He was somewhat disconcerted. Then he reflected that she could hardly
be expected to give up her whims without a little struggling. "It shows
how sweet and good she is," thought he, "that she took it so quietly."
And he went to bed in the room across the hall--the room he had been
occupying most of the time since three months before Winchie came. As
he fell asleep he felt that he had laid "the ghost" and had settled all
his domestic affairs upon the proper basis. He slept, but she lay awake
the whole night, watching, tearless, beside her dead.
*IV*
Next morning, after her usual breakfast alone, she took Winchie and went
across in the motor boat to her father's. If she had been led blindfold
into that house she would have known, from the instant of the opening of
the door, that she was at home. Every home has its individual odor.
Hers had a clean, comfortable perfume suggestive of lavender. She
inhaled it deeply now as she paused a moment in the front hall--inhaled
it with a sudden sense of peace, of sorrow shut out securely. She left
the baby in the sitting room with her sister Lal, and sought out her
mother in the pleasant old-fashioned back parlor with its outlook on the
hollyhocks and sunflowers of the kitchen garden. Mrs. Benedict, a model
of judicial sternness, as her husband was of judicial gentleness, sat
reading a pious book by the open window. She glanced up as her daughter
entered, and prepared her cold-looking cheek for the conventional
salute. But Courtney was in no mood for conventions. She seated herself
on the roll of the horsehair sofa. "Mother," she said, "I want to talk
to you about Richard."
The tone was a forewarning--an ominous forewarning because it was calm.
Mrs. Benedict, for all her resolute unworldliness, had been unable to
live sixty-seven years without there having been forced upon her an
amount of wisdom sufficient to store to bursting the mind of any woman
half her age. She closed the heavy-looking book in her lap, leaving her
glasses to mark the place. "I don't think I need tell a daughter of
mine that she cannot discuss her husband with anyone."
Courtney flushed. "That's just it," replied she. "He is no longer my
husband."
She was astonished at her mother's composure. An announcement about the
weather could not have been less excitedly received. She did not
realize how plainly she was showing, in her changed countenance, in
stern eyes and resolute chin, the evidences a mother could hardly fail
to read--evidences of a mood a sensible mother would not aggravate by
agitation. "I cannot live with him," she went on. "I've brought
Winchie and come home."
Her words startled herself. In this imperturbable, severely sensible
presence they sounded hysterical, theatrical, though she had thought out
the idea they conveyed with what she felt sure was the utmost
deliberation. Her mother's gray-green eyes looked at her--simply
looked.
"I know you don't believe in divorce, mother. But he and I have never
been really married. He's entirely different from the man I loved. And
he-- What he feels for me isn't love at all. He doesn't know me--and
doesn't want to know me."
"Has he sent you away?"
"Oh, no. _He's_ satisfied."
Mrs. Benedict folded her ladylike hands upon the pious book, said coldly
and calmly: "Then you will go back to him."
"Never. I refuse to live with a man who classes me with the lower
animals. I----"
Her mother's stern, calm voice interrupted. "Don't say things you will
have to take back. You will return because there is no place else for
you."
"Mother! Do you refuse to take me and Winchie? Oh, you don't
understand. You--who believe in religion--you couldn't let me----"
"Your father," interrupted her mother in the same cold, placid way, "is
not to be made judge again. We shall have to give up this house and
retire to the farm. We have nothing but the farm. It will take every
cent we can rake and scrape to pay the insurance premiums. The
insurance premiums must be paid. The insurance is for your sisters.
They have no husbands." And with these few bald statements she stopped,
for she knew that under her daughter's youthful idealism there was the
solid rock of common sense, that behind her impetuosity there was her
father's own instinct for justice.
"The farm," said Courtney, stunned. "The farm." Twenty miles back in
the wilderness--a living death--burial alive. "Oh, mother!" And the
girl flung herself down beside the old woman and clasped her round the
waist. "You shan't go there! I'll go back to Richard and we'll see
that you and father and Lal and Ann stay on here."
Her mother was as rigid as the old-fashioned straight-back chair in
which she sat. The blood burned brightly in the center of each of her
white cheeks, but her voice was distinctly softer as she said: "You will
go back. But we accept nothing from anybody."
Courtney hung her head. "Of course not," she said, hurried and
confused. "I spoke on impulse."
"You'd better sit in a chair," said Mrs. Benedict. "You are rumpling
your dress."
But Courtney was not hurt. She had an instinct why her mother wished
her to sit at a distance. "Very well, mother," said she meekly, and
obeyed.
After a pause Mrs. Benedict spoke: "I was not surprised when you told
me. I suppose there is not one woman in ten thousand who doesn't at
least once in the first five years of her married life resolve to leave
her husband."
"But it's different with me. I must have something--and I have
nothing."
"You have your home and Winchie."
"That house--those prim, dressed-up looking grounds--they've always
oppressed me. And I hate them--now that--" She checked herself. How
futile to relate and to rail. "As for Winchie, he's not enough."
"There will be others presently."
Courtney gave her mother a horrified look.
"You will do your duty as a wife, and the children will be your reward."
Courtney could not discuss this; discussion would be both useless and
painful. "There may be some women who could be content with looking
after a house and the wants of children," said she. "But I'm not one of
them, and I never saw or heard of a worth-while woman who was. How am I
to spend the time? I'm like you--I don't care for running about doing
inane things. I can't just read and read, with no purpose, no sympathy.
It seems to me I could do almost anything with love--almost nothing
without it.... Brought up and educated like a man, and then condemned
to the old-fashioned life for women--a life no man would endure!"
Her mother was looking out through the window, a strange expression
about her stern mouth--the expression of one who, old and in a far, cold
land, thinks of home and youth when the sun warmed the blood and the
heart.
"What shall I do if I go back?" repeated Courtney. "But why ask that?
I've simply got to go back. As you say, there's no place else for me."
A flush of shame overspread her cheeks. "Oh, it's so degrading!"
"You forget Winchie," said her mother, and her tone was gentle.
"No, I thought of that excuse. But I was ashamed to speak it. It
seemed like hypocrisy. Of course, I've got to go back for his sake.
But if I hadn't him I'd go back just the same. Mother, you ought to
have had me educated more or else less. If I knew less I could be
content with the sort of life women used to think was the summit of
earthly bliss. If I knew more I could make my own life. I could be
independent. I begin to understand why women are restless nowadays.
We're neither the one thing nor the other."
Up to a certain point Mrs. Benedict could understand her daughter, could
sympathize. She could even have supplemented Courtney's forebodings as
to the future with drearier actualities of experience. But beyond that
point the two women were hopelessly apart. "You are warring with God,"
she rebuked. "He has ordained woman's position." And to her mind that
settled everything.
"It isn't God," replied Courtney. "It's just ignorance."
"It is God," declared her mother, in the fanatic tone that told Courtney
her mind was closed.
The mother and daughter belonged to two different generations--the two
that are perhaps further apart than any two in all human history.
Courtney saw how far apart she and her mother were, thought she
understood why her mother could sympathize with her restlessness in
woman's ancient bondage, but could only say "sacrilege" when the younger
and better educated woman went on from vague restlessness to open
revolt.
"God has seen fit to make the lot of woman hard," said the mother.
"If that is God," cried the daughter, "then the less said about Him the
better."
"Courtney, your sinful heart will bring you to grief."
"Is it a sin to think?"
"I sometimes believe it is--for a woman," replied the mother, with the
kind of bitter irony into which the most reverent devotee is sometimes
goaded by the whimsical cruelties of his deity.
Courtney had long since learned to be unargumentative before her
mother's somber and savage religion, so logical yet so inhuman. She had
dimly felt that if she ever investigated religion, the misery of the
world would compel her to choose between believing in her mother's devil
god and believing nothing. So she left religion aside in her scheme of
life, like so many of the men and women of her generation.
"I ought to have had more education or less," she repeated. "I ought to
have had more, for it wouldn't have been fair to give me less than the
rest of the girls have."
She fancied it was her formal education of the college that had made her
think and feel as she did. In fact, that had little, perhaps nothing,
to do with it; for colleges, except the as yet few scientific
schools--stupefy or stunt more minds than they stimulate. She was
simply a child of her own generation, and the forces that were stirring
her to restlessness were part of its universal atmosphere--the
atmosphere all who live in it must breathe, the "spirit of the time"
that makes the very yokel with his eyes upon the clod see things in it
his yokel father never saw.
She knew her mother would gladly help her, but she realized she might as
hopefully appeal to Winchie. All her mother could say would be: "Yes,
it is sad. But the only thing to do is to return and pretend to be the
old-fashioned wife, and perhaps custom will make the harness cease to
gall." Well, perhaps her mother was right; perhaps there was no
solution, no self-respecting hopeful solution. Certainly she could not
support herself, except in some menial and meager way that would more
surely kill all that was aspiring in her than would submission to the
lot which universal custom made abject only in theory. She could not
support herself--and there was Winchie, too. Winchie had his
rights--rights to the advantages his father's position and fortune gave.
Dick had made it clear that he did not and would not have the kind of
love, the kind of relationship, she believed in. She must go on his
terms or not at all.
She ended the long silence, during which her mother sat motionless in an
attitude of patient waiting for the inevitable. "I will go," she said.
"And I will try to be to him the kind of wife he wants."
Mrs. Benedict looked at her daughter; there were tears of pride in her
eyes. "That is right," she said, and they talked of it no more.
But on the way back in the motor boat, and for the rest of that day, and
for a good part of many a day and many a night thereafter, Courtney
Vaughan's mind was stormily busy. It teemed with the thoughts that in
this age of the break-up of the old-fashioned institution of the family
force themselves early or late upon every woman endowed with the
intelligence to have, or to dream of, self-respect.
Thenceforth Dick Vaughan, if he had thought about it at all, would have
congratulated himself on his wise and thorough adjustment of his
threatened domestic affairs. But he gave no more thought to it than
does the next human being. We do not annoy ourselves with what is going
on in the heads of those around us. We look only at results. And
usually this plan works well; for, no matter what the average human
being may have in mind, the habit of a routine of action ultimately
determines his or her real self. Once in a while, however,
circumstances interfere, encourage the latent revolt against action's
routine apparently so placidly pursued. But this is rare.
The weeks, the months went by; and Courtney seemed, and thought herself,
a typical "settled" wife and mother. That is, as "settled" as an
intelligent, energetic, and young woman, restless in mind and body,
could be. She did not attempt to come to a definite verbal
understanding with him. What would be the use? There was nothing to
change except herself. There was nothing to explain. She understood
him. He did not understand her, did not wish to, could not on account
of his prejudices, however carefully she might explain. "No," thought
she, "the only thing is for me to accept my position as woman and adapt
myself to it, since I haven't the right, or the courage, or the whatever
it is I lack, to do as I'd like." The only outward difference in their
relations was that she rarely talked with him, and when he was about,
fell into his habit of abstraction.
That winter he became extremely irregular about coming to dinner, and as
the days lengthened with the spring he often worked on through supper
time also. In late May or early June he began to note that when he did
come up to the house for supper, his wife was sometimes there and
sometimes not. Gradually her absence made an impression on him, and her
always answering his inquiry with, "I was over at the club." As that
meant the Outing Club, established and supported and frequented by the
young people of Wenona and its suburbs, he was entirely satisfied.
This, until about midsummer. One evening, when she returned in the dusk
from supper at the club, she found him seated on the bench at the
landing stage, smoking moodily. He was scantily civil to Shirley
Drummond, who had brought her in the club launch. When Shirley was well
on the way back to the north shore, Courtney, who had seated herself
beside her husband, spoke of the heat and unwound the chiffon scarf
about her bare neck and shoulders. Dick glanced round. In some moods
he would not have seen at all. In other moods those slender shoulders,
that graceful throat, and the small head with its lightly borne masses
of auburn hair would have appealed to his pride and joy of possession.
But things had gone wrong at "the shop," and he was in the mood that
could readily either turn him to her for the consolation of a "lighter
hour" or set him off in a rage. He frowned upon the exposed shoulders.
"Where did you get that dress?" he demanded.
She heard simply the question. Her thoughts were on the events of the
evening at the club. "Had it made here," said she, unconscious of his
mood. "It's something like one I saw in a fashion picture from Paris.
Like it?"
To her amazement he replied angrily: "I do not. I've never seen a dress
I disapproved of so thoroughly. Don't wear it again, and please be
careful how you adopt a fashion you get that way. French fashions are
set by a class of women I couldn't speak to you about. Respectable
women have to alter them greatly."
"Why, what's the matter with the dress?" exclaimed she. "Everyone
admired it at the club."
"It isn't decent," replied he. "I know you are so innocent that you
don't think of those things. But it's my duty to protect you. I won't
have men commenting on my wife's person."
"But, Dick," protested she, "this isn't a low-cut dress. It's higher
than those I usually wear. It has bands across the shoulders and a real
back----"
"Then change all your dresses. You must not make yourself conspicuous."
"Conspicuous! The other women wear much lower-cut dresses than I do."
"I know about such things," said he peremptorily. "I don't believe in
low-neck dresses anyhow. What business has a good woman flaunting her
charms--rousing in other men thoughts she ought to rouse in her husband
only?"
"Don't you think it's all a matter of custom?" she said persuasively.
She was not convinced, or even shaken. But she admired the shrewdness
of his argument. The reason she had never grown to dislike him was that
even in his prejudices he was always plausible, and not in his narrowest
narrowness was he ever petty. "Now really, Dick, if that were carried
out logically, a woman'd have to cover her face and not speak, for often
it's a woman's voice that charms a man"--with a little laugh--"and once
in a long while what she says."
"I would carry it out logically," replied he promptly, "if I had my way.
That reminds me. You're away from home very often these days, I notice.
You're over at the club a great deal."
"The weather's been so fine, everybody goes."
"I've no objection to your going occasionally. But after all the place
for a good woman is at home."
She thought so too, as a general principle; home undoubtedly was the
place for a good woman, or any sort of woman, or for a man; that was to
her mind the meaning of home--the most attractive, the most magnetic
spot on earth. However, the Vaughan place was not "home." She could
not discuss this with him, so she simply answered, "But I get
bored--here alone--and with nothing to do. And nobody'll come at this
time of year, with something on at the club every day and evening."
"You don't even stay home to meals."
"Neither do you."
"But I haven't Winchie to look after."
"He plays with the other children at the kindergarten. And Miss
Brockholst can keep a child amused as I couldn't. When I stay out to
supper I see that Nanny or Lizzie brings him home and puts him to bed.
And I'm not out to supper often."
"I don't like it," said Dick imperiously.
"You ought to come with me," rejoined she. "But you never will."
"I've no time for foolishness. And I'm sure you haven't either."
"What ought I to do with myself?"
"What other good women do. Our mothers didn't hang about clubs."
"No. But these aren't pioneer times. Things are entirely different
nowadays. That was why--" She did not finish. She did not wish to
remind him how he had refused to let her either share his life or make a
life of her own. She refrained because the subject might be unpleasant
to him. It was no longer unpleasant to her; she now had not the least
desire to share his life, was in a way content to drift aimlessly along
with the rest of the aimless women.
"Yes, many of the women are different nowadays," said he. "The more
reason for my wife's conducting herself as a woman should."
She flushed with sudden anger. "Why can't you accept a woman as a human
being?" exclaimed she. "Oh, you men--tempting--compelling--us to be
hypocrites--and making our natural impulses rot into vices because they
have to be hid away in the dark."
"We will not quarrel," said he, in the calm superior tone he always took
when their talk touched on the two sexes. "I simply say I will not
tolerate my wife's being a club lounger."
To have answered would have been to say what must precipitate a furious
and futile quarrel. She kept silent, with less effort than many women
would have to make in the circumstances. She had had the conventional
feminine training in self-suppression, that so often gives women the
seeming of duplicity and only too often imperceptibly leads them into
forming the habit of duplicity. She had also had special training in
self-concealment through having been brought up austerely. She kept
silent, and made up her mind to obey. She had heard much talk among the
women at the club about the "rights of a wife"; but it had not convinced
her. She could not see that she, or any other of the women married as
was she, contributed to the family anything that entitled her to oppose
the husband's will as to how it should be conducted. And she would have
scorned to get by cajolery what she could not have got honestly. She
was thus the good wife, not through fear of him, for she was not a
coward and he was not the sort of small tyrant that makes the women and
the children tremble; nor was it because she was faithful to her
marriage vows, for she never thought of them. Her submissiveness was
entirely due to the agreement she had tacitly signed the day she went
back to him, after the talk with her mother. In return for shelter and
support she would be, so far as she could, the kind of wife he wanted.
She kept away from the club, stayed at home; and soon the telephone bell
was ringing, and pleading voices were giving the flattering proof that
in her abrupt divorce from the social life of the town the sense of loss
was by no means altogether on her side. And presently over came Sarah
Carpenter escorted by her big handsome brother, Shirley Drummond, "as a
committee of two," so Sarah put it, "to investigate and report on your
cruel and inhuman treatment of us." It was dull, frightfully dull, at
the club house, she went on to explain. They did nothing but sit round
and try to guess why Courtney Vaughan had dropped them. "And have you
forgotten the flower show you were planning? and the play you were going
to organize? and the Venetian fete?"
"Oh, that was just talk," replied Courtney. "It's far too hot. I'm
resting, and looking after my boy. I'll be over some afternoon soon."
Sarah pleaded and coaxed. Shirley took no part, but sat on the veranda
rail, his long legs swinging, his eyes on the interior of the straw hat
he was turning round and round between his hands. When Sarah realized
that there was unalterable resolution under Courtney's light and gay
laughing off of her entreaties, she bade Shirley wait there for her and
went to call on Molly Donaldson. Courtney looked admiringly after
Sarah's long willowy figure and striking costume--sunshade and hat,
dress and stockings and ties, all of various cool, harmonious shades of
red.
"Your sister always was pretty," said Courtney. "But since she's
married it seems to me she gets prettier all the time."
"Marriage does bring out those women that don't go to pieces," said he.
"I guess it's because they get the courage to be more like themselves.
Girls are such hypocrites--always posing. You were the only one I ever
liked. You weren't a hypocrite. Where you didn't dare be yourself you
simply kept quiet."
"I like your impudence--attacking women for being what you men compel."
"Maybe so," said he absently. "But I didn't come over here in the hot
sun to talk generalities. Look here, Courtney, there's something I've
got to say to you." His good-humored commonplace face was even redder
than the heat and his bulk--for he wasn't a thin man--warranted. His
voice was low and confused, yet suggested a man talking against a mob
and determined to be heard. "I've got to tell you that I care for
you--and have ever since we used to walk from high school
together--whenever some other fellow didn't slip in ahead of me."
Courtney, puzzled, rapidly reviewed her conduct toward Shirley the past
two months--since he came home from Harvard Law School. She recalled
nothing that could have given him encouragement to this speech. "I
should hope you did like me," she said carelessly. "Of course, we're
good friends, as always." She rose. "Let's go over to Donaldson's."
Her tone and manner contained the subtle warning to desist that reaches
through the thickest skin into the dullest brain.
"You know what I mean," said Shirley doggedly. "Now listen to me while I
make a proposition. You're a sensible, up-to-date woman, and this is
the twentieth century, not the dark ages. I'm not as clever as some,
but neither am I as much the muttonhead as maybe you think. Anyhow, I
appreciate you."
"Drop it," said Courtney.
"I want you to get a divorce and marry me."
He spoke as tranquilly as if they were at a dance and he were asking her
for the next two-step. She stared. "Well, I never did!" she exclaimed.
"I see you're surprised," said he. "I've thought about it so much that
I've got used to it."
"This is something new--a woman getting proposals after she's married,
just as if she wasn't." She was laughing.
"Why not?" retorted he, unruffled. "Nobody looks on marriage as the
finish any more. I don't think you love me--not for a minute. You've
got better brains than I have--a lot better, for I'll admit I'm pretty
slow. But you've tried brains and you see they don't amount to much
when it comes down to solid living. You don't love me now. But,
Courtney, if you'll marry me, I'll guarantee to treat you and the
youngster so that you'll simply _have_ to love me."
She was slowly recovering from her utter amazement, when he spoke those
last words in his simple, honest way with his love in his voice, in his
eyes--love that makes bright the dullest face, quickens into bloom the
barrenest fancy, puts sweet music in the most tedious voice. Her words
of rebuke dropped back unsaid, her throat choked up and tears welled
into her eyes. While she was still trying to control this sudden
treachery of her hungry heart, he went on: "I was away to college when I
heard you were engaged. I cut exams, and everything and rustled out
here. But I saw you were dead in love. It nearly knocked me out. Then
it occurred to me that marrying's only a trial go and that in a few
years I might get you and you'd be all the better for the experience."
What he said did not shock her. But she was shocked that she was not
shocked. Still, it isn't easy to meet a wholly new form of attack; and
less easy is it to be stiff and stern with a person one has known always
and liked always--a person one knows to be through and through sincere
and profoundly respectful. "Shirley," said she, "you mean well and you
are slow--so, you don't realize that what you've said is perfectly
outrageous."
"Why?" demanded he. "Is it an insult to a woman to tell her you love
her? Is it a crime to let her know that, if she isn't suited, there's
some one waiting to try to help her get suited? Where's the outrage?"
"I don't know just where," admitted she. "But I feel that it is an
outrage--that you've taken advantage of our friendship."
"On the contrary, I've shown I _am_ your friend; ready to stand by you.
I haven't laid a finger on you, and, so help me God, Courtney, I
couldn't try. I'm that old fogey, at least. And I haven't tried to
wheedle or win you--have I? I just made a plain statement that if you
want me, I'm waiting--and eager. I've seen how things are with you----"
"You've seen nothing of the kind!" Her pride and her loyalty were in
arms now.
He looked at her with eyes that were as honest as an open sky. "You
don't love your husband, nor he you," he said. "If you did, you'd not
see as little of each other as you do."
"Shirley, it's cowardly to say those things," she began angrily.
"Oh, I'd say 'em to him, if it wasn't that I'm afraid you'd have to
suffer for it. You needn't get mad. I've been so damn miserable this
past week, not seeing you, that I don't care what happens to me. I know
why you don't come over any more. He's shut you up here. I saw it in
his face that night."
"It was about time he stopped me, I see," said she quickly. "Evidently
he understood better than I did. But you mustn't go away thinking I'm
obeying a jailer. Do you suppose I'd stay here at the request of a man
unless I cared for him?"
"Certainly," replied he. "A right sort woman'll put up with most
anything to avoid a row. You needn't try to fool me, Courtney. I
know--everyone knows--the truth."
"The truth!" cried Courtney. "How dare you sit there insulting me!"
"Now, Courtney!" begged he.
"Go join your sister and take her back without coming here."
She felt she ought to leave him; but her hungry heart would not let her
go. She lingered, looking at him angrily, watching the utter love in
his countenance--and enjoying it. He slowly dropped from the veranda
rail and faced her. His look was that same mingling of gentle and
fierce qualities that makes a bulldog's face fascinating. "If I've said
anything I shouldn't, I beg your pardon," said he. "But I stick to my
proposition. You can take it or leave it--now, or next year--or
whenever you like. It's you or nobody for me." He put out his hand.
She clasped her hands behind her. But she had to lower her head that he
might not see--"and misunderstand"--her swimming eyes, her trembling
lip.
"Please shake hands," he begged.
She shook her head.
"That hurts," said he shakily, and she turned hastily away. "But," he
added, "I'm used to hurts."
He lingered, embarrassed. At length, with a huge sigh, he descended
from the veranda and plodded across the lawn toward the hedge. She
darted upstairs and shut herself in her room and cried, lying on the bed
face down. She felt guilty; would not the right sort of woman have been
able to meet such talk from a man, even a Shirley Drummond, with
effective fiery resentment? But she knew it was not her guilt that she
was weeping for. No, her tears were flowing from the wounds in her
heart--the wounds she had thought healed. She had not the faintest
feeling in the least akin to love for Shirley Drummond. She never could
love him. She had always avoided him as far as her instinct against
hurting people's feelings permitted. His grotesque proposal, in itself,
appealed only to her sense of humor. But at the mere sound of loving
words, words of considerate tenderness, how her whole being vibrated!
It terrified her, this heart of hers suddenly and fiercely insurgent.
The next evening after supper she interrupted Dick in the library.
"Richard," she said gravely, "I want you to come upstairs with me a few
minutes."
"Certainly," said he. "Directly." And he worked on--and would have
continued to work until bedtime had she not insisted.
"No. Right away, please."
He glanced up. Her eyes prevented him from returning to his
calculations. "All right," said he.
Her sitting room was changed into a painting and drawing exhibition. On
the walls, on tables, on sofas and chairs, and leaning against the
baseboard were pictures and plans of interiors and of gardens, many in
colors, more in black and white, most of all in ground-plan drawings.
"What's this?" said he.
"You were right about my going to the club too much," replied she. "I
shall stay at home more. But I _must_ have something to occupy me.
These are my plans for making over the house and grounds. Please don't
try to stop me. I am going to explain it all to you, and I ask you to be
considerate and polite enough to listen."
Her manner was compelling; the exhibit was interesting. And he looked
and listened as she talked, rapidly, intensely, yet clearly and calmly,
describing the whole scheme in minutest detail, not forgetting expense
which she demonstrated would be small. He asked several
questions--enough to show that he was giving his attention. When she
finished she was trembling all over. He continued to inspect the water
colors that showed how things would look when the changes had been made.
After a while he smiled and nodded at her. "Very clever," he said.
"Really, I had no idea you could do anything like this."
Her mouth and throat were dry; her eyes gleamed. She was giving out the
force that flows from a soul in desperate earnest--the force that sweeps
away any opposition not already aggressive, before it has a chance to
gather. "I may try it?" she asked.
"That's another matter," reflected he aloud. "I ought to say no, for
I'm sure you'll be disappointed and your mistakes'll have to be covered
up." Now that he was reminded of it he was ashamed of the curt
ill-humored way he had issued his orders about her going to the club.
"But you can only learn by trying. So, I've no objections to your
making a start." He laid his hands on her shoulders. "A little at a
time--remember!" he cautioned. "A _very_ little."
With that unconsciousness of her being intelligent enough to see his
thoughts in his expression--an unconsciousness to which she had long
since got used, but never hardened--he was showing that he wished to
refuse her, but that, being taken by surprise, he in his kindness of
heart could not frame a pretext. His manner took from her all desire or
ability to thank him. "I'll be careful," said she.
The smile in his eyes was like a parent's at a precocious child. He
kissed her, patted her cheek, went back to his work. He had read the
anthropologies, all written by men. Anthropology being out of his line,
he accepted as exact science the prejudice and baseless assertion and
misleading "statistics" there set down as "laws." Nature had made man
active, woman passive; thus, action in woman was contrary to nature, was
inevitably abortive and whimsical, was never, except by rare accident,
valuable. "She's clever," thought he, by way of finis to the subject.
"But she'll soon tire of this thing and drop it. Well, I suppose a few
more years'll wash away the smatter she got at college, and this
restlessness of hers will yield to nature, and she'll be content and
happy in her womanhood. A few more children would have an excellent
effect. She's suffering from the storing up of the energy that ought to
have outlet in childbearing. As grandfather often said, it's a dreadful
mistake, educating women beyond their sphere. But it hasn't done the
dear child any permanent harm. She's far too womanly."
*V*
By the time Winchie was four years old--and in looks and health, in
truthfulness and self-reliance a credit to her--she had about completed
the transformation of house and grounds. The Vaughan place was no
longer an example of those distressing attempts to divorce beauty from
its supreme quality, use, that are the delight of the unfortunates whose
esthetic faculty has been paralyzed by the mediaeval monastic education
still blighting the modern world. It was, throughout, beauty applied to
use, use achieved in beauty. She had no theory in doing this; she
followed the leadings of a courageous and unspoiled taste which was
thoroughly practical, as practical as that of the artists of the age of
Pericles, a taste which abhorred the bizarre and the blatant. The
results would not have pleased Colonel Achilles; they would not have
stirred the enthusiasm of anyone who has been enslaved by false
education to admire only what has been approved by tradition. But charm
no one could have denied. Winter and summer the house, livable and
restful in every corner, bloomed within--for over no other part of
nature is man's dominion so complete as over the plant kingdom. From
early spring through the last warm days of autumn the grounds were
delightful to behold; it was as if summer were living there freely and
at ease, with no restraint upon her except keeping her clear of the
restraint of her own profuse and careless litter. In winter the lawns
and clumps and hedges were by no means dead or filled only with
evergreen's mortuary suggestions; there are many plants that bloom with
bright berries and leaves in the midst of snow and ice, and Courtney
knew about them. Winter indoors seemed a millennium in which winter and
summer lived amicably together. There were snows and icy storms
without, huge open fires within; the windows were gay with blossoming
plants, and from a conservatory she built and stocked at surprisingly
small cost there came cut flowers for vases and bowls as well as plants
that replaced those which had done service and needed rest. Courtney was
one of those for whom things grow; her own vivid life seemed to radiate
throughout her surroundings and infect all things with the passion to
live vividly. With the flowers, as with Winchie, she was patient,
intelligent, understanding--never expecting too much, always encouraging
to the least disposition to develop.
All this wonder of transformation was not wrought in a day, nor by
dreaming. It came as the result of tireless and incessant labor of
brain and hand. She had dreamed her dream; she was determined that it
should be realized. Failure did not daunt her; it taught her. Nor was
she halted by her sense, rather than experience, of a latent reluctance
in Richard about giving her money he wanted for the laboratory; for, as
his work there expanded, its expenses grew rapidly heavier. She did not
ask him for the money; she did not let him know she needed it; she got
along without it. In such work as she was doing it takes a vast deal of
thought, of planning and contriving, to take the place of money. She
did that necessary thinking. When she could get a little money, she
spent it to amazing advantage; when she could not, she went on without
it. Some of her most satisfying results came through the work made
necessary by lack of money. Very powerful, too, was the influence of
this upon her character--in developing self-reliance and self-respect
which come only through successful independent action.
Now, after nearly three years of days of toil that was also play, since
she loved it, she saw, but a short distance ahead, a time when she would
have little to do beyond taking care that Jimmie and Bill kept the
grounds up, and that Nanny and Mazie and Lizzie did their work properly
in the house. There would be minor changes, new features; but the task
as a task was almost done. And, in spite of Nanny's opposition, she had
put the household on a systematic basis, so that with a little daily
attention every part of the routine went smoothly, each servant doing
his or her share of the work in the same way always and at the same
time. She was about to have many hours each day liberated--and this, in
a quiet place, where time refuses to take wings, but insists upon being
definitely employed every moment of it.
What should she do next? She had grown through her work. She had
educated her originality and her instinctive good taste, had educated
them so intelligently that originality had not lost its courage nor good
taste its breadth. It had not "settled" her to make a home, as it
"settles" a human or lower animal that acts largely from instinct and
example and that conceives a home to be chiefly a place to eat and
sleep. On the contrary, it had unsettled her the more. Her character
had not changed. Character never does change; it simply develops,
responding to its environment like any other growing thing. Her
character had developed.
What next? What should she do to occupy hand and brain, now grown far
more skillful? What should she do with heart? It was now grown far
bolder in its dreams and longings; and from time to time it was giving
ever more imperious notice that not much longer would it be content with
solicitude about a child and makeshift interest in interior decoration
and landscape gardening, but would demand its right to the fullness of
experience. She temporized with these ominous threatenings. She hoped
there would be more children--for children would compel her. From
Richard, the absorbed, the well pleased with his "settled, womanly
wife," she expected nothing--and wished nothing. The routine of
matrimony had become as unconscious as breathing or winking. Her sense
of moral obligation to him was also automatic; she felt its restraint
not definitely as the wife of a certain Richard Vaughan, but generally
as a woman of the married estate. She knew little about him beyond what
he thought of her, of marriage--and that knowledge killed all further
interest in him. He knew nothing whatever about her beyond the
surface--her physical charm, enhanced by good taste in dress. The
comfort of his home and its order, the surprising success of her
"tinkerings" with house and grounds made small impression upon him. The
changes had come about gradually; and he was absorbed at the Smoke
House. Before the next change was made he had got used to the one
preceding, and had come to regard it as something that had always
existed. And she was not one of those who see to it that they get full
credit by preceding, accompanying, and following every act with blast of
trumpets. She did things because she liked to do them, just as she
learned because she liked to know. She worked without friction or
bluster. Also, having dismissed him from her inner, her real life, as
he had dismissed her from his, it never occurred to her to talk to him
about herself--and her work was herself.
What next? She often asked the question as she paused to look about her
and saw so short a distance ahead the end of her task. But she was not
troubled because she could not answer the question. She waited with a
certain confident tranquillity until an answer should be imperative.
Meanwhile-- One look at her was enough to convince that her lot had
been better than the lot of the gay, discontented young married women of
Wenona society who pitied her because of her solitude. They did not
realize that not only were they unhappy, but also were without the
capacity to enjoy happiness if it should offer, had lost the capacity as
utterly as a deaf man the capacity to enjoy music. One may abuse
intellect or heart with impunity no more than body. Transgression and
punishment are simply cause and effect. There were times when Courtney
wished she could be gayer; but at least she was never bored, never did
the things that do not amuse in the doing, and have an aftermath of
disgust. She had an intense, ever intenser desire to live life to its
uttermost limits of interest and joy; but that did not seem to her to
mean changing her clothes many times a day, rushing from house to house,
from party to party, gossiping, eating indigestible sauces and desserts,
and playing bridge. She knew what she did not want. She did not know
what she wanted--did not dare inquire. She feared life was a good deal
of a cheat--not altogether a cheat, not by any means--but still a raiser
of longings it had no way to satisfy, of expectations it had no way to
fulfill.
She fancied herself little changed since her marriage. And she was
hardly changed at all physically. But in mind she was a woman full
grown--a rarity indeed in our civilization which tends to make
odalisques and parasites out of the women it does not crush under toil.
She was ready for a strong part in life, should opportunity offer.
Meanwhile, she was living her placid routine with the originality and
interest with which intelligence can invest the humblest, the most usual
acts.
She wrote in her commonplace book this sentence:
"Love is a tune we whistle in the dark of our aloneness to keep up our
courage."
In Winchie's fourth year, in the spring, Judge Benedict had an illness
so severe that Courtney went to the farm, taking Winchie with her to
stay until the crisis passed. It was nearly three weeks before decision
for life was rendered and she could return home.
She had been gone during what ought to have been her busiest season.
She rather expected to find the place in some confusion. Instead, so
far advanced toward completion were her plans, and so thoroughly had she
trained Jimmie and his son Bill and the house servants, everything was
well under way. All her instructions, both those given before she left
and those written to Jimmie from her father's--had been carried out
exactly. They had worked as hard as if she had been there, had done it
because they loved her--for only love can arouse and inspire the
sluggish energies of those who serve. The lawns were trim and freshly
green, the walks were covered with new tan-bark; and its red brown
harmonized with the colors of lawn and trees as its odor harmonized with
the odors from the grass and the foliage, from the brilliant flowers in
great beds at either side of the house. All the windows were gay with
boxes of blooming plants. Railings of verandas and balconies were
draped with mats of budding creepers. The gardens--the beds in the lawns
and along the verandas--the edges of walks and drives--the thickets and
trellises--all were blossoming and odorous. Lovely contrasts of light
and shade, delicious perfumes, birds flashing to and fro, singing in the
trees and bushes--the Vaughan place illustrated what Pope meant when he
called landscape gardening nature plus a soul. The soul that had given
form to nature's color and perfume was Courtney's.
As the carriage drove down the deeply shaded main drive from highway to
drive-front porch, she gazed round with a creator's pride and joy and
love. She had two children--Winchie and this lovely place. All the
servants gathered to welcome her--all except old Nanny, who had never
forgiven and who resented the changes as sacrilege. They watched
eagerly for signs of approval. Her expression, as she looked at what
they had done, then at them, the unsteady voice in which she said
"Beautiful--beautiful" went straight to their hearts. Within the house,
everywhere open wide to June's enchantment, there was evidence of the
same creative impulse--order without stiffness, art without any trace of
art's labor.
Winchie would go straightway to look at his rabbits; she went upstairs
alone to bathe and change after the dusty journey, telling Lizzie to
bring him as soon as he had satisfied himself that his rabbits were all
right. The door of the bedroom immediately across the hall from hers
stood open, and with the thorough housekeeper's instinct she glanced in.
It was the room Dick usually occupied. Instead of Dick's belongings she
saw, spread about, toilet articles and clothing strange to her. She
entered. On the bureau she instantly noted a pair of tasteful silver
and ebony brushes; the monogram was "B.G." She opened a drawer;
neckties, more attractive than any she had ever seen, filled two
compartments to overflowing with their patterned silks and linens. In
the third compartment several dozen line handkerchiefs; the monogram on
them was again "B.G."
She opened the nearest closet. On forms hung perhaps a dozen coats; she
recognized the cut and materials as foreign. Beneath was a long row of
boots, shoes, pumps, slippers, all of the kind a woman of taste at once
knows and appreciates. As she was closing the door there swung out from
the hook high up a suit of beautiful striped linen pajamas monogramed in
gray and faintly perfumed with lavendar. She went on into the adjoining
front room--the room Dick had used as a study. Obviously, he no longer
used it. The books of fiction and poetry--the big silver cigarette
box--the gaudily trimmed silk dressing gown flung carelessly on a
chair--none of these belonged to him or suggested his studious and
rather Spartan temperament.
In the hall she saw Lizzie just come with Winchie. "Who's in these
rooms?" asked she.
"Mr. Gallatin," replied Lizzie. "Mr. Vaughan put him in here and moved
down to the suite at the Smoke House."
Lizzie's tone indicated that she was assuming Courtney knew all about
Mr. Gallatin. That tone put her on guard. "When did he come?" asked
she, feeling her way.
"Two weeks ago yesterday. He's very nice. He's as particular as you
about his things, but it's a pleasure to look after them."
Had Richard forgotten to tell her he expected this Mr. Gallatin? Or had
she, fallen long since into his absent-minded habit, failed to hear as
he told her? Was it a chance visit from some college or scientific
acquaintance? The character of the stranger's installation--the quantity
of clothing--did not speak for a brief chance visit. The quality of the
clothing, the taste, the care, the worldly interest and knowledge it
suggested, were all against the idea of "B.G.'s" being a devotee of
science. At least, if there were such scientists, this was the first
she had known of it. After she had changed for the evening, and had
given Winchie his supper and sent him to bed, she went into the
stranger's quarters again. These personal belongings of his attracted
her; they so clearly revealed taste and refinement, a refinement unusual
in a man; they so strongly hinted a personality more in sympathy with
her own passionate joy in life than with Richard's intellectual
abstractions. In the early days of their married life Richard had been
rather particular about himself; but he had got more and more
indifferent, no longer shaved every day, was at times distinctly
slovenly. "B.G. is a bachelor," thought she. "Married men--except
those that are at heart bachelors--soon lose this sort of gloss."
Usually she had not the faintest interest in anything concerning
Richard. But this man interested her.
She was in the sitting room downstairs, playing and singing in an
undertone when Richard came. "Hello," said he. And he kissed the cheek
she turned to a reachable angle. His manner was as casual as hers. It
was their habitual manner, and long had been. The difference between
his habit and hers was that his yielded from time to time to the
intermittent gusts of desire, while hers remained always tranquilly
cool. "Your father's quite all right again?" was his careless first
question.
"I hope so. I think so."
He was not merely looking at her now, he was seeing her. His eyes
lighted up and into his voice came the wooing note. "Glad you've not
dropped into my sloppy ways," said he. He was admiring her pale-green
chiffon dress that left the slender column of her throat bare and her
forearms, but almost concealed her shoulders. "Gallatin won't think
we're altogether barbarians here. He dresses for supper. He's at it
now."
His eyes showed that he was not thinking at all of Gallatin, but of
her--thoughts which did not leave her entirely indifferent, but gave her
an unwonted sense of vague distaste, after her long absence and complete
freedom. As he moved toward her she said: "There's time for you to
dress. And you need a shave badly. Is he from the East?"
"From Philadelphia by way of Pittsburg. He's been doing a little
chemistry in his amateurish way in the mills there. I'd not have him
about if I didn't need his money."
Dick was coming on toward her again. "The bell will ring in ten
minutes," she reminded him. Perhaps through perverseness, the impulse
to evade was a little stronger.
But he came, put his arms round her, kissed her again, this time with
undivided attention. She lost the impulse to evade, submitted, smiled
amicably, and, to extricate herself, rose. The lines of her dress
brought out the perfection of her small, slim figure; its color
harmonized with her deep-sea eyes and with the delicate bronze of her
skin. "What a beauty you are!" he exclaimed. "No wonder I'm so proud of
you."
Usually she was indifferent, without being conscious of it; this evening
of her return from freedom to married life she felt her indifference.
She said coldly, "If you're going to dress----"
"A shave'll be enough," protested Dick. "Your finery'll more than make
up for my absence of it. Bachelors like Gallatin have to sleek
themselves up. They've still got their brides to win."
"You'll be late."
"I want you to be extra civil to Gallatin. He's likely to get bored in
this quiet place after a few months. He's rather gay, I imagine. At
least he used to be. And I don't want him to pull out."
"After a few months," repeated Courtney, interested. "Why, how long is
he to stay?"
"A year or so--perhaps longer."
"Here in the house!"
"I can't put him down at the laboratory, so near my secrets. I'm not
going to let him in on everything. That's part of our bargain. We're
partners, you understand."
"Here in the house!" exclaimed Courtney again. The very idea of an
outsider as spectator at what was going on there made her acutely
conscious of it, all in an instant.
"Oh, you'll like him--at least, you must for my sake. He doesn't amount
to much, but he's agreeable--well mannered--good family--entertaining in
a light way."
"There goes the bell."
Dick rushed away to shave. He had been gone but a few moments when
Courtney was roused from her agitated reverie by the sense of some one
in the room. Near the threshold stood the newcomer, who was to be a
factor in her intimate life, a spectator of it, whether she willed or
no, for "a year or so--perhaps longer." He was a blond young man, fair
and smooth of skin, his hair almost golden. He certainly was not
handsome; only his coloring and a pair of frank gray eyes saved him from
downright homeliness. As their eyes met, his heavy, conventional face
was suddenly transformed by as charming a smile as she had ever seen.
He was of about the medium height, his figure neither powerful nor weak.
He wore a dinner suit of dark gray, fashionably draped upon him, pumps,
gray socks that matched his gray silk tie, a plaited French shirt, an
unusually tall, perfectly fitting collar. If he had not been so well
and so tastefully dressed, he would have attracted no attention
anywhere--unless he had smiled. That smile meant a frank nature, a kind
and generous heart--rarities to make their possessor distinguished in
whatever company.
Courtney, with woman's swift grasp of surface details, noted all this
and more while she was advancing with extended hand and saying, "Mr.
Gallatin, is it not?"
He was obviously confused and embarrassed. Her natural,
self-unconscious manner encouraged him candidly to explain. "I feel
very shy," said he, speaking with a strong Eastern accent, "and very
guilty. Shy because, before I came, I had somehow got the impression
Vaughan was not married--and that we were to keep bachelor hall. I was
astonished to find he had a wife." His eyes added without impertinence
that he was amazed and dazzled now that he saw the wife. "I feel
guilty," he went on, "because I seem to be thrusting myself in upon you.
But Vaughan assured me I'd not be intruding."
"You needn't trouble yourself about that," said she. She liked his
accent; it was pleasant as a novelty, and rather amusing. She liked his
manners. They were of the best type of conventional manners, the type
affected by fashionable people everywhere, the type that is excelled
only by the kind of manners of which it is an artful and insincere
imitation--the simple manners of those rare self-unconscious people who
have the courage--or, rather, the lack of fear--to be natural and
spontaneous. "We'll not wait for Richard," she said, as the supper bell
rang. "He's got a great deal to do before he can come."
She had just finished the sentence when he entered, exactly as he was
when he went out. "I forgot I'd taken all my razors down to the
laboratory," he explained.
During supper he and Gallatin talked chemistry; that is, he talked and
Gallatin listened--listened and ate. Courtney noted--with increased
liking for him--that he had a vigorous appetite and that he liked the
things they had to eat. But her thoughts soon wandered away to her
gardening, to retouching her plans for bringing the grounds a little
nearer her ideal than they had been the summer before. When the men
lighted cigars, she went to the veranda to stroll up and down in the
moonlight. She forgot everything unpleasant in the delight of being
home again. As she looked about her, her heart was singing the
nightingale's song. She was startled--and her heart's song was
stopped--by the newcomer's voice. "Vaughan's gone to the library," said
Gallatin. "Do you mind if I walk with you?"
She did mind very much indeed. She had somehow lost interest in him as
soon as he ceased to be the mystery B.G. She liked him well enough,
admired his manners, his really delicate tact in what must have been for
him an extremely difficult position. But she had got the impression
that Dick was right in estimating him as a "don't-amount-to-much." And
just now he was distinctly a kill-joy. However, she acquiesced
courteously, though with no unnecessary cordiality. She felt that now
was the time to get him in the habit of respecting her privacy; she
could establish a barrier now, where an attempt to establish it later on
would offend him. At best, the barrier would be a poor enough
makeshift; he would be bound to see, to make her feel uncomfortable
about things she had been able to keep unconscious of or indifferent to.
Still, she was far too generous to blame him.
"Do you have much spare time?" she asked, her manner more cordial than
if she had not been wishing him out of the house.
"A great deal. Vaughan realizes I'm only an amateur."
"I'll take you over to the club and introduce you. You'll find some very
agreeable people."
"Thank you. It has been rather dull these two weeks--especially of
evenings."
"I don't see how you had the courage to come."
"I had to," said he, in the curt way in which a young man gives himself
the pleasure of hinting a secret he cannot with good taste give himself
the pleasure of telling.
She glanced across the lake at the twinkling lamps of the town. "The
women over there will fill every minute you give them," said she. "You
see, most of our men are busy all day and tired in the evening. You'll
be a lion."
"That sounds attractive. I'm amazed at the West. I had no idea
civilization was so advanced."
The implied condescension in this amused her. But she merely said: "Oh,
I guess the same sort of people are much alike the world over."
The conversation languished through a to her tiresome discussion of
differences of accent, dress, manners, and such trifles until he
happened to say: "This place of yours here was a revelation to me. I've
been talking to Vaughan about it--admiring it. He tells me his
grandfather's responsible for it. He must have been an extraordinary
man."
"He was," said Courtney, in a queer voice. She glanced out over her
creation and the blood burned in her cheeks.
"He'd certainly be proud of the way you keep it up."
Her sense of humor had come to the rescue; besides, vanity was not a
dominating emotion with her who had too much else to think about to have
much time for thought of self. "I'm fond of gardening," was her placid
noncommittal reply to his compliment.
"Yes, Vaughan's grandfather must have been a wonder," Gallatin went on
reflectively. He had paused, was leaning on the rail, looking out over
the lawns and gardens. "I don't mind confessing to you--if you'll not
tell your husband--that I'm a chemist only by profession, with landscape
gardening as my real passion."
Courtney glanced at him with interested eyes.
"I know a little something about it," he continued. "I learned long ago
in a general way that a personality is always revealed in any work, and
I at once looked for the personality in this place. That old man must
have been an artist.... I can't reconcile these grounds with the
portrait of him in the library."
Courtney was smiling to herself. A thrill of pride and pleasure was
running through her. She began to like Basil Gallatin, to feel that he
was by no means commonplace, but a man of breadth and artistic instinct,
something at least of the man of the big world, not merely the man of
the little world of well-cut manners and clothes.
"That portrait is of a stern, narrow man--strong but conventional," he
went on, confirming her more sympathetic judgment of him. "This
place--the house as well as the grounds--shows a very different
individuality. It's feminine and sensuous and poetical. Yes, it's
distinctly feminine--and delightfully disdainful of the conventional--of
everything and anything 'cut and dried.' I don't mean the details--the
things you're probably responsible for--and they're very charming. But
I mean the whole conception--so free, so daring, and so lovely. Yet
Vaughan tells me that the old gentleman made the plans himself and
superintended their carrying out. It's very curious. Don't you think
so?"
"I hadn't thought about it."
"You're not interested?"
"Why do you say so?"
"Your tone. I suppose a man is tedious when he gets on his hobby. I
noticed you were bored when we were talking chemistry at supper."
"I wasn't bored. I simply wasn't listening."
"You don't like chemistry?"
"I did. But my enthusiasm cooled as I got interested in other things."
Again the conversation languished. She suspected that his opinion of
her was rapidly declining. But some instinct withheld her from making
any effort whatever to rehabilitate herself. Finally he said: "Well, I
guess I've disturbed you long enough. I'll go to my room and read."
"I'm going up myself after I've had a little talk with Nanny about the
house."
As soon as he disappeared, she dismissed him from mind with a few
pleasant and friendly thoughts--"he may not have any great amount of
brains or force, but he certainly has good taste. He will be a distinct
addition." When she ascended to her sitting room, perhaps an hour
later, she halted on the threshold, coloring with anger. Dick was
seated at her center table reading a newspaper; Gallatin was inspecting
the books in one of her cases. Dick saw her and said: "Come in. Don't
mind us."
Courtney, struggling against her anger at this climax to the impudent
intrusion upon her privacy, remained upon the threshold.
Dick's eyes had dropped to his paper. "Gallatin," he went on, "was
complaining that the books in the library were too old and solemn. So I
brought him here. I knew you'd laid in a stock of the frivolous kinds
that grandfather wouldn't have tolerated. Finding what you want, old
man?"
When Dick's speaking warned him that Courtney had come, Gallatin had
startled guiltily and had hastily put away the book he was examining.
But he didn't turn round until Richard directly addressed him. His face
was red and his eyes were down. "I feel sleepy," said he awkwardly.
"I'll look again some other time if Mrs. Vaughan will let me."
"Certainly," said Courtney, cold as a flower blooming in the heart of a
block of ice.
The case into which Gallatin had been delving was filled with works on
landscape gardening and interior decoration--modern works. As he almost
stumbled from the room he cast a further glance round at the
walls--walls covered with the original plans, sketches, and paintings
Courtney had made for her revolution in house and grounds--very
modern-looking drawings all, and unmistakably feminine. She knew that
the newcomer had her secret--all of it--not merely the secret of her
authorship, but also, through it, the secret of this loveless married
life in which the husband had not the remotest idea who his wife was or
what she had done. In passing her on his way out, Gallatin visibly
shrank and grew as white as he had been red. She went to the window to
compose herself, for her blood was boiling in the greatest rage of her
life.
Richard went to close the door after Gallatin, then turned on her. "My
dear," said he in his "grandfather" tone, which sometimes amused and
sometimes angered her, "you are so cold by nature that you don't realize
it, but you were almost insulting to Gallatin."
"I hope so!" cried she, facing him. "How dared you bring him in here
without my permission? There are not many women who would have accepted
quietly your bringing him to this house to live without a word to me. I
wish you to understand you cannot thrust him upon my privacy. I don't
allow anyone in this room without my consent. It must not occur again."
"Now--now--my dear," said Dick soothingly. "All that is very
unreasonable. Of course, I have the right to do as I please in my own
house, and you're too good and too sensible a wife to dispute it."
"I do dispute it!" she cried, her bosom heaving. "This room is--_me_!"
"What a tempest in a teapot! Child, what has made you take such a
sudden dislike to him--and so violent? He isn't worth it--an amiable,
well-meaning, commonplace chap. Really, you mustn't act this way. I've
told you I need him, and you must be polite to him."
"The impertinent, prying----"
"I brought him here, Courtney," he interrupted, magisterially. "And I
repeat, I had the right to do so."
Like most people of sweet and even temperament, she lost all control of
herself in this unprecedented rage, where those in the habit of raging
learn a sort of etiquette of bad temper. "You had not the right!" she
declared, her eyes blazing into his. "And if you ever do such a thing
again, I'll make it impossible for him to remain here. Do you
understand?"
"I do not quarrel," said Richard with gentle superiority, "especially
not with women--with my wife."
"And why not? You call it chivalry. I call it contempt. And I detest
it. If you could appreciate how absurd you are, with your antiquated
notions of superior and inferior sex, of rights and duties, and all such
nonsense!"
Richard was in full armor of masculine patience against feminine folly.
"You are beside yourself, my dear. I'll leave you until you are calm
and courteous." And he added, as if he were meting out severe but just
punishment, "I shall occupy the spare room."
Courtney gave a strange laugh. He turned away, went into her bedroom.
Presently he reappeared exclaiming: "Why, where are my pajamas? I told
Lizzie to put them in there."
Courtney's smile was of the same quality of strangeness as her laugh of
the moment before. "They are in the spare room," said she. "I put them
there before I came in here."
He looked puzzled, vaguely discomfited. "Oh--very well." He glanced
inquiringly at her, decided against the trivial question he had been
about to ask. "Good night." He was again puzzled when what he heard
about the location of the pajamas was recalled and made vivid by the
sight of them on the turned-down bed in the spare room. But for an
instant only. He dismissed the trifle and went to bed and to sleep.
Husbands do not bother their heads about the petty feminine
eccentricities of wives. The mystery of these transposed pajamas was
too petty to detain a masculine mind.
*VI*
She did not go down to breakfast next morning until Richard and his
guest would surely be gone. Her anger against the guest had evaporated
because it was clearly unjust. Her anger against Richard was subsiding
because it was clearly futile--and also because she hadn't it in her to
foster harsh feeling. But there remained a dislike and dread of
Gallatin because he had her secret. She could not think with composure
of facing him, intolerably her partner in a secret she was ashamed of,
was hiding from her husband, was trying to hide from herself. She would
be unable to look at him, to remember his existence even, without at the
same time having it thrust at her that her married life was a sham, a
hypocrisy.
Half an hour before dinner Richard came to her in the big greenhouse she
had built back of the library. As the day was warm, all its doors and
sashes were open. Richard sent Jimmie's son Bill away and said with
agitated abruptness: "Courtney, Gallatin seems determined to take rooms
over at the hotel."
"I'm glad of that," replied she. "It's much better." She had not
paused in her delicate task of extricating plants from their winter bed
and arranging them in a basket for taking into the garden.
"But it's the first step toward going away. He'll never put up with the
hotel's discomforts." Her indifference, her inattention made him
impatient. "My dear, you don't understand. I need him. I've branched
out on the strength of the capital he's supplying and has promised to
supply. If he leaves, I'll be in a hole. We'll have to cut down in
every direction, for I simply can't abandon my new plans."
"I don't like him," said Courtney. She had abruptly stopped work, was
leaning against the frame facing him. "I want him out of the house."
Dick took the tone of gentle, forbearing remonstrance. "It's too late to
change him to the Smoke House. He feels your dislike--is eager to get
away. If there were any ground for dislike, I'd say nothing. As it is,
I-- I don't like to assert authority, but your frivolous whimsicality
makes it necessary. I want you at once to convince him that you wish
him to stay."
"But I don't." Her voice showed that those brief words were all she
could trust to it.
"You do, since I wish it."
"Why should I consider what you wish? When have you considered what I
wish?"
"When have I been inconsiderate of what was for your good?"
She was silent--silenced, he thought. His handsome face and his voice
were gentle; but underneath there was sternness in both as he said:
"You'll not oppose me in this. It'd be a very severe strain upon my love
for you, if I found you so contemptuous of my interests. I'm sure
you'll not risk that strain."
She saw into what an impossible position her anger had hurried her.
Usually women, through playing upon the husband's passions and
weaknesses generally, get enough control over him to be able to
maintain--with only an occasional slight lapse--the pleasant fiction
that they are of full human rank. They take care to avoid such crises
as was this. Courtney, by long keeping away from the bars of her cage,
had been lured into believing her pretense that they were not there.
She now found herself bleeding and exhausted against them. "Very well,"
said she, after a moment's silence. It had taken her quick mind only a
moment to see the alternatives--submission or a clash in which she could
not but be defeated. "I'll try to get him to stay." Her voice was low
and broken, but not from anger. Deeper than the sense of Richard's
tyranny burned the humiliating sense of her servitude. In fact, her own
plight so mortified her that she had no emotional capacity for raging
against him as the author of it. She felt, as always in these sex
conflicts, that the fault was not his, but fate's; he was simply playing
his part as man, she her part as woman.
"That's a good girl," cried her approving husband, kissing her brow. It
did not occur to him, the deep-down reason of sordidness that enabled
him to compel; but she could think of nothing else. "Be sweet to him,"
Dick went on, in an amiable, petting tone. "And you may rest assured,
dear, I'll get rid of him as soon as I can. I don't like intruders into
our happiness any more than you do."
Her cheeks flushed, and she turned again to the frame, to resume her
digging. Her whole body to her finger tips was in a tremor.
Through dinner she was silent and cold; Gallatin hardly lifted his gaze
from his plate. Whenever Richard could catch her eye, he frowned and
glanced significantly at Gallatin. But her eyes met his hints with a
vacant look that made him twitch in his chair with nervousness and
exasperation. As soon as Gallatin in politeness could, he excused
himself and left the family of three alone.
Richard, unmindful of Winchie, burst out, "What's the meaning of this?
"You must let me humble myself in my own way," said Courtney coldly.
"Come, Winchie." And the two went out on the lawn.
As Gallatin a few minutes later issued from the front door with Richard,
she called: "Oh, Mr. Gallatin, I want to speak to you a moment."
He halted. The color flared into his face. Richard said, "I'll go on.
You needn't hurry," and strode along the path into the eastern
shrubbery. Gallatin hesitatingly crossed the grass. Winchie, who had
on first sight taken an instinctive dislike to him, held a fold of
Courtney's walking skirt and glowered like a small but very fierce
storm.
"Go to the veranda, Winchie," said his mother.
The boy released his hold and reluctantly obeyed. Gallatin stood before
her like a prisoner arraigned for sentence. "Richard tells me you're
talking of moving to the hotel over in town," said she.
"Yes, I'm going to-morrow."
"Because you feel I want you out of the house?"
"I think a man in my position couldn't help being an intruder."
"I want you to stay."