CHAPTER V
Two weeks later she and Peter Coleman had their evening at the Chutes, and a wonderful evening it was; then came a theater trip, and a Sunday afternoon that they spent in idly drifting about Golden Gate Park, enjoying the spring sunshine, and the holiday crowd, feeding the animals and eating peanuts. Susan bowed to Thorny and the faithful Wally on this last occasion and was teased by Thorny about Peter Coleman the next day, to her secret pleasure. She liked anything that made her friendship for Peter seem real, a thing noticed and accepted by others, not all the romantic fabric of her own unfounded dreams.
Tangible proof of his affection there was indeed, to display to the eyes of her world. But it was for intangible proof that Susan's heart longed day after day. In spite of comment and of envy from the office, in spite of the flowers and messages and calls upon which Auntie and the girls were placing such flattering significance, Susan was far too honest with life not to realize that she had not even a thread by which to hold Peter Coleman, that he had not given an instant's thought, and did not wish to give an instant's thought to her, or to any woman, as a possible sweetheart and wife.
She surprised him, she amused him, she was the company he liked best, easiest to entertain, most entertaining in turn, this she knew. He liked her raptures over pleasures that would only have bored the other girls he knew, he liked the ready nonsense that inspired answering nonsense in him, the occasional flashes of real wit, the inexhaustible originality of Susan's point-of-view. They had their own vocabulary, phrases remembered from plays, good and bad, that they had seen together, or overheard in the car; they laughed and laughed together at a thousand things that Susan could not remember when she was alone, or, remembering, found no longer amusing. This was all wonderful, but it was not love.
But, perhaps, she consoled herself, courtship, in his class, was not the serious affair she had always known it to be in hers. Rich people took nothing very seriously, yet they married and made good husbands for all that. Susan would blame herself for daring to criticize, even in the tiniest particular, the great gift that the gods laid at her feet.
One June day, when Susan felt rather ill, and was sitting huddled at her desk, with chilled feet and burning cheeks, she was sent for by old Mr. Baxter, and found Miss Emily Saunders in his office. The visitor was chatting with Peter and the old man, and gaily carried Susan off to luncheon, after Peter had regretted his inability to come too. They went to the Palace Hotel, and Susan thought everything, Miss Emily especially, very wonderful and delightful, and, warmed and sustained by a delicious lunch, congratulated herself all during the afternoon that she herself had risen to the demand of the occasion, had really been "funny" and "nice," had really "made good." She knew Emily had been amused and attracted, and suspected that she would hear from that fascinating young person again.
A few weeks later a letter came from Miss Saunders asking Susan to lunch with the family, in their San Rafael home. Susan admired the handsome stationery, the monogram, the bold, dashing hand. Something in Mary Lou's and Georgianna's pleasure in this pleasure for her made her heart ache as she wrote her acceptance. She was far enough from the world of ease and beauty and luxury, but how much further were these sweet, uncomplaining, beauty-starved cousins of hers!
Mary Lou went with her to the ferry, when the Sunday came, just for a ride on the hot day, and the two, being early, roamed happily over the great ferry building, watching German and Italian picnics form and file through the gateways, and late-comers rush madly up to the closing doors. Susan had been to church at seven o'clock, and had since washed her hair, and washed and pressed her best shirtwaist, but she felt fresh and gay.
Presently, with a shout of pleasure that drew some attention to their group, Peter Coleman came up to them. It appeared that he was to be Miss Saunders' guest at luncheon, too, and he took charge of the radiant Susan with evident satisfaction, and much laughter.
"Dear me! I wish I was going, too," said Mary Lou mildly, as they parted. "But I presume a certain young man is very glad I am not," she added, with deep finesse. Peter laughed out, but turned red, and Susan wished impatiently that Mary Lou would not feel these embarrassing inanities to be either welcome or in good taste.