heartened by this philosophy. It was so like Suzanne, he thought. She
seemed to have reached definite and effective conclusions so early. Her
young mind seemed a solvent for all life's difficulties.
"Oh, you wonderful girl!" he said. "You know you are wiser than I am,
stronger. I draw to you, Suzanne, like a cold man to a fire. You are so
kindly, so temperate, so understanding!"
They rode on toward Tarrytown and Scarborough, and on the way Eugene
told Suzanne some of his plans. He was willing not to leave Angela, if
that was agreeable to her. He was willing to maintain this outward show,
if that was satisfactory. The only point was, could he stay and have
her, too? He did not understand quite how she could want to share him
with anybody, but he could not fathom her from any point of view, and he
was fascinated. She seemed the dearest, the subtlest, the strangest and
most lovable girl. He tried to find out by what process she proposed to
overcome the objections of her mother, but Suzanne seemed to have no
plans save that of her ability to gradually get the upper hand mentally
and dominate her. "You know," she said at one point, "I have money
coming to me. Papa set aside two hundred thousand dollars for each of us
children when we should come of age, and I am of age now. It is to be
held in trust, but I shall have twelve thousand or maybe more from that.
We can use that. I am of age now, and I have never said anything about
it. Mama has managed all these things."
Here was another thought which heartened Eugene. With Suzanne he would
have this additional income, which might be used whatever else might
betide. If only Angela could be made to accept his conditions and
Suzanne could win in her contest with her mother all would be well. His
position need not be jeopardized. Mrs. Dale need hear nothing of it at
present. He and Suzanne could go on associating in this way until an
understanding had been reached. It was all like a delightful courtship
which was to bloom into a still more delightful marriage.
The day passed in assurances of affection. Suzanne told Eugene of a book
she had read in French, "The Blue Bird." The allegory touched Eugene to
the quick--its quest for happiness, and he named Suzanne then and there
"The Blue Bird." She made him stop the car and go back to get her an
exquisite lavender-hued blossom growing wild on a tall stalk which she
saw in a field as they sped by. Eugene objected genially, because it was
beyond a wire fence and set among thorns, but she said, "Yes, now, you
must. You know you must obey me now. I am going to begin to train you
now. You've been spoiled. You're a bad boy. Mama says that. I am going
to reform you."
"A sweet time you'll have, Flower Face! I'm a bad lot. Have you noticed
that?"
"A little."
"And you still like me?"
"I don't mind. I think I can change you by loving you."
Eugene went gladly. He plucked the magnificent bloom and handed it to
her "as a sceptre," he said. "It looks like you, you know," he added.
"It's regal."
Suzanne accepted the compliment without thought of its flattering
import. She loved Eugene, and words had scarcely any meaning to her. She
was as happy as a child and as wise in many things as a woman twice her
years. She was as foolish as Eugene over the beauty of nature, dwelling
in an ecstasy upon morning and evening skies, the feel of winds and the
sigh of leaves. The beauties of nature at every turn caught her eye, and
she spoke to him of things she felt in such a simple way that he was
entranced.
Once when they had left the car and were walking about the grounds of an
inn, she found that one of her silk stockings had worn through at the
heel. She lifted up her foot and looked at it meditatively. "Now, if I
had some ink I could fix that up so quickly," she said, laughing.
"What would you do?" he asked.
"I would black it," she replied, referring to her pink heel, "or you
could paint it."
He laughed and she giggled. It was these little, idle simplicities which
amused and fascinated him.
"Suzanne," he said dramatically at this time, "you are taking me back
into fairyland."
"I want to make you happy," she said, "as happy as I am."
"If I could be! If I only could be!"
"Wait," she said; "be cheerful. Don't worry. Everything will come out
all right. I know it will. Things always come right for me. I want you
and you will come to me. You will have me just as I will have you. Oh,
it is all so beautiful!"
She squeezed his hand in an ecstasy of delight and then gave him her
lips.
"What if someone should see?" he asked.
"I don't care! I don't care!" she cried. "I love you!"
CHAPTER XII
After dining joyously, these two returned to the city. Suzanne, as she
neared New York proper, was nervous as to what Angela might have done,
for she wanted, in case Angela told her mother, to be present, in order
to defend herself. She had reached a rather logical conclusion for her,
and that was, in case her mother objected too vigorously, to elope with
Eugene. She wanted to see just how her mother would take the
intelligence in order that she might see clearly what to do. Previously
she had the feeling that she could persuade her mother not to interfere,
even in the face of all that had been revealed. Nevertheless, she was
nervous, and her fears were bred to a certain extent by Eugene's
attitude.
In spite of all his bravado, he really did not feel at all secure. He
was not afraid of what he might lose materially so much as he was of
losing Suzanne. The thought of the coming child had not affected them at
all as yet. He could see clearly that conditions might come about
whereby he could not have her, but they were not in evidence as yet.
Besides, Angela might be lying. Still at odd moments his conscience
troubled him, for in the midst of his intense satisfaction, his keenest
thrills of joy, he could see Angela lying in bed, the thought of her
wretched future before her, the thought of the coming life troubling
her, or he could hear the echo of some of the pleas she had made. It was
useless to attempt to shut them out. This was a terrible ordeal he was
undergoing, a ruthless thing he was doing. All the laws of life and
public sentiment were against him. If the world knew, it would accuse
him bitterly. He could not forget that. He despaired at moments of ever
being able to solve the tangle in which he had involved himself, and yet
he was determined to go on. He proposed accompanying Suzanne to her
friends, the Almerdings, but she changed her mind and decided to go
home. "I want to see whether mama has heard anything," she insisted.
Eugene had to escort her to Staten Island and then order the chauffeur
to put on speed so as to reach Riverside by four. He was somewhat
remorseful, but he argued that his love-life was so long over, in so far
as Angela was concerned, that it could not really make so very much
difference. Since Suzanne wanted to wait a little time and proceed
slowly, it was not going to be as bad for Angela as he had anticipated.
He was going to give her a choice of going her way and leaving him
entirely, either now, or after the child was born, giving her the half
of his property, stocks, ready money, and anything else that might be
divisible, and all the furniture, or staying and tacitly ignoring the
whole thing. She would know what he was going to do, to maintain a
separate menage, or secret rendezvous for Suzanne. He proposed since
Suzanne was so generous not to debate this point, but to insist. He must
have her, and Angela must yield, choosing only her conditions.
When he came to the house, a great change had come over Angela. In the
morning when he left she was hard and bitter in her mood. This afternoon
she was, albeit extremely sad, more soft and melting than he had ever
seen her. Her hard spirit was temporarily broken, but in addition she
had tried to resign herself to the inevitable and to look upon it as the
will of God. Perhaps she had been, as Eugene had often accused her of
being, hard and cold. Perhaps she had held him in too tight leading
strings. She had meant it for the best. She had tried to pray for light
and guidance, and after a while something softly sad, like a
benediction, settled upon her. She must not fight any more, she thought.
She must yield. God would guide her. Her smile, kindly and wan, when
Eugene entered the room, took him unawares.
Her explanation of her mood, her prayers, her willingness to give him up
if need be, even in the face of what was coming to her, moved him more
than anything that had ever passed between them. He sat opposite her at
dinner, looking at her thin hands and face, and her sad eyes, trying to
be cheerful and considerate, and then, going back into her room and
hearing her say she would do whatever he deemed best, burst into tears.
He cried from an excess of involuntary and uncontrolled emotion. He
hardly knew why he cried, but the sadness of everything--life, the
tangle of human emotions, the proximity of death to all, old age,
Suzanne, Angela, all--touched him, and he shook as though he would rend
his sides. Angela, in turn, was astonished and grieved for him. She
could scarcely believe her eyes. Was he repenting? "Come to me, Eugene!"
she pleaded. "Oh, I'm so sorry! _Are you as much in love as that?_ Oh,
dear, dear, if I could only do something! Don't cry like that, Eugene.
If it means so much to you, I will give you up. It tears my heart to
hear you. Oh, dear, please don't cry."
He laid his head on his knees and shook, then seeing her getting up,
came over to the bed to prevent her.
"No, no," he said, "it will pass. I can't help it. I'm sorry for you.
I'm sorry for myself. I'm sorry for life. God will punish me for this. I
can't help it, but you are a good woman."
He laid his head down beside her and sobbed, great, aching sobs. After a
time he recovered himself, only to find that he had given Angela courage
anew. She would think now that his love might be recovered since he had
seemed so sympathetic; that Suzanne might be displaced. He knew that
could not be, and so he was sorry that he had cried.
They went on from that to discussion, to argument, to ill-feeling, to
sympathetic agreement again by degrees, only to fall out anew. Angela
could not resign herself to the thought of giving him up. Eugene could
not see that he was called upon to do anything, save divide their joint
possessions. He was most anxious to have nothing to do with Angela
anymore in any way. He might live in the same house, but that would be
all. He was going to have Suzanne. He was going to live for her only. He
threatened Angela with dire consequences if she tried to interfere in
any way. If she communicated with Mrs. Dale, or said anything to
Suzanne, or attempted to injure him commercially, he would leave her.
"Here is the situation," he would insist. "You can maintain it as I say,
or break it. If you break it, you lose me and everything that I
represent. If you maintain it, I will stay here. I think I will. I am
perfectly willing to keep up appearances, but I want my freedom."
Angela thought and thought of this. She thought once of sending for
Mrs. Dale and communicating with her secretly, urging her to get Suzanne
out of the way without forewarning either the girl or Eugene, but she
did not do this. It was the one thing she should have done and a thing
Mrs. Dale would have agreed to, but fear and confusion deterred her. The
next thing was to write or talk to Suzanne, and because she mistrusted
her mood in Suzanne's presence she decided to write. She lay in bed on
Monday when Eugene was away at the office and composed a long letter in
which she practically gave the history of Eugene's life reiterating her
own condition and stating what she thought Eugene ought to do.
"How can you think, Suzanne," she asked in one place, "that he will be
true to you when he can ignore me, in this condition? He has not been
true to anyone else. Are you going to throw your life away? Your station
is assured now. What can he add to you that you have not already? If you
take him, it is sure to become known. You are the one who will be
injured, not he. Men recover from these things, particularly from an
infatuation of this character, and the world thinks nothing of it; but
the world will not forgive you. You will be 'a bad woman' after this,
irretrievably so if a child is born. You think you love him. Do you
really love him this much? Read this and stop and think. Think of his
character. I am used to him. I made my mistakes in the beginning, and it
is too late for me to change. The world can give me nothing. I may have
sorrow and disgust, but at least I shall not be an outcast and our
friends and the world will not be scandalized. But you--you have
everything before you. Some man will come to you whom you will love and
who will not ask and willingly make a sacrifice of you. Oh, I beg you to
think! You do not need him. After all, sorry as I am to confess it, I
do. It is as I tell you. Can you really afford to ignore this appeal?"
Suzanne read this and was greatly shocked. Angela painted him in a
wretched light, as fickle, deceitful, dishonest in his relations with
women. She debated this matter in her own room, for it could not help
but give her pause. After a time, Eugene's face came back to her,
however, his beautiful mind, the atmosphere of delight and perfection
that seemed to envelop all that surrounded him. It was as though Eugene
were a mirage of beauty, so soft, so sweet, so delightful! Oh, to be
with him; to hear his beautiful voice; to feel his intense caresses!
What could life offer her equal to that? And, besides, he needed her.
She decided to talk it out with him, show him the letter, and then
decide.
Eugene came in a day or two, having phoned Monday and Tuesday mornings.
He made a rendezvous of the ice house, and then appeared as eager and
smiling as ever. Since returning to the office and seeing no immediate
sign of a destructive attitude on Angela's part, he had recovered his
courage. He was hopeful of a perfect denouement to all this--of a studio
and his lovely Suzanne. When they were seated in the auto, she
immediately produced Angela's letter and handed it to him without
comment. Eugene read it quietly.
He was greatly shocked at what he read, for he thought that Angela was
more kindly disposed toward him. Still he knew it to be true, all of it,
though he was not sure that Suzanne would suffer from his attentions.
The fates might be kind. They might be happy together. Anyhow, he wanted
her now.
"Well," he said, giving it back, "what of it? Do you believe all she
says?"
"It may be so, but somehow when I am with you I don't seem to care. When
I am away from you, it's different. I'm not so sure."
"You can't tell whether I am as good as you think I am?"
"I don't know what to think. I suppose all she says about you is true.
I'm not sure. When you're away, it's different. When you are here, I
feel as though everything must come out right. I love you so. Oh, I know
it will!" She threw her arms around him.
"Then the letter doesn't really make any difference?"
"No."
She looked at him with big round eyes, and it was the old story, bliss
in affection without thought. They rode miles, stopped at an inn for
something to eat--Mrs. Dale was away for the day--looked at the sea
where the return road skirted it, and kissed and kissed each other.
Suzanne grew so ecstatic that she could see exactly how it was all
coming out.
"Now you leave it to me," she said. "I will sound mama. If she is at all
logical, I think I can convince her. I would so much rather do it that
way. I hate deception. I would rather just tell her, and then, if I have
to, defy her. I don't think I shall have to, though. She can't do
anything."
"I don't know about that," said Eugene cautiously. He had come to have
great respect for Suzanne's courage, and he was rather relying on
Mrs. Dale's regard for him to stay her from any desperate course, but he
did not see how their end was to be achieved.
He was for entering on an illicit relationship after a time without
saying anything at all. He was in no hurry, for his feeling for Suzanne
was not purely physical, though he wanted her. Because of her strange
reading and philosophy, she was defying the world. She insisted that she
did not see how it would hurt her.
"But, my dear, you don't know life," said Eugene. "It will hurt you. It
will grind you to pieces in all places outside of New York. This is the
Metropolis. It is a world city. Things are not quite the same here, but
you will have to pretend, anyhow. It is so much easier."
"Can you protect me?" she asked significantly, referring to the
condition Angela pleaded. "I wouldn't want--I couldn't, you know, not
yet, not yet."
"I understand," he said. "Yes, I can, absolutely."
"Well, I want to think about it," she said again. "I prefer so much to
be honest about it. I would so much rather just tell mama, and then go
and do it. It would be so much nicer. My life is my own to do with as I
please. It doesn't concern anybody, not even mama. You know, if I want
to waste it, I may, only I don't think that I am doing so. I want to
live as I choose. I don't want to get married yet."
Eugene listened to her with the feeling that this was the most curious
experience of his life. He had never heard, never seen, never
experienced anything like it. The case of Christina Channing was
different. She had her art to consider. Suzanne had nothing of the sort.
She had a lovely home, a social future, money, the chance of a happy,
stable, normal life. This was love surely, and yet he was quite at sea.
Still so many favorable things had happened, consciously favorable, that
he was ready to believe that all this was intended for his benefit by a
kind, governing providence.
Angela had practically given in already. Why not Suzanne's mother?
Angela would not tell her anything. Mrs. Dale was not any stronger than
Angela apparently. Suzanne might be able to control her as she said. If
she was so determined to try, could he really stop her? She was
headstrong in a way and wilful, but developing rapidly and reasoning
tremendously. Perhaps she could do this thing. Who could tell? They came
flying back along lovely lanes where the trees almost swept their faces,
past green stretches of marsh where the wind stirred in ripples the tall
green cat grass, past pretty farm yards, with children and ducks in the
foreground, beautiful mansions, playing children, sauntering laborers.
All the while they were reassuring each other, vowing perfect affection,
holding each other close. Suzanne, as Angela had, loved to take Eugene's
face between her hands and look into his eyes.
"Look at me," she said once when he had dolefully commented upon the
possibility of change. "Look straight into my eyes. What do you see?"
"Courage and determination," he said.
"What else?"
"Love."
"Do you think I will change?"
"No."
"Surely?"
"No."
"Well, look at me straight, Eugene. I won't. I won't, do you hear? I'm
yours until you don't want me anymore. Now will you be happy?"
"Yes," he said.
"And when we get our studio," she went on.
"When we get our studio," he said, "we'll furnish it perfectly, and
entertain a little after a while, maybe. You'll be my lovely Suzanne, my
Flower Face, my Myrtle Blossom. Helen, Circe, Dianeme."
"I'll be your week-end bride," she laughed, "your odd or even girl,
whichever way the days fall."
"If it only comes true," he exclaimed when they parted. "If it only
does."
"Wait and see," she said. "Now you wait and see."
The days passed and Suzanne began what she called her campaign. Her
first move was to begin to talk about the marriage question at the
dinner table, or whenever she and her mother were alone, and to sound
her on this important question, putting her pronouncements on record.
Mrs. Dale was one of those empirical thinkers who love to philosophize
generally, but who make no specific application of anything to their own
affairs. On this marriage question she held most liberal and philosophic
views for all outside her own immediate family. It was her idea, outside
her own family, of course, that if a girl having reached maturity, and
what she considered a sound intellectual majority, and who was not by
then satisfied with the condition which matrimony offered, if she loved
no man desperately enough to want to marry him and could arrange some
way whereby she could satisfy her craving for love without jeopardizing
her reputation, that was her lookout. So far as Mrs. Dale was concerned,
she had no particular objection. She knew women in society, who, having
made unfortunate marriages, or marriages of convenience, sustained some
such relationship to men whom they admired. There was a subtle, under
the surface understanding outside the society circles of the most rigid
morality in regard to this, and there was the fast set, of which she was
at times a welcome member, which laughed at the severe conventions of
the older school. One must be careful--very. One must not be caught.
But, otherwise, well, every person's life was a law unto him or herself.
Suzanne never figured in any of these theories, for Suzanne was a
beautiful girl, capable of an exalted alliance, and her daughter. She
did not care to marry her off to any wretched possessor of great wealth
or title, solely for wealth's or title's sake, but she was hoping that
some eligible young man of excellent social standing or wealth, or real
personal ability, such, for instance, as Eugene possessed, would come
along and marry Suzanne. There would be a grand wedding at a church of
some prominence,--St. Bartholomew's, very likely; a splendid wedding
dinner, oceans of presents, a beautiful honeymoon. She used to look at
Suzanne and think what a delightful mother she would make. She was so
young, robust, vigorous, able, and in a quiet way, passionate. She could
tell when she danced how eagerly she took life. The young man would
come. It would not be long. These lovely springtimes would do their work
one of these days. As it was, there were a score of men already who
would have given an eye to attract Suzanne's attention, but Suzanne
would none of them. She seemed shy, coy, elusive, but above all, shy.
Her mother had no idea of the iron will all this concealed any more than
she had of the hard anarchic, unsocial thoughts that were surging in her
daughter's brain.
"Do you think a girl ought to marry at all, mama?" Suzanne asked her one
evening when they were alone together, "if she doesn't regard marriage
as a condition she could endure all her days?"
"No-o," replied her mother. "What makes you ask?"
"Well, you see so much trouble among married people that we know.
They're not very happy together. Wouldn't it be better if a person just
stayed single, and if they found someone that they could really love,
well, they needn't necessarily marry to be happy, need they?"
"What have you been reading lately, Suzanne?" asked her mother, looking
up with a touch of surprise in her eyes.
"Nothing lately. What makes you ask?" said Suzanne wisely, noting the
change in her mother's voice.
"With whom have you been talking?"
"Why, what difference does that make, mama? I've heard you express
precisely the same views?"
"Quite so. I may have. But don't you think you're rather young to be
thinking of things like that? I don't say all that I think when I'm
arguing things philosophically. There are conditions which govern
everything. If it were impossible for a girl to marry well, or if looks
or lack of money interfered,--there are plenty of reasons--a thing like
that might possibly be excusable, but why should you be thinking of
that?"
"Why, it doesn't necessarily follow, mama, that because I am good
looking, or have a little money, or am socially eligible, that I should
want to get married. I may not want to get married at all. I see just as
well as you do how things are with most people. Why shouldn't I? Do I
have to keep away from every man, then?"
"Why, Suzanne! I never heard you argue like this before. You must have
been talking with someone or reading some outre book of late. I wish you
wouldn't. You are too young and too good looking to entertain any such
ideas. Why, you can have nearly any young man you wish. Surely you can
find someone with whom you can live happily or with whom you would be
willing to try. It's time enough to think about the other things when
you've tried and failed. At least you can give yourself ample time to
learn something about life before you begin to talk such nonsense.
You're too young. Why it's ridiculous."
"Mama," said Suzanne, with the least touch of temper, "I wish you
wouldn't talk to me like that. I'm not a child any more. I'm a woman. I
think like a woman--not like a girl. You forget that I have a mind of my
own and some thoughts. I may not want to get married. I don't think I
do. Certainly not to any of the silly creatures that are running after
me now. Why shouldn't I take some man in an independent way, if I wish?
Other women have before me. Even if they hadn't, it would be no reason
why I shouldn't. My life is my own."
"Suzanne Dale!" exclaimed her mother, rising, a thrill of terror passing
along her heartstrings. "What are you talking about? Are you basing
these ideas on anything I have said in the past? Then certainly my
chickens are coming home to roost early. You are in no position to
consider whether you want to get married or not. You have seen
practically nothing of men. Why should you reach any such conclusions
now? For goodness' sake, Suzanne, don't begin so early to meditate on
these terrible things. Give yourself a few years in which to see the
world. I don't ask you to marry, but you may meet some man whom you
could love very much, and who would love you. If you were to go and
throw yourself away under some such silly theory as you entertain now,
without stopping to see, or waiting for life to show you what it has in
store, what will you have to offer him. Suzanne, Suzanne"--Suzanne was
turning impatiently to a window--"you frighten me! There isn't, there
couldn't be. Oh, Suzanne, I beg of you, be careful what you think, what
you say, what you do! I can't know all your thoughts, no mother can,
but, oh, if you will stop and think, and wait a while!"
She looked at Suzanne who walked to a mirror and began to fix a bow in
her hair.
"Mama," she said calmly. "Really, you amuse me. When you are out with
people at dinner, you talk one way, and when you are here with me, you
talk another. I haven't done anything desperate yet. I don't know what I
may want to do. I'm not a child any more, mama. Please remember that.
I'm a woman grown, and I certainly can lay out my life for myself. I'm
sure I don't want to do what you are doing--talk one thing and do
another."
Mrs. Dale recoiled intensely from this stab. Suzanne had suddenly
developed in the line of her argument a note of determination, frank
force and serenity of logic which appalled her. Where had the girl got
all this? With whom had she been associating? She went over in her mind
the girls and men she had met and known. Who were her intimate
companions?--Vera Almerding; Lizette Woodworth; Cora TenEyck--a half
dozen girls who were smart and clever and socially experienced. Were
they talking such things among themselves? Was there some man or men
unduly close to them? There was one remedy for all this. It must be
acted on quickly if Suzanne were going to fall in with and imbibe any
such ideas as these. Travel--two or three years of incessant travel with
her, which would cover this dangerous period in which girls were so
susceptible to undue influence was the necessary thing. Oh, her own
miserable tongue! Her silly ideas! No doubt all she said was true.
Generally it was so. But Suzanne! Her Suzanne, never! She would take her
away while she had time, to grow older and wiser through experience.
Never would she be permitted to stay here where girls and men were
talking and advocating any such things. She would scan Suzanne's
literature more closely from now on. She would viser her friendships.
What a pity that so lovely a girl must be corrupted by such wretched,
unsocial, anarchistic notions. Why, what would become of her girl? Where
would she be? Dear Heaven!
She looked down in the social abyss yawning at her feet and recoiled
with horror.
Never, never, never! Suzanne should be saved from herself, from all such
ideas now and at once.
And she began to think how she could introduce the idea of travel easily
and nicely. She must lure Suzanne to go without alarming her--without
making her think that she was bringing pressure to bear. But from now on
there must be a new order established. She must talk differently; she
must act differently. Suzanne and all her children must be protected
against themselves and others also. That was the lesson which this
conversation taught her.
CHAPTER XIII
Eugene and Angela had been quarreling between themselves most bitterly;
at other times Angela was attempting to appeal to his sense of justice
and fair play, if not his old-time affection, in the subtlest of ways.
She was completely thrown out of her old methods of calculation, and
having lost those had really no traditions on which to proceed. Eugene
had always heretofore apparently feared her wrath; now he cared nothing
for that. He had been subject, in times past, to a certain extent to
those alluring blandishments which the married will understand well
enough, but these were as ashes. Her charms meant nothing to him. She
had hoped that the thought of a coming child would move him, but no, it
was apparently without avail. Suzanne seemed a monster to her now since
she did not desert him, and Eugene a raving maniac almost, and yet she
could see how human and natural it all was. He was hypnotized,
possessed. He had one thought, Suzanne, Suzanne, and he would fight her
at every turn for that. He told her so. He told her of her letter to
Suzanne, and the fact that he had read and destroyed it. It did not help
her cause at all. She knew that she had decried him. He stood his ground
solidly, awaiting the will of Suzanne, and he saw Suzanne frequently,
telling her that he had won completely, and that the fulfilment of their
desires now depended upon her.
As has been said, Suzanne was not without passion. The longer she
associated with Eugene, the more eager she became for that joyous
fulfilment which his words, his looks, his emotions indicated. In her
foolish, girlish way, she had built up a fancy which was capable of
realization only by the most ruthless and desperate conduct. Her theory
of telling her mother and overcoming her by argument or defiance was
really vain, for it could not be settled so easily, or so quickly.
Because of her mother's appeal to her in this first conversation, she
fancied she had won a substantial victory. Her mother was subject to her
control and could not defeat her in argument. By the latter token she
felt she was certain to win. Besides, she was counting heavily on her
mother's regard for Eugene and her deep affection for herself. Hitherto,
her mother had really refused her nothing.
The fact that Eugene did not take her outright at this time,--postponing
until a more imperative occasion an adjustment of the difficulties which
must necessarily flow from their attempted union without marriage--was
due to the fact that he was not as desperate or as courageous as he
appeared to be. He wanted her, but he was a little afraid of Suzanne
herself. She was doubtful, anxious to wait, anxious to plan things her
own way. He was not truly ruthless ever, but good natured and easy
going. He was no subtle schemer and planner, but rather an easy natured
soul, who drifted here and there with all the tides and favorable or
unfavorable winds of circumstance. He might have been ruthless if he had
been eager enough for any one particular thing on this earth, money,
fame, affection, but at bottom, he really did not care as much as he
thought he did. Anything was really worth fighting for if you had to
have it, but it was not worth fighting for to the bitter end, if you
could possibly get along without it. Besides, there was nothing really
one could not do without, if one were obliged. He might long intensely,
but he could survive. He was more absorbed in this desire than in
anything else in his history, but he was not willing to be hard and
grasping.
On the other hand, Suzanne was willing to be taken, but needed to be
pressed or compelled. She imagined in a vague way that she wanted to
wait and adjust things in her own way, but she was merely dreaming,
procrastinating because he was procrastinating. If he had but compelled
her at once she would have been happy, but he was sadly in need of that
desperate energy that acts first and thinks afterward. Like Hamlet, he
was too fond of cogitating, too anxious to seek the less desperate way,
and in doing this was jeopardizing that ideal bliss for which he was
willing to toss away all the material advantages which he had thus far
gained.
When Mrs. Dale quite casually within a few days began to suggest that
they leave New York for the fall and winter, she, Suzanne and Kinroy,
and visit first England, then Southern France and then Egypt, Suzanne
immediately detected something intentional about it, or at best a very
malicious plan on the part of fate to destroy her happiness. She had
been conjecturing how, temporarily, she could avoid distant and long
drawn out engagements which her mother not infrequently accepted for
herself and Suzanne outside New York, but she had not formulated a plan.
Mrs. Dale was very popular and much liked. This easy suggestion, made
with considerable assurance by her mother, and as though it would be
just the thing, frightened and then irritated Suzanne. Why should her
mother think of it just at this time?
"I don't want to go to Europe," she said warily. "We were over there
only three years ago. I'd rather stay over here this winter and see
what's going on in New York."
"But this trip will be so delightful, Suzanne," her mother insisted.
"The Camerons are to be at Callendar in Scotland for the fall. They have
taken a cottage there. I had a note from Louise, Tuesday. I thought we
might run up there and see them and then go to the Isle of Wight."
"I don't care to go, mama," replied Suzanne determinedly. "We're settled
here comfortably. Why do you always want to be running off somewhere?"
"Why, I'm not running--how you talk, Suzanne! I never heard you object
very much to going anywhere before. I should think Egypt and the Riviera
would interest you very much. You haven't been to either of these
places."
"I know they're delightful, but I don't care to go this fall. I'd rather
stay here. Why should you suddenly decide that you want to go away for a
year?"
"I haven't suddenly decided," insisted her mother. "I've been thinking
of it for some time, as you know. Haven't I said that we would spend a
winter in Europe soon? The last time I mentioned it, you were very keen
for it."
"Oh, I know, mama, but that was nearly a year ago. I don't want to go
now. I would rather stay here."
"Why would you? More of your friends go away than remain. I think a
particularly large number of them are going this winter."
"Ha! Ha! Ho! Ho!" laughed Suzanne. "A particularly large number. How you
exaggerate, mama, when you want anything. You always amuse me. It's a
particularly large number now, just because you want to go," and she
laughed again.
Suzanne's defiance irritated her mother. Why should she suddenly take
this notion to stay here? It must be this group of girls she was in
with, and yet, Suzanne appeared to have so few intimate girl friends.
The Almerdings were not going to stay in town all the winter. They were
here now because of a fire at their country place, but it would only be
for a little while. Neither were the TenEycks. It couldn't be that
Suzanne was interested in some man. The only person she cared much about
was Eugene Witla, and he was married and only friendly in a brotherly,
guardian-like way.
"Now, Suzanne," she said determinedly, "I'm not going to have you talk
nonsense. This trip will be a delightful thing for you once you have
started. It's useless for you to let a silly notion like not wanting to
go stand in your way. You are just at the time when you ought to travel.
Now you had better begin to prepare yourself, for we're going."
"Oh, no, I'm not, mama," said Suzanne. "Why, you talk as though I were a
very little girl. I don't want to go this fall and I'm not going. You
may go if you want to, but I'm not going."
"Why, Suzanne Dale!" exclaimed her mother. "Whatever has come over you?
Of course you'll go. Where would you stay if I went? Do you think I
would walk off and leave you? Have I ever before?"
"You did when I was at boarding school," interrupted Suzanne.
"That was a different matter. Then you were under proper supervision.
Mrs. Hill was answerable to me for your care. Here you would be alone.
What do you think I would be doing?"
"There you go, mama, talking as though I was a little girl again. Will
you please remember that I am nearly nineteen? I know how to look after
myself. Besides, there are plenty of people with whom I might stay if I
chose."
"Suzanne Dale, you talk like one possessed. I'll listen to nothing of
the sort. You are my daughter, and as such, subject to my guardianship.
Of what are you thinking? What have you been reading? There's some silly
thing at the bottom of all this. I'll not go away and leave you and you
will come with me. I should think that after all these years of devotion
on my part, you would take my feelings into consideration. How can you
stand there and argue with me in this way?"
"Arguing, mama?" asked Suzanne loftily. "I'm not arguing. I'm just not
going. I have my reasons for not wanting to go, and I'm not going,
that's all! Now you may go if you want to."
Mrs. Dale looked into Suzanne's eyes and saw for the first time a gleam
of real defiance in them. What had brought this about? Why was her
daughter so set--of a sudden, so stubborn and hard? Fear, anger,
astonishment, mingled equally in her feelings.
"What do you mean by reasons?" asked her mother. "What reasons have
you?"
"A very good one," said Suzanne quietly, twisting it to the singular.
"Well, what is it then, pray?"
Suzanne debated swiftly and yet a little vaguely in her own mind. She
had hoped for a longer process of philosophic discussion in which to
entrap her mother into some moral and intellectual position from which
she could not well recede, and by reason of which she would have to
grant her the license she desired. From one remark and another dropped
in this and the preceding conversation, she realized that her mother had
no logical arrangement in her mind whereby she included her in her
philosophical calculations at all. She might favor any and every theory
and conclusion under the sun, but it would mean nothing in connection
with Suzanne. The only thing that remained, therefore, was to defy her,
or run away, and Suzanne did not want to do the latter. She was of age.
She could adjust her own affairs. She had money. Her mental point of
view was as good and sound as her mother's. As a matter of fact, the
latter's attitude, in view of Suzanne's recent experience and feelings,
seemed weak and futile. What did her mother know of life any more than
she? They were both in the world, and Suzanne felt herself to be the
stronger--the sounder of the two. Why not tell her now and defy her. She
would win. She must. She could dominate her mother, and this was the
time to do it.
"Because I want to stay near the man I love," she finally volunteered
quietly.
Mrs. Dale's hand, which had been elevated to a position of gesticulation
before her, dropped limp, involuntarily, to her side. Her mouth opened
the least bit. She stared in a surprised, anguished, semi-foolish way.
"The man you love, Suzanne?" she asked, swept completely from her
moorings, and lost upon a boundless sea. "Who is he?"
"Mr. Witla, mama--Eugene. I love him and he loves me. Don't stare, mama.
Mrs. Witla knows. She is willing that we should have each other. We love
each other. I am going to stay here where I can be near him. He needs
me."
"Eugene Witla!" exclaimed her mother, breathless, a look of horror in
her eyes, cold fright in her tense hands. "You love Eugene Witla? a
married man! He loves you! Are you talking to me? Eugene Witla!! You
love him! Why I can't believe this. I'm not in my right mind. Suzanne
Dale, don't stand there! Don't look at me like that! Are you telling me,
your mother? Tell me it isn't so! Tell me it isn't so before you drive
me mad! Oh, great Heavens, what am I coming to? What have I done? Eugene
Witla of all men! Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God!"
"Why do you carry on so, mama?" asked Suzanne calmly. She had expected
some such scene as this--not quite so intense, so hysterical, but
something like it, and was, in a way, prepared for it. A selfish love
was her animating, governing impulse--a love also that stilled self, and
put aside as nothing all the world and its rules. Suzanne really did not
know what she was doing. She was hypnotized by the sense of perfection
in her lover, the beauty of their love. Not practical facts but the
beauty of the summer, the feel of cool winds, the glory of skies and
sunlight and moonlight, were in her mind. Eugene's arms about her, his
lips to hers, meant more than all the world beside. "I love him. Of
course, I love him. What is there so strange about that?"
"What is strange? Are you in your right mind? Oh, my poor, dear little
girl! My Suzanne! Oh, that villain! That scoundrel! To come into my
house and make love to you, my darling child! How should you know? How
could I expect you to understand? Oh, Suzanne! for my sake, for the love
of Heaven, hush! Never breathe it! Never say that terrible thing to me
again! Oh, dear! Oh, dear! Oh, dear!!! That I should live to see this!
My child! My Suzanne! My lovely, beautiful Suzanne! I shall die unless I
can stop this! I shall die! I shall die!"
Suzanne stared at her mother quite astonished at the violent emotion
into which she had cast her. Her pretty eyes were open wide, her
eyebrows elevated, her lips parted sweetly. She was a picture of intense
classic beauty, chiseled, peaceful, self-possessed. Her brow was as
smooth as marble, her lips as arched as though they had never known one
emotion outside joy. Her look was of a quizzical, slightly amused, but
not supercilious character which made her more striking than ever if
possible.
"Why, mama! You think I am a child, don't you? All that I say to you is
true. I love Eugene. He loves me. I am going to live with him as soon as
it can be quietly arranged. I wanted to tell you because I don't want to
do anything secretly, but I propose to do it. I wish you wouldn't insist
on looking on me as a baby, mama. I know what I am doing. I have thought
it all out this long time."
"Thought it all out!" pondered Mrs. Dale. "Going to live with him when
it can be arranged! Is she talking of living with a man without a
wedding ceremony being performed? With a man already married! Is the
child stark mad? Something has turned her brain. Surely something has.
This is not my Suzanne--my dear, lovely, entrancing Suzanne."
To Suzanne she exclaimed aloud:
"Are you talking of living with this, with this, oh, I don't dare to
name him. I'll die if I don't get this matter straightened out; of
living without a marriage ceremony and without his being divorced? I
can't believe that I am awake. I can't! I can't!"
"Certainly I am," replied Suzanne. "It is all arranged between us.
Mrs. Witla knows. She has given her consent. I expect you to give yours,
if you desire me to stay here, mama."
"Give my consent! As God is my witness! Am I alive? Is this my daughter
talking to me? Am I in this room here with you? I." She stopped, her
mouth wide open. "If it weren't so horribly tragic, I should laugh. I
will! I will become hysterical! My brain is whirling like a wheel now.
Suzanne Dale, you are insane. You are madly, foolishly insane. If you do
not hush and cease this terrible palaver, I will have you locked up. I
will have an inquiry made into your sanity. This is the wildest, most
horrible, most unimaginable thing ever proposed to a mother. To think
that I should have lived with you eighteen long years, carried you in my
arms, nursed you at my breast and then have you stand here and tell me
that you will go and live unsanctioned with a man who has a good true
woman now living as his wife. This is the most astounding thing I have
ever heard of. It is unbelievable. You will not do it. You will no more
do it than you will fly. I will kill him! I will kill you! I would
rather see you dead at my feet this minute than to even think that you
could have stood there and proposed such a thing to me. It will never
be! It will never be! I will give you poison first. I will do anything,
everything, but you shall never see this man again. If he dares to cross
this threshold, I will kill him at sight. I love you. I think you are a
wonderful girl, but this thing shall never be. And don't you dare to
attempt to dissuade me. I will kill you, I tell you. I would rather see
you dead a thousand times. To think! To think! To think! Oh, that beast!
That villain! that unconscionable cur! To think that he should come into
my house after all my courtesy to him and do this thing to me. Wait! He
has position, he has distinction. I will drive him out of New York. I
will ruin him. I will make it impossible for him to show his face among
decent people. Wait and see!"
Her face was white, her hands clenched, her teeth set. She had a keen,
savage beauty, much like that of a tigress when it shows its teeth. Her
eyes were hard and cruel and flashing. Suzanne had never imagined her
mother capable of such a burst of rage as this.
"Why, mama," she said calmly and quite unmoved, "you talk as though you
ruled my life completely. You would like to make me feel, I suppose,
that I do not dare to do what I choose. I do, mama. My life is my own,
not yours. You cannot frighten me. I have made up my mind what I am
going to do in this matter, and I am going to do it. You cannot stop me.
You might as well not try. If I don't do it now, I will later. I love
Eugene. I am going to live with him. If you won't let me I will go away,
but I propose to live with him, and you might as well stop now trying to
frighten me, for you can't."
"Frighten you! Frighten you! Suzanne Dale, you haven't the faintest,
weakest conception of what you are talking about, or of what I mean to
do. If a breath of this--the faintest intimation of your intention were
to get abroad, you would be socially ostracized. Do you realize that you
would not have a friend left in the world--that all the people you now
know and are friendly with would go across the street to avoid you? If
you didn't have independent means, you couldn't even get a position in
an ordinary shop. Going to live with him? You are going to die first,
right here in my charge and in my arms. I love you too much not to kill
you. I would a thousand times rather die with you myself. You are not
going to see that man any more, not once, and if he dares to show his
face here, I will kill him. I have said it. I mean it. Now you provoke
me to action if you dare."
Suzanne merely smiled. "How you talk, mama. You make me laugh."
Mrs. Dale stared.
"Oh, Suzanne! Suzanne!" she suddenly exclaimed. "Before it is too late,
before I learn to hate you, before you break my heart, come to my arms
and tell me that you are sorry--that it is all over--that it is all a
vile, dark, hateful dream. Oh, my Suzanne! My Suzanne!"
"No, mama, no. Don't come near, don't touch me," said Suzanne, drawing
back. "You haven't any idea of what you are talking about, of what I am,
or what I mean to do. You don't understand me. You never did, mama. You
have always looked down on me in some superior way as though you knew a
great deal and I very little. It isn't that way at all. It isn't true. I
know what I am about. I know what I am doing. I love Mr. Witla, and I am
going to live with him. Mrs. Witla understands. She knows how it is. You
will. I don't care anything at all about what people think. I don't care
what any society friends do. They are not making my life. They are all
just as narrow and selfish as they can be, anyhow. Love is something
different from that. You don't understand me. I love Eugene, and he is
going to have me, and I am going to have him. If you want to try to
wreck my life and his, you may, but it won't make any difference. I will
have him, anyhow. We might just as well quit talking about it now."
"Quit talking about it? Quit talking about it? Indeed, I haven't even
begun talking yet. I am just trying to collect my wits, that's all. You
are raging in insanity. This thing will never be. It will nev-er be. You
are just a poor, deluded slip of girl, whom I have failed to watch
sufficiently. From now on, I will do my duty by you, if God spares me.
You need me. Oh, how you need me. Poor little Suzanne!"
"Oh, hush, mama! Stop the hysteria," interrupted Suzanne.
"I will call up Mr. Colfax. I will call up Mr. Winfield. I will have him
discharged. I will expose him in the newspapers. The scoundrel, the
villain, the thief! Oh, that I should have lived to see this day. That I
should have lived to have seen this day!"
"That's right, mama," said Suzanne, wearily. "Go on. You are just
talking, you know, and I know that you are. You cannot change me.
Talking cannot. It is silly to rave like this, I think. Why won't you be
quiet? We may talk, but needn't scream."
Mrs. Dale put her hands to her temples. Her brain seemed to be whirling.
"Never mind, now," she said. "Never mind. I must have time to think. But
this thing you are thinking will never be. It never will be. Oh! Oh!"
and she turned sobbing to the window.
Suzanne merely stared. What a peculiar thing emotions were in
people--their emotions over morals. Here was her mother, weeping, and
she was looking upon the thing her mother was crying about as the most
essential and delightful and desirable thing. Certainly life was
revealing itself to her rapidly these days. Did she really love Eugene
so much? Yes, yes, yes, indeed. A thousand times yes. This was not a
tearful emotion for her, but a great, consuming, embracing joy.
CHAPTER XIV
For hours that night, until one, two, and three o'clock in the morning;
from five, six and seven on until noon and night of the next day, and
the next day after that and the fourth day and the fifth day, the storm
continued. It was a terrible, siege, heart burning, heart breaking,
brain racking; Mrs. Dale lost weight rapidly. The color left her cheeks,
a haggard look settled in her eyes. She was terrified, nonplussed,
driven to extremities for means wherewith to overcome Suzanne's
opposition and suddenly but terribly developed will. No one would have
dreamed that this quiet, sweet-mannered, introspective girl could be so
positive, convinced and unbending when in action. She was as a fluid
body that has become adamant. She was a creature made of iron, a girl
with a heart of stone; nothing moved her--her mother's tears, her
threats of social ostracism, of final destruction, of physical and moral
destruction for Eugene and herself, her threats of public exposure in
the newspapers, of incarceration in an asylum. Suzanne had watched her
mother a long time and concluded that she loved to talk imposingly in an
easy, philosophic, at times pompous, way, but that really there was very
little in what she said. She did not believe that her mother had true
courage--that she would risk incarcerating her in an asylum, or exposing
Eugene to her own disadvantage, let alone poisoning or killing her. Her
mother loved her. She would rage terribly for a time this way, then she
would give in. It was Suzanne's plan to wear her down, to stand her
ground firmly until her mother wearied and broke under the strain. Then
she would begin to say a few words for Eugene, and eventually by much
arguing and blustering, her mother would come round. Eugene would be
admitted to the family councils again. He and Suzanne would argue it all
out together in her mother's presence. They would probably agree to
disagree in a secret way, but she would get Eugene and he her. Oh, the
wonder of that joyous denouement. It was so near now, and all for a
little courageous fighting. She would fight, fight until her mother
broke, and then--Oh, Eugene, Eugene!
Mrs. Dale was not to be so easily overcome as Suzanne imagined. Haggard
and worn as she was, she was far from yielding. There was an actual
physical conflict between them once when Suzanne, in the height of an
argument, decided that she would call up Eugene on the phone and ask him
to come down and help her settle the discussion. Mrs. Dale was
determined that she should not. The servants were in the house
listening, unable to catch at first the drift of the situation, but
knowing almost by intuition that there was a desperate discussion going
on. Suzanne decided to go down to the library where the phone was.
Mrs. Dale put her back to the door and attempted to deter her. Suzanne
tried to open it by pulling. Her mother unloosed her hands desperately,
but it was very difficult, Suzanne was so strong.
"For shame," she said. "For shame! To make your mother contest with you.
Oh, the degradation"--the while she was struggling. Finally, angry,
hysteric tears coursed involuntarily down her cheeks and Suzanne was
moved at last. It was so obvious that this was real bitter heart-burning
on her mother's part. Her hair was shaken loose on one side--her sleeve
torn.
"Oh, my goodness! my goodness!" Mrs Dale gasped at last, throwing
herself in a chair and sobbing bitterly. "I shall never lift my head
again. I shall never lift my head again."
Suzanne looked at her somewhat sorrowfully. "I'm sorry, mama," she said,
"but you have brought it all on yourself. I needn't call him now. He
will call me and I will answer. It all comes from your trying to rule me
in your way. You won't realize that I am a personality also, quite as
much as you are. I have my life to live. It is mine to do with as I
please. You are not going to prevent me in the long run. You might just
as well stop fighting with me now. I don't want to quarrel with you. I
don't want to argue, but I am a grown woman, mama. Why don't you listen
to reason? Why don't you let me show you how I feel about this? Two
people loving each other have a right to be with each other. It isn't
anyone else's concern."
"Anyone else's concern! Anyone else's concern!" replied her mother
viciously. "What nonsense. What silly, love-sick drivel. If you had any
idea of life, of how the world is organized, you would laugh at
yourself. Ten years from now, one year even, you will begin to see what
a terrible mistake you are trying to make. You will scarcely believe
that you could have done or said what you are doing and saying now.
Anyone else's concern! Oh, Merciful Heaven! Will nothing put even a
suggestion of the wild, foolish, reckless character of the thing you are
trying to do in your mind?"
"But I love him, mama," said Suzanne.
"Love! Love! You talk about love," said her mother bitterly and
hysterically. "What do you know about it? Do you think he can be loving
you when he wants to come here and take you out of a good home and a
virtuous social condition and wreck your life, and bring you down into
the mire, your life and mine, and that of your sisters and brother for
ever and ever? What does he know of love? What do you? Think of Adele
and Ninette and Kinroy. Have you no regard for them? Where is your love
for me and for them? Oh, I have been so afraid that Kinroy might hear
something of this. He would go and kill him. I know he would. I couldn't
prevent it. Oh, the shame, the scandal, the wreck, it would involve us
all in. Have you no conscience, Suzanne; no heart?"
Suzanne stared before her calmly. The thought of Kinroy moved her a
little. He might kill Eugene--she couldn't tell--he was a courageous
boy. Still there was no need for any killing, or exposure, or excitement
of any kind if her mother would only behave herself. What difference did
it make to her, or Kinroy, or anybody anywhere what she did? Why
couldn't she if she wanted to? The risk was on her head. She was
willing. She couldn't see what harm it would do.
She expressed this thought to her mother once who answered in an
impassioned plea for her to look at the facts. "How many evil women of
the kind and character you would like to make of yourself, do you know?
How many would you like to know? How many do you suppose there are in
good society? Look at this situation from Mrs. Witla's point of view.
How would you like to be in her place? How would you like to be in mine?
Suppose you were Mrs. Witla and Mrs. Witla were the other woman. What
then?"
"I would let him go," said Suzanne.
"Yes! Yes! Yes! You would let him go. You might, but how would you feel?
How would anyone feel? Can't you see the shame in all this, the
disgrace? Have you no comprehension at all? No feeling?"
"Oh, how you talk, mama. How silly you talk. You don't know the facts.
Mrs. Witla doesn't love him any more. She told me so. She has written me
so. I had the letter and gave it back to Eugene. He doesn't care for
her. She knows it. She knows he cares for me. What difference does it
make if she doesn't love him. He's entitled to love somebody. Now I love
him. I want him. He wants me. Why shouldn't we have each other?"
In spite of all her threats, Mrs. Dale was not without subsidiary
thoughts of what any public move on her part would certainly, not
probably, but immediately involve. Eugene was well known. To kill him,
which was really very far from her thoughts, in any save a very secret
way, would create a tremendous sensation and involve no end of
examination, discussion, excited publicity. To expose him to either
Colfax or Winfield meant in reality exposing Suzanne to them, and
possibly to members of her own social set, for these men were of it, and
might talk. Eugene's resignation would cause comment. If he left,
Suzanne might run away with him--then what? There was the thought on her
part that the least discussion or whisper of this to anybody might
produce the most disastrous results. What capital the so-called "Yellow"
newspapers would make out of a story of this character. How they would
gloat over the details. It was a most terrible and dangerous situation,
and yet it was plain that something had to be done and that immediately.
What?
In this crisis it occurred to her that several things might be done and
that without great danger of irremediable consequences if she could only
have a little time in which Suzanne would promise to remain quiescent
and do so. If she could get her to say that she would do nothing for ten
days or five days all might be well for them. She could go to see
Angela, Eugene, Mr. Colfax, if necessary. To leave Suzanne in order to
go on these various errands, she had to obtain Suzanne's word, which she
knew she could respect absolutely, that she would make no move of any
kind until the time was up. Under pretense that Suzanne herself needed
time to think, or should take it, she pleaded and pleaded until finally
the girl, on condition that she be allowed to phone to Eugene and state
how things stood, consented. Eugene had called her up on the second day
after the quarrel began and had been informed by the butler, at
Mrs. Dale's request, that she was out of town. He called the second day,
and got the same answer. He wrote to her and Mrs. Dale hid the letter,
but on the fourth day, Suzanne called him up and explained. The moment
she did so, he was sorry that she had been so hasty in telling her
mother, terribly so, but there was nothing to be done now save to stand
by his guns. He was ready in a grim way to rise or fall so long as, in
doing either, he should obtain his heart's desire.
"Shall I come and help you argue?" he asked.
"No, not for five days. I have given my word."
"Shall I see you?"
"No, not for five days, Eugene."
"Mayn't I even call you up?"
"No, not for five days. After that, yes."
"All right, Flower Face--Divine Fire. I'll obey. I'm yours to command.
But, oh, sweet, it's a long time."
"I know, but it will pass."
"And you won't change?"
"No."
"They can't make you?"
"No, you know they can't, dearest. Why do you ask?"
"Oh, I can't help feeling a little fearful, sweet. You are so young, so
new to love."
"I won't change. I won't change. I don't need to swear. I won't."
"Very well, then, Myrtle Bloom."
She hung up the receiver, and Mrs. Dale knew now that her greatest
struggle was before her.
Her several contemplated moves consisted first, in going to see
Mrs. Witla, unknown to Suzanne and Eugene, learning what she knew of how
things were and what she would advise.
This really did no good, unless the fact that it fomented anew the rage
and grief of Angela, and gave Mrs. Dale additional material wherewith to
belabor Eugene, could be said to be of advantage. Angela, who had been
arguing and pleading with Eugene all this time, endeavoring by one
thought and another to awaken him to a sense of the enormity of the
offense he was contemplating, was practically in despair. She had
reached the point where she had become rather savage again, and he also.
In spite of her condition, in spite of all she could say, he was cold
and bitter, so insistent that he was through with the old order that he
made her angry. Instead of leaving him, as she might have done, trusting
to time to alter his attitude, or to teach her the wisdom of releasing
him entirely, she preferred to cling to him, for there was still
affection left. She was used to him, he was the father of her coming
child, unwelcome as it was. He represented her social position to her,
her station in the world. Why should she leave him? Then, too, there was
this fear of the outcome, which would come over her like a child. She
might die. What would become of the child?
"You know, Mrs. Dale," she said at one point significantly, "I don't
hold Suzanne absolutely guiltless. She is old enough to know better. She
has been out in society long enough to know that a married man is sacred
property to another woman."
"I know, I know," replied Mrs. Dale resentfully, but cautiously, "but
Suzanne is so young. You really don't know how much of a child she is.
And she has this silly, idealistic, emotional disposition. I suspected
something of it, but I did not know it was so strong. I'm sure I don't
know where she gets it. Her father was most practical. But she was all
right until your husband persuaded her."
"That may be all true," went on Angela, "but she is not guiltless. I
know Eugene. He is weak, but he will not follow where he is not led, and
no girl need be tempted unless she wants to."
"Suzanne is so young," again pleaded Mrs. Dale.
"Well, I'm sure if she knew Mr. Witla's record accurately," went on
Angela foolishly, "she wouldn't want him. I have written her. She ought
to know. He isn't honest and he isn't moral as this thing shows. If this
were the first time he had fallen in love with another woman, I could
forgive him, but it isn't. He did something quite as bad six or seven
years ago, and only two years before that there was another woman. He
wouldn't be faithful to Suzanne if he had her. It would be a case of
blazing affection for a little while, and then he would tire and cast
her aside. Why, you can tell what sort of a man he is when he would
propose to me, as he did here, that I should let him maintain a separate
establishment for Suzanne and say nothing of it. The idea!"
Mrs. Dale clicked her lips significantly. She considered Angela foolish
for talking in this way, but it could not be helped now. Possibly Eugene
had made a mistake in marrying her. This did not excuse him, however, in
her eyes for wanting to take Suzanne under the conditions he proposed.
If he were free, it would be an entirely different matter. His standing,
his mind, his manners, were not objectionable, though he was not to the
manner born.
Mrs. Dale went away toward evening, greatly nonplussed by what she had
seen and heard, but convinced that no possible good could come of the
situation. Angela would never give him a divorce. Eugene was not a fit
man morally for her daughter, anyhow. There was great scandal on the
verge of exposure here in which her beloved daughter would be
irretrievably smirched. In her desperation, she decided, if she could do
no better, she would try to dissuade Eugene from seeing Suzanne until he
could obtain a divorce, in which case, to avoid something worse, she
would agree to a marriage, but this was only to be a lip promise. The
one thing she wanted to do was to get Suzanne to give him up entirely.
If Suzanne could be spirited away, or dissuaded from throwing herself
away on Eugene, that would be the thing. Still, she proposed to see what
a conversation with Eugene would do.
The next morning as he was sitting in his office wondering what the
delay of five days portended, and what Suzanne was doing, as well as
trying to fix his mind on the multitudinous details which required his
constant attention, and were now being rather markedly neglected, the
card of Mrs. Emily Dale was laid on his table, and a few moments later,
after his secretary had been dismissed, and word given that no one else
was to be allowed to enter, Mrs. Dale was shown in.
She was pale and weary, but exquisitely dressed in a greenish blue silk
and picture hat of black straw and feathers. She looked quite young and
handsome herself, not too old for Eugene, and indeed once she had
fancied he might well fall in love with her. What her thoughts were at
that time, she was not now willing to recall, for they had involved the
probable desertion or divorce, or death of Angela, and Eugene's
passionate infatuation for her. All that was over now, of course, and in
the excitement and distress, almost completely obliterated. Eugene had
not forgotten that he had had similar sensations or imaginations at the
time, and that Mrs. Dale had always drawn to him in a sympathetic and
friendly way. Here she was, though, this morning coming upon a desperate
mission no doubt, and he would have to contend with her as best he
could.
The conversation opened by his looking into her set face as she
approached and smiling blandly, though it was something of an effort.
"Well," he said, in quite a business like way, "what can I do for you?"
"You villain," she exclaimed melodramatically, "my daughter has told me
all."
"Yes, Suzanne phoned me that she told you," he replied, in a
conciliatory tone.
"Yes," she said in a low, tense voice, "and I ought to kill you where
you stand. To think that I should have ever harbored such a monster as
you in my home and near my dear, innocent daughter. It seems incredible
now. I can't believe it. That you should dare. And you with a dear,
sweet wife at home, sick and in the condition she is in. I should think
if you had any manhood at all any sense of shame! When I think of that
poor, dear little woman, and what you have been doing, or trying to
do--if it weren't for the scandal you would never leave this office
alive."
"Oh, bother! Don't talk rot, Mrs. Dale," said Eugene quietly, though
irritably. He did not care for her melodramatic attitude. "The dear,
darling little woman you speak of is not as badly off as you think, and
I don't think she needs as much of your sympathy as you are so anxious
to give. She is pretty well able to take care of herself, sick as she
is. As for killing me, you or anyone else, well that wouldn't be such a
bad idea. I'm not so much in love with life. This is not fifty years
ago, though, but the nineteenth century, and this is New York City. I
love Suzanne. She loves me. We want each other desperately. Now, an
arrangement can be made which will not interfere with you in any way,
and which will adjust things for us. Suzanne is anxious to make that
arrangement. It is as much her proposition as it is mine. Why should you
be so vastly disturbed? You know a great deal about life."
"Why should I be disturbed? Why should I? Can you sit in this office,
you a man in charge of all this vast public work, and ask me in cold
blood why I should be disturbed? And my daughter's very life at stake.
Why should I be disturbed and my daughter only out of her short dresses
a little while ago and practically innocent of the world. You dare to
tell me that she proposed! Oh, you impervious scoundrel! To think I
could be so mistaken in any human being. You, with your bland manners
and your inconsistent talk of happy family life. I might have
understood, though, when I saw you so often without your wife. I should
have known. I did, God help me! but I didn't act upon it. I was taken by
your bland, gentlemanly attitude. I don't blame poor, dear little
Suzanne. I blame you, you utterly deceiving villain and myself for being
so silly. I am being justly rewarded, however."
Eugene merely looked at her and drummed with his fingers.
"But I did not come here to bandy words with you," she went on. "I came
to say that you must never see my daughter again, or speak of her, or
appear where she might chance to be, though she won't be where you may
appear, if I have my way, for you won't have a chance to appear anywhere
in decent society very much longer. I shall go, unless you agree here
and now never to see or communicate with her any more, to Mr. Colfax,
whom I know personally, as you are aware, and lay the whole matter
before him. I'm sure with what I know now of your record, and what you
have attempted to do in connection with my daughter, and the condition
of your wife, that he will not require your services very much longer. I
shall go to Mr. Winfield, who is also an old friend, and lay the matter
before him. Privately you will be drummed out of society and my daughter
will be none the worse for it. She is so very young that when the facts
are known, you are the only one who will bear the odium of this. Your
wife has given me your wretched record only yesterday. You would like to
make my Suzanne your fourth or fifth. Well, you will not. I will show
you something you have not previously known. You are dealing with a
desperate mother. Defy me if you dare. I demand that you write your
farewell to Suzanne here and now, and let me take it to her."
Eugene smiled sardonically. Mrs. Dale's reference to Angela made him
bitter. She had been there and Angela had talked of him--his past to
her. What a mean thing to do. After all, Angela was his wife. Only the
morning before, she had been appealing to him on the grounds of love,
and she had not told him of Mrs. Dale's visit. Love! Love! What sort of
love was this? He had done enough for her to make her generous in a
crisis like this, even if she did not want to be.
"Write you a statement of release to Suzanne?" he observed, his lips
curling--"how silly. Of course, I won't. And as for your threat to run
to Mr. Colfax, I have heard that before from Mrs. Witla. There is the
door. His office is twelve flights down. I'll call a boy, if you wish.
You tell it to Mr. Colfax and see how much farther it goes before you
are much older. Run to Mr. Winfield also. A lot I care about him or
Mr. Colfax. If you want a grand, interesting discussion of this thing,
just begin. It will go far and wide, I assure you. I love your daughter.
I'm desperate about her. I'm literally crazy about her"--he got up--"she
loves me, or I think she does. Anyhow, I'm banking all on that thought.
My life from the point of view of affection has been a failure. I have
never really been in love before, but I am crazy about Suzanne Dale. I
am wild about her. If you had any sympathy for an unhappy, sympathetic,
emotional mortal, who has never yet been satisfied in a woman, you would
give her to me. I love her. I love her. By God!"--he banged the desk
with his fist--"I will do anything for her. If she will come to me,
Colfax can have his position, Winfield can have his Blue Sea
Corporation. You can have her money, if she wants to give it to you. I
can make a living abroad by my art, and I will. Other Americans have
done it before me. I love her! I love her! Do you hear me? I love her,
and what's more, I'm going to have her! You can't stop me. You haven't
the brains; you haven't the strength; you haven't the resources to match
that girl. She's brighter than you are. She's stronger, she's finer.
She's finer than the whole current day conception of society and life.
She loves me and she wants to give herself to me, willingly, freely,
joyously. Match that in your petty society circles if you can. Society!
You say you will have me drummed out of it, will you? A lot I care about
your society. Hacks, mental light weights, money grubbers, gamblers,
thieves, leeches--a fine lot! To see you sitting there and talking to me
with your grand air makes me laugh. A lot I care for you. I was thinking
of another kind of woman when I met you, not a narrow, conventional
fool. I thought I saw one in you. I did, didn't I--not? You are like all
the rest, a narrow, petty slavish follower after fashion and convention.
Well," he snapped his fingers in her face, "go on and do your worst. I
will get Suzanne in the long run. She will come to me. She will dominate
you. Run to Colfax! Run to Winfield! I will get her just the same. She's
mine. She belongs to me. She is big enough for me. The Gods have given
her to me, and I will have her if I have to smash you and your home and
myself and everyone else connected with me. I'll have her! I'll have
her! She is mine! She is mine!" He lifted a tense hand. "Now you run and
do anything you want to. Thank God, I've found one woman who knows how
to live and love. She's mine!"
Mrs. Dale stared at him in amazement, scarcely believing her ears. Was
he crazy? Was he really so much in love? Had Suzanne turned his brain?
What an astonishing thing. She had never seen him anything like
this--never imagined him capable of anything like it. He was always so
quiet, smiling, bland, witty. Here he was dramatic, impassioned, fiery,
hungry. There was a terrible light in his eyes and he was desperate. He
must be in love.
"Oh, why will you do this to me?" she whimpered all at once. The terror
of his mood conveying itself to her for the moment, and arousing a
sympathy which she had not previously felt. "Why will you come into my
home and attempt to destroy it? There are lots of women who will love
you. There are lots more suited to your years and temperament than
Suzanne. She doesn't understand you. She doesn't understand herself. She
is just young, and foolish and hypnotized. You have hypnotized her. Oh,
why will you do this to me? You are so much older than her, so much more
schooled in life. Why not give her up? I don't want to go to Mr. Colfax.
I don't want to speak to Mr. Winfield. I will, if I have to, but I don't
want to. I have always thought so well of you. I know you are not an
ordinary man. Restore my respect for you, my confidence in you. I can
forgive, if I can't forget. You may not be happily married. I am sorry
for you. I don't want to do anything desperate. I only want to save
poor, little Suzanne. Oh, please! please! I love her so. I don't think
you understand how I feel. You may be in love, but you ought to be
willing to consider others. True love would. I know that she is hard and
wilful and desperate now, but she will change if you will help her. Why,
if you really love her, if you have any sympathy for me or regard for
her future, or your own, you will renounce your schemes and release her.
Tell her you made a mistake. Write to her now. Tell her you can't do
this and not socially ruin her and me and yourself, and so you won't do
it. Tell her that you have decided to wait until time has made you a
free man, if that is to be, and then let her have a chance of seeing if
she will not be happy in a normal life. You don't want to ruin her at
this age, do you? She is so young, so innocent. Oh, if you have any
judgment of life at all, any regard, any consideration, anything, I beg
of you; I beg as her mother, for I love her. Oh!" Tears came into her
eyes again and she cried weakly in her handkerchief.
Eugene stared at her. What was he doing? Where was he going? Was he
really as bad as he appeared to be here? Was he possessed? Was he really
so hard-hearted? Through her grief and Angela's and the threats
concerning Colfax and Winfield, he caught a glimpse of the real heart of
the situation. It was as if there had been a great flash of lightning
illuminating a black landscape. He saw sympathetically, sorrow, folly, a
number of things that were involved, and then the next moment, it was
gone. Suzanne's face came back, smooth, classic, chiseled, perfectly
modeled, her beauty like a tightened bow; her eyes, her lips, her hair,
the gaiety and buoyancy of her motions and her smile. Give her up! Give
up Suzanne and that dream of the studio, and of joyous, continuous,
delicious companionship? Did Suzanne want him to? What had she said over
the phone? No! No! No! Quit now, and her clinging to him. No! No! No!
Never!! He would fight first. He would go down fighting. Never! Never!
Never!
His brain seethed.
"I can't do it," he said, getting up again, for he had sat down after
his previous tirade. "I can't do it. You are asking something that is
utterly impossible. It can never be done. God help me, I'm insane, I'm
wild over her. Go and do anything you want to, but I must have her and I
will. She's mine! She's mine! She's mine!"
His thin, lean hands clenched and he clicked his teeth.
"Mine, mine, mine!" he muttered, and one would have thought him a
villain in a cheap melodrama.
Mrs. Dale shook her head.
"God help us both!" she said. "You shall never, never have her. You are
not worthy of her. You are not right in your mind. I will fight you with
all the means in my power. I am desperate! I am wealthy. I know how to
fight. You shall not have her. Now we will see which will win." She rose
to go and Eugene followed her.
"Go ahead," he said calmly, "but in the end you lose. Suzanne comes to
me. I know it. I feel it. I may lose many other things, but I get her.
She's mine."
"Oh," sighed Mrs. Dale wearily, half believing him and moving towards
the door. "Is this your last word?"
"It is positively."
"Then I must be going."
"Good-bye," he said solemnly.
"Good-bye," she answered, white faced, her eyes staring.
She went out and Eugene took up the telephone; but he remembered that
Suzanne had warned him not to call, but to depend on her. So he put it
down again.
CHAPTER XV
The fire and pathos of Mrs. Dale's appeal should have given Eugene
pause. He thought once of going after her and making a further appeal,
saying that he would try and get a divorce eventually and marry Suzanne,
but he remembered that peculiar insistency of Suzanne on the fact that
she did not want to get married. Somehow, somewhere, somewhy, she had
formulated this peculiar ideal or attitude, which whatever the world
might think of it, was possible of execution, providing he and she were
tactful enough. It was not such a wild thing for two people to want to
come together in this way, if they chose, he thought. Why was it? Heaven
could witness there were enough illicit and peculiar relationships in
this world to prevent society from becoming excited about one more,
particularly when it was to be conducted in so circumspect and subtle a
way. He and Suzanne did not intend to blazon their relationship to the
world. As a distinguished artist, not active, but acknowledged and
accomplished, he was entitled to a studio life. He and Suzanne could
meet there. Nothing would be thought of it. Why had she insisted on
telling her mother? It could all have been done without that. There was
another peculiar ideal of hers, her determination to tell the truth
under all circumstances. And yet she had really not told it. She had
deceived her mother a long time about him simply by saying nothing. Was
this some untoward trick of fate's, merely devised to harm him? Surely
not. And yet Suzanne's headstrong determination seemed almost a fatal
mistake now. He sat down brooding over it. Was this a terrific blunder?
Would he be sorry? All his life was in the balance. Should he turn back?
No! No! No! Never! It was not to be. He must go on. He must! He must! So
he brooded.
The next of Mrs. Dale's resources was not quite so unavailing as the
others, though it was almost so. She had sent for Dr. Latson Woolley,
her family physician--an old school practitioner of great repute, of
rigid honor and rather Christian principles himself, but also of a wide
intellectual and moral discernment, so far as others were concerned.
"Well, Mrs. Dale," he observed, when he was ushered into her presence in
the library on the ground floor, and extending his hand cordially,
though wearily, "what can I do for you this morning?"
"Oh, Dr. Woolley," she began directly, "I am in so much trouble. It
isn't a case of sickness. I wish it were. It is something so much worse.
I have sent for you because I know I can rely on your judgment and
sympathy. It concerns my daughter, Suzanne."
"Yes, yes," he grunted, in a rather crusty voice, for his vocal cords
were old, and his eyes looked out from under shaggy, gray eyebrows which
somehow bespoke a world of silent observation. "What's the matter with
her? What has she done now that she ought not to do?"
"Oh, doctor," exclaimed Mrs. Dale nervously, for the experiences of the
last few days had almost completely dispelled her normal composure, "I
don't know how to tell you, really. I don't know how to begin. Suzanne,
my dear precious Suzanne, in whom I have placed so much faith and
reliance has, has----"
"Well, tell me," interrupted Dr. Woolley laconically.
When she had told him the whole story, and answered some of his incisive
questions, he said:
"Well, I am thinking you have a good deal to be grateful for. She might
have yielded without your knowledge and told you afterwards--or not at
all."
"Not at all. Oh, doctor! My Suzanne!"
"Mrs. Dale, I looked after you and your mother before you and Suzanne. I
know something about human nature and your family characteristics. Your
husband was a very determined man, as you will remember. Suzanne may
have some of his traits in her. She is a very young girl, you want to
remember, very robust and vigorous. How old is this Witla man?"
"About thirty-eight or nine, doctor."
"Um! I suspected as much. The fatal age. It's a wonder you came through
that period as safely as you did. You're nearly forty, aren't you?"
"Yes, doctor, but you're the only one that knows it."
"I know, I know. It's the fatal age. You say he is in charge of the
United Magazines Corporation. I have probably heard of him. I know of
Mr. Colfax of that company. Is he very emotional in his temperament?"
"I had never thought so before this."
"Well, he probably is. Thirty-eight to thirty-nine and eighteen or
nineteen--bad combination. Where is Suzanne?"
"Upstairs in her room, I fancy."
"It might not be a bad thing if I talked to her myself a little, though
I don't believe it will do any good."
Mrs. Dale disappeared and was gone for nearly three-quarters of an hour.
Suzanne was stubborn, irritable, and to all preliminary entreaties
insisted that she would not. Why should her mother call in outsiders,
particularly Dr. Woolley, whom she knew and liked. She suspected at once
when her mother said Dr. Woolley wanted to see her that it had something
to do with her case, and demanded to know why. Finally, after much
pleading, she consented to come down, though it was with the intention
of showing her mother how ridiculous all her excitement was.
The old doctor who had been meditating upon the inexplicable tangle,
chemical and physical, of life--the blowing hither and thither of
diseases, affections, emotions and hates of all kinds, looked up
quizzically as Suzanne entered.
"Well, Suzanne," he said genially, rising and walking slowly toward her,
"I'm glad to see you again. How are you this morning?"
"Pretty well, doctor, how are you?"
"Oh, as you see, as you see, a little older and a little fussier,
Suzanne, making other people's troubles my own. Your mother tells me you
have fallen in love. That's an interesting thing to do, isn't it?"
"You know, doctor," said Suzanne defiantly, "I told mama that I don't
care to discuss this, and I don't think she has any right to try to make
me. I don't want to and I won't. I think it is all in rather poor
taste."
"Poor taste, Suzanne?" asked Mrs. Dale. "Do you call our discussion of
what you want to do poor taste, when the world will think that what you
want to do is terrible when you do it?"
"I told you, mama, that I was not coming down here to discuss this
thing, and I'm not!" said Suzanne, turning to her mother and ignoring
Dr. Woolley. "I'm not going to stay. I don't want to offend Dr. Woolley,
but I'm not going to stay and have you argue this all over again."
She turned to go.
"There, there, Mrs. Dale, don't interrupt," observed Dr. Woolley,
holding Suzanne by the very tone of his voice. "I think myself that very
little is to be gained by argument. Suzanne is convinced that what she
is planning to do is to her best interest. It may be. We can't always
tell. I think the best thing that could be discussed, if anything at all
in this matter can be discussed, is the matter of time. It is my opinion
that before doing this thing that Suzanne wants to do, and which may be
all right, for all I know, it would be best if she would take a little
time. I know nothing of Mr. Witla. He may be a most able and worthy man.
Suzanne ought to give herself a little time to think, though. I should
say three months, or six months. A great many after effects hang on this
decision, as you know," he said, turning to Suzanne. "It may involve
responsibilities you are not quite ready to shoulder. You are only
eighteen or nineteen, you know. You might have to give up dancing and
society, and travel, and a great many things, and devote yourself to
being a mother and ministering to your husband's needs. You expect to
live with him permanently, don't you?"
"I don't want to discuss this, Dr. Woolley."
"But you do expect that, don't you?"
"Only as long as we love each other."
"Um, well, you might love him for some little time yet. You rather
expect to do that, don't you?"
"Why, yes, but what is the good of this, anyhow? My mind is made up."
"Just the matter of thinking," said Dr. Woolley, very soothingly and in
a voice which disarmed Suzanne and held her. "Just a little time in
which to be absolutely sure. Your mother is anxious not to have you do
it at all. You, as I understand it, want to do this thing right away.
Your mother loves you, and at bottom, in spite of this little
difference, I know you love her. It just occurred to me that for the
sake of good feeling all around, you might like to strike a balance. You
might be willing to take, say six months, or a year and think about it.
Mr. Witla would probably not object. You won't be any the less
delightful to him at the end of that time, and as for your mother, she
would feel a great deal better if she thought that, after all, what you
decided to do you had done after mature deliberation."
"Yes," exclaimed Mrs. Dale, impulsively, "do take time to think,
Suzanne. A year won't hurt you."
"No," said Suzanne unguardedly. "It is all a matter of whether I want to
or not. I don't want to."
"Precisely. Still this is something you might take into consideration.
The situation from all outside points of view is serious. I haven't said
so, but I feel that you would be making a great mistake. Still, that is
only my opinion. You are entitled to yours. I know how you feel about
it, but the public is not likely to feel quite the same. The public is a
wearisome thing, Suzanne, but we have to take it into consideration."
Suzanne stared stubbornly and wearily at her tormentors. Their logic did
not appeal to her at all. She was thinking of Eugene and her plan. It
could be worked. What did she care about the world? During all this
talk, she drew nearer and nearer the door and finally opened it.
"Well, that is all," said Dr. Woolley, when he saw she was determined to
go. "Good morning, Suzanne. I am glad to have seen you again."
"Good morning, Dr. Woolley," she replied.
She went out and Mrs. Dale wrung her hands. "I wish I knew what was to
be done," she exclaimed, gazing at her counselor.
Dr. Woolley brooded over the folly of undesired human counsel.
"There is no need for excitement," he observed after a time. "It is
obvious to me that if she is handled rightly, she will wait. She is in a
state of high strung opposition and emotion for some reason at present.
You have driven her too hard. Relax. Let her think this thing out for
herself. Counsel for delay, but don't irritate. You cannot control her
by driving. She has too stern a will. Tears won't help. Emotion seems a
little silly to her. Ask her to think, or better yet, let her think and
plead only for delay. If you could get her away for two or three weeks
or months, off by herself undisturbed by your pleadings and uninfluenced
by his--if she would ask him of her own accord to let her alone for that
time, all will be well. I don't think she will ever go to him. She
thinks she will, but I have the feeling that she won't. However, be
calm. If you can, get her to go away."
"Would it be possible to lock her up in some sanatorium or asylum,
doctor, until she has had time to think?"
"All things are possible, but I should say it would be the most
inadvisable thing you could do. Force accomplishes nothing in these
cases."
"I know, but suppose she won't listen to reason?"
"You really haven't come to that bridge yet. You haven't talked calmly
to her yet. You are quarreling with her. There is very little in that.
You will simply grow further and further apart."
"How practical you are, doctor," observed Mrs. Dale, in a mollified and
complimentary vein.
"Not practical, but intuitional. If I were practical, I would never have
taken up medicine."
He walked to the door, his old body sinking in somewhat upon itself. His
old, gray eyes twinkled slightly as he turned.
"You were in love once, Mrs. Dale," he said.
"Yes," she replied.
"You remember how you felt then?"
"Yes."
"Be reasonable. Remember your own sensations--your own attitude. You
probably weren't crossed in your affair. She is. She has made a mistake.
Be patient. Be calm. We want to stop it and no doubt can. Do unto others
as you would be done by."
He ambled shufflingly across the piazza and down the wide steps to his
car.
"Mama," she said, when after Dr. Woolley had gone her mother came to her
room to see if she might not be in a mellower mood, and to plead with
her further for delay, "it seems to me you are making a ridiculous mess
of all this. Why should you go and tell Dr. Woolley about me! I will
never forgive you for that. Mama, you have done something I never
thought you would do. I thought you had more pride--more individuality."
One should have seen Suzanne, in her spacious boudoir, her back to her
oval mirrored dressing table, her face fronting her mother, to
understand her fascination for Eugene. It was a lovely, sunny, many
windowed chamber, and Suzanne in a white and blue morning dress was in
charming accord with the gay atmosphere of the room.
"Well, Suzanne, you know," she said, rather despondently, "I just
couldn't help it. I had to go to someone. I am quite alone apart from
you and Kinroy and the children"--she referred to Adele and Ninette as
the children when talking to either Suzanne or Kinroy--"and I didn't
want to say anything to them. You have been my only confidant up to now,
and since you have turned against me----"
"I haven't turned against you, mama."
"Oh, yes you have. Let's not talk about it, Suzanne. You have broken my
heart. You are killing me. I just had to go to someone. We have known
Dr. Woolley so long. He is so good and kind."
"Oh, I know, mama, but what good will it do? How can anything he might
say help matters? He isn't going to change me. You're only telling it to
somebody who oughtn't to know anything about it."
"But I thought he might influence you," pleaded Mrs. Dale. "I thought
you would listen to him. Oh, dear, oh, dear. I'm so tired of it all. I
wish I were dead. I wish I had never lived to see this."
"Now there you go, mama," said Suzanne confidently. "I can't see why you
are so distressed about what I am going to do. It is my life that I am
planning to arrange, not yours. I have to live my life, mama, not you."
"Oh, yes, but it is just that that distresses me. What will it be after
you do this--after you throw it away? Oh, if you could only see what you
are contemplating doing--what a wretched thing it will be when it is all
over with. You will never live with him--he is too old for you, too
fickle, too insincere. He will not care for you after a little while,
and then there you will be, unmarried, possibly with a child on your
hands, a social outcast! Where will you go?"
"Mama," said Suzanne calmly, her lips parted in a rosy, baby way, "I
have thought of all this. I see how it is. But I think you and everybody
else make too much ado about these things. You think of everything that
could happen, but it doesn't all happen that way. People do these
things, I'm sure, and nothing much is thought of it."
"Yes, in books," put in Mrs. Dale. "I know where you get all this from.
It's your reading."
"Anyhow, I'm going to. I have made up my mind," added Suzanne. "I have
decided that by September fifteenth I will go to Mr. Witla, and you
might just as well make up your mind to it now." This was August tenth.
"Suzanne," said her mother, staring at her, "I never imagined you could
talk in this way to me. You will do nothing of the kind. How can you be
so hard? I did not know that you had such a terrible will in you.
Doesn't anything I have said about Adele and Ninette or Kinroy appeal to
you? Have you no heart in you? Why don't you wait, as Dr. Woolley
suggests, six months or a year? Why do you talk about jumping into this
without giving yourself time to think? It is such a wild, rash
experiment. You haven't thought anything about it, you haven't had
time."
"Oh, yes, I have, mama!" replied Suzanne. "I've thought a great deal
about it. I'm fully convinced. I want to do it then because I told
Eugene that I would not keep him waiting long; and I won't. I want to go
to him. That will make a clear two months since we first talked of
this."
Mrs. Dale winced. She had no idea of yielding to her daughter, or
letting her do this, but this definite conclusion as to the time brought
matters finally to a head. Her daughter was out of her mind, that was
all. It gave her not any too much time to turn round in. She must get
Suzanne out of the city--out of the country, if possible, or lock her
up, and she must do it without antagonizing her too much.
CHAPTER XVI
Mrs. Dale's next step in this struggle was to tell Kinroy, who wanted,
of course, in a fit of boyish chivalry, to go immediately and kill
Eugene. This was prevented by Mrs. Dale, who had more control over him
than she had over Suzanne, pointing out to him what a terrifically
destructive scandal would ensue and urging subtlety and patience. Kinroy
had a sincere affection for his sisters, particularly Suzanne and Adele,
and he wanted to protect all of them. He decided in a pompous, ultra
chivalrous spirit that he must help his mother plan, and together they
talked of chloroforming her some night, of carrying her thus, as a sick
girl, in a private car to Maine or the Adirondacks or somewhere in
Canada.
It would be useless to follow all these strategic details in their
order. There were, after the five days agreed upon by Suzanne, attempted
phone messages by Eugene, which were frustrated by Kinroy, who was now
fulfilling the role of private detective. Suzanne resolved to have
Eugene summoned to the house for a discussion, but to this her mother
objected. She felt that additional meetings would simply strengthen
their bond of union. Kinroy wrote to Eugene of his own accord that he
knew all, and that if he attempted to come near the place he would kill
him at sight. Suzanne, finding herself blocked and detained by her
mother, wrote Eugene a letter which Elizabeth, her maid, secretly
conveyed to the mail for her, telling him how things stood. Her mother
had told Dr. Woolley and Kinroy. She had decided that September
fifteenth was the time she would leave home, unless their companionship
was quietly sanctioned. Kinroy had threatened to kill him to her, but
she did not think he had anything to fear. Kinroy was just excited. Her
mother wanted her to go to Europe for six months and think it over, but
this she would not do. She was not going to leave the city, and he need
not fear, if he did not hear anything for a few days at a time, that
anything was wrong with her. They must wait until the storm subsided a
little. "I shall be here, but perhaps it is best for you not to try to
see me just now. When the time comes, I will come to you, and if I get a
chance, I will see you before."
Eugene was both pained and surprised at the turn things had taken, but
still encouraged to hope for the best by the attitude Suzanne took
toward it all. Her courage strengthened him. She was calm, so
purposeful! What a treasure she was!
So began a series of daily love notes for a few days, until Suzanne
advised him to cease. There were constant arguments between her, her
mother and Kinroy. Because she was being so obviously frustrated, she
began to grow bitter and hard, and short contradictory phrases passed
between her and her mother, principally originating in Suzanne.
"No, no, no!" was her constantly reiterated statement. "I won't do it!
What of it? It's silly! Let me alone! I won't talk!" So it went.
Mrs. Dale was planning hourly how to abduct her. Chloroforming and
secret removal after the fashion she had in her mind was not so easy of
accomplishment. It was such a desperate thing to do to Suzanne. She was
afraid she might die under its influence. It could not be administered
without a doctor. The servants would think it strange. She fancied there
were whispered suspicions already. Finally she thought of pretending to
agree with Suzanne, removing all barriers, and asking her to come to
Albany to confer with her guardian, or rather the legal representative
of the Marquardt Trust Company, which held her share of her father the
late Westfield Dale's estate in trust for her, in regard to some
property in western New York, which belonged to her. Mrs. Dale decided
to pretend to be obliged to go to Albany in order to have Suzanne sign a
waiver of right to any share in her mother's private estate, after
which, supposedly, she would give Suzanne her freedom, having also
disinherited her in her will. Suzanne, according to this scheme, was
then to come back to New York and go her way and her mother was not to
see her any more.
To make this more effective, Kinroy was sent to tell her of her mother's
plan and beg her for her own and her family's sake not to let the final
separation come about. Mrs. Dale changed her manner. Kinroy acted his
part so effectively that what with her mother's resigned look and
indifferent method of address, Suzanne was partly deceived. She imagined
her mother had experienced a complete change of heart and might be going
to do what Kinroy said.
"No," she replied to Kinroy's pleadings, "I don't care whether she cuts
me off. I'll be very glad to sign the papers. If she wants me to go
away, I'll go. I think she has acted very foolishly through all this,
and so have you."
"I wish you wouldn't let her do that," observed Kinroy, who was rather
exulting over the satisfactory manner in which this bait was being
swallowed. "Mama is broken hearted. She wants you to stay here, to wait
six months or a year before you do anything at all, but if you won't,
she's going to ask you to do this. I've tried to persuade her not to.
I'd hate like anything to see you go. Won't you change your mind?"
"I told you I wouldn't, Kinroy. Don't ask me."
Kinroy went back to his mother and reported that Suzanne was stubborn as
ever, but that the trick would in all probability work. She would go
aboard the train thinking she was going to Albany. Once aboard, inside a
closed car, she would scarcely suspect until the next morning, and then
they would be far in the Adirondack Mountains.
The scheme worked in part. Her mother, as had Kinroy, went through this
prearranged scene as well as though she were on the stage. Suzanne
fancied she saw her freedom near at hand. Only a travelling bag was
packed, and Suzanne went willingly enough into the auto and the train,
only stipulating one thing--that she be allowed to call up Eugene and
explain. Both Kinroy and her mother objected, but, when finally she
refused flatly to go without, they acceded. She called him up at the
office--it was four o'clock in the afternoon, and they were leaving at
five-thirty--and told him. He fancied at once it was a ruse, and told
her so, but she thought not. Mrs. Dale had never lied to her before,
neither had her brother. Their words were as bonds.
"Eugene says this is a trap, mama," said Suzanne, turning from the phone
to her mother, who was near by. "Is it?"
"You know it isn't," replied her mother, lying unblushingly.
"If it is, it will come to nothing," she replied, and Eugene heard her.
He was strengthened into acquiescence by the tone of her voice. Surely
she was a wonderful girl--a master of men and women in her way.
"Very well, if you think it's all right," said Eugene; "but I'll be very
lonely. I've been so already. I shall be more so, Flower Face, unless I
see you soon. Oh, if the time were only up!"
"It will be, Eugene," she replied, "in a very few days now. I'll be back
Thursday, and then you can come down and see me."
"Thursday afternoon?"
"Yes. We're to be back Thursday morning."
She finally hung up the receiver and they entered the automobile and an
hour later the train.
CHAPTER XVII
It was a Montreal, Ottawa and Quebec express, and it ran without
stopping to Albany. By the time it was nearing the latter place Suzanne
was going to bed--and because it was a private car--Mrs. Dale explained
that the president of the road had lent it to her--no announcement of
its arrival, which would have aroused Suzanne, was made by the porter.
When it stopped there shortly after ten o'clock it was the last car at
the south end of the train, and you could hear voices calling, but just
what it was was not possible to say. Suzanne, who had already gone to
bed, fancied it might be Poughkeepsie or some wayside station. Her
mother's statement was that since they arrived so late, the car would be
switched to a siding, and they would stay aboard until morning.
Nevertheless, she and Kinroy were alert to prevent any untoward
demonstration or decision on Suzanne's part, and so, as the train went
on, she slept soundly until Burlington in the far northern part of
Vermont was reached the next morning. When she awoke and saw that the
train was still speeding on, she wondered vaguely but not clearly what
it could mean. There were mountains about, or rather tall, pine-covered
hills, mountain streams were passed on high trestles and sections of
burned woodlands were passed where forest fires had left lonely, sad
charred stretches of tree trunks towering high in the air. Suddenly it
occurred to Suzanne that this was peculiar, and she came out of the bath
to ask why.
"Where are we, mama?" she asked. Mrs. Dale was leaning back in a
comfortable willow chair reading, or pretending to read a book. Kinroy
was out on the observation platform for a moment. He came back though
shortly, for he was nervous as to what Suzanne would do when she
discovered her whereabouts. A hamper of food had been put aboard the
night before, unknown to Suzanne, and Mrs. Dale was going shortly to
serve breakfast. She had not risked a maid on this journey.
"I don't know," replied her mother indifferently, looking out at a
stretch of burnt woods.
"I thought we were to be in Albany a little after midnight?" said
Suzanne.
"So we were," replied Mrs. Dale, preparing to confess. Kinroy came back
into the car.
"Well, then," said Suzanne, pausing, looking first out of the windows
and then fixedly at her mother. It came to her as she saw the unsettled,
somewhat nervous expression in her mother's face and eyes and in
Kinroy's that this was a trick and that she was being taken
somewhere--where?--against her will.
"This is a trick, mama," she said to her mother grandly. "You have lied
to me--you and Kinroy. We are not going to Albany at all. Where are we
going?"
"I don't want to tell you now, Suzanne," replied Mrs. Dale quietly.
"Have your bath and we'll talk about it afterwards. It doesn't matter.
We're going up into Canada, if you want to know. We are nearly there
now. You'll know fast enough when we get there."
"Mama," replied Suzanne, "this is a despicable trick! You are going to
be sorry for this. You have lied to me--you and Kinroy. I see it now. I
might have known, but I didn't believe you would lie to me, mama. I
can't do anything just now, I see that very plainly. But when the time
comes, you are going to be sorry. You can't control me this way. You
ought to know better. You yourself are going to take me back to New
York." And she fixed her mother with a steady look which betokened a
mastership which her mother felt nervously and wearily she might
eventually be compelled to acknowledge.
"Now, Suzanne, what's the use of talking that way?" pleaded Kinroy.
"Mama is almost crazy, as it is. She couldn't think of any other way or
thing to do."
"You hush, Kinroy," replied Suzanne. "I don't care to talk to you. You
have lied to me, and that is more than I ever did to you. Mama, I am
astonished at you," she returned to her mother. "My mother lying to me!
Very well, mama. You have things in your hands today. I will have them
in mine later. You have taken just the wrong course. Now you wait and
see."
Mrs. Dale winced and quailed. This girl was the most unterrified,
determined fighter she had ever known. She wondered where she got her
courage--from her late husband, probably. She could actually feel the
quietness, grit, lack of fear, which had grown up in her during the last
few weeks under the provocation which antagonism had provided. "Please
don't talk that way, Suzanne," she pleaded. "I have done it all for your
own good. You know I have. Why will you torture me? You know I won't
give you up to that man. I won't. I'll move heaven and earth first. I'll
die in this struggle, but I won't give you up."
"Then you'll die, mama, for I'm going to do what I said. You can take me
to where this car stops, but you can't take me out of it. I'm going back
to New York. Now, a lot you have accomplished, haven't you?"
"Suzanne, I am convinced almost that you are out of your mind. You have
almost driven me out of mine, but I am still sane enough to see what is
right."
"Mama, I don't propose to talk to you any more, or to Kinroy. You can
take me back to New York, or you can leave me, but you will not get me
out of this car. I am done with listening to nonsense and pretences. You
have lied to me once. You will not get a chance to do it again."
"I don't care, Suzanne," replied her mother, as the train sped swiftly
along. "You have forced me to do this. It is your own attitude that is
causing all the trouble. If you would be reasonable and take some time
to think this all over, you would not be where you are now. I won't let
you do this thing that you want to do. You can stay in the car if you
wish, but you cannot be taken back to New York without money. I will
speak to the station agent about that."
Suzanne thought of this. She had no money, no clothes, other than those
she had on. She was in a strange country and not so very used to
travelling alone. She had really gone to very few places in times past
by herself. It took the edge off her determination to resist, but she
was not conquered by any means.
"How are you going to get back?" asked her mother, after a time, when
Suzanne paid no attention to her. "You have no money. Surely, Suzanne,
you are not going to make a scene? I only want you to come up here for a
few weeks so that you will have time to think away from that man. I
don't want you to go to him on September the fifteenth. I just won't let
you do that. Why won't you be reasonable? You can have a pleasant time
up here. You like to ride. You are welcome to do that. I will ride with
you. You can invite some of your friends up here, if you choose. I will
send for your clothes. Only stay here a while and think over what you
are going to do."
Suzanne refused to talk. She was thinking what she could do. Eugene was
back in New York. He would expect her Thursday.
"Yes, Suzanne," put in Kinroy. "Why not take ma's advice? She's trying
to do the best thing by you. This is a terrible thing you are trying to
do. Why not listen to common sense and stay up here three or four
months?"
"Don't talk like a parrot, Kinroy! I'm hearing all this from mama."
When her mother reproached her, she said: "Oh, hush, mama, I don't care
to hear anything more. I won't do anything of the sort. You lied to me.
You said you were going to Albany. You brought me out here under a
pretence. Now you can take me back. I won't go to any lodge. I won't go
anywhere, except to New York. You might just as well not argue with me."
The train rolled on. Breakfast was served. The private car was switched
to the tracks of the Canadian Pacific at Montreal. Her mother's pleas
continued. Suzanne refused to eat. She sat and looked out of the window,
meditating over this strange denouement. Where was Eugene? What was he
doing? What would he think when she did not come back? She was not
enraged at her mother. She was merely contemptuous of her. This trick
irritated and disgusted her. She was not thinking of Eugene in any wild
way, but merely that she would get back to him. She conceived of him
much as she did of herself though her conception of her real self was
still vague as strong, patient, resourceful, able to live without her a
little while if he had to. She was eager to see him, but really more
eager that he should see her if he wanted to. What a creature he must
take her mother to be!
By noon they had reached Juinata, by two o'clock they were fifty miles
west of Quebec. At first, Suzanne thought she would not eat at all to
spite her mother. Later she reasoned that that was silly and ate. She
made it exceedingly unpleasant for them by her manner, and they realized
that by bringing her away from New York they had merely transferred
their troubles. Her spirit was not broken as yet. It filled the car with
a disturbing vibration.
"Suzanne," questioned her mother at one point, "won't you talk to me?
Won't you see I'm trying to do this for your own good? I want to give
you time to think. I really don't want to coerce you, but you must see."
Suzanne merely stared out of the window at the green fields speeding by.
"Suzanne! Don't you see this will never do? Can't you see how terrible
it all is?"
"Mama, I want you to let me alone. You have done what you thought was
the right thing to do. Now let me alone. You lied to me, mama. I don't
want to talk to you. I want you to take me back to New York. You have
nothing else to do. Don't try to explain. You haven't any explanation."
Mrs. Dale's spirit fairly raged, but it was impotent in the presence of
this her daughter. She could do nothing.
Still more hours, and at one small town Suzanne decided to get off, but
both Mrs. Dale and Kinroy offered actual physical opposition. They felt
intensely silly and ashamed, though, for they could not break the spirit
of the girl. She ignored their minds--their mental attitude in the most
contemptuous way. Mrs. Dale cried. Then her face hardened. Then she
pleaded. Her daughter merely looked loftily away.
At Three Rivers Suzanne stayed in the car and refused to move. Mrs. Dale
pleaded, threatened to call aid, stated that she would charge her with
insanity. It was all without avail. The car was uncoupled after the
conductor had asked Mrs. Dale if she did not intend to leave it. She was
beside herself, frantic with rage, shame, baffled opposition.
"I think you are terrible!" she exclaimed to Suzanne. "You are a little
demon. We will live in this car, then. We will see."
She knew that this could not be, for the car was only leased for the
outward trip and had to be returned the next day.
The car was pushed on to a siding.
"I beg of you, Suzanne. Please don't make a mockery of us. This is
terrible. What will people think?"
"I don't care what they think," said Suzanne.
"But you can't stay here."
"Oh, yes, I can!"
"Come, get off, please do. We won't stay up here indefinitely. I'll take
you back. Promise me to stay a month and I'll give you my solemn word
I'll take you back at the end of that time. I'm getting sick of this. I
can't stand it. Do what you like after that. Only stay a month now."
"No, mama," replied Suzanne. "No, you won't. You lied to me. You're
lying to me now, just as you did before."