THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE CHASM
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 A NOVEL BY 
 GEORGE CRAM COOK 
 
 "/ love those -who sacrifice themselves to 
 the earth, that the earth may be one day 
 the Superman s" 
 
 SO SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA 
 
 "Come shoulder to shoulder ere earth 
 grows older! The Cause spreads over 
 land and sea." 
 
 THE VOICE OF TOIL 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 Copyright, IQII, by 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 
 All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign 
 languages, including the Scandinavian 
 
 February,
 
 Til 
 
 PARTI 
 
 MOLINE 
 
 THE nine-fifteen train was speeding toward Mo- 
 line on the Mississippi. At the window of one 
 of the Pullman staterooms, a girl, lifting her 
 eyes from her book, looked out across black, fall- 
 plowed furrows, russet plains cut with barbed-wire 
 fences, wet fields full of broken and withered corn 
 stalks tramped by cattle. The sky was covered with 
 gray, amorphous cloud. 
 
 "How dismal this country is," said the girl. 
 
 "We should have stayed in Italy till May at least," 
 answered her middle-aged mother in the chair oppo 
 site. 
 
 The girl s tightened lips marked her inward de 
 nial. 
 
 "You must learn, Marion, to find your sunshine in 
 your own soul," preached the lady. "Roman palaz- 
 zo or desert island are all one to me." 
 
 "If you mean that first palazzo we tried to exist 
 in give me the island." 
 
 "Some day you will learn to make yourself inde- 
 
 -fo;-.-;pr- 
 .1 di < w-.4 -> *.^v^i
 
 2 THE CHASM 
 
 pendent of the external world and be complete in 
 yourself," the other continued, not to be diverted 
 by frivolous exaggerations. 
 
 "You have to depend on external dressmakers, 
 though. And what about food, Mama?" 
 
 "The day may come when we learn to nourish 
 our bodies spiritually," the mother maintained. 
 
 Marion reopened her book Fogazzaro s "II 
 Santo" printed in Italian and privately bound in 
 hand-tooled crimson levant. On the title-page, in 
 Russian-looking script was written the name of Ma 
 rion Moulton and that of Feodor de Hohenfels. 
 
 As soon as her mother became immersed in her 
 new thought pamphlet, the girl let her head sink 
 back and closed her eyelids. 
 
 The Italian maid on the other side of the room 
 laid down her needlework and brought a small 
 cushion. 
 
 "You re very thoughtful," said Marion, speaking 
 Italian. 
 
 "If the signorina would let me take off that great 
 hat?" suggested Mathilde. "The cinders do not 
 come in any more." Brown veil and green velvet hat 
 removed, the girl s red-gold hair showed circlewise 
 around her head in a massive coil like a garland or a 
 crown. Without taking off her long brown gloves, 
 she had slipped her right hand free to turn the leaves 
 of her book. For ring, so soft it could be molded to 
 her finger, she wore a thick band of gold, from 
 which, in gypsy setting, the highest point of light in 
 her color scheme, gleamed a vivid yellow diamond. 
 
 "What does the word abaco mean, Mathilde?" 
 asked Marion. She suspected it of being an abacus.
 
 THE CHASM 3 
 
 Of course she must know what an abacus was, only 
 she found she didn t. Mathilde also had to con 
 vince herself of her ignorance and was looking the 
 word up in an Italian dictionary when she was inter 
 rupted by a knock at the stateroom door. The por 
 ter gave her a card, which she handed to Marion. 
 
 "George Pearson," she read. 
 
 Asked to come in, a correctly attired young man 
 with thin brown hair, aquiline nose and narrow chin 
 greeted the ladies effusively. "We d begun to think 
 you were never coming back," he said, seating him 
 self. "To think of my being on the same train! I 
 didn t see you get on. The conductor asked me if I 
 knew you were on board. Not that I m in the habit 
 of talking to conductors, but this one used to know 
 
 me when I was a small boy, so of course " He 
 
 stopped, judging he had said enough to justify the 
 intimacy of the trainman. 
 
 Marion did not look very sympathetic, and Mr. 
 Pearson concluded he must be careful not to offend 
 her presumable new standards of exclusiveness ac 
 quired in her recent contact with the European aris 
 tocracy. 
 
 "How is Lady Diotima, George?" 
 
 "Lady Diotima? Oh, yes, that s what you used 
 to call my mother. Why, she s well, thank you. 
 She will want to see you right away." 
 
 "I have strange tales for her sympathetic ears." 
 
 "I d like to hear a little of that, myself," the young 
 man suggested, glancing at Mrs. Moulton, and then 
 at his watch. "I want you folks to take lunch with 
 me. They have a new diner a beauty, finished in 
 mission style."
 
 4 THE CHASM 
 
 "They re waiting lunch for us at home," Marion 
 explained. "Won t papa be cross by two?" she 
 added to her mother. 
 
 "Thank you, though, George," said Mrs. Moul- 
 ton. 
 
 "Don t let us keep you from your lunch," put in 
 Marion. 
 
 "Why-uh, there s no hurry. I m awfully anxious 
 to find out if some things I ve heard are true." 
 
 "I am going to take just a peep at that mission 
 car," announced Mrs. Moulton. 
 
 "Mother!" Marion remonstrated, but Mrs. 
 Moulton was undeterred and left. 
 
 "Your mother is a brick," said George enthusias 
 tically. "Quickest person. She knew I wanted to 
 ask you some things." 
 
 "Naturally since you said so. But did she know 
 I wanted you to ask them?" 
 
 "Why, don t you? Seems to me I have pretty 
 near a right to, Marion." 
 
 "Do you believe much in rights of that sort? 
 If you want me to do anything, make me want to." 
 
 "What kind of a moral standard is that doing 
 only what you want to?" demanded George, looking 
 severe. 
 
 "That is all we do anyway. One way is to do 
 things honestly because we want to. The other 
 is to find some lofty moral ground for doing the 
 very same things." 
 
 "What becomes of the will-power of a person 
 who does only what he wants to?" 
 
 "Is there such a person? Well, I should say
 
 THE CHASM 5 
 
 strength is developed by doing things rather than 
 by not doing them." 
 
 "Are those European ideas?" demanded George. 
 
 "Not particularly. They are Marionian ideas. 
 Your mother shares them." 
 
 "Oh, mother! It s all talk with her. She acts 
 just like everybody else. I m afraid you wouldn t." 
 
 "I haven t the faintest desire to ! Do you suppose 
 I would be guilty of acting just like anybody else 
 by cut and dried formulas rules of propriety 
 with never a guiding emotion of my own never 
 one spontaneous yes or no out of my own heart 
 a clockwork dummy wound up to do the proper 
 thing?" 
 
 "Why, who in the world are you talking about, 
 Marion? You don t mean my mother, do you?" 
 
 "Your mother, you idiot! Bless your heart, no! 
 I mean about everybody but her. She is a live per 
 son in the midst of a lot of social automata." 
 
 Mr. Pearson rose abruptly. "I don t think I care 
 to ask you, Miss Moulton, about your reported en 
 gagement to that foreigner, since you consider me 
 an idiot!" 
 
 "I didn t suppose you were really one !" 
 
 "I never had a girl call me that in my life. I 
 don t propose to give any girl the chance to do it 
 twice." 
 
 "Don t be a baby, George ! Sit down here. Must 
 I really explain that we feminine mortals call no 
 one but our intimates idiots?" 
 
 "I would prefer to be excluded from that select 
 circle."
 
 6 THE CHASM 
 
 "That s clever!" She smiled at him winningly, 
 but her unflattering surprise at his cleverness irri 
 tated him still more and he refused to relax. "Oh, 
 well," she said, settling herself in her chair and pre 
 paring to dismiss him from her thoughts. 
 
 "If those are European ideas and manners of 
 yours, young lady, I think you d better stay in Mo- 
 line and lose a little polish." He threw loose the 
 curtain. Looking out of the corner of his eye to 
 see how Marion was taking his departure, he had 
 the misfortune to collide with Mrs. Moulton return 
 ing from her peep at the mission car. 
 
 "It didn t take you long, Marion," commented 
 Mrs. Moulton, resuming her chair. 
 
 "No, I was abominably rude to him and he didn t 
 know it. Then I made amends by being nice and 
 he thought I was insulting him. All he can hear is 
 words. Mr. G. Pearson shows me what a dungeon 
 Moline would be to me. Oh, I hate papa every 
 time I think of it!" 
 
 "Marion!" 
 
 "And I think about it all the time. Even when I m 
 asleep some of my mind still burns with the humilia 
 tion of that cablegram." 
 
 "It would have worked out all right if you hadn t 
 insisted on leaving. You gave Feodor no chance 
 to forgive you." 
 
 "I can t bear to be forgiven. I won t be. If papa 
 won t write and apologize I shall contrive somehow 
 to make my own living. I will have nothing more 
 to do with papa never in my life !" 
 
 "If you would leave it to me everything would 
 work out all right. I have been sending the right in-
 
 THE CHASM 7 
 
 fluence into your father s mind every night and 
 morning since we left Rome." 
 
 The girl picked up an alligator hand-purse, 
 glanced at a miniature watch set in the leather and 
 realized that in another half hour she would be 
 facing her father. The tension of her nerves grew 
 painful. A stop in East Moline seemed prolonged 
 wantonly. When the air-brake fell in Moline she 
 reached the station platform and located the driver 
 of the motor-car before her mother and Mathilde 
 appeared. 
 
 The driver, Eldridge, affected by her tense atmos 
 phere, sent his machine recklessly through the dingy 
 brick business section crowded with workingmen, 
 past the great factories, up the hill on the high 
 power, between the terra cotta pillars at the gate of 
 Hillcrest, along the curving driveway, past the con 
 servatory and under the archway of the porte 
 cochere where the heavy car skidded a little on the 
 concrete flags and stopped. 
 
 A footman in livery and white gloves opened the 
 door the end of their five thousand mile journey 
 the door of "Dave" Moulton, plow manufacturer, 
 the great man of Moline. 
 
 Mr. Moulton was just coming downstairs as they 
 entered a big, slow-moving man of fifty with well- 
 trimmed, reddish brown beard and florid cheeks. 
 He was unconsciously chewing the end of a thick, 
 unlighted cigar. His high forehead was a little 
 flushed and moist, his blue eyes keen behind rimless 
 gold spectacles. "I m glad to see you, Anne," he 
 said. His voice was deep and convincing. He evi 
 dently wished to have no more made of this than if
 
 8 THE CHASM 
 
 his wife had been away only a day. He returned 
 her kiss perfunctorily and turned to Marion. "How 
 are you, daughter?" he said, extending his hand. 
 
 "I don t feel like shaking hands with you," she 
 said. 
 
 His hand drew back abruptly, his lips and eyes 
 ominously hardening. "Oh, is that the way you 
 feel?" He turned toward the library as though 
 there were nothing more to be said. 
 
 The girl matched his effect of indifference by 
 giving Mathilde some directions in Italian; and 
 then, without looking at her father, she crossed to 
 the foot of the stairs. Having expected some invol 
 untary word or sign indicating her desire not to let 
 her first greeting go unmodified, he gave her a 
 curious look as he saw her sticking to it. "Oh, 
 Marion!" he called. 
 
 She stopped and looked back. 
 
 "We ll have to fight it out you and I," he said 
 incisively. "It will be better if we do it at once." 
 
 She decided it was too much like an order and 
 went on, followed by Mathilde. "I shall be in the 
 library a few minutes before lunch," she said. 
 
 "I suppose I am to await your pleasure there," 
 he remarked. 
 
 "If you choose," she answered, as she disap 
 peared. 
 
 He felt that he had lost the key to her mind. 
 "That seems to be a high and mighty daughter of 
 yours, Mrs. Moulton," he observed. "I find the 
 Illinois legislature somewhat easier to control." 
 
 He was not in the library when Marion came
 
 THE CHASM 9 
 
 down. Rather than sit face to face with him at 
 table she decided to have luncheon in her own 
 rooms, and telephoned her Lady Diotima to come 
 quick and keep her company. "There is war," she 
 announced. "I m blue and lonesome and dying to 
 see you. I need your moral support. I ll tell you 
 my troubles and I ll even let you give me advice." 
 
 "Will you promise to follow it if it s exactly what 
 you think yourself?" Mrs. Pearson demanded. "Oh, 
 I can t wait to see you, Marion. I ll be over in 
 stantly." 
 
 Half an hour later the Lady Diotima, coming 
 into the large, book-lined room which Marion called 
 her "lair," set her eyes of unfaded blue upon a 
 physically radiant creature, fresh from her bath, in 
 a silvery-looking negligee revealing white rondures 
 of throat and shoulder. For a moment the girl s 
 face glowed with welcome in the sumptuous light of 
 a drift-wood fire, and then she flew into the woman s 
 arms and hugged her. "Oh, Diotima, you are worth 
 all the rest of America!" she crooned. "I would 
 perish here if it weren t for you ! Do you still love 
 me?" 
 
 "Against my conscience yes, you vagabond! You 
 deserve nothing of the sort. I ve been shamefully 
 neglected left here to age and ossify with never a 
 letter from Rome and all sorts of fascinating 
 rumors unverified." 
 
 "What has age to do with your young soul? 
 I won t waste breath apologizing. You know the 
 Marionian psychology too well to expect a letter 
 when you ought to have it." She put her arm around
 
 10 THE CHASM 
 
 Lady Diotima s shoulder, intending to take off her 
 mink stole, but forgot and let her hand linger strok 
 ing the smooth fur. 
 
 "Eat, child," commanded Mrs. Pearson, tossing 
 her muff on the window-seat and taking off her 
 toque. "You must be famished." 
 
 "I am," admitted Marion, and seated herself at a 
 little table set with chafing dish and charcoal-heated 
 samovar. The dark green curtain behind her was in 
 shadow, the girl in firelight. One white, high-heeled 
 slipper was outlined in startling beauty on the dark, 
 highly polished floor that almost mirrored it. Lady 
 Diotima watched the girl s graceful, leisurely hands 
 as she drew a cup of tea and balanced across it a 
 spoon containing a lump of sugar which she satu 
 rated with brandy from a flask cased in silver filigree, 
 and ignited with a gold-handled alcohol lighter. 
 Mathilde carefully set for the visitor this cup over 
 which the blue and fragrant flame danced as with 
 feet that rose and fell. "That s your flame-fairy," 
 explained Marion. "Isn t he nice this chilly day?" 
 
 "Charming as he is, I m no salamander," pro 
 tested the lady. "He ll have to die before I drink 
 him." 
 
 "Oh, he doesn t die. He reincarnates himself in 
 the tea." 
 
 The Lady Diotima looked dreamily at the flame, 
 then thoughtfully at Marion, who glanced at Ma 
 thilde and told her she would not be needed. 
 
 "You speak Italian unconsciously!" Mrs. Pear 
 son commented with a little note of envy. 
 
 "Yes, isn t that nice? I have even accomplished 
 the feat of dreaming in Italian."
 
 THE CHASM 11 
 
 "I suppose you ve forgotten you learned your first 
 Italian phrases from my phonograph?" 
 
 "Could I ever forget that mournful invalid who 
 always wanted a bed or a cab or a room or a doctor 
 and for twenty-six lessons refused to eat one single 
 
 bite? Which reminds me " Uncovering the 
 
 chafing dish, she served herself with creamed sweet 
 breads. 
 
 The flame-fairy having danced himself and his 
 sugar pedestal away, Lady Diotima turned so she 
 could see the fireplace and the play of light on the 
 bronze replica of Rodin s "The Thinker" who sat 
 in silent power above the tiers of books, and musing 
 sipped her tea. 
 
 Twice in the six years of their intimacy she had 
 turned the current of the girl s life. 
 
 When Marion was seventeen her awakened na 
 ture, under her mother s influence, had thrown it 
 self ardently into one of the modern cults of spirit 
 ual mysticism. Being a rebel by nature the girl had 
 delighted in that revolt against "orthodoxy." She 
 had attempted to convert Mrs. Pearson and had 
 given her some of the wonderful literature of her 
 cult. Mrs. Pearson began skillfully to preach the 
 beauty of accurate thinking, with the result that the 
 girl, fired with the passion for study, had tutors to 
 prepare her for college and became a Vassar grind. 
 
 Contact with scholarly women developed a habit 
 of mind that freed her from the spell of the esoteric, 
 but two years of safe, sane Vassar began to make her 
 dull. Then the Lady Diotima, named by Marion 
 after that wise woman who was the teacher of 
 Socrates, cried down mere intellect and preached
 
 12 THE CHASM 
 
 life; disparaged knowledge and taught power. To be 
 a social, an intellectual, even a political force a 
 power behind the throne to have influence through 
 charm to modernize the role of Madame Re- 
 camier the ideal of the old French salon all this 
 the Lady Diotima preached. 
 
 The two of them tried it in Washington one win 
 ter but not two. Not men, but soulless "interests" 
 being there the real power, there was in Washington 
 no significant role for a woman, however gifted with 
 beauty or brains or charm. Wealth did count, but 
 not for its esthetic use, the only use that Marion 
 knew or cared for. 
 
 "My face is set toward Europe," then said Mar 
 ion. 
 
 Mr. Pearson s health failing, Lady Diotima did 
 not make the European campaign, and now, as she 
 drank her tea she was keen for history. 
 
 "Marion Moulton," she broke out, "do you in 
 tend to tell me of your own free will and accord 
 whether you are engaged? It s your last chance." 
 
 "How unflattering!" said Marion, buttering a 
 French roll. 
 
 "Stupid! Your last chance to tell except under 
 torture." 
 
 "Unfortunately I m not thanks to my tactful 
 papa." 
 
 "Do tell what happened." 
 
 "From the beginning?" 
 
 "No, the end first. I couldn t stand the suspense. 
 And before you tell the end tell me if it is the end." 
 
 "Papa again. If I can make him do what he 
 should "
 
 THE CHASM 13 
 
 "Ah-hem! Financially?" 
 
 "No, confound him! That s what he thought! 
 That s what he took for granted. That s what he 
 cabled to Feodor right out of a blue sky that 
 insulting assumption. And now you too ! I thought 
 you would take it for granted that I had brains 
 enough to tell the difference between a man and a 
 fortune hunter!" 
 
 "Well, well, Marion, we all know European 
 marriage customs." 
 
 "The mistake you both make is in assuming that 
 Feodor de Hohenfels is a creature of custom. I 
 know him and I know myself and I flatter myself 
 I can afford not to be jealous of my own dot." 
 
 "What made your father send this cablegram?" 
 
 "I didn t consider it necessary to beat about the 
 bush with him. I wrote him that De Hohenfels had 
 made me a proposal of marriage and I intended to 
 accept it. I told him what kind of a man De Hohen 
 fels was brilliant, talented, a daring steeple-chaser, 
 good-looking, influential, estates in Russia, winter 
 residence in Rome a quaint old Palazzo and gar 
 den, and above all I didn t tell papa this a man 
 who had just about outlived his enthusiasms when 
 he met me." 
 
 "And naturally they revived," said Lady Diotima 
 dryly. "Very good incense. What form is his re 
 vived ambition going to take?" 
 
 "That doesn t particularly matter. I m told he 
 is a wonderful stylist in Russian. He could be emi 
 nent in musical criticism. He has the position and 
 the brains to make himself a leader of the younger 
 nobility. He is a candidate for the new Duma and
 
 14 THE CHASM 
 
 may become a power for progress in Russia." 
 "He certainly sounds wonderful," said Mrs. Pear 
 son, trying to decide how much allowance should be 
 made for Marion s friendly and imaginative vision. 
 If the half were true she saw the futility of her son 
 George s hopes of Marion. 
 
 "I didn t like him a bit the night I first met him," 
 Marion confided. "You see, mama and I started 
 wrong in Rome. Mama met one of her old friends 
 whom she considered most patrician. She had mar 
 ried an Italian. I was foolish enough to believe in 
 the lady and let her plan a reception for us. We had 
 everything wrong wrong place, wrong people, 
 people invited whom the most patrician person 
 imagined she knew, or her husband knew and he 
 was a joke, and oh, it was awful ! so awful the 
 swagger people came for a lark and De Hohenfels 
 put them up to that. Of course I became aware of 
 his attitude as soon as he was introduced. Maybe I 
 didn t know the ropes of Roman society, but I 
 knew how to deal with a man who accepted my hos 
 pitality for the purpose of making fun of it. He 
 thought he was doing it so subtly! He was nice and 
 frank when I cornered him, and you should have 
 seen him make amends. He told everybody the 
 Titian American was a social treasure. They who 
 came to scoff remained et cetera, and I was not 
 butchered to make a Roman holiday. Little Marion 
 became the thing, was invited everywhere, and a 
 month later, with the guidance of Feodor s mother, 
 the Countess Xenia, and her brother Prince Razin- 
 sky, we gave a ball oh, beautifully right. You
 
 THE CHASM 15 
 
 couldn t have thrown a cat without hitting an ambas 
 sador or a prince or a duchess those funny Roman 
 nobles, ruined in land speculation, who come with 
 splendid carriages and empty stomachs." 
 
 "Well, talk about luck!" exclaimed Lady Dioti- 
 ma. "But you started to tell me about your father s 
 cablegram." 
 
 "In my letter to papa I came square out about 
 my dot. I wanted a big one and asked how big he 
 would make it. I simply said it was the custom in 
 Europe, and a girl marrying in Europe ought to do 
 it right." 
 
 "In Rome as the Russians do," Mrs. Pearson 
 suggested sympathetically. 
 
 "Exactly. What does papa do but send a cable 
 gram to mama, and get Feodor s address; and the 
 next thing I suppose the first time Fedya realized 
 there was such a person as papa came this message 
 saying: Do not care to purchase European title for 
 my daughter. Much obliged for offer. 
 
 "How did the count take that?" 
 
 "How could he? It made him furious!" 
 
 "Did it make him break things off with you?" 
 
 "Nonsense, Diotima. I simply couldn t stand it. 
 It was such a hopeless, crude, horrible, uncalled-for 
 piece of impertinence! If you only knew how in 
 congruous that message and that man!" 
 
 "But what happened? What did you say? What 
 did you do?" 
 
 "I couldn t say anything. I was dazed and 
 more humiliated more than I shall ever allow my 
 self to be again!"
 
 16 THE CHASM 
 
 "Was the man angry with you?" 
 
 "With me no. He wanted me to marry him 
 that day to show papa." 
 
 "Well, that was correct. Really I m glad you 
 didn t, but why didn t you? Your father would 
 have respected both of you for that. Now you have 
 apparently confirmed his suspicions." 
 
 "It won t take me long to disabuse his mind of 
 that particular delusion." 
 
 "But how did you leave things, Marion? What 
 understanding have you with De Hohenfels?" 
 
 "None. I simply fled. Mother and I left Rome 
 that night." 
 
 "Well Marion Moulton! You certainly did lose 
 your head. Do you know what you are here for?" 
 
 "To make papa take it back!" said the girl 
 grimly.
 
 II 
 
 MRS. MOULTON interrupted Lady Dioti- 
 ma s visit with the information that Mar 
 ion s father was alone in the library. 
 
 "Did he send for me?" the girl demanded. 
 
 "No. He didn t even mention your name all 
 through luncheon, but I know from the quality of 
 
 the thought-force he radiated that Would you 
 
 like it, Mrs. Pearson, if you hadn t seen your son 
 for over a year and he refused even to shake hands 
 with you?" 
 
 "I am told that even pugilists shake hands be 
 fore they fight," agreed Lady Diotima. 
 
 "Oh, dear!" exclaimed Marion impatiently. "I 
 do often bow to custom and treat people hypocriti 
 cally but not papa. And not you, Lady Diotima. 
 Whenever I feel like quarrelling with you I intend 
 to do it." She rose abruptly. "I might as well see 
 him and have it over," she said, and called Mathilde. 
 After promising Mrs. Pearson to come to see her 
 next day, Marion dressed for the afternoon and 
 went down to her father s study. 
 
 As she entered, Mr. Moulton appeared to be ab 
 sorbed in the pages of "The Iron Age." 
 
 "Am I interrupting you?" she inquired. 
 
 17
 
 18 THE CHASM 
 
 "Oh, come in." 
 
 She seated herself without hurry in the big leather 
 chair on the opposite side of her father s wide, or 
 derly table. "I suppose we might as well have it 
 out," she said. 
 
 "Good! Well, what is it we are to quarrel 
 about?" 
 
 Marion found it difficult to avoid liking him. 
 "As if you didn t know perfectly!" 
 
 "You forget. I am not the mind-reading member 
 of the family." 
 
 "You know you sent an insulting cablegram to 
 Feodor de Hohenfels and that he and I were on the 
 point of engaging ourselves to marry." 
 
 "You didn t did you?" 
 
 "He would have married me that day, but I 
 wished first to have him receive from you a letter of 
 apology. I came home to ask you to write it. Will 
 you do it?" 
 
 "Suppose I will not?" 
 
 "There s no use going into that until it is certain 
 you will not." 
 
 "I hope I shall not find it necessary." 
 
 "What, in your opinion, will make it unneces 
 sary?" 
 
 "Your own decision that I acted wisely." 
 
 "Wisely! You acted without the slightest knowl 
 edge of facts, persons, or circumstances. You blazed 
 away with your eyes shut. You were governed by 
 a provincial prejudice against the European nobility 
 some platitude you read in a funny paper when you 
 were a boy. If you did things like that in your busi 
 ness you d be bankrupt in a week. You took it for
 
 THE CHASM 19 
 
 granted I was a fool. I know what kind of a man a 
 man is. And yet you five thousand miles away 
 you over-rule my judgment in a case where I have 
 all the facts and you haven t one 1" 
 
 "That s a good many charges to answer all at 
 once, Marion. At least it brought you home with 
 out the gentleman and that was what I wanted." 
 
 "Why did you want to play the devil with my 
 life?" 
 
 "In the first place an American girl is a fool to 
 marry into nations that have a lower ideal of women 
 than her own." 
 
 "Sheer provincial ignorance, I tell you. I have 
 studied exactly what role a woman can play here 
 and abroad. In America an ornament, in Europe 
 a power. I prefer to be a power." 
 
 "You do? I m glad to hear it. That is exactly 
 what I hoped. I respect your preference. You 
 want power. You are running to the ends of the 
 earth for it. You don t know exactly what it is yet, 
 but you want it. You think of it as social, intellec 
 tual, political. As a matter of fact, in the modern 
 world these are merely the shadows of power. The 
 real power is industrial." 
 
 "Industrial power doesn t happen to appeal to me 
 personally. I suppose it s a good foundation, but 
 need I concern" myself about it?" 
 
 Letting his finger slip from the page it had been 
 marking, he thoughtfully broke into a tray the long 
 ash from his cigar, and swung his chair to face her 
 squarely. "Do you know," he asked, "what is hap 
 pening here in the shops and offices of Moline and 
 Rock Island in all these miles of factories that you
 
 20 THE CHASM 
 
 have looked at all your life and never seen? It s a 
 fascinating, big, slow battle between various sets of 
 powerful, determined men. Do you know what it 
 means? It means that in a few years one man will 
 control the plow manufacturing business of the 
 United States. Every furrow that is turned across 
 eight million farms will send its share of tribute in 
 to him. Men in mines, steel-mills, shops, men on 
 railroads and on farms, will depend on him for work 
 and life. Millions of men will collaborate in pour 
 ing in to him a stream of wealth so great the imagi 
 nation cannot conceive it. If I can, I am going to 
 be that man. If I am well, in the natural course 
 of events that stream of wealth will flow to you. 
 You Marion Moulton! A young lady who has 
 decided that in America there is no power to be had. 
 She is looking for it in Europe, in Rome, a city 
 whose chief industries are a wax bead factory for 
 peasant s rosaries and the business of manufactur 
 ing saints relics out of mutton bones." 
 
 11 What a view of eternal Rome I" Marion ex 
 claimed. "Oh, in spite of your narrowness, your 
 blindness to everything in life but business, you do 
 make me feel how big and real your power is and 
 may become. I suppose it s too bad I m not a man. 
 But I m not. You don t want me to remain unmar 
 ried and go to work in your office, do you?" 
 
 "I want you to realize your position. Did they 
 say nobility imposes obligation? That motto has 
 died. The motto that is alive to-day is this : Owner 
 ship imposes obligation. Your marriage is not, as 
 you seem to suppose, a thing that concerns you alone. 
 It is of direct concern to thousands."
 
 THE CHASM 21 
 
 "Just for curiosity, Papa, whom do you want 
 me to marry?" 
 
 "You ought to know I have no intention of trying 
 to dictate to you. If you did decide to carry out 
 your original intention of marrying George Pearson, 
 I should make no objection." 
 
 "When I did think of doing that, you said George 
 didn t have brains enough to be a corporal of in 
 dustry." 
 
 "I was doubtful about George s having the head 
 to carry on a great industry, but it has recently de 
 veloped that Dick Pearson, supposed to be in poor 
 health and thinking only of retiring from business, 
 has really been putting through some tremendous 
 deals in lumber. The rise in timber lands is going 
 to make his holdings simply colossal. The Pearson 
 interests are now so secure that " He hesitated. 
 
 "That your respect for George s brain power has 
 increased?" Marion suggested innocently. 
 
 He scrutinized her, making sure she was con 
 scious of her irony. "He will have advisers and 
 managers. The Pearsons are going to have vast 
 capital to invest in other lines than lumber. The 
 plow industry is attractive. If that capital should 
 back up United States Plow we could ultimately ab 
 sorb our competitors. We may do it single-handed. 
 But any young person looking for power should 
 consider attentively a proposition that would result 
 in one of the great fortunes of the modern world." 
 
 "Don t you see your inconsistency?" said Marion. 
 "You attribute a mercenary motive to De Hohen- 
 fels, reproach him for it, and in the next breath you 
 advise me to marry George Pearson for his money 1"
 
 22 THE CHASM 
 
 "One of these propositions is to your disadvant 
 age, the other to your advantage. I advise you ac 
 cordingly." 
 
 "Assuming that there s no sort of advantage but 
 the economic. No, Papa. You can make business 
 your own God if you like, but you can t make it 
 mine." 
 
 "You are not in a position to assume ethical supe 
 riority in this matter. As a matter of fact you have 
 no moral right to throw away the immense resources 
 that may be yours on any little foreign landowner." 
 
 "Feodor de Hohenfels is not little in any sense 
 of the word." 
 
 "Economically he is exactly that. He owns some 
 farms in Russia. Perhaps he employs a villageful 
 of muzhiks who scratch the ground with wooden 
 plows. What does it amount to? He naturally 
 will have the prejudices and mental limitations of 
 his medieval, land-holding class." 
 
 Marion smiled. " Mental limitations sounds 
 funny, Papa, in connection with the gentleman you 
 are talking about without knowing anything about 
 him. A man has certain aspects besides the eco 
 nomic. This man is not exactly a pauper at that. 
 There are several million roubles worth of timber 
 lands, for instance, that make him decidedly richer 
 than I am, for at present I have nothing. Of course 
 if you re going to throw in all the plows and farms 
 and mines and things in America that you may own 
 some day " 
 
 The thrust angered Dave Moulton. "The twenty- 
 five odd million dollars worth of them I do at pres 
 ent own I may feel compelled to place beyond the
 
 THE CHASM 28 
 
 reach of Mr. de Hohenfels. Possibly if he is given 
 to understand this, the problem will solve itself." 
 
 "There you go again!" exclaimed Marion, spring 
 ing to her feet. "I d rather earn my living by my 
 own hands than be in a position where anyone in 
 this world can take the right to talk to me like that !" 
 
 "Don t be a fool, Marion." 
 
 "If it s fool or slave, I prefer to be fool!" 
 
 "You needn t be either." 
 
 "I needn t? Oh, no ! All I have to do is let you 
 decide such little matters as whom I shall marry and 
 whom not!" 
 
 "You are mistaken. Marry whom you please. If 
 the man happens to be one I don t want in control 
 of the United States Plow Company he shan t con 
 trol it that s all." 
 
 "The Count de Hohenfels does not happen to be 
 consumed with a burning passion for the United 
 States Plow Company. It s very doubtful if he 
 knows there is such a thing. It s that assumption 
 of yours which has caused all the trouble, and I m 
 simply asking you to straighten things out again by 
 a letter to him." 
 
 "Doesn t know there is such a thing, eh? Do you 
 know we send over a million dollars worth of agri 
 cultural machinery a year through the port of Riga? 
 You ll find he has read a little something about us 
 in Bradstreet s." 
 
 "What s the use of making that statement? All 
 there is to the whole question is that you insulted us. 
 I want to know whether or not you are going to be 
 decent and write that letter?" 
 
 "A letter of apology?"
 
 24, THE CHASM 
 
 "Exactly." 
 
 "Which would result in the gentleman s taking 
 the next steamer for America?" 
 
 "I don t know how it would result. I do know 
 you owe him that reparation. You owe it to me. 
 Can t you see it doesn t put me in a very good light 
 your taking it for granted that the only reason a 
 man would want to marry me is for your money?" 
 
 "Being married for money is a distinct danger of 
 any girl in your position especially when she de 
 velops an affair with a man of a notoriously money 
 marrying class. The newspapers are full of how 
 such marriages turn out." 
 
 "The newspapers I Papa, are you going to write 
 that letter?" 
 
 "Not to-day." 
 
 "When are you going to write it?" 
 
 "When you tell me you d rather have that letter 
 written than inherit control of the United States 
 Plow Company." 
 
 "Well, I ll tell you that right now!" blazed Mar 
 ion. "Please write the letter." She went rapidly to 
 the door. 
 
 "Just a moment," said Mr. Moulton. "I do not 
 intend to accept a decision of such magnitude made 
 by you on the spur of the moment and in the heat 
 of argument. I will accept no decision one way or 
 
 the other for " He glanced at the calendar on 
 
 his desk. "This is Tuesday the twentieth. A fort 
 night is none too much. You may give me your an 
 swer on April third, two weeks from to-day." 
 
 "I should very much like to see the letter before 
 you send it," said Marion, and out she walked.
 
 Ill 
 
 NEVER in her life having felt the lack of it, 
 wealth meant little to Miss Moulton. To 
 have every luxury, to do whatever one pleased 
 without reckoning the cost, seemed simply the nor 
 mal state of things. She had no conception of the 
 thing she was ready to throw away; and yet before 
 she reached the end of the hall as she left her father s 
 study, she stopped with a pang. "Fedya!" She 
 voiced the name involuntarily. "I can t let you 
 marry me without a penny!" she thought. Walking 
 slowly on, she turned absent-mindedly into the con 
 servatory. 
 
 From the west, blown clear of cloud by a north 
 west wind, the low sun was sending red lances and 
 arrows of light through fronds of palm. In front of 
 a dark green wall of ferns a bed of orchids blazed 
 fantastic, over rich a sense impression of so 
 violent beauty as to draw the attention of the girl 
 even with her life-problem burning in her thoughts ! 
 She remembered a certain rustic seat and passed 
 down a tessellated aisle between fragrant walls of 
 verdure and bloom that rose from shining jardi 
 nieres and trailed from hanging baskets. From that 
 artificial splendor of sumptuous nooks and graceful 
 bowers she entered a place of massive rocks and moss 
 
 25
 
 26 THE CHASM 
 
 run wild and great ferns growing. There was the 
 tinkle and gurgle of a rivulet, a rustic bridge, a pool 
 of Japanese pond-lilies. 
 
 With a welcome sense of seclusion she dropped 
 upon the rustic seat to think things out. She was 
 wondering whether among her dabblings of art and 
 knowledge there was anything substantial enough to 
 make a living for her. Hearing a curious swish near 
 a high rock of an island in the pond, she looked and 
 to her amazement beheld there, knee-deep among 
 the lilies, a man in shirt-sleeves and hip-boots. He 
 was stooping over and carefully touching with a 
 brush the center of certain blossoms. 
 
 "Where in the world did you come from?" the 
 girl exclaimed. 
 
 The man straightened up hastily and stared at her. 
 "Excuse me for having a better right to the ques 
 tion," he said. "I ve been here two hours on this 
 job." 
 
 "Oh," said the girl, her curiosity satisfied. "You re 
 one of the gardeners." 
 
 "That s all," said the man. Smiling privately at 
 his elimination in her mind from the category of 
 human beings, he resumed his occupation. 
 
 Something in his tone modified her preconception 
 of him as simply a specimen of the genus gardener, 
 but she did not wish to think about him. She tried 
 to get back her interrupted train of thought, but 
 found herself mechanically watching the movements 
 of the gardener and his brush. The result was a 
 slight irritation that he should be doing it. 
 
 "Why are you doing that?" she demanded, not 
 really thinking of what she was saying.
 
 THE CHASM 27 
 
 "To cross-fertilize the flowers," he answered with 
 out looking up. 
 
 She felt that she had displayed her ignorance, 
 and social inferior though he was, she did not care 
 to leave that impression on the man. She gave the 
 subject her full consideration for a moment, grop 
 ing among shadowy recollections of freshman bot 
 any. "Have you ever looked at the pollen through 
 a microscope ?" Her malicious hope was that he had 
 not. 
 
 "Oh, yes," he answered in a matter of course tone. 
 
 Her failure to make him feel ignorant roused her 
 interest. The glance he gave her seemed to be one 
 of lessening hostility. He drew a pocket lens from 
 his corduroys, and bent down with it looking at 
 various flowers. She noticed his fine wavy brown 
 hair and fair complexion slightly tanned by his arti 
 ficial summer under glass. 
 
 "Here s a grain of pollen on the tip of this pistil," 
 he said. "It s likely to open and send a little liquid 
 filament down to the eggs of the flower. Would you 
 care to watch it?" 
 
 "Not having any hip-boots at hand, I think I 
 won t," she answered, wondering how a man in his 
 station had managed to acquire such diction. 
 
 He took a knife, cut the stem of the gorgeous lily, 
 brought it ashore to her, and offered her the lens. 
 
 She hesitated an instant, then took the flower and 
 looked. The young man went back to his work 
 without waiting for her comment, so she was free to 
 forget him and lose herself in contemplation of the 
 wonderful structure and still more wonderful func-. 
 tion of that minute, amorous grain of living dust.
 
 28 THE CHASM 
 
 She watched it with real interest. When she lowered 
 the lens she looked at the whole flower with a new 
 wonder a sudden realization of the depth and 
 beauty of sex in the life of the world. "What a 
 pity the stem is cut!" she thought. "That wonder 
 ful event will do no good." 
 
 With a start she remembered the presence of the 
 gardener, felt that he was looking, glanced quickly 
 to read his expression, and to her surprise encount 
 ered an inadvertent look of sympathetic understand 
 ing. For a purely human instant it disarmed her 
 and drew a like look to her eyes. But what right 
 had he to understand? "Very interesting, I m sure," 
 she said coldly. 
 
 He turned without answering and bent over the 
 next lily, but she saw a curious little smile. What 
 sort of man was he anyhow with his rough hands 
 and scholar s speech? Her eye went back to the 
 lily. 
 
 "Tell me," she said, "do women ever do this sort 
 of work?" 
 
 "Gardening? My mother has slaved at it all her 
 life." 
 
 She dismissed her half-formed idea that he might 
 be a man of good family reduced to working his way 
 through college. "It seems to me I have heard of 
 girls fitting themselves as horticulturalists in a col 
 lege founded by Lady Warwick," she mused. "How 
 decent a living could one make at it anyway?" 
 
 "At gardening?" He looked at her and smiled. 
 "If you think of going into the business, you d better 
 put in plenty of capital and hire me."
 
 THE CHASM 29 
 
 She did not respond to his humor, but as he started 
 to laugh she noticed with approval his excellent, clean 
 teeth. "I wished to know what one could do with 
 out capital by one s own work." 
 
 "Starve," said the gardener. 
 
 "Indeed? You do not look emaciated. How 
 much do you earn a month?" 
 
 "I get fifty and board." 
 
 The girl s eyebrows lifted at the meagerness of the 
 wage. Her own personal yearly expenses were sup 
 posed to be limited to twenty thousand a year. "Are 
 you the head gardener?" she pursued. 
 
 "No. He draws a hundred." 
 
 "And you think that I, for instance, couldn t aspire 
 to fifty?" 
 
 "It takes physical strength," said the man eyeing 
 her sceptically. 
 
 That made little impression on her, for she felt 
 that she had it. 
 
 "It also takes patience," he added "an ox-like 
 physical endurance such as nothing in your life can 
 possibly have given you." , 
 
 "Oh, as to that !" she said, waving it aside. "If 
 others acquire it, I could." 
 
 He thought a moment. "My father and mother 
 have slaved at truck-farming all their lives, Miss 
 Moulton they and their children often sixteen 
 hours a day and sometimes in emergencies twenty 
 hours. They have produced pretty near enough to 
 feed Moline, and they haven t cleared fifty a month 
 year in, year out, for the whole family. Of course a 
 job like this after a technical course and some
 
 SO THE CHASM 
 
 years experience you might get a hundred raising 
 useless things for rich people to look at once or 
 twice a year." 
 
 Her expression hardened with dislike of his tone. 
 
 "You gardening!" he repeated, not at all worry 
 ing about the effect of his words on her. "It s as 
 though a nightingale who could fill the heart of the 
 night with fire should want to live in a hen-house 
 and lay eggs for somebody s breakfast." 
 
 Her mind drew from the speaker to the poetic 
 phrase. His voice s indisputable knowledge of how 
 to give it the value of truthful music affected her 
 only unconsciously. 
 
 "What gives you that romantic idea as to the 
 heart of the night?" she said, her disparaging tone 
 not successfully concealing the pleasure the romantic 
 idea gave her. 
 
 "The things open to you! Your boundless free 
 dom for development. Some who have that have 
 nothing to develop; but it s evident that " 
 
 "I have no freedom whatever!" she exclaimed 
 bitterly. "I was thinking of that very thing when I 
 came in here !" 
 
 Seeing his interest in her exclamation, she pulled 
 up, wondering how she had come to drift so far 
 into things personal. Her unconscious feeling that 
 her social superiority was too obviously secure to 
 bother thinking about or demonstrating was there 
 to reassure her. The man went carelessly on in his 
 tone of dispassionate analysis. "Of course you 
 haven t much sense yet," he said, " but doubt 
 less that s inexperience."
 
 THE CHASM 31 
 
 For a moment Miss Moulton was too astonished 
 to answer. "I admit that what I am doing just now 
 shows lack of good sense," said she, scathingly. 
 
 "In talking to me?" smiled the gardener, straight 
 ening up. "Oh, no, that s sensible." 
 
 "I think," said she with an air of finality, "that 
 there is a little too much ego in your cosmos." 
 
 "On the contrary to reverse your quotation of 
 Kipling most everyone you meet has so much cos 
 mos in his ego that the ego is all squeezed out." 
 
 What arrested her was the fact that that very 
 thought, turned that very way, might have come 
 from Feodor de Hohenfels! "One thing would 
 be interesting to know," she said. "Did you borrow 
 that egoistic pose from someone you ve heard or 
 from something you ve read?" 
 
 "Neither. Oh, I have read Max Stirner and 
 found him in possession of a few distorted frag 
 ments of my philosophy. But it isn t an egoistic 
 pose, Miss Moulton. It s real egoism." 
 
 The surprise of this turn and his smile as he said 
 it were too much for her. She had to smile back. 
 
 "I have simply accepted myself," he explained. 
 "Most people accept instead some fool ideal and 
 then belittle themselves for differing therefrom. I 
 reflect that nature has been twenty or a hundred mil 
 lion years or so at the job of making me as I am. I m 
 not egotist enough to frame up some ideal concep 
 tion of what I should be and imagine that shadow 
 of my brain superior to nature s actual achievement 
 in me." 
 
 She was silent following and weighing the idea.
 
 32 THE CHASM 
 
 "Yes," she decided. "It s strange, but this man does 
 think like Feodor." And then she asked, "Have 
 you read Bernard Shaw?" 
 
 "Some," he answered. 
 
 "Did you learn that trick of turning things inside 
 out from him?" 
 
 "It seems hard for you to conceive that a man can 
 be his own thinker." 
 
 She looked at him with the sudden respect of a 
 stung child for a bee. 
 
 "Your question," he said, "entitles me to ask if 
 you think when Shaw turns an old idea inside out 
 that he s wantonly twisting that he knows to be true 
 into something clever and different?" 
 
 "My dear Mr. " began Marion. 
 
 "Bradfield." 
 
 "Thank you. Anyone who knows that a man may 
 say a thing wittily and nevertheless believe what he 
 says will not debate the banal question of Mr. Shaw s 
 sincerity. Which do you prefer, Mr. Bradfield: 
 Shall I imitate you and tell you plainly that I am an 
 intelligent person, or shall I pay you the compliment 
 of supposing you able to perceive it?" 
 
 "Hoist with my own petard!" chuckled Mr. Brad- 
 field. "I believe there s no one else in Moline who 
 could have come back at me outegotizing the egoist." 
 
 She found herself not resenting his putting him 
 self with her in a class from which the rest of Moline 
 was somewhat naturally excluded. Feeling that she 
 might find clarification in the atmosphere of this re 
 markable individual, she had a sudden instinctive im 
 pulse to test and seize and use his thinking power as 
 a tool for her own purposes very much as her fam-
 
 THE CHASM S3 
 
 ily was using his power of muscular labor. "I m 
 into this too deep to back out now," was the way she 
 put it to herself. "If you are as clear-headed a 
 
 person as you think you are " she began. 
 
 "Please come up out of that pond and sit down here 
 and tell me why you said I have no sense. If you 
 can prove it " 
 
 He came ashore. "Any one with the enormous 
 economic power that will be yours to talk of gar 
 dening for a living!" he scoffed. 
 
 "Suppose I find the price I must pay for that 
 power too high?" 
 
 "Well it must be a staggering price 1" 
 
 "Do you think slavery too high a price?" 
 
 "Slavery!" he echoed. "You don t know what it 
 means! Go ask my mother what it is!" After a 
 moment he added: "Your father s conditions are 
 nothing to the thing you want to put your neck into." 
 
 "My father s conditions!" Marion gasped. "How 
 did you what makes you say that?" 
 
 "An obvious inference from slavery as the price 
 of economic power." 
 
 "Do you call that obvious? It strikes me as un 
 canny. Sit down. How much more do you infer?" 
 
 "More would be guessing." He glanced at the 
 low sun, sat down, and turned down the tops of his 
 boots. "Still was it some little point of honor a 
 difficulty you could have smoothed out in a minute if 
 it was not for what your friends call your high 
 spirit ?" 
 
 Marion sat back abruptly. That letter she had 
 come to America to have written was that so all- 
 important? Incidentally Bradfield no longer re-
 
 34 THE CHASM 
 
 minded her of Feodor. The Russian prized that 
 same high spirit more than anything else. It was 
 that in her which had attracted him and fired him 
 with the passion of conquest. "I was high-handed 
 with papa," she thought. "And what did I gain 
 by it? Why don t I steer straight for the big thing?" 
 Completely absorbed in viewing the whole affair of 
 De Hohenfels and her father from this sudden new 
 angle, she rose and started toward the bridge. 
 
 Looking after her, Bradfield the gardener 
 thought she was going to leave without another 
 word; but remembering him, she turned and, not 
 really letting go the new threads of her thought, she 
 murmured, "That suggests things. Thank you. I 
 wish to think them out." So she walked on slowly 
 out of the gardener s sight.
 
 IV 
 
 MARION showed a desire after dinner that 
 evening to talk again with her father on the 
 subject of the letter to De Hohenfels. Mr. 
 Moulton saw with satisfaction that it must mean 
 modification sooner than he had hoped of her 
 demand, but he felt it necessary to maintain his reso 
 lution to accept no answer before the specified time; 
 and Marion had to resign herself to a fortnight of 
 unsettledness. She chafed at what she felt to be the 
 sheer tyranny of the unnecessary delay, characteriz 
 ing it as springing from a senseless, old-fashioned 
 habit of parental rigidity toward children. 
 
 The letters to Feodor which she began were 
 necessarily so unsatisfactory that they all went into 
 the fire. 
 
 Everything at Hillcrest irritated her. When it 
 occurred to her the second morning after her arri 
 val to go to the conservatory and talk again with 
 Bradfield, her knowledge that her father would 
 neither understand nor sympathize was anything but 
 a deterrent. And when she began to think of Brad- 
 field, whom she had left so brusquely, she became 
 really curious. He was an unusual phenomenon she 
 wished to understand. She decided to get him talk 
 ing, hear his history, explore his range, and find his 
 
 35
 
 36 THE CHASM 
 
 limits, which were still quite vague to her. She felt 
 that very likely her first surprise at finding an intel 
 lectual man in his station had caused her to overesti 
 mate him. On her way to the conservatory, for the 
 satisfaction of her own, not her father s, sense of 
 decorum, she considered pretty carefully the tone she 
 ought to adopt. To treat him simply as a gardener, 
 she felt, would be absurd, since merely as a gardener 
 he had practically no interest for her. About right, 
 she decided, would be that nuance of conduct she 
 had been taught to observe with governesses and 
 tutors and middle-class people of culture, not ser 
 vants, who for any reason mingle with the family 
 yet are paid for being there. 
 
 When Bradfield, however, looked up at her, re 
 turning her greeting, from his kneeling posture be 
 fore a velvet slope of moss he was creating on a bare 
 spot among the rocks, a sudden spirit of mischief 
 somewhat disarranged Miss Moulton s predeter 
 mined program. 
 
 "Sir Oracle," she said in a tone of amiable mock 
 ery, "I think perhaps you did me a service the other 
 day, and for all I know I may now be seeking more 
 wisdom." 
 
 "What shall I enlighten you about?" he inquired, 
 straightening up on his knees. 
 
 "I haven t just decided. You disapprove of gar 
 dening, so of course I have dropped that. As I re 
 member it your alternative was to fill the heart of 
 the night with fire. The idea appeals to me re 
 markably. I m sure I should like nothing better. 
 But on reflection I find myself just a little uncertain 
 how it is done."
 
 THE CHASM 37 
 
 "Of course I couldn t be explicit for you," he said, 
 taking another square of moss from his basket. 
 
 "Be so for you then. How would you go about 
 filling it?" 
 
 He took the question seriously thinking for a 
 moment. 
 
 "I suppose I would have to go about it mainly 
 with pen and ink I mean a typewriter. But mean j 
 while I would study, think, travel, observe. I would 
 get my philosophy down to unshakeable bedrock. I 
 would stiffen it with multitudes of exactly gauged 
 facts. Above all I would become personally ac 
 quainted with the men in every land who are fight 
 ing for freedom find out what they want done 
 and help them do it." For a moment he was ab 
 sorbed in the vision of what his life would be if he 
 had her opportunity. The ring in his voice as he 
 spoke of the fight for freedom must have stirred 
 something deep in her, for he heard her saying self- 
 unconsciously: 
 
 "My version of that feeling seems narrower but 
 more definite to rouse and guide the ambition of a 
 gifted man adrift on life : to waken him into a power 
 for the liberalization, not of every land, but of one 
 belated country Russia." 
 
 "The liberalization of Russia?" said Bradfield 
 dubiously. 
 
 "Yes. To transform it into a free government." 
 
 "Like ours?" 
 
 Her mind busy with his trend, she seated herself 
 sidewise on the rustic bench and turned looking over 
 the back of it to talk to him the whole graceful 
 process the flower of long training become uncon-
 
 38 THE CHASM 
 
 scious. "I suppose you think liberalizing Russia as 
 much too big as gardening is too small," she said. 
 
 "No. I am thinking it wouldn t be worth while." 
 
 She repeated that phrase in amazement. 
 
 "You see only the outward form, not the substance 
 of modern tyranny," he explained, going on with his 
 work. "The men in your father s mills and the 
 men who are not allowed to work in them are op 
 pressed with the real oppression, which is economic. 
 The people of Russia would be practically no better 
 off under a republic if all the sources of wealth re 
 mained as now both in Russia and America, in the 
 hands of a few." 
 
 "You don t know Russia, my friend, or you would 
 not talk like that." 
 
 "I know America, though, and you do not." 
 
 "Don t you think that rather arrogant? I have 
 lived most of my life in America. I ve kept my eyes 
 open and have thought some. How comes it that 
 you know America and I do not?" 
 
 "Because you ve not had to know it. I have. You 
 and your friends have tabooed the subject of the 
 people s misery. You live like the uncaring gods of 
 Epicurus in places like this." The fernery was 
 full of gorgeous glooms and gleams, ripplings and 
 tinklings of sound and light. "You never see the 
 unbeautiful homes of the workmen who make this 
 beauty possible," he said. "If you did, you d think 
 their squalor good enough. Where they are con 
 cerned you are afflicted with the myopia of your 
 class, whose dominance is based on systematic injus 
 tice to mine." 
 
 "I simply don t believe it," said Marion.
 
 THE CHASM 39 
 
 "Shall I tell you why you don t?" said he, forget 
 ting moss. "Because the class philosophy you have 
 breathed since babyhood is full of lies born of your 
 class-interests the self-interest of profit-taking men 
 and dividend-spending women. Dividends are holy 
 things not to be cut no matter how much or how 
 wide-spread suffering it costs to maintain them. You 
 bourgeois have believed your own lies about this 
 condition until you have lost the power of seeing 
 straight in anything. The foggy, new religions you 
 go wild over prove the decadence of your intellect. 
 You affect looking down on intellect it is so dead 
 against you. Whatever you deal with you show 
 yourselves muddleheads. We workers see things 
 straight. We have to. Economic pressure imposes 
 the habit on us. We are up against hard facts that 
 can t be Christian-scienced out of existence. Nietz 
 sche talks about the splendid tension of the human 
 spirit resulting from the effort of Europe to throw 
 off the yoke of ecclesiasticism. That tension s noth 
 ing to ours our effort to throw off the yoke of eco 
 nomic slavery. There s the real splendor of the 
 human spirit in our time. You will see it burst out 
 before you die." He rose from his knees and came 
 toward her. She had a little sense of his having 
 dramatically assumed the role of protagonist of his 
 class, yet neither that nor the fact that he was ad 
 dressing an audience of one in cadences approaching 
 those of public speaking seemed odd enough to her 
 to spoil his effect. "We who have borne the burden 
 of the world," he said, " did you think we would 
 not grow strong? When we had to think ourselves 
 out of your false view of life or perish, did you sup-
 
 40 THE CHASM 
 
 pose we wouldn t learn to think? We were forced to 
 forge intellectual weapons for your overthrow or 
 be ground down out of existence. Naturally we 
 forged them. We ve come free of your lies with 
 a burning love of truth; we ve survived your injus 
 tice with a burning love of justice. On truth and 
 justice and the brotherhood we have learned in 
 misery we will build a world a thousand times better 
 than yours even for you whom we shall overthrow ! 
 On our foundation you shall see a human civilization 
 lift into more than Athenian beauty and perfection! 
 For the first time since the communes of savagery 
 the economic basis of life shall be right and with 
 our power enlarged from stone axe to steam-ham 
 mer. . . . Our power, mind you. Not Dave Moul- 
 ton s, and not yours!" 
 
 "You are really a poet, Mr. Bradfield," said the 
 girl, so little affected by the substance of his speech 
 that she was free to admire the passionate vigor of 
 his expression. 
 
 "And if I am ! Do you think so little of the poets 
 as to oppose our vision to fact?" 
 
 "I naturally can t help seeing that you overlook 
 some large facts," said Marion calmly. "If it was 
 n t for my father s factories, for instance, the men 
 there whom you think so oppressed would not have 
 the work they have nor draw the thousands of dol 
 lars they get for doing it." 
 
 "Do you know your father sells a plow costing 
 him seven and a half for labor and material, for 
 thirty-five dollars? Do you know he has crushed 
 the unions which stand for a little better pay, a little
 
 THE CHASM 41 
 
 better hours, a little better life for all these working- 
 men? Do you know these workingmen receive less 
 than one-fifth the value of their labor?" 
 
 "I don t know just what proportion of the total 
 value they receive. Did these workmen buy the steel 
 and wood to make the plows of?" 
 
 "No, the steel was mined and made, the wood cut 
 and sawed by other workers who received only a 
 fraction of the value they created out of the natural 
 earth." 
 
 "Why didn t your workers organize the United 
 States Plow Company themselves? Why did they 
 leave that to my father and grandfather?" 
 
 "The time was not then ripe. They had not 
 learned to work together in great factories. They 
 know how now. Your grandfather did perform a 
 service to society. Was it so great that society 
 should give him and his heirs forever despotic power 
 over its labor and life? Only a tiny fraction of the 
 human energy of brain and muscle that built these 
 factories and constructed this machinery was his. 
 The savage who first used fire, perhaps a thousand 
 centuries ago, helped him to make his plow. Archi 
 tects and wage-workers built the factories; inventors, 
 designers, and wage-workers made the machinery. 
 Thousands of men have been forced to content them 
 selves with a pittance for creating the wealth with 
 which the Moultons bought factories." 
 
 She was certain the Moultons ought to have the 
 factories, but could not lay hold of a good reason 
 why. "How far back do you go with that?" she 
 asked. "To the Norman Conquest?"
 
 42 THE CHASM 
 
 "I could go back to a much older war fought with 
 flint-tipped arrows and stone celts. The Moulton 
 of that time was a war-chief, who, instead of din 
 ing on a captive, set him to work and dined through 
 out the year on the fruits of that work. Slavery, 
 serfdom, wage-work the last method of living off 
 the labor of other men is an improvement on all 
 others from the point of view of the exploiters." 
 He laughed, and went back to his basket of moss. 
 
 "You seem to be equipped with a very elaborate 
 perversion of the true relations between labor and 
 capital." 
 
 "That s funny," he said. "Don t you really see 
 that the economic interest of your class inclines you 
 to look on relations very advantageous to capital 
 and very disadvantageous to labor as true ? My 
 economic interest and that of my class makes me 
 brand these same relations as rotten." 
 
 "Let me point out that there is such a thing as ab 
 stract truth what the French call the true truth 
 which is neither your point of view nor mine, but 
 simply true." 
 
 "Into the blue !" he exclaimed. "A truth different 
 from what L think, and from what you think, and 
 from what every other human being thinks existing 
 in no brain where does it exist? What good is it 
 anyhow? In reality there is only you and me and 
 what facts force us to believe. That is the true truth." 
 
 She weighed that a moment. "You may be right 
 about that," she said. "Suppose you are also right 
 about slavery, serfdom and wage-work. Do you 
 think you can overthrow these laws of life the law 
 of stronger and weaker which, according to your
 
 THE CHASM 43 
 
 own view of history, has been working among men 
 since the age of stone?" 
 
 "Not permanently. The present system has tem 
 porarily set that law aside since a stupid man with 
 capital is at present much more than a match eco 
 nomically for a keen-minded man without it. But 
 my analysis of history shows me that the same eco 
 nomic laws that have made the slave a serf and the 
 serf a wage-worker are going to make the wage- 
 worker his own boss." 
 
 "Then what will make him work?" 
 
 "What makes your father work?" 
 
 "He s an unusual man." 
 
 "Well, I ll grant that. He happens to be. But 
 suppose just usual men, the workers, owned all the 
 factories in common. Can you imagine them stand 
 ing outside the closed doors of their own factories 
 suffering, perhaps dying, for lack of the things their 
 factories can produce? No. All there is to it is 
 this : At present, ignorant, narrow and small-souled 
 as the view of your class is, you have the power to 
 enforce it. You capitalist plutocrats had to over 
 throw the feudal aristocrats to get the power you 
 have. Very well. As you overthrew them, we social 
 democrats will overthrow you." 
 
 "Oh," said Marion. "Are you a socialist?" She 
 looked at him curiously. "I m not sure I ever saw a 
 real live one before." 
 
 "I ll not be the last one you see." 
 
 "Very likely not. I understand socialism is grow 
 ing. But do you really imagine, Mr. Bradfield, that 
 in Europe the landed aristocracy has no power?" 
 
 "Only in so far as the aristocrats are capitalists.
 
 44 THE CHASM 
 
 Aristocracy is a survival like the vermiform appen 
 dix. That s why you doom yourself to futility when 
 you attempt to galvanize your Russian." 
 
 "How many European nobles have the honor to 
 be acquainted with you, Mr. Bradfield? Do you 
 realize what a cock-sure theorizer you are? It hap 
 pens that the brain of the Russian nobleman I was 
 thinking of glows with magnificent life. His mind 
 is like a bed of orchids." 
 
 Bradfield was evidently impressed for a moment, 
 and then his eyes narrowed keenly. "Why does he 
 need so much rousing, and guiding, and waking?" he 
 asked. "Did you say he was adrift on life? Why is 
 he adrift? The Russian revolutionists are not drift 
 ing. Neither are the rulers. They are real they 
 stand for something vital, they know what they 
 are doing. But your landed young gentleman who 
 is to liberalize the Russian Government ! The peas 
 ants of the mir on his estate will make new Russia 
 not he." 
 
 "I ve heard that prophecy is a risky business," she 
 said, not caring to discuss De Hohenfels with Brad- 
 field. 
 
 "What is his attitude toward the Russian lower 
 classes ?" pursued Bradfield. 
 
 "I suppose he considers most of them ignorant and 
 fanatical." 
 
 "Risky it may be, but I think I can make a pretty 
 fair forecast of his fate, and yours if you marry him. 
 I do not think you and he will fill the heart of the 
 night with fire. You will certainly not liberalize 
 Russia, and if you did it would do no good. The 
 Russian revolution, the rising of peasant and worker
 
 THE CHASM 45 
 
 whose interests are antagonistic to yours with 
 that new-found, passionate religion they call Solid 
 arity, they will sweep you away like chaff!" 
 
 "How very exultant the idea makes you," said she, 
 smiling. "Well, you are interesting, Mr. Bradfield. 
 You really are an amazing gardener." His expres 
 sion hardened in a reaction against her patronizing 
 tone. "But do you know," she added quickly, "I 
 can t see such a vast difference between your rhap 
 sodies and those of the new religionists you are so 
 scornful of." 
 
 "They may be alike in fervor. The difference is 
 that mine are based on close analysis of human his 
 tory, on economic science, on real psychology. Theirs 
 are based on wind. If you can t see the differ 
 ence !" 
 
 "It must be because I belong to a muddle-headed 
 class, Mr. Bradfield. Do let it be my class ! It is so 
 much more comforting to blame the others for it!" 
 
 "It is your class. You are the most intelligent 
 member of it I have ever met. You are the only 
 bourgeois person I know that I like." 
 
 "Thank you. It happens, however, that I am not 
 a bourgeois person. The phrase sets my teeth on 
 edge." 
 
 He looked at her thoughtfully. "I see," he said. 
 "The class feeling of the aristocracy. But consider 
 the angle from which I look. Aristocrat and bour 
 geois are alike exploiters of us. Now we begin tak 
 ing the reins of the world from you, you are uniting 
 against us like you and your Russian. In a few 
 years you will be one class." 
 
 "Wrong," she said, exulting because he was
 
 46 THE CHASM 
 
 wrong. "I hated all that was bourgeois in ethics 
 and wall-paper, literature and hair-dressing years 
 before I came in contact with the aristocracy." 
 She expected Bradfield to catch the little turn and 
 smile back at it; but he was busy with a new idea of 
 his own. Till then he had taken for granted an im 
 passable chasm between them. 
 
 "You hate the bourgeois instinctively?" he pon 
 dered. "Why is that? And you talk of gardening 
 of earning your own living. Is it something 
 deeper than I thought in you? Is it possible that 
 some day you will be coming to us?" 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "I wouldn t think so if you were the ordinary 
 brainless society girl. You think. You feel. You re 
 big enough to rise above your class ethics or you 
 wouldn t be talking to me. In spite of your wealth 
 why, you have even felt in a pale way the lack 
 of economic freedom! I think you should be com 
 ing to us toward democracy, instead of away from 
 it. Believe me only on our side will you find the 
 kind of life you crave the spirit you love!" 
 
 "Just what kind of life and spirit do you take 
 that to be, Mr. Bradfield?" 
 
 "The life of useful work and the spirit of com 
 radeship." 
 
 "Awhile ago you were scornful because I wanted 
 to find useful work." 
 
 "Yes, at the present degrading price of human 
 labor power, someone else taking the greater part of 
 the value of your labor. That will not be so when 
 we workers adjust the work and wealth of the 
 world to our own needs."
 
 THE CHASM 47 
 
 "Are you talking of your grandchildren?" she in 
 quired. "And comradeship ! Have you the spirit of 
 comradeship toward us whom you regard as your 
 enemies?" 
 
 "No, not now. How can we? But there are very 
 few of you fewer all the time as wealth concen 
 trates. Out of eighty millions in this country not 
 quarter of a million. One in four hundred. But 
 you own everything. You hold everything we must 
 have to work with to live. You own our working 
 power mental and manual. We have to sell it to 
 you or starve. You own us. You use us solely for 
 your benefit, not ours. We have to fight you. After 
 we have taken away your power to rob us we will 
 have no reason to exclude you from comradeship." 
 
 "You have your narrowness," she said. "Do you 
 imagine that we the people you now exclude do 
 you really think we know nothing of comradeship?" 
 
 "Not for us. Not for three hundred and ninety- 
 nine four hundredths of the people in America." 
 
 "You are wrong," said the girl. She looked him 
 full in the eyes but met there the glint of a conviction 
 stronger than her own. "How shall I make you feel 
 it?" she exclaimed. An unaccountably vivid desire 
 to shake his grip on that hostile conviction became 
 momentarily the most essential thing in the world. 
 She was leaning unconsciously toward him, exerting 
 all the personal attraction of her serious eyes and 
 earnest voice. Suddenly she held out her hand to 
 him. He looked surprised, took her hand uncer 
 tainly, and through his eyes she saw his grip on his 
 idea relax his attention wavering toward the charm 
 of her gesture and the delicate, nervous shock of
 
 48 THE CHASM 
 
 her smooth hand in his. "You are one man in a 
 thousand, Mr. Bradfield," she said warmly. u You 
 have plenty of ability. Lift yourself out of the class 
 in which you happen to have been born." 
 
 He dropped her hand abruptly. "On a ladder of 
 my own people s faces!" he cried with scorn. "No, 
 I prefer to help lift the class in which I was born!" 
 
 She drew back. "What folly to look at it so!" 
 she exclaimed, vexed with his rude repulse of an ad 
 vance she felt to be magnanimous. "Well then 
 stay down!" 
 
 "No!" said he. "I will come up with the other 
 nine hundred and ninety-nine!" 
 
 "Try it and see!" 
 
 "We are not merely trying we are doing it." 
 
 "A little too unselfish of you for this world as it 
 is," she said, wishing she could lay hold of some 
 thing that would really cut. 
 
 "This world, Miss Moulton, shall not remain as it 
 is. We are not content with a mere mournful, in 
 active, poetic wish that we might grasp this sorry 
 scheme of things entire ! We will grasp it. We will 
 shatter it to bits. We will remold it nearer to the 
 heart s desire !" 
 
 "You seem very sure of your ability to do a very 
 big thing." 
 
 "As individuals we could not do it. As a class we 
 can." 
 
 "A whole class of heaven-stormers?" 
 
 "Not at all. Our energy is not directed impo- 
 tently against God. We have discovered that he is 
 not the responsible party. And you needn t worry 
 about our being too unselfish. To labor for the
 
 THE CHASM 49 
 
 super-enrichment of you owners that s rank unsel 
 fishness. What unites us is self-preservation. We 
 are true to our class because we have solved for our 
 selves the problem of alter and ego. We know 
 towards whom and what we must act egotistically 
 and where to use our altruism. Light like ours burns 
 only as a torch in the open night. We ve seen too 
 many labor leaders use their torch for the illumina 
 tion of some private bushel. They take place and 
 pelf and subtler bribes seats at a banquet the 
 privilege of speaking to exquisite women like you. 
 And their souls go out!" 
 
 "You re not absurd enough to suppose I am trying 
 to bribe you with my companionship !" She laughed. 
 
 "Not consciously. But do you suppose the class- 
 soul the social group of which you are one compo 
 nent molecule does not use you and daily work 
 through you in a thousand ways you do not under 
 stand?" 
 
 She had a glimpse of his vision. Since he dropped 
 her hand she had tried to hurt him, to make him feel 
 foolish, to shake his faith in his ideas. Whether 
 they were true or not did not concern her so much 
 as her desire to loosen his grip, to weaken him with 
 self doubt. Each utterance had been a conscious 
 thrust of her will seeking to break his. He had dealt 
 with these hostile volitions merely as ideas, uncon 
 scious of the easily adequate action of his own resist 
 ing will. She gave it up. "It s a little uncanny," she 
 said. "For a moment then I felt that I was not just 
 plain me as I comfortably supposed, but the tip 
 of a social tentacle stretched out here to you the 
 tentacle of another octopus."
 
 50 THE CHASM 
 
 "Your octopus very small and quick and open- 
 eyed," he said, his fancy kindling from hers. "Mine 
 gigantic and slow and blind. Yours draining three- 
 quarters of the blood of mine. Mine painfully 
 aware of that weakening drain and slowly opening 
 its long-closed eyes to see!" 
 
 A slight shudder ran through her. "No," she 
 said, after a moment. "I refuse to believe the 
 beautiful world we live in is based upon any such 
 hideous struggle. These social octopuses are not 
 real. Awhile ago you said yourself: There is only 
 you and me and what we believe. 
 
 "You and me and the other yous and mes, 
 A while ago I merely denied concreteness to an ab 
 stract idea. But these classes, of which you and I 
 are at present tentacle tips, are concrete groups of 
 human individuals. The class has no existence in 
 dependent of its component members. But the mem 
 bers are grouped in certain economic and social rela 
 tions to each other. A generation dies away atom 
 by atom, and the new generation takes its place atom 
 by atom, maintaining the old relations. These re 
 lations, changing slowly, are the growing structure 
 of the social organism." 
 
 "The social organism! You were claiming two 
 two distinct and hostile organisms your class and 
 mine. Which is it one organism or two?" She 
 thought she had him. 
 
 "A half-split ameba may be regarded as one or 
 ganism or two," he said. "Likewise a society split 
 into classes. When our class has absorbed yours 
 there will be no doubt about social solidarity."
 
 THE CHASM 51 
 
 "And suppose we object to absorption so vigorous 
 ly that you fail?" 
 
 "We are the immense majority. What shall stop 
 us?" 
 
 "Possibly the immense majority s immense stupid- 
 ity." 
 
 "The nail on the head. But events are teachers 
 that reach even the deaf. Stupid or not, I think 
 our desire for the wealth we create will finally prove 
 stronger and better based than your desire for It." 
 
 "Please, sir, I m sorry," said she, tired of seri 
 ousness, "but I didn t know I had a desire for the 
 wealth you create." 
 
 "No," he answered, refusing to follow her make- 
 believe that she was a schoolchild answering her 
 teacher. "You ve accepted your dividends as un 
 thinkingly as you accept the philosophy that justi 
 fies them. How much do you spend a year?" 
 
 "Do you know that s an awfully impertinent ques 
 tion?" " 
 
 "You didn t think so the other day when you 
 asked it of me. And just now the question seems 
 pertinent to the argument." 
 
 "I m not arguing. It s you. I ve never thought 
 about these things you insist upon talking about. I 
 hate arguments anyway." She felt like crying. 
 
 "You re not the only one, Miss Moulton. It s a 
 peculiarity that appears whenever a defender of the 
 existing industrial system tries to meet the socialist 
 argument. They never meet it. They evade it. 
 They misstate it. They talk about something else. 
 You have done splendidly."
 
 52 THE CHASM 
 
 "The idea of your patronizing me!" she ex 
 claimed. 
 
 "You began by patronizing me !" he retorted. 
 
 "Aren t you hateful to me!" she protested. And 
 then, mentally criticizing her tone, she grew con 
 scious of the fact that she had become almost incap 
 able of treating this ungentle man in any other way 
 than as an equal. "I am going," she said abruptly. 
 As soon as she spoke she looked furtively to see if 
 he would be sorry. 
 
 "Just one more light on the bourgeoisie before 
 you go," he said. 
 
 She looked at him resentfully. "So full of your 
 own precious ideas, you don t care whether I go or 
 not!" she thought. She had noticed the lily he had 
 cut for her two days before lying withered on the 
 seat. 
 
 "You hate bourgeois ethics and wallpaper and 
 literature, Miss Moulton," he went on, "but you 
 forget to hate the thing that shapes its hateful ideals 
 and tastes. The way it gets its living. There is the 
 root of all its sordid soul and all its ugly evil. Not 
 money itself, as the Christians superficially thought, 
 but the way you private owners of the world s 
 wealth-creating machinery suck profit from the over 
 worked and joyless lives of men, women, and chil 
 dren who have to work for you or starve." 
 
 "I guess you re hopeless," thought Marion. The 
 question "Have you ever been in love?" formed it 
 self in her mind, but she suppressed it, rose, and 
 started across the bridge. Bradfield rose and stood 
 looking after her from among the rocks and ferns. 
 
 "Goodbye, Mr. Bradfield," she called back.
 
 THE CHASM 53 
 
 "Goodbye, Miss Moulton." His tone had finally 
 changed and very much. 
 
 She stopped and looked back. "Oh," said she 
 with an air of surprise, "are you really human?" 
 He was puzzled a sight that delighted her soul, 
 and she laughed. 
 
 "I don t know what you mean," he said, bluntly. 
 
 She stopped. "If you don t understand, you 
 should have the grace to think it your fault, not 
 mine." 
 
 "But it isn t," he said. 
 
 "Isn t it? Think it over." 
 
 "Think over the intentionally obscure expression 
 of some perfectly simple idea !" 
 
 "You analytic wretch!" thought she. "How you 
 do refuse to play!" she exclaimed. "I was going 
 to wish that sometime we might meet and contrive to 
 talk something else besides socialism, but " 
 
 "I ll talk anything on earth," he interrupted. 
 Then as an after-thought, with a secret thrill at his 
 own boldness, but saying it anyway, he added, 
 " if it is with you!" 
 
 "Oh, did you know you were with me? I thought 
 you were conversing merely with a social tentacle. 
 I feel like coming back, now you ve stopped arguing 
 and admitted my personal existence. But be care 
 ful. Perhaps you are being bribed!" 
 
 She went at once, afraid if she gave him the chance 
 that he would pick loose or break the subtle little 
 knots with which she had momentarily enmeshed 
 him.
 
 THE virtues of the absent Feodor?" inquired 
 Lady Diotima, breaking into Marion s rev 
 erie one evening before the Pearson hearth- 
 fire. 
 
 The girl started. "No," she answered. "I was 
 thinking about a man I ve been seeing lately." 
 
 "So soon?" 
 
 "Oh, I wasn t thinking of him that wayl" Her 
 disclaimer instantly striking her as unnecessary, 
 Marion blushed; then menaced her hostess. "I ve 
 half a mind not to tell you a thing about this re 
 markable man who interests, bores, charms and ir 
 ritates all in the same breath!" 
 
 "Who is he?" 
 
 "Give him one detail, and presto he has filled in! 
 And his grip on ideas is disconcerting. He s al 
 ways abnormally right at least he carries it off." 
 
 "I evidently am not acquainted with him." 
 
 "He knows what you re going to say, and why it 
 isn t so that is, why he thinks it isn t. He knows 
 what you ve done, and what you re going to do, and 
 why it s why he thinks it s foolish. He loves to 
 tell you it s foolish. Unfortunately his reasons are 
 formidable unless you re just trifling; then you 
 can fluster him some." 
 
 54
 
 THE CHASM 55 
 
 "Marion, does this supernatural male being live 
 in Moline?" 
 
 "Yes. He has read out of the way authors you 
 intended to read and haven t Max Stirner, Nietz 
 sche, Stendhal, and that sort. He s so absorbed in 
 his ideas that " 
 
 "That?" 
 
 "That to impress him with one s personality is 
 an achievement." 
 
 "So you took the trouble to achieve. I suppose I 
 must be patient until you make up your tyrannical 
 mind to tell me who he is." 
 
 "He is one of our gardeners!" 
 
 "Marion Moulton!" 
 
 "His name is Walt Bradfield!" 
 
 "One of your gardeners!" 
 
 "His father and mother are ignorant Moline 
 truck-farmers." 
 
 Lady Diotima was speechless. 
 
 "He is a socialist." 
 
 "Does he eat with his knife?" 
 
 "I suppose so. I began by patronizing him. Be 
 fore we get through he promises to scatter most of 
 my cherished convictions to the four winds!" 
 
 "Is he scrubbed?" 
 
 "Well, yes. But his hands feel like nutmeg grat 
 ers." 
 
 "Feel?" 
 
 "The one I shook did," said Marion, laughing. 
 "His teeth are good and clean and his hair is nice. 
 His shirt is generally unbuttoned at the neck per 
 haps to show his fine throat. And you should hear 
 his vocabulary! Western vowels and r s, of course,
 
 56 THE CHASM 
 
 and sometimes too bookish showing where his cul 
 ture comes from but I was astonished. He s given 
 me a new perspective. My quarrel with papa, for 
 instance. I m going to withdraw my demand about 
 that letter, and see if I can t reconcile him to my 
 marriage with Fedya." 
 
 "Marion: did you talk to this gardener about your 
 marriage?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," Marion answered, reveling in Mrs. 
 Pearson s consternation. 
 
 "What would Hohenfels think of that?" 
 
 "I don t know," said Marion, thoughtfully. "Of 
 course, Diotima, I didn t go into the personal side 
 of my affair with Fedya. Our talk was political. 
 Fedya is inclined to be a little leonine. But," she 
 added pointedly, "if I wanted to talk intimately with 
 the gardener, and then let other people s cut and 
 dried opinions scare me out, Fedya would be scorn 
 ful." 
 
 Lady Diotima winced a little and changed her 
 tone. "Oh, of course, if he really is such an excep 
 tional man. Does he intend to remain a gardener? 
 How old is he?" 
 
 "Perhaps twenty-six. I believe he intends to 
 write." 
 
 "By the way," said Mrs. Pearson, "George told 
 me he met you on the train last week. A little 
 rough on him, weren t you?" 
 
 "No, Lady Diotima. In pure affection I called 
 him an idiot, and he couldn t conceive the word as 
 kindly meant. It s too bad he and I have such a 
 different set of values. I should dearly love to have 
 you for a mother-in-law."
 
 THE CHASM 57 
 
 "Are you sure your values and those of De Hohen- 
 fels will not turn out still more different?" 
 
 "It is curious really," said Marion. "Feodor 
 and Bradfield are diametrically opposed in many of 
 their ideas. And yet Feodor and Bradfield and I 
 have passed beyond certain limitations which all 
 three of us regard as harmful to life. George still 
 thinks them essential." 
 
 "I know," said George s mother. "But he is not 
 so narrow as his father, and he s more intelligent 
 except about business. I did use to hope you would 
 take him and broaden him." 
 
 "After your failure to broaden Mr. Pearson? 
 
 "I admit I was thinking of George s welfare more 
 than yours. But now I m beginning to think you have 
 turned your back too completely on convention." 
 
 "Because I talked with the gardener? I talked 
 with an intelligent man of unusual power. It s stupid 
 not to know when to ignore convention, and it s 
 cowardly not to ignore it when it ought to be ignored. 
 Do you think George could turn me back into the 
 strait and narrow path?" 
 
 "Perhaps not," sighed Mrs. Pearson. "A born 
 rebel like you any attempt to turn you back would 
 only drive you farther on." 
 
 "Especially if anyone went at it the way George 
 would. He would get behind and push, not lead 
 and lure." 
 
 "Would Feodor lead and lure?" 
 
 "He d enjoy making you think the thing he ob 
 jected to was decadent your instinct perverted by 
 some herd opinion your will weakened by too much 
 subservient inhibition of impulse."
 
 58 THE CHASM 
 
 "And Bradfield?" asked Lady Diotima curiously. 
 
 "Bradfield? If possible he d startle you with 
 the real simplicity of the matter. He d bring you 
 and your problem into focus just for his own in 
 tellectual gratification; and not really care a rap 
 what you decided. He wouldn t think you headed 
 for perdition either way." 
 
 "What a tremendous opinion you have of the 
 man, Marion!" 
 
 "Yes, I have. I d like to have you meet him and 
 see why." 
 
 "Would you bring him to call?" asked Mrs. Pear 
 son, amused and looking keenly at the girl. 
 
 Marion hesitated. Bradfield in corduroys fertil 
 izing lilies and laying moss was one thing, but Brad- 
 field in Lady Diotima s drawing room 
 
 "Bring him to dinner," said Mrs. Pearson grave 
 ly. "I should love to see him putting sugar and 
 cream in his bouillon." 
 
 "But I shouldn t," said Marion, her protective 
 instinct awaking. "We ll do it some other way. 
 Come over some morning, and we ll talk to him at 
 his work." 
 
 The too veracious image of the gardener putting 
 sugar in his bouillon somehow made Marion ask her 
 self again, somewhat irrelevantly, whether she was 
 not rating even his intellectual power too high. It 
 was an absurdly little thing, and yet typical of a lot 
 of little things whose aggregate she was accustomed 
 to associate with human excellence of whatever kind. 
 
 She had hastily read up a little on socialism, and 
 in one of her later talks with Walt Bradfield attacked 
 it for the purpose of drawing out his ideas fully.
 
 59 
 
 In Europe socialism was a factor to be reckoned 
 with, and she knew she ought to understand it. She 
 had as yet heard nothing of that story of his own 
 mind which she had promised herself. But the day 
 after her talk with Mrs. Pearson, intending direct 
 dispassionate study of him, she went into the con 
 servatory to make Bradfield talk about himself. 
 
 He was not there. Irrationally, his absence when 
 she had come to look for him affected her almost 
 as a rudeness. She quickly dismissed that. He 
 was where his work called him of course. Very 
 likely he had picked the strawberries she had had 
 for breakfast. But she found other things to foster 
 the unflattering suspicion that she was less interest^ 
 ing to him than he to her. One of their conserva 
 tory conversations had revealed the fact that her 
 own a priori disdain of him as a "servant" when 
 they first met had been perfectly matched on his part 
 by an a priori disdain of her as a "parasite woman." 
 Until then she had supposed the superiority of the 
 upper classes to be a thing conceded by the lower. 
 That it was not that the opposite was firmly be 
 lieved not only by Bradfield, but as he assured her 
 by great numbers of working people was to her 
 startling, portentous of impending social change and 
 overthrow. The acquaintance of Marion and Brad- 
 field had caused each of them to make of the other 
 an exception in their general view of each other s 
 classes; but the initial prejudice, merely instilled into 
 her, had been ground into him, and she did not know 
 to what extent it had yielded to personal liking. The 
 withered yellow stem of the lily she had loved and 
 wondered at had fallen into a crack in the rustic
 
 60 THE CHASM 
 
 seat. She had left it there beside him, under his 
 eye, within reach of his hand not intentionally 
 certainly not for him and yet men much more im 
 portant than he would have treasured it. She con 
 vinced herself that she didn t want him to be senti 
 mental about her; but the necessity for self-directed 
 argument about it made her wonder if she were not 
 thinking too much about him. 
 
 She went back that morning to "II Santo" and 
 finished it; and that afternoon played bridge at 
 Miss Cowperthwaite s. That evening she went to 
 a bridge party in Rock Island. That night she went 
 to bed sick of bridge but with endless hours of it 
 looming upon her from all quarters of Moline, 
 Davenport, and Rock Island. Human conversation 
 was at a low ebb among the ladies of the three 
 cities. 
 
 Next morning the Gildersleeve boys came over 
 in their car and for two hours talked golf in which 
 fine game their listener was not wildly interested. 
 This experience gave Miss Moulton more respect 
 for Walt Bradfield s taste in hobbies. Another after 
 noon of bridge; a dinner party with George Pear 
 son beside her, and Marion was ripe for rebellion. 
 George s interest in her had revived on hearing 
 from his mother that she was not actually engaged 
 to the foreigner, and he had contrived to see her 
 every two or three days, heralding his visits with 
 boxes of candy and armfuls of cut roses. 
 
 "George isn t very poikilodoros," she mused, after 
 one of Mr. Pearson s prolonged evening calls. 
 "Bradfield would bring other gifts his own mind 
 news of big world-wide problems interest in things
 
 THE CHASM 61 
 
 I want to be interested in. I shall shock Lady Dio- 
 tima by telling her that the big things are as im 
 portant as the little things. It s nonsense not to 
 make the most of Bradfield s existence in this dreary 
 time. I shall flirt with him if I feel like it. At 
 least I shall hale him forth from his hiding-place 
 and tell him how I hate bridge."
 
 VI 
 
 MARION reached the conservatory next morn 
 ing by nine o clock. It was a bright day and 
 warm for March. Bradfield was in the long 
 part of the building consulting a thermometer and 
 adjusting a mechanism that opened a row of sash 
 in the roof. He returned Miss Moulton s greeting, 
 and either not assuming or not wishing to appear to 
 assume she had come there to talk with him, he 
 turned his attention back to the ventilator-lifter. Sup 
 posing that diffidence was not a permissible explana 
 tion of conduct in a professed egoist, she promptly 
 misinterpreted. 
 
 "Is your time too valuable to waste talking to me 
 this morning, Mr. Bradfield?" she inquired. 
 
 "My time doesn t belong to me, Miss Moulton, 
 but I will steal as much of it as you have any use 
 for." 
 
 "That would seem to oblige me to say important 
 things to justify the theft. Important things are 
 what I don t want to say. I d better wait till you re 
 off duty." 
 
 "I have next Sunday off," he suggested tentative- 
 
 l y- 
 
 In spite of the fact that she admired and liked 
 some of the "big things" about him, she found her- 
 
 62
 
 THE CHASM 63 
 
 self incapable of imagining herself receiving Mr. 
 Bradfield as a caller. 
 
 "The Roughers and Finishers of the Republic 
 Steel Company will give a masked ball Saturday," 
 he said doubtfully. "You wouldn t care to see the 
 working class enjoy itself, would you? No, you 
 wouldn t. They don t know how very well. Not 
 enough practice. I wish you could hear Gilroy s 
 socialist talk in Draper Hall to-morrow night." 
 
 "I hear enough of that from you," said Marion, 
 smiling. "You couldn t let me watch you work 
 a while, could you? Haven t you something to do 
 while we talk that I could sit and watch?" 
 
 "Why yes," he said. "Someone has to putter 
 around near this thermometer this kind of a day, 
 opening windows and turning off steam. Just be 
 fore you came in I saw how a thermostat could be 
 put on here with a rod controlling a valve that would 
 automatically shut off steam and turn the windows 
 open this way as the temperature started to rise. 
 Like an incubator. It would hold the atmosphere of 
 the conservatory at any temperature you like." 
 
 "Isn t that idea valuable?" she asked. "Why 
 don t you work it out and patent it?" 
 
 "Perhaps I might make a little something that 
 way." 
 
 "A little something? I should think a successful 
 device like that good enough to put in all conser 
 vatories would mean thousands." 
 
 "To the capitalist who floated it and put it on the 
 market. To the inventor a few dollars." 
 
 "Oh dear!" said Marion. "I wasn t going to 
 give you a chance to say capitalist or working
 
 64 THE CHASM 
 
 class to me to-day and you ve got them both in 
 already." 
 
 "What shall I talk about?" he asked, laughing. 
 
 "Yourself. You are an enigma I wish to under 
 stand. But first won t you bring that bench over 
 here for me?" He brought it. "Now tell me where 
 you got your vocabulary," she commanded, seating 
 herself. 
 
 "I had four whole years of grammar school," he 
 said, deciding that "vocabulary" meant education. 
 "Trucking then cut school to five months a year, 
 but I studied evenings with my older sister, and 
 made high school at fifteen. Then I discovered the 
 public library. The money I had for clothes went 
 into books of poetry. A student of Augustana Col 
 lege worked for my father summers, and I pumped 
 him of what he knew while we hoed cabbages. He 
 showed me how to study the parts of plants, and I 
 devoured his text-books nights. Time being limited, 
 I had to learn to get the cream of a book in an hour 
 or so, and books being expensive, I had to manage to 
 carry the good of them away in my head. I spent 
 so much time reading I failed to advance out of the 
 D class. My father thought I was wasting time, and 
 so the next year I had to work in the new green 
 house we had built. My English teacher, a lovely 
 woman, was indignant at my being taken out of 
 school. She had me call on her, and loaned me her 
 own beautiful books Ruskin, Morris, Vernon Lee, 
 Keats, Dante. We read together, and I wrote 
 verses to her." 
 
 "Dare I ask how old she was?" 
 
 "To me she was ageless and deathless."
 
 THE CHASM 65 
 
 "That s nice of you," nodded Marion approving 
 ly. "I think she accounts for you nearly. Is she 
 still in the high school?" 
 
 "No, she is teaching in Seattle. She sometimes 
 writes. She praised the style of my books, but she 
 wasn t modern enough to understand them." 
 
 "Oh, you have already written books? Where 
 can I get hold of them? Am I modern enough ? 
 But if you outgrew her what gave you the ideas 
 she couldn t understand?" 
 
 "First, Haeckel. He taught me the real history 
 and nature of organic life. His savage truth was 
 more inspiring than Alice s gentle fiction." 
 
 "So you called her Alice," thought Marion. 
 
 He was reddening beneath his tan, and went on 
 rapidly. "As soon as I was clear of the confusing 
 idea of a monarchic interferer in the self-evolving 
 universe, all that was religious in me and it was a 
 lot poured itself into a passionate adoration of 
 life itself life as the pressure of the universe has 
 thrust it up out of lifelessness into ever intenser es 
 sence and ever finer forms. After monism, social 
 ism was bound to come somehow especially after 
 I went to work in the U. S. Plow Company black 
 smith shop. The only men there who did anything 
 worthy to be called thinking were socialists. It 
 came to me in one magnificent rush from the lips 
 of a little wizened street-sweeper in the park by the 
 depot. In him first I saw the splendor of impas 
 sioned public speech. His grammar was bad, but he 
 had a wealth of fresh and purposeful thoughts 
 thoughts like the gleam of swords. He was talking 
 to a crowd of workingmen, some of them socialists.
 
 66 THE CHASM 
 
 They had a table lit with a gasoline torch and were 
 selling their little red five cent books. I bought 
 the Communist Manifesto. We got into a sizzling 
 argument after the speech, and a dozen of us went 
 over to a saloon and sat there till they turned us 
 out at two in the morning. That was Romance and 
 knightly quest and I was drinking soda water then 
 too. Till then I had come in touch with intellectual 
 energy only in the quietness and solitude of reading. 
 Here was intellect in battle I My brain glowed with 
 it. Everything was a poem. These were magnifi 
 cent men. I was intoxicated with high discourse 
 and the leaping play of wits. Of course the social 
 ists demolished the others all except one anarchist 
 who set up nothing much himself and threw his force 
 into a brilliant attack from the rear, as it were, 
 while the socialists were faced the other way against 
 the muddleheads." 
 
 "Here is where I demand a definition," said Mar 
 ion. "Is muddlehead synonymous with non-social 
 ist, non-revolutionist, or what?" 
 
 "There are overlappings," conceded Bradfield. 
 "Your father is no muddlehead. He knows his class 
 interest and acts accordingly. Haeckel is no mud 
 dlehead in biology. Neither was Mendel, the Cath 
 olic abbe. There are socialists who are clear in 
 economics and muddleheads in religion." 
 
 "Who are the non-muddleheads in religion? 
 Those who have none?" 
 
 "In religion, I think most of the non-muddleheads 
 are what I d call dynamist monists." 
 
 "Sometimes pronounced moonists by the uncon 
 verted?" she suggested gravely.
 
 THE CHASM 67 
 
 "The unconverted are the moonists," he coun 
 tered. "Am I boring you with this history of my 
 mind?" 
 
 "No. The personal part is exactly what I wanted. 
 But " holding up a warning finger "not too much 
 socialism." 
 
 "But it is precisely socialism the crowning, syn 
 thesizing science of the evolutionary philosophy 
 socialism with its riddle-reading analysis of human 
 history, which gives me the key to all that is hap 
 pening in the life around me. Thanks to it, and the 
 sciences that lie back of it, I am better entitled than 
 Browning s Ben Ezra to cry, I see the whole de 
 sign! I see the people about me who lack its light 
 stumbling in a blind maze a welter and confusion 
 of facts they cannot understand. Things happen to 
 them that fill their hearts with misdirected bitter 
 ness. Befogging ideas conceal the real source of 
 their misery the loaded dice with which the em 
 ploying classes play this game of life." 
 
 "So you do propose to turn the bitterness of the 
 working people against their employers!" 
 
 "No. Against their loaded dice. We will take 
 the dice away without bitterness." 
 
 "Do you imagine that little process will not result 
 in bitterness?" 
 
 "Then let it. Would you have us not disarm a 
 burglar simply because he might be embittered?" 
 
 "You have things upside down with a vengeance! 
 You propose to take their property away from cer 
 tain people, and then you have the effrontery to call 
 those people burglars!" 
 
 "The burglar s gun is his property all right, but
 
 68 THE CHASM 
 
 what use does he make of it? So with natural re 
 sources and socially created machinery. When it is 
 finally beaten into the nation s thick head that it 
 must in order to have anything of decent life 
 the nation is going to take that gun away from cer 
 tain people. Miss Moulton: who ought to own 
 those factories the men who every day put all their 
 vital energy into the use of them or you?" 
 
 "There s no particular reason for my owning 
 them. But if my father chooses to give them to me 
 he may not, by the way do you expect me to say 
 No, thank you ?" 
 
 "You d be a fool if you did under the present 
 system. But what do you think of the system, real 
 ly? And the thousands of men who work there, 
 every man with a vote, creating an average value 
 of ten dollars a day apiece, and getting less than 
 two? What do you think of them for voting year 
 after year to present your father and you with eight 
 out of every ten dollars they make?" 
 
 "Is it quite so simple as that?" 
 
 "Essentially. There s much muddying of waters 
 to keep the workers from seeing it. Fortunately 
 the wage-system is only a passing mal-adjustment 
 in the age-long evolutionary process. It s only a 
 little over a hundred years old the state of col 
 lective toil by the many and private ownership of 
 the necessary machinery by the few. As it came, 
 it will pass and good riddance ! Knowing this, we 
 are able to work without bitterness against the bit 
 ter injustice of it. In place of the bloody, futile out 
 breaks my class contented itself with in the past, we 
 analyze society, discover its laws, work in harmony
 
 THE CHASM 69 
 
 with them. We throw our force in the direction 
 humanity must move. Everything groups and re 
 lates itself. Facts string themselves ordinately as 
 beads on the sound generalizations of our philos 
 ophy." 
 
 "Your own mind does happen to work that way 
 with facts. I was trying to express it to Lady Dio- 
 tima a friend of mine I would like you to meet. I 
 imagine, though, that your mind would work just 
 the same way whatever your philosophy." 
 
 "You imagine wrong." 
 
 "So?" said she, resolving to crush him for once. 
 "Haeckel hasn t the socialist philosophy, has he?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Do not his facts string themselves on the lines 
 of sound generalizations?" 
 
 "His biologic facts do, because his biologic gen 
 eralizations are sound. His sociologic facts remain 
 to him a welter and confusion. So would mine if I 
 did not have the socialist philosophy. Take any 
 other social philosophy, and the beads break the 
 string." 
 
 She thought hard for a moment. It was too easy 
 for him. "I can t argue with youl" she exclaimed. 
 "I swore I wouldn t do it to-day. I wanted to get 
 acquainted with you. When you argue with me on 
 these subjects it s like a strong man holding the 
 wrists of a child. It s a thing you ve trained your 
 self in for years. You ought to be ashamed of your 
 self!" 
 
 "For self-defense?" he remonstrated. 
 
 "I won t argue whether it s self-defense. It isn t, 
 but you d beat me out of that, too. .You are the most
 
 70 THE CHASM 
 
 disputatious person I ever met. Did you ever hear 
 Emerson s saying, The gods do not argue ?" 
 
 "I wouldn t either, if I were a god," chuckled 
 Bradfield. "What I said would go whether it was 
 so or not. We have to make people see things in 
 spite of inclination, false education, prejudice. That 
 takes argument." 
 
 "You even argue about arguing." 
 
 "Self-defense," he reiterated. "I m not feeling 
 argumentative." 
 
 "I hope I never see you when you are," she 
 laughed. "Shall I tell you something? Yes, I will. 
 You are so egotistic already that nothing can make 
 you worse. I came in here looking for you the other 
 day, and was disappointed." 
 
 He drew a deep breath and held it while he looked 
 her in the eyes. 
 
 "Well?" she said blithely. "Aren t you going to 
 say you are honored or charmed or somethinged?" 
 
 "I m somethinged, all right," said he. "But there 
 seems to be something the matter with my vocal 
 cords." 
 
 "I knew you d be fun if I could once get you off 
 your hobby!" 
 
 "I think perhaps I m safer on it." Tolerant 
 amusement at himself was his tone not perfectly 
 sustained. 
 
 "I being one of the national burglars?" she sug 
 gested. 
 
 "You as national burglar are not especially dan 
 gerous to me personally." 
 
 "But how about being bribed with my companion-
 
 THE CHASM 71 
 
 ship? Is your alarm for your integrity so great that 
 you wish to avoid my society?" 
 
 "By no means." 
 
 "Is that all you intend to say about it? How un- 
 flatteringly moderate!" 
 
 "Well, that shows my self-control. My real feel 
 ings are not a bit moderate. I d give a leg or two 
 to know you well, Miss Moulton, but it doesn t look 
 probable that I ll have the chance." 
 
 "Now that is what I call being adequate to the 
 occasion!" 
 
 "And I refuse to let myself get started wanting 
 things I can t get. It s a waste of energy." 
 
 "You are economical!" she said unsympathetical- 
 ly. "As for me Moline drives me mad! I can t 
 tell you how unspeakably I hate bridge." 
 
 He looked blank and she laughed. 
 
 "You don t even know what it is! Happy man!" 
 
 "Oh," he said awkwardly "bridge whist. Of 
 course I ve heard of it." 
 
 "They play it morning, noon and night but not 
 for money. Perish the immoral thought! Think 
 of the inanity a gambling game without stakes 
 firing at a target with blank cartridges! I could 
 have stood a little of it. As it is, I m desperate. I 
 feel like doing something perfectly devilish some 
 thing they will disapprove of in me as much as I 
 disapprove of their assassinating half my waking 
 hours. Do you know that pet phrase of harum 
 scarum French artists and writers epater les 
 bourgeois ?" 
 
 "I don t know French."
 
 72 THE CHASM 
 
 "You know the word bourgeois. The other means 
 to spat. The idea is to horrify them, scandalize 
 them, do something to shock their deadly sense of 
 propriety." 
 
 "May I offer you any assistance I may be able to 
 render in epateing the bourgeois?" he said, with ser 
 ious lips and dancing eyes. 
 
 There was a flash in her eyes which looked like 
 yes, and he added quickly : 
 
 "Shall we go for a long ride Sunday in a speed 
 boat I have the use of?" 
 
 "Oh, I d like to!" she exclaimed. 
 
 "Why don t you? The boss wants me to gather 
 some moss maybe to prove I m not a rolling stone. 
 That means some beautiful places I could show 
 you." 
 
 She sat a moment thinking. "That would be sim 
 ply fine but I m afraid it would hardly do. We 
 can t do all the things we d like to, you know," she 
 added, taking refuge in a tone of superior knowl 
 edge of the world. "Mrs. Grundy is still a little 
 too strong for us." 
 
 He looked at her as though something he had 
 expected had developed, and said quietly, "So you 
 dasn\ epater the bourgeois!" 
 
 "You realize very well that kind of lack of free 
 dom common in your own class, Mr. Bradfield," she 
 said, hating to see her courage sink in his estima 
 tion, "but I wonder if freedom isn t scarcer than you 
 think in ours?" 
 
 "It s a condition indeed pitiable!" he said. "The 
 university sociologists ought to investigate it." 
 
 "Of course you wouldn t understand," she said,
 
 THE CHASM 73 
 
 feeling that lie was definitely placing her in the very 
 bourgeoisie with which she claimed to have no sym 
 pathy. "It s a thing I can t explain. Such things 
 come to be a matter of instinct." 
 
 "But I do understand," he said. "It happens to 
 be one of the things I understand best. The expla-, 
 nation, which you are unable to give, is that when it 
 comes to action you find you are a member of your 
 class and must obey its ethics." 
 
 "Is it really no more than class ethics?" 
 
 He wouldn t answer it. 
 
 She saw it was undeniable. It had been too much 
 of her to see it herself. She had unconsciously tak 
 en it for granted when she weighed right and wrong, 
 what to do, what not, that her standard was simply 
 of humanity practically universal, because if there 
 were people to whom it did not apply they were of 
 lower orders and did not count. But she had imagi 
 nation enough to see now how strange that whole 
 standard must look from the outside to one who 
 honestly felt her class to be almost unnecessary, its 
 vital function in the world almost outgrown, its 
 destiny as a class to sink to parasitic rank, and then 
 be sloughed. That vision seemed to shake the 
 stable world. "Is everything I have unconsciously 
 felt as right and wrong every act that says Do me 
 and Don t do me is it all class ethics?" 
 
 "I wouldn t go as far as that," said Bradfield. 
 "There is common ground way down deeper than 
 most folks ever get much deeper than is claimed 
 by those whose interest it is to obscure the chasm. A 
 lot oh, an awful lot is of class." 
 
 For a moment the undeniable fact of social dis-
 
 74 THE CHASM 
 
 union filled her with sadness and a sense of loneli 
 ness as though she were isolated on some far pin 
 nacle. It gave her a yearning to bridge all gaps 
 to draw the severed and warring factions of the 
 world together. Then the practical side of her 
 mind took hold. "If that is what the world is," she 
 said, "I cannot change it. That part of my right 
 and wrong which is of class is still right and wrong 
 for me." 
 
 "You have this moment become thoroughly class- 
 conscious," said Bradfield. "I predict that from 
 now on you will progressively cease to be a muddle- 
 head." 
 
 "Thank you, kind prophet, for your kind proph 
 ecy. It seems to me that I have just now felt some 
 thing much wider than class-consciousness. It seemed 
 cosmic. But you ll admit that it s all pretty far 
 afield from a certain launch-ride. I want to go. 
 Would you care to invite Mrs. Pearson?" 
 
 "Why yes. If you want her." 
 
 "I ve been wanting to have her talk with you, you 
 know," said Marion, but then she pondered. The 
 mossy places were good enough excuse for anybody. 
 Lady Diotima would go as her guest, but hardly if 
 she realized clearly that she would be Bradfield s. 
 Was Bradfield a man who would at all expand in 
 the presence of a chaperone? Bradfield and chaper- 
 onage did not seem to belong in the same boat. And 
 Lady Diotima as friend Marion feared she would 
 be too keen for signs of ignorance of the unwritten 
 edicts of her class and pounce with joy on any little 
 gaucherie betraying plebeian breeding. The girl felt 
 just then that if Lady Diotima tried that with Brad-
 
 THE CHASM 75 
 
 field she would get the worst of it, but still "Per 
 haps I don t want her," she said. "But if I want her, 
 and if she has no engagement, and if she ll go then 
 we ll gather moss." 
 
 As she left him that day she had the feeling that 
 between them there had begun a shifting of spiritual 
 hegemony as though weight had moved from her 
 side of their balance to his as though the ideal of 
 freedom to which he looked inward had gained on 
 her waning ideal of caste. The meeting of their 
 eyes at parting sent a delicate thrill through her a 
 sensation as of breathing sudden perfume: but she 
 turned her mind from that at once, and made believe 
 to herself that no such thing had happened.
 
 VII 
 
 THE trim, maroon-colored launch "Nancy" lay 
 ready to be stepped into alongside the boat- 
 house wharf on a hot Sunday morning the last 
 of March. The brass would take no higher polish,- 
 woodwork could be no cleaner, and Walt Bradfield 
 in his Sunday clothes was looking nervously up the 
 street to the south for a motor car bringing Miss 
 Moulton and Mrs. Pearson. To his surprise Mar 
 ion arrived alone, coming on foot along the white 
 boulevard through the raw little trees of the new 
 park by the river. 
 
 "I telephoned Mrs. Pearson not to stop for me at 
 Hillcrest," she said, joining Bradfield beside the 
 launch. "I didn t realize how hot it was. Shall I 
 get in? That canopy looks good after the mockery 
 of those absurd trees." 
 
 He held the launch from rocking as she stepped 
 in and seated herself on the shaded side. 
 
 "I couldn t persuade myself you were really com 
 ing," he said. 
 
 "I was afraid after I started that Mrs. Pearson 
 would get here first. What would you have done?" 
 
 "I m not half as much afraid of Mrs. Pearson as 
 I am of you." 
 
 She looked up the street perhaps to avoid that 
 
 76
 
 THE CHASM 77 
 
 faint thrill of meeting eyes. "There she is now!" she 
 exclaimed, seeing the Pearson car. "I was just in 
 time." 
 
 Walt turned to see, mentally preparing for battle 
 with Mrs. Pearson. "No one but the driver in that 
 car," he said. 
 
 The chauffeur stopped his machine, saw Miss 
 Moulton in the launch, and brought her a note. She 
 skimmed it. 
 
 "Please tell Mrs. Pearson I m very sorry," she 
 said. She looked out thoughtfully across Sylvan 
 water as the chauffeur went back to his car. She 
 lifted the note from her lap and read it again, then 
 tore it absent-mindedly across. She looked back 
 along the shadeless boulevard. Walt watched her 
 curiously, brightening finally as he saw her look of 
 determination. "Well, she s not coming," said 
 Marion, dropping overboard the fragments of 
 crested note-paper. "We might as well start." 
 
 He cast off with alacrity, climbed in, and took his 
 place at the engine. She looked at the slowly wide 
 ning strip of water between launch and landing. "Can 
 you see Class-Ethics prostrate on that wharf?" she 
 asked. 
 
 They laughed together the laugh of people who 
 have little jokes that other people cannot under 
 stand. 
 
 "Who s that with Walt Bradfield?" asked a 
 launch-owner of Joe the boat-keeper. 
 
 "Looks like the Moulton girl that used to go out 
 with George Pearson," Joe responded. "Guess she 
 wouldn t be going out with Walt, though." 
 
 "Marion Moulton? A thirty millionairess! I
 
 78 THE CHASM 
 
 should say not. She s going to marry some foreign 
 prince. But that s sure a high-toned girl." 
 
 "Prob ly hired Walt to take her some place," Joe 
 conjectured. 
 
 The launch sped away from the dingy wooden 
 landing, Bradfield watching and listening to the en 
 gine while he steered with the tiller-lever a handle 
 set in the line that ran outside the low rail. "It 
 seems too good to be true," he said. 
 
 "Good things do happen sometimes. I am escap 
 ing some people who ll eat half the afternoon and 
 talk about it the other half. Poor mother! I told 
 her I was going on an all afternoon launch-party. 
 If she could see the party!" 
 
 "Would it epater her, too?" 
 
 "She might pretend not. She s a new thoughtist, 
 but you can t tell just when she s going to be an old 
 thoughtist. The party might strike her as some 
 what unchaperoned." His expression gave rise to 
 an amusing doubt. "Do you know what a chaperone 
 is, oh man of Eden?" 
 
 "I ve read of it," he answered. 
 
 "It!" she exclaimed joyfully. 
 
 "It s an institution above my social level and be 
 low yours," he explained. 
 
 She reluctantly gave up the hope of that delightful 
 piece of ignorance in him. "No," she said, " not 
 below my social level." 
 
 "But below you" He liked that even better. 
 
 "To-day it is in the collapse of our friend on the 
 wharf. You see you are giving me the egotism. 
 By the way, is there some place we can get dinner? 
 Not that I m hungry, Mr. Bradfield. Nothing so
 
 THE CHASM 79 
 
 indelicate, I assure you, but still we can t eat moss, 
 you know." 
 
 "I don t know any place good enough for you." 
 
 "Some woodsy, farmy place? Where would you 
 take me if I were Alice?" Her eyes were mischiev 
 ous at the name. 
 
 "Spinnyville," he said, brightening, but not en 
 couraging her to tease him about his former love. 
 
 Deciding to stop on their way down to the island 
 where they were to get the moss, they rounded the 
 head of the government island, went through the new 
 lock, and ran down along a rocky shore. The flaw 
 less glades of the golf-links, laid out through rugged 
 woods, were already green with spring. On their 
 right the tree-lined streets of Davenport climbed 
 from river to bluff churches and residences half 
 emerging from a russet haze of buds. Down-stream, 
 beneath a span of the big bridge they saw miles of 
 blue water bounded by willow-covered shores and 
 towheads putting on new gold. Above the south 
 western hills were piled slow masses of white cloud. 
 
 As they ran down past the cities and the islands 
 they talked of one of his books. He had given her 
 two of them, small cloth-bound volumes of about 
 seventy pages each. She had yet to read "Social 
 Evolution," but had finished "Organic Evolution" 
 the night before. It was not the cold, scientific 
 treatise the title had led her to expect. She found 
 in it the work of a poet who had based his work on 
 cold, scientific treatises, but he himself had visualized 
 the million centuries of life and written the history 
 thereof with passion. This writing gave her a new 
 feeling toward the world she lived in, a new feeling
 
 80 THE CHASM 
 
 toward herself. Life was much more marvelous 
 than she had supposed, but less mysterious. While 
 she was under the spell of the book, "soul" ceased to 
 be a thing apart. It was a function of living mat 
 ter. But instead of making soul less beautiful, the 
 intimacy made living matter more so. Instead of 
 ceasing to exist, the most exquisite spirituality be 
 came a glorious phase of material life. Inorganic 
 matter itself was no longer the inert stuff it had 
 seemed. It was polarized energy each atom a 
 point where complex forces crystallize each mole 
 cule a balancing and interlocking of such atoms into 
 substance. Matter, as Bradfield made her conceive 
 it, was as spiritual as her own old notion of spirit. 
 These forces her mother decried as "earth-forces" 
 played through the farthest stars of deepest heaven; 
 but not more wonderfully than through the nearest 
 grain of earthly dust. The dust itself was force. 
 And spirit conceived as a something that can float 
 free of matter was more material than spirit as a 
 function of matter. A function cannot float away, 
 and floating is a material process. 
 
 When Marion had read the passage on the nature 
 of "soul" which Bradfield had inserted in his account 
 of the first trace of nerve-tissue in the Platodaria she 
 found herself indulging in a curious speculation. 
 Would a man who felt soul and body to be so indis 
 soluble a unity feel as he touched a woman s lips that 
 it was her soul he touched? And would there be 
 
 therefore in his kiss an exaltation ? At this point 
 
 she checked that train of thought, and turned her 
 mind forcibly back to the life-story of her Platodari- 
 an ancestors. But trains of thought so checked in con-
 
 THE CHASM 81 
 
 sciousness are inclined to complete themselves sub 
 consciously, and after she had turned off her elec 
 tric reading lamp, her head sunk in her pillow and 
 her conscious soul in sleep, she dreamed she kissed 
 Walt Bradfield on the lips, and was trying to explain 
 to him that she had made a mistake, but it was the 
 fault of his book. 
 
 As he sat opposite her in the launch this morning, 
 a casual glance at his lips suddenly and for the first 
 time brought the memory of that dream of the night 
 into her consciousness. Mr. Bradfield was talking, 
 but suddenly lost hold of his idea. He looked at 
 Marion closely, but contrary to her custom her eyes 
 would not meet his. He wondered what could have 
 made her of a sudden so astonishingly beautiful. 
 That problem he soon solved. The answer was 
 simply that she was blushing, and there was no sun 
 set cloud that could compete with the fleeting rose 
 hue of her skin. But why was she blushing? Being 
 unable to solve that, Walt asked her. 
 
 "I m not," she protested. 
 
 He insisted that he had eyes fortunately. 
 
 "Well, then, it s sunburn. I sunburn very easily. 
 I freckle, too isn t that dreadful? What is that 
 stone house over there?" 
 
 "That stone house over there is a pretext for a 
 highly undesirable change of subject." 
 
 "Oh," said Marion. "There is a canal lock ! And 
 there s the mouth of a river! That must be the 
 Hennepin canal. Evidently that s the lock-keeper s 
 house." 
 
 "Nothing I was saying could have caused it," said 
 Bradfield, reasoning aloud. "Consequently it was
 
 83 THE CHASM 
 
 something you thought of just then. What was it 
 you thought of?" 
 
 "Are you acquainted with the lock-keeper?" The 
 cross purpose conversation amused her and gave her 
 time to realize that it was no such criminal thing, 
 after all, to have dreamed of kissing a man. 
 
 "Well, I see you re a secretive person likewise a 
 stubborn," he observed. "But you can t deprive 
 me of the satisfaction of having seen it. It was 
 somewhat the loveliest thing I have ever beheld." 
 
 "If that s so, I shall have to cultivate it." 
 
 "Have mercy! You are sufficiently disturbing 
 normally." He noticed that his hand was trembling, 
 and laughed. 
 
 "What are you laughing at?" she demanded. 
 
 "People who won t tell things don t get things 
 told them." 
 
 "It s bad manners to laugh and not tell why." 
 
 "Not half so tantalizing as to blush and not tell 
 why. But I ll tell if you will." 
 
 She declined hastily. 
 
 "Ah ha !" he exclaimed. "That proves you know 
 why you blushed." 
 
 "But you don t!" she exulted. "And that isn t 
 half. You aren t going to." 
 
 "You re doing it again!" he exclaimed. "Good 
 God!" 
 
 She gave a start. "That last remark led me to 
 suppose the engine was about to explode !" 
 
 "The engine isn t!" 
 
 She could not keep the laughter out of her eyes; 
 and when he saw it his whole soul laughed, a spasm 
 of silent, joyous laughter, flooding his nerves in spite
 
 THE CHASM 83 
 
 of the protest of reason. The happiness in that 
 was much too keen. Reason said: "Don t do that, 
 Walt. Don t let yourself fall in love with the 
 Countess de Hohenfels." And reason would prob 
 ably have been obeyed had it not been for certain 
 charming little intimations that the not-yet Countess 
 de Hohenfels was letting herself fall in love with 
 him or doing it without her permission. He form 
 ulated no hopes, but the possibility made her fear 
 fully attractive to him. 
 
 "You are fun, Walt Bradfield," she said. "What 
 reader of those deep books of yours would guess how 
 you can laugh?" 
 
 He noticed the engine igniting irregularly, stood 
 up and leaned over it, reduced the flow of gasoline : 
 and when he reseated himself, it was beside her. 
 
 "Doesn t this make the boat trim badly?" she 
 suggested. 
 
 "The boat doesn t mind," he said. "Do you?" 
 
 "I wouldn t let a mere boat outdo me in indif 
 ference," said she, her eyes fairly crinkling. 
 
 He acknowledged the hit with a laugh. "It isn t 
 indifference, though." 
 
 "Indeed!" She drew herselT up and faced him. 
 
 "Not on the part of the boat. My sitting over 
 here really does throw it a little off its balance." 
 
 "Supersensitive boat!" she scoffed. 
 
 "It never blushes, though. Oh, Lord!" He pulled 
 sharply on the tiller-lever. The boat swung to the 
 left, away from a rocky islet. He looked anxiously 
 at the shore and at the water alongside them and for 
 a moment held his breath. 
 
 "What s wrong?" exclaimed Marion.
 
 84 THE CHASM 
 
 "We just sidled over the middle of a wing-dam," 
 he answered with a sigh of relief. "Fortunately 
 there was water enough." He looked back, noticing 
 the part of the dam which they had crossed. In 
 turning the boat down-stream again the easing of the 
 rudder drew his arm along the gunwale past her. 
 He did not think of it as being around her, his mind 
 still being on the wing-dam; but a subtle and lovely 
 sensation stole through him, a faint fragrance from 
 her garments or her hair, a delicate knowledge of 
 her nearness caroling in his nerves. As she turned 
 to look at the island, her face was toward him and 
 her elbow rested lightly on his arm. His sleeve 
 seemed sentient of the touch. 
 
 "Look at that cunning cabin!" she exclaimed. 
 "Lew Anderson s the blacksmith on Second 
 Avenue. Built it himself. This is his boat we just 
 missed sinking." He was finding articulation dif 
 ficult. 
 
 "Would we have sunk?" she asked. 
 "Oh, we d have got her off and run ashore be 
 fore she filled." 
 
 "Wouldn t that have been exciting?" 
 He forgot to answer, and she looked at him as 
 though to see what he was thinking. 
 , "I am looking at those Rossetti lips of yours," he 
 said. He intended to speak the words lightly, but 
 his voice played him the trick of expressing his real 
 instead of his make-believe emotion. His real emo 
 tion made her turn away with a quick, deep intake of 
 breath. Her shoulders drew up a little with the 
 memory of her dream and the feeling of the danger 
 of its coming true. She seemed to have eaten of the
 
 THE CHASM 85 
 
 lotus, and the energy necessary to move or speak or 
 think had dissolved under the influence of that in 
 sidious flower. The vital electricity which stores 
 and restores itself in living nerves and is wont at a 
 motor thought to pour itself into paths leading to 
 muscular action seemed to have flowed away into 
 the blood that throbbed in her temples and flushed 
 her cheeks. 
 
 Walt too had eaten of the flower of enervation. 
 The vital electricity whose total was his soul was 
 raying with unknown spirituo-bodily forces. There 
 seemed to be a glorified form of gravitation drawing 
 them close enough to kiss. She succeeded in turning 
 her face away only by overcoming an exquisite force 
 operating in the opposite direction. He had never 
 known anything so adorable as that ardent, dream 
 like bending of her head. 
 
 She had let Feodor kiss her once when they found 
 themselves secluded for a moment among the great 
 evergreens of the Pincio with a solemn sunset flam 
 ing down behind the dome of St. Peter s; but that 
 had been a voluntary act of hers, a reasonable thing 
 she deliberately decided to do and did, because she 
 loved Fedya and he was dying to kiss her. In that 
 her own nature had played no such part as now, 
 when against reason and will she wanted to kiss Walt 
 Bradfield a desire forming itself into an idea as 
 definite as an act. 
 
 U I mustn t, I mustn t!" she told herself, and rose 
 intending to sit on the other side of the launch. 
 
 Before he knew it he had caught her hand, but it 
 seemed to her it was not so much by her hand he 
 drew her as by an exquisite invisible net enveloping
 
 86 THE CHASM 
 
 and drawing her whole body. "I mustn t !" she said 
 aloud and drew away her hand. Her voice, vibrat 
 ing with unfamiliar emotion, did not seem her own. 
 She steadied herself by taking hold of a rod that 
 supported the canvas roof. "Are you sure you know 
 where this boat is running?" she asked. 
 
 He had, in fact, forgotten there was such a thing 
 as a boat racing twenty-five miles an hour down a 
 river full of just submerged wing-dams. He turned 
 with a start to the indispensable business of piloting, 
 and that turning of his attention seemed to free her 
 a little from the overmastering spell. 
 
 She seated herself on the opposite side of the 
 launch, not looking at him, leaning forward on her 
 elbow, staring out with troubled, unseeing eyes across 
 the gray, steel-colored water. The thought of Feo- 
 dor was linked with a pang at her disloyalty. Till 
 now, since she loved Feodor and did not love Brad- 
 field, she had felt perfectly free to enjoy the com 
 panionship of the working-class thinker. Now she 
 began to see that she had formulated the case too 
 simply. Love and non-love were not the two dis 
 tinct, easily distinguishable things she had assumed 
 them to be. The lovely languor that had stolen 
 through her was telling every fiber that Walt Brad- 
 field s kiss would be sweeter than the one on the 
 Pincian hill. The knowledge was painful. It upset 
 everything. She did not want it to be so. Did it 
 mean that she loved Bradfield? A thousand mem- 
 ories of Feodor said no. The main ideas and pur 
 poses of her life were obscured and threatened by 
 this inexplicable allurement. Old feelings rose to 
 defend themselves against the vivid new invader:
 
 THE CHASM 87 
 
 but the mental pain of the conflict was mingled with 
 a sweetness beyond violets, gleam of stars, or sound 
 of exquisite chords. 
 
 The man s intoxicating impulse to fold her and 
 hold her and tell her he loved her, having been 
 thwarted in that instant when she made him realize 
 the necessity of piloting, all his good reasons for not 
 making love to her came flashing back upon his mind. 
 He looked at her nervously for signs of reaction. 
 One instant he feared that what kept her from look 
 ing at him was anger: and the next he hoped it was 
 self-distrust. He was eager to know; but he quickly 
 rejected, when it formed itself in his mind, the ques 
 tion "Are you angry?" It was too likely to convey 
 the suggestion that she ought to be. The only other 
 question worth asking he judged impolitic. If she 
 was not asking herself whether she loved him, there 
 was no use in his asking. And if she was asking 
 herself, then whatever answer she formed in her 
 own mind was likely to be more favorable than any 
 she would voice for him. And after all, he reflected, 
 what difference would it make how near loving him 
 she was at this moment? Her class feeling would 
 keep her from marrying him. Of that he was cer 
 tain. His own class feeling had hitherto helped 
 him to regard a marriage with her not only as im 
 possible, uut even as unwise from the point of view 
 of his own intellectual and spiritual ambitions. 
 
 She was wondering whether she would dare tell De 
 Hohenfels. She tried to persuade herself there was 
 nothing to tell. Nothing had really happened. But 
 how would he take it if he knew she wanted some 
 thing to happen? It surely would not do to tell him
 
 88 THE CHASM 
 
 such a thing in a letter, but she resolved that some 
 kind of letter should be mailed to him that very 
 night in spite of her earlier conclusion that she 
 could not write until she had talked with her father. 
 As she sat looking across the slate-colored waves she 
 was deciding to go to her father that evening and 
 insist on his listening to what she had to say. Then 
 she would write to Fedya. 
 
 Into her consciousness, interrupting her train of 
 thought, stole the lovely sensation that filled her 
 lungs each time she breathed. It was like the scent 
 of clover in the sun. She remembered the look of 
 Bradfield s clear, sun-browned skin, the slight rosi- 
 ness that showed through it, the suggestion of pure, 
 abounding blood and outdoor health. Was it the 
 magnetism of health in that tiller of the earth, that 
 breather of pure air, which so affected her? She 
 glanced at him. It surprised her somehow to see 
 that he was absorbed in thought, not looking at her, 
 apparently not aware of her presence. She remem 
 bered the lily he had not taken as a souvenir of her. 
 He sighed, as though reaching some undesired but 
 accepted conclusion, then looked at her. Their eyes 
 met. He smiled a little, in a manner that kept her 
 from looking away, a tender amusement that took 
 her into his confidence and compelled the gift of 
 hers. "Don t you think we had better talk social 
 ism?" he said. 
 
 Her face lit up with understanding and sympathy. 
 She liked his frank acceptance of the fact that they 
 were attracted, his readiness not to make too much 
 of it, his ability to take a human, not merely a mas-
 
 THE CHASM 89 
 
 culine, view of the sex duel. "Socialism?" she said. 
 "Well, yes. Or why not try dynamist monism?" 
 
 Their attention was drawn by a far-off rumble. 
 
 "Just look at that storm ahead of us!" he ex 
 claimed. "Why, there s the Buffalo station! We ve 
 passed Spinnyville." He looked around. 
 
 "I think you are rather an absent-minded pilot," 
 she observed. 
 
 "It does look like it to-day." He drew the rud 
 der over and the speed-boat wheeled, leaning to star 
 board and turning almost in her own length. He 
 headed up the river, got his bearings, then looked 
 back at the clouds which stretched from south to 
 northwest as far as the eye could reach. "Funny I 
 didn t notice that," he muttered. There was a 
 flicker of lightning reddening the cloud. He quick 
 ly pulled out his watch and looked at it until he heard 
 the thunder. "About eighteen seconds," he said. 
 "Over three and a half miles." 
 
 "Isn t that fun?" she said. "Just how do you get 
 that?" 
 
 "Eleven hundred feet a second." He was trying 
 to judge the speed of the storm from its appearance. 
 
 "Can we make Spinnyville?" she asked. 
 
 "Easily. One minute s run. But possibly this 
 
 will be an all day rain " He looked at her 
 
 tailored suit. 
 
 "Could we make Moline?" 
 
 "We could make the lower end of Rock Island in 
 seventeen or eighteen minutes, leave the launch there, 
 and go home on the car." 
 
 "Will the storm give us eighteen minutes?"
 
 90 THE CHASM 
 
 "If it has just our speed, we are ten or twelve 
 minutes ahead of it now, and of course we d hold 
 that lead. I don t think it can be traveling enough 
 faster than we to cut the lead to nothing." 
 
 "A race with a storm ! Try it !" 
 
 He advanced the spark to the last notch, showed 
 her how to steer and where to hold, looked over the 
 connections on his coils, tightened a screw here and 
 there, filled up his oil-cups, and once more took 
 charge of the tiller-lever. The boat was at top 
 most speed, rushing under the drive of sixty horse 
 power. "There goes Spinnyville!" he said, pointing 
 back over the stern quarter to a country inn. The 
 rapidity with which it receded gave her a sense of 
 security. The storm rampant looked motionless; 
 but Bradfield saw it had grown much higher. 
 
 "Goodbye Spinnyville I" she called. "Oh dear I 
 I suppose I ll have to dine with Aunt Farnsworth 
 after all!" 
 
 "Will you eat with me^-some place in Rock Is 
 land?" he asked, hesitatingly. 
 
 Marion considered. "Where, for instance?" 
 
 He was at a loss. The only place he could think 
 of Jane s Lightning Lunch did not strike him as 
 particularly appropriate. "Where would I take 
 you," he asked, "if I were Feodor?" 
 
 She smiled at his tit-for-tat, but the question 
 bothered her. She did not know the extent of that 
 fifty dollar a month purse of his; she was reluctant 
 about suggesting an expensive place and unwilling to 
 go to a cheap one. She was perfectly certain poor 
 Bradfield had never in his life ordered a dinner a 
 la carte and was bound to make a botch of it. The
 
 THE CHASM 91 
 
 question made them both uncomfortably class-con 
 scious. She saw he would attribute a refusal solely 
 to her sense of his social inferiority. "You would 
 take me to The Harms," she answered finally. 
 
 He was silent, trying to understand her hesita 
 tion, uncertain now whether he ought to ask her to 
 go with him. 
 
 "There s the island with the cabin!" she said, 
 looking ahead. 
 
 A stab of lightning behind them lit up their faces, 
 and shortly afterward the sound broke on them 
 much louder than before. Bradfield took out his 
 watch and caught the exact time of the next peal. 
 "That doesn t look very good," said he after a 
 moment. "That was only a couple of miles away." 
 He looked back. "That s all it is, too," he said. 
 He saw a white, contorted fringe of cloud blown out 
 before the black body of the tempest. 
 
 "Can t you figure the speed from the two flashes?" 
 she asked. 
 
 Seeing that the method of calculating distance by 
 sound had caught her fancy, he took a pencil and en 
 velope. She leaned over looking at his figures. "Ac 
 cording to that," he said, "it s making two miles to 
 our one. It will beat us all hollow." 
 
 "Perhaps the first thunder you timed came from 
 farther back in the storm." 
 
 "Yes, but look at the thing. It must be coming 
 fifty miles an hour!" 
 
 The storm-clouds had gained enormously on them 
 even while they were playing with their figures. 
 When they passed the wing-dam they had run over 
 coming down and cleared the head of the island,
 
 92 THE CHASM 
 
 they saw a great, black arm of cloud above the Iowa 
 hills not half a mile away, and farther back a falling 
 wall of rain. Walt pulled the rudder square across 
 the stern, made the launch whirl, and headed back 
 down-stream. "We ve got to get out of that!" he ex 
 claimed. "Us to the cabin!" 
 
 From cloud to earth or from earth to cloud there 
 leapt a blinding blade of light, a shocking crash of 
 sound. It fell half way up the hill and split a mas 
 sive oak-tree into three great gleaming splinters. 
 One fragment of the trunk shot off like a chip from 
 an axe, and two large limbs sank down not wholly 
 severed. Marion gripped the edge of the seat and 
 turned pale. Bradfield s nerves were shaken. An 
 icy wind came rushing up the river piling up waves 
 and tearing off their tops. The canvas roof filled 
 and nearly knocked the boat over. 
 
 He was too anxious to get ashore quickly. Rather 
 than turn broadside to the wind by running around 
 the wing-dam which lay between them and the island 
 landing he headed straight across it holding as nearly 
 as he could on the point he had gone over it before. 
 When they reached it the launch struck and stopped 
 with a crash that threw them forward against the 
 bulkhead. Trembling with the futile driving of the 
 propeller, the boat began to swing down-stream. 
 Bradfield picked himself up, and instinctively threw 
 off the power. "Are you hurt?" he shouted. 
 
 "No," she called, though she really did not know 
 whether she was or not. "What shall I do?" 
 
 "Sit still I" 
 
 The water was coming through the stove-in bot 
 tom, and the rising waves slapped in as the current
 
 THE CHASM 93 
 
 swung the stern down-stream. Keel and wheel cleared 
 the dam, but the bow, now pointing up-stream, stuck 
 fast on the rock. Bradfield reversed the engine, 
 threw in the switch, and rocked the flywheel. The 
 engine started backing, but the bow was somehow 
 wedged or impaled on a point of rock. He retarded 
 the spark and opened the throttle for more power, 
 but in vain. "Get clear to the stern 1" he called to 
 Marion. 
 
 She obeyed, wetting her feet in the water that now 
 covered the bottom of the boat, but the shifting of 
 her weight did not free the bow. Leaving the pro 
 peller backing, Bradfield jumped up on the bow 
 deck, lowered himself knee deep in the water, got 
 foothold on the rocks of the dam, and with all his 
 strength pulled up on the painter. She came free 
 with a jerk that made him lose his balance and left 
 him on the dam. He threw himself after the back 
 ing boat, caught a precarious hold with his right arm 
 over the bow and clung there half submerged in the 
 icy water. "Can you help me up?" he shouted. 
 
 Marion ran forward and climbed up on the little 
 bow deck. The wind nearly swept her off, but she 
 caught herself and kneeling grasped his left arm with 
 both hands and pulled him up till he got his weight 
 on the deck. He scrambled up and darted for the 
 engine. The launch was backing in a circle, her rud 
 der jammed sidewise: and the water was almost 
 up to the base of the cylinders. A little more and 
 there would be no power to run her ashore before 
 she sank. He started her ahead, headed her toward 
 shore, then turned and helped Marion down from 
 the wind-swept deck. "We re all right I" he cried.
 
 94 THE CHASM 
 
 "We ll make it!" He shivered with the chill of his 
 watersoaked garments. 
 
 Great drops of rain came driving slant-wise : the 
 lightning flashed on the hills. The boat grounded 
 eight or ten feet from dry land. He jumped over 
 board and waded ashore with the painter, but could 
 not get the bow in far enough for Marion to make 
 it. He came back into the water and put up his arms 
 for her. 
 
 "Come!" he said. 
 
 She leaned down to him quickly, her arms about 
 his neck. He took her, meeting her expected weight 
 and the unexpected pressure of the wind blowing her 
 damp skirt tight against him and sweeping wet ten 
 drils of her hair across his eyes. As he turned with 
 her and waded swiftly through the water, his pur 
 pose of getting her ashore dry-shod could not keep 
 out all joy of even such fulfilment of his desire to 
 have her in his arms. Too incidental to be real ful 
 filment, too brief to be then quite realized, it was a 
 thing to dream back to afterward. 
 
 "Run!" he commanded as she gained her balance 
 on the shore. "To the cabin!" 
 
 "What are you going to do?" she demanded. 
 
 "Get the boat in. She s going to sink!" He 
 
 | found two round barkless limbs, placed one under the 
 
 bow, another on the shore, and pulled on the painter. 
 
 "Let me help," she said, seizing the rope. 
 
 Together they dragged the boat in, the cold 
 rain beating in their faces, and then they ran for the 
 cabin.
 
 VIII 
 
 SAFE inside, with the cabin door shut against 
 rain, wind and lightning, Marion wilted into a 
 chair near the deal table, leaned over with her 
 face between her hands, and shivering uncontrolla 
 bly, began to cry. 
 
 Walt looked at her helplessly. Her response had 
 been so quick and adequate when he had called on 
 her in their danger that he had no idea she had been 
 undergoing a strain such as this reaction indicated. 
 "I m awfully sorry," he said, sitting down beside 
 her. 
 
 She straightened up, and caught a glimpse of the 
 solicitude in his face. "How perfectly silly of me!" 
 she exclaimed. She laughed hysterically, then reso 
 lutely controlling herself she took off her soiled 
 gloves and dripping hat. 
 
 "You ve earned the right to be a little silly," said 
 Walt, speaking quietly. "I never would have got 
 back into that boat if it hadn t been for you. And 
 with your skirts the wind came near taking you 
 into the river." 
 
 The little cabin was lit weirdly by three quick 
 angry flashes. Then broke the thunder like a whole 
 sea overhead. 
 
 95
 
 96 THE CHASM 
 
 Marion shrank from it. "I had no idea I was 
 such a baby!" 
 
 His hand moved with protective impulse to her 
 shoulder. She leaned closer as she would have to 
 Lady Diotima, with a sense of refuge from the 
 threatening river, the rain, and the sudden, sweep 
 ing cold. The broad soft coils of her hair lay 
 beautiful against his cheek. He breathed its fra 
 grance. The sweetness that suffused them was love 
 lier because not sought. For her, not thinking of it 
 then, it made her refuge more complete. But in a 
 few moments it became the main thing, a dear com 
 pulsion weaving its fairy meshes round their souls, 
 drawing them close and warm amid the rattling of 
 the water-covered window, the pouring of the rain 
 upon the roof. The idea that she ought not to leave 
 his arm around her did not lead to action. Inaction 
 was too sweet. She let the idea dissolve, closed her 
 eyes happily, and settled herself better like a child 
 that is content. 
 
 Then she knew that if she stayed there another 
 moment their lips would meet. Something powerful 
 within her said "Stay!" She started to pretend to 
 herself that it wasn t so; then broke abruptly from 
 the grasp of self deception, breathing the name of 
 Feodor, and rose as one drowsy, unwillingly awak 
 ing. 
 
 "How are we ever going to get home?" she asked, 
 going to the window. 
 
 Walt had risen with the impulse to follow her. 
 For a moment he could not speak. She turned and 
 looked at him. "A fisherman s house-boat," he said, 
 pointing to the Iowa shore. "We will signal him to
 
 THE CHASM 97 
 
 take us off. Perhaps we can get a farmer to drive 
 us in to the street-car." 
 
 "Suppose the storm doesn t stop? If we were left 
 here all night it would epater Moline a little more 
 than I bargained for." 
 
 "Moline mustn t know." 
 
 "My father would. Oh, really, it would be 
 dreadful!" 
 
 "It isn t likely to last till dark. We must have 
 a fire." 
 
 "You must be frozen," she said. 
 
 He glanced at her wet shoes. He started a fire 
 in the stone fire-place, and piled it high with logs. 
 The wind rushing overhead soon made the flame 
 roar in the chimney. From a locker he produced 
 glasses, a bottle of whiskey and one of chalybeate 
 water. "Here s something we need," he said. 
 
 He found no argument about it, as he would have 
 with Alice. Marion took the whiskey as a matter 
 of course. "Well," she said, smiling. "Things 
 look better I" She set down the empty glass and 
 moved nearer the fire. "You haven t a cigarette 
 there in your friend s locker, have you?" 
 
 "Makin s." 
 
 She nodded. He handed her a big sack of tobacco 
 and an orange booklet of Riz La Croix papers. 
 Looking with the eyes of the average American, 
 Bradfield had hitherto regarded girls smoking as an 
 indication of moral depravity; but as he watched 
 Marion roll her cigarette the cachet of refinement 
 on every movement of her graceful, efficient hands 
 he decided that in this opinion he had been a muddle- 
 headed provincial. He thought of the soothing effect
 
 98 THE CHASM 
 
 of tobacco on the nerves of this girl who was just 
 emerging from a condition of hysteria; and then he 
 rejected that excuse and all excuses as unnecessary. 
 If she wanted to smoke that was reason enough for 
 her, and for him. He fished out a cob-pipe of Lew 
 Anderson s and filled it, and placed a tin box full of 
 matches near her. She tried to light one on the sole 
 of her shoe but it was too wet. 
 
 "You must take those off," he said. "Here are a 
 pair of Lew s slippers for you just the right size." 
 
 "The antique jest shall be forgiven you," she an 
 swered, lighting her cigarette, " for the sake of 
 your sensible suggestion." Whereupon, undoing their 
 corded silk laces, she drew off her high tan shoes. 
 He noticed a delicate monogram, two M s in brown 
 silk above her ankle. He placed a box before the 
 fire for her to rest her feet on, then set her shoes 
 and coat and hat to dry. 
 
 "How about yourself?" she said. "You must be 
 wet to the skin." 
 
 "With your gracious permission," he answered, 
 "I shall now retire to the dressing-room alias be 
 hind the cupboard." He suited the action to the 
 word, opening the cupboard door for additional 
 screened space, and reappearing after a few min 
 utes in Lew Anderson s corduroys, blue flannel shirt, 
 and felt moccasins. 
 
 As she sat before the mounting flame, Marion had 
 been contrasting this forthright solution of the wet 
 clothes question with George Pearson s. George 
 would never have dreamed of having either of them 
 do anything but sit all afternoon in discomfort. She
 
 THE CHASM 99 
 
 reflected that in his own environment Walt dealt with 
 things with firmness and certainty. Difficulties arose 
 only when he approached hers. 
 
 Thinking of the girl s fearless, first-hand attitude 
 toward things, the typical attitude Nietzsche called 
 "value-creating," Bradfield went on to wonder how 
 far present master-ethics, the life-expression of men 
 and women economically secure and free, would re 
 semble the ethics of the masterless and slaveless 
 future. Slave-ethics the product of poverty and 
 economic oppression would surely disappear. As 
 he came from behind the cupboard absorbed in this, 
 he suddenly became aware that Marion s wide eyes 
 were interestedly fixed on his. She was leaning back 
 luxuriously, the firelight making her hair a glory of 
 gleaming lights and luring shadows. 
 
 "What were you thinking about so intently?" she 
 asked. 
 
 When he told her, she raised her fair hands in 
 despair. "That soulful gaze!" she cried. "That 
 rapt expression! I supposed of course you were 
 thinking of me ! To think that I cannot compete 
 with the ethics of dynamist monism !" 
 
 "It was the thought of you which led me to the 
 thought of that," he explained. 
 
 "I refuse to be appeased. The thought of that 
 should have led you to the thought of me." 
 
 "Fair lady, I have sinned against you," said he. 
 humbly. "What shall my penance be?" 
 
 "Your penance? Let me see. Your offense was 
 being guilty of prose. You are condemned to im 
 provise a poem in praise of me."
 
 100 THE CHASM 
 
 "De Bergerac improvised a ballade while fighting 
 a duel," said Walt. "I will improvise this poem 
 while I roast potatoes." He went and got the po 
 tatoes and buried them thoughtfully in the hot ashes. 
 
 " No fair!" she said. "You are making it up 
 beforehand." 
 
 "I have to arrange my rhymes," he protested. 
 "The poem doesn t have to be done till the potatoes 
 are." He put two bottles of beer out in the rain to 
 cool, caught a. kettleful of water for coffee, swung 
 it on the crane, and proceeded to set the table with 
 tin plates, knives, forks and cups. Then he cut 
 pieces of cheese to toast on square crackers, got out 
 a gridiron, sliced some ham, and began broiling it 
 over the wood coals. 
 
 "I hope the poem is as good as that smells," she 
 said. 
 
 "This poem must be seen to be appreciated." 
 
 "Is it done already? What is it a visible poem?" 
 
 "One more line." He poked a potato. He turned 
 the ham, then kneeling and holding the gridiron so 
 as not to burn his hands, he recited: 
 
 "Music of infinite waters descending, 
 Ardors of lightning that gleam in our sky, 
 Richer the music and gleam of my blending 
 Intricate runes with the meaningful cry 
 Of opulent Love in his subtlety lending 
 Name to his secret of ardor unending." 
 
 "It has a noble sound," said Marion. 
 
 He made no comment, being absorbed in the prob 
 lem of not burning the ham. 
 
 "But my dear poet!" she broke out. "Am I sup 
 posed to understand that poem?"
 
 THE CHASM 101 
 
 "My occupations clash. If I stop to get my poem 
 appreciated, my dinner will spoil." He hastened to 
 get the dinner on. They sat down together. 
 
 "I m sure this beats Spinnyville," she said. "I 
 never enjoyed anything so in my life. What cook 
 ever prepared a dinner and a poem at the same 
 time or what poet? But really I couldn t under 
 stand it hearing it just once. Won t you repeat it?" 
 
 He reveled in the opportunity. 
 
 "The music is beautiful," she said, "but this poem 
 was to be in praise of me. I m not in it at all. The 
 idea of leaving me out of my very own poem !" 
 
 "You are everything in it. Let me write it for 
 you." He wrote it, and watched her read it. "The 
 guarded treasure of the runes," he said, "is Mar 
 ion." He spoke the name lingeringly, loving the 
 sound of it. 
 
 She saw her name in the initial letters. "You 
 lovely thing!" she exclaimed, and hugged it. Her 
 delight was to him the fitting pay for poet s work. 
 She read it again. "It is lovely," she said, " the 
 lovelier for being unlockable without the key." 
 
 "It gave me the chance to call you Marion once 
 anyhow in a hidden way." 
 
 "Why not do it in an unhidden way?" she said. 
 As soon as she had so spoken, however, she thought 
 of one good reason why not. Feodor! And then, 
 in spite of all her leanings and acceptings and broad- 
 enings, all the old other sphere of ideas in her grew 
 uncomfortable at the thought of being Marion to 
 her father s gardener. 
 
 He read that like a book. "Don t be afraid," he 
 said. "I shall not call you that."
 
 102 THE CHASM 
 
 That made her ashamed of her narrowness. 
 "Here is a man of intellect," she thought, " a poet, 
 a soul full of beauty and passion!" 
 
 It seemed strange to her that she should want to 
 kiss a man, yet balk at having him call her by her 
 name. But so it was.
 
 IX 
 
 MRS. MOULTON was alarmed about Marion 
 when the storm first broke over Moline, 
 but hoped the launch party would by that 
 time be safe in the Camanche club house. Since 
 thinking evil things brings evil, it was her duty 
 to believe them safe. Since nothing is but think 
 ing makes it so, thinking of the party as not 
 being at Camanche would very likely cause them not 
 to be there. Her visualization of them there 
 in the grill room became so distinct that she 
 could feel her astral self at Camanche seeing 
 eight people, among them Marion, sitting at a cer 
 tain table. Had anyone suggested to her that this 
 vision might possibly be the optical memory of a 
 party she had there chaperoned two years before, 
 her will to believe the alluringly mysterious astral 
 doctrine would have scorned the suggestion as ema 
 nating from the critical, that is from the Mephisto- 
 phelian, spirit "the spirit that ever denies." Yield 
 ing to this spirit would be evil because it would 
 project from her mind a powerfully injurious 
 thought-force. 
 
 When Mrs. F arnsworth, Mr. Moulton s sister, 
 their guest at dinner, inquired for Marion, Mrs. 
 
 103
 
 104. THE CHASM 
 
 Moulton replied that she had gone with a launch- 
 party to Camanche. 
 
 Mr. Farnsworth conjectured that the storm would 
 compel them to leave their launch up there and re 
 turn by train. 
 
 "I hope they got there before the storm struck," 
 said Mr. Moulton. 
 
 A certain mysterious intonation in his wife s as 
 surance that they had reached Camanche led him 
 to suspect astral information. As soon as dinner 
 was over he succeeded, in spite of the storm, in get 
 ting the steward at Camanche by telephone. Then 
 he called Mrs. Moulton from her guests. "No 
 launch party has reached Camanche to-day," said 
 he abruptly. 
 
 Her real alarm made him relent. 
 
 "And none was expected there," he added. "Now, 
 Anne, don t get rattled, but tell me what you do real 
 ly know about this launch party. Whose party was 
 it?" 
 
 She had to explain that Marion, due at the river 
 at ten-thirty, and not leaving the house till quarter 
 to eleven, had departed hurriedly without giving her 
 any details. 
 
 "How did she go?" 
 
 "On foot." 
 
 "Why didn t she take her electric?" 
 
 "I cannot say." She knew David imagined he 
 had shattered one of her intuitions against a stone 
 wall of fact, and resented the air of arrogant, in 
 cisive efficiency he always assumed on such occasions. 
 If anything did happen to Marion it would be his
 
 THE CHASM 105 
 
 fault for creating all this malicious thought-mag 
 netism. 
 
 Mr. Moulton sent for one of the drivers and 
 directed him to take Miss Moulton s electric down 
 to the boat-landing. She might be there with no 
 way to get home through the rain. If she was not 
 there, the driver was to find out and report at once 
 what party she went with and which way they had 
 gone. 
 
 Twenty minutes later, Mr. Moulton was informed 
 by the driver, Eldridge, that it must have been Miss 
 Moulton who had gone out alone with Walt Brad- 
 field. About eleven o clock they had gone through 
 the lock, and so down the river, in Lew Anderson s 
 launch "Nancy." 
 
 "Bradfield?" repeated Mr. Moulton, trying to 
 place the gentleman. 
 
 "He works here, sir," said the chauffeur, expect 
 ing to produce a sensation. "Sits beside me in the 
 servants dining-room. He s one of the gardeners." 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Mr. Moulton, " that plan of 
 my daughter s. I didn t know she was doing that 
 to-day. That s all, Eldridge." 
 
 Eldridge turned to go, but hesitated an instant at 
 the door with the idea that he was to be told to keep 
 this matter quiet. 
 
 "Was there something else?" inquired Mr. Moul 
 ton. 
 
 "No, sir," replied Eldridge, getting out. "I 
 wonder if that old fox did know about that Brad- 
 field deal?" he speculated. 
 
 Mr. Moulton sank back in his chair, irritation and
 
 106 THE CHASM 
 
 perplexity in his soul. "What is that girl up to?" 
 thought he. He looked out at the still driving rain 
 and swaying tree-tops. He was divided between con 
 cern for Marion s safety in the storm, and his effort 
 to understand her motive in making a companion of 
 a servant. Stories of refined women infatuated with 
 strapping grooms and coachmen rose repulsively in 
 his mind. He did not accept that explanation; but 
 it remained in the background of his thoughts ready 
 to reassert itself. 
 
 The affair looked worse to him when he found 
 the girl had never mentioned Bradfield to her 
 mother. Mrs. Moulton s amazement when she 
 heard Marion had gone in a launch with the gar 
 dener made it impossible for her to bring the kindly 
 side of her philosophy to bear. "Earth-forces" was 
 her formulation of the same suspicion that had arisen 
 in her husband. For her, once started along that 
 path of thought, the very occupation of the man was 
 symbolic. Was he not a digger in the earth? And 
 Marion had gone with him upon the water. The af 
 fair was of earth and water, unsanctified of fire and 
 air. 
 
 Mr. Moulton was tormented with the impulse to 
 do something. Either the launch had swamped, or 
 it had not. If it had, he wanted to know it. If it 
 had not, Marion and her companion must now be 
 some place under shelter waiting for the storm to 
 stop. He did not care to have them wait. He 
 finally sent down the river a big launch with a closed 
 cabin and a searchlight to find the "Nancy" and 
 bring Marion home. 
 
 This launch left Moline about four o clock manned
 
 THE CHASM 107 
 
 by two old rivermen in charge of McChesney, 
 a confidential agent in the detective service of the 
 Plow Company. The rain stopped while they were 
 searching. Near dark they located the stove-in 
 "Nancy" on the shore of Round Island; but they 
 found the log-cabin there empty. The old fisher 
 man in the house-boat on the Iowa shore told Mc 
 Chesney that when he came out after the storm to 
 look at his nets, he had seen a couple on the island 
 waving a shirt on an oar. He had taken them off, 
 and they had started to walk to town. 
 
 The fisherman had told them they might make 
 it by dark: but they had to pick their way along the 
 edges of muddy roads, finally took to the gravel and 
 ties of the railroad track; and as night fell, the elec 
 tric lights of Davenport sprang up white out of the 
 blackness of the eastern horizon. They came to a 
 railroad bridge beneath which in the gloom a rain- 
 swollen torrent ominously thundered. They stopped 
 a moment, standing close together. The cold wind 
 and the tumult of that unfriendly elemental force 
 made the warmth and nearness of each other more 
 precious. 
 
 "You don t suppose the bridge is out, do you?" 
 said Marion, peering ahead. "No, I can see the 
 shine on the rails." She clasped Walt s hand, and 
 welcomed the support of his arm around her as 
 they crossed, stepping from tie to tie. 
 
 He was seized with a wild happiness, a piercing 
 realization of the present moment, an intense feeling 
 of his identity and hers. The two of them crossing 
 that bridge in the black night were to him the only 
 man and woman in the world. When they felt the
 
 108 THE CHASM 
 
 gravel once more underfoot she would have drawn 
 away. 
 
 "A man, a woman, and Nature which made us!" 
 he exclaimed. "There are no classes. There is no 
 town. There is nothing but you and me and the 
 night." 
 
 His feeling swept her like a poem creating a new 
 mood. The thunder of waters behind them seemed 
 no more a hostile voice, but the voice of great har 
 monious forces at work through eons and eons creat 
 ing and maintaining man. She leaned and pressed 
 her cheek against his shoulder; then, sighing, with 
 drew her hand and walked alone. "For me," she 
 said, "there is town. There is Hillcrest, and in it 
 another man and woman. They are worrying about 
 me. They love me, in a way, not wisely, not 
 trustfully, not realizing I must find or make my own 
 path through life. They do not understand me: 
 they have no sympathy for the things that I, being 
 I, must seek and find. They will attack me to-night. 
 I will have to defend myself. If he had his way, 
 my father would reduce the real me to pulp." 
 
 The great tenderness then filling Walt turned into 
 the channel of regret that she too should be subject 
 to all the influences that shape our modern world and 
 shape it wrong. "Shall I go in and help you de 
 fend yourself?" he asked. 
 
 "No. The best you could hope would be to de 
 fend yourself. After you left I should have my own 
 fight just the same or worse." 
 
 They caught the suburban car where it crossed 
 the railroad at the lower end of Davenport. Three- 
 quarters of an hour later, they got off in Moline at
 
 THE CHASM 109 
 
 an electric-lighted corner where the streets were 
 thickly lined with workingmen s small frame houses, 
 their paint grimed with soot from the factories. 
 Back on the bluff towered Hillcrest, its four stories 
 marked by half a dozen brilliant windows. Well to 
 the right and left of it stood other great houses, each 
 aloof on its own spacious eminence as the castles 
 of robber barons stood on the hills of Rhineland. 
 
 Walt and Marion ascended the hill, walking 
 alongside a heavy terra-cotta retaining wall, from 
 the top of which leafless, brittle-looking vines trailed 
 downward. Between the base of the wall and the 
 concrete sidewalk stood a row of low shrubs which 
 Walt himself had planted. The return to use-and- 
 wont, to Hillcrest, the end of his day with her, af 
 fected him gloomily. "I have a wretched premoni 
 tion I am not going to see you very much any more," 
 he said. 
 
 She had the same unpleasant feeling, but would 
 not admit it. "I should think a monist like you 
 would regard premonitions as superstitious." 
 
 "I did yesterday. Imagination was reason- 
 guided, a light I turned at will upon the world. 
 Therein lay my power. To-day that monism of 
 mine is split by war of reason and desire and rea 
 son has the worst of it." 
 
 "Is that a reproach of me?" 
 
 "An analysis of me. I can no longer distinguish 
 between the thing I desire and the thing that is true. 
 I am no better than a bourgeois." 
 
 "That is humility!" she laughed. "But really, 
 Walt, a little humility won t hurt you a bit." 
 
 He stopped abruptly. Once more, as on the dark
 
 110 THE CHASM 
 
 bridge in the thunder of waters, there were no 
 classes. She was woman to him, and he was man. 
 An overpowering feeling of worship swept through 
 him. "I could kneel here at your feet for that!" 
 he breathed. "In fact I must!" 
 
 "Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "No!" She caught 
 hold of his arms to keep him from doing it. "It will 
 make me cry if you do that!" 
 
 "No ! Don t take it that way. I will be nice and 
 quiet about it. It s a thing I have to do." He made 
 her feel it as impulse and compulsion of the depths 
 of life in him, and then he knelt as though it were 
 an act of mere deliberate resolve. She found a 
 beauty and richness in that union, in one act, of 
 simple conscious will and some uncomprehended 
 depth of feeling. The depth, and nothing of quiet 
 ness, was in his voice when he stretched out his arms 
 to her with the cry, "I worship you!" 
 
 She swayed back breathless, leaning against the 
 wall, knowing clearly that this was something more 
 than merely physical allurement. His cry which 
 she thought no woman in the world could have heard 
 unmoved and its echo in her were of the spirit, or 
 more truly, of the whole and single being which man 
 is. It felt like a great love. The great desire of 
 , all that day, thwarted but stronger inwardly for 
 1 every thwarting, retreating only to advance through 
 some new path of feeling, seized and subdued her. 
 Not indirectly nor as an accident, not with manner 
 unpurposive, she bent and kissed him in the mood 
 of answered prayer. 
 
 He rose. A beam from an arc-lamp through the 
 young buds showed her his face. In his arms she
 
 THE CHASM 111 
 
 whispered: "I shouldn t have done it. I don t know 
 why I did. I seemed to have to. It was too big 
 for me, Walt." 
 
 "It was star-high above my hope!" he said. 
 
 "It s a pity to say it, but you mustn t, mustn t make 
 too much of it. I must go in. I need to be alone 
 and think." She saw a question forming in his eyes 
 and did not dare listen. "Come!" she said, and 
 using all her will power moved on up the hill. She 
 looked down and up the walk. Fortunately no 
 one ! They turned in through the gate of Hillcrest 
 and neared the door. 
 
 "Don t let this be the end of things between us!" 
 he pleaded. "It has grown too strong to break." 
 
 "I m utterly at sea," said Marion.
 
 X 
 
 SHE would have liked nothing so much as to slip 
 upstairs to her lair, there to get her balance and 
 find out a little where she stood : but her mother 
 heard her come in, and hastened to see if it was she. 
 
 "Hello, Mother!" said the girl with rather arti 
 ficial cheerfulness. "Did you think I was drowned?" 
 
 "I knew you were not," said Mrs. Moulton in her 
 tone of occult knowledge. "But I did not know why 
 you had slipped off as you did to spend the day with 
 one of the men-servants." 
 
 Mr. Moulton came into the reception-hall, and 
 looked searchingly at his daughter. 
 
 "You word it very badly," said the girl to her 
 mother. "Good evening, Papa. I hope you have 
 not been worrying about me. It wasn t necessary." 
 
 "I differ with you," he said. 
 
 "There s a searching party down the river looking 
 for you now," said Mrs. Moulton. 
 
 "Such a fuss!" exclaimed Marion in scornful resig 
 nation. 
 
 "Where were you during the storm?" asked Mr. 
 Moulton. 
 
 "In front of a fire getting dry. We had an ac 
 cident with the launch, and had to walk home. I
 
 THE CHASM 113 
 
 would like to get these muddy boots off if you d just 
 as soon." 
 
 "Just a moment, please," said Mr. Moulton. 
 "Have you any objection to telling where this fire 
 was?" 
 
 "I wouldn t have the slightest objection to telling 
 everything that happened to-day were it not for 
 the tone you and mama have adopted. You seem 
 to take it for granted that I am guilty of something. 
 If you wish to make a criminal court out of this, go 
 ahead, and I ll act accordingly." She took off her 
 hat and gloves frank battle preparations. "I real 
 ly ought to have a lawyer to take advantage of tech 
 nical points," she said scathingly. "I believe, first 
 of all, I have a right to know the exact crime for 
 which I am to be tried." 
 
 "There s considerable bluff to that, Marion," said 
 Mr. Moulton. "You spent the day alone with Brad- 
 field the gardener you have avoided saying just 
 where." He paused a moment. "What are you up 
 to?" 
 
 "I am not up to anything. I went launch-riding 
 with Mr. Bradfield because I like him." She waited 
 a moment. "Is that sufficient?" 
 
 "Hardly." 
 
 "It should be." 
 
 "Why did you say nothing to your mother about 
 Mister Bradfield?" 
 
 "The subject did not happen to come up. I told 
 Mrs. Pearson all about it. She was going with us 
 to-day, and hurt her knee at the last minute. It s 
 absurd to think of Bradfield as a servant. He is a
 
 114, THE CHASM 
 
 thinker and writer. I have read one of his books. 
 He is much the most interesting man in Moline." 
 
 "How did you come to discover all this?" in 
 quired Mrs. Moulton. 
 
 "I began talking with him about the Japanese 
 lilies in the conservatory." 
 
 "Well, that part of it sounds all right," said Mr. 
 Moulton, relieved of his darkest suspicions. "But 
 Marion, you must be more careful of appearances. 
 The thing looks bad. Don t do it, my girl, don t do 
 this sort of thing." 
 
 "If the thing had happened with George Pearson, 
 not a word would be said about it. Why then when 
 it is Walt Bradfield a man more intelligent and 
 worth while?" 
 
 "Look here," said Mr. Moulton. "Eldridge the 
 driver knows you went with this man who in his eyes 
 certainly is simply a fellow servant of his, and he is 
 all ready to start some talk that will make your hair 
 stand on end. If this Bradfield doesn t show a 
 damned sight more decency and good sense than he s 
 at all likely to in answering Eldridge s questions, 
 there ll be a scandal over this affair. You must not 
 let it go any farther. You ve got to drop Bradfield !" 
 
 "I shan t do it!" blazed Marion, and then she 
 thought it better to be a little more conciliating. "It 
 isn t necessary, Papa. Mr. Bradfield may be relied 
 on for both decency and good sense." 
 
 An automobile came up and stopped outside the 
 door, but they were too absorbed to notice it. 
 
 "You seem to be completely under the man s in 
 fluence!" exclaimed Moulton. "I d like to know 
 how you reconcile your apparently limitless admira-
 
 THE CHASM 115 
 
 tion for this gardener with your interest in the 
 Count de Hohenfels." 
 
 She had not herself reconciled those two things. 
 If she had only had time to think things out to 
 find just how far reconciliation was possible ! "That 
 is a matter that must be decided by my own con 
 science," was all she could find to say. 
 
 Mr. Moulton was really astonished. He had ex 
 pected an indignant disclaimer of anything more than 
 friendship for Bradfield. 
 
 "Is the trial over?" said Marion patiently. 
 
 "I sometimes think you love rebellion for its own 
 sake!" said he bitterly. 
 
 "Do you ever love authority for its own sake?" 
 she asked, thinking of his rigid adherence to the time 
 he had set for further discussion of the letter to 
 De Hohenfels. 
 
 The doorbell rang. A servant turned on the porch 
 light, and through the plate-glass of the door Mr. 
 Moulton saw a clean-cut gentleman with dark, close 
 ly trimmed beard taking out a card-case, the move 
 ment displaying white waistcoat and sable-lined over 
 coat. 
 
 There was an exclamation of astonishment from 
 Mrs. Moulton. Marion turned, but the caller had 
 stepped back so as not to see what was going on in 
 side. 
 
 "De Hohenfels!" exclaimed Mrs. Moulton. 
 "Marion, it s De Hohenfels!" 
 
 "De Hohenfels?" echoed Mr. Moulton. He 
 looked at Marion. 
 
 She stood there dazed and speechless.
 
 XI 
 
 JUST look at you!" exclaimed Mrs. Moulton, 
 almost as upset as Marion by De Hohenfels s 
 unexpected arrival. "You can t let him see 
 you like that!" 
 
 "Mother, are you sure it s Fedya? Did he see 
 you? Where is that footman? Oh, please let me 
 get away, and open the door yourself!" She fled up 
 stairs. "Why didn t he telephone?" she thought. 
 "When did he get here? What will papa say to 
 him? Oh, dear, I must dress! Where is Mathilde?" 
 
 Suppressing misgivings as to propriety, Mrs. 
 Moulton did open the door herself. The Count 
 de Hohenfels thanked her for her kind informality, 
 but became formal himself on the presentation of 
 Mr. Moulton, who briefly acknowledged the intro 
 duction. The footman, arriving to open the door, 
 deferentially relieved the visitor of his stick, hat, 
 and the beautiful warm coat, to get the fur for which 
 nomad hunters on snow-shoes had lain for days half- 
 frozen by the holes of the sables on Siberian steppes. 
 
 "Won t you come in?" said Mrs. Moulton, turn 
 ing a key that lighted up the nearest reception room. 
 "Marion has just gone to dress; I m afraid she ll 
 keep you waiting awhile. Why didn t you let us 
 know you were coming?" 
 
 116
 
 THE CHASM 117 
 
 "Things were a little vague," replied De Hohen- 
 fels, whose thoughts were then vigorously centered 
 on Marion s father. Starting to follow his hostess, 
 he glanced back to see if her husband were coming 
 too. Mr. Moulton showing no such intention, De 
 Hohenfels stopped and faced him. Having come 
 to beard the lion in his den, the sight of the lion 
 impelled him to immediate bearding. "Do not care 
 to purchase European title for my daughter" was 
 rankling. 
 
 "Allow me to acknowledge your cablegram," he 
 said, speaking with the precision of an ambassador. 
 "I decided to answer it in person. I wish to explain 
 first that my family makes its daughters independent 
 of their husbands at marriage in order that the sor 
 did bond of money-asking and money-giving may 
 play no part in their wedded lives. Should you be 
 unable or unwilling to do this for your daughter, I 
 am neither. If Miss Moulton does me the honor 
 to accept my offer of marriage, I shall be happy to 
 endow her in her own right with the half of my 
 estate which is not exactly the smallest in Russia." 
 
 "Very noble of you," said Moulton, wishing to 
 throw the gentleman off the track of his apparently 
 premeditated speech. 
 
 "Not at all. The satisfaction of making this an 
 swer to your polite communication is in itself worth 
 half of any man s estate." 
 
 "Especially when the said half-estate, magnani 
 mously deeded out of the family one day, comes 
 back by marriage the next ! I believe, also, that in 
 Europe a man is the guardian of his wife s estate 
 and the administrator of her property."
 
 118 THE CHASM 
 
 "Not in Russia. There exists there the absolute 
 independence of a married woman with regard to 
 her property. But you miss the point. My proposal 
 effectually destroys the accusation of your cablegram 
 that the title of De Hohenfels is for sale." 
 
 "Your proposal may also be regarded as a grandt 
 stand play of half the De Hohenfels estate now for 
 all of the Moulton estate later." 
 
 "Mr. Moulton, you are at liberty to do anything 
 you like with your estate except accuse me of im 
 proper motives in regard to it. Men accustomed to 
 wealth take it for granted. With me it is a means, 
 not an end. I am perfectly willing to throw away 
 a forest and never see it again for the sake of let 
 us say a felicitous revenge. You apparently are 
 ready to spoil your own life and your daughter s 
 for fear somebody other than yourself will enjoy the 
 use of your money after you are dead." 
 
 "I am a creator of wealth, young man; and, by 
 your account, you are a spender of it. That may 
 account for certain differences in our points of view." 
 
 "My peasants and my land create my wealth. 
 Your factories and your workmen create yours. Not 
 so vast a difference, I think. We had better not go 
 into the subject of political economy, however, since 
 Mrs. Moulton has been kind enough to suggest that 
 I follow her. At my hotel I have documents neces 
 sary to make the transfer of property I mentioned." 
 Suppressing a gleam of malicious satisfaction, which 
 showed his feeling that he had the best of it, De 
 Hohenfels bowed and followed Mrs. Moulton into 
 the reception room.
 
 THE CHASM 119 
 
 "Clever!" was Moulton s verdict as he turned 
 toward his study. He began to wonder if the man 
 could be interested in the administration of industry, 
 and whether he would live in America. Considering 
 the Bradfield affair, perhaps it was just as well the 
 foreigner had arrived. And still, Mr. Moulton 
 thought it worth while to consider whether there 
 was any way of playing De Hohenfels and Bradfield 
 against each other for the elimination of both and 
 the advantage of George Pearson. 
 
 A few minutes after the coming of De Hohenfels 
 to Hillcrest, there sounded through its spacious 
 rooms, with their hard-wood floors and lofty ceilings, 
 the opening of Chopin s Nocturne in G Major. De 
 Hohenfels was playing for Mrs. Moulton, though 
 she was wont to express disdain of "intellectual musi 
 cians who spoil the soul-impression by analysis." 
 Since he nevertheless played with all the intelligence, 
 as well as with all the power and taste, which he 
 possessed, it may be surmised that there in the Hill- 
 crest music room Count Feodor was not playing sole 
 ly for Mrs. Moulton. 
 
 The first phrase of the famous Nocturne, rising 
 and repeated in the tonic, he rendered like a ques 
 tion the descending answer faltering a little to a 
 tentative solution in the subdominant minor. Re- 
 arising there, the question was answered in the tonic; 
 but there the eager fairies, knowing another answer, 
 seized the theme, swept it through flitting chords of 
 C and F, B flat and E flat to D flat, transmuted it 
 to esoteric E flat minor, filled it with dew and moon 
 beams on the borderland of flats and sharps, brought
 
 120 THE CHASM 
 
 it back as far as F, then gave it to A minor and the 
 gods. 
 
 The Olympians said it in their language and sent 
 it back through a thunder of warring sevenths to E 
 minor and friendly C major. There a new move 
 ment rocked like a boating song in big slow waves. 
 The yearning question and answer broke out again, 
 developed as before as far as E flat minor, but this 
 time, avoiding the Olympian confusion on the border 
 land of sharps and-flats, the melody sailed smoothly 
 on around the circle of the keys, working through the 
 antipodal key, there solving the mystery of the iden 
 tity of G flat and F sharp which binds the two hemi 
 spheres of the keys into a sphere, and finally, from 
 the other side of the world of music, it emerged 
 Magellan-like in the vassal chords of G and the 
 harbor song. 
 
 After enchanted minors the common chords came 
 as the richest change of all, as man, enriched by 
 creative experience, at last emerges into understand 
 ing of his own real and earth-born soul to find it 
 more wondrous than all his mythic gods and heavens. 
 
 The recurring question and response hinted of 
 final answer, the music moved toward some climax 
 not to be divined. Gathering energy and meaning, it 
 swept through B flat, E flat, across F sharp, and 
 moved with deepening bass through clear and lumi 
 nous chords of B and E and A, dropping a sharp at 
 every beat, and then there came, in lieu of the ex 
 pected D, a chord of stars, the Pleiades, a B flat, E 
 and G, and far below, a mystery and a thunder 
 called C sharp.
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 The distant phrases intensified Marion s feeling of 
 the importance of life. That pattern of beautiful 
 sound which sadness had woven in the soul of Chopin 
 made more poignant her sense of crisis and unpre- 
 paredness. She was afraid of Feodor not only of 
 his judgment of this day of hers with Walt, but 
 habitually lest she should fail to satisfy his instinct 
 and intelligence of beauty. Manners, language, 
 ideas, dress, all things expressing personality, were 
 subject of his art-criticism, and she felt that the prize 
 of his approval was a great one. 
 
 With Walt she had begun to accept her whole 
 nature, as he accepted his, allowing it spontaneous 
 play; with the return of Feodor, she tried to regain 
 her old attitude of selecting, rejecting, developing 
 favored impulses. 
 
 She came down to the room where he was playing, 
 white irises chained to her corsage in a flower-clasp 
 of Roman gold, her red-gold hair done high in a 
 Russian coiffure, the kakoshnik, with which she had 
 once delighted his soul in Rome. 
 
 Mrs. Moulton saw in the girl s eyes a troubled 
 look that made her hope she was regretting her af 
 fair with Bradfield. There was imperfectly con 
 cealed constraint in her greeting to De Hohenfels. 
 Mrs. Moulton left them, and went to tell her hus 
 band he had better drop his opposition to the for 
 eigner. Her chief objection to Count Feodor, un 
 acknowledged even to herself, had been that if she 
 would only wait a few years Dave Moulton s daugh 
 ter could probably aspire higher. It would be very 
 fine to feel spiritually superior to the mere title of
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 a son-in-law who was a duke. But if it was to be 
 Count Feodor or a gardener ! 
 
 Count Feeder s attention was on Marion as pic 
 ture. "It is impossible to retain a mental image 
 equal to you," he said. 
 
 "I can t believe it s you," she said. "Here it 
 seems unreal. Why didn t you let me know you 
 were coming?" 
 
 "Didn t you know I would have to come after 
 you?" He folded her hands in his, close to his 
 breast, and drew her toward him. She stepped back 
 hastily, and flushed as she realized the idea that 
 made her do it. He accounted for it superficially. 
 She realized then how it would wound him if he 
 ever knew. She had shrunk from him because the 
 kiss of another man was on her lips. 
 
 "Tell me," said he, "do you still love me?" 
 
 She hesitated. 
 
 "You do not!" he exclaimed. "I never doubted 
 that till now. I thought of every other reason why 
 you left Rome." 
 
 "Oh, I do. I do love you. But " 
 
 She found herself unable to tell him of Walt. 
 Mentally she made the excuse that she must wait 
 till she herself understood how such contradictory 
 emotions could exist together in her. "The humilia 
 tion of that cablegram," said she lamely uncom 
 fortable with the consciousness of her evasion. 
 
 "How can you be so illogical? I thought by next 
 morning you would realize you were not responsible 
 for the acts of your father. The next morning you 
 were gone without a word, without a line! Not a
 
 THE CHASM 123 
 
 line from Genoa, not a line from Gibraltar! I had 
 to take your majordomo s word for it that you had 
 gone to America. I wasn t certain till to-night that 
 you would be here in Moline." 
 
 "I felt then that I couldn t face you again until 
 you had been atoned to in some way. I came home 
 to make my father apologize to you." 
 
 "Make him apologize!" he protested. "That 
 would be a superficial, an empty, atonement. I have 
 already done better than that." 
 
 "What?" she asked eagerly. 
 
 "Forced him to see that he was wrong." 
 
 "You did!" she cried, exulting. "How did you 
 doit?" 
 
 He told her of the proposal he had made to Mr. 
 Moulton. 
 
 "You endow me! Oh, what a shame!" She 
 turned away from him, sank into a chair, and stared 
 before her. "Yes," she said. "You have your re 
 venge. But it isn t fair! It isn t fair to you. You 
 had your sister Vanya s dot to pay. And it isn t fair 
 to me. No; that s impossible, Feodor. We may be 
 barbarians in some ways, but we re hardly so low as 
 marriage by purchase." 
 
 "You re confused. The price of a purchased 
 bride goes not to her but to her family." 
 
 "Well!" she blazed. "If the price goes to the 
 woman herself what do you call that?" 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders. "American marriage. 1 
 
 She knitted her brows trying to see in that any 
 thing more than a mot of his. 
 
 "Surely," said he, "it is better that a woman
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 should be made independent by her husband once and 
 for all and in her own right than to have it doled out 
 to her in the form of support." 
 
 "How terribly financial a thing marriage is!" ex 
 claimed Marion. "Americans like my father think 
 the dot makes marriage mercenary. Europeans like 
 you think a dotless marriage mercenary. And what 
 I never saw until this moment is that both of you 
 are right!" 
 
 "Do you think me mercenary?" he asked irritably. 
 
 "No. I know you are not. You have had too 
 many things in your life more interesting than the 
 pursuit of money." 
 
 "Are you mercenary?" 
 
 "No. I haven t had to be. I ve taken wealth for 
 granted." 
 
 "Exactly. Just as you should do." 
 
 "But our being unmercenary makes my point the 
 stronger. We desire to marry, and unmercenary 
 though we are, complication after complication 
 arises about money; and there doesn t seem to be any 
 possible arrangement that isn t degrading or unfair 
 to someone." 
 
 "What has started you along this line? It is 
 necessary to settle matters at the beginning that s 
 all. After that, the question of money will cause us 
 no more trouble than it always has." 
 
 She could not help looking through Walt s eyes 
 at the idea that they should have wealth without 
 trouble or thought or any service to the society which 
 gave them luxury and culture. She remembered 
 Bradfield s "you have accepted the profits as unthink 
 ingly as you accept the philosophy that justifies
 
 THE CHASM 125 
 
 them." She thought of a certain vast, one-story, old 
 brick building in Moline where, from dawn till dusk 
 in Rembrandtesque gloom, lit by the weird, red lights 
 of forges, men with black, sweat-streaked faces and 
 uncanny forearms held and hammered red plow 
 shares on the ringing anvils. Money was a thing 
 they had to think about and give their whole lives 
 for! "Do your peasants plow with wooden plows, 
 Feodor?" she asked abruptly. 
 
 "Hardly. Why do you ask?" 
 
 "I thought probably my father was speaking meta 
 phorically." 
 
 "Oh, has he been investigating my estates?" 
 
 "I think not." 
 
 "It is hard to get them to use American labor-sav 
 ing machinery." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "They are slaves of tradition." 
 
 "Why do they say they don t want to use it?" 
 
 "They? Oh, various pretexts." 
 
 "For instance?" 
 
 "That it robs too many of work. That they have 
 to have larger holdings of land first. So they dream 
 of nationalizing the land after overthrowing the 
 monarchy." 
 
 "That is not being slaves of tradition." 
 
 "Well no, the social revolutionists are not. They 
 would make muzhiks of us all. But where have you 
 acquired such an interest in this?" 
 
 "I was thinking how easily wealth comes to some, 
 how hard to others. Tell me, if you were a muzhik, 
 would you not work for nationalization of the land ?" 
 
 "What I d do if a muzhik is too unimportant for
 
 126 THE CHASM 
 
 discussion. Being what I am, I shall do everything 
 in my power to prevent the annihilation of present 
 Russian society. It s bad enough in some ways, but 
 as a whole it is on the highest level of individual 
 culture in Europe. Old culture that of the west 
 in a new soul that of the upper-class Russian, not 
 too remote from barbaric vigor there, perhaps, lies 
 the highest possibility for human development. The 
 muzhik to cultivate the soil, and we ourselves. But 
 strange as it may seem, my dear Marion, I really 
 can t get my mind on those impersonal subjects. I 
 am disturbed by your unwillingness to back me up 
 in the position I have taken with Mr. Moulton. Un 
 less we carry things through on the basis I have pro 
 posed, he will take advantage of the failure to im 
 pute insincerity to me. If you are so anxious that 
 atonement be made to me, don t you see that this is 
 the one way that really does atone? Don t you see 
 how strong this makes your position with him? Go 
 and tell him you and I are going to marry next 
 week." 
 
 "Oh, no!" she exclaimed, startled by the vividness 
 of the idea. 
 
 "Two weeks, then. Three. The point is say 
 nothing more about settlement, dower, or anything 
 of the kind. Ignore the subject. If he broaches it, 
 tell him it s quite immaterial." 
 
 "That would be delicious!" Her eyes were 
 radiant. 
 
 "Good! Do it now!" 
 
 "Oh, Feodor!" She sank back despondent. "It s 
 as though you were marrying a beggar from the 
 streets of Rome!"
 
 THE CHASM 12T 
 
 "Nonsense ! Suppose I were an American. 
 There d be no question of dower. I am able to take 
 care of you. If you love me you should be willing 
 to give me the happiness of doing it to say noth 
 ing of the fiendish satisfaction it will give me to spike, 
 the guns of your skeptical pater. Run along and 
 tell him, and come back to me. Or shall we go hand 
 in hand and say, Bless us, our father! 
 
 It was alluring. It was easier to do it than not. 
 She was trembling on the verge of consent. The 
 thought of the cabin and the launch, the bridge, the 
 concrete walk, came over her like a pang. To forget 
 all that before the day was done 1 It would be dese 
 cration. She shook her head. "Not today, Fedya. 
 I can t say yes to that today. That doesn t mean 
 I will tomorrow. No, there are some things I must 
 think out."
 
 XII 
 
 WHEN Mrs. Moulton came in after confer 
 ence with her husband and asked Count 
 Feodor to stay at Hillcrest while he was in 
 Moline, the European, betraying no surprise, and 
 welcoming the indication of a favorable impression 
 produced on Mr. Moulton, accepted the invitation. 
 He came up next morning in a motor-car with his 
 English valet, who unpacked the trunks in a suite 
 more luxurious than Hohenfels had known in the 
 manor-houses of Russia. From his windows the 
 foreign visitor looked across to the heights of sub 
 urban Davenport; and in the valley saw the river, 
 wide as the Volga at Samara, flowing around the 
 nobly wooded government island. There the arsenal 
 alined its giant yellow stone gables beneath the 
 towering flag-staff flying the flag with aristocratic 
 blue field, its patrician white striped with a color 
 Hohenfels would have omitted, symbolic of one 
 blood in the veins of all men loved by slaves and 
 serfs and democrats from the days of the labor 
 unions of imperial Rome. 
 
 In the expanse of woods and water and citied hills 
 the ugliest and most interesting area was the long 
 crescent of massive brick factory buildings which 
 
 128
 
 THE CHASM 129 
 
 lined the Moline water front. Among groups of 
 cylindrical sheet-iron smoke-stacks and tall brick 
 chimneys with soot-blackened tops, the names of plow 
 and wagon and implement and carriage companies 
 stood above the horizontal roof-lines in black or 
 gilded metal letters twice the height of a man. 
 
 After luncheon with Marion and Mrs. Moulton, 
 Count Feodor went with them in their car to the 
 golf-links and met a number of society people at the 
 club-house on the island. 
 
 When Mr. Moulton, who had lunched at the 
 Manufacturers with some eastern business men, 
 drove home late in the afternoon, he saw the Pearson 
 car near the door and met Mrs. Pearson coming out. 
 
 "Not a soul homel" said she, after Mr. Moulton 
 had returned her greeting. "I came to carry Marion 
 off to dinner." 
 
 "Come in, won t you?" said Moulton. "Marion 
 may not go to dinner with you but she will be anxious 
 to have you meet her latest acquisition." 
 
 "Yes, she asked me to come over and talk with 
 him," said Lady Diotima, turning back with Moul 
 ton to the house and concluding that Marion must 
 have confided in her father as to Bradfield. 
 
 "The gentleman arrived last night," said Moul 
 ton. "I believe my wife has already domesticated 
 him." 
 
 "Last night!" echoed Mrs. Pearson. "Why whom 
 do you mean?" 
 
 "Feodor, Count de Hohenfels," said Moulton 
 with a grimace. 
 
 "You don t mean it! Hm! So he came. Did 
 you talk with him?"
 
 130 THE CHASM 
 
 "A little. By the way: whom did you think I 
 meant by Marion s latest?" 
 
 "Oh, a Mr. Bradfield," said Lady Diotima, as 
 though the subject were not worth pursuing. 
 
 "I learned of that yesterday," said he. "What 
 do you think of it?" 
 
 "She has probably formed an exaggerated idea 
 of his talent, judgment, and so on, simply because in 
 that kind of man one expects nothing at all." 
 
 "Sound!" exclaimed Moulton. He offered her a 
 chair. "Tell me," he began, seating himself near 
 her. "I ve a hazy kind of notion. Is there any pos 
 sibility of getting these two acquisitions to elimi 
 nate each other?" 
 
 "Like the two snakes that began at each other s 
 tails and swallowed till they both vanished?" She 
 laughed. 
 
 "The analogy would discredit the idea," he said, 
 refusing to think the snakes amusing. "But serious 
 ly: women have a talent for such things. Marion 
 has already confided in you. Her mother and I 
 found out about Bradfield only by accident. I wish 
 you would feel your way in the matter." 
 
 "I don t want Marion to cast me in the role of 
 designing mama," observed Lady Diotima. "If I 
 am to lose her as a daughter-in-law, I don t care to 
 lose her as a friend too. Whatever influence I have 
 with her is as a chum. However: ask her to bring 
 Count de Hohenfels to dinner to-night. In any case 
 I wish to meet him, and George is in Minneapolis." 
 
 Lady Diotima s scientific observations at her din 
 ner-table that evening led her to believe that Count 
 Feodor had Marion. She herself liked him. In
 
 THE CHASM 131 
 
 the conversation there was a sprinkling of smart 
 epigrams, a light tone of graceful false sentiment 
 that made no pretense of being genuine, and not too 
 great earnestness about anything a kind of talk 
 Mrs. Pearson pined for and seldom attained. The 
 guest followed her lead happily. His easy dignity, 
 his not quite blase air, his assured tone of man of 
 the world, were qualities whose absence in Bradfield, 
 as Marion recognized, would have meant a con 
 strained party had he been in the Russian gentle 
 man s place. 
 
 While Hohenfels and Mr. Pearson, over their 
 cigars, were discussing certain grand-ducal timber 
 speculations as the real cause of the Russo-Japanese 
 war, Lady Diotima, alone with Marion upstairs, in 
 nocently inquired if the Count had met her friend 
 Mr. Bradfield. 
 
 "No," said Marion, non-committally. The ques 
 tion being not unexpected, she betrayed nothing of 
 her state of soul. 
 
 "Aren t you going to arrange a meeting?" asked 
 Mrs. Pearson smiling. 
 
 "Goodness!" said the girl. "Your question sug 
 gests the duello." 
 
 "Do you suppose your philosopher will take it 
 philosophically?" 
 
 This pierced Marion s armor. "Don t joke about 
 it!" she exclaimed. 
 
 "Dear me! I didn t suppose it was serious." 
 
 "I lay awake half the night thinking about it." 
 
 "I don t see why Mr. Bradfield s disappointment 
 should bother you so much. You seem quite uncon 
 cerned about George."
 
 132 THE CHASM 
 
 "I am not worrying about Mr. Bradfield s feel 
 ings. He is capable of taking care of them himself. 
 It s my own." 
 
 "Is it possible? Do you mean to say you like him 
 better than your Russian?" 
 
 "You can call me as weak and worthless as you 
 like, but I don t know. I begin to think myself in 
 capable of real love. I thought I loved Fedya I 
 think so yet. Yes, it must be that I do. And yet, 
 if I do how can it be that this other man attracts me 
 so?" 
 
 "Has the other man made love to you?" 
 
 Marion looked at her reproachfully for asking, 
 but Lady Diotima was unabashed. 
 
 "An enterprising person," she observed. 
 
 Marion rose to go downstairs. "Perhaps I was 
 the enterprising one. I don t know. My likes and 
 dislikes have always been positive. I imagined I 
 understood myself. Evidently I do not. It s a 
 wretched condition to be in." 
 
 "Have you seen Bradfield since the Count s ar 
 rival?" 
 
 "No, I don t know what to tell him." 
 
 "See him, and probably things will clear up. Only 
 for heaven s sake don t marry him. Even if you 
 cared for them both equally as individuals though 
 I can t believe you do you ought not to hesitate 
 when life with one leads into the central current to 
 world capitals St. Petersburg, Rome and life with 
 the other leads nowhere. But you don t have to 
 marry either of them." 
 
 "No," said Marion. "I don t have to marry at 
 all. But I think I shall."
 
 THE CHASM 133 
 
 "Does that mean one of these two?" 
 
 "I do know that these two are different to me from 
 other men the kind of difference a girl expects to 
 find and is expected to find in only one." 
 
 As they came down and Marion caught sight of 
 Fedya, immaculate, at ease, as he sat talking in the 
 library, the idea of really marrying anyone else was 
 suddenly painful to her. They left early; and as they 
 rode homeward in the seat behind the driver, Count 
 Feodor, had he known how she then felt, would have 
 prospered. 
 
 On the corner of Sixteenth Street and Third Ave 
 nue their attention was attracted by a crowd of work- 
 ingmen. A man standing above the crowd in the 
 light of a gasoline torch was speaking. 
 
 "A political meeting?" asked De Hohenfels. 
 "Would you mind stopping?" 
 
 The driver stopped on the edge of the crowd. A 
 score of men turned to see what the "buzz-wagon" 
 was doing there. Occupants of automobiles were 
 not usually interested in such meetings. The speaker 
 turned to look at them, and Marion repressed an ex 
 clamation of astonishment. It was Walt Bradfield. 
 
 When he recognized Marion in her lace automo 
 bile veil and saw the man in evening dress beside her, 
 he lost the thread of his discourse. He turned away 
 quickly, groped for his connections, found them, but 
 spoke uncertainly. "Life is too easy," he said, "for 
 those who now own the sources of wealth that is, 
 the sources of life." 
 
 Half a dozen men looked toward the richly 
 dressed occupants of the motor car. 
 
 "A socialist?" queried De Hohenfels.
 
 134 
 
 "Hand those plutocrats something, Walt," said 
 one of the speaker s comrades. 
 
 "Labor bought with wealth produces more 
 wealth," continued Bradfield. "The possessors of 
 labor-buying wealth call the golden stream which 
 our bought labor pours into their laps the reward 
 of brains ! Wake up, you workingmen ! That gold 
 en stream is the reward of their ownership of your 
 productive power their power to buy your labor in 
 a labor market in which supply exceeds demand. If 
 it is brains* that is being rewarded why does this 
 same ownership enrich imbeciles, children, degener 
 ates? 
 
 "The present fight of the Illinois manufacturers 
 against the simplest and most obvious demands for 
 the protection of laborers at their work confirms the 
 old principle that no ruling class can be convinced by 
 reasoning. Only the force of circumstances, the de 
 velopment of society, the awakened intelligence of 
 the oppressed workers can drive them into sense and 
 submission." 
 
 "Does your father know he is to be driven into 
 submission to his workmen?" inquired Count Feodor. 
 
 "Really they are getting too raw ! They have 
 come to rely too implicitly on working-class stupidity. 
 Day before yesterday the Illinois Legislature voted 
 on the Curran bill. If passed, it would compel prop 
 er ventilation of rooms where girls and pregnant 
 women must now inhale poisonous sulphuric and 
 alkaline gases. It would compel the shielding of 
 machinery to safeguard factory employees from 
 avoidable accidents. They keep it out of the papers, 
 but in this state women like your own mothers have
 
 THE CHASM 135 
 
 been mangled by unprotected shafting and belting, 
 and the shafting and belting that did it is unprotected 
 yet. Take a look through the window there in the 
 next block at the exposed cog-wheels in the black 
 smith shop of the United States Plow Company. 
 Look at their paint shop on the fourth floor, full of 
 fiercely burning materials, crowded with workers, 
 and without a fire-escape. The company cannot af 
 ford fire-escapes. It is fighting the Curran bill to 
 save the expense of fire-escapes. Money spent for 
 fire-escapes cannot go into dividends." 
 
 "Is such a thing possible?" demanded Marion un 
 der her breath. 
 
 De Hohenfels shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "The Illinois Federation of Labor had a lobby at 
 Springfield working for this bill. Did you read in 
 yesterday s papers what happened? The legislature 
 killed it. They killed it in slave obedience to letters 
 written by members of the Illinois Manufacturers 
 Association, who claimed that the bill gave arbitrary 
 power to the state factory board to demand the re 
 construction of buildings and readjustment of ma 
 chinery. What frightful tyranny that would be ! 
 What sort of power to make and enforce such de 
 mands shall be exercised by the state if not arbitrary 
 power ? What is unarbitrary power? The state 
 exerts arbitrary power to prevent and punish other 
 forms of murder murders which do not happen to 
 be profitable to the manufacturers of Illinois. The 
 Manufacturers Association of Illinois is aghast at 
 the despotic restriction of the right of respectable 
 employers to increase their profits by mangling wo 
 men, poisoning girls, and burning men!"
 
 136 THE CHASM 
 
 Bradfield made this point with savage earnestness. 
 There was a sharp, quick burst of applause from the 
 crowd, and then silence to hear what he would say 
 next. 
 
 "My father fought that bill," said Marion grimly. 
 She had not suspected in the gentle Bradfield any 
 such fighting power as now rang in his voice. For a 
 moment she saw the whole profit-system and the 
 social structure built upon it through his eyes. 
 
 "Women s sympathies make them liable to be 
 carried away by this sort of appeal," observed De 
 Hohenfels. 
 
 "They ought to be carried away! They ought to 
 make men stop this kind of thing! I see why we 
 ought to vote!" 
 
 "Don t you see, you workmen of Moline," cried 
 Bradfield, "that if, instead of a voiceless lobby there 
 at Springfield, you had your own elected representa 
 tives on the floor of that house there with the right 
 to speak and the burning will to speak we could 
 make the bought slaves on that floor and the masters 
 in their palaces writhe beneath the knout of ouc 
 criticism? Don t you know that our voices there, 
 speaking as I am speaking here, would shame the 
 State of Illinois into an approach to civilization?" 
 
 "It s about time the unions found tndt out," said 
 one workingman to another near the motor car. 
 
 When Bradfield closed his speech, he called for 
 questions, and briefly answered half a dozen stock 
 objections to socialism. 
 
 "He has it all cut-and-dried," observed De 
 Hohenfels. 
 
 "Do you call that cut-and-dried?" exclaimed Mar-
 
 THE CHASM 137 
 
 ion. "It seems to me I never in my life till now have 
 heard the voice of intense conviction!" 
 
 "Well, perhaps when he was dealing with new 
 facts. But these glib answers he has them by heart. 
 I d like to ask him a question to make him think, 
 but " 
 
 "Go ahead," said Marion. 
 
 "Wouldn t it draw too much attention for you?" 
 
 "I don t mind in the least." She sat back, leaving 
 it to him to speak or not. 
 
 "Is there any other question?" called Bradfield. 
 
 "Suppose you socialists get power," said De 
 Hohenfels in a clear, incisive voice with British ac 
 cent. "Suppose you really work out your theories in 
 practise. What will then prevent the degeneration 
 of men?" 
 
 "There is nothing in capitalism to prevent it," re 
 plied Bradfield. "Slums, starvation, overwork, un 
 derpay these cause degeneration, and these we will 
 remove." 
 
 "You miss the point. Hard conditions have de 
 veloped all the virile strength that has ever existed. 
 You propose to remove the source of human 
 strength." 
 
 "Have hard conditions developed your strength?" 
 demanded Bradfield. The workingmen laughed, and 
 De Hohenfels wished he had kept out of it. 
 
 "What discipline I have had is not to the point," 
 he said. "This is not a personal question." 
 
 "Then generalize it. Either thqre is no strength 
 in what are called the upper classes, or they have 
 developed their strength under easy conditions. You 
 can take your choice."
 
 138 THE CHASM 
 
 "It is a well-known fact," said the Russian, prefer 
 ring not to choose, "that the elimination of the unfifc 
 in the struggle for existence has been the chief cause 
 of all race improvement. Socialism proposes to 
 make existence so easy for all that even the most 
 unfit shall survive and breed. Even sincere socialists 
 admit this. You should read Jack London s War 
 of the Classes. 
 
 "I have," said Bradfield. "Jack s wrong for 
 once. The same conditions that now eliminate the 
 least fit also reduce the vitality of the most fit. The 
 crushing process that destroys the weak half de 
 stroys the strong. It stunts the life of all!" 
 
 "You are going counter to the whole science of 
 biology." 
 
 "No, I am refusing to confuse biology and so 
 ciology." 
 
 "Who, may I ask, is your authority for your half- 
 destruction of the strong?" 
 
 "I am." 
 
 De Hohenfels had suspected as much, but did not 
 imagine the man would dare avow that authority as 
 sufficient. "You will have to pardon me," said the 
 aristocrat, "for declining to accept your ex cathedra 
 statement, and for continuing to believe with the 
 rest of the thinking world that the survivors of a 
 severe struggle will be stronger than the survivors 
 of no struggle at all." He turned to the chauffeur, 
 wishing to end the argument with that, but Brad- 
 field forestalled him. 
 
 "A hundred men have malarial fever in Missis 
 sippi," he said. "Three die. Ninety-seven crawl 
 around for years half-men living half-lives. You
 
 THE CHASM 139 
 
 would retain the swamp for the sake of killing the 
 three." 
 
 "That case is too special to base a theory on." 
 "If you care to listen I ll give you fifty cases 
 parallel. On second thought I won t grant your 
 principle even in biology. The same species of pine 
 that they make masts of where the tree has enough 
 warmth and moisture, grows one inch high and has 
 only three leaves in the hard conditions near the 
 limits of vegetation. Take a human case from Jack 
 London whom you cite his People of the Abyss. 
 A million people half-starve in the dark, dirty, 
 crowded rooms of London tenements. Many die of 
 starvation, many of tuberculosis. What of the sur 
 vivors of those hard conditions? Undersized, spir 
 itless human wrecks!" 
 
 "The real survivors of that struggle you will find 
 in the West End of London." 
 
 "In these days! Too few to count." 
 "In my counting those few are worth all the rest." 
 "You are at liberty to count crazily if it amuses 
 you. We prefer to give the millions who are now 
 starved and frozen and stifled into unfitness the 
 chance to nourish and warm themselves*into fitness. 
 My proposition stands. Humanity can afford to 
 let more of the unfit survive for the sake of the 
 heightened splendor of life in all the fit. Observe, 
 by the way, that in this connection unfit means 
 simply unadapted to the present ignoble money 
 game. Through this sieve you lose some of the 
 finest souls of earth. Leisure is good especially 
 that leisure we shall earn with a moderate amount 
 of healthful, socially useful work. You should have
 
 140 THE CHASM 
 
 more faith in men, my friend, than to believe it is 
 good for you to loaf and invite your soul but bad 
 for the other fellow." 
 
 "And you should have less faith in men. The 
 fact that you are talking here on the street instead 
 of in the Illinois Legislature proves that to the hilt. 
 Why don t your workingmen elect you? They are 
 worth nothing but scorn! Go on, driver." 
 
 "They will some day," called Bradfield. 
 
 "Ye didn t exactly eat him alive," shouted a work- 
 ingman beside the car to De Hohenfels. 
 
 As the big gray-green car moved off beneath the 
 electric light, the speaker of the evening had a 
 glimpse of Marion Moulton looking back at him.
 
 XIII 
 
 THOUGH De Hohenfels had "nothing but 
 scorn" for the socialist speaker s ideals, he 
 was impressed by the man s decided person 
 ality and undecadent will. As the car glided up 
 toward Hillcrest, Marion, intently balancing her 
 impressions of the two men she had just seen in 
 conflict, detected a note of unconscious envy in the 
 nobleman s musing question: "Where does he get 
 that passion?" 
 
 "From being in close touch with a vital, wide 
 spread movement?" she suggested. "Did you feel 
 his intimate relation with the crowd?" 
 
 The explanation did not appeal to Feodor. "Do 
 you suppose he is a student of that college we saw 
 this afternoon?" 
 
 "No," she answered. "He has had no education." 
 
 "Oh, so you know about him? Evidently a local 
 celebrity." 
 
 "His parents are ignorant peasants. His name is 
 Bradfield." 
 
 She was about to add that she knew him person 
 ally, but De Hohenfels at once became interested in 
 accounting for intelligence from such a source. He 
 thought the man must be regarded biologically as a 
 
 141
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "sport." His faith in heredity, natural in an aris 
 tocrat, had been increased by study of the pedigrees 
 of blooded horses he had ridden at Tsarskoye-Selo 
 and Rome. "Such a man s children are likely to 
 inherit the ox-like qualities of their grand-parents," 
 he observed. 
 
 Marion looked away abruptly. For the first time 
 she thought of Bradfield as the possible father of 
 her own children, and De Hohenfels s suggestion 
 made her shrink. 
 
 The idea of the brotherhood of man latent in the 
 street-speaker s arguments, and the fear Marion 
 would feel that he himself had rushed in and got 
 the worst of it at the hands of a workingman, 
 stirred De Hohenfels to an eloquent exposition of 
 his own biologic-aristocratic philosophy. He was 
 in full swing when they reached Hillcrest, and con 
 trary to his custom, was so obviously interested in 
 what he was saying, that he hardly stopped while he 
 and Marion were transferring themselves from the 
 car to their favorite fireplace. It was his own esoteric 
 doctrine, cherished the more because really under 
 stood by only a few recondite spirits, that some one 
 small class or section of the present race of man is 
 destined to sever itself from the mass and develop 
 into the higher race. He foresaw races of men 
 existing on earth alongside the supermen as various 
 ape tribes exist alongside men. He scoffed at the 
 idea of a feeling of brotherhood toward these hos 
 tile lower races, and took for touchstone of moral 
 value the question, "Will this retard or further the 
 coming of the higher race?" 
 
 Marion stimulated his idea by saying that what
 
 THE CHASM 143 
 
 she had read concerning the superman had appealed 
 to her imagination but not to her reason. 
 
 "What you have readl" protested Count Feodor. 
 "My idea has nothing in common with the prevalent 
 loose habit of calling mere superior individuals su 
 permen. The herd have the word and are goring it to 
 death. The real idea never dawns on them. There 
 is no reason for the existence of any such term except 
 to designate a not-yet-existing but possible genus 
 differing from man as genus Homo differs from 
 genus Simia. If the male of one and the female of 
 the other group can habitually reproduce, there is 
 no generic difference. If their offspring can also 
 reproduce, there is no specific difference." 
 
 "Would you mind putting that a little less tech 
 nically?" said Marion, her forehead wrinkling and 
 then relaxing as she smiled. 
 
 "What I am driving at is this. Even a specific 
 difference, producing hybrid and infertile offspring, 
 is sufficient, as with horse and ass, to sunder two 
 species forever. There is no more brotherhood, 5 
 no more race-unity." 
 
 "I saw two Madagascar wild men," said she, af 
 ter some silent thinking. "Their keeper called them 
 Houvres. Their skulls were very small and sloped 
 to a point like a pyramid. I was told the bone was 
 three times as thick as ours, and their spines seemed 
 to run straight to the top of their heads. I do not 
 think their brains could be one quarter the size of 
 ours. Their eyes looked human, but their mouths! 
 They are cannibals. Do you suppose they are be 
 yond the boundary line of our species? I hope 
 they are !"
 
 144 THE CHASM 
 
 He looked at her approvingly. "That would be 
 most interesting to know," he said, narrowing his 
 lids in thought. "If it were demonstrated that 
 their unions with highly developed Europeans could 
 not produce grandchildren it would dispose biologi 
 cally of sentimental talk about the brotherhood of 
 man." 
 
 "But we all come from the same ancestors," 
 she objected. 
 
 "Yes. From that one branch of the apes the 
 Pithecanthropus which differentiated itself from 
 all the others." 
 
 "I see," said Marion. "You have a precedent 
 for your idea." 
 
 "A precedent? I have thirty. Every race in our 
 ancestry back to the plant cytode< offers a prece 
 dent." She sat for a moment taking that in. "There 
 is no doubt in my mind," he said, "that the existing 
 varieties of men constitute what biologists call incipi 
 ent species. Whether these, or some of these, are 
 to become permanent that is the most important 
 question that can be asked concerning man." He 
 rose energetically from his chair, stood with his back 
 to the fire, and spoke with a curious blending of care 
 fulness and passion. "The amphibian could not keep 
 the ascending section of his race from becoming 
 monotremes. The monotreme had to project out of 
 his tribe the marsupial. The marsupial had to let 
 the placentalia split away and upward. The pla- 
 centals could not hold down or drag back that branch 
 of themselves who became primates. The primitive 
 primate could not maintain brotherhood with the 
 aspiring prosimae. Destiny forced the prosimian
 
 THE CHASM 145 
 
 to bring forth his superior, the simian; and all the 
 ape-tribes could not league together and stop the rise 
 of us the superape ! But man with his democ 
 racy, his socialism, his brotherhood, his doctrine of 
 equality, his power of creating an omnipotent majori 
 ty out of weak, inferior individuals this race may 
 thwart destiny, sterilize itself, abort, and not bring 
 forth the superman!" 
 
 "Is that what Bradfield s movement really 
 means?" exclaimed Marion. "I had no idea there 
 was so much real reason to believe we actually will 
 develop a higher race. Why if that is so, Fedya, 
 that rule of the lower bringing forth the higher, 
 then that is the reason for the existence of man. 
 If our race does not give birth to a higher, all hu 
 manity will have existed in vainl" 
 
 "And we will be the first to fail the first in a 
 hundred million years." 
 
 "The first traitors to the universe! But tell me, 
 Fedya really your idea is wonderful have we any 
 thing to indicate what the new race will be like?" 
 
 "Only speculation." 
 
 "But speculate!" 
 
 He went and sat in his chair, pushed down its 
 back with his shoulders, and half reclined. "One 
 surmises that intellectually the superman will look 
 as from air-ships seeing easily all the relations of 
 multitudinous things minutely known. That de 
 scendant of ours will draw steadily on such sources 
 of power and knowledge as now open fitfully to 
 trance psychics. He will know the psychology of 
 superman, and man, of ape, and fish, and worm, and 
 even what the sleeping rocks do dream of. He
 
 146 THE CHASM 
 
 will know the laws of eugenics Mendelian laws, 
 and apply them to his own breeding. He will exer 
 cise self-government, not be governed either by tsars 
 or by majorities. The unconscious development by 
 which we have groped and stumbled part way out 
 of darkness he will replace with clear and conscious 
 development. He will rapidly shape his race into 
 a race yet higher, training his children into powers 
 more perfect than his own. He will know he is not 
 descended from gods or god-like men who fell. But 
 he, child of the worm, is father of the gods! The 
 gods were man s deep dream of what man is to 
 be." 
 
 "It takes my breath, your vision!" said Marion, 
 low. "I feel the immense past and future! A 
 child was always wonderful but now! Think of 
 it! A link in the cha-in of life from worm to god!" 
 
 "He will be greater in will, in courage, in psychic 
 power," dreamed De Hohenfels, " able to con 
 trol men as men do dogs or the dog kind of men." 
 
 "The idea is glorious!" she said. "You give your 
 superman a superhuman mind and will. But why 
 is he so ruthless, so cold? He will know, he will 
 know! Is there no superhuman heart?" 
 
 "He is certainly no sentimentalist, no non-resister, 
 no sympathizer with inferiority." 
 
 "No," she agreed, "but I see I will have to have 
 a superman of my own. My superman is going to 
 be a greater lover and friend than any man has 
 been. He is going to love supermen, and men, and 
 animals " 
 
 "And superwomen," interposed Fedya.
 
 THE CHASM 147 
 
 "He d be a superfool if he didn t!" she retorted, 
 her eyes becoming joyous. 
 
 "His love can be no sweeter to him than mine to 
 me!" he said with sudden ardor. 
 
 She gave him her hand quickly and pressed his, 
 but turned away her face and held him back from 
 kissing. "Over there, over there!" she commanded, 
 pointing to his chair. 
 
 "That sweet, sure pride of yours in feminine in- 
 dispensability that woman-knowledge of your 
 own value is simply ravishing!" he protested. 
 
 "You will now state the objection I saw in your 
 eyes to my warm-hearted superman." 
 
 "My head is too full of a cold-hearted woman." 
 
 "You know I m not. It s too bad you have to 
 go and spoil a good talk. You interrupted a most 
 poetic remark I was about to make and now I can t 
 remember it." 
 
 He gave a shrug and sat down. "How," he asked, 
 resuming his wonted, faintly ironic tone, "is this 
 amiable being of yours to dominate, to subdue, per 
 haps in scornful mercy to prevent the birth of, the 
 hordes of men who threaten his existence?" 
 
 She could not say. He made her feel she was 
 too facile with her warm-hearted superman. Ruth- 
 lessness, coldness, were traits essential to any domi 
 nant race or class which was to develop into a dis 
 tinct new species. According to Fedya, this was 
 the unconscious aspiration of every aristocracy the 
 instinctive motive of its effort to differentiate itself 
 from the mass. "The instinct of the mass," he said, 
 "is to drag back and reabsorb all such aspiring life.
 
 148 THE CHASM 
 
 In the past, I admit, the mass of mankind has been 
 successful. Somewhere, somewhen, mankind will 
 be overcome. The lords of war, Alexander, Csesar, 
 Napoleon, failed. The lords of wealth may not. 
 The intense and successful effort to draw the bulk 
 of the life-sustaining wealth of the world into the 
 power of a tiny social fraction may be, at bottom, 
 a concentration of racial energy, destined to create 
 a special environment, mold the new race, and 
 force a chosen people of nature across the chasm 
 sundering species from species, superman from 
 man!" 
 
 She gave an exclamation of comprehension. This 
 vaster vision of Feodor s was it the other side, 
 the cosmic import, of that class-struggle seen nar 
 rowly by Bradfield? Was this the issue underlying 
 all man s battles raging yesterday, today, tomor 
 row, and only to be settled in future geologic time? 
 If so, in her recent sympathy with Bradfield s ideas 
 had she been guilty of disloyalty not merely to her 
 class, but also to the highest hope and possibility 
 of man? "Feodor:" she said, "is this tendency of 
 every race to fork and send one branch upward the 
 real cause of that class struggle preached by the so 
 cialists?" 
 
 "I should say that struggle is a phase of the fork 
 ing; process yes." 
 
 Then his aim their aim with their immense 
 numerical superiority to wrest control of the 
 wealth producing forces from us ?" 
 
 "Is the same old instinct of the mass its latest, 
 strongest, most dangerous expression." 
 
 "But from their point of view or say from the
 
 THE CHASM 149 
 
 point of view of humanity as a whole isn t their 
 attempt to reabsorb us the effort of the organism 
 called mankind to preserve its unity?" 
 
 "Yes. Exactly. Thereby preventing the upward 
 movement of the new and highest branch of the 
 tree of life. Socialism is reactionary in that it blocks 
 the progress of the most powerful few toward 
 greater power. If the socialistic tendency prevails, 
 if humanity retains its unity, real progress will be 
 checked and the new race will not be born." 
 
 "But if we prevail ?" 
 
 "Then the pain and strain and misery of the 
 laboring world are only pangs of the birth of the 
 higher race of which humanity is destined to be 
 the mother!" 
 
 They sat awhile in silence, thinking. The idea the 
 man had somewhat coldly formed by study and con 
 structive thought tended to take on, in the warm 
 imagination of the girl, the splendor of a new and 
 vital myth. Here in the human future loomed a 
 new Messiah, not one to save a little nation in bat 
 tle, nor yet to save mankind in some mystic, spiritual 
 way by sacrificing himself, but one for whom human 
 ity must sacrifice itself, as parent for child, a Son of 
 Man whom Mankind must either destroy in its own 
 womb or bring to birth ! Marion sighed. "Fedya," 
 she said, "if I looked through your eyes too much I 
 would be terribly sad. I do not think my mind 
 could bear that vast and tragic vision. I wonder if 
 it is really true." 
 
 "What makes you doubt it?" 
 
 "If it was a question of myself and those hor 
 rible Houvres they are ages behind us they do
 
 150 THE CHASM 
 
 seem another species. But I do not feel even an in 
 cipient race difference between myself and say 
 Bradfield. In his youth my great-grandfather Moul- 
 ton was nothing but a common blacksmith. Aren t 
 you afraid to marry such a plebeian?" 
 
 "You plebeian! You have every mark of the 
 blood! That astonished me when I first saw you 
 in Rome. You can t tell where it flows. Every 
 where in Europe it has been mixed with Dravidian, 
 Pelasgian, oh, all sorts of baser strains of con 
 quered peoples. For instance, some think not a 
 trace of Aryan blood remains In Greece. It died 
 out there under too much light. That blacksmith of 
 yours may have carried the old blood in unusual 
 purity." 
 
 "Then so may Bradfield." 
 
 "Bradfield?" he said, looking at her curiously. 
 "No. He s composite orthocephalic." 
 
 "Can you tell so accurately?" 
 
 "Not accurately. I know the pure types and can 
 sometimes guess their intermixtures." 
 
 "But if the blood flows everywhere " 
 
 "It generally flows near the top or toward it." 
 
 She was inclined to believe it. "How about your 
 people, Feodor?" she asked. "How do you come 
 to have a German name?" 
 
 "An ancestor of an ancient German family of 
 knightly rank taken prisoner in the reign of Ivan 
 the Terrible settled in Courland." 
 
 "And is all the rest of you Russian? Oh, of 
 course, the Countess Xenia that makes you half 
 Polish, doesn t it? How about your father? Tell
 
 THE CHASM 151 
 
 me about him, Fedya. I am not even sure of his 
 name." 
 
 "Lyof Alexievitch." 
 
 "What kind of a man was he?" 
 
 "Typically a liberal. A university student in the 
 days leading to the Emancipation. Court influence 
 and a railway concession. Lucky thing, for he d lost 
 money in a paper mill. He was close to Alexander 
 II in the movement for the constitution in 8 1. A 
 great orator in his generation, but tastes have 
 changed. I couldn t abide his carefully balanced 
 politico-moral harangues." He looked at Marion 
 for explanation of her smile. 
 
 "Were they anything like the messages of our 
 strenuous President?" 
 
 "Very much. His model was Gladstone. He was 
 forever standing on some oratorical teterboard and 
 deprecating reaction on the one hand and revolu 
 tion on the other. In the reaction after the assassin 
 ation of Alexander he lost all influence, lived on 
 his estates, and spent the winters in Rome. He 
 hoped to return to power in 94 when Nicholas 
 came in, but when he found the young Tsar blowing 
 hot and cold with every wind he gave it up, sold the 
 St. Petersburg house, and bought the Palazzo 
 Zuccari." 
 
 "So that is how you came to live in Rome." 
 
 "A year ago last February when the Tsar gave 
 out the Duma manifesto and announced his indomi 
 table will to rule through the representatives of the 
 people, my father hailed it as the fulfilment of his 
 old dream of constitutional Russia. Had he lived
 
 152 THE CHASM 
 
 he would have had himself elected. Just before his 
 death, he made me promise I would stand. I am 
 doing it now. The elections are going on this 
 month. Am I not an enthusiastic candidate?" See 
 ing she did not quite like his tone, he added, "I 
 might have taken some interest, but after the Mos 
 cow revolution was safely suppressed, the Tsar be 
 gan to talk about his indomitable will to bear the 
 burden of government all alone. I thought then he 
 was going to throw over the Duma altogether. I m 
 glad I did think it, for that is what sent me to 
 Rome and you!" 
 
 He held out his hand for hers. She gave it ab 
 sent-mindedly, thinking that if she married him she 
 would have to get him to take that Duma more 
 seriously. Just now she wanted more light on the 
 working of heredity in the Hohenfels family. She 
 thought of Fedya s Catholic uncle, Prince Razinsky, 
 a cynical little man she had met at her ball in Rome; 
 and then De Hohenfels, though somewhat bored, 
 had to tell her about his grandfather, Alexis Feo- 
 dorovitch, who, it seemed, had amounted to little 
 in the army, never sought court favor, married a 
 beautiful girl of uninfluential family, was something 
 of a musician and poet, and fond of country life. 
 The father of Alexis was Feodor de Hohenfels, a 
 general of the Napoleonic wars, who wore many 
 stars and crosses and medals, married the Princess 
 Sarmatoff, one of the great dames of the period, 
 stood high with Alexander I, and became Governor- 
 General of Courland. He was a typical bureaucrat, 
 orthodox, intolerant, bigoted, cruel to his peasants. 
 
 Marion could not find what she was looking for
 
 THE CHASM 153 
 
 some unifying thread of character, tendency, or tem 
 perament in the various generations. Of course she 
 was following only a single thread of the complex 
 web of Fedya s ancestry, but as far as it went the 
 history seemed to show that each man was chiefly 
 a product of his time a result of its dominant ideas 
 woven into the soul of each in the formative period 
 of youth. She could discern no definite Hohenfels 
 type nor anything justifying in the least the idea of 
 a tendency toward a distinct and higher variety of 
 the human species, and yet Marion went to bed that 
 night with two powerful impressions one that Walt 
 Bradfield s children might be like his parents rather 
 than like him, the other that the child of Count 
 Feodor, descending from the master class of eastern 
 Europe, would be likely to begin life higher in the 
 scale. 
 
 And through her soul as she sank asleep was 
 filtering that overpowering lonely myth dynamic 
 as the myths that have given birth to world-religions 
 the vision of mankind as a female, parthenogeni- 
 tal, big with the embryonic daughter-race that shall 
 replace us as the mistress of the earth!
 
 XIV 
 
 EARLY next morning when Marion, half 
 awake, began to pick up the threads of yes 
 terday, she felt vaguely as though she had 
 drifted into some conspiracy against the human race. 
 She found herself in recoil against the Hohenfelsian 
 interpretation of life. It affected too profoundly 
 her feeling toward the mass of people in the world. 
 It changed things too much. It made the dear old 
 earth too wild and strange a theater for too vast a 
 drama. Rising to close her window, she saw the sol 
 emn sunrise and felt homesick for her simple old 
 view of things as they are things unlit by the weird 
 light that shines back on them from an immense 
 and vividly imagined future. That actually exist 
 ing man there spading the garden beds beneath the 
 gorgeous, silent sky she started, seeing that the 
 man was Walt. Her heart went out to him. For 
 the moment he was representative of the race of 
 men. At that dull work! Last night his face and 
 gestures were expressive of intellectual energy, his 
 eyes alert and lit, his voice ringing with conviction. 
 Now his slow, steady movements as he cut and 
 turned the crumbling soil, seemed to spring from a 
 
 154
 
 THE CHASM 155 
 
 totally different temperament. Was this the tem 
 perament he had inherited and might transmit? 
 Or were the temperaments of the digger of the 
 earth and of the man of intellect after all formable 
 and transformable products of their occupations? 
 What would he have to say concerning the powerful 
 new impression she had received from Feodor? 
 Could the magnificent religious idea of the higher 
 race survive his criticism? She dressed without call 
 ing Mathilde, and went down to him; but in his 
 presence lost hold of the things she wanted to talk 
 about. She was embarrassed to begin with because 
 she did not know how to address him. 
 
 He answered her "good morning" with the same 
 non-committal greeting, and came over to the edge 
 of the concrete driveway along which she was walk 
 ing. "You re up early," he said, starting to spade 
 up a new bed. 
 
 "Yes, I saw you here from my window." 
 
 He glanced up at it unconsciously, showing that 
 he knew where it was. "This is about the only time 
 of day you " He left it unsaid. 
 
 She hastened to break the silence. "I was im 
 pressed by your speech last night. It s a shame the 
 employers do not do all those things of their own 
 free will without legislation compelling them. It s 
 simply barbarous. Personally they seem like good, 
 kind men. I cannot understand their attitude." 
 
 "I can," he said, but evidently did not care to go 
 into the subject. 
 
 "I did not know you were a public speaker." This 
 too failed, and she became uncomfortably aware of 
 the banality of her remarks. "I suppose you know
 
 156 THE CHASM 
 
 that was the Count de Hohenfels?" she said, trying 
 to get to reality. "How did he impress you?" 
 
 "As being pleasantly situated." 
 
 "You aren t in a very good humor this morning. 
 I think Count de Hohenfels admired you very 
 much." 
 
 "I had the honor last night of dining with his 
 valet. James informs me that the Count has with 
 him fifty-six shirts and he himself fourteen." 
 
 "And from that you conclude?" She spoke cold- 
 
 ] y- , 
 
 "That the Count is four times as good a man." 
 
 "I think you are horrid," she said, looking him 
 reproachfully in the eyes. "I did not expect it of 
 you." 
 
 "Did you expect of me the pettily amiable hypoc 
 risy of pretending not to be jealous?" 
 
 "Oh," said she, readjusting her ideas. She re 
 garded him thoughtfully, her expression changing. 
 "What an utterly frank thing you are 1" 
 
 "Why not?" he said, unflattered. 
 
 "I wish I knew what to tell you. I could do it 
 now." 
 
 "Don t you really know?" 
 
 "I thought I did last night." 
 
 "And now you like me again?" 
 
 "Yes. Miserable jellyfish that I am!" 
 
 "Nonsense! Why don t you accept facts?" 
 
 "What facts?" 
 
 "The big one. That you are in love with both 
 of us." 
 
 "But that is dreadful!" she gasped, shivering at 
 his simplicity and directness.
 
 THE CHASM 157 
 
 "Dreadful or not, you can t do anything till you 
 face it. Stop muddling yourself by denying what s 
 so." 
 
 "But what shall I do?" she pleaded. 
 
 He was tempted to take advantage of her mo 
 mentary helpless reliance on his judgment, but felt 
 instinctively that he could really gain nothing except 
 through clearness and truth. It was these in him 
 which made her rely on him, and confused though 
 she was, he knew she would instantly sense any de 
 parture from them in him. "Before you try to 
 decide what to do," he said, "you must unsnarl your 
 ideas." 
 
 "That s what I have been trying to do. How is 
 it to be done?" 
 
 "In the first place you must accept your nature 
 as it is and stop condemning it for not conforming 
 to ideal preconceptions." 
 
 "I m not aware of having any." 
 
 "They are woven right into your thinking. A 
 minute ago I stated the fact, and your thought-pro 
 cess was: That cannot be true, for that is dreadful 
 and I am not dreadful. 
 
 "Well, I m not," she said defiantly, and then see 
 ing him ready to give it up, she forced herself to 
 follow his reasoning. "Yes I see what you mean. 
 I am not dreadful is an ideal preconception. You 
 want me to look at the bare facts, and " 
 
 "And nothing else," he insisted. 
 
 "It is hard when the facts are one s own heart." 
 
 "I think I know the circle you have been mov 
 ing in, and worrying over. The other night with 
 me you loved me! Oh, you did!" He paused,
 
 158 THE CHASM 
 
 repressing the emotion which had involuntarily 
 found voice. "If I don t look out I can t think 
 clearly either. Here : the fact that you actually 
 are in love with two men calls for revision of your 
 traditional theory that a girl can love but one. 
 You have been trying to revise the fact. It is a 
 false assumption that if one love is true the other 
 must be false. They are both true." 
 
 "Both true? But what then?" 
 
 "The fact first," he insisted. "Is it the fact?" 
 
 "It does seem to explain things. Yes, I suppose 
 it really is the fact. But if they are both true," 
 she said, in the tone of one thinking aloud, "then 
 one, though true, must be disregarded." 
 
 He realized which one would be disregarded, 
 and groped for some way to hold her. 
 
 "And that leaves everything just where it was 
 to begin with," she concluded. 
 
 "Not quite. You have accepted in your own 
 mind the fact that your love for me too is true. 
 
 "I see I have been too completely off my guard," 
 she said. "I seemed to be using your mind to 
 think with as though it were my own. It won t be 
 a bit magnanimous of you if you " 
 
 "If I ?" 
 
 "I didn t realize just where that impersonal, scien 
 tific method of yours was leading." 
 
 "What s the trouble? Have you realized you 
 ought to tell De Hohenfels the real state of things?" 
 
 She was silent. She felt she had been trapped 
 into a fatal conclusion. It would be unfair to Feo- 
 dor not to tell him, and if she told him that she loved 
 "the son of ignorant peasants," expecting him to
 
 THE CHASM 159 
 
 admit such a man to the equality of rivalry, she 
 felt he would simply decline such competition and 
 withdraw. For, if anything, the class instinct of the 
 Russian aristocracy, implanted in the boy Feodor by 
 social transmission, had gained intensity by the far- 
 reaching philosophic and poetic ideas which he him 
 self had woven into it or, as he himself would say, 
 had found in it. In him class instinct was reinforced 
 by visioned biologic destiny. Seeing no honorable 
 way to avoid losing him, the pain of it taught the girl 
 better than she had ever known it how much she 
 wanted him. Her desperation turned her against 
 Walt. Just then she felt, however unfairly, that he 
 was to blame for coming between her and Feodor, 
 for leading her with his seemingly disinterested 
 logic into this position. "I never should have made 
 that admission even to myself!" she broke out. "You 
 took advantage of my openness to force me into 
 it." 
 
 "I did nothing of the kind," he retorted, defend 
 ing himself, but feeling that his cause, hopeless to 
 him always, except for a few wild, exalted moments, 
 was lost. "There was no taking advantage about 
 it. As for forcing you into it it was your own 
 honesty that did that." 
 
 She gave a little gasp of dismay at the sight of 
 Count Feodor strolling from the front of the house, 
 and looking curiously at her and Bradfield. Check 
 ing her first impulse to go toward him so as to avert 
 a meeting between the two men, she waved her hand 
 to him as a signal for him to join her. "We have 
 been talking about your speech," she said signifi 
 cantly to Walt.
 
 160 
 
 "You are making a bad beginning," he warned 
 her. "If you can t be frank with him about this !" 
 
 "Please leave that to me!" She spoke low and 
 sharply. "This is certainly not the time to tell him 
 anything about you and me." 
 
 "That may be. But I doubt if you ever do tell 
 him." 
 
 "Good morning, Fedya," called Marion, raising 
 her voice a little. 
 
 Count Feodor returned her greeting, throwing 
 away his cigarette, and doffing his cap. His newly 
 pressed English-looking clothes, svelte footgear in 
 nocent of wrinkle, and immaculate colored linen 
 were in striking contrast with Walt s russet shirt and 
 thick-soled shoes bent up at the toes. 
 
 "This is Mr. Bradfield," said Marion. 
 
 Hohenfels stared, not conceiving that Marion 
 could be intending to place a gardener with whom 
 she happened to be talking on the footing of social 
 equality implied by an introduction. 
 
 "After last night an introduction seems belated," 
 said Marion, trying to fill the awkward pause. 
 
 "Oh," said De Hohenfels. "You are the street- 
 speaker. I didn t recognize you. In the torchlight, 
 you know, you really looked quite fierce." 
 
 "I doubt if even a Nietzschian could look fierce 
 making garden," observed Bradfield, and resumed 
 his spading. 
 
 It was startling to Hohenfels to hear himself so 
 characterized by a man so dressed, so working. "I 
 doubt if a Nietzschian would be making garden," 
 he observed, not concealing his lack of high regard 
 for that ancient occupation.
 
 THE CHASM 161 
 
 "I think he would if it was make garden or not 
 eat," said Bradfield with cheerful conviction. 
 
 Marion saw that Fedya was irritated at his fail 
 ure to think of some effective repartee. "Speaking 
 of not eating," said she, "suppose we see if we 
 can get some breakfast." She turned toward the 
 house. 
 
 "Oh, very well," said the Count. "Do you work 
 here regularly, Mr. Bradfield?" 
 
 "Yes," said Walt. He was thinking how sym 
 bolic it was that he was once more to see Marion 
 going away with De Hohenfels. 
 
 "Then, no doubt, I will have the pleasure of more 
 discussion of Nietzschianity. But I was thinking 
 what confidence you must have in Mr. Moulton s 
 magnanimity to agitate against his interests while 
 in his employ." 
 
 Was it a threat? Walt was warm and chanced it. 
 "Possibly no one has taken upon himself the role of 
 informer!" His hostile look square into the eyes of 
 De Hohenfels left no room for doubt as to his mean 
 ing. 
 
 "That is a very singular thing for you to say," 
 said Marion, looking back at him. 
 
 "Whatever you may mean by that, Mr. Brad- 
 field," said Hohenfels, turning to go, "it sounds 
 awfully Nietzschian." 
 
 As Marion and he went in she told him that she 
 had hitherto found Bradfield interesting and agree 
 able, but did not like him so well since he made those 
 bitter remarks. 
 
 "Why didn t you tell me he worked here and you 
 knew him?"
 
 162 THE CHASM 
 
 "I started to last night, but just then you began 
 philosophizing about him." 
 
 He remembered turning the conversation, but it 
 seemed curious. 
 
 Irritated by the gardener s conviction that it was 
 accident and circumstance and not anything inherent 
 in character which relieved the aristocrat from the 
 necessity of digging for a living, Count Feodor had 
 in fact made his remark about Mr. Moulton in or 
 der to make Bradfield fear the loss of his job. He 
 had laid hold of the idea only because the gardener 
 was getting the best of their swift exchange of intel 
 lectual pistol shots, and he did not fancy leaving the 
 field in defeat protected by Marion. 
 
 He saw it would now have a bad effect to let her 
 know the man had any sort of justification for his 
 cutting remarks. For one thing, it would give her 
 too high an opinion of his penetration. It was easier 
 to let her go on thinking no such idea as Bradfield 
 accused him of had ever crossed his mind, than to 
 try to make her see that even if he really should 
 speak to Mr. Moulton about his gardener s political 
 agitation, there would be no element of baseness or 
 treason in the act. He was not a comrade of Brad- 
 field, and he would not be playing the informer for 
 pay. But it was fortunate for him that he did not try 
 to justify himself along this line, for the girl would 
 have thought it a poor business to use such a weapon 
 against a workingman. 
 
 He spent the morning at the piano, weaving on its 
 strings incessant, shifting, complex webs of beauty so 
 unearthly that, felt through them, the present world 
 became at times to Marion no whit less wonderful
 
 THE CHASM 163 
 
 than that distant, unknown future which veiled the 
 far-off goal of man. Outside on the garden beds 
 Walt listened and dug. 
 
 At luncheon, Mr. Moulton, warming up a little, 
 and Count Feodor found points of contact; and 
 Moulton invited him to call at his office any time he 
 cared to go through the shops. Finding that Marion 
 was going to some reception, De Hohenfels went 
 down that afternoon, and was escorted through the 
 magnificent establishment of the United States Plow 
 Company by the company s salaried inventor, an 
 expert mechanic whose labor-saving improvements- 
 were already saving the company scores of 
 thousands of dollars annually in wages. He was a 
 quiet, modest fellow. The company owned the 
 patents on all his improvements. De Hohenfels 
 found he was perfectly satisfied with this arrange 
 ment. He had the power to endow machinery with 
 human-seeming intelligence, but did not use it him 
 self in considering his own economic status. "How 
 indispensable to us are brainy fools!" the Russian 
 gentleman philosophized. 
 
 Mr. Moulton met Mrs. Pearson downtown. Their 
 brief conversation as she sat in her automobile along 
 side the curb, sufficed to alarm him as to the serious 
 ness of Marion s affair with Bradfield. In the Lady 
 Diotima s opinion, his son-in-law was going to be 
 either Walt Bradfield or Feodor de Hohenfels, and 
 the logical thing for him was to do what he could 
 to make it the gentleman and not the gardener. 
 
 Moulton thereupon went out of his way to pick 
 up De Hohenfels at the plow works; and as they 
 came whizzing into the Hillcrest grounds before din-
 
 164 THE CHASM 
 
 ner, Bradfield looked up from the fresh black earth 
 he had been all day spading, and saw his employer 
 and the foreign visitor together. The Count nodded 
 to him as the machine went by, and a moment later 
 Walt saw Mr. Moulton look back at him. 
 
 About half past seven, after Eldridge had gone 
 around with the car which was to take Marion, Mrs. 
 Moulton and De Hohenfels to a performance of 
 "You Never Can Tell" in Davenport, Bradfield re^ 
 ceived a summons to Mr. Moulton s study. 
 
 The employer sized him up with interest. "I un 
 derstand," said he, "that last night at a street meet 
 ing you made an incendiary speech against the Illi 
 nois Manufacturers Association." 
 
 "If it is incendiary to tell the facts about the de 
 feat of the Curran bill, I did." 
 
 "The facts as you understand them," corrected 
 Mr. Moulton. 
 
 "The facts." He might have argued the point, 
 but was too deeply interested in the source of Mr. 
 Moulton s information. 
 
 "We ll pass that point, seeing you do not care to 
 substantiate your claim to absolute knowledge of 
 the facts. You also indulged in some perfervid rhet 
 oric on the subject." 
 
 "Did De Hohenfels call it perfervid rhetoric ?" 
 inquired Walt. 
 
 Mr. Moulton did not attempt to conceal his in 
 terest in this question. 
 
 "I believe my informant called it hot air, " he 
 observed after a moment s reflection. 
 
 Walt looked at Mr. Moulton keenly, and set 
 the remark down as an extremely clever attempt to
 
 THE CHASM 165 
 
 throw him off the track. De Hohenfels had cer 
 tainly never said "hot air." 
 
 "Do you think of giving up your job here with 
 me?" asked Mr. Moulton. 
 
 "No, sir." 
 
 "I have certain reasons for wishing not to make 
 a martyr of you, but you cannot work here and go 
 on talking as you did last night." 
 
 "Very well," said Bradfield. 
 
 "Does that mean you give up the job?" 
 
 "As long as I hold the job I won t speak." 
 
 "That sounds as though you didn t expect to hold 
 the job long." 
 
 "I haven t said anything about quitting." 
 
 "Let us be perfectly aboveboard, Bradfield. Do 
 you intend to stay here merely until the next time you 
 want to speak?" 
 
 "I m not looking that far ahead just now, Mr. 
 Moulton. That would be a natural thing to do 
 if I could get other work." 
 
 "I ve said all I wish to this time," said Mr. 
 Moulton after a moment s thought. "That s all, 
 Bradfield." 
 
 "May I ask if it was the Count de Hohenfels who 
 told you about my speech last night?" 
 
 "As a general thing I do not discuss the sources 
 of such information. I see no reason for departing 
 from my custom in this case." 
 
 Whether or not Moulton deliberately produced 
 such an impression, Walt went out with the case 
 against De Hohenfels proved to his own satisfac 
 tion. It made him angry that a man small enough 
 to use such a weapon should, as a matter of course,
 
 166 THE CHASM 
 
 be constantly at dinners, theaters, and in drawing- 
 rooms with Marion, while he, a decent man, was, 
 equally as a matter of course, spading the garden and 
 eating with the foreigner s valet. 
 
 At the sound of Walt s footsteps leaving Mr. 
 Moulton s study, De Hohenfels, waiting for Marion 
 to come down, looked out the door of the library. 
 Walt saw him and stopped. 
 
 "Good evening, Mr. Bradfield," said De Hohen 
 fels. "It is an unexpected pleasure to meet you in 
 the house." 
 
 There was a footstep and rustle on the stairs be 
 hind Walt, but he had no eyes or ears just then for 
 anything but De Hohenfels. "I m here," he said, 
 "because some informer has really done his dirty 
 work about my speech last night. I don t mind telling 
 you that I think it was you." 
 
 "You think wrong," said De Hohenfels coldly. 
 "If Mr. Moulton has discharged you he is well rid 
 of an insolent servant." 
 
 "Not like that, Feodor!" exclaimed Marion, 
 speaking from the stairs. She came down as quickly 
 as her trailing gown, which she held through an open 
 ing in her opera cloak, would permit. "Mr. Brad- 
 field, I am surprised that you should make an accus 
 ation like that. What earthly reason have you for 
 saying such a thing?" 
 
 "This morning you heard Count Hohenfels try 
 to scare me with a veiled threat that he would tell 
 Mr. Moulton about my speech. This afternoon he 
 came in from downtown with Mr. Moulton. They 
 both looked at me, exchanged some remark, and 
 went into the house together. This evening Mr.
 
 THE CHASM 167 
 
 Moulton calls me up, and tells me to drop my speak 
 ing or my job. He refers to my perfervid rhetoric 
 a stilted phrase that has a peculiarly Hohenfelsian 
 sound." 
 
 "Be careful how you use that name, young man!" 
 said De Hohenfels. 
 
 Walt laughed. 
 
 "Feodor," said Marion, impressed by Walt s 
 statement of the case, "this isn t so, is it?" 
 
 "It is not. Mr. Bradfield and his speech are not 
 of so much importance as he imagines. I have not 
 been thinking of it or of him." 
 
 Mr. Moulton came to the door of his study, evi 
 dently very much interested in the conversation, 
 which was not being carried on in low tones. It 
 happened that Marion did not see her father, though 
 both Bradfield and Hohenfels did. "Is that enough 
 for you, Mr. Bradfield?" she demanded. 
 
 Walt was a little shaken by the Russian s expres 
 sion when he saw Moulton. He did not look like a 
 man caught in a lie. "I asked Mr. Moulton if his 
 informant was De Hohenfels," said Walt, "and in 
 stead of denying it he very plainly evaded the ques 
 tion." 
 
 "You were somewhat hasty in your conclusion, 
 Mr. Bradfield," said Moulton suavely. Marion 
 looked at her father. "Since there appears to be 
 need for it, I will state for Mr. Bradfield s benefit 
 that my informant was a private detective employed 
 here in Moline to keep an eye on labor agitators." 
 
 "Of course!" said Marion to Walt. In her eyes 
 was a world of reproach and disappointment. 
 
 "That gives me the worst of it," said Walt. He
 
 168 THE CHASM 
 
 turned to Mr. Moulton. "I wish you had had the 
 fairness to say that five minutes ago when you were 
 asking me to be perfectly aboveboard!" 
 
 "I think we needn t wait for your next speech to 
 sever our present relations," said Mr. Moulton. 
 
 "I agree with you," replied Bradfield. 
 
 "Shall we go, Fedya?" said Marion. She turned 
 and went toward the door. De Hohenfels bowed 
 to Bradfield, and followed her, but his silent irony 
 was lost on Walt, for all that Walt could see was 
 Marion in her beauty and her splendor disappearing 
 from his life.
 
 PART TWO
 
 PART II 
 
 RUSSIA 
 I 
 
 MARION felt it deeply when she found she 
 would not see Bradfield again before her 
 wedding. He had left Hillcrest the night 
 of his discharge. Another interview with him might 
 be hard, but she felt she ought not to let all the 
 splendid threads between them tear apart with no 
 effort to save and bind them into an enduring friend 
 ship. There were things in Bradfield she needed 
 things she felt she would not soon find elsewhere. 
 She wanted to make him feel better about that un 
 fortunate mistake of his to admit that her father 
 had not been fair to keep the thought of that 
 last scene from clouding his whole memory of her. 
 But somehow, for several days her time was so 
 crowded and she did not know just where to reach 
 him, and when she finally found out his address she 
 found out also that he had gone to Chicago in search 
 of employment. It was too late. 
 
 The wedding was hastened by a telegram from 
 Zhergan in Courland, forwarded by cablegram from 
 Rome, announcing the election of De Hohenfels. 
 
 171
 
 172 THE CHASM 
 
 The Duma was to assemble in St. Petersburg by the 
 end of April, and it was necessary for Marion and 
 Feodor to spend at least a few days in Rome. At 
 the wedding reception the ladies of the three cities 
 read approvingly the cablegrams from Russian rela 
 tives, aristocrats, and dignitaries, and feasted their 
 wealth-loving imaginations on rumors of princely 
 gifts title-deeds to ancestral estates in the Baltic 
 Government of Courland, stock in the Moscow-Kieff- 
 Vorones Railroad. They debated in low voices 
 whether these unlooked-for accompaniments of the 
 international marriage could be worth as much as 
 that cool million represented by a single entry on a 
 certain stock-book and a single ornate piece of paper 
 certifying that "Marion, Countess de Hohenfels, is 
 the owner of 10,000 shares of the capital stock of 
 the United States Plow Company." 
 
 For, of course, Dave Moulton, finding the pair 
 could do very well without his financial assistance, 
 gave it to them. 
 
 Ignoring popular superstition, Count Feodor and 
 his new Countess sailed on the Moltke for Genoa 
 on Friday the I3th of April, and arrived with 
 out mishap at Rome. They were received by Feo- 
 dor s mother and her brother, Prince Razinsky, who 
 was some sort of dignitary at the Vatican. He ad 
 vised Marion to join the Greek Church in Russia on 
 the ground of good form, smiled at the idea that 
 one s private convictions should have anything to 
 do with such a matter, and assured her that Feodor s 
 failure to conform had hurt him in St. Petersburg, 
 and would continue to do so. 
 
 The Countess Xenia was glad to see her son de-
 
 THE CHASM 173 
 
 voted to such solid subjects as economics and politics. 
 He had armed himself in New York with works he 
 thought would be advantageous to him in the com 
 ing debates in the Duma. He and Marion had 
 studied together in their room-like cabin on ship 
 board, but the lessons she made him give her in 
 Russian pronunciation were so much more personal 
 and delightful, so much more conducive to kisses as 
 they watched each other s lips pronouncing words, 
 that they did not go very deeply into the "dismal 
 science," as they still called it. At that time he 
 thought her as fascinating as the Duchess di Calli- 
 gnano, with whom in Rome two years before he had 
 had a sumptuous amour. 
 
 In Rome, gay with Easter and with spring, the 
 Count and Countess did not receive formally, nor 
 drive on the Pincio, nor appear at the Del Valle 
 Theater, and saw only a few of their intimate 
 friends. Marion sub-let her rented palazzo, and 
 arranged other things left at loose ends. 
 
 Feodor translated letters from Ilyitch Kronberg, 
 describing the Zhergan election. Kronberg, who 
 leased a brickfield from De Hohenfels, hoped his 
 landlord would accept his services as political man 
 ager in place of certain cash. The manager had 
 been unable to learn whether his candidate was Con 
 servative, Octoberist, or Constitutional Democrat, 
 but Baron Medin of a neighboring estate having 
 come out as a government candidate, the resource 
 ful Kronberg put up his man under the non-commit 
 tal name of Progressive, and that was enough for 
 the people. They elected De Hohenfels because 
 they hated the Government.
 
 174. THE CHASM 
 
 The Socialists had expressed their opinion of the 
 Tsar s Duma by voting for August Rumpe s cow. 
 Count Feodor was not flattered to find he had 
 beaten that political antagonist by only a few votes, 
 and Baron Medin was furious. The vote for the 
 cow was duly included in Kronberg s report. Marion 
 laughed and said she would like to know these vil 
 lagers of Zhergan. Fedya explained that there had 
 been disturbances. Seventy-five thousand troops had 
 forced out the popular revolutionary officials in 
 Courland and re-established the government of the 
 Tsar, and the country was now theoretically paci 
 fied. If it proved to be so in fact, they could go 
 there when the summer became too unpleasant in St. 
 Petersburg. 
 
 On the 2d of May, the Count and Countess 
 started for St. Petersburg via Berlin. The Duma 
 was to open April 27th. On May 4th they had their 
 morning coffee on the Nord Express in the suburbs 
 of Berlin, rode all day through agricultural Ger 
 many, crossed the frontier at Eydtkuhnen, full of 
 German uniforms and surrounded by broad low for 
 tifications, and reached the Customs Hall at Vierz- 
 bolovo after dark on Friday, April 2ist. Marion 
 informed Fedya that since their wedding was on 
 April loth they had been married only eleven days. 
 Fedya thereupon gallantly forgave the Orthodox 
 Church its antiquated calendar for the sake of the 
 thirteen days it added to their honeymoon. 
 
 The ex-American s passport was registered and 
 stamped with a notice that she could not leave Rus 
 sia without a police permit, or if her stay exceeded
 
 THE CHASM 175 
 
 six months, without a Russian passport. It did not 
 seem possible that these facts could ever become 
 important to her. 
 
 Leaving the frontier in a wide, mahogany-pan 
 eled railway carriage lighted by scores of wax- 
 candles, they were served with glasses of tea and 
 vodka by uniformed, dignified servants whose grav 
 ity was intentionally upset by the Countess practising 
 her Russian upon them. All the night, with the red 
 wood-sparks from the locomotive flying past the 
 windows in the darkness, the train pushed into the 
 unseen. In the weirdness of dawn the bride looked 
 out upon a moorland of endless heather. Later she 
 saw tracts of silver birches, patches of oats, Scotch 
 firs, and occasionally little gray wood-shingled izbas 
 huts not to be distinguished from stables the 
 homes of Polish peasants. Them she saw at stations 
 standing amid acres of wood cut and piled for loco 
 motive fuel. They wore sackcloth or sheepskins; 
 their shoes were of rope wound round their feet; 
 they had unkempt hair, flat features, mournful eyes 
 a sad, careworn, hungry-looking people. 
 
 On the wooded banks of a river they came in 
 sight of st eples and gilded cupolas, red-tiled roofs, 
 and the gi iy walls of a fortress. From the station 
 they looked up the narrow dirty streets of the city 
 of Vilna, where palaces of Polish nobles stood side 
 by side with arched gateways leading into dreadful 
 courts formed by blistered, rotting walls that hid the 
 dens and cellars of the Jewish poor. On the plat 
 form moved Jews with quick, cunning eyes, greasy 
 black curls, brass ear-rings and long kaftans. Two
 
 176 THE CHASM 
 
 pretty, fair-haired girls in red blouses giggled and 
 flirted with three or four soldiers in white caps 
 and tunics. 
 
 After luncheon they passed, at Gatchina, a summer 
 palace of the imperial family. Truck farms and 
 villages became numerous, and then they saw far- 
 off towers and clustered domes of white and gold and 
 green and blue. St. Petersburg rose somewhat un 
 impressively from the flat Ingrian plain. 
 
 When they pulled into the great, plain, lead-col 
 ored station, the Count and Countess, instead of 
 joining the crowd pouring from the train, remained 
 in their railway carriage while Fedya s valet went to 
 locate a certain coachman. A liveried chauffeur, di 
 rected by a train-guard, came to their carriage, and 
 respectfully addressed the Count. De Hohenfels 
 shook his head and dismissed the man with a curt 
 message in Russian. 
 
 "My sister wants us to come to her house," he ex 
 plained to Marion. "I can t stand her husband, M. 
 Kokoreff. He s Assistant Minister of the Interior. 
 His father kept a vodka-shop and became a million 
 aire collecting, or rather not collecting, the revenue 
 on vodka. You d think now that this Monsieur Ko 
 koreff, who has quadrupled the paternal millions by 
 lending wheat and money to peasants at one hundred 
 and fifty per cent., was the only simon-pure patrician 
 in Russia. He is insatiable. He throws government 
 favor to a certain bank, and they give him bank- 
 stock; he secures exemption from taxation for an in 
 dustrial company and becomes a stock-holder." 
 
 "Was it money she married him for?" asked Mar 
 ion.
 
 THE CHASM 177 
 
 "And power. He stands high with the administra 
 tive clique the lick-spittle!" 
 
 Marion shuddered, remembering her talk with 
 her father about power. "Will you go to see your 
 sister?" she asked. 
 
 "Oh, I ll see her. She ll call on you. If you will 
 be good enough to return her first visit after that 
 we can drop the Kokoreffs." 
 
 In the line of droshkies in the station yard De Ho- 
 henfels s valet located a big coachman in a padded 
 gown of dark blue drawn in by a narrow silk waist- 
 belt. Feodor assisted Marion into a dark blue 
 droshky drawn by a troika of black Orloffs, and they 
 drove down the league-long, crowded Nevsky Pros 
 pect toward the gilded spire of the Admiralty Build 
 ing. They passed the Annitshkoff palace and the 
 four bronze horse-tamers at the ends of the granite 
 bridge over the Fontanka Canal half full of broken 
 blocks of ice confined between massive granite quays. 
 The American had a glimpse of Admiralty Square 
 a mile long, quarter of a mile wide, surrounded by 
 immense palaces, churches, and administrative build 
 ings. 
 
 They took a suite at the Hotel d Europe, hiring 
 their own maids and lackeys, butler and coachman, 
 and took part in the post-Easter festivities of the 
 capital. Soon after their arrival they were enter 
 tained at the American Embassy, and were included 
 in an informal reception only two hundred guests, 
 and court costume not required at the Winter Pal 
 ace, the lodging of six thousand of the Tsar s re 
 tainers. 
 
 Until that very week, the Tsar had not been in
 
 178 THE CHASM 
 
 St. Petersburg for fifteen months not since Bloody 
 Sunday, when masses of shivering, half-famished 
 workingmen, still retaining faith in the "Little 
 Father," paid for their faith with their lives on the 
 stones of Admiralty Square, and dying beneath the 
 bullets of the "Little Father s" soldiers, quenched 
 forever with their blood the old futile faith of Rus 
 sia, and began the revolution. 
 
 The Tsar s guests at the small reception were 
 mostly of a class seldom seen in those large pink and 
 white halls enameled in imitation of marble. There 
 were men of letters, savants, professional men, many 
 of them members of the Cadet or Constitutional 
 Democrat party of the Duma which was to assemble 
 on the following day. Very likely the Tsar thought 
 a taste of the imperial hospitality would tend to take 
 the edge off their opposition to his government. 
 
 Marion met half a dozen people of note a 
 famous orator and his wife, the editor of the chief 
 organ of the constitutional democrats, the univer 
 sity professor who had organized the influential 
 Union of Unions, his wife, the leader of the Russian 
 woman suffragists, a celebrated old chemist and his 
 daughter, the Minister of Ways of Communication 
 Prince and civil engineer, and a rising novelist, not 
 yet significant or outspoken enough to be banished 
 from St. Petersburg. 
 
 When the new Countess was presented to the 
 Tsaritsa, a woman with large features, waist too 
 obviously laced, and a habit of looking at the floor 
 when talking with anyone, the imperial lady asked 
 her a perfunctory question about the higher educa 
 tion of women in the United States. The Countess s
 
 THE CHASM 179 
 
 answer led to a less perfunctory question about Vas- 
 sar, and the next moment the American was called 
 upon to defend her belief that the spirit of a place 
 could be at once exclusive and democratic. 
 
 "Democratic!" sniffed a lady of honor, as though 
 the word were a bad odor. 
 
 But people so seldom expressed an opinion differ 
 ent from that of the Empress that she found it rather 
 refreshing at least in an American. She encour 
 aged Marion to tell of her own little group of ten 
 "spirits" at Vassar from which the non-congenial 
 were excluded by mere natural lack of affinity, and 
 in which the congenial were not excluded by any ques 
 tion of birth or wealth. The Vassarite told how she 
 had brought a neighboring patriarchal nature-lover, 
 and man of letters down from the seclusion of his 
 hills to the frivolity of a dress-suit and an April hop. 
 "He was the center of attraction," said Marion, 
 "and in his droll, quiet, keen way the gayest of the 
 gay. The girls filled up his dance program till he 
 had to split dances, quarreled over his cutting 
 a dance, and made such a fuss over him that the 
 youngsters from Yale and Harvard were quite 
 eclipsed. One disconsolate said he was going to give 
 up football, study the spots on birds eggs, and grow 
 a white beard." 
 
 Liking Marion s way of talking to her as though 
 she were a human being, the Tsaritsa considered the 
 desirability of having the fresh and honest mind of 
 this young woman in her entourage. Then remem 
 bering something she had heard, she asked whether 
 the Count de Hohenfels was still inclined to be in 
 transigent in his attitude toward the Church.
 
 180 THE CHASM 
 
 Upon the American s unsatisfactory answer, the 
 Tsaritsa sighed and "conged" her not so cordially 
 as the tone of the rest of their conversation would 
 have warranted. So Marion lost her chance of be 
 coming an intimate of the Tsaritsa a lady of honor 
 in the hardened and cynical circle of the Russian 
 court. 
 
 The next day, before the opening of the Duma, 
 Count Feodor had a college friend at luncheon, a 
 M. Hertzenstein, who was a fine, scholarly man, 
 somewhat devoid of humor, but an authority on 
 agrarian questions, and well-informed as to the 
 programs and tendencies of the various parties 
 among the deputies. Marion saw how much valuable 
 information Fedya was acquiring with small expendi 
 ture of labor. They discussed particularly the prob 
 able demands of the Labor Group. Hertzenstein 
 said the muzhiks undoubtedly had to have more land, 
 and pointed out that they could not buy it because 
 existing prices and methods of farming left most of 
 them in arrears for taxes at the end of every year. 
 They talked of the self-educated Kurneen, a clerk in 
 the Moscow branch of the Standard Oil Company, 
 who had displayed such sanity, tact, and skill in or 
 ganization that he had enrolled over a million in his 
 Peasants Union with seven or eight million sym 
 pathizers. 
 
 "How this would interest Walt!" thought Mar 
 ion. She made up her mind to send a letter to his 
 Moline address telling him of Russia and the 
 things she had wanted to say to him before she left. 
 
 She had to resign herself to staying home inactive 
 while Feodor and Hertzenstein departed for the
 
 THE CHASM 181 
 
 Winter Palace to take part in the formal opening of 
 Russia s first Parliament. 
 
 The men found twenty thousand motionless white- 
 tuniced soldiers of the Tsar massed about the palace. 
 
 Inside, they found the deputies assembled on the 
 left of the throne room, everyone standing, the 
 black frock-coats of professional men and country 
 gentlemen mingling with the dark gray cloaks of 
 brown-faced, bearded peasants. The black-coated 
 men talked in low, serious tones; the men in cloaks 
 talked little, but watched everything with earnest, 
 questioning eyes. 
 
 Up the middle of the hall to the throne ran a nar 
 row lane left for the Tsar and his cortege, and on 
 the right of the hall, beyond that social chasm, was a 
 throng of men in scarlet coats and gold braid, their 
 breasts covered with jeweled stars and medals and 
 crosses honorary generals and admirals, councilors 
 of state, ministers, senators, heads of administrative 
 departments among them many a flabby face and 
 watery eye and sensual mouth. There was laughter 
 among them the laughter of arrogant power, as 
 they exchanged loud flippancies calculated to show 
 that they, the inmost circle of the great bureaucracy, 
 were no whit disturbed by all the revolutionary activ 
 ity which had finally forced the Tsar into this farce 
 of popular government. There was close relationship 
 between the motionless, white-tuniced, still obedient 
 masses of peasants and workingmen alined as sol 
 diers outside the walls and the insolent mirth of the 
 rulers of Russia within. 
 
 De Hohenfels flushed as he looked at the two par 
 ties and took his place among the people s deputies.
 
 182 THE CHASM 
 
 There were not six men of his wealth and rank in 
 the whole Duma. What was he doing there among 
 peasants? He caught sight of Kokoreff with his 
 monocle and his superior stare directed across the 
 chasm; and Kokoreff, the grafting sycophant, the 
 son of a brandy-seller, gave him a commiserating 
 smile. De Hohenfels felt it a shame to him to re 
 linquish power in Russia to such hands as Kokoreff s. 
 And yet, to pay the price for power that Kokoreff 
 paid would be more shame ! 
 
 On the other hand the Duma, the people whose 
 function it was to be fleeced what part had he with 
 them? He felt himself to be in the old inconsistent 
 position of his father that position forced upon 
 him from the grave. Being in that hall at all, he was 
 doomed to the paternal teterboard, between official 
 goatdom on his right and popular sheepdom on his 
 left. It seemed to put his esthetic immoralism out 
 of joint. He had the pain of a man with an ideal 
 which does not fit the facts. With his philosophy he 
 had no logical ground for despising the scarlet- 
 coated hogs and hypocrites of the bureaucracy. They 
 were the actual "Overmen" of Russia, but not ex 
 actly "arrows of longing" toward a higher race. 
 
 There was a blare of trumpets. The Tsar en 
 tered, accompanied by gorgeous court chamberlains 
 and popes. They walked solemnly down the narrow 
 lane, and reaching the throne, went through an 
 elaborate religious ceremony. The insignificance of 
 all ritual was made more glaring here by the men 
 tally made contrast with the significant words which 
 should have been spoken. After fifteen months of 
 revolution had shaken Russia, ritual was all the Tsar
 
 THE CHASM 183 
 
 had to lay before those thinking university men, law 
 yers, civil engineers, and toilers. After the weari 
 some ceremony, the Tsar read his three-minute 
 speech from the throne. Presumably lest he should 
 forget it, he had carefully written down the state 
 ment that he loved his people and trusted in God. 
 That was all. Not a word that meant anything 
 nothing about the land needed by the peasants 
 nothing about amnesty for men still held in prison 
 for criminal beliefs such as that Russia should have 
 a Duma, an uncensored press, and freedom of 
 speech. 
 
 "The kind-hearted Tsar loves his people," said 
 De Hohenfels softly to Hertzenstein, "but he has a 
 little way of expressing his affection with rifle-bullets, 
 and this causes him to be cruelly misunderstood. It 
 is very touching these lonely sorrows of the great !" 
 
 "May God bless Me and you !" said the Tsar, end 
 ing his weighty suggestions to his Parliament. 
 
 Officialdom cheered the wise words of the Ruler. 
 
 The Duma clapped no hand, raised no voice, mur 
 mured no approving word. 
 
 "Good for the Duma!" said De Hohenfels, tak 
 ing in the expression of as many faces as he could 
 see. Their silence drew his sympathy as much as 
 the noise of the claqueurs in scarlet repelled it. 
 
 The Tsar marched majestically down the lane and 
 out, followed by officialdom. The deputies filed out 
 in sullen silence, and went on board the steamer 
 which was to take them to the Tauride Palace. On 
 the way up the Neva they passed beneath the walls of 
 the Central Prison. From many a window waved 
 the hands of men and women whose agitation
 
 184. THE CHASM 
 
 through the years had made the Duma possible. 
 Their cheers rang out between the stone walls and 
 the boat. 
 
 And so, sneered at by the bureaucrats, treated as 
 meaningless by the Tsar, cheered by the prisoners, 
 opened Russia s first Parliament. 
 
 Telling Marion about it at dinner, De Hohenfels 
 repeated the epigram he had made about the Tsar, 
 and described the first session in the Tauride Palace 
 where the President, Muromsev, had appointed a 
 committee representing all parties to frame a reply 
 to the "God bless us" throne speech. 
 
 "The Duma is composed of abler men than the 
 bureaucracy," said Count Feodor. "It is not in na 
 ture that men so stupid should rule the world for 
 ever. With the revolutionary nation behind it there 
 is a possibility that the now legally powerless Duma 
 will repeat the course of the States-General under the 
 French monarchy and take the whole power of the 
 state into its own hands." 
 
 "Wouldn t that be splendid!" cried Marion. 
 
 "I m not so sure. The trouble is a movement 
 like that once started doesn t know where to stop." 
 
 "Do you mean they may go on to socialism?" 
 
 "Yes. Not that these deputies are socialists con 
 sciously. But it s in the air. Things drift that way. 
 For instance these peasants eight or ten million of 
 them calmly proposing to expropriate the land for 
 themselves ! They think all they have to do is state 
 their case and all the rest of the world will agree 
 with them that the use of the land is a natural right 
 which we landlords have cheated them out of! The 
 Cadets with forty per cent, of the deputies against
 
 THE CHASM 185 
 
 the Peasants thirty-five will insist on their paying 
 for the land, but even at that ! We don t want to 
 sell. Why can t they limit their demand to the ex 
 propriation of the Crown land?" 
 
 Having taken a box for the remainder of the 
 season, they went to the opera that evening. It was 
 a resplendent audience; and Marion could see she 
 was an object of particular interest to many occu 
 pants of the boxes. The book of the piece "Life 
 for the Tsar" was irritating to Fedya by reason of 
 its antiquated patriotic clap-trap; and his humor 
 was not improved by the visit of M. Kokoreff after 
 the first act. He went to the Kokoreff box to see his 
 sister Vanya. There he had to listen to her re 
 proaches for his neglect of her, and found no way to 
 avoid accepting an invitation to a dinner she was de 
 termined to give for him and his bride. The As 
 sistant Minister exerted himself to be agreeable to 
 Marion, telling her her appearance was making a 
 most favorable impression, and that everyone was 
 talking of the high opinion the Tsaritsa had ex 
 pressed of the new American Countess. Kokoreff had 
 never expected his brother-in-law, devoid of official 
 influence, to accomplish any such master-stroke as a 
 marriage with a sixty million rouble American in 
 dustry. 
 
 After the second act, Fedya came back bubbling at 
 a meeting with two of his old companions of the 
 Jockey Club, whom he introduced. They were whole- 
 souled, good-natured fellows, popular in St. Peters 
 burg, laughing heartily over things that were not 
 very funny. They said "thou" to De Hohenfels, he 
 called them Mitya and Volodya, and decided that
 
 186 THE CHASM 
 
 what he needed was the old care-free, unthinking 
 companionship of men. He had been narrowing him 
 self too exclusively to the society of one woman. 
 
 Marion liked these well-fed, happy animals, but 
 when the four went after the opera to "The Bear," 
 the most swagger of the big Petersburg cafes, she 
 knew the three men would have had a better time 
 without her. The need of women friends came over 
 her keenly. That night in the darkness she felt 
 the immensity of Russia stretching eastward one 
 quarter of the way around the world so far that 
 in order to look straight toward Vladivostok she 
 must look down at an angle of forty-five degrees in 
 to the earth. And in all that immensity not one girl 
 or woman who cared for her! She cried with loneli 
 ness and homesickness. 
 
 When Fedya had gone next afternoon to the Tau- 
 ride Palace, and his sister Vanya came to call, Mar 
 ion disregarded his desire not to become intimate 
 with the Kokoreffs and received Vanya as a sister 
 indeed, and one in need. Unfortunately, with the 
 best will in the world, Madame Kokoreff and the 
 Countess Marion found little in common. The Rus 
 sian lady cared nothing for books, pictures, music, or 
 politics, and was very anxious to have her brother s 
 wife come under the influence of Father John of 
 Kronstadt in order that he might instruct her in the 
 doctrines of the Orthodox Church. Like her uncle 
 Prince Razinsky she laid stress on the social advan 
 tages of conformity, though, unlike him, she would 
 not admit that as her only reason for devotion. So 
 cial advancement being in her mind the great end of 
 existence, it seemed to her criminal and suicidal not
 
 THE CHASM 187 
 
 to do the things that led to it. Marion saw, unwill 
 ingly, before Madame Kokoreff took her departure, 
 that Feodor s sister did not have in her soul either 
 the need or the capacity for friendship. 
 
 All six of the grandes dames Marion met at Ma 
 dame Kokoreff s dinner were dominated by the same 
 ideals. Tchin, official rank, not so much for its own 
 sake as for the standing it gave one in society, was a 
 passion and a longing that left no room in them for 
 much enthusiasm for anything else. Their friend 
 ships were calculated accordingly. Fedya said that 
 was true only of "the administrative set"; but after 
 half a dozen excursions into a more fashionable, 
 frivolous, and wealth-displaying crowd, that too 
 proved unalluring. The American girl, her spiritual 
 antenna? out and active, and all doors at that time 
 open to her, failed, during their ten weeks stay in 
 the capital, to find in all its high society one genuine 
 friend. 
 
 The critical spirit, though it did her husband no 
 harm in Rome, and would have helped him in Paris, 
 really isolated him, she began to see, in St. Peters 
 burg. She herself at that time shared to some ex 
 tent his spirit. Bringing together in her mind re 
 marks he dropped at various times, she found that De 
 Hohenfels scorned the Tsar for his superstition and 
 his pretense that he knew nothing of the terrible 
 things done in his name, the bureaucrats for their 
 sycophancy, militarism for its artificial ranking of 
 natural inferiors above natural superiors, the gilded 
 youth of St. Petersburg for their lack of esthetic and 
 intellectual development, the scholars of the univer 
 sity for their supineness, atrophied life-instincts, and
 
 188 THE CHASM 
 
 ignorance of joy, the Christian anarchists for their 
 sentimentalism and their unnatural doctrine of non- 
 resistance, and the revolutionists for their futile sac 
 rifice of self for the abstraction they called "the 
 Cause." Did he realize that he was in accord with 
 no one, saying yes to nothing but his own far-off, 
 gigantic dream of a race unborn?
 
 II. 
 
 MARION S hope of a political career for 
 Fedya ended early in fact on the third day 
 of the Duma, when the committee of thirty- 
 three brought in its reply to the Tsar. The Cadets 
 had yielded to practically the entire revolutionary 
 program of the meek and lowly peasants, demanding 
 not only the rights of free speech, press, and assem 
 bly promised by the Tsar in his October manifesto, 
 but also amnesty, responsible ministry, universal 
 suffrage, the abolition of the upper house, and ex 
 propriation of all property in land. 
 
 The Progressive Party, consisting of De Hohen- 
 fels, had hitherto been torn by internal dissensions, 
 but now its sympathies swung abruptly from the 
 center to the extreme right of the Duma. Even 
 there there were only eleven deputies who did not 
 endorse the committee s reply to the Tsar. The elev 
 en, including De Hohenfels, left the Chamber, and 
 the reply was adopted unanimously. After refusing 
 to vote for the reply because of its demand for 
 the expropriation of land, and refusing to vote 
 against it because such a vote would be a vote for the 
 Tsar, De Hohenfels came home disgusted. 
 
 On that day the Countess saw just why her hus 
 band s inability to join any real and definite move- 
 
 189
 
 190 THE CHASM 
 
 ment doomed him to futility in the Russia of their 
 time. He was neither for autocracy nor for democ 
 racy, and in Russia no third thing was possible. She 
 lay awake a long time that night thinking about it. 
 She remembered how fine she had once thought his 
 idea that the Russian upper class should "hold the 
 people in check," not by filling their heads with out 
 worn religious superstition and hocus pocus, but by 
 sheer strength of intellect and will deriving their 
 power not from subservience to an autocrat backed 
 by an army, but from their own individual souls 
 the natural supremacy of the finer breed. How thin 
 and unreal that idea appeared in contact with actual 
 conditions ! 
 
 She tried to remember just what Bradfield had 
 said predicting De Hohenfels s political failure. At 
 the time she had attached no importance to his 
 prophecy it seemed such a snap judgment, based on 
 so few facts. Apparently Walt had grasped their real 
 significance. She could not remount to the exact 
 ground on which he had based his idea, but she 
 knew it was substantially correct. He had seen at 
 once what only the event could convince her of 
 that Fedya s position as an anti-bureaucratic wealthy 
 landowner prevented his alliance with either of 
 the two great hostile forces of Russian life. 
 
 She did not yet understand her own satisfaction in 
 the action of the Duma. To feel so gave her a sense 
 of disloyalty to Fedya s interest, but she could not 
 help it. Perhaps it was merely because she had 
 grown up in a republic. Perhaps her feeling lay 
 deeper in that profound discontent which had arisen 
 in her before her marriage when her quarrel with her
 
 THE CHASM 191 
 
 father made her feel keenly for the first time that she 
 was of necessity a dependent human being her 
 only choice being dependence on father or husband. 
 The one escape from that lay in productive, income- 
 producing work of her own, and Bradfield had 
 warned her back from that as being under present 
 conditions a degrading slavery of toil, the fruits of 
 which must flow to other hands. It was probably this 
 in her the approaching revolt of the Woman 
 which gave her sympathy with that other world-re 
 volt of the Worker. The reply of the Duma to 
 the Tsar was one of its thousand voices. 
 
 Fedya s first enthusiasm as a teacher of Russian 
 phonetics having waned, Marion hired as tutor a 
 student of philology recommended by one of the 
 university lecturers. Vasili Pososhkov was a pale 
 shy youth with spiritual forehead, bad teeth, and an 
 uncanny facility in mastering languages. Through 
 cold and hunger and poverty in St. Petersburg he 
 clung with demonic persistence to his university 
 career. He came every morning at eleven, treated 
 the Countess with formality, did his work thoroughly 
 and without enthusiasm, and she had set him down as 
 a dry-as-dust sort of person. 
 
 One day they finished reading Tolstoi s Sunday- 
 school story about the peasant Ivan Shcherbakof, 
 entitled "Neglect a Fire and It Spreads." 
 
 "And if anyone ever did him any harm, he made 
 no attempt to retaliate," repeated Vasili Pososhkov, 
 and tossed the book contemptuously on the table. 
 "What supine rot!" He spoke defiantly. "The peas 
 ants have had about enough of being walked on!" 
 he announced. "Why don t you read Gorky and hear
 
 192 THE CHASM 
 
 the voice of a Russia that no longer intends to turn 
 the other cheek to its enslavers the Russia that is 
 sick of letting itself be harmed without retaliation 1" 
 
 "My dear fellow," said Marion, "I intend to 
 read Gorky. In fact I have already read some of his 
 things in English. He is tremendous." 
 
 "Then how can you stand Neglect a Fire ?" 
 
 "I m learning Russian." 
 
 "If you understood Gorky I wouldn t read that 
 Tolstoi rot if I found it in Chinese!" 
 
 The Countess protested her innocence of the crime 
 of endorsing the non-resistance theory of Tolstoi s 
 Christian anarchism, but the humdrum Vasili Pososh- 
 kov once ablaze could not be quenched until he had 
 voiced the profound and passionate faith of proleta 
 rian Russia in Gorky and the coming social revolu 
 tion which would never come so long as people 
 were so morally dense as not to be ashamed of own 
 ing copies of "Neglect a Fire." 
 
 "Vasili Pososhkov, have you a sense of humor?" 
 
 "No, Madame Countess. There has been nothing 
 in my life to give me one." 
 
 That gave Madame Countess a thrill of insight 
 into the youth s life, but her sympathy did not deter 
 her from delivering the message she had for him. 
 "You must learn to laugh especially at trifles. If 
 that kind and brave old man is foolish smile at him. 
 Save your energy. One can even read Neglect a 
 Fire without destroying the social revolution. To 
 morrow we will read Gorky." 
 
 Gorky (Bitter) gave her a desire to see the life 
 of the workers of St. Petersburg. The first saint s 
 day that closed the University and the factories she
 
 THE CHASM 193 
 
 took a motor car, a driver, and Vasili Pososhkov, 
 and went to the Vibourg suburb. They traversed 
 miles of slightly sandy driveways winding through 
 the greening woods and budding alder thickets of the 
 island parks of Petersburg; passing villas, palaces, 
 gardens, casinos; skirting granite quays of the Neva 
 arms; crossing bridges from woodland to woodland 
 of silver birch and solemn fir; sweeping around dim 
 forest-mirroring lakelets. From that spacious play 
 ground of the rich, used by some of them for a few 
 weeks of the year, they emerged on the north bank 
 into a dismal city of gaunt factories, packed and filthy 
 tenements, damp cellars below the river level where 
 a dozen or more men, women and children lodged in 
 a single room. Sometimes that room was flooded 
 when a hard wind blew a certain way from the sea. 
 Recognizing the responsibility of society as a whole 
 for the welfare of these its cellar-dwelling members, 
 the authorities met it by having a cannon fired when 
 the flood was coming. The cellar-dwellers were ac 
 cordingly not drowned, but merely rendered home 
 less till the waters went down and they could bail 
 their apartments. 
 
 Vasili Pososhkov regretted that she could not see 
 those warrens of the poor when the Arctic circle 
 spilled its cold down through St. Petersburg, or when 
 the summer stench arose from the low lagoons. She 
 heard him talk with the maimed, the sick, the starv 
 ing; she saw men dying of consumption on straw pal 
 lets on damp and sunless floors, a lunatic lodged 
 in a room among young children, a woman raving 
 perhaps in typhoid no one knew. Vasili Pososhkov, 
 coldly explaining everything, held her mind to grew-
 
 194 THE CHASM 
 
 some details that bit into her soul. She could not 
 stand it. She grew sick. She had to leave. 
 
 "One should cultivate a sense of humor," said 
 Vasili Pososhkov. 
 
 She could not see the grim humor of that. 
 
 In the motor car again, the young Russian renewed 
 his attack. 
 
 "Tolstoi knows these conditions and wishes to 
 change them," he said, "yet he is so darkened by his 
 upperclass mind and his Christianity that he has 
 dared to call economic reform nonsense, and to 
 preach resignation blind to the blazing fact that 
 the one hope of the world lies in the successful rebel 
 lion of the class that is now pushed down into that 
 hell!" 
 
 The things she had seen were working too deeply 
 in her soul to permit of argument then. 
 
 On the way back across the spacious islands held 
 netted in the branching Neva, he told her how they, 
 the proletarians, working for the sake of their own 
 life, and not for other people s profits, would line the 
 woodland drives of all those forty islands with league 
 on league of neat sweet cottages, cleaned and warmed 
 and lighted by the power of the rushing waters. 
 
 "I hope you do it soon!" she exclaimed. "You or 
 somebody. All I fear is that you won t." 
 
 That started him on the real weakness of the class 
 whose power, embodied in rifle bullets, maintained 
 the island parks and the Vibourg suburb. According 
 to him their intellects were atrophying. Their in 
 comes came to them with little exertion of mind or 
 body. Their political power was maintained with 
 little more mental effort than it took to command
 
 THE CHASM 195 
 
 "Fire!" Justification in their own minds for the 
 present scheme of things was furnished by political 
 economists, editors, philosophers, novelists, who 
 "had to live" and therefore wrote and taught the 
 things that led them upward in the existing social 
 order. He pointed out the inefficiency of the mili 
 tary and naval officers in the war, instancing the 
 childish panic that made them fire on the English 
 fishing boats in the North Sea taking them for 
 Japanese torpedo boats which were ten thousand 
 miles away. He asked her to read a few state papers 
 of the leading bureaucrats for proof that they were 
 not masters of any language. "With a private in 
 come of sixty-six million roubles a year and the Rus 
 sian army the Tsar needs no brains and has none 1" 
 
 "I think you are mistaken about that," said Mar 
 ion. "I have heard he is not so ignorant as he seems 
 about things that are happening." 
 
 "Then so much the worse for him," he exclaimed. 
 "Is deliberate, open-eyed brutality to rule us forever? 
 They pride themselves on strong will-power. It is 
 shown chiefly in their ability to overcome the weak 
 ness which makes an unhardened human being 
 loath to order the destruction by rifle fire of a crowd 
 of unarmed men and women coming to tell their 
 rulers they are perishing of cold and hunger." 
 
 Marion could not really judge at that time, but 
 felt that Pososhkov underestimated the power of the 
 enemy. 
 
 That night she talked to Count Feodor of that 
 damning contrast the island parks and the Vibourg 
 suburb. 
 
 He replied that he could practically match the con-
 
 196 THE CHASM 
 
 trast in every great city of the modern world 
 including New York. In St. Petersburg there was 
 no truckling attempt to hide or deny it. In his 
 opinion the true attitude of the aristocracy of all 
 time was expressed by Beatrice when Dante won 
 dered if she were not made unhappy by compassion 
 for the souls she saw in burning hell. She answered: 
 "God in his mercy has made me such that the fire 
 of this burning does not touch me." 
 
 If the price of the island parks was all that human 
 misery, he felt that this very fact gave their beauty 
 added elements of costliness and terror. This idea 
 struck him as so profound, so true to the nature of 
 the universe in which we live, that he resolved to 
 embody it in a tone-poem called "The Islands of the 
 Neva." 
 
 He sought themes expressive of the despair of the 
 starving dwellers of the mainland and treatment 
 suggestive of the weakness, ebbing vitality, and 
 broken spirit, which kept those wretches from revolt. 
 He had no difficulty with the contrasted movements 
 full of the joy of life, the sense of power, the pride 
 of mastery over the world, the exuberance of soul 
 that overflowed in love of beauty and magnificence. 
 
 His inspiration here was his conception of Peter 
 the Great the physical, intellectual, and moral 
 giant whose will had created immense and massive 
 St. Petersburg there amid insalubrious marshes 
 where no spontaneous city of men could have arisen. 
 De Hohenfels strove for strange and Brobdignagian 
 harmonies and movements to glorify the unnature, 
 the monstrosity of that creation. He remembered all 
 he had ever heard or seen or read of Peter the
 
 THE CHASM 197 
 
 life-size, wax-portrait model of him in the Palace of 
 the Hermitage sitting in his own chair, dressed in 
 the very clothes he wore, grasping the very sword he 
 had wrested from the ruined king of Poland beside 
 him the yellow war-horse he had ridden at Poltava 
 the day he founded Russia upon the ruins of Sweden. 
 Feodor, the musician, in his own imagination became 
 Peter, ruining Poland, ruining Sweden, transforming 
 the Neva-marshes, transforming the Muscovite Rus 
 sia that had been into the European Russia that he 
 willed to be. 
 
 That destruction and assimilation of nations was 
 to De Hohenfels s imagination only a vast develop 
 ment of the primitive vital theme the capture and 
 destruction and assimilation of one living thing by 
 another the theme announced in minute notes by 
 the musician Nature when the first animal cellsturned 
 from inorganic food and began to suck in, break 
 down, and absorb the living tissue of their organic 
 fellows. In the last analysis it was the imaginative 
 emotion aroused in him by the whole of life as he 
 conceived it which he was striving to express in 
 music. He voiced indifferently the tragic hopeless 
 ness of helpless victims, and he voiced well the vic 
 tor s power and joy of power, but he felt he was fail 
 ing to make his music express the peculiar relation he 
 wished it to between this hopelessness and this joy. 
 The originality and the thrill of his first conception 
 did not seem to work out in musical form. 
 
 He was playing over all he had written one morn 
 ing when Marion and Vasili Pososhkov were work 
 ing in a neighboring room. They stopped to listen, 
 the tutor s interest heightened by her remark that it
 
 198 THE CHASM 
 
 was her husband s own composition he was working 
 on. 
 
 "Magnificent!" said Pososhkov when De Hohen- 
 fels played what he called the Peter music. 
 
 Marion had been deeply impressed not only by 
 the music but also by Fedya s profound and poetic 
 verbal interpretations of it. Believing Vasili would 
 be similarly affected, she outlined the composer s 
 original conception the seminal idea of the work 
 and some of the branching ideas that had since put 
 forth. 
 
 "That s what he thinks he s doing, is it?" grunted 
 Pososhkov. "Glorifying Bloody Sunday! The noble 
 battle! Well, the music s all right. Fortunately 
 he can t narrow that universal language to his mean 
 ing. The dream of Peter nothing! Do you know 
 what those big, weird chords are really? That s the 
 giant Labor waking from his strange old sleep. And 
 that exultant part? Democracy triumphant the 
 voice of new Russia. And that doleful stuff? The 
 miserable Russia which has been including a wax 
 work Tsar and his stuffed horse!" 
 
 "Don t you make a mistake in considering such 
 conceptions dead while they still have life enough 
 in a human mind to produce art like this?" 
 
 "It is good music because he is a good musician 
 in spite of his false social conceptions. It is good 
 because it happens to express our true ones." 
 
 "How can the same piece of music express these 
 opposite conceptions?" 
 
 "The musician s conceptions arouse in him cer 
 tain feelings which he expresses. But in me these 
 very feelings are associated with opposite concep-
 
 THE CHASM 199 
 
 tions. He says that is Tsar Peter s joy of power. 
 It s nothing of the kind. It s anybody s joy of power. 
 I like it, not because Tsar Peter had it, but because 
 the Russian people are going to have it." 
 
 She admitted he had the best of that, and they 
 went back to their Russian grammar, Vasili Pososh- 
 kov deciding that the American Countess had a 
 penetrative intellect and a fair spirit. 
 
 When she repeated the young tutor s various 
 comments to Fedya, he made the point that his 
 own philosophy and Count Tolstoi s being diametric 
 opposites, Pososhkov could have no real ground for 
 rejecting both. 
 
 She hurled that at Pososhkov next morning. The 
 linguist seemed puzzled, but did admit that the two 
 philosophies really were opposites. Marion then 
 insisted that he must choose between them, and 
 when he declined, accused him of being unwilling to 
 admit defeat. 
 
 "But what exactly is the main question upon which 
 Count Hohenfels and Count Tolstoi take opposite 
 sides?" 
 
 Marion thought in its broadest form it was the 
 question of egoism vs. altruism. 
 
 Pososhkov preferred to define it as the actual 
 practice of the world (mainly egoistic) vs. the Chris 
 tian theory of altruism. "The present practise of 
 living off the labor of others means island parks for 
 you and Vibourg tenements for your neighbor. It is 
 not reconcilable with the theory love your neighbor 
 as yourself. Your husband escapes this contradic 
 tion by accepting the world s actual practise and 
 throwing away the hypocritical pretense of altruism.
 
 200 THE CHASM 
 
 Count Tolstoi tries to escape it in the other direction 
 by accepting the Christian ideal and throwing 
 away the world s practise. What he actually does 
 is personally half to renounce the fruits of capital 
 ism. He still owns Yasnaya Polyana, but thinks he 
 makes that all right by dressing as though 
 he didn t." 
 
 "But does he think so? Doesn t he himself feel 
 
 that as an inconsistency that exposes him to ridicule ?" 
 
 "Whether he feels it or not, it is true," said Po- 
 
 soshkov. "He tries to escape the contradiction and 
 
 fails." 
 
 "Well," said she, with a gleam of approaching tri 
 umph, "I admit your point against Tolstoi. But I 
 noticed you said my husband does escape the contra 
 diction." 
 
 "Yes, his position is logical." 
 "Then why don t you accept it?" 
 "Because there is an infinitely better one." 
 "Better than one that is perfectly logical?" 
 "Certainly. Ours is not only logical, but right. 
 Your husband s is logical and rotten. It means 
 Vibourg tenements. The whole miserable problem 
 disappears with the system of private ownership of 
 the sources of life. Owning Russia in common, new 
 Russia thereby establishes work and reward on a 
 basis that antiquates both the worldly practise of ex 
 ploiting others, and the Christian theory of allowing 
 others to exploit us." 
 
 But the next day, having thought this over, Mari 
 on forced Pososhkov to retreat from his poor 
 opinion of Tolstoi s altruism for Tolstoi. "I can
 
 THE CHASM 201 
 
 see now," he said after listening to her, "that in 
 men of Tolstoi s class altruism, non-retaliation, is 
 not socially noxious. Altruism in him does no 
 harm. But don t let him preach it to us. I know 
 in every fiber of my being that altruism, submission, 
 meekness, on the part of our class means leaving 
 practically all social wealth and power in the hands 
 of the few whose use of it makes such a world as 
 we have. That is socially noxious. The selfish self- 
 assertive desire of the poor, the workers, to hold 
 enough of wealth to maintain life well is socially 
 valuable. The selfish desire of the rich for wealth 
 beyond what is necessary to maintain life well is bad 
 for the common life. Improvement in our society is 
 furthered only by altruists among the rich and ego 
 ists among the poor. It is retarded by the egoist 
 rich who own the earth and the altruist poor who 
 let them own it." 
 
 Marion did not care to go into it with Vasili Po- 
 soshkov, but back in her own mind, unanswered, 
 was the question whether the concentration of wealth 
 he considered socially noxious might not be the 
 world s unconscious preparation for the mighty work 
 of molding the beyond-man. 
 
 In succeeding days she saw wider applications of 
 Pososhkov s method of attacking the egoist-altruist 
 problem. She laid hold of tools of thought that 
 were new to her. She had never realized that a posi 
 tion could be "logical and rotten." She had thought 
 the maxim "Of two evils choose neither" a witty im 
 possibility. And this new thinking of hers tended to 
 reduce the ascendency Fedya had established over
 
 202 THE CHASM 
 
 her mind in th e blaze of intellectual and artistic 
 power in him when he first conceived "The Islands 
 of the Neva." 
 
 His musical enthusiasm had begun to wane even 
 before he was drawn off by his appointment on a 
 commission sent by the Duma to investigate the 
 massacre of the Jews in Bialostok. In that town he 
 helped to gather, sift, and analyze a mass of testi 
 mony proving that the butchery of unarmed men by 
 armed, organized, and carefully directed mobs, the 
 raping of women, the killing of children, was done 
 with the connivance of the police and local military 
 authorities, that some of the police were eye-witness 
 es of some of the murders and made no attempt to 
 stop them, that women fugitives escaping the mob 
 were denied refuge at police headquarters, being told 
 by the chief of police that what they were getting 
 they deserved because of the socialist agitation 
 among the Jews. The commission found that the 
 Anti-Semitic newspaper editor whose paper had care 
 fully manufactured sentiment against the Jews had 
 been given free rein by the Governor-General of 
 Grodno, that this editor and his son had organized 
 the bands of so-called Black Hundreds which were 
 led and directed by prominent citizens of Bialostok. 
 The Governor-General had refused the Jews permis 
 sion to arm themselves in self-defense, and one band 
 who did arm themselves were overpowered and dis 
 armed by police and soldiers, who then left them to 
 the mercy of the Black Hundreds. The commission 
 found that the editor was acting with the approval 
 of the St. Petersburg authorities. 
 
 The Minister of the Interior published a report
 
 THE CHASM 203 
 
 on the causes of the massacre which the Duma s 
 commission proved to be wholly at variance with 
 the facts. The final report of the commission placed 
 the responsibility for the massacre upon the Central 
 Government itself. 
 
 To the Duma s specific charge of direct complicity 
 in the wholesale murders of Bialostok the only an 
 swer of the Government was a manifesto of the Tsar 
 stating in general terms that riot, sedition, and rebel 
 lion were rife throughout the Empire, that seventy 
 thousand lives had already been sacrificed, and that 
 this condition had been brought about solely through 
 the dirty work (skernoye dyelo] of the revolution 
 ists. 
 
 Upon De Hohenfels s return from Bialostok, M. 
 Kokoreff came to him and told him that as his 
 brother-in-law he wanted to warn him that he would 
 find it seriously to his personal disadvantage if he 
 did not use his influence with his colleagues to secure 
 a more "conservative" report. 
 
 Count Feodor replied that if Kokoreff wished to 
 indulge himself in the pastime of arranging mas 
 sacres, to go ahead, but not to expect people of dif 
 ferent tastes to help him avert publicity. 
 
 Kokoreff said significantly that even for certain 
 unofficial acts he had the sanction of his chief. This 
 should have overwhelmed De Hohenfels, but to 
 Kokoreff s horror, when the report appeared, he 
 found himself quoted to that effect. He saved his 
 official head only by swearing he had never made the 
 remark. 
 
 De Hohenfels was protected by a theoretical im 
 munity from arrest enjoyed by members of the
 
 204 THE CHASM 
 
 Duma, but "the Tsar s promises" had become a 
 proverb. Scores of men who had accepted as made 
 in good faith the ukase granting the right of free 
 speech and had used the right had been instantly 
 seized and subjected to terrible treatment by the 
 police. Of them and their agents, after Bialostok, 
 Marion began to live in fear. 
 
 De Hohenfels s work with the commission having 
 brought him into closer touch with his colleagues, he 
 again attended the sessions of the Duma. Things 
 there were coming to a head. The peasant deputies 
 had reached almost the limit of their patience with 
 mere speech-making. Pressure had been brought 
 constantly to bear on them by their constituents who, 
 in twenty thousand letters and telegrams, wanted to 
 know why they had not secured the land. By the 
 middle of July, after the Tsar s manifesto, which, 
 the peasants noticed, said nothing about the land, 
 committees of muzhiks from all over Russia came 
 pouring into St. Petersburg "to find out what was 
 the matter with their deputies." 
 
 Commenting on this, Vasili Pososhkov said to 
 Marion that it showed how really representative the 
 parliament of new Russia would be "when decay 
 ing, capitalistic autocracy is over and done with and 
 the stench of it gone from the earth!" 
 
 Their spines stiffened by the knowledge that there 
 were ten million peasants behind them, the Labor 
 Group prepared an appeal to the people stating that 
 the Duma was an impotent body, that it could do 
 nothing but talk, and that the only way to secure any 
 change whatever in conditions was for the people
 
 THE CHASM 205 
 
 themselves to rise en masse and overturn the existing 
 Government. 
 
 That Saturday afternoon, July 2ist, the Consti 
 tutional Democrats who had made the long speech 
 es the peasants were weary of hearing proposed, 
 instead of this appeal, a statement to the people ex 
 plaining why they could do nothing, but omitting the 
 Peasants revolutionary call to arms. 
 
 Monday morning, the time set for the debate be 
 tween the Peasants with their appeal and the Cadets 
 with their statement, De Hohenfels went as usual to 
 the Tauride Palace. He found the building full of 
 troops, crowds of excited deputies in the corridors, 
 and on the locked door of the assembly room a man 
 ifesto of Nicholas dissolving the Duma. 
 
 In the corridor, Hertzenstein, who, as chairman, 
 had signed the report of the Bialostok commission, 
 met De Hohenfels and took him to one side. "I am 
 going to Finland this afternoon," said he. "In fact 
 most of us are. I don t know whether you will be 
 with us in what we may decide to do from across 
 the border but take my advice and get out of St. 
 Petersburg. Better get out of Russia. And do it 
 to-day." 
 
 De Hohenfels thought him unduly alarmed, but 
 had no intention of remaining in St. Petersburg 
 through the summer, and went home to talk it over 
 with Marion and decide where they were to go. He 
 hesitated about going to his estate in Central Rus 
 sia, where martial law prevailed, or to Zhergan. Ten 
 days before they had shot eight revolutionists in 
 Riga, forty miles from there. However, he had a
 
 206 THE CHASM 
 
 letter from Churisnok, his overseer, saying that the 
 commandant of the Zhergan garrison had estab 
 lished his headquarters at the manor-house; and that, 
 he reflected, would assure a guard for himself and 
 Marion. 
 
 On his way home in a hired droshky from the 
 Tauride Palace, De Hohenfels secured a copy of 
 the official Gazette of that morning, and turned to 
 the Tsar s manifesto, which he had not stopped to 
 read through at the Palace. He read the manifesto, 
 and then, to his amazement, discovered a brief no 
 tice of the death of Deputy Hertzenstein, killed by 
 persons unknown in front of his apartment in Vasili 
 Ostrov, Fifth Line. The notice did not specify the 
 hour, but it must have been in type two or three 
 hours; and having talked with Hertzenstein not 
 a quarter of an hour before, De Hohenfels knew it 
 must be incorrect. 
 
 When he came in, Marion was writing Russian at 
 a big table with grammar and dictionary at her el 
 bow, getting ready for Vasili Pososhkov at eleven. 
 
 "There s some Russian for you," said Feodor, 
 handing her the paper with the Tsar s manifesto. 
 "The Duma is dissolved." 
 
 "Dissolved!" She took the paper. "Isn t that un 
 expected? Doesn t that leave everything unsettled 
 and undone?" 
 
 "Of course. That s what the Government wants. 
 Most of the deputies are going to Finland. They 
 may direct the rising of all Russia from across the 
 border." 
 
 "Are you going with them?" Her eyes lighted 
 with the hope that he was.
 
 THE CHASM 207 
 
 "No. But what we should decide at once is where 
 we ourselves are going for the summer. St. Peters 
 burg is no place even aside from politics." 
 
 They were approaching a decision in favor of 
 Zhergan, when the footman brought Count Feodor 
 the card of the editor Kovalevsky. 
 
 Being ushered in, and assured he could speak 
 freely before Marion, the newspaper man said he 
 had only a moment. He was not a member of the 
 Duma, but had been actively aiding it, and he was 
 going to take the first train for Vibourg across the 
 Finnish border. He had been told by some of the 
 deputies that De Hohenfels had gone home, and 
 passing the Hotel d Europe, he had thought it well 
 to come up and tell him of certain things that were 
 happening. "Did you hear about Hertzenstein?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "His death?" said De Hohenfels. 
 
 "His death!" exclaimed Marion, turning pale. 
 
 "It isn t true," said De Hohenfels hastily. "I 
 talked with him myself not over an hour ago, and 
 this paper must have gone to press three or four 
 hours ago." He reached for the Gazette, and turned 
 to the notice. 
 
 "I know nothing about what s in the paper," 
 said Kovalevsky. "I saw Hertzenstein s dead body 
 at his lodgings half an hour ago. His wife is hyster 
 ical. The concierge saw him shot to death by four 
 rough-looking fellows with army revolvers. They 
 were waiting at his door and opened fire as he got 
 out of his cab. After he fell they took time to fire 
 into his body as it lay on the curb. They kept off 
 passers-by at the point of their pistols, and escaped.
 
 208 THE CHASM 
 
 Since last night there have been no city police on 
 duty, not even at crossings, within three blocks of 
 that house." 
 
 "How horrible!" exclaimed Marion. 
 
 "Here s the real horror," said Fedya, pointing 
 to the notice in the paper. "The official Gazette 
 printed the notice of Hertzenstein s death three 
 hours before it took place." 
 
 Kovalevsky glanced at the notice without sur 
 prise. "This was evidently released about one edi 
 tion too soon," said he. "I don t wish to alarm the 
 Countess, but you also did good work at Bialostok, 
 Count de Hohenfels, and the moral of this story for 
 you is get out of St. Petersburg."
 
 Ill- 
 
 TRAVELING unattended, the Count and 
 Countess de Hohenfels reached Pskov at nine 
 that evening with sunset still reddening the 
 northwest, and five hours later, in the dawn, looked 
 from the swaying windows of their sleeping-car 
 stateroom to find the train following a swift, cold 
 stream through a warm and winding valley from 
 which rose rolling uplands belted with firwoods. 
 Outlined against the russet sky appeared half-ruined 
 walls with round-arched windows and crenelated tur 
 rets mournful as unburied skeletons masonic 
 bones of a social structure that had passed away, fill 
 ing the soul with sudden knowledge that our own 
 crowded and busy epoch will fall silent and fore 
 shorten to a moment of immense antiquity. 
 
 They spent an hour in Riga a large and busy 
 city of electric cars, automobiles, public gardens with 
 electric-lighted band-stands, and solid business blocks 
 like those of Hamburg. After a surfeit of Mus 
 covite domes, Marion was glad to look once more 
 on the architecture of western Europe in the Gothic 
 Peterskirche. They drove past the old Rathhaus of 
 Hanseatic times, and two minutes later, with the 
 imaginative shock of suddenly contrasted ages, they 
 
 209
 
 210 THE CHASM 
 
 found themselves looking at a steamer from New 
 York. 
 
 On a track across the broad paved street from the 
 quay, close to the wall of a five-story stone ware 
 house, stood a string of dumpy little white freight- 
 cars bound for Irkutsk in Siberia four or five thou 
 sand miles inland, and on those cars, with a cry of 
 joy, followed by an unexpected choke, Marion Moul- 
 ton that was discovered a row of bright new farm 
 machinery from Moline. The trouble was it stood 
 just that same way on the cars alongside the Third 
 Avenue warehouse. That warehouse beneath the 
 windowed walls of which she had walked in the days 
 of slates and short skirts it was there this minute ! 
 She kept her face away so Fedya did not see the sil 
 ver drops beneath her veil. 
 
 Two hours ride on a slow train brought them to 
 Mitau, a quiet town as large as Moline and Rock 
 Island. Above it loomed the massive castle of Biren, 
 Duke of Courland, a cousin of the Von Hohenfels 
 of his time, a paramour of the Empress of Russia, 
 and the host of the realmless Louis XVIII of 
 France. Mitau was full of black-eyed, high-cheek- 
 boned Cossacks and Polish infantrymen Catholic 
 Slavs brought here to stamp out the revolution of 
 the Lutheran Letts while Lettish soldiers were shoot 
 ing the striking workmen of Poland. 
 
 It was only twenty-five versts from Mitau to 
 Zhergan, and had it not been for rumors of "Broth 
 ers of the Woods" in the Hohenfels forest, the 
 Count would have had his coachman meet them at 
 Mitau. They went on a passenger-coach trailed be^ 
 hind short, dingy-white, flat-cars whose heavy wood^
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 en floors were scurfed by the butts of pine-logs till 
 they looked like hempen mats. After the first ten 
 versts the roughly built spur of the railway ran 
 through their own property. 
 
 The logging cars were shunted to a siding in the 
 forest, and the engine, emerging into fields of oats 
 and potatoes and open pastures full of cattle and 
 grazing ponies, drew the coach and some empty 
 "goods-trucks," as Fedya called them, to a little 
 slate-colored railway station in the outskirts of Zher- 
 gan a town whose five thousand people were most 
 ly liberated Hohenfels serfs living now by agricul 
 ture, lumbering, and the rural industries. 
 
 They were met by broadly smiling footman and 
 coachman in livery, who called Fedya "little father." 
 He called them little David and little Ilya, little 
 David being something over six feet high. They got 
 into a cumbrous gala coach which lumbered out of 
 the village, past Kronberg s brickyard, along a 
 country road between brown hayfields to a large 
 group of stone and wooden farm buildings, beyond 
 which they came through a shady, English-looking 
 park to the manor. It was a large white wooden 
 house with colonnades and terraces and gravel walks 
 not wholly free from weeds, and reminded Marion 
 of the Georgia home of the college chum she called 
 "my glorious Barbara." To the east, in front of an 
 orchard, were the brown shelter tents of a platoon of 
 Russian soldiers. 
 
 A score of houseservants were lined up in the 
 manner of the preceding generation to receive the 
 "barin" and his bride, and "Feodor Lefyevitch," 
 greeting them by their diminutive names, found him-
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 self drawn back into the patronizing, patriarchal 
 manner of his father "Lef Alexievitch." He drew 
 the line, however, at their kissing his hand. 
 
 Yury Churisnok, a Great-Russian muzhik risen by 
 virtue of success as a rent-collector to the long coat 
 of the overseer, performed the important social func 
 tion of introducing the Commandant Count Tschu- 
 litsky to his master. 
 
 The Countess acknowledged the introduction of 
 the army officer in Russian, but that gentleman, 
 noting her accent, had sufficient lack of tact to an 
 swer in French as much as to say, "I see you don t 
 speak Russian." Marion gave him a look he did not 
 understand. The Adjutant, Captain Sikorsky, a 
 plump, fine-looking man with blue eyes and brown 
 moustache, spoke Russian and complimented the 
 Countess on hers, thereby winning a look of real 
 interest as she wondered whether he had been keen 
 enough to understand her displeasure with Tschu- 
 litsky. Sikorsky said something to De Hohenfels 
 about the inconvenience of finding uninvited guests 
 in possession of one s house. 
 
 Feodor replied that on the contrary it was any 
 thing but an inconvenience there in the country to be 
 assured of the society of men of one s own class. 
 
 Tschulitsky drew attention to the obvious prac 
 tical benefit of a guard for the premises, at which 
 Sikorsky, raising his eyebrows, looked at the Coun 
 tess as much as to say, "Well, there s no help for it !" 
 
 As Feodor and Marion walked through the old- 
 fashioned rooms with their inlaid floors, ceilings six 
 teen feet high, and heavy Victorian furniture, he
 
 THE CHASM 213 
 
 observed that no doubt she would want to modern 
 ize her house. He used the special phrase "sobst- 
 venny dom," emphasizing her ownership. 
 
 "Oh, no, Fedya ! Don t try to make a reality out 
 of that legal fiction." 
 
 "As you please. I was only trying to make you 
 feel at home." 
 
 "I know," she said, and did not explain that bring 
 ing up that idea in that way had the opposite effect. 
 "The old nurse is a dear," she said, "and that jolly 
 Davuidka. The affection they have for you is charm 
 ing. How much better it is to have cordial human be 
 ings for servants than expressionless automata of 
 the English pattern. I can t tell you how glad I am 
 to get away from St. Petersburg to these people who 
 are of the soil." 
 
 He said he was afraid she would soon find limits 
 to the charm of the peasant class, and in the days 
 that followed she had to admit that he was right. In 
 the first place she found the "affection" she had no 
 ticed confined to a few old Russian retainers among 
 the houseservants. Most of the hired agricultural 
 laborers at the farm, and the numerous tenants, sons 
 of liberated Hohenfels serfs, were Letts, and she 
 could not speak their language. There was an In 
 filtration of muzhiks from Kovno, but though she 
 talked with them, they were suspicious of her friendly 
 advances. For a while the chief impression was one 
 of immense unconquerable stupidity in them, but one 
 morning two muzhiks she knew passed outside the 
 window of the dairy where she was talking to a 
 woman churning, and one of them was criticizing
 
 214 THE CHASM 
 
 Count Feodor s attitude on the land question in the 
 Duma as not representing the desire of the people 
 who elected him. 
 
 "Don t you know no landlord can understand any 
 thing?" demanded the other. 
 
 "So they think us stupid," mused Marion, and 
 wondered if the stupidity she saw in them could be a 
 mask behind which they concealed their real thoughts 
 and feelings from "the landlords." From her win 
 dow she sometimes heard the soldiers laughing, turn 
 ing proverbs against each other, speaking with voices 
 expressive of shrewdness and humor, but when an 
 officer was near, or when she herself tried to talk 
 with them the mask ! They did not consciously put 
 it on. It was instinct. 
 
 The Baron and Baroness Krushcaln and their sev 
 enteen-year-old daughter called to pay their respects 
 to the new Countess. They were provincial people 
 and not very interesting to Marion. Baron Von 
 Wikkerstrom and Police Intendant Bratavzinsky 
 were other important neighbors whose calls had to 
 be returned by Count Feodor. Yan Sarin, the fore 
 man of the smithy on the estate, was a manly, in 
 telligent-looking fellow, who, Marion felt, could 
 have helped her get in touch with the people, but 
 he was a Lett. So was the plump, rosy mail-carrier 
 who brought their mail from town. She was reluct 
 ant to take up Lettish in addition to Russian, espe 
 cially since she thought the language had no import 
 ant literature to reward her for the labor of learn 
 ing it, but finally took as tutor one of the housemaids. 
 The girl was uneducated and not so much a teacher 
 as a passive, and indifferent, living dictionary.
 
 THE CHASM 215 
 
 Count Tschulitsky said he could not understand 
 why anyone should wish to know Lettish, and when 
 she answered, "Because one wishes to know the 
 Letts," he seemed inclined to regard her as a dan 
 gerous character. Sikorsky remarked afterward to 
 the Countess that Tschulitsky looked upon the 
 Letts Inability to speak Russian as a kind of treason. 
 
 The Captain suggested as tutor the village dress 
 maker, who spoke Lettish, though she was of a 
 Russian family now impoverished. She had been 
 educated in France and St. Petersburg. Sikorsky had 
 attempted to make her acquaintance. He said she 
 was a touchy, bad-tempered individual, possibly em 
 bittered by misfortune, but no doubt intelligent 
 enough to teach. Moreover if study of the people 
 was the idea, the Countess might find a short cut 
 through this Sonya Demidoff s knowledge of them. 
 
 Marion drove over that afternoon to the Zhergan 
 dressmaking establishment, located in one wing of a 
 two : story brick building. It had one display win 
 dow exhibiting three pathetic bonnets, a trayful of 
 artificial flowers, and half a dozen bolts of ribbon. A 
 bell jangled alarmingly above her head as she pushed 
 open the street door. There was no one in the un- 
 carpeted, littered-up shop; but low sounds as of 
 things being hastily set to rights came from behind a 
 partition of unpainted dressed lumber, in a certain 
 crack of which, unobserved by the visitor, there was 
 one small knot-hole covered, as it happened, on the 
 inside, by a framed lithograph which could be noise 
 lessly drawn aside. The shop was nearly filled by a 
 pine table covered with paper patterns and half-cut 
 garments, two chairs, and a Singer sewing machine
 
 216 THE CHASM 
 
 made in the American Company s factory in Podolsk 
 by low-waged Russian workers. The manufacturer s 
 name, CVIHFEP, in Russian characters, was cast in 
 the metal. 
 
 The door in the partition was unbolted and 
 opened, a young woman in a black and white checked 
 gingham waist and short walking skirt came through 
 it, saw the fashionable customer in her fine linen suit, 
 and accompanied her Russian salutation with a frank 
 look out of clear blue eyes. Expecting to see a some 
 what sour, old-maidish individual, the Countess was 
 agreeably surprised. "Are you Sonya Demidoff?" 
 she asked. 
 
 "Yes. What can I do for you?" The absence of 
 any conventionally respectful form of address was 
 not noticeable thanks to a peculiar friendliness of 
 tone. 
 
 Marion gave an order for a large number of rough 
 towels and cotton sheets and pillow-cases much need 
 ed at the manor in the row of one-roomed cottages 
 called the servants wing. The fine embroidered bed- 
 linen, of which there was an enormous quantity, was 
 used only on the beds of the gentlefolks, and ac 
 cording to Anna Churisnok, the housekeeper, it 
 would have been a sure sign of family degeneracy 
 had there not been enough of it to last a year with 
 out a washing. 
 
 The dressmaker hesitated about accepting the 
 Countess s order, but said finally that she would send 
 to Mitau for the goods in a day or two. 
 
 "It would be only fair if I advanced the money 
 for the goods," said Marion. 
 
 "More than fair," answered Sonya Demidoff,
 
 THE CHASM 217 
 
 smiling. "But as I think you guessed, it would save 
 my friends the trouble of lending it to me. So you 
 may if you will." 
 
 Marion nodded. 
 
 "Let us see how much it will be," said the dress 
 maker. She sat down and began to figure. After a 
 moment she looked up, with a shade of surprise, at 
 Marion still standing, and then at the other chair. 
 
 The lady accepted the suggestion and seated her 
 self. 
 
 "About a hundred and seventy-five roubles." 
 
 Marion opened her silver-linked purse with the 
 arms of De Hohenfels on one side of it, and laid out 
 two hundred roubles in clean new notes. 
 
 "What a remarkable purse !" the dressmaker mur 
 mured. 
 
 "It is handsome," admitted Marion, turning it to 
 view. 
 
 "It has money in it! Most abnormal!" 
 
 Marion was inclined to view talk about money as 
 in poor taste, but Sonya Demidoff broke into such 
 care-free, unmalicious laughter that the lady with the 
 abnormal purse could not resist its contagion. She 
 wondered what had given Sikorsky the impression 
 that this creature was sour or bad-tempered. "I be 
 lieve I forgot to mention my name," she said. "I am 
 the Countess de Hohenfels." 
 
 "You could be no one else," said Sonya Demidoff, 
 wondering if the Countess attached much importance 
 to the title. To find out she observed : "I suppose you 
 know I am the Princess Demidoff." 
 
 Marion s eyes opened wide. "Really?" she 
 gasped.
 
 218 THE CHASM 
 
 The Princess Demidoff smiled. "Is that so won 
 derful? You will find stranger things than that in 
 Russia." 
 
 "Goodness!" exclaimed Marion, smiling. "I hope 
 I haven t inadvertently failed in the respect due to 
 one of your rank!" 
 
 "No, since you have not failed in the respect due 
 the village dressmaker." 
 
 "I see. Were you always so democratic?" 
 
 "No. I had to free myself of many unrealities." 
 
 "Are social distinctions unrealities?" 
 
 "Not yet. But they have no weight with me. In 
 dividual distinctions are all that count." 
 
 "I find the class distinction very sharp in Russia. 
 I know one barin who believes there is even the be 
 ginning of a biologic difference between his class and 
 the muzhik indicated by a totally different set of 
 instincts." 
 
 "Such superstition! Do you not know about the 
 jus primee noctls?" 
 
 The Countess confessed her ignorance, and Sonya 
 Demidoff opened her eyes by explaining how that in 
 stitution and the polygamous tendency of the male 
 aristocrats had sent their blood through the entire 
 European population in every two or three genera 
 tions during all the long centuries of feudalism. "The 
 different instincts are consequently the result of dif 
 ferent economic and social conditions," said Sonya. 
 "The same blood flows in the muzhik and the Tsar, 
 and of the two give me the muzhik." 
 
 "Of two evils choose neither," murmured Marion. 
 
 "The muzhik is not an evil. He has been made 
 muzhikavatwi (boorish), but the root of the word is
 
 THE CHASM 219 
 
 muzh (a man). Did you live in St. Petersburg this 
 summer and not learn the caliber of such muzhiks as 
 Anakin, Jilkin, Aladin, Kurneen? But be more care 
 ful how you agree with strangers that the Tsar is 
 an evil. I am not a police spy, but if I were and 
 you do not know who is I would talk to you just 
 as I m talking now even to this very warning." 
 
 The American caught a glimpse of the nature of 
 that great net of treachery and countertreachery 
 whose meshes run through the whole of Russian so 
 ciety. "How do you know / am not?" demanded 
 she. 
 
 "People engage in that dirty business for profit 
 at first, and finally from perverted pride in their skill 
 as liars. But you are a rich American." 
 
 "I will be more discreet. But my instinct for 
 people is quite untrustworthy if you are in any dis 
 creditable business." 
 
 "That s sweet!" exclaimed Sonya, smiling. 
 
 "I am looking for a tutor in Lettish," said Mari 
 on. "Will you accept me as a pupil?" 
 
 "Lettish? I am doubtful. I have never thought 
 of it as a language to be studied. My knowledge of 
 it has been picked up instinctively." 
 
 "It would probably be impossible to find anyone 
 of whom that is not true." 
 
 "No, the Letts are cultivating their language. 
 There are poems, novels, romances. There is a Let 
 tish literary society in Mitau. German philologians 
 have made exhaustive studies of the grammar and 
 phonology. You could find masters of the subject in 
 Mitau." 
 
 "I want you," said Marion. "You know how to
 
 220 THE CHASM 
 
 study language. You would enjoy analyzing your in 
 stinctive knowledge of this one." 
 
 The dressmaker asked for a day or two to con 
 sider. 
 
 That night Marion asked Feodor how the Prin 
 cess Demidoff came to be keeping a little shop in 
 Zhergan. 
 
 "She s the daughter of a Siberian exile," he ex 
 plained. "Prince Ivan Demidoff s estates were confis 
 cated, and he was sentenced to fifteen years labor in 
 the mines for circulating high treasonable literature 
 condemning the government censorship of books. 
 The girl s stepmother went back to her family. De 
 midoff was a fine fellow. I heard him speak once 
 when I was in the University. He was perfectly 
 right about the censorship. I hold his view exactly." 
 
 "The view he is in Siberia for holding!" 
 
 "The same. I didn t print my view. Demidoff was 
 one of the self-sacrificing fools. What good has his 
 ruining himself done for the freedom of the press? 
 Absolutely none!" 
 
 The next day Marion was back at the dressmak 
 er s, her sympathy stirred by Sonya s history, her lik 
 ing for the girl increased by reflection upon what she 
 had seen of her. She was invited into the room behind 
 the partition to have a cup of tea from Sonya s samo 
 var. This room kitchen, dining-room, bedroom, 
 and salon was considerably larger than the shop, 
 had a thick carpet on the floor, heavy curtains, semi- 
 ornamental iron lattices across the windows looking 
 into a side street, and what with the bed, the long 
 divans, and some upholstered chairs, was capable of 
 seating fifteen or twenty persons.
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 U I see you are looking at my books," remarked 
 Sonya. "Those are for the benefit of the police, who 
 occasionally pay me a little visit when they think I d 
 rather not see them. You are sitting on my forbidden 
 library enough to send me to Siberia. If there s 
 
 anything you d like to smuggle home with you " 
 
 She showed how the divan opened, revealing a secret 
 chest full of books and pamphlets, and watched her 
 visitor s expression. 
 
 "I would like to take all your books home with 
 me," said Marion, " and also their owner." Judg 
 ing from the girl s pleased expression that the idea 
 appealed to her, the Countess made her an offer of a 
 permanent position at a good salary as tutor of Let 
 tish and Russian, making it plain that she was desired 
 even more as a companion than as a teacher. 
 
 Sonya thanked her, but declined, and being pressed 
 for her reason, answered: "Here I am free. Here 
 my friends come and go as they like." 
 
 "You can be equally free at the manor. I would 
 love to have your friends come there." 
 
 Sonya shook her head and remained firm, not 
 choosing, however, to explain that her friends would 
 not love to go there. 
 
 "I haven t one girl friend in Russia 1" said Marion 
 disconsolately. "I thought you and I could be but 
 you don t seem to feel that way." 
 
 "Because I won t give up my independence? My 
 dear, that s absurd! You appeal to me strongly. I 
 like you. I will probably love you. Come as often 
 as you will every morning and I will talk Lettish 
 to you while I sew." 
 
 They drifted into a language lesson that afternoon
 
 222 THE CHASM 
 
 over their tea. Sonya gave the words "glass," "lem 
 on," "sugar," "spoon," and so on, as she used each 
 object. She pointed to herself and said "I" to 
 Marion and said "you," and by actions taught such 
 phrases as "I rise from my chair," "I walk," "I roll 
 a cigarette," "Will you roll yourself a cigarette?" 
 and "Havea match." It was a game that called out 
 the most pleasurable play of invention and imitation. 
 Words of any language but Lettish were barred. 
 
 They were laughing over Sonya s imitation 
 "sneeze," when the bell over the shop door set up its 
 violent jangle. Sonya sprang up, closed the divan 
 book chest, ran to the lithograph on the partition, 
 drew it back from the peep-hole, and saw the in 
 tersecting head-line and fate-line of a man s hand. 
 
 She started back in alarm, stood one instant, then 
 snatched a lead pencil from her hair and jabbed it 
 viciously through the knot-hole. There was a yowl 
 from beyond the partition, and also an unobstructed 
 view through the peep-hole. Sonya availed herself 
 of it, and then opened the door. "I might have 
 known that was one of your small boy tricks!" said 
 she. 
 
 "Sonya, you devil, you ve crucified me!" called a 
 cheerful barytone. "I shall die of lead poisoning. 
 Why the mischief do you have such sharp pencils? 
 I always suspected you of being a remarkable woman, 
 
 but now " The speaker stopped short in the 
 
 doorway as he caught sight of the elegant visitor 
 within. 
 
 The elegant visitor was making a heroic struggle 
 not to laugh in the young man s face. 
 
 "Countess de Hohenfels," said Sonya in her state-
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 liest manner, "allow me to present Professor Alex 
 ander Bratavzinsky, Doctor of Philosophy, instructor 
 of the youth of Zhergan, nephew of the eminent 
 magistrate A. Bratavzinsky, Police Intendant of 
 Mitau." 
 
 "Bahl" said Bratavzinsky. "Give me some tea." 
 
 "According to the most recent usage in polite so 
 ciety, Sasha," said Sonya didactically, "the proper 
 formula to use in acknowledging an introduction to 
 a lady is not Bah! " 
 
 "In polite society young women no longer per 
 forate callers with lead-pencils, nor introduce them 
 with allusions to their disreputable relatives. I am 
 happy to meet you, Countess de Hohenfels, and trust 
 you will overlook these little provincialisms of our 
 hostess." 
 
 "Her methods seem effective," observed Marion. 
 
 "I consider them too pointed," maintained Bratav 
 zinsky, glancing at his hand. "Sonya, do I get tea 
 or do I not?" 
 
 "Not unless you go knock on Dr. Grenning s door, 
 and ask him to join us." 
 
 "All right," mumbled Bratavzinsky. He glanced 
 with lazy regret at the back wall. Grenning s rooms 
 being on the other side of it, he could easily have 
 been summoned by certain taps the "talk of the 
 walls" used in prison. The status of the Countess 
 de Hohenfels was sufficiently defined. She was well 
 enough known to let her see the use of the peep 
 hole, but Sonya did not care to have her hear the 
 signals through the wall. 
 
 Unlocking a door into a corridor, Bratavzinsky 
 went out, returning after several minutes. "That
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 Grenning insisted on taking my blood," he com 
 plained. "He s putting it still alive on slides in his 
 new high-power microscope and exhibiting it." 
 
 "To whom?" asked Sonya. 
 
 "Nachman Kaminsky and Trina Ronke. He wants 
 you and your friend to come in and look at it. I 
 assure you it s very superior blood. It has all kinds 
 of astonishing things in it." 
 
 "How interesting!" said Marion, ready to go. 
 
 "Ask him to bring the microscope and Kaminsky 
 in here," said Sonya, " where we can all have tea 
 while he tells us about phagocytes and things." 
 
 "How about Trina?" 
 
 "Her too of course. Isn t it lucky I stabbed 
 you?" 
 
 Bratavzinsky went out posing as a martyr to cold 
 blooded scientific curiosity. 
 
 "Trina Ronke is the mayor s daughter," explained 
 Sonya. Through subtle intimation understood of 
 women Marion knew that Sonya did not like Trina. 
 
 Bratavzinsky came back presently with Grenning 
 and Kaminsky carrying the microscope and its ac 
 cessories. 
 
 "Where s Trina?" asked Sonya. 
 
 "She couldn t stay," explained Dr. Grenning. He 
 was a man of more than middle height with well- 
 trimmed beard parted in the middle, gray eyes, 
 slightly stooping shoulders, large hands, a peculiar 
 swing in walking, and a rich bass voice which he 
 seemed inclined to use as little as possible. He was 
 the only physician in Zhergan, and did an enormous 
 amount of work for very little pay. 
 
 Nachman Kaminsky was the Jewish notary who
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 had his office across the corridor a small man with 
 beautiful eyelashes, hands and voice. He had ob 
 tained a costly legal education in St. Petersburg, 
 found himself excluded from practice by a new rul 
 ing against the Jews, and was reduced to writing 
 letters and drawing contracts for illiterate people 
 of his blood. He also ran a sort of school for Jew 
 ish children. His father was one of the leading 
 rabbis of Riga, but Nachman was an atheist. 
 
 When the microscope was set up and Marion was 
 looking into it, Kaminsky began to act as barker for 
 the show, announcing "the blue blood of Bratavzin- 
 sky now on exhibition! On the coverslip of this 
 microscope, ladies and gentlemen, you now behold 
 thousands of living animal cells. Among the red 
 corpuscles which look like copecks but unfortunately 
 are not, you will observe big white corpuscles. Those 
 are the police of the body, the military caste in blood 
 society. The large one near the center of the field 
 is Police Intendant of the Carotid Artery." 
 
 "I protest!" said Bratavzinsky. "I won t have 
 any police intendant in my blood. And I appeal to 
 Grenning. Have I got any carotid artery in the mid 
 dle of my hand?" 
 
 "No, but don t interrupt Kaminsky s eloquence 
 with mere facts." 
 
 "I am assured by that eminent bloodist, Dr. Ferdi 
 nand Grenning, that the red corpuscles of human 
 blood are entirely without nucleus, while a percentage 
 of the red corpuscles of equus asinus have a nucleus. 
 Since the specimen of blood before you does contain 
 a percentage of nucleated red cells, we are forced, 
 however unwillingly, to the conclusion that the living
 
 226 THE CHASM 
 
 specimen from which this blood is taken is a donkey." 
 
 "I wouldn t have to take a microscope, Kaminsky," 
 observed Sasha judicially, "to find that out about 
 you." 
 
 "Neat!" said Grenning, chuckling. 
 
 Marion looked up at Bratavzinsky and laughec) 
 appreciatively, her eyes brimming with fun. 
 
 "Lovely!" said Sonya, and gave him a glass of 
 tea. 
 
 "Annihilated!" groaned Kaminsky. "And by 
 Sasha! Grenning: get me some cyanide of potas 
 sium." 
 
 Grenning spoke to Marion. "Here is a wet slide 
 with some of Bratavzinsky s blood that ought to 
 show tubercular germs." 
 
 "What s that?" demanded Bratavzinsky. 
 
 "I ve just put them in," said Grenning. "I m 
 hoping they re still alive in spite of a little stain. 
 Perhaps we can find white cells eating them." Look 
 ing into the instrument, he slowly turned the thumb 
 screws. "Good luck," he said. "In the upper right- 
 hand corner perhaps you can see that white cell 
 starting to suck in a germ just a little pink line." 
 
 Marion looked and saw it with awe and wonder 
 at that revelation of the cryptic process. It remind 
 ed her of the emotion she had felt in looking 
 through Walt Bradfield s lens at the marriage of 
 pollen and pistil in the Hillcrest conservatory. 
 
 "I call that a battle worth fighting," said Gren 
 ning. "There is a military caste worth having. If 
 these co-operative citizens of the blood should 
 imitate our present society, the white cells would be 
 sucking the substance from the red."
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "That s a beauty, Grenning," said Kaminsky. 
 
 Marion looked up from the lens and met the 
 steady eyes of Grenning. "Even bacteriology!" 
 she murmured. 
 
 "So you understand." 
 
 She was perceiving Fedya s failure to read all the 
 minute notes in the score of the musician nature. 
 He had ears only for the primitive vital theme an 
 nounced in the individual animal cell absorbing the 
 protoplasm of its organic fellows. The later theme 
 of infinite richness developed in the social cell he 
 had failed to find.
 
 IV 
 
 IN Sonya s circle, Marion found what she had 
 vainly looked for in the high society of St. 
 Petersburg. She recognized among these free- 
 souled people a bond like that between her ten 
 "spirits" at Vassar an interest in things of the 
 mind and a comradeship which frequently exist in 
 youths of college age, but do not frequently survive 
 the atmosphere and conditions of modern bourgeois 
 society. She knew, however, that she was not 
 quite of this group, that they had other standards 
 and aspirations than hers. Things were understood 
 between them which she did not understand. She 
 was half conscious of her desire to make them stop 
 looking upon her as an outsider. 
 
 Thanks to the hour of Lettish every morning, she 
 and Sonya grew to be close friends in spite of the 
 fact that Sonya would not spend the night at the 
 manor or even accept an invitation to dinner. 
 
 Sometimes at Sonya s she encountered Trina 
 Ronke, a heavy, brown-haired girl whose mouth 
 often drooped abnormally at the corners, and who 
 gave the impression of being too acutely aware of 
 the Countess s rank to accept her as a human being. 
 
 Fritz Dumpe, the plump and rosy mail-carrier, 
 whom Marion rechristened Dumpling, would stop 
 
 228
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 and joke with Sonya, and tell the news, and talk 
 Lettish with the Countess. She soon progressed 
 enough to stop every day or two as she drove by 
 the smithy and talk with Yan Sarin, the foreman, 
 whose fine, hard face a sculptor would have wished 
 to reproduce in bronze. He reminded Marion of a 
 certain frescoed figure of Michael Angelo s in the 
 Sistine Chapel. She took pleasure in saying things 
 like this about Sarin to Captain Sikorsky, who was 
 pink and white and soft and too obviously trying to 
 impress her with his graces. 
 
 One day the American was struck by a curious 
 exclamation of Sonya s. They were talking of mar 
 riage, and something Sonya said caused Marion to 
 ask if she did not intend to marry. 
 
 "Marry in Russia !" the girl exclaimed. "Bring 
 a child into Russia 1" 
 
 Marion did not feel the full force of that. She 
 said she herself wanted children, but later, in an 
 other year or two. 
 
 The only one of the Zhergan group to set foot 
 in the manor was Nachman Kaminsky. He came 
 to see Count Feodor on behalf of a poor Jewish 
 family who owed rent on a one-roomed cabin. The 
 Count tried to refer him to Churisnok, but Kamin 
 sky explained that this was an appeal from Churis- 
 nok s already announced intention to evict. De 
 Hohenfels said since he could not manage the whole 
 estate at all times it would be illogical to interfere 
 in one isolated case. Finally he took refuge in the 
 fact that he was not the owner of the estate. It 
 belonged to the Countess. 
 
 Kaminsky went to the Countess. She explained
 
 230 THE CHASM 
 
 that her ownership was merely nominal. She could 
 not overrule Churisnok without recognizing the 
 reality of her title. 
 
 His mind full of the misery of that sick woman, 
 those hungry children, that man legally excluded 
 from nearly every occupation, Kaminsky was dis 
 gusted with the shifting of responsibility back and 
 forth between the Count and Countess. He told her 
 so, and took pleasure in describing the condition 
 of scores of people on her estate. He told her of 
 miserable hovels, unfit for the housing of cattle, 
 for which she was drawing rent from human beings. 
 He told her of an old Lett and his wife who had 
 just sold their last cow to pay the rent, of families 
 so poor they could afford but one wooden spoon 
 though a wooden spoon cost only three copecks 
 of babies born and wrapped in newspapers the 
 only clothes their mothers could get for them. 
 
 She stopped him by giving him the money to give 
 his clients to pay Churisnok to return to her; but she 
 knew well enough how far solving the rent-problem 
 for one family for two months was from solving the 
 problem of five hundred impoverished tenant fami 
 lies paying rent twelve times a year. Ownership 
 of the Zhergan estate became repugnant to her on 
 new grounds. 
 
 She went to Fedya and told him she wished to 
 transfer the property back to him, but he would not 
 consent, giving as his reason the opinion her father 
 would necessarily have of that. 
 
 Count Feodor was growing bored and discon 
 tented. His imaginative emotion, capable of being 
 stirred by whatever he could interpret as tending up
 
 THE CHASM 231 
 
 beyond life s present level, was finding little food 
 in the life of Russia as revolution and anti-revolu 
 tion were revealing it. St. Petersburg had given 
 up fish on account of the masses of soldiers bodies 
 thrown into the sea after the betrayal of the revolu 
 tionary design of the troops in Kronstadt and Svea- 
 bourg. 
 
 One day Marion said to him : "We, with no neces 
 sary work, are almost as badly off as the muzhiks 
 with too much. We grow blue and aimless because 
 there is nothing we have to do. The way we spend 
 our hours has no relation to the food we eat, the 
 clothes we wear, the rooms we live in. I am be 
 ginning to believe there must be such a relation if 
 our souls are not to be vague and our lives unreal." 
 
 He asked her if she had been reading too much 
 Tolstoi lately, and averred that for his part he had 
 long since passed the point where the industry of 
 the ditch-diggers shamed him. 
 
 She said no more, but contrasted the zest, cheer 
 fulness and interest in things which filled the group 
 at Sonya s with the boredom of Hohenfels, Tschulit- 
 sky, and Sikorsky. Hohenfels was reading a great 
 deal but not creatively, not selectively, not in the 
 light of any purpose of his own. He was falling 
 into the vice of the reading idler. For lack of 
 anything better he spent most of his evenings at 
 cards with the officers, generally winning from 
 Tschulitsky and losing to Sikorsky. There was a 
 different lieutenant in command of the headquarters 
 guard each week, but Tschulitsky and Sikorsky they 
 had always with them. 
 
 Knowing Dr. Grenning would be a more inter-
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 esting companion for her husband, Marion wrote 
 him a note inviting him to dinner. She was sur 
 prised and hurt at Grenning s answer, received next 
 day, in which he regretted that certain circumstances 
 made it impossible for him to accept an invitation to 
 the manor. 
 
 A day or so later she met him as he was coming 
 from his office to the street in front of Sonya s. She 
 bowed coldly to him, and was going on in, but he 
 stopped her and begged her not to interpret his 
 refusing her dinner invitation as an indication of 
 lack of regard. 
 
 "I am not overeasily offended," said she, "but it 
 happens I never before received so singular a note 
 of regret." 
 
 "There are people with whom a man chooses to 
 avoid even such small insincerities as pleading a 
 previous engagement when he has none," said Gren- 
 ning. "You will not be offended at my taking you 
 for such a person." 
 
 "No, Dr. Grenning, that won t quite do," said 
 Marion. "In such matters one must give either con 
 ventional excuses or real reasons, and you did 
 neither." 
 
 "Well, you are right. It s not just in my line, 
 but I should have written a polite prevarication." 
 
 "Why is it impossible to you to accept an invita 
 tion to my house?" She spoke impatiently. 
 
 "Don t you really know?" 
 
 "I do not." 
 
 "It is because I do not care to break bread with 
 professional murderers." His gray eyes were 
 square on hers.
 
 THE CHASM 233 
 
 She returned his look for a moment, but it be 
 came uncomfortable and she looked away. His 
 opinion that his remark was justified was stronger 
 than hers that it was not. "I suppose you mean 
 Tschulitsky and Sikorsky." 
 
 "The same." 
 
 "Are they really, Doctor? Tschulitsky s a boor, 
 and Sikorsky a an agreeable fellow, but " 
 
 "But they are professional murderers." 
 
 "Have they ever done anything but their duty?" 
 
 "Perhaps not. It s their duty that s not to our 
 taste." 
 
 "So it s the military profession you object to 
 not these men personally." 
 
 "The distinction is unreal. You can t divide a 
 man from his function. The agreeable Sikorsky last 
 October ordered young Juraw taken from his bed 
 at night a boy of sixteen and had him shot in the 
 street for refusing to tell where his brother Martin, 
 the revolutionary leader, was. Tschulitsky ordered 
 his Cossacks to take my friend Chelms, the finest 
 soul in Russia, out of his schoolroom and shoot him. 
 It was done in front of Chelms s pupils." 
 
 "Abominable!" exclaimed Marion. "But there 
 must have been some reason, Doctor. Your friend 
 must have been a revolutionist." 
 
 "Oh!" said Grenning with a sardonic smile. "I 
 had almost forgotten I was talking with the Countess 
 de Hohenfels. For the same crime your soldiers 
 will have to kill thirty million Russians. However, 
 they have gone at the job cheerfully. Perhaps they 
 will succeed. At least they will destroy all those 
 who are capable of leading Russia out of hell."
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 For the first time Marion saw clearly the nature 
 of the gulf that separated her from the Zhergan 
 "spirits." Her first thought was that if they were 
 active revolutionists it might be well for her to be a 
 little more discreet about cultivating their acquaint 
 ance. 
 
 "If you have any curiosity to see how and for what 
 things men are killed in Russia," added Grenning, 
 "just repeat my remarks to Tschulitsky or to the 
 amiable Sikorsky." 
 
 "You don t mean ?" 
 
 "I would join Chelms." 
 
 "For a remark made to me privately? Without 
 a trial?" 
 
 Grenning laughed. "Since last October," he said, 
 "fifty thousand people have been killed by sword 
 expeditions in Courland, Esthonia, and Livonia 
 not half of them in armed resistance. Think how 
 much time it would take to try all these groups and 
 individuals accused by spies of treason! Why 
 bother with trials when everybody was guilty? It 
 was this whole people that rose. We elected our 
 own revolutionary officers in every town and city 
 and village in these provinces. The Tsar s govern 
 ment did not exist. The Baltic Republic was a fact. 
 Did you know this?" 
 
 "No. I heard there were agrarian disorders." 
 
 "Agrarian disorders that seized and administered 
 cities of a third of a million people. It is a wonder 
 ful thing the modern suppression of news! But 
 tell me: are my real reasons real enough to win 
 your forgiveness for refusing to dine with the of 
 ficers?"
 
 THE CHASM 235 
 
 She thought a moment. "They are so real, Dr. 
 Grenning, that henceforth I too shall decline to dine 
 with them." 
 
 Before he knew it he had caught her hands in his 
 and pressed them. "Don t tell them why," warned 
 he. He turned quickly, and without looking back, 
 went down the street, his head bent forward, his 
 shoulders stooping a little, a peculiar swing in his 
 walk.
 
 THE Countess lunched in her own rooms after 
 her talk with Grenning and invited Count 
 Feodor to dine there with her, Weary of 
 Tschulitsky, he did: and that evening she succeeded 
 in reviving his interest in "The Islands of the Neva." 
 The officers had to content themselves with a three- 
 handed card game. 
 
 Sikorsky, who had been feeling his way toward an 
 intrigue with the Countess, at first attributed her 
 retreat to her rooms to her dislike of Tschulitsky; 
 but her frigid manner next morning when he con 
 trived to meet her on the terrace, discouraged him. 
 That night when De Hohenfels absented himself for 
 the second time from the card game, the Adjutant 
 observed to Tschulitsky that it was plain they had 
 overstayed their welcome. He began to talk about 
 the three blooming daughters of Mayor Ronke, sug 
 gesting that under certain circumstances the house 
 of Ronke, in spite of inferior service and cuisine, 
 might be a pleasanter residence than the manor. 
 
 The idea took root in Tschulitsky s mind. He re 
 membered some official business that took him next 
 morning to the Mayor s house in town. 
 
 Before Count Feodor was out of bed the forester 
 236
 
 THE CHASM 237 
 
 of the estate, Robert Guibet, came in from his cabin 
 in the forest, insisted on seeing the barin at once, 
 and being admitted to De Hohenfels s bedroom, re 
 ported that the night before, cutting through the 
 woods from the village of Medin, he had come upon 
 the camp of an armed band of fifty or sixty Brothers 
 of the Woods not more than five versts from the 
 manor. 
 
 De Hohenfels dressed and went to Tschulitsky s 
 room, but found he had already gone to town. When 
 he came back, about eleven o clock, Count Feodor 
 told him of the forester s report, and took it for 
 granted that the commandant would immediately 
 send an expedition to clean out the revolutionists. 
 
 Looking from their windows after luncheon, 
 Count Feodor and Marion saw that the tents of 
 the headquarters guard were struck, their army 
 wagons loaded, and the men formed in heavy march 
 ing order. 
 
 "Are they going to attack the revolutionists now?" 
 exclaimed Marion. 
 
 De Hohenfels supposed so. 
 
 Presently the horses of the officers and of their 
 orderlies were brought around from the stable. 
 
 "Is Tschulitsky going himself?" wondered De 
 Hohenfels. His interest was aroused to the point 
 of going down to find out. As he went out on the 
 terrace he turned and saw Sikorsky coming out of 
 the house. 
 
 "The Commandant has decided we should not 
 impose longer on your hospitality, Count," said 
 Sikorsky. "We are transferring headquarters to 
 town. Please express my regret to the Countess
 
 238 THE CHASM 
 
 that I have not had the opportunity of seeing her 
 lately even to thank her for our entertainment." 
 
 "Tschulitsky might have had the decency to say 
 he was going," said Hohenfels, scowling. 
 
 "The decision was reached very unexpectedly only 
 an hour ago." 
 
 "That is since I told him of that band here in the 
 woods at our door!" exclaimed Hohenfels. 
 
 Tschulitsky came out of the house booted and 
 spurred and followed by an orderly. 
 
 "Aren t you going to leave a guard for these 
 premises, Tschulitsky?" demanded De Hohenfels. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Then you should have given me notice. I could 
 have had one sent from Mitau. In view of the 
 particular danger you know threatens this point your, 
 withdrawing the guard to-day looks like deliberate 
 violation of your duty to protect life and property." 
 
 "What are you going to do about it?" demanded 
 Tschulitsky. "Come on, Sikorsky." 
 
 "Fortunately the telegraph is working between 
 here and Mitau," said Hohenfels, as the officers 
 mounted. 
 
 Sikorsky narrowed his eyes, wondering how much 
 influence Hohenfels had in Mitau, and looked dis 
 approvingly at Tschulitsky. 
 
 Seeing the troops move off toward town, Marion s 
 pleasure at being rid of the professional murderers 
 was mingled with apprehension. She wanted to see 
 Grenning, thinking he might be in communication 
 with the band in the woods and be able to tell her 
 whether there was danger to the manor. Not wish 
 ing to leave Fedya out there, she asked him to drive
 
 THE CHASM 239 
 
 in town with her. He had her leave him at the tele 
 graph office. 
 
 "It will be impossible to get any sort of protec 
 tion to-night," he said as she left him. "You d bet 
 ter invite yourself to spend the night with the Prin 
 cess Demidoff." 
 
 "And how about you?" 
 
 "I may stay at the inn. There are half a dozen 
 officers there. I m told it s a jolly crowd." 
 
 "I may " began Marion, starting to say she 
 might find out there was no danger to the manor, "I 
 may stay with Sonya." 
 
 She sent Davuidka with the droshky to the inn 
 stable. As she walked toward Grenning s she was 
 considering whether to see him first, or Sonya, when 
 she perceived the girl in the act of locking her shop- 
 door from the outside. 
 
 "Are you going to be gone long?" called Marion. 
 
 "Well, well!" said Sonya, looking around. "No. 
 In fact I m not going at all." She unlocked the 
 door. "Come in," she said. "I was just starting 
 for the manor to see you." 
 
 "Actually?" exclaimed Marion, following her in. 
 
 "I want you to stay here with me to-night," said 
 the girl. "Will you? Your accommodations will be 
 primitive, but " 
 
 "Nonsense ! It will be a lark. But what makes 
 you want me to stay with you to-night?" 
 
 "I have my own mysterious reasons," smiled 
 Sonya. 
 
 "Won t to-morrow night do as well?" 
 
 "Oh, you can stay then, too." 
 
 "Won t you let me drive you out to the manor
 
 240 THE CHASM 
 
 and spend to-night with me there?" asked Marion, 
 watching Sonya s expression. 
 
 "I can t really I can t. Besides you practically 
 accepted my invitation, and now I going to hold you 
 to it." 
 
 "I want to tell you something," said Marion. "It 
 may make a difference in your unwillingness to come 
 to the manor. The officers left there this after 
 noon." 
 
 "They did!" exclaimed Sonya. "Where did they 
 go?" 
 
 "Tschulitsky moved his headquarters into town. 
 I don t know where. He took his guard with him 
 leaving us very much at the mercy of our Brothers 
 of the Woods." 
 
 "Won t Tschulitsky be at the manor to-night?" 
 demanded Sonya. 
 
 "That seems to disarrange some plans," thought 
 Marion. "He is already here in Zhergan," she re 
 peated. 
 
 "Take off your things," said Sonya. "Excuse me 
 a minute. I want to ask Dr. Grenning to take sup 
 per with us." She unlocked the door into the corri 
 dor, and went quickly to Grenning s. 
 
 Marion sat down, her eyes fixed thoughtfully on 
 the floor. "She has gone to tell Grenning that 
 Tschulitsky is not to be at the manor to-night," she 
 meditated. "She was going out especially to get me 
 away from there to-night. They hate Tschulitsky. 
 And there are fifty or sixty of them as many as the 
 headquarters guard." Her conclusion was that per 
 haps the withdrawal of Tschulitsky and his guard 
 which had so alarmed them might be the very thing
 
 THE CHASM 241 
 
 to save the manor from an attack which would other 
 wise have been made. 
 
 Sonya came back. 
 
 "Did the Doctor accept your invitation to sup 
 per?" asked Marion. 
 
 Sonya looked guilty. 
 
 "You never asked him!" thought Marion. "You 
 were too deeply interested in telling him about 
 Tschulitsky. But I am all wrong unless Dr. 
 Grenning goes out very soon to get word to the 
 brethren." She listened for his footsteps in the 
 corridor. 
 
 "I had made up my mind to no more sewing to 
 day and hate to go back to it," said Sonya. "Shall 
 we do some Lettish?" 
 
 Marion agreed, but hearing a door open and 
 close and someone passing along the corridor, she 
 jumped up, went to the door and looked out. It was 
 Grenning. 
 
 "How are you, Doctor?" she called. 
 
 He stopped uncertainly, returned her greeting, and 
 was going on. 
 
 "Are you in a great hurry?" asked Marion sweet- 
 
 ly. 
 
 "Why, yes, I am rather." 
 
 "But we ll have you here with us at supper, won t 
 we?" 
 
 "Why-uh, you ll be here, will you? I think I ll 
 be back by then, in which case I shall be charmed." 
 
 "Don t let me keep you from your patient she 
 said. He saw the door close slowly, narrowing to a 
 crack, pausing an instant, and then concealing her 
 smiling eyes and mouth.
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "She knows too much," thought he, as he turned 
 toward the street. "I have altogether too much of 
 an impulse to confide in her. But I hope and think 
 she will not tell." 
 
 Of course Marion stayed at Sonya s that night. 
 Grenning was there for supper and the evening. She 
 told him as though she did not know he knew it of 
 the withdrawal of the guard from the manor, and 
 asked him if he thought there was any danger of 
 attack. 
 
 "I think not," he said in the tone of one who has 
 no special knowledge. He seemed disturbed prob 
 ably at the idea of her possessing information lead 
 ing her to ask that question. 
 
 The rest of the evening they talked of books, 
 people, philosophies. Marion told them in some de 
 tail of her friend Walt Bradfield, his writing, and his 
 agitation among the workingmen of Moline. Sonya 
 and Grenning found it hard to understand why the 
 American workingmen with their universal and equal 
 male suffrage the lack of which so handicapped 
 their European fellows did not control the govern 
 ment, and through it the industrial life of the United 
 States. 
 
 The next morning, in Sonya s bed, Marion woke 
 from a dreadful dream that Walt Bradfield had 
 shot himself! Because he could not get work ? 
 because of her marriage ? because she had not 
 written ? She could not make it out, but somehow 
 it seemed to be her fault. Then she slept again and 
 woke with a new terror filling her mind the feeling 
 that the manor had been burned in the night that 
 something terrible had happened to Fedya. As her
 
 THE CHASM 243 
 
 thoughts cleared, it struck her as strange and rash 
 that she should have come straight to these revolu 
 tionists, personal friends though they were, and told 
 them of the unprotected situation of her own home 
 which lay exposed to the attack of an armed band 
 not one hour s march away. She felt as Grenning 
 had felt about her the day before that she had 
 altogether too much of an impulse to confide in 
 them. If her surmise was correct, these friends of 
 hers knew of perhaps had planned an attack on 
 her house for the purpose of capturing Tschulitsky. 
 To be sure they were going to get her away from 
 there, but how about Fedya ? What if the activity of 
 these friends of hers had resulted in his death in 
 that attack? She rose and began to dress. 
 
 "So early?" murmured Sonya, more than half 
 asleep. 
 
 "I m worried about Fedya. I must make sure he 
 stayed at the inn last night." 
 
 Sonya reached under her pillow, and looked at a 
 little black watch. "He ll be sound asleep," she 
 said, but Marion kept on dressing. "Dear me!" ex 
 claimed Sonya, jumping up. "You really must wait 
 till I get you some tea I mean coffee. I got some 
 especially for your breakfast." 
 
 Marion finished dressing, waited reluctantly a 
 few minutes for coffee, then hastened on foot in the 
 early morning to the Zhergan Inn. She had to 
 rouse a man sleeping on a bench in his stocking feet, 
 who had to rouse the innkeeper, who escorted her 
 to the room of the Count de Hohenfels. That gen 
 tleman, having kept it up with the jolly crowd of 
 officers until a very short time before, was most un-
 
 244 THE CHASM 
 
 appreciative of his lady s flattering solicitude. She 
 quickly left him to resume his slumbers, and went 
 back to Sonya s in a frame of mind considerably less 
 tender and self-reproachful. 
 
 Of course that other dream about Walt was 
 equally baseless. Still it was absurd not to know 
 whether he was alive or not, and this time she really 
 did sit down and write to him. 
 
 "Are you angry with me," she wrote, "for the 
 way I left Moline without saying goodbye? I 
 wanted to see you truly I did. I hated to leave 
 things so badly as they were that night. I never 
 dreamed as I went out the door of Hillcrest of not 
 seeing you again and saying goodbye, and telling 
 you how much I think of you." The letter ex 
 pressed her desire for his friendship always, told of 
 her sympathy with phases of Russian life which she 
 never would have understood had it not been for 
 her acquaintance with him, described the group of 
 friends she had found and asked for his criticism of 
 that doctrine of the higher race which so appealed 
 to her religious sense. "Does not the finest flower 
 of human life," she wrote, " its superhuman issue 
 demand at last a divided humanity? Must not 
 root and trunk of the racial tree exist for the sake 
 of blossoming above? The blossoming not for its 
 own sake, but to bear and send up vigorously above 
 the rest one favored shoot, tip of the tree of life, 
 to attain the stage of evolution next above the human 
 and there branch richly out. The idea that humanity 
 by sacrifice of what is lower to what is higher in 
 itself should create superhumanity lays hold of me 
 with a power I cannot describe. To me the super-
 
 THE CHASM 245 
 
 race looms like a new Messiah, not dreadful, not 
 hostile, not destined to destroy us. It is not coming 
 to save humanity by sacrificing itself. For it human 
 ity must sacrifice itself, as parent does for child a 
 daughter-race which we, the mother-race, must bear 
 and nurse." 
 
 After addressing her letter to Walt in Moline, 
 hoping his people would forward it, she became 
 absorbed for the rest of the morning in Sonya s for 
 bidden library. Some of the propaganda consisted 
 of what struck her as rather mechanical applications 
 of revolutionary and materialist theories, but some 
 of it was based on illuminating study of things as 
 they are, and through this she had glimpses of the 
 whole design broad and splendid outlines of the 
 freer, finer society which the workers, learning and 
 following their own real interests, ought to develop 
 along definite lines out of the present society based 
 on wage-labor. She wondered if there was any way 
 of reconciling that with the letter she had written 
 to Walt. Her own non-proletarian interests and 
 point of view prevented her embracing that prole 
 tarian philosophy for herself, but she did not see 
 how its validity for the proletarians could be denied. 
 Passing into their power the world would without 
 question become a place more favorable for their 
 development the development of all but the chosen 
 few. She began to feel vaguely, but could not, or 
 did not want to, think out a flaw somewhere in the 
 theory that the chosen few, the present ruling class, 
 could breed from themselves a higher race. 
 
 While she sat reading and thinking Trina Ronke 
 came in. She was returning a book which she had
 
 246 THE CHASM 
 
 smuggled home, and selected another. As she went 
 out through the shop with it, she asked Sonya if it 
 was safe to have the Countess know of the library. 
 
 "Why?" Sonya asked. 
 
 "She might tell her husband." 
 
 "Do you think the Count de Hohenfels would 
 run and tell the police about my books?" said Sonya, 
 laughing, but Trina Ronke shook her head, saying 
 you couldn t tell about these aristocrats. If anything 
 came up making it important to destroy her there 
 was the means! 
 
 Sonya said nothing. Secretly she felt there was 
 more risk in Trina s possession of that knowledge. 
 
 About noon Davuidka . brought the Countess a 
 note from the Inn. The awakened Feodor asked 
 her to take lunch with him there. At table in his 
 own rooms he showed her a letter from the Gover 
 nor-General at Mitau written with flattering prompt 
 itude in answer to his telegram. The letter stated 
 that orders had been issued the Commandant at 
 Zhergan immediately to capture the revolutionary 
 band located on the Hohenfels estate. 
 
 "In Courland, at least," commented Count Feo 
 dor, "one can still conjure a little with the name De 
 Hohenfels." 
 
 "Tschulitsky will have to eat dirt!" gloated Mar 
 ion. 
 
 "He has already. He called this morning. Very 
 respectful. Requested me to send for Robert Guibet 
 to act as guide tonight. They will surround the 
 gang in the middle of the night." 
 
 He suggested that until the marauders were cap-
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 tured they had better not return to the manor, so 
 Marion went back after luncheon to Sonya s. 
 
 After her first exultation over the idea of hum 
 bling Tschulitsky, she began to realize what the or 
 ders from Mitau meant. The killing, wounding, and 
 capturing of fifty men was not in itself a pleasant 
 thing to contemplate, and it was still less pleasant 
 to Marion when she realized that in that district it 
 would mean the final triumph of the atrocious gov 
 ernment of the Tsar over the Baltic Republic the 
 triumph of men like Tschulitsky and Sikorsky, who 
 shot intellectual men and heroic boys without trial, 
 over men like Grenning, Kaminsky, and the clear- 
 eyed Yan Sarin, who were working against terrific 
 odds, for liberty and democracy, for freedom of 
 speech and press, for better houses, better wages, 
 and better life. 
 
 "The manor will be safer after the revolutionists 
 are destroyed," she thought. It was that considera 
 tion which had caused Feodor the landlord to take 
 such prompt and effective steps for their destruc 
 tion, and it was that which had caused her instinctive 
 ly to approve those steps. But as she walked along 
 the dusty August streets, catching an occasional 
 phrase of Lettish in the treble voices of children 
 playing, it seemed to her no admirable thing to help 
 the Tsar crush down the Lettish people because a 
 band of revolutionists might possibly burn down 
 one s house. She probably would not have seen that 
 this was what she and Feodor were doing had it not 
 been for Sonya s books. And on second thought it 
 occurred to her that she had not heard of any manor
 
 248 THE CHASM 
 
 houses being burned when the revolutionists were in 
 control of the country. Arms had been taken forci 
 bly by an armed party from the Hohenfels manor 
 itself, but the house was certainly not burned. Yawn 
 ing foundations of small houses were visible in and 
 around Zhergan, but they had belonged to revolu 
 tionists and had been burned by troops of the Tsar. 
 She had heard of the burning of a house in the 
 neighboring village of Benen by revolutionists, and 
 of the shooting of a man and two women among 
 those who lived in it, but Grenning and Sonya had 
 told her that those three had been tried by the Zher 
 gan local and condemned as spies whose informa 
 tion to the government troops had led to the burning 
 of several houses and the summary shooting of many 
 men. Marion sighed, and without reaching any con 
 clusion, went back to Sonya s books. 
 
 Sasha Bratavzinsky came in at four o clock for 
 tea from Sonya s samovar. Finding the Countess 
 preoccupied, he talked cheerful nonsense to Sonya. 
 
 Nachman Kaminsky came in looking gloomy. 
 
 Marion asked him how the Jewish family was 
 getting along. 
 
 "Your money paid the rent for them. It gave 
 the woman a chance to die under a roof. She was 
 buried Sunday." 
 
 "Is it that that makes you so blue, Nachman?" 
 asked Sonya. 
 
 "No." He relapsed into silence. 
 
 Bratavzinsky talked awhile, but could not resist 
 the depressing atmosphere, and ran out of subjects. 
 
 "Where s Grenning?" asked Kaminsky.
 
 THE CHASM 249 
 
 "He ll probably be in for a glass of tea," said 
 Sonya. "I wish he would come I" 
 
 "I have news," said Kaminsky. "I ve been keep 
 ing it to myself on your account, Countess de Hohen- 
 fels, but I have decided I want you to hear it. I 
 want you to know how the officers of the detective 
 division of the police examine a witness. Yan Kenim 
 is a man who helped govern the city of Riga last 
 summer when it was in the hands of the people. I 
 have known him since boyhood. Six days ago he 
 was arrested in Riga and taken to the station of the 
 detective division. Night before last he was ex 
 amined. The officers who did it are Gregus, Mik- 
 heyev, Zimmermann, Davus, and Petrov. There 
 were two others whom I shall not name. They read 
 to Kenim a long list of crimes allegedly committed 
 by him, and demanded a confession, if not of all, then 
 at least of a part of these. Kenim denied his guilt. 
 First they struck blows. Then they undressed him, 
 threw him on a bench, tied him to it, gagged his 
 mouth with a rag, and two police officers began 
 first with rubber whips, then with wire whips. When 
 his back became swollen they covered it with a wet 
 rag and kept on. When he fainted, they poured cold 
 water on him, and as soon as he regained conscious 
 ness, began again. Then they untied him, and threw 
 sharp pieces of salt on the floor. Two of them raised 
 him about five feet from the floor and hurled him 
 down on the salt. This was " 
 
 "Oh!" groaned Marion, white and trembling. 
 "What is the use of this?" 
 
 "If Kenim and thousands more can endure the
 
 250 THE CHASM 
 
 reality of these things," said Kaminsky, "you can en 
 dure the telling of them! I am sick of the com 
 fortable ignorance of the leisure class. You don t 
 want to know. But I want to tell you that you, every 
 one of you, who maintain and profit by the estab 
 lished order have each your share in the torture of 
 Keniml" 
 
 "I do nothing to maintain the established order!" 
 cried Marion. 
 
 "To do nothing is to maintain the established 
 order." 
 
 She had no reply. 
 
 Kaminsky walked across the room, sat down and 
 paid no further attention to anybody. 
 
 "What men do they treat like this?" Marion 
 asked. "Not every prisoner?" 
 
 "Every revolutionist from whose agony they can 
 hope to wring a confession of guilt or the name of a 
 comrade," said Bratavzinsky. "I know of tortures 
 much worse than this of Kenim." 
 
 "If they capture this band in our forest," said 
 Marion, " will they torture them?" 
 
 "Well rather!" Bratavzinsky answered. He was 
 going to say more, but caught an angry warning look 
 from Kaminsky, and realized he had no business ad 
 mitting knowledge of that band. 
 
 "Do you people know anything about these Broth 
 ers of the Woods?" asked Marion. 
 
 Kaminsky looked at her. "We do not," he said, 
 positively. "Why do you ask?" 
 
 "Because I have been told they are thieves and 
 murderers, and if they are not, I want to know it." 
 
 Kaminsky and Bratavzinsky sat keen and silent,
 
 THE CHASM 251 
 
 but Sonya broke out. "Thieves and murderers!" 
 she cried. "The very spies that go among them to 
 betray them they try to dissuade from that work. 
 They kill them only when they will not stop." 
 
 "Anyone can see," said Bratavzinsky, "that some 
 where now there must be in hiding thousands of rev 
 olutionists known by the authorities to be such." 
 
 "There is no need for me to hesitate," said Mar 
 ion. "Whatever you people choose to deny or ad 
 mit, I know that if these men are thieves and 
 murderers you have no interest in them. If they 
 are revolutionists well, I happen to know that 
 Tschulitsky has information of a band of fifty in 
 camp two versts east of the railroad in our forest. 
 He has orders from Mitau to send a force in there 
 and capture them to-night." 
 
 A needle falling on the carpet would have sounded 
 loud while Sonya, Sasha, and Kaminsky were realiz 
 ing that the Countess de Hohenfels had made her 
 self a revolutionary spy.
 
 VI 
 
 KAMINSKY was the first to speak. He asked 
 Bratavzinsky if he had seen the recent ad 
 dress of the rector of the St. Petersburg Uni 
 versity urging all poor students to "let science and 
 sedition alone" and go in for manual training. "He 
 refers to the glorious battle against the revolution 
 ists and calls it a battle for truth and right. 
 
 Marion looked at him curiously, smiled to her 
 self, and rose. "There s nothing like discretion," 
 she said. She took her hat and put it on before the 
 mirror. "I have some things to buy, Sonya. I ll 
 be back in time for supper." The bell over the 
 street door jangled behind her. 
 
 "It s a quarter to five," said Sonya. "We can 
 reach Martin Mitrevitz by six. Who is going?" 
 
 "Is Grenning in there?" Kaminsky asked. He 
 rapped on the wall. There was an answering rap 
 and presently Grenning came in. 
 
 They told him the news. His eyes brightened 
 when he heard what Marion had done. 
 
 "Kaminsky treated her as though she were a gov 
 ernment detective," said Sonya. 
 
 "The rest of you are too confiding by half!" pro 
 tested Kaminsky. "Grenning talks to a woman and 
 thinks he s converted her to the revolution, when all 
 
 252
 
 THE CHASM 253 
 
 he s really done is convert her to Grenning. Trina 
 Ronke has no more business in your local than her 
 father. She has her cap set now for Sikorsky the 
 man who shot young Juraw, and she knows it. And 
 now Sonya and Bratavzinsky have let the Countess 
 de Hohenfels see our connection with Martin Mitre- 
 vitz ! Suppose she has a change of heart!" 
 
 "After she has once come square out?" said Gren 
 ning. "Kaminsky: she has been leaning our way 
 ever since she came. It s from deep down and of 
 old and by temperament with her." 
 
 "How are we going to get word to Martin Mitre- 
 vitz?" asked Bratavzinsky. 
 
 "I have decided to have a sick-call in that direc 
 tion," said Grenning. 
 
 "See Yan Smika," suggested Kaminsky, " the 
 forester of the Medin estate. He will know just 
 where they are." 
 
 The physician went to the stable, harnessed his 
 horse, and drove out to the cabin of Yan Smika, 
 whom he found getting ready to cook supper. When 
 he heard of the intended attack on Mitrevitz, the 
 forester put half a loaf of black bread in his pocket 
 and took down his rifle. 
 
 "I will tell Mitrevitz in twenty minutes," he said. 
 
 "Do you think you ll have use for that?" asked 
 Grenning, nodding toward the rifle. 
 
 "There s a three-quarter moon. White coats 
 show well." 
 
 A new idea struck Grenning. "I believe I will go 
 with you to Mitrevitz," he said. 
 
 He and Smika crossed the road into the Hohen 
 fels forest, walked in silence between the thick-set
 
 254 THE CHASM 
 
 pillars of the pines, and crossed the railroad which 
 ran eastward from Zhergan then turned southwest, 
 so forming a giant figure seven through the forest. 
 
 The revolutionary militia lay near a spring two 
 versts east of the curve. They had no tents or 
 military uniforms, and their rifles were of many 
 kinds. The forester and the physician were stopped 
 by an outpost, one of whom knew Smika and let them 
 pass without any military formalities. 
 
 Martin Mitrevitz, a lean, bronzed man with sev 
 eral weeks beard, dressed as a workingman, asked 
 them to share his supper, such as it was. They de 
 clined, knowing provisions were scarce in the camp. 
 
 "We ll get away at once," said Mitrevitz, when 
 he heard of the intended night attack. 
 
 Smika and he agreed that the troops would have 
 to come out from Zhergan on the wagon road past 
 the Hohenfels manor, turn to their left on the rail 
 road, follow it eastward until it swung south, and 
 then through the woods to the camp. 
 
 On the back of a letter Grenning drew lines repre 
 senting the wagon road, the railroad, and the camp. 
 "They will come up the railroad in column, won t 
 they?" he asked. 
 
 "No other way." 
 
 Grenning put lines on the railroad representing 
 infantry in column. "Instead of finding you, as they 
 expect, here in camp seven versts from town and un 
 prepared," he said, "suppose they found you here 
 four versts from town like this?" 
 
 "They would die," said Mitrevitz, his eye kindling 
 with the idea of the enfilading lines alongside the 
 track. "But we will lie here, still closer to town.
 
 THE CHASM 255 
 
 where there is a clearing to shoot across. Here 
 they will not have begun to move with caution. This 
 will repay us for not getting Tschulitsky. I am sorry 
 for these men, but for us to-night they are tools of 
 the Tsar, not men." 
 
 At eight o clock when Grenning got back to Zher- 
 gan after his sick-call at Yan Smika s, he found a 
 man waiting nervously in his office and had to hasten 
 out with him to attend a woman in labor. He looked 
 in at Sonya s a moment. She and Marion sat near 
 the table reading by a bright, well-shaded lamp. 
 
 Sonya rose and came close to him near the door. 
 "What?" said she, speaking almost inaudibly. 
 
 "You ll hear firing to-night," he answered. Then 
 he raised his voice. "You look so cozy here reading 
 I wish I could stay." 
 
 "We wish so too," said Marion. "Don t we, 
 Sonya?" 
 
 "Indeed," said the girl absently. "Why couldn t 
 they get away?" she demanded, whispering. 
 
 "They prefer to lie in ambush," he answered, also 
 whispering, and then gave a warning glance over 
 his shoulder to remind her that he had an outsider 
 somewhere there in the hall beyond the half-opened 
 door. 
 
 "Do you share Kaminsky s distrust of me, Sonya?" 
 said Marion, after Grenning had gone. 
 
 "No." After a moment Sonya inclined her head 
 back toward the door Grenning had just gone out 
 of. "Neither does he. But wouldn t you rather not 
 know anything definite about us?" 
 
 "Only this: whether those men in the woods are 
 warned and can escape."
 
 256 THE CHASM 
 
 "Yes, they have been warned." The girl glanced 
 at the alarm clock on her dresser, sat down, and 
 tried to resume her reading. Several times she was 
 on the point of telling Marion what Grenning had 
 said, but did not. 
 
 She did not keep her light burning after ten for 
 fear of drawing the attention of the police. Thanks 
 to the iron gratings of the windows they were able 
 to let the cool night air into the room. They could 
 see the moonlit silver birches in the yard of the 
 Lutheran church on the other side of the wide, dusty 
 street. The lights had gone out of the windows, 
 and the streets were deserted save for an occasional 
 pair of lovers in the shadow of a doorway. 
 
 Marion was dropping off to sleep, when Sonya, 
 who had remained sitting near the window, called to 
 her in a low, excited voice "Look here!" 
 
 Marion sprang to the window and saw, coming 
 down the street, in a cloud of dust, so silently she 
 would not have known they were passing, the Rus 
 sian rotnis which Feeder s influence had started on 
 their night march against the revolutionists^ 
 
 "Uncanny!" Marion whispered. "All those men, 
 and hardly a sound!" 
 
 "Not the clink of a scabbard!" whispered Sonya. 
 "I m glad the Brothers know! Thanks to you!" 
 She put her arm around Marion and hugged her. 
 
 "I think there will be some profanity when they 
 reach that camp," Marion said. She chuckled hap 
 pily at the thought of having averted the tragedy. 
 
 Sonya s conscience hurt her a little for leaving 
 Marion in ignorance of the ambush. "How many 
 of those men are making their last march?" she
 
 THE CHASM 257 
 
 thought as the last man passed from sight beyond the 
 corner of the shop. 
 
 There was a chill in the night air, but the soldiers 
 did not wear the white coats Smika had said would 
 show well, and Captain Byeletsky had made the men 
 blue their rifle barrels that afternoon lest the glint 
 of them should be seen in the woods from the 
 enemy s camp. 
 
 With Robert Guibet knowing every tree in the 
 woods, Byeletsky expected to close in on that camp 
 from all sides and get every man. The main thing 
 he feared was that the rifle of some revolutionary 
 sympathizer among his own men would go off acci 
 dentally near the camp. He halted his force on the 
 road outside the town, called the sergeants of his 
 two companies together, and gave them orders to 
 shoot in his tracks anyone to whom this accident 
 happened. The sergeants told the men. 
 
 The column left the wagon road and turned east 
 ward upon the railroad track. Reaching the edge 
 of the forest, Byeletsky sent out flankers to move 
 through the woods parallel with the railroad abreast 
 of his advance guard. 
 
 This was a thing Mitrevitz had not foreseen. He 
 and his comrades lying concealed behind trees and 
 in shadow on the edge of the clearing in an open 
 irregular line would not be seen by the small advance 
 guard moving along the track, but these four ad 
 vancing figures out fifty and a hundred arshin to the 
 right and left they must infallibly run into the lines 
 of his ambush. How keep them from giving the 
 alarm and time for those two hundred men to de 
 ploy against his fifty?
 
 258 THE CHASM 
 
 Mitrevitz picked two men, explained the danger 
 to them, and told them each to take one of those 
 men, keep square in front of him, and when he 
 entered the shadow, stop him and kill him if he at 
 tempted to cry out or discharge his piece. Then, 
 only two or three hundred arshin ahead of the 
 enemy s advance guard Mitrevitz crossed the track 
 on his belly, and gave similar orders to two men 
 on the other side. It looked desperate to Mitre 
 vitz. He had done all he could, but it was almost 
 too much to expect to stop all four of those men in 
 silence. 
 
 The advance guard thought themselves too far 
 from the enemy to be very alert. The ensign in 
 command was talking in low tones to the forest 
 guard Robert Guibet as the dozen men swung along 
 between the two lines of the ambush. The four 
 flankers, trying not to drop behind, did not slacken 
 their pace as they approached the edge of the 
 clearing. 
 
 Mitrevitz, his nerves tense, saw the inner flanker 
 on his side was coming straight for him. "Lie still !" 
 he whispered to the man he had detailed to stop this 
 Russian. "I ll take him." He waited till the soldier 
 entered the shadow of the pines. He sprang up, 
 pointing his revolver at the man s eyes. "Not a 
 sound!" he hissed, in Russian. 
 
 The soldier gave a gasp of terror. "Don t shoot!" 
 he whispered, not realizing that Mitrevitz could not 
 shoot without giving the alarm "I m with you ! 
 I m a Social-Democrat for the revolution!" 
 
 His mind acting with lightning-like rapidity under 
 strain, Mitrevitz seemed to read the man s SQ.U!,
 
 THE CHASM 259 
 
 believed him, and paying no more attention to him, 
 listened with torturing intensity for the shot or 
 shout he feared. To his left, where the outer flank 
 er had come upon the line, he heard a sickening 
 groan just one. "Whether necessary or not, God 
 knows!" thought Mitrevitz, but that man s death 
 did not occupy another second of his thought. 
 
 The advance guard had not stopped. They were 
 fifty, a hundred feet beyond the ambush. On the 
 other side of the track, behind the revolutionary 
 line, he saw a Russian move through a lighted space 
 parallel with the track. It was the inner flanker on 
 that side. He" must have closed in far enough to 
 miss the line, and they had let him go. 
 
 "Good work!" thought Mitrevitz. "How about 
 number four?" There was no sound or movement 
 in that direction. The advance guard marched 
 farther and farther into harmlessness; and the main 
 body of the Russians was in sight. From the front, 
 at that distance, the two companies in column of 
 fours looked like a single dark object. One would 
 have taken it for a team and wagon. Mitrevitz 
 could hear the deep breathing of the nervous men 
 around him. It was a racking wait till they could 
 see the individual forms, and then the faces of the 
 Russians in the moonlight. 
 
 In the silent night, a rifle flamed and roared on the 
 black edge of the clearing one shot followed in 
 stantly by two a dozen thirty visible to the Rus 
 sians as the blazing arc of a circle of which they were 
 the center and scores of bullets drawing the short 
 and deadly radii ! Men pitched, whirled, stumbled, 
 went down groaning. The column melted down in
 
 260 THE CHASM 
 
 blood and anguish on the track. From front to rear 
 they were raked and hit by a fire they could not 
 return. To get them out of that focus of slaughter 
 Byeletsky tried to make them execute right and left 
 front into line of squads, but their instinct, far older 
 than modern firearms, far older than military disci 
 pline, was to huddle together for mutual protection. 
 When the leaden logic of the 3<>3o s forced them to 
 see the helpless, hopeless doom of that, the surviv 
 ors bolted from that litter of warm corpses and 
 writhing human forms in a wild rush for shelter. 
 
 With the melting away of their definite living 
 target on the track, the revolutionists slackened their 
 fire, and in the lull heard Mitrevitz shouting, "For 
 ward in line !" He was afraid not to go forward lest 
 the Russians, unpursued, should reform, advance in 
 line, and sweep his still numerically inferior force 
 out of existence. 
 
 The Russians, an organization no longer, did not 
 await the charge of their enemies. There were men 
 who had stood the test of Mukden in that crowd of 
 individuals running through the woods toward Zher- 
 gan. Mitrevitz did not dare pursue them beyond 
 the forest, for fear of reinforcements especially 
 the Cossacks. 
 
 Seeing the main body scattered, the Russian ad 
 vance guard, whose carelessness had caused the 
 disaster, did not attempt to return through the revo 
 lutionary force. Guided by Robert Guibet through 
 the woods to the road from Medin, they reached 
 town unharmed. 
 
 The Brothers of the Woods, whose return from 
 that pursuit was the beginning of their own flight
 
 THE CHASM 261 
 
 from the neighborhood, saw fifty or sixty dead and 
 wounded Russians on the track and in the ditches 
 where stricken men had reeled. Other wounded 
 men had been able to reach the woods, and had 
 fallen there. Some died there alone. Some had faint 
 ed with pain or loss of blood and were to regain con 
 sciousness in solitude, or with what grim sense of 
 companionship a man unable to move and feeling 
 the life ebb out of him may have in hearing the 
 groans of comrades in agony.
 
 VII 
 
 THREE quarters of an hour after they saw the 
 troops go by, Sonya left the window and 
 went to Marion s bed. "Marion!" 
 
 The sleeper started, opened her eyes, recognized 
 her friend, and smiled happily at being called Mar 
 ion. 
 
 "Listen!" 
 
 There was the far-off, ominous roar of many rifles 
 a sound nearly as horrible in its significance as 
 any that vibrates in the air of man s still horrible 
 planet. 
 
 "What does it mean?" said Marion tensely. 
 "Have they caught the revolutionists?" 
 
 "I hope for once the revolutionists have caught 
 them." 
 
 "Fifty of them?" She got up, slipped on a dress 
 ing gown, and went to the window. Sonya had not 
 undressed. "That sounds as though it were at the 
 manor," said Marion. 
 
 "The night is still. It is probably in the forest." 
 
 A mounted orderly came galloping up the street 
 from the direction of Mayor Ronke s, Tschulitsky s 
 new headquarters, and disappeared in the direction 
 of the firing. 
 
 After about ten minutes the fire slackened and 
 262
 
 THE CHASM 263 
 
 ceased. A little later it began again, more scat 
 tering, but louder. Marion shivered. 
 
 A drummer at the barracks near the central prison 
 began beating the long roll ; a bugler blew first call 
 over and over, and then assembly; the more distant 
 call of the Cossacks came from the northwest quar 
 ter; the night air carried hoarse shouts of command 
 weirdly over the town. Somewhere in the distance a 
 door slammed. Lights appeared in windows that 
 had been dark. There was a murmur of wondering 
 voices here and there as sleepers woke and called 
 to each other to know what was wrong. 
 
 The mounted orderly came tearing back from the 
 southeast, and five minutes later a rotni of Cos 
 sacks a hundred strong galloped through Zhergan 
 hurling a great cloud of dust high into the quiet 
 moonlight air. 
 
 "Why didn t the Brothers get away while they 
 could?" exclaimed Marion, shuddering at the power 
 of that living, catapultic projectile of men and 
 horses. 
 
 "The Cossacks can t go through the woods like 
 that," said Sonya, to reassure herself no less than 
 Marion. 
 
 A few minutes later a company of infantry went 
 by in double time, some of the men choking and 
 coughing as they breathed the dust raised by the Cos 
 sacks. 
 
 "Why do they need so many?" exclaimed Marion. 
 "Is the revolutionary force larger than I said?" 
 
 Sonya shook her head. "They made an ambush." 
 
 "An ambush," repeated Marion thoughtfully. She 
 realized then that all those drums and bugles in the
 
 264 THE CHASM 
 
 night, that roar of many rifles, that rush of men and 
 horses, were all the result of one brief sentence spo 
 ken by her in this same room seven hours before. 
 
 The muffled pounding of the feet of the infantry 
 men died away in the distance. There were no more 
 audible indications of what was going on among the 
 three or four hundred men who had left Zhergan. 
 The minutes of waiting with strained attention were 
 long. Thirty of them passed with no sound from 
 beyond the town. Sonya and Marion found them 
 selves shivering with cold and excitement. They lay 
 down still listening, grew drowsy, fell asleep. 
 
 They were roused and terrified by someone in the 
 corridor kicking violently on their door, and a harsh 
 voice calling, "Dr. Grenning!" 
 
 "That s a Cossack!" exclaimed Sonya under her 
 breath. "What if they ve come for Grenning?" 
 
 "Why should they?" whispered Marion. 
 
 "He carried your information to the Brothers." 
 
 They heard a match strike in the corridor. Boot 
 ed feet moved heavily on the flag-stones. Outside 
 the window they heard the hard breathing of horses, 
 the swish of their tails, the champ of bits and stamp 
 of hoofs as the animals bit and kicked at the mosqui 
 toes drawing their blood. 
 
 "If somebody doesn t open some door in this 
 house I ll break them down!" roared the man in 
 the hall. 
 
 "I wonder if Grenning is in there?" whispered 
 Marion. 
 
 "I hope not." 
 
 "What shall we do?"
 
 THE CHASM 265 
 
 "If they ve come to arrest him and find him not 
 here they ll say that proves " 
 
 "He can prove he s been with a patient." 
 
 "What chance will he have to prove anything? 
 They may take him out and shoot him against the 
 wall of his own office." 
 
 A door on the other side of the corridor opened 
 and the women heard Kaminsky demanding, 
 "What s this racket?" They could see by the gleam 
 of light along the crack under the door that Kamin 
 sky had a light. 
 
 "Are you Dr. Grenning?" 
 
 "No. That s the Doctor s door over there with 
 his card on it. Can t you read?" 
 
 "Can t you see I m a jigit?" retorted the Cossack, 
 scorning the suggestion that he could be guilty of so 
 unwarriorlike a habit. 
 
 "What do you want with Dr. Grenning?" in 
 quired Kaminsky. His manner made the Cossack 
 take him for some kind of civil authority, so he 
 adopted a tone of friendly superiority. 
 
 "I don t want him at all. The Cossacks wouldn t 
 be such fools as let a few Lettish cattle shoot them 
 to pieces. It s the soldiers. They re spilled all 
 over the woods. I ve brought a horse for this doc 
 tor to go and cut off their arms and legs. Much 
 good they ll be after that!" 
 
 "They want him as a doctor!" rejoiced Sonya. 
 
 Marion drew a long breath. 
 
 Relieved of the same fear that had upset Sonya 
 and Marion, Kaminsky read the Cossack the notice 
 the doctor had thumb-tacked to his door giving the
 
 266 THE CHASM 
 
 address at which he could be found. "Did they 
 catch the Letts that did the shooting?" Kaminsky 
 inquired. 
 
 "The soldiers? Of course not. They ll let them 
 go till daylight. By then they ll be in as many 
 different izbas as there are men. They ll hide their 
 guns in haystacks, and then how are you going to 
 tell who was out?" 
 
 "You might shoot them all," Kaminsky suggested. 
 
 "We will if we get the word," said the Cossack. 
 "There s no nonsense about us." He rode off, lead 
 ing the horse he had brought for the doctor. 
 
 "I wish the Cossacks had been shot instead of 
 those peaceable-minded Russian conscripts," said 
 Marion to Sonya. 
 
 Army wagons half-filled with hay were rumbling 
 and rattling through the streets on their way out to 
 bring in the wounded and the dead. 
 
 At quarter to one, Grenning came on horseback 
 with the Cossack, who stayed outside with the horses. 
 The doctor went into his office, packed a suit-case 
 full of bandages, splints, cotton, and gauze, and got 
 ready his instruments, needles, thread, antiseptics, 
 ether cans and hood, hypo tablets and syringe. While 
 doing this, he heard Sonya s rap through the wall, 
 and went to her door. It was held ajar. 
 
 "Ferdinand," whispered Sonya, "I was fright 
 ened when the Cossacks came for you, and " 
 
 "I didn t know you knew how to be frightened," 
 he said as she hesitated. 
 
 "We were wondering what to do, and I told Mar 
 ion it was you who carried word to the Brothers. 
 She gave us that information to save the Brothers,
 
 THE CHASM 267 
 
 and I think she blames us for using it to destroy the 
 Russians. She wants to speak to you. I wanted you 
 to understand everything." 
 
 "Thanks, Sonya. She can t expect us to stop with 
 half-way measures." 
 
 Sonya yielded her place at the door to Marion. 
 
 "Are there many wounded?" began the Countess 
 abruptly. 
 
 "The Cossack says a hundred. It seems the two 
 companies walked into a trap and lost over half their 
 men." 
 
 "Of course your knowledge of that trap comes 
 only from the Cossack!" Her eyes attacked his, but 
 he displayed no qualms. "Do you imagine for an 
 instant that I am ashamed of my share in the trap?" 
 he demanded. 
 
 She did not pursue the question. "Is there hospital 
 room for so many?" she asked. 
 
 "Probably the army surgeon will secure a building 
 for temporary hospital." 
 
 "What I wanted to say was if there s anything 
 money can buy that the Government fails to furnish, 
 get it. I will pay." 
 
 "I understand." 
 
 She looked at him, trying to make out why he was 
 not wholly sympathetic. He could not be enthusias 
 tic over her salving a conscience that from his point 
 of view needed no salve. 
 
 "Have no fear," he said. "There will be plenty 
 the Government fails to furnish." 
 
 "You will need nurses," she said. "Get them. And 
 tell me shall I come myself tonight? Can I help?" 
 
 "Have you had hospital experience?" She judged
 
 268 THE CHASM 
 
 from his expression that he hoped she had, but she 
 said no. "Don t come," he said, and looked toward 
 the outer door. 
 
 "Don t you feel a curious justice in your going to 
 help these men?" 
 
 "Justice!" he exclaimed. "Lord!" He dropped 
 his voice still lower. "All that s worrying me is aid 
 and comfort to the enemy. He thought a mo 
 ment, then went on. "Today when he saw he would 
 have the Russians in his power the leader of the 
 Brothers said to me, I am sorry for these men, but 
 tonight they are tools of the Tsar, not men. 
 
 "That is more human than the professional sol 
 dier." 
 
 "It was our business to deal with them as tools of 
 the Tsar," said Grenning. "We did it. It now 
 seems to be my business to deal with them as men. 
 But don t delude yourself by thinking I do it to make 
 amends. There are none to make." 
 
 "Don t let me keep you from these men who are 
 suffering. I wish I could Jook at it as cold-bloodedly 
 as you seem to. I can t take so easily the thought 
 that if it hadn t been for me these men would not 
 have been killed and wounded." 
 
 "Better men would have been. Yes and tor 
 tured ! But you re wrong if you think me cold-blood 
 ed, Countess Marion. I have just come from the 
 birth of a child a thing of unceasing marvel. As 
 I came away it struck me as a ghastly absurdity that 
 you brave, tender women should bear mankind in ag 
 ony to have them destroyed in war. But you and 
 I cannot escape war. It is here. We can sulk . 
 we can criticize the ungentle, uncouth fighters, or <
 
 THE CHASM 269 
 
 we can take sides. The best we can do is fight on 
 the side whose triumph means the end of war. Yes, 
 and the end of the horrors of peace ! You re on that 
 side today. Don t leave it not for wealth, and not 
 for love!" 
 
 Something warm and beautiful seemed to flow into 
 Marion s soul a sense of rising to a higher spiritual 
 level a vision or a feeling of practical idealism, 
 of sacrifice approved by reason, of faith that burned 
 not in spite of, but as a result of critical intelligence 
 a faith that stands the test ! "I m glad you re alive, 
 Dr. Grenning!" she exclaimed. "I m oh so glad 
 the Cossacks came for you as a physician!" She 
 wished him good luck and Godspeed as he hastened 
 out with his instruments and rode away to his night 
 of toil. 
 
 She lay awake a long while thinking of the things 
 he had said. There was something about him that 
 stirred her enthusiasm, made her believe in him and 
 in the cause he placed above wealth and love. 
 
 The quiet of the town was not yet broken by the 
 noises of returning troops and wagons. The room 
 and the house were still. In that stillness Marion 
 heard a strange involuntary whisper. Whether 
 from troubled sleep or feverish wakefulness in 
 either case from her subconscious soul came Son- 
 ya s whispered words "He loves her!"
 
 VIII 
 
 AT dawn, Tschulitsky set out with Cossacks, in 
 fantry, and machine guns. Captain Byeletsky 
 had reported the force he met as not less than 
 two hundred. The troops spent a hard day scouting 
 through the forest, but found no enemy. The revo 
 lutionists had scattered or circled Zhergan. The sol 
 diers came back to town after dark, exhausted for 
 nothing. 
 
 Marion returned with Feodor to the manor, but 
 finding it lonely there after growing used to the com 
 panionship of her friends in town, she sent Davuidka 
 to bring Sonya and Grenning out to dinner. 
 
 Grenning had been up all the night before, had 
 worked all day, and was going to bed; but he came. 
 He was tempted to take a hypo, of morphine, but 
 finally decided the Countess would have to make 
 allowances. 
 
 The evening was the best De Hohenfels had spent 
 since coming from St. Petersburg. After the society 
 of the army officers, it was an inspiration to him to 
 talk with people of mental range and power. Son- 
 ya s self-certainty, her independence, the impression 
 she gave of thinking more than she expressed, his 
 feeling that she understood him better than he un- 
 
 270
 
 THE CHASM 271 
 
 derstood her, gave her mystery, and attracted him. 
 He did most of the talking, being stimulated by 
 brief comments of Grenning showing comprehension 
 but not agreement. After they had gone, Feodor 
 commented on Grenning s taciturnity, and asked if 
 he and Sonya were lovers. 
 
 Marion thought of Sonya s whisper, though by 
 day it did not have the enormous significance it had 
 presented to her nocturnal soul. "Perhaps she is in 
 love with him," she answered. "It s hard to tell 
 about them. They seem more like comrades than 
 lovers, but " 
 
 "I noticed they both look at things from the 
 socialist angle. Do you suppose there is a social- 
 democratic way of being in love?" 
 
 She smiled, then considered it seriously. "I had 
 not thought of it," she said, "but perhaps there is. 
 The bourgeois world has certainly failed to create 
 any way of love of its own. Its love, like its poetry, 
 has had to ape the forms of the past. It has imi 
 tated the love of feudal chivalry, or finding that false 
 for itself has turned to cynical disbelief and dis 
 regard of love." 
 
 "And what was the feudal way of love?" asked 
 Count Feodor, more interested than he usually was 
 in Marion s ideas. 
 
 "The feudal way was to capture a woman, domi 
 nate her, set her on a narrow pedestal from which 
 she must not move then worship her. It was idola 
 trous because the dominator was worshiping a thing 
 of his own making." 
 
 "You will change the nature of man before you do 
 away with domination."
 
 272 THE CHASM 
 
 "Willingly," she said. "Fortunately it is chang 
 ing all the time. In the coming way of love there will 
 be no domination, no pedestal, no making and so no 
 smashing of idols, no forming and so no losing of 
 illusions. We shall love truthfully with realism. 
 Love between man and woman shall be love between 
 comrades and equals. Yes, I have convinced myself 
 there is a social-democratic way of love." 
 
 Feodor de Hohenfels listened with disapproval. 
 "Then goodbye glamour, mystery and lure!" he 
 cried. "Goodbye the Dionysian intoxication the di 
 vine madness there was in all great deeds and art and 
 love ! Put out the fire of spring there ll be nothing 
 in men s souls for it to kindle ! Your social-demo 
 cratic way of love is drabbest English Puritanism!" 
 
 "Do you feel any of that in Sonya Demidoff ?" 
 
 "No. I didn t feel it. Is it there?" 
 
 "Not any drab English Puritanism. But what I 
 was describing is there. She will love a man as a 
 comrade, not as an overmasterer. She will play 
 mouse to no cat-passion of capture. If your Diony 
 sian intoxication is incompatible with sex-equality, 
 the men of the future will have to contrive some way 
 to get along without it." 
 
 "It dies in marriage anyhow," he said gloomily. 
 
 "And the love of comrades does not!" was all 
 she said, but she was deeply hurt, could not longer 
 conceal from herself her feeling that her marriage 
 was a mistake, and her heart turned aching to the 
 thought of that other "true" love which she had 
 chosen to erase from her life. "Walt s love would 
 not have died," she thought. 
 
 Count Feodor thought regretfully of Rome and
 
 THE CHASM 273 
 
 the Duchess di Callignano, who wrought with the 
 sex-lure like an artist on the souls of men. If to be 
 untouched with modern spirit would enable a woman 
 to retain glamour and mystery, Di Callignano would 
 retain hers forever. 
 
 Next day Feodor and Marion had no time to con 
 sider the problem of how they were to live together 
 without love. Soon after breakfast sixteen Cos 
 sacks rode up the gravel driveway to the manor, 
 and their ensign informed De Hohenfels that it was 
 his duty to escort him to the Town-House. 
 
 A court-martial was sitting to determine the cause 
 of the recent disaster. The court could not really 
 succeed in this without finding that had it not been 
 for the torture of Yan Kenim in Riga Saturday night 
 there would have been no revolutionary ambush 
 Tuesday at Zhergan. De Hohenfels asked in what 
 capacity he was sent for, but the ensign could not 
 say. 
 
 They found the Town-House full of soldiers, some 
 under arms, some with side-arms sentries, order 
 lies, and guards. Robert Guibet the forester was 
 sitting on a bench in the hall-way under guard. He 
 had been imprisoned the night of the ambush. Two 
 private soldiers were also prisoners. Captain Bye 
 letsky and Ensign Khlopov, the commander of the 
 advance guard, were waiting in the anteroom under 
 arrest. The Cossack ensign requested De Hohen 
 fels to be seated in the same room, and sat with his 
 prisoner or witness. The Count had to wait there 
 during a lengthy examination of Byeletsky, Khlopov, 
 and others. 
 
 Byeletsky was let off with a reprimand. He was
 
 274 THE CHASM 
 
 allowed to show that Ensign Khlopov was in a posi 
 tion to ascertain the presence of the ambush and had 
 failed to do so. 
 
 Khlopov explained that he had flankers out prop 
 erly, but they had failed to give any signal when they 
 came upon the enemy s line. He had not yet thrown 
 forward a point, but the point would have been on 
 the track and would not have discovered the ambush. 
 He said he was relying largely on Robert Guibet. 
 He gave the names of the four flankers. The court- 
 martial recommended that Ensign Khlopov be dis 
 honorably dismissed from the service. The recom 
 mendation was finally carried out, and Khlopov shot 
 himself. 
 
 Of the four flankers, one the Social-Democrat 
 spared by Mitrevitz was missing, and one had been 
 found dead in the woods with a bayonet wound 
 through his throat. The third, the soldier Kazyol, 
 was drawn by Sikorsky into the admission that as he 
 approached the edge of the clearing he had closed 
 in to less than the prescribed distance from the ad 
 vance guard. This trifling failure to follow in 
 structions had caused him to miss the revolutionary 
 line. He was sentenced to five years in one of the 
 Siberian disciplinary regiments. When he heard 
 this sentence, he begged to be shot, but his plea was 
 not granted. 
 
 Dutloff, the fourth flanker, was hazy in his testi 
 mony. He remembered walking from the clearing 
 into the shadow, and the next thing he knew was 
 that he was on his back under the trees alone, with 
 a terrible pain in his head. His head was bruised 
 and swollen. He claimed he had heard nothing of
 
 THE CHASM 275 
 
 the battle. The court decided that he must have 
 had some opportunity to give the alarm, and had 
 failed to do so. He was adjudged guilty of neglect 
 of duty through cowardice and sentenced to be shot 
 next day at sunrise in presence of the garrison. 
 
 Robert Guibet was brought in and accused of 
 treacherously leading the expedition into ambush. 
 He said he had last seen the revolutionists in their 
 camp at eight o clock in the evening, and had no 
 reason to suppose they were not still there at eleven. 
 Tschulitsky was presiding, and no one called atten 
 tion to the fact that he had sent no scouts of his 
 own to find out the exact position and movements of 
 the enemy. He brought out the fact that the forest 
 er had full knowledge of the expedition by two in 
 the afternoon. The court decided that if six hours 
 later he was near enough to the camp of the revolu 
 tionists to see it, he was there for no good purpose. 
 He was sentenced to be shot next day at sunrise 
 unless in the meantime he should decide to confess 
 his guilt and name his accomplices particularly 
 what orders or messages he had received from his 
 master the Count de Hohenfels. 
 
 The Count de Hohenfels was summoned. In the 
 small room where the court sat, he found four of 
 ficers sitting stiffly in full uniform along the farther 
 side of a long table, and a Jewish soldier at the 
 end of the table writing and fussing with open and 
 folded documents. De Hohenfels recognized Com 
 mandant Tschulitsky and Captain Sikorsky. The 
 others were infantry captains and Tschulitsky s 
 clerk. 
 
 Without making a formal charge, Tschulitsky
 
 276 THE CHASM 
 
 pointed out that outside the military authorities the 
 Count de Hohenfels and his forester were the only 
 persons in Zhergan who had official knowledge of 
 the expedition. This knowledge had evidently 
 reached the revolutionists. How? 
 
 De Hohenfels replied that he did not know. 
 
 He was asked to produce the letter he had re 
 ceived from the Governor-General. He found it in 
 his pocket, glanced over it and dropped it on the 
 table. He was irritated by having been kept wait 
 ing so long. "It would be well for you to reflect, 
 Commandant," he observed, "that, as this letter 
 shows, the Governor-General knows you had to be 
 forced into this expedition. If you start any ab 
 surd proceedings against me or against Robert 
 Guibet I will see to it that a court-martial sits in 
 this case with rank enough to determine why the 
 Commandant of Zhergan had to be compelled to 
 undertake this expedition, and what relation his re 
 fusal to attack the revolutionists on Monday bears 
 to the failure of the attack he was ordered to make 
 on Tuesday." 
 
 Tschulitsky turned white and red with fear and 
 anger. He saw that this unexpected view of the 
 case looked infernally plausible, and Sikorsky was 
 making him violent signals to keep cool. The Com 
 mandant could think of no decent-looking way to 
 drop De Hohenfels then and there. Sikorsky came 
 to his rescue. "It was too clearly to the interest 
 of the Count de Hohenfels to have this band of 
 marauders on his estate exterminated," said the ad 
 jutant politely, "to permit anyone to suppose that 
 he intentionally put them in possession of informa-
 
 THE CHASM 277 
 
 tion as to the Government s plans. There remains, 
 however, the possibility of his having been indis 
 creet. I suggest that the Count be asked to tell this 
 court exactly what persons he talked to concerning 
 I this expedition." Tschulitsky put the question di 
 rectly. 
 
 "Only to Robert Guibet," said De Hohenfels. 
 
 "What did you tell him?" asked Tschulitsky. 
 
 "Tuesday noon I ordered him to keep watch of 
 the band as long as possible to make sure they had 
 not left their camp, but to go to you not later than 
 nine o clock and guide whomever you designated to 
 the camp." 
 
 "That accounts for Guibet being there at eight," 
 remarked Sikorsky. 
 
 "Did you tell Guibet the camp was to be at 
 tacked?" asked Tschulitsky. 
 
 "No. Still, not being a fool, he understood that." 
 
 "Did you tell him not to talk about it?" 
 
 "No. I was sure he would not." 
 
 "What made you sure?" 
 
 "I know his character. He is sensible, truthful, 
 and loyal." 
 
 "Loyal to whom?" 
 
 "To me." 
 
 "And to the Tsar?" 
 
 "Guibet is a simple man. I have never heard him 
 express his sentiments concerning the Tsar. He is 
 untainted by revolutionary ideas." 
 
 Sikorsky leaned over and whispered something 
 to Tschulitsky. "One more question," said the 
 Commandant. "Whom else did you talk to concern 
 ing the expedition?"
 
 278 THE CHASM 
 
 "To no one." De Hohenfels did not think of 
 his wife as some one "else." 
 
 "Did you show this letter to anyone or tell anyone 
 of its contents?" 
 
 De Hohenfels remembered the table in his room 
 at the Zhergan Inn where Marion had read the 
 Governor-General s letter. Was it possible their dis 
 cussion had been overheard by some servant listen 
 ing outside their door? Should he qualify his state 
 ment now by saying, "I showed it to no one but 
 the Countess de Hohenfels"? 
 
 "I demand that the Count de Hohenfels be 
 sworn," said Sikorsky suddenly. 
 
 A scornful little smile stirred the corners of De 
 Hohenfels s mouth at the idea that if he thought it 
 right to deceive these unfriendly inquisitors he would 
 be deterred by an oath, not given freely by himself, 
 but compulsorily administered by them. He would 
 have been reluctant to violate his own word, but their 
 oath it was nothing to him. 
 
 They administered the oath. 
 
 "Count de Hohenfels :" said Tschulitsky solemnly, 
 "did you or did you not show or speak of the Gover 
 nor-General s letter to any person whatsoever?" 
 
 "I did not." 
 
 Tschulitsky and Sikorsky conferred together. 
 Tschulitsky asked the captains if they had any ques 
 tions. De Hohenfels was escorted out by the Cos 
 sack ensign, and kept in the anteroom until Tschulit- 
 sky s clerk brought him a written notice stating it 
 was the order of the court-martial that the Count 
 de Hohenfels should not at present leave the vicinity 
 of Zhergan without permission from the military
 
 THE CHASM 279 
 
 authorities. He was then allowed to leave the 
 Town-House. 
 
 Next morning, a few minutes after sunrise, the 
 soldier Dutloff was shot in presence of the garrison 
 at the brickyard. The sound of the volley that 
 killed him was plainly audible at the manor-house. 
 The soldier Kazyol was placed guarded and in 
 irons on the morning train for Mitau en route to 
 Siberia to a life worse feared by the Russian sol 
 diers than the seven hells. The sentence against 
 Robert Guibet was not revoked, but execution was 
 suspended, and the forester held in prison, to be 
 used as a witness in case the detective division of the 
 police could find sufficient evidence against De 
 Hohenfels to convince the Governor-General, now 
 friendly to him, of his guilt. For Tschulitsky and 
 Sikorsky had placed the affair in the hands of the 
 secret police. Starting with the known fact that 
 Guibet and De Hohenfels had the disastrous knowl 
 edge which had finally reached the revolutionists, the 
 detectives set themselves to find out if anyone in the 
 town, soldier or civilian, man or woman, had shared 
 that knowledge.
 
 IX 
 
 ON the Friday following the execution of Dut- 
 loff, Yan Smika, the forester of the Medin 
 estate, was arrested in his cabin by a party 
 of Cossacks from Zhergan and sent to Riga for 
 examination by the detective division. 
 
 The revolutionary parties in Zhergan did not 
 hear of this arrest until Monday morning, when 
 Kaminsky received word through the Jewish agent 
 of a firm of grain-buyers in Riga that Smika had 
 been recognized on the night of the battle by a gov 
 ernment spy who fought under Mitrevitz. 
 
 Kaminsky went immediately to Grenning s office. 
 "This brings it only one step from you," he said to 
 Grenning. "You must get away now while you 
 can." 
 
 Grenning shook his head. "I was nominated 
 night before last by the Social-Democrats for the 
 second Duma," he said. "I wanted to see you yes 
 terday. The authorities have given us only three 
 weeks notice, and I hear Medin has been at work 
 for a couple of months. But if you Social-Revolu 
 tionists will deign to vote, and vote with us, we can 
 take the seat away from De Hohenfels." 
 
 "What does the Duma amount to?" scoffed 
 280
 
 THE CHASM 281 
 
 Kaminsky. "In Moscow they ve put fifteen promi 
 nent lawyers in jail to keep them from running as 
 opposition candidates." 
 
 "I don t think De Hohenfels will allow that in 
 Zhergan," said Grenning. "He d be ashamed to 
 have the Countess know he d won that way himself, 
 and he won t let Medin do it." 
 
 "And suppose meanwhile Smika caves in?" 
 
 "Your news shows they didn t arrest him for 
 carrying information to Mitrevitz. Smika shouldn t 
 have fought with the Brothers that night, or having 
 done it, he should have stayed with them. But think 
 of that traitor with Mitrewitz! Do you know who 
 it is?" 
 
 "Yes. Mitrevitz has been notified. The man will 
 be killed. But that will not release Smika. And if 
 Smika weakens under torture it s you next!" 
 
 Grenning thought a while. "In the first place," he 
 said, "I have faith in Smika." 
 
 Kaminsky made a gesture of impatience. 
 
 "In the second place, they will not be pressing 
 Smika for information they don t suspect him of 
 having." 
 
 "Nonsense! They will press him for all the in 
 formation he has and a lot he has not." 
 
 "Even so if I am elected to the Duma, I be 
 come exempt from arrest." 
 
 "Theoretically." 
 
 Grenning laughed and thought of Kaminsky s un 
 warranted distrust of the Countess de Hohenfels. 
 "Nachman: you are der Geist der stets verneint. 
 It s probably due to your habit of calling yourself 
 an atheist. Why don t you drop that nineteenth cen-
 
 282 THE CHASM 
 
 tury negative denial of God and affirm the mod 
 ern positive the oneness of the world?" 
 
 "What s the difference?" grunted Kaminsky. 
 
 "Of mental habit. I call the scepticism which 
 cannot accept a truth no better than the credulity 
 which accepts a falsehood." 
 
 "You ll observe I can agree it s better to affirm 
 your own proposition than deny its opposite, and 
 nevertheless maintain you d better get out of Zher- 
 gan." 
 
 "I m not saying there s no risk," said Grenning. 
 "But in my opinion it s worth running. We can win 
 this election in Zhergan. The Socialist parties can 
 return thirty or forty per cent, of the delegates of the 
 next Duma. If we had foreseen last spring the tem 
 per of those peasant deputies we would never have 
 boycotted the elections then. If we d had our dele 
 gates there with them we would have made that weak 
 Vibourg Manifesto a call to arms that would have 
 aroused the Russian nation, not in a dozen times and 
 places and unco-ordinated movements, but as one 
 
 man." 
 
 "That has undoubtedly been our weakness," said 
 Kaminsky. He had no idea then that leaders of his 
 own party like Eugene Phillipovitch Azef were tools 
 of the Tsar who were intentionally disco-ordinating 
 the revolutionary movements and scattering the revo 
 lutionary strength. 
 
 "Will you get your people to vote for me?" asked 
 Grenning. 
 
 "If you re still here to vote for." Seeing he could 
 not influence Grenning directly, Kaminsky left him, 
 and went in to Sonya s.
 
 THE CHASM 283 
 
 The Countess de Hohenfels was there, but since 
 the others told her everything sooner or later any 
 how, Kaminsky did not think it worth while to keep 
 from her the news of Smika s arrest. 
 
 "Do they know about Grenning?" was Sonya s 
 quick question. 
 
 "Apparently not. Not yet." 
 
 "He and Smika went together." 
 
 "But Smika stayed that night and fought. It was 
 then he was seen. Now, because they ve arrested 
 him for taking part in the fight, and not for carry 
 ing information, Grenning thinks they won t examine 
 him along the line that leads to him. The police are 
 not that dense. The main thing they are after is 
 how Mitrevitz learned of the expedition. In Smika 
 they have a man who joined the band that night. 
 They won t need an abacus to calculate that the in 
 formation probably came to camp with him. And 
 if so who gave it to him? Grenning can say what 
 he likes he lies square in the path of that investi 
 gation." 
 
 "How about the rest of us?" said Marion. She 
 saw the power of the Russian State working in 
 toward her from both sides the side of Feodor, 
 from whom she received the information the side 
 of the Brothers, to whom she had sent it. 
 
 "Smika does not know about us," said Sonya. 
 
 "He won t listen to me," said Kaminsky. "I wish 
 you d try to get him away from Zhergan." 
 
 "He d pay more attention to you, Marion," said 
 Sonya. 
 
 Marion colored. "I think not," she said. "Is 
 Smika a man so likely to betray Grenning?"
 
 284. THE CHASM 
 
 "Smika isn t," answered Kaminsky. "But the 
 
 thing they turn Smika into 1" He shrugged his 
 
 shoulders. 
 
 Marion s face grew gray and her fingers clenched. 
 "lhate Russia!" 
 
 "Not Russia!" Sonya protested. 
 
 "The horror that calls itself Russia ! The Tsar 
 and all the tens of thousands of horrible small 
 tsars ! I cannot stand this country. I must get away 
 from it to some place where men have a right to 
 think and read and speak and breathe and not smell 
 blood!" 
 
 "What is Ferdinand s argument for not leaving?" 
 asked Sonya. 
 
 "He has the parliamentary bee in his bonnet, and 
 that s all he can hear. He has just been nominated 
 for the Duma." 
 
 "Then he will run against Count Feodor!" Mar 
 ion exclaimed. 
 
 "If he stays," supplemented Kaminsky. "You will 
 be doing a good piece of electioneering if you get 
 him to go." 
 
 "Electioneering!" cried Marion. She gave Ka 
 minsky a wrathful look. "I hope he stays and 
 wins!" 
 
 "So?" said Kaminsky, hastily revising his ideas. 
 
 Sonya looked away. 
 
 "I m not thinking of the men personally," Mar 
 ion explained, forcibly. "No anti-democrat like 
 Count Feodor can do anything of value in the Duma, 
 and Grenning perhaps he can." 
 
 "And perhaps no one can," said Kaminsky. 
 "But!" He held out his hand to Marion. They
 
 285 
 
 looked each other in the eye, and for the first time 
 she liked him. "I did not know you," he said. "I 
 used just the wrong argument. But for Grenning s 
 sake, for ours, no, for the cause that is above us all 
 since you are a woman who can look impersonally 
 get Grenning away. We can t afford to risk him 
 for the sake of a seat in the Duma. If it was any 
 thing vital, I wouldn t grudge him." 
 
 "I will try it," Marion responded, rising. "Though 
 if you could not get him to go, there is little chance 
 that I can. Is he in his office ?" 
 
 She went in, accepted the Doctor s invitation to 
 be seated, and in her talk with him repeated the 
 arguments of Kaminsky. At one point, as plainly as 
 though he had done his thinking aloud, she saw him 
 pause and half-shut his eyes as the idea of "election 
 eering" crossed his mind; and then, with equal clear 
 ness, she saw him dismiss the idea as being out of 
 keeping with his conception of her character. His 
 faith in her gave her a thrill of pleasure. But when 
 she asked him if he would go, he asked "Where?" 
 
 "Out of Russia?" she suggested, uncertainly. She 
 added half to herself, "That is where I am going." 
 Realizing the personal interpretation he might give 
 to that, she looked quickly at him, but saw he did not 
 give it. 
 
 "I am not going out of Russia while there is a 
 chance of overthrowing the bureaucracy," he said 
 positively. "For the present they have kicked the 
 fire of revolt pretty well to pieces here, and in Mos 
 cow, and at Sveabourg, but we must be ready for the 
 new flame. There is still Poland, the Caucasus, the 
 Black Sea Fleet, the other troops around St. Peters-
 
 286 THE CHASM 
 
 burg. The Baltic Republic must be ready to rise 
 again with them. Everywhere the plans of a revolu 
 tionary state are being steadily elaborated. The 
 Duma is important because the deputies from all 
 over Russia will be in a position to make the rising 
 of distant districts simultaneous." 
 
 "I did not really expect to influence your decision," 
 said she. "I tried it only to satisfy Sonya and Ka- 
 minsky. It may sound disloyal to my husband, but 
 you will understand why I wish you and not him to 
 win this election. His position is such that he can 
 not throw his strength unreservedly to either side in 
 the Russian struggle and you can. And I hope you 
 overthrow the Tsar. You Russians have suffered so 
 from tyranny that you love and value freedom more 
 than we Americans." 
 
 "You Americans? Aren t you a Russian subject?" 
 
 "The law considers me one. But it has struck me 
 lately as queer that, whether she desires it or not, 
 marriage should automatically change a woman s 
 nationality to that of her husband. I do not feel 
 myself a Russian, and of all things in the world the 
 thing I am least willing to be is a subject of the 
 Tsar." 
 
 "We are not willing either! You speak as though 
 the Americans believe themselves free. If so, they 
 are easily fooled ruled as they are by the most un 
 mitigated industrial oligarchy in the world. The 
 peoples of Russia have at least the advantage of 
 knowing they are not free." 
 
 "If you overthrow this government which has sur 
 vived out of the dark ages," conceded Marion, 
 "America will have to learn democracy from you.
 
 THE CHASM 287 
 
 You and Sarin and Sonya and the rest have more 
 faith in democracy and are profounder democrats 
 than any Americans I know except one." 
 
 "Walt Bradfield?" said Grenning. 
 
 "Oh, do you remember his name?" Her face light 
 ed up. 
 
 "I would like to know him," the Doctor said, wist 
 fully. "He must be a wonderful man to be loved by 
 you." 
 
 "I didn t tell you that!" she exclaimed. "What 
 gave you that idea?" 
 
 "You said he was your friend," hedging. 
 
 "Oh," she said, subsiding. "I wrote to him two 
 weeks ago." She paused, seeming to listen. "Per 
 haps he is just this very moment receiving my let 
 ter." She turned her watch and looked at it. "I 
 dreamed he was dead. That night I told you about 
 him I dreamed it. I told him of you and Sonya and 
 Russia." 
 
 "Be careful what you write," he warned. "The 
 authorities may think it worth while to read your 
 letters these days." 
 
 Marion rose to go. "I have a personal reason 
 for desiring your election, Doctor. If Count Feodor 
 is defeated, I think I will be able to get him to live in 
 Rome." 
 
 "Rome?" he said. "I will be sorry to see you go." 
 He sat looking intently before him. "I might as 
 well speak out," he said. "I will regret it if I let you 
 go without speaking. I do not think you will be 
 satisfied with life in Rome. It will be a dilettant 
 life without real significance and you know what 
 significance is. You know Russia needs this revolu-
 
 288 THE CHASM 
 
 tion as a man smothering needs air. It s a need 
 greater than religion, keener than the yearning of 
 wife for husband as compelling as the love of 
 mother for child. This need of the nation comes 
 into the individual s mind sometimes seemingly 
 against a man s or woman s will and when it comes 
 it dominates action. Often it comes in the form of 
 an impulse you find yourself obeying." 
 
 "You are describing my particular case," said 
 Marion, intensely interested, " the way I began to 
 tell about the expedition." 
 
 "Most of us began in some such way you when 
 you heard of Kenim, Sonya when they sent her father 
 to Siberia, Bratavzinsky when his uncle cynically 
 condemned an innocent man to death, I when they 
 shot Chelms. Kaminsky thinks the Cause above all 
 such personal considerations. To him these are un 
 worthy reasons; but most of us come to the cause, 
 not as an abstraction, but through the burning need 
 of revolution which we find unmistakably in some 
 particular case that comes home to us, and then we 
 see it everywhere. And when it does come, we grow 
 quiet and definite and unshakable and proceed to do 
 the thing we have to." 
 
 "I know you are describing a real thing truly," 
 said she. "But isn t it like madness such involun 
 tary obedience to an idea?" 
 
 "Yes, it is like madness and like genius. It is 
 the yearning and the struggle for sanity in a nation 
 driven mad." 
 
 Marion sat down again. All that she knew of 
 Russia a thousand hitherto unrelated facts 
 seemed suddenly to regroup themselves and come
 
 THE CHASM 289 
 
 into focus. "Am I deserting if I go to Rome?" 
 she asked. 
 
 "Not by the mere act of going to Rome. Not by 
 going anywhere. This is a world-struggle. It is 
 more acute in Russia because here oppression is at its 
 worst and in an antiquated form. You spoke awhile 
 ago as though it were here only as though it did 
 not exist in America. To think that is not to be 
 deserting. It is to have not yet enlisted. Countess 
 Marion: I hold you capable of the only vital conver 
 sion left in the world that which finds one an active 
 or passive supporter of established, powerful, unjust 
 tyranny, political and economic, and makes one a 
 fighter for freedom. This conversion sets you 
 cleanly over from the retarding to the advancing 
 party of mankind from the world-party of rulers, 
 financiers and magnates who hold the life of the 
 world in their enslaving grip, to the Promethean 
 world-party which means to tear those strangling 
 fingers from the world s throat and give the instinc 
 tive brotherhood of man a chance to grow into actual- 
 ity." 
 
 "The instinctive brotherhood?" she repeated. To 
 her now it sounded like a true word though it op 
 posed her theory that the brotherhood of all would 
 thwart the loftiest development of the few. Her own 
 instinct, her own actions of late did not square with 
 that theory. What was the matter with it? In the 
 light of her Russian experience, Grenning seemed to 
 be defining truly the great real issue of the modern 
 world. She had a keen feeling of its importance and 
 seriousness. But Feodor? She knew his life, his 
 training, his philosophy, made him incapable of that
 
 290 THE CHASM 
 
 vital conversion. "There are things that hold me 
 back," she said. 
 
 "As to Rome," he said, retracting, "I spoke hasti 
 ly from personal disappointment. I was hoping 
 to see you this winter in St. Petersburg. As for de 
 serting you might as well go to Rome. You will 
 not stay there. Or if you do, you will find the battle 
 there. Wherever you go you will find it the same 
 battle setting the souls of men on flame!" 
 
 "I have a large job of spiritual stock-taking on my 
 hands," said Marion. "A fine lot of unsolved prob 
 lems I ve accumulated. I ve been shirking and put 
 ting them off. I am indebted to you for a keen de 
 sire to attack them. We must see each other again 
 for a good talk before one or both of us leave Zher- 
 gan." 
 
 As she left Grenning s office, she met Trina Ronke 
 coming in, and received a look of surprise and re 
 sentment in return for her greeting. "What s the 
 matter with that individual ?" she thought. "Can she 
 imagine I have robbed her of Grenning s affection?" 
 
 Stopping a moment to tell Sonya and Kaminsky 
 that she had not shaken Grenning s resolution, she 
 then went by the inn stable, where she told Davuidka 
 to drive home without her; and walking slowly home 
 ward in the autumn sunshine, past the brickyard and 
 the smithy and the fields where women, children, and 
 men were at work digging and sacking potatoes, she 
 thought deeply of her life. 
 
 She thought of her old desire, awakened by Lady 
 Diotima, for social and political power, and knew 
 she had missed it by her marriage with Feodor. But 
 that desire had been linked with the supposition that
 
 THE CHASM 291 
 
 a woman could obtain and use such power benefi 
 cently. When she had come to know upon what 
 sordid considerations real "influence" in Washington 
 depended, she knew she could not attain it and re 
 main anything she wanted to be. And power in St. 
 Petersburg! It was power of darkness, and the 
 hearts of those who grasped it petrified ! Was there 
 any power in the world which could coexist with 
 love? With eyes that had seen Russia she looked 
 back on her father s conception of power control 
 of industry the power of which political power was 
 but the shadow. She remembered the defeat of the 
 Curran bill, and Bradfield s burning revelation of 
 the manufacturers motives which had made her 
 want to vote, and Fedya s cold comment 
 "Women s sympathies are too easily carried away 
 by such appeals." 
 
 Was power that did not crush and grind man 
 kind impossible? If leaders of the new democ 
 racy like Grenning, Sonya, Sarin, and Bradfield at 
 tained political power would they make the same 
 narrow selfish use of it the ruling class made now? 
 Her feeling was that they would not but why? 
 What was to prevent it? She made a mental note 
 to ask Grenning about direct legislation the ma 
 chinery of the new democracy. Then she re mem- 
 bered those peasant deputies whose parliamentary 
 course had been shaped by the eight million peas 
 ants behind them, and Vasili Pososhkov s theory 
 that collective ownership, aligning the self-interest 
 of every individual with the common good, would 
 resolve the undeniable discord now sounding be 
 tween self and society, and with the discord its re-
 
 292 THE CHASM 
 
 flex in men s minds the apparent antithesis be 
 tween socialism and individualism. Less definite 
 but more weighty than all else with her was her 
 own realization in herself of a new order of mo 
 tives and passions the same order she felt in the 
 souls of all those in whom the social consciousness 
 had dawned. Through this she felt that she un 
 derstood the new spirit, the new kind of govern 
 ment, dawning among the peoples of the world. 
 She felt the bitter need of it. 
 
 But Feodor? She had grown accustomed to 
 keeping her thoughts from him, but was determined 
 that things should not go on so. Their conversa 
 tion had grown narrower through avoidance of sub 
 jects on which they knew there was between them 
 a fundamental disagreement. His atmosphere of 
 cold disapproval, usually unspoken, was slowly 
 freezing all her affection for him. Her high opin 
 ion of his esthetic judgment had at first made her 
 dread his disapproval even in the least of things. 
 When she read it in his manner it had then given 
 her a feeling of her own deficiency. Little by little, 
 she was forced to feel that the deficiency lay rather 
 in him. He disapproved of and excluded too 
 much, he said "no" to too wide and splendid a part 
 of life, he loved too few things, persons, ideas, and 
 those he loved he did not love enough. It seemed 
 some other, dreamier self within her which mental 
 ly repeated the words, "He did not love enough," 
 as though she were reading the epitaph of a dead 
 marriage. 
 
 "How could he," she thought, "when his heart
 
 THE CHASM 293 
 
 grew up in that icy upper Russian world that is 
 based on the crushing of men?" 
 
 He was indeed a Hyperborean a dweller be 
 yond the cold. But the woman needed love. She 
 had to have love or wither. She did not solve that 
 problem as she walked home through the autumn 
 sunshine, nor did she find it solved when she awoke 
 at dawn, hearing the mournful song of a swallow, 
 and feeling the pathos of all far-off things cities 
 remote, and days gone by, and faces she no longer 
 saw.
 
 X 
 
 THE days were shorter, the nights colder, the 
 intense labor of the harvest nearly over 
 in the region round Zhergan. The Count 
 and Countess de Hohenfels and Baron Medin were 
 the only upperclass residents of the district remain 
 ing in the melancholy country, and they of course 
 were staying only on account of the September elec 
 tion. Baron Medin argued privately with De Ho 
 henfels that as a landowner he could not afford to 
 divide the anti-socialist strength in the face of a 
 Lettish population honeycombed with socialism. 
 
 De Hohenfels smiled. "Considering your small 
 vote this spring, Medin, I don t see how there can 
 be any argument as to which anti-socialist candidate 
 should withdraw." 
 
 "There are two arguments. First: the new re 
 strictions of the suffrage will disqualify at least half 
 of those who voted for you this spring." 
 
 "Restrictions made in violation of the guarantee 
 in the Tsar s original ukase," observed De Hohen 
 fels. 
 
 "The restrictions are now part of the law. The 
 second point is that much of your remaining 
 strength is this time going to Grenning." A third 
 point that the Government was preparing to use 
 
 294
 
 THE CHASM 295 
 
 intimidation Medin did not think it necessary to 
 state. 
 
 De Hohenfels had no exact information as to 
 how things were going, but his desire to retain his 
 seat being aroused by the activity of the Govern 
 ment on the one hand, and of the Socialists on the 
 other, he began to give some time, thought, and 
 energy to the campaign. 
 
 About a week before the election, Marion, glanc 
 ing at her morning s mail, carelessly tore open the 
 return envelop of a Chicago manufacturing firm. 
 From it she drew forth a fat letter from Walt 
 Bradfield. She ran off quickly with it to her own 
 room. 
 
 It was dated Chicago, Sept. 22d. "Dear Count 
 ess Marion," he wrote. "You ask if I am angry 
 with you because you left Moline without saying 
 goodbye and without telling me how much you think 
 of me. How long do you think anger could with 
 stand that question? My answer is that I am fatalist 
 enough to know that all that happened had to hap 
 pen. All I need to relieve my mind of about that 
 night and morning is this: Count Hohenfels did not 
 do what I accused him of, but he thought of doing 
 it, and in your eyes my great crime was thinking he 
 thought of it. 
 
 "You say you have a thousand things to ask and 
 tell. There may be an opportunity sooner than 
 you think. Yes, I have fallen in love a couple of 
 times, but have been too busy to do it thoroughly. 
 It s taboo now, I suppose, but I hate taboos, and the 
 fact is you spoiled me a little for others or them 
 for me.
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "As to that glorious vision of yours the higher 
 race I see it must be serviceable to the Countess 
 de Hohenfels in that it will help her to view with 
 indifference (as a thing necessary and ultimately 
 productive of the highest good) the needless suf 
 fering and degradation of almost the whole of her 
 own kind the only beings she ever expects to see. 
 If you and Count Feodor were naturally callous 
 people you probably wouldn t need that philosophic 
 protection against pity. Your doctrine is an appar 
 ently well-based substitute for the old idea that God 
 has damned the bulk of the race to hell. For God 
 substitute Nature, and for hell race stagnation and 
 decay, and you have your comforting new formula. 
 Comforting because it relieves you of responsibility 
 for conditions from which you profit. It is Nature 
 at work! The elect, the chosen few of Nature 
 (pretty shallowly identified, I must say, with the 
 present ruling class) are to carry life on up into 
 the earthly heaven of superhumanity. 
 
 "That s clever! It could be made to sweep the 
 bourgeois world like Christian Science or New 
 Thought if only it didn t take so much real imag 
 ination and so thorough a comprehension of the big 
 results of biology. I concede at once that all the 
 races of our ancestry have split as you expect ours 
 to. Put on top of all biologic precedent the allure 
 ment of the old messianic idea transfer your re 
 ligious emotions from a supernatural to a natural 
 Messiah reasonably to be expected in the future and 
 appealing to the most profound instinct of all true 
 lovers of men the desire for a finer race and I 
 do not wonder you have yielded to this charm!
 
 THE CHASM 297 
 
 "The Count de Hohenfels and you, however, 
 seem to have overlooked the fact that the various 
 ape-tribes, for instance, had no steamships and rail 
 roads to bring them together, create among them 
 like ways of life and work and thought, and insure 
 the blending of the blood of all. Thanks to a knit- 
 together world the many branches of mankind must 
 have not many fates, but one. Humanity cannot 
 split as simianity did into lower and higher. There 
 will be no groups left isolated in special environ 
 ments. 
 
 "The Count s idea is worth forming and re 
 jecting because it brings into clear light the fact 
 that in not branching into distinct species mankind 
 makes a new departure in the history of racial 
 growth. Man must transform not a part, but the 
 whole of his kind into the higher race!" 
 
 "Oh, I love that, Walt!" said Marion, half 
 aloud. "There s inspiration of a wider, warmer 
 kind in that!" 
 
 She sat a moment loving that, before she went 
 on. "If the Count is looking for the final cleavage 
 to occur, not between different nations or races, but 
 within the highest existing races through gradual 
 widening of the gap between higher and lower 
 classes, tell him to leave that gap to Socialism 
 and sex-attraction ! Europe is not exactly getting 
 ready for Hindoo caste. 
 
 "Our race is one, by the test of Fertility, and as 
 one it must attain or fail of the heaven of super- 
 humanity. In a thousand years the blood of the 
 basest must blend with yours. Better not block 
 social progress that will make his children less
 
 298 THE CHASM 
 
 base! A single pair doubling thirty times would 
 have over a billion living descendants. After the 
 human net is woven through thirty generations, 
 knotting every ancestral thread to every other, you 
 and your worst enemy, if the blood of both of you 
 endures at all, will both be the very great grand 
 parents of every individual alive! 
 
 "We cannot say that free men and women es 
 pecially women will never find some way to breed 
 men only from the best. To be the best may be 
 the chief incentive of that time. But it is certainly 
 not from our society of narrow individuals or from 
 the present necessarily selfish and slavish age that 
 a conscious tendency toward a higher race can rise. 
 That time may not come till Capitalism and Social 
 ism are both outgrown and dim as ancient Egypt. 
 
 "Having thus wantonly deprived you of the com 
 fort of your new religion (for of course you are 
 crushed!) I feel I should make some slight amends 
 by confessing that you were not altogether wrong 
 about that automatic sash-lifter for regulating the 
 temperature of conservatories. It is on the market, 
 and thanks to some friends I made in Chicago, I 
 was not entirely robbed. In fact I am now ex 
 tracting royalty from the sweat of the men who are 
 actually making the device. 
 
 "You ask for an account of my doings. First, 
 I have not shot myself. Before I lifted myself out 
 of the class in which I happened to have been born 
 I worked in a Chicago greenhouse, did a little 
 speaking, and have had two or three articles in 
 Socialist and semi-Socialist magazines, and a pros-
 
 THE CHASM 299 
 
 pect of some money from them for articles from 
 abroad. They would like to know, for instance, 
 why the revolution in Russia is going so badly. It 
 looked like a sure thing. If I were there as a 
 magazine writer let s see, which is more respect 
 able I shall also be examining the field for the 
 introduction of the automatic sash-lifter and since 
 it is in one sense my own sash-lifter, I may prefer 
 to regard myself as a manufacturer rather than a 
 mere commercial traveler. I shall select which 
 ever social status will best enable me to visit you 
 in your Zhergan." 
 
 "Zhergan!" exclaimed Marion, and her thoughts 
 flashed. "Here! Walt here in Zhergan! What 
 will Fedya oh, this isn t Turkey! But we won t 
 be here in Zhergan! What a shame to come all 
 the way from America When is he coming?" She 
 glanced on hastily, finding the sentence "I am leav 
 ing next week expect to land in Hamburg. On 
 the map I locate Zhergan near Riga." She looked 
 at the date. "Next week," she repeated. "Not 
 over a week behind the letter if he comes straight 
 through. But will he?" How much was there to 
 his elaborate intention of coming to Europe and 
 Russia anyway irrespective of her letter? Would 
 he stop in Hamburg for business, in Berlin for. 
 sight-seeing? It would be only decent if he did not 
 rush straight through. But unless he did he 
 would not reach Zhergan before they left. They 
 were going the day after the election. If she wrote 
 to him at Hamburg but what could she tell him? 
 She did not yet know where she and Fedya were
 
 300 THE CHASM 
 
 going. To St. Petersburg only if he were elected. 
 And if to Rome she and Bradfield might not meet 
 at all. 
 
 She laid the letter on her lap and gazed out un 
 seeing across the sere and black-ribbed fields. 
 "Walt!" Pictures: the island cabin in wood-fire 
 light; the launch and the lightning; the white lights 
 of Davenport; the Hillcrest wall and the uphill 
 concrete walk. Tones: the rain on rattling win 
 dows; music of infinite waters descending; the roar 
 of that torrent; the sound of his voice saying, 
 "Don t let this be the end of things between us 
 it has grown too strong to break!" She had not 
 heard again that sincerity of passion in a human 
 voice. 
 
 She rose suddenly, walked through the room and 
 back, forbidding her mind ever to remember again 
 those great emotional experiences whose record 
 must likewise still exist in the memory of the man 
 with whom she had shared them. Only if these 
 were ignored and made as though they did not exist 
 could she and that man have the friendship she de 
 sired. She looked at the letter, asking herself, "Can 
 I show it to Fedya?" She sat down and carefully 
 reread it with that in view. 
 
 "Why didn t he have the sense to observe the 
 taboo he recognized?" she sighed, and put the letter 
 in her waist without deciding. She wanted Fedya 
 to see the criticism of the doctrine of superhuman- 
 ity. He might have some convincing reply. It 
 would be best to copy that and burn the original. 
 As she went about her affairs she began systematic-
 
 THE CHASM 301 
 
 ally to reduce Walt s visit to its true importance. 
 To see a friend or not important of course, but 
 not so world-changing as it seemed in her first sur 
 prise. 
 
 "O Fedya," said she at luncheon, "do you re 
 member Walt Bradfield?" 
 
 "Not pleasantly." 
 
 "Of course he was wrong that night. But you 
 did hint, Feodor. It has occurred to me lately that 
 he took his medicine pretty well. I have a letter 
 from him. He is in Hamburg, or perhaps by now 
 in Riga. He has an invention, a conservatory de 
 vice, that has made money, and he wants to intro 
 duce it in Russia." 
 
 Count Feodor merely sniffed. 
 
 "He is coming here," she said. "Of course we 
 may be gone, but if not I shall receive him." 
 
 The Count shrugged his shoulders. "One so 
 cialist more or less !" 
 
 "I copied the philosophical part of his letter," 
 she said, pushing it over to him. "I would like 
 your criticism of it." 
 
 "Sorry you had to take the trouble copying. 
 Perhaps the original was illegible." 
 
 She looked away, shaking her head over the im 
 possibility of meeting insinuations which were per 
 haps not insinuations, and then she turned back. 
 "Are you criticizing me for not submitting my entire 
 correspondence to your censorship?" 
 
 "How absurd!" 
 
 "Then don t say things that sound spiteful!" 
 
 "Will you pardon me for reading?" He be-
 
 302 THE CHASM 
 
 came interested at the first sentence. u . . . For hell 
 read race-degeneration, " he read, half aloud. "He 
 has it straight. Did you write him all this?" 
 
 "Just a hint." 
 
 "Now let s see " He finished reading. 
 
 "What pleasure he takes in the idea of the basest 
 mingling his blood with the bestl" said the Count, 
 tossing the sheet on the table. 
 
 "No, Feodor," said she gently. "What pleases 
 him is his proof of our interest in having the basest 
 be less base." Expecting his answer to the main 
 argument, she saw an uneasy look in his face. Self- 
 doubt? She was surprised. 
 
 "I never said the higher race is a certainty. It 
 is a possibility and undeniably it is in the power of 
 the mob to thwart it if they find out their power. 
 I never said the herd would not triumph. I say it 
 is a pity if they do." 
 
 "But who are the herd? Who are the herd s 
 superiors?" 
 
 "It would take somewhat too long to enumerate." 
 His tone was an orphic one that usually overawed 
 her, but she had lost her old feeling that not to see 
 what he saw was proof of deficient perception. 
 
 "I wanted you to meet Bradfield s objection that 
 the existing class of rulers and owners, say in Rus 
 sia, does not at all coincide with the human material 
 that should be selected to form a higher breed. 
 What line excludes the numerous men like your 
 brother-in-law and includes men like Grenning?" 
 
 "So you want to include Grenning?" 
 
 That being mere evasion of defeat, she pressed 
 him no further.
 
 THE CHASM 303 
 
 He gave her a hostile look and rose. "I hear 
 you and he are wonderfully thick," he said. 
 
 She did not feel like speaking, she was so sorry 
 and ashamed for him, and Count Feodor left the 
 room, the weakness of his great dream mercilessly 
 bare, missing the opportunity to give it heroic fare-/ 
 well.
 
 XI 
 
 THREE or four days before the election the 
 Zhergan police and Tschulitsky s Cossacks 
 broke up a meeting addressed by Grenning, 
 threatened him with arrest, and roughly dispersed 
 the crowd. The faces of some of the peasants were 
 cut with whips, and a woman was badly trampled. 
 
 In private De Hohenfels expressed scorn of such 
 tactics, but it made him angry when Marion asked 
 him why he did not protest publicly. She had come 
 ,to regard such a protest as a psychic improbability 
 in any man of his class. This idea of hers irritated 
 him, and yet, as a matter of fact, he had lived so 
 long in the habit of concealing dangerous opinions 
 that he had come to regard anything else as a use 
 less and foolish sacrifice of self. From his point of 
 view, therefore, Marion was criticizing him for act 
 ing wisely, and admiring Grenning, who had come 
 out with a scathing protest, for acting foolishly. 
 
 "If all men had your wisdom," she said to him, 
 "the present Russian Government would endure to 
 the end of the world." 
 
 He reproached her for getting her head full of 
 the ideas of his political opponents. 
 
 She reminded him that she was entitled to her 
 own political opinions. 
 
 "Herd-opinions!" he scoffed. 
 304
 
 THE CHASM 305 
 
 "Opinions leading to resolute action. We really 
 should make good and sure of manhood before as 
 piring to supermanhood." 
 
 One word leading to another, she told him she 
 did not sympathize with his desire to return to the 
 Duma. 
 
 "May I ask if it is Baron Medin with whom you 
 desire to replace me in the Duma?" 
 
 "Don t be nasty, Feodor." 
 
 "If you had any respect for my wishes, you d 
 quit those daily visits to the Social-Democratic 
 headquarters." 
 
 "I do not go to Sonya Demidoff s because it is 
 the Social-Democratic headquarters if it is. I go 
 there because she and her friends are all that make 
 life in Russia supportable." 
 
 "So I supposed. Particularly her friends." 
 
 "I m sick of your insinuations. If you have any 
 thing to say, say it like a man. If not, keep still." 
 
 "How delicately you put things!" 
 
 "I ve heard too many bitter things put delicately. 
 Since we are to leave Zhergan next week, I shall 
 make the most of Sonya in the meantime." 
 
 "And her friends?" 
 
 "And her friends." 
 
 "Your frankness is astonishing." 
 
 "Not unless it is wilfully misunderstood. Lack of 
 frankness is spoiling our life, Fedya." 
 
 "Lack of consideration for my wishes has some 
 thing to do with the spoiling." 
 
 "There is nothing I would not do," she said with 
 a sudden appeal to him in her eyes and voice, " if 
 you asked it in the spirit of love."
 
 306 THE CHASM 
 
 "Said spirit to be turned on at will like a gas-jet? 
 You say and do things that make such a spirit im 
 possible, and then make my not having it an excuse 
 for the things you do." 
 
 "What things do I do? I hold certain opinions. 
 I see certain people. These things need no excuse." 
 
 They went their ways without reconciliation, but 
 Marion did not go that day or the next to Sonya s. 
 She kept looking for a letter or telegram from 
 Walt. She thought by now he must be in Europe. 
 The third morning she mentioned to her husband 
 the fact that she had not been to the dressmaker s. 
 
 "Wonderful!" he said. 
 
 She rang for a page. "Ironic comment is the 
 only reward for sacrificing one s wishes to yours," 
 she said. 
 
 "Must there be a reward ?" 
 
 "Do you think observing your wishes such a vir 
 tue as to be its own reward? I do not. She told 
 the page to have Davuidka bring around the car 
 riage. "I am going to Sonya s," she said, and went 
 to put on her coat and hat. 
 
 It was the day before election. Marion had al 
 most given up hope of Walt s coming in time. If 
 he did not let her know where to reach him, the best 
 she could do was to let him come to Zhergan and 
 leave there a letter telling him where she and Fedya 
 had gone. Her thoughts turning to Sonya, who 
 was about to drop out of her life, she began to get 
 the blues. It was a shame she had sacrificed for 
 no result these last two days. It might well be 
 that Grenning would now be too busy with the elec 
 tion to have the farewell talk she had planned.
 
 THE CHASM 307 
 
 As her carriage passed the brickyard and came 
 in sight of the railway station, Davuidka called, 
 "The soldiers!" and pointed with his whip to a line 
 of white tunics and bayonets. They were drawn up 
 in front of the passenger coach of the train about to 
 leave for Mitau. 
 
 As the Hohenfels droshky came closer, a man 
 with his wrists handcuffed was pushed into one of 
 the compartments. Before the door was shut on 
 him, he turned to look back at someone in the 
 crowd. Marion saw that it was Grenning. His 
 face was white and grim, his head held as though 
 the blow of a rifle-butt on the side of it would not 
 have made his neck bend. 
 
 Marion ordered Davuidka to turn back to the 
 station gate. He obeyed mechanically, and then, 
 too late for any possible effect, voiced his protest: 
 "Better keep away from there, little mistress 1" 
 
 She did not even hear him. She sprang from 
 the carriage and hastened through the station with 
 the feeling that somehow she must put a stop to 
 that. There were forty or fifty people kept back 
 from the train by the wall of soldiers. In the 
 crowd she caught sight of Sonya, and started toward 
 her. Sonya ran to meet her. "I want money," 
 she said, under her breath. "Have you money? 
 Quick if you have I must get a ticket for Riga." 
 
 Marion reached for her purse. 
 
 "Don t give it to her," said a man s voice at Mar 
 ion s elbow. She gave a start, then saw it was 
 Kaminsky. "Sonya : they ll spot you if you rush off 
 on this train. You have no permit. You haven t 
 even closed your shop."
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "You close it." 
 
 Kaminsky turned to Marion. "Don t give her 
 money till after this train goes," he urged. 
 
 "She is judge of her own acts," said Marion, and 
 opened her purse. 
 
 Kaminsky shook his head, his eyes on Marion s. 
 "They ll get her sure if you do!" warned he. The 
 train-guard closed the last compartment, signaled 
 the engineer, and the train started. A look of re 
 lief came into Kaminsky s eyes, and into Sonya s a 
 look of sheer despair. As the coach glided by, they 
 looked, but could not see Grenning. At the window 
 of his compartment sat soldiers. Sonya gave them 
 a look of hatred. "If only everyone hadn t been 
 at work!" groaned she. 
 
 "You can go tonight, Sonya," said Kaminsky. 
 "It is ever so much better. I will go with you. 
 Zhergan is getting too hot. I promise you I will do 
 all man can do in Riga for Grenning. But it can t 
 be done in an hour, nor a day. You and I must 
 disappear from the knowledge of the police. Gren 
 ning may have to tell them about us." 
 
 "He never will!" cried Sonya. 
 
 "We will get permits to go to Odessa, but in 
 Mitau our official existence ends pointing toward 
 Odessa. Another man and woman will arrive in Riga 
 late tonight." 
 
 "How about me?" asked Marion. 
 
 "Leave Russia." 
 
 "Grenning will never tell them about us," insisted 
 Sonya. 
 
 "Grenning won t," said Kaminsky. 
 
 Sonya writhed.
 
 THE CHASM 309 
 
 "Sikorsky is looking at us," warned Kaminsky. 
 "He will know Grenning is our only business at this 
 train." 
 
 To Sikorsky personally the three were two wo 
 men who had resisted his charms, and a Jew the 
 despised race. 
 
 "Can you come to Sonya s?" asked Kaminsky. 
 
 "Yes. Come both of you in my carriage." 
 
 "Not all three. Take Sonya. I ll join you." 
 He turned and walked away. 
 
 The two went out and got into the carriage. "Can 
 it be they have arrested Grenning merely to prevent 
 his election?" asked Marion hopefully as they 
 drove away from the station. She spoke French so 
 Davuidka could not understand. 
 
 Sonya shook her head. 
 
 "What do you hope to do in Riga, Sonya? I 
 know you must go for your own sake, but what 
 have you planned?" 
 
 "I must get poison to him." 
 
 Her quietness was uncanny, suggesting to Marion 
 that the shock of seeing the arrest and the thought 
 of what it meant had unbalanced her. How could 
 a normal mind accept that terrible conclusion as in 
 evitable? Was Kaminsky s talk of doing some 
 thing in Riga meant only to lessen Sonya s despair? 
 
 "He may not know enough to take poison when 
 they finish." 
 
 The horror deepened for Marion, but she gave 
 up the idea of madness in Sonya. But what hope 
 lessness! She remembered Prince Demidoff. His 
 daughter had hoped too long in vain. 
 
 They left the carriage at the inn stable. As they
 
 310 THE CHASM 
 
 drove up, the hostler was saying to a well-to-do 
 muzhik, "Vote for him anyway." When they saw 
 Sonya, the two men gave her a look of comprehen 
 sion and sympathy. 
 
 As they walked to Sonya s, Marion tried to get 
 the girl to think of what she was to do with her 
 books and things. That only made her think of 
 Grenning s books and instruments there in his rooms 
 unused. The police had locked and sealed the 
 doors and taken the keys. 
 
 At the shop they met Fritz Dumpe with Sonya s 
 mail. "Oh our mail!" exclaimed Marion. "Let 
 me see the mail for the manor!" The postman 
 found it and handed it to her. She ran it over. 
 Nothing! 
 
 The mail-carrier wanted to know about Gren- 
 ning. "If Mitrevitz only knew!" he exclaimed. 
 "Mitrevitz would stop the train and take Gren- 
 ning off." 
 
 Sonya s eyes lit up, but only for an instant. There 
 was no possible way to let Mitrevitz know. Dumpe 
 gave her her mail. "You might as well take Ka- 
 minsky s too," he said. "No use leaving it lie around. 
 There s a letter from Riga came this morning. 
 The censor doesn t get a chance to read Kaminsky s 
 letters." He gave a wink. The limit he had 
 placed on the otherwise unlimited power of the 
 censor was pure joy to him. 
 
 "Comrade Dumpe," said Marion, "does the cen 
 sor ever hold out letters for the manor?" 
 
 "I never thought to see. I can find out. He 
 didn t use to. Does it matter much, I mean?" 
 
 "I m expecting nothing political," said Marion.
 
 THE CHASM 311 
 
 "I was just wondering yes, find out if any letter 
 for me has not been delivered. I don t think any 
 thing can ever darken the world for you, Comrade 
 Dumpe," she ended, glancing at Sonya. At "com 
 rade" as a substitute for the "master" disguised in 
 "Mr.," the Countess had sometimes smiled as a 
 piece of make-believe a pretense that the visioned 
 future was already here; but addressing the mail- 
 carrier, she found no other form of speech that 
 sounded right. 
 
 Comrade Dumpe admitted he liked being alive. 
 
 When Kaminsky came, Marion gave him the let 
 ter from Riga, and waited to see if it threw any 
 light on the arrest. 
 
 Kaminsky tore it open, and sat down to read it. 
 It was in familiar cipher. The others watched his 
 expression. "Smika is a maniac," he said. "Some 
 where in the ruins they learned of Grenning." 
 
 "In the ruins of Grenning will they learn of us?" 
 thought Marion. 
 
 "Why didn t your man telegraph?" Sonya de 
 manded passionately. 
 
 Kaminsky shook his head. "The night operator 
 here is against us. Listen to this. It s from our 
 man in the detective division of the Riga police. 
 I can t stay here much longer. If I did, I d turn 
 monster like Gregus and Davus. I make an ex 
 cuse to be away from the torture chamber, and then 
 find a horrible fascination drawing me to it. I un 
 derstand now how the autocracy can get men to do 
 this work. They come to crave it. 
 
 Sonya sprang up, gave Kaminsky a look of bitter 
 ness, and went out into the shop.
 
 312 THE CHASM 
 
 "I think she understands," said Kaminsky. "It 
 hits too hard now. Do you understand?" 
 
 "Understand! Absolutely not." 
 
 "You ought to. This is good propaganda. He 
 read: The shock on the nerves of a man who tears 
 out another s finger-nail and feels his victim quiver 
 is intense. This intense sensation soon becomes an 
 object of desire. I understand the cat with the 
 mouse. I understand the tortures inflicted by sav 
 ages. I understand Gregus and Davus and Zim- 
 mermann. The trade of Gregus has reshaped him 
 in a way I do not care to be reshaped. The sight 
 of someone s agony is all that gives him sexual grati 
 fication. He awaits the hour of torture as a normal 
 youth awaits a night with a woman. For women 
 he cares nothing. Davus is still one step from that. 
 He rushed from the torture chamber to wreak his 
 lust upon the women of the town. I think probably 
 the savages who gave no sign of pain under torture 
 so acted in order to deprive their enemies of actual 
 physical gratification. Gregus and Davus and Zim- 
 mermann are not so robbed of their delight by mod 
 ern victims. There are screams of horror that go 
 to the marrow of whomsoever hears. 
 
 "Is there no one to kill these men?" said Marion 
 hoarsely. Something that had been soft in her soul 
 seemed to harden into steel. 
 
 "Yes," Kaminsky answered, significantly. "Or 
 better the men who set these at this work. Do 
 you blame the Social Revolutionists for looking 
 coldly on a parliament called by this government? 
 Do you blame us for grasping terrorism as a 
 weapon?"
 
 THE CHASM 313 
 
 "I blame you for nothing! I could kill these men 
 with my own hands ! I blame the civilized world 
 for permitting such a regime as this to remain on 
 earth!" 
 
 "Permitting it! The financiers of the civilized 
 world maintain it! The wages of Gregus are paid 
 with the money of New York bondbuyers." 
 
 "Yes," thought Marion bitterly, "and Feodor de 
 Hohenfels maintains it!" 
 
 Sonya came and stood in the doorway. "Nach- 
 man," she said, passionately, "the thing to think 
 about today is Grenning on his way to the claws of 
 Gregus!" 
 
 "As though I were not here shaping a force for 
 his deliverance!" thought Kaminsky resentfully; but 
 instead of defending himself, he preferred to let 
 Marion suspect him of lukewarmness, knowing with 
 quick instinct that if she did not place too much 
 faith in him she would feel more powerfully the im 
 pulse to act herself. She looked at him expectantly, 
 and he kept silent. 
 
 "What are you going to do?" she asked. 
 
 "I will not know till I get to Riga and see." 
 
 "Why can t your police confederate contrive 
 Grenning s escape?" 
 
 "I don t know. But he would have contrived 
 Smika s if he had had the power." 
 
 "He can carry poison," said Sonya, softly. 
 "Poison is beautiful, unruining death!" 
 
 "Sonya, why do you think of the last resort first?" 
 cried Marion. "Kaminsky, can these insane beasts 
 be bought?" 
 
 "Undoubtedly they can," replied the Jew. "Only
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 what of the buyer? His offer is a confession of 
 complicity. What is to prevent their seizing him?" 
 
 Marion looked at him with a decreasing opinion 
 of his courage and resourcefulness. "Some way 
 must be found!" she said. "What time does your 
 train go tonight?" 
 
 "Seven o clock." 
 
 "We are going anyhow day after tomorrow," 
 she mused. 
 
 "Day after tomorrow is long enough to make the 
 Grenning you knew a maimed old man!" cried 
 Sonya. "Come to Riga tonight." 
 
 "I may have to, to get the money," said Marion. 
 She saw the situation calling for the sacrifice of her 
 last chance of being in Zhergan when Walt ar 
 rived. "How much do you think it will take, Ka- 
 minsky?" 
 
 "I do not know. We have never had enough 
 money to try it." 
 
 "Five thousand roubles? Ten thousand? Twen 
 ty-five?" 
 
 "Really I ve no idea. Terrible things are done 
 for much less than five thousand. But the larger 
 the sum the greater temptation and surer result." 
 
 "Could I give you a check on Riga?" 
 
 "A check! To establish my connection with you, 
 and yours with me, make me declare my presence 
 officially in Riga, and " 
 
 "No, no," she interrupted. "I see it won t do." 
 She wondered what excuse she could give Feodor. 
 Well, he would have to think what he would. "I ll 
 go tonight," she said, and rose.
 
 THE CHASM 315 
 
 "Much the best," said Kaminsky. "They can 
 not lay hands on you so easily in a large city. Riga 
 is a door from Russia. If necessary we can slip 
 you through on an emigrant ship." 
 
 Sonya came and clung to Marion and sobbed 
 convulsively. 
 
 "You of all people, Sonya !" 
 
 Sonya tried in vain to stop. "I could stand 
 everything till I began to hope!" 
 
 All that day at home Marion was tense with feel 
 ing of danger and uncertainty. At luncheon she 
 could not eat. In her mind ideas independent of 
 her will were blazing, leading to others, passing. 
 "It thought" within her as one says "it rains." 
 She no longer felt free as of old to choose her way. 
 Her way was being marked for her by things, 
 events, outside herself. She had to follow the 
 marks. She noticed the visible beat of her pulse in two 
 places on her wrist. She nodded to the servants 
 to withdraw. 
 
 "Did you hear about Grenning?" She spoke with 
 a calmness that both surprised and reassured her. 
 
 "Kronberg came and told me," replied Count 
 Feodor. 
 
 "Are you going to do anything?" 
 
 "I?" 
 
 "I thought you might wish to use your influence 
 to keep a man like that from being tortured." 
 
 "I fail to see " He paused. 
 
 She waited. 
 
 "No," he said. "I have no reason to suppose 
 him innocent of the charge against him. If I
 
 316 THE CHASM 
 
 thought it was merely pity for the man which moved 
 you " 
 
 "What then?" 
 
 He smiled. "I should then preach a sermon on the 
 morbid psychology of pity." 
 
 She was anything but amused. "What is the 
 charge against Grenning?" 
 
 "Being a spy. Giving secret information to Mi- 
 trevitz. Apparently it s about the thing Sikorsky 
 wanted to accuse me of." He said this nonchalant 
 ly; then suddenly looked keenly at Marion. He 
 leaned abruptly forward, his elbow on the table, 
 palm up, forefinger pointing toward her, and opened 
 his lips to speak then checked his fierce question, 
 sat back, and was thinking hard. 
 
 "I am going to Riga tonight," she said. 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 "To free Grenning." 
 
 He tried to beat down her eyes with his. She 
 paid no attention, and went on, "I may have to stay 
 for a time in Riga. I can rejoin you from there 
 in " She started to say St. Petersburg, but re 
 membered that that city was located in Russia. "If 
 Bradfield comes here before you leave, I wish you 
 would tell him to come to see me in Riga. I will 
 have to send you my Riga address tomorrow." 
 
 "Is this an avowal of your liaison?" demanded 
 Count Feodor. 
 
 "No since I have none." 
 
 "The information Grenning is accused of furnish 
 ing was contained in the Governor General s letter 
 which I read to you. Where did Grenning get it?
 
 THE CHASM 317 
 
 Did you tell him about that intended night attack?" 
 
 "If I had, it would imply no liaison." 
 
 "Why then should you tell him?" 
 
 She gave a gesture of impatience. U I may as 
 well tell you. I did not give that or any other in 
 formation to Grenning. He is no spy. That in 
 formation crossed the chasm from government to 
 revolutionist when it passed from you to me. It 
 reached Mitrevitz through mel" 
 
 "What treachery!" He spoke with loathing. "A 
 spy in one s own bed!" 
 
 "Treachery! To what? The Russian govern 
 ment? I hate and despise it! My motive when I 
 did it was merely to save Mitrevitz and his men 
 from its horrible tortures. Since then I have ad 
 vanced. I would do it now to help destroy your 
 hateful government." 
 
 "I am not a supporter of the government." 
 
 "What childish folly! You are! You fight the 
 only forces that can end it. And it supports you 
 your property, your title. For all you have ever 
 done or will do the bureaucracy would go on un 
 changed forever. You profit by the grinding of the 
 people which it decrees and bloodily enforces. In 
 music you try to exalt existing economic misery as 
 something beautiful!" 
 
 "Don t go into esthetics. You know nothing 
 about it. In all you say about this business you show 
 yourself morally obtuse. That act of yours was 
 treachery to me!" 
 
 "How unconsciously and completely you identify 
 your interest with that of the government ! Don t
 
 318 THE CHASM 
 
 say treachery to me I A .man who sends govern 
 ment troops against the revolutionists is a traitor 
 to the Russian people!" 
 
 "And I took you for a natural aristocrat! You 
 are simply crazy with your democratic rot!" 
 
 "One must be a block of wood to remain sane in 
 Russia." 
 
 "Do you realize that I swore to Sikorsky that I 
 had revealed the government plans to no one? 
 What do you suppose will happen when what you 
 have done comes out?" 
 
 "Is that all you can think of that you may be 
 caught in a lie a lie you were proud of when 
 what I have done comes out?" 
 
 He saw scorn deepening in her eyes, and turned 
 red. "Do you expect to go on living with me?" he 
 demanded. 
 
 "I have been wondering. I had not made up my 
 mind. But " 
 
 "Yes, but ! You hate the government, and 
 however falsely, you identify me with it. The in 
 ference is obvious." 
 
 "I do not hate you. I made up my mind this 
 morning to be guilty of no more well-intentioned 
 deceit toward you. I meant to tell you that I no 
 longer have any respect for any Russian who is not 
 a revolutionist. But now a man whose wife may 
 
 be given into the hands of insane human beasts 
 
 And you think only of some inconvenience to your 
 self! One can approve the egotism of a large na 
 ture. But this! You have a very much smaller 
 soul than I thought possible !" 
 
 "That is too much! Insults like these are unfor-
 
 THE CHASM 319 
 
 givable. Our living together is out of the question." 
 She sat quiet a moment, wondering that the final 
 knowledge of the death of love should be so pain 
 less. "I thank you really for deciding. I give 
 you credit for at least not pretending to feel things 
 you do not." 
 
 "I find I have no talent for husbandhood," he 
 said, relieved of his fear of heroics. "Approach 
 and capture charm. Possession cloys." 
 
 "Possession? Yes, that is your antique error! 
 Oh, I am glad we have no baby!" She rose quickly, 
 left the room, ran upstairs, and locked her door, 
 before she broke down.
 
 XII 
 
 NEXT morning the Countess de Hohenfels s 
 slumber was broken by the unaccustomed 
 clink of iron-shod hoofs on paving-stones, the 
 rumble of wheels, the melancholy chant of city 
 street cries. She knew it could not be Chicago; 
 she was afraid it was St. Petersburg; and then link 
 ing the life of to-day with that of yesterday, she 
 made out the large hotel room in which she lay 
 alone, and murmured "Riga!" Riga, she knew, 
 was more strange and terrible than St. Petersburg, 
 but why? "Grenning!" Somewhere in this city lay 
 Grenning. Already Gregus must have laid eyes on 
 him eyes of terrible lust! That was the over- 
 towering, difficult, immediate thing to free Gren 
 ning! She looked at her watch. It was too early 
 to do anything, but her desire for action, her feeling 
 that an unforeseen emergency might arise at any 
 time, forced her to rise and begin dressing. 
 
 The events of the night before crowded through 
 her mind her departure alone driven for the last 
 time by Davuidka the lights of Feyda s manor far 
 in the night last seen from her car window the 
 railway journey with Sonya, tense to the breaking 
 point, and Kaminsky, watching everyone without 
 showing it her open farewell to the two, acted for 
 
 320
 
 THE CHASM 321 
 
 the benefit of detectives in Mitau. There the revo 
 lutionists were to help Sonya and Kaminsky change 
 their names, passports, destinations, clothes, pro 
 fessions, personalities. They would leave Mitau a 
 third-guild leather-merchant and his wife. They 
 must be now in Riga in rooms over a German 
 bookseller s in the Kaufstrasse. Marion wanted to 
 rejoin Sonya as soon as possible. Sonya had urged 
 her to leave them what money she could and get 
 away from Russia at once, but the girl was under 
 terrible strain, was likely to go all to pieces if they 
 failed to save Grenning, and Marion definitely de 
 clined to leave the best friend she had in Russia 
 like that. She was going to stay till Grenning was 
 free or all hope gone. The Countess de Hohen- 
 fels was to exist just long enough to get her money 
 from the Riga bank. She had written from Zher- 
 gan that she would call personally this morning. 
 As soon as she had that money the Countess would 
 disappear. 
 
 She was sorry for Walt- and for herself after 
 his long journey from America. He would try to 
 trace her and would lose the trail. There seemed 
 to be no help for it. The nets were being drawn 
 too tight to risk exposure a single unnecessary hour. 
 The hotel people might already be asking how it 
 happened that the Countess de Hohenfels came in 
 in the night alone. Wishing now that she had 
 learned to use it better, she took from beneath the 
 bed and put into her handbag her automatic pistol. 
 Fedya had given it to her. The thought of Fedya, 
 the memory of the first days of their marriage, swept 
 her soul. She stood still, thinking; then slowly
 
 322 THE CHASM 
 
 shook her head. The thought of him had nothing 
 for her but deadening of heart. It was over! 
 
 Her soul had been arctic yesterday afternoon in 
 that final, formal conference in which Count Feo- 
 dor discussed the question of divorce. He assured 
 her that under ordinary circumstances he would of 
 course think of nothing but of allowing her to ob 
 tain it though the Russian law would not in that 
 case permit him to remarry. "Not that I wish to 
 remarry," he explained, " at least till after I have 
 lived the best of life. But the time will come when 
 there should be an heir to the name of Hohenfels. 
 Of course legitimization is possible, but since you 
 will not live in Russia, and will therefore not be 
 subject to the restrictions of the Russian law " 
 
 "Of course," she had answered. "Obtain the di 
 vorce yourself." 
 
 "Thank you. Is there any reason for delay in 
 the matter?" 
 
 "I have none." It did not seem real to her 
 the iron tone between her and the man who had been 
 her lover and her husband. 
 
 She had impressed even herself as a person with 
 out emotion. Mayor Ronke had come at her re 
 quest to the manor/ She empowered him to act as 
 her advocate in the suit to be brought in Mitau, in 
 structing him not to contest. Through him she com 
 pleted arrangements for the transfer to the Count 
 de Hohenfels of the Zhergan estate and her Kieff- 
 Vorones stock, and the Mayor, dazed by the magni 
 tude of his realized and prospective fees, sent her 
 her police permit to leave Zhergan and the pass 
 port entitling her to leave Russia. She was dubious,
 
 THE CHASM 323 
 
 in view of her known friendship with Grenning, 
 whether the national and Riga authorities would 
 permit her to leave. She was not at all sure that 
 Tschulitsky and Sikorsky, connecting her flight with 
 Grenning s arrest, would not today be taking steps 
 
 through the detective division She shuddered, 
 
 opened her handbag, made sure again of the readi 
 ness of the pistol. 
 
 She met no obstacles, after her coffee and rolls, 
 in paying her hotel bill, conveying the impression 
 that she was leaving that day for America, and get 
 ting away in a cab for the Bank of Riga. Watch 
 ing the sidewalk crowds it struck her that Brad- 
 field might this very day be passing through Riga 
 on his way to Zhergan; and as soon as she began to 
 look for him several men at a distance resembled 
 him. 
 
 At the bank, a distinguished-looking polyglot 
 gentleman with frock-coat and monocle received her 
 with formal hospitality in a room with semiparti- 
 tions of hard wood a room carefully unsuggestive 
 of bookkeeping. After waiting a few minutes in 
 trepidation lest they should require inconvenient 
 identification, the Countess learned that they had re 
 ceived her letter. She made out a check for the 
 exact amount that stood to her credit in the house 
 nearly thirty thousand roubles. 
 
 The bank-clerk asked in what form she desired 
 the money, noted her reply on a small piece of paper, 
 touched a button, and with no word spoken, handed 
 check and note to a uniformed bank messenger, and 
 made a polite remark about the weather. In a few 
 minutes the messenger returned with a few gold and
 
 324 THE CHASM 
 
 silver coins, stacked on a little green felt mat on a 
 salver, and three packets of bank-notes ten one 
 thousand rouble notes, the rest in hundreds the 
 largest denomination the men for whom the money 
 was intended might be willing to accept. 
 
 Noting her dismay at the bulk of the packets, the 
 clerk observed it was quite a sum to carry person 
 ally. 
 
 She explained that she was about to make a visit 
 to America whereat the financial gentleman looked 
 surprised. "We can furnish you with American cur 
 rency," he said. 
 
 She mentioned obligations to be met before she 
 sailed, put the Russian money in her handbag, and 
 left the bank uneasy. No one appeared to be fol 
 lowing her, but instead of driving to her rendezvous 
 in the Kaufstrasse she went to the warehouse of the 
 United States Plow Company, leaving her cab in 
 front of the office. 
 
 Introducing herself to her father s Riga agent, 
 and incidentally saying things that convinced him 
 she was really the president s daughter, she ar 
 ranged to have her trunks and boxes coming from 
 Zhergan received and held subject to her order. 
 The American gave her sailing lists of the steamers 
 out of Riga. She noticed that there were none after 
 November, the gulf being ice-bound in mid-winter. 
 On the pretense of wishing to see it, she went 
 through the warehouse. Recognizing a young man 
 she had known by sight in Moline, she felt like hug 
 ging him. She asked him his name, and inadvertent 
 ly left him full of visions of romantic promotion. 
 She gave him the money to pay off the cabman
 
 THE CHASM 325 
 
 in front of the office after awhile and went out 
 on the other side of the great warehouse. 
 
 On foot, suit case in one hand, in the other the 
 handbag whose loss would be fatal, she found the 
 crowded Kaufstrasse, and the number, and the near 
 sighted German bookseller s, and climbed to a not 
 very elegant third-story furnished flat. Sonya was 
 there waiting. Marion held her in her arms. She 
 would hardly have recognized her. Poor Sonya ! It 
 was not wholly the artificial changes that disguised 
 and aged her. Thoughts that came in the nigh t 
 must have been dreadful to her. 
 
 Kaminsky had not yet returned from an interview 
 with his informant of the detective division the 
 revolutionary spy in the third section of the Riga 
 police, from whom he expected to learn just what 
 could be done for Grenning. 
 
 Sonya had already been out and located the prison 
 in which Grenning was confined. It stood in a small, 
 irregular, cobble-stoned plaza. The narrow, pre- 
 Russian streets that led to it ran up-hill, and from it 
 there was a distant glimpse of the Dwina sliding 
 to the gulf. It was a long, gray-plastered, three- 
 story building with iron-shuttered windows, not much 
 different from the surrounding buildings except that 
 its walls bore no crudely frescoed pictures of boots, 
 keys, clothing, or other objects for sale. From the 
 front the only places Sonya could see into were a 
 wide doorway opening into a corridor paved with 
 square brown bricks or tiles, and beside this a small 
 uncarpeted business office with roller-top desks, low 
 pilastered wooden railings with gates, and two or 
 three black horsehair sofas somewhat humpy and
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 worn through in spots to dingy once-white canvas. 
 There was an ikon in one corner, and a gilt-framed, 
 fly-specked lithograph of Tsar Nicholas II on the 
 unpapered wall. 
 
 There were buildings or blind walls across the 
 streets and alleys which, at one time, had led past 
 the rear of that tragic, commonplace-looking struc 
 ture, in some dim cell of which sat Ferdinand Gren- 
 ning, still a high-souled, unmutilated man with sur 
 geon s fingers still sound and flexible. Walking past 
 casuflly, her eyes taking in everything with the in 
 tensity of fever, went Sonya Demidoff, who loved 
 that man, and knew her native land as a place unfit 
 for the mating of man and woman. 
 
 Sonya going to answer a knock at the door of the 
 apartment, Marion instinctively caught up her 
 handbag, thinking how useless her pistol would be 
 shut away with the money inside the bag. The 
 tradesman Sonya permitted to walk in past her 
 looked at Marion with a grunt of satisfaction. "I 
 see you got it," said he, nodding at the handbag, 
 and she finally realized it was Kaminsky. 
 
 He told them there were fifteen revolutionists be 
 sides Grenning and Smika being held in the central 
 prison and in the station of the detective division for 
 trial by a field court-martial which might not sit for 
 several weeks. It was illegal extension of the powers 
 of the field court-martial, but seeking legal redress 
 was futile. The third section would have ample 
 time in which to secure "confessions." He did not 
 tell the women that Grenning had already been tak 
 en to look at the glaring, cowering wreck of the 
 forester Smika in order that a vivid picture of what
 
 THE CHASM 327 
 
 was in store for him might be working on his mind. 
 
 "What s to be done for Grenning?" demanded 
 Sonya. 
 
 "We thought of two things," said Kaminsky. 
 "Comrade M. will be in charge of the station next 
 Wednesday night. If he ordered the warder and 
 turnkey to release Grenning there is no way to keep 
 Thursday morning s investigation from locating re 
 sponsibility." 
 
 "Let M. do it and leave Russia with us," Marion 
 urged. 
 
 Kaminsky shook his head. "He is much too valu 
 able where he is." He looked at Marion. "No one 
 man among us" he said, "need expect to have the 
 interests of many sacrificed for him. Let me do 
 Grenning justice he would not have it." 
 
 Sonya and Marion exchanged a glance recogniz 
 ing the predominance of the Cause. "I do not see 
 that he s of much value if he can t keep men from 
 being tortured," said Marion unreasonably. 
 
 "Do you remember he let us know of Smika s ar 
 rest? And when Smika told of Grenning, Grenning 
 was warned by M. through me." 
 
 "Is that warning to be made a reason for doing 
 nothing for Grenning?" flashed Sonya. 
 
 "No, Sonya. M. will try the other thing we 
 thought of. It s this: the first chance he gets he s 
 going to let Davus know there s ten thousand roubles 
 for the escape of Grenning non-political source 
 personal interest of a wealthy noblewoman. Davus 
 is chief would investigate himself. M. will mere 
 ly mention as a piece of gossip that this offer has 
 been made to him. Davus may look it up himself.
 
 328 THE CHASM 
 
 The drawback is someone has to be named finally 
 as the person who will pay the money, and if Davus 
 double-crosses " 
 
 "Tell M. to name me," said Sonya. "I am here 
 for just that thing." 
 
 "Not exactly," said Kaminsky. "If that has to 
 be done I ll do it with every precaution. We 
 might be able to leave the money in a stipulated 
 place. The whole thing depends on how Davus re 
 acts. You mustn t expect the very first thing we try 
 to succeed, Sonya. You must be patient. It may be 
 two or three days before M. can find the right time 
 and place to speak to Davus." He turned to Marion. 
 "Are you going to sail?" 
 
 "Why no," she answered. "We settled that last 
 night." 
 
 "Are you sure you don t want to? Do you realize 
 the risk?" 
 
 "I realize. I can t leave." 
 
 "All right. In that case a woman, an English 
 governess out of a place, will sail to-day for London 
 as Countess de Hohenfels. We pay her passage and 
 five hundred roubles in consideration of risk of ar 
 rest. Give me the money, your passport, etc., and 
 I ll bring you hers. No, I ll bring new papers and 
 you ll not risk being found ignorant of your own 
 history. You are Miss Baker, fresh from England, 
 looking for a governess s place. Make yourself 
 older, not so good-looking." 
 
 Marion gave him the money and papers. 
 
 "You understand the advantage," he said. "The 
 police mark you down out of the country and won t
 
 THE CHASM 329 
 
 look for you here if Grenning if in any way 
 through your husband, through anyone in Zher- 
 gan they trace to you that message warning 
 Mitrevitz." 
 
 He went to close the bargain with the English 
 woman and came back at noon with Miss Baker s 
 English passport, registered and stamped with the 
 regular notice that she could not leave Russia with 
 out a police permit. He also had the police permit 
 signed but undated, and proper papers for Sonya, 
 Grenning, and himself though he said he himself 
 would not leave the country unless some new de 
 velopments made his stay too risky. 
 
 An event next morning made Marion think it 
 risky enough as it was. She was playing the un 
 wonted role of housemaid, cleaning her room after 
 breakfast, when she heard Sonya and Kaminsky 
 talking with some men in the front room. She looked 
 in, and nearly dropped at the sight of two police 
 officers, questioning Sonya and Kaminsky and mak 
 ing notes of their replies. "Traced from Zhergan !" 
 thought she. "They ve established our connection 
 with Grenning." 
 
 "And you?" demanded one of the officers, glaring 
 at her. 
 
 "I don t understand," she said. 
 
 "She doesn t speak much Russian," said Sonya. 
 
 "The Englishwoman?" asked the other officer. 
 
 "Yes," said Kaminsky. "The roomer." 
 
 Marion saw a gleam of hope. 
 
 "They ll want to see your passport," said Sonya 
 in French.
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 Going to get it, Marion had a moment to recover, 
 to hide her thirty thousand roubles, and throw her 
 self into her part. 
 
 At the close of their domiciliary visit the officers 
 informed the leather merchant that he was fined 
 one hundred roubles for taking up residence without 
 permit. Kaminsky protested that the party who sub 
 let him the apartment told him he would make every 
 thing straight with the authorities. Finally yielding 
 the principle sullenly in the face of mysterious 
 threats, he made the officers think he could not scrape 
 up one hundred roubles between himself and his 
 wife, and appealed to their roomer, Miss Baker, to 
 advance them enough to make up the fine. The of 
 ficers pocketed it and departed, satisfied they had 
 secured all the traffic would bear. 
 
 As soon as they were gone Marion nearly col 
 lapsed. 
 
 "They might have caught us at a worse time," 
 said Kaminsky consolingly. "These petty grafters 
 are not the ones we have to look out for. They con 
 sider us dry for the present. It was a little hard on 
 you, Countess Marion, because you didn t know 
 their brand. You ll have more confidence next 
 time." 
 
 They scanned the evening paper for indication 
 whether the sham Countess de Hohenfels had been 
 intercepted at the dock. 
 
 "Here!" exclaimed Sonya, catching the name 
 Countess de Hohenfels. They found it was a dis 
 patch from Mitau announcing that Count Feodor de 
 Hohenfels had filed a petition for divorce from the 
 Countess Marion, his American wife, and that the
 
 THE CHASM 331 
 
 case would be heard at an early date before the Mag 
 istrate Intendant Bratavzinsky. Count Feodor, the 
 dispatch added, was being detained, until after the 
 hearing, from an important journey to Rome. 
 
 "What an inconvenience!" murmured Marion. 
 
 Sonya came and put her arm around her. "You 
 didn t tell me this," she said reproachfully. "Have 
 I been too full of my own fear and grief?" 
 
 "How could you help it?" answered Marion, 
 shuddering. "I am not so much in need of sym 
 pathy now for this the mere legal forms. The 
 real end of things was when love flickered and went 
 out." 
 
 To Kaminsky, who would have allowed neither 
 Russian state nor church to sanction or dissolve a 
 marriage of his, Marion s view of it was so much a 
 platitude that he took refuge from it in the election 
 reports. 
 
 "Here s a dispatch from Zhergan," he said, and 
 read: "The judges of election threw out the votes 
 of Dr. Ferdinand Grenning, Social-Democrat, issu 
 ing a statement that he had furnished secret informa 
 tion to a band of outlaws and marauders guilty of 
 armed resistance to the authority of Holy Russia." 
 
 "But he hasn t been tried!" cried Marion. "How 
 can those election judges say that?" 
 
 "The odd thing about it is that for once their 
 statement happens to be true," said Kaminsky. 
 
 "Outlaws and marauders isn t true." 
 
 "Marauders isn t. Baron Medin, Conservative, 
 was declared elected, he having a majority of the 
 legal votes." 
 
 "That s why Count Hohenfels is going to Rome,"
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 said Marion, adding mentally " and Callignano." 
 She found no pang of jealousy in the thought. 
 
 "Grenning is legally a member of the Duma," 
 mused Kaminsky. "Unless we buy his way out, it 
 will be a member of the imperial Duma here in 
 Riga that they " 
 
 "It doesn t say he had a majority," objected Son- 
 ya. 
 
 "They would not otherwise have bothered to 
 throw out his vote." 
 
 "Oh!" cried Sonya. "Just one more day! If 
 Smika had held out another day Ferdinand would 
 have been protected by uncontested Duma member 
 ship!" 
 
 "Do you think that would have stopped them, 
 Sonya? Don t break your heart about that!" 
 
 "And here we are doing nothing!" cried Sonya. 
 "We ought not to rely on M. He does nothing 
 because of his idea it s wrong to single out one man 
 and do anything for him!" 
 
 "Only when doing something for one will hurt 
 the others. M. is doing what he can. I didn t tell 
 you because it came to nothing, but yesterday he ap 
 proached the officer who will be in charge of the 
 station tonight. He let him know there was ten 
 thousand roubles for the escape of a prisoner, think 
 ing this particular officer, who has not yet acquired 
 a taste for torture, would consider ten thousand 
 worth more than his job. The man did, too. He 
 would have been ours but for his fear that M. was a 
 government spotter." 
 
 "The revolutionary police spy feared as a govern 
 ment spotter!" thought Marion, seeing more clear-
 
 THE CHASM 333 
 
 ly the great net of treachery and countertreachery 
 whose meshes run through Russia. 
 
 Kaminsky found out that evening that the ostensi 
 ble Countess de Hohenfels had not been prevented 
 from sailing. But two days later, on Sunday, they 
 learned from Sasha Bratavzinsky, just from Zher- 
 gan, by how narrow a margin she had got through. 
 Yan Sarin, informed of it by the Zhergan day opera 
 tor, had sent Sasha to tell Kaminsky of a cipher tel 
 egram sent to the Riga police that morning calling 
 on them to arrest the Countess de Hohenfels. Riga 
 had replied that the Countess had sailed for Lon 
 don Thursday. Sarin supposed she had, but for 
 Kaminsky s sake and Sonya s, wanted them to know 
 just how much the police knew. Bratavzinsky was 
 astonished when he found Marion still with them. 
 
 "What made them call for the Countess s arrest, 
 Sasha?" asked Kaminsky. 
 
 Sasha glanced at the Countess. "The testimony 
 in the divorce case yesterday in Mitau. I suppose 
 you know about it." 
 
 "No," said Marion, her lips setting firmly. "How 
 should we? Was that in the papers too? What 
 was it?" 
 
 "I didn t see it in the papers, but the divorce was 
 granted by that unspeakable uncle of mine on the 
 ground of improper relations with Dr. Grenning. 
 Sikorsky and the Zhergan detectives jumped at a 
 political connection." 
 
 A hard light came into Marion s eyes. "So he did 
 that 1" she exclaimed. "He never told me there d be 
 such a charge as that. I left it to him, taking it for 
 granted he d be decent."
 
 834 THE CHASM 
 
 "Give the devil his due," said Kaminsky quietly. 
 "There had to be such a charge if there was to be 
 a decree. Everybody understands that." 
 
 "I didn t understand it !" blazed Marion. "Count 
 Feodor knew I didn t. My people won t understand 
 it." 
 
 "Need they hear the details?" 
 
 "What possible evidence could he present?" she 
 demanded of Bratavzinsky. 
 
 "Trina Ronke testified to seeing you come out of 
 the doctor s office one day and she gave the thing 
 the proper color." 
 
 "The little beast!" exclaimed Marion. "Her 
 father in charge of my case did he let that testi 
 mony of hers stand?" 
 
 "Did you instruct him to contest the case?" asked 
 Kaminsky. 
 
 "I did not know it would be such a case !" 
 
 "What s the difference, Marion?" said Sonya. 
 "The whole thing is of that dreadful shackled 
 world we re out of. If chains are cut or broken, 
 what s the difference?" 
 
 "Even in your own Russian circle, Countess Mar 
 ion," said Kaminsky, "since they have to have di 
 vorce, and since they will not leave it to the people 
 who best know whether it s necessary, this kind of 
 testimony is simply a legal necessity and is so under 
 stood. Of course with your double standard the 
 men of your class don t suffer and it s usually the 
 woman who gets the divorce. Outside of high so 
 ciety most thinking people no longer bother with the 
 law at all. The serious thing in this case is the 
 political significance they attach to your connection
 
 THE CHASM 335 
 
 with Grenning. Count Hohenfels should have wait 
 ed till you were out of the country." 
 
 "He may have heard she sailed," said Sonya. 
 
 "And he may have been in such a hurry to get to 
 Rome, he didn t care!" retorted Marion. 
 
 She sat down and wrote a letter to her father, 
 though she dared not mail it till after she was out 
 of Russia. The real facts would set her straight 
 with him at least, though she could hear his inevita 
 ble "I told you so." 
 
 Imbued as she was with the ideas of her American 
 training, she could not accept the point of view of 
 Sonya and Kaminsky. They discounted the crude 
 complication forced by the antiquated divorce law 
 into the delicate human problem. Her it embittered 
 beyond all possibility of future reconciliation with 
 the man who had accused her falsely before the 
 world. 

 
 XIII 
 
 SHAKING snow from their hats, Sonya and 
 Marion came into their apartment after lunch 
 eon; and Kaminsky, stretched out on a lounge, 
 woke up, looked at his watch, and growled because 
 he had been asleep. They paid no attention to him. 
 
 "Snowing?" he said, looking at their coats. "I ve 
 had no lunch." He went to the window. "Say, I 
 meant to tell you last night. Bratavzinsky threw me 
 off. M. told me yesterday. Might interest you." 
 
 "Well, out with it," said Sonya. 
 
 "They ve got an American in the station." 
 
 "An American?" 
 
 "Yes. They arrested him yesterday day before 
 yesterday." 
 
 "What for?" asked Marion, stopping. 
 
 "They read some letter of his saying he was go 
 ing to write up the Russian revolution for some 
 American socialist magazine." 
 
 "What!" gasped Marion, dropping her coat. 
 "What is his name?" 
 
 Kaminsky had not asked. 
 
 "But I have a friend coming ! He wrote that very 
 thing in a letter to me. Was this man s name Brad- 
 field? WaltBradfield?" 
 
 "Didn t hear his name." 
 336
 
 THE CHASM 337 
 
 "Your gardener!" exclaimed Sonya. 
 
 "What a thing to arrest a man for!" cried Mar 
 ion. "They must have read his letter to me. How 
 long have they had this man? Where did he come 
 from?" 
 
 "Saturday s steamer from Hamburg." 
 
 "But Hamburg is where Bradfield landed from 
 America last week! Oh, it s he! Kaminsky, what 
 will they do to him? What can they do to him?" 
 
 "They probably expect to change his mind as to 
 the desirability of studying contemporary Russian 
 history in Russia." 
 
 "I am going to the American consul," said Mar 
 ion. 
 
 "You are an Englishwoman," objected Kaminsky. 
 
 "I am Dave Moulton s daughter!" Her eyes 
 flashed with pleasure, picturing the energy she would 
 put into that consul. She went to the mirror and 
 rubbed energetically at Miss Baker s make-up. 
 
 "Don t you realize you can t possibly appear in 
 your real character in Riga?" demanded Kaminsky, 
 thoroughly awake. "Do you think the business 
 we re in here is some fool girl s masquerade? You ll 
 upset everything. If the police learn you re in Riga 
 it s sheer madness!" 
 
 Marion stopped and thought. "The consul is not 
 going to compare the time I see him with the time 
 I officially sailed. What s more, I ll tell him I m 
 incognito for personal reasons. He probably knows 
 about this wretched divorce. He ll keep still. There 
 isn t one chance in a hundred that the discrepancy 
 will ever come to anybody s attention. If it does, 
 somebody s memory for dates is poor. I can t afford
 
 338 THE CHASM 
 
 to throw away the influence of my relation to one of 
 the most important American interests in Riga. My 
 father could have this consul removed if he wanted 
 to. It won t take me an hour." 
 
 Kaminsky argued in vain. She restored her youth 
 and good looks, took a cab to the consul s office, saw 
 him, charmed him, convinced him of her relation 
 to Moulton of U. S. Plow, informed him that she 
 was strictly incognito in Riga, swore him to secrecy 
 concerning her and her interest in the Bradfield case, 
 made him call in one of the best lawyers in the city 
 to be paid through the office of the Plow Company 
 and sent the two of them personally to the detective 
 station to secure Walt Bradfield s immediate release. 
 Having arranged it, she departed charging them to 
 bring Mr. Bradfield back with them to the consulate. 
 There would be a man there to take charge of him. 
 
 Ten minutes at the U. S. Plow Company office and 
 she had the attorney s fee provided for and the ser 
 vices of the Moline youth, Mr. Benson, at her dis 
 posal. She sent him to the consulate to meet Brad- 
 field and take him to the warehouse. "I ll send a 
 man here," she said " a Jewish leather merchant 
 he doesn t speak English. Turn Mr. Bradfield over 
 to him. Send them out the other side of the build 
 ing to shake these vile Russian detectives that 
 watch everybody." 
 
 She returned to appease Kaminsky, assure him 
 there was no harm done, and coax him to go to the 
 Plow Company office. When the time came he went, 
 coerced by her threat to go back herself, but told 
 her it would have been a thousand times better for 
 them all if it were the real, and not a sham Countess
 
 THE CHASM 339 
 
 de Hohenfels who had steamed out of the Gulf of 
 Riga. 
 
 "If you could only do that for Ferdinand!" sighed 
 Sonya, as Kaminsky went out. 
 
 Marion clasped the girl s hands. "I wish I could 1 
 How I wish I could! I d give up anything, Sonya. 
 I d give up seeing Walt. I d give it up forever! 
 Do you grudge my seeing him? I don t want to turn 
 bitter at my age. It seems to me now he s my only 
 chance of not hating the world. I had forgotten 
 how much I ought to see him till I heard he was 
 here in prison. Sonya, my heart has been simply 
 frozen all these months! Frozen, frozen!" She 
 stood a moment silent by the window. "Walt s com 
 ing! Walt s coming!" whispered some hidden joy 
 within her that would not, could not, kill itself be 
 cause another woman s joy was in danger of dreadful 
 death. 
 
 "I should think so 1" muttered Sonya. "That man 
 of ice!" Her thoughts snapped back to Grenning. 
 It hurt. If it were only Grenning who was to walk 
 out of that grim building! It did not seem fair. 
 "They wouldn t torture Bradfield if he did stay!" 
 cried she, the words wrung out of her. 
 
 Marion winced. "I feel utterly selfish," she said, 
 and sat down searching her conscience. How was it 
 she had suddenly laid hold of so much power to save 
 Walt when she had so little for Grenning? She ex 
 plained it point by point to herself, and proved it, 
 and yet felt wretched. Her father s name was magic 
 with the consul; theoretically the consul should have 
 taken up the case of an arrested American anyway. 
 Walt s case was trivial beside Grenning s in the eyes
 
 340 THE CHASM 
 
 of the Russian authorities. Though she filled the 
 cables with appeals to her father, he would not 
 touch the Grenning case. Kaminsky had said lawyers 
 for Grenning would be futile. "Sonya!" she de 
 manded, "is there anything I can do for Ferdinand 
 beyond furnishing money?" 
 
 "I wish you had waited a day or two, and some 
 how perhaps they couldn t. But M. in there might 
 have arranged the mistake of sending Ferdinand out 
 as Bradfield. Afterwards they d have had to let 
 Bradfield go just the same." 
 
 "Unless they held him for conspiring to release 
 Grenning. But it s too late now, Sonya. Walt must 
 be out by now." 
 
 An hour later Kaminsky returned from the ware 
 house. Marion sprang up radiant as she heard him 
 coming, but he was alone. 
 
 "Where s Bradfield?" she said, turning pale. 
 
 "The consul couldn t get action on the case till to 
 morrow," grunted Kaminsky. "So your Mr. Benson 
 said. Profitable time I ve had sitting there." 
 
 "What s the matter with that consul?" demanded 
 Marion. "Do you think he intends to act tomor 
 row?" 
 
 "Yes. I heard your lawyer telephoning the Plow 
 Company to make sure he d get his fee. They told 
 him you were really Moulton s daughter. Your 
 man will come out fast enough." 
 
 Sonya looked eagerly at Marion. "Sonya wants 
 to know if Comrade M. could cause a mistake that 
 would let Grenning out in place of Bradfield." 
 
 Kaminsky gave thought to it: "Grenning doesn t
 
 THE CHASM 341 
 
 speak English. How could he pass for an Ameri 
 can? The consul would have to be in the plan." 
 
 "But no!" cried Sonya. "Let M. not make the 
 release till after the consul is gone." 
 
 Kaminsky shook his head. "I ll ask M. tonight," 
 he said. "He may be willing to try it. We have 
 other things, Sonya. Davus may want that ten thou- 1 
 sand." 
 
 Davus, as Kaminsky found when he went to M s 
 that night, did want it. At first when M. told his 
 chief of the wealthy noblewoman, Davus said, "Take 
 her money. You fail to secure Grenning s escape. 
 What then ? Has she influence enough to hurt you ?" 
 
 The detective said he didn t care to risk it. 
 
 "She evidently hasn t enough to get orders in here 
 to release him." 
 
 "She may be handicapped by not wanting her in 
 terest in the prisoner known," surmised M. "I won t 
 risk taking her money and making her desperate." 
 
 "I will," said Davus. "Who is she?" 
 
 M. replied that he had not heard her name, and 
 had difficulty in withholding the name of his inform 
 ant on the ground that he himself would get the 
 blame for any double cross. The incident did not 
 improve his standing with Davus. 
 
 M. told Kaminsky he would make no more at 
 tempts of that nature for Grenning or anyone else. 
 He was hurting the confidence of the men of the divi 
 sion in him. He also declined to try to substitute 
 Grenning for the American. "Their cells lie pretty 
 well for it," he said, "but it s a good deal too com 
 plicated to put through."
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "Oh, here!" exclaimed Kaminsky, impatient with 
 himself. "The proper man to offer these bribes is 
 Grenning himself. That implicates nobody; he has 
 nothing to lose." 
 
 "Why didn t you say that last week?" 
 
 "Let Grenning get the turnkey and the warder. 
 Their jobs are not valuable like those of the officers. 
 They can leave right after Grenning. He can tell 
 them he has friends who can get them out of Russia 
 if they wish." 
 
 "It looks good," said Mitiukhin. "All I have to 
 do is get the money to him. When can you get it?" 
 
 "I ll have it here in three-quarters of an hour." 
 
 "I ll go with you and bring it myself. I am 
 armed." 
 
 M. had the dress and manners of a Germanized 
 commercial traveler, though his speech at times was 
 a little too scholarly. Kaminsky took him to the 
 Kaufstrasse flat, where Marion and Sonya were 
 waiting on edge. 
 
 "Did Davus consent?" asked Sonya, as soon as she 
 learned who M. was. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Then Marion and I have thought of a way. Get 
 the money to Grenning. Let him buy the guards." 
 
 Kaminsky and his companion exchanged a glance, 
 laughed, explained that they had the same idea, and 
 whether it was telepathy or coincidence they took it 
 as a good omen. With low voices, gas turned down, 
 and curtains drawn, they worked out that night 
 everything they could think of Grenning s disguise 
 by shaving as soon as he reached Kaminsky s room,
 
 THE CHASM 343 
 
 his pseudonym, his passport, their steamer tickets 
 each of them had something to do next day. As 
 Marion placed the ten thousand roubles for Gren- 
 ning in the hands of M. she realized as never before 
 the meaning of money. The sweat and weariness 
 and pain of glistening forearms at red forges in 
 Moline the endurable torture, spread across years, 
 of muscles aching and stiffening under an ever accel 
 erated pace of work this was the price of one man s 
 rescue in Riga from concentrated hours of soul- 
 destroying, body-breaking anguish ! 
 
 As M. took that money they all felt that Grenning 
 would sail for London Wednesday noon with Sonya 
 and the Countess. 
 
 Marion went to the door with the detective. "I 
 want to ask about Bradfield," she said, " the 
 American arrested Saturday. Have you seen him?" 
 
 "Yes. Stubborn chap." 
 
 "What did he do?" 
 
 "Refused to take the hint and leave Russia." 
 
 "Do the police require that? Surely they have no 
 legal right " She saw the man of the third sec 
 tion smile at her naivete. "What did the consul say 
 to that?" she asked. 
 
 "Said there was powerful pressure on him to get 
 the man in. Seems funny an American socialist 
 writer. We hadn t heard of the Socialist Republic 
 taking control in the United States. The police told 
 the consul the man was free to go as soon as he made 
 up his mind to leave Russia." 
 
 "But do they refuse to liberate him anyway, un 
 conditionally, whether he agrees to leave or not?"
 
 344 THE CHASM 
 
 "No, not if the consul insists. It would make un 
 necessary trouble to refuse. But ." He stopped. 
 
 "This man s a friend of mine, Comrade M. I in 
 fluenced the consul who knows my father could 
 crush him. Tell me what Bradfield had better do." 
 
 "He d better leave. You can have him released 
 tomorrow if you like, but he can do nothing now in 
 Russia! He s spotted. He ll never send any arti 
 cles out of Russia, and he ll never take any out 
 neither in manuscript nor in his head." 
 
 "Would they kill him?" 
 
 "Someone will somewhere, and the police will be 
 mystified. They ll never be able to discover who did 
 it. Or he may be arrested some place and get shot 
 attempting to escape. There are numerous ways." 
 
 Marion remembered the fate of Hertzenstein. 
 "Bradfield must go with us," she said. "Let him tell 
 them he ll go on the London steamer Wednesday. 
 Will you tell him I ask him to go? Tell him I m 
 going Wednesday." She began to color beneath 
 M. s penetrating look. 
 
 "No," said M. "I d rather not risk being seen 
 talking to him. My English is none too good. He 
 wouldn t believe anything a police officer told him 
 anyway." 
 
 "But then you ll flick him a note, won t you an 
 unsigned little note? Won t you please?" 
 
 M. consented reluctantly, and Marion flew to 
 write it before he could change his mind. "Don t 
 say anything the police shouldn t see. Tell him to 
 swallow the confounded thing as soon as he reads it. 
 Tell him not to recognize you at the dock." 
 
 To facilitate the swallowing process she borrowed
 
 THE CHASM 345 
 
 one of Sonya s needle-pointed pencils and wrote her 
 missive on half a cigarette paper. 
 
 "You can do nothing in Russia now they have you 
 spotted," she wrote. "They read your letter about 
 the superman. What do you suppose they made of 
 it? Tell them you ll go. Take the K. and F. 
 steamer for London Wednesday noon. Marion 
 sailed for London last week. Do not recognize any 
 one you know at the dock. Wait till the ship is at 
 sea. Swallow this paper. I ve chewed up the other 
 half to see what it s like. That makes this a philo- 
 pena. I mustn t sign this, but remember the Nancy." 
 
 M. put the tiny scrap of paper in his pocketbook, 
 made sure of the packet of bank-notes, and took his 
 leave. 
 
 Next morning, choosing a moment when none of 
 his colleagues or subordinates were there, he came 
 down the corridor between the cells of Grenning 
 and Bradfield, laid his hand carelessly on the hori 
 zontal iron bar across the bottom of the American s 
 window, let fall the folded flick of paper almost con- 
 cealable beneath a long thumbnail, and tapping 
 swiftly three or four times on the bar to draw the 
 prisoner s attention to the paper, stepped across 
 to the nearly opposite cell of Grenning. Bradfield, 
 picking up the note, intently sized up the message- 
 bearer. M. slipped the packet of bank-notes to 
 Grenning. "Buy the turnkey and warder," he said 
 in an undertone. "Go out about quarter past twelve 
 tonight. Go straight down the hill. Meet Kamin- 
 sky disguised as a leather merchant. Got it?" 
 
 "Yes," whispered Grenning. 
 
 The officer, having stopped only three or four
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 seconds, went on through the brick-floored corridor, 
 the eyes of prisoners staring at him sullenly through 
 their little windows. 
 
 Gratitude and love swept Grenning. The Coun 
 tess Marion what liberality! Kaminsky and per 
 haps great-hearted Sonya here in Riga risking for 
 him the same horrible fate that threatened him! 
 What greater love could man or woman show? 
 
 Bradfield picked open his minute missive. As M. 
 had said, he was not disposed to trust anything that 
 came from a Russian police officer. In two days he 
 had come to hate them as he had never hated a 
 human being. The tiny handwriting on the crum 
 pled paper gave him no clew. The query about the 
 effect of the superman on the police suggested Count 
 de Hohenfels to him, and the statement: "Marion 
 sailed for London last week," who else in Russia 
 could have written that? "But why so friendly, so 
 familiar, De Hohenfels? Why want me to go to 
 London if Marion is there? I ve chewed up the 
 other half to see what it s like, " read he. " That 
 makes this a philopena. " That was pure Marion to 
 him and "remember the Nancy !" It was she ! He 
 did remember the Nancy with a thrill. He went 
 back and started to read the note through as Mar 
 ion s. It could be her hand, writing as small as 
 this. This time he accounted for "Marion sailed for 
 London" as a precaution to throw off possible police 
 readers. Why was the Countess de Hohenfels 
 forced to such mysterious secrecy? "If she really is 
 the writer of this she did not sail for London last 
 week," he thought. "But the note tells me to. De 
 Hohenfels would like nothing better than to send me
 
 THE CHASM 347 
 
 off to London if she was here. But that philopena ! 
 He hasn t playfulness enough to invent that. She 
 might have told him in a general way about our 
 launch-ride but the name Nancy!" "Recognize no 
 one at the dock." Who could there be to recog 
 nize? Herself. It looked as though she herself 
 was going on this ship Wednesday. He formed a 
 dozen theories, none of which he could disprove 
 or verify. He wanted to speak to the police officer 
 who had given him the note. He tried to attract the 
 attention of the prisoner across the corridor to 
 whom the officer had spoken. Once he caught his 
 eye and whispered: "Can you speak English?" 
 
 Grenning shook his head, laid his finger on his 
 lips, and drew back from his window. 
 
 At noon the turnkey unlocked the door of Gren- 
 ning s cell to admit an attendant with a prison din 
 ner. The attendant came out. The turnkey closed 
 and locked the door, and was going on. 
 
 "Wait," said Grenning in a low voice. 
 
 The man gave a start, looked around and shook 
 his head. 
 
 "I have something that means big money to you." 
 
 "Forbidden." The man went on. 
 
 Twenty minutes later he reopened the door, and 
 the waiter took away the bread and soup almost un 
 touched. The turnkey was slow about locking the 
 door. "Why don t you eat?" he asked. 
 
 "I expect to get something worth eating tonight. 
 Look!" He showed a bulky roll of bank-notes, held 
 them to the light, and counted them back one by one 
 so the 100-100-100 struck the turnkey s astonished 
 eyes.
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 "Bozhe moil In the name of Christ! Where 
 did you get that?" He looked around guiltily, saw a 
 prisoner peering out of his cell on the other side, 
 moved his body to cut off the man s view, and whis 
 pered, "That s only the American. He under 
 stands nothing." He looked longingly at the money. 
 "Why didn t they get that when they searched you?" 
 
 "Well, they didn t. If you report it you get noth 
 ing. Otherwise you can get all this for yourself." 
 
 "All that ? How much is that ?" 
 
 "Two thousand roubles." 
 
 "What do you want?" 
 
 "See that this door and the corridor door are un 
 locked just after midnight." 
 
 "Yes, and have them find you gone and the door 
 unlocked at two!" 
 
 "You can lock it again before two. What s more, 
 you can be out of Riga before two. How long 
 would it take you to save two thousand roubles on 
 this job?" 
 
 "I never would. I never saw that much money 
 in my life. It must pay to be a revolutionist." 
 
 "Yes, it pays the best of all. It gives a man 
 friends such as no other man has." 
 
 "When do I get that?" 
 
 "When you unlock the door. Is it a bargain?" 
 
 "Sst! Yes. Here s the waiter!" 
 
 Grenning sat down on his blanket on the floor, 
 momentarily unnerved in his relief from the strain. 
 He had still to get the warder who would come on at 
 four o clock that afternoon. 
 
 Soon after three, the American consul and the
 
 THE CHASM 349 
 
 Riga lawyer hired for Walt drove up to the station. 
 A few minutes later and Walt was taken from his 
 cell to the office. There being no charge against 
 him, the consul, the lawyer, and the police came to 
 an agreement very quickly when Walt announced his 
 intention of sailing next day for London. They very 
 affably turned over to him his passport, most of 
 his other papers, his money, an order on the custom 
 house for his much searched trunk, and made out 
 his police permit to leave Russia. 
 
 Walt drew a deep breath as he left the office with 
 the consul and attorney. "What ghastly tyrants life 
 can turn men into!" he moralized. "I wonder how 
 those hell-hounds would check me up if I didn t go 
 to-morrow?" 
 
 The consul looked alarmed. "But " 
 
 "Oh, I m going," said Walt, with the mental res 
 ervation: "Unless things turn out very different than 
 I think." 
 
 "Don t worry about their checking you up," said 
 the consul. "They d do it eighteen ways. This isn t 
 America by a long shot. Everybody has to be ac 
 counted for everywhere. The police can let you drop 
 and are sure to pick you up again the first place 
 you go." 
 
 Walt looked at the consul s cab, into which the 
 Riga lawyer had already climbed. 
 
 "Where to now?" inquired the consul. 
 
 "To a bathtub if I can make some cabman un 
 derstand." 
 
 The consul laughed and hailed a cab for him. 
 "Benson of the U. S. Plow Company was waiting
 
 350 THE CHASM 
 
 for you yesterday at the consulate," he said. "He 
 speaks German and Russian. You d better look him 
 up and make him steer you around." , 
 
 Walt assented, and with twenty hours of freedom 
 to spend in Russia, drove first to the Plow Company 
 office and inquired for Benson. 
 
 "The Countess de Hohenfels had a man here 
 waiting for you yesterday," Benson told him. "She 
 forgot to leave us her address. I ve no idea where 
 to reach her." 
 
 Counting on her note to insure Walt s sailing on 
 her ship next day, Marion had renounced as too 
 dangerous the attempt to see him sooner. 
 
 Half an hour after Walt left the prison, the 
 warder who would be on duty between midnight and 
 two came down Grenning s corridor on his first 
 round. He stopped and looked into each of the 
 occupied cells. Hearing how brief a time he paused 
 at each door, Grenning was nervous with the realiza 
 tion that he would have no time for leading up. He 
 was close to the grating when the warder looked in 
 so close the man threw his hand to his revolver. 
 
 "Do you want to make three thousand roubles?" 
 asked Grenning tensely. 
 
 "Shut up." The man came close, and peered past 
 the prisoner into his cell. 
 
 "I have to pass you tonight as I go out," said 
 Grenning. "It will be worth three thousand roubles 
 to you if you fail to see me." 
 
 "Don t talk to me, I tell you. It s against thfr 
 rules." 
 
 "One breaks a rule or two for three thousand
 
 THE CHASM 351 
 
 roubles. Pay attention to what I told you and you 
 get in your hand thirty hundred-rouble notes." 
 
 "Are you crazy just thinking about things? 
 Wait till they happen!" 
 
 "I don t intend to wait," said Grenning, resisting 
 the paralyzing image of cruelty and fear the warder 
 was trying to force upon him. "I m going out to 
 night. Look, man!" He pulled out his roll of bills. 
 
 "So. You have real money in there? It goes to 
 the office." 
 
 "Where you get not one rouble of it. Keep still 
 and agree and it s yours right now." 
 
 In vain ! The warder said he had a wife and two 
 children in Riga. 
 
 Grenning told him he could go abroad and have 
 them follow. 
 
 "No. If I let a prisoner escape and went myself, 
 the woman and my son and my daughter would never 
 leave Riga alive." 
 
 Grenning promised him they would within 
 twenty-four hours. "You re crazy, man!" he ex 
 claimed. "Here s a chance for you to make more 
 for your family than you could save in a lifetime. By 
 doing what? Something bad? No. By saving a 
 human being from this hell on earth." 
 
 "You wouldn t be here if God didn t want you 
 here. You can t buy God off no matter how much 
 you got." 
 
 "Are you sure God isn t trying to get me out of 
 here through you?" 
 
 "God trying? No. I report what I see to the 
 office."
 
 352 THE CHASM 
 
 Grenning raised his offer to eight thousand rou 
 bles and showed them. 
 
 "I don t care if it s eighty thousand! You won t 
 have it long!" His footsteps died away down the 
 corridor. Then the prisoner heard low voices and 
 heavy, hateful steps returning. The warder was 
 bringing the officer in charge and brutal guards the 
 prisoner knew would not be gentle. 
 
 "The Countess s money gone!" was Grenning s 
 first thought, and then despair swept his soul. All 
 the thinking, planning, co-operating of his comrades, 
 their wary approach, their love and sacrifice, wiped 
 out in a moment, leaving him to suffer worse than 
 death through a blockhead s incorruptible fidelity 
 to the cause of hell !
 
 XIV 
 
 COMING to their apartment after supper in 
 a Kaufstrasse cafe with Sonya and Marion, 
 Kaminsky found a man waiting for him with 
 a crushing message from M. that Grenning had lost 
 his ten thousand roubles and his best chance of 
 escape. They could not bear to look at Sonya. 
 
 "As far as the money is concerned," said Marion, 
 finally, "if it will do any good we can still spare 
 another ten thousand." 
 
 Unable to endure an hour without some definite 
 plan, Sonya made Kaminsky set out with her for 
 M. s to try to form some new idea. Marion offered 
 to go with them, but Kaminsky said two were al 
 ready too many. On the way Sonya stopped to buy 
 her vial of poison. 
 
 Marion was left alone to realize that she and Son 
 ya and Grenning would not sail next day and that 
 her note to Walt would not only send him off on 
 that ship alone, but would set him looking in vain for 
 her in London. She knew he had left the station, 
 but did not know where he had gone. "Why didn t 
 I have the nerve to keep in touch with him as I 
 wanted to !" she exclaimed. "I ve missed my chance 
 to see him!" To send a message to him at the dock 
 where the detectives would be watching to see 
 
 353
 
 354 
 
 whether he got off would immediately direct their 
 suspicion against anyone who communicated with 
 him. 
 
 She put on her hat and coat, turned out the gas, 
 locked the apartment, went down to an apothecary s 
 where there was a closed telephone booth, called up 
 the American consul at his residence, and asked if 
 he could tell where Mr. Bradfield went that after 
 noon. 
 
 "Oh, yes," answered the consul, "is that " 
 
 "You recognize my voice, I see," interrupted 
 Marion with significant quickness. 
 
 "Excuse me. Yes, I do, of course. It s not easy 
 to forget." 
 
 "Thank you so much for your interest. Could you 
 tell me where the gentleman went? Or where he 
 intended to stop?" 
 
 "I think he was going to some hotel. I told him 
 about Mr. Benson waiting for him yesterday, and 
 when he left me he was going to look up Benson at 
 the Plow Company s office. Benson might tell you 
 where he is now. If you ll hold the wire a sec 
 ond " In a moment he gave her Benson s num 
 ber. 
 
 "Thank you so much," she murmured. 
 
 She got Mr. Benson. 
 
 "Mr. Bradfield?" he repeated, answering her. 
 "Yes. Who is that?" 
 
 "I prefer not to say just now. You are a poor 
 guesser, Mr. Benson." 
 
 "Oh, of course," said Benson. "Excuse me. Yes, 
 Mr. Bradfield is here with me. We got to talking
 
 THE CHASM 355 
 
 Moline and Russia. He is going to stay with me 
 tonight. He leaves for London tomorrow." 
 
 "Yes. Will you call him to the phone?" 
 
 Mr. Benson did. 
 
 "Hello !" came Bradfield s hearty, open voice. 
 
 "Walt," said Marion. 
 
 "Yes?" He was all hushed attention. 
 
 "Can you find 534 Kaufstrasse, third floor, right- 
 hand apartment?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Come. Try not to be followed. Do you under 
 stand?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Goodbye." 
 
 She went back along the brightly-lighted side 
 walk, covered with trampled snow, crowded with 
 middle-class shoppers, to her room. She changed 
 Miss Baker s clothes, removed Miss Baker s years. 
 Walt was real. His one word yes thrice spoken 
 what depths it stirred! 
 
 Alone in the German-Russian apartment with its 
 ugly, ornate gas-fixtures, its blue and white porcelain 
 stove, its pious ikon in the corner, she listened for- 
 Walt s step, and heard instead the mournful sirens 
 and dim bells of steamers, the hum and chug and 
 rumble of tram and motor and train far off, the 
 chink and grind and murmur of hoof and wheel and 
 voice, the thousand tremors and reverberations not 
 definable but blending in one faint throbbing roar 
 the sound of Riga. The modern Baltic city, meshed 
 in tyrannous authority a daily woven web of fear 
 and lies and violence, of insane cruelties and pangs
 
 356 THE CHASM 
 
 and bitter deaths was suddenly as strange to her 
 as Sidon. Through that city of Moloch of spies 
 who might track him to her and drag her to worse 
 than death came Walt. 
 
 At his knock she called softly, and heard his an 
 swer before she unlocked her door. She drew him 
 in quickly, her hands on his arms leaned and 
 looked past him down the stairs, not noting how the 
 life in him intensified at the touch of her and the re 
 membered fragrance of her hair. 
 
 "Shut in Elysium!" The phrase flashed, while his 
 eyes etched on his glowing mind her coronal of red- 
 gold hair, the tendrils of it gleaming on her white 
 neck, behind her ear, the undulation of her noble 
 figure as she bent to lock the world out. Her hands 
 trembled when she turned and pressed his. He read 
 her eyes of welcome full of reviving memories. He 
 looked at her firm, rich lips, which had once met his 
 the day they had eaten of the lotus and even as 
 then his thought of her love for De Hohenfels was 
 an invisible barrier shutting her away. The golden 
 mist half-lifted at her tense question: "Were you fol 
 lowed?" 
 
 "Yes. I shouldn t have noticed it if it hadn t been 
 for your telephone, but there were two of them sit 
 ting in a cab opposite Benson s out there in the 
 cold. I was surprised. Why am I so important to 
 them? They drove after me, and when I got a cab, 
 kept right behind. When I stopped and got out, 
 they did too. I lost them doubling through a 
 crowded department store." 
 
 "You must go on that ship tomorrow." 
 
 "Are you going on it?"
 
 THE CHASM 357 
 
 "I was. I can t." 
 
 "When are you going?" 
 
 "A week a month. It can t be long." She 
 shuddered with the horrible, absorbing thought dom 
 inating those days. 
 
 "What queer thing has hold of you?" he asked. 
 
 "Russia almost." 
 
 He had an uncanny feeling of terrible, vague dan 
 ger threatening her. He looked at her critically. 
 "You don t use cocaine, do you?" 
 
 "Why no. Do I seem so strange as that? Walt, 
 Walt, I am so glad to see you ! I thought tonight I 
 had missed you. You don t know, you don t know!" 
 
 He drew in his breath and held it as though her 
 words had fragrance. 
 
 "Your mind is so clean so free from you ve 
 never had your soul screwed out of shape by lust of 
 blood. I need you so your comradeship the 
 warm interpretation of the world you can help me 
 make." 
 
 He felt, but read it as illusion of his own desire, 
 that she needed most his arms around her and 
 long kisses. He could not gauge the loneliness, the 
 bitterness, the fear, from which he was refuge. He 
 looked away to keep himself from being drawn 
 depth below depth by the look in her eyes. He had 
 thought she would know she must not use her power 
 to make love ache in him. She turned slowly and 
 seated herself on the lounge. 
 
 "How do you expect me to go?" he demanded. 
 
 "They will kill you if you don t." 
 
 "If that s all," he said, smiling and sitting down 
 beside her, "I think I will manage to go."
 
 358 THE CHASM 
 
 "I want you to wait for me in London or Paris. 
 Will you?" 
 
 "I must find out first whether you ought not to 
 go. What are you doing here writing unsigned 
 notes wording them so the hell-hounds of police 
 will think you re in London staying in this place 
 where men are killed for I don t know what ! Why 
 are you here in this queer flat in this murderous 
 city?" He looked around the room for signs of 
 Count Hohenfels, and saw her pistol lying on the 
 table. 
 
 "It s a long story," said she, with a quick sigh. 
 She leaned toward him and lowered her voice. "The 
 heart of it is that five weeks ago I gave a small 
 party of revolutionaries a warning that resulted in a 
 military disaster to some troops of the Tsar." 
 
 "You did! The Countess de Hohenfels!" 
 
 "Ssh! Don t use that name! I am Miss Baker. 
 I am here to get a man out of the prison where you 
 were the man who carried that warning one of 
 my best friends threatened with torture unspeak 
 able!" 
 
 He clenched his hands. "For carrying the secret 
 
 you sent ! Then If they get you !" He saw her 
 
 lips shut tight and her eyes turn steel. He had the 
 maddening picture of her cherishable body writhing 
 beneath the hands of fiends. He looked at her pistol. 
 "London is no place for me until you re there." He 
 spoke with finality. 
 
 She saw it was useless now to try to make him go. 
 She had not meant to let him know so much. Ignor 
 ant of the country, the language marked and 
 tracked by the police he would be more trouble to
 
 359 
 
 them in their enterprise than he was worth. Yet her 
 unreasonable soul rejoiced that he was there. 
 
 "Do you have to stay here?" he asked. 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 "What is it friendship for this man?" 
 
 "That too." 
 
 "Were you drawn into all this accidentally?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Then you re not yourself a revolutionist on 
 principle?" 
 
 "I ve hardly stopped to realize it, but I am yes ! 
 With my whole soul 1 I d die I d be tortured if 
 that could destroy this Russian despotism!" 
 
 He gazed at her, stirred, disquieted, convinced. 
 There was a terrible fire behind her eyes. Too far 
 down that road ! But who, capable of magnifi 
 cence, is not capable of madness too? "I ve called 
 myself a revolutionist," he said. "Henceforth I 
 think I ll save the word for the reality." 
 
 She laid her hand quickly on his, her eyes soften 
 ing, her tense soul unclosing a little in the sweetness 
 of being near him. "I seem unreal beside some men 
 and women here," she said. "Of me such as I am 
 you were the beginning. Walt: after you, as I 
 went on, I kept on looking at things from my own 
 old point of view, and Count Feodor s but then, 
 just for fun with myself, because I liked pretending 
 to be you, I d shift the angle and look at things from 
 yours. A dangerous game, sir! From yours I could 
 read men and women who from mine would have 
 been meaningless scrawls. I could account for the 
 hollowness and falseness of high society: I could see 
 through the self-deceptions and hypocrisies of ruling
 
 360 THE CHASM 
 
 classes the dreadful governments they maintain 
 with a disgusting pretense that it is for the people s 
 good that they kee*p them down. 
 
 "You ve traveled far," he said, his half-closed 
 eyes looking afar at his new picture of her mind. 
 
 "Had you not touched my eyes, dear man," she 
 said, leaning close to him, "I would have been blind 
 for life like the rest to our utter and eternal dis 
 regard for the life and welfare and liberty of the 
 millions who are and must ever be of our own blood 
 and nature, but who are without the little trained-in 
 traits of our own class ! Those would have been the 
 all-important things to me not the big human 
 things !" 
 
 It moved him deeply to hear her the most desir 
 able woman he knew in mind, in will, in bodily love 
 liness, voicing out of her own experience and heart 
 one phrase of his own belief. His left hand was shut 
 tight, a result of his determination not to put it 
 around her as she sat beside him. He still thought 
 clearly but with an effort like that of a man refusing 
 to let the wine he has drunk affect him. "You ll 
 never get back to the view of the world that prevails 
 in your own class," he said. "You are not of the 
 working class. Where will you land?" 
 
 She had a sudden exalted sense of glorious an 
 swers to be reached some day if Russia did not end 
 all. "All I see left for me," she said, smiling her 
 way back from that somber, intruding thought, "is 
 the viewpoint of the social whole. Your own let 
 ter opened my way to that. If I can get life that will 
 let me grow out of the bitterness recent things have
 
 THE CHASM 361 
 
 forced into me I may become, not class-conscious 
 like you, but socially conscious." 
 
 "And what will that lead to?" 
 
 "I m not sure. From that viewpoint I may have 
 to agree with you that everything beautiful and true 
 and free in life is being blighted by our profit-system 
 without which most of us who are used to it and 
 benefit by it think the world would stop. You class- 
 struggle socialists seem to be the only ones who now 
 desire to end it. But wouldn t it be a lovely joke 
 on you if the private owners of the world s industry 
 should themselves see it ought to be socialized and 
 do it themselves?" 
 
 "Can you imagine your father doing that?" 
 
 "No. But can t you imagine me doing it?" 
 
 "Yes, if you had the power bless your big heart! 
 But it s your class that has the power, and a ruling 
 class, even though doomed, cannot surrender. It is 
 against the law of the world. It is there to make 
 the rising class develop struggling. Your class is 
 an organism much too tenacious of life to drink the 
 hemlock you think of offering it." 
 
 "I haven t thought it out," she said. "I m not so 
 sure the workers will ever win. I would not like to 
 see the present wage-workers, degraded by bad 
 conditions, secure control of the world." 
 
 "Are those now in control running the world so 
 well for human welfare?" 
 
 "They are running it for their own welfare and 
 very badly from every other point of view. Would 
 the workers as they are do better? If they are to 
 gain power I hope men like you will first have made
 
 362 THE CHASM 
 
 them more fit for it than the present rulers. If I 
 can help you do that, I will. I do feel in you, Walt- 
 oh, with love I feel it a great hope of a clean, 
 sweet world!" 
 
 A surge of feeling made thought difficult for 
 him. His arms ached for her. He started to speak 
 cleared his throat let his criticism go. 
 
 "Walt," she said, pouring oil on flame. 
 
 He turned his eyes to hers. 
 
 "Are you glad to see me?" 
 
 "You know I am." He could hardly speak. 
 
 "But why don t you tell me you are ? Why do you 
 pretend not to be?" 
 
 "Because I m a thousand times too glad!" 
 
 "You can t be! Oh, I need a monstrous gladness 
 for me in someone someone !" 
 
 "Do you know what will happen if you how 
 does Count Hohenfels feel about your revolutionary 
 activity?" 
 
 "What he feels about all things and persons but 
 himself exalted scorn!" 
 
 "So on account of him you re lonely and un 
 happy? Where is he?" 
 
 She drew her forearms back against her breast, 
 lowering her head so her knuckles hurt her cheeks. 
 "I have left him." 
 
 A diamond turning on her clenched third finger 
 revealed its deepest unsuspected gleam. To the im 
 passioned man beside her, life in that instant 
 changed. In his soul a trumpet blew. 
 
 "He has a divorce on a miserable false charge 
 of improper conduct with Dr. Grenning who is 
 here in prison, facing death and worse."
 
 THE CHASM 363 
 
 He saw her indignation against De Hohenfels 
 blaze out even through her anxiety for Grenning. 
 He could not instantly adjust his own ideas, nor fol 
 low hers. She looked at him. He felt her feel 
 through his shifting thoughts his underlying joy. "It 
 may be a sorrow to you," he said, "but don t ask me 
 to sympathize. To me it means that you, Marion, 
 who loved me once on the other side of the world 
 are free ! You are a woman unmated !" 
 
 Her attention focused on him with that intensity 
 in her which was new to him. He did not want her 
 to think that merely because she had left De Hohen 
 fels he thought her his. For all he really knew she 
 did love Grenning or loved no one. So reasoning 
 he tried to keep himself from her. He could not. 
 His soul knew she was crushing her throbbing fin 
 gers against her cheeks, her yearning breasts against 
 her arms in lieu of to keep herself from him! 
 He leaned and gathered her against him, feeling her 
 body shake with sobs as she opened her arms to fold 
 him in beauty and wonder. Through her nerves, 
 made tense by days and weeks of mental pain and 
 dread, saving her from threatening hysteria, flowed 
 the deep magic of love-liesse. 
 
 She raised her head and looked with glittering 
 eyes at him. 
 
 "I knew nothing of love," she said, as their lips 
 neared. "It is strong as death."
 
 XV 
 
 THE evening roar of Riga had died away to 
 discontinuous nocturnal sounds when a knock 
 at the apartment door startled Marion from 
 her hour s oblivion to the cocaine-like Russian fear. 
 
 The sudden pallor of her face as she rose from her 
 lover s side could not conceal the stirred and vivid 
 beauty of kissed lips and shining eyes. A throbbing 
 languor underlay her quick movements as she twisted 
 into place a fallen strand of glinting hair and closed 
 the fragrant bosom of her gown. Echoes of exqui 
 site sensation, sweet throes inflicted by caressing lips 
 were vibrating in her as she went to answer the un 
 welcome summons of the outside world. 
 
 She opened the door. 
 
 There, dumbly waiting, stood Sonya with stony 
 eyes. From them the forgotten thought of Gren- 
 ning leaped and stabbed the love-intoxicated woman. 
 Sonya did not speak. In her nostrils Marion heard 
 the quivering breath indrawn by shuddering lungs. 
 Kaminsky drew her by the arm. As they passed in, 
 Marion caught his eye, and flashed him her dreadful 
 question. 
 
 "Yes," he said. "They examined Grenning this 
 evening." 
 
 364
 
 THE CHASM 365 
 
 Her gesture begged him not to drive it into Sonya s 
 mind by speech. 
 
 He did not think much of the policy. "I don t 
 think she hears anyway," he said. "We need a doc 
 tor." 
 
 Sonya turned as though to speak, looked at Mar 
 ion, shook her head. 
 
 Encircling her with arms of infinite compassion, 
 Marion went with her to her room, bending to kiss 
 her, pressing her to her side, talking to her in the 
 voice new love had taught her, trying to woo back to 
 life her friend s will to live. She could not make the 
 life-creating sweetness throbbing in her veins reach 
 that shut heart as Sonya s dumb agony reached hers. 
 In glimpses that seemed to open and flame upon her 
 from the inferno of Sonya s soul she saw the prison 
 room, the intent look of torturers at work,, the 
 strapped-down victim, the distorted face of Gren- 
 ning! Stifling a sudden desire to scream, she felt 
 back for Count Feodor s prophylactics against the 
 infection of pity its morbidity and futility the 
 ideal of the hard, heroic heart beatitude unscorched 
 by the flame of another s burning. Those cobwebs 
 might shield the intellect that spun them, but not 
 a woman s midriff ! 
 
 She came out to Walt and Kaminsky. The latter 
 sat with his shoulders hunched up near the stove, his 
 mouth occasionally twisting. He straightened up 
 when he saw her and became matter of fact. "Bet 
 ter not leave that there," he said, nodding toward 
 her pistol on the table. 
 
 She picked it up mechanically, considering where
 
 366 THE CHASM 
 
 to keep it out of Sonya s way. "Did she hear 
 everything?" she asked. 
 
 "She got everything out of M. made him tell her 
 everything. She loathes him. He had to help." 
 
 -Help 1" 
 
 "He had to. Davus suspected him. M. had to 
 try to force Grenning to tell who gave him that 
 ten thousand sweating blood for fear he would 
 tell." 
 
 "And he didn t?" 
 
 "No. Nor about us. Nor his own connection 
 with Mitrevitz. They got nothing out of him. The 
 only evidence they have against him is Smika s and 
 for all the police know that was mere insanity." 
 
 "Is there a hope they will release him after all?" 
 
 He shook his head. "Sonya hoped that too. When 
 she realized she made M. go back to the prison to 
 give Grenning that little bottle. M. came back and 
 said the doctor wouldn t take it. In spite of Smika, 
 Grenning thinks his nervous system is strong enough 
 to pull him through alive and sane. He hopes we 
 will find some way to get him out before they re- 
 examine him." 
 
 "Oh, we must, we must! But why if they think 
 he had nothing to do with Mitrevitz " 
 
 "They daren t let people see the marks. They 
 put out cigars against his flesh. They could hold 
 him till the holes are healed, but his hands. They 
 are ruined. The broken bones of his fingers will 
 reknit unset and his nails are gone." 
 
 A tigress sound broke from the woman, and her 
 hand clenched convulsively on the pistol. Walt 
 sprang up not understanding ready to fly at
 
 THE CHASM 367 
 
 Kaminsky. "Are you going to kill them?" de 
 manded Marion. 
 
 Kaminsky s gesture indicated there was nothing to 
 gain by it. 
 
 "What is it ?" asked Walt. He held out his hand, 
 wanting to take the weapon himself. "What are you 
 going to do with that?" 
 
 "Nothing oh, just nothing ! They tore out Gren- 
 ning s nails, but we submit! They broke his sur 
 geon s fingers what did they do with those nails, 
 Kaminsky? Just throw them on the floor? They 
 must look pretty. Wouldn t you like one as a souve 
 nir of Grenning? I never saw the root of a man s 
 nail !" She looked at her own pink nail. 
 
 "Pull your mind straight off of that!" commanded 
 Nachman Kaminsky sternly. "Go baresark and kill 
 Gregus and what have you done? Your life s worth 
 more than that!" 
 
 "Think of it, Walt!" cried she, again speaking 
 English. "That girl, Sonya, loves him, and can do 
 nothing!" She looked at Walt s hand, not yet soft 
 and white like a gentleman s. She looked at his 
 nails. She shuddered and her face was screwed out 
 of shape by imagined pain. Suddenly she reached 
 and drew Walt s fingers passionately against her 
 breast and kissed them, and then for an instant, un 
 expectedly, her life flamed toward him. There was 
 a sudden all-meaning look between them on their 
 narrow ledge of joy above the world s swimming 
 pain. Her voice dropped. "Even now I am drunk 
 with your love," she said. "Even this ghastly 
 
 news ! If I could only give poor Sonya the 
 
 least bit of this unquenchable sweetness ! Don t leave
 
 368 THE CHASM 
 
 here tonight. They would pick you up again at Ben 
 son s. I ll be with Sonya. You can have my room. 
 Tomorrow we can make a place for you." 
 
 "Elysium in the midst of hell!" he muttered. "I 
 don t like the way you handle that gun. If shoot 
 ing has to be done, give me the job." 
 
 She turned to Kaminsky. "What is to be our 
 program?" she asked. To his relief she spoke now 
 like a sane person. 
 
 "Get Sonya to go with you tomorrow as planned, 
 minus Grenning." 
 
 "Heaven and earth couldn t make her! She d die 
 ten deaths first!" 
 
 "She ll lose her mind." 
 
 "More likely if she went." 
 
 "Be careful yourself," he warned. "Terrible 
 forces are ready to break loose from you. Don t 
 make pictures as you were doing. Don t let them 
 make themselves. Don t let your thoughts concentrate 
 on finger-nails. Keep your rudder; use judgment how 
 you handle your mind. If the whole pack of you 
 would get out of here leaving what money you can, 
 I could do just as much with one quarter the risk." 
 
 "You re right. But she won t go! How can you 
 ask it? I wouldn t in her place." 
 
 "Being in your own, you d better go. Bradfield 
 can leave tomorrow as he agreed, and you with him 
 that is, on the same ship. He will have trouble 
 going later." 
 
 The unquenchable sweetness rose through her 
 lungs. To escape from the horror of Russia into 
 love just love! "What would Sonya do?" she 
 asked.
 
 THE CHASM 369 
 
 "I ll take care of her." 
 
 "If ever a woman needed another, she needs 
 me. If I let her make her fight for sanity alone 
 no, thank you ! Walt won t leave me either. There s 
 no use preaching sense to any of us, Kaminsky. We 
 must keep Bradfield here. The police have lost him. 
 Get him some papers for the benefit of the domicili 
 ary gentleman. Let him be my brother come for me 
 from England or my betrothed." The tones her 
 voice found for the word surprised her. She looked 
 at Walt, and across her flashed the vision of a sym 
 pathetic marriage years together in Western 
 Europe, in America he and she touched with the 
 same flame working together for the same great 
 social ends bringing their vision of a fairer society 
 to bear upon the one in which they lived carving 
 their dream in the resisting block of hard reality 
 helping to lead the world into the coming time. Then 
 the shadow of Russia fell on her the difficulties of 
 frontier and port the ghastly tragedy of capture 
 Sonya alone there in her room. "I must get back to 
 her," she said. "I ll show you where you are to 
 sleep. Start something for Grenning, Nachman 
 if only for effect on her." 
 
 Kaminsky smiled after her and Walt. "Lucky for 
 you you have got something to take your mind off 
 Grenning s nails on the floor!" he thought. His 
 mouth twisted again. Was it out of his own experi 
 ence he knew one must not think of nails? "Gren 
 ning should have drunk that bottle," he muttered. 
 
 Four days later, Kaminsky was hopeful again. The 
 day after his examination, Grenning, in ceaseless 
 pain, had been transferred to the Central Prison. In
 
 370 THE CHASM 
 
 a vodka-shop Kaminsky gained the confidence of one 
 of the prison guards, excited his cupidity, got him to 
 draw in a pal, and the two agreed to get Grenning 
 out. The guards intended to take a fishing boat and 
 sail to Sweden. Sunday night was set for the escape, 
 and arrangements made for leaving Russia Monday; 
 but Sunday morning Grenning was unexpectedly sent 
 back to the detective station for reexamination. 
 
 After that it was hopeless. He could not have 
 walked out had all doors stood open and unguarded. 
 For in the second examination, determined to get 
 something out of him before the field court-martial, 
 they strapped Grenning to a bench, placed a plank 
 across his back, jumped on the ends of the plank and 
 broke his spine. 
 
 He made no confession. He told them nothing. 
 He did not die. Day after day they let him lie the 
 agonized wreck of a man still sane. 
 
 At every opportunity Kaminsky talked to Sonya of 
 the revolutionary plans and activities going on in 
 Riga, told her how the peasant deputies of the first 
 Duma had come to the second Social Revolutionists, 
 described how the waves spreading from the Russian 
 revolution were stirring Turkey Persia India 
 all of them testing the strength of their chains. In 
 every way he sought to relight the fire of what had 
 once seemed Sonya s strongest passion Russian 
 freedom. 
 
 It all seemed to mean nothing to her. 
 
 Marion got her occupied preparing breakfast and 
 lunches, but could not make her hold her mind to 
 the game of teaching Walt Russian. It was a fear 
 ful pain to Sonya to do anything that kept her from
 
 THE CHASM 871 
 
 her own thoughts. Her "pictures drew her to look 
 at them always. They were jealous of any inter 
 ruption. Even the danger of detection in a second 
 domiciliary visit of the police drew her attention 
 only while the officers were present. Kaminsky being 
 away Marion herself had to deal with them in ex 
 aggeratedly meager Russian. Walt was superficial 
 ly disguised by spectacles and changed dress, and the 
 visitors were not of that section of the police who 
 could have identified him. Fortunately Kaminsky 
 had supplied him with papers that satisfied them. 
 
 It was eight days after the reexamination of Gren- 
 ning, on a dark mid-October afternoon, the east wind 
 whirling snow-flakes down the streets of Riga, when 
 Kaminsky brought word to the Kaufstrasse that the 
 field court-martial was sitting. Russian officers and 
 gentlemen men with the old culture in a new soul 
 were passing upon the evidence submitted to them 
 by the detective division, deciding the fate of the sev 
 enteen revolutionists then in the toils in Riga. 
 
 It was reported that night that two were con 
 demned to death. Grenning and Smika? Their 
 friends did not voice the hope that they were the 
 lucky ones. Sonya, Marion, and Walt rose before 
 daylight next morning, went to the reeking wharf 
 of the fishing boats, and gazing with a glass across 
 the sands between them and the Central Prison, they 
 saw both prisoners march out and stand before the 
 firing squads. Neither of these new corpses could 
 be Grenning s. 
 
 Soon after breakfast they learned that Grenning 
 and Smika, a maniac and a man with broken 
 spine who would not die had been sentenced to
 
 372 THE CHASM 
 
 fifteen years hard labor in the Siberian mines. Thir 
 teen other prisoners left at eight o clock for Siberia, 
 but the doctor and the forester were not among 
 them. They were not in the detective station or the 
 Central Prison, and in neither of those places was 
 there any record of where they had been sent. They 
 must have been removed in the night. M. was not 
 in the secret. 
 
 Kaminsky mingled with the Jews of his father s 
 synp.gogue after the morning service. Among them 
 were secret revolutionists, merchants who had all 
 kinds of codes and modes of communication with 
 others of their race throughout the Baltic provinces, 
 Kovno, Grodno, and the governments of the Pale. 
 They had no information, but by nine o clock that 
 morning the question "Where is Grenning?" began 
 to spread in curious ways through western Russia. 
 
 After a midday meal with a Jewish friend, Ka 
 minsky, returning to the Kaufstrasse flat, found no 
 one there to let him in. "All at lunch together again 
 and taken the key!" he reflected. He looked at his 
 cheap watch, sat down on the top step, and pulled 
 out a newspaper. Presently he heard someone run 
 ning up the lower flights of stairs. It was Sonya. 
 She came up breathless, frightened out of the intro 
 spective look of melancholia. "We ve been recog 
 nized!" she exclaimed. 
 
 Kaminsky clenched his fingers, fighting for con 
 trol of the panic that started in him. "Where are 
 the others?" he asked. 
 
 "I don t know. I hoped they d be here. We 
 separated. It was in the Alexander II cafe. Trina 
 Ronke came in with Captain Sikorsky and took the
 
 THE CHASM 373 
 
 next table. We kept our faces away and did not let 
 them hear our voices, but we had to pay the waiter. 
 Ronke looked harder and harder and finally she was 
 sure. We got out as fast as we could, but she had 
 Sikorsky convinced and he was up looking for an 
 officer. In the street we went opposite ways. What 
 if they ve got Marion!" 
 
 "If they have, Trina Ronke will die." 
 
 "As i f her miserable life could pay!" 
 
 "Is her money with her or here?" 
 
 "Here I think." 
 
 "Has she the key?" 
 
 "Bradfield has it." 
 
 "Then we ll have to get a locksmith or break 
 down the door. If she has the money with her we 
 will have none for getting her out." 
 
 "Oh, they can t have been caught!" exclaimed 
 Sonya. "They must have mixed up in some crowd 
 to avoid being followed." 
 
 "I m going down to look," said Kaminsky. "Was 
 it " 
 
 "Listen!" exclaimed Sonya. There were foot 
 steps below two persons coming up fast. It was 
 Walt and Marion. He had hold of her arm and 
 was talking low, emphatic English. Sonya sat down 
 on the step with a sigh of gratitude. That strain of 
 danger and relaxation of relief were perhaps her 
 salvation. 
 
 They saw Marion s white face, compressed lips, 
 and eyes turned up to them, and heard her relieved 
 exclamation, "Sonya s here !" 
 
 "You ve heard," she said to Kaminsky, as Walt 
 unlocked the door.
 
 374 THE CHASM 
 
 "Yes. When are you going?" 
 
 "The first ship. Sonya, you are coming, too." 
 She followed Walt in. 
 
 "No," said Sonya. 
 
 Marion sat down by the marble-topped table and 
 scanned the sailing lists. "The F. and K. steamer 
 Kursk for London. Three o clock." She looked at 
 her watch. "An hour and three-quarters. Sonya, 
 there s no time at all to lose. Get ready." 
 
 Sonya shook her head. "No, dear Marion," she 
 said. It was her old, reasonable, loving voice. 
 
 "She recognized you too!" exclaimed Marion. 
 "They ll know you re not in Odessa. They know 
 how close we ve been. She knows you loved Son 
 ya, won t you come ? I want you !" 
 
 "We ve done all we can for Grenning," urged Ka- 
 minsky. "It was our best, but it wasn t enough. We 
 may never hear definitely what happened. It is 
 certain he is dead or will soon die beyond our 
 knowledge or power to help him." 
 
 Sonya bowed her head. "I know that," she said. 
 "He should have died as he was when he came here. 
 But Marion my place is Russia. I d love to go 
 with you, but I d have nothing to do but think. 
 Here there are things to be done that can t very 
 well be done by people who care to live. I can do 
 these things." 
 
 Marion looked away suddenly. 
 
 "The revolution seems all tragically futile now," 
 said Sonya, "but no matter who is killed, it can never 
 end till it wins." 
 
 The eyes of Sonya and Marion met, and they
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 knew for the first time, in the moment of farewell, 
 the full depth of the love between them. 
 
 Marion came and embraced her. "God bless 
 you," she said. "Don t throw your life away! Will 
 you get away from Riga to-day in a good new dis 
 guise?" 
 
 "Yes. Perhaps to Libau." 
 
 "You make me see my place is America not 
 Rome not Paris. On the other side of the world I ll 
 be on your side of the world-fight, Sonya 1" 
 
 "Look here!" said Kaminsky. "This ship doesn t 
 leave soon enough. It will be two hours after 
 Sikorsky saw you. The police will have telephoned 
 the dock. They ll have a description of you in that 
 disguise." 
 
 Marion turned saved from breaking down. "I d 
 better leave off the wig and look young," she said. 
 
 "I m afraid no disguise is good enough now. 
 There are too few English-speaking people going 
 out. You have some accent. Half a dozen of them 
 can identify Bradfield." 
 
 "Walt," said Marion, "Kaminsky says we can t 
 get through at the dock. They will have telephoned 
 about me, and there are half a dozen men who can 
 identify you." 
 
 "In fact, all of them," said Bradfield. "They 
 took my measurements. How far is it to the Swed 
 ish coast?" 
 
 She asked Kaminsky. 
 
 "Less than two days sail with this wind. Tell 
 Bradfield he s right. A fishing boat s the thing. But 
 tell him the Swedish Socialists have to fight to keep
 
 376 THE CHASM 
 
 our refugees from being sent back by their govern 
 ment. Best keep in the steamer route and get an 
 English ship to pick you up." 
 
 Marion looked at the sailing lists. "There seems 
 to be no English ship till day after tomorrow." 
 
 "Better go now," said Kaminsky. "It will be 
 harder tomorrow when every detective knows of 
 you. Try the Kursk. It s her last trip. She won t be 
 back till spring. If we go at once we should get 
 a boat and get you off an hour ahead of her. I ll 
 go down with you and help get you a crew. You 
 might as well be in the hands of comrades." 
 
 Quarter of an hour later they were ready. Mar 
 ion made Sonya say she would make a good new 
 disguise and leave Riga at once. There was a knock 
 at the door. It was a messenger from M. at the 
 detective station warning them that the police had in 
 formation that the Countess de Hohenfels, wanted 
 for complicity in the Zhergan disaster, was disguised 
 in Riga. They were looking for her. She turned 
 pale, and translated for Bradfield. "Let s get to 
 that wharf!" he said. Marion turned to Sonya for 
 a last kiss. Then she went down with Bradfield and 
 Kaminsky into the wind-swept, daylight streets of 
 Riga. Armed all three, knowing death was better 
 than capture, they passed at every crowded crossing 
 one of the gorodovoi with his visored cap and boots 
 and saber. Kaminsky went twenty or thirty feet 
 ahead. 
 
 They passed Benson on the sidewalk. He stopped 
 in astonishment, a danger to them, but Marion gave 
 no sign of recognition and kept on. Ever since Brad- 
 field had left his trunk there, a representative of the
 
 THE CHASM 377 
 
 third section had been living in Benson s pension. 
 
 A Jewish pony-buyer wanted to stop and talk with 
 Kaminsky, who would not have it. The man walked 
 along with him. They saw Kaminsky give a nod of 
 comprehension, and then the man turned back the 
 way he had been going. 
 
 Down a squalid street they saw the black hulls of 
 vessels, their spars and yards white with sticky snow. 
 The shores of the Dwina were lined with thin, blue 
 ice. Passing through a line of carts and wagons, 
 they reached the wharf. It was built along the 
 length of its center with low forecastle-like cabins, 
 and was covered with trampled snow and scales, clut 
 tered with frozen coils of line, piled high with low, 
 heavy barrels. There were only a few boats in. 
 Kaminsky made some inquiries and got the Ameri 
 cans into one of the shanty markets smelling of fish 
 and tar, of vodka and bad tobacco. They quickly 
 struck a bargain with a skipper and his one-man 
 crew. The cabin of their boat was a dire-looking 
 place to spend a day in, but the sight of the walls 
 of the Central Prison across the snow-covered sands 
 made it alluring. A hundred rouble note persuaded 
 a wharf detective who had not yet heard of the 
 Countess de Hohenfels that this man and woman 
 could want a fishing-boat for none but laudable and 
 lawful ends. Walt helped Marion down from the 
 icy wharf into the boat. Kaminsky went with them 
 into the little cabin while the fishermen made ready 
 to cast off. 
 
 "I have something to tell you," said Kaminsky. 
 "Did you see that man that walked with me? He 
 was coming from the freight-yard. Among the mar-
 
 378 THE CHASM 
 
 ket reports the Jews send each other chalked on the 
 sides of freight-cars, that man saw a message in 
 Hebrew on a car just in from Kokenhausen. It 
 said, Grenning and Smika were brought here alive 
 in the night. This morning they were dead. They 
 were reported shot attempting to escape. 
 
 The slap and swish of little waves against the 
 sides of the boat the creak and strain of pulleys 
 a 3 the sail went up were for a moment the only 
 sounds. 
 
 "Thank God!" breathed Marion. She laid her 
 hand on Walt s. "Grenning is dead. Shot attempt 
 ing to escape a man with ! Walt, did you 
 
 know Sonya thought he loved me? You know how 
 she loved him. And look at her love for me ! She 
 has the greatest heart I have ever known I" She 
 turned to Kaminsky. "Nachman," she said, clasping 
 his hand goodbye, "take care of Sonya ! She is the 
 most precious thing in Russia." She gave him an 
 envelope containing ten thousand rouble notes. 
 "This was for Grenning. Now it s for the cause. 
 It means that you and Sonya shall have a little free 
 dom for a while to work for Russian freedom. And 
 can t you have Grenning s body cared for? The 
 cause owes him burial." 
 
 Nachman Kaminsky hesitated an instant. "Yes," 
 he said. "I will." But he knew that Grenning 
 would lie that night in a bed of quicklime. No man 
 of the future would read in the broken, half-knit 
 bones of that skeleton how men were governed under 
 the Tsars. 
 
 Two hours later, Marion and Walt Bradfield, 
 sailing northwestward through the Gulf of Riga in
 
 THE CHASM 379 
 
 the track of the outgoing ships, were helped over the 
 rail to the deck of the steamship Kursk, loaded with 
 ponies and Jewish emigrants bound for London. 
 
 Before night fell, breathing deep breaths of cold 
 salt air, standing close and warm together in the lea 
 of the cabin on the after deck, they saw the white 
 shore of Russia fade into a cloud beyond the sea- 
 rim of the Baltic.
 
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