"Better than I do?" She grinned sarcastically.
"Better. I know better what he comes from. Then I saw you. I had the impression, Marcia, that your maternal instincts were involved. You were pulling the child to your warm breast and nourishing his starved little body. Feelings like that. No-good feelings, for wives." She had sucked her lips into a point; she glanced at me almost with fear; so I went on. "Maybe you thought about running errands for his kids. But actually you did more thinking about fondling his emotions—taking care of him—working for him. And you even did work. You sat there in the Knight's Bar looking at Paul like a proud female parent—like a doting mother sharing in her son's discussions of his conquests. You were the conquered—but you were the string-pulling mamma, too. Take it or leave it—that's how I felt you felt about him! And then I caught you looking at me—looking at me the way a girl with warm insides looks at a man. So if I didn't give you the impression I was struck silly with the possibilities of the match—that's also why. I'm sorry—but there's the whole answer."
She was breathing evenly—but more deeply than anybody needed to breathe, just sitting. Down the hall, doors opened and shut. Raucous, faintly nervous male laughter echoed. "Some of the boys from the convention," she said, almost reluctantly—as if she found it necessary to explain so I wouldn't stop, and as if she was afraid the explanation would stop me.
I looked at her—at a breathing, beautiful girl—and I thought for a moment about the canoe-hats. Then I shook it off. "If a good gal—a sweethearted dame who had no stomach for the life—had started living with Paul, I'd have objected. In your case—I didn't believe you were even that—"
Feet marched on happy excursions down the hall. Somebody tried the door—opened it, to his surprise—and apologized gruffly without daring to carry the impulse through and look in.
Marcia was staring at me. "So all right," she said. "Paul's just a little kid. He's not even a good boyfriend. Too jittery. I thought I could teach him. He doesn't really want to learn. He thinks a dame is made of soap bubbles and lives on a pedestal a mile high. He thinks sex is something for pack trips in the mountains and spruce boughs. I got sick to death of his pack-trip monologue! Who wouldn't? Lying with a guy on a good inner-spring mattress and listening to him yak about pine needles! Drenching myself in cologne—and hearing him rave about stable smells! I was ready to spring myself, when we had that lunch. And you gave me the excuse. I'd saved up mad enough for six girls—and I let him have it."
"He asked for it."
"Did he!"
"But you gave him the wrong medicine. Why didn't you tell him it wasn't the disapproval of an uncle—the looks to come from men—but—the spruce routine?"
"Haven't you any feelings? That was his dream. Why louse that up, too? Let him dream! Someday, God knows, he may even meet one of those spruce-loving dopes with cute little things in her flannel blouse and her jodhpurs. Let him have her! I got tired of my uptown personality the minute I realized it led straight to the Rocky Mountains—and the farther from camp the better."