CHAPTER II
PYRAMUS AND THISBE
The two men turned up the street. They walked in silence. ArthurMifflin was going over in his mind such outstanding events of theevening as he remembered--the nervousness, the relief of findingthat he was gripping his audience, the growing conviction that hehad made good; while Jimmy seemed to be thinking his own privatethoughts. They had gone some distance before either spoke.
"Who is she, Jimmy?" asked Mifflin.
Jimmy came out of his thoughts with a start.
"What's that?"
"Who is she?"
"I don't know what you mean."
"Yes, you do! The sea air. Who is she?"
"I don't know," said Jimmy, simply.
"You don't know? Well, what's her name?"
"I don't know."
"Doesn't the Lusitania still print a passenger-list?"
"She does."
"And you couldn't find out her name in five days?"
"No."
"And that's the man who thinks he can burgle a house!" said Mifflin,despairingly.
They had arrived now at the building on the second floor of whichwas Jimmy's flat.
"Coming in?" said Jimmy.
"Well, I was rather thinking of pushing on as far as the Park. Itell you, I feel all on wires."
"Come in, and smoke a cigar. You've got all night before you if youwant to do Marathons. I haven't seen you for a couple of months. Iwant you to tell me all the news."
"There isn't any. Nothing happens in New York. The papers say thingsdo, but they don't. However, I'll come in. It seems to me thatyou're the man with the news."
Jimmy fumbled with his latch-key.
"You're a bright sort of burglar," said Mifflin, disparagingly. "Whydon't you use your oxy-acetylene blow-pipe? Do you realize, my boy,that you've let yourself in for buying a dinner for twelve hungrymen next week? In the cold light of the morning, when reason returnsto her throne, that'll come home to you."
"I haven't done anything of the sort," said Jimmy, unlocking thedoor.
"Don't tell me you really mean to try it."
"What else did you think I was going to do?"
"But you can't. You would get caught for a certainty. And what areyou going to do then? Say it was all a joke? Suppose they fill youfull of bullet-holes! Nice sort of fool you'll look, appealing tosome outraged householder's sense of humor, while he pumps you fullof lead with a Colt."
"These are the risks of the profession. You ought to know that,Arthur. Think what you went through tonight."
Arthur Mifflin looked at his friend with some uneasiness. He knewhow very reckless Jimmy could be when he had set his mind onaccomplishing anything, since, under the stimulus of a challenge, heceased to be a reasoning being, amenable to argument. And, in thepresent case, he knew that Willett's words had driven the challengehome. Jimmy was not the man to sit still under the charge of being afakir, no matter whether his accuser had been sober or drunk.
Jimmy, meanwhile, had produced whiskey and cigars. Now, he was lyingon his back on the lounge, blowing smoke-rings at the ceiling.
"Well?" said Arthur Mifflin, at length.
"Well, what?"
"What I meant was, is this silence to be permanent, or are you goingto begin shortly to amuse, elevate, and instruct? Something'shappened to you, Jimmy. There was a time when you were a brightlittle chap, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.Where be your gibes now; your gambols, your songs, your flashes ofmerriment that were wont to set the table in a roar when you werepaying for the dinner? You remind me more of a deaf-mute celebratingthe Fourth of July with noiseless powder than anything else onearth. Wake up, or I shall go. Jimmy, we were practically boystogether. Tell me about this girl--the girl you loved, and wereidiot enough to lose."
Jimmy drew a deep breath.
"Very well," said Mifflin complacently, "sigh if you like; it'sbetter than nothing."
Jimmy sat up.
"Yes, dozens of times," said Mifflin.
"What do you mean?"
"You were just going to ask me if I had ever been in love, weren'tyou?"
"I wasn't, because I know you haven't. You have no soul. You don'tknow what love is."
"Have it your own way," said Mifflin, resignedly.
Jimmy bumped back on the sofa.
"I don't either," he said. "That's the trouble."
Mifflin looked interested.
"I know," he said. "You've got that strange premonitory fluttering,when the heart seems to thrill within you like some baby birdsinging its first song, when--"
"Oh, cut it out!"
"--when you ask yourself timidly, 'Is it? Can it really be?' andanswer shyly, 'No. Yes. I believe it is!' I've been through itdozens of times; it is a recognized early symptom. Unless promptmeasures are taken, it will develop into something acute. In thesematters, stand on your Uncle Arthur. He knows."
"You make me sick," Jimmy retorted.
"You have our ear," said Mifflin, kindly. "Tell me all."
"There's nothing to tell."
"Don't lie, James."
"Well, practically nothing."
"That's better."
"It was like this."
"Good."
Jimmy wriggled himself into a more comfortable position, and took asip from his glass.
"I didn't see her until the second day out."
"I know that second day out. Well?"
"We didn't really meet at all."
"Just happened to be going to the same spot, eh?"
"As a matter of fact, it was like this. Like a fool, I'd bought asecond-class ticket."
"What? Our young Rockerbilt Astergould, the boy millionaire,traveling second-class! Why?"
"I had an idea it would be better fun. Everybody's so much morecheery in the second cabin. You get to know people so much quicker.Nine trips out of ten, I'd much rather go second."
"And this was the tenth?"
"She was in the first-cabin," said Jimmy.
Mifflin clutched his forehead.
"Wait!" he cried. "This reminds me of something--something inShakespeare. Romeo and Juliet? No. I've got it--Pyramus and Thisbe."
"I don't see the slightest resemblance."
"Read your 'Midsummer Night's Dream.' 'Pyramus and Thisbe,' says thestory, 'did talk through the chink of a wall,'" quoted Mifflin.
"We didn't."
"Don't be so literal. You talked across a railing."
"We didn't."
"Do you mean to say you didn't talk at all?"
"We didn't say a single word."
Mifflin shook his head sadly.
"I give you up," he said. "I thought you were a man of enterprise.What did you do?"
Jimmy sighed softly.
"I used to stand and smoke against the railing opposite the barber'sshop, and she used to walk round the deck."
"And you used to stare at her?"
"I would look in her direction sometimes," corrected Jimmy, withdignity.
"Don't quibble! You stared at her. You behaved like a common rubber-neck,and you know it. I am no prude, James, but I feel compelled tosay that I consider your conduct that of a libertine. Used she towalk alone?"
"Generally."
"And, now, you love her, eh? You went on board that ship happy,careless, heart-free. You came off it grave and saddened.Thenceforth, for you, the world could contain but one woman, andher you had lost."
Mifflin groaned in a hollow and bereaved manner, and took a sip fromhis glass to buoy him up.
Jimmy moved restlessly on the sofa.
"Do you believe in love at first sight?" he asked, fatuously. He wasin the mood when a man says things, the memory of which makes himwake up hot all over for nights to come.
"I don't see what first sight's got to do with it," said Mifflin."According to your own statement, you stood and glared at the girlfor five days without letting up for a moment. I can quite imaginethat you might glare yourself into love with anyone by the end
ofthat time."
"I can't see myself settling down," said Jimmy, thoughtfully. "And,until you feel that you want to settle down, I suppose you can't bereally in love."
"I was saying practically that about you at the club just before youcame in. My somewhat neat expression was that you were one of thegypsies of the world."
"By George, you're quite right!"
"I always am."
"I suppose it's having nothing to do. When I was on the News, I wasnever like this."
"You weren't on the News long enough to get tired of it."
"I feel now I can't stay in a place more than a week. It's havingthis money that does it, I suppose."
"New York," said Mifflin, "is full of obliging persons who will bedelighted to relieve you of the incubus. Well, James, I shall leaveyou. I feel more like bed now. By the way, I suppose you lost sightof this girl when you landed?"
"Yes."
"Well, there aren't so many girls in the United States--only twentymillion. Or is it forty million? Something small. All you've got todo is to search around a bit. Good-night."
"Good-night."
Mr. Mifflin clattered down the stairs. A minute later, the sound ofhis name being called loudly from the street brought Jimmy to thewindow. Mifflin was standing on the pavement below, looking up.
"Jimmy."
"What's the matter now?"
"I forgot to ask. Was she a blonde?"
"What?"
"Was she a blonde?" yelled Mifflin.
"No," snapped Jimmy.
"Dark, eh?" bawled Mifflin, making night hideous.
"Yes," said Jimmy, shutting the window.
"Jimmy!"
The window went up again.
"Well?"
"Me for blondes!"
"Go to bed!"
"Very well. Good-night."
"Good-night."
Jimmy withdrew his head, and sat down in the chair Mifflin hadvacated. A moment later, he rose, and switched off the light. It waspleasanter to sit and think in the dark. His thoughts wandered offin many channels, but always came back to the girl on the Lusitania.It was absurd, of course. He didn't wonder that Arthur Mifflin hadtreated the thing as a joke. Good old Arthur! Glad he had made asuccess! But was it a joke? Who was it that said, the point of ajoke is like the point of a needle, so small that it is apt todisappear entirely when directed straight at oneself? If anybodyelse had told him such a limping romance, he would have laughedhimself. Only, when you are the center of a romance, howeverlimping, you see it from a different angle. Of course, told badly,it was absurd. He could see that. But something away at the back ofhis mind told him that it was not altogether absurd. And yet--lovedidn't come like that, in a flash. You might just as well expect ahouse to spring into being in a moment, or a ship, or an automobile,or a table, or a--He sat up with a jerk. In another instant, hewould have been asleep.
He thought of bed, but bed seemed a long way off--the deuce of away. Acres of carpet to be crawled over, and then the dickens of aclimb at the end of it. Besides, undressing! Nuisance--undressing.That was a nice dress the girl had worn on the fourth day out.Tailor-made. He liked tailor-mades. He liked all her dresses. Heliked her. Had she liked him? So hard to tell if you don't get achance of speaking! She was dark. Arthur liked blondes, Arthur was afool! Good old Arthur! Glad he had made a success! Now, he couldmarry if he liked! If he wasn't so restless, if he didn't feel thathe couldn't stop more than a day in any place! But would the girlhave him? If they had never spoken, it made it so hard to--
At this point, Jimmy went to sleep.