quentin charter is attracted by the travail of pelée, and encounters a queer fellow-voyager
charter did not find paula linster in the week of new york that followed his call at the zoroaster, but he found quentin charter. the first three or four days were rather intense in a psychological way. the old vibrations of new york invariably contained for him a destructive principle, as paris held for dr. duprez. the furious consumption of nerve-tissue during the first evening after his arrival; a renewal of desires operating subconsciously, and in no small part through the passion of selma cross; his last struggle, both subtle and furious, with his own stimulus-craving temperament, and the desolation of the true romance—combined, among other things, worthily to test the growth of his spirit.... the thought that skylark had fallen into the hands of selma cross, and had been given that ugly estimate of him which the actress held before his call, as he expressed it in his letter, "drove straight and swiftly to the very centres of sanity." over this, was a ghastly, whimpering thing that would not be immured—the effect of which, of all assailants to rising hope, was most scarifying: that paula linster had suffered herself to listen to those old horrors, and had permitted him to be called to the bar before selma cross. no matter how he handled this, it held a fundamental lesion in the skylark-fineness.
charter whipped his wastrel tendencies one by one until on the fifth day his resistance hardened, and the brute within him was crippled from beating against it. his letter to paula linster was a triumph of repression. probably one out of six of the thoughts that came to him were given expression. he felt that he had made of selma cross an implacable enemy, and was pursued by the haunting dread (if, indeed, the conversation had not been overheard), that she might think better about "squaring" him. it was on this fifth day that for a moment the mystic attraction returned to his consciousness, and he heard the old singing. this was the first reward for a chastened spirit. again and again—though never consciously to be lured or forced—the vision, unhurt, undiminished, returned for just an instant with a veiled, but exquisite refinement.
the newspaper account of pelée's overflowing wrath immediately materialized all his vague thought of voyaging. his quest had vanished from new york. had selma cross been true to her word; at least, had any part of their interview been empowered to restore something of the faith of paula linster—there had been ample time for him to hear it. he was afraid that, in itself, his old intimacy with the actress had been enough to startle the skylark into uttermost flight. reifferscheid's frigidity had required only one test to become a deep trouble. his hint that miss linster would be away two or three months rendered new york and a return to his own home equally impossible. father fontanel held a bright, substantial warmth for his isolated spirit—and the panther was among the imminent sailings.
he bought his berth and passage on the morning of the sailing date, and there was a matinée of the thing in the meantime. charter did not notify selma cross of his coming, but he liked the play unreservedly, and was amazed by the perfection of her work. he wrote her a line to this effect; and also a note of congratulation and greeting to stephen cabot.... it was not without a pang that he looked back at manhattan from the narrows that night.
for several mornings he had studied the gaunt, striding figure of a fellow-passenger, who appeared to be religious in the matter of his constitutional; or, as a sailor softly remarked as he glanced up at charter from his holy-stoning, "he seems to feel the need av walkin' off sivin or eight divils before answerin' the breakfast-gong...." in behalf of this stranger also, charter happened to overhear the chief-steward encouraging one of the waiters to extra-diligence in service, queerly, in the steward's mind, the interest seemed of a deeper sort than even an unusual fee could exact—as if he recognized in the stranger a man exalted in some mysterious masonry. and charter noticed that the haggard giant enforced a sort of willing slavery throughout the ship—from the hands, but through the heads. this strange potentiality was decidedly interesting; as was the figure in itself, which seemed possessed of the strength of vikings, in spite of an impression, inevitable to charter when he drew near—of one enduring a sort of promethean dissolution. charter reflected upon the man's eyes, which had the startling look of having penetrated beyond the formality of death—into shadows where inquisition-hells were limned. it was not until he heard the steward address the other as "doctor bellingham," that the fanciful attraction weakened. his recollection crowded instantly with newspaper paragraphs regarding the bellingham activities. charter was rather normal in his masculine hatred for hypnotic artists and itinerary confessionals for women.
the panther ran into a gale in that storm-crucible off hatteras. charter smiled at the thought, as the striding bellingham passed, doing his mileage on the rocking deck, that the roar of the wind in the funnels aloft was fierce energy in the draughts of this human furnace. while his own interest waned, the other, curiously enough, began to respond to his unspoken overtures of a few days before. the panther was a day out from san juan, steaming past the far-flung coral shoals off santo domingo, when charter was beckoned forward where bellingham sat.
"this soft air would call a saint francis down from his spiritual meditations," the doctor observed.
the voice put charter on edge, and the manner affected him with inward humor. it was as if the other thought, "why, there's that pleasant-faced young man again. perhaps it would be just as well to speak with him." as he drew up his chair, however, charter was conscious of an abrupt change in his mental attitude—an inclination to combat, verbally to rush in, seize and destroy every false utterance. his initial idea was to compel this man who spoke so glibly of meditations to explain what the word meant to him. this tense, nervous impatience to disqualify all the other might say became dominant enough to be reckoned with, but when charter began to repress his irritation, a surprising inner resistance was encountered. his sensation was that of one being demagnetized. thoughts and words came quickly with the outgoing energy of the current. altogether he was extraordinarily affected.
"these islands are not particularly adapted for one who pursues the austerities," he replied.
"yet where can you find such temperamental happiness?" bellingham inquired, plainly testing the other. his manner of speech was flippant, as if it were quite the same to him if his acquaintance preferred another subject.
"anywhere among the less-evolved nations, when the people are warm and fed."
the doctor smiled. "you will soon see the long, lithe coppery bodies of the islanders, as they plunge into the sea from the antillean cliffs. you will hear the soft laughter of the women, and then you will forget to deny their perfection." sensuality exhaled from the utterance.
"you speak of the few brief zenith years which lie at the end of youth," charter said. "this sort of perfection exists anywhere. in the antilles it certainly is not because the natives have learned how to preserve life."
"that's just the point," said bellingham, "add to their natural gifts of beautiful young bodies—the knowledge of preservation."
"take a poor, unread island boy and inform him how to live forever," charter observed. "of course, he'll grasp the process instantly. but wouldn't it be rather severe on the other boys and girls, if the usual formula of perpetuating self is used? i mean, would he not have to restore his vitality from the others?"
bellingham stared at him. charter faced it out, but not without cost, for the livid countenance before him grew more and more ghastly and tenuous, until it had the effect of becoming altogether unsubstantial; and out of this wraith shone the eyes of the serpent. the clash of wills was quickly passed.
"you have encountered a different fountain of youth from mine," the doctor said gently.
"rather i have encountered a disgust for any serious consideration of immortality in the body."
"interesting, but our good saint paul says that those who are in the body when the last call sounds, will be caught up—without disturbing the sleep of the dead."
"it would be rather hard on such bodies—if the chariots were of fire," charter suggested.
he was inwardly groping for his poise. he could think well enough, but it disturbed him to feel the need to avoid the other's eyes. he liked the shaping of the conversation and knew that bellingham felt himself unknown. charter realized, too, that he would strike fire if he hammered long enough, but there was malevolence in the swift expenditure of energy demanded.
bellingham smiled again. "then you think it is inevitable that the end of man is—the clouds?"
"the aspiration of the spirit, i should say, is to be relieved of feet of clay.... immortality in the body—that's an unbreakable paradox to me. i'm laminated, harveyized against anything except making a fine tentative instrument of the body."
"you think, then, that the spirit grows as the body wastes?"
"orientals have encountered starvation with astonishing results to philosophy," charter remarked. "but i was thinking only of a body firmly helmed by a clean mind. the best i have within me declares that the fleshly wrapping becomes at the end but a cumbering cerement; that through life, it is a spirit-vault. when i pamper the body, following its fitful and imperious appetites, i surely stiffen the seals of the vault. in my hours in which the senses are dominant the spirit shrinks in abhorrence; just as it thrills, warms and expands in rarer moments of nobility."
"then the old martyrs and saints who macerated themselves wove great folds of spirit?"
the inconsequential manner of the question urged charter to greater effort to detach, if possible, for a moment at least, the other's ego. "in ideal," he went on, "i should be as careless of food as thoreau, as careless of physical pain as suso. as for the reproductive devil incarnated in man—it, and all its ramifications, since the most delicate and delightful of these so often betray—i should encase in the coldest steel of repression——"
"you say, in ideal," bellingham ventured quietly. "... but are not these great forces splendid fuel for the mind? prodigious mental workers have said so."
"a common view," said charter, who regarded the remark as characteristic. "certain mental workers are fond of expressing this. you hear it everywhere with a sort of 'eureka.' strength of the loins is but a coarse inflammation to the mind. a man may use such excess strength, earned by continence, in the production of exotics, feverish lyrics, and in depicting summer passions, but the truth is, that so long as that force is not censored, shriven and sterilized—it is the same jungle pestilence, and will color the mind with impurity. it is much better where it belongs—than in the mind."
"you do not believe in the wild torrents, the forked lightnings, and the shocking thunders of the poets?"
"i like the calm, conquering voices of the prophets better.... immortality of the body?... there can be no immortality in a substance which earth attracts. we have vast and violent lessons to learn in the flesh; lessons which can be learned only in the flesh, because it is a matrix for the integration of spirit. it appears to me that, in due time, man reaches a period when he balances in the attractions—between the weight of the body and the lifting of the soul. this is the result of a slow, refining process that has endured through all time. reincarnation is the best theory i know for the process. that there is an upward tendency driving the universe, seems to be the only cause and justification for creating. devolution cannot be at the centre of such a system.... the body becomes more and more a spotless garment for the soul; soul-light more and more electrifies it; the elimination of carnality in thought may even render the body delicate and transparent, but it is a matrix still, and falls away—when one's full-formed wings no longer need the weight of a thorax——"
"what an expression!" bellingham observed abruptly. he had been staring away toward a low, cloudy film of land in the south. one would have thought that he had heard only the sentence which aroused his comment. charter was filling with violence. the man's vanity was chained to him like a corpse. this experience of pouring out energy to no purpose aroused in charter all the forces which had combined to force the public to his work. the thought came that bellingham was so accustomed to direct the speech and thought of others, mainly women, that he had lost the listening faculty.
"let me express it, then," charter declared with his stoutest repression, "that this beautiful surviving element, having finished with the flesh, knows only the attraction of light. it is the perfect flower of ages of earth-culture, exquisite and inimitable from the weathering centuries, and is radiant for a higher destiny than a cooling planet's crust——"
"my dear young man, you speak very clearly, prettily, and not without force, i may say,—a purely platonistic gospel."
charter's mental current was turned off for a second. true or false, the remark was eminently effective. a great man might have said it, or a dilettante.
"in which case, i have a firm foundation."
"but i am essentially of the moderns," said bellingham.
"perhaps i should have known that from your first remark—about the brown bodies of the islanders, rejoicing in the sunlight and bathing in these jewelled seas."
"ah, yes——" the softening of bellingham's mouth, as he recalled his own words, injected fresh stimulant into the animus of the other. as charter feared the eyes, so he had come to loathe the mouth, though he was not pleased with the intensity of his feelings.
"do you honestly believe that—that which feels the attraction of earth, and becomes a part of earth after death—is the stuff of immortality?" he demanded.
"by marvellous processes of prolongation and refinement—and barring accident—yes."
"processes which these poor islanders could understand?"
"we are moving in a circle," bellingham said hastily.
for the first moment, charter felt the whip-hand over his own faculties.
"i've noted the great, modern tendency to preach body," he said, inhaling a big breath of the fragrant air, "to make a religion of bodily health—to look for elemental truth in alimentary canals; to mix prayer with carnal subterfuge and heaven with health resorts. better phallicism bare-faced.... i read a tract recently written by one of these body-worshippers—the smug, black devil. it made me feel just as i did when i found a doctor book in the attic once, at the age of ten.... whatever i may be, have done, may feel, dream or think below the diaphragm—hasn't anything to do with my religion. i believe in health, as in a good horse or a good typewriter, but my body's health is not going to rule my day."
"you are young—to have become chilled by such polar blasts," bellingham said uneasily, for he now found the other's eyes but without result.
"i came into the world with a full quiver of red passions," charter said wearily, yet strangely glad. "the quiver is not empty. i do not say that i wish it were, but i have this to declare: i do not relish being told how to play with the barbs; how to polish and point and delight in them; how to put them back more deadly poisoned. i think there are big blankets of mercy for a natural voluptuary—for the things done when tissues are aflame—but for the man who deliberately studies to recreate them without cost, and tells others of his experiments—frankly, i believe in hell for such men-maggots. oblivion is too sweet. the essence of my hatred for these bodyists is because of the poison they infuse into the minds of youths and maidens, whose character-skeletons are still rubbery.... but let such teachers purr, wriggle, and dilate—for they're going back right speedily to the vipers!"
bellingham's eyes had been lost in the south. he turned, arose, and after a pause said lightly, "your talk is strong meat, young man.... i—i suffered a serious accident some months ago and cannot stay too long in one place. we shall talk again. how far do you go with the panther?"
"saint pierre."
charter already felt the first pangs of reaction. his vehemence, the burn of temper for himself, in that he had allowed the other's personality to prey upon him, and the unwonted aggressiveness of his talk—all assumed an evil aspect now as he perceived the occultist's ghastly face. in rising, bellingham seemed to have stirred within himself centres of unutterable torture. his look suggested one who has been drilled in dreadful arcanums of pain, unapproached by ordinary men.
"i think i must have been pent a long time," charter said in his trouble. "perhaps, i'm a little afraid of myself and was rehearsing a warning for the strength of my own bridle-arm—since we're swinging down into these isles of seduction."
"you'll find a more comfortable coolness with the years, i think, and cease to abhor your bounding physical vitality. remember, 'jesus came eating and drinking——'"
charter started under the touch of the old iron. "but 'wisdom is justified of all her children,'" he responded quickly.
they were at the door of bellingham's cabin, which was forward on the promenade. the doctor laughed harshly as he turned the key. "i see you have your scriptures, too," he said. "we must talk again."
"how far do you go with the panther?" charter asked, drawing away. his eyes had filled for a second, as the door swung open, with the photograph of a strangely charming young woman within the cabin.
"i have not decided—possibly on to south america."
charter felt as he walked alone that he had shown his youth, even a pertness of youth. he recalled that he had done almost all the talking; that he had felt the combativeness of a boy who scents a rival from another school—quite ridiculous. moreover, he was weary, as if one of his furious seasons of work had just ended—that rare and excellent kind of work which gathers about itself an elemental force to drive the mind as with fire until the course is run.... he did not encounter bellingham during the rest of the voyage.
long before dawn the panther gained the harbor before saint pierre, and charter awoke to the consciousness of a disorder in the air. alone on deck, while the night was being driven back over the rising land, he was delighted to pick out the writhing letters of gold, "saragossa," through the smoky gray, a few furlongs to the south. peter stock, an acquaintance from a former call at saint pierre, had become a solid and fruitful memory....
father fontanel was found early, where the suffering was greatest in the city. the old eyes lit with gladness as he caught charter with both hands, and murmured something as his gaze sank into the eyes of the younger man—something which charter did not exactly understand, about wolves being slain.
"what have you been doing with old man pelée, father? we heard him groaning in the night, and the town is fetid with his sickness."
"ah, my son, i am afraid!"
had all the seismologists of civilization gathered in saint pierre, and uttered a verdict that the volcano was an imminent menace, charter would not have turned a more serious look at pelée than he did that moment.... at the palms, he found peter stock and a joyous welcome. they arranged for luncheon together, and the capitalist hurried down into the city.... that proved a memorable luncheon, since peter stock at the last moment persuaded miss wyndam to join them.
charter was disturbed with the thought that he had seen her before; and amazed that he could have forgotten where. he could only put it far back among the phantasmagoria of drinking days. certainly the sane, restored charter had never met this woman and forgotten. his veins were dilated as by a miraculous wine.
"the name is new to me, but i seem to have seen you somewhere, miss wyndam," he declared.
"that's the second time you've said that, young man," mr. stock remarked. "don't your sentences register?"
"it's always bewildering—i know how mr. charter feels," paula managed to say. "i'm quite sure we were never introduced, though i know mr. charter's work."
"that's good of you, indeed," he said. "i don't mean—to know my work—but to help me out with friend stock. it is bewildering that i have forgotten. i feel like a boy in an enchanted forest. pelée has been working wonders all day."
"i can't follow you," the capitalist sighed. "your sentences are puckered."
they hardly heard him. paula, holding fast with all her strength to the part she had planned to play, sensed charter's blind emotion, distinct from her own series of shocks. to her it was that furious moment of adjustment, when a man and his ideal meet for the first time in a woman's heart. as for this heart, she feared they would hear its beating. instantly, she knew that he had not come to saint pierre expecting to find her; knew that she was flooding into his subconsciousness—that he felt worlds and could not understand. she found the boy in his eyes—the boy of his old picture—and the deep lines and the white skin of a man who has lived clean, and the brow of a man who has thought many clean things. he was thinking of the skylark, and "wyndam" disturbed him.... always when he hesitated in his speech, the right word sprang to her lips to help him. she caught the very processes of his thinking; his remoteness from the thought of food, was her own.... for hours, since she had heard his voice below, paula had paced the floor of her room, planning to keep her secret long. she would play and watch his struggle to remember the skylark; she would weigh the forces of the conflict, stimulate it; study him among men, in the presence of suffering, and in the dread of the mountain. all this she had planned, but now her whole heart went out to the boy in his eyes—the boy that smiled. all the doubts which at best she had hoped for the coming days to banish were erased in a moment; she even believed in its fullness the letter from selma cross—because he was embarrassed, brimming with emotions he could not understand, quite as the boy of her dreams would be. she lived full-length in his silences, hardly dared to look at him now, for she felt his constant gaze. she knew that she was colorless, but that her eyes were filled with light.... presently she realized that they were talking of father fontanel.
"he's a good old man," said peter stock. "he works day and night—and refuses to call it work. just think of having a servant with a god like father fontanel's to make work easy!"
"he's even a little bit sorry for pelée," charter said. "i'm never quite the same in saint pierre. many times up in the states, i ask myself, if it isn't largely in my mind about father fontanel's spirit and his effect upon me. it isn't. stronger than ever it came to me this morning. you know him?" he turned the last to the woman.
"yes, i found him down on the water-front——"
"and brought him to me," said mr. stock, and added: "you know what bothered me about priests so long—they seem to have it all settled between them that theirs is the only true air-line limited to god. fontanel's down in the lowlands, where life is pent and cruel, where there are weak sisters and little ones who have to be helped over hard ways—that's what gets peter stock."
"you don't know how good that is to hear," paula said softly. "i have thought it, too, about some men in holy orders—black figures moving along in a 'grim, unfraternal' indian file, with their eyes so occupied in keeping their feet from breaking fresh ground—that it seems they must sometimes lose the summit."
charter looked from one to the other. peter stock regarded their plates. paula made a quick pretense of eating, and was grateful when charter broke the silence: "yes, father fontanel has found one of the trails to the top—one of the happy ones. sometimes i think there are just as many trails, as an ant could find to the top of an apple. wayfarers go a-singing on father fontanel's trail—eyes warm with soft skies and untellable dreams. it's a way of fineness and loving-kindness——"
mr. stock had risen from the table and moved to a window which faced the north. all was vague about them. paula had been carried by charter's voice toward far-shining mountains.... in the silence, she met the strange, steady eyes of the boy, and looked away to find that the room had darkened.
"it is getting dark," he said.
she would have said it, if he hadn't.
the mountain rumbled.
"the north is a mass of swirling grays and blacks," peter stock announced from the window. "it isn't a thunderstorm——"
a sharp detonation cleaved the darkening air, and from the rear of the house the answer issued—quavering cries of children, sharp calling of mothers, and the sullen undertone of men. a subdued drumming came from the north now, completing the tossing currents of sound about the house. the dismal bellowing of cattle and the stamping of ponies was heard from the barns. all this was wiped out by a series of terrific crashes, and the floor stirred as if intaking a deep breath. the dining-room filled with a crying, crouching gray-lipped throng of servants. a deluge of ash complicated the half-night outside, and the curse of sulphur pressed down.
paula arose. charter had taken his place close beside her, but spoke no word.
