1
THE streets outside were full of dirty melting snow, and there was a
cold drizzly rain falling.
“We still don’t know where we are going,” said Rose-Ann, as they stood
in the doorway, waiting for the taxi. “Isn’t it amusing? What are we
going to tell the driver?”
“City Hall, what else?” said Felix.
Rose-Ann shrugged her shoulders. “It’s an abode, a place of residence—a
home, if you like—some place to take you besides Community House or that
dreadful place that I’ve heard about on Canal Street: it’s that I’m
thinking of, rather than the legal process. It’s rather absurd, isn’t
it, that neither of us has anything resembling a home! We just _are_
vagabonds, that’s a fact.... And—somehow I don’t want to be married at
the City Hall and have a fat alderman offer to ‘kiss the bride.’ ... If
you don’t mind, I want some place to go where we can have a moment to
consider what to do. After all, even vagabonds have their self-respect
to take care of! Let’s not be rushed into an ugly and stupid performance
that has no significance or beauty for either of us. I want to have
something to say about the way I get married! And if there isn’t some
way of getting married that’s _our_ way, so that we don’t have to feel
like fools and cowards, why—” she finished in a mournful voice, “I think
I’d rather not be married at all.”
Felix patted her arm reassuringly. “That’s all right,” he said. “I know
what we’ll do. We’ll go to Clive’s place.”
“Clive Bangs? Up at Woods Point?”
“Yes.” And he told her of Clive’s invitation. “You needn’t worry, it’s
not a bachelor’s den, it’s a real house, with all the appurtenances
thereto appertaining, and a woman to come in to do the cooking. And
we’ll be married there. Clive will help us arrange it.”
The taxi had swung up beside the curb. Rose-Ann still hesitated a
moment, then said, “All right!” and climbed in.
“Northwestern station!” said Felix to the driver.
“No!” said Rose-Ann. “To Community House first!—If I’m to be married,
Felix, at least I must change my clothes; there’s no need for me to be
married in this”—and she looked down at the grey suit she was wearing.
“I’m just as I came from the train.”
“All right,” said Felix. “But let’s not stop there long. And—I do hope
they won’t suspect what we are up to ... it will be rather a give-away,
our dashing in together and out again!”
She laughed. “You mean it will look like an elopement? Well, you can
wait for me in the taxi.”
He waited, impatiently, smoking a cigarette, for what seemed a long
time. At last she came, dressed now in some soft creamy thing under her
grey cloak, and carrying a suitcase.
“I think one person suspected me,” she said.
“Mrs. Perk?”
“Yes. Old women think they know so much, don’t they? Why should she
imagine—? just because I—! It’s my own fault, for making a last
sentimental visit to the theatre. But I wanted to—sort of—say good-bye!”
At the station, Rose-Ann hesitated again, and urged Felix at least to
call Clive up and tell him they were coming. Felix refused. “Let’s make
it a surprise,” he said.
“I don’t know!” Rose-Ann said, when they were aboard the train. “To tell
the truth, I’m a little afraid of your friend Clive.”
“Afraid of him?”
“I mean—I’m in awe of him, a little.”
“Nothing awe-ful about Clive. He’s a nice fellow. I’ve always wanted you
to meet him.”
“I wondered why you kept us so carefully apart,” said Rose-Ann. “I
thought perhaps you felt that I didn’t measure up to his specifications.
Do you think I will?”
He laughed tenderly, and looked at her. She was very sweet, and, it
seemed, very tired despite the buoyant vivacity that always made her
lovely. “You are wonderful,” he said. “But,” and he put his arm about
her, to the amusement of two adolescent girls across the aisle, “it
doesn’t make any difference what anybody in the world thinks about you,
except me!”
“How possessive you are, of a sudden!” said Rose-Ann. But she relaxed
deep within his caressing and protecting gesture, and closed her eyes.
He looked down, touching softly with his glance the delicate surface of
her cheek as it slanted away from the high cheek-bones, and the forehead
half hidden under the drooping tangle of red gold hair. Yes, she was
very tired, and strangely enough he was glad to have her so, glad to
feel her restless and vivid life relax to peace in the shelter of his
arm. She had gone through a good deal of late; he thought of her home,
and of that death-bed from which she had come, and the jarring family
hostilities only half-repressed by the solemnity of that scene; it was
strange to think of her—this lovely child made for happiness—emerging
from those troubled shadows....
She was free now. And he too was free—free from dubieties and
hesitations, strange and foolish suspicions of her—free from fear. How
simple everything was, after all! By what strange ways they had come, to
find each other—not knowing until this last moment the real meaning of
their lives....
2
“It’s beginning to snow again,” said Rose-Ann, rousing herself and
looking out of the window. And then—“What have you told Clive Bangs
about me?”
“Not very much,” he confessed. “I suppose because of Clive’s manner
about his own girls—or girl, I should say; it’s been a particular one
for a long time now. He alludes to her, discusses her in an impersonal
way, but he has never even told me her name. A queer sort of futile
secrecy—Which reminds me of a curious story about him.” And he told her
Eddie Silver’s drunken tale of the building of the house.
“This house we are going to?”
“Yes—if the story’s true.”
“So that’s why he became a woman-hater.”
“Perhaps not quite so bad as that. I should say it made him a Utopian.”
“It’s the same thing,” said Rose-Ann. “It’s curious,” she added, “how
many men nowadays—particularly interesting men—are afraid of women;
afraid that being really in love will ruin their career, commercialize
their art, or something—Are you afraid of me, Felix?”
“Not any more,” he laughed.
“Why, were you ever?”
“Afraid you didn’t really care for me,” he said.
“Yes, you _were_ rather shy! But I liked you for it. And it was just as
well, until I had made up my own mind.”
“How did you come to make up your mind? Why did you decide to marry me?”
“Shall I tell you?”
“Yes, tell me.”
“It was partly your love-letters—”
“Did I write love-letters to you? I suppose I did—but I tried awfully
hard not to!”
“Beautiful love-letters! And then—being at home: that more than anything
else made me realize that I was in love with you. I had thought so
before, but then I was sure of it. And—well, it seemed stupid not to
make something of our two lives. Why should we keep on being afraid to
try?...”
“Were you afraid, too, Rose-Ann?”
“Yes. But I’m not any more. We’re going to be very happy, and you’re
going to be a very great man and write wonderful things....”
He stirred uneasily. “Don’t put our happiness on that basis, please.
Suppose I don’t write wonderful things!”
“But you will!”
He sighed. “That makes me realize that I am a little afraid of you,
Rose-Ann. Afraid you will make me have a career!”
“Don’t you want a career? I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want
to.”
“That’s just it. I’m afraid you are going to make me do all the things I
do want to! Things I would otherwise just dream of doing!”
“Is that prospect so terrifying?”
“Yes, rather.”
“Poor dear!” She pressed his hand in hers. “I suppose I _am_ a terrible
person. I can’t do the things I want to do myself; and so I’m going to
insist on your doing them—is that it?”
“I have the feeling that you expect a terrible lot from me,” he said.
“It’s true—I do think you’re rather a wonderful person.”
“I wish you wouldn’t!”
“I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to help it, Felix. You’ll have to
take me, enthusiasm and all, my dear! For I’m in love with you, and I
_do_ think you are going to be a great man, and I shall continue to, no
matter how miserable it makes you feel—so there! I won’t marry a
commonplace man, and you’ll have to agree to let me think you out of the
ordinary, or the marriage is off!” She tilted her chin defiantly.
“All right, Rose-Ann,” he said. “You may think me as wonderful as you
like, if only you’ll not say so out loud. Praise upsets me. I thrive
only on contumelious blame! So if you want to put me at my ease, tell me
something bad about myself.”
“That’s easy enough,” she said. “You’re quite the shabbiest-looking man
that ever went to his own wedding, vagabond or not. You seem to have
packed off to the hospital in your oldest shirt—look at those cuffs!”
Felix looked at them, and pulled down his coat-sleeves over their frayed
edges. He looked at his dusty shoes, and tucked them out of sight under
the seat.
“Does Felix feel himself again?” she asked maliciously.
“Quite,” he said. “Now I know it’s true I’m going to be married.”
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