I
Maria blamed a good many things upon the institution of marriage for
which the explanation probably lay elsewhere. If Peter had been a lover
rather than a husband he would still have been insensitive to Chopin. In
all the range of Maria's repertoire he was never able to detect more
than a single tune. That itself seemed to him an achievement for the
Fantaisie Impromptu had not yet been discovered to be actually, "I'm
Always Chasing Rainbows." But as a matter of fact Peter did not really
understand Maria Algarez any better than he understood Chopin. He loved
her throughout the year of their married life but he was not happy.
"It is the curse of the witch on you," she said, "or maybe it is not the
witch but that America of yours. There is something in you, Peter, that
will not let you be happy. You are afraid of it. Of me you are afraid,
Peter."
He protested that this was not so but Maria knew better.
"Love--what you call sex--that is one of the things which has frightened
you the most of any. Somebody has put black thoughts into that head.
Yes, I tell you it is so. A terrible thing has been done to you.
Somebody has brought you up carefully."
But in an instant she had come across the room to him and had a
protecting arm about him.
"Now I have made you the more sad. You must tell me what it is."
"I can't, Maria. I don't know whether I know. But anyhow I can't."
"Perhaps it is the sound of it which you fear. You tell me. You must.
Whisper it."
Peter did whisper. "You remember that night you told me---- you told me
about the others."
"You mean those oh so few lovers. But that did not make you sad then.
You were not angry."
"I'm not angry now. But I can't help it, Maria, that I worry."
"And for what do you worry?"
"I think that maybe those other lovers they made you happier than I
can."
"So! That I should have known. You think you are not the so great lover.
These men they are gone but they are still your rivals. Perhaps I
remember. That is it?"
"Yes," said Peter.
He was startled when Maria laughed.
"Why do you laugh at me?"
"It is to you like the baseball game. It is what you call it? Oh yes, a
competition."
Peter made no answer.
"Now listen to me, Peter. You I love the most of anybody in the world. I
tell you that but it is not enough. You still worry. Something I must do
to show you. This blackness I must drive away. Peter, you must have a
baby. Yes, it is a son you need. Then you can worry about him."
Maria spoke upon the conviction but also upon impulse and babies are not
born that way. The time of her trial beat fiercely upon her. She had to
quit the show just a day after a new role and several new songs were
promised to her. During the last three months of her pregnancy she never
left the apartment. "I do not want anybody to point at me," she told
Peter, "and say that is Maria Algarez who did the Butterfly Dance in
'Adios.'"
* * * * *
In the note which Dr. Clay handed to Peter, Maria had written: "I did
keep my promise. It is a baby and a son. That was all I promised. More I
cannot do. Peter, I must be Maria Algarez, the dancer. I cannot be the
wife and the mother. You should not be sad altogether. I think it is
good that we have met. When you look at your son you will forget some of
the rubbish that was in your head. That is more than that you should
remember Maria Algarez. And the boy, Peter, remember it is fair that
from life he should get fun. Thank God, nobody can ever make of him the
wife and mother. Miss Haine says he is like me. If that is so, Peter,
you may have much trouble. But leave him just a little bad."
The last sentence was hard to decipher. Peter could not make out whether
Maria had written, "I love you," or "I loved you."
II
Peter must have gone to sleep eventually on the sofa in the reception
room of Dr. Clay's hospital. It was almost dark when he woke. He had
been dreaming hard. In the dream some vague figure, forgotten by the
time he awoke, presented him with a small lion cub as a pet. Throughout
the dream Peter worried about the lion cub. The apartment house in which
he lived had a strict rule against dogs. The janitor did not actually
come into the dream, but much of Peter's sleeping consciousness was
concerned with planning arguments for that official. "But it isn't a
dog," Peter was prepared to say, "it's a lion. Your rules don't say
anything about lions. Anyhow it's only a little lion." There had been a
lion cub in Battling Nelson's camp and Peter had often watched the
fighter fool around with it and slap the animal when it tried to nip
him. Nelson had a trick of rubbing the rough stubble of his beard
against the lion's nose. Peter hated that.
Disentangling himself from his dream he decided that his nightmare had
been an echo he remembered from Goldfield. It took him several minutes
to get himself back from the Nevada fight to the hospital in New York.
While he slept he had forgotten that Maria had run away and that his son
was in a room upstairs. He was about to skirmish out in search of one
of the nurses when Dr. Clay came into the room.
"Feeling any better?" asked the doctor.
"I feel all right. I'm all ready to take the baby now."
"You don't need to be in any hurry about that, Mr. Neale. Better let him
stay till tomorrow. It's after six now. Suppose we go up and watch the
little fellow get bathed. I asked Miss Haine to postpone that so you
could see him."
Peter realized that his presence at the bath seemed to be obligatory in
the mind of the doctor. He went up the stairs to the same room which he
had visited the fortnight before when he rushed away from the poker
game. There could be no possible question about finding the right door
for the hall was filled with loud howling.
"They never like it," said Dr. Clay.
"Is there any other reason for doing it?" asked Peter, but the physician
made no answer.
The baby was propped up against one end of the tub rubbing at his eyes
and Miss Haine was sloshing his chest with water from a sponge.
She looked up and said, "He's just fine, Mr. Neale. I'm not really
hurting him."
Peter found that a dim shadow of personality had descended upon his son
in the two weeks since he had last seen him. The face was too crowded
with tears and fingers to make much of an impression, but Peter, making
room for the doctor, walked around behind the tub and from the shoulders
of the child he received his first thrill. They were square high
shoulders without the suggestion of a curve. Christy Mathewson, the
rookie pitcher of the Giants, whom Peter Neale had recently hailed in
his column as a coming baseball star had shoulders just like that. And
it was a fine assertive chest.
"He'll be a big man some day," said Miss Haine lifting up one of the
baby's feet. "Remember he's got to grow up to these."
But no sooner was his foot lifted than the child began to howl louder
than ever. Peter suddenly reached toward him.
"Look out," cried Miss Haine in alarm. "You mustn't touch his head."
Peter cared nothing about the head. It was the high boxed shoulders
which he wanted, for some reason, to touch. He patted the child twice.
"I wouldn't cry like that," he said. But the child continued.
"He thinks I put soap in his eyes," explained Miss Haine. "Tell him I
didn't."
Peter thought it would be silly to say anything like that to the baby.
He patted him twice more and said, "There, there."
"You're going to have your bottle in just a minute now," cooed Miss
Haine, drying the child with a vigor which it resented. She put him back
into his crib and presented the bottle.
Instantly he ceased crying and drank noisily. He drank a good deal more
than he could conveniently swallow and milk began to spill out at the
corners of his mouth. The flash of interest which had animated Peter
died away. Indeed his feeling slumped down through indifference to
dislike.
"I suppose," said Miss Haine, "you're going to keep him on cow's milk
from now on."
"Cow's milk?" said Peter. "That's what he's got in the bottle now, isn't
it? It's all right for him, I suppose?"
"In theory," said Dr. Clay, "bottle babies don't do quite so well, but
it doesn't make much difference. I imagine more than half the children
in New York today are brought up on bottles."
"By the way," he continued, "I don't want to pry into your affairs, Mr.
Neale, but I suppose the little fellow's got a grandmother or somebody
you can turn him over to."
"No," said Peter, "he hasn't got any grandmother that I know of. I guess
we'll just have to get along without one."
"I can give you the telephone number of an agency where you could get a
trained nurse for him. That would insure expert care for a month or so
while you're looking around trying to make some more permanent
arrangement."
Peter shook his head. He had come to hate the hospital. Any starched
person would remind him constantly of Maria and her letter and her
running away.
"I think I've got somebody," he said. He was thinking of Kate. She had
been part of his life before he met Maria. And then there couldn't be
any scandal concerning Kate. She was about sixty. Before the baby was
born Kate had discussed the possibility of his paying her more than she
got for part time housekeeping and letting her be a nurse for the child.
"Well, whoever you get," advised Dr. Clay, "I want you to buy this book.
I'll write it down for you--it's Dr. Kerley's, I've always found it the
best--and have her follow the directions carefully."
Peter put the slip in his pocket. "I'll come around for the baby at
ten," he said. He took one more glance at the crib, but the milk
guzzling still continued. He left without saying goodbye to anybody
except Miss Haine and Dr. Clay. As he went out the front door he
suddenly said, "Damn!" He remembered that Kate couldn't read.