In and out of my early memories like a dancing ray of sunlight flits the
spirit of Nancy. I was always fond of her, but in extreme youth I
accepted her incense with masculine complacency and took her allegiance
for granted, never seeking to fathom the nature of the spell I exercised
over her. Naturally other children teased me about her; but what was
worse, with that charming lack of self-consciousness and consideration
for what in after life are called the finer feelings, they teased her
about me before me, my presence deterring them not at all. I can see them
hopping around her in the Peters yard crying out:--"Nancy's in love with
Hugh! Nancy's in love with Hugh!"
A sufficiently thrilling pastime, this, for Nancy could take care of
herself. I was a bungler beside her when it came to retaliation, and not
the least of her attractions for me was her capacity for anger: fury
would be a better term. She would fly at them--even as she flew at the
head-hunters when the Petrel was menaced; and she could run like a deer.
Woe to the unfortunate victim she overtook! Masculine strength, exercised
apologetically, availed but little, and I have seen Russell Peters and
Gene Hollister retire from such encounters humiliated and weeping. She
never caught Ralph; his methods of torture were more intelligent and
subtle than Gene's and Russell's, but she was his equal when it came to a
question of tongues.
"I know what's the matter with you, Ralph Hambleton," she would say.
"You're jealous." An accusation that invariably put him on the defensive.
"You think all the girls are in love with you, don't you?"
These scenes I found somewhat embarrassing. Not so Nancy. After
discomfiting her tormenters, or wounding and scattering them, she would
return to my side.... In spite of her frankly expressed preference for me
she had an elusiveness that made a continual appeal to my imagination.
She was never obvious or commonplace, and long before I began to
experience the discomforts and sufferings of youthful love I was
fascinated by a nature eloquent with contradictions and inconsistencies.
She was a tomboy, yet her own sex was enhanced rather than overwhelmed by
contact with the other: and no matter how many trees she climbed she
never seemed to lose her daintiness. It was innate.
She could, at times, be surprisingly demure. These impressions of her
daintiness and demureness are particularly vivid in a picture my memory
has retained of our walking together, unattended, to Susan Blackwood's
birthday party. She must have been about twelve years old. It was the
first time I had escorted her or any other girl to a party; Mrs. Willett
had smiled over the proceeding, but Nancy and I took it most seriously,
as symbolic of things to come. I can see Powell Street, where Nancy
lived, at four o'clock on a mild and cloudy December afternoon, the
decorous, retiring houses, Nancy on one side of the pavement by the iron
fences and I on the other by the tree boxes. I can't remember her dress,
only the exquisite sense of her slimness and daintiness comes back to me,
of her dark hair in a long braid tied with a red ribbon, of her slender
legs clad in black stockings of shining silk. We felt the occasion to be
somehow too significant, too eloquent for words....
In silence we climbed the flight of stone steps that led up to the
Blackwood mansion, when suddenly the door was opened, letting out sounds
of music and revelry. Mr. Blackwood's coloured butler, Ned, beamed at us
hospitably, inviting us to enter the brightness within. The shades were
drawn, the carpets were covered with festal canvas, the folding doors
between the square rooms were flung back, the prisms of the big
chandeliers flung their light over animated groups of matrons and
children. Mrs. Watling, the mother of the Watling twins--too young to be
present was directing with vivacity the game of "King William was King
James's son," and Mrs. McAlery was playing the piano.
"Now choose you East, now choose you West,
Now choose the one you love the best!"
Tom Peters, in a velvet suit and consequently very miserable, refused to
embrace Ethel Hollister; while the scornful Julia lurked in a corner:
nothing would induce her to enter such a foolish game. I experienced a
novel discomfiture when Ralph kissed Nancy.... Afterwards came the feast,
from which Ham Durrett, in a pink paper cap with streamers, was at length
forcibly removed by his mother. Thus early did he betray his love for the
flesh pots....
It was not until I was sixteen that a player came and touched the keys of
my soul, and it awoke, bewildered, at these first tender notes. The music
quickened, tripping in ecstasy, to change by subtle phrases into themes
of exquisite suffering hitherto unexperienced. I knew that I loved Nancy.
With the advent of longer dresses that reached to her shoe tops a change
had come over her. The tomboy, the willing camp-follower who loved me and
was unashamed, were gone forever, and a mysterious, transfigured being,
neither girl nor woman, had magically been evolved. Could it be possible
that she loved me still? My complacency had vanished; suddenly I had
become the aggressor, if only I had known how to "aggress"; but in her
presence I was seized by an accursed shyness that paralyzed my tongue,
and the things I had planned to say were left unuttered. It was
something--though I did not realize it--to be able to feel like that.
The time came when I could no longer keep this thing to myself. The need
of an outlet, of a confidant, became imperative, and I sought out Tom
Peters. It was in February; I remember because I had ventured--with
incredible daring--to send Nancy an elaborate, rosy Valentine; written on
the back of it in a handwriting all too thinly disguised was the
following verse, the triumphant result of much hard thinking in school
hours:--
Should you of this the sender guess
Without another sign,
Would you repent, and rest content
To be his Valentine
I grew hot and cold by turns when I thought of its possible effects on my
chances.
One of those useless, slushy afternoons, I took Tom for a walk that led
us, as dusk came on, past Nancy's house. Only by painful degrees did I
succeed in overcoming my bashfulness; but Tom, when at last I had blurted
out the secret, was most sympathetic, although the ailment from which I
suffered was as yet outside of the realm of his experience. I have used
the word "ailment" advisedly, since he evidently put my trouble in the
same category with diphtheria or scarlet fever, remarking that it was
"darned hard luck." In vain I sought to explain that I did not regard it
as such in the least; there was suffering, I admitted, but a degree of
bliss none could comprehend who had not felt it. He refused to be
envious, or at least to betray envy; yet he was curious, asking many
questions, and I had reason to think before we parted that his admiration
for me was increased. Was it possible that he, too, didn't love Nancy?
No, it was funny, but he didn't. He failed to see much in girls: his tone
remained commiserating, yet he began to take an interest in the progress
of my suit.
For a time I had no progress to report. Out of consideration for those
members of our weekly dancing class whose parents were Episcopalians the
meetings were discontinued during Lent, and to call would have demanded a
courage not in me; I should have become an object of ridicule among my
friends and I would have died rather than face Nancy's mother and the
members of her household. I set about making ingenious plans with a view
to encounters that might appear casual. Nancy's school was dismissed at
two, so was mine. By walking fast I could reach Salisbury Street, near
St. Mary's Seminary for Young Ladies, in time to catch her, but even then
for many days I was doomed to disappointment. She was either in company
with other girls, or else she had taken another route; this I surmised
led past Sophy McAlery's house, and I enlisted Tom as a confederate. He
was to make straight for the McAlery's on Elm while I followed Powell,
two short blocks away, and if Nancy went to Sophy's and left there alone
he was to announce the fact by a preconcerted signal. Through long and
persistent practice he had acquired a whistle shrill enough to wake the
dead, accomplished by placing a finger of each hand between his teeth;--a
gift that was the envy of his acquaintances, and the subject of much
discussion as to whether his teeth were peculiar. Tom insisted that they
were; it was an added distinction.
On this occasion he came up behind Nancy as she was leaving Sophy's gate
and immediately sounded the alarm. She leaped in the air, dropped her
school-books and whirled on him.
"Tom Peters! How dare you frighten me so!" she cried.
Tom regarded her in sudden dismay.
"I--I didn't mean to," he said. "I didn't think you were so near."
"But you must have seen me."
"I wasn't paying much attention," he equivocated,--a remark not
calculated to appease her anger.
"Why were you doing it?"
"I was just practising," said Tom.
"Practising!" exclaimed Nancy, scornfully. "I shouldn't think you needed
to practise that any more."
"Oh, I've done it louder," he declared, "Listen!"
She seized his hands, snatching them away from his lips. At this critical
moment I appeared around the corner considerably out of breath, my heart
beating like a watchman's rattle. I tried to feign nonchalance.
"Hello, Tom," I said. "Hello, Nancy. What's the matter?"
"It's Tom--he frightened me out of my senses." Dropping his wrists, she
gave me a most disconcerting look; there was in it the suspicion of a
smile. "What are you doing here, Hugh?"
"I heard Tom," I explained.
"I should think you might have. Where were you?"
"Over in another street," I answered, with deliberate vagueness. Nancy
had suddenly become demure. I did not dare look at her, but I had a most
uncomfortable notion that she suspected the plot. Meanwhile we had begun
to walk along, all three of us, Tom, obviously ill at ease and
discomfited, lagging a little behind. Just before we reached the corner I
managed to kick him. His departure was by no means graceful.
"I've got to go;" he announced abruptly, and turned down the side street.
We watched his sturdy figure as it receded.
"Well, of all queer boys!" said Nancy, and we walked on again.
"He's my best friend," I replied warmly.
"He doesn't seem to care much for your company," said Nancy.
"Oh, they have dinner at half past two," I explained.
"Aren't you afraid of missing yours, Hugh?" she asked wickedly.
"I've got time. I'd--I'd rather be with you." After making which
audacious remark I was seized by a spasm of apprehension. But nothing
happened. Nancy remained demure. She didn't remind me that I had
reflected upon Tom.
"That's nice of you, Hugh."
"Oh, I'm not saying it because it's nice," I faltered. "I'd rather be
with you than--with anybody."
This was indeed the acme of daring. I couldn't believe I had actually
said it. But again I received no rebuke; instead came a remark that set
me palpitating, that I treasured for many weeks to come.
"I got a very nice valentine," she informed me.
"What was it like?" I asked thickly.
"Oh, beautiful! All pink lace and--and Cupids, and the picture of a young
man and a young woman in a garden."
"Was that all?"
"Oh, no, there was a verse, in the oddest handwriting. I wonder who sent
it?"
"Perhaps Ralph," I hazarded ecstatically.
"Ralph couldn't write poetry," she replied disdainfully. "Besides, it was
very good poetry."
I suggested other possible authors and admirers. She rejected them all.
We reached her gate, and I lingered. As she looked down at me from the
stone steps her eyes shone with a soft light that filled me with
radiance, and into her voice had come a questioning, shy note that
thrilled the more because it revealed a new Nancy of whom I had not
dreamed.
"Perhaps I'll meet you again--coming from school," I said.
"Perhaps," she answered. "You'll be late to dinner, Hugh, if you don't
go...."
I was late, and unable to eat much dinner, somewhat to my mother's alarm.
Love had taken away my appetite.... After dinner, when I was wandering
aimlessly about the yard, Tom appeared on the other side of the fence.
"Don't ever ask me to do that again," he said gloomily.
I did meet Nancy again coming from school, not every day, but nearly
every day. At first we pretended that there was no arrangement in this,
and we both feigned surprise when we encountered one another. It was
Nancy who possessed the courage that I lacked. One afternoon she
said:--"I think I'd better walk with the girls to-morrow, Hugh."
I protested, but she was firm. And after that it was an understood thing
that on certain days I should go directly home, feeling like an exile.
Sophy McAlery had begun to complain: and I gathered that Sophy was
Nancy's confidante. The other girls had begun to gossip. It was Nancy who
conceived the brilliant idea--the more delightful because she said
nothing about it to me--of making use of Sophy. She would leave school
with Sophy, and I waited on the corner near the McAlery house. Poor
Sophy! She was always of those who piped while others danced. In those
days she had two straw-coloured pigtails, and her plain, faithful face is
before me as I write. She never betrayed to me the excitement that filled
her at being the accomplice of our romance.
Gossip raged, of course. Far from being disturbed, we used it, so to
speak, as a handle for our love-making, which was carried on in an
inferential rather than a direct fashion. Were they saying that we were
lovers? Delightful! We laughed at one another in the sunshine.... At last
we achieved the great adventure of a clandestine meeting and went for a
walk in the afternoon, avoiding the houses of our friends. I've forgotten
which of us had the boldness to propose it. The crocuses and tulips had
broken the black mould, the flower beds in the front yards were beginning
to blaze with scarlet and yellow, the lawns had turned a living green.
What did we talk about? The substance has vanished, only the flavour
remains.
One awoke of a morning to the twittering of birds, to walk to school
amidst delicate, lace-like shadows of great trees acloud with old gold:
the buds lay curled like tiny feathers on the pavements. Suddenly the
shade was dense, the sunlight white and glaring, the odour of lilacs
heavy in the air, spring in all its fulness had come,--spring and Nancy.
Just so subtly, yet with the same seeming suddenness had budded and come
to leaf and flower a perfect understanding, which nevertheless remained
undefined. This, I had no doubt, was my fault, and due to the
incomprehensible shyness her presence continued to inspire. Although we
did not altogether abandon our secret trysts, we began to meet in more
natural ways; there were garden parties and picnics where we strayed
together through the woods and fields, pausing to tear off, one by one,
the petals of a daisy, "She loves me, she loves me not." I never ventured
to kiss her; I always thought afterwards I might have done so, she had
seemed so willing, her eyes had shone so expectantly as I sat beside her
on the grass; nor can I tell why I desired to kiss her save that this was
the traditional thing to do to the lady one loved. To be sure, the very
touch of her hand was galvanic. Paradoxically, I saw the human side of
her, the yielding gentleness that always amazed me, yet I never overcame
my awe of the divine; she was a being sacrosanct. Whether this idealism
were innate or the result of such romances as I had read I cannot say....
I got, indeed, an avowal of a sort. The weekly dancing classes having
begun again, on one occasion when she had waltzed twice with Gene
Hollister I protested.
"Don't be silly, Hugh," she whispered. "Of course I like you better than
anyone else--you ought to know that."
We never got to the word "love," but we knew the feeling.
One cloud alone flung its shadow across these idyllic days. Before I was
fully aware of it I had drawn very near to the first great junction-point
of my life, my graduation from Densmore Academy. We were to "change
cars," in the language of Principal Haime. Well enough for the fortunate
ones who were to continue the academic journey, which implied a
postponement of the serious business of life; but month after month of
the last term had passed without a hint from my father that I was to
change cars. Again and again I almost succeeded in screwing up my courage
to the point of mentioning college to him,--never quite; his manner,
though kind and calm, somehow strengthened my suspicion that I had been
judged and found wanting, and doomed to "business": galley slavery, I
deemed it, humdrum, prosaic, degrading! When I thought of it at night I
experienced almost a frenzy of self-pity. My father couldn't intend to do
that, just because my monthly reports hadn't always been what he thought
they ought to be! Gene Hollister's were no better, if as good, and he was
going to Princeton. Was I, Hugh Paret, to be denied the distinction of
being a college man, the delights of university existence, cruelly
separated and set apart from my friends whom I loved! held up to the
world and especially to Nancy Willett as good for nothing else! The
thought was unbearable. Characteristically, I hoped against hope.
I have mentioned garden parties. One of our annual institutions was Mrs.
Willett's children's party in May; for the Willett house had a garden
that covered almost a quarter of a block. Mrs. Willett loved children,
the greatest regret of her life being that providence had denied her a
large family. As far back as my memory goes she had been something of an
invalid; she had a sweet, sad face, and delicate hands so thin as to seem
almost transparent; and she always sat in a chair under the great tree on
the lawn, smiling at us as we soared to dizzy heights in the swing, or
played croquet, or scurried through the paths, and in and out of the
latticed summer-house with shrieks of laughter and terror. It all ended
with a feast at a long table made of sawhorses and boards covered with a
white cloth, and when the cake was cut there was wild excitement as to
who would get the ring and who the thimble.
We were more decorous, or rather more awkward now, and the party began
with a formal period when the boys gathered in a group and pretended
indifference to the girls. The girls were cleverer at it, and actually
achieved the impression that they were indifferent. We kept an eye on
them, uneasily, while we talked. To be in Nancy's presence and not alone
with Nancy was agonizing, and I wondered at a sang-froid beyond my power
to achieve, accused her of coldness, my sufferings being the greater
because she seemed more beautiful, daintier, more irreproachable than I
had ever seen her. Even at that early age she gave evidence of the social
gift, and it was due to her efforts that we forgot our best clothes and
our newly born self-consciousness. When I begged her to slip away with me
among the currant bushes she whispered:--"I can't, Hugh. I'm the hostess,
you know."
I had gone there in a flutter of anticipation, but nothing went right
that day. There was dancing in the big rooms that looked out on the
garden; the only girl with whom I cared to dance was Nancy, and she was
busy finding partners for the backward members of both sexes; though she
was my partner, to be sure, when it all wound up with a Virginia reel on
the lawn. Then, at supper, to cap the climax of untoward incidents, an
animated discussion was begun as to the relative merits of the various
colleges, the girls, too, taking sides. Mac Willett, Nancy's cousin, was
going to Yale, Gene Hollister to Princeton, the Ewan boys to our State
University, while Perry Blackwood and Ralph Hambleton and Ham Durrett
were destined for Harvard; Tom Peters, also, though he was not to
graduate from the Academy for another year. I might have known that Ralph
would have suspected my misery. He sat triumphantly next to Nancy
herself, while I had been told off to entertain the faithful Sophy.
Noticing my silence, he demanded wickedly:--"Where are you going, Hugh?"
"Harvard, I think," I answered with as bold a front as I could muster. "I
haven't talked it over with my father yet." It was intolerable to admit
that I of them all was to be left behind.
Nancy looked at me in surprise. She was always downright.
"Oh, Hugh, doesn't your father mean to put you in business?" she
exclaimed.
A hot flush spread over my face. Even to her I had not betrayed my
apprehensions on this painful subject. Perhaps it was because of this
very reason, knowing me as she did, that she had divined my fate. Could
my father have spoken of it to anyone?
"Not that I know of," I said angrily. I wondered if she knew how deeply
she had hurt me. The others laughed. The colour rose in Nancy's cheeks,
and she gave me an appealing, almost tearful look, but my heart had
hardened. As soon as supper was over I left the table to wander, nursing
my wrongs, in a far corner of the garden, gay shouts and laughter still
echoing in my ears. I was negligible, even my pathetic subterfuge had
been detected and cruelly ridiculed by these friends whom I had always
loved and sought out, and who now were so absorbed in their own prospects
and happiness that they cared nothing for mine. And Nancy! I had been
betrayed by Nancy!... Twilight was coming on. I remember glancing down
miserably at the new blue suit I had put on so hopefully for the first
time that afternoon.
Separating the garden from the street was a high, smooth board fence with
a little gate in it, and I had my hand on the latch when I heard the
sound of hurrying steps on the gravel path and a familiar voice calling
my name.
"Hugh! Hugh!"