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CHAPTER 27
The sun of Martin's good fortune rose. The day after Ruth's visit, he received a check for three dollars from a New York scandal weekly in payment for three of his triolets. Two days later a newspaper published in Chicago accepted his "Treasure Hunters," promising to pay ten dollars for it on publication. The price was small, but it was the first article he had written, his very first attempt to express his thought on the printed page. To cap everything, the adventure serial for boys, his second attempt, was accepted before the end of the week by a juvenile monthly calling itself YOUTH AND AGE. It was true the serial was twenty-one thousand words, and they offered to pay him sixteen dollars on publication, which was something like seventy-five cents a thousand words; but it was equally true that it was the second thing he had attempted to write and that he was himself thoroughly aware of its clumsy worthlessness.
But even his earliest efforts were not marked with the clumsiness of mediocrity. What characterized them was the clumsiness of too great strength - the clumsiness which the tyro betrays when he crushes butterflies with battering rams and hammers out vignettes with a war-club. So it was that Martin was glad to sell his early efforts for songs. He knew them for what they were, and it had not taken him long to acquire this knowledge. What he pinned his faith to was his later work. He had striven to be something more than a mere writer of magazine fiction. He had sought to equip himself with the tools of artistry. On the other hand, he had not sacrificed strength. His conscious aim had been to increase his strength by avoiding excess of strength. Nor had he departed from his love of reality. His work was realism, though he had endeavored to fuse with it the fancies and beauties of imagination. What he sought was an impassioned realism, shot through with human aspiration and faith. What he wanted was life as it was, with all its spirit-groping and soul-reaching left in.
He had discovered, in the course of his reading, two schools of fiction. One treated of man as a god, ignoring his earthly origin; the other treated of man as a clod, ignoring his heaven-sent dreams and divine possibilities. Both the god and the clod schools erred, in Martin's estimation, and erred through too great singleness of sight and purpose. There was a compromise that approximated the truth, though it flattered not the school of god, while it challenged the brute-savageness of the school of clod. It was his story, "Adventure," which had dragged with Ruth, that Martin believed had achieved his ideal of the true in fiction; and it was in an essay, "God and Clod," that he had expressed his views on the whole general subject.
But "Adventure," and all that he deemed his best work, still went begging among the editors. His early work counted for nothing in his eyes except for the money it brought, and his horror stories, two of which he had sold, he did not consider high work nor his best work. To him they were frankly imaginative and fantastic, though invested with all the glamour of the real, wherein lay their power. This investiture of the grotesque and impossible with reality, he looked upon as a trick - a skilful trick at best. Great literature could not reside in such a field. Their artistry was high, but he denied the worthwhileness of artistry when divorced from humanness. The trick had been to fling over the face of his artistry a mask of humanness, and this he had done in the half-dozen or so stories of the horror brand he had written before he emerged upon the high peaks of "Adventure," "Joy," "The Pot," and "The Wine of Life."
The three dollars he received for the triolets he used to eke out a precarious existence against the arrival of the WHITE MOUSE check. He cashed the first check with the suspicious Portuguese grocer, paying a dollar on account and dividing the remaining two dollars between the baker and the fruit store. Martin was not yet rich enough to afford meat, and he was on slim allowance when the WHITE MOUSE check arrived. He was divided on the cashing of it. He had never been in a bank in his life, much less been in one on business, and he had a naive and childlike desire to walk into one of the big banks down in Oakland and fling down his indorsed check for forty dollars. On the other hand, practical common sense ruled that he should cash it with his grocer and thereby make an impression that would later result in an increase of credit. Reluctantly Martin yielded to the claims of the grocer, paying his bill with him in full, and receiving in change a pocketful of jingling coin. Also, he paid the other tradesmen in full, redeemed his suit and his bicycle, paid one month's rent on the type-writer, and paid Maria the overdue month for his room and a month in advance. This left him in his pocket, for emergencies, a balance of nearly three dollars.
In itself, this small sum seemed a fortune. Immediately on recovering his clothes he had gone to see Ruth, and on the way he could not refrain from jingling the little handful of silver in his pocket. He had been so long without money that, like a rescued starving man who cannot let the unconsumed food out of his sight, Martin could not keep his hand off the silver. He was not mean, nor avaricious, but the money meant more than so many dollars and cents. It stood for success, and the eagles stamped upon the coins were to him so many winged victories.
It came to him insensibly that it was a very good world. It certainly appeared more beautiful to him. For weeks it had been a very dull and sombre world; but now, with nearly all debts paid, three dollars jingling in his pocket, and in his mind the consciousness of success, the sun shone bright and warm, and even a rain-squall that soaked unprepared pedestrians seemed a merry happening to him. When he starved, his thoughts had dwelt often upon the thousands he knew were starving the world over; but now that he was feasted full, the fact of the thousands starving was no longer pregnant in his brain. He forgot about them, and, being in love, remembered the countless lovers in the world. Without deliberately thinking about it, MOTIFS for love-lyrics began to agitate his brain. Swept away by the creative impulse, he got off the electric car, without vexation, two blocks beyond his crossing.
He found a number of persons in the Morse home. Ruth's two girl- cousins were visiting her from San Rafael, and Mrs. Morse, under pretext of entertaining them, was pursuing her plan of surrounding Ruth with young people. The campaign had begun during Martin's enforced absence, and was already in full swing. She was making a point of having at the house men who were doing things. Thus, in addition to the cousins Dorothy and Florence, Martin encountered two university professors, one of Latin, the other of English; a young army officer just back from the Philippines, one-time school- mate of Ruth's; a young fellow named Melville, private secretary to Joseph Perkins, head of the San Francisco Trust Company; and finally of the men, a live bank cashier, Charles Hapgood, a youngish man of thirty-five, graduate of Stanford University, member of the Nile Club and the Unity Club, and a conservative speaker for the Republican Party during campaigns - in short, a rising young man in every way. Among the women was one who painted portraits, another who was a professional musician, and still another who possessed the degree of Doctor of Sociology and who was locally famous for her social settlement work in the slums of San Francisco. But the women did not count for much in Mrs. Morse's plan. At the best, they were necessary accessories. The men who did things must be drawn to the house somehow.
"Don't get excited when you talk," Ruth admonished Martin, before the ordeal of introduction began.
He bore himself a bit stiffly at first, oppressed by a sense of his own awkwardness, especially of his shoulders, which were up to their old trick of threatening destruction to furniture and ornaments. Also, he was rendered self-conscious by the company. He had never before been in contact with such exalted beings nor with so many of them. Melville, the bank cashier, fascinated him, and he resolved to investigate him at the first opportunity. For underneath Martin's awe lurked his assertive ego, and he felt the urge to measure himself with these men and women and to find out what they had learned from the books and life which he had not learned.
Ruth's eyes roved to him frequently to see how he was getting on, and she was surprised and gladdened by the ease with which he got acquainted with her cousins. He certainly did not grow excited, while being seated removed from him the worry of his shoulders. Ruth knew them for clever girls, superficially brilliant, and she could scarcely understand their praise of Martin later that night at going to bed. But he, on the other hand, a wit in his own class, a gay quizzer and laughter-maker at dances and Sunday picnics, had found the making of fun and the breaking of good- natured lances simple enough in this environment. And on this evening success stood at his back, patting him on the shoulder and telling him that he was making good, so that he could afford to laugh and make laughter and remain unabashed.
Later, Ruth's anxiety found justification. Martin and Professor Caldwell had got together in a conspicuous corner, and though Martin no longer wove the air with his hands, to Ruth's critical eye he permitted his own eyes to flash and glitter too frequently, talked too rapidly and warmly, grew too intense, and allowed his aroused blood to redden his cheeks too much. He lacked decorum and control, and was in decided contrast to the young professor of English with whom he talked.
But Martin was not concerned with appearances! He had been swift to note the other's trained mind and to appreciate his command of knowledge. Furthermore, Professor Caldwell did not realize Martin's concept of the average English professor. Martin wanted him to talk shop, and, though he seemed averse at first, succeeded in making him do it. For Martin did not see why a man should not talk shop.
"It's absurd and unfair," he had told Ruth weeks before, "this objection to talking shop. For what reason under the sun do men and women come together if not for the exchange of the best that is in them? And the best that is in them is what they are interested in, the thing by which they make their living, the thing they've specialized on and sat up days and nights over, and even dreamed about. Imagine Mr. Butler living up to social etiquette and enunciating his views on Paul Verlaine or the German drama or the novels of D'Annunzio. We'd be bored to death. I, for one, if I must listen to Mr. Butler, prefer to hear him talk about his law. It's the best that is in him, and life is so short that I want the best of every man and woman I meet."
"But," Ruth had objected, "there are the topics of general interest to all."
"There, you mistake," he had rushed on. "All persons in society, all cliques in society - or, rather, nearly all persons and cliques - ape their betters. Now, who are the best betters? The idlers, the wealthy idlers. They do not know, as a rule, the things known by the persons who are doing something in the world. To listen to conversation about such things would mean to be bored, wherefore the idlers decree that such things are shop and must not be talked about. Likewise they decree the things that are not shop and which may be talked about, and those things are the latest operas, latest novels, cards, billiards, cocktails, automobiles, horse shows, trout fishing, tuna-fishing, big-game shooting, yacht sailing, and so forth - and mark you, these are the things the idlers know. In all truth, they constitute the shop-talk of the idlers. And the funniest part of it is that many of the clever people, and all the would-be clever people, allow the idlers so to impose upon them. As for me, I want the best a man's got in him, call it shop vulgarity or anything you please."
And Ruth had not understood. This attack of his on the established had seemed to her just so much wilfulness of opinion.
So Martin contaminated Professor Caldwell with his own earnestness, challenging him to speak his mind. As Ruth paused beside them she heard Martin saying:-
"You surely don't pronounce such heresies in the University of California?"
Professor Caldwell shrugged his shoulders. "The honest taxpayer and the politician, you know. Sacramento gives us our appropriations and therefore we kowtow to Sacramento, and to the Board of Regents, and to the party press, or to the press of both parties."
"Yes, that's clear; but how about you?" Martin urged. "You must be a fish out of the water."
"Few like me, I imagine, in the university pond. Sometimes I am fairly sure I am out of water, and that I should belong in Paris, in Grub Street, in a hermit's cave, or in some sadly wild Bohemian crowd, drinking claret, - dago-red they call it in San Francisco, - dining in cheap restaurants in the Latin Quarter, and expressing vociferously radical views upon all creation. Really, I am frequently almost sure that I was cut out to be a radical. But then, there are so many questions on which I am not sure. I grow timid when I am face to face with my human frailty, which ever prevents me from grasping all the factors in any problem - human, vital problems, you know."
And as he talked on, Martin became aware that to his own lips had come the "Song of the Trade Wind":-
"I am strongest at noon, But under the moon I stiffen the bunt of the sail."
He was almost humming the words, and it dawned upon him that the other reminded him of the trade wind, of the Northeast Trade, steady, and cool, and strong. He was equable, he was to be relied upon, and withal there was a certain bafflement about him. Martin had the feeling that he never spoke his full mind, just as he had often had the feeling that the trades never blew their strongest but always held reserves of strength that were never used. Martin's trick of visioning was active as ever. His brain was a most accessible storehouse of remembered fact and fancy, and its contents seemed ever ordered and spread for his inspection. Whatever occurred in the instant present, Martin's mind immediately presented associated antithesis or similitude which ordinarily expressed themselves to him in vision. It was sheerly automatic, and his visioning was an unfailing accompaniment to the living present. Just as Ruth's face, in a momentary jealousy had called before his eyes a forgotten moonlight gale, and as Professor Caldwell made him see again the Northeast Trade herding the white billows across the purple sea, so, from moment to moment, not disconcerting but rather identifying and classifying, new memory- visions rose before him, or spread under his eyelids, or were thrown upon the screen of his consciousness. These visions came out of the actions and sensations of the past, out of things and events and books of yesterday and last week - a countless host of apparitions that, waking or sleeping, forever thronged his mind.
So it was, as he listened to Professor Caldwell's easy flow of speech - the conversation of a clever, cultured man - that Martin kept seeing himself down all his past. He saw himself when he had been quite the hoodlum, wearing a "stiff-rim" Stetson hat and a square-cut, double-breasted coat, with a certain swagger to the shoulders and possessing the ideal of being as tough as the police permitted. He did not disguise it to himself, nor attempt to palliate it. At one time in his life he had been just a common hoodlum, the leader of a gang that worried the police and terrorized honest, working-class householders. But his ideals had changed. He glanced about him at the well-bred, well-dressed men and women, and breathed into his lungs the atmosphere of culture and refinement, and at the same moment the ghost of his early youth, in stiff-rim and square-cut, with swagger and toughness, stalked across the room. This figure, of the corner hoodlum, he saw merge into himself, sitting and talking with an actual university professor.
For, after all, he had never found his permanent abiding place. He had fitted in wherever he found himself, been a favorite always and everywhere by virtue of holding his own at work and at play and by his willingness and ability to fight for his rights and command respect. But he had never taken root. He had fitted in sufficiently to satisfy his fellows but not to satisfy himself. He had been perturbed always by a feeling of unrest, had heard always the call of something from beyond, and had wandered on through life seeking it until he found books and art and love. And here he was, in the midst of all this, the only one of all the comrades he had adventured with who could have made themselves eligible for the inside of the Morse home.
But such thoughts and visions did not prevent him from following Professor Caldwell closely. And as he followed, comprehendingly and critically, he noted the unbroken field of the other's knowledge. As for himself, from moment to moment the conversation showed him gaps and open stretches, whole subjects with which he was unfamiliar. Nevertheless, thanks to his Spencer, he saw that he possessed the outlines of the field of knowledge. It was a matter only of time, when he would fill in the outline. Then watch out, he thought - 'ware shoal, everybody! He felt like sitting at the feet of the professor, worshipful and absorbent; but, as he listened, he began to discern a weakness in the other's judgments - a weakness so stray and elusive that he might not have caught it had it not been ever present. And when he did catch it, he leapt to equality at once.
Ruth came up to them a second time, just as Martin began to speak.
"I'll tell you where you are wrong, or, rather, what weakens your judgments," he said. "You lack biology. It has no place in your scheme of things. - Oh, I mean the real interpretative biology, from the ground up, from the laboratory and the test-tube and the vitalized inorganic right on up to the widest aesthetic and sociological generalizations."
Ruth was appalled. She had sat two lecture courses under Professor Caldwell and looked up to him as the living repository of all knowledge.
"I scarcely follow you," he said dubiously.
Martin was not so sure but what he had followed him.
"Then I'll try to explain," he said. "I remember reading in Egyptian history something to the effect that understanding could not be had of Egyptian art without first studying the land question."
"Quite right," the professor nodded.
"And it seems to me," Martin continued, "that knowledge of the land question, in turn, of all questions, for that matter, cannot be had without previous knowledge of the stuff and the constitution of life. How can we understand laws and institutions, religions and customs, without understanding, not merely the nature of the creatures that made them, but the nature of the stuff out of which the creatures are made? Is literature less human than the architecture and sculpture of Egypt? Is there one thing in the known universe that is not subject to the law of evolution? - Oh, I know there is an elaborate evolution of the various arts laid down, but it seems to me to be too mechanical. The human himself is left out. The evolution of the tool, of the harp, of music and song and dance, are all beautifully elaborated; but how about the evolution of the human himself, the development of the basic and intrinsic parts that were in him before he made his first tool or gibbered his first chant? It is that which you do not consider, and which I call biology. It is biology in its largest aspects.
"I know I express myself incoherently, but I've tried to hammer out the idea. It came to me as you were talking, so I was not primed and ready to deliver it. You spoke yourself of the human frailty that prevented one from taking all the factors into consideration. And you, in turn, - or so it seems to me, - leave out the biological factor, the very stuff out of which has been spun the fabric of all the arts, the warp and the woof of all human actions and achievements."
To Ruth's amazement, Martin was not immediately crushed, and that the professor replied in the way he did struck her as forbearance for Martin's youth. Professor Caldwell sat for a full minute, silent and fingering his watch chain.
"Do you know," he said at last, "I've had that same criticism passed on me once before - by a very great man, a scientist and evolutionist, Joseph Le Conte. But he is dead, and I thought to remain undetected; and now you come along and expose me. Seriously, though - and this is confession - I think there is something in your contention - a great deal, in fact. I am too classical, not enough up-to-date in the interpretative branches of science, and I can only plead the disadvantages of my education and a temperamental slothfulness that prevents me from doing the work. I wonder if you'll believe that I've never been inside a physics or chemistry laboratory? It is true, nevertheless. Le Conte was right, and so are you, Mr. Eden, at least to an extent - how much I do not know."
Ruth drew Martin away with her on a pretext; when she had got him aside, whispering:-
"You shouldn't have monopolized Professor Caldwell that way. There may be others who want to talk with him."
"My mistake," Martin admitted contritely. "But I'd got him stirred up, and he was so interesting that I did not think. Do you know, he is the brightest, the most intellectual, man I have ever talked with. And I'll tell you something else. I once thought that everybody who went to universities, or who sat in the high places in society, was just as brilliant and intelligent as he."
"He's an exception," she answered.
"I should say so. Whom do you want me to talk to now? - Oh, say, bring me up against that cashier-fellow."
Martin talked for fifteen minutes with him, nor could Ruth have wished better behavior on her lover's part. Not once did his eyes flash nor his cheeks flush, while the calmness and poise with which he talked surprised her. But in Martin's estimation the whole tribe of bank cashiers fell a few hundred per cent, and for the rest of the evening he labored under the impression that bank cashiers and talkers of platitudes were synonymous phrases. The army officer he found good-natured and simple, a healthy, wholesome young fellow, content to occupy the place in life into which birth and luck had flung him. On learning that he had completed two years in the university, Martin was puzzled to know where he had stored it away. Nevertheless Martin liked him better than the platitudinous bank cashier.
"I really don't object to platitudes," he told Ruth later; "but what worries me into nervousness is the pompous, smugly complacent, superior certitude with which they are uttered and the time taken to do it. Why, I could give that man the whole history of the Reformation in the time he took to tell me that the Union-Labor Party had fused with the Democrats. Do you know, he skins his words as a professional poker-player skins the cards that are dealt out to him. Some day I'll show you what I mean."
"I'm sorry you don't like him," was her reply. "He's a favorite of Mr. Butler's. Mr. Butler says he is safe and honest - calls him the Rock, Peter, and says that upon him any banking institution can well be built."
"I don't doubt it - from the little I saw of him and the less I heard from him; but I don't think so much of banks as I did. You don't mind my speaking my mind this way, dear?"
"No, no; it is most interesting."
"Yes," Martin went on heartily, "I'm no more than a barbarian getting my first impressions of civilization. Such impressions must be entertainingly novel to the civilized person."
"What did you think of my cousins?" Ruth queried.
"I liked them better than the other women. There's plenty of fun in them along with paucity of pretence."
"Then you did like the other women?"
He shook his head.
"That social-settlement woman is no more than a sociological poll- parrot. I swear, if you winnowed her out between the stars, like Tomlinson, there would be found in her not one original thought. As for the portrait-painter, she was a positive bore. She'd make a good wife for the cashier. And the musician woman! I don't care how nimble her fingers are, how perfect her technique, how wonderful her expression - the fact is, she knows nothing about music."
"She plays beautifully," Ruth protested.
"Yes, she's undoubtedly gymnastic in the externals of music, but the intrinsic spirit of music is unguessed by her. I asked her what music meant to her - you know I'm always curious to know that particular thing; and she did not know what it meant to her, except that she adored it, that it was the greatest of the arts, and that it meant more than life to her."
"You were making them talk shop," Ruth charged him.
"I confess it. And if they were failures on shop, imagine my sufferings if they had discoursed on other subjects. Why, I used to think that up here, where all the advantages of culture were enjoyed - " He paused for a moment, and watched the youthful shade of himself, in stiff-rim and square-cut, enter the door and swagger across the room. "As I was saying, up here I thought all men and women were brilliant and radiant. But now, from what little I've seen of them, they strike me as a pack of ninnies, most of them, and ninety percent of the remainder as bores. Now there's Professor Caldwell - he's different. He's a man, every inch of him and every atom of his gray matter."
Ruth's face brightened.
"Tell me about him," she urged. "Not what is large and brilliant - I know those qualities; but whatever you feel is adverse. I am most curious to know."
"Perhaps I'll get myself in a pickle." Martin debated humorously for a moment. "Suppose you tell me first. Or maybe you find in him nothing less than the best."
"I attended two lecture courses under him, and I have known him for two years; that is why I am anxious for your first impression."
"Bad impression, you mean? Well, here goes. He is all the fine things you think about him, I guess. At least, he is the finest specimen of intellectual man I have met; but he is a man with a secret shame."
"Oh, no, no!" he hastened to cry. "Nothing paltry nor vulgar. What I mean is that he strikes me as a man who has gone to the bottom of things, and is so afraid of what he saw that he makes believe to himself that he never saw it. Perhaps that's not the clearest way to express it. Here's another way. A man who has found the path to the hidden temple but has not followed it; who has, perhaps, caught glimpses of the temple and striven afterward to convince himself that it was only a mirage of foliage. Yet another way. A man who could have done things but who placed no value on the doing, and who, all the time, in his innermost heart, is regretting that he has not done them; who has secretly laughed at the rewards for doing, and yet, still more secretly, has yearned for the rewards and for the joy of doing."
"I don't read him that way," she said. "And for that matter, I don't see just what you mean."
"It is only a vague feeling on my part," Martin temporized. "I have no reason for it. It is only a feeling, and most likely it is wrong. You certainly should know him better than I."
From the evening at Ruth's Martin brought away with him strange confusions and conflicting feelings. He was disappointed in his goal, in the persons he had climbed to be with. On the other hand, he was encouraged with his success. The climb had been easier than he expected. He was superior to the climb, and (he did not, with false modesty, hide it from himself) he was superior to the beings among whom he had climbed - with the exception, of course, of Professor Caldwell. About life and the books he knew more than they, and he wondered into what nooks and crannies they had cast aside their educations. He did not know that he was himself possessed of unusual brain vigor; nor did he know that the persons who were given to probing the depths and to thinking ultimate thoughts were not to be found in the drawing rooms of the world's Morses; nor did he dream that such persons were as lonely eagles sailing solitary in the azure sky far above the earth and its swarming freight of gregarious life.
马丁的好运的太阳升了起来。露丝走后的第二天他收到了纽约一家流言蜚语周刊寄给他的一张三块钱的支票，作为他三篇小三重奏的稿费。两天以后芝加哥出版的一家报纸又采用了他的《探宝者》，答应发表后给他十块钱。报酬虽不高，但那却是他的第一篇作品，他第一次想变作铅印的试作。尤其叫他高兴的是，他的第二篇试作，一篇为孩子们写的连载冒险故事，也在周末前为一家名叫《青年与时代》的月刊所采用。不错，那篇东西有二万一千字，而他们只答应在发表后给他十六块钱，差不多只有七毛五分钱一千字；可还有一点也是事实：那是他试笔的第二篇东西，他完全明白那东西很拙劣，没有价值。
他最早的作品尽管拙劣，却不平庸。它们拙劣的特点是过人——是初出茅庐者那种用撞城锤砸蝴蝶、用大棒描花样的拙劣。因此能把自己早期的作品用低价卖掉他仍然感到高兴。他明白它们的价值——写出后不久就明白了。他把信心寄托在后来的作品上。他曾努力要超出杂志小说家的水平；力求用种种富于艺术性的手段武装自己。另一方面他也不愿因此削弱作品的力量。他有意识地从避免过火中提高作品的力度。他也没有偏离自己对现实的爱。他的作品是现实主义的，但他也努力把它跟幻想和想像中的美融合在一起。他追求的是一种冷静的现实主义，充满了人类的理想和信念。他所要求的是生香暮色的生活，其中融会了生活中的全部精神探索和灵魂成就。
在阅读过程中他发现了两种小说流派。一派把人当作天神，忽略了人原是来自人间；另一派把人当作傻瓜，忽略了他天赋的梦想和神圣的潜力。在马丁看来，两派都有错误，原因在于视角和目的太单一。有一种折中办法较为接近真实，虽然它一方面非难了傻瓜派的禽兽式的野蛮，一方面也不吹嘘天神派。马丁觉得他那篇叫露丝觉得冗长的故事《冒险》就体现了小说真实的理想。他在一篇叫做《天神与傻瓜》的论文里对这个问题作了全面的阐述。
但是他的帽险》和其他自以为得意的作品却还在编辑们门前乞讨。他早期的作品在他眼里除了给他带来报酬之外毫无意义。尽管他的恐怖故事卖掉了两个，他也并不认为它们是高雅之作，更不是最好的作品。他认为这些东西显然都是彰明较著的想当然和想入非非之作，尽管也杂读了真实事物的种种魅力——那是它们力量的源泉。他把这种荒诞离奇与现实的杂揉只认作是一种技巧——最多是一种聪明的技巧。伟大的文学作品是不可能在这样的东西里存在的。它们技巧颇高，但他并不承认脱离了人性的技巧会有什么价值。它们只是给技巧戴上人性的面具而已。他在他的六七部恐怖小说里就是这样做的。那是在他达到《冒险》、《欢乐》、《罐子》和《生命之酒》的高度之前的事。
他拿三篇小三重奏的三块钱凑合着应付到了《白鼠》的支票到达。他在杂货店那信他不过的葡萄牙老板那儿兑现了第一张支票，还了他一块钱，另外两块分别还给了面包店和水果店。马丁还吃不起肉，《白鼠》的支票到达时他一直在捉襟见肘。对第二张支票的兑现他拿不定主意。他一辈子也没有进过银行，更不用说去取钱了。他有一种孩子气的天真愿望：大踏步走进奥克兰一家大银行，把已经背书好的四十元支票往柜台上一扔。可另一方面讲求实效的常识却告诉他，还是在他的杂货商那儿兑现的好，那可以给杂货商一个印象，以后可以多赊点帐。他不情愿地满足了杂货商的要求，还清了他的债，找回了一口袋叮叮当当的硬币。然后还清了其他商人的债，赎回了他的衣服和自行车，预付了一个月打字机租金，还了玛利亚一个月欠租，还预付了一个月。这一来他兜里只剩下差不多三块钱以备不时之需了。
这小小的进项似乎成了一笔大财产。他把衣服一赎回来便立即去看露丝，路上忍不住在口袋里拨拉着几块银币叮当作响。他穷得太久。像一个快要饿死而被救活的人舍不得放开没吃完的食物一样，他那手就是舍不得离开几个银币。他并不小气，也不贪婪，但那钱不光意味着银洋和角于，它代表了成功，银币上的几个鹰徽对他来说就是几个长了翅膀的胜利之神。
他朦胧中感到这个世界非常美好，确实比平常美好多了。许多个礼拜以来世界都是非常郁闷的，严峻的；可现在，在他几乎还清了所有的债务，口袋里还叮叮当当响着王块钱，心里满是成功的喜悦的时候，阳光便明亮而温暖起来。这时忽然下了一场急雨，把毫无准备的行入淋了个透湿，可他仍然感到高兴。他挨饿时心里老想着他所知道的世界上无数挨饿的人，可现在他吃饱了，脑子里那无数挨饿的人便消失了，忘掉了。他自己在恋爱，便也想起了世界上无数恋爱的人。爱情抒情诗的主题不知不觉已开始在他脑子里活跃。他受到创作激情的左右，下电车时已错过了两段路，也不觉烦恼。
他在莫尔斯家见到许多人。露丝的两个表姐妹从圣拉非水来看她，莫尔斯太太便以招待她俩为由执行起用年轻人包围露丝的计划。在马丁无法出面的时候这计划已经开始，现在正进行得热火朝天。她把邀请有作为的男性作为重点。于是除了陶乐赛和佛罗伦斯两姐妹之外，马丁在那里还见到了两位大学教授（一个教拉丁文，一个教英文）；一个刚从菲律宾回来的青年军官，以前曾是露丝的同学；一个叫梅尔维尔的人，是旧金山信托公司总裁约塞夫·相金斯的私人秘书。最后，还有一个男性是一个精力旺盛的银行经理，查理·哈外古德，斯坦福大学的毕业生，三十五岁了却还年轻，尼罗俱乐部和团结俱乐部的成员，在竞选时是共和党稳妥的发言人——总之在各个方面都正在扶摇直上。女性之中有一个女肖像画家，一个职业音乐家，还有一个社会学博士，因为她在旧金山贫民窟的社会服务工作而在那一带小有名气。但是女性在莫尔斯太太的计划里并不重要，充其量是些必不可少的附属品。有所作为的男性总是要设法吸引来的。
“你谈话时别激动。”在考验性的介绍开始之前露丝叮嘱马丁。
马丁因为自己的笨拙感到压抑，开始时有些拘谨，尤其害怕自己的肩膀会出毛病，威胁到家具和摆设的安全。这一群人还让他忐忑不安。这样高层的人士他以前从没见过，何况人数又那么多。银行经理哈外古德很引起他的兴趣，他决定有了机会就研究他一下。因为在他的惶惑之下还隐藏着一个自信的自我。他急于用这些纳士淑女对照自己，看他们从书本和生活中学会了一些什么他所不知道的东西。
露丝的眼睛不时地瞄着他，看他应付得如何，见他轻轻松松便跟她的表姐妹认识了，不禁感到又吃惊又高兴。他肯定没有激动，坐下之后也不再担心肩膀闯祸了。露丝知道两个表姐妹都是聪明人——浅薄，但是敏锐。（那天晚上睡觉时两人都称赞马丁，她却几乎不明白她们的意思。）在那一方面，马丁也觉得在这样的环境里开开玩笑、无饬大雅地斗斗嘴其实轻而易举，因为他在自己的阶级里原本是个机智风趣的人，在舞会和星期天的野宴上惯会挖苦说笑，调皮逗乐。而那天晚上成功又还支持着他，拍着他的肩膀告诉他地干得不错。因此他不但能够让自己高兴也能够让别人高兴，毫无窘涩之感。
后来露丝的担心却有了道理。马丁跟考德威尔教授在一个显眼的角落里交谈起来。对露丝那挑剔的眼光说来，虽然马丁没有在空中挥舞手臂，却仍然太容易激动，眼睛太频繁地闪出光芒，谈话也太快太热烈，太容易紧张，也太频繁地容许激动的血液涨红了面颊。他缺乏彬彬有礼的风度和涵养，跟和他谈话的年青英文教授形成了鲜明的对比。
但是马丁对外表却满不在乎2他很快就注意到了对方那训练有素的心智，欣赏起他的渊博。而考德威尔教授却不了解马丁对一般英文教授的看法。因为马丁不明白为什么不应该谈本行，便要求教授谈本行，教授虽然开始时似乎不乐意，后来还是照办了。
“反对谈本行是荒谬而不公平的，”几个礼拜以前马丁曾对露丝说过，“当男男女女欢聚一堂之时，在太阳底下有什么理由不让他们交流自己最好的东西呢？他们最好的东西正是他们最感兴趣的、他们赖以生存的东西，他们日以继夜地专门干着、研究着、甚至连做梦也想着的东西。你想想看，若是让巴特勒先生出于社交礼仪而大谈其保尔·魏尔伦、德国戏剧、或是邓南遮，岂不是要闷死人吗？如果我非要听巴特勒先生谈话不可，我就宁愿听他谈他的法律。那才是他最好的东西。生命太短促，我想听到的是我所遇到的人的精华。”
“可是，”露丝反对道，“大家都感兴趣的话题是有的。”
“那你就错了，”他匆匆说下去，“社会上的每一个人和每一个集团——一或者说，几乎每一个人和每一个集团——都要拿比他们强的人做榜样。那么谁是最好的榜样呢？无所事事的人，有钱的闲人。这些人一般不知道世界上做事的人所知道的东西。听他们谈自己所从事的事业他们感到沉闷。因此他们便宣布这类东西叫做本行，不宜谈论。同样他们还确定什么东西不算本行。可以谈论。于是可以谈论的东西就成了最近演出的歌剧、最新出版的小说、打扑克、打弹子、鸡尾酒、汽车、马展、钓鲜鱼、钓金熗鱼、大野兽狩猎、驾游艇和诸如此类的东西——注意，这些都不过是闲人们熟悉的东西。说穿了，是他们决定了他们自己的本行话题。而最有趣的是：他们把这类意见强加给别人，而许多聪明人和全部可能聪明的人都欣然接受。至于我么，我总是想听见别人的精华，无论你把它叫做失礼的本行话或是别的什么都可以。”
露丝没有明白他的道理，只觉得他对于现存秩序的攻击太意气用事。
这样，马丁以他急切的心情感染了考德威尔教授，逼着他说出了心里话。露丝从他身边走过时正听见马丁在说：——
“这种离经叛道之论你在加州大学肯定是不会发表的吧？”
考德威尔教授耸耸肩。“这是诚实的纳税人应付政客的办法，你知道，萨克拉门托给我们拨款，我们只好向萨克拉门托磕头。我们还得向大学董事会磕头，向党报磕头，向两个党的党报都磕头。”
“对，这很清楚，可你呢？”马丁追问，“你看来是一条离开了水的鱼呢！”
“我看，在大学这个池子里像我这样的鱼并不多。有时我真觉得自己是条离开了水的鱼。我应当到巴黎去，到贫民窟去，到隐士的洞窟里去，或是跟贫苦放荡的流浪艺人在一起。我应当跟他们一起喝红葡萄酒——在旧金山叫做‘南欧红’。我应当在法国拉丁区廉价的饭店里吃饭，对上帝创造的一切发表激烈的言论，慷慨激昂。的确，我几乎经常确认自己是个天生的极端分子。可我有许多问题仍旧没有把握。在我面对着自己人性的弱点时，我便怯懦起来。这常常使我对任何问题都难以纵览全局——人的问题，事关重大的，你知道。”
他一边谈着，马丁却意识到自己的唇边出现了《贸易风之歌》——“我最强劲时虽在正午，可等到夜里月儿透出，我也能吹得帆地鼓鼓。”
他几乎哼出声来，却忽然发现原来教授今他想起了贸易风——东北贸易风。那风稳定、冷静、有力。这位教授心平气和，值得信赖，可仍叫他捉摸不透：说话总有所保留，宛如马丁心中的贸易风：浩荡强劲，却留有余地，决不横流放肆。马丁又浮想联翩了。他的脑子是一个极容易展开的仓库，装满了记忆中的事实和幻象，似乎永远对他整整齐齐排开，让他查阅，在他眼前发生的一切都可以引起对比的或类比的联想，而且往往以幻影的形态出现——它总是随着眼前鲜活的事物飘然而来。例如：露丝的脸上暂时表现嫉妒时，他眼前便出现了久已遗忘的月光下的狂风场景；又如听考德威尔教授讲话时他眼前便重新出现了东北贸易风驱赶着白色的浪花越过紫红色的海面的场景。这样，新的回忆镜头往往在他面前出现，在他眼帘前展开，或是投射到他的脑海里。它们并不让他难堪，反倒使他认识了自己，明白了自己的类属。它们源出于往日的行为与感受，源出于昨天和上个礼拜的情况、事件、和书本——源出于不计其数的幻影，无论是他睡着还是醒着总在他心里翻腾的幻影。
在他听着考德威尔教授轻松流畅的谈话（那是个有教养有头脑的人的谈话）时，便是这样。他不断地看到过去的自己。那时他还是个十足的流氓，戴一项“硬边的”斯泰森大檐帽，穿一件双排扣方襟短外衣，得意洋洋地晃动着肩膀，他的最高理想是粗野到警察管不到的程度——而对这些他并不打算掩饰或淡化。他在生活里有一段时间的确是个平常的流氓，一个叫警察头痛的、威胁着诚实的工人阶级居民的团伙头子。可是他的理想已经改变。现在他满眼是衣冠楚楚、门第高贵的红男绿女，肺里吸进的是教养与风雅的空气，而同时他早年那个戴硬边帽、穿方襟短外衣、神气十足、粗鲁野蛮的青年的幻影也在这屋里出没。他看见那街角的流氓的形象跟自己合而为一，正跟一个货真价实的大学教授并坐交谈。
他毕竟还没有找到自己持久的地位。他到哪儿都能随遇而安，到哪儿都永远受人欢迎，因为他工作认真，愿意并也能够为自己的权利而斗争，因此别人对他不能不尊敬。但是他却不曾扎下根来。他有足够的能力满足伙伴们的需要，却不能满足自己的需要。一种不安的情绪永远困扰着他，他永远听见远处有什么东西在召唤，他一辈子都在前进，都在憧憬着它，直到他发现了书本、艺术和爱情。于是他来到了这里，来到这一切之间。在他所有共过患难的同志们之中他是唯一被接纳入莫尔斯家的人。
可这一切思想和幻影并没有影响他跟随考德威尔教授的谈话。在他怀着理解和批判的眼光听着他时，他注意到了对方知识的完整性，也不时地发现着自己知识的漏洞和大片大片的空白，那是许多地完全不熟悉的话题。然而，谢谢斯宾塞，他发现自己对于知识已有了一个总的轮廓。按照这个轮廓去填补材料只是时间的问题。邓时候你再看吧，他想——注意，暗礁！他感到自己仿佛是坐在教授脚边，满怀景仰地吸取着知识；但他也渐渐发现了对方判断中的漏洞——那漏洞闪烁不定，很难捉摸，若不是一直出现他是难于把捉到的。他终于把捉住了，一跃而上，与对方平起平坐了。
马丁开始谈话时，露丝第二次来到了他们身边。
“我要指出你的错误，或者说那削弱着你的判断的东西，”他说，“你缺少了生物学。你的体系之中没有生物学的地位。我指的是如实地诠释着生命的生物学，从基础开始，从实验室、试管和获得了生命的无机物开始直到美学和社会学的广泛结论的生物学。”
露丝感到惶恐。她曾听过考德威尔教授两n课，她崇拜他，是把他看作活的知识宝库的。
“我不太明白你的意思。”教授含糊地说。
马丁却多少觉得他其实明白他的意思。
“我来解释一下看，”他说，“我记得读埃及史的时候曾读到这样的意思：不光研究埃及的土地问题就无法研究埃及的艺术。”
“很对，”教授点点头。
“因此我似乎觉得，”马丁说下去，“既然在一切事物之中没有事先了解生命的本质和构成生命的元素就无法了解土地问题，那么，如果我们连创制法律、制度。宗教和风俗的生灵的本质和他的构成元素都不了解，又怎么能谈得上了解法律、制度、宗教和风俗本身呢？难道文学还不如埃及的建筑和雕刻更能反映人性么？在我们所知道的世界中有什么东西能不受进化规律的支配呢——啊，我知道，对于各种艺术的进化过程已经有人神精竭虑作过阐述，但我总觉得它们先于机械，把人本身漏掉了。对于工具、竖琴、音乐、歌曲和舞蹈的进化过程已有了美妙精彩的阐述，可对于人本身的进化过程呢？对创造出第一个工具和唱出第一首歌曲之前的人类本身的基本的、内在的部分的进比过程呢？你没有思考的正是这个东西，我把它叫做生物学——最广义的生物学。
“我知道我的阐述不够连贯，但我已经尽力表达了我的意思。那是在你谈话时我才想到的，因此考虑得不成熟，讲得也不清楚。你刚才谈到人的脆弱，因此无法考虑到所有的因素。于是你就漏掉了生物学这个因素——我觉得似乎是这样的——而所有的艺术却是依靠这个因素编织出来的，它是编织人类一切行为和成就的经纬线呢。”
令露丝大吃一惊的是，马丁的理论没有立即被粉碎，她觉得教授的回答宽容了马丁的不成熟。考德威尔教授摸弄着他的表链，一言不发，坐了足有一分钟。
“你知道不？”他终于说话了，“以前也有人这样批评过我——那是个非常伟大的人，一个科学家，进化论者，约瑟夫·勒孔特。他已经过世，我以为不会有人再发觉我这个问题了河你来了，揭露了我。不过，郑重地说，我承认错误，我认为你的意见是有道理的——实际上很有道理。我太古典，在解释性的学科分支方面我的知识已经落后。我只能以我所受到的不利教育和我拖沓的性格来做解释，是它们阻止了我。你相不相信我从来没有进过物理实验室和化学实验室？可那是事实。勒孔特说得不错，你也不错，伊登先生，至少在一定程度上不错——我有许多东西都不知道。”
露丝找了个借口拉走了马丁。她把他带到一边，悄悄说道：——
“你不应该像那样垄断了考德威尔教授。可能有别的人也想跟他谈话呢。”
“我错了，”马丁后悔了，承认，“可是你知道么？我激动了他，而他也很引起我的兴趣，于是我就忘了想到别人。他是我平生与之交谈过的最聪明、最育用头脑的人。我还要告诉你另一件事。我以前以为凡是上过大学或是处于社会上层的人都跟他一样有头脑，一样聪明呢。”
“他可是个非凡的人。”露丝回答。
“我也这么想。现在你要我跟谁谈话呢？——啊，对了，让我跟那个银行经理见一见面吧。”
马丁跟银行经理谈了大约十五分钟，露丝不可能要求她的情人态度更好了。他的眼睛从不闪光，面颊也从不泛红。他说话时的平静、稳重使她惊奇。但银行经理这类人在马丁的评价里却是一落千丈。那天晚上剩下的时间里他一直在跟一个印象作斗争：银行经理跟满D陈词滥调的人是同义语。他发现那个军官性情温和，单纯质朴，是个身体不错头脑也健全的小伙子，满足于家世和幸运在生活中分配给他的地位。在听说他也上过两年大学之后，马丁感到纳闷：他把大学学到的东西藏到哪儿去了？然而比起那位满口陈词滥调的银行经理马丁毕竟觉得他可爱得多.
“的确，我并不反对陈词滥调，”后来他告诉露丝，“可折磨得我受不了的是，他搬出那些陈词滥调时那神气十足、志得意满、高人一等的态度，和他所占用的时间。他用来告诉我统一劳工党跟民主党合并所花去的时间，我已经可以用来给他讲一部宗教改革史了。你知道么？他在字句上玩花头用去的时间跟职业赌徒拿手里的牌玩花头的时间差不多。有了时间我再跟你详谈吧。”
“我很抱歉你不喜欢他，”她回答，“他可是巴特勒先生的一个红火。巴特勒先生说他忠实可靠，坚如磐石，称他为‘彼得’，认为银行的一切机制只要建立在他身上便都牢实可靠。”
“从我在他身上所见到的那一点东西和我听见他说出的更少的东西看来，对此我并不怀疑；但我现在对银行的估价已经大不如前。我这样坦率奉告你不会介意吧？”
“不，不，挺有意思的。”
“那就好，”马丁快活地说下去，“这不过是我这个野蛮人第一次窥见文明世界时的印象。对于文明人来说我这种印象也一定有趣得惊人吧。”
“你对我的两个表姐妹作何感想？”露丝问道。
“比起其他的妇女我倒更喜欢她俩。两人都非常风趣，而且从不装腔作势。”
“那么你也喜欢别的女人么？”
他摇摇头。
“那位搞社会救济的妇女谈起社会问题来只会胡扯。我敢发誓，如果把她用明星（比如汤姆林森）的思想进行一番簸扬，她是一点独创的意见都没有的。至于肖像画家么，简直是个十足的讨厌鬼。她做银行经理的老婆倒也珠联壁合。对那位女音乐家，不管她那抬头有多灵活，技巧有多高明，表现又是多么美妙，我都没有兴趣——事实上她对音乐是一窍不通。”
“她演奏得很美妙的。”露丝反对。
“不错，她在音乐的外部表现上无疑操练有素，可对音乐的内在精神她却把捉不住。我问过她，音乐对她是什么意义——你知道我对这个特殊问题一向感兴趣；可她并不知道它对她有什么意义，只知道她崇拜音乐，音乐是最伟大的艺术，对于她比生命都重要。”
“你又让她们谈本行了。”露丝责备说。
“这我承认。不过可以想像，既然她们连本行都谈不出个道理来，谈别的可不更叫我头痛么？我一向以为这儿的人具有着文化上的一切优势，——”他暂时住了嘴，仿佛看到他年轻时那幻影戴着硬边大檐帽，穿着方襟短外衣进了门，大摇大摆地穿过了屋子。“我刚才说了，我以为在社会上层人们都是聪明睿智的，都闪着光芒。可现在，在我跟他们作了短暂的接触之后，他们给我的印象却是：大部分都是笨蛋，剩下的人中百分之九十都是讨厌鬼。只有考德威尔教授例外。他倒是个十足的人，每一寸都是的，他脑髓的灰白质里每一个原子都是的。”
露丝的脸闪出了光芒。
“谈谈他吧，”她怂恿他，“用不着谈他的长处和聪明，那我很清楚。谈谈反面的东西吧，我急着想听。”
“我也许会说不清楚，”马丁幽默地争辩了一下，“倒不如你先跟我说说他的问题。说不定你看他全身都是精华呢。”
“我听过他两门课，认识他已经两年；因此急于知道你对他的第一印象。”
“你是说坏印象？好了，是这样的。我估计他确实如你所想，具有一切优秀的品质，他至少属于我所遇见过的最优秀的知识分子之列，可他有一种秘密的耻辱感。
“啊，不，不！”他急忙叫道，“没有什么肮脏或粗俗的事。我的意思是他给我这样的印象：作为一个洞明世事的人，他害怕他所洞见到的情况，因此便假装没有看见。这种说法也许不清楚，可以换一个说法。他是这样的一个人，发现了通向隐秘的庙堂的路却没有沿着那路走下去。他可能瞥见了庙堂，事后却努力劝说自己：那不过是海市蜃楼中的绿洲而已。再换个说法，他原是个大有作为的人，却觉得那样做没有意义，而在内心深处又一直懊悔没有去做；他秘密地嘲笑那样做可能得到的回报，然而，更秘密的是，他也渴望着那回报和那么做时的欢乐。”
“我可不这么分析他，”她说，“我不明白你刚才这话的意思O”
“这只不过是我的一种模糊感觉，”马丁敷衍道，“提不出理由的。感觉而已，很可能是错的。你对他肯定应当比我更了解。”
马丁从露丝家的晚会带回的是奇怪的混乱和矛盾的感受。他达到了目的却失望了。为了跟那些人来往他往上爬，可一交往却失望了。另一方面他也为自己的胜利所鼓舞。他的攀登要比预期的容易。他超越了攀登，而且比高处的人们更优秀（对此他并不用虚伪的谦逊向自己掩饰）——当然考德威尔教授除外。无论讲生活还是讲书本马丁都比他们知道得多。他真不知道这些人把他们的教育扔到什么旮旯里去了。他并不知道自己的脑力特别强大，也不知道在世界上像莫尔斯家这样的客厅里是找不到献身于探索着事物的底奥和思考着终被问题的人的。他做梦也没有想到，那样的人有加孤独的雄鹰，只能独自翎翔在蔚蓝的天空里，远离开尘世和其间的扰攘纷坛的生活。
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