Juggernaut: A Veiled Record

XXIII

In the mountains near Mauch Chunk, August, 18 – . This is the first time for months I have felt like writing. We have been here since June. After my illness I had a great longing to get away, away, away; anywhere out of the excitement, away from the furniture, the servants, the surroundings that seemed to have become so hateful to me that if I looked upon them I must shriek. It seemed as though I should never be strong enough to go.

Edgar was as anxious to get away with me as I was to go. A great change has taken place in him. He has ever been good and thoughtful, but it is impossible to describe the lengths to which his affection drives him now. If his business has been pressing, these last months must have been disastrous to him, for he has hardly left my side for an hour. There is a new expression in his eyes when he looks at me. He seems to feel as if he were guilty of some terrible crime against me, and to be ever trying to expiate it. Sometimes this amuses me a little, but his earnestness makes me almost feel unhappy at times.

Once in a while, if we have been sitting quietly alone, he will look at me silently for a time, and then say with almost a groan:

"Oh, if you only knew, Helen! If you only knew all that I suffered in those weeks!"

I was very ill for a long time. He seems hardly to realize that I am again well and safe. I would never dare let him know the agony of mind as well as body, that I endured so long.

I feel differently, too, about some things. I think that whatever regret Edgar felt at first, and before my confinement, he suffered a keen disappointment and unhappiness at the loss of the child. He has made but one allusion to it, but he betrayed his deep feeling then, unconsciously.

It is strange; but after all my longing for the child, before it became a longing likely to be gratified, the relief that I experienced when I knew that I had none is indescribable.

At first I would burst out sobbing for very joy and relief. I cannot understand my feeling. I sometimes think if circumstances had been different, and Edgar had had the same emotions in regard to it that he has now, perhaps I should have felt differently. I am impressed, for some reason, that this aversion I have is abnormal. But it is so strong that it has decided one thing: I have had my last child. Nothing on earth can ever bring back the old feeling. That is something for which women in my position have no time. The horrible feeling of lost time and opportunity that I experienced in those months will never be forgotten. I will never live through it again. If I ever find it likely to become a necessity, I will kill myself at the outset, without a moment's hesitation. So this is settled for ever and ever.

I intimated as much to Edgar, involuntarily, the other night, and I think he felt a little hurt. I regretted that I had betrayed the feeling when I saw that it made him unhappy. I thought he would feel as I did about it. I presume he does, in some degree. I made some remark to the effect that people in our position could not afford to lose time in that way, and he said:

"But, dear, what would become of the people if all thought so?"

I told him that there were plenty whose talents lay principally in that direction, and that that part of life's work should be apportioned to them, and strictly confined to the lesser people.

He began a little argument, but saw that it did not please me, and changed the subject. But he said something that impressed me with its truth, for all that.

He said something to the effect that the "industry" was already confined too strictly to "lesser people;" that what the country needed to save it was high-bred, fine and greater fathers and mothers, instead of lesser; that if there was ever an "industry" that should be confined to the superior of the land, it was child-rearing. Perhaps this is so – I felt so too, once, and determined to do a duty in this direction that would be a loved duty. It is different now. It will never happen again – and I live through it. The suffering is not what I flinch from. I'm not cowardly. It is not that. But it will never happen again, if there is a means on earth to prevent it, even though the means be suicide.

I wonder if my character is degenerating? Am I as good a woman as I was when I married Edgar? I do not know. I only know how I feel now, and it is not so comfortable to feel in that way as to feel in the old way. Am I deteriorating? If so, what is the cause?

XXIV

The Braines have been back in Washington for a month. Politics recalled Braine, and Braine recalled Helen. When she began to think of returning to the Washington house where she had endured one year of absolute wretchedness as an initiation, she was overwhelmed with distaste for the move, but she resolved to keep her repugnance to herself, and fight the feeling down.

She wondered once if she had rather return to the cottage in Thebes, but dismissed the idea quickly and impatiently. She knew that the meagre, provincial life would be intolerable to her now. She wanted the luxuries of the Washington house, but shrank from the thought of having to go thither to find them. She made up her mind to the inevitable, however, and they returned as late as business would allow.

The night of her return when she first entered the house she felt faint and weak for a moment, as a host of wretched memories arose, connected with every portion of the place. But she brought her will to bear, and Braine did not notice her distress.

He seemed affected differently. He seemed almost like a boy in his enthusiasm over their return, and went from room to room, showing her certain changes he had made surreptitiously during the summer for her surprise.

He pauses in the library, and suddenly takes Helen in his arms. He says:

"I cannot analyze the feeling that I experience; the peculiar gladness I have at returning here with you well and happy. Though I suffered agony in sympathy with the suffering you endured here, the experience seems to have endeared the place to me. You will never know what your counsel and help during those months meant to me. Our achievements shall now begin in earnest. Oh, Helen, Helen, the joy of striving and accomplishing for you is the dearest one of my life. To see you honored and admired and envied, and to know it comes through my exertions will be my supreme happiness."

"Am I not your supreme happiness?"

"Yes, and therefore less than all for you would mean supreme wretchedness for me."

There has been a wistful note in his voice, and he is tender beyond all imagining. They seem very near to each other this night of their return, and this new marriage somehow lessens Helen's feeling of disquietude, and reassures her. She finds herself looking forward with a certain delight and satisfaction to this winter when she will establish her social supremacy, that she may stand beside this man who is just becoming supreme in another field, and seem worthy to share some of the honors accorded him.

They have sat below by the library fire, far into the night. They have discussed the situation. They have planned the details of the campaign, and their confidence in each other, and the feeling of each that the advancement of the other is in his or her hands, has already won the fight.

The servants are in bed; the silence of the great house has not been broken for hours, save by the low, earnest, wooing tones of the man and woman in the soft light of the rare room. The woman in a half-dream of delight, as rosy visions of the future are conjured up by the man whose voice of the lover always intoxicates her senses; a dainty woman, a regal woman, a woman whose least motion suggests the patrician, morally, mentally, physically; a woman subtle in her frankness and simplicity, dignified in her naïveté; a woman perfectly matched with the man. And he, a man whose very presence suggests power and grace of mind; a temperament wherein reverence predominates, if audacity dominates; a man who must lend good, even to the worst, and make the worst seem not tolerable, but acceptable. And none in looking on him can decide whether his mind is responsible for his charming person, or the reverse.

All the room is in shadow save where they two sit, and as he takes the soft, shaded light in his hands, and conducts the woman to her door, my imagination plays a sudden trick; the room is one of statelier times, and one becomes a "bold, brave knight," the other one, "my lady."

XXV

"Do you see Bogart and Mrs. Stevens?"

Gladys Grayson drops the question into Helen's ear as she stands listlessly leaning against the conservatory entrance.

Everet is looking away for the moment. Gladys has come up with Dalzel, the young congressman.

Helen looks at her inquiringly:

"Bogart and Mrs. Stevens? Where?"

Mrs. Grayson gives a silvery little laugh, and just lifts her eyebrows.

"Everywhere," with a comprehensive wave of her pretty hand.

Everet and Dalzel are talking together. Helen looks a little bewildered, and Mrs. Grayson looks a little amused, and a good deal contemptuous – or shocked, perhaps. She nods towards the conservatory, and at the moment a man and woman come from the shadow of a palm, towards the quartette, engrossed in conversation – at least, Bogart is. Mrs. Stevens is engrossed in looking charming. Gladys continues in little spasmodic asides:

"Every one in the room – " they are nearer, and she lowers her voice, "is talking about it. It is disgraceful."

"What?"

"Why, the very apparent affaire between them."

Helen stares – then looks at Mrs. Stevens. Gladys says under her breath, between her teeth:

"Don't stare at her in that way, you goose. She will come over here in a minute, and ask if the enamel on her neck is chipping."

Helen lowers her eyes. Gladys continues:

"Things are so very apparent, you know."

Mrs. Stevens is coming leisurely toward them. "There is a story of a little dinner." Mrs. Stevens is here. Gladys bows with her accustomed hauteur, with which she meets every one but the initiated, and without the suspicion of discourtesy in her manner, turns away on Dalzel's arm.

Mrs. Stevens begins to talk volubly to Helen and Everet. Helen is disconcerted. She has none of the studied, courteous rudeness that is her friend's stock-in-trade, with which to carry off a thing of this kind gracefully. She replies a little helplessly to Mrs. Stevens, and moves away as quickly as she can.

Mrs. Stevens perceives the slight – it amuses her a little. Later, when she is alone with Bogart, she mentions it, and remarks that "these ingénues try one's patience terribly."

Bogart says "Yes;" and thinks, "but they are delicious to teach."

Everet seldom leaves Helen's side. When he is not with her, he is watching her. The house is too crowded for comfort, and Helen has not had enough experience yet to enjoy it. She always feels a little bewildered after one o'clock, and remarks to Everet as he stands by her while she leans back in a chair, wearily, that she always feels as though she ought to be in bed after eleven. She laughs, a sweet, excited little laugh as she looks up at him. He wonders how long so charming a child will retain her naïveté in such an atmosphere.

She delights him. There is a simplicity about her manner and expression that fascinates him – and yet she is a polished woman of the world. She is surely that, but the difference between herself and other women of the world is – that she is not a worldly woman.

Once, during the evening, Braine is near her, and says with suppressed elation:

"You are charming to-night, Helen. I have never seen you more beautiful. Everet is strongly attracted."

Helen looks up quickly. She says with a little deprecation in her tone, and a little entreaty in her eyes;

"He only admires me as he does other nice looking women, Ed. Indeed, you need not mind. I will keep out of his way, if you don't like it."

Braine listens at first in surprise, then bursts into a low, happy laugh. He covertly presses her hand, and says, as he moves away to make room for Everet, who is coming with an ice for Helen:

"I don't mind, I assure you. You needn't take pains to keep out of his way. I am perfectly satisfied with my wife. I am delighted that this man is so interested as he is – only be cautious, dear; don't let it be too obvious to others – you understand?"

Helen does not understand, but Everet is at her side, and she has to turn to him, and say something, or listen to him.

Her mind runs on Braine's few words, and they trouble her. While she answers the questions of this one and that, and makes trite, witty, serious, politic, or straightforward little speeches, as one case or another demands, she is turning over Braine's words in her mind.

Perhaps Everet is one who can be of service to Edgar, and he thinks it as well for her to be civil. She is a little piqued at his last words – "be cautious, don't let it be too apparent to others – " as though she were likely to permit an aggression on Everet's part more quickly in private than she would in public. It wounds her a little that he should have said so thoughtless a thing. It would be terrible if he thought so horrible a thing.

As she sees Braine from to time to time in the crowd, she notices that the worried, anxious expression she has noted for the last week, is no longer on his face. He is charming to-night. His personality has never so strongly impressed her, or apparently other people either.

Everet notices how her glance follows Braine's flexile figure, that is full of strength and dignity, and once, remarks with a smile, and a little amusement in his tone:

"You are a great admirer of your husband?"

She looks up at him, and says quite innocently,

"I love him."

Everet's smile becomes one of approval, almost of tenderness.

At last she is near Braine again, and says a little wistfully:

"May we not go home soon?"

He looks at the flushed, weary face, beautiful in its ennui and excitement, and says:

"At once if you wish it," and suddenly the desire possesses him to have her in the carriage, alone, quite to himself, in his arms, and he seems a little impatient while Everet folds her wrap about her, and is asking which is her "day."

Helen says with an airy little informality that she has no day for her friends – the days are theirs.

As they step out into the cold air, Braine draws Helen's furs still closer about her throat. There is a tenderness and passion in his action that she has missed these last weeks. It delights her, and causes the hot blood to surge over her face and neck, leaving her in a quivering little ecstacy, for a moment after she is in the carriage.

Braine, standing outside, is pushing her gown about her, and pulling the rug over her lap as he directs the coachman. And Helen is saying in husky little trebles, so that only he hears:

"Ed. – Ed."

Some one at this moment runs down the steps to say some nearly forgotten thing to Braine, and as he talks he is acknowledging Helen's little appeals by covert pressure of the hand that is inside the coupé. Finally he gets in, and closes the door.

As they roll away, Braine draws her into his arms. It seems to both that they have been waiting all night for this moment. After a time, Braine says:

"I have never loved you more than at this moment. I believe until to-night I have never fully realized how magnificent you are. You are not where you belong. You are not where you shall be. I want to see you there," nodding his head in the direction of the White House.

Helen does not understand, but she is glad.

He is excited. Every fibre of his being is responsive. He holds her hand in his, and kisses it repeatedly, passionately. She laughs in a nervous, hysterical way, and leans her head against him. She half sobs:

"I want to be here, Ed. This satisfies me."

He presses her to him and answers:

"I am not satisfied for you. A little patience, and you shall have all. There is nothing that we cannot accomplish together. I am ambitious. There is no reason why I should not be. Ambition is a worthy sentiment. Yes, I am ambitious for myself, but it whets my appetite for the great things of earth, when I see you as you have been to-night, when I hold you as I do now. Sometimes it half angers me when I see you lacking appreciation of yourself. You do not know your own value, child; other people know it. You could be a power, if you would. You must. I – "

He leans back to look at her. He has imparted something of his enthusiasm and intensity to her, and her fingers play nervously with the cords of her cloak. Her eyes gleam in the dusk.

Braine notes every little detail about her – how the flash from an electric light makes the tiara in her hair sparkle; how white her hands look as they lie buried in the fur of the rug; how the little tendrils of hair cling to her neck. He thinks vehemently: "How I love this woman! How I love this woman!"

They stop in front of the house, and they go silently up the steps. Both are thinking. Woolet opens the door for them, making a vain endeavor to appear dignified and wide awake. But it is sufficiently evident that he has been asleep in the hall.

Helen goes directly up the stairs, and Braine passes on to the library, saying:

"I have a little work to do – I will be up in five minutes – wait for me."

Susanne is asleep with her head on the dressing-table. Helen says kindly, as the little, plump thing makes an effort to wake up:

"Go to bed, child. I will look after myself to-night."

Susanne goes, and Helen stands a moment, looking at her reflection in the glass. She smiles at it. She says half aloud:

"Yes, I am very beautiful. I love beautiful things" – with a nod at herself. She unfastens her gown, and it slips to the floor; she steps out of it. She takes the pins from her hair and it falls over her shoulders with a little swish. Braine taps at the door. She calls: "One moment, Ed."

She throws about her the negligée on the chair and calls, "Come in," adding, "You didn't have much to do," as Braine enters the room.

"If I did, I didn't do it," with a little laugh. He throws himself into a chair by her dressing-room fire. After a moment he says:

"Come here, dear."

Helen is brushing her hair at the mirror. She puts down the brush and goes over to him. He pulls her down beside him. For a moment they sit silently, cheek to cheek, looking into the fire together. Finally, Braine says in a low voice:

"I want to talk to you, dear, about – about a business matter." He pauses.

Helen smiles a little mistily. She does not know anything about business matters, but she will like to hear about anything if he tells it. She says:

"Well?"

Braine hesitates a moment, and then says, with a little effort to appear quite natural:

"I don't want to trouble you with details, dear, but I must, a little. I want you to help me in a difficult task – to help us, for this means everything to both. You believe in your husband, do you not, Helen?"

"I will not answer that question, Ed. You can answer it yourself." She caresses his head gently, and waits for him to go on.

"Well, I meant the question seriously enough. You know I can do much, but I wonder if you believe me capable of all I can do? You know how the newspapers talk of me as 'the wizard,' because I have achieved very quickly things that most men find it difficult to achieve at all. They believe in me, but they would think me insane if I were to tell them of the plans I am going to tell you of. I wonder if your belief in me is enough firmer than theirs, to let you share my ideas without distrusting my ability to make them facts?"

He receives sufficient answer in a caress which has tears of joy in it. He muses a while, and then takes up his discourse at a different point.

"It is rather a dramatic story, I suppose, as ordinary people look at things. I was rolling barrels on the levee at Thebes not many years ago. I got my fingers in on the Enterprise with my mind set on making myself felt, and I made the Enterprise a power. I was not easily appalled, as I showed when I set out to make the noblest woman in the world my wife, to take, as all my own, the one perfect example of what God meant when he created woman" – Here a long pause occurs in the monologue.

"When Hildreth thought to make me a serviceable tool for him and his millionaire partners to work with, I whipped out the combination in six or eight weeks, and I taught them once for all who was master by virtue of superior intellect, when they and I had occasion to work together in any matter. I was poor and needed wealth for the sake of the opportunity it gives. I set to work to achieve wealth, and in three months my name was good enough to stand alone in any bank from New York to San Francisco. I planned the systematizing of the railroad lines centering at Thebes, and created almost a new West by the operation, enriching a whole people. I decided to be a Senator, with my party in an apparently hopeless minority, and I achieved the result with as much precision as if it had been merely the drawing of a straight line with a ruler. I have not been taking wine, dear, and I am not running over these things to boast of them. I care nothing whatever for what is behind me. I only say all this to show you what I mean when I say that from the earliest time I can remember, I have never in my life made up my mind to accomplish anything, without succeeding in the attempt. I want you to bear that in mind when I tell you that I have made up my mind to be – well, to place you in the highest position possible to any American woman. With your help I can accomplish that, as I have accomplished everything else."

"Oh, Ed, you frighten me. I am content as we are. Your ambition is eating you up. For myself, life has brought me – no, it is you that have brought me all, and more than all. I only want – this!" clasping her arms about him, and pressing him close. "I would give up everything for you, Ed, and it is for your sake that I want you to give up all further ambitions for me. You do not care for these things, dear, except for my sake, and I care for nothing except to have you love me. You are great and good. You do not need honors. Let us let them alone."

"I cannot, Helen. I might but for you. I do not know; it is my nature to go forward; I cannot stand still: but I might if it were not for you. How can I rest when I remember that there is one woman in Washington whose place is so exalted that she is held exempt from the duty of returning calls, and that woman is not my Helen! I tell you I must work out the plans I have formed, and I need your help. Now let me explain. I'll spare you every detail I can, and keep to the bare outline."

"Go on," she says, "I like you to tell me stories, Ed, and you haven't told me many of late. Your business has taken you away so much, till I have almost come to hate business."

Braine feels a little sting in this reminder, which Helen has not meant to put there, but he is too intent upon his purpose to pause for its removal.