Other Things Being Equal Part 8

"Some day? Why not to-day? Would it be impossible to arrange it?"

"Why, no," she faltered, looking at him in surprise.

"Excuse my curiosity, please; but the boy is in such pressing need of some pleasurable emotion that as soon as I looked at you and your roses I thought, 'Now, that would not be a bad thing for Bob.' You see, I was simply answering a question that has bothered me all day. Then will you drive there with me now?"

"Would not that be impossible with your driver?" she asked, searching unaccountably for an excuse.

"I can easily dispense with him."

"But won't my presence be annoying?" she persisted, hesitating oddly.

"Not to me," he replied, turning quickly for his hat. "Come, then, please, I must waste no more time in Bob's good cause."

She followed him silently with a sensation of quiet excitement.

Presently she found herself comfortably seated beside the doctor, who drove off at a rapid pace.

"I think," said he, turning his horses westward, "I shall have to make a call out here on Jones Street before going to Bob. You will not mind the delay, Miss Levice, I hope."

"Oh, no. This is 'my afternoon off,' you know. Father is at home, and my mother will not miss me in the least. I was just thinking--"

She came to a sudden pause. She had just remembered that she was about to become communicative to a comparative stranger; the intent, interested look in Kemp's eye as he glanced at her was the disturbing element.

"You were thinking what?" he prompted with his eye now to the horses'

heads.

"I am afraid you would not be edified if I continued," she answered hastily, biting her lip. She had been about to remark that her father would miss her, nevertheless--but such personal plat.i.tudes are not always in good taste. Seeing that she was disinclined to finish her sentence, he did not urge her; and a few minutes later he drew up his horses before a rather imposing house.

"I shall not be gone a minute, I think," he said, as he sprang out and was about to attach the reins to the post.

"Let me hold them, please," said Ruth, eagerly stretching forth a hand.

He placed them in her hand with a smile, and turned in at the gateway.

He had been in the house about five minutes when she saw him come out hastily. His hat was pulled down over his brows, which were gathered in an unmistakable frown. At the moment when he slammed the gate behind him, a stout woman hurrying along the sidewalk accosted him breathlessly.

He waited stolidly with his foot on the carriage-step till she came up.

"So sorry I had to go out!" she burst forth. "How did you find my husband? What do you think of him?"

"Madame," he replied shortly, "since you ask, I think your husband is little short of an idiot!"

Ruth felt herself flush as she heard.

The woman looked at him in consternation.

"What is the matter?" she asked.

"Matter? Mayonnaise is the matter. If a man with a weak stomach like his cannot resist gorging himself with things he has been strictly prohibited from touching, he had better proclaim himself irresponsible and be done. It is nonsense to call me in when he persists in cutting up such antics. Good-afternoon."

And abruptly raising his hat, he sprang in beside Ruth, taking the reins from her without a word.

She felt very meek and small beside the evidently exasperated physician.

He seemed to forget her presence entirely, and she had too much tact to break the silence of an angry man. In nine cases out of ten, the explosion is bound to take place; but woe to him who lights the powder!

They were now driving northeast toward the quarter known as North Beach.

The sweet, fresh breeze in the western heights toward Golden Gate is here charged with odors redolent of anything but the "sh.o.r.es of Araby the blest."

Kemp finally gave vent to his feelings.

"Some men," he said deliberately, as if laying down an axiom, "have no more conception of the dignity of controlled appet.i.tes than savages.

Here is one who could not withstand anything savory to eat, to save his soul; otherwise he is a strong, sensible man. I can't account for it."

"The force of habit, perhaps," suggested Ruth.

"Probably. Jewish appet.i.te is known to dote on the fat of the land."

That he said this with as little vituperation as if he had remarked on the weather Ruth knew; and she felt no inclination to resent the remark, although a vision of her cousin Jennie protesting did present itself.

Some Jewish people with diseased imaginations take every remark on the race as a personal calumny.

"We always make the reservation that the fat be clean," she laughed.

Kemp flashed around at her.

"Miss Levice," he exclaimed contritely, "I completely forgot--I hope I was not rude."

"Why, certainly not," she answered half merrily, half earnestly. "Why should you be?"

"As you say, why should I be? Jewish individuals, of course, have their faults like the rest of humanity. As a race, most of their characteristics redound to their honor, in my estimation."

"Thank you," said the girl, quietly. "I am very proud of many Jewish traits."

"Such as a high morality, loyalty, intelligence, filial respect, and countless other things."

"Yes."

"Besides, it is wonderful how they hold the balance of power in the musical and histrionic worlds. Still, to be candid, in comparison with these, they do not seem to have made much headway in the other branches of art. Can you explain it, Miss Levice?"

He waited deferentially for a reply.

"I was trying to think of a proper answer," she responded with earnest simplicity; "and I think that their great musical and histrionic powers are the results not so much of art as of pa.s.sion inherited from times and circ.u.mstances stern and sad since the race began. Painting and sculpture require other things."

"Which the Jew cannot obtain?"

A soft glow overspread her face and mounted to her brow.

"Dr. Kemp," she answered, "we have begun. I should like to quote to you the beautiful ill.u.s.tration with which one of our rabbis was inspired to answer a clergyman asking the same question; but I should only spoil that which in his mouth seemed eloquent."

"You would not, Miss Levice. Tell the story, please."