Part 25 (1/2)
”Oh, yes, yes! Well, this is generally said to be a very good mixture.
Try some.” He gave a jar of tobacco to Peter. ”These are nice, though perhaps they are a little too dry.” And he extended a box of cigars to Graham.
The boy helped himself, trying to keep his hand steady. ”Thank you,” he said.
”And now,” said the Doctor, ”let's sit down and have a long yarn. Shall we? I would like to tell you about to-night. The meeting was of vital interest and importance.” He drew his chair forward so that it might be between those of the two boys. He looked from Peter's face to Graham's as though afraid that he was asking too great a favour. ”You--you'll forgive my talking about myself, I'm sure--at least I hope you will. I so seldom have the opportunity,--with those I love, I mean--with those for whom I'm working. To see you here like this, at last, makes me very happy.” He slipped his large gla.s.ses off and wiped them openly without attempting to hide the fact that they had become suddenly useless to him.
A short silence followed--a silence in which the emotion with which the room was charged could almost be heard. Peter threw a quick glance round it, almost as though he expected to see the curious experimental tubes turn and point accusingly at his brother. The laboratory was filled with such tubes and other curious instruments,--all of them silent witnesses of Graham's act of madness.
The Doctor re-lit his cigar, put his gla.s.ses on again and clasped his long, capable hands over one thin knee. ”I wish I could even suggest to you,” he said--more naturally and with keen enthusiasm--”the intense excitement that we bacteriologists are all beginning to feel. For years and years we've been experimenting, and little by little our work is coming to a definite head. Every time we meet we find that we've moved a step further on the road to discoveries. It makes me laugh to think that my early theories, which, only a few years ago, were scoffed at and looked upon as dreams, are taking shape. It's been a long, uphill fight.
Science is beginning to win. It's all very wonderful.” He noticed that Graham's cigar had gone out. With extreme politeness, such as a man would use to very welcome guests, he held out a box of matches.
The boy took it. ”I don't feel like smoking,” he said, with a catch in his voice.
Something in his tone made the Doctor peer closely at him. ”You look pale, my dear lad,” he said, ”pale and tired. Aren't you well?”
”Oh, yes; he's perfectly all right,” said Peter hurriedly, trying to steer his father to another subject.
Graham threw his cigar away. ”I'm not!” he cried, with a sudden, uncontrollable outburst. ”I feel as rotten as I am. I can't sit here and listen to you, father. Don't be kind to me, I can't stand it.” He put his head down between his hands and burst out crying like a boy.
The Doctor was startled. He got up quickly and stood hesitatingly. He wanted to put his hands on the boy's shoulders, but the sudden breakdown brought back his shyness. ”What's the matter?” he asked. ”Peter, do you know?”
Peter nodded. He then made up his mind to let things take their course.
”Let him tell you,” he said. ”This may be the turning point for all three of us.”
Graham drew the cheque-book out of his pocket, opened it and threw it on the desk under the reading lamp. ”Look!” he said. ”That's what I've come to.”
For some moments the Doctor saw nothing but a cheque drawn by himself in favor of his second son for three thousand dollars. The fact that he didn't remember having made it out, and the fact that it was for so large a sum made at first no impression upon him. He was so puzzled and so taken back at the sudden outburst of emotion which had broken up what he hoped was going to be a charming reunion that the sight of this cheque conveyed nothing to him. Both his sons watched him closely, not knowing what he would say or do. He was such a stranger to them--his feelings and characteristics were so unknown to them that they found themselves speculating as to the manner in which he would take this dreadful piece of dishonesty. A great surprise was in store for them.
When the Doctor realized what had been done,--that the signature on the cheque was not his own, although it was very cleverly copied,--they saw him wince and shut his eyes. After a moment of peculiar hesitation he drew his chair up to the desk and sat down. Holding his breath, Peter watched him tear the cheque out and quietly make out another for precisely the same amount. Then the Doctor got up and stood in front of Graham with the new cheque in his hand. All the sprightliness and exhilaration with which he had entered the room had left him. He looked old and thin and humble. His shoulders stooped a little and the cheque trembled in his hand.
”Am I such an ogre that my children are afraid to bring their troubles to me?” he said, in a broken voice. ”What have I ever done to deserve this, Graham? You'd only to come to me and say that you needed money and I'd have given it to you. Who am I working for? For whom have I always worked?” He held out the cheque. ”Take it, and if that isn't enough ask me for more. I'd like to know why it is that you need it, if you'll be good enough to tell me; but, for G.o.d's sake, don't hurt me like this again.”
Without a word--without, indeed, being able to find a word,--infinitely more crushed by this kindness than he would have been by an outburst of anger and reproach,--Graham took the cheque, turned on his heel and left the room, walking like a drunken man.
Peter watched him go. There was a feeling of great relief in his heart.
Nothing that he could have done or said--nothing that Kenyon could have said in his most forcible manner, with all the weight of sophistication behind it, could have pulled Graham up and set him on a new path so well as the unexpected generosity of his father and the few pathetic words with which he underlined it.
But when Peter turned round to his father with the intention of taking him, for the first time, into his confidence and treating him as he would have treated Ranken Townsend under the same circ.u.mstances, he saw that the Doctor was crumpled up in his chair with his hands over his face and his shoulders shaking with sobs, and so he held his peace; and instead of obtaining the help that he needed so much he put his strong arm round his father in a strange protective way, as though he were the stronger man.
”Oh, don't, father,” he said. ”Please don't.”
VII
There was a good reason why Kenyon didn't stay out his fortnight at Dr.
Guthrie's house. He had already begun to know several young men whose very good feathers were waiting to be plucked. It was obviously impossible for him to invite them to East Fifty-second Street, and it became necessary, therefore, that he should take a bachelor-apartment in which to set up business. There he could play cards until any hour that suited him and settle down seriously to make his winter in New York a success. Also, he confessed to himself, the atmosphere of the Doctor's house was not conducive to his peace of mind or to his rigidly selfish way of life. He hadn't come over to the United States in order to play the fairy G.o.dmother, or even the family adviser to the young Guthries.
He had worked hard to clear the one thing out of Graham's life which had rendered him useless, and he had had the satisfaction of seeing Peter's engagement broken, for which admirable accident he was profoundly grateful, because Peter also would now be free. In fact, these two brothers could now easily be brought to concentrate upon Kenyon's deserving case and take round to his apartment any friends of theirs who enjoyed gambling and could pay when they lost.
Kenyon possessed a neat and tidy brain. It was run on the same principle as a well-organized business office. It had its metaphorical card indexes, letter-files and such like; so that when he made up his mind to go into his own quarters he gave the matter the closest and most careful consideration. He paid several visits to the well-known bachelor apartment-houses in and around West Forty-fourth Street. They would have been very suitable but for the existence of irksome rules and regulations as to ladies. He went further afield and, with Graham's a.s.sistance, examined several apartments in private houses. What he wanted was a place somewhere on the map where his breakfast would be cooked especially for him at any hour he desired, and which would be free of elevator boys, clerks, and the watchful eye of a manager.
Finally he discovered exactly such a place on the second floor of a fairly large old-fas.h.i.+oned house in West Forty-eighth Street. In this the elderly lady who, as Kenyon at once saw, was blessed with the faculty of being able to look at things with a Nelsonian eye,--having, poor soul, to earn her living,--lived in the bas.e.m.e.nt with her parrot and her Manx cat. Two young business men shared rooms on the first floor and a retired professor--who spent the greater part of his time in the country--rented the third floor. The servants slept in the attic.