CHAPTER XI.
“Not unto the forest, O my lover,
O my lover, do not lead me to the forest.
Joy is where the temples are, lines of dancers swinging far,
Drums and lyres and viols in the town,
And the flapping leaves would blind me, and the clinging vines would bind me,
And the thorny rose-boughs tear my saffron gown.
I will love you by the light, and the beat of drums at night,
And the echoing of laughter in my ears,
But I fear the forest.”—Greek Folk Song.
It was Christmas Eve. A soft, light snow had left the country white and downy as a young swan’s breast. As if the feather padding of the road had muffled the engine, the car cut along quietly as a boat, but the clear, cooing tones of the girl’s voice carried far, and her laughter echoed back from the trees like the mimicry of some mischievous nymph. In the after calm of the year’s first snowstorm the purity of the earth and air and sky gave the world that touch of unreality dear to poets and lovers, and Marjorie and Billy had come out in the late afternoon, as they often did on holidays and Sundays, to breathe for miles the air of the hills, to watch the lights of the city rush out through the dusk like streams of little racing fires, and to drive
wherever fancy led them, stopping somewhere in town for supper and coming home slowly, very slowly and quietly in the dark.
“Let’s take some road we don’t know,” the girl suggested. “Let’s go over the hills, and then just when it’s getting dark we’ll come to the edge of the heights somewhere and coast right down into the city, like we did the first night you came here—do you remember?”
“Every second of it.”
“That was in the spring. Even the town was half asleep and lazy after the winter’s dissipation; to-night it will be as gay as a debutantes’ ball. In the country it was muddy and the fields and barns and fences stood out ugly and unashamed of themselves, like some old scrub-woman. Now the snow comes and gives her a new dress, you see, and here she is, a lady in white fox and diamonds. Wonderful, isn’t it, what clothes will do? But underneath she’s still the same old scrub-woman, the work-driven, squalid country. How I pity the people who have to stay here all their lives. Where are we going?”
Billy had turned up a new road, the winding, wooded avenue leading to the place on the hill. He had felt that if she could ever see its beauty it would be to-day, with the glow of the sun still pink above the cedars jagging the horizon, and the early moon making sharp shadows and glittering open spaces on the snow. Her last burst of
sympathy for the people who had to live in the country was not encouraging, but he was so filled with the spell of it all himself that it seemed as though he must fire her with some of his enthusiasm.
At the crest of the hill the car stopped and he told her to look. There was nothing tangible to see but a deep expanse of level whiteness with a windbreak of black pines at the back, and one tall gnarl-limbed maple sheltering the remains of a ruined old house. She looked about blankly and asked:
“What is it?”
He smiled. “There’s isn’t much to see, yet,” he said, “but I’ve always wanted to show you this place. I think it could be made a little heaven and I want to buy it. I can just see what it would be like on a night like this with the light shining from the windows and the sparks from the fireplace shooting right up to the sky, and inside——”
“But it would cost an awful lot to fix it up and when you did get it done it would be so far from everywhere. But then you like to be away off from people and towns, don’t you?”
“It wouldn’t matter what I liked. A man can make his home anywhere; I suppose something of the savage in him likes to get out to the wild places. You think this is lonesome, then? It seems the beginning of an Eldorado to me. Listen
to the trees. On the stillest days you can hear those pines starting up with a low, cooing little shiver, growing louder and louder till you’d think there was a forest of them. It can be the sleepiest or the thrilliest sound in the world, I think.”
“To me they sound like someone crazy, crying. Let’s go.” She shivered, crept deeper into her furs and consulted her little French wrist-watch. “Do you know it’s getting late?” she finished a little wearily.
Then when the car had started she moved up closer—it was one of the trifling signs that always set him piling up the robes again, and scarcely above a whisper she confided:
“I’m sorry I don’t like your place. I remember, when I was very small, the little boy who played with me came one day to see my new play-house. It was the dream of my heart—up to that time—expressed in wood and paint and wonderful miniature furnishings, and I did so want him to like it. But he came and looked it over for a long time, frowning, with his hands in his pockets, just like a man. Then he said, ‘I don’t like it. It’s too sissy,’ and he walked right away. But when I cried, he came back and he said, ‘I don’t like your house, but that isn’t saying I don’t like you, and ‘cause you’re a girl, I guess maybe I like you better ’cause you like a house like that.’ ... You understand, don’t you, Billy?”
She was rather startled by the intense searching that suddenly came into his steady eyes. His right hand was leaving the wheel and she wasn’t ready for this. She laughed gaily to break the tension, and finished her parable.
“I believe I had almost made you forget that we’re grown up. Things aren’t nearly so simple as when we lived in play-houses, are they?”
“Heavens, no,” he agreed, and went back to the wheel.
To hide the shock of the sudden contact with earth after his insane flight he turned his attention to the car, inquiring lightly:
“Shall we fly for a mile or two? There aren’t any speed laws here, nor many living things to run over. It’s one of the advantages of a place as wild as this, that you can do just as you like.”
So they raced against the wind, the girl looking ahead to catch the first glow of the city lights, and Billy staring blindly at the road and hearing the crying of the pines waiting for a house and warmth and light and life to shelter. He was beginning to accept the haunting suspicion that it wasn’t just the fear for the hard, lonely places that was responsible for the girl’s indifference, but that all his constant, ardent reaching out for her had failed absolutely to awaken anything deeper than a passing delight in being courted. Some unaccountable flash of disillusionment made him wonder if she was capable of anything
more than this weak, kittenlike playfulness, and as quickly he cursed himself for being an unchivalrous cad, and came to, with all his usual interest.
They were not strangers to the most select cafes in town, and they found a table in a corner close to a blazing fire, half screened from the crowd, but where a panel mirror reflected all the gaiety of the place. They made a very human little pantomime, these pleasure-seekers—over-made-up women with bloated, sated-looking men; gay young college crowds, glowing and noisy, trooping in from an afternoon on the ice; engaged couples making the most of one of the rare celebrations which the limits of their purses and the needs of the half-furnished nest would allow, and other less elated, but obviously more comfortable, men and women whom one could spot immediately as having left the baby with a grandmother and come here to snatch a respite from family ties, only to fly happily back to them again and ask, “After all what did we ever see to prize so much in what we called our liberty?”
At odd moments Billy found himself prospecting their cases in the light of his own ambitions; most of the time he was unconscious of any presence in the room other than the girl sitting opposite him. He was also proudly aware of other admiring glances in her direction. It was the same dazzling attraction that had made her so
popular at dances and house-parties almost before she was grown up. The wild rose color in her cheeks, the gold in her crinkling hair, the bits of just the right shade of an amethyst gown peeping out from her white furs, and the wonderful little hat that had evidently been the breast of a bird—all had their part in the effect. More compelling still were the wavering blue eyes with their little brown specks. They seemed very mysterious and bright and childishly troubled to-night, but that was because she was searching the crowd to see if there might be “anyone she knew.”
Coming back from one of these explorations she suddenly seemed to remember that she owed some attention to Billy. Without thinking much she inquired gaily:
“When you go out to your farm are you still going to come in here sometimes to celebrate?”
“Every Christmas Eve anyway. You don’t think I expect to make a hermitage of the farm, do you?”
“I didn’t know. It’s so hard for me to get your viewpoint.” The tone implied that she would give worlds to acquire the art of getting his viewpoint. Then, lest his courage should surprise her again, she rattled on:
“And you will say to your wife, ‘The girl who taught me to like these things couldn’t have made a pound of butter to save her life’.”
He didn’t laugh and he didn’t play up to her banter as he generally did. He looked away from her, and she knew he was angry. She leaned forward, but failed to get his attention; then she called softly:
“Billy——”
It was the irresistible childish plea to be forgiven, but for the first time it failed to move him. His hand was resting on the table. She reached across until her fingers almost touched his and again she called, “Billy,” but it was almost a whisper this time and very unsteady. The brown fingers closed quickly and warmly over the reconciliatory hand and held it for a minute longer than necessary, but the hurt had not quite left him. With all her “socially trained” delicacy, he realized that she had no scruples about rushing into what he considered sacred ground. The armor of her frivolity was always ready as a check to his seriousness, and while she could seem alluringly in earnest herself sometimes, the minute he turned to follow her again she brought his pursuit down to the level of common philandering. Suddenly he reddened and slowly released her hand; at the next table a sleek, muddy-eyed man with a theatrical-looking woman, was doing the same thing.
Whether it was an effort or not, he caught the spirit of her gaiety very well after that. On their way to the theatre they called at a florist’s and he
experienced a new, thrilling sense of nearness in being allowed to hold the long-stemmed roses in place while she pinned them to her dress. It was nearly midnight when their car threaded its way out from the flashing, snorting tangle of limousines and taxis, and gradually leaving the lights and the noises behind, purred out toward the snowy darkness of the hills. The moon had gone; there were no lights in the houses, and they felt strangely alone and quiet.
Presently in a thin, groping little voice she said:
“I almost made you angry to-night, didn’t I?”
He laughed. “I’m afraid you did. A man is generally an awful crank about some things, and if a thing means very much to him he can’t stand to have it handled lightly.”
“You mean——”
“That I love you. You see I’ve been trying so long to let you know. Most of the time I see what a fool I am to dream of such a thing. Then sometimes I go blind for a while and almost wonder if you don’t care a little; but all the time, whether you care or not, it seems impossible to think of going on without you.”
He was talking with a hard edge in his voice, both hands gripping the wheel as though he could manage them better if he kept them there. When she didn’t answer, he turned and searched her
face hungrily for a minute, but looked away again unrewarded.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said gently. “I almost knew you couldn’t. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
Marjorie was not accustomed to such unsensational denouements as this. She caught her breath in something so nearly like a sob that he came back more penitent than ever.
“Don’t,” he pleaded. “It’s all right, I shouldn’t have told you.”
“But I didn’t say that I didn’t care—” She was going on to explain that a highly emotional nature was capable of varying shades of caring, but there was nothing in Billy’s simple code of ethics to anticipate such a fine analysis of the case. Perhaps he waited for one breathless second to be sure he had heard aright; the next, she was pushing him away.
“How could you!” she stormed. “How could you!” She was angry and injured and tearful—or she seemed to be, and for the minute the thought of his mistake staggered him. Then very quietly he said:
“I didn’t understand, and I’m sorry; but I’m not ashamed. I know I’ve offended you, but you wouldn’t be offended if you knew what I meant. You think it’s savage and primitive. It is that, I guess; but I want you to know that at least it’s genuine, and—it’s not brutal. If things had
been different, if you could have cared and married me, you would know.”
Marjorie was considering. It was not her first experience of this kind. You can’t make a practice of playing with animals and not get mussed up sometimes, but with a girl in her social position most men of the “socially experienced” set would not have blustered into things so whole heartedly. If they did, beneath their cajoling apologies afterwards, there would lurk a quizzical half-smile, as much as to say, “What did you start the thing for? Just what is the game?” It generally meant the end of a flirtation and the loss of the girl’s prestige in that particular quarter; but, somehow, Billy had left her with all her self-respect. It was hard to know what to do, for even with the weak passion of which her selfish make-up was capable, she had unwittingly stumbled into a little love herself.
“I—I don’t want to be silly about this,” she advanced magnanimously after a while. “I’m not offended, but don’t let’s spoil everything by being serious on our last night together.”
“Our last night?”
“The last for a while, anyway. I guess I didn’t tell you that I’m going to town for the winter—my really official debut in society. Auntie wants me, and Dad and Mother have consented to let me go for the season. You see,” she explained rather plaintively, “I’ve never really had an opportunity
of trying my wings at all, and I just crave life and excitement and company. Maybe some day I’ll settle down and be the domestic little wren you’d like to see me; but don’t you see, I’m so young—I don’t want to get married. I just want to live for awhile. I think a winter in town will do me lots of good. Auntie knows the very best people, and she entertains beautifully. Would you—I wonder if you’d care to see some of my little dresses?”
Later, in her luxurious little sitting-room, she brought out the “little dresses” and caressingly displayed them one by one for his stupid admiration. They were very artful creations and considerably expensive, but Mrs. Evison, who appreciated the value of clothes as a social asset, considered them a good investment for her daughter. To Billy they emphasized how meagre she would find the kind of life he could give her, so far as purchasable things were concerned.
“You should consider yourself a very privileged person,” she told him archly. “I don’t know another man I’d show them to, but you won’t be there when I wear them, and I just couldn’t go without letting you see them. I wish you were coming, too. I hope you won’t be lonesome when I’ve gone.”
“Can I come to see you?”
She considered, surveying him slantwise. “If you’d asked me that yesterday, I might have said
‘yes’; but after to-night—I wonder. You’d better wait. Maybe I’ll send for you.”
When he was leaving her he begged:
“I can see you to-morrow, anyway, can’t I? You say you leave the day after.”
“I’m sorry, but we’re having a little dinner-party to-morrow. Dr. Knight and some of his friends have planned for a sleigh-ride. I guess I’ll have to say good-bye to-night.” Her voice seemed to be trembling a little. “And whatever happens, I’ll always remember our little times together as some of the dearest of my life. You’ve been very good to me, Billy; I know, whatever happens, you won’t think I’ve been heartless, or that I haven’t cared at all. You’re so much more generous than most men. I’ve read, somewhere, that where a girl is concerned, men are generally like boys setting out to catch a bird. They have a cage and they want a bird for it, and someone has told them that they can catch one by putting salt on its tail. Whenever they think they have just caught it, the bird flits off and waits till they come up again; it doesn’t want to go into a cage. When it gets tired being pursued and flies away out of reach altogether, the little savage in them crops out, and they throw stones at the bird for leading them on. You won’t ever think I did that, will you?”
She felt rather alone after he had gone, but then she knew that he would come back any time
she wanted him. For the present alluring possibilities were awaiting elsewhere. Dr. Knight had been very attentive in the way of motoring out to see her, but of course a great many liked to motor out to pleasant country homes on holidays. Once launched in society under the prestige of her aunt’s influential wing, the situation would be different. From various angles she consulted her mirror, and decided that her prospects were good. She could already picture the quaint old Anglican church in the village decorated for her wedding; there would be lilies and smilax—she had often talked that over with her mother, and she would have a little empire dress, very girlish and bride-like, with her veil caught up in a Juliet cap. She visualized herself very distinctly coming down the church aisle. It would be very hard for Billy, for of course he would be there to follow her with that tragic worship in his sober eyes—it was far from likely that he would ever love anyone else—and when he came to say he hoped she would be happy, she just knew she wouldn’t be able to keep the tears back, and she would lift her face—heavens, no!—she couldn’t do that. Why, everything would be at an end with Billy, and she would have to go away with Dr. Knight. But she would know that he would be thinking about her and loving her just the same. And whenever she came home to her mother’s receptions and things, she would
see that he was invited, and she would be very gracious to him.
A wicked little voice suggested another idea. What if she should come back sometime to find Billy in love with someone else? Men were so queer. She had known them to be married a year after some girl had supposedly broken their hearts, and to actually fall desperately and permanently in love with their wives. The possibility made her furious. If only Billy had had Dr. Knight’s position—he would have been so everlastingly good to live with, and recklessly she made up her mind that if nothing materialized from her season in town—if Dr. Knight remained indefinite, she would come back and marry Billy. She couldn’t go on a farm with him, of course, and she couldn’t live all her life in small towns like this, but he could get something else to do; she had heard a man tell her father that he hoped to see him in the federal parliament some day. So if nothing else developed, she would marry Billy. The idea left her feeling beautifully generous and secure.