It was a social plague; it had run through all Society, high and low.

It had destroyed conversation and all good-fellowship--it would end by destroying even common decency, and turning the best people into vulgar gamblers.--Thus spoke Mrs. Billy Alden, who was one of the guests; and Montague thought that Mrs. Billy ought to know, for she herself was playing all the time.

Mrs. Billy did not like Mrs. Winnie Duval; and the beginning of the conversation was her inquiry why he let that woman corrupt him. Then the good lady went on to tell him what bridge had come to be; how people played it on the trains all the way from New York to San Francisco; how they had tables in their autos, and played while they were touring over the world. "Once," said she, "I took a party to see the America's Cup races off Sandy Hook; and when we got back to the pier, some one called, 'Who won?' And the answer was, 'Mrs. Billy's ahead, but we're going on this evening.' I took a party of friends through the Mediterranean and up the Nile, and we pa.s.sed Venice and Cairo and the Pyramids and the Suez Ca.n.a.l, and they never once looked up--they were playing bridge. And you think I'm joking, but I mean just literally what I say. I know a man who was travelling from New York to Philadelphia, and got into a game with some strangers, and rode all the way to Palm Beach to finish it!"

Montague heard later of a well-known Society leader who was totally incapacitated that winter, from too much bridge at Newport; and she was pa.s.sing the winter at Hot Springs and Palm Beach--and playing bridge there. They played it even in sanitariums, to which they had been driven by nervous breakdown. It was an occupation so exhausting to the physique of women that physicians came to know the symptoms of it, and before they diagnosed a case, they would ask, "Do you play bridge?" It had destroyed the last remnants of the Sabbath--it was a universal custom to have card-parties on that day.

It was a very expensive game, as they played it in Society; one might easily win or lose several thousand dollars in an evening, and there were many who could not afford this. If one did not play, he would be dropped from the lists of those invited; and when one entered a game, etiquette required him to stay in until it was finished. So one heard of young girls who had p.a.w.ned their family plate, or who had sold their honour, to pay their bills at the game; and all Society knew of one youth who had robbed his hostess of her jewels and p.a.w.ned them, and then taken her the tickets--telling her that her guests had robbed him.

There were women received in the best Society, who lived as adventuresses pure and simple, upon their skill at the game; hostesses would invite rich guests and fleece them. Montague never forgot the sense of amazement and dismay with which he listened while first Mrs.

Winnie and then his brother warned him that he must avoid playing with a certain aristocratic dame whom he met in this most aristocratic household--because she was such a notorious cheater!

"My dear fellow," laughed his brother, when he protested, "we have a phrase 'to cheat at cards like a woman.'" And then Oliver went on to tell him of his own first experience at cards in Society, when he had played poker with several charming young debutantes; they would call their hands and take the money without showing their cards, and he had been too gallant to ask to see them. But later he learned that this was a regular practice, and so he never played poker with women. And Oliver pointed out one of these girls to his brother--sitting, as beautiful as a picture and as cold as marble, with a half-smoked cigarette on the edge of the table, and whisky and soda and gla.s.ses of cracked ice beside her. Later on, as he chanced to be reading a newspaper, his brother leaned over his shoulder and pointed out another of the symptoms of the craze--an advertis.e.m.e.nt headed, "Your luck will change." It gave notice that at Rosenstein's Parlours, just off Fifth Avenue, one might borrow money upon expensive gowns and furs!

All during the ten days of this house-party, Mrs. Winnie devoted herself to seeing that Montague had a good time; Mrs. Winnie sat beside him at table--he found that somehow a convention had been established which a.s.signed him to Mrs. Winnie as a matter of course. n.o.body said anything to him about it, but knowing how relentlessly the affairs of other people were probed and a.n.a.lyzed, he began to feel exceedingly uncomfortable.

There came a time when he felt quite smothered by Mrs. Winnie; and immediately after lunch one day he broke away and went for a long walk by himself. This was the occasion of his meeting with an adventure.

An inch or two of snow had fallen, and lay gleaming in the sunlight.

The air was keen, and he drank deep draughts of it, and went striding away over the hills for an hour or so. There was a gale blowing, and as he came over the summits it would strike him, and he would see the river white with foam. And then down in the valleys again all would be still.

Here, in a thickly wooded place, Montague's attention was arrested suddenly by a peculiar sound, a heavy thud, which seemed to shake the earth. It suggested a distant explosion, and he stopped for a moment and then went on, gazing ahead. He pa.s.sed a turn, and then he saw a great tree which had fallen directly across the road.

He went on, thinking that this was what he had heard. But as he came nearer, he saw his mistake. Beyond the tree lay something else, and he began to run toward it. It was two wheels of an automobile, sticking up into the air.

He sprang upon the tree-trunk, and in one glance he saw the whole story. A big touring-car had swept round the sharp turn, and swerved to avoid the unexpected obstruction, and so turned a somersault into the ditch.

Montague gave a thrill of horror, for there was the form of a man pinned beneath the body of the car. He sprang toward it, but a second glance made him stop--he saw that blood had gushed from the man's mouth and soaked the snow all about. His chest was visibly crushed flat, and his eyes were dreadful, half-started from their sockets.

For a moment Montague stood staring, as if turned to stone. Then from the other side of the car came a moan, and he ran toward the sound. A second man lay in the ditch, moving feebly. Montague sprang to help him.

The man wore a heavy bearskin coat. Montague lifted him, and saw that he was a very elderly person, with a cut across his forehead, and a face as white as chalk. The other helped him to a position with his back against the bank, and he opened his eyes and groaned.

Montague knelt beside him, watching his breathing. He had a sense of utter helplessness--there was nothing he could think of to do, save to unb.u.t.ton the man's coat and keep wiping the blood from his face.

"Some whisky," the stranger moaned. Montague answered that he had none; but the other replied that there was some in the car.

The slope of the bank was such that Montague could crawl under, and find the compartment with the bottle in it. The old man drank some, and a little colour came back to his face. As the other watched him, it came to him that this face was familiar; but he could not place it.

"How many were there with you?" Montague asked; and the man answered, "Only one."

Montague went over and made certain that the other man--who was obviously the chauffeur--was dead. Then he hurried down the road, and dragged some brush out into the middle of it, where it could be seen from a distance by any other automobile that came along; after which he went back to the stranger, and bound his handkerchief about his forehead to stop the bleeding from the cut.

The old man's lips were tightly set, as if he were suffering great pain. "I'm done for!" he moaned, again and again.

"Where are you hurt?" Montague asked.

"I don't know," he gasped. "But it's finished me! I know it--it's the last straw."

Then he closed his eyes and lay back. "Can't you get a doctor?" he asked.

"There are no houses very near," said Montague. "But I can run--"

"No, no!" the other interrupted, anxiously. "Don't leave me! Some one will come.--Oh, that fool of a chauffeur--why couldn't he go slow when I told him? That's always the way with them--they're always trying to show off."

"The man is dead," said Montague, quietly.

The other started upon his elbow. "Dead!" he gasped.

"Yes," said Montague. "He's under the car."

The old man's eyes had started wild with fright; and he caught Montague by the arm. "Dead!" he said. "O my G.o.d--and it might have been me!"

There was a moment's pause. The stranger caught his breath, and whispered again: "I'm done for! I can't stand it! it's too much!"

Montague had noticed when he lifted the man that he was very frail and slight of build. Now he could feel that the hand that held his arm was trembling violently. It occurred to him that perhaps the man was not really hurt, but that his nerves had been upset by the shock.

And he felt certain of this a moment later, when the stranger suddenly leaned forward, clutching him with redoubled intensity, and staring at him with wide, horror-stricken eyes.

"Do you know what it means to be afraid of death?" he panted. "Do you know what it means to be afraid of death?"

Then, without waiting for a reply, he rushed on--"No, no! You can't!

you can't! I don't believe any man knows it as I do! Think of it--for ten years I've never known a minute when I wasn't afraid of death! It follows me around--it won't let me be! It leaps out at me in places, like this! And when I escape it, I can hear it laughing at me--for it knows I can't get away!"

The old man caught his breath with a choking sob. He was clinging to Montague like a frightened child, and staring with a wild, hunted look upon his face. Montague sat transfixed.

"Yes," the other rushed on, "that's the truth, as G.o.d hears me! And it's the first time I've ever spoken it in my life! I have to hide it--because men would laugh at me--they pretend they're not afraid! But I lie awake all night, and it's like a fiend that sits by my bedside! I lie and listen to my own heart--I feel it beating, and I think how weak it is, and what thin walls it has, and what a wretched, helpless thing it is to have your life depend on that!--You don't know what that is, I suppose."

Montague shook his head.

"You're young, you see," said the other. "You have health--everybody has health, except me! And everybody hates me--I haven't got a friend in the world!"

Montague was quite taken aback by the suddenness of this outburst. He tried to stop it, for he felt almost indecent in listening--it was not fair to take a man off his guard like this. But the stranger could not be stopped--he was completely unstrung, and his voice grew louder and louder.

"It's every word of it true," he exclaimed wildly. "And I can't stand it any more. I can't stand anything any more. I was young and strong once--I could take care of myself; and I said: I'll make money, I'll be master of other men! But I was a fool--I forgot my health. And now all the money on earth can't do me any good! I'd give ten million dollars to-day for a body like any other man's--and this--this is what I have!"

He struck his hands against his bosom. "Look at it!" he cried, hysterically. "This is what I've got to live in! It won't digest any food, and I can't keep it warm--there's nothing right with it! How would you like to lie awake at night and say to yourself that your teeth were decaying and you couldn't help it--your hair was falling out, and n.o.body could stop it? You're old and worn out--falling to pieces; and everybody hates you--everybody's waiting for you to die, so that they can get you out of the way. The doctors come, and they're all humbugs! They shake their heads and use long words--they know they can't do you any good, but they want their big fees! And all they do is to frighten you worse, and make you sicker than ever!"

There was nothing that Montague could do save to sit and listen to this outburst of wretchedness. His attempts to soothe the old man only had the effect of exciting him more.

"Why does it all have to fall on me?" he moaned. "I want to be like other people--I want to live! And instead, I'm like a man with a pack of hungry wolves prowling round him--that's what it's like! It's like Nature--hungry and cruel and savage! You think you know what life is; it seems so beautiful and gentle and pleasant--that's when you're on top! But now I'm down, and I KNOW what it is--it's a thing like a nightmare, that reaches out for you to clutch you and crush you! And you can't get away from it--you're helpless as a rat in a corner--you're d.a.m.ned--you're d.a.m.ned!" The miserable man's voice broke in a cry of despair, and he sank down in a heap in front of Montague, shaking and sobbing. The other was trembling slightly, and stricken with awe.

There was a long silence, and then the stranger lifted his tear-stained face, and Montague helped to support him. "Have a little more of the whisky," said he.

"No," the other answered feebly, "I'd better not."

"--My doctors won't let me have whisky," he added, after a while.

"That's my liver. I've so many don'ts, you know, that it takes a note-book to keep track of them. And all of them together do me no good! Think of it--I have to live on graham crackers and milk--actually, not a thing has pa.s.sed my lips for two years but graham crackers and milk."

And then suddenly, with a start, it came to Montague where he had seen this wrinkled old face before. It was Laura Hegan's uncle, whom the Major had pointed out to him in the dining-room of the Millionaires'