But the best way to treat a fatality is to make nothing of it. Thus treated, it is seldom fatal. Then he was rather curious to see how Miss Thomas would behave among these Dibbles and these Westerhouses. After all, she too was an American; a little more sophisticated, a little better endowed by nature; but she, too, made a toy of love, and actors in private theatricals of her more “exciting” friends. “Exciting” was a word that Vane had heard Miss Westerhouse apply to Mr. Dibble. Vane had caught a little of the Parisian’s contempt for flirting with young girls. In a flirtation with married women, he thought, there were at least possibilities; and the flirtations were not so utterly silly. But marriage was far too serious an affair to be made fun of. At this period Vane affected to himself an extreme cynicism. Intercourse with Cinerea girls had corrupted him. They had given him their own levity. At another time, he would have deplored the vulgarization of a lofty sentiment; but since the past June he had been in a flippant mood himself. The American cue was to make game of everything in fun, and to make a hazard of life in earnest. He felt that he was becoming Americanized.
Feminine companionship was certainly corrupting to earnestness, if not to morals. By the end of this week he felt cloyed with too much trifle. He sighed for a man and a cigar, for a seat in a club, for a glass of brandy, for anything else masculine, for a little of man’s plain language and strong thinking. Yet these girls were no fools: they read Prosper Mérimée’s Letters, for example. They were emancipated enough. But they also read Lucile. He understood why women were not let into ancient religions, Freemasonry and the Egyptian mysteries. They belittled the imagination. Per contra, they were essential to the Eleusinian. Their only truly great rôle was the Mœnad. And yet, he thought, these sentiments of his would have shocked these girls.
Vane’s thoughts came and went nervously. He was driving in a buggy alone, or, at least, only Miss Morse was with him. He was ashamed of himself; he was ashamed of his thinking; he was ashamed, thinking as he did, of his inconsistency in driving with Miss Morse in a buggy. Postiche, postiche, it was all postiche, or was it frankness? Was it the troubled dream, the low beginning of the new conditions? Was his disapproval a bit of feudal prejudice? Vane was troubled, excited, disgusted, confused. Miss Morse noticed all this, but thought he was in love with her.
The only green spots in the man’s memory were Rennes, and Monserrat, and Carcassonne; yes, and the littered desk in the down-town office in New York—the scene of his only labors and his one success. And that success was no longer necessary; it no longer profited any one but himself. Vane had never formulated his position with such precision before. The last person of his own family was dead; he had claims upon no one, no one had any claim upon him; he had no further ambitions upon Mammon. Given this problem, what solution could the world offer—the New York world, that is? Somebody says life is made up of labor, art, love, and worship. New York had given him labor, which he had performed. And of the others? Had it given him love, even? Was he a barbarian, better fitted for a struggle with crude nature than New York, not up to the refinements of modern civilization? Should he leave these places? Now, that day Miss Thomas was to come, and he must decide. He thirsted for happiness; how was he best to find it? These thoughts, perhaps, seemed selfish, cold-blooded, practical, but there was a sadness in them for Vane.
So thinking, as he drove his buggy along the road, they passed Miss Thomas, walking gracefully, and the rich, slow color burned through her face and fell away at her temples as she bowed. Vane drove on the faster, flicking his horse with the whip, and considered what he would do now that she had returned.
He would treat her like Miss Westerhouse and Miss Gibbs of Philadelphia. He would not have his own movements disturbed by her coming and going. He would stay his intended fortnight out and then go.
XXIII.
THERE was a mountain party that afternoon, organized by Mr. Dibble. Vane supposed that Miss Thomas would be of the number, and himself stayed away, not caring to meet her. But when he came back, after a long walk, she was sitting on the piazza with Mrs. Haviland. Vane passed by, raising his hat. She looked at him almost wistfully, not blushing this time, but very pale. When he came down from his room, before tea, he went up and spoke to her.
“You have not gone to the picnic, Miss Thomas!”