“Hello,” said Joy sourly. Félicie’s but-lately-kissed beauty was annoying. . . . “Where’s Jerry?” Félicie demanded, crawling inside and emptying her suitcase over Joy in the process.
“Married!” Joy snapped, and turned over to look out of the window at the lights of New York they were leaving behind.
“Married!” Félicie sank down in the midst of the out-heaval of hairpins and lingerie, cold cream jars and silk stockings. Then weakly she articulated Jerry’s epitaph: “I always said that girl would do anything!”
XI
Winter hung heavily on that year; February dragged itself to a close, choked with December snowfall, and Spring looked bleak and far away. Travelling even from New York to Boston was horrible, and Jerry did not come for a long time.
Joy was alone in the apartment.
As she had foreseen, Sarah’s querulous voice wavered in the halls. And in the kitchenette her kimono and curl papers tinted the atmosphere. And everywhere the tap of the pink mules or the sound of the rough plush of Jerry’s voice seemed to be trembling in echo’s echo. . . . She asked Félicie to spend the night with her as often as she cared to; but Félicie didn’t care to very often. It was not that she was not fond of Joy, as she explained; but it was so much trouble to move herself and all her things. Félicie liked everything drawn up around her in waxworks precision of detail, just as she had arranged it at her home.
And so Joy lived in an enforced solitude while considering what she was going to do. The heavy snowfalls were deadening to enterprise; the easiest thing to do was to stay in the apartment, which was hers for the present, instead of looking around for something else. Sitting alone at the piano in the room which had so often sung with mirth, she found it hard to realize that she was the only one left in Sarah’s and Jerry’s flat. One little, two little, three little Indians! One had gone; and then there were two. And now one more had gone; and there was only one. . . .
She had not seen Jim Dalton for a long time. When he had called her up, she had put him off with the excuse of work. She could not see him, because she felt that she wanted to see him too much. But she told herself with an easy surety that she was not in love with him; once back with Pa Graham she had fallen into the magic of music once more, magic that left no room for sentimentality, and that, she told herself, was all that her lapse had been; sheer sentimentality. But since the idea had occurred to her that she might suspect herself of being in love with him, she was uneasy about seeing him. And surely preventative methods were best!
Yet she longed to see him, to tell him every little detail of the epoch-making trip to New York. Looking back she clung to her part in it, and wanted Jim—wanted him to exult with her over the great one’s approval. Who was it who said he travelled faster who travels alone? There had to be someone to spur on the traveller—sometimes! And Jerry had gone, and there was no one. Félicie was frankly bored with music. And Jim of her own exclusion stayed away, although his telephone calls did not diminish in number. . . .