BOOK ONE / CHAPTER 2
That winter Robert Cohn went over to America with his novel, and it was
Accepted by a fairly good publisher. His going made an awful row I heard, and I
Think that was where Frances lost him, because several women were nice to him in
New York, and when he came back he was quite changed. He was more enthusiastic
About America than ever, and he was not so simple, and he was not so nice. The
Publishers had praised his novel pretty highly and it rather went to his head. Then
Several women had put themselves out to be nice to him, and his horizons had all
Shifted. For four years his horizon had been absolutely limited to his wife. For three
Years, or almost three years, he had never seen beyond Frances. I am sure he had
Never been in love in his life.
He had married on the rebound from the rotten time he had in college, and
Frances took him on the rebound from his discovery that he had not been everything
To his first wife. He was not in love yet but he realized that he was an attractive
Quantity to women, and that the fact of a woman caring for him and wanting to live
With him was not simply a divine miracle. This changed him so that he was not so
Pleasant to have around. Also, playing for higher stakes than he could afford in some
Rather steep bridge games with his New York connections, he had held cards and
Won several hundred dollars. It made him rather vain of his bridge game, and he
Talked several times of how a man could always make a living at bridge if he were
Ever forced to.
Then there was another thing. He had been reading W. H. Hudson. That
Sounds like an innocent occupation, but Cohn had read and reread “The Purple
Land.” “The Purple Land” is a very sinister book if read too late in life. It recounts
Splendid imaginary amorous adventures of a perfect English gentleman in
an
Intensely romantic land, the scenery of which is very well described. For a man to
Take it at thirty-four as a guide-book to what life holds is about as safe as it would be
For a man of the same age to enter Wall Street direct from a French convent,
Equipped with a complete set of the more practical Alger books. Cohn, I believe,
Took every word of “The Purple Land” as literally as though it had been an R. G. Dun
Report. You understand me, he made some reservations, but on the whole the book to
Him was sound. It was all that was needed to set him off. I did not realize the extent
To which it had set him off until one day he came into my office.
“Hello, Robert,” I said. “Did you come in to cheer me up?”
“Would you like to go to South America, Jake?” he asked.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. I never wanted to go. Too expensive. You can see all the South
Americans you want in Paris anyway.”
“They’re not the real South Americans.”
“They look awfully real to me.”
I had a boat train to catch with a week’s mail stories, and only half of them
Written.
“Do you know any dirt?” I asked.
“No.”
“None of your exalted connections getting divorces?”
“No; listen, Jake. If I handled both our expenses, would you go to South
America with me?”
“Why me?”
“You can talk Spanish. And it would be more fun with two of us.”
“No,” I said, “I like this town and I go to Spain in the summertime.”
“All my life I’ve wanted to go on a trip like that,” Cohn said. He sat down. “I’ll
Be too old before I can ever do it.”
“Don’t be a fool,” I said. “You can go anywhere you want. You’ve got plenty
Of money.”
“I know. But I can’t get started.”
“Cheer up,” I said. “All countries look just like the moving pictures.”
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