In the Heart of a Fool

CHAPTER XXXII

WHEREIN VIOLET HOGAN TAKES UP AN OLD TRADE AND MARGARET VAN DORN SEEKS A HIGHER PLANE

The new Century brought to Harvey such plenitude that all night and all day the smelter fires painted the sky up and down the Wahoo Valley; all night long and all day long the miners worked in the mines, and all through the night and the long day the great cement factory and the glass factories belched forth their lurid fumes. The trolley cars went creaking and moaning around the curves through the mean, dirty, squalid, little streets of the mining and manufacturing towns. They whined impatiently as they sailed across the prairie grass under the befogged sunshine between the settlements, but always they brought up with their loads at Harvey. So Harvey grew to be a prosperous inland city, and the Palace Hotel with its onyx and marble office, once the town’s pride, found itself with all its striving but a third-class hostelry, while the three-story building of the Traders’ Bank looked low and squatty beside its six and seven storied neighbors. The tin cornices of Market Street were wiped away, and yellow brick and terra cotta and marble took the place of the old ornaments of which the young town had been so proud. The thread of wires and pipes that made the web of the spider behind the brass sign, multiplied and the pipes and the rails and the cables that carried his power grew taut and strong. New people by thousands had come into the town and gradually the big house, the Temple of Love on Hill Crest, that had been deserted during the first years of its occupancy, filled up. Judge Thomas Van Dorn and his handsome wife were seen in the great hotels of New York and Boston, and in Europe more or less, though the acquaintances they made in Europe and in the East were no longer needed to fill their home. But the old settlers of Harvey maintained their siege. It was at a Twelfth Night festivity when young people from all over the Valley and from all over the West were masqueing in the great house, that Judge Van Dorn, to please a pretty girl from Baltimore whom the Van Dorns had met in Italy, shaved his mustache and appeared before the guests with a naked lip. The pursed, shrunken, sensuous lips of the cruel mouth showed him so mercilessly that Mrs. Van Dorn could not keep back a little scream of horror the first time he stood before her with his shaved lip. But she changed her scream to a baby giggle, and he did not know how he was revealed. So he went about ever after, preening himself that his smooth face gave him youth, and strutting inordinately because some of the women he knew told him he looked like a boy of twenty-five–instead of a man in his forties. He was always suave, always creakingly debonaire, always, even in his meannesses, punctilious and airy.

So the old settlers sometimes were fooled by his attitude toward Margaret, his wife. He bore toward her in public that shallow polish of attention, which puzzled those who knew that they were never together by themselves when he could help it, that he spent his evenings at the City Club, and that often at the theater they sat almost back to back unconsciously during the whole performance. But after the curtain was down, the polite husband was the soul of attendance upon the beautiful wife–her coat, her opera glasses, her trappings of various sorts flew in and out of his eager hands as though he were a conjurer playing with them for an audience. For he was a proud man, and she was a vain woman, and they were striving to prove to a disapproving world that the bargain they had made was a good one.

Yet the old settlers of Harvey felt instinctively that the price of their Judge’s bargain was not so trifling a matter as at first the happy couple had esteemed it. The older people saw the big house glow with light as the town spread over the hill and prosperity blackened the Valley. The older people played their quiet games of bridge, by night, and said little. Judge Van Dorn polished the periods of his orations, kept himself like a race horse, strutted like a gobbler, showed his naked mouth, held himself always tightly in hand, kept his eye out for a pretty face, wherever it might be found, drank a little too much at night at the City Club; not much too much but a very little too much–so much that he needed something to brighten his eyes in the morning.

But whatever the Judge’s views were on the chess game of the cosmos, Margaret, his wife, had no desire to beat God at his own game. She was a seeker, who always was looking for a new God. God after God had passed in weary review before her. She was always ready to tune up with the infinite, and to ignore the past–a most comfortable thing to do under the circumstances.

As she turned into Market Street one February morning of the New Year in the New Century, leading her dachshund, she was revolving a deep problem in her head. She was trying to get enough faith to believe that her complexion did not need a renovation. She knew that the skin-thought she kept holding was earth-bound and she had tried to shake it, but it wouldn’t shake. She had progressed far enough in the moment’s cult to overcome a food-thought when her stomach hurt her, by playing a stiff game of bridge for a little stake. But the skin-thought was with her, and she was nervous and irritable and upon the verge of tears for nothing at all. Moreover, her dog kept pulling at his leash, so altogether her cup was running over and she went into Mr. Brotherton’s store to ask him to try to find an English translation of a highly improper German book with a pious title about which she had heard from a woman from Chicago who had been visiting her.

Now Mr. Brotherton had felt the impulse of the town’s prosperity in his business. The cigar stand was gone. In its place was a handsome plain glass case containing expensive books–books bound in vellum, books in hand-tooled leather, books with wide, ragged margins of heavy linen paper around deep black types with illuminated initials at the chapter heads; books filled with extravagant illustrations, books so beautiful that Mr. Brotherton licked his chops with joy when he considered the difference between the cost mark and the price mark. The Amen Corner was gone–the legend that had come down from the pool room, “Better go to bed lonesome than wake up in debt,” had been carted to the alley. While the corner formerly occupied by the old walnut bench still held a corner seat, it was a corner seat with sharp angles, with black stain upon it, and upholstered in rich red leather, and red leather pillows lounged luxuriously in the corners of the seat; a black, angular table and a red, angular shade over a green angular lamp sat where the sawdust box had been. True–a green angular smoker’s set also was upon the table–the only masculine appurtenance in the corner; but it was clearly a sop thrown out to offended and exiled mankind–a mere mockery of the solid comfort of the sawdust box, filled with cigar stubs and ashes that had made the corner a haven for weary man for nearly a score of years. Above the black-stained seat ran a red dado and upon that in fine old English script, where once the old sign of the Corner had been nailed, there ran this legend:

For Mr. Brotherton’s commercial spirit could not permit him to withhold the fact that he had enlarged his business by adding such household necessities as wall paper and such business necessities as stationery and office supplies. Thus the town referred ever after to Mr. Brotherton’s “Sweet serenity of Books and Wallpaper,” and so it was known of men in Harvey.

When Mrs. Van Dorn entered, she was surprised; for while she had heard casually of the changes in Mr. Brotherton’s establishment, she was not prepared for the effulgence of refined and suppressed grandeur that greeted her.

Mr. Brotherton, in a three buttoned frock coat, a rich black ascot tie and suitable gray trousers, came forward to meet her.

“Ah, George,” she exclaimed in her baby voice, “really what a lit-ry,” that also was from her Chicago friend, “what a lit-ry atmosphere you have given us.”

Mr. Brotherton’s smile pleaded guilty for him. He waved her to a seat among the red cushions. “How elegant,” she simpered, “I just think it’s perfectly swell. Just like Marshall Field’s. I must bring Mrs. Merrifield in when she comes down–Mrs. Merrifield of Chicago. You know, Mr. Brotherton,” it was the wife of the Judge who spoke, “I think we should try to cultivate those whose wide advantages make our association with them a liberal education. What is it Emerson says about Friendship–in that wonderful essay–I’m sure you’ll recall it.”

And Mr. Brotherton was sure he would too, and indicated as much, for as he had often said to Mr. Fenn in their literary confidences, “Emerson is one of my best moving lines.” And Mrs. Van Dorn continued confidentially: “Now there’s a book, a German book–aren’t those Germans candid–you know I’m of German extraction, and I tell the Judge that’s where I get my candor. Well, there’s a German book–I can’t pronounce it, so I’ve written it out–there; will you kindly order it?” Mr. Brotherton took the slip and went to the back of the store to make a memorandum of the order. He left the book counter in charge of Miss Calvin–Miss Ave Calvin–yes, Miss Ave Maria Calvin, if you must know her full name, which she is properly ashamed of. But it pleased her mother twenty years before and as Mr. Calvin was glad to get into the house on any terms when the baby was named, it went Ave Maria Calvin, and Ave Maria Calvin stood behind the counter reading the Bookman and trying to remember the names of the six best sellers so that she could order them for stock.

Mrs. Van Dorn, who kept Mrs. Calvin’s one card conspicuously displayed in her silver card case in the front hall, saw an opportunity to make a little social hay, so she addressed Miss Calvin graciously: “Good morning, Ave–how is your dear mother? What a charming effect Mr. Brotherton has produced!” Then Mrs. Van Dorn dropped the carefully modulated voice a trifle lower: “When the book comes that I just ordered, kindly slip it to one side; I wouldn’t have Mr. Brotherton–he might misunderstand. But you can read it if you wish–take it home over night. It’s very broadening.”

When Mr. Brotherton returned the baby voice prattled at him. The voice was saying, “I was just telling Ave how dead swell it is here. I just can’t get over it–in Harvey–dear old Harvey; do you remember when I was a little school teacher down in the Prospect schoolhouse and you used to order Chautauqua books–such an innocent little school girl–don’t you remember? We wouldn’t say how long ago that was, would we, Mr. Brotherton? Oh, dear, no. Isn’t it nice to talk over old times? Did you know the Jared Thurstons have left Colorado and have moved to Iowa where Jared has started another paper? Lizzie and I used to be such chums–she and Violet and I–where is Violet now, Mr. Brotherton? Oh, yes, I remember Mrs. Herdicker said she lives next door to the kindergarten–down in South Harvey. Isn’t it terrible the way Anne Sands did–just broke her father’s heart. And Nate Perry quarrelling with ten million dollars. Isn’t this a strange world, Mr. Brotherton?”

Mr. Brotherton confessed for the world and Mrs. Van Dorn shook her over-curled head sadly. She made some other talk with Mr. Brotherton which he paraphrased later for Henry Fenn and when Mrs. Van Dorn went out, Mr. Brotherton left the door open to rid the room of the scent of attar of roses and said to Miss Calvin:

“Well, s–,” but checked himself and went on in his new character of custodian of “The Sweet Serenity of Books and Wall Paper,” but he added as a compromise:

“‘And for bonnie Annie Laurie’ I certainly would make a quick get-away!”

After which reflection, Mr. Brotherton walked down the long store room to his dark stained desk, turned on the electric under the square copper shade, and began to figure up his accounts. But a little social problem kept revolving in his head. It was suggested by Mrs. Van Dorn and by something she had said. Beside Mrs. Van Dorn in her tailored gown and seal-skin, with her spanking new midwinter hat to match her coat, dragging the useless dog after her, he saw the picture of another woman who had come in the day before–a woman no older than Margaret Van Dorn–yet a broken woman, with rounded shoulders who rarely smiled, wishing to hide her broken teeth, who wheeled one baby and led another, and shooed a third and slipped into the corner near the magazine counter and thumbed over the children’s fashions in the Delineator eagerly and looked wistfully at the beautiful things in the store. Her red hands and brown skin showed that she had lived a rough, hard life, and that it had spent her and wasted her and taken everything she prized–and given her nothing–nothing but three overdressed children and a husband whose industrial status had put its heavy mark on her.

Mr. Brotherton’s memory went back ten years, and recalled the two girls together–Violet and Margaret. Both were light-headed and vain; so far as their relations with Van Dorn were concerned, one was as blamable as the other. Yet one had prospered and the other had not–and the one who had apparently suffered most had upon the whole lived the cleaner, more normal life–and Mr. Brotherton drummed his penholder upon the black desk before him and questioned the justice of life.

But, indeed, if we must judge life’s awards and benefits from the material side there is no justice in life. If there was any difference between the two women whom Tom Van Dorn had wronged–difference in rewards or punishments, it must have been in their hearts. It is possible that in her life of motherhood and wifehood, in the sacrifices that broke her body and scarred her face, Violet Mauling may have been compensated by the love she bore the children upon whom she lavished her life. For she had that love, and she did squander–in blind vain folly–the strength of her body, afterwards the price of her soul–upon her children. As for Margaret Van Dorn–Mr. Brotherton was no philosopher. He could not pity her. Yet she too had given all. She had given her mind–and it was gone. She had given her heart and it was gone also, and she had given that elusive blending of the heart and mind we call her soul–and that was gone, too. Mr. Brotherton could see that they were gone–all gone. But he could not see that her loss was greater than Violet’s.

That night when Dennis Hogan came in for his weekly Fireside Companion as he said, “for the good woman,” Mr. Brotherton, for old sake’s sake, put in something in paper backs by Marie Corelli, and a novel by Ouida; and then, that he might give until it hurt, he tied up a brand new Ladies’ Home Journal, and said, as he locked up the store and stepped into the chill night air with Mr. Hogan: “Dennis–tell Violet–I sent ’em in return for the good turns she used to do me when I was mayor and she was in Van Dorn’s office and drew up the city ordinances–she’ll remember.”

“Indeed she will, George Brotherton–that she will. Many’s the night she’s talked me to sleep of them golden days of her splendor–indeed she will.”

They walked on together and Hogan said: “Well–I turn at the next crossin’. I’m goin’ home and I’m glad of it. Up in the mornin’ at five; off on the six-ten train, climbin’ the slag dump at seven, workin’ till six, home on the six-fifteen train, into the house at seven; to bed at ten, up at five, eat and work and sleep–sleep and eat and work, fightin’ the dump by day and fightin’ the fumes in me chist by night–all for a dollar and sixty a day; and if we jine a union, we get canned, and if we would seek dissipation, we’re invited to go down to the Company hall and listen to Tommy Van Dorn norate upon what he calls the ‘de-hig-nity of luh-ay-bor.’ Damn sight of dignity labor has, lopin’ three laps ahead of the garnishee from one year’s end to the other.”

He laughed a good-natured, creaking laugh, and said as he waved his hand to part with Mr. Brotherton–“Well, annyhow, the good woman will thank you for the extra readin’; not that she has time to read it, God knows, but it gives the place a tone when Laura Nesbit drops in for a bit of a word of help about the makin’ of the little white things she’s doin’ for the Polish family on ‘D’ Street these days.” In another minute Brotherton heard the car moaning at the curve, and saw Hogan get in. It was nearly midnight when Hogan got to sleep; for the papers that Brotherton sent brought back “the grandeur that was Greece,” and he had to hear how Mr. Van Dorn had made Mr. Brotherton mayor and how they had both made Dr. Nesbit Senator, and how ungrateful the Doctor was to turn against the hand that fed him, and many other incidents and tales that pointed to the renown of the unimpeachable Judge, who for seven years had reigned in the humble house of Hogan as a first-rate god.

That night Hogan tossed as the fumes in his lungs burned the tissues and at five he got up, made the fire, helped to dress the oldest child while his wife prepared the breakfast. He missed the six-ten car, and being late at work stopped in to take a drink at the Hot Dog, near the dump on the company ground, thinking it would put some ginger into him for the day’s work. For two hours or so the whiskey livened him up, but as the forenoon grew old, he began to yawn and was tired.

“Hogan,” called the dump-boss, “go down to the powder house and bring up a box of persuaders.”

The slag was hard and needed blasting. Hogan looked up, said “What?” and before the dump boss could speak again Hogan had started down and around the dump to the powder house, near the saloon. He went into the powder house, and then came out, carrying a heavy box. At the sidewalk edge, Hogan, who was yawning, stumbled–they saw him stumble, two men standing in the door of the Hot Dog saloon a block away, and they told the people at the inquest that that was the last they saw. A great explosion followed. The men about the dump huddled for a long minute under freight cars, then crawled out, and the dump boss called the roll; Hogan was missing. In an hour they came and took Mrs. Hogan to the undertaker’s room near the smelter–where so many women had stood beside death in its most awful forms. She had her baby in her arms, with another plucking at her skirts and she stood mutely beside the coffin that they would not open. For she knew what other women knew about the smelter, knew that when they will not open the coffin, it must not be opened. So the little procession rode to the Hogan home, where Laura Van Dorn was waiting. Perhaps it was because she could not see the face of the dead that it seemed unreal to the widow. But she did not moan nor cry–after the first scream that came when she knew the worst. Stolidly she went through her tasks until after the funeral.