The Seventh Noon | Page 4

to do it now."
"In brief," suggested Barstow, "you desire money."
"Enough so that I might forget there was such a thing."
"Well, you 'll have to sell something of yourself to get it."
"Just so. I won't and there you are. You see I don't fit."
Donaldson paused a moment and then went on.
"You know something of my story, you alone of all this grinding city. You saw me in college and in the law school, where on a coolie diet I did a man's work. But even you don't know how close to hard pan I was during those seven years,--down to crackers and water for weeks at a time."
"You don't mean to say you went hungry?"
"Hungry?" laughed Donaldson. "Man dear, there were days when I was starving! I 've been to classes when I was so weak I could n't push my pencil. I was hungry, and cold, and lonesome, but at that time I had my good warm, well-fed dreams, so I did n't mind so much. And always I thought it would be better next year, but it was n't. None of the things that come to some men fell to me; it continued the same old pitiless grind until I began to expect it. Then I said to myself that it would be different when I got through. But it was n't. I finished, and you are the only pleasant recollection I have of all that past. You used to let me sit by your fire and now and then you brought out cake they had sent you from home."
"Good Lord," groaned Barstow, "why did n't you let a fellow know?"
"Why should I let you know? It was my fight. But I 've watched by the hour your every move about the room, so hungry that my pulse increased or decreased as you neared or retreated from the closet where you kept that cake. I 'll admit that this condition was a good deal my fault,--I had a cursed false pride that forbade my doing for grub what some of the fellows did. Then, too, I was an optimist; it was coming out all right in the end. But it did n't and it has n't."
Donaldson paused.
"Am I boring you, old man?"
"No! No! Go on. But if I had suspected--"
"You could not then have been the friend you were to me,--I 'd have cut you dead. And understand, I 'm not recalling this now for the purpose of exciting sympathy. I don't deserve sympathy; I went my own gait and cheerfully paid the cost, content with my dreams of the future. I would n't sell one whit of myself. I wouldn't sacrifice one extravagant belief. I would n't compromise. And I 'm glad I did n't.
"When I finished my course you lost sight of me, but it was the same old thing over again. I refused to accept a position in a law office, because I would n't be fettered. I had certain definite notions of how a law practice ought to be conducted,--of certain things a decent man ought not to do. This in turn barred me from a job offered by a street railway company and another by a promoting syndicate. I took a room and waited. It has been a long wait, Barstow, a bitter long wait. Four barren years have gone. I have been hungry again; I have gone on wearing second-hand clothes; I have slept in second-class surroundings; my life has resembled life about as much as the naked trees in the Fall resemble those in June. I have existed after a fashion and learned that if I skimp and drudge and save for twenty years I can then begin to do the things I wish to do. But not before,--not before without compromise. And I 've had enough of the will o' the wisp Future, enough of the shadowy to-morrows. I 've saved a few hundreds and had a few hundreds left me recently by the last relative I had on earth. I 'd like to take this and squander it--live a space."
"Why don't you?"
"It's the curse of coming back, and the mere fact that your heart continues to tick forces that upon you. There is only one way--one way to dodge the mortgage I would place upon my Future by spending these savings."
"And that?"
"Not to let the heart tick on; to bar the future."
Donaldson moved a bit uneasily. As he did so the pup lost his balance and fell to the floor. The little fellow struck upon his side but instantly regained his feet, blinking sleepily at the light. Barstow took out his watch and squatting nearer him studied him with interest.
Suddenly the dog's legs crumpled beneath him. He tried to stand, to make his way to his master, but instantly toppled