Old Adam — Chapter 10

I.

Throughout the voyage of the _Lithuania_ from Liverpool to New York, Edward Henry, in common with some two thousand other people on board, had the sensation of being hurried.

He who in a cab rides late to an important appointment arrives with muscles fatigued by mentally aiding the horse to move the vehicle along.

Thus were Edward Henry's muscles fatigued, and the muscles of many others; but just as much more so as the _Lithuania_ was bigger than a cab.

For the _Lithuania_, having been seriously delayed in Liverpool by men who were most ridiculously striking for the fantastic remuneration of one pound a week, was engaged on the business of making new records.

And every passenger was personally determined that she should therein succeed.

And, despite very bad June weather toward the end, she did sail past the Battery on a grand Monday morning with a new record to her credit.

So far, Edward Henry's plan was not miscarrying.

But he had a very great deal to do and very little time in which to do it, and whereas the muscles of the other passengers were relaxed as the ship drew to her berth Edward Henry's muscles were only more tensely tightened.

He had expected to see Mr. Seven Sachs on the quay, for in response to his telegram from Queenstown, the illustrious actor-author had sent him an agreeable wireless message in full Atlantic; the which had inspired Edward Henry to obtain news by Marconi both from London and New York, at much expense; from the east he had had daily information of the dwindling receipts at the Regent Theatre, and from the west daily information concerning Isabel Joy.

He had not, however, expected Mr. Seven Sachs to walk into the _Lithuania's_ music-saloon an hour before the ship touched the quay.

Nevertheless this was what Mr. Seven Sachs did, by the exercise of those mysterious powers wielded by the influential in democratic communities.

"And what are you doing here?"

Mr. Seven Sachs greeted Edward Henry with geniality.

Edward Henry lowered his voice.

"I'm throwing good money after bad," said he.

The friendly grip of Mr. Seven Sach's hand did him good, reassured him, and gave him courage.

He was utterly tired of the voyage, and also of the poetical society of Carlo Trent, whose passage had cost him thirty pounds, considerable boredom, and some sick-nursing during the final days and nights.

A dramatic poet with an appetite was a full dose for Edward Henry; but a dramatic poet who lay on his back and moaned for naught but soda water and dry land amounted to more than Edward Henry could conveniently swallow.

He directed Mr. Sachs's attention to the anguished and debile organism which had once been Carlo Trent, and Mr. Sachs was so sympathetic that Carlo Trent began to adore him, and Edward Henry to be somewhat disturbed in his previous estimate of Mr. Sachs's common sense.

But at a favourable moment Mr. Sachs breathed humorously into Edward Henry's ear the question: "What have you brought _him_ out for?"

"I've brought him out to lose him."

As they pushed through the bustle of the enormous ship, and descended from the dizzy eminence of her boat deck by lifts and ladders down to the level of the windy, sun-steeped rock of New York, Edward Henry said: "Now I want you to understand, Mr. Sachs, that I haven't a minute to spare.

I've just looked in for lunch."

"Going on to Chicago?"

"She isn't in Chicago, is she?"

demanded Edward Henry, aghast.

"I thought she'd reached New York!"

"Who?"

"Isabel Joy."

"Oh!

Isabel's in New York, sure enough.

She's right here.

They say she'll have to catch the _Lithuania_ if she's going to get away with it."

"Get away with what?"

"Well--the goods."

The precious words reminded Edward Henry of an evening at Wilkins's, and raised his spirits even higher.

It was a word he loved.

"And I've got to catch the _Lithuania_, too!"

said he.

"But Trent doesn't know!

...

And, let me tell you, she's going to do the quickest turn round that any ship ever did.

The purser assured me she'll leave at noon to-morrow unless the world comes to an end in the meantime.

Now what about a hotel?"

"You'll stay with me--naturally."

"But--" Edward Henry protested.

"Oh, yes, you will.

I shall be delighted."

"But I must look after Trent."

"He'll stay with me too--naturally.

I live at the Stuyvesant Hotel, you know, on Fifth.

I've a pretty good private suite there.

I shall arrange a little supper for to-night.

My automobile is here."

"Is it possible that I once saved your life and have forgotten all about it?"

Edward Henry exclaimed.

"Or do you treat everybody like this?"

"We like to look after our friends," said Mr. Sachs simply.

In the terrific confusion of the quay, where groups of passengers were mounted like watch dogs over hillocks of baggage, Mr. Sachs stood continually between the travellers and the administrative rigours and official incredulity of a proud republic.

And in the minimum of time the fine trunk of Edward Henry and the modest packages of the poet were on the roof of Mr. Sachs's vast car, the three men were inside, and the car was leaping, somewhat in the manner of a motor boat at full speed, over the cobbles of a wide, medieval street.

"Quick!"

thought Edward Henry.

"I haven't a minute to lose!"

His prayer reached the chauffeur.

Conversation was difficult; Carlo Trent groaned.

Presently they rolled less perilously upon asphalt, though the equipage still lurched.

Edward Henry was forever bending his head toward the window aperture in order to glimpse the roofs of the buildings, and never seeing the roofs.

"Now we're on Fifth," said Mr. Sachs, after a fearful lurch, with pride.

Vistas of flags, high cornices, crowded pavements, marble, jewelry behind glass--the whole seen through a roaring phantasmagoria of competing and menacing vehicles!

And Edward Henry thought: "This is my sort of place!"

The jolting recommenced.

Carlo Trent rebounded, limply groaning, between cushions and upholstery.

Edward Henry tried to pretend that he was not frightened.

Then there was a shock as of the concussion of two equally unyielding natures.

A pane of glass in Mr. Seven Sachs's limousine flew to fragments and the car stopped.

"I expect that's a spring gone!"

observed Mr. Sachs with tranquillity.

"Will happen, you know, sometimes!"

Everybody got out.

Mr. Sachs's presumption was correct.

One of the back wheels had failed to leap over a hole in Fifth Avenue some eighteen inches deep and two feet long.

"What is that hole?"

asked Edward Henry.

"Well," said Mr. Sachs.

"It's just a hole.

We'd better transfer to a taxi."

He gave calm orders to his chauffeur.

Four empty taxis passed down the sunny magnificence of Fifth Avenue and ignored Mr. Sachs's urgent waving.

The fifth stopped.

The baggage was strapped and tied to it: which process occupied much time.

Edward Henry, fuming against delay, gazed around.

A nonchalant policeman on a superb horse occupied the middle of the road.

Tram cars passed constantly across the street in front of his caracoling horse, dividing a route for themselves in the wild ocean of traffic as Moses cut into the Red Sea.

At intervals a knot of persons, intimidated and yet daring, would essay the voyage from one pavement to the opposite pavement; there was no half-way refuge for these adventurers, as in decrepit London; some apparently arrived; others seemed to disappear forever in the feverish welter of confused motion and were never heard of again.

The policeman, easily accommodating himself to the caracolings of his mount, gazed absently at Edward Henry, and Edward Henry gazed first at the policeman, and then at the high decorated grandeur of the buildings, and then at the Assyrian taxi into which Mr. Sachs was now ingeniously inserting Carlo Trent.

He thought: "No mistake--this street is alive.

But what cemeteries they must have!"

He followed Carlo, with minute precautions, into the interior of the taxi.

And then came the supremely delicate operation--that of introducing a third person into the same vehicle.

It was accomplished;

three chins and six knees fraternized in close intimacy; but the door would not shut.

Wheezing, snorting, shaking, complaining, the taxi drew slowly away from Mr. Sachs's luxurious automobile and left it forlorn to its chauffeur.

Mr. Sachs imperturbably smiled.

("I have two other automobiles," said Mr. Sachs.

) In some sixty seconds the taxi stopped in front of the tremendous glass awning of the Stuyvesant.

The baggage was unstrapped; the passengers were extracted one by one from the cell, and Edward Henry saw Mr. Sachs give two separate dollar bills to the driver.

"By Jove!"

he murmured.

"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Sachs politely.

"Nothing!"

said Edward Henry.

They walked into the hotel, and passed through a long succession of corridors and vast public rooms surging with well-dressed men and women.

"What's all this crowd for?"

asked Edward Henry.

"What crowd?"

asked Mr. Sachs, surprised.

Edward Henry saw that he had blundered.

"I prefer the upper floors," remarked Mr. Sachs as they were being flung upward in a gilded elevator, and passing rapidly all numbers from 1 to 14. The elevator made an end of Carlo Trent's manhood.

He collapsed.

Mr. Sachs regarded him, and then said: "I think I'll get an extra room for Mr. Trent.

He ought to go to bed."

Edward Henry enthusiastically concurred.

"And stay there!"

said Edward Henry.

Pale Carlo Trent permitted himself to be put to bed.

But, therein, he proved fractious.

He was anxious about his linen.

Mr. Sachs telephoned from the bedside, and a laundry maid came.

He was anxious about his best lounge suit.

Mr. Sachs telephoned, and a valet came.

Then he wanted a siphon of soda water, and Mr. Sachs telephoned, and a waiter came.

Then it was a newspaper he required.

Mr. Sachs telephoned and a page came.

All these functionaries, together with two reporters, peopled Mr. Trent's bedroom more or less simultaneously.

It was Edward Henry's bright notion to add to them a doctor--a doctor whom Mr. Sachs knew, a doctor who would perceive at once that bed was the only proper place for Carlo Trent.

"Now," said Edward Henry, when he and Mr. Sachs were participating in a private lunch amid the splendours and the grim silent service of the latter's suite at the Stuyvesant, "I have fully grasped the fact that I am in New York.

It is one o'clock and after, and as soon as ever this meal is over, I have just _got_ to find Isabel Joy.

You must understand that on this trip New York for me is merely a town where Isabel Joy happens to be."

"Well," replied Mr. Sachs.

"I reckon I can put you on to that.

_She's going to be photographed at two o'clock by Rentoul Smiles_.

I happen to know because Rent's a particular friend of mine."

"A photographer, you say?"

Mr. Sachs controlled himself.

"Do you mean to say you've not heard of Rentoul Smiles?

...

Well, he's called 'Man's photographer.'

He has never photographed a woman!

Won't!

At least, wouldn't!

But he's going to photograph Isabel!

So you may guess that he considers Isabel some woman, eh?"

"And how will that help me?"

inquired Edward Henry.

"Why!

I'll take you up to Rent's," Mr. Sachs comforted him.

"It's close by--corner of Thirty-ninth and Fifth."

"Tell me," Edward Henry demanded, with immense relief.

"She hasn't got herself arrested yet, has she?"

"No. And she won't." "Why not?"

"The police have been put wise," said Mr. Sachs.

"Put wise?"

"Yes.

_Put wise!

_" "I see," said Edward Henry.

But he did not see.

He only half saw.

"As a matter of fact," said Mr. Sachs, "Isabel can't get away with the goods unless she fixes the police to lock her up for a few hours.

And she'll not succeed in that.

Her hundred days are up in London next Sunday.

So there'll be no time for her to be arrested and bailed out either at Liverpool or Fishguard.

And that's her only chance.

I've seen Isabel, and if you ask me my opinion she's down and out."

"Never mind!"

said Edward Henry with glee.

"I guess what you are after her for," said Mr. Seven Sachs, with an air of deep knowledge.

"The deuce you do!"

"Yes, sir!

And let me tell you that dozens of 'em have been after her already.

But she wouldn't!

Nothing would tempt her."

"Never mind!"

Edward Henry smiled.

II.

When Edward Henry stood by the side of Mr. Sachs in a doorway half shielded by a portiere, and gazed unseen into the great studio of Mr. Rentoul Smiles, he comprehended that he was indeed under powerful protection in New York.

At the entrance on Fifth Avenue he and Sachs had passed through a small crowd of assorted men, chiefly young, whom Sachs had greeted in the mass with the smiling words, "Well, boys!"

Other men were within.

Still another went up with them in the elevator, but no further.

They were reporters of the entire world's press, to each of whom Isabel Joy had been specially "assigned."

They were waiting; they would wait.

Mr. Rentoul Smiles, having been warned by telephone of the visit of his beloved friend Seven Sachs and his English protege had been received at Smile's outer door by a clerk who knew exactly what to do with them, and did it.

"Is she here?"

Mr. Sachs had murmured.

"Yep," the clerk had negligently replied.

And now Edward Henry beheld the objective of his pilgrimage, her whose personality, portrait, and adventures had been filling the newspapers of two hemispheres for three weeks.

She was not realistically like her portraits.

She was a little, thin, pale, obviously nervous woman, of any age from thirty-five to fifty, with fair untidy hair, and pale grey-blue eyes that showed the dreamer, the idealist, and the harsh fanatic.

She looked as though a moderate breeze would have overthrown her, but she also looked, to the enlightened observer, as though she would recoil before no cruelty and no suffering in pursuit of her vision.

The blind dreaming force behind her apparent frailty would strike terror into the heart of any man intelligent enough to understand it.

Edward Henry had an inward shudder.

"Great Scott!"

he reflected.

"I shouldn't like to be ill and have Isabel for a nurse!"

And his mind at once flew to Nellie, and then to Elsie April.

"And so she's going to marry Wrissell!"

he reflected, and could scarcely believe it.

Then he violently wrenched his mind back to the immediate objective.

He wondered why Isabel Joy should wear a bowler hat and mustard-coloured jacket that resembled a sporting man's overcoat; and why these garments suited her.

With a whip in her hand she could have sat for a jockey.

And yet she was a woman, and very feminine, and probably old enough to be Elsie April's mother!

A disconcerting world, he thought.

The "man's photographer," as he was described in copper on Fifth Avenue and in gold on his own doors, was a big, loosely-articulated male, who loured over the trifle Isabel like a cloud over a sheep in a great field.

Edward Henry could only see his broad bending back as he posed in athletic attitudes behind the camera.

Suddenly Rentoul Smiles dashed to a switch, and Isabel's wistful face was transformed into that of a drowned corpse, into a dreadful harmony of greens and purples.

"Now," said Rentoul Smiles, in a deep voice that was like a rich unguent.

"We'll try again.

We'll just play around that spot.

Look into my eyes.

Not _at_ my eyes, my dear woman, _into_ them!

Just a little more challenge--a little more!

That's it.

Don't wink, for the land's sake!

Now!"

He seized a bulb at the end of a tube and slowly squeezed--squeezed it tragically and remorselessly, twisting himself as if suffering in sympathy with the bulb, and then in a wide sweeping gesture he flung the bulb on to the top of the camera, and ejaculated: "Ha!"

Edward Henry thought: "I would give ten pounds to see Rentoul Smiles photograph Sir John Pilgrim."

But the next instant the forgotten sensation of hurry was upon him once more.

Quick, quick, Rentoul Smiles!

Edward Henry's scorching desire was to get done and leave New York.

"Now, Miss Isabel," Mr. Smiles proceeded, exasperatingly deliberate, "d'you know, I feel kind of guilty?

I have got a little farm out in Westchester County and I'm making a little English pathway up the garden with a gate at the end.

I woke up this morning and began to think about the quaint English form of that gate, and just how I would have it."

He raised a finger.

"But I ought to have been thinking about you.

I ought to have been saying to myself, 'To-day I have to photograph Isabel Joy,' and trying to understand in meditation the secrets of your personality.

I'm sorry!

Now, don't talk.

Keep like that.

Move your head round.

Go on!

Go on!

Move it!

Don't be afraid.

This place belongs to you.

It's yours.

Whatever you do, we've got people here who'll straighten up after you....

D'you know why I've made money?

I've made money so that I can take _you_ this afternoon, and tell a two-hundred-dollar client to go to the deuce.

That's why I've made money.

Put your back against the chair, like an Englishwoman.

That's it.

No, don't _talk_, I tell you.

Now look joyful, hang it!

Look joyful....

No, no!

Joy isn't a contortion.

It's something right deep down.

There, there!"

The lubricant voice rolled on while Rentoul Smiles manipulated the camera.

He clasped the bulb again, and again threw it dramatically away.

"I'm through!"

he said.

"Don't expect anything very grand, Miss Isabel.

What I've been trying to do this afternoon is my interpretation of you as I've studied your personality in your speeches.

If I believed wholly in your cause, or if I wholly disbelieved in it, my work would not have been good.

Any value that it has will be due to the sympathetic impartiality of my spiritual attitude.

Although"--he menaced her with the licenced familiarity of a philosopher--"Although, lady, I must say that I felt you were working against me all the time....

This way!"

(Edward Henry, recalling the comparative simplicity of the London photographer at Wilkins's, thought: "How profoundly they understand photography in America!"

) Isabel Joy rose and glanced at the watch in her bracelet; then followed the direction of the male hand, and vanished.

Rentoul Smiles turned instantly to the other doorway.

"How do, Rent?"

said Seven Sachs, coming forward.

"How do, Seven?"

Mr. Rentoul Smiles winked.

"This is my good friend, Alderman Machin, the theatre-manager from London."

"Glad to meet you, sir."

"She's not gone, has she?"

asked Sachs hurriedly.

"No, my housekeeper wanted to talk to her.

Come along."

And in the waiting room, full of permanent examples of the results of Mr. Rentoul Smiles's spiritual attitude toward his fellow men, Edward Henry was presented to Isabel Joy.

The next instant the two men and the housekeeper had unobtrusively retired, and he was alone with his objective.

In truth Seven Sachs was a notable organiser.

III.

She was sitting down in a cosy-corner, her feet on a footstool, and she seemed a negligible physical quantity as he stood in front of her.

This was she who had worsted the entire judicial and police system of Chicago, who spoke pentecostal tongues, who had circled the globe, and held enthralled--so journalists computed--more than a quarter of a million of the inhabitants of Marseilles, Athens, Port Said, Candy, Calcutta, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Tokio, Hawaii, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Denver, Chicago, and lastly New York!

This was she!

"I understand we're going home on the same ship!"

he was saying.

She looked up at him, almost appealingly.

"You won't see anything of me, though," she said.

"Why not?"

"Tell me," said she, not answering his question.

"What do they say of me, really, in England?

I don't mean the newspapers.

For instance, the Azure Society.

Do you know of it?"

He nodded.

"Tell me," she repeated.