ENOCH CRANE

Lamont ... was again beside her, pleading to take her home.

[Page 114

ENOCH CRANE

A NOVEL PLANNED AND BEGUN BY F. HOPKINSON SMITH AND COMPLETED BY F. BERKELEY SMITH

ILLUSTRATED BY ALONZO KIMBALL

NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 1916

Copyright, 1916, by CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS Published September, 1916

PREFACE

It was my father’s practise, in planning a novel, first to prepare a most complete synopsis from beginning to end—never proceeding with the actual writing of the book until he had laid out the characters and action of the story—chapter by chapter.

This synopsis, which closely resembled the scenario of a play, he kept constantly enriching with little side-notes as they occurred to him—new ideas and points of detail.

So spirited were these synopses, and so clearly did they reflect the process of his mind, that by the few who saw them in the course of publishing consultations, or friendly confidence, they were remembered often after the finished novel had obliterated its constructive lines.

A scheme like this he had prepared for “Enoch Crane”—a story which, like “Felix O’Day,” he had very much at heart. Once he had begun a novel it occupied his whole mind. He lived—as it were—with the characters he was developing, to the exclusion of all other work. He would talk to me constantly of their welfare or vicissitudes, and was often in grand good-humor when any of them had proved themselves worthy by their wit, their courage, or their[vi] good breeding. They all seemed to be old personal friends of his, whom by some chance I had never met.

My father had written three chapters of “Enoch Crane” when his brief illness came. Thus there has remained to me as a legacy of his unquenchably youthful spirit an unfinished novel, which to reach his readers needed to be wrought out on the lines he had so carefully laid down with that untiring enthusiasm with which he undertook everything; and this—his last story—it has been my privileged task to complete.

F. Berkeley Smith.

New York, 1916.

ILLUSTRATIONS

ENOCH CRANE

CHAPTER I

Joe Grimsby stood on the door-mat—a very shabby and badly worn door-mat, I must say—trying to fit his key into the tiny slit which, properly punctured, shot back the bolt which loosened the door, admitting him to the hallway leading to his apartment on the third floor of No. 99 Waverly Place.

“Somebody must have—no, here it is. Hello, Moses, is that you? I was just going to put my knee against it and——”

The old negro janitor bowed low.

“I wouldn’t do dat, sir; ’spec’ yo’ hand is a little unstiddy. You young gemmen gets dat way sometimes, ’specially when so much is goin’ on. Hold on till I turn up de gas. It gets dark so early, can’t find yo’ way up-stairs in de broad daylight, let alone de evenin’. I jes’ lighted a fire in yo’ room.”

“Bully for you, Moses. And don’t forget to come up-stairs when I ring. Mr. Atwater in yet?”

“No, sir; not as I knows on. Ain’t seen nuffin’ of him. ’Spec’ he’s a little mite how-come-you. I seen in de papers dat bofe on yo’ was at de big ball last[2] night. Matilda was a-readin’ it out while I was a-brushin’ yo’ shoes.”

The young architect waved his hand in reply and mounted the stairs, his strong, well-knit frame filling the space between the wall and the banisters. He had mounted these same stairs in the small hours of the morning, but if he was at all fatigued by his night’s outing, there was no evidence of it in his movements. He was forging his way up, his coat thrown back, arms swinging loose, head erect, with a lifting power and spring that would have done credit to a trained athlete.

Only once did he pause, and that was when the door of Miss Ann’s apartment on the second floor was opened softly and the old lady’s fluffy gray head was thrust out. He had never met the dear woman, but he lifted his hat in a respectful salute, and brought his body to a standstill until she had closed the door again.

She, no doubt, misunderstood the sound of his tread, a curious mistake had she thought a moment, for no one of the occupants of 99—and there were a good many of them—had ever mounted the dingy stairs two steps at a time, humming a song between jumps, except the handsome, devil-may-care young architect. The others climbed and caught their breath. And climbed again and caught another breath. So did most of the visitors. As for her own invalid sister, Miss Jane, who shared with her the rooms behind this partly opened and gently closed door, the poor lady had no breath of any kind to catch, and so wheezed up one step at a time, her thin, bird-claw fingers clutching[3] the hand-rail. It was she Miss Ann was waiting for, it being after five o’clock, and the day being particularly raw and uncomfortable, even for one in January.

He had reached his own door now, the one on the third floor—there was only one flight above it—and with the aid of a second key attached to his bunch made his way into the apartment.

The sight of his cosey sitting-room loosened up the bar of another song: the janitor’s fire was still blazing, and one of the three big piano-lamps with umbrella-shades Moses had lighted and turned down was sending a warm glow throughout the interior.

Joe tossed his hat on a low table, stripped off his overcoat and coat, pushed his arms into a brown velvet jacket which he took from a hook in his bedroom, and settled himself at his desk, an old-fashioned colonial affair, which had once stood in his grandfather’s home in his native town. Heaped up on a wide pad, the comers bound with silver clamps, was a pile of letters of various colors, shapes, and sizes.

These the young fellow smoothed out with a sweep of his hand, glancing hurriedly at the several handwritings, pulled out a drawer of the desk, opened a box of cigars, and selecting one with the greatest care, snipped its end with a cutter hung to his watch-chain. In the same measured way he drew a match along the under-side of the colonial, held the flame to the perfecto, and, after a puff or two to assure himself that it was in working order, proceeded leisurely to open his mail.

[4]It is good to be young and good-looking and a favorite wherever you go. It is better yet to be good-natured, and well-born, and able to earn your living, and it is better still to so love the work by which you earn your daily bread that you count as nothing the many setbacks and difficulties which its pursuit entails.

Joe was all that; twenty-five, well-built, erect, strong of limb, well-dressed, even if sometimes a little bizarre in his outfit, more particularly in wide sombreros and low collars with loose ties; thoroughly content with his surroundings wherever they were, whether a student at the Beaux-Arts, living on the closest of allowances, or fighting his way in New York among his competitors; meeting each successive morning with a laugh and a song, and getting all the fun out of the remaining hours of which he was capable.

He had moved into these rooms but a fortnight before, and had at once proceeded to make himself as comfortable as his means and belongings would allow. His partner, Atwater, had come with him: there was the rent of the office to pay, and the wages of his two assistants, and they could save money by doubling up. With this in view, Joe had moved in some of the old furniture his father had left him, including the desk, and a set of shelves filled with books; had added a rare old Spanish sofa that had once stood in a hidalgo salon, to say nothing of the three or four easy chairs of the sofa-pillow-stuffed-armed variety, covered with chintz, that he had bought at an auction, and which had once graced his former quarters. Some small tables[5] had then been commandeered—two were now surmounted by big lamps; a rug thrown on the floor and another before the fire—good ones both, one being a Daghestan and the other a Bokhara; and the two young men proceeded to make themselves at home. The bedrooms, one Atwater’s and the other Joe’s, although simply furnished, were equally comfortable,

and the bathroom all that it should be.

As to creature comforts, did not Moses bring them their breakfast, and did not his wife Matilda cook the same on her own stove in the basement in the rear? For their dinners, some one of the restaurants on 14th Street could always be counted upon, unless some Wall Street potentate, or one of his innumerable friends, or the mother of Joe’s last lady love—he had a fresh one every month—laid a cover at her table in his honor.

His one predominant ambition in life, as has been said, was to succeed in his profession. His uncle had achieved both riches and distinction as one of the leading architects of his time and, divining Joe’s talents, had sent him abroad to uphold the honor of the family, a kindness the young fellow never forgot, and an obligation which he determined to repay by showing himself worthy of the old man’s confidence. If he had any other yearning, it was, as has also been said, to have a good time every moment of the day and night while the developing process was going on. And the scribe, who knew him well, freely admits that he succeeded, not only in New York, but in Paris.

[6]When a posse of gendarmes followed a group of students along the Boul Miche who were shouting at the top of their voices their disapprovals or approvals, it made very little difference which, of some new law in the Latin Quarter, Joe’s voice was invariably the loudest. When the room under the sidewalk at the Taverne was full, every seat occupied, and the whole place in an uproar, it was Joe who was leading the merriment.

When, upon the dispersal of the gay revellers from the Quart’z’Arts ball, the Champs-Elysées was made the background of a howling mob of bareskinned warriors of the Stone Age, Joe led the chorus, the only student in the group who was entirely sober, intemperance not being one of the ways in which he enjoyed himself.

It was, therefore, quite in keeping with his idea of what a normal life should be that, when he nailed up his shingle in his down-town office, and started in to earn a crust and a reputation, this same spirit of fun should have dominated his idle hours to the exclusion of everything else except the habit of falling in love with every pretty girl he met.

If the beautiful and accomplished and fabulously rich Mrs. A. had a ball, Joe invariably led the german. If there was a week-end party at Mrs. B.’s, Joe’s engagements were always consulted and a day fixed to suit him. They couldn’t help it really. There was an air about the young fellow that the women, both married and single, could not resist. The married ones generally counted on him to make their parties a success,[7] but the single ones manœuvred so as to be within arm’s reach whenever Joe’s partner was tired out and he ready for another.

Should you have tried to solve the problem of this ever-increasing popularity and, in marshalling your facts, had gone over his personal attractions—his well-groomed figure, never so attractive as in a dress suit, clear brown eyes, perfect teeth shining through straight, well-modelled lips shaded by a brown mustache blending into a close-cut, pointed beard, and had compared these fetching attractions with those possessed by dozens of other young men you knew, you would be still at sea.

Old Mrs. Treadwell, who, when Joe had sprained his ankle, had kept him at her country-seat for a whole week, came nearest to the solution. “Never thinks of himself, that young fellow.” That’s it. Hasn’t an ego anywhere about him. Never has had. Always thinking of you, no matter who you are. And he is sanely polite. Treats an apple woman as if she were a duchess, and a duchess, whenever he runs across one, as first a woman—after that she can be anything she pleases.

This accounted in a measure for the number and quality of the several notes he was opening, one after another, his face lighting up or clouding as he perused their contents.

CHAPTER II

Moses was having a busy day. The front hall was packed full with a heterogeneous mass of miscellaneous furniture, the sidewalk littered with straw packing, kitchen utensils, empty bird-cages, umbrella-stands, crates of china, and rolls of carpet. Mr. Ebner Ford, late of Clapham Four Corners, State of Connecticut; Mrs. Ebner Ford, formerly Preston, late of Roy, State of North Carolina, and her daughter, Miss Sue Preston, were moving in.

Moses was in his shirt-sleeves, a green baize apron tied about his waist, a close-fitting skull-cap crowning his gray wool. There were spots on his cranium which the friction of life had worn to a polish, and, the January air being keen and searching, the old darky braved no unnecessary risks.

The force was properly apportioned. Mrs. Ford was in charge of the stowage, moving back, and hanging-up department. Mr. Ford had full charge of the sidewalk, the big furniture van and the van’s porters. Moses was at everybody’s beck and call, lifting one moment one end of a sofa, the other steadying a bureau on its perilous voyage from the curb to the back bedroom, while Miss Preston, with an energy born of young and perfect health, tripped up and down the few steps, pointing out to the working force this or[9] that particular chair, table, or clock most needed. All this that the already tired mother might get the room to rights with the least possible delay.

It was not the first time this young woman had performed this service. The later years of her life had been spent in various intermittent moves in and out of various houses since the gentleman from Connecticut had married her mother.

Her first experience had taken place some months after the unexpected wedding, when her stepfather—he was at that time a life-insurance agent—had moved his own bag and baggage into the family homestead. Shortly after he had elaborated a plan by which the entire family would be infinitely better off if a red flag should be hoisted out of the second-story window, and the old place knocked down to the highest bidder. He would then invest the proceeds in the purchase of some town lots in one of the larger cities up the State. They would then have a home of their own, more in keeping with the aspirations of his wife, who really had married him to escape her present poverty, and the welfare of his stepdaughter, whose sole ambition was to perfect herself in music, she being the possessor of a wonderful soprano voice.

In this new venture six houses were to be built; one they would live in, rent and cost free, the income from the other five supporting them all.

Then had come a hasty packing up and rather sudden departure for Norfolk, the houses being partly built, and none of them rented or sold, Mr. Ford having[10] abandoned life insurance and given his attention to a new dredging machine for use in the Dismal Swamp Canal. And then a third exodus to a small village near New York, where the promoter of a brilliant and entirely new adaptation of laundry machinery, never before imagined, and the formation of which was known among the favored few as The United Family Laundry Association, Limited, engrossed the distinguished engineer Mr. Ebner Ford’s sole attention.

It was from this near-by village the fourth move had been made, the van and supplementary cart having absorbed the contents of a small house, situated on the outskirts of the town, that deluded individual having exchanged a year’s rent for a delicately engraved sheet of paper, certifying that he was the proud possessor of ten shares of the company’s preferred.

That these several shiftings, migrations, and re-handlings had had their effect on the family belongings could be seen by even the most cursory examination of the several articles littering the sidewalk. Even the old family sideboard—and every Southern family has an old-fashioned sideboard—lacked a brass door-handle or escutcheon here and there, and similar defects could be found in Mrs. Ford’s high-poster, once the property of her dead mother, two of the carved feet being gone by reason of a collision in an extra-hazardous journey.

It was because of the knowledge gained in these experiences, as well as a fervent desire to get the whole matter over as quickly as possible, that the young girl[11] had taken charge of the “picking-out” department, so that each article might reach her mother in regular order, and in discrete corners as much as what was left of the old mahogany was saved.

She was again on the sidewalk, dragging out a rocker, ordering a crate here, and a bundle of fire-tongs there, when the gentleman from Connecticut must have got in her way, for she broke in in an authoritative tone of voice, much to Moses’ astonishment, with:

“No, Mr. Ford, stop right where you are. Mamma doesn’t want any more small things until she gets the big ones arranged, and don’t you send them in!”

“My dear Sue, you will have to take them as they come.”

“No, I’m not going to take them as they come. I’m going to take them as I want them. You’ve got plenty of room here, and you’ve got plenty of men to help. That wardrobe comes next.”

“Well, but can’t you take these here cushions?”

“Yes, send in the cushions, but that’s the last, until I tell you what next.”

The distinguished engineer raised his hands, opening his fingers in a deprecatory way, expressive of his firm belief that she would live to see the day when she would keenly regret her interference, and in subdued, almost apologetic, tones called Moses.

“Here, Moses—your name is Moses, ain’t it?”

The darky nodded.

“Well, be good enough to carry this here bundle of cushions to Mrs. Ford. And be careful, Moses.”

[12]Moses, without a word in reply, swung the bundle to his shoulder, mounted the few steps and deposited the pillows at Mrs. Ford’s feet, and resumed his place on the sidewalk. He was making up his mind as to the character and personality of the new tenants, and nothing had so far escaped him. The old janitor’s likes and dislikes had a very important bearing on the status occupied by the various tenants.

Furthermore, his diagnosis was invariably correct.

Thus far, two things had impressed him. That the young lady should have addressed her stepfather as if he had been a mere acquaintance, and that that master of the house should have prefaced his order to him with a “be good enough.” Nobody had ever, so far as he could remember, addressed him in any such way. His former master’s customary formula, generally with a laugh, was: “Here, Moses, you infernal scoundrel.” His later employers had been contented with Moses, Mose, or Mr. Harris (the latter he despised). The new young gentlemen had begun with Moses, and had then passed on to “You ebony gargoyle,” or “Bulrushes,” “Pottifer’s Kid.” But the order came direct as if they meant it, and was always carried out by him in the same kind of spirit. “Be good enough, eh,” he kept saying to himself, “’spec’ he ain’t ’customed to nuffin’.”

The young lady seemed to be cast in a different mould.

“That’s too heavy for you, Uncle,” she had said in a low, soft voice, the more surprising to him when he[13] remembered the tones in addressing her stepfather. He was struggling under the weight of one end of the dining-room table at the time. “Come here, one of you men, and help him. Put it down, Uncle. You’ll break your poor old back, first thing you know.”

“Thank you, young mistiss. ’Tis little mite heavy,” he had answered humbly, as the leg he was carrying sagged to the sidewalk, adding as he watched her disappear again into the house: “Befo’ God, she’s one of my own people, dat she is. I ain’t been called Uncle by nobody, since I went back home dat Christmas time.”