A SON OF ESAU
 
 A SON OF ESAU 
 
 BY 
 
 MINNIE GILMORE 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 "PIPES FROM PRAIRIE-LAND," ETC. 
 
 " And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, he ate, and drank, and went 
 his way ; making little account of having sold his first birth-right." GENESIS, 
 xxv, 34. 
 
 " The wages of sin, is death." ST. PAUL, vi., 23. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 LOVELL, CORYELL & COMPANY 
 
 43, 45 AND 47 EAST TENTH STREET
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1892, 
 
 BY 
 UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY, 
 
 \All r if A is reserved.]
 
 ffatber 
 
 P. S. GILMORE, MUSICIAN 
 
 from whose flower of genius my seed of talent is inherited, 
 
 and to whose tender love, patient faith, and generous indulgence, 
 
 I owe all that has fostered the little seed to bud and bloom, and 
 
 flfcotbet 
 
 A PERFECT WOMAN" 
 
 whose paean awaits an angel-voice to sing it, 
 above Love's -vox Aumana, heaven high. 
 
 With the prayer of my soul, 
 the love of my heart, and the service of my life, 
 
 I INSCRIBE THIS BOOK 
 
 " If life-blood's fertilizing, I wrung mine 
 On every leaf of this." 
 
 E. B. BROWNING. 
 
 2061825
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. NEWFIELD, 1 
 
 II. HARRIMAN'S BLOCK, 10 
 
 III. " FRESHET SAL," 24 
 
 IV. SISTERS, 27 
 
 V. THE SHAKESPEARE CLUB GIVES A DAXCE, . 40 
 
 VI. ACROSS THE RUBICON, 63 
 
 VII. "THE COST AND THE PAIN," .... 75 
 
 VIII. To YOUTH'S SWEET PAGE, 93 
 
 IX. IN GOD'S GOOD TIME, 109 
 
 X. THE DANCE IN JENKINS' BARN, . . . .119 
 
 XI. SAL RECEIVES A CALL, AND MAKES ONE, . . 132 
 
 XII. THE HONEYMOON, 140 
 
 XIII. THE HONEYMOON WANES, 145 
 
 XIV. THE HONEYMOON FLICKERS OUT, . . . 154 
 XV. A MIDNIGHT TOAST, 167 
 
 XVI. MAGDALEN, 178 
 
 XVII. FROM FLAME TO ASHES, . . . . .185 
 XVIII. A PHANTOM GUEST, . ... . .197 
 
 XIX. SWEET CHARITY, 210 
 
 XX. AT BENEDICTION, 222 
 
 XXI. THE STAIN OF THE MIRE, 227 
 
 XXII. IN TIGHTENING TOILS, 233 
 
 XXIII. A SON AND HEIR 241
 
 viii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXIV. THE REVEREND HUNGERFORD HARNEY, . . 251 
 
 XXV. " You SHALL BE RIGHTED," . . . .261 
 
 XXVI. CLERGY VERSUS LAITY, . . . . . 268 
 
 XXVII. DRUCE'S CROWN DRAWS NEAR, .... 275 
 
 XXVIII. KlNGSLEY SAYS GOOD-BY, 279 
 
 XXIX. EXIT RUNDELL, 287 
 
 XXX. RUNDELL'S REVENGE, 309 
 
 XXXI. "THE WAGES OF SIN is " . . . .317 
 
 XXXII. " DEATH!" 326 
 
 XXXIII. AN END, AND A BEGINNING, . . . .339
 
 NOTE. 
 
 As minor characters, I have ventured to introduce into 
 this story a few " real people," who will recognize them- 
 selves, and be recognized by their neighbors. The re- 
 sult of such recognition may be a suspicion that the cari- 
 catures with which these are associated have been drawn 
 from the same social circle. Therefore, I beg leave to 
 explain that Milly and Cilly Hunter, the Linnetts, the 
 Tompsons, etc., exemplify types unrepresented in the so- 
 ciety, as I know it, of the Western neighborhood to which 
 I address this note. An apology, however, is due to Mrs. 
 Gome-Ins (to echo a Newfield parody), whose faultless 
 Queen's English I have been constrained to translate into 
 a ruder, dialectical tongue. My excuse is that this kindly, 
 cordial, and hospitable gentlewoman is a typical represen- 
 tative of a kindly, cordial, and hospitable social class. In 
 conclusion, a word of fond and grateful acknowledgment 
 to Mrs. Annabel Eorke, but for whose long hospitality to 
 "Miss Bread-and-Butter, her Yankee niece," the "real 
 people" of these pages were strangers to them ! 
 
 M. L. G. 
 
 NEW YORK, May, 1892.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 CHAPTEB t 
 
 NEWFIELD. 
 
 Bounded by the Eocky Mountains on the west, on the 
 east by a vagrant fork of the Arkansas Kiver, known as the 
 " Freshet " since the spring night thirty years before my 
 story opens, when its flooding waters had overflowed their 
 banks and swept away the camp slumbering on their 
 brink, stretches a tract of country which presents at once 
 the characteristics of mountain and prairie, of hill and 
 valley, of wood and field ; maintaining at the same time an 
 individuality which these diverse features fail to destroy. 
 Its mountains are such gentle acclivities, its valleys such 
 mere dimples of descents, that they seem to accentuate 
 rather than to interrupt the level of the fundamental plain, 
 half-horizoned in the distance by purple mist pierced by 
 glistening snow-streaked summits, half by an arch of 
 prairie merged in iridescent sky. 
 
 Circling the Freshet waters in irregular random fashion, 
 spanning them here by a bridge, there by an isthmus of 
 made-land indistinguishable at the present day from a 
 natural formation, the town of Newfield lifts from both 
 upper and lower banks its blocks of shops and houses, its 
 clustered cottages and handsome suburban dwellings;
 
 2 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 beyond which rolls the prairie toward a background of 
 sunlit hillocks, footstools of the royal forest throned on 
 the mountain range. Approached from either east or 
 west, its aspect is alike pleasing to the eye, jaded in the 
 one case by monotonous stretches of plain whose for- 
 lorn settlements their straggling blocks of shops and 
 shanties supplemented by still more straggling ranks of 
 brutalized humanity suggest a dead-level of life infinitely 
 more desolate than its prototype in surrounding nature ; 
 in the other, by deserts of sand and sage-brush, and 
 seamed, shrivelled, ghastly alkali wastes. The gradual 
 slopes that mark its site prepare one for the farther foot- 
 hills, and for the mountains looming in abrupt range be- 
 yond; while the town itself, in spite of an almost aggressive 
 air of prosperity, has a cordial, open-hearted, happy-go- 
 lucky atmosphere about it, alluring in its suggesti veil ess 
 of vital youth and hope. 
 
 In natural aspect, Newfield, of course, varies with the 
 seasons. There are brief times when its surface features 
 seem all but obliterated, the town-site, the adjacent plains, 
 the more distant foot-hills, the mountains, even the over- 
 hanging sky itself, presenting from horizon to horizon a 
 single, vast, unbroken blur of snow. But these " white 
 days" are but episodes, the ordinary winter day of the 
 region displaying the reviviscence of vivid autumn, set 
 like the flame in an opal, in a monotint of snow. 
 
 Neither autumn nor winter aspect seems characteristic 
 of Newfield, however. Irresistibly, one associates it with 
 fairer seasons of bloom and song and .sun. When the 
 spring with golden chisel carves through the marble of 
 the frozen snows till the green bases of the mountains 
 reappear beneath their white turrets ; and the streams, 
 breaking from their icy bonds like butterflies from the
 
 A SOX OF ESAU. 3 
 
 chrysalis, flash flocks of wavelets seaward on skimming 
 new-fledged wings ; when the willows and oaks and cedars 
 re-don their emerald vesture, and the nude gray limbs of 
 the cottonwoods are draped anew with tenderest green ; 
 when the buffalo-grass puts up its spears, and the daisies 
 and wind-flowers and mountain-lilies break in white and 
 gold and azure from a mosaic of spiraea and vetch; when 
 the violet blends its blue with the iris, and the wild rose 
 blushes with envy beside the rosy shooting-star ; when 
 the sun from dawn to gloaming shines unshadowed in 
 blinding golden splendor, and the crisp cool air of the 
 mountains is warmed and scented in its flight through a 
 flowered, myriad-winged, song-laden June then indeed, 
 and then only, does Newfield look itself a new Eden, 
 fulfilling the fair tradition of the old : 
 
 "A paradise of pleasure . . . brought forth of the 
 ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to 
 eat of . . . And a river went out . . . to water 
 paradise, . . . and the gold of that land is very good. " 
 
 To him who alights at its little station, the main street 
 of Newfield runs down like an eager host with hand out- 
 stretched in greeting. Buildings of brick and granite 
 bound it on either side, their architectural monotony re- 
 lieved, here by the dome and spires of a Christian fane, 
 there by the rival thyrsus of pagan Bacchus. On the 
 north corner a staid old post-office sets its face against 
 the south corner, where an upstart telephone tinkles its 
 clamorous bell. A Morning Daily flouts its type from the 
 east side, at an Evening Daily waiting for its type, on the 
 west. Beyond rises the great hotel haunt of commercial 
 " drummers," of dashing " confidence-men," of footlight 
 stars of passage, of gay young bachelors, of truant bene- 
 dicts, of unencumbered wives, of " willin' " widows, of
 
 4: A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 maidens rich in ringlets as in years ; while farther on, the 
 new town-hall, proudly ycleped Opera House, lifts an at- 
 tenuated but patriotic marble eagle, in neighborly juxta- 
 position to the court-house weathercock an ironical em- 
 blem, in its gilded instability, of the Justice throned 
 within. 
 
 Leaving the town-centre, the main street of Newfield 
 soon outstrips its bordering brick pavements, which are 
 substituted first by plank paths appropriately called 
 " walks," each and all of them not only walking but ab- 
 solutely running off, darting here into a ditch, mounting 
 there to a precipitous and unscalable height, disappear- 
 ing elsewhere into some yawning roadside gully ; later, 
 by banks of grass and brush, dotted with wayside flowers. 
 Beckoned by silver-green cottonwoods, by sapling pines 
 astray from their parent-groves, by wild-rose thickets 
 masquerading in thorns like maids in knightly armor, the 
 long road sweeps from the town suburbs to their adjacent 
 camps and settlements, beyond which, corn and grain 
 fields, slim young orchards, and vast fields grazed by 
 hoi-se and cattle, mark rich outlying districts of ranch and 
 farm. 
 
 Twice daily, once in the vivid glow of the morning 
 sunshine, once in the shadows of the evening dusk, the 
 " through express," panting and puffing like an exhausted 
 giant, halts for breath in the little town. While it is still 
 afar, cutting its iron-shod way through the distant 
 mountains, its shrill, clear whistle resounds through New- 
 field, announcing its approach. Then, throughout the 
 entire town a transformation is observable. The station, 
 but now apparently deserted, suddenly brims with active 
 life. There is a simultaneous influx of travellers, baggage, 
 and uniformed officials ; carriages whirl down the street
 
 A SOlf OF ESAU. 5 
 
 to the waiting-room entrance ; small boys gather about 
 the doors. Women lean from the windows of the neigh- 
 boring cottages, and salesmen follow their customers 
 from the shops, and look down toward the tracks. Then, 
 too, sauntering from field or cottage, or lounging toward 
 the station from saloon and corner, may be seen a quaint 
 procession of solitary figures, with hands in tattered 
 pockets and ragged hat-brims set more or less rakishly 
 upon ne'er-do-weel heads figures such as every railroad 
 town duplicates, and are to every traveller a familiar, 
 pathetic sight. Day after day, year after year, the express 
 comes and goes, and finds them as it left them, leaves 
 them as it found them, watching, always watching 
 waiting, always waiting for whom or what, God knows ! 
 Like wraiths they issue forth, like wraiths they fade from 
 vie\y, wraith-like to haunt the heart when eyes no longer 
 see them. Somewhere, one knows, in patient, wistful 
 quest, still they are watching, waiting. 
 
 The west-bound train arrives at daybreak ; hence the 
 migrator from the east is greeted on the very threshold of 
 Newfield by the golden augury of the morning sun. His 
 first impulse is to accept the invitation of the long main 
 street and follow it whither it leads him. This instinct is 
 born sometimes of idle curiosity, often of eager interest ; 
 but most commonly of that instinctive desire for one last 
 hour of respite, known to all whose wheels of life are 
 forced, of a sudden, to adjust themselves to new and 
 untried grooves. The masculine stranger, sauntering, 
 satchel in hand, through the town and beyond it, is a 
 familiar figure to Newfield, but one that never fails to at- 
 tract general attention. The shopmen lean from their 
 doors to gaze after him ; the saloon-loafers cease their 
 desultory chat, and stare in silence as he passes ; children
 
 6 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 leave their games to follow in his footsteps, caricaturing 
 his gait and carriage, while small dogs bark and caper in 
 the rear ; young girls steal curious glances at him, and if 
 he, too, be young and comely, smile shyly to themselves, 
 and blush, and pass with quickened heart-beats ; house- 
 wives catching a glimpse of him through blinds or cur- 
 tains, hasten to their doors in kindly, womanly interest, 
 and watch him out of sight. Soon he returns to face the 
 new life whether for victory or defeat, who knows? 
 Not the men, nor the children, nor even the new-comer 
 himself, asks the question ; the hope of youth, the resolve 
 of manhood, admits no possibility of defeat. Only the 
 hearts of the maidens ask it, and the wistful eyes of the 
 women. But to their mute question no present answer 
 comes. 
 
 After the continental express, the local trains steam- 
 ing in and out of the town by day and night, are features 
 of Newfield life which demand recognition. Morning 
 after morning, out of sight of the rows of cottages whence 
 young wives wave their aprons, young mothers beckon 
 their babies' tiny hands, they bear crowds of sturdy, 
 sombreroed, high-booted laborers with tools over shoul- 
 ders, and dinner-pails swinging from brawny hands ; re- 
 turning at night, sometimes swiftly and joyously, with 
 triumphant clang of bell and whistle ; sometimes slowly 
 and silently, with engines sobbing and shuddering like 
 suffering things a burden of bitter human pain behind 
 them. A mine has caved in, or a bridge given way, or a 
 misplaced switch has done its fatal work, and the dead 
 and wounded are many ; or there has been a quarrel, and 
 a blow or shot, and one man's working-time is ended, and 
 one woman's weeping-time begun. But these are only 
 the common mischances of border-life. Like ripples on
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 1 
 
 the Freshet waters they come and go the tide flows on 
 unheeding. 
 
 On the last night of the work-day week the gala night 
 of the week for Newfield the local train, indeed, reigns 
 supreme. Long before the hour of its arrival the human 
 life of the town seems to empty itself into the little sta- 
 tion. All is bustle, excitement, expectation. " Runners " 
 for the rival hotels, saloons, and haunts lower down in 
 the social scale, struggle for vantage-ground with stage- 
 drivers, teamsters, and pack-encumbered and encumber- 
 ing pedlers ; itinerant showmen, erecting their tents on 
 the verge of the tracks, lift rival voices, each announcing 
 his own attraction and denouncing his neighbors' with a 
 play of word and wit worthy of nobler cause. Often from 
 one of these tents emerges a half-nude figure clad only in 
 gaudy tights and glittering spangles ; sometimes a man's 
 figure, usually a woman's. Ordinarily the performance is 
 a rope-walk above the track-side roofs, or from pole to 
 pole across the narrow river. When it is ended a cheer 
 goes up from the crowd, and a shower of "nickels" and 
 dimes falls into the showman's hat. Then, if the crowd 
 wait still, some street-corner auctioneer, tramping his 
 southward way toward credulous, trinket-loving negro- 
 dom, sets up his stand, and sends his confederate to the 
 front to open bids, preluding his nasal eulogy of gay cot- 
 ton handkerchiefs, glass diamonds, brass and tin jewelry, 
 (warranted pure silk, first water, and precious metal, 
 respectively) and innumerable other articles of his stock 
 in trade, with a clever medley of jest and song and story. 
 
 Meanwhile the throng grows restless. Men and women 
 struggle with one another for foothold. A rough contest, 
 begun in jest by a couple of youths in the background, 
 ends in earnest, and it is shouted that there will be a fight,
 
 8 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 and boys and men force their way through, the crowd and 
 close around the combatants. Showily-garbed women, 
 flushed with rum and rouge, jostle fresh-faced girlhood, 
 beautiful in its youth and innocence, and curse defiance 
 of the contrast ; white-haired men, with the pathetic resig- 
 nation of helpless, hopeless Age in their faces, stand side 
 by side with anxious-eyed wives and mothers, waiting \vith 
 mingled hope and dread what the train shall bring. 
 
 A cheer from the crowd announces that the train is in 
 sight. A moment, and it slackens, stops. Then from the 
 cars a motley throng descends shifts from the rival 
 mines ; contract-gangs from the roads and bridges ; tim- 
 ber-men from the camps ; cattle-men from the ranches ; 
 cowboys desperate with long isolation, recklessly bent 
 upon wild orgies whose memory shall warm their blood 
 when the horror of lonely days and nights on the silent 
 plains shall threaten to congeal it ; hunters from the 
 mountains and forests, with dogs and guns and game ; 
 gamblers from neighboring camps and city ; real estate 
 "boomers;" contractors, overseers, engineers, represen- 
 tatives of every form and degree of western labor and 
 speculation all pour in a very torrent of humanity into 
 the little town, to such result of wild carouse and revel as 
 could be tolerated only in a comparatively new and soci- 
 ally lawless community. 
 
 And dating, though it does historically, if somewhat 
 hazily, from the early fifties, Newfield is still a new settle- 
 ment ; not only in the worst, but in the best and truest 
 sense of the word, as well. The spirit of youth, sanguine, 
 energetic, indomitable, is in it a spirit which, para- 
 doxical though it be, only comparative maturity can con- 
 ceive. In their earliest youth our pioneer communities 
 are at their oldest ; old in the worst and saddest sense,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 9 
 
 with the disappointment, failure, despair, and consequent 
 bitter recklessness of decaying settlements which surge 
 into them at their outset, impelled by such forlorn hope 
 as, while life lasts, outlives despair. 
 
 These baleful elements, inseparable from a new and 
 wealth-seeking community, are slow to become extinct, and 
 in the meantime the social problem is generated. Ac- 
 cording to popular belief, the social life of the West is 
 nothing if not simple ; in fact, its simplicity is, at the 
 present day, its most complex feature. The lawless spirit 
 of pi-e-civilized days survives, at bitter war with the ethics 
 of older conservative civilization pitted against it. Be- 
 tween the two stands the class which, after the native ele- 
 ment, is accepted as representative of the West the cos- 
 mopolitan immigrant class of strong, rude, ambitious 
 spirits which, set face to face in solitude with the universal 
 Mother, cast off the oppressive sense common in effete 
 and over-crowded communities, of unindividuality, of ir- 
 responsibility, of entity existent not in the individual 
 human unit, but only in the unity of Humanity ; and de- 
 velop in their rebound a dignity, an independence, an 
 uncompromising, even aggressive assertiveness, alike eva- 
 sive and defiant of conventional social classification. 
 
 Nevertheless, the social problem of the West is not 
 unsolvable. Already from its primal chaos order is evolv- 
 ing. The brutality of lingering barbarism, the material- 
 ism of an immature and inferior civilization, the libertin- 
 ism of a primitive society whose standards are uncertain, 
 whose laws as yet uncompiled, are passing away. When 
 the evolution is complete, the social millennium of our Re- 
 public will have come. Already the West has conceived 
 it. In ripe time, her travail ended, she shall bring it 
 forth.
 
 CHAPTER H. 
 
 HARRIMAN'S BLOCK. 
 
 On the evening of which I write, the border-town whose 
 characteristic features have been described but cursorily, 
 flashed from its lonely site like a terrene star, its myriad 
 rays flickering in far fantastic shadows across the dark 
 landscape. Every shop on the long main street was 
 illumined ; lamps were shining at the windows, lanterns 
 swaying above the open doors ; while upheld in zealous 
 hands, scores of torches with long flames veering in the 
 wind, burned before a new and imposing structure of stone 
 and marble, at whose entrance was stationed in twofold 
 glory of uniform and instrument, the Newfield brass band. 
 The occasion was the formal opening of "Harrirnan's 
 Block," which included not only the Opera House already 
 mentioned, but also the new and luxurious quarters of the 
 popular private bank hitherto known as Harriman's, but 
 henceforth to bear the more imposing title of the Newfield 
 Bank. Half a dozen blocks away, in darkness and deser- 
 tion, the humbler brick building which had done bank- 
 duty heretofore, hid its diminished head ; and like the old 
 building, the old administration had had its day. " Le 
 roi est mort. Vive le roi ! " 
 
 The inaugurative ceremonies which were drawing to a 
 close within the Opera House had been long and en- 
 thusiastically anticipated by the inaugurators thereof, if 
 not by the inaugurated. Months previously a committee
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 11 
 
 bad been formed ; meetings held at midnight Lours within 
 the secret chambers of the Whiskey Straight Club ; re- 
 solutions formerly drawn up, and signatured with much 
 flourish of pen by the resolvers collectively designated 
 therein as " We, the undersigned : " the local orators fore- 
 warned of the "impromptus" to be inspired by the oc- 
 casion ; and last, but not least, the Newfield brass band 
 bound under greenback bonds, to figure in the grand 
 finale with trumpet and fife and drum. 
 
 And the glorious end did honor to the means. 
 
 The Whiskey Straight Club, if not individually sobered 
 on the eventful night, at least was generally so, and shaved 
 and shirted, to a man ; the resolutions were declaimed by 
 a native Demosthenes, whose cuds of tobacco realistically 
 represented the historic pebbles ; the impromptu orators 
 not only outdid themselves, but capped the climax of elo- 
 quence by outdoing one another ; the trumpet brayed its 
 brassiest challenge and the drum responded with its deep- 
 est growl. And now, with simultaneous flourish of ban- 
 danna and metaphor, the master of ceremonies was deliver- 
 ing the closing address. On the stage surrounding him 
 were seated the representative men of Newfield ; i.e., such 
 financial, professional, and social powers as even in border- 
 towns be, painfully self-conscious cynosures of the keen 
 and quizzical eyes of the represented, crowding the Opera 
 House from stage to exits, galleries, lobby, and aisles. 
 
 The alliterative peroration was in the throes of delivery. 
 It proclaimed America to be the stronghold of the world ; 
 the West the stronghold of America ; Colorado the strong- 
 hold of the West ; Denver the name was drowned in such 
 a voUey of groans, cheers, and hisses as only the loyal 
 factions of rival American townships can emit Denver 
 the present, Newfield the future stronghold of Colorado !
 
 12 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The disapproving Denverites were in the minority. A 
 thousand Newfield throats sent up a commendatory shout 
 which was echoed by the crowd without. There was a din 
 with which the roof vibrated ; a characteristic, spontaneous 
 outburst in which bands, feet, hats, voices, and whistles 
 simultaneously took part. The master of ceremonies pur- 
 sued his alliterative way. 
 
 " The stronghold of Newfield is in its ambitious, ener- 
 getic, enterprising, successful Newfielders ! " 
 
 During the ensuing applause the self-consciousness of 
 the representative men deepened from pain to agony. 
 Representative feet shuffled and hands twisted. Repre- 
 sentative faces, even such as knew neither Whiskey 
 Straight Clubs overnight, nor matutinal Caudle-lectures 
 (wherein wively tongues, falling" foul of the club-title, laid 
 caustic stress upon the exclusive relation of the adjective 
 to its antecedent), flushed an apoplectic purple. 
 
 "Hear ! hear ! " shouted the represented. 
 
 " Hear ! " echoed the crowd. 
 
 " Out here ! " supplemented a wag, from the street. 
 
 The master of ceremonies resumed : 
 
 " The stronghold of Newfield is in its men, plural ; the 
 stronghold of its men is in a single representative man. 
 This man, pioneer of us all he who lifted the first tent 
 on Newfield ground, sunk the first spade in Newfield soil, 
 struck the first pick on Newfield ore ; who led the way 
 that we might follow, and opened the gate that we might 
 pass in ; he who has aided the weak and speeded the 
 strong ; who has spurred on the timid and held back the 
 reckless ; who has been a father to the young, a brother 
 to the mature, a son to the aged ; who has shared his 
 luck with the unlucky, and grudged not to cheer on the 
 lucky to their goal ; he who has accepted our small trusts
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 13 
 
 with our great ones, and been loyal to each and all this 
 man, founder of Newfield, father of Newfielders, life-long 
 and faithful guardian of Newfield's financial trusts, is 
 
 JOHN HARRIMAN ! " 
 
 The acclamation was deafening. The walls shook, the 
 rafters rang with it. Men cheered and women sobbed. 
 From the centre of the stage an old man walked to the 
 front ; a white-haired, venerable figure infused for the 
 moment with all the erectness and vigor of youth. He 
 stood with bowed head while the applause thundered on. 
 "When he turned back to his seat, tears were running down 
 his face. 
 
 The speaker resumed. 
 
 " As holder of such trusts John Harriman resigns, to 
 be succeeded by his son, 
 
 STEELE HARRIMAN." 
 
 A young man of splendid physical proportions rose 
 from his seat on the stage and gravely acknowledged the 
 public plaudit. 
 
 " To be succeeded by his son, Steele Harriman," reit- 
 erated the interrupted orator ; " to-night formally installed 
 
 BANKER OF NEWFIELD ! " 
 
 " Home, Sweet Home," struck up the band outside, in 
 apposite suggestion. The inauguration ceremonies were 
 at an end. 
 
 The master of ceremonies made his bow and retired, 
 the representative men following him with suspicious 
 alacrity ; whereupon the emulative spirit of the repre- 
 sented inspired them to a sudden exchange of mysterious
 
 14 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 winks and signals, winch watchful wives, intercepting, 
 promptly annulled by unanimous declaration that the 
 exchanges thereof were to "march straight home." 
 
 As the stage cleared there was long and loud applause, 
 a general upthrowing of hats, a final volley of lusty cheers. 
 Then, down the broad stairs to the street, displacing the 
 band and forcing the torch-holders back to the opposite 
 pavement, poured a stream of noisy humanity ; the men, 
 picturesque in their colored shirts and wide sombreros, 
 the women grotesque in contrast, in their forlorn sugges- 
 tion of conventional gala attire. Around these, after a 
 momentary struggle, the outstanders closed in an impene- 
 trable human wall. There was a cordial exchange of 
 familiar greetings, then all eyes turned expectantly 
 toward a window overhead. 
 
 " Speech ! " cried an enthusiastic torch-bearer. 
 
 " Speech ! Speech ! " reiterated the multitude. 
 
 "Arrah, an' its kilt entoirely we're afther bein' th' 
 noight, wid yer sp'aches, sp'aches ! " protested a musical 
 Celtic voice. " Faith, if th' hands uv yez match'd th' 
 tongues, there'd be more pratees i' th' pot for th' 
 childer." 
 
 " An' thrue for ye, Mrs. Murphy, dear. Wurra ! wurra ! 
 wurra ! " wailed a mischievous youth in the background. 
 
 " Howld yer whist, woman ! " retorted Mrs. Murphy's 
 worser half, waving his short clay pipe like a shillalah. 
 " Shure, an' divil a tongue a man 'ud be afther wan tin' at 
 all at all, barrin' to rist th' woman's." 
 
 " Rest yer own, Paddy," advised a neighbor. 
 
 " Gi' us a rest," groaned the crowd. 
 
 A girlish voice broke the silence. "It's nigh on ter 
 midnight, boys," it plained. " Gi' a gal a show fur a 
 snack o' sleep afore sun-up."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 15 
 
 " Her's a-worritin' about 'er beyuty-sleep, is Mandy ! " 
 laughed a woman, shrilly. "Let 'er out, boys. Bob 
 Jenkins '11 git skeert afore he buys th' ring, ef 'taint 
 getten reg'lur." 
 
 A broad-shouldered young farmer, a rugged weed iu 
 appearance, but whose opaque complexion proved him by 
 all poet-lore to be but a timid flower, since born to blush 
 unseen, grinned consciously, and shuffled into the scrawny 
 shadow of his paternal parent, wlio turned upon the 
 speaker a pair of twinkling gray eyes. 
 
 "Bob Jenkins hed his skeer, bet thet thar Sunday 
 squint o' your'n, ole gal," he said, " when he fust seed 
 yo' ! an' Mandy 'yer, nor nary gal, hain't half a show ter 
 skeer him, arter." 
 
 A howl of delight greeted this outburst, and the " ole 
 gal," certainly not a creature of beaut}-, subsided. At the 
 same instant a sudden flash of light from the Opera 
 House attracted all eyes to a balconied window overhead. 
 
 "Shet up yer heads." 
 
 " 'Yer they come." 
 
 " Three cheers fur th' old un ! " 
 
 "A tiger fur young Steele Harriman ! " 
 
 " Hurrah ! Hurrah ! Ra-a-a-a-a-ah ! " 
 
 The big drum rolled an enthusiastic accompaniment to 
 the cheers that greeted the simultaneous appearance of 
 the Harrimans father and son at the Opera House 
 window. Then out upon the upper balcony stepped John 
 Harriman. 
 
 " My friends," he began, simply, " I'm gettin' old ! " 
 
 No murmurs of polite dissent greeted this avowal. 
 The crowd accepted the truth as self-evident, and waited 
 for what should follow. What did follow was unex- 
 pected.
 
 16 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The old girl who bad attacked Maudy Smith, and been 
 routed with slaughter by Mandy Smith's prospective kins- 
 man, was still sore from the slur cast upon her beauty, 
 and her misery had the proverbial desire for company. 
 
 "I'm gettin" old," repeated John Harriman, emphati- 
 cally. 
 
 The old girl rose to the occasion. 
 
 " Sure, an' thar's nary fool sayin' aught ter th' differ'," 
 she shouted. " Hain't ye getten no lookin'-glass ter th' 
 big house, ole man, thet ye're tellin' fur news wot's plum'- 
 plain ez yer nose this twenty year ? " 
 
 Old John Harriman was undisturbed. 
 
 "Th' old," he went on, "th' old must clear track fur 
 th' young." 
 
 The light from the lamps behind shone on his long white 
 hair, on his high broad brow, on his soul-illumined eyes. 
 He looked a patriarch of yore ; an Elias with inspired 
 gaze fixed on the chariot of his translation. 
 
 "Ikem here a poor lad," he said, " kem here before 
 th' first o' ye, when th' only roofs as sheltered us was th' 
 pines, when our only food was wot our guns shot down, 
 an' our only neighbors God help us them as gev wel- 
 come wi' whoop an' torch an' hatchet ! " 
 
 His voice was the voice of a victor. 
 
 "I hev lived through it all," he cried, "lived through 
 th' hardship, an' th' want, an' th' danger ; lived through 
 th' wearin' years o' struggel, an' waitin', an' failyer ; lived 
 ter stand here ter-night, th' father o' Steele Harriman, 
 th' happiest man on all God's happy earth ! " 
 
 His face was almost dazzling in its radiance. 
 
 "Through all these here years," he said, " we hev b'en, 
 ye an' me, as a father an' his chil'ren ; through all these 
 here years I hev took yer little piles, an' saved 'em, an'
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 17 
 
 swelled 'em fur ye ; through all these here years I hev b'eu 
 a proud man, a glad man, a grateful man fur yer trust in 
 me. Ter-night, thanldn' ye fur switchin' that trust outer 
 young'rer an' strong'rer shoulders, thankin' ye fur giviu' 
 it inter young'rer an' abler'r hands, thankin' ye me, th' 
 father fur th' faith an' trust ye pass down ter th' sou, I 
 am a proud'rer, a glad'rer, a gratef uller'r man, by far ! " 
 
 His arms strained toward them. 
 
 " J love ye," he cried, " ev'ry man, an' woman, an' child 
 o' ye. Side by side we've stood tergether, shar'd failyer an' 
 good fortun', hoped, an' joyed, an sorrered, heart ter heart. 
 If I didn't know as my son Steele was good an' squar' an' 
 honest, if I couldn't sw'ar ter his faith an' truth an' honor, 
 if the smalles'est, faintes'est fear o' him was in my heart 
 by ev'ry star above I sw'ar that son or no sou, I would smite 
 him wi' my own hand, like Abra'm his Isaac, before yer piles 
 should quit my keepin' fur my son Steele's, ter-night ! " 
 
 There was a spontaneous burst of applause from the 
 crowd. There were tears in many of the honest eyes. 
 Old John Harriman lifted his outstretched arms toward 
 heaven. 
 
 " As he does by ye," he said, " as he is true ter yer 
 trusts, as he holds ter yer faith, as he stands by ye in 
 good an' in bad days, in th' beginnin' an* in th' end 
 so, fur good or fur bad, fur joy or fur sorrer, fur 
 blessin' or fur curse, God do uuter him, my one son God 
 do unter him ! " 
 
 The rude eloquence went straight to the hearts of the 
 simple hearers. There was not a dry eye, not an un- 
 touched soul, among them as the old man stepped from 
 the balcony and disappeared in the room behind. 
 
 Young Harrimau, taking his place upon the impromptu 
 platform, scanned the faces below him with a momentary
 
 18 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 look of keen, almost quizzical, criticism. As the light 
 shone full upon him a murmur rose from the crowd, akin 
 to the spontaneous tribute of the thrilled multitude to the 
 young gladiator stripped for the arena. He was a splen- 
 did specimen of perfect physical manhood a grandly- 
 built young giant of one and thirty, with fine head set 
 imperiously upon powerful shoulders, flashing dark eyes 
 clouded with gray, and sensuous lips that met relentlessly 
 over strong white teeth. He wore a jacket of rough oloth, 
 buttoned closely to his handsome throat, whose vocal 
 promise his sonorous tones fulfilled. He bared his head 
 and ran his hand quickly through his dark hair. 
 
 "Boys," he said, " you know me ! " 
 
 The brusque, matter-of-fact address was not without its 
 charm. With a sigh of relief his auditors descended 
 from the heights to which John Harriman's burning words 
 had lifted them. 
 
 " You have known me, the greater number of you, since 
 I was a little chap the size of Charity Brown's Tommy 
 there, asleep in his mother's arms." 
 
 There was a murmur of friendly assent. He struck one 
 hand, clenched tightly, upon his open palm. 
 
 "If you run any risk," he said, "you run it with your 
 eyes open." 
 
 " We bean't no bit afeard o' ye, lad," shouted a friendly 
 voice. He did not heed it. 
 
 " If I break faith with you, I break it with myself ! Not 
 a thing a man means to do, not a thing a man does delib- 
 erately ; yet men have done it, and men will do it, to 
 the end of time ! " 
 
 His face, calm to impassiveness, was suddenly moved 
 by some strong emotion. His voice rang out in impulsive 
 passionate appeal.
 
 A SOy OF ESAU. 19 
 
 " How should I know that I am better, stronger, truer 
 than these ? " he cried. " How can I swear that I will not 
 prove one of them ? " 
 
 There was an uneasy stir in the crowd. This was not 
 the style of address that had been expected from mas- 
 terful Steele Harriman. Feet shifted, and questioning 
 eyes met confusedly. Suddenly a manly voice broke the 
 silence : 
 
 " Ye're an' honest-spoken lad," it said. " We'll resk 
 
 And a hundred voices caught up the cry. 
 
 " We'll resk ye, lad ! We'll resk ye ! " 
 
 Was his curious pallor born only of the light slanting 
 suddenly from the window behind, or of some mystic evil 
 premonition, as he heard them ? 
 
 For a moment he stood with parted quivering lips. 
 Then, regaining his self control, he ended his speech with 
 a few commonplace yet eloquent words. His voice, as he 
 disappeared, vibrated along the silence like an echoing 
 organ-tone. 
 
 Two men, contrasts, typically, to their fellow-townsmen, 
 had lingered on the outskirts of the crowd, interested 
 spectators of the scene. As the cheers died away, the 
 younger turned impulsively to his companion. 
 
 " He is a young Anak," he said, "and the body is the 
 symbol of the spirit. I would swear by him as by my 
 own soul." 
 
 The reply of Thaddeus Keene, M.D., was characteristic 
 of him. 
 
 " So would all these other fools," he said, curtly. 
 
 For a moment they walked on in silence. Then Dr. 
 Keene broke out suddenly and fiercely.
 
 20 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Fools !" be repeated. Fools!" Judging the spirit 
 by the flesh that masks it mistaking mere animal mag- 
 netism for the power of a pure and upright soul ! " 
 
 He struck his cane sharply against the plank sidewalk. 
 
 " He is a handsome animal," he said, "with the animal 
 nature rapacious, unscrupulous, irresponsible." 
 
 They had turned from the main street into a cross-road 
 shadowed by cottonwoods. As Dr. Keene spoke, a girl, 
 mounted on a bay pony, flashed past them, followed by 
 two horsemen, who cheered as they gained upon her. 
 
 " Miss Sterling, I think," said Druce, quickening his 
 pace. " Can those men be annoying her? " 
 
 " Impossible ! " answered the doctor. " Our boys are 
 rough, but not ungallaut. She should not ride alone at 
 night, however. I wonder why that young calf, Holbrook, 
 is not baa-baaing round her, as usual. He has been liv- 
 ing in a fool's paradise of late, poor young simpleton ! 
 "When the flaming sword drives him out, mark my words, 
 no angel's hand will wield it! Only the strength, daring, 
 and fascination of the other type will ever pierce her maid- 
 en armor. At present, she is the most graciously un- 
 gracious young person of her sex. One always feels 
 declined, with thanks ! " 
 
 "Her reserve is not ungraciousness, I think," replied 
 Druce, after a moment. " She is proud, in a gentle, maid- 
 enly, exquisitely virginal way ; but her heart peeps through 
 her hauteur as shyly and sweetly as a young spring crocus 
 out of the April snow. To me she seems a type of the 
 highest, purest, sweetest species of girlhood. Years ago 
 I I knew one like her." 
 
 His voice faltered, but the doctor, absorbed in the sub- 
 ject of the moment, did not heed his emotion. "Of 
 course, she is a disciple of yours ? " he queried.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 21 
 
 "I fancy," answered Druce, "that she is the disciple of 
 One higher, independent of creed and priest one of the 
 chosen ones who, unaided, walk with Him. I am some- 
 what surprised, however, that she is not a Catholic. Her 
 father came of Catholic stock, and Mrs. Rounds tells me 
 that she was educated in a convent. The atmosphere of 
 the cloister hovers about her still. One feels, rather 
 than sees, the vestal veil." 
 
 " You approve the vestal veil ? " 
 
 "I venerate it out of as in the cloister. It is the un- 
 seen wing upon which pure women soar through the world 
 unsullied. After all, the influence of religious training 
 in youth an influence which, deny it as we Protestants 
 may, no secular school exerts cannot be over-estimated. 
 Religion thus becomes a part of life, not apart from it. 
 Do you know, Doctor, I sometimes find it difficult to re- 
 alize that Miss Sterling is Mrs. Rouuds's sister ? " 
 
 " The virginal atmosphere not quite so tangible, eh ? " 
 chuckled the doctor. " My dear Druce, both vulture and 
 dove belong to the bird family." 
 
 The Reverend Druce, solving the enigma, scrupled his 
 uncharitableness, and subsided into contrite silence. But 
 the doctor's conscience was less sensitive. His conviction 
 was that charity ceased to be a virtue, exercised in favor 
 of Althea Rounds. 
 
 " To return to our little Easterner," he said, resuming 
 the subject where Druce had dropped it, "why will she 
 not return to the East, where she belongs? The West 
 is too brutal for her tender soul and heart. Even so- 
 cially she is incongruously out of place. Newfield and 
 New York the ' Shakespeare Club,' and Marmaduke 
 Sterling's daughter ! Pah ! The association is an ab- 
 surd under the circumstances, a pathetic mistake ! "
 
 22 A soy OF ESAU. 
 
 "Marmaduke Sterling was a great man in the world of 
 letters, Doctor ? " 
 
 " No, he was a man who just missed being great. He 
 was the seed. His daughter is the flower. Alas for her ! 
 born to the artist-heritage which means for the woman a 
 life-long lien on Pain. Much as I dread the "West for the 
 girl, I dread it more for the artist. The artistic nature is 
 too fine for us. As an episode the rude experience might 
 not hurt her, but there is absolutely no chance that it will 
 be but an episode. She has come to stay. It is Kismet." 
 
 "You mean that she will marry?" asked Druce, not 
 uncheerfully. 
 
 "I mean that she will be married," replied the doctor, 
 with fine distinction. " The local man will be hit, hard 
 hit. He will be strong, passionate, picturesque a new 
 type to her ; and she will mistake her bewilderment, her 
 fear, her fascination, for love. She is open to impres- 
 sions ; the awakening from her poet-dreams, the invasion 
 of her virgin -shrine, will daze her. Poor little fledgling 
 song-bird thrust into the shadow of the eagle's wing, 
 what hope that the eagle will spare her ? " 
 
 " She is in God's hands, Doctor," reminded the young 
 minister, gently. 
 
 "And in Althea Rounds' s, " sighed the doctor, "who 
 will move earth and he aven, take my word for it, 
 Druce, to bring the girl and Harriman together ! She 
 will have her little motive irreproachable Althea ! " 
 
 " Now, Doctor ! " 
 
 "Don't 'now Doctor' me in defence of Althea Bounds. 
 I know her ! George Rounds disapproves her intimacy 
 with Hamrnan, and Althea disapproves his disapproval. 
 Her sister will be the tool and victim of her revenge. The 
 tool, because she will be used for Althea's ends ; the vie-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 23 
 
 tim, because her future will be sacrificed to Steele Harri- 
 man's past, whose unlaid ghost must haunt her not 
 in the form of Althea, of the Ledge, however ; but of Sal, 
 of the Freshet cabin ! " 
 
 The minister halted in his walk, turning upon the doc- 
 tor a protesting, pained young face. 
 
 "Surely, Doctor," he cried, "you do not, you cannot 
 believe that cruel slander ? " 
 
 "Five years ago," evaded the doctor "before your 
 Newfield day, I think Jack Harriman, Steele's younger 
 brother, met a tragic death in a gambling-hell of the min- 
 ing-camp known as Smith's Settlement. Rumors of foul 
 play followed the body, which Steele brought home for 
 interment, and after the funeral he returned to the camp, 
 where he lingered for several months. Less than a year 
 later, the woman Sal, with her new-born child, appeared 
 in the Freshet cabin. I attend the child who is slowly 
 but surely dying of a spinal weakness born with her 
 and discovered by merest chance that she was bom in 
 Smith's Settlement." 
 
 " A coincidence," laughed Druce, " which affords not 
 the slightest excuse for your suspicions. Doctor, you 
 surprise me." 
 
 "To the deuce with your coincidence," fumed the iras- 
 cible doctor. "I tell you that the child is a Harriman." 
 
 The Reverend Druce, halting abruptly, lifted his hat. 
 
 "Good-night," he said. 
 
 The old man looked at the resentful young face regret- 
 fully, even yearningly, for the moment. Then he turned 
 away with characteristic stoicism. 
 
 "One more moth for the flame to scorch !" he mut- 
 tered, and went his way alone.
 
 CHAPTER HL 
 ''FRESHET SAL." 
 
 In the meantime the hero of the evening, forcing his 
 way through the dispersing crowd, had vaulted to his 
 saddle, and turned into a road leading somewhat circuit- 
 ously northwestward from the town. At first he spurred 
 his mare to a fierce gallop, but little by little, as the peace 
 of the midnight stole upon him, he retarded her pace to 
 a steady canter, which gradually slackened to a walk. 
 
 All about him was the shadowy semi-darkness of the 
 spring night. He paused under a clump of pines waver- 
 ing in the starlight like the hovering phantoms of some 
 dusky Titan race, and bared his head to the night-breezes. 
 The spell of an unwontedly exalted mood was upon him. 
 Whence had it come ? What subtle, resistless force had 
 converted his speech, in premeditation a triumph of art, 
 into a triumph of nature ? What boyish impulse had 
 constrained him to stretch out his arms in sudden pas- 
 sionate gesture, and appeal to that gaping wondering 
 crowd for strength and succor? His heart was throbbing 
 excitedly ; his breath passed his lips in short quick gasps. 
 The calm moon mounted her midnight turret The light 
 of her lucent banners flickered across his face. The wind 
 blew freshly about him, pungent with pine-scents, and 
 moist with vaporous mists. The pine-boughs stirred in 
 it, and the rustle of their spiuous leafage broke on the 
 stillness softly as a fledgling-note. The restful sounds did
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 25 
 
 not soothe him. They hurt, in their solemnity, in their 
 tenderness, in their purity and peace, the unrestful soul 
 within him. 
 
 Through the open door of a cabin in the gloom before 
 him nickered a familiar light, its breeze-blown flame 
 beckoning eerily, like some luminous phantom-hand. He 
 spurred his mare toward it. Where the road emerged 
 from the pine-shadows, it was bathed in, flooded with, 
 the light of the mid-heaven moon. On both sides lay the 
 spring prairie, a limitless field of dappled cloth of gold. 
 To the front, distant and visionary, mystic as Sphinx be- 
 hind their opaline veils of mist, rose the mountains. Be- 
 tween them and the cabin flashed a fall of moon-lit waters. 
 Their voice was as the voice of his own soul. He knew it 
 in all its keys and cadences, in all its changeful scales of 
 skies and seasons. He knew the creak of the old boat 
 moored just beyond the Freshet cross-roads, for years 
 unused and forgotten ; the grating of its keel on the 
 bank, the rattle of its loosened oars, the splash of the 
 shallow- waves against it. To-night the waters were surg- 
 ing restlessly, almost stormily; and over their sullen 
 undertone sounded the liquid murmur of a tiny stream 
 which, swollen by the spring rains, was making its way, 
 slope by slope, down a neighboring hill-side. He lingered 
 a moment after he had dismounted, looking down at the 
 moon-lit waters ; and even as he looked, the little stream 
 met the strong one and was engulfed. 
 
 On the threshold of the cabin built upon the Freshet's 
 brink stood a woman, young and of regal stature and 
 physique ; handsome, with an almost savage beauty, har- 
 monious with its surroundings as were the distant 
 mountains looming darkly, imperiously against the hori- 
 zon of stellar sky. The light behind lent a lustrous tint
 
 26 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 to her dark hair, and projected in bold relief the noble 
 lines of her figure clad in a gown of dark flannel, relieved 
 by a crimson neckerchief. Her face, etherealized by the 
 moonlight, was turned toward him. No star in all the 
 glowing pageantry of heaven eclipsed in radiance her 
 sombre eyes. 
 
 " Sal," he called, softly. 
 
 She was murmuring a weird reiterative melody, sway- 
 ing her body to its fitful rhythm, and was apparently 
 unconscious of his approach. Her voice, in its minor 
 monotone, had the desolate, mournful music of the 
 mountain-waters, of the winds as they sweep unhindered 
 from pine-clad peak to peak. 
 
 " Sal ! " he repeated. 
 
 The night-express was speeding along its river- side 
 tracks. Its shrill whistle, thrice repeated, pierced the 
 silence. The woman's song ceased abruptly. She raised 
 both hands to her mouth, and hollowing her fingers over 
 her lips, sent forth a long, clear, echoing note. A single 
 softer whistle answered it. As the sound died away, she 
 turned to him with a defiant laugh. He took a quick 
 step toward her. She retreated into the cabin. He 
 followed her across the threshold, and the door shut 
 upon them.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SISTERS. 
 
 Miss Isolde Sterling, cantering, or, as the West has al- 
 ready taught her to call it, " loping," toward the Ledge, 
 as the crowd about the Opera House dispersed, felt 
 guiltily conscious that she was in the exalted state of mind 
 which her sister Althea, Mrs. George Bounds, mistress of 
 the Ledge, was wont to designate as "fatherish." Had 
 the unfilial adjective pierced the silence of the grave un- 
 der the Eastern grasses, the peace of the dead would not 
 have been disturbed. Among other bitter lessons, life 
 had taught Marmaduke Sterling to expect nothing filial 
 from his daughter Althea. 
 
 Truth to tell, the brevity of Althea's maiden years had 
 been their one redeeming feature. With all the bitter- 
 ness of her restless, ambitious, disappointed youth, she 
 had rebelled against the social isolation born of her fath- 
 er's recluse-life, and absorption in lore and letters ; and 
 her rebellion had not been a silent one. When George 
 Rounds, crossing her path by fate or chance, had turned 
 back to look at her, found her fair, and thereupon 
 plunged into love in characteristic headlong fashion, 
 Marmaduke Sterling had relinquished her to his arms 
 with a sigh, indeed ; a sigh born not of paternal regret, 
 however, but of relief and supreme content. 
 
 As for Althea, she had yielded to Love's first supplica- 
 tion as instinctively and responsively as the caged bird
 
 28 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 yields to the voice that calls it outward and speeds it on 
 its flight. Could the human bird but flee on, impelled by 
 the same blind unquestioned instinct with which it starts 
 out, life and love would be simpler things. But as its 
 fledgling-wings strengthen, and their small span widens, 
 a challenge stays its flight : " Whither bound, O bird ! 
 and who doth show thee the way ? " And if the bird can 
 answer, " Love doth show me, and leadeth me to Love's 
 goal," it may fly on, indeed, and sing while flying ; but 
 if it answer not the question, knowing that Love has 
 failed it, then its song dies, and its flight falters, and 
 down from the open it sinks, sore-smitten, with broken 
 wing and heart. 
 
 Althea's marriage did not prove a happy one. Short- 
 ly after the birth of their first and only child, it was re- 
 marked that George Rounds's ruddy blond face, frank 
 brown eyes, and superfluity of yellow whiskers were be- 
 coming less and less familiar to Newfield eyes. 
 
 "Those dreadful mines," explained Althea, with a 
 shrug of her handsome shoulders. 
 
 Masculine Newfield admired the shoulders, and openly 
 marvelled that George Rounds could neglect so fine a 
 \woman. Feminine Newfield sniffed disparagingly, and 
 suggested that the stereotyped response savored rather of 
 evasion than of truth. As George himself corroborated 
 her, however, during his brief and infrequent sojourns at 
 the Ledge, Althea's position was speciously invulnerable. 
 The fact that a few keen eyes were unblinded by either 
 her evasion or its corroboration, failed to affect it or 
 her. 
 
 The lonely life which had made of Althea, at one-and- 
 twenty, a wife and mother, had made of her younger sis- 
 ter, now at the same age, only a wistful-eyed dreamer ; a
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 29 
 
 singer of songs in which Youth's glad note thrilled in- 
 deed, but with the subdued supplicatory cadence heard 
 in the matin-chants of vestal voices floating from the 
 cloister-shrine. Inheriting her father's artistic tastes and 
 dreamful, sensitive nature, she had voluntarily forced into 
 the isolated groove of his recluse-life her glad young 
 years, blind to the pathos of her repressed, imprisoned 
 youth, to the certainty that though the girlhood might be 
 submissive the womanhood must bring new needs, new 
 rights, new demands with it. When, a year after Mar- 
 maduke Sterling's death, which occurred in the fourth 
 year of Althea's marriage, to Isolde's bitter pain and be- 
 wilderment her mother remarried, she had come to Al- 
 thea, a pale, pensive, almost saddened young creature, 
 with the heart of a child, the soul of a woman, the brain 
 of a poet and dreamer. At first Althea had asked of the 
 gods what to do with her, but already the problem was 
 solving itself. The sweet, glad, natural instincts common 
 to youth and girlhood the world over, asserted them- 
 selves, and she responded as spontaneously and blissfully 
 as the flower responds to the air and sunshine, as the 
 fledgling bird to the impulse of glad young wings. Life 
 opened a twofold wonder to her, Nature and Humanity 
 The mountains, the pines, the prairies, every unfolding 
 leaf of budding Nature held unutterable glory for her ; 
 but the human revelation was even more ecstatical, be- 
 cause more sweet. Every man was a revelation of the 
 world to her ; every little child a revelation of heaven ; 
 every woman a revelation of herself. A conventional 
 and conservative society would have violated her young 
 soul's solitude, only to leave it more solitary than before ; 
 but the simple, cordial, social welcome of the West, 
 which took her not only hand in hand, but heart to heart,
 
 30 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 stormed her shy reserve and razed its walls forever. An 
 intense love of her human kind, hitherto uncompre- 
 hended and repressed, quickened to conscious, rapturous, 
 life within her. Her pulses leaped ; the blood coursed 
 through her veins with new impetus. She was like a 
 flower whose petals, shut in darkness, bloom forth exult- 
 antly at the first ray of light. 
 
 At the Ledge-gate Althea was waiting a tall, white 
 statuesque figure a Galatea in a garden niche. 
 
 " The bank crowd caught me," the girl explained, as 
 she dismounted. " I could ride neither on nor back. 
 For an hour I was wedged between the torches and the 
 trumpets. I hope that you have not been anxious about 
 me, Althea ? " 
 
 There was an unfamiliar note in her voice that did not 
 escape her sister. It suggested an excitement which her 
 words did not explain. Her cheeks were flushed, her 
 eyes luminous. Althea scanned her with curious eyes. 
 
 Suddenly she laughed, a low light laugh of keen, almost 
 cruel enjoyment. 
 
 "You look," she said, "like a girl in love." 
 
 Isolde turned away with an impatient exclamation. 
 1 The light words jarred upon her. How vulgar even a 
 fastidious woman like Althea could be, she thought, in- 
 tolerantly. 
 
 " I shall be down in a moment," she said, running up 
 the stairs. " My habit is too dusty for your dainty bou- 
 doir, Althea." 
 
 "Or your mood too exalted which?" asked Althea, 
 her mocking laughter echoing up the stairs. 
 
 The girl twirled about and faced her. She looked tall 
 and slender in her plain, close-fitting habit, whose length 
 had curled itself about her feet. One gauntleted hand
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 31 
 
 rested upon the baluster. In the other she held her 
 riding-crop. Her lips, naturally sweet of curve, were 
 curled in an half-indignant, half-disdainful expression, but 
 above them shone her eyes' shy, mute appeal. 
 
 " What do you mean, Althea? " she asked. 
 
 Althea had the intuition of a good soldier. She knew 
 when to retreat. 
 
 "I mean that it is nearly midnight, you dissipated 
 child," she said, " and that a syllabub of Jersey cream, 
 mixed by my own fair hands, awaits you. Make haste, 
 my dear, or all the old Grundies in town will be after 
 us. A light after ten o'clock is a scandal, in Newfield." 
 
 " Thank you. I shall be down immediately," replied 
 Isolde, turning away with a perplexed sigh. Althea was 
 a problem. She sought in vain to solve her. 
 
 A night-lamp was burning on a stand by her bed. She 
 lifted it to the toilet-table, and scanned her face by its 
 gentle light, in the little muslin-draped mirror. 
 
 " She said that I looked like a girl in love ! " she 
 murmured. The flush in her soft cheeks deepened. She 
 felt, its thrill and glow, and caught the star-like radiance 
 of her lustrous eyes. She gazed at the fair reflection, 
 breathlessly. Did Love's vague, translucent likeness lurk 
 indeed within it Love the beautiful, Love the un- 
 known ? Her virgin face veiled itself in her white hands. 
 
 The room below, in its decoration and equipment, was 
 a white and gold room pre-eminently. Fair, reposeful 
 Althea, with her golden hair and trailing white garments, 
 seemed a component part of it. Isolde supplied the 
 needed touch of color as she entered. Her blonde beauty 
 was of more vivid type than her sister's, and she had 
 donned a rose-tinted tea-gown, whose flowing draperies 
 gave gleams and glints of glowing ruby-tints. Althea left
 
 32 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 the room, as she entered it. She walked to the hearth, on 
 which the smallest of wood-fires was burning out, and, 
 clasping her hands on the low mantel, looked musingly 
 into the flames. 
 
 At a casual glance one would have pronounced her tall. 
 Her semblance of height was due, however, to the grace- 
 ful erectness of her carriage, and to the stately poise of 
 her head. Her face, small and clear-cut in feature, was 
 delicately oval, and wrapped in a pure, bright, virginal 
 pallor, as a vestal in her veil. Her throat, disclosed by 
 the low gown, was full and soft, like a young dove's 
 breast. Her eyes, deep violet in color, were wide and 
 liquid, and heavily fringed with lashes shades darker than 
 her hair, which was bronze in shadow, golden-brown in 
 the light, rippling back in natural waves from a broad, 
 pure brow. Her mouth, curled like a rose-petal, was 
 fresh and red as a little child's. In its sweetness and in- 
 nocence the expression of her face, too, was childlike ; but 
 the face, in spite of its youth, was not immature. Through 
 the transparent veil of the fair young flesh shone a pure, 
 tender, and earnest woman-soul. 
 
 Althea, returning with a dainty tele-^-tUe service, ar- 
 ranged on a small salver, sunk into a rocker by the hearth- 
 stone, and sipped her syllabub at ease. Her white gown 
 trailed like snow beside her. Her smile, in its cold glit- 
 ter, repeated the suggestion. 
 
 " About the evening ?" she inquired. "The ride was 
 not all. You were at the bank-opening ? " 
 
 " Yes ! in attempting to ride past the crowd I rode into 
 it a happy accident for me. I would not have missed 
 the scene for anything. It was splendid. Picturesque, 
 dramatic, Olympian ! " 
 
 "The Olympic god being Harriman, junior, I sup-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 33 
 
 pose ?" remarked Althea. "How did he look? What 
 did he say ? " 
 
 " The young banker ? He looked king-like. And he 
 said such words as only a king of men could say. He 
 told them that his faith with them was his faith with him- 
 self that no man meant to break such faith that never- 
 theless men did break it that he was no stronger than 
 the rest. He warned them of the risk. Kisk ! even his 
 voice disproved it his true, strong voice, ringing from 
 his time strong soul ! " 
 
 "I hear it ! " murmured Althea. 
 
 The girl nestled closer to her, clasping caressing hands 
 about her knee. 
 
 " It was grand, heroic, godlike ! " she said. " There 
 was something so fine about it, Althea his admission of 
 possible weakness, his appeal for strength and help. But 
 the few who understood did not appreciate it. I heard 
 one man say that he was a fool for his pains. Noblesse 
 obliged him, but they did not know it. His divine soul 
 cried out to them they heard only his human voice ! " 
 
 " His human voice is divine," whispered Althea, to the 
 fire. 
 
 Isolde did not heed her. She was engrossed in her 
 own tender thoughts. 
 
 "All his life," she said, "has been but the prelude ; 
 to-night his real life begins. A man's life must be such 
 a great, grand thing, Althea. A woman's life is sweet 
 and tender and beautiful, but it lacks the power of the 
 man's. A good woman may live and die, and only God 
 be the wiser ; but a good man is like a meteor his life 
 illumines both earth and sky, and its golden trail lives 
 after him." 
 
 "An example," sneered Althea, "of the beautiful
 
 3 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 justice of the unknown quantity called by the orthodox 
 Divine Providence. All men are gods. A woman, at 
 highest, can be only a Mary a Mary, to serve and 
 suffer ! " 
 
 There was a moment's silence, broken only by the sigh 
 of the wind, and the gasp of the flickering fire. The girl 
 pressed closer to her sister's knee and shuddered. 
 
 " To suffer ! " she said. " It sounds so terrible, Althea. 
 Sometimes when I wake in the night, I think of it of all 
 the suffering of God's poor creatures in just that single 
 little hour. I think of the helpless anguish of the dumb 
 creation of the traps in the forest, the shots in the 
 jungle, the knives in the slaughter-house, the snares in 
 the trees. I think of the live-stock, bruised and spent, 
 parched and starved and stifled, in the torture-pens on 
 the railroad ; of the droves forced hither and thither by 
 lash and prod ; of the cattle writhing under the branding- 
 iron, and the racers bleeding from bit and spur. I think 
 of the animals quivering on the vivisection-table ; of the 
 beasts of burden straining, panting, shuddering under 
 goad and whip. I think of the awful throe of universal 
 human anguish of the women moaning in childbirth ; 
 of the waifs of the slums, hungry and cold and beaten ; of 
 the girl decoyed to the dive, and the boy to the wine and 
 dice of the plunge of the girl in the river, and the shot 
 of the boy through the heart. I think of the stab of the 
 assassin and the blow of the murderer ; of the stifled cry 
 of the victim, and the thud of the lifeless body on the 
 ground. I think of the watchers at the windows, of the 
 staggering steps that near them, of the horror of blows 
 and curses, and the trample of unborn children under the 
 rum-mad feet. I think of the beds of pain in the hos- 
 pitals, of the surgical-rooms with their knives and tables,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 35 
 
 of the death-wards and their agonies of flesh and spirit, 
 their impotent struggles, their terror, their despair. I 
 think of the jails and prisons, of the men and women 
 herded like beasts ; of the suicide dead in his cell, of the 
 murderer who looks on his gallows. I think of the 
 asylums of the hopeless blind, the helpless cripples ; of 
 the dumb who strain to speak, of the deaf who yearn to 
 hear ; of the mad, and their shrieks and shudders, as the 
 whip sinks curling and hissing into the tortured flesh. I 
 think of the ship going down in the ocean ; of the train 
 crashing over the trestles ; of the dwelling gutted by fire ; 
 and the death-throes of all three. I think of the Jugger- 
 naut wheel of human mental agony, of the faith and hope 
 of youth, and their slow, hard, cruel death ; of its unful- 
 filled dreams, its unsated desires, its disappointed am- 
 bitions, its unwon goals. I think of the brave endeavors 
 of earnest manhood, and of life's long, bitter lesson of 
 defeat. I think of love, unreciprocated, betrayed, bereft ; 
 of loss, of loneliness, of heartache, of heartbreak. I think 
 of remorse for wrongs and follies irreparable, of wild de- 
 fiance born thereof, and of final, mad despair. I think of 
 the struggle of souls with the tempter, of the groping for 
 God through the darkness, of the cry to God through 
 the silence, of the blind who do not see Him, and the deaf 
 who do not hear. I think of the souls snatched in their 
 sins, and hurled to the judgment ; of the unpurged shut 
 in their prisons of fire, of the lost souls in eternal hell. 
 And I shrink and shudder, and cower down in bed I 
 am only a coward, Althea ! dreading the time when my 
 turn, too, shall come, and flesh and spirit bear their share 
 of the universal pain." 
 
 Althea rose with a shiver. 
 
 " Go to bed, you horrible child ! " she said. " Great
 
 36 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 heavens, what hideous thoughts! What put them into 
 your innocent young head ? " 
 
 "I scarcely know," said the girl. "They come, some- 
 times." 
 
 She put her hand to her breast, sighing wearily. 
 
 "Something in here tells me everything," she said; 
 " everything of sin and sorrow, of life, and love, and 
 death. I think that humanity must be like one great 
 Eolian harp, Althea. A breath on the single string wakens 
 common vibration." 
 
 She was very pale as she rose. Her lips, as she kissed 
 her sister, were tremulous ; her eyes heavy with unshed 
 tears. 
 
 " An example," mused Althea, looking after her, " of 
 the sin of the father visited upon his child. Poor, little, 
 morbid, tender-hearted fool ! There is only one cure for 
 her. She must dream love's dream and waken." 
 
 Upon her lips played a sudden smile. Not of tender- 
 ness for the girl's love-dream ! She smiled for the sure 
 awakening. 
 
 She turned down the lamp till its light was but a tiny 
 spark, and sunk down by the dying fire. Its flickering 
 flames, fanned by a swirl of wind down the chimney, 
 writhed up to meet her. She held her large white hands 
 toward them, and fixed her eyes on their fitful glow. Thus 
 she had watched out many a midnight vigil ; thus she 
 would watch out one now. 
 
 The strong night-wind was rising. It swelled and 
 soughed from its mountain-cave like waves from a sono- 
 rous sea. The boughs of the cottonwoods rustled, and the 
 young grass stirred as if the train of a phantom-garment 
 swept it. In the hall a clock ticked loudly a great old- 
 fashioned thing, with a pendulum that clicked between
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 37 
 
 its ticks, swaying to and fro in its worn old case. From 
 an inner room came the sound of a sleeping child's deep 
 breathing. Peaceful sounds, all of them, monotonic voices 
 of the night, blending in sweet lullaby and benediction 
 with the dream of the innocent child, and the prayer of 
 the girl up-stairs. But they brought no peace to Althea. 
 A restless mood was on her. Thoughts whirled like wheels 
 of fire through her brain thoughts of a wasted past, of 
 an empty present, of a future from which she shrunk in 
 doubt and dread ! 
 
 A wind-wave broke outside. Its invisible spray dashed 
 sharply against the pane. She sprung to her feet and 
 listened. Had some one tapped on the pane ? No, the 
 wind swept on, and the night resumed its silence. The 
 tick of the clock was the only sound and the sleeping 
 child's deep breathing. 
 
 The cruel smile was still on her lips as she went back 
 to her reverie. Yes, Isolde must dream her dream of 
 love, and waken ! Who should hold her the love-dream 
 the dream to which the reality is what the desert is to the 
 mirage ? Any man, one as well as another ! What did it 
 matter ? 
 
 In an open case on the mantel stood a porcelain por- 
 trait of her husband a strong, fair man, with the soft 
 brown eyes of a girl, and the mouth of a man and master. 
 She took it down and scanned it with uutender eyes, by 
 the light of the dying fire. Then she replaced it with a 
 scornful shrug. 
 
 " Any man would have done as well," she murmured. 
 " Almost any man would have done better. After all, it 
 is not the lover, but the love of the lover, that counts." 
 
 The clock in the hall ticked louder. Its voice seemed 
 to echo up the stairs as if it, too, were thinking of Isolde.
 
 38 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Who should hold her the love-dream ? Althea was asking. 
 Who ? who ? who ? ticked the clock. 
 
 Of a sudden her thoughts reverted to a word of Isolde's. 
 The mad old clock caught it up, and reiterated it louder 
 and louder through the silence of the night. 
 
 " It was grand, heroic, godlike, Althea ! " Godlike ! 
 that was the word. Only one man is ever godlike to a 
 woman. Already he was this to her. 
 
 She dragged herself to her feet, slowly and heavily, and 
 walking to the window, opened it and leaned out. The 
 midnight moon was waning. The world looked wan and 
 ghastly in its pallid light. The town was shrouded in 
 shadows. Only an occasional light wavered from its 
 dark expanse, as a last pale taper flickers from a bier. 
 The Ledge-road swept to the right, whence it whirled 
 suddenly southward, cutting a straight course to the 
 Freshet cross-roads. A faint ray of light glimmering 
 from the Freshet cabin pierced the darkness. She looked 
 at it long and fixedly. 
 
 " If it were not for that ! " she murmured. "If it 
 were not for that ! " 
 
 The wind ruffled her smooth hair and blew back the 
 lace from her throat. It was chill and damp with the 
 damp of dews and the chill of the ghastful hour. She 
 shivered, but she did not know it. She was thinking, 
 thinking. 
 
 Suddenly she laughed, a low, hard, bitter laugh, which 
 the wind caught up and echoed. 
 
 " In a man's love there is always an ' if ' for the woman 
 to face," she thought. "Wh'ether this 'if or another 
 what matters it?" 
 
 She turned back to the porcelain portrait, bending a 
 long, still look upon it not of tender, wifely love, in-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 39 
 
 deed ; yet a softened look of piteous womanly protest 
 and appeal. If George had seen it 
 
 If ! if ! if ! ticked the clock. 
 
 But even as she looked, she was again the calm, impas- 
 sive, imperturbable Althea the world knew her. 
 
 Galatea, for the moment a woman, had resumed her 
 marble mask.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE SHAKESPEARE CLUB GIVES A DANCE. 
 
 Between the young banker and the Ledge mistress, in 
 the earlier days of her married life, there had waxed an 
 intimacy which, unfortunately for Althea, her husband did 
 not share. The two men were antipathetic to each other 
 by nature. The one distrusted, the other resented the 
 distrust ; and "from such background of masculine un- 
 friendliness the young wife's wilful coquetry stood out in 
 over-bold relief. Like Newfield eyes, Newfield tongues 
 were censorious, and as the eyes watched, the tongues 
 prated. At one time, in truth, it had been whispered 
 that Steele Harriman's presence at the Ledge was the 
 secret of George Bound's absence from it The gossip, 
 however, died a natural death ; the censured intimacy 
 waning, eventually, like a flame that had burned itself 
 out. Nor had Isolde's arrival at the Ledge served to re- 
 vive it. 
 
 True, on an evening shortly after the girl's advent, the 
 young banker, clad in faultless evening attire, had de- 
 scended at the Ledge-gate from the handsomest equipage 
 of the Harriman stables, and left a couple of irreproach- 
 able cards for the ladies, absent at the time. This social 
 duty done, and correctly done, he had rested on his lau- 
 rels ; not, it must be confessed, without a chagrined sur- 
 prise that he was allowed to rest upon them. He had felt 
 convinced that in bringing her sister to the Ledge, Althea
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 41 
 
 had not been innocent of an ulterior motive connected 
 with himself. As after-events seemed to cast a doubt 
 upon the truth of this conviction, he felt not only cha- 
 grined, but what was far worse, humiliated. He had been 
 at pains to evince his indifference, and Althea, in showing 
 him that his pains were superfluous, had placed him at 
 an ignominious, because ridiculous, disadvantage. While 
 her apparent unconcern baffled, it did not deceive him, 
 however. Althea's quiescence was always ominous. He 
 likened it to the delusive calm that presages the storm. 
 
 Somewhat late on the evening of the semi-annual dance 
 of the Newfield Shakespeare Club, the young banker was 
 lounging in the vicinity of the club-house, through whose 
 windows floated the strains of a gay dance-tune, when the 
 Ledge carriage passed him and drew up at the club-house 
 entrance. As Althea, followed by Isolde, disappeared up 
 the long stairway, a sudden whim seized him to follow. 
 He had ridden out to the mine-district that afternoon, 
 dressed for a descent into one of the subterranean drifts 
 of an abandoned mine, and had dined at the hotel on his 
 way back, in the same rough costume. He looked him- 
 self over, from his tweed jacket buttoned over a flannel 
 shirt, to the top-boots whose vamps still bore testimony 
 to the sand and soil through which he had passed. He 
 flicked them with his handkerchief, and then, flinging 
 away his cigar, strode up the club-stairs. His indifference 
 to the Eastern girl's opinion of his attire, his indepen- 
 dence, his open defiance of it, seemed to him, in that mo- 
 ment of resolution, a proud and manly thing. 
 
 The scene of the dance was the assembly-room of a 
 literary and social association known as the Newfield 
 Shakespeare Club a large square apartment which, with 
 its ante-rooms, occupied the third floor of the Newfield
 
 42 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Club-house, recently erected and opened by unscrupu- 
 lous speculators for the demoralization of masculine New- 
 fielders, according to the most insidious and seductive 
 methods of Eastern precedents. The cafe and bar of the 
 first floor were supplemented, on the second, by card, bill- 
 ard, and reading-rooms, luxurious in appointments, and 
 alluring alike to the bachelors and benedicts of the neigh- 
 borhood. The opposition of the club members to the 
 lease of any portion of the house to the Shakespeare Club, 
 which was exclusively feminine in its constitution, had 
 been both strong and bitter ; nevertheless the opposed 
 had won the day. The result was an unhappy one, the 
 single stairway dividing the rival clubs not infrequently 
 proving an insufficient barrier between the midnight rev- 
 eller and his waiting better-half, upon whose exasperated 
 ears snatches of song and laughter, floating from the floor 
 below, smote only less provokingly than certain tell-tale 
 fumes upon the feminine nostrils, which, like Job's war- 
 horse, "scented from afar." Between the clubs there 
 waged, in consequence, bitter and open war. The hatchet 
 was buried for mutual benefit, however, on such festive 
 social occasions as the present, when the members of both 
 clubs were accustomed to meet in common truce. As a 
 formal invitation affair, from which the uninvited majority 
 were rigorously excluded, the Shakespeare Club Dance 
 was looked upon as an important social event. All the iu- 
 'vited accepted. All the uninvited resented the slight more 
 or less actively, as opportunity permitted. The youthful 
 representatives of the ostracized, indeed, furious at their 
 exclusion from an entertainment which presupposed un- 
 limited supplies of ice-cream, cake, and like luscious es- 
 culents, made their own opportunity ; and gathering with 
 tin pans, sticks, and fish-horns upon the sidewalk, pro-
 
 A SON OF ESAU: 43 
 
 ceeded to treat the club to such a deafening shiveree, as 
 was nipped in the unmelodious bud only by persistent 
 applications of the club-house hose. This little incident, 
 however, only added to the general hilarity. 
 
 Upon the platform at the end of the hall stood the 
 piano, beside which capered an enthusiastic violinist, 
 whose arm was less active in marking the tempo of the 
 dance-tune than were his head and legs. The floor was 
 crowded with dancers. Bound them sauntered a double 
 file of promenaders, cutting off all view from the mature 
 matrons ranged in rows around the room. One and all, 
 these were garbed in their best black silks, and likewise 
 (the association being inseparable), in irreproachable com- 
 pany-manners. Their facial expression was one of elegant 
 placidity. Their lips wore a serene smile. Their lace- 
 mitted or silk-gloved hands were neatly folded on their 
 laps. The matronal necks were chastely veiled by wide 
 lace collars, ornamented by miniature glass-coffins, en- 
 closing ghastly daguerreotypes or lifeless locks of hair. 
 The younger matrons were frisking through the dance. 
 They belonged to a generation which is nothing if not 
 progressive. Matrimony had added to, not taken from 
 their " rights." In dress, in dash of manner, in dance, in 
 chat, in flirtation, they cast the maidens, young and old, 
 into deepest shade. Only the widows were their rivals. 
 These trailed their weeds through the "Squares" with 
 pensive coquetry. The coquetry was of the present ; the 
 pensiveness a tribute to the dear, but defunct past. The 
 assertion that one live man is better than ten dead ones 
 is a libel on human nature, which widowhood disproves. 
 Ten live men, nay, ten times ten, are inadequate to fill 
 the yawning vacuum left by one man dead ! 
 
 As the young banker entered the hall, Isolde was tak-
 
 44 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 ing her place in a set, smiling over her shoulder at a 
 couple of importunate rivals for her future favor. Althea, 
 the central figure of an attractive group standing by one 
 of the windows, was superciliously overlooking the rest 
 of the company through the lenses of an antique silver 
 lorgnette. Her appearances in Newfield society were few 
 and far between, and usually even these were repented as 
 soon as made. To-night, however, she did not regret 
 that she had come. She had contrived to enter the 
 room with ex-Senator Bushing, of Nebraska, and as one 
 of his distinguished party, was enabled to look down 
 from a pleasing political and social eminence upon New- 
 field citizens. Moreover, with the exception of Mrs. 
 Rushing, whose velvet robe, as she wore it, was a queenly 
 garment hers was by far the most elegant costume in 
 the room. It was of soft gray cloth, ornamented by a 
 Cleopatra girdle of antique silver ; and her capote of 
 silver filigree was bordered with violets. White, gray, 
 black, purple, the mourning colors these only had 
 Althea permitted herself to wear since her husband's 
 defection ! She felt an artistic sense of satisfaction in 
 confining herself to them. They were delicately sugges- 
 tive of a penitential spirit. Moreover, they were surpass- 
 ingly becoming. 
 
 As Steele made his way toward her, he surprised a flash 
 of recognition in her eyes which belied her apparent un- 
 consciousness of his approach. As he reached her, the 
 press of promenaders suddenly separated her from her 
 companions. He smiled at the opportune accident. Al- 
 thea's little ruses still amused him. 
 
 " At last ! " he said, as he took the hand which she 
 yielded rather than offered him. " It has been a question 
 of ' When shall we two meet again ? ' with us, of late."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 45 
 
 " Yes ? " queried Althea, languidly, as she readjusted 
 her lorgnette. " A pleasant evening." 
 
 He had been prepared for her resentment, but not for 
 her smiling indifference. He did not know how to take 
 it. He shifted from foot to foot, glowering at her with 
 discomfited eyes. Hang the woman ; what did she mean ? 
 Months had elapsed since they had met ; and she talked 
 to him she, to him about the weather ! 
 
 "Really it has not been half my fault," he began. 
 " Bank matters have engrossed me, and " 
 
 He had made the masculine mistake of accusing, in 
 excusing himself. A woman forgives a man anything, 
 everything, save the slight confessed. Her low laugh 
 interrupted him. There was a note of insolent amuse- 
 ment in it, under which he flushed resentfully. 
 
 "Society in Newfield," she said, "is, thanks be for 
 small favors, a collective noun. Heaven forbid that one 
 should parse it in the singular ! And Newfield society 
 has been, alas ! er social as usual. Until this moment 
 I was not aware that the individual Newfielder had neg- 
 lected me. How shall I punish him ? " 
 
 How ruthlessly she had punished him already, his face 
 told her. 
 
 Suddenly her careless smile changed to an expression 
 even less flattering. Her lorgnette, lowered for a mo- 
 ment, was relifted. 
 
 " Really ! " she exclaimed, when the scrutiny to which 
 she had subjected him was ended. 
 
 He seized two chairs vacated at the moment, and drew 
 them into a vacant corner. Not until he was seated by 
 her side, did he betray that he had heard her. 
 
 " Really what ? " he asked then. 
 
 "Really worth an inventory. Collar, conspicuous for
 
 46 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 its absence. Item, a becoming but inappropriate pea- 
 jacket ; item, a picturesque flannel shirt ; item, <* cowboy- 
 belt, with dirk, pistol, and flask attachments. Ac ^ whole, 
 not bad for a masquerade. And what social assemblage 
 is either more or less than a masquerade ? though we 
 seldom wear our masks quite frankly. Costume aside, 
 your presence here is an unexpected honor. Newfield 
 must have become a very abomination of desolation to 
 have driven you to the Shakespeare Club, to escape it." 
 
 " Bather to seek it. I have not seen much of Newfield 
 social life lately, and was inspired to renew the acquaint- 
 ance. It looks about the same old thing," he added. 
 "The Misses Hunter are still on the scent, I see ; and 
 Mrs. and Miss Liunett still plume themselves and twitter 
 away, in characteristic fashion. So the Bushings are 
 down from Nebraska? They come in honor of Bill's 
 handsome bride, of course ; but Newfield takes the honor 
 to itself, and a local boom for Bill, financial and political, 
 is assured. I don't mind telling you that I wish the po- 
 litical flood-tide would dislodge his financial anchor. With- 
 out him the slow old 'National ' could not stand against 
 me. ' Talk of the devil ' here he comes, with all his sur- 
 rounding angels ! Mrs. Bushing, take my chair. Senator, 
 how goes Nebraska? Bill, I think I have not yet con- 
 gratulated you. Words are inadequate to express my envy 
 of his good fortune, Mrs. Bushing ; hence my delay." 
 
 The bride smiled and blushed. The groom, a robust 
 young man with an intellectual head and a soldierly car- 
 riage, looked proud and happy. 
 
 " If this designing young woman had not decoyed me 
 from the ranks of eligibles, Mrs. Bounds," he said, " Jack 
 Holbrook should not be having things all his own way 
 with your charming sister to-night."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 47 
 
 "It strikes me that my charming sister is having things 
 all her own way," corrected Althea, with a gratified 
 glance toward Isolde, besieged by admirers in the inter- 
 lude of the dance. 
 
 " Mrs. Rounds's amendment is accepted," avowed 
 Steele, with a bow in Isolde's direction. " Mrs. Rush- 
 ing, will you not say as much in favor of my chair ? " 
 
 " Trains forbid," remonstrated her husband. " Ours 
 leaves in an hour, and she has yet to change her gown, 
 and all that." 
 
 Mrs. Rushing confessed to the change of gown, but 
 proclaimed the " all that " to be a libel. " We give a 
 politic why are you frowning, Dick? of course I mean 
 a political dinner, to-morrow night," she explained, " at 
 which I hoped Nellie would keep me in countenance ; 
 but she cruelly refuses to return with us. She comes 
 from Kansas, you know, and looks down on Nebraskan 
 politics. The geographical fact that she should look 
 up to them, goes for nothing with her. She reserves 
 her attitude toward Colorado politics till Bill enters 
 them." 
 
 " Is this woman the consort of a loyal citizen of the. 
 United States ? " demanded the ex-Senator, with a tragical 
 clutch at his hair. 
 
 "The Dis-united States, I insist," laughed Mrs. Rush- 
 ing, making her adieux. 
 
 The happy party passed on. Althea's eyes followed 
 them. 
 
 "Mrs. Rushing," she remarked, " is a typical American 
 woman. No position she may attain will be too exalted 
 for her. She would enter the White House with the same 
 graceful self-possession with which she now makes her 
 exit from Newfield's club-room. And speaking of the
 
 48 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 White House, rumor says that the Bushing political pos- 
 sibilities are unbounded. What are they ? " 
 
 Steele smiled at the womanly question. Evidently the 
 instant elucidation of subtle political problems presented 
 no more difficulty to her feminine mind than the enum- 
 eration of so many gilded buttons. 
 
 " O, they scarcely reach the White House yet, I think ! " 
 he answered. " But Rushing has brain as well as wealth, 
 power as well as popularity. The Governorship will be 
 his undoubtedly, if he consents to the nomination." 
 
 "If he consents?" 
 
 " He has other irons, golden ones, in the fire." 
 
 "He will sacrifice wealth to position." 
 
 "It is possible." 
 
 "It is certain. He is an American." 
 
 " Which, quite evidently, you are not." 
 
 "I? O, /am a woman ! " 
 
 The quadrille ended. As Isolde left the floor, escorted 
 by a blond young man whose smiling blue eyes, like 
 miniature heavens, beamed impartially on everything and 
 everybody within their range of vision, Steele rose and 
 made a feint of turning away, but Althea chose to detain 
 him. She dropped her lorgnette, and before he could 
 extricate it from entangling feminine draperies, the girl 
 had reached them. She wore a Grecian gown of unre- 
 lieved white, and her hair, innocent of bang or crimp, was 
 drawn back from her forehead in a simple Psyche knot. 
 Every eye in the room was fixed upon her. She felt rather 
 than heard, the criticisms that followed her. 
 
 "She hasn't a bit of style," decided Miss Milly Hunter, 
 a dashing damsel whose forehead and temples, even to 
 eyebrows and ears, were hidden by a mass of frizzes under 
 which her sharp little eyes snapped like a watchful fer-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 49 
 
 ret's. Her slight, active figure bristled with fluttering 
 ribbons, reminding one of an animated May-pole. Her 
 sister was her younger duplicate and echo. 
 
 " Not a bit of style," repeated Cilly. 
 
 " Nor manner ! " languished Miss Caroline Linnett, to 
 whom manner and affectation were synonymous. "And, 
 as Ma says, manner is the hand marking on the social 
 dial the degrees between the lady and the the " 
 
 "Tiger? " suggested a tall, lank, spectacled young man, 
 by name Peter Jones, who was of a literary turn of 
 mind. 
 
 " O, that sweet simplicity pose is considered quite the 
 thing when it is becoming ! " subjoined Miss Hunter, in 
 a tone which implied that the present case did not fulfil 
 the condition. 
 
 " When it is becoming," echoed Cilly, with still more 
 disparaging emphasis. 
 
 " It wouldn't become you, Milly," tittered a youth whose 
 general callowness had drawn upon him the ignominious 
 nickname of "Chicken." 
 
 " The simplicity, Mr. Impudence ? " inquired Miss 
 Hunter, tartly. 
 
 " No, the sweetness, Milly," retorted Miss Virginie 
 Sharpe, a spinister, of whom more hereafter. 
 
 " Come over by me, Chicken," invited Miss Linnett, 
 whom the literary Jones had deserted. " Miss Sharpe 
 implies that your proximity sets Milly at a disadvantage." 
 
 " Girls, hear Carrie ! " shrieked Susanna Tompson, a 
 plain-faced young woman who completed the group. 
 " She's telling Chicken that he's just too sweet for any- 
 thing." 
 
 The group laughed uproariously. 
 
 Isolde's face, as she reached Althea, wore a slightly puz-
 
 50 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 zled expression. Hitherto she had idealized Newfield's 
 social aspect. To-night, for the first time, a doubt if her 
 ideal was realized, presented itself. She resisted it loy- 
 ally. It \vas her social inexperience, she told herself, 
 that made her feel ill at ease, constrained, even embar- 
 rassed, in the presence of these gay and nimble-tongued 
 youths and maidens. Her heaviness, not their lightness, 
 was at fault. She smiled at a sally of the blue-eyed 
 boy's beside her, but the smile did not deceive him. Be- 
 hind it lurked a seriousness which he saw and miscon- 
 ceived. 
 
 " You are bored," he said, ruefully ; "and I, thanks to 
 you, am enjoying the evening so much. I suppose that 
 our little affairs cannot be expected to amuse you." 
 
 "Have you found it so difficult to amuse me?" she 
 asked with mischievous mimicry. 
 
 "O, no, not that, of course; "he stammered, "but 
 things of this sort social things, you know must be so 
 different in the East. The West is not very well up, 
 just yet, in frills and fixings." 
 
 " Mr. Holbrook is saying," she laughed to Althea, as 
 they reached her, " that the West is not yet up, socially, 
 in ' frills and fixings.' What are frills and fixings, Althea ? " 
 
 "Jack is a bad boy," evaded Althea. "The West is 
 up in everything. Eeal-estate interests 'oblige.' By 
 the way, Isolde, of course you know Mr. Harriman ? No ? 
 Then you yourself are unknown. That is the only solu- 
 tion." 
 
 " Flattering to which of us, Miss Sterling ? " asked 
 Steele, as he bowed. He looked at her admiringly. The 
 lamplight, garish upon others, seemed to shed a softer 
 light as it mingled with her golden-brown hair, and vivid, 
 yet delicate blond tints. Her eyes, bright with excite-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 51 
 
 ment, suddenly softened as they met his ; then shyly 
 veiled themselves in their white lids. He noticed that 
 her lashes were long and thick, with tips that curled 
 coquettishly upward, casting a semicircular shadow upon 
 her soft young cheeks. Her hand stole into his. He 
 clasped it the more warmly, because he had not invited 
 it. It had come of her own will. 
 
 "Mr. Harriman is not quite a stranger to me," she be- 
 gan. The shy flush in her cheeks deepened. Just at that 
 instant the piano and violin resumed the shrill-voiced 
 contest which a merciful truce had hushed, temporarily. 
 Her gentle voice was rendered inaudible. With a little 
 shrug and smile she turned away and took a seat beside 
 Althea. 
 
 He followed her with a secret imprecation upon the 
 inopportune fortissimos which had silenced her impul- 
 sive words. Why was not he quite a stranger to her, he 
 wondered. She must be either very simple or very guile- 
 ful, to make such an admission. Guileful ? Her shy 
 soft eyes, her pure sweet face, shamed the suspicion. His 
 eyes wandered to her white gown, falling in graceful folds 
 from throat to feet. Then, involuntarily, they sought 
 his own rough habit. The contrast struck him almost 
 painfully. For the second time he cursed his folly. The 
 violin scraped into a waltz-tune, and the piano cackled 
 after it. With an amused sense of the incongruity of the 
 thing, he asked her for the waltz. 
 
 Newfield feet had not yet mastered the subtleties of the 
 waltz-reverse, and the couples who had not come to open 
 grief were bobbing about in an out-of-step manner, or 
 breaking at will into polka or galop, heedless of the 
 music's tune and time. As Steele and Isolde made a cir- 
 cuit of the hall, in the long, sliding, swaying step of the
 
 52 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 dancer born and bred, the attention of the company was 
 concentrated upon them. Behind her lorgnette Althea 
 smiled at the general verdict. It was, that they made a 
 handsome couple. 
 
 As the waltz ended, Isolde returned, flushed and 
 smiling. 
 
 " I have never been to a real dance before," she ad- 
 mitted. " Do I betray the novice I am, Althea? " 
 
 "Ask Mr. Harriman," replied Althea, with a daring 
 look Harrimanward. 
 
 " Are you really a novice ? " he asked. " But yes, 
 you must be, since you call this ' a real dance ! ' ' 
 
 " But is it not a real dance ? " 
 
 " That last waltz was for me ! " 
 
 "Say thank you, Isolde," prompted Althea. "You 
 could not suspect it, but that last remark was intended 
 for a compliment." 
 
 " Then its kind intention was quite fulfilled, Althea," 
 replied the girl, gently. " Thank you, Mr. Harriman. 
 And now please answer my question." 
 
 " As to the real dance ? Frankly, then, Miss Sterling, 
 while unwaxed floors, crack-voiced fiddles, romping reels 
 and heels, and men in miners' dress I mean undress 
 are still unostracized, I fear that Newfield cannot show 
 you 'a real dance.' But possibly it has its equivalents." 
 
 " In its dancers ? " queried Althea, innocently. 
 
 In its " 
 
 " SUPPEK," roared a stentorian voice. 
 
 "Answered, Mrs. Bounds," laughed Steele. "And 
 now, may I not have the pleasure of your company and 
 Miss Sterling's at my table ? We clubmen have our 
 private nooks, you know, which even the Shakespeare 
 Club may not invade uninvited."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 53 
 
 " Go, Isolde ! " acquiesced Althea, after a moment of 
 elaborate hesitation. " I will follow when I have spoken 
 to Mrs. Dumond, the club president, who is gesticulat- 
 ing to me in the most appealing manner." 
 
 She disappeared in the crowd as she spoke. Isolde 
 looked after her blankly. With a smile Steele offered 
 his arm. As she took it he caught a whiff of fragrance so 
 faint as to be rather a sweet suggestion than a perceptible 
 odor. Always thereafter the memory of that fragrance 
 was associated with her in his thoughts. It was not a 
 sensuous memory. Even in that first hour of acquaint- 
 ance, while the girl was still virtually unknown to him, 
 it impressed him as the fragrance exhaled from a pure 
 young spirit, shut, like the golden heart of the lily in its 
 sweet white petals, in correspondingly pure young flesh. 
 
 The crowd swept them on. It surged down the long 
 stairs in a noisy torrent. Girls pressed close to the es- 
 corts who, in rural reversal of matters, were hanging on 
 their arms. A few young men straddled the baluster and 
 sped down, cheered by the spectators. A challenge was 
 sent out for a girl to follow suit, a kiss from the man of 
 her choice being proposed as her reward. The crowd 
 waited. Suddenly a girl sprung from the upper staii-, 
 and mounting the baluster, flashed down the flight be- 
 fore her intention was realized. A roar of laughter rose 
 from the men. The women tittered more or less indul- 
 gently. From the lower landing came the noise of a 
 playful scuffle, followed by a long, loud, sibilant sound, at 
 which Isolde flushed up to her small ears, and looked 
 startled. 
 
 " Three cheers for Milly Hunter! " hurrahed the crowd, 
 surging into the supper-room. 
 
 A double row of long tables occupied the centre of the
 
 54 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 room. Smaller tables were ranged against the wall To 
 one of these, set in the alcove of an open window, the 
 young banker led Isolde. She took her seat in silence, 
 and turned her face to the night. In truth, she was some- 
 what embarrassed. She had been unprepared for such a 
 riotous scene as she had witnessed. He scanned her 
 averted face with gloomy eyes. 
 
 "Your initiation into Newfield society cannot be called 
 propitious, Miss Sterling, he said. " You will not wish to 
 repeat the experience." 
 
 She divined his humiliation, and with the fine instinct 
 of a lady sought to assuage it. 
 
 " Indeed I shall wish to repeat it soon, and very often," 
 she answered brightly. " There is a butterfly -instinct in 
 us all, do you not think ? and I I have always been a 
 caterpillar. Now that my wings have broken from the 
 chrysalis, I feel impelled to plume them, to open them, 
 to flutter them, to fly ! " 
 
 " To fly away, I can well believe." 
 
 " No, if to fly away were the cost of opening my wings, 
 I would keep them shut forever." 
 
 He stared at her in amazement. She met his gaze with 
 frank, unconscious eyes. An hour earlier he had ques- 
 tioned if she were guileful. He could no longer doubt 
 her simplicity. Like Druce, he found it difficult to realize 
 that she was Althea's sister. Of simplicity, at least, Althea 
 could not be accused. Even as he smiled at the thought, 
 Althea appeared, sailing triumphantly toward the little 
 table, with old John Harriman in her wake. The sum- 
 mons of the club president had been her little fiction. 
 She had caught sight of John Harriman, hesitating in the 
 doorway, and thereupon had set about his capture in cir- 
 cuituous fashion, for her own inscrutable ends. She smiled
 
 A SOX OF ESAU. 55 
 
 as sweetly, seating herself, as if she did not know that the 
 young banker was secretly execrating her officiousness. 
 Not that he was ashamed of his simple old father on the 
 contrary, he gloried in him ; but in this first hour of their 
 acquaintance he would have preferred to impress himself 
 upon the Eastern girl's consciousness, independent of all 
 local associations. His greeting, however, betrayed no 
 disappointment. 
 
 " Here, father ! " he said cordially, resigning his seat, 
 and passing to the foot of the table. 
 
 "Quite a family party, I declare/' remarked Althea. 
 Then she laughed at the audaciousness of her speech. 
 Steele glanced at Isolde. She was smiling at his father, 
 who was cordially shaking both her hands. The old man 
 looked radiant. 
 
 " This here's a sight fur old eyes," he was saying. "I 
 was young onct mysel', an' th' sight o' young folkses' 
 doin's sorter brings it all back. When an old man sech 
 as me lias a grow'd up son like my son Steele here, he 
 lives life all over again in th' youth born o' him. Some 
 day, when ye've sons o' yer own, ye'll know how 'tis, my 
 dear." 
 
 "Your son Steele is a local institution, Mr. Harriman," 
 exclaimed Althea, rushing to the rescue. " Really I do 
 not know what Newfield would do without him." 
 
 "He's my dear boy," assented the old man, beaming 
 with happy pride. " My dear boy ! " 
 
 "Keep him yours," advised wily Althea. "Beware of 
 the enticements of any designing petticoat. Marriage 
 affects man as England does ale. It makes him ' 'alf and 
 'alf.' " 
 
 John Hftrriman did not smile. 
 
 " My son Steele's a good boy now, Mis' Rounds," he
 
 56 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 said, " but it'll take a woman's soft little hand ter make 
 him a good man. Th' Lord left it ter th' woman ter 
 bring th' men-folks inter th' world, an' I sorter reason as 
 how th' job's jest left in her hands till she's see'd 'em 
 through it. My son Steele '11 find nuthin' sweeter'r nor 
 preciouser in life than th' little woman as '11 some day love 
 him ; an' he can't do no better'r, before God nor man, 
 than ter jest be worthy o' her." 
 
 " 0, the dear old man ! " murmured Isolde to Althea. 
 
 "O, you dear little fool!" mimicked Althea, in a 
 responsive whisper. 
 
 Supper was being served at the long tables. Althea 
 lifted her lorgnette and surveyed the dishes. 
 
 "Canned oysters, native wines, uneatable sandwiches, 
 and melted ice-cream ! " she announced, with a rueful 
 grimace. " Why was I tempted to stay ? " 
 
 " That is the bill-of-fare of the Shakespeare Club, Mrs. 
 Bounds," said Steele. " We are with, but not of it." 
 
 Althea, who was a bit of an epicure, brightened visibly. 
 
 " I know ! " she cried. " You are going to give us a 
 sip of champagne from your private stock. Yes, here it 
 is, and a delicious mayonnaise with it. How did you 
 manage it, you prince of hosts ? Pop ! that is dry Pom- 
 mery. Domestic wines never pop, they only fizzle 
 characteristic, rather, of the national spirit." 
 
 " Do you like champagne, Miss Sterling ? " Steele 
 asked as he filled her glass. 
 
 "I love to see it work," she said, lifting the long- 
 stemmed glass to the light " Its sparkles seem so full 
 of life and youth and brightness. It is too pretty to 
 drink, at first ; and after, one does not care for it. In 
 honor of the Shakespeare Club, I think the moral must 
 be that the tide not ' taken at the flood ' etc."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 57 
 
 "O, but Mr. Harrinian always does take the tide at the 
 flood, my dear ! " reminded Althea, whom the champagne 
 had made gracious. "For instance, the Newfield Bnnk." 
 
 "That there's th' bank!" ejaculated the proud old 
 father, emphasizing the words with a blow of his clenched 
 fist on the table. 
 
 The other small tables, with few exceptions, were occu- 
 pied by decorous family parties. At the main tables, 
 however, where the younger and gayer guests had con- 
 gregated, the merriment was becoming riotous. Loud 
 voices and louder laughter rang from them. Shrill femi- 
 nine giggles staccatoed masculine guffaws. At one of the 
 tables a young man rose, glass in hand, to make a speech. 
 Fruit, bread, and other esculents were thrown at him, and 
 the glass, dashed from his hand, fell and broke upon the 
 floor. At the next table the centre-piece of bonbons was 
 roughly demolished, and the bonbons were snapped with 
 laughs and shrieks, amidst noisy nut-crackings, and bois- 
 terous cries of " Philopena." Althea put her hands to her 
 ears. 
 
 " That Hunter girl ought to be married ! " she ex- 
 claimed, a moment later. " Look at her now." 
 
 Hilly was standing upon her chair, her head adorned 
 by a bright green paper cap, to whose high-peaked crown 
 a frolicsome youth had surreptitiously applied a match. 
 As the flames neared her head, she gave a piercing shriek, 
 and tearing off the blazing cap flung it upon the table. 
 There was a feminine stampede, followed by a crash and 
 sizzle, as the fire was extinguished under a jug of water 
 pitched from an adjacent table. 
 
 The apology for the scene, with which Steele turned to 
 Isolde, was unspoken. She had drawn aside the curtain 
 and was leaning toward the window, her dreamful eyes
 
 58 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 fixed on the outer darkness. Althea's mention of the 
 Newfield Bank, old John Harrimau's beaming face, the 
 ringing voice, the handsome magnetic presence of the 
 young banker all recalled to her the scene of the bank- 
 opening. Once more she heard his appealing words, once 
 more her soul responded. Impulsively she turned to 
 him. The words that had been on her lips earlier in the 
 evening, were now spoken. 
 
 "Speaking of your bank," she said, "I was present at 
 your inauguration. It was a coronation, and the king's 
 speech was royal ! Ever since, I have been wishing to 
 congratulate you." 
 
 The young man smiled. For more than one reason he 
 was well pleased. The girl's words, in themselves grati- 
 fying, solved the riddle of the earlier evening. He knew 
 now why she had said that he was not a stranger to her. 
 He suspected that he was even less a stranger to her than 
 she acknowledged. 
 
 "I am indeed a king," he whispered, as they rose from 
 the table, " since your words have crowned me. To wear 
 the crown royally shall be my endeavor if I may wear it 
 for your sake." 
 
 She blushed, and turned her face to the window. Althea 
 and his father had passed ahead. He stepped over the 
 sill, and without a word extended his hands. After an 
 instant's hesitation she followed him. A turn in the ve- 
 randa commanded a view of the mountains, from which 
 the breeze blew freshly. He took her wrap from her arm 
 and folded it about her. 
 
 "You will like it out here," he asserted. " In there we 
 were on the stage, in the glare of the footlights. Here, 
 behind the scenes, our parts played and the curtain rung 
 down, we can be our real selves. And the real self is al-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 59 
 
 ways the best self, is it not, Miss Sterling? Poor old 
 human nature is not such a bad lot, after all." 
 
 " Against whom are you defending it ? " she asked. 
 
 " Not against you, certainly. You idealize it, of course." 
 
 "I do not admit the ' of course,' Mr. Harriinan ! " 
 
 "Nor the ideals?" 
 
 " Ah, that depends ! " 
 
 He accepted the evasion, liking her the better for it. 
 She was not as transparent as he had supposed. Even 
 her simplicities were not without an instinctive subtle re- 
 serve born of vestal pride and purity. Over the night 
 swayed a waltz-strain. The leaves of the cottonwoods 
 rustled like fairy-feet pattering in time to it. The massive 
 shadow of the range, overhanging the starlit prairie like a 
 dark phantom, swayed like a living presence, as the nether 
 grass rippled in the breeze gentle of passage as an angel's 
 unseen wing. 
 
 " It is beautiful !" he assented, in answer to her de- 
 lighted exclamation. " Even I, to whom the scene in all 
 its aspects is an old, old story, am not insensible to its 
 spell. The eternal fascination of the mountains lies alike, 
 I think, in their strength and their repose. They are 
 Nature's counterpoise for human weakness and unrest. 
 We have distanced many a restless mood, my mare Lady- 
 bird and I, in a midnight gallop through the hush and 
 darkness. Can you fancy the dash from a sleepless bed 
 into the saddle, the wild gallop in face of the night-wind, 
 its hiss mingling with the muffled thud of gallant hoofs 
 speeding on, on, till the great crags close around one like 
 a god's strong arms? For an hour the cramp and suffo- 
 cation of finite individual existence are forgotten. One 
 draws breath : the race of life is ended, the goal attained ! 
 The hour passes with the midnight, but it leaves its mark
 
 GO A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 behind it. One is no longer a mere finite unit, but an 
 integral part of the infinite universal whole." 
 
 " Isolde ! " called Althea from the window, " I have been 
 searching everywhere for you. Are you not ready for 
 ' home, sweet home,' you moonstruck child ? " 
 
 " Quite ready, Althea," she answered. Nevertheless 
 she lingered for a moment. In that moment he took her 
 hand, and held it in both his own. 
 
 "You are going to your prayers," he said, in a wist- 
 ful voice, "and to your white, white dreams. Good- 
 night." 
 
 She did not answer him in words, but her lifted eyes 
 were eloquent. As he followed her to the carnage he 
 smiled at himself as well as her. 
 
 Both Druce and Dr. Keene had been attentive observers 
 of the little party in the supper-room alcove. When the 
 dancing was resumed, the doctor, who in flagrant disre- 
 gard of professional principles, had upset his digestion, 
 and consequently his temper, by indulgence in welsh rare- 
 bit and hard old ale, snatched his sombrero from its peg 
 in the hallway, and seizing Druce's arm, dragged him 
 down the stairs, heedless of the young minister's protests 
 against such unceremonious departure. 
 
 " Ceremony be hanged," ejaculated the doctor, loosing 
 his hold as they reached the street. " What conven- 
 tional obligations shall be imposed by a society which 
 tolerates such an asinine absurdity as a Shakespeare Club 
 Dance ? Heels against heads it is, indeed or would be, 
 were there any heads in the club save blockheads ! The 
 association of Marmaduke Sterling's daughter with such 
 a scene is worse than folly. Althea Rounds ought to be 
 horsewhipped for suffering it."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 61 
 
 "Miss Sterling seemed to be enjoying the evening," 
 remarked Druce, mischievously. 
 
 " Eu joy ing it ? " fumed the doctor. " That shows how 
 far your ministerial eyes see over a prayer-book. She 
 was shy, dazed, distressed by her incongruous surround- 
 ings, till that son of Old Harry changed the aspect of 
 things by his mere appearance. He is a splendid speci- 
 men of the human male animal," he admitted, grudging- 
 ly ; " strong and beautiful, and with the voice of the angel 
 Israfel dash him ! " 
 
 " Israfel ? " 
 
 " No, Harrirnan though, Hades knows, he is dashing 
 enough already ! He took that poor little girl by storm. 
 She could scarcely take her fascinated eyes from him. He 
 was doing the sentimental beautifully, and she swallowed 
 the sham for the divinest truth. He saw her innocent 
 credulity, and judged her by it ; but he will find out his 
 mistake. Her siege will be no easy one, even for him. 
 She will retreat the further into her vestal shrine the 
 nearer the violator approaches." 
 
 " Doctor," said Druce, shyly, " I beg your pardon if I 
 speak intrusively, but you have such a tender heart for 
 women, you should have a daughter of your own to guide 
 and watch over. It is a pity that you have not married." 
 
 There was a moment's silence. From the wind-stirred 
 cottonwoods the dews plashed to the ground with the 
 sound of falling tears. The doctor's voice, as he an- 
 swered, harmonized with them. 
 
 " My boy," he said, " in every lonely man's and woman's 
 life there is a pathetic story, not necessarily told to its 
 end sometimes but a mere suggestion ; yet traced on 
 the heart with the life-blood of youth, graven on the face 
 by bitter, secret tears shed in loneliness, in yearning, in
 
 C2 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 heartache always, in heartbreak often. Forty years ago 
 I called mine heartbreak. Life has taught me, since, that 
 the man's heart gets no further than the ache ; the break 
 is left for the woman's." 
 
 They had reached the parsonage. "Without a farewell 
 look or word the old man strode on. Turning into the 
 gate Druce rested his arms on its low, white post, and 
 watched him out of sight. Then his eyes lifted to the 
 high, still, starlit skies. 
 
 " My God ! my God ! " he murmured. " Then the 
 tears, the heartache, the heartbreak, are the common lot. 
 None escape it. None." 
 
 Over the heavens passed a sudden cloud. The shining 
 stars were shadowed. In the darkened waste before him 
 the young minister saw a vision, Gethsemane, its lonely 
 Figure prostrate in the Agony, the mute Eyes, eloquent 
 of pain and yearning unappeasable, fixed on Peter, His 
 disciple, who in the distance slept. A sob, the first, last 
 plaint, reproach, of His patient Passion, broke from His 
 anguished Heart. 
 
 " Could you not watch one hour with Me ? " 
 
 Loneliness, loneliness, the agony of God and man !
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ACROSS THE RUBICON. 
 
 The Ledge was a large white house which impressed 
 one at first sight as having been built on the instalment 
 plan. Nor did this appearance belie the truth. In the 
 pioneer days of the West, George Rounds, senior, had 
 lifted on its site, first his tent, then a rude pine-cabin, 
 and later, in more prosperous years, a small white cot- 
 tage, to which ell and story were added thereafter, as 
 need or whim suggested. In the hands of his only son, 
 Althea's husband, the house was transformed, as far as 
 the transformation-power of paint and upholstery ex- 
 tended, but the original structure remained unaltered. 
 
 Althea mourned over its winding stairways, its odd- 
 shaped rooms, and its omnipresent extensions ; but 
 Isolde rejoiced in the rambling halls with their shadowy 
 recesses, in the nooks and corners of the quaint cham- 
 bers, and in the deep windows jutting in all directions, 
 and commanding equally fine views of the pine-woods, 
 olive-amber in the sunshine, of the prairie sweeping like 
 a grass-waved, flower-fleeted sea, and of the purple- 
 misted mountains, whose jagged ledges stretching like 
 giant-arms in the direction of the house, gave it its name. 
 In fact, Isolde rejoiced in everything. There was noth- 
 ing in her new life that did not delight her. It held one 
 all-pervading, imperishable charm its contrast to the 
 old.
 
 C4- A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The season was an early one. Tiny white daisies and 
 blue anemones having budded out prematurely, declined 
 to be frightened back to cover by the occasional chill 
 winds sweeping back like farewell messages from the de- 
 parting winter ; and white field-lilies, following them in 
 acolyth-file, summoned with breeze-swayed fragrant cen- 
 sers all their flowery kin. Soon the land was one chame- 
 leon bed of bloom, whose every bewildering tint was 
 reflected in the overhanging mirror of skies ; and neither 
 bird nor bee held gayer carnival than Isolde. She was up 
 with the larks in the dewy, fresh, spring mornings, twit- 
 tering to the swallows that fluttered by her window, tril- 
 ling to the thrushes singing in shadow of the cottonwoods, 
 warbling her own little lay of life and youth and glad- 
 ness meanwhile, her voice but the echo of her singing 
 heart. She looked across the sunshine and wondered 
 that she had never before realized what a beautiful world 
 she lived in, what a perfect thing life was. She made 
 sweet little songs, spontaneous as the songs of the 
 thrushes, and sung them wandering knee-deep in the 
 flowered grasses ; quaint little prayers, unorthodox as 
 the matins of the swallows, and said them kneeling in 
 God's open fane. She took her little cousin Gaylord's 
 hands in hers, and danced about with him in wild, wide, 
 merry circles, shouting like a child for very joy of living 
 a joy as open and luminous for any eye to read as the 
 young spring sun shining on the prairie. 
 
 "It makes me glad to look at her," said Druce to Dr. 
 Keene, as they walked back together from a call at the 
 Ledge. 
 
 "Why," queried the doctor, whose responses defied all 
 rules of polite conversation, " why is joy so often more 
 pathetic than pain ? "
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 65 
 
 The reverend Druce gave it up. The doctor worked 
 out the problem in thoughtful silence. 
 
 She took long, delightful drives over the prairie ; half- 
 day canters through the pine-woods whose narrow paths, 
 winding in and out their dark recesses, brought her at 
 last to the base of the mountains, grassed and flowered on 
 their foothills, snow-crowned on their heights. She made 
 friends of the farm-hands working in the road-side fields, 
 and of the women and children living in the little cabins 
 of the mining settlement. Not infrequently she chanced 
 to meet the laughing, blue-eyed young farmer she had 
 favored at the club dance, who rode back with her to the 
 Ledge. Before her awakening human interests her old 
 visionary dreams and fancies vanished like starlight be- 
 fore the sun. She no longer wrote ; she lived. Her let- 
 ters were bubbling over with such exuberant spirits that 
 her mother read and re-read them, finding it difficult 
 to recognize her pale, quiet, dreamful Isolde, in the wild, 
 merry madcap whose dancing eyes and glowing face 
 laughed at her from every line. And indeed the girl did 
 not quite recognize herself. Spiritually and physically 
 there was a change. In truth she was maturing, soul and 
 body, as naturally as the hothouse-bud matures, trans- 
 planted to God's free soil. The luminousness of the 
 spring sunbeams, the warm virginal glow of the spring 
 bloom, were on her face ; the reflection not only of the 
 spring without but of the spring within the spring of 
 life, called Youth! 
 
 "With the dance of the Shakespeare Club the season of 
 Newfield's formal social entertainments virtually closed ; 
 a series of informal out-of-door merrymakings succeeding 
 them. During the day there were picnics in the woods 
 or by the river, or excursions to distant ranch or camp or
 
 66 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 farmhouse ; in the evening, riding or driving parties, and 
 gatherings of gay young folks on twilight lawns, for tennis 
 or croquet, followed, as night deepened, by impromptu 
 dances on piazzas, or in barns lighted by dim lanterns, or 
 perhaps only by the starlight streaming in through the 
 open doors. The Ledge, since Isolde's advent, had be- 
 come one of the favorite meeting-places of these sociable 
 young people. Althea alone had not been popular enough 
 to attract many informal callers, for which she had been 
 wont to thank her stars. There was a mystery about her 
 which Newfield resented, because it failed to solve it. 
 " You are ice and fire," Steele Harriman had said to her, 
 early in their acquaintance. " I see the ice, I feel the 
 fire ! " and though many had felt it with him, only he had 
 dared the words. That Althea had intended him to feel 
 it, he did not suspect at the time. No man reads a 
 woman quite through and through. To the frankest page 
 she holds him, there is always a reserve. 
 
 Since their parting on the club-house piazza on the 
 night of the dance, Isolde and the young banker had not 
 met. His father, however, almost nightly represented 
 him at the Ledge. He had taken a fancy to Isolde at the 
 club-supper, and had haunted her since, with the shame- 
 faced fidelity of a shy, but loving child. 
 
 " She sorter minds me o' mother ! " he confided to Al- 
 thea, one evening, explaining his sudden devotion to the 
 Ledge. " She's got a way wi' her, an' a look, soft an' 
 gentle an' lovin'-like, as is jest mother over again. An' 
 ye never know'd mother, Mis' Rounds ? Wai, now ! " 
 
 " Law me ! " his fellow-caller, Mrs. Holbrook, ejaculated 
 in Althea's ear ; " if ever woman led a man by the nose, 
 Winifred Steele did John Harriman. She warn't any 
 great things as ever I see, an' she carried on flighty enough
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 67 
 
 before she made her market. She warn't nuthin' to boast 
 of as a church- member, nuther, but went flitterin' about, 
 hither an' yon, with no hold nowheres. But he allers 
 held as how the sun riz and set on her, an' none dared 
 say to the differ. If only other husbands was like him ! " 
 sighed Mrs. Holbrook, reproachfully shaking her head at 
 her disconcerted spouse, who twirled his thumbs in pro- 
 test ; " but law me, they ain't, they ain't ! " 
 
 Old John Harriman, needless to say, did not overhear 
 this whisper. Had he heard it, he would not have under- 
 stood it. "Mother " was, as indeed she always had been 
 in his eyes, a heavenly angel. Earth could not sully, be- 
 cause it could not reach, her pure white wings. 
 
 Blue-eyed Jack arrived as his parents departed. " They 
 are going to make a call and so am I ! " he explained, 
 radiantly. " Miss Sterling, I am always making a call, 
 nowadays, and thereby hangs a tale." 
 
 "Do not tell it yet, Jack," warned Althea. 
 
 Isolde laughed with them, in innocent unconsciousness 
 of the innuendo. Why she laughed she did not think to 
 ask herself. Life, of late, was one long laugh to her. 
 Old John Harriman smiled in sympathy. 
 
 "Jest ye two go on sparkiu', same's if I warn't here," he 
 entreated. " Let young folkses be young folkses 's my 
 motto ! Us old people's hed our day, eh, Mis' Rounds ? " 
 
 Althea had the making of a modern fashionable woman 
 in her, and considered not only that her day was not over, 
 but that, her marriage notwithstanding, it had not yet 
 begun. Her response was somewhat curt, in consequence. 
 Jack hurled himself into the breach. 
 
 "Someone has said that ' only the old know how to be 
 young,'" he quoted. "Mr. Harriman, we appeal to you 
 to share with us your secret of eternal youth."
 
 68 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " T\i secret o' youth is love," answered the old man, 
 his eyes fixed on a vision of " mother." 
 
 " Love ? Hurrah ! I am young forever ! " shouted 
 Jack, boyishly tossing up his cap and catching it again, 
 darting an eloquent glance at Isolde during the ma- 
 noeuvre. 
 
 " And happiness, do you not think, Mr. Harriman ? " 
 added Isolde. " One feels so young when one is happy. 
 At least I do ! " 
 
 " But love presupposes happiness. O, do admit it, Miss 
 Sterling ! " pleaded Jack. " If it does not ' Alas, poor 
 Yorick ! ' " 
 
 He struck an attitude of such woe-begone dejection that 
 she could not but smile, though she answered earnest!}'. 
 
 "I read somewhere," she said, " that love and pain are 
 synonyms. But I suppose this can be true only of the 
 selfish love that fails to forget self in others." 
 
 "In another, you mean, Isolde," corrected Althea. 
 "Your plural sounds like Mormonism." 
 
 " But I mean my plural," the girl insisted, " and so, I 
 am sure, did Mr. Hairiman. Love of God and of all 
 God's creation is the love of which I spoke. He was not 
 thinking of the circumscribed love of two." 
 
 " / was," confessed Jack, impenitently. 
 
 "You are an overgrown baby," retorted Isolde. " You 
 could not think a serious thought if you tried." 
 
 " Could I not ? " he asked, with sudden earnestness. 
 
 There was a moment's silence. The twilight of earth 
 had deepened into night ; the darkness of heaven bright- 
 ened into stars. From the distance sounded the thud of 
 hoofs. Old John Harriman looked eagerly toward the 
 cross-roads. 
 
 "Them's Ladybird's hoofs," he said. "I'd know 'em
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 69 
 
 in a herd o' steer. My son Steele's a-comin'. He'd Lev 
 come long before, only that he's be'n diggin' away like a 
 miner, day an' night. He's bound ter make th' bank a 
 success, an' he's jest doin' it. It's far an' away ahead 
 already of any private bank 'twixt here an' 'Frisco ! " 
 
 Jack rose. 
 
 " I must tear myself away," he said. " Mother gave 
 me some orders for town. I was hoping that Miss Ster- 
 ling would drive in with me but of course, if Harriman 
 is coming " 
 
 " No commission for me, I suppose, Mrs. Rounds? " he 
 asked, as he made his adieux. 
 
 "Yes," whispered Althea, in quick assent. "Take 
 Isolde as far as the gate with you, and show her that 
 you can be serious. I wish you to leave a good impres- 
 sion." 
 
 " I'll try," he said, with a fervently grateful glance. He 
 did not know that her kindness was due to her desire that 
 the young banker should be greeted, as he reached the 
 Ledge, by the sight of Isolde and Jack, hand in hand to- 
 gether. 
 
 John Harriman had not been mistaken. His son had 
 just reached the cross-roads. There he halted and hesi- 
 tated. The temptation to turn to the Ledge was strong, 
 and for this very reason he took a proud pleasure in resist- 
 ing it. 
 
 Of a sudden, however, his hesitation ended. He had 
 caught sight of the two figures sauntering down the 
 Ledge path, and even in the semi - darkness recognized 
 them. With a muttered exclamation he gave Ladybird 
 her head. As he galloped nearer he saw Jack take 
 Isolde's hand. She turned a flushed, shyly smiling face 
 to greet him as he dismounted. The flush was not for
 
 70 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Jack, but he did not know it. He saluted both somewhat 
 gravely, and lingered over the act of hitching Ladybird. 
 When he reached the gate Jack was driving down the 
 road, and Isolde was alone. 
 
 She was looking very fair and girlish in her simple 
 gown, whose folds followed the graceful curves of her 
 figure. He bared his head as he reached her, but did not 
 take her hand. He resented, with a boyish, unreasonable 
 bitterness. Jack's clasp of it. 
 
 " My father is here, I believe ? " he asked. 
 
 She answered gently, but with a sudden keen sense of 
 disappointment. In the little hour in which this man and 
 she had met and parted, the possibility had suggested it- 
 self of a sweeter, more intimate companionship than life 
 had yet opened to her. But the possibility had not yet 
 been, and now in his averted eyes and indifferent voice 
 she seemed to read that it would never be fulfilled. She 
 was conscious less of her disappointment than of its effect. 
 She felt suddenly chilled, reserved, repellent as well as 
 repelled. It was a strange mood for gentle Isolde. The 
 young man looked at her tell-tale face curiously. He 
 missed a certain simple joyousness which had been in it 
 when she greeted him. Perhaps it had followed Jack 
 Holbrook down the star -lit road, he told himself, sav- 
 agely. Suddenly their eyes met and held each other. 
 Through their clear windows soul questioned soul, and 
 albeit mutely, the answer came. In that brief instant of 
 silent communion, their acquaintance grew as it could 
 not have grown in months of conventional converse. A 
 Rubicon had been passed, but its name, its import, they 
 knew not. Toward the goal that lay beyond it they 
 pressed with heedless feet 
 
 " A new moon, good people," announced Althea, break-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 71 
 
 ing the silence that had fallen on them. u When I was a 
 girl I used to wish on every new moon for a lover. After 
 many moons he came. The moral is Isolde, I leave you 
 to answer ! " 
 
 The girl hesitated. Such flippant treatment of what 
 to her unsophisticated heart seemed a hallowed subject, 
 struck her as coarse, even revolting. She had forgotten, 
 for the moment, to what unhappy end Althea's love- 
 episode had tended, or her distress would have been 
 greater, but Althea believed her to be thinking of it, and 
 felt resentfully intent upon torturing her. 
 
 " The moral, my dear," she insisted. 
 
 Steele hastened to her relief. 
 
 " You are behind the times, Mrs. Rounds," he said, "in 
 spite of that er diminutive telescope through which 
 you struck awe into the heart of Newfield, at the club 
 dance. The moral is no longer for the Young Person. 
 She discards it." 
 
 " In favor of the immoral ? " asked Althea. " I call that 
 hard on Isolde." 
 
 " Upon second thoughts I retract the title," he said. 
 " It is not appropriate. Miss Sterling is not at all repre- 
 sentative of the Young Person." 
 
 "You are not representative of the Young Person, 
 Isolde, " laughed Althea. " The logical corollary is too 
 unflattering to put into words. The slur upon your mor- 
 als might be forgiven : the slur upon your -youth, never, 
 as you are a woman ! " 
 
 " Miss Sterling understands me," said Steele, with a 
 significant look into the shy eyes smiling up at him. 
 
 "If she does," retorted Althea, sharply, "she under- 
 stands more than the Young Person should." 
 
 He did not answer in words, but across the darkness
 
 72 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 their eyes met. As lie looked away, at last, Althea 
 changed the subject. 
 
 The crescent moon was rising. It shed no light as yet, 
 but shone with concentrated radiance within its dark sky- 
 setting. Its line was perpendicular it held no rain, John 
 Harriman said ; and close beside it shone the watchful 
 star which is ever faithful in its vigil. Isolde's eyes were 
 fixed upon it. Her woman's heart seemed to read its 
 mission of patient faith and love and service. Steele, 
 looking into her uplifted eyes, lost himself for a moment 
 in their blue depths. Were they blue, by the way, or 
 violet, or only a deep blue-gray ? And their soft lumi- 
 nousness was it their natural light, or only the reflected 
 glory of the vestal moon's white radiance ? 
 
 "You look prayerful," he said to her, suddenly. "Are 
 the stars, to your eyes, the ' little chinks of heaven ' your 
 fellow-poet calls them ? " 
 
 " Surely you cannot mean to imply that Colorado is not 
 1 high as heaven ' itself ? " she replied, mischievously. 
 
 " Ah ! So the natives have been spinning their yarns of 
 altitude, and you, a new-comer to Colorado, have breath 
 enough left to laugh at them. Evidently, heights are 
 your natural plane. And speaking of our rare atmos- 
 phere, Miss Sterling, do you know that its physical effects 
 upon the unacclirnated are not half as wonderful as the 
 occasional spiritual phenomena exhibited in the born 
 mountaineer? An incident came to my notice to-day 
 which I hesitate to relate, it is so incredible, naturally 
 considered. But you will consider it poetically, so I may 
 venture to confide it" 
 
 A sudden impulse had seized him to show himself at 
 his best to this pure-eyed girl, in whose presence, in spite 
 of himself, he felt a reverence which no other woman had
 
 A SOW OF ESAU. 73 
 
 evoked. He knew that the story he had to tell would touch 
 her ; he knew that he could tell it well He possessed 
 an eloquence of voice which set off his eloquence of words 
 as the music the lines of a song. He had taken off his 
 hat, and his handsome head was outlined in relief against 
 the vine-shadowed trellis. In his easy unconscious pose 
 he suggested a gladiator at rest, his noble physique pre- 
 senting the grace of passive power, which, to a feminine 
 eye, is the most irresistible of all masculine attractions. 
 
 "In our county asylum," he began, "was a blind girl 
 born of parents who emigrated from the southern ranges 
 mountaineers for generations back. A year ago her 
 strength began to fail, and as death approached she grew 
 more and more restless. She could not ' die without see- 
 ing it,' was her constant cry, though she never specified 
 her soul's desire. A few hours before her death, which 
 occurred some days ago, she awakened to sight, the poor 
 blind eyes illumined by an ante-heavenly light. One ex- 
 pected to witness rapture at the sudden revelation, but her 
 eyes betrayed only disappointment, yearning, distress. 
 The sight of her mother's face caused her only a faint 
 pleasure, the reflection of her own but passing interest. 
 She was lifted to the window it looked across the prairie 
 to the town ; she only shook her head. At the further 
 end of the ward was a western window, commanding a 
 view of the mountains, towering that sunlit afternoon 
 like gold-throned, purple-robed monarchs crowned with 
 glistening snow. One glance, and her face was transfig- 
 ured. It had been plain even to ugliness : it was sud- 
 denly beautiful with the glory of a triumphant soul. All 
 at once the light faded from her eyes, the lids closed over. 
 'I have seen it,' she cried. And sunk back, dead! " 
 
 " Poor creetur," murmured old John Harriman, "but
 
 74 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 she's better'r off, better'r off ! Wai, now ! Ter think as 
 she's wi' mother." 
 
 The little group sauntered down the path in silence. 
 As Steele reached the gate his mare strained toward him, 
 whinnying softly. She was a beautiful creature, powerful, 
 but graceful as a small head, arched crest, clean limbs, 
 and slanting shoulders could make her ; roan in color, 
 with sheeny, satiny hide. 
 
 " O you pet, you darling, you beauty ! " cooed Isolde, 
 caressing the soft nose gently rubbed against her. 
 
 " Would you not like to ride her, Isolde ? " asked 
 Althea. 
 
 The question, unsuspected by Isolde, was a challenge. 
 Steele chose to accept it. 
 
 "Ladybird is not a lady's mount," he said, "but I 
 have a bay, swift as the wind, gentle as a baby, which I 
 shall be most happy to offer Miss Sterling if I may." 
 
 " Certainly," tantalized Althea. " It is a man's privilege 
 to 'offer.'" 
 
 " And a woman's to accept " laughed Isolde, veiling her 
 blushing face in the mare's silky mane. 
 
 "Thank you, Miss Sterling," said Steele, a flash of 
 gratification in his eyes. "Since you agree with me, I 
 can afford to leave Mrs. Rounds to her theory that a 
 woman's privilege is to reject." 
 
 " Scarcely her privilege ; only her wiser alternative ! " 
 retorted Althea, over her shoulder.
 
 CHAPTEK VII. 
 
 THE COST AND THE PAIN. 
 
 It was characteristic of the young banker that he did 
 not hasten to claim the fulfilment of Isolde's promise. 
 Possibly he claimed it the less promptly because in his 
 heart of hearts he was conscious of impatience at the self- 
 imposed delay. Nearly a fortnight had elapsed since his 
 call at the Ledge, when he rode up to the gate at night- 
 fall, leading a second mare, a small, sleek bay, by the 
 rein. 
 
 Isolde met him as he dismounted, her hands full of 
 sugar. Althea followed, carrying her gauntlets and rid- 
 ing-crop. The thought struck the young man that the 
 respective burdens were appropriately apportioned. As 
 she stood off, taking admiring note of the bay mare's 
 points, ' t he made a somewhat similar inventory of her own. 
 He liked her trim dark habit with its suggestion of snowy 
 linen at throat and wrists ; the coquettish poise of the 
 little derby on her fair head ; her neat, high riding-boots, 
 her soft tan gauntlets, her sturdy crop. Every graceful 
 curve of her girlish figure was outlined by the severe, 
 close-fitting habit, above which glowed her vivid face, like 
 a warm-hued picture from a sombre frame. As her foot 
 rested in his hand, he noticed the lithe spring of its ball 
 from his palm, and the curve of the high arched instep. 
 Handing her the rein, he caught a breath of the same 
 sweet fragrance that he had noticed about her on the
 
 7G A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 night of the club-dance. Nothing escaped him ; all 
 pleased him. As they turned from the Ledge he threw 
 an eloquent backward glance at Althea ; but she did not 
 see it She was leaning on the gate, with her face toward 
 them ; but her eyes were fixed thoughtfully, almost sadly, 
 on the ground. 
 
 The evening was one of the perfect evenings met in the 
 West, at the season when, while the winter snows still 
 linger on the mountains, spring, youthful on the hills, 
 seems to mature in the valley, thrilled with the premoni- 
 tion of approaching passioned June. The breath of a 
 recent shower was on the air, its dew-like drops still 
 sparkling on the fresh young grass. In the east, the 
 sapphire sky was darkening ; the sun's red disc was sink- 
 ing in the west. Over the mountains the night-mists 
 curled and colored, brushed by the sunset's radiating 
 wing. The gurgle of the Freshet waters blended with the 
 murmur of the wind through the cottonwoods. From 
 their half-built nests in the tree-tops piped the vespering 
 birds of spring. 
 
 " How do you like her gait ?" he asked, as they halted 
 after a trial canter. 
 
 " It is perfect ! " eulogized Isolde. " The saddle is 
 like a cradle. And, by the way, what a handsome saddle 
 it is ! I seem to have a more secure seat than in Al- 
 thea's." 
 
 " You like the third horn. It lessens the fatigue of a 
 ride, and insures a firm seat. When you are an experi- 
 enced horsewoman, however, you will not need it. Does 
 the slipper-stirrup suit you ? It is the safer style for a 
 woman. In case of a throw, there is no danger of being 
 dragged." 
 
 " I prefer to hear that there is no danger of a throw,"
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 77 
 
 slie laughed. " I may as well confess it here and now, 
 Mr. Harriman, physical courage is not my strong point." 
 
 " Suppose we test it by a race to the cross-roads ? You 
 are certain that everything is quite secure? Then, one, 
 two, three, and off ! " 
 
 They galloped side by side over the level road. As the 
 wind whistled by them, the air seemed filled with flash- 
 ing crystals. Myriad sparks danced and coruscated be- 
 fore Isolde's eyes. Laughing and panting, with rose-red 
 cheeks and glowing parted lips, she reached the goal, and 
 wheeling her mare about, faced Ladybird, struggling 
 against the check that held her a neck's length behind. 
 As he rode up, Steele bared his head. 
 
 " Hail to the victor ! " he said. 
 
 " Oh, but that was not a noble victory ! " she protested. 
 " You held Ladybird in." 
 
 " I never give her her head," he evaded. " She always 
 feels the curb. Eh, old girl ? " stroking her arched neck 
 fondly. 
 
 The mare turned her head, and responded to the rare 
 caress with limpid, loving eyes. 
 
 The silence of night had fallen, broken only by the reg- 
 ular thud of the mares' hoofs falling like muffled drum- 
 beats on the ground. Into the sky flashed the sentinel 
 stars, ranging for midnight muster. In the roadside-grass 
 the locusts were chirping loudly, heralding, so says the 
 legend, the summer's warm approach. 
 
 Of a sudden the hush was broken, not as the young 
 man had proposed that his words should break it but by 
 the sound of hoofs speeding toward them, urged on by 
 shouts and cheers. The road into which they had turned 
 was hedged in by pine and brush. Its only open outlet lay 
 a mile or moi'e ahead, the one behind them being cut off
 
 78 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 by their pursuers. As Ladybird pricked up her ears and 
 began to champ on the bit, he suddenly caught the bay's 
 rein, and urged both horses to a fierce gallop. A glance 
 at Isolde's startled face and swaying form, however, as 
 their speed increased, showed him that the wild pace 
 could not be sustained. Altering his intention, he turned 
 the mares' heads, facing about to meet the advancing 
 ridei*s. Visions of Indians, with warwhoop and tomahawk, 
 of masked road-agents, armed with cocked revolvers, 
 of riotous cowboys, bent on a night's wild spree, flitted 
 before Isolde's mental eyes. Happily, her suspense was 
 but brief. In a swirl of dust and babel of sound, the 
 riders galloped up, proving to be the merry young people 
 of the neighborhood, whose social custom it was, on even- 
 ings when no indoor pleasure claimed them, to ride to a 
 common meeting-place, whence they set out in couples 
 for a canter into the country. These parties, in spite 
 of fine horse-flesh and splendid riding, presented to the 
 Eastern eye a somewhat unique appearance. The men, 
 as a rule, wore sombreros, and gaudy neck-scarfs with 
 flying ends ; the girls were partial to jerseys of brilliant 
 colors, and to caps or hats of unconventional styles. 
 Gold neck-chains hung with elaborate pendants were 
 likewise prominent features of their toilets. Isolde's se- 
 verely plain habit, indeed, was looked down upon by the 
 native feminine eye perhaps the more scornfully be- 
 cause the masculine eye proved prone to look up to it 
 Not the habit, however, but the girl inside the habit, was 
 the attraction. 
 
 As the present party bore down upon them, hallooing a 
 noisy greeting, Steele lifted his hand and waved them 
 back imperatively. The spirited mares were almost be- 
 yond his control.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 79 
 
 " Fools ! " he exclaimed, angrily, " You seem to over- 
 look the fact that I have a lady with me," he called out, 
 riding toward them as they slackened their pace in obedi- 
 ence to his gesture. 
 
 " No, we overlooked the fact that the lady had you with 
 her," retorted one of the leaders. "Miss Sterling is 
 the attraction, not you, Harriman." 
 
 "Miss Sterling would prefer not to be ridden down, 
 even as a token of admiration," he replied, surlily. He 
 was annoyed not only that the girl had been startled, 
 but also by the intrusion. He had encountered these 
 parties before, under somewhat similar circumstances, 
 and foresaw that the pleasure of his ride was at an 
 end. 
 
 " I was not frightened," Isolde said, striving to assuage 
 his resentment, "and they meant kindly. Please say 
 nothing more ; and I think you may trust me with my 
 reins now. She seems quite quiet." 
 
 He had forgotten that he still held the bay's bridle, 
 and released it with a word of apology. Milly Hunter 
 rode to the front just in time to observe the little inci- 
 dent. 
 
 " In leading-strings already ? " she asked, audaciously. 
 "But the strings were in the wrong hands, weren't 
 they ? Take my advice, and don't be led by any man, 
 Miss Sterling. The strings turn to chains in his 
 hands." 
 
 "In his hands," emphasized her echo, from the rear. 
 
 Steele saw Isolde flush, and caught a gleam of indig- 
 nant pride in her gentle eyes. 
 
 " Shut up, Milly," he said with familiar rudeness ; " and 
 do not let us interrupt your ride. Miss Sterling and I 
 are not going your way."
 
 80 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Of course not," rallied Milly's escort. "Who would 
 go our way, in your place, Harrirnan '? " 
 
 " Life is fleeting, youth is brief, 
 Love is only a springtime leaf ; 
 Bud of April, bloom of May, 
 Dead ere the Summer's first June day." 
 
 As the rollicking voice died away, the party caught up 
 the chorus. 
 
 " Bud of April, bloom of May, 
 Pluck and wear, ere it fades away. 
 Ah ! how fleeting, ah ! how brief ; 
 Love is only a springtime leaf." 
 
 At another time the rude jests would not have annoyed 
 the young man, but at the present moment, he resented 
 them with disproportionate bitterness. Without a glance 
 at the girl beside him, he knew instinctively that she was 
 shrinking from him. His anger grew no less as Jack 
 Holbrook came riding out of the ranks toward her. Hap- 
 pily his face was in shadow, or its tell-tale scowl would 
 have evoked further witticism. 
 
 " I called at the Ledge, but Harriman had the advan- 
 tage of me," Jack was saying to Isolde, as he saluted her. 
 " On my way back I fell in with the party, but I am not 
 enjoying it at all." 
 
 " No ? Why not ? " asked Isolde. 
 
 His boyish face flushed. He answered with averted 
 eyes, lashing the roadside grass with his whip, as he 
 spoke. 
 
 " O, I don't care for these romping parties any more ! " 
 he said. " I surmise I've outgrown them. I'm outgrow- 
 ing everything that is not one thing, nowadays."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 81 
 
 " ' Everything that is not one thing,' you incoherent 
 boy ! " she laughed, without a suspicion of his meaning. 
 " And pray what is the one thing ? " 
 
 " May I really tell you, some time? " he asked, eagerly, 
 flushing up to his girlish blue eyes as he spoke. 
 
 Steele turned to Isolde. 
 
 " Perhaps we had better turn back," he said. " I think 
 you will not enjoy riding with the party. The mare will 
 be restless." 
 
 As the party rode on, Milly Hunter, wheeling about 
 with a laugh, called to Jack, over her shoulder. 
 
 " Going to play gooseberry, Jack ? " she asked. 
 
 " Gooseberry, Jack ? " queried Cilly. 
 
 " Don't be a spoil-sport, Jackie dear," implored Miss 
 Linnett. "Come back where you'll be welcome." 
 
 Isolde turned to him with a bright flush on her cheeks. 
 
 " Will you do me the favor to ride back with us ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 He looked at Steele, and hesitated. 
 
 " I wish it," she said. 
 
 Without a word he turned with her, followed by the 
 laughs and jeers of the mischievous observers. 
 
 Steele stared straight before him with sullen eyes. The 
 ride was spoiled for him, nevertheless he acknowledged that 
 neither Isolde nor Jack was at fault. The blame lay with 
 the brainless, malicious boors and fools behind them. 
 Could they not see that this girl was different from them, 
 unused to their coarse "chaff," and outraged by it? 
 Would she judge him by his social associations ? Behind 
 clenched teeth, he swore that she should not. The party 
 had galloped out of sight. A road, a branch of the high- 
 way, trailed like a ribbon through the prairie toward them. 
 As they reached it Jack halted, and lifted his hat.
 
 82 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " I think I must say good-evening here," he said. " I 
 have some commissions for town, and it is getting late. If 
 you are not engaged for to-morrow evening, Miss Ster- 
 ling, I should like to take you for a spin behind my new 
 sorrels." 
 
 "With great pleasure," accepted Isolde, cordially. 
 " Thank you." 
 
 She looked after him as he rode away, nodding over 
 her shoulder to him. 
 
 " He is not quite his usual bright self to-night," she 
 said, as he rode out of sight " I think he is such a dear 
 boy, do not you ? " 
 
 Steele's eyes twinkled. 
 
 " I did not think so a moment ago," he admitted, " but 
 distance lends enchantment. He's not half a bad fellow 
 a mile away." 
 
 Her smile in response to his was somewhat con- 
 strained. She was not quite sure of the meaning his 
 words were intended to convey to her. Gallant innuen- 
 does from admiring young men were a novelty to her. 
 She had not yet learned how to parry them. 
 
 " After all," he said, turning a sudden keen glance upon 
 her, "he is not such a boy. He is six or seven and 
 twenty. It is never safe to rely too much upon the boy- 
 ishness of a young man." 
 
 " O, but he seems such a boy," she insisted, " always 
 so light-hearted and happy ! I cannot fancy him a man, 
 taking life gravely and earnestly. I suppose his is what 
 is called a ' sunny ' disposition. All his days are golden 
 days. A happy fate, is it not ? " 
 
 " Very, while it lasts," he replied. " Unless I mistake, 
 however, his golden days are numbered." 
 
 " O, why do you say that ? "
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 83 
 
 " If I told you why, you would not forgive me. The 
 case is one of circumstantial evidence, which you would 
 refuse to accept as proof. Holbrook, by the way, is not 
 a bad specimen of the native type of youth. But, of 
 course, you know the type by this time, not only gener- 
 ally, but individually. One has to know everyone in this 
 primitive social region." 
 
 "Primitive? Yes," she admitted, "since it has not 
 yet outgrown the primal creed of universal human broth- 
 erhood, as taught by Christ." 
 
 "I bow to the rebuke, Miss Sterling." 
 
 " I was not presuming to rebuke you, Mr. Harriman. 
 I simply spoke my thought. Your West, socially, is such 
 a beautiful contrast to my East, where anyone outside of 
 the little sphere of capitalized Society is left, socially 
 speaking, in isolation. I speak, who know, because I was 
 one of the isolated." 
 
 " By your own choice, of course," he said, somewhat 
 embarrassed by her frankness. 
 
 " No, by Hobsou's choice," she laughed, " but my iso- 
 lation did not hurt me. Only now and then the suspicion 
 came to me that something was lacking in my life a 
 sweet something, which it was sad and wrong that a 
 young life should miss. What that sweet something was, 
 your West revealed to me, when it opened my book of 
 life at the page Humana." 
 
 He listened to her with increasing interest. Her sim- 
 plicity at once amused and touched him. How charming 
 her childish confessions were ; how piquant, how pathetic ! 
 She was speaking of having missed something in her life. 
 Of a sudden he felt an extraordinary, irrational impulse to 
 cry out to her that up to this moment he, too, had missed 
 something that he must miss it forever, if she if she
 
 84 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 his thought went no farther, "but incomplete as it was, he 
 saw that its betrayal in his face had startled her. She 
 was suddenly self-conscious. He averted his eyes, and 
 replied earnestly. 
 
 " Its social aspect aside," he said, " life in a great 
 metropolis like New York must be an inspiration, a stim- 
 ulant,' an incentive ; while country-life is a clog. In the 
 one a man lives ; in the other he only exists. Counti*y- 
 life is still-life ; city-life, action ; and it takes action, 
 friction, competition, to develop human life to its 
 highest and fullest extent. The mere atmosphere of 
 the great city is stimulating. The great smoke-puffing 
 chimneys, the immense factories swarming with hu- 
 man life, and pulsating like living creatures, with their 
 mighty cogs and wheels ; the rush of aerial traffic ; the 
 street-cars sweeping along their tracks ; the carriages 
 rolling over the pavements ; the rattle of carts and 
 wagons ; the whistle and roar of engines speeding by 
 with their living freight above all, the mighty human 
 concourse coming and going, crowding and jostling, 
 meeting and passing by day and night all act like a 
 spur upon the human animal, and start him on the race ! 
 The race for the goal of Finance, the race for the goal 
 of Politics the rival powers that with more than auto- 
 cratic pride, more than royal pomp and splendor, rule 
 our American Republic of to-day. Politics sits the 
 throne, but Finance holds the court and palace ! The 
 great financial enterprises of the day allure with dazzling, 
 irresistible attraction. The splendid whir of Specula- 
 tion's golden wheel draws one toward it impellently as 
 the whirlpool draws the spar. It holds unlimited scope 
 for energies, stimulation for lassitude, Nepenthe for 
 unrest action, excitement, risk. Politics for maturity I
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 85 
 
 Finance, with its golden ensign, is the glittering god of 
 youth ! " 
 
 He waved his cap with an excited triumphant gesture. 
 His eyes flashed, his voice rang out exultantly. Isolde 
 sighed. A premonition had come to her girlish heart 
 of the defeat and failure to which such wild ambition as 
 this man avowed, was fore-doomed. 
 
 To the social isolation of her solitary young life she 
 had confessed quite simply, not suspecting that the pain 
 of it, which her dreamful soul had but dimly recognized, 
 was fully comprehended by the young banker. A social 
 need, formerly unrealized, but felt somewhat bitterly, of 
 late a need of sympathetic and congenial companion- 
 ship, of refined social associations not exclusively mascu- 
 line, explained, he now told himself, the disproportionate 
 charm and influence which his intercourse with Isolde 
 was gradually assuming. That he was attracted by her 
 he could not but realize. Had she attracted him after the 
 natural manner, as he miscalled it, of girls of other types, 
 he would have yielded with the half-contemptuous pleas- 
 ure with which men do yield to influences which touch 
 the lowest, not the highest, in them. It was because she 
 touched his highest that he resisted her spell. On the 
 Saturday evening following his ride with her he took the 
 " flyer " for Denver, there to " make a night of it," a fleshly 
 tonic of which he felt in need. In fact, he made two 
 nights and a day of it, and cursed himself for a fool at 
 their end. A deeper plunge of the kind might have re- 
 sulted as he desired, but when too late he realized that 
 the surface-dip was a mistake. It intensified the fever it 
 had been intended to calm. In characteristic defiance he 
 turned back to the Ledge. 
 
 Formerly, the young banker's frequent visits to the
 
 86 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Ledge had evoked the general verdict that George Rounds 
 was a fool. Now they evoked only the whisper that Althea 
 Rounds was a clever woman. As she had once smiled her 
 defiance of the first verdict, so she now smiled her indif- 
 ference to the second. Not by little Newfield was Althea 
 to be turned out of her elected way. 
 
 To do Althea justice, her way was not the openly match- 
 making one that feminine Newfield suspected. To this, 
 Steele Harriman's lowering brow bore frequent testimony. 
 It was Althea's bitter delight to make his proud brow 
 lower. She developed a perfect genius for assigning 
 Isolde to Jack Holbrook, when both young men approached 
 her on equal grounds ; for recollecting hitherto unmen- 
 tioned engagements, and hurrying off the girl to fulfil 
 them, at any and every hour of the young banker's ap- 
 pearance. The little contradictions did no harm perhaps 
 they were intended to do none. They challenged both 
 his vanity and the proud imperiousness of his despotic 
 nature : they kept his interest on the qui vive, and were like 
 narcotics to Isolde's unconsciously awakening sensitive- 
 ness. In spite of Althea's manoeuvres, their acquaintance 
 grew. Steele Harrimau had sworn that it should grow. 
 
 As is inevitably the case when two congenial young 
 persons are thrown much into each other's society, their 
 intercourse became familiar, even intimate ; their talk, 
 personal. Not all at once, deliberately, but little by 
 little, in impulsive slips and snatches, Steele told the girl 
 his life as far as he chose to tell it : of his childhood, 
 free, untrammelled, in its primitive surroundings, as the 
 flight of a young eaglet along the mountain-peaks ; of his 
 boyhood, daring, reckless, exuberant, a riotous revel of con- 
 scious life and youth and animal strength and spirits. He 
 told her of his youth, of books, companions, ideals, of spirit-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 87 
 
 ual forces that weakened with the mental, to grapple with 
 the material ones leaping strong-limbed from the cradle 
 of youthful, vigorous, healthful human years ; of the bat- 
 tles fought between soul and body, when physical Nature, 
 Nature the Force, the Evolver ; Nature the Cause, the Ef- 
 fect the Infinite Whole of which his individual human 
 nature was but a finite unit part, cried to him, " / am 
 soul, I am mind, I am body ! Of me all is conceived, of 
 me brought forth ; to me all shall come back ! Of me 
 is time : in me is eternity ! I am life, I am death ! I am 
 the creator, I am the destroyer ! I am the beginning, I am 
 the end I " Ho told her of the maturer years, when, the 
 materialistic phase outlived, he had lost himself in the con- 
 templation of human source and issue ; of life finite and in- 
 finite ; of its human brevity, its spiritual immortality ; of 
 the riddle of existence, of the divine and human solutions ; 
 of the doubt, the dark, the chaos that lay between. He 
 told her of the four voices, wakening one by one to solve 
 life's questions for him ; the voices of Soul, and Mind, and 
 Heart, and Body. 
 
 " God," cries the voice of the Soul, " God Who was be- 
 fore us, God Who will be after us ! 
 
 " God the One, God the Only ! 
 
 "God the Creator, God the Life-Giver, God the De- 
 stroyer ! 
 
 " All save God is nothing ; and nothing is, save God ! 
 
 "To live for God, to die for God this is life, this is 
 death ; this is humanity, this is immortality ! 
 
 " For God, and God alone ! " cries the Soul. 
 
 "Lore ! " cries the voice of the Mind. "Lore, the resur- 
 rection of the past ; lore, the immortality of the present ; 
 lore, the revelation of the future !
 
 88 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "Lore, the omniscience; lore, the omnipresence ; lore, 
 the eternal ! 
 
 " All save lore is a myth ; all save lore is falsehood ; lore 
 alone is reality ; lore alone is truth ! 
 
 " Lore is the apocalypse of God, lore is the evidence of 
 man ! 
 
 " Lore is the solution of all, lore is the revealer of all ! 
 
 "Lore is all," cries the Mind. 
 
 " Life ! " cries the voice of the Body. " Young, sweet, 
 rapturous human life ! 
 
 " The life of the flesh, the life of the blood, the life of 
 the senses ! 
 
 " There was nothing before life, there will be nothing 
 after life ! Life is the beginning, life is the end ! 
 
 "Drain all earth's nectar, breathe all earth's fragrance, 
 hearken all earth's song ! Satiate the flesh with all sweet 
 fleshly pleasures ; brim the blood with all sweet sensual 
 human draughts ! this is the one life this is the only 
 life! 
 
 " Life ! life ! life ! " cries the Body. 
 
 " Love ! " cries the voice of the Heart." Love the Divine, 
 love the human, love the Divine-human ! 
 
 "In love God created us, in love Christ redeemed us. 
 
 "In love we are begotten, in love we are brought 
 forth ! 
 
 " In human love's successive stages filial, fraternal, 
 friendly, philanthropical, romantic, conjugal, parental, we 
 live. 
 
 " In Divine Love, the first love, the last love, we die ! 
 
 " Love is God ! Love is lore ! lore is life ! 
 
 " Love ! Love ! Love ! " cries the Heart
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 89 
 
 And so, like four strong foes, they tilt at each other ; 
 and the Heart stabs the Mind, and the Mind stabs the 
 Soul, and the Soul stabs the Body, and the Body stabs all 
 three ! 
 
 He told her of a man's first conscious conception of the 
 great struggling, striving human world ! Of the sense of 
 expansion infinite almost to infinity, with which the 
 realization of independent individuality, of personal re- 
 sponsibility, first conies ; of the first fruit of that revela- 
 tion, the divine impulse the human resolve, to be, to do, 
 not as the lowest tempts, but as the highest inspires to 
 think, speak, act, like a new John, " giving evidence of 
 the light." He told her of a young man's dreams of a life 
 in a rarefied atmosphere far above the material plane of the 
 mass ; consecrated to all high, noble, beautiful immaterial 
 ends ; dreams of purification, atonement, regeneration 
 such dreams, alas, as come to all youth, and go from all, 
 and leave behind only the bitterness of loss ! 
 
 In return she had little to tell him of her simple life 
 that he did not know already little as might be told of 
 the cloister-lily, sheltered from adverse winds, fostered 
 by gentle hands, steeping its petals in the golden sun- 
 shine, storing in its chalice the fall of fresh young dews ; 
 a little lonely, a little wistful, dreaming its flower-dreams 
 from dawn to twilight, keeping its virgin-vigils by moon 
 and star ; waiting its perfect bloom, wondering what its 
 bloom shall bring it, knowing not its destiny within the 
 chapel-shrine ! Nevertheless, he listened to the shy tale, 
 rapturously. The loneliness, the wistfulness, the dreams, 
 the waiting, the hope, the fear and wonder, were exqui- 
 site revelations of her maiden heart. If a shamed half- 
 fearful suspicion of all sue was revealing ever dawned 
 upon her, he assuaged it by reciprocal confidence, and
 
 90 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 spontaneously, freely, blissfully, both gave their best, and 
 took! 
 
 The mutual confidence was fraught with mutual revela- 
 tion. To Isolde it opened a new conception of masculine 
 prowess, to see how Steele's mind grappled with all na- 
 tural and human problems, daunted by no difficulties, 
 acknowledging no defeat ; while to him it was baffling, 
 almost incredible, to behold the elusive problems im- 
 pervious to the cannon and shell of his masculine 
 charge, vanish like wraiths before her sophisms, illogi- 
 cal, unpremised, and undemonstrated, but nevertheless 
 soaring triumphantly on their feminine wings over 
 his masculine Hills of Difficulty. Sometimes he laughed 
 at her, and sometimes he sighed ; but most frequently 
 they smiled together. The smile was so spontaneous 
 that even Dr. Keene, watching the couple with anxious 
 eyes, reflected it. Althea alone did not. In truth, Althea 
 in those days was not a happy woman. 
 
 There is no more pathetic figure in this pathos-full 
 world, than that of a woman whose past of sin or foil}-, 
 refusing to be laid, confronts her like a haunting spirit, 
 with mocking vengeful face. Thus Althea's past of folly 
 confronted her now. Woman-like, she accredited the 
 masculine memory with a feminine sensitiveness and con- 
 stancy it did not possess ; and the thought that Steele, as 
 his knowledge of Isolde grew, was continually contrasting 
 her with the sister with whom, at the same age, he had 
 been equally familiar, was gall and wormwood to her proud 
 and jealous spirit. In fact, the young man was doing- 
 nothing of the sort. Had Althea been as wise on this 
 subject as she was on others, however, she would not have 
 been a woman. In truth, she was most unwise. She re- 
 vived the memories she would have given half her life to
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 91 
 
 obliterate, and virtually forced him to draw the unfavor- 
 able contrast she was dreading. 
 
 The result was almost as painful to him as to her. At 
 times, in Isolde's presence, with a repentant mood upon 
 him, he felt that he hated Althea ; notwithstanding which 
 they were specious!}', at all times, the best of friends. In 
 fact, Isolde, in her innocent soul, had marvelled more than 
 once at the mysterious intimacy which did not openly de-. 
 clare itself, but which occasional unwatchful moments sug- 
 gested or betrayed. Her limited experience had held no 
 precedent of such social illustration of the Platonic theory, 
 
 " He called you ' Thea,' " she said, one day to the sister, 
 gazing at her with puzzled, questioning eyes. 
 
 It had been an intentional slip of the tongue upon his 
 part, which Althea had hoped unnoticed a slip into which 
 her own folly had wilfully betrayed him. If she chose to 
 be reckless, he had no wish to restrain her. But Althea 
 did not choose, thereafter. Even Dr. Keene, watching the 
 Ledge with suspicious, vigilant eyes, could not but admit 
 that, for once, Althea's conduct judged as Althea's wras 
 above reproach. Cognizant of the old doctor's watchful- 
 ness, she did not resent it. On the contrary, she encou- 
 raged his constant presence at the Ledge with a gracious- 
 ness which irritated him, because he failed to divine its 
 motive. In truth, Althea knew that should the news of 
 Steele Harriman's renewed intimacy at the Ledge reach 
 George's ears, the co-existent presence of his friend and 
 confidant, Dr. Keene, would leave him little, if anything, 
 to say. 
 
 The old doctor's interest in the girl deepened as he 
 watched. He read the poems of her pen and the poem of 
 her life, simultaneously, and found that the keynotes 
 clashed. One day he told her as much.
 
 92 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " You are trying to serve two masters, Art and Nature," 
 he said, " and their claims conflict. Unless one yields, 
 you will be like a bird of which both earth and heaven 
 hold a wing, to rend its heart between them. Art is a 
 hard mistress, but a harder master. Women like you are 
 born for sweeter service. Let your life be an altar to your 
 womanhood, your genius its holocaust. You will miss 
 some joy, yes ; but more pain. 
 
 " * The true gods sigh for the cost and the pain 
 For the reed that grows never more again 
 As a reed with Hie reeds of tlie rirer.* 
 
 "The laui-els of fame are for man's brow, the rose of 
 love, for the woman's. Resign the laurels, and escape 
 ' the cost and the pain ! ' "
 
 CHAPTER VUL 
 
 TO YOUTH'S SWEET PAGE. 
 
 " The true gods sigh for the cost and tJwpain 
 For the reed tJiat grows never more again 
 As a reed icith the reeds of the river. '' 
 
 The words haunted Isolde. They sobbed between her 
 and the young bird's music, cast a shadow between her 
 and the sunlit skies. They were like a minor refrain per- 
 sistently threading, with wailing undertone, the whole glad 
 melody of June. A phrase that she had read recurred to 
 her a wonderful phrase, expressing in its few brief words 
 all the pathos of humanity. 
 
 ' ' Tlie pain of the woi'ld ; " 
 
 it ran 
 
 " The pain of the world. " 
 
 She repeated the sad words over and over, shuddering 
 with a mystic premonitory dread. What did they mean, 
 what could they mean, in this beautiful, bright, youth- 
 sweet, life-thrilled, exultant summer weather? 
 
 "I want to be happy ;" she cried to the skies. "O, I 
 want to be happy." 
 
 41 The cost and Hie pain ! " 
 sighed the grasses. 
 
 " The pain of the uwrld ! " 
 sobbed the pines.
 
 94: A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 But Nature passes through no changeful phase that does 
 not exercise a correspondent influence upon her human 
 children. With her our hearts warm, quicken from bud 
 to blossom ; with her turn reminiscent, dead faiths, dead 
 loves, dead dreams, our autumn leaves ; with her we know 
 a winter drear, chill, wailing, beneath whose snows but 
 slumber the song and sunshine, the bud and blossom, the 
 renewed youth and revivified life of spring. Hence not 
 for long did Isolde hear the sighing grasses, the sobbing 
 pines. She was young, and it was June, and the birds 
 were singing their glad young songs to heaven, and her 
 soul sung with them, the gayest, sweetest singer of them 
 all. Not the pain of the world, but the perfect, unalloyed, 
 bewildering joy of it, was soon again her soul's glad ciy. 
 Was her joy from without or within ? The girl did not 
 know, but Althea did. She saw all with her calm eyes, 
 concealed all with her calm smile. So the eternal Sphinx, 
 mute, inscrutable, smiles with her lips of stone. 
 
 As the summer advanced, and the late June days length- 
 ened hour by hour, as if resolved to make the most of the 
 brief life left them, the work, the play, the very dreams of 
 Newfield seemed to converge toward a common centre, 
 a tract of land whose grassy acres, sweeping from the 
 town-suburbs to the dark pinewoods that separated the 
 prairie-country from the mountains, were known as the 
 Fair-grounds. Here was held the annual cattle and agri- 
 cultural show of the country, when stock of royal lineage 
 neighed and lowed and baa'd and squeaked according to its 
 kind, lustily as any of its plebeian kindred ; when mam- 
 moth fruits and vegetables contested for badge and medal 
 like knights for their ladies' colors ; and bins of glowing 
 cobs reflected from recent huskings the blushes of maiden- 
 victims of the red corn ear. Here, also, was the scene of
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 95 
 
 Newfield's great midsummer festivity, familiarly called 
 "the picnic" held in annual patriotic honor of tbe 
 American eagle on each successive Fourth. For weeks 
 beforehand the town was in a hospitable ferment of prep- 
 aration. Passing the open-doored cottages, one was 
 conscious of a succession of savory odors suggestive of 
 brimming ovens, and well-stocked larders, and pantries 
 overflowing with pasty sweets ; while above, at sunny 
 chamber-windows, buzzed swift machines cheerily as if 
 they knew that the golden threads of fond young hopes and 
 tender dreams were woven into every seam of the pretty 
 summer gowns taking luring shape under the necromancy 
 of clever feminine hands. Even the Ledge caught the 
 prevailing fever, and Althea, invading the realm of the rosy- 
 cheeked kitchen-maid, whose culinary good-will was 
 equalled only by its resultant evil deeds, retired behind a 
 barricade of dough and batter, and opened vigorous fire 
 with egg-beaters, cream-whippers, and all their domestic 
 kind. Isolde, since she had been entrusted with some 
 raisins to stone, to be discovered some hours later, compla- 
 cently admiring a huge bowl of carefully-preserved seedy 
 pulps, while the raisins proper, which the cake awaited, lay 
 beside her in au outcast heap, had been excused from 
 active domestic service, and in lieu thereof, commissioned 
 to guard Gaylord, whose spirits rose with his appetite, as 
 the picnic preparations progressed. 
 
 " I' ove pitnits," he confided to Isolde, his hands full of 
 stolen raisins. " I 'ove pitnits, an' parties, an' yaisins, 
 an' an' 'ou ! " 
 
 " That thar child '11 bust ef he don't quit stuffiu'," 
 " protested the culinary oracle engaged for the occasion. 
 " I know'd a little boy onct, ez snack'd raisins out o' his 
 maw's pantry, au' chok'd on 'em, an' died plum'-off ! "
 
 96 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Did he do to heav'iu ? " queried Gaylord with a faco 
 which would have made a Sunday-school principal dream 
 of an angel unaware. The culinary oracle, however, was 
 severely practical. 
 
 " He didn't git ter go ter th' picnic ! " she responded, 
 significantly. 
 
 Whereat poor little Gaylord ruefully relinquished the 
 raisins, and fled their seductive sight 
 
 The scene presented by the picnic on the eventful day 
 was a varied one. Humble vehicles of every conceivable 
 age, size, style and condition, hitched to the roadside 
 trees and fences, to improvised posts, and as a last resort, 
 to one another, surrounded the grounds; while glossy 
 chaises, handsome family carry-alls, jaunty phaetons and 
 dashing buckboards whirled about the inner track. To 
 the right were the toy, firework, and refreshment booths ; 
 dilapidated structures, whose veteran legs were appropri- 
 ately draped in patriotic bunting. Beyond rose the 
 grove, the vestibule of deeper woods, beneath whose 
 swing and hammock-hung trees were set lavishly spread 
 guest-tables, waited upon by a volunteer committee of 
 rustic youths and maidens. On the eastern edge of the 
 grove was a large platform, fronted by wooden settees de- 
 jected in appearance as if they realized upon what evil 
 days they had fallen, this site of recent Methodist camp- 
 meetings being now prostituted to the uses of worldly 
 revellers ; even the planks upon which the ministerial 
 soles had rested now being profaned by light feet tripping 
 to round-dance measures, as interpreted by the Newfield 
 brass band. From a stand, situated in the centre of the 
 grounds and circled by the racetrack, the more conserva- 
 tive element of Newfield society overlooked the scene, 
 refreshing the inner man and woman, meantime, with sipa
 
 A SOX OF ESAU. 97 
 
 and tastes of such choice cups and dishes as had been 
 reserved for the social elect. Althea, who headed the list 
 of conservatives, had declined all invitations for Isolde ; 
 and permitted her only to overlook, not to share, the 
 festivities. Little Graylord, however, protested so pathet- 
 ically against this elegant but unsatisfactory method of 
 picnicking, that, as the afternoon wandered, Isolde won 
 Allhea's permission to make with him a democratic tour 
 of the grounds. She sauntered from booth to booth, 
 from swing to merry-go-round each and all of which, 
 with a lavishness born of the possession of a bright new 
 silver dollar, Gaylord insisted upon patronizing uncon- 
 scious that after a short chat with Steele Harrimau, 
 whose handsome bays had just turned into the gates, 
 Althea had caught up her reins and traitorously driven 
 homeward. Sinking into a seat in view of the dancers, 
 she watched them for a moment with pleased attention, 
 and then drifted into a day-dream, from which Dr. 
 Keene's voice aroused her. Her expression was at once 
 wistful and tender, as the expression of a young face is 
 apt to be upon which the light of pre-natal heaven has 
 chanced to linger. The doctor, taking her by surprise, 
 observed the light, and partially understood it. 
 
 " You idealize everything," he complained. " That 
 braying brass is singing to you with the voice of Gabriel's 
 trumpet. You love music. Your face convicts you." 
 " Yes," she admitted, " I love it." 
 
 " As the dog loves the hand that strikes it. O woman ! 
 woman ! " 
 
 " You mean that it hurts me ? How did you know ? " 
 " Never mind the how. Tell me why it hurts you ? " 
 " I suppose because it is always so sad. Its majors 
 feign to overlaugh them, but its minors are always sigh-
 
 98 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 ing, sighing underneath. Listen to that waltz-tune. Do 
 you not hear the plaintiveness of it ? It is like the laugh 
 of a brave soul, beneath which the heartbreak sobs un- 
 stilled." 
 
 "Yes," he said, "I hear it. Old ears do hear such un- 
 dertones, but young ears should not recognize them. 
 ' The cost and the pain,' " as I warned you ; " ' the cost 
 and the pain.' " 
 
 " Now, Doctor at a picnic ! " 
 
 " Hang, draw and quarter picnics ! Must one talk 
 only fire-crackers and peanuts at them? " 
 
 " Fi'-cwakers an' peanuts is nice," defended Gaylord, 
 loyally. 
 
 " So are mustard-plasters and castor-oil, my young 
 man," retorted the doctor, " as you will know by ex- 
 perience before this time to-morrow." 
 
 " The violin is your favorite instrument, of course ? " 
 he resumed, turning back to Isolde. " Pan made his 
 pipe of a reed. The violin is made of a soul." 
 
 "To me," she replied, "the various voices of music 
 are like the moods of our best-beloved. Loving the 
 keynote, we love its chords, as kin. The harp is the 
 poet of music, the organ its priest ; the brasses are its 
 soldiers ; the reeds its courtiers, the violin is its lover." 
 
 " And music itself? " 
 
 "Music itself is the articulate sigh of the universal 
 soul, homesick for songful heaven." 
 
 With a disapproving shake of his gray head, the doctor 
 passed on. 
 
 The round dances ended. The " Lady Washington " 
 succeeded them, followed by the Virginia Reel. As the 
 latter reached its final figure, Isolde collected the fes- 
 tive souvenirs consisting of fire-crackers, peanuts, prize
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 99 
 
 candy, a popcorn ball, . chewing-gum, a mouth-balloon, 
 and a dismembered but still energetic jumpmg-jack 
 with which Gay lord, not without a fine regard for his 
 own little tastes, had generously presented her ; and was 
 about to seek Althea, when a confusion throughout the 
 grounds, as if of sudden panic, arrested her. Vehicles 
 whirled madly toward the gates ; and such townsfolk as 
 were on foot excitedly sought shelter. There were cries 
 of " A storm ! " "Look out for the wind ! " followed by a 
 general furling of tents and lowering of awnings. Then 
 she realized that the little cloud which had risen on the 
 western horizon, at first no larger than the proverbial 
 hand, had grown and darkened till now it hung the 
 heavens like a pall. There was a distant rumble of 
 thunder, a sudden play of lightning, a far-off voice of 
 menace from the rising wind. As she caught Gaylord 
 in her arms, a man's familiar voice, sharp with anxiety, 
 called her from afar. She staggered blindly toward it 
 through the sudden darkness that enveloped her ; then, 
 confused and terrified, she stood still. The darkness suf- 
 focated her. A sudden, awful hush was on the world. 
 It was broken by a peal of thunder which jarred the 
 deafened earth, and reverberated over the mountains ; 
 the maddened shriek of cyclonic wind rang through the 
 pine trees ; then a mighty crash resounded, as an awful, 
 unearthly, blinding glare folded earth and sky in one 
 giant flame. 
 
 The wind swept on, and the lightning followed it. A 
 shower of sudden rain, and the western storm was over ; 
 one royal smitten pine alone marking its path of woe. 
 
 Isolde, hushing Gaylord, who was sobbing with fright 
 in her arms, waited as the Harriman bays sped toward 
 her from the direction whence Steele's voice had sounded
 
 100 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 as the storm broke. The Holbrqok carriage, driven by 
 Jack, was drawn up by her side at the same moment, 
 with an abruptness which jounced portly Mrs. Holbrook 
 simultaneously out of seat and temper. 
 
 "Law me!" she ejaculated, as she recovered her 
 balance, " my best bonnet's smashed flatter'n a griddle- 
 cake. You're no more of a driver, Jack Holbrook, than a 
 a a pesterin' hornet ! " 
 
 " O mother ! mother ! give me a better reputation," 
 laughed Jack, as he leaped to the ground, " or Miss Ster- 
 ling will not trust herself to me." 
 
 " Get in, my dear, an' welcome," Mrs. Holbrook invited, 
 in a voice in which hospitality struggled with indignation 
 increased by a closer scrutiny of her demoralized " best 
 bunnit." " If he breaks our necks before he's done with 
 us, it may be a lesson to him ; though," she added, with 
 scathing sarcasm, "'taint likely as necks is of any more 
 account to him than than bunnits ! " 
 
 Steele Harriman, driving up at this juncture, arrested 
 Isolde's ascent into the Holbrook carry-all. 
 
 " Mrs. Bounds authorized me to drive you home," he 
 explained. 
 
 He took abrupt leave of the Holbrook party, and in si- 
 lence assisted Isolde and Gaylord into the carnage. As he 
 took his seat beside her, Isolde noticed that his face and 
 lips were pale and nervous. His voice, when he spoke, 
 was unsteady. 
 
 " The tree ! " he said. " I saw it fall not ten yards 
 from you. If you had been under it or even a few 
 yards nearer ! My God ! " 
 
 Her lips trembled. Her eyes as she turned them on 
 him, were suffused with grateful tears. 
 
 " I was standing under it when your voice called me to-
 
 A SOX OF ESAU. 101 
 
 ward you ! " she said. " Under God, we owe our lives to 
 you." 
 
 " Thank your God, for us both ! " he said, lifting his hat. 
 " I would thank Him with you if I knew how ! " 
 
 "If? " she repeated. 
 
 He ignoi'ed the wistful query, and lashed the bays into 
 a gallop. Isolde was only too glad that their pace should 
 absorb his attention. Intuitively she realized that he was 
 not quite master of himself. She thought that the scene 
 had unnerved him. In truth, it was not the scene, but its 
 unexpected effect upon him, which was the secret of his 
 emotion. As he said, the tree had fallen not ten yards 
 from her. In the agony of the moment when he had 
 thought her under it, he had learned that the girl was 
 dear to him. The revelation was apposite, corning as it 
 did, upon a word from Althea which had been a challenge, 
 albeit a veiled one, to his manly honor. Had the girl 
 known of it ? he asked himself, suspiciously. A glance at 
 her unconscious face answered him. Of a sudden his 
 mood changed. Her unconsciousness no longer pleased, 
 it tortured him. By what right was she unconscious, sit- 
 ting there within reach of his strong hand, his passionate 
 eyes upon her? Did her soul not only soar, but abide 
 above, beyond him or could he reach her, claim her, 
 master her, if he chose ? 
 
 Again and again he asked himself the question, driving 
 alone from the Ledge-gate. Reaching his stables, he 
 threw the reins to the groom, and ordered that Ladybird 
 be saddled without delay. He paced up and down impa- 
 tiently, restlessly, as he waited. The fever in his blood, 
 the turmoil in his heart, the struggle of his soul 
 whence came they ? From a girl's fair face, a girl's soft 
 voice, a girl's white heart !
 
 102 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 He leaped to the saddle, as Ladybird was led out and 
 without a word or look to the Jehu at her bridle, galloped 
 out of sight. Jehu gazed after him with sullen eyes. 
 
 " Th' team's all o' a lather, an' that thar mare's got ter 
 race wi' th' devil, an' beat ! " he confided to the maid, 
 whom the sound of hoofs in the stable-yard had brought 
 to the door. " I hate a man as takes his tantrums out in 
 hoss-killiu.' It's a darned mean trick." 
 
 "A man's bound ter take his tantrums out o' suthin 
 weaker its his natur' ! " responded the maid, severely. 
 " When ' taint a hoss he's a-takiu' 'em outer, it's a 
 woman!" 
 
 " He'd be a smart man as 'ud take his tantrum out o' 
 yo' ! " meditated Jehu, admiringly. 
 
 " Jest yo' try it," invited the maid, briskly. 
 
 The summer twilight was darkening to night. Little 
 by little, as the miles behind her multiplied, Ladybird's 
 gallant pace slackened. Finally, the feverish restlessness 
 of his mood abating, Steele reduced it to a walk. After a 
 time, he threw the rein on her neck, quieting her with a 
 word and caress ; and striking a match on the saddle, 
 proceeded to light and smoke a cigar. Far behind him 
 the town- lights twinkled, but in the country about him all 
 was dark and still. Now and again a cow's law floated 
 to him, or the gentle whinny of a pastured horse ; peace- 
 ful sounds which intensified, rather than lessened, the 
 restful silence of the night. 
 
 He looked up to the starlit sky. Who shall tell the 
 thoughts of a man alone with his soul in the night's awed 
 hush and darkness ? What do the angels read, watching 
 him through the peep-holes that we call stars ? Backward 
 thoughts of youth and childhood, forward thoughts of 
 maturity and age, upward thoughts of God and heaven,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 103 
 
 downward thoughts of flesh and hell ; thoughts that 
 speed back to birth, and on to death ; peaceful thoughts 
 of faith, and trust, and hope, and love ; warring thoughts 
 of doubt and fear, of hatred and despair ; thoughts that 
 wing his soul, and thoughts that clog it ; thoughts of 
 joy and thoughts of sorrow ; bitter thoughts and sweet : 
 now commingled and now separate thoughts, thoughts, 
 thoughts ! 
 
 It was an hour, a scene, in which, inevitably, a man 
 must have faced himself, and through himself his God ! 
 The divine spark ever smoldering within Steele Harri- 
 man's soul leaped up and quickened into flame. In the 
 turmoil of day he could fight the spark and conquer it, 
 but in this holy hour of truce, when the fray of the world 
 had ceased, and the clash of its arms was silent, the flame 
 would not be trampled. Down from the sky the stars 
 were shining softly ; up toward the sky his soul-flame 
 leaped, fanned by the winds, fed by the moon's white fire. 
 Life, which his materialistic creed regarded as the simple 
 human evolvent of living prolific Nature, of a sudden took 
 on immortal spiritual meanings. In vivid panorama its 
 phases from birth to death passed before his eyes, 
 illumed by the revealing stars of heaven. 
 
 Babyhood. As a birdling from its dream, a soul wakes 
 from night to day. The name of the day is Life. Its 
 eyes are dazzled by the sudden light. Its wings are gone, 
 and its cloud-nest is where ? In place of the wings, 
 flesh ; of the cloud-nest, a cradle. Its little hands quiver 
 toward the ladder of the sunshine; its wistful eyes wander 
 toward the sky. Its voice lifts in a faint sad cry a 
 homesick cry for heaven. Of a sudden the cry is stilled. 
 The little lips are hushed against something soft and 
 warm ; the little hands waver up, and thrill with the first
 
 104 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 rapturous contact of human flesh with flesh. The little 
 mouth sucks iu its first sweet draught, and life is begun. 
 
 Childhood. The cradle is set away and the mother- 
 bosom covered. The child has outgrown both. He 
 wakes from his sleep, and leaps on lusty limbs from his 
 small white cot, running out knee-deep into the morning 
 grasses. All about him pink, sweet flowers are blooming ; 
 past all he runs unheeding, his eyes fixed on one far, fair 
 rose. He presses toward it, tottering on tiptoe as he 
 strains up, up, little arms lifted, little hands open, little 
 fingers curved for grasping the rose beyond his reach. A 
 great stone lies near by. He strains at it till his arms are 
 aching, and his tiny body tired, rolling it over and over 
 toward that tempting rose. He mounts it with a laugh of 
 triumph ; at last the rose is within his reach ! With both 
 hands he clutches it greedily. Then a cry, a sob, a shower 
 of childish tears, through which he looks from his hands 
 to the rose, from the rose back to the little palms its cruel 
 thorn has wounded. He sobs, and sobs, and will not be 
 comforted ; and the grown folk think the thorn still hurts 
 him. They do not think of the pain of life's first lesson, 
 sunk deeply, cruelly, as the thorn in his palm, into the 
 trusting childish heart ! 
 
 Boyhood. No more tears, no more idle wanderings in 
 morning gardens. Life is real ; life is earnest. Men and 
 books and something within him more eloquent than 
 either, tell him this. He runs, and rides, and swims, and 
 wrestles. Only thus can he become a man. He cons 
 Latin and Greek conjugations, and pores musty lore- 
 books. Only thus can he become a scholar. And to be 
 a man and scholar, this is all ! Is it all ? There comes 
 an hour when the day is ended, and his companions have 
 left him, and his tasks are done ; an hour all his own.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 105 
 
 He steals away from the hearthstone out into the dark- 
 ness, his eyes fastened on the starlit sky. Is it all, to be 
 a man and a scholar all the meaning, the end and issue 
 of birth, and life, and death? Death ! He feels that the 
 night is chill, and the darkness lonely. His breath comes 
 a little faster ; he crouches closer to the ground. Yes, 
 he knows of death. A boy of his class died last week, 
 and they shut him in a box, and buried him far, far down 
 in the cold dark earth. He had not been a man ; not 
 even a scholar. His birth, his life, his death, then were 
 they nothing, nothing ? The stars hold his eyes or is it 
 the face of the dead boy looking from them ? Of a sud- 
 den he remembers all that his mother and the good old 
 parson have told him of God, and heaven, and angels. 
 His lifted face is illumined. For an instant he catches 
 a glimpse of life as God means it the mortal way to the 
 immortal goal ; the human means to the divine end ! 
 He clasps his hands on his heart. Tears are running 
 down his face. " O God ! " he cries under his breath. O 
 God ! " 
 
 But the next morning he has forgotten. Birth and 
 life and death are mysteries for women and preachers to 
 ponder. For a boy to be a man and scholar, this is all ! 
 
 Youth. The Latin and Greek are laid away, the books 
 conned to their end. Now a new book lies before him 
 the wonderful book called the World. He opens it with 
 eager hand and hopeful heart, and eyes bright with am- 
 bition. For a few chapters he reads on lightly ; then he 
 pauses, flushing like a boy. The new page is fair to sight, 
 and sweet of scent, and O, warm and soft, and thrilling- 
 sweet of touch ! He reads on with kindled eyes and 
 clasped hands, and panting breath. His body thrills and 
 quivers ; his heart burns his breast like a white-hot flame.
 
 106 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 He falls on his knees ; his burning face is hidden in his 
 hands. The boy's problem is solved. He knows now, 
 all life's secret. He reads it on Youth's first sweet page 
 of Love ! 
 
 Manhood. Life, like history, repeats itself. The story 
 of youth's love is the story of the child and the rose. He 
 has read the sweet tale to its end ; plucked the rose and 
 felt the thorn-pricks. The difference is that he sheds no 
 tears. His eyes are dry, and overbright. They wear a 
 hard glitter. He sighs, and reads on listlessly. Soon 
 two pages hold his eyes. The first is radiant-white ; it 
 bears in golden letters, a single name God. The other 
 is unlettered and untinted, a dim, dull opaque blank. 
 Between them his eyes hesitate. God ! God ! the golden 
 Name allures him. He recalls a word of the good old 
 parson's, gone, long since, to his reward : " There is no 
 peace where God is not ! " A sob breaks from his breast 
 it is so true, so true. In all these restless, feverish, 
 wasted, Godless years, no peace, no peace ! " O God ! " 
 he cries in an ecstacy of reawakened faith " O God ! " 
 But the cry is hushed on his lips. " There is no God," 
 refutes the world. " To be a man and scholar, this is 
 all ! " He averts his eyes from the pure white page with 
 the golden Name upon it. " There is no God ! " he 
 echoes, and fixes his eyes on the blank. 
 
 Age. The story of life is ending. Only a few brief, 
 unread pages, and then . He reads on, slowly, pain- 
 fully. His eyes are dim ; his hands tremble ; his palsied 
 finger traces word and line, lest his failing sight wander. 
 The pages are reminiscent. Babyhood, childhood, boy- 
 hood, youth, manhood, all the secrets of their sealed pages 
 are retold in fitful fragments. Sometimes he sighs, some- 
 times a tear blurs his sight. He brushes it away, and
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 107 
 
 reads on. He would pause so gladly, but ah ! he cannot, 
 he cannot ; a resistless force impels him on and on. He 
 trembles as he nears the end ; his face is gray and drawn ; 
 he clasps with impotent hands the passing pages. Let , 
 him turn back ; let him read again life's story. He has 
 read it so hastily, so carelessly ; missing its best sweet- 
 ness, its highest beauty, its noblest meaning. Just for 
 one little span of years, one little space of life, let him 
 turn back, O, let him turn back ! Nay ! the pages pass on 
 swiftly. He clenches his hands upon their margin with 
 a defiant cry. He will not read further, he will not ! Poor 
 vain resister. Before his shuddering eyes already the 
 last leaf opens. Upon it is pictured a new-dug, open 
 grave. His sight is blurred. He shuts the book, and 
 totters wildly to his feet. His limbs fail him ; he staggers 
 and falls. A terrible agony convulses him. There are 
 chill white drops of anguish on his brow. His sightless 
 eyes grow fixed and glassy ; his pale lips writhe and 
 shrink apart. The book falls from his nerveless hands ; 
 with a wild, despairing cry he sinks prostrate upon it. 
 His death-cry rings through the world, but the world 
 hears not, nor heeds it. Only the children shudder, and 
 creep closer to each other in their small white beds. 
 Some of them weep, because it is dark, and because they 
 are frightened, and because because they know not 
 why. In after years they will know, but they will deny 
 it. Like the rest of the world, they will say, " There is 
 no God ! " But in the midnight, beside a death-bed, in 
 some chill haunted hour of hush and darkness, the death- 
 cry will come back to them the cry old as humanity, 
 universal as mortality ; on the lips of the faithful soul a 
 cry of hope and rapture, on the lips of the unfaithful, a 
 cry of mad despair ! The brief cry, the long cry, uttered
 
 108 A BON OF ESAU. 
 
 in a breath, reverberating through all eternity ; the cry of 
 the finite to the Infinite, of the creature to his Creator, 
 of the impotent to the Power, " God ! O God ! O God !" 
 
 He broke from his reverie with a shuddering sigh. 
 Reaching the home-gate, his face was wan and rigid. 
 Nevertheless there was an exaltation, a dawning radiance 
 upon it, flickering purely, whitely, as the reflection of a 
 celestial flame. Whence did it come ? What did his 
 eyes read by it ? 
 
 Ah ! who shall tell the secrets of " Youth's sweet 
 page ? "
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 IN GOD'S GOOD TIME. 
 
 As the Newfield Bank entered upon the second quarter 
 of its existence, the young banker realized that he had at- 
 tained celebrity. During his flying trips to Denver and 
 Omaha, he was pointed out as a man of note. In Chicago 
 and San Francisco his name began to be known in con- 
 nection with certain bonanza railroad schemes then agi- 
 tating the financial heart of the West. Eastern brokers, in 
 daily communication with him by mail and wire, prophe- 
 sied that he would make a stir in the speculative market. 
 He accepted the general tribute with the natural indiffer- 
 ence of the born leader of men ; an indifference the more 
 sincere because the tribute left him unsatisfied. A re- 
 pressed yet defiantly articulate cry was ever ringing from 
 some mysterious void within him, for something deeper 
 than life yet held him something higher, fuller, more. If 
 he realized that the cry was that of his starved and stunted 
 soul, he scorned to acknowledge it, even to himself. But 
 there was no indifference, feigned or real, about old John 
 Harriman, upon whom the laurels reflected. He abso- 
 lutely radiated delighted pride and gratification as he sat, 
 day after day, in the alcove of one of the bank's great 
 windows, beaming approval on the depositors as they 
 passed in and out. Many of them lingered daily for a chat 
 with the genial old man, whose simple faith in " my son 
 Steele " and the Newfield Bank was at once reassuring
 
 110 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 and contagious. Runs were made on the less popular 
 banks of neighboring towns, and accounts transferred to 
 Steele Havriman. Private deposits poured in upon him. 
 He held money in trust for more unprotected women than 
 are supposed to exist in that region of gallant westerners. 
 Moreover, he was fortunate in his private financial vent- 
 ures "had the devil's own luck," as he termed it, in 
 somewhat ambiguous self-congratulation. Cautious men 
 watched his investments ; ambitious men duplicated 
 them. The town itself, under the manipulation of a mas- 
 ter-hand, suddenly leaped into prominence. A laud- 
 boom cleverly started in the vicinity, died a natural death, 
 indeed, but its progressive spirit outlived it. An influx 
 of enterprising eastern blood infused Newfield veins with 
 new life and vigor ; homes and shops and professional 
 offices rose with the phenomenal suddenness of the mush- 
 room growth of a night. And justly or unjustly, the en- 
 tire credit of the boom was attributed to the Newfield 
 Bank. 
 
 . The bank closed at three. Regularly, a few hours later, 
 Steele mounted Ladybird, and turned into the road that 
 led to the Ledge. The gossip which had once coupled his 
 name with Freshet Sal's had subsided. If, of late, he 
 ever turned into the Freshet road, only Ladybird knew it. 
 Friendly eyes followed him, and friendly hearts felt drawn 
 closer to him, because of the embryo love-story which 
 his frequent visits to the Rounds' house seemed to indi- 
 cate. Only Isolde was blind to the indications ; but their 
 spell, though unrecognized, was upon her maiden-heart. 
 The vestal veil which had rendered it hitherto as inacces- 
 sible as inviolable was stirred. Its white film fluttered in 
 the breath of dawning revelation, like a lily in the morn- 
 ing wind that presages the sun. She did not realize that
 
 A SON OF ESAU. Ill 
 
 life had taken on a new aspect for her ; she knew only 
 that it no longer held the old. 
 
 She grew a little pale, a little listless. The human so- 
 cial intercourse which had been so sweet to her lost its 
 charm. Her old solitary tastes revived. She took long 
 lonely rides toward the mountains, solitary strolls under 
 the mountain-pines. She kept shy, sweet, night-long 
 vigils, tossing on her white bed in waking dreams. She 
 prayed long prayers, and knelt when they were ended, 
 worldless, motionless, her face hidden in her hands ; con- 
 scious of no thoughts, yet with a maelstrom of thought 
 seething in fears, hopes, visions, within her. She turned 
 to Althea with a new tenderness the woman-want had 
 wakened with the woman-heart. She yearned for her 
 mother. To lay her head on the mothei'-breast, to feel 
 the fold of mother-arms, must be to solve the riddle of 
 her heart's new, mystic pain. She crushed back the long- 
 ing as disloyal to Althea, and sought refuge in her books. 
 For hours she sat with the open pages before her, only to 
 realize, later, that she had not read a word. Of what had 
 she been thinking? She could not answer. Evasive, 
 elusive, intangible, yet O, how vivid, those virginal day- 
 dreams !' Then she turned to her writing. At first her 
 pen went swiftly, striving to keep pace with her flame-like 
 thought. In the fever of creation her lines sang spontane- 
 ously ; but when in calmer hours she read them over, she 
 marvelled at them. Whence had come their vivid life and 
 glow, their new-born strength and passion ? She wrote 
 on and on, as the fire of inspiration waxed ; then, with 
 her pen still at white heat, she dropped it. Words ! 
 words ! words ! What were they but soulless shadows, 
 mocking the living heart they would fain reveal? 
 
 Of a sudden, all life took on a personal human meaning
 
 112 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 for her. Every pain and every joy of the world was her 
 individual personal pain. Every brave deed done en- 
 nobled her as the doer ; every ignoble wrong stabbed her 
 to her bare white soul. The mother-heart stirred within 
 her. The voices of little children echoed through her, 
 hauntiugly as the burden of a sweet sad song. She took 
 them in her arms and pressed her lips to their faces, 
 whispering mother-prayers above their little heads. One 
 day she broke into bitter sobbing over Gay lord's golden 
 curls. 
 
 "To go back only to go back and be a child again ! " 
 she murmured. 
 
 Ah ! the childhood had fled forever. She, too, was in 
 the joy, the pain, the dream, the travail, born of " Youth's 
 sweet page." 
 
 One afternoon in early autumn Steele rode up to the 
 Ledge gate, and hallooed to the maid an imperious sum- 
 mons for Mrs. Rounds. As she came out he dismounted, 
 surlily. 
 
 " Why have I not been told what has been going on up 
 here ? " he demanded, abruptly. 
 
 " I do not understand," evaded Althea, but she looked 
 conscious as she said it. She did understand quite 
 well 
 
 A week earlier, Jack Holbrook, coming upon Isolde as 
 she walked on the lawn at twilight, had flushed and fal- 
 tered, and finally flung out his hands boyishly, and clasped 
 hers, toying with the golden-rod at her belt. 
 
 " Miss Sterling Isolde " he stammered, "you you 
 must know how it is with me. If there is no one in 
 the East " 
 
 She interrupted him gently but firmly. 
 
 " There is no one anywhere, Jack, as yet ! " she said.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 113 
 
 "Be my clear friend always. Do not pain me by asking 
 to be more." 
 
 And manfully Jack bad taken bis answer, resuming 
 with a brave, if saddened, heart bis old footing at the 
 Ledge. 
 
 The young people had supposed the secret all their 
 own, but they had forgotten little Gaylord, playing near 
 them at the time. Five minutes later he had dashed in- 
 to the house, breathless and incoherent with indigna- 
 tion. 
 
 " Jack Holbwook's a nassy sing," he sobbed to his 
 mother. "He took't 'Soldy's ban's out dere by de foun'- 
 t'in an' jes' 'queezed 'em awful, an' he hurted her, he did, 
 for s'e's up in her woom, a-kyin' ! " 
 
 Althea was neither surprised nor ill-pleased at the reci- 
 tal. Her family vanity was gratified, and she knew that 
 the little incident could be turned to Isolde's advantage. 
 That she had not scrupled thus to turn it, was proved by 
 Steele Harrimau's lowering face. 
 
 . " The boys are all laughing at him," he said, gloomily. 
 " They say that any man would be a fool to hope to keep 
 her here." 
 
 "So any man would be," assented Althea "save 
 one." 
 
 " You know this? " he cried, breathlessly. 
 
 She hesitated. 
 
 " Pshaw ! " he said. " You are not sure of me not 
 sure of me ! I thought you knew me better." 
 
 " It is because I know you so well," she retorted, " that 
 I cannot be sure of you." 
 
 He flushed, and prodded the bank with his spur. " You 
 may be sure," he said, at last. "I am in earnest." 
 
 For answer she held him out a folded sheet of paper.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "It is ?" be questioned, eagerly. 
 
 "Rath era pretty rhyme." 
 
 With an impatient exclamation he unfolded it, reading 
 with kindling eyes the little impromptu verse which in 
 the fulness of her girlish heart Isolde had dashed off, 
 some days earlier, and forgotten thereafter. She had en- 
 titled it 
 
 IN GOD'S GOOD TIME. 
 
 O morning sun. as a glad young lover 
 
 To far tryst speeding with kindled soul, 
 Across the mist and the clouds hung over, 
 
 You seek forever your western goal ! 
 Fair skies smile vainly to tempt and stay you 
 
 Beyond them, splendor of height sublime. 
 Peace ! you shall gain it, full sure attain it, 
 
 In God's good time. 
 
 O fledgling-bird with wee heart a flutter, 
 
 As wings wave open like gates ajar, 
 What yearnings wild in your songs you utter 
 
 For boughs that beckon from fields afar ! 
 The safe home-nest and the meads that know you 
 
 Are naught to freedom and foreign clime. 
 Peace ! wings shall strengthen, and brief nights lengthen, 
 
 In God's good time. 
 
 O budding rose, in }'our sweet spring garden, 
 
 With young heart weary of calyx-gloom, 
 Against the wound of your brown thorn-warden 
 
 Your strain to sunshine and summer bloom : 
 The Past, the Present, are buds unbearing 
 
 The Future, flower of golden prime. 
 Peace ! you sliall prove it, to rue or love it, 
 
 In God's good time.
 
 A SON' OF ESAU. 115 
 
 And tliou, my heart, in youth's incompleteness 
 
 To sun and songster and rose akin, 
 Thou, too, dost yearn for the mystic sweetness 
 
 Like unquafPd nectar Life's cup within ! 
 O draught divinest, whose eterne paean 
 
 All earth and heaven in chorus chime 
 (Shall I dare name thee ?) Love! call me, claim me, 
 
 In God's good time. 
 
 He refolded the sheet and slipped it into his breast- 
 pocket. 
 
 " Well ? " he asked. 
 
 " She does not love you yet, that is, not consciously ; 
 but the possibility of love is revealing itself. She is still 
 in her girlhood's dream, but she is in your power. You 
 may waken her when you will." 
 
 His eyes flashed. His hands, toying restlessly with his 
 whip, were suddenly clenched. 
 
 " Don't ! " he cried, in impulsive incoherent appeal, 
 which the woman both understood and disregarded 
 " don't for her sake ! I am not worthy yet. There is 
 something to to retrieve, to leave behind." 
 
 " Yes," interrupted Althea, with calm acquiescence ; 
 " the Freshet cabin." 
 
 At her words he started, aifd a sudden, bitter con- 
 tempt for her burned in his eyes. Believing the worst of 
 him, she was yet not only willing, but eager, to force her 
 pure young sister into his unworthy arms ! But the con- 
 tempt of his thought paled before the passion of it. The 
 hot blood surged to his face. 
 
 "I I thought there must be longer waiting!" he 
 cried, almost humbly. "She is snow, and I am fire. I 
 feared to frighten her, to repel her, if I spoke too soon."
 
 116 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "You may waken her when you will," repeated Altliea. 
 
 The words did their evil work. His control was lost, 
 his hesitation over. 
 
 "The waiting has been torture," he cried. "Worthy 
 or not, by heaven, I'll claim her now ! " 
 
 He leaped to the saddle, touching the mare with his 
 spur. She reared and plunged spiritedly. When he had 
 controlled her, his face and voice were calm. 
 
 " There will be a dance to-night in Jenkins' barn," he 
 said. " Tell Miss Sterling that the scene will afford her 
 unique literary material. With her permission, I will 
 call for her at about eight." 
 
 Althea's eyes followed him until he had ridden out of 
 sight. Then she turned back to the house. In her bed- 
 room Isolde was rocking, with Gaylord in her arms. 
 There was a sweetness upon the girl's face not without 
 its sadness, had loving eyes read it aright. It told of 
 unconscious repression, of a secret only half cognizant 
 of itself, of a dream trembling on the verge of waking, 
 at once the dread and the desire of the uncomprehending 
 virgin soul. 
 
 " W T ho was your caller?" she asked, as Althea rejoined 
 her. 
 
 "Harriman, junior, to offer you his escort to the Jen- 
 kins' barn-dance to-night. I accepted for you." 
 
 A sudden tide of color surged over the girl's face, dye- 
 ing it a shamed crimson, and forcing hot tears to her 
 eyes. She freed herself from Gaylord's clinging arms, 
 and crossed to her sister's side. 
 
 " Althea," she said, "I I cannot go with him! Per- 
 haps you have noticed that I that I have not been " 
 
 " That you have not been quite the same to him since 
 poor Jack opened your innocent eyes to the aspirations
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 117 
 
 of his sex ? Oh, yes, my dear, I have noticed it ; and so, 
 undoubtedly, has he. Is it wise to have forced him to 
 notice it, Isolde? Is it not just possible that you are 
 fighting a shadow ? 
 
 She drew herself up haughtily, with burning face. 
 
 " Althea," she cried. 
 
 " Oh, my dear, plain words break no bones and I as- 
 sert nothing! I merely suggest." 
 
 "Your suggestion is unnecessaiy. " 
 
 " I am delighted to hear it. I need no longer fear for 
 you, then, that most ridiculous of feminine blunders a 
 premature retreat." 
 
 For a moment the girl stood shamed, bewildered, in- 
 dignant ; but of a sudden her pride deserted her. She 
 fell on her knees, burying her face in her sister's gown. 
 
 "Althea," she sobbed, "I I want to go home. I want 
 to go to mother. I am homesick so homesick, Althea, 
 I cannot bear it any longer. I must go home to-morrow." 
 
 Althea took the tear-wet face between her hands, 
 and scanned it with pitiless eyes. She smiled as she re- 
 leased it. 
 
 "A retreat invites pursuit," she said ; "and no one can 
 eay that you have forced the battle, should you be over- 
 taken and captured. In spite of your innocence, you 
 are a diplomate, my Isolde. Yes, you shall go home to- 
 morrow. I will pack for you, to-night. In the mean- 
 time, put on your prettiest gown and your merriest 
 mood. The woman who covers her retreat with a smile, 
 converts it into an attack. Like the crab, she advances 
 backing." 
 
 Later, as the Harriman buggy drew up at the Ledge 
 gate, Althea hastened down to meet it. 
 
 "You have played the cat too long," she whispered to
 
 118 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Steele. " The tortured mouse is escaping you. Her 
 trunks are packed. She will leave Newfield to-morrow." 
 Then she turned to the little white figure poised like a 
 fluttering bird on the gate-step, and pressed a kiss on 
 the cheek already crimsoning beneath Steele Harriman's 
 eyes.
 
 CHAPTEK X. 
 
 THE DANCE IN JENKINS* BARN. 
 
 "She does not love you yet, that is, not consciously; 
 but the possibility of love is revealing itself. She is in your 
 power. You may waken her when you will." 
 
 Althea bad spoken the words lightly, but they were 
 not light words. Instantaneously, radiantly as a light- 
 ning-flash, they had revealed to Steele Harriman the 
 hitherto unrecognized strength of the passion within him. 
 He had dreamed it but a bud, a young, pale, tender bud, 
 just tinged with warmth and color like a white rose at the 
 heart. But in that moment of revelation it had burst 
 from its bud forever, flashing forth in the majestic matur- 
 ity of ripe immortal bloom. 
 
 Until now he had kept, instinctively, a strict guard on 
 his thoughts. Resolved, as he had told Althea, to retrieve 
 the old life before committing himself to the new, he had 
 realized, though scarcely consciously, that in the mean- 
 time his self-control must be absolute, to be control at 
 all. A lover's fancy is a fiery steed. Once given its head, 
 the bit is taken between its teeth beyond the restrictive 
 power of curb or rein. Excited thoughts, dreams, visions, 
 surged like waves through his heated brain. She was so 
 fair, so sweet, so young, so tender ! She was so proud, 
 so yielding ! He had tasted of both her pride and her 
 submission, and panted to drink the draught, and drain. 
 So frail ! With a rapturous, triumphant thrill he realized
 
 120 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 his strength against her weakness, fancied her fluttering 
 like a bird in his heart's close toils fluttering wildly, 
 vainly, and yielding the strife at last. She was so pure, 
 so pure ! Her spirit had soared unsullied, while his had 
 trailed soiled pinions in the dust. Involuntarily he glanced 
 in the direction of the Freshet cabin. The few follies 
 and more faults, the many sins of his life, were all as 
 nothing beside this irretrievable one. Irretrievable? No, 
 it could not, should not, be that. He must, please God, 
 he would, retrieve it for love's pure sake. The means of 
 retrievement he would consider later ; for the present, let 
 his oath suffice. This holy hour had room for only her, 
 her, her! 
 
 He turned to the girl at his side, an apology for his ab- 
 straction on his lips, but he did not speak it. She, too, 
 was engrossed in her unspoken dream. Her eyes were 
 tixed on the far mountains. Her upturned face was lu- 
 minous, as from the light of divine vision. Beside him, 
 she was as yet as far above him as the evening's vestal 
 star. 
 
 "You are looking not at the mountains, but beyond 
 them," he said. " I see but the symbol ; you the mean- 
 ing. What is it ? " 
 
 "I was thinking," she said, "that they are God's alle- 
 gory the natural typification of the human, even as the 
 human is the typification of the Divine. Every phase of 
 human life is pictured in them. The plain is our child- 
 hood, sunlit with love, flowered with caresses, songful 
 with laughter and lullaby, and tender mother- words. The 
 foothills are our youth, sunlit, flowered, songful still ; but 
 with occasional lonely, shadowed, bleak, still stretches 
 which we must climb alone. The mountain is maturity. 
 Here the sun is brightest, the bloom most bountiful, the
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 121 
 
 song most rich and sweet ; here, too, is the shadow darkest, 
 the waste most dreary, the way most steep. Higher up, at 
 the summit, waits Age ; a realm of cloud, a twilight shore, 
 cradle of the mists, birthplace of the mountain-shadows. 
 A dark cavern lurks within it. We call it Death. An 
 ice-cold blast strikes us and bears us through it, above 
 the cloud-palled mountain-top. We do not feel the pas- 
 sage, we drift through it, in a dream. When we wake, 
 the mountain is below us. Before, above us, heaven 
 past the summit gates of snow ! " 
 
 His eyes, like flames, flashed on her. 
 
 " There is only one heaven for man," he cried: "the 
 heaven of love." 
 
 "Yes," she answered, "for God is love." 
 
 "But I mean human love, woman's love!" he cried, 
 recklessly. 
 
 She answered him with startled, shrinking, uncon- 
 sciously questioning eyes. 
 
 Words of passionate avowal rushed to his lips, but he 
 forced them back. Not yet, not here, not thus ! In a 
 dim and dreamful way he had pictured the environment 
 he would choose. He was tempted to smile at the ab- 
 surd lover-like thought that suggested itself, that his arms 
 now claimed by his spirited team, must be free free to 
 fold, to hold, to press, to crush he pulled himself up 
 with a sharp breath. Jove ! what a thing a man's love is ! 
 Do men love in vain, and live ? 
 
 He controlled himself, but not before his face had be- 
 trayed him. Incomplete as the betrayal was, it startled 
 her. She felt in every thrilling, quivering nerve the pre- 
 monition of an undefined, yet imminent, personal dan- 
 ger. The tremulous, nervous eagerness with which she 
 broke the perilous silence appealed to his manly chivalry.
 
 122 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Poor little, white-winged bird fluttering in shadow of the 
 net, let her flutter with free wings while she might. 
 
 " You have never been to a Harvest Home ? " he asked 
 her, smiling at her ingenuous relief at his commonplace 
 words. " It is an autumnal religious festival, you know, 
 to which Newfield adds a social appendix. We are too 
 late for the service, but we will drive around by the 
 church and give you a peep at the interior, whose vegeta- 
 ble decorations are unique if not beautiful. Pumpkins take 
 the place of roses, and grains of smilax. The service is 
 one of thanksgiving." 
 
 He drew up at the little white church as he spoke. 
 The doors were open. Through them flashed the gold 
 and red and purple of the harvest decorations. The 
 walls were hung with the boughs of fruit and draped 
 with grape-vines, the corners stacked with corn and 
 grain-sheaves, the chancel heaped with green and yellow 
 melons, red " love-apples," golden pumpkins all the 
 glowing vivid treasure of harvest's luscious store. The 
 words of the final hymn floated clearly over the still 
 night : 
 
 " Lord ! spring and summer, 
 
 In sunshine and rain, 
 We grafted the orchards, 
 
 We planted the grain. 
 On fields lying fallow, 
 
 By night and by day 
 The good seed we scattered, 
 
 And Thou dost repay. 
 Now ripe is our harvest 
 
 For sickle and wain; 
 Fruits glow in our orchards, 
 
 Our fields glint with grain ; 
 Our meadows are golden
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 123 
 
 With hay new and sweet ; 
 Our corn waits the husking, 
 
 The flail waits our wheat. 
 For seed-time and harvest, 
 
 In humble award, 
 We bless Thee, we praise Thee, 
 
 We thank Thee, O Lord I 
 
 1 ' Lo, Lord, on Thine altar 
 
 Our first-fruits we lay 
 Corn juicy with kernels, 
 
 Oats ripe on the spray ; 
 Sheaves poppied and heavy 
 
 With succulent wheat, 
 And fruit of the vineyard, 
 
 Round, purple, and sweet; 
 Young apples still fragrant 
 
 And pink with the May, 
 Plums dusky and golden 
 
 In mellow array; 
 Herbs tasselled and tender, 
 
 Nuts swelling with meat, 
 Combs flowing with honey, 
 
 We lay at Thy feet. 
 For first-fruits and last-fruits, 
 
 In humble award, 
 We bless Thee, we praise Thee, 
 
 We thank Thee, O Lord ! 
 
 " Lord, of all harvests, 
 
 We, too, are Thy grain ; 
 Swift Time Thy sure sickle, 
 
 And Death Thy dark wain ! 
 Our souls, be they fallow 
 
 Or sown with bad seed, 
 Thine anger shall perish, 
 
 As tempest the reed. 
 Sin sweeps like a whirlwind 
 
 We breast it in vain ;
 
 124 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Our corn runs to cockle, 
 
 To chaff our good grain. 
 Thy sowing is scattered, 
 
 And tares choke Thy seed, 
 Yet reap not in vengeance 
 
 Nor anger, we plead. 
 As love was Thy sower, 
 
 Be Mercy Thy sword, 
 And garner Thy harvest 
 
 In Heaven, O Lord ! " 
 
 As the service ended, Steele touched his team with the 
 whip, and the carriage whirled out of sight of the out- 
 pouring congregation. 
 
 "We will take the long way round to the barn," he 
 said, turning into a by-road, " and give the natives time to 
 assemble. Jenkins' barn and you ? What a ridiculous, 
 incongruous association. Suppose we forego the dance 
 and take a drive toward the mountains instead, with the 
 harvest-moon to light us ? " 
 
 He smiled at her eager disclaimer. He had known that 
 she would refuse, even as he asked her. Under the cir- 
 cumstances, her acceptance would have discomfited him. 
 Her refusal did not. 
 
 Jenkins' barn was not, as the uninitiated might sup- 
 pose, a hay-filled outbuilding of the Jenkins' farm ; but an 
 empty shed rising from a tract of pasture-land, and un- 
 used in winter save as a temporary shelter for man and 
 beast. With the advent of the warmer season, however, 
 its festive days began. Picnic-parties spread their lunch- 
 eons under its noon-day shade ; riders halted within its 
 spacious grounds ; and many a lover's " buggy-ride " was 
 interluded by a merry dance upon its starlit floor. On 
 the present occasion the barn was trimmed with boughs,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 125 
 
 and hung with lanterns shining like Argus-eyes upon the 
 dark roads ringing with hoofs and wheels. 
 
 As they entered, the nondescript instrument strained 
 of back and screechy of strings, which the proud manipu- 
 lator thereof fondly designated as a " vy'lin," struck into 
 the jiggy measure of the " Arkansas Traveller ! " Lanterns 
 swayed from the high brown rafters, and blazed in fiery 
 groups from the corner beams ; while rows of tallow can- 
 dles sputtered along the walls, a favored few set in tin 
 sconces, but the majority consigned to humbler candela- 
 bras made of pine laths closely spiked with sharp-pointed 
 nails. From one end of the barn, whence the odor of 
 cider floated, shone a bin of ruddy apples, faced by a row 
 of tables spread with cakes, cookies, and doughnuts. 
 Dancers were already upon the floor, but the majority of 
 the company still lingered about the doorway. The 
 Hunter sisters, fluttering with vivacity and ribbons, 
 descended upon Isolde as Steele found her a seat. 
 
 " We had given you up," cried Milly, shrilly, " and were 
 just about to melt into tears on the spot. Not for you 
 don't take that sweet unction to your credulous soul ; but 
 because it goes without saying, as the dear French say, that 
 unless you brought him, we should pine in vain for our 
 best dancer, Steele Harriman, Esquire, Banker of New- 
 field ! " 
 
 " Banker of Newfield," reiterated Cilly. 
 
 The B. O. N. bowed profoundly. 
 
 The vy'lin aforesaid, having followed the " Arkansas 
 Traveller " to his journey's end, had been squirming and 
 squeaking in ineffectual struggles to wrest from its inner 
 anatomy an evasive tune. Finally, however, its persist- 
 ence triumphed, and through the barn quavered the 
 plaintive tune of an old-fashioned waltz.
 
 12G A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " ' Being in Rome,' " suggested Steele, " shall we not 
 dance just this one waltz?" 
 
 As Isolde assented, there was a stir at the entrance, fol- 
 lowed by a general surprised exclamation of admiration, 
 as the regal form of Freshet Sal appeared in the doorway. 
 
 She wore a gown of some brilliaiit-hued, large-figured 
 fabric, open at the throat, and disclosing her beautiful 
 arms to the shoulder. Large golden hoops dangled from 
 her ears, and on her upper arms shone a pair of massive 
 bracelets. Her hair, coiled about her head like a crown, 
 was surmounted by a glittering comb. Her eyes were 
 dazzling ; her cheeks warmly flushed ; her vivid lips 
 parted in a triumphant smile. She paused for an instant, 
 in evident gratification at the impression made by her 
 beauty, and then walked proudly down the floor to Steele 
 Harriman, whose arm already encircled Isolde. 
 
 " Whar I hail fro'," she said, halting before him, and 
 speaking in a loud clear voice, "theer's a dance called 
 'Gals' Choosin's,' an' th' man as shirks dancin' it wi' th' 
 gal as axes him is shot down dead by her men-folks. This 
 'yer dance is ' Gals' Choosin's ' fur me, an' I ax Steele 
 Harriman ter foot it wi' me." 
 
 The vy'lin had hushed its quavering strings, the dancers 
 paused in their half-tripped measures. There was a gen- 
 eral surge toward the couple. Steele's eyes rested calmly 
 on Sal's excited face. 
 
 "I am already engaged for this waltz," he said. "It is 
 the only dance I shall dance to-night." 
 
 He turned back to Isolde. 
 
 " You are quite free," she said, drawing back, 
 haughtily. In his excitement he did not heed her. 
 
 Sal stood looking at him helplessly, all the animation 
 and triumph dying out of her face. She had been so
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 127 
 
 sure of her victory, so proud in her anticipation of this 
 public proof of her power, and he was daring to defy her. 
 Her eyes gleamed ominously ; she began to twist her 
 hands, and to sway backward and forward, suggesting a 
 beautiful tigress lashing itself to rage. 
 
 "I say yo' shall, yo' shall!" she panted. "I bean't 
 agoin' ter be set back afore all these 'yer folks. Yo'll 
 dance this dance wi' me, Steele Harriman, or I'll 
 
 rn- 
 
 In the crowd that had pressed about them there was a 
 sudden break. A man who since Sal's entrance had lin- 
 gered in the background, a tall, fair, sinewy man, clad in 
 the red-shirted dust-begrimed undress of an engineer, was 
 forcing his way to the front. As he passed, some of the 
 women shrieked, and a man's oath was audible. His 
 hand, lifted suddenly to his belt, had drawn forth and 
 was proceeding to cock a revolver. 
 
 As he reached Sal's side, by only a gesture did Steele 
 acknowledge his presence. With a backward swing of 
 his strong arm he put Isolde behind him. 
 
 " This 'yer gal an' me," said the man, slowly, " is old 
 friends an' 'quaintunces, an' theer bein' none o' her men- 
 kin' 'yer ter tek up this 'yer little darncin' matter fur her, 
 I reck'n ez th" shootin' falls to me. ' Gals' Choosin's ' 's 
 b'en th' bull's-eye fur more'n one shot in its day, an' I 
 reck'n ez it '11 be un 'yer ter-night ef 'tain't footed lively. 
 'Yer's her, an' 'yer's me, an' both o' us avvaitin' on yo', 
 young feller. Jest tek yer ch'ice atwixt us." 
 
 " Jim ! " cried Sal, wildly. 
 
 An unwritten law of Newfield etiquette enjoined that a 
 fair fight should be unspoiled by any friendly interfer- 
 ence. That the fight should be a fair one, however, was 
 an indispensable condition. From the crowd behind a
 
 123 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 hand was extended over Steele's shoulder. It offered a 
 pistol. He waved it aside. 
 
 " You forget," he said, " that there are ladies present." 
 
 " Th' wiminen-folks kin git outside. I'll giv' 'em time," 
 said Jim, grimly. 
 
 Not a petticoat rustled, but as the revolver lifted there 
 was a chorus of feminine shrieks. Simultaneously a 
 dozen men leaped toward the engineer to disarm him ; 
 but Sal was before them. With one quick gesture she 
 had wrested the pistol from his hand, and flung it over 
 the heads of the crowd, through the open door. As it 
 fell, it struck against the trunk of a tree. There was a 
 flash, a sharp crackling report, and a thin line of smoke 
 floated up toward the moonlight. Over the applause 
 that greeted her act, her voice rang angrily. 
 
 " Yo're a fool, Jim Oakes," she cried, " an' your fool- 
 gun's anuther. Th' next time yo' go shootin' fur me 
 wait till yo're axed ! " 
 
 Even as she spoke she had made her way through the 
 crowd and disappeared in the darkness. After a discon- 
 certed hesitation the disarmed man shuffled after her, fol- 
 lowed by jeers and threats. In gaping and exclamatory 
 curiosity the crowd watched the couple till the last gro- 
 tesque line of their shadows, gigantic in the magnifying 
 moonlight, was merged in the mingled light and darkness 
 of the tree-shadowed road. At this juncture the vy'lin 
 struck up a tune. The crowd broke into groups and 
 couples, and then ensued a moment of indecision, during 
 which all eyes were fixed upon the young banker. 
 Without a word he turned to Isolde, and whirled her into 
 the centre of the floor. In another instant the dancing 
 was resumed. 
 
 It was not until the waltz was fully under way that
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 129 
 
 Steele awoke to a realization of the resistance made by 
 Isolde as he had drawn her to him. She had yielded for 
 the moment, rather than cause another scene, but he 
 now comprehended that her submission was only physical. 
 Had he lost her ? In the thought he forgot the occasion, 
 the circumstances, the vigilant spectators ; forgot all save 
 that, perhaps, for the last sweet time, he had his arms 
 around her. He folded her passionately, almost fiercely to 
 him. As his eyes sought her averted face he saw it pale, 
 and felt her light form sway in his arms. With a few 
 adroit turns he guided her through the doorway into the 
 shadow of the nearest pine. She leaned against the trunk, 
 shrinking from his arms in shuddering repulse. The ac- 
 tion was a fateful one. In the hours that had elapsed be- 
 tween his parting with Althea and his return to the Ledge 
 gate, he had resolved to do by this pure and trustful girl 
 as she should be done by, and to his confession of love 
 add a confession of his unworthiness of his sin and his 
 remorse. But now his heart failed him. There was a 
 rigidity about her moral attitude that he knew instinc- 
 tively would not relax. The unwelcome conviction forced 
 itself upon him that such confession as he had meditated 
 would part her from him forever. Should he, as his soul 
 besought him, dare all, at the risk of losing all ? or should 
 he woo her, win her, in untruth and dishonor, guarding 
 his shameful secret till even its revelation could not set 
 her free? Which? which? Her repellent gesture an- 
 swered him. His resolve was taken. To reveal the truth 
 was to lose her. He would win her by a lie. 
 
 " An explanation, as well as an apology, is clue you," 
 he said. " If I sully your ears with a shameful story, it is 
 because I have no choice. The woman is the unwedded 
 mother of my dead brother's child. To shield his name,
 
 130 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 to spare my father the bitter pain and shame knowledge 
 of the truth would give him, I guard the secret. Feeling 
 a personal duty to Jack's child, however, I give the woman, 
 who, wild and savage creature as she is, is a passionately 
 tender mother, no choice between surrendering the child 
 in which case I should tell my father the whole story, and 
 openly adopt it and keeping the secret of its parentage, 
 while living here, where I can personally care for its wel- 
 fare. Her defiance of rne to-night was her revenge. The 
 unhappy affair would be a complex problem did the shad- 
 ow of death not solve it. The child will be in its grave 
 within a year. Therefore I bend to the painful yoke iu 
 patience. You, who to-night have shared it, shall judge 
 for me whether I shall submit still, or cast it off." 
 
 "No, no, no!" she cried. "Bear it to the end, till 
 God's hand lifts it. " Her lifted face was radiant, even 
 reverent. " You are good," she murmured, " good, and 
 true, and noble. And I made it harder for you. O, I beg 
 your pardon, I do indeed ! " 
 
 He turned away abruptly. Backing the carriage out of 
 the shed, he assisted her into it. The homeward drive 
 was taken in silence. At the Ledge, however, with the 
 gate between them, she spoke to him over her shoulder. 
 
 " I shall go home to-morrow," she faltered. " Thank 
 you for all your kindness. Good-by. " 
 
 He bowed in silence. The Ledge door was open. 
 Hitching his team, he followed her through it into the 
 empty parlor, lighted only by the moonbeams flickering 
 through the crimson upper panes. 
 
 " You will go home to-morrow ! " he repeated, softly. 
 " When shall you come back ? " 
 
 She was very pale as she turned and faced him, but her 
 erect figure looked tall and rigid. She had braced her-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 131 
 
 self, not for defeat, but for victory. On the silence 
 her voice fell sharply, suddenly, like an unsheathed blade. 
 
 "I will never come back," she said. 
 
 He smiled slowly, and took a step toward her. She 
 would have shrunk back, but his masterful eyes were on 
 her. 
 
 "When will you come back," he repeated, "back 
 to me ? " 
 
 The wind wavered by, rustling the leaves of the cotton- 
 woods. A wakened bird trilled dreamfully to its sleeping 
 mate. A moonbeam, striking through the ruddy paue, 
 lingered upon the girl's uplifted face. 
 
 Was it that roseate glow, or the luminous dove-like eyes 
 that answered him ? 
 
 " Isolde ! " he cried. " Isolde ! " 
 
 And the bird without trembled down in its nest, and 
 was stilL
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 SAL RECEIVES A CALL, AND MAKES ONE. 
 
 On the afternoon following the Jenkins dance, the 
 Rev. Father Harney, the Catholic priest of the parish, 
 passing the Freshet on his round of parochial calls, was 
 inspired to knock at the door of Sal's cabin. He was a 
 young priest, recently ordained, and naturally of a sensi- 
 tive and retiring disposition ; and it was not without fear 
 lest his zeal should render him intrusive that he entered 
 the cabin at Sal's sullen bidding. The humble exterior 
 of the cabin had prepared him for an interior of poverty, 
 but not for the rude comfort and barbaric decoration 
 which the equipment of the cabin presented. Rugs of 
 unmounted skins were scattered over the bare pine- boards, 
 and from the farther wall protruded the antlered head of 
 a monster stag. In one corner stood a gun; above it 
 hung a poignard it its sheath, beside a brace of pistols. 
 From the centre of the ceiling dangled an Indian bow and 
 arrow of ancient barbarous design. In the background 
 swung a Mexican hammock heaped with robes. A couple 
 of wicker chairs were set against the wall. A gilt-framed 
 mirror, hung on the Freshet side of the cabin, reflected 
 the only other conventional ornament of the room a 
 gaudily-framed painting of Sal herself, extravagant in col- 
 oring, inartistic in pose, crude in treatment, but true, 
 strikingly true, in likeness. Below this picture stood a 
 small round table upon which, beside a modern lamp, a 
 handsomely bound Bible was lying.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 133 
 
 Sal, seated by the table with her child in her arms, 
 vouchsafed the young priest no further welcome than a 
 look of defiant inquiry. He hesitated, at a loss how to 
 approach this beautiful, savage, incongruous creature, till 
 his eyes fell upon the gilt-framed portrait. 
 
 "What a striking likeness!" he exclaimed, drawing 
 nearer to examine it. "As a portrait it is absolutely per- 
 fect. When was it painted ? " 
 
 In spite of herself she looked mollified. " Five years 
 ago," she admitted, " afore Waif 'yer war born. I war a 
 harnsum gal then, ef I do say it. Th' feller ez painted 
 that theer went crazy over me. I war happy then. Folks 
 war clever to me. I warn't dirt under theer feet, ez I be 
 now. Some day I'll burn it, when Waif 'yer's dead. She's 
 dyin'. She's b'en dyin' ever sin' she war born. Folks 
 sez it's best fur her. Likely 'tis ; but she's all I've get- 
 ten. Theer's none ez keers wots best fur me." 
 
 " Yes, Sal, there is One who cares. I do not know 
 whether you are, or are not, one of my fold ; but," as she 
 shook her head in negation, " we are all children of the 
 one good Father." 
 
 He smiled sunnily, but there was no response on Sal's 
 sullen face. Little Waif, however, was more amicably 
 disposed. Emerging from the folds of the shawl into 
 which she had collapsed temporarily, she suffered herself, 
 though not without tremors and backslidings, to be trans- 
 ferred to his knees. She was a sunny-haired, snowdrop- 
 faced little creature, whose great blue eyes looked out 
 piteously from the purple circles that surrounded them. 
 These tell-tale shadows were the only visible signs of the 
 cruel infirmity that was slowly but surely sapping the 
 childish life. 
 
 The young priest folded her in gentle arms, a patheti-
 
 134 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 cally tender look on his face. He had sacrificed all sweet 
 human affections upon the altar of the Divine, but the 
 father-heart still beat within him. He stooped until his 
 cheek rested on the childish golden hair. 
 
 " God bless His own dear little child ! " he whispered. 
 
 " Canny? " suggested Waif, her little hands wandering 
 hopefully toward his pocket. 
 
 " Not candy this time, I am sorry to say," he said, re- 
 gretfully ; " but " a sudden bright idea striking him 
 " pictures, yes ! " 
 
 From an inner pocket he took his breviary, slipping 
 from between its leaves some lace-edged cards printed in 
 pretty colors. At Waif's cry of delight, Sal's face relaxed. 
 
 " Thank yo' kindly," she said. " 'Taint many folks ez 
 thinks o' her, an' it's her mother she's getten ter thank fur 
 it her mother ! It's a hard world. Ef 'twaru't fur her, 
 I'd inter th' Freshet, an' be out o' it." 
 
 There were hot tears gathering in her sombre eyea 
 Her proud lips trembled. Since the previous night she had 
 been in a bitter, resentful mood, but a look in the young 
 priest's face had softened her. It was a look which she 
 seemed to recognize and understand ; a chastened look 
 of patient suffering and renunciation ; a look of peace 
 born of sore struggle ; of rest won through long weariness 
 and pain. A strangled sob broke from her. 
 
 "Yo're a parson," she panted, "an' kin chapter an' 
 varse all day fur them ez does th' wrong. Be theer a word 
 in all th' Good Book, I ax yo', be theer fur them us is 
 done wrong by?" 
 
 "Yes, "he replied, "a word from Him to whom the 
 sorest of all wrongs was done, even unto death. It is, 
 ' Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' " 
 
 There was a sudden radiance in the room as the beams
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 135 
 
 of the setting sun turned from gold to crimson. Over the 
 silence the Freshet waters chanted. A flock of birds on 
 nestward flight twittered a vesper choral. 
 
 " Sal," said the priest, " try to say the word with 
 Him." 
 
 " I can't," she cried. " It's ag'in' natur'. I'd say it will- 
 iu' ef death war th' only hurt, but it's life, it's life, that's 
 wrongin" me ! " 
 
 She stepped to the window opening on the Freshet 
 waters, and leaned far out When she drew in her head 
 she was calmer. 
 
 "I'm a fool ter be so free-spoke," she said, "but I 
 know'd a good parson onct, an' suthin' about yo' 'minds me 
 o' him. He gev me that theer Bible yonder. He writ i'side 
 o' it." 
 
 He opened the Bible in silence, waiting for her to 
 speak on. He was certain that she would speak on. 
 
 " It war when I war a girl," she broke out, " an' hevin' a 
 hard life, thro' bein' young, an' poor, an' harnsun. Theer 
 war more like me, but they all went under. Gentlefolks 
 war theer, yo' see overseers an' owners an' sech." 
 
 " Poor child ! " he said, pitifully. 
 
 " Mebbe I war't jest like 'em," she said ; " mebbel war 
 prouder'r an' fiercer'r, ez they said. Leastwise, I held out 
 longer'r. But last off, I got tired, an' dizzy ; an' suthin 
 sez ter me : ' Wot's th' use, Sal, wot's th' use ? ' An' jest 
 then kern a parson ter th' camp an' saved me." 
 
 She did not notice the priest's start of surprise as he 
 bent over the Bible, nor the sudden flush which had risen 
 to his face as he listened to her. 
 
 " His name," she said, " war Harney. He war a good 
 man, a good man ! Ef thar's aught o' bad I've kep' fro', 
 it's him I've getten ter thank fur it."
 
 136 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "I am happy to hear you say that, Sal," he replied. "He 
 is a good man. He is my brother; my half-brother, born 
 of the same mother. Our fathers were cousins." 
 
 She started incredulously at him for a moment, and 
 then cowered down in her chair, covering her face with 
 her hands. 
 
 " No ! no ! " she cried : " not your brother, fur yo' 
 ter tell not your brother, fur yo' ter fetch an' shame 
 me " 
 
 With a wild laugh she interrupted herself. 
 
 "It war all a lie," she said. "I'm a bad un, I be. I 
 war a-foolin' o' yo', a-foolin' o' yo' ! " 
 
 Even as she spoke she snatched Waif from his arms 
 and darted past him out of the cabin into the Ledge 
 road. 
 
 The sun had set, and the twilight, dim and dewy, en- 
 compassed her. A soft west wind was blowing, sweet 
 with the scent of hay. The prairie-grass was billowing, 
 green grass no longer, but touched with brighter hues of 
 gold and crimson, deepening, here and there, to umber. 
 Birds flitted from tree to tree, chirping as they flew. The 
 misty peaks of the mountains were carved in blue relief 
 against the darkening sky. Above them hung a faintly 
 luminous crescent ; and in comparative adjacence shone 
 forth in lonely radiance the evening star. 
 
 At the Ledge gate the woman stopped and looked about 
 her. Why was she here ? She had not meant to come 
 here yet. Ah ! but had she not meant it ? Brooding 
 over her bitter wrong, her torturing shame, with the jeers 
 and taunts that had maddened her on the previous night 
 still ringing in her ears, had she not sworn to make this 
 very journey, gloating maliciously over the vengeance it 
 implied ? Her hand, as it touched the gate, suddenly
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 137 
 
 faltered. Something restful, peaceful, holy in the gather- 
 ing dusk arrested it. Her eyes wandered to the moun- 
 tains, whose mists were blending with the shadowy 
 twilight. Down from their heights' dim realms a winged 
 wind fluttered, wafting an angel's whisper as it rustled by : 
 
 " Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" 
 
 She turned irresolutely, and retraced a few steps tow- 
 ard the cabin. Should she relinquish the revenge to 
 which she had been spurring herself through all the rest- 
 less, sleepless, miserable night ? The scene whose mem- 
 ory scorched her haughty spirit flashed before her the 
 lighted barn, the mocking crowd, the scornful laughs, 
 the taunting faces ! Relinquish her revenge ! No, a 
 thousand times, no ! She lifted the latch and passed in 
 resolutely. 
 
 Gaylord, playing on the lawn, ran gayly down to meet 
 her. 
 
 " Det down an* yun," he invited Waif, cordially. 
 
 "Tan't!" she sighed, shaking her golden curls. "My 
 'egs is sick. Dey's doin' to be well, to heav'n." 
 
 "'Ou won't have legs in heav'n," corrected Gaylord. 
 " 'Ou'll be a little angel, an' have wings." 
 
 " I'll jes' have bof ! " 
 
 " O o h ! Dat's a 'towy." 
 
 Waif tossed her curls, indignantly. 
 
 " 'Towy 'ouse'f, boy ! " she retorted. " Ain't ain't 
 birdies dot 'egs ? " 
 
 Gaylord was staggered, but not convinced. 
 
 "Birds isn't angels," he insisted, stoutly. 
 
 Waif hesitated ; then a bright thought struck her. 
 
 " Dey is," she cried. " 'Tourse dey is, 'tause dey's dot 
 wings ! " 
 
 Attracted by the voices Althea looked out, and discover-
 
 138 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 ing Sal, hastened down to meet her, not on hospitable 
 greeting intent. She had had a surprise, not an agreeable 
 one, in the unexpected return of her husband, scarcely 
 an hour before. In his face, as she retailed the little 
 fiction of her mother's illness and Isolde's sudden recall, 
 which in the watches of the night she had invented for the 
 satisfaction of inquiring Newfield, she had read that Dr. 
 Keene had forestalled, betrayed her ; and that George was 
 not to be thus easily deceived. Therefore she felt al- 
 ready in a difficult and precarious position : and that 
 Freshet Sal should so inopportunely appear to aggravate 
 matters, was not to be endured. Midway up the path she 
 met and stopped her. 
 
 "To what," she asked with scathing emphasis, "do I 
 owe the unexpected honor of this call ? " 
 
 " I bean't a-goin' ter be set back by enny o' your fine- 
 lady words," said Sal, sulkily. " I kem yer ter see*'Soldy 
 Sterlin', an' see her I will ! " 
 
 Althea smiled triumphantly. 
 
 " 'Soldy Sterling, as you most ignorantly and impu- 
 dently call her," she said, " left Newfield at noon. You 
 are too late, my woman, too late ! " 
 
 Sal had already turned away, when George Rounds over- 
 took her. He greeted her courteously as he laid a de- 
 taining hand on her shoulder. 
 
 " My girl," he asked, " will you tell me your errand ? " 
 
 " 'Twar a fool un," she cried, " a fool un, ef ef " 
 
 He read her unspoken doubt. 
 
 "Believe me," he said, "it is as my wife tells you. 
 Miss Sterling is gone, and for good." 
 
 An amused expression flitted across Althea's face. He 
 caught it. He drew her aside, and scanned her face with 
 troubled eyes.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 139 
 
 " Althea," he said, " remember that if you play me false 
 in this, we are parted forever." 
 
 Althea turned to Sal. 
 
 " Miss Sterling is gone, for good and all," she repeated, 
 calmly. 
 
 But even as she spoke her eyes wandered toward the 
 distant tracks along which the evening train was speeding 
 eastward, the train from which, a fortnight thereafter, 
 Steele Harriman waved farewell as from the Ledge tower 
 window she watched him out of sight. 
 
 And over those same far tracks, a few weeks later, 
 Steele Harriman and Isolde returned together man and 
 wife.
 
 CHAPTEE XH. 
 
 THE HONEYMOON. 
 
 Girlhood wifehood the two sweetest phases of a 
 woman's life the first yielding up its pure young life 
 for the second, unmurmuringly, lovingly, as the young 
 mother yields her life for her child. And the priest sings 
 the Te Deum for the new-born, but he sobs no De Pro- 
 fundis over the beautiful ungraved dead. Only here and 
 there from some pale woman's lips falls a prayer, from 
 her eyes a tear. 
 
 They had made only a few days' tour, as Isolde, dazed 
 by the change in her life, looked toward her new home as 
 to a refuge wherein her bewildered soul might recover 
 calm and peace. Accepting the fact of love, she had 
 ignored its correlative fact of marriage with an instinct 
 as innately maidenly as it was unconscious. When her 
 dream of truce was wakened she had succumbed perforce, 
 but not without a fierce, if brief, struggle ; and she was 
 still bewildered by the unexpectedness of her defeat. Dr. 
 Keene'd prophecy was fulfilled. She had not married 
 she had been married. The eagle had not spared the 
 song-bird thrust in shadow of its wing. 
 
 The western skies had donned to greet her all the 
 auspicious splendor of an autumn sunset. Old John 
 Harriman and Althea were at the station to welcome her. 
 Both exclaimed at her increased beauty. She was radiant, 
 almost dazzling in her happiness. The charm of the bud
 
 A SOJV OF ESAU. 141 
 
 had not departed, but it was crowned with the glory of the 
 perfect flower. 
 
 She lived through that first evening in her new home, 
 as she had lived through all the hours since her marriage, 
 like one in a dream. She married ? She a wife ? She 
 could have laughed, or wept, at the unreality of it. She 
 had never looked forward to marriage ; never conceived 
 its possibility in association with herself. Like many an- 
 other unawakened girl, she had dreamed that she was not 
 as other women, that love and marriage were not among 
 her possibilities ; and now that her pretty sophistries 
 were shattered, her virgin soul stood confused and 
 helpless, like a knight unarmored and disarmed. As the 
 evening ended, and husband and wife were left alone 
 together, she turned to Steele with startled, appealing 
 eyes. 
 
 "Steele," she cried, "it is beginning, the new strange 
 life ! All at once I realize the change, and the the 
 difference. I feel as if I must go back with Althea as if 
 I I could not stay without her ! What shall I do, 
 Steele, what shall I do ? " 
 
 He folded her in strong, close, tender arms. 
 
 " The change, little wife is it an unhappy one ? " he 
 asked her. 
 
 " O no, no, no ! not unhappy ! " 
 
 " Is it a happy one, Isolde ? " 
 
 " Ye-es ! Only only " 
 
 " Only what, my sweetheart ? " 
 
 " Only I am afraid, Steele, afraid ! " 
 
 He folded her more closely, bending his face till their 
 lips met. 
 
 "Are you afraid ? " he asked, softly. 
 
 The inflection of his voice carried her to his thought.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 A radiance born of more than the shy blood mantling her 
 cheeks was on her face. 
 
 " Perfect love casteth out fear," she whispered. " No, 
 I am not afraid, O my love, my love ! " 
 
 For a month after their marriage their life was an idyl 
 in which Steele bore his part feverishly, ecstatically 
 Isolde hers with quiet but ever deepening joy. It seemed 
 to her iu those days that she must step lightly and speak 
 softly. Love was a sacrament, and her soul bowed 
 reverently before it; but Steele partook of it boldly, 
 rapturously, as the high-priest has right. She was his 
 wife, his wife ! but with a thrill of excitement he realized 
 that he was still the wooer. He had won much, but there 
 was more, infinitely more, to win. There was an inviolate 
 vestal reserve about her, even in her tenderest moments, 
 which whetted him deliciously. The instinct of the 
 hunter was in him ; the more elusive the prey, the keener 
 his delight in the chase. 
 
 By almost imperceptible degrees they returned to the 
 plane of practical life. Isolde relinquished her dreamful 
 days to the dutiful return of her bridal-calls. Steele de- 
 voted his leisure hours to consultations with upholster- 
 ers and decorators, whom he summoned from Chicago 
 in behalf of the " big house," one of John Harriman's 
 princely wedding-gifts to Isolde. This spacious stone 
 structure, situated upon an eminence overlooking the 
 surrounding town, was set back some forty rods from the 
 road ; the intervening green threaded at one side by the 
 carriage-road, in the centre by a gravelled foot-path wind- 
 ing from the gate to the house-entrance being bordered 
 with full grown cottonwood trees. Originally it had 
 been erected for the summer palace of a millionaire 
 speculator, whose financial ruin, however, compelled its
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 143 
 
 consignment to his creditors, just as the house was com- 
 pleted. John Harriman had bought it at auction, not at 
 all because he aspired to such a palatial abode, but because 
 he believed investment in Newfield estate to be the civic 
 duty of every loyal Newfi elder. He had furnished it plainly 
 but comfortably, and for his sake Isolde had protested 
 against any alteration in her honor ; but Steele was good- 
 naturedly inexorable. The simple garnitures had had 
 their day, the reign of garish splendor must begin. The 
 metamorphosed interior soon shone with omnipresent 
 gilding and shimmered with plate-glass. Warm-hued 
 Oriental rugs glowed on the inlaid floors ; frescoed ceilings 
 and tapestry-hung walls dazzled one with their brilliance. 
 The appointments throughout betrayed lavish expenditure 
 and ostentatious taste. 
 
 " I've caught the bird," he said, one day, jocosely, as 
 Isolde expostulated against further outlay, " and, by 
 heaven, I'll make the cage worthy of her." 
 
 He emphasized the words by drawing her to him, 
 in a fond if masterful manner, and at the time she had 
 smiled at them. But later, she shuddered as they recurred 
 to her. More than once, as her married days went on, 
 she felt that the gilded bars indeed were closing about 
 her. 
 
 Old John Harriman accepted the transformation with 
 unselfish delight. In the rooms set apart for his habita- 
 tion, rooms endeared to him by fond associations, he had 
 collected the familiar ornaments banished from the rest 
 of the house ; and with these about him, he spent many 
 a happy retrospective hour. But perhaps he was still 
 happier when, with the scent of Steele's cigar floating to 
 him from lawn or library, he sat in a shadowy corner of 
 the brilliant drawing-room, while Isolde played and sung
 
 14:4: A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 such simple old melodies as lie loved. When the hour of 
 music was ended, he pressed a long kiss on her brow, 
 Avith a " Thankee, my dearie. Now go and spark a spell 
 wi' Steele." Stealing off by himself then, with misty eyes 
 and tremulous tender smile, to thoughts of youth and 
 " mother." 
 
 To the simple old man with his reverence for all 
 women, Isolde, with her soft voice and gentle ways, 
 seemed indeed little short of an angel. But Steele, since 
 the night when in the shadow of the moonlit pines, with 
 the waltz-tune floating to him through the open door of 
 Jenkins' barn, he had spoken the words which had won 
 him his wife, and lost him eternally, irrevocably, all that 
 could have made him worthy of her, had resolutely shut 
 his eyes to the angel in her, and fixed them with pas- 
 sionate concentration upon the human woman. Her he 
 loved almost fiercely, working himself into a feverish pas- 
 sion which for the hour absorbed him, flesh and spirit. 
 The change was subtle, but Isolde, with insight born of 
 love, divined it. Mute-lipped, she looked at him with 
 wistful, questioning eyes. What was the struggle his 
 strong man-soul was waging ? 
 
 She dared not ask him in words, but her sympathetic 
 arms stole shyly, tenderly about him. 
 
 "I want to be a good wife to you, Steele," she whis- 
 pered, wistfully. 
 
 " Kiss me," he responded, passionately. 
 
 And she smiled and flushed, and did his tender bid- 
 ding. 
 
 Was it not Love's ?
 
 CHAPTER Xin. 
 
 THE HONEYMOON WAKES. 
 
 But erelong the srnile died and the flush deepened. 
 Like other girls, and poets, she had dreamed of love in 
 an abstract, impersonal fashion, but the reality was not 
 what the dream had promised. She had dreamed of the 
 strong sweet soul of love, of its pure true heart, of its 
 ideal, immaterial aspect ; but it was not the ideal love, 
 but the real love that now confronted her, and its aspect 
 was human, only human ; and what, if not love, in all 
 Christ's love-redeemed world, is divine ? The loving but 
 virginal soul would not be bound, since love's bonds were 
 of flesh. Its pure white pinions beat against their fetters, 
 like birds' against the net. 
 
 Looking back upon her life as a girl, she could scarcely 
 realize that she was the same Isolde who had lived so un- 
 eventfully from day to day, dreaming over her manu- 
 scripts, thinking her pure young thoughts, praying her 
 girlish prayers, with no thought that the life now hers 
 could ever reach her. When, at odd times, one suscept- 
 ible youth or another had been fain to linger before her ves- 
 tal shrine, she had retreated to her inner temple like Diana 
 into the forest, and the real significance of the episodes 
 had never touched her at all. In taking her by storm, 
 Steele had adopted instinctively the only means by which 
 she could have been taken. She was a vestal by nature ; 
 and after three months of married life the oil of her vir-
 
 146 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 gin lamp had not yet run out. She could not become 
 reconciled to the fading of the flame, and kept herself in 
 a perpetual fever in her efforts to preserve it. Had she 
 resigned herself to extinguish it forever, to immolate the 
 girl and the girl's creeds upon the altar of wifehood, she 
 must have accepted life's new phase naturally, after the 
 manner of her sister-women ; but such renunciation she 
 found impossible. Day after day, spiritually as well as 
 materially, she strove to re-enter upon the routine of her 
 girlhood ; but, grasp its material features as she would, 
 the divine essence that had been its life and sweetness 
 escaped her. Even her writing suffered. After the first 
 month of marriage she had endeavored to devote at least 
 a few hours daily to her art, but she progressed so slowly 
 that she was tempted to yield the effort in despair. Her 
 inspiration, according to her intolerant judgment, was 
 dead. She was like a bird that, straining to soar, finds 
 its pinions fettered to the earth. One day she poured 
 out her heart in this impromptu bit of verse, and then 
 sinking her head upon her manuscript, broke into bitter 
 sobbing : 
 
 Life was once an April day, 
 Youth its sun of golden ray : 
 Gentle as a maiden's years 
 In its smiles and in its tears. 
 O'er it hung in glints and gleams, 
 Golden-gray, a haze of dreams 
 Hush'd and holy, as on wing 
 Pure young angels, hovering. 
 Innocence that knew not sin, 
 Like a lily bloomed therein ; 
 Calm as dove o'er twilight vale, 
 Peace abode on pinions pale. 
 Streamlets twain of mingled tide,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Faith and Hope, purled side by side ; 
 Thoughts, like reeds their brink along, 
 Echoing their spring-time song. 
 Tender creeds of tenets true, 
 Up their shores as roses grew, 
 Sowing wide, like summer seed, 
 High resolve and gentle deed. 
 White and warm as vestal fires 
 Glowed its passionless desires ; 
 Artless Joy like music blent 
 With the hush of sweet Content; 
 Pure as incense on the air 
 Rose to heav'n its virgin prayer 
 O my heart ! to hold for aye 
 Life that was an April day ! 
 
 Love, the summer solstice, came ! 
 Love, the ruddy ; Love, the flame ! 
 Where calm was, and heavens fair, 
 Simooms pant, and fierce suns glare, 
 Youth's fair morning, ripe o'ersoon, 
 Forthwith flames to fervid noon ; 
 Olden dreams are woo'd in vain, 
 Bliss is drained to lees of pain ; 
 Thoughts are warring ; wild unrest, 
 Peace displacing, racks the breast. 
 Prayer, white-pinioned, loses worth, 
 Sullied plumes a-trail on earth. 
 
 True Love's cost what may it be, 
 Loss or gain ? 
 
 O, answer ye, 
 
 Life erst human, now divine, 
 Cup of Love's transmuting wine ? 
 Soul Love-winged, that Godward leaps, 
 Heart a surge with Love-loosed deeps ; 
 Mind illumed by Love's white flame, 
 Past unfaith. past fear, past shame ; 
 Flesh refined by purgers twain,
 
 148 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Love the bliss and Love the pain ! 
 Dreams new-born in dead dreams' place, 
 Higher, purer, by Love's grace ; 
 Meanings deep that light things take, 
 Least one's greatest for Love's sake ; 
 Eyes unsealed, that newly see 
 How divine humanity ! 
 
 Loss or gain ? Not thus we prove 
 Heaven-born, incarnate Love ! 
 Love that claims as primal cost, 
 Blind surrender, uttermost, 
 Scales for low things. Love is high, 
 Measureless infinity 1 
 
 Sweeter, then, dare heart avow 
 
 Loveless Once than sweet Love's Now ? 
 
 Loveless Was, than Sweet Love's Is, 
 
 Mourning apotheosis ? 
 
 Love, forgive me thine no less, 
 
 Nay, thine more, for waywardness ! 
 
 Sun the shadows leaves behind, 
 
 Love, its fears ! Meanwhile be kind, 
 
 Tender still, O Love ! to me, 
 
 Doubting not my fealty, 
 
 Tho' my soul, in soar and slip, 
 
 Force the fetter of mute lip, 
 
 Sobbing like a child astray 
 
 On some fair but unknown way, 
 
 " Love, sweet Love, give back, I pray, 
 
 Life that was an April day ! " 
 
 Old John Harriman, coming suddenly upon her and 
 surprising her in her tears, divined the struggle her pure 
 young soul was undergoing. To her he said only a few 
 caressing words, but with Steele that night he had a long 
 talk as they smoked together. 
 
 " I've hed my 'xsperience wi' wimmen-folks," he said,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 149 
 
 " an' uaterally, I know better'r how ter take 'em. Mother, 
 now, sleepin' wi' God this twenty year, mother was high- 
 strung an' sperrited-like, jest like 'Soldy ; an' that sort 
 takes love hard. But its only a matter o' time, my boy, 
 only a matter o' time. Jest ye use a little polycy turn 
 tail as a man, an' sorter edge roun' like a woman kiss her 
 hair inste'd o' her mouth, an' let her cry her cry out, jest 
 sayin' tender an' woman-like, ' Poor little 'Soldy ! Poor 
 little dear girl 'Soldy ! ' an' in less 'n a week she'll begin 
 ter smile up shy-like, an' sorter make out ter hersel' as 
 ye're her own born'd mother ! Ye'll see her peek up thro' 
 her tears sweet an' bright as a rose-bud arter a shower. 
 Wimmen-folks is cur'us critters. Thar ain't no answerin' 
 fur their ways, nor a-follerin' o' their thinkin's ; an' they 
 ain't all made arter th' same pattern, nor out o' th' same 
 ware, mind ye that ! Some on 'em 's like common crock'ry 
 ware rough-usin' don't hurt 'em. Some on 'em 's like 
 that thar chiny vase a breath '11 break 'em. Now 'Soldy, 
 she's chiny chiny all over. Be tender wi' her. Win her 
 young heart ter ye, little by little. Th' weddin' ain't th' 
 fun'ral o' th' courtiu' it's th' christ'nin' o' it, my boy, th' 
 christ'nin' ! " 
 
 The young man had listened without a word. As his 
 father finished, he flung away his cigar, and with an abrupt 
 "good-night," went upstairs. Isolde was at her prayers. 
 He paced restlessly up and down as he waited. When 
 she rose there were traces of tears on her face. 
 
 "My father," he said, curtly, "has been favoring me 
 with a lecture a lecture upon my treatment of you. I 
 must deserve it if I have caused those tears. In what 
 have I been wanting ? " 
 
 His tone was more defiant than tender. It roused her 
 spirit.
 
 150 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "You have been wanting in nothing," she answered. 
 "Were it otherwise, be assured that I should not permit 
 your father to ' lecture ' you in my behalf." 
 
 The pride of her attitude pleased him. He liked the 
 sight of a high spirit subject to him. 
 
 "Brava for the proud little woman!" he laughed ; "I 
 admire your mettle, Isolde." 
 
 The good-natured answer, rough as it was, touched her. 
 
 " Steele," she said, "I should not have spoken to you 
 in that manner. Forgive me." 
 
 She drew him into a chair, and kneeling beside it, 
 rubbed her cheek childishly along his knee. 
 
 " You have been very tender, very generous with me," 
 she said, "and you will be generous still, Steele, and 
 patient, just a little longer? Other women seem to take 
 the change naturally, but to me it is all new and strange 
 and terrible. At first I was dazed I did not realize it ; 
 but day after day the awful seriousness of the surrender, 
 its responsibility, its irrevocableness, grows upon me. It 
 awes me, Steele, it terrifies me ! I want to realize it, I 
 want to di-aw breath, and there is no time no space no 
 freedom " 
 
 She wrung her hands nervously. A sudden sob 
 strangled her. 
 
 " I was never a girl who looked forward to marriage," 
 she cried, " and the woman's life, the wife's life, frightens 
 me. Marriage is an open sea, and I I am not a brave 
 sailor. I want to go back to shore, Steele, I want to go 
 back to shore ! " 
 
 He looked at her helplessly. 
 
 " My God ! " he cried, " you are unhappy with me 
 unhappy ! " 
 
 She shook her head in mute negation, but he did not
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 151 
 
 heed her. In his heart he felt a keen, shamed sting of bit- 
 ter self-reproach. She had called him generous with her, 
 but full well he knew that he had not been generous. He 
 was not the man to have been that. There was an elusive- 
 ness about her which he had felt and resented. He had 
 been pitiless in the suspicion that her surrender was even 
 yet with a reserve. Many and many a time he had felt 
 her fluttering like a bird in the net, and he had only 
 gathered the meshes tighter. But to-night, realizing how 
 helpless, how frail, how completely in his power she had 
 been and was still, he felt a sudden tender pity for her. 
 
 " Marriage is an open sea, and I am not a brave sailor. I 
 want to go back to shore, Steele, I want to go back to shore! " 
 
 It was so pathetic, that startled cry of the vestal soul 
 so pathetic, because so vain. 
 
 " What am I to do ? " he asked, miserably. " You can- 
 not go back. I need not tell you that. You must make 
 the vogage as other women make it. But you are not 
 as other women. You do not know what love is. I read 
 a woman's verse to-day, and thought of you. I would give 
 what would I not give to have you write me such an 
 one ! " 
 
 He took the verse from his pocket, gazing eagerly at her 
 as she read it. 
 
 Dear love of mine, if I should die to-night, 
 Close eyes on all the fair of earth your face ; 
 Close lips on all the sweets of earth your kiss ; 
 Close ears to all the song of earth your voice, 
 Think you my soul would seek the Infinite, 
 Swift-winged as lark on singing skyward flight, 
 Or linger still for this one sweet, last grace 
 To feel again upon my lips your kiss, 
 To hear again the music of your voice ?
 
 152 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 If I should die, if I should die to-night, 
 
 Within my soul this doubt, Love's human sin, 
 
 Or wide, or shut, the gates of jasper, pearl, 
 
 And golden courtway of the Great White Throne ? 
 
 "Thou blessed, in," would God the Son invite, 
 
 Or thunder, " Back, to Life, and Love's sure blight ! '* 
 
 And O, (sweet Christ, forgive !) my soul within, 
 
 Bewail'd or bless'd the curse, tho' He shouldst hurl, 
 
 Sent it me back to thee, my love, my own ? 
 
 "The woman who wrote that,loves," he said. "I wish 
 to God I could say as much of you. You chill me, starve 
 me. I am hungry, Isolde, hungry, and your bread is a 
 stone ! " 
 
 " No ! no ! " she cried, like a creature in mortal pain. 
 " You misconceive you wrong me " 
 
 She struggled to her feet. From her eyes, in their 
 mute pleading, looked at him resisting, yet entreatingly, 
 her hunted soul, at bay ! 
 
 " It is a true, sweet thought," she said, " that death 
 cannot lessen love, but a narrow, unworthy, ignoble 
 thought, unless it adds that death too, purifies it. Not 
 to sink together, but to rise together, is the prayer of love 
 immortal. O, my husband, do not doubt my love ! I 
 love you. I am no longer my own no longer myself. 
 I am yours I am you, Steele, you not only for this little 
 life, not alone in this poor perishable flesh, but for eter- 
 nity, in God ; because our love is a sacrament, a union of 
 souls of which this mortal union is only the faint brief 
 symbol ! Think of me, think of our love, in this higher 
 light ! Live for love, yes but for the real immortal love, 
 not for its poor, pale, sullied, human phantom. Sooner 
 or later one of us two must be taken and one left. 
 Should death choose me and the grave claim me, }'ou 
 would not love these lips you kiss so now ; you would
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 153 
 
 not fold these arms around you ; you would not hold this 
 little body to your heart. You would shrink and shud- 
 der, should one small finger touch you. Is this your love, 
 to end to-day, to-morrow ? Do you love me so little that 
 you can give me up with life ? Is your love so degraded, 
 so unworthy, that it prompts your soul not up, but down ? 
 And my soul, Steele, made one with your soul must it 
 sink down with you ? Shall ioy eyes never Lift above your 
 human face ? It is a terrible thing for her and him, when 
 a man stands between a woman and her God. If she 
 loses Him, who shall find Him for her and without Him, 
 where shall she find the twofold strength that the woman 
 should have in soul, as the man has in body ? We women 
 stand like Mary at the Cross, the Link between Christ and 
 John. And heart to heart, each knowing each as His best 
 gift, both must look up." 
 
 Her eyes, in tearful supplication, were fixed upon his 
 face. For one remoi'seful moment he hesitated. Then 
 his passionate lips, Like searing flames, fell on them, kiss- 
 ing them shut and blind. 
 
 Her appeal was it in vain ? 
 
 Ask any man the question. Ask any woman the answer.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE HONEYMOON FLICKERS OUT. 
 
 Christmas, the sweetest time of all the year when the 
 Bethlehem Star shines not only for the Judean shepherds, 
 but for the wide, wide world as well, and prince and peas- 
 ant bend knee together beside the omnipresent Crib ; 
 when the angel-choirs sing unto all hearts hearing their 
 heavenly message of peace and good-will to men ; and the 
 Holy Child, from the breast of His Virgin Mother, holds 
 eager hands to all who linger near Christmas had come 
 and gone, and with the dawn of the New Year, a new era 
 for the bank began. It was enlarged and adorned to the 
 superlative degree of, splendor, and its glittering exterior 
 was but the sign and symbol of the prosperity within. 
 As the honeymoon waned, Steele became more and more 
 absorbed in his financial ventures. These were not con- 
 fined to the legitimate field of the bank, but extended to 
 the quicksands of private speculation ; and a set of rest- 
 less, eager-eyed men soon gathered about him, whose 
 voices, floating to the drawing-room from the adjoining 
 library, sounded ever the same refrain of " stock " and 
 " share " and " bond." 
 
 Isolde sighed as the voices reached her. These nightly 
 conclaves from which she found herself debarred in effect, 
 if not in fact, weighed upon her sensitive conscience. Was 
 a wife's sphere 'circumscribed even within its circumscrip- 
 tions, she wondered? Would not a wiser and worthier
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 155 
 
 woman associate herself with all the interests of her hus- 
 band's life? She studied the financial columns in the 
 newspapers and aired her newly acquired knowledge, only 
 to be laughed at for her pains. 
 
 "There are 'numbers and numbers,' little woman!" 
 Steele said to her. " If you invade my realm, I must in- 
 vade yours ; and then for poetry ' as is ' poetry ! " 
 
 "Now, Steele! " 
 
 " Now, Isolde ! " 
 
 " But I want to to " 
 
 " But you ' Avant to be a good wife ; ' is that it, as 
 usual ? Yes, I thought so ! Well, lips a little closer, arms 
 a little tighter now you are the best little wife in all the 
 world ! " 
 
 It was impossible, considering her nature, her youth, 
 her inexperience, and her perfect love, undoubting and 
 adoring as first love ever is, that this philosophy, repeated 
 day by day, should not set its brand upon her susceptible 
 and sensitive heart and soul. At first, imperceptibly, but 
 later in visible transfiguration, the fire of his passion 
 ignited her heart's white flame. 
 
 The change was betrayed less in her life than in her 
 writing. Art is a mirror in which are reflected all the 
 phases of the artist's life. The inspiration she had 
 mourned as dead was revivified. She wrote, now, with a 
 firmer hand and a fuller heart than had been possible for 
 her before young life's pale bud had bloomed to love's red 
 flower. Her earlier work had been vestal in its chastity. 
 Now her awakened heart tuned her song in a more pas- 
 sionate key. She had reached the organ-stop of life 
 the vox humana. Her work was still chaste, but with a 
 warm, sweet chastity, human to its core. And it was the 
 human note that won her success. Not art, but heart,
 
 15G A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 makes the work immortal Art is the beautiful body, but 
 unless the artist's heart throb within it, a body without a 
 soul. 
 
 Hence the artist, instinctively as unconsciously, plays 
 upon his heart as a minstrel on his lyre ; holding its white 
 strings up to use, threading his song with every quivering 
 fibre. Identified with her art the art which had been 
 all her life before love had dethroned it Isolde's love grew, 
 sending out new shoots apace, new leaves and buds and 
 flowers. Her vestal heart, that had been so shy of the seed 
 of love, now fostered its bud till love's rank bloom over- 
 grew it. It rioted over all her life and gave new color to 
 it. It grafted itself on her life's stock. She began to live 
 in a feverish love-dream. The sun shone love, the winds 
 sighed love, the birds sang love. Her husband no longer 
 complained of her coldness. The pale young spark at last 
 had flamed to fire. Love, love, love was her dream, her 
 thought, her prayer ! 
 
 The honeymoon, that had waxed and waned, suddenly 
 redawned. Lured by the domestic hearth's new warmth 
 and radiance, Steele re-devoted himself to it with all a 
 lover's assiduity. One January afternoon he left the bank 
 at an earlier hour then usual, and surprised Isolde in her 
 study. 
 
 "Think of an angel," she said, gayly. "I was just 
 writing a poem to you, such a poem as you once asked for. 
 But, O, Steele, it is so poor, so weak, so failing ! It is not 
 even the echo of the poem within my heart." 
 
 He read it with his arms around her. 
 
 My life is in thy hand. O love ! My past, 
 
 My present, future, nest upon thy palm ; 
 
 Fold wings and bird-like, pipe their simple psalm, 
 
 Love consecrate to thee, first note and last.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 157 
 
 Thine own to spurn ; thine own to hold love-fast ; 
 Thine own to doom to storm or gentle calm ; 
 To hold Pain's gall, or love's sweet draught of balm, 
 Or keep a thirst, as thine heart's edict hast. 
 Surrender sweet ; fraught with this single pain, 
 That soul, heart, voice, do night and day bemoan 
 (Yet, O my love, though fall my tears like rain, 
 Though wails my sob as wind from zone to zone, 
 Both sob and tear alike in vain, in vain ) 
 That but one life is mine to make thine own ! 
 
 He kissed it, and then her, tenderly. 
 
 "My darling," he said, "I will not doubt your love. 
 You do love me, in your way, and your way is highest." 
 
 An hour later they were cantering side by side along 
 the Settlement road. 
 
 Across the blue expanse of sunlit heaven flitted, like 
 white-winged angels, a train of clouds. The air, warmed 
 by the afternoon sunshine, blew with a fresh crisp sweet- 
 ness from its mountain caves. The frosty boughs of the 
 cottonwoods tinkled as they blew against one another. 
 The horses' hoofs struck resonantly on the frozen ground. 
 Here and there bits of ice snapped up in iridescent par- 
 ticles. Where the highway merged itself in a road lead- 
 ing through pine-woods to the Settlement, a sunbeam 
 slanting from the tree-tops turned the dusk-brown vista 
 into gold. It hovered round their heads and lingered 
 on their glowing faces. Across its radiance their happy 
 eyes met. With a mutual impulse they leaned toward 
 each other. The wind was sibilant with their kiss. 
 
 Their mood held the twofold sweetness of past and 
 present. Steele thrilled anew with the sweetly torturous 
 fire of love's primal flame. Isolde experienced again the 
 heart-throb born of fear and faith, of dread and hope, 
 of pain and bliss, which had been love's pang of birth.
 
 3^8 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 With absolute abandon she yielded herself to her joy. 
 The glow of the sunlight was within her, the wild, free 
 spirit of the wind. The liquid laughter of a newly-thawed 
 creek floated to them, and her laughter rippled with 
 it, like a chord akin. Her voice supplied the music of 
 the absent birds' song. She was youth, she was beauty, 
 she was love and joy incarnate the embodied spirit of 
 the vivid, alluring, riotous day. 
 
 They rode on faster and faster. The wind swirled past 
 them, tossing the boughs like bare brown arms above 
 their heads. Icy twigs, crisp dead leaves, detached bits 
 of frosty earth, snapped up around them, displaced by 
 the gallant hoofs that sped like wings. In the exhilara- 
 tion of the hour, new life surged through Isolde's veins. 
 Without fatigue or effort she galloped on and on, till the 
 labored breaths of the panting horses pleaded for a halt. 
 
 "On! on!" cried Steele, to the flying figure before 
 him. "Your mad mood is irresistible, Isolde. I follow 
 your wild lead to the death." 
 
 She reined in her horse. He overtook her. His shoulder 
 pressed heavily against her. His breath was on her cheek. 
 
 " Siren ! Sorceress ! " he cried. 
 
 The brightness of her dancing eyes, as they turned 
 upon him, softened into a sweeter light. 
 
 " Love ! " he finished. " O my love, my love ! " 
 
 A three minutes' canter brought them to the Settlement, 
 its low pine-roofs outlined sombrely against the snow-clad 
 mountain-range. 
 
 "A harnsum' couple," commented an admiring settler, 
 watching them from his doorway, as they cantered by. 
 
 "A happy couple," amended his companion, and fol- 
 lowed them with wistful woman-eyes. 
 
 They rode through the Settlement and beyond it to the
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 159 
 
 foot-hills, then turned about and retraced their way at 
 an easy pace. In the heart of the Settlement Steele 
 halted, as if struck by a sudden thought. 
 
 " By the way," he said carelessl}', "I may as well com- 
 bine pleasure with business. A Denver chap, Kingsley, 
 by name, was talking to me to-day about the old Ked 
 Ridge Mine, in which most of the settlers got badly bitten 
 a few years since. I promised him I'd have a word with a 
 few of them. If Midge will not stand, walk her up and 
 down till I return." 
 
 Before she could object he had hitched Ladybird, and 
 disappeared in the "Shanty," a structure half-tent, half- 
 shed, which, as it included both bar- and card-room, was 
 naturally the masculine headquarters of the place. For 
 more than an hour Isolde paced up and down the long 
 road, while the last rays of the setting sun faded into 
 shadow, the shadow deepened to dusk. The wind grew 
 chill. She shivered in it not that she was cold in body, 
 but its chill seemed to strike through the flesh to her in- 
 most heart. She felt as if the sun of her happiness was 
 setting in a dusk which no coming dawn would brighten 
 as if the day of her life was over, and its night begun. 
 The reaction from her rapturous mood was only natural, 
 but to her it seemed prophetic. 
 
 "I was too happy, too happy," she cried to the darken- 
 ing skies. 
 
 And the night crept on. 
 
 When Steele reappeared at last, he was flushed and 
 noisy, and exchanged rude jests with the rough men 
 who followed him to the door. As he joined her, Isolde 
 turned away her face with a disgusted exclamation. 
 
 "You have been drinking," she said ; "drinking their 
 horrible whiskey. O Steele, how could you ? "
 
 160 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Had to, to seal the bargain," be admitted, unguard- 
 edly ; then bit his lip in annoyed regret. He would have 
 given all the whiskey in Colorado at that moment to have 
 retracted the incautious admission. 
 
 " What bargain ? " she asked. " Surely you have not 
 been buying that hopeless old mine ? " 
 
 " Buying up the Red Ridge ? " he laughed. " It is not 
 worth a copper cent. That is what I have been ascertain- 
 ing for Kingsley ; and the price I paid for the knowledge 
 vas a treat all round of bad whiskey. Don't be alarmed, 
 little wife, I can stand it. And, by the way, I have some 
 good old brandy in my flask here. Better take a sip. You 
 must be chilled and tired." 
 
 "I am wearing my heavy habit, and am not cold," she 
 said, rejecting it ; "and you know quite well, Steele, that 
 I disapprove your flask. It is full of a bad habit. Why 
 do you carry it ? " 
 
 "Because I am a man, little woman," he laughed ; " or, 
 rather, because I am not a woman ; which is, I suppose, at 
 once the cause of, and an excuse for, all my masculine 
 peccadilloes ! " 
 
 To Isolde's surprise, Kingsley was waiting in the draw- 
 ing-room when they reached home. He was a tall, slight, 
 refined-looking man, bearing the unmistakable stamp of 
 the great world. His pale, delicate face, lighted by mel- 
 ancholy dark-brown eyes, was crowned by a noble head of 
 prematurely gray hair. He had a reserved, indifferent air 
 about him which impressed Isolde favorably. It was a 
 welcome contrast to the free-and-easy familiarity of the 
 greater number of her husband's business associates. 
 He dined with them, talking languidly and sometimes 
 cynically upon many subjects. After dinner he disap- 
 peared with his host in his library, where they were clos-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 161 
 
 eted together until long after midnight. In the mean- 
 time Isolde was sobbing nervously in her room up-stairs. 
 She felt suddenly ill, despondent, startled she knew not 
 what. She hid her face in her hands, and then un- 
 clasped her hands and wrung them in nervous anguish. 
 She went down for Steele, but turned back from the 
 library door without speaking to him. When he came 
 up at midnight, however, she was sleeping peacefully, 
 with the smile of a tender dream on her fair young face. 
 
 Two months later there was a sudden excitement in the 
 Settlement. The Bed Kiclge Mine, which had been dead 
 stock for some years, had leaped to the front. There was 
 a rush for shares, and no shares were forthcoming. Un- 
 known speculators had bought them up for a song, and 
 the mine, properly worked, was proving a bonanza. The 
 rumor did not reach Isolde for some time. When it 
 did reach her, it fell upon unheeding ears. She was still 
 absorbed in the tender dream that the annunciation- 
 angel had brought her. One morning, however, by 
 chance or fate, the matter was forced upon her notice. 
 
 She was standing in the library with her husband, who 
 was gathering up some papers to be used that day at the 
 bank, when the engineer, Jim Oakes, was ushered in. 
 Isolde, who had not seen him since the night of the barn- 
 dance, gave a startled cry, and ran to Steele's side. Jim 
 looked crestfallen and foolish. 
 
 "I ain't a-goin' ter hurt him, marm," he said, "an* I 
 makes my excuses fur ever a-runnin' him down. Sal, ez 
 knows th' track ter th' end o' th' road, Sal sez ez how I 
 nigh wreck'd th' huh 1 caboose, an' I ain't above sayin' ez I 
 mistook th' signals." 
 
 " Mistake them, you did, my man," assented Steele, "but 
 your excuses are accepted. Is that all you have to say ? "
 
 162 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Keowketcher, no ! I kem ter talk o' th' mine. Them 
 tbeer shar's o' mine " 
 
 Steele led Isolde to the door, and shut it after her. 
 
 " We will talk on the way to the bank," he said, taking 
 up his hat. 
 
 Jim's brawny fist came down with a crash on the little 
 s racking-table. 
 
 " We'll talk 'yer an' now," he said, " an' talk it out. 
 Theer ain't no Sal ter stan' atwixt us 'yer. Them theer 
 shar's o' Ked Ridge ez old Jenkins traded fur my team o' 
 burros, an' I swopped off, like th' darned fool-cuss I be, 
 fur tarnation nuthin' them theer shar's ter-day is wuth a 
 fortoon ! " 
 
 "What the devil is that to me?" asked Steele, sav- 
 agely. 
 
 " Wot's itteryo'? Yo' want ter know, doyo'? Wai, 
 I'll tell yo*. It's so much capytal ter yo', Mr. Steele 
 Harriman ; its so many more fine windeys ter th' bank, 
 an' so many more gran' fixin's ter hum. It's store-clo'es 
 ter yer back, an* fancy vittuls in yer mouth. It's so 
 much cash in yer pocket thet's wot it be ter yo'. If th' 
 rest can't see thro' a tunnel, Engine Jim ken. D' yo' 
 think I didn't sight yo' ? Yo're a flyer, yo' be, but yo' 
 can't beat me. 'Tvvar a put-up job." 
 
 Steele looked uneasy. The door had blown ajar. He 
 shut it with a bang ; then he gestured Jim to a seat, and 
 took one opposite him. 
 
 " To begin with," he said, " do you know -that I can 
 prosecute you for libel ? You have spread this story ; I 
 
 have heard it before to-day, and it is a d d lie, every 
 
 word of it. You would retract it, of course, should I 
 give you the present price of your shares ? " 
 
 " Ya-as, I reck'n so," admitted Jim, uncertainly.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 163 
 
 " Let me have that promise upon paper." 
 
 He went to his desk, and hastily wrote a few words on 
 a sheet of legal-cap paper. Then he asked Jim to sign 
 his name. When, with equal flow of ink and perspira- 
 tion, the signature was finally appended, Steele folded 
 the sheet and shut it in his wallet with a triumphant 
 smile. 
 
 " The charge of libel is now supplemented by that of 
 blackmail," he said. " This paper will convict you in any 
 court in the land. Both are long-term offences, my 
 man." 
 
 Jim scratched his curly head in open-mouthed bewil- 
 derment. He was unprepared for this turning of the 
 tables. Nevertheless he held to his conviction. 
 
 " 'Twar a put-up job," he reiterated. 
 
 " It was a put-up job," assented Steele, " and I am 
 your fellow-victim. I believed the old mine to be hope- 
 lessly dead stock, and negotiated for the settlers in 
 friendship, setting a price upon their shares which, though 
 comparatively small, was yet beyond their wildest dreams. 
 When I saw that the mine was proving a good specula- 
 tion, no one was more surprised, as no one was a heavier 
 loser, than L But I bear my loss like a man, not like a 
 whimpering old woman. Now go and take back your 
 lies, or I'll have you in jail before night." 
 
 The man shambled out, convinced and penitent. 
 Steele, turning toward the door with a look of mingled 
 triumph and relief, found himself face to face with Isolde. 
 She was gastly pale, and her hands, as they clasped each 
 other, trembled nervously. 
 
 "You remember," she panted, "that on the evening 
 following our ride to the Settlement I felt suddenly ill. 
 I came downstairs for you. Mr. Kingsley was with you
 
 164 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 in the library. I stood at the door hesitating to disturb 
 you, and your words reached me. I did not guess their 
 application, and they made no impression upon me at the 
 time ; but they have coine back to me clearly, every one. 
 You said, ' The mine was never half- worked. There is a 
 rich lode in it, I swear to you ! Halve the. expenses, and 
 I will halve the profits. Randal can be the cat's-paw, and 
 we will silence him with a small chestnut. The fire holds 
 a fortune for us ! " 
 
 She pressed her trembling hands to her forehead. 
 
 " They are burning my brain," she cried ; " they are 
 ringing in my ears ; they are flaming before my eyes. 
 You have deceived the poor creatures who have trusted 
 you you have enriched yourself by their ruin you 
 you " 
 
 He drew on his coat, and turned toward the door. His 
 face was calm, cruelly calm ; but his eyes flashed omi- 
 nously. 
 
 " I may not return to luncheon, since I am late in get- 
 ting down-town," he said. "Kingsley will dine with 
 us." 
 
 She sprung to the door and stood with her back against 
 it. 
 
 " You are not going like this ? " she gasped. 
 
 " I am going ' like this,' now and always. Understand 
 once for all, Isolde, that I deny your right, as a woman, 
 to interfere in my business affairs. Moreover, I refuse 
 to be called to an account by you or anyone." 
 
 The latent strength in her gentle face seemed suddenly 
 to assert itself. Her eyes were still appealing, but her 
 lips were as lips of stone. 
 
 " I am not a child," she said, " to be silenced by stern 
 words. There is a duty I owe to others, a duty I owe to
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 165 
 
 myself, as well as a duty I owe to you, which forbids me 
 to be accessory to this cruel wrong, even though my 
 husband be the wrong-doer. Eight your wrong, Steele, 
 not because I ask you, but because your own soul de- 
 mands it, and I will forget it. If you refuse, I I must 
 appeal to your father." 
 
 A terrible look flashed into his face, but he masked it 
 with a sudden smile. 
 
 " Our first quarrel, and over a mere trifle ! " he laughed. 
 " My dear, this is a bad precedent. The fault, however, 
 is mine. I should have explained the matter clearly to 
 you at first, but that boorish fellow upset my temper. 
 The bargain was an honest one. The shares were dead 
 paper in the men's pockets. They sold them voluntarily 
 and we paid a good, even a generous, price for them. The 
 purchase was a foolhardy risk, which had only my blind 
 and unreasonable faith in the mine to excuse it. The 
 after- work was at our expense ; the possible, the probable 
 loss we were prepared to bear alone ; therefore, we were 
 entitled to the unexpected gain. The affair is simply a 
 business transaction, shrewd and hard perhaps, to a 
 woman's thinking, but legitimate in law, and honorable. 
 A thousand such are transacted openly every day. I did 
 not care to appear in the matter, simply because it is not 
 wise for a banker to be known as a speculator ; moreover, 
 I knew that, in case of success, I should be besieged for 
 shares, and Kingsley made it a condition of his invest- 
 ment that we should keep the mine in our own hands. 
 For the first time, Isolde, you have demanded that your 
 husband should justify himself to you. It must be your 
 last demand of the kind." 
 
 She drew a long breath of relief. He was not at fault, 
 then, after all. His deed was lawful, according to a man's
 
 166 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 hard creed, though irreconcilable with a woman's standard 
 of right and justice. She lifted her clasped hands and 
 leaned them on his shoulder. 
 
 "Forgive me if I exaggerated your wrong," she said, 
 "but it still seems a wicked, cruel wrong to me. Repair 
 it, Steele ; ill-gotten wealth will bring no blessing. He- 
 store the shares or their equivalent for my sake." 
 
 He led her to a chair, and pressed his lips lightly on 
 her forehead. 
 
 " Not even for your sweet sake, my dear," he said, " can 
 I, in the present state of the bank, afford to be quixotic. 
 The National is crowding me fast and furiously, and 
 in keeping well ahead of it, I have taken more hurdles 
 than I can well clear. To be plain with you, the Red 
 Ridge profits have saved the bank from ruin, the banker 
 from disgrace." 
 
 He whistled a gay air as he sauntered out. At the door 
 he lighted a cigar and walked down the path, puffing at it 
 jauntily. 
 
 But hours afterward Isolde still crouched where he 
 had left her, her bright head bowed on the leathern arm 
 of the library chair.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 A MIDNIGHT TOAST. 
 
 The point at which love ceases to be blind is not clearly 
 defined. Sometimes the life of disillusion bursts suddenly 
 upon dazzled eyes ; sometimes it dawns and deepens in 
 almost imperceptible gradations. In such gradations, 
 unconsciously to Isolde, disillusion had crept upon her. 
 Spiritually, the husband had not fulfilled the promise of 
 the lover. His sin, like a cancer day by day eating deeper 
 into the sound white flesh, had meshed his soul in its toils. 
 He could not hide his deterioration. The time came when 
 even Isolde's eyes, though the glamour of love was on them, 
 could no longer be blinded to it. The hours, as she 
 crouched in the library chair, were hours of death-agony. 
 "When she rose, her breast was the shroud, her heart the 
 grave, of Faith's fair young dream. 
 
 In spite of her efforts to conceal the change, it was not 
 long before her husband realized that love's roseate fillet 
 had fallen from her eyes. He was still her idol, but she 
 had discovered his feet to be of clay. At first the realiza- 
 tion caused him a pang of almost unendurable pain, but as 
 his deterioration went on, the pain faded to a light regret. 
 Not that he loved her less. Sometimes he fancied that his 
 love grew with every hour of his life, every throb of his 
 heart ; but his moral sense was blunted. The conscious- 
 ness of his unworthiness no longer tortured him. To the 
 stab of conscience his sin-drugged spirit was benumbed.
 
 168 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The honeymoon, which had waxed and waned, been re- 
 vivified and waxed anew, now waned forever. He watched 
 it flicker out with an unconscious sigh of relief. Love's 
 fever had been fierce, if brief ; love's calm was welcome. 
 Uncertainty was replaced by assurance, novelty by habi- 
 tude, fancy by reality. With the impetuous self-surrender 
 to the pursuit of the moment, which was characteristic of 
 him, he now abandoned himself to his financial ambitions. 
 His clear brain, his natural speculative aptitude, his ambi- 
 tion, daring, unscrupulousness above all, his " devil's 
 luck," tended to make him the central figure in the group 
 of speculators whom he had attracted about him. Almost 
 without exception these were financiers whose name and 
 fame, enviable or otherwise, were known throughout the 
 West. The fact that such men, old in the world to which 
 he was a new-comer, not only looked at him, but up to 
 him, he found intoxicating. Leadership had been, in a 
 measure, forced upon him. Since he had accepted it, he 
 must, he would hold to it, for life or death ! A few of 
 his associates were his friends as well as their own ; the 
 greater number were their own exclusively. These 
 spurred him to a reckless gait, following cautiously in his 
 footsteps. He was far too clever to degenerate into their 
 cat's-paw, as Randal had degenerated into his, and the 
 chestnuts he pulled from the fire were his own, but he did 
 not obtain them unburned. His wounds were slight, but 
 on young flesh slight wounds tell. It was to heal their 
 scars that he had plunged so recklessly into the Red 
 Ridge mine. 
 
 Foremost among the few men specified as his friends, 
 loyal and comparatively disinterested, stood Ralph Kings- 
 ley. Since their first chance meeting through an asso- 
 ciate named Rundell a meeting which, having been un-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 169 
 
 der feminine, but not reputable feminine, auspices (though 
 surely this is a paradox), it may be as well not to de- 
 scribe the men had been drawn to each other by a 
 mutual attraction which intimate acquaintance seemed to 
 intensify. A few days after the excitement attendant 
 upon the Red Ridge boom had subsided, Kingsley re- 
 turned to Newfield, from which, at the time, he had 
 beaten a discreet retreat, and sought Steele at the bank. 
 
 "Bad news," he began, without preface. " Rundell 
 recalls his loan." 
 
 " The deuce ! " ejaculated Steele. " What's up ? " 
 
 " He has a bigger spec on hand lands in the direction 
 of the C., B. & Q.'s proposed branch-road. I suggested 
 a 'combine ' for you without success." 
 
 " What was his ground for refusal ? " 
 
 " It was ' wine in and truth out ' with him. He said 
 he had been a fool and let you into too much already." 
 
 " He'll let me into more before I have done with him. 
 Recalls his loan, does he ? Well, he gets not a d d cent. 
 And I will have a finger in those lands, or swamp them. 
 My eye has been on them all along. Will you go into 
 them with me ? " 
 
 " Impossible. I am drowned fathoms deep in oil." 
 
 " All right. I'm equal to them." 
 
 " What will you raise on ? " 
 
 " On the devil, if nothing better turns up. It is win 
 or die with me. You don't half know me yet, old fellow." 
 
 " No," admitted Kingsley, " I do not half know you." 
 
 This short interview revealed the young banker's char- 
 acter to him in a new light. He had known him socially 
 as " a good fellow" the social misnomer for a bad one 
 and in the Red Ridge Mine transaction had discovered 
 him to be as unscrupulous as he was daring. But to defy
 
 170 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Rundell implied more than daring. He was a man with 
 whom few cared to interfere ; a gross, surly, iron-willed 
 man, a wily financier, and, politically, a power. The young 
 banker's attitude toward him implied a latent strength 
 which Kingsley had not suspected, and which he both 
 liked and admired, Steele was conscious of the favorable 
 impression he had made, and confirmed it. He retained 
 the loan, and had more than one finger in the railroad- 
 land pie, as well. 
 
 At about this period a new era in the social life of the 
 Harriman house began. In the early days of her mar- 
 riage, Isolde had sighed because the door of the library 
 seemed to shut her put from a phase of her husband's 
 life. Now she sighed because the door was opened. 
 Library and drawing-room were now as one, and the 
 strident voices formerly subdued by distance now rang 
 in coarse, rude accents in her ear. For a little space she 
 submitted in dazed fashion, but ere long she awoke to 
 the fact that she had been made the centre of a circle 
 the outskirts of which, a year earlier, she would have 
 shunned as contamination. She appealed to her hus- 
 band, and he laughed at her ; to Althea, and was met by 
 stony unconsciousness and misconception. More than 
 once she felt sorely tempted to appeal to Ralph Kings- 
 ley. There was something about him that convinced her, 
 even against the evidence of her own eyes and ears, that 
 he was not like his companions. Inadvertently, she had 
 probed beneath the cynical surface, and found the under- 
 grain good. He was conscious of her discovery, and she 
 was conscious of his consciousness. A secret sympathy 
 and understanding between them was the natural result 
 one which as yet, however, they realized but dimly. Their 
 conscious attitude toward each other was one of mutual
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 171 
 
 uncertainty. Against the good she suspected in him was 
 the evil she knew ; while on his side, he could not forget 
 that she was a woman ; a title which, unfortunately, one 
 sharp lesson in his earlier life had taught him to hold in 
 small respect. 
 
 Newfield, meantime, was not unobservant of the wheels 
 within wheels whirling under the impetus of Steele Har- 
 riman's hands. It was whispered that the Newfield Bank 
 was not the only bank that represented his interests ; and 
 that these, unconfined by bank- walls, were threading, like 
 strong quick fibres, the financial heart of the West. 
 These masculine whispers, overheard by quick feminine 
 ears, lost nothing in the repetition. Newfield generally, 
 even Newfield individually, began to feel a personal pride 
 in the bank and banker, shining in reflected light, finan- 
 cial and social, with amusing complacency. 
 
 " That thar's my bank th' Newfield bank Harri- 
 man's ! " the local inhabitant would boast, an upward and 
 outward sweep of his brawny thumb indicating the bank 
 to some open-mouthed country cousin. 
 
 "There goes cump'ny-folks ter the big house more 
 cump'ny-folks ! " was the daily feminine remark, as the 
 Harriman carriage, filled with guests, dashed through 
 the town. In fact, the big house became the cynosure of 
 the local Argus eyes. Isolde shrunk from the eyes in 
 dread and fear. What might not they discover? Her 
 dread, her fear, were the more cruel because they were 
 undefined. 
 
 As Newfield grew observant, Dr. Keene, whose inti- 
 macy with Isolde had lessened since her marriage, re- 
 established it with frank determination, and began to 
 appear almost nightly in the Harriman drawing-room, 
 the reverend Druce often by his side. At first Isolde
 
 172 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 ascribed the change to an old man's whim ; but when 
 she discovered that the whim was not indulged without a 
 motive deeper than she had suspected, she shrunk from 
 him, as if resenting his presence, with startled regret and 
 shame. Later on, however, as her need of such loyal 
 service as his grew greater, she looked up into his rugged 
 old face with grateful eyes. 
 
 "You are so good, so good!" she cried, incoherently. 
 
 But the doctor understood. 
 
 Steele smiled at first at the incongruous appearance of 
 the doctor and Druce in the drawing-room, whose other 
 frequenters were of such contrasting types ; but later on 
 he began to regard the constant presence of the two men 
 with resentful suspicion. 
 
 " Are they your body-guard ? " he asked Isolde, one 
 night, when he had felt their presence more than usually 
 irritating. 
 
 The words were a tacit admission of the position into 
 which he had forced her an unwise admission, since she 
 had endured in silence only because she believed herself 
 to be the victim of chance, rather than of deliberate 
 intent. 
 
 " You realize, then, that I am in need of a body- 
 guard?" she said, slowly. "Until now I have hoped, I 
 have believed, even, that you did not realize it Steele, 
 what is left me of faith and honor ? " 
 
 " Ask me something easier, my dear. That style of 
 problem went out with the ark." 
 
 She scarcely heard the scoffing answer. What was 
 left her of faith and honor? she had asked him. But 
 this was not the complete question. Faith, honor there 
 was one thing more. 
 
 " What is left me of love, Steele ? " she sobbed.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 173 
 
 " This and this and this ! " he cried, kissing her 
 protesting lips to silence. 
 
 Aye, such alone are the lees of love, be faith and honor 
 spilled ! 
 
 Steele was a genial host, even to the unwelcome guesi, 
 and from his manner, neither Druce nor Dr. Keene could 
 suspect his distaste to their presence under his roof. 
 Some of his guests, however, were less courteous. The 
 old doctor was inoffensive, in spite of his gruffness ; but 
 the mere presence of the pale, pure-faced young minister 
 was found intolerable by many of the frequenters of the 
 house, and these did not even feign to conceal their an- 
 tipathy. More than once Druce's cheeks had flushed, 
 and his soft eyes flashed, under the stab of an open sneer ; 
 but the eyes were veiled, and the proud young blood con- 
 trolled, by the grace of " Jesus, meek and humble of 
 Heart." Here was an acre, perhaps the most precious in 
 his Master's vineyard. Should he leave the vine to its 
 untrained way, because the weeds resisted him ? The 
 doctor's care was all for Isolde ; the minister's for Steele. 
 He saw that the world and the flesh had snared the fallen 
 soul, but he believed that their triumph would be but 
 brief. 
 
 One night it chanced that the two outstayed the other 
 guests, a discussion having arisen from the doctor's de- 
 risive account, resented by Druce, of a Methodist revival 
 in an adjacent settlement. Druce's creed was orthodox ; 
 the doctor, a religious man but not a religionist, upheld 
 the broad creed which neither questions Divinity nor 
 judges humanity, but is content to leave all ends, like all 
 beginnings, to an infinitely wise, as infinitely merciful 
 God. 
 
 " The Methodists are a great sect," said Druce. "If
 
 174 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 we do not wholly agree with their preaching, at least we 
 can honor their practice. The Catholics were the pioneers 
 of church and creed ; the Methodists of religion, pure 
 and simple. They brought Christ down from heaven, 
 changed Him from a God into a real, live, toiling, suffer- 
 ing, human brother-Man, set Him face to face with every 
 man, woman and child, whose human lives were divinized 
 thereafter. If their methods are, as the doctor says, 
 theatrical, so are Nature's ; so are Human Nature's. 
 There is tragedy, drama, comedy, in every phase of 
 natural and human life. The circuit rider was father to 
 the pastor, the founder of all Protestantism in the West, 
 to-day. Honor to him, and to his followers ! " 
 
 " Bravo, Druce!" said Steele, " the Methodists have a re- 
 cruit. " Suppose you mount the bench, and give us your 
 experience." 
 
 He threw himself at ease upon a low couch, exhaling 
 the smoke of his cigar with slow enjoyment. 
 
 " Methodist or Puseyite, Unitarian or Presbyterian, Jew 
 or Catholic, what's in a name ? " he said. " Keligion is a 
 jewel precious not in itself, but in its setting. Your 
 charming personality, for instance, dear your Reverence, 
 makes your religion a ' pearl of price ! ' ' 
 
 Druce took leave, somewhat abruptly ; the doctor fol- 
 lowed him. Isolde looked after them with sorrowful 
 shamed eyes. When the door was shut upon them, she 
 stole to her husband's side, and slipped her hand in his 
 with much of the shy tenderness of earlier days. She felt 
 that the minister was disappointed in him. With a 
 woman's loyal impulse she enlisted on the losing side. 
 
 "You were only jesting, I know, Steele," she said, "but 
 the jest was a scoff. Tell me that you did not mean it 
 that you do not think religion is nothing."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 175 
 
 ' I think as I said," he answered, making room on the 
 couch, and drawing her down beside him. " Religion is 
 just what and only what the professor makes it : hypo- 
 crisy in the hypocrite, cant in the Pharisee, truth in the 
 fanatic." 
 
 "Truth in the sincere Christian, you mean." 
 
 "The sincere Christian is the fanatic ; his Christianity 
 an ecstatic, hysterical fancy ; but truth to him." 
 
 "And not to you? Then you are not a Christian? 
 What are you, Steele ? " 
 
 " I am a man, my dear : a man of the world ; a man of 
 the world of to-day. I profess nothing, I deny nothing. 
 As truth is, let it be. I do not oppose it. I simply claim 
 freedom, public and private : freedom to think as I choose, 
 to speak as I choose, to act as I choose and this claim I 
 assert against even you." 
 
 " Not against me, Steele ; do not deceive yourself ; but 
 against your own best and highest self against your 
 God ! " 
 
 " God ! The old Word ! the old Name ! the old unan- 
 swering answer ! 
 
 "The all-answering answer, you mean! Above Him, 
 beyond Him, is who, what ? " 
 
 " No one, nothing, for you, my sweet, I admit ! You 
 are a woman." 
 
 "Yes, a woman 'woman, a helper,' as Scripture has 
 it. I begin to think that the revised Testament should 
 read, ' a helper-up ! ' ' 
 
 " Up to what, to whom ? he asked, passionately. " To 
 God and Christ, you will say. What can God and Christ 
 ever be to humanity but myths ? the Christian mj'th of 
 to-day, replacing the pagan myth of yesterday, to be re- 
 placed by the scientific myth of to-morrow. Not God,
 
 17G A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 but man, is the one reality of tins little life, and to make 
 each clay an earthly heaven this is the best life holds 
 life, to a man, is not what a woman conceives it a 
 mere succession of days and nights and seasons, a round 
 of duty, a dull routine of toil. These pave the track ; life 
 is the exultant racer that speeds along it. Life means to 
 a man tlje surge of hot blood through his veins, the thrill 
 of his virile flesh, the throb of his strong heart, the leap 
 of his quick pulses. It means the glorious freshness of 
 youth, the vigor of health, the strength and conscious 
 power of maturity. It means the slow, delicious awaken- 
 ing out of dreamless sleep to the glow and fragrance of 
 morning the plunge into sparkling waters, the dash into 
 dewy air. It means the seductive lassitude that steals 
 on with the night ; the relaxation of tense muscles ; the 
 stretch of languorous limbs on soft couches; the sensuous 
 passage through lotos-realms that bridge both sleep and 
 waking ; the slow, resistless drifting of an active brain 
 over the falls of dreamland into the deeps of sleep. It 
 means the rush and crush of the great human world ; the 
 splendid whirl of the rival wheels of trade, profession, 
 art, finance, politics. It means the grapple of brain, the 
 strife of hands, the competition of skill, the pitting of 
 forces. It means the revolving cycle of risk, gain, loss, 
 failure, triumph, downfall and uprising, defeat and vic- 
 tory, struggle and rest, war and peace, pain and pleasure. 
 It means the wrestle, the race, the chase, the joust, the 
 tourney. It means the rattle of dice ; the flash of cards ; 
 the spell of chance. It means the glow and sparkle, the 
 warmth and exhilaration of wine ; the dream of love ; the 
 fever B of passion. To be a man God ! It is heaven 
 enough. Let hell come after ! " 
 
 On a salver at hand stood a bottle of wine with a long-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 177 
 
 stemmed glass beside it. He sprang toward it, and fill- 
 ing the glass to the brim, lifted it to his lips. 
 
 "A toast," he cried, "a man's toast, to the man's life ! 
 It is ' Eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we 
 die ! ' " 
 
 Solemnly, as if resounding the evil words to heaven, 
 over the silence, broken only by the moan of the night- 
 wind through the cottonwoods, the church-clock tolled 
 the midnight hour. 
 
 Those twelve strokes were the knell of Steele Harri- 
 man's better life. Hitherto his soul had fluttered between 
 earth and heaven, like a moth between rushlight and 
 star. Thenceforward its wings strained no more toward 
 heaven. World-bound, flesh-bound, they failed, and 
 sunk to earth.
 
 CHAPTER XVL 
 
 MAGDALEN. 
 
 Material life is a barometer whose sensitive mercury 
 responds to every subtle fluctuation of the soaring or sink- 
 ing spirit. Therefore it was inevitable that this episode 
 in Steele Harriraan's spiritual life should cast its material 
 reflection. With his own hand he had slain Isolde's faith 
 in him. Bereft of its pure ideal to which to live up, in 
 masculine consequence, he lived down. Isolde watched 
 him, dizzily. She scarcely realized the terrible change, 
 its revelation had been so sharp and sudden. Life had 
 been all song and golden sunshine, and in the space of one 
 sharp lightning-flash the sun had set forever, and only 
 darkness was left. 
 
 Shut out by love for Steele grew morose and moody 
 she fled to her writing for relief, as the sufferer to the 
 anodyne of his pain ; surrendering herself with the aban- 
 donment of despair, to her art. But woman or artist, 
 love or art who shall doubt the stronger ? There were 
 hours, days, weeks together, when she spurned her manu- 
 script with passionate hand, and flung away her pen, cry- 
 ing out that she would dissemble no longer, that heart 
 was all, and brain nothing ; that she would sell her art, as 
 Esau his birthright, for the sweet warm human pottage 
 her human heart was hungering for. But later came the 
 reaction. Artist -like, she was a creature of moods ; reflec- 
 tive, superficially, of outer influences as a river-surface of
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 179 
 
 overhanging skies. She felt strong, happy, triumphant, 
 us she took up her pen. A font of inspiration seemed 
 suddenly loosed within her. This was life this subtle, 
 intoxicating consciousness of the creative power, that was 
 quickening pulse and brain. Love ! What was love but 
 a brief, sweet, human dream? Art was the one, true, 
 imperious passion of an artist's life. 
 
 From morning till night she wrote with feverish eager- 
 ness ; but the work if crude, was strong and vivid, and 
 found favor with press and public. One day she dashed 
 off a poem of more than ordinary passion and power, and 
 submitted it to Dr. Keene, who, though he had warned 
 her of "the cost and the pain," was, nevertheless, her 
 literary mentor. He returned it. 
 
 "Your soul is in a transition-state," he wrote, "and 
 your Muse is in travail with it. Give her time, and she 
 will come forth with new and ripened powers. Deliver 
 her prematurely, and her youth, her strength, her spon- 
 taneity will be slain forever. You can afford to wait. 
 Your genius is immortal." 
 
 She was musing over this message when her husband 
 came in, and playfully taking the note from her hands, 
 read it in spite of her protests. 
 
 " I forbid you to subject yourself or me to another 
 such impertinence," he said, tearing it into shreds which 
 he contemptuously flung away. " You write for the public, 
 let the public judge your work. And now off with the 
 blue-stockings, and on with the jewels. Eundell has 
 wired, announcing an inroad of guests by the evening 
 train." 
 
 The guests arrived duly. All, with the exception of 
 Rundell, were strangers to Isolde, but of a type she already 
 knew too well. They were familiar in address, flashy in
 
 ISO A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 attire, coarse in jest, and all deep drinkers. She excused 
 herself from the table as soon as possible. When they 
 joined her in the drawing-room they were visibly under 
 the influence of wine. At her husband's command she 
 gave some music, and then escaped to her room. When 
 he followed at midnight, he was hilarious, and slightly 
 incoherent. 
 
 " They're slap-down good fellows," he said, enthusiasti- 
 cally, " and represent a dozen millions between 'em. 
 That Rundell's the black sheep of the lot, but I cau't 
 afford to offend him. There's a few women connected 
 with 'em one way and another, and he's proposed bring- 
 in' 'em down here, over Sunday. They mayn't be just 
 your style, but we've got to make the best of it sabe f 
 They're a gay crowd, and I don't want my wife to be out- 
 shone, mark that. Order some scrumptious rigs, if you're 
 out of 'em, and don't be afraid of the cash. I'll stand it." 
 
 The guests arrived on the following Saturday. Isolde, 
 with frigid courtesy, received them. The women were 
 three in number, all handsome, all vivacious in manner, 
 all extravagantly attired. Before they had been an hour 
 in the house, Isolde was overlooked entirely, but about 
 their host they radiated like satellites around a sun. 
 When, dinner being ended, Isolde gave the eldest of the 
 three the customary signal, she openly laughed at her. 
 
 "Not if I know it," she said. "The twin P's parlor 
 and piano, I suppose ; a paraphrase upon 'Home, Sweet 
 Home,' or the 'Last Rose,' with a pathetic tremolo in the 
 last verse. Many thanks, but I prefer a cigarette and 
 your husband." 
 
 " And her husband prefers you and a cigar," laughed 
 her host, lighting a weed as he spoke. " A cigar is to a 
 man what love is to a woman the material germ of a
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 181 
 
 rapturous dream which kindles, flames to fire, and 
 flickers out ; ending in both cases in a puff of smoke, and 
 ashes ! " 
 
 " And then ? " questioned one of the women. 
 
 " And then the man lights a fresh cigar, the woman 
 takes a new lover, and the old dreams are dreamed over. 
 Dreams ! dreams ! dreams ! Life is a dream, love is a 
 dream, death is a dream ! The only reality is nothing." 
 
 "Apropos of what, Harriman or rather of whom?" 
 queried Eundell, daringly. "A man's, even a married 
 man's cheap cynicisms and negative philosophies are said 
 to have a feminine ' raison d'etre.' " 
 
 " Naturally," replied Steele, his eyes fixed on the woman 
 at his right hand the youngest and by far the handsom- 
 est woman of the three " since femininity is the univer- 
 sal ' raison d'etre.' Theology has it, ' born of God ! ' 
 Physiology, which is the theology of our material modern 
 age, says ' born of woman ! ' * 
 
 " Hush ! " cautioned the oldest and boldest woman, 
 tapping his lips with her cigarette. " No naughty 
 speeches here ! Mrs. Harriman 's 'ologies do not include 
 ambilogy." 
 
 " Toddle along, Isolde," laughed Steele, " since you're 
 not a smoker. We'll join you later." 
 
 " Yes much later ! " laughed the second woman. 
 
 Isolde did not hear her. She had already dropped the 
 portiere behind her, seized a wrap that lay on one of the 
 chairs, and darted from the house. 
 
 The wind blew bleakly through the leafless cotton- 
 woods. Between their ghost-like trunks, snows, like 
 trailing shrouds, were drifting. With trembling hands 
 she caught up her train, and sped down the path, out the 
 gate, into the dark Ledge-road. The sky was starless and
 
 182 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 lowering ; stray flakes of snow began to fall harbingers 
 of a coming squall. The wind beat her back, stinging 
 her face and freezing her breath upon her parted lips, 
 but she pressed on resolutely. The fierce bark of a 
 watch-dog, aroused by the light fall of her feet on the 
 frosty ground, stilled her heart with terror. Once she 
 heard the sharp cry of a famished cayote, astray from its 
 prairie herd. She paused, shaking with fear and cold, 
 but she would not turn back. Her love, her faith, her 
 pride, were outraged. She shrunk from the tender mem- 
 ories of the past with burning cheeks and lowered 
 eyelids. She shrunk from the future with a shuddering 
 heartsickness such as only a white soul threatened by the 
 nrire can know. What further outrage it held for her she 
 too clearly foresaw. 
 
 A sudden choking anguish was in her throat. She 
 clutched it with both hands, and gasped hysterically. 
 The sky, the trees, the barren ground, whirled above, 
 around, beneath her. She staggered, and struck against 
 a rough pine-trunk. A frost-sharpened splinter pierced 
 her shawl, and buried itself in her upper arm's soft flesh. 
 She moaned, and her pale lips trembled pathetically. 
 Poor little white bruised arm ; how round, how soft, how 
 fair it was. How piteous that such young, fair, frail 
 things must suffer. She pressed her lips to the wounded 
 place, and kissed it pitifully. The hurt flesh shuddered 
 from even their soft touch. In a flash her face grew hard 
 and bitter. What was the bruise of body to the death- 
 hurt of heart and soul ? She was glad that the soft flesh 
 pricked and burned and shuddered. O, that everyone, 
 everything, in this bad, hard, cruel world, might suffer 
 suffer suffer ! " The pain of the world ! " Once, she had 
 wept over the words ; now she gloated over them. They
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 183 
 
 soothed her, eased her, made her laugh, laugh, laugh ! 
 The wild peal startled her. She clasped her hands to her 
 ears, and crouched down on the frosty ground, racked 
 with strangling sobs. O God ! she was so wicked ! O 
 God, forgive her ! O God, take away her heart's wild 
 maddening pain ! 
 
 When she reached the Ledge-gate she was panting and 
 could scarcely drag herself to the door. It was unlatched, 
 and she pushed it back and fell in blindly. Althea was 
 at supper. She uttered a cry of surprise when she saw 
 her sister's face. Isolde staggered to her and fell weakly 
 into her arms. 
 
 A glass of wine revived her. Slowly the color crept 
 back to her lips. She motioned away the refilled glass, 
 and sobbed out her piteous story. Before she had 
 finished it Althea had ordered the carriage to the door. 
 
 " You must go back," she said firmly. " To yield will 
 be to conquer." 
 
 Isolde yielded. 
 
 They reached thejiouse just as the party in the dining- 
 room rose from the table. Althea drew her sister into a 
 sheltered recess of the brilliant drawing-room. The two 
 elder women, with wine-brightened eyes and wine-flushed 
 faces, still rotated about their host ; but his eyes were 
 eagerly following the third woman, a pale, proud, beautiful 
 young creature, who turned from him with almost inso- 
 lent indifference, and sought Isolde. 
 
 " Your gown is quite wet," she said, " and you are 
 shivering. Have you been out ? " 
 
 Suddenly a look of pained comprehension flashed into 
 her face. 
 
 "We frightened you," she said in an undertone, "and 
 you ran away from us. Your sister brought you back."
 
 181 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Isolde did not answer. The girl misunderstood lier 
 silence. 
 
 " You need not shrink from me," she said, with proud 
 sadness. "My touch will not pollute you. I am on the 
 brink, yes ; but, as yet, I have not crossed the chasm ! " 
 
 Isolde heard the words, after a dull, unconscious 
 fashion, but she failed to comprehend them. A death- 
 like languor encompassed hei % , deadening even the cruel 
 pain in her heart. Magdalen bent to her pitifully. 
 
 " Slip upstairs ! " she said, with a quick glance about 
 her. " You can escape unnoticed. I will make your 
 excuses." 
 
 When the draggled train had disappeared up the curve 
 of the winding stairway, the girl turned to her host. 
 
 " I have sent your wife upstairs," she said. " She was 
 looking pale and tired. She left her excuses with me." 
 
 He fancied that she sneered as she spoke, and started 
 toward the stairs with an ugly frown on his face. Mag- 
 dalen recalled him. 
 
 " Are you going to call her back ? " she asked, reproach- 
 fully, "and prove all my finesse wasted? To be frank, I 
 suggested that she leave us to her husband. I " with 
 a bewildering upward glance of her beautiful wine-brown 
 eyes "I wanted him to myself." 
 
 Isolde was left in peace.
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 FROM FLAME TO ASHES. 
 
 On Monday the guests departed. Steele accompanied 
 them to Denver, and did not return until Tuesday, when 
 he went directly from the station to the bank. There, in 
 the late afternoon, Althea called upon him. He was not 
 in a brotherly mood, but this obvious fact, Althea, with 
 sisterly assurance, disregarded. She did not protest, as 
 he expected, against a repetition of the episode of the pre- 
 vious Saturday evening. On the contrary, she congratu- 
 lated him upon his certain exemption from protest, in case 
 of such repetition, assuming the inevitability of Isolde's 
 absence from the scene to be granted. That he was not 
 insensible to the covert threat of her specious words, his 
 savage scowl betrayed. Althea met the scowl with a smile, 
 and dismissing the delicate subject, introduced another, 
 this time a personal one. He listened with attention. As 
 she concluded, he congratulated her. He congratulated 
 himself, likewise. The bad quarter of an hour which he 
 had been dreading from Isolde, would now be on Isolde's 
 side. 
 
 He entered the house unnoticed, and surprised her at 
 her desk. She submitted to his kiss of greeting but did 
 not respond to it. As she was about to speak he took the 
 initiative, warned by her face that he could not afford to 
 yield the advantage that Althea's confidence had given 
 him.
 
 186 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Althea has been here," be asserted. " Did sbe tell 
 you anytbing of special interest ? " 
 
 " Of interest to me ? " sbe asked. " No." 
 
 " Of interest to herself and George, I mean." 
 
 " No." 
 
 He was pacing the little study with restless feet. His 
 bands were unsteady. His face and eyes showed traces of 
 dissipation. 
 
 " She has applied for a divorce," he said. "George does 
 not oppose it. In fact he submits most gracefully, and 
 has made over the Ledge to Gay, and settled a snug little 
 sum upon Gay and Altbea, jointly. In consequence, things 
 will go on much as usual, for the present at least ; and 
 the divorce will be a strictly private one, unknown outside 
 of family and court. There will be no scandal, no pub- 
 licity. Althea has done wisely, as usual ; ' wisely, and,' 
 though you will not admit it c well.' The divorce is the 
 best thing for her, under the circumstances." 
 
 From her pale lips came no protest. After her first 
 irrepressible start of surprise she had betrayed no emo- 
 tion. She believed that she felt none. Her heart seemed 
 dead within her. 
 
 " Her alleged ground fictitious, of course," he contin- 
 ued, "is desertion. She is a hard woman, our hand- 
 some Althea ; yet I think George loves her still. I ven- 
 ture to assert that, sooner or later, matters between them 
 must have righted themselves in orthodox fashion, but for 
 our marriage." 
 
 " I do not understand," she roused herself to say. 
 
 " As my wife you have opened a new social vista to 
 Althea. She has a quick eye for the main chance, and 
 worships wealth. George's moderate means and lack of 
 ambition have always galled her. I suspect it is only a
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 187 
 
 suspicion, mind that she has sighted a golden bait, and 
 means to nibble at it." 
 
 "You mean that she will marry again ? " 
 
 " Not necessarily. I mean that she prefers to be free 
 to marry again." 
 
 " With her husband alive ? " 
 
 " With her husband, as her husband, dead. The di- 
 vorce is the funeral-rite of the mariage-tie ; its legal seal 
 the clod on the coffin. The corpse, like other dead, is left 
 to the graveyard ! " 
 
 She looked up dizzily. 
 
 " ' To have and to hold ' ' for better, for worse ' ' till 
 death us do part ! ' What do the words mean, Steele," 
 she cried, "since they do not mean what they say ! " 
 
 He traced the pattern of the carpet with his foot, in 
 embarrassed silence. 
 
 " I must go to Althea," she said, rising. 
 
 He held her back gently, but firmly. 
 
 "No," he said, "you must not go to Althea. She for- 
 bids expostulation. She knows that to hear you, would 
 be to hear what she could not forgive." 
 
 "But the little child, Steele ! the little child ! For his 
 sake we must save her." 
 
 " It is too late to save her. You force me to tell you 
 what I hoped to conceal. I put the case in the future to 
 break it more gently ; in truth, it is of the past. The 
 divorce was granted this morning. Hang the woman ! I 
 wish she would make her own confessions. Long ago 
 she asked me to tell you ; but I have been a coward, and 
 spared you ! " 
 
 " Spared me ! " she repeated, bitterly. " Have you ? " 
 
 Her significant tone incensed him. He turned upon 
 her almost brutally.
 
 188 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Quit that firing from arnbush ! " be said. "We will 
 have it out, ' face to face, once for all. You refer, of 
 course, to the little affair of the other night. That it was 
 unpleasant for you, I acknowledge : that it was the insult 
 you chose to consider it, I deny. The Rundell crowd is a 
 gay one, as I forewarned you ; but I explained that I could 
 not afford to offend him, and you should have helped me 
 out of my difficulty not made it harder for me. The 
 women are not your style God forbid ! I admit, even, 
 that they are slightly off-color. Nevertheless, they are by 
 no means what you think them. They belong to a fast 
 set, whose ethics you do not understand. Of course, I 
 would not choose them for your associates. Probably you 
 will never meet them, nor any like them, again. On the 
 other hand, it is possible that such society must occasion- 
 ally be forced upon you. The West is not the East. The 
 social pace is faster here : the social rein more lax, the 
 social field wider. If the society I move in is distaste- 
 ful to you, I am sorry ; but you should have thought 
 of that before you entered it. Your social adaptabil- 
 ity was one of the charms which first attracted me to 
 you. Do not force me to realize that it was a spurious 
 one." 
 
 Her pale lips made no answer, but bitter tears welled 
 slowly to her eyes. Steele and Althea, .her two nearest 
 and dearest, seemed going from her, into a world of evil 
 whose paths she could not tread. A clicking sound roused 
 her from her sad reverie. As she looked up, her husband 
 dropped over her shoulder a jeweller's case, in which, from 
 a bed of ruby velvet, flashed dazzling diamonds. For a 
 moment she sat in silence, gazing blankly at the glittering 
 baubles. Then rising with calm, proud dignity, she shut 
 the case, and held it toward him.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 189 
 
 " All are said to have their price," she said, " but mine 
 is higher than you think. These do not cover it." 
 
 He caught the jewels from her hand, and hurled them 
 to the floor. 
 
 "You rank yourself too high," he sneered. "As a 
 woman, your price fluctuates with your beauty. Perhaps 
 you do not know that you have gone off damnably, of 
 late. After all, you are quite right. Diamonds would 
 not become you. They are fatal to beauty in its wane." 
 
 He rang the bell imperatively, and waited in sullen 
 silence. When the maid appeared, he pointed to the 
 jewels. 
 
 " Pick those up, and hand them to Mrs. Harrimau," he 
 said. 
 
 The maid obeyed with a frightened face. 
 
 " Th' boss was in one o' his white tantrums," she con- 
 fided a few minutes later, to the still faithful Jehu. " I 
 was that flustered as I nearways dropped 'em, arter 
 a-picking 'em up. I wouldn't be in Mis' Harriman's 
 shoes, not far all th' di'mants in Californy." 
 
 "Di'mants beant ev'rythin','' insinuated Jehu, hope- 
 fully. 
 
 " No, nor husbands beant, nuther ! " responded the 
 maid, cruelly. " Di'mants or no di'mants, no man's tan- 
 trums fur me." 
 
 In the meantime Isolde, who had accepted the case 
 fi-om the maid without a protest, resolutely held it to- 
 ward her husband, when they were again alone. For a 
 moment he hesitated. Then, with a taunting smile he 
 took it from her, drawing out his watch at the same 
 time. 
 
 "Just in time for the Denver flyer," he said, as he 
 turned away.
 
 190 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 She saw him no more that night. 
 
 Bitter days ensued. As love failed her, Isolde turned 
 for consolation to her art. As she resumed the writing 
 which for a time she had utterly abandoned, her pen, as if 
 impelled, transcribed the story of her heart. Completed, 
 it was a long poem of sustained power, a noble story told 
 in noble verse. Such a poem had been the dream of her 
 girlhood, the conception of her earlier womanhood ; but 
 only with maturity had come the pain and sorrow whose 
 travail gave it birth. When the last word was written, 
 she kissed the manuscript with rapturous lips. The in- 
 tuition had come to her the sure intuition of the creator, 
 that the creation is good. . 
 
 She relinquished her pen with a sigh ; half of regret, 
 half of relief, and abandoned herself to the rapt unspeak- 
 able ecstasy which the artist alone knows. The fire of 
 inspiration, though its work was consummated, had not yet 
 flickered out ; and the spirit-flame cast over the material 
 creation the transfiguring glow of the ideal conception, 
 which not till calmer hours would she realize, had eluded 
 birth. Its life was in her blood, its glow in her heart, its 
 excitement in her brain. The poem flashed before her 
 eyes in fitful phrase and fragment echoed in her ears 
 now in sonorous periods swelling like organ-harmonies, 
 now in dainty fancies, lilting like fairy-songs. In uncon- 
 scious, ecstatic murmuring, her lips reiterated her spirit's 
 music. Her arm, where it pressed her eyes, was wet with 
 rapturous tears. A subtle tremor thrilled her from head 
 to foot. 
 
 Her husband, surprising her in her blissful reverie, 
 scrutinized her rapt face with curious eyes that followed 
 her as she shut her manuscript in her desk. He had re- 
 marked her unwonted abstraction and absorption of late,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 191 
 
 and was not loath to possess himself of the secret of it. 
 At the moment, as fate would have it, the announcement 
 of a visitor called her from the room. As the door shut 
 behind her, he stepped to her desk, and after an instant's 
 hesitation, raised its lid and took out the written pages. 
 Then he lighted a cigar, and by the glow of the open fire, 
 began to read. For an hour he read on intently. Then 
 he tossed the stump of his cigar into the flames. 
 
 " The devil ! " he ejaculated. 
 
 Flinging the manuscript back to the desk he paced the 
 little room, his hands folded behind him, his brow fur- 
 rowed with deep and gloomy thought. Now and again 
 he smiled bitterly. Once with impatient hand he dashed 
 a sudden moisture from his eyes. As Isolde returned, he 
 pointed to the desk in silence. She started violently as the 
 disordered sheets caught her eyes. 
 
 "Yes, I have been reading it," he admitted, "and a 
 lucky thing, too, by Jingo ! Is it possible that you intend 
 to publish it ? You are mad ! Do you realize that you 
 have analyzed yourself, me, the whole spiritual and emo- 
 tional history of our marriage, as minutely as the sur- 
 geon dissects a naked body ? If you enjoy the scalpel, 
 I do not. As a matter of common decency your dissec- 
 tion of me, at least, should have been with a reserve." 
 
 Without a word, she gathered up the pages, and turned 
 with them toward the door. He mistook her dazed 
 silence for defiance. 
 
 " Have you understood me ? " he asked, interposing as 
 she was about to leave the room. 
 
 She did not answer. She had not heeded, scarcely 
 heard him. His anger, which had been slowly kindling, 
 flashed into sudden flame. 
 
 " Possibly you will understand this," he cried, wrench-
 
 192 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 ing the manuscript from her hand ; " and this," tear- 
 ing it leaf by leaf ; " and this! " showering the fragments 
 into the glowing grate. "Let this end the damned non- 
 sense, for good and all. As for me, I am sick of it." 
 
 He went out, slamming the door behind him. She 
 stood where he had left her, staring blankly into the open 
 tire. 
 
 A mother looks upon the face of her dead child, and 
 smiles ; the child lives still, in heaven. A lover kisses his 
 dead love, and whispers between his sobs that love is 
 deathless, eternal. The artist turns from his shattered 
 work, and knows that the past was vain, that the future is 
 hopeless ; that the child of his soul, the love of his heart, 
 the dream of his brain, the creation of his hand, is dead, 
 dead forever ! 
 
 Under the glowing logs, in a pall of pathetic ashes, lay 
 the shattered vase which had brimmed with her life- 
 blood. She put her hand to her breast. It felt chill, 
 numb, empty. Without stint, without reserve, she had 
 spilled its sweet life-store. She stretched her hand to 
 the bright flames. Give her back, O give her back, all 
 they had taken from her ! In vain the prayer. Not one 
 small portion of her golden measure should be restored 
 to her. Gone to the last sweet tittle, gone forever ! 
 
 She had sunk on her knees by the hearth, crouching 
 lower and lower, until her forehead rested on the gilded 
 fender. The burned sheets rustled in the grate ; the soft 
 sound roused her. As she lifted her face, a scrap of 
 paper fluttered to the hearth. In trembling hands she 
 caught it up, and pressed a passionate kiss upon it. Then 
 with eager eyes she scanned it. Upon its curled scorched 
 surface a few lines still were legible. As she read them a 
 cry of pain and incredulity escaped her. Re-reading
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 193 
 
 them, the dawn of anguished revelation paled upon her 
 face. 
 
 * " Who loveth Love must break the bonds of Art ! 
 Man chafes at loving a divided heart. 
 Art is a mistress with a sovereign will, 
 Man's heart a master and to quite fulfil 
 The stern demands of either is a strife 
 Extending e'en beyond one woman's life. 
 Love brooks no rival ; half-souled gifts derides, 
 And, scornful, shuns the shrine where Art abides. 
 Let woman choose the fleeting bubble Fame, 
 And bid good -by to cheeks with Love aflame ; 
 Or let her choose Love's leaping lambent fires, 
 And put away Ambition's wild desires. 
 No middle course is left ; man's heart demands 
 Complete surrender at a woman's hands." * J. C. H. 
 
 The twilight deepened to dusk. The spent flames 
 flickered. Through the grate-bars a shower of chill gray 
 ashes filtered to the hearth. She did not see them, 
 though her blank gaze seemed to follow them. Her eyes 
 were fixed upon the vision of her life's mistake. 
 
 " Who loveth Love must break the bonds of Art ! " 
 
 How and why had she written the fateful words she, 
 who had loved Love well, yet borne Art's bonds unbroken? 
 The prayer of her bridal-days, of her wife-heart, re- 
 curred to her. To be "a good wife only to be a good 
 wife," had been its burden. Had that yearning prayer 
 been born of her own unrecognized suspicion that her 
 wifely surrender of heart and life was not entire and un- 
 reserved ? 
 
 " Art is a mistress with a sovereign will, 
 Man's heart a master and to quite fulfil 
 The stern demands of either is a strife 
 Extending e'en beyond one woman's life."
 
 194 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Her own pen had written the too true words, yet in the 
 field full narrow for single strife, she had waged the two- 
 fold one, loyal to neither sovereign, since failing both. 
 And the cost of her failure 
 
 " Love brooks no rival ; half souled gifts derides, 
 Arid, scornful, shuns the shrine where Art abides." 
 
 Though Art should yield the shrine, Love must still 
 scorn it. For her whole-souled gift, it was too late, too 
 late ! With bowed face she wept bitterly. 
 
 The mistake, the failure of her marrried life confronted 
 her with accusing, vengeful face. Her husband had 
 changed from good to bad, from bad to worse. She had 
 believed this change her misfortune ; now she realized 
 that it was, in part, her fault Her life, which should 
 have been the complement of his, had denied, eluded, 
 resisted him. He had hungered for bread, and she by 
 his own lips convicted had held him a stone. His 
 thirsting soul had turned to her, and the draught which 
 she alone could hold, whose fulness alone could satisfy 
 him, she had poured in stinted measure which left him 
 a-thirst still. 
 
 " Let woman choose the fleeting bubble Fame 
 And bid good-by to cheeks with Love aflame, 
 Or let her choose Love's leaping lambent fires, 
 And put away Ambition's wild desires, . 
 No middle course is left " 
 
 she had written, yet striven to pursue the middle 
 course. She sprang to her feet, and turned to her desk. 
 The hearth was littered with the ashes of her dead Art- 
 di-eam. Impulsively, yet resolutely, beside these she 
 emptied her desk's entire store. Eeams of manuscript,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 195 
 
 prose and verse ; two small volumes of published song ; 
 letters from press and public ; stories and poems in print 
 and: type ; columns of criticisms ; heaps of fugitive 
 notices ; budgets of reviews ; souvenirs of pen-won friends 
 from far and near ; her gold, pearl-handled pens ; her 
 scented blotters ; all the dainty, luxurious trifles with 
 which her art had been surrounded, she turned out to- 
 gether. Then she looked down upon her work. Her 
 eyes were tearful, but her lips inexorable. 
 
 " Man's heart demands 
 Complete surrender at a woman's hands," 
 
 she murmured. " O my love, my love, the surrrender is 
 complete, at last !. God grant it may not be too late ! " 
 
 Then, filling and refilling her hands swiftly as she could 
 empty them, she cast the whole precious hoard into the 
 devouring fire. 
 
 " Your Muse ? " questioned Dr. Keene, that evening. 
 
 "My Muse," she said, "has fled me on wings of fire. 
 Bid her God-speed, Doctor. Her flight, if late, is eternal !" 
 
 " You mean ? " he queried. 
 
 " I mean that you were right when you warned me that 
 the laurels of fame are for man's brow, the rose of love 
 for the woman's ; when you told me to make my life an 
 altar to my womanhood, my Muse its holocaust. 
 
 " Who loveth Love must break the bonds of Art ! 
 
 " And, O Doctor, Doctor ! not because I break the 
 bonds, but because I break them too late with them, ' for 
 love of love,' my heart is breaking ! " 
 
 The doctor was too wise to quell her passionate sobs, 
 but he lingered till they abated. Then he went sadly out.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Poor little fledgling song-bird," he sighed. " So the 
 eagle has not spared her." 
 
 At the gate he halted, looking back to the splendid 
 house with misty eyes. 
 
 "She will be mute while her heart is breaking," he 
 murmured, "but," with a triumphant smile flashing 
 through his tears, " when her heart is broken, how she 
 will sing, how she will sing ! "
 
 CHAPTER XVIIL 
 
 A PHANTOM GUEST. 
 
 As time went on, Isolde's dread lest her sacrifice be 
 made too late, deepened to conviction. If Steele was con- 
 scious that she had chosen 
 
 " . . . Love's leaping lambent fires, 
 And put away Ambition's wild desires," 
 
 he made no sign. Even as he had derided the half-souled 
 gift of her divided heart, so he now rejected her whole- 
 souled offering her complete surrender made at such 
 sore cost. His feverish pursuit of fortune by day, of 
 pleasure by night, absorbed him. In the past he had 
 been only defiant : now he was reckless. Newfield began 
 to remark that the young banker was " going it," feminine 
 tongues speaking the words indulgently, however, until 
 masculine ones reiterated them with a wistful cadence 
 which betrayed the temptation of the owners thereof to 
 "go it" with him. Whereat indulgent femininity grew 
 suddenly rigid, and relentlessly nipped such masculine 
 aspii-ations in their bud. 
 
 The snows were still white on the hills, the wind fierce 
 through the tree-tops, when " th' big house gev a party." 
 In the columns of the local journal, the festivity was de- 
 scribed as the grandest social event of the season. In 
 reality it was not a social event at all, but a business affair, 
 pure and simple, as Virgiuie Sharpe, spinster, knew.
 
 198 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " A motley assemblage ! " she declaimed to her chance 
 companion of the moment, her keen eyes making an in- 
 telligent survey of the crowded rooms. " 'Motley' is the 
 newspaper adjective, isn't it, for such incongruous collec- 
 tions of human specimens ? Do sit down in this corner, 
 while I tell you who's who, free of charge. You look like 
 a performing lizard, wriggling about in that serpentine 
 manner." 
 
 The addressed was a slender, lithe young man, arrayed 
 in the conventional evening garb of polite society ; the ad- 
 dresser a maiden of uncertain years, whose mission it was 
 to teach the idea of youthful Newfield how to shoot. She 
 was a tall, angular, aggressive specimen of femininity, 
 with a plain, prematurely-faded face whose high wrinkled 
 forehead was stiffly framed in unlovely store-crimps. Her 
 most telling feature was her tongue, which, while turned 
 upon himself, the newspaper man failed to admire. Later, 
 however, he acknowledged it an invaluable acquaintance 
 for one of his profession. 
 
 As Miss Sharpe had said, the social assemblage was in- 
 deed a motley one ; not only Newfield proper, but its out- 
 lying mine, ranch, and farm districts, being represent- 
 ed. Rough-handed, high-booted miners, writhing in the 
 misery of starched linen ; clumsy young farmers, uncouth- 
 ly clad in ready-made clothes purchased for the occasion ; 
 ruddy-faced cattle-men, gorgeous in satin-ties of resplen- 
 dent hues, and with folded sombreros protruding from 
 their pockets, circled about with their respective wives 
 and sisters and sweethearts, side by side with the con- 
 ventionally-attired partners of the Newfield belles. 
 
 The newspaper-man looked about him in amazement. 
 
 " Don't understand it, eh ? " queried Miss Sharpe. 
 " Well, / do. Every native in the room is a Harrimau
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 109 
 
 Bank depositor. What's the logical deduction? Give it 
 up, eh ? Take the head of the class, do. I give you the 
 medal for stupidity. Bless your muddled brains, what 
 other than that the Harriman Bank is the only sesame to 
 the Harriman house ? Now, the Harriman house means 
 Denver folk, Omaha folk, Chicago folk, Eastern folk. It 
 means the great moneyed magnates (pronounced mag- 
 nets), of the coast ; it means English ranchmen of title ; it 
 means railroad-kings, politicians, speculators of all classes; 
 it means, in short, Society ! Perhaps you think this 
 primitive region does not care for the capital S ? There's 
 where you're out. Every paterfamilias within a hundred 
 miles will be a Harriman depositor by this day month. 
 The women will work that, the ambitious daughters 
 and the matchmaking mas. And Steele Harriman knows 
 it. Every fool here looks upon this flare-out as a reckless 
 extravagance. I tell you it's a big investment." 
 
 The newspaper-man began to enjoy himself. 
 
 "Doesn't Mrs. Harriman look just lovely?" exclaimed 
 Miss Sharpe, whose own costume consisted of a scant 
 black silk, freckled in patches by dowdy knots of brown 
 ribbon. " Those tan shoes do look so stylish. If they 
 have such in Denver, 'remember me when them you see.' 
 I wear sevens." 
 
 "Shall I make a foot-note of it?" 
 
 " A bank-note, if you like." 
 
 The newspaper-man evidently did not like. Miss Sharpe 
 considerately changed the subject. 
 
 "That Sphinx of a woman in black velvet, helping to 
 do the honors," she said, " is Althea Rounds, Mrs. Hani- 
 man's sister. She made the match not but what Barkis 
 was willin' enough, but Peggotty wasn't She was the 
 shyest, most skrinking little creature I ever saw. To
 
 200 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 marry her was like tearing up a white rose by the roots, 
 and that's what Althea Rounds and Steele Harriman did 
 between them. And George Rounds knows it." 
 
 " George Rounds ? " 
 
 " Althea's absent, always absent, husband. She caught 
 him like a fish on a hook, but even she failed to land 
 him. She's got the tarnalest nature ever woman had, and 
 he keeps the length of the line between them. When 
 he heard of Steele Harriman's attentions, however, he 
 swooped up to the Ledge like a shark ; but the Sphinx 
 lied in the most bare-faced manner, swearing by Ananias 
 and Sapphira that the report was false. When he found 
 her out, there was a frightful scene ; I had it from one of 
 my dunces, whose first cousin's sweetheart has a brother 
 married to a sister-in-law of Mrs. Rounds' hired girl. He 
 hasn't been back since, and my opinion is that he's gone 
 for good, this time. See her glare at me. I believe she 
 has heard every word. She's the type of woman whose 
 every hair is an ear-trumpet, and every eyelash a telescope. 
 She'll hear more than that from me before I marry. 
 There's Harriman p&re, pairing off the wall-flowers. Don't 
 punish the pun." 
 
 The newspaper-man revived. 
 
 "I shall, next time," he said. "How does he like the 
 bride?" 
 
 " O, he's devoted to her. But then, he'd be devoted to 
 an alligator. He's the dearest old fool the Lord ever 
 made, and He's seen fit to make a good many of the sex. 
 Sits down in that feather-weight bank, and beams on 'my 
 son Steele ' till the snow melts off the sidewalk. The twin- 
 brother, Jack, shot six years ago in a backwoods gambling 
 
 h ahem ! hole, was a wild fellow, but worth a dozen 
 
 of this one. O, you like him, of course ! all greenhorns
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 201 
 
 do. But he doesn't wear. He's like a professional 
 beauty, skin-deep and good for one season only." 
 
 " Who are those er " 
 
 " Gushing young things with the hair and complexions ? 
 
 " 'Red an' yeller, 
 Ketch a feller,' 
 
 but they haven't caught one yet. They are known as the 
 Miss Hunters husband and hyphen understood. That 
 'divinely tall ' woman in dull jet following is Mrs. Anna- 
 bel Rorke, relict of our late mayor, and besieged by his 
 would-be successors. Handsome eyes, and knows how to 
 use them. ' Samivel, bevare of the vidders.' Miss Bread- 
 aud-Butter beside her is her Yankee niece. Doesn't look 
 as if she knew beans, does she ? But as she comes from 
 Boston, she's open to suspicion. We make a point of 
 being polite to her, in case she is writing us up. In all 
 probability she is writing us down, in consequence. 
 Politic politeness is one of the things which even the 
 blind see through." 
 
 "The little Yankee does not look blind to me," said the 
 newspaper-man, scrutinizing the girl somewhat keenly. 
 
 "O no ! " admitted Miss Sharpe, "she's only near-sight- 
 ed. Sees as far and only as far as others choose she shall 
 see. Sooner or later, of course, she will put on glasses, 
 but they will be rose-colored. She's that sort of a sim- 
 pleton." 
 
 "I like ' that sort of a simpleton.' " 
 
 " What man doesn't ? The rose-color haloes him as the 
 god, crowns him as the king, his own fancy paints him. 
 Every man scorns to be only a man ; he must be more 
 or less. A god, till the halo pales ; a king, till the crown 
 crumbles. After a brute ! "
 
 202 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "I say, Miss Sharpe," protested the attacked, " draw it 
 mild, will you ! " 
 
 " Mild as a lamb," she acquiesced. " Humanity de- 
 mands it. I forgot that you were alone and unpro- 
 tected." 
 
 There was a stir at the entrance. Miss Sharpe read- 
 justed her spectacles. 
 
 "Enter the guy of the town," she announced, "Miss 
 Caroline Linnett, in love with Peter Jones, a noodle 
 rhymester who signs himself the ' Pike's Peak Poet.' Look 
 at her dandelion-and-green get-up. Didn't think she had 
 the taste to match her complexion. He's pouring forth 
 like a cat on a fence. Listen as they pass." 
 
 " Such a poem as you gave us last evening ! " Caro- 
 line was murmuring. " I was faint faint with vener- 
 ation ! " 
 
 " My lute ! " sobbed the poet, " trembling and vibrat- 
 ing under the touch of the master-hand ! My receptive 
 one, open to the poet's influence even as the the as the 
 lips are for the ruddy wine " 
 
 Caroline disapproved. 
 
 " I belong to the ' Young Ladies' Temperance Socie- 
 ty,' " she said, reprovingly. 
 
 "Ah!" faltered the poet, somewhat disconcerted. 
 Then, with sudden inspired fervor : " / do not. 
 
 "It has been said," he went on, "that my verses are 
 ' like wine, effervescent, delirious, and suggestive of the 
 empty bottle behind them.' The Denver Satirist said 
 that. I thought it a very sweet compliment." 
 
 Mrs. Linnett, a faded, affected, beribboned and be- 
 crimped little woman, chaperoning the gushing Caroline 
 from the rear, leaned forward, and tapped the poet-cheek 
 with her fan.
 
 A SOW OF ESAU. 203 
 
 " Sweets to the sweet ! " she said, archly. 
 
 " O, ma ! " simpered Caroline, in coy confusion. 
 
 "Here comes an engaged couple," resumed Miss 
 Sharpe ; "Jack Holbrook, who once fancied himself in love 
 with Mrs. Harrirnan, and Hanna Agnew, whose vestal- 
 wings have just fluttered from a convent nest. She 
 reminds me of Camoen's Catarina, with her 
 
 " ' Sweetest eyes were ever seen ! ' 
 
 That handsome man with the twinkling blue eyes is 
 Nevilles, the contractor, noted for his witty tongue and 
 kind heart, as well as for his millions. He's poking fun 
 now at that portly and placid dowager by his side, whom 
 he calls the ' Mother of her Country ; ' she having done 
 her patriotic duty, maternally, to the tune of the thirteen 
 original States, since the matrimonial administration be- 
 gan. In the interests of Social Economy, her husband 
 should pension her off. Such women belong on the retired 
 list of the Knights of Labor." 
 
 Here Miss Sharpe bowed to a bright-eyed man who 
 carried his intellectual head with an air of distinction. 
 
 " His type ? " questioned her companion, with in- 
 terest. 
 
 " Newspaper-type ! But it's not strange you don't 
 recognize it. He's a capital where you're only an interro- 
 gation-point. I fear that he'll degenerate into a printers' 
 devil, however. ' Follow your nose,' says the adage, and 
 his nose is crooked ! " 
 
 Rejoicing in the possession of a purely Grecian feature, 
 the newspaper-man looked complacent. 
 
 " What is mine ? " he asked. 
 
 " Flat ! " responded Miss Sharpe. " Flat as a flounder."
 
 204 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 f 
 The Grecian-featured subsided. 
 
 "Here comes the religious element," she continued, 
 briskly ; " the Romanist priest side by side with our min- 
 ister Druce. I call that edifying. See those Hunter girls 
 smirking Druceward. They might as well set their caps 
 at the man in the moon. That distinguished looking man 
 following is Governor Rushing, of Nebraska. If you 
 haven't to write him up as president, yet, 'I'll lose my 
 crimps ! " 
 
 With the instinct of the turning worm, the newspaper- 
 man started up. He had endured much, but to search 
 for those unlovely hirsute appendages just as supper was 
 announced, he felt to be beyond even a journalist's cour- 
 tesy. 
 
 " I'll write him up as anything," he cried ; " as the Rus- 
 sian Czar, if you like ! I'll swear to it, Miss Sharpe, if 
 you will only cling to the crimps till after supper." 
 
 " What," snapped Miss Sharpe, as she rose, " will a man 
 never forget ? " 
 
 " His prayers ! " asserted the newspaper-man, piously. 
 
 " Scat ! There's only one S in masculine, and that one 
 stands not for soul, but stomach." 
 
 " Really, Miss Sharpe, your opinion of man is " 
 
 " That the one good man is the woman ! No, don't 
 faint ! No more before supper." 
 
 The Denver orchestra had been, up to the present mo- 
 ment, the crowning feature of the evening ; but now, as 
 Farmer Jenkins appropriately put it, " th' supper took th' 
 cake ! " There was a general exclamation of admiration 
 as the dining-room portieres were drawn back, and the 
 guests ushered into the spacious room, decorated with 
 holly and fir-trees, upon whose artificially frosted branches 
 twinkled hundreds of tinted lights. The long tables fill-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 205 
 
 ing the room were dazzling with costly silver and scin- 
 tillating glass. The glossy green of the holly-leaves 
 tangled with crimson berries presented an artistic con- 
 trast to the snow-white damask over which they trailed in 
 graceful loops and lines. White-gloved waiters flitted to 
 and fro, dispensing sparkling wines and dainty viands. 
 The popping of corks sounded like staccato notes above 
 the subdued strains of the unseen orchestra. 
 
 The festive sounds floated through the windows, out 
 iuto the cold and darkness, down the path, beyond the 
 gate, along the highway, to the spot where, under a clump 
 of ice-coated pines, crouched Freshet Sal, her sullen eyes 
 fixed fiercely upon the splendid house. Inside were 
 warmth and light and mirth and feasting ! and she was 
 shut outside out in the bitter cold, the lonely darkness 
 she and the little child clasped to her mother-breast. 
 The bitter contrast maddened her. She rose from her 
 crouching posture, staggering heavily on her cramped, 
 chilled limbs, and dragged herself to the gate. It was 
 open, and she passed through it. The light streamed 
 from the windows of the deserted drawing-room. As she 
 pressed her face against the pane, gazing hungrily upon 
 the beauty and luxury within, a burst of music floated 
 to her, as to the Peri, wistful at the gates, the angel- 
 strains from Paradise ! A fierce look flashed into her 
 eyes. She turned from the window, and with a stealthy 
 glance about her, darted to the door. It was ajar, but a 
 servant was stationed inside it She dashed it open and 
 sped like a phantom past him into the room beyond. 
 
 The feast was at its height. Wines were flowing among 
 the elder, mottoes snapping, and nuts cracking for philo- 
 penas among the younger guests. The room was ring- 
 ing with jest and laughter. The orchestra whispered a
 
 206 A, SON OF ESAU. 
 
 waltz-tune. As the host, amidst a tumult of applause, 
 rose to propose a toast, a scuffle sounded in the hall, 
 followed by the noisy protests of excited servants. 
 Althea, whose seat commanded a view of the door, gave 
 one quick glance toward it, and then with a warning call 
 to Steele, which he did not hear, rose hurriedly, white to 
 the lips, and stepped forward. One glance, however, 
 showed her that she was too late. She turned back and 
 swept down the room, making an imperative signal to 
 Isolde as she passed her. 
 
 Isolde, surprised and alarmed at Althea's pallid face, 
 made a hasty excuse, and followed her sister through the 
 rear door, just as Freshet Sal, with Waif in her arms, 
 appeared on the upper threshold. 
 
 Steele's glass was lifted for the toast. As all eyes 
 looked past him his own followed their gaze over his 
 shoulder to the figure hesitating in the doorway. The 
 glass fell from his hand and shivered into atoms ; the 
 wine trickled in a bright stream over the floor. A breath- 
 less hush fell upon the room. 
 
 For a moment they faced each other, eyes defying 
 eyes, man's and woman's. Then, slowly, miserably, the 
 woman's fell. Not in fear, though in his eyes as they 
 turned on Waif she read the threat which for four bitter 
 years had kept her subservient to him. In her mad 
 mood she no longer feared, she defied, him. Not while 
 there was might in her mother-arms, not while there was 
 warmth in her mother-heart, not while there was life in 
 her mother-breast, should that threat be fulfilled. She 
 quailed before him not in fear, but in despair. As he had 
 turned toward her, she had seen not him alone, but like- 
 wise the splendid room with its superb appointments, its 
 beautiful decorations, its tinted lights, its glittering
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 207 
 
 tables. From the shimmering silks, the flashing jewels 
 of the womeu t before her, her eyes reverted to her own 
 uncouth attire. The scent of flowers was on the air, the 
 sound of soft string-music. She thought of the dark, 
 chill, lonely road, and of the rough pine-trunks against 
 which she had crouched, with the wailing winds about 
 her. They were her portion these were his. What 
 could she do against him ? Without a word she turned, 
 and disappeared as silently as she had come, vanishing 
 like a wraith in the outer darkness. 
 
 The banker turned back to his guests. A crystal 
 goblet stood by his plate. He seized it, and calling 
 for brandy, filled the goblet half-way to its shining 
 brim. 
 
 " Our Phantom Guest," he said, and drained the toast 
 at a draught. 
 
 But as he set down his empty glass an oath broke 
 from him. He had drunk the toast, alone. 
 
 "I wish," ruminated old John Harriman, breaking the 
 constrained silence, " as that there poor crazy creetur' 'd 
 let th' little gal stop fur a bit o' cake." 
 
 Isolde returned to her guests, in smiling unconscious- 
 ness of the little episode. 
 
 " Althea was taken suddenly faint," she explained, " but 
 she recovered directly. Strange, was it not such a sud- 
 den seizure ? " 
 
 " Althea," remarked the newspaper-man in an aside to 
 Miss Sharpe, "is evidently a woman of resources." 
 
 " Ahem ! " coughed feminine Newfield, behind its fan. 
 
 " Is this little episode to figure in your columns ? " 
 asked Miss Sharpe, accepting the journalist's arm, as they 
 rose from the table. " Because if it is, at the cost of a
 
 208 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 year's salary, I bargain, here and now, for the entire 
 edition." 
 
 He did not answer her lightly, but turned upon her an 
 earnest, proud young face. 
 
 " The popular belief concerning us reporters, is," he 
 said, " that we are heartless, conscienceless, honorless. I 
 think that if you knew us more intimately, Miss Sharpe, 
 you would find us, as a class, both men and gentlemen." 
 
 To which noblest of titles, Miss Sharpe, thereafter, 
 acknowledged the reporter's right. 
 
 When the last guest had gone his way, old John Hnrri- 
 man rested loving hands on his son's broad shoulders. 
 
 " Good-night, my boy," he said. " It was beyutif ul 
 beyutiful. Don't ye go worritin' 'Soldy, tellin' her o' that 
 there poor crazy creetur', ez didn't put no one out a mite, 
 not a mite. I wonder if if she'd give up th' little gal ? 
 My old arms aches ter hold her. Some'ow, she 'minded 
 me, wi' her blue eyes a-smilin* under her yaller hair, o' 
 my own little lad, before he grow'd up, an' died. If she'd 
 give up th' little gal, would ye let 'Soldy take her, fur my 
 sake, Steele ? I'd like ter see a little face in th' old rooms 
 before I die an' she 'minded me o' my own little lad 
 before he grow'd up an' died." 
 
 Althea watched the old man up the stairs, and then 
 glided to Steele's side. 
 
 "Possibly," she sneered, "since your punishment has 
 overtaken you, you may at last realize the enormity of your 
 senseless folly in not fulfilling your promise to me, and 
 ridding yourself forever of the woman before marrying 
 Isolde. For her sake, for your own sake, why did you 
 not keep your word ? " 
 
 "Curse it! "he cried, "I did my best. She stayed
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 209 
 
 against her will, before my marriage. To stay against 
 mine, after it, has been her revenge." 
 
 "Ah, and for how long, may I ask, is Isolde to be in- 
 sulted by ' her revenge ? ' To-morrow she must be told 
 of this evening's scandalous episode. What shall you say 
 to her ? " 
 
 "Nothing," he answered, surlily. 
 
 "But those women will tell her." 
 
 "Let them go to the devil." 
 
 " With all my heart ; but the devil himself cannot stop 
 their tongues. The time is come when this matter must 
 be faced. I tell you plainly that Isolde must not, shall 
 not, be subjected to another such insult. Of course, I 
 know that you told her a lie before your marriage. You 
 must now tell her the truth.'' 
 
 "Not by a long shot." 
 
 " Then I will." 
 
 " You ! " he sneered. " You tell her the truth ! Sup- 
 pose you wait until you know it. Understand, once for 
 all, that the scandal I have allowed you to believe, like the 
 fine tale I told her, is a d d lie ! " 
 
 "A lie ! " repeated Althea. " A lie ! In Heaven's name, 
 then, what is the truth? " 
 
 " What, indeed ! " he jeered. " Put this in your bed, 
 and He on it, my lady / defy you to discover the truth ! "
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 SWEET CHARITY. 
 
 A few days subsequent to the big house festivity was 
 held the monthly meeting of the " Newfield Sewing and 
 Social Club." The sewing was for the heathen, and con- 
 sisted chiefly of finely hemstitched and embroidered 
 handkerchiefs, and decorative tidies. The social appendix 
 to the sewing-hour was one of refreshment for mind and 
 body ; a light collation seasoning a still lighter debate 
 upon any subject of social interest suggested by the 
 president, Mrs. Rorke, a cultured and brilliant woman of 
 social tact and charm. Althea was, as usual, absent from 
 tine meeting. Sewing-societies were not among her social 
 dissipations. Nor was Isolde a faithful or diligent mem- 
 ber. As a needlewoman she did not shine, and her 
 monthly check toward the fund of the society usually 
 represented her. Occasionally, however, she appeared 
 in time for the after-hour, rather enjoying feminine 
 Newfield's social discussions. 
 
 The scene of the present meeting was the Kummins' 
 farm, famous as the most royally hospitable house in Col- 
 orado. In fact, the Kummins' name was appropriately 
 and gratefully parodied by their social debtors into the 
 " Gome-ins." The farm, the richest and most extensive of 
 the neighborhood, was situated some miles out of town, 
 and in consideration of the long ride preceding and fol-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 211 
 
 lowing the meeting, the usual light collation was dispensed 
 with, and the society invited, instead, to partake of a sub- 
 stantial repast ; which invitation, needless to say, the so- 
 ciety, to a woman, accepted. Mrs. Kummins' teas were 
 justly famous, and as the afternoon waned, and the hostess' 
 frequent excursions to the kitchen were succeeded by an 
 influx of sundry appetizing odors, feminine Newfield 
 waxed even more vivacious than usual. The talk, of 
 course, turned upon the Harrimau party, which conver- 
 sational windfall bade fair to be a joy forever to that town 
 of gossips. 
 
 " I will say," italicized Milly Hunter, stabbing her 
 emery by way of emphasis, " that if I was Mrs. Harriman, 
 there'd be no ' phantom guests ' at my parties, husband 
 or no husband ! " 
 
 " No husband," echoed Cilly, mournfully. 
 
 " 'If ' you were Mrs. Harriman, Milly ? " laughed Miss 
 Sharpe, polishing her thimble. " ' What an " if " is 
 there, my countrywomen ! ' ' 
 
 " Tut, tut, child ! " protested Mrs. Hunter, smiling in- 
 dulgently, nevertheless, at her dashing daughter. " Young 
 girls ain't expected to talk about sech things." 
 
 " Young girls ! " sniffed Mrs. Holbrook, from a corner. 
 " You an' me'd better be gittin' shy and bashful, Mis' 
 Gibson. That there Milly's thirty, if she's a day ! " 
 
 Mrs. Gibson, being a remarkably beautiful woman, 
 could afford to be charitable to her less favored sisters. 
 She shrugged her handsome shoulders, smiled with her 
 handsome lips, and flashed an intelligent glance from her 
 handsome eyes, in silence. 
 
 Mrs. Linnett, plying an aristocratic scent - bottle in 
 preference to the plebeian needle, took up the conversa- 
 tional ball.
 
 212 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "For my part," she said, "I consider the affair a 
 scandal. It makes me faint, ladies, faint, to realize that 
 such an one is suffered in our midst ! " 
 
 "Law me ! " ejaculated Mrs. Holbrook ; " and they do 
 say that the way that Caroline carried on " 
 
 Mrs. Korke, passing at the moment, gently tapped her 
 on the shoulder. 
 
 " If we listen to all ' they ' say, my dear Mrs. Hol- 
 brook," she remonstrated, "we shall have no time left for 
 our prayers." 
 
 Mrs. Tompson, an insignificant little woman, whose 
 single talent was for housework, pursued the subject. 
 
 " Did you mind the supper ? " she inquired, generally. 
 " Not a thing on the table but was bough ten. For a 
 young housekeeper, Mis' Harrirnan is the shif'lessest ! " 
 
 "I'll up an' own as I was shocked at the superflu'ty of 
 wine on Mis' Harriman's table," volunteered Miss Prim, 
 an ancient spinster. " A glass of sister Prude's good 
 home-brewed, or bottled berry, now or, on extry occa- 
 sions, a sip of Californy grape, I say naught against ; but 
 when it comes to champagne runnin' like water, not to 
 speak of stronger, as no Christian lady, not to say an un- 
 married one, could so much as name, /draw the line." 
 
 "Wouldn't it be more exemplary to have drawn the 
 lip?" asked Miss Sharpe, upon whom poor old Miss 
 Prim's sly enjoyment of the Harriman champagne had 
 not been wasted. 
 
 Miss Prim scorned to appropriate this address ; and as 
 no one was magnanimous enough to appropriate it for 
 her, Miss Sharpe had the floor. 
 
 " I have sent Mrs. Harriman some tracts," announced 
 Mrs. Prude, a tall, prim, stern woman, from whose side 
 was suspended a small black ever-open bag of religious
 
 A SON OF ESAff. 213 
 
 pamphlets. " 'Death to the Drinker,' ' Kum and Roman- 
 ism,' 'Bottled Blood,' 'The Corked Curse,' and others. 
 But as she is sowing, so she must reap ; and I fear her 
 harvest is close at hand. They do say as Steele Harri- . 
 man is beginning to drink like a fish." 
 
 "Have you held a thanksgiving meeting over him?" 
 queried Miss Sharpe. " To drink like a fish, assuming 
 that fish do drink, is, of course, to drink only water. His 
 conversion must be recent. When last I saw him, he 
 drank brandy, like a man." 
 
 Mrs. Prude turned purple. 
 
 " I hate old maids ! " she retorted. 
 
 Mrs. Rorke tapped the presidential table with her 
 jewelled thimble. 
 
 " Ladies, ladies ! " she cried, " we are working for 
 chanty. Let the golden virtue that covers a multitude of 
 sins extend to our tongues as well as our fingers." 
 
 At this juncture, the Harrirnan sleigh dashed up to the 
 door. Isolde's face, against its background of dark vel- 
 vet, looked pale and delicate. 
 
 " What a sweet face she has," remarked bright-eyed 
 Mrs. Yonge, with the cordial admiration of one pretty 
 woman for another. 
 
 " 'Beauty,'" quoted Hilly Hunter, disparagingly, '"is 
 but a disease ' " 
 
 " Which, as you and I prove conclusively, Milly," in- 
 terrupted Miss Sharpe, " is not contagious." 
 
 Isolde entered the room, hand in hand with her cordial 
 hostess. 
 
 "You're jest in time for supper, dear," Mrs. Kummins 
 was assuring her ; "an" you look as if a cup of hot tea 
 wouldn't hurt you. If you'll walk right into the eatin'- 
 rooin now, ladies, you'll find the table ready."
 
 214 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 There was a brisk folding-up of unfinished articles, a 
 putting of thimbles into pockets, a shaking of gowns, and 
 blowing-off of threads, followed by a general uprising of 
 the society. 
 
 " Go up-stairs and lie down on my bed, dear," the 
 hostess whispered to Isolde. " You look sorter tuckered 
 out, and can have a tray up there jest as well as not. 
 Daughter Kitty'll be only too happy to wait on you." 
 
 She looked distressed as Isolde smilingly declined the 
 kindly offer. An unfriendly element was rampant in the 
 society, and she feared lest one malicious tongue or 
 another should wound the young wife with a covert 
 stab. 
 
 As the society seated itself, there was a flutter 
 throughout it of pleasant anticipation. Even Mrs. Tomp- 
 son's sour face attempted a smile, as her eyes swept 
 greedily over the lavish table. A stew of canned oysters 
 inevitable prelude of Western feasts steamed in white 
 bowls at each plate. Great dishes set at intervals down 
 the length of the table were piled with plump and tender 
 chickens, fried to a turn, and covered with thick cream- 
 sauce. Tureens smoking with a certain luscious rich 
 dark mixture, known as " Mis' Kummins' gravy," waited 
 for the farm-grown potatoes bursting snowily from their 
 brown jackets. There were plates heaped with cream- 
 biscuit light as foam between their amber crusts ; pretty 
 prints of freshly churned butter ; round white cheeses, 
 with pitchers of yellow cream beside them ; pies, cakes, 
 and preserves ; apples and nuts, maple sugar, and pop- 
 corn ; and jugs of foaming cider flanking the coffee and 
 tea-pots on either side. 
 
 " Sister Kummins," exclaimed Mrs. Prude, " you do 
 beat all ! I often say if Newfield has one housekeeper
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 215 
 
 more 'n another to be jest sinful proud of, that one is 
 Sister Kummins." 
 
 "O, now, if it comes to that, Mis' Prude," returned 
 Mrs. Kummins, politely, " I surmise as some folks whose 
 names won't be mentioned is second to none ! " 
 
 " Well," admitted Mrs. Prude, modestly, " I won't say 
 as I don't do my best, according to my lights. But as for 
 such biscuits as these, or such gravy I up and own 
 as I'm beat. Your worst enemy can't but do you the 
 justice to admit, Sister Kummins, as you're a good 
 cook." 
 
 "Are you a good cook, Miss Hunter ?" asked Isolde, 
 laughingly acknowledging her own deficiencies. 
 
 " We flatter ourselves, Cilly and I, that we do exceed- 
 ingly well, for our ages," admitted Milly, ingenuously. 
 
 " For our ages," accented Cilly. 
 
 Miss Sharpe, overhearing, could not resist a retort. 
 
 " Do let us shake hands," she cried, vivaciously. " That 
 is my case, precisely. I do very well for my age. When 
 we were younger we were, of course, more ambitious to 
 excel." 
 
 Mrs. Rorke signalled for silence. 
 
 "Ladies," she said, " the subject of our discussion to- 
 day is a social one. It is, ' Society, and its Require- 
 ments.' " 
 
 " Law me ! " ejaculated Mrs. Holbrook, " where 's the 
 dictionary ? " 
 
 " Sew-ciety's quite an appropriate subject for the occa- 
 sion," giggled Milly Hunter. 
 
 "I thought it was Show-ciety," ventured Cilly, for once 
 deserting her sister's words in favor of her idea. 
 
 "It's not Slow-ciety, anyway, where you two are," 
 muttered Miss Sharpe, in audible soliloquy.
 
 216 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Sister Prim took advantage of Miss Sharpe's inatten- 
 tion, and refilled her glass with cider. 
 
 " The fatal fault of American society, I think," re- 
 marked Mrs. Drumond, the pretty and clever wife of the 
 college-president, " is, that ' social selection ' is its motto, 
 rather than ' social equality.' It demands too much." 
 
 "And I think that it demands too little," differed 
 Isolde. " Cultured, gifted, beautiful humanity is the 
 highest humanity, and it yearns the highest to satisfy it 
 Neither chance of birth, nor accident of name ; wealth, 
 nor display, fitful fashion nor conventional etiquette, 
 can satisfy with their material husks the humanity 
 elevated through the refined flesh to a spiritual altitude 
 whose requirements are 
 
 ' Tlie highest and most human, too.' r 
 
 " And these ' high and human ' requirements are what, 
 Mrs. Harriman ? " asked Miss Sharpe, interested. 
 
 " They are, as I see them," replied Isolde, with timid 
 earnestness, " the soul for which only God is high enough, 
 and the heart for which the lowest man is not too low. 
 They are truth and honor, faith and charity, strength and 
 purity ; magnanimity, sacrifice, love. They are reverence, 
 sympathy, brotherhood. They are high thoughts, tender 
 words, noble ambitions, heroic deeds. They are all the 
 Divine that is in the human, and all the human that does 
 not sully the Divine." 
 
 "But, Mrs. Harriman," objected Mrs. Linnett, with un- 
 pleasant significance, "surely you must realize that such 
 requirements as you suggest would utterly demolish 
 society." 
 
 " God forbid ! " remonstrated Isolde. " I hold a firm
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 217 
 
 conviction, Mrs. Linnett, that men and women are much 
 better than the man and woman think them." 
 
 "Possibly if your social charity were less quixotic," 
 retorted Mrs. Linnett, impulsively, " there would be less 
 barefaced imposition upon it, ' a consummation devoutly 
 to be wished ' if ' honor and purity ' be indeed require- 
 ments of good society, as you say." 
 
 " O Ma ! " gasped Caroline. 
 
 The gauntlet had been thrown. In the ensuing hush, 
 all eyes were turned upon Isolde. For an instant she 
 looked bewildered. Then, alternately flushing and paling, 
 she spoke. 
 
 " I do not quite understand," she said. "Will you be 
 kind enough to explain your significant words, Mrs. 
 Linuett?" 
 
 " O, no particular significance was intended," fluttered 
 Mrs. Linnett, intimidated by Caroline's hysterical re- 
 proaches, and already regretting her rash attack. 
 
 Mrs. Prude disapproved. 
 
 "Sister Linnett," she said, "let them as the cap fits, 
 put it on." 
 
 Isolde rose. 
 
 "I insist," she said, " that you speak clearly." 
 
 " Haven't they told you ? " demanded Mrs. Prude, breath- 
 lessly. 
 
 " Nothing has been told me nothing ! What is there 
 to tell?" 
 
 There was a general murmur of consternation. 
 
 " They're a fine pair Althea Rounds and Steele Harri- 
 man," muttered Mrs. Prude, under her breath. 
 
 Mrs. Rorke left her seat, and stepped to Isolde's 
 side. 
 
 ''This is a great tempest in a very small teapot, Mrs.
 
 218 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Harriman," she said, " and it is a disgrace, a scandal, that 
 you should be insulted by it. The simple fact is, that 
 while you were absent from the supper-room, on the night 
 of your charming entertainment and for the pleasure you 
 so kindly gave us you are indeed most gratefully repaid ! 
 that poor crazed creature called 'Freshet Sal,' attracted 
 by the music and lights, made her way into the house, and 
 surprised us by her appearance in the room. We had 
 scarcely discovered her when she disappeared, and that is 
 the whole story. I beg leave to add, however, that as pres- 
 ident of this most charitable society, I resign. Its charity 
 is a mockery. Therefore the excuse for the existence of 
 the society is at an end." 
 
 Her resignation was not accepted without many pro- 
 tests. Mrs. Rorke was a woman eminently fitted for social 
 leadership, and under her tactful rule the society had 
 seen its halcyon days. Reproachful glances were darted 
 at Mrs. Linnett, who began a nervous apology, interrupted, 
 however, by Isolde's resolute voice. 
 
 "You say," she said, "that the woman Sal is crazy. 
 Thank you for your kindly championship, dear Mrs. 
 Rorke but you mistake. Freshet Sal is as sane as you 
 are, as I am ! " 
 
 This statement was a surprise. What would she say 
 next ? The expectant society held its breath. 
 
 "It is late," she went on slowly, "to offer you an 
 apology for the very unpleasant ordeal to which, as 
 my guests, you were subjected. Nevertheless, I beg 
 that you will accept it. You may feel that a full ex- 
 planation is due you. I regret to say that I cannot 
 offer you one. In doing so, a sacred trust reposed in 
 me by my husband before our marriage, would be be- 
 trayed."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 219 
 
 Mrs. Prude coughed significantly. Isolde turned upon 
 her. 
 
 "There are many of you," she said, "who are devoted 
 church-members, fruitful workers in the vineyard, loyal 
 sheep of the Good Shepherd's fold. Of such, at least, I 
 may ask in firm faith that I shall not be denied, charity 
 not for myself, but for those from whom Mrs. Linnett's 
 words prove that it has been withdrawn." 
 
 There was no response. The prevailing sentiment was 
 that charity had been stretched to its uttermost limit, in 
 favor of Steele Harriman. Isolde realized that her appeal 
 had been in vain. They were doubting Thomases, who 
 must see, to believe. Impulsively, she raised her hand 
 toward heaven. 
 
 "I swear to you," she said, " that your suspicions are 
 unjust. The innocent is suffering nobly and generously, 
 if quixotically, for the guilty. How could I endure it, 
 were it as you think? Do you believe me ?" she asked. 
 " Do you trust me ? " 
 
 A few kept silence. The greater number murmured 
 a shamed affirmative. She inclined her head, grate- 
 fully. 
 
 " I thank you," she said ; then with a word of apology, 
 she left the room. 
 
 There were tears in her eyes as she took Mrs. Kummins' 
 hand at the door. 
 
 " You can never pardon me for having spoiled your 
 charming tea by such a scene," she said, "but you must 
 have seen that it was forced upon me." 
 
 Warm-hearted Mrs. Kummins was weeping into the 
 fluted edge of her company-apron. 
 
 " You're a blessed angel," she sobbed, lowering the 
 apron to kiss her, " an' them tarnal women shall never
 
 220 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 darken my doors again. Charity, indeed ! No more 
 sech charity at rny table ! " 
 
 When she returned to her guests, she listened eagerly 
 for the general verdict. 
 
 " Some cock-an'-bull story that scamp of a Steele Hani- 
 man made up for that little fool to swallow for gospel- 
 truth," Mrs. Prude was saying. 
 
 " She is actually goose enough to believe in her hus- 
 band ! " laughed Milly Hunter. 
 
 "Her husband," acknowledged Cilly, with envious 
 emphasis. 
 
 "I'll never be invited to another Harriman party," 
 sobbed Caroline Linnett, hysterically. 
 
 Mrs. Liunett, in repentant tears and silence, timidly 
 proffered her salts. 
 
 An hour later, when the last guest had taken her de- 
 parture, and the dishes had been piled up for washing, 
 Mrs. Kummins went to the society basket and emptied 
 its contents upon the table. 
 
 "Thirty women, and an afternoon's sewing," she said. 
 " Result, two highfalutin aprons, seven crazy-quilt patches, 
 ten half-hemmed handkerchiefs, three bibs, and a half- 
 dozen folderol tidies." 
 
 "The heathen will appreciate the tidies," remarked 
 Kitty. 
 
 "Fifteen chickens, ninety biscuit, sixteen quarts of 
 cream, and everything else in proportion," reckoned Mrs. 
 Kummins, junior a pretty, dark-eyed bride. " Mother 
 Kummins, charity don't pay." 
 
 Gentle Mrs. Kummins, for once exasperated, pushed 
 aside the astonished kitchen-maid, and vigorously attacked 
 the dishes. 
 
 " Charity ! " she exclaimed. " Full stomicks an' wag-
 
 A SON OF ESAU: 221 
 
 gin' tongues an' bleedin' hearts that's what comes of 
 charity ! I vum an' swanny, Elizabeth Jones Kummius, 
 as they've had their last charity-supper in this here 
 house ! " 
 
 " Amen ! " sighed tired Elizabeth. 
 
 "Till next time, Ma ! " laughed Kitty.
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 AT BENEDICTION. 
 
 Isolde's mind was in a whirl during the long homeward 
 ride. Had she done well or ill said too much or too 
 little ? Would Steele be enraged with her, or would he 
 realize the necessity of the action she had taken ? She 
 felt a nervous dread of meeting him, born not of fear, but 
 of a premonition that more than the mere question of his 
 approval or disapproval of her words was at stake. Now 
 that it was too late she realized the mistake she had made 
 in not insisting before her marriage that the secret whis- 
 pered to her under the moonlit pines on the night of the 
 dance in Jenkins' barn, should be made public. In her 
 innocence and inexperience she had not foreseen the sus- 
 picion to which the scene of that night must give birth in 
 the minds, if not upon the lips, of all who had witnessed 
 it. Her own wifely dignity, her husband's honor, she 
 now realized were the bitter cost of her mistake. She 
 had hoped to reach her room unnoticed, but Steele, from 
 the library ringing with men's voices, caught the sound 
 of the sleigh-bells and hastened to the door to meet her. 
 
 " Where the deuce have you been ? " he asked. " Run- 
 dell has been here, and has taken your absence none too 
 pleasantly. Thinks you are turning the cold shoulder on 
 him, or some such bosh. Kingsley and Randal are here 
 for the nierht. Get into a decent rier and come down at
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 223 
 
 once. I can't afford to offend the crowd, bear that in 
 mind, wise little woman." 
 
 Her voice was low, but resolute, as she answered. 
 
 " I have seen your friends for the last time," she said. 
 " I have slept my last night under your roof, unless you 
 promise me, swear to me, at once to make public the true 
 story of ' Freshet Sal ! ' " 
 
 With an oath strangled behind his clenched teeth, he 
 drew her into the empty drawing-room, under the blaze 
 of the great chandelier. 
 
 " What do you mean ? " he asked, scanning her face 
 with defiant eyes. 
 
 "I attended a society-meeting held at the Kummins* 
 farm this afternoon, and was insulted there publicly 
 taken to task for the scandal given by the mysterious re- 
 lationship existing between you and the woman Sal. A 
 reply was necessary. I did not betray your trust, but I 
 confessed that you had reposed one in me. I swore that 
 their suspicion was false ; that you, the innocent, were 
 nobly suffering for the guilty. And you have been noble, 
 Steele, though mistaken. The nobility is yours alone, 
 while I share your mistake. In my girlish innocence 
 and folly I encouraged you in the quixotic course which 
 has brought us to this shame. You cannot reproach me 
 more bitterly than I reproach myself. But our mistake 
 is not irredeemable. I have avowed your innocence 
 you have only to corroborate me by publishing the 
 truth." 
 
 " I refuse ! " he said. 
 
 " Steele ! " she implored, " for your own sake, for my 
 sake, for our child's " 
 
 "I refuse ! " he repeated. " But you you, I suppose, 
 will betray me. What a fool I was, to trust a woman."
 
 224 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 To escape her scornful eyes, he took a turn up the 
 room, but her scornful voice followed him. 
 
 " I will not betray you," she said. "Not women, but 
 men, are the betrayers. I shall only appeal to the 
 woman." 
 
 As he wheeled about, a blast of cold air struck him. 
 The parted portieres were still stirring. Past them, 
 swiftly, noiselessly, Isolde had sped. 
 
 He dashed to the hall- door ajar and swinging in the 
 draught, and flung it open. 
 
 " Come back ! " he called authoritatively. " Come 
 back ! " 
 
 The echo of his words answered him ; their echo only. 
 
 From the direction of the library came the sound of 
 approaching footsteps. He slammed the outer door just 
 as his guests, the worse for his hospitality, joined him. 
 
 " I say, old boy, thought you'd eloped with the funds ! " 
 laughed Kingsley. 
 
 " Or w-with the fair," stuttered Kandal, with an 
 amatory leer. 
 
 " I was taking a look at the night," he said, leading the 
 way back to the library. " Its deucedly cold. A stiff 
 pick-me-up will be in season. I say, boys, we haven't 
 had a spree in a month of Sundays. Suppose we make a 
 night of it ? " 
 
 "L-let's make it a w-week," suggested Randal, whose 
 potations had gone to his head. 
 
 He seated them at a card-table, plied them with fresh 
 liquors and cigars, and then, with a muttered excuse, left 
 them. A moment later, having given a hasty order for 
 the sleigh to follow him, he was striding through the 
 darkness toward the Freshet Cabin. 
 
 Over the scene brooded the luminous darkness peculiar
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 225 
 
 to the rare-aired winter night. There was only a sugges- 
 tion of moonlight, but myriad stars frescoed in gold 
 relief the high blue dome of heaven. The air was chill 
 and sharp ; the boughs of the leafless cottonwoods 
 creaked frostily in the wind. A light fall of snow was 
 frozen underfoot. From the Freshet sounded the roar of 
 swollen waters breaking against their shores of jagged 
 ice. For one breathless moment he halted, listening in- 
 tently. Had he heard a sudden splash in the distance 
 a woman's cry, strangled by the death-cold waters? 
 What if, crazed by her trouble as trouble had been known 
 to craze women in her emotional condition already she 
 was sleeping beneath that death-cold tide ? 
 
 Isolde, meanwhile, heedless of cold and weakness, was 
 pressing on at a reckless pace toward Freshet Sal's cabin. 
 Suddenly a deathly chill and faintness surged over her ; 
 her breast was racked with every panting breath. As she 
 paused and looked about her dizzily, a light shone out 
 from a little chui'ch on her right, beckoning to her like a 
 friendly hand. She staggered toward it blindly ; her 
 hands, as they grasped the porch-posts, were weak and 
 nerveless. Their hold relaxed, and she sunk prostrate 
 upon the frosty steps. 
 
 An instant of surrender, then she forced open the white 
 lids fluttering heavily over her sightless eyes. If she were 
 dying, she could not, would not die without one prayer. 
 Dying ? A sharp pang stabbed her heart. Of a sudden, 
 life, even with all its pain and problems, was sweet. Die, 
 and never know the fold of baby-arms about her ; never feel 
 the flutter of baby-hands, the warmth of baby-lips upon her 
 breast ? She would not die, she would not. She struggled 
 to her feet with desperate resoluteness, and dragged her- 
 self into a sheltered corner of the empty church.
 
 226 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 She was aroused from her swoon by the sound of solemn 
 music, and by a pungent, spicy, sweet, pervading scent. 
 The church was all alight, and its body filled with kneel- 
 ing worshippers. Before the altar knelt the vestmented 
 priest, surrounded by white-robed acolytes, veiled in the 
 incense-smoke. Aloft, just above the gilt-doored Taber- 
 nacle, surrounded by tiers of shimmering waxen lights, a 
 golden star was shining. The lights struck its chased 
 rays, and radiated from them ; within it, exposed for 
 adoration, shone the White Lamb of the Bloodless 
 Sacrifice the Sacred Host. 
 
 The choir was singing the beautiful Tantum Ergo. The 
 celebrant's head was bowed in worship. The censers 
 swayed on. From the kneeling congregation sounded 
 fitful murmurs of articulate prayer. The altar-lights 
 flickered across the rail, glancing like a passing blessing, 
 here on a rapt, uplifted face ; there on a prostrate form 
 and lowered head. From her shadowed corner, hidden 
 under the projection of the organ-loft, Isolde looked. 
 The scene was no new one to her ; such an one had been a 
 familiar feature of her girlhood's peaceful, happy convent- 
 days. The altar-bell tinkled. The golden star with its 
 white Host-heart was lifted in Divine benediction. She 
 sunk on her knees, her face bowed in her hands. The 
 crowd passed out. The lights were one by one extin- 
 guished. At last, the one red lamp of perpetual vigil 
 burned alone. On the porch of the darkened church she 
 hesitated. To the Freshet cabin, or back to the home 
 from which, on passionate impulse, she had fled ? Toward 
 the cabin she turned, at last, as one impelled ; but calmly. 
 The peace of Christ's benediction was in her heart.
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THE STAIN OF THE MIRE. 
 
 The church stood midway between the Ledge and 
 Freshet crossroads. Steele strode past it with no suspi- 
 cion that his wife was within. The uncurtained window 
 of the cabin showed him a background of ruddy firelight, 
 against which Waif was outlined, straining from Sal's 
 arms as she held transparent hands to the bright pine- 
 sparks snapping fitfully toward her. He flung open the 
 door without knocking. As it shut behind him he leaned 
 against it almost weakly. Isolde was not here. Where 
 was she ? 
 
 " Put down the child," he said, as Sal turned to him. 
 "I have serious news for you." 
 
 " 'Ant to pway my pwayer," wailed Waif, thinking to 
 gain a moment of grace from threatened bed-time. 
 
 Without a word Sal drew a chair toward the fire, 
 and fastened her in it. Short as the interval was, it 
 afforded the man an opportunity to concentrate his 
 scattered thoughts. He realized, of a sudden, that Isolde's 
 absence gave him an advantage which might prove 
 his salvation. If he could but induce Sal to leave New- 
 field before Isolde could see her, his secret would still 
 be safe. 
 
 " My wife is not here ? " he asked, looking suspiciously 
 into the shadowy inner room.
 
 228 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Intense surprise flashed into Sal's face, but she answered 
 only by a sullen shake of her head. 
 
 " She has not been here ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " But she will be, and the meeting will not be a plea- 
 sant one for you, SaL I am come to save you from it. 
 She has discovered the truth." 
 
 The words were a lie, but the woman did not know it. 
 She started, uttered an involuntary exclamation of fear 
 and defiance, and sped between him and Waif. He 
 took a quick step toward her, speaking in a low but im- 
 passioned voice. 
 
 "The truth," he said. "You know the penalty, Sal. 
 But I give you one chance to escape it go, this hour, 
 this moment ! You shall have money competence, 
 riches. You shall have anything, everything your heart 
 desirea Only go go ! Jim will stop the night-train at 
 your signal, and take you with him into a new world 
 where you two can marry, and be rich and happy. Delay, 
 and you will lose your chance. Here is money enough to 
 see you through the journey, and the rest shall follow. I 
 swear it. Off with you, my girl ! You are free, free for- 
 ever, from the Harriman yoke of shame ! " 
 
 He had uttered the words with feverish eagerness, 
 pressing a roll of bills between her locked hands, as he 
 spoke. She lifted her face ; it was set and sullen. With 
 deliberate hand she dropped the money into the nether 
 flames. 
 
 He sprang forward, but he was too late to rescue it. 
 Already the crisp bills were uncurling in the fiery draught, 
 writhing as the flames caught them, withering into 
 ashes. 
 
 " Curse you ! " he cried, fiercely. " What do you mean ? "
 
 A SOX OF ESAU. 229 
 
 " Fur four long years," she answered, " I pray'd yo' day 
 an' night fur to let me go. But yo' left me naught 'twixt 
 bidin' wi' Waif or goiu' wi'out her, an* th' choosin' I 
 made, I'll bide by. Waif's not getten many things ter 
 love, nor long ter love 'em, an' th' Freshet's her friend, 
 an' I ain't a-goin' ter part her fro' it. When Waif's gone, 
 I'll go, an' welcome ; but not afore then, not fur nuthin ! 
 You're too late !" 
 
 "Then bear the consequences of your refusal," he 
 ci-ied. " My threat shall be no empty one this time, by 
 the devil " 
 
 But the oath died on his lips. Between him and the 
 child he was about to snatch from her shielding arms, 
 Isolde sped, like a vision. 
 
 As he fell back, Sal sunk upon her knees at Isolde's 
 feet. 
 
 " Yo're a woman ! " she sobbed. " Some day, yo'll be 
 a mother. Ez yo' do by us, your child '11 be done by. 
 Waif can't last long. Life's done hard enough by her. 
 Let her die easy, I ax yo' in God's name ! She's lived 'yer 
 by th' Freshet, an' she'll die easy by it. She's allers 
 watchin' an' waitin' fur th' boat ez '11 come ter fetch her, 
 an' th' tide ez '11 sail her safe ter th' golden shore. I've 
 laid out how I'll loose th' old boat by th' cross-roads, an' 
 drift along th' Freshet, while she dies in my arms. 'Tain't 
 much I ax, arter th' hard wrong done me, but he's ag'inst 
 me. Stand by me, fur Waif's sake ! 'Twon't be fur long. 
 I oughter be glad o' it. Heav'n's th' place fur winimen- 
 folks. This yer's a men-folks' world ! " 
 
 Isolde had come to appeal to Sal. Instead, Sal had 
 appealed to her. Steele awaited the result, breathlessly. 
 If Isolde's heart were touched, his secret was still safe. 
 Had Sal failed, or succeeded ? One look at Isolde's face
 
 230 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 answered him. It was deathly pale, yet luminous with 
 the sacrificial fires flaming from the altar of her soul. He 
 thrilled with the exultation of triumph. His "devil's 
 luck" had not failed him. On the verge of direst failure, 
 he had won. 
 
 As Sal rose, Isolde answered her. 
 
 " Such mercy as you ask of me," she said, "I came to 
 ask of you, Sal, but God has judged between us. I dare not 
 set aside what seems to be His hand. I promise all you 
 ask. I will guard your secret. Waif shall not be taken 
 from you. She has lived by the Freshet she shall die 
 by it ! At best, your cross is sorely, bitterly heavy. I will 
 not make it heavier, to lighten mine 1 " 
 
 11 Pitty 'ady," cooed Waif, burying her little hands in 
 Isolde's soft seal coat, and stroking the rich fur with child- 
 ish murmurs of delight. 
 
 Outside the cabin, sleigh-bells jingled. Steele stepped 
 toward the door. As Isolde turned to follow him, Sal's 
 prostrate figure barred her way. In her passionate grati- 
 tude she was kissing Isolde's feet. 
 
 Less than an hour later, her pathetic pallor enhanced 
 by her dead black gown, Isolde entered the drawing- 
 room in obedience to her husband's imperious summons. 
 As Kingsley joined her, she saw, hesitating behind him, 
 a blonde young man with a boyish, wine-flushed face. 
 
 " Randal ! " presented Steele, informally. 
 
 As the youth stared into her face, retaining her hand 
 iu his unsteady clasp, a sudden shamed self-consciousness 
 flashed into his bleared blue eyes. 
 
 " I I'm not in trim to take your hand to-night," he 
 said, " but I can't let it go. May I k kiss it ? You look 
 like some one I once knew one 1 1 loved and lost. She 
 and my mother were all I had, and 1 1 lost both. If my
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 231 
 
 mother bad lived, if if she had 1 loved ine, I should not 
 be (hie) here to-night. I was a good enough young 
 f fellow in the the s sweet by-and-by. I say, you're 
 p pretty as a picture. Only why the d dickens don't 
 you s sit still ? L let's have another drink. W what's 
 yours? I I didn't know how to d drink in those 
 days. I had not met R (hie) Rundell, then, nor 
 nor " 
 
 " Nor my husband," finished Isolde, quietly. " I under- 
 stand." 
 
 There was an expression on her face that Steele caught, 
 and partially understood. He knew that the boy had 
 drunk more than was good for him, and thought that she 
 was pained and annoyed. 
 
 "Come, Randy," he said, slapping him on the back, and 
 twirling him about as he struggled to regain his balance ; 
 " it's time for good little boys to be in bed. Ring for 
 lights in the green room, Isolde. In the ' green-room,' 
 by Jove ! Pleasant quarters to lie low in for a few days, 
 eh, young chap ? till the hounds lose scent of you ! " 
 
 "The hounds in question being the original owners of 
 the Red Ridge mine ? " asked Isolde. 
 
 Kiiigsley started, and looked at her keenly. The boy 
 nodded confusedly. 
 
 "Then sleep in peace," she said. "If the hounds 
 do scent you, they shall learn that not the boy who 
 bought up the stock, but the man who paid for it, is their 
 rightful prey." 
 
 Steele stifled an oath. Kingsley, after an expressive ex- 
 clamation, laughed indulgently. 
 
 " You're a plucky little woman," he said. " I like you." 
 
 She watched her husband till he had disappeared with 
 his guest up the stairs. Then she turned to Kingsley.
 
 232 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "He is a child in your bands," she said. "I beg that 
 you will spare him." 
 
 " I will," he answered, boldly, " if I may spare him for 
 your sake." 
 
 Her shining eyes, whose sudden light he failed to read 
 aright, led him on. 
 
 " You are divine ! " he whispered. 
 
 Her silence emboldened him. As he leaned closer she 
 repulsed him, with a gesture which was at once a com- 
 mand and an appeal. 
 
 "I am human," she moaned; "a human, young, weak 
 woman, tired of a woman's life-long battle against man's 
 ruthless odds. A madness born of anguish is upon me. 
 The narrow way is weary ; the wide way lures my feet. O, 
 by your manhood, be for me, not against me ! Save me 
 from myself ! " 
 
 O, the pity of it ! the pity of it ! The white dove 
 dragged in the mire, howsoever against its will, rises not 
 thence, ah, never ! with pure, unsullied wings. 
 
 As she left him he took a quick step after her, then with 
 a dazed look, fell back. 
 
 "By Jove!" he murmured. "And I thought that I 
 knew women ! " 
 
 Through a woman Ralph Kingsley had fallen- Through 
 a woman his regeneration was begun.
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 IN TIGHTENING TOILS. 
 
 The crucial test to which Isolde had been subjected 
 reacted physically, resulting in a severe illness to which 
 she passively, even gratefully, succumbed. After her 
 feverish emotion, the languor of weakness was welcome to 
 her. She lay for weeks in utter exhaustion, passive and 
 peaceful as a drowsy child. When she roused herself, 
 at last, the snow had disappeared, and spring was bright 
 on the prairie. 
 
 As Isolde convalesced, the gossip which had waxed and 
 waned since the day of Mrs. Kummins' tea, waxed anew ; 
 expectant Newfield believing a solution of the scandalous 
 mystery to be at hand. But as week succeeded week, and 
 DO explanation of her impulsive statement was attempted 
 when of the statement itself, indeed, both Isolde and 
 her husband assumed blank and disconcerting uncon- 
 sciousness there was a general shrugging of shoulders, a 
 confidential whisper that " Mrs. Harriman had found out 
 Steele Harriman, for all his smartness," and the scandal, 
 the fact of its scandalousness having been satisfactorily 
 established, eventually lost its interest. Isolde, however, 
 was scarcely the happier for the truce, but she had now 
 given up all hope of happiness. She had even given up 
 its desire. Where she had once prayed to be happy, she 
 now prayed only to be good. Since that mad moment
 
 234 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 with Kingsley, when for the first time in her pure young 
 life, temptation, born of pain and desperation, had faced 
 her, she had realized that only in prayer was her strength, 
 her salvation. Self is strong against others, but against 
 self only God can defend. 
 
 For a little space after her recovery, her husband left 
 her in peace then the old miserable life was resumed. 
 Delicate, physically, and with heart shrinking from the 
 past and quailing before the future, she found herself com- 
 pelled, night after night, to don the gorgeous gowns 
 which she began to regard as the livery of a shameful slave- 
 hood, and break bread with guests from whom her pure 
 soul instinctively revolted. Night after night she found 
 herself surrounded in the sumptuous drawing-room by 
 such men as chose to sacrifice the wines and weeds, the 
 racy after-dinner stories, and billiard and poker-tables, 
 for her society. To her husband's pride, to her own bit- 
 ter humiliation and regret, such men were neither few nor 
 far between. As they flocked about her, flushed with 
 wine and coarsely familiar in address, she felt a moral re- 
 pulsion amounting to physical nausea, and turned to 
 Kiugsley for the protection her husband ruthlessly de- 
 nied her. Since the night when her white soul had 
 revealed its struggle to him, his previous familiar gal- 
 lantry of manner had been substituted by an almost rev- 
 erent respect, which fell like balm upon her wounded 
 spirit. Too wise in his generation to assume any openly 
 on-guard attitude in response to her unconscious appeal, 
 Kingsley nevertheless saved her on more than one occa- 
 sion from far worse evils than she knew. In her darkest 
 hour she realized that the shadow might be darker. Had 
 the men whom she found endurable only because they 
 were men, been accompanied by such women as must
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 235 
 
 naturally have been their affinities women of such 
 type as the three from whom, months earlier, she had 
 fled from her home into the bitter night she felt 
 that she must have revolted. But this insult, at least, 
 was spared her ; and more or less directly, to the in- 
 fluence of Ralph Kingsley, her merciful immunity was 
 due. 
 
 There was one man from whom, however, despite all 
 her courteous efforts to dissimulate, she openly and in- 
 stinctively recoiled. This man was Rundell. He was a 
 coarse, thick-set, sullen-browed man, with snake-like eyes 
 whose pupils constantly expanded and contracted in a 
 horribly fascinating manner. His coarse, black hair was 
 oiled and scented ; and diamonds flashed from his shirt- 
 bosom and upon his short, thick fingers. He was Steele's 
 inseparable companion, and one of the men who never 
 failed to seek the drawing-room soon after the after- 
 dinner claret. 
 
 One evening he had drunk more deeply than usual 
 as a rule he did not offend in this manner and Isolde had 
 fled his offensive presence in disgust. Later, he had some 
 high words with his host. Steele excused himself, and 
 followed Isolde to her room. 
 
 " You have insulted Rundell," he said, with ominous 
 quiet. " To-morrow you will make amends." 
 
 "I did not insult him," she said, firmly. "I simply 
 made it impossible for him to insult me." 
 
 "Insult you!" he repeated. "Did he really forget 
 himself so far as that ? " 
 
 "Not absolutely in words," she admitted; "but his 
 presence is in itself an insult his manner, his very 
 glance " 
 
 He laughed contemptuously.
 
 236 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "A woman's vanity and prejudice," he said. "There 
 must be no more such folly. I I " 
 
 His eyes fell. His voice lost its imperiousness. There 
 was an appealing note in it. 
 
 " Make allowance for him. Endure him, for my sake," 
 he faltered. " He is a power. There is more at stake 
 than you know." 
 
 Her face blanched. For a moment she stood in silence. 
 When she spoke at last, it was in desperation, born of 
 despair. 
 
 "You force me to say to you," she said, "what per- 
 haps you will not forgive. But the truth is neither 
 more nor less than the truth, for being spoken. Suppose 
 that the application of your words should be reversed ? 
 that there is more at stake than you know? You have 
 forced me to play with fire, all my married life. It is a 
 dangerous pastime. How can you know that I shall not 
 be burned, at last?" 
 
 A terrible look flashed into his face, but it vanished 
 even as it came. With a laugh, he stooped and kissed 
 her. 
 
 " I do not fear for you," he said. " You are a woman 
 with a God ! " and hastened from the room. 
 
 On an impulse born of desperation she followed him. 
 He heard the rustle of her gown behind him and quick- 
 ened his steps. As she overtook him he drew aside the 
 library portiere, and dropped it between them. Turning 
 back irresolutely, she found herself face to face with 
 Kingsley. She grasped his hand, and drew him toward 
 the hall. He yielded, looking anxiously at her mean- 
 while. She was very pale, and her hand, as it rested on 
 his, was chill and trembling. 
 
 "I want you to tell me," she panted, " what this man
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 237 
 
 Rundell is, to my husband why is he here what his 
 hold is " 
 
 "Has he made you feel his hold ? " he interrupted, wrath- 
 fully. 
 
 She waived the question, wringing her hands in ner- 
 vous impatience. 
 
 " Tell me ! tell me ! " she implored. 
 
 "I cannot tell you just what his hold is," he faltered. 
 "That he has one, however, I fear I must admit." 
 
 " Then you think " 
 
 " I think it best that you should not offend him, un- 
 necessarily best for your husband's sake ! " 
 
 She turned away with a moan. Half-way up the stairs, 
 she looked back. Kingsley was gazing after her with 
 shadowed, miserable eyes, and at the end of the hall, the 
 library portieres just closing behind him, stood Rundell, 
 smiling on them. 
 
 The next morning, Steele rode to the bank by the way 
 of the Ledge. He had not responded to Isolde's appeal, 
 but neither had he been deaf to it. Althea, since her 
 divorce, the secret of which had leaked out, had been cir- 
 cumspect, socially, and seldom presented herself at the 
 Harriman house during guest-hours. Of late, however, 
 Steele had noticed that Rundell had more than once found 
 his way to the Ledge. He foresaw the way by which he 
 could at once shield Isolde, and forward Althea's ambition. 
 
 " Isolde is the right woman in the right place," he con- 
 fided to her, after a brief preliminary chat, " but she is 
 not adaptable. She is impolitic, and intolerant of social 
 means for business ends. You are clever and not too 
 squeamish. You know what I want of you. She is the 
 wheel to grind the grain, but your's is the hand to turn 
 it. Do you agree ? "
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Althea hesitated. In truth, she resented his plain 
 speaking. It proved that he lacked the respect for her 
 that he felt for Isolde. Moreover, she thought that he 
 was somewhat reckless. Remarks were already rife in 
 Newfield as to the " goings-on " at the Harriman house. 
 Steele, who had not dismounted, watched her with half- 
 shut eyes, flicking away the ashes from his cigar as he 
 waited. 
 
 " I will make it worth your while," he added. 
 
 Still she made no answer. 
 
 "By the way," he said, as if changing the subject, "the 
 house must be kept attractive to Rundell, and the present 
 administration bores him. In his brutal way, he is an 
 inveterate lady's man. The tastes of a man of millions 
 must be considered. I must get down a few handsome 
 girls from Denver, to amuse him." 
 
 Althea's blue eyes dilated. 
 
 "I agree," she said, curtly. 
 
 He rode away with a smile on his face. Isolde would 
 be shielded. 
 
 Ignorant of her husband's little manoeuvre in her be- 
 half, Isolde, meanwhile, was passing a bad day. The 
 scene of the previous night haunted her like the memory 
 of an evil dream. She scarcely dared realize the real sig- 
 nificance of it. That her husband had political ambitions 
 at stake that he speculated recklessly, even daringly, 
 she knew ; but that he could be in the power of Rundell 
 or his kind, was a possibility fraught with shame she 
 could not face. She thought and thought, till her heart 
 fainted and her brain reeled. When her husband's 
 step sounded on the threshold she sped to her dressing- 
 room, where, at this hour, he usually sought her. Per- 
 haps he would hear, would heed, a last appeal. The
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 239 
 
 day had gone well with him, and he joined her in happy 
 humor. 
 
 "Not dressed yet?" he said, with a disparaging glance 
 at her dainty negligee. "Make haste, little woman! 
 Appetite, as well as dinner, waits ! " 
 
 " Do we dine alone, Steele ? " 
 
 " Heaven forbid ; since upon Rundell's amiable mood 
 this evening is staked the biggest stock ' combine ' of the 
 spring market. He and Kingsley drove up with me. A 
 few of the boys will run down by special, for the even- 
 ing. They can't keep away. Do you know what they 
 say in Denver ? that I own the best wines, the best 
 weeds, and the prettiest woman in Colorado ! " 
 
 " You are willing that your wife should be classed by 
 such men, with your wine and your cigars?" 
 
 "I am charmed that such men consider my wife worthy 
 of the classification." 
 
 There was a knock at the door. The maid handed in 
 an exquisite cluster of rare orchids. They bore Rundell's 
 card. 
 
 She shut the door and turned to her husband. The 
 moment for her appeal was come. 
 
 " Steele," she said, " I am going to appeal to you for 
 the last time. If you repulse me now, I will never turn to 
 you again, never, so help me God, however sore my need ! 
 You are dragging me down, unconsciously, unrealizingly, 
 as you are allowing yourself to be dragged down by these 
 bold, bad men. They are not your friends, Steele, but 
 your most ruthless enemies ; because they are ruining 
 not only your body, but your soul. Are you better for 
 their companionship by one pure thought, one high ambi- 
 tion, one noble word or deed ? Not one ! What are their 
 words but oaths ? What is their example but dissipation ?
 
 240 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 What are their animal, brutal, sensual lives but insults to 
 their God, evils to their fellow-men, degradation for 
 themselves, contamination for you ? The intimacy has 
 been a mistake, a step aside. End it ! Begin, by letting 
 me send back these flowers. Let me send them back, 
 Steele let me send them back ! " 
 
 He took the orchids from her hand, and buried his face 
 in them. In breathless suspense she waited for his an- 
 swer. As he restored the bouquet to her, his eyes did not 
 meet hers. 
 
 " Sweets to the sweet," he said. " Rundell is nothing if 
 not gallant. Have you remarked his devotion to Althea? 
 Wear or carry these to-night. Their sweetness, like their 
 fair recipient's, is far too precious to be wasted." 
 
 She dashed the blossoms to the ground, and trampled 
 on them.
 
 CHAPTER XXIIL 
 
 A SON AND HKTR. 
 
 In September Isolde's baby was born a son. Steele 
 was at the bank when the summons reached him. He 
 obeyed it with haggard face and a heart racked with bitter, 
 vain regret. The possibility of losing her tortured, al- 
 most maddened him. In spite of the misery to which he 
 had ruthlessly subjected her, he loved her. Bad as he 
 was, he would have been infinitely worse but for this love, 
 whose purifying, ennobling influence kept alive the divine 
 flame ever flickering within his soul. As he entered the 
 hushed house, the sound of a faint cry reached him. He 
 dashed into the library, and covered his ears with his 
 hands. Without remorse he had subjected her to long 
 and acute mental torture ; but physical pain was differ- 
 ent. He could comprehend, compassionate it, revolt 
 against it. He drew a breath of relief that was almost 
 a sob as Dr. Keene appeared, and ended his suspense. 
 
 " The danger is comparatively over," he said. " She is 
 asking for you. Be careful not to excite her." 
 
 On the threshold of the darkened chamber he hesi- 
 tated. He felt himself pushed in, and heard the door 
 shut softly behind him. At first, the still, dark room with 
 its drawn curtains seemed unfamiliar to him. Then he 
 discerned a cloud of gold-brown hair on the pillow, and a 
 sweet, wan face framed in it, lighted by fluttering violet
 
 242 A SON OF ESAU, 
 
 eyes. One white arm lay outside the coverlet, and upon 
 it a tiny bundle of flannel seemed to stir. A great awe 
 swept over him. How dared he enter this holy chamber 
 he, every unworthy phase of whose life flashed venge- 
 f ully before him, like angel-swords of flame ! A sob broke 
 from him, a terrible sob, strangled in its birth. He 
 groped his way to the bed, and fell on his knees before it. 
 
 " My darling ! " he cried. " My darling ! " 
 
 " You wished for a son," she quavered. "I am so glad, 
 so glad ! Is he not the most beautiful darling ? Kiss 
 him." 
 
 The bundle of flannel proved to have one vulnerable 
 spot. On the little red, distorted countenance, whose 
 beauty was unrevealed, as yet, save to doting mother-eyes, 
 the young father timidly rested his lips. As he did so, a 
 tiny clenched fist, soft as down and weak as a fledgling- 
 wing, wavered up against his cheek. He held his breath 
 as it lingered there, caressing it with timid tenderness, as 
 it fluttered down. The young mother's eyes overflowed 
 with happy tears. 
 
 "My baby's father ! " she whispered. 
 
 The tender words unmanned him. 
 
 " My wife," he cried, " tell me, tell me that you forgive 
 me ! " 
 
 He hid his face as she answered him. Forgive him ? 
 Ah, there was so much to be forgiven so much more 
 than she knew ! 
 
 The unextinguished divine spark within him was fanned 
 to sudden flame. By its light he saw himself, his life, as 
 both had been, as both might and should have been, had 
 this pure, sweet woman but had her gentle way. Intui- 
 tively, she read his thoughts. A shadow fell on her 
 happy face. She began to tremble, nervously.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 243 
 
 "The past has been all wrong and wicked," she mur- 
 mured. " God will forgive us, help us, to begin anew. 
 We will do better we must do better, Steele, for baby's 
 sake ! " 
 
 He did not answer. He was shuddering in acute torture. 
 The words were coals of fire burning his soul and heart. 
 " God will forgive us us !" she was saying she, who had 
 been as pure and spotless as the white-winged angels. 
 " God will forgive us ! We will do better ! " O, the 
 shame, the pain, the pity of it ! 
 
 Of a sudden he realized that her breath was coming in 
 quick gasps, and that her hand was burning. He looked 
 at her anxiously. Her eyes were darker and brighter 
 than when he had last looked in them, and a feverish flush 
 was deepening on her cheeks. On the pillow her head 
 tossed restlessly, to and fro, to and fro 
 
 " I I cannot think how it all came about," she panted ; 
 "all the wrong and sin and sorrow. The cabin by 
 the Freshet ! The child and the woman ! Who are 
 all these men around me smiling at me and staring 
 with dreadful eyes ! Save me from them Steele, Steele, 
 save me for baby's sake ! " 
 
 In alarm, he called to the nurse, waiting in the little 
 ante-room. One glance at the flushed face on the pillow, 
 and she ordered him from the room, and summoned Dr. 
 Keene. As he descended the stairs, Althea met him. 
 She extended her hand, gaily. 
 
 " I congratulate you, Harriman senior ! " she said. 
 
 In his torture of suspense and vain remorse, he brushed 
 by her with a shudder. 
 
 " Don't touch me ! " he cried. " Don't speak to me. I 
 have been with her ! " 
 
 Althea gazed after him, blankly. Then, with a shrug of
 
 24:4 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 her handsome shoulders, she passed on. The tale of the 
 lost Paradise recurred to her. According to Adam, it is 
 Eve, always Eve, who eats the apple ! 
 
 Isolde did not die. Day by day, fettered to earth by 
 clinging baby-hands, her hold on life grew stronger. Upon 
 a changed world she looked out with changed eyes. What 
 had seemed before, earthily, ignobly human, was now 
 divine. The sweet old Christmas story was brought near 
 to her. She understood now how the world had been 
 redeemed by the birth of One little Child. The maternal 
 passion was strong in her. She loved God, her husband, 
 all the human world, infinitely the more, because of this 
 one helpless atom of humanity, lying like a rosebud on her 
 breast. With tender eyes and cheek pressed lovingly 
 against the baby-face, she sat, day after day, dreaming 
 dreaming. Who shall read the heart of the mother- 
 bird, brooding in rapture over the new-filled nest ? Who 
 tell the dream of the mother-breast, thrilling with love of 
 its first sweet human birthling ? She made tender little 
 songs, and sung them between her dreams. Here is one 
 of them : 
 
 LOVE'S SYNONYMS. 
 
 What is my sun ? 
 
 A silken floss 
 
 That young winds tangle, and twine, and toss. 
 A floating halo that gilds the air, 
 Aud the floss my sun is your golden hair, 
 
 Your hair, 
 
 Baby boy I 
 
 What are my stars ? 
 
 Sweet pansies two, 
 With hearts of purple, and rims of blue.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 245 
 
 Love shines within them in stellar guise, 
 And my pansy-stars are your two bright eyes, 
 Your eyes, 
 
 Baby boy ! 
 
 What is my rose ? 
 
 A love-cup shy ; 
 
 Sweet draughts of kisses within it lie. 
 It brims with laughter and love and youth. 
 And the cup my rose is your rose-red mouth, 
 
 Your mouth, 
 
 Baby boy ! 
 
 What is my bird ? 
 
 An unseen lyre, 
 
 Whose sweet strains echo from angel-choir, 
 Its songs of heaven bid earth rejoice, 
 And the lyre my bird is your childish voice, 
 Your voice, 
 
 Baby boy ! 
 
 What are my life, 
 
 My love, my bliss ? 
 
 Your gold young tresses, your eyes, your kiss ! 
 In these my rapture ; elsewhere my rue, 
 For my whole, whole world is just you, sweet, you I- 
 Just you, 
 
 Baby boy I 
 
 And here, another. 
 
 SLUMBEK-SONG. 
 
 Fair five petalled lilies two. 
 Budding white in heaven's blue, 
 Earthward peeping, once saw you, 
 
 (Sleep, baby mine !) 
 Hence in heaven could not stay, 
 Truant-lilies, stole away ; 
 They that are your hands to-day. 
 
 (Baby mine, sleep!)
 
 246 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Once from Edeu, roses twain, 
 Five wee rosebuds in their train, 
 Wandered toward this world mundane, 
 
 (Sleep, baby mine !) 
 .Met you in some dim retreat, 
 White rose fair, and pink rose sweet; 
 Bloomed into your two wee feet. 
 
 (Baby mine, sleep!) 
 
 Once an angel at earth's gate, 
 Unincarnate lay in wait, 
 Seeking soul inviolate, 
 
 (Sleep, baby mine !) 
 Seeking eyes of heaven's blue, 
 Mouth like rosebud wet with dew, 
 Seeking, finding all, in you! 
 
 (Baby mine, sleep !) 
 
 " There is the look of an angel on her face," sighed 
 Mrs. Kummins, turning with Miss Sharpe from the Har- 
 riman gate, after a congratulatory call. "That blessed 
 baby '11 go back to the heaven it came from, an' take her 
 along with it. We'd best make the most of her while 
 she's left us, Virginny, for we won't keep her long." 
 
 Miss Sharpe disagreed. 
 
 " There is a look of a woman on her face," she empha- 
 sized ; "the look of a woman who has loved and suffered 
 much, and who will live to love and suffer more." 
 
 At the cross-roads they met Steele, mounted on Lady- 
 bird. He cantered by them with a gay salute. Miss 
 Sharpe looked after him. 
 
 "He is grandly handsome," she admitted, reluctantly. 
 " There is something almost terrible about such animal 
 strength and beauty. After all, the love of such a man 
 must mean life or death."
 
 A SOW OF ESAU. 247 
 
 " To him ? " questioned innocent Mrs. Kummins. 
 Miss Sbarpe scorned the suggestion. 
 "To him a man!" she jeered. "Nonsense, woman, 
 of course not. I mean to her, to her ! " 
 
 Brooding, bird-like, over her baby day after day, in 
 sweet young-mother fashion thinking over her past, and 
 dreaming of her future there was one half-forgotten 
 scene, whose memory revived and haunted her the scene 
 of the bitter night when she had fled from her home, and 
 Althea had forced her back, and Magdalen the woman 
 from whom she had shrunk, had stood her fiiend and 
 shielded her. 
 
 " You need not shrink from me ; my touch will not pollute 
 you. lam on the brink, yes; but as yet, I have not crossed 
 the chasm." 
 
 She had forgotten the words in the troubled time suc- 
 ceeding them, but in these long weeks of blissful reverie, 
 when all the natural world seemed fairer, and all the 
 human world nearer and dearer, because of the baby 
 cradled in her arms, she recalled them, bitterly reproach- 
 ing herself for having been deaf so long to their pathos 
 and appeal. Baby should atone for her, she resolved, 
 tenderly ; never doubting* the power of those helpless, 
 childish hands. 
 
 As she convalesced, the subject of the baby's christen- 
 ing was broached. 
 
 " What is to be his name ? " inquired Steele, tweaking 
 one of the wee pink ears by way of caress. 
 
 "He shall be called after you, of course," said 
 Isolde. 
 
 " I prefer that he be called first, after a better man my 
 father. John Steele how does that suit you ? "
 
 28 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " It is not very pretty. I was thinking of Steele Mar- 
 maduke, after you and my father." 
 
 " Save the Marmaduke for his brother, my sweet, and 
 please me. As to his sponsors, let Kingsley and Dr. Keene 
 be godfathers " 
 
 <: I should have liked George," interrupted Isolde, "wist- 
 fully. " But under the circumstances he is, of course, 
 impossible. As to his godmother " 
 
 She hid a smile and blush in the golden down which, 
 notwithstanding her Muse's flattering representations, 
 was all that had as yet materialized of John Steele's hair. 
 
 " As to his godmother, baby and I have a surprise in 
 store for you," she said. "I will tell you what it is, after 
 I have been to Denver. We are so happy about it, so 
 happy baby and I ! " 
 
 She took a flying trip to Denver, her errand connected 
 with the christening, indeed ; but not as exclusively with 
 purchases for the christening as Steele believed. In 
 reality, she went in search of Magdalen. The search 
 proved unavailing. All her clues were false ones. Her 
 atonement was too late. Beautiful Magdalen had escaped 
 her. She resigned the vain search with a sigh. 
 
 She had left Newfield on the forenoon flyer. When her 
 search ended, the sun .was sinking. On the western 
 mountains the summit-snows were crimson, the purple 
 mists flecked with rose and gold. It lacked an hour of 
 train-time. She was faint and tired. She drove to the 
 Windsor, and ordered some refreshment served in the 
 room known as "Harriman's," it being reserved for the 
 Newfield banker's use. 
 
 As she left the hotel, and was in the act of crossing the 
 sidewalk to her carriage, there whirled round the Larimer 
 street corner a showy equipage drawn by a span of
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 249 
 
 spirited bays, whose glittering harness jingled with gilded 
 bells. 
 
 As the liveried footman leaped to the ground, a tall, 
 beautiful blonde, magnificently gowned and jeweled, 
 descended. Isolde, moved by a sudden impulse, turned 
 and looked at her. Then, with an exclamation of sur- 
 prised pleasure, she approached her with outstretched 
 hand. The woman started, and drew back against the 
 carriage. 
 
 " You ?" she cried, under her breath. "You ? " 
 
 A sudden burning blush stained her fair face. 
 
 " I cannot take your hand," she said. " I told you 
 once that my touch would not pollute you. I cannot say 
 that now. The brink is behind me. I have crossed the 
 chasm. Your hand, above all others, I can never touch 
 again." 
 
 She swept past her into the hotel, even as she spoke the 
 words. For a moment, Isolde hesitated. Then with pale 
 sad face, she entered her carriage. 
 
 Steele was at the station to meet her. As they turned 
 into the home-road, she burst into sudden tears. 
 
 " My surprise," she sobbed, " is spoiled. You may 
 choose baby's godmother, after alL She can never be 
 Magdalen, never ! I was too late, too late ! " 
 
 " Magdalen ? " he echoed, incredulously. " Magdalen ? " 
 
 He flushed suddenly, and as suddenly paled. 
 
 "Did you meet her?" he demanded. "Did she dare 
 to speak to you ? In heaven's name, what did she say ? " 
 
 "Nothing that she should have said," sobbed Isolde. 
 "Not that the world is hard, and women false, and men 
 strong and cruel ; not that she had stood my friend, who 
 failed to stand hers ; not that her sin is on my head, who 
 selfishly, ungratefully, deserted her, whom I might have
 
 250 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 saved. She said only that she could never touch my 
 hand again." 
 
 The drive was taken in silence. At the door Kingsley 
 met them. Steele drew him aside, and spoke a few 
 hasty words. 
 
 "Come in for a B, and S.," he finished. "I feel as weak 
 as as a woman." 
 
 Kingsley turned off abruptly, with a stern, resentful 
 face. 
 
 " Nothing for me," he said, curtly. " And, by the way, 
 why not be truthful in our similes, and say, as weak as 
 a man ? "
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE REVEREND HUNGERFORD BARNEY. 
 
 " MY DEAR DIVINE : ' The iniquity of the fathers shall be 
 visited upon the children ! ' Alas for rne the hapless 
 victim of our dissenting ancestors ! You seem to be at 
 anchor in Rome, but I still drift from port to port, to fall 
 foul in each of some rock of doctrinal unbelief. Like 
 John, I want to go into the wilderness, and pray. The 
 New- World wilderness is Newfield. I knock ! With your 
 Bishop's permission, bid me enter in ! 
 
 " HUNGERFORD." 
 
 With this characteristic letter in his hand, the Catholic 
 priest sat in the parochial study, absorbed in earnest 
 thought. Finally, he took up his hat, and with the letter 
 still in his hand, walked to the Freshet cabin. 
 
 " It means," asked Sal, when he had read it to her, " ez 
 hell be 'yer 'yer in Newfield ?" 
 
 " Yes," he admitted. 
 
 " Yo' sent fur him ; yo' told him ! " she cried, passion- 
 ately. 
 
 "Before God," he said, "I did not. I read you this 
 letter to show you that his visit is unsolicited. Tho 
 confidence you reposed in me was surprised from you, 
 through your ignorance of our kinship. It is sacred. I 
 have not betrayed it ; I shall not betray it But should
 
 252 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 my bi'other remain here for any length of time, it will be 
 impossible to shield you from discovery. To be honest, 
 I shall not ti % y. I suspect, I hope, that discovery will be 
 the very best thing that can befall you." 
 
 The reverend Huugerford arrived with the twilight, a 
 fortnight later. He was an impulsive, nervous man, whose 
 gold-rimmed eye-glasses waged perpetual warfare with 
 their nasal support. In appearance he was fair and slight- 
 ly florid ; and his forty years were carried as jauntily as 
 his glasses. His ministerial profession was carried more 
 jauntily than either. In fact, the reverend Hungerford 
 frankly confessed that he had made a failure of it. 
 
 " Spiritually," he said, " I am a rolling stone, and am 
 absolutely without the moss of faith. High Episcopalian 
 and low Episcopalian, Baptist and Methodist, Presbyterian 
 and TJniversalist I have been each and all. Romanism 
 and Nothingism are the alternatives left me. Pray for 
 me, that the fitter may survive ! " 
 
 Newfield listened, took his half-jesting confession for 
 whole earnest, and sympathized with soulful fervor. Mrs. 
 Linnett's sympathy, in particular, knew no bounds. 
 
 " Creeds," she said, " are naiTOW ; and you, dear Mr. 
 Hungerford, are broad ! Caroline and I, with other 
 chosen spirits, have sadly felt the need of a more pro- 
 gressive creed than the reverend Druce professes. He 
 is admirable, as far as he goes ; but he has his limits. In 
 my opinion, a special Providence has sent you to New- 
 field. Do not abjure your mission ! " 
 
 " But, my dear madam," he began, twitching off his 
 glasses in his eager expostulation. 
 
 " But me no buts," she quoted in playful interruption. 
 " Caroline and I will not be refused ! " 
 
 " O Ma," simpered Caroline.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 253 
 
 The nerves of the fair sex are proverbially sensitive. 
 Its olfactory nerves are super-sensitive. They detect an 
 odor of distinction about the clerical profession, even 
 though the odor of sanctity utterly fails to supplement it. 
 Tiie reverend Huugerford found himself, thanks to femi- 
 nine Xewfield, a social lion. His pleasing appearance and 
 happy address above all, his immunity from any trammel- 
 ing matrimonial tie, adapted him for the role. He did not 
 accept it, but he submitted to it. His complaisance was 
 an additional feature in his favor, contrasted, as it was, 
 with Druce's social reserve. The sectarian hatchet was 
 buried, and a rush in the lion's direction made by all the 
 marriageable females in the town, spurred on by their 
 solicitous friends and relatives. Moreover, the religious 
 revolution conceived by Mrs. Linnett soon took tangible 
 shape, in consequence of which the unorthodox element 
 of Newfield was in a ferment. Mrs. Prude, pushing aside 
 little Mrs. Linnett by sheer force, headed it A broad 
 creed ! A new church ! An unorthodox minister ! The 
 tide of Eevised Testamentism and Improved - Gospel- 
 ism which had swept over the great cities, emptied its 
 last small ebb-wave into Newfield. Newfield mistook the 
 ebb- wave for the tide itself, and became in its own eyes 
 supremely important. Its progressive mind could not be 
 confined to narrow creeds, its enlightenment scorned the 
 fillet of superstition ! A subscription was proposed, and 
 resolved upon, as the fii-st step toward the establishment 
 of a new church, whose unorthodox pulpit the reverend 
 Hungerford should be called upon to fill In the mean- 
 time, he was feted, day and night. Mrs. Tompson gave 
 him a dinner, upon which occasion not the dinner, but 
 the fair Susanna, was thrown at him. Mi's. Linnett hon- 
 ored him with a " tea," at which Caroline, in her most
 
 254 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 aesthetic gown and simpering mood, officiated. The 
 Hunters ventured a " party," which presented Hilly and 
 Cilly in all the allurements of evening (un)dress; and 
 even Mrs. Prude, in forlorn hope for poor old unclaimed 
 sister Prim, baked a suggestively bridal- like cake, de- 
 canted her choicest berry-wine, opened the blinds of the 
 dark, damp, and dismal " best-room," and stitched up a 
 brand-new calico-shroud, very long about the toes and 
 veiy short about the heels, for the " orphan-help ; " who 
 appropriately laid herself out therein, to the knell of a 
 falling ti*ay and the toll of smashed china, proving, in 
 consequence, not only chief corpse, but likewise, through 
 the necromancy of Mrs. Prude's avenging rod, chief 
 mourner ! 
 
 As the social fever waned, the religious fever waxed. 
 The subscription for the new church boasted many names, 
 if not, as yet, many dollars. To broach with due cere- 
 mony the subject of his election to the pulpit thereof, a 
 committee was appointed to wait upon the reverend 
 Hungerford, who received the ladies forming it in the 
 little parlor of the parochial residence. Upon the parts 
 of Mrs. Prude and Mrs. Tompson, particularly, there had 
 been strong misgivings as to the orthodoxy of crossing 
 the Romish threshold, but these the less bigoted majority 
 over-ruled. Entering the parochial parlor under protest, 
 as it were, Mrs. Prude showered tracts about her spirit- 
 ual disinfectants warranted to be specifics against Romish 
 contagion. Mrs. Liunett shivered sensitively, explaining 
 that the " possible proximity of holy water chilled her 
 delicate spiritual organization." Mrs. Prude, however, as 
 self-elected spokeswoman of the occasion, found it neces- 
 sary to overcome her spiritual delicacy ; so adjusting her 
 spectacles, and fixing her eyes upon her notes fiercely as
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 255 
 
 if defying them to evade her, she arose with a preparatory 
 ahem ! 
 
 " Ahem ! " she repeated. "Ahem ! " 
 
 The committee cleared its throat in sympathy. Mrs. 
 Prude extended her hand to the reverend Hungerford, 
 with the gesture of an amateur tragedy-queen. 
 
 " And palm to palm is holy palmer's kiss ! " she an- 
 nounced, in salutatory. 
 
 Sister Prim hid her virgin face. The Hunters tittered. 
 Caroline Linnett sniffed her salts. 
 
 "It's Shakespeai-e," asserted Mrs. Prude, resenting the 
 general disapproval. 
 
 "Shake what?" asked Mrs. Tompson, her domestic 
 mind reverting to carpets. 
 
 "Shakespeare, Mrs. Tompson, "explained Mrs. Linnett, 
 with gracious supe:*iority, "was a man " 
 
 " That's why his mind run on kissin'," snapped Mrs. 
 Tompson. 
 
 "His mind, like all great, high, beautiful minds," de- 
 fended Caroline, " ran on poetry ! To quote a great 
 poet " 
 
 "Peter Jones," interrupted Milly Hunter. 
 
 " The Pike's Peak Poet, if you please, Miss Hunter," 
 amended Caroline, relinquishing the quotation. 
 
 " Really, ladies ! " expostulated the minister. 
 
 Mrs. Prude rustled her notes. 
 
 "This interruption is unseemly," she said. "I beg 
 leave to proceed." 
 
 She straightened her spectacles, held the notes off at 
 arm's length, and proceeded. 
 
 " Dear Brother in the Lord ! " she said. 
 
 This Ciceronian period was worthy of acknowledgment. 
 Mrs. Prude looked expectantly about her.
 
 256 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Hear ! Hear! " applauded Mrs. Linnett, tapping her 
 vinaigrette on the table. Mrs. Prude resumed. 
 
 " By our Christian sisters," she began, truthfully as well 
 as politely giving "place aux dames," the unorthodox 
 movement being an exclusively feminine one " by our 
 Christian sisters and brothers, we, the undersigned I 
 mean, we the present, have been ahem ! have been " 
 
 " Choosed," suggested Mrs. Tompson, in like defiance 
 of Prude and Murray. 
 
 " Have been elected," italicised Mrs. Prude, with a with- 
 ering look Tompsonward, "to call upon you, in reference 
 to to " 
 
 "A new church," prompted Mrs. Linnett. 
 
 Mrs. Prude scorned the suggestion. 
 
 " In reference to a religious movement at present on 
 foot 
 
 "In hand, "corrected Milly Hunter, holding up the sub- 
 scription-list. 
 
 "At present on foot," repeated Mrs. Prude, "concern- 
 ing " 
 
 She had come to the end of her first page of notes ; 
 turning it, she gazed helplessly at the reverse-side hiero- 
 glyphics. 
 
 " Concerning " she repeated, glaring defiantly about 
 
 her. 
 
 After a moment the silence grew oppressive. There 
 were sundry apologetic coughs, and the Hunters giggled. 
 The Hungerford glasses went on and off with nervous 
 rapidity. Sister Prim searched for her spectacles, found 
 them ; searched for her handkerchief, found it ; polished 
 the spectacles, adjusted them, and refolded and repocketed 
 the handkerchief ; then rising in desperation, she looked 
 over Mrs. Prude's shoulder.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 257 
 
 "Why, Sister Prude," she exclaimed, "you've got 'em 
 tail-end up." 
 
 Sister Prude rectified the mistake, and continued. 
 
 " Concerning the establishment of a new - " 
 
 "Church," re-suggested Mrs. Linnett, undiscouraged. 
 
 " Edifice ! of a new edifice to the Lord, and to the 
 pulpit of which, we are in in - " 
 
 "Invited," murmured Milly Hunter, her thoughts on a 
 coming festivity. 
 
 " Inspired by the Spirit to call you ! YOU," she capi- 
 talized, in eloquent peroration "YOU, the Keverend Mr. 
 Hungerford Haruey, dear brother in the Lord ! " 
 
 With a complacent flutter of skirts and handkerchief, 
 Mrs. Prude resumed her seat, her discarded notes falling 
 like laurels about her. The reverend Hungerford con- 
 sidered the matter in silence. Finally with a sweep-off 
 of his glasses with one nasal contortion, and a sweep-on 
 of them with another, he spoke. 
 
 " Of course," he said, " there are certain conditions to 
 be imposed. What are they ? M 
 
 The committee hesitated. Mrs. Prude, having taken the 
 initiative, felt constrained to keep it. 
 
 " As for me," she said, " I must beg that the doctrine of 
 damnation be insisted upon." 
 
 "Hum!" ejaculated the minister. "And you, Mrs. 
 Linnett ? " 
 
 "Dear Caroline and I," murmured Mrs. Linnett, with 
 heavenward eyes, " seek the gospel of universal salvation, 
 the gospel that is all light, all sweetness, all tenderness, 
 
 " Poetry and love, Ma," suggested Caroline, with coy 
 self-consciousness. 
 
 Mrs. Linnett accepted the suggestion.
 
 258 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "Yes, all poetry and love, dear minister ; " she said, " all 
 poetry and love ! " 
 
 Mrs. Tompson expostulated. 
 
 "I recommend," she said, quoting from an eloquent 
 exhortation published in a recent number of a religious 
 weekly, "I recommend that a tireless watch be kept on 
 each and every member of the fold, lest a general laxity 
 er um ahem lest a general laxity follow the de- 
 cline of the decline of of individual vigilty." 
 
 " Vigiftmce, Ma ! " corrected Susanna, blushing furi- 
 ously. 
 
 Mrs. Linnett tittered. Mrs. Tompson turned ireful. 
 
 "Lance, or dance, or pants, Miss," she retorted, with 
 increasing vigor, " I didn't pay fur your schooliu ' this 
 twelve year, ter have you sass me, throwin ' it in my face 
 afore folks. You're a serpent's tail, Susanna Tompson." 
 
 " Tooth, Ma, tooth ! " groaned Susanna. 
 
 " And your requirements, young ladies ? " asked the 
 minister of the Misses Hunter. 
 
 " We, Cilly and I," confessed Milly," would suggest the 
 introduction of semi-weekly sociables to attract ahem ! 
 to save the young men of the fold from the girls I mean 
 the godlessness, outside it." 
 
 "From the girls outside it," corroborated Cilly, who 
 had not noticed her sister's amendment. 
 
 The reverend Hungerford, who had grimaced off his 
 glasses as he listened, now grimaced them on again. 
 
 " Ladies," he said, " the issue of this matter rests with 
 yourselves." 
 
 There was a general murmur of gratification which he 
 silenced abruptly. 
 
 " No," he said, " not yet I have heard your conditions. 
 Now hear mine ! "
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 259 
 
 He paced nervously up and down the little room, halt- 
 ing successively before each member of the committee, 
 as his respective remarks applied. 
 
 "First," he said, standing before Mrs. Prude, "as to 
 tracts. In their way they are good. In wise hands they 
 are the possible instruments by which a heedles soul may 
 be reminded of its Creator ; but commonly, they are more 
 prolific of harm than of good. Their indiscriminate dis- 
 tribution I shall not only disapprove, but forbid. More- 
 over, I shall oppose the social slavehood, denounce the 
 slaveholders, and free the child-slaves, existing under the 
 present local domestic system of orphan-help ! " 
 
 He passed on to Mrs. Linnett. 
 
 "Secondly," he said, "I shall reprove all unchristian 
 social pretensions and assumptions all silly airs and affec- 
 tations and frivolities all foolish enthusiasms, and brain- 
 less hero-worship, from the pulpit." 
 
 "Caroline, my salts," gasped Mrs. Linnett, hysterically, 
 The ruthless Hungerford passed on to Mrs. Tompson. 
 
 " Thirdly," he said, " the text of my first sermon shall 
 be, 'And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's 
 eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?' 
 Such as are blind to their own beams, I shall feel it my 
 duty publicly to enlighten." 
 
 His nose went up and his glasses came down. Twice 
 he passed the Misses Hunter in silence. As he spoke, at 
 last, there was a regretful, an almost tender cadence, in 
 his lowered voice. 
 
 " Finally," he said, " I shall endeavor to elevate, ennoble, 
 enrich the lives of such unmanned women of my congre- 
 gation as are no longer in their earliest youth." With a 
 comprehensive glance he included the Misses Linnett and 
 Tompson in his address. " I shall say to them that human
 
 260 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 love is much, but Divine love most of all that the Lord 
 gives, or the Lord gives not, but that His Name is blessed 
 still ! I shall say to them, ' be not foolish virgins, vainly 
 striving to kindle the marriage-lamp He has not seen fit 
 to kindle for you, but rather, wise virgins, swinging your 
 single lives like vestal lamps, chastely, modestly, stead- 
 fastly, before the altar of the Lamb ! ' " 
 
 The committee departed in dreary silence, its frigid 
 leave-takings bearing no resemblance to the effusive greet- 
 ings of the previous hour. Mrs. Tompson, indeed, gave 
 voice to her indignation while the reverend Hungerford 
 was still bowing them from the door. 
 
 " Well ! I never ! " she ejaculated. 
 
 " We have been insulted, grossly insulted ! " cried Caro- 
 line Linnett. 
 
 "For my part, ladies, I withdraw my subscription," an- 
 nounced Mrs. Prude, undeterred by the unimportant con- 
 sideration that she had subscribed nothing to withdraw. 
 " The Spirit has undeceived me. We have been mistaken 
 in him." 
 
 Mrs. Linnett sighed plaintively. 
 
 "A rude awakening is the bitter fate of the dreaming 
 soul," she said. " Caroline, my salts." 
 
 " He's a mean, spying, impudent old hypocrite," sobbed 
 Cilly Hunter, for pnce assertive. 
 
 " He is, Cilly," corroborated Susanna, with responsive 
 tears. 
 
 But it was left for Milly to cap the climax. 
 
 "He is a Romanist in ambush," she said ; " a Jesuit in 
 disguise. My answer is declined without regret." 
 
 The motion passed unanimously. And without regret 
 the answer was alike given and received.
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 "YOU SHALL BE RIGHTED." 
 
 Some evenings later the reverend Hungerford was dis- 
 cussing this experience with Druce, who had not been 
 unaware of the backsliding of his parishioners. The young 
 minister had failed rapidly of late. His always delicate 
 face was now wan and pallid, and his eyes, in spite of 
 their feverish brightness, were languid. His hands, 
 loosely folded on the desk before him, were thin and 
 transparent. 
 
 " I tell you frankly," said Hungerford, " that I do not 
 envy you your pulpit. Those few women would make a 
 Babel of Eden. They need a parson apiece to manage 
 them. How do you do it, Druce ?" 
 
 " I am sorry to say that I do not do it. I fail, utterly," 
 he replied, despondently. 
 
 His weary voice, his wan face, struck Hungerford pain- 
 fully. He leaned across the little desk, and laid bis hand 
 on Druce's shoulder. 
 
 " Out with it, my boy ! " he said. " Something is weigh- 
 ing heavily on that heart of yours. Is it a question of ortho- 
 dox profession versus unorthodox conviction or only next 
 Sunday's sermon, or to-morrow's Old Women's meeting?" 
 
 " Neither one nor the other," replied Druce, smiling 
 faintly. " It is only that this is an anniversary for me, 
 and I have been thinking ! "
 
 262 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The desk was littered with manuscript, under which a 
 small daguerreotype case lay open, face upward. Druce 
 drew it out, arid handed it to Hungerford. 
 
 " A woman ! " cried Hungerford. " Marriageable New- 
 field, I weep for thee ! " 
 
 " Hush ! " cried Druce, sharply. " That dream is over. 
 Such an one can never touch me again." 
 
 His elbow was resting on the table ; his frail hand sup- 
 ported his cheek. He spoke in a weary monotone, his 
 eyes fixed on the pictured face. 
 
 " It was a childish attachment," he said, " and it grew 
 with years. "When I went to college, I took her kiss with 
 me. When I entered the ministry, the portrait of my 
 promised wife was on my heart She was delicate and 
 had been tenderly reared. I could not claim her, while 
 luck went against me, as it did, for four long years. At 
 the end of that time I was called to a pulpit a hundred 
 miles from here. I sobbed like a girl over the letter that 
 accepted me. It meant so much to me : a start in my 
 Master's work a home her ! I went to claim her, and 
 found her in the graveyard. She had died three days 
 before. Five years since then five long lonely years, that 
 seem like fifty ! With David, I am tempted to cry out, 
 ' How long, O Lord, how long ! ' ' 
 
 Hungerford's answer was a silent hand-clasp. Then 
 he took his leave. Outside the house, however, he lin- 
 gered before the curtained window upon which the shadow 
 of the young minister's head was visible, drooping over 
 his manuscript like a tired child's. 
 
 "Whom He loveth, Hechasteneth," murmured Hunger- 
 ford. His eyes were suddenly dim. 
 
 The parsonage was at one side of the town, the priest's 
 house at the other. Main Street, with its shops and
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 263 
 
 saloons, stretched between. It bad attained, of late, to 
 tbe dignity of gas ; no ghastly electric glare, nor un- 
 canny natural gas conflagration, but good old-fashioned 
 gas, burning steadily in yellow jets at the street cor- 
 ners. As Hungerford turned one of these, his thoughts 
 busy with the young minister and the simple story 
 of his sad young life, he found himself face to face 
 with a pedestrian who was hurrying in the opposite 
 direction, and a sudden collision brought both to an 
 abrupt halt. As he grimaced off his treacherous glasses, 
 he was horrified to see that the victim of his onslaught 
 was a woman. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he cried; "I trust that I have 
 not hurt you ? These wretched eyes of mine " 
 
 He paused suddenly, with an exclamation of pleased 
 surprise. As she had attempted to pass him, the gas- 
 light overhead, shining fully upon her, had revealed a 
 face strangely familiar to him, but which, for the moment, 
 he failed to identify. 
 
 "My girl," he said, "you are you are " 
 
 He looked at her intently. A sudden light flashed into 
 his face. 
 
 "Let me see your hand, your left hand!" he said, 
 quickly. 
 
 She extended it, defiantly. It was a handsome hand, 
 large and strong, yet finely moulded. He took it in his 
 hand and looked at it blankly. It was ringless. 
 
 " Five years ago, in Smith's Settlement," he said, "I 
 saw a ring placed upon this hand. Where is it ? " 
 
 Her haughty, defiant silence did not baffle him. In 
 her eyes he caught the shimmer of rising tears. 
 
 " My girl," he said, " trouble and shame have come to 
 you. Is that it?"
 
 264 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " Yes," she said, snatching away her hand, " that's it ! 
 Aint yo' glad yo' know ? " 
 
 "You shall be righted!" he cried, but she shook her 
 head hopelessly, as she glided past him. Before he could 
 follow her she had melted like a wraith into the night. 
 With glasses on and with glasses off, he peered into the 
 darkness, this way and that, but neither sight nor sound 
 betrayed her. 
 
 His brother was not in the library when the excited 
 minister burst in. The meek young curate, just leaving 
 the library for his room, turned back in surprise. 
 
 " Can I do anything for you ? " he asked. 
 
 " Yes ! " cried the reverend Hungerford with fire. 
 " You can pray that the wicked be confounded and the 
 righteous triumphant ! " 
 
 He vanished as he spoke the words, darting toward the 
 church where he knew his brother would be found at this 
 hour. The curate gazed after him \vith an uncharitable 
 suspicion, for which he afterward did penance, that the 
 reverend Hungerford had been seduced by hospitable 
 Newfield into taking the "glass too much." 
 
 Hungerford entered the church by the vestry-door which 
 communicated with the house, and stepping from the 
 vestry into the dark side-aisle, turned, after an instant's 
 hesitation, into a pew. His first impulse had been to call 
 his brother, and confide his story without delay, but some- 
 thing about the quiet church calmed and restrained him. 
 
 The church was dark, save for the perpetual flame of 
 the altar-lamp ; and deserted, but for the priest's still figure 
 kneeling within the altar-rails. The starlight shimmered 
 through the stained-glass windows, bathing in a trans- 
 figuring light the bare wood floor, the uncushioned pews, 
 the plaster walls. It flickered over the white main
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 265 
 
 altar, glistened on the gilded door of the Tabernacle, 
 and bathed the ivory-mounted crucifix in a sheen of 
 light. Back of the altar was a crudely-painted panel 
 representing the Guardian Angel, whose white wings, 
 iu the flickering star-light, seemed to wave and rustle 
 as the wind swept through the churchyard trees. An 
 image of the Blessed Virgin stood on one side-altar ; 
 one of her spouse, St. Joseph, on the other. Toward both 
 the star-light wavered, plaj'ing over the white statues in 
 tremulous, tinted rays. The only sounds that broke the 
 peaceful silence were the wind through the churchyard, 
 and the tinkle of decade against decade, as the priest told 
 to listening Mary his chaplet-beads. The light of the 
 altar-lamp shone upon his lifted face. His eyes were fixed 
 upon the Tabernacle door, where Hungerford's followed 
 them. Behind that gilt door What ? A line he had 
 heard somewhere recurred to him and haunted him. " A 
 miracle of love," he repeated ; "a miracle of love." What 
 did the words mean ? Where had he heard them ? Sud- 
 denly he remembered. He had heard them sung, chanc- 
 ing into a little Catholic chapel in the far West, during 
 the. beautiful rite of Benediction. The simple words had 
 struck his fancy, and he had jotted them down as they 
 were chanted. As he recalled them, his eyes reverted to 
 the mystic door. Involuntarily, he sunk upon his knees. 
 His eyes filled with tears. What peace, what rest for his 
 doubt-tossed, tired soul, could this sweet faith in the Heal 
 Presence be but his. 
 
 He rose noiselessly, and stole into the loft. The little 
 organ was open, and a ray of starlight glistened on its 
 keys. With one hand he struck them softly, gliding from 
 chord to chord as he adjusted the stops. Then he began 
 to sing. His voice was a baritone ; not strong, but true
 
 266 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 and sweet. He sung the verses slowly, improvising little 
 interludes between them : 
 
 He broods within the silent shrine, 
 
 As in its nest the dove ; 
 His Flesh as bread, His Blood as wine, 
 
 In miracle of love. 
 
 With eye of faith, look and see 
 
 Not bread, not wine alone, 
 But Him who died for thee, for me, 
 
 That we might be His own ! 
 
 Upon His Brow the thorns' sharp crown 
 
 Within His Hand, the reed ; 
 From sore Wounds five, His Blood drips down, 
 
 His Eyes with sad tears bleed. 
 
 Yet His soft smile, how sweet, O see, 
 
 From mute Lips bruised apart! 
 It saith, " I gave My Life for thee, 
 
 My child, give Me thine heart ! " 
 
 Shall I deny His tender 'quest? 
 
 Nay, Christ, at Thy dear Feet, 
 Behold me, at Thy sweet behest, 
 
 In sacrifice complete. 
 
 In hyssop of Thy Blood divine, 
 
 But wash me from my guilt 
 Then with me, who no more am mine, 
 
 O Christ, do as Thou wilt ! 
 
 He bowed his head in his hands. A touch on his 
 shoulder roused him. 
 
 " Some day, my brother," said the priest, softly, " you 
 will sing those words from your heart."
 
 A SOW OF ESAU. 2CT 
 
 The brothers went out together. Reaching the study, 
 Hungerford broached the subject of which, previous to 
 his entry into the church, his mind had been full. 
 
 "I saw a ghost to-night," he said ; " a ghost from the 
 days when I officiated, ministerially, at the marriage of 
 the handsomest girl in Smith's Settlement To-night she 
 tells me that I did not marry her. What does it mean ? " 
 
 " You have met her ? " exclaimed the priest. " Thank 
 God." 
 
 "Eh?" cried his brother, grimacing off his glasses, 
 " you in the secret ? The plot thickens." 
 
 In a few words, the priest told him all he knew of the 
 woman. He listened attentively. When the tale was 
 finished, he sprung up impulsively. 
 
 " I am going to make a call," he said. " Will you 
 accompany me ? " 
 
 The priest took out his watch. 
 
 "It is nearly ten o'clock ! " he objected. 
 
 " The house I am going to is an all-night house," per- 
 sisted Hungerford, " and we can reach it in ten minutes. 
 Will you go or not?" 
 
 " I will go," said the priest ; and the two went out 
 together.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 CLERGY VERSUS LAITY. 
 
 "When, a quarter of an hour later, the brothers were 
 ushered into the Harriman drawing-room, it was, by 
 happy chance, deserted. Steele, hastily shutting behind 
 him the heavy door hidden by the library portieres, lest 
 the boisterous voices of his guests should scandalize his 
 clerical callers, welcomed them with a cordiality by which 
 he vainly sought to conceal his surprise at their late call. 
 His proffered hand, however, Hungerford rejected. 
 
 " I must tell you frankly," he said, " that I do not come 
 as a friend." 
 
 Steele bowed in silence, and motioned them to seats. 
 He suspected that some of his dashing friends had in- 
 curred the clerical anathema, and that he was about to be 
 called to an account in their stead ; in which case of mis- 
 taken zeal, he resolved to give the clergymen a severe 
 lesson. His suspicion, however, was sharply dissolved 
 by Hungerford's first words. 
 
 "Mr. Harriman," he said, "upon our first meeting 
 your name impressed me as a familiar one. An hour ago I 
 recalled the circumstances of my previous acquaintance 
 with it. In consequence, I have come to ask you for the 
 history, as you know it, of the poor girl known here 
 God help her ! only as Freshet Sal." 
 
 Steele started, and then flushed angrily. The com-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 269 
 
 maud veiled by the courteously-worded request, did not 
 escape him. It set him at his worst. His obligations as 
 a host, as a gentleman, were forgotten. 
 
 "To a parson," he sneered, " the story of a Magdalen, 
 especially of such a handsome Magdalen 
 
 Hungerford interrupted him. 
 
 "When you imply that she is a Magdalen," he said, 
 "you are a coward, a traitor, and a liar. And you know 
 it!" 
 
 Steele sprang up, white with wrath. 
 
 " You are under my roof," he panted, " and as you 
 doubtlessly remember, your cloth protects you. But if 
 you think that you can insult me with impunity " 
 
 He fell back, quailing under. Hungerford's relentless 
 words. 
 
 " You are a traitor to the dead ; a coward, because your 
 victim is a woman ; a liar, since you know, even as I know 
 it, that she was your dead brother's wife, that she is his 
 lawful widow, the mother of his legitimate child." 
 
 "You you are " stammered Steele, with paling 
 
 lips. 
 
 " The minister who married her." 
 
 The great bronze clock, swinging its gilded pendulum 
 in the adjacent hall, struck the eleventh hour. Voices 
 floated from the library. Against the window the night- 
 wind brushed, now and again rustling a dead leaf against 
 the pane. 
 
 "I see," said Steele, after a moment's silence, "that I 
 shall have to tell you the whole story." 
 
 He took a hasty glance into the hall, and drew the por- 
 tieres closer. Then he turned back to his guests with a 
 taunting laugh. 
 
 "The story," he said, "is a love-story, including ring
 
 270 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 and register and parson's fee. Yet it is a story of love 
 only; not of marriage. Do I offend ? Peccavi! I forgot 
 that I spoke not to men, but to clergymen. Can the 
 cloth absolve me ? " 
 
 They passed the insult in silence. With insolent non- 
 chalance he flung himself upon a couch heaped with 
 sumptuous cushions, telling his story lightly, between 
 puffs of his cigar. 
 
 "Between five and six years ago," he said, my "brother 
 met a tragic death in a little mining-camp in the Sierras. 
 On his death-bed he sent for me, but he was dead before 
 I reached him. The woman Sal stood by his bier. She 
 claimed to have been his wife, but her certificate was 
 ahem ! missing ; and the minister said to have performed 
 the little ceremony had vanished, none knew where. If I 
 laughed at her little story, who could blame me? Never- 
 theless, she had a claim upon me. Jack had left a legacy 
 behind him an unborn child." 
 
 From the library echoed a shout of ribald laughter. 
 The clock in the hall chimed the quarter-hour. Outside 
 the night-wind moaned like an unshrived ghost. 
 
 "I returned to the camp, when Jack was laid at rest," 
 he said, " with a softened heart for the woman. She was 
 a regally handsome creature, and her passionate eyes 
 haunted me. Jack's dead face, too, had pleaded for 
 her. What if her tale should be true? The rumor 
 of a previous lover reached me 'Engineer Jim,' whom 
 her coquetries had driven from the camp before my 
 brother reached it. But beauty will have besiegers. 
 I thought no less of her for that. In fact, I came to be- 
 lieve her honest. In the days of her youth, some canting 
 parson had brought her up in the way she should go, and 
 she had not departed from it intentionally. Jack had de-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 271 
 
 ceived her. She had never been his legal wife, she was 
 not his legal widow ; another and less worthy woman, 
 through a clerical ceremony which preceded, by years, 
 your Reverence's little farce, having pre-empted both 
 honorable titles." 
 
 " The name of the woman your proof ! " cried Hun- 
 gerford. 
 
 " The Christian name of the woman, now dead, was Kose ; 
 of her maiden-name there is no record ; her married name, 
 when Jack married her she was a divorced wife I will 
 tell you when I have finished my story. My investigations 
 took time to complete. In the meantime, Jack's child was 
 born a hopeless cripple. As I said before, I felt a duty 
 to it. I felt a duty likewise to my dead brother's name. 
 Therefore I gave the woman her choice between surren- 
 dering the child to us, and guarding the secret of its 
 parentage, thus shielding the Harriman name. When she 
 chose the latter course, as the lesser of the two evils, I 
 imposed one inexorable condition that she should bring 
 the child to Newfield and live in dependence upon, in 
 submission to, me. My threat to rob her of her child, for 
 which she has the savage, passionate fondness of the 
 tigress for her young, compelled her to accept it. The 
 rest you know. The humble Freshet cabin was her own 
 choice. God knows I have grudged her nothing. My 
 conscience does not reproach me on that score. The child 
 has had the constant care of our own physician ; the woman 
 every comfort she would accept from my hands. She 
 is bitter, because her shame galls her proud, and I ad- 
 mit, pure spirit. Her passionate nature has not been able 
 to resist an occasional open defiance of me, in revenge. 
 In consequence, Newfield suspects a scandal. You won- 
 der, perhaps, that I submit. I have, alas ! no choice.
 
 272 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 You, who know the world, will understand that having 
 hid the secret in the beginning, I am compelled, in self- 
 defence, to hide it to the end. Our respective positions 
 the woman's and mine are, in fact, reversed. I once held 
 her in my power. She now holds me in hers. Happily 
 for me, she is unconscious of her advantage. You are sur- 
 prised, perhaps, at my reckless frankness. I trust to your 
 clerical charity and discretion, as well as to your honor. 
 To publish her shame would be to do the woman no good ; 
 to desecrate the grave of my brother, to break the heart 
 of my good old father one of whose tenderest memories 
 is that of his ' little lad, as grow'd up and died. ' Finally, 
 the child's death is now a matter of weeks of mouths, at 
 longest. It is the woman's own wish to remain, mean- 
 time, in the Freshet cabin. Whenever, wherever she 
 goes, I will provide for her. Freshet Sal's true story 
 you have now heard to its end." 
 
 " Your proof ! " re-demanded Hungerford, inexora- 
 bly. 
 
 With a triumphant smile, Steele stepped toward the 
 library. Flinging open the oaken door, he called to 
 some one within. In answer to his summons, appeared 
 Rundell. 
 
 " Allow me to present the divorced first husband of my 
 brother's legal wife and widow, Rose Harriman, previously 
 Rose Rundell," he said, as they walked down the drawing- 
 room together. "Rundell, genuflect to the reverend 
 Harneys." 
 
 " Will you swear to this? " demanded Hungerford. 
 From his breast he took a pocket-Bible, and laid it on 
 an adjacent table. 
 
 For the first time, Steele quailed. Rundell, after a 
 scornful glance at him, stepped forward.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 273 
 
 " I swear it, willingly," he said. And laid his hand on 
 the book, and took the oath. 
 
 As the brothers, convinced and sorrowful, departed, 
 Steele turned to Rundell. 
 
 " You beat the devil ! " he ejaculated. " The d d 
 words stuck in my throat." 
 
 " I swore to the truth," growled Rundell, doggedly. 
 
 " To the truth ! " repeated Steele, bewildered, " but 
 but " 
 
 "But but "mocked Rundell, "you are no whit 
 brighter than your reverend Harneys, or you would di- 
 vine the mental reservation by which I omitted to explain 
 that the second marriage ceremony, null and void in con- 
 sequence did not follow, but preceded the divorce, by a 
 half-year ! " 
 
 " The same mental reservation," sneered Steele, " by 
 which you fooled me so successfully six years ago. Per- 
 haps you think I thank you for your oath to-night. On 
 the contrary, I curse you for it. But for you, no lies, no 
 perjurious oaths, were needed in my defence. You have 
 been the evil genius of my life, even as you were of my 
 brother's. When, at the time of Jack's death, you hid the 
 truth, who alone knew it when you lied to me, swore 
 that his marriage was illegal, that the woman's virtue was 
 but assumed, to arouse my sympathy ; you did me a bad 
 turn, Rundell. You did me a worse one, when, too late 
 by far for me to avow it, you revealed the truth. My life 
 since has been one long fear, even as poor wronged Sal's 
 has been one long anguish. Do you think I do not know 
 your motive for wishing to hold me in your power? / 
 learned too much, when I went to the camp, of my brother's 
 life and death. You loved your wife, though your brutality 
 drove her from you. When Jack, in his boyish folly,
 
 274 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 swore to protect her, you vowed to be revenged. With 
 Jack's death in Smith's Settlement your slow revenge was 
 consummated. Virtually, you were his murderer. Sal 
 told me as much, five years ago. Last week, Rose, on her 
 death-bed, confirmed her." 
 
 "Rose dead ! " gasped Rundell, reeling to a chair. 
 
 " Dead and buried ! " 
 
 With an effort Rundell recovered himself. 
 
 " Come ! come ! " he remonstrated, forcing a smile, 
 though his lips were ashen ; " such insane talk is d d 
 nonsense ; and as for dead men's accusations, and idle 
 threats, they're -neither here nor there, and we can't waste 
 time on them. You stand by me, and I'll stand by you ! 
 We are useful, reciprocally ; and, hang me if, in spite of 
 your curses, I don't like you ! We understand each other 
 pretty well, my boy, and it's Satan's choice between us. 
 We'll call the past square, and begin a new deal. Shake 
 hands on it." 
 
 But Steele rejected his hand. 
 
 " Be devilish careful that the new game's no bluff one," 
 he warned, sulkily.
 
 CHAPTEK XXVIL 
 
 DRUCE'S CROWN DRAWS NEAR. 
 
 The following day Hungerford passed in solitary medi- 
 tation. He thought the case over and over until his brain 
 reeled, but he could see no gleam of hope with which to 
 lighten Sal's despairing heart. If the tale had been Steele 
 Harriraan's only, he would have insisted upon further 
 proof ; but Kundell's prompt corroboration and oath 
 seemed to place the matter beyond doubt. In the after- 
 noon he went to the parsonage, and confided the story to 
 Druce, who heard it with mingled relief and pain. Cruel 
 story though it was, it did not verify Dr. Keene's suspi- 
 cions. 
 
 "I think with you," he said, as Hungerford concluded, 
 " that this sad story must be the true one. Harriman 
 could scarcely have fabricated it, or have been corrob- 
 orated so promptly, taken as he was, by surprise. I be- 
 lieve that any attempt to prove the girl a legal wife will 
 fail, and result only in giving publicity to her misfortune, 
 and to the stain on the Harriman escutcheon, which old 
 John Harriman believes to be without reproach. If any 
 good could come to the woman from betraying her secret, 
 no Harriman, innocent or guilty, should stand in the way. 
 As it is, to respect the woman's silence, since the child 
 cannot live to suffer by it, is, I think, our sad duty." 
 
 Huno-erford rose.
 
 276 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "I promised her," lie said, " tbat she should be righted. 
 That I cannot fulfil my promise is a hard thing to tell 
 her, and a harder thing for her to hear." 
 
 Druce had followed him to the door. The afternoon 
 sun shone on his chastened face, on his sad, calm eyes, on 
 his patient, tender lips. 
 
 " Life is a hard thing for us all," he said. "It is the 
 cross, but after it " 
 
 The setting sun, smoldering in the western heavens, 
 burst into ruddy glory. He held his arms toward it with 
 transfigured face. 
 
 "After it," he murmured, with a tremulous sigh of 
 happiness, "comes the crown!" 
 
 Around his head the golden sun-rays flickered. It 
 seemed to Hungerford as if already Druce's crown was 
 near. 
 
 " There is the light of another world on his face," he 
 said to his brother, a few hours later, as they walked to- 
 gether toward Sal's cabin. " The chastened flesh is free- 
 ing the pure spirit. Already its white wings are pluming 
 for heavenward flight." 
 
 " God speed it ! " murmured the priest, lifting his hat. 
 
 The Freshet waters were gurgling softly. The breeze, 
 as it blew from them, was cool and moist with their spray. 
 Over the last rays of the setting sun brooded the twilight 
 shadows. The cabin door was ajar. Sal was moving 
 about the interior, engaged in some domestic duty. By 
 the window, Waif was nestling contentedly in Engine 
 Jim's brawny arms. 
 
 As the visitors passed in, Sal introduced them. 
 
 " This 'yer's th' old parson ez stood by me ter th' Set- 
 tlement, in time o' need," she said, " an' th' Father 'yer 
 an' yo' ain't fur bein' strangers. This 'yer's Jim."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 277 
 
 Jim shuffled forward to - shake hands. 
 
 " I'm de-lighted ter see yo both ! " he said, cordially. 
 " Jest de-lighted ! " 
 
 "This," explained the priest to Hungerford, "is the 
 first lover, of whom Harriman spoke." 
 
 " Ah ! " Hungerford's glasses were grimaced off, and 
 readjusted in a twinkling. " If the strength of your heart, 
 my man, is to be judged by your strength of hand, I 
 should say that the woman you love can rely upon 
 you." 
 
 As Hungerford laughingly rubbed his crushed mem- 
 ber, Jim looked abashed, and sheepishly took his leave. 
 
 "Yo're right," said Sal, as her eyes followed him. 
 "Th" woman he loves kin an' does rely onter him." 
 
 "And what about the woman who loves him?" asked 
 Hungerford. " You feel your cross heavy, my girL 
 Think what it would be if you could not tell that honest 
 fellow that you are sinned against, not sinning ! " 
 
 She crouched down on the little hearthstone, hiding 
 her face in her hands. Sinned against ! The two words 
 told her that her wrong was irreparable, that Hungerford 
 could not right her. She had not realized how much 
 faith she had placed in his impulsive promise, until now, 
 when it was failing her. He read her aching heart, and 
 his own ached for her. 
 
 " I I believed that I could right you, Sal," he said, 
 brokenly. " I tried my best, God knows 1 " 
 
 "Thank yo' kindly," she sobbed. 
 
 He took a few turns through the room, whisking off 
 and on his glasses with extraordinary rapidity. Then 
 he halted before her, laying his hand on her bowed 
 head. 
 
 "My girl," he said, "something tells me that you are
 
 278 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 fond of this Jim. He offers you a new and honorable 
 life. Accept it." 
 
 Her lifted face was resolute. 
 
 " While thar's th' soil o' shame on my hand," she said, 
 "as dead lips kissed onter it, I'll never put it inter th' 
 clean palm o' th' man as loves me o' th 1 man I love ! "
 
 CHAPTER XXVm. 
 
 KINGSLEY SAYS GOOD-BYE. 
 
 During the ensuing winter, the Newfield banker went 
 from bad to worse. Indulgence increased to* dissipation, 
 and his face, reflective of his soul, took on a grossness 
 whose tale all eyes could read. Scandalous suspicions 
 concerning him filtered through masculine sieves into 
 feminine receivers, and reports injurious not only to the 
 banker, but likewise to the bank, were soon in circula- 
 tion. The result was financial rather than social. Face 
 to face with him, there were few who could resist the 
 magnetic personal charm which still stood him in good 
 stead ; but out of his presence, his dissipations, extrav- 
 agances, and reckless speculations were added to one 
 another, and prophetic heads shaken over the ominous 
 sum-total. Individual distrust bred general distrust, and 
 faith in the " Harriman luck " began to waver. Rival 
 banks, taking advantage of the turn in the tide of public 
 favor, started and sustained a hue and cry against him, 
 and anonymous reports were circulated as to the pre- 
 carious financial condition of the Newfield Bank. The 
 Newfield banker set his teeth, and plunged into deeper 
 dissipation, wilder extravagances, more reckless specula- 
 tion, than before. Newfield understood the defiance, and 
 gloated over " th' pluck o' it ! " 
 
 " Th' young chap's got th' grit o' th' old Harry,"
 
 280 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 chuckled one old Adam, " an' by blazes, I'll stick ter 
 him ! " 
 
 Adam had his followers, and in due time, the fickle 
 tide of opinion turned again, reinstating both bank and 
 banker in public favor. 
 
 " Didn't I say ez he'd got th' grit o' th' old Harry ? " 
 triumphed Adam ; " an' th' old Harry, he takes keer o' 
 his own ! " 
 
 " He must take uncommon fine care of you, then !" re- 
 torted a sharp-tongued neighbor. 
 
 "No," responded Adam, unabashed, "he hain't got 
 no time left over, he's thet thar much okkerpied wi' 
 yo' ! " 
 
 The crisis safely passed, the banker drew a breath of 
 intense relief. Like Hamlet's madness, his apparently 
 reckless defiance of Newfield had had its method. Nev- 
 ertheless he had run a risk greater, almost, than he cared 
 to realize. He understood the menace of the failure of 
 public faith in him, no less a menace because the faith 
 was now re-established. He knew that he would be wise 
 to heed its warning. 
 
 Isolde, meanwhile, was living her life like one in a 
 bad dream, her one consolation being her baby the hu- 
 man pillow upon which her tired heart rested. Her chief 
 effort, of late, had been to hide Steele's dissipation from 
 his father, and owing to the old man's simple life, the task 
 was not difficult. He retired, except on rare occasions, 
 at a primitively early hour, so that his son's nightly ex- 
 cesses were not suspected by him, and if, as was seldom 
 the case, he was present at the late breakfast at which 
 Steele appeared heavy-eyed and listless, with appetite only 
 for coffee and seltzer, his physical deterioration was as- 
 cribed, as Isolde contrived that it should be, to too close
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 281 
 
 application to the bank. Happily, Steele himself, even in 
 his -worst moments, seconded her deception. There was 
 a tenderness in his heart for his simple old father that 
 even yet he had not outlived ; and he knew better even 
 than Isolde, that to discover a flaw in his idol would break 
 the old man's heart. Among the house's nightly fre- 
 quenters, of whose real type he had no suspicion, he came 
 and went at will, in almost pathetic pride and happiness. 
 There was not one of them but treated him with defer- 
 ence and respect, instinctively concealing their real selves 
 from his unsuspecting eyes. His personal enjoyment of 
 their society was supplemented by his pride in the son who 
 had attracted such a brilliant circle about him. In his 
 simple eyes they were all as kings and princes "grand- 
 folk, friends of his son Steele." One night when, contrary 
 to his usual custom, he had lingered till the departure of 
 the guests, he looked after them with tenderly regretful 
 eyes. 
 
 "I wish," he murmured, " as how mother had lived fur 
 ter see 'em. She was powerful fond o' cump'ny-folk, was 
 mother powerful fond ! We never had none fine enough 
 fur her in them days. In course, I warn't the man ter 
 bring 'em round her. I wish as how she'd lived ter see 
 an' know 'em through my own son Steele." 
 
 For some time after Steele's defiance of Rundell, the 
 man absented himself from the Harriman house. Isolde 
 drew a breath of happy relief. Of her many uncongenial 
 guests, he was still the most abhorrent to her. Later, 
 however, he reappeared. In the meantime Isolde received 
 an anonymous letter. 
 
 It arrived one morning as she sat at breakfast, Kings- 
 ley, who had been their guest over-night, seated by 
 her side, Steele scanning his paper opposite her. His
 
 282 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 father had taken his simple meal hours earlier, and was 
 already on his way to town. Outside the window, in the 
 morning sunshine, John Steele, now a noble boy, was leap- 
 ing in his nurse's anns. 
 
 The letter in question was one of three letters lying by 
 her plate. The first was an invitation to some social en- 
 tertainment ; the second, a long missive from her mother, 
 which she laid aside for perusal, later ; the third was 
 rose-tinted and musk-scented, and directed in a scrawling, 
 unfamiliar hand. Isolde broke the envelope with a feel- 
 ing of distaste. The contents were without address or 
 signature, and consisted of only two lines. 
 
 " Ask your husband the name of the man who led Mag- 
 dalen across the chasm. He knows him ! " 
 
 She read the words and re-read them, a half-dozen, 
 a dozen times ; then the letter dropped from her lax hold. 
 There was a rushing as of angry waters in her ears ; there 
 were letters of fire flaming before her eyes ; there was 
 something, a terrible something, cold and heavy, clutch- 
 ing her numb heart. She tried to lift her hand to it, but 
 it failed to obey her. A darkness closed about her, dense, 
 and chill, and horrible ; an awful gulf opened below her, 
 a black vacuum of fathomless depth ! She was falling 
 falling 
 
 " Harriman ! " cried Kingsley, catching her slender 
 figure as it swayed toward him. 
 
 The darkness was lifting. Some one was bearing her 
 out of the black gulf up, up, to the air and daylight. 
 As her eyes reopened, they fell upon the rose-tinted 
 letter. She grasped it and held it toward her husband. 
 He read it, then tossed it across her to Kingsley, look- 
 ing at her in blank despair. 
 
 "Is it true?" she panted.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 283 
 
 Her anguish maddened him. He was about to hurl a 
 brutal defiance at her, when Kingsley interrupted him. 
 His face was suddenly drawn and white, and his eyes 
 wore a look of hopeless pain, but his voice was calm and 
 resolute. 
 
 " It is true, Mrs. Harriman," he cried. " Your hus- 
 band knows the man. You too, know Ralph Kings- 
 ley!" 
 
 Even as she recoiled, a look of intense relief flashed 
 into her face. It hurt him cruelly, but he made no sign. 
 Steele stared incredulously at him for an instant, doubt- 
 ing if he had heard aright. As he realized the full 
 significance of the words, the shamed blood surged to 
 his face. 
 
 " By heaven ! " he began, recklessly. 
 
 " Not a word ! " interrupted Kingsley, in a voice of 
 stern command. Then he turned back to Isolde. 
 
 "I suppose, Mrs. Harriman," he said, "that there is 
 nothing left for me to say to you, save good-by ! " 
 
 As she hesitated there was a tap at the window, and her 
 baby's face looked at her through the pane. His wee red 
 mouth, like a crushed rose-bud, was pressed against the 
 glass. She heard his coo and gurgle the inarticulate yet 
 eloquent language of love's sweetest phase child - love. 
 Yielding to a tender impulse, she seized Kingsley's hand 
 in both her own. 
 
 " You are my baby's godfather," she said. " It was the 
 wish of my heart that she should be his godmother ! 
 For her sake, I say to you, No. ' Good-by ' is not the only 
 word left you ! There is a nobler word which I beg, I 
 pray that you will speak. It is reparation ! " 
 
 His pale face flushed suddenly and vividly. 
 
 " Oh, impossible ! impossible ! " he cried.
 
 2Si A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 She relinquished his hand and stood back, looking at 
 him with sudden proud disdain. 
 
 " Then I admit," she said, " that the only word left you 
 is ' good-by. } " 
 
 He Lowed, and went in silence. 
 
 That morning, for the first time since the bitter hour 
 when she had watched with tearless eyes the dreams, the 
 hopes, the ambitions, the consummations of her artist- 
 youth, fade from flame to ashes, she took up her pen. 
 
 This is what she wrote. 
 
 MAGDALEN.* 
 
 Pity her, pray for her, 
 
 Sisters, who scorn her ! 
 
 Turn not away with that merciless air. 
 
 Somewhere, to-night, some poor mother may mourn her, 
 Sobbing to Mary her shame and her pr&yer. 
 
 Once she was pure as an innocent child is 
 Once she was lovely to angels and men. 
 
 Pity her, pray for her, who now defiled is 
 Save her, our poor Magdalen ! 
 
 Mary, called Magdalen, 
 Sinner, unchaste one, 
 
 Christ forgave freely, ' ' because she loved much. '' 
 Shall we, like Pharisees, scorn our debas'd one, 
 Shudder away from her glance and her touch ? 
 
 Spurning her, shunning her, sister and woman 
 Shrinking aside lest our robes be defiled ? 
 Christian we are not, nor even kind human, 
 Christ, to Thy prodigal child ! 
 
 * Republished by kind permission of the Boston Pilot.
 
 A SOJT OF ESAU. 285 
 
 Little we pure women 
 
 Know of her anguish, 
 
 Scorched by the flames of our blush and our sneer ; 
 
 Little we know what her spirit might vanquish, 
 Entered once more in Life's ranks as our peer. 
 What is her brazen bold smile bnt a mask for 
 Woman-face seared by a shame past compare ? 
 God's iior man's mercy her mute lips dare ask for 
 Her's is the smile of despair ! 
 
 Yet she is sinned against, 
 Sorely as sinning ! 
 (Stand forth, ye tempters, unmasked in your guile ; 
 
 Dissolute men, who to-night may be winning 
 Sweets from pure lips that your soiled lips defile ! 
 
 Forth in your lust and your craven dishonor ! 
 Stand by her side in her shame as her sin ! 
 Scarlet the letter the world brands upon her 
 Share it, ye sinners akin ! ) 
 
 Bid from your portals their 
 Gilded depravement ; 
 Shun them as lepers unclean for pure wives ! 
 
 Turn to their victim, the girl of the pavement 
 Take her within the white fold of your lives. 
 We alone stand between her and the river ; 
 Spurn her, and listen 1 its tide tolls her knell. 
 'JSeath its dark waves, shrive we not, nor forgive her, 
 Opens the suicide's hell I 
 
 Save her, in name of Christ's 
 
 Pitiful Mother ! 
 Back from the dark brink, O call, ere too late ! 
 
 We are her keepers, as Cain of his brother ; 
 If her soul perish, on us be her fate !
 
 286 A SOW OF ESAU. 
 
 Cant not of Christ as her only Forgiver, 
 Stoning her, meantime, from hearthstone and door. 
 Echo His words, and with Him hless and shrive her 
 "Magdalen! Peace! Sin no more!' 1 
 
 Some day may God speed it 
 Mother who mourns her, 
 Sobbing to Mary your prayer and your shame ! 
 
 Some day, the Pharisee-world that now scorns her 
 Once more shall honor the Magdalen's name. 
 
 Purged then by tears, as soiled lily by rain is, 
 She, like evangel, shall preach unto men : 
 " Be sins as scarlet, repentance not Taints! 
 
 Christ shrited the first Magdalen ! ''
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 EXIT RUNDELL. 
 
 The second winter of Isolde's marriage came to an ab- 
 rupt end. A wintry blizzard of extreme severity was fol- 
 lowed by a phenomenal rise of temperature, culminating 
 in a series of balmy days which proved to be the har- 
 bingers of a premature and unseasonably sultry spring. 
 The pioneers of the town croaked ominously of the spring 
 three and thirty years earlier, when just such a sudden 
 thaw had melted the snows and sent the swollen streams 
 pouring in floods down the mountains, till the overflow of 
 the Arkansas resulted in the fatal Freshet from which 
 the Newfield waters derived their name. Councils were 
 held by the city fathers, and resolutions drawn up, con- 
 cerning the immediate inspection and repairing of the 
 Freshet dyke ; but the dyke failed to pi-ofit thereby, the 
 resolutions proving the only tangible result of the con- 
 ventions. 
 
 Simultaneously with this premature spring, a season of 
 dire financial depression dawned throughout the country. 
 A cry of hard times was followed by divers insignificant 
 financial panics, which, confined to the Eastern market 
 though they were, reacted upon the West, thrilling it 
 with the presage of disaster. Bulletins were issued, con- 
 taining the latest telegraphic reports from all the great 
 stock-centres ; and these were discussed by groups of
 
 288 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 gloomy-faced men who feared the effect of the general 
 depression upon the axis about which all local financial 
 interests rotated the Newfield Bank. As has been said, 
 the fast life of the young banker, which must have been 
 fatal to his financial interests in a more cautious and con- 
 servative community, had not advanced them, even here. 
 Nevertheless, a general blind belief was entertained that, 
 by hook or crook, the bank would pull through faith in 
 the Harriman luck surviving faith in the Harriman honor. 
 The death of even the latter faith, indeed, was compara- 
 tive rather than absolute ; it being subject to daily resus- 
 citation as old John Harriman, seated in his favorite nook 
 in the swell of the bank-window, waxed more and more 
 eloquent upon the financial soundness of " my son Steele," 
 and " th' biggest bank this side o' 'Frisco ! " The young 
 banker, recognizing the favorable effect of the paternal 
 tribute, smiled somewhat sardonically. In truth, he was 
 watching the approach of disaster much as the condemned 
 murderer watches the erection of his gallows. Of a sud- 
 den, however, the market rebounded, and the prospect of 
 a steady rise suggested the redemption of the fortunes 
 swamped by the recent depression. Stocks were bought 
 up with feverish haste, and held for inflated values. The 
 rise continued. In the very hour which lifted the tem- 
 perature of the market to fever-heat, a fateful thing hap- 
 pened. The man who, single-handed, with almost super- 
 human strength and daring, had turned the tide of finance 
 and forced it from ebb to flow a railroad king and cen- 
 tral figure of the most powerful " ring " in Wall Street 
 dropped on the floor of the Exchange, smitten by sudden 
 death. On the instant there was a fatal fall of the stocks 
 controlling the market, and upon the further rise of 
 which half the fortunes of the country were staked. A
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 289 
 
 panic ensued, the contagion of which spread like wild-fire 
 over the entire country. The fortunate few stood firm, 
 and reaped a golden after-harvest. The unfortunate many, 
 not strong enough financially to keep their feet, were 
 swept relentlessly into the gulf of ruin. A year earlier, 
 the Newfield banker could have stood one of the few ; but 
 now he threatened to sink with the many. The auspicious 
 rebound of the market had tempted him to make a spec- 
 ulative spurt in which, on the desperate impulse which 
 impels the gambler to stake his life on his last throw, he 
 had madly involved his last dollar. To withdraw in the 
 face of the panic meant a loss which must entail instant 
 and fatal disaster. Not to withdraw meant, upon the 
 other hand, a strain of indefinite duration, which the 
 bank, in its precarious financial condition, could not sur- 
 vive. Resources which had been open to him in former 
 difficulties now failed him. But he was not in despair. 
 One untried resource, for years held in reserve, was left 
 him. It was not among the pi-obabilities that it would 
 he said "could " fail him. The time was come to test it. 
 In the stellar system of the firmament of Western specu- 
 lation, a certain Isaac Solomon scintillated as a star of the 
 first magnitude. Mr. Solomon was of Hebrew parentage, 
 but of New England birth ; and his heritage of Jewish 
 enterprise was supplemented by an acquisition of Yankee 
 shrewdness. Rising, originally, from a shop ornamented 
 exteriorly by three gilded balls, he had flashed like a me- 
 teor across the sky of the Republic, his golden orbit, finan- 
 cial in perihelion but political in aphelion, illuminating 
 the domain of the "White House with the vivid and stead- 
 fast velocity of the mis-called fixed star. Upon this man 
 Solomon, Steele Harriman's eyes were turned. Already 
 he had met him, and during the meeting, the young
 
 290 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 banker had insinuated that he was cognizant of more of 
 Mr. Isaac Solomon's political intrigues than that cautious 
 individual had been wont to confide to the uninitiated. 
 Thereupon the wise Solomon had temporized straight- 
 way, and admitted the young banker to the outer circle 
 of his satellites. This concession he had supplemented, 
 however, by a gratuitous word of advice. 
 
 " You are a clever young man," he said, " an exceed- 
 ingly clever young man ; and your manipulation of the 
 screw is admirable. But permit me to give you a word of 
 warning. It is never safe to apply the screw too relent- 
 lessly. It is always within the possibilities that relative 
 positions may be reversed, and in such case the retaliation- 
 screw is apt to be felt unpleasantly." 
 
 Steele, with a scoff at the implied threat, had gone on 
 his way rejoicing. He knew that the man was, to a cer- 
 tain measure, in his power ; and did not then exercise his 
 power to the utmost, only because he preferred to bide 
 his time. In face of the ruin now before him he felt his 
 time was come. He took a flying-trip to Cheyenne, inter- 
 cepting the magnate as he was speeding coastward in the 
 sumptuous chariot of American royalty, a private car, and 
 extracted from him a promise to stop over on his return- 
 trip, for a night in Newfield. The intervening days he 
 passed in feverish suspense. His pz-eparations for the en- 
 tertainment of his guest were extravagant, lavish to os- 
 tentation. Decorators, caterers, florists from Denver, 
 Omaha, even Chicago, were pressed into service. Isolde 
 timidly asking to be excused from appearing on the occa- 
 sion, was answered by an oath that frightened her, aud 
 imperatively bidden to order the most gorgeous dinner- 
 gown that money could command. 
 
 "He lives like his royal namesake in all his glory," he
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 291 
 
 said, " and his women are Queens of Sheba in attire. You 
 are not only to equal, but to surpass them. Mind that ! 
 We must dazzle him, or die in the attempt ! " 
 
 Mr. Isaac Solomon, a dark-faced, smiling-lipped man, 
 whose keen, alert black eyes flashed in curious contrast 
 to the sullen brows that shaded them, arrived in Newfield 
 on the dreariest and wildest of nights. The wind howled 
 like an avenging spirit. The rain surged down in angry 
 torrents. The night was of awful blackness blackness 
 the denser in contrast with the dazzling forks of flame 
 flashing here, there, and everywhere in the lurid heavens. 
 Over the shrieking wind sounded the thunder's menace. 
 Its peals were heavy and stifled, jarring the earth with 
 dull, reverberant thuds. Altogether it was a night of evil 
 omen. Mr. Solomon, in the luxurious shelter of the Har- 
 riman carriage, hugged himself, metaphorically, in con- 
 gratulation that the omen was not for him. 
 
 Descending from the carriage, he hesitated for an in- 
 stant, surprised and dazed by the luxury surrounding him. 
 From the carriage-step to the house-door stretched an 
 awning banked up both sides of its interior by tall green 
 plants, among whose glossy leaves glowed colored lights, 
 like brilliant tropical blossoms. The doors of the house 
 were thrown open. He caught sight of the roseate lights 
 within, of waving palms and rare exotics, over which 
 floated, like a breath of songful summer, the strains of 
 unseen violins. His feet, as he entered the splendid 
 vestibule, resounded on costly marble, then sunk noise- 
 lessly into the depths of priceless carpets and dusky ori- 
 ental rugs. Bare tapestries, massive carvings, delicate 
 frescoings, allured his eyes. An exquisite perfume floated 
 about him, exhaled by everything he approached or 
 touched. He entered the drawing-room like one in a
 
 292 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 dream. It was a dream well suited to warm and quicken 
 his sensuous, semi-oriental blood. 
 
 A number of guests awaited him. All were men of 
 whom he knew already, as rising or risen capitalists and 
 politicians ; but with whom personally, but for a single 
 exception, he was unacquainted. This exception, how- 
 ever, was not made evident. Not by the flicker of an 
 eyelash, as the guests were introduced, did Mr. Solomon 
 betray his previous acquaintance with Rundell. 
 
 Isolde, a lovely vision in glistening white and silver, 
 with Althea, regal in violet velvet, from which her 
 shoulders rose like those of a sculptured Juno, sup- 
 plied the feminine complement. Mr. Solomon, bowing 
 to Althea, involuntarily exclaimed, " Splendid ! " Then 
 he turned back to his hostess. His opinion of her 
 did not escape him. Neither did his eyes leave her 
 face. 
 
 As dinner was announced, Isolde took Solomon's arm. 
 Footmen in livery held back the portieres, as the guests 
 filed through the suite of splendid rooms. The walls 
 were banked with gorgeous hot-house roses ; the ceilings 
 hung with lights, festooned with flowers. In the vesti- 
 bule of the dining-room played a perfumed fountain. 
 Lilies floated on its waters, and among them sailed one 
 snow-white swan. 
 
 They entered under an arch of lights and flowers. 
 The oval table stood in the middle of the spacious room. 
 Its centre-piece was a pool of shimmering glass, edged 
 with quivering ferns and drooping valley-lilies. From 
 side to side played tiny jets of water, spraying the nether 
 glass and showering with baby-dews the fresh young 
 flowers. The embroidered cloth was white, of a soft, rich 
 woof, in whose luxurious thickness the massive service
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 293 
 
 seemed to nestle. A fringe of valley-lilies trailed from it 
 to the floor. Glass of varied tint and shape, fragile as 
 breath, and finely-cut as a diamond, caught the rose- 
 tinted lights and multiplied them in myriad scintillating 
 reflections. A deep green jungle framed the room, re- 
 freshing in its suggestion of hush and shadow. The 
 splash of waters was heard within it ; and mingled with 
 them, as Pan's reed with the gurgle from the river-brink, 
 a harp's strain sounded. 
 
 On Isolde's right hand sat Solomon, with Kundell be- 
 side him ; on her left a titled Englishman of hunting 
 tastes a manly young Nimrod whose vivid pink and 
 white complexion put the indoor American complexion to 
 shame. Althea sat between Steele and the president of a 
 bonanza gold-mine company, and opposite her sat the 
 president of an influential Chicago bank. These, with a 
 few other well-known financiers of the speculator type, 
 represented the financial element. Governor Bushing, of 
 Nebraska, whose future nomination as a candidate for the 
 presidential office was already discussed by his party, 
 with a couple of fellow-politicians and a prominent 
 Western editor, made up the group which old John Har- 
 riman as incongruously as happily completed. In the 
 midst of the almost royal splendor he sat with the same 
 unconscious, simple ease with which he had once par- 
 taken of his frugal meals at the pioneer's pine-board 
 table ; glorying in the pomp and luxury surrounding him 
 like a credulous child to whom, while all things are new 
 and beautiful, none are wonderful. Even his cup of pleas- 
 ure, however, had its dregs of pain. 
 
 "I wish," he confided in a wistful voice to the aghast 
 young Englishman who neglected his terrapin to stare 
 through his eye-glass at this new specimen of the curious
 
 294 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 genus American "I wish ez how mother had lived ter 
 see it." 
 
 " O ya as, ya as ! " amiably responded the heir to an 
 earldom, after a mystified hesitation. "Ton honor, I 
 wish so too, I'm su ah." 
 
 A moment later, however, as at one of their host's 
 brilliant sallies the company burst into enthusiastic ap- 
 plause, the old man sprung to his feet in an access of 
 rapturous pride and happiness. 
 
 " That there's my son Steele," he cried, designating 
 their host with outstretched finger " my son Steele ! " 
 
 No one laughed. For the moment there was an almost 
 reverent hush over the merry party. In the sudden 
 silence, the anteroom and jungle fountains blended their 
 liquid music. The harp sighed in the jungle-shadow. 
 Afar, the viols played. 
 
 "Chicago," admitted the bank-president, sipping his 
 f rapped champagne, " is supposed to be the Garden City, 
 but evidently the Garden of Eden has escaped it. New- 
 field, indisputably, is the New- World Paradise." 
 
 Old John Harriman applauded. 
 
 "A Paradise with an Eve," whispered Solomon, with a 
 bow to Isolde. 
 
 "Yet Chicago is the Fair er," put in the editor, mis- 
 chievously. 
 
 A general groan rewarded him. 
 
 " Chicago represents the West Newfield only the wild, 
 wild West ! ' " distinguished Steele, modestly. 
 
 " Is this," queried his lordship, with an admiring glance 
 about him, " wepwesentative of the aw ' wild, wild 
 West?'" 
 
 "No, it is representative of the 'golden West, '" re- 
 plied Althea.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 295 
 
 The gold-mine president approved. 
 
 "Mrs. Rounds has said it," he cried. " Were it not 
 the 'golden West,' it would be still the 'wild, wild 
 West.' Gold softens the barbaric to the picturesque, and 
 weds Western picturesqueness to Eastern sybaritism. It 
 is the only alchemy which neither man nor nature re- 
 sists." 
 
 " How about greenbacks, silver, the humble but useful 
 copper ? " asked the Chicago banker, facetiously. 
 
 " Doomed, one and all ! " announced Althea. " Like 
 the red man, they must go. Your Oscar's mission was 
 not so wild, after all, Lord Earlescourt. Even sordid 
 finance now has its aesthetic side. Our cultured eyes 
 resent the ugliness of the baser specie. We exchange 
 our bills and coins for sunflower gold " 
 
 " And swear over the discount ! " concluded Governor 
 Rushing, who, with the taste of an epicure, was sipping 
 old claret with his game. 
 
 His fellow-politician pretended to weep. 
 
 " I refuse to go to Congress," he said. " Mrs. Rounds 
 implies it to be a foregone conclusion that I cannot pass 
 my bill." 
 
 " Excuse him, Mrs. Harriman," begged the Governor. 
 " His election has turned his head." 
 
 " No," retorted the accused, " it only turned my poli- 
 tics." 
 
 The Englishman looked interested. " Is that an Amew- 
 icanism ? " he asked, as the laugh subsided. 
 
 " No, it's an Irishism," replied his host. 
 
 " Which proves," laughed Althea to the Briton, " that 
 John Bull is mis-named. It is Paddy Bull, you know, by 
 all the rights of paradox." 
 
 " W weally ! " stammered the addressed, too courte-
 
 296 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 ous to contradict, but taking it out of Altbea with bis eye- 
 glass. 
 
 " Oh, Johnnie's named after the bull in the china-shop," 
 put in the Governor, who had Celtic blood in his veins. 
 " Poor little Ireland is the china-shop." 
 
 The Englishman, who had been reared in an atmosphere 
 of Royal Worcester and Crown Derby, protested. 
 
 " Oh, weally, now ! there isn't any aw Iwish china, 
 don't you know ? " he remonstrated. 
 
 " No, Irish china's all Cork ! " assented his host. 
 
 " How about Belleek? " put in the Governor, loyally. 
 
 "Have you shot any buffalo ?" asked Isolde, hastening 
 to the nobleman's rescue. 
 
 " Of course he has," interposed Rundell. " English- 
 men come to America only to bag big game." 
 
 " Does the game always fall ?" asked one of the specu- 
 lators, alive to the innuendo. 
 
 " No," retorted Rundell. " It rises above par." 
 
 Solomon smiled appreciatively. " When financier 
 meets financier," he parodied. " But of course all such 
 allusions are Greek to you, Mrs. Harriman ? " 
 
 "No," chuckled Rundell, who was drinking freely, 
 " they are only dialect." 
 
 His tone was insolently significant. Solomon gave him 
 a warning glance. Isolde, however, had not heeded him. 
 
 "Speaking of dialect," she said, "are you aware that 
 our Western dialect promises to be the future Volapuk ? 
 Papers, magazines, novels, even dramas, abound with it. 
 Not only the great American novel which, by the way, 
 report says that that pessimistic genius, Hamlin Garland, 
 is now writing in the Arena, but which I, loyal alike to 
 my sex and to Colorado, look for from Patience Stapleton, 
 who unites the brain of the man with the hopeful heart of
 
 A SON OF ESAU-. 297 
 
 the woman not only the great American novel, I say, but 
 the universal language as well, will come out of the 
 West." 
 
 " Fawncy ! " exclaimed the Briton, looking up from his 
 sorbet. 
 
 "Then the universal language will come from dialect 
 ' as she is spoke/ and not ' as she is writ,' " said the 
 editor, emphatically. " Spoken dialect is music. Written 
 as our authors write it, it scrapes on the mental ear like 
 the twanging of an out-of-tune string. Like our British 
 friend here, I confess to a weakness for the Queen's 
 English. Over my editorial door hangs a legend which I 
 bid my staff read and heed. It runs, ' Who enters here, 
 leaves dialect behind.' " 
 
 " I renew my subscription," said Steele, approvingly. 
 
 The Englishman caught the word, and adjusted his 
 eye-glass. He thought it possible, being in Western 
 America, that the partakers of this gorgeous " spread " 
 were about to be assessed to defray expenses. 
 
 Isolde challenged the editor. 
 
 " The failure of dialect in our literature," she said, "lies 
 not at the writer's, but at the critic's door." 
 
 "Q. E. D.," responded the challenged, fortifying him- 
 self with a glass of Blue Seal Johanuisberg. 
 
 " The writer," she demonstrated, " lives in, or comes to 
 the West, and studies the dialect from nature. The critic 
 stays in the metropolis, and studies it from a book. The 
 writer learns that the West is not Western, but cosmo- 
 politan ; that Western dialect is, in consequence, a poly- 
 glot. He transcribes it with infinite care and faithfulness, 
 compares his written duplicate with the oral original, and 
 pronounces his work good. The critic's verdict, on the 
 contrary, is against it. ' Here is a Southernism,' he cries,
 
 298 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 triumphantly, comparing the transcribed polyglot with 
 the treatise on purely "Western colloquialisms which is his 
 standard ; ' here a flagrant Easternism ; here a turn of 
 speech redolent of the Northern pines.' The writer hides 
 his diminished head, and borrows the critic's treatise, 
 from which he copies his Western dialect thereafter. 
 Whereat the critic writes, ' great improvement ; dialect 
 true to nature ! ' and the writer reads, aud copies on, and 
 laughs in his sleeve." 
 
 " By Jove ! " said the editor, " I feel tempted to laugh 
 with him. You have converted me, Mrs. Harriman." 
 
 " Mrs. Harrirnan converts everyone," said Rundell. 
 " She is an evangelist of the gospel of beauty." 
 
 " I avow myself her disciple," said Solomon, with a 
 bow. 
 
 " The only disciple a woman tolerates is herself," said 
 Althea, aping humility as she set out to charm the wealthy 
 Solomon. "It is her rtile, and she does not like it 
 usurped. Women are born disciples, Mr. Solomon 
 men the masters." 
 
 "And the slaves," added Rundell, with a boldly admir- 
 ing glance across the table. 
 
 " The master is always the slave," broke out Steele. 
 " ' Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.' Were a 
 hundred representative leaders of the day to compare 
 notes with a hundred of the representative led, I wager a 
 round million that the result would testify to the greater 
 freedom, happiness, and general good fortune of the 
 under-stratum. In human as in physical nature, ah 1 the 
 cyclones, lightnings, thunderbolts, etc., fall on the upper 
 crust." 
 
 " How about aw earthquakes ? " queried the noble- 
 man, scoring a point for Oxford.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 299 
 
 "An additional proof of the law in question," per- 
 sisted Steele. " "When the upheaval comes, the upper 
 crust is the swamped ; the lower is pitched to the top." 
 
 "Aw, ya as," meditated the Briton, "in Amewica !" 
 
 Solomon rose. Beyond a few general remarks, and a 
 desultory conversation with Isolde, he had not contrib- 
 uted to the conversational menu. Of the culinary one, 
 however, he had partaken with the gourmet's conscien- 
 tiousness and enjoyment. Now that the salad had been 
 followed by a Nesselrode pudding, and the biscuit and 
 Burgundy were appearing on the table, however, his con- 
 centrated interest began to diffuse itself. Moreover, the 
 inspiration of rare old wines was in his veins. At the 
 moment he admired his host more than any other man he 
 knew. He was young, handsome, spirited, ambitious, 
 clever, successful, and he had given him a perfect din- 
 ner. His gracious mood inspired him to put his admira- 
 tion into words. As he rose, his glowing eyes and vivid 
 face commanded attention. He had bided his time ; now 
 it was come. He did not at once make his host his theme, 
 but took his text from the conversational subject of the 
 moment. It was not a bad one Leaders and Led. 
 
 There had been a time in Solomon's early life, when he 
 had advocated the cause of the led, as himself one of 
 them. Now that he had risen to the ranks of the leaders, 
 however, his advocacy of the led was less enthusiastic. 
 He dismissed them with a few comprehensive words which 
 served as an effective introduction to the real subject of 
 his speech. As he spoke on, his voice rang resonantly ; 
 his gestures were forceful, his whole mien impressive. 
 
 From the subject of leadership in general, he passed 
 on to the leader in particular, his host ; speaking elo- 
 quently of his youth, his enterprise, his success ! He
 
 300 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 dilated upon the fruits of that success, visible in the 
 splendor and luxury about him. He drew from the 
 briliant present of the young banker the horoscope of 
 his still more brilliant future. He hinted that above the 
 crown of wealth waited the higher crown of political 
 office. Steele's face grew radiant. This man prophesied 
 nothing rashly. He knew whereof he spoke. The ful- 
 fillment of the young banker's ambitions seemed sud- 
 denly within his reach. As he rose to reply, a murmur 
 of admiration went round the table. The disfiguring 
 marks of dissipation, as of all other evils, were, for the 
 hour, obliterated. It was as if an angel's wing had 
 swept over his face, erasing all its sin-traced lines and 
 shadows. 
 
 He began by graceful thanks to his guest for his elo- 
 quent words, whose compliments he parried by turning 
 them upon Solomon himself. His enterprise and success he 
 set against those of the bowing Hebrew, laughing ironically 
 at the comparison. He reciprocated the laudatory men- 
 tion which had been made of his surroundings, by a 
 graceful allusion to Solomon's own gorgeous household ; 
 whereat the gratified Solomon flushed with honest pleas- 
 ure. Then, leaving personalities behind him, he took up 
 the subject of leadership where Solomon had dropped it, 
 confining his considerations to leadership in politics, upon 
 the majesty of which, in this American Republic, he dwelt 
 in eloquent words, which the eloquence of his clarion- 
 voice accented. 
 
 "To lead," he cried, "not by the wrong we mis-call 
 right, of blood, birth, name, or heritage but by the one, 
 the divine right of instinct, impulse, power, born within 
 us ! To rise from the ranks, to make our way by force 
 of brain, of will, of endeavor ; to march on, up, while the
 
 A SOW OF ESAU. 301 
 
 weak and worthless lag behind us ; to face undaunted, 
 and conquer singlehanded, obstacles small and great that 
 bar our way ; to withstand foes, and, if the fight must be, 
 in fair and equal contest to overthrow them ; to reach, at 
 last, the goals of Fame and Power, arid know them ours 
 by right to claim our own this is to drain the Olympian 
 gods' own nectar, whose sweets the human god alone can 
 know ! 
 
 " Who is the human god ? Not the king of subjects, 
 not the master of slaves but the leader of men ! In the 
 royal cup, the draught of power is clotted with the blood 
 that cries for vengeance from its lees. The Republic 
 only, the Republic alone, holds the clean chalice wherein 
 the draught endures both strong and sweet. The life of 
 millions of freemen thrills within it the warmth of their 
 living hearts, the spell of their dreams, the fire of their 
 faiths, the glow of their hopes, the inspiration of their 
 ambitions. And when to these come fulfilments beyond 
 their promise, consummations higher than their dreams 
 conceived, then, and then only, the leader grasps the 
 priceless ' spoil of office ' the consciousness of the mission 
 of office manfully fulfilled ! " 
 
 A spell-bound silence followed his speech, broken, an 
 instant later, by plaudits with which the room resounded. 
 The exalted chord which he had struck was in har- 
 mony with his auditors' exalted mood. Exaltation of 
 spirit is born, in saints, of the flesh subdued ; in sinners, 
 of the flesh exultant 
 
 " He's a deuced aw deep thinker," admitted the Eng- 
 lishman, admiring his host through his eyeglass. 
 
 " He's a d deuced deep drinker ! " retorted Rundell, 
 who had kept pace with his host, glass for glass, and 
 whose head was the worse in consequence.
 
 302 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The Englishman thought the retort too good to mon- 
 opolize "just like an aw Amewican, don't you know? " 
 and passed it around the table. Under cover of the 
 boisterous applause it evoked, Isolde and Althea stole 
 away. 
 
 Left to themselves, the men closed about their host, 
 and discussed his political ambitions, as if their fulfil- 
 ments were assured. When, an hour later, the group 
 dispersed, Steele's face was flushed with excitement, his 
 eyes shone exultantly. This was life, this was manhood, 
 this was success ! Youth and strength, wealth and 
 honor, power and fame ! could the immortal gods ask 
 more ? 
 
 Rundell had followed Isolde into the drawing - room. 
 The gold-mine president, who had fallen a victim to 
 Althea's statuesque charms, hastened after him. John 
 Harriman had long since slipped away. Governor Rush- 
 ing made his adieux, a telegram summoning him back to 
 Nebraska having interrupted one of the brilliant after- 
 dinner stories for which he was famous. His fellow-pol- 
 iticians followed him to the carriage, and then, lured by 
 the click of balls, sauntered into the billiard-room, where 
 the rival cues of the American editor and the English 
 nobleman waged an international contest. The financiers, 
 with the freedom of old frequenters of the house, seated 
 themselves at a poker- table in the library. Finally, only 
 Solomon was faithful to the old Madeira. This was as 
 Steele would have had it He plied his guest's glass, 
 entertaining him, meanwhile, with amusing jest and 
 anecdote, until he saw the effect of the wine in the glow- 
 ing face and ready smile of the Jewish magnate. Then, 
 with subtle cleverness, he turned the conversation into a 
 graver channel.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 303 
 
 From the drawing-room the piano sounded. Solomon 
 looked up from his wine. 
 
 " Suppose we join the ladies ? " he said. " May I take 
 the liberty of confessing that they are ii-resistible ? I judge 
 that congratulations are still in order " 
 
 Steele waived them, with a smile. 
 
 " My wife is young," he explained ; " but we have been 
 married more than two years. We have a son aged a ven- 
 erable number of months. I really forget how many." 
 
 Solomon sighed. 
 
 " I congratulate you," he said. " I I never had a child." 
 
 There was a look in his eyes that surprised his host. 
 Heretofore he had found him a man of flint. If the human 
 spark was in him, he would ignite it. He gave an order, 
 inaudible to his guest, to the man who answered his ring, 
 and then, pressing upon Solomon a fresh cigar, plunged 
 into an anecdote which ended just as there was a knock 
 at the door, followed by the entrance of a white-capped 
 maid, bearing in her arms Harriman junior, dewy-eyed 
 and rosy-cheeked from recent slumber. 
 
 "My son," presented the young host, gaily. "John 
 Steele, do honor to your father, and shake hands." 
 
 John Steele's first impulse was to clench his little 
 fist, curl his little lip, and utter a protesting howl ; 
 but as his dazzled eyes began to distinguish the lights 
 and flowers, he changed his weathercock mind, and 
 stretching his hands toward the roses, smiled and crowed. 
 
 " Ah ! " remarked Solomon, " a fine child, very. His 
 mother's eyes and hair, and a promise of your physique. 
 An exceptionally enviable inheritance." 
 
 His eyes followed the golden baby-head, as, happy in 
 the possession of a glowing flower, John Steele was car- 
 ried out. Steele struck while the iron was hot. Even
 
 301 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 as the door shut be introduced the subject he had at 
 heart. 
 
 "Before we join the ladies," he said, "one parting 
 glass. 'Women and wine,' says the carpet-knight. 'Wine 
 and women,' says the man. And, by the bye, speaking of 
 manhood, what Titanic weights ambition lays on a man's 
 shoulders nowadays. Mine are absolutely over-bur- 
 dened. My last straw has been ahem ! the Sierraville 
 lands." 
 
 " Ah ! " murmured the cautious Solomon. He had set 
 down his refilled glass untasted, and was looking at his 
 host with suddenly suspicious eyes. 
 
 Steele went on recklessly. 
 
 "I did not intend to introduce business here," he said; 
 " but perhaps we had better take advantage of this op- 
 portunity to settle the matter. I will speak to you frankly, 
 as friend to friend. I confess that I know you must have 
 the lands. I invested with the intention of holding them 
 till you should make it worth my while to let them go, 
 but I did not foresee the present panic. They are too 
 heavy for me to carry through the hard times. I must 
 lighten my load, or sink under it. Of course you will 
 take the lands. I will lower the figure in consideration 
 of the accommodation. Two hundred thousand down, 
 and " 
 
 Solomon interrupted him. 
 
 " But we are no longer in need of them," he said. 
 "Learning that they had passed into somewhat extortion- 
 ate hands, we branched off the road just below them, and 
 crossed Mason's ranch, on their left, which we obtained at 
 a comparatively reasonable figure." 
 
 "What ! " cried Steele, after an instant of dazed silence, 
 " you have betrayed me ; you, who indirectly spurred me
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 305 
 
 on to buy them ! You have schemed to outwit and ruin 
 me you ! You are mad ! Needing the lands or not, you 
 shall take them now, and at my own figure, too, by heaven ! 
 Do you think that that little affair of the last campaign 
 bribery " 
 
 Again Solomon interrupted him. 
 
 "I warned you once before," he said, "that your ma- 
 nipulation of the screw was too pitiless. You make the 
 retaliation screw a necessity. I may as well tell you 
 frankly, since you force me to the point of defence, that 
 Rundell and I are one ! " 
 
 " Ruudell and you ? " 
 
 He had risen from his chair, but he sunk back dizzily. 
 The room whirled; the lights dazzled, blinded him. With 
 a groan he lifted to his lips, with shaking hand, the glass 
 of brandy that Solomon had pushed toward him. 
 
 "Drink ! " said Solomon, not unkindly. In spite of his 
 natural resentment, he liked the man, and was not un- 
 willing to help him out of a difficulty which he saw must 
 be serious. Moreover, the amiable relationship which 
 such help must establish between him and the young 
 banker was not undesirable in Solomon's eyes. He had 
 felt, of late, a lack of the enterprise and daring of his op- 
 ponents the need of young blood of just such ilk as was 
 surging through the veins of this handsome young scape- 
 grace. 
 
 " Come, come ! " he said, cheerfully. " Don't give way. 
 The lands aside, if you are in a tight place we may be able 
 to do something for you." 
 
 He lifted the long-stemmed glass to his lips, and drained 
 its royal draught to the last drop. Its warmth was in his 
 voice as he spoke. 
 
 " I say plainly, that we will do something for you,"
 
 306 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 he said. " I I like you ! Now, let us join the ladies. 
 You can take the run to Denver with me to-morrow, and 
 we will settle the matter on the way." 
 
 Steele followed him mechanically. He was still dazed 
 by his disappointment In the ante-room, Solomon 
 halted. In statuesque pose by the fountain's brink, fair 
 and stately as the swan at her feet, stood Althea. The 
 perfect line of her throat and shoulders was unbroken by 
 gem or ornament. One bare arm, perfect in tint and 
 symmetry, was extended ; her white fingers idly toyed 
 with the perfumed spray. Her breast, from its velvet cor- 
 sage, swelled like life-thrilled marble. The gold-mine 
 president was bending over her with kindled eyes. Over 
 her white shoulder she smiled at the intruders. 
 
 " Mrs. Harrirnan is in the drawing-room," she said. 
 
 Solomon was not a man of stupidities. He passed on. 
 
 As they were about to cross the threshold of the draw- 
 ing-room, the sound of a man's impassioned voice arrested 
 them. Isolde had risen from her chair, over the back of 
 which Rundell was leaning, and pointed to the door. 
 
 " You have insulted me ! " she said in a low yet imperi- 
 ous voice. " Go ! While I am mistress of this house, 
 you shall never cross its threshold again." 
 
 Rundell laughed sneeringly, though his lips were white. 
 
 " Ha, ha ! Quite a realistic assumption of the virtuous 
 role" he said. " But do you think I don't know you ? 
 What are you but a decoy, a financial lobbyist, different 
 from others in only that your price is higher ? Do you 
 suppose there is one of us who does not know why you 
 are here, night after night, tricked out in your devilish 
 gewgaws? /insult you! You have given me the right 
 to insult you, as you have given it to each and every man 
 for whom you are used as a decoy ! "
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 307 
 
 In a bice Steele had him by the throat. 
 
 "Liar! coward! brute!" he raged. "Retract your 
 damned lies retract them retract them " 
 
 Released from his powerful grasp, the man staggered 
 back, gasping for breath. His face was livid with fury. 
 Between his lips oozed the foam of mad animal rage. 
 
 " I will have my revenge ! " he panted. 
 
 " Damn your revenge ! " thundered Steele, seizing him 
 by the shoulder and shaking him as if he were a feather- 
 weight. " Down on your knees, I say ! Down on your 
 knees ! " 
 
 There was the sound of approaching footsteps. Steele's 
 hand relaxed. 
 
 " Go ! " he said, in a smothered voice. " Your apology 
 shall be made, later." 
 
 Solomon stepped forward. 
 
 "I warned you that we were one, Harriman," he said. 
 " If Rundell goes, I go with him. You know the cost ! " 
 
 " Go ! " he hissed, through teeth clenched tightly be- 
 hind paling lips. The portieres fell behind them. For a 
 moment he stood, staring blankly before him ; then, with 
 a groan, he staggered to a seat, his face hid in his hands. 
 
 The cost ? Aye, he knew it, he knew it ! Ruin ! Ruin ! 
 Ruin! 
 
 Isolde sunk on her knees beside him. 
 
 " His attentions to Althea were only a cloak," she 
 whispered, between her nervous sobs. " It was he who 
 wrote that dreadful letter about Magdalen. He wished 
 me to think the man you ! " 
 
 " I am the man," he cried, despairingly. " Kingsley 
 shouldered it, for your sake. I have been a bad man, a 
 bad man. And the wages of sin are on me." 
 
 She had struggled to her feet, and was swaying to and
 
 308 A SOW OF ESAU. 
 
 fro, saved from falling only by her unconscious grasp of 
 bis chair. 
 
 " You ? " she moaned. " You ? " 
 
 "I! Nor is this all. Rundell's revenge shall I tell 
 you what it will be ? It will be the public vindication 
 of Freshet Sal as my brother's legal wife, the mother of 
 my brother's legitimate child. He has the marriage cer- 
 tificate in his possession. Dishonor, ruin, stare me in the 
 face ! " 
 
 He expected her to spurn him, to shrink, flee from 
 him. Even yet he did not know her woman-heart. After 
 her first involuntary shuddering recoil, as the horror of 
 his sin dawned upon her, she was conscious only of 
 her soul's infinite pity for him of her yearning impulse 
 to stand between him and the doom his sin entailed. 
 
 " From the wages of your sin," she prayed, uncon- 
 sciously echoing his words, " Oh, my husband, God spare 
 you, God spare you ! " 
 
 Over the viol's song, over the harp's soft strain and 
 the purl of perfumed waters, his answer shuddered. With 
 set white face, and eyes that looked past the lights and 
 flowers into the darkness of death, and the eternal life 
 beyond it he spoke it. 
 
 " The wages of sin is death ! "
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 EUNDELL'S REVENGE. 
 
 The day that followed was Sunday. At the first glim- 
 mer of day-break Steele rose from his sleepless bed and 
 walked down to the bank. The watchman had just 
 opened the private door, situated in the rear of the bank, 
 and with his unextinguished lantern still swinging from 
 his hand, was standing on the threshold, drawing in 
 deep sibilant breaths of the balmy morning air. Dis- 
 missed to notify the day- watchman that he could take a 
 half-holiday, as business would keep the banker in the 
 building until noon, he went his way with an alacrity 
 born of his eagerness to impart his exciting conviction 
 that " suthin war up wi' tli' boss." Steele watched the 
 retreating figure out of sight, dully conscious, in the 
 meantime, of the fresh, cool wind, of the purple haze of 
 day-break, and the twittering of myriad sparrows waking 
 in the budding trees. He sighed as he turned into the 
 bank. The peace of the scene was in bitter contrast to 
 the restless heart within him. He shut and locked the 
 door, saw that the iron shutters were down securely, lest 
 a ray of light shining through a chance chink should be- 
 tray him, and turned on a couple of the electric jets. 
 Then he opened the safes. He rifled them of books, 
 bonds, bills, coins, their entire contents, which he piled 
 on desks and tables. Then he began his work. For six
 
 310 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 long hours he worked on steadily. Then he shut the last 
 book, and dropped his head upon its cover. He was face 
 to face with the fatal truth. Ruin ! Ruin ! Ruin ! 
 
 Over and over again he repeated the word. Even yet 
 he scarcely realized its personal application. He ruined 
 he, Steele Harriman, banker of Newfield, master of the 
 big house, John Harriman's sou ? Only last night he had 
 stood a king, a god among men ; surrounded by fawning 
 courtiers, revelling in royal luxury, foretasting the elysian 
 draught of ambitions, dreams fulfilled! Ruined he! 
 How had it come about? Where were the thousands, the 
 hundreds of thousands, that had passed through his hands 
 in the last two years? His thoughts followed them to 
 their various graves ; to the mines that had swallowed 
 all and returned nothing ; to the real estate whose vast 
 values had collapsed like balloons as their air escapes ; to 
 the stocks sunk in the market like lead to the sea-bottom ; 
 to the mortgages upon whose margins the financial de- 
 pression of the hour fatally encroached ; to the loans whose 
 interest, even, was defaulted ; to the bonds now but waste 
 paper, in consequence of the fall of the fickle market ! 
 And beyond this vista of misfortune opened the darker 
 one of dishonor ! Hypothecated bonds, watered stock, 
 duplicate mortgages all the piteous futile resources of 
 desperation and despair stared him in the face. Ruin ! 
 Ruin ! And all for the lack of a little time. A mouth, 
 perhaps a fortnight hence, the tide would turn, the 
 depressed market rebound. And meantime, his notes 
 must be met ; the certain run on the bank withstood 
 with what ? He looked at the bills and gold about him 
 with a bitter sneer. As well none as these. He leaped 
 to his feet with a stifled cry, and pressed both hands to 
 his head. These piles must be increased and multiplied
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 311 
 
 they must, they must ! But how, and by whom ? His best 
 resources were drained already ; and a general chariness 
 about accommodating him had been noticeable of late. A 
 suspicion of his difficulties was already abroad. More- 
 over, others were embarrassed as well as he. Many of 
 whom he had thought to ask a temporary accommodation 
 had asked it of him instead. Solomon had been his 
 main, his last hope, and he had failed him. Who was 
 left? 
 
 After an hour's despairing thought he dashed off a few 
 cipher telegrams, and telephoned to his home for a ser- 
 vant. Him he sent with the despatches, ordering him to 
 wait in the office until all the replies were in. The man 
 looked at him reproachfully it was his half-holiday but 
 something in the white set face of the banker forbade 
 remonstrance. As the servant went, and the door was re- 
 locked upon him, the lonely occupant of the great building 
 set about obliterating all traces of his visit He replaced 
 the books and bonds in the exact order in which he had 
 found them, restored to the safes their precious contents, 
 and fastened the massive door of the vault with the lock 
 whose combination was known only to him and his cashier. 
 Then he turned out the light, and locked the door of his 
 compartment on the outside. Between it and the private 
 exit was a passage illuminated during bank-hours by 
 electric light. But now, with the lights turned off and 
 the outer door still unopened, it was dark almost to 
 blackness. His feet, sinking in the luxurious carpet with 
 which the floor of the passage was covered, made no 
 sound. The wall, as his hand touched it, felt chill and 
 damp. The atmosphere was close and heavy ; he fancied 
 that it smelled like a vault. "With a shudder he groped 
 for the door, and with shaking hands, flung it open. The
 
 312 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 surprised face of the day-watchman, just coming to his 
 post, greeted him. 
 
 " Spent your morning-off in church, I hope, Hopkins? " 
 he said, with forced pleasantry. The sound of his voice 
 grated upon him. He shut the door behind him with 
 impatient haste, and strode toward home. 
 
 He had been out since earliest dawn, and it was now past 
 the noon-hour. Isolde was watching for him with anxious 
 eyes. He passed her without a word, and hastening to 
 his room, locked himself in it. He had tasted nothing 
 since the night before, but the tray-laden servant who 
 knocked at his door was fiercely ordered away, and for- 
 bidden to return. Ruin ! Ruin ! The word rang in 
 his ears, blazed before his eyes, crashed like a hammer 
 through his reeling brain. Ruin, utter, inevitable ! un- 
 less, unless O God ! when would those answers reach 
 him ? He had waited days, months, j-ears ! 
 
 One ! Two ! Three ! Four ! Five ! The little time- 
 piece on the mantel chimed out the long, slow hours. 
 How the awful day dragged ! Each silvery tick was a slow 
 stab through his shrinking, shuddering heart ! Pacing 
 from door to window, from window to door, with heavy 
 tread and hands clenched tightly behind him, the sus- 
 pense was endurable ; but forced by sheer physical fatigue 
 to pause and rest, his unstrung nerves gained the mas- 
 tery. There was a deafening surge in his ears, a blur be- 
 fore his eyes, a maddening throb, an anguished com- 
 pressed contraction in his brain. Iron bands were bind- 
 ing it, a red-hot iron was piercing it through and through. 
 A sky of fire burned above him, a gulf of fire burned be- 
 low ; the flames curled down, the flames wreathed up, 
 surrounding, scorching, devouring him ! " Ruin ! Ruin ! " 
 hissed a thousand fiery tongues. Again and again he
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 313 
 
 sprung to his feet with a shuddering cry, forcing his 
 heavy eyes open, his exhausted limbs into renewed mo- 
 tion. Any pain, any agony, were those visions of infernal 
 fire but kept at bay. 
 
 The dreary day darkened to dusk. He lifted the window 
 and leaned out, his wild eyes piercing the deepening 
 shadows. The replies upon which his doom depended 
 would they ever come ? The cool night-air, moist with 
 dew, blew gratefully on his fevered face. It softened his 
 mood, broke his tense self-control, as a gentle word some- 
 times pierces the lethargy of a great grief. He gasped for 
 breath with parted lips and hands pressed convulsively 
 against his anguished breast. Then a sound arose, strong, 
 deep, terrible the sound of a man's despairing sob. His 
 racked brow dropped to the hard sill. Ruin ! Ruin ! O 
 God! 
 
 The sound of approaching footsteps roused him. He 
 started up and looked oat eagerly. A cry escaped him 
 as he descried the messenger, a packet of yellow envel- 
 opes in his hand. In a hoarse voice he called to the 
 man to throw them to him. He caught them in shaking 
 hands and tore them open with his teeth, like a greedy 
 animal. Then he leaned from the window and read them 
 by the light of the lawn-lamps. 
 
 One by one he read, and re-read them, and flung them 
 to the floor. Then he stamped upon them, grinding his 
 teeth and uttering horrible oaths as he ground them 
 under his heel. Suddenly he laughed, a fierce wild laugh, 
 that died in a sharp sob. Suspense was ended. He had 
 nothing left to hope, nothing to strive for. He had only to 
 sit with folded hands and wait for what ? The awful 
 question went unanswered. Something snapped in his 
 braiu or was it his heart ? The irou-bauds were loos-
 
 314: A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 enecl. The room slipped from him. He was falling 
 fulling. With an exhausted sigh he sunk into a chair. 
 The flames no longer tortured him ; he was engulfed in 
 chill and darkness. The wind blew in through the open 
 window, rustling the yellow shreds upon the floor. They 
 were the ashes of his last hope, but he did not heed them. 
 Merciful unconsciousness had come to his relief. 
 
 It was nearly midnight when Isolde, startled by the un- 
 broken silence, knocked resolutely upon his door. Twice 
 through the day she had begged admittance and been re- 
 pulsed ; but now she was resolved to take no denial. He 
 woke from his lethargy with a start, and as the knock was 
 repeated, listened. Over her gentle voice he caught a 
 sound welcome to him in his feverish thirst and faintness 
 the tinkle of ice against glass. With an effort he rose 
 and opened the door. Isolde was alone, staggering under 
 the weight of a heavy tray. A siphon of seltzer stood 
 upon it, and a bowl of crushed ice. He seized both, and 
 pouring the seltzer over the ice, drank from the bowl 
 greedily. Then, deaf to her entreaty, he locked the door 
 against her. She turned away with tearful eyes, but with 
 a lightened heart. At least, he was alive, and sober. 
 She had feared she scarcely knew what in those long, 
 dread hours of silence. Covering the tray with a napkin, 
 she left it by the door, in case he should wish refreshment 
 during the night. Then she crept wearily upstairs, to lie 
 beside her baby, with sleepless anxious eyes. 
 
 Breakfast, the next morning, was a silent meal. John 
 Harriman had long since partaken of his simple dish, and 
 was smoking in the grounds. He had not the slightest 
 suspicion of his son's difficulties. His seclusion of the 
 day before had seemed to the old man the natural sequel 
 of the pi'eceding night's entertainment, and Isolde had not
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 315 
 
 dispelled his happy illusion. To her relief and surprise, 
 Steele ate heartily. His magnificent physique, with its 
 virile recuperative powers, was asserting itself. The 
 despair of the night before had been a weak delirium, 
 from which he awoke to strength, if not to hope. As the 
 clock chimed the hour of nine, he rose from the table. 
 Isolde followed him into the hall. The nurse was just 
 descending the stairs, the baby in her arms. Isolde took 
 him from her, and the girl passed on. Then she held 
 him toward her husband. 
 
 "Kiss him," she said, softly. 
 
 She felt a tender hope, poor young mother, that the 
 memory of the innocent, childish face would remain with 
 him, and strengthen him for whatever conflict the day 
 might bring. The revelations of the night of the dinner 
 had well-nigh broken her gentle heart, but she had put 
 aside all thought of self, knowing, instinctively, that her 
 husband was in dire need of all her love and tenderness. 
 She yearned to go to Sal ; she yearned to go to Magdalen ; 
 she yearned with the weary pain of hopeless impotence, 
 to right the wrongs of both. Upon the wrong done her, 
 she did not suffer her thoughts to dwell. She was no 
 longer the passionate girl who had fled from her home 
 into the bitter night, because the mantle of vice had 
 dared to brush against her ; but the conscientious, 
 patient, resigned woman, facing her wrongs, not fleeing 
 them, steadfastly following the way of the Master, Who, 
 with bleeding feet, first trod the Via Crucis of the 
 Christian life. Not but that she resolved one wrong 
 should end, and one be righted. She had thought out 
 both termination and reparation in the sleepless hours of 
 the previous night, while her baby, hers and his, dreamed 
 its heaven-born dreams beside her. But these resolves
 
 316 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 were born of duty, not of resentment. Personal resent- 
 ment, indeed, she no longer felt. Pain and pity for the 
 mortal guilt of the man she loved, absorbed her. 
 
 As he drew on his coat the bell pealed noisily. He 
 opened the door, and was confronted by the anxious face 
 of his cashier. 
 
 "I came to warn you that there is a run on the bank," 
 he said. 
 
 The banker reeled against the door. 
 
 " Already ? " he gasped. 
 
 "Rundell is at the bottom of it," the cashier explained. 
 " He stayed over Sunday at the hotel, and started the 
 rumor that we are dependent upon the Denver Bank, 
 which suspends payment this morning. The run looks 
 serious. I did not wish to act without your orders." 
 
 "We will walk to the bank together," he said. Then 
 he turned back to Isolde. 
 
 " Order the carriage at once," he said, " and ask father 
 to drive you to the ranch. Remain there until I send for 
 you." 
 
 " Steele," she cried, imploringly. 
 
 At the cry, he looked back. She stood in the morning 
 sunlight, leaning toward him with awed white face and 
 pleading eyes, her baby in her arms. 
 
 Turning back, he caught her to him in a wordless, close 
 embrace ; then without one backward glance, he left her. 
 
 In that mute kiss, though they knew it not, their lips 
 had bidden to love and to each other a last, eternal fare- 
 well
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 THE WAGES OF SIN IS 
 
 At the private entrance to the bank his father met him, 
 pointing with trembling hand to the crowd clamoring at 
 the public door. 
 
 " I've spoke ter 'em, but 'tain't made no differ'," he 
 quavered. " They say as how words is all very well, but 
 money's better'r. I axed 'em ef they'd ever wanted fur 
 money as John Harriman owed 'em, an' they said 'twarn't 
 wi' John Harriman they're dealin' now, but wi' John Har- 
 riman's son. Wot's getten inter 'em ter talk that there 
 way, Steele ? Wot's gone wrong atwixt ye ? " 
 
 " Nothing," answered Steele, forcing a smile as he 
 spoke. " The run is the result of a senseless scare, start- 
 ed by an enemy. I will pay them off as they come, and 
 by night they will be ashamed of themselves. The rumor 
 has reached the house, and Isolde is nervous. I want you 
 to drive her to the ranch, father. You can do nothing 
 for me here." 
 
 The old man hesitated. " I can't leave ye ter face yer 
 trouble single-handed," he said. 
 
 Steele feigned a laugh. " My trouble, father? Why, 
 this is a joke absolutely a joke ! You will see them 
 shambling back humbly enough to-morrow. Go, for my 
 sake ; and whatever rumors reach you, do not believe 
 them. If anything serious turns up, I will send for you."
 
 318 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 The old man's face was averted, but a glistening drop 
 trickling slowly down bis cheek betrayed him. 
 
 "Why, father," exclaimed his son, "I do believe that 
 you are crying, like a woman ! " 
 
 The grand old face was radiant behind its tears, like 
 the sun behind a shower. 
 
 " I was thankin' God fur givin' me sech a good son, 
 sech a true sou ! " he sobbed. " I was thinkin' how it 
 might o' b'en ef all this warn't a joke ; ef ef 'twar in 
 'arnest, an' an' ye'd desarv'd it ! " 
 
 He turned away, with a hearty pressure of his son's 
 hand, and a whispered " God bless ye ! " Steele's defiant 
 eyes, as they followed the aged figure, softened with sud- 
 den tears. 
 
 "Poor old father ! " he murmured. " If if anything 
 should happen to me ' 
 
 He pulled a flask from his pocket and took a deep 
 draught from it ; then, with a bracing gesture of his 
 strong young shoulders, he entered upon the day's work. 
 
 Kingsley arrived during the forenoon his first appear- 
 ance in Newfield since Isolde had disdainfully dismissed 
 him from the Harriman breakfast-room. Steele greeted 
 him surlily. Surliness was the mask with which he hid 
 his shame. He had reason to be ashamed in Kiugsley's 
 presence, more reason than, as yet, even Kingsley knew. 
 Unknown to Newfield, which supposed the bank to be 
 Steele Harriman's private venture, Kingsley, for the last 
 nine months, had been the banker's "silent partner." 
 From the first he had known the partnership to be a reck- 
 less speculation to-day he learned that it had been a 
 ruinous one. Not only was his capital lost, but he was 
 legally bound to share the banker's liabilities, should the 
 bank fail which ominous possibility seemed suddenly
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 319 
 
 imminent. Moreover, should the real culprit turn de- 
 serter and Kingsley could not but realize that should 
 the worst come to worst, nothing but flight could save 
 Steele the entire responsibility would devolve upon him. 
 He left for Denver at noon, with a pate face and eyes that 
 foresaw trouble. But his parting word to Steele was a 
 kind one. 
 
 "Do the best you can for yourself," he said. "I have 
 no wife to suffer with me." 
 
 At two o'clock there was a knock at the private door. 
 As it opened, Steele started back with an amazed excla- 
 mation. His visitor was a woman. 
 
 With a word of apology to the crowd pressed about it, 
 he drew down his window, and motioned his cashier 
 to shut the door connecting their apartments. When 
 this was done, the two were virtually alone. 
 
 " Magdalen ! " he said, then. 
 
 In silence she lifted the heavy veil that concealed her 
 face. Then unlocking, with a key hanging from her 
 watch-guard, a satchel secured by a strap that crossed her 
 shoulder, she took from it a bulky package of bank-notes, 
 and laid it on his desk. 
 
 For a moment they looked at each other in silence. 
 Then the man's eyes fell. 
 
 "Five thousand dollars," she said, in a bitter voice; 
 " the balance of the sum placed to my credit six months 
 ago. I wish to God that I could return the full sum. I 
 wish to God that we had never met ! " 
 
 She had bowed her head and was leaning upon his 
 desk, shaken from head to foot with tearless sobs. 
 Something in the despairing attitude of the regal figure 
 touched him. In her presence, incongruous as it may 
 seem, he was seldom at his worst.
 
 320 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "I am sorry, Magdalen," he said, helplessly. 
 
 She lifted her face and raised her beautiful eyes to 
 him. 
 
 " Before I met you," she said, " my life was a clean 
 page. No man had written dishonor or shame upon it. 
 Kingsley Kiugsley " 
 
 "Yes, I know," he said. "Kingsley would have mar- 
 ried you. You you owe me no kindness, Magdalen. 
 Keep your money. I cannot accept it." 
 
 "You must accept it," she said, firmly. " It is the least 
 the last honor you can do me. I am going out of 
 your life forever. Good-by." 
 
 Over the soft carpet her light footfalls made no sound. 
 The outer door opened and shut. She was gone. 
 
 With nervous hands he caught up the bank-notes and 
 counted them rapidly. Five thousand dollars ! Not a 
 drop in the bucket, should the worst corne to, the worst ; 
 but a faint hope was springing up in the man's heart, 
 that the worst might be averted. The prompt and un- 
 questioning payment which had been made all day had 
 restored general confidence. There were no more out- 
 spoken suspicions nor muttered threats. At the first 
 stroke of the hour which was the usual signal for closing, 
 Steele shut the books. The men about his window fell 
 back with shamed faces as his contemptuous eyes chal- 
 lenged them. 
 
 " You have seen enough to-day," he said, in a ringing 
 voice that echoed through the bank, " to prove the 
 utter falseness of your suspicions. I did not tell you 
 that you were fools, because I chose to let you dis- 
 cover that fact for yourselves. Resume your run to- 
 morrow, and your accounts, to the last one, shall be 
 closed. The Harriman Bank is dissolved. I will not
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 321 
 
 accept the restored trust of the men who have once dis- 
 trusted ine." 
 
 Without a word the men slunk out. The crowd 
 jeered them. 
 
 " Steele Harriman's tongue-lashin's turned ye inter 
 whipped curs, wi' yer tails atween yer legs," cried a 
 mocking voice. " Wot's he b'en a-sayin' of ? " 
 
 " He sez ez how we've made fools o' oursel's," respond- 
 ed one of the tongue-lashed. " / sez ez how we've made 
 darned fools of ourselves." 
 
 This sentiment proved contagious, and the crowd, its 
 confidence in bank and bankers alike restored, began to 
 disperse. As the bank door closed upon the last apolo- 
 getic figure, the banker turned to his cashiers. 
 
 "Put up the books, boys," he said. "You have had a 
 hard day. I will see to the safes before Billy comes to 
 lock up. Go out the front way, through the crowd, and 
 say that I have already left by the reai% They will hang 
 about if they suspect that I ana still in the bank." 
 
 The young men obeyed with alacrity. The groups 
 still lounging before the bank closed about them with 
 eager questions. Taking advantage of the moment, 
 Steele opened the private door. As he had expected, 
 Ladybird was already there. A quick glance about him 
 showed him that he was unobserved. 
 
 " Bring the mare in here ! Quick, lad ! " he whispered. 
 
 The boy stared at him stupidly. 
 
 " Bring th' mare in ? " he repeated, incredulously. 
 
 " In, you fool, in ! " he cried. 
 
 The mare, obeying his voice and gesture, followed him 
 with a low whinny. The boy gawked at her with open 
 mouth, as she stepped lightly over the threshold onto 
 the velvet carpet.
 
 322 A SOI? OF ESAU. 
 
 " I'm dumm'J ef th' boss ain't gone crazy ez a branded 
 bull," he ruminated, scratching his head through a hole 
 in his ragged cap. "A hoss onter thet theer kyarpet! 
 Red Injuns ! " 
 
 He followed the mare in dazed fashion. Steele shut 
 and locked the door after him. 
 
 " Let down the blinds, as usual," he said, " and don't 
 gape like a blasted idiot. If they saw the mare they would 
 wait for me, and I am not in the mood to bandy words 
 with the fools. Now, do you understand? " 
 
 Billy shuffled toward the window, relieved, but not con- 
 vinced. " A hoss onter thet theer kyarpet " was too much 
 for him, explanations notwithstanding. The loungers 
 without, catching sight of his staring eyes, thought that 
 their presence awed him, and mischievously proceeded to 
 intimidate him with deadly threats and belligerent gest- 
 ures, the evident effect of which they greeted with howls 
 of glee. One man threw a small stone against one of the 
 windows, but was promptly hustled out of temptation's 
 way by his companions. They had nothing against the 
 bank now ; not they ! It was dealing squarely by them, 
 and they would deal squarely by it. No weather-vane is 
 more veering than the temper of a mob. 
 
 When the last shutter was down, and the last bolt 
 slipped into its place, Billy departed, still scratching his 
 head over the problem of "a hoss outer thet theer kyar- 
 pet." At last the banker was alone. With his head bowed 
 on his desk, he sat, thinking, thinking. The run on the 
 bank no longer troubled him. The worst was over, and 
 he was not unhopeful that he could satisfy the demands 
 of such few depositors as might yet choose to close their 
 accounts ; but the bank, alas, was the least of his respon- 
 sibilities ! In his reckless financial ambition he had vent-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 323 
 
 ured far outside of his legitimate field, and it was beyond 
 its borders that ruin threatened him. How was he to avert 
 it ? Absorbed in the thought, he was unconsciously finger- 
 ing the notes Magdalen had left, and which he had not yet 
 locked away, when the sound of a sudden tumult outside 
 roused him from his reverie. He drew on his light overcoat, 
 and cramming the notes into its inner pocket, crouched 
 against the iron shutter of the bank-door, and listened. 
 
 " Th' Denver bank's shet down ter-day," cried a strident 
 voice, " w'ich means ez th' Newfield bank '11 shet down 
 ter-morrer. Steele Harriman's kep' dark, but th' Denver 
 Bank war his'n. Th' Denver News' extry sez so ! " 
 
 There was a groan from the crowd. 
 
 The voice resumed: " Th' banks ain't all th' extry 's 
 got inter it, not by a darned deal ! Thar's wusser comin'. 
 Th' Weste'n Land Comp'ny's gone kersmash, an' ye all 
 know wot thet thar means th' little lots ez we've slaved 
 ter hold an' pay fur 's gone wi' it." 
 
 Cries and oaths responded. Above them sounded a 
 woman's Ii3'sterical sob. 
 
 " An' now, chaps " the speaker had mounted the bank- 
 steps, and only the iron door divided him from the des- 
 perate, despairing listener crouching on the bank floor 
 " an' now, chaps, ye've heerd th' extry, an' now hear me ! 
 I'm a plain man, an' a hard-workin' man, an' my woman 
 hain't hed no silks nor di'mants, nor my gals don't play 
 th' pyanner, nor set down fer help ter wait on. But plain 
 livin' fur plain folks 's my motto, an' I've stood up ag'in' 
 ye fur Steele Harriman, thro' likin' th' chap, an' his father 
 afore him, an' holdin' ez twarn't no affair o' mine how he 
 spent his own pile, so's he stood by mine. But he hain't 
 stood by mine, nor he hain't stood by yern, chaps ! He's 
 fool'd us fro' th' fust-off start. He's robb'd us right an'
 
 324 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 left, an' we hain't bed th' git-up ter see it. Th' Land 
 Comp'ny's a sell th' extry sez so ! an' wot's fur an' away 
 wuss fur me an' more liker me, th' Mine Comp'ny's a sell ! 
 This 'yer run onter th' bank's got wind, an' th' truth's 
 come out ter last. Thar's wirin's fro' far an' near, an' 
 theer all ag'in' us. Th' Mine Comp'nies 's wi'out a mine 
 atwixt 'em. Thar war deep enough pockets ter theer 
 trousers, but nary a one ter theer mines. We've getteu 
 our shar's honest paper these 'yer's mine. Ain't them 
 purty things, now, fur ter pay over five years' savin's far ? 
 Th' Open-Mouth Mine, it sez onter 'em. Wai, now, thar 
 ain't no Open-Mouth Mine. Thar ain't a pick nor a pan 
 in th' hull diggin's. Steele Harrimau's play'd a bluff 
 game, an' he's beat us, ev'ry time ! " 
 
 There was a sullen roar of anger from the crowd, fol- 
 lowed by a dull sound, as it surged against doors and 
 windows. But the banker did not hear it. As the man 
 spoke, he had dashed to the private door, backed Lady- 
 bird out, her light hoofs passing noiselessly from carpet 
 to soil, and stealthily crossing the open field at the rear of 
 the bank, had given the mare her head, and was dashing 
 madly along toward the Junction tracks. 
 
 But the distance was not half compassed when a faint 
 sound from behind struck on his ear. He pulled up Lady- 
 bird and listened. Were they already on his track ? An 
 instant later the fear became a certainty. They had dis- 
 covered his flight, and were already in pursuit of him. 
 
 He dashed ahead at desperate speed, mentally weighing, 
 meantime, his chances of escape. He would back his mare 
 against all the mustangs behind her, but to outrace them 
 now was nothing. The express was not due for an hour, and 
 unless he could throw them off the scent the delay would 
 be fatal to him. But if not toward the Junction, where
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 325 
 
 should he ride? The fierce curses rushing to his lips 
 seemed to choke him. His breath came in strangling, 
 sob-like gasps. The air, as it hissed past him, caught 
 up his despairing question. " Where? " it reiterated, be- 
 fore, around, behind him. " Where ? Where ? Where ? " 
 
 In his irresolution he had held in the mare, uncon- 
 sciously slackening her pace. Of a sudden he realized 
 that his pursuers had gained upon him. With a stifled 
 cry, he dashed from the road into a narrow footpath 
 closely overgrown with shrub and brush, which seemed to 
 lose itself a few rods ahead in a dense pine thicket. He 
 halted in its shadow, crouching in the saddle with pant- 
 ing breath, and watched with wild, fierce eyes as his pur- 
 suers sped by, shouting and swearing, and urging on 
 their galloping horses with whip and spur. 
 
 As the last one galloped out of sight, he turned Lady- 
 bird's head, and spoke a low word to her. With an in- 
 telligent whinny she sprung through the pine-thicket 
 The narrow path, long untrodden by man or beast, was 
 almost impassable, even on foot. For a horseman it was 
 wellnigh impenetrable, yet the brave mare stumbled on. 
 His pursuers would, he knew, press straight on from the 
 big house to the Ledge, and thence to the Junction. By 
 this short cut, if Ladybird could make it, he would gain 
 a clear half-hour upon them. As the mare strained on, 
 his brain began to reel, his reason was almost unseated. 
 A rushing sound, ever increasing in violence, surged shud- 
 deringly about him. It bewildered, terrified him. Was 
 it the warning of his prophetic soul, crying out that 
 judgment had overtaken him? Was it the shriek of 
 demon-voices, as the gates of hell flamed open for him ? 
 
 No, it was only the ominous voice of the swollen 
 Freshet the roar of its waters, rising, rising !
 
 CHAPTEE XXXIL 
 
 DEATH ! " 
 
 He was dashing past the Freshet cabin toward the 
 Junction, when his mare reared suddenly, her mad pace 
 arrested by Sal's strong hand on her bridle. 
 
 "They're ter th' Ledge a'ready, an' they'll spot yo' fro' 
 th' winders," she panted. "Foot it acrost th' marsh-way 
 ter th' Junction, an' yo'll jest about ketch th' flyer. Don't 
 fool wi' your last show." 
 
 She darted into the cabin with an imperious call for him 
 to follow. He threw the reins on Ladybird's neck and 
 dismounted, obeying her in a dazed way, yet with a gleam 
 of hope dawning upon the lethargy of his despair. 
 
 As he stepped across the threshold, however, a dread 
 sound reached him the sound of shouts which the 
 wind brought from the Ledge. " It's too late ! " he said ; 
 "I'm done for, Sal!" 
 
 He tapped his breast-pocket significantly. 
 
 "This or the Freshet ? " he asked. " Which shall it 
 be?" 
 
 She struck down his hand with a contemptuous gesture. 
 
 " Your coat, quick ! " she cried. 
 
 Before he realized her intention she had torn his 
 light coat from his shoulders, and drawn it over her 
 woman's garb. On the table lay a gray sombrero, similar 
 in tint and shape to one he often wore a style common
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 327 
 
 to both men and women in wilder parts of the West. 
 This she put on, pushing it well back till its biim con- 
 cealed her hair. 
 
 " I've a ride fur life afore me," she panted ; " a ride fur 
 your life. I'm riskin' mine, not fur yo', but fur her ez 
 stood by me ! I've writ down outer this 'yer paper ez 
 Waif's her'n, ef aught goes wrong wi' me. Pin it onter 
 her skirt fur me. I I can't do it." 
 
 She caught the wondering child from the hammock, 
 and clasped her in a clinging, passionately fond embrace. 
 An instant later she had crossed the road, and was vault- 
 ing, man-fashion, into Ladybird's saddle. 
 
 He followed her with set white face. The last in- 
 stinct of honest manhood surviving in him the instinct 
 which, at the cost of his own ruin, had impelled him 
 to avenge the insult offered his wife now impelled him 
 to tell this woman the truth, though his life was in her 
 hands. 
 
 "Sal," he said, "I cannot go until I tell you the truth. 
 Jack was never married to Kose KundelL You are his 
 legal wife, Waif his legitimate child. Isolde knows the 
 truth. She will see you righted." 
 
 She heard him almost incredulously. All her shame, 
 all her loneliness, all the torture of her outcast life and 
 evil fame, all the wrong and pathos of her innocent child's 
 brief life, the fruit of this man's lie ! And she was risk- 
 ing her life, the desertion of her friendless, helpless child, 
 for him. She made an attempt to dismount, but her 
 strength failed her. With both hands she clutched her 
 strangling throat. 
 
 The hoofs sounded nearer. They were speeding round 
 the angle of the Ledge cross-roads. Through a cloud of 
 dust the heads of the leaders were just discernible.
 
 328 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 With a sob that was almost a cry, she bent, and with 
 fierce hands pushed him from her toward the cabin. 
 
 "God forgive yo'," she sobbed, "an* save yo' fur her 
 sake ! " 
 
 Then, as the cabin-door swung behind him, she rode 
 Ladybird into the middle of the road, and waited. 
 
 For a moment there was silence ; then a hoarse shout 
 rang from the foremost of the pursuers, announcing that 
 Ladybird was recognized. She waited an instant longer, 
 that the well-known mare and familiar gray coat and 
 sombrero might be fully identified, and then, giving 
 Ladybird her head, she was off off on the heroic ride that 
 risked her life for the man who had ruthlessly blasted it. 
 
 Two miles ! three miles ! five miles ! Ladybird caught 
 the spirit of the hour, and led the mob a gallant chase. 
 The wind hissed by ; the mountains, the pines, the bushes 
 sped past on lightning wings. The twilight deepened 
 to darkness, relieved by the flickering spaz'ks of the ig- 
 niting stars. The pursuers, desperate lest their prey es- 
 cape them under cover of the shadows, sunk spurs deeper 
 and deeper into their horses' shuddering flanks, uttering 
 cries of triumph as a spurt of speed brought the bay and 
 its intrepid rider at last within their range. A score of 
 hands lifted simultaneously ; a score of shots rang sharply 
 over the silent night. There was a moment of breathless 
 suspense as the smoke cleared away, then a wild cheer 
 rose from the crowd. The noble mare was down, riddled 
 with cruel bullets ; and prostrate beside her lay her rider, 
 motionless, face downward in the dust, a telltale stream 
 of blood oozing from one outstretched arm. 
 
 In a trice they were on her, lifting her with brutal 
 hands, which, as they turned her face to the sky, grew 
 suddenly gentle.
 
 A SOX OF ESAU. 329 
 
 " 'Taiu't him, by the devil ! " 
 
 " Good Lord, it's a woman ! " 
 
 Down the gray sleeve the red blood trickled drop by 
 drop drop by drop. First in a little pool, then in a tiny 
 stream, it stained the dust. They fell back from the 
 ghastly sight, looking at one another with pale, remorseful 
 faces. With lips white as her own, above her face up- 
 turned to the still sky, tenderly, one to another, they 
 whispered her piteous woman-name. 
 
 " Freshet Sal ! " they faltered. " Freshet Sal ! " 
 
 The express would be due at the Junction in less than 
 half an hour. The marsh-way was roundabout and hard 
 to travel, owing to the treacherous water-soaked soil. If 
 the fugitive would not lose his last small chance, he must 
 act quickly. As he emerged from the inner room of the 
 cabin in which he had concealed himself till the sound of 
 the hoofs died away, his thoughts reverted to his coat, the 
 pocket of which, in his bewilderment at Sal's sudden ac- 
 tion, he had forgotten to empty. With desperate hands 
 he clutched his pockets, turning them inside out, and 
 emptying their contents on the cabin-floor. Cigar-case, 
 match safe, flask, pistol, watch, knife, handkerchief, cards, 
 letters, stamps, keys a few loose coins of gold .and silver, 
 and his purse ! With trembling hands, he opened it. A 
 hundred dollars in bills, and a couple of gold pieces 
 these were all. For a moment he despaired ; then hope 
 reasserted itself. Bad as things were, they might have 
 been worse. He could lie in ambush till the money in 
 Sal's possession should be forwarded to him through 
 faithful Jim ; and then there were lands to which the 
 extradition-treaty did not extend lands in which he 
 might begin life anew ; life, with its proud ambitions, its
 
 330 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 luring pleasures, its golden goals. Hastily gathering up 
 the scattered articles, he replaced them in his pockets ; 
 and then, drawing his hat over his eyes, stepped toward 
 the door. Half a pace from it he paused. What was 
 it that sudden dreadful sound thundering from the dis- 
 tance toward him that sudden, awful sensation as the 
 cabin stirred and trembled like a human creature in fear ? 
 What was it what was it ? 
 
 There was a startled cry from Waif, and then tense si- 
 lence, as both man and child listened in spell-bound terror. 
 For a moment the sound was dully deafening, but gradu- 
 ally it subsided, only a subdued surge and gurgle remain- 
 ing. The cabin seemed to steady itself, but its walls 
 still vibrated with the regular, smothered thuds of some 
 opposing outer force. At the same time there came 
 through the window opening on the Freshet a blinding 
 shower of spray. As it dashed in Steele's face, he under- 
 stood. To shut the window and drop its inner shutter 
 was the work of but an instant. Then he sprung to the 
 door. A foamy tide swept in as he opened it, eddying 
 like a miniature whirlpool about his feet. He pressed 
 forward defiantly. In an instant he was up to his waist in 
 water, and almost swept off his feet. Stepping to one 
 side, that the cabin-light might shine through the door, 
 he peered with wild eyes into the falling darkness. Before 
 him, to right and left of him, there was nothing but rush- 
 ing water. The dyke had broken, and the swollen Ar- 
 kansas was flooding its fork. The Freshet hemmed him in. 
 
 He staggered back into the cabin, with difficulty shut- 
 ting the door in the face of the rising water. Then he 
 pushed the table against it. He recollected now, that for 
 some days there had been grave fears of the Freshet ; that 
 Isolde had begged him, only two days before, to force
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 331 
 
 Sal into safer quarters, and that a party of commissioners 
 and workmen bad ridden out that morning to examine 
 and strengthen the dyke. Little by little the old story 
 of the fatal freshet, the horror-tale of his childhood, came 
 back to him. He recalled how, more then thirty years 
 before, a horseman had galloped at midnight over the 
 ground now known as the Freshet cross-roads, and dis- 
 mounted a few rods further on, to tighten a girth ; how 
 he had been surprised by a sudden thunder-like boom, 
 distant at first, but reverberating nearer and nearer, then 
 by a rushing, gurgling sound behind him, and had looked 
 back to behold the tract over which he had galloped five 
 minutes before, a swirling expanse of water ; how for thi'ee 
 days and nights the waters had surged there, leaving be- 
 hind them, to tell of the ill-fated settlement, only a few 
 spars from the cabin- wrecks. He saw the tents and cabins 
 drifting out, saw the men struggling in the rushing 
 waters, heard their despairing shrieks as the dark tide 
 sucked them down forever. He shuddered convulsively. 
 Cold drops of agony stood on his forehead. Suddenly, 
 he started up with an appealing cry. The gurgle about 
 the cabin had been succeeded by a series of sullen booms 
 accompanied by steady shocks, under which the cabin 
 creaked and trembled ominously ; and now, from under 
 the door, even to his feet, flowed a deepening stream of 
 foam-flecked water. In the back of the cabin a station- 
 ary ladder led to a loft opening upon the roof. With a 
 bound he scaled it. The last ray of light had vanished. 
 Beaching the slanting roof, the darkness of death engulfed 
 him ; the dark skies lowered above him ; the dark night 
 encompassed him ; the dark waters swelled beneath him. 
 As they surged up toward him, a terrible cry rang from 
 his shuddering lips.
 
 332 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "Help! Help! The boat! Tlieboat! Help!" 
 He forgot the pursuers be bad eluded, tbe capture be 
 was inviting, tbe danger he bad not yet escaped forgot 
 everything save those yawning, black-depthed waters, 
 straining hungrily toward the cabin-roof. 
 
 Driving leisurely from the prairie into tbe Ledge road, 
 a man beard the wild cry and answered it. The answer 
 was only the faintest note echoing from the distance, but 
 Steele caught it. He lowered himself into the cabin and 
 snatched tbe lamp from the table. The lighter furniture 
 was already swimming about the room ; a moment later, 
 and the lamp must have yielded its precious flame to its 
 elemental enemy. As be was turning back to the ladder, 
 the sound of Waifs frightened sob reached him. "With a 
 sensation of relief at the proximity of a fellow human 
 creature, he folded bis disengaged arm about her, and 
 mounted with her to the roof, waving tbe lamp above 
 bis head as be cried again for help. The responsive voice, 
 though nearer than before, sounded hopelessly distant to 
 the man toward whom the fatal waves rose swiftly. A 
 mad desire possessed him to leap into them, to breast, to 
 defy, to conquer them. As he hesitated, there was a 
 crash beneath him. A portion of the cabin-wall facing on 
 the Freshet bad been forced in, and through the aperture 
 the little centre-table drifted. He watched it breathlessly. 
 If it floated on tbe waters he could breast them. If it 
 sunk but the doubt was already solved. For a moment 
 it trembled, strained, resisted ; then, with an angry mur- 
 mur the waters caught it, whirling it dizzily about, in 
 ever-narrowing circles, until the undercurrent seized it 
 and bore it resistlessly outward toward tbe all-devouring 
 falls. He watched it till the last ripple that marked its 
 grave in the dark waters vanished ; then, with a fierce im-
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 333 
 
 precation, he burled the lamp after it into the swirling 
 tide. Waif, startled by the sudden darkness, began to 
 sob in his arms. For one wild moment he threatened to 
 cast her, too, into the seething waters, but of a sudden 
 his fierce face softened. He soothed her gently, rocking 
 her to and fro in his arms, till her sobs were quieted. 
 Then he folded her closer to him, clasping her little arms 
 about his neck, pressing her soft child-cheek against his 
 own. 
 
 " Go to sleep, little Waif," his pale lips murmured. 
 " Go to sleep." 
 
 " 'Ant to pway my pwayer," she sobbed. " ' Now I 'ay 
 me ! ' Pway it ! " 
 
 Pray it ? He ? How many a year since he had prayed 
 at all how many and many an one since that simple prayer 
 of his innocent childhood had passed his impious lips. 
 
 " Pway it ! " insisted Waif. 
 
 On a sudden surge of memory, the words came back 
 to him. 
 
 "Now Hay me" he began, almost unconsciously. 
 
 " Now I 'ay me," she repeated. 
 
 " Down to sleep" 
 
 " Down to s'eep " 
 
 " I pray the Lord," 
 
 " I pway de 'Ord " 
 
 " My soul to keep," 
 
 " My soul to teep " 
 
 " And if I die" 
 
 " An' if I die " 
 
 "Before I wake " 
 
 "Afo' I wate " 
 
 " I pray the Lord" 
 
 " I pway de 'Ord "
 
 334 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 " My soul to take," 
 
 "My soul to tate ! " 
 
 With a convulsive sob he pressed his lips to hers. He 
 had said a prayer he ! The merciful lethargy of despair 
 was broken. Thoughts flashed through his brain like 
 flames from a fierce fire. Thoughts not of the present, 
 but of the past, and of the future the past foreshadows. 
 
 Who shall follow them as they sped backward, back- 
 ward, over the sinful life whose every incident flashed be- 
 fore him with the awful clearness that is the premonitory 
 revelation of the great revealer, Death ! He saw him- 
 self again a boy, a handsome, manly, proud little fellow, 
 going his riotous way side by side with wild, reckless, 
 rollicking Jack golden-haired, blue-eyed, light-hearted 
 Jack, who had been every man's friend and no man's 
 enemy, save his own. He saw himself once more a youth 
 a tall, broad-shouldered, masterful young fellow, tread- 
 ing his native soil like a prince and monarch. How proud 
 his father had been of him how cordially the town-folk 
 had hailed him what an imperious, triumphant life he 
 had led, his masculine beauty the admiration of every 
 eye, his splendid prowess the envy of every arm, his brill- 
 iant promise the theme of every tongue ! Then the 
 phases of early manhood passed before him the phase 
 of mental pride and spiritual struggle ; the phase of 
 doubt, dispelled by divine conviction, against which he 
 had revolted because it armed his spirit against his human 
 flesh. Day by da}*, night by night, scene by scene, that 
 fateful phase was re-lived. Again he drank of the draught 
 of sin whose stain had sullied the virginal lips of his soul 
 forever ; again shuddered from its bitter lees ; again re- 
 newed the resolves, the dreams, the hopes, the aspirations 
 of his regenerated spirit. But the regenerative phase had
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 335 
 
 been but brief, slain in the very moment in which his 
 guilty concealment of Sal's honest wifehood had been 
 conceived. Waif's tiny form seemed a leaden weight, her 
 clinging arms to strangle him as he thought of it. He 
 turned from the memory with a shudder, and fixed his 
 thoughts on Isolde on Isolde, the dreamful, sweet, pure- 
 hearted girl ; on Isolde, the fluttering, shy, evasive sweet- 
 heart ; on Isolde, the startled, shrinking, yet ah ! how lov- 
 ing bride ; on Isolde, the wife, who, with her faith and 
 love ruthlessly outraged, was faithful, loving still ; on 
 Isolde, the sad-eyed, pure-faced young mother of his 
 child, his son standing as he had last seen her, with the 
 bright spring sunlight shimmering around her, her baby 
 like a flower on her breast. He had not done well by her, 
 poor Isolde. Ah, by whom in all his life had he done 
 well ! Not by his old father, whose pathetic faith he had 
 failed ; not by Jack, whom he had left to his own wild 
 way ; not by Sal, whose claim on him he had outraged 
 and denied ; not by the helpless child in his arms, in 
 whose veins ran the same blood that coursed within his 
 own not by these, of his own kin. And what of others 
 strangers? Had he done well by Kingsley, whose 
 honor he had risked, whose wealth he had lost, whose love 
 he had blasted ? Had he done well by boyish, weak young 
 Randal, whom he had betrayed to the tempters, cards 
 and women and wine? Had he done well by beautiful, 
 hapless Magdalen, who had never crossed the chasm 
 save for him ? Had he done well by the poor, hard-work- 
 ing settlers by the toil-worn women who had trusted 
 tim by anyone who had ever relied on his faith, his 
 truth, his honor? No, a thousand times no. And the 
 chill, dark waters the waters of death tolled about his 
 feet.
 
 336 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Death ! the dreadful Avord means what ? The end of 
 life ! the end only ? Or at once an end and a beginning ? 
 An endless, restful, untroubled dream, a deep, sweet si- 
 lence, a long, still torpor, an eternal sleep, the pagan 
 "dust to dust?" Or, as the Christian, as his own soul 
 told him, the flight of the creature to his Creator, of the 
 soul to its God, of the sinner to the Tribunal whose justice 
 cannot be blinded, whose judgment is not man's, whose 
 sentence rings past life, past death, to the eternity be- 
 yond them, eternity in heaven, eternity in hell. 
 
 A cry escaped him, a cry of awful terror and despair. 
 Again a voice responded. Did he dream, or rang it 
 no longer from the distant shore, but from the waters 
 near him ? Waif answered his wild question. With a 
 little sigh of content that her prayer was prayed, she 
 had nestled down in his arms, dreamfully watching the 
 waters, which were not fearful, but only wonderful to her, 
 in the unfamiliar phase whose portent she did not know. 
 But now she started suddenly, and, stretching out her 
 arms, gazed into the spray-veiled darkness with rapt, 
 ecstatic eyes. 
 
 " De boat ! " she cried, " de boat ! " 
 
 There was no question in the childish mind but that 
 this was the boat for which she had watched and waited 
 the tide which should bear her up to God's golden 
 shore ! Her eyes looked past the darkness into a light 
 with which her child face was illumined. What was the 
 vision of the white child-soul ? W T hat did the child-eyes 
 see, where the man saw but death and hell ? Who can 
 doubt that God's golden shore was indeed before her 
 that already her angel was speeding the child-soul to it, 
 folding it for the passage in its glistening white wings ! 
 
 As the oars splashed nearer, and the boat strained in
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 337 
 
 sight, through the darkness over the turmoil of the waters 
 a familiar voice sounded. 
 
 " Keep yer grip, Freshet Sal ! " it quavered. " Dontee 
 be afeared, little gal ! Th' old boat an' th' old man's 'yer 
 ter save ye ! " 
 
 " Father ! " sobbed Steele ; " O, father ! " 
 
 There was an instant's breathless silence. Then over 
 the waters echoed one ringing, exultant cry. 
 
 " My son Steele ! " it rang. " O, my son Steele ! " 
 
 Just beside the cabin swirled the current that eddied 
 to the falls. With all his strength the old man rowed 
 against it. The fretted oars split, the old boat creaked 
 and strained, its rotten timbers cracked and parted. The 
 water oozed slowly in. 
 
 With giant strokes he pulled it within reach of the 
 cabin. Then he dropped the oars, and clutching with 
 both hands the jutting eave of the cabin, by main force 
 drew the boat toward it, succeeding, at last, in steadying 
 it upon the submerged window-sill. Then he looked up 
 with a wan smile on his face. 
 
 " Gi' me th' little gal," he panted, " an' let yersel' down. 
 Th' water's risin'." 
 
 A great swell struck the cabin. It trembled, creaked, 
 and tottered. From the shore came the sound of voices, 
 and lanterns and torches flashed. 
 
 Standing in the swaying boat, the old man, clinging to 
 the cabin with one hand, lifted the other toward the 
 roof. 
 
 " Now ! " he gasped, motioning his son to lower Waif to 
 him. 
 
 But Steele did not heed him. With his eyes fixed be- 
 fore him in a terrible stare, with lips white and damp 
 with the dews of his death-agony, he stood, shaking
 
 338 A SO^i OF ESAU. 
 
 from head to foot, deaf and blind to his father's wild 
 appeal. 
 
 " Steele ! " The piteous cry rose shudderingly from the 
 waters. " My son Steele !" 
 
 A second and stronger swell struck the cabin, shaking 
 it to its foundations. Little by little the logs were giving 
 way. There was a strangled creak as it wavered and 
 shuddered like a living creature in fear. Then slowly, 
 surely, it tipped toward the yawning waves. 
 
 With the strength of despair, the old man drew himself 
 up to the tilting roof, and grasped his son by the arm. 
 
 " It's fallin'," he cried. " Th' boat '11 be swamped 
 under it. Fur God's sake fur 'Soldy's sake fur my 
 sake " 
 
 The fixed eyes stared ahead. Over the dark waters a 
 frightful phantom flitted, the foam of the angry billows 
 its ghastly shroud. Help ! Help ! It was his brother 
 Jack Sal's husband, Waif's father, vengeance flaming in, 
 his awful eyes ! 
 
 " Waif ! " he shrieked. " I always meant to do well by 
 j-ou ! I have done well by you ! Sal and Waif are righted, 
 Jack Sal and Waif are righted ! Keep between us, 
 Waif ! Help ! He is on me ! His scorching eyes his 
 strangling arms Waif ! Waif ! O God ! " 
 
 The old, appealing, despairing human cry ! Uttered 
 in faith, in fear, in hope since in piteous petition ! Who 
 shall say that even in that late, last moment it rang past 
 Christ's Cross, unheard ? 
 
 The cry was drowned, even as it was uttered. The 
 cabin, dislodged at last, tipped into the dark waters, 
 which, like a pall, closed over it ; then with its human 
 freight, it was sucked into the maelstrom of the flooded 
 falls.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIH. 
 
 AN END, AND A BEGINNING. 
 
 Six months later. 
 
 The flood had flowed and ebbed, and the Freshet 
 tragedy was already a thing of the past. Where the 
 waves had swirled, the deep tides seethed, again rose 
 banks and meadows green with summer. The site of the 
 Freshet cabin, now bleak and barren, was the single sur- 
 viving mark of the water's fatal passage. Material evi- 
 dences, be they of life or death, are but transitory. 
 Only in Isolde's soul, in Sal's sad mother-heart, the 
 flood-mark is eternal. 
 
 The triple Harriman tragedy ; Sal's ride, with its well- 
 nigh fatal ending ; the story of her marriage, which 
 Isolde roused herself from her grief to publish and au- 
 thenticate ; her installation in the Hai-riman house, in de- 
 fiance of Althea's open protests and Newfield's silent dis- 
 approval all had been a nine times nine days' wonder 
 to the little town. But with the honorable settlement, 
 through Kingsley, of the banker's financial affairs, the 
 wonder, like the flood at its neap, abated. Upon the 
 death of the banker, the law had stepped in ; only to step 
 out again with polite apologies, however, when Kingsley 
 presented legal proof that as the banker's surviving part- 
 ner, the liabilities of the bank lawfully devolved upon 
 him ; and in the meantime, happily for Kingsley, the
 
 340 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 wave of financial depression, whose tidal passage over the 
 country bad submerged the Newfield Bank, turned and 
 ebbed, and finally receded altogether. As the natural re- 
 action set in, and the depressed market rebounded with 
 cork-like lightness, the over-burden which had swamped 
 the Harrimau name in life, saved it in death. Seizing the 
 most advantageous moment, Kingsley made a clear sale 
 of all the Newfield banker's stock. The dead paper of 
 two mouths before sold now at inflated values ; and the 
 sum thus realized not only cancelled all honest debts and 
 redeemed all dishonest ones, but likewise included a sur- 
 plus which served to clear the Harriman home, whose heavy 
 mortgage had been Steele's guilty secret. As to the 
 Land and Mine Companies which the orator of the bank- 
 steps, on the fatal night of the Freshet, had denounced as 
 frauds, Kingsley had not,' and proved that he had not, 
 been implicated in them. These had been Steele's pri- 
 vate ventures, and though not strictly legitimate ones, 
 resembled the devil in only that they were less black 
 than they had been painted. Suffice it to say that none 
 of the investors lost by them. There were a few who 
 knew, and many who suspected, that the honorable settle- 
 ment of the Harriman affairs was not due to the dead 
 banker's integrity ; but even these, recalling his prompt 
 payments made upon demand up to the hour of his 
 death, faltered in their conviction against him, and as 
 time went on, began to doubt if the young banker had 
 not indeed gone down to a hero's rather than to a trait- 
 or's grave. The men who would have been most pitiless 
 to him, living, were the most charitable to him, dead. 
 They forgot the criminal and fugitive, and remembered 
 only the handsome, dashing young banker, the "big 
 house " host, John Harrirnan's son. In life, there would
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 341 
 
 have been no dishonor too great to heap upon him, to 
 whom, in death, they granted an honored memory in lieu 
 of an honored grave. Who shall say that the ways of 
 Providence are only mysterious ? Thev are merciful, as 
 well. 
 
 The five thousand dollars, found where the banker had 
 placed it, in the pocket of the coat worn by Sal during 
 her perilous ride, was added, by Isolde's desire, to the sum 
 the law settled upon Sal as Jack Harriman's legal widow. 
 None suspected whence it had come. The only one who 
 knew kept silence. Isolde did not suffer her to keep 
 aloof, however. Shortly after Steele's death she had 
 sought Magdalen, and induced the guilty but penitent 
 woman to return to Newfield with her. Althea, ignorant 
 of the truth, yet suspected the association to be quixoti- 
 cal ; and declined to enter the house while Magdalen 
 and Sal inhabited it. Overtaking Kingsley as he was 
 walking from the station on one afternoon of early 
 autumn, she drove- him to the gate, however ; com- 
 missioning him to acquaint Isolde with a sweet se- 
 cret which, indeed, she was far from unwilling to con- 
 fide by proxy. The personal confidence would have been 
 embarrassing, even for Althea. It was, that the gold- 
 mine president had capitulated. 
 
 Isolde pressed her baby closer to her breast as Kingsley 
 told her ; but she made no audible answer. She was 
 thinking of little Gaylord, fatherless now as her own 
 child. The tints of the sunset hovered on her hair, but 
 they desecrated with no color her chastened face, lifting 
 from her sombre garments like a lily pure and pale. 
 
 The gate-latch clicked. Up the long path came Jim, 
 and Sal went down to meet him. The grime of the road 
 was washed off him. He was no longer " Engine," but
 
 342 A SOW OF ESAU. 
 
 now "Train-master Jim." The social promotion was re- 
 flected in the physical man. He looked strong, proud, 
 confident. But Sal went toward him slowly. The bereft 
 mother-arms, the lonely mother-heart, ached with their 
 emptiness. 
 
 Isolde's eyes, rather than her lips, smiled at Kingsley as 
 she pointed to them. 
 
 " Her wound will heal," she said. " He must be patient 
 only a little longer. His reward is slow in coming slow, 
 but sure." 
 
 Kingsley had done nobly. He had had it in his power 
 to enrich himself at the expense of the Harriman name, 
 but instead, unknown to Isolde, he had sacrificed, to clear 
 the name, his own large and lawful claim. If he was a 
 poorer man for the deed, he was likewise a happier one. 
 He had been born and bred a good man, and his swerving 
 from the straight path had been an accident. Retracing 
 his steps, he felt the light heart of the exile who treads 
 once more his native heath. Nevertheless the way had 
 been long and lonely, and as he wended it, he had fixed 
 his eyes upon Isolde's face, as the mariner's eyes are fixed 
 on his beacon-star. Did she know it ? Ah ! what woman 
 would not ? Bat the star, guiding the mariner safely to 
 the haven, shines still afar and inaccessible in the high, 
 calm, vestal skies. 
 
 Her words had moved him. Impulsively he drew 
 nearer to her. She read and resolved to answer the un- 
 spoken question in his eyes. For an instant she hesitated, 
 her face hidden in her baby's golden curls. "When she 
 lifted it there was the light upon it of votive consecration. 
 
 " As for me," she said, " the wound will never heal. I 
 have loved, and been loved. Hereafter, my life belongs 
 to my child my child and his and to my work."
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 343 
 
 The man's face paled. He had known that his dream 
 was vain, yet the awakening was bitter. She had her 
 child, and her work. Yes ! But what had he ? 
 
 As if inspired, her soft voice answered his unspoken 
 question. She had stepped beside him, and laid, in 
 speaking, her hand upon his arm. 
 
 "In all our lives," she said, " there is some sweet hope 
 unsatisfied, some sweet dream unrealized, some sweet 
 prayer denied. The little pain chastens life, refines, en- 
 nobles it. It purifies it from the stain of self ; conse- 
 crates it to the service of others. A few weak souls fail 
 their mission ; yours is not one of these. Look behind 
 you ! There, in that shadowed corner, your mission waits 
 you a great, a noble, a Christ-sent one, not only to the 
 woman, but to womanhood, whose service is the noblest 
 manhood knows. Two years ago you loved her. You 
 love her still, for Jove is changeless, deathless. You dream 
 that sin has slain it, but the wound is not a death-wound. 
 Even its scar is yielding to her soul's repentant tears." 
 
 Silence, long and deep and holy. Silence in the 
 shadowed corner ; silence as the man's soul wrestled ; si- 
 lence as the woman sped to God a wordless prayer. 
 
 " I would be patient even for years asking nothing, 
 claiming nothing. Is there no hope for me, absolutely 
 none ? " he cried, miserably. 
 
 " There is every hope for you with her ! " she replied. 
 
 Her answer was final. He accepted it, perforce. 
 
 " Then, since you wish it," he said, at last, " I will go 
 to her ; but it is too late. She is proud. She will not 
 hear me." 
 
 " She will hear you," whispered Isolde. " God be with 
 you. Go." 
 
 Toward the shadowed corner he went slowly.
 
 344 A SON OF ESAU, 
 
 " Magdalen," he whispered. 
 
 Slowly, joylessly, the beautiful brown eyes lifted eyes 
 pathetic not in their joylessuess, but in their lack of 
 hope. 
 
 " Magdalen," he said, " we two stand in the world'alone 
 and stranded ; the old life lies behind us the world, at 
 least to one of us, denies a new. Singly, we are weak 
 together, strong. A man alone is but half a power, a 
 woman alone, powerless ; but the man and woman united 
 make the motor-force which propels life, controls the 
 world, commands it. Place your woman-hand in mine, 
 Magdalen. We will face the world together ! " 
 
 She yearned toward him as the Peri yearned toward 
 heaven, but her pride resisted. 
 
 " I am not worthy," she moaned. 
 
 " My worth is lower. For my wounds of sin I ask your 
 box of precious ointment. Not for my feet, Magdalen, 
 but for my heart ! " 
 
 " I cannot ! " she sobbed. " I cannot ! " 
 
 Isolde heard, and answered her. 
 
 " You can, Magdalen," she whispered. " Will you listen 
 while I tell you how? " 
 
 Only the mute eyes answered her pathetic eyes no 
 longer. Behind their tears was shining the light of hope 
 re-born. 
 
 Isolde spoke : 
 
 "To her woman's place in the world, Life led her. She 
 was young, and very beautiful. Her garments were white 
 and floating, like angel-wings. Her hands were filled with 
 flowers. Experience, an old, white-headed man, smiled 
 bitterly as he saw them. A white rose budded on her 
 breast. Its scent was sweet." 
 
 "I used to know that sweet white flower/' he said,
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 345 
 
 " but the world uproots such, and I have forgotten it. 
 Will you tell me its name ? " 
 
 " Its name," she said, " is Innocence." 
 
 And he smiled again, the same sad, bitter smile ; and 
 summoned one, bold-eyed and glowing-lipped, whose 
 name was Passion. 
 
 And Passion asked : " What do you wish of me? " 
 
 Experience answered : " She wears the pure white bud 
 of perfect Innocence. Until you wrest it from her, I can- 
 not teach her the lessons she must learn." 
 
 And Passion promised: "I will wrest it from her." 
 And he sought her, in her garments white and floating 
 like angel-wings. 
 
 "You still wear Innocence?" he asked, and leaned 
 toward her, and smiled upon her with his bold, bad eyes. 
 
 " I shall wear it always," she said, shrinking from 
 him. 
 
 "You have worn it for the last time," he exulted. " If 
 you wore it still, you would not shrink thus from me. 
 Its petals would bloom between us, like angel-wings." 
 
 " I wear it still," she said, with tears in her soft eyes ; 
 " but it is fading." 
 
 "It will fade on," he told her, "until you know why 
 you shrink from me. When you know, it will bloom 
 again but not as whitely." 
 
 "Tell me why I shrink from you," she prayed, with 
 outstretched hands, "that it may fade no more." 
 
 He clasped the soft white hands in both his own, and 
 smiled into her eyes. 
 
 " Do you know, yet ? " he asked her. And she flushed 
 and shrank and trembled, but she answered, "No ! " 
 
 Then he drew her closer, face toward face, till their lips 
 met. "Do you know, yet?" he asked again. And she
 
 346 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 burned and thrilled and quivered, but her lips still an- 
 swered, "No." 
 
 Then lie opened his arms, and caught her closer 
 closer. Only lips to lips they were no longer, but heart 
 to heart. 
 
 " Do you know, now? " he whispered. 
 
 And cowering, weeping, shuddering, she answered, 
 "Yes." 
 
 And lo ! the bud on her breast was the sweet white bud 
 of Innocence no longer. The bud had bloomed, the white 
 rose blushed. Innocence had matured to Knowledge. 
 
 Upon the flowers still fair 'and fresh within her hands 
 she looked down sadly. She was wondering if they too 
 would change. 
 
 And Experience came again, and looking at the flowers, 
 drew from them five sweet violets, and asked her, " What 
 are their names ? " 
 
 And she answered : " These are the blue-eyed flowers 
 of Youthful Dreams, and their names are Faith, Hope, 
 Friendship, Love, and Joy." 
 
 " Faith in what ?" he asked her. 
 
 "Faith is a dual flower," she told him ; "and its blos- 
 soms are Faith-in-God, and Faith-in-Man ! " 
 
 And he smiled once more the same sad, bitter smile ; 
 and summoned one, wan-eyed, chill-breathed by name 
 Uufaith. 
 
 "While she wears Faith," he whispered, "I cannot 
 teach her the world's lessons." 
 
 And Unfaith breathed upon the blue-eyed flower, and 
 both its blossoms paled and shrunk and died ! 
 
 "O my Faith ! my Faith!" moaned the maiden, and 
 kissed the dead bud as it fluttered to the ground.
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 37 
 
 But Uiifaith said, and Experience told her he spoke 
 truly: 
 ."Faith was only a dream." 
 
 And Experience touched the second flower. Like Faith, 
 it bore a double blossom. It was bright and warm and 
 fair. 
 
 " What is its name ? " he asked her, touching its bluer 
 blossom. 
 
 And she answered, " Divine Hope." 
 
 " Hope of what ? " he questioned. 
 
 "Hope of the soul for heaven," she would have an- 
 swered, but her voice faltered ; the words failed her. Soul 
 and heaven were dreams, since Faith was but a dream 
 dreams, all three dead dreams ! 
 
 And her tears fell on them, but even as she wept, her 
 sad eyes brightened. 
 
 " You have taken from me Innocence, and Faith, and 
 Divine Hope in soul and heaven," she said ; "but Human 
 Hope at least is left me." 
 
 And he answered, "Is it?" 
 
 And summoned to her side Despair. 
 
 Only three of the blue-eyed flowei's of Youthful Dreams 
 were left her. Hope, like Faith, was trampled in the dust. 
 
 Experience touched the third flower. 
 
 "Its name?" he asked her. 
 
 And she answered "Friendship," and pressed it to her 
 lips in fond caress. 
 
 " Innocence, and Faith, and Hope have fled me," she 
 sobbed, " but you at least are faithful, my friend, my 
 friend ! "
 
 348 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 "You shall test her," smiled Experience. And he 
 summoned the revealer, Truth. 
 
 " She says," he whispered, " that her friend is true and 
 faithful." 
 
 And Truth asked her : " Besides Friendship, \vhat 
 Youthful Dreams are left ? " 
 
 And the maiden answered : " Innocence, and Faith, and 
 Hope are wakened ; but Friendship dreams on still, and 
 Love, and Joy." 
 
 And Truth said : " Friendship, Love, and Joy are 
 dreams that wake all three together," and lifted the veil 
 of Distance, and bade the maiden look. 
 
 And in the arms of her lover she saw her friend ; and 
 heard them, between their kisses, mock her faith and love ; 
 and the dreams of Friendship and Love were wakened, 
 and Joy died, in bearing Pain. 
 
 Again Experience sought her. Her hands were almost 
 empty. Faith, and Hope, and Friendship, and Love, and 
 Joy had fled them. Only two fair flowers were left. 
 
 One was a pure white lily. Experience touched it. 
 
 " I do not know it," he said. 
 
 She looked at him with her sad, pure eyes. Her pale 
 lips parted proudly. 
 
 "You took my Innocence," she said, "and left me 
 Knowledge. You have robbed me of Faith, and Hope, 
 and Friendship, and Love, and Joy the sweet brief 
 dreams of Youth and Innocence ; but you have done your 
 worst. This lily is mine forever. Its name is Purity." 
 
 He gazed at her in wonder. 
 
 " You have not sullied it yet ? " he asked her. 
 
 " I shall never sully it," she answered.
 
 y OF ESAU. 349 
 
 Then he summoned Temptation. 
 
 As an angel of light Temptation came to her. His white 
 wings hid his cloven foot. 
 
 So she listened to him, at first shyly, then with spell- 
 bound eyes and parted quivering lips. And when he 
 bade her follow him, she went resistlessly ; unheedful of 
 her beautiful lily of Purity, which Temptation, with his 
 cloven foot, was trampling in the dust. 
 
 In years that seemed like days to her Sin wings time, 
 Virtue alone drags it she returned. She was changed. 
 Her garments, that had been white and floating like 
 angel-pinions, were white and floating no longer. Their 
 white was sullied. They trailed behind her like broken 
 wings. She was very pale, and her lips were as lips of 
 marble. A single flower, the white tube-rose, was in her 
 hand. 
 
 Experience shunned her eyes, and fled her. But one 
 replaced him, whose name she did not know. 
 
 "Give me your flower," he told her. 
 
 But she clasped it to her breast and pleaded wildly. 
 
 " Not this ! not this ! " she cried. " I have yielded Inno- 
 cence, and Faith, and Hope, and Friendship, and Love, 
 and Joy, and Purity. None can give them back. I will 
 not live without them. I will not yield this chill, pale 
 flower the sweet, sweet flower of Death ! " 
 
 But he snatched it from her, and flung it backward 
 far, far back, over the long, lone path her weary spirit 
 must retrace. 
 
 And he said to her : " Death I hold to the laughing lips 
 of Joy, but from Pain's wan lips I wrest it." 
 
 " But why ? " she moaned. " Why ? "
 
 350 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 Aud he answered, " Because I am Retribution, first- 
 born of Justice. And he who sows Pain must reap it, 
 and its seeds are Love, Joy, Sin." 
 
 "I sowed no Love," she cried, "for Love, ere Life's 
 springtime, failed me. I sowed no Joy. Pain snatched 
 it from me ere I knew the seed." 
 
 " You sowed Sin," he told her. 
 
 " Last, not first ! " she pleaded. 
 
 But he thundered, "First! " 
 
 " How ? " she moaned. 
 
 To the red rose on her breast he pointed sternly. 
 
 "As the bud expands to bloom, so my Innocence matured 
 to Knowledge," she sobbed. "I could not hold it back." 
 
 And she strove to tear the red rose from its place, but 
 she could not loosen it Its thorns were bedded in her 
 shuddering woman-breast. 
 
 " The bud of Innocence must bloom to Knowledge," 
 he said, " but Life, and Maturity, and Wisdom, and above 
 all, Love, should have matured it. You suffered Passion 
 to usurp them. Therein lay your sin." 
 
 And she answered not, but crouched with shamed face, 
 mute. 
 
 And Retribution spoke on. 
 
 "Faith and Hope,''" he said, "are theologic virtues, 
 whose pure and holy influence had guarded Friendship 
 true and Love inviolate, if the vice of human Passion had 
 not sullied your soul's shrine. Joy had abided with them, 
 and by their strength Temptation been resisted. Then 
 Purity, the celestial lily, had not been lost and trodden 
 in the dust!" 
 
 "The loss, is it eternal? " she moaned. " Shall I never 
 find it, never wear it again ? May its sullied petals never 
 more be white ? "
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 351 
 
 Beneath his silence she shrunk in shaine and anguish, 
 cowering till her fair head pressed the dust. 
 
 " Death ! Death ! Death ! " she moaned. 
 
 And he asked her : " Why do you wish for Death, you, 
 who are young and beautiful ? " 
 
 And she answered : " Because of remorse and shame." 
 
 Then, for the first time, his eyes grew soft and tender. 
 He raised her from the ground, and lifted her face toward 
 his. 
 
 " Remorse redeems the sin," he said. " Be not ashamed. 
 My silence meant no evil. I did not answer, because I 
 do not know. It is a question which not a man, but a 
 woman must answer a woman who has sinned and has 
 repented, and whose punishment is to wear upon her 
 breast, not the white rose of Death, but the blood-red 
 thorn of Life. The world awaits the answer. Will you 
 be the woman to give it ? " 
 
 A great but chastened joy flashed into her pale 
 face. 
 
 " I will be the woman," she answered. " O, I will be 
 the woman, if I may ! " 
 
 " The thorn-wound will be cruel," he said. " For years 
 it will pierce and torture your woman -heart." 
 
 She bared her warm white breast in swift, mute answer, 
 and over her heart, where the soft flesh was most tender, 
 he sunk the cruel thorn. 
 
 "Its prongs are many," he said: " Pride and Preju- 
 dice, the Taunt of Man and the Scorn of Woman ; Malice, 
 Envy, Distrust. Their sting is bitter. Can you endure 
 it ? It has no human balm." 
 
 " No human balm ? " she repeated. " Then what balm 
 has it ? " 
 
 "The balm," he answered, "of Divine Forgiveness."
 
 352 A SON OF ESAU. 
 
 She fell on her knees. Her face was rapt, exalted. 
 
 "Where the God leads, the man must follow," she cried. 
 "The human forgiveness will come in time." 
 
 And lo ! as she rose, eyes wet, and heart still bleed- 
 ing, the celestial lily of Purity glowed snow-white upon 
 her breast. 
 
 " Magdalen ! " called Kingsley. 
 
 She sunk on her knees beside him. The mute act was 
 her answer. She had wept the tears, she had borne the 
 thorn-wounds. Her sin's redemption was consummated 
 with her prayer. 
 
 Isolde stole away, leaving the two together. With her 
 child on her breast, she sped through the falling dusk, 
 the deepening shadows, to the brink of the lonely Freshet. 
 In her eyes were tears, but they shone with the light of 
 stars. 
 
 "The last of your wrongs is righted," she sobbed, 
 sinking upon her knees and leaning her lips to the chill 
 dark waters. " O my darling, my darling, at last you may 
 sleep in peace ! " 
 
 Over the twilight shadows a silvery chime broke 
 softly. From the little Catholic chapel was ringing the 
 vesper-bell. 
 
 She listened till the last sweet echo faded. Then her 
 eyes turned toward the spire, cross-shaped against the 
 evening sky. 
 
 "It is the faith of my fathers," she murmured. "For 
 my son's sake, I will go back to it. It is the faith that 
 keeps men pure because it holds women holy ; which 
 makes marriage a sacrament, and love eternal ; spanning 
 the grave, and pointing love's service beyond it, past
 
 A SON OF ESAU. 353 
 
 the mortal flesh, death-smitten, to the live, immortal 
 soul ! " 
 The words of the grand old requiem recurred to her : 
 
 "Eternal rest give unto them, Lord! " 
 " And let perpetual light shine upon them." 
 " May they rest in peace." 
 
 And the Freshet waters responded, 
 "Amen ! Amen !" 
 
 THE EXD. 
 
 . . . " Long green days, 
 
 Worn bare of grass and sunshine long calm nights, 
 From which the silken sleeps were fretted out, 
 Be witness for me, with no amateur's 
 Irreverent haste and busy idleness, 
 I set myself to art ! What then ? What's done ? 
 What's done, at last ? 
 
 Behold at last, a book ! " f 
 
 Aurora Leigh.
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
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