The idea that Betty and her mother were eyeing her somewhat askance
troubled Joan not a little. In her heart of hearts she preferred women
to men, and believed their friendship more of a compliment. She would
have liked to make a friend of Mrs. Desmond, had there been time,
envying Betty's camaraderie with her mother; although Mrs. Desmond
presented a golfing, bridge-playing, sporting type of motherhood quite
new to her experience.
There was a peculiar intimacy and freedom among all this group of
people, who seemed to spend most of the year together either in
Philadelphia or Aiken or Ormond or these long-established country-places
surrounding the Longmeadow Hunt Club. It was like a curiously ramified
family, in which husbands and wives seemed to have changed partners
rather frequently, and were still in process of changing. It was Joan's
first glimpse of a society in which married women hold the center of the
stage rather than young girls, and she was just a little shocked by it.
There appeared to be no age limit here. It was not so much that these
women concealed their age, after the rather obvious fashion of Effie
May, as that they simply ignored it. Even Mrs. Desmond, dignified and
well-bred though she was, had a devoted attendant or two, spoken of
casually by Betty as "mamma's flames," and during Joan's visit at least
Mr. Desmond remained merely an abstraction. Conjugal affection was
distinctly not the fashion in the Desmond circle.
But this casualness of relations did not extend to the young girls. They
had no such freedom as Joan was accustomed to in the South. Betty, at
eighteen, was as carefully guarded as if she were still a child. She was
not permitted to go into the city without a maid or an older woman; she
neither drove or canoed alone with men, nor "sat out" with them at
dances. And it did not occur to her to protest.
"That sort of thing isn't good form," she explained once to Joan. "For
us, at least--Of course with Southern girls it's different."
But Joan began to suspect that even Southern girls were expected to hold
in regard this one fetish they had elected to worship, Good Form; and
that according to this standard she had already been condemned.
At first the younger women had made some effort to include her in their
various activities, golf, bridge, tennis. But latterly they had left her
alone, not severely but tolerantly, as one dedicated to other pursuits.
"Miss Darcy? Oh, she's from the South, you know--awfully busy with the
men," she overheard one of them explain to a newcomer; and she had
resented the remark keenly, not only for herself, but for the women of
her adopted home, who at least are rarely "busy with the men" after
marriage.
The person who made this remark was a Mrs. Rossiter, a pretty, boyish
creature, already divorced and remarried at thirty, and bearing her
present conjugality rather lightly. She was on terms of great intimacy
with the Desmond family, Eduard included; and Joan fancied that she
might have been one of the "widows" mentioned by Betty as her uncle's
chosen companions.
But if it had been so, her day was done. Eduard had palpably no eyes for
her now, and Joan could afford the generosity of admiring Mrs. Rossiter.
She was so natural and frank, and so royally indifferent to others'
opinion. Joan, who had a fatal propensity for acting as the people about
her expected her to act, envied her this assurance, and wished that she
could make friends with her.
The truth was that the girl, despite her success, felt utterly lonely.
She saw very little of Betty. Mrs. Desmond was an experienced hostess
who made no attempt to regulate the comings and goings of her guests,
and the girls made separate engagements. Even bedtime confidences had
ceased, owing to the fact that when Joan came up to her room, Betty was
usually asleep.
But on the night of her illuminating afternoon in the woods with Eduard,
Betty appeared to be waiting up for her. She came yawning into Joan's
room to watch her friend undress, and established herself sleepily on
the foot of the bed.
"What a pity you can't wear your hair down all the time, Jo! Men adore
hair, don't they? And yours has a regular patina on it, like old
bronze."
"Not greenish, I hope," laughed Joan.
"No--sort of orangish. Dark, with an orange lining."
"Betty! It sounds horrible!"
"Well, you know very well it isn't.--May Rossiter thinks you are awfully
clever to wear it that simple way, too, so straight and plain, when the
rest of us stick out like mops. She says you're awfully clever about
lots of things--too smart for the likes of us."
"Does she?" Joan was a little startled and not quite pleased. She had
not intended to give the impression of cleverness. It was out of her
present role entirely. "I wonder what Mrs. Rossiter meant by that?"
"Oh, men, of course," yawned Betty. "You see you've annexed a few of
hers, which naturally makes her peevish."
"Have I?" murmured Joan. "Who, for instance?"
"Well, Uncle Neddy, for one."
"Oh! So she _was_ one of his flames, then?"
Betty sat up. "You mean to say you didn't know it? One of them! _The_
one, my child! Surely you remember about his broken heart?--the married
lady he was recovering from in Washington last year? Well, May's it. Of
course I'm not supposed to know, being an _ingenue_--but our Neddy was
frightfully gone on her, and she returned it, and the husband she had
then got jealous (rather a bounder he was, not one of us, you know), and
there was some sort of excitement, and she divorced him. Every one
thought to marry Uncle Ned, of course. But instead she upped and married
Mr. Rossiter! Joke on Neddy, wasn't it?"
Joan's lip curled. "What a romantic love story! Why do you suppose she
married that old Mr. Rossiter?"
Betty shrugged in a worldly-wise manner. "Awfully rich, my dear. And
Neddy isn't."
"But they seem friendly enough still, she and Mr. Desmond?"
"Oh, of course. Why not? It would be frightfully uncomfortable for the
rest of us if they glowered and didn't speak and all that, like
quarreling servants. And Uncle Neddy seems to be consoling himself!" She
twinkled at Joan. "That evens things up, you see. But,"--she suddenly
grew grave--"what do _you_ get out of all this, Joan? You couldn't
possibly _like_ seeing so much of Uncle Neddy! He's such a--softy. And
such a bore, too, with his art and poetry and stuff."
"You mean," smiled Joan, "he's too mature for you, dear."
"Too mature for you then, too! You're only a few months older."
The other gave an unconscious sigh. "Oh, me--I'm different."
Betty rounded upon her, "You certainly are! I've never seen such a
change in any one as a few months have made in you! Sometimes I hardly
recognize you for the Jo I used to know at school--so funny and larky,
and yet paying no more attention to the boys we used to make eyes at
over at the College than if they didn't exist."
"College boys _don't_ exist," said Joan gravely. "They're like tadpoles,
just a transition state. And rather disgusting."
"Not half as disgusting as the Uncle Neds! Look here, Joan," Betty
blurted out, "you're not--wanting to get married, are you?"
Joan went as pale as the other was flushed. "No," she said in a low
voice, "I'm not!"
Betty heaved a sigh of relief. "There! That's what I told 'em." (She did
not mention whom.) "The Ritters' guest was different. She _had_ to get
married, because she'd been visiting 'round for years, and people were
getting tired of it, and she couldn't pay for her clothes. But you, at
your age, with all the beaux you must have! Why, you wouldn't touch
Uncle Neddy with a ten-foot pole."
Joan bit her lip. "Why not, Betty?" she asked, quietly. "What's wrong
with your uncle? You mean--because he drinks?"
Betty looked uncomfortable. She was more of an _ingenue_ than she
thought, and found herself getting into deep water.
"I don't know exactly," she confessed, "but there's _something_ wrong
with him. I don't think he drinks; not more than everybody does, anyway.
He's too fastidious--and I'd have noticed if he did. But there are other
ways of being dissipated--aren't there?"
"I see!" said Joan, wisely; though she saw with some vagueness. Chorus
girls, she fancied, models, the artistic temperament, and all that....
On the whole, she felt rather relieved.
"That sort of thing ought to be easier to cure than drinking," she mused
aloud, "if a man were happily married."
"_If!_" repeated Betty. "The question is, could it be done? Well, thank
Heaven, _we_ don't have to do it, anyway. I'd hate the job of keeper to
Uncle Ned's roving eye!... Ugh, let's not talk about it! Years before
you and I have to think of horrid things like marriage--Good night, you
bad old flirt," she murmured, kissing her friend.
Joan was left with the subtle impression of having been warned.
The impression was repeated the next morning when Mrs. Desmond, meeting
her on the stairs, remarked with a friendly pat of the arm in passing,
"I do wish you'd teach Betty something of the fine art of keeping them
guessing, Joan, It's quite wonderful the way you play them all off
against each other, and so good for them--particularly Ned! He's rather
spoiled, I'm afraid--used to monopolizing his favorites...."
Evidently the Desmonds did not intend to take her affair with Eduard
seriously. For the first time it occurred to her that this might be
because they did not wish to. She was certainly not, to use Betty's
significant phrase, "one of them."
The girl's head lifted haughtily. She was a Darcy of Kentucky. Surely
that was sufficient?
Once in her childhood she had heard her father remark in a moment of
especial grandiloquence that Darcys were entitled to the society of
kings and queens; and Joan had never doubted the truth of the statement.
Something within assured her that she would feel perfectly at ease with
any kings or queens who chanced to cross her path. In fact the only
people with whom so far she had not felt at ease were snobs and
parvenues, under neither of which categories the Desmonds could be
placed.
Now she wondered suddenly to what she and her father owed this
comfortable sense of lofty destiny. True, theirs was "an old Southern
family"; but living in a part of the world that seems entirely populated
by such families, this was no distinction. Darcys, she knew, had fought
and died for their country whenever occasion offered, but so had quite
simple people named Smith or Jones. She racked her brain to think of
anything else they might have done for their country, or even for
themselves. Genius had never made its appearance among them, nor wealth,
nor even beauty, to any noticeable extent. They were rich in one thing
only: self-esteem.
Fortunately, however, Joan had her share of that; and upon further
reflection she decided that "Darcy" was at least as distinguished a name
as "Desmond." Doubtless their ancestors had been kings in Ireland
together.
The question of her poverty occurred to her for a moment, only to be
dismissed as negligible. The Desmonds were too well-bred to be
mercenary. Eduard was not rich himself; and if, as Betty intimated, his
reputation was a trifle tarnished, he could not be too exacting in his
demands. He could not expect youth, and charm, and wit, and a dowry as
well! thought Joan complacently. No: Eduard would be getting quite as
much as he gave....
It was in rather a defiant mood that she appeared at dinner that night
in a blue chiffon frock which the observant Eduard had pronounced his
favorite; and though some people were expected afterwards for dancing,
she deliberately accepted his murmured suggestion that they row up the
river to see the last of the harvest moon.