Episodes Before Thirty/Chapter 18
CHAPTER XVIII
The episode, though far from being finished, had a shattering effect upon me. If a friend, so close to me by ties of affection and gratitude, could act like this, how would others, less intimately related, behave? My trust in people was killed. A sense of deep loneliness was added to the other miseries of that bed.
Only my books comforted and helped . . . they did not fail . . . their teachings stood stiff and firm like a steel rod that never bent or shifted, much less broke. Since these notes tell merely the superficial episodes of my early years, further mention of what the books meant to me is unnecessary; enough—more than enough, probably—has already been told to show the background which explains motive and conduct. The main stream of my life, at any rate, ran deeper and ever deeper, its centre of gravity far below anything that could possibly come to me in the ordinary world or outward happenings. Big dreams were in me at white heat, burning, burning . . . and all external events were coloured by them.
There followed now a more peaceful though short period, during which Boyde behaved well, with kindness and signs of true penitence. Grant warned me this was acting, and that I had been a fool to forgive and let him stay on, but I would not listen, and followed my own principle. I did not trust him, but never let him know it, showing him full confidence, with all the former intimacy and affection. I felt sure this was the right and only way. His attitude to me had something of a dog's devotion in it. I fully believed he was "running straight" again. I watched him closely, while hiding suspicion carefully away.
November drew to a close; Kay sent no more money; the debt to Mrs. Bernstein grew; income became smaller and smaller. I wrote to McCloy, who replied with a brief word that I could come back when I was well again.
Before leaving my bed, however, at the end of the month, another incident occurred that shocked me far more than the first.
One afternoon about a week after the confession, there came a knock at the door, and to my complete surprise, in walked a banker, who had often stayed in our house in England. I was startled and annoyed, for I feared he would write home and tell the truth that my letters so carefully concealed. It was a couple of years since I had seen him. How had he found me out? His first sentence told me: "But this is dreadful. I knew nothing about your being ill. I didn't know you were in New York even. An Englishman named Boyde came to my office yesterday and told me." He looked me over with anxiety. "But your bones are showing! Have you been very bad? Why on earth didn't you let me know, my dear fellow?"
I had spoken of this acquaintance in Boyde's presence, and he had evidently made a note of name and address. I explained quickly that I had not been seriously ill, that I was nearly well and had a good doctor, and that I was on the staff of the Evening Sun and doing well. I told him briefly about my Canadian career as well. The banker was a very decent fellow. His visit was brief, but he was very kind, well-meaning and sympathetic--only--I did not want him! He promised, anyhow, he would not write to my father--was glad, I think, to be relieved of the necessity--and before going he absolutely insisted on leaving some money with me. I refused and refused again. But my own exhaustion and his persistence resulted in his leaving all he had on him at the moment--$32. Months later I discovered that Boyde had obtained other sums from him on the plea that I needed a specialist, and there may have been yet further amounts of similar kind for all I knew.
On coming in, Boyde took his scolding with a smile; he had "acted for the best...." We discussed how the money should be spent, agreeing upon $10 to Mrs. Bernstein, $10 to the doctor next day, $3 to redeem Kay's overcoat, which we would send to him, and the balance in hand, after laying in a store of dried apples, oatmeal and condensed milk, as our supplies were now exhausted. Next morning, when he left at eight o'clock for a studio appointment and choir rehearsal, I gave him the money for the landlady and a dollar he asked for himself. The balance he put back in the drawer of the little desk beside my bed.
It was a happier morning than I had known for long; the feeling that I had something to give to the doctor made the hours pass quickly, and when he arrived at three, in his very best mood, he was obviously pleased on hearing that I could easily spare $10. The relief was written on his beaming face. He thanked me warmly. "I do really need it," he said with emphasis, "or I couldn't take it from you." We passed a delightful hour or two; I was strong enough to play the fiddle to him; we talked ... the happiest afternoon I had yet known in that room came to an end; he prepared to go. Pointing to the drawer, I asked him to take the money out. He did so. At least he opened the drawer. He opened all four drawers. The money was not there.
The most painful part of it, I think, was the look on his face as he presently went out. He did not believe me. I had found it impossible to mention Boyde. I had been speechless. I had no explanation to give. By the expression on the old German's face as he left the room I could see he thought I was lying to him. His disappointment in me was greater than his disappointment over the money. It was a bitter moment--even more bitter than the further treachery of my companion....
I was alone with my thoughts and feelings. I was alone for four days--and four nights. Boyde, that is, did not return till four days had passed, while the doctor stayed away three days. Whether either of them had said anything to Mrs. Bernstein on their way out, Boyde promising payment perhaps, the doctor letting fall something derogatory, I did not know. Mrs. Bernstein, anyhow, was very unpleasant during those four awful days. Boyde had not even given her the $10. She paid me dreadful visits, she threatened to sell my things (what? I wondered), to turn me out; she sent up hardly any food....
Waiting for Boyde's step, listening all day, all night ... I needed my books, my dreams, my inner crack, as I had never needed them before during those horrible four days. They seemed an eternity. The long nights, of course, were by far the worse; the dreams, the expectancy, for ever anticipating the familiar tread of stockinged feet on the stairs, wondering what in the world had happened, how things would end.... Had he been arrested, perhaps for something terrible? They were haunted nights that made me dread the first sign of coming dusk. It seemed like weeks, an incalculable time altogether had passed since I had seen him.... Then the spider took the place of the other vermin. I have always particularly disliked spiders, and this one was the father of them all; though it was the horror of him, not the physical presence, that haunted my nights so persistently. He was, I am sure, the Spider Idea. He originated in a room in Toronto, where a friend foolishly let his prototype, a tarantula, escape, and where it hid all night. It was my room. He came from Florida with a case of bananas. He was very big, if sluggish, his swollen body and hairy black legs the nastiest I had ever seen. I spent the night with this monster on the loose, and the first thing in the morning I saw him, low down on the wall, quite close to me. He had crept for warmth to a pipe near the hot air register.
This spider now came at me, stirred into life by the chance activity of some memory cell. He came crawling across the leads, dragging his bulging body slowly, then feeling over the smooth glass with his legs that were like black brushes a chimney sweep might use. Up the stairs he came too, but sideways there, being too large to move in his usual way; first three legs on one side, then three legs on the other, heaving himself along, the mass of his body between them sloping like a boat at sea. The fat body was derived, I'm sure, from the shock of noticing Boyde's well-fed appearance.... There were other things besides the spider, the mind, doubtless, being a little overwrought.
One of these "other things" was real--a yellow-haired woman who aired what the papers called her "shapely legs" in silk tights for a living. Pauline M---- was her name, and she was leading lady in the "Night Owls Company," then playing at Tony Pastor's Music Hall in 14th Street, or, perhaps, it was at Koster and Biel's Hall further up town. I have forgotten. In any case, Boyde had mentioned the Company to me in some connexion or other. He knew her.
Her visit to me has always seemed vague and hazy; shrouded in mist of some kind, the mist of my suffering mind, I imagine. There lies a feverish touch of fantasy all over it. It was on the evening of the second day since Boyde had disappeared, though I could have sworn that at least a week's loneliness had intervened. It was the second day, I know, because the doctor came on the fourth. During the afternoon an unintelligible telegram had come, sent from a Broadway office: "Don't be anxious--have surprising news for you--no drinking--home this afternoon.----B." There was not much comfort in it, though at least I knew then he had not been arrested, but an hour or so later a second telegram had arrived, sent from an office above 42nd Street: "Married Pauline this afternoon.----B." It all mystified, confused and troubled me extremely, and the strain on nerves and emotions had been so prolonged that, I think, I was half stupefied with it all, half stupid certainly.
At any rate, the visit always seemed a sort of unreal visit, veiled as it were, and shadowy. Two thoughts were in my mind when the knock sounded on the door: food and Boyde. I was always listening intently for his tread, but I was also listening for Mrs. Bernstein's footstep with a possible tray. It was after six o'clock; since coffee and bread at 8.30 in the morning I had eaten nothing, for our own supplies were finished. Instead of Boyde or the tray, however, in walked the woman with yellow hair and statuesque figure. She wore furs, she was over-dressed and painted, she reeked of scent. To me it was a kind of nightmare vision.
Details of her long visit I remember but very few. She at once announced herself--"I am Pauline M----" and asked excitedly, "Are you Blackwood?" She was in a "state." Her great figure filled the little room. She poured out a torrent of words in a cockney voice. Her face was flaming red beneath the paint. Occasionally she swept about. The name of Boyde recurred frequently. She was attacking me, I gathered. Boyde had said this and that about me. I understood less than nothing. I remember asking her to sit down, and that she refused, and that presently I asked something else: "Has he married you?" and that she suddenly caught sight of the telegrams lying on my bed--I had pointed--then picked them up and read them. She came closer to me while she did this, so that I caught the stink of spirits.
It was all very muddled and confused to me, and I made no attempt to talk. I heard her begging me to "give him back" to her, that she loved him, that I had "poisoned his mind" against her--threats and beseeching oddly mingled. But the telegrams seemed to sober her a little, for I remember her becoming abruptly more quiet, almost maudlin, and pouring out an endless story about Boyde who was, apparently, "full of money ... full of liquor" ... and full of anger against me because he had been "supporting" me and I had shown "base ingratitude."... I was too bewildered to feel much. It numbed me. I couldn't make sense of it. I couldn't realize how Boyde had deliberately left me alone so long. Something monstrous and inhuman touched it all.
She went away eventually in a calmer state, though leaving me in a condition that was far from calm. She went, begging me to "send him back" to her when he came home, but half realizing, I gathered, that the boot was on the other leg, so far as Boyde and myself were concerned. She was still angry with me in a vague unjust sort of way, not knowing whom to believe probably, nor exactly what had happened. She flounced out of the room in a whirl of excitement and cockney sentences, and I never saw her again. My tray arrived within a few minutes of her welcome departure.... I spent an appalling night. Boyde, the yellow-haired woman, Mrs. Bernstein, the old German, the spider, steps on the stairs a hundred times that came to nothing.... I wished once or twice that I were dead.... The door did not open....
It never rains but it pours. Two days later the doctor came in the afternoon, in the blackest mood I had yet encountered. I rather expected his visit, and though dreading it, I also longed for it, longed to see someone--a human being. He came sharp at three, attended to me, and left again. The visit lasted perhaps ten or fifteen minutes, and during the whole time he spoke no single word, not even greeting me when he entered, or saying good-bye when he went out. His face was black, aged, terrible in the suffering it wore. I had meant to tell him at last about Boyde, unable any longer to keep it to myself. I simply must tell someone. But not a syllable could I get out. When the old German had gone, however, I felt sure it was his own mysterious suffering, and not any feeling against myself, that caused his strange behaviour. I knew, too, that he would come again, and thus I got some comfort from his silent, rapid visit. This was on the fourth day since Boyde deserted; it was the day on which he came back.
He came back; his money had given out; he had nowhere to sleep.
It was night, somewhere about ten o'clock. I was falling into an uneasy doze, the kind of doze that introduced the spider, when the door opened softly. There was no knock. I had heard no footstep. The door just opened and he came in.
Every nerve in me became alert. Truth to tell, there was no emotion in me of any sort or kind. I was numb, exhausted to the bone. I lay still and stared at him. He looked sleek and even prosperous. He looked gorged with food. His face was a little swollen. The big blue eyes were clear. He let the eyeglass fall, gazing at me, while a smile broke over his face. I was so glad to see him, so relieved to have him back, that, though no emotion beyond that of suspense ended was in me, I felt, as once before with the doctor, a lump rise in my throat. His bloated expression distressed me vaguely. At first he said nothing, but walked across the room on tiptoe, as though pretending I was asleep and he feared to wake me.
My tongue loosened suddenly. The very words I have not forgotten. A matter that had not lain in my mind for days came uppermost:
"Did you send off the overcoat to Kay?"
He nodded, but without looking at me. It was a lie, I knew. My eyes followed him round, as he began to undress. For several minutes I said nothing. Then other words came to me:
"I've been alone four days and nights."
Silence.
"Without food--or anybody."
Silence, but he turned his back to me.
"Without money."
Silence. He stood quite motionless.
"I might have died. I might have gone crazy."
Silence.
"It's been awful--the loneliness and wondering----"
He half turned, but instantly turned back again. No sound escaped him.
"I've been thinking about you--and wondering day and night. Are you really married? Pauline's been here--this afternoon."
His silence was broken by a sort of gulp, and he bent over. My mistake about the date of the woman's visit was intentional--I thought it might open his lips; I did not correct it. He half turned to look at me, but again instantly hid his face as before. Then he abruptly sat down on the sofa, leaning against the back, his head in his hands. I raised myself in bed, never taking my eyes off him.
"I got your telegrams. Have you nothing to say? No explanation? Have you brought any food, any money? You have had money--all this time."
Silence, broken only by another gulp.
"I saw you take the money out of the drawer. I said nothing because I thought you were going to get me things. I trusted you."
He turned all at once and faced me, though keeping his eyes always steadily on the floor. The tears were streaming down his face like rain.
"Are you tired?" I asked. "You'd better lie down and go to sleep. You can talk to-morrow."
It was this that finished him. He had reached the breaking point.
There is no heroism in me; it was simply that I needed him, rotten as he was, heartless, cruel, vile as well; I funked another spell of that awful loneliness; I knew him now for a coward and a beast, but I could not face another night alone. That complete loneliness had been too horrible. A wild animal was better than that. Boyde was of the hyena type, but a hyena was better than a spider. It was neither generosity nor nobility that made me listen to his ridiculous and lying story of an "awful and terrible temptation," of a "fearful experience with a woman" who had drugged him.... The tale spun itself far into the night, the razor and the confession were under my pillow, I fell asleep, dead with exhaustion, while he was still explaining something about a "woman named Pauline M----" who had "deceived me in a most extraordinary way...."
The following day, in the morning--Dr. Huebner came unexpectedly. Boyde had gone out before I woke. This time he was a radiant Dr. Jekyll, and I told him the whole story. His only comment, looking severely at me through the big spectacles, was: "I expected it. He is a confidence man. I knew it the first time I saw him. You have kicked the devil out, of course?"
A violent disagreement that was almost a quarrel followed.
"I simply do not understand you," he said at last, in complete disgust. It was only the wondrous, beaming happy mood he was in that prevented his being really angry. He threw his hands up and snorted. "You are either a fool or a saint, and—I'm sure you're not a saint." He was very much upset.
I did not yield. There was something in me that persuaded me to forgive Boyde and to give him yet another chance. I told Boyde this in very plain language. I claim no credit—I have never felt the smallest credit—for what I did. It was simply that somehow it seemed impossible not to forgive him—anything. But the time was near, though the feeling of forgiveness still held true in me, when my forgiveness took another form. Thirty years ago these little incidents occurred. It seems like thirty days.