The Turmoil (32 page)

Bibbs and his father were gone when Mrs. Sheridan woke, the next morning, and she had a dreary day. She missed Edith woefully, and she worried about what might be taking place in the Sheridan Building. She felt that everything depended on how Bibbs “took hold,” and upon her husband’s return in the evening she seized upon the first opportunity to ask him how things had gone. He was non-committal. What could anybody tell by the first day? He’d seen plenty go at things well enough right at the start and then blow up. Pretty near anybody could show up fair the first day or so. There was a big job ahead. This material, such as it was—Bibbs, in fact—had to be broken in to handling the work Roscoe had done; and then, at least as an overseer, he must take Jim’s position in the Realty Company as well. He told her to ask him again in a month.

But during the course of dinner she gathered from some disjointed remarks of his that he and Bibbs had lunched together at the small restaurant where it had been Sheridan’s custom to lunch with Jim, and she took this to be an encouraging sign. Bibbs went to his room as soon as they left the table, and her husband was not communicative after reading his paper.

She became an anxious spectator of Bibbs’s progress as a man of business, although it was a progress she could glimpse but dimly and only in the evening, through his remarks and his father’s at dinner. Usually Bibbs was silent, except when directly addressed, but on the first evening of the third week of his new career he offered an opinion which had apparently been the subject of previous argument.

“I’d like you to understand just what I meant about those storage-rooms, father,” he said, as Jackson placed his coffee before him. “Abercrombie agreed with me, but you wouldn’t listen to him.”

“You can talk, if you want to, and I’ll listen,” Sheridan returned, “but you can’t show me that Jim ever took up with a bad thing. The roof fell because it hadn’t had time to settle and on account of weather conditions. I want that building put just the way Jim planned it.”

“You can’t have it,” said Bibbs. “You can’t, because Jim planned for the building to stand up, and it won’t do it. The other one—the one that didn’t fall—is so shot with cracks we haven’t dared use it for storage. It won’t stand weight. There’s only one thing to do: get both buildings down as quickly as we can, and build over. Brick’s the best and cheapest in the long run for that type.”

Sheridan looked sarcastic. “Fine! What we goin’ to do for storage-rooms while we’re waitin’ for those few bricks to be laid?”

“Rent,” Bibbs returned, promptly. “We’ll lose money if we don’t rent, anyhow—they were waiting so long for you to give the warehouse matter your attention after the roof fell. You don’t know what an amount of stuff they’ve got piled up on us over there. We’d have to rent until we could patch up those process perils—and the Krivitch Manufacturing Company’s plant is empty, right across the street. I took an option on it for us this morning.”

Sheridan’s expression was queer. “Look here!” he said, sharply. “Did you go and do that without consulting me?”

“It didn’t cost anything,” said Bibbs. “It’s only until to-morrow afternoon at two o’clock. I undertook to convince you before then.”

“Oh, you did?” Sheridan’s tone was sardonic. “Well, just suppose you couldn’t convince me.”

“I can, though—and I intend to,” said Bibbs, quietly. “I don’t think you understand the condition of those buildings you want patched up.”

“Now, see here,” said Sheridan, with slow emphasis; “suppose I had my mind set about this. JIM thought they’d stand, and suppose it was—well, kind of a matter of sentiment with me to prove he was right.”

Bibbs looked at him compassionately. “I’m sorry if you have a sentiment about it, father,” he said. “But whether you have or not can’t make a difference. You’ll get other people hurt if you trust that process, and that won’t do. And if you want a monument to Jim, at least you want one that will stand. Besides, I don’t think you can reasonably defend sentiment in this particular kind of affair.”

“Oh, you don’t?”

“No, but I’m sorry you didn’t tell me you felt it.”

Sheridan was puzzled by his son’s tone. “Why are you ‘sorry’?” he asked, curiously.

“Because I had the building inspector up there, this noon,” said Bibbs, “and I had him condemn both those buildings.”

“What?”

“He’d been afraid to do it before, until he heard from us—afraid you’d see he lost his job. But he can’t un-condemn them—they’ve got to come down now.”

Sheridan gave him a long and piercing stare from beneath lowered brows. Finally he said, “How long did they give you on that option to convince me?”

“Until two o’clock to-morrow afternoon.”

“All right,” said Sheridan, not relaxing. “I’m convinced.”

Bibbs jumped up. “I thought you would be. I’ll telephone the Krivitch agent. He gave me the option until to-morrow, but I told him I’d settle it this evening.”

Sheridan gazed after him as he left the room, and then, though his expression did not alter in the slightest, a sound came from him that startled his wife. It had been a long time since she had heard anything resembling a chuckle from him, and this sound—although it was grim and dry—bore that resemblance.

She brightened eagerly. “Looks like he was startin’ right well don’t it, papa?”

“Startin’? Lord! He got me on the hip! Why, HE knew what I wanted —that’s why he had the inspector up there, so’t he’d have me beat before we even started to talk about it. And did you hear him? ‘Can’t reasonably defend SENTIMENT!’ And the way he says ‘Us’: ‘Took an option for Us’! ‘Stuff piled up on Us’!”

There was always an alloy for Mrs. sheridan. “I don’t just like the way he looks, though, papa.”

“Oh, there’s got to be something! Only one chick left at home, so you start to frettin’ about IT!”

“No. He’s changed. There’s kind of a settish look to his face, and—”

“I guess that’s the common sense comin’ out on him, then,” said Sheridan. “You’ll see symptoms like that in a good many business men, I expect.”

“Well, and he don’t have as good color as he was gettin’ before. And he’d begun to fill out some, but—”

Sheridan gave forth another dry chuckle, and, going round the table to her, patted her upon the shoulder with his left hand, his right being still heavily bandaged, though he no longer wore a sling. “That’s the way it is with you, mamma—got to take your frettin’ out one way if you don’t another!”

“No. He don’t look well. It ain’t exactly the way he looked when he begun to get sick that time, but he kind o’ seems to be losin’, some way.”

“Yes, he may ‘a’ lost something,” said Sheridan. “I expect he’s lost a whole lot o’ foolishness besides his God-forsaken notions about writin’ poetry and—”

“No,” his wife persisted. “I mean he looks right peakid. And yesterday, when he was settin’ with us, he kept lookin’ out the window. He wasn’t readin’.”

“Well, why shouldn’t he look out the window?”

“He was lookin’ over there. He never read a word all afternoon, I don’t believe.”

“Look, here!” said Sheridan. “Bibbs might ‘a’ kept goin’ on over there the rest of his life, moonin’ on and on, but what he heard Sibyl say did one big thing, anyway. It woke him up out of his trance. Well, he had to go and bust clean out with a bang; and that stopped his goin’ over there, and it stopped his poetry, but I reckon he’s begun to get pretty fair pay for what he lost. I guess a good many young men have had to get over worries like his; they got to lose SOMETHING if they’re goin’ to keep ahead o’ the procession nowadays —and it kind o’ looks to me, mamma, like Bibbs might keep quite a considerable long way ahead. Why, a year from now I’ll bet you he won’t know there ever WAS such a thing as poetry! And ain’t he funny? He wanted to stick to the shop so’s he could ‘think’! What he meant was, think about something useless. Well, I guess he’s keepin’ his mind pretty occupied the other way these days. Yes, sir, it took a pretty fair-sized shock to get him out of his trance, but it certainly did the business.” He patted his wife’s shoulder again, and then, without any prefatory symptoms, broke into a boisterous laugh.

“Honest, mamma, he works like a gorilla!”

And so Bibbs sat in the porch of the temple with the money-changers. But no one came to scourge him forth, for this was the temple of Bigness, and the changing of money was holy worship and true religion. The priests wore that “settish” look Bibbs’s mother had seen beginning to develop about his mouth and eyes—a wary look which she could not define, but it comes with service at the temple; and it was the more marked upon Bibbs for his sharp awakening to the necessities of that service.

He did as little “useless” thinking as possible, giving himself no time for it. He worked continuously, keeping his thoughts still on his work when he came home at night; and he talked of nothing whatever except his work. But he did not sing at it. He was often in the streets, and people were not allowed to sing in the streets. They might make any manner of hideous uproar—they could shake buildings; they could out-thunder the thunder, deafen the deaf, and kill the sick with noise; or they could walk the streets or drive through them bawling, squawking, or screeching, as they chose, if the noise was traceably connected with business; though street musicians were not tolerated, being considered a nuisance and an interference. A man or woman who went singing for pleasure through the streets—like a crazy Neopolitan—would have been stopped, and belike locked up; for Freedom does not mean that a citizen is allowed to do every outrageous thing that comes into his head. The streets were dangerous enough, in all conscience, without any singing! and the Motor Federation issued public warnings declaring that the pedestrian’s life was in his own hands, and giving directions how to proceed with the least peril. However, Bibbs Sheridan had no desire to sing in the streets, or anywhere. He had gone to his work with an energy that, for the start, at least, was bitter, and there was no song left in him.

He began to know his active fellow-citizens. Here and there among them he found a leisurely, kind soul, a relic of the old period of neighborliness, “pioneer stock,” usually; and there were men —particularly among the merchants and manufacturers—“so honest they leaned backward”; reputations sometimes attested by stories of heroic sacrifices to honor; nor were there lacking some instances of generosity even nobler. Here and there, too, were book-men, in their little leisure; and, among the Germans, music-men. And these, with the others, worshiped Bigness and the growth, each man serving for his own sake and for what he could get out of it, but all united in their faith in the beneficence and glory of their god.

To almost all alike that service stood as the most important thing in life, except on occasion of some such vital, brief interregnum as the dangerous illness of a wife or child. In the way of “relaxation” some of the servers took golf; some took fishing; some took “shows” —a mixture of infantile and negroid humor, stockings, and tin music; some took an occasional debauch; some took trips; some took cards; and some took nothing. The high priests were vigilant to watch that no “relaxation” should affect the service. When a man attended to anything outside his business, eyes were upon him; his credit was in danger—that is, his life was in danger. And the old priests were as ardent as the young ones; the million was as eager to be bigger as the thousand; seventy was as busy as seventeen. They strove mightily against one another, and the old priests were the most wary, the most plausible, and the most dangerous. Bibbs learned he must walk charily among these—he must wear a thousand eyes and beware of spiders indeed!

And outside the temple itself were the pretenders, the swarming thieves and sharpers and fleecers, the sly rascals and the open rascals; but these were feeble folk, not dangerous once he knew them, and he had a good guide to point them out to him. They were useful sometimes, he learned, and many of them served as go-betweens in matters where business must touch politics. He learned also how breweries and “traction” companies and banks and other institutions fought one another for the political control of the city. The newspapers, he discovered, had lost their ancient political influence, especially with the knowing, who looked upon them with a skeptical humor, believing the journals either to be retained partisans, like lawyers, or else striving to forward the personal ambitions of their owners. The control of the city lay not with them, but was usually obtained by giving the hordes of negroes gin-money, and by other largesses. The revenues of the people were then distributed as fairly as possible among a great number of men who had assisted the winning side. Names and titles of offices went with many of the prizes, and most of these title-holders were expected to present a busy appearance at times; and, indeed, some among them did work honestly and faithfully.

Bibbs had been very ignorant. All these simple things, so well known and customary, astonished him at first, and once—in a brief moment of forgetting that he was done with writing—he thought that if he had known them and written of them, how like a satire the plainest relation of them must have seemed! Strangest of all to him was the vehement and sincere patriotism. On every side he heard it—it was a permeation; the newest school-child caught it, though just from Hungary and learning to stammer a few words of the local language. Everywhere the people shouted of the power, the size, the riches, and the growth of their city. Not only that, they said that the people of their city were the greatest, the “finest,” the strongest, the Biggest people on earth. They cited no authorities, and felt the need of none, being themselves the people thus celebrated. And if the thing was questioned, or if it was hinted that there might be one small virtue in which they were not perfect and supreme, they wasted no time examining themselves to see if what the critic said was true, but fell upon him and hooted him and cursed him, for they were sensitive. So Bibbs, learning their ways and walking with them, harkened to the voice of the people and served Bigness with them. For the voice of the people is the voice of their god.