CHAPTER LXXVIII

THE FATEFUL MORN

On the evening of April 17, 1906, Frank and Bertha, who had recently returned, attended the opera. The great Caruso, whose tenor voice had taken the East by storm, and whose salary was reputed to be fabulous, had come at last to San Francisco. Fremsted, almost equally famous, was singing with him in "Carmen" at the Grand Opera House. All the town turned out in broadcloth, diamonds, silks and décolleté to hear them--a younger generation of San Franciscans assuming a bit uncomfortably that social importance which had not yet become genealogically sure of itself.

Frank and Bertha drove down in the electric brougham, for which they had with difficulty found a place along the vehicle-lined curb of Mission street. And, as they were early, they halted in the immense and handsome, though old-fashioned, foyer to observe the crowd. The air was heavy with perfume.

"Look at that haughty dame with a hundred-thousand dollar necklace," he smiled. "One would have thought her father was at least a king. Forty years ago he drove a dray.... And that one with the ermine coat and priceless tiara. Wouldn't you take her for a princess? Ah, well, more power to her! But her mother cleaned soiled linen in Washerwoman's Lagoon and her dad renovated cuspidors, swept floors in the Bella Union."

But the girl did not seem interested. "I wonder," she remarked a little later, "why it makes so very much--ah--difference ... who one's parents were?"

There was a curious, half-detached sadness in her tone. Frank wondered suddenly if he had blundered. Bertha had never mentioned her parents. He vaguely understood that they had died abroad and had foreborne to question, fearing to arouse some tragic memory.

"Of course, it really doesn't matter," he said hastily; "it's only when people put on airs that I think of such things." She took his arm with fingers that trembled slightly. "Let us go in. The overture is beginning."

During an intermission she whispered. "I wish I were like Carmen--bold enough to fight the world for lo--for what I wanted."

"Aren't you?" he turned and looked at her.

"No, sometimes I'm overwhelmed ... feel as though I can't look life in the face." He saw that her lips were trembling, that her eyes were winking back the tears.

"What is it, dear?" he questioned. But she did not answer. The curtain rose upon the final act.

Silently they moved out with a throng whose silk skirts swished and rustled. The men were restless, glad of a chance at the open and a smoke; the women gay, exalted, half intoxicated by the musical appeal to their emotions. There was an atmosphere almost of hysteria in the great swiftly emptying auditorium.

"I feel sort of--smothered," Bertha said; "suppose we walk."

"Gladly," answered Frank, "but what about the coupe?"

"There's one of these new livery stables with machine shop attached not far away. They call it a garage.... We'll leave the brougham there," she said.

* * * * *

The night was curiously still--breathless one might have called it. While the temperature was not high, there was an effect of warmth, vaguely disturbing like the presage of a storm. As they traversed a region of hotels and apartment houses, Frank and Bertha noted many open windows; men and women staring out half dreamily. They passed a livery stable, out of which there came a weird uncanny dissonance of horses neighing in their stalls.

"Tell me of your actress friend. Do you see her often?" Bertha asked.

"Not very. She's a good pal. But she's ... well, not like you."

Her eyes searched him. "Do you mean she's not as--pretty, Frank?"

"Oh, I don't know," he answered. "It's because I love you, dear. Aleta's right enough. But she's not--oh, you know--essential."

Bertha squeezed his arm. Was silent for a moment. Then, "Aleta's father was a circus rider?"

"Acrobat. Yes, he was killed when she was quite a child."

"But she remembers him; they were married, her mother" and he."

"Why, yes, I suppose so ... naturally."

There was another silence. Suddenly he turned on her, perplexed. "Bertha, what is wrong with you tonight?"

They were crossing a little park high up above the city whose lights lay, shimmering and misty, below. The stillness was obtrusive here. Not a leaf stirred. There was no one about. They might have been alone upon some tropic peak.

"I--can't tell you, Frank." Her tone of blended longing and despair caught at his heart.

Impetuously his arms went around her. "Dear," he said unsteadily. "Dear, I want you.... Oh, Bertha, I've waited so long! I don't care any more if you're rich ... I'm going to--you've got to promise...."

She tried to protest, to push him away; but Frank held her close. And, after a moment, like a tired child's, her head lay quiet on his shoulder; her arms stole round his neck; she began to weep softly.

* * * * *

The horror came at dawn.

Frank, startled from a late and restless slumber, thought that he was being shaken or attacked by some intruder. He sprang up, sleepily bewildered. The room rocked with a quick, sharp, jerking motion that was strangely terrifying. There was a dull indescribable rumbling, punctuated by a sound of falling things. A typewriter in one end of the room went over on the floor. A shaving mug danced on the shelf and fell. The windows rattled and a picture on the wall swayed drunkenly.

"Damn!" Frank rubbed his eyes. "An earthquake!"

He heard his mother's scream; his father's reassuring answer. Hurriedly he reached for his clothes. Downstairs he found his father endeavoring to calm the frightened servants, one of whom appeared to have hysterics. Presently his mother entered with the smelling salts. Soon the maid's unearthly laughter ceased.

"Anyone hurt?" Frank questioned anxiously.

"No," his father answered. "Thought the house was going over ... but there's little damage done."

Suddenly Frank thought of Bertha. He must go to her. She would be frightened.

He ran into the debris-cluttered street. Cable cars stood here and there, half twisted from the tracks, pavements were littered with bricks from fallen chimneys, bits of window glass. Men and women in various degrees of dishabille, were issuing from doorways. As he mounted higher, Frank saw smoke spirals rising from the southeastern part of town. He heard the strident clang of firegongs.

Automobiles were tearing to and fro, with a great shrieking of siren whistles.

It seemed like a nightmare through which he tore, without a sense of time or movement, arriving finally at the marble vestibule of Bertha's home. It was open and he rushed in, searching, calling. But he got no answer. Bertha, servants, aunt--all apparently had fled.

##