Chapter XXXI: Fate Empties Her Creel

[FROM SUE PAYNTER]

PARIS, Feb. 10th., 189--

JERRY DEAR:

What must you think of me for delaying so long to write,
after the few curt words I found for you that night? I hope
you know that something must have kept me and have forgiven
me already. Poor little Susy was taken very sick the night
you sailed, with violent pains and a high fever. Fortunately
there is a good American doctor here--a Doctor Collier--and
we pulled her through, though it seemed a doubtful thing at
one time. The doctor decided that she had appendicitis (I
never heard of it before) and operated immediately on her,
which undoubtedly saved her life. It seems that Mother
Nature is not quite so clever as we have always thought her
and has left a very dangerous little _cul-de-sac_ somewhere,
that ought not to be there, so modern science takes it out.
Isn't that strange? The doctor has just come over to operate
for this in Germany somewhere; he was an assistant of Dr.
McGee, whom you sent to the South, and can't say enough of
the magnificent work he is doing there. He was much
interested to find I knew all about it and that Uncle Morris
stocked the dispensary. Isn't the world small?

I hope you're not feeling too badly about Margarita--don't.
Of course I understand what the stage has lost, and you will
confess that I was as anxious for her career as anybody,
even when I was sorriest for Roger. I wanted her to have her
rights as an artist. But if _she_ doesn't want them--ah,
that's a different pair of sleeves altogether. She has sent
me her latest photograph, and the eyes are all I need. Of
course, I have no such brilliant future to sacrifice, but if
I had, I am sure I should throw a dozen of them over the
windmill for two eyes like hers to-day!

I don't know why I am prosing along at this rate and
avoiding the main object of this letter. I must plunge right
into it, I suppose, and get it over.

Don't think I don't appreciate all your kind, your generous,
offer meant, Jerry. I thought of it so often and so long
before I gave you that brusque answer. And it tempted me for
a moment--indeed it did. I think, as you say, that we could
travel very comfortably together and we have many of the
same tastes--I know no one so sympathetic as you. As for
"nursing a rheumatic, middle-aged wanderer through assorted
winter-climates," that is absurd, and you know it, though I
should be glad enough to do it, if it _were_ true, as far as
that goes. I know all you would do for the children, and how
kind you would be to them. Not that I like that part,
though, to be quite frank. I could never love another
woman's children (especially if I loved their father) and I
can't understand the women that do. So I always imagine a
man in the same position. And I can't help feeling, Jerry,
that if you _really_ loved me--loved me in the whole crazy
sense of that dreadful world, I mean--that you wouldn't
speak so sweetly about the children: how could you? How can
any man--I couldn't, if I were one!

But this is very unfair, because you never said you did love
me in that way--don't imagine that I thought so for a
moment. Jerry dear, my best friend now, for I must not count
on Roger any more, do you think I am blind? Do you think I
have been blind for three years? And will you think me a
romantic, conceited fool when I say that unless I--even I, a
widow and a jilt, who hurt a good man terribly and got well
punished for it!--can have the kind of love that you can
never give me, because you gave it to someone else three
years ago, I don't want to accept your generous kindness?
You see, I know how you can love, Jerry, just as I see now
that I never knew how Roger could until those same three
years ago. Of course he didn't either--would he ever have
known the difference, I wonder, if we had married?

And there is another reason, too. You might just as well
know it, for my conceit is not pride really, and it may be
you know it already. Whatever love Frederick failed to kill
in me--and the very idea of passionate love almost nauseates
me, even yet--is not in my power to give you, Jerry dear. It
might, some day, later, wake again, but it would not be your
touch that could wake it.

Now, since this is so of both of us, don't you see, dear,
that things are better as they are? I promise you that if I
ever need help, I will come to you _first of all_, since
what you really want is to help me and make me comfortable
and give me the pleasure of wide travel, you generous
fellow! And if ever you _really_ need me, Jerry--but you
won't, I am sure. No one else is quite what you are to me,
or can be, now, and we must always be what we have always
been--the best of friends. Tell me that you know I am right,
and then let us never discuss it again.

Yours _always_,

SUE.

UNIVERSITY CLUB, May 20th, 189--

DEAR JERRY:

Have just got back from a little Western trip (my brother
and I exchanged pulpits for a month) and learned of Roger's
illness and the accident. What a terrible thing, and how
fortunate they were! I always liked that big dog, the fine,
faithful fellow. Mrs. Bradley's leaving the stage was no
great surprise to me: she came to New York to ask my advice
about it just before the accident. We had a long talk, and
though she by no means agreed at the time to everything I
said on the subject, she did not seem opposed, herself, to
much of it, in fact, she seemed very anxious to do the fair
thing, it seemed to me. She appreciated perfectly that the
more she did in one way the less she could do in
another--how wonderful it is to think that she has never
been to school in her life! It almost seems as if so much
schooling were unnecessary, doesn't it, when association
with educated people can do so much in three years. Or
perhaps it is only women that could absorb so quickly.

I hope the doctors are wrong about her voice. They all say
it will be a little husky always (though less and less so
with time) and that singing, except in the quietest,
smallest way, will be impossible. It does not seem to matter
very much to her. She is looking very well indeed (you know,
of course, that she is expecting another child in the
autumn--Roger told me). He is quite magnificent with his
thick, silvery hair, I think. Mr. Carter, who dined with me
here at the club a night or two ago (he gave my boys a fine
talk on German customs and military games) tells me that he
hopes (Roger, I mean) to be able to do a great deal of his
work on the Island--certainly all the summer and autumn. He
seems to be turning into a sort of consulting lawyer, like a
surgeon. Besides that great text-book business I suppose you
know about. He says there are two or three years' work on
that alone.

I hope that you agree with me that Mrs. Bradley is much
better off in her husband's home, fulfilling the natural
duties of her sex. You seemed to think in your last that
Mrs. Paynter would not, to my great surprise. What in the
world is the matter with the women, nowadays? Where shall we
be if the finest specimens of them have no leisure to
perpetuate the race? Are only the stupid and unoriginal,
unattractive ones to have this responsibility? I wish I
dared get up a sermon on these lines; I may try yet!

You know Mrs. Paynter well, Jerry--do you think there is any
chance for me there? I have been for ten years proving that
a minister need not be married, and I've done it, too, but
it was only because I never met the woman I wanted. I have,
now, but she won't have me. Does that mean it's final? I
don't know much about women, but I can't believe one like
her would refuse just to be asked again. Tell me what you
think. She seems very decided, though she sympathises
thoroughly with my work.

Yours faithfully,

TYLER FESSENDEN ELDER.

[FROM MY ROUGH DIARY]

May 30, 189--

Have just written Tip Elder how sorry I am about Sue, but
that he'd better give it up. She'll never marry. How
curiously we three are twisted into the Bradley weaving!

M. so happy and beautiful--the past seems a dream. Voice
lovely still, but not quite under her control always, and a
tiny roughness in it that humanises, somehow--it was _too_
clear before, though that sounds absurd.

Everybody wondering how everybody else will take her
retirement. Strangely enough, no one regrets much,
personally, but all sure the others will! Are we all more
clear-sighted than we suppose--or more sentimental? Surgeon
from Vienna has pronounced condition final. Either she is a
wonderful actress or else we have overestimated her vocation;
she seems absolutely contented. And yet, think of her
triumphs! And of course, her greatest successes were all to
come. Madame M---- is furious, but told Sue she had never
trusted Roger--he was always too silent! "He has absorbed a
great artist like so much blotting-paper!" she said. But he
has got something into her eyes that Madame never saw there:
we all agree on that. How did Alif put it--"Tis Allah sets
the price, brother--we have but to pay." Well, she's paid.
And old Roger, for that matter, and Sue, and Tip--and I. Who
keeps the shop, I wonder?