Steven looked important and considered. He remembered when Governor Gwynne had entertained the Whig Campaign Committee in—in—he forgot the year, but it was when Van Buren was elected; every room in the house had been occupied, and cots in the library—you could put ten cots in the library—oh, easily ten, end to end, you know——
"Cots! Oh, I don't think we'll need cots, you know, with young ladies in the party——"
Steven did not hear her. He was launched on an accurate description of the festivities, to which Mrs. Pallinder listened with a caressing attention. How much had she overheard? Or how much guessed? Possibly she would have been as painstakingly gracious to Steven in any event; to look her best, to act her best, was Mrs. Pallinder's trade, and you may trust me it was not always an easy one. "So interesting, isn't it? Oh, it's all very well for you to smile, Doctor Vardaman, you remember all this, and it seems very ordinary to you, no doubt. But it's rarely one hears such reminiscences—you've met so many celebrated people, Mr. Gwynne—the Governor knew everybody, of course, in his position, and then he was a famous man himself. Oh, now I'm here, and have a chance at last, I want you to tell me again about that time the Governor gave away the crimson velvet waistcoat with gold bees embroidered on it—don't you remember, you told it to me the first time we met, and I tried to tell it to the colonel afterwards, but I got it all mixed up. He gave it to Tom Corwin, didn't he? And then the darky waiter got hold of it somehow, and wore it to the party? I laughed so when I came to that part, I couldn't go on with the story——"
Doctor Vardaman listened between relief and a singularly unreasonable resentment; the business of pacifying Steven seemed ludicrously easy, now. His weaknesses and the adroitness with which they were approached, were alike contemptible. Anything, of course, he admitted unwillingly, anything was better than having a scene; they should be thankful they were so well past that danger. Yet he wondered privately what Gwynne thought of this dexterous jockeying; a woman's performances in what she chooses to consider the art of diplomacy unveiled, seldom fail of moving the masculine onlooker to mingled wonder, scorn, and pity. The creature has the cunning of her feebleness; how she does juggle with honour and decency! How lightly she trips it along the unstable wire! What capital she makes of her toy emotions, her sham beliefs and unbeliefs! There is even something admirable in her serene assurance that the end always justifies the means.
Steven may not have talked himself, or been talked, into a complete forgetfulness of his errand; but at least the evil hour was a while postponed. He saw Mrs. Pallinder leave the house escorted by Gwynne through the falling dusk, with genial unconcern; and reiterated to the doctor as they sat at table that evening his conviction that Mrs. Pallinder was a very polished lady! Thus did the afternoon finish; never was there a tamer sequel to a more alarming prelude. If the doctor had received some disquieting revelations, he could still put them from his mind as no affair of his; and if a vexed anxiety about Gwynne lurked within him, it needed no great effort to stifle or banish that, too, momentarily, at any rate. The boy knew what he was about—laissez faire! he thought, and surrendered himself to a long evening of Steven and the circulating medium with thankfulness and even some amusement.
"You—you're ever so kind to poor old Cousin Steven, Mrs. Pallinder," Gwynne said to her, with a good deal of feeling, as they parted in the shadow of the Parthenon front. His voice trembled a little; and perhaps the lady let him hold her hand a trifle longer than etiquette prescribes.
"My dear boy," she said with gentle emphasis, "my dear boy, don't I know—— If there is any way I can think of to make a person like that happier, wouldn't I gladly do it? That seems to me a very small thing—a woman's duty—what else are we for? I would do it for you anyhow, even if I didn't feel so sorry for him." She melted into the house without waiting to gauge the effect of this touching speech, and the young man went off down the avenue with his head in the stars.
All very wrong and very improper, no doubt! But, on the whole, Gwynne's conduct, it seems to me, was most edifying—a pattern for any youth in his position. If Mrs. Pallinder had been the angel he thought her, he could not have borne himself toward her with more respect. A young man's first love, or let us call it, his first amorous fancy, is free from grossness. There was something spiritual and exalted in Gwynne's devotion; I believe he figured himself, foolishly and egotistically enough, her knight, faithful without hope of reward, and gloried in his anguish. If he stood between her and the all-too-righteous exactions of his relatives and co-heirs, if he shielded her from the vials of their wrath, at the cost of some squirmings of conscience, still I am loath to blame him.
There was, of course, no excuse for him, yet—— Mrs. Pallinder was old enough to be his mother, and married to boot; but she was a very beautiful woman, and he was softhearted and sentimental, and had had a harsh and loveless life. How can I sit in judgment on him? Was I so wise at twenty-four? For Mrs. Pallinder herself, I say and stick to it, she was a perfectly good woman; having discovered that she could twist Gwynne around her finger, she cannot be blamed, in the circumstances, for twisting him. The men may well sneer at our tools, but we must even use the tools you let us have, gentlemen, and sometimes you thrust the haft into our hands. No woman can make a fool of a man, I think, unless the man lends himself whole-heartedly to the job. And there are times when she goes at it with little relish.
Was it pleasant for Mrs. Pallinder to blarney Gwynne into forgetfulness? Did she enjoy listening to old Steven's dreary, everlasting talk? I think that mean necessity galled her at times as much as it would have the highest-minded reader of this page. We must suppose she loved her swindling rascal of a husband, for I detect a dingy loyalty in her method of supporting him. So he cleaves to her and cherishes her, a woman cares not a jot whether her husband be honest or not; she will uphold him by such sorry arts as he himself will look upon with disfavour. So terrific is her moral obliquity that she will lie, wheedle, cozen, cheat, with an unruffled mind to protect or further him; displaying a distorted integrity of purpose that compels our grudging admiration. Let anyone who doubts these statements ask the wives and mothers who unsparingly condemn Mrs. Pallinder's line of conduct, what they would have had her do? Give up the game, and so betray her husband's interests, or engage in a little harmless flirtation to put off the hour of his reckoning? You will find that these virtuous ladies will dodge the question utterly. They will indignantly and scornfully reject either course—yet they will not be able to think of any other, and therein you have your answer. I remember once hearing Doctor Vardaman solemnly declare and vow that he believed nine-tenths of the shiftless, incompetent, scoundrelly men in the world were kept going in their profitless or criminal careers solely by the co-operation of some fool of a woman—"an honest woman, at that!" he added, with a laugh.