Rainsford

“ He staggered, but he did not fall; nor did he drop his revolver. He stood there, rubbing his injured shoulder, and Rainsford, with fear again gripping his heart, heard the general’s mocking laugh ring through the jungle.
“Rainsford,” called the general, “if you are within sound of my voice, as I suppose you are, let me congratulate you. Not many men know how to make a Malay man-catcher. Luckily for me I, too, have hunted in Malacca. You are proving interesting, Mr. Rainsford. I am going now to have my wound dressed; it’s only a slight one. ”

“ The swish of the underbrush against his hunting boots grew fainter and fainter.
The pent-up air burst hotly from Rainsford’s lungs. His first thought made him feel sick and numb. The general could follow a trail through the woods at night; he could follow an extremely difficult trail; he must have uncanny powers; only by the merest chance had the Cossack failed to see his quarry. ”

“ Fairfax's lips trembled. "It rests on a man's heart and soul, on his flesh and blood, on his bleeding wounds, Rainsford. I worked in Cedersholm's studio, I slaved for him night and day for eighteen months. I spilled my youth and heart's blood there, I did indeed." His face working, he tapped his friend's arm with his hand. "I made the moulds for those beasts. I cast them in bronze, right there in his studio. Every inch of them is mine, Rainsford, mine. ”

“ The general sipped his wine.
Then a businesslike air animated him. “Ivan,” he said to Rainsford, “will supply you with hunting clothes, food, a knife. I suggest you wear moccasins; they leave a poorer trail. I suggest, too, that you avoid the big swamp in the southeast corner of the island. We call it Death Swamp. There’s quicksand there. One foolish fellow tried it. The deplorable part of it was that Lazarus followed him. You can imagine my feelings, Mr. Rainsford. I loved Lazarus; he was the finest hound in my pack. Well, I must beg you to excuse me now. I always take a siesta after lunch. ”

“ The boss was a Massachusetts man and new to Nut Street, and Fairfax, when he took the paper with his orders from Rainsford's hand, saw for the first time in months a man of his own class, sitting in the revolving chair before the desk where his papers and schedules and ledgers were filed. The man's clothes were too thin for the season, his linen was old and his appearance meagre, and in his face with its sunken cheeks, the drooping of the eyes and the thinness of the brow, were the marks of the sea of life and its waste, and the scars of the storm. ”

“ Fairfax's hand was listlessly touched by his friend's, then Rainsford went over and took Molly's place by the lamp. Fairfax checked the words, "Not there, for God's sake, Rainsford!" He thought, "Let the living come. Nothing can brush away the image of her sitting there in the lamplight, no matter how many fill the place." ”

“ Are you going to sweat and stew all your life in the cab of an engine? Why, you are insane."
"Stop," cried Fairfax again, "for the love of heaven...."
Rainsford regarded him, fascinated. He saw in him [Pg 165] his own lost promises, his own lost chance; it seemed to him that through this young man he might in a way buy back the lost years.
"I'll not stop till I have used every means to make you see the hideous mistake you're making."
"Rainsford," said Antony, paling, "if you had made me this offer the day before I left Nut Street, I would have been in France by this. My God!" ”

“ Rainsford's greeting was that of a friend to a friend. Fairfax, surprised, lifted his eyebrows and smiled "thanks." He took the chair Rainsford offered. "Why thank you, Rainsford." He took a cigar which Rainsford handed him. He was in the dress of a railroad man off duty.
"Now I don't know anybody I've been more curious about," said the paymaster. "Where on earth did you go to, Fairfax? You don't know how you have mystified us all here, and in fact, me from the first."
"There are no end of mysteries in life," said the young man, still smiling ”

“ Two couches served in the night-time as their beds, there was a small stove guiltless of fire, a few pieces of studio property, a skylight, a desk covered with papers and books and manuscripts, and in the part of the room near the window and under the skylight, Tony Fairfax, now Thomas Rainsford, worked among his casts and drawings, amidst the barrels of clay and plaster. To him, in spite of being almost always hungry, in spite of the discomfort, of the constant presence and companionship of another when he often longed for solitude, in spite of this, his domain was a heaven. ”

“ Rainsford. Doubtless that is why I enjoy the problems of the chase.”
“No doubt, General Zaroff.”
“So,” continued the general, “I asked myself why the hunt no longer fascinated me. You are much younger than I am, Mr. Rainsford, and have not hunted as much, but you perhaps can guess the answer.”
“What was it?”
“Simply this: hunting had ceased to be what you call ‘a sporting proposition.’ It had become too easy. I always got my quarry. Always. There is no greater bore than perfection.”
The general lit a fresh cigarette. ”

“ No man could connect him with the idea of greatness or success. Fairfax answered it would depend upon circumstances.
"I expect you are very much overrun with orders, Mr. Rainsford. I can understand that. I do not take up a newspaper without reading some appreciative criticism of your work." The Swedish sculptor removed his glasses and wiped his eyes with a fragrant silk handkerchief. Then carefully replacing his spectacles, begged Fairfax's pardon. ”

“ The boss, his thin hand opening and shutting over a small book which looked like a daily ledger, regarded the engineer in his red shirt as Fairfax paused.
"Irish, I expect? Your name, Fairfax, is Irish. I understand you've had a hard blow this year, been sick and lost your mother."
At the quiet statement of this sacred fact Fairfax started painfully, his face flushed.
"He would not have spoken to me like that," he thought, "if he had not imagined me a working man."
"Work is the best friend a young man can have," Rainsford went on; "it is a great safeguard. I take it that you are about thirty?" ”

“ I wanted to make a living first, and I was too proud to take the thorny way an artist must."
Fairfax got up, put his hands in his pockets, and walked across Rainsford's small room. It was in excellent order, plainly furnished but well supplied with the things a man needs to make him comfortable. There were even a few luxuries, like pillows on the hard sofa, bookshelves filled with books and a student's lamp soft under a green shade. ”

“ I assure you that I went down to New York seeing scarlet. I had made my plans. Afterward, mind you, Rainsford, not of course before a whole lot of people,—but in his own studio, I intended to tell Cedersholm a few truths. Upon my honour, I believe I could have killed him."
Rainsford held a pecan nut between the crackers which he pressed slowly as he listened to his friend. Antony's big hand was spread out on the table; its grip would have been powerful on a man's throat.
"We often get rid of our furies on the way," said Rainsford, slowly. ”

“ Rainsford married at Kingsthorpe, on 30 May 1637, Catherine, daughter of Rev. Samuel Clerke, D.D., rector of St. Peter's, Northampton, who survived him, and died on 1 June 1698. By her he had, with five daughters, six sons. Most of his children died early. His eldest son, Richard, matriculated at Oxford from Queen's College on 15 June 1657, represented Northampton in the first parliament of James II, 1685–7, and died on 17 March 1702–3.
Rainsford's portrait, by Gerard Soest, is at Lincoln's Inn ”

“ The mysterious lodger enclosed, moreover, a week's board in advance, but no address; nor had the coloured man any information for Nut Street, and a decided antipathy existed between George Washington and Mary Kenny. She was pale when she packed up Fairfax's belongings and cried into his trunk, as she laid the drawing of Bella Carew next to the unopened packet of his mother's treasures. She was unconscious of what sacred thing she touched, but she was cut to the heart, as was poor Falutini. Peter Rainsford, who had not gone far in his friendship with the elusive Fairfax, was only disappointed. ”

“ I always like to be in favour with the powers that be."
Eugénie Rainsford was a tall, dark-complexioned girl, with clearly cut features and coils of black hair twisted round the top of her well-shaped head. She was dressed in a blue serge costume, with a red ribbon round her throat, and another round her waist. A handsome girl with a pleasant smile, and there was a look in her flashing dark eyes which showed that she had a will of her own. Keith stood beside her, as fair as she was dark, and a handsomer couple could not have been found in Melbourne. ”

“ Anne was married about 1595 to Sir Henry Rainsford, who became Drayton's friend, host and patron. It is likely that Lady Rainsford deserved a goodly portion of the praises bestowed upon her beauty. And she need not have been ashamed of the devotion of her knight of poesy; for Michael Drayton was, like Constable and Daniel and Fletcher, a man good and true, and the chorus of contemporaries that praise his character and his verse is led by pious Meres himself, and echoed by Jonson.
Idea's Mirrour, Amours in Quatorzains, formed the title under which the sonnet-cycle appeared in 1594. ”

“ Rainsford broke in impatiently. “I’m a professional scientist, of a good many more years’ standing than you, and I accept Jack Holloway’s statements. A frontiersman like Jack is a very careful and exact observer. ”

“ Going to the communication screen, he punched out the wave-length combination of the naturalist’s camp, seventy miles down Snake River from the mouth of Cold Creek. Rainsford’s screen must have been on automatic; it lit as soon as he was through punching. There was a card set up in front of it, lettered: AWAY ON TRIP, BACK THE FIFTEENTH. RECORDER ON.
“Ben, Jack Holloway,” he said. “I just ran into something interesting.” He explained briefly what it was. “I hope he stays around till you get back. He’s totally unlike anything I’ve ever seen on this planet.” ”

“ I will tell you the reason some day."
"But I want to know now."
"Curiosity is a woman's vice," said Kitty lightly "Don't worry yourself, Miss Rainsford, whatever I know of Keith Stewart won't alter him in your eyes--now, don't say anything more about it. I'll ring for Meg."
Eugénie tried to get a more explicit answer out of her, but Kitty only laughed.
"It can't be anything so very bad," she said to herself, "or this woman would not laugh at it."
Meg came in quietly, a demure, pensive-faced little child, and after Kitty had kissed her she presented her to Eugénie. ”

“ The prize to be awarded was ten thousand dollars and the time for handing in the design a year.
"Not a very cheerful or inspiring subject, Tony."
On the contrary, Fairfax thought so. He leaned forward eagerly, and Rainsford, watching him, saw a transfigured man.
"Death," said the engineer, "has taken everything from me. Life has given me nothing, old man. ”

“ Eugénie Rainsford was a very clever young woman, much too clever to pass her life in the up-country wilds of Australia, and no doubt she would have left her solitude in some way even had not fortune favoured her. Luckily, however, fortune did favour her and in a rather curious way, for a rich sharebroker having seen her, fell in love with her, and wanted to marry her; she however refused, telling him that she was engaged to marry Keith Stewart, whereupon he made inquiries, and she told him the whole story. ”

“ I know I am talking heresy: but I cannot divest myself of the persuasion, that a face with precisely the features that we are accustomed to admire in antique statuary, would, if clothed in flesh and blood, be scarcely considered beautiful."
"Perhaps so," said Rainsford; "but you surely consider Miss Mandeville beautiful?"
"The beauty of Lucinda Mandeville," replied Fitzsimmons, "is not that of a Grecian statue. It is the beauty of an elegant American lady, uniting all the best points of her countrywomen. ”

“ Some light is thrown upon the character of his mind by the record of the books he studied while yet a slave. Rainsford gives a list, which does not pretend to be complete, but which is valuable as far as it goes. It appears that in his years of comparative leisure he was completely engrossed by one book at a time, reading it at all spare moments, meditating its contents while in the field, and quoting it in conversation for weeks together. One of the first authors whose works thus entirely possessed him was Raynal: afterwards, Epictetus, in a French translation ”

“ Why borrow from art a term, or terms, that so imperfectly defines the beauty of nature? When we look at a living face, with features more lovely than the imagination of an artist has ever conceived, or at a complexion blooming with health, and eyes sparkling with intelligence, why should our delight and our admiration be disturbed, by admitting any idea connected with a block of marble and the instruments that form it into shape?"
"But you must allow," said Rainsford, "that Miss Mandeville has a fine classic head." ”

“ Burned the midnight oil, and wrote some articles, which were accepted in Melbourne, so, with the usual prudence of genius, I threw up my billet and came down here to set the Thames, or rather the Yarra, on fire. Needless to remark, I didn't succeed or I shouldn't be here, so there is my history in a nutshell."
"And Miss Rainsford?"
"Oh, I engaged myself to her before I left Sandhurst," said Keith, his face growing tender, "bless her--the letters she has written me have been my bulwark against despair--ah! what a poor devil a man is in this world without a good woman's love to comfort him." ”