The roof of the front porch had been turned into an outdoor terrace, and here, wrapped up against the cool evening, they had their coffee and peppermints in long deck chairs. They were above the tree-tops; and as their eyes widened in the darkness they could see the river by starlight. The hoot of a wandering owl; then the kind air, the whispering air, crept round them.
“Oh, my God, it is so sweet—so sweet!” he sighed, as he fumbled for her hand and felt it slip confidently into his. Suddenly he was ruthless, tearing it all down:
“Too darn’ sweet for me, I guess. Sharon, I’m a bum. I’m not so bad as a preacher, or I wouldn’t be if I had the chance, but me—— I’m no good. I have cut out the booze and tobacco—for you—I really have! But I used to drink like a fish, and till I met you I never thought any woman except my mother was any good. I’m just a second-rate traveling man. I came from Paris, Kansas, and I’m not even up to that hick burg, because they are hard-working and decent there, and I’m not even that. And you—you’re not only a prophetess, which you sure are, the real big thing, but you’re a Falconer. Family! Old servants! This old house! Oh, it’s no use! You’re too big for me. Just because I do love you. Terribly. Because I can’t lie to you!”
He had put away her slim hand, but it came creeping back over his, her fingers tracing the valleys between his knuckles, while she murmured:
“You will be big! I’ll make you! And perhaps I’m a prophetess, a little bit, but I’m also a good liar. You see I’m not a Falconer. There ain’t any! My name is Katie Jonas. I was born in Utica. My dad worked on a brickyard. I picked out the name Sharon Falconer while I was a stenographer. I never saw this house till two years ago; I never saw these old family servants till then—they worked for the folks that owned the place—and even they weren’t Falconers—they had the aristocratic name of Sprugg! Incidentally, this place isn’t a quarter paid for. And yet I’m not a liar! I’m not! I am Sharon Falconer now! I’ve made her—by prayer and by having a right to be her! And you’re going to stop being poor Elmer Gantry of Paris, Kansas. You’re going to be the Reverend Dr. Gantry, the great captain of souls! Oh, I’m glad you don’t come from anywhere in particular! Cecil Aylston—oh, I guess he does love me, but I always feel he’s laughing at me. Hang him, he notices the infinitives I split and not the souls I save! But you— Oh, you will serve me—won’t you?”
“Forever!”
And there was little said then. Even the agreement that she was to get rid of Cecil, to make Elmer her permanent assistant, was reached in a few casual assents. He was certain that the steely film of her dominance was withdrawn.
Yet when they went in, she said gaily that they must be early abed; up early tomorrow; and that she would take ten pounds off him at tennis.
When he whispered, “Where is your room, sweet?” she laughed with a chilling impersonality, “You’ll never know, poor lamb!”
Elmer the bold, Elmer the enterprising, went clumping off to his room, and solemnly he undressed, wistfully he stood by the window, his soul riding out on the darkness to incomprehensible destinations. He humped into bed and dropped toward sleep, too weary with fighting her resistance to lie thinking of possible tomorrows.