. These

two spent days and days together meditating on the details of this

home museum. An immense gallery was to occupy the west wing of

the house and be devoted to pictures; a second gallery should

occupy the south wing and be given over to sculpture and large

whorls of art; and these two wings were to swing as an L around

the house proper, the latter standing in the angle between them.

The whole structure was to be of a rich brownstone, heavily carved.

For its interior decoration the richest woods, silks, tapestries,

glass, and marbles were canvassed. The main rooms were to surround

a great central court with a colonnade of pink-veined alabaster,

and in the center there would be an electrically lighted fountain

of alabaster and silver. Occupying the east wall a series of

hanging baskets of orchids, or of other fresh flowers, were to

give a splendid glow of color, a morning-sun effect, to this richly

artificial realm. One chamber--a lounge on the second floor--was

to be entirely lined with thin-cut transparent marble of a peach-blow

hue, the lighting coming only through these walls and from without.

Here in a perpetual atmosphere of sunrise were to be racks for

exotic birds, a trellis of vines, stone benches, a central pool

of glistening water, and an echo of music. Pyne assured him that

after his death this room would make an excellent chamber in which

to exhibit porcelains, jades, ivories, and other small objects of

value.

Cowperwood was now actually transferring his possessions to New

York, and had persuaded Aileen to accompany him. Fine compound

of tact and chicane that he was, he had the effrontery to assure

her that they could here create a happier social life. His present

plan was to pretend a marital contentment which had no basis solely

in order to make this transition period as undisturbed as possible.

Subsequently he might get a divorce, or he might make an arrangement

whereby his life would be rendered happy outside the social pale.

Of all this Berenice Fleming knew nothing at all. At the same

time the building of this splendid mansion eventually awakened her

to an understanding of the spirit of art that occupied the center

of Cowperwood's iron personality and caused her to take a real

interest in him. Before this she had looked on him as a kind of

Western interloper coming East and taking advantage of her mother's

good nature to scrape a little social courtesy. Now, however, all

that Mrs. Carter had been telling her of his personality and

achievements was becoming crystallized into a glittering chain of

facts. This house, the papers were fond of repeating, would be a

jewel of rare workmanship. Obviously the Cowperwoods were going

to try to enter society. " What a pity it is, " Mrs. Carter once

said to Berenice, " that he couldn't have gotten a divorce from his

wife before he began all this. I am so afraid they will never be

received. He would be if he only had the right woman; but she--"

Mrs. Carter, who had once seen Aileen in Chicago, shook her head

doubtfully. " She is not the type, " was her comment. " She has

neither the air nor the understanding. "

" If he is so unhappy with her, " observed Berenice, thoughtfully,

" why doesn't he leave her? She can be happy without him. It is

so silly--this cat-and-dog existence. Still I suppose she values

the position he gives her, " she added, " since she isn't so interesting

herself. "

" I suppose, " said Mrs. Carter, " that he married her twenty years

ago, when he was a very different man from what he is to-day. She

is not exactly coarse, but not clever enough. She cannot do what

he would like to see done. I hate to see mismatings of this kind,

and yet they are so common. I do hope, Bevy, that when you marry

it will be some one with whom you can get along, though I do believe

I would rather see you unhappy than poor. "

This was delivered as an early breakfast peroration in Central

Park South, with the morning sun glittering on one of the nearest

park lakes. Bevy, in spring-green and old-gold, was studying the

social notes in one of the morning papers.

" I think I should prefer to be unhappy with wealth than to be

without it, " she said, idly, without looking up.

Her mother surveyed her admiringly, conscious of her imperious

mood. What was to become of her? Would she marry well? Would she

marry in time? Thus far no breath of the wretched days in Louisville

had affected Berenice. Most of those with whom Mrs. Carter had

found herself compelled to deal would be kind enough to keep her

secret. But there were others. How near she had been to drifting

on the rocks when Cowperwood had appeared!

" After all, " observed Berenice, thoughtfully, " Mr. Cowperwood isn't

a mere money-grabber, is he? So many of these Western moneyed men

are so dull. "

" My dear, " exclaimed Mrs. Carter, who by now had become a confirmed

satellite of her secret protector, " you don't understand him at

all. He is a very astonishing man, I tell you. The world is

certain to hear a lot more of Frank Cowperwood before he dies.

You can say what you please, but some one has to make the money

in the first place. It's little enough that good breeding does

for you in poverty. I know, because I've seen plenty of our friends

come down. "

In the new house, on a scaffold one day, a famous sculptor and his

assistants were at work on a Greek frieze which represented dancing

nymphs linked together by looped wreaths. Berenice and her mother

happened to be passing. They stopped to look, and Cowperwood

joined them. He waved his hand at the figures of the frieze, and

said to Berenice, with his old, gay air, " If they had copied you

they would have done better. "

" How charming of you! " she replied, with her cool, strange, blue

eyes fixed on him. " They are beautiful. " In spite of her earlier

prejudices she knew now that he and she had one god in common--Art;

and that his mind was fixed on things beautiful as on a shrine.

He merely looked at her.

" This house can be little more than a museum to me, he remarked,

simply, when her mother was out of hearing; " but I shall build it

as perfectly as I can. Perhaps others may enjoy it if I do not. "

She looked at him musingly, understandingly, and he smiled. She

realized, of course, that he was trying to convey to her that he

was lonely.

Chapter LI

The Revival of Hattie Starr

Engrossed in the pleasures and entertainments which Cowperwood's

money was providing, Berenice had until recently given very little

thought to her future. Cowperwood had been most liberal. " She

is young, " he once said to Mrs. Carter, with an air of disinterested

liberality, when they were talking about Berenice and her future.

" She is an exquisite. Let her have her day. If she marries well

she can pay you back, or me. But give her all she needs now. " And

he signed checks with the air of a gardener who is growing a

wondrous orchid.

The truth was that Mrs. Carter had become so fond of Berenice as

an object of beauty, a prospective grande dame, that she would

have sold her soul to see her well placed; and as the money to

provide the dresses, setting, equipage had to come from somewhere,

she had placed her spirit in subjection to Cowperwood and pretended

not to see the compromising position in which she was placing all

that was near and dear to her.

" Oh, you're so good, " she more than once said to him a mist of

gratitude commingled with joy in her eyes. " I would never have

believed it of any one. But Bevy--"

" An esthete is an esthete, " Cowperwood replied. " They are rare

enough. I like to see a spirit as fine as hers move untroubled.

She will make her way. "

Seeing Lieutenant Braxmar in the foreground of Berenice's affairs,

Mrs. Carter was foolish enough to harp on the matter in a friendly,

ingratiating way. Braxmar was really interesting after his fashion.

He was young, tall, muscular, and handsome, a graceful dancer;

but, better yet, he represented in his moods lineage, social

position, a number of the things which engaged Berenice most. He

was intelligent, serious, with a kind of social grace which was

gay, courteous, wistful. Berenice met him first at a local dance,

where a new step was being practised--" dancing in the barn, " as

it was called--and so airily did he tread it with her in his

handsome uniform that she was half smitten for the moment.

" You dance delightfully, " she said. " Is this a part of your life

on the ocean wave? "

" Deep-sea-going dancing, " he replied, with a heavenly smile. " All

battles are accompanied by balls, don't you know? "

" Oh, what a wretched jest! " she replied. " It's unbelievably bad. "

" Not for me. I can make much worse ones. "

" Not for me, " she replied, " I can't stand them. " And they went

prancing on. Afterward he came and sat by her; they walked in the

moonlight, he told her of naval life, his Southern home and

connections.

Mrs. Carter, seeing him with Berenice, and having been introduced,

observed the next morning, " I like your Lieutenant, Bevy. I know

some of his relatives well. They come from the Carolinas. He's

sure to come into money. The whole family is wealthy. Do you

think he might be interested in you? "

" Oh, possibly--yes, I presume so, " replied Berenice, airily, for

she did not take too kindly to this evidence of parental interest.

She preferred to see life drift on in some nebulous way at present,

and this was bringing matters too close to home. " Still, he has

so much machinery on his mind I doubt whether he could take any

serious interest in a woman. He is almost more of a battle-ship

than he is a man. "

She made a mouth, and Mrs. Carter commented gaily: " You rogue! All

the men take an interest in you. You don't think you could care

for him, then, at all? "

" Why, mother, what a question! Why do you ask? Is it so essential

that I should? "

" Oh, not that exactly, " replied Mrs. Carter, sweetly, bracing

herself for a word which she felt incumbent upon her; " but think

of his position. He comes of such a good family, and he must be

heir to a considerable fortune in his own right. Oh, Bevy, I

don't want to hurry or spoil your life in any way, but do keep in

mind the future. With your tastes and instincts money is so

essential, and unless you marry it I don't know where you are to

get it. Your father was so thoughtless, and Rolfe's was even worse.

She sighed.

Berenice, for almost the first time in her life, took solemn heed

of this thought. She pondered whether she could endure Braxmar

as a life partner, follow him around the world, perhaps retransferring

her abode to the South; but she could not make up her mind. This

suggestion on the part of her mother rather poisoned the cup for

her. To tell the truth, in this hour of doubt her thoughts turned

vaguely to Cowperwood as one who represented in his avid way more

of the things she truly desired. She remembered his wealth, his

plaint that his new house could be only a museum, the manner in

which he approached her with looks and voiceless suggestions. But

he was old and married--out of the question, therefore--and Braxmar

was young and charming. To think her mother should have been so

tactless as to suggest the necessity for consideration in his case!

It almost spoiled him for her. And was their financial state,

then, as uncertain as her mother indicated?

In this crisis some of her previous social experiences became

significant. For instance, only a few weeks previous to her meeting

with Braxmar she had been visiting at the country estate of the

Corscaden Batjers, at Redding Hills, Long Island, and had been

sitting with her hostess in the morning room of Hillcrest, which

commanded a lovely though distant view of Long Island Sound.

Mrs. Fredericka Batjer was a chestnut blonde, fair, cool, quiescent

--a type out of Dutch art. Clad in a morning gown of gray and

silver, her hair piled in a Psyche knot, she had in her lap on

this occasion a Java basket filled with some attempt at Norwegian

needlework.

" Bevy, " she said, " you remember Kilmer Duelma, don't you? Wasn't

he at the Haggertys' last summer when you were there? "

Berenice, who was seated at a small Chippendale writing-desk

penning letters, glanced up, her mind visioning for the moment

the youth in question. Kilmer Duelma--tall, stocky, swaggering,

his clothes the loose, nonchalant perfection of the season, his

walk ambling, studied, lackadaisical, aimless, his color high, his

cheeks full, his eyes a little vacuous, his mind acquiescing in a

sort of genial, inconsequential way to every query and thought

that was put to him. The younger of the two sons of Auguste Duelma,

banker, promoter, multimillionaire, he would come into a fortune

estimated roughly at between six and eight millions. At the

Haggertys' the year before he had hung about her in an aimless

fashion.

Mrs. Batjer studied Berenice curiously for a moment, then returned

to her needlework. " I've asked him down over this week-end, " she

suggested.

" Yes? " queried Berenice, sweetly. " Are there others? "

" Of course, " assented Mrs. Batjer, remotely. " Kilmer doesn't

interest you, I presume. "

Berenice smiled enigmatically.

" You remember Clarissa Faulkner, don't you, Bevy? " pursued Mrs.

Batjer. " She married Romulus Garrison. "

" Perfectly. Where is she now? "

" They have leased the Chateau Brieul at Ars for the winter. Romulus

is a fool, but Clarissa is so clever. You know she writes that

she is holding a veritable court there this season. Half the smart

set of Paris and London are dropping in. It is so charming for

her to be able to do those things now. Poor dear! At one time I

was quite troubled over her. "

Without giving any outward sign Berenice did not fail to gather

the full import of the analogy. It was all true. One must begin

early to take thought of one's life. She suffered a disturbing

sense of duty. Kilmer Duelma arrived at noon Friday with six types

of bags, a special valet, and a preposterous enthusiasm for polo

and hunting (diseases lately acquired from a hunting set in the

Berkshires). A cleverly contrived compliment supposed to have

emanated from Miss Fleming and conveyed to him with tact by Mrs.

Batjer brought him ambling into Berenice's presence suggesting a

Sunday drive to Saddle Rock.

" Haw! haw! You know, I'm deiighted to see you again. Haw! haw!

It's been an age since I've seen the Haggertys. We missed you

after you left. Haw! haw! I did, you know. Since I saw you I

have taken up polo--three ponies with me all the time now--haw!

haw! --a regular stable nearly. "

Berenice strove valiantly to retain a serene interest. Duty was

in her mind, the Chateau Brieul, the winter court of Clarissa

Garrison, some first premonitions of the flight of time. Yet the

drive was a bore, conversation a burden, the struggle to respond

titanic, impossible. When Monday came she fled, leaving three

days between that and a week-end at Morristown. Mrs. Batjer--who

read straws most capably--sighed. Her own Corscaden was not much

beyond his money, but life must be lived and the ambitious must

inherit wealth or gather it wisely. Some impossible scheming

silly would soon collect Duelma, and then-- She considered Berenice

a little difficult.

Berenice could not help piecing together the memory of this incident

with her mother's recent appeal in behalf of Lieutenant Braxmar.

A great, cloying, disturbing, disintegrating factor in her life

was revealed by the dawning discovery that she and her mother were

without much money, that aside from her lineage she was in a certain

sense an interloper in society. There were never rumors of great

wealth in connection with her--no flattering whispers or public

notices regarding her station as an heiress. All the smug minor

manikins of the social world were on the qui vive for some

cotton-headed doll of a girl with an endless bank-account. By

nature sybaritic, an intense lover of art fabrics, of stately

functions, of power and success in every form, she had been dreaming

all this while of a great soul-freedom and art-freedom under some

such circumstances as the greatest individual wealth of the day,

and only that, could provide. Simultaneously she had vaguely

cherished the idea that if she ever found some one who was truly

fond of her, and whom she could love or even admire intensely--some

one who needed her in a deep, sincere way--she would give herself

freely and gladly. Yet who could it be? She had been charmed by

Braxmar, but her keen, analytic intelligence required some one

harder, more vivid, more ruthless, some one who would appeal to

her as an immense force. Yet she must be conservative, she must

play what cards she had to win.

During his summer visit at Narragansett Cowperwood had not been

long disturbed by the presence of Braxmar, for, having received

special orders, the latter was compelled to hurry away to Hampton

Roads. But the following November, forsaking temporarily his

difficult affairs in Chicago for New York and the Carter apartment

in Central Park South, Cowperwood again encountered the Lieutenant,

who arrived one evening brilliantly arrayed in full official regalia

in order to escort Berenice to a ball. A high military cap

surmounting his handsome face, his epaulets gleaming in gold, the

lapels of his cape thrown back to reveal a handsome red silken

lining, his sword clanking by his side, he seemed a veritable

singing flame of youth. Cowperwood, caught in the drift of

circumstance--age, unsuitableness, the flaring counter-attractions

of romance and vigor--fairly writhed in pain.

Berenice was so beautiful in a storm of diaphanous clinging garments.

He stared at them from an adjacent room, where he pretended to

be reading, and sighed. Alas, how was his cunning and foresight

--even his--to overcome the drift of life itself? How was he to

make himself appealing to youth? Braxmar had the years, the color,

the bearing. Berenice seemed to-night, as she prepared to leave,

to be fairly seething with youth, hope, gaiety. He arose after a

few moments and, giving business as an excuse, hurried away. But

it was only to sit in his own rooms in a neighboring hotel and

meditate. The logic of the ordinary man under such circumstances,

compounded of the age-old notions of chivalry, self-sacrifice,

duty to higher impulses, and the like, would have been to step

aside in favor of youth, to give convention its day, and retire

in favor of morality and virtue. Cowperwood saw things in no such

moralistic or altruistic light. " I satisfy myself, " had ever been

his motto, and under that, however much he might sympathize with

Berenice in love or with love itself, he was not content to withdraw

until he was sure that the end of hope for him had really come.

There had been moments between him and Berenice--little approximations

toward intimacy--which had led him to believe that by no means was

she seriously opposed to him. At the same time this business of

the Lieutenant, so Mrs. Carter confided to him a little later,

was not to be regarded lightly. While Berenice might not care so

much, obviously Braxmar did.

" Ever since he has been away he has been storming her with letters, "

she remarked to Cowperwood, one afternoon. " I don't think he is

the kind that can be made to take no for an answer.

" A very successful kind, " commented Cowperwood, dryly. Mrs. Carter

was eager for advice in the matter. Braxmar was a man of parts.

She knew his connections. He would inherit at least six hundred

thousand dollars at his father's death, if not more. What about

her Louisville record? Supposing that should come out later? Would

it not be wise for Berenice to marry, and have the danger over

with?

" It is a problem, isn't it? " observed Cowperwood, calmly. " Are

you sure she's in love? "

" Oh, I wouldn't say that, but such things so easily turn into love.

I have never believed that Berenice could be swept off her feet

by any one--she is so thoughtful--but she knows she has her own

way to make in the world, and Mr. Braxmar is certainly eligible.

I know his cousins, the Clifford Porters, very well. "

Cowperwood knitted his brows. He was sick to his soul with this

worry over Berenice. He felt that he must have her, even at the

cost of inflicting upon her a serious social injury. Better that

she should surmount it with him than escape it with another. It

so happened, however, that the final grim necessity of acting on

any such idea was spared him.

Imagine a dining-room in one of the principal hotels of New York,

the hour midnight, after an evening at the opera, to which Cowperwood,

as host, had invited Berenice, Lieutenant Braxmar, and Mrs. Carter.

He was now playing the role of disinterested host and avuncular

mentor.

His attitude toward Berenice, meditating, as he was, a course which

should be destructive to Braxmar, was gentle, courteous, serenely

thoughtful. Like a true Mephistopheles he was waiting, surveying

Mrs. Carter and Berenice, who were seated in front chairs clad in

such exotic draperies as opera-goers affect--Mrs. Carter in

pale-lemon silk and diamonds; Berenice in purple and old-rose,

with a jeweled comb in her hair. The Lieutenant in his dazzling

uniform smiled and talked blandly, complimented the singers,

whispered pleasant nothings to Berenice, descanted at odd moments

to Cowperwood on naval personages who happened to be present.

Coming out of the opera and driving through blowy, windy streets

to the Waldorf, they took the table reserved for them, and Cowperwood,

after consulting with regard to the dishes and ordering the wine,

went back reminiscently to the music, which had been " La Boheme. "

The death of Mimi and the grief of Rodolph, as voiced by the

splendid melodies of Puccini, interested him.

" That makeshift studio world may have no connection with the genuine

professional artist, but it's very representative of life, " he

remarked.

" I don't know, I'm sure, " said Braxmar, seriously.

" All I know of Bohemia is what I have read in books--Trilby, for

instance, and--" He could think of no other, and stopped. " I

suppose it is that way in Paris. "

He looked at Berenice for confirmation and to win a smile. Owing

to her mobile and sympathetic disposition, she had during the opera

been swept from period to period by surges of beauty too gay or

pathetic for words, but clearly comprehended of the spirit. Once

when she had been lost in dreamy contemplation, her hands folded

on her knees, her eyes fixed on the stage, both Braxmar and

Cowperwood had studied her parted lips and fine profile with common

impulses of emotion and enthusiasm. Realizing after the mood was

gone that they had been watching her, Berenice had continued the

pose for a moment, then had waked as from a dream with a sigh.

This incident now came back to her as well as her feeling in regard

to the opera generally.

" It is very beautiful, " she said; " I do not know what to say.

People are like that, of course. It is so much better than just

dull comfort. Life is really finest when it's tragic, anyhow. "

She looked at Cowperwood, who was studying her; then at Braxmar,

who saw himself for the moment on the captain's bridge of a

battle-ship commanding in time of action. To Cowperwood came back

many of his principal moments of difficulty. Surely his life had

been sufficiently dramatic to satisfy her.

" I don't think I care so much for it, " interposed Mrs. Carter.

" One gets tired of sad happenings. We have enough drama in real

life. "

Cowperwood and Braxmar smiled faintly. Berenice looked contemplatively

away. The crush of diners, the clink of china and glass, the

bustling to and fro of waiters, and the strumming of the orchestra

diverted her somewhat, as did the nods and smiles of some entering

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