Go Look In Your Mirror, You Fool
As the Taine automobile left Aaron King and his friend, that afternoon,
Mrs. Taine spoke to the chauffeur; "You may stop a moment, at the next
house, Henry."
If she had fired a gun, James Rutlidge could not have turned with a more
startled suddenness.
"What in thunder do you want there?" he demanded shortly.
"I want to stop," she returned calmly.
"But I must get down town, at once," he protested. "I have already lost
the best part of the afternoon."
"Your business seems to have become important very suddenly," she
observed, sarcastically.
"I have something to do besides making calls with you," he retorted. "Go
on, Henry."
Mrs. Taine spoke sharply; "Really, Jim, you are going too far. Henry, turn
in at the house." The machine moved toward the curb and stopped. As she
stepped from the car, she added, "I will only be a minute, Jim."
Rutlidge growled an inarticulate curse.
"What deviltry do you suppose she is up to now," rasped Mr. Taine.
Which brought from his daughter the usual protest,--"O, papa, don't,"
As Mrs. Taine approached the house, Sibyl Andrés--busy among the flowers
that bordered the walk--heard the woman's step, and stood quietly waiting
her. Mrs. Taine's face was perfect in its expression of cordial interest,
with just enough--but not too much--of a conscious, well-bred superiority.
The girl's countenance was lighted by an expression of childlike surprise
and wonder. What had brought this well-known leader in the social world
from Fairlands Heights to the poor, little house in the orange grove, so
far down the hill?
"Good afternoon," said the caller. "You are Miss Andrés, are you not?"
"Yes," returned the girl, with a smile. "Won't you come in? I will call
Miss Willard."
"Oh, thank you, no. I have only a moment. My friends are waiting. I am
Mrs. Taine."
"Yes, I know. I have often seen you passing."
The other turned abruptly. "What beautiful flowers."
"Aren't they lovely," agreed Sibyl, with frank pleasure at the visitor's
appreciation. "Let me give you a bunch." Swiftly she gathered a generous
armful.
Mrs. Taine protested, but the girl presented her offering with such grace
and winsomeness that the other could not refuse. As she received the gift,
the perfect features of the woman of the world were colored by a blush
that even she could not control. "I understand, Miss Andrés," she said,
"that you are an accomplished violinist."
"I teach and play in Park Church," was the simple answer.
"I have never happened to hear you, myself,"--said Mrs. Taine
smoothly,--"but my friends who live next door--Mr. Lagrange and Mr.
King--have told me about you."
"Oh!" The girl's voice was vaguely troubled, while the other, watching,
saw the blush that colored her warmly tinted cheeks.
"It is good of you to play for them," continued the woman from Fairlands
Heights, casually. "You must enjoy the society of such famous men, very
much. There are a great many people, you know, who would envy you your
friendship with them."
The girl replied quickly, "O, but you are mistaken. I am not acquainted
with them, at all; that is--not with Mr. King--I have never spoken to
him--and I only met Mr. Lagrange, for a few minutes, by accident."
"Indeed! But I am forgetting the purpose of my call, and my friends will
become impatient. Do you ever play for private entertainments, Miss
Andrés?--for--say a dinner, or a reception, you know?"
"I would be very glad for such an engagement, Mrs. Taine. I must earn what
I can with my music, and there are not enough pupils to occupy all my
time. But perhaps you should hear me play, first. I will get my violin."
Mrs. Taine checked her, "Oh, no, indeed. It is quite unnecessary, my
dear. The opinion of your distinguished neighbors is quite enough. I shall
keep you in mind for some future occasion. I just wished to learn if you
would accept such an engagement. Good-by. Thanks--so much--for your
flowers."
She was upon the point of turning away, when a low cry from the nearby
porch startled them both. Turning, they saw the woman with the disfigured
face, standing in the doorway; an expression of mingled wonder, love, and
supplication upon her hideously marred features. As they looked, she
started toward them,--impulsively stretching out her arms, as though the
gesture was an involuntary expression of some deep emotion,--then checked
herself, suddenly as though in doubt.
Sibyl Andrés uttered an exclamation. "Why, Myra! what is it, dear?"
Mrs. Taine turned away with a gesture of horror, saying to the girl in a
low, hurried voice, "Dear me, how dreadful! I really must be going."
As she went down the flower-bordered path towards the street, the woman on
the porch, again, stretched out her arms appealingly. Then, as Sibyl
reached her side, the poor creature clasped the girl in a close embrace,
and burst into bitter tears.
* * * * *
Upon the return of the Taines and James Rutlidge to the house on Fairlands
Heights, Mrs. Taine retired immediately to her own luxuriously appointed
apartments.
At dinner, a maid brought to the household word that her mistress was
suffering from a severe headache and would not be down and begged that she
might not be disturbed during the evening.
Alone in her room, Mrs. Taine--her headache being wholly
conventional--gave herself unreservedly to the thoughts that she could
not, under the eyes of others, entertain without restraint. She was seated
at a window that looked down upon the carefully graded levels of the
envying Fairlanders and across the wide sweep of the valley below to the
mountains which, from that lofty point of vantage, could be seen from the
base of their lowest foothills to the crests of their highest peaks. But
the woman who lived on the Heights of Fairlands saw neither the homes of
their neighbors, the busy valley below, nor the mountains that lifted so
far above them all. Her thoughts were centered upon what, to her, was more
than these.
When night was gathering over the scene, her maid entered softly. Mrs.
Taine dismissed the woman with a word, telling her not to return until she
rang. Leaving the window, after drawing the shades close, she paced the
now lighted room, in troubled uneasiness of mind. Here and there, she
paused to touch or handle some familiar object--a photograph in a silver
frame, a book on the carved table, the trifles on her open desk, or an
ornamental vase on the mantle--then moved restlessly away to continue her
aimless exercise. When the silence was rudely broken by the sound of a
knock at her door, she stood still--a look of anger marring the
well-schooled beauty of her features.
The knock was repeated.
With an exclamation of impatient annoyance, she crossed the room, and
flung open the door.
Without leave or apology, her husband entered; and, as he did so, was
seized by a paroxysm of coughing that sent him reeling, gasping and
breathless, to the nearest chair.
Mrs. Taine stood watching her husband coldly, with a curious, speculative
expression on her face that she made no attempt to hide. When his torture
was abated--for the time--leaving him exhausted and trembling with
weakness, she said coldly, "Well, what do you want? What are you doing
here?"
The man lifted his pallid, haggard face and, with a yellow, claw-like hand
wiped the beads of clammy sweat from his forehead; while his deep-sunken
eyes leered at her with an insane light.
The woman was at no pains to conceal her disgust. In her voice there was
no hint of pity. "Didn't Marie tell you that I wished to be alone?"
"Of course," he jeered in his rasping whisper, "that's why I came." He
gave a hideous resemblance to a laugh, which ended in a cough--and, again,
he drew his skinny, shaking hand across his damp forehead "That's the time
that a man should visit his wife, isn't it? When she is alone. Or"--he
grinned mockingly--"when she wishes to be?"
She regarded him with open scorn and loathing. "You unclean beast! Will
you take yourself out of my room?"
He gazed at her, as a malevolent devil might gloat over a soul delivered
up for torture. "Not until I choose to go, my dear."
[Illustration: "Well, what do you want? What are you doing here?"]
Suddenly changing her manner, she smiled with deliberate, mocking humor.
While he watched, she moved leisurely to a deep, many-cushioned couch;
and, arranging the pillows, reclined among them in the careless
abandonment of voluptuous ease and physical content. Openly,
ostentatiously, she exhibited herself to his burning gaze in various
graceful poses--lifting her arms above her head to adjust a cushion more
to her liking; turning and stretching her beautiful body; moving her limbs
with sinuous enjoyment--as disregardful of his presence as though she were
alone. At last she spoke in cool, even, colorless tones; "Perhaps you will
tell me what you want?"
The wretched victim of his own unbridled sensuality shook with
inarticulate rage. Choking and coughing he writhed in his chair--his
emaciated limbs twisted grotesquely; his sallow face bathed in
perspiration his claw-like hands opening and closing; his bloodless lips
curled back from his yellow teeth, in a horrid grin of impotent fury. And
all the while she lay watching him with that pitiless, mocking, smile. It
was as though the malevolent devil and the tortured soul had suddenly
changed places.
When the man could speak, he reviled her, in his rasping whisper, with
curses that it seemed must blister his tongue. She received his effort
with jeering laughter and taunting words; moving her body, now and then,
among the cushions, with an air of purely physical enjoyment that, to the
other, was maddening.
"If this is all you came for,"--she said, easily,--"might have spared
yourself the effort--don't you think?"
Controlling himself, in a measure, he returned, "I came to tell you that
your intimacy with that damned painter must stop."
Her eyes narrowed slightly. One hand, hidden in the cushions, clenched
until her rings hurt. "Just what do you mean by my intimacy?" she asked
evenly.
"You know what I mean," he replied coarsely. "I mean what intimacy with a
man always means to a woman like you."
"The only meaning that a creature of your foul mind can understand," she
retorted smoothly. "If it were worth while to tell you the truth, I would
say that my conduct when alone with Mr. King has been as proper as--as
when I am alone with you."
The taunt maddened him. Interrupted by spells of coughing--choking,
gasping, fighting for breath, his eyes blazing with hatred and lust,
mingling his words with oaths and curses--he raged at her. "And do you
think--that, because I am so nearly dead,--I do not resent what--I saw,
to-day? Do you think--I am so far gone that I cannot--understand--your
interest in this man,--after--watching you, together, all--the afternoon?
Has there been any one--in his studio, except you two, when--he was
painting you in that dress--which you--designed for his benefit? Oh, no,
indeed,--you and your--genius could not be interrupted,--for the sake--of
his art. His art! Great God!--was there ever such a damnable farce--since
hell was invented? Art!--you--_you_--_you_!--" crazed with jealous fury,
he pointed at her with his yellow, shaking, skeleton fingers; and
struggled to raise his voice above that rasping whisper until the cords
of his scrawny neck stood out and his face was distorted with the strain
of his effort--"_You!_ painted as a--modest Quaker Maid,--with all the
charm of innocence,--virtue, and religious piety in your face. _You!_ And
that picture will be exhibited--and written about--as a work of _art!_
You'll pull all the strings,--and use all your influence,--and the
thing--will be received as a--masterpiece."
"And," she added calmly, "you will write a check--and lie, as you did this
afternoon."
Without heeding her remark, he went on,--"You know the picture is
worthless. He knows it,--Conrad Lagrange knows it,--Jim Rutlidge knows
it,--the whole damned clique and gang of you know it, He's like all his
kind,--a pretender,--a poser,--playing into the hands--of such women as
you; to win social position--and wealth. And we and our kind--we pretend
to believe--in such damned parasites,--and exalt them and what we--call
their art,--and keep them in luxury, and buy their pictures;--because they
prostitute--their talents to gratify our vanity. We know it's all a damned
sham--and a pretense that if they were real artists,--with an honest
workman's respect for their work,--they wouldn't--recognize us."
"Don't forget to send him a check,"--she murmured--"you can't afford to
neglect it, you know--think how people would talk."
"Don't worry," he replied. "There'll be no talk. I'll send the genius his
check--for making love--to my wife in the sacred name of art,--and I'll
lie--about his picture with--the rest of you. But there will be--no more
of your intimacy with him. You're my wife,--in spite of hell,--and from
now on--I'll see--that you are true--to me. Your sickening pose--of
modesty in dress shall be something--more than a pose. For the little time
I have left,--I'll have--you to--myself or I'll kill you."
His reference to her refusal to uncover her shoulders in public broke the
woman's calm and aroused her to a cold fury. Springing to her feet, she
stood over him as he sat huddled in his chair, exhausted by his effort.
"What is your silly, idle threat beside the fact," she said with stinging
scorn. "To have killed me, instead of making me your wife, would have been
a kindness greater than you are capable of. You know how unspeakably vile
you were when you bought me. You know how every hour of my life with you
has been a torment to me. You should be grateful that I have helped you to
live your lie--that I have played the game of respectability with
you--that I am willing to play it a little while longer, until you lay
down your hand for good, and release us both.
"Suppose I _were_ what you think me? What right have _you_ to object to my
pleasures? Have you--in all your life of idle, vicious, luxury--have you
ever feared to do evil if it appealed to your bestial nature? You know you
have not. You have feared only the appearance of evil. To be as evil as
you like so long as you can avoid the appearance of evil; that's the game
you have taught me to play. That's the game we have played together.
That's the game we and our kind insist the artists and writers shall help
us play. That's the only game I know, and, by the rule of our game, so
long as the world sees nothing, I shall do what pleases me.
"You have had your day with me. You have had what you paid for. What right
have you to deny me, now, an hour's forgetfulness? When I think of what I
might have been, but for you, I wonder that I have cared to live, and I
would not--except for the poor sport of torturing you.
"You scoff at Mr. King's portrait of me because he has not painted me as I
am! What would you have said if he _had_ painted me as I am? What would
you say if Conrad Lagrange should write the truth about us and our kind,
for his millions of readers? You sneer at me because I cannot uncover my
shoulders in the conventional dress of my class, and so make a virtue of a
necessity and deceive the world by a pretense of modesty. Go look in your
mirror, you fool! Your right to sneer at me for my poor little pretense is
denied you by every line of your repulsive countenance Now get out. I'm
going to retire."
And she rang for her maid.