As Garrison left his last business conference in K——, where the tall
buildings, and the amazing crowds always seemed such a commentary on
the power and force and wealth of America and the world, and was on
his way to the railway station to take a train for G——, his home city,
his thoughts turned with peculiar emphasis and hope, if not actual
pleasure—and yet it was a pleasure, of a sad, distressed kind—to
Idelle. Where was she now? What was she doing at this particular
moment? It was after four of a gray November afternoon, just the time,
as he well knew, winter or summer, when she so much preferred to be
glowing at an afternoon reception, a “thé dansant,” or a hotel grill
where there was dancing, and always, as he well knew, in company with
those vivid young “sports” or pleasure lovers of the town who were
always following her. Idelle, to do her no injustice, had about her
that something, even after three years of marriage, that drew them,
some of the worst or best—mainly the worst, he thought at times—of
those who made his home city, the great far-flung G——, interesting and
in the forefront socially and in every other way.
What a girl! What a history! And how strange that he should have been
attracted to her at all, he with his forty-eight years, his superior
(oh, very much!) social position, his conservative friends and equally
conservative manners. Idelle was so different, so hoyden, almost
coarse, in her ways at times, actually gross and vulgar (derived from
her French tanner father, no doubt, not her sweet, retiring Polish
mother), and yet how attractive, too, in so many ways, with that
rich russet-brown-gold hair of hers, her brown-black eyes, almost
pupil-less, the iris and pupil being of the same color, and that
trig, vigorous figure, always tailored in the smartest way! She was a
paragon—to him at least—or had been to begin with.
* * * * *
_How tingling and dusty these streets of K—— were, so vital always! How
sharply the taxis of this mid-Western city turned corners!_
* * * * *
But what a period he had endured since he had married her, three years
before! What tortures, what despairs! If only he could make over Idelle
to suit him! But what a wonderful thing that destroying something
called beauty was, especially to one, like himself, who found life
tiresome in so many ways—something to possess, a showpiece against the
certain inroads of time, something wherewith to arouse envy in other
persons.
* * * * *
_At last they were reaching the station!_
* * * * *
She did not deserve that he should love her. It was the most
unfortunate thing for him that he did, but how could he help it now?
How overcome it? How punish her for her misdeeds to him without
punishing himself more? Love was such an inscrutable thing; so often
one lavished it where it was not even wanted. God, he could testify to
that! He was a fine example, really. She cared about as much for him as
she did for the lamp-post on the corner, or an old discarded pair of
shoes. And yet— He was never tired of looking at her, for one thing, of
thinking of her ways, her moods, her secrets. She had not done and was
not doing as she should—it was impossible, he was beginning to suspect,
for her so to do—and still—
* * * * *
_He must stop and send her a telegram before the train left!_
* * * * *
What a pleasure it was, indeed, anywhere and at all times, to have her
hanging on his arm, to walk into a restaurant or drawing-room and to
know that of all those present none had a more attractive wife than he,
not one. For all Idelle’s commonplace birth and lack of position to
begin with, she was the smartest, the best dressed, the most alluring,
by far—at least, he thought so—of all the set in which he had placed
her. Those eyes! That hair! That graceful figure, always so smartly
arrayed! To be sure, she was a little young for him. Their figures
side by side were somewhat incongruous—he with his dignity and years
and almost military bearing, as so many told him, she with that air
of extreme youthfulness and lure which always brought so many of the
younger set to her side wherever they happened to be. Only there was
the other galling thought: That she did not wholly belong to him and
never had. She was too interested in other men, and always had been.
Her youth, that wretched past of hers, had been little more than a
lurid streak of bad, even evil—yes, evil—conduct. She had, to tell the
truth, been a vile girl, sensuous, selfish, inconsiderate, unrepentant,
and was still, and yet he had married her in spite of all that, knowing
it, really. Only at first he had not known quite all.
* * * * *
“_Yes, all three of these! And wait till I get my sleeper ticket!_”
* * * * *
No wonder people had talked, though. He had heard it—that she had
married him for his money, position, that he was too old, that it was a
scandal, etc. Well, maybe it was. But he had been fond of her—terribly
so—and she of him, or seemingly, at first. Yes, she must have been—her
manner, her enthusiasm, if temporary, for him! Those happy, happy first
days they spent together! Her quiet assumption of the rôle of hostess
in Sicard Avenue at first, her manner of receiving and living up to
her duties! It was wonderful, so promising. Yes, there was no doubt of
it; she must have cared for him a little at first. Her brain, too,
required a man of his years to understand—some phases of her moods and
ideas, and as for him—well, he was as crazy about her then as now—more
so, if anything—or was he? Wasn’t she just as wonderful to him now as
she had been then? Truly. Yes, love or infatuation of this kind was a
terrible thing, so impossible to overcome.
* * * * *
“_Car three, section seven!_”
* * * * *
Would he ever forget the night he had first seen her being carried
into the Insull General on that canvas ambulance stretcher, her temple
bruised, one arm broken and internal injuries for which she had to
be operated on at once—a torn diaphragm, for one thing—and of how
she had instantly fascinated him? Her hair was loose and had fallen
over one shoulder, her hands limp. Those hands! That picture! He had
been visiting his old friend Dr. Dorsey and had wondered who she was,
how she came to be in such a dreadful accident and thought her so
beautiful. Think of how her beauty might have been marred, only it
wasn’t, thank goodness!
* * * * *
_His telegram should be delivered in one hour, at most—that would reach
her in time!_
* * * * *
Then and there he had decided that he must know her if she did not die,
that perhaps she might like him as he did her, on the instant; had
actually suffered tortures for fear she would not! Think of that! Love
at first sight for him—and for one who had since caused him so much
suffering—and in her condition, torn and bruised and near to death! It
was wonderful, wasn’t it?
* * * * *
_How stuffy these trains were when one first entered them—coal smoky!_
* * * * *
And that operation! What a solemn thing it was, really, with only
himself, the doctor and three nurses in the empty operating room that
night. Dorsey was so tall, so solemn, but always so courageous. He had
asked if he might not be present, although he did not know her, and
because there were no relatives about to bar him from the room, no one
to look after her or to tell who she was, the accident having occurred
after midnight in the suburbs, he had been allowed by Dorsey to come in.
* * * * *
“_Yes, put them down here!_”
* * * * *
He had pulled on a white slip over his business suit, and clean white
cotton gloves on his hands, and had then been allowed to come into the
observation gallery while Dorsey, assisted by the hospital staff, had
operated. He saw her cut open—the blood—heard her groan heavily under
ether! And all the time wondering who she was. Her history. And pitying
her, too! Fearing she might not come to! How the memory of her pretty
shrewd face, hidden under bandages and a gas cone, had haunted him!
* * * * *
_The train on this other track, its windows all polished, its
dining-car tables set and its lamps already glowing!_
* * * * *
That was another of those fool dreams of his—of love and happiness,
that had tortured him so of late. From the first, almost without quite
knowing it, he had been bewitched, stricken with this fever, and could
not possibly think of her dying. And afterward, with her broken arm set
and her torn diaphragm mended, he had followed her into the private
room which he had ordered and had charged to himself (Dorsey must have
thought it queer!) and then had waited so restlessly at his club until
the next morning, when, standing beside her bed, he had said: “You
don’t know me, but my name is Garrison—Upham Brainerd Garrison. Perhaps
you know of our family here in G——, the Willard Garrisons. I saw you
brought in last night. I want to be of service to you if I may, to
notify your friends, and be of any other use that I can. May I?”
How well he remembered saying that, formulating it all beforehand, and
then being so delighted when she accepted his services with a peculiar,
quizzical smile—that odd, evasive glance of hers!
* * * * *
_Men struck car wheels this way, no doubt, in order to see that they
were not broken, liable to fly to pieces when the train was running
fast and so destroy the lives of all!_
* * * * *
And then she had given him her address—her mother’s, rather, to whom he
went at once, bringing her back with him. And so glad he was to know
that there was only her mother, no husband or— And the flowers he had
sent. And the fruit. And the gifts generally, everything he thought
she might like! And then that queer friendship with Idelle afterwards,
his quickly realized dream of bliss when she had let him call on her
daily, not telling him anything of herself, of course, evading him
rather, and letting him think what he would, but tolerating him! Yes,
she had played her game fair enough, no doubt, only he was so eager to
believe that everything was going to be perfect with them—smooth, easy,
lasting, bliss always. What a fool of love he really was!
* * * * *
_What a disgusting fat woman coming in with all her bags! Would this
train never start?_
* * * * *
At that time—how sharply it had all burned itself into his memory!—he
had found her living as a young widow with her baby daughter at her
mother’s, only she wasn’t a widow really. It was all make-believe.
Already she had proved a riant scoffer at the conventions, a wastrel,
only then he did not know that. Where he thought he was making an
impression on a fairly unsophisticated girl, or at least one not
roughly used by the world, in reality he was merely a new sensation
to her, an incident, a convenience, something to lift her out of a
mood or a dilemma in which she found herself. Although he did not know
it then, one of two quarreling men had just attempted to kill her via
that automobile accident and she had been wishing peace, escape from
her own thoughts and the attentions of her two ardent wooers, for the
time being, at the time he met her. But apart from these, even, there
were others, or had been before them, a long line apparently of almost
disgusting—but no, he could not say quite that—creatures with whom she
had been—well, why say it? And he had fancied for the moment that he
was the big event in her life—or might be! He!
But even so, what difference did all that make either, if only she
would love him now? What would he care who or what she was, or what she
had done before, if only she really cared for him as much as he cared
for her—or half as much—or even a minute portion! But Idelle could
never care for any one really, or at least not for him, or him alone,
anyway. She was too restless, too fond of variety in life. Had she not,
since the first six or seven months in which she had known and married
him, little more than tolerated him? She did not really need to care
for anybody; they all cared for her, sought her.
* * * * *
_At last they were going!_
* * * * *
Too many men of station and means—younger than himself, as rich or
richer, far more clever and fascinating in every way than he would ever
be (or she would think so because she really liked a gayer, smarter
type than he had ever been or ever could be now)—vied with him for her
interest, and had with each other before ever he came on the scene.
She was, in her queer way, a child of fortune, a genius of passion and
desire, really. Life would use her well for some time yet, whatever
she did to him or any other person, or whatever he sought to do to her
in revenge, if he ever did, because she was interesting and desirable.
Why attempt to deny that? She was far too attractive yet, too clever,
too errant, too indifferent, too spiritually free, to be neglected by
any one yet, let alone by such seeking, avid, pleasure lovers as always
followed her. And because she wouldn’t allow him to interfere (that was
the basis on which she had agreed to marry him, her personal freedom)
she had always been able to go and do and be what she chose, nearly,
just as she was going and doing now.
* * * * *
_These wide yards and that ruck of shabby yellow-and-black houses,
begrimed and dirty externally, and internally no doubt, with souls in
them nearly as drab, perhaps. How much better it was to be rich like
himself and Idelle; only she valued her station so lightly!_
* * * * *
Always, wherever he went these days, and his affairs prevented him from
being with her very much, she was in his mind—what she was doing, where
she was going, with whom she might be now—ah, the sickening thought,
with whom she might be now, and where—with that young waster Keene,
possibly, with his millions, his shooting preserve and his yacht; or
Browne, equally young and still in evidence, though deserted by her to
marry him, Garrison; or Coulstone, with whom Idelle had had that highly
offensive affair in Pittsburgh five years before, when she was only
eighteen. Eighteen! The wonder year! He, too, was here in G—— now after
all these years, this same Coulstone, and after Idelle had left him
once! Yes, he was hanging about her again, wanting her to come back and
marry him, although each of them had remarried!
* * * * *
_That flock of crows flying across that distant field!_
* * * * *
Of course, Idelle laughed at it, or pretended to. She pretended to
be faithful to him, to tell him all this was unavoidable gossip, the
aftermath of a disturbing past, before ever she saw him. But could he
believe her? Was she not really planning so to do—leave him and return
to Coulstone, this time legally? How could he tell? But think of the
vagaries of human nature and character, the conniving and persuasive
power of a man of wealth like Coulstone. He had left his great business
in Pittsburgh to come here to G—— in order to be near her and annoy him
(Garrison) really—not her, perhaps—with his pleas and crazy fascination
and adoration when she was now safely and apparently happily married!
Think of the strangeness, the shame, the peculiarity of Idelle’s
earlier life! And she still insisted that this sort of thing was
worth while! All his own station and wealth and adoration were not
enough—because he could not be eight or ten people at once, no doubt.
But why should he worry? Why not let her go? To the devil with her,
anyhow! She merely pretended to love him in her idle, wanton spirit,
because she could—well, because she could play at youth and love!
* * * * *
_Barkersburg—a place of 30,000, and the train not stopping! The sun,
breaking through for just one peep at this gray day, under those trees!_
* * * * *
The trouble with his life, as Garrison now saw it, was that throughout
it for the last twenty years, and before that even, in spite of his
youth and money, he had been craving the favor of just such a young,
gay, vigorous, attractive creature as Idelle or Jessica—she of his
earlier years—and not realizing it, until he met Idelle, his desire.
And this, of course, had placed him at a disadvantage in dealing with
women like them. Years before—all of fourteen now, think of it!—there
had been that affair between himself and Jessica, daughter of the rich
and fashionable Balloghs, of Lexington, which had ended so disastrously
for him. He had been out there on Colonel Ledgebrook’s estate attending
to some property which belonged to his father when she had crossed his
path at the colonel’s house, that great estate in Bourbon County. Then,
for the first time really, he had realized the delight of having a
truly beautiful girl interested in him, and him alone, of being really
attracted to him—for a little while. It was wonderful.
* * * * *
_The smothered clang of that crossing bell!_
* * * * *
But also what a failure! How painful to hark back to that, and yet how
could he avoid it? Although it had seemed to end so favorably—he having
been able to win and marry her—still in reality it had ended most
disastrously, she having eventually left him as she did. Jessica, too,
was like Idelle in so many ways, as young, as gay, nearly as forceful,
not as pretty, and not with Idelle’s brains. You had to admit that in
connection with Idelle. She had more brains, force, self-reliance,
intuition, than most women he knew anything about, young or old.
But to return to Jessica. At first she seemed to think he was
wonderful, a man of the world, clever, witty, a lover of light,
frivolous, foolish things, such as dancing, drinking, talking idle
nonsense, which he was not at all. Yes, that was where he had always
failed, apparently, and always would. He had no flair, and clever women
craved that.
* * * * *
_That flock of pigeons on that barn roof!_
* * * * *
At bottom really he had always been slow, romantic, philosophic,
meditative, while trying in the main to appear something else, whereas
these other men, those who were so successful with women at least, were
hard and gay and quick and thoughtless, or so he thought. They said and
did things more by instinct than he ever could, were successful—well,
just because they were what they were. You couldn’t do those things
by just trying to. And gay, pretty, fascinating women, such as Idelle
or Jessica, the really worthwhile ones, seemed to realize this
instinctively and to like that kind and no other. When they found a
sober and reflective man like himself, or one even inclined to be,
they drew away from him. Yes, they did; not consciously always, but
just instinctively. They wanted only men who tingled and sparkled and
glittered like themselves. To think that love must always go by blind
instinct instead of merit—genuine, adoring passion!
* * * * *
_This must be Phillipsburg coming into view! He couldn’t mistake that
high, round water tower!_
* * * * *
Ah, the tragedy of seeing and knowing this and not being able to remedy
it, of not being able to make oneself over into something like that!
Somehow, Jessica had been betrayed by his bog-fire resemblance to the
thing which she took him to be. He was a bog fire and nothing more, in
so far as she was concerned, all she thought he was. Yet because he
was so hungry, no doubt, for a woman of her type he had pretended that
he was “the real thing,” as she so liked to describe a gay character,
a man of habits, bad or good, as you choose; one who liked to gamble,
shoot, race, and do a lot of things which he really did not care for
at all, but which the crowd or group with which he was always finding
himself, or with whom he hoped to appear as somebody, was always doing
and liking.
* * * * *
_These poor countrymen, always loitering about their village stations!_
* * * * *
And the women they ran with were just like them, like Jessica, like
Idelle—smart, showy and liked that sort of man—and so—
Well, he had pretended to be all that and more, when she (Jessica) had
appeared out of that gay group, petite, blonde (Idelle was darker),
vivacious, drawn to him by his seeming reality as a man of the world
and a gay cavalier. She had actually fallen in love with him at sight,
as it were, or seemed to be at the time—she!—and then, see what had
happened! Those awful months in G—— after she had returned with him!
The agonies of mind and body!
* * * * *
_If only that stout traveling man in that gray suit would cease staring
at him! It must be the horn-rimmed glasses he had on which interested
him so! These mid-Western people!_
* * * * *
Instantly almost, only a few weeks after they were married, she seemed
to realize that she had made a mistake. It seemed not to make the
slightest difference to her, after the first week or so, that they
were married or that he was infatuated with her or that he was who he
was or that her every move and thought were beautiful to him. On the
contrary, it seemed only to irritate her all the more. She seemed to
sense then—not before—that he was really the one man not suited to her
by temperament or taste or ideas, not the kind she imagined she was
getting, and from then on there were the most terrible days, terrible—
* * * * *
_That pretty girl turning in at that village gate!_
* * * * *
Trying, depressing, degrading really. What dark frowns used to flash
across her face like clouds at that time—she was nineteen to his
twenty-four, and so pretty!—the realization, perhaps, that she had
made a mistake. What she really wanted was the gay, anachronistic,
unthinking, energetic person he had seemed to be under the stress of
the life at Ledgebrook’s, not the quiet, reasoning, dreamy person he
really was. It was terrible!
* * * * *
_Tall trees made such shadowy aisles at evening!_
* * * * *
Finally she had run away, disappeared completely one morning after
telling him she was going shopping, and then never seeing him any
more—ever—not even once! A telegram from Harrisburg had told him that
she was going to her mother’s and for him not to follow her, please;
and then before he could make up his mind really what to do had come
that old wolf Caldwell, the famous divorce lawyer of G——, representing
her mother, no doubt, and in smooth, ingratiating, persuasive tones
had talked about the immense folly of attempting to adjust natural
human antipathies, the sadness of all human inharmonies, the value of
quiet in all attempts at separation, the need he had to look after his
own social prestige in G——, and the like, until finally Caldwell had
persuaded him to accept a decree of desertion in some Western state in
silence and let her go out of his life forever! Think of that!
* * * * *
_The first call for dinner! Perhaps he had better go at once and have
it over with! He wanted to retire early to-night!_
* * * * *
But Jessica—how she had haunted him for years after that! The whole
city seemed to suggest her at times, even after he heard that she was
married again and the mother of two children, so strong was the feeling
for anything one lost. Even to this day certain corners in G——, the
Brandingham, where they had lived temporarily at first; Mme. Gateley’s
dressmaking establishment, where she had had her gowns made, and the
Tussockville entrance to the park—always touched and hurt him like some
old, dear, poignant melody.
* * * * *
_How this train lurched as one walked! The crashing couplings between
these cars!_
* * * * *
And then, after all these busy, sobering years, in which he had found
out that there were some things he was not and could not be—a gay,
animal man of the town, for instance, a “blood,” a waster; and some
things that he was—a fairly capable financial and commercial man, a
lover of literature of sorts, and of horses, a genial and acceptable
person in many walks of society—had come Idelle.
* * * * *
_Think of the dining-car being crowded thus early! And such people!_
* * * * *
He was just settling down to a semi-resigned acceptance of himself as
an affectional, emotional failure in so far as women were concerned,
when she had come—Idelle—this latest storm which had troubled him so
much. Idelle had brains, beauty, force, insight—more than Jessica ever
had had, or was he just older?—and that was what made her so attractive
to men, so indifferent to women, so ready to leave him to do all the
worshiping. She could understand him, apparently, at his time of life,
with his sober and in some ways sad experiences, and sympathize with
him most tenderly when she chose, and yet, strangely enough, she could
ignore him also and be hard, cruel, indifferent. The way she could
neglect him at times—go her own way! God!
* * * * *
_Not a bad seat, only now it was too dark to see anything outside!
These heavy forks!_
* * * * *
But to return to that dreadful pagan youth of hers, almost half-savage:
take that boy who shot himself at the age of sixteen for love of her,
and all because she would not run away with him, not caring for him at
all, as she said, or she would have gone! What a sad case that was, as
she had told it, at least. The boy’s father had come and denounced her
to her parents in her own home, according to her, and still she denied
that it had been her fault. And those other two youths, one of whom had
embezzled $10,000 and spent it on her and several other boys and girls!
And that other one who had stolen five hundred in small sums from his
father’s till and safe and then wasted it on her and her companions at
country inns until he was caught! Those country clubs! Those little
rivers she described, with their canoes—the automobiles of these
youths—the dancing, eating, drinking life under the moon in the warmth
of spring and summer under the trees! And he had never had anything
like that, never! When one of the boys, being caught, complained of her
to his parents as the cause of his evil ways she had denied it, or so
she said, and did still to this day, saying she really did not know he
was stealing the money and calling him coward or cry-baby. Idelle told
him of this several years ago as though it had some humorous aspects,
as possibly it had, to her—who knows? but with some remorse, too, for
she was not wholly indifferent to the plight of these youths, although
she contended that what she had given them of her time and youth and
beauty was ample compensation. Yes, she was a bad woman, really, or had
been—a bad girl, say what one would, a child of original evil impulse.
One could not deny that really. But what fascination also, even yet,
and then no doubt—terrible! He could understand the actions of those
youths, their recklessness. There was something about sheer beauty,
evil though it might be, which overcame moral prejudices or scruples.
It had done so in his case, or why was he living with her? And so why
not in theirs?
* * * * *
_How annoying to have a train stop in a station while you were eating!_
* * * * *
Beauty, beauty, beauty! How could one gainsay the charm or avoid
the lure of it? Not he, for one. Trig, beautiful women, who carried
themselves with an air and swing and suggested by their every movement
passion, alertness, gayety of mind! The church bells might ring and
millions of religionists preach of a life hereafter with a fixed table
of rewards and punishments, but what did any one know of the future,
anyhow? Nothing! Exactly nothing, in spite of all the churches. Life
appeared and disappeared again; a green door opened and out you went,
via a train wreck, for instance, on a night like this. All these
farmers here tilling their fields and making their little homes and
towns—where would they be in forty or fifty years, with all their
moralities? No, here and now was life, here and now beauty—here and now
Idelle, or creatures like her and Jessica.
* * * * *
_He would pay his bill and go into the smoker for a change. It would be
pleasant to sit there until his berth was made up._
* * * * *
Then, take that affair of the banker’s son, young Gratiot it was, whom
he knew well even now here in G——, only Gratiot did not know that he
knew—or did he? Perhaps he was still friendly with Idelle, although she
denied it. You could never really believe her. He it was, according to
her, who had captured her fancy with his fine airs and money and car
when she was only seventeen, and then robbed her (or could you call it
robbery in Idelle’s case, seeking, restless creature that she was?) of
her indifferent innocence. No robbery there, surely, whatever she might
say.
* * * * *
_Those fascinating coke ovens blazing in the dark beside the track,
mile after mile!_
* * * * *
Somehow her telling him these things at first, or rather shortly after
they were married and when she was going to make a clean breast of
everything and lead a better life, had thrown a wonderful glamour over
her past.
* * * * *
_“Gay Stories”! What a name for a magazine! And that stout old
traveling man reading it!_
* * * * *
What a strange thing it was to be a girl like that—with passions and
illusions like that! Perhaps, after all, life only came to those who
sought it with great strength and natural gifts. But how hard it was
on those who hadn’t anything of that kind! Nevertheless, people should
get over the follies of their youth—Idelle should, anyhow. She had
had enough, goodness knows. She had been one of the worst—hectic,
vastly excited about life, irresponsible—and she should have sobered by
now. Why not? Look at all he had to offer her! Was that not enough to
effect a change? While it made her interesting at times, this left-over
enthusiasm, still it was so ridiculous, and made her non-desirable,
too, either as wife or mother. Yet no doubt that was what had made her
so fascinating to him, too, at this late day and to all those other
men in B—— and elsewhere—that blazing youthfulness. Strange as it
might seem, he could condone Idelle’s dreadful deeds even now, just as
her mother could, if she would only behave herself, if she would only
love him and him alone—but would she? She seemed so determined to bend
everything to her service, regardless,—to yield nothing to him.
* * * * *
_No use! He couldn’t stand these traveling men in this smoking room! He
must have the porter make up his berth!_
* * * * *
And then had come Coulstone, the one who was still hanging about her
now, the one with whom she had had that dreadful affair in Pittsburgh,
the affair that always depressed him to think about even now. Of
course, there was one thing to be said in extenuation of that, if you
could say anything at all—which you couldn’t really—and that was that
Idelle was no longer a good girl then, but experienced and with all
her blazing disposition aroused. She had captured the reins of her
life then and was doing as she pleased—only why couldn’t he have met
her then instead of Coulstone? He was alive then. And his own life had
always been so empty. When she had confessed so much of all this to him
afterward—not this Coulstone affair exactly, but the other things—why
hadn’t he left her then? He might have and saved himself all this
agony—or could he have then? He was twice her age when he married her
and knew better, only he thought he could reform her—or did he? Was
that the true reason? Could he admit the true reason to himself?
* * * * *
_“Yes, make it up right away, if you will!” Now he would have to wait
about and be bored!_
* * * * *
But to come back to the story of Coulstone and all that hectic life
in Pittsburgh. Coulstone, it seems, had been one of four or five very
wealthy young managing vice-presidents of the Iverson-Centelever Frog
and Switch Company, of Pittsburgh. And Idelle, because her father had
suddenly died after her affair with young Gratiot, never knowing a
thing about it, and her mother, not knowing quite what to do with her,
had (because Idelle seemed to wish it) sent her to stay with an aunt
in Pittsburgh. But the aunt having to leave for a time shortly after
Idelle reached there, a girl friend had, at Idelle’s instigation,
apparently, suggested that she stay with her until the aunt’s return,
and Idelle had then persuaded her mother to agree to that.
* * * * *
_That tall, lanky girl having to sleep in that upper berth opposite!
European sleeping cars were so much better!_
* * * * *
Her girl friend was evidently something like Idelle, or even worse.
At any rate, Idelle appeared to have been able to wind her around her
finger. For through her she had found some method of being introduced
to (or letting them introduce themselves) a few of these smart new-rich
men of the town, among them two of these same vice-presidents, one
of whom was Coulstone. According to Idelle, he was a lavish and even
reckless spender, wanting it to appear generally that he could do
anything and have anything that money could buy, and liking to be
seen in as many as a dozen public places in one afternoon or evening,
especially at week-ends, only there weren’t so many in Pittsburgh at
the time.
* * * * *
_This must be Centerfield, the state capital of E——, they were now
passing without a pause! These expresses cut through so many large
cities!_
* * * * *
From the first, so Idelle said, he had made violent love to her,
though he was already married (unhappily, of course), and she, caring
nothing for the conventions and not being of the kind that obeys any
laws (wilful, passionate, reckless), had received him probably in
exactly the spirit in which he approached her, if not more so. That
was the worst of her, her constant, wilful, pagan pursuit of pleasure,
regardless of anybody or anything, and it still held her in spite of
him. There was something revolting about the sheer animality of it,
that rushing together of two people, regardless. Still, if it had been
himself and Idelle now—
* * * * *
_How fortunate that he had been able to obtain a section! At least he
would have air!_
* * * * *
There had been a wild season, according to her own admissions or
boastings—he could never quite tell which—extending over six or seven
months, during which time Idelle had pretended to her mother, so she
said, to prefer to live with her girl friend rather than return home.
She had had, according to her, her machine, her servants, clothes
without end, and what-not—a dream-world of luxury and freedom which he
had provided and from which she never expected to wake, and her mother
totally ignorant of it all the while! There had been everything she
wished at her finger tips—hectic afternoons, evenings and midnights;
affairs at country clubs or hotel grills, where the young bloods of the
city and their girls congregated; wild rides in automobiles; visits to
the nearest smartest watering-places, and the like. Or was she lying?
He could scarcely think so, judging by her career with him and others
since.
* * * * *
_Ah, what a comfort to fix oneself this way and rest, looking at the
shadowy moonlit landscape passing by!_
* * * * *
Idelle had often admitted or boasted that she had been wildly
happy—that was the worst of it—that she had not quite realized what she
was doing, but that she had no remorse either, even now—that she had
lived! (And why should she have, perhaps? Weren’t all people really
selfish at bottom—or were they?) Only, owing to her almost insatiable
pagan nature, there were other complications right then and there—think
of that!—an older rival millionaire, if you please, richer by far than
Coulstone, and more influential locally ... and younger ones, too, who
sought her but really did not win her, she having no time or plan for
them. As it happened, the older one, having been worsted in the contest
but being partially tolerated by her, had become frantically jealous
and envious, although “he had no right,” as she said, and had finally
set about making trouble for the real possessor, and succeeded to the
extent of exposing him and eventually driving him out of the great
concern with which he was connected and out of Pittsburgh, too, if you
please, on moral grounds (?), although he himself was trying to follow
in Coulstone’s footsteps! And all for the love or possession of a
nineteen-year-old girl, a petticoat, a female ne’er-do-well! How little
the world in general knew of such things—and it was a blessed thing,
too, by George! Where would things be if everybody went on like that?
* * * * *
_The rhythmic clack of these wheels and trucks over these sleeper
joints—a poetic beat, of sorts!_
* * * * *
But Idelle was so naïve about all this now, or pretended to be, so
careless of what he or any one else might think in case they ever found
out. She did not seem to guess how much he might suffer by her telling
him all this, or how much pain thinking about it afterward might cause
him. She was too selfish intellectually. She didn’t even guess,
apparently, what his mood might be toward all this, loving her as he
did. No—she really didn’t care for him, or any one else—couldn’t, or
she couldn’t have done anything like that. She would have lied to him
rather. She had been, and was—although now semi-reformed—a heartless,
careless wastrel, thinking of no one but herself. She had not cared
about the wives of either of those two men who were pursuing her in
B——, or what became of them, or what became of any of the others who
had pursued her since. All she wanted was to be danced attendance on,
to be happy, free, never bored. The other fellow never counted with
Idelle much. In this case the wife of the younger lover, Coulstone, had
been informed, the conservatives of the city appealed to, as it were.
Coulstone, seeing the storm and being infatuated with his conquest,
suggested Paris or a few years on the Riviera, but, strangely enough,
Idelle would have none of it, or him, then. She wouldn’t agree to be
tied down for so long! She had suffered a reversal of conscience or
mood—even—or so she said,—went to a priest, went into retirement here
in G——, having fled her various evil pursuers.
* * * * *
_How impressive the outlying slopes of these mountains they were just
entering!_
* * * * *
And yet he could understand that, too, in some people, anyhow,—the one
decent thing in her life maybe, a timely revolt against a too great
and unbroken excess. But, alas, it had been complicated with the fact
that she wasn’t ready to leave her mother or to do anything but stay
in America. Besides things were becoming rather complicated. The war
on J—— C—— threatened to expose her. Worse yet,—and so like her, life
had won her back. Her beauty, her disposition, youth and age pursuing
her—one slight concession to indulgence or pleasure after another and
the new mood or bent toward religiosity was entirely done away with.
Her sensual sex nature had conquered, of course.
* * * * *
_That little cabin on that slope, showing a lone lamp in the dark!_
* * * * *