Ellison

“ As he closed the door of Ellison’s studio, the young artist clasped his hands together, while a distressed expression came into his face.
“Oh! what an error I have committed!” came almost hissing through his teeth, at the same time that his arms were flung about his head with a gesture of impatience and despair. “I have sold myself—I have parted with my manliness—my independence—my right to breathe the air as a freeman. ”

“ If a cold hand had been laid upon the bosom of Clara, she could not have experienced a more sudden chill. She made no reply. Ellison perceived, in an instant, the extent of his error. Like a man struggling in the mire, every moment seemed but to plunge him deeper. A more painful reserve followed this brief but unhappy interview. Deeply did the young man regret not having taken the certificates when they were handed to him. That was his only right course. ”

“ So, many a one might have been dressed, so they might have danced, and flirted, and chattered, on the very night when John Ellison ended that gay life and called them to death, with a brief order to close in on the Garden Mound and defend the flag that floated from its central tower. And Grace, more imaginative, more fanciful than Lesley, found her thoughts wandering more than once in a wonder whether some call to show themselves worthy of that past might not come again, come there in the midst of the lights and the laughter. ”

“ Ellison moved to a distant city, being invited to a higher post in the ministry of his sect; nor how curiously he and his child lived in a lodging, where, notwithstanding all his efforts to fill the place of both parents, his boy was too often seen in rags; nor how the child played leap-frog and other games with little beggars and ruffians in the streets, so cleverly, that his father might be seen gazing at him from the foot-pavement, in a rapture of admiration ”

“ A shot would bring discovery; they dared not risk it. Annister could see the great head, the wide ruff at the neck, the grinning jaws.... Then, the giant’s hands had gone up and out; there came a straining heave, a wrench, a queer, whistling croak; Ellison, rising from his knees, looked downward a moment to where the beast, its jaw broken by that mighty strength, lay stretched, lifeless, at his feet. ”

“ Will you stay away from the Ellisons’ dinner, or will you not?”
“I shall go,” said Carmichael, stubbornly. “I am to take in Miss Ellison, and to lead their cotillon afterward. I could not be guilty of such a departure from good form as to throw over the Ellisons because this assorted lot of paragons of yours are going to be there. Among thirty people it is hardly likely I shall run counter to them. And should I do so, I fancy my position is assured beyond any attempt at a slight they could put upon me. My dear girl, your attitude in all this is in the last degree strained and goody-goody. ”

“ Ellison did as he was ordered.
"The pearl—the pearl! Here it is safe and sound!"
"I thought as much. The scoundrel! Now I can die happy. Give me some more whiskey."
Ellison thrust the pearl back into the safe, and then gave Murkard another drink of the spirit. It put fresh life into him for the moment.
"Ellison," he said, taking his friend's hand, "you've been a true friend to me."
"I have not been half as true a friend as you have been to me. My God, Murkard, is there nothing I can do for you until the doctor comes? I cannot let you die like this!"
"It's hopeless, old man. I can feel it. ”

“ Annister, breathing heavily, thrust out his hand.
"A draw, ha?" he said. "Well—suppose we let it go at that."
For a moment Ellison appeared to hesitate; there came again the queer look in his eyes, as of surprise, wonder, and something more. There came a grating curse from Lunn; a sudden movement from the onlookers roundabout.
Ellison's great paw closed on the extended hand with a grip of iron, as Rook's voice rose, strident, under the lights:
"Bull—are you crazy? This man—he's just—a dam' dick!" ”

“ Gangland is much more given to boxing gloves than books, and the conversation at Flynn's, as it drifted across the bar to Ellison—busy drawing beer—was more calculated to help his hands than help his head. Now and then, to be sure, there would come one who, like Slimmy, had acquired a stir education, that is, a knowledge of books such as may be picked up in prison; but for the most those whom Ellison met, in the frothy course of business, were not the ones to feed his higher nature or elevate his soul. It was a society where the strong man was the best man, and only fist-right prevailed. ”

“ Ellison's choice—presumably one of her American friends—his bride should have some additional dowry to recommend her. What were all those distant schemes, and even the brilliant future that everybody seemed to prophesy for him, to the bewildering possibilities that were almost within his reach? He went to the window. The pots of musk, and lobelia, and ox-eye daisies, in the little balcony over there, and also the Virginia creeper intertwisting its sprays through the iron bars, seemed fresh: no doubt she had sprinkled them with water before leaving with her grandfather. ”

“ About the time Slimmy began his lucid setting forth of Brutus, Cæsar and their political differences, Ellison and Razor, down at Nigger Mike's in Pell Street, were laying their heads together. A bottle of whiskey stood between them, for they required inspiration. There were forty people in the room, some dancing, some drinking, some talking. But no one came near Ellison and Razor, for their manner showed that they did not wish to be disturbed. As the Nailer observed, “They had a hen on,” and when gentlemen have a hen on they prefer being quiet. ”

“ And his sole guests, you say?—Yes, I admit, it looks queer. I hope to goodness there is no kind of entanglement—"
"Oh," said Mrs. Ellison, in sudden alarm; "don't imagine anything from what I have told you I There may be nothing in it: he as good as declared there was nothing in it: and he is so fiery and sensitive—on this one point—why, that is the most serious feature of it all! He looks you straight in the face, and dares you to suspect anything. But really—really—to have those two companions—and no others—on a house-boat at Henley: it is a challenge to the world!" ”

“ And so Ellison settled down in New York for that year to pass.”
“There doesn’t seem to be much in your tale to give me a hint,” said Nick. “Now let me ask you a leading question. I beg you will not evade it through any friendship for Ellison, whom you evidently like, or feeling of loyalty to your cousin. Here is a mysterious thing in which a man does the very thing you would expect him not to do, and at the very time it would be supposed that the object of his life was accomplished, defeating that object. ”

“ Ellison put down the candle and ran towards him.
"Murkard, what on earth does this mean? Pull yourself together! You're all right!"
But the man took no notice. He only drew himself further into his corner and clutched at the woodwork of the wall.
"Don't come near me," he cried; "for pity's sake, don't come near me! You're shaking me, you're loosening my hold, and I shall fall!" His voice went up to a shriek again. "I shall fall! I'm falling, falling, falling! Help! Help! Help!" ”

“ Her son Arthur was a student and preferred his books. So eventually society introduced itself. Persons who ignored it must be interesting. When it became known that Mrs. Ellison had been the schoolmate of the beautiful and aristocratic wife of General Chetwood; when the local banker quietly spread the information that the Ellisons were comfortably supplied with stocks and bonds of a high order, society concluded that it could do very well without past history. That could come later.
When her father died, Elsa became as much at home in the Ellison house as in her own. ”

“ Ellison, imploringly. "Now, Vincent, promise me! You know there are crises in a woman's life when she expects a little consideration—when she expects to be petted—and have things a little her own way: well, promise me now you will be very kind to Louie—kinder than ever—why, what an omen at a wedding it would be if my chief attendant and the groomsman were to fall out——"
"Oh, we shan't fall out, aunt, be sure of that," he said good-naturedly. ”

“ But Ellison shook his head in a very positive way.
“Just as you like,” said the friend. “Every one to his fancy. But it strikes me that you could not do a more sensible thing than make Clara Deville your wife. You at once have a home, a pleasant companion, and come into the possession of sufficient property to relieve you of all care about the common and perplexing concerns of life. Think with what delight, ardor, and success you could then devote yourself to painting.”
When these things were first said by the friend they did not make much impression on the mind of the young artist. ”

“ But the man in the black Stetson continued to study the big fellow through the holes in his newspaper: the hard face, tanned a rich saddle color; the nose, flattened to a smudge of flaring nostril; the cauliflower ear.
He had heard the name, “Ellison” once or twice; somewhere, deep down, it had set vibrating a chord of memory that brought with it, incongruously enough, an altogether different setting: a padded ring under twin, blazing arcs; the thud and shuffle of sliding feet; a man, huge, brutish, broad, fists like stone mauls, yet, for all his bulk, a very cat for quickness.... ”

“ Ellison laughed softly. He had a marvellous belief in this woman and in her power of attracting.
“You are not a woman’s man, Matravers, or you would know that her beauty is not a matter of curves and colouring! You cannot judge her as a piece of statuary. All your remarks you would retract if you talked with her for five minutes. I am not sure,” he continued, “that I dare not warrant you to retract them before this evening is over. At least, I ask you to stay. I will run my risk of your pulverization.”
The curtain rang up again, the play proceeded. ”

“ Any thing rather than return to the East with your property lessened a single dollar.”
“It is wrong for you to feel so, Alfred—very wrong,” said Clara. “We ought always to let a conviction of having acted from right motives sustain us in every position in life. Here, and only here, is the true mental balance.”
Alas for Ellison! the lack of this very conviction was at the groundwork of his inquietude. The property that now caused him so much trouble was the first thing that drew him toward his wife; and all the alloy that had mixed itself with his happiness came from this source. ”

“ Let us begin without a concealment, and go through life as if we possessed but one mind and heart.”
While Clara was speaking thus, Ellison partly shaded his face and tried to think to some right conclusion. But the more he thought, the more embarrassed did he feel, and the more entire became the confusion of his ideas. At length, finding it impossible to avoid uttering at least a portion of the truth, and perceiving that the truth must soon become known, he concluded to make at least some allusion to the embarrassment under which he was laboring. ”

“ Miss Lady could not tell; and it had taken, indeed, a keen student to define the real meaning of the enigmatical face of Alice Ellison, woman not yet forty, ease-loving, sensuous, yet for this time almost timorous.
"Now, a good, liberal man," began Mrs. Ellison presently, however, "is the best ambition for any young woman. For some reasons, we might do better than remain at the Big House longer. ”

“ Ellison listened meekly, "I have undertaken to write for my friend Carmichael of the Edinburgh Chronicle a series of papers on a branch of our own family that attained to great distinction in the Western Isles during the reign of the Scotch Jameses—the learned Beatons of Islay and Mull."
"Oh, indeed," said Mrs. Ellison, affecting much interest.
"Yes," resumed old George Bethune, with much dignified complacency, "it will be a singular history if ever I find time to trace it out. The whole of that family seem to have been regarded with a kind of superstitious reverence ”

“ The young lad from Otsego soon became a favorite with his tutor, who took pleasure in instructing him. Had Mr. Ellison lived, his pupil's career might have been different; though it is scarcely probable that one so active in body, as well as in mind, would have been satisfied with the quiet and comparative monotony of a student's life. In 1802, Mr. Ellison died. His pupil soon after entered Yale College, at the early age of thirteen. ”

“ I don’t quite know how to size up young Sanborn. For a man who is well acquainted with Ellison as he pretends to be, he is singularly ignorant of the man, or else he refuses to tell all that he knows. In his talk yesterday he dropped the name of a man as one of those with whom Ellison spent much of his time, and that man I am very well acquainted with. ”

“ Ellison turned his face in the direction of the [Pg 19] settlement and strode off round the hill. He had not the slightest expectation of finding any lucrative employment when he got there, but he was full of the desire to work. If he failed this time it should not be imputed against him as his own fault. He at least was eager, and if society did not give him the wherewithal upon which to spend his energy, then it must be set against his score with society. ”

“ It was not Conrad Ellison's way to be dishonest with any one except himself. He telephoned and told her frankly that he had been invited to a party with several of the country's most successful song writers and that he knew it would be good business to accept.
She caught the nuance of pleading in his voice and bade him go and have a go time. He told her that e was a darned good kid and rushed away to join the others, proclaiming loudly that he had the swellest little wife in the world—and then he promptly forgot her. ”