the days settled into a routine. when they rose in the morning a colored woman "did" their room while they went down to the chop saloon for breakfast. returning, quidmore threw himself on his bed again. he did this after each meal, poking his nose deep into the limp pillow. hardly ever speaking, he now and then uttered a low moan.
tom watched patiently, ready to tell him the time or bring him a drink of water. when the day grew too hot he fanned him with an old newspaper.
"why don't we go home, dad?" he asked anxiously on the third day. "i could get you there as easy as anything."
"i'm not well enough."
"you don't seem very sick to me. you don't have any pain and you can eat all right."
"it isn't that kind of bein' sick. it's—" he sought for a name—"it's like nervous prostration."
more nearly than he knew he had named his malady. in his own words, he was all in; and he was all in to the end of the letter of the term. of that moral force which is most of what any man has to live upon some experience had drained him. he had spent his gift of vitality. all in was precisely the phrase to apply to him. he had cashed the last cent of whatever he had inherited or saved in the way of inner strength, and now he could not go on.
[pg 150]
"what's the good of it anyhow?" he asked of tom in the night. "there's nothin' to it, not when you come to think of it. you run after something as if you couldn't live without it; and then when you get it you curse your god that you ever run."
tom shuddered in his bed, but he was used to doing that. there was hardly a night when he was not wakened by a nightmare. if it was not by a nightmare, it was by the soft complaining voice.
"are you awake, tom?"
"yes, dad. can i get you anything?"
"no; i only wanted to know if you was awake."
tom kept awake as long as he could, because he knew the poor wretch was afraid of lying sleepless in the dark. to keep him awake, perhaps for less selfish reasons, too, the soft voice would take this opportunity of giving him advice.
"don't you ever go to wanting anything too much, boy. that's what's done for me. you can want things if you like; but one of the tricks in the game is to know how to be disappointed. i never did know, not even when i was a little chap. if i cried for the moon i wouldn't stop till i got it. when i was about as old as you, not gettin' what i wanted made me throw a fit. if i couldn't get things by fair means i had to get 'em by foul; but i got 'em. it don't do you no good, boy. if i could go back again over the last six months...."
for fear of a confession tom stopped his ears, but no confession ever came. the tortured soul could dribble its betrayals, but it couldn't face itself squarely.
[pg 151]
"look out for women," he said, gently, on another night. "you're old enough now to know how they'll play the dutch with you. when i was your age there was nothing i didn't understand, and i guess it's the same with you. don't ever let 'em get you. they got me before i was—well, i don't hardly know what age i was, but it was pretty young. look out for 'em, boy. if you ever damn your soul for one of 'em, she'll do you dirt in the end. if it hadn't been for her...."
to keep this from going further, the boy broke in with the first subject he could think of. "i wonder if they'll remember to pick the new peas. they'll be ready by this time. do you suppose they'll ...?"
"i don't care a hang what they do." after a brief silence he continued: "i'd 'a left the place to you, boy, only my brother-in-law, my sister's husband, has a mortgage on the place that'd eat up most of the value, so i've left it to her. that'll fix 'em both. i wish i could 'a done more for you."
"you've done a lot for me, as it is."
"you don't know."
there was another silence. it might have lasted ten minutes. the boy was falling once more into a doze when the soft voice lisped again,
"tom."
he did his best to drag himself back from sleep. "yes, dad? do you want to know what time it is? i'll get up and look."
"no, stay where you are. there's somethin' i want to say. i've been a skunk to you."
"oh, cut it, dad...."
[pg 152]
"i won't cut it. i want to say it out. when i—when i first took you, it wasn't—it wasn't so much that i'd took a fancy to you...."
"i know it wasn't, dad. you wanted a boy to pick the berries. let's drop it there."
but the fevered conscience couldn't drop it there. "yes; at first. and then—and then it come into my mind that you might be—might be the one that'd do somethin' i didn't want to do myself. i thought—i thought that if you done it we might get by on it. we got by on it all right—or up to now we've got by—but i didn't get real fond of you till—till...."
"oh, dad, let's go to sleep."
"all right. let's. i just wanted to say that much. i was glad afterward that...."
the boy breathed heavily, pretending that he was asleep. he was soon asleep in earnest, and for the rest of the night was undisturbed. in the morning his father didn't get up, and tom went down to the chop saloon to bring up something that would serve as breakfast. he did the same at midday, and the same in the evening. it was a summer's evening, with a long twilight. as it began to grow dark quidmore seemed to rouse himself. he needed tooth paste, shaving cream, other small necessities. sitting up on the bed, he made out a list of things, giving tom the money with which to pay for them. if he went to the pharmacy in hudson street he would be back in half an hour.
"all right, dad. i know the way. i'm an old hand in new york by this time."
[pg 153]
he was at the door when quidmore called him back.
"say, boy. give us a kiss."
tom was stupefied. he had kissed his adopted mother often enough, but he had never been asked to do this. quidmore laughed, pulling him close.
"ah, come along! i don't ask you often. you're a fine boy, tom. you must know as well as i do what's been...."
the words were suspended by a hug; but once he was free tom fled away like a small young wild thing, released from human hands. having reached the street, he began to feel frightened, prescient, awed. something was going to happen, he could not imagine what. he made his purchases hurriedly, and then delayed his return. he could be tender with the man; he could be loving; but he couldn't share his secrets.
but he had to go back. in the dim upper hall outside the door he paused to pump up courage to go in. he was not afraid in the common way of fear; he was only overcome with apprehension at having a knowledge he rejected forced on him.
the first thing he noticed was that no light came through the crack beneath the door. the room was apparently dark. that was strange because his father dreaded darkness, except when he was there to keep him company. he crept to the door and listened. there was no sound. he pushed the door open. the lights were out. in panic at what he might discover, he switched on the electricity.
[pg 154]
but he only found the room empty. that was so far a relief. his father had gone out, and would be back again. closing the door behind him, he advanced into the room.
it seemed more than empty. it felt abandoned, as if something had gone which would not return. he remembered that sensation afterward. he stood still to wonder, to conjecture. the red indian gleamed with his bronze leer.
the next thing the boy noticed was an odd little pile on the table. it was money—notes. on top of the notes there was silver and copper. he stooped over them, touching them with his forefinger, pushing them. he pushed them as he might have pushed an insect to see whether or not it was alive.
lastly he noticed a paper, on which the money had been placed. there was something scribbled on it with a pencil. he held it under the dim lamp. "for tom—with a real love."
the tears gushed to his eyes, as they always did when people showed that they loved him. but he didn't actually cry; he only stood still and wondered. he couldn't make it out. that his father should have gone out and forgotten all his money was unusual enough, but that he should have left these penciled words was puzzling. it was easy to count the money. there were seven fifty-dollar bills, with twenty-eight dollars and fifty-four cents in smaller bills and change. he seemed to remember that his father had drawn four hundred dollars for the wilmington expenses, with a margin for purchases.
[pg 155]
he stood wondering. he could never recall how long he stood wondering. the rest of the night became more or less a blank to him; for, to the best of the boy's knowledge, the man who had adopted him was never seen again.
