A “BETTER SELF.”
EMILY went directly to her room. “Tell Miss Gresham not to wait,” she
said to the maid, “and please save only a very little for me.” She
slept two hours and awoke free from the headache, but low-spirited.
Joan came into the dining-room to keep her company while she tried to
eat, then they sat in the library-drawing-room before the fire. For the
first time in years Emily felt that she needed advice, or, at least,
needed to state her case aloud in hope of seeing it more clearly.
“You are not well this evening,” Joan said presently. “Shall I read to
you?”
“No, let us talk. Or, rather, please encourage me to talk about myself.
I want to tell you something, and I don’t know how to begin.”
“Don’t begin. I’m sure you’ll regret it. Whenever I feel the
confidential mood coming, I always put it off till to-morrow.”
“Yes--but--there are times----”
“Do you wish me to approve something you’ve decided to do, or to
dissuade you from doing something you would not do anyhow? It’s always
one or the other.”
“I’m not sure which it is.”
Joan lit a cigarette and stretched herself among the cushions of the
divan. “Well, what is it? Money?”
“No.”
“Then it’s not serious. Money troubles and poor health are about the
only serious calamities.”
“No--it’s--Joan, I’ve been making an idiot of myself. I’ve lost my head
over a married man.” The words came with a rush.
“But you practically confessed all that the other day. And I told you
then what I thought. Either get rid of him straight off, or steady your
head and let him hang about until you are sick of him.”
“But--you don’t understand. Of course you couldn’t. No one ever did
understand another’s case.”
“I don’t think it’s that, my dear. When one is in love, he or she
thinks it’s a peculiar case. And the stronger his or her imagination,
the more peculiar seems the case. But when it’s submitted to an
outsider, then it is looked at in the clear air, not in the fog of
self-delusion. And how it does shrink!”
“I want him and he wants me,” said Emily doggedly. “It may be
commonplace and ridiculous, but it’s the fact.”
“Do you think it would last long enough to enable him to get a divorce?
If so, he can do that. There’s nothing easier nowadays than divorce.
And what a dreadful blow to intrigue that has been! It doesn’t leave
either party a leg to stand on. Just say to him: ‘Yes, I love you.
You say you love me. Go and get a divorce and then perhaps I’ll marry
you. But if not, you’ll at least be free from daily contact with the
wife you say or intimate that you loathe.’ It’s perfectly simple. The
chances are you’ll never see him again, and you can have a laugh at
yourself, and can congratulate yourself on a narrow escape.”
“Good advice, but it doesn’t fit the case.”
“Oh, you don’t wish to marry him?”
“I never thought of it. But I’d rather not discuss the sentiment-side,
please. Just the practical side.”
“But there isn’t any practical side. Why doesn’t he get a divorce?”
“Because he’s too conspicuous. There’d be an outcry against him. I
don’t believe he could get the divorce.”
Emily was gazing miserably into the fire. Joan looked at her pityingly.
“Oh,” she said gently, dropping the tone of banter. “Yes--that might
be.”
“And it seems to me that I can’t give him up.”
“But why do you debate it? Why not follow where your instinct leads?”
“That’s just it--where _does_ my instinct lead? If--the--the
circumstances--I can’t explain them to you--were different with him
about--about his family, I’d probably reason that I was not robbing any
one and would try to--to be happy. But----”
She halted altogether and, when she continued, her voice was low and
she was looking at her friend, pleadingly yet proudly: “You may be
right. We may be deceiving ourselves. But I do not think so, Joan. I
believe--and you do too, don’t you?--that there can be high thoughts in
common between a man and a woman. I’m sure they can care in such a way
that passion becomes like the fire, fusing two metals into one stronger
and better than either by itself. And I think--I feel--yes, it seems to
me I _know_, that it is so with us. Oh, Joan, he and I need each the
other.”
Joan threw away her cigarette and rested her head upon her arms, so
that her face was concealed from Emily. She murmured something.
“What do you say, Joan?”
“Nothing--only--I see the same old, the eternal illusion. And what a
fascinating tenacious illusion it is, Emmy dear. We no sooner banish it
in one form than it reappears in another.”
“But--tell me, Joan--what shall I do?”
“I, advise you? No, my dear. I cannot. I’d have to know you better than
you know yourself to give you advice. You have grown into a certain
sort of woman, with certain ideas of what you may and what you may not
do. In this crisis you’ll follow the path into which your whole past
compels you. And while I don’t know you well enough to give you advice,
I do know you well enough to feel sure that you’ll do what is just and
honourable. If that means renunciation, you will renounce him. If it
means defiance, you will defy. If it means a compromise, why--I don’t
think you’ll make it, Emily, unless you can carry your secret and
still feel that the look of no human being could make you flinch.”
“Will I?” Emily’s voice was dreary and doubtful. “But, when one is
starving, he doesn’t look at the Ten Commandments before seizing the
bread that offers.”
“Not at the Ten Commandments--no. But at the one--‘Thou shalt not kill
thy self-respect.’ And don’t forget, dear, that if you aren’t valuable
to the world _without_ love, you’ll be worth very little to it _with_
love.”
“Joan’s Professor” came, and Emily went away to bed.
* * * * *
On her “lazy day” she went into the Park and seated herself under an
elm high among the rocks. Several squirrels were playing about her and
a fat robin was hopping round and round in a wide circle, pretending
to be interested only in the food supply but really watching her. The
path leading to her retreat turned abruptly just before reaching it,
then turned again for the descent. She did not hear a footstep but,
looking up as she was shifting her glance from one page of her novel
to the next, she saw a child before her--a tall child with slim legs
and arms, and a body that looked thin but strong under a white dress.
She had a pink ribbon at her throat. Her hair was almost golden and
waved defiantly around and away from a large pink bow. Her eyes were
large and gray and solemn. But at each corner of her small mouth there
was a fun-loving line which betrayed possibilities of mischief and
appreciation of mischief. This suggestion was confirmed by her tilted
nose.
Emily smiled at this vision criss-crossed with patches of sun and
shadow. But the vision did not smile in return.
“Good morning, Princess Pink-and-white,” said Emily. “Did you come down
out of the sky?”
“No,” answered the child, drawing a little nearer. “And my name is
not--not that, but Mary. Do you live here?”
“Yes--this is my home,” answered Emily. “I’m the big sister of the
squirrels and a cousin to the robins.”
The child looked at her carefully, then at the squirrels and then at
the robin. “You are not truthful,” she said, her large eyes gazing
straight into Emily’s. “My uncle says that it is dishon’able not to
tell the truth.”
“Even in fun, while you are trying to make friends with Mary, Princess
Pink-and-white?” Emily said this with the appearance of anxiety.
“It’s bad not to always tell the truth to young people.” She came still
nearer and stood straight and serious, her hands behind her. “My uncle
says they ought to hear and say only what is true.”
“Well then--what does he tell you about fairies?”
“He doesn’t tell me about them. Mamma says there are fairies, but he
says he has never seen any. He says when I am older I can find out for
myself.”
“And what do the other children say?”
“I don’t know. There aren’t any other children. There’s just uncle and
mamma and nurse. And when mamma is ill, I go to stay with nurse. And I
only go out with uncle or mamma.”
“That is very nice,” said Emily, taking one of the small, slender hands
and kissing it. But in reality she thought it was the reverse of nice,
and very lonely and sad.
“I was going away across the ocean where there are lots of children
waiting to play with me. But mamma--she hadn’t been sick for a long,
long time--most two years, I think--and then she was sick again and I’m
not to go. But I’m not sorry.”
“Why?”
“I’m a great comfort to uncle, and he wasn’t going along. And I’m glad
to stay with him. He says I’m a great comfort to him. I sing to him
when he is feeling bad. Would you like for me to sing to you? You look
as if you felt bad.”
Emily did feel like tears. It was not what the child said, but her
air of aloneness, of ignorance of the pleasures of childhood and its
companionships. She seemed never to have been a child and at the same
time to be far too much a child for her years--apparently the result of
an attempt by grown persons to bring her up in a dignified way without
destroying the innocence of infancy.
“Yes, I should like to hear you sing,” said Emily.
The child sat, folded her hands in her lap and began to sing in
French--a slow, religious chant, low and with an intonation of
ironic humour. As Emily heard the words, she looked at “Princess
Pink-and-White” in amazement. It was a concert-hall song, such as is
rarely heard outside the cafés chantants of the boulevards--a piece of
subtle mockery with a double meaning. The child sang it through, then
looked at her for approval.
“It’s in French,” was all Emily could say, and the child with quick
intuition saw that something was wrong.
“You don’t like it,” she said, offended.
“You sing beautifully,” replied Emily. She wished to ask her where she
had got the song, but felt that it would be prying.
“Mamma taught it me the last time she was being taken ill. It was hard
to learn because I do not speak French. I had to go over it three
times. She said I wasn’t to sing it to uncle. But I thought _you_ might
like it.”
“No, I shouldn’t sing it to uncle, if I were you,” said Emily.
Just then the child rose and her face lighted up. Emily followed her
glance and saw Stilson at the turn of the path, standing like a statue.
He was looking not at the child, but at her. The child ran toward him
and he put his hand at her neck and drew her close to him.
“Why, how d’ye do, Mr. Stilson,” said Emily, cordially. “This is the
first time I’ve seen you since I was leaving for Paris. As soon as I
came back I asked for you, but you were on vacation. And I thought you
were still away.”
Stilson advanced reluctantly, a queer light in his keen, dark-gray
eyes. He shook hands and seated himself. Mary occupied the vacant space
on the bench between him and Emily, spreading out her skirts carefully
so that they should not be mussed. “I am still idling,” said Stilson.
“I hate hotels and I loathe mosquitoes. Besides, I think if I ever got
beyond the walls of this prison I’d run away and never return.”
“So you too grow tired of your work?” said Emily. “Yet you are
editor-in-chief now, and-- Oh, I should think it would be fascinating.”
“It would have been a few years ago. But everything comes late. One
has worked so hard for it that one is too exhausted to enjoy it. And
it means work and care--always more and more work and care. But,
pardon me. I’m in one of my depressed moods. And I didn’t expect any
one--you--to surprise me in it.”
Emily looked at him, her eyes giving, and demanding, sympathy. “I
often wish that life would offer something worth having, not as a free
gift--I shouldn’t ask that, and not at a bargain even, but just at a
fair price.”
“I’m surprised to find such parsimony in one so young--it’s unnatural.”
Stilson’s expression and tone were good-humoured cynicism. “Why, at
your age, with your wealth--youth is always rich--you ought never to
look at or think of price marks.”
“But I can’t help it. I come from New England.”
“Ah! Then it’s stranger still. With the aid of a New England conscience
you ought to cheat life out of the price.”
“I do try, but--” Emily sighed--“I’m always caught and made pay the
more heavily.”
Stilson studied her curiously. He was smiling with some mockery as he
said. “You must be cursed with a sense of duty. That sticks to one
closer than his shadow. The shadow leaves with the sunshine. But duty
is there, daylight or dark.”
“Especially dark,” said Emily. “What a slavery it is! To tramp the
dusty, stony highway close beside gardens that are open and inviting;
and not to be able to enter.”
His strong, handsome face became almost stern. “I don’t agree with
you. Suppose that you entered the gardens, would they seem good if you
looked back and saw your better self lying dead in the dust?” He seemed
to be talking to himself not to her.
“But don’t you ever wish to be free?” she asked.
“I _am_ free--absolutely free,” he said proudly. “One does not become
free by license, by cringing before the stupidest, the most foolish
impulses there are in him. I think he becomes free by refusing to
degrade himself and violate the law of his own nature.”
“But--What is stupid and what isn’t?”
“No one could answer that in a general way. All I can say is--” Stilson
seemed to her to be looking her through and through. “Did you ever have
any doubt in any particular case?”
Emily hesitated, her eyes shifting, a faint flush rising to her cheeks.
“Yes,” she said.
“Then that very doubt told you what was foolish and what intelligent.
Didn’t it?”
Stilson was not looking at her now and she studied his face--mature yet
young, haughty yet kind. Strong passions, good and bad, had evidently
contended, were still contending, behind that interesting mask.
“No,” he went on, “if ever you make up your mind to do wrong,”--His
voice was very gentle and seemed to her to have an undercurrent of
personal appeal in it--“don’t lie to yourself. Just look at the
temptation frankly, and at the price. And, if you will or must, why,
pay and make off with your paste diamonds or gold brick or whatever
little luxury of that kind you’ve gone into Mr. License’s shop to buy.
What is the use of lying to one’s self? We are poor creatures indeed,
it seems to me, if there isn’t at least one person whom we dare face
with the honest truth.”
Emily had always had a profound respect for Stilson. She knew his
abilities; and, while Marlowe had usually praised his friend with
discreet reservations, she had come to know that Marlowe regarded him
as little, if at all, short of a genius in his power of leading and
directing men. As he talked to her, restating the familiar fundamentals
of practical morals, she felt a strong force at work upon her. Like
Stanhope he impressed her with his great personal power; but wholly
unlike him, Stilson seemed to be using that power to an end which
attracted her without setting the alarm bells of reason and prudence to
ringing.
“I’m rather surprised to find you so conventional,” said Emily, by way
of resenting the effect he and his “sermon” were having upon her.
“Conventional?” Stilson lifted his eyebrows and gave her an amused,
satirical look. “Am I? Then the world must have changed suddenly. No, I
wasn’t pleading for any particular code of conduct. Make up your code
to suit yourself. All I venture to insist is that you must live up to
your own code, whatever it is. Be a law unto yourself; but, when you
have been, don’t become a law breaker.”
“Do you think mamma will be well enough for me to go home to-morrow?”
It was the little girl, weary of being unnoticed and bursting into the
conversation.
Stilson started as if he had forgotten that she was there.
“Perhaps--yes--dear,” he said and rose at once. “We must be going.”
“Good-bye,” said Mary. Emily took her hand and kissed it. But the
child, with a quaint mingling of shyness and determination, put up her
face to be kissed, and adjusted her lips to show where she wished the
kiss to be placed. “Good-bye,” she repeated. “I know who you are now.
You are the Violet Lady Uncle Robert puts in the stories he tells me.”
“Come, Mary,” said Stilson severely. And he lifted his hat, but not his
eyes, and bowed very formally.
Emily sat staring absently at the point at which they had disappeared.