One day, on the street, Quincy saw Professor Deering. Quincy was hurt at
the Professor. He was in a mood for a cold bow that would leave its
mark. But the big man stopped him and talked the mood away in
cordiality.
“Mr. Burt--I am ashamed of myself,” he smiled wanly. “There have been
worries and they have made me rude. Walk me home, now, will you?”
Quincy followed tacitly at his side.
“I was very grateful for that paper,” went on the Professor. “I gave
Snowdon of the _Monthly_ a piece of my mind for rejecting it. But tell
me, how are you?”
“I am getting on, thank you, Professor Deering.”
“That is as it should be. I am glad to hear it. I wasn’t so sure of you,
you see.”
Quincy’s heart sank. It was as if he had been found out, as if a guilt
had been fixed on him. Yet, he knew that the Professor’s words tokened
merely respect and an unusual interest.
The Professor went on: “You evidently have qualities of rebellion, Mr.
Burt. If you have the strength to support what these qualities will
always bring you, I have no fear for you. But it is more common to
revolt than to support what revolt sets up.”
“I’m all right, Mr. Deering,” Quincy replied; “I am not in the least
worried. I am having a bully time.”
“Will you come in just a few minutes? It is tea hour.”
Quincy hesitated clumsily; grew aware of his awkwardness, and agreed, in
order to conceal it.
They were before the Deering House. It looked very like a big,
paste-board box, dropped directly upon the street by some careless
errand-boy. There was no lawn before it. Two low steps led to a tiny
porch, scarcely wider than the door, yet big enough for two banks of
flower-pots. These were now barren and frozen. The house was of white
frame and square. The two windows of the façade seemed to have been
punched upon it as an afterthought.
Mr. Deering unlocked the door and Quincy was led across a narrow hall
into the library. The room was spacious and bare. The center table had
no cover; the three windows had no curtains; the walls were entirely
occupied with plain book-racks, the height of the ceiling. A wood fire
burned in the hearth, before which lay a tiger skin. This touch of
Oriental glamor in the room’s prim contour stood out. With the exception
of one upholstered arm-chair, the furniture was plain. Domestic rugs
pieced out the soft-wood floor. There was a small gas stove in the
corner of two book shelves. On it were a pewter kettle, several cups and
a decanter of spirits.
“Sit down, and let me brew you some tea,” said Mr. Deering.
Quincy complied. “This is where you work?”
“Yes. When I close the doors, I am in an inviolable castle.”
The boy remarked that on the center table lay a low pile of unused
papers, a single pen and, in the corner, a small rack containing half a
dozen books. Even the table seemed impoverished and empty. No artistic
wealth of abandon was about it. Meantime, Professor Deering was boiling
water.
“You must come here often, Mr. Burt,” he spoke as he leaned over the
little table.
Quincy liked the massive stretch of his back, the wide, high head poised
gracefully upon a short, thick neck and closely covered, like a cap,
with hair.
During the process of tea-soaking there was no further talk. The host
seemed absorbed. The guest had naught to say. But now, after the
perfunctory questions relative to sugar and brandy and lemon, Mr.
Deering came forward with two cups. He made Quincy move to the hearth
and sat down beside him.
“Mr. Burt,” he said, stirring his tea, into which Quincy observed that
he had poured a plentiful quantity of cognac, “I am anxious to get to
know you. I want to hear if you have any plans.”
He questioned the boy about his courses; he asked for candid views of
text-books and instructors. He got them. It never occurred to Quincy
that the chance of their meeting might seem in contradiction to
Professor Deering’s interest. There was about the man an impressionistic
note that made harmonious this chance renewal of their acquaintance.
Everything about the room, from the kettle to the curtainless windows,
suggested a free, airy impressionism. The tidy desk with its bare batch
of papers, also. Professor Deering appeared to need about him a liberal
space, unhampered and untrammeled by pre-conceptions or too much
furniture whatsoever, be it in the physical or the ideal world. Thus
only, his creative mind was able to career. So it was natural that a
very real result should come of a quite impromptu meeting. Wherefore,
Quincy did not restrain himself.
Of a sudden there was a knock. Mr. Deering clattered his tea-cup
nervously and arose. A woman had made open the door without waiting for
a signal.
“Oh, excuse me, Lawrence,” she said. But at the same time, she stepped
inside. And Quincy heard her excuse as if it had been ironical.
Mr. Deering stood strangely embarrassed, his weight thrown back so as to
give him an air of difficult balance.
“Julia--this is Mr. Burt. My wife--” he added.
“May I speak to you, one moment, Lawrence? I am sure Mr. Burt will
excuse you.”
The big man hesitated again, shifting his weight from foot to foot.
Then, he went forward without turning to Quincy and the door shut behind
the pair. Quincy had remarked that the embarrassment was all with Mr.
Deering. His wife had scarce deigned to nod to him. But now that he was
alone for a few moments, he had the chance to bring to consciousness the
impression he had had of her.
He recalled her as a slender, supple figure, framed in the doorway. Her
eyes were very bright and dark, her chin was long and seemed to point
protrusively. She wore a waist of dull blue silk that draped loose from
her shoulders. These were narrow and high. Above the dull blue gleamed
in his vision that black mass of her hair. Two great coils of it stood
out, disordered, above her ears. A curve was low over the flat, cool
forehead. He remembered that she was pale and that just below her eyes
the blood shone strangely in two flecks through her delicate, hard skin.
Also, her hands were large. And tight sleeves drew out the thinness of
her arms. She seemed to have the bosom of a boy.
Now, the door opened. The silence of the hall whence Mr. Deering stepped
back beside him, taking up his tea-cup, brought out a memory of her
voice. It had been low and vibrant. Quincy thought, without too great
awareness why, of a velvet casing over a silver knife. Then, Mr. Deering
continued the conversation.
In a few minutes, Quincy, with a poise that himself was stranger to,
arose and left.
He admired Professor Deering for having so beautiful a wife. Then, she
was beautiful--this Julia Deering, whose first name he had not lost? It
occurred to him that she had been very beautiful indeed, framed there,
in the doorway....