for twenty years the social life of new damascus had been as an untended orchard,—shapeless, perfunctory and reminiscent. its estate was a memory running back to the old woolwine mansion and the days of aaron. it had no rallying point. there was youth as a biological fact without gaiety, sparkle or sweet daring. quality street lived on its income. young men succeeded their fathers in business. the girls, after music and finishing at philadelphia, returned to new damascus and married them.
the gib mansion might as well have been a mausoleum. life was never entertained there. it did not expect to be. jonet was nobody until gib married her. after that she was the community’s commiseration. she died when agnes, their only child, was ten. the obsequies were private. at the grave, besides the sexton and the minister, and gib holding agnes by the hand, there was one other person. that was gearhard, the father of jonet, who stood with his feet crossed and his left forearm resting on the sexton’s shoulder as on the bellows-sweep, in a contemplative attitude. people spoke of it literally. there, they said, was another thing enoch had broken and cast away. no wonder he wished to bury it privately.
agnes was sent off to school. she had lately returned[127] and was now living at the gib mansion alone with her father. nobody knew her. there was some mystery about her. a story of unknown origin, and unverified, was that she had been found out at school in an unchaperoned escapade, which so enraged old enoch that he brought her home and deprived her of liberty. it would be like him to do that. moreover, in the iron age such discipline was feasible. youth had not yet delivered itself from parental tyranny. that was reserved to be one of the marvels of the steel age. in 1870 any girl of seventeen was dependent, and one in the situation of agnes gib was helpless.
john’s advent on this iron grey scene produced a magical change. he was rightful heir to all the social tradition there was in new damascus. this would have meant nothing in itself. but he liked it. he was not then nor did he ever become the kind of man who must renounce life to reach success. that is a matter partly of temperament and partly of capacity. knowledge necessary to his ends he acquired easily, seemingly without effort, even technical knowledge. his imagination worked with the ease of fancy and knew no fatigue. business was a game at which he played. therefore it could not devour him. without a moment’s notice he could turn from one kind of play to another and back again. he would dance all night and come with a crystal mind to the day’s work. frivolity seemed to stimulate or recharge his mind.
the youth of new damascus adored him. a group spontaneously formed around him. he kept large[128] rooms at the inn, where he entertained. more than half his time was spent away from new damascus, but the new social order adjusted itself to his movements. when he was at home there were parties, dances, suppers, excursions, flirtings and episodes. all this took place on the plane of quality street. but his liking for people neither began nor ended there. it knew no petty distinctions. there were two kinds of people in the world,—his kind and others. and his kind were all the same to him no matter where he found them. he had friends among the mill workers—big, roystering fellows with whom he often went revelling to fill out a night. one of these was alexander thane, the splendid puddler who had spoken to him that first night in the mill. they became fast friends.
he scandalized people without offending them. whatever he did, that was john. he did anything he liked and it was forgiven beforehand. his errancies were extravagant and alarming, such as had been almost certain to involve a superficial nature in disaster. they were never wicked or immoral, never hurtful to others and seemed but to innocently enhance the romantic aspect of his personality. this may be true only of one whose character is superior to his follies. as his character came more and more to be realized people began to say, “well, that’s one young man enoch gib won’t break.”
enoch regarded him with wonder and misgiving. john’s impact on the business had been phenomenal.[129] perhaps no one else could have done it; certainly no one else wasting so much of himself in ways for which gib felt the utmost contempt could at the same time have attended to business at all. yet his way with it grew steadily stronger and more remarkable, no matter what else he did.
gradually there grew up in gib a vague baffled sense of recurrence. as new damascus had idolized aaron in the old time so now it idolized john. was that because he was aaron’s son? for a while it had that aspect. then it could no longer be so explained. something that had been was taking place again. what was it? the old man came to this question again and again. it tormented him for a year of nights. then suddenly he had the answer.
new damascus idolized this person not because he was aaron’s son but because he was aaron!
once this wild thought had occurred to enoch it expanded rapidly, filling his whole mind, and became an obsession. aaron lived again! he had returned with youth and strength restored.
the physical resemblance was in fact very striking. enoch began to study it surreptitiously. the sight tortured and fascinated him. he could not let it alone. he decided he had been mistaken about that look of esther which at first he had seemed to see in the young man’s eyes. it was not there. thank god for that. this youth was aaron himself.
from the moment of perceiving this thing with hallucinated clarity enoch hated john and arranged his[130] thoughts to dwell against him dangerously. how should he deal with the situation? it had no tangibility. if he spoke of it people would think he was crazy. yet there was the fact. aaron by foul strategy had entered the business again. the circumstances of his entering it in the guise of a son were extraordinary. as the old man reviewed the incident it assumed a flagrant, preposterous aspect. aaron had outwitted him.
yes. aaron had always been able to do that. but this was an outrageous act! nothing like it had ever happened before in the world. and now it behooved him to act cautiously, think cunningly, and above all to conceal the fact that he knew. merely again to put aaron out of the business, as he could easily do, would be neither quittance nor justice.
