The Plastic Age Part 16

George Winsor stood up and leaned against the mantel. He ran his fingers through his hair until it stood grotesquely on end. "Oh, that's the old argument. I've heard it debated in a hundred bull sessions. One fellow says it's all wrong, and another fellow says it's all right, and you never get anywhere. I want somebody to tell me what's wrong about it and what's right. G.o.d knows you don't find out in your cla.s.ses. They have Doc Conners give those s.m.u.t talks to us in our freshman year, and a devil of a lot of good they do. A bunch of fellows faint and have to be lugged out, and the Doc gives you some sickening details about venereal diseases, and that's as far as you get. Now, I'm all messed up about this s.e.x business, and I'll admit that I'm thinking about it all the time, too. Some fellows say it's all right to have a woman, and some fellows say it's all wrong, but I notice none of them have any use for a woman who isn't straight."

All of the boys were sitting in easy-chairs except Donald Ferguson, who was lying on the couch and listening in silence. He was a handsome youth with Scotch blue eyes and sandy hair. Women were instantly attracted by his good looks, splendid physique, slow smile, and quiet drawl.

He spoke for the first time. "The old single-standard fight," he said, propping his head on his hand. "I don't see any sense in sc.r.a.pping about that any more. We've got a single standard now. The girls go just as fast as the fellows."

"Oh, that's not so," Hugh exclaimed. "Girls don't go as far as fellows."

Ferguson smiled pleasantly at Hugh and drawled; "Shut up, innocent; you don't know anything about it. I tell you the old double standard has gone all to h.e.l.l."

"You're exaggerating, Don, just to get Hugh excited," Ross said in his quiet way. "There are plenty of decent girls. Just because a lot of them pet on all occasions isn't any reason to say that they aren't straight.

I'm older than you fellows, and I guess I've had a lot more experience than most of you. I've had to make my own way since I was a kid, and I've b.u.mped up against a lot of rough customers. I worked in a lumber camp for a year, and after you've been with a gang like that for a while, you'll understand the difference between them and college fellows. Those boys are bad eggs. They just haven't any morals, that's all. They turn into beasts every pay night; and bad as some of our college parties are, they aren't a circ.u.mstance to a lumber town on pay night."

"That's no argument," George Winsor said excitedly, taking his pipe out of his mouth and gesticulating with it. "Just because a lumberjack is a beast is no reason that a college man is all right because he's less of a beast. I tell you I get sick of my own thoughts, and I get sick of the college when I hear about some things that are done. I keep straight, and I don't know why I do, I despise about half the fellows that chase around with rats, and sometimes I envy them like h.e.l.l. Well, what's the sense in me keeping straight? What's the sense in anybody keeping straight? Fellows that don't seem to get along just as well as those that do. What do you think, Mel? You've been reading Havelock Ellis and a lot of ducks like that."

Burbank tossed a cigarette b.u.t.t into the fire and gazed into the flames for a minute before speaking, his homely face serious and troubled. "I don't know what to think," he replied slowly. "Ellis tells about some things that make you fairly sick. So does Forel. The human race can be awfully rotten. I've been thinking about it a lot, and I'm all mixed up.

Sometimes life just doesn't seem worth living to me, what with the filth and the slums and the greed and everything. I've been taking a course in sociology, and some of the things that Prof Davis has been telling us make you wonder why the world goes on at all. Some poet has a line somewhere about man's inhumanity to man, and I find myself thinking about that all the time. The world's rotten as h.e.l.l, and I don't see how anything can be done about it. I don't think sometimes that it's worth living in. I can understand why people commit suicide." He spoke softly, gazing into the fire.

Hugh had given him rapt attention. Suddenly he spoke up, forgetting his resolve not to say anything more after Ferguson had called him "innocent." "I think you're wrong, Mel," he said positively. "I was reading a book the other day called 'Lavengro.' It's all about Gipsies.

Well, this fellow Lavengro was all busted up and depressed; he's just about made up his mind to commit suicide when he meets a friend of his, a Gipsy. He tells the Gipsy that he's going to b.u.mp himself off, that he doesn't see anything in life to live for. Then the Gipsy answers him.

Gee, it hit me square in the eye, and I memorized it on the spot. I think I can say it. He says: 'There's night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, brother, all sweet things; there's likewise a wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?' I think that's beautiful," he added simply, "and I think it's true, too."

"Good for you, Hugh," Ross said quietly.

Hugh blushed with pleasure, but he was taken back by Nutter's vigorous rejoinder. "Bunk!" he exclaimed. "Hooey! The sun, moon, and stars, and all that stuff sounds pretty, but it isn't life. Life's earning a living, and working like h.e.l.l, and women, and pleasure. The 'Rubaiyat'

's the only poem--if you're going to quote poetry. That's the only poem I ever saw that had any sense to it.

"Come, Beloved, fill the Cup that clears To-day of past Regrets and future Fears.

To-morrow? Why, To-morrow I may be Myself with Yesterday's seven thousand Years.

You bet. You never can tell when you're going to be b.u.mped off, and so you might just as well have a good time while you can. You d.a.m.n well don't know what's coming after you kick the bucket."

"Good stuff, the 'Rubaiyat,'" said Ferguson lazily. He was lying on his back staring at the ceiling. "I bet I've read it a hundred times. When they turn down an empty gla.s.s for me, it's going to be _empty_. I don't know what I'm here for or where I'm going or why. 'Into this world and why not knowing,' and so on. My folks sent me to Sunday-school and brought me up to be a good little boy. I believed just about everything they told me until I came to college. Now I know they told me a lot of d.a.m.ned lies. And I've talked with a lot of fellows who've had the same experience.... Anybody got a b.u.t.t?"

Burbank, who was nearest to him, pa.s.sed him a package of cigarettes.

Ferguson extracted one, lighted it, blew smoke at the ceiling, and then quietly continued, drawling lazily: "Most fellows don't tell their folks anything, and there's no reason why they should, either. Our folks lie to us from the time we are babies. They lie to us about birth and G.o.d and life. My folks never told me the truth about anything. When I came to college I wasn't very innocent about women, but I was about everything else. I believed that G.o.d made the world in six days the way the Bible says, and that some day the world was coming to an end and that we'd all be pulled up to heaven where Christ would give us the once-over. Then he'd s.h.i.+p some of us to h.e.l.l and give the good ones harps. Well, since I've found out that all that's hooey I don't believe in much of anything."

"I suppose you are talking about evolution," said Ross. "Well, Prof Humbert says that evolutions hasn't anything to do with the Bible--He says that science is science and that religion is religion and that the two don't mix. He says that he holds by evolution but that that doesn't make Christ's philosophy bad."

"No," Burbank agreed, "it doesn't make it bad; but that isn't the point.

I've read the Bible, which I bet is more than the rest of you can say, and I've read the Sermon on the Mount a dozen times. It's darn good sense, but what good does it do? The world will never practice Christ's philosophy. The Bible says, 'Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward,' and, believe me, that's d.a.m.n true. If people would be pure and good, then Christ's philosophy would work, but they aren't pure and good; they aren't made pure and good, they're made selfish, and bad: they're made, mind you, made full of evil and l.u.s.t. I tell you it's all wrong. I've been reading and reading, and the more I read the more I'm convinced that we're all rotten--and that if there is a G.o.d he made us rotten."

"You're wrong!" They all turned toward Winsor, who was still standing by the fireplace; even Ferguson rolled over and looked at the excited boy.

"You're wrong," he repeated, "all wrong. I admit all that's been said about parents. They do cheat us just as Don said. I never tell my folks anything that really matters, and I don't know any other fellows that do, either. I suppose there are some, but I don't know them. And I admit that there is sin and vice, but I don't admit that Christ's philosophy is useless. I've read the Sermon on the Mount, too. That's about all of the Bible that I have read, but I've read that; and I tell you you're all wrong. There is enough good in man to make that philosophy practical. Why, there is more kindness and goodness around than we know about. We see the evil, and we know we have l.u.s.ts and--and things, but we do good, too. And Hugh was right when he talked a while ago about the beauty in the world. There's lots of it, lots and lots of it. There's beautiful poetry and beautiful music and beautiful scenery; and there are people who appreciate all of it. I tell you that in spite of everything life is worth living. And I believe in Christ's philosophy, too. I don't know whether He is the son of G.o.d or not--I think that He must be--but that doesn't make any difference. Look at the wonderful influence He has had."

"Rot," said Burbank calmly, "absolute rot. There has never been a good deed done in His name; just the Inquisition and the what-do-you-call-'ems in Russia. Oh, yes, pogroms--and wars and robbing people. Christianity is just a name; there isn't any such thing. And most of the professional Christians that I've seen are d.a.m.n fools. I tell you, George, it's all wrong. We're all in the dark, and I don't believe the profs know any more about it than we do."

"Oh, yes, they do," Hugh exclaimed; "they must. Think of all the studying they've done."

"Bah." Burbank was contemptuous. "They've read a lot of books, that's all. Most of them never had an idea in their lives. Oh, I know that some of them think; if they didn't, I'd leave college to-morrow. It's men like Davis and Maxwell and Henley and Jimpson who keep me here. But most of the profs can't do anything more than spout a few facts that they've got out of books. No, they don't know any more about it than we do. We don't know why we're here or where we're going or what we ought to do while we are here. And we get into groups and tell s.m.u.tty stories and talk about women and religion, and we don't know any more than when we started. Think of all the talk that goes on around this college about s.e.x. There's no end to it. Some of the fellows say positively there's no sense in staying straight; and a few, d.a.m.n few, admit that they think a fellow ought to leave women alone, but most of them are in a muddle."

He rose and stretched. "I've got to be going--philosophy quiz to-morrow." He smiled. "I don't agree with Nutter, and I don't agree with George, and I don't agree with you, Don; and the worst of it is that I don't agree with myself. You fellows can bull about this some more if you want to; I've got to study."

"No, they can't," said Ross. "Not here, anyway. I've got to study, too.

The whole of you'll have to get out."

The boys rose and stretched. Ferguson rolled lazily off the couch.

"Well," he said with a yawn, "this has been very edifying. I've heard it all before in a hundred bull sessions, and I suppose I'll hear it all again. I don't know why I've hung around. There's a little dame that I've got to write a letter to, and, believe me, she's a d.a.m.n sight more interesting than all your bull." He strolled out of the door, drawling a slow "good night" over his shoulder.

Hugh went to his room and thought over the talk. He was miserably confused. Like Ferguson he had believed everything that his father and mother--and the minister--had told him, and he found himself beginning to discard their ideas. There didn't seem to be any ideas to put in the place of those he discarded. Until Carl's recent confidence he had believed firmly in chast.i.ty, but he discovered, once the first shock had worn off, that he liked Carl the unchaste just as much as he had Carl the chaste. Carl seemed neither better nor worse for his experience.

He was lashed by desire; he was burning with curiosity--and yet, and yet something held him back. Something--he hardly knew what it was--made him avoid any woman who had a reputation for moral laxity. He shrank from such a woman--and desired her so intensely that he was ashamed.

Life was suddenly becoming very complicated, more complicated, it seemed, every day. With other undergraduates he discussed women and religion endlessly, but he never reached any satisfactory conclusions.

He wished that he knew some professor that he could talk to. Surely some of them must know the answers to his riddles....

CHAPTER XVI

Hugh wasn't troubled only by religion and s.e.x; the whole college was disturbing his peace of mind: all of his illusions were being ruthlessly shattered. He had supposed that all professors were wise men, that their knowledge was almost limitless, and he was finding that many of the undergraduates were frankly contemptuous of the majority of their teachers and that he himself was finding inspiration from only a few of them. He went to his cla.s.ses because he felt that he had to, but in most of them he was confused or bored. He learned more in the bull sessions than he did in the cla.s.s-room, and men like Ross and Burbank were teaching him more than his instructors.

Further, Nu Delta was proving a keen disappointment. More and more he found himself thinking of Malcolm Graham's talk to him during the rus.h.i.+ng season of his freshman year. He often wished that Graham were still in college so that he could go to him for advice. The fraternity was not the brotherhood that he had dreamed about; it was composed of several cliques warring with each other, never coalescing into a single group except to contest the control of a student activity with some other fraternity. There were a few "brothers" that Hugh liked, but most of them were not his kind at all. Many of them were athletes taken into the fraternity because they were athletes and for no other reason, and although Hugh liked two of the athletes--they were really splendid fellows--he was forced to admit that three of them were hardly better than thugs, cheap muckers with fine bodies. Then there were the sn.o.bs, usually prep school men with more money than they could handle wisely, utterly contemptuous of any man not belonging to a fraternity or of one belonging to any of the lesser fraternities. These were the "smooth boys," interested primarily in clothes and "parties," pa.s.sing their courses by the aid of tutors or fraternity brothers who happened to study.

Hugh felt that he ought to like all of his fraternity brothers, but, try as he would, he disliked the majority of them. Early in his soph.o.m.ore year he knew that he ought to have "gone" Delta Sigma Delta, that that fraternity contained a group of men whom he liked and respected, most of them, at least. They weren't prominent in student activities, but they were earnest lads as a whole, trying hard to get something out of college.

The Nu Delta meetings every Monday night were a revelation to him. The brothers were openly bored; they paid little or no attention to the business before them. The president was constantly calling for order and not getting it. During the rus.h.i.+ng season in the second term, interest picked up. Freshmen were being discussed. Four questions were inevitably asked. Did the freshman have money? Was he an athlete? Had he gone to a prep school? What was his family like?

Hugh had been very much attracted by a lad named Parker. He was a charming youngster with a good mind and beautiful manners. In general, only bad manners were _au fait_ at Sanford; so Parker was naturally conspicuous. Hugh proposed his name for members.h.i.+p to Nu Delta.

"He's a harp," said a brother scornfully. "At any rate, he's a Catholic."

That settled that. Only Protestants were eligible to Nu Delta at Sanford, although the fraternity had no national rule prohibiting members of other religions.

The sn.o.bbery of the fraternity cut Hugh deeply. He was a friendly lad who had never been taught prejudice. He even made friends with a Jewish youth and was severely censured by three fraternity brothers for that friends.h.i.+p. He was especially taken to task by Bob Tucker, the president.

"Look here, Hugh," Tucker said sternly, "you've got to draw the line somewhere. I suppose Einstein is a good fellow and all that, but you've been running around with him a lot. You've even brought him here several times. Of course, you can have anybody in your room you want, but we don't want any Jews around the house. I don't see why you had to pick him up, anyway. There's plenty of Christians in college."

"He's a first-cla.s.s fellow," Hugh replied stubbornly, "and I like him. I don't see why we have to be so high-hat about Jews and Catholics. Most of the fraternities take in Catholics, and the Phi Thetas take in Jews; at least, they've got two. They bid Einstein, but he turned them down; his folks don't want him to join a fraternity. And Chubby Elson told me that the Theta Kappas wanted him awfully, but they have a local rule against Jews."

"That doesn't make any difference," Tucker said sharply. "We don't want him around here. Because some of the fraternities are so d.a.m.n broad-minded isn't any reason that we ought to be. I don't see that their broad-mindedness is getting them anything. We rate about ten times as much as the Phi Thetas or the Theta Kappas, and the reason we do is that we are so much more exclusive."

Hugh wanted to mention the three Nu Delta thugs, but he wisely restrained himself. "All right," he said stubbornly, "I won't bring Einstein around here again, and I won't bring Parker either. But I'll see just as much of them as I want to. My friends are my friends, and if the fraternity doesn't like them, it can leave them alone. I pledged loyalty to the fraternity, but I'll be d.a.m.ned if I pledged my life to it." He got up and started for the door, his blue eyes dark with anger.

"I hate sn.o.bs," he said viciously, and departed.