It was the longest day Angelica had ever spent. She didn’t go out of the
room; even lunch was brought to them there. She sat, answering whenever
she was spoken to, but for the most part silent, looking out of the
window at the country landscape, which held nothing to interest her
gamine eye, and watching the clock. She couldn’t believe that something
wouldn’t happen.
She tried, in her very crude way, to study Polly, but she had no
success. She watched her lying for long stretches of time with her eyes
closed, whether asleep or awake it was impossible to divine. Her face in
repose was profoundly mournful, and, unrelieved by the fine black eyes,
looked older and more worn. Her mouth had a kindly line, but it was the
disillusioned, cynical kindness of one who expects no gratitude.
"I suppose she’s Mr. Eddie’s wife," reflected Angelica. "Well, she’s
certainly a lot older than he is--ten years, I’d say. I wonder why they
call her Mrs. Geraldine, when her name’s Polly!"
This detail puzzled her greatly. She fancied it must be some custom of
rich people. Perhaps Polly was a nickname for Geraldine among them. It
didn’t occur to her that it was a surname; she took it for granted that
Polly was young Mrs. Russell.
Little by little, as always, her thoughts drifted off to her own future.
"I wonder how it’ll be when I’m married? Anyway, I bet you’d never catch
me moping around like she does! If I was rich like her, and got sick,
I’d have lots of flowers, and friends coming in all the time--everything
nice and pretty and bright; and a trained nurse, too, I guess."
It must be admitted that Angelica had little sympathy. She had a certain
amount of facile generosity. She had moods when she was willing to do a
great deal for any one she liked; but it was impossible for her to put
herself in the place of another, to compassionate any pain which she had
not actually felt herself. Losing a baby seemed to her a grief of small
significance. She had seen very little of babies, and wasn’t interested
in them. To her, at nineteen, the only comprehensible sorrow was that of
losing a lover.
She regarded Polly with irritation. She was rich, not too old, not too
bad-looking; why didn’t she try to throw off this lethargy of grief and
take some advantage of her opportunities? The life of a rich person, as
seen by Angelica, was a very fantasy of gaiety. It might be gaiety
covering a broken heart, if you wished, but always gaiety. The proper
course for such as Polly would be to plunge into a whirlpool of
excitement, and just reveal, from time to time, by a shadow stealing
over her face, that her heart was broken. No, decidedly she could not
comprehend this woman lying there with closed eyes, brooding over her
immeasurable loss.
Polly, however, through her greater sophistication and experience, and
through her native shrewdness, found Angelica no puzzle. Now and then
she asked her a well-calculated question, and she soon learned that
Angelica had apparently spent all her nineteen years in learning, quite
unconsciously, whatever would be useful in a lady’s service. She had
spent innumerable Saturday afternoons sauntering through the big shops
with girl friends, until her mind was richly stored with information.
She knew just which place was best for any given article. She had
compared styles and prices, and, with the amazing discernment of her
sort, she had even distinguished among the various grades of customers.
She knew who the really best people were, where they went for things,
what they wanted, and what they paid. She knew things one wouldn’t have
imagined her knowing--smart, out-of-the-way little shops for perfumes,
for sweets, for lingerie.
Of equal or perhaps superior value was her deftness. She could manicure,
she could dress hair; she had picked up, God knows how or where, an
almost professional knowledge of make-up. She could sew, she could
embroider, she could quite marvelously trim hats. She told all this to
Polly, because she wanted to convince her of her usefulness. And she
did.
Long before the afternoon was over, Polly had made up her mind that this
girl would be valuable and likewise agreeable. She liked her, liked her
lovely face and her husky, oddly touching voice, liked the character
which she so ingenuously displayed. Here was a girl passionately anxious
to please, yet without servility, who was at once ignorant and
intelligent; one whom she could command, yet on whom she could lean.
However, she didn’t show any such approval. Who would, indeed, toward a
person being employed?