Testimony Of Two Men (52 page)

Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. He won’t get hospital privileges
in
any other city. Get him out, Louis.”

Louis had the obstinacy of his Teutonic forebears, and he had never liked the Senator for all they were the dearest of friends. He said, “He saved little Hortense Nolan’s life a few days ago, Kenton, and her parents are the best friends you have in this town. He’s saved more people than I like to remember. He is a splendid surgeon and physician, and we need him—”

“Get him out, Louis,” said the Senator
in
a soft and deadly voice. “Is that understood? Out of your hospital, out of Bedloe’s. Do you know what he did to my son? He made it impossible for him to continue at his seminary. I objected to the seminary in the first place, but I bowed, like an indulgent father, to the boy’s decision. Then this Ferrier almost destroyed him, filled his mind with the most unspeakable things, and the boy has run off to France. I have heard some more about his cases. Didn’t little Martha Best die under mysterious circumstances, for instance? And only yesterday my dear and delicate friend, Elsie Holliday, was put under sedatives by you, Louis, because your Ferrier drove her son, young Jefferson, out of town, out of his home state, and to some pesthole near the Gulf of Mexico, after some alleged treatment, or diagnosis, which no one else has confirmed and which is probably false.”

Louis’ face tightened. “Now, listen to me, Kenton, you’ve heard very filthy lies. Little Martha had a very rare disease, cancer of the blood, and it’s incurable and Jon diagnosed it at once. My God, man! You can’t blame Jon for an act of God or nature! I don’t know about your boy. I didn’t know Jon was his physician—”

“He wasn’t. He forced himself, uninvited, uncalled, into my house and talked alone to my boy, and the next thing I and his dear aunt knew he was off for France and places unknown. Is it ethical to insist on treating a patient against his will, against the will of his family? I thought not. But what about Jefferson Holliday?”

Louis hesitated. “I can’t tell you exactly, but he has something the government designates as a ‘loathesome and contagious disease.’ That’ll have to satisfy you, Kenton.”

The Senator chuckled, glanced sidelong at his sister, who was still chatting. “Venereal, eh? Well, young men. What about the new arsenic treatments? Why, Louis, if all the young men who had syphilis or the clap were driven out of the cities, we’d have no one left.”

He tapped Louis on the shoulder. “Get him out, Louis. Is that understood? Come, Beatrice, we’ll just have time to drive down to the park and dine with our friends and than see the fireworks at night.”

The ladies of the Ferrier party had discreetly retired, “for refreshment,” into the interior of the City Hall, and the gentlemen also retired for the same purpose into the convenient basement of the First Presbyterian Church. They met again at the table. “We’re practically alone,” said Jonathan with pleasure.

“Well, we still have the chocolate cake dear Father brought us, and there is still ice for the tea,” said Marjorie. She sank down on a bench as if very weary. “Isn’t it getting
a
little cooler? What time is it, Jon? I didn’t bring my watch.”

“Nearly six. Campion gassed so long that you fell asleep, Mother, and nearly everyone else at this table. What
a
fraud and dangerous farce he is! What did you think, Bob?”

“I?” asked Robert, and his fair cheeks turned very pink. “Candidly, Jon, I don’t enjoy listening to politicians. I heard enough of them in Philadelphia. I just let the Senator’s words slide easily, without penetration.” At this word his color became extremely bright and Jonathan wanted to burst out laughing, for the young doctor had glanced with wincing at Jenny Heger, who was not listening at all and had so far overcome her fear of strangers that she was helping Marjorie fill clean glasses with ice and tea.

“You didn’t miss anything,” said Jonathan. The men were not yet seated. They stood in a little group together, Jonathan, Robert Morgan, the priest and Mr. Kitchener.

“I didn’t listen, either,” said the latter. “What for? It’s bad enough around election time. Did you listen—sir?” he kindly asked Father McNulty.

“I’m afraid I did,” said the priest. “I found it very disturbing. I’ve never heard a speech like that before, though I’ve been hearing hints of such things in editorials in many news- papers since the new century arrived. There’s a sort of exuberance in the air—”

“Well, that isn’t very bad,” said Mr. Kitchener.

“An approaching madness,” said Jonathan. “I just remembered what Henry James said recently, to the effect that our world will have pretty well gone to smash about midcentury.
I
believe him. Some of the old boys are very good prophets.”

“In what way will it have gone to smash?” asked Mr. Kitchener, and he looked at his daughter.

“Wars. Revolutions. Nihilism. We’ve already smelled its stench in America. Coming events send their stink ahead of them, as well as their shadows. Populism. Teddy’s Progressivism. William Jennings Bryan. Eugene Debs. I’ve been reading a lot about Debs lately. At midcentury I’ll be eighty-four, and dead, thank God.”

“But our grandchildren,” said Mr. Kitchener, very unhappily.

Jonathan shrugged. “I won’t have any, and that’s a blessing. Let our grandchildren take care of themselves. Sufficient unto the day— Well, we still have comparative peace in the world just now, though I doubt it is going to last much longer, considering our Campions in Washington.”

“Wars?” said Robert. “Can you imagine America embroiling herself in any foreign war? Impossible.”

But Jonathan had turned his head to look at Jenny. She was leaning over the table, her back to him, and he saw the extended long slim length of her and her small and slender waist, and the stretch of cheap checked cotton over her fine shoulders. Marjorie caught his eye and the gentlemen, all of them troubled now, returned to the table and the tea and the cake. But now Jenny was sitting far opposite Jonathan, next to Marjorie, and other of the ladies had changed their seats and so Jonathan found himself near Mrs. Kitchener on one side and Maude on the other. Maude was not pleased at this, for Robert was sitting next to Jenny on the opposite bench and was not looking at Maude at all.

They ate and drank desultorily, idly watching the stout German Brass Band put away its instruments. The hot early evening air was so quiet that those at the table could hear the guttural accents of the musicians. They could hear the dry rustling of the trees and the movements of carriages in streets beyond the park as the celebrants drove home. Men were clearing away the flags and the chairs on the City Hall steps, and the draped banners of red, white and blue, and other men were walking over the grass gathering up the larger litter. No one moved quickly. A man laughed. A distant dog barked. The sun fell lower and lower into a reddening sky. There was a scent of old roses and hay from somewhere, even over the smell of heated stone, and a breath from the river.

“How peaceful it is,” said Marjorie. “I’m just drugged with sun and air. I’m sure I’ll be asleep before we get home. I’ve enjoyed this day, in spite of the Senator. You must tell me what he said when we get home, Jon.”

“I’ve forgotten,” her son replied. Now the old sick restlessness was on him again, the blankness, the wanting to go he knew not where, the intense desire for meaning and fulfillment, which he had known as a child. He looked at the golden glitter in the tops of the trees and the blue shadows under them, and his restlessness deepened to an old pain, an old desire, and his disquiet submerged his thoughts in darkness. He looked at Jenny, shyly talking to Mrs. Kitchener, and again he was tense and tingling and again he felt sorrow and bitterness and the deepest anger. But now the anger was against himself because he knew, finally, what had ailed him for nearly four years.

“Robert?” said Mrs. Morgan.
“I
really think we must be getting home. My arthritis, you know.”

Robert seemed rebellious, and then he sighed. “Very well, Mother.” He stood up. He bowed to Marjorie. “Mrs. Ferrier, it was most kind of you to invite us, most kind. You have done so much to make us happy in our new home. When we have moved into our house, I hope you will visit us often.”

“My dear, I’ve done nothing,” said Marjorie, and her hazel eyes sparkled at him with affection.

Robert stood and hesitated. He had the strongest yearning that Jenny look at him, say a word, or simply smile. He could not leave without that. As if she felt his urgent desire, she did glance up across the table, for he had moved to help his mother, and she gave him her faint and shrinking smile, then glanced away. It was enough for the young man. He was quite hearty in his last good-byes.

“Such a nice young man, so devoted to his poor mother,” said Sue Kitchener. “She has led a life of such trials. Quite a martyr. Is he—I mean, has he spoken—”

“If you mean, Sue, is there a girl lurking in the shadows— no,” said Jonathan. “He’s disengaged.
I
hope he keeps that way.”

“Now, Jon,” said Marjorie, and yawned deeply and richly.

Sue giggled. “Well, I hope he finds a lovely girl, right here in Hambledon.” She smiled tenderly at her daughter and Maude blushed.

“And I have Benediction,” said Father McNulty, “not that
I
expect many visitors to the Blessed Sacrament today.”

He rose and made his farewells and trotted off, and everyone watched him go, even Jenny Heger. “At any rate, Kenton was good to help him buy his horse and buggy,” said Marjorie. “I suppose that was because of Francis.” She looked inquiringly at Jonathan, but he said nothing.

“And now
I
am afraid we must leave, too,” said Sue Kitchener. “We are having just a light supper—if we can find any room for it—and then we are going down to the river to watch the fireworks in the dark. Are you going, too, Marjorie?”

“I think not,” said Marjorie Ferrier.
“I’m
really too tired. Jonathan?”

“Certainly not,” he replied.

“Well, that’s too bad. I thought you might like to take Jenny.”

Jonathan was amazed. The very idea was grotesque. The Kitcheners took their leave. Now the last yellow glitter had left the trees and a coolness was rising, and the Ferriers were alone with Jenny, who was sitting in her usual anguished silence with her head bowed and her hands in her lap.

But when Marjorie began to gather dishes and glasses and silver and napkins together, Jenny stood up at once and began to help her, her young hands deft and quick. Jonathan filled the baskets neatly. “Jenny,” said Marjorie, “will ride with us to the river. She didn’t bring her bicycle today.”

“Oh, no, I can walk!” cried the girl. “I like to walk! It isn’t far!”

“Nonsense. A young girl walking alone on the streets—it’s getting quite dark now—and on a holiday, could be misunderstood,” said Marjorie.

“Mother, you’re in the twentieth century now,” Jonathan said. “Young ladies are understood these days, not misunderstood. Isn’t that so, Jenny?”

When she did not answer but only hurried more, he added, “It is all the ‘new woman’ now, isn’t it, Jenny, the free woman, free to do as she likes under any circumstances. Bold and free, like a man.”

“Don’t be unpleasant, Jon,” said Marjorie. “Jenny, I’ll hear no more. You must ride with us, among the baskets, I am afraid. Will your servants have returned by the time you arrive?”

The girl blurted, “No.
I
told them they need not come back until the morning. It is a holiday for them, too.”

Marjorie let her hands fall. “Jenny! You mean to spend the night entirely alone on the island! Why, that’s not to be thought of! It’s too dangerous. Anyone can row over there and molest you or rob you. Say no more. You must stay with us tonight.”

“Oh, no!” The cry was purely desperate. “I’m not afraid, Aunt Marjorie. I’m not afraid when I am alone.” She looked, in the blue twilight, as if she were about to cry. “I want to be alone,” she added. “I didn’t mean to say that, Aunt Marjorie, but I did mean it—I mean—”

Jonathan had listened to this with surly amusement. Was she planning a new rendezvous, with Childe Harald away, on that island? She looked distracted enough.

“I won’t hear of it,” said Marjorie. “What if something happened to you?”

“It won’t,” said Jenny. “It never has before.
I
‘ve often been alone like this.”

Oh, you have, have you? thought Jonathan, and remembered a recent story now avid in Hambledon, alleged to be directly from one of the servants herself. It was related that the maid had often seen Harald leaving Jenny’s bedroom early in the morning, and once or twice had detected Jenny leaving Harald’s at dawn. It was a delicious story. There was still another—that Jenny’s favors were not Harald’s alone and never had been. The girl was only twenty, yet there was hardly a woman more notorious in Hambledon than she.

Who had muttered the sniggering story to him only a few days ago? He could not remember. “But I can vouch for it,” someone had said. “It is true enough.” Then he remembered. It had been in St. Hilda’s lobby, and one of the young doctors had told him. Jenny had discharged the maid, who was now working for his mother. “The wench had seen too much,” the doctor had said. “But that Heger trollop is a fine piece! I’d like to—” Jonathan had walked away, full of his chronic rage and full of his hate. He did not see but only guessed the young doctor’s obscene gesture.