I
Sharp at ten o’clock the next morning Angelica knocked at Polly’s door.
Her eyes were dancing, she was filled with an exhilarating sense of
mischief, for she had been having breakfast with the doctor, and a
regular rowdy breakfast it had been--the old delightful badinage of the
street and the factory.
When she had come down the dining-room was deserted, and she had
lingered about waiting for any one who might come. Presently, in had
come the dapper little doctor. His face had lighted up marvelously when
he saw her there alone; and he had told her archly that she was welcome
as the flowers in the spring.
"That’s all right!" Angelica had retorted, belligerently. "Never you
mind about me!"
And so the conversation had proceeded, flowery compliments on his side
and a continuous show of resentment on hers--all as it should be.
"You’re a regular old devil!" she had told him. "You ought to be ashamed
of yourself!"
"You’re a devil yourself!" he had answered. "A young devil, and a
dangerous one, too. You could teach me a trick or two, I dare say!"
Then she had thrown a piece of bread at him, and he had sprung up and
smothered her in a napkin, almost upsetting her chair backward, and she
had given his necktie a terrific pull. She did so like this sort of
thing!
She had a familiar and delightful feeling now toward Polly, such as she
had so often felt toward teachers at school and foremen in
factories--that she had something up her sleeve, that she was slyly
outraging authority.
"Come in!" said Polly.
She was still in bed, her breakfast, untouched, on a tray beside her.
She looked stale, broken, weary in body and in spirit, miserably
inferior to the sparkling girl who stood waiting for her orders.
"Good morning! Sit down," she said, politely enough.
She could say nothing further. Weary from a sleepless night, sick with
grief and longing, lonely as a traveler stranded on a desolate shore, it
seemed to her impossible to communicate with any one about her. She
could think of no words that they would comprehend, no answer from them
that would give her any possible solace.
She seemed to Angelica a sallow, listless woman of forty, who persisted
very selfishly in staring out of the window and preserving a tedious
silence. She had no faintest idea of that anguish of a fine and strong
soul.
"Would you mind----” said Polly, suddenly. "There’s a little leather
book in my desk, and a fountain pen. I’d like to write a little."
Angelica jumped up and brought them to her with alacrity. She felt very
obliging this morning.
"Anything else I can do?" she asked cheerfully.
"No, thanks. It’s my diary. It’s just seven weeks ago that my child
died."
She spoke quietly, but her face had assumed an odd, drawn look.
"Oh, Lord!" thought Angelica. "Now I suppose there’ll be a scene. And me
feeling so happy!"
But there was no ‘scene,’ not even a tear. Polly had long ago got past
that consolation. She put down her little book.
"Will you go and ask Mrs. Russell, please, when she wants to use the
car? I think I’ll go out this afternoon."
Angelica sped off, glad to be released from this terrible ennui, and
knocked upon Mrs. Russell’s door. She found her engaged in a surprising
occupation. She was carefully rouging her cheeks--that tough,
weather-beaten, brown skin!
Her hair was carefully dressed, and she wore a handsome embroidered
white linen frock. She was tall and straight, with good shoulders and a
fine, free play of limb. From the back she wasn’t bad, she looked like a
muscular and athletic young woman until she turned and one saw her face.
With the rouge and the blackened eyebrows, it had an indescribably
repulsive look of dissipation; it was as if a man had rouged and
bedecked himself.
"Well!" she said. "How do I look?"
"All right," said Angelica dubiously.
"Tell me frankly if there’s the least thing. I must be very nice to-day.
We’re giving a lunch to a young English woman, a tennis champion, and
I’m on the reception committee. Do I _really_ look nice?"
"Yes," said Angelica, in a still more doubtful tone.
"You don’t think so!" cried Mrs. Russell. "I can see that! But, my dear,
I don’t suppose a woman of my age ever can look very nice."
However, the glance she gave to her reflection in the mirror was quite a
complacent one. She began covering her face with pink powder, while she
talked; and grimacing as she carefully avoided the blackened eyebrows.
"How did you get on with Mrs. Geraldine?" she asked.
"All right; she’s not so bad," said Angelica. "Only sort of dopey."
"‘Dopey’? What’s that?"
Angelica flushed.
"Oh, like people that take dope--morphine and opium and all that."
"But my _dear_ girl, Polly doesn’t----”
"I _know_. I only said she acted like people that do. It’s just a word
people use about any one that’s quiet and----”
"Mrs. Geraldine’s very reserved--quite different from me. I’m obliged to
say everything that comes into my head. But I dare say her life has made
her like that."
"Why has it? What kind of life has she had?" asked Angelica, with naked
curiosity.
"My dear, you see, she was married before to a perfectly dreadful sort
of man. He drank, and I don’t know what else--absolutely no good at all.
You see, she used to be a concert singer when she was young. It’s very
interesting to hear her tell about her days in Germany, when she studied
there. And then she came back to New York and got an engagement to sing
in one of the first-class restaurants. She really comes from a _nice_
family--Ohio people--not in society at all, but _nice_. They weren’t at
all well off, so I suppose they were glad to have her earning her own
living. Anyway, they were away off in Ohio, so they couldn’t have
stopped her very well, could they?"
"No," said Angelica, astounded at the very idea of the melancholy Mrs.
Geraldine singing in a restaurant.
"She must have been quite a pretty girl," Mrs. Russell went on. "I’ve
seen pictures of her. She says she had the most distressing experiences
with men, following her, and so on. She says she was really just about
to give up the restaurant singing when one night this tremendously
handsome man was waiting for her when she came out. She says he was so
different from the usual sort--so gentlemanly, and so on; and _he’d_
been so impressed with _her_. My dear, have I too much powder on?"
"Yes, on your forehead. Who was this feller--the handsome one?"
Mrs. Russell stared at her in perplexity. Then she suddenly recollected
the subject of their talk.
"Oh, yes, of course! He told her afterward that he was so much impressed
with her refinement and distinction. I suppose she did look well,
standing up on the platform in a white dress. And her voice is charming.
He walked home with her that night and they were married three weeks
later. Of course, as she says, she didn’t really know him at all; and he
turned out to be perfectly dreadful. She went through the greatest
misery with him. He was killed in an accident; he was in a taxi with
some chorus-girl. I don’t really know much about him; she doesn’t like
to talk about him, but I’ve seen a picture of him. He _was_ handsome,
but coarse, I think. He was quite successful in his business, whatever
it was, but he spent all he made, and only left her a tiny little
income. She made it do, though, she lived so quietly."
Angelica was delighted to get all this information. She leaned against
the doorway in one of her careless, beautiful gamine attitudes, her dark
eyes on Mrs. Russell’s face with an attention that pleased that veteran
gossip.
"She’s a charming woman. Still, I was amazed at Vincent, of all people!
She’s so much older than he--years, and she shows it. Of course, when
they were first married three years ago, she was quite different--much
nicer-looking. Poor soul! She really had a wretched time with Vincent.
He’s frightfully trying. I really think she’s been wonderfully patient
with him. I’ll never forget the day he came into my room and told me he
was married. I couldn’t believe it; he’s so fickle and erratic. I never
expected him to settle down. I don’t suppose he really has. And when I
saw her--simply a plainly dressed woman of thirty-five! Of course, she
has a certain sort of charm about her; she’s _restful_. I like being
with her--but not all the time. I can’t understand why she clings to me
so. She’s so self-reliant."
How indeed was Mrs. Russell to understand all this? She with her
thistledown heart, her life of infantile amusement-seeking, to
understand the solitude of this woman from a small town, accustomed to
the friendly faces of neighbors, of people who had known her all her
life and were interested in all that concerned her; this woman who had
twice given her love with simplicity and generosity, to have it twice
despised, a wife without a husband, a mother bereft of her child? Polly
hadn’t a soul near her who took the least interest in her, _no one to
talk to_. That was what made her so silent. She didn’t, she couldn’t
utter flippancies; she longed for one of her own good, earnest, kindly
small-town women, who would wish to listen and know how to console.
And in default of this, then she must have Mrs. Russell, who could at
least talk about her lost child. She could say to her, "Do you remember
this day and that day, this that he said, and how he looked?"
She had loved her child with a passion tiresome to all those about her.
She had been absorbed in him; she had seen in this little boy not alone
her only child, but her only friend, a fellow countryman in a hostile
land. And now he was gone.
"She’s charming," Mrs. Russell repeated; "but I should never have picked
her out for Vincent. She’s not the sort of woman to hold him. He’s so
odd, you know. He always used to say that he’d never marry, and that he
was looking for the perfect woman, whatever he fancied a perfect woman
was. I don’t know what it was he saw in Polly. She’s not beautiful, or
fascinating, as far as I can see. Of course, there’s her voice. It’s
lovely, but still---- He met her at some sort of tea, he told me, and he
said that he was enchanted by the sight of her, sitting there in her
plain dark blue suit, with her hands folded, so quiet and clever, you
know, in comparison with all the other women. I must admit I was
disappointed."
She paused for a few minutes, to rub her big square nails with pink
paste. When she began to talk again, she had unaccountably changed her
point of view. Instead of her bland contempt for Polly, she had,
somehow, within her queer soul developed a great indignation against her
son.
"He has behaved abominably," she said, with a frown. "I can’t understand
him. For days at a time he doesn’t speak to her; doesn’t even see her.
And all for nothing! He took her up in a caprice, and he’s dropped her
in another caprice. Do you know, my dear, all the time their child was
so ill, he wouldn’t see it? He said he could do nothing to help it, and
he couldn’t bear to look at suffering. And at last, when it died, the
thing became so scandalous that Eddie had to go and actually force him
to come into its room. So he came sauntering in, and what do you think
he said? ‘Thank God I really hadn’t had time to grow attached to it
yet.’"
"That was pretty bad," said Angelica. But she was more curious than
shocked; she was eager to hear more about this atrocious Vincent.
"And now," went on Mrs. Russell, "whenever the poor soul begins to
practise, he comes stamping out of his room and shouts down the stairs,
‘Stop! Stop! For God’s sake, stop!’"
"He must be pretty selfish!"
"Selfish! That’s not the word. He squeezes every one dry. He bothered me
a while ago until I sold one of my rings to get money for him; and as
soon as I’d handed him the money he walked out of the room without even
saying, ‘Thank you.’ And when I tried to speak to him, he didn’t even
stop; just called back to me, ‘I’m not in the mood for your conversation
to-day. I couldn’t endure it.’ He’s a devil!"
"A devil!" thought Angelica. "I wish I could get at him! I bet I could
handle him! I’d like to see him, anyway. I’d devil him! And maybe if he
had a wife with more fight in her, more spirit, he’d be different. He’d
be different to _me_!" her secret heart cried. "No man could ever
neglect or hurt _me_. No man could ever really win me. I shall be loved,
adored, obeyed, but I shall not give much. I am Angelica, the beautiful,
the proud, the free!"
She was very ready to hear more, but that was not to be. The aggrieved
voice of Courtland, the chauffeur, was heard in the hall.
"Now, then, do you want to be late?" he called. That reminded Angelica
of her errand.
"Oh! Mrs. Geraldine said to ask you when did you want to use the car.
She thought she’d go out."
Mrs. Russell stared at her in distress.
"Oh, pshaw! I never imagined she’d want it. Tell her, please, I’ll send
Courtland back with it in an hour."
"I don’t think!" said Courtland. "She better not hold her breath
waiting."
Even Angelica was aware that this was not the proper way for a chauffeur
to address his lady. She was surprised that he wasn’t rebuked. She
looked at him with an indignant glance, which he returned with one of
the greatest scorn.
"Wait in the car, Courtland," was all that Mrs. Russell said. "I’ll be
down directly."
"He’s a nice boy," she told Angelica, after he had gone. "I think a
great deal of him. I’m sorry for him. He’s very bright and intelligent,
but he hasn’t had any opportunities."
"He’s mighty fresh," said Angelica.
"You mean disrespectful? I know it; but it seems to me that in this
country, you know--a republic--we should expect that sort of thing.
We’re all more or less equals, I suppose, aren’t we?"
Angelica said yes; but she didn’t think so, and she knew that Mrs.
Russell didn’t think so. A game of exploitation, simply but in a country
where every one had the pleasing possibility of becoming one of the
exploiters.
Angelica went back to Polly with the message.
"She says she’ll send back the car in an hour."
"Then I think I’ll get up and dress," said Polly. "We’ll run into the
city for lunch. Do you know, I feel better! I think you’re doing me
good."
She really believed so; it seemed to her that the fierce and careless
vitality of this girl charged all the atmosphere, penetrated and
invigorated even her jaded and sorrowful heart. It was not the sort of
vitality that fatigues and irritates, like the ceaseless activities of a
little child. Angelica was quiet, for the most part; she didn’t speak
much, she sat quietly in her chair, with the sort of cool steadiness
that one notices in cats. When you spoke to her, it required no effort
for her to attend, to concentrate her thought on you; at once her dark
face was alert, her ready mind in action.
With Polly--although she wasn’t aware of it--her manner was exactly what
was needed. She was generally quite indifferent, thinking her own
thoughts, absorbed in her own affairs; but she was instantly willing to
perform any service, or to talk, or to listen.
"Mr. Eddie spoke to me about you," Polly went on. "I have a very high
opinion of his judgment, and he seems to think you’re just the person
for me."
Angelica was delighted.
"Well," she said, in her pitifully ungracious way, "it’s kind o’ hard,
not knowing your ways or anything; but I guess I’ll be useful."
Polly smiled.
"Help me to get ready, won’t you? I haven’t been out for such a long
time; and the doctor seems to think I should."
"This doctor, is it? _Her_ husband?"
"Oh, no! He’s not exactly a doctor. He invented a patent medicine,
called Dr. Russell’s Old-Time Rejuvenator. That’s why they call him
doctor."
"I see! But those things are mostly fakes, aren’t they?"
Polly didn’t answer.
Angelica enjoyed helping her to dress. She liked to open bureau drawers
and wardrobes and see the well-ordered and dainty things, all faintly
fragrant. She liked fetching the silk stockings, the fine little
handkerchiefs, the gloves, all the accessories of a woman of excellent
taste and a decent income. Very plain, Polly’s things were, but with a
most refined and fastidious plainness. Angelica, seeing and handling
them, gained a quite new idea of a lady’s requirements.