He relit his pipe, which had gone out during a tense spell of work on
the suspenders.
"Well, Steve," he said, "what do you think of life? How is this best of
all possible worlds treating you?"
Steve deposed that life was pretty punk.
"You're a great describer, Steve. You've hit it first time. Punk is the
word. It's funny, if you look at it properly. Take my own case. The
superficial observer, who is apt to be a bonehead, would say that I
ought to be singing psalms of joy. I am married to the woman I wanted
to marry. I have a son who, not to be fulsome, is a perfectly good sort
of son. I have no financial troubles. I eat well. I have ceased to
tremble when I see a job of work. In fact, I have advanced in my art to
such an extent that shrewd business men like Middleton put the
pictorial side of their Undeniable Suspenders in my hands and go off to
play golf with their minds easy, having perfect confidence in my skill
and judgment. If I can't be merry and bright, who can? Do you find me
merry and bright, Steve?"
"I've seen you in better shape," said Steve cautiously.
"I've felt in better shape."
Steve coughed. The conversation was about to become delicate.
"What's eating you, colonel?" he asked presently.
Kirk frowned in silence at the Undeniable for a few moments. Then the
pent-up misery of months exploded in a cascade of words. He jumped up
and began to walk restlessly about the studio.
"Damn it! Steve, I ought not to say a word, I know. It's weak and
cowardly and bad taste and everything else you can think of to speak of
it, even to you. One's supposed to stand this sort of roasting at the
stake with a grin, as if one enjoyed it. But, after all, you are
different. It's not as if it was any one. You are different,
aren't you?"
"Sure."
"Well, you know what's wrong as well as I do."
"Surest thing you know. It's hit me, too."
"How's that?"
"Well, things ain't the same. That's about what it comes to."
Kirk stopped and looked at him. His expression was wistful. "I ought
not to be talking about it."
"You go right ahead, squire," said Steve soothingly. "I know just how
you feel, and I guess talking's not going to do any harm. Act as if I
wasn't here. Look on it as a monologue. I don't amount to anything."
"When did you go to the house last, Steve?"
Steve reflected.
"About a couple of weeks ago, I reckon."
"See the kid?"
Steve shook his head.
"Seeing his nibs ain't my long suit these days. I may be wrong, but I
got the idea there was a dead-line for me about three blocks away from
the nursery. I asked Keggs was the coast clear, but he said the Porter
dame was in the ring, so I kind of thought I'd better away. I don't
seem to fit in with all them white tiles and thermometers."
"You used to see him every day when we were here. And you didn't seem
to contaminate him, as far as any one could notice."
There was a silence.
"Do you see him often, colonel?"
Kirk laughed.
"Oh, yes. I'm favoured. I pay a state visit every day. Think of that! I
sit in a chair at the other end of the room while Mrs. Porter stands
between to see that I don't start anything. Bill plays with his
sterilized bricks. Occasionally he and I exchange a few civil words.
It's as jolly and sociable as you could want. We have great times."
"Say, on the level, I wonder you stand for it."
"I've got to stand for it."
"He's your kid."
"Not exclusively. I have a partner, Steve."
Steve snorted dolefully.
"Ain't it hell the way things break loose in this world!" he sighed.
"Who'd have thought two years ago......"
"Do you make it only two? I should have put it at about two thousand."
"Honest, squire, if any one had told me then that Miss Ruth had it in
her to take up with all these fool stunts......"
"Well, I can't say I was prepared for it."
Steve coughed again. Kirk was in an expansive mood this afternoon, and
the occasion was ideal for the putting forward of certain views which
he had long wished to impart. But, on the other hand, the subject was a
peculiarly delicate one. It has been well said that it is better for a
third party to quarrel with a buzz-saw than to interfere between
husband and wife; and Steve was constitutionally averse to anything
that savoured of butting in.
Still, Kirk had turned the talk into this channel. He decided to risk
it.
"If I were you," he said, "I'd get busy and start something."
"Such as what?"
Steve decided to abandon caution and speak his mind. Him, almost as
much as Kirk, the existing state of things had driven to desperation.
Though in a sense he was only a spectator, the fact that the altered
conditions of Kirk's life involved his almost complete separation from
Mamie gave him what might be called a stake in the affair. The brief
and rare glimpses which he got of her nowadays made it absolutely
impossible for him to conduct his wooing on a business-like basis. A
diffident man cannot possibly achieve any success in odd moments.
Constant propinquity is his only hope.
That fact alone, he considered, almost gave him the right to interfere.
And, apart from that, his affection for Kirk and Ruth gave him a claim.
Finally, he held what was practically an official position in the
family councils on the strength of being William Bannister Winfield's
godfather.
He loved William Bannister as a son, and it had been one of his
favourite day dreams to conjure up a vision of the time when he should
be permitted to undertake the child's physical training. He had toyed
lovingly with the idea of imparting to this promising pupil all that he
knew of the greatest game on earth. He had watched him in the old days
staggering about the studio, and had pictured him grown to his full
strength, his muscles trained, his brain full of the wisdom of one who,
if his mother had not kicked, would have been middle-weight champion of
America.
He had resigned himself to the fact that the infant's social status
made it impossible that he should be the real White Hope whom he had
once pictured beating all comers in the roped ring; but, after all,
there was a certain mild fame to be acquired even by an amateur. And
now that dream was over, unless Kirk could be goaded into strong action
in time.
"Why don't you sneak the kid away somewhere?" he suggested. "Why don't
you go right in at them and say: 'It's my kid, and I'm going to take
him away into the country out of all this white-tile stuff and let him
roll in the mud same as he used to.' Why, say, there's that shack of
yours in Connecticut, just made for it. That kid would have the time of
his life there."
"You think that's the solution, do you, Steve?"
"I'm dead sure it is." Steve's voice became more and more enthusiastic
as the idea unfolded itself. "Why, it ain't only the kid I'm thinking
of. There's Miss Ruth. Say, you don't mind me pulling this line of
talk?"
"Go ahead. I began it. What about Miss Ruth?"
"Well, you know just what's the matter with her. She's let this society
game run away with her. I guess she started it because she felt
lonesome when you were away; and now it's got her and she can't drop
it. All she wants is a jolt. It would slow her up and show her just
where she was. She's asking for it. One good, snappy jolt would put the
whole thing right. And this thing of jerking the kid away to
Connecticut would be the right dope, believe me."
Kirk shook his head.
"It wouldn't do, Steve. It isn't that I don't want to do it; but one