The Heart Line 22

The Heart Line 22

"Not on your folding bed! This is a close corporation, old man. I’ve

got that claim staked out, see? So long!" and walk away pleased.

 

At the theater, he always made a point of going out between the acts, in

order that his reëntry might point more conspicuously at his conquest.

Afterward, at Zinkand’s, having engaged a table beside which all the

world must pass, he would pose, apparently oblivious to the crowd,

talking to her with absorbed interest.

 

Fancy suffered the exhibition without displeasure. She had no objection

to being looked at. To make a picture of herself, to play the arch and

coquettish before a room of well-dressed folk was one of the things she

did best.

 

She was recognized occasionally and pointed out by one or another of

Granthope’s patrons. "There she is; over behind you, in the white lace

hat, with a chatelaine watch—don’t look just yet, though," was the

almost audible formula which Gay P. Summer learned to wait for. At such

times his chest swelled with pride. To walk into a restaurant with her

late at night and leave a wake of excited whispers behind him, was all

he knew of fame.

 

It did not escape Gay’s notice, however, that Fancy’s eyes were not

always for him. In the middle of his longest and most elaborate story,

she would often throw a surreptitious glance about the room, letting it

rest for an instant—a butterfly’s caress—upon some admiring stalwart

stranger. Once or twice he detected the flicker of Fancy’s smile, a

smile not meant for him. He found that, although his attention was all

for Fancy, Fancy’s errant glances allowed nothing and nobody to escape

her observation. If he mentioned any one whom he had seen in the room,

Fancy had seen him, or more often her, first. Fancy always knew what

she wore, what it cost, what she was doing, how much she liked him and

what her little game was.

 

This sort of thing would have been an education for Gay, had he been

amenable to such teaching; but what women see and know without a tutor

he would and could never know. Wherefore, such dialogues as this were

common:

 

Fancy: "The brute! He’s actually made her cry, now. She’s a little

fool, though; it’s good enough for her!"

 

From Gay: "Where?—who do you mean?"

 

"Over there in the corner—don’t stare so, _please_!—See those two

fellows and two girls? The girl in the white waist is tied up in a

heart-to-heart talk with that bald-headed chap, but she’s dead in love

with the other fellow, see? Yes, that fellow with the mustache. My! but

she’s jealous of the other girl."

 

"How can you tell? Oh, that’s all a pipe-dream, Fancy!"

 

"Why, any fool would know it—any woman would, I mean. She had a few

words with him—the fellow she’s stuck on, just now! He must have said

something pretty raw. Look at her eyes! You can tell from here there

are tears in them. Look! See? I thought so. She’s going to try and

make him jealous! What do you think of that?"

 

"Why, she’s changed places with him; what’s that for?" To Gay, the

drama was as mysterious as a Chinese play.

 

"Just to get him crazy, of course! That other fellow thinks she’s

really after him, too. The other girl sees through the whole game, of

course. My, but men are easy! Those two fellows are certainly being

worked good and plenty. Just look at the way she’s freezing up to that

bald-headed chap now. Well, I never! If that other girl isn’t trying

to get you on the string. Smile at her, Gay, and see what she’ll do."

 

"Never mind about her!" said Gay, secretly pleased at the tribute. "You

girls can always see a whole lot more than what really happens. She’s

just changed places on account of the draught, probably. She is lamping

me, though, isn’t she? Say, she’s a peach, all right!"

 

"Yes, she’s sure pretty. Say, Gay—"

 

"What?" His eye returned fondly to her.

 

"Do you think I’m as pretty as she is?"

 

"Oh, you make me tired, Fancy. Gee! You’ve got her sewed up in a sack

for looks!"

 

So Fancy played her game cleverly, keeping Gay, but keeping him off at

arm’s length. But as time went on, his ardor grew and she was often at

her wits’ end to handle him. Though free from any conventional

restraints, she did not yet consider her lips Mr. Summer’s property,

though she permitted him a cool and lifeless hand upon occasion. In

time, the excitable youth began to understand her reserve; but instead

of dampening his enthusiasm, it aroused his zest for the chase. She was

not so easy game as he had thought. He waxed sentimental, therefore, and

plied her with equivocal monologues, hinting, in the attempt to make

sure of his way. At this, her sense of humor broke forth, effervescing

in lively ridicule. This brought Mr. Summer, at last, to the point of

an out-and-out proposal. Fancy, experienced in such situations, warned

in time by his preludes, did not take it too seriously.

 

"I am sorry to say you draw a blank, Gay," she informed him lightly.

"I’m not in the market yet. Many a man has expected me to become

domesticated at sight, and settle down in content over the cookstove.

But I haven’t even a past yet—nothing but a rather tame present and hope

for a future. I don’t seem to see you in it, Gay. In fact, there’s

nobody visible to the naked eye at present."

 

"Well," he said, "I’ll cut it out for now, as long as I can’t make good,

but sometime you’ll come to me and beg me to marry you, see if you

don’t. Whenever you get ready, I’ll be right there with the goods."

 

Fancy laughed and the episode was closed.

 

 

"Say, Fancy, there’s a gang of artist chaps and literary guys I’d like

to put you up against," Gay said one afternoon. "I think you’d make a

hit with the bunch, if you can stand a little jollying."

 

"You watch me!" Fancy became enthusiastically interested. "Where do

they hang out?"

 

"They eat at a joint down on Montgomery Street. They’re heavy joshers,

though. They’re too clever for me, mostly. It’s the real-thing Bohemia

down there, though."

 

"Why didn’t you tell me about it before?" she pouted. "I’m game! Let’s

float in there to-night and see the animals feed."

 

So they went down to the Latin Quarter together.

 

Bohemia has been variously described. Since Henri Murger’s time, the

definition has changed retrogressively, until now, what is commonly

called Bohemia is a place where one is told, "This is Liberty Hall!"—and

one is forced to drink beer whether one likes it or not, where not to

like spaghetti is a crime. Not such was the little coterie of artists,

writers and amateurs, who dined together every night at Fulda’s

restaurant.

 

In San Francisco is recruited a perennial crop of such petty soldiers of

fortune. Here art receives scant recompense, and as soon as one gets

one’s head above water and begins to be recognized, existence is

unendurable in a place where genius has no field for action. The

artist, the writer or the musician must fly East to the great

market-place, New York, or to the great forcing-bed, Paris, to bloom or

fade, to live or die in competition with others in his field.

 

So the little artistic colonies shrink with defections or increase with

the accession of hitherto unknown aspirants. Many go and never return.

A few come back to breathe again the stimulating air of California, to

see with new eyes its fresh, vivid color, its poetry, its romance. To

have gone East and to have returned without abject failure is here, in

the eyes of the vulgar, Art’s patent of nobility. Of those who have

been content to linger peaceably in the land of the lotus, some are

earls without coronets, but one and all share a fierce, hot, passionate

love of the soil. San Francisco has become a fetish, a cult. Under its

blue skies and driving fogs is bred the most ardent loyalty in these

United States. San Francisco is most magnificently herself of any

American city, and San Franciscans, in consequence, are themselves with

an abounding perfervid sincerity. Faults they have, lurid, pungent,

staccato, but hypocrisy is not of them. That vice is never necessary.

 

The party that gathered nightly at Fulda’s was as remote from the world

as if it had been ensconced on a desert island. It was unconscious,

unaffected, sufficient to itself. Men and girls had come and gone since

it had formed, but the nucleal circle was always complete. Death and

desertions were unacknowledged—else the gloom would have shut down and

the wine, the red wine of the country, would have tasted salt with

tears. There had been tragedies and comedies played out in that group,

there were names spoken in whispers sometimes, there were silent toasts

drunk; but if sentiment was there, it was disguised as folly. Life

still thrilled in song. Youth was not yet dead. Art was long and

exigent.

 

It was their custom, after dinner, to adjourn to Champoreau’s for _café

noir_, served in the French style. In this large, bare saloon, with

sanded floor, with its bar and billiard table, foreign as France, almost

always deserted at this hour save by their company, the genial _patron_

smiled at their gaiety, as he prepared the long glasses of coffee.

To-night, there were six at the round table.

 

Maxim, an artist unhailed as yet from the East, was, of all, the most

obviously picturesque, with a fierce mustached face and a shock of black

hair springing in a wild mass from his head to draggle in stringy locks

below his eyes, or, with a sudden leonine shake, to be thrown back when

he bellowed forth in song. He had been in Paris and knew the airs and

argot of the most desperate studies. His laughter was like the roar of

a convivial lion.

 

Dougal, with a dog-like face and tow hair, so ugly as to be refreshing,

full of common sense and kindness, with a huge mouth full of little

cramped teeth and a smile that drew and compelled and captured like a

charm—he sat next. Good nature and loyalty dwelt in his narrow blue

eyes. His slow, labored speech was seldom smothered, even in the wit

that enveloped it.

 

Most masculine and imperative of all, was Benton, with his blur of

blue-black hair, fine tangled threads, his melting, deep blue eyes,

shadowy with fatigue, lighted with vagrant dreams or shot with brisk

fires of passion. His hands were strong and he had an air of suppressed power.