The ''Genius'', Theodore Dreiser [classic reads txt] 📗

you can leave me, but you will not get me out of this car. I am done with listening to nonsense and pretences. You have lied to me once. You will not get a chance to do it again."

"I don't care, Suzanne," replied her mother, as the train sped swiftly along. "You have forced me to do this. It is your own attitude that is causing all the trouble. If you would be reasonable and take some time to think this all over, you would not be where you are now. I won't let you do this thing that you want to do. You can stay in the car if you wish, but you cannot be taken back to New York without money. I will speak to the station agent about that."

Suzanne thought of this. She had no money, no clothes, other than those she had on. She was in a strange country and not so very used to travelling alone. She had really gone to very few places in times past by herself. It took the edge off her determination to resist, but she was not conquered by any means.

"How are you going to get back?" asked her mother, after a time, when Suzanne paid no attention to her. "You have no money. Surely, Suzanne, you are not going to make a scene? I only want you to come up here for a few weeks so that you will have time to think away from that man. I don't want you to go to him on September the fifteenth. I just won't let you do that. Why won't you be reasonable? You can have a pleasant time up here. You like to ride. You are welcome to do that. I will ride with you. You can invite some of your friends up here, if you choose. I will send for your clothes. Only stay here a while and think over what you are going to do."

Suzanne refused to talk. She was thinking what she could do. Eugene was back in New York. He would expect her Thursday.

"Yes, Suzanne," put in Kinroy. "Why not take ma's advice? She's trying to do the best thing by you. This is a terrible thing you are trying to do. Why not listen to common sense and stay up here three or four months?"

"Don't talk like a parrot, Kinroy! I'm hearing all this from mama."

When her mother reproached her, she said: "Oh, hush, mama, I don't care to hear anything more. I won't do anything of the sort. You lied to me. You said you were going to Albany. You brought me out here under a pretence. Now you can take me back. I won't go to any lodge. I won't go anywhere, except to New York. You might just as well not argue with me."

The train rolled on. Breakfast was served. The private car was switched to the tracks of the Canadian Pacific at Montreal. Her mother's pleas continued. Suzanne refused to eat. She sat and looked out of the window, meditating over this strange dénouement. Where was Eugene? What was he doing? What would he think when she did not come back? She was not enraged at her mother. She was merely contemptuous of her. This trick irritated and disgusted her. She was not thinking of Eugene in any wild way, but merely that she would get back to him. She conceived of him much as she did of herself though her conception of her real self was still vague as strong, patient, resourceful, able to live without her a little while if he had to. She was eager to see him, but really more eager that he should see her if he wanted to. What a creature he must take her mother to be!

By noon they had reached Juinata, by two o'clock they were fifty miles west of Quebec. At first, Suzanne thought she would not eat at all to spite her mother. Later she reasoned that that was silly and ate. She made it exceedingly unpleasant for them by her manner, and they realized that by bringing her away from New York they had merely transferred their troubles. Her spirit was not broken as yet. It filled the car with a disturbing vibration.

"Suzanne," questioned her mother at one point, "won't you talk to me? Won't you see I'm trying to do this for your own good? I want to give you time to think. I really don't want to coerce you, but you must see."

Suzanne merely stared out of the window at the green fields speeding by.

"Suzanne! Don't you see this will never do? Can't you see how terrible it all is?"

"Mama, I want you to let me alone. You have done what you thought was the right thing to do. Now let me alone. You lied to me, mama. I don't want to talk to you. I want you to take me back to New York. You have nothing else to do. Don't try to explain. You haven't any explanation."

Mrs. Dale's spirit fairly raged, but it was impotent in the presence of this her daughter. She could do nothing.

Still more hours, and at one small town Suzanne decided to get off, but both Mrs. Dale and Kinroy offered actual physical opposition. They felt intensely silly and ashamed, though, for they could not break the spirit of the girl. She ignored their minds—their mental attitude in the most contemptuous way. Mrs. Dale cried. Then her face hardened. Then she pleaded. Her daughter merely looked loftily away.

At Three Rivers Suzanne stayed in the car and refused to move. Mrs. Dale pleaded, threatened to call aid, stated that she would charge her with insanity. It was all without avail. The car was uncoupled after the conductor had asked Mrs. Dale if she did not intend to leave it. She was beside herself, frantic with rage, shame, baffled opposition.

"I think you are terrible!" she exclaimed to Suzanne. "You are a little demon. We will live in this car, then. We will see."

She knew that this could not be, for the car was only leased for the outward trip and had to be returned the next day.

The car was pushed on to a siding.

"I beg of you, Suzanne. Please don't make a mockery of us. This is terrible. What will people think?"

"I don't care what they think," said Suzanne.

"But you can't stay here."

"Oh, yes, I can!"

"Come, get off, please do. We won't stay up here indefinitely. I'll take you back. Promise me to stay a month and I'll give you my solemn word I'll take you back at the end of that time. I'm getting sick of this. I can't stand it. Do what you like after that. Only stay a month now."

"No, mama," replied Suzanne. "No, you won't. You lied to me. You're lying to me now, just as you did before."

"I swear to you I'm not. I lied that once, but I was frantic. Oh, Suzanne, please, please. Be reasonable. Have some consideration. I will take you back, but wait for some clothes to arrive. We can't go this way."

She sent Kinroy for the station master, to whom was explained the need of a carriage to take them to Mont Cecile and also for a doctor—this was Mrs. Dale's latest thought—to whom she proposed to accuse Suzanne of insanity. Help to remove her was to be called. She told this to Suzanne, who simply glared at her.

"Get the doctor, mama," she said. "We will see if I have to go that way. But you will rue every step of this. You will be thoroughly sorry for every silly step you have taken."

When the carriage arrived, Suzanne refused to get out. The country driver, a French habitant, reported its presence at the car. Kinroy tried to soothe his sister by saying that he would help straighten matters out if she would only go peacefully.

"I'll tell you, Susie, if it isn't all arranged to suit you within a month, and you still want to go back, I'll send you the money. I have to go back tomorrow, or next day for ma, but I'll give you my word. In fact, I'll persuade mother to bring you back in two weeks. You know I never lied to you before. I never will again. Please come. Let's go over there. We can be comfortable, anyhow."

Mrs. Dale had leased the lodge from the Cathcarts by phone. It was all furnished—ready to live in—even wood fires prepared for lighting in the fireplaces. It had hot and cold water controlled by a hot-water furnace system; acetylene gas, a supply of staples in the kitchen. The service to take care of it was to be called together by the caretaker, who could be reached by phone from the depot. Mrs. Dale had already communicated with him by the time the carriage arrived. The roads were so poor that the use of an automobile was impossible. The station agent, seeing a fat fee in sight, was most obliging.

Suzanne listened to Kinroy, but she did not believe him. She did not believe anyone now, save Eugene, and he was nowhere near to advise her. Still, since she was without money and they were threatening to call a doctor, she thought it might be best perhaps to go peacefully. Her mother was most distracted. Her face was white and thin and nervous, and Kinroy was apparently strained to the breaking point.

"Do you promise me faithfully," she asked her mother, who had begun her pleadings anew, corroborating Kinroy in a way, "that you will take me back to New York in two weeks if I promise to stay that long?" This was still within the date in which she had promised to go to Witla, and as long as she got back by that time, she really did not care, provided she could write to her lover. It was a silly arbitrary thing for her mother to have done, but it could be endured. Her mother, seeing no reasonable way to obtain peace, promised. If she could only keep her there two weeks quietly, perhaps that would help. Suzanne could think here under different conditions. New York was so exciting. Out at this lodge all would be still. There was more argument, and, finally, Suzanne agreed to enter the hack, and they drove over toward Mont Cecile and the Cathcarts' Lodge, now vacant and lonely, which was known as "While-a-Way."

CHAPTER XVIII

The Cathcart Lodge, a long, two-story affair, half-way up a fine covered mountain slope, was one of those summer conveniences of the rich, situated just near enough to the primeval wilds to give one a sense of the unexplored and dangerous in raw nature, and yet near enough to the comforts of civilization, as represented by the cities of Quebec and Montreal, to make one feel secure in the possession of those material joys, otherwise so easily interrupted. It was full of great rooms tastefully furnished with simple summery things—willow chairs, box window-seats, structural book shelves, great open fireplaces, surmounted by handsome mantels, outward swinging leaded casements, settees, pillow-strewn rustic couches, great fur rugs and robes and things of that character. The walls were ornamented with trophies of the chase—antlers, raw fox skins, mounted loons and eagles, skins of bears and other animals. This year the Cathcarts were elsewhere, and the lodge was to be had by a woman of Mrs. Dale's standing for the asking.

When they reached While-a-Way, the caretaker, Pierre, an old habitant of musty log-hut origin, who spoke broken English and was dressed in earth-brown khaki over Heaven knows what combination of clothes beneath, had lighted the fires and was bestirring himself about warming the house generally with the furnaces. His wife, a small, broad-skirted, solid-bodied woman, was in the kitchen preparing something to eat. There was plenty of