Chapter XXIII: The Last of the Old Man

Georgia pressed the knob of the time clock at fifteen minutes to nine the next morning. When she opened her locker to hang up her hat and jacket she discovered a novel which she had drawn from a circulating library six weeks before and which had been costing her two cents a day ever since, a box of linen collars, an umbrella she thought she had lost, and a shirt waist done up in paper.

She went from the locker hall into the room of the office, half expecting to find it changed in some way, but everything was the same. The same clerks were stoop-shouldered over the same desks, the same young auditor was lolling back in his swivel chair, pulling his stubby mustache, his elbow on the low mahogany railing that marked him off from his assistants. That was how he always began the day. At nine precisely he would ring for a stenographer and dictate from notes. He never dictated straight from his head, probably because his work was so full of figures.

Georgia was taken back by the casual way in which she was greeted. Several arose and shook hands and were briefly glad to see her again; others simply nodded a good morning. An oldish bookkeeper asked, "Been away, haven't you?"

The girls of the lunch club, however, welcomed her warmly as they came in one after the other and found her seated at her old desk, just outside the old man's door. But even they, she felt with a twinge of bitterness, failed to grasp the stupendousness of her experience.

Since last she had been in the office she had knocked at the gate of death and lost her lover and found her faith, yet the people of the office seemingly perceived no change in her except that she was pale.

All that they knew of her was the surface and that, she reflected, was all she knew of them. Perhaps during her absence the oldest bookkeeper had received notice to quit at the end of the year and dreaded to tell his invalid wife; perhaps he had had a daughter die, not recover, from typhoid; or his son had gone to prison or received a hero medal or become a licensed aviator.

The young auditor might be frowning and pulling his mustache because he had recently acquired a chorus lady for a stepmother. The tall, red-puffed girl with the open-work waist and abrupt curves might, as had been suspected, be no better than she should be. It wouldn't surprise Georgia greatly if that was so.

But, she reflected, what of it? None of them mattered to her, just as she mattered to none of them.

For everyone she supposed it was much the same; four or five people one knew and the rest strangers.

She slipped some paper into the machine to try her fingers. She wrote hadn't, "hand't" and stenographer, "stonegrapher." She was not pleased to find whoever had been subbing for her had put a black ribbon on her machine. She liked purple better.

Mechanically she pulled at the upper left-hand drawer where she had kept her note books and pencils, but it was locked. And she didn't have the key. She had sent it by Al from the hospital.

Miss Gerson walked briskly to the desk. "Oh," she said, "Miss Connor, you're back."

"Yes. How do you do!" They shook hands.

"That's fine--you do look a little pale--we were all so sorry to hear of your illness. I've been your understudy," she gave a little sigh, "using your desk. I'm afraid its cluttered up with my things. If I'd only known you were returning to-day I'd have left it spick and span for you." She took out the key and unlocked the master drawer, which released the others, and removed her notebook, pencils, erasers, some picture postal cards, a broken-crystalled lady's watch, an apple and a book on etiquette.

"I think the old man's just fine to work for, don't you!" she asked as she collected her belongings.

"Indeed I do," said Georgia jealously. "Will you be at the club for lunch to-day?"

"Indeed I will," responded Miss Gerson, departing.

The telephone tinkled on Georgia's desk.

"Hello," came the voice, "is this Miss Gerson?"

"Did you wish to speak to her personally?"

"I wish to speak with Miss Gerson, Mr. Tatton's secretary."

"This is his secretary," said Georgia.

"This is St. Luke's hospital," said the voice. "Mr. Tatton wants you to take a cab and come right down here to see him, and say--hello--I'm not through--bring your typewriter. Right away."

The old man was propped up in a chair, fully dressed, when Georgia arrived. "Oh, Miss Connor," he said when he saw her, "I wasn't expecting you. All the better, though. Glad you're well again. I'm not." He held his hand to his side and seemed to have difficulty with his breathing.

"Take this," he said. "Date it and write: Codicil. And I hereby declare and publish, being of sound mind and body, and in the presence of witnesses, that I do now revoke and cancel and make of no effect and void, in whole and in part, the clause numbered seven--then put also figure seven in parenthesis--in the foregoing instrument, will and testament of date July second, nineteen hundred and five. I expressly withdraw and withhold all the bequests therein made, named and stipulated."

Georgia took his words directly on the machine. A nurse and an interne witnessed his signature.

"Now," said the old man, "take this in shorthand, to my wife, care Platz & Company, Bankers, 18 Rue Scribe, Paris, France.

"Dear Marion: Except for those three pleasant days last summer we haven't seen each other for six years, and as you will know long before you read this, we shan't see each other alive again.

"I deeply regret that, especially of later years, our marriage has been so unsuccessful. I apprehend clearly that the fault lay with me insofar as I--quote--had grown so very prosy--end quote--as you remarked last summer.

"My last wish is that you will bring Elsie home and keep her here until she marries some decent American with an occupation. Underline those last three words, Miss Connor. She is now a young woman of seventeen, and it was evident to me last summer that her head is fast becoming stuffed with nonsense. She is learning to look down on her country and her countrymen and mark my words--underline mark my words, Miss Connor--if you encourage her to marry some foreign scamp she will be very unhappy. I know you don't agree with these views, but I know they are sound, and if you keep Elsie over there you will live to see that proved; although I hope not.

"Give my love to Elsie and remind her of her old dad now and then.

"Good-bye, Marion. You and Elsie are the only women I ever loved.

"That's all, Miss Connor. Now what I want you to do is this: If I don't come out of this operation--appendicitis--please write that up and mail it. Just sign it Fred. If I do get well, destroy your notes and don't send the letter.

"Oh, you better add a postscript--P.S. I am dictating this because I have neither the time nor the strength to write myself. I was attacked suddenly."

Two nurses and a doctor who had been waiting now gathered about the old man, lifted him gently to the bed and began to undress him. He held out his hand. "Good-bye, Miss Connor," he said.

He died, and Georgia sent the letter to his wife.