The ensuing December days brought to Clyde some pleasing and yet
complicating and disturbing developments. For Sondra Finchley, having
found him so agreeable an admirer of hers, was from the first inclined
neither to forget nor neglect him. But, occupying the rather prominent
social position which she did, she was at first rather dubious as
to how to proceed. For Clyde was too poor and decidedly too much
ignored by the Griffiths themselves, even, for her to risk any marked
manifestation of interest in him.
And now, in addition to the primary motivating reason for all this--her
desire to irritate Gilbert by being friends with his cousin--there
was another. She liked him. His charm and his reverence for her and
her station flattered and intrigued her. For hers was a temperament
which required adulation in about the measure which Clyde provided
it--sincere and romantic adulation. And at the very same time he
represented physical as well as mental attributes which were agreeable
to her--amorousness without the courage at the time, anyhow, to annoy
her too much; reverence which yet included her as a very human being; a
mental and physical animation which quite matched and companioned her
own.
Hence it was decidedly a troublesome thought with Sondra how she
was to proceed with Clyde without attracting too much attention and
unfavorable comment to herself--a thought which kept her sly little
brain going at nights after she had retired. However, those who had met
him at the Trumbulls' were so much impressed by her interest in him
that evening and the fact that he had proved so pleasing and affable,
they in turn, the girls particularly, were satisfied that he was
eligible enough.
And in consequence, two weeks later, Clyde, searching for inexpensive
Christmas presents in Stark's for his mother, father, sisters, brother
and Roberta, and encountering Jill Trumbull doing a little belated
shopping herself, was invited by her to attend a pre-Christmas dance
that was to be given the next night by Vanda Steele at her home in
Gloversville. Jill herself was going with Frank Harriet and she was not
sure but that Sondra Finchley would be there. Another engagement of
some kind appeared to be in the way, but still she was intending to
come if she could. But her sister Gertrude would be glad to have him
escort her--a very polite way of arranging for Gertrude. Besides, as
she knew, if Sondra heard that Clyde was to be there, this might induce
her to desert her other engagement.
"Tracy will be glad to stop for you in time," she went on, "or--" she
hesitated--"perhaps you'd like to come over for dinner with us before
we go. It'll be just the family, but we'd be delighted to have you. The
dancing doesn't begin till eleven."
The dance was for Friday night, and on that night Clyde had arranged
to be with Roberta because on the following day she was leaving for
a three-day-over-Christmas holiday visit to her parents--the longest
stretch of time thus far she had spent away from him. And because,
apart from his knowledge she had arranged to present him with a new
fountain pen and eversharp pencil, she had been most anxious that he
should spend this last evening with her, a fact which she had impressed
upon him. And he, on his part, had intended to make use of this last
evening to surprise her with a white-and-black toilet set.
But now, so thrilled was he at the possibility of a reëncounter with
Sondra, he decided that he would cancel this last evening engagement
with Roberta, although not without some misgivings as to the difficulty
as well as the decency of it. For despite the fact that he was now
so lured by Sondra, nevertheless he was still deeply interested in
Roberta and he did not like to grieve her in this way. She would look
so disappointed, as he knew. Yet at the same time so flattered and
enthused was he by this sudden, if tardy, social development that
he could not now think of refusing Jill. What? Neglect to visit the
Steeles in Gloversville and in company with the Trumbulls and without
any help from the Griffiths, either? It might be disloyal, cruel,
treacherous to Roberta, but was he not likely to meet Sondra?
In consequence he announced that he would go, but immediately
afterwards decided that he must go round and explain to Roberta, make
some suitable excuse--that the Griffiths, for instance, had invited
him for dinner. That would be sufficiently overawing and compelling to
her. But upon arriving, and finding her out, he decided to explain the
following morning at the factory--by note, if necessary. To make up
for it he decided he might promise to accompany her as far as Fonda on
Saturday and give her her present then.
But on Friday morning at the factory, instead of explaining to her
with the seriousness and even emotional dissatisfaction which would
have governed him before, he now whispered: "I have to break that
engagement to-night, honey. Been invited to my uncle's, and I have to
go. And I'm not sure that I can get around afterwards. I'll try if I
get through in time. But I'll see you on the Fonda car to-morrow if I
don't. I've got something I want to give you, so don't feel too bad.
Just got word this morning or I'd have let you know. You're not going
to feel bad, are you?" He looked at her as gloomily as possible in
order to express his own sorrow over this.
But Roberta, her presents and her happy last evening with him put aside
in this casual way, and for the first time, too, in this fashion,
shook her head negatively, as if to say "Oh, no," but her spirits were
heavily depressed and she fell to wondering what this sudden desertion
of her at this time might portend. For, up to this time, Clyde had
been attentiveness itself, concealing his recent contact with Sondra
behind a veil of pretended, unmodified affection which had, as yet,
been sufficient to deceive her. It might be true, as he said, that
an unescapable invitation had come up which necessitated all this.
But, oh, the happy evening she had planned! And now they would not
be together again for three whole days. She grieved dubiously at the
factory and in her room afterwards, thinking that Clyde might at least
have suggested coming around to her room late, after his uncle's dinner
in order that she might give him the presents. But his eventual excuse
made this day was that the dinner was likely to last too late. He could
not be sure. They had talked of going somewhere else afterwards.
But meanwhile Clyde, having gone to the Trumbulls', and later to the
Steeles', was flattered and reassured by a series of developments such
as a month before he would not have dreamed of anticipating. For at the
Steeles' he was promptly introduced to a score of personalities there
who, finding him chaperoned by the Trumbulls and learning that he was a
Griffiths, as promptly invited him to affairs of their own--or hinted
at events that were to come to which he might be invited, so that at
the close he found himself with cordial invitations to attend a New
Year's dance at the Vandams' in Gloversville, as well as a dinner and
dance that was to be given Christmas Eve by the Harriets in Lycurgus,
an affair to which Gilbert and his sister Bella, as well as Sondra,
Bertine and others were invited.
And lastly, there was Sondra herself appearing on the scene at about
midnight in company with Scott Nicholson, Freddie Sells and Bertine,
at first pretending to be wholly unaware of his presence, yet deigning
at last to greet him with an, "Oh, hello, I didn't expect to find you
here." She was draped most alluringly in a deep red Spanish shawl.
But Clyde could sense from the first that she was quite aware of his
presence, and at the first available opportunity he drew near to her
and asked yearningly, "Aren't you going to dance with me at all?"
"Why, of course, if you want me to. I thought maybe you had forgotten
me by now," she said mockingly.
"As though I'd be likely to forget you. The only reason I'm here
to-night is because I thought I might see you again. I haven't thought
of any one or anything else since I saw you last."
Indeed so infatuated was he with her ways and airs, that instead of
being irritated by her pretended indifference, he was all the more
attracted. And he now achieved an intensity which to her was quite
compelling. His eyelids narrowed and his eyes lit with a blazing desire
which was quite disturbing to see.
"My, but you can say the nicest things in the nicest way when you want
to." She was toying with a large Spanish comb in her hair for the
moment and smiling. "And you say them just as though you meant them."
"Do you mean to say that you don't believe me, Sondra," he inquired
almost feverishly, this second use of her name thrilling her now
as much as it did him. Although inclined to frown on so marked a
presumption in his case, she let it pass because it was pleasing to her.
"Oh, yes, I do. Of course," she said a little dubiously, and for the
first time nervously, where he was concerned. She was beginning to find
it a little hard to decipher her proper line of conduct in connection
with him, whether to repress him more or less. "But you must say now
what dance you want. I see some one coming for me." And she held her
small program up to him archly and intriguingly. "You may have the
eleventh. That's the next after this."
"Is that all?"
"Well, and the fourteenth, then, greedy," she laughed into Clyde's
eyes, a laughing look which quite enslaved him.
Subsequently learning from Frank Harriet in the course of a dance that
Clyde had been invited to his house for Christmas Eve, as well as that
Jessica Phant had invited him to Utica for New Year's Eve, she at once
conceived of him as slated for real success and decided that he was
likely to prove less of a social burden than she had feared. He was
charming--there was no doubt of it. And he was so devoted to her. In
consequence, as she now decided, it might be entirely possible that
some of these other girls, seeing him recognized by some of the best
people here and elsewhere, would become sufficiently interested, or
drawn to him even, to wish to overcome his devotion to her. Being of a
vain and presumptuous disposition herself, she decided that that should
not be. Hence, in the course of her second dance with Clyde, she said:
"You've been invited to the Harriets' for Christmas Eve, haven't you?"
"Yes, and I owe it all to you, too," he exclaimed warmly. "Are you
going to be there?"
"Oh, I'm awfully sorry. I am invited and I wish now that I was going.
But you know I arranged some time ago to go over to Albany and then up
to Saratoga for the holidays. I'm going to-morrow, but I'll be back
before New Year's. Some friends of Freddie's are giving a big affair
over in Schenectady New Year's Eve, though. And your cousin Bella and
my brother Stuart and Grant and Bertine are going. If you'd like to,
you might go along with us over there."
She had been about to say "me," but had changed it to "us." She was
thinking that this would certainly demonstrate her control over him to
all those others, seeing that it nullified Miss Phant's invitation. And
at once Clyde accepted, and with delight, since it would bring him in
contact with her again.
At the same time he was astonished and almost aghast over the fact that
in this casual and yet very intimate and definite way she was planning
for him to reëncounter Bella, who would at once carry the news of his
going with her and these others to her family. And what would not
that spell, seeing that even as yet the Griffiths had not invited him
anywhere--not even for Christmas? For although the fact of Clyde having
been picked up by Sondra in her car as well as later, that he had been
invited to the Now and Then, had come to their ears, still nothing had
been done. Gilbert Griffiths was wroth, his father and mother puzzled
as to their proper course but remaining inactive nonetheless.
But the group, according to Sondra, might remain in Schenectady until
the following morning, a fact which she did not trouble to explain
to Clyde at first. And by now he had forgotten that Roberta, having
returned from her long stay at Biltz by then, and having been deserted
by him over Christmas, would most assuredly be expecting him to spend
New Year's Eve with her. That was a complication which was to dawn
later. Now he only saw bliss in Sondra's thought of him and at once
eagerly and enthusiastically agreed.
"But you know," she said cautiously, "you mustn't pay so very much
attention to me over there or here or anywhere or think anything of it,
if I don't to you. I may not be able to see so very much of you if you
do. I'll tell you about that sometime. You see my father and mother are
funny people. And so are some of my friends here. But if you'll just be
nice and sort of indifferent--you know--I may be able to see quite a
little of you this winter yet. Do you see?"
Thrilled beyond words by this confession, which came because of his
too ardent approaches as he well knew, he looked at her eagerly and
searchingly.
"But you care for me a little, then, don't you?" he half-demanded,
half-pleaded, his eyes lit with that alluring light which so fascinated
her. And cautious and yet attracted, swayed sensually and emotionally
and yet dubious as to the wisdom of her course, Sondra replied: "Well,
I'll tell you. I do and I don't. That is, I can't tell yet. I like you
a lot. Sometimes I think I like you more than others. You see we don't
know each other very well yet. But you'll come with me to Schenectady,
though, won't you?"
"Oh, will I?"
"I'll write you more about that, or call you up. You have a telephone,
haven't you?"
He gave her the number.
"And if by any chance there's any change or I have to break the
engagement, don't think anything of it. I'll see you later--somewhere,
sure." She smiled and Clyde felt as though he were choking. The mere
thought of her being so frank with him, and saying that she cared for
him a lot, at times, was sufficient to cause him to almost reel with
joy. To think that this beautiful girl was so anxious to include him
in her life if she could--this wonderful girl who was surrounded by so
many friends and admirers from which she could take her pick.