Noble Dill came from his father's house, after dinner that evening, a
youth in blossom, like the shrubberies and garden beds in the dim yards
up and down Julia's Street. All cooled and bathed and in new clothes of
white, he took his thrilled walk through the deep summer twilight, on
his way to that ineffable Front Porch where sat Julia, misty in the
dusk. The girlish little new moon had perished naïvely out of the sky;
the final pinkness of the west was gone; blue evening held the quiet
world; and overhead, between the branches of the maple trees, were
powdered all those bright pin points of light that were to twinkle on
generations of young lovers after Noble Dill, each one, like Noble,
walking the same fragrant path in summer twilights to see the Prettiest
Girl of All.
Now and then there came to the faintly throbbing ears of the pedestrian
a murmur of voices from lawns where citizens sat cooling after the day's
labour, or a tinkle of laughter from where maidens dull (not being
Julia) sat on verandas vacant of beauty and glamour. For these poor
things, Noble felt a wondering and disdainful pity; he pitied everything
in the world that was not on the way to starry Julia.
Eight nights had passed since he, himself, had seen her, but to-day she
had replied (over the telephone) that Mr. Atwater seemed to have settled
down again, and she believed it might be no breach of tact for Noble to
call that evening--especially as she would be on the veranda, and he
needn't ring the bell. Would she be alone--for once? It was improbable,
yet it could be hoped.
But as he came hoping up the street, another already sat beside Julia,
sharing with her the wicker settee on the dim porch, and this was the
horn-rimmed young poet. Newland had, as usual, a new poem with him; and
as others had proved of late that they could sit on Julia's veranda as
long as he could, he had seized the first opportunity to familiarize her
with this latest work.
The veranda was dark, and to go indoors to the light might have involved
too close a juxtaposition to peculiar old Mr. Atwater who was in the
library; but the resourceful Newland, foreseeing everything, had
brought with him a small pocket flashlight to illumine his manuscript.
"It's _vers libre_, of course," he said as he moved the flashlight over
the sheets of scribbled paper. "I think I told you I was beginning to
give all the old forms up. It's the one new movement, and I felt I ought
to master it."
"Of course," she said sympathetically, though with a little nervousness.
"Be just a wee bit careful with the flashlight--about turning it toward
the window, I mean--and read in your nice low voice. I always like
poetry best when it's almost whispered. I think it sounds more musical
that way, I mean."
Newland obeyed. His voice was hushed and profoundly appreciative of the
music in itself and in his poem, as he read:
"I--And Love!
Lush white lilies line the pool
Like laces limned on looking-glasses!
I tread the lilies underfoot,
Careless how they love me!
Still white maidens woo me,
Win me not!
But thou!
Thou art a cornflower
Sapphire-eyed!
I bend!
Cornflower, I ask a question.
O flower, speak----"
Julia spoke. "I'm afraid," she said, while Newland's spirit filled with
a bitterness extraordinary even in an interrupted poet;--"I'm afraid
it's Mr. Dill coming up the walk. We'll have to postpone----" She rose
and went to the steps to greet the approaching guest. "How nice of you
to come!"
Noble, remaining on the lowest step, clung to her hand in a fever. "Nice
to come!" he said hoarsely. "It's eight days--eight days--eight days
since----"
"Mr. Sanders is here," she said. "It's so dark on this big veranda
people can hardly see each other. Come up and sit with us. I don't have
to introduce you two men to each other."
She did not, indeed. They said "H'lo, Dill" and "H'lo Sanders" in a
manner of such slighting superiority that only the utmost familiarity
could have bred a contempt so magnificent. Then, when the three were
seated, Mr. Sanders thought well to add: "How's rent collecting these
days, Dill? Still hustling around among those darky shanties over in
Bucktown?"
In the dark Noble moved convulsively, but contrived to affect a light
laugh, or a sound meant for one, as he replied, in a voice not entirely
under control: "How's the ole poetry, Sanders?"
"What?" Newland demanded sharply. "What did you say?"
"I said: 'How's the ole poetry?' Do you read it to all your relations
the way you used to?"
"See here, Dill!"
"Well, what you want, Sanders?"
"You try to talk about things you understand," said Newland. "You better
keep your mind on collecting four dollars a week from some poor coloured
widow, and don't----"
"I'd _rather_ keep my mind on that!" Noble was inspired to retort. "Your
Aunt Georgina told my mother that ever since you began thinkin' you
could write poetry the life your family led was just----"
Newland interrupted. He knew the improper thing his Aunt Georgina had
said, and he was again, and doubly, infuriated by the prospect of its
repetition here. He began fiercely:
"Dill, you see here----"
"Your Aunt Georgina said----"
Both voices had risen. Plainly it was time for someone to say:
"Gentlemen! Gentlemen!" Julia glanced anxiously through the darkness of
the room beyond the open window beside her, to where the light of the
library lamp shone upon a door ajar; and she was the more nervous
because Noble, to give the effect of coolness, had lit an Orduma
cigarette.
She laughed amiably, as if the two young gentlemen were as amiable as
she. "I've thought of something," she said. "Let's take the settee and
some chairs down on the lawn where we can sit and see the moon."
"There isn't any," Noble remarked vacantly.
"Let's go, anyhow," she said cheerily. "Come on."
Her purpose was effected; the belligerents were diverted, and Noble
lifted the light wicker settee. "I'll carry this," he said. "It's no
trouble. Sanders can carry a chair--I guess he'd be equal to that much."
He stumbled, dropped the settee, and lifted a basket, its contents
covered with a newspaper. "Somebody must have----"
"What is it?"
"It's a basket," said Noble.
"How curious!"
Julia peered through the darkness. "I wonder who could have left that
market basket out _here_. I suppose----" She paused. "Our cook does do
more idiotic things than--I'll go ask her if it's ours."
She stepped quickly into the house, leaving two concentrations of
inimical silence behind her, but she returned almost immediately,
followed by Kitty Silver.
"It's no use to argue," Julia was saying as they came. "You did your
marketing and simply and plainly left it out there because you were too
shiftless to----"
"No'm," Mrs. Silver protested in a high voice of defensive complaint.
"No'm, Miss Julia, I ain' lef no baskit on _no_ front po'che! I got jus'
th'ee markit baskits in the livin' worl' an' they ev'y las' one an' all
sittin' right where I kin lay my han's on 'em behime my back do'. No'm,
Miss Julia, I take my solemn oaf I ain' lef no----" But here she
debouched upon the porch, and in spite of the darkness perceived herself
to be in the presence of distinguished callers. "Pahdon me," she said
loftily, her tone altering at once, "I beg leaf to insis' I better take
thishere baskit back to my kitchen an' see whut-all's insiden of it."
With an elegant gesture she received the basket from Noble Dill and took
the handle over her ample forearm. "Hum!" she said. "Thishere ole basket
kine o' heavy, too. I wunner whut-all she _is_ got in her!" And she
groped within the basket, beneath the newspaper.
Now, it was the breath of Kitty Silver's life to linger, when she could,
in a high atmosphere; and she was a powerful gossip, exorbitantly
interested in her young mistress's affairs and all callers. Therefore it
was beyond her not to seize upon any excuse that might detain her for
any time whatever in her present surroundings.
"Pusserve jugs," she said. "Pusserve or pickle. Cain't tell which."
"You can in the kitchen," Julia said, with pointed suggestion. "Of
course you can't in the dark."
But still Mrs. Silver snatched at the fleeting moment and did not go.
"Tell by smellin' 'em," she murmured, seemingly to herself.
With ease she unscrewed the top of one of the jars; then held the open
jar to her nose. "Don't smell to me exackly like no pusserves," she
said. "Nor yit like no pickles. Don't smell to me----" She hesitated,
sniffed the jar again, and then inquired in a voice quickly grown
anxious: "Whut _is_ all thishere in thishere jug? Seem like to _me_----"
But here she interrupted herself to utter a muffled exclamation, not
coherent. Instantly she added some words suitable to religious
observances, but in a voice of passion. At the same time, with a fine
gesture, she hurled the jar and the basket from her, and both came in
contact with the wall, not far away, with a sound of breakage.
"Why, what----" Julia began. "Kitty Silver, are you crazy?"
But Kitty Silver was moving hurriedly toward the open front door, where
appeared, at that moment, Mr. Atwater in his most irascible state of
peculiarity.