226CHAPTER XVI
During Beatrice’s house party, at which twenty or so equally Gorgeous Girls and their husbands were quartered in the Villa Rosa, while a string orchestra danced them further along the road toward nervous prostration each night, a fire ignited in the offices of the O’Valley Leather Company.
Steve’s office and Mary’s adjoining room were damaged by water rather than by the slight blaze itself and during an enforced recess from work both Mary and Steve found that a fire in an office building may cause a loss of time from routine yet be a great personal boon.
The day following the accident, Steve having been summoned at midnight to view the flames, Mary came to the office to try to rescue the files and sweep aside the débris.
“Nothing is really hurt, but they always mess things up,” Steve said, coming to the doorway to hold up a precious record book. “See this? I wonder why they always leave such a lot of stuff to clear away. Now the whole extent of damage is the destroying of that rickety side stairway that is never used and could have been done away with long ago. Some boys, playing craps and smoking, left the makings of the fire and before it touched these rooms there was water poured into the whole plant. As a consequence, we have a three-day vacation and227instead of having the side stairs torn down I’m in line for a chunk of insurance.”
“Even the tea isn’t spilled from my caddy,” Mary answered; “Look.”
“Wonder what they used this side stairway for? It was rickety when I bought the place.” He looked at the blackened remains of steps.
“I don’t know,” Mary answered, absent-mindedly. She could have added that whenever she looked at those stairs or their closed door she saw but one thing––Steve on his wedding day as he came stealing up to ask about the long-distance telephone call, aglow with happiness and dreams. For her own reasons, therefore, Mary did not regret the destruction of the side stairs.
“They’ve shoved this cabinet over as if they had a special antagonism to it,” he was saying, righting a small piece of furniture containing mostly Mary’s papers. “There––not hurt, is it? Do the drawers open?” He began pulling them out, one after another. The last refused to open.
“What’s in this one––it blocks the spring?”
Mary tried her hand at it. “Something wedged right at the edge. I’m sure I don’t see what it can be. I never used that drawer for anything but–––”
At their combined jerk the drawer came flying into space, and with it the remains of a white cardboard box with the monograms of B. C. and S. O. entwined by means of a cupid and a tiny wreath of flowers. Dried cake crumbs lay in the bottom of the drawer. It was the Gorgeous Girl’s box of wedding cake which Mary Faithful had found on her desk.
Neither spoke immediately. Finally Mary said: “I suppose that’s as bad an omen as to break a mirror228under a ladder on Friday the thirteenth. Now shall I have the men sweep the office out? There is no reason we cannot get to work to-morrow.”
“Wait a moment about sweeping out offices and going to work,” Steve insisted. “If you want to break the hoodoo you have just brought on yourself by smashing up wedding cake––let me talk and act as high priest.”
She shook her head. “You promised, and you’ve been true-blue––don’t spoil it. Besides, it can do no good.”
“I want to ask a question,” he insisted. “I’m not going to break faith with you or take advantage of knowing what you told me. I shall always try to appreciate the honour done me, no matter if I am unworthy. I want to ask a question in as impersonal a way as if I wrote in to a woman’s column.” He tried to laugh.
“Ask away.” Mary sat down in the nearest chair, the broken cardboard box at her feet.
“Why is it that a man can honestly be in love with the woman he marries and yet in an amazingly short time find himself playing the cad in feeling disappointed, discontented, utterly lacking affection? It’s a ghastly happening. Why is it he saw no handwriting on the wall? I am not stupid, Mary, neither am I given to inconstancy––I’ve had to struggle too much not to have my mind made up once and for all time. Why didn’t I see through this veneer of a good time that these Gorgeous Girls manage to have painted over their real selves? Why did I never suspect? And what is a man to do when he discovers the disillusionment? You see it all, there’s no sense in not admitting it––why do I find myself ill229at ease, now tense, now irritable over trifles, now sulky, despondent––as plainly sulky and despondent as a wild animal successfully caged and labelled, which must perforce stay put yet which will not afford its spectators the satisfaction of walking wistfully from cage corner to cage corner and yowling in unanswered anguish!”
“Is it as bad as that?” she asked, softly.
He nodded as he continued: “I sometimes feel the way the monkish fraternity did at Oxford when they claimed ‘they banished God and admitted women.’ I want a man-made world, womanless, without a single trace of romance or a good time. Not right, is it? Sometimes I think I’ll crack under the pretense, go raving mad and scream out the whole miserable sham under which I live––and every time I indulge myself in such a reverie I find myself writing Beatrice an extra check and going with her to this thing or that, steel-hammer pulses beating at my forehead and a languor about even the attempt at breathing.”
Mary would have spoken but he rushed ahead: “I like this fire, this debris. Most people would curse at it––it’s real and rather common, sort of plain boiled-dinner variety. It gives me an excuse to take time off from the eternal frolic. I’m glad when there’s a strike or a row and I dig out of town to stay in a commercial hotel. I have to get away from the whole tinsel show. And yet it was what I wanted, was willing to play modern Faust to any Wall Street Mephistopheles–––”
“And you are sure it wasn’t a Mephistopheles?”
“Of course not––for that much I can draw a deep breath and give thanks––it was my own luck.”
230
“Other times, other titles,” she murmured.
“One time you told me what you thought of the future of American women, the all-round good fellows of the world––do you remember? I wish you had not told me. It’s just another thing to irritate. I’m driven mad by trifles––I’m starved for a big tragedy; that’s the way this craving for a fortune and a good time is playing boomerang. I’m so infernally weary of hearing about the cut-glass slipper heels of some chorus girl and so hungry to hear about a shipwreck, a new creed, a daring crime that–––”
“You foolish, funny boy,” she said, taking pity on his involved analysis, “don’t you see what you have done? It’s quite the common fate of get-rich-quick dreamers; you merely symbolized your goal by Beatrice Constantine, she stood for the combined relationships of wife, comrade, lady luxury––and you captured your goal, and the greater effort ceased. You have had time to examine your prize in microscopic fashion. It isn’t at all what you intended––but it is quite what you deserve. No one can make a lie serve for the truth––at all times and for an indefinite period. There is bound to come a cropper somewhere––usually where you least expect it. And you lied to yourself in the beginning, a passive sort of falsehood, in merely refusing to see the truth and groping for the unreal. You had to justify your race for wealth, so you said, ‘Oho, I’ll love a story-book princess and let that be my incentive. Story-book princesses are expensive lovelies and you have to have money bags to jingle before their fair selves!’ So you became more and more infatuated with the fairy-book princess who happened to be in your pathway––and it was Beatrice. She made you feel231that anything your slightly mad and quite unrealizing young self might do was proper. Just as the boy with a new air rifle deliberately sets up a target to shoot away at because the savage in him must justify hitting something besides the ozone, so you have merely wooed and won your own falsehood and disillusionment.”
“You say it rather neatly; but that isn’t all. The thing is that I’m not game enough to go on and take the punishment. Are you surprised?”
“No. But are you prepared to give up the thing which won her?”
“My money? I’ve thought of it.” He folded his arms and began walking up and down the littered, water-soaked office. “Would you like me any better?” he asked, tenderly.
Mary’s eyes grew stormy. “If the men go to work at once we can have the rugs sent to the cleaner’s and put down old matting for a temporary covering––and I can go ahead taking inventory,” was her answer.
“I see,” Steve made himself respond. “Well––I didn’t trespass very much,” he whispered as he passed her to leave the building.
Beatrice regarded the fire as an amusing happening and before Steve realized what was being done she had proposed that Gaylord refurnish the office in an arts-and-crafts fashion. It had long seemed to her a most inartistic and clumsy place and when Steve refused her offer and told her that a splint-bottomed chair and a kitchen chair were his office equipment some years ago she sent for Gaylord on her own initiative and told him to beard the lion in the den to232see if he could win Steve to the cause of painted wall panels typifying commerce, industry, and such, and crippled beer steins and so on as artistic wastebaskets.
There had never been an active feud between Gaylord and Steve; it was always that hidden enmity of a weak culprit toward a strong man. Neither had Trudy been able to win Steve by her Titian curls, baby-blue eyes, and obese compliments. In fact, Gaylord had avoided Steve the last year. He was the one Beatrice called upon to play with her, he accompanied her shopping, even unto the milliner’s, and had been in New York one time when Beatrice had gone down to see about buying a moleskin wrap. Not even Trudy knew that he had actually adopted a monocle and squired Beatrice round in state.
So he approached Steve with the attitude of “I hate you and am only waiting to prove it but meanwhile I’ll play off the friend lizard no matter how painful.”
But after a few “my dear fellows” and “old dears” and gibes about the disordered office with its prosaic chairs and Mary Faithful, quite flushed and plain looking as she dashed round giving orders, Gaylord found himself being neatly set outside on the curbstone and told to remain in that exact position.
“I hate this decorating business,” Steve said in final condemnation. “I agree with my father-in-law that when a man approaches me with a book of sample braids and cretonnes under his arm I feel it only righteous that he be shot at sunrise––and now you know how strong you stand with me. I don’t mind Beatrice having her whirl at the thing. A new colour scheme as often as she has a manicure; that’s233different. But my office stays as I wish it and you can’t rush in any globes of goldfish and inkstands composed of reclining young females with their little hands forming the ink cup, while a single spray of cherry blossoms flourishes over the hook I hang my hat and coat upon. Oh, no, trot back to your boudoirs and purr your prettiest, but stop trying to tackle real men.”
Gaylord’s one-cylinder brain had become more efficient by dint of daily sparring with his wife. So he retorted: “She is going to make you a present of it––your birthday gift, I understand. Does that alter the case?”
Steve looked at him with an even wilder frown. “Tell her to build a bomb-proof pergola for herself and mark it for me just the same. When we redecorate round here it takes Miss Faithful about a half hour to plan the show. Good-bye, Gay, I’m awfully rushed. Thanks just as much.”
Gaylord sauntered outside, smiling, apparently as if he accepted the entire universe. But his one-cylinder brain harboured an unpleasant secret which concerned Steve. Gaylord knew that Steve had not reckoned with his enemies and that he was in no condition to begin doing so now. Constantine was no longer at the helm, fearless, respected, and dominating. Steve was quite the reckless egotist, out of love with his wife, mentally jaded, and weary of the game––and his enemies surmised all this in rough fashion and were making their plans accordingly. How wonderful it would be if certain catastrophes did happen. How lucky Beatrice had her own income! She would never cease ordering bomb-proof pergolas or bird cages carved from rare woods.
234
The next day––before Beatrice and Steve had a chance to argue the matter out to a fine point––Mark Constantine had a stroke. It was like the sudden crashing down of a great oak tree which within had been hollow and decayed for some time but to all exterior appearances quite the sturdy monarch. Without warning he became first a mighty thing lying day after day on a bed, fussed over and exclaimed over and prayed over by a multitude of people. Then he assumed the new and final proportions of a childish invalid––his fierce, true grasp of things, his wide-sweeping and ambitious viewpoint narrowed hastily to the four walls of the sick room. Instead of the stock-market fluctuation bringing forth his “Gad, that’s good!” or oaths of disapproval, the taste of an especially good custard or the way the masseuse neglected his left forearm were cause for joy or grief.
Life had suddenly changed into the monotonous and wearing routine of a broken, lonesome old man who had plenty of time to think of the past with his wife Hannah, recalling incidents he had not recalled until this dull, long day arrived. And after reaching many conclusions about many things Constantine was forced to realize that no one particularly cared for or sought out his opinions. He was placed in the category of all fallen oaks––someone who would have one of the largest funerals ever held in the city. And friends murmured that for Bea’s sake they hoped it would not be long.
But it was to be long––for with the tenacity of purpose he had always exhibited Constantine readjusted himself to the narrow realm of four walls. His former tyranny toward the business world was now235exercised toward his daughter and son-in-law, his sister and his attendants. He resolved to live––or exist––just as long as life was possible, to vampire-borrow from those about him all the vitality that he could, to have every care and comfort and every new doctor ever heard of called in to attend him; he now said he wished to live as many years as God willed. There was a God, now that he was partially paralyzed, a very real God, to whom he prayed in orthodox fashion. He wanted to keep remembering the past with Hannah, to shed the tears for her death which he had never taken the time to shed, to decide what it was that had been so wrong in his life in order that his death and hereafter might be very properly right.
Aunt Belle had taken this new affliction after the fashion of a Mrs. Gummidge. It affected her worse than any one else, first because the ridicule and fault-finding to which her brother had always treated her were tripled in their amount and quality, and yet as she was dependent upon this childishly weak brother she must endure the treatment. Secondly, she was reminded that her age was somewhat near Mark Constantine’s age and perhaps a similar fate lay in store for her. Lastly, it tied her down––propriety demanded that someone be in the sick room a share of the time and certainly Beatrice had no intention of undertaking the responsibility.
Steve had acted as Aunt Belle fancied he would act, genuinely concerned over the catastrophe and seeking refuge with this tired old child a greater share of the time. By degrees Aunt Belle left Steve to play the role of comforter and companion, since no nurse ever stayed at the Constantine bedside for longer than a fortnight. So she was allowed to gambol236about in her pinafore frocks and high-heeled shoes, wondering if her brother had made a fair will, taking into account the fact that a woman is only as old as she looks––and with a tidy fortune who knows what might happen after the proper mourning period?
Beatrice had been prostrated at the news. For two days she stayed in bed and sobbed hysterically. Then she was prevailed upon to see her father and to take the sensible attitude of preparing for a long siege, as Steve suggested.
“How cold-hearted it sounds––a long siege!” she reproached.
“But it is true. He will not die––he will live until that splendid vitality of his has been snuffed out by a careless law of rhythm, so you may as well buck up and run in to see him every day and then go about as usual.”
“A sick room drives me wild. I wish I had taken a course in practical nursing instead of the domestic-science things.”
Steve did not answer.
“I can’t bear to think of it. It’s like having life-in-death in the very house. Oh, Steve, can’t you talk him into going to a sanitarium? They’d have so many interesting kinds of baths to try!”
“He won’t mind your parties, if that is what is bothering you. The only thing he asks is to be left in peace in his room with plenty of detective stories and plenty of medical attention, and he won’t know if you dance the roof off. But if you really want to hasten the end send Gay up there with plans for remodelling his room––it will either kill or cure,” he laughed.
“I must do something to help me forget and make237it easier for him,” she said, soberly. “I’m going to try a faith healer––not because I believe in them but because I don’t want to leave any stone unturned. I think a new interest would help papa. Would you try adopting a child or my taking up classical dancing in deadly earnest?” She was quite sincere and emotionally wrought up as she came up to him and laid her head on his shoulder.
“Oh, I’d take up classical dancing,” he advised.
She gave a sigh of relief. “Yes, it’s what I really think would be the best. I will dance on the lawn so papa can watch me.”
He gave vent to his father-in-law’s favourite expletive, “Gad!” under his breath.
He did not add what was an unpleasant probability: that, having to assume full responsibility of affairs, there were likely to be astonishing complications. Crashed-down oak trees are quite helpless concerning their enemies, reckoned upon or otherwise, and Steve, who had never taken count of his foes, would be called upon to meet them all single-handed.
238CHAPTER XVII
In a jewellery store Trudy Vondeplosshe, wrapped in wine-coloured velours, was coquetting with diamond rings under glass and trying to affect an air of indifference concerning them. With all her husband’s rise in the world he did not see fit to bestow upon his wife any substantial token of his regard. The vague and transitory idea he once entertained of playing off fairy godfather to her and placing a fortune at her feet had become past history. Now that Gay did run a motor and wear monogrammed silk shirts he saw to it that Trudy had as little as the law allowed. She still continued remaking her dresses and haunting remnant counters, sewing on Gay’s work, playing off the same overstrained, underfed Trudy as in the first days at the Graystone apartment. But as it was for a good time she never thought of faltering.
She had decided, however, that it was time now to adopt other and more forceful methods of obtaining the things she craved and felt she had earned. Foremost, as with many women, was a diamond ring. After obtaining this she would turn in her wedding ring for old gold, the price to apply on a platinum circlet studded with brilliants. For months Trudy’s eyes had glittered greedily as she observed Gay’s clientele with their jewelled bags, rings, brooches, watches, and what not––yet she possessed not a single gem.
239
She had often enough asked Gay for one, to which he would sneer: “What do you want with a diamond? You know I’m always on the ragged edge of failing!”
“Because you gamble and drink and are a born fool,” she protested. “You could make real money if you would listen to me and keep quiet.”
“I can’t see what that has to do with your wanting a diamond ring! If I ever make real money you can have one but not when auto tires are as high as they are–––”
“And when husbands grow tipsy and drive into ditches and have to be brought home by horses and wagons. Oh, no. But you’ll go shopping with Beatrice and pick out her jewellery and tell her jewels have souls and a lot more bunk, and then get a commission as soon as her back is turned! Why don’t you get me a diamond instead, and omit the bunk? I’ll take one with a flaw––I’m used to seconds. You must believe me when I say that, because I married you.”
Gay no longer feared Trudy; in fact, he felt he had little use for her. She was an obstacle to his making an excellent marriage. Through Trudy and all the rest of the complicated ladder climbing he was now recognized, and real men were extremely busy these days getting the tag ends of war-debris business in shape. It was quite a different situation––he could have had his choice of several widows. Take it all in all, he preferred a matron, his days at playing with debutantes were in the discard. The business of buying and selling antiques and interior decorating had so inflated his one-cylinder brain that he really fancied he needed a mature companionship and understanding.
240
“I’ll buy you a diamond ring, old dear,” he said, lightly, “when you have me in a corner, hands up––so set your wits to work and see what you can do about it.”
It was over their hurried breakfast that the discussion took place, with Trudy, quite a fright in a tousled boudoir cap and négligé, scuttling about the dining room with the breakfast tray and planning to send out bills, reorder some draperies, and call up her friends until one of them should offer to take her to a fashionable morning musical in the near future. After which she would go down town and make good at her star act––window wishing.
“You make me so tired I wonder why I don’t clear out,” she retorted. “You think I’m afraid to buy a diamond ring and charge it to you? Watch me!”
“Just try it and see what will happen.”
“I will, kind sir.” Dropping him a curtsy, Trudy repaired to do the dishes and swiggle an oil mop about the floor briefly. Then she burnt some scented powder and pulled down the window shades. This constituted getting the establishment in order, the slavey having gone tootling off on a party some days before.
Trudy did not refer to the breakfast-table discussion before she left the apartment. She was dangerously sweet, and even went into Gay’s room, where he was donning his gray-velvet studio blouse for the morning’s labours. She told him she was quite sure of securing a fairly good-sized order for some window shades. Gay did not think it necessary to answer. He did not glance at her; instead he yawned and sprinkled toilet water profusely on his pink lawn handkerchief.
241
After a moment’s hesitation she went her own way. When she had lingered about the jewellery counter like a wilful yet not quite wicked child––peering down at the wonderful, enchanting things which mocked her empty purse; recalling Gay’s first flush of romance and devotion; her own clever, untiring methods of pushing him into the front ranks; Mary and Mary’s little secret, so unsafe in Trudy’s keeping; Beatrice, who did not know quite how many rings she possessed; the whole maddening and really uninteresting tangle––she wondered if she could force Gay to buy her a ring. Should she boldly order such-and-such a stone and pick out a setting and present him with the bill? Why she hesitated she did not know; she was like all her wilful sisters who gaze and sigh, pity themselves, and then steal away to Oriental shops to appease the hunger by a near-silver ring with a bulging near-precious stone set in Hoboken style.
This Trudy did not do. For some reason or other she let her errands go by and took a car to Mary’s office, stopping at the corner to buy her a flower. Instinctively one connected Mary and flowers as one associated Beatrice and jewellery.
She found Mary had gone into the old office building to see about something and that Steve, who was always as restless as a polar bear when forced into a tête-à-tête with Trudy, was alone in his office. He was obliged to ask her to sit down and wait for Mary. Trudy peered curiously about the rooms. She had never lost that rare sense of triumph––returning as a fine lady to the very place where she had once worked for fifteen per. Smiling graciously at former associates she imagined that she created as much excitement as Beatrice’s visits themselves.
242
“It seems so good to come back here,” she began without mercy.
Steve had to lay aside his work and wonder why Miss Lunk ever let this creature into his private domain. He would see that it did not happen twice.
“Ah––I suppose,” he knew he answered.
“You are such a busy man; you don’t know how I admire you.” Trudy tried fresh tactics.
“Um––have you seen the morning papers?”
“Thank you but Gay read them to me at breakfast.... You never come to our little home, do you? Too busy, I presume. Or are you one of those who can forgive everyone but the interior decorator?” This with an arch expression and a slight twinkle of the blue eyes––it could not quite be called a wink.
“I’m afraid so, Mrs. Vondeplosshe. I leave such things to Beatrice.”
“Oh, I understand.” Trudy took her cue quickly. “It is out of your province. You can’t do big, gigantic things if you bother with doll-house notions. Now I really prefer––oh, far prefer––men like yourself, who–––”
Steve started the electric fan whirring.
“Don’t you ever long for camping trips or long horseback rides––something away from the everlasting fuss and feathers? I do. Would you believe it?” she fibbed glibly.
Had Steve been seventy-five he might have believed her. But he merely nodded and said that if there was a draft from the fan she could sit outside.
Piqued, Trudy turned to Mary Faithful.
“Mary is a wonderful girl, isn’t she? Of course you have a Gorgeous Girl, too––but she is for playtime.243I should think it would mean a great deal to have Mary for your chief confidante––she is so good, and yet human and–––”
Steve stood up abruptly and wondered why no kind friend saw fit to enter at this moment. He would have really welcomed Trudy’s husband. He looked at Trudy briefly, it did not take Steve long these days to look at Gorgeous Girls and Gorgeous Girl seconds and realize the whole story of their purpose and struggle––things, to have more gayly coloured or delicate coloured, gold, silver, velvet, carved, perfumed or whatever-the-mode-dictated things, flaunting these priceless sticks and stones in each other’s faces with pretended friendship.
He did not answer this last lead at conversation, but, not discouraged, Trudy went on down the list of her resources.
“How is dear old Mr. Constantine?”
“The same.” Steve thanked fortune his father-in-law was paralyzed and could furnish a neutral topic of debate.
“Poor dear. So hard for Bea, too. She says she will not do much this season. She feels if––if it should not be much longer, you understand”––a lowered tone of voice and a sigh––“that she wants to have nothing on her conscience. Still, a sick room is wearing, but of course love makes any task easy.”
Steve suppressed a smile. It was surprising how well this funny little person managed to ape the jargon and chatter of Bea’s set as well as their mode of appearance. She did it mightily well, everything considered, and when she proceeded to offer to go and sit with the old dear or bring her game board and play with him Steve released a broad grin as he pictured244Constantine in his helpless captive state welcoming Trudy as an entertainer about as much as he would have begged for a tête-à-tête with a lady major bent on conquest.
“She would even marry him if she could dispose of Gay,” he thought, and rightly, as he watched her.
As she was telling him of the head-dress party she intended to give for Gay’s birthday and how he must come because she wanted him to wear a pirate turban, in came Mary, much flurried over a mistake made in a shipment, and her nose guilty of a slight but unmistakable shine.
“Oh, Trudy! Run home––your house is on fire! Your cretonnes will burn!” she said, half in earnest. “My dear child, I’m mighty busy. It is so stupid of Parker!” She turned to Steve. “He made the original error and I have to keep cross-examining everyone else to prove to him that I know he is at fault and that he must ’fess up. But he won’t––people never want to say: ‘Yes, it is my fault and I’m sorry,’ do they?”
“Sort of habit since the Garden of Eden, I guess––you can’t expect it to change now.” Steve had lost his listless air. All unconsciously he had the same animated, interested attitude that he had had during the days of being engaged to the Gorgeous Girl. Trudy saw at a glance that Mary had not only realized her starved hopes but that she was quite ignorant of the fact that she had done so. To Trudy’s mind it was a most stupid situation; also an inexcusable one. Here was Mary, the good-looking thing who deserved a love such as Steve O’Valley’s yet never dared to hope he would ever think of her twice except if she asked for a raise in salary. This Trudy knew, also.245And since it is inevitable that a cave man cannot exist on truffles, chiffon frocks that must not be rumpled, and an interior decorator with a ukulele at his beck and call, Steve had been forced into realizing Mary’s worth and loving her for it, giving to her the mature and steady love of a strong man who, like Parker, had made a mistake and not yet ’fessed up. Why Mary did not realize that happiness was within her reach, and why Steve did not realize that Mary adored him, and why they were not in the throes of talking over her lawyer and my lawyer and alimony but we love each other and let the whole world go hang––was not within Trudy’s jurisdiction to determine. She only knew what she would have done and be doing were she Mary––and Steve O’Valley loved her.
She felt the situation was as unforgivable and stupid as to have Gay offer her a two-carat diamond ring and to have her say: “No, Bubseley; sell it and let us use the money to start a fund for heating the huts of aged and infirm Eskimos. The Salvation Army has never dropped up that way.”
The great miracle had happened. And, envying Mary a trifle and pitying Steve for not having won his cause, Trudy justified a hidden resolve of long ago: To use Mary’s secret in case Beatrice became overbearing or impossible. It was mighty fine plunder, upon which she flattered herself she had a single-handed option.
So she released Steve from the agony of conversation, and watching the tender, happy look as he talked to Mary over some other detail of the cropper, she went inside to Mary’s office to powder her own little nose and realize that she was no nearer to obtaining a246diamond ring than when she first began to crave for one.
“I’m going to bundle you off,” Mary informed her. “I really must––or was it anything special?”
It was all Trudy could do not to offer to play the confidential bosom friend and urge Mary to show Beatrice where she stood. But somehow the brisk business atmosphere, which was very real and brusque, prevented her from saying anything except that she had wanted to talk to her. She was lonesome––she was going to come some evening and have a good, old-time visit.
“Of course––just let me know when.”
“Oh”––archly––“are you busy on certain evenings?”
“Sometimes. French lessons; theatre; general odd jobs.”
“No particular caller?”
“No,” Mary laughed.
“I thought perhaps––you know, one time I came in and–––”
“You came one time and found Mr. O’Valley,” Mary hastened to add. “Yes, I remember, but that was an unusual occurrence. He came in on business and when he discovered I did not object to a pipe––he stayed.”
Trudy was disappointed. “Did Beatrice ever know?”
“Don’t know myself.” Mary was determined to win out. “I can’t see why she should––it would not interest her. She never listens to things that do not interest her.... You won’t know Luke. He grows like a weed.”
Trudy found herself dismissed. She did not know247just how it had come about but Mary was smiling her into the elevator and Trudy was sinking to the ground floor feeling that though it was none of her business unless she got a diamond ring she was just going to make other people unhappy, too.
Why this conclusion was reached was not at all clear to Trudy any more than to the rest of the world. But after all, it is only fair to leave something for the psychologists to debate about. At all events, it was the definite conclusion at which she arrived.
She could not resist paying a fleeting return visit to the largest of the jewellery stores. After which she told herself that it was little short of going without shoes or stockings through the streets to have been married the length of time she had been married and to possess not a single diamond.
Returning home for a canned luncheon she discovered Gaylord humming a love song and strumming on his ukulele.
“I say, old dear,” he began, “I have had the greatest luck! I call it nothing short of a fairy tale.” He pointed at his neckscarf. Coming near, Trudy bent over and gave way to a shrill scream. A handsome diamond pin reposed in the old-rose silk.
“Where––where did you get it?” she managed to articulate.
“Beatrice really––the result of the raffle for the children’s charity. You remember we took tickets? She donated this scarfpin, and this morning Jill Briggs came in and presented the trophy. My number was the winning one: 56.”
“She made you win it. You know she did, you toadying little abomination! You fairly lick her boots––and she has to tip you occasionally. And248you sit there wearing that pin and never offering to have it set in a pin for me. You dare to keep it––you dare?” She lost her self-control.
Gay sprang up in alarm, the ukulele being the only weapon handy, holding her off at arm’s length. “How low!” he chattered. “How d-disgustingly low–––”
“Is it? I’ll show you––I’ll show you whether or not you can wear diamond stickpins while I have to endure a wedding ring like a washwoman’s!”
Before Gay knew what was happening Trudy had left the house. A half hour later a suave clerk’s voice from the jewellery store was asking him to step down at once, his wife had requested it, she had decided on a ring for herself but wished his seal of approval––so did the store––and a small deposit––would he be able to be with them shortly?
He would, struggling with a man-size rage. After all, the little five-eighths-carat stone he had so proudly adorned his bosom with would be dearly paid for in the end. That was what came of marrying beneath him, he reproached himself as he locked up the apartment and went down to the store. To make a scene in a fifty-cent café was not worth the effort, Trudy had once proclaimed, but to run the gauntlet of real rough-house emotion in a jewellery store frequented by his clientele would be social suicide. The only thing was to make Beatrice pay a larger commission on the things for her new tea house so that he could pay for this red-haired vixen’s ring. But this would not in the least dim the red-haired vixen’s triumph, which was the issue at stake. From that moment he began really to hate Trudy.
To her amazement he greeted her in honeyed tones, approved the ring, and suggested that the wedding249ring be turned in for old gold and replaced by a modern creation and so on, produced a deposit, and walked out with Trudy, who wore the new symbol of triumph on her finger, proposing that they lunch downtown. He was determined to carry it through without a moment’s faltering.
Even Trudy was nonplussed. Once the treasure was secure in her possession she told herself it had been so easy that she was a fool not to have tried it before––she even complimented Gay on his scarfpin. But she began hating him also. No one would have suspected it, to watch these diamond-adorned young people guzzling crab-meat cocktails and planning fiercer raids on Beatrice O’Valley’s pocketbook.
Moreover, Trudy did not change in her decision to make someone unhappy. She found that possessing a diamond ring did not remove her discontent––and a shamed feeling stole over her, causing her to wonder how loudly she had screamed at Gay and how she must have looked when she started to strike him in her blind rage; how horrible it was to go off on tangents just because you wanted rings on your fingers and bells on your toes when all the time the world did contain such persons as Mary Faithful, who did not choose to claim a paradise which longed to be claimed.
Trudy was unable to keep her fingers out of the pie. She found herself naturally gravitating over to see Beatrice. Ostensibly she wanted to display her new ring and talk about Gay’s luck and the daring gypsy embroideries he had just received from New York but really to tell her Steve O’Valley, supposedly enslaved cave man, loved another and a plainer woman than her own gorgeous self.
250
She found Beatrice in a négligé of delicately embroidered chiffon with luxurious black-satin flowers as a corsage. She had seldom seen her look as lovely; even the too-abundant curves of flesh were concealed behind the lace draperies. She seemed this day of days to fit into the background of the villa, as if some old master had let his most adored brain child come tripping from a tarnished frame––a little lady in old lace, as it were.
Beatrice had taken up a new activity since her father’s stroke. At first the stroke had frightened, then bored, then amused her. She really liked having what she termed a “comfortable calamity” in the family. It was something so new to plan for and talk about, such a valid excuse if she did not wish to accept invitations, and an excellent reason for runaway trips to Atlantic City or New York “to get away from it all for a little––poor, dear papa.”
So she sat with her father rather more than one would have expected, made him listen to opera records which drove him to distraction, talked to him of nothing, and tried to be a little sister to the afflicted in a pink-satin and cream-lace setting.
She had lost her interest in Trudy––Trudy no longer amused or frightened her. And Gay had become so useful and attentive that had the truth about the raffle been known it would be the astonishing information that as Beatrice donated the tie pin she decided she should pick the future owner––and Gay was the logical candidate to her way of thinking.
Also she was quite contented with Steve. He let her alone and he adored her––she never doubted that. He wanted her to have everything she wished––and251that was the biggest, finest way to show one’s love for another. It was the only way that she had ever known existed. Of course all brides have silly notions of perpetual adoration, that sort of thing, and Steve was a cave man first and last, bless his old heart, but they had passed any mid-channel which might exist and were happy for all time to come. They seldom quarrelled, and she no longer tried to make Steve over to her liking in small ways, and he seldom offered her suggestions. Moreover, he was so good to her father––and of course everything was as it should be. It was simply the rather drab fashion in which most lives are lived, and Beatrice was quite contented. She had never gotten another toy dog, not even as a contrast to Tawny Adonis. Really, Gay answered a multitude of needs!
But Trudy was a real person––and a constant reminder of what Beatrice herself might have been, and therefore Beatrice never ceased to envy her or to picture how much better she could do were she in Trudy’s place. She preferred not having her about. Besides, Trudy was impossible in Italian villas––she belonged in a near-mahogany atmosphere with cerise-silk drapes and gaudy vases. Age-old elegancies did not harmonize with her vivid self.
So she was not overly cordial in greeting Trudy. But Trudy with an eye to mischief managed to draw her little lady-in-old-lace hostess into a heart-to-heart talk. And before the afternoon ended Beatrice had experienced the first real shock of her life. Her husband smoked a pipe in Mary Faithful’s living room and never told her; and Mary Faithful admitted she loved someone very much and was with him each day in business and so on; and Trudy had252seen the smile pass between them which signifies the perfect understanding! And oh, she did not know a tenth of it, deary; not a tenth of it! It was one of those subtle, hidden things, nothing tangible or dreadful––like a purgatorial state of mind which may result in brimstone or lovely angels with harps. Neither could she do anything about it since they were both perfect dears and always would be. Not for worlds, in Trudy’s estimation, would they ever take it upon themselves to prove the brittleness of vows.
After which Beatrice thanked Trudy, wishing her a speedy death by way of gratitude, going to her room to decide what her attitude should be.
To accuse Steve was crude; besides, she must be positive that it was true. To get up an affair herself would be no heart balm since she had never ceased having affairs––well-bred episodes, rather, perfectly harmless when all is said and done, quite like Steve’s, for that matter! She could not find a new interest in life until she had reduced at least twenty pounds, since her dieting and exercises required all surplus will power and thought. She would go away only her plans were made for months ahead. She could not tell her father––the shock might kill him.... There was really nothing left to do but suffer––be wretched and wonder if it was true. A horrid state of uncertainty––to ask herself how it could ever have happened and what would be the end, and terrible things––just terrible things! No matter how large a check she might write to buy herself a new toy it would have no bearing whatsoever upon the matter. She wished to heaven Trudy had confined her gossip to the funny little manicure with champagne eyes253who flirted with someone else’s husband! This was her reward for having taken up with a shopgirl person!
The final conclusion she reached was that she did not believe a word Trudy had told her.