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Page 67
CHAPTER XIII
About two weeks after the death of Doctor Gordon's wife James went to
the post office before beginning his round of calls. Lately nearly all
the practice had devolved upon him. Gordon seemed sunken in a gloomy
apathy, from which he could rouse himself only for the most urgent
necessities. Once aroused he was fully himself, but for the most part he
sat in his office smoking or seemingly half-asleep. Once in a while a
very sick patient acted upon him as a momentary stimulus, but Alton was
unusually healthy just then. After an open and, for the most part,
snowless winter, which had occasioned much sickness, the spring brought
frost and light falls of snow, which seemed to give new life to people
in spite of unseasonableness. James had had little difficulty in
attending to most of the practice, although he was necessarily away from
home the greater part of the time. However, he often took Clemency with
him, and she would sit well wrapped up in the buggy reading a book while
he made calls. Then there were the long drives over solitary roads,
which, though rough, causing the wheels to jolt heavily in deep ridges
of frozen soil, or sink into the red mud almost to the hubs, as the case
might be, seemed like roads of Paradise to the young man. Although he
himself grieved for Gordon's wife, and Gordon himself filled him with
covert anxiety, yet he was young and the girl was young, and they were
both released from a miserable sense of insecurity and mystery, which
had irritated and saddened them; their thoughts now turned toward their
own springtime, as naturally and innocently as flowers bloom. There was
grief, and the shadow of trouble, but of past trouble; their eyes looked
upon life and love and joy instead of death, as helplessly as a flower
looks toward the sun. They were happy, although half-ashamed of their
happiness; but, after all, perhaps, being happy after bereavement and
trouble means simply that the soul has turned to God for consolation.
James's face was beaming with his joyful thoughts as he drew up before
the village store, got out of the buggy, and tied the horse. When he
entered he said "good morning!" in a sort of general fashion. There were
many men lounging about. The morning mail had been distributed, and
although Alton people got very few letters, still there was a wide
interest in the post office, a little boxed-off space in a corner of the
store. The store-keeper, Henry Graves, was the postmaster. He felt the
importance of his position. When he sorted and distributed the mail from
the limp leather bag, he realized himself as an official of a great
republic. He loved to proudly ignore, and not even seem to see, the
interested and gaping faces watching the boxes. Doctor Gordon's box was
an object of especial interest. Indeed, that was the only one to be
depended upon to contain something when the two mails per day arrived.
Gordon, moreover, took the only New York paper which reached the little
hamlet. Alton had no paper of its own. The nearest was printed in
Stanbridge. One man, the Presbyterian minister, subscribed to the
Stanbridge paper, and paid for it in farm produce. He had a little farm,
and tilled the soil when he was not saving souls. The Stanbridge paper
had arrived the night before, and the minister had been good enough to
impart some of its contents to the curious throng in the store. He was
accustomed to do so. Likewise Gordon, when he was not too hurried,
would open his New York paper, and read the most startling "headers" to
a wide-eyed audience. This morning the paper was in the box as usual,
with a number of letters. The men pressed in a suggestive way around
James, as he took the parcel from the postmaster. There were no
lock-boxes. James hesitated a moment. He had not much time, but he was
good-natured, and the eager hunger in the men's eyes appealed to him.
There was something pathetic about this outreaching for intelligence of
their kind, and its progress or otherwise, among these plodding folk,
who had so to count their pence that a newspaper was an unheard-of
luxury to them.
James opened the paper and glanced over the headlines on the first page.
Now, had he looked, he might have seen something sinister and malicious
in the curious eyes, but he was so dazed by the very first thing he saw
as to be for the moment oblivious to anything else. On the right of the
first page was the headline: "Strange dual life of a prominent physician
in Alton, New Jersey. Doctor Thomas B. Gordon has lived with his wife
for years, and called her his widowed sister, Mrs. Clara Ewing. Upon
her death, a few days since, he revealed the secret. Will give no
reasons for this strange conduct, simply states that he was justified,
even compelled, by circumstances." Then followed a caricature portrait
of Gordon, a photograph of the house, one of the village church, and the
cemetery and Gordon's wife's grave, with various surmises and comments,
enough to fill the column. James paled as he read. He had not known of
Gordon's action in telling that the dead woman was his wife. He looked
around in a bewildered fashion, and met the hungry eyes. One small, mean
face of a small man peered around his shoulder gloatingly. "Some news
this mornin'?" he observed, with a smack of the lips, as if he tasted
sweets.
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