A QUESTION OF EUGENICS
Callers for Mrs. Helen Davies, and a huge bouquet of American beauties
for Gail. The latter young lady was in the music room, engaged with
Chopin and a great deal of pensiveness, when the interruption occurred,
and not quite understanding the specific division of ceremonies, crossed
up into the Louis XIV room, where Nicholas Van Ploon and Miss Van Ploon
sat with unusual impressiveness.
“We don’t wish to see any frivolous young people,” said Miss Van Ploon
playfully, kissing Gail and pinching her cheek affectionately.
“You can’t mean me,” laughed Gail, turning to receive the outstretched
palm of Nicholas, who, to her intense surprise, bent his round head and
kissed her hand.
“Just you,” returned Miss Van Ploon, drawing Gail down beside her. “We
consider you the most delightfully frivolous young person in existence.”
“That’s flattering, but is it complimentary?” queried Gail, and she was
astounded that Nicholas Van Ploon laughed so heartily. He had folded his
hands over his entirely uncreased vest, and now he nodded at her over
and over.
“Clever,” he said, “very clever;” and he continued to beam on her.
Miss Van Ploon turned sidewise, to inspect Gail with a fondly critical
estimate. The pensiveness which had needed Chopin for its expression,
and which had been rather growing since the night of Dick Rodley’s final
proposal, had begun to set its slightly etherealising mark upon her.
“You are a trifle pale, my dear,” said Miss Van Ploon anxiously. “We
must not allow the roses to fade from those beautiful cheeks,” and
Nicholas Van Ploon was at once seriously concerned. He straightened his
neck, and bore the exact expression of a careful head of the family
about to send for a doctor.
“That’s the second scolding I’ve had about it to-day,” smiled Gail, a
feeling of discomfort beginning to tighten itself around her. “Aunt
Grace is worrying herself very much because I do not sleep sufficiently,
but Aunt Helen tells her that the season will soon be over.”
“It has been very gay,” observed Miss Van Ploon approvingly. “However, I
would like to see you finish the season as gloriously as you began it.”
“You should systematise,” advised Nicholas Van Ploon earnestly, and in
an almost fatherly tone. “No matter what occurs, you should take a half
hour nap before dinner every day.”
Mrs. Davies came into the room, arrayed in the black velvet afternoon
gown which gave her more stateliness and more impressive dignity than
anything in her wardrobe. Miss Van Ploon, who was a true member of the
family, in that she considered the Van Ploon entity before any
individual, quite approved of Mrs. Davies, and was in nowise jealous of
being so distinctly outshone in personal appearance. Nicholas Van Ploon
also surveyed Mrs. Davies with a calculating eye, and bobbed his round
head slightly to himself. He had canvassed Mrs. Helen Davies before, and
had discussed her in family council, but this was a final view, a dress
parade, as it were.
“I suppose I am dismissed,” laughed Gail, rising, in relief, as Mrs.
Davies exchanged the greetings of the season with her callers.
“Yes, run away and amuse yourself, child,” and Miss Van Ploon, again
with that assumption that Gail was a pinafored miss with a braid down
her back and a taffy stick in one hand, shook at her a playful finger;
whereupon Gail, pretending to laugh as a pinafored miss should, escaped,
leaving them to their guild matters, or whatever it was.
“What a charming young woman she is!” commented Miss Van Ploon,
glancing, with dawning pride, at the doorway through which Gail had
disappeared.
“Indeed, yes,” agreed Mrs. Davies, with a certain trace of
proprietorship of her own. “It has been very delightful to chaperon
her.”
“It must have been,” acquiesced Miss Van Ploon; “and an extremely
responsible task, too.”
“Quite,” assented Mrs. Davies. Both ladies were silent for a moment.
Nicholas Van Ploon, watching them in equal silence, began to show traces
of impatience.
“We shall miss Gail very much if she should return to her home at the
end of the season,” ventured Miss Von Ploon, and waited.
“We dread to think of losing her,” admitted Mrs. Davies, beginning to
feel fluttery. The question had been asked, the information given.
Miss Van Ploon turned to her father, and bowed with formal deliberation.
Nicholas Van Ploon looked at her inquiringly. He had not detected any
particular meaning in the conversation, but that bow was a letter of
instructions. He drew a handkerchief from his pocket, and touched his
lips. He arose, in his completely stuffed cutaway, and deliberately
brought forward his chair. He sat down facing his daughter and Mrs.
Helen Davies. The latter lady was tremulous within but frigid without.
Mr. Van Ploon cleared his throat.
“I believe that you are the acknowledged sponsor of Miss Sargent,” he
inquired.
Mrs. Davies nodded graciously.
“May I take the liberty of asking if your beautiful ward has formed a
matrimonial alliance?”
“I am quite safe in saying that she has not.” Thus Mrs. Davies, in a
tone of untroubled reserve.
“Then I feel free to speak,” went on the head of the Van Ploons, in
whose family the ancient custom of having a head was still rigidly
preserved. “I may state that we should feel it an honour to have Miss
Sargent become a member of the Van Ploon family.”
Since he seemed to have more to say, and since he seemed to have paused
merely for rhetorical effect, Mrs. Helen Davies only nodded her head,
suppressing, meantime, the look of exultation which struggled to leap
into her face.
“My son Houston, I am authorised to state, is devoted to Miss Sargent.
We have discussed the matter among us, and beg to assure you that Miss
Sargent will be received with affection, if she should consent to honour
us with this alliance.”
The pause this time was not for rhetorical effect. It was a period,
which was emphasised by the fact that Nicholas leaned back in his chair
to restore his hands to their natural resting place.
“We are honoured,” observed Mrs. Davies, with excellent courtesy
suppressing a gasp. The Van Ploons! The Van Ploons amid the stars! Why,
they were so high in the social firmament that they dared live and talk
and act like common people—and did it. To be above the need of pretence
is greatness indeed! “I shall take up the matter with my niece.”
“I thank you,” responded the head of the Van Ploons. “You have rendered
it possible for me to inform my son that he is at liberty to speak to
Miss Sargent. He is anxious to call this evening, if he may,” whereupon
he smiled indulgently, and his daughter also smiled indulgently, and
Mrs. Davies smiled indulgently.
“If you will pardon me, I will ascertain if my niece will be at liberty
this evening,” offered Mrs. Davies, rising.
“We shall be highly gratified,” accepted Mr. Van Ploon, rising and
bowing.
“We are so fond of Gail,” added Miss Van Ploon, beaming with sincerity,
and the beam was reflected in the face of her father, who nodded his
spherical head emphatically.
Mrs. Helen Davies paused at the head of the stairs to calm herself. The
Mrs. Waverly-Gaites’ annual faded into dim obscurity. Mrs.
Waverly-Gaites would beg Gail on her bended knees to attend the annual,
and Mrs. Helen Davies could attend if she liked. She went into her own
room, and took a drink of water, and sat down for thirty or forty
seconds; then she went into Gail’s suite, where she found that young
lady, all unconscious of the honour which was about to befall her,
reading a six hundred page critique of Chopin’s music, and calmly
munching chocolates out of a basket decorated with eight shades of silk
roses.
“Sit down and have a chocolate, Aunt Helen,” hospitably offered Gail,
slipping a marker in her book.
Mrs. Davies consumed a great deal of time in selecting a chocolate, but
she did not sit down.
“Shall you be at liberty this evening, Gail?” she inquired, with much
carelessness.
“Why?” and Gail, whose feet were stretched out and crossed, in lazy
ease, looked up at her aunt sidewise from under her curving lashes.
Mrs. Davies hesitated a moment.
“Houston Van Ploon would like to call.”
“Are they still downstairs?” Gail suddenly unveiled her eyes, and
brought her slippers squarely in front of her divan. Also she sat bolt
upright.
“Yes,” and Mrs. Davies betrayed signs of nervousness.
“Are they making the appointment for Houston?”
“Yes.” The word drawled.
“Why?” and Gail’s brown eyes began to crackle.
Mrs. Davies thought it better to sit down.
“My dear, a great honour has come to you.”
Gail leaned forward towards her aunt, and tilted her chin.
“Houston wants to propose, and he’s sent his father and sister to find
out if he may!” she charged.
“Yes,” acknowledged Mrs. Davies, driven past the possibility of delay or
preparation, and feeling herself unjustly on the defensive.
“I shall not be at home this evening,” announced Gail decisively, and
stretched out her feet again, and crossed her little grey slippers, and
took a chocolate. “Or any other evening,” she added.
Mrs. Davies lost her flutter immediately. This was too stupendously
serious a matter to be weakly treated.
“My dear, you don’t understand!” she protested, not in anger, but in
patient reason. “Houston Van Ploon has been the unattainable match of
New York. He is a gentleman in every particular, a desirable young man
in every respect, and gifted with everything a young girl would want. He
has so much money that you could buy a kingdom and be a queen, if you
chose to amuse yourself that way. He has a dignified old family, which
makes mere social position seem like an ignominious scramble for
cotillion favours; and it is universally admitted that he is the most
perfect of all the Van Ploons for many generations. Not exceptionally
clever; but that is one of the reasons the Van Ploons are so particular
to find a suitable matrimonial alliance for him.”
Gail, nibbling daintily at her chocolate, closed her eyelids for a
second, the long, brown lashes curved down on her cheeks, and from
beneath them there escaped a sparkle like the snap of live coals, while
the corners of her lips twitched in that little smile which she kept for
her own enjoyment.
“You can not appreciate the compliment which has been paid you, Gail.
Every débutante for the past five years has been most carefully
considered by the Van Ploons, and I sincerely believe this to be the
first time they have unanimously agreed on a choice. It is a matter of
eugenics, Gail, but in addition to that, Mr. Van Ploon assures me that
Houston is most fervently interested.”
“How careless of them,” criticised Gail. “They have neither asked for my
measurements nor examined my teeth.”
“Gail!” Her chaperon and sponsor was both shocked and stern.
“I positively decline to even discuss the Van Ploon eugenics,” stated
Gail, pushing aside her chocolates, while a red spot began to appear on
her cheeks. “I shall not, as I stated before, be at home to Houston Van
Ploon this evening—or any other evening.”
“I shall not deliver that message,” announced Mrs. Davies, setting her
lips. “As your present sponsor, I shall insist that you take more time
to consider a matter so important.”
“I shall insist on refusing to consider it for one second,” returned
Gail quietly. “I am very fond of Houston Van Ploon, and I hope to remain
so, but I wouldn’t marry him under any circumstances. This is firm,
flat, and final.”
Mrs. Helen Davies dropped patient reason instantly. She was aware of an
impulsive wish that Gail were in pinafores, and her own child, so she
could box her ears.
“Gail, you compel me to lose my patience!” she declared. “When you came,
I strained every influence I possessed to have you meet the most
desirable eligibles this big city could offer, just as if you were my
own daughter! I have succeeded in working miracles! I have given you an
opportunity to interest the very best! You have interested them, but I
have never seen such extravagance in the waste of opportunities! You
have refused men whom thousands in the highest circles have sought; and
now you refuse the very choice of them all! What or whom do you want?”
Gail’s red spots were deepening, but she only clasped her knee in her
interlocked fingers, her brown hair waving about her face, and her chin
uptilted.
“You can’t always expect to retain your youth, and beauty and charm!”
went on her Aunt Helen. “You can’t expect to come to New York every year
and look over the eligibles until you find one to suit your fastidious
taste! You’re capricious, you’re ungrateful, and you’re unsatisfactory!”
Gail’s eyes turned suddenly moist, and the red flashed out of her
cheeks.
“Oh, Aunt Helen!” she exclaimed in instant contrition. “I’m so very,
very sorry that I am such a disappointment to you! But if I just can’t
marry Mr. Van Ploon, I can’t, can I? Don’t you see?” She was up now and
down again, sitting on a hassock in front of Mrs. Davies, and the face
which she upturned had in it so much of beautiful appeal that even her
chaperon and sponsor was softened. “I was nasty a while ago, and I had
no excuse for it, for you have been loving and sincere in your desire to
make my future happy. I’m so very, very sorry! I’ll tell you what I’ll
do! You may go down and tell Mr. Van Ploon and his daughter that I will
see Houston this evening,” and then she smiled; “but you mustn’t say
‘with pleasure.’”