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£6' 
 
 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Prof. Guy E, Grrantham 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924021751452 
 
, ■■'^iA*.-t^. 
 
 'deaiv old ma! stop crying, ma!" 
 
 [See p. 102 
 
THE 
 
 EMPTY SACK 
 
 BY 
 
 BASIL KING 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 THE INNER SHRINE, 
 THE WILD OLIVE, Etc. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 GROSSET & DUNLAP 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
 Made in the United Statu of Amelic* 
 
 Tt-vrl 
 

 The Emptv Sack 
 
 Copyright, 1921, by Harper & Brothers 
 Printed in the United States of America 
 
 B-W 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 MR. COLLINGHAM will see you in his 
 office before you go." 
 
 Having thus become the Voice of Fate, Miss 
 Ruddick, shirt-waisted and daintily shod, sHpped 
 away between the pens where clerks were preen- 
 ing themselves before leaving their desks for the 
 day. 
 
 The old man to whom she had spoken raised 
 his head in the mild surprise of an ox disturbed 
 while grazing. He, too, was leaving his desk for 
 the day, arranging his work with the tidy care 
 of one for whom pens, ink, and ledgers were the 
 vital things of life. Finishing his task, his hands 
 trembled. His smile trembled, too, when a 
 young man in a neighboring pen called out in 
 tones which mingled sarcasm with encouragement : 
 
 "Good luck, old top! Goin' to get your raise 
 at last!" 
 
 It was what he repeated to himself as he 
 shuffled after Miss Ruddick. He was obliged to 
 repeat it in order to steady his step. He was 
 obliged to steady his step because some fifteen 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 or twenty pairs of eyes from all the pens in the 
 office were following him as he went along. It 
 was the last bit of pride in the man marching 
 up to face a firing squad. 
 
 He had reached the glass door on which the 
 word "Exit "could be traced in reversed letters, 
 when a breezy young fellow of twenty startled 
 him by a sudden clap on the shoulder. The boy 
 had not come from a pen, but from the more 
 distant portion of the bank where a line of 
 tellers' cages faced the public. 
 
 "Hello, dad ! Tell ma I'll be home for supper. 
 Off now for a plunge at the gym." 
 
 The boy passed on, leaving behind a vision of 
 gleaming teeth and the echo of gay tones. 
 
 Opening a glass door and entering a passage- 
 way, the old man stumbled along it till another 
 door, standing open, showed Miss Ruddick, 
 beside her typewriter, assorting her papers before 
 going home. Miss Ruddick was a competent 
 woman of thirty-five. She was in her present 
 position of stenographer-secretary to the head 
 of the banking house because Mr. Bickley, the 
 efficiency expert, for whose opinion Mr. Col- 
 lingham had a kind of reverence, had selected 
 her for the job. Miss Ruddick cultivated her 
 efficiency as another woman cultivates her voice 
 or another her gift for dancing. Throwing off 
 the weaknesses that spring from affection and 
 softness of heart, she had steeled and oiled her- 
 self into a swiftly working, surely judging, and 
 wholly impersonal business automaton. Ten 
 
 2 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 years ago she would have felt sorry for a man in 
 Josiah FoUett's predicament. She would have 
 felt sorry for him now had she not learned to her 
 cost that sympathy diminished the accuracy of 
 her work. Now she could turn him off as easily 
 as an executioner the man condemned to death. 
 
 As a matter of fact, she knew that ten minutes 
 previously the efficiency expert had been closeted 
 with Mr. Collingham, dealing with this very case. 
 With her own ears she had heard Mr. Bickley 
 say: 
 
 "You will do as you think best, Mr. Colling- 
 ham. Only, I can't help reminding you that 
 once you admit any principle but that of supply 
 and demand, business methods are at an end." 
 
 Miss Ruddick knew Mr. Collingham's inner 
 struggle because she had been through it herself; 
 but she knew, too, that to Mr. Collingham the 
 efficiency expert was much what his physician 
 is to a king. His advice may be distasteful, but 
 it is a command. The most merciful thing now 
 was rapidity of action, as with the appUcation 
 of the guillotine. It was mercy, therefore, to 
 throw open instantly the door of Mr. Colling- 
 ham's office, so that Josiah was forced to enter. 
 
 He stood meekly, feeling, doubtless, as the 
 psalmist felt when all the ends of the world had 
 come upon him. Confusedly he was saying to 
 himself tfyat all the threads of his laborious life, 
 from the time when, as a boy in Canada, he had 
 begun to earn his living at sixteen, till now, when 
 he was sixty-three, had been drawn together 
 
 3 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 at just this point, where he was either to get his 
 raise or else — 
 
 The suspense was terrible. As the August 
 Presence into which he had been ushered was 
 engaged in examining the contents of a lower 
 drawer of the flat-topped desk at which It was 
 seated. It was only partly visible. All Josiah 
 could see was the shoulder of a portly form, the 
 edge of a pear-shaped pearl in a plum-colored 
 tie, and a temple of grizzled hair. The clerk 
 moved forward, coming to a halt midway be- 
 tween the door and the desk till the Presence 
 should recognize his approach by raising Its head. 
 
 The Presence didn't quite raise Its head. It 
 merely glanced upward in a casual, sidelong way, 
 continuing the inspection of the drawer. 
 
 "Well, FoUett, I suppose you know what I've 
 got to say?" 
 
 Follett betrayed the fact that he did know. 
 
 "Is it the same as you said two years ago, 
 sir?" 
 
 Thus challenged, the Presence lifted itself, 
 becoming to the full Bradley CoUingham, the 
 distinguished banker, philanthropist, and Amer- 
 ican citizen, so widely and favorably known for 
 his sympathetic personality. The essence of 
 these traits rang in the appealing quality of his 
 tone. 
 
 "What do you think, Follett? I told you 
 then that you were not earning your salary. 
 You haven't been earning it since. What can 
 I do?" 
 
 4 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 " I could work harder, sir. I could stay over- 
 time, when none of the young fellows want to." 
 
 "That wouldn't do any good, FoUett. It isn't 
 the way we do business." 
 
 "I've been five years with you, sir, and all 
 my life between one banking house and another, 
 in this country and Canada. In my humble 
 way I've helped to build the banking business 
 up." 
 
 "And you've been paid, haven't you ? I really 
 don't see that you've an3rthing to complain of." 
 
 There was no severity in this response. It 
 was made only because the necessities of the case 
 required it, as FoUett had the justice to perceive. 
 
 "I'm not complaining, sir. I only don't see 
 how I'm going to live." 
 
 The voice already distressed became more so. 
 
 "But that isn't my affair, is it, now.? I'm 
 running a business, not a charitable institution. 
 It isn't as if you'd been with us twenty or thirty 
 years. You've shifted about a good deal in 
 your time — " 
 
 "I've had to better myself, sir — ^with a family." 
 
 "Quite so. And once you admit any principle 
 but that of supply and demand business methods 
 are at an end. Don't think that this isn't as 
 hard for me as it is for you, FoUett, but — " 
 
 "If it was as hard for you as it is for me, sir, 
 you d — 
 
 But, the possibilities here being dangerous, the 
 banker was forced to cut in: 
 
 "Besides, you'll get another job. Stairs wiU 
 S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 write you any kind of recommendation you ask 
 for." 
 
 "Recommendations won't do me any good, sir, 
 once I'm fired for old age. That's a worse brand 
 on you than coming out of jail." 
 
 The discussion growing painful, the banker 
 rose to put an end to it. Even so, he had some- 
 thing still to say to justify himself. 
 
 "It isn't as if I hadn't warned you of this, 
 Follett. You've had two years in which" — it 
 was hard to find the right phrase — "in which to 
 provide for your future." 
 
 The clerk was unable to repress a dim, far- 
 away smile. 
 
 "Two years in which to provide for my future 
 — on forty-five a week! And me with five 
 mouths to feed, to say nothing of Teddy, who 
 pays his board!" 
 
 The banker found an opening. 
 
 "I made a place for him — didn't I, now? — as 
 5oon as he was released from the navy. He 
 ought to be able to help you." 
 
 "He does help, sir, as far as a young fellow 
 can on eighteen a week with his own expenses to 
 take care of. But I've two little girls still at 
 school, and another, my eldest — " 
 
 A hint of embarrassment emphasized the 
 banker's words as he began moving forward to 
 show his visitor to the door. 
 
 "I understand that she's engaged as an artist's 
 model. That, too, ought to bring you in some- 
 thing." 
 
 6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I suppose Mr. Robert told you that, sir." 
 
 This was inadvertent on Follett's part, and a 
 mistake. Any other distinguished man would 
 have stiffened at the use of the name of a member 
 of his family in a connection like the present one. 
 Bradley CoUingham was admirably temperate 
 in saying: 
 
 "I don't talk of such matters with my son. I 
 merely understood that your eldest girl was 
 earning something — " 
 
 "She poses six hours a week for Mr. Hubert 
 Wray, at a dollar an hour." 
 
 "She could probably get more engagements. 
 I hear — I forget who told me — ^that she's the 
 type these artist people like to put into their 
 pictures." 
 
 Finding himself obliged to keep step with his 
 employer, FoUett felt as if he was walking to his 
 soul's dead-march. Only the force of the con- 
 ventions in which everybody lives enabled him to 
 go on making conversation. 
 
 "We don't much like the occupation for a 
 daughter of ours, sir; and, besides, there's lots 
 who think that being an artist's model isn't 
 respectable." 
 
 *' Still, if she can earn good money at it — " 
 
 To Collingham's relief, they were at the door, 
 which he opened significantly and without more 
 words. FoUett looked into the outer world as 
 represented by Miss Ruddick's office as into an 
 abyss. For the minute it seemed too awful a 
 void to step into. When his watery blue eyes 
 2 7 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 again sought Collingham's face, it was with the 
 dumb question, "Must I?" which the banker 
 himseh could only meet with Mr. Bickley's 
 manfulness. 
 
 He, too, spoke only with his eyes: "You must, 
 my poor Follett. There's no help for it. You 
 and I are both caught up into a vast machine. 
 I can't act otherwise than as I'm doing, and I 
 know you don't expect it." 
 
 Thus Follett stepped over the threshold and 
 the door closed behind him. So short a time had 
 passed since he had gone the other way that Miss 
 Ruddick was still beside her desk, putting away 
 Jier papers. Follett didn't look at her, but she 
 looked at him, finding herself compelled to hark 
 back to Mr. Bickley's axioms to check the tears 
 she couldn't allow to rise. ' 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 MEANWHILE there was that going on 
 which would have disturbed both these 
 elderly men had they known anything about it. 
 
 Jennie Follett, in a Greek peplum of white- 
 cotton cloth, her amber-colored hair drawn into 
 a loose Greek knot, was on her knees before a 
 plaster cast of Aphrodite, to which she was 
 holding up a garland of tissue-paper flowers. 
 
 While there was nothing alarming in this 
 pagan act, the freedom with which two young 
 men laid hands on her little person threw out 
 hints of impropriety. 
 
 The pretexts were obvious, and, in the case of 
 one of the young men, were backed by what 
 might have been called professional necessity. 
 One bare arm needed to be raised, the other to 
 be lowered. One sandaled foot was too visible 
 beneath the edge of the peplum, the other not 
 visible enough. Adjustments called for read- 
 justments, and readjustments for revisions of 
 the scheme. What one young man approved of, 
 the other disallowed, to a running accompani- 
 ment of Miss Follett's laughter. 
 
 "Do go away," she implored, when Mr. Bob 
 CoUingham, with one hand beneath her elbow 
 
 9 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 and the other at her finger-tips, tilted her arm 
 at what seemed to him its loveliest angle. 
 
 "Clear out, Bob," the artist seconded, in half- 
 vexed good humor. "We'll never get the pose 
 with you here." 
 
 "You'd never get anything if I went away, 
 because Miss FoUett wouldn't work. Would 
 you, Miss FoUett?" 
 
 The artist having gone in search of something 
 at the far end of the studio. Miss FoUett replied 
 to Mr. CoUingham alone. 
 
 "I don't know what I'd do if you went away; 
 but if you stay I shall go frantic. If you touch 
 me again I shall get up." 
 
 "I'm not touching you again," he said, going 
 on to bend her left arm ever so slightly, "because 
 this is the same old time all along. The picture 
 is all I care about." 
 
 "But it's Mr. Wray's picture. It isn't yours." 
 
 "It will be if I buy it. I said I would if I 
 liked it, and I sha'n't like it unless I get it the 
 way I want it." 
 
 "You know you don't mean to buy it." 
 
 "I don't mean to let anybody else buy it; you 
 can lay down your life on that." 
 
 There was so much earnestness in this declara- 
 tion that Miss FoUett laughed again. It was an 
 easy, silvery laugh, pleasant to the ear, and not 
 out of keeping with the medley of beautiful 
 things round her. 
 
 "Jennie's value in a studio is more than that 
 of a model," Wray had recently confided to his 
 
 ID 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 friend, Bob CoUingham. "It's as if she extracted 
 the beauty from every bit of tapestry or bronze 
 and turned it into animate Hfe." 
 
 "By doing nothing or standing still," Col- 
 lingham had adde'd, "she can pin your eyqs on 
 her as other girls can't by frisking about. And 
 when she moves — " 
 
 An exclamation from Wray conveyed the fact 
 that Jennie's motion was beyond what either of 
 these young experts in womanhood could pos- 
 sibly put into words. 
 
 But that Jennie knew where to draw a certain 
 kind of line became evident when, either by 
 inadvertence or design, the back of Bob CoUing- 
 ham's hand rubbed along her cheek. With a 
 smile at once kindly and cold she put away his 
 arm and rose. In the few yards she placed be- 
 tween them before she turned again, still with her 
 kind, cold smile, there was rebuke without 
 offense. 
 
 Being fair, the young man colored easily. 
 When he colored, the three inches of scar across 
 his temple which he had brought home from the 
 war became a streak of red. It was one of the 
 reasons why Jennie, who was sensitive to the 
 physical, didn't like to look at him. Not to 
 look at him, she pretended to arrange the folds 
 of her peplum, which kept her gaze downward. 
 
 But had she looked, she would have seen that 
 he was hurt. His face was of the honest, sym- 
 pathetic cast that quickly reflects the wounding 
 of the feelings. If men had prototypes in dogs, 
 
 II 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Bob CoUingham's would have been the mastiff 
 or the St. Bernard — big, strong, devoted, slow 
 to wrath, and with an almost comic humiliation 
 at sound of a harsh word. Though there was no 
 harsh word in Jennie's case. Bob was sure he 
 detected a harsh thought. It hurt him the more 
 for the reason that she was a model, while he 
 had advantages of social consideration. Little 
 as he would have been discourteous to a girl of 
 his own station, he would have thought it un- 
 worthy of a cad to profit by Jennie's helplessness 
 in a place like a studio. 
 
 "I hope you didn't think I was trying to be 
 fresh." 
 
 Now that she felt herself secured by distance, 
 she laughed again. 
 
 "I didn't think anything at all. I just — ^just 
 don't like people touching me." 
 
 "Not any people?" 
 
 "Not any I need speak about to you." 
 
 "Why me?" 
 
 "Because I hardly know you." 
 
 "You could know me better if you wanted to." 
 
 "Oh, I could know lots of people better if I 
 wanted to." 
 
 "And you don't want to — for what reason?" 
 
 "It isn't always a reason. Sometimes it's just 
 an instinct." 
 
 "And which is it in my case?" 
 
 "In your case, it doesn't have to be discussed. 
 I shouldn't know you, anyhow. We're like 
 creatures in different — ^what do they call it.? — 
 
 12 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 not spheres — elements, Isn't it? — ^We're like 
 creatures in different elements — a bird and a 
 fish — ^that don't get a point of contact." 
 
 "You mayn't see the points of contact — " 
 
 "And if I don't see them they're not there." 
 She turned toward Wray, who was coming 
 back in their direction, addressing him in the 
 idiom she heard among young native-born 
 Americans, and which accorded best with her 
 position in the studio. "Oh, Mr. Wray, could 
 you let me off posing any more to-day? This 
 friend guy of yours has got me all on springs." 
 
 "Clear out, friend guy. Can't you see you're 
 in the way?" 
 
 She continued to take the tone she was trying 
 to make second nature, since it was not first. 
 
 "That's something he wouldn't notice if a 
 car was running over him. But please let me 
 go. There's a quarter of an hour left on to-day, 
 but I'll make it up some other time." 
 
 She moved down the studio with as much 
 seeming unconcern as if she didn't know that 
 two pairs of eyes were following her. Picking 
 her way between old English chairs with can- 
 vases stacked against their legs, past dusty 
 brocade hangings, and beneath an occasional 
 plaster cast lifted on a pedestal, she went -out 
 at the model's exit without a glance behind her. 
 
 Bob spoke only when she had disappeared. 
 
 "Listen, Hubert. I'm going to marry that 
 girl." 
 
 Wray stepped back to the front of the easel, 
 13 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 flicking in a touch or two on the rough sketch of 
 the Greek girl kneeling before Aphrodite. 
 
 "I was afraid you were getting some such bug 
 in your head." 
 
 Bob limped to a table on which he had thrown 
 his hat and the stick that helped his lameness. 
 
 People at Marillo Park, where the CoUinghams 
 lived for most of the year, said that, with the 
 wounds he had got while in the French army in 
 the early days of the war, he had brought back 
 with him a real enhancement of manhood. 
 Having come through Groton and Harvard little 
 better than an uncouth boy, his experience in 
 France had shaped his outlook on life into some- 
 thing like a purpose. It was not very clear as 
 yet, or sharply defined; but he knew that cer- 
 tain preliminary conditions must be met before 
 he could settle down. One of these had to do 
 with Miss Jennie FoUett; and what Hubert 
 called " a bug in his head " was, in his own mind, 
 at least, as vital to his development as his braving 
 his family in going to the war. 
 
 That had been in the famous year when the 
 American nation was trying to be "neutral in 
 thought." "I'm not neutral in thought," Bob, 
 who had only that summer left Harvard, had 
 declared to his father. "I'm not neutral in any 
 way. Give me my ticket over, dad, and I'll do 
 the rest myself." 
 
 He got his ticket over, and fifteen months 
 later, bandaged and crippled, a ticket back. 
 On the return voyage he had as his companion 
 
 14 
 
vTHE EMPTY SACK 
 
 a young American stretcher-man who had helped 
 to carry him off the battlefield, and who, a few 
 weeks later, nervously shattered, had joined him 
 in the hospital. Wray, who, on the outbreak of 
 war, had been painting in Latoul's atelier, had 
 now got what he called "a sickener of Europe," 
 and was glad to hang out his shingle in New York. 
 A New England man of Gallicized ways of 
 thinking, he had means enough to wait for 
 recognition, so long as he kept his expenses with- 
 in relatively narrow bounds. 
 
 With his soft hat plastered provisionally on the 
 back of his head, Bob leaned heavily on his stick. 
 
 "I've got to marry some one," he said, as if 
 in self-defense. "I'm that kind. I can't begin 
 fitting my jig saw together till I do it." 
 
 Wray kept on painting. 
 
 "Why don't you pick out a girl in your own 
 class ? Lots of nice ones at Marillo." 
 
 "You don't marry girls just because they're 
 nice, old thing. You take the one who's the 
 other half of yourself." 
 
 " I don't see that you're the other half of Miss 
 FoUett." 
 
 "Well, I am." 
 
 "Miss FoUett herself doesn't think so." 
 
 "She'll think so, all right, when I show her 
 that she can't do without me." 
 
 "Some job!" Wray grunted, laconically. 
 
 "Sure it's some job; but the bigger the job 
 the more you're on your mettle. That's the 
 way we're made." 
 
 IS 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 The artist continued to add small touches to 
 the shadows of the Aphrodite cast as he changed 
 his tactics. 
 
 "If you married Miss FoUett, wouldn't your 
 family raise hell?" 
 
 "They'd raise hell at first, and put a can on it 
 afterward. Families always do." 
 
 "And what would Miss FoUett feel — before 
 they'd put on the can ? " 
 
 Bob limped uneasily toward the door. 
 
 "Life wouldn't be all slip-and-go-down for 
 her, of course; but that's what I should have to 
 make up to her." 
 
 "Oh, you'd make it up to her." 
 
 With his hand on the knob, CoUingham turned 
 in mild indignation. 
 
 "Say, Hubert, what do you think I'm made of? 
 A girl I'm crazy about — " 
 
 "Oh, I only wondered how you were going to 
 do it." 
 
 "Well, wonder away." A steely glint came 
 into the deep-set, small gray eyes as he added, 
 "That's something I don't have to explain to you 
 beforehand, now do I?" 
 
 Left alone, the painter went on painting. As 
 it always does, the house of Art opened its door 
 to the troubles of the artist. Wray neither 
 turned his head as his friend went out nor mut- 
 tered a farewell. He merely laid on his strokes 
 with an emotional vigor which hardened the 
 surface of the plaster cast into marble. Neither 
 did he turn his head nor utter a greeting when he 
 
 i6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 became aware that Jennie, in her sport suit of 
 tobacco color set oflF with collar and cuffs of ruby 
 red, was moving toward him among the studio 
 properties. It was easier to work his desire to 
 look at her into this swift, sure wielding of the 
 brush. 
 
 In the spirit rather than with the eyes he 
 knew that she had paused within ten or twelve 
 feet of him, that her kind, soft, bantering glance 
 was resting on him as he worked, and that a 
 kind, soft, bantering smile was flickering about 
 her lips. With a deft force, he found the colors 
 and gave this expression to the mouth and eyes 
 of the kneeling girl. It was the work of a second 
 — the merest twist of the fingers. 
 
 "I just wanted to say," Jennie explained, 
 after waiting for him to see her, "that I'm sorry 
 to have been so horrid just now, and I'd like to 
 know when I'm to come again." 
 
 "You could marry Bob CoUingham — if you 
 wanted to." 
 
 His efforts had become so passionately living 
 that he couldn't afford to look up at her now, 
 even had he wished to do so. He did not so wish, 
 because he knew, still in the spirit, how she 
 would take this announcement — ^without the 
 change of a muscle, without a change of any 
 kind beyond a flame in the amber depths of the 
 irises. It would be a tawny flame, with an in- 
 describable red in it, and he managed, on the 
 instant, to translate it into paint. The girl on 
 her knees was getting a soul as the lumpish white 
 
 17 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of the plaster cast was taking on the gleam of 
 ancient, long-worshiped stone. 
 
 "And would you advise me to do that?" 
 The voice had the charm of the well-placed 
 mezzo, the enunciation a melodious precision. 
 Born in Halifax, where she had spent her first 
 twelve years, the English tradition of musical 
 speech, which in that old fortified town makes 
 its last tottering stand on the American con- 
 tinent, had been part of her inheritance. 
 
 Still working at his highest pitch of tensity, 
 Wray considered his answer. 
 
 "I shouldn't advise you to do that — if I 
 thought about myself." 
 
 "Then why say anything about it?" 
 "Because I thought I ought to put you wise." 
 "What's the good of that, when I don't like 
 him?" 
 
 "Girls often marry men they don't like wheti 
 they have as much money as he'll have." 
 
 "Money's an object, of course; but when a 
 fellow—" 
 
 "He's not so bad. I like him. Most men 
 do." 
 
 "Most men wouldn't have to stand his pawing 
 them about. I like him, too — except for the 
 physical." 
 
 "Then you wouldn't marry him?" 
 "Not unless it was the only way not to starve 
 to death." 
 
 " But you'll marry some one." 
 "Probably; and, probably — so will you." 
 i8 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Her voice was as cool and unflurried as if the 
 words were tossed ofF without intention. 
 
 Both knew that an electric change had come 
 into the mental atmosphere. Of the two, the 
 girl was the less perturbed. Though beneath her 
 feet the floor seemed to heave like the deck of a 
 ship in a storm, she could stand in a jaunty 
 attitude, her hands in her ruby-red pockets, and 
 throw up at its sauciest angle her dain-ily 
 modeled chin. 
 
 With him it was different. He, had two main 
 points to consider. In the first place. Bob Col- 
 lingham had just made an announcement to 
 which he, Wray, was obliged to give some 
 thought. He didn't need to give much to it, 
 because the conclusions were so obvious. Jennie 
 had hit the poor fellow in the eye, and, instead 
 of viewing the case in a common-sense, Gal- 
 licized way, he was taking it with crazy Ameri- 
 can solemnity. There was nothing to it. The 
 CoUinghams would never stand for it. It would 
 be a favor to them, as well as to Bob himself, to 
 put the whole thing out of the question. 
 
 "So that settles that," he said to himself. 
 
 Because as he continued to reflect he worked 
 furiously, Jennie saw in him the being whom the 
 lingo of the hour had taught her to call a cave- 
 man. In the motion-picture theaters she gen- 
 erally frequented, cavemen struggled with vam- 
 pires in duels of passion and strength. Jennie 
 "* longed to be loved by one of this race; and a 
 •caveman who came to her with violet eyes and 
 
 19 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 a sweeping brown mustache possessed an appeal 
 beyond the prehistoric. In spite of the challenge 
 in her smile and the daring angle at which she 
 held her chin, she waited in violent emotion for 
 what he would say next. 
 
 "Oh, I sha'n't marry for years to come," he 
 jerked out, still going on with his work. " Sha'n't 
 be able to afford it. If I didn't have a few, a 
 very few, hundred dollars a year, I couldn't pay 
 you your miserable six a week." 
 
 She took this manfully. The head, with its 
 ruby-red toque, to which a tobacco-colored 
 wing gave the dash which was part of Jennie's 
 personality, was perhaps poised a little more 
 audaciously; but there was no other sign outside 
 the wildness of her heart. 
 
 "Oh, well; you're only beginning your career as 
 yet. One of these days you'll do a big portrait — " 
 
 "But, Jennie, marriage isn't everything." 
 
 It was the caveman's plea, the caveman's tone; 
 and though Jennie knew she couldn't respond to 
 it in practice, the depths of her being thrilled. 
 
 "No it isn't everything; but for a girl like me 
 it's so much that — " 
 
 "Why specially for a girl like you?" 
 
 "Because her ring and her marriage lines are 
 about all she's got to show. No woman can hold 
 a man for more than — ^well, just so long; and 
 when his heart's gone where is she, poor thing, 
 except for the ring and the parson's name?" 
 
 "A woman's heart is as free as a man's; and 
 when he goes his way — " 
 
 20 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "She's left standing in the same old place. 
 We'd all be better off if we felt as free to wander 
 as the men; but most of us are made so that we 
 don't want to. God! what a life!" she moaned, 
 with a comic grimace to take the pain from the 
 exclamation. "But, tell me, Mr, Wray, what 
 day do you want me to come again?" 
 
 He asked, as if casually: 
 
 "Why do you say, 'God! what a life'?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. I suppose because it's 
 the only thing to say. Wouldn't you say it if — " 
 
 "If what?" 
 
 "Oh, nothing." 
 
 "Is it anything to do with me?" 
 
 "No — ^not specially. It's everything — begin- 
 ning with being born." 
 
 "I shouldn't think you had any kick against 
 being born — ^with a face and a figure like yours." 
 
 "What good are they to me? My mother 
 used to be — Well, I'm only pretty, and she 
 was a great beauty — but look at her now." 
 
 "But you don't have to go the same way." 
 
 "All women of our class go the same way. 
 It's awful to spend your whole Ufe toiling and 
 aching and worrying and scraping and paring 
 just on the hither side of starving to death; and 
 yet, if it was only yourself, you could stand it. 
 But when you see that your father and mother 
 did it before you, and that your children will 
 have to do it after you — " 
 
 "Not in this country, Jennie," he put in, senten- 
 tiously. "This country gives everyone a chance." 
 
 21 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 She gave another of her comic little moans. 
 
 "This country is like every other country. 
 It's a football field. If you're big enough and 
 tough enough, with skin padded and conscience 
 wadded, and legs to kick hard enough — ^you get 
 a chance — ^yes — and one man in a hundred 
 thousand is able to make use of it. But if you're 
 just a decent, honest sort, willing to do a decent, 
 honest day's work, your only chance will be to 
 keep at it till you drop." 
 
 "Aren't you rather pessimistic?" 
 
 She ignored this question to pace up and 
 down with little tossings of the hands which 
 Wray found infinitely graceful. 
 
 "Look at my father. He's worked like a con- 
 vict all his life, just to reach the magnificent 
 top-notch of forty-five a week. We've been 
 praying to God to give him a raise — " 
 
 "And perhaps God will." 
 
 She snapped her fingers. "Like that he will! 
 God has no use for the prayers of the decent, 
 honest sort. He's on the side of the football 
 tough with the biggest kick in the scrimmage — 
 Ah, what's the use? I'm born, and I've got to 
 make the best of it. Tell me when to come 
 again, and let me go." 
 
 Laying aside his brushes and palette, he went 
 close to her. All the poetry in the world seemed 
 to Jennie to vibrate in his tones. 
 
 "Making the best of it because you're bom is 
 loving and letting yourself be loved, Jennie." 
 'So it is." She laughed, with a ring of the 
 
 22 
 
 "( 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 desperate in her mirth. "You don't have to tell 
 me that." 
 
 His voice sank to a whisper. 
 
 "Then why not do it?" 
 
 "I would like a shot if I had only myself to 
 think about." 
 
 "In love, there are only two to think about, 
 Jennie." 
 
 She laughed — a hard little laugh, in spite of 
 its silvery tinkle. 
 
 "When I love I've got two sisters and a 
 brother, all younger than myself, to bring into 
 the little affair, to say nothing of a nice old dad 
 and a mother that I'm very fond of. I've got to 
 love for them as well as for myself — " 
 
 "Then why don't you love Bob Collingham?" 
 
 She threw him a reproachful look. 
 
 "Don't! Please don't! That's brutal of you ! 
 But then, you are brutal, aren't you ? I suppose, 
 if you weren't, I shouldn't — " 
 
 A little nondescript gesture expressed her 
 thought better than she could have put it into 
 words; and with this tribute to the caveman she 
 slipped away again amid the brocades, pedestals, 
 and old furniture. 
 3 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MARILLO PARK, N. Y., is more than a 
 park; it is a life. When a social corre- 
 spondent registers the fact that Mr. and Mrs. 
 Robert Bradley Collingham, Miss Edith CoUing- 
 ham, and Mr. Robert Bradley Collingham, 
 Junior, have arrived at Collingham Lodge, 
 Marillo Park, from their camp in the Adiron- 
 dacks, their farm in Dutchess County, or their 
 apartment in Fifth Avenue, the implications are 
 beyond any that can be set forth in cold print. 
 Cold print will tell you that a man has died, 
 but it can convey no adequate notion of the 
 haven of peace into which presumably he has 
 entered. 
 
 Cold print might describe Marillo Park as it 
 might describe Warwick Castle or the Chateau 
 of Chenonceau, with a catalogue of landscapes 
 and architectural minutiae. It could tell you of 
 charming houses set in artfully laid-out grounds, 
 of gardens, shrubberies, and tennis courts, of 
 the club, the swimming pool, the riding school, 
 the golf links; but only experience could give 
 you that sense of being beyond contact with 
 outside vulgarity which is Marillo's specialty. 
 Against its high stone wall outside vulgarity 
 breaks as the sea against a cliff; before its beau- 
 
 24 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 tiful grille gate it swirls like a river at the foot 
 of a lawn with no possibility of overflow. As 
 nearly as may be on earth, the resident of 
 Marillo Park can be barricaded against the sor- 
 did, and withdrawn from all things inharmonious 
 with his own high thought. 
 
 But every Eden has its serpent, and at Col- 
 lingham Lodge on that October afternoon this 
 Satan had taken the form of a not very good- 
 looking young man who was pacing the flagged 
 terrace side by side with Miss Edith Collingham. 
 I emphasize the fact that he was not good- 
 looking for the reason that, in his role of Satan, 
 it was an added touch of the diabolic. Tall, 
 thin, and stormy eyed, his knifelike features 
 were streaked with dark shadows which seemed 
 to fall in the wrong places in his face. When it 
 is further said that he was a young professor of 
 political economy in a near-by university, with- 
 out a penny or much prospect in the world, it 
 will easily be seen how devilish a creature he 
 was to have crept into such a paradise. 
 
 He had crept in by means of being occasion- 
 ally invited by young Sidebottom, whose family 
 had the next estate to Collingham Lodge. Walls 
 and hedges being unknown at Marillo, the lawns 
 melted into one another with no other hint of 
 demarcation than could be sketched by clumps 
 of shrubs or skillfully scattered trees. You 
 could be off the Collingham grounds and on to 
 those of the Sidebottoms without knowing you 
 had crossed a boundary. Between trees and 
 
 25 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 shrubs you could slip from the one place to the 
 other and not be seen from either. 
 
 "She might meet him a thousand times and 
 you or I wouldn't know it," Mrs. Collingham 
 had pointed out to her husband when her 
 suspicions were first roused. "All she's got to 
 do is to go round that lilac bush and she might 
 do anything." 
 
 True; besides which, the mere chances of 
 that hospitality without which Marillo could 
 not be Marillo would throw together any two 
 young people minded so to come. In such 
 spacious freedom, an ineligible young professor 
 could touch the hem of the garment of a banker's 
 daughter without forcing the issue in any way. 
 
 With the conversation between Miss Edith 
 Collingham and Professor Ernest Ayling we have 
 almost nothing to do. It is enough to say that, 
 from the rapidity of the young pair's movements 
 and the animation of their gestures, Mrs. Col- 
 lingham judged that they were very much in 
 earnest. Looking out from what was known as 
 the terrace drawing-room, she was convinced 
 that no two young people could talk like that 
 without an understanding between them. 
 
 She had been led to the terrace drawing-room 
 by the sound of voices and the fact that it was 
 the end of the house toward the Sidebottoms' 
 premises. Against a background of cannas, 
 dahlias, and gladioli, with maples flinging their 
 flame and crimson up into a golden sky, the two 
 figures passing and repassing the long French 
 
 26 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 windows were little more than silhouettes. Such 
 scraps of their phrases as drifted her way told 
 her that they were up to nothing more criminal 
 than settling the affairs of a distracted universe, 
 but she had no intention that they should settle 
 anything. At the appropriate moment she 
 decided to make her presence felt. 
 
 In doing this she was supported by the 
 knowledge that her presence was a presence to 
 be felt impressively. Of her profile, it was mere 
 economy of effort to say that it was like a cameo, 
 aristocratically regular and clear-cut. Her hair, 
 prematurely white, lent itself to the simplest 
 dressing, too classic to be a mode. A figure, of 
 which it would have been vulgar to use the word 
 "plump," carried the most sumptuous costumes 
 with regal suitability. Studied, polished, and 
 perfected, she wore her finish as a mask that con- 
 cealed the lioness mother which she was. 
 
 It was the lioness mother who confronted the 
 young couple as they turned in their promenade. 
 Edith alone came forward. Her professor being 
 given a bow so cold that it was tantamount to a 
 dismissal, as a dismissal was obliged to take it. 
 Within a minute, he was down both the flowered 
 terraces and out of sight behind the lilac bush. 
 
 Mrs. Collingham's enunciation had the ex- 
 quisite precision of the rest of her personality. 
 
 " I thought I asked you, dear, not to encourage 
 that impossible young man to come here." 
 
 "But I can't stop his coming without encour- 
 agement, can I, mother darling?" 
 
 27 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Mother darling moved to the edge of the 
 flagged pavement, looking down on the blaze of 
 summer's final fireworks. On each of the two 
 lower terraces fountains played, their back drops 
 falling on<the water lillies in the basins. It being 
 the moment for a strong appeal, she sounded the 
 first note without turning round. 
 
 "Edith, I wonder if you have the faintest idea 
 of a mother's ambitions for her children.?" 
 
 Instinct had taken her to the root of the whole 
 difference between the two generations in the 
 family. Instinct took Edith to the same spot in 
 her reply. 
 
 "I think I have. But, on the other hand, I 
 wonder if a mother has the faintest idea of her 
 children's ambitions for themselves." 
 
 Following an outflanking movement, Mrs. 
 CoUingham threw her line a little farther. 
 
 "It's curious how, as your father and I ap- 
 proach middle age, we feel that vou and Bob 
 are going to disappoint us." 
 
 " I'm sure I speak for Bob as well as for myself 
 when I say that we wouldn't disappoint you 
 willingly. It's only that the things we want are 
 so difi^erent." 
 
 "Ours — ^your father's and mine — are simple 
 and natural." 
 
 "That's the way Bob's and mine seem to us." 
 
 She was in a tennis costume carelessly worn 
 and not very fresh. A weatherbeaten Panama 
 pulled down to shade her eyes gave a touch of 
 cowboy picturesqueness to an ensemble already 
 
 28 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 picturesque rather than pretty or beautiful. 
 Leaning nonchalantly against the high, carved 
 back of a teakwood chair, the figure had a 
 leopard grace to which the owner seemed in- 
 different. Indifference, boredom, dissatisfaction 
 focused the expression of the delicate, irregular 
 features to a wistful longing as far as possible 
 from the mother's brisk self-approval. All ihis 
 was emphasized by a pair of restless, intelligent 
 eyes, of which one was blue and the other brown. 
 
 The mother turned round with an air of 
 expostulation. 
 
 "I'm sure I can't see what you want to make 
 of your life. You seem to have no ideals, not 
 any more than Bob. You're not pretty, but 
 you're not ugly; and you've a kind of witchiness 
 most pretty girls have to do without. If you'd 
 only dress with some decency and make the best 
 of yourself, you could take as well as any other 
 girl." 
 
 "Yes; if the game was worth the candle." 
 
 "But surely some game is worth the candle." 
 
 "Oh, certainly; only, not this one, of taking — 
 in the way you seem to think girls want to take." 
 
 "Some girls do." 
 
 "Oh, some girls, of course — only, not — not 
 my kind." 
 
 "But what is your kind? That's what I 
 can't understand." 
 
 The girl smiled — a dim, distant, rather wistful 
 
 smile that merely fluttered on the lips and died 
 
 like a feeble light. 
 
 29 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "And that's what I can't explain to you, 
 mother darling." 
 
 "Are we so far apart as that?" 
 
 "We're not far apart at all. It's only that I'm 
 myself, while you want me to be a continuation 
 of you." 
 
 "I don't want anything but what will make 
 fo;, your happiness." » 
 
 "My happiness as you see it for me — ^not as I 
 see it for myself." 
 
 " But you're my child, Edith. I can't be with- 
 out hopes for you." 
 
 Another dim, quickly dying smile was the 
 only answer to this as Edith picked up her 
 racket from the teakwood chair and moved 
 toward the house. On a note that would have 
 been plaintive had it not been so restrained, Mrs. 
 Collingham continued: 
 
 "Edith darling, I don't think there's been a 
 moment since you were born when I haven't 
 dreamed of a brilliant future for you, and 
 now — " 
 
 "But, oh, mother dear, what's the use of a 
 brilliant future, as you call it, when your whole 
 soul is set on something else?" 
 
 The lioness mother was roused. 
 
 "But it shouldn't be set on something else. 
 That's what I resent. Don't think for a minute 
 that your father and I mean to stand by and see 
 you throw yourself away." 
 
 " I didn't know there was any question of my 
 doing that." 
 
 30 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "That boy will never be anything better than 
 a university professor — never in this world; and 
 if it comes to our forbidding it, forbid it we shall 
 without hesitation." 
 
 The girl's head was flung up. Boredom and 
 indifFerence passed out of the strange eyes. For 
 an instant the conflict of wills seemed about to 
 break out into mutual challenge. It was Edith 
 who first regained enough mastery of self to say, 
 quietly. 
 
 "You surely wouldn't take that responsibility 
 — ^whatever I did." 
 
 The soft answer having warned the mother of 
 the danger of collision, she subsided to an easier, 
 if a more fretful, tone. 
 
 "And Bob's such a worry, too. If your father 
 knew about this FoUett girl, I think he would 
 go wild." 
 
 "But we don't know anything ourselves — 
 beyond the few hints dropped by Hubert Wray 
 which I'm sure he didn't mean." 
 
 "Well, I'm worried. It's the war, I suppose. 
 If he'd only settle down to work — " 
 
 "He won't settle down till he marries; and, 
 if he marries, it will have to be some girl he's in 
 love with." 
 
 "If he were to marry a girl of that class — " 
 
 " Girl of what class ? What's the good word ? " 
 
 Mrs. CoUingham turned on her son, who 
 stood on the threshold of one of the French 
 windows. 
 
 "We're talking about men and women marry- 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ing outside of their own class, Bob, and I was 
 trying to say how fatal it was." 
 
 "Good Lord! mother, do people still think 
 things like that? I thought they'd rung the 
 bells on them even at Marillo. Wasn't it one of 
 the things we fought for in the war — ^to wipe out 
 the lines of caste?" 
 
 "But not to wipe out ideals, Bob. What 
 fathers and mothers have worked to build up 
 their sons fought to maintain." 
 
 Max, the police-dog puppy, who had been 
 poking his nose between Bob's legs, now squeezed 
 his vigorous person through the opening and 
 came out on the terrace joyously. Wagging his 
 powerful tail and sniffing about each of the 
 ladies in turn, he seemed to be saying: "Don't 
 you see that I'm here? Now cheer up, every- 
 body, and let's have a good time." 
 
 Bob made a feint at seconding this invitation. 
 Going up to his mother, he slipped an arm round 
 her waist and kissed her. 
 
 "Old lady, you're years behind the times. 
 What fathers and mothers built turned out to 
 be a rotten old world which they've handed to us 
 to bolster up. We're tackling the job as well as 
 we can, but you must give us a free hand." 
 
 Releasing herself from his embrace, she stood 
 with an air of authority. 
 
 " If giving you a free hand means looking on at 
 the frustration of our hopes, you'll have to learn, 
 Bob, that your father and mother still have some 
 of the energy that placed you where you are." 
 
 32 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Of course you've placed us where we are, 
 mother dear," Edith agreed, pacifically, "but 
 that's just the point. Because we are where 
 you've placed us, we're crazy to go on to some- 
 thing else. Isn't that the way of life — ^the per- 
 petual struggle for what we haven't got? Be- 
 cause you and father didn't have a big house 
 and a big position to begin with, you worked 
 till you got them. Bob and I were born to them, 
 and so — " 
 
 "It's this way, old lady," Bob broke in. 
 "All your generation had bigness on the brain. 
 It was a kind of disease like the water that 
 swells a baby's head. They used to think it was 
 a specially American disease till they found out 
 it was English, French, German, and every other 
 old thing. The whole lot of you puffed up till 
 the earth hadn't room for you, and you made the 
 war to push one another off." 
 
 "I didn't make the war. Bob. I've never 
 been anything but a poor mother, striving and 
 praying for her children." 
 
 "Well, you did push one another off — ^to the 
 tune of ten or twelve millions, mostly the young. 
 Since then, the universal disease of swelled head 
 is being got under control, as they say of epi- 
 demics. Only the left-overs catch it still, and 
 Edith and I aren't that. Hardly anyone of our 
 age is. We just don't take the germ. Not that 
 we blame you and your lot, old lady — " 
 
 "Thanks, Bob." 
 
 "Oh, don't thank me. I'm just telling you." 
 33 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "And the point of your homily is — " 
 
 "That our generation all over the world has 
 got out of Marillo Park. Marillo Park is a back 
 number. It's as out of date as the hat you wore 
 five years ago. You couldn't give it away to the 
 poor, because the poor don't wear that kind of 
 thing, and the rich have gone on to a new fashion. 
 Listen, old lady. The thing I'd hate worst of 
 all for dad and you is to see you left behind, 
 trying to put over the footlights a lot of old gags 
 that the audience swallowed in its time, but 
 which don't get a laugh any more. The actor 
 who tries to do that is pass-ay forever — " 
 
 "If you'd keep to English, Bob, I should 
 understand you a little better." 
 
 Bob grew excited, laying down the law on the 
 palm of his left hand with the forefinger of the 
 right, while Max, all aquiver, scored the points 
 with his terrific tail. 
 
 "I'll not only keep to English, but I'll tell you 
 the line to take if you want to remain the up- 
 to-date, brightras-a-button old lady you are." 
 
 "I should be grateful." 
 
 "Then here goes. Take a long breath. Keep 
 your wig on. Put your feet in plaster casts so as 
 not to kick." He summoned his forces to speak 
 strongly. "If Edith was to pick out a man she 
 wanted to marry — and I was to pick out a girl 
 — ^no matter who — it would be the chic new stuff 
 for father and you — " 
 
 But the chic new stuff for father and her was 
 not laid down on the palm of the hand for the 
 
 34 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 reason that a portly snadow was seen to move 
 within the dimness of the drawing-room. At the 
 same time, Max's joy was stifled by the appear- 
 ance on the terrace of Dauphin, the Irish setter, 
 who was consciously the dog en litre of the 
 master of the house. Mrs. CoUingham composed 
 herself. Edith picked up a tennis ball from the 
 flags and jumped it on her racket. Bob put a 
 cigarette in his mouth and struck a match. It 
 was the unwritten law of the family not to risk 
 intimate discussion before a tribunal too august. 
 
 Once he had reached the terrace, it was plain 
 that CoUingham was tired. His shoulders were 
 hunched; his walk had no spring in it. 
 
 "I'm all in," he sighed, sinking into the 
 teakwood chair. 
 
 "Poor father!" 
 
 Edith dropped a hand on his shoulder. He 
 drew it down to his lips and kissed it. 
 
 "You'd like your tea, wouldn't you?" The 
 solicitude was his wife's. "We were just going 
 to have it. Bob, do find Gossip and tell him to 
 bring it here." 
 
 Bob Hmped into the house and out again. By 
 the time he had returned, his father was saying: 
 
 "Yes; it's been a trying day. Among other 
 things I've had to dismiss old FoUett." 
 
 "The devil you have!" 
 
 The exclamation was so heartfelt as to turn all 
 eyes on the young man. 
 
 "Why, Bob dear," his mother asked, craftily, 
 "what diff'erence does it make to you?" 
 
 35 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Bob did his best to recapture a position he 
 was not yet ready to abandon. 
 
 "It may not make any difFerence to me, but 
 — but how is he going to Uve ? " 
 
 "Is that your responsibility?" 
 
 Edith came to her brother's rescue. 
 
 "It's some one's responsibiUty, mother." 
 
 "Then let some one shoulder it. Bob doesn't 
 have to saddle himself with it, unless — " 
 
 Convinced that, in the presence of his father, 
 his mother wouldn't speak too openly, Bob felt 
 safe in a challenge. 
 
 "Yes, mother? Unless — ^what?" 
 
 Mother and son exchanged a long look. 
 
 "Unless you go — ^very far out of your way." 
 
 "Well, suppose I did go — very far out of my 
 way ? " 
 
 "I should have to leave it with your father to 
 deal with that." 
 
 "Well, it wouldn't be the first time dad's 
 been philanthropic." 
 
 Collingham looked up wearily. He was sitting 
 with one leg thrown across the other, his left 
 hand stroking Dauphin's silky head. 
 
 "You can be as philanthropic as you like out- 
 side business, Bob," he said, with schooled, 
 hopeless conviction. "Inside, it's no go. Once 
 you admit the principle of treating your em- 
 ployees philanthropically, business methods are 
 at an end." 
 
 " I don't think modern economics would agree 
 with you, daddy," Edith objected. "Aren't we 
 
 36 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 beginning to realize that the well-being of em- 
 ployees, even when they're no longer of much 
 use—" 
 
 CoUingham looked up with a kind of longing 
 in his eyes. 
 
 "I wish I could believe that, Edie, but an 
 efficiency expert wouldn't bear you out." 
 
 "An efficiency expert doesn't know everything. 
 He studies nothing but the individual private, 
 whereas a political economist knows what's 
 going on all up and down the line." 
 
 To CoUingham this was like the doctrine of 
 universal salvation to a Calvinist theologian. 
 He would have seized it had he dared, but for 
 daring it was too late. He had trained himself 
 otherwise. On a basis of expert advice and in- 
 dividual efficiency CoUingham & Law's had been 
 built up. All he could do was to grasp at the 
 personal. 
 
 "Where did you hear that?" 
 
 "You can read all about it in Mr. Ayling's 
 last book, The Economic Value of Good Will." 
 
 As she passed through the French window into 
 the house, her mother turned with a gesture of 
 both outspread hands. 
 
 "There! You see! What did I tell you ? She 
 has the effrontery to read his books and name 
 him openly." 
 
 But too dispirited to take up the gauntlet, 
 CoUingham looked, with welcome, toward Gos- 
 sip, who appeared in the doorway with the tea. 
 
 37 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE FoUetts came together every evening 
 about six, chiefly by the process known to 
 American cities as commuting. Commuting 
 brought them to Number Eleven Indiana Av- 
 enue, Pemberton Heights. Seen from the New 
 York river-front, Pemberton Heights, on top 
 of a great cHff on the New Jersey side of the 
 Hudson, suggests a battlemented parapet. By 
 day, its outHne is a fringe against the sky; by 
 night, its clustering lights are hke a constellation. 
 
 Indiana Avenue is one of those rare spots in 
 the neighborhood of New York where a measure 
 of beauty is still reserved for the relatively poor. 
 The heights are too high for the railways to scale, 
 too inconvenient for factories. The not-very- 
 well-to-do can find shelter there, as the mediaeval 
 peoples of the Mediterranean coast found it in 
 the rock towns where the pirates couldn't follow 
 them. It is hardly conceivable that industry will 
 ever climb to this uncomfortable perch, or that 
 much competition will put up rents. Too inac- 
 cessible for the social rich, and too isolated for 
 the still more social poor, Pemberton Heights is 
 the refuge of those who don't mind the trouble 
 of getting there for the sake of the compensation. 
 
 The compensation is largely in the way of air 
 38 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 and panorama. Both have a tendency to take 
 away your breath. You would hardly beHeve 
 that so much of New York could be visible all 
 at once. The gigantic profile of Manhattan is 
 sketched in here with a single stroke, while the 
 river is thronged like a busy street seen from the 
 top of a tower. City smoke rolls up and ocean 
 mist rolls in while you are looking on. Sunrise, 
 moonrise; moonset, sunset; stars in the heaven 
 and lights along the darkened waterway, afford 
 to the not-very-well-to-do, cooped up all day in 
 kitchens, offices, and factories, a morning and 
 evening glimpse into the ecstatic. 
 
 Number Eleven was somewhat withdrawn 
 from all this toward the middle of the plateau. 
 Built at a period when an architect's ambition 
 was chiefly to do something singular, it had a 
 great deal of sloping roof, with windows where 
 you would not expect them. Pemberton Heights 
 being held up bravely to rain and snow, the color 
 of the house was a weatherbeaten brown. Two 
 hydrangea trees, shaped like open umbrellas, 
 and covered now with white blossoms fading to 
 rose, stood one on each side of the front door in 
 the center of two tiny grass-plots. There was a 
 piazza, of course, where most of the family leisure 
 was passed, and in the yard behind the house 
 there stood a cherry tree. AH up and down the 
 street for the length of about half a mile were 
 similar little houses, each with its piazza and its 
 architectural oddity, homes of the not-»very- 
 well-to-do, content with their relative poverty. 
 4 39 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Among themselves they formed a society as dis- 
 tinct and as active as that of Marillo Park, and 
 out of it they got as much pleasure as the Side- 
 hottoms and Collinghams from their more 
 exclusive forgatherings. 
 
 In this soil, the Folletts had taken root with the 
 ease of transplantation of the Anglo-Saxon race. 
 Drawn to Pemberton Heights by the presence 
 there of other Canadians, Josiah had bought the 
 little house for seven thousand dollars. On this 
 he had paid four, raising the other three on a 
 mortgage which it was his ruling desire to pay 
 off. The mild, tenacious optimism of his nature 
 convinced him he should be able to do this, in 
 spite of the danger of being "fired" hanging over 
 him for two years. The fact that, though the 
 months kept passing, that sword didn't fall in- 
 spired the belief that it never would. He had 
 grown so sure of this that with regard to the 
 "warning issued by Collingham he had never 
 taken his wife into his confidence. For one thing, 
 it was useless to alarm her when it might be 
 without cause, and for another . . . 
 
 But that was the secret tragedy of Josiah's 
 life. He had not made good the promise he gave 
 when Lizzie Scarborough married him, and the 
 falling of the sword would be the final proof of 
 it. It would mean that his whole patient, pains- 
 taking life had fitted him for nothing better 
 than the scrap heap. That he should come to 
 such an end he couldn't believe possible. That 
 after nearly fifty years of uncomplaining drudg- 
 
 40 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ery he should be flung aside as useless to man in 
 general and worse than useless to his family- 
 was not, he argued, in keeping with the will of 
 God. It was to the will of God he trusted more 
 than to the mercy of Bradley Collingham, 
 though he trusted to them both. 
 
 When he married Lizzie in the little town of 
 Lisgar, Nova Scotia, he had been a bank clerk. 
 A bank clerk in Canada is a kind of young noble- 
 man at the beginning of what may be a striking 
 career, after the manner of a fledgling in diplo- 
 macy. The banking institutions being few and 
 large, the employees are moved from post to 
 post, much like attaches or army officers. As 
 moves bring promotion, the clerk becomes a 
 teller and the teller a cashier and the cashier a 
 branch manager and the branch manager a 
 wealthy man in touch with world-wide issues. 
 It was the kind of progress Josiah expected when 
 he married Lizzie Scarborough, the kind of future 
 they dreamed of and talked about, and which 
 never came. 
 
 Josiah lacked something. You couldn't put 
 your finger on the flaw in his energy, but you 
 knew it was there. He was moved about, of 
 course, but with little or no promotion. Other 
 men got that, but he was ignored. Harum- 
 scarum young fellows whose ignorance of book- 
 keeping was a scandal were lifted over his head, 
 while he and Lizzie stared at each other in 
 perplexity. 
 
 Hardest of all for him was that, as years went 
 4-1 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 by, Lizzie herself lost belief in him. More 
 tender with him for his failure, she nevertheless 
 saw that he was not the man she had supposed 
 in the gay young days at Lisgar, and he saw 
 that she saw. She gave up the hope of promo- 
 tion before he did. The best to which they came 
 to aspire was a "raise." 
 
 It was bitter for Lizzie because, as she was 
 fond of saying to herself, and now and then to 
 the children, she had been born a lady. This 
 was no more than the truth. Whatever the 
 meaning given to the word, Lizzie fulfilled it, 
 though her claims were more than moral ones. 
 The Scarboroughs had been great people in 
 Massachusetts before the Revolution. The old 
 Scarborough mansion, still standing in Cam- 
 bridge, bears witness to the generous scale on 
 which they Hved. But they left it as it stood, 
 with its pictures, its silver, its furniture, its 
 stores, rather than break their tie with England. 
 Scorned by the country from which they fled, 
 and ignored by that to which they remained 
 true, their history on Nova-Scotian soil was 
 chiefly one of descent. A few of them prospered; 
 a few reached high positions in the adopted land, 
 but most of them lacked opportunity as well as 
 the will to create it. True, Lizzie's father was a 
 clergyman; but her sisters married poorly, her 
 brothers dropped into any chance jobs that came 
 their way, while she herself got only such ful- 
 fillment of her dreams as she found at Pemberton 
 Heights. Even the move to New York which 
 
 42 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Josiah had made when convinced that the Bank 
 of the Maritime Provinces held no further hope 
 for him had not greatly prospered them. Five 
 years of drifting between one bank and another 
 were followed by five steady years with CoUing- 
 ham & Law; but even that peaceful time was 
 now at an end. 
 
 While the Collinghams were drinking tea on 
 the flagged terrace,- and Jennie was on the ferry- 
 boat, and Teddy dressing and skylarking after 
 his plunge at the gym, and FoUett nearing home, 
 Lizzie was on her knees pinning up the draperies 
 she was "making over" for Gussie. Pansy, the 
 daughter of a bulldog and a Boston terrier, 
 whose pansy-face had in it a more than human 
 yearning, stood looking on, with forelegs wide 
 apart. 
 
 Gussie was fifteen, pretty, pert, and impatient. 
 
 " Everyone '11 see that it's the old thing you've 
 been wearing since I dunno when." 
 
 Accustomed to this plaint, Lizzie thought it 
 useless to reply. 
 
 "I'd rather not have a rag to wear than a thing 
 everyone's sick of the sight of. Momma, why 
 can't I have a new dress, right out and out?" 
 
 "My darling, you'll have a new dress when 
 your father gets his raise. It must come be- 
 fore long; but I can't possibly give it you till 
 then." 
 
 "I wish you'd stop talking," came from 
 Gladys, who was busy with her lessons in a 
 corner. "How can I study with all this row 
 
 43 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 going on? Momma, what's the meaning of 
 'coagulation'?" 
 
 Coagulation explained, the fitting finished, and 
 a dispute adjusted between the two children, 
 Lizzie began to spread the table for supper, 
 Gussie helping her. Most of the downstairs por- 
 tion of the house being thrown into one large 
 living room, the dining table stood at the end 
 nearest the kitchen and pantry. It was a pleasure 
 to watch the supple movements of Gussie's 
 figure, and the Sittings of her sUm-wristed hands 
 as she took the plates and laid them in their 
 places. Most people said she would one day be 
 prettier than Jennie, but as yet that was only 
 promise. 
 
 Quite apparent was the fact that the mother 
 had been more beautiful than any of her daugh- 
 ters was ever likely to become. At fifty-odd, it 
 was a beauty that still had youth in it. Worn 
 with the duties of providing for a husband and 
 four children, it retained a quality proud and 
 aloof. In her scouring and cooking and endless 
 domestic round, Lizzie was like an actress 
 dressed and made up for a humble part rather 
 than really living it. The Scarborough tradition, 
 which had first refused to bend to king against 
 people and again to yield to people against king, 
 had -survived in this woman fighting for her inner 
 life against failure, poverty, and sordidness. 
 
 She was singing at her work when the front 
 door opened and Josiah came in. He stood for a 
 minute in the little entry, surveying the living- 
 
 44 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 room absently, while Pansy pranced about his 
 feet. Gladys was still at her lessons, Gussie 
 laying out the knives and forks. 
 
 "Where's your mother?" 
 
 Gladys jumped up and ran to him., She was 
 his youngest, his darling, just over twelve. He 
 had always hoped to do better by her than by the 
 older ones. 
 
 "Hello, daddy!" With her arms round his 
 neck, she was pulling his face down to hers. 
 
 "Where's your mother?" he asked of Gussie, 
 having advanced into the room. 
 
 Gussie looked up from her task to inform him 
 that her mother was in the kitchen, but, seeing 
 his gray face and shambling gait, she paused 
 with a fork in her hand. 
 
 "You're all right, daddy, aren't you?" 
 
 The soiind of voices having called Lizzie from 
 her work, she stood on the threshold of the pan- 
 try, drying her hands on the corner of her apron. 
 Before he said a word she knew that the calamity 
 which forever threatens those dependent on a 
 weekly wage had fallen on the family. 
 
 "Lizzie, I'm fired." 
 
 She had never had to take a blow like this, not 
 even when the three who came before Jennie 
 had died in babyhood. This was the worst and 
 hardest thing her imagination could conjure up, 
 because it meant not only the sweeping away of 
 their meager income, but her husband's defeat as 
 a man. 
 
 Going to him, she laid her hands on his shoul- 
 45 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ders and tried to look into the eyes that avoided 
 hers in shame. 
 
 "We'll meet it, Jo," she said, quietly. "We've 
 been through other things. I've saved a little 
 money ahead — nearly a hundred dollars. Don't 
 feel badly. I'm glad you're out of CoUingham 
 & Law's, where you've said yourself that your 
 desk was in a draught. You'll get another job, 
 with bigger pay, and perhaps" — she sprang to the 
 great glorious hope she was always cherishing — 
 " and perhaps Teddy will earn more money and 
 be a great success." 
 
 "Hel-[o,m^\" 
 
 Teddy himself was swinging down the room. 
 Pansy capering round him with her silvery bark. 
 Having tossed his cap on the sofa, he caught his 
 mother in a bearish hug. Fresh from his bath, 
 gleaming, ruddy, clear-eyed, stocky rather than 
 short, he was a Herculean cub, the makings of 
 a man, but as yet with no soul beyond play. No 
 one had ever seen him serious. It was a draw- 
 back to him at CoUingham & Law's, where he 
 skylarked his way through everything. "You 
 must knock the song-and-dance out of that 
 young blood," was Mr. Bickley's report on him, 
 "or he'll never earn his pay." 
 
 Before his mother could say anything he was 
 tickling her under the chin with little "elks!" 
 of the tongue. Pansy assisting by springing half- 
 way to his shoulder. The sport ended, he held 
 her out at his strong arm's length, laughing down 
 into her eyes. 
 
 46 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Good old ma! — ^the best ever! What have 
 you got for supper?" 
 
 She told him, as nearly as possible as if nothing 
 else was on her mind. Then she added: 
 
 "You've got to know, Teddy darling. They've 
 discharged your father from Collingham & 
 Law's." 
 
 Confusedly, Teddy FoUett knew he had re- 
 ceived a summons, the call to be a man. Hither- 
 to he had been a boy; he had thought himself a 
 boy; he had called himself a boy. Even in the 
 navy he had been with boys who were treated 
 as boys. The pang of agony he felt now was 
 that he was a boy still — ^with a man's part to 
 play. 
 
 He did his best to play it on the instant. 
 
 "Oh, is he? Then that's all right. I'll be 
 making more money soon and be able to swing 
 the whole thing." 
 
 Gussie was here the discordant element. 
 
 "You've got to make it pretty quick, then, 
 and be smarter than you've ever been before." 
 
 He turned away from the group in which his 
 mother watched him with adoring eyes while 
 his father stood with gaze cast down like a 
 criminal. 
 
 "I'm sorry to put the burden on you at your 
 age, my boy," he said, brokenly, "but perhaps I 
 may get another job, after all, and one that '11 
 pay better." 
 
 Teddy didn't hear this, not that he was so far 
 away, but because he was listening to that call 
 
 47 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 which seemed so impossible to respond to. He 
 would have to be a man; he would have to earn 
 big money, and at present he didn't see how. 
 Fifty bucks a week, he was saying to himself, was 
 hardly enough to run the family, and he had 
 only eighteen! 
 
 He was standing with his back to them all, 
 his hands in his pockets, when the front door 
 opened again. Jennie came in all aglow and 
 abloom after her walk from the street cars. 
 
 "Well, what's the pose?" she asked, briskly, of 
 Teddy, beginning to take off her jacket. "You 
 ought to be model to a sculptor." 
 
 "Jen," he whispered, hoarsely, before she 
 could join the others, "pa's fired." 
 
 To take this information in, Jennie paused 
 with her arms still outstretched in the act of 
 taking off her jacket. 
 
 " Do you mean they don't want him any more 
 at Collingham & Law's ? " 
 
 "That's the right number." 
 
 "But — but what are we going to do?" 
 
 "That's for you and me to say. It's up to us, 
 Jen. Pa'U never get another job, not on your 
 life, unless it's running a lift. We've got to 
 shoulder it — you and me between us." 
 
 Jennie passed on into the room and down to 
 the group round the table. The glow had gone 
 out of her cheeks, but she was free from her 
 brother's dismay. To begin with, she was a 
 woman, and he was only a man. All his adven- 
 tures would have to be dull ones in the line of 
 
 48 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 work whereas hers . . . She could hear Wray 
 saying, as he had said only two hours ago, 
 "You could marry Bob Collingham if you 
 wanted to." 
 
 She didn't want to — as far as that went; but 
 if the worst were to come to the worst and they 
 should be in need of bread . . . 
 
 "Hello, mother! Hello, daddy!" Jennie was 
 quite self-possessed. "Teddy's been telling me. 
 Too bad, isn't 't? But something will turn up. 
 What is there for supper, Gus?" 
 
 Gussie minced round the table, putting on the 
 salt cellars. 
 
 "There's pickled humming birds for prin- 
 cesses," she said, witheringly. "After that 
 there'll be honey-dew jam." 
 
 "Then I'll go up and take my hat off." 
 
 This coolness had the inspiriting effect of an 
 officer's calm on a sinking ship. It was an indi- 
 cation that life could go on as usual; and if 
 life could go on as usual, all wasn't lost. 
 
 "And for mercy's sake," Jennie added, turning 
 to leave them, "don't everybody look so glum. 
 Why, if you knew what I could tell you you'd 
 all be ordering champagne." 
 
 So they were tided over the dreadful minute, 
 which meant that they found power to go on 
 with the preparations for supper and to sit down 
 to supper itself. There the old man cheered up 
 sufficiently to be able to tell what had passed 
 between him and the head of the firm. He was 
 still doing this when Teddy sprang to his feet, 
 
 49 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 striking the table with a blow that made the 
 dishes jump. 
 
 "God damn Bradley Collingham!" he cried, 
 with his mouth full. "I'll do something to get 
 even with him yet — if I have to go to the chair 
 for it." 
 
 "Sit down, you great gump — ^talking like 
 that!" Gussie pulled her brother by. the coat 
 till he sank back into his seat. "Momma, you 
 should send him away from the table." 
 
 "That's a very wicked thing to say, my boy — " 
 Josiah was beginning. 
 
 "Let him talk as he likes," the mother broke 
 in, calmly. "Going to the chair can't be so 
 terrible — if you have a reason." 
 
 She went on carving as if she had said nothing 
 strange. 
 
 "Well, ma, I call that the limit," Jennie 
 commented. 
 
 "Oh no, it isn't," the mother returned, with 
 the new strength which seemed to have come to 
 her within half an hour. "I'm ready to say a 
 good deal more." 
 
 She looked adoringly toward Teddy, who after 
 his outburst had returned sheepishly to his 
 plate, while Pansy stood apart from them all, 
 wise, yearning, and yet implacable, a little 
 doggy Fate. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 NO difference of standard in the Collingham 
 household was so obvious as that between 
 Dauphin, the Irish setter, and Max, the police 
 dog. The situation was specially hard on 
 Dauphin. To have owned Collingham Lodge 
 and its occupants during all his conscious life, 
 and then one day to find himself obliged to share 
 this dominion with a stranger had given him in 
 his declining years a pessimistic point of view. 
 It had made him proud, cold, withdrawn, like a 
 crusty old aristocrat forced in among base com- 
 pany. To the best of his ability he ignored the 
 police dog, though it was difficult not to be 
 aware of the presence of a being too exuberant to 
 appreciate disdain. 
 
 For Dauphin, the most beastly experience of 
 the day began about four each afternoon, at the 
 minute when the dog-clock told him that his 
 master might be expected home. That was the 
 hour at which from time immemorial he had 
 taken possession of the great front portico where 
 the distant burr of the motor-car first reached 
 him. When the burr became a throb he knew it 
 was passing the oak that marked the Collingham 
 boundary; and, since it had arrived on his own 
 ground, he could run down the driveway to meet 
 
 SI 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 it. This had been his exclusive right. To be 
 joined daily now by a frisky, irrepressible pup 
 made him feel like an old man tied to an insup- 
 portable young wife from whom his own death 
 will be the sole dehverance. Life to Dauphin 
 had thus become a mingling of impatience and 
 anguish, poorly masked beneath an air of dignity. 
 
 And as far as he could judge, his master's wife, 
 of whom he had no great opinion, had begun to 
 share these emotions. Anguish and impatience 
 had become of late the chief elements in the 
 aura she threw out, and by which dogs take their 
 sense of men. It was not that her words or 
 expressions betrayed her. It was only that when 
 she came within his sphere of perception he was 
 aware that she felt the kind of passion the police 
 dog roused in himself. 
 
 He was aware of it on this May afternoon, 
 more than six months after she had first learned 
 of Bob's infatuation for the Follett girl, when 
 she came out on the portico to listen for the 
 expected car. She would come out, listen, and 
 go in. Each time she came out, each time she 
 listened, each time she retired, he felt the sweep- 
 ing to and fro of an imperious will worried or 
 frustrated, though he sat on his haunches and 
 gave no sign. He couldn't give a sign, because 
 Max would misunderstand it. There he was, 
 down on the lawn before the portico, grinning, 
 prancing, joking, calling names — names quite 
 audible in dog intercourse, though a human being 
 couldn't catch them — and the least little move- 
 Si 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ment Dauphin made would be taken as conces- 
 sion. The old setter was sorry. He would have 
 liked showing his master's wife — he didn't con- 
 sider her his mistress — that he understood her 
 distress; but he was nailed to the doorstep by 
 jorce majeure. 
 
 And the woman envied him. He was perfectly 
 aware of that. She assumed that dogs had no 
 social problems. All he had to do, she thought, 
 was to sit and blink at the magnolias, hawthorns, 
 and lilacs pursuing one another into bloom. AH 
 he had to think of was the up hill and down dale 
 of the view before him, a haze of blue and green 
 and rose melting to the mauve of hills. 
 
 As a matter of fact, this was something like 
 what was passing through her mind. A master- 
 ful woman, she was nevertheless reaching that 
 point of self-pity where she envied the untroubled 
 dogs. While she carried the cares of so many 
 others, no one else carried hers. All through the 
 winter she had had Edith and Bob on her mind, 
 and now she had Bradley. On leaving for the 
 bank that morning, he had been so terribly up- 
 set that she couldn't rest till knowing how he 
 had got through his day. She was the more 
 worried because of being entirely alone and thus 
 thrown in on herself. 
 
 Edith had gone to stay with people in the 
 Berkshires. Of that her mother was glad. She 
 meant for the present to keep her there. With 
 her queer ideas, she would only make her brother 
 the more difficult to deal with, though she had 
 
 S3 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 not been difficult herself. Nearly seven months 
 had passed, and yet her affair with Ayling was 
 exactly where it had been in the previous October. 
 That was the advantage of a girl; you could 
 always tell where she stood. Edith was tena- 
 cious, but not defiant. Though capable of 
 engaging herself to this young man, she would 
 hardly marry him in face of her father's op- 
 position. 
 
 Bob, on the other hand, was not only head- 
 strong, but unreasonable. He would marry the 
 FoUett girl if she would marry him, whatever 
 might be the consequences. She, his mother, 
 had it "out" with him, and he had said so. It 
 was a terrible thing to have their whole domestic 
 happiness hang on the whim of a creature like 
 the FoUett girl; but apparently it did. 
 
 She had not spoken to Bob till Hubert Wray 
 had surrendered all he had to tell. He had done 
 this through a process of "pumping" of which 
 he himself had hardly been aware. Having 
 ascertained that his New England connections 
 were unexceptional, Junia had been attentive 
 to him through the winter, making him feel 
 that CoUingham Lodge was a second home. 
 What he didn't tell to her he told to Edith, and 
 what Edith knew the mother had no great diffi- 
 culty in finding out. Thus when, on the previous 
 Saturday, Bob was about to leave for a party on 
 Long Island, they had had the plain talk which 
 could no longer be deferred. 
 
 They had had it after lunch, seated on a bench 
 54 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 overlooking the tennis court. They had come out 
 ostensibly to talk over the sacrifice of the pink- 
 and-white hawthorn in the shade of which they 
 sat in favor of extending the court so that Bob 
 and Edith could both have parties simultane- 
 ously. While the new court would be an im- 
 provement, they would regret the celestial 
 flowering of the hawthorn whenever, as at 
 present, it was May. 
 
 " Not that it would make so very much differ-": 
 ence to your father and me," Junia began, in a 
 quavering tone, "if things we're afraid of were 
 to happen." 
 
 So the subject was opened up. Bob could 
 only ask, "What things?" and his mother could 
 only tell him. 
 
 "It's quite true, old lady," he confessed^ 
 "You might as well know it first as last." 
 
 Junia had not brought up her children without 
 having learned that, while Edith could be con- 
 trolled. Bob could only be managed. With Edith, 
 she could say, "I forbid," with Bob, it had to 
 be, "I suffer." 
 
 "Of course, dear," she said now, "I'm your 
 mother, and whatever you do I shall try to 
 accept. It will be hard, naturally — it's hard 
 already — but you can count on me." 
 
 He took her hand and squeezed it. 
 
 "Thanks, old lady." 
 
 "Of course I can't answer for your father. 
 You know for yourself how stern and unyielding 
 he is." 
 5 55 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Oh, I'm not so sure about that. It's always 
 seemed to me that he'd give in to a lot of things, 
 if you'd only let him." 
 
 This perspicacity being dangerous, she glided 
 to another aspect of her theme. 
 
 "What I don't understand is why, if you've 
 been in love with her for seven or eight months, 
 and you mean to marry her, you haven't done it 
 already." 
 
 He took two or three puffs at his cigarette 
 before tossing off: 
 
 "I'd do it like a shot, if she would." 
 
 "And she won't?" 
 
 "Not yet." 
 
 "And you think she will?" 
 
 "I'm sure she will." 
 
 "What makes you so certain?" 
 
 "Nothing. I just know." 
 
 Having had her fears verified, Junia had no 
 object in pushing the inquiry further. Her duty 
 in life was to take events as they touched her 
 family and mold them for the best. When she 
 called it "the best" she meant it as the best. 
 She was not a worldly woman with mere fashion- 
 able ends in view. Eager for the good of her 
 children, she was conscientious in pursuit of the 
 things she truly believed to be worthiest. 
 
 All through Sunday she took counsel with 
 herself, going to communion at the restful little 
 Marillo church, and putting new intensity into 
 her devotion. She had guests at lunch and 
 went out to dinner, and, though equal to all the 
 
 S6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 social demands, her mind did not relinquish the 
 purpose she had in view. Could she have accom- 
 plished it without her husband's aid, she would 
 probably not have taken him into her confidence. 
 '■ It being her special task to deal with the chil- 
 dren, the less he knew of their mistakes and 
 escapades the simpler it was for them all. 
 
 It may be an illuminating digression here to 
 say that there had been a time, some fifteen 
 years earlier, when Junia had had an experience 
 as difficult as the one she was facing now. Noth- 
 ing but a trained subconsciousness had carried 
 her through that, and she looked for the same 
 mainstay of the self to come to her aid again. 
 One of the lessons she had learned at that time 
 was the value of quietude, of reserve in "giving 
 herself away." She was not one to whom this 
 restraint came natural; but for the very reason 
 that it was acquired, it had the intenser force. 
 
 It was at a time when they had lived in the 
 Marillo house only a little while, and the Bradley 
 of that day was not the portly, domesticated 
 bigwig of the present. He was a tempestuous 
 sea of passions right at the dangerous flood-tide, 
 the middle forties. The first ardor of married 
 life was at an end for both of them; but while, 
 for her, existence was running more and more 
 into one quiet purposeful stream, for him it was 
 raging off" in new directions. 
 
 Whatever Junia suspected she was too wise to 
 know it as a certainty. Knowing, she argued, 
 would probably weaken her and do nothing to 
 
 57 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 strengthen him. Already she was more intensely 
 a mother than she was a wife, living in the amaz- 
 ing careers she was planning for her children. 
 Edith would marry an English peer, while Bob 
 would take a brilliant place in his own country. 
 Their victories would be her victories, till, in 
 some far-distant, beatified old age, she would be 
 translated to the stars. 
 
 And then one afternoon, when the flagged 
 pavement had only recently been laid and they 
 were drinking tea on it, Bradley had said, right 
 out of a clear sky : 
 
 " Junia I don't know whether you've suspected 
 it or not, but for some time past I've had a 
 mistress." 
 
 That was the instant when she first learned 
 the value of a schooled subconsciousness. It 
 seemed to her that she had been slain; and yet, 
 with a nerve Uttle less than miraculous, she went 
 on with her tasks among the tea things. 
 
 "If you've done it so far without telling me, 
 Bradley," she said, at last, with only the slightest 
 tremor in her tone, "why shouldn't you let me 
 remain ignorant?" 
 
 "Does that mean that you don't care if I go 
 on?" 
 
 "I think you can answer that as well as I. 
 What I don't care for is to be drawn into an 
 affair from which your own good taste — merely 
 to put it on that ground — ^should be anxious to 
 leave me out." 
 
 He looked at her savagely. 
 5» 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 'Don't you resent it any more than that?" 
 'Is that why you're giving me the information 
 see how much I resent it?" 
 
 "Partly." 
 
 "Then I'm afraid you will have your labor for 
 your pains. You'll never see more than you're 
 seeing at this instant." 
 
 That stand was a master stroke. It gave her 
 the advantage of being enigmatic. It enabled 
 her to take blows without seeming to have felt 
 them, and to deliver them without betraying the 
 quarter from which the next would come. 
 
 Right there and then Bradley had been 
 monstrous enough to suggest that, since she 
 liked CoUingham Lodge, she should remain there 
 and let him go away. He would make generous 
 provision for her and the children, and in return 
 expect his divorce. 
 
 But she had taken her stand — the enigmatic. 
 She didn't argue; she didn't plead; she didn't 
 reproach him; she didn't treat him to the scene 
 through which weaker women would have put 
 him. 
 
 "Bradley, I shall expect you to remain with 
 me," were the only words she used. 
 
 And he had remained. Less than two years 
 later, it was she who fixed the sum the other 
 woman was to be paid in order to get rid of her. 
 She was sufficiently in sympathy with her sex 
 to insist on the terms being liberal. " I think she 
 should have fifty thousand dollars," she declared, 
 and fifty thousand dollars the woman received. 
 
 59 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 So that, if Bradley had lost the first passion 
 of his love for her, he had gained vastly in re- 
 spect. Hot-tempered, high-handed, impetuous, 
 imperious, as he knew her to be, he saw her 
 curb and compress these qualities till they be- 
 came a prodigious motor force. If she had not 
 mastered herself, she had mastered the expres- 
 sion of herself till she was an instrument at her 
 own command. 
 
 It was as an instrument at her own command 
 that, on the Wednesday morning, before he went 
 to town, she gave her husband as much infor- 
 mation as she thought he ought to possess about 
 his son. 
 
 "Would you mind sitting down for a minute, 
 Bradley? I've something important to say." 
 
 He had come up to her room, as she took her 
 breakfast in bed, after he had had his own down- 
 stairs. Wearing a lace dressing jacket and a 
 boudoir cap, she was propped up with pillows, 
 a wicker tray with legs on the coverlet before her. 
 In the canopied Louis Quinze bed of old rich- 
 grained walnut, raised six inches above the floor, 
 she suggested an eighteenth-century French 
 princess, Madame Sophie or Madame Victoire, 
 receiving a courtier at her levee. 
 
 Luxurious with a note of chastity was the rest 
 of the chintzy room. The pictures on the walls 
 were sacred ones, copies of old Italian masters. 
 A prie-dieu in a corner supported a bible and a 
 prayer-book in tooled bindings with a coat of 
 arms. The white-paneled wardrobe room seen 
 
 60 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 through a door ajar was as austere as a well- 
 kept sacristy. Perfumed air came in through the 
 open windows, and thrushes were fluting in the 
 trees. 
 
 Reminding her that Tims, the chauffeur, would 
 soon be at the door to take him to the bank, Col- 
 lingham sank into the armchair nearest to the 
 bed. His thoughts were on the amount in the 
 proposed issue of Paraguayan bonds the house 
 would be able to carry. 
 
 "It's about Bob," she began, in a tone little 
 more than casual. "Did you know he was in a 
 scrape?" 
 
 He started, firing off his brief questions rapidly : 
 
 "Who? Bob? What kind of scrape? With a 
 girl?" 
 
 "Exactly. With a girl who may give us a 
 good deal of trouble unless the thing is stopped." 
 
 If CoUingham's heart sank it was not wholly 
 because of the scrape with the girl, but because 
 he was afraid of chickens coming home to roost. 
 Though he had never broached the subject with 
 the boy, he had often wondered as to how he 
 met sexual temptation; and now he was to learn. 
 
 "Is it an5rthing very wrong?" 
 
 "Only in intention." She sipped her coffee 
 before letting him have the full force of it. "He 
 wants to marry her." 
 
 He felt some slight rielief. 
 
 "Oh, then it's not—" 
 
 "No; not as far as he's concerned. As to her 
 — ^well I presume that she's the usual type." 
 
 6i 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Did he tell you himself?" 
 
 "He told me himself." 
 
 "His job at the bank pays him only two thou- 
 sand dollars a year. Did he say what else he 
 expected to marry on?" 
 
 "We didn't discuss that; but I suppose it 
 would be what he expects you to give him." 
 
 "Arid if I don't give him anything?" 
 
 "That's what I wanted to know. If you 
 didn't—" 
 
 "He'd call it off?" 
 
 "No; perhaps not. But she would." 
 
 " Have you any special reason for thinking 
 so?" 
 
 "None but my knowledge of — of that kind of 
 woman in general." She went on as quietly as 
 if the incident of fifteen years previously had 
 never occurred. "Men are so guileless about 
 women who have — ^who have love to sell. They're 
 such simpletons. They so easily think these 
 women like them for themselves when all the 
 while they're only gauging the measure of the 
 pocketbook." 
 
 CoUingham endeavored not to hang his head, 
 but it seemed to go down in spite of him as the 
 placid voice sketched his program for the day. 
 
 Junia had heard her husband say that Mr. 
 Huntley, his second in command, was to go to 
 South America in connection with the issue 
 of Paraguayan bonds. Why shouldn't Bob be 
 sent with him? It would add to his experience 
 and make him feel important. After he had 
 
 62 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 left Asuncion, reasons could be found for keeping 
 him at Lima, Rio, or Buenos Aires till the whole 
 thing blew over. Having accepted the sugges- 
 tion gratefully, CoUingham came to the question 
 he had up to now repressed. 
 
 "Who's the girl.? I suppose you know." 
 
 "She's been posing for Hubert Wray. Bob 
 met her at the studio. Her name is — " 
 
 Grasping the arms of the chair, he strained 
 forward. 
 
 "Not— not Follett's girl?" 
 
 "Yes; that is the name. You dismissed her 
 father from the bank last year." Her eyes fol- 
 lowed him as he stumbled to his feet. "But 
 what difference does it make whether it's she or 
 some one else?" 
 
 He couldn't tell her. The fear of the vague 
 nemesis he called "chickens coming home to 
 roost" was too obscure. Listening in a daze to 
 the rest of his instructions, he seized them 
 chiefly because they would ease the line he was 
 to take with Bob. 
 
 He was to give him no hint that he, the father, 
 had heard anything of the Follett girl. The 
 South American mission could stand on its own 
 merits as extremely flattering. Whatever re- 
 luctance Bob might feel, he would see the oppor- 
 tunity as too important to forego. All Junia 
 begged of her husband was to know nothing of 
 Bob's love aff'airs. If Bob himself brought the 
 subject up, it would be enough to remain firm 
 on the question of money. Of the rest, Junia 
 
 63 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 was willing to take charge, as she would explain 
 to him when he came home in the afternoon. 
 
 These instructions CoUingham did his best to 
 carry out. At lunch, in the house's private room 
 at the Bowling Green Club, he approached Mr, 
 Huntley on the subject of being responsible for 
 Bob on the errand to Asuncion, and Mr. Huntley 
 expressed himself as delighted. On returning to 
 the bank, CoUingham asked Miss Ruddick to 
 bring the young man to the private office. 
 "Hello, Bob! How are things going?" 
 "So, so, dad," Bob admitted, guardedly 
 "Sit down. I want to talk to you."[^ 
 Bob sat down gingerly, warily, scenting some- 
 thing in the wind, much like Max or Dauphin 
 from a person's atmosphere. Whatever his 
 mother had been told on Saturday, his father 
 might have learned by Wednesday. Bob would 
 have been sure of this were it not that his mother 
 often had curious reserves. 
 
 For CoUingham there was nothing to do but 
 to plunge on the subject of South America, and 
 he plunged. But, in his dread of the roosting 
 chicken, he plunged nervously, with a tendency 
 to redden, to stammer, and otherwise to betray 
 himself. Before he had finished Bob was saying 
 inwardly: "Mother's put him wise to Jennie 
 and I'm to be packed off. Well, we'll see." 
 
 "It's thumping good of you and Mr. Huntley, 
 dad," he said, aloud; "and I suppose it would 
 do if I gave you my answer in a day or two." 
 "That's the girl," the father thought; but he 
 64 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 obeyed Junia's injunction as to not being ex- 
 plicit when it came to words. 
 
 "You see, it's this way, Bob: It's not exactly 
 an invitation that I'm giving you; it's — it's a 
 decision of the bank of which you're an em- 
 ployee. We take it for granted that you'll go if 
 we want to send you." 
 
 "And I take it for granted that you won't 
 send me if I don't want to go." 
 
 Not to force the issue, Collingham left the 
 matter there, preferring to consult Junia as to 
 what he should do next. To this end, he drove 
 home earlier than usual. 
 
 It added to Dauphin's irritation that Max 
 should hear the motor first. V/ith ears cocked 
 like a donkey's, how could he help it? There 
 was nothing in the world that Dauphin despised 
 as he despised the police dog's ears. They were 
 forever pointed, alert, inquisitive, ignoble. But 
 there it was! Max was bounding down the 
 driveway, covering yards at a spring, before the 
 setter could drag himself from his haunches. 
 It was Max, too, who, when the motor passed 
 the oak, gave the first yelp of delight. 
 
 But it was Dauphin who, as his master de- 
 scended from the car, entered into his depression. 
 It was he, too, who perceived the conflict of 
 auras when wife and husband met. Waves of 
 unreasoned dread on the one side encountered a 
 force of clear-eyed determination on the other as 
 the weltering sea comes up against the steadfast 
 rocks. 
 
 65 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 They began talking as they turned to enter 
 the house, continuing the conversation within 
 the great hall, where only the strip of red carpet 
 running its length and up the fine stairway, two 
 or three bits of old carved English oak, and the 
 brass touches on the wrought-iron baluster, 
 relieved the admirable nudity, 
 
 "Now come in here," she said, briskly, having 
 heard all that had passed between him and Bob. 
 
 He followed her into the library, where she led 
 the way to the desk. 
 
 "Read that." 
 
 He ran his eye over the lines written in her 
 legible, decorative hand. 
 
 COLLINGHAM LoDGE, 
 
 Marillo Park. 
 Dear Miss Follett: 
 
 My husband and I would be greatly obliged if you could 
 give us a half hour of your time to talk over matters which 
 may prove as important to you as to us. If you could 
 make it convenient to come here to-morrow, Thursday, 
 afternoon, you would find a very good train at three- 
 twenty-five, and one by which to return at five-forty-" 
 seven. I inclose a time-table, and you would be met at 
 Marillo Station. 
 
 Yours sincerely, 
 
 JUNIA COLLINGHAM. 
 
 He looked at her wonderingly. 
 
 "What's the big idea?" 
 
 "A very big idea. Don't you see? We can 
 cut the ground right from under his feet without 
 his ever thinking we had anything to do with it. 
 You personally needn't be supposed to know 
 
 66 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 that this nonsense has ever been in the air. It's 
 too late for me, of course, because he and I have 
 already talked of it. But for you — " 
 He tapped the paper in his hand. 
 " But this move I don't understand." 
 "Well, sit down and I'll tell you." 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 AT the minute when Junia CoUingham was 
 /\_ laying before her husband a plan which 
 would bring comparative wealth to the Follett 
 family, a number of things were happening in 
 and about New York. 
 
 First, Lizzie Follett had dropped into a chair 
 to think, an action rare with her. She generally 
 thought as she whisked about her work, but this 
 problem called for concentration. Briefly, it was 
 as to how to cook the supper without heat. The 
 gas-man had just gone away, and the gas for 
 the range had been cut off because she couldn't 
 pay a bill of twenty-nine dollars and sixty- 
 seven cents, or anything on account. This was 
 Wednesday, and she would have no more money 
 till the children got their various pay-envelopes 
 on Saturday. 
 
 Though in the back of her mind she blamed 
 herself for an unwise distribution of the week's 
 funds, it was one of those situations in which you 
 blame yourself without seeing how you could 
 have done otherwise. With six to feed, and all 
 the subsidiary expenses of a family to meet, she 
 had twenty-two dollars a week. Of his eighteen, 
 Teddy gave her fifteen, three being needed for 
 car fares and other small necessities. From the 
 
 68 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 six she earned at the studio, Jennie contributed 
 three. Gladys, who was now a cash girl on seven 
 a week, was able to turn in four. Gussie brought 
 nothing to the common fund as yet, for the reason 
 that the three-fifty which Madame Corinne con- 
 ceded for the privilege of "teaching her the 
 millinery" allowed no margin over what she had 
 to spend. 
 
 To Lizzie, during the past six months, life had 
 become an exciting game. How to pay the 
 minimum on every account and yet keep alive 
 her credit had been the calculation with which 
 she rose in the morning and lay down at night. 
 It was a game that could be played successfully 
 for two months, or three months, or four. When 
 it came to six, the heaping-up of unpaid balances 
 made it harder to go on. 
 
 It was making it impossible to go on. During 
 the past fortnight she had found her credit 
 stopped at three places in The Square where 
 Pemberton Heights did its shopping. In vain 
 she had tried to transfer her account elsewhere, 
 but Pemberton Heights is no more than a huge 
 village where the status of most families is known. 
 More and more her small amount of cash was 
 needed for cash purposes in order that the 
 family might live. 
 
 Lizzie sat down to cast up her assets. She had 
 the small remnants of a ham which could be 
 eaten cold. She had bread and butter. If she 
 could only make tea. . . She might have done 
 that in a neighbor's house, but she shrank from 
 
 69 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 exposing a situation which a lucky stroke might 
 change. 
 
 At the same moment Josiah was turning away 
 from a wooden bar which shut off an office from 
 the pubUc. He had entered and, stood there, 
 meek, unobtrusive, trembling, while none of the 
 young men or young women busy at desks or 
 with one another paid him any attention. When 
 a girl with hair combed over her ears, very bright 
 eyes, and very short skirts, tripped by him acci- 
 dentally, he managed to stammer out something 
 in which she caught the word "job." The word 
 being significant, and Josiah's appearance more 
 so, she whispered to a gentleman, who left his 
 desk and came forward. 
 
 "No; I'm very sorry. We can't do anything 
 for you." 
 
 He hadn't waited for the word "job"; he 
 hadn't waited for Josiah to speak at all. He 
 knew the situation so well that his method was 
 to end it there and then. Josiah turned away 
 meekly as he had entered, and with no sinking 
 of the heart. His heart used to sink; but that 
 was four and five months previously, before he 
 had exhausted his emotions. Now the bitterness 
 of death was past. It had passed day by day and 
 inch by inch, by stages of slow agony, leaving him 
 with a dried soul that couldn't suffer any more. 
 
 And also at this minute Teddy was standing 
 in his cage at the bank in a very peculiar situ- 
 
 70 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ation. At least it struck him as peculiar, be- 
 cause for the first time he perceived its oppor- 
 tunities. 
 
 For Teddy, too, six months had been a period 
 of development, just as it is for a green fruit 
 when you pick it and lay it in the sun. It 
 ripens, but it ripens green. When you eat it, it 
 has a green flavor, or a flat flavor, or none at aU. 
 Teddy was a fruit to be left on the tree to take 
 its time. He was now twenty-one, with the 
 promptings of sixteen. At his own rate of 
 progress, he would probably have reached twenty 
 by the time he was twenty-two, but thirty at 
 twenty-five. 
 
 As it was, he had been called on to be thirty 
 when his growth was just beginning. Not merely 
 the circumstances had made this demand on 
 him, but the dependence, more or less uncon- 
 scious, of the members of the family. They 
 looked to him to do something big because he 
 was a young man. Having heard of other young 
 men who had been financially heroic, they ex- 
 pected him to be the same. The possibilities 
 open to a bank clerk of twenty-one had no rela- 
 tion to their hopes. Even his mother, chiefly 
 because of her adoration, seemed to feel that he 
 should spring from eighteen to a hundred dollars 
 a week by the force of inner flame. 
 
 She didn't say so, of course. She only revealed 
 
 her sentiments as Pansy revealed hers, by an 
 
 inextinguishable look. The father did no more 
 
 than throw emphasis on the boy's responsibility. 
 
 6 71 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie and Gladys never said anything at all, 
 but Gussie was quite frank. 
 
 "A great big fellow like you and only making 
 eighteen per! Look at poor momma, working 
 her fingers to the bone. I'd be ashamed if I were 
 you. Why, Fred Inglis orders his clothes at 
 Love's and keeps his own Ford." 
 
 It was all there in a nut shell — his inability 
 to rise to the occasion in a land where everyone 
 else who was worth his salt had only to shake 
 the money tree and pick up coin. How Fred 
 Inglis did it Teddy couldn't think, when your 
 value by the week was so definitely fixed and a 
 raise lay so far ahead. If he had developed 
 during the past six months, it was mainly through 
 a carking sense of inefficiency. 
 
 Meanwhile, he had to do what Gussie told 
 him — watch his mother work her fingers to the 
 bone. In spite of a tendency to squabble, the 
 FoUetts were an affectionate family, and the 
 mother was the center of their love. Teddy 
 didn't stop to analyze what she was to them; 
 he only knew that there was nothing he 
 wouldn't be to her. If he could only have 
 compassed it, she would have had a bar-pin like 
 their neighbor, Mrs. Weatherby; she would 
 have worn the skunk neckpiece for which he 
 had once heard her utter a desire; she would 
 have gone out in his Ford oftener than Fred 
 Inglis's mother in his. These things he would 
 have done for her and more, had he but been the 
 financial Titan all American example called on 
 
 72 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 him to become. Between Gussie's taunts and 
 his own What lack I yet? he was reaching a 
 condition of despair. 
 
 And now, on this particular afternoon, when 
 nearly everyone had left the bank and Mr. 
 Brunt, to whom he was specially attached, was 
 working later than usual, there was the fruit of 
 the money tree piled up on the ground. Mr. 
 Brunt had gone to the other end of the main 
 office, and would return presently to stow these 
 piles of bills in the safe. These bills were money. 
 Teddy had never consciously dwelt on that fact 
 before. He had been in this same situation a 
 thousand times, when he had nothing to do but 
 put out his hands and stuff his pockets with food 
 and fuel and gas and the interest on the mort- 
 gage, and all the other things of which there was 
 such a lack at home, and had never considered 
 that the needed things were here. 
 
 He remembered that as a child in Nova 
 Scotia he would occasionally swipe an apple from 
 a cart-load, knowing that the owner couldn't 
 miss it, and had the same sensation now. Here 
 were the piles of bills, all arranged in rows ac- 
 cording to their values — a pile of hundreds, a 
 pile of fifties, a pile of twenties, and so on down. 
 Mr. Brunt would come back, as he had done at 
 other times, and put them away without counting 
 them. Having counted them already, he would 
 accept this reckoning for the day. He, Teddy, 
 was left there to see that nothing happened to 
 this treasure. 
 
 73 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 He was never able to tell how it came about, 
 but without seemingly being able to control the 
 action of his hand he had slipped a twenty- 
 dollar bill from the top of the pile into his own 
 pocket. It was an instant's weakness, followed 
 the next instant by repentance. Teddy knew 
 what theft was. He had not, through his father, 
 had so much to do with banks without being 
 fully aware of the sure and pitiless punishment 
 meted out to it. He didn't mean to steal. He 
 was horror-stricken at the act. Quick as a flash 
 his hand went into his pocket again — but Mr. 
 Brunt was back. The thing that could have been 
 done at once had to be deferred. 
 
 Looking for a chance to drop the bill to the 
 floor and make restitution by picking it up, it 
 was annoying that Mr. Brunt should give him 
 none. Mr. Brunt seemed possessed by a demon 
 of speed, so quickly had he locked all the piles in 
 the safe, and then locked the cage behind him. 
 Teddy found himself outside with the bill still 
 burning in his pocket. 
 
 Even so there were other possibilities. Going 
 to the washroom, he hung on there till Mr. Brunt 
 had gone home. The cage was made of open 
 wire-work. It was a simple thing to slip a bill 
 through one of the interstices. It would be found 
 next morning on the floor and a fresh running- 
 over of accounts would show where it belonged. 
 Mr. Brunt would wonder how he came to be so 
 careless, but with his balance straight he would 
 be satisfied. 
 
 74 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 But as Teddy reached the cage, there was 
 Doolan, the night watchman. Doolan was an 
 ex-poHceman, too old for public office, but equal 
 to sounding an alarm in case the bank was being 
 robbed. He was a friendly soul, and in strolling 
 up to Teddy had no motive beyond asking after 
 the "ould man" and whether or not he had yet 
 found a job. But Teddy suspected that he was 
 being watched. He didn't know but that Doolan 
 might have seen the movement of the hand 
 which snatched the bill from the pile. When he 
 stirred to go homeward, Doolan might clutch 
 him by the neck. It was a strange, new sensation 
 to feel that within a minute, within a few seconds, 
 the law might have its grip on him. Having 
 said good-by to Doolan and turned away, he 
 took the first steps in expectation of a stem 
 command to come back. 
 
 It was another strange new sensation to be 
 walking the familiar ways of Broad Street and 
 Wall Street with this strange new consciousness. 
 There were thousands of bright young men and 
 women streaming to electrics, subways, and 
 ferries in the first stages of commuting, and 
 among them he bore a secret mark. Tramping 
 along in the crowd, he felt like a soldier marching 
 with his comrades to the trenches, but knowing 
 himself picked for death. Luckily, his folly was 
 not even now beyond reparation. He would 
 get to the bank early in the morning, discover 
 the cursed bill lying in some artfully chosen 
 corner of the floor, and restore it to Mr. Brunt. 
 
 75 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 All the same, it was a relief to get away from the 
 fear of detection which he felt to be haunting 
 the streets by plunging into the maw of the 
 subway, where his identity was swallowed up. 
 
 At this minute, too, in the studio, Hubert 
 Wray was leaning over Jennie FoUett's shoulder 
 and placing before her a rough pencil sketch. 
 
 "Take it away!" Jennie cried, tearfully. "I 
 don't want to look at it." 
 
 " But, Jennie, I only wish you to see how little 
 it involves." 
 
 It was a drawing of a nude woman, her hair 
 coiled on the top of her head, sitting very upright 
 in a marble Byzantine chair, her knees pressed 
 together in the manner of the Egyptian cat- 
 goddess. On a level with her face and poised on 
 the tips of her fingers, she held a human skull 
 which she inspected with slanting, mysterious eyes. 
 
 Wray continued to keep the sketch before 
 Jennie, hanging over her shoulder. He was so 
 close that she felt. his breath on her neck. He 
 could easily have pressed his lips against her 
 amber-colored hair, and Jennie wished he would. 
 But having long ago made up his mind that she 
 could best be won by a system of starving out, 
 he refrained from doing it. As, however, she 
 persisted in brushing the sketch aside, he straight- 
 ened himself up. 
 
 "Then, Jennie, I'm afraid I can't use you any 
 more — that is, for the present. Since you won't 
 do it, I must get some one who will." 
 
 76 
 
THE. EMPTY SACK 
 
 "You could paint another kind of picture," 
 she argued indignantly, "with me with clothes 
 on." 
 
 "You don't understand. I'm an artist. An 
 artist doesn't paint the picture he chooses, but 
 the one that's given him to paint." 
 
 "No one gave you this to paint. It isn't a 
 commission. It's just your own bad mind." 
 
 "I'm not ready to explain what it is. You 
 wouldn't understand. Something comes to you. 
 You've got to obey it. This is the picture I've 
 seen and which I'm obliged to do next. And, 
 besides, it isn't a bad mind, Jennie, The human 
 form is the most — " 
 
 "Oh, you don't have to hand me out any 
 hokum about the human form. It's all very 
 well in its place. But you fellows are crazy — ^the 
 way you stick it up where it doesn't belong. 
 Look at that picture of Sims's you were all so 
 wild about — three women walking in a field, 
 and not a stitch between them. Who'd go out 
 like that? There's no sense in it — '' 
 
 "It isn't a question of sense, Jennie; it's one 
 of business. If you want to be a model, you 
 must be a model and meet the demands of the 
 market." 
 
 She wore the cheap linen suit that had been 
 her best last summer, and the corresponding 
 hat; but her beauty being of the type which 
 subordinates externals to itself, she was more 
 than adorable; she was elegant. With tears 
 still rolling down her cheeks, she pointed at the 
 
 77 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 sketch Wray held in his hand as he stood before 
 her at a distance. 
 
 "Do you know what my father would do if 
 he thought I was going to be painted like that ? 
 He'd turn me out of doors." 
 
 Wray tossed the sketch on the table. 
 
 "Then, Jennie, there's no use talking of it any ■ 
 more. You're not that kind of a model, and it's 
 that kind of a model I'm looking for." 
 
 "I'm the kind of model you were looking for 
 when you put that advertisement in the paper 
 nearly a year ago. I answered it because you 
 said a pretty girl, not a professional — " 
 
 "Yes; that was a year ago. That's what I 
 wanted then. But now it's something else. It 
 doesn't follow that because you're satisfied with 
 an egg for breakfast, that an egg will be enough 
 for every meal all the rest of your life." 
 
 She looked up reproachfully. 
 
 "Yes; all the rest of your life! That's the 
 way you talk. Nothing will ever be enough for 
 you all the rest of your life." 
 
 "No, Jennie; nothing — not as far as I see 
 now." 
 
 "And yet you expect me to stake every- 
 thing — " 
 
 "You must choose your words there, Jennie. 
 I don't exfect you to do ansrthing. There may 
 .have been a time when I hoped — but that's all 
 over. We won't talk of it. You've made up your 
 mind; I must make up mine. There's nothing 
 between us now but a question of business. 
 
 78 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 I'm looking for a model who does this kind of 
 thing, and it doesn't suit you to serve my turn. 
 Well, that settles it, doesn't it? Our little ac- 
 count is paid up to date, and so — " 
 
 She stumbled to her feet. The only form her 
 resentment took was a trembling of the lip and 
 the streaming of more tears. 
 
 "But what can IJo.?" 
 
 "Do you mean for a living?" 
 
 As she nodded speechlessly, he smiled, with a 
 faint shrug of the shoulders. 
 
 "That's not for me to decide, is it, Jennie? 
 Once you've left me — " 
 
 "I'm not leaving you. You're driving me 
 away." 
 
 "Suppose we said that life was separating us? 
 "Wouldn't that express it better? We've — we've 
 liked each other. I've never made any secret 
 of it on my side — have I, Jennie? — ^though 
 you're so terribly discreet on yours. And yet 
 life—" 
 
 "I've only been discreet about one thing." 
 
 " But that one thing is the whole business." 
 
 "And I wouldn't be discreet about that if 
 there was any other way." 
 
 "There's the way I've told you about." 
 
 "Yes; and be left high and dry after two or 
 three years, neither one thing nor the other." 
 
 "Isn't that looking pretty far ahead?" 
 
 "It's not looking farther ahead than a girl 
 has to. It's easy enough to talk. There you'd 
 be, able to walk off without a sign on you; 
 
 79 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 whereas I'd have to lie down and die or — or find 
 some one else." 
 
 "Well, there'd be that possibility, wouldn't 
 there? They're not so difficult for a prtitty girl 
 to find when — " 
 
 She stamped her foot. 
 
 "I hate you!" 
 
 "Oh no, you don't, Jennie. You love me — 
 only, you won't let yourself — " 
 
 " And I never will — ^never — never — never ! Not 
 if I was starving in the streets — so help me God ! " 
 
 She was running toward the model's exit 
 when he called after her. 
 
 "Then you leave me to work with another 
 woman, Jennie — another woman sitting in your 
 place — another woman — " When she threw 
 him a despairing glance he snatched the sketch 
 from the table and held it up to her. "Another 
 woman — dressed like that!" 
 
 But out on the stairs she paused. Anger was 
 giving place to fear. It was, first of all, a fear 
 of the other woman dressed like that, and then it 
 was a fear not less agonizing of the loss of her 
 six a week. 
 
 Her six a week was all that stood between 
 Jennie and the not very carefully veiled contempt 
 of the family. In the testing to which the past 
 half year had subjected them all, Jennie had not 
 made very good. Six a week had been her 
 measure. For obscure reasons which none of 
 them could fathom, she had proved incapable of 
 really lucrative work. She had tried to get em- 
 
 80 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ployment with other artists who would leave her 
 free for her hours with Wray, but she had failed. 
 She had failed, too, in stores, factories, offices, 
 and dressmaking estabhshments. Perhaps they 
 saw she was only half hearted in her attempts; 
 perhaps her air of helplessness told against her. 
 "She was too much like a lady," had been one 
 employer's verdict, and possibly that was true. 
 Whatever the reason, she seemed a creature not 
 primarily meant to work, but to be utilized in 
 some other way. The question was as to that 
 way. "You're splendid to love," little Gladys 
 had whispered one day, when Jennie was Crying 
 to herself, and much in her recent experience 
 confirmed this opinion. In her applications for 
 something to do, it had more than once been 
 made plain to her that money could be made by 
 other means than by punching a time clock at 
 seven. 
 
 But she couldn't retrace her steps and go back 
 to Wray. She thought of it. She had chosen to 
 descend by the stairs instead of by the lift which 
 served the huge studio building, in order to give 
 herself the chance of changing her mind. She 
 went down a few steps and stood still, then a 
 few more steps and stood still. If it had been 
 only a question of the money she might have 
 swallowed her pride and returned to throw her- 
 self at his feet. 
 
 But there was the other woman — dressed like 
 that: He had dared to invoke her. Well, let him 
 invoke her. Let him paint her; let him do any- 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 thing he liked. She, Jennie, would break her 
 heart over it; but it would be easier to break 
 her heart than go back. 
 
 And yet not to go back made her feet like lead 
 as she dragged herself down the interminable 
 steps. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 SHALL I ever go in or out of this door 
 again?" 
 
 Jennie lingered on the threshold to ask herself 
 this question, and, as she did so, saw Bob Col- 
 lingham lift his hat. 
 
 For the time being she had forgotten him. 
 That is, she had a way of putting him out of her 
 mind except when, as he expressed it to herself^ 
 he came bothering her. Bothering her meant 
 asking her to marry him, which he had done per- 
 haps twenty times. Each time she refused him 
 she considered that it was for good. There was 
 a quality in him that raised her ire — a certainty 
 that, pressed by need, she would one day come 
 to him. ^That, Jennie said to herself, would be 
 the last thing! She wouldn't do it as long as 
 there was any other possibility on earth. In 
 view, however, of the state of things at home 
 and Wray's cold-bloodedness at the studio it had 
 sometimes seemed to her of late as if earth would 
 not afford her any other possibility. 
 
 If she welcomed him now, it was chiefly as a 
 distraction from thoughts which, were she to 
 keep dwelling on them, would drive her mad. 
 Her temperament being naturally happy, anguish 
 was the more anguishing for being so unnatural 
 
 83 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 The mere necessity of having to strive with Bob 
 called forth in her that spirit of sex-wrestling 
 which was not so much second nature in her as 
 it was first. 
 
 She greeted him, therefore, with a sick little 
 smile, and allowed him to limp along beside her. 
 The studio building was in a street in the Thirties 
 and east of Lexington Avenue. To take the way 
 by which she usually went, they sauntered 
 toward the sunset. 
 
 "You're in trouble, Jennie, aren't you?" 
 
 The kindly tone touched her. He was always 
 kind. He was always looking for little things 
 he could do. it was part of the trouble with 
 him from her point of view that he was so 
 watchful and overshadowing. He poured out so 
 much more than her cup was able to receive 
 that he frightened her. AU the same, his sym- 
 pathy, coming at this minute, started her tears 
 afresh. 
 
 "Is it things at home?" he persisted, when 
 she didn't respond. 
 
 Thinking this enough for him to know, she 
 admitted that it was. 
 
 "I've got something in my pocket that would 
 —that would help all that — in the long run." 
 
 From anyone else this would have alarmed her. 
 She would have taken it to mean money, money 
 which she would in her own way be expected to 
 repay. As it was she merely turned her swim- 
 ming eyes toward him in mild curiosity. 
 
 "Look!" 
 
 84 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Seeing a little white box which could contain 
 nothing but a ring held between his thumb and 
 forefinger on the edge of his waistcoat pocket, 
 she flushed with annoyance. 
 
 "I think you'd better go away," she said, 
 coldly, pausing to give him the chance to take 
 his leave. 
 
 "And chuck you back upon your trouble?" 
 
 The argument was more effective than he 
 knew. Jennie became aware that even this little 
 bit of drama had put home conditions and Wray's 
 <;ruelty a perceptible distance behind her. It 
 was sheer terror at being thrown on them again 
 that induced her to walk on, tacitly permitting 
 him to stay with her. 
 
 "You can't be saved from one kind of trouble 
 by getting into another," she argued, ungra- 
 ciously. "The fire's not much of a relief from the 
 frying pan." 
 
 "It is if it doesn't bum you — if it only warms 
 and comforts you and makes it easier to live." 
 
 "This fire would bum me — ^to death." 
 
 "Oh no, it wouldn't; because I'd be there. 
 I'd be the stoker, to see that it was kept in the 
 furnace. The furnace in the house, Jennie, is 
 like the heart in the body — something out of 
 sight, but hot and glowing, and cheering every- 
 body up." If she could have listened to such 
 words from Hubert Wray, she thought, how 
 enraptured she would have been. "Did you 
 ever hear the story of the guy who gave us fire 
 in the first place?" Bob continued, as she walked 
 
 85 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 on and said nothing. "You know we didn't have 
 any fire on earth— at least, that's the tune to 
 which the rig is sung. The gods had fire in 
 heaven, but men had to shiver." 
 
 "Why didn't they freeze to death?" 
 
 "They did — in a parable way. It wasn't life 
 they lived; it was a great big creeping horror 
 on the edge of nothing. Then this old bird — I 
 forget his name — ^went up to heaven — " 
 
 "How did he do that?" 
 
 "The story doesn't tell; but up he went, 
 stole the fire, and brought it down. After that, 
 they were able to open the ball we call 'civiliza- 
 tion,' which gives every one a good time." 
 
 "Oh, does it? Much you know!" 
 
 "I know this much, Jennie — ^that I could 
 give you a good time if you'd let me." 
 
 "You couldn't give me the good time I want." 
 
 "But I could make you want the good time 
 I'd give you, which would come to the same 
 thing. I imagine the folks on earth didn't think 
 much of the fire from heaven — beforehand; but 
 once they'd got it, they knew what it meant to 
 them. That's the way you'd feel, Jennie, if you 
 married me. You can't begin to fancy now — " 
 On coming in sight of a line of taxicabs drawn 
 up before a hotel, he broke off to say, " Do you 
 see those taxis, Jennie?" 
 
 She replied that she did. 
 
 "Well, one of them may mean a great deal to 
 you and me." 
 
 "Which one of them?" 
 86 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ''Whichever one we get into." 
 
 "Why should we get into it ? " 
 
 "Because" — he tapped the white box in his 
 waistcoat pocket — "this Uttle thing I've got in 
 here wouldn't do us any good without something 
 else. We should have to go after it together." 
 
 Her mystified expression told him that she 
 was in the dark. 
 
 "It's something we should have to ask for, and 
 to sign — Robert Bradley CoUingham, bachelor, 
 and Jane Scarborough FoUett, spinster — I be- 
 lieve that's the way it runs." 
 
 "Oh!" The low ejaculation was just enough 
 to show that she understood. 
 
 "Why shouldn't we, Jennie? It wouldn't 
 take half an hour to get there and back." 
 
 " ' Back ? ' " She was so dazed that she echoed 
 the word more or less unconsciously. 
 
 They came in sight of a low brown tower at 
 which he pointed with his stick. *'Do you see 
 that church? Well, that church has got a par- 
 son — quite a decent sort for a parson-^-" 
 
 "How do you know?" 
 
 "Because I talked to him — about half an hour 
 ago. I said that if he was going to be at home, 
 we might look in on him toward the end of the 
 afternoon." 
 
 "You had no right to say anything of the 
 kind." 
 
 "I know I hadn't, but I took a chance. Won't 
 you take a chance, too, Jennie? It would mean 
 the beginning of the end of all your troubles. 
 7 87 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 In the long run, if not in the short run, I could 
 take them off your hands." 
 
 That she should be dead to this argument was 
 not in human nature. Her basic conception of 
 a man was of one who would relieve her of her 
 burdens. Helplessness was a large part of her 
 appeal. That marriage meant being taken care 
 of imparted, according to her thinking, its chief 
 common sense to the institution. She shrank 
 from marrying just to be taken care of; but if 
 there was no other way, and if in this way she 
 could bring to the family the stupendous Colling- 
 ham connection in lieu of her six a week . . . 
 She made up her mind to temporize. 
 
 "What makes you in such an awful hurry? 
 We could do it any other day — " 
 
 "Did you ever see a sick man who wasn't in 
 an awful hurry to get well ? " 
 
 "You're not as bad as all that." 
 
 "Listen, Jennie," he said, with an ardor en- 
 hanced by her hints at relenting; "listen, and 
 I'll tell you what I am. I'm like a chap that's 
 been cut in two, who only lives because he knows 
 the other half will be joined to him again." 
 
 "That's all very well; but where's the other 
 half?" 
 
 "Here." He touched her Hghtly on the arm. 
 "You're the other half of me, Jennie; I'm the 
 other half of you." 
 
 She laughed ruefully. 
 
 "That's news to me." 
 
 "I thought it might be. That's why I'm 
 88 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 telling you. You don't suppose any other fellow 
 could be to you what I'd be, do you?" 
 
 "I don't know what you'd be to me because 
 I've so many other things to think of first." 
 "What sort of things?" 
 "What your folks would say, for one." 
 He replied, with a shade of embarrassment: 
 "They'd say some pretty mean things, to 
 begin with." 
 
 "And to end with?" 
 
 "They'd give in. They'd have to. Families 
 always do when you only leave them Hobson's 
 choice." 
 
 She dropped into the studio idiom. 
 "That wouldn't be all pie for me, would it?" 
 "Is anything ever all pie? You've got to 
 work for your living in this old world if you want 
 to eat. I'm ready to work for this, Jennie. I'm 
 ready to move mountains for it, and, by God! 
 I'm going to move them! But do you know 
 why?" 
 
 She said, shyly, "I suppose because you like 
 me. 
 
 "I don't know whether I do or not. That's 
 not what I think about first." Though they had 
 not yet reached the line of taxicabs, he paused 
 to make an explanation. "Suppose you were 
 inventing a machine and had got it pretty well 
 fitted together, only that you couldn't make it 
 work. And suppose, one day, you found the 
 very part that was missing — ^the thing that 
 would make it run. You'd know you'd have to 
 
 89 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 have that one thing, wouldn't you ? You'd have 
 to have it — or your life wouldn't be worth 
 while." 
 
 "I never heard any other man talk like 
 that." 
 
 "Listen, Jennie. There are men and men. 
 They'll go into two big bunches. To one kind 
 women are like whisky — some better than others, 
 but all good. If they can't have Mary, Susan '11 
 do, and when they're tired of Susan they'll run 
 after Ann. That's one kind of fellow, and he's 
 in the great majority. They're polygamous by 
 nature, those chaps. I suppose the Lord made 
 them so. Anyhow, as far as I can see — and I've 
 seen pretty far — they can't help themselves." 
 He drew a long breath. "Then there's another 
 kind." 
 
 If Jennie listened with attention, it was not 
 because she was interested in him, but in Hubert 
 Wray. Hubert had more than once said things 
 of the same kind. He had declared male con- 
 stancy to be outside the possibilities of flesh and 
 blood, and, with her preference for cave men, 
 Jennie had agreed with him. That is, she had 
 agreed with him as to everyone but himself. 
 Others could take their pleasure where and as 
 they found it; but she could not conceive of any 
 man loVing her, or of herself loving any man, 
 unless it was for life. On the subject of constancy 
 or inconstancy, this was her sole reservation. 
 
 "You'll think me an awful chump, Jennie, but 
 I'm that other kind." 
 
 90 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 She threw him a sidelong glance of some 
 perplexity. 
 
 "You mean the kind that — " 
 
 "I'm not polygamous," he declared, as one 
 who confessed a criminal tendency. "There it 
 is, laid out flat. I'm — " He hesitated before 
 using the term lest she might not understand it. 
 "There's a word for my kind," he went on, 
 tenderly. "It's monogamous." 
 
 She made a little sound of dismay at the 
 strangeness, it almost seemed the indecency, of 
 the syllables. 
 
 "Yes; I thought you might never have heard 
 it," he pursued, in the same tender strain, "but 
 it means the opposite of polygamous. A polyg- 
 amous guy wants to marry all the wives he can 
 make love to. A one-wife chap like me asks for 
 nothing so much as to be true to the girl he loves. 
 I'm that kind, Jennie." 
 
 To his amazement, and somewhat to his joy, 
 he saw a tear trickle down her cheek. It was a 
 tear of regret that Hubert couldn't have ex- 
 pressed himself like this, but Bob thought her 
 touched by his appeal. It encouraged him to 
 continue with accentuated warmth. 
 
 "You've heard of what they call the battle of 
 the sexes, haven't you?" 
 
 She thought she had. 
 
 "Well, that's what it comes from chiefly — the 
 crowds of polygamous men and the small number 
 of polygamous women; or else it's the crowds of 
 monogamous women and the small number of 
 
 91 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 monogamous men. Out of every hundred men, 
 about ninety are polygamous, and ten want only 
 one woman for a lifetime. Out of every hundred 
 women, ninety are satisfied to love one man, and 
 the other ten are rovers. Don't you see what a 
 bad fit it makes?" 
 
 "Yes; but how do you know I'm not one of the 
 rovers ? " 
 
 "You couldn't be, Jennie. Even if I thought 
 you might be, I'd be willing to take a chance. 
 And the reason I've spun this rigmarole to you 
 is because, if you don't take me, it '11 be ten to 
 one that you'll fall into the hands of one of the 
 gay ninety who'll make your life a hell. I'd hate 
 that. God! how I should hate it! Even if I 
 didn't care anything about you, I should want 
 to marry you, just to save you from some fancy 
 man who'd think no more of breaking your heart 
 than he would of smashing an egg-shell." 
 
 As they walked on toward the row of public 
 conveyances, he explained himself further. On 
 Monday next he might sail for South America. 
 But he couldn't do this leaving everything at 
 loose ends between them. If she married him, 
 he could go off with an easy mind, and they could 
 keep their secret till his return. In the mean- 
 while he would be able to supply her with a 
 little cash, not much, he was afraid, as dad kept 
 so tight a rubber band round the pocketbook. 
 It would, however, be something, and he would 
 know that she could give up her work at the 
 studio without danger of starving to death. 
 
 92 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "And you might as well do it first as last, 
 Jennie," he summed up, "because I mean that 
 you shall do it sometime." 
 
 "And suppose," she objected, "that you came 
 back from South America in six months' time 
 — and were sorry. Where should I be then?" 
 
 He argued that this was impossible. A monog- 
 amous man always knew his mate as a monog- 
 amous bird knew his. It was instinct that told 
 them both, and instinct never went wrong. 
 
 They reached the row of taxis, and, in spite of 
 the queer looks of the passers-by, he took her 
 by the hand. 
 
 "Come, Jennie, come!" 
 
 But she hung back. 
 
 "Oh, Bob, how can I? All of a sudden Hke 
 this!" 
 
 "It might as well be all of a sudden as any 
 other way, since you're my woman and I'm your 
 man." 
 
 " But I don't believe it." 
 
 "Then I'll prove to you that it's so." 
 
 Though he could not do this, she went with him 
 in the end. She was not won; she was not more 
 moved by his suit than she had been at other 
 times; she still shrank from the scar on his brow 
 and the touch of his tremendous hands. But she 
 was afraid of letting him go, of dropping back 
 into the horror of no lover in the studio and no 
 money to bring home. To do this thing would 
 save her from that emptiness, even if it led to 
 something worse. Worse would be easier to 
 
 93 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 bear than returning to nothing but a void; and 
 so slowly, reluctantly, with anguish in her heart, 
 she let herself be helped into the shabby vehicle. 
 
 An hour or so later, Teddy reached home. 
 He arrived breathless, because he had run nearly 
 all the way from the street-car. In the empty 
 spaces of Indiana Avenue he felt himself con- 
 spicuous. He knew it was fancy, that no hint 
 of his folly could have come to this quiet suburb, 
 and that his theft could not possibly be discov- 
 ered as yet, even by those most concerned. But 
 he was not used to a guilty conscience. Already 
 in imagination he saw himself tried, sentenced, 
 and serving a long sentence at Bitterwell, of 
 which he had once seen the grim gray walls. 
 
 "God! I'd shoot myself first!" was his com- 
 ment to himself, as he hurried past the trim 
 grassplots where care-free men in shirt sleeves 
 were watering their bits of lawn. 
 
 It was Pansy who first knew that something 
 was amiss. At sound of his hand on the door 
 knob she had come scampering, with little 
 silvery yelps, and had suddenly been checked by 
 the atmosphere he threw out. Pansy knew what 
 wrongdoing was ; she knew the pangs of remorse. 
 She had once run away from being shut up in the 
 coalbin, her fate when the family went to the 
 movies, and had been lost for half a day. The 
 agony of being adrift and the joy of seeing 
 Gussie come whistling and calling down the 
 Palisade Walk formed the great central escapade 
 
 94 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 in Pansy's memory. For days afterward, when- 
 ever the family spoke of it, she would stand 
 with forepaws planted apart, and head hanging 
 dejectedly, aware that no terms could be scathing 
 enough fully to cover her guilt. 
 
 And here was Teddy in the same state of mind. 
 Pansy had learned that the great race could 
 suffer; but she hadn't supposed that it could 
 get into scrapes like herself. All she could do on 
 second thoughts was to creep forward timidly, 
 raise herself on her hind legs, with her paws 
 against his shin, and tell him that whatever the 
 trouble was she had been through it all. 
 
 He paid her no attention because, as he looked 
 into the living room, Gladys was seated at a 
 table, crying, her hands covering her face. At 
 the same time Gussie was peacocking up and 
 down the room, saying things to her little sister 
 that were apparently not comforting. Now that 
 Gussie, at Madame Corinne's request, had "put 
 up" her hair, her great beauty was apparent. 
 Her face had not the guileless purity of Jennie's, 
 but it had more intellectual vigor and much 
 more fire. 
 
 Gladys was Teddy's pet, as she was her 
 father's. Of the three girls, she was the plain 
 one, a little red-haired, snub-nosed thing, with 
 some resemblance to Pansy, and a heart of gold. 
 Teddy went over and laid his hand on her fiery 
 crown. 
 
 "Say, poor little kiddie, what's the matter?'* 
 
 "It's my feet," Gladys moaned. 
 9S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "And she thinks that learning the millinery 
 at three-fifty per is all jazz and cat-step," 
 Gussie declared, grandly. "Well, let her try it 
 and see. She's welcome. My soul and body! 
 Corinne would blow her across the river when 
 she got into a temper. I say that if you're a 
 cash girl you've got to take the drawbacks of a 
 cash girl, and what's the use of kicking? If 
 you're on your feet, you're on your feet. Rub 
 'em with oil and buck up. That's what I say." 
 
 "It's all very well for you to talk, spit-cat," 
 Gladys retorted. "All you've got to do is to 
 play with ribbons as if you were dressing a doll. 
 If you had to run like Pansy every time some 
 stuck-up thing calls, ' Ca-ash! ' — " 
 
 Gussie undulated her person and her out- 
 stretched arms in sheer joy of the dancing step 
 as she strutted up and down. 
 
 "That's right, old girl. Blame it on me. 
 I'm always the one that's in the wrong in this 
 house. If Master Teddy lets a glass fall and 
 breaks it, as he did last night, I pushed it out of 
 his hand on purpose, though I'm in the next 
 room. All the same, I say, 'Buck up,' and I 
 don't care who says different. Sniffing won't 
 cure your feet or give you a brother like Fred 
 Inglis who can pay for a woman to do all the 
 heavy work, and his mother hardly lifting a 
 hand." 
 
 Teddy passed on to the kitchen to see if his 
 mother was there. 
 
 She was seated at a table with a ham bone 
 96 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 before her, and from it was paring the last rags 
 of the meat. He tried to take his old-time tone 
 of gayety. 
 
 " Hello, ma ! At it again ? What are you giving 
 us for supper? Something good, I'll bet." 
 
 Lizzie went on working without lifting her 
 eyes. She didn't even smile. Teddy sensed 
 something new in the way of care, as Pansy 
 had sensed it in him. He stood at a little 
 distance, waiting for the look that had never 
 failed to welcome him, but which this time 
 didn't come. 
 
 "What's the matter, ma? Has anything gone 
 wrong ? " 
 
 Putting down the ham, Lizzie raised her eyes,, 
 though with no light in them. 
 
 "It's nothing so very wrong, dear, but I 
 haven't told your sisters because it's no use to 
 worry them if—" 
 
 "What is it, ma ? Out with it." 
 
 She told him. If it was necessary to go with- 
 out a hot meal between Wednesday and Satur- 
 day, of course it could be done; but even on 
 Saturday the gas people would demand fifteen 
 dollars on account before the gas would be 
 turned on again. There were just two possibil- 
 ities : The father might come home with the news 
 that he had found a job, or Teddy might have — 
 she didn't believe it, but he had talked of saving 
 for a new suit of clothes — ^Teddy might have 
 fifteen dollars laid away. 
 
 He turned his back and walked out of the 
 97 
 
THE^ EMPTY SACK 
 
 kitchen. He did it so significantly that it seemed 
 to the mother there could be only one meaning 
 to the act. He had saved the money and re- 
 sented being robbed of it. She knew he was 
 something of a coxcomb, and had always been 
 proud that he could look so neat. He had only 
 two suits, a common one and a best one, but 
 even the common one was as brushed and pressed 
 and stylish as if he had a valet. Nevertheless, 
 his great activity and his love of rough-and- 
 tumble skylarking made him hard on clothes in 
 the sense of wear, and the common one was 
 growing shiny at the seams and thin where there 
 was most attrition. A new suit was an urgent 
 necessity; so that if he had a few dollars put 
 away toward getting it, it would be no wonder if 
 it hurt him to be asked to give them up. 
 
 But Teddy had no few dollars put away. 
 When the fund for the new suit could be counted 
 otherwise than in per\nies, some special need had 
 always swept it into the family treasury. Teddy 
 had let it go without a sigh. He would have let 
 it go without a sigh to-day, only that he had 
 nothing saved. Being naturally of a loving, care- 
 taking disposition, it meant more to him that 
 Gussie or Gladys should have a new pair of shoes 
 than that he should be able to emulate Fred 
 Inglis in ordering a suit at Love's. 
 
 Having left the kitchen, he did not go farther 
 than the living room, where, Gussie having 
 taken herself upstairs, Gladys was drying her 
 eyes. He merely walked to the end of the room, 
 
 98 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 his hands in his pockets, as he stared above one 
 of the hydrangea trees into Indiana Avenue. 
 The windows being open, the voices of playing 
 children mingled with the even-song of birds. 
 To Teddy, there was mockery in these cheerful 
 sounds. There was mockery in the westering 
 May sunshine, mockery in the groups of girls, 
 barfeheaded and arm in arm, as they strolled 
 toward Palisade Walk; mockery in the ruddy- 
 faced men who watered their shrubs and grass; 
 mockery in the aproned women who came to 
 windows or doors in the intervals of preparing 
 supper. It all spoke of a homey comfort and 
 content, with no bluff behind it. In the FoUett 
 house all was bluff — and misery. 
 
 Somehow, for reasons he couldn't fathom, the 
 cutting off of the gas from the range seemed the 
 last humiliation. In the matter of food, if one 
 thing was too dear, you could eat another. So 
 it was in the whole round of essentials in living. 
 You could get a substitute or you could go with- 
 out. But for heat there was no substitute, and 
 you couldn't go without it. It ranked with 
 clothes and shelter as a necessity even among 
 savages. And yet here they were, a civilized 
 family, living in a civilized house, in a suburb 
 of New York, deprived of what even Micmacs 
 could have at will. It was one of the happen- 
 ings that could never have been foreseen as 
 possibilities. 
 
 His hands being in his pockets, Teddy fingered 
 the twenty-dollar bill. He did this uncon- 
 
 99 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 sciously, merely because it was there. It did 
 occur to him to wish it was his own; but his 
 wishes went no farther. 
 
 They had gone no farther when he swung on 
 his heel to go back to the kitchen. He must tell 
 his mother that he didn't have fifteen dollars put 
 away. He hadn't done so at once merely because 
 his) emotions had been too strong for him. * 
 
 He pulled his burly figure down the length~of 
 the room as one who has to drag himself along.- 
 If he had only been Fred Inglis, he would have 
 handed his mother a sheaf of bills with instruc- 
 tions to buy all she wanted. Why couldn't he, 
 Teddy Follett, do the same? He was, as Gussie 
 phrased it, a great big fellow of twenty-one — 
 and his value was only eighteen per. He had 
 proved that to his own satisfaction, for in se- 
 cretly trying to unearth a better place he had 
 been offered less than he got at Colhngham & 
 Law's. 
 
 What were the shackles that bound him? 
 Were they of his own creation, or were they 
 forced on him by the world outside? He was as 
 industrious as his father had been, and, except 
 for a tendency to do his work with a broad grin, 
 just as wholehearted. If good intentions had 
 commercial value, both father and son should 
 have been rated high; but here was his father 
 a bit of old junk, while he himself, having 
 reached man's estate, having served his country, 
 having tacitly offered himself to the limit of his 
 strength, was rewarded with a wage on which he 
 
 lOO 
 
(C 
 
 THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 could hardly live, to say nothing of helping 
 others live. 
 
 Madly, wildly, these thoughts churned in his 
 mind as he lurched down the room toward the 
 kitchen, while Pansy watched him with a look 
 into which she was putting all her soul. 
 
 He knew what he would say. He would say: 
 
 Ma, it's no go. I haven't a red cent. We've 
 got to eat cold and wash cold till Saturday, any- 
 how. We'll not look farther ahead than that. 
 When Saturday comes, we'll see." 
 
 But, on the threshold of the kitchen, he saw 
 something which brought a new sensation. In 
 free fights while in the navy he had thought he 
 had seen red; but he had never seen red like this. 
 He had never supposed it possible that this tor- 
 rent of wrath, tenderness, and pity should rise 
 within himself, a fountain spouting at the same 
 time both sweet water and bitter. 
 
 His mother was seated at the table, crying. 
 The ham bone was before her, the rags of meat 
 on the plate, and the knife on top of them. But 
 she, like Gladys a few minutes previously, had 
 covered her face with her hands, while her 
 shoulders rocked. 
 
 In all his twenty-one years Teddy had never 
 seen his mother cry. He had cried; the girls 
 had cried; his father had very nearly cried; but 
 his mother never. The strong spirit had grieved 
 in strong ways, but not in this way. Now it 
 seemed as if all the griefs she had laid up since 
 the days when she was Lizzie Scarborough had 
 
 lOI 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 heaped themselves to the point at which these 
 strange, harsh, unnatural tears were their only- 
 assuagement. 
 
 Teddy was down on his knees beside her, his 
 arm flung round her neck. 
 
 "Ma! Good old ma! Dear old ma! Don't 
 cry! For God's sake don't cry! Stop crying, 
 ma!" he shouted, in an imploring passion as 
 strange, harsh, and unnatural as her own. 
 "Here's the money I had saved for my new 
 clothes. Take it and go and pay something on 
 the gas bill. There! There! Stop! For God's 
 sake! For your little boy's sake! I love you, 
 ma. Only stop! There! That's better! Calm 
 down, ma! Everything will be all right, and I'll 
 — I'll get the new clothes by and by." 
 
 But in his heart he was saying, "To hell with 
 CoUingham & Law's!" as he laid the bill before 
 her. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 JENNIE cried herself to sleep that Wednesday 
 night, and, in the morning, cried herself 
 awake. She was in no doubt as to the motive of 
 her tears; she was sorry for having put a gulf 
 between her and the man she loved by marrying 
 one she didn't care for. 
 
 Why she didn't care for him was beyond her 
 power of analysis. He was good and kind and 
 tender; he was rocklike and steady and strong. 
 In a forceful way he was almost handsome, and 
 some day he would be rich. But there was the 
 fact that, her heart being given to the one man, 
 her nerves shuddered at the other. The explana- 
 tion she used to give, that the lividness of the 
 scar on his forehead frightened her, was no longer 
 tenable, since the mark tended to fade out. The 
 other infirmity, his limp, was also less conspicu- 
 ous, for, though he would never walk as if his; 
 foot had not been crushed, he walked as well as 
 many other men. It wasn't these peculiarities; 
 it wasn't any one thing in itself; it was simply 
 that she didn't love him and never would. 
 
 Whereas, she did love another man. She loved 
 
 his violet eyes, his brown mustache, his flashing 
 
 teeth, his selfishness, his cruelty. She loved his 
 
 system of starving her out, his habit of keeping 
 
 8 103 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 her in anguish. Too much reasonableness was 
 hard for her to assimilate, like too much water 
 to a portulaca. 
 
 And Bob had been so reasonable. He had 
 tried to explain himself. He had used words 
 that scared, that shocked her. Polygamous! 
 Monogamous! The very sounds suggested an- 
 atomy or impropriety. 
 
 Nevertheless, she could have pardoned this 
 language as an eccentricity if, in the dimness of 
 the parson's hall, he hadn't taken her in his arms 
 and kissed her. This possibility was something 
 she forgot when she followed him up the rectory's 
 brownstone steps. For the inadvertence she 
 blamed herself the more, since, throughout the 
 winter, she had never once lost sight of it. 
 Whenever he had proposed to her, the advantages 
 of marrying so much money had been offset by 
 her terror at his "pawing her about." With no 
 high-flown ideas as to virtue, Jennie would have 
 fought like a wildcat for her virginity of mind 
 and body till ready of her own free will to give 
 them up. And here she had sold herself to Bob 
 CoUingham, a man whose touch made her 
 shrink. 
 
 "I can't live with you!" she had cried, as she 
 tore herself from his embrace. 
 
 And poor Bob had been reasonable again. 
 
 "Of course not, Jennie darling — ^not yet. 
 When I come back — " 
 
 She hadn't let him finish. She had dashed 
 through the door and down the steps, so that he 
 
 104 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 had some ado to keep up with her. . . . Even then, 
 if he had only dragged her away and been a 
 cave man. . . . 
 
 And the evening at home had been one of the 
 oddest she had ever spent under her father's roof. 
 Everyone was so queer — or else she was queer 
 herself. Gussie and Gladys, reconciled after their 
 squabble, had both been in high spirits, and 
 Teddy almost hysterical. He gave imitations of 
 the men with whom he worked most closely at the 
 bank, of Fred Inglis, of Mrs. Inglis, of Dolly, 
 Addie, and Sadie Inglis, which made everyone 
 feel that a great actor was being lost to the 
 stage; but on top of these exhibitions he would 
 fall into spells of profound reverie. The father 
 had been apathetic, but he was always apa- 
 thetic now; the mother, on the other hand, more 
 serene than usual. More than usual, too, her 
 eyes applauded Teddy's high spirits with a 
 quiet, adoring smile. Altogether, the supper 
 had been a merry one, and yet, to Jennie's think- 
 ing, merry with a mysterious note in the merri- 
 ment — a note which perhaps only Pansy's intu- 
 itions could have really understood. 
 
 But sitting on the edge of her bed in the 
 morning, she saw a ray of hope. There was 
 divorce. Marriage wasn't the irreparable thing 
 which their family„jraditions assumed it to be. 
 As a tolerably diligent reader of the personal 
 items in the papers, Jennie had more than once 
 read of divorces granted to young couples who 
 had parted at the church door. Naturally, she 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 shrank from the fuss it would involve, but better 
 the fuss than. . . . 
 
 Having got up, for the reason that she couldn't 
 stay in bed, she dressed slowly, because none of 
 the family was as yet astir. She would surprise 
 her mother by lighting the gas range and making 
 the coflFee before anyone came down. Thus it 
 happened that she saw the postman crossing the 
 street with a letter in his hand. Though letters 
 were not rare in the family, they were rare enough 
 to make the arrival of one an incident. She went 
 to the door to take it from the postman's hand. 
 Seeing it addressed to Miss Follett and bearing 
 the postmark "Marillo," her knees trembled 
 under her. 
 
 Having read what Mrs. CoUingham had 
 written, Jennie's first thought was that her early 
 rising enabled her to keep this missive secret. 
 What it could portend was beyond her surmise. 
 It was not unfriendly, but neither was it cordial. 
 It took the guarded tone, she thought, of a 
 woman who meant to see her face to face before 
 being wilUng to commit herself. As success on 
 meeting people face to face had mostly been 
 Jennie's portion, she was not so much afraid of 
 the test as of what it might bring afterward. 
 
 What it might bring afterward was the recog- 
 nition of her marriage and her translation into 
 a rich family. This would mean the end of her 
 father's and mother's material cares, Teddy's 
 advancement at the bank, and brilliant careers 
 for Gussie and Gladys in New York social life. 
 
 io6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie could think of at least half a dozen 
 picture plays in which the sacrifice of some 
 lovely, virtuous girl had done as much as this 
 for her relatives. 
 
 So, all that day, sacrifice was much in her 
 mind. Against a vague background of grandeur, 
 it had the same emotional effect as of passion 
 sung to the accompaniment of a great orchestra. 
 To see herself with a limousine at her command, 
 and the family established in a modest villa 
 somewhere near Marillo Park, if not quite within 
 it, enabled her mentally to face another embrace 
 from Bob in the spirit of an early-Christian 
 maiden thinking of the lions awaiting her in the 
 arena. It would be terrible — but it could be met. 
 
 The vision of the limousine at her command 
 seemed to have come partly true as a trim 
 chauffeur stepped up to her in the station at 
 Marillo, touching his cap and asking if he spoke 
 to Miss FoUett. He touched his cap again when 
 he closed the door on her, and the car tooled 
 away along a road which bore the same relation 
 to the roads with which Jennie was familiar as a 
 glorified spirit to a living man. 
 
 The park was not so much a park as it was a 
 country. It had hills, valleys, landscapes, lakes, 
 and what seemed to Jennie immense estates for 
 which there was plenty of room. There were 
 houses as big as hotels and much more beautiful. 
 Trees, flowers, lawns, terraces, fountains, tennis 
 courts, dogs, horses, and motor cars were as 
 silver in the building of the Temple of Jerusalem 
 
 107 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 — ^nothing accounted of. Jennie had seen high 
 life as lived by the motion-picture heroine, but 
 she had not believed that even wealth could buy 
 such a Garden of Eden as this. Expecting to 
 reach Collingham Lodge a few minutes after 
 passing the grille, she had gone on and on, over 
 roads that branched, and then branched, and 
 then branched again, like the veinings of a leaf. 
 
 After descending at the white-columned por- 
 tico, she went up the steps in a state bordering 
 on trance. She knew what to do much as Elijah, 
 having come by the chariot of fire to another 
 plane of life, must have known what to do when 
 required to get out and go onward. Since a man 
 in livery opened a door of wrought-iron tracery 
 over glass, she had no choice but to pass through. 
 
 It is possible that Max, by his supersenses, 
 knew that she belonged to his master, for, spring- 
 ing toward her, he nosed her hand. It was, as 
 she put it to herself, the only human touch in 
 the first stages of her welcome. Thenceforward, 
 during all the forty or fifty minutes of her stay, 
 he kept close to her, either on foot or crouched 
 beside her chair, till a curious thing happened 
 when she regained the car. 
 
 I have said in the first stages of her welcome, 
 for as soon as she entered the hall she heard a 
 cheery voice. 
 
 "Oh, so it's you. Miss FoUett! So glad you've 
 come. It's really too bad to bring you so far — 
 only, it seemed to me we might be cozier here 
 than if I went up to town." 
 
 io8 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Adown the golden space which seemed to 
 Jennie much too majestic for anyone's private 
 dweUing, a brisk figure moved, with hand out- 
 stretched. A few seconds later Jennie was 
 looking into eyes such as she didn't suppose 
 ejdsted in human faces. Beauty, dignity, poise, 
 white hair dressed to perfection, and clothes 
 such as Jennie had never seen off the stage — 
 and rarely on it — ^were all subordinated to a 
 hearty, kindly, womanly greeting before which 
 they sank out of sight. Overpowered as she was 
 by the material costliness of all she saw, the girl 
 was well-nigh crushed by this unaffected affa- 
 bility. Like the Queen of Sheba at the court of 
 Solomon, to be Scriptural again, there was no 
 more spirit left in her. 
 
 Mrs. CoUingham went on talking as, side by 
 side, they walked slowly up the strip of red 
 carpet into the cool recesses of the house. 
 
 "I hope you didn't find the train too stuffy. 
 It's too bad they won't give us a parlor car on 
 the locals. For the last three or four years we 
 only have a parlor car on what they call the 
 'husbands' trains' — one in the morning and one 
 in the afternoon, and, my dear, they make us pay 
 for it as if — " 
 
 A toss of the hands proved to Jennie that Mrs. 
 CoUingham knew the difference between cheap 
 and dear, which again took her by surprise. 
 
 They passed through the terrace drawing- 
 room, which Jennie couldn't notice because she 
 trod on air, and came out to the flagged pave- 
 
 109 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ment. Even here, Mrs. Collingham didn't 
 pause, but, leading the way to the end of it, she 
 went round a comer to the northern and more 
 private side of the house, which looked into a 
 little wood. 
 
 "Mr. CoUingham's at home — ^just driven 
 down — but I'm not going to have him here. 
 Men are such a nuisance when women talk 
 about intimate things, don't you think.? They 
 make such mountains of molehills. It's just as 
 when you have a cry. They think your heart 
 must be breaking, and never seem to understand 
 that it gives you some relief." 
 
 Jennie was still more astounded. That the 
 mistress of Collingham Lodge, a great figure in 
 Marillo Park, and therefore high up in the peer- 
 age of the United States, could have the same 
 feelings as herself seemed the touch of nature 
 that makes the whole world kin to a degree she 
 had put beyond the limits of the human heart. 
 
 They came to a construction like a giant bird- 
 cage — a room out of doors, yet sheltered from 
 noisome insects like their own screened piazza, 
 furnished with an outdoor-indoor luxury. 
 
 "We don't have many mosquitoes at Marillo," 
 Mrs. Collingham explained, as she led the way 
 in, "but in spring they can be troublesome. 
 So we'll have our tea here. Gossip will bring it 
 presently. Where will you sit? I think you'll 
 like that chair. There! What about a cushion? 
 Oh, I'm sure you don't need it at your age, but, 
 still, one likes to be comfortable. No, Max; 
 
 no 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 stay out. Well, if you must come in, come in. 
 He seems to like you," she chatted on. "He's 
 Bob's dog, and I suppose he takes to Bob's 
 friends." 
 
 Rendered speechless by this frank reference 
 to the man who was the bond between them, 
 there was, fortunately, no immediate need for 
 Jennie to speak, since Gossip appeared in the 
 doorway pushing the tea equipage. It was a 
 little table on wheels, and on it Jennie noticed, 
 in a general way, every magnificent detail — ^the 
 silver tray, the silver kettle, the silver teapot, 
 the silver tongs, the silver spoons. "And all of 
 them solid," she said to herself, awesomely. 
 She regretted that she wouldn't be at liberty to 
 recount these marvels at home. At home, they 
 thought her merely at the studio, while she had 
 been borne away through the air as by a witch 
 on a broomstick. 
 
 Jennie would have said that Mrs. CoUingham 
 had hardly looked at her, but then, she reflected, 
 every woman knew how little looking you had 
 to do to grasp the details of another woman's 
 personality. You took them all in at a glance, 
 as if you brought seven or eight senses into play. 
 Each time her hostess, now settled behind the 
 tea table, lifted her fine eyes, Jennie was sure 
 they "got" her, like a camera. 
 
 "You pose, don't you?" The words came out 
 in a casual, friendly tone, as she busied herself 
 with the spirit lamp. "That must be so in- 
 teresting. I often wonder, when I'm in the big 
 
 211 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 galleries, what the immortal women would have 
 said had they known how their features would 
 go down through the ages. ' Take Dorotea 
 Nachtigal, for instance, the original of Holbein's 
 'Meyer Madonna,' in Darmstadt — ^the most 
 wonderful of all the Madonnas, I always say — 
 and how queer I suppose she would have felt if 
 she'd known that we should be adoring her when 
 she's no more than a handful of dust. Or the 
 model who posed for the Madonna di San Sisto! 
 Or the young things who sat to Greuze ! Did you 
 ever think of them ? " 
 
 Jennie saw how Bob could have come by words 
 like "polygamous" and "monogamous." People 
 at Marillo Park spoke a language of their own — 
 "English with frills on it," was the way she put 
 it to herself. From the intonation, she was able 
 to frame her answer in the negative, while, once 
 more, the superb eyes, which were oddly like Bob's 
 little steely ones, were lifted on her with a smile. 
 
 "You know, I should think people would be 
 crazy to paint you. How do you like your tea? 
 Sugar? Cream? One lump? Two lumps?" 
 Having flung out answers at random, Jennie 
 leaned forward to take her cup, while the kindly 
 voice ran on: "Just as you sit there you're a 
 picture. Funny I should have given you a tan- 
 colored cushion, because it tones in exactly." 
 
 Jennie explained that the various shades of 
 brown and some of the deeper ones of red were 
 among her favorites. 
 
 "Because they go so well with your hair," her 
 
 IIZ 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 hostess said, comprehendingly, and studying her 
 now more frankly. "My dear, you've got the 
 most lovely hair! It isn't auburn; it isn't cop- 
 pery; it isn't red. It's— what is it.? Oh, I see! 
 It's amber — it's the extraordinary shade Romney 
 gets into some of his portraits of Lady Hamil- 
 ton. You see it in the one in the Frick gallery, 
 if I remember rightly. You must look the next 
 time you're there." 
 
 Jennie tried to stammer that she would, only 
 that her syllables ran into one another and be- 
 came incoherent. 
 
 "But Romney couldn't paint you" Mrs. 
 CoUingham declared, enthusiastically, putting 
 her cup to her lips. "He's too Georgian. You're 
 the twentieth century. You're the perfect spirit 
 of the age — restless, rebeUious, wistful, and deli- 
 cate all at once. Girls nowadays remind me of 
 exquisite fragile things like the spire of the 
 Sainte Chapelle, only built of steel. You've got 
 the steel look — all slender and unbendable. 
 It's curious that — ^the way women look like the 
 ages in which they're bom. You've only to go 
 through a portrait collection to see that it's so. 
 Take the Stuart women, for instance — the Van- 
 dyke and Lely women — great saucer-eyed things, 
 with sensual lips and breasts. And then the Hol- 
 bein women, so terribly got up in their stiff 
 Sunday clothes, which they must have hurried 
 to put into their cedar chests the minute they 
 got home from mass. But they belong to their 
 time, don't you think.?" 
 
 "3 
 
T]HE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie could only say she did think, vowing in 
 her heart that the next day would see her going 
 round the Metropolitan Museum with a cata- 
 logue. 
 
 "But you! Hubert Wray says he's done a 
 wonderful study of you, and I'm crazy to see it. 
 The only thing I don't like from his description 
 is that he's got you in a Greek dress and atti- 
 tude, and I think, now that I've seen you, that 
 the day after to-morrow is your style. What do 
 you say yourself?" 
 
 "I don't know about the day after to-morrow; 
 I'm so busy with to-day." 
 
 Mrs. CoUingham took this with a pleasant 
 little laugh. 
 
 "You clever thing! You won't give yourself 
 away." She mused a few seconds, a smile on her 
 lips, and then said, with a sudden lifting of the 
 eyes, "What do you think of Bob?" 
 
 The girl could only stammer : 
 
 "Think of him — in what way?" 
 
 "Do you think he looks like me?" 
 
 In this rapid, unexpected shifting of the 
 ground, Jennie was like a giddy person trying to 
 keep her head. 
 
 "Well, yes — in a way; only — " 
 
 Mrs. CoUingham laughed again. 
 
 "I see that, too. He does. I can't deny it. 
 Often when I look at him, I see myself, only — 
 you'll laugh, I know — only myself as I'd be 
 reflected in the back of a silver spoon. That's 
 the trouble with Bob — he's so unformed. You 
 
 114 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 must have noticed it. I suppose it's the war; 
 and yet I don't know. He's always been like 
 that — a dear fellow, but no more than half 
 grown. I dare say that by the time he's fifty 
 he'll be something like a man." 
 
 As there seemed to be no absolute need for a 
 response to this, Jennie waited for more. It 
 came, after another little spell of musing. 
 
 "He's talked to me so much about you all 
 through the winter. That's why I asked you to 
 come down. Mr. CoUingham and I feel so tre- 
 mendously indebted to you for the way you've 
 acted." 
 
 Jennie could only repeat feebly, "The way 
 I've acted?" ^ 
 
 "I mean the way you've understood him. 
 Almost any other girl — yes, girls right here in 
 Marillo Park — ^would have taken him at his 
 word." Jennie's lips were parted, but unable to 
 frame a question. Mrs. CoUingham eyed the 
 spirit lamp. "All the same, that doesn't excuse 
 hint. Even a fellow who isn't half grown should 
 have more sense than to make love to every girl 
 he spends an hour with. One of these days, some 
 girl will catch him, and then he'll be sorry. 
 That's why we've been so thankful for the kind 
 of influence you've had over him, and why my 
 husband and I thought we'd like to do something 
 — ^well, something a little audacious." 
 
 Jennie was twisting her fingers and untwisting 
 them, but luckily her hostess, by keeping her 
 eyes on the spirit lamp, didn't notice this sign 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of nervousness. Once more she spoke, with a 
 musing half smile. 
 
 "We — ^we see a good deal of some one else 
 who keeps talking about you; and — ^you won't 
 mind, will you.'' — of course we've drawn our 
 conclusions. We couldn't help that — could we? 
 — when they were staring us in the face." 
 
 "Do you mean Mr. Wray?" Jennie asked, 
 with the point-blank helplessness of one who 
 doesn't know how to hedge. 
 
 "Oh, I didn't use the name, now did I? And, 
 as I've said, what we've seen we've seen, and we 
 couldn't help it. But, of course, if it hadn't been 
 for Bob, we shouldn't have seen so quickly." 
 
 "But he doesn't know?" Jennie cried, more as 
 query than as affirmation. 
 
 "No; I suppose he doesn't. I only mean that 
 as you refused Bob so many times — he told me 
 that — ^we naturally thought there must be some 
 one else, and when everything pointed that way 
 and Hubert talked of you so much — " She 
 kept this line of reasoning suspended while once 
 more she shifted her ground suddenly. "I 
 wonder if you've ever realized how hard it is to 
 show your gratitude toward people to whom yoju 
 truly and deeply feel grateful?" 
 
 Jennie mumbled something to the effect that 
 she had never been in that situation. 
 
 "Well, it is a situation. People are so queer 
 and proud and difficile. I suppose it's we older 
 people who run up oftenest against that; but if 
 Mr. Collingham and I could only do for people 
 
 ii6 
 
THE [EMPTY SACK 
 
 the things we might do, and which they won't 
 let us do — " 
 
 Once more the idea was suspended to give 
 Jennie time to take in the fact that a good thing 
 was coming her way; but all she could manage 
 was to stare with frightened, fascinated eyes and 
 no power of thought. 
 
 "Do you know, my dear," the artless voice 
 ran on, "now that I'm face to face with you, I'm 
 really afraid? I told my husband that, if he'd 
 leave us alone together, I shouldn't be — and, 
 after all, I am." She leaned forward confiden- 
 tially. " How frank would you let me be ? How 
 much would you be willing for me to say?" 
 
 But before the girl could invent a reply the 
 voice kept up its even, caressing measure. 
 
 "/ know how things are with you — at least, I 
 think I do. I've been young, my dear. I know 
 what it is to be in love. You're coloring, but you 
 needn't do it — not with me. You're very much 
 in love, aren't you?" 
 
 Jennie bowed her head to hide her tears. She 
 hadn't meant to admit how much in love she 
 was, but this sympathy unnerved her. 
 
 "You do love Hubert, don't you?" 
 
 ^'Yes, but—" 
 
 "And that's why you told Bob you couldn't 
 marry him?" 
 
 "That's one of the reasons, but — " 
 
 "One of the reasons will do, my dear. You 
 don't know how much I feel with you and for 
 you. I could tell you a little story about myself 
 
 117 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 when I was your age — but, then, old love tales 
 are like dried flowers, they've lost their scent 
 and color. Mr. CoUingham and I are very fond 
 of Hubert, and, of course, he doesn't make enough 
 to marry on as things are now. He has a little 
 something, I suppose, and, with the work he's 
 doing, the future is secure. You'll find, one day, 
 that he'll be painting you as Andrea del Sarto 
 painted Lucrezia, and Rembrandt Saskia — their 
 wives, you know — " 
 
 "Oh, but, Mrs. CoUingham—" 
 
 "There, there, my dear! I'm not going to say 
 anything more about that. I know Hubert and 
 what he wants, and so my husband and I thought 
 that if we could show our gratitude to you and 
 make things easier for him — " 
 
 "Oh, but you couldn't!" 
 
 "We couldn't unless you helped us. That goes 
 without saying, of course. But we hoped you 
 would. You see, when people have so much — 
 not that we're so tremendously rich, but when 
 they have enough — and when they know as we 
 do what struggle is — and there's been anyone 
 whom they admire as we admire you, after all 
 you've done for Bob — ^we thought that if we 
 could give you a little present — a wedding present 
 it would be — only just a little in anticipation — 
 we thought five thousand dollars — " 
 
 She ceased suddenly because Jennie appeared 
 as one transfixed. She sat erect; but the life 
 seemed to have gone out of her. 
 
 Mrs. CoUingham was prepared for this; she 
 ii8 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 had discounted it in advance. "She's playing 
 for more," she said to herself. Luckily, she had 
 named her minimum only, and had arranged 
 with her husband for a maximum. The maxi- 
 mum was all the same to her so long as she 
 saved Bob. Having given Jennie credit for seeing 
 through the game all along — such girls were 
 quick and astute — she had expected that the 
 first figure of the "present" would meet with 
 just this reception. 
 
 But Jennie was saying to herself, "Oh, if this 
 kind offer had only come yesterday!" Five 
 thousand dollars was a sum of which she could 
 not see the spending limitations. It meant all 
 of which the family had need and that she her- 
 self had ever coveted. With five thousand dol- 
 lars, she could not only have put her father on 
 his feet, but have come before Hubert as an 
 heiress. 
 
 "If you don't think it enough," Mrs. Colling- 
 ham said, at last, with a shade of coldness in her 
 tone, "I should be willing to make it seven — or 
 ten. Perhaps we'd better say ten at once, and 
 end the discussion. My husband's willing to 
 make it ten, but I don't think he'd give more. 
 Our son is very dear to us " — the realities seeped 
 through in spite of her attempts at comedy — 
 "and, oh. Miss FoUett, if you'll only help us to 
 keep him for ourselves as you've helped us 
 already — " 
 
 Jennie staggered to her feet. Her arms hung 
 lax at her sides. Ten thousand dollars ! The sum 
 9 "9 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 was fabulous! It would have meant all cares 
 lifted from the home — and, Hubert! She was 
 hardly aware of speaking as she said : 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. Collingham, I can't take your 
 money. I wish I could. My God ! how I wish I 
 could ! But — but — " 
 
 "But, for goodness' sake, child, why can't 
 you?" 
 
 "Because — oh, because — I'm married to Bob 
 already." 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 IT was one of those occasions when the auditory 
 nerve seems to connect imperfectly with the 
 brain. Mrs. ColUngham placed her cup on the 
 table and leaned forward, puzzled, tense. 
 
 "What did you say? Sit down. Tell me that 
 again." 
 
 Jennie collapsed against the tan cushion of 
 the chair, and repeated her confession. Her 
 hostess's brows knitted painfully. 
 
 "But I don't understand. When did you 
 marry him?" 
 
 The girl explained that it had been on the 
 previous afternoon. 
 
 "But — but — ^you said just now that you were 
 in love with some one else." 
 
 "So I am — only — only, Bob made me." 
 
 "Made you what?" 
 
 "Made me go and get a license and marry 
 him. He said" — her lips and tongue were so 
 parched that it was hard to form the words — ■ 
 "he said he was going away in a few days to 
 South America, and that he couldn't go unless 
 he knew I was his wife. I begged him to let me 
 off, but he — he wouldn't. Oh, Mrs. CoUingham, 
 what am I to do?" 
 
 The appeal helped Junia to rally her stricken 
 
 121 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 powers. It enabled her to say inwardly: "I 
 must act through this girl herself. If I estrange 
 her, I may lose my son." A flash of the lioness 
 wrath with which she trembled might lead to an 
 irretrievably false step. So she made her tone 
 kindly, sympathetic, almost affectionate. 
 
 "And Bob — does he know that — ^that you care 
 for some one else?" 
 
 "He never asked me." 
 
 "But don't you think you should have told 
 him?" 
 
 "That's not so very easy when — " 
 
 "But there was some sort of understanding 
 between you and Hubert, wasn't there?" 
 
 Jennie's only answer to this was to clasp her 
 hands and say, 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. CoUingham, how do people get 
 divorces ? " 
 
 This being more than Junia had hoped for, she 
 tried to use the opening to the best of her ability. 
 
 "They — ^they do something that — ^that makes 
 the other person want to be free." Trying to 
 explain this further, she ran the risk of citing a 
 case perhaps too close to the point. "For in- 
 stance, if my husband wanted to be free, he'd do 
 something that would make me willing to di- 
 vorce him." 
 
 "And would you?" 
 
 "You see, I'm taking the case of his wanting 
 to be free. In that situation, he's the one who 
 would do the thing. If I wanted to be free, I 
 suppose — I suppose I should do it." 
 
 122 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "So that if I wanted to be free, it would be 
 up to me to do the thing rather than up to 
 Bob." 
 
 A moral issue being here at stake, Junia was 
 obliged, in the expressive American phrase, "to 
 sidestep," though she supposed that the sug- 
 gestion in the air was of no more than Jennie 
 had done already. As an artist's model, it would 
 be part of her professional occupation. 
 
 "I'm not giving you advice, my dear; I'm 
 only trying to answer your question. I'm so 
 sorry for you that I'd do anything I could to 
 help you unravel the tangle." 
 
 "Then you think there are ways of unraveling 
 it?" 
 
 "Oh, certainly, if you were wiUing to — " 
 
 "To what, Mrs. CoUingham. There's almost 
 nothing I wouldn't do — ^to get us all out — ^when 
 you've been so kind to me." 
 
 Having a conscience of her own, Junia con- 
 tinued to "sidestep." 
 
 "My dear, I can't tell you what to do. I'm 
 not sure that I know — very well. You see, it's 
 your trouble, and you must get out of it. I'll 
 help you. I will do that. In every way I can 
 I'll make it easy for you. But I couldn't advise 
 — or — or put anything in your way that might 
 be considered as — as temptation." 
 
 But conscientious scruples were not in Jennie's 
 line. When eager to reach a point, she went to 
 it straight. 
 
 "If Bob came back from South America and 
 123 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 found I was living with Hubert, wouldn't he have 
 to divorce me then ? " 
 
 Junia rose in the agitation of one unusued to 
 plain talk, and shocked by it. 
 
 "Jennie — your name is Jennie, isn't it? — I 
 must go and speak to Mr. Collingham. You'll 
 stay here — ^won't you ? — ^till I come back. I may 
 have something then rather important to say." 
 
 The girl sat still, looking up adoringly. 
 
 "Are you going to tell him?" 
 
 "No; I think not. But there's something I 
 Want to ask him. I don't think that either you 
 or I had better say anything to anyone. What do 
 you think?" 
 
 Jennie shook her head. 
 
 "I don't want to. I wish nobody would ever 
 have to know." 
 
 "I wish Hubert didn't have to know. Perhaps 
 he won't; and yet — Let us think." She 
 dropped into a chair nearer to Jennie than the 
 one behind the tea table. "One thing I must 
 ask you. What happened after you and Bob 
 went through that ceremony yesterday after- 
 noon ? " 
 
 "Nothing happened. He motored back to his 
 friends on Long Island and I took the ferry and 
 went home. He said he'd see me on Saturday to 
 say good-by." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. In Central Park, I expect. 
 He's asked me to meet him there once or twice 
 already." 
 
 124 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "But I wouldn't go anywhere else with him 
 if I were you — not into a house, or anything." 
 
 "I won't if he doesn't make me." 
 
 "I'd be firm about that. You see, if you did 
 — ^well, I'm sure you understand — it might — it 
 might make it harder for you to find your way 
 out to where you'd be happy again. Are you 
 sure you see what I mean?" 
 
 "I've had that out with him. He'd said that 
 nothing would happen till he got back from 
 South America." 
 
 Relieved by this simple statement, Junia 
 went on. 
 
 "And if I were you, I wouldn't say a word to 
 anybody — not even to your own father and 
 mother. Your mother is living, isn't she .'' Don't 
 even tell Bob that you've seen me. Don't tell 
 anyone anything. Let it be your secret and 
 mine. I want you to feel that I'm your friend 
 and anxious to help you out of the muddle in 
 which you've tied up your happiness. At first, 
 when you told me, I thought more of Hubert; 
 but now that we've talked I'm thinking of you, 
 too, and how much I should like to see you — " 
 A dim smile conveyed the rest of the thought 
 while she rose again. "Now I'll go. Don't be 
 alarmed if I'm a little long. Max will take care 
 of you." 
 
 Left to herself, Jennie's emotions came in 
 waves of conflicting calculation. Had she only 
 been in love with Bob, and not with Hubert, all 
 this graciousness would have lapped her round 
 
 125 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 in silk and softness. Nothing would have been 
 denied her from a limousine to pearls. There 
 would have been the villa for the family, with 
 Gussie and Gladys turned into "buds." 
 
 But, as an oflFset to it, there would be the re- 
 nunciation. Somehow, since cutting herself 
 away from Hubert by the ceremony with Bob, 
 he seemed nearer to her than before. Things 
 she had supposed to be out of the question now 
 presented themselves as more in the line of those 
 that could be done. Within twenty-four hours 
 she had lived much; she had ripened much. 
 Now that she had had this talk with Mrs. Col- 
 lingham, Hubert became more definitely an 
 alternative. She could choose him and let this 
 wealth and beauty go, or she could choose the 
 wealth and beauty and let him . . . 
 
 But at the thought of turning her back on 
 him something seemed to choke her. To choose 
 what money could buy instead of this great love 
 was treachery to all she knew as sublime. She 
 clutched herself over the heart. It was as if she 
 were going to die. Max was so startled that he 
 sprang upon her with his mighty paws in the 
 roughness of young consternation. 
 
 On the other hand, home conditions were well- 
 nigh imperative. Love and Hubert were all very 
 well, but they were part of the world of romance. 
 The family, with their concrete needs, were 
 actuality. Jennie thought of each one of them 
 in turn, but of Teddy most of all. Among those 
 of her own generation, he was her favorite. If 
 
 126 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 she became openly Mrs. Robert Bradley Colling- 
 ham. Junior, of Marillo Park, Teddy would go 
 far. He might have a place like Mr. Brunt's. 
 Only the other day her father had said of Mr. 
 Brunt, "There's one who don't have any trouble 
 in pickling down his ten a week." To see Teddy 
 pickling down his ten a week, which would be 
 more than five hundred dollars in a year, Jennie 
 was ready to submit to almost anything — even 
 Bob's hands on her person. She might get used 
 to them, and, if she didn't, why, the daily sacri- 
 fice would be not without its reward. 
 
 She had reached something like this decision 
 when Mrs. Collingham came back. Watching 
 her from the minute when she rounded the corner 
 of the flagged pavement, Jennie noted a rapid 
 change in her expression. At first it was terrible 
 — that of a queen in wrath. As she approached 
 the bird cage, however, it cleared so quickly that 
 by the time she reached the threshold it was 
 almost tender. 
 
 "That's because she hkes me," Jennie said to 
 herself. She was accustomed to being liked, 
 though especially by men. "I think it will cheer 
 her up if I say right off that I've come to stay 
 with her." 
 
 To make this announcement she had risen to 
 her feet, with lips already parted; but Mrs. 
 Collingham forestalled her. 
 
 "Sit down again, my dear. I want to talk to 
 you some more. I must tell you about Mr. Col- 
 lingham." She herself sank into the chair near 
 
 127 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie which she had already occupied. She 
 panted as after a difficult experience. "Oh dear! 
 It's been so trying! You don't know him, do 
 you? Well, he's a good man — kind and just in 
 his way — but oh, so stem and relentless! If he 
 knew what Bob had done in going through that 
 mad thing with you, he'd turn the boy adrift." 
 
 Having reseated herself already, Jennie now 
 closed her lips. She had forgotten Mr. CoUing- 
 ham. Coming to stay was meeting a new 
 obstacle. 
 
 " It's only fair to you to make you understand 
 what kind of man my husband is. Of course, 
 he's a strong man, otherwise he wouldn't have 
 accomplished all he has. My son, my daughter, 
 I myself — ^we're but puppets on his string. His 
 word has to be law to us. And with Bob the way 
 he is — ^wanting to marry every girl he meets — 
 and forgetting her next day — ^his father has no 
 patience. You don't know how hard it is for me, 
 my dear, always to have to stand between them." 
 
 As she paused to dab her eyes, Jennie saw the 
 limousine, the villa, with Teddy's chance of 
 pickling down ten a week, fading out like a 
 picture in the movies. 
 
 "I wouldn't dare to tell him of the great wrong 
 Bob has done to you. He'd disinherit him on the 
 spot. If Bob were to insist on having this es- 
 capade — you wouldn't really call it a marriage, 
 would you ? — but if he were to insist on its being 
 made public, why, there'd be an end of his rela- 
 tions with his father. My husband would neither 
 
 128 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 give him a cent nor leave him a cent. I must say 
 that Bob would deserve it; but, Jennie, I'm 
 thinking of you. You'd have forsaken the man 
 you loved, married a man you didn't care for, 
 and got nothing in the world to show for it. 
 That's where you'd have to suffer, and I can see 
 well enough that you're suffering already." 
 
 There was every reason now that Jennie's 
 tears should begin to flow. Flow they did while 
 her companion watched. 
 
 "And yet, as you'll see, Mr. CoUingham is not 
 an unkind man. When I explained to him that 
 we might be more indebted to you than I had 
 thought at first, he said — " 
 
 With a look of anticipation, Jennie stopped 
 crying suddenly, though the tears already shed 
 were glistening on her cheek. 
 
 The point was now to find phraseology at 
 once clear enough and delicate enough to suggest 
 a course and yet not shock the sensibilities. 
 
 "You see, my dear, it's this way. One has to 
 keep one's ideals, hasn't one ? That goes without 
 saying. Once we let our ideals go" — she flung 
 her hands outward — "well, what's the use of 
 living? My own life hasn't been as happy as 
 you might think; and if it hadn't been for my 
 ideals—" 
 
 Jennie broke in because she couldn't help it. 
 
 "Mr. Wray is ideal for a man, don't you think, 
 Mrs. CoUingham?" 
 
 It was the lead Junia needed. 
 
 "He's perfect, Jennie, in his way; and, oh, 
 129 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 how I wish you were as free as forty-eight hours 
 ago! You could be, of course, if — But I mustn't 
 advise you, must I ? I don't know how to. I'm 
 just as lost as you are. Only, if you could find a 
 way to cast the burden of the whole thing on 
 Bob—" 
 
 "Do you mean to make him get the divorce?" 
 
 " In that case, we should want to feel that you 
 had something to fall back upon. And so my 
 husband thought that perhaps twenty-five thou- 
 sand dollars — " 
 
 Jennie gave a great gasp. Her head began to 
 swim. Not villas and limousines rose before 
 her, but cloud-capped towers and gorgeous 
 palaces. 
 
 "Poor daddy," she thought, "wouldn't have 
 to hunt for a job any more, and momma'd have 
 nothing to do for the rest of her life but sit in a 
 chair and rock." 
 
 Yet that was only part of the vision. The rest 
 did not go so easily into words. She had only to 
 hurry to the studio, fling herself into the arms 
 she was longing to feel clasped round her — and 
 become fabulously rich. 
 
 That would be if Bob took the opening she 
 offered him. If he didn't — 
 
 "But suppose Bob won't?" she asked, in terror 
 lest he should not. 
 
 "I've thought of that, too," came the prompt 
 answer. "He will, of course. But suppose he 
 didn't. Well, we're not hagglers, my dear. 
 We're only simple people trying to do right, just 
 
 130 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 as you're trying to do right yourself. If Bob is 
 only in a position in which he can undo his 
 wrong, whether he undoes it or not, you shall 
 have your twenty-five thousand just the same." 
 
 "Could I have it as early as — as next week?" 
 
 "If the conditions are fulfilled, certainly." 
 
 Jennie was anxious to free herself from the 
 charge of cupidity. 
 
 "The reason I say next week is that my father 
 is worried about the interest on the mortgage 
 and the taxes. He didn't pay the interest last 
 time, and the taxes are two months overdue. If 
 he can't find the money by next week — " 
 
 "You yourself can be in a position to take all 
 the worry off his hands — once the conditions are 
 fulfilled." 
 
 Little more was said after this. There was 
 little more to say. The necessities of the case 
 being once understood, Junia steered her guest 
 back to the car which waited at the door. 
 
 But into the leave-taking Max threw an odd 
 note of hostilisty. As if he resented some base- 
 ness toward his master, he pressed his flank 
 against Jennie with such force as almost to 
 knock her down, and when she sprang away 
 from him into the car he growled after her. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 "QJO you can do it and get away with it." 
 
 O This was Teddy's reflection as he left the 
 bank on that Thursday afternoon. He had 
 spent an infernal day, but it was over, and over 
 safely. Of the missing twenty dollars he had 
 neither heard a word nor caught a sign of anxiety. 
 Mr. Brunt had been methodical and taciturn as 
 usual. Always keeping a gulf between Teddy 
 and himself, it was neither more nor less a gulf 
 to-day than it was on other days. As to whether 
 he missed twenty dollars or whether he did not, 
 Teddy could form no idea. 
 
 In the middle of the morning there had been 
 a terrifying incident. 
 
 "See that guy over there?" Lobley, one of his 
 colleagues, had asked him. 
 
 He saw the guy over there — a crafty, clean- 
 shaven Celt — and said so. 
 
 "That's Flynn, the detective who copped 
 Nicholson, the teller at the Wyndham National." 
 
 "O my God! I'm pinched!" Teddy exclaimed 
 to himself. "If I had a gun or a dose of poison, 
 he'd never get me alive." 
 
 But Flynn only chatted with Jackman, one 
 of the house detectives, laughed, cashed a check 
 at a wicket, and left the bank. 
 
 132 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Teddy breathed again, wondering if he had 
 given anjrthing away to Lobley. Was it pos- 
 sible that Lobley could have heard of the twenty 
 dollars and been set to try him out? No; he 
 didn't believe so. Lobley had merely pointed 
 out Flynn as a notable character, and gone about 
 his business. 
 
 "I shall never forget that mug," Teddy 
 thought, as he summoned his sang-froid to go on 
 with his work, "The mug of a guy without 
 guts," he added, further to define the pitiless set 
 of Flynn's features. "I sure would kill myself 
 before I let him touch me." 
 
 There was no other alarm that day; there was 
 only the incessant fear, the incessant watchful- 
 ness that made him shrink from every eye that 
 glanced his way, and which, when office hours 
 were over, sent him scuttling to the subway like 
 a rabbit to its hole. 
 
 At supper, his father brought up again the 
 subject of the taxes and the interest on the 
 mortgage. The latter would be due at the end 
 of the following week, and the former was long 
 overdue. With the added interest on both, he 
 owed two hundred and sixty-odd dollars, of which 
 he had borrowed from old friends a hundred and 
 fifteen. Between the sum due and that in hand, 
 there was a gap which he didn't see how to fill. 
 
 "We'll get it somehow, daddy," Jennie said, 
 encouragingly. "Don't begin worrying." 
 
 "No; Ted 'U rob the bank," Gussie laughed, 
 flippantly. 
 
 133 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Teddy was on his feet, shaking his fist across 
 the table. 
 
 "See here, Miss Gus; that's just about — " 
 
 Gussie laughed up at him, still more flippantly. 
 
 "You haven't robbed it already, have you? 
 Momma, dp make him behave." 
 
 "Children, don't squabble, please! Teddy 
 darling, Gussie was only poking a little fun. Sit 
 down and have some more hash. It's made with 
 beets in it, just the way you like it. I was 
 reading," she continued, to divert the minds of 
 the company, "of that teller at the Wyndham 
 National—" 
 
 "Nicholson," Josiah put in. "I used to know 
 him when I was at the Hudson River Trust. 
 Sharp-eyed little ferret face, he was. Twenty- 
 three thousand, extending over a period of five 
 years. Often had lunch with him at the same 
 counter. Blueberry pie was a favorite of his." 
 
 "Twenty-three thousand, extending over a 
 period of five years!" Teddy repeated that to 
 himself. He wondered that it hadn't struck him 
 when he heard the fellows at the bank discussing 
 the arrest. One of them had claimed "inside 
 dope" as to how Nicholson had covered up his 
 tracks, and explained the process. Teddy hadn't 
 hstened to that, because the magnitude of the 
 theft had excluded its bearing on his own. 
 
 But there it was forcing itself on his attention, 
 like Pansy's cold nose pressed at that minute 
 against his hand. You could have five years' 
 leeway, and never be suspected. He pumped his 
 
 134 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 father for further details as to Nicholson's Ufe, 
 learning that he had owned his home at Leffing- 
 well Manor, where he had been a member of the 
 golf club and a church goer. 
 
 At his own fears Teddy smiled inwardly. 
 Twenty dollars, which would certainly be paid 
 back in the course of a few weeks! Already he had 
 saved seventy cents toward the restoration, just by 
 going without his lunch, with a few economies 
 in car fares. If he could pawn his best suit of 
 clothes, he would have the whole sum within a 
 fortnight. The suit had been bought for twenty- 
 six dollars, and would certainly bring in ten. It 
 would be a matter of dodging his mother and 
 getting it out of the closet in her room, where 
 she kept it in order to regulate his use of it. 
 
 As supper went on, it was little Gladys who 
 brought up the question which some one older 
 might have asked. 
 
 "What would happen, daddy, if you couldn't 
 pay the interest and the taxes.?" 
 
 "They could sell us out of house and home." 
 
 But this possibility being more than a week off, 
 the statement brought no fears with it. Like 
 all people who at the best of times are dependent 
 on a weekly wage, the Folletts had the mental 
 attitude best described as "from hand to mouth." 
 That is, once the dinner was secure, there was no 
 will to worry as to where the supper was to come 
 from. It was fundamentally a question of out- 
 look. People used to being provided for naturally 
 looked ahead; but where your most extended 
 10 ^35 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 view could take you no more than from one meal 
 to another your powers of forecast grew limited. 
 Doubtless the provision was merciful, for, in the 
 case of the Folletts, even the parents felt the 
 futility of dreading a calamity more than a week 
 away. 
 
 Of all the six, Jennie was the only one with a 
 power of making comparisons and drawing con- 
 trasts. She had had, that day, a glimpse of a 
 world as different from her own as paradise from 
 earth. It was no use saying that it was different 
 only in degree; it was different also in kind. It 
 was different in values, in textures, in ampli- 
 tudes. It was another thing, not another aspect 
 of the same thing. Junia Collingham might be a 
 human being like herself; but in all that was of 
 practical account, she was as widely separated 
 from Jennie FoUett as a New Yorker from a 
 Central African. 
 
 That was as far as Jennie got. Her mind was 
 not given to deduction or her spirit to asking 
 questions. Not having a God in particular, she 
 had nothing to act as a great touchstone, to praise 
 or to blame. Some human beings had every- 
 thing; others had next to nothing. The Folletts 
 were among "the others." Jennie didn't know 
 how or why. She didn't ask to know. Knowing 
 would perhaps be worse than not knowing, since 
 it might stir rebellion where there was now only 
 lassitude and resignation. But there was the 
 fact. The Collinghams could throw her twenty- 
 five thousand dollars as she threw a titbit to 
 136 
 
THE EMPTY, SACK 
 
 Pansy, while her father might be sold out of house 
 and home for lack of a hundred and fifty. 
 
 Jennie mused, but she did no more. Life was 
 too big a mystery to grapple with. If she tried 
 it, it made her unhappy. It made her unhappy i 
 that Max should have been friendly at first, and 
 then growled at her so resentfully. She won- 
 dered if dogs had a scent for moral and emotional 
 atmospheres. She couldn't express this last in 
 words, but she did it very well by thought. She 
 often had thoughts for which she had no words, 
 so that her inner life was broader than that 
 which she showed outside. It was one of the 
 things she had noticed about Mrs. CoUingham — 
 that she had words for everything. It was like 
 her possession of the house, the gardens, the 
 beautiful things. They gave her spaciousness. 
 Her spirit moved with a larger swing. She could 
 think, feel, express herself strongly, vividly, 
 commandingly, while they, the FoUetts, had to 
 creep and sneak timidly along the back lanes of 
 life. 
 
 "That's why I'm doing it," she reasoned with 
 herself, "because I'm in the back lanes of life. 
 I can creep and sneak along, and I can't do any- 
 thing else. It was all very well for him to jostle 
 me with his lean, iron flank and to growl; but 
 he didn't know what twenty-five thousand would 
 mean to me." 
 
 Along the line of these musings, Teddy said, 
 suddenly: 
 
 "Saw young Coll to-day. Came up and spoke 
 137 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to me. Not half a bad sort when you get to 
 know him." 
 
 Jennie felt a little faint, but no one noticed it, 
 because Gussie threw back the ball. 
 
 "Tell him to come up and speak to me. Any 
 afternoon at half past five, when I leave Corinne's." 
 
 "Say, Gus," Gladys giggled; "wouldn't you 
 like a guy with all that wad waitin' for you every 
 day when Corinne shuts down the lid? My! 
 The ice-cream sodas he could blow you to!" 
 
 Lizzie was pained. It seemed to her that the 
 process of Americanization which her children 
 were undergoing lay chiefly in the degradation 
 of their speech. 
 
 "Gladys darling, can't you find proper words 
 
 "Oh, momma dear," Gladys complained, 
 "do put a can on all that. If you're a cash girl, 
 you've got to talk English, or the other girls 'U 
 whizzy you round the lot." 
 
 "Young Coll is going to South America," 
 Teddy informed the party. "Sails with Huntley 
 on Monday. Gosh! Wouldn't I like to be going, 
 too! Say, dad, why do some fellows come into 
 the world with the way all smoothed for them 
 and their bread buttered in advance?" 
 
 "Because," Gussie declared, loftily, "they're 
 clever and can get ahead, like Fred Inglis. I'll 
 bet that if his father wanted his taxes and the 
 interest on a mortgage, he wouldn't have to 
 raise the wind among his old friends. Fred 'd be 
 Johnny-on-the-spot with the greenbacks." 
 
 138 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Teddy could only gulp, hang his head over his 
 plate, and choke himself with hash, as he mut- 
 tered to his soul; "God! I'll shoot that Fred 
 Inglis if I ever get a gun." 
 
 And just as if she knew that Teddy needed 
 comforting, Pansy sprang upon his knees, pushing 
 her face up along his breast till she could lick his 
 chin. 
 
 Twenty-four hours later Max was vexing his 
 soul with the difficulty of transcending planes. 
 There was so much of which he could have 
 warned his master, now that he had got him 
 back from Long Island; but there was neither 
 speech nor language, neither symbol nor sign, to 
 make human beings understand anything but 
 the most primitive needs and concepts. Obe- 
 dience! Disobedience! Hunger! Thirst! Sor- 
 row! Joy! These sentiments could be put over 
 from the dog plane to the human plane, but 
 without shadings, subtleties, or any of the mar- 
 vels of untuitive knowledge by which dogs could 
 enlighten men if men had open faculties. To 
 another dog, he could have flashed his informa- 
 tion in an instant; whereas human beings could 
 only seize ideas when they were beaten into 
 them with verbal clubs. 
 
 Edith and Bob voted Max a nuisance because, 
 in his agony of impotence, he pranced restlessly 
 about the bedroom, lashing his tail in one tempo 
 and pointing his ears in another. Edith had 
 come down from the Berkshires on hearing by 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 wire that Bob was to leave next Monday for 
 South America. She was seated now on the bed, 
 her back against the footboard. 
 
 "What I don't quite see," she was saying, "is 
 how you can be so sure." 
 
 Bob looked at her as he stood taking the studs 
 from the soft-bosomed evening shirt in his hand 
 to transfer them to the clean one lying on the 
 bed. 
 
 "How can you be so sure about Ayling?" 
 
 "Well, that's a little different. Ernest speaks 
 our language; he has our ways. Dad and 
 mother make a fuss because he hasn't a lot of 
 money; but that means no more than if he didn't 
 wear a certain kind of hat. He's our sort, just 
 the same." 
 
 "And I'm her sort. I can't explain it to you, 
 Edie, but she needs me." 
 
 "How do you know she needs you? Has she 
 ever admitted it ? " 
 
 "I haven't asked her to admit it. I can see." 
 
 "Yes, that's all very fine, but — did it ever 
 strike you, when Hubert's been talking about 
 her, that — " 
 
 Bob made an inarticulate sound of scorn as he 
 inserted the cuff links into a cuff. 
 
 "Oh, Hubert's a top-hole chap, all right; but 
 my Lord ! — Jennie wouldn't look across the street 
 at him." 
 
 " But he might look across the street at Jennie; 
 and with you so far away — " 
 
 He smiled, with something like a wink. 
 140 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Don't you fret about that. She's the kind of 
 little woman to be true. You can't mistake 'em." 
 
 "We've known a good many men who have 
 mistaken them." 
 
 "You haven't known my kind to make that 
 sort of tumble. Love can be blind; but instinct 
 can't be. Edie, I believe so much in that girl 
 that, if she was to play me false — But there — 
 good Lord ! — she couldn't ; so why talk about it 
 any more? See here," he added. "If you're 
 going to change your dress, you'll have to 
 scuttle — and I must get into my waiter's togs." 
 
 Meanwhile Dauphin's struggles were of an- 
 other order. It was the hour of the day which 
 he was accustomed to spend with CoUingham, 
 and to spend it undisturbed. In this lovely 
 spring weather they strolled about the gardens, 
 peeped into the hotbeds, dropped in aimlessly 
 at the stable or the garage, exchanged odds and 
 ends of observation with the men working around 
 the place. After this, they returned to the 
 house, where, upstairs, in a comfortably, mascu- 
 hne bedroom, the man made changes in his 
 outer fur, while the setter, less concerned about 
 trifles, stretched himself out on the floor and 
 blinked. It was a restful time, suited to a mind 
 which after the stormier years was growing more 
 and more content with material prosperity, and 
 to a heart that was alwajrs content with its mas- 
 ter's contentment. 
 
 But, of late, poor Dauphin had been pain- 
 141 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 fully buffeted by waves of agitation. They 
 emanated from his master, like circlets round a 
 stone thrown into a pool. When his master's 
 wife came into the scene the conflict of forces 
 was terrible. She was not straight with her lord. 
 She was using him, hoodwinking him. Dauphin 
 would have sprung at her throat had it not been 
 for the knowledge that, were he to do so, he 
 would be beaten and kicked by the object of his 
 defense. No; you couldn't deal with human 
 beings sensibly. The wise thing to do was to 
 stretch on the floor and pretend to snooze while 
 they fought their own fight. 
 
 They didn't precisely fight their own fight 
 just now. Collingham merely accepted terms. 
 He was picking up his evening jacket from the 
 bed on which his valet had laid it out. Junia, 
 dressed exactly to the mean between two little 
 and too much suited for a family dinner, had 
 crossed the threshold of his room, where she stood 
 adjusting a fall of lace. 
 
 "As I told you yesterday after she went away, 
 she's just what you'd expect from such a girl, 
 certainly no better and possibly a little worse. 
 She's a mousey little thing, with a veneer of 
 modesty; but 'mercenary' isn't the word. It's 
 just a question of money, Bradley; and if you'll 
 leave it to me to deal with — " 
 
 "Leave it to you to deal with — to the tune of 
 twenty-five thousand dollars," he said, morosely, 
 pulling his coat into shape round his shoulders 
 as he looked into the long glass. 
 
 142 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Well, that's only half what it migiit have 
 been. I thought at one time that we might have 
 to make it fifty thousand — " 
 
 He was not sure, but he thought she finished 
 with the word "again." If so it was uttered too 
 softly for him to be obliged to take note of it, 
 so that he merely picked up a hairbrush and put 
 another touch to his hair. 
 
 She was now at work on the great string of 
 pearls which, to keep them alive, she wore even 
 in domestic privacy. Her object was to get the 
 famous Roehampton pearl, from the late Lady 
 Roehampton's collection, which had been the 
 seal of her reconciliation with Bradley fifteen 
 years earlier — to get this jewel right in the center 
 of her person, to make the string symmetric. 
 
 "My point in bringing it up now," she said, 
 speaking into her chin as her eyes inspected the 
 long oval of the necklet, "is to remind you that 
 you don't know anything. You haven't seen 
 Bob for nearly a week, and after Monday you 
 won't see him for two or three months at least. 
 Don't let him suspect that you've anjrthing on 
 your mind. As a matter of fact, you haven't, 
 except what I tell you — and I may not tell you 
 everything." 
 
 "And that may be what I complain of." 
 
 "You can't complain of it when I give you the 
 results — now can you? You don't complain of 
 Mr. Bickley, or ask him for all the reasons he has 
 for saying this or that. You leave him a free 
 hand, and are ruled by him — ^you've often said 
 
 143 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 it — even when your own preference would be ta 
 do something else, as it was in the case of this 
 man FoUett. Now I only claim to be the Mr, 
 Bickley of the family." 
 
 That he had rights as father CoUingham was 
 aware, though he was shy of putting them for- 
 ward. Having left them so much in abeyance, 
 it would have been as ridiculous to emphasize 
 them now as to dispute Bickley as efficiency 
 expert at the bank. Moreover, the uneasiness 
 which seizes on a man when his chickens come 
 home to roost inclined him still further to pas- 
 sivity. If Bob was "knocking about town," as 
 he seemed to be, he might know about his father 
 what Junia did not — or presumably did not — 
 that the woman who received the fifty thousand 
 dollars had had her successors, and that even 
 now the line was not extinct. While he knew of 
 amusing incidents of fathers and sons meeting 
 on this ground, any such contretemps in his own 
 case would have shocked him profoundly. Junia 
 might go beyond her powers in prescribing his 
 course, and yet, for a multitude of reasons too 
 subtle for him to phrase, it seemed wise to 
 follow what Junia prescribed. 
 
 So the family dined and spent the evening 
 together as tourists walk across the Solfatara 
 crater. The ground was hot beneath their 
 tread, and here and there a whifF of sulphuric 
 vapor poured through a fissure in the crust; 
 but only Max and Dauphin sensed the volcanic 
 fire. 
 
 144 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Later in the evening, Junia knelt at her prie- 
 dieu with the armorial books of devotion. 
 
 "And, O heavenly Father," she added, to her 
 usual prayer, "have mercy upon that poor 
 erring girl and help her to repent. Grant that 
 my son may extricate himself from the toils in 
 which he is entangled. Enable my daughter to 
 see that her duty lies in the station of life to 
 which thou hast been pleased to call her. Give 
 my husband the wisdom to seek advice and to 
 follow it. Lead me with thy counsel so that I 
 may do what is best for all my dear ones, through 
 Jesus Christ, Our Lord, Amen." 
 
 Having thus poured out her heart, she rose 
 feeling stronger and more comforted. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 IT should be said for Jennie Follett that, in the 
 matter of her course toward Bob Collingham, 
 she had few of those convictions of sin and 
 righteousness which restrain a proportion of 
 mankind. As with the other members of her 
 family, her conduct followed certain lines "be- 
 cause she couldn't help it." That is as far as 
 her analysis would have carried her, though 
 analysis didn't give her much concern. Having 
 so much to do to get food and clothes, the higher 
 laws were outside her sphere of interest. Her 
 chief law was Necessity, and it covered so much 
 ground that there was little place for any other law. 
 It may be well to state here that the FoUetts 
 belonged to that vast American contingent who 
 have practically no religion. They had had a 
 religion in Canada, where they had attended the 
 church of a local god who seemed to hold no 
 sway over the United States. They never found 
 that church in the suburbs of New York, or, if 
 they found it nominally, it didn't, in their 
 opinion, "seem the same." There were no local 
 suasions and compulsions to bring them to its 
 doors, and so, after a few spasmodic efforts to 
 re-establish the connection, they gave up the 
 attempt. 
 
 146 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Perhaps this failure was due to the fact that, 
 in the depths of her strong, proud heart, Lizzie 
 didn't believe in God. Josiah did — or, at least, 
 he had believed in him up to the time of being 
 thrown upon the scrap heap. But Lizzie's faith 
 in God had died with the dying of her faith in 
 man. She had never said so, because she kept her 
 deeper thoughts to herself; but along these lines 
 her influence on her children had been negative. 
 
 So Jennie had missed those counsels to do 
 right which sometimes form a part of domestic 
 education. With so little latitude for doing any- 
 thing, there was not — apart from the grosser 
 vices — much latitude in the FoUett family even 
 for doing wrong. They did what they "couldn't 
 help" doing, and there was an end of it. A 
 kind of inborn rectitude kept them from offenses 
 of which the public would have taken note, but 
 behind it there was little in the way of principle. 
 
 Jennie went to her farewell meeting with Bob 
 untroubled by qualms of conscience. Even if 
 scruples had worried her, they would have been 
 allayed by the knowledge, imparted by Bob's own 
 mother, that he had done her a great injury. 
 He made the same kind of love to every girl he 
 had known for an hour, and forgot her the next 
 day. "One of these days," the mother had said, 
 "some girl would catch him, and then he would 
 be sorry." A girl hadn't caught him in this case, 
 but he had caught a girl, and didn't know what to 
 do with her. Having compelled her to go through 
 a form of marriage — it was no more than a form 
 
 147 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 — he was sailing off to the ends of the world, 
 leaving her not so much as the protection of his 
 name. She owed him nothing; and only the 
 goodness of his angel mother was making up for 
 what he owed to her. 
 
 And, on his side, Bob was so carried away by 
 his romance as to have no conception of Jennie's 
 attitude toward him. Seeing himself as a knight , 
 riding to the relief of a damsel in distress, it did '* 
 not occur to him that the daimsel could have a 
 preference as to her deliverer. It was a matter 
 of course that, from the window of the tower in 
 ' which she was a prisoner, she would drop into his 
 arms. 
 
 In other words. Bob had his own view of the 
 advantages of being a CoUingham. They were 
 great advantages, since they gave him the op- 
 portunity of being generous. He was in love 
 with Jennie largely because she was an exquisite 
 object on which to spend himself. She was a 
 gem, not in the rough, and yet in need of polish- 
 ing, and though his own refinement was not so 
 very great, he could throw refinement in her way. 
 
 That is to say, love for Bob was very much 
 a matter of giving himself out. Girls who could 
 have brought him everjrthing — and they were 
 not scarce at Marillo Park— didn't interest him. 
 They left no place for the selflessness which was 
 the basis of his character. He couldn't precisely 
 be called kind, since kindness implies some de- 
 liberation of the will. As the impulse of a foun- 
 tain is to pour itself out, so Bob's impulse was 
 
 148 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to give, while Jennie was a crystal chalice wide 
 open to receive. 
 
 " I want you to have everything in the world, 
 Jennie darling," he declared, bending above her 
 as lovingly as a bench in the park would permit. 
 "I can't give it to you right ofF the bat, worse 
 luck, but sooner or later I'll be able to dope you 
 out every little wish. Good Lord! How I'll 
 enjoy it." 
 
 "What do you mean by sooner or later?" 
 Jennie asked, with eyes downcast. 
 
 "When I get the family broken to the bit. 
 I can't tell you in dates or time. They'll be hard 
 in the mouth at first; and mother pulls like the 
 devil." 
 
 At this false witness, Jennie was revolted. 
 No one knew better than herself the bigness of 
 that maternal heart which, as early as next week, 
 would give liberal proof of its sincerity, when 
 Bob's promises would still be in the air. 
 
 Bob had the afternoon at his disposal. The 
 park offered itself as a delicious trysting place, 
 because it was the month of May. In a nook 
 where lilac and syringa overshadowed them and 
 water glinted between lawns and glades, they 
 sat discreetly side by side, and she permitted him 
 to hold her hand. 
 
 He went on to sketch his plans for the imme- 
 diate future. His most trying lack was that of 
 ready cash. The parental system had always 
 been generous as to things, but penurious in 
 money. In the matter of things, he would be as 
 
 149 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 extravagant as he reasonably liked, so long as 
 the bills were sent to dad. Before he went to 
 work at the bank, his allowance in money 
 wouldn't have kept him in cigarettes. Even now, 
 he was only on the weekly pay roll for thirty- 
 eight dollars and sixty-six cents per, handed him 
 in a pay envelope. Food, lodging, clothes, 
 saddle horses, motor cars — all these were thrown 
 in extra; but in actual coin he didn't handle 
 more than his two thousand dollars a year, 
 like any other clerk. 
 
 Jennie could see, therefore, that, to begin with, 
 their position would be difficult, though only to 
 begin with. He could send her a little money 
 while he was away, but it wouldn't be very 
 much. 
 
 "I don't want you to send me any," she said, 
 hastily. 
 
 "You forget that I'm your husband, dear. 
 If I didn't, you could bring an action for divorce 
 on the ground of nonsupport." 
 
 This idea being new to Jennie, she had it 
 explained to her, rejecting it as a resource be- 
 cause it was unromantic. 
 
 "And so, to be on the safe side against that," 
 he laughed, "I've got this for you now." 
 
 Slipping an envelope from his pocket, he forced 
 it into the hand he was holding. 
 
 "It's only a hundred dollars — " he was be- 
 ginning to explain. 
 
 She snatched her hand away as if she had been 
 stung. 
 
 15° 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Oh, Bob, I can't!" 
 
 That situation amused him. It was one more 
 proof of the naive honesty of the httle girl. He 
 knew how hard up she was, how hard up all the 
 family must be, and yet money didn't tempt her. 
 
 "You're a funny little kid," he laughed, 
 drawing her as near to him as the park laws 
 would permit. "You'd think I didn't have a 
 right to take care of you." 
 
 But Jennie was feeling that if she took this 
 money she would be bound to him by principles 
 more acute than the promises she had made 
 before the parson. 
 
 "No, Bob, I can't. Please don't make me — 
 please!" 
 
 But in the end he forced it on her, and she 
 stowed it away in her little bag. By that time, 
 too, she had reviewed the family situation. With 
 a hundred dollars in her possession they could 
 less easily be sold out of house and home at the 
 end of the following week. That calamity, at 
 least, could be dodged, whatever other misfor- 
 tune might overtake herself. She might decide 
 that to be sold out of house and home would be 
 easier than to bind herself further to Bob by 
 using his money; but, still, she would have the 
 choice. As to the twenty-five thousand, there 
 was always the possibility that it might not come 
 in time. She had not yet seen Hubert; she 
 couldn't see him till Bob had sailed. When she 
 did, the other woman might be in her place and 
 her heart would have to break in spite of every- 
 11 151 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 thing. Better it should break with a hundred 
 dollars in her pocket than that she should be 
 helpless to stay the family disaster. 
 
 But when Bob sailed on the Monday she was 
 free to make the great test. Notwithstanding 
 his definite farewells on the Saturday, he had 
 tried to see her again on the Sunday, but the 
 necessity for secrecy made it possible for her to 
 put him off. For one thing, she couldn't go 
 through a second time such a good-by as that of 
 Saturday. Bob had been too much overcome. 
 As unexpectedly to himself as to her, he had 
 broken down. Braving all publicity, he had sud- 
 denly seized her hand, pressed it to his lips, and 
 as he bent over it she could feel his tears against 
 her fingers. He hadn't exactly cried; he had 
 only breathed hard, with two great sobs. 
 
 "My God! how I love you, Jennie!" she had 
 heard him muttering. "How I love you! Howl 
 love you I How can I do without you all the time 
 till I come back?" When he raised his head he 
 laughed sheepishly, though the tears were still 
 on his cheeks. " Forget it, little girl," he begged, 
 unsteadily, wiping his cheeks and blowing his 
 nose. "I just worship you, and that's all there 
 is about it. It breaks me all up to go away and 
 leave you; but the time will pass, and, if I can 
 help it, I shall never go away from you again." 
 
 Defying the park laws once more, he had 
 kissed her and kissed her. She had let him do 
 it because she was so unnerved. Besides, she 
 was sorry for him, and would ^have been sorrier 
 
 152 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 still if she hadn't known that by to-morrow he 
 would have forgotten her. That was always the 
 way with fellows who took things so hard. The 
 true love was too stem and strong to show 
 emotion. 
 
 Nevertheless, she had had an unhappy Sunday 
 thinking of those two sobs. It was not until 
 after ten o'clock on Monday morning that she 
 was able to turn again to the compulsion of the 
 man she loved. At ten, Bob sailed, and that 
 episode in Jennie's life was probably behind her. 
 By the time he came back, he would be in love 
 with a girl of his own class and eager to seize 
 the freedom she, Jennie, would be in a position 
 to deliver him. At last the way was clear. She 
 had only to go to her lover and tell him she was 
 there. 
 
 She went that afternoon. Her plan was 
 simple. She would say that if he had not yet 
 found a model for the girl in the Byzantine 
 chair, she was ready to do the work. The rest 
 would come as a matter of course. 
 
 Now that she was face to face with the task, 
 her heart was oddly apathetic. "I might be out 
 to buy postage stamps," she said to herself, 
 while crossing the ferry. 
 
 None the less, she wished she didn't have to 
 look at this water down which Bob had sailed 
 only four or five hours previously. Off toward 
 the south, in the haze of the warm May after- 
 noon, there was a giant steamer lying as if be- 
 calmed. It might be his. There was one still 
 
 153 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 farther out to sea. That, too, might be his. Far 
 down on the horizon, just passing out of sight, 
 there was a little black spot with a pennon of 
 black smoke. That could very easily be his. 
 She watched it. It might be carrying him away 
 to where he would forget her. Perhaps he had 
 forgotten her already. His mother had said — 
 and his mother must know him — ^that he made 
 love to girls one day and forgot them on the 
 nejct, and it was already two days since Saturday. 
 Very well ! Let him forget ! Only, it didn't seem 
 as if those kisses and those tears were quite in 
 keeping with a heart which treated love so easily. 
 
 She was glad when the ferryboat bumped 
 softly against its pier and she could get away 
 from the great stream of which the very smells 
 and sounds would now begin to make her think 
 of him. She wished there was another means of 
 returning home. She wished he had gone by 
 train. She wished. . . . 
 
 At the door of the studio building she was 
 seized with a great terror. She began to under- 
 stand what it was she had come to do. She had 
 come to give herself up. She was to say, in fact, 
 "Here I am — ^take me." And he would take 
 her — if he hadn't already taken some one else. 
 The betrayal of a husband who was hardly a 
 husband was no longer in her mind. She was 
 appalled at this yielding of herself. 
 
 Yet she did everything as she had been ac- 
 customed to do it and entered the studio by the 
 door she generally used. 
 
 1 54 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 At first she thought there was no one there. 
 Certainly the other woman was not there, and 
 that was so far a reUef. Slowly, cautiously, she 
 made her way between the brocades, old fur- 
 niture, and pedestals. Then she saw Hubert and 
 Hubert saw her. 
 
 She stood very much as a deer stands when 
 surprised in the bracken — head erect, eyes curi- 
 ous. Till he gave her a sign she made no move- 
 ment to go farther. And for a minute he gave 
 her no sign. He only remained seated and looked. 
 He looked, with a sketch and pencil in his hand. 
 He had been occupied in touching something up. 
 
 But she couldn't mistake it. It was the girl 
 in the Byzantine chair. Her heart, which seemed 
 to swell to thrice its size, thumped painfully. 
 
 Then, at last, a smile broke over his face, 
 lifting his mustache and mounting to his violet 
 eyes. He didn't speak; he didn't move. He 
 only looked, hushed, enraptured, as the hunter 
 at the startled deer. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 FEELING that an explanation of her presence 
 in the studio should come from herself, 
 Jennie faltered : 
 
 "I — I only looked in to say that if you hadn't 
 found a model foir — for the picture you wanted 
 to paint, I might — I might be able to pose." 
 
 Though she hadn't advanced and he hadn't 
 moved, the extraordinary light in his eyes made 
 her heart thump more wildly. 
 
 "You'd do it" — ^he held up the sketch — 
 "dressed like that?" 
 
 She remembered his own phrase, "If I'm to 
 be that kind of a model I must be that kind of 
 a model — and do what's expected." 
 
 The process of starving out being so far suc- 
 |cessful, Wray felt it well to push it a little more. 
 He rose with an air of distress. 
 
 "I wish you could have told me this last week, 
 Jennie. As it is — " 
 
 "You've got some one else?" 
 
 "Not definitely. I've tried out three — ^two of 
 them no good, though the third might — " 
 
 "Might do as well as me?" 
 
 "Perhaps better in some ways. I mean," he 
 added hastily, as she seemed about to go, "that 
 she's a real professional model, and for this kind 
 
 iS6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of job, of course, a professional would be — let us 
 say, more at her ease." 
 
 So many good things had, during the past few 
 days, swum into Jennie's vision, only to swim 
 out again, that she had grown almost used to 
 this fading of her hopes. Nevertheless, the bhss 
 of loving Hubert and getting twenty-five thou- 
 sand dollars for it had seemed tolerably sure. 
 To lose it now would be hard; but harder still, 
 for the moment, at least, was this tone of detach- 
 ment, of indifference. That another woman 
 should, in some ways, do better than herself 
 was worse than the last indignity. Her lip 
 trembled. She was about to turn away with that 
 collapse of the figure which marks the woman 
 who has lost all hope. 
 
 He hurried up to her, laying his hand on her 
 arm in a way that made a thrill run through her 
 frame. 
 
 "Wait a minute, Jennie! I'd like to talk it 
 over. If you want me to try you out — " 
 
 "What does that mean — ^try me out?" 
 
 "Oh, simply that you'd take the pose, so that 
 I could see how nearly you'd come up to what I 
 want." 
 
 "And then if I didn't—" 
 
 He smiled. "Oh, but you will — at least I 
 think so." 
 
 "When would you do it.?" 
 
 "Oh, right now. As soon as you like. I've 
 got the time." 
 
 She looked at him inquiringly, but there was 
 157 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 nothing in his eyes to answer the question she 
 was asking. 
 
 "Oh, very well," she said, dully, and once 
 more turned toward the little door. 
 
 She had taken a step or two when he said, 
 suddenly, 
 
 "Jennie, what made you come back?" 
 
 she paused, turned again, and pulled herself 
 together. It was necessary to take the old 
 bantering tone. After all, she could fence in her 
 way as well as anybody else. 
 
 "Oh, I don't know," she threw off carelessly. 
 "I thought I might as well." 
 
 "Might as well what?" 
 
 "Oh, go in for the whole thing. As you 
 say yourself, if you're to be that kind of a 
 model — " 
 
 "And was that all?" 
 
 "'All?' It was a good deal, I should say." 
 
 "It was a good deal, yes — but I asked if it 
 was all." 
 
 "Well, ask away, my boy. I don't have to 
 answer you or go to jail, now do I?" 
 
 Extraordinary the relief of falling back on 
 studio badinage! It took her off the Collingham 
 stilts, away from the high-wrought Collingham 
 emotions. She began to see what the trouble 
 was with Bob. His touch wasn't light enough. 
 He was too purposeful. He seemed to think you 
 must mean something all the time. Mrs. Col- 
 lingham, too, seemed to think so. It was not in 
 Bob's language so much as in his cast of mindj 
 
 IS8 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 but it was in his mother's cast of mind, and in 
 her language, too. 
 
 Jennie thought of this as she stood before the 
 pier-glass in the little dressing-room, first taking 
 off her jacket, and then unpinning her hat. She 
 would have to do her hair on the top of her head 
 like the girl in Hubert's sketch. "And that's all 
 the clothes I shall need to put on," she tried to 
 say flippantly. She tried to say it flippantly, 
 because that, too, would be along the hne that 
 people took who weren't CoUinghams. 
 
 People who weren't CoUinghams ! That meant 
 all the people in Indiana Avenue, all the people 
 in Pemberton Heights, the vast majority of the 
 people in the United States, not to speak of any 
 other country. Jennie had a good many ac- 
 quaintances, and the family, taken as a whole, 
 had more; but she couldn't think of anyone in 
 their class who took life as more than a skim- 
 ming on the surface. Outside the bounden 
 duties which they couldn't avoid they chiefly 
 liked being silly. 
 
 She thought of that, too, loosening her hair 
 and letting it fall in amber wavelets over her 
 shoulders and down her back. Mrs. CoUingham 
 had said that it was lovely hair, but she hadn't 
 really seen it. There was so much of it that, 
 when she piled it up like the girl in the sketch, 
 it almost overweighted her delicate little face. 
 
 No; whatever you could say about people 
 like the CoUinghams, you couldn't say they 
 were silly. They had motives, opinions, points 
 
 150 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of view. They had minds, and they used them. 
 They might not use them well, but to use them 
 at all was better than to let them grow atrophied, 
 Jennie, as has been said, had no words to ex- 
 press these thoughts, but, like Pansy, she could 
 do without a vocabulary. She felt; she vi- 
 brated. She, too, had a mind, though she was 
 afraid of putting it to work. Lingering over the 
 piling of her hair, she wondered if the use or 
 nonuse of the mind marked the real line between 
 people like the Collinghams and people like the 
 Folletts. Was that why the country was di- 
 vided into highbrows and lowbrows — those who 
 made the best of what they had, and those who 
 disqualified themselves for all the stronger pur- 
 poses? Since her peep at Marillo Park, she saw 
 that something admitted one to such a haven, 
 and something kept one out. There was money, 
 of course, and position; but back of both position 
 and money wasn't it the case that there was 
 mind ? 
 
 She threw off her blouse and lingered again 
 to examine her arms and bust. She lingered on 
 purpose, putting off the extraordinary thing she 
 had to do to the latest possible minute. 
 
 At Collingham Lodge, she had caught glimpses 
 of books, papers, and magazines. Even in the 
 bird cage they were lying on the table and chairs. 
 The Folletts hardly ever read a book. The only 
 work of the kind she could remember the family 
 ever to have bought was one called Ancient 
 Rome Restored, which her mother had sub- 
 
 i6o 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 scribed for in monthly parts when an agent 
 brought a sample to the house. It was at a 
 time when Lizzie was afraid that her children — 
 they were children still — ^would grow up with- 
 out cultivation. Ancient Rome Restored, being 
 abundantly illustrated, called out in the young 
 Folletts the almost extinct Scarborough tradi- 
 tion. Having no other important picture book 
 to look at, they pored over the glories of the 
 Forum, of Hadrian's Villa, of the Baths of 
 Caracalla, till an odd, incipient love of classic 
 beauty began to stir in them. But there their 
 cultivation ended. In the papers they studied 
 only the murders, burglaries, and comic cuts. 
 In the way of general entertainment, the movies 
 formed their sole relaxation, but unless the play 
 was silly they complained. Anything that asked 
 for thought they kicked against, and Pemberton 
 Heights kicked with them. Was that why there 
 was a Pemberton Heights and a Marillo Park? 
 Did the power of thought control the difference 
 between them? Was it that where there was 
 little or no power of thought, there was little or 
 nothing of anything else? 
 
 She unhooked her skirt and let it slip down to 
 a circular heap about her feet. She wondered 
 if the girl who would, in some ways, do better 
 than herself were as lithely built as she. Mrs. 
 Collingham had likened her to — oh, what was 
 it? It was a spire. It sounded like a chapel. 
 She had tossed it off as something that every- 
 body knew about. So she had tossed off other 
 
 i6i 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 names, taking it for granted that Jennie would 
 have them at her fingers' ends. 
 
 The more she pondered the more sure of it 
 she became — ^that she and her kind were poor 
 and helpless chiefly because they wouldn't take 
 the trouble to be otherwise. Not to stray from 
 the childish, the sentimental, and the obvious 
 gave them the relief she found in returning to the 
 lingo she had always used with Wray. 
 
 She had used it with Bob, too — only, with 
 Bob she had used it differently. Perhaps it was 
 he who had used it differently. Between her and 
 Wray, it had never been more than the medium 
 of chaff, except on those occasions when it had 
 become the vehicle of a half-acknowledged pas- 
 sion. Bob had tried to say something with it, 
 even when slangy or colloquial. He had treated 
 her as if she was worth talking to. He had 
 tried to make her feel that she could talk on 
 better themes than any they ever broached. 
 
 Poor Bob — sailing away to the south, thinking 
 that where he left her there he would find her! 
 Little he knew! If he could only see her now! 
 If he could only dream of what she would be 
 doing in ten minutes' time ! If he only ... 
 
 Something made her shudder. She felt cold. 
 Perhaps the wind had changed outside, as it 
 often did in May. She stooped, picked up her 
 skirt, and mechanically hooked it round her. 
 Still feeling chilled, she crossed her arms and 
 hugged herself. A minute or two later she had 
 put on her blouse and her jacket. She meant 
 
 162 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to take them off again as soon as she stopped 
 shivering. Already Hubert would be cursing her 
 delay. 
 
 She thought of the light in his eyes when she 
 told him that, after all, she had come to pose. 
 The memory of it made her heart jump again, 
 with a great, single throb. It was the cave man's 
 light. She never saw it in Bob's, and never would. 
 Bob's eyes were twinkling and kind. She didn't 
 suppose she would ever see such kind eyes in any- 
 one else. If kindness were what she wanted . . . 
 
 Beginning to feel warmer, she noticed how 
 grotesque her hair was with her spring sport 
 suit. She had stuck through it a great skewer, 
 with a handle of artificial jade, which she had 
 used with some other costume. But the high 
 crown of hair was so little in keeping with the 
 rest of her that she pulled out the skewer and 
 the other pins, again letting the glinting cataract 
 tumble down. 
 
 Why had Bob never asked her if she loved him? 
 Hubert had done it a hundred, perhaps a thou- 
 sand times. Bob had seemed to think that his 
 loving her covered all possible conditions. What 
 he had to give her was always the theme of his 
 enthusiasm, as if she were a beggar who could 
 give nothing in return. With Hubert, it was 
 what he was to get from her. She was the richly 
 dowered one who could offer or withhold. He 
 would take all — and give nothing. 
 
 Well, let him! It was what she wanted — ^to 
 be drained dry. If she was to give herself up, 
 
 163 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 she would give herself up. When Hubert had 
 done with her, he would chuck her on the scrap 
 heap like her father. That was the way she 
 loved him. That was the way to be loved. 
 Cave men didn't watch lest you should get damp 
 feet, or have their lives insured for you. Their 
 love was passion, a fire that burned you up and 
 left you a white bit of ash. 
 
 And yet to be burned up and left a white bit of 
 ash was something for which she was not yet 
 prepared. She didn't say this to herself. All of 
 a sudden she was terrified. Whatever instinct 
 governed her went into the nimbleness of her 
 fingers as she began flattening her hair so as to 
 put on her hat. She didn't know why she was 
 doing this. She didn't even know that she 
 wanted to get away. It was just a wild impulse 
 to be back as the everyday Jennie FoUett. The 
 girl in the Byzantine chair was out of the ques- 
 tion — for to-day. To-morrow, perhaps! — prob- 
 ably — quite surely! But for to-day she must still 
 belong for a few more hours to herself. Hubert 
 might come thumping any minute on the door, 
 and if he found her dressed for the street . . . 
 
 And just then he did come thumping on the 
 ; door. 
 
 "Jennie, for God's sake, what's the matter? 
 Are you dead ? " 
 
 She gasped. It would have been a relief if 
 she could have fainted. All she could do was to 
 thrust the last pin into her hat and go to the 
 door and open it. 
 
 164 
 
THE.EMPTYiSACK 
 
 Hubert stood aghast. 
 
 "Well, by all the holy cats—!" 
 
 " I'm not well, Mr. Wray," she pleaded, with 
 sudden inspiration. 
 
 "Ah, go on, Jennie! You were well enough 
 twenty minutes ago." 
 
 "Yes; but since then I've been feeling chilled." 
 
 He strode into the dressing-room, which he 
 was not supposed to do. 
 
 "Chilled — ^hell! Why, this hole's as hot. as 
 blazes." 
 
 "It isn't that. I think it's a germ-cold I'm 
 taking." 
 
 "See here, Jennie," he said, sternly. "You're 
 going to funk it. All right! It doesn't make 
 much difference to me. The other girl — it's 
 Emma Brasshead — ^you know! — she was the 
 middle one in Sims's three nudes — perfectly 
 stuiming hips — " 
 
 "I'll be here to-morrow — right on the dot." 
 
 He wheeled away as far as the space of the 
 dressing-room would permit. 
 
 "Oh, well, Jennie, I don't know that it would 
 be of much use, after all. Emma's the type, you 
 see. You'd be too — " 
 
 "You can't tell that till — ^till you've tried me 
 out." 
 
 "I can try you out right through your clothes. 
 What's a man a painter for?" 
 
 "If you can do that, why did you want me 
 
 He turned sharply. 
 
 i6s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Jennie, you're not straight with me." 
 
 "Oh, but I am! I'm as straight with you as — 
 as you are with me. But I can't help being 
 sick." 
 
 "You can't help being Jennie," he muttered, 
 brokenly, "the girl I worship and who worships 
 me. Jennie! Jennie! Jennie!" 
 
 "Oh, don't, Hubert; don't!" she begged. 
 "To-morrow! I'll come to-morrow, and then — " 
 
 But he smothered these protests. 
 
 "You wildcat! You adorable tigress!" 
 
 "Yes, Hubert — but to-morrow — " 
 
 "No, no!" 
 
 His kisses, his brutalities, were agony to her, 
 and yet they were bliss. She didn't know why 
 she fought them off, or what instinct led her to 
 defend herself, or how she found herself out on 
 the stairs. 
 
 She went down slowly. She was not angry; 
 she was only excited and a little amused. Sex 
 fury was less romantic than she had supposed; 
 but as an exhibition of the human being at his 
 most animal, it was "some curtain raiser." If 
 she had to go through it again . . . 
 
 But as she jogged toward the ferry in the 
 street car, this mood passed off. She grew sick 
 with a sense of failure. Love and twenty-five 
 thousand dollars were at stake, and she had 
 funked the game. She was not a sport; she 
 wondered if she were a woman. If she couldn't 
 play up better than this, she would have Bob 
 back on her hands again and be shamed forever 
 
 i66 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 before Mrs. CoUingham, who had been so good 
 to her. Moreover, if she continued to play fast 
 and loose with Wray he would certainly return 
 to Miss Brasshead. 
 
 She dreaded reaching the ferry and having to 
 go on the boat. The river was now haunted by 
 Bob, like the sea by a phantom ship. While 
 crossing, she sat with her eyes closed so as to 
 shut out this memory by not looking at the 
 water. 
 
 Arrived on the New Jersey side, she was so 
 much earlier than she usually returned, and so 
 dispirited, that she decided to walk home, 
 threading the way through sordid streets till she 
 climbed the more cleanly ascent to the Heights. 
 The Heights has a common as well as a square, 
 and Jennie's way took her through the great 
 shady grassplot, where men were lounging on 
 benches, nurses wheeling their babies, and boys 
 playing baseball. Round the common are the 
 civic monuments of Pemberton Heights, the 
 bank, the post-office, the hospital, the engine 
 house, and the public library. Jennie looked at 
 this last as if she had never seen it before. 
 
 As a matter of fact, she never had seen it 
 before. She had looked at it more times than 
 she could count, but with the eyes only. She 
 knew what it was. She had actually watched the 
 coquettish red-brick building, with its glass dome 
 and white Grecian portico rising at the command 
 of the great philanthropist whose name the 
 building bore; but she had never been conscious 
 12 167 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of its purpose as related to herself. Now, for 
 the first time, it occurred to her that here was a 
 place where a reader could find books. 
 
 With no very clear idea in mind, she stepped 
 within. The interior was hushed, rather awe- 
 some, yet sunny and sweetly solemn like the 
 temple of some cheerful god. Finding herself 
 confronted by a kindly, bookish little lady 
 seated at a table behind a wooden barrier, it 
 was obviously Jennie's duty to address her. 
 
 " I wonder if — if I could borrow a book." 
 
 She was informed that she could borrow three 
 books at a time, as soon as certain inquiries as 
 to her identity and residence were carried out, 
 and this would take a few days. But in a few 
 days, Jennie knew that her desire to read might 
 be dead, and said so. The object of the library 
 being to encourage young people to read rather 
 than to be too particular about their addresses, 
 the kindly little lady, after some consultation 
 with a kindly little gentleman, filled out Jennie's 
 card. 
 
 "What sort of book were you thinking of? A 
 novel?" 
 
 Jennie said, "Yes," if it was a good one. 
 
 "This is one of the best," the little lady went 
 on, pushing forward a volume that happened to 
 be lying at her hand, "if you'd care to take it." 
 
 It was The Egoist, by George Meredith, and 
 Jennie accepted it as something foreordained. 
 
 "You could have two more books if you wanted 
 them — now that you're here." 
 
 i68 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie made a plunge. 
 
 "Have you anything about — about spires?" 
 
 The lady smiled gently. 
 
 "About church spires?" 
 
 The girl thought it was — chapel spires — 
 especially French ones. 
 
 The kindly little gentleman, being accustomed 
 to this kind of search, was called into counsel. 
 
 In the end she selected a work on the old 
 churches of Paris, which she thought might give 
 her the information she desired. 
 
 "And now a third book?" 
 
 Here she was on safer ground. The English 
 name had caught her ear with more precision 
 than the foreign ones. 
 
 "Have you got anything about a Lady 
 Hamilton ? " 
 
 "You mean Romney's Lady Hamilton?" 
 
 Again there was an echo from Jennie's memory. 
 Romney was the man who couldn't paint her 
 because he was too Georgian. She began to see 
 how Mrs. CoUingham could play with narnes as 
 she might with tennis balls. Since there was 
 everything else at Marillo Park, there must also 
 be a public library. 
 
 Arrived at home, she secreted her volumes 
 under her bed. She could read at night, and by 
 scraps in the daytime. If Ted or Gussie were to 
 learn that she was trying to inform her mind, 
 they would guy her with as little mercy as if 
 they I caught her in that still more offensive 
 crime, the improvement of her speech. 
 
 169 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 THAT Bob Collingham was at ease in his con- 
 science as to sailing to South America and 
 leaving behind him an unacknowledged wife 
 will hardly be supposed; but the true situation 
 did not present itself to him till after he and 
 Jennie had said their good-bys. He had tried 
 to see her again on the following day to take 
 counsel as to the immediate publication of their 
 marriage, and only her refusal to meet him had 
 frustrated that intention. But the more he 
 pondered the more the thing he had done seemed 
 little to his credit. On the morning of the day 
 on which he sailed, he rose with the resolve to 
 tell the whole truth to his father. 
 
 Had he known the facts, that Jennie had 
 actually been to Collingham Lodge, that his 
 mother knew of the marriage, that his father, 
 without knowing of the marriage, was aware of 
 his infatuation, he would have made a clean 
 breast of it. But the habit of domestic life being 
 strong, it seemed impossible to spring the con- 
 fession in the middle of a peaceful breakfast. 
 His mother had come down to the table for this 
 parting meal and was already half in tears; 
 his father concealed a genuine emotion behind 
 the morning paper; Edith said she wondered 
 
 170 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 what would happen to them all before they met 
 again. The possibilities evoked were so sig- 
 nificant that the mother said, sharply : 
 
 "I hope it may be God's will that we shall 
 meet exactly as we are — a united family." 
 
 "We could still be a united family," Edith 
 ventured, "and not meet exactly as we are." 
 
 "Edith — please!" her mother had begged, and 
 Bob felt it out of the question to add to her distress. 
 
 Edith having driven to the dock with his 
 father and himself, there was only the slightest 
 opportunity for a private word between the 
 father and the son. That came at a minute 
 when Edith was talking to Mr. and Mrs. Huntley 
 on the deck of the Demerara. 
 
 "Dad," Bob asked, awkwardly and abruptly, 
 "do you feel quite at ease in your mind as to 
 old man FoUett ? " 
 
 Passengers and their friends were pushing 
 and jostling. CoUingham was obhged to brace 
 himself against the rod running along the line of 
 cabins before he could reply. 
 
 "Why do you ask?" 
 
 "Because I don't." 
 
 "You don't with regard to my stand — or with 
 [regard to your own?" 
 
 The boy looked his father in the eyes. 
 
 "With regard to yours, dad." 
 
 "That's very kind of you, Bob; but may I 
 suggest that you'll have all you can do in repent- 
 ing of your own sins without trying, in addition, 
 
 to repent of mine?" 
 
 171 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Nevertheless, when the minute came the part- 
 ing was affectionate. Neither father nor son 
 was satisfied with a handshake. Throwing 
 their arms about each other, they kissed as in 
 the days when Bob was a Httle boy. 
 
 Perhaps it was the warmth of this farewell 
 that induced the father, on arriving at the bank, 
 to ask Miss Ruddick to invite Mr. Bickley to the 
 private office in case he should look round that 
 afternoon. Mr. Bickley did look round that 
 afternoon and was accordingly ushered in. 
 
 He was a delicately built man whose appear- 
 ance produced that effect of accuracy you get 
 from a steel trap. Constructed to do a certain 
 kind of work, it can do that work and no other. 
 Two minutes after Bickley had looked at a man, 
 he knew both his weak points and his aptitudes, 
 and could tell to a nicety the job it was best to 
 put him to. Forehead, nose, jaw, lips, eyes, and 
 ears were to him as the letters of the alphabet. 
 More than once he had transferred a teller to 
 the accounting department, or made an ac- 
 countant a detective by his reading of facial 
 lines. 
 
 Having put his man in an armchair and given 
 him one of the Havanas he kept for social inter- 
 course, CoUingham waited for the mellow mo- 
 ment when the cigar was smoked to half its 
 length. 
 
 "Do you know, Bickley," he said then, "I've 
 never been quite at ease in my mind about the 
 way we shelved that old fellow, FoUett. It 
 
 172 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 seems to me we showed — ^well, let us call it a 
 want of consideration." 
 
 Bickley's eyes measured what was left of his 
 cigar as he held it out before him horizontally. 
 
 "Consideration for whom, Mr. CoUingham?" 
 
 "For the old man himself." 
 
 "Oh, I didn't know but what you were going 
 to say for your stockholders." Before the banker 
 could parry this thrust, the expert went on:' 
 "I looked in yesterday at the court room where 
 they were trotting out that fellow Nicholson of 
 the Wyndham National. If they'd ever asked 
 me, I could have told them long ago that they'd 
 lose money by him in the end." 
 
 "Oh, but FoUett isn't in that box." 
 
 "He is, if you drop money by him. I'm speak- 
 ing not of the ways you drop money by a man, 
 but only of the fact that you drop it. Your 
 business, I suppose, Mr. CoUingham, is to make 
 money for your shareholders and yourself. It's 
 to help out that, I take it, that you send for me 
 and go by my advice." 
 
 "Then you'd class FoUett and Nicholson 
 together ? " 
 
 "I don't class them at aU. Whether a man 
 steals the bank's money or you give it to him as 
 a gift isn't to the point. My job is over when I 
 tell you that he gets what he doesn't earn. The 
 rest, Mr. CoUingham, is up to you — or the dis- 
 trict attorney, as the case may be." 
 
 "I'm afraid I don't see it that way." 
 
 "It's your affair, Mr. CoUingham, not mine. 
 173 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 I only venture to remind you that we've had this 
 little tussle over almost every man we've ever 
 bounced. It does great credit to your kindness 
 of heart, and if you want to go on supporting 
 Follett and his family for the rest of your life — " 
 
 CoUingham winced at this hint that his kind- 
 ness of heart was greater than his business capac- 
 ity. It was a point at which he always felt 
 himself vulnerable. 
 
 "Speaking of FoUett's family," he said, ghding 
 away from the main topic, "we've got that boy 
 of his here. How is he getting on ? " 
 
 "Ah, there you have a horse of another color. 
 My first report on him was not so favorable; 
 but now that we've knocked the high jinks out 
 of him—" 
 
 "Oh, we've done that, have we?" 
 
 "He's on the way to become a valuable boy. 
 Good worker, cheery, likable. If he can get over 
 his one defect, he'll be worth hanging on to." 
 
 "And his one defect is — " 
 
 "Liable to get excited and lose his head. 
 Type to see red in a fight, and do something 
 dangerous." 
 
 Unaware of the effort which his former em- 
 ployer's good will was vainly putting forth on 
 his behalf, Josiah arrived in front of his pair of 
 grassplots in Indiana Avenue. It was a trim 
 little place, meeting all the wishes for a roof 
 above his head which his soul had ever formed. 
 He stood and looked at it, thinking of the days 
 
 174 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 when little Gladys used to play "house" be- 
 neath one of the umbrella-shaped hydrangea 
 bushes. 
 
 That was not so long ago — only six or eight 
 years. It was nine since he had bought Number 
 Eleven, paying out three thousand dollars that 
 had come to him from a matured twenty years' 
 endowment policy, together with another thou- 
 sand Lizzie had inherited from an aunt. They 
 had thought it a good investment because, if 
 the worst ever came to the worst — and they 
 didn't know what they meant by that — they 
 would always have a home. Now the home was 
 in danger because he couldn't raise a hundred 
 and forty-seven dollars and sixty-three cents. 
 He had been everywhere trying to borrow more, 
 and he had failed. He had got to the point 
 where his acquaintances in the different offices 
 were putting him doAvn as an "old bum." To 
 Josiah, knowing all the shades of meaning in 
 the term, it was a dreadful name as applied to 
 himself; and he had heard it that very after- 
 noon. An old friend, who had promised to lend 
 him five of the hundred and fifteen already 
 raised, had said on seeing him approach: 
 
 "Here comes that old bum again." 
 
 Josiah had turned about there and then. 
 Giving up trying any more to raise the hundred 
 and forty-seven, he had wandered home. He, 
 Josiah FoUett, an old bum! 
 
 Having hidden her three volumes under the 
 bed, Jennie looked out and saw him. He didn't 
 
 175 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 look specially dejected, yet she knew he was. 
 She knew it by the way he stared at the hy- 
 drangea bush, or by the fact that he had re- 
 nounced his search for another job so early in 
 the afternoon. Like herself, he seemed thrown 
 on his own resources for company, finding little 
 or nothing there. She ran down to meet him. 
 She would do that rare thing in the FoUett 
 family, take him for a walk. 
 
 He turned with her obediently. It was a relief 
 to him not to be obliged to go in at once and tell 
 Lizzie he had no good news. Lizzie was still his 
 great referee, as he was hers. The children were 
 still the children, not to be taken into confidence 
 till there was nothing else to be done. 
 
 But this afternoon life, for the first time, 
 looked different. It was as if, unaided, he 
 couldn't carry the burden any more. There 
 were younger shoulders than his, and perhaps 
 it was time now to call on them to share the 
 task. 
 
 "I'm an old man, Jennie," he said, as they 
 began to move slowly toward Palisade Walk. 
 "I haven't felt old till lately; but now — now 
 I'm all in. I don't suppose I'll ever get a chance 
 to do a day's work again." 
 
 When she rallied him on this, he told her the 
 story of his day, omitting the "old bum " incident. 
 He must spare his children that, even if he 
 couldn't have been spared himself. 
 
 This tale, delivered without emphasis, was 
 more terrible to Jennie than all the pangs of 
 
 176 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 conscience. Had she but been true to the 
 promises made to Mrs. CoUingham, she could 
 have said, "Father dear, you'll never have to 
 worry any more." Two hours earlier, twenty- 
 five thousand dollars had been within her grasp, 
 and she had let it go. "All that money," she 
 sighed to herself, "and love!" 
 
 But since it would be within her grasp to- 
 morrow, a new thought came to her. The hun- 
 dred dollars she would ultimately return to Bob 
 need not be in exactly the same bills. There was 
 no reason why she should not use this amount 
 and restore it from the wealth to come. Bob 
 couldn't possibly tell the difference between the 
 paper that made up one sum of a hundred dollars 
 and the paper that made up another. She 
 would have preferred to hand it back without 
 touching it, but, in view of the family need, 
 fastidiousness was out of place. 
 
 As they emerged into Palisade Walk and the 
 vast panorama lay below them, she slipped her 
 arm through his. 
 
 "Daddy," she said, caressingly, "what should 
 you say if you saw me with a hundred dollars?" 
 
 To Josiah, it was the kind of question children 
 ask when their imaginations go off on flights. 
 It would have been the same thing had she said 
 a thousand or a million. Nevertheless, he re- 
 plied, more gravely than she had expected: 
 
 "What should I say, my dear? I should say 
 you couldn't have come by it honestly." 
 
 "Oh, but if I could?" 
 177 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "It's no use talking about that, my dear, 
 because I know you couldn't. If you had a 
 hundred dollars, some man would have given it 
 to you, and no man would give it to you 
 unless — " 
 
 He didn't finish the sentence, because she 
 hurried on ahead. He reached her only when 
 she stood still, looking down on the river, to 
 spring the question prepared on second thoughts. 
 
 " But, daddy, if I had a hundred dollars, you'd 
 use it for the taxes — wouldn't you? — even if I 
 hadn't got it honestly." 
 
 A spasm crossed his face. He laid his hand 
 on her shoulder roughly. She could think of 
 nothing but the stem father of a wayward girl 
 as she had seen him pictured in the movies. 
 She hadn't supposed that such dramatic parents 
 existed off the screen. 
 
 "Jennie, you haven't got a hundred dollars! 
 Tell me you haven't! Don't let me think that 
 the worst thing of all has overtaken us." 
 
 Amazed as she was, her feminine quick- 
 wittedness came to her aid. 
 
 "Oh, you funny daddy!" she laughed, drawing 
 his hand from her shoulder and again slipping 
 it through her arm. "You're not a bit good at 
 making pretend." 
 
 "Excuse me, my dear," he said, humbly, as 
 they strolled on once more. "I'm a little nerv- 
 ous. I don't suppose I'll ever get a chance to 
 do a day's work again." 
 
 Jennie, too, was a Httle nervous, though she 
 178 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 did her best to hide the fact. She had not ex-i 
 pected him to take this tragically moral point; 
 of view. It made so many new complications 
 as to her twenty-five thousand that she didn't 
 know where she stood. Her mother might agree 
 with him. Teddy and the girls might agree 
 with her. To act in opposition to them all was 
 outside her sphere of contemplation. 
 
 Indiana Avenue was indeed not so primitive 
 but that the subject of ladies who chose their 
 own way was frequently under discussion, and 
 Jennie had never heard much condemnation of 
 this liberty except where the associations were 
 considered "low." Where, on the contrary, the 
 situation was on a large financial scale and 
 carried with a lordly hand, opinion, while not 
 approving, was in a measure deferential. It was 
 no secret that Mrs. Inglis had a sister, mysteri- 
 ously known as "Mrs. Deramore," whose career 
 had been of the most romantic; and whenever 
 her limousine drove up to the Inglis door, as it did 
 perhaps twice a year, all the women crowded 
 to the windows to see the fair occupant get in and 
 out. On one occasion Jennie had heard her 
 mother say to their next-door neighbor, Mrs. 
 Weatherby, "After all, with the kind of world 
 we've got to-day, why shouldn't she?" 
 
 Jennie had not thought of herself as a 
 second Mrs, Deramore. She had hardly 
 thought of herself at all. The combination of 
 Hubert, love, and the family deliverance from 
 penury had precluded speculation as to what 
 
 179 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 she might become. She made no attempt to call 
 up this vision even now. The irony of a situation 
 in which she had a small fortune tucked away 
 in the glove-and-handkerchief box in her top 
 bureau drawer, and yet was helpless to make 
 use of it, was enough for her to deal with. 
 
 Palisade Walk is protected by a row of small, 
 irregular, upright boulders like the dragon's 
 teeth. At a spot where a low flat stone forms a 
 seat between two granite cones Jennie sat down 
 sidewise to the river, to think her situation out. 
 'Josiah, too, came to a standstill, leaning on the 
 stick which Hfelong British habit put into his 
 hands whenever he went out-of-doors, and 
 gazing at a scene whose very mightiness smote 
 him through and through with a sense of his 
 I futility. 
 
 It was a view of New York which few New 
 lYorkers know to exist, and which those who 
 know it to exist mainly ignore. Rio from the 
 Pao d'Assucar, Montreal from Mount Royal, 
 Quebec from the St. Lawrence, San Francisco 
 from the Golden Gate, are all of the earth, earthy. 
 Manhattan as viewed from the Hudson's western 
 :bank is like the city which rose when Apollo 
 sang, or that beheld in the Apocalypse of John. 
 
 From the dragon's teeth, the precipice broke 
 in terraces and shelves hung with ash, sumach, 
 and stunted oak. Wherever there was a hand's 
 breadth of soil, a dandelion or a violet, a butter- 
 cup or a lady-fern, nestled in the keeping of the 
 cliff as a bird's nest on a branch. Creepers and 
 
 i8o 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 vines threw their tangles of tassels down to 
 where the chimneys clustering along the river's 
 brink blackened them with smoke. Small 
 water-worn docks, sheltering nameless craft, 
 battered, ancient, and grotesque, crept in and 
 out among factories and coal yards, linking up 
 with one another in a line of some twenty miles. 
 Straight as the cut of a knife, the river clove its 
 tremendous gash from Adirondacks to Atlantic — 
 a leaden, shimmering, storied streak, too deep 
 within its bed to catch the westering sunlight. 
 The westering sunlight itself was silvered in the 
 perpetual misty haze hanging over the island 
 like an aureole, through which the city glimmered 
 in mile after mile of gable and spire, of dome 
 and cube, silent, suspended, heavenly. 
 
 There is nothing in the world like this cloud- 
 built vision garlanded along the sky. No sound 
 breaks from it, no sign of our earth-born life. 
 The steel-blue-gray of a gull's wing swooping 
 above the water is gross as compared with its 
 texture. The violet and the lady-fern are not so 
 delicate as the substance of its palaces. It 
 might be dream; it might be mirage; it might 
 be the city which came down from God as a 
 bride adorned for her husband. Beginning too 
 far away for the eye to reach, and ending where 
 the gaze can no longer follow, it is immense 
 and yet aerial, a towered, battlemented, mighty 
 thing, yet spun of the ether between the worlds. 
 
 Though Jennie and her father had looked at 
 this mystic wraith of a city so often that they 
 
 i8i 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 hardly noticed it any more, they were never 
 free from its ecstatic influence. That is, it moved 
 them to aspirations without suggesting the 
 objective to which they should aspire. Caught 
 in the web of daily circumstance, entangled, 
 enmeshed, helplessly captive amid hand-to- 
 mouth necessities, their thoughts were rarely 
 at liberty to wander from the definite calculation 
 as to how to live. They didn't so wander even 
 now. Even now, lifted up as they were among 
 spiritual splendors, food, clothes, gas, taxes, and 
 the mortgage were the things most heavily on 
 their minds; but something else stirred in them 
 with a sluggish will to live. 
 
 "Jennie, do you believe in God?" 
 For a minute Jennie gazed sidewise at the 
 celestial city in the air and made no answer. 
 Josiah himself hardly knew why he had asked 
 the question unless it was because of vague new 
 fears as to Jennie's associations. Of these he 
 knew almost as little as the parent bird of its 
 oflFspring's doings when the young have taken, 
 flight. This was the custom of the family, the 
 custom of the country. But he had never been 
 free from misgivings that Jennie's calling of 
 artist's model was "not respectable," and novs' 
 this mention of a hundred dollars, even though 
 it were but in jest, roused some little-used sense 
 of paternal responsibility. 
 
 " I don't know that I do," Jennie said, at last. 
 She added, after another minute's thought^ 
 "What's the good of God, anyhow?" 
 
 182 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "People say he can take you to heaven when 
 you die, or send you to the other place." 
 
 "I'm not worrying about what will happen 
 when I die; I've got all I can attend to here. 
 Can God help me about that?" 
 
 It was the test question of Josiah's inner life. 
 His faith stood or fell by It. He would have 
 been glad to tell his child that she could be aided 
 in her earthly problems, but, unlike Job, hadn't 
 he himself served God for naught.? 
 
 "He don't seem able to do that, my dear," 
 he sighed, as if the confession of unbelief forced 
 its way out in spite of himself. 
 
 "Well, then" — Jennie rose, wearily — "what's 
 the use ? If God can put me off till I die, I sup- 
 pose I can put him off in the same way, can't I>* 
 Do you believe in him, yourself, daddy?" 
 
 "I used to." 
 
 And that was all he could say. 
 
 As the sun sank farther into the west, the 
 celestial city which had hitherto been of a 
 luminous white was shot with rose and saffron. 
 Within its heart lay Broadway, Fifth Avenue, 
 Wall Street, and the Bowery, shops, churches, 
 brothels, and banks, all passions, hungers, yearn- 
 ings, and ambitions, all national tendencies 
 worthy and detestable, all human instincts holy 
 and unclean, all loveliness, all lust, all charity, 
 all cupidity, all secret and suppressed desire, 
 all shameless exposure on the housetops, all sor- 
 row, all sin, all that the soul of man conceives of 
 evil and good — and yet, with no more than these 
 13 183 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 few miles of perspective and this easy play of 
 light translated into beauty, uphfting, un-! 
 earthly, and ineffable. 
 
 For a minute longer Jennie and her father; 
 looking on the vision as it melted from glory to 
 glory in this pageantry of sky. Then, with arms 
 linked as before, they turned their backs on it. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 FOR the next twenty-four hours Jennie did 
 her best to suspend the operation of thought. 
 Thought got her nowhere. It led her into so 
 many bUnd alleys that it made her head ache. 
 She had once heard a returned traveler describe 
 his efforts to get out of the labyrinth at Hampton 
 Court, and felt herself now in the same situation. 
 Each way seemed easy till she followed it and 
 found herself balked by a ^edge. 
 
 But the fact that her head ached gave her an 
 excuse for going to her room and locking herself 
 in. She could thus pull her books from beneath 
 the bed without fear of detection. The points 
 as to which she needed enlightenment being 
 spires and Lady Hamilton, she went at her task 
 with the avidity of a starving person at sight of 
 food. 
 
 As to spires, she was quickly appeased, for her 
 volume on the old churches of Paris had the 
 Sainte-Chapelle as its frontispiece. Now that 
 she had seen the name in print, she was sure of 
 it. Because of being so little taxed, her memory 
 was the more retentive. Every sound that had 
 fallen from Mrs. CoUingham's lips was stamped 
 on her mind Hke a footprint hardened into rock 
 on a bit of untracked soil. Within half an hour, 
 
 i8S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 she had learned the outlines of the history of 
 the Sainte-Chapelle, and, with some fluttering 
 of timid vanity, had grasped the comparison of 
 its strong and exquisite grace with her own 
 personality. 
 
 But, after all, the Sainte-Chapelle was a thing 
 of stone, whereas Lady Hamilton — she loved, 
 the name — must have been of flesh and blood. 
 Here, too, there was a frontispiece, the very 
 Dian of the Frick Gallery to which Mrs. Col- 
 lingham had referred. Unfortunately, the illus- 
 trations were in black and white, so that she 
 could get no adequate idea as to the complexion 
 or the color of the hair. The face, however, with 
 its bewitching softness, its heavenly archnesses, 
 bore some resemblance to her own. 
 
 It was a shock to learn that the possessor of 
 so much beauty, the bearer of so melodious a 
 title, had begun life as Emma Lyon, a servant 
 girl, but, after all, she reflected, the circumstance 
 only created analogies with herself. There were 
 more analogies still. Emma Lyon had been an 
 artist's r^odel. In an artist's studio she had 
 made the* acquaintance of men of lofty station, 
 just as she herself had met Bob. She had loved 
 and been loved. Romney was perhaps her 
 Hubert Wray. Her career had been excit- 
 ing and dramatic — ^the friend of a queen, the 
 more-than-wife of one of the great men of the 
 age. The tragic, miserable death didn't frighten 
 Jennie, since misery and tragedy always stalked 
 on the edge of her experience. She fell asleep 
 
 i86 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 amid vast, vague concepts of queens and heroes 
 beset with loves and problems not unlike Jennie^ 
 FoUett's, 
 
 All through the next day she stilled the working 
 of thought by application to The Egoist. Shcj 
 took to it as to a drug. In the intervals of herj 
 household duties, or whenever her mind became; 
 active over her affairs, she ran to her room to] 
 begin again, "Comedy is a game played to throw] 
 reflections upon social life, and it deals with hu-j 
 man nature in the drawing-room of civilized 
 men .and women, where we have no dust of the 
 struggling outer world, no mire, no violent; 
 clashes, to make the correctness of the represen-j 
 tation convincing." She got little farther, since,' 
 for her purpose, this was far enough. She was 
 drugged already, as by dentist's gas. The more 
 she read the more she felt herself wandering sleepily 
 through realms of dream, where words, as she 
 understood them, had ceased to have significance.* 
 
 So, by sheer force of will, she brought herself 
 to that moment in the afternoon when she stood 
 at the studio door. She hadn't thought; she 
 hadn't, in her own phrase, imagined. She had 
 allowed herself no instant in which to count the 
 cost or to shrink from paying it. Hubert, love, 
 and the family deliverance from poverty would 
 be hers before nightfall, and she meant not to 
 look beyond. She opened the door softly. 
 
 Before showing herself, she stopped and 
 listened. There was not a sound. It was often 
 so if Hubert was painting, and the silence only 
 
 187 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 assured her that if he was there, as he probably 
 was, he was waiting for her alone. He was 
 waiting for her alone with that look in his eyes, 
 that maddened animal look which she had seen 
 yesterday, so bestial and yet so compelling! 
 Still more softly she moved forward among the 
 studio odds and ends. 
 
 Then she saw — and stopped. 
 
 In the Byzantine chair, a nude woman, seated 
 in the manner of the Egyptian cat-goddess, was 
 holding up a skull. Though the woman looked 
 the other way, Jennie could see her as a lovely 
 creature, straight, strong, triumphant, and un- 
 ashamed. Hubert was painting, busily, eagerly. 
 He raised his eyes, saw Jennie as she cowered, 
 took no notice of her at all, and went on with 
 his work. It passed all that she had ever imag- 
 ined of cruelty that, as she turned to make her 
 way out again, he should glance up once more — ■ 
 and let her go. 
 
 Hubert — and the woman dressed like that! 
 The woman dressed like that — in this intimacy 
 with Hubert! She herself shut out — cast out — 
 sent to the devil! Some one else in her place, 
 when she might so easily have kept it ! 
 
 Jennie's suffering was in the dry and stony 
 stage at which it hardly seemed suffering at all. 
 Yes, it did; she knew it was suffering — only, she 
 couldn't feel. She could think lucidly and yet 
 put the whole situation away from her for the 
 reason that it would keep. Anguish would keep; 
 tears would keep. She could postpone every- 
 
 i88 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 thing, since she had all the rest of her life to give 
 to its contemplation. Just for the present, the 
 memory of the woman in the chair zvith Hubert 
 looking at her was so scorching to the mind that 
 she could do nothing but snatch her faculties 
 away from it. 
 
 Coming to Fifth Avenue and seeing an electric 
 bus stop near the curb, she climbed into it. 
 It was the old story of not knowing where to go 
 or what to do once her simple round of habits 
 had been upset. Snuggled close to a window, 
 she could at least be jolted along without effort 
 of her own while she still fought off the con- 
 sciousness of the frightful thing that had hap- 
 pened. It was not merely Hubert and the 
 woman; it was everything. So much was 
 included that she couldn't bear to think of this 
 ruin to her beautiful house of cards. 
 
 Such wealth and beauty in the shop windows ! 
 Such streams of people in their new spring 
 clothes! She had heard it said that every heart 
 had its bitterness, but she didn't think that 
 that could be possible. If everyone had a heart- 
 ache like hers, or even the memory of such a 
 heartache, it would make too monstrous a world, 
 too deplorable a human race. After all, there 
 must be some sense in the presence of mankind 
 on earth, and if all were kicked about and bruised, 
 there would be none. She preferred to think that 
 the people on the pavements and in the limousines 
 were as happy as they looked, and that she alone 
 
 was selected for bewilderment and pain. 
 
 189 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 She wondered where she was going. There 
 was a ferry far up on the Riverside Drive which 
 would take her across to New Jersey, and thence, 
 by a combination of trolley-cars, she could work 
 her way southward to Pemberton Heights. 
 This would consume an hour and more, and so 
 eat up part of the afternoon. What she would 
 do when she arrived home with her dreams all 
 shattered God alone knew. If she could only 
 have seen her friend, Mrs. CoUingham, clinging 
 to that kind hand as she poured out her heart. . . . 
 
 Just then a huge building came into sight on 
 the left, and with it a new impulse. She had 
 often meant to visit it, though the day never 
 seemed to come. Gussie had once gone to the 
 Metropolitan Museum in company with Sadie 
 Inglis, since when she had been in the habit of 
 saying that she had as good as taken a trip 
 abroad. Jennie didn't want a trip abroad; she 
 wanted soothing, comforting, affection. She 
 wanted another drop of that experienced, wo- 
 manly sympathy, instinct with kindliness and 
 knowledge of the world which she had tasted 
 for the first and only time on that blissful after- 
 noon at CoUingham Lodge. 
 
 It was to get nearer to CoUingham Lodge that 
 she left the bus to drag herself up the long flight 
 of steps and into the vast, cool hall. There were 
 others going in, chiefly the Slavs and Italians for 
 whom she felt a legitimate Anglo-Saxon con- 
 tempt, so that she had nothing to do but to 
 follow them. Thus she found herself at the top 
 
 190 
 
■• JENNIE, YOU haven't GOT A HUNDRED DOLLARS ! TELL 
 
 ME 
 
 YOU HAVEN T! 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of another long flight of steps, gazing about her 
 in an awe that soon became an intoxicating sense 
 of beauty. 
 
 It was Jennie's first approach to beauty on 
 this scale of immensity and variety. It was her 
 first draught of Art. Her childhood's poring 
 over Ancient Rome Restored had given her a 
 feeling for line and economy, but she had never 
 dreamed that color, substance, and texture could 
 be used with this daring, profuse creativeness. 
 Having no ability to seize details, she drifted 
 helplessly up and down aisles of splendor and 
 gleam. Here there were gold and silver, here was 
 tapestry, here crystal, here enamel. The pic- 
 tures were endless, endless. She could no more 
 deal with them than with a sunset. Life came to 
 the Scarborough tradition in her as it does to a 
 frozen limb, with distress and yet with an ele- 
 ment of ecstasy. A soul that had passed to a 
 higher plane of existence, whom there was no 
 one to welcome and guide, might have ventured 
 timidly into the celestial land as Jennie among 
 these lovely things outside her comprehension. 
 
 She came to herself, as it were, on hearing a 
 man's voice say, in a kind of tone and idiom with 
 which she was familiar: 
 
 "Have you looked at this Cellini now? That's 
 the only authentic bit of Cellini in the United 
 States. There's six or seven other pieces in 
 different museums that people says is Cellini, 
 but there's always a hitch in the proof." 
 
 Turning, she saw a stocky man in custodian's 
 191 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 uniform who was addressing a group of Italian*, 
 two bareheaded women, three children between 
 ten and fifteen, and a man. All were interested. 
 All studied the gold shell with its dragon-shaped 
 handle in purplish enamel. They commented, 
 criticized, appraised, even the children pointing 
 out excellencies to one another. When they had 
 drifted away, Jennie turned to the kindly Irish- 
 man, who, by dint of living with beauty, had 
 grasped its spirit, and put a hesitating question. 
 She asked him to repeat the name of the gold- 
 smith, pronouncing it after him till she registered 
 it on her mind as she had that of Lady Hamilton. 
 
 "Sure, there was an artist for you," the cus- 
 todian went on. "The breed is dead and gone. 
 Hot-timpered fellow, though. Had more mis- 
 tresses and killed more men than you could 
 count. Should read about him in a book he 
 wrote himself." He looked at Jennie from the 
 corner of an eye, accustomed to "size up" an 
 individual here and there among the thousands 
 who floated daily through his little domain, 
 apparently finding in her something that merited 
 further favors. "Are you wise to this Memling .'' " 
 he asked, leading the way to a corner of the wall 
 where hung a small portrait. "There's only two 
 other men in the wor-rld that could have painted 
 that head, and that's Holbein and Rembrandt. 
 Memling himself never did it but just that 
 wance." 
 
 Jennie looked, registering Memling's name. 
 It was the head of an elderly man; so living, 
 192 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 kindly, and humorous that she loved him. 
 When she turned to her guide he stood with a 
 smile of curiosity, like that of a mother showing 
 her baby to a friend. 
 
 "What d'ye say to that now?" 
 
 Jennie said what she could — ^that it was mar- 
 velous, but that she didn't know anjrthing about 
 art. Since he was so kind, she ventured, how- 
 ever, on another question. Did the museum 
 contain a portrait of Lady Hamilton? 
 
 He pursed up his nose. Not a good one. Not 
 a Romney. There was one in gallery twenty- 
 four, but it was by John Opie, of whom he had 
 no high opinion. In comparison with Romney, 
 he thought Opie big and coarse, but, since there 
 was nothing better to be seen, Jennie might 
 choose to glance at this second-rate specimen. 
 
 "And I'll tell you another thing," he went on, 
 confidentially. "You're not used to looking at 
 pictures and such like, are you, now?" 
 
 Jennie said she was not. 
 
 "Well, then, go to gallery twenty-four. Find 
 your Opie, which you'll see hanging over one of 
 the doors — and don't look at annything else. 
 You'll have seen all you can absor-rb in wan 
 day. Come back to-morrer, or anny other toime, 
 and come straight to me. You'll find me here, 
 and I'll tell you what to look at next. But don't 
 take more to-day than you can enjoy." 
 
 He walked with her till she reached the 
 boundary of his realm. 
 
 "You look like a gur-rl that 'd have an eye and 
 193 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 a taste for beauty. You don't find them often 
 among Americans, and when you do it's a god- 
 send. Poles, Jews, Russians, yes. When the 
 French and Italian officers was in New York, 
 their eyes 'd fairly eat the museum up. But 
 Americans — ^they don't know and they don't 
 want to know — not wan in a hundred thousand. 
 Well, good-day to you and good luck. I'm always 
 here, and I'm just the wan to tell you which is 
 the things to pick out." 
 
 But by the time she discovered her Lady 
 Hamilton she had only the courage to note 
 listlessly that the hair was somewhat the color 
 of her own — not chestnut, not russet, not copper, 
 not red-gold, but perhaps a combination of them 
 all. She had reached her limitations unex- 
 pectedly. The tide she had dammed had burst 
 its barriers and rushed in on her. She sank to 
 a chair in the middle of the almost empty room, 
 her eyes blinded by sudden tears. 
 
 Hubert was still with that woman! The 
 woman was perhaps resting now and they were 
 talking ! She would be so much at her ease that 
 she would talk without taking the trouble to 
 throw her wrap round her. Hubert, too, would 
 be at ease, preferring her without her wrap rather 
 than with it. In vain she reminded herself that 
 the situation was one to which an artist was 
 accustomed. She hadn't been in a studio for a 
 year without learning that much, though she 
 got no comfort from it now. No comfort was 
 possible with the vision of this naked mag- 
 
 194 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 nificence seared on her memory. Hubert had 
 let her come without a welcome, and go without 
 a protest. He was probably glad when she went 
 so that he might be alone with this wanton who 
 didn't know shame. 
 
 In the end, she saw but one course before her. 
 She would make the best of Bob. To do so 
 would mean that Bob would be disinherited by 
 his ogre of a father, but with Mrs. CoUingham's 
 aid a counteracting influence might be found. 
 Moreover, she could thus return home, confess 
 herself Bob's wife, and offer the hundred dollars 
 to her father as cash lawfully her own. Life 
 would be simplified in this way, even though 
 happiness were dead. 
 
 she was the last of the commuting family ta 
 reach the house that evening, and on crossing, 
 the threshold was greeted with a sense of cheer. 
 It did not mean much to her at first, for, with 
 the optimism of a hand-to-mouth existence, a 
 sense of cheer was the last thing the family ever 
 abandoned. She herself cast all outward air of 
 trouble away from her on opening the door, be- 
 cause it was in the tradition. 
 
 Her father was seated quietly smoking his 
 pipe, which he had not done for the past week 
 or more. Gussie held the middle of the floor, 
 her arms extended in a serpentine wave, hum- 
 ming a dance tune and practicing the step. To 
 mark the rhythm, Gladys was clapping her 
 hands with a slow, tom-tom beat. Pansy alone 
 stood apart, blinking and unresponsive, as if 
 
 I9S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 for reasons of her own she considered this mirth 
 ill-timed. 
 
 "Look, Jen!" Gladys giggled, as her eldest 
 sister passed down the room. "This is the new 
 thing at the Washington. Gus has got it so you 
 wouldn't know her from Samarine herself." 
 
 Jennie went on to the kitchen, where, as she 
 expected, her mother was getting the supper, and 
 did her best to be nonchalant. 
 
 "Hello, momma! What's the good word? 
 What makes everyone so gay?" 
 
 Lizzie looked up, a cover in one hand and a 
 spoon in the other. Her face was so radiant 
 that Jennie was still more mystified. 
 
 "Oh, Jennie darling, your father has the 
 money! He can make the payment to-morrow, 
 and everything will come right." 
 
 So Jennie's plans recoiled upon herself. She 
 had meant to tell her mother here and now that 
 for four days past she had been Bob Collingham's 
 wife, and had a hundred dollars in her top 
 bureau drawer. Her mother was to tell her 
 father, and her father Teddy and the girls. But 
 now — well, what would be the use ? By keeping 
 her secret she might put off inevitable fate a 
 little longer. 
 
 "Who lent it?" Jennie asked, after she had 
 chosen her line of action. 
 
 "Nobody; that's the wonderful part of it. 
 It's a hundred and fifty dollars Teddy has 
 earned." 
 
 "'Earned!' How?" 
 
 196 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Selling bonds for a man he knows. He 
 doesn't want anything said about it, because 
 it's what he calls 'on the side.' If the house 
 knew of it — ^that he was working in off times for 
 some one else — he might lose his job. But, oh, 
 Jennie, isn't it wonderful?" 
 
 Jennie thought it wonderful for other reasons 
 than Teddy's glory and the peace of the family 
 mind. It was less easy to renounce Hubert 
 than it had been an hour or two earlier. If he 
 snapped his fingers she had said to herself, while 
 crossing the ferry, she would run to him like a 
 dog, in spite of everything; and if she did it, 
 she would want to be free from the complica- 
 tions that must ensue if she were to proclaim 
 herself Bob's wife. 
 
 Having assented to her mother's praise of 
 Teddy, she went back through the living room 
 and on upstairs to take off her hat and coat. 
 Near the top of the stairs, the door of the 
 bathroom opened suddenly and Teddy ap- 
 peared in his shirt sleeves. There being noth- 
 ing unusual in that, she was about to say, 
 "Hello, Ted!" and ascend the few remaining 
 steps to her room. 
 
 But seeing her moving upward in the dim hall 
 light, Teddy started back within the bathroom, 
 and, with a movement he couldn't control, 
 slammed the door noisily. The action was so 
 odd that she called out to him: 
 
 "It's only me, goose! What's the matter 
 with you? Have you got the jumps?" 
 
 197 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 The door opened and Teddy reappeared, 
 grinning sheepishly. 
 
 "I — I didn't have my coat on," was the only 
 explanation he could find. 
 
 "Dear, dear!" Jennie threw over her shoulder, 
 as she passed into her own room. "We've got 
 terribly modest all of a sudden, haven't we?" 
 
 But weeks later she recalled this lame excuse. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 DURING the next few days, Wray snapped. 
 his fingers twice, and on each occasion 
 Jennie ran to him like a dog, as she had foreseen 
 she would. 
 
 The first time was in response to a telegram. 
 The telegram said, simply: 
 
 Studio Thursday, 3 p.m. 
 
 There was no signature, but Jennie knew what 
 it meant. By one o'clock she was dressing fe- 
 verishly; by two, she had said good-by to her 
 mother and was on her way. She was not 
 thinking of her twenty-five thousand dollars- 
 now, or of any offering up of herself. Her one 
 objective was to drive that woman from the 
 Byzantine chair so that Hubert shouldn't look, 
 at her again. 
 
 But she had not got out of Indiana Avenue on 
 her way to the trolley car when something hap- 
 pened which had never happened in her life 
 before. She received another telegram, the 
 second in one day. The messenger boy, who was 
 a neighbor's son, had hailed her from across the 
 street. 
 
 "Hello, Jennie! Are you Miss Jane Scar— 
 14 ^99 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 borough FoUett? That's a name and a half, 
 ain't it?" 
 
 Her first thought was that Hubert was wiring 
 to put her off because he wanted the other 
 woman, after all. Her second, that he had 
 aheady addressed her as "Miss Jennie Follett," 
 and she doubted if he knew her full baptismal 
 name. Only in one connection had it been used 
 of late, and that recollection made her tremble. 
 
 This message, too, was unsigned, and, being so, 
 it puzzled her: 
 
 Always close to you in spirit and loving you. 
 
 That wasn't hke Hubert — and Bob was on the 
 sea. 
 
 She walked slowly, reading it again and again, 
 till her eyes caught the address in a comer — 
 Havana. She remembered then that the Deme- 
 rara was to touch at that port, and understood. 
 Crushing the telegraphic slip into the bottom of 
 her handbag, she made her way to the square 
 and took her place in the car. 
 
 As she jolted down the face of the cliff she 
 wished that this message hadn't come till after 
 her return from the studio. Then it wouldn't 
 have mattered. It would have been too late to 
 matter. Not that it mattered now — only, that 
 the way in which Bob expressed himself made her 
 feel uneasy. "Always close to you in spirit." 
 She didn't want him to be close to her in any 
 way, but in spirit least of all. Latterly, she had 
 
 heard Mrs. Weatherby, a convert to some school 
 
 200 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of New Thought, discourse on the unreality of 
 separations and the bridging power of spirit, and 
 while these ideas made no appeal to her, they 
 endued Bob's telegram with a ghostly creepiness. 
 If he was close to her in spirit on an errand like 
 the present one . . . 
 
 So she turned back from the very studio door. 
 She couldn't go in. She couldn't so much as put 
 her hand on the knob. Knowing that Hubert 
 was within a few yards of her, eager to be hers 
 as she was to be his, she crept guiltily down the 
 stairs. 
 
 She cried all night from humiliation and re- 
 pentance. It was as if Bob had laid a spell on 
 her. Unless she could break it, her life would be 
 ruined. 
 
 But the opportunity to break it came no later 
 than the very next day. Chancing to look out 
 into Indiana Avenue, she saw Hubert scanning 
 Number Eleven from the other side of the street. 
 He must indeed want to see her, since he had 
 taken this journey into the unknown. 
 
 Picking up a sunshade, she went out and 
 spoke to him. He refused to come in, but 
 begged her to take a little walk. 
 
 "Jennie, what's your game?" he asked, 
 roughly, as they sauntered down the avenue 
 toward the edge of the cliff. "Why don't you 
 come to the studio when I ask you? What are 
 you afraid of?" 
 
 'I did come — ^the other day — but — " 
 
 'Why didn't you stay? I thought you would, 
 zoi 
 
 "1 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Brasshead wouldn't have minded it, and you 
 could have seen how the thing is done." 
 
 "What's the good of seeing how it's done when 
 — ^when you've got some one else?" 
 
 "But, good Lord! Jennie, this is not the only 
 picture of the kind I shall ever paint! Even if I 
 go on using Emma for this, I shall want you for 
 another one — and I'm not sure that I shall go 
 on using Emma. Do you see?" 
 
 She was so perturbed that she launched on a 
 -question without knowing what she meant to 
 ask. 
 
 "Isn't sh^" 
 
 "Oh, she's all right as far as the figure goes. 
 Features coarse. Not a bit what I'm trying to 
 get. Have to keep toning down and modifying 
 to give her the spiritual look that you've got, 
 Jennie, to throw away. I keep thinking of you 
 all the time I'm doing it. Look here, if you'll 
 come to-morrow, I'll pay Brasshead off and you 
 shall have the job." 
 
 By the time they reached Palisade Walk the 
 business was settled on a business basis. Not 
 once did he depart from the professional side of 
 the affair, and not once did she allude to the 
 •scene in her dressing-room. But what was un- 
 derstood was understood, not less certainly for 
 its being by passionate mental vibration, with- 
 out a word, or a glance, or a pressure of the 
 hand. 
 
 But the next day, as Jennie was leaving the 
 liouse to keep her appointment, Josiah, who had 
 
 202 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 gone out as usual to look for work, had dragged 
 himself home and fainted at the door. 
 
 "I'm all in," he mumbled, on his return to 
 consciousness. "I don't suppose I shall ever 
 get a chance to do a day's work again." 
 
 Jennie was so much alarmed that she forgot 
 to telephone her inability to go to the studio till 
 after her father had been put to bed and the 
 doctor had come and gone. 
 
 "Oh, it's all right," Hubert had said, listlessly. 
 "I didn't expect you. I knew that if it wasn't 
 one excuse, it would be another — " 
 
 "But I will come," Jennie had interrupted, 
 tearfully. 
 
 "Do just as yoii like about that. Emma's 
 here, and, as you're so uncertain, I've decided to 
 go on and finish the picture without making a 
 change." 
 
 He put up the receiver on saying this, so that 
 Jennie was left all in the air with her love and 
 her distress. 
 
 When Teddy appeared that evening, it was 
 she who told him of their father's breakdown. 
 
 "The doctor says it's worry," she explained, 
 "and lack of nutrition. He says he must stay in 
 bed a week, and we've got to feed him up and not 
 let him worry again." 
 
 Teddy's face grew longer and longer. 
 
 "Then we'll have to have more money." 
 
 "You poor Ted, yes; but then you're making 
 money on the side, aren't you ? " 
 
 Reminding himself, as he did a hundred times 
 203 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 a day, that Nicholson had had five years in 
 which to get away with it, Teddy passed on up- 
 stairs to his father's bedside. 
 
 "It's all right, dad," he tried to smile. "Don't 
 you worry. I'm here. I'll take care of ma and 
 the girls. You just make your mind easy and 
 give yourself up to getting well." 
 
 Jennie's attendance at the studio was thus 
 put out of the question for many days, and in 
 the meantime she had a letter posted at Havana. 
 Fearing that it would come and attract attention 
 in the family, she watched the postman, getting 
 it one morning before breakfast. Bob wrote: 
 
 There is a love so big and strong and sure that separa- 
 tions mean nothing to it, because it fills the world. That's 
 my kind of love, Jennie darling. You can't get out of it — - 
 I can't get out of it — even if we would. At this very min- 
 ute I'm sailing and sailing; but I'm not being carried 
 farther away from you. The love in which you and I are 
 now leading our lives is wider than the great big circle 
 made by the horizon. Don't forget that, dear. I'm always 
 with you. Love doesn't recognize distance. Love isn't 
 physical or geographical. It's force, power, influence. I 
 love you so much that I know I can keep you safe even 
 though I'm on the other side of the world. I can't fend 
 troubles away from you, worse luck, but I can carry you 
 through them. I know that till I come back you'll be 
 having a hard time; but my love will hang round you like 
 an enchanted cloak, and nothing will really get at you. 
 You're always wearing that cloak, Jennie; you always 
 walk with it about you. 
 
 While Jennie was reading this, Edith Colling- 
 ham, at breakfast at Marillo Park, was springing 
 
 204 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 a question on her father. She sprang It at break- 
 fast because it was the only time she was sure 
 of seeing him alone. 
 
 " Father, how far are children obliged to marry 
 or not to marry in deference to their parents' 
 wishes, and how far have fathers and mothers 
 the right to interfere?" 
 
 Dauphin, who was on his haunches near his 
 master's knee, removed himself to a midway 
 position between the two ends of the table, as if 
 he felt that in the struggle he perceived to be 
 coming he couldn't throw his influence with 
 either side. Through the open window Max 
 could be seen in perpetual motion on the lawn, 
 yet pausing every two minutes to look wistfully 
 down the avenue in the hope of some loved 
 approach. 
 
 Without answering at once, CoUingham tapped 
 an egg with a spoon. The broaching of so per- 
 sonal a question between one of his children and 
 himself was something new. It had been an 
 established rule in the household that, however 
 free the intercourse between the boy and the 
 girl and their mother, the approach to their 
 father was always indirect. Junia had made it 
 her lifelong part to explain the children to their 
 father and the father to his children, but rarely 
 to give them a chance of explaining themselves 
 to each other. CoUingham had acquiesced in 
 this for the reason that the duties of a parent 
 were not those for which he felt himself, in his 
 own phrase, specially "cut out." 
 
 205 
 
r' THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 J 
 
 The duties for which he did feel himself cut 
 ''out were those that had to do with the invest- 
 ment of money. On this ground, he spoke with 
 authority; he was original, intuitive, inspired. 
 When it came to a flair for the stock which was 
 selling to-day at fifty and which to-morrow would 
 be worth five hundred, he belonged to the il- 
 luminati. This being the highest use of intelli- 
 gence known to man, he felt it his duty to 
 specialize in it to the exclusion of everything 
 else. 
 
 As already hinted, there were two Collinghams. 
 There was the natural man, a kindly, generous 
 fellow who would never have made a big position 
 an the world; and there was the other Colling- 
 iham, standardized to the accepted, forceful, 
 American-business-man pattern, and who, now 
 that he was sixty-odd, was the CoUingham who 
 mainly had the upper hand. 
 
 Mainly, but not completely. The natural 
 CoUingham often made timid attempts to speak 
 and had to be stifled. He was being stifled while 
 the standardized CoUingham tapped his egg. 
 It was the pupil of Junia, Bickley, and the 
 business world who finally sought to gain time 
 by asking a counter-question. 
 
 "What do you want to know for?" 
 
 Edith was prepared for this, 
 
 "Because I may make a marriage that you 
 and mother wouldn't like; and I think it pos- 
 sible that Bob may do the same." 
 
 Whatever the natural CoUingham might have 
 206 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 said to this, the man who had been evolved from 
 him could have but one response. 
 
 "People who act on their own responsibility 
 should be prepared to go the whole hog." 
 
 Edith sipped her coffee while she worked out 
 the significance of this. 
 
 "Does that mean that you wouldn't give us 
 any money?" 
 
 " Rather that, being so extremely independent, 
 you wouldn't ask for it." 
 
 "Oh, ask for it — no; and yet — " 
 
 "And yet you think I ought to hand it out." 
 
 "I was thinking rather of a kind of noblesse 
 oblige — " 
 
 " In which all the noblesse must be mine." 
 
 "Not exactly that. In which perhaps the 
 noblesse should be ours. Even if I should marry 
 a poor man, I can't help being a CoUingham, a 
 member of a family with large ideas and a large 
 way of living." 
 
 "Yes; but, you see, you'd be giving them up." 
 
 "You can't give up what's been bred into you. 
 And in my case I should be bringing the man — 
 you must let me say it, dad — I should be bringing 
 the man I — I love — so little — " 
 
 "He's probably counting on a great deal. 
 Poor men who marry rich men's daughters 
 generally do." 
 
 "I was going to say that while he'd be giving 
 me so much, all I could offer him would be 
 money; and if I didn't bring that — " 
 
 "Well? Goon." 
 
 207 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "If I didn't bring that, I should feel so humili- 
 ated before him — " 
 
 He affected an ignorance which was not a 
 fact. 
 
 "Who is this paragon, anyhow?" 
 
 "I thought mother might have told you. It's 
 Mr. Ayling." 
 
 "Oh, that teacher fellow!" 
 
 "He's more than that, dad. He's a professor 
 in one of our greatest universities. He's a 
 writer beginning to be recognized as having 
 ideas. He has a position of his own — " 
 
 "Yes; but only an intellectual one." 
 
 She raised her eyebrows. 
 
 "'Only'?" 
 
 He straightened himself and prepared for 
 business. 
 
 "Look here, Edith, don't kid yourself. An 
 intellectual position in this country is no position 
 at all. The American people have no use for the 
 intellectual, and they've made that plain." 
 
 She could hardly express her amazement. 
 
 "Why, dad! There's no country in the world 
 where people go in more for education, where 
 there are more men who go to colleges — " 
 
 "Yes — to fit them for making money, not to 
 turn them into highbrows. You must have a 
 spade to dig a garden, but it's the garden you're 
 proud of, not the spade." 
 
 "And the very President of the country — " 
 
 "Is what you call an intellectual man; but 
 that's a bit of chance. He's not President be- 
 
 208 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 cause he was a college professor, but because he 
 was a politician. If he hadn't been a politician — 
 something that the country values — he'd still 
 be rotting in some two-by-three university. 
 Listen, Edith!" He emphasized his point by 
 the movement of his forefinger. "We've a rule 
 in business which is the test of everything. So 
 long as you stick to it you can't go wrong in your 
 estimates. The value of a thing is as much money 
 as it will bring. You know the value of the intel- 
 lectual in American eyes the minute you think 
 of what the American people is willing to pay 
 for it. You say your intellectual man has a posi- 
 tion of his own. Well, you can see how big the 
 position is by what he earns. He doesn't earn 
 enough decently to support a wife, and so long 
 as the American people have anything to say to 
 it, he never will. You can box the whole com- 
 pass of fellows who live by their wits — ^teachers, 
 writers, journalists, artists, musicians, clergy- 
 men, and the whole tribe of them. We don't 
 want them in this country, except as you want a 
 spade and a hoe in your tool-house. When they 
 try to get in, we starve them out; and, Colling- 
 ham as you are, once you've married this fellow 
 you'll go with your gang." He pushed back his 
 chair and rose. "That's all I've got to say. 
 Think it over." As he passed out through the 
 French window to the terrace beyond he snapped 
 his fingers. "Dauphin, come along!" 
 
 But, perhaps for the first time in his life, 
 Dauphin didn't immediately follow him. In- 
 
 209 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 stead, he went first to Edith, laying his long 
 nozzle in her lap. 
 
 For five or ten minutes, as CoUingham smoked 
 his morning cigar while visiting the stables, the 
 garage, and the kitchen garden, the natural man 
 tried to raise his voice. 
 
 "Why didn't you say, 'Marry your man, 
 Edith, my child, and I'll give you ten thousand 
 a year?' Poor little girl," this first CoUingham 
 went on, "she's so frank and true and high 
 spirited! You've made her unhappy when you 
 could so easily have made her glad." 
 
 "You said what any other American father 
 in your position would have said," the pupil of 
 Bickley and Junia argued, on the other side. 
 "True, you've made her unhappy, but young 
 people often have to be made unhappy in order 
 that the foolish dictates of the heart may be 
 repressed. There are millions of people all over 
 the world whose lives would have been spoiled 
 if such early emotional impulses hadn't been 
 thwarted." 
 
 And, after all, it was true that the intellectual 
 was not respected. The public pretended that it 
 was, but when it came to the test of social and 
 financial reward — the only rewards there were — 
 the pretense was apparent. There were no intel- 
 lectual people at Marillo Park; there were none 
 whom he, CoUingham, knew in business. There 
 were men with brains; but to distinguish 
 them from the intellectual they wete described 
 as brainy. Edith as the wife of an intellectual 
 
 210 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 man would be self-destroyed; and it was his 
 duty as her father to stop, if he could, that 
 self-destruction. 
 
 By the time he had reached the point in his 
 morning ritual which brought him to Junia's 
 bedside, he was standardized again, even though 
 it was with a bleeding heart. He could more 
 easily suffer a bleeding heart than he could the 
 fear of not being an efficient man of business. 
 
 "What use have you had for the twenty-five 
 thousand I've paid in your account?" he asked, 
 before he kissed her good-by. 
 
 She concealed her anxiety that so many days 
 had passed without a sign from Jennie under an 
 air of nonchalance. 
 
 "No use as yet, but I expect to have. I shall 
 let you know when the time comes." 
 
 But no sign could come from Jennie, for the 
 reason that her father died in mid-July, and 
 during the intervening weeks she was tied to his 
 bedroom. As the eldest daughter and the only 
 one at home, all her other functions were ab- 
 sorbed in those of nurse. Luckily, there was 
 money in the house, for Teddy had been success- 
 ful in his efforts "on the side," and Bob con- 
 tinued to transmit small sums to herself, which 
 she added to the hundred dollars in the top 
 bureau drawer. Bob, Hubert, CoUingham Lodge, 
 her ambition, and her love became unreal and 
 remote as she watched the setting of the sun to 
 which her being had been turned. In the ey^s of 
 others, Josiah might be feeble and a failure, but 
 
 211 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to Teddy and his sisters he was their father, the 
 pivot of their lives, the nearest thing to a supreme 
 being they had known. 
 
 Lizzie's grief was different. Her heart didn't 
 ache because he was dying. Life having become 
 what it was, he was better dead. If she could 
 have died herself, she would have gone to her 
 rest gladly, had it not been for the children. 
 For their sake, she remained sweet, calm, active, 
 brewing and baking, sweeping and cleaning, 
 sitting up at night with Josiah while they were 
 asleep, and hiding the fact that instead of a 
 heart she felt nothing within her but a stone. 
 
 Her grief was not for Josiah; it was for the 
 futility of the best things human beings could 
 bring to life. Honesty, industry, thrift, devo- 
 tion, ambition, and romance had been the 
 qualifications with which Josiah Follett and 
 Lizzie Scarborough had faced the world; and 
 this was the best the world could do with them. 
 "It isn't as if we ever faltered or refused or 
 turned aside," she mused to herself, as she hur- 
 ried from one task to another. "We've been 
 absolutely faithful. We've had pluck in the face 
 of every discouragement and eaten ashes as if 
 it were bread, and, in the end, we come to this. 
 It makes no difference that we didn't deserve it; 
 we get it just the same." 
 
 Josiah's wanderings as his mind grew feebler 
 turned forever round one central theme: A job! 
 a job! To be allowed to work ! To have a chance 
 to earn a living! It was his kingdom of heaven, 
 
 212 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 his forgiveness of sins, his paradise of God. In the 
 middle of night he would open his eyes and say: 
 
 "I've got a job, Lizzie. Fifty a week!" 
 
 "Yes, yes," Lizzie would say, drawing the 
 sheet about his shoulders. "Yes, yes; you'll go 
 to town in the morning. Now turn over, dear, 
 and go to sleep again." 
 
 These excitements were generally in the small 
 hours of the morning. By day, he was less 
 cheerful. 
 
 "I'm all in, Jennie darling," he would say 
 then. "I don't suppose I'll ever get a chance to 
 do a day's work again." 
 
 But one hot afternoon in the middle of July 
 he woke from a long sleep with a look that 
 startled her. Jennie had never seen the approach 
 of death, but, now that she did, she knew it could 
 be nothing else. He had simply rolled over on 
 his back, staring upward with eyes that had be- 
 come curiously glassy and sightless. Jennie ran 
 to the head of the stairs. 
 
 "Momma! Momma! Come quick!" 
 
 He said nothing till Lizzie had reached the 
 bedside. Though he didn't move his head or 
 look toward her, he seemed to know that she was 
 there. 
 
 "Here's mother, Lizzie." He raised his hands, 
 while a look of glad surprise stole over his face. 
 "There's a country," he stammered on, brokenly, 
 "no, it isn't a country — it's like a town — ^they're 
 working — they've got work for me — and — and 
 they're never — they're never — fired." 
 
 213 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 The hands fell, but the look of glad surprise 
 was only shut out of sight by the coffin lid. 
 
 Teddy paid for the lot in the cemetery, as well 
 as the other expenses of the funeral, within a week 
 of his father's death. "Now I'm through," he 
 said to himself, with a long sigh of relief. 
 
 "You darling Ted," was Jennie's commenda- 
 tion. "You must have given momma five hun- 
 dred dollars at least. Now I hope you'll be able 
 to save a little for yourself." 
 
 At the bank, Teddy's younger colleagues 
 were sympathetic, Lobley especially doing him 
 kindly little turns. He asked him to supper one 
 evening at a restaurant, where they talked of 
 marksmanship, at which Teddy had been pro- 
 ficient in the navy. He was out of practice now, 
 he said, to which Lobley had replied that it was 
 a pity. He, Lobley, had an automatic pistol 
 illegally at home, and if Teddy would like to 
 borrow it he could soon bring himself back to 
 his old form. Teddy did so like, and went back 
 to Pemberton Heights with the thing secreted on. 
 his person. It went with him to the bank next 
 day — and every day. 
 
 For Teddy had begun to notice symptoms to 
 which one less keenly suspicious would be blind. 
 Nothing was ever said of money missing, and no 
 hint thrown out that he himself was not trusted 
 as before. He had nothing to go on except that 
 Mr. Brunt became more taciturn than ever, and 
 once or twice he thought he was being watched. 
 The eyes of Jackman, the principal house de- 
 
 214 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 tective, wandered often toward him, and twice 
 he, Teddy, had seen Jackman in conference with 
 Flynn. 
 
 "They'll never get me alive," was his inner 
 consolation, though immediate suicide sug- 
 gested itself as an alternative, and flight, disap- 
 pearance, an absolute blotting out was a third 
 expedient. 
 
 Yet nothing was sure; nothing was even re- 
 motely sure. By becoming too jumpy he might 
 easily give himself away. Nicholson had had 
 five years. In two years, in one, Teddy meant to 
 be square with the bank again. 
 
 But one afternoon, as he emerged into Broad 
 Street on his way home, Jackman and Flynn 
 were talking together on the opposite pavement. 
 The boy jumped back, though not before he saw 
 Jackman make a sign to Flynn which said as 
 plainly as words, "There he is now." 
 
 To Teddy, it was the end of the world. All the 
 past, all the future, merged into this single 
 second of terror. He looked across at them; they 
 looked across at him. There was a degree of con- 
 fession in the very way in which his blanched 
 face stared at them through the intervening 
 crowds. 
 
 Jackman's lips formed half a dozen syllables, 
 emphasized by a nod and a Ufting of the brows. 
 
 "That's the guy all righty," were the words 
 Teddy practically heard. 
 
 Like a startled wild thing, he had but one im- 
 pulse — to run. Actual running in Broad Street 
 15 "S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 at that hour of the day being out of the question, 
 he dived into the procession mounting toward 
 Wall Street, ducking, dodging, pushing, almost 
 knocking people down, and mad with fear. 
 "They '11 never get me alive," he was saying to 
 himself; but how in that crowd to find space in 
 which to turn the pistol to his heart already 
 puzzled him. 
 
 At the comer of Wall Street he summoned 
 courage to look over his shoulder. They might 
 not be after him. If not, it would prove a false 
 alarm, such as he had had before. But there 
 they were — ^Jackman scrambling laboriously up 
 the other side of Broad Street, and Flynn crossing 
 it, picking his way among the vans and motor 
 cars. 
 
 Like a frightened rabbit, Teddy scurried on 
 again, meaning to gain Nassau Street and some- 
 how double on his tracks. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 BUT Teddy did not double on his tracks in 
 Nassau Street, for the reason that, in again 
 looking over his shoulder, he saw that Flynn had 
 taken one side of that thoroughfare and Jackman 
 the other. They were burly men, who moved 
 heavily, while he, in spite of his stocky build, 
 glided in and out among the pedestrians with the 
 agility of a squirrel. He was putting distance 
 between himself and them, and five minutes' 
 leeway would be enough for him. All he needed 
 was the space and privacy in which to shoot 
 himself. 
 
 At the corner of John Street he turned to the 
 left and made toward Broadway. They would 
 expect him to do this, his chief hope being that 
 among the homing swarms they would already 
 have lost sight of him. His mind was not work- 
 ing. He was not looking ahead, even over the 
 few minutes he had still to live. All his instincts 
 were fused into the fear of the hand of the law 
 on his person. It was like Jennie's terror of the 
 hand of a man she didn't love — a frenzy for 
 physical sanctity stronger than the fear of 
 death. 
 
 At the same time, he couldn't run the risk of 
 being more noticeable than the majority of people 
 
 217 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 going his way. As he pushed and dodged, a 
 young man whom he had jostled called out, in 
 ironic good humor, "Say, is the cop after you?" 
 at which Teddy almost lost his head. He ex- 
 pected a crowd to gather, and three or four men 
 to hold him by the arms till Jackman and Flynn 
 came up. But nothing happened. The pro- 
 testing young man was lost in the scramble, and 
 he, Teddy, found himself in Broadway. 
 
 Paying no heed to the jam of street cars, lor- 
 ries, private tars, and motor trucks, he dashed 
 into the interlaced streams of traffic. He dashed 
 — and was held up. He dashed again — and was 
 held up a second time. He was held up a third 
 time, a fourth, and a fifth. With every spurt of 
 two or three feet, cries warned him and curses 
 startled him. "Say, sonny, your ma must have 
 lost you," came from a jocose chauffeur beside 
 whose machine Teddy had been brought to a 
 halt. "I'd damn well like to run over you," 
 shouted the driver of a van who had narrowly 
 escaped doing it. Teddy wished he had. If he 
 could only be sure of being killed, it might have 
 been the easiest way out. 
 
 Reaching the opposite pavement, he had time 
 to see that Jackman had crossed lower down and 
 more easily than he, and was lumbering toward 
 him from the downtown direction. Jackman 
 could have shouted to the passers-by to lay hold 
 of Teddy, only that, from a distance and among 
 such numbers, he couldn't indicate his victim. 
 Being younger than Flynn and of lighter build, 
 218 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 he could move in his own way almost with 
 Teddy's rapidity. The boy didn't dare to run, 
 because the action would have marked him out, 
 but he started again on his snakelike gliding 
 between pedestrians. He must gain some door- 
 way, some cellar, some hole of any sort, in which 
 to draw his pistol. He would have drawn it 
 there and then, only that a hundred hands 
 would have seized him. 
 
 All at once he saw the open portal of a great 
 mercantile building, leading to a vast interior 
 with which he was familiar. There were several 
 exits and many floors. Once he had turned in 
 here, he could cross the scent. In he went, with 
 scores who were doing likewise, passing scores 
 who were coming out. His first intention was to 
 avoid the conspicuous exit toward Dey Street 
 and make for the less obvious one into Fulton 
 Street; but in doing that, he passed a line of 
 some twenty lifts, of which one was about to 
 close its door. He slipped into it like a hare into 
 its warren. The door clanged; the lift moved 
 upward with an oily speed. Among his com- 
 panions he was hot, flurried, breathless, and yet 
 not more so than any other young clerk who had 
 been doing an errand against time. 
 
 There were nearly thirty floors, and he got oflF 
 at the twenty-third. He chose the twenty-third 
 so as not to get ofi" too soon, and yet not call 
 attention to himself by remaining in the Uft 
 when most of its occupants had left it. The floor 
 was spacious and almost empty. A few people 
 
 219 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 were waiting for a lift to take them down; a 
 few were going in and out of offices, but other- 
 wise he had the place to himself. 
 
 Mechanically he walked to a window and 
 looked out. He seemed to be up in the sky, with 
 only the tops of a few giant cubes on a level with 
 himself. "Skyscrapers" they were called, and 
 skyscrapers they seemed up here even more than 
 down below. The tip of the great city, the 
 stretches of the bay, the green slopes of Staten 
 Island, and the far-ofF colossal woman with a 
 torch were all within his vision, with the oblique 
 strip that was Broadway, a tiny, ugly gash in 
 which bacteria were squirming, deep down and 
 cutting across the foreground. 
 
 Except for the dull roar that came up and the 
 clang of an occasional footstep along the hall- 
 ways, it was so still and pleasant that the need 
 to shoot himself seemed for the minute less in- 
 sistent. It would have to be done sooner or 
 later, but when it comes to suicide, even a few 
 minutes' respite is something. He could have 
 done the thing right there and then by the 
 window, where the few people within hearing 
 would have run to him at sound of the shot. If 
 the shot didn't kill him, they would keep him 
 from firing another. Publicity, distasteful in 
 itself, might lead to ineff^ectuality. 
 
 He must find a lavatory, and so began walking 
 
 up and down the corridors, looking at doors 
 
 discreetly placed in corners. When he came to 
 
 his objective, it was locked. Again it was re- 
 
 220 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 prieve. The same door would be on other 
 floors, but he was not ready for the moment to 
 forsake his shelter. It was true that at any 
 minute Fljmn and Jackman might emerge from 
 the lift, but there were nearly thirty chances 
 that if they had followed him so closely they 
 would not select this landing. Even more were 
 the chances that they had not seen him slip into 
 the building at all. 
 
 Fevered and thirsty, he stooped to drink at 
 the fountain crowning the head of a little bronze 
 woman with a pair of dolphins on her shoulders. 
 She seemed to be of Maya type, and a uniformed 
 guardian had once told him that a great modern 
 sculptor had molded her. With a difference in 
 dolphins, she was repeated on every floor, forever 
 diademed in water. 
 
 Teddy's mind had so far suspended operation 
 as to his immediate plight that he went back to 
 the morning, seven or eight months previously, 
 when an errand from Mr. Brunt had brought 
 him into the great ground-floor atrium, revealing 
 the Basilica Julia or the Basilica Emilia of 
 Ancient Rome Restored right there in lower 
 Broadway. Simplicity, immensity, the awe- 
 some beauty of mere form I The wide spaces, 
 the mighty columns, the tempered white light of 
 majestic Roman windows! The absence of 
 striving for effect! The peace, the restfulness, 
 the cheerfulness, when striving for efi^ect are 
 abandoned, dwarfing the magnitude of crowds 
 and reducing their ebbings and flowing to mere 
 
 221 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 vanity! Like Jennie with her emotions, like 
 Pansy with her intuitions, Teddy had no words 
 for these impressions; but the Scarborough 
 tradition, nursed on Ancient Rome Restored, 
 vibrated to their music. 
 
 "And here I am, trapped like a rat in a hole!" 
 
 So he came back to it. He wondered if he 
 were awake. Was it possible that ten or fifteen 
 minutes could have transformed him from a 
 hard-working, home-loving boy into a fugitive 
 who had no choice left but to shoot himself? 
 As for facing the disgrace, he did not consider 
 it. To stand before his mother charged with 
 theft, even if it was on her behalf, was not to be 
 thought of. He couldn't do it, and there was an 
 end to it. Still less could he go through the other 
 incidentals, handcuffs, a cell, the court, the 
 sentence, Bitterwell, and the lifetime that would 
 come after his release. He could put the pistol 
 to his heart and, if necessary, he could burn in 
 hell — if there was a hell; but he couldn't do the 
 other thing. 
 
 And yet to put the pistol to his heart and bum 
 in hell formed a lamentable choice on their side. 
 
 "I'm not a thief," he protested, inwardly. "I 
 took the money — how could I help it, with dad 
 sick and ma at the end of everything? — but I'm 
 not a thief." 
 
 He was sure of that. It became a formula, 
 not perhaps of comfort, but of justification. 
 Had he been a thief, he told himself, he could 
 have faced the music; but it was precisely be- 
 
 222 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 cause he had taken money while preserving his 
 inner probity that he refused to be judged by the 
 standards of men. Once more he couldn't ex- 
 press it in this way to himself; but it was the 
 conclusion to which his instincts leaped. Only 
 one tribunal could discern between the good and 
 evil in his case; so he was resolved to go before it. 
 
 In a quiet corner he began to cry. He was 
 only a boy, with a boy's facility of emotion, 
 especially of distress. He cried at the thought 
 of his mother and the girls, with no one to fend 
 for them, and no Teddy coming home in the 
 evenings. It was true that, apart from his 
 filchings, he had been able to fend for them only 
 to the extent of eighteen per, but there was 
 always a chance of better days ahead. Even at 
 the worst of times, they had a good deal of fun 
 among themselves, and now . . . 
 
 Now his mother would be in the kitchen, be- 
 ginning to get supper, and each of the girls would 
 be making her way back to Indiana Avenue. 
 Pansy's dog clock would tell her when to watch 
 for them, and the loving little creature would be 
 eying the door, ready to welcome each of them 
 in turn. If she had a preference, it was for 
 himself, and the feeling of her gentle paws 
 against his shin was connected with the ten- 
 derest things he knew. 
 
 No; it wasn't possible. He couldn't be skyed 
 on that twenty-third floor, unable to come down, 
 unable to go home. It must be a nightmare. 
 Such things didn't happen. He was Teddy 
 
 223 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 FoUett, a good boy at heart, with an honorable 
 record in the navy. He had never meant to 
 steal, but what could he do? The money was 
 there, to be stacked in the vaults of Collingham 
 & Law's, not to be touched for months, very 
 likely, and the home needs imperative. He 
 couldn't see his father and mother turned out of 
 house and home because they couldn't pay their 
 taxes. It was not in common sense. Nothing 
 was in common sense. That he should be 
 dragged into court, that his mother should break 
 her heart, that shame should be showered on his 
 sisters was ridiculous. Somewhere in the uni- 
 verse there was a great big principle that was on 
 his side, though he didn't know what it was. 
 
 What he did know was that crying was un- 
 manly. Sopping up his tears and trying not to 
 think, he jumped into the first lift that stopped 
 and got out at floor eleven. There he went 
 straight to the lavatory, which he now knew how 
 to place, and once more found the door locked. 
 
 Though again it was reprieve, it was reprieve 
 almost unwelcome. The first passing lift was 
 going upward, and so he ascended to floor seven- 
 teen. Here again the lavatory was locked, as 
 it was on floors nineteen and twenty-five, both 
 of which he tried. He began to understand that 
 they were locked according to a principle, and 
 that for those seeking privacy in which to shoot 
 themselves they offered no resource. 
 
 Moreover, offices were closing and the great 
 building emptying itself rapidly. The rush was 
 224 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 all to the lifts going downward. He, too, must 
 go downward. To be found skulking in corri- 
 dors where he had no business would expose him 
 to suspicion. After nearly an hour spent above 
 he descended to the atrium, where Flynn and 
 Jackman might be watching the cages disgorge, 
 knowing that in time he must appear from one 
 of them. 
 
 But he walked out without interference. A 
 far hint of twilight was deepening the atmosphere 
 round the heads of the great columns, and the 
 waning sunshine spoke of workers seeking rest. 
 Streams of men and women, mostly young, were 
 setting toward each of the exits, to Broadway, 
 to Fulton Street, to Dey Street; and he had only 
 to drop into one of them. He chose that toward 
 Dey Street, finding himself in the open air, in 
 full exercise of his Hberty. 
 
 Once more it was hard to believe that there 
 was a difference between this day and other 
 days. It would have been so natural to go ta 
 the gym for a plunge or a turn with the foils, 
 and then home to supper. He discussed with 
 himself the possibility of a last night with the 
 family, recoiling only from the fact that it was 
 precisely there that they would look for him. 
 Much reading of criminal annals had printed 
 that detail on his brain — ^the poor wretch torn 
 from the warm shelter of his home, with his 
 wife's arms round him and the baby sleeping in 
 the cradle. There was no wife or baby in this 
 case; but to have the thing happen to himself,. 
 
 22S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 with his mother and the girls vainly trying to 
 stay the course of the law, would be worse than 
 going to the chair. 
 
 He was in the uptown subway, with no out- 
 ward difference between himself and the scores 
 of other young men scanning the evening papers. 
 Because he didn't know what else to do, he got 
 out at Chambers Street. He got out at Chambers 
 Street because there was a ferry there which 
 would take him over to New Jersey. He went 
 over to New Jersey because it was his habit at 
 this hour of the day, and to follow his habit 
 somehow preserved his sanity. To be on the 
 same side of the river as his home was a faint, 
 futile consolation. 
 
 And while on the ferryboat a new idea came 
 to him. In the Erie station he should find a 
 telephone booth from which he could ring up his 
 mother and inform her that he was not to be 
 home that night. Though it would do no good 
 in the end, it would at least save her from im- 
 mediate alarm. Flynn and Jackman were 
 unknown by face to the family, and if they rang 
 at the door in search of him they would prob- 
 ably not tell their tale. Before he reached the 
 other side he had concocted a story of which his 
 only fear was as to his ability to tell it on the 
 wire without breaking down. 
 
 It was a bit of good luck to be answered by 
 Gladys, whom he could "bluff" more easily 
 than the rest of them. 
 
 "Hello, Gladys! This is Ted. Tell ma I'm 
 226 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 in Paterson and shall not get home to-night or 
 to-morrow night." 
 
 He could hear Gladys calling into the interior 
 of the house: 
 
 "Well, what do you know about that? Ted's 
 at Paterson and not coming home to-night or 
 to-morrow night." Into the receiver she said, 
 "But, Ted, what '11 they say at the bank?" 
 
 "I may not go back to the bank. This is a 
 new job. You remember the fellow I was work- 
 ing for on the side ? Well, he's put me into this, 
 and perhaps I'm going to make money." 
 
 "Oh, Ted," Gladys called, delightedly, "how 
 many plunks?" 
 
 "It — it isn't a salary," he stammered. "I — 
 I may be in the firm. To-morrow I may have to 
 go to Philadelphia. Tell ma not to worry — and 
 not to miss me. I'll try to call up from 
 Philadelphia, but if I can't — Well, anyhow, 
 give my love to ma and everybody, and if I'm 
 not home the day after to-morrow, don't think 
 anything about it." 
 
 He put up the receiver before Gladys could 
 ask any more questions, and felt ready to cry 
 again. In order not to do that, he walked out 
 of the station into the street, where the presence 
 of the crowds compelled him to self-control. 
 Having nothing to do and nowhere to go, he 
 walked on and on, getting some relief from his 
 desolation by the mere fact of movement. 
 
 So he walked and walked and walked, headed 
 vaguely toward the outskirts of the town. 
 
 227 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 There were vast marshes there into which he 
 could stray and be lost. The rank grasses in this 
 early August season were almost as high as his 
 shoulders, so that he could lie down and be 
 beyond all human ken. His body might not be 
 found for weeks, might never be found at all. 
 Teddy Follett would simply disappear, his fate 
 remaining a mystery. 
 
 Toward seven o'clock, the shabby suburbs 
 began to show their primrose-colored lights — a 
 twinkle here, a twinkle there, stringing out in 
 longer streets to scattered bits of garland. Teddy 
 felt hungry. Counting his money and finding 
 that he had two dollars and thirty-one cents, he 
 was sorry not to be able to transmit the two 
 dollars to his mother. » 
 
 Growing more and more hungry, and knowing 
 he must keep up his nerve, he spied a little 
 bread-and-pastry shop just where the houses 
 were thinning out and the marshes invading the 
 town, as the ocean invaded the marshes. On 
 entering, he asked for two tongue sandwiches 
 and half a dozen doughnuts. The woman who 
 wrapped up the sandwiches and dropped the 
 doughnuts into a paper bag was an English- 
 speaking foreigner of the Scandinavian type, 
 blond, dumpy, with a row of bad teeth and 
 piercing blue eyes. As she performed her task, 
 she seemed not to take her eyes from off him, 
 though her smile was kind, and she called his 
 attention to the fact that she was giving him 
 seven doughnuts for his six. 
 
 228 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "You don't lif rount here?" she asked, in 
 counting out the change for his dollar. 
 
 "No; just going up the road." 
 
 "Well, call again," she said, politely, as he 
 took his parcels and went out. 
 
 Having eaten his two sandwiches, he felt 
 better, in the sense of being stronger and more 
 able to face the thing that had to be done. He 
 was not quite out on the marshes, the long, flat 
 road cutting straight across them to the nearest 
 little town. The lights were rarer, but still 
 there were lights, their saffron growing more 
 and more luminous as the colors of the sunset 
 paled out. An occasional motor passed him, 
 but never a man on foot. 
 
 He could have turned in anywhere, and per- 
 haps for that reason he put off doing so. It 
 would be easier, he argued, to shoot himself 
 after dark. It was not dark as yet — only the 
 long August gloaming. Moreover, the tramping 
 was a relief, soothing his nerves and working off 
 some of his horror. He wished he could go on 
 with it, on and on, into the unknown, where he 
 would be beyond recognition. But that was 
 just where the trouble was. For the fugitive 
 from justice recognition always lay in wait. 
 He had often heard his father say that in the 
 banking business you could get away with a 
 thing for years and years, and yet recognition 
 would spring on you when least expected. As 
 for himself, recognition could meet him in any 
 little town in New Jersey. They would have his 
 
 229 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 picture in the paper by to-morrow — and, besides, 
 what was the use? 
 
 The dark was undeniably faUing when he 
 noticed on the right a lonely shack with nothing 
 but the marsh all round it. Coming nearly 
 abreast of it, he detected a rough path toward 
 it through the grass. He had no need of a path, 
 no need of a shack, but, the path and the shack 
 being there, they offered something to make for. 
 Since he was obliged to turn aside, he might as 
 well do it now. 
 
 So aside he turned. The path was hardly a 
 path, and had apparently not been used that 
 year. Wading through the dank grasses which 
 caught him about the feet, he could hear small 
 living things hopping away from his tread, or a 
 marsh bird rise with a frightened whir of wings. 
 Water gushed into his shoes, but that, he de- 
 clared, wouldn't matter, as he would so soon be 
 out of the reach of catching cold. 
 
 The building proved to be all that fire had left 
 of a shanty knocked together long ago, probably 
 for laborers working on the road. The walls were 
 standing, and it was not quite roofless. There was 
 no door, and the window was no more than a hole, 
 but as he ventured within he found the flooring 
 sound. At least, it bore his weight, and, what was 
 more amazing still, he tripped over a rough bench 
 which the fire had spared and the former occu- 
 pants had not thought worth the carting away. 
 
 It was the very thing. Shooting oneself was 
 something to be performed with ritual. You 
 
 230 
 
THE EMPTY SXCK 
 
 lay down, stretched yourself out, and did it with 
 a hint of decency. 
 
 Teddy groped his way. First he drew the 
 pistol from his hip pocket, laying it carefully on 
 the floor and within reach of his hand. Next he 
 sat down for a minute, but, fearing he would 
 begin to think, lifted his feet to the bench, 
 lowered his back, and straightened himself to his 
 full, flat length. Putting down his hand, he 
 found he could touch the pistol easily, and there- 
 fore let it lie. He let it lie only because he had 
 not yet decided where to fire — at his heart or 
 into his temple. 
 
 Outside the hut there was a hoarse, sleepy 
 croak, then another, and another, and another. 
 The dangers of light being past, the frogs were 
 waking to their evening chant. Teddy had al- 
 ways loved this dreamy, monotonous lullaby, 
 reminiscent of spring twilights and approaching 
 holidays. He was glad now that it would be the 
 last sound to greet his ears on earth. Since he 
 had to go, it would croon to him softly, cradle 
 him gently, letting the night of the soul come 
 down on him consolingly. He was not fright- 
 ened ; he was only tired — ;oddly tired, considering 
 where he was. It would be easier to fall asleep 
 than do anything else, listening to the co-ax, co-ax, 
 co-ax, with which the darkness round was filled. 
 
 And right at that minute, Flynn, with low 
 chuckles of laughter, was telling Mrs. Fl5mn of 
 the extraordinary adventure of the afternoon. 
 16 231 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "We didn't have nothin' on the young guy at 
 all till we seen him look over at us scared-like, 
 and he tuck to his heels." 
 
 It was a cozy scene — Flynn, in his shirt sleeves 
 and slippers, smoking his pipe in the dining-room 
 of a Harlem apartment, while his wife, a plump, 
 pretty woman, was putting away the spoons and 
 forks in the drawer of the yellow-oak sideboard. 
 The noisy Flynn children being packed off to 
 bed, the father could unbend and become 
 confidential. 
 
 "It's about three weeks now since Jackman 
 put me wise to money leakin' from Collingham & 
 Law's, and we couldn't tell where the hole was. 
 First we'd size up one fella, and then another; 
 but we'd say it couldn't be him or him. We 
 looked over this young Follett with the rest, but 
 only with the rest, and found but wan thing 
 ag'in' him." 
 
 "Didn't he lose his father a short while back?" 
 
 "Yes; and that was what made us think of 
 him. Old Follett was fired from the bank eight 
 or nine months ago, and yet the family had gone 
 on livin' very much as they always done." 
 
 "That 'd be to their gredit, wouldn't it?" Mrs. 
 Flynn suggested, kindly. 
 
 "It'd be to some one's credit; and the thing 
 we wanted to know was if it was to Collingham 
 & Law's. But we hadn't a thing on him. We 
 found out he'd paid for the old man's funeral, 
 and the grave, and all that; but whether old 
 -Follett had left a little wad or whether the 
 
 232 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 young guy'd found it lyin* around loose, we 
 couldn't make out at all. And then this after- 
 noon, as Jackman and me was talkin' it over on 
 the other side o' Broad Street, who should come 
 out but me little lord! Well, wan look give the 
 whole show away. The third degree couldn't ha' 
 been neater. The very eyes of him when he seen 
 us on the other side o' the street says, 'My God! 
 they've got me!' So off he goes — and off we 
 goes — up Broad Street — into Wall Street — across 
 to Nassau Street — up Nassau Street — round the 
 corner into John Street — up to Broadway — over 
 Broadway — and then we lost him. But we've 
 done the trick. To-morrow, when he comes to 
 the bank, we'll have him on the grill. Sooner or 
 later he'd ha' been on the grill, anyhow." 
 
 "But suppose he doesn't come?" 
 
 *'That '11 be a worse give-away than ever." 
 
 She turned from the drawer, asking of the 
 FoUett family and learning whatever he had to tell. 
 
 "And you say he's a fine boy of about twenty- 
 one. 
 
 "That 'd about be his age. Yes, a fine, up- 
 standing lad — and very pop'lar with Jackman 
 he's always been." 
 
 She waited a minute before saying, "Oh, Peter, 
 I wish you'd let him off." 
 
 "Ah, now, Tessie," he expostulated, "there 
 you go again ! If you had your way, there'd be 
 no law at all." 
 
 "Well, I wish there wasn't." 
 
 He laughed with a jolly guffaw. 
 233 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "If there was no law, and no one to break it, 
 "where'd your trip to the beach be this summer, and 
 the new Ford car I'm goin' to get for the boys? 
 Anyhow, even if we do get him with the goods 
 on him, which we're pretty sure o' doin' now, 
 he'll be recommended to mercy on account of 
 his youth, and p'raps be let off with two years." 
 
 "Yes — and what '11 he be when he comes out?" 
 
 Getting up, he pulled her to him, with his 
 arm across her shoulder. 
 
 "Ah, now, Tessie, don't be lookin' so far 
 ahead. That's you all over." 
 
 And he kissed her. 
 
 Gladys, that evening, kissed her mother, in 
 the hope of kissing away her foreboding. Lizzie 
 had not been satisfied with Teddy's story on the 
 telephone. 
 
 "I don't understand why he didn't ask to 
 speak to me," she kept repeating. 
 
 "Oh, momma," Gussie explained to her, 
 "don't you see? It was a long-distance call. 
 Three minutes is all he was allowed, and of 
 course he didn't want to pay double. Here's his 
 chance to make money that we've all been 
 praying for since the year one; and you pull a 
 long face over it. Cheer up, momma, do! Smile! 
 Smile more! There! That's better. Ted said 
 himself that you were not to miss him." 
 
 So Lizzie did her best to smile, only saying in 
 her heart, "I don't understand his not speaking 
 to me." 
 
 234 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 TEDDY woke to a brilliant August sunshine, 
 and that calling of marsh birds which is 
 not song. He woke with a start and with terror. 
 He was still on the bench, though turned over on 
 his side, and with the pistol in view. He needed 
 a minute to get his wits together, to piece out 
 the meaning of the blackened walls, the sagging 
 floor, and the sunlight streaming through the rent 
 in the roof. A hole that had once been a door 
 and another that had once been a window let the 
 summer wind play over his hot face, bringing a 
 soft refreshment. 
 
 Dragging himself to a sitting posture, his first 
 sensation was one of relief. "I'm alive!" He 
 hadn't done the thing he had planned last night ! 
 Merciful sleep had nailed him to the bench, 
 keeping him motionless, unconscious. The pistol 
 had lain within reach of his hand, and was there 
 still; it could do duty still, but for the moment 
 he was alive. Had he ever asked God for help 
 or thanked Him when it came, he would have 
 gone down on his knees and done it now; but 
 the habit was foreign to the FoUett family. He 
 could only thank the purposeless Chance, which 
 is the god most of us know best. 
 
 But he was glad. Twelve hours previously he 
 had not supposed it possible ever to be glad 
 
 235 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 again. It had been a nightmare, he reasoned now, 
 or, if not a nightmare, it had been thought out 
 of focus. He hadn't seen straight and normally. 
 It was as if he had been drunk or mildly insane. 
 He recalled experiences during naval nights 
 ashore, at Brest or Bordeaux or Hampton Roads, 
 when, after a glass or two of something, his 
 mind had taken on this fevered twist in which 
 all life had gone red. 
 
 Bickley had read this from the lines of his 
 profile. "Forehead sHghtly concave; mouth 
 and chin distinctly convex; tends to act before 
 he thinks." The other traits had been satisfac- 
 tory, indicating pluck, patience, fidelity, and 
 cheerfulness of outlook. 
 
 The cheerfulness of outlook asserted itself 
 now. Since he was alive on a glorious summer 
 morning, the two great assets of a man, himself 
 and the outside world, were still at his command. 
 Nevertheless, he didn't blink the facts. 
 
 "I'm not a thief — but I took the money. 
 They're after me, and they mustn't get me. I'll 
 shoot myself first; but I don't have to shoot 
 myself — yet." 
 
 He would not have to shoot himself so long 
 as he was safe, and safety might take many turns. 
 The abandoned, half-burnt sty in which he had 
 found refuge was a fortress in its very loneliness. 
 Close to the road, close to Jersey City, not very 
 far from Pemberton Heights, it had probably no 
 visitor but a toad or a bird or a truant boy from 
 twelvemonth to twelvemonth. 
 
 236 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 His chief danger was that of being seen. The 
 door and the window were both on the side 
 toward the road. By avoiding the one and 
 ducking under the other, he could move, but he 
 could move very little. That little, however, 
 would stretch his muscles and relieve the in- 
 tolerable idleness. 
 
 The idleness, he knew, would be irksome. By 
 looking at his watch, which had not run down, 
 he found it was six o'clock. The six o'clock stir 
 was also in the air. Motors had begun to dash 
 along the road, and market garden teams were 
 lumbering toward the big town. He was hungry 
 again, but with his seven doughnuts still in the 
 bag he couldn't starve to death. 
 
 By getting on the floor he found a peephole 
 just above the level of the grass through which 
 he could see without detection. This must be 
 his spying place. Unlikely as it was that anyone 
 would track him to this lair, he must be carefully 
 on the lookout. What he should do if threatened 
 with a visitor was not very clear to him. There 
 being no exit except by the door, and the door 
 being toward the road from which a visitor would 
 naturally approach, there was no escape on that 
 side. Escape being out of the question, there 
 would only remain — the other thing. The other 
 thing was always the great possibility. He hadn't 
 abandoned the thought of it; he had only post- 
 poned the necessity. He would live as long as he 
 could; and yet the necessity of the other thing 
 would probably arise. If it arose, he hoped he 
 
 ^37 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 should get through it by that tendency which he 
 recognized in himself as clearly as Mr. Bickley 
 had read it from his profile — ^to act before he 
 thought. 
 
 With this as a possibility, he got dovsTi to his 
 peephole, put the pistol near him on the floor, 
 and began on his doughnuts. For breakfast, he 
 allowed himself three, keeping the rest for his 
 midday needs. When darkness fell he would 
 steal out and buy more. He could do this as 
 long as his money held out, and before it was 
 spent something would probably have happened. 
 What that something would be he did not fore- 
 cast. He was in a fix where forecasting wasn't 
 possible. The minute was the only thing, and a 
 thing that had grown precious. 
 
 Even the family had somehow become subor- 
 dinate to that. In the strangeness of his night, 
 he seemed to have traveled away from them. A 
 man clinging to a spar on the ocean might have 
 had this sense of remoteness from his dear ones 
 safe on shore. Since they were safe on shore, 
 that would be the main thing. Since his mother 
 and sisters could come and go in Indiana Avenue, 
 he could wish them nothing more. That was 
 the all-essential, and they had it. Want, anxiety, 
 grief, "and no Teddy coming home in the eve- 
 nings," were trifles as compared with this priceless 
 blessing of security. 
 
 So he settled down amid filth and slime and the 
 debris of charred wood to watch and wait and 
 cling to his life till he could cling to it no longer. 
 
 238 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Later that morning, Mrs. Collingham motored 
 from Marillo to see Hubert Wray's much-dis- 
 cussed picture, "Life and Death," in a famous 
 dealer's gallery in Fifth Avenue. It had hung 
 there a week, and though the season was dead, it 
 was being talked about. Among the few in New 
 York who care for the art of painting, the picture 
 had "caught on." The important critics had 
 honored it with articles, in which one wrote 
 black and another white with an equal authority. 
 The important middlemen had come in to look 
 at it, saying to one another, "Here's a fellow 
 who'll go far — en voild un qui vafaire son chemin." 
 The important connoisseurs had made a point of 
 viewing it, with their customary fear of expressing 
 admiration for the work of a native son. From 
 the few who knew, the interest was spreading to 
 the many who didn't know but were anxious to 
 appear as if they did. 
 
 Junia's introduction to the picture had caused 
 her some chagrin. She had not ranked Hubert 
 among the important family acquaintances, and 
 when he came down to Collingham Lodge, for a 
 night or two, as occasionally he did, she pre- 
 sented him to only the more negligible neighbors. 
 "A young man Bob met in France," was all the 
 explanation he required. 
 
 But in dining out recently she had been led 
 in to dinner by a man of unusual enlightenment, 
 with whose flair and discernment she liked to 
 keep abreast. To do this she was accustomed 
 to fall back on such scraps of reviews or art notes 
 
 239 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 as drifted to her through the papers, bringing 
 them out with that knack of "putting her best 
 goods in the window" which was part of her 
 social equipment. Books and the theater being 
 too light for her attention, she was fond of 
 displaying in music and painting the expertise of 
 a patroness. She could not only talk of Boldini 
 and Cezanne, of Paul Dukas and Vincent d'Indy, 
 but could throw off the names of younger men 
 just coming into view as if eagerly following 
 their development. 
 
 Her neighbor's comments on the new picture, 
 "Life and Death," at the Kahler Gallery were of 
 value to her chiefly because they were up to 
 date and told her what to say. "A reaction 
 against the cubists and post-impressionists in 
 favor of an art rich in color, suggestion, and sig- 
 nificance," was a useful phrase and one easy to 
 remember. But not having caught the painter's 
 name, she felt it something of a shock when, 
 with the impressiveness of one whose notice 
 confers recognition, her escort went on to re- 
 mark : " I'm going to look up this young 
 Hubert Wray and ask him down to Marillo. 
 You and Bradley will be interested in meeting 
 him." 
 
 Junia's chagrin was inward, of course, and 
 arose from the fact of having had a budding 
 celebrity like a tame cat about the house, not 
 merely without suspecting it, but without keeping 
 in touch with the thing he was creating. At the 
 same time, she couldn't have been the woman 
 240 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 she was had it not been for the faculty of tuning 
 herself up to any necessary key. 
 
 Her smile was of the kind that grants no 
 superiority even to a man of unusual en- 
 lightenment. 
 
 "You can't imagine how interested I am in 
 hearing your opinion of the dear boy's work, and 
 so I've been letting you run on. He happens to 
 be a very intimate friend of ours — ^he comes 
 down to stay with us every few weeks — and I've 
 been watching his development so keenly. I 
 really do think that with this picture he'll arrive; 
 and to have a man like you agree with me delights 
 me beyond words." 
 
 It was also the excuse she needed for calling 
 Hubert up. More than two months had passed 
 since her meeting with Jennie, and the twenty- 
 five thousand dollars was still lying to her credit 
 at the bank. She was not unaware of a reason 
 for this, in that Bradley had told her of old 
 FoUett's death, and even a "bad girl" like 
 Jennie must be allowed some leeway for grief. 
 But FoUett had been nearly two weeks in his 
 grave, and still the application for the twenty- 
 five thousand didn't come. Unless a pretext 
 could be found for keeping Bob in South Amer- 
 ica, he would soon be on his way homeward, and 
 she, Junia, was growing anxious. To be face to 
 face with Hubert would give her the oppor- 
 tunity she was looking for. 
 
 He met her at the street entrance to the Kahler 
 Gallery, conducting her through the main exposi- 
 
 241 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 tion of canvases to a little shrine in the rear. 
 It was truly a shrine, hung in black velvet, 
 and with no lighting but that which fell in- 
 directly on the vivid, vital thing just sprung 
 into consciousness of life, like Aphrodite risen 
 from the sea foam. But, just sprung into con- 
 sciousness of life, she had been called on at once 
 to contemplate death, eying it with a mysterious 
 spiritual courage. The living gleam of flesh, the 
 marble of the throne, and the skull's charnel 
 ugliness stood out against a blue-green at- 
 mosphere, like that of some other plane. 
 
 Junia was startled, not by the power and 
 beauty of this apparition, but by something 
 else. 
 
 "You've — you've changed her," she said, with 
 awed breathlessness, after gazing for three or 
 four minutes in silence. 
 
 "You mean the model?" 
 
 She nodded a "Yes," without taking her eyes 
 from the extraordinary vision. 
 
 "You've seen her?" he asked, in mild surprise. 
 
 "Just once." 
 
 "The figure is exact," he explained, "but I 
 did have to make changes in the features. It 
 wouldn't have done, otherwise." 
 
 "No, of course not." 
 
 More minutes passed in silent contemplation, 
 when she said: 
 
 " I thought there was more of the gleam of the 
 red in amber in the hair. This hair is a brown 
 with a little red in it." 
 
 242 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I got it as nearly as I could," he felt it 
 enough to say. "The shade and sheen and silki- 
 ness of hair are always difficult." 
 
 After more minutes of hushed gazing, Junia 
 made a venture. She spoke in that insinuating, 
 sympathetic tone which in moments of tensity 
 a woman can sometimes take toward a man. 
 
 "You're in love with her — aren't you?" 
 
 He jerked his head in the direction of the nude 
 woman. 
 
 "With her? That model? Why, no! What 
 made you think so?" 
 
 Junia was disconcerted. 
 
 "Oh, only — only the hints that have seeped 
 through when you didn't think you were giving 
 anything away." 
 
 He said, with some firmness: 
 
 " I never meant to give that away — or to hint 
 that it was — that it was love — a rouleuse of the 
 studios, whom any fellow can pick up." 
 
 Junia felt like a person roaming aimlessly 
 through sand who suddenly stumbles on gold. 
 There was more here than, for the moment, she 
 could estimate. All she could see were pos- 
 sibilities; but there was one other point as to 
 which she needed to be sure. It was conceivable 
 that the thing might have been painted long ago, 
 before Bob's departure for South America, in 
 which case it would lose at least some of its value 
 for her purpose. 
 
 "When did you do this, Hubert?" 
 
 "Oh, just within the last few weeks." 
 243 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 This was enough. With her usual swiftness of 
 decision, she had her plans in mind. 
 
 "What are you asking?" 
 
 He named his price. It was a large one, but 
 her balance at the bank was large. It could be 
 put to this use as well as to another. 
 
 "I'll take it," she said, after a minute's con- 
 sideration, "if you could let me have it within a 
 few days." 
 
 Not to betray the eagerness he felt, he said 
 that it would give him publicity to keep it on 
 view as long as possible. 
 
 "It will be almost as much publicity to have it 
 on view at Marillo." 
 
 And in the end he agreed that this was so. 
 
 He walked back to the studio as if wings on his 
 feet were lifting him above the pavement. It 
 was the seal on his success. "Sold to a private 
 collector" would be a bomb to throw among the 
 dealers, who had been taking their time and 
 dickering. It was more than the seal on this one 
 success; it was a harbinger of the next success. 
 And with this thing behind him, the next success 
 was calling to him to begin. 
 
 He already knew what he should begin on. 
 It was to be called, "Eve Tempting the Serpent." 
 He was not yet sure how he should treat the idea, 
 but a lethargic semihuman reptile was to be 
 roused to the concept of evil by a woman's 
 beauty and abandonment. The thing would be 
 daring; but it couldn't be too daring, or it would 
 bring down on him the recrudescent blue-law 
 244 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 spirit already so vigorous through the country. 
 He couldn't afford a tussle with that until he was 
 better estabhshed. 
 
 But he had made some sketches, and had 
 written to Jennie that he should like to talk the 
 matter over on that very afternoon. She had 
 written in reply that, at last, she would be free 
 to come. For the first few days after the funeral 
 she had been either too griefstricken or too busy; 
 but now the claims of life were asserting them- 
 selves again and she was trying to respond to 
 them. He must not expect her to be gay; but 
 she would grow more cheerful in time. 
 
 So he went back to the studio to lunch and 
 to wait for her coming. Till she had ceased 
 coming he hadn't known how much the daily 
 expectation of seeing her had meant to him. The 
 very occasions on which she had, as he expressed 
 it, played him false had brought an excitement 
 which he would have been emotionally poorer 
 for having missed. He could not go through the 
 experience often; he could, perhaps, not go 
 through it again. But for that test he was ap- 
 parently not to be called upon. She was coming. 
 She knew what she was coming for. The very 
 fact that she had written meant surrender. 
 
 And that, indeed, was what Jennie had been 
 saying to herself all through the morning. Now 
 that there had been this interval, she knew that 
 her latitude for saying "Yes'* and acting "No" 
 was at an end. If she went at all, she must go all 
 the way. To go once more and draw back once 
 
 24s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 more would not be playing the game. She was 
 clear in her mind that the day would be decisive. 
 As to her decision, she was not so sure. 
 
 That is, she was not sure of its wisdom, though 
 sure what she would do. She would do what she 
 had meant to do more than two months earlier. 
 There was no reason why she shouldn't, and the 
 same set of reasons why she should. Not only 
 were the money and release imperative, but 
 Hubert meant more to her than ever. His sym- 
 pathy through her sorrow had touched her by 
 its very novelty. He had written, sent flowers, 
 and kept himself in the background. Bob would 
 have done more and moved her less, for the reason 
 that doing all and giving all were in his nature. 
 The rare thing being the most precious thing, 
 she treasured the perfunctory phrases in Hubert's 
 scrawl of condolence above all the outpourings of 
 Bob's heart. 
 
 Nevertheless, she treasured them with mis- 
 givings. The consciousness of being married had 
 acquired some strength from watching the effect 
 of her father's death on her mother. She had 
 known, ever since growing up, that her father 
 and mother had been unequally mated. It was 
 not wholly a question of practical failure or 
 success — it was rather that the balance of moral 
 support had been so shifted between them that 
 the mother had nothing to sustain her. "Poor 
 monjma," had been Jennie's way of putting it, 
 "has to take the burden of everjrthing. She's 
 got us on her shoulders, and poppa, too." And 
 
 24.6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 yet, with Josiah's death, some prop of Lizzie's 
 inner life seemed to have been snatched away. 
 She was not weaker, perhaps, but she was more 
 detached, and stranger. To her children, to her 
 neighbors, she had always been strange, always 
 detached, but now the aloofness had become 
 more significant. With Josiah alone she had 
 Uved in that communion of things shared which 
 leads to understanding. Now that he was gone, 
 something had gone with him, leaving Lizzie 
 like an empty house. 
 
 Jennie was thrown back on what Bob had 
 repeated so often: "You're the other half of me; 
 I'm the other half of you." Whether it came 
 through some impulse of affinity, or whether it 
 was the chance of conscientiously living to- 
 gether, Jennie wasn't sure; but it began to seem 
 as if in the mere fact of marriage there was a 
 naturally unifying principle. To go against it 
 was, in a measure, to go against the forces of the 
 universe; and though she had only been nomi- 
 nally married to Bob, she was preparing to go 
 against it. Had she been a rebel at heart, it 
 would have been easier; but she was docile, 
 loving, eager to be loved, with nothing more 
 daring in her soul than the wish to live at peace 
 with the world she saw round her. 
 
 Bob's letters were disturbing, too. In the way 
 of a happy future, he took everything for granted. 
 He reasoned as if, now that they had gone 
 through a certain form together and signed it 
 with a parson's name, she had no more liberty 
 17 247 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of will than a woman in a harem. Little as she 
 was rebellious, she rebelled against that, pre- 
 ferring an element of chance in her love to a love, 
 in which there was no choice. Bob wrote as if 
 her love was of no importance, as if he could 
 Iqve enough for two — did, in fact, love enou^ 
 for two — so that the whole need of loving was 
 taken off her hands. 
 
 I feel as if my love was the air and you were a plant to 
 grow in it. It's the sunshine to which your leaves and 
 blossoms will only have to turn. 
 
 "That's all very well for him," she said, falling 
 back with a grimace on the language Gussie 
 brought home with her from vaudeville shows, 
 "but I ain't no blooming plant." 
 
 Hubert's love, she thought at other times, 
 was like a rare and precious cordial, of which a 
 few drops carefully doled out ran like fire through 
 the veins. Bob's was a rushing torrent which, 
 without saying with your leave or by your leave, 
 carried you away. She preferred the cordial, of 
 which you could take up the glass and put it 
 down according as you wanted less or more; but, 
 on the other hand, when there was a flood which, 
 without asking your permission, poured all over 
 you, what were you to do ? She knew what she 
 meant to do; but it was the difficulty of doing it 
 and facing that terrific tide which made her 
 stand aghast. If Bob would only let her alone. . . . 
 
 But, then, Bob couldn't let her alone. He 
 248 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 himself would have argued that you might as 
 well ask a man to let a hand or a foot alone while 
 it is aching. At the minute when Jennie was 
 thinking these thoughts as she flitted about the 
 house, he was seated at an open hotel window on 
 the Santa Thereza hill above Rio de Janeiro, look- 
 ing down on an iridescent city creeping round 
 the foam-fringed edges of a turquoise sea, and 
 saying to himself: "I'm watching over you, 
 Jennie. I'm here, but my love is there and fills 
 all the space between us. I came away and left 
 you exposed to all sorts of trouble. I shouldn't 
 have done that; I'm sorry now I did. I thought 
 that if we were married the rest would take 
 care of itself; but I see now it couldn't. You're 
 having a harder time than I ever supposed 
 you'd have, and you're having it all alone; but 
 my love is with you, Jennie, and the worst can't 
 happen while it protects you. Dangers will 
 threaten you, but you'll go to meet them with 
 my love closing you in, and something will ward 
 them off." 
 
 "I wish he'd stop thinking about me like 
 that." 
 
 Jennie's reference, while she stood at the 
 mirror putting the last touches to her costume, 
 was to this same thought as expressed, in the 
 letters she received from South America. Its 
 appeal to her imagination was such as to create 
 an atmosphere wrapping her about as a halo 
 wraps a saint. She couldn't get away from it. 
 In going to meet Hubert, as she would do in a 
 
 249 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 few minutes, it would go with her, an embarrass- 
 ing witness of the sin against itself. 
 
 For the minute, the action of her mind was 
 twofold. She was making this protest as to Bob 
 and was also giving minute attention to her 
 dress. Not only was it her first appearance in 
 public since her father's funeral but it was a 
 moment at which the victim must be neatly 
 decked for the altar. Having no money to spend 
 on "mourning," she had put deft touches of black 
 on a last year's white summer suit, to which a 
 black hat thrown together by Gussie, with the 
 black shoes and stockings already in her pos- 
 session, added their mute witness that she was 
 grieving for a relative. Having, moreover, the 
 native chic which counts for most in the art of 
 dressing, she was one more instance of the girl 
 of the humbler walks in life who, by some secret 
 of her own, confounds the product of the Rue de 
 la Paix. 
 
 She was to leave for the studio as soon as her 
 mother got up from her early-afternoon rest. 
 The early-afternoon rest had become a necessity 
 for Lizzie ever since the day when Josiah had 
 been laid away. 
 
 "You'll call me if Teddy rings," she had stipu- 
 lated, before lying down, and Jennie had prom- 
 ised faithfully. 
 
 As to Teddy's message, nominally sent from 
 Paterson, Lizzie had betrayed a skepticism which 
 the three girls found disconcerting. She said 
 nothing, but it was precisely the saying nothing 
 
 250 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 that puzzled them. When they themselves grew 
 expansive over the things they would buy with 
 the money Teddy was going to make, the moth- 
 er's faint smile was alarming. It was alarming 
 chiefly because it combined with other things to 
 produce that eflFect of strangeness they had all 
 noticed in her since their father died. Though 
 they couldn't define it for themselves, it was as 
 if she had renounced any further effort to make 
 life fulfill itself. She was like a man on a sinking 
 ship, who, after casting about as to how he may 
 save himself, knows there is no choice left but to 
 go down, and so becomes resigned. Having 
 thrown up her hands, Lizzie was waiting for the 
 waters to close over her. Jennie was thus uneasy 
 about her mother, as she was uneasy about Bob, 
 uneasy about Hubert, and, most of all, uneasy 
 about herself. 
 
 By the time she was ready she heard Lizzie 
 stirring in her bedroom. It was the signal agreed 
 upon. She was free to go, which meant that she 
 was free to turn her back on all her more or less 
 sheltered past and strike out toward a terrifying 
 future. She felt as she had always supposed she 
 would feel on leaving her home on her wedding 
 day; and she would do as she had decided she 
 
 . would do in that event. She would go without 
 making a fuss, without anything to record that 
 the going was different from other goings, or 
 
 "^ that the return would be different from other 
 returns. She would make her departure casual, 
 without consciousness, without admitted inten- 
 
 251 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 tions. She merely called to her mother, there- 
 fore, through the closed door, that she was on 
 her way, and her mother had called out in 
 response, "Very well." This leave-taking mak- 
 ing things easier — all Jennie had to do was to 
 gulp back a sob. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 BUT as Jennie opened the door to let herself 
 out, two men were standing on the cement 
 sidewalk in front of the grassplots, examining the 
 house. They were big, heavily built men, who, 
 although in plain clothes, suggested the guardian- 
 ship of law. It came to Jennie instantly that 
 their examination of the house was peculiar; and 
 of that peculiarity she divined with equal 
 promptness the significance. The men de- 
 clared afterward that in her manner of standing 
 on the step and waiting till they spoke to her 
 there was the same kind of "give-away" as when 
 her brother had eyed them across Broad Street. 
 
 The older and heavier of the two advanced 
 up the walk between the grassplots. 
 
 "This is the FoUett house, ain't it, miss?" 
 
 Jennie replied that it was. 
 
 "And you're Miss FoUett?" 
 
 She assented again. 
 
 " Is your brother in ? " 
 
 "N-no; he's not in town." 
 
 The big man turned toward his taller and 
 slighter colleague, whatever he had to say being 
 communicated by a look. Having expressed this 
 thought, he veered round again toward Jennie, 
 speaking politely. 
 
 253 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Maybe we could have a word with you, 
 private-like." 
 
 "Won't you step in?" 
 
 Presently they were all three seated in the 
 living room, the big man continuing as spokes- 
 man. 
 
 "Ah, now, about your brother. Miss FoUettj 
 you're sure he isn't anywheres around?" 
 
 The inference from the tone was that somehow 
 Jennie was secreting him. 
 
 "He isn't to my knowledge. He called up 
 last evening to say that he wouldn't be home 
 to-day, and perhaps not to-morrow." 
 
 The two men being seated within range of 
 each other's eyes, some new understanding was 
 flashed silently. 
 
 "Did he, then? And where would he have 
 called up from?" 
 
 "From Paterson." 
 
 "From Paterson, was it? And what made you 
 think it was from Paterson ? " 
 
 "He said so." 
 
 "And that was all you had to go by?" 
 
 "That was all." 
 
 "Well, well, now! He said so, did he? And 
 he didn't come home last night?" 
 
 Jennie shook her head. 
 
 For a third time Flynn's eyes telegraphed 
 something to Jackman's, and Jackman's re- 
 sponded. What they said to each other Jennie 
 didn't try to surmise, for the reason that she was 
 listening to a call. It was the call that Teddy 
 2S4 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 had heard on the night when his father had 
 brought home the news that he was "fired" — 
 the call to assume responsibilities. Her father 
 had gone; her mother was collapsing; Teddy had 
 broken beneath the strain. "And now it's up to 
 me." Mentally, she spoke the words almost 
 before she was conscious of the thought. "And 
 that settles it." These words, too, she spoke 
 mentally, but in them the reference was different. 
 The vision of love and twenty-five thousand 
 dollars, of bliss for herself and relief for the 
 family, which had waxed and waned so often, 
 now faded out forever behind a mass of storm- 
 clouds. But of all this she gave no sign as she 
 waited for the burly man to speak again. 
 
 "And when your brother called up from 
 Paterson — ^^let us say it was Paterson — didn't 
 you ask him no questions at alli*^" 
 
 "He didn't speak to me. I wasn't at home. 
 It was to my little sister. I understood that he 
 rang off before she could ask him anything." 
 
 "Oh, he did, did he?" The telegraphy be- 
 tween the two men was renewed. "And didn't 
 he say nothin' about what had tuck him to a 
 place like Paterson?" 
 
 " I think he said it was business." 
 
 "'Business,' was it? Ah, well, now! And 
 what sort of business would that be?" 
 
 "I don't know." 
 
 "And would you tell me now if you did 
 know ? " 
 
 Jennie looked at him with clear, limpid eyes. 
 25S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I'm not sure that I would. I don't know 
 "what right you have to ask me questions as it is." 
 
 "This right." Turning back the lapel of his 
 coat, he displayed a badge. "We don't want to 
 frighten you, Miss FoUett, my friend and me, 
 Tve don't; but if you know anything about the 
 boy, it '11 be easier in the long run both for him 
 and for you — " 
 
 "What do you want him for?" 
 
 Lizzie's voice was so deep that it startled. On 
 ^e threshold of the little entry she stood, tall, 
 black robed, almost unearthly. At the same 
 time Pansy, who had also come downstairs, crept 
 -toward Flynn with a low, vicious growl. Both 
 men stumbled to their feet, awed by something 
 in Lizzie which was more than the majesty of 
 _grief. 
 
 "Ah, now, we're sorry to disturb you, ma'am, 
 my friend and me. We know you've had trouble, 
 and we wouldn't be for wantin' to bring more 
 into a house where there's enough of it already. 
 But when things is duty, they can't be put by 
 just because they're unpleasant — " 
 
 "Has my son been taking money from Col- 
 lingham & Law's?" 
 
 The spectral voice gave force to the directness 
 of the question. Abandoning the hint of pro- 
 fessional bullying he had taken toward Jennie, 
 Flynn, with Pansy's teeth not six inches from his 
 calf, went a pace or two toward the figure in the 
 'entry. 
 
 "Has he been takin' money, that boy of yours? 
 256 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Well now, and have you any reason to think so, 
 ma'am?" 
 
 "None — apart from what I hoped." 
 
 "Momma!" 
 
 Jennie sprang to her mother, grasping her by 
 the arm. While Jackman stood like an iron 
 figure in the background, Flynn, always with 
 Pansy's teeth keeping some six inches from his 
 calf, advanced still another pace or two. 
 
 "Ah, now, that's a quare thing, ma'am, for 
 the mother of a lad to say — ^that she hoped he 
 was takin' money." 
 
 "Oh, don't mind her," Jennie pleaded. "She 
 hasn't been just — ^just right — ever since my 
 father died." 
 
 "I didn't think of it at first," Lizzie stated, 
 in a lifeless voice. "I believed what he told us, 
 that he was making money on the side. It was 
 only latterly that I began to suspect that he 
 wasn't; and now I hope he took it from the 
 bank." 
 
 "But, good God! ma'am, why? Don't you 
 know he'll be caught — and what he'll get for it ? " 
 
 "Oh, he'd get that just the same, if you mean 
 suffering and punishment and a life of misery. 
 All I want is that he should be the first to 
 strike. Since he's got to go down before brute 
 power — " 
 
 "Brute power of law and order, ma'am, if 
 you'll allow me to remind you." 
 
 She uttered a little joyless laugh. 
 
 "Law and order! You'll excuse me for 
 257 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 laughing, won't you? I've heard so much of 
 them—" 
 
 "And you're likely to hear a lot more, if this 
 is the way o' things." 
 
 "Oh, I expect to. They'll do me to death, a& 
 they'll do you, and as they do everyone else. 
 Law and order are the golden images set up for 
 us to bow down to and worship as gods; and we 
 get the reward that's always dealt out to those 
 who believe in falsehood." 
 
 Flynn appealed to both Jennie and Jackman. 
 
 "I never heard no one talk Uke that, whether 
 dotty or sane." 
 
 "If it was real law and order," Lizzie con- 
 tinued, with the same passionless intonation, 
 "that would be another thing. But it isn't. 
 It's faked law and order. It's a plaster on a sore, 
 meant to hide the ugly thing and not to heal it. 
 It's to keep bad bad by pretending that it's 
 good—" 
 
 "Ah, but bad as it is, ma'am," Flynn began to 
 reason, "it's better than stealin' — now, isn't it?" 
 
 But Lizzie seemed ready for him here. 
 
 "I think I've read in your Bible that the com- 
 mandment, 'Thou shalt not steal,' was given to 
 a people among whom it was a principle that 
 everyone should be provided for. If it happened 
 that anyone was not provided for, there was 
 another commandment given as to him, 'Thou 
 shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the 
 corn.' He was to be free to take what he needed." 
 
 Flynn shook his head. 
 258 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "That may be in the Bible, ma'am; but it 
 wouldn't stand in a court o' law." 
 
 "Of course it wouldn't; only, the court of 
 law is nothing to me." 
 
 "It can make itself something to you, ma'am, 
 if you don't mind my sayin' so." 
 
 "Oh no, it can't! It can try me and sentence 
 me and lock me up; but that's no worse than 
 law and order are doing to me and mine every 
 hour of the day." 
 
 "Oh, momma," Jennie pleaded, clinging to her 
 mother's arm, "please stop — please!" 
 
 "I'm only warning him, darling. Law and 
 order will bring him to grief as it does everyone 
 else. How many did it kill in the war? Some- 
 thing like twelve millions, wasn't it, and could 
 anyone ever reckon up the number of aching 
 hearts it's left alive?" 
 
 "Yes, momma; but that kind of talk doesn't 
 do Teddy any good." 
 
 "It does if we make it plain that he was only 
 acting within his rights. These people think 
 that by passing a law they impose a moral duty. 
 What nonsense! I want my son to be brave 
 enough to strike at such a theory as that. It's 
 true that they '11 strike back at him, and that 
 they have the power to crush him — only, in the 
 long run he'll be the victor." 
 
 Flynn looked at Jennie in sympathetic apology. 
 
 "All right now. Miss FoUett. I guess my 
 friend arid me'U be goin' along — " 
 
 "You'll do just as you like about that," Lizzie 
 2S9 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 interposed, with dignity; "but if you see my 
 son before I do, tell him not to be sorry for 
 what he's done, and above all not to think that I 
 blame him. 'Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that 
 treadeth out the corn.' When you do, the eighth 
 commandment doesn't apply any longer." 
 
 Jennie followed her visitors to the doorstep. 
 After her mother's reckless talk, they seemed Uke 
 friends, as, indeed, at bottom of their kindly 
 hearts they could easily have been. They 
 brought no ill will to their job — only a convic- 
 tion that if Teddy FoUett was a thief, they must 
 "get him." 
 
 "Does — does Mr. CoUingham know that all 
 this is going on?" 
 
 She asked her question in trepidation, lest 
 these men, trained to ferret out whatever was 
 most hidden, should be able to read her secret. 
 It was Jackman who shouldered the duty of 
 answering. He seemed more laconic than his 
 colleague, and more literate. 
 
 "We don't trouble Mr. CoUingham with 
 trifles. If it was a big thing — " 
 
 So Jennie was left with that consolation — ^that 
 it was not a big thing. How big it was she could 
 only guess at, but, whatever the magnitude, she 
 had no doubt at all but that it was "up to her." 
 She got some inspiration from the little word 
 "up." There was a lift in it that made her 
 courageous. 
 
 Nevertheless, when she returned to the living 
 room, finding her mother seated, erect and 
 
 260 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 stately, in an armchair, with Pansy gazing at 
 her with eyes of quenchless, infinite devotion, 
 Jennie knew a qualm of fear. 
 
 "Oh, momma, wouldn't it be awful if Teddy 
 had to go to jail?" 
 
 "It would be awful or not, just as you took 
 it. If you thought he went to jail as a thief, it 
 would be awful, but if you saw him only as the 
 martyr of a system, you'd be proud to know he 
 was there." 
 
 "Oh, but, momma, what's the good of saying 
 things like that?" 
 
 "What's the good of letting them throw you 
 down, a quivering bundle of flesh, before a Jugger- 
 naut, and just being meekly thankful? That's 
 what your father and I have always done, and, 
 now that the wheels have passed over him, I see 
 the folly of keeping silent. I may not do any good 
 by speaking, but at least I speak. When they 
 muzzle the ox that treadeth out the com, it isn't 
 much wonder if the famished beast goes mad. 
 Did you ever see a mad ox, Jennie? Well, it's 
 a terrible sight — the most patient and laborious 
 drudge among animals, goaded to a desperation 
 in which he's conscious of nothing but his 
 wrongs and his strength. They generally kill 
 him. It's all they can do with him — but, of 
 course, they can do that." 
 
 "So that it doesn't do the ox much good to go 
 mad, does it?" 
 
 "Oh yes; because he gets out of it. That's 
 the only relief for us, Jennie darling — ^to get out 
 
 261 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of it. I begin to understand how mothers can 
 so often kill themselves and their children. 
 They don't want to leave anyone they love to 
 endure the sufferings this world inflicts." 
 
 From these ravings Jennie was summoned by 
 the tinkle of the telephone bell. 
 
 "Teddy!" cried the mother, starting to her 
 feet. 
 
 "No; it's Mr. Wray. I knew he'd ring me if 
 I didn't turn up." 
 
 The instrument was in the entry, and Jennie 
 felt curiously calm and competent as she went 
 toward it. All decisions being taken out of her 
 hands, she no longer had to doubt and calculate. 
 The renunciations, too, were made for her. She 
 was not required to look back, only to go on. 
 
 In answer to the question, "Is this Mrs. 
 FoUett's house?" she replied, as if the occasion 
 were an ordinary one: 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Wray. I'm sorry I can't come to 
 the studio." 
 
 "Oh! so it's you! You can't come — ^what? 
 Then you needn't come any more." 
 
 "Yes; that's what I thought. I see now that 
 — that I can't." 
 
 "Well, of all — " He broke off in his expostu- 
 lation to say: "Jennie, for God's sake, what's 
 the matter with you ? What are you afraid of? " 
 
 "I'm not afraid of anything, Mr. Wray; but 
 there's a good deal the matter which I can't 
 explain on the telephone." 
 
 "Do you want me to come over there?" 
 262 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "No; you couldn't do any good." 
 
 "Is it money?" 
 
 "No." She remembered the accumulation of 
 untouched bills and checks in her glove-and- 
 handkerchief box upstairs. "I've got plenty of 
 money. There's nothing you could do, thank 
 you." 
 
 There was a pause before he said : 
 
 "Then it's all off? Is that what you mean?" 
 
 "Isn't it what you meant yourself only a 
 minute ago?" 
 
 "Oh, well, you needn't stake your life on 
 that." 
 
 She began to feel faint. It cost her more to 
 stand there talking than she had supposed it 
 would when she took up the receiver. 
 
 "I'm afraid I must — must stake my life on 
 that. I — I can't stay now. I can't come any 
 more to see you, either. I've — I've given up 
 posing. G — good-by." 
 
 She heard him beginning to protest from the 
 other end. 
 
 "No, Jennie! Wait! For God's sake!" 
 
 But her putting-up of the receiver cut them 
 off from each other. 
 
 "So that's all over," she said to herself, turning 
 again into the living room. 
 
 But she said it strongly, as Lizzie had many 
 a time said similar things on witnessing the 
 death of hopes, with desolation in the heart, 
 perhaps, but no wish to cry. 
 
 Meanwhile, Flynn and Jackman, trudging 
 18 263 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 toward the car station in the square, were discuss- 
 ing this strange case. 
 
 "That was a funny line o* talk about the ox 
 treadin' out the corn. I never heard nothin' like 
 that in our church." 
 
 But Jackman, being a Methodist and a student 
 -of the Bible before coming to New York and 
 giving himself to detective work, was able to 
 explain. 
 
 "That's in the Old Testament, to begin with; 
 laut Paul takes it up and says that, though it 
 was meant, in the first place, to apply to the 
 animals, its real application is to man. 'That he 
 that ploweth may plow in hope, and that he 
 that thresheth in hope should be partaker of 
 his hope' — that's the way it runs. That every- 
 one should get a generous living wage and not 
 be cheated of it in the end is the way you might 
 put it into our kind of talk." 
 
 "Is it now? And it do seem fair — don't it? — 
 for all the old woman yonder is so daft. And 
 would that Paul be the same Saint Paul as we've 
 got in our church?" 
 
 "Oh, the very same." 
 
 "Would he now? And you a Protestant! 
 That's one thing I've often wondered — ^why 
 there had to be so many religions and everyone 
 wasn't a Catholic. It 'd be just as easy, and cost 
 us less. Ah, well! It's a quare world, and that 
 poor woman's had a powerful dose o' trouble. 
 I don't wonder she's got wheels in her head. 
 Do you? Maybe you and me'd have them if 
 
 264 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 we'd gone through the same." Having thus 
 worked up to his appeal, he plunged into it, "I 
 know wan little woman 'd be glad if I was to 
 come home to-night and tell her we'd called the 
 thing off. That's my Tessie. It's amazin' how 
 she's set her heart on my not trackin' down this 
 boy." 
 
 "Not to track him down would be to compound 
 a felony," Jackman replied, severely. 
 
 "Ah, well! So it would, now. You sure have 
 got the right dope there, Jackman, and that I'll 
 tell Tessie. I'll say I'd be compounding a felony^ 
 and them words '11 scare her good." 
 
 So Flynn, too, resigned himself, putting on 
 once more the mask of craft and implacability 
 that was part of his stock in trade, and which 
 Jackman rarely took off. 
 
 And all that day Teddy lay crouched in his 
 lair with his eye glued more or less faithfully to 
 the peephole. Except from hunger, he had 
 suffered but little, and the minutes had been 
 too exciting to seem long in going by. It was 
 negative excitement, springing from what didn't 
 happen; but because something might happen, 
 and happen at any instant, it was excitement. 
 From morning to midday, and from midday on 
 into the afternoon, cars, carts, and pedestrians 
 traveled in and out of Jersey City, each spelling 
 possible danger. Now and then a man or a 
 vehicle had paused in the road within calling 
 distance of the shanty. For two minutes, for 
 
 26s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 five, or for ten at a time, Teddy lay there won- 
 dering as to their intentions and trying to make 
 up his mind as to his own course. Whether to 
 shoot himself or make a bolt for it, or if he shot 
 himself whether it should be through the temple 
 or the heart, were points as to which he was still 
 undecided. He would get inspiration, he told 
 himself, when the time came. He had often 
 heard that in crises of peril the brain worked 
 quicker than in moments of tranquillity; and 
 perhaps, after all, a crisis of peril might not lie 
 before him. 
 
 In a measure, he was growing used to his 
 situation as an outlaw; he was growing used to 
 the separation from the family. It was not that 
 he loved them less, but that he had moved on 
 and left them behind. He could think of them 
 now without the longing to cry he had felt 
 yesterday, while the desperation of his plight 
 centered his thought more and more upon him- 
 self. If he didn't have to shoot himself, he 
 planned, in as far as plans were possible, to sneak 
 away into the unknown and become a tramp. 
 He couldn't do it yet, because the roads were 
 probably being watched for him; but by and 
 by, when the hunt had become less keen. . . . 
 
 Seven doughnuts swallowed without a drop 
 of water being far from the nourishment to 
 which he was accustomed, he waited with pain- 
 ful eagerness for nightfall. When the primrose- 
 colored lights up and down the road and along 
 the ragged fringe of the town were deepening to 
 266 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 orange, he crept forth cautiously. Even while 
 half hidden by the sedgy grasses, he felt horribly 
 exposed, and when he emerged into the open 
 highway, the eyes of all the police in New York 
 seemed to spy him through the twilight. Never- 
 theless, he tramped back toward the dwellings 
 of men, doing his best to hide his face when 
 motor lights flashed over him too vividly. 
 
 Unable to think of anything better than to 
 return to the friendly woman who had given 
 him seven doughnuts for his six, he found her 
 behind her counter, in company with a wispy 
 little girl. 
 
 "Ah, good-evening. Zo you'f come ba-ack. 
 You fount my zandwiches naice." 
 
 Teddy replied that he had, ordering six, with 
 a dozen of her doughnuts. Her manner was so 
 affable that he failed to notice her piercing eyes 
 fixed upon him, nor did he realize how much a 
 young man's aspect can betray after twenty- 
 four hours without water to wash in, as well as 
 without hairbrush or razor. He thought of him- 
 self as presenting the same neat appearance as 
 on the previous evening; but the woman saw 
 him otherwise. 
 
 "I wonder if I could have a glass of water?'" 
 he asked, his throat almost too parched to let, 
 the words come out. 
 
 "But sairtainly." She turned to the child, 
 whispering in a foreign language, but using mor& 
 words than the command to fetch a glass of wat^*' 
 would require. 
 
 267 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 When the child came back, Teddy swallowed 
 the water in one long gulp. The woman asked 
 him if he would like another glass, to which he 
 replied that he would. More instructions fol- 
 lowed, and while the woman tied up the sand- 
 ^ches the little girl came back with the second 
 glass. This Teddy drank more slowly, not no- 
 ticing as he did so that the little girl slipped 
 away. 
 
 Nor did he notice as he left the shop and turned 
 westward into the gloaming, that the child was 
 returning from what seemed like a hasty visit to 
 a neighbor's house across the street. Still less 
 did he perceive, when the comforting loneliness of 
 the marshes began once more to close round him, 
 that a big, husky figure was stalking him. It 
 had come out of one of the tenements over the 
 way from the pastry shop, apparently at a sum- 
 mons from the wispy little girl. Like the men 
 whom Jennie had seen eying the house in the 
 afternoon, he suggested the guardianship of law, 
 even though he was, so to speak, in undress 
 uniform. His duties for the day being over, he 
 had plainly been taking his ease in slippers, 
 ' trousers, and shirt. Even now he was bare- 
 headed, pulling on his tunic as he went along. 
 He didn't go very far, only to a point at which 
 he could see the boy in front of him turn into the 
 unused path that led to the old shack. Where- 
 upon he nodded to himself and turned back to 
 Jiis evening meal. 
 
CHAPTER XIX , 
 
 JENNIE'S chief hesitation was as to cashing^ 
 the checks, not because the teller at the 
 Pemberton National Bank didn't know her, 
 but because he did. To present a demand 
 for money made out to Jane Scarborough 
 FoUett, and signed, "R. B. CoUingham, Jr.," 
 was embarrassing. 
 
 But she had grown since the previous after- 
 noon, and embarrassment sat on her more 
 lightly. Like Teddy marooned on the marshes, 
 she seemed to have moved on, leaving her old 
 self behind. Now she had things to do rather 
 than things to think about. One fact was a 
 relief to her; she was no longer under the neces- 
 sity of betraying Bob. 
 
 So she cashed her checks, and counted her 
 money, finding that she had two hundred and 
 forty-five dollars. She didn't know how much 
 Teddy had taken from the bank; possibly more 
 than this, possibly not so much; but whatever 
 the sum, this would go at least part of the way 
 toward meeting it. If she could meet it alto- 
 gether, then, she argued, the law couldn't touch 
 him. 
 
 On arriving at the bank her first sensation 
 was one of confusion. There seemed to be no 
 
 269 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 one in particular to whom to state her errand. 
 Men were busy in variously labeled cages, and 
 more men beyond them sat at desks within pens. 
 Two or three girls moved about with documents 
 in their hands, and there was a distant click of 
 typewriters. People passed in and out of the 
 bank, occupied with their own affairs, and every- 
 one, clerk and client alike, had apparently a 
 definite end in view. It was hke coming up 
 against a blank wall of business, leaving no 
 opening through which to slip in. 
 
 The weakest point seemed to be at a counter 
 beneath the illuminated sign, "Statements," 
 where two ladies waited for custom, conversing 
 in the interim. Jennie stood unnoticed while 
 the speaker for the moment finished her narra- 
 tion, bringing it to its conclusion plaintively. 
 
 "So when mother called in the doctor, it turned 
 out to be a very bad case of ty-phoid. State- 
 ment ? " 
 
 The question at the end being directed toward 
 Jennie, the latter asked if she could see Mr. 
 Collingham. The reply was sharp; the tone 
 quite diff^erent from that of the domestic anec- 
 dote of which she had just heard a portion. 
 
 "Next floor. Take the elevator. Ask for Miss 
 Ruddick." The voice resumed its plaintiveness. 
 "So we had him moved into the comer bedroom, 
 and sent for a trained nurse^" 
 
 On getting out of the hft, Jennie found herself 
 in a sort of lobby where applicants for interviews 
 sat with the hangdog look which such postulants 
 
 270 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 generally wear. A brisk little Jewess seated at 
 a desk murmured the name of each newcomer 
 into a telephone, after which there was nothing 
 to do but take a chair and wait upon events. 
 Now and then some one came out from his con- 
 ference, whereupon a messenger girl, generally 
 of Slavic or Hebraic type, would summon his 
 successor. 
 
 It was nearly an hour before Jennie was called 
 to the office of Miss Ruddick, who, with her prac- 
 ticed method of dealing with the importunate, 
 prepared to put her rapidly through her paces 
 and land her again at the lift. This Miss Rud- 
 dick did, not so much with the mimimum of 
 courtesy as with the maximum of conscientious- 
 ness. Her aim was to save Jennie's time as well 
 as her own, in the altruistic spirit of Mr. Bickley's 
 principles. 
 
 "How do you do.? Are you the daughter of 
 the Mr. Follett who used to be with us here.? 
 So sorry for your loss, though it may be a release 
 for him, poor man. We never know, do we? 
 Now what is it I can do for you.?" 
 
 Jennie said again that she hoped to see Mr. 
 Collingham. 
 
 "I think you'd better tell your errand to me." 
 "I couldn't. I can only tell it to him." 
 In saying this she supposed Miss Ruddick 
 would understand the reference to be to Teddy, 
 whose story must by this time be ringing through 
 the bank. In spite of what Jackman had said 
 on the previous afternoon, they couldn't keep so 
 
 271 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 serious a crime secret for more than a matter of 
 hours. But Miss Ruddick only seemed dis- 
 pleased by Jennie's insistence, answering coldly, 
 
 "If it's a job you're looking for, the best per- 
 son to see would be — " 
 
 And just then the commimicating door opened 
 and Collingham himself came out. He was 
 about to give some order to Miss Ruddick and 
 pass on when Jennie rose in such a way that his 
 eye fell upon her. When a man's eye fell upon 
 Jennie his attention was generally arrested. In 
 this case, it was the more definitely arrested, for 
 the reason that Jennie, timidly and tremblingly, 
 gave signs of having a request to make. 
 
 "You wish to speak to meV 
 
 At this condescension Miss Ruddick was 
 amazed, but, the responsibility being taken off 
 her hands, she was already capturing the minutes 
 by being "back on her job," according to her 
 favorite expression. Jennie could hardly speak 
 for awe. She recalled what Mrs. Collingham had 
 said — a hard, stern, ruthless man, who kept her, 
 her son, and her daughter as puppets on his 
 string. If he so treated his own flesh and blood,, 
 how would he treat her? 
 
 Following him into the private office, she re- 
 minded herself that she must keep her head. 
 She had come on a specific business, and to that 
 business she must confine herself. Her other 
 relations with this 'terrible man she must leave 
 to his son to deal with. 
 
 "Your name is — " 
 
 272 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 His tone was courteous. They were both 
 seated now — he at his desk, she in a small chair 
 at a respectful distance. The question surprised 
 her, for the reason that in her confusion she sup- 
 posed that her identity was known to him. 
 
 "I'm Jennie Follett." His visible start did 
 not make her situation easier. She remembered 
 that Mrs. Collingham had said that if he knew 
 of the tie between herself and Bob he would dis- 
 inherit him on the spot. Just what was implied 
 by that she didn't understand, but it suggested 
 all that was most dramatic in the movies. To 
 disarm his suspicions in this direction, she hurried 
 on to add, "I came about my brother." 
 
 He relaxed slightly, leaning on the desk and 
 examining her closely. 
 
 "Oh, your brother!" 
 
 "Yes, sir. I don't know how much money 
 he's been taking from the bank — " 
 
 CoUingham's brows contracted. 
 
 "Wait a minute. Has your brother been 
 taking money from the bank?" 
 
 At the thought that she might be making a 
 false step, Jennie was appalled. 
 
 "Oh, don't you know that yet, sir?" 
 
 "Don't I know it yet? I don't know what 
 you're talking about at all." 
 
 So the whole thing had to be explained. Two 
 men had appeared on the previous afternoon in 
 Indiana Avenue, accusing Teddy of systematic 
 robbery. Teddy had so far corroborated the 
 charge that he had absented himself from home 
 
 273 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 and work. He had called up once, nominally 
 from Paterson, but tke two detectives didn't 
 believe that it was. In any case, she had a little 
 money of her own — her very own — ^two hundred 
 and forty-five dollars it was — and as far as it 
 would go she had come to make restitution. If 
 it wasn't enough, they would sell the house as 
 soon as they could get it on the market and pay 
 up the balance, if he would only give the order 
 that Teddy shouldn't be sent to jail. 
 
 Emboldened by his concentration on her story 
 and herself, she took out the roll of bills from her 
 bag, enlarging on her plea. 
 
 "You see, sir, it was this way. After my 
 father had to leave the bank last fall, Teddy had 
 to be our chief support, just on his eighteen a 
 week. My two little sisters left school and went 
 to work; but that didn't bring in much. Then 
 there were the taxes, and the mortgages, and the 
 expenses of my father's funeral, besides six of 
 us having to eat — " 
 
 "You were working, too, weren't you?" 
 
 "Yes, sir; I was posing. But I only earned 
 six a week." 
 
 "Only?" 
 
 Based on a memory of his own of something 
 Junia had said — "a mousey little thing with a 
 veneer of modesty, but mercenary isn't the word 
 for her" — there was an implication in this 
 "Only?" which escaped Jennie's simplicity. 
 
 "Yes, sir; that was all. Somehow I couldn't 
 get the work. Nobody seemed to want me." 
 274 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 He pointed at her roll of bills. 
 
 "Then where did you get the money you're 
 holding in your hand?" 
 
 The question was unexpected and confounding. 
 She must either answer it truly or not answer it 
 at all. If she answered it truly, she not only 
 exposed Bob, but she exposed herself to the ut- 
 most rigor of his wrath. She didn't care about 
 herself; she didn't care much about Bob; she 
 cared only about Teddy. The utmost rigor of 
 this man's wrath would send him to jail as easily 
 as she could brush a fly through an open window. 
 She could say nothing. She could only look at 
 him helplessly, with lips parted, eyes shimmering, 
 and the hot color flooding her face pitiably. 
 
 It was the kind of situation in which no man 
 with the heart of a man could be hard on any 
 little girl; besides which, Collingham looked on 
 this silent confession as providential. It would 
 enable him to reason with Bob, if it ever came to 
 that, and tell him what he, the father, knew at 
 first hand and from his own experience. Other- 
 wise he brought no moral judgmeiit to bear on 
 poor Jennie, and condemned her not at all. 
 
 "Just wait a minute," he said, in a kindly tone, 
 getting up as he spoke. "I'll go and straighten 
 the thing out." 
 
 Left alone, Jennie had these concluding words 
 to strengthen her. He would straighten the thing 
 out. That meant probably that Teddy wouldn't 
 have to go to jail, and beyond this relief she 
 didn't look. It would be everything. Nothing 
 
 275 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 else would matter. He might be dismissed from 
 the bank; they might starve; but the great 
 thing would be accomplished. 
 
 It was a half hour or more before he re- 
 turned, and when he did he looked worried. 
 "Troubled" would perhaps be a better word, 
 since even Jennie could see that his thoughts 
 were farther away and deeper down than the 
 incidents on the surface. He spoke almost r^ 
 absent-mindedly. 
 
 "I find there's been a leakage for some little 
 time past, and they've had difficulty in fixing 
 where the trouble was. Now I'm sorry to say 
 it looks as if it was your brother. There's hardly 
 any doubt about that — " 
 
 "You see, sir," she pleaded, "it was so hard 
 for him not to be able to do anything when my 
 father was so ill and my mother worried and the 
 bills piling up — ^they stopped our credit nearly 
 everywhere — and the tax people — ^they were the 
 worst of all." 
 
 "Yes, yes; I quite understand. And I've told 
 them not to press the matter further. Flynn and 
 Jackman, the two men you saw yesterday, are 
 out for the minute; but when they come in they 
 are to report to me. I don't suppose we can take 
 your brother back; but I'll see what I can do for 
 him elsewhere." He rose to end the interview, 
 so that Jennie rose, too. "You can keep that 
 money," he added, nodding toward her roll of 
 bills. "You were not responsible, and there's 
 no reason at all why you should pay." 
 276 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 When Jennie protested, he merely escorted 
 her to the door, which he held open. 
 
 "No, don't thank me," he insisted. "Please! 
 Just make your mind easy as to your brother. 
 The matter shall not go any farther. I don't 
 know what I can do for him as yet — the circum- 
 stances make it difficult; but I shall find some- 
 thing." 
 
 So, blinded with tears, Jennie made her way 
 toward the lift, calling down on Bob's father as 
 well as on his mother all the blessings she was 
 able to invoke. 
 
 Late that afternoon, Teddy, on the floor of his 
 hut, woke with a start from a doze. He hadn't 
 meant to doze, but he had slept little on the pre- 
 ceding night, and was lulled, moreover, by a sense 
 of his security. The day had not been as ex- 
 citing as the day before. Nothing having hap- 
 pened during all those hours, he was growing 
 convinced that nothing would. In its way, 
 safety was becoming irksome. He began to 
 ask himself whether the spirit of adventure 
 didn't summon him to go forth as a tramp that 
 night. 
 
 So he dozed — and so he waked, with a start. 
 The start was possibly due to a consciousness 
 even in his sleep that there were people in the 
 road. He was frightened before he could put his 
 eye again to the peephole. Luckily the pistol 
 was at hand, and the other thing might now have 
 
 to be done. 
 
 277 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 As a matter of fact it seemed likely. Two burly- 
 figures had already left the highway, Flynn 
 tramping along the flicker of path, and Jackman 
 picking his steps through the oozy mud a little 
 to Flynn's right and a little behind him. There 
 was no secrecy about their approach, and ap- 
 parently no fear. 
 
 "They don't suspect that I've got a gun," 
 Teddy commented to himself. "Lob ley can't 
 have told them." 
 
 They were talking to each other, and, though 
 Teddy could not make out their words, he heard 
 Flynn's gurgle of a laugh. To his fevered 
 imagination, it was a diabolic laugh, suggestive 
 of handcuff's and torture. 
 
 The thought of handcuff's frenzied him. Of 
 the sacrilegious touch on his person, the links 
 set the final mark. Rather than submit to them 
 he would shoot anyone, preferably himself. For 
 shooting himself the minute had come, and he 
 decided to do it through the temple. The aim 
 through the heart might miscarry; there was no 
 chance of miscarriage through the brain. All 
 that remained for him now was to know the 
 moment when. 
 
 "Don't shoot till you see the whites of their 
 eyes." 
 
 Some trick of memory brought the tag back 
 to him. He knew that it applied to the shooting 
 of an enemy, but in this case it suited himself. 
 He couldn't see the whites of their eyes as yet, 
 for through the grasses and over the slimy 
 
 278 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ground they advanced but slowly. That gave him 
 the longer to live. He might hve for three min- 
 utes, possibly for five. Even a minute was 
 something. 
 
 But he was ready. He couldn't say that he 
 had no fear, because he was all fear; but for the 
 very reason that he was all fear, he was frozen, 
 numb. Only, the hand that held the pistol shook. 
 He couldn't control it. All the more, then, must 
 he do it through the brain, since he found by 
 experiment that he could steady the muzzle 
 against his temple. He didn't dare so to hold it 
 long, lest that impulse of acting before he thought 
 might deprive him of these last precious seconds 
 of hfe. So he let the thing rest on the peephole, 
 pointing outward, like a gun on board ship. 
 He found, too, that this steadied his eye. He 
 could squint along the barrel right at the two 
 big figures lumbering through the morass. 
 
 "Don't shoot till you see the whites of their 
 eyes." 
 
 Flynn looked up, a laugh on his lips at this 
 absurd adventure. The boy saw the whites of 
 his eyes, and, as far as he himself knew, his mind 
 went blank. He always declared that he heard 
 no sound. He only saw Flynn throw up his 
 arms with a kind of stifled shout — stagger — try 
 to regain his lost balance — and go tumbling, face 
 downward, into the long grass. Jackman fell, 
 too, though not so prone but that he could 
 partially raise himself, half supported by his 
 left arm, while, without being able to face toward 
 19 279 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 the road, he waved his right to the motors flashing 
 
 For Teddy mind-action ceased. He was 
 nothing but mad instinct. He knew he must 
 have fired — must have fired twice — ^that the 
 hand that was to shoot into his temple had 
 betrayed him. He knew, too, that he couldn't 
 shoot into his temple — that great as was his 
 terror of the handcuffs, his terror of this thing 
 was worse. Flinging the pistol across the floor,, 
 his one impulse was to save himself. 
 
 As he had foreseen, his mind, once it began to 
 work, worked quickly. He saw that the grass 
 growing up to the door of the shack was tall, and 
 hardly beaten down by his footsteps. Lying 
 flat like a lizard, he wriggled his way into it. 
 The very yielding of the swampy bottom beneath 
 his weight was in his favor. By a sense, such as 
 that which had waked him up, he knew that 
 motors were stopping in the road, that people 
 were leaping out, that Fl3Tin and Jackman were 
 the objects of everyone's concern, and that, in 
 the mystery as to what had happened to them, 
 no one's attention was as yet directed to himself. 
 He made for the back of the shack, writhing his 
 way round the two comers, and heading out 
 toward the center of the marsh. It was needful 
 to do this, since the shanty and its neighborhood 
 would soon be explored, and he must, if possible,^ 
 be lost in the swampy tracklessness. 
 
 Though progress of necessity was slow, he 
 was amazed at the distance he was putting 
 280 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 between himself and danger. Oh, if it was only 
 night! If a thundercloud would only come up 
 and darken the sky! But it was the brilUant, 
 pitiless sunshine of an August afternoon, with 
 not a shred of atmosphere to help him. Still 
 he writhed and writhed and writhed his way 
 onward, making the pace of a snake when half 
 of its body is dead. He was no longer Teddy 
 FoUett; he was no longer so much as an animal. 
 He was one big agony of mind, which becomes 
 an agony of body; and yet he was eager to live. 
 
 He began to think that he might live. He 
 seemed as far away from the peril behind him 
 as the woods thing that gives its hunter the .slip 
 in the green depths of the covert. Dogs might 
 be able to track him, but not men alone; and 
 while they were bringing up the bloodhounds 
 he might. . . . 
 
 And then he heard a shout that struck through 
 him like paralysis. 
 
 "There he is! I see him!" 
 
 "Where? Where?" 
 
 "That line behind the shack — don't you see? 
 — a little streak right through the grass." 
 
 "No; I don't see anything." 
 
 "Come along and I'll show you. Come 
 along, boys. We'll get him. He's only going on 
 his belly." 
 
 "Yes, and be croaked, like this poor guy! 
 Don't forget that the bird over there can give 
 you a dose of lead." 
 
 So Flynn was dead! That was the meaning 
 281 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of that. Teddy had killed a man. Perhaps he 
 had killed two men. He hadn't taken time to 
 think of it Before; btit now that he did, he lay 
 stricken in every muscle of his frame, his face 
 in the mud, and his fingers dug into the queachy 
 roots of the sedges. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE guests went early. It was a relief to 
 have them go. Not that they differed 
 from other guests to whom Collingham Lodge 
 was accustomed to open its doors, or that the 
 dinner was less fastidiously good than Junia 
 was in the habit of giving. Dinner and guests 
 had both been up to form; and yet it was a 
 relief when the last car glided from beneath the 
 portico. 
 
 "Why do you suppose it is?" 
 Junia had asked this question so often of late 
 that Collingham had ceased to try to answer 
 it. Instead, he lit a cigar and strolled to the 
 open French window. He, too, found it a relief 
 to relax in the company of his family, though 
 less puzzled than Junia at the state of mind. 
 
 "Oh, come out!" Edith called froni the ter- 
 race. "It's heavenly." 
 
 It was a soft, warm, velvety night, starlit and 
 voluptuous. The air astir was just enough to 
 carry the scents of roses, honeysuckle, mignon- 
 ette, and new-mown hay. Except for the 
 Waitings of small living things and the occasional 
 'peep of a half-awake bird, there was no sound 
 but that of the plash of the fountains on the 
 
 283 ' 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 terraces. Edith went in for a light wrap for her 
 mother; CoUingham, his cigar in hand, dropped 
 into the teakwood chair. 
 
 "It isn't our dinners only," Junia complained, 
 when, with the wrap about her shoulders, she 
 had settled herself in the wicker armchair she 
 preferred; "it's all dinners. It's just as if people 
 didn't enjoy them any more." 
 
 "Well, they don't." Edith half loungingly 
 swung herself in a Gloucester hammock. "What 
 we've got to learn, mother dear, is that enter- 
 taining, as we called it, was a pre-war habit 
 which we've outlived in spirit, though we haven't 
 quite come to the point in fact." 
 
 "There's something in that," CoUingham' 
 agreed. 
 
 "And yet there's got to be hospitality," Junia 
 reasoned. "You can't just live and die to 
 yourself." 
 
 Edith swung lazily. 
 
 "Hospitality, yes; but isn't there a difference- 
 between that and entertaining?" 
 
 "If so, what is it?" 
 
 "I'm not sure that I can say. Isn't the one 
 a permanent necessity, and the other merely a 
 custom that can go out of date?" 
 
 "Between your custom that can go out of 
 date and your permanent necessity, I don't see 
 that there's much distinction." 
 
 "Well, there is, mother dear. It's like this: 
 Entertaining is giving people something they 
 don't particularly want and which you expect 
 284 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 them to repay; while hospitality is opening your 
 house to people in need, whether they can repay 
 you or not." 
 
 "Oh, if we're going to open our houses to people 
 in need — " 
 
 "Well, what?" 
 
 "I'm sure I don't know what ; nor you, either." 
 
 "And that's just it. We're halting between 
 two states of mind. Ever since the war began, 
 mere entertaining bores us; and we're terrified 
 at the idea of genuine hospitality; so there we 
 are. We still give dinners and go to them; but 
 when we do we feel it's something fatuous, which 
 can't help making us dull." 
 
 Out of the silence that ensued CoUingham 
 said, moodily: 
 
 "It's all very fine to talk of opening your 
 house to people in need; but it's not as easy as 
 It looks." 
 
 "Is anjrthing ever as easy as it looks, dad? 
 Don't we shirk the social problems that are 
 upsetting the world by declaring them impos- 
 sible to solve, when a material difficulty only 
 puts us on our mettle?" 
 
 He turned this over. All that day he had been 
 calculating his own possible responsibility in 
 Teddy FoUett's going wrong, and was thinking 
 of it now. In the end he said : 
 
 "All the same you've got to follow the regular 
 trend. If you were in business you'd know. 
 You can't do things differently from other people. 
 You may be as sorry as you like not to be able 
 
 28s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to help; but if you can't, you can't^and there's 
 an end of it." 
 
 "Mr. Ayling in his new book. Social Problems 
 and the Individual, says there's a distinction to 
 be drawn between can't and can't — ^there's the 
 can't that comes from lack of ability, and the 
 can't that springs from the accepted standard. 
 He says — " 
 
 "I don't believe your father is at all interested 
 in that, Edith dear." 
 
 "Oh yes; let her go on. I'm not afraid of 
 what Ayling thinks." 
 
 But before Edith could resume the attention 
 of all three was called by the tinkle of the tele- 
 phone bell in the library, which could be ap- 
 proached from the terrace through the drawing- 
 room. With a muttered, "Who's ringing up 
 at this time of night?" CoUingham dragged 
 himself in to answer it. The women remained 
 silent, each listening to see if the call was for her. 
 
 "Yes? . . . This is Mr. CoUingham Who? 
 
 . . . Oh, it's you, Mr. Brunt ? . . . Yes ? . . . What 
 did you say? . . . Killed? Who's killed? . . . 
 Not Flynn the detective, who comes in and out 
 of the bank? . . . Indeed! Dear me! Dear me! 
 Where was it? . . . Who did it? . , . Not that boy? 
 . . . Oh, my God ! . . . What happened ? . . . Tell 
 me quickly. . . . Over beyond Jersey City! Yes? 
 Yes? . . . And they've got him? ... In the Brig? 
 That's the EUenbrook jail, isn't it? . . . Jackman, 
 too, did you say? .' . . Wounded, but not killed. 
 . . . Badly? . . . Oh, the poor fellow! ... In the 
 286 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 hospital? . . . That's right. . . . Has anyone com- 
 municated with his family? . . . Good! Good! . . . 
 And Flynn's wife? . . . Oh, the poor woman! . . . 
 And the boy's family? . . . You don't know any- 
 thing? Then no one has informed his mother? 
 . . . Not that you know of. ... I see. . . . He's to 
 be brought into court to-morrow morning. . . . 
 Poor little devil! . . . Oh, I know he doesn't de- 
 serve pity, but — but I can't help it. Brunt. 
 His father was with us so long and — and one 
 thing and another! . . . No; I'll appear in court 
 myself and see what I can do for him. . . . Good 
 night, then. I'll see you in the morning." 
 
 "What boy can that be?" Junia whispered, 
 as her husband hung the receiver in its place. 
 
 "I'm sure I don't know —unless — unless it's 
 the FoUett boy." 
 
 "Oh, I hope not. It would make such awful 
 complications." 
 
 They waited for CoUingham to come and tell 
 them his plainly thrilling news, but he remained 
 in the library. 
 
 "It would make complications," Edith ven- 
 tured, in a low voice, "if it proved to be young 
 Follett — ^with Bob in love with his sister." 
 
 Junia spoke not so much from impulse as 
 from inspiration. 
 
 "He's more than in love with her. He's 
 married to her." 
 
 "Mother!" 
 
 "Yes; he was married to her a few days 
 before he sailed. I've known it all along." 
 
 287 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Edith was breathless. 
 
 "Did he tell you?" 
 
 "No; she did." 
 
 "She? The FoUett girl? Why, mother!" 
 
 Junia rose. She knew that if her suspicions 
 were correct she would have things to do before 
 she slept. 
 
 "Go to bed now, dear; and I'll come to your 
 room and give you the whole story. In the mean- 
 time I may have to tell your father." 
 
 "You mean to say that he doesn't know?" 
 
 "No; not yet. I've been rather hoping that 
 before I told him Bob would — ^would see his way 
 out of the mess." 
 
 "He'll never do that, never in this world — 
 not according to what he's said to me." 
 
 "Oh, well, he didn't know everything then 
 that he'll have to know now. But go and say 
 good night to your father; and I'll come up by 
 the time you're in bed." 
 
 "Mother, you're amazing!" Edith spoke 
 more in awe than in admiration; but she obeyed 
 orders by going to her father. 
 
 She found him still sitting in the chair by the 
 telephone, bowed forward, his elbows on his 
 knees, and his forehead in his hands. When 
 he lifted his haggard eyes toward her she stood 
 still. 
 
 "Daddy, what in the world has happened? 
 Who is it that has killed some one? We couldn't 
 help hearing that much." 
 
 He raised himself. "Come here." 
 288 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Going forward, she knelt down beside him, 
 taking his hand and kissing it. 
 
 "You poor daddy I You're bothered, aren't 
 you?" 
 
 "It's — it's young Follett. He's been stealing 
 money from the bank, and now he's shot one of 
 the detectives who heard he was hiding in a 
 cabin out on the New Jersey marshes. They'd 
 sent out a description of him to the suburban 
 stations. And only to-day I told his sister that 
 I'd call the thing off and give him another 
 chance." 
 
 "She came to see you?" 
 
 " She came to see me."^ 
 
 "Then you did what you could, didn't you?" 
 
 "I did what I could — ^then." In spite of the 
 emphasis on the final word, he slapped his knee 
 with new conviction. "I've done what I could 
 all through. It's no use saying I haven't, be- 
 cause I have. There's just so much you can do, 
 and you can't do any more. You can't make a 
 business a home for indigent old gentlemen — 
 now, can you ? '' 
 
 He sprang to his feet, leaving her kneeling by 
 the chair. 
 
 "No, I don't suppose you can," she assented, 
 rising slowly. " But I do wish you'd talk to Mr. 
 Ayling sometime, daddy. _ He seems to see all 
 these things from new points of view — " 
 
 He was pacing about the room very much Uke 
 Max in moments of agitation. 
 
 "Oh, new points of view! There's only one 
 289 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 point of view, I tell you, and that's the one on 
 what we've made the country prosperous." 
 
 She smiled wistfully. 
 
 "Prosperous for some." 
 
 "Well, that's better than prosperous for 
 nobody, isn't it?" 
 
 She said good night to him then, for the reason 
 that she herself was so stirred that she needed 
 seclusion in which to think these strange things 
 over. That Bob should have married Jennie 
 Follett was a shock in itself; but that through 
 his wife he should now be involved in this 
 frightful tragedy was something that her mind 
 found it hard to take in. It was the first time 
 that she had ever come so close to the more 
 terrible happenings in life. 
 
 Meanwhile, Junia, overhearing what was said, 
 reconstructed her plan of campaign. In common 
 with great generals, she possessed the faculty of 
 rapid revision, as events took place differently 
 from the way she had expected. By the time 
 she heard Edith go upstairs she had foreseen 
 the line of action which the new situation forced 
 on them. 
 
 Collingham was still lashing about the library 
 when she appeared on the threshold. Her calm- 
 ness arrested him. In a measure it soothed him. 
 It was the kind of juncture in which she always 
 knew what to do, and he had confidence in her 
 judgment. When she said, "Sit down, Bradley; 
 I've something to say," he obeyed her quietly, 
 relighting his cigar. As she, too, sat down. Max 
 
 290 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 or Dauphin would have noted in her the aura of 
 authority which a master wears when about to 
 lecture a schoolboy. 
 
 "I've something startling to tell you, Bradley; 
 but I want to say beforehand that you mustn't 
 get worked up, because I see a way out." 
 
 Taking his cigar from his lips, he looked at 
 her sidewise. His expression said, "What's it 
 going to be now?" 
 
 "What I've heard you telling Edith about 
 this young Follett killing a detective concerns 
 us more closely than you may think, because 
 Bob is married to his sister." 
 
 He laid his cigar on an ash tray, swung round 
 to the table between them, clasped his fingers, 
 and leaned on his outstretched elbows. His 
 tone was quiet, even casual. 
 
 "When did he do that?" 
 
 "Just before he sailed." 
 
 "Then I'm through with him." 
 
 "Oh no, you're not, Bradley! He's your son, 
 whether he's married anyone or not." 
 
 "I can't help his being my son; but I can help 
 having anything more to do with him." 
 
 "Listen, Bradley. This whole thing is going 
 to be in the papers in the course of two or three 
 days; and you must come through it with honors. 
 It's perfectly simple to do it, and win everyone's 
 respect and sympathy. In addition to that you 
 can get Bob's devoted affection; and you know 
 how much that means to us all." 
 
 To Collingham it meant so much that he 
 291 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 listened to her attentively, with eager eyes. In 
 Bob's marriage, with its attendant circum- 
 stances, they had obviously received a shock. 
 All Marillo Park, as well as the public in general, 
 would know it to be a shock and would be 
 watching to see how they took it. In that case, 
 the best thing was the sporting thing. They 
 must stand right up to the facts and accept them. 
 Everyone knew that the younger generation was 
 peculiar. It was the war, Junia supposed, and 
 yet she didn't know. In any case, it was not the 
 Collinghams alone who were so afflicted, but 
 dotted all over Marillo were families whose young 
 ones were acting strangely. There were the 
 Rumseys, whose twin sons had refused an 
 uncle's legacy amounting to something like 
 three millions, because they held views opposed 
 to the owning of private property. There were 
 the Addingtons, whose son and heir had married 
 a girl twice imprisoned as a Red and was be- 
 lieved to have gone Red in her company. There 
 were the Bendlingers, whose daughter had eloped 
 with a chauffeur, divorced him, and then gone 
 back and married him again. These were 
 Marillo incidents, and in no case had the parents 
 found any course more original than the anti- 
 quated one of discarding and disinheritance. 
 And yet you couldn't wash your hands of your 
 flesh and blood like that. They were your flesh 
 and blood whatever they did; and it was idiotic 
 to act as if you could cut the tie between yourself 
 and them. He could see for himself that Rum- 
 292 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 seys, Addingtons, and Bendlingers had lost 
 rather than gained in general esteem by their 
 melodramatic poses. 
 
 Now, the thing for the CoUinghams was to 
 accept the situation with a great big generous 
 heart. They were to open their arms to Bob, 
 and back him loyally in the combination of diffi- 
 culties he had to swing. But he himself must 
 swing them. Junia laid emphasis on that. By 
 direct action they couldn't intervene. They 
 could only make it possible for him to act di- 
 rectly on his own responsibility. He had married 
 a wife whose family was in trouble. They, the 
 CollLnghams, would not share that trouble, but 
 they would help him to share it, since he had 
 brought on himself the necessity for doing so. 
 
 To accomplish this, Junia suggested sending 
 to Bob a cablegram covering the following five 
 points. The FoUett boy was in jail charged 
 with murdering a detective; Bob should publish 
 at once his marriage to this boy's sister; he 
 should return to New York by the first con- 
 venient steamer; his father was placing ten 
 thousand dollars to his account, and when that 
 was used would place more; he was also ready, if 
 instructed by Bob, to engage the best counsel in 
 New Jersey to defend the boy. 
 
 "That will take care of everything till he gets 
 here," Junia concluded, "and in the meantime, 
 we can't do better, it seems to me, than go up, 
 as we always do at this time of year, to our camp 
 in the Adirondacks. This house can be kept 
 
 ^93 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 open for Bob when he arrives, and Gull can stay 
 with one of the motors to run him in and out of 
 town." 
 
 "And what are we to do about the girl?" 
 
 "Nothing. That isn't for us to take up. We 
 must leave it to Bob. If he ever brings her to 
 us as his wife — But, then, he never may." 
 
 "What makes you think so.?" 
 
 Her superb eyes covered him with their fine, 
 audacious, womanly regard. 
 
 "I'd tell you, Bradley, if— if I didn't think 
 there are things that had better not go into 
 words, even between you and me. Whatever Bob 
 discovers will be his own affair. You and I had 
 best know as little as possible. We can back 
 Bob up, and that's all we can do. Everything 
 else he will have to work out for himself. By 
 the time he's done that he'll be a grown-up 
 man. It's possible he's needed something of the 
 sort to develop him." 
 
 So CoUingham telephoned his cablegram to 
 Bob, and went to bed comforted. Next morning, 
 on arriving at the bank, he found Junia's coun- 
 sels supported by the best opinion among his 
 co-workers. That is, he changed his mind as to 
 going to the court in EUenbrook for the first 
 hearing of the FoUett boy, or otherwise expressing 
 himself toward the FoUett family. He had 
 given Bob the means of doing whatever needed 
 to be done, and Bob had the cable at his dispo- 
 sition. To go to the court, or to express sym- 
 pathy in any way, would, according to Bickley, 
 
 294 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 be dangerous to discipline. Feeling in the bank 
 was extremely hostile to young Follett, and it 
 was better that it should remain so. The bank 
 employee's cast of mind, so Bickley said, was. 
 not revolutionary or rebellious against acknowl- 
 edged rights. By sheer force of habit, it was 
 schooled to reverence for life and property. The 
 principle of ownership being holier to it than any , 
 tenet of religion, the Follett boy could not be >-■ 
 looked upon otherwise than as an enemy of man- 
 kind; and this was as it should be. 
 
 While CoUingham thus weighed the counsels 
 offered him at the bank, Gussie Follett was 
 blindly making her way homeward from Co- 
 rinne's with a paper so folded in her hand as not 
 to display its headlines. She had gone to her 
 work with comparative cheerfulness, since, on 
 the previous day, Jennie had been assured by 
 no less authority than Mr. CoUingham himself 
 that Teddy should not be sent to jail. So long 
 as he was not sent to jail, they would be free 
 from public comment, and, free from public com- 
 ment, they could "manage somehow." Managing 
 somehow being an art in which they had gained 
 authority, they were not afraid of that, even 
 though it involved parting with the one great 
 asset against calamity, the house. 
 
 Gussie's first intimation of bad news came 
 
 when, on entering the shop, she found the four 
 
 or five other girls huddled round Corinne. Her 
 
 appearance m.ade them start as if she was a 
 
 20 29S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ghost. Her own heart sank at that, though she 
 hailed this shudder with a laugh. 
 
 "Say, girls, is this the big reel in 'The Specter 
 Bride'?" 
 
 Corinne, whose real name was Mamie Callag- 
 han, emerged from a miniature forest of upright 
 metal rods crowned with hats at various roguish 
 angles. A dark, wavy-nosed woman of cajoling 
 Irish witchery, she could hardly keep the prank 
 from her voice even at such a time as this. 
 
 "So, Gussie, you don't know! Well, some 
 one's got to break it to you, and I guess it '11 
 have to be me." 
 
 But it was broken already, even before Corinne 
 had brought forward the paper she was hiding 
 behind her back. 
 
 "Teddy!" Gussie cried out. "There's some- 
 thing about him in that thing. Let me see it! 
 Let me see it ! " 
 
 Corinne let her see it, and the work was done. 
 Gussie couldn't read beyond the headlines with 
 their "Robbery" and "Murder" in Italic cap- 
 itals, but she grasped enough. The snapshot of 
 Teddy taken in the road, just as he had been 
 dragged, a mass of shme, out of the morass, made 
 her reel backward as if about to fall; but when 
 Eily O'Brien sprang to her support she waved 
 her away gently. She was not going to faint. 
 Her physical strength wouldn't leave her, what- 
 ever else was gone. 
 
 "I'm — I'm going home," was all she said, 
 crushing the paper against her breast. 
 
 296 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Oh, Gus, lemme go with you!" Eily haul 
 begged; but this kindness, too, Gussie put away 
 from her. 
 
 She could go alone, and alone she went, with 
 one consuming thought as she sped along. 
 
 "Oh, momma! Poor momma! This 'II about 
 finish her." 
 
 And yet when she entered the living-room her 
 mother was sitting, calm and serene, while Mr. 
 Brunt told the tale of the New Jersey marshes. 
 Jennie, white, tearless, terrified, crept up to 
 Gussie, and the two clung together as their 
 mother said, in her steady voice. 
 
 "So I understand that only one of them is 
 dead — ^the Irish one." 
 
 Mr. Brunt assented. 
 
 "Yes, Flynn, the Irish one." 
 
 "I'm not surprised. I told him when he was 
 here the other day that what he called 'law and 
 order' would bring him to grief, a^s they bring 
 most of us, though I didn't expect it to be so 
 soon. And my son, you say, is in jail.'* 
 
 "At Ellenbrook." 
 
 "They'll try him, I suppose." 
 
 "I'm afraid so." 
 
 "And then they'll send him to the chair.'* 
 Mr. Brunt didn't answer. "Oh, you needn't be 
 afraid to speak of it. I know they will. I'm not 
 sorry. Teddy will be sorry, of course — ^till it's 
 over. But I'd rather he'd suffer a little now and 
 be done with it than go through the hell of years 
 his father and I have had. If there was going to 
 
 297 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 be any chance for him, it would be different; 
 but there's no chance, not the way the world is 
 organized now." 
 
 The girls crept forward together. 
 
 "Momma darling — " 
 
 But Lizzie resumed, calmly : 
 
 "Where there's nothing but government by 
 the strong for the strong, people like ourselves 
 must go under. You'll go under, too, Mr. Brunt. 
 You belong to the doomed class. The working- 
 man will soon be getting share and share alike 
 with the capitalist; and the white-collar 
 crowd will be kicked about by both. If we had 
 the pluck to fight as the workingman has fought, 
 we might save something even now; but we 
 haven't, and so there's no hope for us. Law and 
 order have us by the throat, and we must suffer 
 till they strangle us. Well, my boy will soon be 
 out of it — thank God ! — and all I ask is to follow 
 him." 
 
 When Mr. Brunt got himself to the door, 
 Jennie went with him, as she had done with 
 Flynn and Jackman two days earlier. She did 
 this in the dazed condition of a woman who per- 
 forms some little act of courtesy during ship- 
 wreck, while waiting for the vessel to go down. 
 
 "You must excuse my mother, Mr. Brunt. 
 Ever since my father died her mind's been 
 unsettled, and we don't know what to make of 
 her." 
 
 But Mr. Brunt's demeanor did not encourage 
 conversation. To do him justice, the mission on 
 
 298 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 which CoUingham had sent him had been re- 
 pugnant for other reasons than the breaking of 
 bad news. His mind being of the cast Bickley 
 had analyzed that morning, Teddy's theft filled 
 him with more horror than his killing of a man. 
 To come so near to crime against the ownership 
 of bank notes inspired him with a physical 
 loathing which even Jennie's loveliness couldn't 
 mitigate. It was as if she herself was tainted by 
 some horrible infection, making it a relief to 
 him to get away from her. 
 
 But turning to re-enter the house, she felt 
 again that access of new strength which had 
 come to her repeatedly during the past few days. 
 It was as if resources of her being never taxed 
 before were now offering themselves for use. 
 What she had to do was in the forefront of her 
 thought rather than what some one else had 
 done. What some one else had done was already 
 in the past. That was made for her and couldn't 
 be helped; whereas her own duties imperatively 
 summoned her to look ahead. 
 
 "Teddy will need a suitcase of clean things," 
 was the direct expression of these thoughts 
 before she had recrossed the threshold. 
 
 Having said this aloud to Gussie, Gussie's 
 mind could also tackle the minor concrete details 
 to the exclusion of the bigger considerations in- 
 volved in Teddy's pHght. That the honest, 
 loving, skylarking boy whom they had grown up 
 with could be a thief and a murderer was some- 
 thing the intelligence rejected as it rejected 
 
 299 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 dreams. They could, therefore, take the new 
 straw suitcase which had once been a family- 
 present to Gussie, and which she had never used, 
 pack it with Teddy's other suit and the necessary 
 linen, as if he were really at Paterson or Phila- 
 delphia. 
 
 "How shall we get it to him?" Gussie asked, 
 when the work was done. 
 
 "I'll take it," Jennie answered, "if you'll 
 stay and look after momma." 
 
 "Momma won't need much looking after — ■ 
 the way she is." 
 
 "Well, that's one comfort anyhow. With 
 this to go through with I'm glad her mind's not 
 what it used to be." 
 
 So, stunned and dry eyed, they caught on to 
 the new conditions by doing little perfunctory 
 things, consoling and helping each other. 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 TEDDY'S first night in a cell was more toler- 
 able than it might have been for the reason 
 that his faculties seemed to have stopped work- 
 ing. As nearly as possible he had become an 
 inanimate thing, to be struck, pulled, hustled, 
 and chucked wherever they chose. Not only 
 had he no volition, but little or no sensation. A 
 dead body or a sack of flour could hardly have 
 been more lost to a sense of rebellion or indignity. 
 
 It was not that he didn't suffer, but that 
 suffering had reached the extreme beyond which 
 it makes no further impression. Nothing regis- 
 tered any more — ^no horror, no brutalities, no 
 curses or kicks. As far as he could take account 
 of himself, the Teddy FoUett even of the shack 
 had been left behind in some vanished world, 
 while the thing that had hands and feet was a 
 clod unable to resent the oaths and blows and 
 flingings to and fro which were all it deserved. 
 
 Once he had heard that shout, "I see himl" 
 in the road, he had been like an insect paralyzed 
 by terror that doesn't dare to move. He had 
 lain there till they came and got him. It was 
 not fear alone that pinned him to the spot; his 
 bodily strength had given out. For forty-eight 
 hours he had eaten but little and drunk only 
 
 301 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 the two glasses of water in the pastry shop. 
 Though he had slept the first night, the second 
 had been passed in a fevered, intermittent doze. 
 Furthermore, the agony of approaching suicide 
 had drained his natural forces. 
 
 So he lay still while the hue and cry of the 
 man hunters quickened and waxed behind him. 
 Escape was out of the question, since, even if 
 he had the strength to drag himself a few yards 
 farther, they would run him down in the end. 
 Resistance, too, would be hopeless, with, as he 
 judged, some twenty or thirty in the po'sse. 
 
 He could feel their fury growing as they slipped 
 and slithered through the grasses. Oaths, ob- 
 scenities, and laughter accompanied every gro- 
 tesque accident, as one man fell with the weedy 
 tangle about his feet, or another went knee-deep 
 into the swamp. The very fear of "a dose of 
 lead" intensified their excitement till, as they 
 caught sight of him, a helpless thing with face 
 hidden in the mud, they gave vent to a yell of 
 satisfaction. 
 
 They didn't let him rise; they didn't so much 
 as pull him to his feet. They dragged him by 
 his collar, by his hair, by his arms, by his legs, 
 by anything they could seize, kicking, beating, 
 and cursing him. He made no outcry; he didn't 
 speak a word. For aught they knew, he might 
 be drunk or Insane or dead. Only once, when a 
 man kicked him In the face, was he powerless to 
 suppress a groan. Otherwise, he was just a 
 sodden lump of flesh as, now head first, now feet 
 302 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 first, now with face upward, now with face down- 
 ward, he was tugged and tumbled and hurtled 
 and rolled over the five hundred yards of slime 
 between the spot where they had caught him and 
 the road. 
 
 There he had a new experience. He learned 
 what it was not only to be outside the human 
 race, but to be held as its foe. Already, while 
 still far out on the marsh, he had heard the yells : 
 "Kill him! Kill him! Kick the damn skunk to 
 death!" But when actually surrounded by 
 these howling, screaming, outraged citizens, 
 with their teams and motor cars banked in the 
 roadway, he tasted the peculiar astonishment of 
 the man who has always been liked when assailed 
 by a storm of hatred. While the three or four 
 police who by this time had appeared did their 
 best to defend him, men fought with one another 
 to get at him. A well-dressed girl of not more 
 than eighteen reached over the shoulder of one 
 of the police and struck him on the head with 
 her sunshade. An elderly woman squeezed her- 
 self near him and spat in his face. 
 
 "Ah, say, people," one of the police called 
 out, "give the young guy a chanst. Can't you 
 see he's only a kid.?" 
 
 "'Kid' be damned!" came the response. 
 "Say, fellows, here's the telegraph pole! Let's 
 lynch him!" 
 
 "Lynch him! Lynch him! String him up!" 
 
 "No! Let's make a bonfire and bum him 
 alive!" 
 
 303 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Chuck the cops Into the Hackensack, and 
 then we can do as we Uke." 
 
 "Lynch him! Lynch him! Lynch him!" 
 
 Teddy didn't care whether they lynched him,; 
 or not. In as far as he could form a wish he. 
 wished they would; but then he was past forming 
 wishes. They could string him up to the tele-, 
 graph pole or bum him alive just as they felt, 
 inclined; for he had traveled beyond fear. 
 
 Just then the crowd parted, the police van« 
 drove up, and his protectors dragged him to its. 
 shelter. Even then there was a new sensation^^ 
 in store for him. The parting of the crowd, 
 showed Flynn lying by the roadside, also waiting; 
 for the van. He was on his back, his knees; 
 drawn up, his mouth dropped open. Waistcoat: 
 and shirt had been torn apart, and Teddy saw. 
 a red spot. 
 
 He started back. Except for the groan when 
 he had been kicked in the face, it was the only 
 time he opened his lips. 
 
 "I didn't do that!" he cried, so loud that a 
 jeer broke from the crowd. 
 
 A policeman shook him by the arm. 
 
 "Say, sonny, you didn't do that?" 
 
 Appalled by the sight of the dead man, 
 Teddy could do no more than stupidly shake 
 his head. 
 
 "Then who in hell did? Tell us that." 
 
 But the boy collapsed, his head sagging, his 
 knees giving way under him. When he returned 
 to consciousness he was lying in the dark, jolt- 
 
 304 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ing, jolting, jolting, on the floor of the police 
 van. 
 
 At the station he was pulled out again. He 
 could stand now, and walk, though not very 
 well. Hands supported him as he stumbled up 
 the steps and into a room where a man in uni- 
 form sat behind a desk, while three or four poUce 
 and half a dozen unexplained hangers-on stood 
 about idly. 
 
 "A live one," the policeman who led Teddy 
 called out, jocosely, as they appj:pached the 
 desk. 
 
 "Looks like a dead one," the man behind the 
 desk replied, with the same sense of humor. 
 "Looks like he'd been dead and buried and dug 
 up again." 
 
 The allusion to Teddy's hatless, mud-caked 
 appearance raised a laugh. 
 
 The man behind the desk dipped his pen in 
 the ink bottle and drew up a big ledger. 
 "Name?" 
 
 Teddy could just articulate. "Edward Scar- 
 borough FoUett." 
 
 "Gee, whiz! Guess you'll have to spell it 
 out." 
 
 Teddy spelled slowly, as if the letters were 
 new to him. Having done this, he was asked no 
 more questions. , Explanations came from the 
 officer who had "run him in" and who produced 
 the automatic pistol picked up on the floor of 
 the shack. When it was stated in addition that 
 Teddy was charged with shooting and kiUing 
 
 30s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Peter Flynn, whom all of them knew and to 
 whom they were bound by ties of professional 
 solidarity, the boy felt the half-friendly in- 
 difference with which the spectators had seen 
 him come in change to sullen hostility. 
 
 The formulas fulfilled, he was seized more 
 roughly than before, to be half led, half pushed, 
 along a dim hall and down a dimmer flight of 
 steps to a worn, stone-flagged basement pervaded 
 by dankness and a smell of disinfectants. The 
 corridor into which they turned was long and 
 straight and narrow like a knife-cut through a 
 cheese. On the left a blank stone wall was the 
 blanker for its whitewash; on the right, a row 
 of little doors diminished down the vista to the 
 size of pigeonholes. Pressed close to the square 
 foot of grating inset in each door was a human 
 face eager to see who was coming next, while the 
 officer was greeted with howls of rage or whining 
 petitions or strings of ugly words. 
 
 They stopped at the first open door, and after 
 one glance within Teddy started back. 
 
 "Don't put me in there, for Jesus' sake!" 
 
 The cry was involuntary, since he knew he 
 would be put in there in any case. 
 
 "Ah, go in wid you I" 
 
 A shove sent him over the threshold with such 
 force that he fell on the wooden bunk which was 
 all the dog hole contained, while the door 
 clanged behind him. 
 
 All that night he lay in a stupor induced by 
 misery. No one came near him; no food or 
 306 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 drink was offered him. Thirst made him slightly- 
 delirious, which was a relief. Now and then, 
 when his real consciousness partially returned 
 he muttered, half aloud : 
 
 "I didn't do it. My hand might have done it 
 — but that wasn't me." 
 
 The crepuscular light of morning was not very 
 different from the darkness of night, but it 
 brought his senses back to him sluggishly. 
 Bruised as he was in body, he was still more 
 bruised in mind, and could render to himself no 
 more than a vague account of what had hap^ 
 pened yesterday. When a tin of water and a 
 hunk of bread were mysteriously pushed into the 
 cell, he consumed them like an animal, lying 
 down again on the bunk. Without water for a 
 wash, his face and hair were still caked with the 
 mud which also stiffened his clothing. 
 
 "My God! what's that?" 
 
 Not having seen him before, the guard who 
 summoned him to court was startled by the ap- 
 parition that crawled to the threshold of the cell 
 when the door was unlocked. The semblance to 
 a boy was little more exact than that of a snow 
 man to a man. 
 
 "Ah! my God! my God! Sure you can't go 
 into court like that. They wouldn't laiow you 
 was a human bein', let alone a prisoner. Wait a 
 bit, and I'll get you somethin* to wash up in." 
 
 There followed a little rough kindliness, 
 scouring and brushing and combing the lad into 
 something less like a monstrosity. Teddy sub- 
 
 307 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 mitted as a child does and with a child's indiffer- 
 ence to cleanliness. 
 
 So, too, he submitted in court, hardly knowing 
 where he was or the significance of these formal- 
 ities. Apart from the relief he got from his own 
 reiterations, "I didn't do it, I didn't do it," the 
 proceedings were a blur to him. When he was 
 led out again down more steps, along more cor- 
 ridors, and cast into another stale and disinfected 
 cell, he took it with the same brutish insensi-, 
 bility. He didn't know that the new cell was in 
 that part of the House of Detention known as 
 Murderers' Row, nor did he heed the hoarse 
 questions whispered through the next-door grat-; 
 ing, and which he could barely catch as they 
 stole along the wall. 
 
 "Say, who'd ye do in.? Did he croak right off?' 
 My guy didn't croak till three weeks after I, 
 give him the lead, and now they can't send me 
 to the chair nohow. In luck, ain't I?" 
 
 To Teddy, this uncanny recitation was no 
 more than the other sounds which smote the 
 auditory nerve but hardly penetrated to the 
 brain. They were all abnormal sounds, sprung 
 of abnormal conditions, breaking in on a silence 
 which was otherwise that of the sepulcher. 
 Footsteps clanked — and then all was still; a 
 door banged — and then all was still; a raucous 
 voice shouted out a curse — and then all was still. 
 The stillness was as ghostly as the soimd, only 
 that, as far as Teddy was concerned, so little 
 reached his massacred perceptions. 
 308 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 The rattle of teys and the clanging of the 
 door! He looked up from the bunk on the edge 
 of which he was sitting Ustlessly. 
 
 "Lady to see you I" 
 
 This guard was young, smart, debonair, with 
 a twinkle in his eye, and the first who didn't 
 treat a comrade's murderer with instinctive ani- 
 mosity. Teddy got up and followed him in the 
 stupefied bewilderment with which he had done 
 everjrthing else that day. Lady to see him! 
 The words seemed to refer to something so far 
 back in his history that he could hardly recall 
 what it was. Once upon a time there had been 
 a mother, a Jennie, a Gussie, and a Gladys; 
 but they were now remote and shadowy. 
 
 Along corridors, up steps, and then along more 
 corridors he tramped, till they stopped at an 
 open door — and there he saw Jennie. In a room 
 unspeakably bare and forbidding in spite of a 
 table and half a dozen chairs she waited for him 
 with a smile. He, too, did his best to smile, but 
 his lower lip, swollen with the kick that had 
 caught him in the mouth, made the effort nothing 
 but a rictus. 
 
 For this, Jennie had been prepared by the snap- 
 shot in the paper. All the while she had been on 
 the way to him she had been saying to herself 
 that she must show no sign of horror or surprise. 
 Even though she would follow the cue of her poor 
 demented mother and pretend that he was in 
 prison as a martyr, she would take no pitying or 
 tragic note. She went forward, thetefore, and 
 
 309 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 threw her arms about him with the same offhand, 
 unsentimental pleasure which she would have 
 shown in meeting him after a brief absence 
 at any time. 
 
 "You darling Ted! We're so glad to have 
 found you. I thought I'd just run down and 
 bring you some clean clothes." 
 
 It was better done than she thought she had 
 the strength for, perhaps because his need was 
 greater than she had supposed possible. Could 
 she have dreamt beforehand that Teddy would 
 ever look like this, she would have screamed 
 from fright. But now that he did, she rose to 
 the fact, seemingly taking it for granted, actually 
 taking it for granted, through some hitherto 
 unsuspected histrionic force. Within a minute 
 of his arrival they were seated near each other, 
 in a curious make-believe that the conditions 
 were not terrible. 
 
 With this familiar presence beside him, Teddy's 
 mind resumed functioning, possibly to his 
 regret. Home was close to him again, while the 
 loved faces came back to life. 
 
 "How's ma.?" 
 
 The question was indistinct because, now that 
 it came to making conversation, he found that 
 his tongue was thickened in addition to his 
 swollen lip. Jennie replied that their mother's 
 health was never better. 
 
 "I suppose "-—he balked a little but forced 
 himself onward — "I suppose she feels pretty 
 bad — over me." 
 
 310 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "No, she doesn't. She told me to tell you so."^ 
 She was determined to speak truthfully in this 
 respect, so that if their mother's dementia could 
 do him any good, he shouldn't fail of it. "She 
 told me to say that you were not to be sorry for 
 anything you'd done, no matter how they 
 punished you." 
 
 "Does she — does she know what I've done?" 
 
 She threw it off, as if casually. 
 
 "She knows all that's been in the papers; and 
 I don't believe they've left anything out, not 
 judging by the things they've said." 
 
 "How's Gussie.? How's Gladys?" 
 
 Having answered these questions to the best 
 of her ability, Jennie raised the subject of what 
 she could bring him to eat. The guard who had 
 remained in the room informed her that she 
 could bring him anything, at which she promised 
 to return next day. For the minute she was at 
 the end of her forces. If she went on much 
 longer they would snap. 
 
 "I'll run away now, Ted," she said, rising. 
 "It's splendid to see you so bucked up. I'll be 
 here again about this time to-morrow, and bring 
 you something nice. Momma's busy already 
 making you a fruit cake." She added, as she 
 held him by the hand, " I suppose you'll have to 
 have a lawyer." 
 
 A memory came to him like that of something 
 heard while under an anaesthetic. 
 
 "I think the judge said this morning that he'd 
 appoint some one to — ^to defend me." 
 21 3" 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Oh, we'll do better than that," she smiled, 
 cheerily, "I've got some money. We'll have a, 
 lawyer of our own." 
 
 The journey home was the hardest thing 
 Jennie had ever had to face. Teddy! Teddy! 
 Teddy brought to this! It was all she could 
 say to herself. The bare fact dwarfed all its 
 causes, immediate or remote. 
 
 Eager for privacy in which to sob, she was 
 speeding along Indiana Avenue when, happening 
 to glance in the direction of her home, she saw 
 Gladys standing on the sidewalk. Gladys, hav- 
 ing at the same minute perceived her, started 
 with a violent bound in her direction. She, too, 
 had a newspaper in her hand, leading Jennie to 
 expect a repetition of Gussie's episode that 
 morning. 
 
 It was such a repetition, and it was not. It 
 was, to the extent that Gladys had been informed 
 of Teddy's drama much as her elder sister at 
 Corinne's, though later in the day. At a minute 
 when trade was slack and Gladys ruminantly 
 chewing gum. Miss Hattie Belweather, a cash 
 girl in the gloves, slipped up to her to say: 
 
 "Oh, Gladys FoUett, if you knew what Sun- 
 shine Bright's been saying about you, you'd 
 never speak to her again!" Hattie Belweather, 
 ,who had the blank, innocent expression of a 
 sheep, having paused for the natural inquiry, 
 went on breathlessly. "She says your brother 
 Teddy robbed a bank and killed a man and is in 
 jail over at Ellenbrook and — " 
 
 312 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Such foolish calumny Gladys could so far 
 contemn as to say with quiet force: 
 
 "You tell Sunshine Bright that the next time 
 I go by the notions I'll stop and break her neck. 
 See?" 
 
 Hattie Belweatheri having sped away to cdrry 
 this challenge, Gladys found herself confronted 
 by Miss Flossie Grimm, a saleslady in the stock- 
 ings, to which department Gladys herself in a 
 minor capacity was also attached. Feeling that 
 the Follett child was ignorant of facts of which 
 she should be in possession, Miss Grimm said, 
 reprovingly: 
 
 "You've got a chunk of gall! Look at that!" 
 
 That was one of the papers giving the story of 
 Teddy's downfall, so that Gladys, too, was 
 soon making her way homeward. But she was 
 not a cash girl for nothing, while the instincts of 
 the city gamine endowed her with alertness of 
 mind beyond either of her sisters. She remem- 
 bered that the paper she had seen was a morning 
 one, and that by this hour those of the afternoon 
 would be on the news stands. They would not 
 only give further details, but might possibly 
 tell her that the whole story was untrue. Some- 
 where she had heard that among the New York 
 evening papers one was renowned for solemnity 
 and exactitude. Veracity costing a cent more 
 than she usually spent for the evening news, 
 when she spent anything, which was rare, she 
 felt the occasion worth the extravagance. 
 
 In these pages, Teddy's case was condensed 
 313 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 into so small a paragraph that she had difficulty 
 in finding it; but during the search she hghted 
 on something else. It was something so extraor- 
 dinary, so unbelievable, so impossible to assim- 
 ilate, as to thrust even Teddy's situation well 
 into the second place. 
 
 After that, all the known methods of locomo- 
 tion were slow to Gladys in her efforts to reach 
 home; but before she could enter the house she 
 had seen Jennie advancing up the avenue, and 
 so ran back to meet her. 
 
 "Oh, Jen! Look!" 
 
 It was all she had breath to say, so that Jennie 
 naturally did as she was bidden. But she, too, 
 found the paragraph thrust beneath her eyes 
 extraordinary, unbelievable, and impossible to 
 assimilate, though for other reasons than those 
 that swayed her sister. 
 
 CoLLiNGHAM — FoLLETT. On May nth, at St. Titus's 
 Rectory, Madison Avenue, by the Rev. Larned Goodbody, 
 Robert Bradley CoUingham, Jr., of Marillo Park, N. Y., 
 to Jane Scarborough Follett, of Pemberton Heights, N. J. 
 
 Of the many things Jennie didn't comprehend, 
 she comprehended this paragraph least of all. 
 Who had put it in the paper, and what did it 
 mean ? She walked on dreamily, Gladys trotting 
 beside her, a living interrogation point. 
 
 "Oh, Jen, what's it all about? Are you 
 married to him really?" 
 
 Jennie answered as best she knew how. 
 
 "Not — ^not exactly." 
 
 314 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 But here Gladys was too quick for her. 
 
 "If you're married to him at all, it's got to be 
 exactly, hasn't it?" 
 
 "I — I did go through — ^through the ceremony." 
 
 "Well then, you've got the law on him," 
 Gladys declared, earnestly. "He'll have to pay 
 you alimony anyhow." 
 
 "I — I don't want him to pay me anything." 
 
 "Not pay you anything, and him with a wad 
 as big as a haystack? Oh, Jen, you're not going 
 dippy like poor momma, are you?" 
 
 Jennie wondered if she was. It seemed to her 
 as if she could stand little more in the line of 
 revolution without her mind giving way. 
 
 And yet within a few minutes she received 
 another shock. It came through Gussie, who 
 ran to meet them at the door. 
 
 " For mercy's sake, Jen, what's all this about ? " 
 
 She fluttered a yellow envelope, on which the 
 address was typewritten. 
 
 Mrs. Bradley Collingham, Jr. 
 Care Mrs. Follett 
 II Indiana Avenue 
 
 Pemberton Heights, N. J. 
 
 "I told the boy it didn't belong here — " Gussie 
 was beginning to explain when Gladys inter- 
 rupted. 
 
 "Yes, it dpes. Read that." 
 
 Gussie read and read again. 
 
 "Well, of all — " She stopped only because 
 she lacked the words with which to continue. 
 
 31S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 In the meanwhile Jennie had opened her tele» 
 gram and read: 
 
 Have asked father to engage best counsel in New York 
 to defend boy. Sailing to-morrow on Venezuela, and will 
 take all responsibilities oiF your hands. Placed two thou- 
 sand dollars to your account at Pemberton National Bank. 
 See manager. Devoted love. Your husband, Bob. 
 
 Jennie let the yellow slip flutter to the entry- 
 floor while she stood gazing into the air. Gussie 
 having picked it up, the two younger sisters 
 read it together. 
 
 "Some class!" Gladys commented, dryly. 
 
 But Gussie could only stare at Jennie awe- 
 somely, as if a miracle had transformed her. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 ON landing from the Fenezuela, Bob drove 
 out to CoUingham Lodge. He knew that 
 by this time the family were in the Adirondacks, 
 and that with Gull and his wife to look after him 
 he should have the place to himself. Now that 
 he was known to be married he had first thought 
 it possible to bring Jennie there, but had decided 
 that the big empty house might frighten her with 
 its loneliness. A hotel in New York was what 
 she would probably prefer; and with all he had 
 to do for Teddy, it would doubtless be most con- 
 venient for himself. He went to his old home, 
 therefore, only as to a base from which to make 
 further arrangements. Having unpacked a few 
 things and eaten a snack of lunch, he would go 
 to see his wife at once. 
 
 Though he had not expected to hear from her 
 on landing, and still less to see her at the dock, 
 he was faintly disappointed to receive neither of 
 these forms of greeting. He reminded himself 
 that not her coldness, but her inexperience, would 
 account for this, and so made the more of his 
 anticipations for the afternoon. She had written 
 to him while he was away, short, noncommittal 
 letters, betraying a mind unused to corre- 
 spondence rather than a heart opposed to it. 
 
 3'^7 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Lack of habit, he told himself, would for a long 
 time to come make her seem unresponsive when 
 she would only be hesitating and observant. 
 
 It was the hot season at Marillo, and those 
 houses which were not closed were somnolent. 
 At CoUingham Lodge, Max, with his madly joy- 
 ful demonstrations, was the only expression of 
 life. Within the house, the shades were down, 
 the furniture befrocked. Nevertheless, it was 
 home, and all the more home after the alien 
 pageantry of the tropics and the south. Having 
 bathed and changed his clothes, he found 
 pleasure in roaming from one dim airless room 
 to another, as if he had been absent for a year. 
 
 It was a greater pleasure for the reason that, 
 ever since receiving his father's amazing cable- 
 gram, the vague antagonism he had felt for two 
 or three years toward his parents had given place 
 to affection and gratitude. They had seemingly 
 come round after all to acknowledging his right 
 to be himself. The concession gave him a sense 
 of loving them, of loving the things that belonged 
 to them. He strolled into their rooms, looking 
 about on the objects they used, as though in 
 this way he got some contact with their person- 
 alities. 
 
 As yet, Jennie's family hardly entered the 
 sphere of his conceptions. He knew she had 
 a mother and sisters; he had seen and spoken to 
 Teddy at the bank. But even the knowledge that 
 the boy was in jail for killing a man didn't bring 
 him or them near to him as realities. While 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 there were things he should do for the boy, they 
 would not be done for him, but for Jennie. 
 What concerned her naturally concerned her 
 husband; but otherwise his father and mother 
 came first. For this new generosity on their 
 part, for this opening of the arms, his heart 
 glowed toward them, making them sensibly his 
 own. 
 
 He was thinking of this as he stood in his 
 mother's room, gazing round on the chintzy com- 
 fort he had all his life regarded with some awe. 
 Not since he had been a little boy had he felt so 
 warmly toward her as now. A note from her at 
 Quarantine had assured him, as she had assured 
 him before he went to South America, that she 
 was his mother and that in all trials he could 
 count on her. Counting on her, he could count 
 on everything, for however difficult his father 
 might prove, she could manage him in the end. 
 It made everything easier for him and for Jennie,, 
 turning an anxious outlook on life into a splendid 
 hopefulness. 
 
 He was leaving the room to go and see if Mrs. 
 Gull had cooked a chop for him when he noticed, 
 propped against the wall and near the door by 
 which he had come in, what looked like a picture 
 carelessly covered with a crimson cloth. His 
 mother had long talked of having her portrait 
 done; he wondered if it could be that. He put 
 his hand on it, and felt the frame. It was a 
 picture, and, if a picture, undoubtedly the 
 portrait. 
 
 319 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Let's see what the old lady looks Uke," were 
 the words that passed through his mind. 
 
 With a twitch the cloth was off, and he sprang 
 back. The start was one of surprise. Looking 
 for no more than the exquisite conventionality 
 he knew so well, this vital nudity caught his 
 breath and made his heart leap. It was as if he 
 had actually come on some living pagan loveli- 
 ness seated in one of the empty rooms. Tann- 
 hauser first beholding the goddess in the secrecy 
 of the Venusberg must have felt something like 
 this amazed tumult of the senses. 
 
 Turning from the great bay window in which 
 he had hastily pulled up the shades, his excite- 
 ment had consciously in it a presentiment of evil. 
 She was so alive, and so much there on purpose ! 
 
 Then a horror stole over him, like a chill that 
 struck his bones. He crept forward, with a 
 stricken, fascinated stare. It couldn't be, he was 
 saying to himself; and yet — and yet — it was. 
 
 The bearings of this conviction didn't come to 
 him all at once. The fact was as much as he 
 could deal with. She had sat and been painted 
 like this ! His impressions were as poignant and 
 confused as if he had seen her struck dead. He 
 couldn't account for it. He couldn't explain the 
 presence of the thing here in his mother's room. 
 
 On the lower bar of the frame he saw an in- 
 scription plate, getting down on all fours to read 
 it— "Life and Death: by Hubert Wray." 
 
 So Hubert had done it; Hubert had seen her in 
 this flinging-ofF of mystery. Of course! 
 
 320 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 His thought flashed back to the day when he 
 had first made her acquaintance. Leaning a 
 little forward, she was sitting in this very Byzan- 
 tine chair, on this very dais, wearing a flowered 
 dress, a^ flower-wreathed Leghorn hat in her lap. 
 Wray, in a painting smock, was standing with 
 the palette and brushes in his hand, making a 
 sketch of her more or less on the lines of a Rey- 
 nolds or a Gainsborough. He had dropped him 
 a line telling him he had taken a studio and 
 inviting him to look him up. He hadn't looked 
 him up till a week or two had gone by; but, hav- 
 ing once seen this girl, he did so soon again. 
 
 Of him she had taken little or no notice. 
 When, later, he forced himself on her attention, 
 she made his approaches difficult. When he 
 asked her to marry him she had at first laughed 
 him ofi^, and then refused him in so many words. 
 But as she generally based her refusal, uncon- 
 sciously, perhaps, on the social differences be- 
 tween them, he wouldn't take her "No" for an 
 answer. If he could ignore the social differences, 
 it seemed to him that she could, while the ad- 
 vantages to her in marrying a Collingham were 
 evident. 
 
 "And all the while this is what the trouble 
 was. 
 
 What he meant by this was more than the 
 picture, "Life and Death," though how much 
 more he made no attempt to measure. The 
 truth that now emerged for him out of his mem- 
 ory of the winter months was that Wray loved 
 
 321 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie, that Jennie loved Wray, and that he had 
 been a blind fool never to have seen it. He 
 threw himself on his mother's couch, burying 
 his face in the cushions. 
 
 As much as from anjrthing else he suffered 
 from the breakdown of his convictions. He had 
 been so glib on the subject of his instinct. Love 
 could make mistakes, he had said to Edith, but 
 instinct couldn't. He had been the other half 
 of Jennie; Jennie had been the other half of him. 
 She couldn't be unfaithful to him, because he 
 knew she couldn't. His love was protecting her 
 like a magic cloak, while she was. . . . The awful 
 shame of a man whose foolish stammerings of 
 passion are held up to public ridicule seemed to 
 kill the heart in his body. 
 
 And yet, when he staggered to his feet and 
 strode toward the obsessing thing to pull the 
 cloth over it again, he started back once more. 
 The woman with the skull had changed. She 
 was a coarse creature now, common and sensual. 
 Amazement pinned him to the spot, his hands 
 raised as if at sight of an apparition. Then 
 slowly, insensibly, weirdly, Jennie came back 
 again, though not quite the Jennie he had seen 
 at first. This Jennie retained the traits of the 
 second woman — a Jennie coarsened, common, 
 and sensual, in spite of being exquisite, too. 
 
 He walked in and out of the other rooms on 
 
 the floor, so as to clear his mind of the suggestion. 
 
 When he came back, he saw the second woman, 
 
 and the second woman only; but having moved 
 
 322 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 into a new light, he found Jennie there as before. 
 It was like sorcery. Whether the thing had a 
 baleful life, or whether his perceptions were 
 growing crazed, he couldn't tell. 
 
 Neither could he tell what he was to do with 
 regard to the plans he had been making. A 
 hotel in New York now, . . . 
 
 But the immediate duties were evident. 
 Nominally he had come back to befriend the 
 boy, and the boy must be befriended. To do 
 that he must have a knowledge of the facts. 
 Farther than this, he had been unable to progress 
 even by the hour, .n the early afternoon, when 
 he was limping along Indiana Avenue. 
 
 He had telephoned his coming, and Jennie 
 had answered in a dead voice which could hardly 
 be interpreted as a welcome. It was like a guilty 
 voice, he said to himself, though he corrected 
 the thought instantly, to argue in favor of 
 emotion. 
 
 He had spent the intervening two or three 
 hours arguing. Jennie was a model, and he 
 must not be surprised if a model's work, however 
 startling to one who was not a model, should 
 seem a matter of course to her. All professions 
 had peculiarities strange to those who didn't 
 belong to them, and the model's perhaps most of 
 all. He couldn't judge; he couldn't condemn. 
 He must try to understand her from her own 
 point of view. Probably her posing in this way 
 seemed the most natural thing in the world to 
 her; and, if so, he must make it seem the same 
 
 325 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to himself. He couldn't expect her to have the 
 hesitations and circumspections of a girl from 
 Marillo Park. If she was true to her own 
 standards, it was all he had a right to look for. 
 
 And yet there was Wray. He had long seen 
 in Hubert a fellow whom no girl could love " and 
 get away with it." These were the words he 
 had used of his friend, and he had considered the 
 detail none of his business. Most men were that 
 way, more or less, and if he himself wasn't, it 
 was not a moral excellence, but a trick of tempera- 
 ment. But that Jennie was in danger from Wray 
 was a thought that never occurred to him. Her 
 innocence and defenselessness, combined with 
 what he had taken to be a kind of studio code 
 of honor, would have been enough to protect 
 her, even had his suspicions been roused, which 
 they never were. He tried to smother those 
 suspicions even now, saying to himself that he 
 had nothing against her except that she had 
 been a model — in all for which a model was ever 
 called upon. 
 
 He had that — and the timbre of her voice on 
 the telephone. There was dismay in that voice, 
 and terror. If it wasn't a guilty voice. . . . 
 
 But, as a matter of fact, it was a guilty voice. 
 In an overwhelming consciousness of guilt, Jennie 
 had spent the whole of the ten days since the 
 coming of his cablegram. The man who at a 
 distance of four or five thousand miles could 
 know that Teddy was in jail and act so promptly 
 for the good of all might be aware of anything. 
 
 324 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Having always seemed immense and over- 
 shadowing, he became godlike now from his 
 sheer display of power. It was power so great 
 that she could put forth no claim; she could only 
 wait humbly on his will. 
 
 As, hidden behind a curtain, she watched for 
 his coming along the avenue, all her thoughts 
 were focused into speculation as to how he 
 would approach her. Would he be sorry for 
 having married her? She could only fear that 
 he would be. She had never mistrusted his 
 mother's reading of his character — that he made 
 love to girls one day and forgot them the next — 
 in addition to which she had involved him in this 
 terrible disgrace. Whatever excuse those wha 
 loved Teddy might make for him, the fact re- 
 mained that to the world he was a bank robber 
 and a murderer. All his kin must share in the 
 condemnation meted out to him, and Bob's first 
 task as a married man must be that of defending 
 her and hers against public disdain. He might 
 be as brave as a lion in doing that, but, she 
 reasoned, he couldn't like the necessity. He 
 might say he did, and yet she wouldn't be able 
 to beUeve him. Even if he still cared for her as 
 he had cared when he went away, his marriage 
 to her couldn't possibly be viewed otherwise 
 than as a misfortune; and he might not still 
 care for her. 
 
 She saw him as he limped round the comer at 
 the very end of the street. He wore a Panama 
 hat and a white-linen suit. Luckily, Gussie and 
 
 3^5 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Gladys had gone back to work and her mother 
 was lying down. She couldn't have borne the 
 suspense had she not been all alone. Even 
 Pansy's searching eyes, as she stood with her 
 little squat legs planted wide apart, trying to 
 understand this new element in the situation, 
 were almost more than Jennie could endure. 
 
 Bob advanced slowly, examining the numbers 
 of the houses, many of which were lacking. 
 Seventeen, Fifteen, and Thirteen were, however, 
 over their doors, so that he was duly prepared 
 for Eleven. 
 
 "I'll know by the first look in his eyes," she 
 kept saying to herself, "whether he's sorry he 
 married me or not." 
 
 As he passed number Thirteen she got up from 
 the arm of the big chair on which she had been 
 perched, and found she could hardly stand. It 
 was all she could do to creep into the entry and 
 open the front door. When he turned into the 
 little cement strip leading up to it, she shrank 
 back into the shadow. He was abreast of the 
 two hydrangea trees before he saw her. When 
 he did so he stood still. It seemed to her that an 
 unreckonable time went by before a smile stole 
 to his lips, and when it did it was wavering, 
 flickering, more poignant than no smile at all. 
 
 Her inner comment was: "Yes; he's sorry. 
 Now I know." Pride, another new force in her 
 character, made of her a woman with a will, 
 as she added', "I must help him to get out of it — 
 somehow." 
 
 326 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 But Pansy, sensing a nimbus of good will as 
 imperceptible to Jennie as the pervasive scent 
 of the summer, lilted down the steps, raised her 
 forepaws against his shin, and gazed up into his 
 face adoringly. 
 
 22 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 IT was a help to Bob CoUingham that his 
 first glance at Jennie decided his attitude for 
 the near future. Whatever his doubts and 
 questionings, he could add nothing to the trials 
 she had to face. Whatever she had done, what- 
 ever the net of circumstances in which she had 
 been caught, he must act as if, as far as he him- 
 self was concerned, he was satisfied. Whether 
 she loved him or whether she didn't, or whether 
 her duties as a model had or had not made her 
 indifferent to considerations to which most 
 people were sensitive, were questions that must 
 be postponed. 
 
 This conviction, which flashed on him as he 
 saw her shrinking in the entry, was confirmed 
 when he felt her crumpled in his arms, relieved 
 by his presence and yet frightened by the new 
 conditions which it wrought. It was the same 
 dependent but rebellious little Jennie, clinging 
 to him and yet trying to slip away from him. 
 It was as if she begged for a love which the per- 
 versity of her tortured little heart wouldn't 
 allow her to accept. Very well then; he must 
 measure it out to her a little at a time, as you 
 fed a sick person or a starving man, till she got 
 used to it. When she was stronger and he more 
 
 328 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 at peace with himself, they could tackle the 
 personal problems between them. 
 
 So, when she struggled from his arms, he let 
 her go, following her into the living-room. 
 
 "Gussie and Gladys are back at work," she 
 said at once, to explain the fact that none of 
 his new connections were there to greet him, 
 "and momma's lying down. She always lies 
 down at this time of day, ever since daddy died." 
 She dropped into one big shabby armchair, 
 motioning him to another. "And there's some- 
 thing else I must tell you. Ever since — this 
 thing happened to Teddy — she hasn't been — 
 well, not right in her mind." 
 
 The stand he had taken became more impera- 
 tive. A father's death, a mother's collapse, a 
 brother's crime had put her at the head of her 
 little troop of three, to bear everything alone. 
 He had left behind him an inexperienced girl; 
 he had come back to find a woman already 
 accustomed to rising to emergencies. The 
 change was perceptible in the clearer, slightly 
 older cutting of her features, as well as in the 
 greater authority with which she spoke. Where 
 the contours of her profile had been soft and 
 vague, there was now a delicate chiseling; where 
 there had been hesitation in words, there was 
 now the firmness of one obliged to know her mind. 
 
 As she sketched her mother's mental state, 
 he sat on the extreme edge of his big chair, 
 straining forward so as to be near her without 
 touching her, his fingers clasped between his 
 
 329 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 knees. She continued to speak nervously, with 
 agitation, and yet lucidly. 
 
 "She isn't very bad. She's only what you'd 
 call unsettled. It's not that she does anything, 
 but rather that, after all the years when she's 
 worked so hard, she just sits and does nothing. 
 It's as if she was lost in thinking; and when she 
 comes back she says such terribly strange 
 things." 
 
 "What sort of things?" 
 
 "For one, that it's no use living any longer — 
 that the world's so bad that the best thing left 
 is to get out of it. She says you can't help the 
 world, or hope to see it improve, because human 
 beings will always reject the principles that 
 would make it any better." 
 
 He smiled gently. 
 
 "I've heard people talk like that who weren't 
 considered unsettled in their minds." 
 
 "Oh, but she doesn't stop there. She tells 
 Teddy he was quite within his rights in taking 
 money from the bank, and when she goes to see 
 him she begs him to be brave and not be sorry 
 for anything he's done." 
 
 "And is he sorry?" 
 
 "I don't know that you could call it sorry. 
 He's dazed and bewildered. He knows he took 
 the money and that he killed a man; but he 
 thinks he was placed in a position where he 
 couldn't help it." 
 
 "And does he say who could have helped it?" 
 
 As she looked down at that twisting and un- 
 330 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 twisting of her fingers which was the chief sign 
 of her effort at self-control, her color rose. 
 
 "He says your father could have helped it; 
 but I don't believe he's right." 
 
 "No, he isn't right — ^not as dad himself sees it. 
 I know he's been worried ever since your 
 father left the bank; but he thinks he couldn't 
 help dismissing him. Life isn't very simple for 
 anyone — not for my dad any more than it was 
 for yours. If I could see Teddy — " 
 
 "Would you go to see him.?" 
 
 "Go to see him? Why, that's what I came 
 back for! I'd like to do it this very afternoon, 
 if you'd tell me first how it all came about. 
 You see, I don't know anything, except the two 
 or three bald facts dad mentioned in his cable- 
 gram." 
 
 It was not easy to tell this story, even to a 
 man whom she knew to be so kind. The fact 
 that he was her husband didn't help her, for the 
 reason that it was because he was her husband 
 that her pride was in revolt. Had he not been 
 her husbarfd, he would have been free to with- 
 draw from this series of catastrophes. Now he 
 could not withdraw. He was tied. 
 
 Moreover, the sordid tale of domestic want 
 became the more sordid when given fact by fact. 
 It was the intimate story of her life in contrast 
 to the intimate story of his. The homely family 
 dodges for making both ends meet which had 
 been the mere jest of penury between Gussie, 
 Gladys, and herself became ghastly when ex- 
 
 331 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 posed to a man who had never known the lack 
 of service and luxury, to say nothing of food 
 and drink, since the minute he was born. She 
 felt as if it emptied her of any little dignity she 
 had ever possessed, as if it denuded her of self- 
 respect. She could more easily have confessed 
 sins to him than the shifts to which they had 
 been put to live. 
 
 Nevertheless, she went through with it, 
 brokenly, with great effort, and yet with a kind 
 of dogged will to drain all the dregs of the cup. 
 
 "He'll see me as I am," was part of her 
 underlying thought. "He'll know then that 
 I can't go on with this comedy of having married 
 him. Even if I have, we've got to end it some- 
 how." 
 
 But on his side the reaction was different. 
 He had never heard this sort of tale before. He 
 had never before been in contact with this phase 
 of poverty. He had known poor men in college, 
 and plenty of chaps who were down on their 
 luck; but the daily pinching and paring of whole 
 families just to have enough to eat and to wear 
 was so new as to astonish him. For the minute 
 it made Jennie less an individual than a type. 
 
 "My God!" he was saying inwardly, "do hu- 
 man beings have to live so close to the edge as 
 all that?" 
 
 When she had told him of the incident of the 
 cutting off of the gas because they couldn't pay 
 fifteen dollars on account, the turning point of 
 Teddy's tragedy, his exclamation was embar- 
 
 332 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 rassing to them both: "Why, I pay twice that 
 for a pair of shoes !" Though she knew he meant 
 it as a protest against the straits to which they 
 had been put, it seemed both to him and to her 
 to make the gulf between them wider. 
 
 "And you were going through all that," he 
 said, when she had finished her recital, "during 
 the months when I was seeing you two and three 
 times a week at the studio. My God! how I 
 wish you could have told me!" 
 
 It was the first time that a little smile came 
 quivering to her lips. 
 
 "You don't tell things like that — not to any- 
 one outside your family. Besides, it isn't worth 
 while. You get used to them." 
 
 "You weren't used to it — ^when your mother 
 cried — and Teddy forked out the money." 
 
 "Not to that very thing — but to things like 
 it. If Teddy hadn't forked out the money, we 
 should have worried through somehow. That's 
 the awful thing about it — ^that if he hadn't done 
 it we shouldn't have been much worse off than 
 we'd been at other times. A little worse — yes — 
 even a good deal, perhaps; and yet we could have 
 lived through it. I couldn't have told you, be- 
 cause people of our kind don't talk about such 
 things, not even with their neighbors. We just 
 take them for granted." 
 
 It was this taking it for granted that impressed 
 him with such a sense of the terrible. It left so 
 little room for living, so limited a swing to do 
 anything but scrape. Scraping was the whole of 
 
 333 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Jennie's history. He could see it as she talked. 
 She had never in her life had fifty dollars to do 
 ■with as she chose. Perhaps she had never had 
 five. It was not the lack of the money that 
 overwhelmed him, but of any freedom to move, 
 of any scope in which to grow. 
 
 Forgetting his reserves of the morning, he 
 caught her by both hands, holding them im- 
 prisoned in her lap. 
 
 " But that's all over now, Jennie. You're my 
 wife. You're coming to me — right off — ^to-day 
 — ^this very afternoon." 
 
 "Oh, Bob, I couldn't!" If he was to be "got 
 out of it," she felt it essential to gain time. " I 
 couldn't leave them. Don't you see? There's 
 no one but me to keep house or — or to decide 
 anything. Momma's given up entirely, and 
 Gussie and Gladys are both so young that I 
 couldn't possibly leave them alone." 
 
 "Then we'll have to manage it some other 
 way." 
 
 "No; not yet. Let's wait. Let's see." 
 
 "Waiting and seeing won't change the fact 
 that we're man and wife and that everyone 
 knows it. It's been in the papers — " 
 
 "Yes, but why did you put it in?" It was her 
 turn to seek information. "To me it was like a 
 thunderbcJlt." 
 
 He gave her the contents of his father's 
 cablegram. 
 
 "I took it for granted that yotu'must have told 
 him." 
 
 334 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I shouldn't have done that. I did — I did tell 
 your mother, Bob — but then I couldn't help it." 
 
 He started back, releasing her hands which he 
 had continued holding. 
 
 "What.? You've seen the old lady?" 
 
 She nodded. "Yes; she sent for me to go out 
 to Marillo Park." 
 
 "For Heaven's sake! What made her do 
 that?" 
 
 She was aware of her opportunity. If she 
 wanted to "get him out of it," now was her 
 chance. She could tell him part of the truth and 
 keep him dangling — or the whole of it and let 
 him go. "Fairer to him — and easier for me" 
 was the thought on which she based her decision. 
 
 "She — she wanted to thank me for — for not 
 having taken you at your word and married 
 you. 
 
 "Oh! So you had to tell her that you had. 
 And what did she say to that ? " 
 
 "She was lovely." 
 
 He beamed with pleasure. 
 
 "She can be when she takes the notion, just 
 as she can be the other way. She must have 
 liked you." 
 
 "I— I think she did." 
 
 "You bet she did! She'd let you see it if she 
 didn't. So that's what smoothed the way for us ! 
 I couldn't make it out. You certainly are a 
 little witch, Jennie!" 
 
 "It isn't as smooth as all that." Springing to 
 her feet, she turned her back on him, moving 
 
 335 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 away toward the window. "Oh, Bob, I wish 
 I didn't have to tell you. You're so good and 
 kind, and I've been so" — it came out with a 
 burst of confession, her arms outstretched, her 
 hands spread palms upward — "I've been so 
 awful! When you know — " 
 
 "Wait!" He seized her by the shoulders with 
 the force which calms emotion from sheer 
 fright. "Wait, Jennie! I know what you're 
 going to tell me." 
 
 "Oh, but you can't." 
 
 "It's — it's something about Wray, isn't it?" 
 
 She nodded dumbly. 
 
 "Then we'll put it off. Do you see? That 
 isn't what I came back for. I came back about 
 Teddy, and we must see that through before 
 we think of ourselves. All that '11 keep — " 
 
 " It won't keep if we go and live together." 
 
 "Then we won't go and live together — not 
 till we see how it's to be done. That's just a 
 detail. In comparison with Teddy, it doesn't 
 matter one way or another. We'll come to it 
 by and by. All we've got to think of now is 
 that there's a boy whose life is hanging by a 
 thread — " 
 
 "Yes; but I don't want you to be mixed up 
 in it. I want to — ^to save you from — from the 
 sacrifice — and — and the disgrace." 
 
 He stood back from her with a hard little laugh. 
 
 "Good God! Jennie, I wonder if you have the 
 faintest idea of what love is! You can't have. 
 Do you suppose it matters to me what I'm mixed 
 336 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 top in so long as it's something that touches you ? 
 Listen! Let me explain to you what love is like 
 when it's the kind I feel for you. I " — he braced 
 himself in order to bring out the words forcibly — 
 *'I don't care what Wray is to you or what you 
 are to Wray — not yet. I put that away from me 
 till I've gone with you through the things you've 
 got to meet. They'll not be easy for you, but I 
 want to make them as easy as I can. No one 
 can do it but me, because no one cares for you as 
 I do." 
 
 "Oh, I know that." 
 
 "Then, if you know it, Jennie, don't force 
 anything else on me when I'm doing my best not 
 to think of it. Let me jiist love you as well as I 
 know how till we do the things that are right in 
 front of us. After that, if there's a reason why 
 I should hand you over to Wray, or to anybody 
 else, you can tell me, and I'll — " 
 
 Pansy's scrambling to attention and a sound 
 on the stairs arrested his words as well as Jennie's 
 rising tears. 
 
 "Momma's coming down," the girl whispered, 
 hurriedly. "She wants to see you. Don't forget 
 that you're not to mind anything she says." 
 
 To Bob, the moment was one of awed surprise, 
 for the commanding, black-robed figure differed 
 from all his preconceptions, as far as he had any, 
 of Jennie's mother. Advancing rapidly into the 
 room, she took his right hand in hers, laying her 
 left on his head as if in benediction. 
 
 "So you're my Jennie's husband. I hope 
 
 ^^^ 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 you're a good man, for you've found a good 
 woman. Be loving to each other. The time is 
 coming when love is all that will survive. Let me 
 look at you." 
 
 He stood off, smiling, while she made her 
 inspection. 
 
 "Love is all there is, anyhow, don't you think,, 
 Mrs. Follett?" 
 
 "Yes; but it gets no chance in this world." 
 
 "Or it is the only thing that does get a 
 chance?" 
 
 "It may be the only thing that does get a 
 chance, but that chance is small. There's no 
 hope for the world. Don't think there is, because 
 you'll be disappointed. Each time your disap- 
 pointment is worse than the last, till you end in 
 despair." 
 
 It was the strain Jennie felt obliged to inter- 
 rupt. 
 
 "Momma, Mr. Collingham is going to see 
 Teddy. Don't you want him to take a message.?" 
 
 "Only the message I've given him myself — 
 that it's only a little way over, and that one of 
 two things must happen then. It will either be 
 sleep, in which nothing will matter, or it will be 
 life, in which he'll be free — understood — ^sup- 
 ported — instead of being beaten and crushed and 
 mangled, as everyone is here. Tell him that." 
 
 He felt it his duty to be cheerier. 
 
 "On the other hand, we may get him off; or 
 if we can't get him off altogether—" 
 
 "What good would that do — your getting him 
 338 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 off? You'd be throwing him back again on a 
 world that doesn't want him." 
 
 "Oh, but surely the world does — " 
 
 "Yes; the world does — I'm wrong — it does to 
 the same extent that it wanted his father — to 
 give it every ounce of his strength with a pit- 
 tance for his pay — to spend and be spent till 
 he's good for nothing more — and then to be 
 thrown aside to starve. It's possible that even 
 now Teddy would be willing to do this if they'd 
 only let him live; but tell him it's not good 
 enough. I've told him, and I don't think he 
 believes me; but you're a man, and perhaps you 
 can make him see it." 
 
 "Yes, momma dear, he'll do the best he 
 can—" 
 
 " It woji't be the best he can if he tries to keep 
 him here. We've passed on, my boy and I. Only 
 our bodies are still on the earth, and that for just 
 a little while. A year from now and we'll both 
 be safe — so safe! — and yet you'd try to keep us 
 in a world where men make a curse of every- 
 thing." 
 
 But Teddy himself was less reconciled than 
 his mother to bidding the world good-by. In 
 proportion as his physical strength returned, 
 the fate that had overtaken him became more 
 and more preposterous. To suppose that he 
 had of his own criminal intention stolen money 
 and killed a man was little short of insane. A 
 man had been killed by a pistol he held in his 
 
 339 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 hand; he had taken money because the need 
 was such that he couldn't help himself; but he, 
 Teddy Follett, was neither a thief nor a mur- 
 derer in any sense involving the exercise of will. 
 He was sure of that. He declared it to himself 
 again and again and again. It was all that 
 gave him fighting force, compelling him to insist, 
 to assert himself, and to protest in season and 
 out of season against being shut up in a cell. 
 
 The cell was seven feet long and four feet wide. 
 Round the foot of the bunk and along the sides 
 there was a space of some twelve inches. At the 
 foot there was the iron-ribbed door with a 
 grating, and along the sides a slimy and viscous 
 stone wall. Besides the bunk, a bucket, and a 
 shelf there was nothing whatever in the way 
 of furnishings. Under the bed he was privileged 
 to keep the suitcase with his wardrobe, and on 
 the shelf whatever his mother and sisters brought 
 him in the way of food. By day, the only light 
 was through the grating to the corridor; by 
 night, a feeble electric bulb was extinguished at 
 half past nine. The Brig being an ancient 
 prison, and Teddy but one of a long, long line of 
 murderers who had lain on this hard bed, vermin 
 infested everything. 
 
 While Bob CoUingham was on his way to him 
 Teddy was in conversation with the chaplain. 
 For this purpose, the door had been unlocked. 
 The visitor leaned against the door post while 
 the prisoner stood in the narrow space between 
 his bunk and the wall. 
 
 340 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 It was the Protestant chaplain, a tall, spare, 
 sandy-haired man of some fifty-odd, whose 
 yearning, spiritual face had, through long asso- 
 ciation with his flock, grown tired and disillu- 
 sioned. Having sought this post from a genuine 
 sympathy with outcast men, he suffered from 
 their rejection. He was so sure of what would 
 help them, and only one in a hundred ever 
 wanted it. Even that one generally laughed at 
 it when he got out of jail. After eighteen years 
 of self-denying work, the worthy man was sadly 
 pessimistic now as to prospects of reform. 
 
 For the minute he was trying to convince 
 Teddy of the righteousness of punishment. He 
 had been drawn to the boy partly because of 
 his youth and good looks, but mainly on account 
 of his callousness to his crime. He seemed to 
 have no conscience, no notion of the difference 
 between right and wrong. "A moral moron" 
 was what he labeled him. The lack of ethical 
 consciousness was the more astonishing because 
 his antecedents had apparently been good. 
 
 "You see," he was pointing out, "you can't 
 break the laws by which society protects itself 
 and yet escape the moral and physical results." 
 
 But in his long, solitary hours Teddy had 
 been thinking this out. 
 
 "Doesn't that depend upon the laws? If the 
 law's wrong — " 
 
 "But who's to judge of that?" 
 
 "Isn't the citizen to judge of that?" 
 
 The parson smiled — his weary, spiritual smile. 
 341 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "If the citizen was allowed to judge of 
 that—" 
 
 "If he wasn't," Teddy broke in, with the 
 impetuosity born of his beginning to think for 
 himself, "if he wasn't, there'd be no such country 
 as the United States. Most of the fireworks in 
 American history are over the fine thing it is to 
 beat the law to it when the law isn't just." 
 
 "Ah, but there's a distinction between individ- 
 ual action and great popular movements." 
 
 "Great popular movements must be made up 
 of individual actions, mustn't they.? If in- 
 dividuals didn't break the laws, each guy on his 
 own account, you wouldn't get any popular 
 movements at all." 
 
 The chaplain shifted his ground. 
 
 "All the same, there are certain laws that 
 among all peoples and at all times have been 
 considered fundamental. Human society can't 
 permit a man to steal — " 
 
 "Then human society shouldn't put a man 
 in a position where he either has to steal or 
 starve to death." 
 
 There was a repetition of the thin, ghostly 
 smile. 
 
 "Oh, well, no one who's ordinarily honest and 
 industrious ever — " 
 
 " Ever starves to death ? That's a lie. Excuse 
 me," he added, apologetically, "but that kind of 
 talk just gets my goat. My father practically 
 starved to death — he died from lackof proper nour- 
 ishment, the doctor said — and there never was a 
 342 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 more industrious or an honester man bom. He 
 gave everjrthing he had to human society, and 
 when he had no more to give, human society 
 kicked him out. It has the law on its side, too, 
 and because" — he gulped — "I came to his help 
 in the only way I knew how they've chucked 
 me into this black hole." 
 
 The chaplain found another kind of opening. 
 
 "So, you see, my boy, there's that. If you 
 don't keep the law — " 
 
 "They can make you suffer for it," Teddy de- 
 clared, excitedly. "Of course they can. They've 
 made me suffer — God! how they've made me 
 suffer — more, I believe, than anyone since Jesus 
 Christ! But that's not what we were talking 
 about. You started in to tell me that it's right 
 for me to suffer the way they're making me. 
 That's what I kick against, and I'll keep on 
 kicking till they send me to the chair." 
 
 " If you could do yourself any good by that — " 
 
 But just here the dialogue was interrupted by 
 the appearance of Boole, the dapper, debonair 
 young guard who generally announced Teddy's 
 afternoon visitors. 
 
 "Hello, old cuss! Gent to see you." 
 
 The chaplain prepared to move on to the neigh- 
 boring cell. His leave-taking was kindly and 
 with a great pity in it. 
 
 "We'll go on with this talk again, my boy. 
 When you're able to get the right point of 
 view — 
 
 What would happen then was drowned in the 
 23 343 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 clanging of the door behind him, as Teddy 
 stepped out into the corridor. 
 
 "Who is it? Stenhouse?" he asked, as he 
 walked along with the guard. 
 
 He had already dropped into the prisoner's 
 habitual tone of hostile friendliness toward the 
 officials with whom he came most in contact, 
 recognizing the fact that had he met any of 
 these men "on the outside" they would have 
 hobnobbed together with the freemasonry of 
 American young men everywhere. On their 
 sides the keepers, apart from the fact that they 
 considered Teddy "a tough lot," had ceased to 
 show him animosity. 
 
 "It's not the lawyer," Boole answered now. 
 "It's a swell guy with a limp. Looks to me as if 
 he might be the gay young banker sport that the 
 papers say is married to your sister." 
 
 Teddy felt his heart contracting in a spasm of 
 dread. The one fact he knew of his brother-in- 
 law was that he had sent him Stenhouse, one of 
 the three or four lawyers most famous at the 
 New Jersey bar for saving lives. This detail, 
 too, the boy had learned from Boole. 
 
 "You'll not get the cur'nt, with him to defend 
 you, believe me. Some bird ! If he can't prove 
 you innocent, he'll find a flaw in the law or the 
 indictment or somethin'. Why, they say he 
 once got a guy off, a Pole, the fella was, just on 
 the spellin' of his name." 
 
 Having been warned by Stenhouse not to 
 discuss his case with anyone, Teddy was dis- 
 
 344 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 erectly silent. As a matter of fact, he had too 
 much to think of to be inclined to talk. The cir- 
 cumstance that "young Coll" had become a 
 relative was one of which he was just beginning 
 to seize the importance. His bruised mind had 
 been unable at first to apprehend it. Slowly he 
 was coming to the realized knowledge that he 
 was allied to that Olympian race which the 
 CoUinghams represented to the Folletts, and that, 
 at least, some of their power was engaged on his 
 behalf. 
 
 It was confusing. Since the might that had 
 struck him down was also coming to his aid, the 
 issue was no longer clear-cut. To have all the 
 right on one side and all the wrong on the other 
 had simplified life. Now, a right that was 
 partly wrong and a wrong that was partly right 
 had been personified, as it were, in this union 
 through which a CoUingham had become a Fol- 
 lett, and a FoUett a CoUingham. 
 
 Young Coll was standing where Jennie had 
 stood on the first occasion of Teddy's coming to 
 the visitors' room. He too waited with a smile. 
 The minute he saw the lad appear timidly on the 
 threshold he limped forward with outstretched 
 hand. 
 
 "Hello, Teddy!" His embarrassment, being 
 a kindly embarrassment, was without awkward- 
 ness. "You didn't know I was going to be 
 your brother the last time you saw me, did you ?" 
 
 Teddy said nothing. He was not sullen, but 
 neither was he friendly. A CoUingham, even 
 
 345 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 though married to his sister, was probably a 
 person to be feared. Teddy's counsel to himself 
 was to be on his guard against "the nigger in 
 the woodpile." 
 
 "Perhaps it was my fault that you didn't," 
 Bob went on, with some constraint. "That's 
 the reason why I'm here, I dare say there isn't 
 much I can do for you, old boy, but what little 
 there is I want to do." 
 
 Teddy eyed him steadily, still without making 
 a reply. Somehow they found chairs. Boole, 
 having once more summed up the visitor, had 
 retreated toward the guard who sat officially at 
 the far end of the room. 
 
 "Looks like a good cuss," was Boole's whis- 
 pered confidence. "Kind o' soft — like most o' 
 them swell sports that marries working goyls." 
 
 Bob was finding himself less and less at his 
 ease. The boy not only came none of the way 
 to meet him, but seemed to hold him as an 
 enemy. By his silence and by the severity of his 
 regard he conveyed the impression that young 
 Coll, and not himself, had done the wrong. 
 
 It was an attitude for which Bob was not pre- 
 pared. Neither was he prepared for the deface- 
 ment of all that had been glowing in the lad's 
 countenance. Jennie had warned him against 
 expecting the ruddy bright-eyed Teddy of the 
 bank, but he hadn't looked for this air of youth 
 blasted out of youthfulness. It was still youth, 
 but youth marred, terrified, haunted, with a fear 
 beyond that of gibbering old age. 
 346 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 With his lovingness and quickness of pity. 
 Bob sought for a line by which he could catch 
 on to the lad's interest. 
 
 "I asked my father to send you the best 
 counsel in New Jersey, and I believe he's picked 
 out Stenhouse." 
 
 Teddy regarded him grimly. 
 
 "Yes, he did." It seemed as if he meant to 
 say no more, when, with a sardonic grunt, he went 
 on, "Something like a guy who smashes a ma- 
 chine and then gets the best mechanician in the 
 world to come and patch it up." 
 
 "Yes — possibly — it may be. Only, there's 
 this to consider — that no one smashes a machine 
 on purpose." 
 
 "No, I don't suppose he does. Only, it's all 
 the same to the machine whether it's been 
 smashed on purpose or by accident — so long as 
 it '11 never run again." 
 
 Bob considered this. 
 
 "You might say that of a machine — a dead 
 thing from the start. You can't say it of a hu- 
 man being, who's alive from the beginning. See ? " 
 
 "No, I don't see." 
 
 "And I don't know that I can explain. I'm 
 only sure that a machine can be done for, and 
 that a human being can't be. You can come to 
 a time when it's no use doing anything more for 
 the one; but you can never reach such a time 
 with the other. With him, you may make mis- 
 takes or you may do him a great wrong, but you 
 can't stop trying to put things right again." 
 
 347 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "And you think you can put things right again 
 forme?" 
 
 "I don't know what I can do. I haven't an 
 idea. Very Ukely I can't do anything at all. I 
 merely came back from South America to do 
 what I could." 
 
 " Did you feel that you had to — because you'd 
 married Jennie?" 
 
 "That was a reason. It wasn't the only one." 
 
 "What else was there?" 
 
 "I'm not sure that I can tell you. A lot of the 
 things we do we do not from reason, but from 
 instinct. But if you don't want me to try to 
 take a hand — " 
 
 Under the dark streaks that blotted out what 
 had once been Teddy's healthy coloring, a slow 
 flush began to mantle. 
 
 "I don't want to be — to be bamboozled." 
 
 "Of course you don't. But how could I bam- 
 boozle you?" 
 
 There was no explanation. Unable to base 
 his distrust on any other ground than that Bob 
 was the son of the man who had dismissed Josiah 
 FoUett from the bank, Teddy fell silent again. 
 He could not afford to reject the least good will 
 that came his way, and yet his spirit was too sore 
 to accept it graciously. 
 
 Some of this young CoUingham divined. He 
 began to see that as the boy was suffering and 
 he wasn't, it was not for him to take offense. 
 On the contrary, he must use all his ingenuity 
 to find the way to make his appeal effectively. 
 
 348 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "All I could do from down there," he said, 
 when Teddy seemed indisposed to speak again, 
 "was to get Stenhouse or some one to take up 
 your case. I mean to see him in the morning 
 and find out how far he's got along with it. But 
 now that I'm here, can't you think of something 
 of your own that you'd like me to do .? " 
 
 Teddy raised his eyes quickly. His look was 
 the dull look of anguish, and yet with sharpness 
 in the glance. 
 
 "What kind of thing?" 
 
 "Any kind. Think of the thing that's most on 
 your mind — the thing that worries you more 
 than anything else — and — put it up to me." 
 The somberness deepened in the lad's face, not 
 from resentment, but from heaviness of thought. 
 "Go ahead," Bob urged. "Cough it up. If 
 it's something I can't tackle, I'll tell you so." 
 
 "What's most on my mind," Teddy began, 
 slowly, gritting his teeth with the effort to get 
 the words out, "what worries me like hell — is 
 ma — and the girls. They — they must be lone- 
 some — something fierce — ^without me." 
 
 In his agony of controlling himself he was 
 rubbing his palms between his knees, but Bob 
 put out his great hand and seized him by the 
 wrist. 
 
 "Look here, old chap! I can't comfort them 
 for your not being there. You know that, of 
 course. But it always helps women to have a 
 man coming and going in the house — ^to take a 
 lot of things off their hands — and keep them 
 
 349 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 company — and I'll do that. If I can't be every- 
 thing that you'd be — " 
 
 "You can be more than I could ever be." 
 
 "Yes — from the point of view of having a 
 little more money — and freedom — and a car to 
 take them out in — and all that; but if you think 
 I could ever make up to them for you, old sport — 
 but that isn't what you want me to do, is it? 
 You don't want me to be you, but to be some- 
 thing different — only, something that '11 make 
 your mother and Jennie and your little sisters 
 buck up again — " 
 
 Stumbling to his feet, Teddy drew the back 
 of his hand across his eyes. 
 
 "I — I guess I'd better beat it," he muttered, 
 unsteadily. "They — ^they don't like you to stay 
 out too long." 
 
 But Bob forced him gently back into his chair 
 again. 
 
 "Oh, cheese that, Teddy! Sit down and let's 
 get better acquainted. I want to tell you how 
 Jennie and I made up our minds to get married." 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 AND yet it's one of the commonest types 
 of the criminal mind," Stenhouse was 
 explaining to Bob during the following forenoon. 
 "Fellows perfectly normal in every respect but 
 that of their own special brand of crime. See 
 no harm in that whatever. Won't have a 
 cigar?" 
 
 Having declined the cigar for the third time. 
 Bob found a subconscious fascination in watching 
 the lawyer's Havana travel from one corner to 
 the other of his long, mobile, thin-Hpped mouth. 
 It was interesting, too, to get a view of Teddy's 
 case different from Jennie's. 
 
 There was nothing about Stenhouse, unless 
 it was his repressed histrionic intensity, to sug- 
 gest the saver of lives. Outwardly, he was a 
 lank, clean-shaven Yankee, of ill-assorted features 
 and piercing gimlet eyes. But something about 
 him suggested power and an immense persuasive- 
 ness. He had only to wake from the quiescent 
 mood in which he was talking to Bob to become 
 an actor or a demagogue. With laughter, tears, 
 pathos, vituperation, satire, and repartee all 
 at his command, together with an amazing 
 knowledge of criminal law, he was born to com- 
 mend himself to the average juryman. Little 
 
 3 SI 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of this was apparent, however, except when he 
 was in action. Just now, as he lounged in his 
 revolving chair, his limber legs crossed, his 
 thumbs in the armholes of his waistcoat, and his 
 perfecto moving as if by its own volition along 
 the elastic lines of his mouth, he was detached, 
 impartial, judicial, with that manner of speaking 
 which the French describe as "from high to low" 
 — "de haut en has" — ^the "good mixer," with a 
 sense of his own superiority. 
 
 The lack of the human element was to Bob the 
 most disconcerting trait in the lawyer's frame of 
 mind. To him the case was a case, and neither 
 more nor less. The boy's life, so precious to 
 himself, was of no more account to Stenhouse 
 than that of a private soldier to his commanding 
 officer on the day when a position must be rushed. 
 Stenhouse was interested in the professional 
 advantage he himself might gain from the out- 
 come of the trial. In a less degree, he was 
 interested in Teddy's psychology as a new slant 
 on criminal mentality in general. But the re- 
 sults as they affected his client's fate concerned 
 him not at all. 
 
 "I'm talking to you frankly," he went on, 
 "because it's the only way we can handle the 
 business. You're making yourself responsible 
 in the case, and so I must tell you what I 
 think." 
 
 "Oh, of course!" 
 
 "I quite understand your connection with this 
 young fellow, and why you're taking the matter 
 352 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 up, but I must treat you as if you were as aloof 
 from it in sentiment as I am myself." 
 
 "That's exactly what I want." 
 
 "Well, then, the boy's in a bad fix. It's a 
 worse fix because he belongs to the dangerous 
 criminal type for whom you can never get a 
 jury's sympathy. Roughly speaking, there are 
 two classes of criminals — the criminals by acci- 
 dent and the criminals born. This boy is a 
 criminal born." 
 
 "Oh, do you think so?" 
 
 "I know so. Yes, sir! You can't have as 
 much to do with both lots as I've had without 
 learning to read them at sight; and when it 
 comes to drawing them out — ^why, he hadn't told 
 me a half of his story before I could see he'd had 
 murder on the brain for the best part of his life." 
 
 "I shouldn't have thought that." 
 
 "No, you wouldn't. Lot of it subconscious — 
 suppressed desire, Freud, and all that. But 
 start him talking, and it's *God! I'd have shot 
 that fellow if I'd had a gun!' or it's, 'If I'd had 
 a dose of poison, they'd never have got me 
 alive.' Mind ran on it. Yes, sir! Always think- 
 ing of doing somebody in — if not another fellow, 
 then himself." 
 
 "I don't think he knew it." 
 
 "Of course he didn't know it. Seemed 
 natural to him. Our own vices always do seem 
 natural to us. If you put it up to him now, he'd 
 say he'd never had a thought of shooting up 
 anyone, and he wouldn't be lying out of it, 
 
 353 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 either. Way it seems to him. Way it seems to 
 every criminal of the class. But to judges and 
 juries it's just so much 'bull,' and tells against 
 the accused in the end. Sure you won't have a 
 Cigar r 
 
 Having again declined the cigar. Bob argued 
 in favor of Teddy, but Stenhouse was fixed in 
 his convictions. 
 
 "I'll do what I can for him, of course; only, 
 I'm blocked by his refusal to plead guilty. 
 Pleading guilty might — I don't say it would, 
 but it might — incline the judge to mercy. It 
 would get him oflF, too, with the second degree, 
 only that, when his own story shows him as 
 guilty as hell, he keeps pulling the innocent stuff 
 to beat a jazz band. The rascal who plumps 
 with his confession will always get the clemency, 
 while the fellow with a mouthful of innocence 
 will be sent to the chair." 
 
 " But if he does feel that he's innocent — " 
 "Sure he feels that he's innocent! That's it! 
 That's what I'm talking about — the ingrained 
 criminal's lack of consciousness that his kind of 
 crime is crime. The other fellow's — ^yes; but his 
 — ^why, the law is a fool to be made that way and 
 trip a good fellow up ! To hear this young shaver 
 talk, you'd think the courts should be manned 
 by pickpockets." 
 
 "All the same, he was in a tight place — " 
 "What's that got to do with it? If we didn't 
 get into tight places, there'd be no need for laws 
 of any kind." 
 
 3S4 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I was only thinking of his motive — " 
 "His motive may have been all right. I'll not 
 dispute you there, because you'll find that 
 legally there's a difference between motive and 
 intent. His motive may have been to provide 
 for his mother, just as he says. Good! No 
 harm in that whatever. But his intent was to 
 rob a bank and shoot the guy that came out 
 after him. The court won't go into his motives. 
 It '11 deal only with his intent, and with what 
 came of it." 
 
 There was more along these lines which sent 
 Bob away with some questioning as to himself. 
 Being of a law-respecting nature, he was anxious 
 not to uphold the transgressor to anything like 
 a danger point. And he ran that risk. Having 
 undertaken to help Teddy on Jennie's account, 
 his heart had gone out beyond what he expected 
 to the boy himself. It was the first time he had 
 ever been in contact with a prisoner, the first time 
 he had ever come face to face with a lone in- 
 dividual against whom all the organized forces 
 of the world were focused in condemnation. 
 His impulse being to range himself on the 
 weaker side, he had, in a measure, so ranged 
 himself. He had told Teddy that he stood by 
 him, and would continue to stand by him through 
 thick and thin. But was he right? Had he 
 shown the proper severity? Hadn't he been 
 sloppy and sentimental, without sufficiently re- 
 membering that a man who had killed another 
 man was not to be handled as a pet? 
 
 355 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 It was not common sense to treat the breaker 
 of laws as if he hadn't broken them or as if his 
 punishment had made him a sympathetic figure. 
 Too facile a pity might easily become a sin 
 against the community's best standards, and by 
 putting himself on the weaker side a man might 
 find himself on the worse one. Even the fact 
 that the wrongdoer was a relative ought not to 
 blirid the eyes to his being a wrongdoer. It was 
 his duty as a citizen. Bob argued, to support the 
 charter of the Rights of Man as set forth in the 
 Old Testament — ^thou shalt not kill — thou shalt 
 not steal — ^the ideal of the New Testament, 
 "Neither was there among them any that lacked, 
 for they had all things common," never having 
 been called to his attention. 
 
 As to Teddy's being a criminal born, he Was 
 not sure. Perhaps he was. Such "sports" ap- 
 peared even from the most respectable stock. 
 There was a dark tradition, never mentioned 
 now except between Edith and himself, of a 
 Collingham — ^they were not sure of the relation- 
 ship — ^who had died in jail somewhere in the 
 West. Of the Follett stock Bob knew nothing. 
 Jennie was the other half of himself; but such 
 affinities, he was sheepishly inclined to feel, 
 dated from other worlds and other planes of 
 existence, though finding a manifestation in 
 this one. 
 
 But it was Jennie who gave him the lead he 
 was in search of. 
 
 " I should think there were plenty of them to 
 3S6 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 attend to that," she said, when he had expressed, 
 as delicately as he could, his misgivings as to his 
 own lack of rigor. "Whatever he did, and how- 
 ever bad it was, they've got all the power in the 
 world to punish him, and they're going to do it. 
 When there's just one person on earth to show 
 him a little pity, I shouldn't think it could be 
 too much." She added, after a second or two of 
 silence: "He was sorry you didn't go in to see 
 him. He missed you. I — I think he's going to 
 cling to you just like a drowning man, you know, 
 to a hand that's stretched out to him from a 
 boat. Very likely he'll have to drown; but so 
 long as the hand is there, it's — it's something." 
 
 In this speech, which was long for Jennie and 
 betokened her growing authority, there were 
 two or three points on which Bob pondered as 
 he drove them homeward from the Brig. Jennie 
 sat beside him, Lizzie in the back seat. He 
 took the longest and prettiest ways so as to give 
 them something like an outing. 
 
 It was the afternoon of the day on which he 
 had seen Stenhouse, and in the interval he had 
 been thinking out a program. Whatever the re- 
 strictions he must put upon himself with regard 
 to the boy, his duty to protect and distract 
 Jennie and her family was clear. Teddy had 
 also given him to understand that, more than 
 an3rthing done for himself, this would contribute 
 to his peace of mind. Done for his mother and ' 
 sisters, it would be done for him, and the doer 
 could be sure that he wasn't loosening the foun- 
 
 357 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 dations of society. Even where there was a born 
 criminal to be judged, and perhaps put out of 
 the way, something was gained when the inno- 
 cent could be saved to any possible degree from 
 suffering with the guilty. 
 
 In this, too, he was not without an eye to 
 Indiana Avenue. Though he had no experience 
 of suburban life, he was intuitive enough to feel 
 sure that, to the neighbors, Jennie's marriage 
 had a "queer look," and the more so since she 
 was not living with her husband, now that he was 
 back from South America. To counteract this, 
 he meant to show himself in the street as much 
 as possible, parading his car before the door. 
 There must be no cheap gossip as to Jennie 
 based on lack of his devotion, even though all 
 arrangements between her and himself were no 
 more than provisional. 
 
 To that point, then, his course was clear. 
 He could not console the mother, whose reason 
 was stricken at its base, nor the three young 
 girls whose lives were overshadowed by tragedy; 
 but he could divert their minds from dwelling 
 too much on calamity by bringing in a new 
 interest. He could make it a big interest. He 
 could enlarge the interest in proportion to their 
 need; and, as Jennie spoke, it dawned on him 
 that they themselves began to foresee that their 
 need might be great indeed. "They've got all 
 the power in the world to punish him; and 
 they're going to do it." "He's going to cling to 
 you like a drowning man. Very likely he'll have 
 3S8 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to drown." Jennie had had one or two inter- 
 views with Stenhouse, and perhaps had inferred 
 from that great man's talk the difficulties of his 
 task. 
 
 But the help she gave Bob was in her response 
 to his misgivings. "When there's just one per- 
 son on earth to show him a little pity, I shouldn't 
 think it could be too much." It couldn't be too 
 much — not possibly. The worst enemy of man- 
 kind had a right to "a little pity," and even 
 Judas Iscariot had received it. If Teddy didn't 
 get it from him. Bob, he wouldn't get it from 
 anyone — ^his mother and sisters apart. All 
 civilized men were lined up against him, and 
 doubtless could not be lined in any other way. 
 In that case, punishment was assured, and, as 
 Jennie said, there were plenty of people to take 
 care of its infliction. He, Bob Collingham, since 
 he stood alone, might well forget the heavy 
 score against the boy in "bucking him up" to 
 meet what lay ahead of him. 
 
 He worked this out before driving Jennie and 
 her mother to their door, after which he waited 
 for Gussie and Gladys to come home from work 
 to take them, too, for an airing. Jennie sat 
 beside him, as on the earlier drive, the two 
 younger girls in the seat behind. 
 
 To both, the expedition was as the first stage 
 of a glorification which might carry them up to 
 any heights. Taken in connection with what 
 they suffered on account of Teddy, it was like 
 drinking an unnfiihgled draught of the very bitter 
 24 359 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 and the very sweet. Hardly able to lift up their 
 heads from shame, they nevertheless felt the dis- 
 tinction of going out in an expensive high-pow- 
 ered car with a gentleman of wealth and position, 
 who thus publicly proclaimed himself their 
 relative. 
 
 "This '11 settle Addie Inglis and Samuella 
 Weatherby," Gladys whispered, in reference to 
 some taunt or aspersion which Gussie under- 
 stood. "Say, Gus, he's some sport, isn't he? 
 Jen sure did cop a twenty-cylinder." 
 
 But Gussie had already turned over her new 
 leaf. From the comer where she reclined with 
 the grace of one accustomed from birth to this 
 style of conveyance, she arched her lovely neck 
 and turned her lovely head just enough to convey 
 a hint of reprimand. 
 
 "Gladys dear, momma wouldn't like you to 
 use that kind of language. Remember that now 
 we must carry out her wishes all the more be- 
 cause she isn't able to enforce them. Your 
 companions may not always be Hattie Bel- 
 weather and Sunshine Bright, and so — " 
 
 "Say, Gus, what's struck you? Has goin' out 
 in a swell rig like this gone to your head ? " 
 
 "Yes, dear; perhaps it has. And if you'll 
 take my advice you'll let it go to yours." 
 
 The only immediate response from Gladys 
 was a cocking of the eye and a "elk" of the 
 tongue against the cheek, something like a Zulu 
 vowel; but Gussie noticed that in Palisade 
 Park, where they descended from the car to 
 360 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 make Bob's acquaintance, Gladys reverted to 
 the intonation and idiom in which she had first 
 picked up her Enghsh. 
 
 The jaunt tended to deepen the sensation 
 which had been creeping over the girls within the 
 past few days, that they were heroines of a 
 dramatic romance. They had figured in the 
 papers, their beauty, personalities, and histories 
 becoming points of vital national concern. One 
 legend made them the scions of an ancient Eng- 
 lish family fallen on evil days, but now to be 
 revived through alliance with the CoUinghams, 
 while another came near enough to the truth to 
 embody the Scarborough tradition and connect 
 them with the historic house in Cambridge. In 
 no case was there any waste of the picturesque, 
 the detail that Jennie had been an artist's model 
 and "the most beautiful woman in America" 
 being especially underscored. 
 
 It was only little by little that Gussie and 
 Gladys came to a sense of this importance, thus 
 finding themselves enabled to react to some 
 small degree against their sense of disgrace. 
 In the shop, Gussie had heard Corinne whisper 
 to a customer: 
 
 "That pretty girl over there is the sister of 
 Follett, who murdered Flynn, and whose sister 
 made that romantic marriage with the banker." 
 
 Though she glanced up from the feather she 
 was twisting only through the tail of her eye, 
 Gussie could reckon the excitement caused by 
 this announcement. When it had been made a 
 
 361 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 second time, and a third, as new customers 
 came in, she saw herself an asset to the shop. 
 Stared at, wondered at, discussed, and ap- 
 praised, she began to feel as princesses and 
 actresses when recognized in streets. 
 
 Similarly, Hattie Belweather had run to 
 Gladys to report what Miss Flossie Grimm had 
 said over the counter, in the intervals of dis- 
 playing stockings. 
 
 "See that little red-headed, snub-nosed thing 
 over there? That's the FoUett child, sister to 
 the guy that shot the detective and the girl 
 that married the banker sport. Some hummer he 
 must be. Jennie, the married one's name is. 
 They say she's had an offer of a hundred plunks 
 a week to go into vawdeville. Fast color? Oh, 
 my, yes! We don't carry any other kind." 
 
 Thus Gladys began to find it difficult to discern 
 between notoriety and eminence, moving among 
 the other cash girls as a queen incognita among 
 ordinary mortals. 
 
 Most of this publicity was over by the time 
 Bob reached New York, though the echoes still 
 rumbled through the press. His own arrival 
 reawakened some of it, offering opportunities 
 that were never ignored of drawing dramatic con- 
 trasts. He was represented as having been 
 "bom in the purple," and stooping to a "maiden 
 of low degree." Low degree was poetically fused 
 with the occupation of a model, and by one 
 publication the statement was thrown in, with- 
 out comment, and as it were accidentally, that 
 
 362 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 the present Mrs. Robert Bradley CoUingham, 
 Junior, of Marillo Park, had been greatly ad- 
 mired by appreciative connoisseurs as the figure 
 in Hubert Wray's already famous picture, "Life 
 and Death." Hubert Wray was even credited 
 with "discovering" this beauty when she was 
 starving in the slums. 
 
 Except for the detail of Wray's picture, the 
 publicity was something of a relief to Bob, since 
 it left him nothing to explain. The truth in 
 these many reports being tolerably easy to dis- 
 engage, his friends and acquaintances knew of 
 his position, and, in view of its circumstances, 
 they respected it. He went to the bank; he 
 went to his club; he passed the time of day with 
 such neighbors as remained at Marillo Park, 
 finding it the easier to come and go because 
 everyone knew what had happened. 
 
 From almost the first day he fell into a rou- 
 tine — the bank, Stenhouse, Teddy, Indiana 
 Avenue. Though he was not yet working at the 
 bank, he felt it wise to show himself daily on the 
 premises, in order to establish the fact that his 
 relations with his family were unchanged. 
 Stenhouse he didn't visit every day, but only 
 when there were matters connected with the 
 case to talk over. He saw Teddy as often as the 
 Brig regulations would allow, growing more and 
 more touched by the eagerness with which the 
 boy welcomed him. In Indiana Avenue he was 
 assiduous. Whatever the hints flung out by 
 Addie Inglis and Samuella Weatherby, they^ 
 
 363 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 received contradiction as far as that was possible 
 from obvious devotion. 
 
 As for his personal relations with Jennie, they 
 changed little from the modus vivendi agreed 
 upon. That she was growing more and more 
 grateful was evident, but gratitude wasn't what 
 he wanted. What he wanted he himself didn't 
 know, and, in a measure, he didn't care. Till she 
 got what she wanted, he could never be wholly 
 satisfied; and if she wanted Wray , . . 
 
 But at this point his reasoning faculties failed 
 him. If she wanted Wray and if Wray wanted 
 her, there would, of course, be but one thing for 
 him to do. It was that one thing itself which 
 remained elusive or obscure, dodging, disturbing, 
 and defying him. He could find a means to give 
 Jennie her freedom, or he could take her by brute 
 force, or, in certain circumstances, he could 
 dismiss her as not worthy of his love. The 
 trouble was that he couldn't see himself doing 
 any of the three; and yet if what seemed to be 
 true was true, he couldn't see himself as doing 
 the other thing. 
 
 The modus vivendi, like all other arrangements 
 of its kind, was therefore safe and convenient. 
 It settled nothing; but it was what the term im- 
 plied, a way of living. It was not an ideal way 
 of living, or a way that shielded anyone from 
 comment; but it was a way. 
 
 As for comment, it reached Bob only indirectly, 
 and not oftener than every now and then. 
 Perhaps it came in as pointed a form as it ever 
 364 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 assumed for him in a seemingly chance remark 
 from the chauffeur's wife, Mrs. Gull. It was 
 not a chance remark, for the neat, pretty, thin- 
 lipped, pinched-face EngHshwoman who had 
 passed all her life "in service" didn't make ill- 
 considered observations. 
 
 "I suppose we shall see the young lady down, 
 sir, some day soon.?" 
 
 "Yes, some day soon," Bob replied, cau- 
 tiously, getting ready in the hall to go to town. 
 
 "To remain.?" 
 
 It was all summed up in those three syllables 
 • — all the gossip on the CoUingham estate, and 
 on all the estates at Marillo, not to go farther 
 afield. 
 
 "Not to remain just yet," Bob answered, 
 judiciously. "Mrs. Follett isn't well, and Mrs. 
 CoUingham has two younger sisters whom she 
 has to take care of." 
 
 That this explanation was not adequate he 
 knew; and yet it was an explanation. "It 
 certainly do seem queer," Mrs. Gull observed to 
 the gardener and the gardener's wife, in a com- 
 pany that included Gull; and Gull, who was 
 from Somersetshire, replied, "It most zure and 
 zertainly do." 
 
 But on the Sunday afternoon two weeks after 
 Bob's return "the young lady" paid her visit to 
 CoUingham Lodge, accompanied by her mother 
 and two sisters. 
 
 The journey was made in what Gladys charac- 
 terized as "style," the style being mainly supplied 
 
 365 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 by Gull in his sedate chauffeur's uniform. But 
 the fact that he drove the car left Bob free to sit 
 with his guests in the tonneau. He put Jennie, 
 as hostess and mistress of the car, in the right- 
 hand corner, Mrs. Follett in the left one, and 
 Gussie in the middle. He and Gladys occupied 
 the adjustable seats behind the chauffeur. At 
 sight of the Hght linen rug with the CoUingham 
 initials in crimson applique, Gussie and Gladys 
 exchanged appreciative glances, and they both 
 searched the neighboring piazzas for a glimpse of 
 Addie Inglis or Samuella Weatherby. 
 
 Acquainted now with the fact that Jennie had 
 viewed the celestial country whither they were 
 traveling, and with her descriptions of the 
 wonders she had seen almost learned by rote, 
 the girls came near to forgetting that Teddy was 
 in a cell. But his mother didn't forget it. Silent, 
 austere, incapable of pleasure, and waiting only 
 the moment of the boy's release and her own, 
 her eyes roamed the parched September landscape 
 and saw none of it. She did not appear unhappy 
 — only removed into a world of her own, a world 
 of long, long thoughts. 
 
 No one said much. There was not much to 
 say and a great deal to think about. Even the 
 house, the terraces, the gardens called forth no 
 more than "Ohs!" and "Ahs!" of approval. 
 Gladys declared that she felt herself wandering 
 through the castle scenes in "The Silver Queen," 
 the latest screen masterpiece, but no one else 
 descended to such comparisons. 
 366 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "It's like heaven," Gussie murmured timidly, 
 to Bob, as they strolled between hedges of 
 dahlias. 
 
 "Oh no, it isn't!" he laughed. "Three or 
 four places at Marillo are much finer than this." 
 
 Subdued by sheer ecstasy, they assembled on 
 the flagged terrace, where Mrs. Gull brought out 
 tea. Bob was pleased at Jennie's bearing toward 
 the chauffeur's wife — friendly with just the right 
 touch of dignity. 
 
 "Mr. Collingham tells me you're English. 
 We're almost English ourselves, since we were 
 born in Canada. I've never been in England, but 
 I should so love to go, though they say it's quite 
 different since the war." 
 
 There was no more to it than that, but Mrs, 
 Gull reported to her husband: "As much a 
 lady as any I've ever served under — and I do 
 know a lady when I see her. Miss Edith's a 
 lady, too, but not a patch on this one. She may 
 have been just as bad as they say she was, but 
 you'd never believe it to look at her, and the 
 sisters be'ave as pretty as pretty. Oh dear! 
 And they with a murderer for a brother! It do 
 seem queer, now don't it?" 
 
 To which Gull replied in his usual antiphon, 
 "It most zure and zertainly do." 
 
 The jarring chord in this harmony came from 
 Lizzie, while Bob was in search of Gull to bid 
 him bring round the car. Lizzie stood looking 
 down the two flowered terraces, where in honor 
 of the visitors the fountains had been turned on. 
 
 367 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I understand now why they couldn't afford 
 to pay your father his forty-five a week. It must 
 cost a great deal of money to keep this establish- 
 ment going." 
 
 "Oh, momma," Gussie pleaded, "don't begin 
 to hang crape just when we're able to enjoy our- 
 selves a little." 
 
 Lizzie turned on her daughter her rare and 
 almost forgotten smile. 
 
 "Very well, dear; enjoy yourself. Only a 
 world in which enjoyment must be bought at 
 such a price is not a fit world for human beings 
 to live in." 
 
 Gladys crept up, snuggling against her mother's 
 shoulder. 
 
 "Yes, momma darling; but you won't say 
 that any more till we get home, now will you? 
 It might hurt poor Bob's feelings if you did, and 
 you can't say that he's ever done us any harm." 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 ON the day after the visit to Collingham 
 Lodge, Bob left for the camp in the 
 Adirondacks. As yet he had no knowledge of 
 the family's attitude toward him more exact 
 than he could infer. He had written to them all 
 since his return, but their replies, even Edith's, 
 had been noncommittal. He guessed that they 
 had decided together not to express themselves 
 fully till they came face to face with him. 
 
 Even then, the approach to his own affairs was 
 indirect. An affectionate family reunion, based 
 seemingly on the ground that nothing had hap- 
 pened when so much had, blocked the openings 
 for bringing up the subjects he had most at 
 heart. During the early part of that first evening 
 at Sugar Maple Point he couldn't get anyone 
 alone. Not till nearly bedtime did he himself 
 offer a lead by strolling out into the moonlight 
 in the hope that one of the three would follow 
 him. 
 
 It was full moonlight, turning Sugar Maple 
 Lake into a sheet of silver and gold laid at the 
 base of a velvety silhouette of mountains. The 
 magic of stillness, the tang of the forest, the re- 
 pose of the spirit from the girding and striving 
 of the world — these lovelinesses came to Bob 
 
 369 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 CoUingham with a peace such as they always 
 brought, but which to-night couldn't find a 
 resting place. It couldn't find a resting place 
 because in this tranquil woodland more than 
 anywhere else he found himself wishing that 
 Teddy Follett wasn't in a cell. 
 
 Sugar Maple Lake is small for the Adirondacks, 
 being no more than three miles long, and a mile 
 and a half in width. All its shores are owned by 
 rich men, mostly from New York, who can keep 
 themselves secluded. In seclusion they are 
 able to combine rusticity with the amenities of 
 life, in a wealthy, modern, American version of 
 Marie Antoinette's humble village at Versailles. 
 At a stranger's first glance, the "camps" are 
 but lumbermen's log cabins on a larger scale; 
 but when you come to the conveniences and 
 luxuries of living, they differ little from Marillo 
 Park. 
 
 Reaching the thin line of maples and pines 
 fringing the edge of the lake, Bob turned to see 
 if he was followed. At first there was no one. 
 The light from the windows and doors made a 
 golden splotch on the greenish silvery black of 
 the sloping lawn, but no figure appeared in the 
 glow. Coming to the conclusion that this, too, 
 was "a put-up job," he was strolling back again 
 when his mother, cloaked against the night air, 
 stole out and called his name softly. 
 
 On reaching him she took his arm, and to- 
 gether they picked their way along a graveled 
 path leading toward the Point. 
 370 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I'm so glad you've come," she said, instantly. 
 "I've been having such a terrible time; with your 
 father. You know how he is — ^so stern — so 
 relentless — " 
 
 "He's been corking to me." 
 
 "You mean the cablegram he sent you to Rio? 
 Oh, well, I made him do that. It's all over now, 
 dear, and you mustn't worry; but at first — that 
 night when we heard that the FoUett boy had 
 got into trouble and I had to tell your father of 
 your marriage — ^well, I don't want to make things 
 out worse than they are, so I sha'n't tell you what 
 he said; but I did manage him. I soothed him 
 and told him how he ought to take it and what 
 he ought to do — ^with the result that you got that 
 message. You mustn't think it was easy, dear — " 
 
 "You've been a brick, old lady!" 
 
 "I'm your mother. Bob. It's all summed up 
 in that. Whatever makes for my children's 
 happiness makes for mine. Your father is not a 
 Woman, and that's the difference between us. 
 And now I've had all this trouble with him over 
 Edith's engagement; but he's given in at last." 
 
 Bob sprang away from her. 
 
 "Edith engaged.? Who to? Not to Ayling?" 
 
 She took his arm again, continuing toward the 
 Point. 
 
 "Yes, to Ernest. He was so opposed to it. 
 But I've battled for my child's heart, Bob, and 
 I've won out. Your father is giving her ten 
 thousand a year. It isn't much, but they ought 
 to be able to manage. We didn't write you, 
 
 371 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 partly because it was only settled last week, and 
 it was easier to wait and tell you." 
 
 "But I thought you didn't like the match 
 yourself, old girl." 
 
 "Oh, me! I have to turn myself every way at 
 once. I've no wishes of my own. To reconcile 
 my children to their father and their father to 
 my children is all I live and work for." 
 
 Coming to the little rustic gazebo perched on 
 the tip of the Point, they entered and sat down. 
 There being nothing to obtrude itself here on 
 lake and moon and mountain, it was as if they 
 had left human crudities behind. In the windless 
 air, the fragrance of Bob's cigarette mingled 
 with the aromatic pungency of millions and 
 millions of growing things. 
 
 "There was simply nothing else to be done," 
 Junia resumed. "There was Edith eating her 
 heart out and stubborn as a mule — and with the 
 mess you've made of things — not that you could 
 foresee — or know the sort of people you were 
 getting in among — " 
 
 It was the opening he had been looking for, 
 and he knew that, whatever the outcome, he must 
 use it. 
 
 "Exactly what do you mean by that, mother?" 
 
 She seemed confused. 
 
 "I don't suppose I mean anything — except 
 what's obvious." 
 
 Not to press the point at once, he said, "You 
 saw Jennie." 
 
 "Yes; I sent for her." 
 372 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "What did you think of her?" 
 
 "Oh, what anyone would think. She's charm- 
 ing — to look at." 
 
 "Only to look at?" 
 
 "Her manner is charming, too. Of course! 
 I — I don't quite know what you want me to 
 say." 
 
 "How much did she tell you that afternoon?" 
 
 She looked at him through the moonlight. 
 
 "Hasn't she told you?" 
 
 "She's told me nothing — except that you 
 were lovely." 
 
 "Then, Bob dear, I'm afraid I can't add any- 
 thing. You see, they were her secrets — " 
 
 "Oh! Then she told you secrets!" 
 
 "Why, of course! What did you think?" 
 
 "Any other secret besides that she and I had 
 been married?" 
 
 "Bob darling, I don't think it's fair to put me 
 on the witness stand. She's your wife — and be- 
 cause she's your wife I accept her. What I 
 know is buried here" — she smote her chest — 
 "and if for your sake and hers I try to forget it 
 I think you might let me." 
 
 For a few minutes he smoked in a silence 
 broken only by the maniac cry of a loon in the 
 distance. 
 
 "Did it occur to you," he asked at last, "that 
 she was a very simple girl who could easily be- 
 come entangled in her talk when she tried to 
 explain things to a woman of the world?" 
 
 "No; because the things said were very simple 
 373 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 — ^just statements of fact as to which there could 
 be no misunderstanding." 
 
 "Had the statements of fact anything" — ^he 
 moistened his dry lips — "anything to do with — 
 with Hubert?" 
 
 "Some of them. But there!" She caught 
 herself up. "You're not going to make me tell 
 you things. I'm your mother, and if I intervene 
 at all, it must be in the way of helping you to 
 come together and not of putting you apart." 
 She rose, drawing her cloak about her. "I think 
 I must go in, dear. I'm beginning to feel the 
 damp." 
 
 He, too, rose, sitting down again sidewise on 
 the rustic rail of the summerhouse. 
 
 "Wait a minute, mother. I want to ask you 
 something. When I was at Marillo I wandered 
 into your room one day and saw a picture." 
 
 "A picture?" 
 
 "Yes; a picture; and I — I wondered how it — 
 it happened to come there." 
 
 She bent a little toward him, drawing her 
 cloak more closely about her. If it was acting it 
 was well done. 
 
 "It — it couldn't have been — " 
 
 He chucked the butt of his cigarette into the 
 lake. 
 
 "Yes, I guess it was. It had an inscription on 
 it — 'Life and Death, by Hubert Wray.'" 
 
 "Oh, my God 1 Where did you say you saw it, 
 Bob?" 
 
 "In your bedroom, against the wall. I 
 374 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 thought It might be a portrait you'd had done, 
 and so lifted — " 
 
 "And I told them to put it out of sight. You 
 see, Hubert didn't send it till after we'd left the 
 house — ^just before he went to California. I'd 
 give . orders that it was to be locked up in an 
 empty closet in my wardrobe room. Oh, Bob 
 darling, I don't know what you're going to think 
 of me." 
 
 "Oh, you're all right, mother. It wasn't you. 
 I — I only wondered how you'd come by the 
 thing at all." 
 
 She made an obvious effort at controlling 
 emotion. 
 
 "Why, Bob, it was this way. After — after 
 what Jennie told me that day I — I naturally 
 thought a good deal about Hubert — and — and 
 their relations to each other — " 
 
 "She talked about them, did she?" 
 
 "Well, you see, in a way she had to. She was 
 let in for it, poor thing. I can't tell you every- 
 thing without giving you the whole story — and 
 it's her story, as I've said before. I've no right 
 to betray her, and least of all to you." 
 
 "All right. Goon." 
 
 "So when I'd heard that Hubert had a new 
 picture at the Kahler Gallery — and everyone was 
 talking about it — and I knew from the things they 
 said what — ^what sort of a picture it was — " 
 
 "Yes, yes; I understand." 
 
 "Well,, then, I — I went and saw it; and to — 
 to get it out of sight I bought it on the spot. 
 25 37S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 I didn't want it to be still on exhibition when you 
 came back; and I hoped that people would for- 
 get it. I should have burned it at once, only 
 that Hubert delayed sending it, and — ^well, you 
 see how it happened. But even so. Bob dear, 
 you knew you were marrying a model — " 
 
 "Oh yes; it isn't that — not altogether." 
 
 She laid her hand on his shoulder. 
 
 "What is it. Bob darling.'' Can't you tell me? 
 I'm your mother, dear — " 
 
 But he moved away from her touch, as if 
 unable to bear sympathy. 
 
 " I can't tell you yet, old lady. I must see my 
 own way first, I've got to get through this 
 business about the boy before I take any step 
 whatever. She knows pretty well that I know 
 that — ^that she and Hubert are in love with — 
 with each other — " 
 
 Oh, but Hubert is not in love with her. He 
 me so. 
 
 "Not in love with her?" he cried, sharply. 
 "Why isn't he?" 
 
 "He said — oh. Bob, I can't talk about it. 
 You'll—" 
 
 "You've got to talk about it, mother. I can't 
 half know. I must know! If he wasn't in love 
 with her, what did he mean by making her 
 think—" 
 
 "I don't believe he did make her think. He 
 hinted that — ^that there'd been something be- 
 tween them, but that — ^that with girls of that 
 sort you — you couldn't call it love." 
 376 
 
 told " 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Why couldn't you?" 
 
 "Because — ^no, I won't, Bob! I'm your 
 mother. I must make things easier for you, and 
 not harder, and so — " 
 
 "It will make things easiest for me to know 
 the truth. So go on! Out with it! Tell me just 
 what he said." 
 
 She wrung her hands beneath the cloak. 
 
 "He said it — it couldn't be love — ^with a girl 
 whom — ^whom anyone could — " 
 
 He sprang from the rail, holding up his hand. 
 
 "Wait a minute, mother! Jennie's my wife. 
 I'm her husband. I believe in her." 
 
 With her speed in trimming her sails to the 
 wind, Junia caught the direction. 
 
 " I don't want you not to believe in her. Bob. I 
 didn't want to say any of the things that — that 
 you've been dragging out of me. You know 
 that." 
 
 "Yes, I know that, old lady, and I'm grate- 
 ful. I had to drag them out and know the worst 
 that could be said, so as to contradict it in — in 
 my heart." 
 
 "Oh, in your heart!" 
 
 "Yes, in my heart. It's where I'm strongest 
 ■ — ^just as it's where dad is strongest, too, if he'd 
 only been true to himself. But that's a side 
 issue. What I want to say now — and what I'd 
 like you to understand — is that I know that 
 Jennie is good and pure and true and one of the 
 sweetest and loveliest spirits God ever made. I 
 know it ! " 
 
 377 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Junia couldn't be as feminine as she was 
 without gazing in awe and admiration at the 
 tall, upright figure, which seemed taller and more 
 upright for the moonlight. 
 
 "Would you know it — mind you, I'm only 
 putting it this way — ^would you know it — ^with 
 her own evidence to the contrary?" 
 
 "Yes, mother; I should know it — ^with her own 
 evidence to the contrary." 
 
 She shivered and turned away from him. 
 
 " I must really go in now, dear. I'm so afraid 
 of catching cold. But — but good night!" 
 
 Having kissed him, she went down the steps, 
 turning once more to look back at him. Sil- 
 houetted against the oblong of light between two 
 rough pilasters, he was mechanically taking out 
 his case and selecting a cigarette. 
 
 "You're splendid, Bob," she said, with a ring 
 of sincerity that startled him. "That's the way 
 to love a woman. If there were only more men 
 like you ! And — I will say it, in spite of the things 
 you've just made me confess — ^there must be 
 something very, very good in a girl to — ^to call 
 forth that kind of love." 
 
 But Jennie herself made that kind of love more 
 difficult. On returning to town Bob found her 
 changed. During all the weeks of the modus 
 vivendi she had been gentle, submissive, grateful, 
 accepting his terms in the provisional spirit in 
 which she understood them, and carrying them 
 out. When Teddy's affairs were settled — and 
 they never defined what they meant by that — 
 
 378 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 she knew they were to have a reckoning; but 
 the reckoning was to be postponed till then. 
 
 And now, all at once, she seemed disposed to 
 force it on. His visit to his family had frightened 
 her. It frightened her the more in that he said 
 so little about it. He, too, was changed. He 
 was silent, pensive. He watched her more and 
 talked to her less; but when he watched her his 
 eyes, so she said to herself, had a queer kind of 
 sorrow in them. She didn't wonder at that. 
 Anyone's eyes would have had sorrow in them — 
 anyone who was seeing Teddy nearly every day 
 and filling him up with fortitude. If it had not 
 been for Teddy's sake she would have done her 
 best to get Bob "out of it" long ago. 
 
 Her fear now was of not being able to make 
 this attempt of her own accord. In other words, 
 she shrank from being found out before confessing 
 of her own free will. Twenty words from Mrs. 
 CoUingham to her son would rob her, Jennie, of 
 such poor shreds of good intention as she still 
 possessed. 
 
 The trouble was, first, the lack of opportunity, 
 and then, the waiting for the right emotional mo- 
 ment. It was not a thing you could spring at 
 any chance hour of the day. Something must 
 lead up to it and make it natural. 
 
 But a week after his return from Sugar Maple 
 Point, the occasion seemed to present itself. It 
 was one of those evenings in late September when 
 indoors was too stifling. In pursuance of his 
 plans for distracting the family, which meant so 
 
 379 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 much to Teddy, Bob had motored the mother 
 and daughters to a small country restaurant, 
 where they had had supper, and had brought 
 them home again. Lizzie and the two girls hav- 
 ing said good night, Jennie was about to do the 
 same, but he held her by the hand. 
 
 "Don't go in. Let's walk a bit." 
 
 "So it's come," Jennie thought. "I must do 
 it before we get home." 
 
 Even so she put it off. He, too, put off what- 
 ever in himself was burning to find words. They 
 said as little as they could without being altogether 
 silent, and that little was mere commonplace. 
 
 "Wonderful night, isn't it?" 
 
 "Yes; and I think we're going to have a 
 breeze. It isn't so hot as an hour ago." 
 
 "Anyhow, the hot weather must be nearly 
 over. It will be October in a day or two." 
 
 " But we often have very hot days in October. 
 I remember that last year — " 
 
 So they came to Palisade Walk and turned 
 into it. Though the moon was not yet up, the 
 effulgence of its approach made a halo above the 
 city. Manhattan was a line of constellations 
 the riverway a gulf of darkness in which were 
 scattered stars. Along the parapet, shadowy 
 couples, mostly lovers, formed little ghostly 
 groups, while here and there was the point of 
 light of a cigarette or cigar. 
 
 They came to a halt, Jennie leaning against 
 one of the dragon's teeth, looking over at the 
 city. Bob standing a little back from her. 
 380 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I've never been here at night before," he 
 said. "I'd no idea it was so beautiful." 
 
 "We don't come very often ourselves. We live 
 so near that I suppose we're used to it." 
 
 "We had some wonderful evenings at Sugar 
 Maple Point ; but that was another kind of thing." 
 
 She assembled her forces without turning to 
 look at him or making any change in her tone. 
 
 "I suppose you talked to your mother while 
 you were up there?" 
 
 "Oh, of course!" 
 
 "About me?" 
 
 Divining what was coming, he was on his 
 guard. "You were mentioned — naturally." 
 
 "And she told you things?" 
 
 "Some things." 
 
 "Some things about me that — ^that were new 
 to you?" 
 
 "Yes; some things about you that were new 
 to me." 
 
 "Did she tell you — everjrthing ? " 
 
 "I'm not in a position to say that it was every- 
 thing; but — but I rather think it was. What 
 of it?" 
 
 "Oh — only, that — ^that I'm as bad as she said 
 I was. I — I wanted you to know that it was 
 tl-ue." 
 
 The long stillness was broken only by a moan 
 like that of a wounded monster from a ferryboat 
 far away. 
 
 "Why do you want me to know that?" he 
 asked, at length. 
 
 381 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "So that you'll see now that when — ^when 
 everything is over about Teddy — ^you'll be — \ 
 you'll be free." 
 
 "But suppose I don't want to be free?" 
 
 "But I want it for you." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Oh, it's very simple." She turned, leaning 
 with her back to the rock. "It's just this. Bob — 
 I'm not fit to be your wife. I never was fit. I 
 never shall be fit. There it is in a nutshell. It 
 isn't education and social things that I'm talking 
 about. I'm — I'm too — I don't know how to put 
 it — but you're so big — " 
 
 "We'll drop all that, Jennie, if you don't] 
 mind, because it isn't a case of fitness on either; 
 your part or mine; it's one of love." 
 
 She hung her head. 
 
 "Oh, love! I — I don't think I — I know what' 
 it is." 
 
 "I'm sure you don't. It's what I've told you.' 
 I want to show you what it's like. Do you know 
 what I said to the old lady when she got off 
 those things? She didn't want to do it, mind 
 you," he hastened to explain. "She wanted to 
 keep your secrets and be true to you — but I 
 dragged them out of her. And do you know 
 what I said to her? Well, I'm going to re- 
 peat it to you now. I said I wouldn't believe 
 anjrthing against you — ^not even on your own 
 evidence." 
 
 "Is that love, Bob — or is it just being stub- 
 born?" 
 
 382 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I shall let you find that out for yourself — 
 as we go on." 
 
 "Oh! as we go on?" 
 
 "Yes, as we go on, Jennie. We're going on. 
 Don't make any mistake about that. I know 
 how you feel. Everything looks so dark to you 
 now that you can't believe it will ever be light 
 again; but it will be, Jennie. All families and 
 all individuals go through these experiences — 
 not as terrible as yours, perhaps^-but terrible 
 all the same. Not one of us is spared. Some- 
 times it seems to you as if you just couldn't go 
 through with it; but you can. You must hang 
 on — and bear it — and it will pass. That's what 
 I'm here for — ^to help you to hang on — and, 
 Jennie, clinging together, as we're doing, we'll 
 come out to the light — even Teddy — and your 
 mother. Oh, look! There the light is now — ^the 
 light everlasting — ^that always comes back, if 
 we only wait for it!" 
 
 At the pointing of his finger and his sudden 
 cry she turned to face the eternal wonder of the 
 moonrise. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 DURING the next few months, the necessity 
 for bracing Teddy and his sisters to meet 
 fate threw Bob CoUingham's personal peroccu- 
 pations more and more into the background. 
 All that was implied by the fact that Jennie was 
 his wife and he was her husband went into this 
 single supreme task. 
 
 Habit came to his aid by fitting them all to the 
 situation as though they had never been in any 
 other. They grew used to the fact that Teddy 
 was in jail and might come out of it only by one 
 exit. Teddy grew used to it himself. The 
 family, once more at Marillo, grew used to the 
 odd arrangement by which Bob and Jennie 
 worked together and lived apart. The CoUing- 
 hams grew used to the thought of the FoUetts, 
 and the Folletts to that of the CoUinghams. 
 
 "You get used to anything," Junia commented 
 to her husband, as one who has made a new dis- 
 covery. "It seems to me as if Edith's living in 
 that flat on Cathedral Heights and keeping only 
 one maid is all I'd ever dreamed for her." 
 
 To Bob, this wonting of the mind was the 
 easier because Wray stayed in California, his 
 absence making it possible to leave in abeyance 
 the subjects that couldn't yet be touched upon. 
 
 384 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 The first chance of fortifying the three girls 
 seemed to present itself on a night in that 
 autumn when it was still warm enough to sit on 
 the screened piazza. His car was, as usual, before 
 the door, and in an hour or so he would be making 
 his way to Marillo. As he had returned to his 
 work at the bank, his spare time was now in the 
 evenings. 
 
 *' If you want to do something for me, Gladys, 
 there's a way." 
 
 He said this in reply to an aspiration of all 
 three, in which the youngest sister had been 
 spokesman. 
 
 Gladys's voice was eager and affectionate. 
 
 "What way. Bob? Tell us. We'll do any- 
 thing." 
 
 Smoothing Pansy's back as she lay on his 
 crossed knees, he considered how best to make it 
 clear. Gladys sat close to him, as the one who 
 most easily took him fraternally. Gussie, in 
 whom he stirred an unusual self-consciousness, 
 kept herself more aloof. Altogether in the 
 shadow, Jennie was seemingly withdrawn, and 
 yet more intensely aware of him than anyone. 
 
 "It's this way," he tried to explain: "Living 
 is like climbing a mountainside. You drag your- 
 self up to a ledge where you can stand and take 
 breath, and feel that you've reached somewhere. 
 Then, just as you think that you can camp there 
 and be comfortable for the rest of your life, you 
 find yourself summoned to move to the next 
 ledge higher up. At that some of us get dis- 
 
 38s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 •couraged; some fall off and go down; but most 
 of us brace ourselves for another great big test. 
 Do you see ? " 
 
 Gladys answered, doubtfully, "I see — a little." 
 
 "Well then, the thing we need for the test is 
 pluck, isn't it.?" 
 
 Gussie spoke dreamily. 
 
 "We need pluck for everything." 
 
 "So we do; and I often think that we don't 
 make enough of it. Pluck is different from cour- 
 age, because it's — how shall I say? — it's a little 
 more cheery and intimate. Courage is like a 
 Sunday suit that you wear for big occasions; 
 tut pluck is your everyday clothes, which you 
 need all the time and feel easy in. Courage is 
 noble and heroic — something we'd be shy about 
 claiming. Pluck is the courage of the common 
 man, which anyone can feel he has a right to." 
 
 "I can't," Gussie confessed. "I'm the aw- 
 fulest coward." 
 
 With this Gladys agreed. 
 
 "Yes, Gus is a regiilar scarecat. I'm not 
 afraid of hardly anything." 
 
 "We're all cowards in our way; but we could 
 all be plucky when we mightn't like to call our- 
 selves brave. Do you get what I mean?" 
 Gladys made a sound of assent which seemed to 
 answer for all three. "Well, what I'm trying to 
 say is this: That the time has come when we're 
 all being summoned — you three — and me — and 
 Teddy — and all of us — to pull up to another 
 ledge. It's going to be tough, but we can make 
 
 386 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 up our minds that we can go through with it. 1 
 don't mean just knowing that we must go 
 through with it, but knowing that we can." 
 
 There was silence for the two or three minutes 
 during which the girls thought this over. 
 
 "You said," Gladys reasoned, "that it was 
 something we could do for you. I don't see — " 
 
 "You'd do it for me, because it's easier to 
 pull with strong people rather than with weak 
 ones. You see, this is something which no one 
 of us can meet alone; we must all meet it to- 
 gether, and the stronger each of us is the stronger 
 we all are. Being strong is a matter of knowing 
 that you're strong, just as being weak is the 
 same. If I was sure that none of you was 
 going to break down, I could be stronger myself, 
 and we could all buck up Teddy." 
 
 After another brief silence, Gladys sighed. 
 
 "All the same, it would be terrible — if they 
 did anything to him." 
 
 "Not more terrible than what millions of 
 sisters faced in the last few years, with their 
 brothers blown to bits. They were able to bear 
 it by getting the idea that they could." 
 
 Jennie spoke for the first time. 
 
 "Ah, but that was glory, and this is disgrace." 
 
 "Then it calls for more pluck — that's all. 
 The test comes to one in one way and to another 
 in another. Real glory is in meeting it." 
 
 It was still Jennie who urged the difficulties. 
 
 "But when it's the hardest test that ever 
 comes to anyone in the world!" 
 
 387 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Why, then, it's pluck again, and still more 
 pluck. It is the hardest test that ever comes to 
 anyone in the world. It's harder than when 
 women hear their boys are missing, and never 
 know what becomes of them; and that's pretty 
 hard. But, Jennie, hard things are the making 
 of us, and if we come through the hardest test 
 in the world and still keep our kindlier feelings 
 and our common sense, why, then, we come out 
 pretty strong, don't we?" 
 
 Jennie said no more. She liked to have him 
 talk to them in this way. It took for granted 
 that they were worth talking to, and to become 
 worth talking to had been a secret aim since the 
 day when she first learned the value of pictures 
 and books. A good many times she had stolen 
 in to confer with the genial custodian at the 
 Metropolitan; a good many volumes she had 
 hidden in her room to study after she went to 
 bed. She had proved to herself that she had a 
 mind; and now Bob was hinting at unknown 
 resources of strength. It nerved her; it put new 
 heart in her. Having always been taught to con- 
 sider herself weak, the suggestion that she could 
 come through her test victoriously — that she 
 could help him and Gussie and Gladys and Teddy 
 and her mother to do the same — thrilled her like 
 a sudden revelation. 
 
 To Bob himself the theme was not a new one, 
 
 though it was the first time he had ever got any 
 
 of it into words. He had been mulling over it 
 
 and round it ever since the war first called him 
 
 388 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 from a state of mental lethargy. Needing then 
 a clew to life, he had cast about him without 
 finding one. Neither Groton nor Harvard had 
 ever given him anything he could seize. His 
 parents hadn't given him anything, nor had 
 their reUgion. Mentally, he had gone to France 
 much as a jellyfish puts to sea, to be tossed about 
 without volition of its own, and get its support 
 from the food that drifts its way. Nothing much 
 had drifted his way till he found himself in the 
 hospital. 
 
 There, in the long, empty days and sleepless 
 nights, the "why" of things played in and out of 
 his brain like a devil's tattoo. He hated to 
 think that all he had witnessed was futility and 
 waste, and yet no explanation that anyone gave 
 him made it seem otherwise. The question of 
 suffering was the one that most perplexed him. 
 What was the good of it? Why had it to be? 
 Even the agony of his slashed head and crushed 
 foot was almost beyond bearing; and what was 
 that in comparison with all the pain, physical and 
 emotional, at that minute in the world ? What 
 was the idea? How did it get you anywhere? 
 
 In as far as he received an answer, it came one 
 night when he waked from a light doze. He 
 waked repeating certain words which he recog- 
 nized as vaguely familiar: 
 
 " Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier 
 of Jesus Christ." 
 
 He said them over two or three times before 
 getting their significance. 
 
 489 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "That's it," he thought then. "That's why 
 we have to go through all this rumpus. 'Thou 
 therefore endure hardness!' Endure it! Accept 
 it! Rub it in! That's it, by gum!" The ex- 
 pletive was the strongest in which his feeble 
 state allowed him to indulge; but he continued: 
 "That's what's the matter with me. I'm not 
 hard. I'm soft. I'm soft inside. In my mind, 
 in my heart, I'm like putty, like dough. It 
 isn't that I'm tender; I'm just soft. If I've 
 ever had to bear anything hard, I've kicked 
 like the dickens; and that's why I'm such an 
 ass now. 'Thou therefore endure hardness!' 
 I'll be hanged if I won't try." 
 
 So the trying came to be a kind of religion — 
 not a very vital religion, or one as to which he 
 was very keen, and yet a religion. During the 
 winter he was seeing Jennie, and the spring he 
 married her, and the summer he spent in South 
 America, he had fumbled with it without getting 
 hold of it. Not till he began his strivings with 
 Teddy, and his efforts to divert the minds of 
 Teddy's family, did it grow sharply defined to 
 his vision as a way of life. 
 
 Perhaps it was Teddy who taught him. Per- 
 haps they mutually taught each other. He 
 couldn't tell. He only became aware that some- 
 thing was working in the boy like the might of 
 spirit in the inner man. Possibly Teddy was 
 learning more quickly than himself because his 
 lessons were more intensive. 
 
 He noticed this first on the day when he went, 
 390 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 at the lawyer's suggestion, to back up the argu- 
 ment that to plead guilty was the only hope. 
 
 "I've done all I can with him," Stenhouse 
 declared. "Now it's up to you. He thinks 
 you're God; and so you may have some in- 
 fluence." 
 
 "But I never will," Teddy answered, coolly. 
 'I'd never have done society — as the chaplain 
 calls it — any harm if society hadn't done me 
 harm to begin with. I may be guilty in the 
 second place, but society is guilty in the first, 
 and no one will make me say anything diflferent 
 from that." 
 
 "That's all very well, Teddy; but society 
 won't accept the plea." 
 
 "Then it can do the other thing." 
 
 Bob's tone became significant. 
 
 "And you realize what — ^what the other thing 
 might be?" 
 
 "You bet I do! You can't live in Murderers' 
 Row without having that rubbed into you." 
 
 They talked softly, in a corner of the visitors' 
 room, because other little groups were scattered 
 about, each centering round some sullen, swarthy 
 man, wreathed in mystery and darkness. 
 
 "That's all right, old chap," Bob agreed; 
 "but you see, don't you, that it's only a stand 
 for an idea?" 
 
 "It's a stand for telling the truth, isn't it?" 
 
 "The truth — as you see it?" 
 
 "The truth as it is — as I'm willing to bank 
 on it." 
 26 391 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Banking on it in a way that — that may call 
 for a great deal of pluck." 
 
 "Well, I've got a great deal of pluck." 
 
 "Yes — if you've got enough. It's one thing 
 to say so now, and another to prove it when the 
 time comes." 
 
 In his suppressed vehemence Teddy grasped 
 Bob's wrist, as the hands of both lay on the 
 «mall table above which their heads came 
 together. 
 
 "I've got the pluck for anything but to go 
 before their court and say what you want me 
 to say. I took the money because my father 
 and mother, after slaving for society all their 
 lives, had a right to it; I shot a man because 
 they'd got me so jumpy with all the wrongs 
 they'd done me that I didn't know what my 
 Jiand was up to. If they won't let me have 
 my kind of justice, they'll just have to dope me 
 out their own, and I'll swallow it." 
 
 Another conversation, in the same spot, and 
 with heads together in the same way, was 
 gentler. 
 
 "I know pretty well what they're going to 
 hand me out — and it '11 be all right. What 
 kind of life would I have now, even if they 
 acquitted me? What could I have had even if 
 I'd never got into this scrape at all? I'm not 
 cut out for big things. I'm just the same size 
 as poor old dad, and I'd have gone the same 
 way. Ma's got it straight — ^it's not good enough. 
 Think of rotting in an office all your life just to 
 
 39^ 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 reach the gorgeous sum of forty-five a week, 
 and when you've got it to be chucked into the 
 hell of the unemployed! Say, Bob, why can't 
 everyone have enough in a world where there's 
 plenty to go round?" 
 
 "I guess it's because we haven't the right 
 kind of world." 
 
 "But why haven't we? We've been at it 
 long enough." 
 
 "Perhaps not. That may be where the 
 trouble hes. When life came on this planet, to 
 begin with, it took miUions of years to get it 
 anywhere. Nobody knows how long it was before 
 the thing that lived in the water could creep 
 on the land; but it was time to be reckoned by 
 ages. When you come to ages, the human race 
 is young. It's made a life for itself which it 
 doesn't know how to swing. In a few more 
 ages it may learn; but it hasn't learned as yet_" 
 
 Teddy reflected. 
 
 "So you've just got to take it as it is." 
 
 "That seems to be the number. We may kick 
 because it isn't perfect, but we don't know how 
 to make it perfect, and that's all there is to 
 say." 
 
 "It's easier for your kind to say than for ours." 
 
 "It's not as easy as it seems for any kind. 
 I don't see anyone, rich or poor, who hasn't 
 to spend most of his energy in bucking up. 
 The poor think it's easier for the rich, because 
 they have the money; and the rich think it's 
 easier for the poor, because they haven't the 
 
 393 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 responsibilities. So there you are. I begin to 
 think that making yourself strong — hard — ^tough 
 in your inner fiber — is about the biggest asset 
 you can bring to life." 
 
 "Or death," Teddy said, softly. 
 
 "Or death," Bob agreed. 
 
 On another occasion, Teddy was in another 
 mood. 
 
 " If I didn't get it now, I guess it would have 
 come along later; so that it's just as well to 
 have it over." 
 
 Bob's mind went back to Stenhouse's view 
 of Teddy's character. 
 
 "What do you mean by that?" 
 
 "Oh, just what I say. You can't see red like 
 me without being a more dangerous cuss than 
 you mean to be. I'd have got into trouble 
 sometime, even if I hadn't done this." Before 
 Bob could find a response Teddy went on: "I 
 suppose you think that because I don't say 
 anything about Flynn I haven't got him on my 
 mind. Well, you're wrong." 
 
 "Ob, I didn't think that." 
 
 "But what can I say? I think and think and 
 think, and then begin thinking again. So that," 
 he jerked out, "that's a reason, too." 
 
 "A reason for what, Teddy?" 
 
 He answered obliquely. 
 
 "I can't keep up that kind of thinking. I'll 
 go crazy if I do. I'd rather be sent to where I 
 can get another point of view. I don't care 
 what kind of point of view it is, so long as it 
 
 394 
 
THE. EMPTY SACK 
 
 isn't this one. If I could come face to face with 
 Flynn, I believe I could make him understand. 
 Do you suppose there's any chance of that?" 
 
 It was inevitable that, in the long run, specu- 
 lative questions should lead them farther still. 
 
 "What do you suppose God is?" Teddy said, 
 unexpectedly, one day. 
 
 Bob smiled. 
 
 "Ask me something easier." 
 
 " But you must have some idea." 
 
 "I'm not sure that I have." 
 
 "Don't you believe in God? I should have 
 thought that you'd be the kind of cuss who 
 would." ( 
 
 "I don't know that you can call it believing. 
 It's more like — Hke having a kind of instinct — 
 helped out by a little thinking." 
 
 "Have I got the instinct?" 
 
 "Can't you tell that yourself?" 
 
 "If I told you you'd howl." 
 
 "No, I shouldn't. Go to it." 
 
 Teddy laughed sheepishly, as if he had ven- 
 tured to peer into secrets which were none of his 
 business. 
 
 "I'll tell you the way God seems to me— 
 it's all come to me while I've been in there." 
 He nodded toward the cells. "I don't seem to 
 get him as a great big man, the way the chaplain 
 says he is. He's all right, the chaplain, only he 
 don't seem to know anything about God. He 
 can gas away to beat the band about law, and 
 society, and the good of the community, and 
 
 395 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 hell to pay when you don't respect them; but 
 when it comes to God — it's nix." 
 
 "Well, what do you make out for yourself?" 
 
 "I haven't made it out exactly. It's as if 
 
 some great big hand had pulled aside a curtain — 
 
 but it's a curtain that I didn't know was there. 
 
 See?" 
 
 "Yes, I see. And what does it show you?" 
 "That's the funny part of it. I can't tell 
 you what it shows me. I don't exactly see it; 
 I only know — mind you, I'm just telling you 
 how it seems to me — I only know that it's 
 God." 
 
 " But I suppose, if you know that it's God, you 
 have an idea of what it's like?" 
 
 "Ye-es; it's like — -like a country into which 
 I'm traveling — not with my body — see.? — but 
 with my self. No," he corrected, "that's not it. 
 It isn't a country; it's more like a life. Oh, 
 shucks! I haven't got it straight yet. Now 
 look! This is the way it is. Suppose that 
 everything we see was alive — that these chairs 
 were alive, and the walls, and the table — that 
 every blamed thing we ever touch or use was 
 alive, and had a voice. See?" Bob nodded 
 that he saw. "Now, suppose every voice was 
 trying to make you understand things. The 
 table would say, 'This is the way God wants 
 you to work'; and the chair, 'This is the way 
 God wants you to rest'; and the walls, 'This 
 is the way God stands round you and backs you 
 up.' Evervthing would be heloing you then, 
 396 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 instead of putting itself dead against you the 
 way we have it here." 
 
 "I get the idea; but would that be God?" 
 Over this question the boy's face brooded! 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 "It mightn't be God in the way that you're 
 you and I'm me. It would be more like a way 
 of knowing God. It's like my case in the courts. 
 It's set down as 'The People against Edward 
 S. Follett.' But I don't see the People; I only 
 feel what they do to me. It's something like 
 that. I don't see God; but I kind of feel— " He 
 broke with another apologetic laugh. "Oh, I 
 guess it's all wrong. Gussie'd call me a gump. 
 It just kind of gets you; that's all. It makes me 
 feel as if I was moving on into something — but 
 I guess I'm not." 
 
 The pensive silence that followed was broken 
 by Bob's saying: 
 
 "That's what I mean by instinct." 
 Teddy resumed as if he hadn't heard. "When 
 I wake up in the night — and waking up in the 
 night in that place, with snores and groans and 
 guys talking in their sleep and having night- 
 mares, is some stunt, believe me — but when I 
 do, it's just as if I had great big arms round me, 
 and some one was saying: 'All right, Teddy, I'm 
 holding you. Keep a stiff upper lip. I'll make 
 it as easy as I can for you and everyone else. 
 I'm just drawing you--drawing you — drawing 
 you — a wee little bit at a time — over here, 
 where you'll get your big chance.' What's more, 
 
 397 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Bob," he went on, as if he touched on the heart 
 of his interest, "it says it '11 take care of 
 Flynn and his wife and his poor little kiddies, 
 and do the things — " Once more he broke off 
 with his uneasy laugh. "Ah, what's the 
 use? You think I'm a quitter, don't you?" 
 
 "Why should I think that?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. I talk like a quitter. 
 But it isn't that. If I could still do anything 
 for ma and the girls — " 
 
 "I'm looking after them, old boy." 
 
 "So there you are. What 'd be the good of 
 my staying?" He added, between clenched 
 teeth, "God, how I'd hate to go back!" 
 
 "Back into the world?" 
 
 He spoke as if to himself: "You see — ^that 
 day — the day the thing happened — and they 
 came and caught me — and did all those things 
 to me — and I saw Flynn lying by the road — 
 it was — it was a kind of sickener. If putting 
 me out of the way is the thing in the wind, it 
 was done right there and then. Right there and 
 then I seem to have begun — moving on." He 
 drew a long breath. "And I'd rather keep 
 moving, Bob — no matter to where — ^no matter 
 to what — ^than turn back again to face a bunch 
 of men." 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 TEDDY was not called on to face a bunch of 
 men till going to the courtroom for his 
 trial. Dressed long before the hour in a new 
 dark-blue suit, fresh linen, and a dark-blue tie, 
 his prison pallor, a little like that of death, put 
 him out of the list of the active and free. As 
 he sat on the edge of his bunk, somber with 
 dread, he was nevertheless obliged to find 
 suitable jocosities with which to answer the 
 good-luck wishes that came slithering along the 
 walls from the neighboring cells. It was half past 
 nine before two guards whom he had never 
 seen before, stalwart fellows well over six feet, 
 came to the door and unlocked it. 
 
 "Ready, Follett? Time's come." 
 
 Springing to his feet, he found handcuiFs 
 slipped round his wrists before he was aware of 
 what was being done. It was an unexpected 
 indignity. He had never been handcuffed 
 before. 
 
 "Say, fellows," he protested, "I'll go all 
 right. I don't want these on me." 
 
 "Come along wid ye." 
 
 The words were friendly rather than rough, 
 as was also the hand of a guard on each shoulder 
 as they steered him along the corridor. The 
 
 399 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Brig is a rambling building, or succession of 
 buildings, with courthouse and house of deten- 
 tion under the same series of roofs. The pil- 
 grimage was long — upstairs, downstairs, through 
 passages, past offices, past courtrooms, with 
 guards, police, clerks, lawyers, litigants, loungers, 
 standing about everywhere. The sight of a man 
 in handcuffs arrested all eyes for the moment, 
 and stilled all tongues. With his glances flying, 
 from right to left and from left to right, Teddy 
 again began to feel the sense of separation from 
 the human race which had struck to his soul 
 that day on the marshes. 
 
 Of his other impressions, the chief was that of 
 squalor. It seemed as if all the elements had 
 been brought together that would make poor 
 Justice vulgar and unimpressive. Out of a 
 squalid cell he had been pushed along squalid 
 hallways, through groups of squaUd faces, into 
 a squalid courtroom, where he was ushered into 
 a squalid cage, long and narrow, with a seat 
 hardly wider than a knife blade. Once within 
 the cage the handcuffs were taken oflF, the door 
 was locked, and each of the stalwart guards 
 took his stand at one end. The cage being 
 raised some six or eight inches above the level of 
 the floor, the boy was well in sight of everyone. 
 It was like being on a throne — or a Calvary. 
 
 On taking his s^at, he was vaguely conscious 
 
 of a bank of faces, tier above tier, at the 
 
 back of the courtroom. Before him some 
 
 fifteen or twenty officials, reporters, and lawyers 
 
 400 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 lolled at their tables, walked about, yawned, 
 picked their teeth, or told anecdotes that raised 
 a smothered laugh. Most of them struck him 
 as untidily dressed; few looked intelligent. 
 Among them a portly man, whom he afterward 
 saw as the district attorney, in a cutaway coat, 
 with a Hne of pique at the opening of his waist- 
 coat, seemed like a person in fancy costume. 
 Everyone paused as he entered the cage, but, a 
 glance having satisfied their curiosity, they paid 
 him no further attention. 
 
 The trial lasted three days, passing before 
 his eyes like a motion-picture film of which he 
 was only a spectator. Try as he would, he found 
 it hard to believe that the proceedings had any- 
 thing to do with him. "All this fuss," he would 
 comment to himself, grimly, "to get the right 
 to kill a man." The strain of being under so 
 many cruel or indifferent eyes sent him back 
 with relief to his cell, where during the nights 
 he slept soundly. 
 
 His one bit of surprise came from Sten- 
 house's final argument in his defense. Up to 
 that point, both defense and prosecution had 
 struck him as more or less silly. The state had 
 tried to prove him a desperado whom it was 
 dangerous to let live; the defense had done its 
 best to show him a youth of arrested intelli- 
 gence, not responsible for his acts. He grinned 
 inwardly when Jennie, Gussie, and half a dozen 
 of his old chums testified to foolish pranks, 
 forgotten or half forgotten by himself, in the 
 
 401 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 hope of convincing the court that he had never 
 had the normal sense. 
 
 But Stenhouse in his concluding speech 
 transcended all that, taking Teddy's own stand 
 as the only one which offered the ghost of a 
 chance of acquittal. He began his final appeal 
 quietly, in a tone little more than colloquial. 
 
 "There's an old saying, a variant on some- 
 thing said by Benjamin Franklin, which we 
 might remember oftener than we do. It's 
 terse, pithy, humorous, wise. Some one has 
 called it the finest bit of free verse composed in 
 the eighteenth century. Listen to it. 'It is 
 hard to make an empty sack stand upright' So 
 it is. The empty sack collapses of its own 
 accord. It can't do anything but collapse. It 
 was not meant to stand upright. To demand 
 that it shall stand upright is to insist ori the 
 impossible. A full sack will stand as solid as 
 a tree. A group of full sacks will support one 
 another. Put the empty sack among them 
 and from the very law of gravitation it will 
 go down helplessly. Now, gentlemen of the 
 jury, you're being asked to bring in a verdict 
 against the empty sack — ^the sack that's been 
 carefully kept empty — because it hasn't the 
 strength and stability of that which all the 
 coiFers of the country have combined to fill." 
 
 With this as a text, Stenhouse drew a picture 
 
 of the industrious man who is limited by the 
 
 very nature of his industry. He is not limited 
 
 by his own desire, but by the use society wishes 
 
 402 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 to make of him. Serving a turn, he is schooled 
 to serve that turn, and to serve no other turn. 
 This schooling takes him unawares. He doesn't 
 know it has begun before waking to find himself 
 drilled to a system from which only a giant can 
 escape. Few men being giants, the average man 
 plods on because he doesn't know what else to 
 do. There is rarely anything else jor him to do. 
 Having taken the first ill-paid job that comes his 
 way, he hasn't meant to give himself to it all 
 his life. He dreams of something bigger, more 
 brilliant, more productive. The boy who runs 
 errands sees himself a merchant; the lad who 
 becomes a clerk looks forward to being a 
 partner; the young man who enters a bank is 
 sure that some day he will be bank president. 
 
 "Sometimes, gentlemen, these early visions 
 work out to a reality. But in the vast majority 
 of cases, the youth, before he ceases to be a 
 youth, finds himself where the horse is when he 
 has once submitted to the bridle. He can go 
 only as he is driven. Life is organized not to 
 let him go in any other way. Needing him for a 
 certain purpose, it keeps him to that purpose. 
 Work, taken as a great corporate thing, is 
 made up of hundreds of millions of tiny tasks 
 each of which calls for a man. The man being 
 found, he must be trimmed to the size of his 
 task." 
 
 Stenhouse had no quarrel with methods uni- 
 versally followed by civilized man. To criti- 
 cize them was not his intention, as it was not 
 
 403 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 his intention to complain because man had not 
 yet brought in the Golden Age. 
 
 "But I do claim that the smaller the task to 
 which a man is nailed down, and the smaller 
 the pay he is able to earn, the greater the respon- 
 sibility of collective society toward that in- 
 dividual." 
 
 There was a time, he declared, when much 
 had been said to the discredit of slavery; but 
 one thing could be urged in its favor. The man 
 who had been kept throughout his Hfe to one 
 small job was not thrown out in his old age to 
 provide for himself as he could. Having worked 
 for society, as society was constituted then, so- 
 ciety recognized at least the duty of taking care 
 of him. Stenhouse disclaimed any comparison 
 between free American labor and a servile con- 
 dition; he was striving only for a principle. 
 Men couldn't be screwed down during all their 
 working lives to the lowest wage on which body 
 and soul could be kept together, and then be 
 judged by the same standards as those who had 
 had opportunity to make provision for them- 
 selves and their families. The same interpre- 
 tation of the law couldn't be made to cover the 
 cases of the full sack and the empty one. 
 
 "And yet," he went on, changing his tone 
 with his theme, "the empty sack is of value 
 because it can be filled. Coarse, cheap, negligible 
 as it seems, it is much too good to throw away. 
 It is an asset to production, to the country's 
 trade, to the whole world's wealth. And, gentle- 
 404 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 men, what shall we say when we call that empty 
 sack — a man?" 
 
 The value of the human asset was the next 
 point to which he led his listeners. 
 
 "It is only a truism to say that among all 
 the precious things with which the Almighty 
 has blessed his creation the most precious is a 
 human Hfe; and yet we live in a world which 
 seems to believe this so little that we must 
 sometimes remind ourselves that it is so. Within 
 a few years we have seen millions of men reckoned 
 merely as stuff. As productive assets to the 
 race, they haven't counted. We could read of 
 a day's loss on the battlefield running up 
 into the thousands and never turn a hair. We 
 came to regard a young man's life as primarily a 
 thing to throw away. It is for this reason, 
 gentlemen of the jury, that I venture to remind 
 you that a young man's life is primarily a thing 
 to save. It may be a truism to say that a 
 human life is the most precious of all created 
 things; but it is a truism of which we are only 
 now, to our bitter and incalculable cost, begin- 
 ning to realize the truth." 
 
 He went on to draw a picture of the contri- 
 butions to the general good made by the Fol- 
 letts, father and son. Their work had been 
 humble, but it had been essential. Essential 
 work faithfully performed should guarantee an 
 old age protected against penury. He reminded 
 his hearers that he was not opposed to the law 
 of supply and demand, which was the only 
 
 405 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 known method by which the business of the 
 world could be carried on. He only pleaded for 
 the same humanity to a man as was shown to 
 a broken-down old horse. From his one inter- 
 view with Lizzie, Stenhouse had got what he 
 called "the good line," " Thou shall not muz~ 
 zle the ox that treadeth out the corn." Of this 
 he now made use, following it up with St. 
 Paul's explanation: "Doth God take care for 
 oxen? Or saith he it altogether for our sakes.?^ 
 For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that 
 he that ploweth may plow in hope; and that he 
 that thresheth in hope should be partaker of 
 his hope." 
 
 "Gentlemen, so long as we live in a society in 
 which the vast majority of us can never be par- 
 takers of the hope with which we started out, so 
 long must justice take account of the suffering 
 of the poor muzzled brute that treadeth 
 out the corn. If he goes frenzied and runs 
 amuck, he cannot be judged by the standards 
 which apply to him who has been left unmuz- 
 zled and free to satisfy his wants. It is not fair; 
 it is not human. It is true that to protect your 
 own interests you have the power to shoot him 
 down; but when he lies dead at your feet, no 
 more muzzled in death than he was in life, there 
 is surely somewhere in the universe an avenging 
 force that is on his side, and which will make 
 you — ^you as representatives of the society 
 which has placed its action in your hands — and 
 you as twelve private individuals with duties 
 406 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 and consciences — there is somewhere in the 
 universe this avenging force which will require 
 his blood at your hands and make you pay the 
 penalty. Surely you can find a better use for 
 that valuable asset, a young man's hfe, than just 
 to take it away. For the sake of the public 
 whose honor is in your keeping, you must play 
 the game squarely. For the sake of your own 
 future peace of mind, you must not add your 
 own crime to this poor boy's misfortune. Your 
 duty at this minute is not merely to interpret the 
 dead letter of a law; it is to be the voice of the 
 People whom you represent. Remember that 
 by the verdict you bring in that People will be 
 committed to the most destructive of all de- 
 structive acts, or it will get expression for that 
 deep, human common sense which transcends 
 written phrases to act in the spirit of the greatest 
 of us all, judging not according to the appearance 
 — not according to the appearance, gentlemen, 
 and you remember who counseled that — but 
 judging righteous judgment." 
 
 He fell back into his seat, exhausted. He was so 
 impressive and impassioned as to convince many 
 of his hearers that he believed his own plea, 
 while to some who had considered the verdict a 
 certainty it was now in doubt. 
 
 Among Teddy's friends a hope arose that, In 
 spite of all expectation to the contrary, he might 
 be saved. Bob looked over and smiled. Teddy 
 smiled back, but mainly because he rejoiced in 
 what he felt to be his justification. He couldn't 
 27 407 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 see how they could convict him after such a 
 setting forth as that, though for the conse- 
 quences of acquittal he had so little heart. 
 
 '^" vhe excitement of the courtroom, the 
 juQge's voice, when he began to give the jury 
 their instructions, fell like cool, quiet rain on 
 thunderous sultriness. He was a small man, 
 with a leathery, unemotional face, framed by an 
 iron-gray wig of faultless side-parting and long, 
 straight, unnaturally smooth hair. He had the 
 faculty of seeming attentive without being influr 
 enced. Listening, reasoning, asking a question, 
 or settling a disputed point, he gave the impres- 
 sion of having reduced intelligence to the soulless 
 accuracy of a cash register. 
 
 He reminded the jury that the law was not on 
 trial; society was not on trial; the industrial ex- 
 perience of one Josiah FoUett was not a feature 
 in the case. They must not allow the issue to be 
 confused by the social arguments which befogged 
 so many of the questions of the day. It was quite 
 possible that the world was not as perfect as it 
 might b^; it was even possible that the law 
 was not the most perfect law that could be passed. 
 But these were considerations into which they 
 could not enter. In merely approaching them, 
 they would lose their way. The law as it stands 
 is the voice of the People as it is; and the only 
 questions before them were, first, whether or not 
 the accused had broken that law, and second, if 
 he had broken it, to what degree. In answering 
 these questions, they must limit themselves to 
 408 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 the bare facts of the charge. With the prisoner's 
 temptations they had nothing to do, except in so 
 far as they tended to create intent. The conse- 
 quences to his person, whether in the way of 
 liberty or of the last penalty, were no concern of 
 others. Justice in itself, viewed as justice in the 
 abstract, was no concern of theirs. They were 
 not, however, to burden their consciences with 
 the fear that the accused was thus deprived of 
 protection. The duty of a jury was not protec- 
 tion, but discernment. The administration of the 
 law was far too big and complex a thing for any 
 one body of men to deal with. Justice having 
 many aspects, the law had as many departments. 
 Protection was in other hands than theirs. The 
 application of justice pure and simple, involving 
 punishment for guilt without excluding pity for 
 the provocation, was duly guaranteed by the 
 methods of the state. They would find their 
 task simplified by dismissing all such hesitations 
 from their minds and confining themselves to the 
 definite question which he repeated. Had the 
 prisoner at the bar broken the existing law, and 
 if he had so broken it, to what degree ? 
 
 Having explained the difference between man- 
 slaughter and murder, as well as between first- 
 degree murder and second, he admitted that, in 
 case the accused was found guilty, there was 
 much to indicate the second degree rather than 
 the first. There was, however, one damning 
 fact. The hand that had shot Peter Flynn went 
 on at once to shoot WiUiam Jackman. The 
 
 409 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 killing of one man might have been an accident. 
 If not an accident, it might still have mitigating 
 features. But for the murderer of a first man to 
 proceed at once to become the murderer of a 
 second indicated a planned and deliberate 
 intent. . . . 
 
 When the court had adjourned and the jury had 
 retired to consider their verdict, one of the guards 
 unlocked the cage and Teddy was taken down 
 by a corkscrew staircase to a room immediately 
 below. It was a small room, lighted by one 
 feeble bulb, and aired from an air shaft. A 
 table and two chairs stood in the middle of the 
 room; a shiny, well-worn bench w-as fixed to one 
 of the walls. The guards took the chairs; Teddy 
 sat down on the bench. One of the guards cut 
 off a piece of tobacco and puc it in his mouth; the 
 other lighted a cheap cigar. Taking another 
 from an upper waistcoat pocket, he held it out 
 toward Teddy. 
 
 "Have a smoke, young fella.?" 
 
 Teddy shook his head. He was hardly aware 
 of being addressed. Nothing else was said to 
 him, and the guards, almost silently, began a 
 game of cards. This waiting with prisoners for 
 verdicts was always a tedious affair, and one to 
 be got through patiently. 
 
 To Teddy, it was not so much tedious as it was 
 unreal. He sat with arms folded, his head sunk, 
 and the foot of the leg which was thrown across 
 the other leg kicking outward mechanically. 
 Except for a rare grunted remark between the 
 410 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 players, there was no sound but the slap of the 
 cards on the table and the scooping in of the 
 tricks. 
 
 After nearly half an hour the door opened and 
 Bob Collingham came in with a basket containing 
 sandwiches and a thermos bottle of hot coffee. 
 With a word of explanation to the guards, he 
 was allowed to take his seat beside the prisoner. 
 
 "Hello, old sport! Must be relieved that it's 
 so soon going to be over. Brought you some- 
 thing to eat." 
 
 With this introduction, they took up common- 
 place ground as if it was a commonplace oc- 
 casion. Teddy asked after his mother and sis- 
 ters; Bob gave him the family news. Of the 
 trial they said nothing. Of what they were 
 waiting for no more was said than that Bob had 
 persuaded Jennie and Gussie to go home, promis- 
 ing to come and tell them the decision. Lizzie 
 and Gladys had not appeared in the courtroom 
 at all. Of all this Teddy approved as he munched 
 his sandwiches stolidly. 
 
 The supply of food and coffee being large, they 
 invited the guards to share with them. The in- 
 vitation was accepted, the officers suspending 
 their game. The talk became friendly, com- 
 menting on the judge's wig and the glass eye of 
 the foreman of the jury, but not touching directly 
 on the trial. These subjects, as well as the supply 
 of sandwiches, exhausted, the guards returned 
 to their game, the two young men being left to 
 
 themselves. 
 
 411 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 For the most part they sat in silence — a 
 silence as nearly cheerful as the circumstances 
 permitted. 
 
 "Don't worry about me. Bob," Teddy mur- 
 mured once. "I'm not going to care much which- 
 ever way it is. Honest to God! I don't say I 
 wouldn't Hke it if they sent me back home; but 
 if they don't — " 
 
 Allowing his companion to finish the sentence 
 for himself, he lapsed into silence again. 
 
 Another time, speaking as if subterranean 
 thought came for a moment to the surface, he 
 said: 
 
 "I liked what you said about hardness — and 
 pluck. I've been practicing away on them both 
 — making myself tough inside. Funny how you 
 can, isn't it? You think at first that, because 
 you're soft, you've got to be soft; but you find 
 out that you're just what you like to make your- 
 self. That's a great line. Bob, * Thou therefore 
 endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.' 
 You watch," he added, with a tremulous smile, 
 "and you'll see me doing it." 
 
 "All right, old boy, I'll watch, but we'll all be 
 doing it with you. We're practicing, too. Jennie 
 and the girls are regular bricks, and, of course, 
 your mother — " 
 
 He smiled again. 
 
 "Good old ma! She sure is the best ever. I'd 
 
 be sorrier for her than I am if I didn't feel certain 
 
 that if — that if I go she won't wait long after 
 
 me." He swung away from this aspect of his 
 
 412 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 thought to a new one. "Say, Bob, do you sup- 
 pose it's a sign that God really is with me — gump 
 as I am! — ^that he's sent you to take ma and the 
 girls off my hands — you know — and make my 
 mind easy?" 
 
 They discussed those happenings which might 
 reasonably be held to be signs of Divine good 
 intention, after which silence fell again. The 
 guards grunted or yawned; the cards were 
 slapped on the table; the tricks were pulled in 
 with the scratching of paper against wood. An 
 hour went by; another hour, and then another. 
 In spite of his efforts to make himself hard, 
 Teddy felt the tension. Having accidentally 
 touched Bob's hand, he grasped it with a clutch 
 like a vise. He was still clutching it when a 
 messenger came to the door to say that the jury 
 was about to render their verdict and the prisoner 
 must come back into court. 
 
 Bob climbed the corkscrew first. A guard 
 followed him, then Teddy, then the other guard. 
 It was after seven in the evening. The court- 
 room, relatively empty, had a sickly look, under 
 crude electric lighting. But half of the specta- 
 tors had come back, and only those officials and 
 lawyers who were obliged to be in their places. 
 All the reporters were there, watching for every 
 shade in Teddy's face and seeing more than he 
 expressed. 
 
 Bob managed to pass in front of the cage. 
 
 "Remember, Teddy — ^hardness is the big 
 word." 
 
 413 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Sure thing!" Teddy whispered back. 
 
 The jury filed in. The judge took his place. 
 Teddy was ordered to stand up. He stood 
 very straight, his hands in the pockets of his 
 jacket. In all that met the eye he was a sturdy, 
 stocky young man, pleasing to look at, and with 
 no suggestion of the criminal. His face was 
 grave with a gravity beyond that of death, but 
 he showed no sign of nervousness. 
 
 If anyone showed nervousness it was the fore- 
 man of the jury, a good-natured fish dealer, with 
 a drooping reddish mustache, who had never 
 expected to be in this situation. When^ asked if 
 the jury had arrived at a verdict his voice 
 trembled as he answered: 
 
 "We have." 
 
 "What is your verdict?" 
 
 "We find the accused guilty of murder." 
 
 "Of murder in the first or the second degree?" 
 
 "In the first." 
 
 That was all. Bob wheeled round toward 
 Teddy, who smiled courageously. 
 
 "It's all right. Bob," he whispered, as their 
 hands met over the rail of the cage. "I've got 
 the right line on it. It's my medicine, and I 
 know hoAV to take it. Keep ma and the girls 
 from worrying, and I can go straight through 
 with it." 
 
 It was all there was time for. They had not 
 
 noticed that Stenhouse had said something 
 
 about appeal, and the judge something about 
 
 sentence. Everyone was leaving. Stenhouse 
 
 414 
 
"all right, ma! I'm ready!" 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 came to shake hands with his chent and tell him 
 that the game wasn't up yet. The boy thanked 
 him. The cage was unlocked, and once more 
 Teddy, with a guard in front and a guard follow- 
 ing after him, went down the corkscrew stair. 
 
CHAPTER XXVlII 
 
 WHAT I don't understand. Bob," CoUIng- 
 ham said, with faint indignation in his 
 tone, "is whether you're a married man or not." 
 
 "I'm a married man, father, all right." 
 
 "Then why don't you live like a married 
 man? I suppose you know that people are 
 saying all sorts of things." 
 
 Bob considered the simplest way in which to 
 put his case. It was the afternoon of the day 
 following the end of Teddy's trial, and his father 
 was giving him a lift homeward from the bank. 
 It being winter, dark was already closing in, and 
 though they were out of the city, great arc-lights 
 were still strung along the roadways, which were 
 otherwise lighted by flashes from hundreds of 
 motor cars. 
 
 "I've never said anything about this before," 
 the father resumed, before Bob had found the 
 right words, "because we'd all agreed — ^your 
 mother, Edith, and myself — that we wouldn't 
 hamper you with questions about it while you 
 were busy with something else. But now that 
 that's over — " 
 
 " Part of it is over, but only part of it. We've 
 a long road to travel yet." 
 
 " If the appeal is denied, as I expect it will be, 
 416 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 you'll have to let me in on the application to the 
 Governor for clemency. I think I'd have some 
 influence there." 
 
 "Thanks, dad. That'll be a help." He 
 asked, after further thinking, "Should you Uke 
 me to live as a married man — considering who 
 it is I've married?" 
 
 Knowing that the question was a searching 
 one. Bob found the reply much what he expected. 
 
 "I want to see the best thing come out of a 
 mixed-up situation. I don't deny that all these 
 problems bother me; but we have them on our 
 hands, and so there's no more to be said. We've 
 got to find the wise thing to do, and do it. That's 
 all I'm after." 
 
 "That's all I'm after, myself, dad." 
 
 "I don't admit any responsibility for all this 
 muss," CoUingham declared, as if his son had 
 accused him. "I don't care what anyone thinks; 
 my conscience is clear." 
 
 "Of course, dad; of course!" 
 
 "But since things have happened as they 
 have, I'd Hke to make them as easy as I can for 
 everyone; and whatever money can do — " 
 
 "Or recognition?" 
 
 They came back to the original question. 
 
 "Yes; recognition, too — as soon as we've 
 anyone to recognize. What I don't understand 
 is all this backing and filling — " 
 
 "Have you asked mother?" 
 
 "In a way; and she's just as mysterious as 
 you." 
 
 417 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Bob tried another avenue. 
 
 "You saw Jennie yourself, didn't you?" 
 
 "Once; yes." 
 
 "What did you think of her?" 
 
 "What any man would think of her. She was 
 very charming and — and appealing." 
 
 "Did you think anything else?" 
 
 The father turned sharply. 
 
 "What makes you ask?" 
 
 " Because it's possible you did." 
 
 "Well, I did. What of it?" 
 
 "Only this — that that's the thing I want to 
 nail before I bring her to you as my wife." 
 
 "Then why don't you go to work and nail it?" 
 
 He found the words he was in search of. 
 
 "Partly because I've other things to do; 
 partly because I feel that> by giving it its time, 
 it will nail itself; and, most of all, for the reason 
 that neither she nor I want to take the — ^the 
 great happiness which we feel is coming to us in 
 the end while — ^while all this other thing is in 
 the air. I wonder if you understand me." 
 
 "More or less." 
 
 "It's as if we'd accidentally put the cart of 
 marriage before the horse of engagement. Do 
 you see? Nominally we're married; but really 
 we're only engaged. We can't be married — ^we 
 don't want to be married — ^till other things are 
 off our minds." 
 
 With this bit of explanation, the CoUinghams 
 began to live once more as if nothing had oc- 
 curred. It was not easy; but by dint of skim- 
 
 418 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ming on the surface they were able to manage it. 
 That is to say. Bob came and went, and they 
 asked him no more questions, while on his part 
 he continued to nerve Teddy and his sisters for 
 another test. 
 
 If there was anyone noticeably different, it 
 was Junia. Always quick to tack according to 
 the wind, she seemed almost to have changed her 
 course. In putting the best face on Edith's 
 marriage and Bob's complications she had 
 adopted the new ideals that kept her in the 
 movement. 
 
 "It's the war," she explained to her intimates. 
 "We're all different. Life as we used to live it 
 begins to seem so empty. We weren't real; we 
 people who spent our time 'entertaining and being 
 entertained. It's all very well to say that we're 
 much the same since the war as we were before, 
 but it isn't so. I know I'm not. I'm quite a 
 revolutionist. I may not have made much 
 progress, but I'm certainly more in touch with 
 reality." 
 
 With this transition. It became natural to 
 speak of her son-in-law. 
 
 "Such a wonderful fellow — all mind, you 
 know, but the type that helps so many of us to 
 find our way through the mists of materialism 
 and selfishness out to the great big ends. To 
 me, it's Uke a new life just to hear him talk, and 
 I can't help feeling it providential that he's 
 found a wife like Edith. She's an extraordinary 
 girl to be my child — intellectual and practical 
 
 419 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 at once. She can keep her husband company in 
 all his researches and yet cook him a good 
 dinner if their little maid is out. Is there any- 
 thing so astonishing in life as our own children 
 and what they turn out to be?" 
 
 This was a transition, too, leading her to speak 
 of Bob's affairs in the tone of one who, though 
 puzzled, takes them sympathetically. 
 
 "And yet I think it's enlarging. Though 
 we've kept only on the outer edge of the drama 
 through which Bob has been going with the girl 
 he's married, the whole thing has deepened his 
 life so much that it couldn't help deepening ours. 
 It's broadened us, too, I think, giving us an in- 
 sight into lives so different from our own. That's 
 what we need so much, it seems to me, that kind 
 of broadening. It's going to solve a lot of our 
 national problems which at present seem to be 
 insoluble. Yes; Bob is still at home with us, 
 and I tell you frankly that I don't know what is 
 coming out of it. It's all so queer and inde- 
 pendent and modern. I'm old-fashioned, and I 
 don't pretend to see through these young people's 
 ways. But I'm Bob's mother, and through all 
 his developments — and he is developing — I'm 
 going with him." 
 
 So Junia talked, and talked so much that she 
 was in danger of talking herself round. The 
 instinct to be in the front line of fashion had 
 something to do with it, but self-persuasion had 
 more. The thing of the hour being the throwing 
 over of the old social code, Junia wouldn't have 
 420 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 been Junia if she hadn't done it; but, even so, 
 the creeping-in of compunction toward Bob took 
 her by surprise. She had told herself hither- 
 to that she loved him so much that she would 
 work for his permanent happiness even at the 
 cost of his temporary pain; but now she began 
 to fear that what had seemed to her his temporary 
 pain might prove the very life of his life. 
 
 She came to this perception through reading 
 in the newspapers the accounts of the Follett 
 boy's trial. By the tacit convention which the 
 Collinghams had established, that they had 
 nothing to do with it, she never spoke of it to 
 Bradley or Edith, nor did they speak of it to 
 her; but she kept herself informed, and knew the 
 devotion with which Bob gave himself to Jennie 
 and her family. The boy's condemnation hit 
 her hard. When Bradley came home that night, 
 she saw that it had also hit him. 
 
 "I'm worth about five million dollars at a 
 guess," he confided to her, "and I'd cheerfully 
 have given four of them if this thing hadn't 
 happened." 
 
 "But, Bradley dear, you had nothing to do 
 with it." 
 
 "I know I hadn't," he declared, savagely; 
 "and yet I'd— I'd do as I say." 
 
 But it wasn't Bradley she was most sorry 
 for; nor was it for the Follett boy. She was 
 sorry that, because of conditions which she her- 
 self had fostered. Bob would never reap the fruit 
 of a love in which he had been so chivalrous. She 
 
 421 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 didn't see how he could. Just as there was a 
 natural Bradley and a standardized one, so there 
 was a natural and a standardized Junia. The 
 natural Junia had long seemed dead; but the 
 bigness of the love which she saw daily and hourly 
 exemplified moved her to the painful stirrings oj' 
 new life. 
 
 Meanwhile Bob went with Teddy up the re. 
 maining steps by which he mounted his Calvary, 
 
 He stood near the cage on the morning when 
 the boy was brought up for sentence, witnessing 
 his coolness. On being asked if he had anything 
 to say before sentence was pronounced he 
 replied : 
 
 "Nothing, sir, except to thank you for giving 
 me such a fair trial." 
 
 The words were spoken in a firmer voice than 
 those which followed: 
 
 "The court, in consideration of your crime of 
 murder in the first degree, sentences you to the 
 punishment of death by the passage of a current 
 of electricity through your body, within the 
 week beginning . . ." 
 
 When the appeal for a new trial was denied, 
 it was Bob who informed Teddy. When all 
 eflForts to obtain Executive clemency had failed, 
 it was Bob again who broke the news. When 
 the boy requested that his mother and sisters 
 should omit their next visit to Bitterwell — 
 should wait till he sent them word before coming 
 again — it was Bob who conveyed the request. 
 422 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Bitterwell, the great penitentiary, was twenty 
 miles from Pemberton Heights, and through the 
 winter they had gone to see him some thirty-odd 
 times. They went in couples. Gladys and her 
 smother, Jennie and Gussie, keeping each other 
 company. The visits were less difficult than 
 might have been expected because of Teddy's 
 cheerfulness. 
 
 Of the request to wait before coming again^ 
 they didn't at first seize the significance. While' 
 frank with them about everything else. Bob had 
 never given them the date of the week the judge 
 had named, nor had they asked for it. If they 
 did so ask, he meant to tell them; but they 
 seemed to divine his intention. 
 
 Perhaps they divined the intention in this 
 intimation from Teddy. At any rate, they didn't 
 question it, or rebel against it. It followed on. 
 visits first of one pair and then of the other, both 
 of which had been so normal as almost to pass as 
 gay. That is, Teddy's spirits had infected theirs, 
 and they had parted from him smiling. That of 
 Jennie and Gussie had been the first of the two, 
 and he had sent them oflF with a joke. 
 
 "My boy, I'm proud of you," had been 
 Lizzie's farewell words to him. "Walk firmly, 
 with your head erect, and never, never be sorry 
 for anything you've done." 
 
 "Good old ma! The best ever! I sure am 
 proud of you! What '11 you bet that we don't 
 have some good times together yet.i"* 
 
 A psychologist would have said that by sug- 
 28 423 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 gestion and autosuggestion they strengthened 
 each other and themselves; but whatever the 
 process, the result was evident. Bob had given 
 them the verb "to carry on," so that "carrying 
 on" became at once an objective and a driving 
 force. Gussie and Gladys went regularly to 
 work; Jennie took care of the house and her 
 mother. The latter task had become the more 
 imperative, for the reason that, after Teddy's 
 request that they should suspend their visits, 
 she began to fail. It was not that she was hurt 
 by it, but rather that she took it as a signal. 
 
 In the efforts to be strong, they were helped 
 by the fact that, not long after Teddy's removal 
 to Bitterwell, Edith Ayling had come to see them, 
 all of her own initiative. She had repeated the 
 visit many times, and had Gussie and Gladys 
 go to see her at Cathedral Heights. Jennie had 
 never been able to leave home. 
 
 "I didn't say anything about it to you," Edith 
 explained to Bob, after the occasion of her 
 breaking the ice, "because I wanted to do it on 
 my own. Quite apart from you and Jennie, I 
 feel that our lots have become involved and 
 that we CoUinghams have some responsibility. 
 I don't say responsibility for what, because I 
 don't know; and yet I feel — " Unable to say 
 what she felt, she elided to the personal. "Jennie 
 I don't get at. She's so silent — so shut away. 
 The mother has never been well enough to see 
 me. But the two younger girls I'm really getting 
 to know very well and to be very fond of. 
 424 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 They're intelligent down to the fingertips, and 
 with a little guidance I'm sure they could do big 
 things." 
 
 "What kind of things?" 
 
 "I should train Gladys along intellectual 
 lines, and Gussie was born for the stage. I know 
 that Ernest and I could help them, if you thought 
 it all right, and we should love doing it. You 
 must read what he says in his new book. Salvage, 
 as to getting people into the tasks for which they 
 are fitted and in which they can be happy. He 
 thinks that a lot of our nonproductiveness 
 comes from the people who'd love doing one 
 thing being compelled to do another, and that if 
 we could only help the individuals we come 
 across to find their natural jobs . . ." 
 
 It was Edith also who unconsciously helped 
 her mother out of the trap in which she had 
 found herself caught. 
 
 "Oh, by the way, whom do you think I met in 
 the street the other day? No less a person than 
 Hubert Wray, just back from California. And 
 that reminds me. He told me you had bought 
 his big picture that everyone was talking about 
 last year. Where is it? Why did you never 
 say anything about it?" 
 
 Edith was spending a day in May at CoUing- 
 ham Lodge, and was walking with her mother 
 between rows of irises. ' 
 
 "Come in," Junia said. "I'll show you. 
 Then you'll understand." 
 
 But not till "Life and Death" had been drawn 
 42s 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 from its hiding place and propped against the 
 wall was Edith allowed to enter her mother's 
 room. She advanced slowly, her eyes on the 
 canvas. Junia waited for the shock. 
 
 "So that's it," Edith said, at last. "It isn't a 
 thing I should want to live and die with — I never 
 can understand that fancy people have for nudes 
 — but I see it's very fine." 
 
 "And is that all you see?" 
 
 "All I see? I see it has a meaning, of course, 
 but—" 
 
 Junia's throat felt dry. 
 
 "Don't you — don't you recognize anybody?" 
 
 "Who? The Brasshead woman? I shouldn't 
 know her from Eve." 
 
 Junia crept nearer. 
 
 " ' The Brasshead woman ' ? Who's she ? What 
 are you talking about?" 
 
 "Why, the model who sat for it. Hubert told 
 me all about her. He said she wasn't his ideal 
 for the part — rather a poor lot as a woman — but 
 he couldn't get anyone better." She added, on 
 examining the features, "I don't think she's 
 bad, considering what he wanted." 
 
 "Doesn't she — doesn't she remind you of — 
 of Bob's wife?" 
 
 "About as much as she does of you. Surely 
 that's not the reason why you hid the thing away !' ' 
 
 "I — I did think — I was afraid — ^that people 
 might see a resemblance — " 
 
 Edith made an inarticulate sound intended for 
 derision. 
 
 426 
 
THE EMPTY SACK' 
 
 "As a matter of fact, Hubert said it was 
 probably a good thing for him to be obliged to 
 paint some one else than Jennie. He'd been 
 painting her so much that he was in danger of 
 painting her into everything, Uke Andrea del 
 Sarto with his wife." 
 
 "Then you — you don't think that he's painted 
 her in here.?" 
 
 Edith looked again. 
 
 "Well, if you put it that way — and you were 
 crazy to find a likeness — perhaps about the 
 brows — and down here at the curve of the cheek 
 and neck — but no! Not really! This is a 
 carnal woman, and Jennie's a thing of the 
 spirit." She dismissed the subject as of no 
 further importance. "Do tell me. Is there 
 anyone in New York who reglazes these English 
 chintzes .f"' 
 
 So Junia made new plans, waitmg for Bob to 
 come home to dinner in order to meet him on the 
 threshold, throw her arms about his neck, and 
 give him the glad facts. 
 
 But Bob sent a telephone message that he 
 would not be home to dinner, that he would not 
 be home that night. No one was to worry, and 
 he would turn up at breakfast in the morning. 
 
 It was all the information he gave because, 
 by special permission from the warden, and imder 
 a solemn promise not to convey anjrthing to the 
 prisoner that would enable him to cheat the 
 law, he was spending the night at Bitterwell. 
 
 He was spending it in a low one-storied build- 
 427 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 ing some sixty feet long and not more than 
 twenty in width. Its arrangements were simple. 
 On entering, you came into a corridor some six 
 feet wide, running the length of seven little 
 rooms. The seven little rooms were each fur- 
 nished with a cot, a fixed wash-basin, a table, 
 and a chair. Each had, however, this peculi- 
 arity — that the end toward the corridor had no 
 wall. Instead of a wall it had long, strong per- 
 pendicular white bars, some two or three inches 
 apart, and running from ceiling to floor. The 
 inmate was thus visible at all times, like an 
 animal in a cage. In the corridor were half a 
 dozen chairs of the kitchen variety, and at the 
 end a little yellow door. 
 
 The little yellow door led into a room of which 
 the chief piece of furniture was a chair vaguely 
 suggestive of an armchair, in a smoking room, 
 though with some singular attachments. Around 
 it in a semicircle were some eight or ten other 
 chairs similar to those in the corridor. In one 
 corner was a walled-ofF space that might have 
 housed a dynamo; in the other a stack of brooms 
 and mops. As a passageway gave access to this 
 room, and the yellow door was carefully kept 
 closed. Bob was not required to see within. 
 
 Of the seven little rooms four were empty, 
 and three had occupants. At one end was a 
 negro; at the other an Italian; Teddy was in the 
 center. Outside, there was a guard for the 
 Italian, another for the negro, while for Teddy 
 there were two. They were big, husky fellows, 
 428 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 three Irishmen and a Swede, genial, good-natured 
 souls to whom their duties had become a matter 
 of course. 
 
 There was something of the matter of course 
 in the whole situation, even to Teddy and 
 Bob. The human mind being ready to accept 
 anything to which it is led by steps sufficiently 
 graded, both young men were attuned to finding 
 themselves as they were. As they were meant ' 
 that Teddy clung to one of the bars from within, 
 and Bob to the same bar from without. They 
 talked through the open spaces, being able to do 
 it quietly because they were so close. 
 
 "You don't think I'm afraid, do you. Bob? 
 I should have been afraid if it hadn't been for 
 you. You've bucked me up something — ^well, 
 there are no words for it." 
 
 "Let it go without words, Teddy. Don't try 
 to say it." 
 
 "I like to say it," he grinned. "Or, rather, 
 I'd like to say it if I could. I like trying to say 
 it, even when I can't." 
 
 That was all for the time; but after some 
 minutes, Teddy's hand stole over Bob's big paw 
 as it held to the bar, so that they held to it 
 together. 
 
 It was Bob who broke the silence next. 
 
 "I didn't tell you, Teddy^-I've only just found 
 It out — that dad's been taking care of Mrs. Flynn 
 and her kiddies and means to go on doing it." 
 
 "That's good," the boy sighed. "It takes 
 about the last thing off my mind." 
 
 429 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 So they talked spasmodically, never saying 
 much, and yet saying all the things for which 
 language has no words. At intervals the Italian 
 showed his sympathy by groaning heavily, which 
 was generally a signal for the negro to begin 
 singing, in a cottony voice, the first verse of 
 "Safe in the Arms of Jesus." Teddy apologized 
 for them as a host for unseemly members of his 
 household. 
 
 "They're good guys, all right. That's just 
 their way of letting me know they feel for me. 
 It's funny how kind hearted some mutt will be 
 who's committed a cold-blooded murder." 
 
 He had probably been following this train of 
 thought for some minutes when he said, in ja 
 reasoning tone : 
 
 "What can the law do with fellows of our sort? 
 Look at the thing straight now. We've got good 
 in us, of course; but you can't trust us to hold 
 our horses. I don't blame them for what they're 
 giving me — hardly any. Only, I'll be darned if 
 it doesn't make me surer that all this is only an 
 experiment — a way of finding out how not to do 
 it — so that we can make the next go a better 
 one." 
 
 They discussed this topic in a desultory way, 
 not so much letting it drop as pursuing it each in 
 his own thought. Teddy picked up the line again 
 after an interval of time, and some distance 
 farther on. 
 
 " I suppose you can't believe that you come to 
 a place where you know you're through and are 
 430 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 in a hurry to get on. Well, you do. I guess old 
 people like ma reach there, anyhow; and young 
 people, too, when they're — ^when they're like me. 
 I've had my shot — and I've miffed it. Now I'm 
 all on edge to have another try. I'm so crazy 
 about that that the thing that's to happen first 
 doesn't seem anything — very much." 
 
 The hours wore on, but it seemed to Bob a 
 night to which there was no time. Though the 
 support he brought to Teddy was merely that of 
 companionship, he felt that the boy was out- 
 stripping him. In Teddy's own phrase, he was 
 "moving on," but moving on very fast. Bob 
 couldn't tell how he knew this; he only felt him- 
 self being left behind. Teddy was quite right; 
 his old experiment was over, and some of the 
 exaltation of the new one was already breaking 
 through. That was the meaning of his silences, 
 his abstractions. That was why he came out of 
 each such spell with a smile that grew more 
 luminous. 
 
 The Italian and the negro fell asleep. The 
 four guards talked less to one another. Clutching 
 the bar grew tiring. Brannigan, one of Teddy's 
 guards, brought up a chair, offering it to Bob. 
 
 "Why don't you sit down? It '11 be quite a 
 while yet." 
 
 Bob took the chair, Teddy the one inside the 
 cell. Bringing it as close to the bars as possible, 
 he thrust his fingers through the opening to 
 touch Bob's hand. Bob closed the fingers within 
 his palm, and so held them. 
 
 431 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "I'm not going to send any message to ma and 
 the girls. They know I love them. You can't 
 add anything to that." A sidelong smile stole 
 through the bars. "I love you too, Bob. I guess 
 it's a bum thing to say, but to-night— well, it's 
 different — and I'm going to say it, I can't do 
 anything to thank you; but it may mean some- 
 thing to you to have me loving you like the devil 
 all the way from — from over there." 
 
 " It means something to me now." 
 
 "Then that's all right," 
 
 The Italian breathed heavily. The negro 
 snored. The guards were bored and somnolent. 
 Teddy might have been asleep except for the look 
 and the smile that every now and then crept 
 through the bars toward his companion. 
 
 Suddenly he pulled his fingers from Bob's 
 clasp, jumped to his feet, and held out his arms. 
 
 "All right, ma! I'm ready!" 
 
 The cry was so loud and joyous that Bob 
 sprang up. Brannigan lumbered forward. 
 
 "Been dreamin'," he explained. "Just as well 
 if he has." 
 
 Teddy looked about him in bewilderment. 
 
 "No, I haven't been. I wasn't asleep. I 
 was wide awake. I guess you'll think I'm dippy. 
 Bob; but I did see ma. 'Pon my soul I did! 
 She was right there." He pointed to the spot. 
 " She looked lovely, too — ^young, like — and yet it* 
 was ma all right. She wanted me to come. 
 That's why I jumped. Oh, well! Perhaps I am 
 dippy. But it's funny, isn't it?" 
 432 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 He was so preoccupied with this happening as 
 not to notice sounds in the outer passage and 
 beyond the yellow door. Even when he did, it 
 was with no more than a partial cognizance. 
 
 "Listen!" he said once. "There they are. 
 It 'li be only a few minutes now. I'm not going 
 to let you go in there, Bob. Funny about ma, 
 isn't it?" 
 
 The sounds grew louder. The guards were 
 moving about. Behind the yellow door people 
 seemed to enter. There was the scraping of 
 chairs as they sat down. The Italian woke and 
 howled dismally. The negro shouted his hymn. 
 Teddy was far away on the wings of speculation; 
 but he came back to say: 
 
 "If ma had gone ahead of me, I know she'd 
 like nothing better than to come and give me a 
 lift over. But she hasn't gone ahead of me. 
 She's over there in Indiana Avenue. That's the 
 funny part of it. What do you suppose it means?" 
 
 Bob didn't know. Neither had he time to 
 offer an opinion, because the main door opened 
 and the warden appeared, accompanied by the 
 chaplain, the doctor, the principal keeper, and 
 three other men whom Teddy didn't know. 
 
 "Here they are!" Teddy whispered, as if their 
 coming was a relief. 
 
 The warden advanced to the central cell. 
 The door was unlocked. Teddy stood on the 
 threshold. 
 
 "Thank you, warden. I suppose I can say 
 gobd-by to my friend?" 
 
 433 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 Permission was given. Teddy stepped out 
 into the corridor. 
 
 "You'd better go now, Bob. No use in your 
 staying any longer." He nodded toward the 
 men standing round him. "They'll handle me 
 gently. I'm not afraid." 
 
 Their hands clasped; but the boy was only a 
 boy, loving and in need of love. Before Bob 
 knew what was happening, Teddy's arms were 
 about his neck, in a long, desperate embrace. 
 
 A gulp that was almost * sob from each — and 
 it was over. 
 
 "All right, boys, I'm ready. Go to it." 
 
 The words were spoken steadily. Bob limped 
 toward the door. A guard unlocked it. 
 
 "Say, Bob!" It was Teddy's voice agdn. 
 Bob turned. The lad had taken oflF his collar, 
 no more conscious of the act than if he was 
 going to bed. One of the strange men was 
 kneeling on one knee, making a significant slit 
 in a leg of Teddy's trousers. "Say, Bob! I 
 wonder — if it doesn't take you too far out of your 
 way — if you'd mind driving round by the house ? 
 You see, if anything has happened to ma, why, 
 the girls '11 be all up in the air, poor things!" 
 
 Bob nodded because he couldn't trust himself 
 to words — and so it was the end. 
 
 Out in the air it seemed to him as if he had 
 dreamed and waked up. The May night was so 
 exquisite, so hallowing, that the walls of Bitter- 
 well were mellow and enchanted against the dome 
 434 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 of stars. Even in these grim courts the scent of 
 growing things was sweet. 
 
 Driving in the deadest hours of night over the 
 long flat road, he was too tired to think. His 
 imagination didn't try to follow Teddy, because 
 it had become an instinct to spring to the need 
 to "carry on." Teddy was behind him. There 
 were other things in front; and his mind was 
 already with them. 
 
 And yet not actively. After he had slept he 
 would be able to take them up; but just now his 
 main desire was to get home to bed. Nothing 
 but that would dispel this overweight of emotion. 
 
 Along the familiar road he drove mechanically. 
 Even Teddy's last request, though it formed an 
 intention, was hardly in his mind. At Bond's 
 Corner, where the roads forked, to the right to 
 Pemberton Heights, to the left to the bridge that 
 would take him over toward Marillo, he was so 
 nearly asleep that he might have gone straight 
 on homeward had he not been startled by seeing 
 a man and a woman standing in the middle of 
 the road. 
 
 He jammed down the service and emergency 
 brakes, swinging to the right. The fact that they 
 stood facing him without getting out of his way 
 both amazed him and rendered him indignant. 
 Turning to look at so strange a pair of pedestri- 
 ans, he saw — ^Teddy and his mother. 
 
 They were not quite on the road, but a little 
 above it. Neither were they in the dark like 
 other things around, but shining with a light of 
 
 435 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 their own. Neither were they shadowy appari- 
 tions, but definite, vital, forcible. They were 
 dressed as he had generally seen them, and yet 
 they wore a kind of radiance. The mother's arm 
 was over her boy's shoulder, but Teddy was 
 waving his hand. Smiles were on both faces, 
 on the lips, in the eyes, and somehow in the 
 personality. 
 
 Bob was not frightened, but he was thrilled. 
 It seemed to him that they stayed long enough 
 to overcome all the doubts of his senses. Though 
 he pressed on the brakes, the car went a number 
 of yards before he could bring it to a standstill; 
 and yet they never left his side. They didn't 
 exactly move; they were only there^living, 
 lovely, sending out love as if it had been light, 
 wrapping him round and round. It was so vivid, 
 so much a fact, that when the car stopped and he 
 saw no one there, he was amazed once more to 
 find himself alone. 
 
 He couldn't drive on at once. He lingered — • 
 staring at the spot where they had stood, looking 
 over the wide, dim country, gazing up at the 
 stars in their yearning infinitude. He tried to 
 persuade himself that his own mind had pro- 
 jected something unreal in itself; but he couldn't 
 throw off the extraordinary happiness the vision 
 left behind it. 
 
 Before reaching Indiana Avenue he had de- 
 cided on a course. If there were no lights in 
 the house, he would drive on homeward. If 
 there were he would stop. At this hour in the 
 
 436 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 very early morning, unless something unusual 
 had happened, there would of course be none. 
 
 But there were lights. At sound of his ap- 
 proach, Pansy gave a little silvery yelp. Jennie 
 oipened the door before he had time to ring. 
 
 "Come in, Bob. I saw your car from the 
 window." 
 
 In the living-room Gussie and Gladys, wearing 
 their dressing-gowns, cried out their relief at 
 seeing him. It was the situation Teddy had fore- 
 seen, in which they were all "up in the air." As 
 usual, Gladys was the spokesman. 
 
 "Oh, Bob, we're so glad to have you. We 
 didn't know what to do. Momma — " 
 
 A sob stopped her, but Jennie was more calm. 
 
 "Momma's gone. Bob. Gussie went into her 
 room about half past ten to take her the glass 
 of milk we always put by her bed, and she was 
 asleep." 
 
 They gathered round him as if he formed their 
 rallying point. He took Jennie and Gussie each 
 by the hand. Gladys held his coat by the lapel.' 
 
 "You're not sorry, any of you, are you? She 
 wanted to go; and she's gone in the sweetest of 
 all ways." 
 
 "She won't have to hear about Teddy," Gussie 
 Wept. "That's a comfort, anyhow." 
 
 Gladys laid her head against Bob's breast. 
 
 "No; but Teddy '11 have to hear about her." 
 
 Bob saw the opportunity. "No, Gladys; 
 Teddy will not have to hear about her." He 
 let this sink in. "Teddy — knows." 
 
 437 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 It was some seconds before Jennie and Gussie 
 released his hands and Gladys let go his lapel. 
 When they did they moved away silently. 
 Gussie dropped on her knees at the arm of a big 
 chair, bowing her head, and crying quietly. 
 Jennie, a slim figure with hands behind her back, 
 walked down the length of the room, staring at 
 the curtained window toward Indiana Avenue. 
 Gladys stood off, looking at Bob, nodding her 
 head sagely, as she said: 
 
 "I thought that's what it meant when he 
 didn't want us to come. He liked it better with- 
 out saying good-by. So we all do." She gave a 
 big, sudden sob, controlling herself as suddenly. 
 " We're going to carry on, Bob. We're not going 
 to show the white feather" — there was another 
 big sob, with another successful effort to keep 
 it back — "we're not going to show the white 
 feather — any of us — ^just to please you." 
 
 "Thank you, Gladys. It will please me. 
 But there's something that pleases me more. 
 I'd like to tell all three of you about it." 
 
 Jennie turned round from the window, coming 
 back down the room. She was pale, but she 
 didn't cry. Gussie dried her eyes and was strug- 
 gling to her' feet when Bob laid his hand on her 
 shoulder. 
 
 "No, Gussie; stay where you are. I'll sit 
 down here." He dropped into the chair. "You 
 come on this side, Jennie. Gladys — " 
 
 But Gladys had already crouched at hjs feet, 
 while Jennie, balancing Gussie, sank beside the 
 
 438 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 other arm of the chair. Pansy sprang up to her 
 place on his knee. 
 
 He told them about Teddy and his mother — 
 about Teddy's vision and his own. 
 
 "I don't say I know what to make of it. I'm 
 not at all sure that we're obliged to explain that 
 sort of thing unless we're scientists or psy- 
 chologists. It seems to me that when beauty 
 and comfort flash on us at a time of great need, 
 we're at liberty to take them for what they 
 seem to be, even if we don't understand them." 
 
 As his hand lay on the arm of the chair, Jennie 
 kissed it again and again. It was the first spon- 
 taneous affection she had ever shown him, and, 
 though it moved him with a stirring strange and 
 fundamental, he felt that with the awesome 
 things so fresh in their minds, the time had not 
 yet come to respond to it. It was one more 
 impulse to gather force by being restrained a 
 little longer. 
 
 " It isn't as if this thing stood alone. A great 
 many people have had experiences like it. They 
 may be no more than fancy, just as some people 
 say; but I do know this: that by what he saw 
 Teddy was helped to do what he had to do, and 
 that for me — " 
 
 "Yes, Bob," Gladys pleaded. "What was it 
 for you ? " 
 
 "Something real — and assuring — and beautiful 
 
 — and comfortiftg — and glorious." He uttered 
 
 the words slowly, as if selecting his terms. "More 
 
 than that," he went on, "it was something that's 
 
 29 439 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 given me a happiness I can't describe but which 
 I should Uke to share with you — which perhaps 
 I shall be able to share with you — as we get to 
 know one another better — and time goes on." 
 
 The little snub-nosed face, something hke 
 Pansy's, was lifted to him adoringly. 
 
 "Are we going to be your very own, Bob?" 
 
 "Yes, Gladys, my very own." 
 
CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 HOW can we be your very own when — ^you 
 don't know anything about m^?" 
 
 Gussie and Gladys had gone up to get some 
 sleep. Jennie was crouched, not against the 
 arm of the chair, as before, but against Bob's 
 knee. Still pressing back the instincts of his 
 passion, he did no more than let his hand rest 
 lightly on her hair. 
 
 "I know this much about you, Jennie — that 
 after all we've gone through we're welded to- 
 gether. Nothing can separate us now — no past — ■ 
 nor anything you could tell me." 
 
 "Is that why you don't want to know?" 
 
 "I don't want to know nozv. That's all I'm 
 saying. Things are settled for us. They're 
 settled and sealed. It's what we get out of so 
 much that's terrible, that we don't have to de- 
 bate that point any more. We may have to 
 adapt ourselves to conditions we don't know 
 anything about as yet — but it will be a matter 
 of adapting, not of cutting loose. What should 
 I be if I were to cut loose from you and the girls 
 now, Jennie ? What should you be if you were 
 to cut loose from me?" 
 
 She pressed her cheek against his knee. 
 
 "We'd die," she said, simply. 
 441 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "So there you are! I know what you mean. 
 I'd die, too. That is, we mightn't die out- 
 wardly; but something would be so killed in us 
 that we'd never be really alive again. So why 
 try to pull apart what life has soldered into one?" 
 
 "But you don't know!" 
 
 "Yes, I do. I know more than you think. 
 I know that the things that trouble you are 
 dreams and that our life together is reality. 
 You'll tell me the dreams as we go on — a little 
 at a time — and I'll show you that you've waked 
 from them. I know there are things to explain; 
 but I know, too, that there's an explanation. But 
 I don't want the explanation yet. I'm — I'm too 
 tired, Jennie. I want to rest. And I can't rest 
 unless we all rest together — you with me — and 
 the girls with us — in a kind of quiet acceptance 
 of the things that have happened — and in the — 
 I hardly know how to express it — but in the 
 tranquillity of love. I wonder if you understand 
 me?" 
 
 She murmured : 
 
 "I don't know that I understand you, Bob — 
 quite — but I do — I do love you, It's — it's differ- 
 ent from love — it's — it's more. It's like — like 
 melting into you — " 
 
 "That's love, Jennie. It isn't anything difFer- 
 / ent. It's just — love." 
 
 "But you're so big — " 
 
 "And you're so little — so wee. Don't you see? 
 — ^that's it! That's the compensating thing in 
 nature. It's because we're different that we need 
 442 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 each other and complete each other. I can't 
 explain it as you'd explain a sum in arithmetic. 
 I only know. You complete me, Jennie. As 
 I've said so often, you're the other half of me—" 
 
 "And you're all of me — and more." 
 
 "Then since we know that, why not do as I 
 said-— just rest awhile? We've come up to our 
 next ledge, as I was trying to explain to you a 
 few months ago; I know we can camp here a bit; 
 and if we've had some scratches in the cjimb we 
 can talk of them by and by. We've learned the 
 one big thing we needed to know — ^that we 
 belong together, that we can't be torn apart. 
 Just for now, why can't that be enough for us?" 
 
 "It will be enough if you will let me tell you 
 that — ^that what I've said about Hubert wasn't — 
 wasn't as bad as perhaps you think. I don't say 
 it mightn't have been; it was as bad as that in — 
 in intention; but the magic cloak of your love 
 which you used to write about seemed to hang 
 round me — that's the only way I can put it — " 
 
 "That '11 do, Jennie. Don't try to say any 
 more now. It's only what — in some way — I can't 
 tell you how — I know already." 
 
 He knew she was crying, but he let her cry. 
 He would have cried himself, only that, since 
 the vision at Bond's Corner, he felt this extraor- 
 dinary happiness. While his reason would have 
 striven to accept the psychologist's explanation 
 his inner self was convinced of Teddy's dehght 
 in beginning his next experiment. He himself 
 was tired, but at peace — tired, but no longer 
 
 443 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 with a need of sleep — only with the need of being 
 quiet with a sense of fulfillment. 
 
 There were tears in her voice as she whispered, 
 brokenly : 
 
 "Is it wrong. Bob, to feel so — so comforted — 
 when momma is lying upstairs — and darling 
 Teddy is—" 
 
 "We can't choose the way by which comfort 
 comes to us, Jennie darling. Things happen 
 which we don't want to have happen, and yet 
 they can work together for good if we only give 
 them half a chance — " 
 
 He was interrupted by the loud, sweet thrilling 
 of a thrush. Jennie raised her head in surprise, 
 looking at the pallid shimmer through the 
 curtained window. 
 
 "It's day!" 
 
 They were both on their feet. 
 
 "Yes, Jennie; it's day — again. Let's go out." 
 
 They went as they were, bareheaded like 
 children, into the purity of morning. Pansy, 
 disturbed by the many strange auras in the house, 
 scampered ahead of them, relieved by the 
 escape. The street was still asleep, empty, clean, 
 with every lawn patch and garden bed drenched 
 with dew. Only the birds and the flowers were 
 waking to the light. 
 
 Turning toward the cliffs and the river, their 
 talk became more practical. Bob suggested to 
 Jennie what his father had suggested to him. 
 Mr. Huntley was going to Europe in connection 
 with some new European loan. The proposal 
 
 444 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 was that Bob should go with him. The trip 
 might last six months. 
 
 "And if I go," he added, "we both go. We 
 should have a few weeks to settle things finally 
 here—" 
 
 "Oh, but, Bob — how could I go and — and 
 leave the two girls? They need me more than 
 ever now. I'm not only their sister, but their 
 mother." 
 
 "Why shouldn't they come with us? I'd love 
 having them. Six months over there would 
 make a break with what they've been through 
 here; and when we come back, Edith has things 
 she's going to suggest — " 
 
 "That would be heavenly. Bob; but — ^but the 
 money?" 
 
 "The money's all right. In my new job at the 
 bank I've a bigger salary — five thousand; and 
 now that dad's giving Edith ten thousand a year 
 as allowance, he's giving me the same. That's a 
 pretty good income to begin with, besides which, 
 dad— you'll have to know dad, Jennie — he 
 doesn't want me to spare any money while we're 
 — ^we're passing through this — ^this crisis." 
 
 "And your mother's lovely. I know that." 
 
 "Yes; mother's splendid, too. So's Edith. 
 You'll find that they all want— want to make up 
 to you — and to the girls — for — ■" 
 
 But he didn't say for what because they came 
 to where they saw above the cloud-wrapt city the 
 glory of chrysoprase, turquoise, and topaz which 
 precedes the sunrise and takes the breath away. 
 
 44S 
 
THE EMPTY SACK 
 
 "Oh, look!" 
 
 "Oh, look!" 
 
 Instinctively they clasped hands as they stood 
 on the edge of the flowery precipice, watching 
 the chrysoprase yellow into saffron, and the tur- 
 quoise melt into sapphire, while the topaz became 
 light. 
 
 Then silently, above the wraithlike towers and 
 cubes and battlements, slipped the rim of gold. 
 
 "There it is. Bob!" 
 
 He drew her to him, holding her close. 
 
 "Yes; there it is again, Jennie — always coming 
 back to us ! The last time we were here we had 
 only the moonrise; and now it is the sun— the 
 sun!" 
 
 Her head lay against his shoulder; and as the 
 rim became an orb the cloud-built vision of Man- 
 hattan was touched with flecks of fire. Within 
 its heart lay Broadway, Fifth Avenue, Wall 
 Street, and the Bowery, shops, churches, brothels, 
 and banks, all passions, hungers, yearnings, and 
 ambitions, all national impulses worthy and de- 
 testable, all human instincts holy and unclean, 
 all loveliness, all lust, all charity, all cupidity, 
 all secret and suppressed desire, all shameless 
 exposure on the housetops, all sorrow, all sin, all 
 that the soul of man conceives of as evil and good 
 — and yet, with no more than these few miles of 
 perspective, and this easy play of light, trans- 
 lated into beauty, uplifting, unearthly, and 
 ineffable. 
 
 THE END 
 

 -S^ieSKBWWH