Gladiator by Philip Wylie (great novels txt) 📕

that he could have met these two people on a different basis, so that he could have learned the truth about them. It was plain that they were educated, cultured, refined. Cane had said something once about raising cattle in England, and Roseanne had cooked peas as she had learned to cook them in France. "Petits pois au beurre," she had murmured—with an unimpeachable accent.

Then the week had passed and there had been no mention of the advance in wages. For himself, Hugo did not care. But it was easy to see why no one had been working on the place when Hugo arrived, why they were eager to hire a transient stranger.

He learned part of what he had already guessed from a clerk in the general store. One of the cows was ailing. Mr. Cane could not drive to town (Mrs. Cane, it seemed, never left the house and its environs) and they had sent Hugo.

"You working for the Canes?" the clerk had asked.

"Yes."

"Funny people."

Hugo replied indirectly. "Have they lived here long?"

"Long? Roseanne Cane was a Bishop. The Bishops built that house and the house before it—back in the seventeen hundreds. They had a lot of money. Have it still, I guess, but Cane's too tight to spend it." There was nothing furtive in the youth's manner; he was evidently touching on common village gossip. "Yes, sir, too tight. Won't give her a maid. But before her folks died, it was Europe every year and a maid for every one of 'em, and 'Why, deary, don't tell me that's the second time you've put on that dress! Take it right off and never wear it again.'" The joke was part of the formula for telling about the Canes, and the clerk snickered appreciatively. "Yes, sir. You come down here some day when I ain't got the Friday orders to fill an' I'll tell you some things about old man Cane that'll turn your stummick."

Hugo accepted his bundle, set it in the seat beside himself, and drove back to the big, green house.

Later in the day he said to Cane: "If you will want me to drive the station wagon very often, I ought to have a license."

"Go ahead. Get one."

"I couldn't afford it at the moment, and since it would be entirely for you, I thought—"

"I see," Cane answered calmly. "Trying to get a license out of me. Well, you're out of luck. You probably won't be needed as a chauffeur again for the next year. If you are, you'll drive without a license, and drive damn carefully, too, because any fines or any accidents would come out of your wages."

Hugo received the insult unmoved. He wondered what Cane would say if he smashed the car and made an escape. He knew he would not do it; the whole universe appeared so constructed that men like Cane inevitably avoided their desserts.

June came, and July. The sea-shore was not distant and occasionally at night Hugo slipped away from the woods and lay on the sand, sometimes drinking in the firmament, sometimes closing his eyes. When it was very hot he undressed behind a pile of barnacle-covered boulders and swam far out in the water. He swam naked, unmolested, stirring up tiny whirlpools of phosphorescence, and afterwards, damp and cool, he would dress and steal back to the barn through the forest and the hay-sweet fields.

One day a man in Middletown asked Mr. Cane to call on him regarding the possible purchase of three cows. Cane's cows were raised with the maximum of human care, the minimum of extraneous expense. His profit on them was great and he sold them, ordinarily, one at a time. He was so excited at the prospect of a triple sale that for a day he was almost gay, very nearly generous. He drove off blithely—not in the sedan, but in the station wagon, because its gasoline mileage was greater.

It was a day filled with wonder for Hugo. When Cane drove from the house, Roseanne was standing beside the drive. She walked over to the barn and said to Hugo in an oddly agitated voice: "Mr. Danner, could you spare an hour or two this morning to help me get some flowers from the woods?"

"Certainly."

She glanced in the direction her husband had taken and hurried to the kitchen, returning presently with two baskets and a trowel. He followed her up the road. They turned off on an overgrown path, pushed through underbrush, and arrived in a few minutes at the side of a pond. The edges were grown thick with bushes and water weeds, dead trees lifted awkward arms at the upper end, and dragon flies skimmed over the warm brown water.

"I used to come here to play when I was a little girl," she said. "It's still just the same." She wore a blue dress; branches had dishevelled her hair; she seemed more alive than he had ever seen her.

"It's charming," Hugo answered.

"There used to be a path all the way around—with stones crossing the brook at the inlet. And over there, underneath those pine trees, there are some orchids. I've always wanted to bring them down to the house. I think I could make them grow. Of course, this is a bad time to transplant anything—but I so seldom get a chance. I can't remember when—when—"

He realized with a shock that she was going to cry. She turned her head away and peered into the green wall. "I think it's here," she said tremulously.

They followed a dimly discernible trail; there were deer tracks in it and signs of other animals whose feet had kept it passable. It was hot and damp and they were forced to bend low beneath the tangle to make progress. Almost suddenly they emerged in a grove of white pines. They stood upright and looked: wind stirred sibilantly in the high tops, and the ground underfoot was a soft carpet; the lake reflected the blue of the sky instead of the brown of its soft bottom.

"Let's rest a minute," she said. And then: "I always think a pine grove is like a cathedral. I read somewhere that pines inspired Gothic architecture. Do you suppose it's true?"

"There was the lotos and the Corinthian column," Hugo answered.

They sat down. This was a new emotion—a paradoxical emotion for him. He had come to an inharmonious sanctuary and he could expect both tragedy and enchantment. There was Roseanne herself, a hidden beautiful thing in whom were prisoned many beauties. She was growing old in the frosty seclusion of her husband's company. She was feeding on the toothless food of dreams when her hunger was still strong. That much anyone might see; the reason alone remained invisible. He was acutely conscious of an hour at hand, an imminent moment of vision.

"You're a strange man," she said finally.

That was to be the password. "Yes?"

"I've watched you every day from the kitchen window." Her depression had gone now and she was talking with a vague excitement.

"Have you?"

"Do you mind if we pretend for a minute?"

"I'd like it."

"Then let's pretend this is a magic carpet and we've flown away from the world and there's nothing to do but play. Play," she repeated musingly. "I'll be Roseanne and you'll be Hugo. You see, I found out your name from the letters. I found out a lot about you. Not facts like born, occupation, father's first name; just—things."

He dared a little then. "What sort of things, Roseanne?"

She laughed. "I knew you could do it! That's one of them. I found out you had a soul. Souls show even in barn-yards. You looked at the peonies one day and you played with the puppies the next. In one way—Hugo—you're a failure as a farm hand."

"Failure?"

"A flop. You never make a grammatical mistake." She saw his surprise and laughed again. "And your manners—and, then, you understood French. See—the carpet is taking us higher and farther away. Isn't it fun! You're the hired man and I'm the farmer's wife and all of a sudden—we're—"

"A prince and princess?"

"That's exactly right. I won't pretend I'm not curious—morbidly curious. But I won't ask questions, either, because that isn't what the carpet is for."

"What is it for, Roseanne?"

"To get away from the world, silly. And now—there's a look about you. When I was a little girl, my father was a great man, and many great men used to come to our house. I know what the frown of power is and the attitude of greatness. You have them—much more than any pompous old magnate I ever laid eyes on. The way you touch things and handle them, the way you square your shoulders. Sometimes I think you're not real at all and just an imaginary knight come to storm my castle. And sometimes I think you're a very famous man whose afternoon walk just has been extended for a few months. The first thought frightens me, and the second makes me wonder why I haven't seen your picture in the Sunday rotogravures."

Hugo's shoulders shook. "Poor Princess Roseanne. And what do I think about you, then—"

She held up her hand. "Don't tell me, Hugo. I should be sad. After all, my life—"

"May be what it does not appear to be."

She took a brittle pine twig and dug in the mould of the needles until it broke. "Ralph—was different once. He was a chemist. Then—the war came. And he was there and a shell—"

"Ah," Hugo said. "And you loved him before?"

"I had promised him before. But it changed him so. And it's hard."

"The carpet," he answered gently. "The carpet—"

"I almost dropped off, and then I'd have been hurt, wouldn't I?"

"A favour for a favour. I'm not a great man, but I hope to be one. I have something that I think is a talent. Let it go at that. The letters come from my father and mother—in Colorado."

"I've never seen Colorado."

"It's big—"

"Like the nursery of the Titans, I think," she said softly, and Hugo shuddered. The instinct had been too true.

Her eyes were suddenly stormy. "I feel old enough to mother you, Hugo. And yet, since you came, I've been a little bit in love with you. It doesn't matter, does it?"

"I think—I know—"

"Sit closer to me then, Hugo."

The sun had passed the zenith before they spoke connectedly again. "Time for the magic carpet to come to earth," she said gaily.

"Is it?"

"Don't be masculine any longer—and don't be rudely possessive. Of course it is. Aren't you hungry?"

"I was hungry—" he began moodily.

"All off at earth. Come on. Button me. Am I a sight?"

"I disregard the bait."

"You're being funny. Come. No—wait. We've forgotten the orchids. I wonder if I really came for orchids. Should you be terribly offended if I said I thought I did?"

"Extravagantly offended."

Cane returned late in the day. The cows had been sold—"I even made five hundred clear and above the feeding and labour on the one with the off leg. She'll breed good cattle." The barns were as clean as a park, and Roseanne was singing as she prepared dinner.

Nothing happened until a hot night in August. The leaves were still and limp, the moon had set. Hugo lay awake and he heard her coming quietly up the stairs.

"Ralph had a headache and he took two triple bromides. Of course, I could always have said that I heard one of the cows in distress and came to wake you. But he's jealous, poor dear. And then—but who could resist a couple of simultaneous alibis?"

"Nobody," he whispered. She sat down on his bed. He put his arm around her and felt that she was in a nightdress. "I wish I could see you now."

"Then take this flashlight—just for an instant. Wait." He heard the rustle of her clothing. "Now."

She heard him draw in his breath. Then the light went out.

With the approach of autumn weather Roseanne caught a cold. She continued her myriad tasks, but he could see that she was miserable. Even Cane sympathized with her gruffly. When the week of the cattle show in New York arrived, the cold was worse and she begged off the long trip on the trucks with the animals. He departed alone with his two most precious cows, scarcely thinking of her, muttering about judges and prizes.

Again she came out to the barn. "You've made me a dreadful hypocrite."

"I know it."

"You were waiting for me! Men are so disgustingly sure of everything!"

"But—"

"I've made myself cough and sniffle until I can't stop."

Hugo smiled broadly. "All aboard the carpet...."

They lay in a field that was surrounded by trees. The high weeds hid them. Goldenrod hung over them. "Life can't go on—"

"Like this," he finished for her.

"Well—can it?"

"It's up to you, Roseanne. I never knew there were women—"

"Like me? You should have