FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87  
88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   >>   >|  
ences to which we say we are indifferent. What matter is it if he _does_ arrest me? I should at least have a cup of coffee at the station house." On either side of the alley through which Fairfax now walked there was not a friendly door open, or a shutter flung back from a window. At the head of the street Fairfax stopped and looked back upon the yards and the tracks of the workshops. The ugly scene lay in the mist of very early morning and the increasing daylight made its crudeness each moment more apparent. As he stood alone in Nut Street, on either side of him hundreds of sleeping workmen, the sun rose over the yards, filling the dreary, unlovely outlook with a pure glory. To Fairfax's senses it brought no consolation but the sharp suffering that any beauty brings to the poet and the seer. It was a new day--he was too young to be crushed out of life because he had an empty pocket, and faint as he was, hungry as he was, the visions began to rise again in his brain. The crimson glory, as it swam over the railroad yards, over the bridge, over the unsightly buildings, was peopled by his ideals--his breath came fast and his heart beat. The clouds from which the sun emerged took winged shapes and soared; the power of the iron creatures in the shed seemed to invigorate him. Fairfax drew a deep breath and murmured: "Art has made many victims. I won't sacrifice my life to it." And he seemed a coward to himself to be beaten so early in the race. "Muscles of iron and a heart of steel," he murmured again, "_a heart of steel_." He turned on his feet and limped on, and as he walked he saw a light in an opposite window with the early opening of a cheap restaurant. The shutters on either side of Nut Street were flung back. He heard the clattering of feet, doors were pushed open and the workers began to drift out into the day. Antony made for the light in the coffee house; it was extinguished before he arrived and the growing daylight took its place. A man from a lodging-house passed in at the restaurant door. Fairfax's hands were deep in the pockets of his overcoat, his fingers touched a loose button. He turned it, but it did not feel like a button. He drew it out; it was twenty-five cents. He had not shaken out quite all the children's coins on the hall floor. This bit of silver had caught between the lining and the cloth and resisted his angry fling. As the young man looked at it, his face softened. He went into the eating
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87  
88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Fairfax

 

restaurant

 

turned

 
Street
 
daylight
 

window

 
walked
 

looked

 

murmured

 

coffee


breath
 

button

 

invigorate

 

winged

 

shapes

 
creatures
 

limped

 

soared

 

opposite

 
Muscles

opening

 
coward
 

sacrifice

 

victims

 

beaten

 

arrived

 

children

 
twenty
 

shaken

 

silver


softened

 

eating

 

resisted

 

caught

 

lining

 

Antony

 

extinguished

 

workers

 

pushed

 

shutters


clattering

 

growing

 

fingers

 

touched

 

overcoat

 

pockets

 
lodging
 

passed

 

tracks

 

workshops