Arms and the Woman - Harold MacGrath (polar express read aloud TXT) 📗

sometimes," mused Pembroke, gazing up. "She is doing her best to dull the lustre of the old gentleman. Ah, those were days when they had men."

"We have them still," said I. "It is not the men, but the opportunities, which are lacking."

"Perhaps that is so. Yet, it is the great man who makes them."

I was thinking of Hillars. "I would give a good deal for a regiment and a bad moment for our side." There was no mighty column in his memory, scarcely a roll of earth. "What do you want to do?" I asked. "Shall we hail a cab and drive to the park?"

"Just as you say, if it is not interfering with your work."

"Not at all."

"Have a cigar," said Pembroke, after we had climbed into the cab and arranged our long legs comfortably. The London cab is all very well for a short and thin person. "These came to me directly from Key West."

"That is one of the joys of being rich," said I. "Gold is Aladdin's lamp. I have to take my chances on getting good tobacco in this country."

"Talking about gold-" he began.

"Don't!" I entreated.

"I was about to say that I drew on my bankers for 20,000 pounds this morning."

"You intend to go in for a figure abroad, then?"

"Oh, no. I deposited the money in another bank-in your name."

"Mine? Deposited 20,000 pounds in my name?" I gasped.

"Just so."

"I understood you to say, because you thought me to be a gentleman, that you weren't going to do anything like this? Have I done something to change your opinion?"

"Of course not. And I never said that I should not do it. You may or may not use it, that is as you please. But so far as I am concerned, it will stay there and accumulate interest till the crack of doom. It isn't mine any more. If I were not almost your brother, I dare say you might justly take offense at the action. As it is," complacently, "you will not only accept the gift, but thank me for it."

"How old are you?" I asked.

"Exactly twenty-five."

"I thought that you could not be older than that. Aren't you afraid to be so far away from home?"

Pembroke lay back and laughed. "You haven't thanked me yet."

"I must get a new tailor," said I. "What! shall I pay a tailor to make a well-dressed man out of me, and then become an object of charity? Do I look, then, like a man who is desperately in need of money?"

"No, you don't look it. That's because you are clever. But what is your salary to a man of your brains?"

"It is bread and butter and lodging."

He laughed again. To laugh seemed to be a part of his business. "Jack, I haven't a soul in the world but you. I have only known you three days, but it seems that I have known you all my life. I have so much money that I cannot even fritter away the income."

"It must be a sad life," said I.

"And if you do not accept the sum in the spirit it is given, I'll double it, and then you'll have trouble. You will be a rich man, then, with all a rich man's cares and worries."

"You ought to have a trustee to take care of your money."

"It would be a small matter to bribe him off, Jack, of course, you do not need the money now, but that is no sign you may not in the days to come. I have known many journalists; they were ever improvident. I want to make an exception in your case. You understand; the money is for your old age."

"Let me tell you why a newspaper man is improvident. He earns money only to spend it. He has a fine scorn for money as money. He cares more for what a dollar spent has bought than what five saved might buy."

"Poor creditors!" was the melancholy interpolation.

I passed over this, and went on: "It is the work which absorbs his whole attention. He begins at the bottom of the ladder, which is in the garret. First, he is running about the streets at two and three in the morning, in rain and snow and fog. The contact with the lower classes teaches him many things. He becomes the friend of the policeman and the vagabond. And as his mind grows broader his heart grows in proportion. It is the comparing of the great and small which makes us impartial and philosophical. Well, soon the reporter gets better assignments and shorter hours. He meets the noted men and women of the city. Suddenly from the city editor's desk his ambition turns to Washington. He succeeds there. He now comes into the presence of distinguished ambassadors, ministers and diplomatists. He acquires a polish and a smattering of the languages. His work becomes a feature of his paper. The president chooses him for a friend; he comes and goes as he wills. Presently his eye furtively wanders to Europe. The highest ambition of a journalist, next to being a war correspondent, is to have a foreign post. In this capacity he meets the notable men and women of all countries; he speaks to princes and grand dukes and crowned heads. In a way he becomes a personage himself, a man whom great men seek. And he speaks of the world as the poet did of the fall of Pompeii, 'Part of which I was and all of which I saw.' Ah," as my mind ran back over my own experiences, "what man with this to gain would care for money; a thing which would dull his imagination and take away the keen edge of ambition, and make him play a useless part in this kingly drama of life!"

"I like your frankness," said Pembroke. "I have no doubt that journalism is the most fascinating profession there is. Yet, you must not accuse the rich of being ambitionless. I have known of rich men losing their all to make papers for men who are ambitious to be foreign correspondents." The young fellow was brimming with raillery. "I have never tried to run a newspaper, but I am, notwithstanding your tirade, ambitious. I am desirous to wed Miss Landors."

The cab was now rolling along the row.

"A truly great ambition," I admitted. "After all, what greater ambition is there than to marry the woman you love? Philip, I will accept your gift in the spirit it is given, and I'll make use of it in the days to come, when I am old and rusted. I understand your motive. You are happy and wish every one to be."

"That's the idea," said he, leaning back and spreading an arm behind my shoulders.

"But not all the money in the world, nor all the fame for that matter, would make me happy." Gretchen was so far away! "Very well; we'll go to Paris together; that is as far as I go. To follow her you will have to go alone."

"And why can't you go the rest of the way?"

"Work. I must be back in town in three days. You must not forget that I have had my vacation; there is plenty to be done."

"Now that you are comparatively wealthy, why not give up the grind, as you call it?"

"The truth is, I must work. When a man works he forgets."

"Then you have something to forget?"

"Every man who has reached the age of thirty has something to forget," said I.

I was gloomy. In my pocket I had the only letter I had ever received from Gretchen. Every hour fate outdoes the romancer. The story she had written for me was a puzzling one. And the finis? Who could say? Fate is more capricious than the novelist; sometimes you can guess what he intends for an end; what fate has in store, never. Gretchen's letter did not begin as letters usually do. It began with "I love you" and ended with the same sentence. "In November my marriage will take place. Do not come abroad. I am growing strong now; if I should see you alas, what would become of that thin ice covering the heart of fire; we have nothing to return, you and I. I long to see you; I dare not tell you how much. Who knows what the world holds hidden? While we live there is always a perhaps. Remember that I love you!"

"Perhaps," I mused absently.

"Perhaps what?" asked Pembroke.

"What?" I had forgotten him. "Oh, it was merely a slip of the tongue." I poked the matting with my cane. "It is high noon; we had best hunt up a lunch. I have an engagement with the American military attaché at two, so you will have to take care of yourself till dinner."

Let me tell you what happened in the military club that night. I was waiting for Col. J-- of the Queen's Light, who was to give me the plan of the fall maneuvers in Africa. Pembroke was in the billiard room showing what he knew about caroms and brandy smashes to a trio of tanned Indian campaigners. I was in the reading room perusing the evening papers. All at once I became aware of a man standing before me. He remained in that position so long that I glanced over the top of my paper.

It was Prince Ernst of Wortumborg. He bowed.

"May I claim your attention for a moment?" he asked.

Had I been in any other place but the club I should have ignored him. I possessed the liveliest hatred for the man.

"If you will be brief."

"As brief as possible," dropping into the nearest chair. "It has become necessary to ask you a few questions. The matter concerns me."

"Whatever concerns you is nothing to me," I replied coldly.

He smiled. "Are you quite sure?"

I had turned the sword on myself, so it seemed. But I said: "I answered some of your questions once; I believe I was explicit."

"As to that I can say you were; startlingly explicit. It is a delicate matter to profess one's regard for a woman before total strangers. It is not impossible that she would have done the same thing in your place. Her regard for you-"

I interrupted him with a menacing gesture. "I am extremely irritable," I said. "I should regret to lose control of myself in a place like this."

"To be sure!" he said. "This is England, where they knock one another down."

"We do not murder on this side of the channel," I retorted.

"That is unkind. Your friend was a very good shot," with a significant glance at his useless arm. "But for