The Terms of Surrender
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“Has she proved disloyal?”
“What else? I tried to find comfort in the belief that her father compelled her to accompany him by threatening to kill her if she refused. But, in these days, that sort of melodrama does not endure beyond its hour. She could have escaped him fifty times during the last six days. She could have appealed to you for help. Mary Van Ralten would at least have shielded her from murder. Yet, what are the facts? In a letter to me she pleaded duty as an excuse. She must have had some similar plea in her mind when she spoke to you. And she has gone to Europe – to rejoin Marten!”
He broke off with a gesture of disdain. He was in revolt. The statue which had glowed into life under the breath of his love was hardening into polished ivory again.
“May I see that letter?” said Dacre.
“Yes. Here it is.”
The older man read and reread Nancy’s sorrow-laden words.
“She tells you her poor heart is breaking – I believe her – in every syllable,” he said.
“Believe her – when she prates of duty – to Marten?”
“I don’t profess to understand, yet I believe. I do, on my soul!”
Power’s face grew dark with a grim humor that was more tragic than misery. “Am I to follow – by the next steamer?” he demanded.
“No. She will come back – send for you. The present deadlock cannot last.”
Again Power showed his disbelief by a scornful grimace. “I am so deeply beholden to your friendship that I claim the privilege of saying that you are talking nonsense,” he said. “She vowed the fidelity to me which I gave unreservedly to her; but what sort of inconstant ideal inspired her faith, that it should be shattered to atoms by the first real test? Could I ever trust her again? If it were possible, which it is not, that some new whim drove her back to America, am I a toy dog to be whistled to heel as soon as her woman’s caprice dictates? To please her father, she married Marten; to placate her father, she has gone back to Marten; to gratify some feminine impulse, she flung herself in my arms; when impulse, or duty as she calls it, again overcomes reason, she may summon her obedient slave once more. Would I run to her call? I don’t know. My God! I don’t know.”
“I’m sure you don’t,” was the quiet response; “nor do you know how unjust you are being to her, leaving me out of the question altogether. You are like a dismasted ship in a storm, driven this way and that by every cross sea, yet drifting hopelessly nearer a rock-bound coast. Yet men have saved their lives even in such desperate conditions. At the worst, short of death, they have scrambled ashore, bruised and maimed, but living. Now, I ask you to suspend judgment for a few days, or weeks. Enlightenment may come – it must come – perhaps from a source you little dream of now. Suppose I practise what I preach, and talk of something else. I think I have whipped you out of a lethargy that was harmful, and, in so far, have done you good. But I’m not here to discuss problems of psychology which are insoluble – for the present, at any rate. Tell me something of your property, of the mine, of Bison. What delightful character-types you picked up in MacGonigal and that picturesque-looking cowboy. And how did the latter gentleman lose the thumb off his left hand? Was it a mere accident? I hope not. I rather expect to hear a page out of the real history of the wild and woolly West.”
Power was slightly ashamed of his outburst already. “You make me feel myself a blatant misanthropist,” he said contritely. “I had no right to blaze out at you in that way. But, now you are here, you shall not escape so easily. Again, and most heartily, I thank you for coming. I realize now that what I wanted more than anything else in the world was some sympathetic ear into which to pour my griefs. Ordinarily, I am not that sort of man. I prefer to endure the minor ills of life in silence. But I have been slammed so hard this time that self-control became a torture. I think I reached the full extent of my resources when I stood by my mother’s open grave today, and saw her name on the coffin. I wanted to tear my heart out with my own hands. For a few seconds I was actually insane.”
“MacGonigal told me how terribly shaken you were. He said you would have fallen if he had not held you up.”
“Ah, was that it? I suppose I nearly fainted. Some nerve in my brain seemed to snap. Perhaps that is why I am talking at random now.”
Not all Dacre’s tact could stop the imminent recital of events since their last meeting. Yet, curiously enough, Power seemed to grow calmer, more even-minded, as he told of his idyl and its dramatic close. By the time they had reached the house again he had recast his views as to Nancy’s desertion of him. During some few days thereafter Fate ceased her outrageous attacks, and he was vouchsafed a measure of peace.
The next blow came from an unexpected hand. Mrs. Moore and her daughters were about to leave Bison for their home in San Francisco. All preparations were made, and their baggage was piled on the veranda ready for transport to the station, when the good lady who had proved such a stanch friend in an emergency called Power into the library. He noticed that she was carrying a small package, wrapped in a piece of linen, and tied with white ribbon.
“Derry,” she said, “I have one sad duty to perform before I go.”
He winced slightly. He was beginning to hate that word “duty.” The very sound of it was ominous, full of foreboding.
“It is nothing to cause you any real sorrow,” she went on, thinking he had misinterpreted her words. “Just before your dear mother’s death she gave me to understand that I was to take charge of a bundle of letters which she kept under her pillow. They were meant for you, I suppose; but unfortunately I could not make out her wishes. Anyhow, here they are. You are the one person in the world who can decide whether or not they should be destroyed. I put them in a locked box, and would have given them to you sooner, but – ” She hesitated, seemingly at a loss for a word.
“But I was acting like a lunatic, and you were afraid of the consequences,” he said, with a pleasant smile.
“Well, I have never seen any man so hard hit,” she admitted. “Mr. Dacre’s arrival was a perfect Godsend, for you and all of us; so I thought it best to keep these letters longer than I had planned at first, though I am sure there is nothing in them to cause you any distress. Indeed, I have an idea that they are mostly your own correspondence, sent from New York and elsewhere, because I saw your handwriting on an envelop, and a postmark. You are not vexed with me for retaining them until today?”
Power reassured her on that point. He placed the packet, just as it was, in a drawer of a writing-desk, and did not open it until he had returned from the station after escorting the women to their train.
Dacre had strolled to the outbuildings to inspect a reaping-machine of new design which had been procured for harvesting work; so the room was otherwise untenanted when the son began to examine his mother’s last bequest. At first it seemed as if Mrs. Moore’s surmise was correct. The first few letters he glanced at were those he had despatched from New York and Newport. Then he came upon others posted at Racket, and a twinge of remorse shook him when he recalled the subterfuges and evasions they contained. Still it had been impossible to set forth the truth, and there was a crumb of comfort in the fact that he had written nothing untrue.
He was so disturbed by the painful memories evoked by each date that he was on the verge of tying the bundle together again when his eye was caught by one letter in a strange handwriting. The postmark showed that it hailed from New York, and the date was a curious one, being exactly six days after he and Nancy went from Newport.
Instantly he was aware of a strong impulse to burn that particular letter forthwith. Perhaps some psychic influence made itself felt in that instant. Perhaps a gentle and loving spirit reached from beyond the veil, and made one last effort to secure the fulfilment of a desire balked by the cruel urgency of death. But the forces of evil prevailed, and Power withdrew the written sheet from its covering.
And this is what he read:
“Madam. – Your son, John Darien Power, has probably represented to you that he is detained in the East by certain horse-dealing transactions. That is a lie. He has gone off with another man’s wife. But his punishment will be swift and sure. He cannot escape it. Its nature will depend on the decision arrived at by the woman he has wronged. I am telling you the facts so that you may be in a position to form a just judgment, whether or not you ever see him again. Keep this letter; although it is unsigned. If circumstances require its production, the writer will not shirk responsibility for either its statements or its threats.”
Dacre came in nearly an hour later. After witnessing an exhibition of the new reaper, he had gone with Jake to admire some of Power’s recent purchases in horse-flesh, and the time passed rapidly. When he entered the room, he found his friend sitting in the shadows.
“Hello!” he cried. “I didn’t know you had returned. I’ve been vetting those black Russians you bought at Newport. What a pair for a tandem!”
“Did Dr. Stearn ever tell you the exact cause of my mother’s death?” was the curiously inappropriate reply, uttered in a low tone.
“Y-yes; acute ulcerative endocarditis was the actual cause. But why in the world do you ask such a question now?”
“Because our worthy doctor was mistaken. I alone know why she died. I killed her. You recollect I said as much to you the day you arrived.”
“I wish to goodness you would cease talking, or even thinking, such arrant rubbish!”
“Nothing could be so certain. Willard wrote and told her I had taken Nancy away from Marten. Willard struck the blow; but I forged the weapon. My mother lay dying while I was philandering with another man’s wife. Poor soul! She tried to have the letter destroyed – to spare me, no doubt – but the dagger I placed in Willard’s hand had pierced so deep that she died with the words of forgiveness on her lips. No, you need not worry unduly, Dacre; though I have no right to harrow your feelings in this way. I shall not anticipate the decree of Providence by self-murder. My worst chastisement now is to live, knowing that I killed my mother.”
“What damned rot!” broke out Dacre furiously.
Power rose, went to his friend, and put a hand on his shoulder. He smiled, with an odd semblance of content.
“You’re a good chap,” he said, “but a poor actor. You know I am right. You wouldn’t stand in my shoes for all the gold in the Indies; ‘for what doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?’ I’ve lost mine. I must try and find it again. Don’t you see? That is my only chance. Good God! If there is another and a better life hereafter, I cannot meet my mother and tell her that I valued my wretched husk of a body so greatly that I made no search for the soul I flung away. I’ve thought it all out. The road is open and marked with signposts. A man without a soul can surely afford to risk his body. Come! It is growing dark, and this room will soon be peopled with ghosts. Let’s walk in the fresh, cool air, and I’ll explain myself clearly.”
CHAPTER XIII
THE BEGINNING OF THE PILGRIMAGE
At first none save Dacre knew what was going on. To MacGonigal and Jake it seemed that Power was merely seeking distraction by putting his affairs in order, and they regarded such healing activity with joy. People in Bison, too, were delighted by the change in his habits. The man who used to leave to his mother everything connected with the social well-being of the town now gave these matters his close interest, and inquired thoroughly into the philanthropic schemes to which she had devoted so much time and almost unstinted means; incidentally, he contrived to puzzle Dr. Stearn.
One day, when in Denver on business, he called at the doctor’s house.
“I want you to clear up a point that is bothering me,” he said. “Suppose nothing unusual had occurred to hasten my mother’s death, how long would she have lived?”
“Nothing unusual did occur,” insisted Stearn.
“Ah! I have expressed myself awkwardly. How long, then, under the most favorable conditions, could she have lived?”
“Three or four years.”
“Five?”
“It is possible.”
“Six?”
“I should doubt it.”
“Seven?”
“You are marching too rapidly. If Mrs. Power lived seven years with inflamed aortic valves, I should regard the fact as something akin to a miracle.”
“But miracles do happen, even in science?”
“Um – yes.”
“Thank you, Doctor. That is all I wish to know. Anything you want for your poorer patients?”
Stearn laughed. “Great Scott!” he cried, “you ought to come with me on a round of visits. It would be an eye-opener for a wealthy young sprig like you. Why, if I had ten dollars a day to spend on special diet, stimulants, and the like, I could get through every cent of the money.”
“Sorry I haven’t time today for slumming. Goodby. I may not see you again for quite awhile.”
“Going abroad?”
“Yes; but my plans are indefinite.”
“Well, young man, when you come back to Colorado, bring a wife, or, better still, look around for one before you go.”
“I’ll think it over. But I must be off. I’m due at my lawyer’s.”
“Those fellows who rake in gold by the bushel are all alike,” grumbled Stearn, when the door had closed on his visitor. “I did imagine, after what he had said, that he would skin a fifty off his wad for the benefit of the poor bedridden devils on my list. Ah, well! They’ll miss his mother at Bison. And what did he mean by his questions? On my honor, he struck me as slightly cracked.”
A fortnight later, when Power was far beyond the reach of thanks, the cashier of Smith & Moffat’s bank sent a formal little note, stating that he was instructed by Mr. John Darien Power to hand him (Dr. Stearn) one hundred dollars on the first of every month during the next seven years, “for the benefit of the sick poor in your district, and in memory of Mary Elizabeth Power.” If the doctor would kindly call, etc.
Stearn rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Oh,” said he, to himself, “is that what he was after? Well, it’s a lesson, even to a grayhead like me. I misjudged him shockingly.”
That same period of seven years proved a stumbling-block to others beside the gruff but kind-hearted medico. Peter MacGonigal, for one, was “dog-goned etarnally” when he heard of it. A lawyer and two bankers, one from Denver and another from New York, were appointed trustees of Power’s estate, real and personal, and the arrangement was partly explained to Mac and Jake, so that they might understand how their interests would be safeguarded. On that historic occasion Jake’s real name was disclosed. Hitherto, no one in Bison believed that he possessed a surname; but, under pressure, he “allowed” he was “riz” in Texas, and his father’s name was James Cutler.
The arrangement was that MacGonigal should control the mine and Jake the ranch for seven years. If Power did not return about the end of that time, and both men were living, a further six months should be allowed to pass, and then each would become the owner of the respective properties under highly favorable terms.
“I may as well say that I shall come back right enough,” said Power, smiling at their bewilderment. “I am only settling matters now to please my lawyer, who wants to avoid a suit for intestacy, or a long argument to presume my death in case I am not heard of again. That is all.”
“Is it?” gasped MacGonigal.
“Yes. In any event, neither of you will be a loser.”
“But whar in hell air you goin’, Derry?”
This, from the man who never swore, was electrical. Jake said afterward that he felt his hair “stannin’ right up on end.”
“I am undertaking a quest,” said Power seriously.
“An’ what the – Gosh! I’ll bust! What’s a ‘quest,’ anyhow?”
“In this instance, it implies a pilgrimage in far lands. Don’t ask me anything else, Mac, because I shall not answer.”
“You’ll be needin’ a plug or two, maybe?” put in Jake anxiously.
“If I do, I’ll send word.”
They could extract no further information. Certain documents were signed with due solemnity, and the conclave broke up. The three trustees took the opportunity offered by Power’s departure for the town to sound Dacre, who was present, as to their client’s intentions. But he, as a loyal friend, though greatly in Power’s confidence, could not reveal his motives; while, as to his plans, he was free to admit, quite candidly, that he had not the slightest notion of their nature. Thus, Bison awoke one morning to find that its chief citizen had left the place overnight. It was only by degrees that the inhabitants discovered how thoroughly he had inquired into and anticipated local needs. Means were forthcoming for every judicious social enterprise. The man had gone; but his money remained.
Dacre accompanied him to Denver. They separated on a platform of the station at the foot of 17th Street, and, at the twelfth hour, the Englishman made a last effort to dissuade his friend from embarking on what he regarded as a fantastic adventure.
“I don’t know where you are heading for, Power,” he said. “You have not told me, and I can only suppose you mean to be lost to the world.”
“Something like that,” and Power smiled frankly. His face no longer wore the hunted, harassed aspect of a man who finds the unhappiness of life almost unbearable. A new look had come into his eyes. He seemed to be gazing constantly at some far horizon not bounded by earth and sky, a dim, sunless line beyond which lay a mysterious land of peace, a kingdom akin to Nirvana, the realm of extinction.
“Shall I not hear from you, even once a year?”
“It is improbable,” was the grave answer.
“But I refuse to believe that you and I are parting now forever.”
“If Providence wills it, we shall meet again. I hope so. If ever I find myself back in the crowded highway, I shall look for you.”
“Can’t I induce you, even now, to come with me to England? I’m tired of globe-trotting. You would find my place in Devonshire a quiet nook.”
“I’ll come to you sometime.”
Then, greatly daring, Dacre urged a plea so cruelly direct that he had not ventured to use it before this final moment.
“Have you reflected as to the effect of this action of yours on Nancy when she hears of it?” he said. “I may run up against her. There are only ten thousand of us, you know. She will surely ask me what has become of you. What am I to tell her?”
Power had not spoken of Nancy during a month or more, and his friend thought that a sudden thrusting of her image before his eyes would startle him out of the semihypnotic condition in which he appeared to exist. But, to Dacre’s chagrin and astonishment, the ruse failed utterly. Power evidently found the point thus unexpectedly raised somewhat perplexing.
“Tell her?” he repeated, in a most matter-of-fact tone. “Is it necessary to tell her anything? But, of course, you will say you saw the last of me, and a woman hates to be ignored, even by the man she has discarded. Tell her, then, that in India there are Hindus of devout intent who measure two thousand miles of a sacred river by prostrations along its banks. These devotees have done no wrong to any human being, and their notion of service is sublimely ridiculous. But if, among them, was a poor wretch who had committed an unforgivable crime, and he thought to expiate it by carrying sharp flints on which to fling himself each yard of the way, one could understand him.”
“That is no message to Nancy,” persisted Dacre.
“If she pouts, and says so, remind her of my mother’s death.”
“Oh, I shall leave you in anger if you talk in that way.”
“No, you won’t. You’re really more than a little sorry for me. You think, perhaps, I am rather mad; but, on reflection, you will be pleased at that, because a lunatic can be contented in his folly, and I know you wish me content. Here’s my train. San Francisco is a great jumping-off place. ‘Last seen in San Francisco’ is quite a common headline in the newspapers. Goodby! I’ll look you up in Devonshire, never fear. Mind you are there to receive me.”
And he was gone. Dacre turned his face to the east. During the long journey to Washington, where he meant to visit some friends before crossing the Atlantic, he thought often of Power. Speaking of him one day to a man of some influence in the Department of State, he inquired if there were any means of keeping track of the wanderer without his cognizance.
“Yes,” said the official. “We can send out a private consular note. Have you any idea which way he is heading?”
“Not the faintest. From a sort of hint he let drop, he may intend joining a Buddhist community in India or Ceylon. At any rate, he had been reading some book on India. But the assumption is too vague to be of value.”
“Well, I’ll see what can be done.”
By the next mail, every United States consulate in the world was asked to report to Washington if John Darien Power, an American citizen, appeared within its jurisdiction. No report ever arrived. Long before the inquiry reached the one consul who might have learned something of his whereabouts, Power had vanished off the map; a phrase which, in this instance, happened to be literally true. Thus, Dacre’s well-meant efforts to keep in touch with his friend were frustrated, and, for the time, he drops out of this history.
When Power arrived in San Francisco, though his definite project as to the future involved a long disappearance from the haunts of civilized men, he had not decided where to pitch his tent. He had actually thought, as Dacre surmised, of going to the inner fastnesses of the Himalayas; but his voluntary exile connoted something more than mere effacement – it meant suffering, and sacrifice, and the succor of earth’s miserable ones – and the barrier of language shut out the East. Again, there was little, if any, element of danger attached to a sojourn in the hilly solitudes of Hindustan; it even appealed to his student’s proclivities. So, for that reason alone, it was dismissed. Spanish was the only foreign tongue he was thoroughly conversant with, and his thoughts turned to Spanish-speaking South America. He made up his mind to go there, and search for his field.
San Francisco was the city of his childhood. In happier conditions, it could hardly fail to evoke pleasant memories. The Moores lived there, and they, aided by a host of oldtime acquaintances, would gladly have made him welcome; but he avoided such snares by driving straight to the offices of the Pacific Steamship Company, where he ascertained that the mail steamer Panama sailed for Valparaiso that day.
He was on board within the hour, and remained in his cabin until the engines started. Then he went on deck, and bade farewell to a land where he had worked, and dreamed, and endured, during the full years of his lost youth. Practically his last intimate glimpse of the West, save for distant views of the California coast, and a fleeting call at San Diego, was obtained when the vessel passed through the Golden Gate. Bitter-sweet recollections warred in heart and brain as he watched the beautiful and well-loved panorama. Every bold promontory and sequestered bay of the miles of narrow straits were familiar to his eyes. If there was aught of weakness in his composition, it must have made its presence felt then; but that there could be any turning back did not even occur to his vague thoughts. He might be moving swiftly into unfathomable night; his action might be deemed either stubborn or irresponsible; he might be regarded as the victim of deep delusion; but at least it must be said of him that he never flinched from the barren outlook or admitted the possibility of retreat. Hitherto love for his mother had exercised the most lasting and salutary influence on his life. The depth and intensity of that love was the gage of his horror when he discovered that he had caused her death. His emotions were incapable of logical analysis. She was dead. His forbidden passion for another woman had killed her. She might have lived seven years. For seven years he would placate her spirit “in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.”