CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Philip did not come for a week. Every day, after the first three, Nan rang up the office, but either Philip had just left or had not yet come. Every night Gerte wondered why, until Catherine finally advised her to write if she was so anxious. And then, on the second Wednesday, Philip appeared. He came late, in his most boisterous mood. Gerte fussed over him, touched him, patted his shoulder, insisted that they had been worried to death about him. Even Beth showed a slight sense of restored comfort, as if some special piece of furniture to which she had grown accustomed had been replaced. Nan was almost as exuberant as Philip. Catherine alone refused to confess any anxiety or relief.
Jean fancied that Catherine's attitude interested Philip, and that in some way he had changed. His hilarity was still diffused to include them all, but when he spoke to Jean directly, he seemed to clear a little space of this boisterous litter, to enter with her an interval of reality. Jean was too busy, however, with her own work and helping Catherine with the coming concert to give it much attention.
The concert was to be on Friday and on Monday Jean had her secretary send out a list of complimentary tickets. Jerome came in while Jean was dictating names, waited until she had finished, and, when the girl had gone, said:
"Well?"
"Well?"
"I didn't hear mine; don't I get a ticket?"
"Do you want to go?"
Jerome smiled. "You can't make me mad that way, not a scrap. You're in league with Alice. I can see that, but you can't get a rise out of me that way. I'm going to the concert because——"
"Never mind. Don't bother to invent a reason. You're going because you want to."
"Oh, feminine intuition, deep, unfathomable and always right! Exactly. I'm going because I want to. Do you know a better reason?"
"None. What did Alice say?"
"She doesn't know yet. I can't reform all at once. I'm going to appear and astonish her."
Jean took a ticket and handed it to him.
"Where is it?"
"Between Alice and myself."
Jerome fingered the ticket as if he were about to say something, didn't, and slipped it into his pocket.
"But please don't forget that some one has to be responsible for me. With Tony I guess I shall be safe, but with that Poloff person there is danger. Ineverknow when the end of one of those classical selections has arrived and I may disgrace you by clapping at the wrong place."
"Never fear. I'll see that no harm comes nigh thee."
"See to it better than you did at the tea," Jerome shot back from the doorway as he left.
On Friday, Jean did not go to the office at all. Gerte had left some alterations on her dress until the last moment, and all afternoon an excitable French seamstress buzzed about the house like a gnat, getting in every one's way, calling incessantly on Le Bon Dieu for needles of the right size, her thimble, for Madamoiselle. Catherine, maddeningly calm in any confusion caused by others, went quietly about, saying bitter, sarcastic things in a gentle voice, and only the realization that this evening was something of a trial for Catherine prevented them from retaliating in kind.
Not until the pickup supper was over, and the French gnat gone, did peace descend. Then, stretched on the couch before the open window of her attic, Jean looked up into the soft spring dusk and let its peace wrap her. The little stars still twinkled with some of the crisp, business-like twinkle of winter, but spring had already come. Down in the narrow streets it was warm. Soon summer would be there. In a short while, a few weeks at most, the house would be empty and still as it was now. The others would be gone on their summer vacations. Jean felt that she would like the house, alone in the silence.
There was barely time to dress when Jean at last jumped up and turned on the light. It was three years since Jean had worn an evening dress and that had been a very simple affair compared to this. Nan had insisted on the lowest possible neck and not the vestige of a sleeve. As Jean hurried into the filmy chiffon, the intricacies of its hooking amused her.
"I feel exactly as if I were a puzzle putting myself together."
She was preening anxiously before the glass, making sure that she had solved the puzzle correctly, when, without waiting for an answer to her knock, Catherine hurried in.
"Just this one hook, please. I simply can't manage it and Gerte—why——"
Catherine stopped and took Jean in from top to toe and back.
"Jean Herrick,areyou going to wear your hair like that?"
"Why, what's the matter with it?"
"It's the way you talked to that labor crowd last Monday."
"Surely. I always do it that way."
"It's impossible with that gown. Nine-tenths of you looks like the real thing and the other tenth——"
"You've got it twisted. One-tenth looks like me and the other nine-tenths are somebody else. I feel—like an idiot—in this thing."
"You come darn near looking like it with your hair that way. Fluff it up some."
"Oh, come on, Catherine, and get hooked. I don't know how to fluff it and wouldn't if I did. What difference does it make, anyhow?"
Catherine looked at her queerly. "None—I guess."
Jean finished the hooking. "There, you're gowned enough for the whole bunch." Catherine's dress was very simple and apparently made no effort to be anything but a covering. In reality it was a frame and shadow box, that softened the sharpness of Catherine's face to piquancy, made her thirty instead of forty, mischievous instead of caustic.
"You're ready, then?" Catherine spoke as if she were giving Jean a last chance to redeem the hair, drawn back in the low, tight knot.
"Been ready for hours and mapped out a whole summer waiting."
Catherine, standing near the switch, turned off the light.
"Do you mean that, too, about not going out of town all summer?"
"Yes, except, perhaps, for week-ends."
Catherine did not answer, but Jean had the feeling of something moving between them in the darkness. Then Catherine passed into the hall.
"Come on. There's Philip with the taxi."