Neither the love of drink nor the love of play ran in her own or Richard's veins--not for generations. back. "One test of a gentleman, my son," Richard always said, "lies in the way in which he controls his appetites--in the way he regards his meat and drink.
Both are foods for the mind as well as for the body, and must be used as such. Gluttons and drunkards should he classed together." No, her boy's heart might lead him astray, but not his appetites, and never his passions. She was as sure of that as she was of his love.
As she talked on, Oliver's mind, yielding to her stronger will as clay does to a sculptor's hand, began to take shape. What at first had looked like a hardship now began to have an attractive side. Perhaps the art career need not be wholly given up. Perhaps, too, there was a better field for him in New York than here--old Mr. Crocker had always told him this. Then, too, there was something of fascination after all, in going out alone like a knight-errant to conquer the world. And in that great Northern city, too, with its rush and whirl and all that it held for him of mystery! How many times had Mr. Crocker talked to him by the hour of its delights. And Ellicott's chair! Yes, he could get rid of that. And Sue? Sue would wait--she had promised him she would; no, there was no doubt about Sue! She would love him all the better if he fought his battle alone. Only the day before she had told him of the wonderful feats of the White Knight, that the new English poet had just written about and that everybody in Kennedy Square was now reading.
Above all there was the delight of another sensation --the sensation of a new move. This really pleased him best. He was apparently listening to his mother when these thoughts took possession of him, for his eyes were still fixed on hers, but he heard only a word now and then. It was his imagination that swayed him now, not his will nor his judgment.
He would have his own adventures in the great city and see the world as Mr. Crocker had done, he said to himself.
"Yes, dearie, I'll go," he answered quickly.
"Don't talk any more about it. I'll do just as you want me to, and I'll go anywhere you say. But about the money for my expenses? Can father give it to me?" he asked suddenly, a shade of anxiety crossing his face.
"We won't ask your father, Ollie," she said, drawing him closer to her. She knew he would yield to her wishes, and she loved him the better for it, if that were possible. "I have a little money saved which I will give you. You won't be long finding a good place."
"And how often can I come back to you?" he cried, starting up. Until now this phase of the situation had not entered his mind.
"Not often, my boy--certainly not until you can afford it. It is costly travelling. Maybe once or twice a year."
"Oh, then there's no use talking, I can't go. I can't--can't, be away from you that long. That's going to be the hardest part." He had started from his seat and, stood over her, a look of determination on his face.
"Oh, yes, you can, my son, and you will," she replied, as she too rose and stood beside him, stopping the outburst of his weakness with her calm voice, and quieting and soothing him with the soft touch of her hand, caressing his cheek with her fingers as she had so often done when he, a baby, had lain upon her breast.
Then with a smile on her face, she had kissed him good-night, closed the door, and staggering along the corridor steadying herself as she walked, her hand on the walls, had thrown herself upon her bed in an agony of tears, crying out:
"Oh, my boy--my boy! How can I give you up?
And I know it is forever!"
And now here he is foot-sore and heart-sore, sitting in Union Square, New York, the roar of the great city in his ears, and here he must sit until the cattle-barge which takes him every night to the house of Amos Cobb's friend is ready to start on her voyage up the river.
He sat with his head in his hands, his elbows on his knees, not stirring until a jar on the other end of the bench roused him. A negro hod-carrier, splashed with plaster, and wearing a ragged shirt and a crownless straw hat, had taken a seat beside him.
The familiarity of the act startled Oliver. No negro wayfarer would have dared so much in his own Square at home.
The man reached forward and drew closer to his own end of the bench a bundle of sawed ends and bits of wood which he had carried across the park on his shoulder.
Oliver watched him for a moment, with a feeling amounting almost to indignation. "Were the poverty and the struggle of a great city to force such familiarities upon him," he wondered. Then something in the negro's face, as he wiped the perspiration from his forehead with the back of his hand, produced a sudden change of feeling. "Was this man, too, without work?" Oliver asked himself, as he felt the negro's weariness, and realized for the first time, the common heritage of all men.
"Are you tired, Uncle?" he asked.
"Yes, a little mite. I been a-totin' dis kindlin' from way up yander in Twenty-third Street where the circus useter be. Dey's buildin' a big hotel dere now--de Fifth Avenue dey calls it. I'm a-carryin' mortar for de brick-layers an' somehow dese sticks is monst'ous heavy after workin' all day."
"Where do you live?" asked Oliver, his eyes on the kindling-wood.
"Not far from here, sah; little way dis side de Bow'ry. Whar's yo'r home?" And the old man rose to his feet and picked up his bundle.
The question staggered Oliver. He had no home, really none that he could call his own--not now.
"Oh, a long way from here," he answered, thoughtfully, without raising his head, his voice choking.
The old negro gazed at him for a moment, touched his hat respectfully, and walked toward the gate.
At the entrance he wheeled about, balanced the bundle of wood on his shoulder and looked back at Oliver, who had resumed his old position, his eyes on the ground. Then he walked away, muttering:
"'Pears like he's one o' my own people calling me uncle. Spec' he ain't been long from his mammy."
