Part 28 (1/2)
She inspired a sense of comrades.h.i.+p and honest friendliness which would easily deepen into fraternal love, but Mrs. Jocelyn's surmise that she might some day touch that innermost spring which controls the entire man had no true basis. Nor would there have been any possibility of this had he never seen Mildred. A true man--one governed by heart and mind, not pa.s.sion--meets many women whom he likes and admires exceedingly, but who can never quicken his pulse.
On Mildred, however--although she coveted the gift so little--was bestowed the power to touch the most hidden and powerful principles of his being, to awaken and stimulate every faculty he possessed.
Her words echoed and re-echoed in the recesses of his soul; even her cold, distant glances were like rays of a tropical sun to which his heart could offer no resistance; and yet they were by no means enervating. Some natures would have grown despondent over prospects seemingly so hopeless, but Roger was of a different type. His deep and unaccepted feeling did not flow back upon his spirit, quenching it in dejection and despair, but it became a resistless tide back of his purpose to win her recognition and respect at least, and his determination to prove himself her peer. A girl so beautiful and womanly might easily gain such power over several men without any conscious effort, remaining meanwhile wholly indifferent or even averse herself, and Roger had indeed but little cause for hope. He might realize every ambitious dream and win her respect and admiration, and her heart continue as unresponsive as it had been from the first. Many a man has loved and waited in vain; and some out of this long adversity in that which touched their dearest interests have built the grandest successes of life and the loftiest and purest manhood.
A few months before, Roger seemingly had been a good-natured, pleasure-loving country youth, who took life as it came, with little thought for the morrow. Events had proved that he had latent and undeveloped force. In the material world we find substances that apparently are inert and powerless, but let some other substance be brought sufficiently near, and an energy is developed that seems like magic, and transformations take place that were regarded as supernatural in times when nature's laws were little understood.
If this be true concerning that which is gross and material, how much more true of the quick, informing spirit that can send out its thoughts to the furthest star! Strong souls--once wholly unconscious of their power--at the touch of adequate motives pa.s.s into action and combinations which change the character of the world from age to age.
But in the spiritual as in the physical world, this development takes place in accordance with natural law and within the limitations of each character. There is nothing strange, however strange it may appear to those who do not understand. Roger Atwood was not a genius that would speedily dazzle the world with bewildering coruscations.
It would rather be his tendency to grow silent and reserved with years, but his old boyish alertness would not decline, or his habit of shrewd, accurate observation. He thus would take few false steps, and would prove his force by deeds. Therefore he was almost predestined to succeed, for his unusually strong will would not drive him into useless effort or against obstacles that could be foreseen and avoided.
After Mildred's departure from the country he carried out his plans in a characteristic way. He wrote frankly and decidedly to his uncle that he was coming to the city, and would struggle on alone if he received no aid. At the same time he suggested that he had a large acquaintance in his vicinity, and therefore by judicious canva.s.sing among the farmers he believed he could bring much patronage with him. This looked not unreasonable to the shrewd commission merchant, and, since his nephew was determined to make an excursion into the world, he concluded it had better be done under the safest and most business-like circ.u.mstances. At the same time recalling the character and habits of the country boy, as he remembered him, he surmised that Roger would soon become homesick and glad to go back to his old life. If retained under his eye, the youth could be kept out of harm's way and returned untainted and content to be a farmer. He therefore wrote to Roger that, if his parents were willing, he might secure what trade he could in farm produce and make the trial.
At first Mr. and Mrs. Atwood would not hear of the plan, and the father openly declared that it was ”those Jocelyn girls that had unsettled the boy.”
”Father,” said Roger, a little defiantly and sarcastically, ”doesn't it strike you that I'm rather tall for a boy? Did you never hear of a small child, almost of age, choosing his own course in life?”
”That is not the way to talk,” said his mother reprovingly. ”We both very naturally feel that it's hard, and hardly right, too, for you to leave us just as we are getting old and need some one to lean on.”
”Do not believe, mother, that I have not thought of that,” was the eager reply; ”and if I have my way you and father, and Susan too, shall be well provided for.”
”Thank you,” Mr. Atwood snarled contemptuously. ”I'll get what I can out of the old farm, and I don't expect any provision from an overgrown boy whose head is so turned by two city girls that he must go dangling after them.”
Roger flushed hotly, and angry words rose to his lips, but he restrained them by a visible effort. After a moment he said quietly, ”You are my father, and may say what you please. There is but one way of convincing you whether I am a boy or a man, and I'll take it. You can keep me here till I'm twenty-one if you will, but you'll be sorry. It will be so much loss to me and no gain to you. I've often heard you say the Atwoods never 'drove well,' and you found out years ago that a good word went further with me than what you used to call a 'good thras.h.i.+ng.' If you let me have my way, now that I'm old enough to choose for myself, I'll make your old age cozy and comfortable. If you thwart me, as I said before, you'll be sorry,” and he turned on his heel and left them.
Politic Mrs. Atwood had watched her son closely for weeks and knew that something was coming, but with woman's patience she waited and was kind. No one would miss him so much as she, and yet, mother-like, she now took sides against her own heart. But she saw that her husband was in no mood to listen to her at present, and nothing more was said that day.
In the evening Roger drove out in his carriage and returned on horseback.
”There's the money you paid for the buggy, with interest,” he said to his father.
”You aren't gone yet,” was the growling answer.
”No matter. I shall not ride in it again, and you are not the loser.”
Roger had a rugged side to his nature which his father's course often called out, and Mrs. Atwood made her husband feel, reluctant as he was to admit it, that he was taking the wrong course with his son. A letter also from his brother in town led him to believe that Roger would probably come back in the spring well content to remain at home; so at last he gave a grudging consent.
Ungracious as it was, the young man rewarded him by a vigorous, thorough completion of the fall work, by painting the house and putting the place in better order than it had ever known before; meanwhile for his mother and sister he showed a consideration and gentleness which proved that he was much changed from his old self.
”I can see the hand of Mildred Jocelyn in everything he says and does,” Susan remarked one day after a long fit of musing, ”and yet I don't believe she cares a straw for him.” Her intuition was correct; it was Roger's ambition to become such a man as Mildred must respect in spite of herself, and it was also true that she was not merely indifferent, but for the reasons already given--as far as she had reasons--she positively disliked him.
Roger brought sufficient business from the country to prevent regretful second thoughts in the mind of his thrifty uncle, and the impression was made that the young fellow might steady down into a useful clerk; but when as much was hinted Roger frankly told him that he regarded business as a stepping-stone merely to the study of the law. The old merchant eyed him askance, but made no response.
Occasionally the veteran of the market evinced a glimmer of enthusiasm over a prime article of b.u.t.ter, but anything so intangible as a young man's ambitious dreams was looked upon with a very cynical eye. Still he could not be a part of New York life and remain wholly sceptical in regard to the possibilities it offered to a young fellow of talent and large capacity for work. He was a childless man, and if Roger had it in him to ”climb the ladder,” as he expressed it to himself, ”it might pay to give him the chance.” But the power to climb would have to be proved almost to a demonstration.
In the meantime Roger, well watched and much mistrusted, was but a clerk in his store near Was.h.i.+ngton Market, and a student during all spare hours.
He had too much sense to attempt superficial work or to seek to build his fortunes on the slight foundation of mere smartness. It was his plan to continue in business for a year or more and then enter the junior cla.s.s of one of the city colleges. By making the most of every moment and with the aid of a little private tutoring he believed he could do this, for he was a natural mathematician, and would find in the cla.s.sics his chief difficulties. At any rate it was his fixed resolve not to enter upon the study of the law proper until he had broadened his mind by considerable general culture. Not only did his ambition prompt to this, but he felt that if he developed narrowly none would be so clearly aware of the fact as Mildred Jocelyn. Although not a highly educated girl herself, he knew she had a well-bred woman's nice perception of what const.i.tuted a cultivated man; he also knew that he had much prejudice to overcome, and that he must strike at its very root.
In the meantime poor Mildred, unconscious of all save his unwelcome regard, was seeking with almost desperate earnestness to gain practical knowledge of two humble arts, hoping to be prepared for the time--now clearly foreseen and dreaded--when her father might decline so far in mind and health as to fail them utterly, and even become a heavy burden. She did not dream that his disease was a drug, and although some of his a.s.sociates began to suspect as much, in spite of all his precautions, none felt called upon to suggest their suspicions to his family.