XISIXTEEN
GORGAS was now fastened up to a schedule—her life became organized. Without a word she gave up her open fight against the unreasonableness of the traditional school customs; accepted the absurdities, and performed the mechanical tasks as if they were really worth doing; and she found, after a while, that, once the ritual was learned, the service was not very exacting either in brain or time.
The need for tutoring being eliminated, the regular weekly dinners at Levering’s gradually broke off. Readings in literature were tried once or twice with a small group, but they developed into rather tame and stilted affairs, and were dropped.
The winter of ’88 and ’89 drifted by before anyone was ready for it to go. The next year Blynn spent in Germany, where all good scholars went in those days, and during the winter that followed his return, the intimate connection with the Leverings seemed almost ready to break off naturally.
Several times Blynn and Gorgas took the afternoon to themselves and read poetry and talked. There was nothing tame nor stilted about these literary exercises; rather, they were warm with the glow of sincere feeling;but they never achieved the perfect freedom of the earlier meetings. Allen Blynn seemed to be growing aloof and pedagogic, and Gorgas was enveloped for good in the protective reserve of the young woman.
Leopold dropped in upon the Leverings with a semblance of regularity. In a crowd he was smilingly silent; but as an intimate guest he came out and talked. The latest news of the biological sciences—all the new mysteries and dramatic new discoveries—he put before them simply and clearly, although he made no concessions to Gorgas’ youth. She thrilled with gratitude because he never once spoke to her in a patronizing way or seemed to consider for one moment that she could not comprehend every discussion; and her acquisitive young soul expanded.
And Ned Morris went on playing tennis with Gorgas until a place had to be set for him regularly at the Levering luncheons and dinners, and on the days of five a. m. practice games, at breakfast, too.
She was sixteen in September—September 10, 1891—and gave a “party”—one of those affairs where everything is planned seriously, as if for excited children—a cake with candles, ice cream in animal moulds, snap bonbons, and guests in semi-masquerade—but where all the so-called children smile satirically and go through the ceremonies in exaggerated earnest. It is really a farewell to childhood.
Kate wrote Blynn his invitation. “Gorgas,” she said, “insists upon celebrating her sixteenth anniversary with due ceremonies of cake and candle and partner.At her suggestion and with the approval of myself I herewith invite you to come and be my partner. Take care before accepting. I have no idea of the duties of partners. Perhaps you may have to bob for apples in tubs; or you may have to play ‘Copenhagen’ and kiss the little girls. It will be outlandish andnon composand characteristic of the Levering Liberty Hall—that you may be assured. I fancy that we old folks will look on, (Gracious! I am twenty-five. O Petruchio, why stayest thou so long in Verona!) while the children cavort.
“The ladies will masquerade mildly. I shall wear my mother’s evening gown of 1861; so you must perforce keep a respectable distance.”
To the great satisfaction of everyone—they all were busy folks and had had a slight chill at the suggestion of children’s party—the guests were simply the old dinner group with the addition of Bea Wilcox. Diccon and Davis were wringing each other’s hands as Blynn entered; Leopold was gaily chatting with Gorgas in French; and Mary Weston and Betty Sommers were crowding around Ed Morris, shaking both hands at once.
“What has Ed been up to now?” inquired Blynn. “Graduated or something?”
Everyone laughed; Blynn looked so eager and so innocent of the world’s doings.
“Ed’s ’89,” Leopold reminded Blynn.
“You ought to know,” chirped Davis, “your marks probably pulled him through.”
Mary Weston took Blynn by the lapels. “Allen Blynn, don’t you really and honestly read the newspapers? Ed Morris has done gone and won the tennis singles championship of Philadelphia county.”
“By the Great Horn Spoon, boy!” Blynn gripped his hand. “I’m mighty glad to know that. Why, I did see an account of some Morris taking the trophy,” he defended himself, “but I didn’t connect you with the business. Why, man, I’d have been there to see you do it.”
“And you didn’t hear about the exhibition mixed doubles, either,” Bea tugged at his other lapel.
“Bless us all!” cried Allen, “don’t tell me you have taken in Montgomery and Lancaster counties, too?”
“It was only an exhibition, Bea,” Gorgas called out from across the room, “the others didn’t half try.”
“Hush, child,” retorted Bea, “when yo’ mammy’s talkin’! The fact is—the latest news is—that Gorgas Levering and Edwin Morris gave a jim-crickety exhibition against the champion ‘mixers’ of the East and—”
“Bless us again!” exclaimed Allen, “don’t tell me that they beat ’em; eh?”
“Yes!” said Bea, “they beat ’em.”
Chorus of protests followed; a babel of correction. Blynn stopped his ears, until Gorgas could be heard.
“No, Mr. Blynn,” she said, “we lost two sets of 10-8 each. We were nearly fagged, weren’t we, Ed? And they were fresh as daisies. They didn’t try; andEd did all the work. What did you fib for, Bea, and drop us down so hard?”
“I repeat,” said Bea solemnly, “Theybeat’em. Who’s to dispute that? The professor of English here asked, ‘Didtheybeat’em,’ and I just wanted him to take more care and pains with his English and not go sp-pilling his p-pronouns p-promiscuously all over the p-place. So, I just said, ‘Yes;theydid beat’em.’ And so they did.”
“Aw! What’s pronouns between friends?” queried Diccon, the editor. “Here the girls get all togged out in their mothers’ clothes, and we’re talking ‘newspaper.’” That brought a fresh outburst, mainly an attack on Diccon.
“Sport’s ‘newspaper,’” he explained laconically. “I make ’em—’em here stands for both sports and newspaper. What’s in the newspaper is sport; the rest don’t happen. Blynn didn’t know anything about Morris because he forgets to read the newspapers—and I ran Ed in on the first page, too. Ah!” he sighed, “What is fame?”
At that moment Kate came slowly into the room and courtesied. She wore the small hoops of a young lady of ’61, a dainty costume, when it is not exaggerated; and some of the charm of that sedate attire found its way by contagion into the personality of the wearer. Gentleness and sweetness were her prevailing charms that evening.
Blynn watched her with open interest; an occupation which she did not miss, even when her back was towardhim; but he was only thinking how that crinoline period had been much maligned, and was fancying that her mother must have been just such a shy, timorous creature a quarter of a century ago.
Mary and Betty had discovered ill-mated parts of gowns of the early ’80’s—skin-tight sleeves, lace shawl and enormous bustles. Bea Wilcox wore a genuine child’s dress, her younger sister’s, and, with her height, looked as scandalous as she intended.
Later, on the lantern-lighted porch, Blynn was aware of Gorgas standing beside him holding out a hand and asking:
“Weren’t you ever coming over to greet me and wish me congratulations?”
“By the Great Horn Spoon!” he ejaculated, looking her over open-eyed. “What’s happened to you?”
“I’ve growed up, M’sieu’.” Something had certainly happened to her. Her masquerade consisted simply of the gown her sister Keyser would have worn that evening if there had been no disguising. Besides, she had coiled her hair.
“This beats the tennis-court all hollow,” he murmured, patently dumbfounded by the change. “Retro, Sathanas!Get thee behind me, silk and satin!”
“Do you like it?” she asked; but staring admiration glowed from him.
“Ein tousand ein hundred ein und zwanzig!” he swore à la Bardek. “It’s uncanny, eerie, spooky!”
“I did it all for you,” she confided frankly. “Hid the—uh—underpinnings.”
“But good Scotland, girl!” he replied. “That’s not the way to please me! Oh, it’s glorious. Goodness! You are stunning! But you always upset me when you—uh—go without—uh—underpinnings, you know. Disconcerts me.” His tone was that of the older-man-joking-with-little-girl; but his eyes shone with admiration. “Makes me think I ought to treat you the way—eh—I ought to be ashamed of myself for wanting to. If you’d only giggle or simper—things you never do, thank Peter!—it would give me the cue, occasionally.”
“I see you are impressed,” she smiled and tapped him on the arm. “That’s what I did it for—just that.... You’ve got the wrong idea about fifteen and sixteen. Older persons always do. Fifteen and sixteen don’t feel at all childlike, I can tell you. I’ll never be any older than I am now. My mind’s grown up—”
“‘I do not wear motley in my brain, madonna,’” he quoted the wise clown, Feste.
“That’s just it,” comprehending; “and it’s insufferable to dress us the way they do—skirts that are neither long nor short, hair hanging or half brought up with ribbons. And,” she whispered, “you get positively ashamed of your—underpinnings. I’ve let out the hem of some of my skirts myself—on the quiet. You don’t know how comfortable and at home I feel in this.” She took several easy steps forward and back. “But mother won’t listen to me. I’d be grown up from now on if she’d let me.”
Others of the party were swarming out on the porch. Kate was coming forward to claim her partner.
“Listen,mon capitaine,” Gorgas spoke hurriedly. “I want to have a powwow with you. Stay a few moments after the others are gone; will you?”
He agreed, hardly comprehending what she had said. Her eyes were searching him as of old and her hand was ever so lightly touching his arm. All convention to the contrary, she was a woman, no doubt; but it was the delightful childlike quality about her that really thrilled him. He was thinking, now that she looked so stately and poised, how, after all, it was as a child that she appealed to him. A strong, painful desire swept him to have just such a brood of his own about him. His impulses were domestic and parental, and he was twenty-six and childless.
Kate was talking to him and he was answering with one-half of his mind. The other half was following Gorgas as she swept across the porch and onto the lawn to claim her partner, Ed Morris. Morris was offering an arm grotesquely in tribute to her long skirts. They marched off gaily.
That’s the way she would go, he tried to assure himself. Some chap of her own generation would take her away, and then she would be lost. It was the fate of parents to lose their offspring. Real fathers, however, had rights and claims. They could put their arms about their daughters, pat their cheeks and listen to their prattle, no matter who else owned them; and there would be no horrid suspicions about the matter. As heheard the ripples of laughter that came from their confidential talks out on the lawn, he had a little pang of regret. “Mon père,” he remembered how she had once dubbed him. “Mon père,” he nodded to himself, “is about to lose hisenfant; and it isn’t at all a pleasant sensation.... It’s like pups,” he grinned. “There’s no use trying to own them. You get your affection all tied up and then they die and you have to begin all over with a new lot. The thing to do is to give ’em away quick and forget ’em.”