Chapter 10




THE ETERNAL MASCULINE.


It was the first week in November, and in those days "everybody" did not stay in the country so late as now. There were many New Yorkers in the crowd of out-of-town people at the Waldorf. Howard was attracted, fascinated by the scene--carefully-groomed men and women, the air of gaiety and ease, the flowers, the music, the lights, the perfumes. At a glance it seemed a dream of life with evil and sorrow and pain banished.

"No place for a working man," thought he, "at least not for my kind of a working man. It appeals too sharply to the instincts for laziness and luxury."

He was late and stood in the entrance to the palm-garden, looking about for Segur. Soon he saw him waving from a table near the wall under the music-alcove.

"The oysters are just coming," said Segur. "Sit over there between Mrs. Carnarvon and Miss Trevor. They are cousins, Howard, so be cautious what you say to one about the other. Oh, here is Mr. Berersford."

The others knew each other well; Howard knew them only as he had seen their names in the "fashionable intelligence" columns of the newspapers. Mrs. Carnarvon was a small thin woman in a black velvet gown which made her thinness obtrusive and attractive or the reverse according as one's taste is toward or away from attenuation. Her eyes were a dull, greenish grey, her skin brown and smooth and tough from much exposure in the hunting field. Her cheeks were beginning to hang slightly, so that one said: "She is pretty, but she will soon not be." Her mouth proclaimed strong appetites--not unpleasantly since she was good-looking.

Miss Trevor was perhaps ten years younger than her cousin, not far from twenty-four. She had a critical, almost amused yet not unpleasant way of looking out of unusually clear blue-green eyes. Her hair was of an ordinary shade of dark brown, but fine and thick and admirably arranged to set off her long, sensitive, high bred features. Her chin and mouth expressed decision and strong emotions.

There was a vacant chair between Segur and Berersford and it was presently filled by a fat, middle-aged woman, neither blonde nor brunette, with a large, serene face. Upon it was written a frank confession that she had never in her life had an original thought capable of creating a ripple of interest. She was Mrs. Sidney, rich, of an "old" family--in the New York meaning of the word "old"--both by marriage and by birth, much courted because of her position and because she entertained a great deal both in town and at a large and hospitable country house.

The conversation was lively and amused, or seemed to amuse, all. It was purely personal--about Kittie and Nellie and Jim and Peggie and Amy and Bob; about the sayings and doings of a few dozen people who constituted the intimates of these five persons.

Mrs. Carnarvon turned to the silent Howard at last and began about the weather.

"Horrible in the city, isn't it?"

"Well, perhaps it is," replied Howard. "But I fancied it delightful. You see I have not lived anywhere but New York for so long that I am hardly capable to judge."

"Why everybody says we have the worst climate in the world."

"Far be it from me to contradict everybody. But for me New York has the ideal climate. Isn't it the best of any great city in the world? You see, we have the air of the sea in our streets. And when the sun shines, which it does more days in the year than in any other great city, the effect is like champagne--or rather, like the effect champagne looks as if it ought to have."

"I hate champagne," said Mrs. Carnarvon. "Marian, you must not drink it; you know you mustn't." This to Miss Trevor who was lifting the glass to her lips. She drank a little of the champagne, then set the glass down slowly.

"What you said made me want to drink it," she said to Howard. "I was glad to hear your lecture on the weather. I had never thought of it before, but New York really has a fine climate. And only this afternoon I let that stupid Englishman--Plymouth--you've met him? No?--Well, at any rate, he was denouncing our climate and for the moment I forgot about London."

"Frightful there, isn't it, after October and until May?"

"Yes, and the air is usually stale even in the late spring. When it's warm, it's sticky. And when it's cold, it's raw."

"You are a New Yorker?"

"Yes," said Miss Trevor faintly, and for an instant showing surprise at his ignorance. "That is, I spend part of the winter here--like all New Yorkers."

"All?"

"Oh, all except those who don't count, or rather, who merely count."

"How do you mean?" Howard was taking advantage of her looking into her plate to smile with a suggestion of irony. She happened to glance up and so caught him.

"Oh," she said, smiling with frank irony at him, "I mean all those people--the masses, I think they're called--the people who have to be fussed over and reformed and who keep shops and--and all that."

"The people who work, you mean?"

"No, I mean the people you never meet about anywhere, the people who read the newspapers and come to the basement door."

"Oh, yes, I understand." Howard was laughing. "Well, that's one way of looking at life. Of course it's not my way."

"What is your way?"

"Why, being one of those who count only in the census, I naturally take a view rather different from yours. Now I should say that your people don't count. You see, I am most deeply interested in people who read newspapers."

"Oh, you write for the papers, like Jim Segur? What do you write?"

"What they call editorials."

"You are an editor?"

"Yes and no. I am one of the editors who does not edit but is edited."

"It must be interesting," said Miss Trevor, vaguely.

"More interesting than you imagine. But then all work is that. In fact work is the only permanently interesting thing in life. The rest produces dissatisfaction and regret."

"Oh, I'm not so very dissatisfied. Yet I don't work."

"Are you quite sure? Think how hard you work at being fitted for gowns, at going about to dinners and balls and the like, at chasing foxes and anise seed bags and golf balls."

"But that is not work. It is amusing myself."

"Yes, you think so. But you forget that you are doing it in order that all these people who don't count may read about it in the papers and so get a little harmless relaxation."

"But we don't do it to get into the papers."

"Probably not. Neither did this--what is it here in my plate, a lamb chop?--this lamb gambol about and keep itself in condition to form a course at Segur's dinner. But after all, wasn't that what it was really for? Then think how many people you support by your work."

"You make me feel like a day-labourer."

"Oh, you're a much harder worker than any day labourer. And the saddest part of it to me is that you work altogether for others. You give, give and get in return nothing but a few flattering glances, a few careless pats on the back of your vanity. I should hate to work so hard for so little."

"But what would you do?" Miss Trevor was looking at him, interested and amused.

"Well, I'd work for myself. I'd insist on a return, on getting back something equivalent or near it. I'd insist on having my mind improved, or having my power or my reputation advanced."

"I was only jesting when I said that about people not counting."

"Altogether?"

"No, not altogether. I don't care much about the masses. They seem to me to be underbred, of a different sort. I hate doing things that are useful and I hate people that do useful things--in a general way, I mean."

"That is doubtless due to defective education," said Howard, with a smile that carried off the thrust as a jest.

"Is that the way you'd describe a horror of contact with--well, with unpleasant things?" Miss Trevor was serious.

"But is it that? Isn't it just an unconscious affectation, taken up simply because all the people about you think that way--if one can call the process thinking? You don't think, do you, that it is a sign of superiority to be narrow, to be ignorant, to be out of touch with the great masses of one's fellow-beings, to play the part of a harlequin or a ballet-girl on the stage of life? I understand how a stupid ass can fritter away his one chance to live in saying and hearing and doing silly things. But ought not an intelligent person try to enjoy life, try to get something substantial out of it, try to possess himself of its ideas and emotions? Why should one play the fool simply because those about one are incapable of playing any other part?"

"I'm surprised that you are here to-night. Still, I suppose you'll give yourself absolution on the plea that one must dine somewhere."

"But I'm not wasting my time. I'm learning. I'm observing a phase of life. And I'm seeing the latest styles in women's gowns and--"

"Is that important--styles, I mean?"

"Do you suppose that my kind of people, the working classes, would spend so much time and thought in making anything that was not important? There is nothing more important."

"Then you don't think we women are wasting time when we talk about dress so much?"

"On the contrary, it is an evidence of your superior sagacity. Women talk trade, 'shop,' as soon as they get away from the men. They talk men and dress--fish and nets."

Berersford heard the word fish and interrupted.

"Do you go South next month, Marian?"

"Yes--about the fifteenth." Miss Trevor explained to Howard: "Bobby--Mr. Berersford here--always fishes in Florida in January."

The conversation again became general and personal. Howard knew none of the people of whom they were talking and all that they said was of the nature of gossip. But they talked in a sparkling way, using good English, speaking in agreeable voices with a correct accent, and indulging in a great deal of malicious humour.

As they separated Mrs. Sidney, to whom Howard had not spoken during the evening, said to Segur: "You must bring Mr. Howard on Sunday afternoon."

"Will you drop Marian at the house for me?" Mrs. Carnarvon asked her. "I want to go on to Edith's."

Segur went with Mrs. Sidney and Marian to their carriage. "Who is Mr. Howard?" Mrs. Sidney said, and Miss Trevor drew nearer to hear the answer.

"One of the editorial writers down on the paper and a very clever one--none better. He works hard and is desperately serious and a regular hermit."

"I think he's very handsome--don't you, Marian?"

"I found him interesting," said Miss Trevor.

Howard thought a great deal about Miss Trevor that night, and she was still in his head the next day. "This comes of never seeing women," he said to himself. "The first girl I meet seems the most beautiful I ever saw, and the most intellectual. And, when I think it over, what did she say that was startling?"

Nevertheless he went with Segur the next Sunday to Mrs. Sidney's great house in the upper Avenue overlooking the Park.

"Why do I come here?" he asked himself. "It is a sheer waste of time. Mrs. Sidney can do me no good, or I her. It must be the hope of seeing Miss Trevor."

When the gaudy and be-powdered flunkey held back the heavy curtains of the salon to announce him and Segur, he saw Miss Trevor on a low chair absently staring into the fire. Yet when he had spoken to Mrs. Sidney and turned toward her she at once stretched out her hand with a slight smile. Some others came in and Howard was free to talk to her. He sat looking at her steadily, admiring her almost perfect profile, delicate yet strong.

"And what have you been doing since I saw you?" Miss Trevor asked.

"Writing little pieces about politics for the paper," replied Howard.

"Politics? I detest it. It is all stealing and calling names, isn't it? And something dreadful is always going to happen if somebody or other isn't elected, or is elected, to something or other. And then, whether he is or not, nothing happens. I should think the men who have been so excited and angry and alarmed would feel very cheap. But they don't. And the next time they carry on in just the same ridiculous way."

"Politics is like everything else--interesting if you understand what it is all about. But like everything else, you can't understand it without a little study at first. It's a pity women don't take an interest. If they did the men might become more reasonable and sane about it than they are now. But you--what have you been doing?"

"I--oh, industriously superintending the making of my new nets." Marian laughed and Howard was flattered. "And also, well, riding in the Park every morning. But I never do anything interesting. I simply drift."

"That's so much simpler and more satisfactory than threshing and splashing about as I do. It seems so fussy and foolish and futile. I wish--that is, sometimes I wish--that I had learned to amuse myself in some less violent and exhausting way."

"Marian--I say, Marian," called Mrs. Sidney. "Has Teddy come down?"

Miss Trevor coloured slightly as she answered: "No, he comes a week Wednesday. He's still hunting."

"Hunting," Howard repeated when Mrs. Sidney was again busy with the others. "Now there is a kind of work that never bothers a man's brains or sets him to worrying. I wish I knew how to amuse myself in some such way."

"You should go about more."

"Go--where?"

"To see people."

"But I do see a great many people. I'm always seeing them--all day long."

"Yes--but that is in a serious way. I mean go where you will be amused--to dinners for instance."

"I don't dare. I can't work at work and also work at play. I must work at one or the other all the time. I can do nothing without a definite object. I can't be just a little interested in anything or anybody. With me it is no interest at all or else absorption until interest is exhausted."

"Then if you were interested in a woman, let us say, you'd be absorbed until you found out all there was, and then you'd--take to your heels."

"But she might always be new. She might interest me more and more. Anyhow I fancy that she would weary of me long before I wearied of her. I think women usually weary first. Men are very monotonous. We are as vain as women, if not vainer, without their capacity for concealing it. And vanity makes one think he does not need to exert himself to please."

"But why do people usually say that it is the men that are difficult to hold?"

"Because the men hold the women, not through the kind of interest we are talking about, but through another kind--quite different. Women are so lazy and so dependent--dependent upon men for homes, for money, for escort even."

Miss Trevor was flushing, as if the fire were too hot--at least she moved a little farther away from it. "Your ideal woman would be a shop-girl, I should say from what you've told me."

"Perhaps--in the abstract. I really do think that if I were going to marry, I should look about for a working-girl, a girl that supported herself. How can a man be certain of the love of a woman who is dependent upon him? I should be afraid she was only tolerating me as a labour-saving device."

Miss Trevor laughed. "There certainly is no vanity in that remark," she said. "Now I can't imagine most of the men I know thinking that."

"It's only theory with me. In practice doubtless I should be as self-complacent as any other man."

They left Mrs. Sidney's together and Howard walked down the Avenue with her. It seemed a wonderful afternoon--the air dazzling, intoxicating. He was filled with the joy of living and was glad this particular tall, slender, distinguished-looking girl was there to make his enjoyment perfect. They were gay with the delight of being young and in health and attractive physically and mentally each to the other. They looked each at the other a great deal, and more and more frankly.

"Am I never to see you again?" he asked as he rang the bell for her.

"I believe Mrs. Carnarvon is going to invite you to dine here Thursday night."

"Thank you," said Howard.

Miss Trevor coloured. But she met his glance boldly and laughed. Howard wondered why her laugh was defiant, almost reckless.

       *      *      *      *      *      *      *

He saw Segur at the club after dinner that same night. "And how do you like Miss Trevor?" Segur began as the whiskey and carbonic were set before them.

"A very attractive girl," said Howard.

"Yes--so a good many men have thought in the last five years. She's marrying Teddy Danvers in the spring, I believe. At any rate it's generally looked on as settled. Teddy's a good deal of a 'chump.' But he's a decent fellow--good-looking, good-natured, domestic in his tastes, and nothing but money."

Howard was smiling to himself. He understood Miss Trevor's sudden consciousness of the nearness of the fire, her flush when Mrs. Sidney asked about "Teddy," and the recklessness in her parting laugh.

"Well, Teddy's in luck," he said aloud.

"Not so sure of that. She's quite capable of leading him a dance if he bores her. And bore her he will. But that is nothing new. This town is full of it."

"Full of what?"

"Of weary women--weary wives. The men are hobby-riders. They have just one interest and that usually small and dull--stocks or iron or real estate or hunting or automobiles. Our women are not like the English women--stupid, sodden. They are alive, acute. They wish to be interested. Their husbands bore them. So--well, what is the natural temptation to a lazy woman in search of an interest?"

"It's like Paris--like France?"

"Yes, something. Except that perhaps our women are more sentimental, not fond of intrigue for its own sake--at least, not as a rule."

"Doesn't interest them deeply enough, I suppose. It's the American blood coming out--the passion for achievement. They want a man of whom they can be proud, a man who is doing something interesting and doing it well."

"I doubt that," replied Segur shrugging his shoulders. "When a woman loves a man, she wants to absorb him."

Howard soon went away to his rooms for a long evening of undisturbed thought about Teddy Danvers's fianc�e--the first temptation that had entered his loneliness since Alice died.

In the few weeks of her illness and the few months immediately following her death, he had been at his very best. He was able to see her as she was and to appreciate her. He was living in the clear pure air of the Valley of the Great Shadow where all things appear in their true relations and true proportions. But only there was it possible for the gap between him and Alice to close--that gap of which she was more acutely conscious than he, and which she made wider far than it really was by being too humble with him, too obviously on her knees before him. Such superiority as she thought he possessed is not in human nature; but neither is it in human nature to refuse worship, to refuse to pose upon a pedestal if the opportunity presses.

In the three years between her death and his meeting Marian, the eternal masculine had been secretly gaining strength to resume its pursuit of the eternal feminine. And the eternal feminine was certainly most alluringly personified in this beautiful, graceful girl, at once appreciative and worthy of appreciation.

Perhaps she appealed most strongly to Howard in her vivid suggestion of the open air--of health and strength and nature. He had been leading a cloistered existence and his blood had grown sluggish. She gave him the sensation that a prisoner gets when he catches a glimpse from his barred window of the fields and the streams radiating the joy of life and freedom. And Marian was of his own kind--like the women among whom he had been brought up. She satisfied his idea of what a "lady" should be, but at the same time she was none the less a woman to him--a woman to love and to be loved; to give him sympathy, companionship; to inspire him to overcome his weaknesses by striving to be worthy of her; to bring into his life that feminine charm without which a man's life must be cold and cheerless.

He knew that he could not marry her, that he had no right to make love to her, that it was unwise to go near her again. But he had no power to resist the temptation. And even in those days he had small regard for the means when the end was one upon which he had fixed his mind. "Why not take what I can get?" he thought, as he dreamed of her. "She's engaged--her future practically settled. Yes, I'll be as happy as she'll let me." And he resumed his idealising.

At his time of life idealisation is still not a difficult or a long process. And in this case there was an ample physical basis for it--and far more of a mental basis than young imagination demands. He took the draught she so frankly offered him; he added a love potion of his own concocting, and drank it off.

He was in love.




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