i
the information given by the ex-director in regard to the whereabouts of charles halsey was substantially, if not circumstantially, correct. he had, indeed, done the most unlikely thing. he had taken up his abode, for the time at least, at the very place to which he might have seemed least apt to return; that is to say, the home of his father-in-law, john rawn.
many things moved halsey to this action. in the first place, having ended his labors, he found no reason for any pretense of continuing them. again, although he fully intended to bring divorce proceedings, and fully intended to leave the city, he was unwilling to depart without seeing once more his wife and their child, because news came to him of the little cripple's serious and continued illness. in point of fact, grace halsey, unhappy, morose, and now jealously suspicious, had brooded over her unfortunate situation in life until she also really was ill. halsey grieved over this, in spite of all. as to the little hunchback, laura, she had known only illness all her life; and halsey, father after all, felt some foreboding which made him unready to leave for yet a time.
halsey, in spite of his own bitterness of soul, realized that rawn himself was well-nigh crazed by the business situation, and his conscience misgave him when he reflected upon the sudden consequences of his own acts. his sense of business honor and of personal justice told him he owed even so unreasonable a man as rawn some sort of definite accounting for his own stewardship, unwelcome as another meeting between them must be to both.
lastly, it may be added, virginia rawn had sent for him.
when he received her message he spent a night resolving that he would not go, that he would never again see either her or grace; never again would set foot on ground belonging to john rawn, come what could, let be lost what any of them all might lose. in the morning he changed his resolution. by evening of the next day he was at graystone hall.
to his surprise, he found it not immediately necessary to patch a peace with the master of graystone hall, for rawn was absent. the great mansion seemed strangely and suddenly changed. an air of anxiety hung over all, the place was oddly silent. the servants went slipshod about their duties, and their mistress did not chide them. swift disintegration of the domestic machine seemed to threaten; mysterious danger seemed to menace the very structure itself, long of so bold and indomitable front. halsey still hesitated—and still remained.
ii
rawn customarily divided his time between the operating headquarters in the western city and the general offices in the eastern capital, but now he had found it needful immediately to transfer all his activities to the latter scene. he did not know of his wife's invitation to halsey, for he had started from his office, without even advising her of his intention, and even without conversation with her by telephone. he telegraphed from the train, stating that he had been called east on urgent matters. after that, no word at all came from him. it was not known when he would return. halsey could only wait. in truth, he was little better than a man gone mad himself, and rawn was worse than such.
gradually, day by day, hour by hour, the terrible strain of this suddenly developed situation began to show its effects upon rawn. he slept but little after his arrival in the east, showed himself more and more untidy in personal habits; and lastly, began to seek the false strength of intoxicating drink. his demeanor in his relations with his urbane associates daily lost its usual arrogance. john rawn, late dictator, became explanatory, conciliatory—a change of mind which had visible physical tokens. his eye became weaker and more watery, his shoulders more drooped, his voice more quavering, his address less abrupt and domineering.
john rawn was a broken man, and began to show it. wherefore his late friends exulted. the wolves, ranged in circle, lick their chops when the wounded bull totters upon his uncertain legs. certain large financial figures in the eastern city licked their chops, and smiled grimly, wolfishly, in contemplation of john rawn as he tottered.
iii
yet rawn himself could get no direct proof of the identity of those now secretly assailing him. at the directors' meetings of the international he was received politely and respectfully—with too much politeness and respect, as he felt, although himself unlike the man once wont to rule there with an iron hand. he did not dare tell them of halsey's defection, could not doubt that they already knew of it; but he met no queries regarding that or anything else in the conduct of the western factory's business. no one seemed to know that the most important of all their factories was closed, after a tedious term spent in incompletion. his associates all were as polite as himself, indeed, more so; as ready as himself to discuss gravely and earnestly any detail of the business which now, as all politely agreed, seemed "somewhat involved," or "somewhat delayed." no one offered any criticism of the executive.
but, what was far more deadly to him, the market seemed most onerously and cruelly oppressive upon the outside investments of john rawn. international power was not hammered, for the reason that there was little of it out to hammer. the rawn stock in international, of course, did not come upon the market. rawn intended to hold on to that grimly, fighting for it to the last gasp, trusting to chance to mend matters for him at the eleventh hour. but ruin in the general market faced him; and he knew that, with credit gone, the courts would take for his former creditors whatever property he could be shown to have. he saw the shadowy circle of the wolves of high finance. almost he felt their fangs snapping at his hamstrings.
iv
in these savage hours the mind of john rawn cast about for rescue, for hope. no rescue, no hope, appeared except one last desperate alternative, purchasable not now with cash or power or influence—since these were gone—but with what other and dearer things remain to a man—things some men, not rotted with the love of self, keep through any or all disaster, prize, even above life and all a life's business success. halsey! ah! halsey was the savior of rawn—halsey, the man who had humiliated him in his own home. how could halsey be secured? there might be brought to bear upon him one influence—that of a beautiful and fascinating woman! what matter if the one woman, was his wife, virginia rawn? he had already hinted to her of her duty. he wondered now continually whether she had really and fully understood. he wondered what she was doing with halsey.
as to halsey, who knew little or nothing of all these turbulent emotions, all these crowding incidents, he found his situation in the great house of john rawn one wholly to his dislike. he saw little of his wife grace after the first conventional greeting on his arrival, and as to the young mistress of graystone hall, she seemed so regularly to have matters demanding her own presence elsewhere, was so busy with other matters, as to have small time for him. the disturbed condition of the stock market was creating a furor in the business world, reflected, of course, in the daily markets of the western city; but halsey had never had many investments, had watched the markets little; and now, isolated at graystone hall almost as much as though upon a desert island, and too much disturbed and distracted in his own mind to find any definite interest in business matters, was hardly conscious of the storm that raged. he simply waited on, unhappily. it seemed to him there was no place for him in all the world. why did virginia remain aloof?
rawn, absent in new york, imagined his wife engaged continuously in the struggle of persuading charles halsey to see the light of reason, although he did not know halsey was living under the same roof with her. as a matter of fact, halsey and she met but rarely. virginia breakfasted for the most part in her own rooms, and found, or pretended to find, something to occupy her for the most part of the day. not once did she ask his attendance, not once did she speak with him, when by chance she saw him, upon any but casual or conventional matters. she seemed always to evade him; and because she did this, he, rebelling, sought her out all the more, even while continually resolving to take his departure, and never again to see this place, or her, again. he wondered at her reticence, her avoidance of him. he wondered why she was so pale. he loitered about, unhappily, in this or that common meeting ground of the great mansion house, waiting to hear the rustle of a gown upon the stair, the sound of a light foot on a floor, the touch of a white hand, the sound of a voice—all things belonging, not to his wife, but to his young stepmother by law.
v
yes. without his wish, in spite of her wish, these had become things desired, the only things desirable any more in his distracted life. he lived under the same roof with two women, saw either rarely, and rarely thought of but one—the wrong one. to atone, halsey lavished all his time and care on his little hunchback daughter, and had her with him as much as the nurse and doctor would allow. the child, undersized, pale, deformed, silent and wistful, and pathetic always, now was listless and weak, obviously very seriously ill. it wrung her father's heart to see her. but charles halsey wanted it wrung. he wanted to do bitterest penance for what he now knew was his secret sin. so the ways of inordinate power, the consequences, for this one or that one, which follow on inordinate greed, worked themselves on out toward their sure and logical ending, the mill of fate grinding those primarily, secondarily, even incidentally guilty.
at this time, had virginia rawn asked of him to recant, to relent, to change, there is likelihood he would have done so. john rawn, cuckold, was right in his despicable reasoning. there are many prices which purchase principles. the weakness which had prompted halsey to remain at graystone hall on such a tenure—which held him there now, waiting for a voice, listening for a footfall—was the ancient weakness of youth before youth, of strength before beauty, of the empty heart before one offering love, of the mind finding perfect echo in another mind.
with all his starved heart, all his repressed soul, all his mutinous body, charles halsey loved virginia rawn.
