The Web of Life | Page 8

to new ideals.
Ideals, Sommers judged, that were not agreeable to old Colonel
Hitchcock, slightly menacing even in the eyes of the daughter, whose
horizon was wider. Sommers had noticed the little signs of this heated
family atmosphere. A mist of undiscussed views hung about the house,
out of which flashed now and then a sharp speech, a bitter sigh. He had
been at the house a good deal in a thoroughly informal manner. The
Hitchcocks rarely entertained in the "new" way, for Mrs. Hitchcock had
a terror of formality. A dinner, as she understood it, meant a gathering
of a few old friends, much hearty food served in unpretentious
abundance, and a very little bad wine. The type of these entertainments

had improved lately under Miss Hitchcock's influence, but it remained
essentially the same,--an occasion for copious feeding and gossipy,
neighborly chat.
To-night, as Sommers approached the sprawling green stone house on
Michigan Avenue, there were signs of unusual animation about the
entrance. As he reached the steps a hansom deposited the bulky figure
of Brome Porter, Mrs. Hitchcock's brother-in-law. The older man
scowled interrogatively at the young doctor, as if to say: 'You here?
What the devil of a crowd has Alec raked together?' But the two men
exchanged essential courtesies and entered the house together.
Porter, Sommers had heard, had once been Alexander Hitchcock's
partner in the lumber business, but had withdrawn from the firm years
before. Brome Porter was now a banker, as much as he was any one
thing. It was easy to see that the pedestrian business of selling lumber
would not satisfy Brome Porter. Popularly "rated at five millions," his
fortune had not come out of lumber. Alexander Hitchcock, with all his
thrift, had not put by over a million. Banking, too, would seem to be a
tame enterprise for Brome Porter. Mines, railroads, land
speculations--he had put his hand into them all masterfully. Large of
limb and awkward, with a pallid, rather stolid face, he looked as if
Chicago had laid a heavy hand upon his liver, as if the Carlsbad
pilgrimage were a yearly necessity. 'Heavy eating and drinking, strong
excitements--too many of them,' commented the professional glance of
the doctor. 'Brute force, padded superficially by civilization,' Sommers
added to himself, disliking Porter's cold eye shots at him. 'Young man,'
his little buried eyes seemed to say, 'young man, if you know what's
good for you; if you are the right sort; if you do the proper thing, we'll
push you. Everything in this world depends on being in the right
carriage.' Sommers was tempted whenever he met him to ask him for a
good tip: he seemed always to have just come from New York; and
when this barbarian went to Rome, it was for a purpose, which
expressed itself sooner or later over the stock-ticker. But the tip had not
come yet.
As Sommers was reaching the end of his conversational rope with

Porter, other guests arrived. Among them was Dr. Lindsay, a famous
specialist in throat diseases. The older doctor nodded genially to
Sommers with the air of saying: 'I am so glad to find you here. This is
the right place for a promising young man.'
And Sommers in a flash suspected why he had been bidden: the
good-natured Miss Hitchcock wished to bring him a little closer to this
influential member of his profession.
"Shall we wait for them?" Dr. Lindsay asked, joining Sommers. "Porter
has got hold of Carson, and they'll keep up their stories until some one
hauls them out. My wife and daughter have already gone down. How is
St. Isidore's?"
"I left to-day. My term is up. I feel homesick already," the young
doctor answered with a smile. "Chicago is so big," he added. "I didn't
know it before."
"It's quite a village, quite a village," Dr. Lindsay answered thoughtfully.
"We'll have some more talk later, won't we?" he added confidentially,
as they passed downstairs.
The Hitchcock house revealed itself in the floods of electric light as
large and undeniably ugly. Built before artistic ambitions and
cosmopolitan architects had undertaken to soften American angularities,
it was merely a commodious building, ample enough for a dozen
Hitchcocks to loll about in. Decoratively, it might be described as a
museum of survivals from the various stages of family history. At each
advance in prosperity, in social ideals, some of the former possessions
had been swept out of the lower rooms to the upper stories, in turn to be
ousted by their more modern neighbors. Thus one might begin with the
rear rooms of the third story to study the successive deposits. There the
billiard chairs once did service in the old home on the West Side. In the
hall beside the Westminster clock stood a "sofa,"