Persuading his father to advance the capital, he went into business and keen and successful business he made of it, devoting his afternoons whole-souled to it, while his partner devoted the mornings.The early evenings he spent socially, but, as the hour grew to nine or ten, an irresistible restlessness overcame him and he disappeared from the haunts of men until the next afternoon.Friends and acquaintances thought that he spent much of his time in sport.And they were right, though they never would have dreamed of the nature of the sport, even if they had seen him running coyotes in night-chases over the hills of Mill Valley.Neither were the schooner captains believed when they reported seeing, on cold winter mornings, a man swimming in the tide-rips of Raccoon Straits or in the swift currents between Goat island and Angel Island miles from shore.
In the bungalow at Mill Valley he lived alone, save for Lee Sing, the Chinese cook and factotum, who knew much about the strangeness of his master, who was paid well for saying nothing, and who never did say anything.After the satisfaction of his nights, a morning's sleep, and a breakfast of Lee Sing's, James Ward crossed the bay to San Francisco on a midday ferryboat and went to the club and on to his office, as normal and conventional a man of business as could be found in the city.But as the evening lengthened, the night called to him.
There came a quickening of all his perceptions and a restlessness.His hearing was suddenly acute; the myriad night-noises told him a luring and familiar story; and, if alone, he would begin to pace up and down the narrow room like any caged animal from the wild.
Once, he ventured to fall in love.He never permitted himself that diversion again.He was afraid.And for many a day the young lady, scared at least out of a portion of her young ladyhood, bore on her arms and shoulders and wrists divers black-and-blue bruises--tokens of caresses which he had bestowed in all fond gentleness but too late at night.There was the mistake.Had he ventured love-****** in the afternoon, all would have been well, for it would have been as the quiet gentleman that he would have made love--but at night it was the uncouth, wife-stealing savage of the dark German forests.Out of his wisdom, he decided that afternoon love-****** could be prosecuted successfully; but out of the same wisdom he was convinced that marriage as would prove a ghastly failure.He found it appalling to imagine being married and encountering his wife after dark.
So he had eschewed all love-******, regulated his dual life, cleaned up a million in business, fought shy of match-****** mamas and bright-eyed and eager young ladies of various ages, met Lilian Gersdale and made it a rigid observance never to see her later than eight o'clock in the evening, run of nights after his coyotes, and slept in forest lairs--and through it all had kept his secret safe save Lee Sing...and now, Dave Slotter.It was the latter's discovery of both his selves that frightened him.In spite of the counter fright he had given the burglar, the latter might talk.And even if he did not, sooner or later he would be found out by some one else.
Thus it was that James Ward made a fresh and heroic effort to control the Teutonic barbarian that was half of him.So well did he make it a point to see Lilian in the afternoons, that the time came when she accepted him for better or worse, and when he prayed privily and fervently that it was not for worse.
During this period no prize-fighter ever trained more harshly and faithfully for a contest than he trained to subdue the wild savage in him.Among other things, he strove to exhaust himself during the day, so that sleep would render him deaf to the call of the night.He took a vacation from the office and went on long hunting trips, following the deer through the most inaccessible and rugged country he could find--and always in the daytime.Night found him indoors and tired.At home he installed a score of exercise machines, and where other men might go through a particular movement ten times, he went hundreds.Also, as a compromise, he built a sleeping porch on the second story.Here he at least breathed the blessed night air.Double screens prevented him from escaping into the woods, and each night Lee Sing locked him in and each morning let him out.
The time came, in the month of August, when he engaged additional servants to assist Lee Sing and dared a house party in his Mill Valley bungalow.Lilian, her mother and brother, and half a dozen mutual friends, were the guests.For two days and nights all went well.And on the third night, playing bridge till eleven o'clock, he had reason to be proud of himself.His restlessness fully hid, but as luck would have it, Lilian Gersdale was his opponent on his right.She was a frail delicate flower of a woman, and in his night-mood her very frailty incensed him.Not that he loved her less, but that he felt almost irresistibly impelled to reach out and paw and maul her.Especially was this true when she was engaged in playing a winning hand against him.
He had one of the deer-hounds brought in and, when it seemed he must fly to pieces with the tension, a caressing hand laid on the animal brought him relief.These contacts with the hairy coat gave him instant easement and enabled him to play out the evening.Nor did anyone guess the while terrible struggle their host was ******, the while he laughed so carelessly and played so keenly and deliberately.