I
THEIR night came unheralded.
Kennicott was on a country call. It was cool but Carol
huddled on the porch, rocking, meditating, rocking. The house
was lonely and repellent, and though she sighed, "I ought
to go in and read—so many things to read—ought to go in," she
remained. Suddenly Erik was coming, turning in, swinging
open the screen door, touching her hand.
"Erik!"
"Saw your husband driving out of town. Couldn't stand
it."
"Well— You mustn't stay more than five minutes."
"Couldn't stand not seeing you. Every day, towards
evening, felt I had to see you—pictured you so clear. I've been
good though, staying away, haven't I!"
"And you must go on being good."
"Why must I?"
"We better not stay here on the porch. The Howlands
across the street are such window-peepers, and Mrs.
Bogart—"
She did not look at him but she could divine his tremulousness
as he stumbled indoors. A moment ago the night had been
coldly empty; now it was incalculable, hot, treacherous. But
it is women who are the calm realists once they discard the
fetishes of the premarital hunt. Carol was serene as she
murmured, "Hungry? I have some little honey-colored cakes.
You may have two, and then you must skip home."
"Take me up and let me see Hugh asleep."
"I don't believe—"
"Just a glimpse!"
"Well—"
She doubtfully led the way to the hallroom-nursery. Their
heads close, Erik's curls pleasant as they touched her cheek,
they looked in at the baby. Hugh was pink with slumber.
He had burrowed into his pillow with such energy that it
was almost smothering him. Beside it was a celluloid
rhinoceros; tight in his hand a torn picture of Old King
Cole.
"Shhh!" said Carol, quite automatically. She tiptoed in
to pat the pillow. As she returned to Erik she had a friendly
sense of his waiting for her. They smiled at each other. She
did not think of Kennicott, the baby's father. What she did
think was that some one rather like Erik, an older and surer
Erik, ought to be Hugh's father. The three of them would
play—incredible imaginative games.
"Carol! You've told me about your own room. Let me
peep in at it."
"But you mustn't stay, not a second. We must go
downstairs."
"Yes."
"Will you be good?"
"R-reasonably!" He was pale, large-eyed, serious.
"You've got to be more than reasonably good!" She felt
sensible and superior; she was energetic about pushing open
the door.
Kennicott had always seemed out of place there but Erik
surprisingly harmonized with the spirit of the room as he
stroked the books, glanced at the prints. He held out his
hands. He came toward her. She was weak, betrayed to a
warm softness. Her head was tilted back. Her eyes were
closed. Her thoughts were formless but many-colored. She
felt his kiss, diffident and reverent, on her eyelid.
Then she knew that it was impossible.
She shook herself. She sprang from him. "Please!" she
said sharply.
He looked at her unyielding.
"I am fond of you," she said. "Don't spoil everything.
Be my friend."
"How many thousands and millions of women must have
said that! And now you! And it doesn't spoil everything.
It glorifies everything."
"Dear, I do think there's a tiny streak of fairy in you—
whatever you do with it. Perhaps I'd have loved that once.
But I won't. It's too late. But I'll keep a fondness for you.
Impersonal—I will be impersonal! It needn't be just a thin
talky fondness. You do need me, don't you? Only you and
my son need me. I've wanted so to be wanted! Once I
wanted love to be given to me. Now I'll be content if I can
give. . . . Almost content!
"We women, we like to do things for men. Poor men!
We swoop on you when you're defenseless and fuss over you
and insist on reforming you. But it's so pitifully deep in us.
You'll be the one thing in which I haven't failed. Do something
definite! Even if it's just selling cottons. Sell beautiful
cottons—caravans from China—"
"Carol! Stop! You do love me!"
"I do not! It's just— Can't you understand? Everything
crushes in on me so, all the gaping dull people, and I look
for a way out— Please go. I can't stand any more.
Please!"
He was gone. And she was not relieved by the quiet of the
house. She was empty and the house was empty and she
needed him. She wanted to go on talking, to get this threshed
out, to build a sane friendship. She wavered down to the
living-room, looked out of the bay-window. He was not to
be seen. But Mrs. Westlake was. She was walking past, and
in the light from the corner arc-lamp she quickly inspected
the porch, the windows. Carol dropped the curtain, stood with
movement and reflection paralyzed. Automatically, without
reasoning, she mumbled, "I will see him again soon and make
him understand we must be friends. But— The house is
so empty. It echoes so."