The Turmoil, Booth Tarkington [best english novels for beginners .txt] 📗

“Keep you hand in that sling,” said Gurney, sharply.

Sheridan turned upon him, uttering a sound like a howl. “For God’s sake, sing another tune!” he cried. “You said you ‘came as a doctor but stay as a friend,’ and in that capacity you undertake to sit up and criticize me⁠—”

“Oh, talk sense,” said the doctor, and yawned intentionally. “What do you want Bibbs to say?”

“You were sittin’ up there tellin’ me I got ‘hysterical’⁠—‘hysterical,’ oh Lord! You sat up there and told me I got ‘hysterical’ over nothin’! You sat up there tellin’ me I didn’t have as heavy burdens as many another man you knew. I just want you to hear this. Now listen!” He swung toward the quiet figure waiting in the doorway. “Bibbs, will you come downtown with me Monday morning and let me start you with two vice-presidencies, a directorship, stock, and salaries? I ask you.”

“No, father,” said Bibbs, gently.

Sheridan looked at Gurney and then faced his son once more.

“Bibbs, you want to stay in the shop, do you, at nine dollars a week, instead of takin’ up my offer?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And I’d like the doctor to hear: What’ll you do if I decide you’re too high-priced a workin’-man either to live in my house or work in my shop?”

“Find other work,” said Bibbs.

“There! You hear him for yourself!” Sheridan cried. “You hear what⁠—”

“Keep you hand in that sling! Yes, I hear him.”

Sheridan leaned over Gurney and shouted, in a voice that cracked and broke, piping into falsetto: “He thinks of bein’ a plumber! He wants to be a plumber! He told me he couldn’t think if he went into business⁠—he wants to be a plumber so he can think!”

He fell back a step, wiping his forhead with the back of his left hand. “There! That’s my son! That’s the only son I got now! That’s my chance to live,” he cried, with a bitterness that seemed to leave ashes in his throat. “That’s my one chance to live⁠—that thing you see in the doorway yonder!”

Dr. Gurney thoughtfully regarded the bandage strip he had been winding, and tossed it into the open bag. “What’s the matter with giving Bibbs a chance to live?” he said, coolly. “I would if I were you. You’ve had two that went into business.”

Sheridan’s mouth moved grotesquely before he could speak. “Joe Gurney,” he said, when he could command himself so far, “are you accusin’ me of the responsibility for the death of my son James?”

“I accuse you of nothing,” said the doctor. “But just once I’d like to have it out with you on the question of Bibbs⁠—and while he’s here, too.” He got up, walked to the fire, and stood warming his hands behind his back and smiling. “Look here, old fellow, let’s be reasonable,” he said. “You were bound Bibbs should go to the shop again, and I gave you and him, both, to understand pretty plainly that if he went it was at the risk of his life. Well, what did he do? He said he wanted to go. And he did go, and he’s made good there. Now, see: Isn’t that enough? Can’t you let him off now? He wants to write, and how do you know that he couldn’t do it if you gave him a chance? How do you know he hasn’t some message⁠—something to say that might make the world just a little bit happier or wiser? He might⁠—in time⁠—it’s a possibility not to be denied. Now he can’t deliver any message if he goes down there with you, and he won’t have any to deliver. I don’t say going down with you is likely to injure his health, as I thought the shop would, and as the shop did, the first time. I’m not speaking as doctor now, anyhow. But I tell you one thing I know: if you take him down there you’ll kill something that I feel is in him, and it’s finer, I think, than his physical body, and you’ll kill it deader than a doornail! And so why not let it live? You’ve about come to the end of your string, old fellow. Why not stop this perpetual devilish fighting and give Bibbs his chance?”

Sheridan stood looking at him fixedly. “What ‘fighting’?”

“Yours⁠—with nature.” Gurney sustained the daunting gaze of his fierce antagonist equably. “You don’t seem to understand that you’ve been struggling against actual law.”

“What law?”

“Natural law,” said Gurney. “What do you think beat you with Edith? Did Edith, herself, beat you? Didn’t she obey without question something powerful that was against you? Edith wasn’t against you, and you weren’t against her, but you set yourself against the power that had her in its grip, and it shot out a spurt of flame⁠—and won in a walk! What’s taken Roscoe from you? Timbers bear just so much strain, old man; but you wanted to send the load across the broken bridge, and you thought you could bully or coax the cracked thing into standing. Well, you couldn’t! Now here’s Bibbs. There are thousands of men fit for the life you want him to lead⁠—and so is he. It wouldn’t take half of Bibbs’s brains to be twice as good a business man as Jim and Roscoe put together.”

“What!” Sheridan goggled at him like a zany.

“Your son Bibbs,” said the doctor, composedly, “Bibbs Sheridan has the kind and quantity of gray matter that will make him a success in anything⁠—if he ever wakes up! Personally I should prefer him to remain asleep. I like him that way. But the thousands of men fit for the life you want him to lead aren’t fit to do much with the life he ought to lead. Blindly, he’s been fighting for the chance to lead it⁠—he’s obeying something that begs to stay alive within him; and, blindly, he knows you’ll crush it out. You’ve set your will to do it. Let me tell you something