The Seventh Noon

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[Frontispiece: "Spring," she answered. "Just spring"
(missing from book)]

THE SEVENTH NOON

BY

FREDERICK ORIN BARTLETT

_Author of "The Web of the Golden Spider",
"Joan of the Alley," etc._

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY

EDMUND FREDERICK

BOSTON

SMALL, MAYNARD AND COMPANY

PUBLISHERS

COPYRIGHT, 1910

By Small, Maynard & Company

(INCORPORATED)

Entered at Stationers' Hall

Two editions before publication, January, 1910

To

K. P. B. and K. J. B.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I THE BLACK DOG
II KING OF TO-DAY
III THE BEGINNING OF THE END
IV KISMET
V THE INNER WOODS
VI THE SHADOW ON THE PORTRAITS
VII THE ARSDALES
VIII THE MAN WHO KNEW
IX DAWN
X OUTSIDE THE HEDGE
XI A PARTING AND A MEETING
XII DISTRICT MESSENGER 3457
XIII THE SLEEPERS
XIV CONSEQUENCES
XV THE DERELICT
XVI THE FOURTH DAY
XVII AN INTERLUDE
XVIII THE MAKING OF A MAN
XIX A MIRACLE
XX A LONG NIGHT
XXI FACING THE SUN
XXII CLOUDS
XXIII WHEN THE DEAD AWAKE
XXIV THE GREATER MASTER
XXV THE SHADOW ON THE FLOOR
XXVI ON THE BRINK
XXVII THE END OF THE BEGINNING
XXVIII THE SEVENTH NOON

ILLUSTRATIONS

"Spring," she answered. "Just spring" . . . _Frontispiece_

"What, you, Miss Arsdale?"

As he studied her it seemed certain that she was
by no means enjoying herself in her present company

Facing her he faced the pendulum which ticked
out to him the cost of each new picture he had of her

He lowered the rails, and Miss Arsdale led the way

"The kid," he announced laconically. "What yuh think of him?"

At noon! At the seventh noon, the whistle was to blow!

The Seventh Noon

CHAPTER I

_The Black Dog_

"The right to die?"

Professor Barstow, with a perplexed scowl ruffling the barbette of gray
hairs above his keen eyes, shook his head and turning from the young
man whose long legs extended over the end of the lean sofa upon which
he sprawled in one corner of the laboratory, held the test-tube, which
he had been studying abstractedly, up to the light. The flickering gas
was not good for delicate work, and it was only lately that Barstow,
spurred on by a glimpse of the end to a long series of experiments, had
attempted anything after dark. He squinted thoughtfully at the yellow
fluid in the tube and then, resuming his discussion, declared
emphatically,

"We have no such right, Peter! You 're wrong. I don't know where,
because you put it too cleverly for me. But I know you 're dead
wrong--even if your confounded old theories are right, even if your
deductions are sound. You 're wrong where you bring up."

"Man dear," answered the other gently, "you are too good a scientist to
reason so. That is purely feminine logic."

"I am too good a scientist to believe that anything so complex as human
life was meant to be wasted in a scheme where not so much as an atom is
lost. Bah, your liver is asleep! Too much work--too much work! The
black dog has pounced upon your shoulders!"

"I never had an attack of the blues or anything similar in my life,
Barstow," Donaldson denied quietly. "You 'll propose smelling salts
next."

"Then what the devil does ail you?"

"Nothing ails me. Can't a man have a few theories without the aid of
liver complaint?"

"Not that kind. They don't go with a sound constitution. When a man
begins to talk of finding no use for life, he 's either a coward or
sick. And--I know you 're not a coward, Peter."

The man on the couch turned uneasily.

"Nor sick either. You are as stubborn and narrow as an old woman,
Barstow," he complained.

"Living is n't a matter of courage, physical or moral. It suits
you--it doesn't happen to suit me, but that doesn't mean that you are
well and moral while I 'm sick and a coward. My difficulty is
simple--clear; I haven't the material means to get out of life what I
want. I 'll admit that I might get it by working longer, but I should
have to work so many years in my own way that there would n't in the
end be enough of me left to enjoy the reward. Now, if I don't like
that proposition, who the devil is to criticize me for not accepting
it?"

"It's quitting not to stay."

"It would be if we elected to come. We don't. Moreover, my case is
simplified by circumstances--no one is dependent upon me either
directly or indirectly. I have no relatives--few friends. These, like
you, would call me names for a minute after I 'd gone and then forget."

"You 're talking beautiful nonsense," observed Barstow.

"Schopenhauer says--"

"Damn your barbaric pessimists and all their hungry tribe!"

Donaldson smiled a trifle condescendingly.

"What's the use of talking to you when you 'll not admit a sound
deduction? And yet, if I said you don't know what results when you put
together two known chemicals, you 'd--"

There was a look in Barstow's face that checked Donaldson,--a look of
worried recollection.

"I 'd say nothing," he asserted earnestly, "because I _don't_ always
know."

For a moment his fingers fluttered over the medley of bottles upon the
shelves before him. They paused over a small vial containing a
brilliant scarlet liquid. He picked it out and held it to the light.

"See this?" he asked.

Donaldson nodded indifferently.

"It is a case in point. Theoretically I should have here the innocuous
union of three harmless chemicals; as a matter of fact I had occasion
to experiment with it and learned that I had innocently produced a
vicious and unheard-of poison. The stuff is of no use. It is one of
those things a man occasionally stumbles upon in this work,--better
forgotten. How do I account for it? I don't. Even in science there
is always the unknown element which comes in and plays the devil with
results."

"But according to your no-waste theory, even this discovery ought to
have some use," commented Donaldson with a smile.

"Well," drawled the chemist whimsically, "perhaps it has; it makes
murder very simple for the laity."

"How?"

Barstow turned back to his test-tube, relieved that the conversation
had taken another turn.

"Because of the slowness with which it works. It requires seven days
for the system to assimilate it and yet the stomach stubbornly retains
it all this while. It is impossible to eliminate it from the body once
it is swallowed. It produces no symptoms and leaves no evidence.
There is no antidote. In the end it paralyzes the heart--swiftly,
silently, surely."

Donaldson sat up.

"Any pain?" he inquired.

"None."

Barstow ran his finger over a calendar on the wall. Then he glanced at
his watch.

"Stay a little while longer and you can see for yourself how it works.
I am making a final demonstration of its properties."

Barstow stepped into the next room. He was gone five minutes and
returned with a scrawny bull terrier scrambling at his heels. The
little brute, overjoyed at his release, frisked across the floor,
clumsily tumbling over his own feet, and sniffed as an overture of
friendship at Donaldson's low shoes. Then wagging his feeble tail he
lifted his head and patiently blinked moist eyes awaiting a verdict.
The young man stooped and scratched behind its ears, the dog holding
his head sideways and pressing against his ankles. He looked like a
dog of the streets, but in his eyes there was the dumb appreciation of
human sympathy which neutralizes breeding and blood. As Barstow
returned to his work, the pup followed after him in a series of awkward
bounds.

"Poor little pup," murmured Donaldson, sympathetically leaning forward
with his arms upon his knees. "What's his name?"

"Sandy. But he 's a lucky little pup according to you; within an hour
by the clock he ought to be dead."

"Dead?"

"If my poison works. It was seven days ago to-night that I gave him a
dose."

Donaldson's brows contracted. He was big-hearted. This seemed a cruel
thing to do. He whistled to the pup and called him by name, "Sandy,
Sandy." But the dog only wagged his tail in response and snuggled with
brute confidence closer to his master. Donaldson snapped his fingers
coaxingly, leaning far over towards him. Reluctantly, at a nod from
Barstow, the dog crept belly to the ground across the room. Donaldson
picked up the trembling terrier and settling him into his lap passed
his hand thoughtfully over the warm smooth sides where he could feel
the heart pounding sturdily.

From the dog, Donaldson lifted his eyes to Barstow's back. They were
dark brown eyes, set deep below a square forehead. His head, too, was
square and drooped a bit between loose shoulders. He smiled to himself
at some passing thought and the smile cast a pleasant softness over
features which at rest appeared rather angular and decidedly intense.
The mouth was large and the irregular teeth were white as a hound's.
His black hair was cut short and at the temples was turning gray,
although he had not yet reached thirty. It was an eager face, a strong
face. It hardened to granite over life in the abstract and softened to
the feminine before concrete examples of it.

"It is a bit of a paradox," he resumed, "that so harmless a creature as
you, Barstow, should stumble upon so deadly an agent. What do you call
it?"

"I have n't reported it yet. I don't know as I care to have my name
coupled with it in these days of newspaper notoriety--even though it
may be my one bid for fame."

Donaldson drew a package of Durham from his pocket and fumbled around
until he found a loose paper. He deftly rolled a cigarette, his long
fingers moving with the dexterity of a pianist. He smoked a moment in
silence, exhaling the smoke thoughtfully with his eyes towards the
ceiling. The dog, his neck outstretched on Donaldson's knee, blinked
sleepily across the room at his master. The gas, blown about by drafts
from the open window, threw grotesque dancing shadows upon the stained,
worn boards of the floor. Finally Donaldson burst out, ever recurring
to the one subject like a man anxious to defend himself,

"Barstow, I tell you that merely to cling to existence is not an act in
itself either righteous or courageous. If we owe obligations to
individuals we should pay them to the last cent. If we owe obligations
to society, we should pay those, too,--just as we pay our poll tax.
But life is a straight business proposition--pay in some form for what
you get out of it. There are no individuals in my life, as I said.
And what do I owe society? Society does not like what I offer--the
best of me--and will not give me what I want--the best of _it_. Very
well, to the devil with society. Our mutual obligations are cancelled."

Barstow, still busy with his work, shook his head.

"You come out wrong every time," he insisted. "You don't seem to get
at the opportunities there are in just living."

The young man took a long breath.

"So?" he demanded between half closed teeth. "No?" he challenged with
bitter intensity. "You are wrong; I know all that it is possible for
life to mean! That's the trouble. Oh, I know clear to my parched
soul! I was made to live, Barstow,--made to live life to its fullest!
There isn't a bit of it I don't love,--love too well to be content much
longer to play the galley slave in it. To live is to be free. I love
the blue sky above until I ache to madness that I cannot live under it;
I love the trees and grasses, the oceans, the forests and the denizens
of the forests; I love men and women; I love the press of crowds, the
clamor of men; I love silks and beautiful paintings and clean white
linen and flowers; I love good food, good clothes, good wine, good
music, good sermons, and good books. All--all it is within me to love
and to desire mightily. How I want those things--not morbidly--but
because I have five good senses and God knows how many more; because I
was _made_ to have those things!"

"Then why don't you keep after them?" demanded Barstow coldly.

"Because the price of them is so much of my soul and body that I 'd
have nothing left with which to enjoy them afterwards. You can't get
those things honestly in time to enjoy them, in one generation. You
can't get them at all, unless you sell the best part of you as you did
when you came to the Gordon Chemical Company. Oh Lord, Barstow, how
came you to forget all the dreams we used to dream?"

Barstow turned quickly. There was the look upon his face as of a man
who presses back a little. For a moment he appeared pained. But he
answered steadily,

"I have other dreams now, saner dreams."

"Saner dreams? What are your saner dreams but less troublesome
dreams,--lazier dreams? Dreams that fit into things as they are
instead of demanding things as they should be? You sleep o' nights
now; you sleep snugly, you tread safely about the cage they trapped you
into."

"Then let me alone there. Don't--don't poke me up."

Donaldson snapped away his cigarette.

"No. Why should I? But I 'll have none of it. That damned Barnum,
'Society,' shall not catch me and trim my claws and file my teeth."

He laughed to himself, his lips drawn back a little, rubbing behind the
pup's ears. The dog moved sleepily.

"Barstow," he continued more calmly, "this is n't a whine. I 'm not
discouraged--it is n't that. I 'm not frightened, nor despondent, nor
worried, understand. I know that things will come out all right by the
time I 'm fifty, but I shall then be fifty. I 'd like a taste of the
jungle now--a week or two of roaming free, of sprawling in the
sunshine, of drinking at the living river, of rolling under the blue
sky. I 'd like to slash around uncurbed outside the pale a little. I
'd like to do it while I 'm young and strong,--I 'd like to do it now."

"In brief," suggested Barstow, "you desire money."

"Enough so that I might forget there was such a thing."

"Well, you 'll have to sell something of yourself to get it."

"Just so. I won't and there you are. You see I don't fit."

Donaldson paused a moment and then went on.

"You know something of my story, you alone of all this grinding city.
You saw me in college and in the law school, where on a coolie diet I
did a man's work. But even you don't know how close to hard pan I was
during those seven years,--down to crackers and water for weeks at a
time."

"You don't mean to say you went hungry?"

"Hungry?" laughed Donaldson. "Man dear, there were days when I was
starving! I 've been to classes when I was so weak I could n't push my
pencil. I was hungry, and cold, and lonesome, but at that time I had
my good warm, well-fed dreams, so I did n't mind so much. And always I
thought it would be better next year, but it was n't. None of the
things that come to some men fell to me; it continued the same old
pitiless grind until I began to expect it. Then I said to myself that
it would be different when I got through. But it was n't. I finished,
and you are the only pleasant recollection I have of all that past.
You used to let me sit by your fire and now and then you brought out
cake they had sent you from home."

"Good Lord," groaned Barstow, "why did n't you let a fellow know?"

"Why should I let you know? It was my fight. But I 've watched by the
hour your every move about the room, so hungry that my pulse increased
or decreased as you neared or retreated from the closet where you kept
that cake. I 'll admit that this condition was a good deal my
fault,--I had a cursed false pride that forbade my doing for grub what
some of the fellows did. Then, too, I was an optimist; it was coming
out all right in the end. But it did n't and it has n't."

Donaldson paused.

"Am I boring you, old man?"

"No! No! Go on. But if I had suspected--"

"You could not then have been the friend you were to me,--I 'd have cut
you dead. And understand, I 'm not recalling this now for the purpose
of exciting sympathy. I don't deserve sympathy; I went my own gait and
cheerfully paid the cost, content with my dreams of the future. I
would n't sell one whit of myself. I wouldn't sacrifice one
extravagant belief. I would n't compromise. And I 'm glad I did n't.

"When I finished my course you lost sight of me, but it was the same
old thing over again. I refused to accept a position in a law office,
because I would n't be fettered. I had certain definite notions of how
a law practice ought to be conducted,--of certain things a decent man
ought not to do. This in turn barred me from a job offered by a street
railway company and another by a promoting syndicate. I took a room
and waited. It has been a long wait, Barstow, a bitter long wait.
Four barren years have gone. I have been hungry again; I have gone on
wearing second-hand clothes; I have slept in second-class surroundings;
my life has resembled life about as much as the naked trees in the Fall
resemble those in June. I have existed after a fashion and learned
that if I skimp and drudge and save for twenty years I can then begin
to do the things I wish to do. But not before,--not before without
compromise. And I 've had enough of the will o' the wisp Future,
enough of the shadowy to-morrows. I 've saved a few hundreds and had a
few hundreds left me recently by the last relative I had on earth. I
'd like to take this and squander it--live a space."

"Why don't you?"

"It's the curse of coming back, and the mere fact that your heart
continues to tick forces that upon you. There is only one way--one way
to dodge the mortgage I would place upon my Future by spending these
savings."

"And that?"

"Not to let the heart tick on; to bar the future."

Donaldson moved a bit uneasily. As he did so the pup lost his balance
and fell to the floor. The little fellow struck upon his side but
instantly regained his feet, blinking sleepily at the light. Barstow
took out his watch and squatting nearer him studied him with interest.

Suddenly the dog's legs crumpled beneath him. He tried to stand, to
make his way to his master, but instantly toppled over on his side.
Donaldson reached for him. That which he lifted was like a limp glove.
He drew back from it in horror, glancing up at Barstow.

"You see," exclaimed the chemist with evident satisfaction, "almost to
the hour!"

"But he isn't--"

"Dead!"

"Poor Sandy! Poor Sandy!"

Donaldson gingerly passed his fingers over the dog's hair. He was
curiously unconvinced. There was no responsive lift of the head, no
contented wagging of the tail, but that was the only difference. A
moment ago the dog had been asleep for an hour; now he was asleep for
an eternity. That was the only difference.

"Well," reflected Barstow, "Sandy had his week; beefsteak, bread and
milk, all he could eat."

"Is n't that better than being still alive,--hungry in the gutters?"

"God knows," answered Barstow solemnly, as he picked up the body and
carried it into the next room. "You see what is left."

As Barstow went out, Donaldson crossed to the chemist's desk. He
fumbled nervously among the bottles until he found the little vial
Barstow had pointed out. He had just time to thrust this into his
pocket and reseat himself before Barstow returned. At the same moment
there was a firm but decidedly feminine knock upon the outer door. The
chemist seemed to recognize it, for instead of his usual impatient
shout he went to the door and opened it. And yet, when the feeble
light revealed his visitor he evinced surprise.

"What, you, Miss Arsdale?"

[Illustration: "_What, you, Miss Arsdale?_"]

"Yes, Professor," she answered, slightly out of breath. "I thought
that if I hurried I might possibly find you here. I am all out of my
brother's medicine and I did not dare wait until to-morrow."

"I 'm glad you did n't," he responded heartily. "If you will sit down
a moment I will prepare it."

Donaldson glanced up, irritated to think he had not left earlier and so
escaped the inevitable introduction. He saw a young woman of perhaps
twenty-two or three, and then--the young woman's eyes. They were dark,
but not black, a sort of silver black like gun metal. They were, he
noted instantly, apparently more mature than the rest of her features,
as is sometimes true when the soul grows out of proportion to the
years. Her hair was of a reddish brown; brown in the shadows, a golden
red as she stood beneath the gas-jet. She was a little below medium
height, rather slight, and was dressed in a dark blue pongee suit, the
coat of which reached to her ankles. One might expect most anything of
her, thought Donaldson, child or woman. It would no more surprise one
to see her in tears over a trifle than standing firm in a crisis;
bending over a wisp of embroidery, or driving a sixty horse-power
automobile. Of one thing Donaldson thought he could be sure; that
whatever she did she would do with all her heart.

These and many other fugitive thoughts passed through Donaldson's brain
during the few minutes he was left here alone with her. What was said
he could not remember a minute afterwards; something of the night,
something of the brilliant reflections of the gas-light in the
varicolored bottles, something of the approaching summer. Her thoughts
seemed to be as far removed from this small room as were his own.

"Your patient is better?" Barstow inquired, when he returned with the
package.

Her face lightened instantly.

"Yes," she answered, "much better."

"Good." He added, "I should n't think it safe for you to be out alone
at night. Have n't there been a good many highway robberies recently
in your neighborhood?"

"You have heard?"

"It would be difficult to listen to the newsboys and not hear that.
The last one, a week ago, made the fourth, didn't it?"

"I don't know. I seldom read the papers. They are too horrible."

"I will gladly escort you if--"

"I could n't think of troubling you," she protested, starting at once
for the door. "I 'm in the machine, so I 'm quite safe. Good night."

With a nod and smile to both men she went out.

Donaldson himself prepared to go at once.

"Well, old man," he apologized nervously to the chemist, "pardon me for
boring you so long. It is bad taste I know for a man to air such views
as mine, but it has done me good."

"Take my advice and forget them yourself. Go into the country. Loaf a
little in the sunshine. Stay a week. I 'm going off for a while
myself."

"You leave--"

"Within a few days, possibly. I can't tell."

"Well, s' long and a pleasant trip to you."

Donaldson gripped the older man's hand. The latter gazed at him
affectionately, apprehensively.

"See here, Peter," he broke out earnestly. "There is one thing even
better for you than the country, a thing that includes the sunshine and
everything else worth while in life. I have hesitated about mentioning
it, but this girl who was here made me think of it again. You know I
'm not a sentimental man, Peter?"

"Unless you have changed. But your panacea?"

"Love."

"That's a generic term."

"Just plain human love, love for a woman like this one who was here. I
wish you knew her. She 'd be good for you; she 'd give your present
self-centred life a broader meaning."

Donaldson turned away.

"Barstow," he replied uneasily, "you 're good,--good clear through, but
we move in different worlds. It is n't in me to love as you mean. I
'm too critical, which is to say too selfish."

"I think you are selfish, Peter," Barstow agreed frankly, "but I don't
think it's your nature. You 've got into the Slough of Despond, and
the only thing that will drag you out of that is love, love of
something outside yourself. Try it."

Donaldson shook his head.

"You 're as good as gold," he declared, "but the things which content
you and me are not the same. Good night."

"Good night. Be sure to drop in again when I get back."

Donaldson went out the door. He groped his way down the stairs into
the street. Once he swung abruptly on his heel and stared at the
pavement behind him. He thought he heard at his heels the scratching
padded tread of the pup.

CHAPTER II

_King of To-day_

Donaldson pressed his way along the lighted streets, clutching the vial
in his pocket with the thrill of a man holding the key to fretting
shackles. One week of life with the future eliminated; one week with no
reckoning to be made at the end; one week with every human fetter struck
off; one week in which to ignore every curbing law of futurity and
abandon himself to the joy of the present! The future--even the narrow
bounds of an earthly future--holds men prisoners. A few careless dogs,
to be sure, live their day, blind to the years to come, but that is brute
stupidity. A few brave souls swagger through their prime with some
bravado, knowing the final cost, but willing to pay it by installments
through the dribbling years which follow; but the usury of time makes
that folly. The wise choke such gypsy impulses--admit the mortgage of
the Present to the Future--and surrender the brisk liberty of youth to
the limping freedom of old age. But Donaldson was too thoughtful a man
to belong to either the first or second class and yet of too lusty stuff
to join the third.

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