_ Bibbs's room, that neat apartment for transients to which the
"lamidal" George had shown him upon his return, still bore the
appearance of temporary quarters, possibly because Bibbs had no
clear conception of himself as a permanent incumbent. However,
he had set upon the mantelpiece the two photographs that he owned:
one, a "group" twenty years old--his father and mother, with Jim
and Roscoe as boys--and the other a "cabinet" of Edith at sixteen.
And upon a table were the books he had taken from his trunk: Sartor
Resartus, Virginibus Puerisque, Huckleberry Finn, and Afterwhiles.
There were some other books in the trunk--a large one, which remained
unremoved at the foot of the bed, adding to the general impression
of transiency. It contained nearly all the possessions as well as
the secret life of Bibbs Sheridan, and Bibbs sat beside it, the day
after his interview with his father, raking over a small collection
of manuscripts in the top tray. Some of these he glanced through
dubiously, finding little comfort in them; but one made him smile.
Then he shook his head ruefully indeed, and ruefully began to read it.
It was written on paper stamped "Hood Sanitarium," and bore the title,
"Leisure."
A man may keep a quiet heart at seventy miles an hour, but not if
he is running the train. Nor is the habit of contemplation a useful
quality in the stoker of a foundry furnace; it will not be found to
recommend him to the approbation of his superiors. For a profession
adapted solely to the pursuit of happiness in thinking, I would
choose that of an invalid: his money is time and he may spend it on
Olympus. It will not suffice to be an amateur invalid. To my way
of thinking, the perfect practitioner must be to all outward
purposes already dead if he is to begin the perfect enjoyment of
life. His serenity must not be disturbed by rumors of recovery; he
must lie serene in his long chair in the sunshine. The world must
be on the other side of the wall, and the wall must be so thick and
so high that he cannot hear the roaring of the furnace fires and the
screaming of the whistles. Peace--
Having read so far as the word "peace," Bibbs suffered an interruption
interesting as a coincidence of contrast. High voices sounded in the
hall just outside his door; and it became evident that a woman's
quarrel was in progress, the parties to it having begun it in Edith's
room, and continuing it vehemently as they came out into the hall.
"Yes, you BETTER go home!" Bibbs heard his sister vociferating,
shrilly. "You better go home and keep your mind a little more on
your HUSBAND!"
"Edie, Edie!" he heard his mother remonstrating, as peacemaker.
"You see here!" This was Sibyl, and her voice was both acrid and
tremulous. "Don't you talk to me that way! I came here to tell
Mother Sheridan what I'd heard, and to let her tell Father Sheridan
if she thought she ought to, and I did it for your own good."
"Yes, you did!" And Edith's gibing laughter tooted loudly. "Yes,
you did! YOU didn't have any other reason! OH no! YOU don't want
to break it up between Bobby Lamhorn and me because--"
"Edie, Edie! Now, now!"
"Oh, hush up, mamma! I'd like to know, then, if she says her new
friends tell her he's got such a reputation that he oughtn't to come
here, what about his not going to HER house. How--"
"I've explained that to Mother Sheridan." Sibyl's voice indicated
that she was descending the stairs. "Married people are not the same.
Some things that should be shielded from a young girl--"
This seemed to have no very soothing effect upon Edith. "'Shielded
from a young girl'!" she shrilled. "You seem pretty willing to be
the shield! You look out Roscoe doesn't notice what kind of a shield
you are!"
Sibyl's answer was inaudible, but Mrs. Sheridan's flurried attempts
at pacification were renewed. "Now, Edie, Edie, she means it for
your good, and you'd oughtn't to--"
"Oh, hush up, mamma, and let me alone! If you dare tell papa--"
"Now, now! I'm not going to tell him to-day, and maybe--"
"You've got to promise NEVER to tell him!" the girl cried,
passionately.
"Well, we'll see. You just come back in your own room, and we'll--"
"No! I WON'T 'talk it over'! Stop pulling me! Let me ALONE!" And
Edith, flinging herself violently upon Bibbs's door, jerked it open,
swung round it into the room, slammed the door behind her, and threw
herself, face down, upon the bed in such a riot of emotion that she
had no perception of Bibbs's presence in the room. Gasping and
sobbing in a passion of tears, she beat the coverlet and pillows
with her clenched fists. "Sneak!" she babbled aloud. "Sneak!
Snake-in-the-grass! Cat!"
Bibbs saw that she did not know he was there, and he went softly
toward the door, hoping to get away before she became aware of him;
but some sound of his movement reached her, and she sat up, startled,
facing him.
"Bibbs! I thought I saw you go out awhile ago."
"Yes. I came back, though. I'm sorry--"
"Did you hear me quarreling with Sibyl?"
"Only what you said in the hall. You lie down again, Edith. I'm
going out."
"No; don't go." She applied a handkerchief to her eyes, emitted a
sob, and repeated her request. "Don't go. I don't mind you; you're
quiet, anyhow. Mamma's so fussy, and never gets anywhere. I don't
mind you at all, but I wish you'd sit down."
"All right." And he returned to his chair beside the trunk. "Go
ahead and cry all you want, Edith," he said. "No harm in that!"
"Sibyl told mamma--OH!" she began, choking. "Mary Vertrees had mamma
and Sibyl and I to tea, one afternoon two weeks or so ago, and she had
some women there that Sibyl's been crazy to get in with, and she just
laid herself out to make a hit with 'em, and she's been running after
'em ever since, and now she comes over here and says THEY say Bobby
Lamhorn is so bad that, even though they like his family, none of the
nice people in town would let him in their houses. In the first
place, it's a falsehood, and I don't believe a word of it; and in the
second place I know the reason she did it, and, what's more, she KNOWS
I know it! I won't SAY what it is--not yet--because papa and all of
you would think I'm as crazy as she is snaky; and Roscoe's such a fool
he'd probably quit speaking to me. But it's true! Just you watch
her; that's all I ask. Just you watch that woman. You'll see!"
As it happened, Bibbs was literally watching "that woman." Glancing
from the window, he saw Sibyl pause upon the pavement in front of the
old house next door. She stood a moment, in deep thought, then walked
quickly up the path to the door, undoubtedly with the intention of
calling. But he did not mention this to his sister, who, after
delivering herself of a rather vague jeremiad upon the subject of her
sister-in-law's treacheries, departed to her own chamber, leaving him
to his speculations. The chief of these concerned the social
elasticities of women. Sibyl had just been a participant in a violent
scene; she had suffered hot insult of a kind that could not fail to
set her quivering with resentment; and yet she elected to betake
herself to the presence of people whom she knew no more than
"formally." Bibbs marveled. Surely, he reflected, some traces of
emotion must linger upon Sibyl's face or in her manner; she could not
have ironed it all quite out in the three or four minutes it took her
to reach the Vertreeses' door.
And in this he was not mistaken, for Mary Vertrees was at that moment
wondering what internal excitement Mrs. Roscoe Sheridan was striving
to master. But Sibyl had no idea that she was allowing herself to
exhibit anything except the gaiety which she conceived proper to the
manner of a casual caller. She was wholly intent upon fulfilling the
sudden purpose that brought her, and she was no more self-conscious
than she was finely intelligent. For Sibyl Sheridan belonged to a
type Scriptural in its antiquity. She was merely the idle and half-
educated intriguer who may and does delude men, of course, and the
best and dullest of her own sex as well, finding invariably strong
supporters among these latter. It is a type that has wrought some
damage in the world and would have wrought greater, save for the
check put upon its power by intelligent women and by its own "lack
of perspective," for it is a type that never sees itself. Sibyl
followed her impulses with no reflection or question--it was like
a hound on the gallop after a master on horseback. She had not even
the instinct to stop and consider her effect. If she wished to make
a certain impression she believed that she made it. She believed
that she was believed.
"My mother asked me to say that she was sorry she couldn't come
down," Mary said, when they were seated.
Sibyl ran the scale of a cooing simulance of laughter, which she had
been brought up to consider the polite thing to do after a remark
addressed to her by any person with whom she was not on familiar
terms. It was intended partly as a courtesy and partly as the
foundation for an impression of sweetness.
"Just thought I'd fly in a minute," she said, continuing the cooing to
relieve the last doubt of her gentiality. "I thought I'd just behave
like REAL country neighbors. We are almost out in the country, so far
from down-town, aren't we? And it seemed such a LOVELY day! I wanted
to tell you how much I enjoyed meeting those nice people at tea that
afternoon. You see, coming here a bride and never having lived here
before, I've had to depend on my husband's friends almost entirely,
and I really've known scarcely anybody. Mr. Sheridan has been so
engrossed in business ever since he was a mere boy, why, of course--"
She paused, with the air of having completed an explanation.
"Of course," said Mary, sympathetically accepting it.
"Yes. I've been seeing quite a lot of the Kittersbys since that
afternoon," Sibyl went on. "They're really delightful people.
Indeed they are! Yes--" _