Alice Duer Miller

“ She was sitting on the edge of the raft, kicking a pair of the prettiest legs in the world in and out of the water. They were clad in the thinnest of blue-silk stockings, the same in which a few minutes before she had been dancing, but not being able to find any others in her bathhouse, she had just kept them on, recklessly ignoring the inevitable problem of what she should wear home. She was leaning back on her straightened arms, with her head back, looking up into the sky and softly whistling to herself. Ben saw in a second that she was the girl of the silver turban. ”

“ By the time Crystal stopped for him Ben had begun to feel like a child who has lost his mother in a museum, or as Dante might have felt if he had missed Virgil from his side. When he bade Mrs. Dawson good night, she asked him to come back.
“Come and spend September here,” she said, as if it were a small thing. “You can work all day if you like. I sha’n’t disturb you, and you need never see a soul. It will do you good.” ”

“ Crystal, who had been tucking away the complicated dishes of her luncheon basket, looked at Ben and lightly sucked one finger to which some raspberry jam from Tomes’s supernal sandwiches had adhered.
“I sha’n’t mind it a bit, Ben,” she said, “and for a good reason—because I’m terribly conceited.” He did not understand at all, and she went on: “I believe I shall be just as much of a person—perhaps more—without money. The women who really mind being poor are the humble-minded ones, who think that they are made by their clothes and their lovely houses and their maids and their sables. ”

“ Time—the mere knowledge of unbroken hours ahead—is a boon which real love cannot do without. Minor feelings may flourish on snatched interviews and stolen meetings, but love demands—and usually gets—protected leisure. The next day these lovers had it. They spent the morning, when Mr. Cord was known to be playing golf, at the Cords’ house, and then when Mr. Cord telephoned that he was staying to luncheon at the club, if Crystal did not object (and Crystal did not) , she and Ben arranged a picnic—at least Tomes did, and they went off about one o’clock in the blue car. ”

“ We—labor, I mean—didn’t initiate this, but when men won’t see, when they have power and won’t stop abusing it, there is only one way to make—”
“Why, Ben,” said Crystal, “you’re just a pacifist in other people’s quarrels, but as militaristic as can be in your own. I’m not a pacifist, but I’m a better one than you, because I don’t believe in emphasizing any difference between human beings. That’s why I want a League of Nations. I hate gangs—all women really do. Little girls don’t form gangs like little boys. Every settlement worker knows that. ”

“ DEAR BEN,—I hate to think what your feelings will be on learning that I am engaged to be married to a daughter of the capitalistic class. Try to overcome your prejudices, however, and judge Eugenia as an individual and not as a member of a class. She has very liberal ideas, reads your paper, and is content to go with me to Monroe College and lead the life of an instructor’s wife. You will be glad to know that Mr. Cord disapproves as much as you do, and will not give his daughter a cent, so that our life will be as hard on the physical side as you in your most affectionate moments could desire. ”

“ I’d give anything to be as much in love as Eugenia.”
“What? With a fellow like that! A complete outsider.”
“Outside of what? The human race?”
“Well, no,” said Eddie, as if he were yielding a good deal, “but outside of your traditions and your set.”
“My set! Good for him to be outside of it, I say. What have they ever done to make anyone want to be inside of it? Why, David is an educated gentleman. To hear him quote Horace—”
“Horace who?”
“Really, Eddie.”
“Oh, I see. You mean the poet. That’s nothing to laugh at, Crystal. It was a natural mistake. ”

“ Crystal admitted, “I don’t, but then—love—father, isn’t love rather a serious undertaking nowadays? Is it a particularly helpful adjunct to marriage? Look at poor Eugenia. Isn’t it really more sensible to marry a nice man who can support one, and then if in time one does fall in love with another man—”
“Never let me hear you talk like that again, Crystal,” said her father, with a severity and vigor he seldom showed outside of board meetings. “It’s only your ignorance of life that saves you from being actually revolting. ”

“ It was impossible to accuse so masklike a magnate of frivolity, but Eddie was often dissatisfied with Mr. Cord’s reactions to the serious problems of life.
“But don’t you think it’s terrible,” he went on, eagerly, “for Crystal to be a socialist? In this age of the world—civilization trembling on the brink—chaos”—Eddie made a gesture toward the perfectly ordered shelves containing Poor’s Manual—“staring us in the face? You say that the half-baked opinions of an immature girl make no difference?” ”

“ You never seemed so much opposed to the radical doctrine.”
“No, it’s the radical, not the doctrine, your father objects to,” said Ben.
“Exactly,” answered Mr. Cord. “You’ve put it in a nutshell. Crystal, I’m going to tell you what these radicals really are—they’re failures—everyone of them. Sincere enough—they want the world changed because they haven’t been able to get along in it as it is—they want a new deal because they don’t know how to play their cards; and when they get a new hand, they’ll play it just as badly. It’s not their theories I object to, but them themselves. ”

“ To see what he could get out of you if he offered to stop the marriage. Well, why not? If these fellows believe all the money ought to be taken away from the capitalists, why should they care how it’s done? I can’t see much difference between robbing a man, and legislating his fortune out of—”
“Well, I must tell you, father dear,” said Crystal, exactly as if Eddie had not been speaking, “that I think it was horrid of you not to have me called when you must have known—”
“Crystal, you’re scolding me,” wailed her father. ”

“ For two summers Ben had made no protest, but the third summer, when the war was over and the allowance again possible, he urged David not to go back to Newport. David flatly refused to yield. He said he saw no reason why he should go on taking Ben’s money when this simple way of earning a full living was open to him. Wasn’t Ben’s whole theory that everyone should be self-supporting? Why not be consistent?
Ignorant people might imagine that two affectionate brothers could not quarrel over an issue purely affectionate. ”

“ Each man began to be angry in his own way. Eddie shouted a little, and Ben expressed himself with turns of phrase quite needlessly insulting. Ben found Verriman’s assumption that the profits of capital were bound up with patriotism, family life, and the Christian religion almost as irritating as Verriman found Ben’s assumption that the government of labor as a class would be entirely without the faults that have always marked every form of class government. ”

“ Ben, you think my father is conservative. But there’s a great scandal in his mental life. He’s a Baconian—”
“He thinks Bacon wrote the plays!” exclaimed Ben, really shocked.
“Certainly I do,” answered Mr. Cord. “Every man who uses his mind must think so. There is nothing in favor of the Shakespeare theory, except tradition—”
He would have talked for several hours upon the subject, but Crystal interrupted him by turning to Ben and continuing what she had meant to say:
“When you said I should have to choose between your ideas, you meant between your political ideas. ”

“ He wondered what Cord had said, and smiled to think that here was one object for which he and Cord were co-operating—only Cord would never believe it. That was one trouble with capitalists—they always thought themselves so damned desirable. And Ben did not stop to inquire how it was that capitalists had gained this impression. ”

“ Verriman doesn’t approve of Liberty. At least, I believe I understood you right, Eddie.” And Mr. Cord, having thus assured himself a few minutes to regain his poise, leaned back comfortably in his chair.
“What’s wrong with the paper, Mr. Verriman?” said Ben, pleasantly.
Eddie did not love the adventure of mental combat, but he was no coward. “It seems to me,” he said, “that it preaches such radical changes in our government that it is seditious. To be frank, Mr. Moreton, I think the government ought to suppress it.”
“But we don’t break the law. The government can’t suppress us.” ”

“ He crushes democracy with an iron efficiency, and he creates communism. He closes the door to trade-unionism and makes a revolution. That’s efficiency for you. We radicals are not so damned inefficient, while we let the conservatives do our work for us.”
“Well, let it be revolution, then,” said Cord. “I believe you’re right. It’s coming, but do you want to drag a girl like Crystal into it? ”

“ He was a pacifist—saw no virtue in war whatsoever. He wished to convert others to his opinion—unlike many reformers who prefer to discuss questions only with those who already agree with them. He argued that the speeches of a man who had been through war, or, better still, the posthumous writings of one who has been killed in war, would have more weight with the public than the best logic of one who had held aloof. ”

“ I’m an old man and not sentimental, you’ll grant, but, take my word for it, love is the only hope of pulling off marriage successfully, and even then it’s not easy. As for Eugenia, I think she’s made a fool of herself and is going to be unhappy, but I’d rather do what she has done than what you’re contemplating. At least she cared for that fellow—”
“I’m glad you feel like that, darling,” said Crystal, “because it isn’t Eddie I’m engaged to, but Ben Moreton. He’s waiting downstairs now.”
Mr. Cord started up—his eyes shining like black flames. ”

“ You think if you married Moreton you’d be going into a great new world of idealism. You wouldn’t. You’d be going into a world of failure—of the pettiest, most futile quarrels in the world. The chief characteristic of the man who fails is that he always believes it’s the other fellow’s fault; and they hate the man who differs with them by one per cent more than they hate the man who differs by one hundred. ”

“ Cord.
“Asking him to lunch,” said Eddie.
“I did that for Crystal,” replied Cord, getting up and slapping his pockets—a gesture which in some subconscious way he hoped would make Eddie go home. “She’s always so keen to meet new people. If she heard that the editor of Liberty had been here while she was asleep and that I had not tried to keep him for her to see—whew!—she would make a scene.” ”

“ Moreton, I don’t think he’s any good. He’s weak, he’s idle, he entirely lacks that aggressive will that—whether we have your revolution or not—is the only bulwark a woman has in this world. Why, Mr. Moreton, you are evidently a very much more advanced and dangerous radical than your brother, but I should not have half the objection to you that I have to him. There is only one thing that makes a difference in this world—character. Your brother hasn’t got it.”
For an instant the perfect accuracy of Cord’s statements about David left Ben silent. ”

“ Though agreeable to talk seriously if you agree, it is correspondingly dangerous if you disagree. Crystal stood up, trembling with an emotion which Eddie, although he was rather angry himself, considered utterly unaccountable. ”

“ Then he pulled himself together and said, with a firmness he did not wholly feel:
“You hardly do David justice. He may not have great force, but he has talent, great sweetness, no vices—”
“Oh, quite, quite, quite, quite,” said Cord, with a gesture of his long hand that should somehow have recalled to Ben the motion of a hand he had recently kissed.
“However,” said Ben, “there is no use in arguing about our differences. The point is we are agreed that this marriage ought not to be. Let us co-operate on that. Where could I find David? ”

“ Ben Moreton was not a Bolshevist; indeed, he had written several editorials to show that, in his opinion, their doctrines were not sound, but of course the people who denounced him never thought of reading his paper. He was a socialist, a believer in government ownership, and, however equably he attempted to examine any dispute between capital and labor, he always found for labor. ”

“ Cord, sarcastically. “Do you realize that I shall hardly survive your marriage with the editor of Liberty. I shall be kicked off—requested to resign from half a dozen boards for having such a son-in-law—”
“There’s freedom for you,” said Ben.
“And,” continued Mr. Cord, “if it were known that I consented to the marriage, and actually consorted with such fellows! You must realize, Crystal, that most of the most influential men in the country think the way Eddie does. Half my boards are composed of older Eddies.” ”

“ Just as you feel it will be destructive to your daughter to be married to a tutor—a fellow with radical views and a seditious brother—”
“One moment, one moment,” said Cord; “you’ve got this all wrong so far as I’m concerned. I do most emphatically disagree with the radical propaganda. I think the radical is usually just a man who hasn’t got something he wants.”
“And the conservative is a man who wants to keep something he’s got,” said Ben, less hostilely than he had spoken to Eddie. ”