The Undiscovered Country. William Dean Howells

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СКАЧАТЬ surprised this trait or that in him he was fond of exhibiting his capture.

      The tie that bound Ford, on his part, to Phillips was not tangible; it was hardly more than force of habit, or like an indifferent yielding to the advances made by the latter. Doubtless the absence of any other intimacy had much to do with this apparent intimacy. They had as little in common in matters of taste as in temperament. Ford openly scorned bric-a-brac; he rarely went into society; for the ladies in whose company Phillips liked to bask he cared as slightly as for stamped leather or Saracenic tiles. He was not of Bostonian origin, and had come to the city a much younger man than we find him. He was known to a few persons of like tastes for his scientific studies, which he pursued somewhat fitfully, as his poverty, and that dark industry known as writing for the press, by which he eked out his poverty, permitted. He wrote a caustic style; and this, together with his brooding look and his taciturn and evasive habits, gave rise to conjecture that his past life concealed a disappointment in love, "Or perhaps," suggested a fair analyst, "in literature."

      Several mornings after the seance at Mrs. Le Roy's, he sat on one of the many benches which the time found vacant in the Public Garden. It was yet far too early for the nurse-maids and their charges and suitors; the marble Venus of the fountain was surprised without her shower on; Mr. Ball's equestrian Washington drew his sword in solitude unbroken by a policeman upon Dr. Rimmer's Hamilton in Commonwealth Avenue; the whole precinct rested in patrician insensibility to the plebeian hour of seven; and Ford, if he had cared, would have been safe from the polite amaze of that neighborhood at finding one even of its remote acquaintance in those pleasure-grounds at that period of the day. He sat in a place which was habitual with him; for he lodged in one of the boarding-houses on a street nearby, and he made the Public Garden the resort of such leisure as each day afforded him, seeking always the same seat under the same Kilmarnock willow, and suffering a sense of invasion when he found it taken. Commonly his leisure fell much later in the day; and he had now the aspect of a sleep-broken man, rather than the early riser who takes the air on principle or from choice. He sat and gazed absently over at the pond, where the swans lay still on the still water, with their white reflections under them as distinct and substantial to the eye as their own bulk.

      A few stragglers, looking as jaded as himself for the most part, lounged on the seats along the walks, or hung listless on the parapet of the bridge. The spiteful English sparrows scattered their sharp, irritating notes through the air, and quarreled about over the grass, or made love like the nagging lovers out of a lady's novel.

      When Ford at last withdrew his absent eyes from the swans and looked up, he was aware of a large and flabby presence, which towered, in the sense that a lofty mold of jelly may be said to tower, on the path directly before him. In this he gradually recognized an acquaintance of the spiritual seance, and finally knew the mottled face of Mr. Eccles; the morning was unseasonably close and warm; his hat was off, and the breeze played with the hair that crept thinly over his crown; his shirt and collar were clean, but affected the spectator differently.

      "A-r-r-h—good-morning!" he said, with a slow, hard smoothness, staring intently at Ford, with a set smile and shut teeth.

      "How d' ye do!" answered Ford, without interest.

      "Nice morning," said Mr. Eccles, turning half about, and describing it with a wave of his limp-rimmed silk hat.

      "Very pleasant," assented Ford, making no motion to rise, and neither inviting nor forbidding further conversation.

      "A habitual early riser?" suggested Mr. Eccles.

      " No, I merely happen to be up."

      "I rise early myself," said Mr. Eccles.

      "It is my digestion. I sleep badly." He looked, as he spoke, like a man who had never slept well. "Your friend, I presume, is not troubled in his digestion?"

      "If you mean Mr. Phillips," replied Ford, with a cold ray of amusement, "I believe not. He makes it a matter of conscience to digest well."

      "It isn't that, sir," said Mr. Eccles. "I have experimented in the matter a great deal. I have tried to digest well on principle, but that does not reach the root of the trouble. It may be alleviated by the proper influences; but this sourness "—he struck his stomach softly—"seems to be the material response to some spiritual ferment which we are at present powerless to escape.

      I am satisfied that the large majority of our indigestion, sir, comes from the existing imperfections of mediumisation."

      "Some philosophers attribute it to pie," said Ford, neutrally.

      "That is a very superficial way of looking at it," returned Mr. Eccles. "If we could once establish the true relations with the other life, pie wouldn't stand in our way."

      "I've no doubt that those who establish their relations in the old-fashioned way, by dying, are not troubled by pie," said Ford.

      "Oh, death is not necessary to a complete rapport," returned Mr. Eccles, somewhat impatiently. "I have long been satisfied of that. It may even prove an obstacle. What we want is to place ourselves in connection with the regions of order and peace. Till we can do this, we must feel the effects of the acidity, as I may call it, which characterizes the crude and unsettled spiritual existence reached by our present system of mediumisation. We had an illustration of that the other night, sir, in the vulgar violence of the manifestations. I was ashamed that any person of refinement should have been invited to witness such a—a saturnalia. I should have withdrawn from the circle myself, at once, as soon as I perceived what the character of the communications was likely to be, if it had not been for my regard for Dr. Boynton and his daughter. There is no doubt in my mind, sir, that if we had then been in communication with ladies and gentlemen of the other life, the circle could have been broken with impunity. As it was, you saw the brutality with which the violation of a single condition was resented by the savage crew we had suffered to be called about us. They dreaded to lose an opportunity for riot. The consequence was that Miss Boynton's hand was caught and crushed till the setting of her ring cut to the bone; then she was flung to the ground. The only redeeming feature, the only hopeful aspect, of the affair was the apparition which terminated the disgraceful scene. Undoubtedly the hand which turned on the gas was a celestial agency of the highest and purest type."

      Ford let his gaze, which had been dwelling upon Mr. Eccles's face with cold scrutiny, drop to the ground. "I hope," he said, "that Miss Boynton has quite recovered from her—accident."

      "It was a shock," returned Mr. Eccles, candidly, "and her physique is delicate. She is a mingling of the finest elements, but the proportions axe so adjusted that the equilibrium is very easily disturbed. Her digestion, I should say, was normally very good. She is evidently in relation, for the most part, with settled and orderly essences." He again set his teeth, and shone upon Ford with a wide, joyless smile. He waited for a moment, and Ford making no sign of interest, he said, "Good-morning," and towered tremulously away, carrying his hat in his hand, and letting his baldness take the breeze as he walked.

      When he was gone, Ford sat in a long reverie, from which he was roused by the clock of the Arlington Street church striking eight, which was his breakfast hour. He rose, and strolled down the path and across the street to his lodging, which he entered with his latch-key. The other boarders, with their morning freshness of toilet upon them, were lounging or tripping down-stairs to breakfast, and met him with various degrees of interest, umbrage, and indifference in their salutation as he went up. The men mostly growled at him, with settled dislike in their tones; some of the women beheld him with pique, others with kindly curiosity; one little lady, in a pretty morning-robe, warbled at him, as she swept her skirts aside to make room for him at the turn of the stairs, "Doing the early bird, Mr. Ford?"

      "No; СКАЧАТЬ