IX
This was on Tuesday. During the rest of the week Bob worked hard. Even askilled man would have been kept busy by the multitude of details thatpoured in on the little office. Poor Bob was far from skilled. He feltas awkward amid all these swift and accurate activities as he had whenat sixteen it became necessary to force his overgrown frame into acrowded drawing room. He tried very hard, as he always did witheverything. When Collins succinctly called his attention to adiscrepancy in his figurings, he smiled his slow, winning, troubledsmile, thrust the hair back from his clear eyes, and bent his leanathlete's frame again to the labour. He soon discovered that this workdemanded speed as well as accuracy. "And I need a ten-acre lot to turnaround in," he told himself half humorously. "I'm a regular ice-wagon."
He now came to look back on his college triumphs with an exaggerated butwholesome reaction. His athletic prowess had given him great prominencein college circles. Girls had been flattered at his attention; hisclassmates had deferred to his skill and experience; his juniors had, inthe manner of college boys, looked up to him as to a demi-god. Then forthe few months of the football season the newspapers had made of him anational character. His picture appeared at least once a week; hisopinions were recorded; his physical measurements carefully detailed.When he appeared on the streets and in hotel lobbies, people were apt torecognize him and whisper furtively to one another. Bob was naturallythe most modest youth in the world, and he hated a "fuss" after thedelightfully normal fashion of normal boys, but all this could not failto have its subtle effect. He went out into the world without conceit,but confident of his ability to take his place with the best of them.
His first experience showed him wholly second in natural qualifications,in ability to learn, and in training to men subordinate in the businessworld.
"I'm just plain dub," he told himself. "I thought myself some pumpkinsand got all swelled up inside because good' food and leisure andheredity gave me a husky build! Football! What good does that do mehere? Four out of five of these rivermen are huskier than I am. Me abusiness man! Why I can't seem even to learn the first principles of thefirst job of the whole lot! I've _got_ to!" he admonished; himselfgrimly. "I _hate_ a fellow who doesn't make good!"' and with a verydetermined set to his handsome chin he hurled the whole force of hisyoung energies at those elusive figures that somehow _would_ lie.
The week slipped by in this struggle. It was much worse than in theChicago office. There Bob was allowed all the time he thought he needed.Here one task followed close on the heels of another, without chance fora breathing space or room to take bearings. Bob had to do the best hecould, commit the result to a merciful providence, and seize the nextjob by the throat.
One morning he awoke with a jump to find it was seven o'clock. He hadheard neither whistle, and must have overslept! Hastily he leaped intohis clothes, and rushed out into the dining room. There he found thechore-boy leisurely feeding a just-lighted kitchen fire. To Bob'sexclamation of astonishment he looked up.
"Sunday," he grinned; "breakfus' at eight."
The week had gone without Bob's having realized the fact.
Mrs. Hallowell came in a moment later, smiling at the winning, handsomeyoung man in her fat and good-humoured manner. Bob was seized with aninspiration.
"Mrs. Hallowell," he said persuasively, "just let me rummage around forfive minutes, will you?"
"You that hungry?" she chuckled. "Law! I'll have breakfast in an hour."
"It isn't that," said Bob; "but I want to get some air to-day. I'm notused to being in an office. I want to steal a hunk of bread, and a fewof your good doughnuts and a slice of cheese for breakfast and lunch."
"A cup of hot coffee would do you more good," objected Mrs. Hallowell.
"Please," begged Bob, "and I won't disturb a thing."
"Oh, land! Don't worry about that," said Mrs. Hallowell, "there'steamsters and such in here all times of the day and night. Helpyourself."
Five minutes later, Bob, swinging a riverman's canvas lunch bag, waswalking rapidly up the River Trail. He did not know whither he wasbound; but here at last was a travelled way. It was a brilliant blue andgold morning, the air crisp, the sun warm. The trail led him firstacross a stretch of stump-dotted wet land with pools and rounded rises,green new grass, and trickling streamlets of recently melted snow. Thencame a fringe of scrub growth woven into an almost impenetrabletangle--oaks, poplars, willows, cedar, tamarack--and through it all anabattis of old slashing--with its rotting, fallen stumps, its network oftops, its soggy root-holes, its fallen, uprooted trees. Along one ofthese strutted a partridge. It clucked at Bob, but refused to movefaster, lifting its feet deliberately and spreading its fanlike tail.The River Trail here took to poles laid on rough horses. The poles wereold and slippery, and none too large. Bob had to walk circumspectly tostay on them at all. Shortly, however, he stepped off into the highercountry of the hardwoods. Here the spring had passed, scattering herfresh green. The tops of the trees were already in half-leaf; the lowerbranches just budding, so that it seemed the sowing must have been fromabove. Last year's leaves, softened and packed by the snow, covered theground with an indescribably beautiful and noiseless carpet. Through itpushed the early blossoms of the hepatica. Grackles whistled clearly.Distant redwings gave their celebrated imitation of a great multitude.Bluebirds warbled on the wing. The busier chickadees and creeperssearched the twigs and trunks, interpolating occasional remarks. The sunslanted through the forest.
Bob strode on vigorously. His consciousness received these thingsgratefully, and yet he was more occupied with a sense of physical joyand harmony with the world of out-of-doors than with an analysis of itscomponents. At one point, however, he paused. The hardwoods had risenover a low hill. Now they opened to show a framed picture of the river,distant and below. In contrast to the modulated browns of thetree-trunks, the new green and lilac of the undergrowth and the far-offhills across the way, it showed like a patch of burnished blue steel.Logs floated across the vista, singly, in scattered groups, in masses.Again, the river was clear. While Bob watched, a man floated into view.He was standing bolt upright and at ease on a log so small that thewater lapped over its top. From this distance Bob could but just make itout. The man leaned carelessly on his peavy. Across the vista hefloated, graceful and motionless, on his way from the driving camp tothe mill.
Bob gave a whistle of admiration, and walked on.
"I wish some of our oarsmen could see that," he said to himself."They're always guying the fellows that tip over their cranky littleshells."
He stopped short.
"I couldn't do it," he cried aloud; "nor I couldn't learn to do it. Isure _am_ a dub!"
He trudged on, his spirits again at the ebb. The brightness of the dayhad dimmed. Indeed, physically, a change had taken place. Over the sunbanked clouds had drawn. With the disappearance of the sunlight alittle breeze, before but a pleasant and wandering companion to thebirds, became cold and draughty. The leaf carpet proved to be soggy; andas for the birds themselves, their whistles suddenly grew plaintive asthough with the portent of late autumn.
This sudden transformation, usual enough with every passing cloud in thechildhood of the spring, reacted still further on Bob's spirits. Hetrudged doggedly on. After a time a gleam of water caught his attentionto the left. He deserted the River Trail, descended a slope, pushed hisway through a thicket of tamaracks growing out from wire grass andpuddles, and found himself on the shores of a round lake.
It was a small body of water, completely surrounded by tall, dead browngrasses. These were in turn fringed by melancholy tamaracks. The waterwas dark slate colour, and ruffled angrily by the breeze which here inthe open developed some slight strength. It reminded Bob of a"bottomless" lake pointed out many years before to his childishcredulity. A lonesome hell diver flipped down out of sight as Bobappeared.
The wet ground swayed and bent alarmingly under his tread. A stubattracted him. He perched on the end of it, his feet suspended above thewet, and aband
oned himself to reflection. The lonesome diver reappeared.The breeze rustled the dead grasses and the tamaracks until they seemedto be shivering in the cold.
Bob was facing himself squarely. This was his first grapple with theworld outside. To his direct American mind the problem was simplicity inthe extreme. An idler is a contemptible being. A rich idler is almostbeneath contempt. A man's life lies in activity. Activity, outside theartistic and professional, means the world of business. All teaching athome and through the homiletic magazines, fashionable at that period,pointed out but one road to success in this world--the beginning at thebottom, as Bob was doing; close application; accuracy; frugality;honesty; fair dealing. The homiletic magazines omitted idealism andimagination; but perhaps those qualities are so common in what somepeople are pleased to call our humdrum modern business life that theywere taken for granted. If a young man could not succeed in this world,something was wrong with him. Can Bob be blamed that in this bafflingand unsuspected incapacity he found a great humility of spirit? In hisfashion he began to remember trifling significances which at the timehad meant little to him. Thus, a girl had once told him, half seriously:
"Yes, you're a nice boy, just as everybody tells you; a nice, big,blundering, stupid, Newfoundland-dog boy."
He had laughed good-humouredly, and had forgotten. Now he caught at oneword of it. That might explain it; he was just plain stupid! And stupidboys either played polo or drove fancy horses or ran yachts--or occupiedornamental--too ornamental--desks for an hour or so a day. Bobremembered how, as a small boy, he used to hold the ends of the reinsunder the delighted belief that he was driving his father's spiritedpair.
"I've outgrown holding the reins, thank you," he said aloud in disgust.At the sound of his voice the diver disappeared. Bob laughed and felt atrifle better.
He reviewed himself dispassionately. He could not but admit that he hadtried hard enough, and that he had courage. It was just a case oflimitation. Bob, for the first time, bumped against the stone wall thathems us in on all sides--save toward the sky.
He fell into a profound discouragement; a discouragement that somehowfound its prototype in the mournful little lake with its leaden water,its cold breeze, its whispering, dried marsh grasses, its funerealtamaracks, and its lonesome diver.