think that even if he would deplore Henley's attitude, he would understand it. And found the shanghaing himself." when Stevenson and I were abandoned While I saw a good deal of Henley in by the others he expressed at once his those summers in the eighties I saw interest in my idea as it was expounded Stevenson only once, although we had toward the end of the tale. "It is a fine exchanged messages through Henley. I idea for a story," he declared; "but knew that his health was frail and un- when you had found that, you ought to certain and that he rarely revisited the have thrown away all the earlier part of club; and I doubted whether I might ever the story and have written straight up stand face to face with him. Then on the to the effect which alone made it worth afternoon of August 3, 1886, he dropped while." into the Savile quite unexpectedly. For most of the two hours that he stayed, the talk was general and I can recapture few fragments of it. As the afternoon wore on, the others dropped out until Stevenson and I were left alone in the smoking-room. What I remember most vividly was the high appreciation of "Huckleberry Finn" that he expressed, calling it a far finer book artistically than "Tom Sawyer," partly because it was a richer book morally; and he wound up by declaring it to be the most important addition to the fiction of our language that had been made for ten years. Another book that we discussed he did not hold to be so important; this was my own "Last Meeting," a brief novel which ought to have been a long short-story. It had at the core of it a romantic idea which I still think to have enticing possibilities for a more romantic writer than myself the idea that the villain, after having shanghaied the hero for a long voyage on a sailing ship, would journey to its next port, so that he might repeat his marine kidnapping. I had sent the book to Henley with a request that he might pass it on to Stevenson; and all the news I had had of it was contained in a single sentence of one of Henley's letters to me: "R. L. S. says he wishes he'd I knew that his words were golden; but honesty compelled me to confess that I had started with the fine idea and that if I had failed to lead up to it adequately, it was because I had mischosen my method. As a dramatist by inclination, I could never begin any narrative unless I knew exactly how it was going to turn out and unless I foresaw its devious windings. Stevenson's sole response was to say that it was a pity I had maltreated an effect worthy of a more appropriate handling. My blunder was in putting so purely romantic a motive in a more or less realistic setting of literary life in New York with its atmosphere of superabundant small-talk. Henley had written to me that the book "is dreadfully like your talk. Not that I don't like your talk; you know very well that I do. But talk is talk, and writing's writing, and both are best in their proper places";-and this has always seemed to me one of the shrewdest and soundest of Henley's criticisms. He went on, with equal wit and wisdom, to object to the "crackle of cleverness" in the conversation of my characters, which affected him "like the noise of an electric spark. I get tired of you and them, as I do of a high-tuned lunch at the Savile. I long for a few flashes of stupidity." D GOD'S MATERIAL By Charles Belmont Davis ILLUSTRATIONS BY JAMES MONTGOMERY FLAGG AVID PRINDLE gathered up his change and his monthly commutation ticket and, through the grated window, smiled at the station agent. David said: "A fine morning for the 1st of December," but the thought in his mind was: "I have now in my pocket two dollars, and this added to the seventy dollars I have in bank will not pay the monthly bills, and I wonder which of the monthly bills I can best leave unpaid." For five years now, on the first day of every month, Prindle had been facing the same question, whether it was better to rob Peter and pay Paul or pay Peter and let Paul wait. Every morning as he sat with his fellow commuters and smoked his pipe and tried to read his newspaper his thoughts were seldom far afield from the question of the high cost of living. The same thoughts usually filled his mind on the return trip, but no sooner had he left the stuffy, smoke-ridden car than such gloomy reveries took instant flight. His head held high, his shoulders thrown back, with long, swinging strides he swung along the broad country road that led to his home. And such a home! The very first glimpse that he caught of the white clapboard farmhouse never failed to cause the same old thrill. Evil reflections concerning unpaid bills, the long, dull routine of the day's work, the years of incessant struggle were forgotten, and the only thoughts that filled his tired, overworked brain were of the little house hidden among the trees and the figure of the girl sure to be waiting for him before the open door. That was about all there was in David's life-this one girl and the open door. And so intertwined were they in his heart and in his mind that they seemed like two happy dreams constantly fading one into another, both very distinct and quite inseparable. For it was in this same farmhouse that David and his beloved Angela had begun their married life. It was the only home they had ever known together, and (with the exception of a new roof and an addition which was to contain an oak-panelled library and a pink-and-gold bedroom for Angela) it was the only home they ever wanted to know. For one year David had paid a modest rental, but at the end of that time, so satisfied were he and Angela that it was the best home in the world, they decided to try to buy the place outright. Therefore, having carefully counted their capital and such prospects as the future might have in store for them, they called on the agent of the property and briefly told him of their heart's desire. The agent admitted that the owner had no possible use for the house himself and would no doubt be glad to part with it on easy terms. These surmises proved correct, and in a week's time David and Angela once more met at the agent's office to sign the allimportant papers. The agent sat behind his flat desk, smiled a little,mysteriously, and with one finger tapped the long, red-sealed deeds that lay before him. "Mr. Dolliver, whom I represent," he began, "is willing to accede to the terms. that you suggest. My client, however reluctantly, must insist on one condition which it is quite possible may deter you from buying the property." David and Angela exchanged swift, unhappy glances, and then David nodded for the lawyer to continue. "The original owner of the house, one Abraham Enright, decreed in his will that so long as the house lasted the eldest male member of the family of Enright should always have the privilege of occupying a certain room for so long a period as he saw fit. That was a long time ago-at least three generations-and although the property has changed hands several times that same clause has al ways appeared in the deed. The eldest living descendant of Abraham Enright, if there is one, still has the right to occupy that room. I believe it is the one at the northern end of the house on the second floor." "Then, as I understand it," said David, "although we own the house we are liable at any time to have a stranger wander in and settle down in our only spare room, and perhaps stay there until he dies?" "Exactly," said the agent. "But I think it is only fair to say that since the condition was first made no one, so far as is known, has ever taken advantage of the privilege. For a few tense moments David alternately turned his glance from the keen, smiling eyes of the lawyer to the deeds, and then back to the lawyer. "Do you not think," he suggested, "if I saw your client and explained how" "Not a chance in the world," the lawyer interrupted. "To be quite frank with you, I don't believe he cares very much whether he sells the property or not. Personally, and I speak from a long experience, I consider the terms, in spite of this unusual condition, very favorable to you." David glanced at Angela and saw tears slowly ebbing into the eyes that he loved the best in all the world. Without another word he reached for the deeds and quickly seized the pen the lawyer proffered him. Even with less hesitation Angela affixed her signature, and the little farmhouse, with the exception of its one absurd and annoying condition, was their very own. When David and Angela had once more returned home they spent the evening in speculating on the probable personality, condition of life, and habits of the stranger who at any moment might demand a place in their household. The name of the creator of the unhappy condition was as unknown to them as was that of the present head of the house of Enright. They speculated about him that particular night and for the next five years, with occasional brief lapses, they continued to speculate about him. The oldest living inhabitant of the neighborhood could not remember an Abraham Enright and where he had gone and who were his heirs no one knew. But to David and Angela the present heir was a very real person and a distinct menace to their lives. During the five years of speculation their composite guesses had assumed the form and character of a real individual. According to this gradually conceived idea the mysterious stranger who was legally entitled to upset their lives was a rather elderly person with few humane or kindly instincts. Also, although David and Angela always referred to him as "the family skeleton," he was very short and stout, had a stubbly, iron-gray beard and a most ungovernable temper. This in their hours of depression was the ogre they always saw. They pictured the roly-poly form stumping up the road; they saw him standing in the doorway gruffly demanding entrance; and they saw him in their one spare bedroom-irritable, gouty, and, with his meagre, uncouth belongings, settled there for life. It was for the latter reason, perhaps, that of all the little home the spare room alone failed to grow in beauty and comfort. A typical farmhouse bedroom, cold, gray, and cheerless they had found it, and cold, gray, and cheerless Angela and David let it remain. It was as if they had prepared a vault to receive the remains of all their happiest and most cherished hopes. However, apart from the always expected visit from the unwelcome guest, Angela and David had known five years of well-nigh perfect content. It is true that to keep the place in proper repair, to add to its simple comforts, to make Angela's flower-garden worthy of its lovely mistress had been no easy task, and had been accomplished not without many unmentioned deeds of sacrifice and privation. For ten years David had worked hard and faithfully for the company with whom he had found his first employment, but, fortunately or unfortunately, David had been born with a nature which contained sweetness and kindliness out of all proportion to aggressiveness or business acumen. Therefore, as is the usual fate of such personalities, he had become but a human cog in a great human wheel that with each revolution ground out many dollars for its owners. For ten years David had served his mas ters well and just as far as he was allowed to serve them, and, then, when he had reached the office on the morning of that first day of December, he found the place filled with whispered rumors that chilled the hearts of the human cogs. Big Business had laid its steel hand on the wheel of human cogs and hereafter it was to play but a minor part in a really great machine. David and all the other human cogs knew that Big Business brought with it sons and nephews and cousins, all of whom must have jobs, and, late that same afternoon, the fears of David at least proved correct. With a heavy heart he alighted from the train and with feet of lead he started to plod wearily over the brittle, frozen roads to his home. After ten long years! But the thought that was uppermost in David's mind was not one of reproach against the company but against himself. Human cogs of ten years' standing could not easily find new positions, and David knew this as well as he knew that with all the needs of his home pressing upon him he had been unable to lay by. During the period of their married life David had held no secret from his wife, and now, more than ever before, he needed the help of her love and of her fine, young courage. They sat down before the wood fire in the little sitting-room, and with no word of bitterness David told the tragedy that had come into their lives. After he had finished the two lovers sat in silence. Gazing into the crackling fire, her chin resting in the palm of one hand, Angela stretched out her other hand until it lay in that of her husband. For a few moments they remained thus, and then, suddenly, they were aroused from their unhappy reveries by the incessant tooting of an automobile horn, evidently clamoring for admission at their garden gate. "Delmonico's," said Johnny Enright to his chauffeur, and, with a dolorous sign of discontent, fell back into the deepcushioned seat of his limousine. To be whisked away in such a gorgeous, purple-lined chariot to a banquet at Delmonico's might have brought a smile of anticipatory pleasure to some young men, but not to Johnny Enright. Had it been a dinner with a few congenial friends, that would have been a very different matter, but of all the chores that his business life very occasionally forced upon him, the annual banquet given to the big men in his employ bored him the most. He hated the dinner with its innumerable courses, he hated the ostentatious souvenirs, the long-winded speeches, and, most of all, he hated the speech that he himself had to make. Had it not been for the latter he could at least have partially forgotten his dislike of the occasion by indulging in large libations of champagne. But as vice-president and the practical owner of the Universal Milk Company it was necessary for him to appear at his very best when the time came for him to address the officers and the district managers of that eminently successful concern. The banquet itself proved to be very much like every other banquet, whether the price is five dollars a plate or five times that amount. The dinner proper once over, the old gentlemen at the speakers' table, one by one, arose and gravely threw verbal bouquets at every one present, including themselves. Johnny sat between two of these elderly, bearded persons and dreamily wondered whether he would spend the next day in town or go to Rye to play golf. And then he was suddenly aroused from his revery by a sudden break in the oratory which at least to Enright seemed to have been rumbling on for hours. A little way down the table a young man with a Henry Clay face and a rarely sympathetic voice was telling his elders something of the worth of Abraham Enright, whose sagacity and high principles had brought the Universal Milk Company into being and to whom every man present owed a debt of gratitude that none could ever hope to pay. From Abraham Enright the young and convincing orator passed to his son, John Enright, and, having properly crowned him with laurel, proceeded to decorate the present head of the house in a similar manner. With a flushed face and downcast eyes Johnny heard himself credited with a list of virtues to not one of which could he possibly lay claim. A few minutes later, confused and still blushing, Johnny himself arose and heartily thanked the young man for mentioning all the things that he should be and wasn't, but promised faithfully that the hint should not go unheeded. To his great relief the banquet came to a fairly early end, the mass of black coats and white shirt-fronts at last arose, disintegrated, and finally disappeared. With a huge sigh Johnny hustled into a fur coat, and, with all possible despatch, started for the nearest cabaret. It was early afternoon on the following day when Enright awoke from a heavy sleep and rang for his servant. The strain of remaining respectable during the long banquet had been too much for him, and to make up for it he had one-stepped and fox-trotted and supped at the cabaret until the new day was well on its way. His first half-crystallized thought was of the beautiful young butterfly with whom he had danced away the early morning hours, and then his mind suddenly reverted to the boy orator with the Henry Clay face who had so glowingly described the great and good work of the three generations of Enrights. Perhaps the youthful district manager had said what he said because he believed it, or perhaps he thought that it would help him with the officers of the company and bring him instant preferment, but, whatever his intention, there could be no doubt that his words had sunk deep into the guilty, joyous soul of Johnny Enright. For some time Enright lay gazing up at the ceiling, listening to his servant moving stealthily about the room, and then he cast a guilty glance at the clock. To his further chagrin he found that it was nearly half past three. Of course, it was too late for golf, and, as he had no dinner engagement, a long, dull afternoon and night in town faced him ominously. He was thoroughly discouraged at the outlook and he was more discouraged about himself. The words of the district manager orator returned to taunt him and upbraid him for not having lived the fine, useful life that his father and grandfather had lived instead of that of the pampered son of a multi-millionaire-a waster. And then, as he still lay gazing up at the ceiling, but now quite wide-awake, there came to his mind a talk he had had with his father just before the old man had died. The conversation that he now recalled so vividly seemed to fit in most curiously with the district manager's speech as well as his gloomy views concerning his own present worthless exist- ence. They had been sitting together in his father's study and the gist of the old man's words was this: "To-day, my son, I have made you my sole heir, but, for certain reasons, there is one bequest I did not mention in my will. Your grandfather began life as a plain farmer. He was born and brought up on a little place that was known as The Oaks, near a town called Millbrook, in Jersey. As a boy he worked on the farm, and among his other chores he drove the cows to and from the pasture and milked them. Long before he died he established one of the biggest milk concerns this or any other country has ever known. When he was successful he moved to New York, but in a way he held on to the farm at Millbrook. He practically gave the place over to an old farmer and his wife, but he always retained the privilege of spending a night there whenever he saw fit. And, in spite of his town house and the big place he built afterward at Elberon, he frequently availed himself of the privilege. He contended that one night at the old farm not only did his nerves a world of good but kept his relative values straight. If the money came in a little too fast he would run down and have a look at the old cow pasture and the barnyard where he worked as a barefooted boy. And when he felt that his power was getting the better of his heart and his common sense he would spend a night in his old whitewashed room at the farm, sleep on a corn-husk mattress, and go back to town chastened and ready to help others who hadn't had his luck or his talent for success. When your grandfather died he left the old place to the farmer who had looked after it for him, but it was stipulated in the deed that the eldest male member of his family should always have the right to occupy his bedroom." "And did you ever take advantage of the privilege?" Johnny asked. "Not exactly," said Johnny's father. "The place had changed hands before I grew old enough and wise enough to feel the need of it. But several times I ran |