"To be too seriously in love, and to show it," said Smith, "is
disastrous to a man. It won't do, Michael. Unless our sex takes it
gayly and good humoredly we're patronized. Take it from me, the solemn
side, the fasting and prayer, must originate in the other sex. It never
does if we betray such symptoms. They always wait to see whether we'll
break out. And when we do they treat us as though we were sick--kindly
but condescendingly. You get me?"
"Vaguely."
"All right. But here's the other aspect: when we fall in love, and say
so, and then take the object of our vows gayly, amiably, and with
perfect good humor always--no matter how inwardly we doubt and fear and
rage--_then_, Michael, the girl we worship becomes very, very
serious--even ponderous at times--and if she's got any brain at all it
gets busy and remains busy. And what preoccupies her mind are questions
concerning whether or not you really do love her seriously enough; and,
if not, whether she can make you do it, which state of intellect causes
perpetual anxiety and chronic uncertainty. And only when these emotions
perpetually preoccupy a girl, can she finally fall in love with you
sufficiently to forget what an ass you really are."
"Smith," said I, "are you in love with Clelia?"
"Yes, damn it," he said serenely.
"Then why don't you practice your theory on her?"
"My theory," he replied, "is the result of my experience with Clelia.
That is how I came to evolve it. I believe in it, too. But it's too
late to try on Clelia. Because already she has my number, Michael, and
she knows me for a solemn, single-minded, and serious ass, very, very
deeply in love with her. She's on to me, Michael."
I remembered my episode with Clelia and considered it for a while in
silence. It was apparent to me that the girl's affections were
completely and healthily disengaged. Her desire for happiness, her
almost pagan love of gayety, her sheer delight in the mere joy of
living, were not unmoral. And if, in her pursuit of pleasure there
seemed something feverish, reckless, that was explained by her odd idea
that she had but a little while to live.
"No use to argue, explain, reason, or preach to that girl," said I.
"The thing to do is to give her a jolt."
"A jolt?" he repeated. "There's nothing left for me to say or do that
could disconcert that girl. She knows I'm in love with her; she knows
that I have lived a morally decent life, that my high ideals concerning
women have never been lowered, that, to me, love is a sacred----"
"You tried to kiss her sister."
"That," he said, reddening painfully, "was my only lapse from the rigid
conservatism of a life-time. And doubtless I am now suffering from that
moment of relaxation into folly----"
"Doubtless you are not!" I returned. "I am certain that Thusis never
mentioned it to Clelia. And I'm sorry she didn't because it might have
furnished the required jolt."
Smith became gloomily interested.
"A jolt," I repeated, "is what starts things. Clelia requires one. All
you need is nerve to administer it."
"How?"
"Why not frivol with Josephine?"
"Good heavens!" he exclaimed. "A man can't get gay with a girl like
that! You might as well try to two-step with the Statue of Liberty!
You might as well play the Doxology on a jazz band! You might as well
give a burnt-cork show on the Acropolis! You might as----"
"Calm your alarm," said I. "That girl, Josephine Vannis, is rather an
overwhelming beauty, I admit. But it's just those big, handsome,
impressive, monumentally magnificent girls who fall for some little
squirt----"
"Who the devil do you mean!" he demanded, hotly.
"I don't mean you. But you are shorter than she is; you don't weigh as
much. Get a move on you! Inject pep into yourself. Become witty, gay,
degage, inconsequential, brilliant, light-hearted, bristling with quips
and epigrams----"
"Who? I?"
"Certainly. Pull yourself up short. Eliminate every moral instinct.
Drink more Moselle than you ought to. Hook arms with that brace of
kings down stairs and pull your hat over one eye! Then, after you've
been the life of the dinner-party, drop into the kitchen and bestow a
few repartees on Josephine. And if Clelia isn't shocked I'm a boche!"
"I can't do all those things," he said uneasily.
"You can try."
So I left him a prey to conflicting emotions, and entered my own room
and sat down on the bed.
"I'm in love," said I to myself, "deeply, inextricably in love! And
what on earth am I to do about it!"
*XI*
*A PYJAMA PARTY*
About midnight I was awakened from agreeable slumber by somebody
knocking at my bedroom door. I leaned out of bed, switched on the
electric light, got up and opened the door.
King Ferdinand stood there in night-shirt and bare feet holding a candle
that shook like an aspen leaf in the darkness.
"Somebody's been trying to open my d-door," he stammered. "I want you
to come in and help me l-look under the b-bed. Not that I'm n-nervous
or af-f-fraid, b-b-but I d-d-don't want to be d-disturbed."
"You say you heard somebody trying your door?"
"Yes, I did. I never sleep well and when I sleep at all I sleep
lightly. I heard it p-p-plainly, I tell you."