Theodore Dreiser - The Stoic

While Berenice got some satisfaction out of outwitting the reporters, she found she was quite lonely in her own home, and spent most of her evenings reading. However, she was shocked by a special feature article in one of the New York Sunday papers which dealt entirely with herself and her previous relations with Cowperwood. While she was referred to as his ward, the whole tenor of the article tended to single her out as an opportunist who had used her beauty to further her personal comfort and social pleasures in general: an interpretation and presentation of herself which irritated as well as pained her greatly. For as she saw herself, then and before, she was wholly concerned with the beauty of life, and such creative achievements as tended to broaden and expand its experiences. However, as she now felt, this type of article was likely to be repeated and even reproduced in other papers, abroad as well as in her own country, for it was obvious that she had been singled out as a romantic and dramatic personality.

What could she do about it? Where go to live to get away from such publicity?

In her troubled and somewhat confused state of mind, she walked about the library of her home, the shelves of which were crowded with long-neglected volumes, and haphazardly withdrawing one of the books, she opened it casually and her eyes fell on the following words:

Yogis who have gained tranquility through the practice of spiritual discipline, behold Him in their own consciousness. But those who lack tranquility and discernment will not find Him, even though they may try hard to do so.

So arresting were these thoughts that she turned the book over to see the name of it. And noting that it was the Bhagavad-Gita, she remembered a certain Lord Severance’s brilliant discourse on the subject matter at a dinner given one evening by Lord Stane at his town house. She had been deeply impressed by Severence’s vivid account of his sojourn in India, where for a considerable period he had lived the monastic life in a retreat near Bombay and studied with a guru. She recalled how stirred she had been by his impressions, and had wished at the time that she also might one day go to India and do likewise. And now, in the face of her threatened social isolation, she felt even more keenly disposed to seek sanctuary somewhere. Indeed, this might be the solution of her present complicated affairs.

India! Why not? The more she thought about going there, the more the idea appealed to her.

According to another book on India which she found on her shelf, there were many swamis, many gurus, or teachers and interpreters of the mysteries of life or God, who had founded for themselves ashramas or retreats in the mountains or forests to which the troubled seekers after the meaning of the marvels or mysteries of life might turn in their hours of grief or failure or dismay, to learn of spiritual resources within themselves, which, if studied and followed, might readily dispel their own ills. Might not such a teacher of these great truths lead her into a realm of light or spiritual peace sufficiently illuminating to dispel the dark hours of loneliness and shadow which might permanently engulf her?

She would go to India! As she arranged it in her mind, she would sail to Bombay from London after closing Pryor’s Cove, taking her mother with her if she wished to go.

The next morning she called Dr. James to get his opinion regarding her decision, and when she told him of her plan to study there, much to her surprise, he said he thought it a very good plan indeed. For he himself had long been intrigued by no less an ambition, only he was not as free as Berenice to avail himself of the opportunity. It would be the kind of retreat and change she most needed, he said. In fact, he had a few patients, with physical and mental condition greatly deranged by social and personal difficulties, whom he had sent to a certain Hindu swami in New York, and they had later returned to him completely restored to health. For, as he had noted, there was something about the limited thought of the self that was lost in the larger thought of the not self that brought about forgetfulness of self in the nervous person, and so health.

And so encouraged was Berenice by his approval of her decision that she made immediate arrangements for the care of her Park Avenue home in her absence, and left New York for London.

To the world in general, the main subject of interest in connection with the death of Frank Algernon Cowperwood was his fortune: its size, who would inherit it, how much they would each receive. Before the will had been admitted to probate, gossip and rumor had it that Aileen was being cut off with a minimum, that Cowperwood’s two children received the bulk of the estate, also that various London favorites had already received huge gifts.

In less than a week after the death of her husband, Aileen had dismissed his lawyer, and in his place made one Charles Day her sole legal representative.

The will, admitted for probate in the Cook County Superior Court five weeks after the death of Cowperwood, contained gifts ranging in size from $2,000 left to each of his servants to $50,000 left to Albert Jamieson, and $100,000 to the Frank A. Cowperwood Observatory, an institution presented to the University of Chicago ten years previously. Included among the ten persons or organizations listed were his two children, and the amount of money involved in these specific gifts totalled approximately half of a million dollars.

Aileen was provided for from the income of the balance of the estate. At her death, his art gallery and collection of paintings and sculpture, valued at $3,000,000, were to be given to the City of New York for the education and enjoyment of the public. Cowperwood had heretofore placed in the hands of trustees $750,000 for these galleries. In addition to this, he willed that a plot of land be purchased in the borough of the Bronx, and a hospital, the buildings to cost not more than $800,000, be erected thereon. The balance of his estate—part of the income from which would provide maintenance of the hospital—was to be placed in the hands of his appointed executors, among whom were Aileen, Dr. James, and Albert Jamieson. The hospital was to be named the Frank A. Cowperwood Hospital, and patients were to be admitted regardless of race, color, or creed. If they lacked financial means with which to pay for treatment, they were to receive it free of charge.

Aileen, once Cowperwood was gone, being extremely sentimental about his last wishes and desires, focussed her first attention on the hospital. In fact, she gave out interviews to the newspapers elaborating her plans, which included a convalescent home which was to be free of any institutional air. She concluded one of these interviews by saying:

“All my energies will be directed toward the accomplishment of my husband’s plan, and I shall make the hospital my lifework.”

Cowperwood had failed to take into consideration, however, the workings of the American courts throughout the nation: the administration of justice or the lack of it; the length of time American lawyers were capable of delaying a settlement in any of these courts.