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Henrik Ibsen - "When We Dead Awaken"

The Veiled Lady

F >> F. Hopkinson Smith >> The Veiled Lady







II



The next morning the group of painters--all except
Joplin, who was doing a head in "smears" behind
the Groote Kerk a mile away--were at work in the
old shipyard across the Maas at Papendrecht. Marny
was painting a Dutch lugger with a brown-madder
hull and an emerald-green stern, up on the ways for
repairs. Pudfut had the children of the Captain
posed against a broken windlass rotting in the tall
grass near the dock, and Malone and Schonholz, pipe
in mouth, were on their backs smoking. "It wasn't
their kind of a mornin'," Malone had said.

Joplin's discourse the night before was evidently
lingering in their minds, for Pudfut broke out with:
"Got to sit on Joppy some way or we'll be talked to
death," and he squeezed a tube of color on his palette.
"Getting to be a bloody nuisance."

"Only one way to fix him," remarked Stebbins,
picking up his mahlstick from the grass beside him.

"How?" came a chorus.

"Scare him to death."

The painters laid down their brushes. Stebbins
rarely expressed an opinion; any utterance from him,
therefore, carried weight.

"Go for him about his health, I tell you," continued
Stebbins, dragging a brush from the sheaf
in his hand.

"But there's nothing the matter with him," answered
Marny. "He's as skinny as a coal-mine
mule, but he's got plenty of kick in him yet."

"You're dead right, Marny," answered Stebbins,
"but he doesn't think so. He's as big a fool over
every little pain as he is over his theories."

"Niver cracked his jaw to me about it," sputtered
Malone from between the puffs of his pipe.

"No, and he won't. I don't jump on him as
you fellows do and so I get his confidence. He's
in my room two or three times every night going
over his symptoms. When his foot's asleep he thinks
he's got creeping paralysis. Every time his breath
comes short, his heart's giving out."

"That's hereditary!" said Marny; "he said so."

"Hereditary be hanged! Same with everything
else. Last night he dug me out of bed and wanted
me to count his pulse--thought it intermitted. He's
hipped, I tell you, on his health!"

"That's because he lives on nothing," rejoined
Marny. "Tine puts the toast in the oven over night
so it will be dry enough for him in the morning--
she told me so yesterday. Now he's running on sour
milk and vinegar--'blood too alkaline,' he says--got
a chalky taste in his mouth!"

"Well, whatever it is, he's a rum-nuisance," said
Pudfut, "and he ought to be jumped on."

"Yes," retorted Stebbins, "but not about his food.
Jump on him about his health, then he'll kick back
and in pure obstinacy begin to think he's well--that's
his nature."

"Don't you do anything of the kind," protested
Marny. "Joppy's all right--best lad I know. Let
him talk; doesn't hurt anybody and keeps everything
alive. A little hot air now and then helps his
epigastric."

Malone and Schonholz had raised themselves on
their elbows, twisted their shoulders and had put
their heads together--literally--without lifting their
lazy bodies from the warm, dry grass--so close that
one slouch hat instead of two might have covered
their conspiring brains. From under the rims of
these thatches came smothered laughs and such unintelligible
mutterings as:

"Dot's de vay, by chimminy, 'Loney! And den
I--"

"No, begorra! Let me have a crack at him fu'st!"

"No, I vill before go and you come--"

"Not a word to Marny, remimber; he'd give it
away--"

"Yes, but we vill tell Poodfut und Sthebbins, eh?"

That afternoon the diabolical plot was put in
motion. The men had finished for the day; had
crossed the ferry and had found Joplin wandering
around the dock looking for a new subject. The
Groote Kerk "smear" was under his arm.

Pudfut, under pretence of inspecting the smear--
a portrait of the old Sacristan on a bench in front of
the main entrance--started back in surprise on seeing
the Bostonian, and asked with an anxious tone in
his voice:

"Aren't you well, old man? Look awfully yellow
about the gills. Worked too hard, haven't you? No
use overdoing it."

"Well? Of course I'm well! Sound as a nut.
Little bilious, maybe, but that's nothing. Why?"

"Oh, nothing! Must say, though, you gave me a
twist when I came on you suddenly. Maybe it's your
epigastric nerve; maybe it's your liver and will pass
off, but I'd knock off work for a day or two if I were
you."

Malone now took a hand.

"Let me carry yer kit, Joppy, ye look done up.
What's happened to ye, man, since mornin'?"

"Never felt better in my life," protested Joplin.
"No, I'll carry it--not heavy--"

Then he quickened his pace--they were all on their
way back to the inn--and overtook Stebbins and
Schonholz.

"Stebbins, old man--"

"Yes, Joppy."

"What I told you last night is turning out just
as I expected. Heart's been acting queer all morning
and my epigastric nerve is very sensitive. Puddy
says I look awful. Do you see it?"

Stebbins looked into the Bostonian's face, hesitated,
and said with an apologetic tone in his voice:

"Well, everybody looks better one time than another.
You've been working too hard, maybe."

"But do I look yellow?"

"Well, to tell you the truth, Joppy, you do--yellow
as a gourd--not always, just now and then when
you walk fast or run upstairs."

"I've been afraid of that. Was my pulse all right
when you counted it last night?"

"Yes, certainly--skipped a beat now and then,
but that's nothing. I had an uncle once who had a
pulse that wobbled like that. He, of course, went off
suddenly; some said it was apoplexy; some said it
was his heart--these doctors never agree. I wouldn't
worry about it, old man. Hold on, Pudfut, don't
walk so fast."

Pudfut held on, and so did Schonholz and Malone,
and then the four slipped behind a pile of oil barrels
and concentrated their slouch hats and Schonholz
slapped his thigh and said with a smothered laugh
that it was "sphlendeed!" and Malone and Pudfut
agreed, and then the three locked arms and went
singing up the street, their eyes on Joplin's pipe-
stem legs as he trotted beside Marny on his way to
the inn.

When the party reached the coffee-room Marny
called Tine to his side, spread out the fingers and
thumb of one hand, and that rosy-cheeked lass without
the loss of a second, clattered over to the little
shelf, gathered up five empty mugs and disappeared
down the cellar steps. This done the coterie drew
their chairs to one of Tine's hand-scrubbed tables
and sat down, all but Joplin, who kept on his way to
his room. There the Bostonian remained, gazing out
of the window until Johann had banged twice on his
door in announcement of dinner. Then he joined the
others.

When all were seated Schonholz made a statement
which was followed with results more astounding to
the peace of the coterie than anything which had
occurred since the men came together.

"I haf bad news, boys," he began, "offle bad news.
Mine fader has wrote dat home I must. Nod anuder
mark he say vill he gif me. Eef I could sell somedings
--but dat ees very seldom. No, Marny, you
don't can lend me noddings. What vill yourselluf
do? Starve!"

"Where do you live, Schonholz?" asked Joplin.

"By Fizzenbad."

"What kind of a place is it--baths?"

"Yes."

"What are they good for?" continued Joplin in
a subdued tone.

"Noddings, but blenty peoples go."

"I can tell you, Joppy," said Pudfut gravely,
with a wink at Malone. "There are two spas, both
highly celebrated. Lord Ellenboro spent a month
there and came back looking like another man. One
is for the liver and the other for something or other,
I can't recollect what."

"Heart?" asked Joplin.

"I don't know."

He didn't,--had never heard the place mentioned
until Schonholz had called its name a moment before.

Joplin played with his knife and made an attempt
to nibble a slice of Tine's toast, but he made no reply.
All the fight of every kind seemed to have been
knocked out of him.

"Better take Fizzenbad in, Joppy," remarked
Pudfut in an undertone. "May do you a lot of
good."

"How far is it, Schonholz?" asked Joplin, ignoring
the Englishman's suggestion.

"Oh, you leafe in de morgen and you come by
Fizzenbad in a day more as do one you go oud mid."

"No--can't afford it."

Here Joplin pushed back his chair, and with the
remark that he thought he would go downtown for
some colors, left the room.

"It's working like a dose of salts," cried Pudfut
when the Bostonian was out of hearing. "Hasn't
said 'epigastric nerve,' 'gram' or 'proteids' once.
Got real human in an hour. Stebbins, you're a
wonder."

The next morning everybody was up bright and
early to see Schonholz off. One of Fop Smit's packets
was to leave for Rotterdam at seven and Schonholz
was a passenger. He could go by rail, but the boat
was cheaper. No deceptions had been practised and
no illusions indulged in as to the cause of his departure.
He had had his supplies cut off, was flat broke
and as helpless as a plant without water. They had
all, at one time or another, passed through a similar
crisis and knew exactly what it meant. A purse, of
course, could have been made up--Marny even insisted
on sharing his last hundred francs with him--
and Mynheer would have allowed the board-bill to
run on indefinitely with or without an addition to
his collection, but the lad was not built along those
lines.

"No--I go home and help mine fader once a leetle,
den maybe I come back, don't it?" was the way he
put it.

The next morning, when the procession formed to
escort him through the Old Gate, every man answered
to his name except Joplin--he had either overslept
himself or was taking an extra soak in his portable
tub.

"Run, Tine, and call Mr. Joplin," cried Marny--
"we'll go ahead. Tell him to come to the dock."

Away clattered the sabots up the steep stairs, and
away they scurried down the bare corridor to Joplin's
room. There Tine knocked. Hearing no response
she pushed open the door and looked in. The
room was empty! Then she noticed that the bed had
not been slept in, nor had anything on the washstand
been used. Stepping in softly for some explanation
of the unusual occurrence--no such thing had ever
happened in her experience, not unless she had been
notified in advance--her eye rested on a letter addressed
to Stebbins propped up in full view against a
book on Joplin's table. Catching it up as offering
the only explanation of his unaccountable disappearance,
she raced downstairs and, crossing the cobbles
on a run, laid the letter in Stebbins's hand.

"For me, Tine?"

The girl nodded, her eyes on the painter's.

The painter broke the seal and his face grew
serious. Then he beckoned to Marny and read the
contents aloud, the others crowding close:

Dear Stebbins:

Keep my things until I send for them. I take the night train
for Rotterdam. Tell Schonholz I'll join him there and go on
with him to Fizzenbad. Sorry to leave this way, but I could
not bear to bid you all good-by. Joplin.




III



That night the table was one prolonged uproar.
The conspirators had owned up frankly to their share
of the villany, and were hard at work concocting
plans for its undoing. Marny was the one man in
the group that would not be pacified; nothing that
either Pudfut, Stebbins or Malone had said or could
say changed his mind--and the discussion, which had
lasted all day, brought him no peace.

"Drove him out!--that's what you did, you bull-
headed Englishman--you and Malone and Stebbins
ought to be ashamed of yourselves. If I had known
what you fellows were up to I'd have pitched you all
over the dike. Cost Joppy a lot of money and break
up all his summer work! What did you want to guy
him like that for and send him off to be scalded and
squirted on in a damned Dutch--"

"But we didn't think he'd take it as hard as
that."

"You didn't, didn't you! What DID you think
he'd do? Didn't you see how sensitive and nervous
he was? The matter with you fellows is that Joppy
is a thoroughbred and you never saw one of his kind
in your life. Ever since he got here you've done
nothing but jump all over him and try to rile him,
and he never squawked once--came up smiling every
time. He's a thoroughbred--that's what he is!"

The days that followed were burdened with a sadness
the coterie could not shake off. Whatever they
had laughed at and derided in Joplin they now longed
for. The Bostonian may have been a nuisance in one
way, but he had kept the ball of conversation rolling
--had started it many times--and none of the others
could fill his place. Certain of his views became respected.
"As dear old Joppy used to say," was a
common expression, and "By Jove, he was right!"
not an uncommon opinion. In conformity with his
teachings, Marny reduced his girth measure an inch
and his weight two pounds--not much for Marny,
but extraordinary all the same when his appetite was
considered.

Pudfut, in contrition of his offence, wrote his English
friend Lord Something-or-other, who owned the
yacht, and who was at Carlsbad, begging him to run
up and see the "best ever" and "one of us"--and
Malone never lost an opportunity to say how quick he
was in repartee, or how he missed him. Stebbins
kept his mouth shut.

He had started the crusade, he knew, and was
personally responsible for the result. He had tried
to arouse Joplin's obstinacy and had only aroused his
fears. All he could do in reparation was to keep in
touch with the exile and pave the way for his homecoming.
If Joppy was ill, which he doubted, some
of the German experts in whom the Bostonian believed
would find the cause and the remedy. If he
was "sound as a nut," to quote Joplin's own words,
certainty of that fact, after an exhaustive examination
by men he trusted, would relieve his nervous
mind and make him all the happier.

The first letter came from Schonholz. Liberally
translated, with the assistance of Mynheer, who spoke
a little German, it conveyed the information that the
Bostonian, after being put on a strict diet, had been
douched, pounded and rubbed; was then on his second
week of treatment; had one more to serve; was
at the moment feeling like a fighting-cock, and after
a fifth week at Stuckbad, in the mountains, where
he was to take the after-cure, would be as strong as
a three-year-old, and as frisky.

The second letter was from Joplin himself and
was addressed to Stebbins. This last was authentic,
and greatly relieved the situation. It read:

Nothing like a thoroughly trained expert, my dear Stebbins.
These German savants fill me with wonder. The moment Dr.
Stuffen fixed his eyes upon me he read my case like an open
book. No nitrogenous food of any kind, was his first verdict; hot
douches and complete rest packed in wet compresses, the next.
I am losing flesh, of course, but it is only the "deadwood" of the
body, so to speak. This Dr. Stuffen expects to replace with new
shoots--predicts I will weigh forty pounds more--a charming and,
to me, a most sane theory. You will be delighted also to hear
that my epigastric nerve hasn't troubled me since I arrived.
Love to the boys, whom I expect to see before the month is out.
Joppy.


"Forty pounds heavier!" cried Marny from his
end of the table. "He'll look like a toy balloon in
knee pants. Bully for Joppy! I wouldn't let any
Schweizerkase with a hot douche get within a hundred
yards of me, but then I'm not a bunch of nerves
like Joppy. Anyhow, boys, we'll give the lad a welcome
that will raise the roof. Joppy thin was pretty
good fun, but Joppy fat will be a roaring farce."

And so it was decided, and at once all sorts and
kinds of welcomes were discussed, modified, rearranged
and discussed again. Pudfut suggested meeting
him in Rotterdam and having a night of it.
Malone thought of chartering a steam launch, hiring
a band and bringing him past the towns with flags
flying. Stebbins and Marny favored some demonstration
nearer home, where everybody could join in.

The programme finally agreed upon included a
pathway of boughs strewn with wild flowers from the
steamboat landing, across the planking, over the cobbles,
under the old Gate of William of Orange, and
so on to the door of the inn; the appointment of Tine,
dressed in a Zeeland costume belonging to her grand-
mother, as special envoy, to meet him with a wreath
of laurel, and Johann in short clothes--also heirlooms
--was to walk by his side as First Groom of the
Bed Chamber.

The real Reception Committee, consisting of
Mynheer in a burgomaster suit borrowed from a
friend, and the four painters--Marny as a Dutch
Falstaff, Pudfut as a Spanish Cavalier, Stebbins got
up as a Night Watch, and Malone in the costume
of a Man-at-Arms--all costumes loaned for the occasion
by the antiquary in the next street--were to
await Joplin's coming in the privacy of the Gate--
almost a tunnel--and so close to the door of the inn
that it might have passed for a part of the establishment
itself.

Meantime the four painters were to collect
material for the decoration of the coffee-room--
wreaths of greens over the mantel and festoons of ivy
hanging down the back of Joplin's chair being prominent
features; while Mynheer, Tine and Johann were
to concentrate their energies in preparing a dinner
the like of which had never been eaten since the
sluiceways in the dikes drowned out the Spanish
duke. Not a word of all this, of course, had reached
the ears of the Bostonian. Half, three-quarters, if
not all, the enjoyment of the occasion would be
realized when they looked on Joplin's face and read
his surprise.




IV



The eventful day at last arrived. Stebbins, as prearranged,
had begged the exile to telegraph the exact
hour of his departure and mode of travel from Rotterdam,
suggesting the boat as being by far the best,
and Joplin had answered in return that Fop Smit's
packet, due at sundown the following day, would
count him among its passengers.

The deep tones of the whistle off Papendrecht sent
every man to his post, the villagers standing back in
amazement at the extraordinary spectacle, especially
at Tine and Johann in their queer clothes, who, being
instantly recognized, were plied with questions.

The boat slowed down; made fast; out came the
gangplank; ashore went the little two-wheel carts
drawn by the sleepy, tired dogs; then the baskets of
onions were rolled off, and the few barrels of freight,
and then two or three passengers--among them a
small, feeble man, in a long coat reaching to his
heels--made their way to the dock.

NO JOPPY!!

"That's the last man to come ashore here," said
Marny. "What's become of the lad?"

"Maybe he's gone aft," cried Stebbins; "maybe--"

Here Tine gave a little scream, dropped her wreath
and running toward the small, feeble man, threw
her arms around his neck. Marny and the others
bounded over the cobbles, tossing the bystanders out
of the way as they forged ahead. When they reached
Joplin he was still clinging to Tine, his sunken
cheeks and hollow deep-set eyes telling only too
plainly how great an effort he was making to keep on
his legs. The four painters formed a close bodyguard
and escorted their long-lost brother to the inn.

Mynheer, in his burgomaster suit, met the party
at the door, conducted them inside and silently drew
out the chairs at the coffee-room table. He was too
overcome to speak.

Joplin dropped into the one hung with ivy and
rested his hands on the table.

"Lord! how good it is to get here!" he said,
gazing about him, a tremble in his voice. "You don't
know what I've gone through, boys."

"Why, we thought you were getting fat, Joppy,"
burst out Marny at last. Up to this time his voice,
like that of the others, seemed to have left him, so
great was his surprise and anxiety.

Joplin waved his forefinger toward Marny in a
deprecatory way, as if the memory of his experience
was too serious for discussion, played with his fork
a moment, and said slowly:

"Will you lay it up against me, fellows, if I tell
you the truth? I'm not as strong as I was and a
good deal of the old fight is out of me."

"Lay up nothin'!" cried Malone. "And when it
comes to fightin' ye kin count on me every--"

"Dry up!" broke in Marny. "You're way off,
Malone. No, Joppy, not a man here will open his
head: say the rest."

"Well, then, listen," continued the Bostonian. "I
did everything they told me: got up at daylight;
walked around the spring seven times; sipped the
water; ate what they prescribed; lay in wet sheets
two hours every day; was kneaded by a man with a
chest as hairy as a satyr's and arms like a blacksmith's;
stood up and was squirted at; had everything
about me looked into--even stuck needles in my arm
for a sample of my blood; and at the end of three
weeks was so thin that my trousers had to be lapped
over in the back under a leather strap to keep them
above my hips, and my coat hung down as if it were
ashamed of me. Doctor Stuffen then handed me a
certificate and his bill. This done he stood me up
and repeated this formula--has it printed--all
languages:

"'You have now thrown from your system every
particle of foul tissues, Mr.--, ah, yes--Mr. Joblin,
I believe.' And he looked at the paper. 'You
thought you were reasonably fat, Mr. Joblin. You
were not fat, you were merely bloated. Go now to
Stuckbad for two weeks. There you will take the
after-cure; keep strictly to the diet, a list of which
I now hand you. At the expiration of that time you
will be a strong man. Thank you--my secretary will
send you a receipt.'

"Well, I went to Stuckbad--crawled really--put
up at the hotel and sent for the resident doctor, Professor
Ozzenbach, Member of the Board of Pharmacy
of Berlin, Specialist on Nutrition, Fellow of the
Royal Society of Bacteriologists, President of the
Vienna Association of Physiological Research--that
kind of man. He looked me all over and shook his
head. He spoke broken English--badly.

"'Who has dreated you, may I ask, Meester
Boblin?'

"'Doctor Stuffen, at Fizzenbad.'

"'Ah, yes, a fery goot man, but a leedle de times
behindt. Vat did you eat?'

"I handed him the list.

"'No vonder dot you are thin, my frent--yoost
as I oxpected--dis ees de olt deory of broteids. Dot
is all oxbloded now. Eef you haf stay anuder mont
you vould be dead. Everyting dot he has dold you
vas yoost de udder way; no bread, no meelk, no vegebubbles
--noddings of dis, not von leedle bit. I vill
make von leest--come to-morrow.'"

"Did you go, Joppy?" inquired Stebbins.

"DID _I_ GO? Yes, back to the depot and on to
Cologne. That night I ate two plates of sauerkraut,
a slice of pork and a piece of cheese the size of my
hand; slept like a top."

"So the proteids and carbohydrates didn't do your
epigastric any good, old chap," remarked Pudfut in
an effort to relieve the gloom.

"Proteids, carbohydrates and my epigastric be
damned," exploded Joplin. "On your feet, boys, all
of you. Here's to the food of our fathers, with every
man a full plate. And here's to dear old Marny, the
human kangaroo. May his appetite never fail and
his paunch never shrink!"




MISS BUFFUM'S NEW BOARDER



I



He was seated near the top end of Miss Buffum's
table when I first saw his good-natured face with its
twinkling eyes, high cheekbones and broad, white
forehead in strong contrast to the wizened, almost
sour, visage of our landlady. Up to the time of his
coming every one had avoided that end, or had gradually
shifted his seat, gravitating slowly toward the
bottom, where the bank clerk, the college professor
and I hobnobbed over our soup and boiled mutton.

It was his laugh that attracted my attention--the
first that had come from the upper end of the table
in the memory of the oldest boarder. Men talk of
the first kiss, the first baby, the first bluebird in the
spring, but to me, who have suffered and know, the
first, sincere, hearty laugh, untrammelled and unlimited,
that rings down the hide-bound table of a
dismal boarding-house, carries with it a surprise and
charm that outclasses them all. The effect on this
occasion was like the opening of a window letting in
a gust of pure air. Some of the more sensitive
shivered at its freshness, and one woman raised her
eyeglasses in astonishment, but all the rest craned
their heads in the new boarder's direction, their
faces expressing their enjoyment. As for Miss Buffum
and the schoolmistress, they so far forgot themselves
as to join audibly in the merriment.

What the secret of the man's power, or why the
schoolteacher--who sat on Miss Buffum's right--
should have become suddenly hilarious, or how Miss
Buffum herself could be prodded or beguiled into
smiles, no one at my end of the table could understand;
and yet, as the days went by, it became more
and more evident that not only were these two cold,
brittle exteriors being slowly thawed out, but that
every one else within the sound of his seductive voice
was yielding to his influence. Stories that had lain
quiet in our minds for months for lack of a willing
or appreciative ear, or had been told behind our
hands,--small pipings most of them of club and
social gossip, now became public property, some
being bowled along the table straight at the new
boarder, who sent his own rolling back in exchange,
his big, sonorous voice filling the room as he replied
with accounts of his life in Poland among the peasants;
of his experiences in the desert; of a shipwreck
off the coast of Ceylon in which he was given up for
lost; of a trip he made across the Russian steppes in
a sleigh--each adventure ending in some strangely
humorous situation which put the table in a roar.

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