Dorian

CHAPTER ONE.

Do­ri­an Trent was go­ing to town to buy him­self a pair of shoes. He had some oth­er er­rands to per­form for him­self and his moth­er, but the rea­son for his go­ing to town was the im­per­ative need of shoes. It was Fri­day af­ter­noon. The com­ing Sun­day he must ap­pear de­cent­ly shod, so his moth­er had told him, at the same time hint­ing at some oth­er than the Sun­day rea­son. He now had the mon­ey, three big, jin­gling sil­ver dol­lars in his pock­et.

Do­ri­an whis­tled cheer­ful­ly as he trudged along the road. It was a scant three miles to town, and he would rather walk that short dis­tance than to be both­ered with a horse. When he took Old Nig, he had to keep to the main-​trav­eled road straight in­to town, then tie him to a post--and wor­ry about him all the time; but afoot and alone, he could move along as eas­ily as he pleased, linger on the canal bank or cut cross-​lots through the fields to the riv­er, cross it on the foot­bridge, then go on to town by the low­er mead­ows.

The road was dusty that af­ter­noon, and the sun was hot. It would be cool­er un­der the wil­lows by the riv­er. At Cot­ton­wood Cor­ners, Do­ri­an left the road and took the cut-​off path. The riv­er sparkled cool and clear un­der the over­hang­ing wil­lows. He saw a good-​sized trout play­ing in the pool, but as he had no fish­ing tack­le with him, the boy could on­ly watch the fish in its grace­ful glid­ing in and out of sun­shine and shad­ow. A robin over­head was mak­ing a noisy demon­stra­tion as if in alarm about a nest. Do­ri­an sat on the bank to look and lis­ten for a few mo­ments, then he got up again.

Cross­ing the riv­er, he took the cool foot-​path un­der the wil­lows. He cut down one of the smoothest, sap­pi­est branch­es with which to make whis­tles. Do­ri­an was a great mak­er of whis­tles, which he freely gave away to the small­er boys and girls whom he met. Just as it is more fun to catch fish than to eat them, so Do­ri­an found more plea­sure in giv­ing away his whis­tles than to stuff them in his own pock­ets. How­ev­er, that af­ter­noon, he had to hur­ry on to town, so he caught no fish, and made on­ly one whis­tle which he found no op­por­tu­ni­ty to give away. In the city, he at­tend­ed to his moth­er's er­rands first. He pur­chased the few no­tions which the store in his home town of Green­street did not have, check­ing each item off on a slip of pa­per with a stub of a pen­cil. Then, there were his shoes.

Should he get lace or but­ton, black or tan? Were there any bar­gains in shoes that af­ter­noon? He would look about to see. He found noth­ing in the way of footwear on Main street which ap­pealed to him. He lin­gered at the win­dow of the book store, look­ing with en­vi­ous eyes at the dis­play of new books. He was well known by the book­seller, for he was a fre­quent vis­itor, and, once in a while, he made a pur­chase; how­ev­er, to day he must not spend too much time “brows­ing” among books. He would, how­ev­er, just slip around to Twen­ty-​fifth street and take a look at the sec­ond­hand store there. Not to buy shoes, of course, but some­times there were oth­er in­ter­est­ing things there, es­pe­cial­ly books.

Ah, look here! Spread out on a ta­ble on the side­walk in front of this sec­ond-​hand store was a lot of books, a hun­dred or more--books of all kind--school books, his­to­ry, fic­tion, all of them in good con­di­tion, some on­ly a lit­tle shop­worn, oth­ers just like new. Do­ri­an Trent ea­ger­ly looked them over. Here were books he had read about, but had not read--and the prices! Dick­ens' “David Cop­per­field”, “Tale of Two Cities”, “Dombey and Son”, large well-​print­ed books, on­ly a lit­tle shop­worn, for thir­ty-​five cents; Thack­er­ay's “Van­ity Fair”, twen­ty-​five cents; books by Mrs. Humphrey Ward and Mar­garet De­land; “Robin­son Cru­soe”, a big book with fine pic­tures. Do­ri­an had, of course, read “Robin­son Cru­soe” but he had al­ways want­ed to own a copy. Ah, what's this? Prescott's “Con­quest of Pe­ru”, two vol­umes, new, fifty cents each! Do­ri­an turned the leaves. A man stepped up and al­so be­gan han­dling the books. Yes, here were bar­gains, sure­ly. He stacked a num­ber to­geth­er as if he de­sired to se­cure them. Do­ri­an be­com­ing fear­ful, slipped the oth­er vol­ume of the Con­quest un­der his arm and made as if to gath­er a num­ber of oth­er books un­der his pro­tec­tion. He must have some of these be­fore they were all tak­en by oth­ers. The sales­man now came up to him and asked:

“Find some­thing you want?”

“O, yes, a lot of things I like” replied Do­ri­an.

“They're bar­gains.”

Do­ri­an need­ed not to be told that.

“They're go­ing fast, too.”

“Yes, I sup­pose so.”

His heart fell as he said it, for he re­al­ized that he had no mon­ey to buy books. He had come to town to buy shoes, which he bad­ly need­ed. He glanced down at his old shoes. They were near­ly falling to pieces, but they might last a lit­tle longer. If he bought the “Con­quest of Pe­ru” he would still have two dol­lars left. Could he buy a pair of shoes for that amount? Very like­ly but not the kind his moth­er had told him to get, the kind that were not too heavy or “sto­gy” look­ing, but would be “nice” for Sun­days. He held tight­ly on to the two books, while Dick­ens and Thack­er­ay were still pro­tect­ing­ly with­in his reach. What could he do?

Down there in Pe­ru there had been a won­der­ful peo­ple whom Pizarro, the bad, bold Spaniard had con­quered and abused. Do­ri­an knew about it all vague­ly as a dim fairy tale; and here was the whole sto­ry, beau­ti­ful­ly and minute­ly told. He must have these books. This bar­gain might nev­er come again to him. But what would his moth­er say? She her­self had added the last half dol­lar to his amount to make sure that he could get the nicer kind.

“Well, sir, how many of these will you have?” asked the sales­man.

“I'll--I'll take these two, any­way”--mean­ing Prescott's Con­quest--“and let me see”, he looked hun­gri­ly over the ti­tles--“And this one 'David Cop­per­field'.” It was hard to se­lect from so many tempt­ing ones. Here was one he had missed: “Ben Hur”--, a fine new copy in blue and gold. He had read the Char­iot Race, and if the whole sto­ry was as in­ter­est­ing as that, he must have it. He hand­ed the vol­ume to the sales­man. Then his hand touched lov­ing­ly a num­ber of oth­er books, but he re­sist­ed the temp­ta­tion, and said: “That's all--this time.”

The clerk wrapped the pur­chase in a news­pa­per and hand­ed the pack­age to Do­ri­an who paid for them with his two sil­ver dol­lars, re­ceiv­ing some small sil­ver in change. Then, with his pack­age un­der his arm, the boy walked on down the street.

Well, what now? He was a lit­tle afraid of what he had done. How could he face his moth­er? How could he go home with­out shoes? Books might be use­ful for the head, but they would not clothe the feet. He jin­gled the coins in his pock­et as he walked on down to the end of the busi­ness sec­tion of the city. He could not buy any kind of shoes to fit his big feet for a dol­lar and twen­ty cents. There was noth­ing more to do but to go home, and “face the mu­sic”, so he walked on in a sort of fear­some ela­tion. At a cor­ner he dis­cov­ered a new can­dy store. Next to books, Do­ri­an liked can­dy. He might as well buy some can­dy for the twen­ty cents. He went in­to the store and took his time look­ing at the tempt­ing dis­play, fi­nal­ly buy­ing ten cents worth of choco­lates for him­self and ten cents worth of pep­per­mint lozenges for his moth­er.

You see, Do­ri­an Trent, though six­teen years old, was very much a child; he did many child­ish things, and yet in some ways, he was quite a man; the child in him and the man in him did not seem to merge in­to the boy, but were some­what “sep­arate and apart,” as the peo­ple of Green­street would say.

Do­ri­an again took the less fre­quent­ed road home. The sun was still high when he reached the riv­er. He was not ex­pect­ed home for some time yet, so there was no need for hur­ry. He crossed the foot­bridge, notic­ing nei­ther birds nor fish. In­stead of fol­low­ing the main path, he struck off in­to a by-​trail which led him to a tiny grass plat in the shade of a tree by the riv­er. He sat down here, took off his hat, and pushed back from a freck­led, sweat­ing fore­head a mop of wavy, rusty-​col­ored hair. Then he un­tied his pack­age of books and spread his trea­sures be­fore him as a miser would his gold. He opened “David Cop­per­field”, looked at the fron­tispiece which de­pict­ed a fat man mak­ing a very em­phat­ic speech against some­one by the name of Heep. It must all be very in­ter­est­ing, but it was al­to­geth­er too big a book for him to be­gin to read now. “Ben Hur” looked sol­id and sub­stan­tial; it would keep un­til next win­ter when he would have more time to read. Then he picked up the “Con­quest”, vol­ume one. He backed up against the tree, set­tled him­self in­to a com­fort­able po­si­tion, took from his pa­per bag a choco­late at which he nib­bled con­tent­ed­ly, and then away he went with Prescott to the land of the In­ca and the glo­ries of a van­ished race!

For an hour he read. Then, re­luc­tant­ly, he closed his book, wrapped up his pack­age again, and went on his home­ward way.

The new canal for which the farm­ers of Green­street had worked and wait­ed so long had just been com­plet­ed. The big ditch, now full of run­ning wa­ter, was a source of de­light to the chil­dren as well as to the more prac­ti­cal adults. The boys and girls played on its banks, and wad­ed and sport­ed in the cool stream. Near the vil­lage of Green­street was a big headgate, from which the canal branched in­to two di­vi­sions. As Do­ri­an walked along the canal bank that af­ter­noon, he saw a group of chil­dren at play near the headgate. They were mak­ing a lot of ro­bust noise, and Do­ri­an stopped to watch them. He was al­ways in­ter­est­ed in the chil­dren, be­ing more of a fa­vorite among them than among the boys of his own age.

“There's Do­ri­an,” shout­ed one of the boys. “Who are you go­ing to mar­ry?”

What in the world were the young­sters talk­ing about, thought the young man, as the chat­ter­ing chil­dren sur­round­ed him.

“What's all this?” asked Do­ri­an, “a par­ty?”

“Yes; it's Car­lia's birth­day; we're just tak­ing a walk by the canal to see the wa­ter; my, but it's nice!”

“What, the par­ty or the wa­ter?”

“Why, the wa­ter.”

“Both” added an­oth­er.

“We've all told who we're go­ing to mar­ry,” re­marked a lit­tle rosy-​faced miss, “all but Car­lia, an' she won't tell.”

“Well, but per­haps Car­lia don't know. You wouldn't have her tell a fib, would you?”

“Oh, shucks, she knows as well as us.”

“She's just stub­born.”

She who was re­ceiv­ing these crit­icisms seemed to be some­what old­er and larg­er than her com­pan­ions. Just now, not deign­ing to no­tice the ac­cu­sa­tion of her friends, she was throw­ing sticks in­to the run­ning wa­ter and watch­ing them go over the falls at the headgate and dance on the rapids be­low. Her white par­ty dress was as yet spot­less. She swung her straw hat by the string. Her brown-​black hair was crowned by an un­usu­al­ly large bow of red rib­bon. She was not the least dis­com­posed by the teas­ing of the oth­er chil­dren, nei­ther by Do­ri­an's pres­ence. This was her par­ty, and why should not she do and say what she pleased.

Car­lia now led the way along the canal bank un­til she came to where a pole spanned the stream. She stopped, looked at the some­what in­se­cure foot­bridge, then turn­ing to her com­pan­ions, said:

“I can back you out.”

“How? Doin' what?” they asked.

“Cross­ing the canal on the pole.”

“Shucks, you can't back me out,” de­clared one of the boys, at which he dart­ed across the sway­ing pole, and with a jump, land­ed safe­ly across. An­oth­er boy went at it gin­ger­ly, and with the an­tics of a tight-​rope walk­er, he man­aged to get to the oth­er side. The oth­er boys held back; none of the girls ven­tured.

“All right, Car­lia,” shout­ed the boys on the oth­er bank.

The girl stood look­ing at the frail pole.

“Come on, it's easy,” they en­cour­aged.

Car­lia placed her foot on the pole as if test­ing it. The oth­er girls protest­ed. She would fall in and drown.

“You dared us; now who's the cow­ard,” cried the boys.

Car­lia took a step for­ward, bal­anced her­self, and took an­oth­er. The chil­dren stood in spell-​bound si­lence. The girl ad­vanced slow­ly along the frail bridge un­til she reached the mid­dle where the pole swayed dan­ger­ous­ly.

“Bal­ance your­self,” sug­gest­ed the sec­ond boy.

“Run,” said the first.

But Car­lia could nei­ther bal­ance nor run. She stood for a mo­ment on the os­cil­lat­ing span, then threw up her hands, and with a scream she plunged in­to the wa­ters of the canal.

No thought of dan­ger had en­tered Do­ri­an's mind as he stood watch­ing the ca­pers of the chil­dren. If any of them fell in, he thought, they would on­ly get a good wet­ting. But as Car­lia fell, he sprang for­ward. The wa­ter at this point was quite deep and run­ning swift­ly. He saw that Car­lia fell on her side and went com­plete­ly un­der. The chil­dren screamed. Do­ri­an, star­tled out of his ap­athy, sud­den­ly ran to the canal and jumped in. It was done so im­pul­sive­ly that he still held on to his pack­age of books. With one hand he lift­ed the girl out of the wa­ter, but in her strug­gles, she knocked the bun­dle from his hand, and the pre­cious books splashed in­to the canal and float­ed down the stream. Do­ri­an made an ef­fort to res­cue them, but Car­lia clung so to his arms that he could do noth­ing but stand and see the pack­age glide over the falls at the headgate and then go danc­ing over the rapids, even as Car­lia's sticks had done. For a mo­ment the young man's thoughts were with his books, and it seemed that he stood there in the canal for quite a while in a sort of daze, with the wa­ter rush­ing by his legs. Then me­chan­ical­ly he car­ried the girl to the bank and would have set her down again with her com­pan­ions, but she clung to him so close­ly and with such ter­ror in her eyes that he lift­ed her in­to his arms and talked re­as­sur­ing­ly to her:

“There, now,” he said, “you're on­ly a bit wet. Don't cry.”

“Take me home. I--I want to go home,” sobbed the girl.

“Sure,” said Do­ri­an. “Come on ev­ery­body.”

He led the way, and the rest of the chil­dren fol­lowed.

“I sup­pose the par­ty's about over, any­way,” sug­gest­ed he.

“I--I guess so.”

They walked on in si­lence for a time; then Car­lia said:

“I guess I'm heavy.”

“Not at all”, lied the young man brave­ly, for she was heav­ier than he had sup­posed; but she made no of­fer to walk. By the time they reached the gate, Car­lia was her­self again, and in­clined to look up­on her wet­ting and es­cape as quite an ad­ven­ture.

“There,” said Do­ri­an as he seat­ed the girl on the broad top of the gate post; “I'll leave you there to dry. It won't take long.”

He looked at his own wet clothes, and then at his ragged, mud-​laden shoes. He might as well car­ry the girl up the path to her home, but then, that was not nec­es­sary. The day was warm, there was no dan­ger of colds, and she could run up the path in a few min­utes.

“Well, I'll go now. Good­by,” he said.

“Wait a minute--Say, I'm glad you saved me, but I'm sor­ry you lost your pack­age. What was in it?”

“On­ly books.”

“I'll get you some more, when I get the mon­ey, yes I will. Come here and lift me down be­fore you go.”

He obeyed. She put a wet arm about his neck and cud­dled her dark, damp curls against his rus­set mop. He lift­ed her light­ly down, and then he slipped a choco­late se­cret­ly in­to her hand.

“Oh girls,” ex­claimed one of the par­ty, “I know now.”

“Know what?” asked Car­lia.

“I know who you are go­ing to mar­ry.”

“Who?”

“You're go­ing to mar­ry Do­ri­an.”