The Belle of Bowling Green
say that in conduct it is best not to make trifles of trifles. For there
is an amazing vitality in some trifles, and we know not which may
abortively pass and which may become of momentous importance.
Yet, for two days Leonard hardly thought of Gilson and his drunken
abuse; or if it entered his mind it was only as an annoying and
commonplace event that he was in no way responsible for. He had not one
fear that it could possibly have any serious effect upon his life. And
as it happened the two days following Annette’s dinner party were
exceedingly happy ones to Sappha and Leonard. One of them was spent with
Madame Bloommaert in Nassau Street, and another with Annette at the
Semple house. Then came Saturday, and Leonard went early in the
afternoon to the Bowling Green. It was a very warm day, the parlour
windows in Judge Bloommaert’s house were open, and Sappha was sitting in
the sunshine happily indolent. She smiled a thousand welcomes as he
entered, but did not move, for her lap was full of knotted embroidery
silks, and Leonard seated himself at her side, and together they began
to slowly unravel and sort the tangled skeins. So happy, so merry, were
they! their hands touching, their heads touching, light laughter and
loving whispers feeding their hearts with a full content.
When the judge came home Sappha and Leonard rose gaily to meet him, but
they were both chilled by his manner, which was constrained and
unfriendly. A sense of something unpleasant swept out of cognisance the
innocent mirth that had pervaded the room; and in a moment its mental
atmosphere was changed. It was embarrassing, because Leonard did not
like to presume there was an offence--it might be only a passing mood,
and the mood might be caused by something or by some person outside of
their interference. So the suddenly checked lovers sat silent, or only
made whispered remarks about the condition of the silks.
One of these remarks attracted the judge’s attention, and he turned to
the apparently busy young man and said: “Sappha has given you a pretty
tangle to straighten out--Leonard.” He spoke Leonard’s name with a
hesitation that was almost like a withdrawal of the position that had
been given him, and Leonard felt the reluctance keenly, yet he answered
with much cheerfulness.
“Patience will win her way, sir--she does in every tangle. One by one
the knots are being untied.”
“You might cut them,” said the judge.
“That would be wasteful and foolish, sir. No one would be the gainer,
and no one would be satisfied. I will unravel them--with Sappha’s help.”
“Well, Leonard,”--this time the name was spoken a little more
pleasantly--“well, Leonard, I can tell you there is an ugly tangle up
the street for you either to cut, or to unravel. And I must say, I am
astonished, not to say displeased, at your neglecting it for three
days.”
“A tangle up the street, sir,--a tangle I have neglected!”
“You certainly have not forgotten your quarrel with Horace Gilson?”
“Oh, I had no quarrel with the fellow! How could I? He was drunk.”
“Not too drunk to tell you that you had only three months’ worth of
patriotism; not too drunk to bid you buy a little dog-courage with your
dirty dollars. Sir, you ought to have stopped such remarks as quickly
as they were made--yes, sir, they ought to have been stopped
peremptorily, whether they were drunk or sober remarks.”
“But, judge, you cannot talk to a drunken man--you cannot reason with a
drunken man----”
“Well, then, you can knock him down. That is an argument even a drunken
man will understand.”
“Father!” cried Sappha with indignation, as she stood with flashing eyes
before him. “Father, to knock a drunken man down would be as bad as to
knock an insane man down. In both cases it would be brutal.”
“When men make themselves into brutes it is just to treat them like
brutes.”
“I never heard such nonsense! such cruel nonsense! I think Leonard did
quite right to ignore the fellow.”
“You have no business, miss, to think anything about such subjects. Go
to your mother.”
“Mother went to Nassau Street long ago.”
“I want her. Tell her to come home immediately. And I do not want you.
It is necessary for me to speak to Leonard alone.”
“Very well. I shall go for mother.” But ere she left the room she took
Leonard’s hands in hers and kissed him. There was a whispered word also,
which the judge did not hear, but the girl’s act of sympathy was
irritating enough. He drew his lips wide and tight, and as soon as
Sappha closed the door he said:
“Now, sir, what are you going to do? Gilson has been vapouring from Dan
to Beersheba about your--cowardice, and your want of patriotism; and Mr.
Ogden told me that when he instanced your frequent generous loans to the
city Gilson laughed and said you had made forty per cent. on them. ‘You
and your father,’ he added, ‘were both canny Scots, and knew cleverly
how to rub one dollar into two.’”
“Judge, my father----”
“Wait a little. Why have you not been in any of your usual resorts since
Wednesday night? It does not look right--the rascal has had a clear
field for all the scurrilous lies he chose to tell.”
“Sir, if I had known that the man was lying soberly about me, I would
surely have given him openly the name he merits. But I did not dream
that he would dare to say out of liquor what he said in liquor; for he
is a quaking coward, and as fearful as a whipped child. Others are
behind him in this bluster. Alas, my money has never brought me anything
but envy and ill-will--no matter how heartily I give it! What would you
advise me to do, sir?”
“Make the man hold his tongue.”
“How?”
The judge was silent a moment, then with a touch of scorn he answered:
“There is the law. Sue him for slander. He is said to be worth twenty
thousand dollars. Lay your damages at twenty thousand. Your friend, Mr.
Burr, will defend your case very feelingly, no doubt.”
And with some anger Leonard answered: “That course is out of the
question, sir.”
“Well, then, write a letter to the newspapers.”
“I do not propose to lend the fellow’s words so much importance.”
“Then give him his lies back generally, and particularly--give him them
back on the street, and in the guard-room, or wherever you meet him--and
make a point of meeting him, here, there, and everywhere.”
“That is what I propose to do. Then, sir, egged on by those whose cue he
is now following, he will probably challenge me. Shall I accept his
challenge?”
“I am not your conscience keeper, Leonard.”
“Put the question then, as a matter of social expediency.”
“If the social verdict is what you want, ask Achille St. Ange. He is a
good authority.”
“Once more, sir. If I lift this foolish business to the moral plane,
what do you say?”
“Zounds! Leonard, I have told you already that morally judging this
question I hold the Decalogue as a finality!” And with these words the
judge rose to his feet. It was evident he had no more to say on the
subject, and Leonard bid him “good-afternoon” and left the house. There
had been throughout the interview a want of sympathy in the judge’s
manner that insinuated suspicion, or at least uncertainty, and Leonard
was pained and offended by it. Judge Bloommaert had known him
intimately, yet he had permitted the evil tongue of a stranger to
influence his own experience. Angry tears rose unconsciously to his
eyes, and he asked himself what did it profit a man to be truthful and
generous, if any dastardly liar could smear and cancel the noblest
record? He walked up the Bowling Green with a burning heart, but Sappha
had whispered her promise to be near the statue; and he soon saw the
flutter of her white gown as she came to meet him. They entered the
enclosure and sat down on a bench facing that heroic representation of
Washington, which, made of wood, shaped and coloured to imitate the
rosiest glow of life, was the best artistic effort New York was capable
of one hundred years ago.[3] But even if Sappha and Leonard had been
conscious of its artistic defects, they cared little for them at that
hour. Their own affairs were too urgent, too perilously near to trouble
again. And though Sappha was full of sympathy and quite determined to
uphold Leonard in all he had done and was going to do, yet she at once
gave vent to her womanish fears in the essentially provoking query: “Oh,
Leonard, why did you not show yourself in the city the last three days?
You might have known people would say you were afraid of that dreadful
man.”
“Dear Sappha!” he answered, “will you, too, oblige me to explain that my
absence from my usual haunts the last three days was quite accidental;
you wanted me to go to Nassau Street with you Thursday, and your
grandmother kept us all day. You wanted me to go to the Semple house
with you Friday, and Annette and Achille kept us all day. This morning
my lawyer brought to the hotel a number of papers and accounts, and it
was noon before we had reviewed them. Then we had a meal together, and
afterwards I came to you. How could I imagine Gilson’s unmerited abuse
of me? And it seems I had no friend or acquaintance willing to take the
trouble to tell me how the man was slandering me behind my
back--everything, and every one, was against me.”
“Father told you as soon as he heard the scandal.”
“Yes, but not very kindly. There was a taste of doubt in all he said.
And he would give me no positive straight-forward advice. I feel
completely at sea as regards his wishes. I am going this evening to talk
the matter over with Achille.”
“Oh, no! Oh, no! Achille will urge you to fight the low creature. I
cannot bear that, Leonard.”
“There is not the least danger. Gilson would be a child in my hands.”
“You never know. Accidents happen--you must be out of practice, and
then, it cannot be right. I don’t believe you are afraid--I am sure you
are not--but I do not want you to fight. I am afraid--I am a mortal
coward about you. You must not accept a challenge, if he sends one. I
shall die of fear. I shall, indeed.”
“If it should become necessary to fight, I am any man’s equal. My sword
and my hands are trained to perfection. Even Achille admits my
superiority. I, personally, should not be in the least danger. In fact,
I am both with sword and pistol so much more expert than Gilson that it
would be almost cowardice, as well as cruelty, to meet him in a duel.
There could be no justice in such a trial of right or wrong--but how few
people can know this? Or knowing it, feel that it might bind me as an
honourable man to refuse the duel.”
“I pray you, Leonard, take my advice, and do not go to Achille. It would
be ‘fight, of course you must fight,’ with Achille. He would hear of
nothing else. And for my sake, Leonard, you must not fight. In the long
run, father would be angry if you did, and perhaps make it an excuse for
separating us. Leonard, promise me on your honour not to fight. If you
come to me with bloody hands I will not take them. And if you let out
life with either sword or pistol your hand will be forevermore bloody.
No water will cleanse it, no good woman will touch it, no saint in
heaven clasp it--better cut it off, and cast it from you, than stain it
for all eternity.” She was quivering with feeling, her eyes were full of
tears, and her voice had those tones of tender authority which subjugate
as well as persuade.
“My dear darling little preacher,” Leonard answered, “I promise you
these hands shall never do anything to make them unworthy to clasp
yours.” And he took her hand, pressed it firmly between his own, and
kissed his promise upon it. Then she rose smiling; they walked together
to madame’s house, and at the gate they parted.
But though somewhat comforted, Leonard did not feel as if the way before