The Riverman

S >> Stewart Edward White >> The Riverman

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The next morning he succeeded in making an arrangement by letter for
an excursion to the newly projected Central Park. Promptly at two
o'clock he was at the Bishops' house. To his inquiry the butler
said that Mrs. Bishop had recovered from her indisposition, and that
Miss Bishop would be down immediately. Orde had not long to wait
for her. The SWISH, PAT-PAT of her joyous descent of the stairs
brought him to his feet. She swept aside the portieres, and stood
between their folds, bidding him welcome.

"I'm so sorry about last night," said she, "but poor mother does
depend on me so at such times. Isn't it a gorgeous day to walk? It
won't be much like OUR woods, will it? But it will be something.
OH, I'm so glad to get out!"

She was in one of her elfish moods, the languid grace of her sleepy-
eyed moments forgotten. With a little cry of rapture she ran to the
piano, and dashed into a gay, tinkling air with brilliancy and
abandon. Her head, surmounted by a perky, high-peaked, narrow-
brimmed hat, with a flaming red bird in front, glorified by the
braid and "waterfall" of that day, bent forward and turned to flash
an appeal for sympathy toward Orde.

"There, I feel more able to stay on earth!" she cried, springing to
her feet. "Now I'll get on my gloves and we'll start."

She turned slowly before the mirror, examining quite frankly the
hang of her skirt, the fit of her close-cut waist, the turn of the
adorable round, low-cut collars that were then the mode.

"It pays to be particular; we are in New York," she answered, or
parried, Orde's glance of admiration.

The gloves finally drawn on and buttoned, Orde held aside the
portieres, and she passed fairly under his uplifted hand. He wanted
to drop his arm about her, this slender girl with her quaint
dignity, her bird-like ways, her gentle, graceful, mysterious,
feminine soul. The flame-red bird lent its colour to her cheeks;
her eyes, black and fathomless, the pupils wide in this dim light,
shone with two stars of delight.

But, as they moved toward the massive front doors, Mrs. Bishop came
down the stairs behind them. She, too, was dressed for the street.
She received Orde's greeting and congratulation over her improved
health in rather an absent manner. Indeed, as soon as she could
hurry this preliminary over, she plunged into what evidently she
considered a more important matter.

"You aren't thinking of going out, are you?" she asked Carroll.

"I told you, mother; don't you remember? Mr. Orde and I are going
to get a little air in the park."

"I'm sorry," said Mrs. Bishop, with great brevity and decision, "but
I'm going to the rectory to help Mr. Merritt, and I shall want you
to go too, to see about the silver."

"But, mother," expostulated Carroll, "wouldn't Marie do just as
well?"

"You know very well she can't be trusted without direction."

"I DO so want to go to the park," said Carroll wistfully. Mrs.
Bishop's thin, nervous figure jerked spasmodically. "There is very
little asked of you from morning until night," she said, with some
asperity, "and I should think you'd have some slight consideration
for the fact that I'm just up from a sick bed to spare me all you
could. Besides which, you do very little for the church. I won't
insist. Do exactly as you think best."

Carroll threw a pathetic glance at Orde.

"How soon are you going?" she asked her mother.

"In about ten minutes," replied Mrs. Bishop; "as soon as I've seen
Honorine about the dinner." She seemed abruptly to realise that the
amenities demanded something of her. "I'm sorry we must go so
soon," she said briefly to Orde, "but of course church business--We
shall hope to see you often."

Once more Orde held aside the curtains. The flame-bird drooped from
the twilight of the hall into the dimness of the parlour. All the
brightness seemed to have drained from the day, and all the joy of
life seemed to have faded from the girl's soul. She sank into a
chair, and tried pathetically to smile across at Orde.

"I'm such a baby about disappointments," said she.

"I know," he replied, very gently.

"And it's such a blue and gold day."

"I know," he repeated.

She twisted her glove in her lap, a bright spot of colour burning in
each cheek.

"Mother is not well, and she has a great deal to try her. Poor
mother!" she said softly, her head cast down.

"I know," said Orde in his gentle tones.

After a moment he arose to go. She remained seated, her head down.

"I'm sorry about this afternoon," said he cheerfully, "but it
couldn't be helped, could it? Jane used to tell me about your harp
playing. I'm going to come in to hear you this evening. May I?"

"Yes," she said, in a stifled voice, and held out her hand. She sat
quite still until she heard the front door close after him; then she
ran to the curtains and looked after his sturdy, square figure, as
it swung up the street.

"Well done; oh, well done, gentle heart!" she breathed after him.
Then she went back to the piano.

But Orde's mouth, could she have seen it, was set in grim lines, and
his feet, could she have heard them, rang on the pavement with quite
superfluous vigour. He turned to the left, and, without pause,
walked some ten or twelve miles.

The evening turned out very well, fortunately; Orde could not have
stood much more. They had the parlour quite to themselves. Carroll
took the cover from the tall harp, and, leaning her cheek against
it, she played dreamily for a half hour. Her arms were bare, and as
her fingers reached out lingeringly and caressingly to draw the
pure, golden chords from the golden instrument, her soft bosom
pressed against the broad sounding board. There is about the tones
of a harp well played something luminous, like rich, warm sunlight.
When the girl muted the strings at last, it seemed to Orde as though
all at once the room had perceptibly darkened. He took his leave
finally, his spirit soothed and restored.

Tranquillity was not for long, however. Orde's visits were,
naturally, as frequent as possible. To them almost instantly Mrs.
Bishop opposed the strong and intuitive jealousy of egotism. She
had as yet no fears as to the young man's intentions, but
instinctively she felt an influence that opposed her own supreme
dominance. In consequence, Orde had much time to himself. Carroll
and the rest of the family, with the possible exception of Gerald,
shared the belief that the slightest real opposition to Mrs. Bishop
would suffice to throw her into one of her "spells," a condition of
alarming and possibly genuine collapse. "To drive mother into a
spell" was an expression of the worst possible domestic crime. It
accused the perpetrator--through Mrs. Bishop--of forgetting the
state of affairs, of ingratitude for care and affection, of common
inhumanity, and of impiety in rendering impossible of performance
the multifarious church duties Mrs. Bishop had invented and assumed
as so many particularly shining virtues. Orde soon discovered that
Carroll went out in society very little for the simple reason that
she could never give an unqualified acceptance to an invitation. At
the last moment, when she had donned her street wraps and the
carriage was at the door, she was liable to be called back, either
to assist at some religious function, which, by its sacred
character, was supposed to have precedence over everything, or to
attend a nervous crisis, brought on by some member of the household,
or by mere untoward circumstances. The girl always acquiesced most
sweetly in these recurrent disappointments. And the very fact that
she accepted few invitations gave Orde many more chances to see her,
in spite of Mrs. Bishop's increasing exactions. He did not realise
this fact, however, but ground his teeth and clung blind-eyed to his
temper whenever the mother cut short his visits or annulled his
engagements on some petty excuse of her own. He could almost
believe these interruptions malicious, were it not that he soon
discovered Mrs. Bishop well disposed toward him personally whenever
he showed himself ready to meet her even quarter way on the topics
that interested her--the church and her health.

In this manner the week passed. Orde saw as much as he could of
Miss Bishop. The remainder of the time he spent walking the streets
and reading in the club rooms to which Gerald's courtesy had given
him access. Gerald himself seemed to be much occupied. Precisely
at eleven every morning, however, he appeared at the gymnasium for
his practice; and in this Orde dropped into the habit of joining
him. When the young men first stripped in each other's presence,
they eyed each other with a secret surprise. Gerald's slender and
elegant body turned out to be smoothly and gracefully muscled on the
long lines of the Flying Mercury. His bones were small, but his
flesh was hard, and his skin healthy with the flow of blood beneath.
Orde, on the other hand, had earned from the river the torso of an
ancient athlete. The round, full arch of his chest was topped by a
mass of clean-cut muscle; across his back, beneath the smooth skin,
the muscles rippled and ridged and dimpled with every movement; the
beautiful curve of the deltoids, from the point of the shoulder to
the arm, met the other beautiful curve of the unflexed biceps and
that fulness of the back arm so often lacking in a one-sided
development; the surface of the abdomen showed the peculiar
corrugation of the very strong man; the round, columnar neck arose
massive.

"By Jove!" said Gerald, roused at last from his habitual apathy.

"What's the matter?" asked Orde, looking up from tying the rubber-
soled shoes that Gerald had lent him.

"Murphy," called Gerald, "come here."

A very hairy, thick-set, bullet-headed man, the type of semi-
professional "handlers," emerged from somewhere across the
gymnasium.

"Do you think you could down this fellow?" asked Gerald.

Murphy looked Orde over critically.

"Who ye ringin' in on me?" he inquired.

"This is a friend of mine," said Gerald severely.

"Beg your pardon. The gentleman is well put up. How much
experience has he had?"

"Ever box much?" Gerald asked Orde.

"Box?" Orde laughed. "Never had time for that sort of thing. Had
the gloves on a few times."

"Where dil him. He's a friend
of mine."

Then he stepped back, the same joy in his soul that inspires a
riverman when he encounters a high-banker; a hunter when he takes
out a greenhorn, or a cowboy as he watches the tenderfoot about to
climb the bronco.

"Time!" said he.

The first round was sharp. When Gerald called the end, Orde grinned
at him cheerfully.

"Don't look like I was much at this game, does it?" said he. "I
wouldn't pull down many persimmons out of that tree. Your
confounded man's too lively; I couldn't hit him with a shotgun."

Orde had stood like a rock, his feet planted to the floor, while
Murphy had circled around him hitting at will. Orde hit back, but
without landing. Nevertheless Murphy, when questioned apart, did
not seem satisfied.

"The man's pig-iron," said he. "I punched him plenty hard enough,
and it didn't seem to jar hd you get your training, sir?" asked the handler.

"My training?" repeated Orde, puzzled. "Oh, I see! I was always
pretty heavy, and I suppose the work on the river keeps a man in
pretty good shape."

Gerald's languor had vanished, and a glint had appeared in his eye
that would have reminded Orde of Miss Bishop's most mischievous mood
could he have seen it.

"Put on the gloves with Murphy," he suggested, "will you? I'd like
to see you two at it."

"Surely," agreed Orde good-naturedly. "I'm not much good at it, but
I'd just as soon try." He was evidently not in the least afraid to
meet the handler, though as evidently without much confidence in his
own skill.

"All right; I'll be with you in a second," said Gerald,
disappearing. In the anteroom he rung a bell, and to the boy who
leisurely answered its summons he said rapidly:

"Run over to the club and find Mr. Winslow, Mr. Clark, and whoever
else is in the smoking room, and tell them from me to cone over to
the gymnasium. Tell them there's some fun on."

Then he returned to the gymnasium floor, where Murphy was answering
Orde's questions as to the apparatus. While the two men were
pulling on the gloves, Gerald managed a word apart with the trainer.

"Can you do him, Murph?" he whispered.

"Sure!" said the handler. "Them kind's always as slow as dray-
horses. They gets muscle-bound."

"Give it to him," said Gerald, "but don't kilim."

The gallery at one end the running track had by flow half filled
with interested spectators.

"Time!" called Gerald for round two.

This time Murphy went in more viciously, aiming and measuring his
blows accurately. Orde stood as before, a humourous smile of self-
depreciation on his face, hitting back at the elusive Murphy, but
without much effect, his feet never stirring in their tracks. The
handler used his best tactics and landed almost at will, but without
apparent damage. He grew ugly--finally lost his head.

"Well, if ye will have it!" he muttered, and aimed what was intended
as a knockout blow.

Gerald uttered a half cry of warning as his practised eye caught
Murphy's intention. The blow landed. Orde's head snapped back, but
to the surprise of every one the punch had no other effect, and a
quick exchange of infighting sent Murphy staggering back from the
encounter. The smile had disappeared from Orde's face, and his eye
had calmed.

"Look here," he called to Gerald, "I don't understand this game very
well. At school we used 'taps.' Is a man supposed to hit hard?"

Gerald hesitated, then looked beyond Orde to the gallery. To a man
it made frantic and silent demonstration.

"Of course you hit," he replied. "You can't hurt any one with those
big gloves."

Orde turned back to his antagonist. The latter advanced once more,
his bullet head sunk between his shoulders, his little eyes
twinkling. Evidently Mr. Bishop's friend would now take the
aggressive, and forward movement would deliver an extra force to the
professional's blows.

Orde did not wait for Murphy, however. Like a tiger he sprang
forward, hitting out fiercely, first with one hand then with the
other. Murphy gave ground, blocked, ducked, exerted all a ring
general's skill either to stop or avoid the rush. Orde followed him
insistent. Several times he landed, but always when Murphy was on
the retreat, so the blows had not much weight. Several times Murphy
ducked in and planted a number of short-arm jabs at close range.
The round ended almost immediately to a storm of applause from the
galleries.

"What do you think of his being muscle-bound?" Gerald asked Murphy,
as the latter flung himself panting on the wrestling mat for his
rest.

"He's quick as chained lightning," acknowledged the other
grudgingly. "But I'll get him. He can't keep that up; he'll be
winded in half a minute."

Orde sat down on a roll of mat. His smile had quite vanished, and
he seemed to be awaiting eagerly the beginning of the next round.

"Time!" called Gerald for the third.

Orde immediately sprang at his adversary, repeating the headlong
rush with which the previous round had ended. Murphy blocked,
ducked, and kept away, occasionally delivering a jolt as opportunity
offered, awaiting the time when Orde's weariness would leave him at
the other's mercy. That moment did not come. The young man
hammered away tirelessly, insistently, delivering a hurricane of his
two-handed blows, pressing relentlessly in as Murphy shifted and
gave ground, his head up, his eyes steady, oblivious to the return
hammering the now desperate handler opposed to him. Two minutes
passed without perceptible slackening in this terrific pace. The
gallery was in an uproar, and some of the members were piling down
the stairs to the floor. Perspiration stood out all over Murphy's
body. His blows failed of their effect, and some of Orde's were
landing. At length, bewildered more by the continuance than the
violence of the attack, he dropped his ring tactics and closed in to
straight slugging, blow against blow, stand up, give and take.

As he saw his opponent stand, Orde uttered a sound of satisfaction.
He dropped slightly his right shoulder behind his next blow. The
glove crashed straight as a pile-driver through Murphy's upraised
hands to his face, which it met with a smack. The trainer, lifted
bodily from the ground, was hurled through the air, to land doubled
up against the supports of a parallel bars. There he lay quite
still, his palms up, his head sunk forward.

Orde stared at him a moment in astonishment, as though expecting him
to arise. When, however, he perceived that Murphy was in reality
unconscious, he tore off the gloves and ran forward to kneel by the
professional's side.

"I didn't suppose one punch like that would hurt him," he muttered
to the men crowding around. "Especially with the gloves. Do you
suppose he's killed?"

But already Murphy's arms were making aimless motions, and a deep
breath raised his chest.

"He's just knocked out," reassured one of the men, examining the
prostrate handler with a professional attention. "He'll be as good
as ever in five minutes. Here," he commanded one of the gymnasium
rubbers who had appeared, "lend a hand here with some water."

The clubmen crowded about, all talking at once.

"You're a wonder, my friend," said one.

"By Jove, he's hardly breathing fast after all that rushing," said a
second.

"So you didn't think one punch like that would hurt him," quoted
another with good-natured sarcasm.

"No," said Orde, simply. "I've hit men that hard before with my
bare fist."

"Did they survive?"

"Surely."

"What kind of armour-plates were they, in heaven's name?"

Orde had recovered his balance and humour.

"Just plain ordinary rivermen," said he with a laugh.

"Gentlemen," struck in Gerald, "I want to introduce you to my
friend." He performed the introductions. It was necessary for him
to explain apart that Orde was in reality his friend, an amateur, a
chance visitor in the city. All in all, the affair made quite a
little stir, and went far to give Orde a standing with these sport-
loving youths.

Finally Gerald and Orde were permitted to finish their gymnasium
practice. Murphy had recovered, and came forward.

"You have a strong punch, sir, and you're a born natural fighter,
sir," said he. "If you had a few lessons in boxing, sir, I'd put
you against the best."

But later, when the young men were resting, each under his sheet
after a rub-down, the true significance of the affair for Orde came
out. Since the fight, Gerald's customary lassitude of manner seemed
quite to have left him. His eye was bright, a colour mounted
beneath the pale olive of his skin, the almost effeminate beauty of
his countenance had animated. He looked across at Orde several
times, hesitated, and at last decided to speak.

"Look here, Orde," said he, "I want to confess something to you.
When you first came here three days ago, I had lots of fun with
myself about you. You know your clothes aren't quite the thing, and
I thought your manner was queer, and all that. I was a cad. I want
to apologise. You're a man, and I like you better than any fellow
I've met for a long time. And if there's any trouble--in the
future--that is--oh, hang it, I'm on your side--you know what I
mean!"

Orde smiled slowly.

"Bishop," was his unexpected reply, "you're not near so much of a
dandy as you think you are."

XVIII

Affairs went thus for a week. Orde was much at the Bishop
residence, where he was cordially received by the general, where he
gained an occasional half-hour with Carroll, and where he was almost
ignored by Mrs. Bishop in her complete self-absorption. Indeed, it
is to be doubted whether he attained any real individuality to that
lady, who looked on all the world outside her family as useful or
useless to the church.

In the course of the happy moments he had alone with Carroll, he
arrived at a more intimate plane of conversation with her. He came
to an understanding of her unquestioning acceptance of Mrs. Bishop's
attitude. Carroll truly believed that none but herself could
perform for her mother the various petty offices that lady demanded
from her next of kin, and that her practical slavery was due by
every consideration of filial affection. To Orde's occasional
tentative suggestion that the service was of a sort better suited to
a paid companion or even a housemaid, she answered quite seriously
that it made mother nervous to have others about her, and that it
was better to do these things than to throw her into a "spell."
Orde chafed at first over seeing his precious opportunities thus
filched from him; later he fretted because he perceived that Carroll
was forced, however willingly, to labours beyond her strength, to
irksome confinement, and to that intimate and wearing close
association with the abnormal which in the long run is bound to
deaden the spirit. He lost sight of his own grievance in the
matter. With perhaps somewhat of exaggeration he came mightily to
desire for her more of the open air, both of body and spirit. Often
when tramping back to his hotel he communed savagely with himself,
turning the problem over and over in his mind until, like a
snowball, it had gathered to itself colossal proportions.

And in his hotel room he brooded over the state of affairs until his
thoughts took a very gloomy tinge indeed. To begin with, in spite
of his mother's assurance, he had no faith in his own cause. His
acquaintance with Carroll was but an affair of months, and their
actual meetings comprised incredibly few days. Orde was naturally
humble-minded. It did not seem conceivable to him that he could win
her without a long courtship. And superadded was the almost
intolerable weight of Carroll's ideas as to her domestic duties.
Although Orde held Mrs. Bishop's exactions in very slight esteem,
and was most sceptical in regard to the disasters that would follow
their thwarting, nevertheless he had to confess to himself that all
Carroll's training, life, the very purity and sweetness of her
disposition lent the situation an iron reality for her. He became
much discouraged.

Nevertheless, at the very moment when he had made up his mind that
it would be utterly useless even to indulge in hope for some years
to come, he spoke. It came about suddenly, and entirely without
premeditation.

The two had escaped for a breath of air late in the evening.
Following the conventions, they merely strolled to the end of the
block and back, always within sight of the house. Fifth Avenue was
gay with illumination and the prancing of horses returning uptown or
down to the Washington Square district. In contrast the side
street, with its austere rows of brownstone houses, each with its
area and flight of steps, its spaced gas lamps, its deserted
roadway, seemed very still and quiet. Carroll was in a tired and
pensive mood. She held her head back, breathing deeply.

It's only a little strip, but it's the stars," said she, looking up
to the sky between the houses. "They're so quiet and calm and big."

She seemed to Orde for the first time like a little girl. The
maturer complexities which we put on with years, with experience,
and with the knowledge of life had for the moment fallen from her,
leaving merely the simple soul of childhood gazing in its eternal
wonder at the stars. A wave of tenderness lifted Orde from his
feet. He leaned over, his breath coming quickly.

"Carroll!" he said.

She looked up at him, and shrank back.

"No, no! You mustn't," she cried. She did not pretend to
misunderstand. The preliminaries seemed in some mysterious fashion
to have been said long ago.

"It's life or death with me," he said.

"I must not," she cried, fluttering like a bird. "I promised myself
long ago that I must always, ALWAYS take care of mother."

"Please, please, dear," pleaded Orde. He had nothing more to say
than this, just the simple incoherent symbols of pleading; but in
such crises it is rather the soul than the tongue that speaks. His
hand met hers and closed about it. It did not respond to his grasp,
nor did it draw away, but lay limp and warm and helpless in his own.

She shook her head slowly.

"Don't you care for me, dear?" asked Orde very gently.

"I have no right to tell you that," answered she. "I have tried,
oh, so hard, to keep you from saying this, for I knew I had no right
to hear you."

Orde's heart leaped with a wild exultation.

"You do care for me!" he cried.

They had mounted the steps and stood just within the vestibule.
Orde drew her toward him, but she repulsed him gently.

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