The Bachelors: A Novel

by William Dana Orcutt

Merry's promise to consider the suggestion was equivalent to a victory, in her mother's mind. True, it had not been won without a cost, for the girl's plain, straightforward comments left their sting; but, after all, they represented only a child's distorted viewpoint which failed to appreciate the manifold demands upon a parent's time. Marian knew that she had been a devoted mother, and she craved appreciation; but this was more than she could expect. Merry's strictures were merely another expression of her peculiar and unfathomable nature.

The promise was the most that Marian could ask for, and with this concession she did not doubt her ability finally to show the child that the older judgment was wise and far-sighted. She knew that Merry had not given the promise lightly, and that once given she would be conscientious in fulfilling it. Her yielding, even to this extent, atoned for many instances in the past where the girl had seemed self-willed in insisting upon following her own judgment in spite of advice from all the family to the contrary; but these were unimportant incidents compared with the one at issue. Marian was now quite content to let her daughter have her own way in anything and everything provided she did not interfere in the gratification of carrying this one great desire of her mother's life to a happy conclusion.

The relations which had existed between her and Philip Hamlen, and the responsibility she assumed for the aftermath, had become greatly magnified during these months. It was natural that she should feel a real satisfaction if she were able to repair the harm she had unwittingly inflicted; but Huntington's question, "Are you not thinking of him and of your obligation more than of your daughter?" proved so disquieting that before speaking to Merry she had made doubly sure in her own mind that the only way her responsibility affected her present actions was to color the result with the romance of the past. She was sincere in her conviction that at every step of her progress she had been guided solely by a desire for her daughter's complete and final welfare, and in her efforts she could find nothing other than a mother's natural love and anxiety.

There was another satisfaction, Marian admitted to herself, but it had no bearing upon the situation until after she became convinced that her attitude was justified from Merry's standpoint. She had never forgotten Hamlen's domination over her as a girl. At the moment when she met him so unexpectedly in Bermuda she felt the old-time sensation of dread she had experienced so many times when alone with him during their childhood days and the period of their engagement. She had never loved him; this knowledge had come clearly to her during the years which had intervened. When she accepted the tacit understanding of an engagement it was because of the dominating influence of his mind over hers rather than a response from her heart to his fierce devotion. The break came on the occasion of the Senior Dance at Harvard to which she accepted Monty Huntington's escort. Hamlen, bitter against college and college life, and having no interest in the graduating festivities, not only refused to attend the dance but forbade her to go without him. Her indignation gave her strength to rebel against his domination. Later she sailed for Europe, feeling a profound sense of relief that she had been able to break the fetters which had bound her, she then realized, against her will.

The Hamlen she met at Bermuda was not the unreasonable boy of twenty years before. He was still bitter, but they met on terms which gave her the ascendency. Those traits which she had admired were accentuated, and the fierce intensity had become modified. Now it was her mind which controlled and his which yielded. He had tried to hold out against her in refusing to come to America, but he had yielded; he was now trying to hold out against her judgment that his marriage to Merry would restore the lost equilibrium, but again he would yield.

Still, above all other considerations, the great fact stood out in Marian's mind that the match itself was ideal. Merry would find in him an intellectual force which would satisfy her natural predilections; she would give him in her spontaneity a leaven to perpetuate the normal expressions of life which Huntington had taught him to understand. She would give him the youth which he had lost, he would give her the response which her unusual development could never obtain from a younger man. The balance was perfect. The mother's heart rejoiced that her efforts could make so noble a gift to her daughter, while the woman's heart found equal satisfaction that these same efforts could pay the debt of years in ample measure.

It would have been a relief if her plans for entertaining the Bermuda party could have been carried through without including Huntington, but, entirely aside from the fact that this omission would have been a marked slight, his co-operation in bringing Hamlen to this satisfactory condition had been so conspicuous that there was no alternative. Mrs. Thatcher was apprehensive lest he take advantage of his influence with Hamlen to strengthen his will against her judgment; but this was a chance she had to take.

Could she have read his mind Marian would have found nothing to fear from Huntington. His familiarity with Merry's nature made him aware, soon after his arrival, of the fact that something of unusual moment had occurred. There was a hectic excitement in her welcome, a yearning in her eyes, otherwise unexplained, which went straight to his heart and prepared him for the climax in the great renunciation of his life.

"When the supreme test comes," she had told him, "I shall accept it"; and he was convinced that the test had come and been accepted.

"Ah, well!" he sighed deeply, "who am I to interfere?"