 | Tales of the jazz age |  |
IV
She was still quite angry when she came out of the
dressing-room and crossed the intervening parlor of politeness
that opened onto the hall—angry not so much
at the actual happening which was, after all, the merest
commonplace of her social existence, but because it
had occurred on this particular night. She had no
quarrel with herself. She had acted with that correct
mixture of dignity and reticent pity which she always
employed. She had succinctly and deftly snubbed
him.
It had happened when their taxi was leaving the Biltmore—hadn't
gone half a block. He had lifted his right
arm awkwardly—she was on his right side—and attempted
to settle it snugly around the crimson fur-trimmed
opera cloak she wore. This in itself had been
a mistake. It was inevitably more graceful for a young
man attempting to embrace a young lady of whose
acquiescence he was not certain, to first put his far arm
around her. It avoided that awkward movement of
raising the near arm.
His second faux pas was unconscious. She had spent
the afternoon at the hairdresser's; the idea of any calamity
overtaking her hair was extremely repugnant—
yet as Peter made his unfortunate attempt the point of
his elbow had just faintly brushed it. That was his
second faux pas. Two were quite enough.
He had begun to murmur. At the first murmur she
had decided that he was nothing but a college boy—
Edith was twenty-two, and anyhow, this dance, first
of its kind since the war, was reminding her, with the
accelerating rhythm of its associations, of something
else—of another dance and another man, a man for
whom her feelings had been little more than a sad-eyed,
love with her recollection of Gordon Sterrett.
So she came out of the dressing-room at Delmonico's
and stood for a second in the doorway looking over the
shoulders of a black dress in front of her at the groups
of Yale men who flitted like dignified black moths
around the head of the stairs. From the room she had
left drifted out the heavy fragrance left by the passage
to and fro of many scented young beauties—rich perfumes
and the fragile memory-laden dust of fragrant
powders. This odor drifting out acquired the tang of
cigarette smoke in the hall, and then settled sensuously
down the stairs and permeated the ballroom where the
Gamma Psi dance was to be held. It was an odor she
knew well, exciting, stimulating, restlessly sweet—the
odor of a fashionable dance.
She thought of her own appearance. Her bare arms
and shoulders were powdered to a creamy white. She
knew they looked very soft and would gleam like milk
against the black backs that were to silhouette them tonight.
The hairdressing had been a success; her reddish
mass of hair was piled and crushed and creased to
an arrogant marvel of mobile curves. Her lips were
finely made of deep carmine; the irises of her eyes were
delicate, breakable blue, like china eyes. She was a
complete, infinitely delicate, quite perfect thing of
beauty, flowing in an even line from a complex coiffure
to two small slim feet.
She thought of what she would say to-night at this
revel, faintly prestiged already by the sounds of high and
low laughter and slippered footsteps, and movements of
couples up and down the stairs. She would talk the
language she had talked for many years—her line—made
up of the current expressions, bits of journalese and college
slang strung together into an intrinsic whole, careless,
smiled faintly as she heard a girl sitting on the stairs
near her say: "You don't know the half of it, dearie!"
And as she smiled her anger melted for a moment,
and closing her eyes she drew in a deep breath of pleasure.
She dropped her arms to her side until they were
faintly touching the sleek sheath that covered and suggested
her figure. She had never felt her own softness
so much nor so enjoyed the whiteness of her own arms.
"I smell sweet," she said to herself simply, and then
came another thought—"I'm made for love."
She liked the sound of this and thought it again; then
in inevitable succession came her new-born riot of dreams
about Gordon. The twist of her imagination which, two
months before, had disclosed to her her unguessed
desire to see him again, seemed now to have been leading
up to this dance, this hour.
For all her sleek beauty, Edith was a grave, slow-thinking
girl. There was a streak in her of that same
desire to ponder, of that adolescent idealism that had
turned her brother socialist and pacifist. Henry Bradin
had left Cornell, where he had been an instructor in
economics, and had come to New York to pour the latest
cures for incurable evils into the columns of a radical
weekly newspaper.
Edith, less fatuously, would have been content to cure
Gordon Sterrett. There was a quality of weakness in
Gordon that she wanted to take care of; there was a
helplessness in him that she wanted to protect. And
she wanted someone she had known a long while, someone
who had loved her a long while. She was a little
tired; she wanted to get married. Out of a pile of letters,
half a dozen pictures and as many memories, and
this weariness, she had decided that next time she saw
Gordon their relations were going to be changed. She
was this evening. This was her evening. All evenings
were her evenings.
Then her thoughts were interrupted by a solemn
undergraduate with a hurt look and an air of strained
formality who presented himself before her and bowed
unusually low. It was the man she had come with,
Peter Himmel. He was tall and humorous, with horned-rimmed
glasses and an air of attractive whimsicality.
She suddenly rather disliked him—probably because he
had not succeeded in kissing her.
"Well," she began, "are you still furious at me?"
"Not at all."
She stepped forward and took his arm.
"I'm sorry," she said softly. "I don't know why I
snapped out that way. I'm in a bum humor to-night
for some strange reason. I'm sorry."
"S'all right," he mumbled, "don't mention it."
He felt disagreeably embarrassed. Was she rubbing
in the fact of his late failure?
"It was a mistake," she continued, on the same consciously
gentle key. "We'll both forget it." For this
he hated her.
A few minutes later they drifted out on the floor while
the dozen swaying, sighing members of the specially
hired jazz orchestra informed the crowded ballroom
that "if a saxophone and me are left alone why then two
is com-pan-ee!"
A man with a mustache cut in.
"Hello," he began reprovingly. "You don't remember
me."
"I can't just think of your name," she said lightly—
"and I know you so well."
"I met you up at—" His voice trailed disconsolately
off as a man with very fair hair cut in. Edith
to the inconnu.
The very fair man insisted on shaking hands enthusiastically.
She placed him as one of the numerous Jims
of her acquaintance—last name a mystery. She remembered
even that he had a peculiar rhythm in dancing
and found as they started that she was right.
"Going to be here long?" he breathed confidentially.
She leaned back and looked up at him.
"Couple of weeks."
"Where are you?"
"Biltmore. Call me up some day."
"I mean it," he assured her. "I will. We'll go to
tea."
"So do I—Do."
A dark man cut in with intense formality.
"You don't remember me, do you?" he said gravely.
"I should say I do. Your name's Harlan."
"No-ope. Barlow."
"Well, I knew there were two syllables anyway.
You're the boy that played the ukulele so well up at
Howard Marshall's house party.
"I played—but not—"
A man with prominent teeth cut in. Edith inhaled
a slight cloud of whiskey. She liked men to have had
something to drink; they were so much more cheerful,
and appreciative and complimentary—much easier to
talk to.
"My name's Dean, Philip Dean," he said cheerfully.
"You don't remember me, I know, but you used
to come up to New Haven with a fellow I roomed with
senior year, Gordon Sterrett."
Edith looked up quickly.
"Yes, I went up with him twice—to the Pump and
Slipper and the Junior prom."
"You've seen him, of course," said Dean carelessly.
"He's here to-night. I saw him just a minute ago."
Edith started. Yet she had felt quite sure he would
be here.
"Why, no, I haven't—"
A fat man with red hair cut in.
"Hello, Edith," he began.
"Why—hello there—"
She slipped, stumbled lightly.
"I'm sorry, dear," she murmured mechanically.
She had seen Gordon—Gordon very white and listless,
leaning against the side of a doorway, smoking and
looking into the ballroom. Edith could see that his
face was thin and wan—that the hand he raised to
his lips with a cigarette was trembling. They were
dancing quite close to him now.
"—They invite so darn many extra fellas that you—"
the short man was saying.
"Hello, Gordon," called Edith over her partner's
shoulder. Her heart was pounding wildly.
His large dark eyes were fixed on her. He took a
step in her direction. Her partner turned her away—
she heard his voice bleating—
"—but half the stags get lit and leave before long,
so—"
Then a low tone at her side.
"May I, please?"
She was dancing suddenly with Gordon; one of his
arms was around her; she felt it tighten spasmodically;
felt his hand on her back with the fingers spread. Her
hand holding the little lace handkerchief was crushed
in his.
"Why Gordon," she began breathlessly.
"Hello, Edith."
She slipped again—was tossed forward by her recovery
coat. She loved him—she knew she loved him—then
for a minute there was silence while a strange feeling
of uneasiness crept over her. Something was wrong.
Of a sudden her heart wrenched, and turned over as
she realized what it was. He was pitiful and wretched,
a little drunk, and miserably tired.
"Oh—" she cried involuntarily.
His eyes looked down at her. She saw suddenly that
they were blood-streaked and rolling uncontrollably.
"Gordon," she murmured, "we'll sit down; I want to
sit down."
They were nearly in mid-floor, but she had seen two
men start toward her from opposite sides of the room,
so she halted, seized Gordon's limp hand and led him
bumping through the crowd, her mouth tight shut, her
face a little pale under her rouge, her eyes trembling
with tears.
She found a place high up on the soft-carpeted stairs,
and he sat down heavily beside her.
"Well," he began, staring at her unsteadily, "I certainly
am glad to see you, Edith."
She looked at him without answering. The effect of
this on her was immeasurable. For years she had seen
men in various stages of intoxication, from uncles all
the way down to chauffeurs, and her feelings had varied
from amusement to disgust, but here for the first time
she was seized with a new feeling—an unutterable
horror.
"Gordon," she said accusingly and almost crying,
"you look like the devil."
He nodded. "I've had trouble, Edith."
"Trouble?"
"All sorts of trouble. Don't you say anything to the
family, but I'm all gone to pieces. I'm a mess, Edith."
His lower lip was sagging. He seemed scarcely to see
her.
"Can't you—can't you," she hesitated, "can't you
tell me about it, Gordon? You know I'm always interested
in you."
She bit her lip—she had intended to say something
stronger, but found at the end that she couldn't bring
it out.
Gordon shook his head dully. "I can't tell you.
You're a good woman. I can't tell a good woman the
story."
"Rot," she said, defiantly. "I think it's a perfect
insult to call any one a good woman in that way. It's a
slam. You've been drinking, Gordon."
"Thanks." He inclined his head gravely. "Thanks
for the information."
"Why do you drink?"
"Because I'm so damn miserable."
"Do you think drinking's going to make it any better?"
"What you doing—trying to reform me?"
"No; I'm trying to help you, Gordon. Can't you
tell me about it?"
"I'm in an awful mess. Best thing you can do is to
pretend not to know me."
"Why, Gordon?"
"I'm sorry I cut in on you—its unfair to you. You're
pure woman—and all that sort of thing. Here, I'll get
some one else to dance with you."
He rose clumsily to his feet, but she reached up and
pulled him down beside her on the stairs.
"Here, Gordon. You're ridiculous. You're hurting
me. You're acting like a—like a crazy man—"
"I admit it. I'm a little crazy. Something's wrong
with me, Edith. There's something left me. It
doesn't matter."
"It does, tell me."
"Just that. I was always queer—little bit different
from other boys. All right in college, but now it's all
wrong. Things have been snapping inside me for four
months like little hooks on a dress, and it's about to
come off when a few more hooks go. I'm very gradually
going loony."
He turned his eyes full on her and began to laugh,
and she shrank away from him.
"What is the matter?"
"Just me," he repeated. "I'm going loony. This
whole place is like a dream to me—this Delmonico's—"
As he talked she saw he had changed utterly. He
wasn't at all light and gay and careless—a great lethargy
and discouragement had come over him. Revulsion
seized her, followed by a faint, surprising boredom.
His voice seemed to come out of a great void.
"Edith," he said, "I used to think I was clever,
talented, an artist. Now I know I'm nothing.
Can't draw, Edith. Don't know why I'm telling you
this."
She nodded absently.
"I can't draw, I can't do anything. I'm poor as a
church mouse." He laughed, bitterly and rather too
loud. "I've become a damn beggar, a leech on my
friends. I'm a failure. I'm poor as hell."
Her distaste was growing. She barely nodded this
time, waiting for her first possible cue to rise.
Suddenly Gordon's eyes filled with tears.
"Edith," he said, turning to her with what was evidently
a strong effort at self-control, "I can't tell you
what it means to me to know there's one person left
who's interested in me."
He reached out and patted her hand, and involuntarily
she drew it away.
"It's mighty fine of you," he repeated.
"Well," she said slowly, looking him in the eye,
"any one's always glad to see an old friend—but I'm
sorry to see you like this, Gordon."
There was a pause while they looked at each other,
and the momentary eagerness in his eyes wavered. She
rose and stood looking at him, her face quite expressionless.
"Shall we dance?" she suggested, coolly.
—Love is fragile—she was thinking—but perhaps the
pieces are saved, the things that hovered on lips, that
might have been said. The new love words, the tendernesses
learned, are treasured up for the next lover.
| Tales of the jazz age | |