Edgar Saltus: The Man Part 11

SNIPPSY."

A small inheritance from his father making finances less of a pre-occupation, Mr. Saltus was free to go and come as he pleased. It was in June when he appeared at the St. Francis Hotel. Even there the shadow followed. He was not welcomed by our little party. With an indifference and high-handedness almost amusing, Mr. Saltus turned not only the tables but the chairs upon them. He treated them like dirt, refusing to dine and finally even to speak to them. Between the lot I was like the Biblical baby with two mothers, minus a Solomon in the background.

An amusing and characteristic episode happened when he had been there but a short time. There was--and I believe is--a funny little restaurant in San Francisco called Coppa's. It looked like a spoonful of old England dropped there by mistake. Quaint mottoes, sketches and epigrams--the souvenirs of artistic and satisfied souls--decorated the walls. The Ches.h.i.+re Cheese is something of a first cousin by comparison. Here, Jack London, Anna Strunsky, now Mrs. William English Walling, and other celebrities used to dine and linger. In that city of bohemian cafes this little place stood alone.

Mr. Saltus hated restaurants. For some reason, the nearness of so many people perhaps, they got on his nerves. In any event, restaurants put him on edge to such an extent that he invariably quarrelled not only with the waiters, but with those who were with him, if they objected to his manner of carrying on. For this reason, it was something of a penance to go into a restaurant with him. To include him in a party going to Coppa's, one had first to proceed as follows:--

"If you go, will you be a good Snipps and not fight with the waiters?"

"I'll be a good Snipps. I'll take what you tell me and be thankful."

"Will you wear your muzzle and not jerk at the lead?"

"I'm old dog Tray--ever faithful."

"Old dog traitor--ever faithless you mean. I know your tricks, but come along then."

He came. Coppa's was almost full, but by some turn of the tables we found ourselves seated in the center of the room. That was enough to start Mr.

Saltus off. Restaurants were bad enough at best, even in a secluded corner. In the middle of a room of closely packed tables--? He began as usual.

"It's far too crowded. Mr. Me doesn't want to stay. Let's leave the others and go somewhere else."

The muzzle as well as the menu was ignored and forgotten. When Mr. Saltus began to growl it was preliminary only, but I knew the signs--knew, too, what might be expected to follow.

As he ceased speaking a sudden cramp took possession of my right foot, and my exclamation of surprise distracted his attention for the moment. It was my turn to growl. A low shoe was kicked off during the growling and the meal began. All at once a sympathetic cramp in the other foot compelled his attention to be directed to me again while the remaining shoe was removed.

It may be mentioned in excuse that it was the fas.h.i.+on to wear ridiculously high and narrow shoes at the time.

We had gone as far as the soup, which Mr. Saltus was sipping mechanically.

As the meal progressed my difficulties did also. Try as I might, the offending shoes could not be forced on my feet again. Then the fun began.

Distracted by it all, Mr. Saltus accepted chicken and salad unmurmuringly, in forgetfulness of his surroundings.

"You will have to sit here until every one goes or some one can fetch you a larger pair of ties." This remark was from one of our conservative friends, and it met with the approval of the others. Mr. Saltus was becoming restive again by this time.

"Not at all," I answered. "It's unfortunate to be sure, but get up and go I shall in my stocking feet. There is no law making shoes obligatory,--and besides, the people in this place are bohemians."

"All the more reason not to imitate them," was the reply.

That was enough to make the crowded little restaurant a most enchanting place to Mr. Saltus. Tables and people became non-existent to him. I was going to defy the lot, and that delighted him to such an extent that good humour covered him like a garment. He even smiled at the waiters. Any show of independence on my part, provided it did not conflict with him, was a treat. Half rising in his seat he exclaimed:--

"Right you are, Mowgy. What the devil do you care for a pack of nincomp.o.o.ps?"

The anguish of the others in the party at being seen leaving a restaurant with a shoeless girl amused and delighted him. It could have been done quietly and unnoticed but for his love of a joke. Our friends were sufficiently horrified as it was, but for the denouement they were quite unprepared. Realizing their discomfiture and revelling in it, Mr. Saltus made a dive under the table. That was not uncommon, for, knowing my habit of letting gloves, handkerchiefs and pocket-books fall from my lap unnoticed, he had trained himself to look. That was the old dog Tray, as he called himself. When he reappeared upon this occasion it was with the offending shoes held before him as a votive offering, and leading the procession he carried them through the restaurant into the street. Queer people with odd fancies were no novelty at Coppa's. This however was an innovation. Some one started clapping, and with one accord the roomful of people took it up. I was laughing, but our friends were scarlet with rage.

We hailed a pa.s.sing taxi.

"What the devil do you care what people think?" Mr. Saltus exclaimed.

"Sheep and swine follow, but you cannot make either of Mowgy,--thank G.o.d."

After that pleasurable and ingratiating episode he was not tormented by invitations from my friends. It was too bad that Anna Strunsky was not in the restaurant that evening, for she would have been amused. We had the pleasure of meeting her not long after this and were enchanted with her cleverness and charm.

Mr. Saltus' interest in spiritualism had flagged. Hearing that Miller, the materializing medium, was holding seances in San Francisco, he determined to go. This we did. Bold in a restaurant, or when he was crushed in a crowd, where a blow from him frequently prefaced a word, he was a child when encountering phenomena of this kind. Sitting silent and almost sullen in a corner, he shrank within himself,--keen to see, hear and investigate, yet frightened as a baby in the dark. Miller seemed to affect him more than others had done.

"I'm frightened," he said. "If a spook should come and ask for me,--you answer it."

With clenched and clammy hands he sat and s.h.i.+vered, and when a form purporting to be that of his mother appeared and gave the name of Eliza Saltus, he whispered to me:--

"Speak."

"Speak yourself," I said. "I refuse to play the part of a phonograph all the time. It is for you, not me, that the spirit is here."

The s.h.i.+mmering form came closer. It almost brushed Mr. Saltus' knee. He shut his eyes and reiterated imploringly:--

"Speak, Mowgy! For G.o.d's sake speak to it!"

The shadowy form had held together as long perhaps as it could. The ectoplasm may have given out or his condition of mind influenced it. In any event the form flickered. With his eyes still closed Mr. Saltus clutched me by the arm:--

"Has it gone?" he whispered.

As he spoke the form flickered again and went out. It was a long time before he wanted to go to a seance again.

During his stay in San Francisco he was guest of honour at the Bohemian Club, and he met there many interesting people. A brief visit to Carmel-by-the-Sea brought his Californian trip to a close. The State interested him. He liked the quiet,--the almost perpetual suns.h.i.+ne, and above all, the absence of convention and the freedom enjoyed by everyone.

It was with regret that he left the suns.h.i.+ne and the silence to chafe under the vibrations and noise of New York.

Once again pathetic letters raced across the continent. He had no home and no anchor. Mrs. Saltus and his daughter were living permanently abroad. His hours with the latter had been his oases in a desert of loneliness. Now, barring Miss G----, Dr. Kelley and occasionally Bob Davis, he had almost no friends. Upon reaching New York he finished a series of articles on Russia, for Munsey's Magazine which later formed the basis of his "Imperial Orgy."

In the late autumn the failing health of my father recalled me to New York.

Mr. Saltus was finis.h.i.+ng the last chapter of "Lords of the Ghostland." No other book he ever wrote was strung out over so long a time, or took so many hours of research. He brought the ma.n.u.script to my home, returning the next day for the praise and patting on the back he felt that he deserved.

"What do you think of it?" he asked. The small boy always appeared at such moments.

"The King of France and twice ten thousand men,--rode up a hill and then went down again," was the reply.

"What do you mean? Is there no climax?"

"Just that. You take the reader from protoplasm to paradise,--you lead him through labyrinths, mazes and mysteries, and leave him just where you started. If you cannot give the reader a ladder give him a straw,--but give him something."

We are all tenacious with the children of our brain, Edgar Saltus especially so, but in this instance he took the criticism willingly. That last chapter he re-wrote four times, amplifying the idea of the continuity of life and the possibility of reincarnation, which he referred to as the "supreme Alhambra of dream." What he offered then was not his belief, but a theory and a suggestion. The last chapter curiously enough was the part of the book receiving the highest praise from the critics, who with one accord said that he had struck a new and exalted note. A few years later he was wringing his hands because he could not re-write "Lords of the Ghostland"

in the light of what he then knew. Over and over again he lamented this fact.

"If I had not been so pig-headed,--so dense. Having the chance to turn out a masterpiece,--a thing that would have lived,--I pa.s.sed it by. I saw only in a restricted circle, when had I but looked up, a limitless horizon of wonder and wisdom stretched before me."

CHAPTER IX

In the spring of 1907, the death of my father left me a nervous and physical wreck. Though never close friends, and knowing quite well of his disapproval, Mr. Saltus admired his splendid intellect and broad vision.

There are those who make tragedies out of trifles, and others to whom most events however important mean nothing at all. To the latter, when touched by an overwhelming grief, the world and everything in it become as shadows on gla.s.s.