It was a ghastly thing to the boy as he came to realize it — this utter deadness and coldness of "the world". Thyrsis himself was all afire with love — with love, not only for his vision and his art, but for all humanity, and for humanity's noblest dreams. His friends were poets and sages of past time, men of generous faith and quick sympathies ; and in all the world of the living, was there not one such man to be found? Was there nothing left upon earth but critical discernment and epistolary politeness?
"
The question pursued him still more, after the one interview which resulted from all this correspondence. There was a distinguished Harvard professor who had told him that he had rare powers and must go on; and hearing that the professor was in New York, Tljvrsis asked the privilege of calling.
It was in one of the city's most expensive hotels— for the professor had married a rich wife, and was what people called "socially prominent". The other did not know this; but it seemed an awful thing to him that anyone should be sitting in a brocaded silk^covered chair in a palace of luxury like this, while possessed of the knowledge that his genius was starving.
"You tell me to go on, professor," he said. "But how
can I go on?"
The professor was fingering his gold eyeglasses and studying his visitor.
"You must get somo kind of routine work," he declared—"enough to support yovu You can't expect to live by your writing."
"But if I do that, I can't write ?' cried Thyrsis-.
"You'll have to do the best you can," said the other.
"But I can't do anything! The emotions of it eat me all up. I daren't even let myself think about my work when I have to do other things."
"I should think," commented the professor, "that you would find you are still more hindered by the uncertainties of hack-work."
"I do find that," the boy replied. "That is just what is the matter with me."
"I'm afraid you'll be forced to a compromise in the end."
"But I won't! I won't!" cried Thyrsis, wildly, "I will starve first!"
THE CORDS ARE TIGHTENED 223
The other said nothing.
"Or I will beg!" added Thyrsis.
The other's look clouded slightly—as the boy, with his quick sensitiveness, noted instantly. "Of course," said the professor, "if you are not ashamed to do that "
"But why should I be ashamed? Greater men than I have begged for their art."
"Yes, I know that. And naturally—I honor that feeling in you. If you have that much fervor—why, of course, you will do it. But I'm a/raid you'll find it a humiliating experience."
"I wouldn't expect to find it a picnic," answered Thyrsis, and took his departure—having perceived that the professor's leading thought was a fear lest he should begin his begging that day.
So there it was! There was the eminent critic, the writer of exquisite appreciations of literature! The darling of the salons of Boston—which called itself the Athens of America and the hub of the universe! A man with a brain full of all the culture of the ages—and with the heart of a mummy and the soul of a snob! He had approved of Thyrsis' consecration with his lips —because he did not dare to disapprove it, because the ghosts of a thousand paupers of genius had stood over him and awed him into silence. But in his secret heart he had despised this wan and haggard boy who threatened to beg; and the boy went out of the palace of luxury, feeling like an outcast rat.
§ 7. FROM this interview Thyrsis went to meet Cory-don in the park; and after he had told her what had happened, they began one more discussion of their great
LOVE'S PILGRIMAGE
problem. This had to be the final one; for the month of respite had passed, and the time for action was come!
Through their long arguments, Thyrsis had gradually come to realize that the decision rested with him. Corydon was in his hands; she had become •& burden upon him, and she would rather she were dead; fend so he had to take the responsibility and issue the command. So through many an hour while Corydon slept he had marshalled the facts and tested them, hungering with all his soul for knowledge of the right.
To bring a child into the world would shatter every plan they had formed. And yet, again and again, he forced himself to face the idea. They had always meant to have children ultimately; and now the gift was offered—and suppose they rejected it, and it should never be offered again ! However unpropitious the hour might be, still the hour was here 5 —the task was already one-third done. And if there were cares and responsibilities, expenses and pains of child-birth—at least they would be for a child; whereas, in the other case, there were also cares and responsibilities, expenses and pains —and for naught!
Throughout all this long pilgrimage of love, Thyrsis had been struck by the part which blind chance had played. It was blind chance that had brought Corydon to the country where he had gone. It was blind chance that he had read his book to her. And then—the chance that he had gone to see a doctor about diet! And that dark accident in the night, that had opened the gates of life to a new human soul! And now, strangest of all—the chance by which this last issue was to be decided ! By a walk in the park, and a casual meeting with a nurse-maid!
"God knows I want to do what is right!" Thyrsis
THE CORDS ARE TIGHTENED
had said. "But I just don't know what to say!"— And then they sat down upon a bench, and the nursemaid came and sat beside them.
It was five or ten minutes before Thyrsis noted what was going on. He was lost in his sombre brooding, his eyes fixed upon vacancy; when suddenly he heard Corydon exclaim: "Isn't he a little love!" He turned to look.
The nurse-maid was in charge of a carriage, and in the carriage was a baby; and the baby was smiling at Corydon, and Corydon was smiling back. She was poking her finger at it, and it was catching at the finger with its chubby paws. "Isn't he a little love!" Corydon repeated.
Thyrsis stared at her. But then, quickly, he hid his thought. He even pretended to be interested.
"Isn't he pretty?" she asked him.
Now as a matter of fact he seemed to Thyrsis to be quite conspicuously ugly. He had red hair, and a flat nose, and was altogether lacking in aristocratic attributes. But Thyrsis answered promptly, "Yes, dear," and continued to watch.
And Corydon continued to play. Apparently she knew something about babies—how to amuse them and how to handle them, and had even heard rumors about how to feed them. She was asking questions of the nurse-maid, and displaying interest—Thyrsis would have been no more amazed had he found her in converse with a Chaldean astrologer. For a full quarter of an hour she had managed to forget her agonies of spirit, and to play with a baby!
They got up to go. "You like babies, don't you, dearest?" asked Thyrsis, as they walked.
"Why, yes," she said.
And then there was a silence, while he pondered. Here, he perceived in a flash, was the great hand of Nature again!
Since the first day of their marriage Thyrsis had been haunted by the sense of a dark shadow hanging over them, of a seed of tragedy in their love. He had his great task to do, and Corydon could not do it with him. The long road of his art-pilgrimage stretched out before him; and some day he must take his staff and go.
And now here, of a sudden, was the solution of the problem! The answer to the riddle of all their disharmonies ! Let Corydon have her baby—and then he might have his books! As he pondered, there came to him the words of the old doctor—"She wants that baby!"
So before he reached home, his mind was made up. Cost what it might, she should have the baby. But he would not tell her his reason—that must be a secret between himself and Mother Nature. And then it seemed to him that he could hear Mother Nature laughing behind her curtain—and laughing not only at Corydon, but at him. He recalled with a twinge all his earlier cynicism, his biological bitterness; he had taken up the burden of his virtues again!