JUST how Leslie Ward had drifted into his innocuous affair with the star
of “The Valley” he was not certain himself. Innocuous it certainly was.
Afterwards, looking back, he was to wonder sometimes if it had not been
precisely for the purpose it served. But that was long months after.
Not until the pattern was completed and he was able to recognize his own
work in it.
The truth was that he was not too happy at home. Nina's smart little
house on the Ridgely Road had at first kept her busy. She had spent
unlimited time with decorators, had studied and rejected innumerable
water-color sketches of interiors, had haunted auction rooms and bid
recklessly on things she felt at the moment she could not do without,
later on to have to wheedle Leslie into straightening her bank balance.
Thought, too, and considerable energy had gone into training and
outfitting her servants, and still more into inducing them to wear the
expensive uniforms and livery she provided.
But what she made, so successfully, was a house rather than a home.
There were times, indeed, when Leslie began to feel that it was not even
a house, but a small hotel. They almost never dined alone, and when they
did Nina would explain that everybody was tied up. Then, after dinner,
restlessness would seize her, and she would want to run in to the
theater, or to make a call. If he refused, she nursed a grievance all
evening.
And he did not like her friends. Things came to a point where, when
he knew one of the gay evenings was on, he would stay in town, playing
billiards at his club, or occasionally wandering into a theater, where
he stood or sat at the back of the house and watched the play with
cynical, discontented eyes.
The casual meeting with Gregory and the introduction to his sister
brought a new interest. Perhaps the very novelty was what first
attracted him, the oddity of feeling that he was on terms of friendship,
for it amounted to that with surprising quickness, with a famous
woman, whose face smiled out at him from his morning paper or, huge and
shockingly colored, from the sheets on the bill boards.
He formed the habit of calling on her in the afternoons at her hotel,
and he saw that she liked it. It was often lonely, she explained. He
sent her flowers and cigarettes, and he found her poised and restful,
and sometimes, when she was off guard, with the lines of old suffering
in her face.
She sat still. She didn't fidget, as Nina did. She listened, too.
She was not as beautiful as she appeared on the stage, but she was
attractive, and he stilled his conscience with the knowledge that she
placed no undue emphasis on his visits. In her world men came and went,
brought or sent small tribute, and she was pleased and grateful. No
more. The next week, or the week after, and other men in other places
would be doing the same things.
But he wondered about her, sometimes. Did she ever think of Judson
Clark, and the wreck he had made of her life? What of resentment
and sorrow lay behind her quiet face, or the voice with its careful
intonations which was so unlike Nina's?
Now and then he saw her brother. He neither liked nor disliked Gregory,
but he suspected him of rather bullying Beverly. On the rare occasions
when he saw them together there was a sort of nervous tension in the
air, and although Leslie was not subtle he sensed some hidden difference
between them. A small incident one day almost brought this concealed
dissension to a head. He said to Gregory:
“By the way, I saw you in Haverly yesterday afternoon.”
“Must have seen somebody else. Haverly? Where's Haverly?”
Leslie Ward had been rather annoyed. There had been no mistake about the
recognition. But he passed it off with that curious sense of sex loyalty
that will actuate a man even toward his enemies.
“Funny,” he said. “Chap looked like you. Maybe a little heavier.”
Nevertheless he had a conviction that he had said something better left
unsaid, and that Beverly Carlysle's glance at her brother was almost
hostile. He had that instantaneous picture of the two of them, the man
defiant and somehow frightened, and the woman's eyes anxious and yet
slightly contemptuous. Then, in a flash, it was gone.
He had meant to go home that evening, would have, probably, for he was
not ignorant of where he was drifting. But when he went back to the
office Nina was on the wire, with the news that they were to go with a
party to a country inn.
“For chicken and waffles, Les,” she said. “It will be oceans of fun. And
I've promised the cocktails.”
“I'm tired,” he replied, sulkily. “And why don't you let some of the
other fellows come over with the drinks? It seems to me I'm always the
goat.”
“Oh, if that's the way you feel!” Nina said, and hung up the receiver.
He did not go home. He went to the theater and stood at the back, with
his sense of guilt deadened by the knowledge that Nina was having what
she would call a heavenly time. After all, it would soon be over. He
counted the days. “The Valley” had only four more before it moved on.
He had already played his small part in the drama that involved Dick
Livingstone, but he was unaware of it. He went home that night, to
find Nina settled in bed and very sulky, and he retired himself in no
pleasant frame of mind. But he took a firmer hold of himself that night
before he slept. He didn't want a smash, and yet they might be headed
that way. He wouldn't see Beverly Carlysle again.
He lived up to his resolve the next day, bought his flowers as usual,
but this time for Nina and took them with him. And went home with the
orchids which were really an offering to his own conscience.
But Nina was not at home. The butler reported that she was dining at
the Wheelers', and he thought the man eyed him with restrained
commiseration.
“Did she say I am expected there?” he asked.
“She ordered dinner for you here, sir.”
Even for Nina that sounded odd. He took his coat and went out again to
the car; after a moment's hesitation he went back and got the orchids.
Dick Livingstone's machine was at the curb before the Wheeler house,
and in the living-room he found Walter Wheeler, pacing the floor. Mr.
Wheeler glanced at him and looked away.
“Anybody sick?” Leslie asked, his feeling of apprehension growing.
“Nina is having hysterics upstairs,” Mr. Wheeler said, and continued his
pacing.
“Nina! Hysterics?”
“That's what I said,” replied Mr. Wheeler, suddenly savage. “You've made
a nice mess of things, haven't you?”
Leslie placed the box of orchids on the table and drew off his gloves.
His mind was running over many possibilities.
“You'd better tell me about it, hadn't you?”
“Oh, I will. Don't worry. I've seen this coming for months. I'm not
taking her part. God knows I know her, and she has as much idea of
making a home as--as”--he looked about--“as that poker has. But that's
the worst you can say of her. As to you--”
“Well?”
Mr. Wheeler's anxiety was greater than his anger. He lowered his voice.
“She got a bill to-day for two or three boxes of flowers, sent to some
actress.” And when Leslie said nothing, “I'm not condoning it, mind you.
You'd no business to do it. But,” he added fretfully, “why the devil,
if you've got to act the fool, don't you have your bills sent to your
office?”
“I suppose I don't need to tell you that's all there was to it? Flowers,
I mean.”
“I'm taking that for granted. But she says she won't go back.”
Leslie was aghast and frightened. Not at the threat; she would go back,
of course. But she would always hold it against him. She cherished small
grudges faithfully. And he knew she would never understand, never see
her own contribution to his mild defection, nor comprehend the actual
innocence of those afternoons of tea and talk.
There was no sound from upstairs. Mr. Wheeler got his hat and went out,
calling to the dog. Jim came in whistling, looked in and said: “Hello,
Les,” and disappeared. He sat in the growing twilight and cursed himself
for a fool. After all, where had he been heading? A man couldn't eat his
cake and have it. But he was resentful, too; he stressed rather hard his
own innocence, and chose to ignore the less innocent impulse that lay
behind it.
After a half hour or so he heard some one descending and Dick
Livingstone appeared in the hall. He called to him, and Dick entered the
room. Before he sat down he lighted a cigarette and in the flare of
the match Leslie got an impression of fatigue and of something new, of
trouble. But his own anxieties obsessed him.
“She's told you about it, I suppose?”
“I was a fool, of course. But it was only a matter of a few flowers
and some afternoon calls. She's a fine woman, Livingstone, and she is
lonely. The women have given her a pretty cold deal since the Clark
story. They copy her clothes and her walk, but they don't ask her into
their homes.”
“Isn't the trouble more fundamental than that, Ward? I was thinking
about it upstairs. Nina was pretty frank. She says you've had your good
time and want to settle down, and that she is young and now is her only
chance. Later on there may be children, you know. She blames herself,
too, but she has a fairly clear idea of how it happened.”
“Do you think she'll go back home?”
“She promised she would.”
They sat smoking in silence. In the dining-room Annie was laying the
table for dinner, and a most untragic odor of new garden peas began
to steal along the hall. Dick suddenly stirred and threw away his
cigarette.
“I was going to talk to you about something else,” he said, “but this is
hardly the time. I'll get on home.” He rose. “She'll be all right. Only
I'd advise very tactful handling and--the fullest explanation you can
make.”
“What is it? I'd be glad to have something to keep my mind occupied.
It's eating itself up just now.”
“It's a personal matter.”
Ward glanced up at him quickly.
“Yes?”
“Have you happened to hear a story that I believe is going round? One
that concerns me?”
“Well, I have,” Leslie admitted. “I didn't pay much attention. Nobody is
taking it very seriously.”
“That's not the point,” Dick persisted. “I don't mind idle gossip. I
don't give a damn about it. It's the statement itself.”
“I should say that you are the only person who knows anything about it.”
Dick made a restless, impatient gesture.
“I want to know one thing more,” he said. “Nina told you, I suppose.
Does--I suppose Elizabeth knows it, too?”
“I rather think she does.”
Dick turned abruptly and went out of the room, and a moment later
Leslie heard the front door slam. Elizabeth, standing at the head of the
stairs, heard it also, and turned away, with a new droop to her usually
valiant shoulders. Her world, too, had gone awry, that safe world of
protection and cheer and kindliness. First had come Nina, white-lipped
and shaken, and Elizabeth had had to face the fact that there were such
things as treachery and the queer hidden things that men did, and that
came to light and brought horrible suffering.
And that afternoon she had had to acknowledge that there was something
wrong with Dick. No. Between Dick and herself. There was a formality in
his speech to her, an aloofness that seemed to ignore utterly their new
intimacy. He was there, but he was miles away from her. She tried hard
to feel indignant, but she was only hurt.
Peace seemed definitely to have abandoned the Wheeler house. Then
late in the evening a measure of it was restored when Nina and Leslie
effected a reconciliation. It followed several bad hours when Nina had
locked her door against them all, but at ten o'clock she sent for Leslie
and faced him with desperate calmness.
To Elizabeth, putting cold cloths on her mother's head as she lay on the
bed, there came a growing conviction that the relation between men and
women was a complicated and baffling thing, and that love and hate were
sometimes close together.
Love, and habit perhaps, triumphed in Nina's case, however, for at
eleven o'clock they heard Leslie going down the stairs and later on
moving about the kitchen and pantry while whistling softly. The servants
had gone, and the air was filled with the odor of burning bread. Some
time later Mrs. Wheeler, waiting uneasily in the upper hall, beheld her
son-in-law coming up and carrying proudly a tray on which was toast of
an incredible blackness, and a pot which smelled feebly of tea.
“The next time you're out of a cook just send for me,” he said
cheerfully.
Mrs. Wheeler, full and overflowing with indignation and the piece of her
mind she had meant to deliver, retired vanquished to her bedroom.
Late that night when Nina had finally forgiven him and had settled down
for sleep, Leslie went downstairs for a cigar, to find Elizabeth sitting
there alone, a book on her knee, face down, and her eyes wistful and
with a question in them.
“Sitting and thinking, or just sitting?” he inquired.
“I was thinking.”
“Air-castles, eh? Well, be sure you put the right man into them!” He
felt more or less a fool for having said that, for it was extremely
likely that Nina's family was feeling some doubt about Nina's choice.
“What I mean is,” he added hastily, “don't be a fool and take Wallie
Sayre. Take a man, while you're about it.”
“I would, if I could do the taking.”
“That's piffle, Elizabeth.” He sat down on the arm of a chair and looked
at her. “Look here, what about this story the Rossiter girl and a few
others are handing around about Dick Livingstone? You're not worrying
about it, are you?”
“I don't believe it's true, and it wouldn't matter to me, anyhow.”
“Good for you,” he said heartily, and got up. “You'd better go to bed,
young lady. It's almost midnight.”
But although she rose she made no further move to go.
“What I am worrying about is this, Leslie. He may hear it.”
“He has heard it, honey.”
He had expected her to look alarmed, but instead she showed relief.
“I'll tell you the truth, Les,” she said. “I was worrying. I'm terribly
fond of him. It just came all at once, and I couldn't help it. And I
thought he liked me, too, that way.” She stopped and looked up at him to
see if he understood, and he nodded gravely. “Then to-day, when he came
to see Nina, he avoided me. He--I was waiting in the hall upstairs, and
he just said a word or two and went on down.”
“Poor devil!” Leslie said. “You see, he's in an unpleasant position, to
say the least. But here's a thought to go to sleep on. If you ask me,
he's keeping out of your way, not because he cares too little, but
because he cares too much.”
Long after a repentant and chastened Leslie had gone to sleep, his arm
over Nina's unconscious shoulder, Elizabeth stood wide-eyed on the
tiny balcony outside her room. From it in daylight she could see
the Livingstone house. Now it was invisible, but an upper window was
outlined in the light. Very shyly she kissed her finger tips to it.
“Good-night, dear,” she whispered.