Part 6 (1/2)
Just as Jonathan Reuben Wix reached his home, a delivery man was taking in at the front door a fine dresser trunk. On the porch stood a new alligator traveling-bag, and a big, new suit-case of thick sole leather, trimmed profusely with the most expensive k.n.o.bs and clamps, and containing as elaborate a toilet set as is made for the use of men. In the hall he found five big pasteboard boxes from his tailor.
He had the trunk and the suit-case and the traveling-bag delivered up to his room; the clothing he carried up himself.
That morning he had dressed himself in new linen throughout. Now he took off the suit he wore and put on one of the new business suits. He opened half a dozen huge bundles of haberdashery which he had purchased within the past week, and began packing them in his trunk: underwear, s.h.i.+rts, socks, collars, cravats, everything brand new and of the choicest quality. He packed away the other new business suit, the Prince Albert, the tuxedo, the dress suit--the largest individual order his tailor had ever received--putting into his trunk and suit-case and traveling-bag not one thing that he had ever worn before; nor did he put into any of his luggage a single book or keepsake, for these things had no meaning to him. When he was completely dressed and packed he went to his mother's room and knocked on the door. It was her afternoon for the Women Journalists' Club, and she was very busy indeed over a paper she was to read on _The Press: Its Power for Evil_. Naturally, interruptions annoyed her very much.
”Well, what is it, son?” she asked in her level, even tone as he came into the room. Her impatience was very nicely suppressed, indeed.
”I'm going to New York on the six-thirty,” he told her.
”Really, I don't see how I can spare any money until the fifteenth,”
she objected.
”I have plenty of money,” he a.s.sured her.
”Oh,” she replied with evident relief, and glanced longingly back at her neatly written paper.
”I can even let you have some if you want it,” he suggested.
”No, thank you. I have sufficient, I am sure, portioned out to meet all demands, including the usual small surplus, up to the fifteenth.
It's very nice of you to offer it, however.”
”You see,” he went on, after a moment's hesitation, ”I'm not coming back.”
She turned now, and faced him squarely for the first time.
”You'd better stay here,” she told him. ”I'm afraid you'll cost me more away from home than you do in Filmore.”
”I shall never cost you a cent,” he declared. ”I have found out how to make money.”
She smiled in a superior way.
”I am a bit incredulous; but, after all, I don't see why you shouldn't. Your father at least had that quality, and you should have inherited something from him besides”--and she paused a trifle--”his name.” She sighed, and then continued: ”Very well, son, I suppose you must carve out your own destiny. You are quite old enough to make the attempt, and I have been antic.i.p.ating it for some time. After all, you really ought to have very little trouble in impressing the world favorably. You dress neatly,” she surveyed him critically, ”and you make friends readily. Shall I see you again before you go?”
”I scarcely think so. I have a little down-town business to look after, and shall take dinner on the train; so I'll just say good-by to you now.”
He shook hands with her and stooped down, and they kissed each other dutifully upon the cheek. Mrs. Wix, being advanced, did not believe in kissing upon the mouth. After he had gone, a fleeting impression of loneliness weighed upon her as much as any purely sentimental consideration could weigh. She looked thoughtfully at the closed door, and a stirring of the slight maternal instinct within her made her vaguely wistful. She turned, still with that faint tugging within her breast which she could not understand, and it was purely mechanical that her eyes, dropping to the surface of the paper, caught the sentence: ”Mental suggestion, unfit for growing minds, is upon every page.” The word ”Mental” seemed redundant, and she drew her pen through it, neatly changing the ”s” in ”suggestion” to a capital.
A cab drove past Wix as he started down the street and he saw Smalley in it. He turned curiously. What was Smalley doing there? He stopped until he saw the cab draw up in front of Gilman's house. He saw Smalley a.s.sist young Gilman out of the cab, and Gilman's mother run out to meet them. He was thoughtful for a moment over that, then he shrugged his shoulders and strode on.
On the train that night as he swaggered into the dining-car, owning it, in effect, and all it contained, he saw, seated alone at a far table, no less a person than Horace G. Daw, as black and as natty as ever, and with a mustache grown long enough to curl a little bit at the ends.
”h.e.l.lo, old pal,” greeted Daw. ”Where now?”
”I'm going out alone into the cold, cold world, to make fortunes and spend them.”
”Half of that stunt is a good game,” commented Mr. Daw.
Wix chuckled.