A Top-Floor Idyl

CHAPTER V

GORDON HELPS

The passing of the next week or two can only be referred to in a few words, for how can a man gauge the distress of a soul, measure the intensity of its pangs, weight the heavy burden of sorrow? That good little Dr. Porter came in very often. Most tactfully he pretended that his visits were chiefly to me, and would merely drop into the other room on his way out of mine; at any rate the smallness of the bill he rendered long afterwards made me surmise that this was the case.

In the meanwhile, the weather remained very warm and the doors were often left open. I went into the room quite frequently. Eulalie is the salt of the earth, but she still has a little of the roughness of the unground crystal so that, for conversational purposes, Frances Dupont perhaps found my presence more congenial. Her faithful, but temporary, retainer was always there, exuding an atmosphere of robust health and lending propriety to my visits. She was generally darning socks.

The hungry one snatches at any morsel presented to him, while those who are dying of thirst pay little heed to the turbidity of pools they may chance upon. The poor Murillo-girl, perforce, had to be content with such friendship and care as her two new friends could give her. Frieda always came in once a day, but she was tremendously busy with her Orion. Indeed, her visits were eagerly awaited; she brought little doses of comfort, tiny portions of cheer that vied with Porter's remedies in efficacy and, possibly, were much pleasanter to take.

From my friend Hawkins I borrowed baby-scales, fallen into desuetude, and triumphantly jotted down the ounces gained each week by Baby Paul. I believe that the humorous peculiarities of my countenance excited the infant's risibilities; at any rate, the young mother assured me that he smiled when he looked at me. Presently, after the violence of the blow had been slightly assuaged and the hours of silent weeping began to grow shorter, she managed, at times, to look at me as if I also brought a little consolation.

I remember so well the morning when I found the bed empty and neatly made up and the young woman sitting in an uncomfortable rocker. I insisted on returning at once to my room for my old Morris chair, knowing that she would be much easier in it. At first, to my consternation, she refused to accept it, under some plea that she did not want me to be deprived of it. When she finally consented, her eyes were a little moist and I was delighted when she acknowledged that it gave her excellent comfort. A little later came the chapter of confidences, memories of brief happy days with her husband, the warp and woof of an existence that had already suffered from broken threads and heart-strings sorely strained.

She had an Aunt Lucinda, it appeared, and when the teacher of singing in Providence had declared that the girl's voice was an uncut jewel of great price that must be smoothed over to perfection by study abroad, the aunt had consented to extend some help and Frances had gone over.

There had been nearly two years of hard study, with some disappointments and rebuffs, and, finally, great improvement. The crabbed teacher had begun to smile at her and pat her on the back, so that other young women had been envious. This, I presume, was tantamount to a badge of merit. Then, she had sung in one or two concerts and, suddenly, Paul Dupont, the marvelous, had come into her life. He was a first prize of the Conservatoire, for the violin, and, people said, the coming man. There had been another concert and, among other things, Frances had sung Gounod's "Ave Maria" while Paul had played the obligato. It was then that, for the first time, her own voice thrilled her. Joined to the vibrant notes the man could cause to weep and cry out in hope, her song had sounded like a solemn pæan of victorious achievement. Critics had written of her power and brilliancy, of her splendid ease of execution.

And then had come the making of love. He had played again for her, and she had put her soul in the songs, for him to revel in, for her to cry out the beating of her heart. It seemed to have come with the swiftness of a summer storm, and they had married, with just a few friends present to witness the ceremony and rejoice in their happiness.

Aunt Lucinda had written that a woman, who would go abroad and espouse a Papist and a fiddler, was utterly beyond the pale. Let her never show her face in Providence again!

But what did it matter! Happiness lay in the hollow of their hands, rosy and bright, full of wondrous promise. Yet she had written to Aunt Lucinda, dutifully, expressing hope that at some later time she might be looked upon with greater indulgence. And there had been more beautiful songs, and Paul had played, and their souls had vibrated together. Finally, a man from New York had engaged them to come over to America and give a series of concerts. When they started away, she thought she was getting a bad cold, for her voice was beginning to get a little husky. Paul asserted that the trip at sea and the long rest would certainly make everything all right. But in New York she had been compelled to call on a doctor, who was an exceedingly busy man, with hosts of patients, who sprayed her throat and gave her medicine to take and charged very high fees, and – and the voice had kept on growing huskier and – and it was no use trying to sing, and – and the engagement had been broken. And Paul had been so good and swore she would be better by and by, and he had played in concerts, without her, and everything went on very well, except her voice. Then, one day, she had told a most marvelous secret to Paul, and they had rejoiced together and been very happy. Then the war had come like a bolt from the blue, and Paul had taken the very first boat with hundreds of other reservists. She would follow him to France after the baby was born, and there she would wait for him in the dear old house of his parents, who were country people, cultivating a farm and oh! so proud of their wonderful son. They had been ever so good and kind to her. She had written to them several times, but no answer had ever come and then some one told her that the small village in which they lived had been razed to the ground. It was over there on the other side of the Marne. And now it was ever so long since she had received any word from Paul, and they had saved very little, because money came so easily, and – and now Paul was dead and she couldn't sing!

Frieda was in the room with me when the tale was told. She rushed out, and I found her, a few minutes later, in my room, her nose swollen and her eyes devastated by weeping. But she used my wash-basin and towels for plentiful ablutions and returned to the room where I left her alone with Frances Dupont, realizing the futility of a man in such circumstances.

At the end of another week our stout angel burst again into my room. Eulalie had been discharged, with mutual regrets, and little Paul was growing apace. Three and a half ounces in seven days!

"Dave! We've got to find something for Frances to do! In a very short time she will not have a penny left. Go to work at once and, in the meanwhile, I'll do my best also. Yes, I know perfectly well that the two of us will see that she doesn't suffer, but she doesn't want charity; she wants work!"

She was off again, and I knew that she would at once inquire of the butcher, the baker and the candlestick-maker in regard to positions suited to a young woman with a Murillo-face and a baby. I put on my hat and went at once to Gordon's studio, facing Central Park. I was lucky enough to find him in.

"Sit down and don't bother me," he said pleasantly. "I must use up the last of this light."

Before him stood an easel with a wonderful portrait of a young woman endowed with splendid neck and arms. He was working at some detail of the gown, which the lady had evidently sent over for him, since the garment was disposed about a large mannikin with a vacuous face. I watched delightedly the sure touches with which he reproduced the sheen of the silk. Gordon doesn't want to talk while he paints, pretending that in order to do his best work a man must bend all his energies to it, whether he is sawing wood or writing elegies.

"People wouldn't begin chatting to a fellow while he played Chopin," he told me one day. "What right have they to disturb the harmonies in a man's mind when he's creating melodies in color? Hang their impertinence!"

I presume, however, that painting a silk dress was somewhat mechanical work to him, for, after some minutes of silent toil, during which he only stepped back once to survey his work, he began to speak. Like many other people, he has not the slightest objection to the infringing of his own rules. It only behooves others to obey them.

"That's Miss Sophia Van Rossum," he told me, taking his short pipe out of his mouth and putting it down on his stool. "She's been coming in from Southampton three times a week, to pose. Drives her own car, you know, and has been arrested a dozen times for speeding. So I finished the face and hands first, and now I'm sticking in the dress. Don't need her for that."

"Very rich people, are they not?" I asked.

"You bet. Zinc and lead, I believe; the old man made it in. Fine buxom creature, isn't she? And mighty good hearted in her way. She hasn't much more brains than a linnet, I think, and she swims and rows and shoots. Golf and tennis, too. Found her rather hard to paint, because it's difficult for her to keep still. Keeps on asking indignantly why I put blue on her nose, and reaching out for the box of chocolates. I told her last time I couldn't paint her with one cheek all bulged out with pralinés. It made her laugh, and I lost fifteen minutes before I could quiet her down."

He worked hard for another ten minutes, during which I considered that he was rather severe on the young lady, or else had idealized her, which is not a habit of his. To me she looks kindly and not a bit unintelligent, a rather fine specimen of the robustious modern young woman. Gordon picked up his brushes.

"That'll do," he said. "The light is changing. Now what the devil do you want? Awfully glad to see you."

My friend is a good listener. I told him about Frances Dupont, giving him a brief account of her story and explaining that Frieda and I wanted to find something for her to do.

"Of course," I finally said, "I suppose that you are going away very soon to spend the rest of this hot summer in the country. Otherwise, I would have asked if you couldn't make use of her for a model, at least till we can find something else."

"I'm not going away yet," he answered, "and I emphatically cannot employ her, or, at any rate, I won't, which comes to the same thing. Hitherto I have kept my serenity of mind unimpaired by the simple process of fighting shy of females in distress. There are lots of models who can be depended on to keep their mouths shut and not bother a fellow. My interest is in my picture and nothing else, and I refuse to have it diverted by the economical problems of ladies on their uppers. If you want a check, I'll give it to you for her, not on her account, but because you're the best, old, weak-minded idiot in this burg and I'm glad to help you out, however silly your quixotic ideas may be. Wait a minute, I'll write one out for you."

"No," I answered, "I've just sold two stories and got some advance royalty on my novel. I'd come and ask you for money, if I needed it, urgently. I might have to, some day. But this poor thing's worrying herself to death and that's what I want to remedy at once, if possible. A little occupation would give her something else to think about. If I tell her that she will have to pose in silence, that it's a part of the work she's engaged for, she won't say a word. She's an intelligent woman."

"Why doesn't Frieda employ her?" he asked.

"Because she's no slender, ethereal sprite. Doesn't have anything of the woodland nymph about her, that's why. Besides, Frieda's doing an Orion with a covey of Pleiades scattering before him, at present."

"I have nothing for the Winter Academy, just now," said Gordon, appearing to relent a little. "Strangely enough, Miss Van Rossum doesn't care to have her portrait exhibited. If I really found a remarkable type, I'd like to do a mother and child. If you really think this Mrs. Dupont will keep still and is willing to earn a few weeks of bread and cheese by the silence of her tongue and some ability to sit quietly in a chair without getting the fidgets, I shouldn't mind trying her. But, of course, she'd have to come up to specifications. I'll have to look at her first. Have you spoken to her about it?"

"Not a word," I answered, "I didn't want to see her disappointed."

"Of course, it's a foolish thing to do," he said, "but you're so anxious about it that I'll see whether it can be managed. She's just heard of her husband's death, has she? Well, she won't be thinking of other men for a while and won't expect to be made love to. Take up your hat, and we'll go over to that nursery of yours. I'll look her over."

If I hadn't known him so well, I should have been provoked at his speaking as if the woman had been some second-hand terrier I wanted to dispose of. We took the elevator and were shot down to the ground floor.

"Mind you," he warned me, "it's ten to one that I'll discover something that will make this errand useless. The mere fact of a woman's having a broken-down voice and a baby doesn't necessarily qualify her to pose as a mother. The woods are full of them. You've probably endowed her with good looks that exist only in your imagination."

To this I made no answer. The mere fact of his having consented to investigate was already a distinct triumph for me. Twenty minutes later we were climbing up the stairs of what he called my zoological boarding-house.

On the second landing, he stopped abruptly and listened. Then he turned to me with a corner of his mouth twisted in the beginning of one of his sarcastic grins.

"Who's that playing your piano?" he asked.

"I – I fancy it must be Mrs. Dupont," I answered. "You see, she's very much alone, and my door was open, and I suppose she saw the thing and walked in, not knowing that I should return so soon."

"Oh! You needn't look so sheepish," he told me. "You look as if a policeman had caught you with a jimmy in your hip-pocket. My dear old boy, I hope she isn't the straw that's going to break your back, you old Bactrian camel! The little wagons they use for the carrying of dynamite in New York, wherewith to soften its tough old heart and permit the laying of foundations, are painted red and marked explosives. Were I the world's czar, I should have every woman labelled the same way. They're dangerous things."

Gordon is somewhat apt to mix his metaphors, a thing rather natural to one who seeks to wed his wit with a pose of scepticism. Really simple language, clothing ordinary common sense, is inadequate for a scoffer; also, I am afraid, for a man who writes about mules and virtuous dogs.

I think we both instinctively stepped more lightly in ascending the remaining stairs. She was playing very softly. It was a dreamy thing with recurring little sobs of notes. For a moment we stopped again; I think it had appealed to us. Then I went in, accompanied by Gordon, and she ceased at once, startled and coloring a little.

"I am so glad you were diverting yourself with the old piano," I told her. "I hope you will always use it when I am out, and – and perhaps once in a while when I am in. My mother used to play such things; she wasn't always happy. I beg to present my friend Gordon McGrath, who is a great painter. He's awfully fond of Frieda."

This, I think, was a canny and effective introduction. Any friend of Frieda's must be very welcome to her.

"Madame," said Gordon, after she had proffered her hand, "won't you oblige us by sitting down. You have been caught in the act and deserve the penalty of being humbly begged to play that over again."

She looked at me, uncertainly.

"It would give me ever so much pleasure," I assured her.

At once she sat again and touched the keys. I know so little of music that my opinions in regard to it are utterly worthless, but I knew at once that she was no marvelous pianist. No, she was only a woman with a soul for harmony, which found soft and tender expression on my mother's old Steinway. Gordon, I noted, sat down in my worst chair, with an elbow on his knee, his chin resting on the closed knuckles. It was evident that he was watching her, studying her every motion, the faint swaying of her shapely head, the wandering of her hands over the keyboard. Once, she stopped very suddenly and listened.

"I beg your pardon," she said, "I thought it was Baby."

She went on, reassured, to an ending that came very soon. It left in me a desire for more, but I could not ask her to continue. She had brought a tiny bit of herself into the room, but she belonged body and soul to the mite in the other.

"I am ever so much obliged to you," I said, as she rose.

"Madame," said Gordon, "it was indeed a treat."

"I am very glad you liked it," she said very simply, "and – and now I must go back."

She smiled, faintly, and inclined her head. We had both risen and thanked her again. She passed out of the room and, once she had regained her own, I heard her faint, husky voice.

"It's mother's own wee lamb!" it said.

Gordon picked up one of my cigarettes, looked at it, put it down, and took one of his own from his case. Then, he went and stood in front of my open window, looking out, with his hands stuffed deeply in his trousers pockets. I maintained a discreet silence.

"Come over here," he ordered, brusquely, as is often his way, and I complied, holding on to my calabash and filling it from my pouch.

"Dave," he said, very low, that his voice might not carry through the open doors into the next room. "Those powder-wagons aren't in it. When the dynamite happens to blow up some Dago, it's a mere accident; the stuff itself is intended for permissible purposes. A woman like that is bound to play havoc with some one, and I'm afraid you're the poor old idiot marked by fate. You're as weak as a decrepit cat. I can see the whole programme; sympathy at first and the desire to console, all mixed up with the imagination that has permitted you to write that 'Land o' Love.' My dear man, you might just as well go and commit suicide in some decent way. If you don't look out, you're done for!"

"Don't be an ass, Gordon," I told him, lighting my pipe.

"All right, it's your own funeral. But don't come to me, afterwards, and weep on my shirtfront, that's all. Women get over the loss of a husband, they even become reconciled to the death of a baby, sometimes. And this one has music in her soul, and for ever and a day she is going to deplore the song that fled from her lips. She'll always be unhappy and you'll have to keep on consoling, and the freedom of your thoughts will vanish, and, when you try to write, you will have her and her miseries always before you. Then you will shed tears on your typewriter instead of producing anything. Better give Frieda some money for her and go fishing. Don't come back until the Milliken woman sends a postal telling you that the coast is clear."

"I know nothing about fishing," I answered.

"Then go and learn."

"You're talking arrant nonsense," I informed him.

"I am giving you the quintessence of solid wisdom," he retorted. "But now I'll tell you about her posing for me. I'm not doing this for your sake or hers, but because she has a really interesting head, and I know myself. I can get a good picture out of her, and I'll employ her for about three weeks. That'll be plenty. After that, I expect to go away and stay with the Van Rossums in the country. While Mrs. Dupont is busy posing for me, you and Frieda can look up another job for her. Let me see; I might possibly be able to pass her on to some other studio, if she takes to posing, properly."

I put my pipe down, intending to strike while the iron was hot.

"Come in with me," I told him.

"Of course you understand that in some ways she's going to be a good deal of a nuisance," he said hurriedly. "The baby squalling when I've just happened to get into my stride and the mother having to retire to feed the thing. But never mind, she's got quite a stunning face."

I knocked at her door, although I could see her sitting at the window with the baby in her arms.

"Please don't trouble to get up," I said. "My friend Gordon happens to need a model; he's thinking of a picture of a mother and child and has told me that, if you could pose for him, he would be glad to employ you. It wouldn't last very long, but you would have the baby with you. By the way, painters have to think very hard when they're at work and so they can't talk much at the same time, so that models have to keep very still. I know you won't mind that, because it's part of the work."

The top button of her waist was open. Instinctively her hand went up to it and covered the very small expanse of white neck that had been revealed.

"A model!" she exclaimed huskily. "I – I don't know – "

Gordon's face looked as if it was graven in stone.

"It is just for the face and hands," he said coldly. "It will be a picture of a woman sitting at an open window; just as you were when we came in. Of course, if you don't care to – "