3
In the middle of the table was a glass bowl brimmed with sweet peas, and around it a wreath of smilax; a festoon of smilax hung from the chandelier. At the head of the table stood impressively a platter bearing a steaming roast duck.
Mrs. Cowan hovered proudly over this spectacle, preparing to take her departure.
“Oh, not without a piece of the wedding-cake!” cried Rose-Ann, and cut it for her.
Immensely gratified, and having wished the bride happiness, and at the last moment bestowed upon her a motherly kiss, Mrs. Cowan went, bearing the piece of cake carefully wrapped in a napkin.
Clive stared after her. “Very interesting,” he said, “she takes home a piece of her own cake—”
“No longer her own,” Rose-Ann finished, “and no longer merely cake—but a piece of Wedding Cake! Will she put it under her pillow, I wonder, and dream of getting another husband? She’s a widow, and her husband used to get drunk ‘something awful.’ Yes, she was telling me all about it—I think by way of warning, so I wouldn’t be too badly disillusioned by the facts of marriage. ‘You can’t expect ’em to be angels,’ she said. So you see Felix, I’m prepared for anything!”
This speech jarred upon Felix. It was too much in the vein that Clive had been indulging all evening. He wondered if he were going to become critical of Rose-Ann, now that he had a sense of possession with regard to her. He said to himself that Rose-Ann was over-wrought and he himself over-sensitive.
“Rose-Ann, here at my right hand,” Clive was saying, “Felix, here at my left. I believe that is correct. The Witness will take the remaining seat, opposite me. First of all, we must have a toast.” He rose. “Up with you all! No, Rose-Ann, you sit still—you can’t drink your own health.... Here’s to the bride!”
They lifted their glasses.
“No—wait till I finish my speech.... In defiance of all the laws of nature and of modern realistic fiction, we wish her happiness!... No, that isn’t all I have to say.... We make this wish—at least I do—with an unwonted confidence in its fulfilment. For this is no ordinary marriage, dedicated to the prosaic comforts of a mutual bondage—it is an attempt to realize the sharp new joys of freedom. A marriage, let us say, in name only—for upon Rose-Ann I set my faith, believing that not even a wedding can turn her into a wife!” Rose-Ann looked up at him and smiled. “To Rose-Ann,” he concluded, “and her adventure!”
They drank. Felix looked at the others. He had a sense of something having been outraged by this speech—something which, if only a tradition, was somehow real to all of them except Clive. But Rose-Ann merely looked amused, and Phyllis’s expression told him nothing. He reflected, “She’s used to him by this time.”
A sense of embarrassment remained with him, in spite of the light talk that followed as Clive heaped their plates in turn with roast duck and dressing.
“Why are you so quiet, Felix?” Clive asked at last. “You might at least tell us how it feels to be a bridegroom—whether you feel as depressed as you look.”
“I confess I shall be glad when it’s over,” said Felix.
They laughed, and went on talking. Rose-Ann was apparently enjoying herself. She and Clive were exchanging pleasantries on the subject of “modern marriage.” For some reason the phrase annoyed Felix. Did they know what nonsense they were talking? Or did they really think that his and Rose-Ann’s marriage was to be, as it were, a sociological performance for the benefit of on-lookers?
Presently Rose-Ann was humourously disclaiming “all the credit” for the modernity of the arrangement. Felix, she insisted, was equally entitled to it; he was just as modern as she was!
“Why,” Felix suddenly asked in exasperation, “should we all want to be so damned modern?”
“Hark to the defiant bridegroom!” said Clive. “He wishes us to understand that his wife is going to love, honour, and obey him, in the good old—fashioned way. He won’t stand for any of this new-fangled nonsense. The Cave-man emerges!”
Felix flushed. He had only succeeded in making a fool of himself, it seemed.
Rose-Ann spoke up. “I hope it will be modern,” she said. “I’m sure it won’t be like any of the marriages I’ve seen back in my home town.... Why are you so afraid of freedom and modernity, Felix?”
Perhaps it was that word afraid, which Rose-Ann used so lightly, that stung him. “Because,” he said, “I am apparently the only one here who knows what those words mean.”
He had not intended to say it—certainly he had not intended to say it in that tone of voice. It came out, raspingly, like a voice out of a music-box, a voice from a strange record that has been put in unawares. His voice was, even to his own ears, remote and metallic.
Rose-Ann looked at him, startled. “What words, Felix?” she asked gently.
“The words you have all been bandying about,” he replied. “Modernity. Freedom.” His voice was still hard.
“Well, what do they mean?”
She leaned toward him.
The others were silent, listening—Clive with an amused smile, Phyllis with troubled eyes.
“Not what you think, I’m afraid, Rose-Ann,” Felix’s voice answered, the voice with a quiet grimness in it.
Rose-Ann’s voice took up the challenge softly. “And what do you think they mean, Felix?”
He looked away from her, and spoke as if from a distance, slowly. “Freedom.... It’s not a nice word, not a pretty word ... to me. There is something terrible in it ... something to be afraid of....” He looked back at her. “Don’t offer me freedom, Rose-Ann.”
Her voice was still soft, but infinitely cool and firm. “Why? Because you might take it? I knew that when I made the offer, Felix. I think I know what you mean. But I take back nothing.” She lifted her chin proudly. “I am not afraid of freedom.”
“Bravo!” cried Clive. “Rose-Ann, I am falling in love with you myself! Why don’t you marry me instead of Felix! He doesn’t appreciate you.”
Curiously enough, nobody except Felix seemed to mind Clive’s clowning. Both girls laughed, and the atmosphere was suddenly cleared.
“But what an odd occasion for us to choose to stage a quarrel!” said Rose-Ann, gaily.
“Yes,” said Felix, now bewildered and contrite. “I must have got into my argumentative mood. I’m sorry. When I get to arguing I think of no one and nothing, except the point at issue—which is usually not of the slightest importance. It’s a bad habit you must break me of when we are married.”
“You are forgiven,” said Phyllis.
“Don’t forget there’s fruit salad coming,” said Rose-Ann, rising and bringing a bowl from the sideboard.
“Yes,” said Clive, “and the car will be here for you two people in ten minutes or so. Will you have your coffee now, Felix?—Rose-Ann?”