THE LOBSTER
“It’s burning, I think,” suggested Zelda.
“You ought to keep stirring,” said Mrs. Forrest.
“It’s usually served hot,” remarked Leighton. “That’s what the books
say.”
The successful chafing-dish cook must be a good actor also. If the
wicks work badly, he must smile at his audience while his fingers burn;
or he must be able to tell an amusing story while the alcohol, which
is always spreading in places where it should not be, ignites grandly
until the table resembles a prairie fire. When the finished rabbit
pulls away from the spoon like taffy, and hardens in long strings in
the air, only an operator possessing unusual dramatic powers can turn
the tragedy into comedy.
“Your advice is neither asked nor desired,” Rodney Merriam said, in
scorn of his critics. “I’ve been under fire before.”
“You seem to be over it just now,” remarked Zelda, who sat nearest him
with her elbows on the table.
“They have smokeless powder now; maybe they’ll have fireless chafing
dishes next,” said Morris.
A spot of alcohol in the far corner of the tray had suddenly risen in a
thin flame, giving point to Leighton’s remark.
“Young people are terribly nervous these days,” remarked Merriam,
stifling the blaze imperturbably.
“‘Myself when young--’” hummed Zelda. “We’re never really old until we
begin to lament the past. But you’re doing it charmingly, uncle, with
quite a touch,--_avec empressement_.” She raised her arm and drew an
imaginary straight line in the air with the points of her fingers.
“It’s a way I have. I’m glad you appreciate it,”--and Merriam nodded to
the Japanese boy to put the plates within reach. The lobster diffused a
cheering aroma through the air as the old gentleman served it.
“It’s delicious. It’s a credit to Mr. _à la Newberg_,” said Zelda, as
she tasted it.
“It’s very indigestible, isn’t it, Rodney?” asked Mrs. Forrest,
guardedly.
“It is, Julia. The best authorities place it next to ten-penny nails
for indigestibility. But it’s good; and it’s better to die than to live
lobsterless. Morris, that bottle of ale is yours.”
Rodney Merriam had an eye for effects and he thought his guests fitted
very well into his dining-room. The furniture was all massive; the
walls were decorated in bright red; and the silver on the sideboard
and the crystal in the quaint old cabinet in the corner added to the
charm of the room. There was no jarring note; the whole house was
irreproachably clean; but a man’s house always has rigid lines. It
is ordained of Heaven that women shall possess certain things, and
the home touch is a feminine gift, that no man has ever been able to
impart, charm he never so wisely and spend he never so lavishly.
A New York friend who once spent a week with Rodney Merriam in Seminary
Square said on leaving that the house was as good as a club; that
the only thing he had missed was the signing of checks for what he
ordered. Men regard a club as paradise brought to earth, not because
they escape there from things feminine or can command a cool siphon by
ringing a bell; but because they like full swing at a club kitchen. It
is a heart-breaking thing in any man’s life when he knows to a moral
certainty that the roast on Monday, week after week, will be beef; that
on Tuesday it will be fowl, while Wednesday will bring mutton with
capers, and so on, to the regular Saturday evening corned beef. It is
not that he dislikes any one of these things; it’s their inevitableness
that causes his brow to darken and all the griefs of a busy day to
becloud his table talk. For the stomachs of men are children and like
to be surprised.
Rodney Merriam enjoyed his little party. It was going well, without
effort on his part. He led his guests from the dining-room to the
library, where a fire of hickory wood had just been lighted.
“There’s a parlor in this house, but the less you say about it the
better,” said Merriam. “I found it here when I bought the house and I
have never had the nerve to change it.”
“This is better,--much more intimate and homelike. I like it, Uncle
Rodney. You may graciously invite me again,” said Zelda.
“I know a trick worth two of being invited. I just come. I suggest my
method as having advantages;” and Leighton smiled at her.
“Yes. One is helpless against intruders,” declared Merriam; “privacy
is a lost art. But I must except present company. All I have--anything
you see--is yours to command, Zee. Better throw away that cigarette and
have a cigar, Morris.”
“He’s in a generous mood to-night,” said Leighton to Zelda. “It’s well
to seize and appropriate his worldly goods when he offers them. He’s
offered you the house and given me a cigar.”
“I’m nothing if not polite,” declared Merriam. “But I don’t see what
you’re complaining of, Morris. You haven’t lost your latch-key, have
you?”
“No. But I wish to be sure that Miss Dameron understands how difficult
you are.”
“Does that mean that you have to work hard to pay for the latch-key? Of
course the compensations are sufficient,” observed Zelda.
“I’m not ashamed of the pains I took to get it. On the whole I think
the labor flatters my good taste.”
“Oh, that!”
She was looking at Morris steadily and nodded her head gravely. The
emphasis on the pronoun was very slight, but it was enough to carry a
hint of impertinence.
Merriam and his sister were observing the young people from different
points of view. The former was anxious for Leighton to impress Mrs.
Forrest and Zelda favorably. Mrs. Forrest, on the other hand, watched
the girl with an admiration that was not wholly void of anxiety.
People usually laughed at what Zelda said, but Mrs. Forrest was not
altogether sure in her own mind as to the quality of the girl’s humor;
or perhaps she thought the amusement that Zelda created was merely
another instance of the ease with which a pretty girl can carry off
a situation. She wondered whether her brother had brought Zelda and
Morris Leighton together with a purpose; but she saw no reason for
suspecting him. It was natural that her brother should have taken up
the son of an old friend; she knew that he was kind and generous; and
Morris was a very presentable young man. He crossed the room now, and
began talking more particularly to her, though still including the
others. He was very straightforward and cordial. He spoke of Mariona
social matters with an irony that had no unkindness in it; and when he
appealed to her brother for corroboration there was a genuine respect
under his joking.
“I’m not a social animal,” Merriam remarked. “I’ve stopped going out.
If you could go to a friend’s house and hear talk that had sense or wit
in it, I’d be glad to leave my slippers and go about. But every house
nowadays is a museum of devices for making a row. You no sooner get
your hat off than your host turns on a hideous, automatic, perfectly
tireless device that squeals and roars like a circus calliope. The
devil’s in the things and they never run down. The other evening I went
to Carr’s, thinking I’d have a quiet evening, and he--Mike Carr--had
the effrontery to turn loose an infernal machine that squealed out
Hamlet’s soliloquy and vilely murdered it, so that I wouldn’t hear it
again--not if Edwin Booth came back to life and offered to give it in
this very room! But,--we can have better entertainment here. There’s
the parlor and a piano. Let there be music.”
“Your piano is probably impossible,” suggested Mrs. Forrest.
“It’s not my fault if it isn’t in tune. I had a man at work on it all
day yesterday.”
“I suppose there are books of music. We usually require something of
the kind,” said Zelda.
“Um--you ought to have brought your own.”
“Not, I hope, without being urged in advance!”
“There are some things here, I think,” said Morris, “if you will let
me show you the way. Mr. Merriam’s music probably dates back to the
_Kathleen Mavourneen_ period.”
“It was a good period, children; don’t speak slightingly of it.”
The old gentleman was lighting a fresh cigar at the mantel. Leighton
and Zelda crossed the hall together.
“Shall we stay here?” Merriam asked his sister. “The chairs over there
are pretty bad.”
The piano itself was not visible, but when the girl sat down by it her
profile was turned toward them.
Leighton opened a cabinet of old music, and drew out the sheets for
Zelda while they discussed the songs, which were all of a sentimental
sort that had long been out of favor.
“I really don’t see how they could have done it,” said Zelda. “I
suppose young women in those days were more courageous, or sentimental,
or something. Perhaps we have changed for the worse.”
“I shouldn’t like to admit it.”
“I have heard that lawyers never admit anything,” she said, musingly,
scanning the songs as Morris held them up for her.
“You’re conceding a good deal when you intimate that I’m a lawyer. But
you’re hard to please--about the music, I mean!”
“Never mind,” she said. “I’ve thought of something;” and she struck
suddenly the prelude of a song.
It was a swift rushing melody in which a gay mood had been imprisoned
with an exquisite art, and the girl’s voice caught it up and sang it
into life. She gave the little Provençal song in the patois; but the
words did not matter. It was a song of spring, which the melody told
without their aid.
Leighton was standing by her and the sudden out-leaping of the song
laid a spell upon him. There was something delightfully joyous and
spontaneous in it--as though it were a newly created thing that would
always remain in the world, now that a voice had been found for it. He
knew nothing of music and the finish of the girl’s singing was wasted
on him; but the spirit with which she gave the chansonnette amazed him.
He had felt that there was a kind of languor in her, an impression
created by her way of speaking; but her singing voice dispelled the
illusion. There was in her prayer to the spirit of spring a strange new
note of passion that struck into his heart and thrilled it.
The song ended as abruptly as it began. The house was very still, save
that the voices of Mrs. Forrest and her brother were heard across the
hall. Leighton waited; it was not for him to profane the silence into
which such melody had gone.
Rodney Merriam looked at his sister inquiringly.
“You never told me--”
“That it was like that? It is wonderful. I never dared try to tell
you. I never understood it myself. Technically it is not so good, her
teachers say; but the girl’s self gets into it and carries her away. I
sometimes wonder whether it is quite right to encourage her. A girl’s
soul ought to be shielded--”
Mrs. Forrest paused in her helpless way.
“Her soul will take care of itself, I think,” said Rodney Merriam.
Zelda turned abruptly to Morris.
“Just once more, if you can stand it. Don’t say a word! But I rarely
sing anything unless I try a certain piece for my own satisfaction.
It’s for bigger voices than mine. _Dreams_--you know--a study for
_Tristan and Isolde_. I really hope you won’t like it at all, for I
want it all to myself, no matter how badly I do it. Go on talking,” she
called to the others across the hall; “this isn’t a stunt,--it’s just
my own little meditation.”
She bent her head with an air of preoccupation for a moment, her face
wholly serious, before she began:
“Say, oh say, what wondrous dreamings--”
She did not turn at once when the song was done, but sat for a moment
very still. She rose smiling.
“Well, there has been music--of a kind, _mon oncle_. Don’t you fiddle
or do something, Mr. Leighton? I oughtn’t to be made the only victim.
No! Nothing more from me! That is always my _finale_.”
Rodney Merriam had come into the room and he took her cheeks between
his hands and kissed her on the forehead.
“I wish I could say it, dear. It’s too much--too much--to think of, and
a little kid like you!”
The tears glistened in his eyes, but he smiled happily; it did not
often happen in Rodney Merriam’s life that a smile caught tears on his
dark face.
“Dear Uncle Rodney,” she said, and rested her hands on his shoulders.
“Let’s get out of this,” said the old gentleman. “The place is sacred
to your singing hereafter.” He led the way into the library and poked
the fire until it crackled and leaped into the chimney in the way that
he liked it.
“We must go home,” Mrs. Forrest announced presently.
“Nonsense,” growled her brother, who had reached the tranquillity of
his fireside pipe and hated to be disturbed.
“Yes; I promised father to be home at ten, and he will stay up for
me,” Zelda answered brightly, and rose to go. She went up stairs for
her wraps and was down at once. Leighton, who had gone to call Mrs.
Forrest’s carriage, met her in the hall. Merriam had waited for his
sister at the foot of the stairs and stood talking to her there.
Zelda was drawing on her gloves. Morris had never consciously watched
this process before, and he followed her movements with the wonder that
is always awakened in a young man by this sort of feminine legerdemain.
“I didn’t say anything about your singing--” began Morris.
“I noticed it!”
“But that was because I couldn’t. It was beautiful beyond any words of
mine to tell you.”
He was speaking earnestly; he was a very earnest fellow, and his gray
eyes were honest and friendly. It was always easy to laugh off the
compliments of people who did not mean them; but he clearly was not of
that kind.
“I’m glad you liked it,” she said simply. “What’s the name of that
animal?” She indicated a great head that hung on the wall above them.
“That’s a moose-head. Your uncle has a fondness for the moose, and goes
after one occasionally.”
“And gets it? I’m sure Uncle Rodney always gets what he goes for.
That’s my opinion of him.”
“Your faith isn’t misplaced. Whether it’s a moose or billiards, or a
bout at fencing, he’s always sure to score.”
“Where do you keep _your_ moose, Mr. Leighton?”
She asked the question with a disconcerting directness, and he answered
soberly.
“I haven’t any place to put my moose, so I haven’t caught him yet.”
“Oh--that!”
“And they’re expensive,--time--money.”
“I suppose so. Still, I think I should get a moose. Oh, Aunt Julia, we
really must--”
“Yes; I’m ready.”
“Father was very sorry he couldn’t come,” said Zelda, to her uncle.
“But he always goes to church Sunday evening. He asked me to explain.”
“It’s too bad he couldn’t come. I didn’t think of church. I thought
Sunday night church wasn’t done any more.”
“Father’s a creature of habit, I find. He always goes,--and to prayer
meeting, and to all those things.”
“Ah, very likely. I suppose he doesn’t insist on the prayer meetings
for you.”
“No, but I’ve volunteered! I’m to begin next Thursday night. I’m sure I
shall enjoy them.”
Merriam looked at her gravely. When she spoke in this way, softly,
with her lingering, caressing note at the end of sentences, he did
not know what to make of her. He was half disposed to believe she was
chaffing him; for she was too clever to be deceived by her father,--for
very long, at least. Rodney Merriam was expecting daily that she would
throw him over and cease trying to make the best of him and his ugly,
forbidding home. His wrath rose every time he reviewed the situation
and Zelda’s reply just now had sent a wave of hot blood to his face.
But she was a Merriam, he remembered. She put her arms about his neck
and kissed him good night.
Morris went with them to the carriage. Mrs. Forrest had brought Zelda
and was taking her home. Merriam waited for Morris in the library.
“Sit down, lad,” said the old gentleman; “don’t begin running away.”
“Very good. I want to leave you comfortable; but I must be going--”
“Going? No! I refuse to be left here alone yet.”
The Japanese boy brought whisky and water, and the old man scolded
Morris for taking Scotch, which he pronounced a barbarous liquor, unfit
for Americans.
“Well?” he said finally, slowly sipping his own whisky.
“It was a great evening,” said Morris.
“Um. How did you get on with my sister?”
“All right, I hope. She asked me to call. I liked her particularly.”
“That’s good. But for heaven’s sake don’t call on Sunday afternoons,
when she sleeps; and don’t ask her how she likes things. She likes most
things, but it bores her to be asked. She has a lot of sense,--do you
understand? And if she takes a fancy to you, she’ll do a lot for you.”
Leighton laughed. “Don’t embarrass me that way. I can’t work two people
at once in the same family,--and I’m working you.”
“Oh, you are, are you? Bah! That whisky has a green streak in it
somewhere.”
He set down his glass and put the tips of his fingers together, resting
his elbows on the arms of the chair. Then with sudden energy he roared:
“I don’t see why you don’t like her.”
“Mrs. Forrest? Of course I like her. I just said so.”
“I heard you. I’m not talking about Mrs. Forrest. Why weren’t you
decent to my niece? I brought her here so that you could get acquainted
with her. I was fool enough to think you had some sense--some social
instinct, some idea of good manners, but you acted like a perfect
damned clam.”
“I am very sorry,” said Morris, sitting forward in his chair. “I don’t
know what you expected. I did my poor level best.”
“And it was damned poor, sir, I’d have you know.”
Morris was trying hard not to laugh. The old gentleman glared at him
fiercely. There was a moment’s silence, and then Leighton said, very
quietly:
“She is charming,--more than that. There is something very unusual
about her. I knew that before she sang; and her singing sets her apart
from all the world.”
Merriam’s face changed slowly. He was listening carefully. He had used
his bluster to draw Morris out. He assumed now an air of indifference
as Leighton went on:
“I didn’t know that singing could be like that. I don’t believe I ever
heard anybody sing before! There was something strange about it--almost
uncanny--in what seemed to lie back of it.”
“You noticed it--you felt it?”
Merriam rose and walked back and forth before the fire, with his hands
thrust deep into his trousers pockets.
“A savage would feel it. It was as though--”
The old man paused suddenly and glared at Morris.
“Yes, it was like what?” he demanded impatiently.
“Like the cry of a soul in pain. No! you can’t tell what it was; but it
hurt. It was as though a child had suddenly gained the power to tell of
a deep, heart-breaking grief in a great way.”
“Yes,” Merriam said; and then he added very softly: “Yes, it was like
that.”
They sat together until late, talking of many things; but they did not
refer again to Zelda Dameron.