he walked rapidly back to the rooms. for his bachelor girl play was swiftly, like magic, working itself out all new in his mind, actually taking form from moment to moment, arranging and rearranging itself nearer and nearer to a complete dramatic story. the big scene was fairly tumbling into form. he saw it as clearly as if it were being enacted before his eyes.... father and daughter—the two generations; the solid old, the experimental selfish new.
he could see that typical bachelor girl, too. if she looked like sue wilde that didn't matter. he would teach her a lesson she would never forget—this “modern” girl who forgets all her parents have done in giving and developing her life and thinks only of her own selfish freedom. it should be like an outcry from the old hearthstone.
and he saw the picture as only a nerve-racked, soul-weary bachelor can see it. there were pleasant lawns in peter's ideal home and crackling fireplaces and merry children and smiling perfect parents—no problems, excepting that one of the unfilial child.
boys had to strike out, of course. but the girl should either marry or stay at home. he was certain about this.
on those who did neither—on the bachelor girls, with their “freedom,” their “truth,” their cigarettes, their repudiation of all responsibility—on these he would pour the scorn of his genius. sue wilde, who so plainly thought him uninteresting, should be his target.
he would write straight at her, every minute, and a world should hear him!
in the dark corridor, on the apartment door, a dim square of white caught his eye—the worm's little placard. an inner voice whispered to light a match and read it again. he did so. for he was all inner voices now.
there it was:
do not feed or annoy
bolboceras americanus muls
habitat here!
he studied it while his match burned out. he knit his brows, puzzled, groping after blind thoughts, little moles of thoughts deep in dark burrows.
he let himself in. the others were asleep.
the worm, in his odd humors, never lacked point or meaning. the placard meant something, of course... something that peter could use....
the worm had been reading—that rather fat book lying even now on the arm of the morris 'chair it was fabre, on insect life.
he snatched it up and turned the pages. he sought the index for that word. there it was—bolbuceras, page 225. back then to page 225!
he read:
“... a pretty little black beetle, with a pale, velvety abdomen... its official title is bulbuceras gallicus muls.”
he looked up, in perplexity. this was hardly self-explanatory. he read on. the bolboceras, it began to appear, was a hunter of truffles. truffles it would, must have. it would eat no common food but wandered about sniffing out its vegetable prey in the sandy soil and digging for each separate morsel, then moving on in its quest. it made no permanent home for itself.
peter raised his eyes and stared at the bookcase in the corner. very slowly a light crept into his eyes, an excited smile came to the corners of his mouth. there was matter here! and peter, like homer, felt no hesitation about taking his own where he found it.
he read on, a description of the burrows as explored by the hand of the scientist:
“often the insect will be found at the bottom of its burrow; sometimes a male, sometimes a female, but always alone. the two sexes work apart without collaboration. this is no family mansion for the rearing of offspring; it is a temporary dwelling, made by each insect for its own benefit.”
peter laid the book down almost reverently and stood gazing out the window at the square. he quite forgot to consider what the worm had been thinking of when he printed out the little placard and tacked it on the door. he could see it only as a perfect characterization of the bachelor girls. every one of those girls and women was a bolboceras, a confirmed seeker of pleasures and delicacies in the sober game of life, utterly self-indulgent, going it alone—a truffle hunter.
he would call his play, the bolboceras.
but no. “buyers from shreveport would fumble it,” he thought, shrewdly practical. “you've got to use words of one syllable on broadway.”
he paced the room—back and forth, back and forth. the truffle-hunter, perhaps.
pretty good, that!
but no—wait! he stood motionless in the middle of the long room, eyes staring, the muscles of his face strained out of shape, hands clenched tightly..he was about to create a new thing.
“the truffler!”
the words burst from his lips; so loud that he tiptoed to the door and listened.
“the truffler,” he repeated. “the trifler—no the truffler.”
he was riding high, far above all worldly irritations, tolerant even toward the little person, sue wilde, who had momentarily annoyed him.
“i had to be stirred,” he thought, “that was all. something had to happen to rouse me and set my creative self working. new people had to come into my life to freshen me. it did happen; they did come, and now i an myself again. i shall not have time for them now, these selfish bachelor women and there self-styled jew geniuses. but still i am grateful to them all. they have helped me.”
he dropped into the chair by the desk, pulled out his manuscript from a drawer and fell to work. it was five in the morning before he crept into bed.
four days later, his eyes sunken perceptibly, face drawn, color off, peter sat for two hours within a cramped disorderly office, reading aloud to a broadway theatrical manager who wore his hat tipped down over his eyes, kept his feet on the mahogany desk, smoked panatelas end on end and who, like peter, was deeply conservative where women were concerned.
at five-thirty on this same afternoon, peter, triumphant, acting on a wholly unconsidered impulse, rushed around the corner of broadway and forty-second street and into the telephone room of a glittering hotel. he found betty deane's name in the telephone book, and called up the apartment.
a feminine voice sounded in his ear. he thought it was sue wilde.
it was sue wilde.
he asked if she could not dine with him.
there was a long silence at the other end of the wire.
“are you there?” he called anxiously. “hello! hello!”
“yes, i'm here,” came the voice. “you rather surprised me, mr. mann. i have an engagement for this evening.”
“oh, then i can't see you!”
“i have an engagement.”
he tried desperately to think up conversation; but failed.
“well,” he said—“good-by.”
“good-by.”
that was all. peter ate alone, still overstrung but gloomy now, in the glittering hotel.
the dinner, however, was both well-cooked and hot. it tended to soothe and soften him. finally, expansive again, he leaned hack, fingered his coffee cup, smoked a twenty-cent cigar and observed the life about him.
there, were many large dressy women, escorted by sharp-looking men of two races. there were also small dressy women, some mere girls and pretty, but nearly all wearing make-up on cheeks and lips and quite all with extreme, sophistication in their eyes. there was shining silver and much white linen. chafing dishes blazed. french and austrian waiters moved swiftly about under the commanding eye of a stern captain. uniformed but pocketless hat boys slipped it and out, pouncing on every loose article of apparel.... it was a gay scene; and peter found himself in it, of it, for it. with rising exultation in his heart he reflected that he was back on broadway, where (after all) he belonged.
his manager of the afternoon came in now, who believed, with peter, that woman's place was the home. he was in evening dress—a fat man. at his side tripped a very young-appearing girl indeed—the youngest and prettiest in the room, but with the make-up and sophistication of the others. men (and women) stared at them as they passed. there was whispering; for this was the successful max neuerman, and the girl was the lucky eileen o'rourke.
neuerrman sighted peter, greeted him boisterously, himself drew up an unoccupied chair. peter was made acquainted with miss o'rourke. “this is the man, eileen,” said neuerman, breathing confidences, “wrote the trufiler. big thing! absolutely a new note on broadway! eric here has caught the new bachelor woman, shown her up and put a tag on her. after this she'll be called a truffler everywhere.... by the way, eric, i sent the contract down to you to-night by messenger. and the check.”
miss eileen o'rourke smiled indulgently and a thought absently. while peter lighted, thanks to neuermnn, a thirty-cent cigar and impulsively told miss o'rourke (who continued to smile indulgently and absently) just how he had come to hit on that remarkable tag.
it was nearly nine o'clock when he left and walked, very erect, from the restaurant, conscious of a hundred eyes on his back. he gave the hat boy a quarter.
out on forty-second street he paused to clear his exuberant but confused mind. he couldn't go back to the rooms; not as he felt now. cabarets bored him. it was too early for dancing. irresolute, he strolled over toward fifth avenue, crossed it, turned south. a north-bound automobile bus stopped just ahead of him. he glanced up at the roof. there appeared to be a vacant seat or two. in front was the illuminated sign that meant riverside drive. it was warm for february.
he decided to take the ride.
just in front of him, however, also moving toward the bus, was a young couple. there was something familiar about them. the girl—he could see by a corner light—was wearing a boyish coat, a plaid coat. also she wore a tam o'shanter. she partly turned her head... his pulse started racing, and he felt the colour rushing into his face. it was sue wilde, no other!
but the man? no overcoat. that soft black hat! a glimpse of a flowing tie of black silk! the odd trick of throwing his right leg out and around as he walked and toeing in with the right foot!
it was the worm.
peter turned sharply away, crossed the street and caught a south-bound bus. wavering between irritation, elation and chagrin, he walked in and out among the twisted old streets of greenwich village. four distinct times—and for no clear reason—he passed the dingy apartment building where sue and betty lived.
later he found himself standing motionless on a curb by a battered lamp-post, peering through his large horn-rimmed eye-glasses at a bill-board across the street on which his name did not appear. he studied the twenty-four-sheet poster of a cut plug tobacco that now occupied the space. there was light enough in the street to read it by.
suddenly he turned and looked to the right. then he looked to the left. fumbling for a pencil, he moved swiftly and resolutely across the street. very small, down in the right-hand corner of the tobacco advertisement, he wrote his name—his pen name—“eric mann.”
then, more nearly at peace with himself, he went to the moving pictures.
entering the rooms later, he found the worm settled, in pajamas as usual, with a book in the morris chair. he also found a big envelope from neuerman with the contract in it and a check for a thousand dollars, advanced against royalties.
it was a brown check. he fingered it for a moment, while his spirits recorded their highest mark for the day. then, outwardly calm, he put it in an inside coat pocket and with a fine air of carelessness tossed the contract to the desk.
the worm put down his book and studied peter rather thoughtfully.
“pete,” he finally said, “i've got a message for you, and i've been sitting here debating whether to deliver it or not.”
“let's have it!” replied the eric mann shortly.
the worm produced a folded envelope from the pocket of his pajamas and handed it ever. “i haven't been told what's in it,” he said.
peter, with a tremor, unfolded the envelope and peered inside. there were two enclosures—one plainly his scribbled note to sue; the other (he had to draw it partly out and examine it)—yes—no—yes, his anonymous letter, much crumpled.
deliberately, rather white about the mouth, peter moved to the fireplace, touched a match to the papers and watched them burn. that done, he turned and queried:
“well? that all?”
the worm shook his head. “not quite all, pete.”
words suddenly came from peter. “what do i care for that girl! a creative artist has his reactions, of course. he even does foolish things. look at wagner, burns, cellini, michael angelo—look at the things they used to do!...”
the words stopped.
“her message is,” continued the worm, “the suggestion that next time you write one of them with your left hand.”
peter thought this over. the check glowed next to his heart. it thrilled him. “you tell your friend sue wilde,” he replied then, with dignity, “that my message to her—and to you—will be delivered next september across the footlights of the astoria theater.” and he strode into the bedroom.
the worm looked after him with quizzical eyes, smiled a little and resumed his book.
