Left to Themselves/Chapter 20
CHAPTER XX.
PRESENT AND FUTURE.
FRIENDLY reader, were you at a Columbia College commencement, in which Philip Touchtone and Gerald Saxton graduated, amid a great waving of pocket-handkerchiefs and a rattle of applause as the class took their places on the stage for their diplomas? No, I am quite sure you were not. For Philip and Gerald happen not to have graduated yet, though they will soon. Touchtone is a senior this year, and Gerald a sophomore; tall, wide-awake young fellows, both of them well up in their work and their athletics, devoted to their college life and (though they do not say any thing about that) to each other, as well. For Mr. Saxton and Mr. Marcy came to a quiet agreement over some discussed questions before that winter found the four of them settled in the same hotel in New York.
"Gerald and I owe the lad every thing," insisted Mr. Saxton. "We can't take him from you, but you must let him be as much with us as is possible. I want you, for one thing, to let me be responsible, henceforth, for his education and for his professional starting-out, whatever he chooses it to be. No more hotel for him, please! I shall just count him another son of mine, with or without your consent, my friend."
So it was agreed. Philip stayed out of college an extra winter or two, that he need not precede Gerald too much, and after the foreign wanderjahr now before them, when their graduation is over, they are to go into the law-school together.
Together (that word which means so much to all friends) they have been again up the coast, and this time the trip extended to Halifax, without let or hinderance, unlike that memorable first attempt. Knoxport and Chantico are places that alter little with years. Time runs slowly there, as of old. They found Mr. Banger at his desk in the Kossuth, a little stouter and more business-like looking than ever. Mr. Banger received them with great unction and much admiration. They walked out into the garden and sat down in the arbor, and smiled, and then grew grave as they recalled the suspense that they had felt, that ended in the dramatic scene under its green roof. Joe has an interest in the hotel now, and he has married a niece of Mr. Banger, into the bargain.
Once upon a time there was a great day for the Probascos—when the two arrived at Chantico Island. Expecting them had kept the couple at the farm, almost with the inclusion of the sagacious Towzer ("His real name's Jock, you know"), in excitement, for a week before.
"Well, well, it's good to see you both, if you have changed everlastingly!" reiterated Mrs. Probasco. "You're—well, you're real sights to comfort one's eyes, both of you!" she added impartially. They spent an evening in the quaint kitchen and a night in the old room, where Gerald had tossed in his sickness, Philip watching him in lonely anxiety. Obed's rheumatics seem over. He talks more than he did. Philip vows that on this occasion Obed began to tell them again the story of the nautical ancestor and the wary "widow that lived on Cape Ann"—promptly interrupted by Mrs. Probasco, who said that "the boys hadn't come all the way from New York to listen to that old yarn." Mrs. Probasco's grandfather is still "feeble, very feeble." But he survives and bids fair to do so for an indefinite time; and so the little island will probably not soon lose its satisfied tenants from its wave-bound circuit.
The Ossokosee flourishes, enlarged, and well-kept as ever. Philip and Gerald and Mr. Saxton join Mr. Marcy there each summer, and then there are great doings in a highly private and quiet way. I don't think the two friends ever walk up one particular path in the evening without Gerald's recalling (though he may not speak of it) the night when, so much younger, he listened with Philip to those words of General Sawtelle within the embowered Summer-house.
The hope and resolve of that evening were indeed granted. To-day in the little cemetery near the hotel is a marble monument in place of a simpler stone, formerly there. One reads that it is—"To the Memory of Reginald Touchtone—Cleared of the Stain of a False Charge upon his Honor—After Many Days—Erected by his Son. Philip Touchtone, and by Jay Marcy and Gerald B. Saxton, Jr."
Farmer Wooden and his wife lead the same plodding, healthful, simple lives as ever. They likewise continue to send butter and eggs in unlimited quantity to the Ossokosee, and they delight to talk with Philip of the days when he used to be the purveyor thereof. They laugh merrily over those commissary experiences, and are sincere friends, as says Mrs. Wooden. "You see, you haven't no right to forget us, Mr. Philip. Not that I expect you ever will. You ain't that kind. But 'twas down there in the ravine, you know, you first met young Mr. Saxton. You recollect the tramp, that day?" Yes, Philip perfectly recollects both "that day" and Mr. Sip.
Mr. Hilliard—jolly, fat, good-tempered Mr. Hilliard—who has always been afraid ever since that year "of some clever vagabond borrowing my name, sir," but never has been favored with that little accident again—he is another regular guest at the Ossokosee. There are signs (so some knowing observers say) that Mr. Hilliard contemplates matrimony. He encountered dignified Miss Beauchamp, a year or so ago, at the Ossokosee, and it is known that she receives very long letters from him; and that he has lately bought a house not far from his Madison Avenue flat. I think that Philip and Gerald are sure of much pleasure in that house next season.
Well! And is this all? Have we really come to the end of this story?—which is, perhaps, a truer one than the imagination of a writer of such things as stories, or even his heart, would fain make him believe? I fear we have indeed reached the last of it, for even by bright forecast, unnecessary, I think, here, a story had best not be lengthened if truly it is all told.
But—if one yields to the temptation to be among the prophets, and closes his eyes, there come, chiefly, pleasant thoughts of how good are friendship and love and loyal service between man and man in this rugged world of ours; and how probable it is that such things here have not their ending, since they have not their perfecting here, perfect as friendship and the service sometimes seem. Therewith the inditer of this chronicle sees Philip and Gerald walking forward, calmly and joyfully, and in an unlessened affection and clearer mutual understanding—into their endless lives.
And so, Philip and Gerald, as says Brutus in the play, "give me your hands all over, one by one." I am loath to let you go, but I must. Good-bye.
The End.