"What I say," was Courtney's reply. And in a, to Helen, appallingly
matter-of-fact way, she went on to explain. "And what I say is simply
the sense under all the nonsense about marrying. You want to marry,
don't you? You're looking about for somebody to support you and your
children, aren't you? You say you love our homely, fascinating,
well-to-do friend Gallatin. But not enough to go very far unless he'd
sign a life contract. Didn't I hear you say one day that you didn't
think it proper for people even to kiss until the preacher had dropped
the flag?"
Helen gazed at her with an expression of sheer horrified amazement that
delighted her. "How can as sweet and pure a woman as you talk that
way?"
Courtney laughed gayly. "Because she's neither sweet nor pure. Because
she's got intelligence and experience. I just wanted to show you that
while you were pretending to think about love--ideal, romantic,
unselfish love, you were really planning for food, clothing and
shelter."
"But I don't want to hear such talk!" cried Helen. "If I'm deluded, why,
let me stay so. You are so frivolous, Courtney! Don't you believe in
love at all?"
Courtney reflected. "I don't know whether I do or not," she finally
said.
Helen looked at her with sad sympathy. "And I thought you were happy!"
she sighed.
"I am," rejoined Courtney. "And I purpose to remain so."
"But you are worried about me? You think Bas--Mr. Gallatin is not a fit
man for me to marry?" The tone betrayed her anxiety, the importance she
attached to Courtney's judgment; for, while Helen's conventional mind
told her that Courtney was a "light-weight," like all lively, laughing
persons, her instinct made her always consult her before acting in any
matter from a man to what hat to wear with what dress. "You think
he's--not nice?"
Courtney felt Helen's nearly breathless expectation; she did not answer
immediately. When she did it was from the farther side of the room,
with her attention apparently on a window garden of hyacinths. "Be
careful, my dear. Remember, your primness is your chief asset. If he
thought--or hoped--you were--loose----"
"Loose!" Helen trembled, looked as if she were about to faint.
"It's ridiculous the way we women exaggerate the value of our favors,"
philosophized Courtney.
"I wish you wouldn't make that kind of--of jests, dear," pleaded Helen.
"I know you don't mean a word of it. You feel just as I do--that a man
couldn't do enough to repay any good woman for giving herself to him."
"Or a woman do enough to repay a man for giving himself to her,"
retorted Courtney. "The account's even, or the whole thing's too low to
talk about. Still--you don't understand--you can't. And so long as men
think a woman the grander the more conceited and selfish she is, you're
as well off, believing as you do.... As to Gallatin----"
"I don't care anything about him!" cried Helen. "What you've been saying
has given me such a shock." She paused, then went on in a low, awful
tone, "Courtney, I must tell you that I was alone with him in his
sitting room for over an hour!"
"When?" asked Courtney, sharply.
"To-day--what we were talking about."
"_Only_ to-day?"
"Never before!" exclaimed Helen. "And never again."
"Then--perhaps--only perhaps, mind you," mocked Courtney, "I'll put off
speaking to Richard about it--and writing Mrs. Torrey."
Helen could not see any humor in the situation. "Do you honestly
believe, Courtney," she asked in deep distress, "that he could have
thought of me as if I were--were a--a--_bad_ woman?"
Courtney's eyes were most unpleasant.
"I see you're disgusted and angry with me, dear," said Helen, in tears
again. "I know it was unwomanly of me to think of him when he'd said
nothing. But I--I couldn't help it. I _will_ help it, though!"
"You think you can?"
Helen showed she was astonished and hurt. "Do you imagine _I_ could
care for a man whose way of caring for me was an insult?"
Courtney counseled with a vase of jonquils. "No, I suppose _you_
couldn't," she replied. "You don't know about wild,
free--_fierce_--love-- Do you?"
Helen's expression was of one appalled. "How can you talk that way?"
she asked. "You're very strange to-day. You're not at all yourself."
"Self!" exclaimed Courtney, scornfully. "What is my self? What is your
self? What is anybody's self?"
She no longer had the delusion of free will that makes us talk about
bettering the race by "changing human nature from within"--the delusion
that the individual is responsible, though obviously the social system
and the other compelling external conditions move the individual as the
showman his puppet. She, helpless in the whirl of strong emotions, was
beginning to understand why, at the outset of her married life, instinct
had bade her arrange all the circumstances round her and Richard so that
they would be compelled to live the life in common, the life of the
single common interest that holds love captive as the cage the bird. She
was beginning to realize how like water self is in the grip of
circumstances--how self is mill pond or torrent, pure or foul, or
mixture of the two, according as circumstance commands. These demon
impulses--they were not her self. Self was amazed onlooker at its own
strange doings--was like helpless occupant of the carriage behind the
runaway team.
When Helen spoke again, she showed that her thoughts were still
lingering longingly where they must not, if Courtney was to be rid of
the demons. "But if a man loves a woman," said Helen, "why shouldn't he
be glad to give her honorable marriage?"