Midnight on Angel Island.
Julia sat alone on the stone bench at the door of the Honeymoon House.
She gazed straight ahead out on a star-lighted sea, which joined a
star-lighted sky and stretched in pulsating star-gleams to the end of
space. She gazed straight out, but apparently she saw nothing. Her eyes
were abstracted and her brow furrowed. Her shoulders drooped.
A man came bounding up the path.
“Has Ralph been here?” he asked curtly. Billy’s face was fiery. His eyes
blazed.
“He’s been here,” Julia answered immediately. “He’s gone!”
“By God, I’ll kill him!” Billy turned white.
Julia’s brow smoothed. She smiled a little. “No, you will not kill him,”
she said with her old serene air. “You will not have to kill him. He
will never come again.”
“Did he try to make love to you?”
“Yes.”
“How did he justify himself?”
“He appealed to me to save him. I did not quite understand from what. He
said I could make a better man of him.” Julia laughed a little.
“How did you know he was here?”
“I stopped at their cabin. He was not there. Peachy did not know where
he was. Of course, I guessed at once. I came here immediately.”
“Did Peachy seem troubled?”
“No. She doesn’t care. Pete was there, examining her drawings. They’re
half in love with each other. And then again, Pete doesn’t know, or if
he does know, he doesn’t care, that Clara is doing her damnedest to
start a flirtation with Honey. And Lulu has walked about like a woman in
a dream for weeks. What are we all coming to? There’s nothing but
flirting here!”
“It must be so,” Julia said, “as long as men and women are idle.”
“But how can we be anything but idle? There’s nothing to do on this
island.”
“I don’t know,” said Julia slowly; “I don’t know.”
“Julia,” Billy said in a pleading voice, “marry me!”
A strange expression came into Julia’s eyes. Part of it was irresolution
and part of it was terror. But a poignant wistful tenderness fused. both
these emotions, shot them with light.
“Not yet,” she said in a terrified voice. “Not yet!”
“Why?”
“I don’t know - why. Only that I cannot.”
“Then, when will you marry me? Julia, I see all the others together and
it - - . You don’t know what it does to me.”
“Yes, I know! It kills me too.”
“Then why wait?”
“Because - - .” The poignant look went for an instant from Julia’s eyes.
A strange brooding came in its place. “Because a little voice inside
says, ‘Wait!’”
“Julia, do you love me?”
Julia did not answer. She only looked at him.
“You are sure there is nobody else?”
“I am sure. There could never be anybody else - after that first night
when I waked you from sleep.”
“It is forever, then?”
“Forever.”
Billy sighed. “I’ll wait, then - until eternity shrivels up.”
They sat for a long time, silent.
“Here comes somebody,” Billy said suddenly. “It’s one of the girls,” he
added after a moment of listening. “I’ll leave you, I guess.”
He melted into the darkness.
A woman appeared, dragging herself along by means of the rail. It was
Lulu, a strange Lulu, a Lulu pallid and silent, but a Lulu shining-eyed.
She pulled herself over to Julia’s side. “Julia!” “Julia! Oh, Julia!”
Lulu’s voice was not voice. It was not speech. Liquid sound flowed from
her lips, crystallizing at the touch of the air, to words. “Julia, I
came to you first, after Honey. I wanted you to know.”
“Oh, Lulu,” Julia said, “not - - .”
Her eyes reflected the stars in Lulu’s eyes. And there they stood, their
two faces throwing gleam for gleam.
“Yes,” said Lulu. Suddenly she knelt sobbing on the floor, her face in
Julia’s lap.