Robert Kimberly

"Yes," he answered, "I know the world is fullof sunshine, and flowers are always fresh and lifeis always young and new hands are alwayscaressing. This I well know, and I do not complain.The bride and the future are always new. ButCharlie," he laid his hand on his brother'sshoulder, "we can't all play the game of life with thesame counters; some play white but some mustplay black. It's the white for you, the black forme. The sun for you, the shadow for me. Don'tspeak; I know, I have chosen it; I know it is myfault. I know the opportunities wasted. I mighthave had success, I asked for failure. But it allcomes back to the same thing-some play thewhite, some the black."

CHAPTER XLIV

A second shock within a week at TheTowers found Kimberly still dazed. In theconfusion of the household Uncle John failed onemorning to answer Francis's greeting. No wordof complaint had came from him. He lay as hehad gone to sleep.

Hamilton stood in the room a moment withKimberly beside his dead uncle.

"He was an extraordinary man, Robert," saidthe surgeon, breaking the silence at last. "A greatman."

"He asked no compromise with the inevitable,"responded Kimberly, looking at the stern foreheadand the cruel mouth. "I don't know" – he added, turning mechanically away, "perhaps, there isnone."

After the funeral Dolly urged Robert to takeHamilton to sea and the two men spent a weektogether on the yacht. Between them there existed acommunity of mental interest and materialachievement as well as a temperamental attraction.Hamilton was never the echo of any expression ofthought that he disagreed with. Yet he was acuteenough to realize that Kimberly's mind workedmore deeply than his own and was by this stronglydrawn to him.

Moreover, to his attractive independenceHamilton united a tenderness and tact developed bylong work among the suffering-and the suffering, like children, know their friends. Kimberly, whilehis wound was still bleeding, could talk toHamilton more freely than to any one else.

The day after their return to The Towers thetwo men were riding together in the deep woodsover toward the Sound when Kimberly spoke forthe first time freely of Alice. "You know," hesaid to Hamilton, "something of the craving of aboy's imagination. When we are young we dreamof angels-and we wake to clay. The imaginationof childhood sets no bounds to its demands, and poor reality, forced to deliver, is left bankrupt.From my earliest consciousness my dreams wereof a little girl and I loved and hungered for her.She was last in my sleeping and first in mywaking thoughts.

"It grew in me, and with me, this picturedcompanion of my life. It was my childish happiness.Then the time came when she left me and I couldnot call her back. An old teacher rebuked meonce. 'You think,' said he, 'that innocence isnothing; wait till you have lost it.'

"I believed at last, as year after year slippedaway, that I had created a being of fancy toolovely to be real. I never found her-in all thewomen I have ever known I never found heruntil one night I saw Alice MacBirney. Dollyasked me that night if I had seen a ghost. Shewas my dream come true. Think of what itmeans to live to a reality that can surpass theimagination-Alice was that to me.

"To be possessed of perfect grace; that alonemeans so much-and grace was but one of hernatural charms. I thought I knew how to lovesuch a woman. It was all so new to her-ourlife here; she was like a child. I thought mylove would lift me up to her. I know, too late,it dragged her down to me."

"You are too harsh. You did what you believedright."

"Right?" echoed Kimberly scornfully. "Whatis right? Who knows or cares? We do what weplease-who does right?"

They turned their horses into a bridle-pathtoward the village and Kimberly continued tospeak. "Sometimes I have thought, what possibilitieswould lie in moulding a child to your ownideas of womanhood. It must be pleasing tocontemplate a girl budding into such a flower asyou have trained her to be.

"But if this be pleasing, think what it is tofind such a girl already in the flower of herwomanhood; to find in her eyes the light thatmoves everything best within you; to read inthem the answer to every question that springsfrom your heart. This is to realize the mostpowerful of all emotions-the love of man for woman."

The horses stopped on the divide overlookingthe lakes and the sea. To the left, the village layat their feet, and beyond, the red roofs of theInstitute clustered among clumps of green trees.The sight of the Institute brought to Kimberly'smind Brother Francis, who, released from hischarge at The Towers, had returned to it.

He had for a time wholly forgotten him. Hereflected now that after Hamilton's departure thecompanionship of Francis might help to relieve hisinsupportable loneliness. The men rode togetherpast the village and parted when they reachedthe lake, Hamilton returning to The Towers andKimberly riding south to the Institute to take, ifpossible, Brother Francis home with him. Heexpected some objection, but was prepared toovercome it as he dismounted at the door of theinfirmary and rang. A tall, shock-haired brotheranswered.

"I have come to see Brother Francis."

"You mean Brother Francis, who was at TheTowers? He has gone, I am sorry to say."

"Where has he gone?"

"Brother Francis has gone to the leper missionat Molokai."

Kimberly stared at the man: "Molokai! Francisgone to Molokai? What do you mean?"

A wave of amazement darkening Kimberly'sfeatures startled the red-haired brother. "Whosent him?" demanded Kimberly angrily. "Whywas I not notified? What kind of managementis this? Where is your Superior?"

"Brother Ambrose is ill. I, Mr. Kimberly, amBrother Edgar. No one sent Brother Francis.Surely you must know, for years he has wished togo to the Molokai Mission? When he was oncemore free he renewed his petition. The day afterit was granted he left to catch the steamer. Hewent to The Towers to find you to say good-by.They told him you had gone to sea."

Kimberly rode slowly home. He was unwillingto admit even to himself how hateful what hehad now heard was to him and how angrily andinexplicably he resented it.

He had purposed on the day that he made Alicehis wife to give Brother Francis as a foundation forthose higher schools that were the poor Italian'sdream, a sum of money much larger than Francishad ever conceived of. It was to have been one ofthose gifts the Kimberlys delighted in-of royalmunificence, without ceremony and without theslightest previous intimation; one of those overwhelmingsurprises that gratified the Kimberly pride.

Because it was to have been in ready moneyeven the securities had previously been converted, and the tons of gold lay with those other uselesstons that were to have been Alice's on the sameday-in the bank vaults. And of the two whowere to have been made happy by them, one layin her grave and the other with his own hand hadopened the door of his living tomb.

Kimberly in the weariness of living returned tothe empty Towers. Dolly and her husband hadgone home and Hamilton now returning to townwas to dine with Charles Kimberly. Robert, welcoming isolation, went upstairs alone.

His dinner was brought to his room and wassent down again untasted. He locked his doorsand sat down to think. The sounds about thehouse which at best barely penetrated the heavywalls of his apartment died gradually away. Aclock within the room chiming the hour annoyedhim and he stopped it. His thoughts ran overhis affairs and the affairs of his brother and hissister and partners and turned to those in variousmeasure dependent upon his bounty.

His sense of justice, never wholly obscured, because rooted in his exorbitant pride, was keenlyalive in this hour of silent reckoning. Noinjustice, however slight, must be left that could beurged against his memory, and none, he believed, could now thus be urged. If there were a shockon the exchanges at the news of his death, if thestocks of his companies should be raided, noharm could come to the companies themselves.The antidote to all uneasiness lay in the unnecessarilylarge cash balances, rooted likewise in theKimberly pride, that he kept always in hand forthe unexpected.

His servants, to the least, had been rememberedand he was going over his thought of them when, with a pang, he reflected that he had completelyforgotten the maid, Annie. It was a humiliationto think that of all minor things this couldhappen-that the faithful girl who had been closerthan all others to her who was dearest to himcould have been neglected. However, this couldbe trusted to a letter to his brother, and going toa table he wrote a memorandum of the provisionshe wished made for Annie.

Brother Francis and his years of servitude cameto his mind. Was there any injustice to this manin leaving undone what he had fully intended todo in providing for the new school? He thoughtthe subject over long and loosely. What wouldFrancis say when he heard? Could he, strickensometime with a revolting disease, ever think ofKimberly as unjust?

The old fancy of Francis in heaven and Divesbegging for a drop of water returned. But thethought of lying for an eternity in hell without adrop of water was more tolerable than the thoughtof this faithful Lazarus' accusing finger pointing toa tortured Dives who had been in the least matterunjust. If there were a hereafter, pride hadsomething at stake in this, too.

And thus the thought he most hated obtrudeditself unbidden-was there a hereafter?

Alice rose before him. He hid his face in hishands. Could this woman, the very thought ofwhom he revered and loved more than lifeitself-could she now be mere dissolving clay-or didshe live? Was it but breathing clay that once hadcalled into life every good impulse in his nature?

He rose and found himself before his mother'spicture. How completely he had forgotten hismother, whose agony had given him life! He lookedlong and tenderly into her eyes. When he turnedaway, dawn was beating at the drawn shades.The night was gone. Without even asking whathad swayed him he put his design away.

CHAPTER XLV

Kimberly took up the matters of the newday heavy with thought. But he sent nonethe less immovably for Nelson and the troublesomecodicil for the school was put under immediateway. He should feel better for it, he assuredhimself, even in hell. And whether, he reflected, itshould produce any relief there or not, it wouldsilence criticism. With his accustomed reticencehe withheld from Nelson the name of the beneficiariesuntil the final draught should be ready, and in the afternoon rode out alone.

McCrea and Cready Hamilton came out laterwith the treasurer. They had brought a messengerwho carried balance sheets, reports, and estimatesto be laid before Kimberly. He kept his partnersfor dinner and talked with them afterward of theaffairs most on their minds. He told them hewould go over the estimates that night alone andconsult with them in the morning. Thetype-written sheets were spread with some necessaryexplanations on his table in the library upstairsand after his usual directions for their comfortfor the night he excused his associates.

He closed his door when they had gone. Thetable lamp was burning and its heavy shadeshrouded the beamed ceiling and the distantcorners of the sombre room. But the darkness suitedKimberly's mood. He seated himself in a loungingchair to be alone with his thoughts and satmotionless for an hour before he moved to thetable and the papers. The impressive totals offigures before him failed to evoke any possibleinterest; yet the results were sufficient to justifyenthusiasm or, at least, to excite a glow ofsatisfaction. He pushed the reports back and as hestared into the gloom Alice's deathbed rose beforehim. He heard her sharp little cry, the only cryduring that fortnight of torture. He saw her graspthe crucifix from Annie's hand and heard Annie'sanswering cry, "Christ, Son of God, have mercy!"

Christ, Son of God! Suppose it were true?The thought urged itself. He walked to awindow and threw it open. The lake, the copses andfields lay flooded with moonlight, but his eyes wereset far beyond them. What if it were true? Heforced himself back to the lamp and doggedly tookup the figures.

Mechanically he went over and over them. Oneresult lost its meaning the moment he passed tothe next and the question that had come upon himwould not down. It kept knocking disagreeablyand he knew it would not be put away until theanswer was wrung from him.

The night air swept in cool from the lake andlittle chills crept over him. He shook them offand leaned forward on the table supporting hishead with his hands. "It is not true," he criedstubbornly. There was a savage comfort in thewords. "It is not true," he muttered. Hishands tightened and he sat motionless.

His head sank to the table, and supporting iton his forearm, with the huge typewritten sheetscrumpled in his hands, he gave way to theexhaustion that overcame him. "It is not true," hewhispered. "I never will believe it. He is not theSon of God. There is no God."

Yet he knew even as he lost consciousness thatthe answer had not yet come.

CHAPTER XLVI

When Charles came over in the morning,Robert made a pretence of discussing thebudget with his associates. It was hardly morethan a pretence. Figures had palled upon himand he dragged himself each day to his work byforce of will.

The city offices he ceased to visit. Everymatter in which his judgment was asked or uponwhich his decision was needed was brought toThe Towers. His horses were left to fret in thestables and he walked, usually alone, among thevilla hills.

Hamilton, even when he felt he could notpenetrate the loneliness of Kimberly's moods, cameout regularly and Kimberly made him to knowhe was welcome. "It isn't that I want to bealone," he said one night in apology to the surgeon."The only subjects that interest me condemn meto loneliness. Charles asked me to meet a Chicagofriend of his last night-and he talked books tome and pictures! How can I talk pictures andbooks? McCrea brought out one of our Westerndirectors the other day," as Kimberly continuedhis chin went down to where it sank when mattersseemed hopeless, "and he talked railroads!"

"Go back to your books," urged Hamilton.

"Books are only the sham battles of life."

"Will you forego the recreation of the intellect?"

"Ah! The intellect. We train it to bring useverything the heart can wish. And when ourfairy responds with its gifts the appetite to enjoythem is gone. Hamilton, I am facing aninsupportable question-what shall I do with myself?Shall I stop or go on? And if I go on, how?This is why I am always alone."

"You overlook the simplest solution. Take uplife again; your difficulties will disappear."

"What life? The one behind me? I havebeen over that ground. I should start out verywell-with commendable resolutions to let amemory guide me. And I should end-in the old way.I tell you I will never do it. There is a short cutto the end of that road-one I would rather takeat the beginning. I loathe the thought of whatlies behind me; I know the bitterness of theflesh." His hands were stretched upon the table and heclenched them slowly as he drew them up withhis words, "I never will embrace or endure it again."

"Yet, for the average man," he went on, "onlytwo roads lie open-Christianity or sensuality-andI am just the average man. I cannot calmlyturn back to what I was before I knew her. Shechanged me. I am different. Christians, youknow," his voice dropped as if he were musing,"have a curious notion that baptism fixes anindelible mark on the soul. If that is so, Alice wasmy baptism."

"Then your choice is already made, Robert."

"Why do you say that? When I choose I shallno longer be here. What I resent is being forcedto choose. I hate to bow to law. My life hasbeen one long contempt for it. I have set myselfoutside every law that ever interfered with mydesires or ambitions. I have scorned law andignored it-and I am punished. What can aman do against death?"

"Even so, there is nothing appalling in Christianity.Merely choose the form best adapted toyour individual needs."

"What would you have me do? Fill myself withsounding words and echoing phrases? I am doingbetter than that where I am. There is only oneessential form of Christianity-you know whatit is. I tell you I never will bow to a law that isnot made for every man, rich or poor, cultured orcrude, ignorant or learned. I never will take upthe husks of a 'law adapted to individualneeds.' That is merely making my own law over again, and I am leaving that. I am sick of exploitingmyself. I despise a law that exploits the individual.I despise men in religious thought thatexploit themselves and their own doctrines. I needwholly another discipline and I shall never bringmyself to embrace it."

"You are closer to it than you think. Yet, formy part, I hate to see you lose your individuality-tolet some one else do your thinking for you."

"A part of my individuality I should be gainerfor losing. A part of it I wish to God some onehad robbed me of long ago. But I hate to seeyou, Hamilton, deceive yourself with phrases.'Let some one else do your thinking for you,'"Kimberly echoed, looking contemptuously away."If empty words like that were all!"

"You are going a good way, Robert," said thesurgeon, dryly.

"I wish I might go far."

"Parting company with a good many seriousminds-not to say brilliant ones."

"What has their brilliancy ever done for me?I am tired of this rubbish of writing and words.Francis was worth libraries. I esteem what hedid with his life more than I do the written wordsof ten thousand. He fought the real battle."

"Did he win?"

Kimberly's hand shot out. "If I knew! If Iknew," he repeated doggedly. And then moreslowly. "If I knew-I would follow him."

CHAPTER XLVII

Kimberly no longer concealed from hisfamily the trend of his thinking nor thatwhich was to them its serious import. Dolly cameto him in consternation. "My dear brother!"she wept, sitting down beside him.

His arm encircled her. "Dolly, there isabsolutely nothing to cry about."

"Oh, there is; there is everything. How canyou do it, Robert? You are turning your backon all modern thought."

"But 'modern thought,' Dolly, has nothingsacred about it. It is merely present-day thoughtand, as such, no better than any other day thought.Every preposterous thought ever expressed wasmodern when it first reached expression. Thedifficulty is that all such 'modern' thought delightsin reversing itself. It was one thing yesterday andis wholly another to-day; all that can withcertainty be predicated of it is, that to-morrow itwill be something quite else. Present day modernthought holds that what a man believes is of nomoment-what he does is everything. Fourhundred years ago 'modern' thought announced thatwhat a man did was of no moment, what hebelieved was everything. Which was right?"

"Well, which was right?" demanded Dolly, petulantly. "You seem to be doing the sermonizing."

"If you ask me, I should say neither. I shouldsay that what a man believes is vital and what hedoes is vital as well. I know-if my experiencehas taught me anything-that what men do willbe to a material degree modified by what theybelieve. It is not I who am sermonizing, Dolly.Francis often expressed these thoughts. I haveonly weighed them-now they weigh me."

"I don't care what you call it. Arthur says itis pure mediævalism."

"Tell Arthur, 'mediævalism' is precisely whatI am leaving. I am casting off the tatters ofmediæval 'modern' thought. I am discarding the ragsof paganism to which the modern thought of thesixteenth century has reduced my generation andam returning to the most primitive of all religiousprecepts-authority. I am leaving the stonydeserts of agnosticism which 'modern' thought fourhundred years ago pointed out as the promisedland and I am returning to the path trodden bySt. Augustine. Surely, Dolly, in this there isnothing appalling for any one unless it is for theman that has it to do."

Yet Kimberly deferred a step against whichevery inclination in his nature fought. It was onlya persistent impulse, one that refused to be whollysmothered, that held him to it. He knew thatthe step must be taken or he must do worse, andthe alternative, long pondered, was a repellent one.

Indeed, the alternative of ignoring a deepeningconviction meant, he realized, that he must partwith his self-respect. He went so far as seriouslyto ask himself whether he could not face puttingthis away; whether it was not, after all, afanciful thing that he might do better without. Heconsidered that many men manage to get on verywell in this world without the scruple of self-respect.

But honesty with himself had been too long thecode of his life to allow him to evade anunanswered question and he forced himself graduallyto the point of returning to the archbishop.One night he stood again, by appointment, in hispresence.

"I am at fault in not having written you,"Kimberly said simply. "It was kind of you toremember me in my sorrow last summer. Throughsome indecision I failed to write."

"I understand perfectly. Indeed, you had noneed to write," returned the archbishop."Somehow I have felt I should see you again."

"The knot was cruelly cut."

The archbishop paused. "I have thought ofit all very often since that day on the hill," hesaid. "'Suppose,' I have asked myself, 'he hadbeen taken instead. It would have been easierfor him. But could he really wish it? Could he, knowing what she once had suffered, wish thatshe be left without him to the mercies of thisworld?'" The archbishop shook his head. "Ithink not. I think if one were to be taken, youcould not wish it had been you. That wouldhave been not better, but worse."

"But she would not have been responsible formy death. I am for hers."

"Of that you cannot be certain. What wentbefore your coming into her life may have beenmuch more responsible."

"I am responsible for another death-my ownnephew, you know, committed suicide. And Iwould, before this, have ended my mistakes andfailures," his voice rose in spite of hissuppression " – put myself beyond the possibility of more-butthat she believed what you believe, that Christis the Son of God."

The words seemed wrung from him. "It isthis that has driven me to you. I am sickened ofstrife and success-the life of the senses. It isDead Sea fruit and I have tasted its bitterness.If I can do nothing to repair what I have alreadydone, then I am better done with life."

"And do not you, too, believe that Christ is theSon of God?"

"I do not know what I believe-I believenothing. Convince me that He was the Son of Godand I will kneel to him in the dust."

"My dear son! It is not I, nor is it another, that can convince you. God, alone, extends thegrace of faith. Have you ever asked for it?"

Kimberly started from his apathy. "I?" Herelapsed again into moodiness. "No." Thethought moved him to a protest. "How can Ireach a far-off thing like faith?" he demandedwith angry energy-"a shadowy, impalpable, evasive, ghostly thing? How can I reach, how canI grasp, what I cannot see, what I cannot understand?"

"You can reach it and you can grasp it. Suchquestions spring from the anger of despair; despair has no part in faith. Faith is the death ofdespair. From faith springs hope. It is despairthat pictures faith to you as a far-off thing."

"Whatever it may be, it is not for me. I haveno hope."

"What brought you to-night? Can you not seeHis grace in forcing you to come against your owninclination? His hope has sustained you whenyou least suspected it. It has stayed your handfrom the promptings of despair. Faith a far-offthing? It is at your side, trembling and invisible.It is within your reach at every moment. Youhave but to put forth your hand to touch it."

Kimberly shook his bowed head.

"Will you stretch forth your hand-will youtouch the hem of His garment?"

Kimberly sat immovable. "I cannot evenstretch forth a hand."

"Will you let me stretch forth mine?" Hissilence left the archbishop to continue. "Youhave come to me like another Nicodemus, andwith his question, unasked, upon your lips. Youhave done wrong-it is you who accuse yourself, not I. Your own words tell me this and theycan spring only from an instinct that has accusedyou in your own heart.