The circle banner. [volume] (Circle, Mont.) 1914-1939, 1917-09-14

CHAPTER xxIII.-continued
IL
There was something peculiarly hor
rifying to him in the exhibition Ran
dolph was making of himself. He't
never in his life taken a drink ex
cept cOnvivially, and then he took a!
little as would pass muster. Going of
alone and deliberately fuddling one
self, as means of escaping unpleas
ant realities, struck him as an act OF
the basest cowardice. But for thai
picture of Rose he'd have gone long
ago and left Randolph to his bemused
reflections. Only Rose had
asked him to drop in on the doctor for
visit. Did she mean she wanted him
tn try to help?
He tried, though not very success
fully, to conceal his violent disrelish of
the task, when he said: Look here,
Jim! What is the matter with you?
Are you sober enough to tell me?"
Randolph put down his glass. ST
have told you" he said. I'm Eleanor's
kept man. Well kept, oh, yes! Beau
ttfully kept. I'm nothing but pos
session of hersl A trophy of sorts, an
ornament. I'm something she's made.
/ have a big practice. I'm the most
fashionable doctor in Chicago. They
come here, the women, in shoals.
That's Eleanor's doing. I'm a faker,
q fraud. pose for them. I play up.
I give them what they want. And
that's her doing. They go silly about
me; fancy they're in love with me.
81 haven't done lick of honest work
In the last year. I can't work. She
won't let me work. She-smothers me.
Wherever l turn, there she is, smooth
Ing things out, trying to make it easy,
trying to anticipate my wants. I've
only one want. That's to be let alone.
She can't do that. She's Unsuitable.
There's always something more she's
tying to get, and I'm always trying to
Keep something away from her, and
falling"
''And why? Do you want to know
why, Aldrich? That's the cream of the
thing. Because we're in love with
each other She wants me to live on
har love. To have nothing else to live
Oh.
do you want to know what my no.
ton of heaven is? It would be to go
OFF alone, with one suit of clothes in
a handbag, oh, and fifty or hundred
dollars in my pocket wouldn't mind
that; I don't want to be a tramp-to
some mining town, or slum, where I
could start a general practice; where |
the things I'd get would be accident |
cases, confinement cases: real things, |
urgent things, that night and day are
all alike to. I'd like to start again and
be poor; get this stink of easy money
out of my nostrils. I'd like to see if I
could make good on my own.
81 came back from New York, after
that look at Rose, meaning to do it;
to talk it out with Eleanor
and tell her why and then go. Well,
talked. Talks cheap. But I didn't go.
I'll never go. I'll go on getting softer
and more of a fake; more dependent.
And Eleanor will go on eating me up
until the last thing in me that's me
myself is gone. And then, some day,
she'll look at me and see that I'm moth
ing"
Then, with suddenly thickened speech
ian affectation, perhaps), he looked up
at Rodney and demanded:
"What are you looking so s-solemn
about? Can't you take joke? Come
along and have another drink"
"No," Rodney said, 'Tm going. And
you'd better get to bed"
Rodney walked home that night like
1 man dazed. The vividness of one
blazing idea blinded him. The thing
ha. Randolph had seen and lacked the
courage to do; the thing Rodney de-
;pised him for a coward for having
allied to do-that thing Rose had done. !
Without knowing it, yielding to a l
lind, unscrutinized instinct, he'd want
d Rose to live on his love. He'd tried
o smooth things out for her, anticipate
er wants. He'd wanted her soft, help :.
ess, dependent. She'd seen, even then, l
omething he'd been blind tO-some- L
hing he'd blinded himself to: that
ove, by itself, was not enough. That q
t could poison, as well as feed. q
But she had won, among the rest of y
er spoils of victory, the thing she had l
set out to get. His friend u
hip and respect. Friendship, he re-
rendered her saying, was a thing you
ad to earn. When you'd earned 1t, 1t d
ouldnt be withheld from you. Well,
. was right she should be told that; II
lade to understand it to the full. He .
ouldn't ask her to come back to him. p
tut she must know that her respect u
,as as necessary now to him as she'd :, !,
nee said his was to her. He must see =
er and tell her that.
He stopped abruptly in his walk. His 3
ones, as the Psalmist said, turned to y
ater How should he confront that ?
axe of hers, which knew SO much and :, =
nderstood so deeply-he with the :
emory Of his two last ignominious en- = !.
,unters with her behind him2 .
CHAPTER XIV. =
ot