“Your voice is very fine,” I said in the flattest of voices and looked
at her beseechingly.
She met my eyes steadily and her smile died away.
“Only a voice,” she said.
“Miss Harris,” I cried imploringly. “You are young, you have beauty--”
She cut short my bromides with an angry exclamation.
“And no more temperament than a tomato can,” Mr. Masters finished for
me.
He ran his fingers over the keyboard in a glittering flow of notes.
“You’re a liar,” she cried, turning furiously on him.
Now, for the first time, I saw her really angry, not childishly
petulant as in her orange-throwing mood, but shaken to her depth with
rage. She was rather terrible, glaring at Masters with a grim face.
“Am I?” he said, coolly striking a chord. “We’ll see Tuesday night in
Brooklyn.”
I had expected him to answer her in kind, but he only seemed weary and
dispirited. Her chest rose with a deep breath and I saw to my alarm
that she had grown paler.
“You didn’t always think that,” she said in a muffled voice.
“No,” he answered quietly, “I believed in you at first.”
He spread his hands in a long clutching movement and struck another
chord. It fell deep into the momentary silence as if his powerful
fingers were driving it down like a clencher on his words.
“And you don’t any more?”
“No, I’ve about done believing,” he responded.
She ran at him and seized him by the shoulder. He jerked it roughly out
of her grasp and twirling round on the stool faced her, exasperated,
defiant, a man at the end of his patience. But his eyes said more,
full of a steely dislike. She met them and panted:
“You can’t, you don’t. Even you couldn’t be so mean--” then she
stopped, it seemed to me as if for the first time conscious of the
hostility of his gaze. There was the pause of the realizing moment and
when she burst out her voice was strangled with passion:
“Go--get out--go away from me. I’m sick of it all. I’ll stand no
more--go--go.”
She ran to the door and threw it open. I got up to make my escape.
Neither of them appeared to remember I was there.
“All right,” he said, calmly rising. “That suits me perfectly.”
He picked up his hat and coat and moved to the door. I tried to get
there before him, dodging about behind their backs for an exit, then,
like a frightened chicken, made a nervous dive and got between them.
Her hand on my arm flung me back as if I had been a chair in the way.
I had a glimpse of her full face, white and with burning eyes. She
frightened me.
Mr. Masters walked into the hall and there came to a standstill. After
looking at the back and front of his hat he settled it comfortably on
his head and moved toward the stairs.
Suddenly she rushed after him and caught him by the arm.
“No--no--” she cried. “Don’t go.”
I couldn’t see her face, but his was in plain view and it looked
exceedingly bored.
“What is it now?” he said.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I’m so discouraged--you take the heart
out of me. I don’t know what I’m saying and I’ve tried so hard--oh,
Jack--”
Her voice broke, her head sank. Mr. Master’s expression of boredom
deepened into one of endurance.
“What do you want me to do?” he asked with weary patience.
“Come back. Don’t be angry. Forget what I said.”
She began to cry, shielding her face with one hand, the other still
holding him by the sleeve.
He sighed, and glancing up, saw me. I expected him to drive me forth
with one fierce look. Instead he made a slight grimace and reentered
the room, she holding to his sleeve. He dropped heavily on the piano
stool and she on the chair opposite, her hands in her lap, two lines
of tears on her cheeks. Neither said a word.
The way was clear and I flew out with the wild rush of a bird escaping
from a snare. As I ran down the stairs the silence of that room, four
walls enclosing a tumult of warring passions, followed me.
It’s midnight and I haven’t got over the ugliness of it. What am I to
think? The thing many people would think, I won’t believe, I can’t
believe. No one who knew her could. That the unfortunate creature loves
him is past a doubt--but how can she? How can she humiliate herself
so? Where is the pride that the rest of us have for a shield and
buckler. Where is the self-respect? To cry--to let him see her cry, and
then--that’s the _comble_, as the Paris art students say--to call him
back!
I feel sick, for I love her. If she hasn’t got a soul or temperament
or any of the rest of it that they do so much talking about, she’s got
something tucked away somewhere that’s good, that’s true. It looks at
you out of her eyes, it speaks to you in her voice--and then Masters
comes along and it’s gone.
I stopped here, and biting the end of my pen, looked gloomily at
the wall and met the cold stare of my ancestors. I wonder what the
men would have said if they had been there this afternoon. I’m not
sure--men are men and Lizzie is beautiful. But about you ladies, I
can make a guess. You would purse your mouths a little tighter and
say, “Evelyn, you’re keeping queer company. Whatever you may think
in your heart, drop her. That’s the wise course.” All but the French
Huguenot lady, she’s got an understanding eye. She feels something that
the others never felt, probably saw a little deeper into life and it
softened the central spot.
No, my dears, you’re all wrong. You’re judging by appearances and fixed
standards, which is something your descendant refuses to do. Go to
sleep and try and wake up more humble and humane. Good night.