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William Shakespeare - "Much Ado About Nothing"

Logan Marshall - "Sinking of the Titanic and Great Sea Disasters"

H. Barber - "The Aeroplane Speaks"

H. Rider Haggard - "King Solomon's Mines"

Other Things Being Equal

E >> Emma Wolf >> Other Things Being Equal




"As if I would bore you in that way!" returned Mrs. Levice, with a laughing
glance at her, as she closed her desk. "Lay off your things, and let us
have a downright comfortable afternoon. Don't forget a single sensation; I
am actually starving for one."

Mrs. Lewis smiled grimly as she fluffed up her bang with her hat-pin. She
drew up a second cosey rocking-chair near her aunt's, drew out her needle
and crochet-work, and as the steel hook flashed in and out, her tongue soon
acquired its accustomed momentum.

"Where is Ruth?" she began, winding her thread round her chubby,
ring-bedecked finger.

"She is paying off some calls for a change."

"Indeed! Got down to conventionality again?" "You would not call her
unconventional, would you?"

"Oh, well; every one has a right to an opinion."

Mrs. Levice glanced at her inquiringly. Without doubt there was an
underground mine beneath this non-committal remark. Mrs. Lewis rocked
violently backward and forward without raising her eyes. Her face was
beet-red, and it looked as if an explosion were imminent. Mrs. Levice
waited with no little speculation as to what act of Ruth her cousin
disapproved of so obviously. She like Jennie; every one who knew her
recognized her sterling good heart; but almost every one who knew her
agreed that a grain of flour was a whole cake, baked and iced, to Mrs.
Lewis's imagination, and these airy comfits were passed around
promiscuously to whoever was on hand. Not a sound broke the portentous
silence but the decided snap with which Mrs. Lewis pulled her needle
through, and the hurricane she raised with her rocking.

"I was at the theatre last night."

The blow drew no blood.

"Which theatre?" asked Mrs. Levice, innocently.

"The Baldwin; Booth played the 'Merchant of Venice.'"

"Did you enjoy it?" queried her aunt, either evading or failing to perceive
the meaning.

"I did." A pause, and then, "Did Ruth?"

Mrs. Levice saw a flash of daylight, but her answer hinted at no
perturbation.

"Very much. Booth is her actor-idol, you know."

"So I have heard." She spread her crochet work on her knee as if measuring
its length, then with striking indifference picked it up again and adjusted
her needle, --

"She came in rather late, didn't she?"

"Did she?" questioned Mrs. Levice, parrying with enjoyment the indirect
thrusts. "I did not know; had the curtain risen?"

"No; there was plenty of time for every one to recognize her."

"I had no idea she was so well known."

"Those who did not know her, knew her escort. Dr. Kemp is well known, and
his presence is naturally remarked."

"Yes; his appearance is very striking."

"Aunt Esther!" The vehemence of Mrs. Lewis's feelings sent her ball of
cotton rolling to the other end of the room.

"My dear, what is it?" Mrs. Levice turned a pair of bright, interested
eyes on her niece.

"You know very well what I wish to say: everybody wondered to see Ruth with
Dr. Kemp."

"Why?"

"Because every one knows that she never goes out with any gentleman but
Uncle or Louis, and we all were surprised. The Hoffmans sat behind us, and
Miss Hoffman leaned forward to ask what it meant. I met several
acquaintances this morning who had been there, and each one made some
remark about Ruth. One said, 'I had no idea the Levices were so intimate
with Dr. Kemp;' another young girl laughed and said, 'Ruth Levice had a
swell escort last night, didn't she?' Still another asked, 'Anything on
the tapis in your family, Mrs. Lewis?' And what could I say?"

"What did you say?"

Mrs. Levice's quiet tone did not betray her vexation. She had feared just
such a little disturbance from the Jewish community, but her husband's
views had overruled hers, and she was now bound to uphold his.
Nevertheless, she hated anything of the kind.

"I simply said I knew nothing at all about it, except that he was your
physician. Even if I had known, I wouldn't have said more."

"There is no more to be said. Dr. Kemp and Ruth have become friendly
through their mutual interest in several poor patients; and in the course
of conversation one morning he heard that Ruth was anxious to see this
play, and had no escort. So he asked her, and her father saw no objection
to her going. It is a pity she didn't think to hand round a written
explanation to her different Jewish friends in the theatre."

"There you go, Aunt Esther! Jewish friends! I am sure that no matter how
indifferent Uncle is to such things, you must remember that our Jewish
girls never go alone to the theatre with any one outside of the family, and
certainly not with a Christian."

"What has that to do with it, so long as he is a gentleman?"

"Nothing. Only I didn't think you cared to have Ruth's name coupled with
one."

"No, nor with any one. But as I cannot control people's tongues--"

"Then I would not give them cause for wagging. Aunt Esther, is there
anything between Ruth and Dr. Kemp?"

"Jennie, you surprise and anger me. Do you know what you insinuate?"

"I can't help it. Either you are crazy, or ignorant of what is going on,
and I consider it my duty to enlighten you," --a gossip's duties are all
away from home, --"unless, of course, you prefer to remain in blissful or
wilful ignorance."

"Speak out, please."

"Of course I knew you must have sanctioned her going last night, though, I
must confess, I still think you did very wrongly; but do you know where she
went this morning?"

Mrs. Levice was put out. She was enough of a Jewess to realize that if you
dislike Jewish comment, you must never step out of the narrowly
conventional Jewish pathway. That Ruth, her only daughter, should be the
subject of vulgar bandying was more bitter than wormwood to her; but that
her own niece could come with these wild conjectures incensed her beyond
endurance.

"I do know," she said in response to the foregoing question. "Ruth is not
a sneak, --she tells me everything; but her enterprises are so mild that
there would be no harm if she left them untold. She called on a poor young
girl who, after a long illness, desires pupils in Spanish."

"A friend of Dr. Kemp."

"Exactly."

"A young girl, unmarried, who, a few weeks ago, through a merciful fate,
lost her child at its birth."

The faint flush on Mrs. Levice's cheek receded.

"Who told you this?" she questioned in an even, low voice.

"I thought you could not know. Mrs. Blake, the landlady where the girl
lives, told me."

"And how, pray, do you connect Ruth with this girl?"

"I will tell you. Mrs. Blake does my white sewing. I was there this
morning; and just as I went into her room, I saw Ruth leaving another
farther down the hall. Naturally I asked Mrs. Blake who had the room, and
she told me the story."

"Naturally." The cutting sarcasm drove the blood to Mrs. Lewis's face.

"For me it was; and in this case," she retorted with rising accents, "my
vulgar curiosity had its vulgar reward. I heard a scandalous account of
the girl whom my cousin was visiting, and, outside of Dr. Kemp, Ruth is the
only visitor she has had."

"I am sorry to hear this, Jennie."

"I know you are, Aunt Esther. But what I find so very queer is that Dr.
Kemp, who pretends to be her friend, --and I have seen them together many
times, --should have sent her there. Don't you?"

"I do not understand it at all, --neither Ruth nor him."

"Surely you don't think Ruth knew anything of this?" questioned Mrs.
Lewis, leaning forward and raising her voice in horror.

"Of course not," returned Mrs. Levice, rather lamely. She had long ago
acknowledged to herself that there were depths in her daughter's nature
that she had never gauged.

"I know what an idol his patients make of him, but he is a man
nevertheless; and though you may think it horrible of me, it struck me as
very suggestive that he was that girl's only friend."

"Therefore he must have been a good friend."

Mrs. Lewis bounded from her chair and turned a startled face to Mr. Levice,
who had thus spoken, standing in the doorway. Mrs. Levice breathed a sigh
of hysterical relief.

"Good-afternoon, Jennie," he said, coming into the room and shaking her
hand; "sit down again. Good-afternoon Esther;" he stooped to kiss his
wife.

Mrs. Lewis's hands trembled; she looked, to say the least, ashamed. She
had been caught scandal-mongering by her uncle, Jules Levice, the head and
pride of the whole family.

"I am sorry I heard what I did, Jennie; sorry to think that you are so poor
as to lay the vilest construction on an affair of which you evidently know
nothing, and sorry you could not keep your views to yourself." It was the
habit of all of Levice's relatives to listen in silence to any personal
reprimand the dignified old man might offer.

"I heard a good part of your conversation, and I can only characterize it
as--petty. Can't you and your friends see anything without springing at
shilling-shocker conclusions? Don't you know that people sometimes enjoy
themselves without any further design? So much for the theatre talk. What
is more serious is the fact that you could so misjudge my honorable friend,
Dr. Kemp. Such a thing, Jennie, my girl, would be as remote from Dr.
Kemp's possibilities as the antipodes. Remember, what I say is
indisputable. Whether Ruth knew the story of this girl or not, I cannot
say, but either way I feel assured that what she did was well done--if
innocently; if with knowledge, so much the better. And I venture to assert
that she is not a whit harmed by the action. In all probability she will
tell us all the particulars if we ask her. Otherwise, Jennie, don't you
think you have been unnecessarily alarmed?" The benign gentleness of his
question calmed Mrs. Lewis.

"Uncle," she replied earnestly, "in my life such things are not trivial;
perhaps because my life is narrower. I know you and Ruth take a different
view of everything."

"Don't disparage yourself; people generally do that to be contradicted or
to show that they know their weaknesses and have never cared to change
them. A woman of your intelligence need never sink to the level of a
spiteful chatterbox; every one should keep his tongue sheathed, for it is
more deadly than a sword. Your higher interests should make you overlook
every little action of your neighbors. You only see or hear what takes
place when the window is open; you can never judge from this what takes
place when the window is shut. How are the children?"

By dint of great tenderness he strove to make her more at ease.

Ruth, confronted with their knowledge, confessed, with flushed cheeks and
glowing eyes, her contretemps.

"And," she said in conclusion, "Father, Mamma, nothing you can say will
make me retract anything I have done or purpose doing."

"Nothing?" repeated her father.

"I hope you won't ask me to, but that is my decision."

"My darling, I dislike to hear you call yourself a mule," said her father,
looking at her with something softer than disapproval; "but in this case I
shall not use the whip to turn you from your purpose. Eh, Esther?"

"It is Quixotic," affirmed Mrs. Levice; "but since you have gone so far,
there is no reasonable way of getting out of it. When next I see the
doctor, I shall speak to him of it."

"There will be no occasion, dear," remonstrated the indulgent father, at
sight of the annoyed flash in Ruth's eyes; "I shall."

By which it will be seen that the course of an only child is not so smooth
as one of many children may think; every action of the former assumes such
prominence that it is examined and cross-examined, and very often sent to
Coventry; whereas, in a large family, the happy-go-lucky offspring has his
little light dimmed, and therefore less remarked, through the propinquity
of others.


Chapter XII

If Ruth, in the privacy of her heart, realized that she was sailing toward
dangerous rapids, the premonition gave her no unpleasant fears. Possibly
she used no lens, being content to glide forever on her smooth stream of
delight. When the sun blinds us, we cannot see the warning black lurking
in the far horizon. Without doubt the girl's soul and sympathies were
receiving their proper food. Life was full for her, not because she was
occupied, --for a busy life does not always prove a full one, --but because
she entered thoroughly into the lives of others, struggled with their
struggles, triumphed in their triumphs, and was beginning to see in
everything, good or bad, its necessity of existence. Under ordinary
circumstances one cannot see much misery without experiencing a world of
disillusion and futile rebellion of spirit; but Ruth was not living just at
that time under ordinary circumstances.

Something of the nature of electricity seemed to envelop her, that made her
pulses bound, her lips quick to smile, and her eyes shine like twin
dreamstars. She seemed to be moving to some rapturous music unheard save
only by herself. At night, alone with her heart, she dared hardly name to
herself the meaning of it all, _ a puritanic modesty withheld her. Yet all
the sweet humility of which she was possessed could not banish from her
memory the lingering clasp of a hand, the warm light that fell from eyes
that glanced at her. For the present, these were grace sufficient for her
daily need. Given the perfume, what need to name the flower?

Her family, without understanding it, noted the difference in their
different ways. Mrs. Levice saw with a thrill of delight that she was
growing more softly beautiful. Her father, holding his hands a few inches
from her shoulders, said, one morning, with a drolly puzzled look, "I am
afraid to touch you; sparks might fly."

Arnold surprised her standing in the gloaming by a window, her hands
clasped over her head, a smile parting her lips, her eyes haunting in the
witchery of their expression. By some occult power her glance fell
unconsciously on him; and he beheld, with mingled amazement and
speculation, a rosy hue overspread her face and throat; her hands went
swiftly to her face as if she would hide something it might reveal, and she
passed quickly from the room. Arnold sat down to solve this problem of an
unknown quantity.

Ruth's birthday came in its course, a few days after her meeting with Rose
Delano.

The family celebrated it in their usual simple way, which consisted only in
making the day pass pleasantly for the one whose day of days it was, --a
graceful way of showing that the birth has been a happy one for all
concerned.

On this evening of her twenty-second birthday, Ruth seemed to be in her
element. She had donned, in a spirit of mischief, a gown she had worn five
years before on the occasion of some festivity. The girlish fashion of the
white frock, with its straight, full skirt to her ankles, the round baby
waist, and short puffs on her shoulders made a very child of her.

"Who can imagine me seventeen?" she asked gayly as she entered the library,
softly lighted by many wax candles. Her mother, who was again enjoying the
freedom of the house, and who was now snugly ensconced in her own
particular chair, looked up at her.

"That little frock makes me long to take you in my lap," said she,
brightly.

"And it makes me long to be there," answered Ruth, throwing herself into
her mother's arms and twining her arms about her neck.

"How now, Mr. Arnold, you can't scare me tonight with your sarcastic
disapproval!" she laughed, glancing provokingly over at her cousin seated
in a deep blue-cushioned chair.

"I have no desire to scare you, little one," he answered pleasantly. "I
only do that to children or grown-up people."

"And what am I, pray, good sir?"

"You are neither; you are neither child or woman; you are neither flesh nor
spirit; you are uncanny."

"Dear me! In other words, I am a conundrum. Who will guess me?"

"You are the Sphinx," replied her cousin.

"I won't be that ugly-faced thing," she retorted; "guess again."

"Impossible. Once acquire a sphinx's elusiveness and you are a mystery
perpetual. You alone can unriddle the riddle."

"I can't. I give myself up."

"Not so fast, young woman," broke in her father, shutting his magazine and
settling his glasses more firmly upon his nose; "that is an office I alone
can perform. Who has been hunting on my preserves?"

"Alas! They are not tempting, so be quite calm on that score." She sat up
with a forlorn sigh, adding, "Think of it, Father, twenty-two, and not a
heart to hang on my chatelaine."

"Hands are supposed to mean hearts nowadays," said Louis, reassuringly; "I
am sure you have mittened one or two."

"Oh, yes," she answered, laughing evasively, "both of little Toddie
Flynn's. Mamma, don't you think I am too big a baby for you to hold long?"
She sprang up, and drawing a stool before her father's chair, exclaimed, --

"Now, Father, a grown-up Mother-Goose story for my birthday; make it short
and sweet and with a moral like you."

Mr. Levice patted her head and rumpled the loosely gathered hair.

"Once upon a time," he began, "a little boy went into his father's
warehouse and ate up all the sugar in the land. He did not die, but he was
so sweet that everybody wanted to bite him. That is short and sweet; and
what is the moral?"

"Selfishness brings misery," answered Ruth, promptly; "clever of both of
us, but what is the analogy? Louis, you look lonesome over there. I feel
as if I were masquerading; come nearer the footlights."

"And get scorched for my pains? Thanks; this is very comfortable.
Distance adds to illusion."

"You don't mean to admit you have any illusions, do you? Why, those
glasses of yours could see through a rhinoceros, I verily believe. Did you
ever see anything you did not consider a delusion and a snare?"

"Yes; there is a standing institution of whose honest value there is no
doubt."

"And that is?"

"My bed."

"After all, it is a lying institution, my friend; and are you not deposing
your masculine muse, --your cigar? Oh, that reminds me of the annual
peace-pipe."

She jumped up, snatched a candle, and left the room. As she turned toward
the staircase she was arrested by the ringing of the doorbell. She stood
quite still, holding the lighted candle while the maid opened the door.

"Is Miss Levice in?" asked the voice that made the little candle-light seem
like myriads of swimming stars. As the maid answered in the affirmative,
she came mechanically forward and met the bright-glancing eyes of Dr. Kemp.

"Good-evening," she said, holding out her disengaged hand, which he grasped
and shook heartily.

"Is it Santa Filomena?" he asked, smiling into her eyes.

"No, only Ruth Levice, who is pleased to see you. Will you step into the
library? We are having a little home evening together."

"Thank you. Directly." He slipped out of his topcoat, and turning quietly
to her, said, "But before we go in, and I enact the odd number, I wish to
say a few words to you alone, please."

She bent a look of inquiry upon him, and meeting the gaze of his compelling
eyes, led him across the hall into the drawing-room. He noticed how the
soft light she held made her the only white spot in the dark room, till,
touching a tall silver lamp, she threw a rosy halo over everything. That
it was an exquisite, graceful apartment he felt at a glance.

She placed her candle upon a tiny rococo table, and seated herself in a
quaint, low chair overtopped by two tiny ivory horns that spread like hands
of blessing above her head. The doctor declined to sit down, but stood
with one hand upon the fragile table and looked down at her.

"I am inclined to think, after all," he said slowly, "that you are in truth
the divine lady with the light. It is a pretty name and a pretty fame,
--that of Santa Filomena."

What had come over her eyelids that they refused to be raised?

"I think," he continued with a low laugh, "that I shall always call you so,
and have all rights reserved. May I?"

"I am afraid," she answered, raising her eyes, "that your poem would be
without rhyme or reason; a candle is too slight a thing for such an
assumption."

"But not a Rose Delano. I saw her to-day, and at least one sufferer would
turn to kiss your shadow. Do you know what a wonderfully beautiful thing
you have done? I came to-night to thank you; for any one who makes good
our ideals is a subject for thanks. Of course, the thing had no personal
bearing upon myself; but being an officious fellow, I thought it proper to
let you know that I know. That is my only excuse for coming."

"Did you need an excuse?"

"That, or an invitation."

"Oh, I never thought of you--as--as--"

"As a man?"

How to answer this? Then finally she said, --

"As caring to waste an evening."

"Would it be a waste? There is an old adage that one might adapt, then, 'A
wilful waste makes a woful want.' Want is a bad thing, so economy would
not be a half-bad idea. Shall we go in to your family now, or will they
not think you have been spirited away?"

He took the candle from her, and they retraced their steps. As she turned
the handle of the door, she said, --

"Will you give me the candle, please, and walk in? I am going upstairs."

"Are you coming down again?" he asked, standing abruptly still.

"Oh, yes. Father," she called, opening wide the door, "here is Dr. Kemp."

With this announcement she fled up the staircase.

She had come up for some cigars; but when she got into her father's room,
she seated herself blindly and looked aimlessly down at her hands. What a
blessed reprieve this was! If she could but stay here! She could if it
were not for the peace-pipe. Such a silly performance too! Father kept
those superfine cigars over in the cabinet there. Should she bring only
two as usual? Then she was going? Why not? It would look very rude not
to do so. Besides, she wondered what they were talking about. She
supposed she must have looked very foolish in that gown with her hair all
mussed; and then his eyes-- She arose suddenly and walked to the
dressing-table with her light. After all, it was not very unbecoming. Had
her face been so white all the evening? Louis liked her face to be
colorless. Oh, she had better hurry down.

"Here comes the chief!" cried her mother as she entered. "Now, Doctor, you
can see the native celebrating her natal day."

"She enacts the witch," said her father "and sends us, living, to the happy
hunting-grounds. Will you join us, Doctor?"

"If Lachesis thinks me worthy. Is the operation painful?"

He received no answer as Ruth came forward with a box of tempting Havanas.
She selected one, and placing the box on a chair, reached to the high-tiled
mantel-shelf, whence she took a tiny pair of scissors and deftly cut off
the point of the cigar. She seemed quite unconscious that all were
watching her. Louis handed her a lighted match, and putting the cigar
between her lips, she lit it into life. The doctor was amused.

She blew up a wreath of the fragrant smoke and handing it to her father,
said, --

"With this year's love, Father."

The doctor grew interested.

She took another, and lighting it as gracefully, and without the slightest
approach to Bohemianism, gave it into Louis's outstretched hand.

"Well?" he suggested, holding it from his lips till she had spoken.

"I can think of nothing you care for sufficiently to wish you."

"Nothing?"

"Unless," with sudden mischief, "I wish you a comfortable bed all the year
round--and pleasant dreams, Louis."

"That is much," he answered dryly as he drew a cloud of smoke.

The doctor became anticipative.

Ruth's embarrassment was evident as she turned and offered him a cigar.

"Do you smoke?" she asked, holding out the box.

"Like a chimney," he replied, looking at her, but taking none, "and in the
same manner as other common mortals."

She stood still, but withdrew her hand a little as if repelling the hint
his words conveyed; whereupon he immediately selected a cigar, saying as he
did so, "So you were born in summer, --the time of all good things. Well,
'Thy dearest wish, wish I thee,' and may it not pass in the smoking!"

She swept him a deep, mock courtesy.

Afer this, Ruth sat a rather silent listener to the conversation. She knew
that they were discussing the pros and cons of the advantages for a
bachelor of club life over home life. She knew that Louis was making some
brilliantly cynical remarks, --asserting that the apparent privacy of the
latter was delusive, and that the reputed publicity of the former was
deceptive, as it was even more isolated than the latter. All of which the
doctor laughed down as untruly epigrammatic.

"Then there is only one loophole for the poor bachelor," Mrs. Levice summed
up, "and that is to marry. Louis complains of the club, and thinks himself
a sort of cynosure in a large household. You, Doctor, complain of the want
of coseyness in a bachelor establishment. To state it simply, you need a
wife."

"And oust my Pooh-ba! Madame, you do not know what a treasure that old
soldier of mine is. If I call him a veritable Martha, I shall but be
paying proper tribute to the neatness with which he keeps my house and
linen; he entertains my palate as deliciously as a Corinne her salon,
and--is never in my way or thoughts. Can you commend me any woman so
self-abnegatory?"

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