The Cords of Vanity: A Comedy of Shirking by James Branch Cabell (free reads .txt) 📖

the top of their voices, for a good half hour, about how important it is not to disturb anybody, I have never been able to regard quite seriously.

So I was spending this evening sedately in my own apartments at the Continental; and meanwhile I lisped in numbers that (or I flattered myself) had a Homeric tang; and at times chewed the end of my pencil meditatively. "From present indications," I was considering, "that Russian woman is cooking something on her chafing-dish again. It usually affects them that way about dawn."

I began on the next verse viciously, and came a cropper over the clash of two sibilants, as the distant clamour increased. "Brutes!" said I, disapprovingly. "Sere, clear, dear—Now they have finished, 'Jamais, monsieur', and begun crying, 'Fire!' Oh, this would draw more than three souls out of a weaver, you know! Mere, near, hemisphere—no, but the Greeks thought it was flat. By Jove! I do smell smoke!"

Wrapping my dressing-gown about me—I had afterward reason to thank the kindly fates that it was the green one with the white fleurs-de-lis, and not my customary, unspeakably disreputable bath-robe, scorched by the cigarette ashes of years,—I approached the door and peeped out into the empty hotel corridor. The incandescent lights glimmered mildly through a gray haze which was acrid and choking to breathe; little puffs of smoke crept lazily out of the lift-shaft just opposite; and down-stairs all Liége was shouting incoherently, and dragging about the heavier pieces of hotel furniture.

"By Jove!" said I, and whistled a little disconsolately as I looked downward through the bars about the lift-shaft.

"Do you reckon," spoke a voice—a most agreeable voice,—"we are in any danger?"

The owner of the voice was tall; not even the agitation of the moment prevented my observing that, big as I am, her eyes were almost on a level with my shoulder. They were not unpleasant eyes, and a stray dream or two yet lingered under their heavy lids. The owner of the voice wore a strange garment that was fluffy and pink,—pale pink like the lining of a sea-shell—and billows of white and the ends of various blue ribbons peeped out about her neck. I made mental note of the fact that disordered hair is not necessarily unbecoming; it sometimes has the effect of an unusually heavy halo set about the face of a half-awakened angel.

"It would appear," said I, meditatively, "that, in consideration of our being on the fifth floor, with the lift-shaft drawing splendidly, and the stairs winding about it,—except the two lower flights, which have just fallen in,—and in consideration of the fire department's probable incompetence to extinguish anything more formidable than a tar-barrel, —yes, it would appear, I think, that we might go further than 'dangerous' and find a less appropriate adjective to describe the situation."

"You mean we cannot get down?" The beautiful voice was tremulous.

And my silence made reply.

"Well, then," she suggested, cheerfully, after due reflection, "since we can't go down, why not go up?"

As a matter of fact, nothing could be more simple. We were on the top floor of the hotel, and beside us, in the niche corresponding to the stairs below, was an iron ladder that led to a neatly-whitewashed trapdoor in the roof. Adopting her suggestion, I pushed against this trap-door and found that it yielded readily; then, standing at the top of the ladder, I looked about me on a dim expanse of tiles and chimneys; yet farther off were the huddled roofs and gables of Liége, and just a stray glimpse of the Meuse; and above me brooded a clear sky and the naked glory of the moon.

3

I lowered my head with a distinct sigh of relief.

"I say," I called, "it is infinitely nicer up here—superb view of the city, and within a minute's drop of the square! Better come up."

"Go first," said she; and subsequently I held for a moment a very slender hand—a ridiculously small hand for a woman whose eyes were almost on a level with my shoulder,—and we two stood together on the roof of the Hôtel Continental. We enjoyed, as I had predicted, an unobstructed view of Liége and of the square, wherein two toy-like engines puffed viciously and threw impotent threads of water against the burning hotel beneath us, and, at times, on the heads of an excited throng erratically clad.

But I looked down moodily, "That," said I, as a series of small explosions popped like pistol shots, "is the café; and, oh, Lord! there goes the only decent Scotch in all Liége!"

"There is Mamma!" she cried, excitedly; "there!" She pointed to a stout woman, who, with a purple? shawl wrapped about her head, was wringing her hands as heartily as a bird-cage, held in one of them, would permit. "And she has saved Bill Bryan!"

"In that case," said I, "I suppose it is clearly my duty to rescue the remaining member of the family. You see," I continued, in bending over the trap-door and tugging at the ladder, "this thing is only about twenty feet long; but the kitchen wing of the hotel is a little less than that distance from the rear of the house behind it; and with this as a bridge I think we might make it. In any event, the roof will be done for in a half-hour, and it is eminently worth trying." I drew the ladder upward.

Then I dragged this ladder down the gentle slant of the roof, through a maze of ghostly chimneys and dim skylights, to the kitchen wing, which was a few feet lower than the main body of the building. I skirted the chimney and stepped lightly over the eaves, calling, "Now then!" when a muffled cry, followed by a crash in the courtyard beneath, shook my heart into my mouth. I turned, gasping; and found the girl lying safe, but terrified, on the verge of the roof.

"It was a bucket," she laughed, "and I stumbled over it,—and it fell—and—and I nearly did,—and I am frightened!"

And somehow I was holding her hand in mine, and my mouth was making irrelevant noises, and I was trembling. "It was close, but—look here, you must pull yourself together!" I pleaded; "because we haven't, as it were, the time for airy badinage and repartee—just now."

"I can't," she cried, hysterically. "Oh, I am so frightened! I can't!"

"You see," I said, with careful patience, "we must go on. I hate to seem too urgent, but we must, do you understand?" I waved my hand toward the east. "Why, look!" said I, as a thin tongue of flame leaped through the open trap-door and flickered wickedly for a moment against the paling gray of the sky.

She saw and shuddered. "I'll come," she murmured, listlessly, and rose to her feet.

4

I heaved another sigh of relief, and waving her aside from the ladder, dragged it after me to the eaves of the rear wing. As I had foreseen, this ladder reached easily to the eaves of the house behind the rear wing, and formed a passable though unsubstantial-looking bridge. I regarded it disapprovingly.

"It will only bear one," said I; "and we will have to crawl over separately after all. Are you up to it?"

"Please go first," said she, very quiet. And, after gazing into her face for a moment, I crept over gingerly, not caring to look down into the abyss beneath.

Then I spent a century in impotence, watching a fluffy, pink figure that swayed over a bottomless space and moved forward a hair's breadth each year. I made no sound during this interval. In fact, I do not remember drawing a really satisfactory breath from the time I left the hotel-roof, until I lifted a soft, faint-scented, panting bundle to the roof of the Councillor von Hollwig.

5

"You are," I cried, with conviction, "the bravest, the most—er—the bravest woman I ever knew!" I heaved a little sigh, but this time of content. "For I wonder," said I, in my soul, "if you have any idea what a beauty you are! what a wonderful, unspeakable beauty you are! Oh, you are everything that men ever imagined in dreams that left them weeping for sheer happiness—and more! You are—you, and I have held you in my arms for a moment; and, before high heaven, to repurchase that privilege I would consent to the burning of three or four more hotels and an odd city or so to boot!" But, aloud, I only said, "We are quite safe now, you know."

She laughed, bewilderingly. "I suppose," said she, "the next thing is to find a trap-door."

But there were, so far as we could discover, no trapdoors in the roof of the Councillor von Hollwig, or in the neighbouring roofs; and, after searching three of them carefully, I suggested the propriety of waiting till dawn to be melodramatically rescued.

"You see," I pointed out, "everybody is at the fire over yonder. But we are quite safe here, I would say, with an entire block of houses to promenade on; moreover, we have cheerful company, eligible central location in the very heart of the city, and the superb spectacle of a big fire at exactly the proper distance. Therefore," I continued, and with severity, "you will please have the kindness to explain your motives for wandering about the corridors of a burning hotel at four o'clock in the morning."

She sat down against a chimney and wrapped her gown about her. "I sleep very soundly," said she, "and we did both museums and six churches and the Palais de Justice and a deaf and dumb place and the cannon-foundry today,—and the cries awakened me,—and I reckon Mamma lost her head."

"And left you," thought I, "left you—to save a canary-bird! Good Lord!
And so, you are an American and a Southerner as well."

"And you?" she asked.

"Ah—oh, yes, me!" I awoke sharply from admiration of her trailing lashes. The burning hotel was developing a splendid light wherein to see them. "I was writing—and I thought that Russian woman had a few friends to supper,—and I was looking for a rhyme when I found you," I concluded, with a fine coherence.

She looked up. It was incredible, but those heavy lashes disentangled quite easily. I was seized with a desire to see them again perform this interesting feat. "Verses?" said she, considering my slippers in a new light.

"Yes," I admitted, guiltily—"of Helen."

She echoed the name. It is an unusually beautiful name when properly spoken. "Why, that is my name, only we call it Elena."

"Late of Troy Town," said I, in explanation.

"Oh!" The lashes fell into their former state. It was hopeless this time; and manual aid would be required, inevitably. "I should think," said my compatriot, "that live women would be more—inspiring"

"Surely," I assented. I drew my gown about me and sat down. "But, you see, she is alive—to me." And I dwelt a trifle upon the last word.

"One would gather," said she, meditatively, "that you have an unrequited attachment for Helen of Troy."

I sighed a melancholy assent. The great eyes opened to their utmost. The effect was as disconcerting as that of a ship firing a broadside at you, but pleasanter. "Tell me all about it," said she, coaxingly.

"I have always loved her," I said, with gravity. "Long ago, when I was a little chap, I had a book—Stories of the Trojan War, or something of the sort. And there I first read of Helen—and remembered. There were pictures—outline pictures,—of quite abnormally straight-nosed warriors, with flat draperies which amply demonstrated that the laws of gravity were not yet discovered; and the pictures of slender goddesses, who had done their hair up carefully and gone no further in their dressing. Oh, the book was full of pictures,—and Helen's was the most manifestly impossible of them all. But I knew—I knew, even then, of her beauty, of that flawless beauty which made men's hearts as water and drew the bearded kings to Ilium to die for the woman at sight of whom they had put away all memories of distant homes and wives; that flawless beauty which buoyed the Trojans through the ten years of fighting and starvation, just with delight in gazing upon Queen Helen day by day, and with the joy of seeing her going about their streets. For I remembered!" And as I ended, I sighed effectively.

"I know," said she.

"'Or ever the knightly years had gone
With the old world to the grave,
I was a king in Babylon
And you were a Christian slave.'"

"Yes, only I was the slave, I think, and you—er—I