“Evie, are you ill?”
I suppose I looked awful. His face told me so; he was evidently scared.
I realized I couldn’t go on with it, must wait till a better time. The
thought quieted me and my voice was almost natural, though my lips felt
loose and shaky.
“I’m tired, I think.”
“You’re as white as death. Why didn’t you tell me? Good heavens, what
an idiot I am not to have noticed before.”
Two men and a child stopped. The intent and glassy interest of their
eyes helped to pull me together. I let go of the fence and put my
hands, trembling as if with an ague, into my muff. Roger gave the trio
a savage look, before which they quailed and slunk reluctantly away,
watching us over their shoulders.
“Come,” he said commandingly, and pulled my hand through his arm.
“We’ll go to the Eighty-sixth Street entrance and get a cab.”
We walked forward, arm in arm, and I gradually revived. I couldn’t come
to any decision now. I wasn’t fit. I must think it over by myself. My
forces began to come back and the feeling of my insides falling down
into my shoes went away. Roger was in a state of deep contrition and
concern, bending down to look into my face, while I held close to his
arm. People stared at us. I think they took us for lovers. They must
have thought the gentleman had singular taste to be in love with such a
sorry specimen of a woman.
When we reached the Eighty-sixth Street entrance he wanted to take me
home, but I insisted on going to Mrs. Ashworth’s. I couldn’t bear the
thought of my own rooms. Alone there, I would go back to that appalling
subject and I couldn’t stand any more of it now. We got into a taxi and
sped away through the Sunday quietness of the city, sweeping through
Columbus Circle and then down to Fifth Avenue. I leaned against the
window watching the long line of vehicles. I was empty of sensation,
gutted like a burned-out house, and that purposeful procession caught
and carried my attention, exercising on my spent being a hypnotic
attraction. Roger, finding me inclined for silence, sat back in his
corner and lighted a cigarette. He had accepted my explanations in
perturbed good faith. We sped on this way, with the glittering rush
that swept by my window, lulling me into a sort of exhausted torpor.
The usual adjusting of myself to Mrs. Ashworth’s environment was not
necessary. I harmonized better than I had ever done before. I am sure
every red corpuscle in my blood was pale, and if, on my former visits I
had instinctively moved softly, now I did so because I was too limp to
move any other way. If refinement, as some people think, is merely an
evidence of depleted vitality, I ought to have appeared one of the most
refined females of my day and generation.
Betty was there and Harry Ferguson, Harry obviously ill at ease. I
know just how he felt--as if he was too big for the chairs, and when
he spoke it sounded like a stevedore. I used to feel that my manner of
speech oscillated between that of the cowgirl in a western melodrama
and the heroine of one of my favorite G. P. R. James’ romances, who,
when she went out riding, described herself as “ascending her palfrey.”
Betty, I noticed, escaped the general blight. She is too nervelessly
unconscious; wouldn’t be bothered trying to correspond with anybody’s
environment.
I sat in a Sheraton chair and watched Mrs. Ashworth’s hands as she
made tea. The prominent veins interested me. I have heard that they
are an indication of blue blood, and though they are not pretty, they
suit Mrs. Ashworth as everything about her does. Her hands move deftly
and without hurry and she never interrupts conversation with queries
about sugar and cream. A maid, who was neither young nor old, pretty
nor ugly, an unobtrusive, perfectly articulated piece of household
machinery, made noiseless flittings with plates. Mrs. Ashworth does not
like men servants. I suppose they are clumsy and by their large bulky
shapes and gruff voices, disturb the rhythm of that beautiful, mellow,
subdued room.
Presently I was sipping my tea and looking at Harry Ferguson trying to
sip his in a perfect way. I knew that he didn’t like tea, would have
preferred a Scotch highball, but didn’t dare to ask for it. He spilled
some on the saucer, then dropped the spoon and had to grovel for it,
coming up red and guilty, looking as if he had been caught in some
shameful act. I could hear him telling Betty on the way home that it
was nonsense taking him to tea--why the devil hadn’t she dropped him at
the club. And Betty, making vague consoling sounds while she studied
the appointments of passing motors.
Then suddenly they began to talk of Lizzie Harris and I forgot Mrs.
Ashworth’s veins and Harry’s embarrassments. Betty explained her to
our hostess, and I sat looking into my cup and listening. It was
what might have been called the popularized version of a complicated
subject--Lizzie as a sad and chastened neophyte who had failed in
a great undertaking and been shattered. Mrs. Ashworth was softly
sympathetic. She turned to me.
“Roger tells me that she is a charming person and very handsome.”