Book 1 - Chapter 6. The Return Of The Artist

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_ CHAPTER VI. The Return of the Artist

After an absence of five months I returned to La Crosse just in time to eat Old Settlers Dinner with my mother at the County Fair, quite as I used to do in the "early days" of Iowa. It was the customary annual round-up of the pioneers, a time of haunting, sweetly-sad recollections, and all the speeches were filled with allusions to the days when deer on the hills and grouse in the meadows gave zest to life upon the farms.

How peaceful, how secure, how abundant my native valley appeared to me, after those gloomy toilsome months in the cold, green forests of British Columbia--and how incredible my story must have seemed to my mother as I told her of my journey eastward by boat and train, bringing my saddle horse across four thousand miles of wood and wave, in order that he might spend his final years with me in the oat-filled, sheltered valley of Neshonoc. "His courage and faithfulness made it impossible for me to leave him up there," I explained.

He had arrived on the train which preceded me, and was still in the car. At the urgent request of my Uncle Frank I unloaded him, saddled him, and rode him down to the fair-ground, wearing my travel-scarred sombrero, my faded trailer's suit and my leggings, a mild exhibition of vanity which I trust the reader will overlook, for in doing this I not only gave keen joy to my relatives, but furnished another "Feature" to the show.

My friend, Samuel McKee, the Presbyterian minister in the village, being from Kentucky, came nearer to understanding the value of my horse than any other spectator. "I don't wonder you brought him back," he said, after careful study. "He is a beauty. There's a strain of Arabian in him."

My mother's joy over my safe return was quite as wordless as her sorrow at our parting (in April) had been. To have me close beside her, to lay her hand upon my arm, filled her with inexpressible content. She could not imagine the hundredth part of the hardships I had endured, and I made no special effort to enlighten her--I merely said, "You needn't worry, mother, one such experience is enough. I shall never leave you for so many months again," and I meant it.

With a shy smile and a hesitant voice, she reverted to a subject which was of increasing interest to her. "What about my new daughter? When am I to see her? I hope now you'll begin to think of a wife. First thing you know you'll be too old."

My reply was vaguely jocular. "Be patient a little while longer. I shall seriously set to work and see what I can find for you by way of a daughter-in-law."

"Choose a nice one," she persisted. "One that will like the old house--and me. Don't get one who will be too stylish to live here with us."

In this enterprise I was not as confident as I appeared, for the problem was not simple. "The girl who can consent to be my wife must needs have a generous heart and a broad mind, to understand (and share) the humble conditions of my life, and to tolerate the simple, old-fashioned notions of my people. It will not be easy," I acknowledged. "I can not afford to make a mistake--one that will bring grief and not happiness to the homestead and its mistress."

However, I decided to let that worry stand over. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," was a saying which my father often repeated--and yet I was nearing the dead line! I was thirty-eight.

That first night of my return to the valley was of such rich and tender beauty that all the suffering, the hardships of my exploration were forgotten. The moon was at its full, and while the crickets and the katydids sang in unison, the hills dreamed in the misty distance like vast, peaceful, patient, crouching animals. The wheat and corn burdened the warm wind with messages of safely-garnered harvests, and my mind, reacting to the serenity, the peace, the opulence of it all, was at rest. The dark swamps of the Bulkley, the poisonous plants of the Skeena, the endless ice-cold marshes of the high country, the stinging insects of the tundra, and the hurtling clouds of the White Pass, all seemed events of another and more austere planet.

On the day following the fair, just as I was stripping my coat and rolling my sleeves to help my father fence in a pasture for Ladrone, a neighbor came along bringing a package from the post office. It was a book, a copy of my _Life of Grant_, the first I had seen; and, as I opened it I laughed, for I bore little resemblance to a cloistered historian at the moment. My face was the color of a worn saddle; my fingers resembled hooks of bronze, and my feet carried huge, hob-nail shoes. "What would Dr. Brander Matthews, Colonel Church and Howells, who had warmly commended the book, think of me at this moment?" I asked myself.

Father was interested, of course, but he was not one to permit a literary interest to interfere with a very important job. "Bring that spade," commanded he, and putting my history on top of a post, I set to work, digging another hole, rejoicing in my strength, for at that time I weighed one hundred and eighty pounds, all bone and muscle. So much the trail had done for me.

I had broadened my palms to the cinch and the axe--I had laid my breast to the rain.

Nothing physical appalled me, and no labor really wearied me.

Oh, the wealth of that day's sunlight, the opulence of those nearby fields--the beauty of those warmly-misted hills! In the evening, as I mounted Ladrone and rode him down the lane, I had no desire to share Burton's perilous journey down the Hotalinqua.

As my mother's excitement over my return passed away, her condition was disturbing to me. She was walking less and less and I began at once to consider a course of treatment which might help her. At my aunt's suggestion I wrote to a physician in Madison whose sanitarium she had found helpful, and as my brother chanced to be playing in Milwaukee, I induced mother to go with me to visit him. She consented quite readily for she was eager to see him in a real theater and a real play.

We took lodging in one of the leading hotels, which seemed very splendid to her and that night she saw Franklin on the stage as one of "the three Dromios" in a farce called "Incog," a piece which made her laugh till she was almost breathless.

Next day we took her shopping. That is to say she went along with us a helpless victim, while we purchased for her a hat and cloak, at an expense which seemed to her almost criminal. They were in truth very plain garments, and comparatively inexpensive, but her tender heart overflowed with pride of her sons and a guilty joy in their extravagance. Many times afterward I experienced, as I do at this moment, a sharp pang of regret that I did not insist on a better cloak, a more beautiful hat. I only hope she understood!

In this way, or some other way, I bribed her to go with me to Madison, to the Sanitarium. "You must not run home," I said to her. "Make a fair trial of the Institution."

To this she uttered no reply and as she did not appear homesick or depressed, I prepared to leave, with a feeling that she was in good hands, and that her health would be greatly benefited by the regimen. "I must go to the city and look up that new daughter," I said to her in excuse for deserting her, and this made her entirely willing to let me go.

Chicago brilliantly illuminated, was filled with the spirit of the Peace Jubilee, as I entered it. State Street, grandly impressive under the sweep of a raw east wind, was gay with banners and sparkling with looping thousands of electric lights, but I hurried at once to my study on Elm Street. In half an hour I was deep in my correspondence. The Telegraph Trail was a million miles away, New York and its publishers claimed my full attention once again.

* * * * *

At two o'clock next day I entered Taft's studio, where I received many cordial congratulations on my return. "I can't understand why you went," Lorado said, and when, at the close of the afternoon, Browne, his brother-in-law, invited me to dinner, saying, "You'll find Miss Zulime Taft there," I accepted. Although in some doubt about Miss Taft's desire to meet me, I was curious to know what four years of Paris had done for her.

Browne explained that she was going to take up some sort of work in Chicago. "She's had enough of the Old World for the present."

As he let us into the hall of his West Side apartment, I caught a momentary glimpse of a young woman seated in the living room, busily sewing. She rose calmly, though a little surprised at our invasion, and with her rising, spools of thread and bits of cloth fell away from her with comic effect, although her expression remained loftily serene.

"Hello, sister Zuhl," called Browne. "Here is an old-time friend of yours."

As she greeted me with entire self-possession I hardly recognized her relationship to the pale, self-possessed art-student, with whom I had held unprofitable argument some four years before. She was much more mature and in better health than when I last saw her. She carried herself with dignity, and her gown, graceful of line and rich in color, fitted her beautifully.

With no allusion to our former differences she was kind enough to say that she had been a delighted reader of my stories in the magazines, and that she approved of America. "I've come back to stay," she said, and we all applauded her statement.

As the evening deepened I perceived that her long stay in England and in France had done a great deal for Zulime Taft. She was not only well informed in art matters, she conversed easily and tactfully, and her accent was refined without being affected. As we settled into our seats around the dinner table, I was glad to find her opposite me.

She had met many interesting and distinguished people, both in London and on the Continent, and she brought to our little circle that night the latest word in French art. Indeed, her comment was so entertaining, and so valuable, that I was quite converted to her brother's judgment concerning her term of exile: "Whether you go on with your sculpture or not," he said, "those four years of Europe have done more for you than a college course."

She represented everything antithetic to the trail and the farm. She knew little of New England and nothing of the Mountain West. In many ways she was entirely alien to my life and yet--or rather because of that--she interested me. Filled with theories concerning art--enthusiasms with which the "American Colony" in Paris was aflame, she stated them clearly, forcibly and with humor. Her temper in argument was admirable and no man had occasion to talk down at her--as Browne, who was a good deal of a conservative, openly acknowledged.

She was all for "technique," it appeared. "What America needs more than subject is skill, knowledge of how to paint," she declared. "Anything can be made beautiful by the artist's brush."

At the close of a most delightful evening Fuller and I took our departure together, and we were hardly out of the door before he began to express open, almost unrestrained admiration of Zulime Taft. "She's a very remarkable girl," he said. "She will prove a most valuable addition to our circle."

"Yes," I admitted with judicial poise, "she is very intelligent."

"Intelligent!" he indignantly retorted. "She's a beauty. She's a prize. Go in and win."

Although I did not decide at that moment to go in and win, I was profoundly affected by his words. Without knowing anything more about her than these two meetings gave me, I took it for granted--quite without warrant, that Fuller had learned from Lorado that she was not committed to any one. It was fatuous in me but on this assumption I acted.

By reference to letters and other records I find that I dined at the Browne's on the slightest provocation. I suspect I did so without any invitation at all, for while Miss Taft did not betray keen interest in me she did not precisely discourage me. I sought her company as often as possible without calling especial attention to my action, and as she gave no hint of being friendlier with any other man, I went cheerily, blindly along.

One afternoon as I was taking tea at one of the great houses of the Lake Shore Drive, she came into the room with the easy grace of one habituated to meeting people of wealth and distinction. Neither arrogant nor humble, her self-respecting composure fairly sealed her conquest so far as I was concerned.

The group of artists surrounding Taft had formed an informal Saturday night club, which met in a "Camp Supper," and in these jolly, intimate evenings Miss Taft and her sister, Mrs. Browne, were guiding spirits. Being included in this group I acknowledged these parties to be the most delightful events of my life in Chicago. They appeared a bit of Bohemia, "transmogrified" to suit our conditions, and they made the city seem less like a drab expanse of desolate materialism.

Sometimes a great geologist would help to make the coffee, while an architect carved the turkey; and sometimes banker Hutchinson was permitted to aid in distributing plates and spoons, but always Zulime Taft was one of the hostesses, and no one added more to the distinction and the charm of the company. She was never out of character, never at a loss in an effort to entertain her guests, and yet she did this so effectively that her absence was instantly felt--I, at least, always resented the action of those wealthy guests who occasionally hurried away with her to the Thomas Concert at eight-fifteen. My mood was all the more bitter for the reason that I could not afford to take her there myself. To ask her to sit in the gallery was disgraceful, and seats in the balcony were not only expensive, but almost impossible to get. They were all sold, in advance, for the season. For all these reasons I frequently watched her departure with a sense of defeat.

Israel Zangwill, who came to town at about this time to lecture, was brought to one of our suppers and proved to be of the true artist spirit. During his stay in the city Taft made a quick sketch of him, catching most admirably the characteristics of his homely face! He was a quaint yet powerful personality, witty and wise, and genial, and made friends wherever he went.

Meanwhile, notwithstanding many pleasant meetings with Miss Taft--perhaps because of them--I had my moments of gloomy introspection wherein I cast up accounts in order to determine what I had gained by my six months' vacation in the wilderness. First of all I had become a master trailer--so much was assured, but this acquirement did not promise to be of any practical benefit to me except possibly in the way of a lecture tour. Broadening my hand to the cinch and the axe did not make me any more attractive as a suitor and certainly did not add anything to my capital.

My outing had cost me twice what I had calculated upon, and, thus far, I had only syndicated a few letters and a handful of poems. The book which I had in mind to write was still a mass of notes. My horse, whose transportation and tariff had cost me a thousand dollars, was of little use to me, although I hoped to get back a part of his cost by means of a story. My lecture on "The Joys of the Trail" promised to be moderately successful, and yet with all these things conjoined I did not see myself earning enough to warrant me in asking Zulime Taft or any woman to be the daughter which my mother was so eagerly awaiting.

It was a time of halting, of transition for me. For six years--even while writing my story of Ulysses Grant I had been absorbing the mountain west in the growing desire to put it into fiction, and now with a burden of Klondike material to be disposed of, I was subconsciously at work upon a story of the plains and the Rocky Mountain foothills. In short, as a cattleman would say, I was "milling" in the midst of a wide landscape.

I should have gone on to New York at once, but with the alluring associations of Taft's studio, I lingered on through November and December, excusing myself by saying that I could work out my problem better in my own room on Elm Street than in a hotel in New York, and as a matter of fact I did succeed in writing several chapters of the Colorado novel which I called _The Eagle's Heart_.

At last, late in December, I bundled my manuscripts together and set out for the East. Perhaps this decision was hastened by some editorial suggestion--at any rate I arrived, for I find in my diary the record of a luncheon with Brander Matthews who said he liked my Grant book,--a verdict which heartened me wonderfully. I believed it to be a good book then, as I do now, but it was not selling as well as we had confidently expected it to do and my publishers had lost interest in it.

The reason for the failure of this book was simple. The war with Spain had thrust between the readers of my generation and the Civil War, new commanders, new slogans and new heroes. To this later younger public "General Grant" meant _Frederick_ Grant, and all hats were off to Dewey, Wood and Roosevelt. "You are precisely two years late with your story of the Great Commander," I was told, and this I was free to acknowledge.

There is an old proverb which had several times exactly described my situation and which described it then. "It is always darkest just before dawn," proved to be true of this particular period of discouragement, for one day while at The Players, Brett, the head of Macmillans, came up to me and said, "Why don't you let me take over your _Main Traveled Roads_, _Prairie Folks_, and _Rose of Dutcher's Coolly_? I will do this provided you will write two new books for me, one to be called _Boy Life on the Prairie_ and the other a Klondike book based on your experiences in the North."

This offer cleared my sky. It not only gave direction to my pen--it roused my hopes of having a home of my own, for Brett's offer involved the advance of several thousand dollars in royalty. I began to think of marriage in a more definite way. My case was not so hopeless after all. Perhaps Zulime Taft----

Taking a room on Twenty-fifth street I set to work with eager intensity to get these five books in shape for the Macmillan press, and in two weeks I had carefully revised _Rose_ and was hard at work on the record of my story of the Northwest which I called _The Trail of the Gold Seekers_. I was done with "milling." I was headed straight for a home.

In calling upon Howells soon after my arrival I referred to our last meeting wherein I had lightly remarked (putting my finger on the map), "I shall go in here at Quesnelle and come out there, on the Stickeen," and said, "I am now able to report. I did it. In spite of all the chances for failure I carried out my program."

He asked about the dangers I had undergone, and I replied by saying, "A trailer meets his dangers and difficulties one by one. In the mass they are appalling but singly they are surmountable. We took each mile as it came."

"What do you intend to do with your experiences?" he asked.

"I don't know, but I _think_ they will take the form of a chronicle, a kind of diary, wherein each chapter will be called a camp. Camp One, Camp Two, and the like."

"That sounds original and promising," he said, and with his encouragement I set to work.

Israel Zangwill was often in the city and we met frequently during January and February. I recall taking him to see Howells whom he greatly admired but had never met. They made a singularly interesting contrast of East and West. Howells was serious, almost sad for some reason, unassuming, self-unconscious and yet masterly in every word. Zangwill on the contrary overflowed with humor, emitting a shower of epigrams concerning America and the things he liked and disliked, and soon had Howells smiling with pleased interest.

As we were leaving the house Zangwill remarked in a musing tone, "What fine humility, or rather modesty. I can't imagine any other man of Howells' eminence taking that tone."

Kipling had just returned to America, and I went at once to call upon him. I had not seen him since the dinner which he gave to Riley and me in the early Nineties, and I was in doubt as to his attitude toward the States. I found him in a very happy mood, surrounded by callers. In the years of his absence the American public had learned to place a very high value on his work and thousands of his readers were eager to do him honor.

"They come in a perfect stream," he said, and there was a note of surprise as well as of pleasure in his voice.

He inquired of Riley and Howells and other of our mutual friends, making it plain that he held us all in his affections. I mention his youth, his happiness, his joy with special emphasis for he was stricken with pneumonia a few days later and came so near death that only the most skillful nursing was able to bring him back to health. For two nights his life was despaired of, and when he recovered consciousness it was only to learn that one of his children had died while he himself was at lowest ebb. It was a most tragic reversal of fortune but it had this compensation, it called forth such a flood of sympathy on the part of his public that the daily press carried hourly bulletins of his conditions. It was as if a great ruler were in danger.

On Saturday the eleventh of February, I attended a meeting (the first meeting) of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. Charles Dudley Warner presided, but Howells was the chief figure. Owen Wister, Robert Underwood Johnson, Augustus Thomas and Bronson Howard took an active part. Warner appointed Thomas and me as a committee to outline a Constitution and By-laws, and I set down in my diary this comment, "Only a few men were out and these few were chilled by a cold room but nevertheless, this meeting is likely to have far-reaching consequences."

In these months of my stay in New York I had a very busy and profitable time with Howells, Burroughs, Stedman, Matthews, Herne and their like as neighbors but after all, my home was in the West, and many times each day my mind went back to my mother waiting in the snow-covered little village thirteen hundred miles away. As I had established her in Wisconsin to be near me, it seemed a little like desertion to be spending the winter in the East.

My thoughts often returned to the friendly circle in Taft's studio, and late in February I was keenly interested in a letter from Lorado in which he informed me that Wallace Heckman, Attorney for The Art Institute, had offered to give the land to found a summer colony of artists and literary folk on the East bank of Rock River about one hundred miles west of Chicago. "You are to be one of the trustees," Lorado wrote, "and as soon as you get back, Mr. Heckman wants to take us all out to look at the site for the proposed camp."

My return to Chicago on the first day of March landed me in the midst of a bleak period of raw winds, filthy slush and all-pervading grime--but with hopes which my new contract with Macmillans had inspired I defied the weather. I rejoined Lorado's circle at once in the expectation of meeting his sister, and in this I was not disappointed.

Lorado referred at once to Heckman's offer to deed to our group a tract of land. "He wants you to be one of the trustees and has invited us all to go out at once and inspect the site."

Upon learning that Miss Taft was to be one of the members of the colony I accepted the trusteeship very readily. With three thousand dollars advance royalty in sight, I began to imagine myself establishing a little home somewhere in or near Chicago, and the idea of an inexpensive summer camp such as my artist friends had in mind, appealed to me strongly.

Alas for my secret hopes!--Whether on this tour of inspection or a few days later I cannot now be sure, but certainly close upon this date Lorado (moved by some confiding remark concerning my interest in his sister Zulime) explained to me with an air of embarrassment that I must not travel any farther in that direction. "Sister Zuhl came back from Paris not to paint or model but to be married. She is definitely committed to another man." He finally, bluntly said.

This was a bitter defeat. Although one takes such blows better at thirty-nine than at nineteen, one doesn't lightly say "Oh, well--such is life!" I was in truth disheartened. All my domestic plans fell with a crash. My interest in the colony cooled. The camp suppers lost their charm.

It is only fair to me to say that Miss Taft had never indicated in any way that she was mortgaged to another, and no one--so far as I could see, was more in her favor than I, hence I was not entirely to blame in the case. My inferences were logical. So far as her words and actions were concerned I was justified in my hope that she might consent.

However, regarding Lorado's warning as final I turned to another and wholly different investment of the cash with which my new contract had embarrassed me. I decided to go to England.

For several years my friends in London had been suggesting that I visit them and I had a longing to do so. I wanted to see Barrie, Shaw, Hardy, Besant, and other of my kindly correspondents and this seemed my best time to make the journey.

_Rose of Dutcher's Coolly_ had won for me many English friends. Henry James had reviewed it, Barrie had written to me in praise of it and Stead had republished it in a cheap edition which had gained a wide circle of readers. "In going abroad now I shall be going among friends," I said to Fuller who was my confidant, as usual.

Henry James in a long and intimate letter had said, "It is high time for you to visit England. I shall take great pleasure in having you for a week-end here at Old Rye"--and a re-reading of this letter tipped the scale. I took the train for Wisconsin to see my mother and prepare her for my immediate trip to London.

Dear soul! She was doubly deeply disappointed, for I not only failed to bring assurance of a new daughter, I came with an avowal of desertion in my mouth. Pathetically counting on my spending the summer with her, she must now be told that I was about to sail for the Old World!

It was not a happy home-coming. I acknowledged myself to be a base, unfilial, selfish wretch, "and yet--if I am ever to see London now is my time. Each year my mother will be older, feebler. The sooner I make the crossing the safer for us all. Furthermore I am no longer young--and just now with Barrie, Shaw, Zangwill, Doyle and Henry James, England will be hospitable to me. The London Macmillans are to bring out my books and so----"

Mother consented at last, tearfully, begging me not to stay long and to write often, to which I replied, "You may count on me in July. I shall only be gone three months--four at the outside. I shall send Frank to stay with you--and I shall write every day."

Just before coming to West Salem (with a feeling of guilt in my heart) I had purchased a mechanical piano in the hope that it would cheer her lonely hours, and as this instrument had arrived I unboxed it and set it up in the music room, eager to please the old folks to whom it was an amazing contrivance.

It was on Sunday and Uncle Will came in together with several of the neighbors, and while I manipulated the stops and worked the pedals, they all sat in silence, marveling at the cunning of the mechanism rather than enjoying "The Ride of the Valkyries." However as I played some simpler things, a song of MacDowells, a study by Grieg, my Uncle's head bowed, and on his face came that somber brooding look which recalled to me the moods of David, his younger brother, whose violin had meant so much to me when as a boy, I lay before the fire and listened with sweet Celtic melancholy to the wailing of its strings.

Something in these northern melodies sank deep into my mother's inherited memories, also, and her eyes were wide and still with inward vision, but my Aunt Susan said, "That's a fine invention, but I'd rather hear you sing," and in this judgment Maria concurred. "It's grand," she admitted, "but 'tain't like the human voice."

In the end I put the machine back in the corner and sang for them, some of the familiar songs. The instrument was surprising and new and wonderful but it did not touch the hearts of my auditors like "Minnie Minturn" and "The Palace of the King."

On the day following I set the date of my departure and at the end of my announcement mother sat in silence, her face clouded with pain, her eyes looking away into space. She had nothing to say in opposition, not a word--she only said, "If you're going I guess the quicker you start the better." _

Read next: Book 1: Chapter 7. London And Evening Dress

Read previous: Book 1: Chapter 5. The Telegraph Trail

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