Wesblock, the autobiography of an automaton

by Harry McDonald Walters

I passed into my second year in the following spring, and then in turn from sophomore to third year without distinction, without disgrace or notable incident. I learned to smoke and began to shave, and believed myself to be a thoroughly sophisticated youth.

I loved many girls during my college years; how many it is impossible to state. I always loved a girl for some special feature; because she had red hair, or for her eyes, or her nose, or her mouth. I loved one because she limped a little and I was sorry for her, and liked the brave way she pretended to be unaware of her deformity. I loved a woman much older than myself, for several days, just because she smelled so good. In imagination I can still smell that sachet powder. I never loved a woman altogether, faults and all, just because she appealed to me in every sense, but always for some special feature or peculiarity. I was fickle, for of course one must soon weary of loving a woman because of a single detail.

My first love, after “Little Blockhead,” was red haired. I met her at a masquerade during my second freshman year. She was masked, but I saw her hair; that was enough; I was gone. I was presented to her. When she unmasked, she discovered a very ordinary countenance, and she had a distinct cast in one eye. These things made no difference to me; I worshipped her hair, and loved her devotedly for at least six weeks.

In the winter of my sophomore year I was trapped for all time—caught to my undoing in one way, and to my making in a hundred ways.

Paul de la Croix talked beautifully of love in two languages—French and English. He was a past-master in the æsthetic realisation and description of love, although I do not believe he ever really loved any one but himself. He was very artistic, and uncommon looking, for which reasons the women loved him, and his family adored him. Music was his chosen career; an easy career for the pampered son of a wealthy, common, luxury-loving father. All his love affairs were confided to me. Most of them were interesting enough, but not striking, except the last one I was ever called upon to listen to.

For about the hundred and first time he was loved: this time, he declared, by the most wonderful creature, the belle of the city’s haut ton; the beautiful, witty and accomplished daughter of Montreal’s most celebrated physician. I had seen the doctor often, but had never met the daughter. I was not one of her set. I had no taste in the direction of teas, dances, box-parties, or other social functions. Society in my youth drew the line a little more strictly than it is drawn now. Fathers like Doctor Joseph, and mothers like Mrs. Joseph, wanted to know something about every one with whom their sons and daughters associated. Professional gentlemen of the law and medicine held themselves a peg above mere business men, or brokers in a small way. In a world now gone crazy with commerce, medicine, law, even the Church, have become so commercialised that they have come down a bit socially, and “all-important” Business has moved up the social scale, and now rubs shoulders with those of the most exclusive circles. The man of business, who regards money as his sole aim, is much more one-sided and undeveloped than he whose end is knowledge of a science or art, for every science and every art is more or less connected with everything. Consequently, the business man cannot be veneered with the veneer of society, but he can be very decently varnished. There is a huge difference between veneer and varnish.

I had never been within the charmed orbit of Miss Muriel Joseph’s soaring. Paul was different. He had large means, he was a singer, a dancer, a ladies’ man with an irreproachable veneer bought for him by a poorly varnished father. He was loved by Muriel Joseph; and he raved to me about her hair, her cheek, her hand, the mole upon her lip, her skin, which was pale and clear, and eyes which were large, full, liquid and inquiring like those of a deer.

I listened and listened to weeks of this stuff. He did it very well. I was told the things she said and had described to me the way she said them till Paul had me half in love with her before I had seen her. Paul was eloquent and I was impressionable; but I did not disclose to him what was in my mind. In fact, I was not very clear as to what was in my mind at the time. All these things I retailed to John, who did not like Paul, and had seldom met him. It was arranged that I should meet Paul’s love.

“Ah, but she will be delighted to meet my chum,” said Paul; “I have talked to her so often of you. If you will call with me there on Sunday, you will be invited to her birthday dance.”

I was somewhat disconcerted, for I could not dance, and I abominated ceremonious calls. Now I regretted the opportunities I had thrown away, when driven weekly to the dancing-class of the dandy Italian signor who polished the young of that time. At the dancing-class I had balked and sulked, and never learned a step. It followed that I was awkward and clumsy on a waxed floor; felt out of place in pumps; and hated taking a girl in my arms before every one. How I wished now that I could dance! I was tall, slim and graceful enough while walking, riding, skating or driving. But dancing was beyond me, although John, who was a beautiful dancer, had often urged me to learn the art. Numberless evenings I had played on the piano alone, or as accompanist for flute or violin, for others to dance, and I had enjoyed it so far without any ambition to take part in it. Lovely young things had tormented me to let them teach me; it was all of no use. Behind all the mixed feelings it excited, I really believe there lurked a strong desire to dance and be frivolous; but some want, mental or physical, withheld me.