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Jack London - "John Barleycorn, by Jack London"

Sir Walter Scott - "My Aunt Margaret's Mirror"

Thomas Love Peacock - "Crotchet Castle"

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Other Things Being Equal

E >> Emma Wolf >> Other Things Being Equal




"Always that--love."

The low, sweet voice that for the first time so caressed him thrilled him
oddly; but a measured step was heard in the hall, and Ruth moved like a
bird to a chair. He could not know that the sound of the step had given
her the momentary courage thus to address him.

He arose deferentially as Mr. Levice entered. The two men formed a
striking contrast. Kemp stood tall, stalwart, straight as an arrow;
Levice, with his short stature, his stooping shoulders, and his silvery
hair falling about and softening somewhat his plain Jewish face, served as
a foil to the other's bright, handsome figure.

Kemp came forward to meet him and grasped his hand. Nothing is more
thoroughly expressive than this shaking of hands between men. It is a
freemasonry that women lack and are the losers thereby. The kiss is a sign
of emotion; the hand-clasp bespeaks strong esteem or otherwise. Levice's
hand closed tightly about the doctor's large one; there was a great feeling
of mutual respect between these two.

"How are you and your wife?" asked the doctor, seating himself in a low,
silken easy-chair as Levice took one opposite him.

"She is well, but tired this evening, and has gone to bed. She wished to
be remembered to you." As he spoke, he half turned his head to where Ruth
sat in a corner, a little removed.

"Why do you sit back there, Ruth?"

She arose, and seeing no other convenient seat at hand, drew up the curious
ivory-topped chair. Thus seated, they formed the figure of an isosceles
triangle, with Ruth at the apex, the men at the angles of the base. It is
a rigid outline, that of the isosceles, bespeaking each point an alien from
the others.

There was an uncomfortable pause for some moments after she had seated
herself, during which Ruth noted how, as the candle-light from the sconce
behind fell upon her father's head, each silvery hair seemed to speak of
quiet old age.

Kemp was the first to speak, and, as usual, came straight to the point.

"Mr. Levice, there is no use in disguising or beating around the bush the
thought that is uppermost in all our minds. I ask you now, in person, what
I asked you in writing last Friday, --will you give me your daughter to be
my wife?"

"I will answer you as I did in writing. Have you considered that you are a
Christian; that she is a Jewess?"

"I have."

It was the first gun and the answering shot of a strenuous battle.

"And you, my child?" he addressed her in the old sweet way that she had
missed in the afternoon.

"I have also done so to the best of my ability."

"Then you have found it raised no barrier to your desire to become Dr.
Kemp's wife?"

"None."

The two men drew a deep breath at the sound of the little decisive word,
but with a difference . Kemp's face shone exultantly. Levice pressed his
lips hard together as the shuddering breath left him; his heavy-veined
hands were tightly clinched; when he spoke, however, his voice was quite
peaceful.

"It is an old and just custom for parents to be consulted by their children
upon their choice of husband or wife. In France the parents are consulted
before the daughter; it is not a bad plan. It often saves some unnecessary
pangs--for the daughter. I am sorry in this case that we are not living in
France."

"Then you object?" Kemp almost hurled the words at him.

"I crave your patience," answered the old man, slowly; "I have grown
accustomed to doing things deliberately, and will not be hurried in this
instance. But as you have put the question, I may answer you now. I do
most solemnly and seriously object."

Ruth, sitting intently listening to her father, paled slowly. The doctor
also changed color.

"My child," Levice continued, looking her sadly in the face, "by allowing
you to fall blindly into this trouble, without warning, with my apparent
sanction for any relationship with Christians, I have done you a great
wrong; I admit it with anguish. I ask your forgiveness."

"Don't, Father!"

Dr. Kemp's clinched hand came down with force upon his knee. He was white
to the lips, for though Levice spoke so quietly, a strong decisiveness rang
unmistakably in every word.

"Mr. Levice, I trust I am not speaking disrespectfully," he began, his
manly voice plainly agitated, "but I must say that it was a great oversight
on your part when you threw your daughter, equipped as she is, into
Christian society, --put her right in the way of loving or being loved by
any Christian, knowing all along that such a state of affairs could lead to
nothing. It was not only wrong, but, holding such views, it was cruel."

"I acknowledge my culpability; my only excuse lies in the fact that such an
event never presented itself as a possibility to my imagination. If it
had, I should probably have trusted that her own Jewish conscience and
bringing-up would protest against her allowing herself to think seriously
upon such an issue."

"But, sir, I do not understand your exception; you are not orthodox."

"No; but I am intensely Jewish," answered the old man, proudly regarding
his antagonist. "I tell you I object to this marriage; that is not saying
I oppose it. There are certain things connected with it of which neither
you nor my daughter have probably thought. To me they are all-powerful
obstacles to your happiness. Being an old man and more experienced, will
you permit me to suggest these points? My friend, I am seeking nothing but
my child's happiness; if, by opening the eyes of both of you to what
menaces her future welfare, I can avert what promises but a sometime
misery, I must do it, late though it may be. If, when I have stated my
view, you can convince me that I am wrong, I shall be persuaded and admit
it. Will you accept my plan?"

Kemp bowed his head. The dogged earnestness about his mouth and eyes
deepened; he kept his gaze steadily and attentively fixed upon Levice.
Ruth, who was the cause of the whole painful scene, seemed remote and
shadowy.

"As you say," began Levice, "we are not orthodox; but before we become
orthodox or reform, we are born, and being born, we are invested with
certain hereditary traits that are unconvertible. Every Jew bears in his
blood the glory, the triumph, the misery, the abjectness of Israel. The
farther we move in the generations, the fainter grown the inheritance. In
most countries in these times the abjectness is vanishing; we have been set
upon our feet; we have been allowed to walk; we are beginning to smile,
--that is, some of us. Those whose fathers were helped on are nearer the
man as he should be than those whose fathers are still grovelling. My
child, I think, stands a perfect type of what culture and refinement can
give. She is not an exception; there are thousands like her among our
Jewish girls. Take any intrinsically pure-souled Jew from his coarser
surroundings and give him the highest advantages, and he will stand forth
the equal, at least, of any man; but he could not mix forever with pitch
and remain undefiled."

"No man could," observed Kemp, as Levice paused. "But what are these
things to me?"

"Nothing; but to Ruth, much. That is part of the bar-sinister between you.
Possibly your sense of refinement has never been offended in my family; but
there are many families, people we visit and love, who, though possessing
all the substrata of goodness, have never been moved to cast off the
surface thorns that would prick your good taste as sharply as any physical
pain. This, of course, is not because they are Jews, but because they lack
refining influences in their surroundings. We look for and excuse these
signs; many Christians take them as the inevitable marks of the race, and
without looking further, conclude that a cultured Jew is an impossibility."

"Mr. Levice, I am but an atom in the Christian world, and you who number so
many of them among your friends should not make such sweeping assertions.
The world is narrow-minded; individuals are broader."

"True; but I speak of the majority, who decide the vote, and by whom my
child would be, without doubt, ostracized. This only by your people; by
ours it would be worse, --for she will have raised a terrible barrier by
renouncing her religion."

"I shall never renounce my religion, Father."

"Such a marriage would mean only that to the world; and so you would be cut
adrift from both sides, as all women are who move from where they
rightfully belong to where they are not wanted."

"Sir," interrupted Kemp, "allow me to show you wherein such a state of
affairs would, if it should happen, be of no consequence. The friends we
care for and who care for us will not drop off if we remain unchanged.
Because I love your daughter and she loves me, and because we both desire
our love to be honored in the sight of God and man, wherein have we erred?
We shall still remain the same man and woman."

"Unhappily the world would not think so."

"Then let them hold to their bigoted opinion; it is valueless, and having
each other, we can dispense with them."

"You speak in the heat of passion; and at such a time it would be
impossible to make you understand the honeymoon of life is made up of more
than two, and a third being inimical can make it wretched. The knowledge
that people we respect hold aloof from us is bitter."

"But such knowledge," interrupted Ruth's sweet voice, "would be robbed of
all bitterness when surrounded and hedged in by all that we love."

Her father looked in surprise at the brave face raised so earnestly to his.

"Very well," he responded; "count the world as nothing. You have just
said, my Ruth, that you would not renounce your religion. How could that
be when you have a Christian husband who would not renounce his?"

"I should hope he would not; I should have little respect for any man who
would give up his sacred convictions because I have come into his life. As
for my religion, I am a Jewess, and will die one. My God is fixed and
unalterable; he is one and indivisible; to divide his divinity would be to
deny his omnipotence. As to forms, you, Father, have bred in me a contempt
for all but a few. Saturday will always be my Sabbath, no matter what
convention would make me do. We have decided that writing or sewing or
pleasuring, since it hurts no one, is no more a sin on that day than on
another; to sit with idle hands and gossip or slander is more so. But on
that day my heart always holds its Sabbath; this is the force of custom.
Any day would do as well if we were used to it, --for who can tell which
was the first and which the seventh counting from creation? On our New
Year I should still feel that a holy cycle of time had passed; but I live
only according to one record of time, and my New Year falls always on the
1st of January. Atonement is a sacred day to me; I could not desecrate it.
Our services are magnificently beautiful, and I should feel like a culprit
if debarred from their holiness. As to fasting, you and I have agreed that
any physical punishment that keeps our thoughts one moment from God, and
puts them on the feast that is to come, is mere sham and pretence. After
these, Father, wherein does our religion show itself?"

"Surely," he replied with some bitterness, "we hold few Jewish rites.
Well, and so you think you can keep these up? And you, Dr. Kemp?"

Dr. Kemp had been listening attentively while Ruth spoke. His eyes kindled
brightly as he answered, --

"Why should she not? If all her orisons have made her as beautiful, body
and soul, as she is to me, what is to prevent her from so continuing? And
if my wife would permit me to go with her upon her holidays to your
beautiful Temple, no one would listen more reverently than I. Loving her,
what she finds worshipful could find nothing but respect in me."

Plainly Mr. Levice had forgotten the wellspring that was to enrich their
lives; but he perceived that some impregnable armor encased them that made
every shot of his harmless.

"I can understand," he ventured, "that no gentleman with self-respect
would, at least outwardly, show disrespect for any person's religion. You,
Doctor, might even come to regard with awe a faith that has withstood
everything and has never yet been sneered at, however its followers have
been persecuted. Many of its minor forms are slowly dying out and will
soon be remembered only historically; this history belongs to every one."

"Certainly. Let us, however, stick to the point in question. You are a
man who has absorbed the essence of his religion, and cast off most of its
unnecessary externals. You have done the same for my--for your daughter.
This distinguishes you. If I were to say the characteristic has never been
unbeautiful in my eyes, I should be excusing what needs no excuse. Now,
sir, I, in turn, am a Christian broadly speaking; more formally, a
Unitarian. Our faiths are not widely divergent. We are both liberal;
otherwise marriage between us might be a grave experiment. As to forms,
for me they are a show, but for many they are a necessity, --a sort of
moral backbone without which they might fall. Sunday is to me a day of
rest if my patients do not need me. I enjoy hearing a good sermon by any
noble, broad-minded man, and go to church not only for that, but for the
pleasure of having my spiritual tendencies given a gentle stirring up.
There is one holiday that I keep and love to keep; that is Christmas."

"And I honor you for it; but loving this day of days, looking for sympathy
for it from all you meet, how will it be when in your own home the wife
whom you love above all others stands coldly by and watches your feelings
with no answering sympathy? Will this not breed dissension, if not in
words, at least in spirit? Will you not feel the want and resent it?"

Dr. Kemp was silent. The question was a telling one and required thought;
therefore he was surprised when Ruth answered for him. Her quiet voice
carried no sense of hysteric emotion, but one of grave grace.

She addressed her father; each had refrained from appealing to the other.
The situation in the light of their new, great love was strained and
unnatural.

"I should endeavor that he should feel no lack," she said; "for so far as
Christmas is concerned, I am a Christian also."

"I do not understand." Her father's lips were dry, his voice husky.

"Ever since I have been able to judge," explained the girl, quietly,
"Christ has been to me the loveliest and one of the best men that ever
lived. You yourself, Father, admire and reverence his life."

"Yes?" His eyes were half closed as if in pain; he motioned to her to
continue.

"And so, in our study, he was never anything but what was great and good.
Later, when I had read his 'Sermon on the Mount,' I grew to see that what
he preached was beautiful. It did not change my religion; it made me no
less a Jewess in the true sense, but helped me to gentleness. To me he
became the embodiment of Love in the highest, --Love perfect, but warm and
human; human Love so glorious that it needs no divinity to augment its
power over us. He was God's attestation, God's symbol of what Man might
be. As a teacher of brotherly love, he is sublime. So I may call myself a
christian, though I spell it with a small letter. It is right that such a
man's birthday should be remembered with love; it shows what a sweet power
his name is, when, as that time approaches, everybody seems to love
everybody better. Feeling so, would it be wrong for me to participate in
my husband's actions on that day?"

She received no answer. She looked only at her father with loving
earnestness, and the look of adoration Kemp bent upon her was quite lost.

"Would this be wrong, Father?" she urged.

He straightened himself in his chair as if under a load. His dark, sallow
face seemed to have grown worn and more haggard.

"I have always imagined myself just and liberal in opinion," he responded;
"I have sought to make you so. I never thought you could leap thus far.
It were better had I left you to your mother. Wrong? No; you would be but
giving your real feelings expression. But such an expression would
grieve--Pardon; I am to consider your happiness." He seemed to swallow
something, and hastily continued: "While we are still on this subject, are
you aware, my child, that you could not be married by a Jewish rabbi?"

She started perceptibly.

"I should love to be married by Doctor C----." As she pronounced the grand
old rabbi's name, a tone of reverential love accompanied it.

"I know. But you would have to take a justice as a substitute."

"A Unitarian minister would be breaking no law in uniting us, and I think
would not object to do so; that is, of course, if you had no objection."
The doctor looked at him questioningly. Levice answered by turning to
Ruth. She passed her hand over her forehead.

"Do you think," she asked, "that after a ceremony had been performed, Dr.
C---- would bless us? As a friend, would he have to refuse?"

"He would be openly sanctioning a marriage which according to the
rabbinical law is no marriage at all. Do you think he would do this,
notwithstanding his friendship for you?" returned her father. They both
looked at him intently.

"Ah, well," she answered, throwing back her head, a half-smile coming to
her pale lips, "it is but a sentiment, and I could forego it, I suppose.
One must give up little things sometimes for great."

"Yes; and this would be but the first. My children, there is something
radically wrong when we have to overlook and excuse so much before
marriage. 'Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof;' and why should we
add trouble to days already burdened before they come?"

"We should find all this no trouble," said Kemp; "and what is to trouble us
after? We have now the wherewithal for our happiness; what, in God's name,
do you ask for more?"

"As I have said, Dr. Kemp, we are an earnest people. Marriage is a step
not entered into lightly. Divorce, for this reason, is seldom heard of
with us, and for this reason we have few unhappy marriages. We know
beforehand what we have to expect from every quarter. No question I have
put would be necessary with a Jew. His ways are ours, and, with few
exceptions, a woman has nothing but happiness to expect from him. How am I
sure of this with you? In a moment of anger this difference of faith may
be flung in each other's teeth, and what then?"

"You mean you cannot trust me."

The quiet, forceful words were accompanied by no sign of emotion. His deep
eyes rested as respectfully as ever upon the old gentleman's face. But the
attack was a hard one upon Levice. A vein on his temple sprang into blue
prominence as he quickly considered his answer.

"I trust you, sir, as one gentleman would trust another in any undertaking;
but I have not the same knowledge of what to expect from you as I should
have from any Jew who would ask for my daughter's hand."

"I understand that," admitted the other; "but a few minutes ago you imputed
a possibility to me that would be an impossibility to any gentleman. You
may have heard of such happenings among some, but an event of that kind
would be as removed from us as the meeting of the poles. Everything
depends on the parties concerned."

"Besides, Father," added Ruth, her sweet voice full with feeling, "when one
loves greatly, one is great through love. Can true married love ever be
divided and sink to this?"

The little white and gold clock ticked on; it was the only sound. Levice's
forehead rested upon his hand over which his silvery hair hung. Kemp's
strong face was as calm as a block of granite; Ruth's was pale with
thought.

Suddenly the old man threw back his head. They both started at the
revelation: great dark rings were about his eyes; his mouth was set in a
strained smile.

"I--I," he cleared his throat as if something impeded his utterance, --"I
have one last suggestion to make. You may have children. What will be
their religion?"

The little clock ticked on; a dark hue overspread Kemp's face. As for the
girl, she scarcely seemed to hear; her eyes were riveted upon her father's
changed face.

"Well?"

The doctor gave one quick glance at Ruth and answered, --

"If God should so bless us, I think the simple religion of love enough for
childhood. Later, as their judgment ripened, I should let them choose for
themselves, as all should be allowed."

"And you, my Ruth?"

A shudder shook her frame; she answered mechanically, --

"I should be guided by my husband."

The little clock ticked on, backward and forward, and forward and back,
dully reiterating, "Time flies, time flies."

"I have quite finished," said Levice, rising.

Kemp did likewise.

"After all," he said deferentially, "you have not answered my question."

"I--think--I--have," replied the old man, slowly. "But to what question do
you refer?"

"The simple one, --will you give me your daughter?"

"No, sir; I will not."

Kemp drew himself up, bowed low, and stood waiting some further word, his
face ashy white. Levice's lips trembled nervously, and then he spoke in a
gentle, restrained way, half apologetically and in strange contrast to his
former violence.

"You see, I am an old man rooted in old ideas; my wife, not so old, holds
with me in this. I do not know how wildly she would take such a
proposition. But, Dr. Kemp, as I said before, though I object, I shall not
oppose this marriage. I love my daughter too dearly to place my beliefs as
an obstacle to what she considers her happiness; it is she who will have to
live the life, not I. You and I, sir, have been friends; outside of this
one great difference there is no man to whom I would more gladly trust my
child. I honor and esteem you as a gentleman who has honored my child in
his love for her. If I have hurt you in these bitter words, forgive me; as
my daughter's husband, we must be more than friends."

He held out his hand. The doctor took it, and holding it tightly in his,
made answer somewhat confusedly, --

"Mr. Levice, I thank you. I can say no more now, except that no son could
love and honor you more than I shall."

Levice bent his head, and turned to Ruth, who sat, without a movement,
looking straight ahead of her.

"My darling," said her father, softly laying his hand on her head and
raising her lovely face, "if I have seemed selfish and peculiar, trust me,
dear, it was through no lack of love for you. Do not consider me; forget,
if you will, all I have said. You are better able, perhaps, than I to
judge what is best for you. Since you love Dr. Kemp, and if after all this
thought, you feel you will be happy with him, then marry him. You know
that I hold him highly, and though I cannot honestly give you to him, I
shall not keep you from him. My child, the door is open; you can pass
through without my hand. Good-night, my little girl."

His voice quavered sadly over the old-time pet name as he stooped and
kissed her. He wrung the doctor's hand again in passing, and abruptly
turned to leave the room. It was a long room to cross. Kemp and Ruth
followed with their eyes the small, slightly stooped figure of the old man
passing slowly out by himself. As the heavy portiere fell into place
behind him, the doctor turned to Ruth, still seated in her chair.


Chapter XVIII

She was perfectly still. Her eyes seemed gazing into vacancy.

"Ruth," he said softly; but she did not move. His own face showed signs of
the emotions through which he had passed, but was peaceful as if after a
long, triumphant struggle. He came nearer and laid his hand gently upon
her shoulder.

"Love," he whispered, "have you forgotten me entirely?"

His hand shook slightly; but Ruth gave no sign that she saw or heard.

"This has been too much for you," he said, drawing her head to his breast.
She lay there as if in a trance, with eyes closed, her face lily-white
against him. They remained in this position for some minutes till he
became alarmed at her passivity.

"You are tired, darling," he said, stroking her cheek; "shall I leave you?"

She started up as if alive to his presence for the first time, and sprang
to her feet. She turned giddy and swayed toward him. He caught her in his
arms.

"I am so dizzy," she laughed in a broken voice, looking with dry, shining
eyes at him; "hold me for a minute."

He experienced a feeling of surprise as she clasped her arms around his
neck; Ruth had been very shy with her caresses.

His eyes met hers in a long, strange look.

"Of what are you thinking?" he asked in a low voice.

"There is an old German song I used to sing," she replied musingly; "will
you think me very foolish if I say it is repeating itself to me now, over
and over again?"

"What is it, dear?' he asked, humoring her.

"Do you understand German? Oh, of course, my student; but this is a sad
old song; students don't sing such things. These are some of the words:
'Beh te Gott! es war zu sch"n gewesen.' I wish--"

"It is a miserable song," he said lightly; "forget it."

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