FullReads

“For what, after all, are we born?” said the Doctor. ” Where we die, or when is a trifle, since die we must. But why we die and how is vital. It is not only vital to the man that goes–it is vital to the race. It is the struggle, it is the fight, which, no matter what form it takes, makes life worth living. Men struggle for money. Financiers strangle one another at the Bourse. People look on and applaud, in spite of themselves. That is exciting. It is not uplifting. But for men just like you and me to march out to face death for an idea, for honor, for duty, that very fact ennobles the race.”

“Ah,” said the Lawyer, “I see. The Doctor enjoys the drama of life, but he does not enjoy the purely domestic drama.”

“And out of all this,” said the Trained Nurse, in her level voice, “you are leaving the Almighty. He gave us a world full of beauty, full of work, full of interest, and he gave us capacities to enjoy it, and endowed us with emotions which make it worth while to live and to die. He gave us simple laws–they are clear enough–they mark sharply the line between good and evil. He left us absolutely free to choose. And behold what man has made of it!”

“I deny the statement,” said the Doctor.

“That’s easy,” laughed the Journalist.

“I believe,” said the Doctor, impatiently, “that no good comes but through evil. Read your Bible.”

“I don’t want to read it with your eyes,” replied the Journalist, and marched testily down the path toward the house.

“Well,” snapped the Doctor, “if I read it with yours, I should call on the Almighty to smite this planet with his fires and send us spinning, a flaming brand through space, to annihilation–the great scheme would seem to me a failure–but I don’t believe it is.” And off he marched in the other direction.

The Lawyer shrugged his shoulders, and suppressed, as well as he could, a smile. The Youngster, leaning his elbows on his knees, recited under his breath:

“And as he sat, all suddenly there rolled,
From where the woman wept upon the sod,
Satan’s deep voice, ‘Oh Thou unhappy God.'”

“Exactly,” said the Lawyer.

“What’s that?” asked the Violinist.

“Only the last three lines of a great little poem by a little great Irishman named Stephens–entitled ‘What Satan Said.'”

“After all,” said the Lawyer, “the Doctor is probably right. It all depends on one’s point of view.”

“And one’s temperament,” said the Violinist.

“And one’s education,” said the Critic.

Just here the Doctor came back,–and he came back his smiling self. He made a dash down the path to where the Journalist was evidently sulking, went up behind him, threw an arm over his shoulder, and led him back into the circle.

“See here,” he said, “you are all my guests. I am unreasonably fond of you, even if we can’t see Life from the same point of view. Man as an individual, and Man as a part of the Scheme are two different things. I asked you down here to enjoy yourselves, not to argue. I apologize–all my fault–unpardonable of me. Come now–we have decided to stay as long as we can–we are all interested. It is not every generation that has the honor to sit by, and watch two systems meet at the crossroads and dispute the passage to the Future. We’ll agree not to discuss the ethics of the matter again. If the men marching out there to the frontier can agree to face the cannon–and there are as many opinions there as here–surely we can look on in silence.”

And on that agreement we all went to bed.

But on the following day, as we sat in the garden after dinner, our attempts to “keep off the grass” were miserably visible. They cast a constraint on the party. Every topic seemed to lead to the forbidden enclosure. It was at a very critical moment that the Sculptor, sitting cross-legged on a bench, in a real Alma Tadema attitude, filled the dangerous pause with:

“It was in the days of our Lord 1348 that there happened in Florence, the finest city in Italy–“

And the Violinist, who was leaning against a tree, touched an imaginary mandolin, concluding: “A most terrible plague.”

The Critic leaped to his feet.

“A corking idea,” he cried.

“Mine, mine own,” replied the Sculptor. “I propose that what those who, in the days of the terrible plague, took refuge at the Villa Palmieri, did to pass away the time, we, who are watching the war approach–as our host says it will–do here. Let us, instead of disputing, each tell a story after dinner–to calm our nerves,–or otherwise.”

At first every one hooted.

“I could never tell a story,” objected the Divorcee.

“Of course you can,” declared the Journalist. “Everybody in the world has one story to tell.”

“Sure,” exclaimed the Lawyer. “No embargo on subjects?”

“I don’t know,” smiled the Doctor. “There is always the Youngster.”

“You go to blazes,” was the Youngster’s response, and he added: “No war stories. Draw that line.”

“Then,” laughed the Doctor, “let’s make it tales of our own, our native land.” And there the matter rested. Only, when we separated that night, each of us carried a sealed envelope containing a numbered slip, which decided the question of precedence, and it was agreed that no one but the story-teller should know who was to be the evening’s entertainer, until story-telling hour arrived with the coffee and cigarettes.