第24章 CHAPTER V.(3)

Peters,with a miserable conviction that he had thrown away a valuable opportunity in mere idle gossip,nevertheless endeavored to look mysterious as he replied,"Oh,business gin'rally."Then in the faint hope of yet retrieving his blunder he inquired,"How long will he be here?""Don't know.I reckon he and Harcourt's got something on hand.He just asked if he was likely to be at home or at his office.I told him I reckoned at the house,for some of the family--I didn't get to see who they were--drove up in a carriage from the 3.40train while you were sitting there."Meanwhile the subject of this discussion,quite unconscious of the sensation he had created,or perhaps like most heroes philosophically careless of it,was sauntering indifferently towards Harcourt's house.But he had no business with his former host,his only object was to pass an idle hour before his train left.He was,of course,not unaware that he himself was largely responsible for Harcourt's success;that it was HIS hint which had induced the petty trader of Sidon to venture his all in Tasajara;HIS knowledge of the topography and geology of the plain that had stimulated Harcourt's agricultural speculations;HIS hydrographic survey of the creek that had made Harcourt's plan of widening the channel to commerce practicable and profitable.This he could not help but know.But that it was chiefly owing to his own clear,cool,far-seeing,but never visionary,scientific observation,--his own accurate analysis,unprejudiced by even a savant's enthusiasm,and uninfluenced by any personal desire or greed of gain,--that Tasajara City had risen from the stagnant tules,was a speculation that had never occurred to him.There was a much more uneasy consciousness of what he had done in Mr.Harcourt's face a few moments later,when his visitor's name was announced,and it is to be feared that if that name had been less widely honored and respected than it was,no merely grateful recollection of it would have procured Grant an audience.As it was,it was with a frown and a touch of his old impatient asperity that he stepped to the threshold of an adjoining room and called,"Clemmy!"Clementina appeared at the door.

"There's that man Grant in the parlor.What brings HIM here,Iwonder?Who does he come to see?"

"Who did he ask for?"

"Me,--but that don't mean anything."

"Perhaps he wants to see you on some business.""No.That isn't his high-toned style.He makes other people go to him for that,"he said bitterly."Anyhow--don't you think it's mighty queer his coming here after his friend--for it was he who introduced Rice to us--had behaved so to your sister,and caused all this divorce and scandal?""Perhaps he may know nothing about it;he and Rice separated long ago,even before Grant became so famous.We never saw much of him,you know,after we came here.Suppose you leave him to ME.I'll see him."Mr.Harcourt reflected."Didn't he used to be rather attentive to Phemie?"Clementina shrugged her shoulders carelessly."I dare say--but Idon't think that NOW"--

"Who said anything about NOW?"retorted her father,with a return of his old abruptness.After a pause he said:"I'll go down and see him first,and then send for you.You can keep him for the opening and dinner,if you like."Meantime Lawrence Grant,serenely unsuspicious of these domestic confidences,had been shown into the parlor--a large room furnished in the same style as the drawing-room of the hotel he had just quitted.He had ample time to note that it was that wonderful Second Empire furniture which he remembered that the early San Francisco pioneers in the first flush of their wealth had imported directly from France,and which for years after gave an unexpected foreign flavor to the western domesticity and a tawdry gilt equality to saloons and drawing-rooms,public and private.But he was observant of a corresponding change in Harcourt,when a moment later he entered the room.That individuality which had kept the former shopkeeper of Sidon distinct from,although perhaps not superior to,his customers--was strongly marked.He was perhaps now more nervously alert than then;he was certainly more impatient than before,--but that was pardonable in a man of large affairs and action.Grant could not deny that he seemed improved,--rather perhaps that the setting of fine clothes,cleanliness,and the absence of petty worries,made his characteristics respectable.

That which is ill breeding in homespun,is apt to become mere eccentricity in purple and fine linen;Grant felt that Harcourt jarred on him less than he did before,and was grateful without superciliousness.Harcourt,relieved to find that Grant was neither critical nor aggressively reminiscent,and above all not inclined to claim the credit of creating him and Tasajara,became more confident,more at his ease,and,I fear,in proportion more unpleasant.It is the repose and not the struggle of the parvenu that confounds us.

"And YOU,Grant,--you have made yourself famous,and,I hear,have got pretty much your own prices for your opinions ever since it was known that you--you--er--were connected with the growth of Tasajara."Grant smiled;he was not quite prepared for this;but it was amusing and would pass the time.He murmured a sentence of half ironical deprecation,and Mr.Harcourt continued:--"I haven't got my San Francisco house here to receive you in,but Ihope some day,sir,to see you there.We are only here for the day and night,but if you care to attend the opening ceremonies at the new hall,we can manage to give you dinner afterwards.You can escort my daughter Clementina,--she's here with me."The smile of apologetic declination which had begun to form on Grant's lips was suddenly arrested."Then your daughter is here?"he asked,with unaffected interest.