Читать книгу: «The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton», страница 12

“The voices I had heard were all unfamiliar and it was not until the yacht had drifted past me that I was apprised it was indeed the craft I sought by hearing the voice of Mildred saying, with an assumed jocularity that could not hide the note of fear:

“‘What will I do? All the other girls have a man to save them. I am the extra girl.’

“I drove my long-legged steed into the water after the boat none too soon, for the whistling of a premonitory gust filled the air. Quickly through the water strode the camel, and, with his lariat in my hand, I plumped down upon the stern overhang just as the mainsail went slatting back and forth across the boat and everybody was ducking his head. In the confusion, nobody observed my arrival.

“‘She’s coming about,’ cried the voice of the skipper, Gannett. ‘A few of these gusts would get us far enough across to be out of danger from the main storm.’

“But she did not come about. I could feel the camel tugging at the lariat as the swerving of the boat jerked him along, but presently the strain ceased, for the boat lay wallowing as before. Again a fitful gust, again the slatting of the sail, the skipper put his helm down hard, the boat put her nose into the wind, hung there, and fell back.

“‘She won’t mind her helm!’

“‘She won’t come about!’

“‘She acts as if she were towing something, were tied to something!’

“‘What’s that big rock behind there? Who the devil is this? And how the devil did he get here?’

“In the midst of these excited and alarmed exclamations came the solemn, portentous voice of the camel tolling out in the unnatural night the tocsin of the approaching hurricane.

“‘It’s the Dago!’ cried Gannett, examining me by the fleeting flash of a match. ‘It’s his damned camel towing behind that won’t let us come about. Pitch him overboard!’

“‘Oh, save me!’ appealed Mildred.

“There she had been, sitting just in front of me and I hadn’t known it was she. It was not strange that she had faith that I who had arrived could also depart.

“‘Selim,’ I called, pulling the camel to the boat. I had never had a name for him before, but it was high time he had one, so now I named him. ‘Selim,’ and there the faithful beast was and with Mildred in my arms, I scrambled on to his back and urged him toward the rift in the wall of cliff.

“As if I had spurned it with my foot, the boat sprang away behind us, a sudden rushing blast filling her sails and laying her almost over, and then she was out of our sight, into the teeth of the tempest, yelling, screaming, howling with a hundred voices as it darted from the sky and laid flat the waves and then hurled them up in a mass of stinging spray.

“In fond anticipation, I had dwelt upon the homeward ride with Mildred. A-camelback, I was, as it were, upon my native heath, master of myself, assured, and at ease. I had planned to tell her of my love, plead my cause with Oriental fervor and imagery, but before we reached shore the tempest was so loud that she could not have heard me unless I had shouted, and I had no mind to bawl my love. Worse still, when once we were going across the wind and later into it, I could not open my mouth at all. We reached the hotel and on its lee side I lifted her down to the topmost of the piazza steps. I determined not be delayed longer. If ever there was to be a propitious occasion, it was now when I had rescued her from encompassing peril. I retained hold of her hand. She gave me a glance in which was at least gratitude, and I dared hope, something more, and I was about to make my declaration, when she made a little step, her right foot almost sunk under her and she gave an agonized cry and hobbling, limping, hopping on one foot, passed from me across the piazza to the stairs leading to the second story, whither she ascended upon her hands and knees.

“That wretched stone from the cavern where Mahommed slept in the Hegira! How many times during the day had she wanted to take her shoe off? She would ascertain the cause of her torment, she would lay it to me. It had indeed been an amulet against sudden love. I was the man whose love it had forefended.

“‘Gannett’s yacht went down and all aboard of her were drowned,’ said one of the bellboys to me. ‘Everybody in the hotel is feeling dreadful.’

“‘How do you know they are drowned?’

“‘Everybody in the hotel says so. I don’t know how they found out.’

“‘What’s that at the pier?’ said I.

“The lights at the end of the pier shone against a white expanse of sail and there was a yacht slowly making a landing.

“Someone came and stood for a moment in an open window above me and there floated out the voice of one of the sisters Decatur, but which one, I could not tell. Their voices were much alike and I had not heard either of them speak very often.

“‘Do you think that one ought to marry a person who rescues her from death, when he happens to be a Dago and cheap circus man into the bargain? I certainly do not.’

“Which one was it? Which one was it? Imagine my feelings, torn with doubt, perplexity, and sorrow. Was it Mildred, replying scornfully to some opinion of her sister, or was it the sister taking Mildred to task for saying she wished or ought to marry me? How was I to know? Could I run the risk of asking the girls themselves?

The emir paused, and it was plain to be seen from the workings of his countenance that once more he was living over this unhappy episode.

“I can well imagine your feelings and sympathize with them,” said Mr. Middleton. “There you sat in the encircling darkness, asking yourself with no hope of an answer, ‘Was it Mildred? Was it her sister? Was it Mildred contemptuously repudiating the idea of marriage with me, or the sister haughtily scoffing at some sentiments just professed by Mildred? But I should not have spent too long a time asking how I was to know. I should put the matter to the test and had it out with Mildred, Miss Mildred, I should say.”

The emir looked steadily at Mr. Middleton. There was surprise, annoyance, perhaps even vexation in his gaze. With incisive tones, he said:

“How could you so mistake me? Ours is a line whose lineage goes back twelve hundred years, a noble and unsullied line. Could I, sir, think of making my wife, making a princess of my race, a woman who could entertain the thought of stooping to marry a Dago cheap circus man? Suppose I had gone to Mildred and had asked her if she had expressed herself of such a demeaning declaration? Suppose she had said, ‘Yes,’ then there I would have been, compromised, caught in an entanglement from which as a man of honor, I could not withdraw. The only thing to do was to keep silence. The risk was too great, I resolved to leave on the morrow. For the first time did I learn that I was believed to be a Dago and the proprietor of the little menagerie. This strengthened my resolve to leave.

“I left. Your happy encounter with the young ladies in the restaurant changed all. They learned from you that I was their social equal. They looked me up and apologized for their apparent lack of appreciation of my services and explained that they thought me a Dago circus man. I learned that neither of them believed in a mesalliance, that the question I had heard was a rhetorical question merely, one not expecting an answer, much used by orators to express a strong negation of the sentiments apparently contained in the question. But I have not yet learned which girl it was who asked the question. It is entirely immaterial and I don’t think I shall try to find out, even after I am married, for of course you have surmised I am to be married, to be married to Mildred.”

“Yes, another American heiress marries a foreign nobleman,” said Mr. Middleton, with a bitterness that did not escape the emir.

“Permit me to correct a popular fallacy,” said the emir. “Nothing could be more erroneous than the prevalent idea that American girls marry foreign noblemen because attracted by the glitter of rank, holding their own plain republican citizens in despite. Sir, it takes a title to make a foreigner equal to American men in the eyes of American women. A British knight may compete with the American mister, but when you cross the channel, nothing less than a count will do in a Frenchman, a baron in the line of a German, while, for a Russian to receive any consideration, he must be a prince.

“And now,” said the emir, “my little establishment here being about to be broken up, I am going to ask you to accept certain of my effects which for sundry reasons I cannot take with me to my new abode. My jewels, hangings, and costumes, my wife will like, of course. But as she is opposed to smoking, there are six narghilehs and four chibouques which I will never use again. As I am about to unite with the Presbyterian church this coming Sunday, it might cause my wife some disquietude and fear of backsliding, were I to retain possession of my eight copies of the Koran. She may be wise there,” said the emir with a sigh. “If perchance you should embrace the true faith and thereby make compensation for the loss of a member occasioned by my withdrawal – ”

“That would not even matters up,” interrupted Mr. Middleton, “for I am not a Presbyterian, but a Methodist.”

“Oh,” said the emir. “Well, there are five small whips of rhinoceros hide and two gags. My wife will not wish me to keep those, nor a crystal casket containing twenty-seven varieties of poisons. Then there are other things that you might have use for and I have not. I have sent for a cab and Mesrour will stow the things in it.”

At that moment the cab was heard without and Mesrour began to load it with the gifts of the emir. At length he ceased his carrying and stood looking expectantly. With an air of embarrassment, and clearing his throat hesitatingly, the emir addressed Mr. Middleton.

“There is one last thing I am going to ask you to take. I cannot call it a gift. I can look upon your acceptance of it in no other light than a very great service. Some time ago, when marriage in this country was something too remote to be even dreamed of, I sent home for an odalisque.”

The emir paused and looked obliquely at Mr. Middleton, as if to observe the effect of this announcement. That excellent young man had not the faintest idea what an odalisque might be, but he had ever made it a point when strange and unknown terms came up, to wait for subsequent conversation to enlighten him directly or by inference as to their meaning. In this way he saved the trouble of asking questions and, avoiding the reputation of being inquisitive and curious, gained that of being well informed upon and conversant with a wide range of subjects. So he looked understandingly at the emir and remarking approvingly, “good eye,” the emir continued, much encouraged.

“To a lonely man such as I then was, the thought of having an odalisque about, was very comforting. Lonely as I then was, an odalisque would have afforded a great deal of company.”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Middleton. “Why, even cats are company. The summer I was eighteen, everybody in our family went out to my grandfather’s in Massachusetts, and I stayed home and took care of the house. I tell you, I’d been pretty lonely if it hadn’t been for our two cats.”

“But now I am going to be married and my wife would not think of tolerating an odalisque about the house. She simply would not have it. The odalisque arrived last night, and I am in a great quandary. I could not think of turning the poor creature out perhaps to starve.”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Middleton. “Some persons desiring to dispose of a cat, will carry it off somewhere and drop it, thinking that more humane than drowning it. But I say, always drown a cat, if you wish to get rid of it.”

“Now I have thought that you, being without a wife to object, might take this burden off my hands. I will hand you a sum sufficient for maintenance during a considerable period and doubtless you can, as time goes on, find someone else who wants an odalisque, or discover some other way of disposal, in case you tire – ”

“Send her along,” said Mr. Middleton, cordially and heartily. “If worst comes to worst, there’s an old fellow I know who sells parrots and cockatoos and marmosets, and perhaps he’d like an odalisque.”

“I will send her,” said the emir.

“So it’s a she,” quoth Mr. Middleton to himself. He had used the feminine in the broad way that it is applied indefinitely to ships, railways trains, political parties etc., etc., with no thought of fitting a fact.

“I will give you fifteen hundred dollars for her maintenance. Having brought her so far, I feel a responsibility – ”

“But that is such a large sum. I really wouldn’t need so much – ”

“That is none too large,” rejoined the emir. “I wish her to be treated well and I believe you will do it. At first, she will not understand anything you say to her, of course, but she will soon learn what you mean. The tone, as much as the words, enlightens, and I think you will have very little trouble in managing her.”

“Is there a cage?” hazarded Mr. Middleton, “or won’t I need one?”

“Lock her in a room, if you are afraid she will run away, though such a fear is groundless. Or if you wish to punish her, the rhinoceros whips would do better than a cage. A cage is so large and I could never see any advantage in it. But you will probably never have occasion to use even a whip. You will have but this one odalisque. Had you two or three, they might get to quarreling among themselves and you might have use for a whip. But toward you, she will be all gentleness, all submission.”

Mr. Middleton and the emir then turned to the counting and accounting of the fifteen hundred dollars, and so occupied, the lawyer missed seeing Mesrour pass with the odalisque and did not know she had been put in the hack until the emir had so apprised him.

“She is in a big coffee sack,” said the emir. “The meshes of the fabric are sufficiently open to afford her ample facility for breathing, and yet she can’t get out. Then, too, it will simplify matters when you get to your lodgings. You will not have to lead her and urge her, frightened and bewildered by so much moving about, but pack her upon your back in the bag and carry her to your room with little trouble.

“And now,” continued the emir, grasping Mr. Middleton’s hands warmly, “for the last time do I give you God-speed from this door. I will not disguise my belief that our intimacy has in a measure come to an end. As a married man, I shall not be so free as I have been. I am no longer in need of seeking out knowledge of strange adventures. The tyrannical imam of Oman, who imprisoned my brother, is dead, and his successor, commiserating the poor youth’s sorrows, has not only liberated him, but given him the vermillion edifice of his incarceration. This my brother intends to transmute into gold, for he has hit upon the happy expedient of grinding it up into a face powder, a rouge, beautiful in tint and harmless in composition, for the rock was quarried in one of the most salubrious locations upon the upper waters of the great river Euphrates. I trust I shall sometimes see you at our place, where I am sure I shall be joined in welcoming you by Mrs. – Mrs. – well, to tell the truth,” said the emir in some slight confusion, “I don’t know what her name will be, for it is obviously out of the question to call her Mrs. Achmed Ben Daoud, and she objects to the tribal designation of Alyam, which I had temporarily adopted for convenience’s sake, as ineuphonious.”

“Sir, friend and benefactor, guiding lamp of my life, instructor of my youth and moral exemplar,” said Mr. Middleton, in the emotion of the moment allowing his speech an Oriental warmth which the cold self-consciousness of the Puritan would have forbade, had he been addressing a fellow American, “I cannot tell you the advantages that have flowed from my acquaintance with you. It was indeed the turning point of my life. The pleasure I will leave untouched upon, as I must alike on the present occasion, the profits. Let me briefly state that they foot up to $3760. A full accounting of how they accrued, would consume the rest of the night, and so it must be good-bye.”

As Mr. Middleton looked back for the last time upon that hospitable doorway, he saw the gigantic figure of Mesrour silhouetted against the dim glow beyond and there solemnly boomed on the night air, the Arabic salutation, “Salaam aleikoom.”

What Befell Mr. Middleton Because of the Eighth and Last Gift of the Emir

Getting into the hack and settling into the sole remaining vacant space Mesrour had left in loading the vehicle with the emir’s gifts, Mr. Middleton was so preoccupied by a gloomy dejection as he reflected that a most agreeable, not to say inspiring and educating, intimacy was at last ended, that he reached his lodgings and had begun to unload his new possessions, before he thought of the odalisque. There lay the coffee sack lengthwise on the front seat and partially reclining against the side of the carriage. He was greatly surprised at the size of the unknown creature and began to surmise that it was an anthropoid ape, though before his speculations had ranged from parrots through dogs to domesticated leopards. Leaving the coffee sack until the last, he gingerly seized the slack of the top of the bag and proceeded to pull it upon his shoulders, taking care to avoid holding the creature where it could kick or struggle effectually, for despite all the emir had told him of the gentleness of the odalisque, he was resolved to take no chances. Whatever the creature was, she had slid down, forming a limp lump at the end of the bag, when he charily deposited it on the floor and turned to consult his dictionary before untying it. He was going to know what the creature was before he dealt with her further, a creature so large as that.

Odalisque. A slave or concubine in a Mohammedan harem!!

A woman!!!

Mr. Middleton tore at the string by which the bag was tied, full of the keenest self-reproach. The uncomfortable position during the long ride, the worse position in which she now lay. The knots refused to budge and snatching a knife, with a mighty slashing, he ripped the bag all away and disclosed the slender form of a woman crouched, huddled, collapsed, face downward, head upon her knees. Turning her over and supporting her against his breast in a sitting posture, Mr. Middleton looked upon the most loveliness, unhappiness, and helplessness he had ever beheld.

For a moment his heart almost stopped as he looked into the still face, but he saw the bosom faintly flutter, slow tears oozed out from under the long lashes of the closed lids, and the cupid’s bow mouth gave little twitches of misery and hopelessness. With what exquisite emotions was he filled as he looked down upon the head pillowed upon his breast, with what sentiments of anger, with what noble chivalry!

A Moslem woman. A Moslem woman, who even in the best estate of her sex as free and a wife, goes to her grave like a dog, with no hope of a life beyond, unless her husband amid the joys of Paradise should turn his thoughts back to earth and wish for her there among his houris. But this poor sweet flower had not even this faint expectation, for she was no wife nor could be, slave of a Mohammedan harem. No rights in this world nor the next. Not even the attenuated rights which law and custom gave the free woman. No sustaining dream of a divine recompense for the unmerited unhappiness of this existence. A slave, a harem slave, wanted only when she smiled, was gay, and beautiful; who must weep alone and in silence, in silence, with never a sympathetic shoulder to weep upon after they sold her from her mother’s side. Tied in a bag, going she knew not whither, thrown in a carriage like so much carrion, in these indignities she only wept in silence, for her lord, the man, must not be discomposed. Like the timorous, helpless wild things of the woods whose joys and sorrows must ever be voiceless lest the bloody tyrants of their domain come, who even in the crunch of death hold silence in their weak struggles, this poor young thing bore her sufferings mutely, for her lord, the man, must not be discomposed, choking her very breath lest a sob escape. Mr. Middleton, in a certain illuminating instinct which belongs to women but only occasionally comes to some men, saw all this in a flash without any pondering and turning over and reflecting and comparing, and he said to himself under his breath, not eloquently, but well, as there came home to him the heinousness of that abhorrant social system dependent upon the religious system of the Prophet of Mecca, “Damn the emir and Mohammed and the whole damned Mohammedan business, kit and boodle!”

In this imprecation there was a piece of grave injustice which Mr. Middleton would not have allowed himself in calmer mood, for the emir was about to become a member of one of the largest and most fashionable Presbyterian congregations in the city and ought not to have been included in an anathema of Moslemry and condemned for anything he upheld while in the benighted condition of Mohammedanism.

Mr. Middleton continuing to gaze, as who could not, upon that beautiful unhappy face, suddenly he imprinted upon the quivering lips a kiss in which was the tender sympathy of a mother, the heartening encouragement of a friend, and the ardent passion of a lover. The odalisque opened her lovely hazel eyes and seeing corroboration of all the touch of the kiss had told her, as she looked into eyes that brimmed with tears like hers, upon lips that quivered like hers, she let loose the flood gates of her woes in a torrent of sobs and tears, and throwing herself upon his shoulders, poured out her long pent sorrows in a good cry.

It was only a summer shower and the sun soon shone. She did not weep long. Too filled with wonder and surpassing delight was this daughter of the Orient in her first experience with the chivalry of the Occident. She must needs look again at this man whose eyes had welled full in compassion for her. She would court again his light and soothing caresses, his gentle ministrations, so different from the brutal pawing of the male animals of her own race, the moiety with souls. Ah, how poignantly sweet, how amazing, that which to her American sisters was the usual, the commonplace, the everyday!

She raised her head. Her tears no longer flowed, but her lips still quivered, in a pleading little smile; and her bosom still fluttered, in a shy and doubting joy, and in her mind floated a half-formed prayer that the genii whose craft had woven this rapturous dream, would not too soon dispel it.

Mr. Middleton gazed at her. He had never seen a face like that, so perfectly oval; never such vermillion as showed under the dusk of her cheeks and stained the lips, narrow, but full. What wondrous eyes were those, so large and lustrous, illumining features whose basal lines of classic regularity were softly tempered into a fluent contour. A circlet of gold coins bound her brow, shining in bright relief against the luxuriant masses of chestnut hair. A delicate and slender figure had she, yet well cushioned with flesh and no bones stood out in her bare neck.

Moved not by his own discomfort on the hard floor, but by the possible discomfort of the odalisque, Mr. Middleton at length raised her and conducted her to a red plush sofa obtained by the landlady for soap wrappers and a sum of money, which having turned green in places and therefore become no longer suitable for a station in the parlor, had been placed in this room a few days before. Upon this imposing article of furniture the two sat down, and though at first Mr. Middleton did no more than place his arm gently and reassuringly about the girl’s waist and hold her hand lightly, in the natural evolution, progression, and sequence of events, following the rules of contiguity and approach – rhetorical rules, but not so here – before long the cheek of the fair Arab lay against that of the son of Wisconsin and her arm was about his neck and every little while she uttered a little sigh of complete, of unalloyed content. What had been yesterday, what might be to-morrow, she was now happy. As for Mr. Middleton, what a stream of delicious thoughts, delicious for the most part because of their unselfishness and warm generosity, flowed through his head. What a joy it would be to make happy the path of this girl who had been so unhappy, to lay devotion at the feet of her who had never dreamed there was such a thing in the world, to bind himself the slave of her who had been a slave.

Then, too, he luxuriated in the simple, elementary joy of possession and the less elementary joy of possession of new things, whether new hats, new clothes, new books, new horses, new houses, or new girls, and which is the cause why so many of us have new girls and new beaux. And when he looked ahead and saw only one logical termination of the episode, he swelled with a pride that was honest and unselfish, as he thought how all would look and admire as he passed with this lovely woman, his wife.

He could have sat thus the whole night through, but the girl must be tired, worn by the sufferings of this day and many before. He motioned toward the bed and indicated by pantomime that she should go to it. She would have descended to her knees and with her damask lips brushed the dust from his shoes, if she had thought he wished it, but she knew not what he meant by his gesturing and sat bewildered in eager and anxious willingness. So arranging the bed for her occupancy, he took her in his arms and bore her to it and dropped her in. The riotous blushes chased each other across her cheeks as she lay there with eyes closed, so sweet, so helpless, so alone.

For a little season he stood there gazing, gloating, enravished, like to hug himself in the keen titillation of his ecstasy and this was not all because this lovely being was his, but because he was hers.

Glancing about the room preliminarily to leaving, and wondering what further was to be done for the girl’s comfort and peace of mind, he bethought him of an ancient tale he had once read. In this narration, fate having made it unavoidable that a noble lord should pass the night in a castle tower with a fair dame of high degree and there being but one bed in the apartment, he had placed a naked sword in the middle of the bed between them and so they passed the night, guarded and menaced by the falchion, for the nonce become the symbol of bright honor and cold virtue. Mr. Middleton had often wondered why the knight did not sleep on the floor, or outside the door, as he himself now intended doing. But it occurred to him that some such symbol might reassure the Arab damosel and having no sword, he drew one of the large pistols the emir had given him and approached the bed to lay it there.

The girl’s eyes had now opened and Mr. Middleton started as he beheld her face. Once more the hunted, helpless look it had worn when first he had looked on it. But more. Such an utter fear and sickening unto death. But not fear, terror for herself. Fear for the death of an ideal, a fear caused by her misinterpretation of his intent with the pistol. It had not been real, it had not been real. He was as other men, the men of her world and all the world was alike and life not worth living. With a finesse he had not suspected he possessed, he laid the pistol on a pile of legal papers on a table at the bed’s head, a pile whose sheets a suddenly entering breeze was whirling about the room. How obvious it was he had brought the pistol for a paper weight. Once more the girl was smiling as he drew the clothes over her, all dressed as she was, and kissing shut her drowsy eyes, he left her in her virginal couch.

On the mat before the door in the hallway without, he disposed himself as comfortably as he could. With due regard for the romantic proprieties, he tried to keep within the bounds of the mat. But it was too short, his curled up position too uncomfortable, and so he overflowed it and could scarcely be said to be sleeping on the mat. It was too late to arouse the landlady and although he was there by choice, it could not have been otherwise.

After snatches of broken sleep, after dreams waking and dreams sleeping, which were all alike and of one thing and indistinguishable, he was at length fully awake at a little before six and aware of an odor of tobacco smoke. Applying his nose to the crack of the door, he finally became convinced that it came from his room. Wondering what it could possibly mean, and accordingly opening the door, opening it so slowly and gradually that the odalisque could have ample time to seek the cover of the bed clothes, he stepped in.

There sat the odalisque on the edge of the bed, fully dressed, puffing away at his big meerschaum, blowing clouds that filled the room. On the table lay an empty cigarette box that had been full the night before. This had not belonged to Mr. Middleton, who was not a cigarette smoker and despised the practice, but had been forgotten by Chauncy Stackelberg on a recent visit. The fingers of her right hand were stained yellow, not by the cigarettes of that one box, but the unnumbered cigarettes of years. Mr. Middleton had not noticed these fingers the night before, but had been absorbed by her face, and this as beautiful, as piquant, as bewitching as before, looked up at him, the lips puckered, waiting, longing.

He stood there, stock-still, stern, troubled, dismayed.

She moved over, where she sat on the edge of the bed, with mute invitation, and Mr. Middleton continuing to stand and stare, she moved again and yet again, until she was against the headboard. And still he did not sit beside her, thinking all the time of the young lady of Englewood whose pure Puritan lips never had been and never could be defiled by cigarettes and tobacco. The young lady of Englewood, the young lady of Englewood, what a jewel of women was she and what a fool he had been and how unkind and inconsiderate! Recalled by a little snuffle from the odalisque, he saw the puckered lips were relaxing sorrowfully and fearing the girl would cry, he hastily sat down beside her and put his right arm about her. But he did not take the shapely hand that now laid down the meerschaum, and though her head fell on his shoulder and her breath came and went with his, he did not kiss her, for that breath was laden with tobacco. Nor did his fingers stray through those masses of silken hair, for he was sure they were full of the fumes of tobacco. There with his arm about the soft, uncorsetted form of that glorious beauty, her own white forearm smooth and cool about his neck, he was thinking of the young lady of Englewood.