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diff --git a/old/284-h/284-h.htm b/old/284-h/284-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c746dbc --- /dev/null +++ b/old/284-h/284-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,13688 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta charset="UTF-8" /> + <title> + The house of Mirth, by Edith Wharton—A Project Gutenberg eBook + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover" /> + <style> /* <![CDATA[ */ + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +h1,h2 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +h1 { + font-weight: normal; + font-size: 150%; +} + +h2 { + margin-top: 4em; + font-weight: normal; +} + +h3 { + font-weight: normal; +} + + +p { + margin-top: .51em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .49em; + text-indent: 1em; +} + +.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} +.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} + +.fs80 {font-size: 80%;} +.fs150 {font-size: 150%;} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: 33.5%; + margin-right: 33.5%; + clear: both; +} + +hr.tb {width: 30%; margin-left: 35%; margin-right: 35%;} +hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} +x-ebookmaker hr.chap {width: 0%; display: none;} + +div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} +h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} + +.center {text-align: center; text-indent: 0em;} + +img { + max-width: 100%; + height: auto; +} + +img.w100 {width: 100%;} + +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; + page-break-inside: avoid; + max-width: 100%; +} + +.transnote { + background-color: #E6E6FA; + color: black; + font-size:smaller; + padding:0.5em; + margin-bottom:5em; + font-family:sans-serif, serif; +} + +.illowp70 {width: 70%;} + +x-ebookmaker-drop, .x-ebookmaker-drop {} + + /* ]]> */ </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The house of Mirth, by Edith Wharton</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The house of Mirth</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Edith Wharton</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: June 1, 1995 [eBook #284]<br /> +[Most recently updated: January 1, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOUSE OF MIRTH ***</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="figcenter illowp70" id="cover" style="max-width: 30em;"> + <img class="w100" src="images/cover.jpg" alt="cover created by the transcriber" /> +</div> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter fs150"></div> +<h1 class="p4">The House of Mirth<br /> +BY<br /> +EDITH WHARTON</h1> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter fs150"></div> +<p class="center fs150 p4">BOOK ONE</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_1">Chapter 1</h2> + +<p>Selden paused in surprise. In the afternoon rush of the Grand Central +Station his eyes had been refreshed by the sight of Miss Lily Bart.</p> + +<p>It was a Monday in early September, and he was returning to his work from +a hurried dip into the country; but what was Miss Bart doing in town at +that season? If she had appeared to be catching a train, he might have +inferred that he had come on her in the act of transition between one and +another of the country houses which disputed her presence after the close +of the Newport season; but her desultory air perplexed him. She stood +apart from the crowd, letting it drift by her to the platform or the +street, and wearing an air of irresolution which might, as he surmised, +be the mask of a very definite purpose. It struck him at once that she +was waiting for some one, but he hardly knew why the idea arrested him. +There was nothing new about Lily Bart, yet he could never see her without +a faint movement of interest: it was characteristic of her that she +always roused speculation, that her simplest acts seemed the result of +far-reaching intentions.</p> + +<p>An impulse of curiosity made him turn out of his direct line to the door, +and stroll past her. He knew that if she did not wish to be seen she +would contrive to elude him; and it amused him to think of putting her +skill to the test.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Selden—what good luck!”</p> + +<p>She came forward smiling, eager almost, in her resolve to intercept him. +One or two persons, in brushing past them, lingered to look; for Miss +Bart was a figure to arrest even the suburban traveller rushing to his +last train.</p> + +<p>Selden had never seen her more radiant. Her vivid head, relieved against +the dull tints of the crowd, made her more conspicuous than in a +ball-room, and under her dark hat and veil she regained the girlish +smoothness, the purity of tint, that she was beginning to lose after +eleven years of late hours and indefatigable dancing. Was it really +eleven years, Selden found himself wondering, and had she indeed reached +the nine-and-twentieth birthday with which her rivals credited her?</p> + +<p>“What luck!” she repeated. “How nice of you to come to my rescue!”</p> + +<p>He responded joyfully that to do so was his mission in life, and asked +what form the rescue was to take.</p> + +<p>“Oh, almost any—even to sitting on a bench and talking to me. One sits +out a cotillion—why not sit out a train? It isn’t a bit hotter here than +in Mrs. Van Osburgh’s conservatory—and some of the women are not a bit +uglier.” She broke off, laughing, to explain that she had come up to +town from Tuxedo, on her way to the Gus Trenors’ at Bellomont, and had +missed the three-fifteen train to Rhinebeck. “And there isn’t another +till half-past five.” She consulted the little jewelled watch among her +laces. “Just two hours to wait. And I don’t know what to do with myself. +My maid came up this morning to do some shopping for me, and was to go on +to Bellomont at one o’clock, and my aunt’s house is closed, and I don’t +know a soul in town.” She glanced plaintively about the station. “It IS +hotter than Mrs. Van Osburgh’s, after all. If you can spare the time, do +take me somewhere for a breath of air.”</p> + +<p>He declared himself entirely at her disposal: the adventure struck him as +diverting. As a spectator, he had always enjoyed Lily Bart; and his +course lay so far out of her orbit that it amused him to be drawn for a +moment into the sudden intimacy which her proposal implied.</p> + +<p>“Shall we go over to Sherry’s for a cup of tea?”</p> + +<p>She smiled assentingly, and then made a slight grimace.</p> + +<p>“So many people come up to town on a Monday—one is sure to meet a lot of +bores. I’m as old as the hills, of course, and it ought not to make any +difference; but if I’M old enough, you’re not,” she objected gaily. “I’m +dying for tea—but isn’t there a quieter place?”</p> + +<p>He answered her smile, which rested on him vividly. Her discretions +interested him almost as much as her imprudences: he was so sure that +both were part of the same carefully-elaborated plan. In judging Miss +Bart, he had always made use of the “argument from design.”</p> + +<p>“The resources of New York are rather meagre,” he said; “but I’ll find a +hansom first, and then we’ll invent something.” He led her through the +throng of returning holiday-makers, past sallow-faced girls in +preposterous hats, and flat-chested women struggling with paper bundles +and palm-leaf fans. Was it possible that she belonged to the same race? +The dinginess, the crudity of this average section of womanhood made him +feel how highly specialized she was.</p> + +<p>A rapid shower had cooled the air, and clouds still hung refreshingly +over the moist street.</p> + +<p>“How delicious! Let us walk a little,” she said as they emerged from the +station.</p> + +<p>They turned into Madison Avenue and began to stroll northward. As she +moved beside him, with her long light step, Selden was conscious of +taking a luxurious pleasure in her nearness: in the modelling of her +little ear, the crisp upward wave of her hair—was it ever so slightly +brightened by art?—and the thick planting of her straight black lashes. +Everything about her was at once vigorous and exquisite, at once strong +and fine. He had a confused sense that she must have cost a great deal to +make, that a great many dull and ugly people must, in some mysterious +way, have been sacrificed to produce her. He was aware that the qualities +distinguishing her from the herd of her sex were chiefly external: as +though a fine glaze of beauty and fastidiousness had been applied to +vulgar clay. Yet the analogy left him unsatisfied, for a coarse texture +will not take a high finish; and was it not possible that the material +was fine, but that circumstance had fashioned it into a futile shape?</p> + +<p>As he reached this point in his speculations the sun came out, and her +lifted parasol cut off his enjoyment. A moment or two later she paused +with a sigh.</p> + +<p>“Oh, dear, I’m so hot and thirsty—and what a hideous place New York is!” +She looked despairingly up and down the dreary thoroughfare. “Other +cities put on their best clothes in summer, but New York seems to sit in +its shirtsleeves.” Her eyes wandered down one of the side streets. +“Someone has had the humanity to plant a few trees over there. Let us go +into the shade.”</p> + +<p>“I am glad my street meets with your approval,” said Selden as they +turned the corner.</p> + +<p>“Your street? Do you live here?”</p> + +<p>She glanced with interest along the new brick and limestone house-fronts, +fantastically varied in obedience to the American craving for novelty, +but fresh and inviting with their awnings and flower-boxes.</p> + +<p>“Ah, yes—to be sure: THE BENEDICK. What a nice-looking building! I +don’t think I’ve ever seen it before.” She looked across at the +flat-house with its marble porch and pseudo-Georgian facade. “Which are +your windows? Those with the awnings down?”</p> + +<p>“On the top floor—yes.”</p> + +<p>“And that nice little balcony is yours? How cool it looks up there!”</p> + +<p>He paused a moment. “Come up and see,” he suggested. “I can give you a +cup of tea in no time—and you won’t meet any bores.”</p> + +<p>Her colour deepened—she still had the art of blushing at the right +time—but she took the suggestion as lightly as it was made.</p> + +<p>“Why not? It’s too tempting—I’ll take the risk,” she declared.</p> + +<p>“Oh, I’m not dangerous,” he said in the same key. In truth, he had never +liked her as well as at that moment. He knew she had accepted without +afterthought: he could never be a factor in her calculations, and there +was a surprise, a refreshment almost, in the spontaneity of her consent.</p> + +<p>On the threshold he paused a moment, feeling for his latchkey.</p> + +<p>“There’s no one here; but I have a servant who is supposed to come in the +mornings, and it’s just possible he may have put out the tea-things and +provided some cake.”</p> + +<p>He ushered her into a slip of a hall hung with old prints. She noticed +the letters and notes heaped on the table among his gloves and sticks; +then she found herself in a small library, dark but cheerful, with its +walls of books, a pleasantly faded Turkey rug, a littered desk and, as he +had foretold, a tea-tray on a low table near the window. A breeze had +sprung up, swaying inward the muslin curtains, and bringing a fresh scent +of mignonette and petunias from the flower-box on the balcony.</p> + +<p>Lily sank with a sigh into one of the shabby leather chairs.</p> + +<p>“How delicious to have a place like this all to one’s self! What a +miserable thing it is to be a woman.” She leaned back in a luxury of +discontent.</p> + +<p>Selden was rummaging in a cupboard for the cake.</p> + +<p>“Even women,” he said, “have been known to enjoy the privileges of a +flat.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, governesses—or widows. But not girls—not poor, miserable, +marriageable girls!”</p> + +<p>“I even know a girl who lives in a flat.”</p> + +<p>She sat up in surprise. “You do?”</p> + +<p>“I do,” he assured her, emerging from the cupboard with the sought-for +cake.</p> + +<p>“Oh, I know—you mean Gerty Farish.” She smiled a little unkindly. “But I +said MARRIAGEABLE—and besides, she has a horrid little place, and no +maid, and such queer things to eat. Her cook does the washing and the +food tastes of soap. I should hate that, you know.”</p> + +<p>“You shouldn’t dine with her on wash-days,” said Selden, cutting the cake.</p> + +<p>They both laughed, and he knelt by the table to light the lamp under the +kettle, while she measured out the tea into a little tea-pot of green +glaze. As he watched her hand, polished as a bit of old ivory, with its +slender pink nails, and the sapphire bracelet slipping over her wrist, he +was struck with the irony of suggesting to her such a life as his cousin +Gertrude Farish had chosen. She was so evidently the victim of the +civilization which had produced her, that the links of her bracelet +seemed like manacles chaining her to her fate.</p> + +<p>She seemed to read his thought. “It was horrid of me to say that of +Gerty,” she said with charming compunction. “I forgot she was your +cousin. But we’re so different, you know: she likes being good, and I +like being happy. And besides, she is free and I am not. If I were, I +daresay I could manage to be happy even in her flat. It must be pure +bliss to arrange the furniture just as one likes, and give all the +horrors to the ash-man. If I could only do over my aunt’s drawing-room I +know I should be a better woman.”</p> + +<p>“Is it so very bad?” he asked sympathetically.</p> + +<p>She smiled at him across the tea-pot which she was holding up to be +filled.</p> + +<p>“That shows how seldom you come there. Why don’t you come oftener?”</p> + +<p>“When I do come, it’s not to look at Mrs. Peniston’s furniture.”</p> + +<p>“Nonsense,” she said. “You don’t come at all—and yet we get on so well +when we meet.”</p> + +<p>“Perhaps that’s the reason,” he answered promptly. “I’m afraid I haven’t +any cream, you know—shall you mind a slice of lemon instead?”</p> + +<p>“I shall like it better.” She waited while he cut the lemon and dropped a +thin disk into her cup. “But that is not the reason,” she insisted.</p> + +<p>“The reason for what?”</p> + +<p>“For your never coming.” She leaned forward with a shade of perplexity in +her charming eyes. “I wish I knew—I wish I could make you out. Of course +I know there are men who don’t like me—one can tell that at a glance. +And there are others who are afraid of me: they think I want to marry +them.” She smiled up at him frankly. “But I don’t think you dislike +me—and you can’t possibly think I want to marry you.”</p> + +<p>“No—I absolve you of that,” he agreed.</p> + +<p>“Well, then——?”</p> + +<p>He had carried his cup to the fireplace, and stood leaning against the +chimney-piece and looking down on her with an air of indolent amusement. +The provocation in her eyes increased his amusement—he had not supposed +she would waste her powder on such small game; but perhaps she was only +keeping her hand in; or perhaps a girl of her type had no conversation +but of the personal kind. At any rate, she was amazingly pretty, and he +had asked her to tea and must live up to his obligations.</p> + +<p>“Well, then,” he said with a plunge, “perhaps THAT’S the reason.”</p> + +<p>“What?”</p> + +<p>“The fact that you don’t want to marry me. Perhaps I don’t regard it as +such a strong inducement to go and see you.” He felt a slight shiver down +his spine as he ventured this, but her laugh reassured him.</p> + +<p>“Dear Mr. Selden, that wasn’t worthy of you. It’s stupid of you to make +love to me, and it isn’t like you to be stupid.” She leaned back, sipping +her tea with an air so enchantingly judicial that, if they had been in +her aunt’s drawing-room, he might almost have tried to disprove her +deduction.</p> + +<p>“Don’t you see,” she continued, “that there are men enough to say +pleasant things to me, and that what I want is a friend who won’t be +afraid to say disagreeable ones when I need them? Sometimes I have +fancied you might be that friend—I don’t know why, except that you are +neither a prig nor a bounder, and that I shouldn’t have to pretend with +you or be on my guard against you.” Her voice had dropped to a note of +seriousness, and she sat gazing up at him with the troubled gravity of a +child.</p> + +<p>“You don’t know how much I need such a friend,” she said. “My aunt is +full of copy-book axioms, but they were all meant to apply to conduct in +the early fifties. I always feel that to live up to them would include +wearing book-muslin with gigot sleeves. And the other women—my best +friends—well, they use me or abuse me; but they don’t care a straw what +happens to me. I’ve been about too long—people are getting tired of me; +they are beginning to say I ought to marry.”</p> + +<p>There was a moment’s pause, during which Selden meditated one or two +replies calculated to add a momentary zest to the situation; but he +rejected them in favour of the simple question: “Well, why don’t you?”</p> + +<p>She coloured and laughed. “Ah, I see you ARE a friend after all, and that +is one of the disagreeable things I was asking for.”</p> + +<p>“It wasn’t meant to be disagreeable,” he returned amicably. “Isn’t +marriage your vocation? Isn’t it what you’re all brought up for?”</p> + +<p>She sighed. “I suppose so. What else is there?”</p> + +<p>“Exactly. And so why not take the plunge and have it over?”</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders. “You speak as if I ought to marry the first +man who came along.”</p> + +<p>“I didn’t mean to imply that you are as hard put to it as that. But there +must be some one with the requisite qualifications.”</p> + +<p>She shook her head wearily. “I threw away one or two good chances when I +first came out—I suppose every girl does; and you know I am horribly +poor—and very expensive. I must have a great deal of money.”</p> + +<p>Selden had turned to reach for a cigarette-box on the mantelpiece.</p> + +<p>“What’s become of Dillworth?” he asked.</p> + +<p>“Oh, his mother was frightened—she was afraid I should have all the +family jewels reset. And she wanted me to promise that I wouldn’t do over +the drawing-room.”</p> + +<p>“The very thing you are marrying for!”</p> + +<p>“Exactly. So she packed him off to India.”</p> + +<p>“Hard luck—but you can do better than Dillworth.”</p> + +<p>He offered the box, and she took out three or four cigarettes, putting +one between her lips and slipping the others into a little gold case +attached to her long pearl chain.</p> + +<p>“Have I time? Just a whiff, then.” She leaned forward, holding the tip of +her cigarette to his. As she did so, he noted, with a purely impersonal +enjoyment, how evenly the black lashes were set in her smooth white lids, +and how the purplish shade beneath them melted into the pure pallor of +the cheek.</p> + +<p>She began to saunter about the room, examining the bookshelves between +the puffs of her cigarette-smoke. Some of the volumes had the ripe tints +of good tooling and old morocco, and her eyes lingered on them +caressingly, not with the appreciation of the expert, but with the +pleasure in agreeable tones and textures that was one of her inmost +susceptibilities. Suddenly her expression changed from desultory +enjoyment to active conjecture, and she turned to Selden with a question.</p> + +<p>“You collect, don’t you—you know about first editions and things?”</p> + +<p>“As much as a man may who has no money to spend. Now and then I pick up +something in the rubbish heap; and I go and look on at the big sales.”</p> + +<p>She had again addressed herself to the shelves, but her eyes now swept +them inattentively, and he saw that she was preoccupied with a new idea.</p> + +<p>“And Americana—do you collect Americana?”</p> + +<p>Selden stared and laughed.</p> + +<p>“No, that’s rather out of my line. I’m not really a collector, you see; I +simply like to have good editions of the books I am fond of.”</p> + +<p>She made a slight grimace. “And Americana are horribly dull, I suppose?”</p> + +<p>“I should fancy so—except to the historian. But your real collector +values a thing for its rarity. I don’t suppose the buyers of Americana +sit up reading them all night—old Jefferson Gryce certainly didn’t.”</p> + +<p>She was listening with keen attention. “And yet they fetch fabulous +prices, don’t they? It seems so odd to want to pay a lot for an ugly +badly-printed book that one is never going to read! And I suppose most +of the owners of Americana are not historians either?”</p> + +<p>“No; very few of the historians can afford to buy them. They have to use +those in the public libraries or in private collections. It seems to be +the mere rarity that attracts the average collector.”</p> + +<p>He had seated himself on an arm of the chair near which she was standing, +and she continued to question him, asking which were the rarest volumes, +whether the Jefferson Gryce collection was really considered the finest +in the world, and what was the largest price ever fetched by a single +volume.</p> + +<p>It was so pleasant to sit there looking up at her, as she lifted now one +book and then another from the shelves, fluttering the pages between her +fingers, while her drooping profile was outlined against the warm +background of old bindings, that he talked on without pausing to wonder +at her sudden interest in so unsuggestive a subject. But he could never +be long with her without trying to find a reason for what she was doing, +and as she replaced his first edition of La Bruyere and turned away from +the bookcases, he began to ask himself what she had been driving at. Her +next question was not of a nature to enlighten him. She paused before him +with a smile which seemed at once designed to admit him to her +familiarity, and to remind him of the restrictions it imposed.</p> + +<p>“Don’t you ever mind,” she asked suddenly, “not being rich enough to buy +all the books you want?”</p> + +<p>He followed her glance about the room, with its worn furniture and shabby +walls.</p> + +<p>“Don’t I just? Do you take me for a saint on a pillar?”</p> + +<p>“And having to work—do you mind that?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, the work itself is not so bad—I’m rather fond of the law.”</p> + +<p>“No; but the being tied down: the routine—don’t you ever want to get +away, to see new places and people?”</p> + +<p>“Horribly—especially when I see all my friends rushing to the steamer.”</p> + +<p>She drew a sympathetic breath. “But do you mind enough—to marry to get +out of it?”</p> + +<p>Selden broke into a laugh. “God forbid!” he declared.</p> + +<p>She rose with a sigh, tossing her cigarette into the grate.</p> + +<p>“Ah, there’s the difference—a girl must, a man may if he chooses.” She +surveyed him critically. “Your coat’s a little shabby—but who cares? It +doesn’t keep people from asking you to dine. If I were shabby no one +would have me: a woman is asked out as much for her clothes as for +herself. The clothes are the background, the frame, if you like: they +don’t make success, but they are a part of it. Who wants a dingy woman? +We are expected to be pretty and well-dressed till we drop—and if we +can’t keep it up alone, we have to go into partnership.”</p> + +<p>Selden glanced at her with amusement: it was impossible, even with her +lovely eyes imploring him, to take a sentimental view of her case.</p> + +<p>“Ah, well, there must be plenty of capital on the look-out for such an +investment. Perhaps you’ll meet your fate tonight at the Trenors’.”</p> + +<p>She returned his look interrogatively.</p> + +<p>“I thought you might be going there—oh, not in that capacity! But there +are to be a lot of your set—Gwen Van Osburgh, the Wetheralls, Lady +Cressida Raith—and the George Dorsets.”</p> + +<p>She paused a moment before the last name, and shot a query through her +lashes; but he remained imperturbable.</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Trenor asked me; but I can’t get away till the end of the week; and +those big parties bore me.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, so they do me,” she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>“Then why go?”</p> + +<p>“It’s part of the business—you forget! And besides, if I didn’t, I +should be playing bezique with my aunt at Richfield Springs.”</p> + +<p>“That’s almost as bad as marrying Dillworth,” he agreed, and they both +laughed for pure pleasure in their sudden intimacy.</p> + +<p>She glanced at the clock.</p> + +<p>“Dear me! I must be off. It’s after five.”</p> + +<p>She paused before the mantelpiece, studying herself in the mirror while +she adjusted her veil. The attitude revealed the long slope of her +slender sides, which gave a kind of wild-wood grace to her outline—as +though she were a captured dryad subdued to the conventions of the +drawing-room; and Selden reflected that it was the same streak of sylvan +freedom in her nature that lent such savour to her artificiality.</p> + +<p>He followed her across the room to the entrance-hall; but on the +threshold she held out her hand with a gesture of leave-taking.</p> + +<p>“It’s been delightful; and now you will have to return my visit.”</p> + +<p>“But don’t you want me to see you to the station?”</p> + +<p>“No; good bye here, please.”</p> + +<p>She let her hand lie in his a moment, smiling up at him adorably.</p> + +<p>“Good bye, then—and good luck at Bellomont!” he said, opening the door +for her.</p> + +<p>On the landing she paused to look about her. There were a thousand +chances to one against her meeting anybody, but one could never tell, and +she always paid for her rare indiscretions by a violent reaction of +prudence. There was no one in sight, however, but a char-woman who was +scrubbing the stairs. Her own stout person and its surrounding implements +took up so much room that Lily, to pass her, had to gather up her skirts +and brush against the wall. As she did so, the woman paused in her work +and looked up curiously, resting her clenched red fists on the wet cloth +she had just drawn from her pail. She had a broad sallow face, slightly +pitted with small-pox, and thin straw-coloured hair through which her +scalp shone unpleasantly.</p> + +<p>“I beg your pardon,” said Lily, intending by her politeness to convey a +criticism of the other’s manner.</p> + +<p>The woman, without answering, pushed her pail aside, and continued to +stare as Miss Bart swept by with a murmur of silken linings. Lily felt +herself flushing under the look. What did the creature suppose? Could one +never do the simplest, the most harmless thing, without subjecting one’s +self to some odious conjecture? Half way down the next flight, she smiled +to think that a char-woman’s stare should so perturb her. The poor thing +was probably dazzled by such an unwonted apparition. But WERE such +apparitions unwonted on Selden’s stairs? Miss Bart was not familiar with +the moral code of bachelors’ flat-houses, and her colour rose again as it +occurred to her that the woman’s persistent gaze implied a groping among +past associations. But she put aside the thought with a smile at her own +fears, and hastened downward, wondering if she should find a cab short of +Fifth Avenue.</p> + +<p>Under the Georgian porch she paused again, scanning the street for a +hansom. None was in sight, but as she reached the sidewalk she ran +against a small glossy-looking man with a gardenia in his coat, who +raised his hat with a surprised exclamation.</p> + +<p>“Miss Bart? Well—of all people! This IS luck,” he declared; and she +caught a twinkle of amused curiosity between his screwed-up lids.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Mr. Rosedale—how are you?” she said, perceiving that the +irrepressible annoyance on her face was reflected in the sudden intimacy +of his smile.</p> + +<p>Mr. Rosedale stood scanning her with interest and approval. He was a +plump rosy man of the blond Jewish type, with smart London clothes +fitting him like upholstery, and small sidelong eyes which gave him the +air of appraising people as if they were bric-a-brac. He glanced up +interrogatively at the porch of the Benedick.</p> + +<p>“Been up to town for a little shopping, I suppose?” he said, in a tone +which had the familiarity of a touch.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart shrank from it slightly, and then flung herself into +precipitate explanations.</p> + +<p>“Yes—I came up to see my dress-maker. I am just on my way to catch the +train to the Trenors’.”</p> + +<p>“Ah—your dress-maker; just so,” he said blandly. “I didn’t know there +were any dress-makers in the Benedick.”</p> + +<p>“The Benedick?” She looked gently puzzled. “Is that the name of this +building?”</p> + +<p>“Yes, that’s the name: I believe it’s an old word for bachelor, isn’t it? +I happen to own the building—that’s the way I know.” His smile deepened +as he added with increasing assurance: “But you must let me take you to +the station. The Trenors are at Bellomont, of course? You’ve barely time +to catch the five-forty. The dress-maker kept you waiting, I suppose.”</p> + +<p>Lily stiffened under the pleasantry.</p> + +<p>“Oh, thanks,” she stammered; and at that moment her eye caught a hansom +drifting down Madison Avenue, and she hailed it with a desperate gesture.</p> + +<p>“You’re very kind; but I couldn’t think of troubling you,” she said, +extending her hand to Mr. Rosedale; and heedless of his protestations, +she sprang into the rescuing vehicle, and called out a breathless order +to the driver.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_2">Chapter 2</h2> + +<p>In the hansom she leaned back with a sigh. Why must a girl pay so dearly +for her least escape from routine? Why could one never do a natural thing +without having to screen it behind a structure of artifice? She had +yielded to a passing impulse in going to Lawrence Selden’s rooms, and it +was so seldom that she could allow herself the luxury of an impulse! This +one, at any rate, was going to cost her rather more than she could +afford. She was vexed to see that, in spite of so many years of +vigilance, she had blundered twice within five minutes. That stupid story +about her dress-maker was bad enough—it would have been so simple to +tell Rosedale that she had been taking tea with Selden! The mere +statement of the fact would have rendered it innocuous. But, after having +let herself be surprised in a falsehood, it was doubly stupid to snub the +witness of her discomfiture. If she had had the presence of mind to let +Rosedale drive her to the station, the concession might have purchased +his silence. He had his race’s accuracy in the appraisal of values, and +to be seen walking down the platform at the crowded afternoon hour in the +company of Miss Lily Bart would have been money in his pocket, as he +might himself have phrased it. He knew, of course, that there would be a +large house-party at Bellomont, and the possibility of being taken for +one of Mrs. Trenor’s guests was doubtless included in his calculations. +Mr. Rosedale was still at a stage in his social ascent when it was of +importance to produce such impressions.</p> + +<p>The provoking part was that Lily knew all this—knew how easy it would +have been to silence him on the spot, and how difficult it might be to do +so afterward. Mr. Simon Rosedale was a man who made it his business to +know everything about every one, whose idea of showing himself to be at +home in society was to display an inconvenient familiarity with the +habits of those with whom he wished to be thought intimate. Lily was sure +that within twenty-four hours the story of her visiting her dress-maker +at the Benedick would be in active circulation among Mr. Rosedale’s +acquaintances. The worst of it was that she had always snubbed and +ignored him. On his first appearance—when her improvident cousin, Jack +Stepney, had obtained for him (in return for favours too easily guessed) +a card to one of the vast impersonal Van Osburgh “crushes”—Rosedale, +with that mixture of artistic sensibility and business astuteness which +characterizes his race, had instantly gravitated toward Miss Bart. She +understood his motives, for her own course was guided by as nice +calculations. Training and experience had taught her to be hospitable to +newcomers, since the most unpromising might be useful later on, and there +were plenty of available OUBLIETTES to swallow them if they were not. But +some intuitive repugnance, getting the better of years of social +discipline, had made her push Mr. Rosedale into his OUBLIETTE without a +trial. He had left behind only the ripple of amusement which his speedy +despatch had caused among her friends; and though later (to shift the +metaphor) he reappeared lower down the stream, it was only in fleeting +glimpses, with long submergences between.</p> + +<p>Hitherto Lily had been undisturbed by scruples. In her little set Mr. +Rosedale had been pronounced “impossible,” and Jack Stepney roundly +snubbed for his attempt to pay his debts in dinner invitations. Even Mrs. +Trenor, whose taste for variety had led her into some hazardous +experiments, resisted Jack’s attempts to disguise Mr. Rosedale as a +novelty, and declared that he was the same little Jew who had been served +up and rejected at the social board a dozen times within her memory; and +while Judy Trenor was obdurate there was small chance of Mr. Rosedale’s +penetrating beyond the outer limbo of the Van Osburgh crushes. Jack gave +up the contest with a laughing “You’ll see,” and, sticking manfully to +his guns, showed himself with Rosedale at the fashionable restaurants, in +company with the personally vivid if socially obscure ladies who are +available for such purposes. But the attempt had hitherto been vain, and +as Rosedale undoubtedly paid for the dinners, the laugh remained with his +debtor.</p> + +<p>Mr. Rosedale, it will be seen, was thus far not a factor to be +feared—unless one put one’s self in his power. And this was precisely +what Miss Bart had done. Her clumsy fib had let him see that she had +something to conceal; and she was sure he had a score to settle with her. +Something in his smile told her he had not forgotten. She turned from the +thought with a little shiver, but it hung on her all the way to the +station, and dogged her down the platform with the persistency of Mr. +Rosedale himself.</p> + +<p>She had just time to take her seat before the train started; but having +arranged herself in her corner with the instinctive feeling for effect +which never forsook her, she glanced about in the hope of seeing some +other member of the Trenors’ party. She wanted to get away from herself, +and conversation was the only means of escape that she knew.</p> + +<p>Her search was rewarded by the discovery of a very blond young man with a +soft reddish beard, who, at the other end of the carriage, appeared to be +dissembling himself behind an unfolded newspaper. Lily’s eye brightened, +and a faint smile relaxed the drawn lines of her mouth. She had known +that Mr. Percy Gryce was to be at Bellomont, but she had not counted on +the luck of having him to herself in the train; and the fact banished all +perturbing thoughts of Mr. Rosedale. Perhaps, after all, the day was to +end more favourably than it had begun.</p> + +<p>She began to cut the pages of a novel, tranquilly studying her prey +through downcast lashes while she organized a method of attack. +Something in his attitude of conscious absorption told her that he was +aware of her presence: no one had ever been quite so engrossed in an +evening paper! She guessed that he was too shy to come up to her, and +that she would have to devise some means of approach which should not +appear to be an advance on her part. It amused her to think that any one +as rich as Mr. Percy Gryce should be shy; but she was gifted with +treasures of indulgence for such idiosyncrasies, and besides, his +timidity might serve her purpose better than too much assurance. She had +the art of giving self-confidence to the embarrassed, but she was not +equally sure of being able to embarrass the self-confident.</p> + +<p>She waited till the train had emerged from the tunnel and was racing +between the ragged edges of the northern suburbs. Then, as it lowered its +speed near Yonkers, she rose from her seat and drifted slowly down the +carriage. As she passed Mr. Gryce, the train gave a lurch, and he was +aware of a slender hand gripping the back of his chair. He rose with a +start, his ingenuous face looking as though it had been dipped in +crimson: even the reddish tint in his beard seemed to deepen. The train +swayed again, almost flinging Miss Bart into his arms.</p> + +<p>She steadied herself with a laugh and drew back; but he was enveloped in +the scent of her dress, and his shoulder had felt her fugitive touch.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Mr. Gryce, is it you? I’m so sorry—I was trying to find the porter +and get some tea.”</p> + +<p>She held out her hand as the train resumed its level rush, and they stood +exchanging a few words in the aisle. Yes—he was going to Bellomont. He +had heard she was to be of the party—he blushed again as he admitted it. +And was he to be there for a whole week? How delightful!</p> + +<p>But at this point one or two belated passengers from the last station +forced their way into the carriage, and Lily had to retreat to her seat.</p> + +<p>“The chair next to mine is empty—do take it,” she said over her +shoulder; and Mr. Gryce, with considerable embarrassment, succeeded in +effecting an exchange which enabled him to transport himself and his bags +to her side.</p> + +<p>“Ah—and here is the porter, and perhaps we can have some tea.”</p> + +<p>She signalled to that official, and in a moment, with the ease that +seemed to attend the fulfilment of all her wishes, a little table had +been set up between the seats, and she had helped Mr. Gryce to bestow his +encumbering properties beneath it.</p> + +<p>When the tea came he watched her in silent fascination while her hands +flitted above the tray, looking miraculously fine and slender in contrast +to the coarse china and lumpy bread. It seemed wonderful to him that any +one should perform with such careless ease the difficult task of making +tea in public in a lurching train. He would never have dared to order it +for himself, lest he should attract the notice of his fellow-passengers; +but, secure in the shelter of her conspicuousness, he sipped the inky +draught with a delicious sense of exhilaration.</p> + +<p>Lily, with the flavour of Selden’s caravan tea on her lips, had no great +fancy to drown it in the railway brew which seemed such nectar to her +companion; but, rightly judging that one of the charms of tea is the fact +of drinking it together, she proceeded to give the last touch to Mr. +Gryce’s enjoyment by smiling at him across her lifted cup.</p> + +<p>“Is it quite right—I haven’t made it too strong?” she asked +solicitously; and he replied with conviction that he had never tasted +better tea.</p> + +<p>“I daresay it is true,” she reflected; and her imagination was fired by +the thought that Mr. Gryce, who might have sounded the depths of the most +complex self-indulgence, was perhaps actually taking his first journey +alone with a pretty woman.</p> + +<p>It struck her as providential that she should be the instrument of his +initiation. Some girls would not have known how to manage him. They would +have over-emphasized the novelty of the adventure, trying to make him +feel in it the zest of an escapade. But Lily’s methods were more +delicate. She remembered that her cousin Jack Stepney had once defined +Mr. Gryce as the young man who had promised his mother never to go out in +the rain without his overshoes; and acting on this hint, she resolved to +impart a gently domestic air to the scene, in the hope that her +companion, instead of feeling that he was doing something reckless or +unusual, would merely be led to dwell on the advantage of always having a +companion to make one’s tea in the train.</p> + +<p>But in spite of her efforts, conversation flagged after the tray had been +removed, and she was driven to take a fresh measurement of Mr. Gryce’s +limitations. It was not, after all, opportunity but imagination that he +lacked: he had a mental palate which would never learn to distinguish +between railway tea and nectar. There was, however, one topic she could +rely on: one spring that she had only to touch to set his simple +machinery in motion. She had refrained from touching it because it was a +last resource, and she had relied on other arts to stimulate other +sensations; but as a settled look of dulness began to creep over his +candid features, she saw that extreme measures were necessary.</p> + +<p>“And how,” she said, leaning forward, “are you getting on with your +Americana?”</p> + +<p>His eye became a degree less opaque: it was as though an incipient film +had been removed from it, and she felt the pride of a skilful operator.</p> + +<p>“I’ve got a few new things,” he said, suffused with pleasure, but +lowering his voice as though he feared his fellow-passengers might be in +league to despoil him.</p> + +<p>She returned a sympathetic enquiry, and gradually he was drawn on to talk +of his latest purchases. It was the one subject which enabled him to +forget himself, or allowed him, rather, to remember himself without +constraint, because he was at home in it, and could assert a superiority +that there were few to dispute. Hardly any of his acquaintances cared for +Americana, or knew anything about them; and the consciousness of this +ignorance threw Mr. Gryce’s knowledge into agreeable relief. The only +difficulty was to introduce the topic and to keep it to the front; most +people showed no desire to have their ignorance dispelled, and Mr. Gryce +was like a merchant whose warehouses are crammed with an unmarketable +commodity.</p> + +<p>But Miss Bart, it appeared, really did want to know about Americana; and +moreover, she was already sufficiently informed to make the task of +farther instruction as easy as it was agreeable. She questioned him +intelligently, she heard him submissively; and, prepared for the look of +lassitude which usually crept over his listeners’ faces, he grew eloquent +under her receptive gaze. The “points” she had had the presence of mind +to glean from Selden, in anticipation of this very contingency, were +serving her to such good purpose that she began to think her visit to him +had been the luckiest incident of the day. She had once more shown her +talent for profiting by the unexpected, and dangerous theories as to the +advisability of yielding to impulse were germinating under the surface of +smiling attention which she continued to present to her companion.</p> + +<p>Mr. Gryce’s sensations, if less definite, were equally agreeable. He +felt the confused titillation with which the lower organisms welcome the +gratification of their needs, and all his senses floundered in a vague +well-being, through which Miss Bart’s personality was dimly but +pleasantly perceptible.</p> + +<p>Mr. Gryce’s interest in Americana had not originated with himself: it was +impossible to think of him as evolving any taste of his own. An uncle had +left him a collection already noted among bibliophiles; the existence of +the collection was the only fact that had ever shed glory on the name of +Gryce, and the nephew took as much pride in his inheritance as though it +had been his own work. Indeed, he gradually came to regard it as such, +and to feel a sense of personal complacency when he chanced on any +reference to the Gryce Americana. Anxious as he was to avoid personal +notice, he took, in the printed mention of his name, a pleasure so +exquisite and excessive that it seemed a compensation for his shrinking +from publicity.</p> + +<p>To enjoy the sensation as often as possible, he subscribed to all the +reviews dealing with book-collecting in general, and American history in +particular, and as allusions to his library abounded in the pages of +these journals, which formed his only reading, he came to regard himself +as figuring prominently in the public eye, and to enjoy the thought of +the interest which would be excited if the persons he met in the street, +or sat among in travelling, were suddenly to be told that he was the +possessor of the Gryce Americana.</p> + +<p>Most timidities have such secret compensations, and Miss Bart was +discerning enough to know that the inner vanity is generally in +proportion to the outer self-depreciation. With a more confident person +she would not have dared to dwell so long on one topic, or to show such +exaggerated interest in it; but she had rightly guessed that Mr. Gryce’s +egoism was a thirsty soil, requiring constant nurture from without. Miss +Bart had the gift of following an undercurrent of thought while she +appeared to be sailing on the surface of conversation; and in this case +her mental excursion took the form of a rapid survey of Mr. Percy Gryce’s +future as combined with her own. The Gryces were from Albany, and but +lately introduced to the metropolis, where the mother and son had come, +after old Jefferson Gryce’s death, to take possession of his house in +Madison Avenue—an appalling house, all brown stone without and black +walnut within, with the Gryce library in a fire-proof annex that looked +like a mausoleum. Lily, however, knew all about them: young Mr. Gryce’s +arrival had fluttered the maternal breasts of New York, and when a girl +has no mother to palpitate for her she must needs be on the alert for +herself. Lily, therefore, had not only contrived to put herself in the +young man’s way, but had made the acquaintance of Mrs. Gryce, a +monumental woman with the voice of a pulpit orator and a mind preoccupied +with the iniquities of her servants, who came sometimes to sit with Mrs. +Peniston and learn from that lady how she managed to prevent the +kitchen-maid’s smuggling groceries out of the house. Mrs. Gryce had a +kind of impersonal benevolence: cases of individual need she regarded +with suspicion, but she subscribed to Institutions when their annual +reports showed an impressive surplus. Her domestic duties were manifold, +for they extended from furtive inspections of the servants’ bedrooms to +unannounced descents to the cellar; but she had never allowed herself +many pleasures. Once, however, she had had a special edition of the Sarum +Rule printed in rubric and presented to every clergyman in the diocese; +and the gilt album in which their letters of thanks were pasted formed +the chief ornament of her drawing-room table.</p> + +<p>Percy had been brought up in the principles which so excellent a woman +was sure to inculcate. Every form of prudence and suspicion had been +grafted on a nature originally reluctant and cautious, with the result +that it would have seemed hardly needful for Mrs. Gryce to extract his +promise about the overshoes, so little likely was he to hazard himself +abroad in the rain. After attaining his majority, and coming into the +fortune which the late Mr. Gryce had made out of a patent device for +excluding fresh air from hotels, the young man continued to live with his +mother in Albany; but on Jefferson Gryce’s death, when another large +property passed into her son’s hands, Mrs. Gryce thought that what she +called his “interests” demanded his presence in New York. She accordingly +installed herself in the Madison Avenue house, and Percy, whose sense of +duty was not inferior to his mother’s, spent all his week days in the +handsome Broad Street office where a batch of pale men on small salaries +had grown grey in the management of the Gryce estate, and where he was +initiated with becoming reverence into every detail of the art of +accumulation.</p> + +<p>As far as Lily could learn, this had hitherto been Mr. Gryce’s only +occupation, and she might have been pardoned for thinking it not too hard +a task to interest a young man who had been kept on such low diet. At +any rate, she felt herself so completely in command of the situation that +she yielded to a sense of security in which all fear of Mr. Rosedale, and +of the difficulties on which that fear was contingent, vanished beyond +the edge of thought.</p> + +<p>The stopping of the train at Garrisons would not have distracted her from +these thoughts, had she not caught a sudden look of distress in her +companion’s eye. His seat faced toward the door, and she guessed that he +had been perturbed by the approach of an acquaintance; a fact confirmed +by the turning of heads and general sense of commotion which her own +entrance into a railway-carriage was apt to produce.</p> + +<p>She knew the symptoms at once, and was not surprised to be hailed by the +high notes of a pretty woman, who entered the train accompanied by a +maid, a bull-terrier, and a footman staggering under a load of bags and +dressing-cases.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Lily—are you going to Bellomont? Then you can’t let me have your +seat, I suppose? But I MUST have a seat in this carriage—porter, you +must find me a place at once. Can’t some one be put somewhere else? I +want to be with my friends. Oh, how do you do, Mr. Gryce? Do please make +him understand that I must have a seat next to you and Lily.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. George Dorset, regardless of the mild efforts of a traveller with a +carpet-bag, who was doing his best to make room for her by getting out of +the train, stood in the middle of the aisle, diffusing about her that +general sense of exasperation which a pretty woman on her travels not +infrequently creates.</p> + +<p>She was smaller and thinner than Lily Bart, with a restless pliability of +pose, as if she could have been crumpled up and run through a ring, like +the sinuous draperies she affected. Her small pale face seemed the mere +setting of a pair of dark exaggerated eyes, of which the visionary gaze +contrasted curiously with her self-assertive tone and gestures; so that, +as one of her friends observed, she was like a disembodied spirit who +took up a great deal of room.</p> + +<p>Having finally discovered that the seat adjoining Miss Bart’s was at her +disposal, she possessed herself of it with a farther displacement of her +surroundings, explaining meanwhile that she had come across from Mount +Kisco in her motor-car that morning, and had been kicking her heels for +an hour at Garrisons, without even the alleviation of a cigarette, her +brute of a husband having neglected to replenish her case before they +parted that morning.</p> + +<p>“And at this hour of the day I don’t suppose you’ve a single one left, +have you, Lily?” she plaintively concluded.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart caught the startled glance of Mr. Percy Gryce, whose own lips +were never defiled by tobacco.</p> + +<p>“What an absurd question, Bertha!” she exclaimed, blushing at the thought +of the store she had laid in at Lawrence Selden’s.</p> + +<p>“Why, don’t you smoke? Since when have you given it up? What—you +never—— And you don’t either, Mr. Gryce? Ah, of course—how stupid of +me—I understand.”</p> + +<p>And Mrs. Dorset leaned back against her travelling cushions with a smile +which made Lily wish there had been no vacant seat beside her own.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_3">Chapter 3</h2> + +<p>Bridge at Bellomont usually lasted till the small hours; and when Lily +went to bed that night she had played too long for her own good.</p> + +<p>Feeling no desire for the self-communion which awaited her in her room, +she lingered on the broad stairway, looking down into the hall below, +where the last card-players were grouped about the tray of tall glasses +and silver-collared decanters which the butler had just placed on a low +table near the fire.</p> + +<p>The hall was arcaded, with a gallery supported on columns of pale yellow +marble. Tall clumps of flowering plants were grouped against a background +of dark foliage in the angles of the walls. On the crimson carpet a +deer-hound and two or three spaniels dozed luxuriously before the fire, +and the light from the great central lantern overhead shed a brightness +on the women’s hair and struck sparks from their jewels as they moved.</p> + +<p>There were moments when such scenes delighted Lily, when they gratified +her sense of beauty and her craving for the external finish of life; +there were others when they gave a sharper edge to the meagreness of her +own opportunities. This was one of the moments when the sense of contrast +was uppermost, and she turned away impatiently as Mrs. George Dorset, +glittering in serpentine spangles, drew Percy Gryce in her wake to a +confidential nook beneath the gallery.</p> + +<p>It was not that Miss Bart was afraid of losing her newly-acquired hold +over Mr. Gryce. Mrs. Dorset might startle or dazzle him, but she had +neither the skill nor the patience to effect his capture. She was too +self-engrossed to penetrate the recesses of his shyness, and besides, why +should she care to give herself the trouble? At most it might amuse her +to make sport of his simplicity for an evening—after that he would be +merely a burden to her, and knowing this, she was far too experienced to +encourage him. But the mere thought of that other woman, who could take a +man up and toss him aside as she willed, without having to regard him as +a possible factor in her plans, filled Lily Bart with envy. She had been +bored all the afternoon by Percy Gryce—the mere thought seemed to waken +an echo of his droning voice—but she could not ignore him on the morrow, +she must follow up her success, must submit to more boredom, must be +ready with fresh compliances and adaptabilities, and all on the bare +chance that he might ultimately decide to do her the honour of boring her +for life.</p> + +<p>It was a hateful fate—but how escape from it? What choice had she? To be +herself, or a Gerty Farish. As she entered her bedroom, with its +softly-shaded lights, her lace dressing-gown lying across the silken +bedspread, her little embroidered slippers before the fire, a vase of +carnations filling the air with perfume, and the last novels and +magazines lying uncut on a table beside the reading-lamp, she had a +vision of Miss Farish’s cramped flat, with its cheap conveniences and +hideous wall-papers. No; she was not made for mean and shabby +surroundings, for the squalid compromises of poverty. Her whole being +dilated in an atmosphere of luxury; it was the background she required, +the only climate she could breathe in. But the luxury of others was not +what she wanted. A few years ago it had sufficed her: she had taken her +daily meed of pleasure without caring who provided it. Now she was +beginning to chafe at the obligations it imposed, to feel herself a mere +pensioner on the splendour which had once seemed to belong to her. There +were even moments when she was conscious of having to pay her way.</p> + +<p>For a long time she had refused to play bridge. She knew she could not +afford it, and she was afraid of acquiring so expensive a taste. She had +seen the danger exemplified in more than one of her associates—in young +Ned Silverton, for instance, the charming fair boy now seated in abject +rapture at the elbow of Mrs. Fisher, a striking divorcee with eyes and +gowns as emphatic as the head-lines of her “case.” Lily could remember +when young Silverton had stumbled into their circle, with the air of a +strayed Arcadian who has published charming sonnets in his college journal. +Since then he had developed a taste for Mrs. Fisher and bridge, and the +latter at least had involved him in expenses from which he had been more +than once rescued by harassed maiden sisters, who treasured the sonnets, +and went without sugar in their tea to keep their darling afloat. Ned’s +case was familiar to Lily: she had seen his charming eyes—which had a +good deal more poetry in them than the sonnets—change from surprise to +amusement, and from amusement to anxiety, as he passed under the spell +of the terrible god of chance; and she was afraid of discovering the +same symptoms in her own case.</p> + +<p>For in the last year she had found that her hostesses expected her to +take a place at the card-table. It was one of the taxes she had to pay +for their prolonged hospitality, and for the dresses and trinkets which +occasionally replenished her insufficient wardrobe. And since she had +played regularly the passion had grown on her. Once or twice of late she +had won a large sum, and instead of keeping it against future losses, had +spent it in dress or jewelry; and the desire to atone for this +imprudence, combined with the increasing exhilaration of the game, drove +her to risk higher stakes at each fresh venture. She tried to excuse +herself on the plea that, in the Trenor set, if one played at all one +must either play high or be set down as priggish or stingy; but she knew +that the gambling passion was upon her, and that in her present +surroundings there was small hope of resisting it.</p> + +<p>Tonight the luck had been persistently bad, and the little gold purse +which hung among her trinkets was almost empty when she returned to her +room. She unlocked the wardrobe, and taking out her jewel-case, looked +under the tray for the roll of bills from which she had replenished the +purse before going down to dinner. Only twenty dollars were left: the +discovery was so startling that for a moment she fancied she must have +been robbed. Then she took paper and pencil, and seating herself at the +writing-table, tried to reckon up what she had spent during the day. Her +head was throbbing with fatigue, and she had to go over the figures again +and again; but at last it became clear to her that she had lost three +hundred dollars at cards. She took out her cheque-book to see if her +balance was larger than she remembered, but found she had erred in the +other direction. Then she returned to her calculations; but figure as she +would, she could not conjure back the vanished three hundred dollars. It +was the sum she had set aside to pacify her dress-maker—unless she +should decide to use it as a sop to the jeweller. At any rate, she had so +many uses for it that its very insufficiency had caused her to play high +in the hope of doubling it. But of course she had lost—she who needed +every penny, while Bertha Dorset, whose husband showered money on her, +must have pocketed at least five hundred, and Judy Trenor, who could have +afforded to lose a thousand a night, had left the table clutching such a +heap of bills that she had been unable to shake hands with her guests +when they bade her good night.</p> + +<p>A world in which such things could be seemed a miserable place to Lily +Bart; but then she had never been able to understand the laws of a +universe which was so ready to leave her out of its calculations.</p> + +<p>She began to undress without ringing for her maid, whom she had sent to +bed. She had been long enough in bondage to other people’s pleasure to be +considerate of those who depended on hers, and in her bitter moods it +sometimes struck her that she and her maid were in the same position, +except that the latter received her wages more regularly.</p> + +<p>As she sat before the mirror brushing her hair, her face looked hollow +and pale, and she was frightened by two little lines near her mouth, +faint flaws in the smooth curve of the cheek.</p> + +<p>“Oh, I must stop worrying!” she exclaimed. “Unless it’s the electric +light——” she reflected, springing up from her seat and lighting the +candles on the dressing-table.</p> + +<p>She turned out the wall-lights, and peered at herself between the +candle-flames. The white oval of her face swam out waveringly from a +background of shadows, the uncertain light blurring it like a haze; but +the two lines about the mouth remained.</p> + +<p>Lily rose and undressed in haste.</p> + +<p>“It is only because I am tired and have such odious things to think +about,” she kept repeating; and it seemed an added injustice that petty +cares should leave a trace on the beauty which was her only defence +against them.</p> + +<p>But the odious things were there, and remained with her. She returned +wearily to the thought of Percy Gryce, as a wayfarer picks up a heavy +load and toils on after a brief rest. She was almost sure she had +“landed” him: a few days’ work and she would win her reward. But the +reward itself seemed unpalatable just then: she could get no zest from +the thought of victory. It would be a rest from worry, no more—and how +little that would have seemed to her a few years earlier! Her ambitions +had shrunk gradually in the desiccating air of failure. But why had she +failed? Was it her own fault or that of destiny?</p> + +<p>She remembered how her mother, after they had lost their money, used to +say to her with a kind of fierce vindictiveness: “But you’ll get it all +back—you’ll get it all back, with your face.”... The remembrance +roused a whole train of association, and she lay in the darkness +reconstructing the past out of which her present had grown.</p> + +<p>A house in which no one ever dined at home unless there was “company”; a +door-bell perpetually ringing; a hall-table showered with square +envelopes which were opened in haste, and oblong envelopes which were +allowed to gather dust in the depths of a bronze jar; a series of French +and English maids giving warning amid a chaos of hurriedly-ransacked +wardrobes and dress-closets; an equally changing dynasty of nurses and +footmen; quarrels in the pantry, the kitchen and the drawing-room; +precipitate trips to Europe, and returns with gorged trunks and days of +interminable unpacking; semi-annual discussions as to where the summer +should be spent, grey interludes of economy and brilliant reactions of +expense—such was the setting of Lily Bart’s first memories.</p> + +<p>Ruling the turbulent element called home was the vigorous and determined +figure of a mother still young enough to dance her ball-dresses to rags, +while the hazy outline of a neutral-tinted father filled an intermediate +space between the butler and the man who came to wind the clocks. Even to +the eyes of infancy, Mrs. Hudson Bart had appeared young; but Lily could +not recall the time when her father had not been bald and slightly +stooping, with streaks of grey in his hair, and a tired walk. It was a +shock to her to learn afterward that he was but two years older than her +mother.</p> + +<p>Lily seldom saw her father by daylight. All day he was “downtown”; and +in winter it was long after nightfall when she heard his fagged step on +the stairs and his hand on the school-room door. He would kiss her in +silence, and ask one or two questions of the nurse or the governess; then +Mrs. Bart’s maid would come to remind him that he was dining out, and he +would hurry away with a nod to Lily. In summer, when he joined them for a +Sunday at Newport or Southampton, he was even more effaced and silent +than in winter. It seemed to tire him to rest, and he would sit for hours +staring at the sea-line from a quiet corner of the verandah, while the +clatter of his wife’s existence went on unheeded a few feet off. +Generally, however, Mrs. Bart and Lily went to Europe for the summer, and +before the steamer was half way over Mr. Bart had dipped below the +horizon. Sometimes his daughter heard him denounced for having neglected +to forward Mrs. Bart’s remittances; but for the most part he was never +mentioned or thought of till his patient stooping figure presented itself +on the New York dock as a buffer between the magnitude of his wife’s +luggage and the restrictions of the American custom-house.</p> + +<p>In this desultory yet agitated fashion life went on through Lily’s teens: +a zig-zag broken course down which the family craft glided on a rapid +current of amusement, tugged at by the underflow of a perpetual need—the +need of more money. Lily could not recall the time when there had been +money enough, and in some vague way her father seemed always to blame for +the deficiency. It could certainly not be the fault of Mrs. Bart, who +was spoken of by her friends as a “wonderful manager.” Mrs. Bart was +famous for the unlimited effect she produced on limited means; and to the +lady and her acquaintances there was something heroic in living as though +one were much richer than one’s bank-book denoted.</p> + +<p>Lily was naturally proud of her mother’s aptitude in this line: she had +been brought up in the faith that, whatever it cost, one must have a good +cook, and be what Mrs. Bart called “decently dressed.” Mrs. Bart’s worst +reproach to her husband was to ask him if he expected her to “live like a +pig”; and his replying in the negative was always regarded as a +justification for cabling to Paris for an extra dress or two, and +telephoning to the jeweller that he might, after all, send home the +turquoise bracelet which Mrs. Bart had looked at that morning.</p> + +<p>Lily knew people who “lived like pigs,” and their appearance and +surroundings justified her mother’s repugnance to that form of existence. +They were mostly cousins, who inhabited dingy houses with engravings from +Cole’s Voyage of Life on the drawing-room walls, and slatternly +parlour-maids who said “I’ll go and see” to visitors calling at an hour +when all right-minded persons are conventionally if not actually out. The +disgusting part of it was that many of these cousins were rich, so that +Lily imbibed the idea that if people lived like pigs it was from choice, +and through the lack of any proper standard of conduct. This gave her a +sense of reflected superiority, and she did not need Mrs. Bart’s comments +on the family frumps and misers to foster her naturally lively taste for +splendour.</p> + +<p>Lily was nineteen when circumstances caused her to revise her view of the +universe.</p> + +<p>The previous year she had made a dazzling debut fringed by a heavy +thunder-cloud of bills. The light of the debut still lingered on the +horizon, but the cloud had thickened; and suddenly it broke. The +suddenness added to the horror; and there were still times when Lily +relived with painful vividness every detail of the day on which the blow +fell. She and her mother had been seated at the luncheon-table, over the +CHAUFROIX and cold salmon of the previous night’s dinner: it was one of +Mrs. Bart’s few economies to consume in private the expensive remnants of +her hospitality. Lily was feeling the pleasant languor which is youth’s +penalty for dancing till dawn; but her mother, in spite of a few lines +about the mouth, and under the yellow waves on her temples, was as alert, +determined and high in colour as if she had risen from an untroubled +sleep.</p> + +<p>In the centre of the table, between the melting MARRONS GLACES and +candied cherries, a pyramid of American Beauties lifted their vigorous +stems; they held their heads as high as Mrs. Bart, but their rose-colour +had turned to a dissipated purple, and Lily’s sense of fitness was +disturbed by their reappearance on the luncheon-table.</p> + +<p>“I really think, mother,” she said reproachfully, “we might afford a few +fresh flowers for luncheon. Just some jonquils or lilies-of-the-valley—”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bart stared. Her own fastidiousness had its eye fixed on the world, +and she did not care how the luncheon-table looked when there was no one +present at it but the family. But she smiled at her daughter’s innocence.</p> + +<p>“Lilies-of-the-valley,” she said calmly, “cost two dollars a dozen at +this season.”</p> + +<p>Lily was not impressed. She knew very little of the value of money.</p> + +<p>“It would not take more than six dozen to fill that bowl,” she argued.</p> + +<p>“Six dozen what?” asked her father’s voice in the doorway.</p> + +<p>The two women looked up in surprise; though it was a Saturday, the sight +of Mr. Bart at luncheon was an unwonted one. But neither his wife nor his +daughter was sufficiently interested to ask an explanation.</p> + +<p>Mr. Bart dropped into a chair, and sat gazing absently at the fragment of +jellied salmon which the butler had placed before him.</p> + +<p>“I was only saying,” Lily began, “that I hate to see faded flowers at +luncheon; and mother says a bunch of lilies-of-the-valley would not cost +more than twelve dollars. Mayn’t I tell the florist to send a few every +day?”</p> + +<p>She leaned confidently toward her father: he seldom refused her anything, +and Mrs. Bart had taught her to plead with him when her own entreaties +failed.</p> + +<p>Mr. Bart sat motionless, his gaze still fixed on the salmon, and his +lower jaw dropped; he looked even paler than usual, and his thin hair lay +in untidy streaks on his forehead. Suddenly he looked at his daughter and +laughed. The laugh was so strange that Lily coloured under it: she +disliked being ridiculed, and her father seemed to see something +ridiculous in the request. Perhaps he thought it foolish that she should +trouble him about such a trifle.</p> + +<p>“Twelve dollars—twelve dollars a day for flowers? Oh, certainly, my +dear—give him an order for twelve hundred.” He continued to laugh.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bart gave him a quick glance.</p> + +<p>“You needn’t wait, Poleworth—I will ring for you,” she said to the +butler.</p> + +<p>The butler withdrew with an air of silent disapproval, leaving the +remains of the CHAUFROIX on the sideboard.</p> + +<p>“What is the matter, Hudson? Are you ill?” said Mrs. Bart severely.</p> + +<p>She had no tolerance for scenes which were not of her own making, and it +was odious to her that her husband should make a show of himself before +the servants.</p> + +<p>“Are you ill?” she repeated.</p> + +<p>“Ill?—— No, I’m ruined,” he said.</p> + +<p>Lily made a frightened sound, and Mrs. Bart rose to her feet.</p> + +<p>“Ruined——?” she cried; but controlling herself instantly, she turned a +calm face to Lily.</p> + +<p>“Shut the pantry door,” she said.</p> + +<p>Lily obeyed, and when she turned back into the room her father was +sitting with both elbows on the table, the plate of salmon between them, +and his head bowed on his hands.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bart stood over him with a white face which made her hair +unnaturally yellow. She looked at Lily as the latter approached: her look +was terrible, but her voice was modulated to a ghastly cheerfulness.</p> + +<p>“Your father is not well—he doesn’t know what he is saying. It is +nothing—but you had better go upstairs; and don’t talk to the servants,” +she added.</p> + +<p>Lily obeyed; she always obeyed when her mother spoke in that voice. She +had not been deceived by Mrs. Bart’s words: she knew at once that they +were ruined. In the dark hours which followed, that awful fact +overshadowed even her father’s slow and difficult dying. To his wife he +no longer counted: he had become extinct when he ceased to fulfil his +purpose, and she sat at his side with the provisional air of a traveller +who waits for a belated train to start. Lily’s feelings were softer: she +pitied him in a frightened ineffectual way. But the fact that he was for +the most part unconscious, and that his attention, when she stole into +the room, drifted away from her after a moment, made him even more of a +stranger than in the nursery days when he had never come home till after +dark. She seemed always to have seen him through a blur—first of +sleepiness, then of distance and indifference—and now the fog had +thickened till he was almost indistinguishable. If she could have +performed any little services for him, or have exchanged with him a few +of those affecting words which an extensive perusal of fiction had led +her to connect with such occasions, the filial instinct might have +stirred in her; but her pity, finding no active expression, remained in a +state of spectatorship, overshadowed by her mother’s grim unflagging +resentment. Every look and act of Mrs. Bart’s seemed to say: “You are +sorry for him now—but you will feel differently when you see what he has +done to us.”</p> + +<p>It was a relief to Lily when her father died.</p> + +<p>Then a long winter set in. There was a little money left, but to Mrs. +Bart it seemed worse than nothing—the mere mockery of what she was +entitled to. What was the use of living if one had to live like a pig? +She sank into a kind of furious apathy, a state of inert anger against +fate. Her faculty for “managing” deserted her, or she no longer took +sufficient pride in it to exert it. It was well enough to “manage” when +by so doing one could keep one’s own carriage; but when one’s best +contrivance did not conceal the fact that one had to go on foot, the +effort was no longer worth making.</p> + +<p>Lily and her mother wandered from place to place, now paying long visits +to relations whose house-keeping Mrs. Bart criticized, and who deplored +the fact that she let Lily breakfast in bed when the girl had no +prospects before her, and now vegetating in cheap continental refuges, +where Mrs. Bart held herself fiercely aloof from the frugal tea-tables of +her companions in misfortune. She was especially careful to avoid her old +friends and the scenes of her former successes. To be poor seemed to her +such a confession of failure that it amounted to disgrace; and she +detected a note of condescension in the friendliest advances.</p> + +<p>Only one thought consoled her, and that was the contemplation of Lily’s +beauty. She studied it with a kind of passion, as though it were some +weapon she had slowly fashioned for her vengeance. It was the last asset +in their fortunes, the nucleus around which their life was to be rebuilt. +She watched it jealously, as though it were her own property and Lily its +mere custodian; and she tried to instil into the latter a sense of the +responsibility that such a charge involved. She followed in imagination +the career of other beauties, pointing out to her daughter what might be +achieved through such a gift, and dwelling on the awful warning of those +who, in spite of it, had failed to get what they wanted: to Mrs. Bart, +only stupidity could explain the lamentable denouement of some of her +examples. She was not above the inconsistency of charging fate, rather +than herself, with her own misfortunes; but she inveighed so +acrimoniously against love-matches that Lily would have fancied her own +marriage had been of that nature, had not Mrs. Bart frequently assured +her that she had been “talked into it”—by whom, she never made clear.</p> + +<p>Lily was duly impressed by the magnitude of her opportunities. The +dinginess of her present life threw into enchanting relief the existence +to which she felt herself entitled. To a less illuminated intelligence +Mrs. Bart’s counsels might have been dangerous; but Lily understood that +beauty is only the raw material of conquest, and that to convert it into +success other arts are required. She knew that to betray any sense of +superiority was a subtler form of the stupidity her mother denounced, and +it did not take her long to learn that a beauty needs more tact than the +possessor of an average set of features.</p> + +<p>Her ambitions were not as crude as Mrs. Bart’s. It had been among that +lady’s grievances that her husband—in the early days, before he was too +tired—had wasted his evenings in what she vaguely described as “reading +poetry”; and among the effects packed off to auction after his death were +a score or two of dingy volumes which had struggled for existence among +the boots and medicine bottles of his dressing-room shelves. There was in +Lily a vein of sentiment, perhaps transmitted from this source, which +gave an idealizing touch to her most prosaic purposes. She liked to think +of her beauty as a power for good, as giving her the opportunity to +attain a position where she should make her influence felt in the vague +diffusion of refinement and good taste. She was fond of pictures and +flowers, and of sentimental fiction, and she could not help thinking that +the possession of such tastes ennobled her desire for worldly advantages. +She would not indeed have cared to marry a man who was merely rich: she +was secretly ashamed of her mother’s crude passion for money. Lily’s +preference would have been for an English nobleman with political +ambitions and vast estates; or, for second choice, an Italian prince with +a castle in the Apennines and an hereditary office in the Vatican. Lost +causes had a romantic charm for her, and she liked to picture herself as +standing aloof from the vulgar press of the Quirinal, and sacrificing her +pleasure to the claims of an immemorial tradition....</p> + +<p>How long ago and how far off it all seemed! Those ambitions were hardly +more futile and childish than the earlier ones which had centred about +the possession of a French jointed doll with real hair. Was it only ten +years since she had wavered in imagination between the English earl and +the Italian prince? Relentlessly her mind travelled on over the dreary +interval....</p> + +<p>After two years of hungry roaming Mrs. Bart had died——died of a deep +disgust. She had hated dinginess, and it was her fate to be dingy. Her +visions of a brilliant marriage for Lily had faded after the first year.</p> + +<p>“People can’t marry you if they don’t see you—and how can they see you +in these holes where we’re stuck?” That was the burden of her lament; and +her last adjuration to her daughter was to escape from dinginess if she +could.</p> + +<p>“Don’t let it creep up on you and drag you down. Fight your way out of it +somehow—you’re young and can do it,” she insisted.</p> + +<p>She had died during one of their brief visits to New York, and there Lily +at once became the centre of a family council composed of the wealthy +relatives whom she had been taught to despise for living like pigs. It +may be that they had an inkling of the sentiments in which she had been +brought up, for none of them manifested a very lively desire for her +company; indeed, the question threatened to remain unsolved till Mrs. +Peniston with a sigh announced: “I’ll try her for a year.”</p> + +<p>Every one was surprised, but one and all concealed their surprise, lest +Mrs. Peniston should be alarmed by it into reconsidering her decision.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston was Mr. Bart’s widowed sister, and if she was by no means +the richest of the family group, its other members nevertheless abounded +in reasons why she was clearly destined by Providence to assume the +charge of Lily. In the first place she was alone, and it would be +charming for her to have a young companion. Then she sometimes travelled, +and Lily’s familiarity with foreign customs—deplored as a misfortune by +her more conservative relatives—would at least enable her to act as a +kind of courier. But as a matter of fact Mrs. Peniston had not been +affected by these considerations. She had taken the girl simply because +no one else would have her, and because she had the kind of moral +MAUVAISE HONTE which makes the public display of selfishness difficult, +though it does not interfere with its private indulgence. It would have +been impossible for Mrs. Peniston to be heroic on a desert island, but +with the eyes of her little world upon her she took a certain pleasure in +her act.</p> + +<p>She reaped the reward to which disinterestedness is entitled, and found +an agreeable companion in her niece. She had expected to find Lily +headstrong, critical and “foreign”—for even Mrs. Peniston, though she +occasionally went abroad, had the family dread of foreignness—but the +girl showed a pliancy, which, to a more penetrating mind than her aunt’s, +might have been less reassuring than the open selfishness of youth. +Misfortune had made Lily supple instead of hardening her, and a pliable +substance is less easy to break than a stiff one.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston, however, did not suffer from her niece’s adaptability. +Lily had no intention of taking advantage of her aunt’s good-nature. She +was in truth grateful for the refuge offered her: Mrs. Peniston’s opulent +interior was at least not externally dingy. But dinginess is a quality +which assumes all manner of disguises; and Lily soon found that it was as +latent in the expensive routine of her aunt’s life as in the makeshift +existence of a continental pension.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston was one of the episodical persons who form the padding of +life. It was impossible to believe that she had herself ever been a focus +of activities. The most vivid thing about her was the fact that her +grandmother had been a Van Alstyne. This connection with the well-fed and +industrious stock of early New York revealed itself in the glacial +neatness of Mrs. Peniston’s drawing-room and in the excellence of her +cuisine. She belonged to the class of old New Yorkers who have always +lived well, dressed expensively, and done little else; and to these +inherited obligations Mrs. Peniston faithfully conformed. She had always +been a looker-on at life, and her mind resembled one of those little +mirrors which her Dutch ancestors were accustomed to affix to their upper +windows, so that from the depths of an impenetrable domesticity they +might see what was happening in the street.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston was the owner of a country-place in New Jersey, but she had +never lived there since her husband’s death—a remote event, which +appeared to dwell in her memory chiefly as a dividing point in the +personal reminiscences that formed the staple of her conversation. She +was a woman who remembered dates with intensity, and could tell at a +moment’s notice whether the drawing-room curtains had been renewed before +or after Mr. Peniston’s last illness.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston thought the country lonely and trees damp, and cherished a +vague fear of meeting a bull. To guard against such contingencies she +frequented the more populous watering-places, where she installed herself +impersonally in a hired house and looked on at life through the matting +screen of her verandah. In the care of such a guardian, it soon became +clear to Lily that she was to enjoy only the material advantages of good +food and expensive clothing; and, though far from underrating these, she +would gladly have exchanged them for what Mrs. Bart had taught her to +regard as opportunities. She sighed to think what her mother’s fierce +energies would have accomplished, had they been coupled with Mrs. +Peniston’s resources. Lily had abundant energy of her own, but it was +restricted by the necessity of adapting herself to her aunt’s habits. She +saw that at all costs she must keep Mrs. Peniston’s favour till, as Mrs. +Bart would have phrased it, she could stand on her own legs. Lily had no +mind for the vagabond life of the poor relation, and to adapt herself to +Mrs. Peniston she had, to some degree, to assume that lady’s passive +attitude. She had fancied at first that it would be easy to draw her aunt +into the whirl of her own activities, but there was a static force in +Mrs. Peniston against which her niece’s efforts spent themselves in vain. +To attempt to bring her into active relation with life was like tugging +at a piece of furniture which has been screwed to the floor. She did not, +indeed, expect Lily to remain equally immovable: she had all the American +guardian’s indulgence for the volatility of youth.</p> + +<p>She had indulgence also for certain other habits of her niece’s. It +seemed to her natural that Lily should spend all her money on dress, and +she supplemented the girl’s scanty income by occasional “handsome +presents” meant to be applied to the same purpose. Lily, who was +intensely practical, would have preferred a fixed allowance; but Mrs. +Peniston liked the periodical recurrence of gratitude evoked by +unexpected cheques, and was perhaps shrewd enough to perceive that such a +method of giving kept alive in her niece a salutary sense of dependence.</p> + +<p>Beyond this, Mrs. Peniston had not felt called upon to do anything for +her charge: she had simply stood aside and let her take the field. Lily +had taken it, at first with the confidence of assured possessorship, then +with gradually narrowing demands, till now she found herself actually +struggling for a foothold on the broad space which had once seemed her +own for the asking. How it happened she did not yet know. Sometimes she +thought it was because Mrs. Peniston had been too passive, and again she +feared it was because she herself had not been passive enough. Had she +shown an undue eagerness for victory? Had she lacked patience, pliancy +and dissimulation? Whether she charged herself with these faults or +absolved herself from them, made no difference in the sum-total of her +failure. Younger and plainer girls had been married off by dozens, and +she was nine-and-twenty, and still Miss Bart.</p> + +<p>She was beginning to have fits of angry rebellion against fate, when she +longed to drop out of the race and make an independent life for herself. +But what manner of life would it be? She had barely enough money to pay +her dress-makers’ bills and her gambling debts; and none of the desultory +interests which she dignified with the name of tastes was pronounced +enough to enable her to live contentedly in obscurity. Ah, no—she was +too intelligent not to be honest with herself. She knew that she hated +dinginess as much as her mother had hated it, and to her last breath she +meant to fight against it, dragging herself up again and again above its +flood till she gained the bright pinnacles of success which presented +such a slippery surface to her clutch.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_4">Chapter 4</h2> + +<p>The next morning, on her breakfast tray, Miss Bart found a note from her +hostess.</p> + +<p>“Dearest Lily,” it ran, “if it is not too much of a bore to be down by +ten, will you come to my sitting-room to help me with some tiresome +things?”</p> + +<p>Lily tossed aside the note and subsided on her pillows with a sigh. It +WAS a bore to be down by ten—an hour regarded at Bellomont as vaguely +synchronous with sunrise—and she knew too well the nature of the +tiresome things in question. Miss Pragg, the secretary, had been called +away, and there would be notes and dinner-cards to write, lost addresses +to hunt up, and other social drudgery to perform. It was understood that +Miss Bart should fill the gap in such emergencies, and she usually +recognized the obligation without a murmur.</p> + +<p>Today, however, it renewed the sense of servitude which the previous +night’s review of her cheque-book had produced. Everything in her +surroundings ministered to feelings of ease and amenity. The windows +stood open to the sparkling freshness of the September morning, and +between the yellow boughs she caught a perspective of hedges and +parterres leading by degrees of lessening formality to the free +undulations of the park. Her maid had kindled a little fire on the +hearth, and it contended cheerfully with the sunlight which slanted +across the moss-green carpet and caressed the curved sides of an old +marquetry desk. Near the bed stood a table holding her breakfast tray, +with its harmonious porcelain and silver, a handful of violets in a +slender glass, and the morning paper folded beneath her letters. There +was nothing new to Lily in these tokens of a studied luxury; but, though +they formed a part of her atmosphere, she never lost her sensitiveness to +their charm. Mere display left her with a sense of superior distinction; +but she felt an affinity to all the subtler manifestations of wealth.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor’s summons, however, suddenly recalled her state of +dependence, and she rose and dressed in a mood of irritability that she +was usually too prudent to indulge. She knew that such emotions leave +lines on the face as well as in the character, and she had meant to take +warning by the little creases which her midnight survey had revealed.</p> + +<p>The matter of course tone of Mrs. Trenor’s greeting deepened her +irritation. If one did drag one’s self out of bed at such an hour, and +come down fresh and radiant to the monotony of note-writing, some special +recognition of the sacrifice seemed fitting. But Mrs. Trenor’s tone +showed no consciousness of the fact.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Lily, that’s nice of you,” she merely sighed across the chaos of +letters, bills and other domestic documents which gave an incongruously +commercial touch to the slender elegance of her writing-table.</p> + +<p>“There are such lots of horrors this morning,” she added, clearing a +space in the centre of the confusion and rising to yield her seat to Miss +Bart.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor was a tall fair woman, whose height just saved her from +redundancy. Her rosy blondness had survived some forty years of futile +activity without showing much trace of ill-usage except in a diminished +play of feature. It was difficult to define her beyond saying that she +seemed to exist only as a hostess, not so much from any exaggerated +instinct of hospitality as because she could not sustain life except in a +crowd. The collective nature of her interests exempted her from the +ordinary rivalries of her sex, and she knew no more personal emotion than +that of hatred for the woman who presumed to give bigger dinners or have +more amusing house-parties than herself. As her social talents, backed by +Mr. Trenor’s bank-account, almost always assured her ultimate triumph in +such competitions, success had developed in her an unscrupulous good +nature toward the rest of her sex, and in Miss Bart’s utilitarian +classification of her friends, Mrs. Trenor ranked as the woman who was +least likely to “go back” on her.</p> + +<p>“It was simply inhuman of Pragg to go off now,” Mrs. Trenor declared, as +her friend seated herself at the desk. “She says her sister is going to +have a baby—as if that were anything to having a house-party! I’m sure I +shall get most horribly mixed up and there will be some awful rows. When +I was down at Tuxedo I asked a lot of people for next week, and I’ve +mislaid the list and can’t remember who is coming. And this week is going +to be a horrid failure too—and Gwen Van Osburgh will go back and tell +her mother how bored people were. I did mean to ask the Wetheralls—that +was a blunder of Gus’s. They disapprove of Carry Fisher, you know. As if +one could help having Carry Fisher! It WAS foolish of her to get that +second divorce—Carry always overdoes things—but she said the only way +to get a penny out of Fisher was to divorce him and make him pay alimony. +And poor Carry has to consider every dollar. It’s really absurd of Alice +Wetherall to make such a fuss about meeting her, when one thinks of what +society is coming to. Some one said the other day that there was a +divorce and a case of appendicitis in every family one knows. Besides, +Carry is the only person who can keep Gus in a good humour when we have +bores in the house. Have you noticed that ALL the husbands like her? All, +I mean, except her own. It’s rather clever of her to have made a +specialty of devoting herself to dull people—the field is such a large +one, and she has it practically to herself. She finds compensations, no +doubt—I know she borrows money of Gus—but then I’d PAY her to keep him +in a good humour, so I can’t complain, after all.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor paused to enjoy the spectacle of Miss Bart’s efforts to +unravel her tangled correspondence.</p> + +<p>“But it is only the Wetheralls and Carry,” she resumed, with a fresh note +of lament. “The truth is, I’m awfully disappointed in Lady Cressida +Raith.”</p> + +<p>“Disappointed? Had you known her before?”</p> + +<p>“Mercy, no—never saw her till yesterday. Lady Skiddaw sent her over with +letters to the Van Osburghs, and I heard that Maria Van Osburgh was +asking a big party to meet her this week, so I thought it would be fun to +get her away, and Jack Stepney, who knew her in India, managed it for me. +Maria was furious, and actually had the impudence to make Gwen invite +herself here, so that they shouldn’t be QUITE out of it—if I’d known +what Lady Cressida was like, they could have had her and welcome! But I +thought any friend of the Skiddaws’ was sure to be amusing. You remember +what fun Lady Skiddaw was? There were times when I simply had to send the +girls out of the room. Besides, Lady Cressida is the Duchess of +Beltshire’s sister, and I naturally supposed she was the same sort; but +you never can tell in those English families. They are so big that +there’s room for all kinds, and it turns out that Lady Cressida is the +moral one—married a clergyman and does missionary work in the East End. +Think of my taking such a lot of trouble about a clergyman’s wife, who +wears Indian jewelry and botanizes! She made Gus take her all through the +glass-houses yesterday, and bothered him to death by asking him the names +of the plants. Fancy treating Gus as if he were the gardener!”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor brought this out in a CRESCENDO of indignation.</p> + +<p>“Oh, well, perhaps Lady Cressida will reconcile the Wetheralls to meeting +Carry Fisher,” said Miss Bart pacifically.</p> + +<p>“I’m sure I hope so! But she is boring all the men horribly, and if she +takes to distributing tracts, as I hear she does, it will be too +depressing. The worst of it is that she would have been so useful at the +right time. You know we have to have the Bishop once a year, and she +would have given just the right tone to things. I always have horrid luck +about the Bishop’s visits,” added Mrs. Trenor, whose present misery was +being fed by a rapidly rising tide of reminiscence; “last year, when he +came, Gus forgot all about his being here, and brought home the Ned +Wintons and the Farleys—five divorces and six sets of children between +them!”</p> + +<p>“When is Lady Cressida going?” Lily enquired.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor cast up her eyes in despair. “My dear, if one only knew! I +was in such a hurry to get her away from Maria that I actually forgot to +name a date, and Gus says she told some one she meant to stop here all +winter.”</p> + +<p>“To stop here? In this house?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t be silly—in America. But if no one else asks her—you know they +NEVER go to hotels.”</p> + +<p>“Perhaps Gus only said it to frighten you.”</p> + +<p>“No—I heard her tell Bertha Dorset that she had six months to put in +while her husband was taking the cure in the Engadine. You should have +seen Bertha look vacant! But it’s no joke, you know—if she stays here +all the autumn she’ll spoil everything, and Maria Van Osburgh will simply +exult.”</p> + +<p>At this affecting vision Mrs. Trenor’s voice trembled with self-pity.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Judy—as if any one were ever bored at Bellomont!” Miss Bart +tactfully protested. “You know perfectly well that, if Mrs. Van Osburgh +were to get all the right people and leave you with all the wrong ones, +you’d manage to make things go off, and she wouldn’t.”</p> + +<p>Such an assurance would usually have restored Mrs. Trenor’s complacency; +but on this occasion it did not chase the cloud from her brow.</p> + +<p>“It isn’t only Lady Cressida,” she lamented. “Everything has gone wrong +this week. I can see that Bertha Dorset is furious with me.”</p> + +<p>“Furious with you? Why?”</p> + +<p>“Because I told her that Lawrence Selden was coming; but he wouldn’t, +after all, and she’s quite unreasonable enough to think it’s my fault.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart put down her pen and sat absently gazing at the note she had +begun.</p> + +<p>“I thought that was all over,” she said.</p> + +<p>“So it is, on his side. And of course Bertha has been idle since. But I +fancy she’s out of a job just at present—and some one gave me a hint +that I had better ask Lawrence. Well, I DID ask him—but I couldn’t make +him come; and now I suppose she’ll take it out of me by being perfectly +nasty to every one else.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, she may take it out of HIM by being perfectly charming—to some one +else.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor shook her head dolefully. “She knows he wouldn’t mind. And +who else is there? Alice Wetherall won’t let Lucius out of her sight. +Ned Silverton can’t take his eyes off Carry Fisher—poor boy! Gus is +bored by Bertha, Jack Stepney knows her too well—and—well, to be sure, +there’s Percy Gryce!”</p> + +<p>She sat up smiling at the thought.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart’s countenance did not reflect the smile.</p> + +<p>“Oh, she and Mr. Gryce would not be likely to hit it off.”</p> + +<p>“You mean that she’d shock him and he’d bore her? Well, that’s not such a +bad beginning, you know. But I hope she won’t take it into her head to be +nice to him, for I asked him here on purpose for you.”</p> + +<p>Lily laughed. “MERCI DU COMPLIMENT! I should certainly have no show +against Bertha.”</p> + +<p>“Do you think I am uncomplimentary? I’m not really, you know. Every one +knows you’re a thousand times handsomer and cleverer than Bertha; but +then you’re not nasty. And for always getting what she wants in the long +run, commend me to a nasty woman.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart stared in affected reproval. “I thought you were so fond of +Bertha.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, I am—it’s much safer to be fond of dangerous people. But she IS +dangerous—and if I ever saw her up to mischief it’s now. I can tell by +poor George’s manner. That man is a perfect barometer—he always knows +when Bertha is going to——”</p> + +<p>“To fall?” Miss Bart suggested.</p> + +<p>“Don’t be shocking! You know he believes in her still. And of course I +don’t say there’s any real harm in Bertha. Only she delights in making +people miserable, and especially poor George.”</p> + +<p>“Well, he seems cut out for the part—I don’t wonder she likes more +cheerful companionship.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, George is not as dismal as you think. If Bertha did worry him he +would be quite different. Or if she’d leave him alone, and let him +arrange his life as he pleases. But she doesn’t dare lose her hold of him +on account of the money, and so when HE isn’t jealous she pretends to be.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart went on writing in silence, and her hostess sat following her +train of thought with frowning intensity.</p> + +<p>“Do you know,” she exclaimed after a long pause, “I believe I’ll call up +Lawrence on the telephone and tell him he simply MUST come?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, don’t,” said Lily, with a quick suffusion of colour. The blush +surprised her almost as much as it did her hostess, who, though not +commonly observant of facial changes, sat staring at her with puzzled +eyes.</p> + +<p>“Good gracious, Lily, how handsome you are! Why? Do you dislike him so +much?”</p> + +<p>“Not at all; I like him. But if you are actuated by the benevolent +intention of protecting me from Bertha—I don’t think I need your +protection.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor sat up with an exclamation. “Lily!——PERCY? Do you mean to +say you’ve actually done it?”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart smiled. “I only mean to say that Mr. Gryce and I are getting to +be very good friends.”</p> + +<p>“H’m—I see.” Mrs. Trenor fixed a rapt eye upon her. “You know they say +he has eight hundred thousand a year—and spends nothing, except on some +rubbishy old books. And his mother has heart-disease and will leave him a +lot more. OH, LILY, DO GO SLOWLY,” her friend adjured her.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart continued to smile without annoyance. “I shouldn’t, for +instance,” she remarked, “be in any haste to tell him that he had a lot +of rubbishy old books.”</p> + +<p>“No, of course not; I know you’re wonderful about getting up people’s +subjects. But he’s horribly shy, and easily shocked, and—and——”</p> + +<p>“Why don’t you say it, Judy? I have the reputation of being on the hunt +for a rich husband?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, I don’t mean that; he wouldn’t believe it of you—at first,” said +Mrs. Trenor, with candid shrewdness. “But you know things are rather +lively here at times—I must give Jack and Gus a hint—and if he thought +you were what his mother would call fast—oh, well, you know what I mean. +Don’t wear your scarlet CREPE-DE-CHINE for dinner, and don’t smoke if you +can help it, Lily dear!”</p> + +<p>Lily pushed aside her finished work with a dry smile. “You’re very kind, +Judy: I’ll lock up my cigarettes and wear that last year’s dress you sent +me this morning. And if you are really interested in my career, perhaps +you’ll be kind enough not to ask me to play bridge again this evening.”</p> + +<p>“Bridge? Does he mind bridge, too? Oh, Lily, what an awful life you’ll +lead! But of course I won’t—why didn’t you give me a hint last night? +There’s nothing I wouldn’t do, you poor duck, to see you happy!”</p> + +<p>And Mrs. Trenor, glowing with her sex’s eagerness to smooth the course of +true love, enveloped Lily in a long embrace.</p> + +<p>“You’re quite sure,” she added solicitously, as the latter extricated +herself, “that you wouldn’t like me to telephone for Lawrence Selden?”</p> + +<p>“Quite sure,” said Lily.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>The next three days demonstrated to her own complete satisfaction Miss +Bart’s ability to manage her affairs without extraneous aid.</p> + +<p>As she sat, on the Saturday afternoon, on the terrace at Bellomont, she +smiled at Mrs. Trenor’s fear that she might go too fast. If such a +warning had ever been needful, the years had taught her a salutary +lesson, and she flattered herself that she now knew how to adapt her pace +to the object of pursuit. In the case of Mr. Gryce she had found it well +to flutter ahead, losing herself elusively and luring him on from depth +to depth of unconscious intimacy. The surrounding atmosphere was +propitious to this scheme of courtship. Mrs. Trenor, true to her word, +had shown no signs of expecting Lily at the bridge-table, and had even +hinted to the other card-players that they were to betray no surprise at +her unwonted defection. In consequence of this hint, Lily found herself +the centre of that feminine solicitude which envelops a young woman in +the mating season. A solitude was tacitly created for her in the crowded +existence of Bellomont, and her friends could not have shown a greater +readiness for self-effacement had her wooing been adorned with all the +attributes of romance. In Lily’s set this conduct implied a sympathetic +comprehension of her motives, and Mr. Gryce rose in her esteem as she saw +the consideration he inspired.</p> + +<p>The terrace at Bellomont on a September afternoon was a spot propitious +to sentimental musings, and as Miss Bart stood leaning against the +balustrade above the sunken garden, at a little distance from the +animated group about the tea-table, she might have been lost in the mazes +of an inarticulate happiness. In reality, her thoughts were finding +definite utterance in the tranquil recapitulation of the blessings in +store for her. From where she stood she could see them embodied in the +form of Mr. Gryce, who, in a light overcoat and muffler, sat somewhat +nervously on the edge of his chair, while Carry Fisher, with all the +energy of eye and gesture with which nature and art had combined to endow +her, pressed on him the duty of taking part in the task of municipal +reform.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher’s latest hobby was municipal reform. It had been preceded by +an equal zeal for socialism, which had in turn replaced an energetic +advocacy of Christian Science. Mrs. Fisher was small, fiery and dramatic; +and her hands and eyes were admirable instruments in the service of +whatever causes she happened to espouse. She had, however, the fault +common to enthusiasts of ignoring any slackness of response on the part +of her hearers, and Lily was amused by her unconsciousness of the +resistance displayed in every angle of Mr. Gryce’s attitude. Lily +herself knew that his mind was divided between the dread of catching cold +if he remained out of doors too long at that hour, and the fear that, if +he retreated to the house, Mrs. Fisher might follow him up with a paper +to be signed. Mr. Gryce had a constitutional dislike to what he called +“committing himself,” and tenderly as he cherished his health, he +evidently concluded that it was safer to stay out of reach of pen and ink +till chance released him from Mrs. Fisher’s toils. Meanwhile he cast +agonized glances in the direction of Miss Bart, whose only response was +to sink into an attitude of more graceful abstraction. She had learned +the value of contrast in throwing her charms into relief, and was fully +aware of the extent to which Mrs. Fisher’s volubility was enhancing her +own repose.</p> + +<p>She was roused from her musings by the approach of her cousin Jack +Stepney who, at Gwen Van Osburgh’s side, was returning across the garden +from the tennis court.</p> + +<p>The couple in question were engaged in the same kind of romance in which +Lily figured, and the latter felt a certain annoyance in contemplating +what seemed to her a caricature of her own situation. Miss Van Osburgh +was a large girl with flat surfaces and no high lights: Jack Stepney had +once said of her that she was as reliable as roast mutton. His own taste +was in the line of less solid and more highly-seasoned diet; but hunger +makes any fare palatable, and there had been times when Mr. Stepney had +been reduced to a crust.</p> + +<p>Lily considered with interest the expression of their faces: the girl’s +turned toward her companion’s like an empty plate held up to be filled, +while the man lounging at her side already betrayed the encroaching +boredom which would presently crack the thin veneer of his smile.</p> + +<p>“How impatient men are!” Lily reflected. “All Jack has to do to get +everything he wants is to keep quiet and let that girl marry him; whereas +I have to calculate and contrive, and retreat and advance, as if I were +going through an intricate dance, where one misstep would throw me +hopelessly out of time.”</p> + +<p>As they drew nearer she was whimsically struck by a kind of family +likeness between Miss Van Osburgh and Percy Gryce. There was no +resemblance of feature. Gryce was handsome in a didactic way—he looked +like a clever pupil’s drawing from a plaster-cast—while Gwen’s +countenance had no more modelling than a face painted on a toy balloon. +But the deeper affinity was unmistakable: the two had the same prejudices +and ideals, and the same quality of making other standards non-existent +by ignoring them. This attribute was common to most of Lily’s set: they +had a force of negation which eliminated everything beyond their own +range of perception. Gryce and Miss Van Osburgh were, in short, made for +each other by every law of moral and physical correspondence——“Yet they +wouldn’t look at each other,” Lily mused, “they never do. Each of them +wants a creature of a different race, of Jack’s race and mine, with all +sorts of intuitions, sensations and perceptions that they don’t even +guess the existence of. And they always get what they want.”</p> + +<p>She stood talking with her cousin and Miss Van Osburgh, till a slight +cloud on the latter’s brow advised her that even cousinly amenities were +subject to suspicion, and Miss Bart, mindful of the necessity of not +exciting enmities at this crucial point of her career, dropped aside +while the happy couple proceeded toward the tea-table.</p> + +<p>Seating herself on the upper step of the terrace, Lily leaned her head +against the honeysuckles wreathing the balustrade. The fragrance of the +late blossoms seemed an emanation of the tranquil scene, a landscape +tutored to the last degree of rural elegance. In the foreground glowed +the warm tints of the gardens. Beyond the lawn, with its pyramidal +pale-gold maples and velvety firs, sloped pastures dotted with cattle; +and through a long glade the river widened like a lake under the silver +light of September. Lily did not want to join the circle about the +tea-table. They represented the future she had chosen, and she was +content with it, but in no haste to anticipate its joys. The certainty +that she could marry Percy Gryce when she pleased had lifted a heavy load +from her mind, and her money troubles were too recent for their removal +not to leave a sense of relief which a less discerning intelligence might +have taken for happiness. Her vulgar cares were at an end. She would be +able to arrange her life as she pleased, to soar into that empyrean of +security where creditors cannot penetrate. She would have smarter gowns +than Judy Trenor, and far, far more jewels than Bertha Dorset. She would +be free forever from the shifts, the expedients, the humiliations of the +relatively poor. Instead of having to flatter, she would be flattered; +instead of being grateful, she would receive thanks. There were old +scores she could pay off as well as old benefits she could return. And +she had no doubts as to the extent of her power. She knew that Mr. Gryce +was of the small chary type most inaccessible to impulses and emotions. +He had the kind of character in which prudence is a vice, and good advice +the most dangerous nourishment. But Lily had known the species before: +she was aware that such a guarded nature must find one huge outlet of +egoism, and she determined to be to him what his Americana had hitherto +been: the one possession in which he took sufficient pride to spend money +on it. She knew that this generosity to self is one of the forms of +meanness, and she resolved so to identify herself with her husband’s +vanity that to gratify her wishes would be to him the most exquisite form +of self-indulgence. The system might at first necessitate a resort to +some of the very shifts and expedients from which she intended it should +free her; but she felt sure that in a short time she would be able to +play the game in her own way. How should she have distrusted her powers? +Her beauty itself was not the mere ephemeral possession it might have +been in the hands of inexperience: her skill in enhancing it, the care +she took of it, the use she made of it, seemed to give it a kind of +permanence. She felt she could trust it to carry her through to the end.</p> + +<p>And the end, on the whole, was worthwhile. Life was not the mockery she +had thought it three days ago. There was room for her, after all, in this +crowded selfish world of pleasure whence, so short a time since, her +poverty had seemed to exclude her. These people whom she had ridiculed +and yet envied were glad to make a place for her in the charmed circle +about which all her desires revolved. They were not as brutal and +self-engrossed as she had fancied—or rather, since it would no longer be +necessary to flatter and humour them, that side of their nature became +less conspicuous. Society is a revolving body which is apt to be judged +according to its place in each man’s heaven; and at present it was +turning its illuminated face to Lily.</p> + +<p>In the rosy glow it diffused her companions seemed full of amiable +qualities. She liked their elegance, their lightness, their lack of +emphasis: even the self-assurance which at times was so like obtuseness +now seemed the natural sign of social ascendency. They were lords of the +only world she cared for, and they were ready to admit her to their ranks +and let her lord it with them. Already she felt within her a stealing +allegiance to their standards, an acceptance of their limitations, a +disbelief in the things they did not believe in, a contemptuous pity for +the people who were not able to live as they lived.</p> + +<p>The early sunset was slanting across the park. Through the boughs of the +long avenue beyond the gardens she caught the flash of wheels, and +divined that more visitors were approaching. There was a movement behind +her, a scattering of steps and voices: it was evident that the party +about the tea-table was breaking up. Presently she heard a tread behind +her on the terrace. She supposed that Mr. Gryce had at last found means +to escape from his predicament, and she smiled at the significance of his +coming to join her instead of beating an instant retreat to the fireside.</p> + +<p>She turned to give him the welcome which such gallantry deserved; but her +greeting wavered into a blush of wonder, for the man who had approached +her was Lawrence Selden.</p> + +<p>“You see I came after all,” he said; but before she had time to answer, +Mrs. Dorset, breaking away from a lifeless colloquy with her host, had +stepped between them with a little gesture of appropriation.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_5">Chapter 5</h2> + +<p>The observance of Sunday at Bellomont was chiefly marked by the punctual +appearance of the smart omnibus destined to convey the household to the +little church at the gates. Whether any one got into the omnibus or not +was a matter of secondary importance, since by standing there it not only +bore witness to the orthodox intentions of the family, but made Mrs. +Trenor feel, when she finally heard it drive away, that she had somehow +vicariously made use of it.</p> + +<p>It was Mrs. Trenor’s theory that her daughters actually did go to church +every Sunday; but their French governess’s convictions calling her to the +rival fane, and the fatigues of the week keeping their mother in her room +till luncheon, there was seldom any one present to verify the fact. Now +and then, in a spasmodic burst of virtue—when the house had been too +uproarious over night—Gus Trenor forced his genial bulk into a tight +frock-coat and routed his daughters from their slumbers; but habitually, +as Lily explained to Mr. Gryce, this parental duty was forgotten till the +church bells were ringing across the park, and the omnibus had driven +away empty.</p> + +<p>Lily had hinted to Mr. Gryce that this neglect of religious observances +was repugnant to her early traditions, and that during her visits to +Bellomont she regularly accompanied Muriel and Hilda to church. This +tallied with the assurance, also confidentially imparted, that, never +having played bridge before, she had been “dragged into it” on the night +of her arrival, and had lost an appalling amount of money in consequence +of her ignorance of the game and of the rules of betting. Mr. Gryce was +undoubtedly enjoying Bellomont. He liked the ease and glitter of the +life, and the lustre conferred on him by being a member of this group of +rich and conspicuous people. But he thought it a very materialistic +society; there were times when he was frightened by the talk of the men +and the looks of the ladies, and he was glad to find that Miss Bart, for +all her ease and self-possession, was not at home in so ambiguous an +atmosphere. For this reason he had been especially pleased to learn that +she would, as usual, attend the young Trenors to church on Sunday +morning; and as he paced the gravel sweep before the door, his light +overcoat on his arm and his prayer-book in one carefully-gloved hand, he +reflected agreeably on the strength of character which kept her true to +her early training in surroundings so subversive to religious principles.</p> + +<p>For a long time Mr. Gryce and the omnibus had the gravel sweep to +themselves; but, far from regretting this deplorable indifference on the +part of the other guests, he found himself nourishing the hope that Miss +Bart might be unaccompanied. The precious minutes were flying, however; +the big chestnuts pawed the ground and flecked their impatient sides with +foam; the coachman seemed to be slowly petrifying on the box, and the +groom on the doorstep; and still the lady did not come. Suddenly, +however, there was a sound of voices and a rustle of skirts in the +doorway, and Mr. Gryce, restoring his watch to his pocket, turned with a +nervous start; but it was only to find himself handing Mrs. Wetherall +into the carriage.</p> + +<p>The Wetheralls always went to church. They belonged to the vast group of +human automata who go through life without neglecting to perform a single +one of the gestures executed by the surrounding puppets. It is true that +the Bellomont puppets did not go to church; but others equally important +did—and Mr. and Mrs. Wetherall’s circle was so large that God was +included in their visiting-list. They appeared, therefore, punctual and +resigned, with the air of people bound for a dull “At Home,” and after +them Hilda and Muriel straggled, yawning and pinning each other’s veils +and ribbons as they came. They had promised Lily to go to church with +her, they declared, and Lily was such a dear old duck that they didn’t +mind doing it to please her, though they couldn’t fancy what had put the +idea in her head, and though for their own part they would much rather +have played lawn tennis with Jack and Gwen, if she hadn’t told them she +was coming. The Misses Trenor were followed by Lady Cressida Raith, a +weather-beaten person in Liberty silk and ethnological trinkets, who, on +seeing the omnibus, expressed her surprise that they were not to walk +across the park; but at Mrs. Wetherall’s horrified protest that the +church was a mile away, her ladyship, after a glance at the height of the +other’s heels, acquiesced in the necessity of driving, and poor Mr. Gryce +found himself rolling off between four ladies for whose spiritual welfare +he felt not the least concern.</p> + +<p>It might have afforded him some consolation could he have known that Miss +Bart had really meant to go to church. She had even risen earlier than +usual in the execution of her purpose. She had an idea that the sight of +her in a grey gown of devotional cut, with her famous lashes drooped +above a prayer-book, would put the finishing touch to Mr. Gryce’s +subjugation, and render inevitable a certain incident which she had +resolved should form a part of the walk they were to take together after +luncheon. Her intentions in short had never been more definite; but poor +Lily, for all the hard glaze of her exterior, was inwardly as malleable +as wax. Her faculty for adapting herself, for entering into other +people’s feelings, if it served her now and then in small contingencies, +hampered her in the decisive moments of life. She was like a water-plant +in the flux of the tides, and today the whole current of her mood was +carrying her toward Lawrence Selden. Why had he come? Was it to see +herself or Bertha Dorset? It was the last question which, at that +moment, should have engaged her. She might better have contented herself +with thinking that he had simply responded to the despairing summons of +his hostess, anxious to interpose him between herself and the ill-humour +of Mrs. Dorset. But Lily had not rested till she learned from Mrs. Trenor +that Selden had come of his own accord. “He didn’t even wire me—he just +happened to find the trap at the station. Perhaps it’s not over with +Bertha after all,” Mrs. Trenor musingly concluded; and went away to +arrange her dinner-cards accordingly.</p> + +<p>Perhaps it was not, Lily reflected; but it should be soon, unless she had +lost her cunning. If Selden had come at Mrs. Dorset’s call, it was at her +own that he would stay. So much the previous evening had told her. Mrs. +Trenor, true to her simple principle of making her married friends happy, +had placed Selden and Mrs. Dorset next to each other at dinner; but, in +obedience to the time-honoured traditions of the match-maker, she had +separated Lily and Mr. Gryce, sending in the former with George Dorset, +while Mr. Gryce was coupled with Gwen Van Osburgh.</p> + +<p>George Dorset’s talk did not interfere with the range of his neighbour’s +thoughts. He was a mournful dyspeptic, intent on finding out the +deleterious ingredients of every dish and diverted from this care only by +the sound of his wife’s voice. On this occasion, however, Mrs. Dorset +took no part in the general conversation. She sat talking in low murmurs +with Selden, and turning a contemptuous and denuded shoulder toward her +host, who, far from resenting his exclusion, plunged into the excesses of +the MENU with the joyous irresponsibility of a free man. To Mr. Dorset, +however, his wife’s attitude was a subject of such evident concern that, +when he was not scraping the sauce from his fish, or scooping the moist +bread-crumbs from the interior of his roll, he sat straining his thin +neck for a glimpse of her between the lights.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor, as it chanced, had placed the husband and wife on opposite +sides of the table, and Lily was therefore able to observe Mrs. Dorset +also, and by carrying her glance a few feet farther, to set up a rapid +comparison between Lawrence Selden and Mr. Gryce. It was that comparison +which was her undoing. Why else had she suddenly grown interested in +Selden? She had known him for eight years or more: ever since her return +to America he had formed a part of her background. She had always been +glad to sit next to him at dinner, had found him more agreeable than most +men, and had vaguely wished that he possessed the other qualities needful +to fix her attention; but till now she had been too busy with her own +affairs to regard him as more than one of the pleasant accessories of +life. Miss Bart was a keen reader of her own heart, and she saw that her +sudden preoccupation with Selden was due to the fact that his presence +shed a new light on her surroundings. Not that he was notably brilliant +or exceptional; in his own profession he was surpassed by more than one +man who had bored Lily through many a weary dinner. It was rather that he +had preserved a certain social detachment, a happy air of viewing the +show objectively, of having points of contact outside the great gilt cage +in which they were all huddled for the mob to gape at. How alluring the +world outside the cage appeared to Lily, as she heard its door clang on +her! In reality, as she knew, the door never clanged: it stood always +open; but most of the captives were like flies in a bottle, and having +once flown in, could never regain their freedom. It was Selden’s +distinction that he had never forgotten the way out.</p> + +<p>That was the secret of his way of readjusting her vision. Lily, turning +her eyes from him, found herself scanning her little world through his +retina: it was as though the pink lamps had been shut off and the dusty +daylight let in. She looked down the long table, studying its occupants +one by one, from Gus Trenor, with his heavy carnivorous head sunk between +his shoulders, as he preyed on a jellied plover, to his wife, at the +opposite end of the long bank of orchids, suggestive, with her glaring +good-looks, of a jeweller’s window lit by electricity. And between the +two, what a long stretch of vacuity! How dreary and trivial these people +were! Lily reviewed them with a scornful impatience: Carry Fisher, with +her shoulders, her eyes, her divorces, her general air of embodying a +“spicy paragraph”; young Silverton, who had meant to live on +proof-reading and write an epic, and who now lived on his friends and had +become critical of truffles; Alice Wetherall, an animated visiting-list, +whose most fervid convictions turned on the wording of invitations and +the engraving of dinner-cards; Wetherall, with his perpetual nervous nod +of acquiescence, his air of agreeing with people before he knew what they +were saying; Jack Stepney, with his confident smile and anxious eyes, +half way between the sheriff and an heiress; Gwen Van Osburgh, with all +the guileless confidence of a young girl who has always been told that +there is no one richer than her father.</p> + +<p>Lily smiled at her classification of her friends. How different they had +seemed to her a few hours ago! Then they had symbolized what she was +gaining, now they stood for what she was giving up. That very afternoon +they had seemed full of brilliant qualities; now she saw that they were +merely dull in a loud way. Under the glitter of their opportunities she +saw the poverty of their achievement. It was not that she wanted them to +be more disinterested; but she would have liked them to be more +picturesque. And she had a shamed recollection of the way in which, a few +hours since, she had felt the centripetal force of their standards. She +closed her eyes an instant, and the vacuous routine of the life she had +chosen stretched before her like a long white road without dip or +turning: it was true she was to roll over it in a carriage instead of +trudging it on foot, but sometimes the pedestrian enjoys the diversion of +a short cut which is denied to those on wheels.</p> + +<p>She was roused by a chuckle which Mr. Dorset seemed to eject from the +depths of his lean throat.</p> + +<p>“I say, do look at her,” he exclaimed, turning to Miss Bart with +lugubrious merriment—“I beg your pardon, but do just look at my wife +making a fool of that poor devil over there! One would really suppose she +was gone on him—and it’s all the other way round, I assure you.”</p> + +<p>Thus adjured, Lily turned her eyes on the spectacle which was affording +Mr. Dorset such legitimate mirth. It certainly appeared, as he said, that +Mrs. Dorset was the more active participant in the scene: her neighbour +seemed to receive her advances with a temperate zest which did not +distract him from his dinner. The sight restored Lily’s good humour, and +knowing the peculiar disguise which Mr. Dorset’s marital fears assumed, +she asked gaily: “Aren’t you horribly jealous of her?”</p> + +<p>Dorset greeted the sally with delight. “Oh, abominably—you’ve just hit +it—keeps me awake at night. The doctors tell me that’s what has knocked +my digestion out—being so infernally jealous of her.—I can’t eat a +mouthful of this stuff, you know,” he added suddenly, pushing back his +plate with a clouded countenance; and Lily, unfailingly adaptable, +accorded her radiant attention to his prolonged denunciation of other +people’s cooks, with a supplementary tirade on the toxic qualities of +melted butter.</p> + +<p>It was not often that he found so ready an ear; and, being a man as well +as a dyspeptic, it may be that as he poured his grievances into it he was +not insensible to its rosy symmetry. At any rate he engaged Lily so long +that the sweets were being handed when she caught a phrase on her other +side, where Miss Corby, the comic woman of the company, was bantering +Jack Stepney on his approaching engagement. Miss Corby’s role was +jocularity: she always entered the conversation with a handspring.</p> + +<p>“And of course you’ll have Sim Rosedale as best man!” Lily heard her +fling out as the climax of her prognostications; and Stepney responded, +as if struck: “Jove, that’s an idea. What a thumping present I’d get out +of him!”</p> + +<p>SIM ROSEDALE! The name, made more odious by its diminutive, obtruded +itself on Lily’s thoughts like a leer. It stood for one of the many hated +possibilities hovering on the edge of life. If she did not marry Percy +Gryce, the day might come when she would have to be civil to such men as +Rosedale. IF SHE DID NOT MARRY HIM? But she meant to marry him—she was +sure of him and sure of herself. She drew back with a shiver from the +pleasant paths in which her thoughts had been straying, and set her feet +once more in the middle of the long white road.... When she went +upstairs that night she found that the late post had brought her a fresh +batch of bills. Mrs. Peniston, who was a conscientious woman, had +forwarded them all to Bellomont.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Miss Bart, accordingly, rose the next morning with the most earnest +conviction that it was her duty to go to church. She tore herself betimes +from the lingering enjoyment of her breakfast tray, rang to have her grey +gown laid out, and despatched her maid to borrow a prayer-book from Mrs. +Trenor.</p> + +<p>But her course was too purely reasonable not to contain the germs of +rebellion. No sooner were her preparations made than they roused a +smothered sense of resistance. A small spark was enough to kindle Lily’s +imagination, and the sight of the grey dress and the borrowed prayer-book +flashed a long light down the years. She would have to go to church with +Percy Gryce every Sunday. They would have a front pew in the most +expensive church in New York, and his name would figure handsomely in the +list of parish charities. In a few years, when he grew stouter, he would +be made a warden. Once in the winter the rector would come to dine, and +her husband would beg her to go over the list and see that no DIVORCEES +were included, except those who had showed signs of penitence by being +re-married to the very wealthy. There was nothing especially arduous in +this round of religious obligations; but it stood for a fraction of that +great bulk of boredom which loomed across her path. And who could consent +to be bored on such a morning? Lily had slept well, and her bath had +filled her with a pleasant glow, which was becomingly reflected in the +clear curve of her cheek. No lines were visible this morning, or else the +glass was at a happier angle.</p> + +<p>And the day was the accomplice of her mood: it was a day for impulse and +truancy. The light air seemed full of powdered gold; below the dewy bloom +of the lawns the woodlands blushed and smouldered, and the hills across +the river swam in molten blue. Every drop of blood in Lily’s veins +invited her to happiness.</p> + +<p>The sound of wheels roused her from these musings, and leaning behind her +shutters she saw the omnibus take up its freight. She was too late, +then—but the fact did not alarm her. A glimpse of Mr. Gryce’s +crestfallen face even suggested that she had done wisely in absenting +herself, since the disappointment he so candidly betrayed would surely +whet his appetite for the afternoon walk. That walk she did not mean to +miss; one glance at the bills on her writing-table was enough to recall +its necessity. But meanwhile she had the morning to herself, and could +muse pleasantly on the disposal of its hours. She was familiar enough +with the habits of Bellomont to know that she was likely to have a free +field till luncheon. She had seen the Wetheralls, the Trenor girls and +Lady Cressida packed safely into the omnibus; Judy Trenor was sure to be +having her hair shampooed; Carry Fisher had doubtless carried off her +host for a drive; Ned Silverton was probably smoking the cigarette of +young despair in his bedroom; and Kate Corby was certain to be playing +tennis with Jack Stepney and Miss Van Osburgh. Of the ladies, this left +only Mrs. Dorset unaccounted for, and Mrs. Dorset never came down till +luncheon: her doctors, she averred, had forbidden her to expose herself +to the crude air of the morning.</p> + +<p>To the remaining members of the party Lily gave no special thought; +wherever they were, they were not likely to interfere with her plans. +These, for the moment, took the shape of assuming a dress somewhat more +rustic and summerlike in style than the garment she had first selected, +and rustling downstairs, sunshade in hand, with the disengaged air of a +lady in quest of exercise. The great hall was empty but for the knot of +dogs by the fire, who, taking in at a glance the outdoor aspect of Miss +Bart, were upon her at once with lavish offers of companionship. She put +aside the ramming paws which conveyed these offers, and assuring the +joyous volunteers that she might presently have a use for their company, +sauntered on through the empty drawing-room to the library at the end of +the house. The library was almost the only surviving portion of the old +manor-house of Bellomont: a long spacious room, revealing the traditions +of the mother-country in its classically-cased doors, the Dutch tiles of +the chimney, and the elaborate hob-grate with its shining brass urns. A +few family portraits of lantern-jawed gentlemen in tie-wigs, and ladies +with large head-dresses and small bodies, hung between the shelves lined +with pleasantly-shabby books: books mostly contemporaneous with the +ancestors in question, and to which the subsequent Trenors had made no +perceptible additions. The library at Bellomont was in fact never used +for reading, though it had a certain popularity as a smoking room or a +quiet retreat for flirtation. It had occurred to Lily, however, that it +might on this occasion have been resorted to by the only member of the +party in the least likely to put it to its original use. She advanced +noiselessly over the dense old rug scattered with easy-chairs, and before +she reached the middle of the room she saw that she had not been +mistaken. Lawrence Selden was in fact seated at its farther end; but +though a book lay on his knee, his attention was not engaged with it, but +directed to a lady whose lace-clad figure, as she leaned back in an +adjoining chair, detached itself with exaggerated slimness against the +dusky leather upholstery.</p> + +<p>Lily paused as she caught sight of the group; for a moment she seemed +about to withdraw, but thinking better of this, she announced her +approach by a slight shake of her skirts which made the couple raise +their heads, Mrs. Dorset with a look of frank displeasure, and Selden +with his usual quiet smile. The sight of his composure had a disturbing +effect on Lily; but to be disturbed was in her case to make a more +brilliant effort at self-possession.</p> + +<p>“Dear me, am I late?” she asked, putting a hand in his as he advanced to +greet her.</p> + +<p>“Late for what?” enquired Mrs. Dorset tartly. “Not for luncheon, +certainly—but perhaps you had an earlier engagement?”</p> + +<p>“Yes, I had,” said Lily confidingly.</p> + +<p>“Really? Perhaps I am in the way, then? But Mr. Selden is entirely at +your disposal.” Mrs. Dorset was pale with temper, and her antagonist felt +a certain pleasure in prolonging her distress.</p> + +<p>“Oh, dear, no—do stay,” she said good-humouredly. “I don’t in the least +want to drive you away.”</p> + +<p>“You’re awfully good, dear, but I never interfere with Mr. Selden’s +engagements.”</p> + +<p>The remark was uttered with a little air of proprietorship not lost on +its object, who concealed a faint blush of annoyance by stooping to pick +up the book he had dropped at Lily’s approach. The latter’s eyes widened +charmingly and she broke into a light laugh.</p> + +<p>“But I have no engagement with Mr. Selden! My engagement was to go to +church; and I’m afraid the omnibus has started without me. HAS it +started, do you know?”</p> + +<p>She turned to Selden, who replied that he had heard it drive away some +time since.</p> + +<p>“Ah, then I shall have to walk; I promised Hilda and Muriel to go to +church with them. It’s too late to walk there, you say? Well, I shall +have the credit of trying, at any rate—and the advantage of escaping +part of the service. I’m not so sorry for myself, after all!”</p> + +<p>And with a bright nod to the couple on whom she had intruded, Miss Bart +strolled through the glass doors and carried her rustling grace down the +long perspective of the garden walk.</p> + +<p>She was taking her way churchward, but at no very quick pace; a fact not +lost on one of her observers, who stood in the doorway looking after her +with an air of puzzled amusement. The truth is that she was conscious of +a somewhat keen shock of disappointment. All her plans for the day had +been built on the assumption that it was to see her that Selden had come +to Bellomont. She had expected, when she came downstairs, to find him on +the watch for her; and she had found him, instead, in a situation which +might well denote that he had been on the watch for another lady. Was it +possible, after all, that he had come for Bertha Dorset? The latter had +acted on the assumption to the extent of appearing at an hour when she +never showed herself to ordinary mortals, and Lily, for the moment, saw +no way of putting her in the wrong. It did not occur to her that Selden +might have been actuated merely by the desire to spend a Sunday out of +town: women never learn to dispense with the sentimental motive in their +judgments of men. But Lily was not easily disconcerted; competition put +her on her mettle, and she reflected that Selden’s coming, if it did not +declare him to be still in Mrs. Dorset’s toils, showed him to be so +completely free from them that he was not afraid of her proximity.</p> + +<p>These thoughts so engaged her that she fell into a gait hardly likely to +carry her to church before the sermon, and at length, having passed from +the gardens to the wood-path beyond, so far forgot her intention as to +sink into a rustic seat at a bend of the walk. The spot was charming, and +Lily was not insensible to the charm, or to the fact that her presence +enhanced it; but she was not accustomed to taste the joys of solitude +except in company, and the combination of a handsome girl and a romantic +scene struck her as too good to be wasted. No one, however, appeared to +profit by the opportunity; and after a half hour of fruitless waiting she +rose and wandered on. She felt a stealing sense of fatigue as she walked; +the sparkle had died out of her, and the taste of life was stale on her +lips. She hardly knew what she had been seeking, or why the failure to +find it had so blotted the light from her sky: she was only aware of a +vague sense of failure, of an inner isolation deeper than the loneliness +about her.</p> + +<p>Her footsteps flagged, and she stood gazing listlessly ahead, digging the +ferny edge of the path with the tip of her sunshade. As she did so a +step sounded behind her, and she saw Selden at her side.</p> + +<p>“How fast you walk!” he remarked. “I thought I should never catch up with +you.”</p> + +<p>She answered gaily: “You must be quite breathless! I’ve been sitting +under that tree for an hour.”</p> + +<p>“Waiting for me, I hope?” he rejoined; and she said with a vague laugh:</p> + +<p>“Well—waiting to see if you would come.”</p> + +<p>“I seize the distinction, but I don’t mind it, since doing the one +involved doing the other. But weren’t you sure that I should come?”</p> + +<p>“If I waited long enough—but you see I had only a limited time to give +to the experiment.”</p> + +<p>“Why limited? Limited by luncheon?”</p> + +<p>“No; by my other engagement.”</p> + +<p>“Your engagement to go to church with Muriel and Hilda?”</p> + +<p>“No; but to come home from church with another person.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, I see; I might have known you were fully provided with alternatives. +And is the other person coming home this way?”</p> + +<p>Lily laughed again. “That’s just what I don’t know; and to find out, it +is my business to get to church before the service is over.”</p> + +<p>“Exactly; and it is my business to prevent your doing so; in which case +the other person, piqued by your absence, will form the desperate resolve +of driving back in the omnibus.”</p> + +<p>Lily received this with fresh appreciation; his nonsense was like the +bubbling of her inner mood. “Is that what you would do in such an +emergency?” she enquired.</p> + +<p>Selden looked at her with solemnity. “I am here to prove to you,” he +cried, “what I am capable of doing in an emergency!”</p> + +<p>“Walking a mile in an hour—you must own that the omnibus would be +quicker!”</p> + +<p>“Ah—but will he find you in the end? That’s the only test of success.”</p> + +<p>They looked at each other with the same luxury of enjoyment that they had +felt in exchanging absurdities over his tea-table; but suddenly Lily’s +face changed, and she said: “Well, if it is, he has succeeded.”</p> + +<p>Selden, following her glance, perceived a party of people advancing +toward them from the farther bend of the path. Lady Cressida had +evidently insisted on walking home, and the rest of the church-goers had +thought it their duty to accompany her. Lily’s companion looked rapidly +from one to the other of the two men of the party; Wetherall walking +respectfully at Lady Cressida’s side with his little sidelong look of +nervous attention, and Percy Gryce bringing-up the rear with Mrs. +Wetherall and the Trenors.</p> + +<p>“Ah—now I see why you were getting up your Americana!” Selden exclaimed +with a note of the freest admiration but the blush with which the sally +was received checked whatever amplifications he had meant to give it.</p> + +<p>That Lily Bart should object to being bantered about her suitors, or even +about her means of attracting them, was so new to Selden that he had a +momentary flash of surprise, which lit up a number of possibilities; but +she rose gallantly to the defence of her confusion, by saying, as its +object approached: “That was why I was waiting for you—to thank you for +having given me so many points!”</p> + +<p>“Ah, you can hardly do justice to the subject in such a short time,” said +Selden, as the Trenor girls caught sight of Miss Bart; and while she +signalled a response to their boisterous greeting, he added quickly: +“Won’t you devote your afternoon to it? You know I must be off tomorrow +morning. We’ll take a walk, and you can thank me at your leisure.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_6">Chapter 6</h2> + +<p>The afternoon was perfect. A deeper stillness possessed the air, and the +glitter of the American autumn was tempered by a haze which diffused the +brightness without dulling it.</p> + +<p>In the woody hollows of the park there was already a faint chill; but as +the ground rose the air grew lighter, and ascending the long slopes +beyond the high-road, Lily and her companion reached a zone of lingering +summer. The path wound across a meadow with scattered trees; then it +dipped into a lane plumed with asters and purpling sprays of bramble, +whence, through the light quiver of ash-leaves, the country unrolled +itself in pastoral distances.</p> + +<p>Higher up, the lane showed thickening tufts of fern and of the creeping +glossy verdure of shaded slopes; trees began to overhang it, and the +shade deepened to the checkered dusk of a beech-grove. The boles of the +trees stood well apart, with only a light feathering of undergrowth; the +path wound along the edge of the wood, now and then looking out on a +sunlit pasture or on an orchard spangled with fruit.</p> + +<p>Lily had no real intimacy with nature, but she had a passion for the +appropriate and could be keenly sensitive to a scene which was the +fitting background of her own sensations. The landscape outspread below +her seemed an enlargement of her present mood, and she found something of +herself in its calmness, its breadth, its long free reaches. On the +nearer slopes the sugar-maples wavered like pyres of light; lower down +was a massing of grey orchards, and here and there the lingering green of +an oak-grove. Two or three red farm-houses dozed under the apple-trees, +and the white wooden spire of a village church showed beyond the shoulder +of the hill; while far below, in a haze of dust, the high-road ran +between the fields.</p> + +<p>“Let us sit here,” Selden suggested, as they reached an open ledge of +rock above which the beeches rose steeply between mossy boulders.</p> + +<p>Lily dropped down on the rock, glowing with her long climb. She sat +quiet, her lips parted by the stress of the ascent, her eyes wandering +peacefully over the broken ranges of the landscape. Selden stretched +himself on the grass at her feet, tilting his hat against the level +sun-rays, and clasping his hands behind his head, which rested against +the side of the rock. He had no wish to make her talk; her +quick-breathing silence seemed a part of the general hush and harmony of +things. In his own mind there was only a lazy sense of pleasure, veiling +the sharp edges of sensation as the September haze veiled the scene at +their feet. But Lily, though her attitude was as calm as his, was +throbbing inwardly with a rush of thoughts. There were in her at the +moment two beings, one drawing deep breaths of freedom and exhilaration, +the other gasping for air in a little black prison-house of fears. But +gradually the captive’s gasps grew fainter, or the other paid less heed +to them: the horizon expanded, the air grew stronger, and the free spirit +quivered for flight.</p> + +<p>She could not herself have explained the sense of buoyancy which seemed +to lift and swing her above the sun-suffused world at her feet. Was it +love, she wondered, or a mere fortuitous combination of happy thoughts +and sensations? How much of it was owing to the spell of the perfect +afternoon, the scent of the fading woods, the thought of the dulness she +had fled from? Lily had no definite experience by which to test the +quality of her feelings. She had several times been in love with +fortunes or careers, but only once with a man. That was years ago, when +she first came out, and had been smitten with a romantic passion for a +young gentleman named Herbert Melson, who had blue eyes and a little wave +in his hair. Mr. Melson, who was possessed of no other negotiable +securities, had hastened to employ these in capturing the eldest Miss Van +Osburgh: since then he had grown stout and wheezy, and was given to +telling anecdotes about his children. If Lily recalled this early emotion +it was not to compare it with that which now possessed her; the only +point of comparison was the sense of lightness, of emancipation, which +she remembered feeling, in the whirl of a waltz or the seclusion of a +conservatory, during the brief course of her youthful romance. She had +not known again till today that lightness, that glow of freedom; but now +it was something more than a blind groping of the blood. The peculiar +charm of her feeling for Selden was that she understood it; she could put +her finger on every link of the chain that was drawing them together. +Though his popularity was of the quiet kind, felt rather than actively +expressed among his friends, she had never mistaken his inconspicuousness +for obscurity. His reputed cultivation was generally regarded as a slight +obstacle to easy intercourse, but Lily, who prided herself on her +broad-minded recognition of literature, and always carried an Omar Khayam +in her travelling-bag, was attracted by this attribute, which she felt +would have had its distinction in an older society. It was, moreover, one +of his gifts to look his part; to have a height which lifted his head +above the crowd, and the keenly-modelled dark features which, in a land +of amorphous types, gave him the air of belonging to a more specialized +race, of carrying the impress of a concentrated past. Expansive persons +found him a little dry, and very young girls thought him sarcastic; but +this air of friendly aloofness, as far removed as possible from any +assertion of personal advantage, was the quality which piqued Lily’s +interest. Everything about him accorded with the fastidious element in +her taste, even to the light irony with which he surveyed what seemed to +her most sacred. She admired him most of all, perhaps, for being able to +convey as distinct a sense of superiority as the richest man she had ever +met.</p> + +<p>It was the unconscious prolongation of this thought which led her to say +presently, with a laugh: “I have broken two engagements for you today. +How many have you broken for me?”</p> + +<p>“None,” said Selden calmly. “My only engagement at Bellomont was with +you.”</p> + +<p>She glanced down at him, faintly smiling.</p> + +<p>“Did you really come to Bellomont to see me?”</p> + +<p>“Of course I did.”</p> + +<p>Her look deepened meditatively. “Why?” she murmured, with an accent which +took all tinge of coquetry from the question.</p> + +<p>“Because you’re such a wonderful spectacle: I always like to see what you +are doing.”</p> + +<p>“How do you know what I should be doing if you were not here?”</p> + +<p>Selden smiled. “I don’t flatter myself that my coming has deflected your +course of action by a hair’s breadth.”</p> + +<p>“That’s absurd—since, if you were not here, I could obviously not be +taking a walk with you.”</p> + +<p>“No; but your taking a walk with me is only another way of making use of +your material. You are an artist and I happen to be the bit of colour you +are using today. It’s a part of your cleverness to be able to produce +premeditated effects extemporaneously.”</p> + +<p>Lily smiled also: his words were too acute not to strike her sense of +humour. It was true that she meant to use the accident of his presence as +part of a very definite effect; or that, at least, was the secret pretext +she had found for breaking her promise to walk with Mr. Gryce. She had +sometimes been accused of being too eager—even Judy Trenor had warned +her to go slowly. Well, she would not be too eager in this case; she +would give her suitor a longer taste of suspense. Where duty and +inclination jumped together, it was not in Lily’s nature to hold them +asunder. She had excused herself from the walk on the plea of a headache: +the horrid headache which, in the morning, had prevented her venturing to +church. Her appearance at luncheon justified the excuse. She looked +languid, full of a suffering sweetness; she carried a scent-bottle in her +hand. Mr. Gryce was new to such manifestations; he wondered rather +nervously if she were delicate, having far-reaching fears about the +future of his progeny. But sympathy won the day, and he besought her not +to expose herself: he always connected the outer air with ideas of +exposure.</p> + +<p>Lily had received his sympathy with languid gratitude, urging him, since +she should be such poor company, to join the rest of the party who, after +luncheon, were starting in automobiles on a visit to the Van Osburghs at +Peekskill. Mr. Gryce was touched by her disinterestedness, and, to escape +from the threatened vacuity of the afternoon, had taken her advice and +departed mournfully, in a dust-hood and goggles: as the motor-car plunged +down the avenue she smiled at his resemblance to a baffled beetle. Selden +had watched her manoeuvres with lazy amusement. She had made no reply to +his suggestion that they should spend the afternoon together, but as her +plan unfolded itself he felt fairly confident of being included in it. +The house was empty when at length he heard her step on the stair and +strolled out of the billiard-room to join her.</p> + +<p>She had on a hat and walking-dress, and the dogs were bounding at her +feet.</p> + +<p>“I thought, after all, the air might do me good,” she explained; and he +agreed that so simple a remedy was worth trying.</p> + +<p>The excursionists would be gone at least four hours; Lily and Selden had +the whole afternoon before them, and the sense of leisure and safety gave +the last touch of lightness to her spirit. With so much time to talk, and +no definite object to be led up to, she could taste the rare joys of +mental vagrancy.</p> + +<p>She felt so free from ulterior motives that she took up his charge with a +touch of resentment.</p> + +<p>“I don’t know,” she said, “why you are always accusing me of +premeditation.”</p> + +<p>“I thought you confessed to it: you told me the other day that you had to +follow a certain line—and if one does a thing at all it is a merit to do +it thoroughly.”</p> + +<p>“If you mean that a girl who has no one to think for her is obliged to +think for herself, I am quite willing to accept the imputation. But you +must find me a dismal kind of person if you suppose that I never yield to +an impulse.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, but I don’t suppose that: haven’t I told you that your genius lies +in converting impulses into intentions?”</p> + +<p>“My genius?” she echoed with a sudden note of weariness. “Is there any +final test of genius but success? And I certainly haven’t succeeded.”</p> + +<p>Selden pushed his hat back and took a side-glance at her. “Success—what +is success? I shall be interested to have your definition.”</p> + +<p>“Success?” She hesitated. “Why, to get as much as one can out of life, I +suppose. It’s a relative quality, after all. Isn’t that your idea of it?”</p> + +<p>“My idea of it? God forbid!” He sat up with sudden energy, resting his +elbows on his knees and staring out upon the mellow fields. “My idea of +success,” he said, “is personal freedom.”</p> + +<p>“Freedom? Freedom from worries?”</p> + +<p>“From everything—from money, from poverty, from ease and anxiety, from +all the material accidents. To keep a kind of republic of the +spirit—that’s what I call success.”</p> + +<p>She leaned forward with a responsive flash. “I know—I know—it’s +strange; but that’s just what I’ve been feeling today.”</p> + +<p>He met her eyes with the latent sweetness of his. “Is the feeling so rare +with you?” he said.</p> + +<p>She blushed a little under his gaze. “You think me horribly sordid, don’t +you? But perhaps it’s rather that I never had any choice. There was no +one, I mean, to tell me about the republic of the spirit.”</p> + +<p>“There never is—it’s a country one has to find the way to one’s self.”</p> + +<p>“But I should never have found my way there if you hadn’t told me.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, there are sign-posts—but one has to know how to read them.”</p> + +<p>“Well, I have known, I have known!” she cried with a glow of eagerness. +“Whenever I see you, I find myself spelling out a letter of the sign—and +yesterday—last evening at dinner—I suddenly saw a little way into your +republic.”</p> + +<p>Selden was still looking at her, but with a changed eye. Hitherto he had +found, in her presence and her talk, the aesthetic amusement which a +reflective man is apt to seek in desultory intercourse with pretty women. +His attitude had been one of admiring spectatorship, and he would have +been almost sorry to detect in her any emotional weakness which should +interfere with the fulfilment of her aims. But now the hint of this +weakness had become the most interesting thing about her. He had come on +her that morning in a moment of disarray; her face had been pale and +altered, and the diminution of her beauty had lent her a poignant charm. +THAT IS HOW SHE LOOKS WHEN SHE IS ALONE! had been his first thought; and +the second was to note in her the change which his coming produced. It +was the danger-point of their intercourse that he could not doubt the +spontaneity of her liking. From whatever angle he viewed their dawning +intimacy, he could not see it as part of her scheme of life; and to be +the unforeseen element in a career so accurately planned was stimulating +even to a man who had renounced sentimental experiments.</p> + +<p>“Well,” he said, “did it make you want to see more? Are you going to +become one of us?”</p> + +<p>He had drawn out his cigarettes as he spoke, and she reached her hand +toward the case.</p> + +<p>“Oh, do give me one—I haven’t smoked for days!”</p> + +<p>“Why such unnatural abstinence? Everybody smokes at Bellomont.”</p> + +<p>“Yes—but it is not considered becoming in a JEUNE FILLE A MARIER; and at +the present moment I am a JEUNE FILLE A MARIER.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, then I’m afraid we can’t let you into the republic.”</p> + +<p>“Why not? Is it a celibate order?”</p> + +<p>“Not in the least, though I’m bound to say there are not many married +people in it. But you will marry some one very rich, and it’s as hard for +rich people to get into as the kingdom of heaven.”</p> + +<p>“That’s unjust, I think, because, as I understand it, one of the +conditions of citizenship is not to think too much about money, and the +only way not to think about money is to have a great deal of it.”</p> + +<p>“You might as well say that the only way not to think about air is to +have enough to breathe. That is true enough in a sense; but your lungs +are thinking about the air, if you are not. And so it is with your rich +people—they may not be thinking of money, but they’re breathing it all +the while; take them into another element and see how they squirm and +gasp!”</p> + +<p>Lily sat gazing absently through the blue rings of her cigarette-smoke.</p> + +<p>“It seems to me,” she said at length, “that you spend a good deal of your +time in the element you disapprove of.”</p> + +<p>Selden received this thrust without discomposure. “Yes; but I have tried +to remain amphibious: it’s all right as long as one’s lungs can work in +another air. The real alchemy consists in being able to turn gold back +again into something else; and that’s the secret that most of your +friends have lost.”</p> + +<p>Lily mused. “Don’t you think,” she rejoined after a moment, “that the +people who find fault with society are too apt to regard it as an end and +not a means, just as the people who despise money speak as if its only +use were to be kept in bags and gloated over? Isn’t it fairer to look at +them both as opportunities, which may be used either stupidly or +intelligently, according to the capacity of the user?”</p> + +<p>“That is certainly the sane view; but the queer thing about society is +that the people who regard it as an end are those who are in it, and not +the critics on the fence. It’s just the other way with most shows—the +audience may be under the illusion, but the actors know that real life is +on the other side of the footlights. The people who take society as an +escape from work are putting it to its proper use; but when it becomes +the thing worked for it distorts all the relations of life.” Selden +raised himself on his elbow. “Good heavens!” he went on, “I don’t +underrate the decorative side of life. It seems to me the sense of +splendour has justified itself by what it has produced. The worst of it +is that so much human nature is used up in the process. If we’re all the +raw stuff of the cosmic effects, one would rather be the fire that +tempers a sword than the fish that dyes a purple cloak. And a society +like ours wastes such good material in producing its little patch of +purple! Look at a boy like Ned Silverton—he’s really too good to be used +to refurbish anybody’s social shabbiness. There’s a lad just setting out +to discover the universe: isn’t it a pity he should end by finding it in +Mrs. Fisher’s drawing-room?”</p> + +<p>“Ned is a dear boy, and I hope he will keep his illusions long enough to +write some nice poetry about them; but do you think it is only in society +that he is likely to lose them?”</p> + +<p>Selden answered her with a shrug. “Why do we call all our generous ideas +illusions, and the mean ones truths? Isn’t it a sufficient condemnation +of society to find one’s self accepting such phraseology? I very nearly +acquired the jargon at Silverton’s age, and I know how names can alter +the colour of beliefs.”</p> + +<p>She had never heard him speak with such energy of affirmation. His +habitual touch was that of the eclectic, who lightly turns over and +compares; and she was moved by this sudden glimpse into the laboratory +where his faiths were formed.</p> + +<p>“Ah, you are as bad as the other sectarians,” she exclaimed; “why do you +call your republic a republic? It is a closed corporation, and you create +arbitrary objections in order to keep people out.”</p> + +<p>“It is not MY republic; if it were, I should have a COUP D’ETAT and seat +you on the throne.”</p> + +<p>“Whereas, in reality, you think I can never even get my foot across the +threshold? Oh, I understand what you mean. You despise my ambitions—you +think them unworthy of me!”</p> + +<p>Selden smiled, but not ironically. “Well, isn’t that a tribute? I think +them quite worthy of most of the people who live by them.”</p> + +<p>She had turned to gaze on him gravely. “But isn’t it possible that, if I +had the opportunities of these people, I might make a better use of them? +Money stands for all kinds of things—its purchasing quality isn’t +limited to diamonds and motor-cars.”</p> + + +<p>“Not in the least: you might expiate your enjoyment of them by founding a +hospital.”</p> + +<p>“But if you think they are what I should really enjoy, you must think my +ambitions are good enough for me.”</p> + +<p>Selden met this appeal with a laugh. “Ah, my dear Miss Bart, I am not +divine Providence, to guarantee your enjoying the things you are trying +to get!”</p> + +<p>“Then the best you can say for me is, that after struggling to get them I +probably shan’t like them?” She drew a deep breath. “What a miserable +future you foresee for me!”</p> + +<p>“Well—have you never foreseen it for yourself?” The slow colour rose to +her cheek, not a blush of excitement but drawn from the deep wells of +feeling; it was as if the effort of her spirit had produced it.</p> + +<p>“Often and often,” she said. “But it looks so much darker when you show +it to me!”</p> + +<p>He made no answer to this exclamation, and for a while they sat silent, +while something throbbed between them in the wide quiet of the air.</p> + +<p>But suddenly she turned on him with a kind of vehemence. “Why do you do +this to me?” she cried. “Why do you make the things I have chosen seem +hateful to me, if you have nothing to give me instead?”</p> + +<p>The words roused Selden from the musing fit into which he had fallen. He +himself did not know why he had led their talk along such lines; it was +the last use he would have imagined himself making of an afternoon’s +solitude with Miss Bart. But it was one of those moments when neither +seemed to speak deliberately, when an indwelling voice in each called to +the other across unsounded depths of feeling.</p> + +<p>“No, I have nothing to give you instead,” he said, sitting up and turning +so that he faced her. “If I had, it should be yours, you know.”</p> + +<p>She received this abrupt declaration in a way even stranger than the +manner of its making: she dropped her face on her hands and he saw that +for a moment she wept.</p> + +<p>It was for a moment only, however; for when he leaned nearer and drew +down her hands with a gesture less passionate than grave, she turned on +him a face softened but not disfigured by emotion, and he said to +himself, somewhat cruelly, that even her weeping was an art.</p> + +<p>The reflection steadied his voice as he asked, between pity and irony: +“Isn’t it natural that I should try to belittle all the things I can’t +offer you?”</p> + +<p>Her face brightened at this, but she drew her hand away, not with a +gesture of coquetry, but as though renouncing something to which she had +no claim.</p> + +<p>“But you belittle ME, don’t you,” she returned gently, “in being so sure +they are the only things I care for?”</p> + +<p>Selden felt an inner start; but it was only the last quiver of his +egoism. Almost at once he answered quite simply: “But you do care for +them, don’t you? And no wishing of mine can alter that.”</p> + +<p>He had so completely ceased to consider how far this might carry him, +that he had a distinct sense of disappointment when she turned on him a +face sparkling with derision.</p> + +<p>“Ah,” she cried, “for all your fine phrases you’re really as great a +coward as I am, for you wouldn’t have made one of them if you hadn’t been +so sure of my answer.”</p> + +<p>The shock of this retort had the effect of crystallizing Selden’s +wavering intentions.</p> + +<p>“I am not so sure of your answer,” he said quietly. “And I do you the +justice to believe that you are not either.”</p> + +<p>It was her turn to look at him with surprise; and after a moment—“Do you +want to marry me?” she asked.</p> + +<p>He broke into a laugh. “No, I don’t want to—but perhaps I should if you +did!”</p> + +<p>“That’s what I told you—you’re so sure of me that you can amuse yourself +with experiments.” She drew back the hand he had regained, and sat +looking down on him sadly.</p> + +<p>“I am not making experiments,” he returned. “Or if I am, it is not on you +but on myself. I don’t know what effect they are going to have on me—but +if marrying you is one of them, I will take the risk.”</p> + +<p>She smiled faintly. “It would be a great risk, certainly—I have never +concealed from you how great.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, it’s you who are the coward!” he exclaimed.</p> + +<p>She had risen, and he stood facing her with his eyes on hers. The soft +isolation of the falling day enveloped them: they seemed lifted into a +finer air. All the exquisite influences of the hour trembled in their +veins, and drew them to each other as the loosened leaves were drawn to +the earth.</p> + +<p>“It’s you who are the coward,” he repeated, catching her hands in his.</p> + +<p>She leaned on him for a moment, as if with a drop of tired wings: he felt +as though her heart were beating rather with the stress of a long flight +than the thrill of new distances. Then, drawing back with a little smile +of warning—“I shall look hideous in dowdy clothes; but I can trim my own +hats,” she declared.</p> + +<p>They stood silent for a while after this, smiling at each other like +adventurous children who have climbed to a forbidden height from which +they discover a new world. The actual world at their feet was veiling +itself in dimness, and across the valley a clear moon rose in the denser +blue.</p> + +<p>Suddenly they heard a remote sound, like the hum of a giant insect, and +following the high-road, which wound whiter through the surrounding +twilight, a black object rushed across their vision.</p> + +<p>Lily started from her attitude of absorption; her smile faded and she +began to move toward the lane.</p> + +<p>“I had no idea it was so late! We shall not be back till after dark,” she +said, almost impatiently.</p> + +<p>Selden was looking at her with surprise: it took him a moment to regain +his usual view of her; then he said, with an uncontrollable note of +dryness: “That was not one of our party; the motor was going the other +way.”</p> + +<p>“I know—I know——” She paused, and he saw her redden through the +twilight. “But I told them I was not well—that I should not go out. Let +us go down!” she murmured.</p> + +<p>Selden continued to look at her; then he drew his cigarette-case from his +pocket and slowly lit a cigarette. It seemed to him necessary, at that +moment, to proclaim, by some habitual gesture of this sort, his recovered +hold on the actual: he had an almost puerile wish to let his companion +see that, their flight over, he had landed on his feet.</p> + +<p>She waited while the spark flickered under his curved palm; then he held +out the cigarettes to her.</p> + +<p>She took one with an unsteady hand, and putting it to her lips, leaned +forward to draw her light from his. In the indistinctness the little red +gleam lit up the lower part of her face, and he saw her mouth tremble +into a smile.</p> + +<p>“Were you serious?” she asked, with an odd thrill of gaiety which she +might have caught up, in haste, from a heap of stock inflections, without +having time to select the just note. Selden’s voice was under better +control. “Why not?” he returned. “You see I took no risks in being so.” +And as she continued to stand before him, a little pale under the retort, +he added quickly: “Let us go down.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_7">Chapter 7</h2> + +<p>It spoke much for the depth of Mrs. Trenor’s friendship that her voice, +in admonishing Miss Bart, took the same note of personal despair as if +she had been lamenting the collapse of a house-party.</p> + +<p>“All I can say is, Lily, that I can’t make you out!” She leaned back, +sighing, in the morning abandon of lace and muslin, turning an +indifferent shoulder to the heaped-up importunities of her desk, while +she considered, with the eye of a physician who has given up the case, +the erect exterior of the patient confronting her.</p> + +<p>“If you hadn’t told me you were going in for him seriously—but I’m sure +you made that plain enough from the beginning! Why else did you ask me to +let you off bridge, and to keep away Carry and Kate Corby? I don’t +suppose you did it because he amused you; we could none of us imagine +your putting up with him for a moment unless you meant to marry him. And +I’m sure everybody played fair! They all wanted to help it along. Even +Bertha kept her hands off—I will say that—till Lawrence came down and +you dragged him away from her. After that she had a right to +retaliate—why on earth did you interfere with her? You’ve known Lawrence +Selden for years—why did you behave as if you had just discovered him? +If you had a grudge against Bertha it was a stupid time to show it—you +could have paid her back just as well after you were married! I told you +Bertha was dangerous. She was in an odious mood when she came here, but +Lawrence’s turning up put her in a good humour, and if you’d only let her +think he came for HER it would have never occurred to her to play you +this trick. Oh, Lily, you’ll never do anything if you’re not serious!”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart accepted this exhortation in a spirit of the purest +impartiality. Why should she have been angry? It was the voice of her own +conscience which spoke to her through Mrs. Trenor’s reproachful accents. +But even to her own conscience she must trump up a semblance of defence. +“I only took a day off—I thought he meant to stay on all this week, and +I knew Mr. Selden was leaving this morning.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor brushed aside the plea with a gesture which laid bare its +weakness.</p> + +<p>“He did mean to stay—that’s the worst of it. It shows that he’s run away +from you; that Bertha’s done her work and poisoned him thoroughly.”</p> + +<p>Lily gave a slight laugh. “Oh, if he’s running I’ll overtake him!”</p> + +<p>Her friend threw out an arresting hand. “Whatever you do, Lily, do +nothing!”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart received the warning with a smile. “I don’t mean, literally, to +take the next train. There are ways——” But she did not go on to specify +them.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor sharply corrected the tense. “There WERE ways—plenty of +them! I didn’t suppose you needed to have them pointed out. But don’t +deceive yourself—he’s thoroughly frightened. He has run straight home to +his mother, and she’ll protect him!”</p> + +<p>“Oh, to the death,” Lily agreed, dimpling at the vision.</p> + +<p>“How you can LAUGH——” her friend rebuked her; and she dropped back to a +soberer perception of things with the question: “What was it Bertha +really told him?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t ask me—horrors! She seemed to have raked up everything. Oh, you +know what I mean—of course there isn’t anything, REALLY; but I suppose +she brought in Prince Varigliano—and Lord Hubert—and there was some +story of your having borrowed money of old Ned Van Alstyne: did you ever?”</p> + +<p>“He is my father’s cousin,” Miss Bart interposed.</p> + +<p>“Well, of course she left THAT out. It seems Ned told Carry Fisher; and +she told Bertha, naturally. They’re all alike, you know: they hold their +tongues for years, and you think you’re safe, but when their opportunity +comes they remember everything.”</p> + +<p>Lily had grown pale: her voice had a harsh note in it. “It was some money +I lost at bridge at the Van Osburghs’. I repaid it, of course.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, well, they wouldn’t remember that; besides, it was the idea of the +gambling debt that frightened Percy. Oh, Bertha knew her man—she knew +just what to tell him!”</p> + +<p>In this strain Mrs. Trenor continued for nearly an hour to admonish her +friend. Miss Bart listened with admirable equanimity. Her naturally good +temper had been disciplined by years of enforced compliance, since she +had almost always had to attain her ends by the circuitous path of other +people’s; and, being naturally inclined to face unpleasant facts as soon +as they presented themselves, she was not sorry to hear an impartial +statement of what her folly was likely to cost, the more so as her own +thoughts were still insisting on the other side of the case. Presented +in the light of Mrs. Trenor’s vigorous comments, the reckoning was +certainly a formidable one, and Lily, as she listened, found herself +gradually reverting to her friend’s view of the situation. Mrs. Trenor’s +words were moreover emphasized for her hearer by anxieties which she +herself could scarcely guess. Affluence, unless stimulated by a keen +imagination, forms but the vaguest notion of the practical strain of +poverty. Judy knew it must be “horrid” for poor Lily to have to stop to +consider whether she could afford real lace on her petticoats, and not to +have a motor-car and a steam-yacht at her orders; but the daily friction +of unpaid bills, the daily nibble of small temptations to expenditure, +were trials as far out of her experience as the domestic problems of the +char-woman. Mrs. Trenor’s unconsciousness of the real stress of the +situation had the effect of making it more galling to Lily. While her +friend reproached her for missing the opportunity to eclipse her rivals, +she was once more battling in imagination with the mounting tide of +indebtedness from which she had so nearly escaped. What wind of folly had +driven her out again on those dark seas?</p> + +<p>If anything was needed to put the last touch to her self-abasement it was +the sense of the way her old life was opening its ruts again to receive +her. Yesterday her fancy had fluttered free pinions above a choice of +occupations; now she had to drop to the level of the familiar routine, in +which moments of seeming brilliancy and freedom alternated with long +hours of subjection.</p> + +<p>She laid a deprecating hand on her friend’s. “Dear Judy! I’m sorry to +have been such a bore, and you are very good to me. But you must have +some letters for me to answer—let me at least be useful.”</p> + +<p>She settled herself at the desk, and Mrs. Trenor accepted her resumption +of the morning’s task with a sigh which implied that, after all, she had +proved herself unfit for higher uses.</p> + +<p>The luncheon-table showed a depleted circle. All the men but Jack Stepney +and Dorset had returned to town (it seemed to Lily a last touch of irony +that Selden and Percy Gryce should have gone in the same train), and Lady +Cressida and the attendant Wetheralls had been despatched by motor to +lunch at a distant country-house. At such moments of diminished interest +it was usual for Mrs. Dorset to keep her room till the afternoon; but on +this occasion she drifted in when luncheon was half over, hollowed-eyed +and drooping, but with an edge of malice under her indifference.</p> + +<p>She raised her eyebrows as she looked about the table. “How few of us are +left! I do so enjoy the quiet—don’t you, Lily? I wish the men would +always stop away—it’s really much nicer without them. Oh, you don’t +count, George: one doesn’t have to talk to one’s husband. But I thought +Mr. Gryce was to stay for the rest of the week?” she added enquiringly. +“Didn’t he intend to, Judy? He’s such a nice boy—I wonder what drove +him away? He is rather shy, and I’m afraid we may have shocked him: he +has been brought up in such an old-fashioned way. Do you know, Lily, he +told me he had never seen a girl play cards for money till he saw you +doing it the other night? And he lives on the interest of his income, and +always has a lot left over to invest!”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher leaned forward eagerly. “I do believe it is some one’s duty +to educate that young man. It is shocking that he has never been made to +realize his duties as a citizen. Every wealthy man should be compelled to +study the laws of his country.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dorset glanced at her quietly. “I think he HAS studied the divorce +laws. He told me he had promised the Bishop to sign some kind of a +petition against divorce.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher reddened under her powder, and Stepney said with a laughing +glance at Miss Bart: “I suppose he is thinking of marriage, and wants to +tinker up the old ship before he goes aboard.”</p> + +<p>His betrothed looked shocked at the metaphor, and George Dorset exclaimed +with a sardonic growl: “Poor devil! It isn’t the ship that will do for +him, it’s the crew.”</p> + +<p>“Or the stowaways,” said Miss Corby brightly. “If I contemplated a voyage +with him I should try to start with a friend in the hold.”</p> + +<p>Miss Van Osburgh’s vague feeling of pique was struggling for appropriate +expression. “I’m sure I don’t see why you laugh at him; I think he’s very +nice,” she exclaimed; “and, at any rate, a girl who married him would +always have enough to be comfortable.”</p> + +<p>She looked puzzled at the redoubled laughter which hailed her words, but +it might have consoled her to know how deeply they had sunk into the +breast of one of her hearers.</p> + +<p>Comfortable! At that moment the word was more eloquent to Lily Bart than +any other in the language. She could not even pause to smile over the +heiress’s view of a colossal fortune as a mere shelter against want: her +mind was filled with the vision of what that shelter might have been to +her. Mrs. Dorset’s pin-pricks did not smart, for her own irony cut +deeper: no one could hurt her as much as she was hurting herself, for no +one else—not even Judy Trenor—knew the full magnitude of her folly.</p> + +<p>She was roused from these unprofitable considerations by a whispered +request from her hostess, who drew her apart as they left the +luncheon-table.</p> + +<p>“Lily, dear, if you’ve nothing special to do, may I tell Carry Fisher +that you intend to drive to the station and fetch Gus? He will be back at +four, and I know she has it in her mind to meet him. Of course I’m very +glad to have him amused, but I happen to know that she has bled him +rather severely since she’s been here, and she is so keen about going to +fetch him that I fancy she must have got a lot more bills this morning. +It seems to me,” Mrs. Trenor feelingly concluded, “that most of her +alimony is paid by other women’s husbands!”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart, on her way to the station, had leisure to muse over her +friend’s words, and their peculiar application to herself. Why should +she have to suffer for having once, for a few hours, borrowed money of an +elderly cousin, when a woman like Carry Fisher could make a living +unrebuked from the good-nature of her men friends and the tolerance of +their wives? It all turned on the tiresome distinction between what a +married woman might, and a girl might not, do. Of course it was shocking +for a married woman to borrow money—and Lily was expertly aware of the +implication involved—but still, it was the mere MALUM PROHIBITUM which +the world decries but condones, and which, though it may be punished by +private vengeance, does not provoke the collective disapprobation of +society. To Miss Bart, in short, no such opportunities were possible. She +could of course borrow from her women friends—a hundred here or there, +at the utmost—but they were more ready to give a gown or a trinket, and +looked a little askance when she hinted her preference for a cheque. +Women are not generous lenders, and those among whom her lot was cast +were either in the same case as herself, or else too far removed from it +to understand its necessities. The result of her meditations was the +decision to join her aunt at Richfield. She could not remain at Bellomont +without playing bridge, and being involved in other expenses; and to +continue her usual series of autumn visits would merely prolong the same +difficulties. She had reached a point where abrupt retrenchment was +necessary, and the only cheap life was a dull life. She would start the +next morning for Richfield.</p> + +<p>At the station she thought Gus Trenor seemed surprised, and not wholly +unrelieved, to see her. She yielded up the reins of the light runabout in +which she had driven over, and as he climbed heavily to her side, +crushing her into a scant third of the seat, he said: “Halloo! It isn’t +often you honour me. You must have been uncommonly hard up for something +to do.”</p> + +<p>The afternoon was warm, and propinquity made her more than usually +conscious that he was red and massive, and that beads of moisture had +caused the dust of the train to adhere unpleasantly to the broad expanse +of cheek and neck which he turned to her; but she was aware also, from +the look in his small dull eyes, that the contact with her freshness and +slenderness was as agreeable to him as the sight of a cooling beverage.</p> + +<p>The perception of this fact helped her to answer gaily: “It’s not often I +have the chance. There are too many ladies to dispute the privilege with +me.”</p> + +<p>“The privilege of driving me home? Well, I’m glad you won the race, +anyhow. But I know what really happened—my wife sent you. Now didn’t +she?”</p> + +<p>He had the dull man’s unexpected flashes of astuteness, and Lily could +not help joining in the laugh with which he had pounced on the truth.</p> + +<p>“You see, Judy thinks I’m the safest person for you to be with; and she’s +quite right,” she rejoined.</p> + +<p>“Oh, is she, though? If she is, it’s because you wouldn’t waste your time +on an old hulk like me. We married men have to put up with what we can +get: all the prizes are for the clever chaps who’ve kept a free foot. Let +me light a cigar, will you? I’ve had a beastly day of it.”</p> + +<p>He drew up in the shade of the village street, and passed the reins to +her while he held a match to his cigar. The little flame under his hand +cast a deeper crimson on his puffing face, and Lily averted her eyes with +a momentary feeling of repugnance. And yet some women thought him +handsome!</p> + +<p>As she handed back the reins, she said sympathetically: “Did you have +such a lot of tiresome things to do?”</p> + +<p>“I should say so—rather!” Trenor, who was seldom listened to, either by +his wife or her friends, settled down into the rare enjoyment of a +confidential talk. “You don’t know how a fellow has to hustle to keep +this kind of thing going.” He waved his whip in the direction of the +Bellomont acres, which lay outspread before them in opulent undulations. +“Judy has no idea of what she spends—not that there isn’t plenty to keep +the thing going,” he interrupted himself, “but a man has got to keep his +eyes open and pick up all the tips he can. My father and mother used to +live like fighting-cocks on their income, and put by a good bit of it +too—luckily for me—but at the pace we go now, I don’t know where I +should be if it weren’t for taking a flyer now and then. The women all +think—I mean Judy thinks—I’ve nothing to do but to go downtown once a +month and cut off coupons, but the truth is it takes a devilish lot of +hard work to keep the machinery running. Not that I ought to complain +today, though,” he went on after a moment, “for I did a very neat stroke +of business, thanks to Stepney’s friend Rosedale: by the way, Miss Lily, +I wish you’d try to persuade Judy to be decently civil to that chap. He’s +going to be rich enough to buy us all out one of these days, and if she’d +only ask him to dine now and then I could get almost anything out of him. +The man is mad to know the people who don’t want to know him, and when a +fellow’s in that state there is nothing he won’t do for the first woman +who takes him up.”</p> + +<p>Lily hesitated a moment. The first part of her companion’s discourse had +started an interesting train of thought, which was rudely interrupted by +the mention of Mr. Rosedale’s name. She uttered a faint protest.</p> + +<p>“But you know Jack did try to take him about, and he was impossible.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, hang it—because he’s fat and shiny, and has a sloppy manner! Well, +all I can say is that the people who are clever enough to be civil to him +now will make a mighty good thing of it. A few years from now he’ll be in +it whether we want him or not, and then he won’t be giving away a +half-a-million tip for a dinner.”</p> + +<p>Lily’s mind had reverted from the intrusive personality of Mr. Rosedale +to the train of thought set in motion by Trenor’s first words. This vast +mysterious Wall Street world of “tips” and “deals”—might she not find in +it the means of escape from her dreary predicament? She had often heard +of women making money in this way through their friends: she had no more +notion than most of her sex of the exact nature of the transaction, and +its vagueness seemed to diminish its indelicacy. She could not, indeed, +imagine herself, in any extremity, stooping to extract a “tip” from Mr. +Rosedale; but at her side was a man in possession of that precious +commodity, and who, as the husband of her dearest friend, stood to her in +a relation of almost fraternal intimacy.</p> + +<p>In her inmost heart Lily knew it was not by appealing to the fraternal +instinct that she was likely to move Gus Trenor; but this way of +explaining the situation helped to drape its crudity, and she was always +scrupulous about keeping up appearances to herself. Her personal +fastidiousness had a moral equivalent, and when she made a tour of +inspection in her own mind there were certain closed doors she did not +open.</p> + +<p>As they reached the gates of Bellomont she turned to Trenor with a smile. +“The afternoon is so perfect—don’t you want to drive me a little +farther? I’ve been rather out of spirits all day, and it’s so restful to +be away from people, with some one who won’t mind if I’m a little dull.”</p> + +<p>She looked so plaintively lovely as she proffered the request, so +trustfully sure of his sympathy and understanding, that Trenor felt +himself wishing that his wife could see how other women treated him—not +battered wire-pullers like Mrs. Fisher, but a girl that most men would +have given their boots to get such a look from.</p> + +<p>“Out of spirits? Why on earth should you ever be out of spirits? Is your +last box of Doucet dresses a failure, or did Judy rook you out of +everything at bridge last night?”</p> + +<p>Lily shook her head with a sigh. “I have had to give up Doucet; and +bridge too—I can’t afford it. In fact I can’t afford any of the things +my friends do, and I am afraid Judy often thinks me a bore because I +don’t play cards any longer, and because I am not as smartly dressed as +the other women. But you will think me a bore too if I talk to you about +my worries, and I only mention them because I want you to do me a +favour—the very greatest of favours.”</p> + +<p>Her eyes sought his once more, and she smiled inwardly at the tinge of +apprehension that she read in them.</p> + +<p>“Why, of course—if it’s anything I can manage——” He broke off, and she +guessed that his enjoyment was disturbed by the remembrance of Mrs. +Fisher’s methods.</p> + +<p>“The greatest of favours,” she rejoined gently. “The fact is, Judy is +angry with me, and I want you to make my peace.”</p> + +<p>“Angry with you? Oh, come, nonsense——” his relief broke through in a +laugh. “Why, you know she’s devoted to you.”</p> + +<p>“She is the best friend I have, and that is why I mind having to vex her. +But I daresay you know what she has wanted me to do. She has set her +heart—poor dear—on my marrying—marrying a great deal of money.”</p> + +<p>She paused with a slight falter of embarrassment, and Trenor, turning +abruptly, fixed on her a look of growing intelligence.</p> + +<p>“A great deal of money? Oh, by Jove—you don’t mean Gryce? What—you do? +Oh, no, of course I won’t mention it—you can trust me to keep my mouth +shut—but Gryce—good Lord, GRYCE! Did Judy really think you could bring +yourself to marry that portentous little ass? But you couldn’t, eh? And +so you gave him the sack, and that’s the reason why he lit out by the +first train this morning?” He leaned back, spreading himself farther +across the seat, as if dilated by the joyful sense of his own +discernment. “How on earth could Judy think you would do such a thing? I +could have told her you’d never put up with such a little milksop!”</p> + +<p>Lily sighed more deeply. “I sometimes think,” she murmured, “that men +understand a woman’s motives better than other women do.”</p> + +<p>“Some men—I’m certain of it! I could have TOLD Judy,” he repeated, +exulting in the implied superiority over his wife.</p> + +<p>“I thought you would understand; that’s why I wanted to speak to you,” +Miss Bart rejoined. “I can’t make that kind of marriage; it’s impossible. +But neither can I go on living as all the women in my set do. I am almost +entirely dependent on my aunt, and though she is very kind to me she +makes me no regular allowance, and lately I’ve lost money at cards, and I +don’t dare tell her about it. I have paid my card debts, of course, but +there is hardly anything left for my other expenses, and if I go on with +my present life I shall be in horrible difficulties. I have a tiny income +of my own, but I’m afraid it’s badly invested, for it seems to bring in +less every year, and I am so ignorant of money matters that I don’t know +if my aunt’s agent, who looks after it, is a good adviser.” She paused a +moment, and added in a lighter tone: “I didn’t mean to bore you with all +this, but I want your help in making Judy understand that I can’t, at +present, go on living as one must live among you all. I am going away +tomorrow to join my aunt at Richfield, and I shall stay there for the +rest of the autumn, and dismiss my maid and learn how to mend my own +clothes.”</p> + +<p>At this picture of loveliness in distress, the pathos of which was +heightened by the light touch with which it was drawn, a murmur of +indignant sympathy broke from Trenor. Twenty-four hours earlier, if his +wife had consulted him on the subject of Miss Bart’s future, he would +have said that a girl with extravagant tastes and no money had better +marry the first rich man she could get; but with the subject of +discussion at his side, turning to him for sympathy, making him feel that +he understood her better than her dearest friends, and confirming the +assurance by the appeal of her exquisite nearness, he was ready to swear +that such a marriage was a desecration, and that, as a man of honour, he +was bound to do all he could to protect her from the results of her +disinterestedness. This impulse was reinforced by the reflection that if +she had married Gryce she would have been surrounded by flattery and +approval, whereas, having refused to sacrifice herself to expediency, she +was left to bear the whole cost of her resistance. Hang it, if he could +find a way out of such difficulties for a professional sponge like Carry +Fisher, who was simply a mental habit corresponding to the physical +titillations of the cigarette or the cock-tail, he could surely do as +much for a girl who appealed to his highest sympathies, and who brought +her troubles to him with the trustfulness of a child.</p> + +<p>Trenor and Miss Bart prolonged their drive till long after sunset; and +before it was over he had tried, with some show of success, to prove to +her that, if she would only trust him, he could make a handsome sum of +money for her without endangering the small amount she possessed. She was +too genuinely ignorant of the manipulations of the stock-market to +understand his technical explanations, or even perhaps to perceive that +certain points in them were slurred; the haziness enveloping the +transaction served as a veil for her embarrassment, and through the +general blur her hopes dilated like lamps in a fog. She understood only +that her modest investments were to be mysteriously multiplied without +risk to herself; and the assurance that this miracle would take place +within a short time, that there would be no tedious interval for suspense +and reaction, relieved her of her lingering scruples.</p> + +<p>Again she felt the lightening of her load, and with it the release of +repressed activities. Her immediate worries conjured, it was easy to +resolve that she would never again find herself in such straits, and as +the need of economy and self-denial receded from her foreground she felt +herself ready to meet any other demand which life might make. Even the +immediate one of letting Trenor, as they drove homeward, lean a little +nearer and rest his hand reassuringly on hers, cost her only a momentary +shiver of reluctance. It was part of the game to make him feel that her +appeal had been an uncalculated impulse, provoked by the liking he +inspired; and the renewed sense of power in handling men, while it +consoled her wounded vanity, helped also to obscure the thought of the +claim at which his manner hinted. He was a coarse dull man who, under all +his show of authority, was a mere supernumerary in the costly show for +which his money paid: surely, to a clever girl, it would be easy to hold +him by his vanity, and so keep the obligation on his side.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_8">Chapter 8</h2> + +<p>The first thousand dollar cheque which Lily received with a blotted +scrawl from Gus Trenor strengthened her self-confidence in the exact +degree to which it effaced her debts.</p> + +<p>The transaction had justified itself by its results: she saw now how +absurd it would have been to let any primitive scruple deprive her of +this easy means of appeasing her creditors. Lily felt really virtuous as +she dispensed the sum in sops to her tradesmen, and the fact that a fresh +order accompanied each payment did not lessen her sense of +disinterestedness. How many women, in her place, would have given the +orders without making the payment!</p> + +<p>She had found it reassuringly easy to keep Trenor in a good humour. To +listen to his stories, to receive his confidences and laugh at his jokes, +seemed for the moment all that was required of her, and the complacency +with which her hostess regarded these attentions freed them of the least +hint of ambiguity. Mrs. Trenor evidently assumed that Lily’s growing +intimacy with her husband was simply an indirect way of returning her own +kindness.</p> + +<p>“I’m so glad you and Gus have become such good friends,” she said +approvingly. “It’s too delightful of you to be so nice to him, and put up +with all his tiresome stories. I know what they are, because I had to +listen to them when we were engaged—I’m sure he is telling the same ones +still. And now I shan’t always have to be asking Carry Fisher here to +keep him in a good humour. She’s a perfect vulture, you know; and she +hasn’t the least moral sense. She is always getting Gus to speculate for +her, and I’m sure she never pays when she loses.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart could shudder at this state of things without the embarrassment +of a personal application. Her own position was surely quite different. +There could be no question of her not paying when she lost, since Trenor +had assured her that she was certain not to lose. In sending her the +cheque he had explained that he had made five thousand for her out of +Rosedale’s “tip,” and had put four thousand back in the same venture, as +there was the promise of another “big rise”; she understood therefore +that he was now speculating with her own money, and that she consequently +owed him no more than the gratitude which such a trifling service +demanded. She vaguely supposed that, to raise the first sum, he had +borrowed on her securities; but this was a point over which her curiosity +did not linger. It was concentrated, for the moment, on the probable date +of the next “big rise.”</p> + +<p>The news of this event was received by her some weeks later, on the +occasion of Jack Stepney’s marriage to Miss Van Osburgh. As a cousin of +the bridegroom, Miss Bart had been asked to act as bridesmaid; but she +had declined on the plea that, since she was much taller than the other +attendant virgins, her presence might mar the symmetry of the group. The +truth was, she had attended too many brides to the altar: when next seen +there she meant to be the chief figure in the ceremony. She knew the +pleasantries made at the expense of young girls who have been too long +before the public, and she was resolved to avoid such assumptions of +youthfulness as might lead people to think her older than she really was.</p> + +<p>The Van Osburgh marriage was celebrated in the village church near the +paternal estate on the Hudson. It was the “simple country wedding” to +which guests are convoyed in special trains, and from which the hordes of +the uninvited have to be fended off by the intervention of the police. +While these sylvan rites were taking place, in a church packed with +fashion and festooned with orchids, the representatives of the press were +threading their way, note-book in hand, through the labyrinth of wedding +presents, and the agent of a cinematograph syndicate was setting up his +apparatus at the church door. It was the kind of scene in which Lily had +often pictured herself as taking the principal part, and on this occasion +the fact that she was once more merely a casual spectator, instead of the +mystically veiled figure occupying the centre of attention, strengthened +her resolve to assume the latter part before the year was over. The fact +that her immediate anxieties were relieved did not blind her to a +possibility of their recurrence; it merely gave her enough buoyancy to +rise once more above her doubts and feel a renewed faith in her beauty, +her power, and her general fitness to attract a brilliant destiny. It +could not be that one conscious of such aptitudes for mastery and +enjoyment was doomed to a perpetuity of failure; and her mistakes looked +easily reparable in the light of her restored self-confidence.</p> + +<p>A special appositeness was given to these reflections by the discovery, +in a neighbouring pew, of the serious profile and neatly-trimmed beard of +Mr. Percy Gryce. There was something almost bridal in his own aspect: his +large white gardenia had a symbolic air that struck Lily as a good omen. +After all, seen in an assemblage of his kind he was not +ridiculous-looking: a friendly critic might have called his heaviness +weighty, and he was at his best in the attitude of vacant passivity which +brings out the oddities of the restless. She fancied he was the kind of +man whose sentimental associations would be stirred by the conventional +imagery of a wedding, and she pictured herself, in the seclusion of the +Van Osburgh conservatories, playing skillfully upon sensibilities thus +prepared for her touch. In fact, when she looked at the other women about +her, and recalled the image she had brought away from her own glass, it +did not seem as though any special skill would be needed to repair her +blunder and bring him once more to her feet.</p> + +<p>The sight of Selden’s dark head, in a pew almost facing her, disturbed +for a moment the balance of her complacency. The rise of her blood as +their eyes met was succeeded by a contrary motion, a wave of resistance +and withdrawal. She did not wish to see him again, not because she feared +his influence, but because his presence always had the effect of +cheapening her aspirations, of throwing her whole world out of focus. +Besides, he was a living reminder of the worst mistake in her career, and +the fact that he had been its cause did not soften her feelings toward +him. She could still imagine an ideal state of existence in which, all +else being superadded, intercourse with Selden might be the last touch of +luxury; but in the world as it was, such a privilege was likely to cost +more than it was worth.</p> + +<p>“Lily, dear, I never saw you look so lovely! You look as if something +delightful had just happened to you!”</p> + +<p>The young lady who thus formulated her admiration of her brilliant friend +did not, in her own person, suggest such happy possibilities. Miss +Gertrude Farish, in fact, typified the mediocre and the ineffectual. If +there were compensating qualities in her wide frank glance and the +freshness of her smile, these were qualities which only the sympathetic +observer would perceive before noticing that her eyes were of a workaday +grey and her lips without haunting curves. Lily’s own view of her wavered +between pity for her limitations and impatience at her cheerful +acceptance of them. To Miss Bart, as to her mother, acquiescence in +dinginess was evidence of stupidity; and there were moments when, in the +consciousness of her own power to look and to be so exactly what the +occasion required, she almost felt that other girls were plain and +inferior from choice. Certainly no one need have confessed such +acquiescence in her lot as was revealed in the “useful” colour of Gerty +Farish’s gown and the subdued lines of her hat: it is almost as stupid to +let your clothes betray that you know you are ugly as to have them +proclaim that you think you are beautiful.</p> + +<p>Of course, being fatally poor and dingy, it was wise of Gerty to have +taken up philanthropy and symphony concerts; but there was something +irritating in her assumption that existence yielded no higher pleasures, +and that one might get as much interest and excitement out of life in a +cramped flat as in the splendours of the Van Osburgh establishment. +Today, however, her chirping enthusiasms did not irritate Lily. They +seemed only to throw her own exceptionalness into becoming relief, and +give a soaring vastness to her scheme of life.</p> + +<p>“Do let us go and take a peep at the presents before everyone else leaves +the dining-room!” suggested Miss Farish, linking her arm in her friend’s. +It was characteristic of her to take a sentimental and unenvious interest +in all the details of a wedding: she was the kind of person who always +kept her handkerchief out during the service, and departed clutching a +box of wedding-cake.</p> + +<p>“Isn’t everything beautifully done?” she pursued, as they entered the +distant drawing-room assigned to the display of Miss Van Osburgh’s bridal +spoils. “I always say no one does things better than cousin Grace! Did +you ever taste anything more delicious than that MOUSSE of lobster with +champagne sauce? I made up my mind weeks ago that I wouldn’t miss this +wedding, and just fancy how delightfully it all came about. When Lawrence +Selden heard I was coming, he insisted on fetching me himself and driving +me to the station, and when we go back this evening I am to dine with him +at Sherry’s. I really feel as excited as if I were getting married +myself!”</p> + +<p>Lily smiled: she knew that Selden had always been kind to his dull +cousin, and she had sometimes wondered why he wasted so much time in such +an unremunerative manner; but now the thought gave her a vague pleasure.</p> + +<p>“Do you see him often?” she asked.</p> + +<p>“Yes; he is very good about dropping in on Sundays. And now and then we +do a play together; but lately I haven’t seen much of him. He doesn’t +look well, and he seems nervous and unsettled. The dear fellow! I do +wish he would marry some nice girl. I told him so today, but he said he +didn’t care for the really nice ones, and the other kind didn’t care for +him—but that was just his joke, of course. He could never marry a girl +who WASN’T nice. Oh, my dear, did you ever see such pearls?”</p> + +<p>They had paused before the table on which the bride’s jewels were +displayed, and Lily’s heart gave an envious throb as she caught the +refraction of light from their surfaces—the milky gleam of perfectly +matched pearls, the flash of rubies relieved against contrasting velvet, +the intense blue rays of sapphires kindled into light by surrounding +diamonds: all these precious tints enhanced and deepened by the varied +art of their setting. The glow of the stones warmed Lily’s veins like +wine. More completely than any other expression of wealth they symbolized +the life she longed to lead, the life of fastidious aloofness and +refinement in which every detail should have the finish of a jewel, and +the whole form a harmonious setting to her own jewel-like rareness.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Lily, do look at this diamond pendant—it’s as big as a +dinner-plate! Who can have given it?” Miss Farish bent short-sightedly +over the accompanying card. “MR. SIMON ROSEDALE. What, that horrid man? +Oh, yes—I remember he’s a friend of Jack’s, and I suppose cousin Grace +had to ask him here today; but she must rather hate having to let Gwen +accept such a present from him.”</p> + +<p>Lily smiled. She doubted Mrs. Van Osburgh’s reluctance, but was aware of +Miss Farish’s habit of ascribing her own delicacies of feeling to the +persons least likely to be encumbered by them.</p> + +<p>“Well, if Gwen doesn’t care to be seen wearing it she can always exchange +it for something else,” she remarked.</p> + +<p>“Ah, here is something so much prettier,” Miss Farish continued. “Do +look at this exquisite white sapphire. I’m sure the person who chose it +must have taken particular pains. What is the name? Percy Gryce? Ah, +then I’m not surprised!” She smiled significantly as she replaced the +card. “Of course you’ve heard that he’s perfectly devoted to Evie Van +Osburgh? Cousin Grace is so pleased about it—it’s quite a romance! He +met her first at the George Dorsets’, only about six weeks ago, and it’s +just the nicest possible marriage for dear Evie. Oh, I don’t mean the +money—of course she has plenty of her own—but she’s such a quiet +stay-at-home kind of girl, and it seems he has just the same tastes; so +they are exactly suited to each other.”</p> + +<p>Lily stood staring vacantly at the white sapphire on its velvet bed. +Evie Van Osburgh and Percy Gryce? The names rang derisively through her +brain. EVIE VAN OSBURGH? The youngest, dumpiest, dullest of the four dull +and dumpy daughters whom Mrs. Van Osburgh, with unsurpassed astuteness, +had “placed” one by one in enviable niches of existence! Ah, lucky girls +who grow up in the shelter of a mother’s love—a mother who knows how to +contrive opportunities without conceding favours, how to take advantage +of propinquity without allowing appetite to be dulled by habit! The +cleverest girl may miscalculate where her own interests are concerned, +may yield too much at one moment and withdraw too far at the next: it +takes a mother’s unerring vigilance and foresight to land her daughters +safely in the arms of wealth and suitability.</p> + +<p>Lily’s passing light-heartedness sank beneath a renewed sense of failure. +Life was too stupid, too blundering! Why should Percy Gryce’s millions be +joined to another great fortune, why should this clumsy girl be put in +possession of powers she would never know how to use?</p> + +<p>She was roused from these speculations by a familiar touch on her arm, +and turning saw Gus Trenor beside her. She felt a thrill of vexation: +what right had he to touch her? Luckily Gerty Farish had wandered off to +the next table, and they were alone.</p> + +<p>Trenor, looking stouter than ever in his tight frock-coat, and +unbecomingly flushed by the bridal libations, gazed at her with +undisguised approval.</p> + +<p>“By Jove, Lily, you do look a stunner!” He had slipped insensibly into +the use of her Christian name, and she had never found the right moment +to correct him. Besides, in her set all the men and women called each +other by their Christian names; it was only on Trenor’s lips that the +familiar address had an unpleasant significance.</p> + +<p>“Well,” he continued, still jovially impervious to her annoyance, “have +you made up your mind which of these little trinkets you mean to +duplicate at Tiffany’s tomorrow? I’ve got a cheque for you in my pocket +that will go a long way in that line!”</p> + +<p>Lily gave him a startled look: his voice was louder than usual, and the +room was beginning to fill with people. But as her glance assured her +that they were still beyond ear-shot a sense of pleasure replaced her +apprehension.</p> + +<p>“Another dividend?” she asked, smiling and drawing near him in the desire +not to be overheard.</p> + +<p>“Well, not exactly: I sold out on the rise and I’ve pulled off four thou’ +for you. Not so bad for a beginner, eh? I suppose you’ll begin to think +you’re a pretty knowing speculator. And perhaps you won’t think poor old +Gus such an awful ass as some people do.”</p> + +<p>“I think you the kindest of friends; but I can’t thank you properly now.”</p> + +<p>She let her eyes shine into his with a look that made up for the +hand-clasp he would have claimed if they had been alone—and how glad she +was that they were not! The news filled her with the glow produced by a +sudden cessation of physical pain. The world was not so stupid and +blundering after all: now and then a stroke of luck came to the +unluckiest. At the thought her spirits began to rise: it was +characteristic of her that one trifling piece of good fortune should give +wings to all her hopes. Instantly came the reflection that Percy Gryce +was not irretrievably lost; and she smiled to think of the excitement of +recapturing him from Evie Van Osburgh. What chance could such a simpleton +have against her if she chose to exert herself? She glanced about, hoping +to catch a glimpse of Gryce; but her eyes lit instead on the glossy +countenance of Mr. Rosedale, who was slipping through the crowd with an +air half obsequious, half obtrusive, as though, the moment his presence +was recognized, it would swell to the dimensions of the room.</p> + +<p>Not wishing to be the means of effecting this enlargement, Lily quickly +transferred her glance to Trenor, to whom the expression of her gratitude +seemed not to have brought the complete gratification she had meant it to +give.</p> + +<p>“Hang thanking me—I don’t want to be thanked, but I SHOULD like the +chance to say two words to you now and then,” he grumbled. “I thought you +were going to spend the whole autumn with us, and I’ve hardly laid eyes +on you for the last month. Why can’t you come back to Bellomont this +evening? We’re all alone, and Judy is as cross as two sticks. Do come and +cheer a fellow up. If you say yes I’ll run you over in the motor, and you +can telephone your maid to bring your traps from town by the next train.”</p> + +<p>Lily shook her head with a charming semblance of regret. “I wish I +could—but it’s quite impossible. My aunt has come back to town, and I +must be with her for the next few days.”</p> + +<p>“Well, I’ve seen a good deal less of you since we’ve got to be such pals +than I used to when you were Judy’s friend,” he continued with +unconscious penetration.</p> + +<p>“When I was Judy’s friend? Am I not her friend still? Really, you say the +most absurd things! If I were always at Bellomont you would tire of me +much sooner than Judy—but come and see me at my aunt’s the next +afternoon you are in town; then we can have a nice quiet talk, and you +can tell me how I had better invest my fortune.”</p> + +<p>It was true that, during the last three or four weeks, she had absented +herself from Bellomont on the pretext of having other visits to pay; but +she now began to feel that the reckoning she had thus contrived to evade +had rolled up interest in the interval.</p> + +<p>The prospect of the nice quiet talk did not appear as all-sufficing to +Trenor as she had hoped, and his brows continued to lower as he said: +“Oh, I don’t know that I can promise you a fresh tip every day. But +there’s one thing you might do for me; and that is, just to be a little +civil to Rosedale. Judy has promised to ask him to dine when we get to +town, but I can’t induce her to have him at Bellomont, and if you would +let me bring him up now it would make a lot of difference. I don’t +believe two women have spoken to him this afternoon, and I can tell you +he’s a chap it pays to be decent to.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart made an impatient movement, but suppressed the words which +seemed about to accompany it. After all, this was an unexpectedly easy +way of acquitting her debt; and had she not reasons of her own for +wishing to be civil to Mr. Rosedale?</p> + +<p>“Oh, bring him by all means,” she said smiling; “perhaps I can get a tip +out of him on my own account.”</p> + +<p>Trenor paused abruptly, and his eyes fixed themselves on hers with a look +which made her change colour.</p> + +<p>“I say, you know—you’ll please remember he’s a blooming bounder,” he +said; and with a slight laugh she turned toward the open window near +which they had been standing.</p> + +<p>The throng in the room had increased, and she felt a desire for space and +fresh air. Both of these she found on the terrace, where only a few men +were lingering over cigarettes and liqueur, while scattered couples +strolled across the lawn to the autumn-tinted borders of the +flower-garden.</p> + +<p>As she emerged, a man moved toward her from the knot of smokers, and she +found herself face to face with Selden. The stir of the pulses which his +nearness always caused was increased by a slight sense of constraint. +They had not met since their Sunday afternoon walk at Bellomont, and that +episode was still so vivid to her that she could hardly believe him to be +less conscious of it. But his greeting expressed no more than the +satisfaction which every pretty woman expects to see reflected in +masculine eyes; and the discovery, if distasteful to her vanity, was +reassuring to her nerves. Between the relief of her escape from Trenor, +and the vague apprehension of her meeting with Rosedale, it was pleasant +to rest a moment on the sense of complete understanding which Lawrence +Selden’s manner always conveyed.</p> + +<p>“This is luck,” he said smiling. “I was wondering if I should be able to +have a word with you before the special snatches us away. I came with +Gerty Farish, and promised not to let her miss the train, but I am sure +she is still extracting sentimental solace from the wedding presents. She +appears to regard their number and value as evidence of the disinterested +affection of the contracting parties.”</p> + +<p>There was not the least trace of embarrassment in his voice, and as he +spoke, leaning slightly against the jamb of the window, and letting his +eyes rest on her in the frank enjoyment of her grace, she felt with a +faint chill of regret that he had gone back without an effort to the +footing on which they had stood before their last talk together. Her +vanity was stung by the sight of his unscathed smile. She longed to be to +him something more than a piece of sentient prettiness, a passing +diversion to his eye and brain; and the longing betrayed itself in her +reply.</p> + +<p>“Ah,” she said, “I envy Gerty that power she has of dressing up with +romance all our ugly and prosaic arrangements! I have never recovered my +self-respect since you showed me how poor and unimportant my ambitions +were.”</p> + +<p>The words were hardly spoken when she realized their infelicity. It +seemed to be her fate to appear at her worst to Selden.</p> + +<p>“I thought, on the contrary,” he returned lightly, “that I had been the +means of proving they were more important to you than anything else.”</p> + +<p>It was as if the eager current of her being had been checked by a sudden +obstacle which drove it back upon itself. She looked at him helplessly, +like a hurt or frightened child: this real self of hers, which he had the +faculty of drawing out of the depths, was so little accustomed to go +alone!</p> + +<p>The appeal of her helplessness touched in him, as it always did, a latent +chord of inclination. It would have meant nothing to him to discover that +his nearness made her more brilliant, but this glimpse of a twilight mood +to which he alone had the clue seemed once more to set him in a world +apart with her.</p> + +<p>“At least you can’t think worse things of me than you say!” she exclaimed +with a trembling laugh; but before he could answer, the flow of +comprehension between them was abruptly stayed by the reappearance of Gus +Trenor, who advanced with Mr. Rosedale in his wake.</p> + +<p>“Hang it, Lily, I thought you’d given me the slip: Rosedale and I have +been hunting all over for you!”</p> + +<p>His voice had a note of conjugal familiarity: Miss Bart fancied she +detected in Rosedale’s eye a twinkling perception of the fact, and the +idea turned her dislike of him to repugnance.</p> + +<p>She returned his profound bow with a slight nod, made more disdainful by +the sense of Selden’s surprise that she should number Rosedale among her +acquaintances. Trenor had turned away, and his companion continued to +stand before Miss Bart, alert and expectant, his lips parted in a smile +at whatever she might be about to say, and his very back conscious of the +privilege of being seen with her.</p> + +<p>It was the moment for tact; for the quick bridging over of gaps; but +Selden still leaned against the window, a detached observer of the scene, +and under the spell of his observation Lily felt herself powerless to +exert her usual arts. The dread of Selden’s suspecting that there was any +need for her to propitiate such a man as Rosedale checked the trivial +phrases of politeness. Rosedale still stood before her in an expectant +attitude, and she continued to face him in silence, her glance just level +with his polished baldness. The look put the finishing touch to what her +silence implied.</p> + +<p>He reddened slowly, shifting from one foot to the other, fingered the +plump black pearl in his tie, and gave a nervous twist to his moustache; +then, running his eye over her, he drew back, and said, with a +side-glance at Selden: “Upon my soul, I never saw a more ripping get-up. +Is that the last creation of the dress-maker you go to see at the +Benedick? If so, I wonder all the other women don’t go to her too!”</p> + +<p>The words were projected sharply against Lily’s silence, and she saw in a +flash that her own act had given them their emphasis. In ordinary talk +they might have passed unheeded; but following on her prolonged pause +they acquired a special meaning. She felt, without looking, that Selden +had immediately seized it, and would inevitably connect the allusion with +her visit to himself. The consciousness increased her irritation against +Rosedale, but also her feeling that now, if ever, was the moment to +propitiate him, hateful as it was to do so in Selden’s presence.</p> + +<p>“How do you know the other women don’t go to my dress-maker?” she +returned. “You see I’m not afraid to give her address to my friends!”</p> + +<p>Her glance and accent so plainly included Rosedale in this privileged +circle that his small eyes puckered with gratification, and a knowing +smile drew up his moustache.</p> + +<p>“By Jove, you needn’t be!” he declared. “You could give ’em the whole +outfit and win at a canter!”</p> + +<p>“Ah, that’s nice of you; and it would be nicer still if you would carry +me off to a quiet corner, and get me a glass of lemonade or some innocent +drink before we all have to rush for the train.”</p> + +<p>She turned away as she spoke, letting him strut at her side through the +gathering groups on the terrace, while every nerve in her throbbed with +the consciousness of what Selden must have thought of the scene.</p> + +<p>But under her angry sense of the perverseness of things, and the light +surface of her talk with Rosedale, a third idea persisted: she did not +mean to leave without an attempt to discover the truth about Percy Gryce. +Chance, or perhaps his own resolve, had kept them apart since his hasty +withdrawal from Bellomont; but Miss Bart was an expert in making the most +of the unexpected, and the distasteful incidents of the last few +minutes—the revelation to Selden of precisely that part of her life +which she most wished him to ignore—increased her longing for shelter, +for escape from such humiliating contingencies. Any definite situation +would be more tolerable than this buffeting of chances, which kept her in +an attitude of uneasy alertness toward every possibility of life.</p> + +<p>Indoors there was a general sense of dispersal in the air, as of an +audience gathering itself up for departure after the principal actors had +left the stage; but among the remaining groups, Lily could discover +neither Gryce nor the youngest Miss Van Osburgh. That both should be +missing struck her with foreboding; and she charmed Mr. Rosedale by +proposing that they should make their way to the conservatories at the +farther end of the house. There were just enough people left in the long +suite of rooms to make their progress conspicuous, and Lily was aware of +being followed by looks of amusement and interrogation, which glanced off +as harmlessly from her indifference as from her companion’s +self-satisfaction. She cared very little at that moment about being seen +with Rosedale: all her thoughts were centred on the object of her search. +The latter, however, was not discoverable in the conservatories, and +Lily, oppressed by a sudden conviction of failure, was casting about for +a way to rid herself of her now superfluous companion, when they came +upon Mrs. Van Osburgh, flushed and exhausted, but beaming with the +consciousness of duty performed.</p> + +<p>She glanced at them a moment with the benign but vacant eye of the tired +hostess, to whom her guests have become mere whirling spots in a +kaleidoscope of fatigue; then her attention became suddenly fixed, and +she seized on Miss Bart with a confidential gesture. “My dear Lily, I +haven’t had time for a word with you, and now I suppose you are just off. +Have you seen Evie? She’s been looking everywhere for you: she wanted to +tell you her little secret; but I daresay you have guessed it already. +The engagement is not to be announced till next week—but you are such a +friend of Mr. Gryce’s that they both wished you to be the first to know +of their happiness.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_9">Chapter 9</h2> + +<p>In Mrs. Peniston’s youth, fashion had returned to town in October; +therefore on the tenth day of the month the blinds of her Fifth Avenue +residence were drawn up, and the eyes of the Dying Gladiator in bronze +who occupied the drawing-room window resumed their survey of that +deserted thoroughfare.</p> + +<p>The first two weeks after her return represented to Mrs. Peniston the +domestic equivalent of a religious retreat. She “went through” the linen +and blankets in the precise spirit of the penitent exploring the inner +folds of conscience; she sought for moths as the stricken soul seeks for +lurking infirmities. The topmost shelf of every closet was made to yield +up its secret, cellar and coal-bin were probed to their darkest depths +and, as a final stage in the lustral rites, the entire house was swathed +in penitential white and deluged with expiatory soapsuds.</p> + +<p>It was on this phase of the proceedings that Miss Bart entered on the +afternoon of her return from the Van Osburgh wedding. The journey back to +town had not been calculated to soothe her nerves. Though Evie Van +Osburgh’s engagement was still officially a secret, it was one of which +the innumerable intimate friends of the family were already possessed; +and the trainful of returning guests buzzed with allusions and +anticipations. Lily was acutely aware of her own part in this drama of +innuendo: she knew the exact quality of the amusement the situation +evoked. The crude forms in which her friends took their pleasure included +a loud enjoyment of such complications: the zest of surprising destiny in +the act of playing a practical joke. Lily knew well enough how to bear +herself in difficult situations. She had, to a shade, the exact manner +between victory and defeat: every insinuation was shed without an effort +by the bright indifference of her manner. But she was beginning to feel +the strain of the attitude; the reaction was more rapid, and she lapsed +to a deeper self-disgust.</p> + +<p>As was always the case with her, this moral repulsion found a physical +outlet in a quickened distaste for her surroundings. She revolted from +the complacent ugliness of Mrs. Peniston’s black walnut, from the +slippery gloss of the vestibule tiles, and the mingled odour of sapolio +and furniture-polish that met her at the door.</p> + +<p>The stairs were still carpetless, and on the way up to her room she was +arrested on the landing by an encroaching tide of soapsuds. Gathering up +her skirts, she drew aside with an impatient gesture; and as she did so +she had the odd sensation of having already found herself in the same +situation but in different surroundings. It seemed to her that she was +again descending the staircase from Selden’s rooms; and looking down to +remonstrate with the dispenser of the soapy flood, she found herself met +by a lifted stare which had once before confronted her under similar +circumstances. It was the char-woman of the Benedick who, resting on +crimson elbows, examined her with the same unflinching curiosity, the +same apparent reluctance to let her pass. On this occasion, however, Miss +Bart was on her own ground.</p> + +<p>“Don’t you see that I wish to go by? Please move your pail,” she said +sharply.</p> + +<p>The woman at first seemed not to hear; then, without a word of excuse, +she pushed back her pail and dragged a wet floor-cloth across the +landing, keeping her eyes fixed on Lily while the latter swept by. It was +insufferable that Mrs. Peniston should have such creatures about the +house; and Lily entered her room resolved that the woman should be +dismissed that evening.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston, however, was at the moment inaccessible to remonstrance: +since early morning she had been shut up with her maid, going over her +furs, a process which formed the culminating episode in the drama of +household renovation. In the evening also Lily found herself alone, for +her aunt, who rarely dined out, had responded to the summons of a Van +Alstyne cousin who was passing through town. The house, in its state of +unnatural immaculateness and order, was as dreary as a tomb, and as Lily, +turning from her brief repast between shrouded sideboards, wandered into +the newly-uncovered glare of the drawing-room she felt as though she were +buried alive in the stifling limits of Mrs. Peniston’s existence.</p> + +<p>She usually contrived to avoid being at home during the season of +domestic renewal. On the present occasion, however, a variety of reasons +had combined to bring her to town; and foremost among them was the fact +that she had fewer invitations than usual for the autumn. She had so long +been accustomed to pass from one country-house to another, till the close +of the holidays brought her friends to town, that the unfilled gaps of +time confronting her produced a sharp sense of waning popularity. It was +as she had said to Selden—people were tired of her. They would welcome +her in a new character, but as Miss Bart they knew her by heart. She +knew herself by heart too, and was sick of the old story. There were +moments when she longed blindly for anything different, anything strange, +remote and untried; but the utmost reach of her imagination did not go +beyond picturing her usual life in a new setting. She could not figure +herself as anywhere but in a drawing-room, diffusing elegance as a flower +sheds perfume.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, as October advanced she had to face the alternative of +returning to the Trenors or joining her aunt in town. Even the desolating +dulness of New York in October, and the soapy discomforts of Mrs. +Peniston’s interior, seemed preferable to what might await her at +Bellomont; and with an air of heroic devotion she announced her intention +of remaining with her aunt till the holidays.</p> + +<p>Sacrifices of this nature are sometimes received with feelings as mixed +as those which actuate them; and Mrs. Peniston remarked to her +confidential maid that, if any of the family were to be with her at such +a crisis (though for forty years she had been thought competent to see to +the hanging of her own curtains), she would certainly have preferred Miss +Grace to Miss Lily. Grace Stepney was an obscure cousin, of adaptable +manners and vicarious interests, who “ran in” to sit with Mrs. Peniston +when Lily dined out too continuously; who played bezique, picked up +dropped stitches, read out the deaths from the Times, and sincerely +admired the purple satin drawing-room curtains, the Dying Gladiator in +the window, and the seven-by-five painting of Niagara which represented +the one artistic excess of Mr. Peniston’s temperate career.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston, under ordinary circumstances, was as much bored by her +excellent cousin as the recipient of such services usually is by the +person who performs them. She greatly preferred the brilliant and +unreliable Lily, who did not know one end of a crochet-needle from the +other, and had frequently wounded her susceptibilities by suggesting that +the drawing-room should be “done over.” But when it came to hunting for +missing napkins, or helping to decide whether the backstairs needed +re-carpeting, Grace’s judgment was certainly sounder than Lily’s: not to +mention the fact that the latter resented the smell of beeswax and brown +soap, and behaved as though she thought a house ought to keep clean of +itself, without extraneous assistance.</p> + +<p>Seated under the cheerless blaze of the drawing-room chandelier—Mrs. +Peniston never lit the lamps unless there was “company”—Lily seemed to +watch her own figure retreating down vistas of neutral-tinted dulness to +a middle-age like Grace Stepney’s. When she ceased to amuse Judy Trenor +and her friends she would have to fall back on amusing Mrs. Peniston; +whichever way she looked she saw only a future of servitude to the whims +of others, never the possibility of asserting her own eager individuality.</p> + +<p>A ring at the door-bell, sounding emphatically through the empty house, +roused her suddenly to the extent of her boredom. It was as though all +the weariness of the past months had culminated in the vacuity of that +interminable evening. If only the ring meant a summons from the outer +world—a token that she was still remembered and wanted!</p> + +<p>After some delay a parlour-maid presented herself with the announcement +that there was a person outside who was asking to see Miss Bart; and on +Lily’s pressing for a more specific description, she added:</p> + +<p>“It’s Mrs. Haffen, Miss; she won’t say what she wants.”</p> + +<p>Lily, to whom the name conveyed nothing, opened the door upon a woman in +a battered bonnet, who stood firmly planted under the hall-light. The +glare of the unshaded gas shone familiarly on her pock-marked face and +the reddish baldness visible through thin strands of straw-coloured hair. +Lily looked at the char-woman in surprise.</p> + +<p>“Do you wish to see me?” she asked.</p> + +<p>“I should like to say a word to you, Miss.” The tone was neither +aggressive nor conciliatory: it revealed nothing of the speaker’s errand. +Nevertheless, some precautionary instinct warned Lily to withdraw beyond +ear-shot of the hovering parlour-maid.</p> + +<p>She signed to Mrs. Haffen to follow her into the drawing-room, and closed +the door when they had entered.</p> + +<p>“What is it that you wish?” she enquired.</p> + +<p>The char-woman, after the manner of her kind, stood with her arms folded +in her shawl. Unwinding the latter, she produced a small parcel wrapped +in dirty newspaper.</p> + +<p>“I have something here that you might like to see, Miss Bart.” She spoke +the name with an unpleasant emphasis, as though her knowing it made a +part of her reason for being there. To Lily the intonation sounded like a +threat.</p> + +<p>“You have found something belonging to me?” she asked, extending her hand.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Haffen drew back. “Well, if it comes to that, I guess it’s mine as +much as anybody’s,” she returned.</p> + +<p>Lily looked at her perplexedly. She was sure, now, that her visitor’s +manner conveyed a threat; but, expert as she was in certain directions, +there was nothing in her experience to prepare her for the exact +significance of the present scene. She felt, however, that it must be +ended as promptly as possible.</p> + +<p>“I don’t understand; if this parcel is not mine, why have you asked for +me?”</p> + +<p>The woman was unabashed by the question. She was evidently prepared to +answer it, but like all her class she had to go a long way back to make a +beginning, and it was only after a pause that she replied: “My husband +was janitor to the Benedick till the first of the month; since then he +can’t get nothing to do.”</p> + +<p>Lily remained silent and she continued: “It wasn’t no fault of our own, +neither: the agent had another man he wanted the place for, and we was +put out, bag and baggage, just to suit his fancy. I had a long sickness +last winter, and an operation that ate up all we’d put by; and it’s hard +for me and the children, Haffen being so long out of a job.”</p> + +<p>After all, then, she had come only to ask Miss Bart to find a place for +her husband; or, more probably, to seek the young lady’s intervention +with Mrs. Peniston. Lily had such an air of always getting what she +wanted that she was used to being appealed to as an intermediary, and, +relieved of her vague apprehension, she took refuge in the conventional +formula.</p> + +<p>“I am sorry you have been in trouble,” she said.</p> + +<p>“Oh, that we have, Miss, and it’s on’y just beginning. If on’y we’d ’a +got another situation—but the agent, he’s dead against us. It ain’t no +fault of ours, neither, but——”</p> + +<p>At this point Lily’s impatience overcame her. “If you have anything to +say to me——” she interposed.</p> + +<p>The woman’s resentment of the rebuff seemed to spur her lagging ideas.</p> + +<p>“Yes, Miss; I’m coming to that,” she said. She paused again, with her +eyes on Lily, and then continued, in a tone of diffuse narrative: “When +we was at the Benedick I had charge of some of the gentlemen’s rooms; +leastways, I swep’ ’em out on Saturdays. Some of the gentlemen got the +greatest sight of letters: I never saw the like of it. Their waste-paper +baskets ’d be fairly brimming, and papers falling over on the floor. +Maybe havin’ so many is how they get so careless. Some of ’em is worse +than others. Mr. Selden, Mr. Lawrence Selden, he was always one of the +carefullest: burnt his letters in winter, and tore ’em in little bits in +summer. But sometimes he’d have so many he’d just bunch ’em together, the +way the others did, and tear the lot through once—like this.”</p> + +<p>While she spoke she had loosened the string from the parcel in her hand, +and now she drew forth a letter which she laid on the table between Miss +Bart and herself. As she had said, the letter was torn in two; but with a +rapid gesture she laid the torn edges together and smoothed out the page.</p> + +<p>A wave of indignation swept over Lily. She felt herself in the presence +of something vile, as yet but dimly conjectured—the kind of vileness of +which people whispered, but which she had never thought of as touching +her own life. She drew back with a motion of disgust, but her withdrawal +was checked by a sudden discovery: under the glare of Mrs. Peniston’s +chandelier she had recognized the hand-writing of the letter. It was a +large disjointed hand, with a flourish of masculinity which but slightly +disguised its rambling weakness, and the words, scrawled in heavy ink on +pale-tinted notepaper, smote on Lily’s ear as though she had heard them +spoken.</p> + +<p>At first she did not grasp the full import of the situation. She +understood only that before her lay a letter written by Bertha Dorset, +and addressed, presumably, to Lawrence Selden. There was no date, but the +blackness of the ink proved the writing to be comparatively recent. The +packet in Mrs. Haffen’s hand doubtless contained more letters of the same +kind—a dozen, Lily conjectured from its thickness. The letter before her +was short, but its few words, which had leapt into her brain before she +was conscious of reading them, told a long history—a history over which, +for the last four years, the friends of the writer had smiled and +shrugged, viewing it merely as one among the countless “good situations” +of the mundane comedy. Now the other side presented itself to Lily, the +volcanic nether side of the surface over which conjecture and innuendo +glide so lightly till the first fissure turns their whisper to a shriek. +Lily knew that there is nothing society resents so much as having given +its protection to those who have not known how to profit by it: it is for +having betrayed its connivance that the body social punishes the offender +who is found out. And in this case there was no doubt of the issue. The +code of Lily’s world decreed that a woman’s husband should be the only +judge of her conduct: she was technically above suspicion while she had +the shelter of his approval, or even of his indifference. But with a man +of George Dorset’s temper there could be no thought of condonation—the +possessor of his wife’s letters could overthrow with a touch the whole +structure of her existence. And into what hands Bertha Dorset’s secret +had been delivered! For a moment the irony of the coincidence tinged +Lily’s disgust with a confused sense of triumph. But the disgust +prevailed—all her instinctive resistances, of taste, of training, of +blind inherited scruples, rose against the other feeling. Her strongest +sense was one of personal contamination.</p> + +<p>She moved away, as though to put as much distance as possible between +herself and her visitor. “I know nothing of these letters,” she said; “I +have no idea why you have brought them here.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Haffen faced her steadily. “I’ll tell you why, Miss. I brought ’em +to you to sell, because I ain’t got no other way of raising money, and if +we don’t pay our rent by tomorrow night we’ll be put out. I never done +anythin’ of the kind before, and if you’d speak to Mr. Selden or to Mr. +Rosedale about getting Haffen taken on again at the Benedick—I seen you +talking to Mr. Rosedale on the steps that day you come out of Mr. +Selden’s rooms——”</p> + +<p>The blood rushed to Lily’s forehead. She understood now—Mrs. Haffen +supposed her to be the writer of the letters. In the first leap of her +anger she was about to ring and order the woman out; but an obscure +impulse restrained her. The mention of Selden’s name had started a new +train of thought. Bertha Dorset’s letters were nothing to her—they might +go where the current of chance carried them! But Selden was inextricably +involved in their fate. Men do not, at worst, suffer much from such +exposure; and in this instance the flash of divination which had carried +the meaning of the letters to Lily’s brain had revealed also that they +were appeals—repeated and therefore probably unanswered—for the renewal +of a tie which time had evidently relaxed. Nevertheless, the fact that +the correspondence had been allowed to fall into strange hands would +convict Selden of negligence in a matter where the world holds it least +pardonable; and there were graver risks to consider where a man of +Dorset’s ticklish balance was concerned.</p> + +<p>If she weighed all these things it was unconsciously: she was aware only +of feeling that Selden would wish the letters rescued, and that therefore +she must obtain possession of them. Beyond that her mind did not travel. +She had, indeed, a quick vision of returning the packet to Bertha Dorset, +and of the opportunities the restitution offered; but this thought lit up +abysses from which she shrank back ashamed.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Mrs. Haffen, prompt to perceive her hesitation, had already +opened the packet and ranged its contents on the table. All the letters +had been pieced together with strips of thin paper. Some were in small +fragments, the others merely torn in half. Though there were not many, +thus spread out they nearly covered the table. Lily’s glance fell on a +word here and there—then she said in a low voice: “What do you wish me +to pay you?”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Haffen’s face reddened with satisfaction. It was clear that the +young lady was badly frightened, and Mrs. Haffen was the woman to make +the most of such fears. Anticipating an easier victory than she had +foreseen, she named an exorbitant sum.</p> + +<p>But Miss Bart showed herself a less ready prey than might have been +expected from her imprudent opening. She refused to pay the price named, +and after a moment’s hesitation, met it by a counter-offer of half the +amount.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Haffen immediately stiffened. Her hand travelled toward the +outspread letters, and folding them slowly, she made as though to restore +them to their wrapping.</p> + +<p>“I guess they’re worth more to you than to me, Miss, but the poor has got +to live as well as the rich,” she observed sententiously.</p> + + +<p>Lily was throbbing with fear, but the insinuation fortified her +resistance.</p> + +<p>“You are mistaken,” she said indifferently. “I have offered all I am +willing to give for the letters; but there may be other ways of getting +them.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Haffen raised a suspicious glance: she was too experienced not to +know that the traffic she was engaged in had perils as great as its +rewards, and she had a vision of the elaborate machinery of revenge which +a word of this commanding young lady’s might set in motion.</p> + +<p>She applied the corner of her shawl to her eyes, and murmured through it +that no good came of bearing too hard on the poor, but that for her part +she had never been mixed up in such a business before, and that on her +honour as a Christian all she and Haffen had thought of was that the +letters mustn’t go any farther.</p> + +<p>Lily stood motionless, keeping between herself and the char-woman the +greatest distance compatible with the need of speaking in low tones. The +idea of bargaining for the letters was intolerable to her, but she knew +that, if she appeared to weaken, Mrs. Haffen would at once increase her +original demand.</p> + +<p>She could never afterward recall how long the duel lasted, or what was +the decisive stroke which finally, after a lapse of time recorded in +minutes by the clock, in hours by the precipitate beat of her pulses, put +her in possession of the letters; she knew only that the door had finally +closed, and that she stood alone with the packet in her hand.</p> + +<p>She had no idea of reading the letters; even to unfold Mrs. Haffen’s +dirty newspaper would have seemed degrading. But what did she intend to +do with its contents? The recipient of the letters had meant to destroy +them, and it was her duty to carry out his intention. She had no right to +keep them—to do so was to lessen whatever merit lay in having secured +their possession. But how destroy them so effectually that there should +be no second risk of their falling in such hands? Mrs. Peniston’s icy +drawing-room grate shone with a forbidding lustre: the fire, like the +lamps, was never lit except when there was company.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart was turning to carry the letters upstairs when she heard the +opening of the outer door, and her aunt entered the drawing-room. Mrs. +Peniston was a small plump woman, with a colourless skin lined with +trivial wrinkles. Her grey hair was arranged with precision, and her +clothes looked excessively new and yet slightly old-fashioned. They were +always black and tightly fitting, with an expensive glitter: she was the +kind of woman who wore jet at breakfast. Lily had never seen her when she +was not cuirassed in shining black, with small tight boots, and an air of +being packed and ready to start; yet she never started.</p> + +<p>She looked about the drawing-room with an expression of minute scrutiny. +“I saw a streak of light under one of the blinds as I drove up: it’s +extraordinary that I can never teach that woman to draw them down evenly.”</p> + +<p>Having corrected the irregularity, she seated herself on one of the +glossy purple arm-chairs; Mrs. Peniston always sat on a chair, never in +it.</p> + +<p>Then she turned her glance to Miss Bart. “My dear, you look tired; I +suppose it’s the excitement of the wedding. Cornelia Van Alstyne was full +of it: Molly was there, and Gerty Farish ran in for a minute to tell us +about it. I think it was odd, their serving melons before the CONSOMME: a +wedding breakfast should always begin with CONSOMME. Molly didn’t care +for the bridesmaids’ dresses. She had it straight from Julia Melson that +they cost three hundred dollars apiece at Celeste’s, but she says they +didn’t look it. I’m glad you decided not to be a bridesmaid; that shade +of salmon-pink wouldn’t have suited you.” Mrs. Peniston delighted in +discussing the minutest details of festivities in which she had not taken +part. Nothing would have induced her to undergo the exertion and fatigue +of attending the Van Osburgh wedding, but so great was her interest in +the event that, having heard two versions of it, she now prepared to +extract a third from her niece. Lily, however, had been deplorably +careless in noting the particulars of the entertainment. She had failed +to observe the colour of Mrs. Van Osburgh’s gown, and could not even say +whether the old Van Osburgh Sevres had been used at the bride’s table: +Mrs. Peniston, in short, found that she was of more service as a listener +than as a narrator.</p> + +<p>“Really, Lily, I don’t see why you took the trouble to go to the wedding, +if you don’t remember what happened or whom you saw there. When I was a +girl I used to keep the MENU of every dinner I went to, and write the +names of the people on the back; and I never threw away my cotillion +favours till after your uncle’s death, when it seemed unsuitable to have +so many coloured things about the house. I had a whole closet-full, I +remember; and I can tell to this day what balls I got them at. Molly Van +Alstyne reminds me of what I was at that age; it’s wonderful how she +notices. She was able to tell her mother exactly how the wedding-dress +was cut, and we knew at once, from the fold in the back, that it must +have come from Paquin.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston rose abruptly, and, advancing to the ormolu clock +surmounted by a helmeted Minerva, which throned on the chimney-piece +between two malachite vases, passed her lace handkerchief between the +helmet and its visor.</p> + +<p>“I knew it—the parlour-maid never dusts there!” she exclaimed, +triumphantly displaying a minute spot on the handkerchief; then, +reseating herself, she went on: “Molly thought Mrs. Dorset the +best-dressed woman at the wedding. I’ve no doubt her dress DID cost more +than any one else’s, but I can’t quite like the idea—a combination of +sable and POINT DE MILAN. It seems she goes to a new man in Paris, who +won’t take an order till his client has spent a day with him at his villa +at Neuilly. He says he must study his subject’s home life—a most +peculiar arrangement, I should say! But Mrs. Dorset told Molly about it +herself: she said the villa was full of the most exquisite things and she +was really sorry to leave. Molly said she never saw her looking better; +she was in tremendous spirits, and said she had made a match between Evie +Van Osburgh and Percy Gryce. She really seems to have a very good +influence on young men. I hear she is interesting herself now in that +silly Silverton boy, who has had his head turned by Carry Fisher, and has +been gambling so dreadfully. Well, as I was saying, Evie is really +engaged: Mrs. Dorset had her to stay with Percy Gryce, and managed it +all, and Grace Van Osburgh is in the seventh heaven—she had almost +despaired of marrying Evie.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston again paused, but this time her scrutiny addressed itself, +not to the furniture, but to her niece.</p> + +<p>“Cornelia Van Alstyne was so surprised: she had heard that you were to +marry young Gryce. She saw the Wetheralls just after they had stopped +with you at Bellomont, and Alice Wetherall was quite sure there was an +engagement. She said that when Mr. Gryce left unexpectedly one morning, +they all thought he had rushed to town for the ring.”</p> + +<p>Lily rose and moved toward the door.</p> + +<p>“I believe I AM tired: I think I will go to bed,” she said; and Mrs. +Peniston, suddenly distracted by the discovery that the easel sustaining +the late Mr. Peniston’s crayon-portrait was not exactly in line with the +sofa in front of it, presented an absent-minded brow to her kiss.</p> + +<p>In her own room Lily turned up the gas-jet and glanced toward the grate. +It was as brilliantly polished as the one below, but here at least she +could burn a few papers with less risk of incurring her aunt’s +disapproval. She made no immediate motion to do so, however, but dropping +into a chair looked wearily about her. Her room was large and +comfortably-furnished—it was the envy and admiration of poor Grace +Stepney, who boarded; but, contrasted with the light tints and luxurious +appointments of the guest-rooms where so many weeks of Lily’s existence +were spent, it seemed as dreary as a prison. The monumental wardrobe and +bedstead of black walnut had migrated from Mr. Peniston’s bedroom, and +the magenta “flock” wall-paper, of a pattern dear to the early ’sixties, +was hung with large steel engravings of an anecdotic character. Lily had +tried to mitigate this charmless background by a few frivolous touches, +in the shape of a lace-decked toilet table and a little painted desk +surmounted by photographs; but the futility of the attempt struck her as +she looked about the room. What a contrast to the subtle elegance of the +setting she had pictured for herself—an apartment which should surpass +the complicated luxury of her friends’ surroundings by the whole extent +of that artistic sensibility which made her feel herself their superior; +in which every tint and line should combine to enhance her beauty and +give distinction to her leisure! Once more the haunting sense of physical +ugliness was intensified by her mental depression, so that each piece of +the offending furniture seemed to thrust forth its most aggressive angle.</p> + +<p>Her aunt’s words had told her nothing new; but they had revived the +vision of Bertha Dorset, smiling, flattered, victorious, holding her up +to ridicule by insinuations intelligible to every member of their little +group. The thought of the ridicule struck deeper than any other +sensation: Lily knew every turn of the allusive jargon which could flay +its victims without the shedding of blood. Her cheek burned at the +recollection, and she rose and caught up the letters. She no longer meant +to destroy them: that intention had been effaced by the quick corrosion +of Mrs. Peniston’s words.</p> + +<p>Instead, she approached her desk, and lighting a taper, tied and sealed +the packet; then she opened the wardrobe, drew out a despatch-box, and +deposited the letters within it. As she did so, it struck her with a +flash of irony that she was indebted to Gus Trenor for the means of +buying them.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_10">Chapter 10</h2> + +<p>The autumn dragged on monotonously. Miss Bart had received one or two +notes from Judy Trenor, reproaching her for not returning to Bellomont; +but she replied evasively, alleging the obligation to remain with her +aunt. In truth, however, she was fast wearying of her solitary existence +with Mrs. Peniston, and only the excitement of spending her +newly-acquired money lightened the dulness of the days.</p> + +<p>All her life Lily had seen money go out as quickly as it came in, and +whatever theories she cultivated as to the prudence of setting aside a +part of her gains, she had unhappily no saving vision of the risks of the +opposite course. It was a keen satisfaction to feel that, for a few +months at least, she would be independent of her friends’ bounty, that +she could show herself abroad without wondering whether some penetrating +eye would detect in her dress the traces of Judy Trenor’s refurbished +splendour. The fact that the money freed her temporarily from all minor +obligations obscured her sense of the greater one it represented, and +having never before known what it was to command so large a sum, she +lingered delectably over the amusement of spending it.</p> + +<p>It was on one of these occasions that, leaving a shop where she had spent +an hour of deliberation over a dressing-case of the most complicated +elegance, she ran across Miss Farish, who had entered the same +establishment with the modest object of having her watch repaired. Lily +was feeling unusually virtuous. She had decided to defer the purchase of +the dressing-case till she should receive the bill for her new +opera cloak, and the resolve made her feel much richer than when she had +entered the shop. In this mood of self-approval she had a sympathetic eye +for others, and she was struck by her friend’s air of dejection.</p> + +<p>Miss Farish, it appeared, had just left the committee-meeting of a +struggling charity in which she was interested. The object of the +association was to provide comfortable lodgings, with a reading-room and +other modest distractions, where young women of the class employed in +downtown offices might find a home when out of work, or in need of rest, +and the first year’s financial report showed so deplorably small a +balance that Miss Farish, who was convinced of the urgency of the work, +felt proportionately discouraged by the small amount of interest it +aroused. The other-regarding sentiments had not been cultivated in Lily, +and she was often bored by the relation of her friend’s philanthropic +efforts, but today her quick dramatizing fancy seized on the contrast +between her own situation and that represented by some of Gerty’s +“cases.” These were young girls, like herself; some perhaps pretty, some +not without a trace of her finer sensibilities. She pictured herself +leading such a life as theirs—a life in which achievement seemed as +squalid as failure—and the vision made her shudder sympathetically. The +price of the dressing-case was still in her pocket; and drawing out her +little gold purse she slipped a liberal fraction of the amount into Miss +Farish’s hand.</p> + +<p>The satisfaction derived from this act was all that the most ardent +moralist could have desired. Lily felt a new interest in herself as a +person of charitable instincts: she had never before thought of doing +good with the wealth she had so often dreamed of possessing, but now her +horizon was enlarged by the vision of a prodigal philanthropy. Moreover, +by some obscure process of logic, she felt that her momentary burst of +generosity had justified all previous extravagances, and excused any in +which she might subsequently indulge. Miss Farish’s surprise and +gratitude confirmed this feeling, and Lily parted from her with a sense +of self-esteem which she naturally mistook for the fruits of altruism.</p> + +<p>About this time she was farther cheered by an invitation to spend the +Thanksgiving week at a camp in the Adirondacks. The invitation was one +which, a year earlier, would have provoked a less ready response, for the +party, though organized by Mrs. Fisher, was ostensibly given by a lady of +obscure origin and indomitable social ambitions, whose acquaintance Lily +had hitherto avoided. Now, however, she was disposed to coincide with +Mrs. Fisher’s view, that it didn’t matter who gave the party, as long as +things were well done; and doing things well (under competent direction) +was Mrs. Wellington Bry’s strong point. The lady (whose consort was known +as “Welly” Bry on the Stock Exchange and in sporting circles) had already +sacrificed one husband, and sundry minor considerations, to her +determination to get on; and, having obtained a hold on Carry Fisher, she +was astute enough to perceive the wisdom of committing herself entirely +to that lady’s guidance. Everything, accordingly, was well done, for +there was no limit to Mrs. Fisher’s prodigality when she was not spending +her own money, and as she remarked to her pupil, a good cook was the best +introduction to society. If the company was not as select as the CUISINE, +the Welly Brys at least had the satisfaction of figuring for the first +time in the society columns in company with one or two noticeable names; +and foremost among these was of course Miss Bart’s. The young lady was +treated by her hosts with corresponding deference; and she was in the +mood when such attentions are acceptable, whatever their source. Mrs. +Bry’s admiration was a mirror in which Lily’s self-complacency recovered +its lost outline. No insect hangs its nest on threads as frail as those +which will sustain the weight of human vanity; and the sense of being of +importance among the insignificant was enough to restore to Miss Bart the +gratifying consciousness of power. If these people paid court to her it +proved that she was still conspicuous in the world to which they aspired; +and she was not above a certain enjoyment in dazzling them by her +fineness, in developing their puzzled perception of her superiorities.</p> + +<p>Perhaps, however, her enjoyment proceeded more than she was aware from +the physical stimulus of the excursion, the challenge of crisp cold and +hard exercise, the responsive thrill of her body to the influences of the +winter woods. She returned to town in a glow of rejuvenation, conscious +of a clearer colour in her cheeks, a fresh elasticity in her muscles. The +future seemed full of a vague promise, and all her apprehensions were +swept out of sight on the buoyant current of her mood.</p> + +<p>A few days after her return to town she had the unpleasant surprise of a +visit from Mr. Rosedale. He came late, at the confidential hour when the +tea-table still lingers by the fire in friendly expectancy; and his +manner showed a readiness to adapt itself to the intimacy of the occasion.</p> + +<p>Lily, who had a vague sense of his being somehow connected with her lucky +speculations, tried to give him the welcome he expected; but there was +something in the quality of his geniality which chilled her own, and she +was conscious of marking each step in their acquaintance by a fresh +blunder.</p> + +<p>Mr. Rosedale—making himself promptly at home in an adjoining easy-chair, +and sipping his tea critically, with the comment: “You ought to go to my +man for something really good”—appeared totally unconscious of the +repugnance which kept her in frozen erectness behind the urn. It was +perhaps her very manner of holding herself aloof that appealed to his +collector’s passion for the rare and unattainable. He gave, at any rate, +no sign of resenting it and seemed prepared to supply in his own manner +all the ease that was lacking in hers.</p> + +<p>His object in calling was to ask her to go to the opera in his box on the +opening night, and seeing her hesitate he said persuasively: “Mrs. Fisher +is coming, and I’ve secured a tremendous admirer of yours, who’ll never +forgive me if you don’t accept.”</p> + +<p>As Lily’s silence left him with this allusion on his hands, he added with +a confidential smile: “Gus Trenor has promised to come to town on +purpose. I fancy he’d go a good deal farther for the pleasure of seeing +you.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart felt an inward motion of annoyance: it was distasteful enough +to hear her name coupled with Trenor’s, and on Rosedale’s lips the +allusion was peculiarly unpleasant.</p> + +<p>“The Trenors are my best friends—I think we should all go a long way to +see each other,” she said, absorbing herself in the preparation of fresh +tea.</p> + +<p>Her visitor’s smile grew increasingly intimate. “Well, I wasn’t thinking +of Mrs. Trenor at the moment—they say Gus doesn’t always, you know.” +Then, dimly conscious that he had not struck the right note, he added, +with a well-meant effort at diversion: “How’s your luck been going in +Wall Street, by the way? I hear Gus pulled off a nice little pile for you +last month.”</p> + +<p>Lily put down the tea-caddy with an abrupt gesture. She felt that her +hands were trembling, and clasped them on her knee to steady them; but +her lip trembled too, and for a moment she was afraid the tremor might +communicate itself to her voice. When she spoke, however, it was in a +tone of perfect lightness.</p> + +<p>“Ah, yes—I had a little bit of money to invest, and Mr. Trenor, who +helps me about such matters, advised my putting it in stocks instead of a +mortgage, as my aunt’s agent wanted me to do; and as it happened, I made +a lucky ‘turn’—is that what you call it? For you make a great many +yourself, I believe.”</p> + +<p>She was smiling back at him now, relaxing the tension of her attitude, +and admitting him, by imperceptible gradations of glance and manner, a +step farther toward intimacy. The protective instinct always nerved her +to successful dissimulation, and it was not the first time she had used +her beauty to divert attention from an inconvenient topic.</p> + +<p>When Mr. Rosedale took leave, he carried with him, not only her +acceptance of his invitation, but a general sense of having comported +himself in a way calculated to advance his cause. He had always believed +he had a light touch and a knowing way with women, and the prompt manner +in which Miss Bart (as he would have phrased it) had “come into line,” +confirmed his confidence in his powers of handling this skittish sex. Her +way of glossing over the transaction with Trenor he regarded at once as a +tribute to his own acuteness, and a confirmation of his suspicions. The +girl was evidently nervous, and Mr. Rosedale, if he saw no other means of +advancing his acquaintance with her, was not above taking advantage of +her nervousness.</p> + +<p>He left Lily to a passion of disgust and fear. It seemed incredible that +Gus Trenor should have spoken of her to Rosedale. With all his faults, +Trenor had the safeguard of his traditions, and was the less likely to +overstep them because they were so purely instinctive. But Lily recalled +with a pang that there were convivial moments when, as Judy had confided +to her, Gus “talked foolishly”: in one of these, no doubt, the fatal word +had slipped from him. As for Rosedale, she did not, after the first +shock, greatly care what conclusions he had drawn. Though usually adroit +enough where her own interests were concerned, she made the mistake, not +uncommon to persons in whom the social habits are instinctive, of +supposing that the inability to acquire them quickly implies a general +dulness. Because a blue-bottle bangs irrationally against a window-pane, +the drawing-room naturalist may forget that under less artificial +conditions it is capable of measuring distances and drawing conclusions +with all the accuracy needful to its welfare; and the fact that Mr. +Rosedale’s drawing-room manner lacked perspective made Lily class him +with Trenor and the other dull men she knew, and assume that a little +flattery, and the occasional acceptance of his hospitality, would suffice +to render him innocuous. However, there could be no doubt of the +expediency of showing herself in his box on the opening night of the +opera; and after all, since Judy Trenor had promised to take him up that +winter, it was as well to reap the advantage of being first in the field.</p> + +<p>For a day or two after Rosedale’s visit, Lily’s thoughts were dogged by +the consciousness of Trenor’s shadowy claim, and she wished she had a +clearer notion of the exact nature of the transaction which seemed to +have put her in his power; but her mind shrank from any unusual +application, and she was always helplessly puzzled by figures. Moreover +she had not seen Trenor since the day of the Van Osburgh wedding, and in +his continued absence the trace of Rosedale’s words was soon effaced by +other impressions.</p> + +<p>When the opening night of the opera came, her apprehensions had so +completely vanished that the sight of Trenor’s ruddy countenance in the +back of Mr. Rosedale’s box filled her with a sense of pleasant +reassurance. Lily had not quite reconciled herself to the necessity of +appearing as Rosedale’s guest on so conspicuous an occasion, and it was a +relief to find herself supported by any one of her own set—for Mrs. +Fisher’s social habits were too promiscuous for her presence to justify +Miss Bart’s.</p> + +<p>To Lily, always inspirited by the prospect of showing her beauty in +public, and conscious tonight of all the added enhancements of dress, the +insistency of Trenor’s gaze merged itself in the general stream of +admiring looks of which she felt herself the centre. Ah, it was good to +be young, to be radiant, to glow with the sense of slenderness, strength +and elasticity, of well-poised lines and happy tints, to feel one’s self +lifted to a height apart by that incommunicable grace which is the bodily +counterpart of genius!</p> + +<p>All means seemed justifiable to attain such an end, or rather, by a happy +shifting of lights with which practice had familiarized Miss Bart, the +cause shrank to a pin-point in the general brightness of the effect. But +brilliant young ladies, a little blinded by their own effulgence, are apt +to forget that the modest satellite drowned in their light is still +performing its own revolutions and generating heat at its own rate. If +Lily’s poetic enjoyment of the moment was undisturbed by the base thought +that her gown and opera cloak had been indirectly paid for by Gus Trenor, +the latter had not sufficient poetry in his composition to lose sight of +these prosaic facts. He knew only that he had never seen Lily look +smarter in her life, that there wasn’t a woman in the house who showed +off good clothes as she did, and that hitherto he, to whom she owed the +opportunity of making this display, had reaped no return beyond that of +gazing at her in company with several hundred other pairs of eyes.</p> + +<p>It came to Lily therefore as a disagreeable surprise when, in the back of +the box, where they found themselves alone between two acts, Trenor said, +without preamble, and in a tone of sulky authority: “Look here, Lily, how +is a fellow ever to see anything of you? I’m in town three or four days +in the week, and you know a line to the club will always find me, but you +don’t seem to remember my existence nowadays unless you want to get a tip +out of me.”</p> + +<p>The fact that the remark was in distinctly bad taste did not make it any +easier to answer, for Lily was vividly aware that it was not the moment +for that drawing up of her slim figure and surprised lifting of the brows +by which she usually quelled incipient signs of familiarity.</p> + +<p>“I’m very much flattered by your wanting to see me,” she returned, +essaying lightness instead, “but, unless you have mislaid my address, it +would have been easy to find me any afternoon at my aunt’s—in fact, I +rather expected you to look me up there.”</p> + +<p>If she hoped to mollify him by this last concession the attempt was a +failure, for he only replied, with the familiar lowering of the brows +that made him look his dullest when he was angry: “Hang going to your +aunt’s, and wasting the afternoon listening to a lot of other chaps +talking to you! You know I’m not the kind to sit in a crowd and jaw—I’d +always rather clear out when that sort of circus is going on. But why +can’t we go off somewhere on a little lark together—a nice quiet little +expedition like that drive at Bellomont, the day you met me at the +station?”</p> + +<p>He leaned unpleasantly close in order to convey this suggestion, and she +fancied she caught a significant aroma which explained the dark flush on +his face and the glistening dampness of his forehead.</p> + +<p>The idea that any rash answer might provoke an unpleasant outburst +tempered her disgust with caution, and she answered with a laugh: “I +don’t see how one can very well take country drives in town, but I am not +always surrounded by an admiring throng, and if you will let me know what +afternoon you are coming I will arrange things so that we can have a nice +quiet talk.”</p> + +<p>“Hang talking! That’s what you always say,” returned Trenor, whose +expletives lacked variety. “You put me off with that at the Van Osburgh +wedding—but the plain English of it is that, now you’ve got what you +wanted out of me, you’d rather have any other fellow about.”</p> + +<p>His voice had risen sharply with the last words, and Lily flushed with +annoyance, but she kept command of the situation and laid a persuasive +hand on his arm.</p> + +<p>“Don’t be foolish, Gus; I can’t let you talk to me in that ridiculous +way. If you really want to see me, why shouldn’t we take a walk in the +Park some afternoon? I agree with you that it’s amusing to be rustic in +town, and if you like I’ll meet you there, and we’ll go and feed the +squirrels, and you shall take me out on the lake in the steam-gondola.”</p> + +<p>She smiled as she spoke, letting her eyes rest on his in a way that took +the edge from her banter and made him suddenly malleable to her will.</p> + +<p>“All right, then: that’s a go. Will you come tomorrow? Tomorrow at three +o’clock, at the end of the Mall. I’ll be there sharp, remember; you won’t +go back on me, Lily?”</p> + +<p>But to Miss Bart’s relief the repetition of her promise was cut short by +the opening of the box door to admit George Dorset.</p> + +<p>Trenor sulkily yielded his place, and Lily turned a brilliant smile on +the newcomer. She had not talked with Dorset since their visit at +Bellomont, but something in his look and manner told her that he recalled +the friendly footing on which they had last met. He was not a man to whom +the expression of admiration came easily: his long sallow face and +distrustful eyes seemed always barricaded against the expansive emotions. +But, where her own influence was concerned, Lily’s intuitions sent out +thread-like feelers, and as she made room for him on the narrow sofa she +was sure he found a dumb pleasure in being near her. Few women took the +trouble to make themselves agreeable to Dorset, and Lily had been kind to +him at Bellomont, and was now smiling on him with a divine renewal of +kindness.</p> + +<p>“Well, here we are, in for another six months of caterwauling,” he began +complainingly. “Not a shade of difference between this year and last, +except that the women have got new clothes and the singers haven’t got +new voices. My wife’s musical, you know—puts me through a course of this +every winter. It isn’t so bad on Italian nights—then she comes late, and +there’s time to digest. But when they give Wagner we have to rush +dinner, and I pay up for it. And the draughts are damnable—asphyxia in +front and pleurisy in the back. There’s Trenor leaving the box without +drawing the curtain! With a hide like that draughts don’t make any +difference. Did you ever watch Trenor eat? If you did, you’d wonder why +he’s alive; I suppose he’s leather inside too.—But I came to say that my +wife wants you to come down to our place next Sunday. Do for heaven’s +sake say yes. She’s got a lot of bores coming—intellectual ones, I mean; +that’s her new line, you know, and I’m not sure it ain’t worse than the +music. Some of ’em have long hair, and they start an argument with the +soup, and don’t notice when things are handed to them. The consequence is +the dinner gets cold, and I have dyspepsia. That silly ass Silverton +brings them to the house—he writes poetry, you know, and Bertha and he +are getting tremendously thick. She could write better than any of ’em if +she chose, and I don’t blame her for wanting clever fellows about; all I +say is: ‘Don’t let me see ’em eat!’”</p> + +<p>The gist of this strange communication gave Lily a distinct thrill of +pleasure. Under ordinary circumstances, there would have been nothing +surprising in an invitation from Bertha Dorset; but since the Bellomont +episode an unavowed hostility had kept the two women apart. Now, with a +start of inner wonder, Lily felt that her thirst for retaliation had died +out. IF YOU WOULD FORGIVE YOUR ENEMY, says the Malay proverb, FIRST +INFLICT A HURT ON HIM; and Lily was experiencing the truth of the +apothegm. If she had destroyed Mrs. Dorset’s letters, she might have +continued to hate her; but the fact that they remained in her possession +had fed her resentment to satiety.</p> + +<p>She uttered a smiling acceptance, hailing in the renewal of the tie an +escape from Trenor’s importunities.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_11">Chapter 11</h2> + +<p>Meanwhile the holidays had gone by and the season was beginning. Fifth +Avenue had become a nightly torrent of carriages surging upward to the +fashionable quarters about the Park, where illuminated windows and +outspread awnings betokened the usual routine of hospitality. Other +tributary currents crossed the mainstream, bearing their freight to the +theatres, restaurants or opera; and Mrs. Peniston, from the secluded +watch-tower of her upper window, could tell to a nicety just when the +chronic volume of sound was increased by the sudden influx setting toward +a Van Osburgh ball, or when the multiplication of wheels meant merely +that the opera was over, or that there was a big supper at Sherry’s.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston followed the rise and culmination of the season as keenly +as the most active sharer in its gaieties; and, as a looker-on, she +enjoyed opportunities of comparison and generalization such as those who +take part must proverbially forego. No one could have kept a more +accurate record of social fluctuations, or have put a more unerring +finger on the distinguishing features of each season: its dulness, its +extravagance, its lack of balls or excess of divorces. She had a special +memory for the vicissitudes of the “new people” who rose to the surface +with each recurring tide, and were either submerged beneath its rush or +landed triumphantly beyond the reach of envious breakers; and she was apt +to display a remarkable retrospective insight into their ultimate fate, +so that, when they had fulfilled their destiny, she was almost always +able to say to Grace Stepney—the recipient of her prophecies—that she +had known exactly what would happen.</p> + +<p>This particular season Mrs. Peniston would have characterized as that in +which everybody “felt poor” except the Welly Brys and Mr. Simon Rosedale. +It had been a bad autumn in Wall Street, where prices fell in accordance +with that peculiar law which proves railway stocks and bales of cotton to +be more sensitive to the allotment of executive power than many estimable +citizens trained to all the advantages of self-government. Even fortunes +supposed to be independent of the market either betrayed a secret +dependence on it, or suffered from a sympathetic affection: fashion +sulked in its country houses, or came to town incognito, general +entertainments were discountenanced, and informality and short dinners +became the fashion.</p> + +<p>But society, amused for a while at playing Cinderella, soon wearied of +the hearthside role, and welcomed the Fairy Godmother in the shape of any +magician powerful enough to turn the shrunken pumpkin back again into the +golden coach. The mere fact of growing richer at a time when most +people’s investments are shrinking, is calculated to attract envious +attention; and according to Wall Street rumours, Welly Bry and Rosedale +had found the secret of performing this miracle.</p> + +<p>Rosedale, in particular, was said to have doubled his fortune, and there +was talk of his buying the newly-finished house of one of the victims of +the crash, who, in the space of twelve short months, had made the same +number of millions, built a house in Fifth Avenue, filled a +picture gallery with old masters, entertained all New York in it, and +been smuggled out of the country between a trained nurse and a doctor, +while his creditors mounted guard over the old masters, and his guests +explained to each other that they had dined with him only because they +wanted to see the pictures. Mr. Rosedale meant to have a less meteoric +career. He knew he should have to go slowly, and the instincts of his +race fitted him to suffer rebuffs and put up with delays. But he was +prompt to perceive that the general dulness of the season afforded him an +unusual opportunity to shine, and he set about with patient industry to +form a background for his growing glory. Mrs. Fisher was of immense +service to him at this period. She had set off so many newcomers on the +social stage that she was like one of those pieces of stock scenery which +tell the experienced spectator exactly what is going to take place. But +Mr. Rosedale wanted, in the long run, a more individual environment. He +was sensitive to shades of difference which Miss Bart would never have +credited him with perceiving, because he had no corresponding variations +of manner; and it was becoming more and more clear to him that Miss Bart +herself possessed precisely the complementary qualities needed to round +off his social personality.</p> + +<p>Such details did not fall within the range of Mrs. Peniston’s vision. +Like many minds of panoramic sweep, hers was apt to overlook the MINUTIAE +of the foreground, and she was much more likely to know where Carry +Fisher had found the Welly Brys’ CHEF for them, than what was happening +to her own niece. She was not, however, without purveyors of information +ready to supplement her deficiencies. Grace Stepney’s mind was like a +kind of moral fly-paper, to which the buzzing items of gossip were drawn +by a fatal attraction, and where they hung fast in the toils of an +inexorable memory. Lily would have been surprised to know how many +trivial facts concerning herself were lodged in Miss Stepney’s head. She +was quite aware that she was of interest to dingy people, but she assumed +that there is only one form of dinginess, and that admiration for +brilliancy is the natural expression of its inferior state. She knew that +Gerty Farish admired her blindly, and therefore supposed that she +inspired the same sentiments in Grace Stepney, whom she classified as a +Gerty Farish without the saving traits of youth and enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>In reality, the two differed from each other as much as they differed +from the object of their mutual contemplation. Miss Farish’s heart was a +fountain of tender illusions, Miss Stepney’s a precise register of facts +as manifested in their relation to herself. She had sensibilities which, +to Lily, would have seemed comic in a person with a freckled nose and red +eyelids, who lived in a boarding-house and admired Mrs. Peniston’s +drawing-room; but poor Grace’s limitations gave them a more concentrated +inner life, as poor soil starves certain plants into intenser +efflorescence. She had in truth no abstract propensity to malice: she did +not dislike Lily because the latter was brilliant and predominant, but +because she thought that Lily disliked her. It is less mortifying to +believe one’s self unpopular than insignificant, and vanity prefers to +assume that indifference is a latent form of unfriendliness. Even such +scant civilities as Lily accorded to Mr. Rosedale would have made Miss +Stepney her friend for life; but how could she foresee that such a friend +was worth cultivating? How, moreover, can a young woman who has never +been ignored measure the pang which this injury inflicts? And, lastly, +how could Lily, accustomed to choose between a pressure of engagements, +guess that she had mortally offended Miss Stepney by causing her to be +excluded from one of Mrs. Peniston’s infrequent dinner-parties?</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston disliked giving dinners, but she had a high sense of family +obligation, and on the Jack Stepneys’ return from their honeymoon she +felt it incumbent upon her to light the drawing-room lamps and extract +her best silver from the Safe Deposit vaults. Mrs. Peniston’s rare +entertainments were preceded by days of heart-rending vacillation as to +every detail of the feast, from the seating of the guests to the pattern +of the table-cloth, and in the course of one of these preliminary +discussions she had imprudently suggested to her cousin Grace that, as +the dinner was a family affair, she might be included in it. For a week +the prospect had lighted up Miss Stepney’s colourless existence; then she +had been given to understand that it would be more convenient to have her +another day. Miss Stepney knew exactly what had happened. Lily, to whom +family reunions were occasions of unalloyed dulness, had persuaded her +aunt that a dinner of “smart” people would be much more to the taste of +the young couple, and Mrs. Peniston, who leaned helplessly on her niece +in social matters, had been prevailed upon to pronounce Grace’s exile. +After all, Grace could come any other day; why should she mind being put +off?</p> + +<p>It was precisely because Miss Stepney could come any other day—and +because she knew her relations were in the secret of her unoccupied +evenings—that this incident loomed gigantically on her horizon. She was +aware that she had Lily to thank for it; and dull resentment was turned +to active animosity.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston, on whom she had looked in a day or two after the dinner, +laid down her crochet-work and turned abruptly from her oblique survey of +Fifth Avenue.</p> + +<p>“Gus Trenor?—Lily and Gus Trenor?” she said, growing so suddenly pale +that her visitor was almost alarmed.</p> + +<p>“Oh, cousin Julia . . . of course I don’t mean....”</p> + +<p>“I don’t know what you DO mean,” said Mrs. Peniston, with a frightened +quiver in her small fretful voice. “Such things were never heard of in my +day. And my own niece! I’m not sure I understand you. Do people say he’s +in love with her?”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston’s horror was genuine. Though she boasted an unequalled +familiarity with the secret chronicles of society, she had the innocence +of the school-girl who regards wickedness as a part of “history,” and to +whom it never occurs that the scandals she reads of in lesson-hours may +be repeating themselves in the next street. Mrs. Peniston had kept her +imagination shrouded, like the drawing-room furniture. She knew, of +course, that society was “very much changed,” and that many women her +mother would have thought “peculiar” were now in a position to be +critical about their visiting-lists; she had discussed the perils of +divorce with her rector, and had felt thankful at times that Lily was +still unmarried; but the idea that any scandal could attach to a young +girl’s name, above all that it could be lightly coupled with that of a +married man, was so new to her that she was as much aghast as if she had +been accused of leaving her carpets down all summer, or of violating any +of the other cardinal laws of house-keeping.</p> + +<p>Miss Stepney, when her first fright had subsided, began to feel the +superiority that greater breadth of mind confers. It was really pitiable +to be as ignorant of the world as Mrs. Peniston! She smiled at the +latter’s question. “People always say unpleasant things—and certainly +they’re a great deal together. A friend of mine met them the other +afternoon in the Park—quite late, after the lamps were lit. It’s a pity +Lily makes herself so conspicuous.”</p> + +<p>“CONSPICUOUS!” gasped Mrs. Peniston. She bent forward, lowering her voice +to mitigate the horror. “What sort of things do they say? That he means +to get a divorce and marry her?”</p> + +<p>Grace Stepney laughed outright. “Dear me, no! He would hardly do that. +It—it’s a flirtation—nothing more.”</p> + +<p>“A flirtation? Between my niece and a married man? Do you mean to tell me +that, with Lily’s looks and advantages, she could find no better use for +her time than to waste it on a fat stupid man almost old enough to be her +father?” This argument had such a convincing ring that it gave Mrs. +Peniston sufficient reassurance to pick up her work, while she waited for +Grace Stepney to rally her scattered forces.</p> + +<p>But Miss Stepney was on the spot in an instant. “That’s the worst of +it—people say she isn’t wasting her time! Every one knows, as you say, +that Lily is too handsome and—and charming—to devote herself to a man +like Gus Trenor unless—”</p> + +<p>“Unless?” echoed Mrs. Peniston. Her visitor drew breath nervously. It was +agreeable to shock Mrs. Peniston, but not to shock her to the verge of +anger. Miss Stepney was not sufficiently familiar with the classic drama +to have recalled in advance how bearers of bad tidings are proverbially +received, but she now had a rapid vision of forfeited dinners and a +reduced wardrobe as the possible consequence of her disinterestedness. To +the honour of her sex, however, hatred of Lily prevailed over more +personal considerations. Mrs. Peniston had chosen the wrong moment to +boast of her niece’s charms.</p> + +<p>“Unless,” said Grace, leaning forward to speak with low-toned emphasis, +“unless there are material advantages to be gained by making herself +agreeable to him.”</p> + +<p>She felt that the moment was tremendous, and remembered suddenly that +Mrs. Peniston’s black brocade, with the cut jet fringe, would have been +hers at the end of the season.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston put down her work again. Another aspect of the same idea +had presented itself to her, and she felt that it was beneath her dignity +to have her nerves racked by a dependent relative who wore her old +clothes.</p> + +<p>“If you take pleasure in annoying me by mysterious insinuations,” she +said coldly, “you might at least have chosen a more suitable time than +just as I am recovering from the strain of giving a large dinner.”</p> + +<p>The mention of the dinner dispelled Miss Stepney’s last scruples. “I +don’t know why I should be accused of taking pleasure in telling you +about Lily. I was sure I shouldn’t get any thanks for it,” she returned +with a flare of temper. “But I have some family feeling left, and as you +are the only person who has any authority over Lily, I thought you ought +to know what is being said of her.”</p> + +<p>“Well,” said Mrs. Peniston, “what I complain of is that you haven’t told +me yet what IS being said.”</p> + +<p>“I didn’t suppose I should have to put it so plainly. People say that Gus +Trenor pays her bills.”</p> + +<p>“Pays her bills—her bills?” Mrs. Peniston broke into a laugh. “I can’t +imagine where you can have picked up such rubbish. Lily has her own +income—and I provide for her very handsomely—”</p> + +<p>“Oh, we all know that,” interposed Miss Stepney drily. “But Lily wears a +great many smart gowns—”</p> + +<p>“I like her to be well-dressed—it’s only suitable!”</p> + +<p>“Certainly; but then there are her gambling debts besides.”</p> + +<p>Miss Stepney, in the beginning, had not meant to bring up this point; but +Mrs. Peniston had only her own incredulity to blame. She was like the +stiff-necked unbelievers of Scripture, who must be annihilated to be +convinced.</p> + +<p>“Gambling debts? Lily?” Mrs. Peniston’s voice shook with anger and +bewilderment. She wondered whether Grace Stepney had gone out of her +mind. “What do you mean by her gambling debts?”</p> + +<p>“Simply that if one plays bridge for money in Lily’s set one is liable to +lose a great deal—and I don’t suppose Lily always wins.”</p> + +<p>“Who told you that my niece played cards for money?”</p> + +<p>“Mercy, cousin Julia, don’t look at me as if I were trying to turn you +against Lily! Everybody knows she is crazy about bridge. Mrs. Gryce told +me herself that it was her gambling that frightened Percy Gryce—it seems +he was really taken with her at first. But, of course, among Lily’s +friends it’s quite the custom for girls to play for money. In fact, +people are inclined to excuse her on that account——”</p> + +<p>“To excuse her for what?”</p> + +<p>“For being hard up—and accepting attentions from men like Gus +Trenor—and George Dorset——”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston gave another cry. “George Dorset? Is there any one else? I +should like to know the worst, if you please.”</p> + +<p>“Don’t put it in that way, cousin Julia. Lately Lily has been a good deal +with the Dorsets, and he seems to admire her—but of course that’s only +natural. And I’m sure there is no truth in the horrid things people say; +but she HAS been spending a great deal of money this winter. Evie Van +Osburgh was at Celeste’s ordering her trousseau the other day—yes, the +marriage takes place next month—and she told me that Celeste showed her +the most exquisite things she was just sending home to Lily. And people +say that Judy Trenor has quarrelled with her on account of Gus; but I’m +sure I’m sorry I spoke, though I only meant it as a kindness.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston’s genuine incredulity enabled her to dismiss Miss Stepney +with a disdain which boded ill for that lady’s prospect of succeeding to +the black brocade; but minds impenetrable to reason have generally some +crack through which suspicion filters, and her visitor’s insinuations did +not glide off as easily as she had expected. Mrs. Peniston disliked +scenes, and her determination to avoid them had always led her to hold +herself aloof from the details of Lily’s life. In her youth, girls had +not been supposed to require close supervision. They were generally +assumed to be taken up with the legitimate business of courtship and +marriage, and interference in such affairs on the part of their natural +guardians was considered as unwarrantable as a spectator’s suddenly +joining in a game. There had of course been “fast” girls even in Mrs. +Peniston’s early experience; but their fastness, at worst, was understood +to be a mere excess of animal spirits, against which there could be no +graver charge than that of being “unladylike.” The modern fastness +appeared synonymous with immorality, and the mere idea of immorality was +as offensive to Mrs. Peniston as a smell of cooking in the drawing-room: +it was one of the conceptions her mind refused to admit.</p> + +<p>She had no immediate intention of repeating to Lily what she had heard, +or even of trying to ascertain its truth by means of discreet +interrogation. To do so might be to provoke a scene; and a scene, in the +shaken state of Mrs. Peniston’s nerves, with the effects of her dinner +not worn off, and her mind still tremulous with new impressions, was a +risk she deemed it her duty to avoid. But there remained in her thoughts +a settled deposit of resentment against her niece, all the denser because +it was not to be cleared by explanation or discussion. It was horrible +of a young girl to let herself be talked about; however unfounded the +charges against her, she must be to blame for their having been made. +Mrs. Peniston felt as if there had been a contagious illness in the +house, and she was doomed to sit shivering among her contaminated +furniture.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_12">Chapter 12</h2> + +<p>Miss Bart had in fact been treading a devious way, and none of her +critics could have been more alive to the fact than herself; but she had +a fatalistic sense of being drawn from one wrong turning to another, +without ever perceiving the right road till it was too late to take it.</p> + +<p>Lily, who considered herself above narrow prejudices, had not imagined +that the fact of letting Gus Trenor make a little money for her would +ever disturb her self-complacency. And the fact in itself still seemed +harmless enough; only it was a fertile source of harmful complications. +As she exhausted the amusement of spending the money these complications +became more pressing, and Lily, whose mind could be severely logical in +tracing the causes of her ill-luck to others, justified herself by the +thought that she owed all her troubles to the enmity of Bertha Dorset. +This enmity, however, had apparently expired in a renewal of friendliness +between the two women. Lily’s visit to the Dorsets had resulted, for +both, in the discovery that they could be of use to each other; and the +civilized instinct finds a subtler pleasure in making use of its +antagonist than in confounding him. Mrs. Dorset was, in fact, engaged in +a new sentimental experiment, of which Mrs. Fisher’s late property, Ned +Silverton, was the rosy victim; and at such moments, as Judy Trenor had +once remarked, she felt a peculiar need of distracting her husband’s +attention. Dorset was as difficult to amuse as a savage; but even his +self-engrossment was not proof against Lily’s arts, or rather these were +especially adapted to soothe an uneasy egoism. Her experience with Percy +Gryce stood her in good stead in ministering to Dorset’s humours, and if +the incentive to please was less urgent, the difficulties of her +situation were teaching her to make much of minor opportunities.</p> + +<p>Intimacy with the Dorsets was not likely to lessen such difficulties on +the material side. Mrs. Dorset had none of Judy Trenor’s lavish impulses, +and Dorset’s admiration was not likely to express itself in financial +“tips,” even had Lily cared to renew her experiences in that line. What +she required, for the moment, of the Dorsets’ friendship, was simply its +social sanction. She knew that people were beginning to talk of her; but +this fact did not alarm her as it had alarmed Mrs. Peniston. In her set +such gossip was not unusual, and a handsome girl who flirted with a +married man was merely assumed to be pressing to the limit of her +opportunities. It was Trenor himself who frightened her. Their walk in +the Park had not been a success. Trenor had married young, and since his +marriage his intercourse with women had not taken the form of the +sentimental small-talk which doubles upon itself like the paths in a +maze. He was first puzzled and then irritated to find himself always led +back to the same starting-point, and Lily felt that she was gradually +losing control of the situation. Trenor was in truth in an unmanageable +mood. In spite of his understanding with Rosedale he had been somewhat +heavily “touched” by the fall in stocks; his household expenses weighed +on him, and he seemed to be meeting, on all sides, a sullen opposition to +his wishes, instead of the easy good luck he had hitherto encountered.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trenor was still at Bellomont, keeping the town-house open, and +descending on it now and then for a taste of the world, but preferring +the recurrent excitement of week-end parties to the restrictions of a +dull season. Since the holidays she had not urged Lily to return to +Bellomont, and the first time they met in town Lily fancied there was a +shade of coldness in her manner. Was it merely the expression of her +displeasure at Miss Bart’s neglect, or had disquieting rumours reached +her? The latter contingency seemed improbable, yet Lily was not without a +sense of uneasiness. If her roaming sympathies had struck root anywhere, +it was in her friendship with Judy Trenor. She believed in the sincerity +of her friend’s affection, though it sometimes showed itself in +self-interested ways, and she shrank with peculiar reluctance from any +risk of estranging it. But, aside from this, she was keenly conscious of +the way in which such an estrangement would react on herself. The fact +that Gus Trenor was Judy’s husband was at times Lily’s strongest reason +for disliking him, and for resenting the obligation under which he had +placed her. To set her doubts at rest, Miss Bart, soon after the New +Year, “proposed” herself for a week-end at Bellomont. She had learned in +advance that the presence of a large party would protect her from too +great assiduity on Trenor’s part, and his wife’s telegraphic “come by all +means” seemed to assure her of her usual welcome.</p> + +<p>Judy received her amicably. The cares of a large party always prevailed +over personal feelings, and Lily saw no change in her hostess’s manner. +Nevertheless, she was soon aware that the experiment of coming to +Bellomont was destined not to be successful. The party was made up of +what Mrs. Trenor called “poky people”—her generic name for persons who +did not play bridge—and, it being her habit to group all such +obstructionists in one class, she usually invited them together, +regardless of their other characteristics. The result was apt to be an +irreducible combination of persons having no other quality in common than +their abstinence from bridge, and the antagonisms developed in a group +lacking the one taste which might have amalgamated them, were in this +case aggravated by bad weather, and by the ill-concealed boredom of their +host and hostess. In such emergencies, Judy would usually have turned to +Lily to fuse the discordant elements; and Miss Bart, assuming that such a +service was expected of her, threw herself into it with her accustomed +zeal. But at the outset she perceived a subtle resistance to her efforts. +If Mrs. Trenor’s manner toward her was unchanged, there was certainly a +faint coldness in that of the other ladies. An occasional caustic +allusion to “your friends the Wellington Brys,” or to “the little Jew who +has bought the Greiner house—some one told us you knew him, Miss +Bart,”—showed Lily that she was in disfavour with that portion of +society which, while contributing least to its amusement, has assumed the +right to decide what forms that amusement shall take. The indication was +a slight one, and a year ago Lily would have smiled at it, trusting to +the charm of her personality to dispel any prejudice against her. But now +she had grown more sensitive to criticism and less confident in her power +of disarming it. She knew, moreover, that if the ladies at Bellomont +permitted themselves to criticize her friends openly, it was a proof that +they were not afraid of subjecting her to the same treatment behind her +back. The nervous dread lest anything in Trenor’s manner should seem to +justify their disapproval made her seek every pretext for avoiding him, +and she left Bellomont conscious of having failed in every purpose which +had taken her there.</p> + +<p>In town she returned to preoccupations which, for the moment, had the +happy effect of banishing troublesome thoughts. The Welly Brys, after +much debate, and anxious counsel with their newly-acquired friends, had +decided on the bold move of giving a general entertainment. To attack +society collectively, when one’s means of approach are limited to a few +acquaintances, is like advancing into a strange country with an +insufficient number of scouts; but such rash tactics have sometimes led +to brilliant victories, and the Brys had determined to put their fate to +the touch. Mrs. Fisher, to whom they had entrusted the conduct of the +affair, had decided that TABLEAUX VIVANTS and expensive music were the +two baits most likely to attract the desired prey, and after prolonged +negotiations, and the kind of wire-pulling in which she was known to +excel, she had induced a dozen fashionable women to exhibit themselves in +a series of pictures which, by a farther miracle of persuasion, the +distinguished portrait painter, Paul Morpeth, had been prevailed upon to +organize.</p> + +<p>Lily was in her element on such occasions. Under Morpeth’s guidance her +vivid plastic sense, hitherto nurtured on no higher food than +dress-making and upholstery, found eager expression in the disposal of +draperies, the study of attitudes, the shifting of lights and shadows. +Her dramatic instinct was roused by the choice of subjects, and the +gorgeous reproductions of historic dress stirred an imagination which +only visual impressions could reach. But keenest of all was the +exhilaration of displaying her own beauty under a new aspect: of showing +that her loveliness was no mere fixed quality, but an element shaping all +emotions to fresh forms of grace.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher’s measures had been well-taken, and society, surprised in a +dull moment, succumbed to the temptation of Mrs. Bry’s hospitality. The +protesting minority were forgotten in the throng which abjured and came; +and the audience was almost as brilliant as the show.</p> + +<p>Lawrence Selden was among those who had yielded to the proffered +inducements. If he did not often act on the accepted social axiom that a +man may go where he pleases, it was because he had long since learned +that his pleasures were mainly to be found in a small group of the +like-minded. But he enjoyed spectacular effects, and was not insensible +to the part money plays in their production: all he asked was that the +very rich should live up to their calling as stage-managers, and not +spend their money in a dull way. This the Brys could certainly not be +charged with doing. Their recently built house, whatever it might lack as +a frame for domesticity, was almost as well-designed for the display of a +festal assemblage as one of those airy pleasure-halls which the Italian +architects improvised to set off the hospitality of princes. The air of +improvisation was in fact strikingly present: so recent, so +rapidly-evoked was the whole MISE-EN-SCENE that one had to touch the +marble columns to learn they were not of cardboard, to seat one’s self in +one of the damask-and-gold arm-chairs to be sure it was not painted +against the wall.</p> + +<p>Selden, who had put one of these seats to the test, found himself, from +an angle of the ball-room, surveying the scene with frank enjoyment. The +company, in obedience to the decorative instinct which calls for fine +clothes in fine surroundings, had dressed rather with an eye to Mrs. +Bry’s background than to herself. The seated throng, filling the immense +room without undue crowding, presented a surface of rich tissues and +jewelled shoulders in harmony with the festooned and gilded walls, and +the flushed splendours of the Venetian ceiling. At the farther end of the +room a stage had been constructed behind a proscenium arch curtained with +folds of old damask; but in the pause before the parting of the folds +there was little thought of what they might reveal, for every woman who +had accepted Mrs. Bry’s invitation was engaged in trying to find out how +many of her friends had done the same.</p> + +<p>Gerty Farish, seated next to Selden, was lost in that indiscriminate and +uncritical enjoyment so irritating to Miss Bart’s finer perceptions. It +may be that Selden’s nearness had something to do with the quality of his +cousin’s pleasure; but Miss Farish was so little accustomed to refer her +enjoyment of such scenes to her own share in them, that she was merely +conscious of a deeper sense of contentment.</p> + +<p>“Wasn’t it dear of Lily to get me an invitation? Of course it would never +have occurred to Carry Fisher to put me on the list, and I should have +been so sorry to miss seeing it all—and especially Lily herself. Some +one told me the ceiling was by Veronese—you would know, of course, +Lawrence. I suppose it’s very beautiful, but his women are so dreadfully +fat. Goddesses? Well, I can only say that if they’d been mortals and had +to wear corsets, it would have been better for them. I think our women +are much handsomer. And this room is wonderfully becoming—every one +looks so well! Did you ever see such jewels? Do look at Mrs. George +Dorset’s pearls—I suppose the smallest of them would pay the rent of our +Girls’ Club for a year. Not that I ought to complain about the club; +every one has been so wonderfully kind. Did I tell you that Lily had +given us three hundred dollars? Wasn’t it splendid of her? And then she +collected a lot of money from her friends—Mrs. Bry gave us five hundred, +and Mr. Rosedale a thousand. I wish Lily were not so nice to Mr. +Rosedale, but she says it’s no use being rude to him, because he doesn’t +see the difference. She really can’t bear to hurt people’s feelings—it +makes me so angry when I hear her called cold and conceited! The girls at +the club don’t call her that. Do you know she has been there with me +twice?—yes, Lily! And you should have seen their eyes! One of them said +it was as good as a day in the country just to look at her. And she sat +there, and laughed and talked with them—not a bit as if she were being +CHARITABLE, you know, but as if she liked it as much as they did. They’ve +been asking ever since when she’s coming back; and she’s promised +me——oh!”</p> + +<p>Miss Farish’s confidences were cut short by the parting of the curtain on +the first TABLEAU—a group of nymphs dancing across flower-strewn sward +in the rhythmic postures of Botticelli’s Spring. TABLEAUX VIVANTS depend +for their effect not only on the happy disposal of lights and the +delusive interposition of layers of gauze, but on a corresponding +adjustment of the mental vision. To unfurnished minds they remain, in +spite of every enhancement of art, only a superior kind of wax-works; but +to the responsive fancy they may give magic glimpses of the boundary +world between fact and imagination. Selden’s mind was of this order: he +could yield to vision-making influences as completely as a child to the +spell of a fairy-tale. Mrs. Bry’s TABLEAUX wanted none of the qualities +which go to the producing of such illusions, and under Morpeth’s +organizing hand the pictures succeeded each other with the rhythmic march +of some splendid frieze, in which the fugitive curves of living flesh and +the wandering light of young eyes have been subdued to plastic harmony +without losing the charm of life.</p> + +<p>The scenes were taken from old pictures, and the participators had been +cleverly fitted with characters suited to their types. No one, for +instance, could have made a more typical Goya than Carry Fisher, with her +short dark-skinned face, the exaggerated glow of her eyes, the +provocation of her frankly-painted smile. A brilliant Miss Smedden from +Brooklyn showed to perfection the sumptuous curves of Titian’s Daughter, +lifting her gold salver laden with grapes above the harmonizing gold of +rippled hair and rich brocade, and a young Mrs. Van Alstyne, who showed +the frailer Dutch type, with high blue-veined forehead and pale eyes and +lashes, made a characteristic Vandyck, in black satin, against a +curtained archway. Then there were Kauffmann nymphs garlanding the altar +of Love; a Veronese supper, all sheeny textures, pearl-woven heads and +marble architecture; and a Watteau group of lute-playing comedians, +lounging by a fountain in a sunlit glade.</p> + +<p>Each evanescent picture touched the vision-building faculty in Selden, +leading him so far down the vistas of fancy that even Gerty Farish’s +running commentary—“Oh, how lovely Lulu Melson looks!” or: “That must be +Kate Corby, to the right there, in purple”—did not break the spell of +the illusion. Indeed, so skilfully had the personality of the actors been +subdued to the scenes they figured in that even the least imaginative of +the audience must have felt a thrill of contrast when the curtain +suddenly parted on a picture which was simply and undisguisedly the +portrait of Miss Bart.</p> + +<p>Here there could be no mistaking the predominance of personality—the +unanimous “Oh!” of the spectators was a tribute, not to the brush-work of +Reynolds’s “Mrs. Lloyd” but to the flesh and blood loveliness of Lily +Bart. She had shown her artistic intelligence in selecting a type so like +her own that she could embody the person represented without ceasing to +be herself. It was as though she had stepped, not out of, but into, +Reynolds’s canvas, banishing the phantom of his dead beauty by the beams +of her living grace. The impulse to show herself in a splendid +setting—she had thought for a moment of representing Tiepolo’s +Cleopatra—had yielded to the truer instinct of trusting to her +unassisted beauty, and she had purposely chosen a picture without +distracting accessories of dress or surroundings. Her pale draperies, +and the background of foliage against which she stood, served only to +relieve the long dryad-like curves that swept upward from her poised foot +to her lifted arm. The noble buoyancy of her attitude, its suggestion of +soaring grace, revealed the touch of poetry in her beauty that Selden +always felt in her presence, yet lost the sense of when he was not with +her. Its expression was now so vivid that for the first time he seemed to +see before him the real Lily Bart, divested of the trivialities of her +little world, and catching for a moment a note of that eternal harmony of +which her beauty was a part.</p> + +<p>“Deuced bold thing to show herself in that get-up; but, gad, there isn’t +a break in the lines anywhere, and I suppose she wanted us to know it!”</p> + +<p>These words, uttered by that experienced connoisseur, Mr. Ned Van +Alstyne, whose scented white moustache had brushed Selden’s shoulder +whenever the parting of the curtains presented any exceptional +opportunity for the study of the female outline, affected their hearer in +an unexpected way. It was not the first time that Selden had heard Lily’s +beauty lightly remarked on, and hitherto the tone of the comments had +imperceptibly coloured his view of her. But now it woke only a motion of +indignant contempt. This was the world she lived in, these were the +standards by which she was fated to be measured! Does one go to Caliban +for a judgment on Miranda?</p> + +<p>In the long moment before the curtain fell, he had time to feel the whole +tragedy of her life. It was as though her beauty, thus detached from all +that cheapened and vulgarized it, had held out suppliant hands to him +from the world in which he and she had once met for a moment, and where +he felt an overmastering longing to be with her again.</p> + +<p>He was roused by the pressure of ecstatic fingers. “Wasn’t she too +beautiful, Lawrence? Don’t you like her best in that simple dress? It +makes her look like the real Lily—the Lily I know.”</p> + +<p>He met Gerty Farish’s brimming gaze. “The Lily we know,” he corrected; +and his cousin, beaming at the implied understanding, exclaimed joyfully: +“I’ll tell her that! She always says you dislike her.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>The performance over, Selden’s first impulse was to seek Miss Bart. +During the interlude of music which succeeded the TABLEAUX, the actors +had seated themselves here and there in the audience, diversifying its +conventional appearance by the varied picturesqueness of their dress. +Lily, however, was not among them, and her absence served to protract the +effect she had produced on Selden: it would have broken the spell to see +her too soon in the surroundings from which accident had so happily +detached her. They had not met since the day of the Van Osburgh wedding, +and on his side the avoidance had been intentional. Tonight, however, he +knew that, sooner or later, he should find himself at her side; and +though he let the dispersing crowd drift him whither it would, without +making an immediate effort to reach her, his procrastination was not due +to any lingering resistance, but to the desire to luxuriate a moment in +the sense of complete surrender.</p> + +<p>Lily had not an instant’s doubt as to the meaning of the murmur greeting +her appearance. No other tableau had been received with that precise note +of approval: it had obviously been called forth by herself, and not by +the picture she impersonated. She had feared at the last moment that she +was risking too much in dispensing with the advantages of a more +sumptuous setting, and the completeness of her triumph gave her an +intoxicating sense of recovered power. Not caring to diminish the +impression she had produced, she held herself aloof from the audience +till the movement of dispersal before supper, and thus had a second +opportunity of showing herself to advantage, as the throng poured slowly +into the empty drawing-room where she was standing.</p> + +<p>She was soon the centre of a group which increased and renewed itself as +the circulation became general, and the individual comments on her +success were a delightful prolongation of the collective applause. At +such moments she lost something of her natural fastidiousness, and cared +less for the quality of the admiration received than for its quantity. +Differences of personality were merged in a warm atmosphere of praise, in +which her beauty expanded like a flower in sunlight; and if Selden had +approached a moment or two sooner he would have seen her turning on Ned +Van Alstyne and George Dorset the look he had dreamed of capturing for +himself.</p> + +<p>Fortune willed, however, that the hurried approach of Mrs. Fisher, as +whose aide-de-camp Van Alstyne was acting, should break up the group +before Selden reached the threshold of the room. One or two of the men +wandered off in search of their partners for supper, and the others, +noticing Selden’s approach, gave way to him in accordance with the tacit +freemasonry of the ball-room. Lily was therefore standing alone when he +reached her; and finding the expected look in her eye, he had the +satisfaction of supposing he had kindled it. The look did indeed deepen +as it rested on him, for even in that moment of self-intoxication Lily +felt the quicker beat of life that his nearness always produced. She +read, too, in his answering gaze the delicious confirmation of her +triumph, and for the moment it seemed to her that it was for him only she +cared to be beautiful.</p> + +<p>Selden had given her his arm without speaking. She took it in silence, +and they moved away, not toward the supper-room, but against the tide +which was setting thither. The faces about her flowed by like the +streaming images of sleep: she hardly noticed where Selden was leading +her, till they passed through a glass doorway at the end of the long +suite of rooms and stood suddenly in the fragrant hush of a garden. +Gravel grated beneath their feet, and about them was the transparent +dimness of a midsummer night. Hanging lights made emerald caverns in the +depths of foliage, and whitened the spray of a fountain falling among +lilies. The magic place was deserted: there was no sound but the splash +of the water on the lily-pads, and a distant drift of music that might +have been blown across a sleeping lake.</p> + +<p>Selden and Lily stood still, accepting the unreality of the scene as a +part of their own dream-like sensations. It would not have surprised them +to feel a summer breeze on their faces, or to see the lights among the +boughs reduplicated in the arch of a starry sky. The strange solitude +about them was no stranger than the sweetness of being alone in it +together. At length Lily withdrew her hand, and moved away a step, so +that her white-robed slimness was outlined against the dusk of the +branches. Selden followed her, and still without speaking they seated +themselves on a bench beside the fountain.</p> + +<p>Suddenly she raised her eyes with the beseeching earnestness of a child. +“You never speak to me—you think hard things of me,” she murmured.</p> + +<p>“I think of you at any rate, God knows!” he said.</p> + +<p>“Then why do we never see each other? Why can’t we be friends? You +promised once to help me,” she continued in the same tone, as though the +words were drawn from her unwillingly.</p> + +<p>“The only way I can help you is by loving you,” Selden said in a low +voice.</p> + +<p>She made no reply, but her face turned to him with the soft motion of a +flower. His own met it slowly, and their lips touched. She drew back and +rose from her seat. Selden rose too, and they stood facing each other. +Suddenly she caught his hand and pressed it a moment against her cheek.</p> + +<p>“Ah, love me, love me—but don’t tell me so!” she sighed with her eyes in +his; and before he could speak she had turned and slipped through the +arch of boughs, disappearing in the brightness of the room beyond.</p> + +<p>Selden stood where she had left him. He knew too well the transiency of +exquisite moments to attempt to follow her; but presently he reentered +the house and made his way through the deserted rooms to the door. A few +sumptuously-cloaked ladies were already gathered in the marble vestibule, +and in the coat-room he found Van Alstyne and Gus Trenor.</p> + +<p>The former, at Selden’s approach, paused in the careful selection of a +cigar from one of the silver boxes invitingly set out near the door.</p> + +<p>“Hallo, Selden, going too? You’re an Epicurean like myself, I see: you +don’t want to see all those goddesses gobbling terrapin. Gad, what a +show of good-looking women; but not one of ’em could touch that little +cousin of mine. Talk of jewels—what’s a woman want with jewels when +she’s got herself to show? The trouble is that all these fal-bals they +wear cover up their figures when they’ve got ’em. I never knew till +tonight what an outline Lily has.”</p> + +<p>“It’s not her fault if everybody don’t know it now,” growled Trenor, +flushed with the struggle of getting into his fur-lined coat. “Damned bad +taste, I call it—no, no cigar for me. You can’t tell what you’re smoking +in one of these new houses—likely as not the CHEF buys the cigars. Stay +for supper? Not if I know it! When people crowd their rooms so that you +can’t get near any one you want to speak to, I’d as soon sup in the +elevated at the rush hour. My wife was dead right to stay away: she says +life’s too short to spend it in breaking in new people.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_13">Chapter 13</h2> + +<p>Lily woke from happy dreams to find two notes at her bed-side.</p> + +<p>One was from Mrs. Trenor, who announced that she was coming to town that +afternoon for a flying visit, and hoped Miss Bart would be able to dine +with her. The other was from Selden. He wrote briefly that an important +case called him to Albany, whence he would be unable to return till the +evening, and asked Lily to let him know at what hour on the following day +she would see him.</p> + +<p>Lily, leaning back among her pillows, gazed musingly at his letter. The +scene in the Brys’ conservatory had been like a part of her dreams; she +had not expected to wake to such evidence of its reality. Her first +movement was one of annoyance: this unforeseen act of Selden’s added +another complication to life. It was so unlike him to yield to such an +irrational impulse! Did he really mean to ask her to marry him? She had +once shown him the impossibility of such a hope, and his subsequent +behaviour seemed to prove that he had accepted the situation with a +reasonableness somewhat mortifying to her vanity. It was all the more +agreeable to find that this reasonableness was maintained only at the +cost of not seeing her; but, though nothing in life was as sweet as the +sense of her power over him, she saw the danger of allowing the episode +of the previous night to have a sequel. Since she could not marry him, it +would be kinder to him, as well as easier for herself, to write a line +amicably evading his request to see her: he was not the man to mistake +such a hint, and when next they met it would be on their usual friendly +footing.</p> + +<p>Lily sprang out of bed, and went straight to her desk. She wanted to +write at once, while she could trust to the strength of her resolve. She +was still languid from her brief sleep and the exhilaration of the +evening, and the sight of Selden’s writing brought back the culminating +moment of her triumph: the moment when she had read in his eyes that no +philosophy was proof against her power. It would be pleasant to have that +sensation again . . . no one else could give it to her in its fulness; +and she could not bear to mar her mood of luxurious retrospection by an +act of definite refusal. She took up her pen and wrote hastily: “TOMORROW +AT FOUR;” murmuring to herself, as she slipped the sheet into its +envelope: “I can easily put him off when tomorrow comes.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Judy Trenor’s summons was very welcome to Lily. It was the first time she +had received a direct communication from Bellomont since the close of her +last visit there, and she was still visited by the dread of having +incurred Judy’s displeasure. But this characteristic command seemed to +reestablish their former relations; and Lily smiled at the thought that +her friend had probably summoned her in order to hear about the Brys’ +entertainment. Mrs. Trenor had absented herself from the feast, perhaps +for the reason so frankly enunciated by her husband, perhaps because, as +Mrs. Fisher somewhat differently put it, she “couldn’t bear new people +when she hadn’t discovered them herself.” At any rate, though she +remained haughtily at Bellomont, Lily suspected in her a devouring +eagerness to hear of what she had missed, and to learn exactly in what +measure Mrs. Wellington Bry had surpassed all previous competitors for +social recognition. Lily was quite ready to gratify this curiosity, but +it happened that she was dining out. She determined, however, to see Mrs. +Trenor for a few moments, and ringing for her maid she despatched a +telegram to say that she would be with her friend that evening at ten.</p> + +<p>She was dining with Mrs. Fisher, who had gathered at an informal feast a +few of the performers of the previous evening. There was to be plantation +music in the studio after dinner—for Mrs. Fisher, despairing of the +republic, had taken up modelling, and annexed to her small crowded house +a spacious apartment, which, whatever its uses in her hours of plastic +inspiration, served at other times for the exercise of an indefatigable +hospitality. Lily was reluctant to leave, for the dinner was amusing, and +she would have liked to lounge over a cigarette and hear a few songs; but +she could not break her engagement with Judy, and shortly after ten she +asked her hostess to ring for a hansom, and drove up Fifth Avenue to the +Trenors’.</p> + +<p>She waited long enough on the doorstep to wonder that Judy’s presence in +town was not signalized by a greater promptness in admitting her; and her +surprise was increased when, instead of the expected footman, pushing his +shoulders into a tardy coat, a shabby care-taking person in calico let +her into the shrouded hall. Trenor, however, appeared at once on the +threshold of the drawing-room, welcoming her with unusual volubility +while he relieved her of her cloak and drew her into the room.</p> + +<p>“Come along to the den; it’s the only comfortable place in the house. +Doesn’t this room look as if it was waiting for the body to be brought +down? Can’t see why Judy keeps the house wrapped up in this awful +slippery white stuff—it’s enough to give a fellow pneumonia to walk +through these rooms on a cold day. You look a little pinched yourself, by +the way: it’s rather a sharp night out. I noticed it walking up from the +club. Come along, and I’ll give you a nip of brandy, and you can toast +yourself over the fire and try some of my new Egyptians—that little +Turkish chap at the Embassy put me on to a brand that I want you to try, +and if you like ’em I’ll get out a lot for you: they don’t have ’em here +yet, but I’ll cable.”</p> + +<p>He led her through the house to the large room at the back, where Mrs. +Trenor usually sat, and where, even in her absence, there was an air of +occupancy. Here, as usual, were flowers, newspapers, a littered +writing-table, and a general aspect of lamp-lit familiarity, so that it +was a surprise not to see Judy’s energetic figure start up from the +arm-chair near the fire.</p> + +<p>It was apparently Trenor himself who had been occupying the seat in +question, for it was overhung by a cloud of cigar smoke, and near it +stood one of those intricate folding tables which British ingenuity has +devised to facilitate the circulation of tobacco and spirits. The sight +of such appliances in a drawing-room was not unusual in Lily’s set, where +smoking and drinking were unrestricted by considerations of time and +place, and her first movement was to help herself to one of the +cigarettes recommended by Trenor, while she checked his loquacity by +asking, with a surprised glance: “Where’s Judy?”</p> + +<p>Trenor, a little heated by his unusual flow of words, and perhaps by +prolonged propinquity with the decanters, was bending over the latter to +decipher their silver labels.</p> + +<p>“Here, now, Lily, just a drop of cognac in a little fizzy water—you do +look pinched, you know: I swear the end of your nose is red. I’ll take +another glass to keep you company—Judy?—Why, you see, Judy’s got a +devil of a head ache—quite knocked out with it, poor thing—she asked me +to explain—make it all right, you know—Do come up to the fire, though; +you look dead-beat, really. Now do let me make you comfortable, there’s a +good girl.”</p> + +<p>He had taken her hand, half-banteringly, and was drawing her toward a low +seat by the hearth; but she stopped and freed herself quietly.</p> + +<p>“Do you mean to say that Judy’s not well enough to see me? Doesn’t she +want me to go upstairs?”</p> + +<p>Trenor drained the glass he had filled for himself, and paused to set it +down before he answered.</p> + +<p>“Why, no—the fact is, she’s not up to seeing anybody. It came on +suddenly, you know, and she asked me to tell you how awfully sorry she +was—if she’d known where you were dining she’d have sent you word.”</p> + +<p>“She did know where I was dining; I mentioned it in my telegram. But it +doesn’t matter, of course. I suppose if she’s so poorly she won’t go back +to Bellomont in the morning, and I can come and see her then.”</p> + +<p>“Yes: exactly—that’s capital. I’ll tell her you’ll pop in tomorrow +morning. And now do sit down a minute, there’s a dear, and let’s have a +nice quiet jaw together. You won’t take a drop, just for sociability? +Tell me what you think of that cigarette. Why, don’t you like it? What +are you chucking it away for?”</p> + +<p>“I am chucking it away because I must go, if you’ll have the goodness to +call a cab for me,” Lily returned with a smile.</p> + +<p>She did not like Trenor’s unusual excitability, with its too evident +explanation, and the thought of being alone with him, with her friend out +of reach upstairs, at the other end of the great empty house, did not +conduce to a desire to prolong their TETE-A-TETE.</p> + +<p>But Trenor, with a promptness which did not escape her, had moved between +herself and the door.</p> + +<p>“Why must you go, I should like to know? If Judy’d been here you’d have +sat gossiping till all hours—and you can’t even give me five minutes! +It’s always the same story. Last night I couldn’t get near you—I went to +that damned vulgar party just to see you, and there was everybody talking +about you, and asking me if I’d ever seen anything so stunning, and when +I tried to come up and say a word, you never took any notice, but just +went on laughing and joking with a lot of asses who only wanted to be +able to swagger about afterward, and look knowing when you were +mentioned.”</p> + +<p>He paused, flushed by his diatribe, and fixing on her a look in which +resentment was the ingredient she least disliked. But she had regained +her presence of mind, and stood composedly in the middle of the room, +while her slight smile seemed to put an ever increasing distance between +herself and Trenor.</p> + +<p>Across it she said: “Don’t be absurd, Gus. It’s past eleven, and I must +really ask you to ring for a cab.”</p> + +<p>He remained immovable, with the lowering forehead she had grown to detest.</p> + +<p>“And supposing I won’t ring for one—what’ll you do then?”</p> + +<p>“I shall go upstairs to Judy if you force me to disturb her.”</p> + +<p>Trenor drew a step nearer and laid his hand on her arm. “Look here, Lily: +won’t you give me five minutes of your own accord?”</p> + +<p>“Not tonight, Gus: you——”</p> + +<p>“Very good, then: I’ll take ’em. And as many more as I want.” He had +squared himself on the threshold, his hands thrust deep in his pockets. +He nodded toward the chair on the hearth.</p> + +<p>“Go and sit down there, please: I’ve got a word to say to you.”</p> + +<p>Lily’s quick temper was getting the better of her fears. She drew herself +up and moved toward the door.</p> + +<p>“If you have anything to say to me, you must say it another time. I +shall go up to Judy unless you call a cab for me at once.”</p> + +<p>He burst into a laugh. “Go upstairs and welcome, my dear; but you won’t +find Judy. She ain’t there.”</p> + +<p>Lily cast a startled look upon him. “Do you mean that Judy is not in the +house—not in town?” she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>“That’s just what I do mean,” returned Trenor, his bluster sinking to +sullenness under her look.</p> + +<p>“Nonsense—I don’t believe you. I am going upstairs,” she said +impatiently.</p> + +<p>He drew unexpectedly aside, letting her reach the threshold unimpeded.</p> + +<p>“Go up and welcome; but my wife is at Bellomont.”</p> + +<p>But Lily had a flash of reassurance. “If she hadn’t come she would have +sent me word——”</p> + +<p>“She did; she telephoned me this afternoon to let you know.”</p> + +<p>“I received no message.”</p> + +<p>“I didn’t send any.”</p> + +<p>The two measured each other for a moment, but Lily still saw her opponent +through a blur of scorn that made all other considerations indistinct.</p> + +<p>“I can’t imagine your object in playing such a stupid trick on me; but if +you have fully gratified your peculiar sense of humour I must again ask +you to send for a cab.”</p> + +<p>It was the wrong note, and she knew it as she spoke. To be stung by irony +it is not necessary to understand it, and the angry streaks on Trenor’s +face might have been raised by an actual lash.</p> + +<p>“Look here, Lily, don’t take that high and mighty tone with me.” He had +again moved toward the door, and in her instinctive shrinking from him +she let him regain command of the threshold. “I DID play a trick on you; +I own up to it; but if you think I’m ashamed you’re mistaken. Lord knows +I’ve been patient enough—I’ve hung round and looked like an ass. And +all the while you were letting a lot of other fellows make up to +you . . . letting ’em make fun of me, I daresay . . . I’m not sharp, and +can’t dress my friends up to look funny, as you do . . . but I can tell +when it’s being done to me.... I can tell fast enough when I’m made a +fool of....”</p> + +<p>“Ah, I shouldn’t have thought that!” flashed from Lily; but her laugh +dropped to silence under his look.</p> + +<p>“No; you wouldn’t have thought it; but you’ll know better now. That’s +what you’re here for tonight. I’ve been waiting for a quiet time to talk +things over, and now I’ve got it I mean to make you hear me out.”</p> + +<p>His first rush of inarticulate resentment had been followed by a +steadiness and concentration of tone more disconcerting to Lily than the +excitement preceding it. For a moment her presence of mind forsook her. +She had more than once been in situations where a quick sword-play of wit +had been needful to cover her retreat; but her frightened heart-throbs +told her that here such skill would not avail.</p> + +<p>To gain time she repeated: “I don’t understand what you want.”</p> + +<p>Trenor had pushed a chair between herself and the door. He threw himself +in it, and leaned back, looking up at her.</p> + +<p>“I’ll tell you what I want: I want to know just where you and I stand. +Hang it, the man who pays for the dinner is generally allowed to have a +seat at table.”</p> + +<p>She flamed with anger and abasement, and the sickening need of having to +conciliate where she longed to humble.</p> + +<p>“I don’t know what you mean—but you must see, Gus, that I can’t stay +here talking to you at this hour——”</p> + +<p>“Gad, you go to men’s houses fast enough in broad day light—strikes me +you’re not always so deuced careful of appearances.”</p> + +<p>The brutality of the thrust gave her the sense of dizziness that follows +on a physical blow. Rosedale had spoken then—this was the way men talked +of her—She felt suddenly weak and defenceless: there was a throb of +self-pity in her throat. But all the while another self was sharpening +her to vigilance, whispering the terrified warning that every word and +gesture must be measured.</p> + +<p>“If you have brought me here to say insulting things——” she began.</p> + +<p>Trenor laughed. “Don’t talk stage-rot. I don’t want to insult you. But a +man’s got his feelings—and you’ve played with mine too long. I didn’t +begin this business—kept out of the way, and left the track clear for +the other chaps, till you rummaged me out and set to work to make an ass +of me—and an easy job you had of it, too. That’s the trouble—it was too +easy for you—you got reckless—thought you could turn me inside out, and +chuck me in the gutter like an empty purse. But, by gad, that ain’t +playing fair: that’s dodging the rules of the game. Of course I know now +what you wanted—it wasn’t my beautiful eyes you were after—but I tell +you what, Miss Lily, you’ve got to pay up for making me think so——”</p> + +<p>He rose, squaring his shoulders aggressively, and stepped toward her with +a reddening brow; but she held her footing, though every nerve tore at +her to retreat as he advanced.</p> + +<p>“Pay up?” she faltered. “Do you mean that I owe you money?”</p> + +<p>He laughed again. “Oh, I’m not asking for payment in kind. But there’s +such a thing as fair play—and interest on one’s money—and hang me if +I’ve had as much as a look from you——”</p> + +<p>“Your money? What have I to do with your money? You advised me how to +invest mine . . . you must have seen I knew nothing of business . . . +you told me it was all right——”</p> + +<p>“It WAS all right—it is, Lily: you’re welcome to all of it, and ten +times more. I’m only asking for a word of thanks from you.” He was closer +still, with a hand that grew formidable; and the frightened self in her +was dragging the other down.</p> + +<p>“I HAVE thanked you; I’ve shown I was grateful. What more have you done +than any friend might do, or any one accept from a friend?”</p> + +<p>Trenor caught her up with a sneer. “I don’t doubt you’ve accepted as much +before—and chucked the other chaps as you’d like to chuck me. I don’t +care how you settled your score with them—if you fooled ’em I’m that +much to the good. Don’t stare at me like that—I know I’m not talking the +way a man is supposed to talk to a girl—but, hang it, if you don’t like +it you can stop me quick enough—you know I’m mad about you—damn the +money, there’s plenty more of it—if THAT bothers you.... I was a +brute, Lily—Lily!—just look at me——”</p> + +<p>Over and over her the sea of humiliation broke—wave crashing on wave so +close that the moral shame was one with the physical dread. It seemed to +her that self-esteem would have made her invulnerable—that it was her +own dishonour which put a fearful solitude about her.</p> + +<p>His touch was a shock to her drowning consciousness. She drew back from +him with a desperate assumption of scorn.</p> + +<p>“I’ve told you I don’t understand—but if I owe you money you shall be +paid——”</p> + +<p>Trenor’s face darkened to rage: her recoil of abhorrence had called out +the primitive man.</p> + +<p>“Ah—you’ll borrow from Selden or Rosedale—and take your chances of +fooling them as you’ve fooled me! Unless—unless you’ve settled your +other scores already—and I’m the only one left out in the cold!”</p> + +<p>She stood silent, frozen to her place. The words—the words were worse +than the touch! Her heart was beating all over her body—in her throat, +her limbs, her helpless useless hands. Her eyes travelled despairingly +about the room—they lit on the bell, and she remembered that help was in +call. Yes, but scandal with it—a hideous mustering of tongues. No, she +must fight her way out alone. It was enough that the servants knew her to +be in the house with Trenor—there must be nothing to excite conjecture +in her way of leaving it.</p> + +<p>She raised her head, and achieved a last clear look at him.</p> + +<p>“I am here alone with you,” she said. “What more have you to say?”</p> + +<p>To her surprise, Trenor answered the look with a speechless stare. With +his last gust of words the flame had died out, leaving him chill and +humbled. It was as though a cold air had dispersed the fumes of his +libations, and the situation loomed before him black and naked as the +ruins of a fire. Old habits, old restraints, the hand of inherited order, +plucked back the bewildered mind which passion had jolted from its ruts. +Trenor’s eye had the haggard look of the sleep-walker waked on a deathly +ledge.</p> + +<p>“Go home! Go away from here”——he stammered, and turning his back on her +walked toward the hearth.</p> + +<p>The sharp release from her fears restored Lily to immediate lucidity. +The collapse of Trenor’s will left her in control, and she heard herself, +in a voice that was her own yet outside herself, bidding him ring for the +servant, bidding him give the order for a hansom, directing him to put +her in it when it came. Whence the strength came to her she knew not; but +an insistent voice warned her that she must leave the house openly, and +nerved her, in the hall before the hovering care taker, to exchange light +words with Trenor, and charge him with the usual messages for Judy, while +all the while she shook with inward loathing. On the doorstep, with the +street before her, she felt a mad throb of liberation, intoxicating as +the prisoner’s first draught of free air; but the clearness of brain +continued, and she noted the mute aspect of Fifth Avenue, guessed at the +lateness of the hour, and even observed a man’s figure—was there +something half-familiar in its outline?—which, as she entered the +hansom, turned from the opposite corner and vanished in the obscurity of +the side street.</p> + +<p>But with the turn of the wheels reaction came, and shuddering darkness +closed on her. “I can’t think—I can’t think,” she moaned, and leaned her +head against the rattling side of the cab. She seemed a stranger to +herself, or rather there were two selves in her, the one she had always +known, and a new abhorrent being to which it found itself chained. She +had once picked up, in a house where she was staying, a translation of +the EUMENIDES, and her imagination had been seized by the high terror of +the scene where Orestes, in the cave of the oracle, finds his implacable +huntresses asleep, and snatches an hour’s repose. Yes, the Furies might +sometimes sleep, but they were there, always there in the dark corners, +and now they were awake and the iron clang of their wings was in her +brain.... She opened her eyes and saw the streets passing—the familiar +alien streets. All she looked on was the same and yet changed. There was +a great gulf fixed between today and yesterday. Everything in the past +seemed simple, natural, full of daylight—and she was alone in a place of +darkness and pollution.—Alone! It was the loneliness that frightened +her. Her eyes fell on an illuminated clock at a street corner, and she +saw that the hands marked the half hour after eleven. Only half-past +eleven—there were hours and hours left of the night! And she must spend +them alone, shuddering sleepless on her bed. Her soft nature recoiled +from this ordeal, which had none of the stimulus of conflict to goad her +through it. Oh, the slow cold drip of the minutes on her head! She had a +vision of herself lying on the black walnut bed—and the darkness would +frighten her, and if she left the light burning the dreary details of the +room would brand themselves forever on her brain. She had always hated +her room at Mrs. Peniston’s—its ugliness, its impersonality, the fact +that nothing in it was really hers. To a torn heart uncomforted by human +nearness a room may open almost human arms, and the being to whom no four +walls mean more than any others, is, at such hours, expatriate everywhere.</p> + +<p>Lily had no heart to lean on. Her relation with her aunt was as +superficial as that of chance lodgers who pass on the stairs. But even +had the two been in closer contact, it was impossible to think of Mrs. +Peniston’s mind as offering shelter or comprehension to such misery as +Lily’s. As the pain that can be told is but half a pain, so the pity that +questions has little healing in its touch. What Lily craved was the +darkness made by enfolding arms, the silence which is not solitude, but +compassion holding its breath.</p> + +<p>She started up and looked forth on the passing streets. Gerty!—they +were nearing Gerty’s corner. If only she could reach there before this +labouring anguish burst from her breast to her lips—if only she could +feel the hold of Gerty’s arms while she shook in the ague-fit of fear +that was coming upon her! She pushed up the door in the roof and called +the address to the driver. It was not so late—Gerty might still be +waking. And even if she were not, the sound of the bell would penetrate +every recess of her tiny apartment, and rouse her to answer her friend’s +call.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_14">Chapter 14</h2> + +<p>Gerty Farish, the morning after the Wellington Brys’ entertainment, woke +from dreams as happy as Lily’s. If they were less vivid in hue, more +subdued to the half-tints of her personality and her experience, they +were for that very reason better suited to her mental vision. Such +flashes of joy as Lily moved in would have blinded Miss Farish, who was +accustomed, in the way of happiness, to such scant light as shone through +the cracks of other people’s lives.</p> + +<p>Now she was the centre of a little illumination of her own: a mild but +unmistakable beam, compounded of Lawrence Selden’s growing kindness to +herself and the discovery that he extended his liking to Lily Bart. If +these two factors seem incompatible to the student of feminine +psychology, it must be remembered that Gerty had always been a parasite +in the moral order, living on the crumbs of other tables, and content to +look through the window at the banquet spread for her friends. Now that +she was enjoying a little private feast of her own, it would have seemed +incredibly selfish not to lay a plate for a friend; and there was no one +with whom she would rather have shared her enjoyment than Miss Bart.</p> + +<p>As to the nature of Selden’s growing kindness, Gerty would no more have +dared to define it than she would have tried to learn a butterfly’s +colours by knocking the dust from its wings. To seize on the wonder would +be to brush off its bloom, and perhaps see it fade and stiffen in her +hand: better the sense of beauty palpitating out of reach, while she held +her breath and watched where it would alight. Yet Selden’s manner at the +Brys’ had brought the flutter of wings so close that they seemed to be +beating in her own heart. She had never seen him so alert, so responsive, +so attentive to what she had to say. His habitual manner had an +absent-minded kindliness which she accepted, and was grateful for, as the +liveliest sentiment her presence was likely to inspire; but she was quick +to feel in him a change implying that for once she could give pleasure as +well as receive it.</p> + +<p>And it was so delightful that this higher degree of sympathy should be +reached through their interest in Lily Bart!</p> + +<p>Gerty’s affection for her friend—a sentiment that had learned to keep +itself alive on the scantiest diet—had grown to active adoration since +Lily’s restless curiosity had drawn her into the circle of Miss Farish’s +work. Lily’s taste of beneficence had wakened in her a momentary appetite +for well-doing. Her visit to the Girls’ Club had first brought her in +contact with the dramatic contrasts of life. She had always accepted with +philosophic calm the fact that such existences as hers were pedestalled +on foundations of obscure humanity. The dreary limbo of dinginess lay all +around and beneath that little illuminated circle in which life reached +its finest efflorescence, as the mud and sleet of a winter night enclose +a hot-house filled with tropical flowers. All this was in the natural +order of things, and the orchid basking in its artificially created +atmosphere could round the delicate curves of its petals undisturbed by +the ice on the panes.</p> + +<p>But it is one thing to live comfortably with the abstract conception of +poverty, another to be brought in contact with its human embodiments. +Lily had never conceived of these victims of fate otherwise than in the +mass. That the mass was composed of individual lives, innumerable +separate centres of sensation, with her own eager reachings for pleasure, +her own fierce revulsions from pain—that some of these bundles of +feeling were clothed in shapes not so unlike her own, with eyes meant to +look on gladness, and young lips shaped for love—this discovery gave +Lily one of those sudden shocks of pity that sometimes decentralize a +life. Lily’s nature was incapable of such renewal: she could feel other +demands only through her own, and no pain was long vivid which did not +press on an answering nerve. But for the moment she was drawn out of +herself by the interest of her direct relation with a world so unlike her +own. She had supplemented her first gift by personal assistance to one or +two of Miss Farish’s most appealing subjects, and the admiration and +interest her presence excited among the tired workers at the club +ministered in a new form to her insatiable desire to please.</p> + +<p>Gerty Farish was not a close enough reader of character to disentangle +the mixed threads of which Lily’s philanthropy was woven. She supposed +her beautiful friend to be actuated by the same motive as herself—that +sharpening of the moral vision which makes all human suffering so near +and insistent that the other aspects of life fade into remoteness. Gerty +lived by such simple formulas that she did not hesitate to class her +friend’s state with the emotional “change of heart” to which her dealings +with the poor had accustomed her; and she rejoiced in the thought that +she had been the humble instrument of this renewal. Now she had an answer +to all criticisms of Lily’s conduct: as she had said, she knew “the real +Lily,” and the discovery that Selden shared her knowledge raised her +placid acceptance of life to a dazzled sense of its possibilities—a +sense farther enlarged, in the course of the afternoon, by the receipt of +a telegram from Selden asking if he might dine with her that evening.</p> + +<p>While Gerty was lost in the happy bustle which this announcement produced +in her small household, Selden was at one with her in thinking with +intensity of Lily Bart. The case which had called him to Albany was not +complicated enough to absorb all his attention, and he had the +professional faculty of keeping a part of his mind free when its services +were not needed. This part—which at the moment seemed dangerously like +the whole—was filled to the brim with the sensations of the previous +evening. Selden understood the symptoms: he recognized the fact that he +was paying up, as there had always been a chance of his having to pay up, +for the voluntary exclusions of his past. He had meant to keep free from +permanent ties, not from any poverty of feeling, but because, in a +different way, he was, as much as Lily, the victim of his environment. +There had been a germ of truth in his declaration to Gerty Farish that he +had never wanted to marry a “nice” girl: the adjective connoting, in his +cousin’s vocabulary, certain utilitarian qualities which are apt to +preclude the luxury of charm. Now it had been Selden’s fate to have a +charming mother: her graceful portrait, all smiles and Cashmere, still +emitted a faded scent of the undefinable quality. His father was the kind +of man who delights in a charming woman: who quotes her, stimulates her, +and keeps her perennially charming. Neither one of the couple cared for +money, but their disdain of it took the form of always spending a little +more than was prudent. If their house was shabby, it was exquisitely +kept; if there were good books on the shelves there were also good dishes +on the table. Selden senior had an eye for a picture, his wife an +understanding of old lace; and both were so conscious of restraint and +discrimination in buying that they never quite knew how it was that the +bills mounted up.</p> + +<p>Though many of Selden’s friends would have called his parents poor, he +had grown up in an atmosphere where restricted means were felt only as a +check on aimless profusion: where the few possessions were so good that +their rarity gave them a merited relief, and abstinence was combined with +elegance in a way exemplified by Mrs. Selden’s knack of wearing her old +velvet as if it were new. A man has the advantage of being delivered +early from the home point of view, and before Selden left college he had +learned that there are as many different ways of going without money as +of spending it. Unfortunately, he found no way as agreeable as that +practised at home; and his views of womankind in especial were tinged by +the remembrance of the one woman who had given him his sense of “values.” +It was from her that he inherited his detachment from the sumptuary side +of life: the stoic’s carelessness of material things, combined with the +Epicurean’s pleasure in them. Life shorn of either feeling appeared to +him a diminished thing; and nowhere was the blending of the two +ingredients so essential as in the character of a pretty woman.</p> + +<p>It had always seemed to Selden that experience offered a great deal +besides the sentimental adventure, yet he could vividly conceive of a +love which should broaden and deepen till it became the central fact of +life. What he could not accept, in his own case, was the makeshift +alternative of a relation that should be less than this: that should +leave some portions of his nature unsatisfied, while it put an undue +strain on others. He would not, in other words, yield to the growth of an +affection which might appeal to pity yet leave the understanding +untouched: sympathy should no more delude him than a trick of the eyes, +the grace of helplessness than a curve of the cheek.</p> + +<p>But now—that little BUT passed like a sponge over all his vows. His +reasoned-out resistances seemed for the moment so much less important +than the question as to when Lily would receive his note! He yielded +himself to the charm of trivial preoccupations, wondering at what hour +her reply would be sent, with what words it would begin. As to its import +he had no doubt—he was as sure of her surrender as of his own. And so +he had leisure to muse on all its exquisite details, as a hard worker, on +a holiday morning, might lie still and watch the beam of light travel +gradually across his room. But if the new light dazzled, it did not blind +him. He could still discern the outline of facts, though his own relation +to them had changed. He was no less conscious than before of what was +said of Lily Bart, but he could separate the woman he knew from the +vulgar estimate of her. His mind turned to Gerty Farish’s words, and the +wisdom of the world seemed a groping thing beside the insight of +innocence. BLESSED ARE THE PURE IN HEART, FOR THEY SHALL SEE GOD—even +the hidden god in their neighbour’s breast! Selden was in the state of +impassioned self-absorption that the first surrender to love produces. +His craving was for the companionship of one whose point of view should +justify his own, who should confirm, by deliberate observation, the truth +to which his intuitions had leaped. He could not wait for the midday +recess, but seized a moment’s leisure in court to scribble his telegram +to Gerty Farish.</p> + +<p>Reaching town, he was driven direct to his club, where he hoped a note +from Miss Bart might await him. But his box contained only a line of +rapturous assent from Gerty, and he was turning away disappointed when he +was hailed by a voice from the smoking room.</p> + +<p>“Hallo, Lawrence! Dining here? Take a bite with me—I’ve ordered a +canvas-back.”</p> + +<p>He discovered Trenor, in his day clothes, sitting, with a tall glass at +his elbow, behind the folds of a sporting journal.</p> + +<p>Selden thanked him, but pleaded an engagement.</p> + +<p>“Hang it, I believe every man in town has an engagement tonight. I shall +have the club to myself. You know how I’m living this winter, rattling +round in that empty house. My wife meant to come to town today, but she’s +put it off again, and how is a fellow to dine alone in a room with the +looking-glasses covered, and nothing but a bottle of Harvey sauce on the +sideboard? I say, Lawrence, chuck your engagement and take pity on +me—it gives me the blue devils to dine alone, and there’s nobody but +that canting ass Wetherall in the club.”</p> + +<p>“Sorry, Gus—I can’t do it.”</p> + +<p>As Selden turned away, he noticed the dark flush on Trenor’s face, the +unpleasant moisture of his intensely white forehead, the way his jewelled +rings were wedged in the creases of his fat red fingers. Certainly the +beast was predominating—the beast at the bottom of the glass. And he had +heard this man’s name coupled with Lily’s! Bah—the thought sickened him; +all the way back to his rooms he was haunted by the sight of Trenor’s fat +creased hands——</p> + +<p>On his table lay the note: Lily had sent it to his rooms. He knew what +was in it before he broke the seal—a grey seal with BEYOND! beneath a +flying ship. Ah, he would take her beyond—beyond the ugliness, the +pettiness, the attrition and corrosion of the soul——</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Gerty’s little sitting-room sparkled with welcome when Selden entered it. +Its modest “effects,” compact of enamel paint and ingenuity, spoke to him +in the language just then sweetest to his ear. It is surprising how +little narrow walls and a low ceiling matter, when the roof of the soul +has suddenly been raised. Gerty sparkled too; or at least shone with a +tempered radiance. He had never before noticed that she had +“points”—really, some good fellow might do worse.... Over the little +dinner (and here, again, the effects were wonderful) he told her she +ought to marry—he was in a mood to pair off the whole world. She had +made the caramel custard with her own hands? It was sinful to keep such +gifts to herself. He reflected with a throb of pride that Lily could trim +her own hats—she had told him so the day of their walk at Bellomont.</p> + +<p>He did not speak of Lily till after dinner. During the little repast he +kept the talk on his hostess, who, fluttered at being the centre of +observation, shone as rosy as the candle-shades she had manufactured for +the occasion. Selden evinced an extraordinary interest in her household +arrangements: complimented her on the ingenuity with which she had +utilized every inch of her small quarters, asked how her servant managed +about afternoons out, learned that one may improvise delicious dinners in +a chafing-dish, and uttered thoughtful generalizations on the burden of a +large establishment.</p> + +<p>When they were in the sitting-room again, where they fitted as snugly as +bits in a puzzle, and she had brewed the coffee, and poured it into her +grandmother’s egg-shell cups, his eye, as he leaned back, basking in the +warm fragrance, lighted on a recent photograph of Miss Bart, and the +desired transition was effected without an effort. The photograph was +well enough—but to catch her as she had looked last night! Gerty agreed +with him—never had she been so radiant. But could photography capture +that light? There had been a new look in her face—something different; +yes, Selden agreed there had been something different. The coffee was so +exquisite that he asked for a second cup: such a contrast to the watery +stuff at the club! Ah, your poor bachelor with his impersonal club fare, +alternating with the equally impersonal CUISINE of the dinner-party! A +man who lived in lodgings missed the best part of life—he pictured the +flavourless solitude of Trenor’s repast, and felt a moment’s compassion +for the man.... But to return to Lily—and again and again he returned, +questioning, conjecturing, leading Gerty on, draining her inmost thoughts +of their stored tenderness for her friend.</p> + +<p>At first she poured herself out unstintingly, happy in this perfect +communion of their sympathies. His understanding of Lily helped to +confirm her own belief in her friend. They dwelt together on the fact +that Lily had had no chance. Gerty instanced her generous impulses—her +restlessness and discontent. The fact that her life had never satisfied +her proved that she was made for better things. She might have married +more than once—the conventional rich marriage which she had been taught +to consider the sole end of existence—but when the opportunity came she +had always shrunk from it. Percy Gryce, for instance, had been in love +with her—every one at Bellomont had supposed them to be engaged, and her +dismissal of him was thought inexplicable. This view of the Gryce +incident chimed too well with Selden’s mood not to be instantly adopted +by him, with a flash of retrospective contempt for what had once seemed +the obvious solution. If rejection there had been—and he wondered now +that he had ever doubted it!—then he held the key to the secret, and the +hillsides of Bellomont were lit up, not with sunset, but with dawn. It +was he who had wavered and disowned the face of opportunity—and the joy +now warming his breast might have been a familiar inmate if he had +captured it in its first flight.</p> + +<p>It was at this point, perhaps, that a joy just trying its wings in +Gerty’s heart dropped to earth and lay still. She sat facing Selden, +repeating mechanically: “No, she has never been understood——” and all +the while she herself seemed to be sitting in the centre of a great glare +of comprehension. The little confidential room, where a moment ago their +thoughts had touched elbows like their chairs, grew to unfriendly +vastness, separating her from Selden by all the length of her new vision +of the future—and that future stretched out interminably, with her +lonely figure toiling down it, a mere speck on the solitude.</p> + +<p>“She is herself with a few people only; and you are one of them,” she +heard Selden saying. And again: “Be good to her, Gerty, won’t you?” and: +“She has it in her to become whatever she is believed to be—you’ll help +her by believing the best of her?”</p> + +<p>The words beat on Gerty’s brain like the sound of a language which has +seemed familiar at a distance, but on approaching is found to be +unintelligible. He had come to talk to her of Lily—that was all! There +had been a third at the feast she had spread for him, and that third had +taken her own place. She tried to follow what he was saying, to cling to +her own part in the talk—but it was all as meaningless as the boom of +waves in a drowning head, and she felt, as the drowning may feel, that to +sink would be nothing beside the pain of struggling to keep up.</p> + +<p>Selden rose, and she drew a deep breath, feeling that soon she could +yield to the blessed waves.</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Fisher’s? You say she was dining there? There’s music afterward; I +believe I had a card from her.” He glanced at the foolish pink-faced +clock that was drumming out this hideous hour. “A quarter past ten? I +might look in there now; the Fisher evenings are amusing. I haven’t kept +you up too late, Gerty? You look tired—I’ve rambled on and bored you.” +And in the unwonted overflow of his feelings, he left a cousinly kiss +upon her cheek.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>At Mrs. Fisher’s, through the cigar smoke of the studio, a dozen voices +greeted Selden. A song was pending as he entered, and he dropped into a +seat near his hostess, his eyes roaming in search of Miss Bart. But she +was not there, and the discovery gave him a pang out of all proportion to +its seriousness; since the note in his breast-pocket assured him that at +four the next day they would meet. To his impatience it seemed +immeasurably long to wait, and half-ashamed of the impulse, he leaned to +Mrs. Fisher to ask, as the music ceased, if Miss Bart had not dined with +her.</p> + +<p>“Lily? She’s just gone. She had to run off, I forget where. Wasn’t she +wonderful last night?”</p> + +<p>“Who’s that? Lily?” asked Jack Stepney, from the depths of a neighbouring +arm-chair. “Really, you know, I’m no prude, but when it comes to a girl +standing there as if she was up at auction—I thought seriously of +speaking to cousin Julia.”</p> + +<p>“You didn’t know Jack had become our social censor?” Mrs. Fisher said to +Selden with a laugh; and Stepney spluttered, amid the general derision: +“But she’s a cousin, hang it, and when a man’s married—TOWN TALK was +full of her this morning.”</p> + +<p>“Yes: lively reading that was,” said Mr. Ned Van Alstyne, stroking his +moustache to hide the smile behind it. “Buy the dirty sheet? No, of +course not; some fellow showed it to me—but I’d heard the stories +before. When a girl’s as good-looking as that she’d better marry; then no +questions are asked. In our imperfectly organized society there is no +provision as yet for the young woman who claims the privileges of +marriage without assuming its obligations.”</p> + +<p>“Well, I understand Lily is about to assume them in the shape of Mr. +Rosedale,” Mrs. Fisher said with a laugh.</p> + +<p>“Rosedale—good heavens!” exclaimed Van Alstyne, dropping his eye-glass. +“Stepney, that’s your fault for foisting the brute on us.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, confound it, you know, we don’t MARRY Rosedale in our family,” +Stepney languidly protested; but his wife, who sat in oppressive bridal +finery at the other side of the room, quelled him with the judicial +reflection: “In Lily’s circumstances it’s a mistake to have too high a +standard.”</p> + +<p>“I hear even Rosedale has been scared by the talk lately,” Mrs. Fisher +rejoined; “but the sight of her last night sent him off his head. What do +you think he said to me after her TABLEAU? ‘My God, Mrs. Fisher, if I +could get Paul Morpeth to paint her like that, the picture’d appreciate a +hundred per cent in ten years.’”</p> + +<p>“By Jove,—but isn’t she about somewhere?” exclaimed Van Alstyne, +restoring his glass with an uneasy glance.</p> + +<p>“No; she ran off while you were all mixing the punch down stairs. Where +was she going, by the way? What’s on tonight? I hadn’t heard of anything.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, not a party, I think,” said an inexperienced young Farish who had +arrived late. “I put her in her cab as I was coming in, and she gave the +driver the Trenors’ address.”</p> + +<p>“The Trenors’?” exclaimed Mrs. Jack Stepney. “Why, the house is +closed—Judy telephoned me from Bellomont this evening.”</p> + +<p>“Did she? That’s queer. I’m sure I’m not mistaken. Well, come now, +Trenor’s there, anyhow—I—oh, well—the fact is, I’ve no head for +numbers,” he broke off, admonished by the nudge of an adjoining foot, and +the smile that circled the room.</p> + +<p>In its unpleasant light Selden had risen and was shaking hands with his +hostess. The air of the place stifled him, and he wondered why he had +stayed in it so long.</p> + +<p>On the doorstep he stood still, remembering a phrase of Lily’s: “It seems +to me you spend a good deal of time in the element you disapprove of.”</p> + +<p>Well—what had brought him there but the quest of her? It was her +element, not his. But he would lift her out of it, take her beyond! That +BEYOND! on her letter was like a cry for rescue. He knew that Perseus’s +task is not done when he has loosed Andromeda’s chains, for her limbs are +numb with bondage, and she cannot rise and walk, but clings to him with +dragging arms as he beats back to land with his burden. Well, he had +strength for both—it was her weakness which had put the strength in him. +It was not, alas, a clean rush of waves they had to win through, but a +clogging morass of old associations and habits, and for the moment its +vapours were in his throat. But he would see clearer, breathe freer in +her presence: she was at once the dead weight at his breast and the spar +which should float them to safety. He smiled at the whirl of metaphor +with which he was trying to build up a defence against the influences of +the last hour. It was pitiable that he, who knew the mixed motives on +which social judgments depend, should still feel himself so swayed by +them. How could he lift Lily to a freer vision of life, if his own view +of her was to be coloured by any mind in which he saw her reflected?</p> + +<p>The moral oppression had produced a physical craving for air, and he +strode on, opening his lungs to the reverberating coldness of the night. +At the corner of Fifth Avenue Van Alstyne hailed him with an offer of +company.</p> + +<p>“Walking? A good thing to blow the smoke out of one’s head. Now that +women have taken to tobacco we live in a bath of nicotine. It would be a +curious thing to study the effect of cigarettes on the relation of the +sexes. Smoke is almost as great a solvent as divorce: both tend to +obscure the moral issue.”</p> + +<p>Nothing could have been less consonant with Selden’s mood than Van +Alstyne’s after-dinner aphorisms, but as long as the latter confined +himself to generalities his listener’s nerves were in control. Happily +Van Alstyne prided himself on his summing-up of social aspects, and with +Selden for audience was eager to show the sureness of his touch. Mrs. +Fisher lived in an East side street near the Park, and as the two men +walked down Fifth Avenue the new architectural developments of that +versatile thoroughfare invited Van Alstyne’s comment.</p> + +<p>“That Greiner house, now—a typical rung in the social ladder! The man +who built it came from a MILIEU where all the dishes are put on the table +at once. His facade is a complete architectural meal; if he had omitted a +style his friends might have thought the money had given out. Not a bad +purchase for Rosedale, though: attracts attention, and awes the Western +sight-seer. By and bye he’ll get out of that phase, and want something +that the crowd will pass and the few pause before. Especially if he +marries my clever cousin——”</p> + +<p>Selden dashed in with the query: “And the Wellington Brys’? Rather +clever of its kind, don’t you think?”</p> + +<p>They were just beneath the wide white facade, with its rich restraint of +line, which suggested the clever corseting of a redundant figure.</p> + +<p>“That’s the next stage: the desire to imply that one has been to Europe, +and has a standard. I’m sure Mrs. Bry thinks her house a copy of the +TRIANON; in America every marble house with gilt furniture is thought to +be a copy of the TRIANON. What a clever chap that architect is, +though—how he takes his client’s measure! He has put the whole of Mrs. +Bry in his use of the composite order. Now for the Trenors, you remember, +he chose the Corinthian: exuberant, but based on the best precedent. The +Trenor house is one of his best things—doesn’t look like a +banqueting-hall turned inside out. I hear Mrs. Trenor wants to build out +a new ball-room, and that divergence from Gus on that point keeps her at +Bellomont. The dimensions of the Brys’ ball-room must rankle: you may be +sure she knows ’em as well as if she’d been there last night with a +yard-measure. Who said she was in town, by the way? That Farish boy? She +isn’t, I know; Mrs. Stepney was right; the house is dark, you see: I +suppose Gus lives in the back.”</p> + +<p>He had halted opposite the Trenors’ corner, and Selden perforce stayed +his steps also. The house loomed obscure and uninhabited; only an oblong +gleam above the door spoke of provisional occupancy.</p> + +<p>“They’ve bought the house at the back: it gives them a hundred and fifty +feet in the side street. There’s where the ball-room’s to be, with a +gallery connecting it: billiard-room and so on above. I suggested +changing the entrance, and carrying the drawing-room across the whole +Fifth Avenue front; you see the front door corresponds with the +windows——”</p> + +<p>The walking-stick which Van Alstyne swung in demonstration dropped to a +startled “Hallo!” as the door opened and two figures were seen +silhouetted against the hall-light. At the same moment a hansom halted at +the curb-stone, and one of the figures floated down to it in a haze of +evening draperies; while the other, black and bulky, remained +persistently projected against the light.</p> + +<p>For an immeasurable second the two spectators of the incident were +silent; then the house-door closed, the hansom rolled off, and the whole +scene slipped by as if with the turn of a stereopticon.</p> + +<p>Van Alstyne dropped his eye-glass with a low whistle.</p> + +<p>“A—hem—nothing of this, eh, Selden? As one of the family, I know I may +count on you—appearances are deceptive—and Fifth Avenue is so +imperfectly lighted——”</p> + +<p>“Goodnight,” said Selden, turning sharply down the side street without +seeing the other’s extended hand.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Alone with her cousin’s kiss, Gerty stared upon her thoughts. He had +kissed her before—but not with another woman on his lips. If he had +spared her that she could have drowned quietly, welcoming the dark flood +as it submerged her. But now the flood was shot through with glory, and +it was harder to drown at sunrise than in darkness. Gerty hid her face +from the light, but it pierced to the crannies of her soul. She had been +so contented, life had seemed so simple and sufficient—why had he come +to trouble her with new hopes? And Lily—Lily, her best friend! +Woman-like, she accused the woman. Perhaps, had it not been for Lily, +her fond imagining might have become truth. Selden had always liked +her—had understood and sympathized with the modest independence of her +life. He, who had the reputation of weighing all things in the nice +balance of fastidious perceptions, had been uncritical and simple in his +view of her: his cleverness had never overawed her because she had felt +at home in his heart. And now she was thrust out, and the door barred +against her by Lily’s hand! Lily, for whose admission there she herself +had pleaded! The situation was lighted up by a dreary flash of irony. She +knew Selden—she saw how the force of her faith in Lily must have helped +to dispel his hesitations. She remembered, too, how Lily had talked of +him—she saw herself bringing the two together, making them known to each +other. On Selden’s part, no doubt, the wound inflicted was inconscient; +he had never guessed her foolish secret; but Lily—Lily must have known! +When, in such matters, are a woman’s perceptions at fault? And if she +knew, then she had deliberately despoiled her friend, and in mere +wantonness of power, since, even to Gerty’s suddenly flaming jealousy, it +seemed incredible that Lily should wish to be Selden’s wife. Lily might +be incapable of marrying for money, but she was equally incapable of +living without it, and Selden’s eager investigations into the small +economies of house-keeping made him appear to Gerty as tragically duped +as herself.</p> + +<p>She remained long in her sitting-room, where the embers were crumbling to +cold grey, and the lamp paled under its gay shade. Just beneath it stood +the photograph of Lily Bart, looking out imperially on the cheap +gimcracks, the cramped furniture of the little room. Could Selden picture +her in such an interior? Gerty felt the poverty, the insignificance of +her surroundings: she beheld her life as it must appear to Lily. And the +cruelty of Lily’s judgments smote upon her memory. She saw that she had +dressed her idol with attributes of her own making. When had Lily ever +really felt, or pitied, or understood? All she wanted was the taste of +new experiences: she seemed like some cruel creature experimenting in a +laboratory.</p> + +<p>The pink-faced clock drummed out another hour, and Gerty rose with a +start. She had an appointment early the next morning with a district +visitor on the East side. She put out her lamp, covered the fire, and +went into her bedroom to undress. In the little glass above her +dressing-table she saw her face reflected against the shadows of the +room, and tears blotted the reflection. What right had she to dream the +dreams of loveliness? A dull face invited a dull fate. She cried quietly +as she undressed, laying aside her clothes with her habitual precision, +setting everything in order for the next day, when the old life must be +taken up as though there had been no break in its routine. Her servant +did not come till eight o’clock, and she prepared her own tea-tray and +placed it beside the bed. Then she locked the door of the flat, +extinguished her light and lay down. But on her bed sleep would not +come, and she lay face to face with the fact that she hated Lily Bart. It +closed with her in the darkness like some formless evil to be blindly +grappled with. Reason, judgment, renunciation, all the sane daylight +forces, were beaten back in the sharp struggle for self-preservation. She +wanted happiness—wanted it as fiercely and unscrupulously as Lily did, +but without Lily’s power of obtaining it. And in her conscious impotence +she lay shivering, and hated her friend——</p> + +<p>A ring at the door-bell caught her to her feet. She struck a light and +stood startled, listening. For a moment her heart beat incoherently, then +she felt the sobering touch of fact, and remembered that such calls were +not unknown in her charitable work. She flung on her dressing-gown to +answer the summons, and unlocking her door, confronted the shining vision +of Lily Bart.</p> + +<p>Gerty’s first movement was one of revulsion. She shrank back as though +Lily’s presence flashed too sudden a light upon her misery. Then she +heard her name in a cry, had a glimpse of her friend’s face, and felt +herself caught and clung to.</p> + +<p>“Lily—what is it?” she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart released her, and stood breathing brokenly, like one who has +gained shelter after a long flight.</p> + +<p>“I was so cold—I couldn’t go home. Have you a fire?”</p> + +<p>Gerty’s compassionate instincts, responding to the swift call of habit, +swept aside all her reluctances. Lily was simply some one who needed +help—for what reason, there was no time to pause and conjecture: +disciplined sympathy checked the wonder on Gerty’s lips, and made her +draw her friend silently into the sitting-room and seat her by the +darkened hearth.</p> + +<p>“There is kindling wood here: the fire will burn in a minute.”</p> + +<p>She knelt down, and the flame leapt under her rapid hands. It flashed +strangely through the tears which still blurred her eyes, and smote on +the white ruin of Lily’s face. The girls looked at each other in silence; +then Lily repeated: “I couldn’t go home.”</p> + +<p>“No—no—you came here, dear! You’re cold and tired—sit quiet, and I’ll +make you some tea.”</p> + +<p>Gerty had unconsciously adopted the soothing note of her trade: all +personal feeling was merged in the sense of ministry, and experience had +taught her that the bleeding must be stayed before the wound is probed.</p> + +<p>Lily sat quiet, leaning to the fire: the clatter of cups behind her +soothed her as familiar noises hush a child whom silence has kept +wakeful. But when Gerty stood at her side with the tea she pushed it +away, and turned an estranged eye on the familiar room.</p> + +<p>“I came here because I couldn’t bear to be alone,” she said.</p> + +<p>Gerty set down the cup and knelt beside her.</p> + +<p>“Lily! Something has happened—can’t you tell me?”</p> + +<p>“I couldn’t bear to lie awake in my room till morning. I hate my room at +Aunt Julia’s—so I came here——”</p> + +<p>She stirred suddenly, broke from her apathy, and clung to Gerty in a +fresh burst of fear.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Gerty, the furies . . . you know the noise of their wings—alone, at +night, in the dark? But you don’t know—there is nothing to make the dark +dreadful to you——”</p> + +<p>The words, flashing back on Gerty’s last hours, struck from her a faint +derisive murmur; but Lily, in the blaze of her own misery, was blinded to +everything outside it.</p> + +<p>“You’ll let me stay? I shan’t mind when daylight comes—Is it late? Is +the night nearly over? It must be awful to be sleepless—everything +stands by the bed and stares——”</p> + +<p>Miss Farish caught her straying hands. “Lily, look at me! Something has +happened—an accident? You have been frightened—what has frightened you? +Tell me if you can—a word or two—so that I can help you.”</p> + +<p>Lily shook her head.</p> + +<p>“I am not frightened: that’s not the word. Can you imagine looking into +your glass some morning and seeing a disfigurement—some hideous change +that has come to you while you slept? Well, I seem to myself like that—I +can’t bear to see myself in my own thoughts—I hate ugliness, you +know—I’ve always turned from it—but I can’t explain to you—you +wouldn’t understand.”</p> + +<p>She lifted her head and her eyes fell on the clock.</p> + +<p>“How long the night is! And I know I shan’t sleep tomorrow. Some one told +me my father used to lie sleepless and think of horrors. And he was not +wicked, only unfortunate—and I see now how he must have suffered, lying +alone with his thoughts! But I am bad—a bad girl—all my thoughts are +bad—I have always had bad people about me. Is that any excuse? I thought +I could manage my own life—I was proud—proud! but now I’m on their +level——”</p> + +<p>Sobs shook her, and she bowed to them like a tree in a dry storm.</p> + +<p>Gerty knelt beside her, waiting, with the patience born of experience, +till this gust of misery should loosen fresh speech. She had first +imagined some physical shock, some peril of the crowded streets, since +Lily was presumably on her way home from Carry Fisher’s; but she now saw +that other nerve-centres were smitten, and her mind trembled back from +conjecture.</p> + +<p>Lily’s sobs ceased, and she lifted her head.</p> + +<p>“There are bad girls in your slums. Tell me—do they ever pick themselves +up? Ever forget, and feel as they did before?”</p> + +<p>“Lily! you mustn’t speak so—you’re dreaming.”</p> + +<p>“Don’t they always go from bad to worse? There’s no turning back—your +old self rejects you, and shuts you out.”</p> + +<p>She rose, stretching her arms as if in utter physical weariness. “Go to +bed, dear! You work hard and get up early. I’ll watch here by the fire, +and you’ll leave the light, and your door open. All I want is to feel +that you are near me.” She laid both hands on Gerty’s shoulders, with a +smile that was like sunrise on a sea strewn with wreckage.</p> + +<p>“I can’t leave you, Lily. Come and lie on my bed. Your hands are +frozen—you must undress and be made warm.” Gerty paused with sudden +compunction. “But Mrs. Peniston—it’s past midnight! What will she think?”</p> + +<p>“She goes to bed. I have a latchkey. It doesn’t matter—I can’t go back +there.”</p> + +<p>“There’s no need to: you shall stay here. But you must tell me where you +have been. Listen, Lily—it will help you to speak!” She regained Miss +Bart’s hands, and pressed them against her. “Try to tell me—it will +clear your poor head. Listen—you were dining at Carry Fisher’s.” Gerty +paused and added with a flash of heroism: “Lawrence Selden went from here +to find you.”</p> + +<p>At the word, Lily’s face melted from locked anguish to the open misery of +a child. Her lips trembled and her gaze widened with tears.</p> + +<p>“He went to find me? And I missed him! Oh, Gerty, he tried to help me. +He told me—he warned me long ago—he foresaw that I should grow hateful +to myself!”</p> + +<p>The name, as Gerty saw with a clutch at the heart, had loosened the +springs of self-pity in her friend’s dry breast, and tear by tear Lily +poured out the measure of her anguish. She had dropped sideways in +Gerty’s big arm-chair, her head buried where lately Selden’s had leaned, +in a beauty of abandonment that drove home to Gerty’s aching senses the +inevitableness of her own defeat. Ah, it needed no deliberate purpose on +Lily’s part to rob her of her dream! To look on that prone loveliness was +to see in it a natural force, to recognize that love and power belong to +such as Lily, as renunciation and service are the lot of those they +despoil. But if Selden’s infatuation seemed a fatal necessity, the effect +that his name produced shook Gerty’s steadfastness with a last pang. Men +pass through such superhuman loves and outlive them: they are the +probation subduing the heart to human joys. How gladly Gerty would have +welcomed the ministry of healing: how willingly have soothed the sufferer +back to tolerance of life! But Lily’s self-betrayal took this last hope +from her. The mortal maid on the shore is helpless against the siren who +loves her prey: such victims are floated back dead from their adventure.</p> + +<p>Lily sprang up and caught her with strong hands. “Gerty, you know +him—you understand him—tell me; if I went to him, if I told him +everything—if I said: ‘I am bad through and through—I want admiration, +I want excitement, I want money—’ yes, MONEY! That’s my shame, +Gerty—and it’s known, it’s said of me—it’s what men think of me—If I +said it all to him—told him the whole story—said plainly: ‘I’ve sunk +lower than the lowest, for I’ve taken what they take, and not paid as +they pay’—oh, Gerty, you know him, you can speak for him: if I told him +everything would he loathe me? Or would he pity me, and understand me, +and save me from loathing myself?”</p> + +<p>Gerty stood cold and passive. She knew the hour of her probation had +come, and her poor heart beat wildly against its destiny. As a dark river +sweeps by under a lightning flash, she saw her chance of happiness surge +past under a flash of temptation. What prevented her from saying: “He is +like other men?” She was not so sure of him, after all! But to do so +would have been like blaspheming her love. She could not put him before +herself in any light but the noblest: she must trust him to the height of +her own passion.</p> + +<p>“Yes: I know him; he will help you,” she said; and in a moment Lily’s +passion was weeping itself out against her breast.</p> + +<p>There was but one bed in the little flat, and the two girls lay down on +it side by side when Gerty had unlaced Lily’s dress and persuaded her to +put her lips to the warm tea. The light extinguished, they lay still in +the darkness, Gerty shrinking to the outer edge of the narrow couch to +avoid contact with her bed-fellow. Knowing that Lily disliked to be +caressed, she had long ago learned to check her demonstrative impulses +toward her friend. But tonight every fibre in her body shrank from Lily’s +nearness: it was torture to listen to her breathing, and feel the sheet +stir with it. As Lily turned, and settled to completer rest, a strand of +her hair swept Gerty’s cheek with its fragrance. Everything about her was +warm and soft and scented: even the stains of her grief became her as +rain-drops do the beaten rose. But as Gerty lay with arms drawn down her +side, in the motionless narrowness of an effigy, she felt a stir of sobs +from the breathing warmth beside her, and Lily flung out her hand, groped +for her friend’s, and held it fast.</p> + +<p>“Hold me, Gerty, hold me, or I shall think of things,” she moaned; and +Gerty silently slipped an arm under her, pillowing her head in its hollow +as a mother makes a nest for a tossing child. In the warm hollow Lily lay +still and her breathing grew low and regular. Her hand still clung to +Gerty’s as if to ward off evil dreams, but the hold of her fingers +relaxed, her head sank deeper into its shelter, and Gerty felt that she +slept.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_15">Chapter 15</h2> + +<p>When Lily woke she had the bed to herself, and the winter light was in +the room.</p> + +<p>She sat up, bewildered by the strangeness of her surroundings; then +memory returned, and she looked about her with a shiver. In the cold +slant of light reflected from the back wall of a neighbouring building, +she saw her evening dress and opera cloak lying in a tawdry heap on a +chair. Finery laid off is as unappetizing as the remains of a feast, and +it occurred to Lily that, at home, her maid’s vigilance had always spared +her the sight of such incongruities. Her body ached with fatigue, and +with the constriction of her attitude in Gerty’s bed. All through her +troubled sleep she had been conscious of having no space to toss in, and +the long effort to remain motionless made her feel as if she had spent +her night in a train.</p> + +<p>This sense of physical discomfort was the first to assert itself; then +she perceived, beneath it, a corresponding mental prostration, a languor +of horror more insufferable than the first rush of her disgust. The +thought of having to wake every morning with this weight on her breast +roused her tired mind to fresh effort. She must find some way out of the +slough into which she had stumbled: it was not so much compunction as the +dread of her morning thoughts that pressed on her the need of action. But +she was unutterably tired; it was weariness to think connectedly. She lay +back, looking about the poor slit of a room with a renewal of physical +distaste. The outer air, penned between high buildings, brought no +freshness through the window; steam-heat was beginning to sing in a coil +of dingy pipes, and a smell of cooking penetrated the crack of the door.</p> + +<p>The door opened, and Gerty, dressed and hatted, entered with a cup of +tea. Her face looked sallow and swollen in the dreary light, and her dull +hair shaded imperceptibly into the tones of her skin.</p> + +<p>She glanced shyly at Lily, asking in an embarrassed tone how she felt; +Lily answered with the same constraint, and raised herself up to drink +the tea.</p> + +<p>“I must have been over-tired last night; I think I had a nervous attack +in the carriage,” she said, as the drink brought clearness to her +sluggish thoughts.</p> + +<p>“You were not well; I am so glad you came here,” Gerty returned.</p> + +<p>“But how am I to get home? And Aunt Julia—?”</p> + +<p>“She knows; I telephoned early, and your maid has brought your things. +But won’t you eat something? I scrambled the eggs myself.”</p> + +<p>Lily could not eat; but the tea strengthened her to rise and dress under +her maid’s searching gaze. It was a relief to her that Gerty was obliged +to hasten away: the two kissed silently, but without a trace of the +previous night’s emotion.</p> + +<p>Lily found Mrs. Peniston in a state of agitation. She had sent for Grace +Stepney and was taking digitalis. Lily breasted the storm of enquiries as +best she could, explaining that she had had an attack of faintness on her +way back from Carry Fisher’s; that, fearing she would not have strength +to reach home, she had gone to Miss Farish’s instead; but that a quiet +night had restored her, and that she had no need of a doctor.</p> + +<p>This was a relief to Mrs. Peniston, who could give herself up to her own +symptoms, and Lily was advised to go and lie down, her aunt’s panacea for +all physical and moral disorders. In the solitude of her own room she was +brought back to a sharp contemplation of facts. Her daylight view of them +necessarily differed from the cloudy vision of the night. The winged +furies were now prowling gossips who dropped in on each other for tea. +But her fears seemed the uglier, thus shorn of their vagueness; and +besides, she had to act, not rave. For the first time she forced herself +to reckon up the exact amount of her debt to Trenor; and the result of +this hateful computation was the discovery that she had, in all, received +nine thousand dollars from him. The flimsy pretext on which it had been +given and received shrivelled up in the blaze of her shame: she knew that +not a penny of it was her own, and that to restore her self-respect she +must at once repay the whole amount. The inability thus to solace her +outraged feelings gave her a paralyzing sense of insignificance. She was +realizing for the first time that a woman’s dignity may cost more to keep +up than her carriage; and that the maintenance of a moral attribute +should be dependent on dollars and cents, made the world appear a more +sordid place than she had conceived it.</p> + +<p>After luncheon, when Grace Stepney’s prying eyes had been removed, Lily +asked for a word with her aunt. The two ladies went upstairs to the +sitting-room, where Mrs. Peniston seated herself in her black satin +arm-chair tufted with yellow buttons, beside a bead-work table bearing a +bronze box with a miniature of Beatrice Cenci in the lid. Lily felt for +these objects the same distaste which the prisoner may entertain for the +fittings of the court-room. It was here that her aunt received her rare +confidences, and the pink-eyed smirk of the turbaned Beatrice was +associated in her mind with the gradual fading of the smile from Mrs. +Peniston’s lips. That lady’s dread of a scene gave her an inexorableness +which the greatest strength of character could not have produced, since +it was independent of all considerations of right or wrong; and knowing +this, Lily seldom ventured to assail it. She had never felt less like +making the attempt than on the present occasion; but she had sought in +vain for any other means of escape from an intolerable situation.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston examined her critically. “You’re a bad colour, Lily: this +incessant rushing about is beginning to tell on you,” she said.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart saw an opening. “I don’t think it’s that, Aunt Julia; I’ve had +worries,” she replied.</p> + +<p>“Ah,” said Mrs. Peniston, shutting her lips with the snap of a purse +closing against a beggar.</p> + +<p>“I’m sorry to bother you with them,” Lily continued, “but I really +believe my faintness last night was brought on partly by anxious +thoughts—”</p> + +<p>“I should have said Carry Fisher’s cook was enough to account for it. +She has a woman who was with Maria Melson in 1891—the spring of the year +we went to Aix—and I remember dining there two days before we sailed, +and feeling SURE the coppers hadn’t been scoured.”</p> + +<p>“I don’t think I ate much; I can’t eat or sleep.” Lily paused, and then +said abruptly: “The fact is, Aunt Julia, I owe some money.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston’s face clouded perceptibly, but did not express the +astonishment her niece had expected. She was silent, and Lily was forced +to continue: “I have been foolish——”</p> + +<p>“No doubt you have: extremely foolish,” Mrs. Peniston interposed. “I +fail to see how any one with your income, and no expenses—not to mention +the handsome presents I’ve always given you——”</p> + +<p>“Oh, you’ve been most generous, Aunt Julia; I shall never forget your +kindness. But perhaps you don’t quite realize the expense a girl is put +to nowadays——”</p> + +<p>“I don’t realize that YOU are put to any expense except for your clothes +and your railway fares. I expect you to be handsomely dressed; but I paid +Celeste’s bill for you last October.”</p> + +<p>Lily hesitated: her aunt’s implacable memory had never been more +inconvenient. “You were as kind as possible; but I have had to get a few +things since——”</p> + +<p>“What kind of things? Clothes? How much have you spent? Let me see the +bill—I daresay the woman is swindling you.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, no, I think not: clothes have grown so frightfully expensive; and +one needs so many different kinds, with country visits, and golf and +skating, and Aiken and Tuxedo——”</p> + +<p>“Let me see the bill,” Mrs. Peniston repeated.</p> + +<p>Lily hesitated again. In the first place, Mme. Celeste had not yet sent +in her account, and secondly, the amount it represented was only a +fraction of the sum that Lily needed.</p> + +<p>“She hasn’t sent in the bill for my winter things, but I KNOW it’s large; +and there are one or two other things; I’ve been careless and +imprudent—I’m frightened to think of what I owe——”</p> + +<p>She raised the troubled loveliness of her face to Mrs. Peniston, vainly +hoping that a sight so moving to the other sex might not be without +effect upon her own. But the effect produced was that of making Mrs. +Peniston shrink back apprehensively.</p> + +<p>“Really, Lily, you are old enough to manage your own affairs, and after +frightening me to death by your performance of last night you might at +least choose a better time to worry me with such matters.” Mrs. Peniston +glanced at the clock, and swallowed a tablet of digitalis. “If you owe +Celeste another thousand, she may send me her account,” she added, as +though to end the discussion at any cost.</p> + +<p>“I am very sorry, Aunt Julia; I hate to trouble you at such a time; but I +have really no choice—I ought to have spoken sooner—I owe a great deal +more than a thousand dollars.”</p> + +<p>“A great deal more? Do you owe two? She must have robbed you!”</p> + +<p>“I told you it was not only Celeste. I—there are other bills—more +pressing—that must be settled.”</p> + +<p>“What on earth have you been buying? Jewelry? You must have gone off your +head,” said Mrs. Peniston with asperity. “But if you have run into debt, +you must suffer the consequences, and put aside your monthly income till +your bills are paid. If you stay quietly here until next spring, instead +of racing about all over the country, you will have no expenses at all, +and surely in four or five months you can settle the rest of your bills +if I pay the dress-maker now.”</p> + +<p>Lily was again silent. She knew she could not hope to extract even a +thousand dollars from Mrs. Peniston on the mere plea of paying Celeste’s +bill: Mrs. Peniston would expect to go over the dress-maker’s account, +and would make out the cheque to her and not to Lily. And yet the money +must be obtained before the day was over!</p> + +<p>“The debts I speak of are—different—not like tradesmen’s bills,” she +began confusedly; but Mrs. Peniston’s look made her almost afraid to +continue. Could it be that her aunt suspected anything? The idea +precipitated Lily’s avowal.</p> + +<p>“The fact is, I’ve played cards a good deal—bridge; the women all do it; +girls too—it’s expected. Sometimes I’ve won—won a good deal—but lately +I’ve been unlucky—and of course such debts can’t be paid off +gradually——”</p> + +<p>She paused: Mrs. Peniston’s face seemed to be petrifying as she listened.</p> + +<p>“Cards—you’ve played cards for money? It’s true, then: when I was told +so I wouldn’t believe it. I won’t ask if the other horrors I was told +were true too; I’ve heard enough for the state of my nerves. When I think +of the example you’ve had in this house! But I suppose it’s your foreign +bringing-up—no one knew where your mother picked up her friends. And her +Sundays were a scandal—that I know.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston wheeled round suddenly. “You play cards on Sunday?”</p> + +<p>Lily flushed with the recollection of certain rainy Sundays at Bellomont +and with the Dorsets.</p> + +<p>“You’re hard on me, Aunt Julia: I have never really cared for cards, but +a girl hates to be thought priggish and superior, and one drifts into +doing what the others do. I’ve had a dreadful lesson, and if you’ll help +me out this time I promise you—”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Peniston raised her hand warningly. “You needn’t make any promises: +it’s unnecessary. When I offered you a home I didn’t undertake to pay +your gambling debts.”</p> + +<p>“Aunt Julia! You don’t mean that you won’t help me?”</p> + +<p>“I shall certainly not do anything to give the impression that I +countenance your behaviour. If you really owe your dress-maker, I will +settle with her—beyond that I recognize no obligation to assume your +debts.”</p> + +<p>Lily had risen, and stood pale and quivering before her aunt. Pride +stormed in her, but humiliation forced the cry from her lips: “Aunt +Julia, I shall be disgraced—I—” But she could go no farther. If her +aunt turned such a stony ear to the fiction of the gambling debts, in +what spirit would she receive the terrible avowal of the truth?</p> + +<p>“I consider that you ARE disgraced, Lily: disgraced by your conduct far +more than by its results. You say your friends have persuaded you to play +cards with them; well, they may as well learn a lesson too. They can +probably afford to lose a little money—and at any rate, I am not going +to waste any of mine in paying them. And now I must ask you to leave +me—this scene has been extremely painful, and I have my own health to +consider. Draw down the blinds, please; and tell Jennings I will see no +one this afternoon but Grace Stepney.”</p> + +<p>Lily went up to her own room and bolted the door. She was trembling with +fear and anger—the rush of the furies’ wings was in her ears. She walked +up and down the room with blind irregular steps. The last door of escape +was closed—she felt herself shut in with her dishonour.</p> + +<p>Suddenly her wild pacing brought her before the clock on the +chimney-piece. Its hands stood at half-past three, and she remembered +that Selden was to come to her at four. She had meant to put him off with +a word—but now her heart leaped at the thought of seeing him. Was there +not a promise of rescue in his love? As she had lain at Gerty’s side the +night before, she had thought of his coming, and of the sweetness of +weeping out her pain upon his breast. Of course she had meant to clear +herself of its consequences before she met him—she had never really +doubted that Mrs. Peniston would come to her aid. And she had felt, even +in the full storm of her misery, that Selden’s love could not be her +ultimate refuge; only it would be so sweet to take a moment’s shelter +there, while she gathered fresh strength to go on.</p> + +<p>But now his love was her only hope, and as she sat alone with her +wretchedness the thought of confiding in him became as seductive as the +river’s flow to the suicide. The first plunge would be terrible—but +afterward, what blessedness might come! She remembered Gerty’s words: “I +know him—he will help you”; and her mind clung to them as a sick person +might cling to a healing relic. Oh, if he really understood—if he would +help her to gather up her broken life, and put it together in some new +semblance in which no trace of the past should remain! He had always made +her feel that she was worthy of better things, and she had never been in +greater need of such solace. Once and again she shrank at the thought of +imperilling his love by her confession: for love was what she needed—it +would take the glow of passion to weld together the shattered fragments +of her self-esteem. But she recurred to Gerty’s words and held fast to +them. She was sure that Gerty knew Selden’s feeling for her, and it had +never dawned upon her blindness that Gerty’s own judgment of him was +coloured by emotions far more ardent than her own.</p> + +<p>Four o’clock found her in the drawing-room: she was sure that Selden +would be punctual. But the hour came and passed—it moved on feverishly, +measured by her impatient heart-beats. She had time to take a fresh +survey of her wretchedness, and to fluctuate anew between the impulse to +confide in Selden and the dread of destroying his illusions. But as the +minutes passed the need of throwing herself on his comprehension became +more urgent: she could not bear the weight of her misery alone. There +would be a perilous moment, perhaps: but could she not trust to her +beauty to bridge it over, to land her safe in the shelter of his devotion?</p> + +<p>But the hour sped on and Selden did not come. Doubtless he had been +detained, or had misread her hurriedly scrawled note, taking the four for +a five. The ringing of the door-bell a few minutes after five confirmed +this supposition, and made Lily hastily resolve to write more legibly in +future. The sound of steps in the hall, and of the butler’s voice +preceding them, poured fresh energy into her veins. She felt herself once +more the alert and competent moulder of emergencies, and the remembrance +of her power over Selden flushed her with sudden confidence. But when the +drawing-room door opened it was Rosedale who came in.</p> + +<p>The reaction caused her a sharp pang, but after a passing movement of +irritation at the clumsiness of fate, and at her own carelessness in not +denying the door to all but Selden, she controlled herself and greeted +Rosedale amicably. It was annoying that Selden, when he came, should find +that particular visitor in possession, but Lily was mistress of the art +of ridding herself of superfluous company, and to her present mood +Rosedale seemed distinctly negligible.</p> + +<p>His own view of the situation forced itself upon her after a few moments’ +conversation. She had caught at the Brys’ entertainment as an easy +impersonal subject, likely to tide them over the interval till Selden +appeared, but Mr. Rosedale, tenaciously planted beside the tea-table, his +hands in his pockets, his legs a little too freely extended, at once gave +the topic a personal turn.</p> + +<p>“Pretty well done—well, yes, I suppose it was: Welly Bry’s got his back +up and don’t mean to let go till he’s got the hang of the thing. Of +course, there were things here and there—things Mrs. Fisher couldn’t be +expected to see to—the champagne wasn’t cold, and the coats got mixed in +the coat-room. I would have spent more money on the music. But that’s my +character: if I want a thing I’m willing to pay: I don’t go up to the +counter, and then wonder if the article’s worth the price. I wouldn’t be +satisfied to entertain like the Welly Brys; I’d want something that would +look more easy and natural, more as if I took it in my stride. And it +takes just two things to do that, Miss Bart: money, and the right woman +to spend it.”</p> + +<p>He paused, and examined her attentively while she affected to rearrange +the tea-cups.</p> + +<p>“I’ve got the money,” he continued, clearing his throat, “and what I want +is the woman—and I mean to have her too.”</p> + +<p>He leaned forward a little, resting his hands on the head of his +walking-stick. He had seen men of Ned Van Alstyne’s type bring their hats +and sticks into a drawing-room, and he thought it added a touch of +elegant familiarity to their appearance.</p> + +<p>Lily was silent, smiling faintly, with her eyes absently resting on his +face. She was in reality reflecting that a declaration would take some +time to make, and that Selden must surely appear before the moment of +refusal had been reached. Her brooding look, as of a mind withdrawn yet +not averted, seemed to Mr. Rosedale full of a subtle encouragement. He +would not have liked any evidence of eagerness.</p> + +<p>“I mean to have her too,” he repeated, with a laugh intended to +strengthen his self-assurance. “I generally HAVE got what I wanted in +life, Miss Bart. I wanted money, and I’ve got more than I know how to +invest; and now the money doesn’t seem to be of any account unless I can +spend it on the right woman. That’s what I want to do with it: I want my +wife to make all the other women feel small. I’d never grudge a dollar +that was spent on that. But it isn’t every woman can do it, no matter how +much you spend on her. There was a girl in some history book who wanted +gold shields, or something, and the fellows threw ’em at her, and she was +crushed under ’em: they killed her. Well, that’s true enough: some women +looked buried under their jewelry. What I want is a woman who’ll hold her +head higher the more diamonds I put on it. And when I looked at you the +other night at the Brys’, in that plain white dress, looking as if you +had a crown on, I said to myself: ‘By gad, if she had one she’d wear it +as if it grew on her.’”</p> + +<p>Still Lily did not speak, and he continued, warming with his theme: “Tell +you what it is, though, that kind of woman costs more than all the rest +of ’em put together. If a woman’s going to ignore her pearls, they want +to be better than anybody else’s—and so it is with everything else. You +know what I mean—you know it’s only the showy things that are cheap. +Well, I should want my wife to be able to take the earth for granted if +she wanted to. I know there’s one thing vulgar about money, and that’s +the thinking about it; and my wife would never have to demean herself in +that way.” He paused, and then added, with an unfortunate lapse to an +earlier manner: “I guess you know the lady I’ve got in view, Miss Bart.”</p> + +<p>Lily raised her head, brightening a little under the challenge. Even +through the dark tumult of her thoughts, the clink of Mr. Rosedale’s +millions had a faintly seductive note. Oh, for enough of them to cancel +her one miserable debt! But the man behind them grew increasingly +repugnant in the light of Selden’s expected coming. The contrast was too +grotesque: she could scarcely suppress the smile it provoked. She decided +that directness would be best.</p> + +<p>“If you mean me, Mr. Rosedale, I am very grateful—very much flattered; +but I don’t know what I have ever done to make you think—”</p> + +<p>“Oh, if you mean you’re not dead in love with me, I’ve got sense enough +left to see that. And I ain’t talking to you as if you were—I presume I +know the kind of talk that’s expected under those circumstances. I’m +confoundedly gone on you—that’s about the size of it—and I’m just +giving you a plain business statement of the consequences. You’re not +very fond of me—YET—but you’re fond of luxury, and style, and +amusement, and of not having to worry about cash. You like to have a good +time, and not have to settle for it; and what I propose to do is to +provide for the good time and do the settling.”</p> + +<p>He paused, and she returned with a chilling smile: “You are mistaken in +one point, Mr. Rosedale: whatever I enjoy I am prepared to settle for.”</p> + +<p>She spoke with the intention of making him see that, if his words implied +a tentative allusion to her private affairs, she was prepared to meet and +repudiate it. But if he recognized her meaning it failed to abash him, +and he went on in the same tone: “I didn’t mean to give offence; excuse +me if I’ve spoken too plainly. But why ain’t you straight with me—why do +you put up that kind of bluff? You know there’ve been times when you were +bothered—damned bothered—and as a girl gets older, and things keep +moving along, why, before she knows it, the things she wants are liable +to move past her and not come back. I don’t say it’s anywhere near that +with you yet; but you’ve had a taste of bothers that a girl like yourself +ought never to have known about, and what I’m offering you is the chance +to turn your back on them once for all.”</p> + +<p>The colour burned in Lily’s face as he ended; there was no mistaking the +point he meant to make, and to permit it to pass unheeded was a fatal +confession of weakness, while to resent it too openly was to risk +offending him at a perilous moment. Indignation quivered on her lip; but +it was quelled by the secret voice which warned her that she must not +quarrel with him. He knew too much about her, and even at the moment when +it was essential that he should show himself at his best, he did not +scruple to let her see how much he knew. How then would he use his power +when her expression of contempt had dispelled his one motive for +restraint? Her whole future might hinge on her way of answering him: she +had to stop and consider that, in the stress of her other anxieties, as a +breathless fugitive may have to pause at the cross-roads and try to +decide coolly which turn to take.</p> + +<p>“You are quite right, Mr. Rosedale. I HAVE had bothers; and I am grateful +to you for wanting to relieve me of them. It is not always easy to be +quite independent and self-respecting when one is poor and lives among +rich people; I have been careless about money, and have worried about my +bills. But I should be selfish and ungrateful if I made that a reason for +accepting all you offer, with no better return to make than the desire to +be free from my anxieties. You must give me time—time to think of your +kindness—and of what I could give you in return for it——”</p> + +<p>She held out her hand with a charming gesture in which dismissal was +shorn of its rigour. Its hint of future leniency made Rosedale rise in +obedience to it, a little flushed with his unhoped-for success, and +disciplined by the tradition of his blood to accept what was conceded, +without undue haste to press for more. Something in his prompt +acquiescence frightened her; she felt behind it the stored force of a +patience that might subdue the strongest will. But at least they had +parted amicably, and he was out of the house without meeting +Selden—Selden, whose continued absence now smote her with a new alarm. +Rosedale had remained over an hour, and she understood that it was now +too late to hope for Selden. He would write explaining his absence, of +course; there would be a note from him by the late post. But her +confession would have to be postponed; and the chill of the delay settled +heavily on her fagged spirit.</p> + +<p>It lay heavier when the postman’s last ring brought no note for her, and +she had to go upstairs to a lonely night—a night as grim and sleepless +as her tortured fancy had pictured it to Gerty. She had never learned to +live with her own thoughts, and to be confronted with them through such +hours of lucid misery made the confused wretchedness of her previous +vigil seem easily bearable.</p> + +<p>Daylight disbanded the phantom crew, and made it clear to her that she +would hear from Selden before noon; but the day passed without his +writing or coming. Lily remained at home, lunching and dining alone with +her aunt, who complained of flutterings of the heart, and talked icily on +general topics. Mrs. Peniston went to bed early, and when she had gone +Lily sat down and wrote a note to Selden. She was about to ring for a +messenger to despatch it when her eye fell on a paragraph in the evening +paper which lay at her elbow: “Mr. Lawrence Selden was among the +passengers sailing this afternoon for Havana and the West Indies on the +Windward Liner Antilles.”</p> + +<p>She laid down the paper and sat motionless, staring at her note. She +understood now that he was never coming—that he had gone away because he +was afraid that he might come. She rose, and walking across the floor +stood gazing at herself for a long time in the brightly lit mirror above +the mantelpiece. The lines in her face came out terribly—she looked +old; and when a girl looks old to herself, how does she look to other +people? She moved away, and began to wander aimlessly about the room, +fitting her steps with mechanical precision between the monstrous roses +of Mrs. Peniston’s Axminster. Suddenly she noticed that the pen with +which she had written to Selden still rested against the uncovered +inkstand. She seated herself again, and taking out an envelope, addressed +it rapidly to Rosedale. Then she laid out a sheet of paper, and sat over +it with suspended pen. It had been easy enough to write the date, and +“Dear Mr. Rosedale”—but after that her inspiration flagged. She meant to +tell him to come to her, but the words refused to shape themselves. At +length she began: “I have been thinking——” then she laid the pen down, +and sat with her elbows on the table and her face hidden in her hands.</p> + +<p>Suddenly she started up at the sound of the door-bell. It was not +late—barely ten o’clock—and there might still be a note from Selden, or +a message—or he might be there himself, on the other side of the door! +The announcement of his sailing might have been a mistake—it might be +another Lawrence Selden who had gone to Havana—all these possibilities +had time to flash through her mind, and build up the conviction that she +was after all to see or hear from him, before the drawing-room door +opened to admit a servant carrying a telegram.</p> + +<p>Lily tore it open with shaking hands, and read Bertha Dorset’s name below +the message: “Sailing unexpectedly tomorrow. Will you join us on a cruise +in Mediterranean?”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter fs150"></div> +<p class="center fs150 p4">BOOK TWO</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_1a">Chapter 1</h2> + +<p>It came vividly to Selden on the Casino steps that Monte Carlo had, more +than any other place he knew, the gift of accommodating itself to each +man’s humour. His own, at the moment, lent it a festive readiness of +welcome that might well, in a disenchanted eye, have turned to paint and +facility. So frank an appeal for participation—so outspoken a +recognition of the holiday vein in human nature—struck refreshingly on a +mind jaded by prolonged hard work in surroundings made for the discipline +of the senses. As he surveyed the white square set in an exotic coquetry +of architecture, the studied tropicality of the gardens, the groups +loitering in the foreground against mauve mountains which suggested a +sublime stage-setting forgotten in a hurried shifting of scenes—as he +took in the whole outspread effect of light and leisure, he felt a +movement of revulsion from the last few months of his life.</p> + +<p>The New York winter had presented an interminable perspective of +snow-burdened days, reaching toward a spring of raw sunshine and furious +air, when the ugliness of things rasped the eye as the gritty wind ground +into the skin. Selden, immersed in his work, had told himself that +external conditions did not matter to a man in his state, and that cold +and ugliness were a good tonic for relaxed sensibilities. When an urgent +case summoned him abroad to confer with a client in Paris, he broke +reluctantly with the routine of the office; and it was only now that, +having despatched his business, and slipped away for a week in the south, +he began to feel the renewed zest of spectatorship that is the solace of +those who take an objective interest in life.</p> + +<p>The multiplicity of its appeals—the perpetual surprise of its contrasts +and resemblances! All these tricks and turns of the show were upon him +with a spring as he descended the Casino steps and paused on the pavement +at its doors. He had not been abroad for seven years—and what changes +the renewed contact produced! If the central depths were untouched, +hardly a pin-point of surface remained the same. And this was the very +place to bring out the completeness of the renewal. The sublimities, the +perpetuities, might have left him as he was: but this tent pitched for a +day’s revelry spread a roof of oblivion between himself and his fixed sky.</p> + +<p>It was mid-April, and one felt that the revelry had reached its climax +and that the desultory groups in the square and gardens would soon +dissolve and reform in other scenes. Meanwhile the last moments of the +performance seemed to gain an added brightness from the hovering threat +of the curtain. The quality of the air, the exuberance of the flowers, +the blue intensity of sea and sky, produced the effect of a closing +TABLEAU, when all the lights are turned on at once. This impression was +presently heightened by the way in which a consciously conspicuous group +of people advanced to the middle front, and stood before Selden with the +air of the chief performers gathered together by the exigencies of the +final effect. Their appearance confirmed the impression that the show had +been staged regardless of expense, and emphasized its resemblance to one +of those “costume-plays” in which the protagonists walk through the +passions without displacing a drapery. The ladies stood in unrelated +attitudes calculated to isolate their effects, and the men hung about +them as irrelevantly as stage heroes whose tailors are named in the +programme. It was Selden himself who unwittingly fused the group by +arresting the attention of one of its members.</p> + +<p>“Why, Mr. Selden!” Mrs. Fisher exclaimed in surprise; and with a gesture +toward Mrs. Jack Stepney and Mrs. Wellington Bry, she added plaintively: +“We’re starving to death because we can’t decide where to lunch.”</p> + +<p>Welcomed into their group, and made the confidant of their difficulty, +Selden learned with amusement that there were several places where one +might miss something by not lunching, or forfeit something by lunching; +so that eating actually became a minor consideration on the very spot +consecrated to its rites.</p> + +<p>“Of course one gets the best things at the TERRASSE—but that looks as if +one hadn’t any other reason for being there: the Americans who don’t know +any one always rush for the best food. And the Duchess of Beltshire has +taken up Becassin’s lately,” Mrs. Bry earnestly summed up.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bry, to Mrs. Fisher’s despair, had not progressed beyond the point +of weighing her social alternatives in public. She could not acquire the +air of doing things because she wanted to, and making her choice the +final seal of their fitness.</p> + +<p>Mr. Bry, a short pale man, with a business face and leisure clothes, met +the dilemma hilariously.</p> + +<p>“I guess the Duchess goes where it’s cheapest, unless she can get her +meal paid for. If you offered to blow her off at the TERRASSE she’d turn +up fast enough.”</p> + +<p>But Mrs. Jack Stepney interposed. “The Grand Dukes go to that little +place at the Condamine. Lord Hubert says it’s the only restaurant in +Europe where they can cook peas.”</p> + +<p>Lord Hubert Dacey, a slender shabby-looking man, with a charming worn +smile, and the air of having spent his best years in piloting the wealthy +to the right restaurant, assented with gentle emphasis: “It’s quite that.”</p> + +<p>“PEAS?” said Mr. Bry contemptuously. “Can they cook terrapin? It just +shows,” he continued, “what these European markets are, when a fellow can +make a reputation cooking peas!”</p> + +<p>Jack Stepney intervened with authority. “I don’t know that I quite agree +with Dacey: there’s a little hole in Paris, off the Quai Voltaire—but in +any case, I can’t advise the Condamine GARGOTE; at least not with ladies.”</p> + +<p>Stepney, since his marriage, had thickened and grown prudish, as the Van +Osburgh husbands were apt to do; but his wife, to his surprise and +discomfiture, had developed an earth-shaking fastness of gait which left +him trailing breathlessly in her wake.</p> + +<p>“That’s where we’ll go then!” she declared, with a heavy toss of her +plumage. “I’m so tired of the TERRASSE: it’s as dull as one of mother’s +dinners. And Lord Hubert has promised to tell us who all the awful people +are at the other place—hasn’t he, Carry? Now, Jack, don’t look so +solemn!”</p> + +<p>“Well,” said Mrs. Bry, “all I want to know is who their dress-makers are.”</p> + +<p>“No doubt Dacey can tell you that too,” remarked Stepney, with an ironic +intention which the other received with the light murmur, “I can at least +FIND OUT, my dear fellow”; and Mrs. Bry having declared that she couldn’t +walk another step, the party hailed two or three of the light phaetons +which hover attentively on the confines of the gardens, and rattled off +in procession toward the Condamine.</p> + +<p>Their destination was one of the little restaurants overhanging the +boulevard which dips steeply down from Monte Carlo to the low +intermediate quarter along the quay. From the window in which they +presently found themselves installed, they overlooked the intense blue +curve of the harbour, set between the verdure of twin promontories: to +the right, the cliff of Monaco, topped by the mediaeval silhouette of its +church and castle, to the left the terraces and pinnacles of the +gambling-house. Between the two, the waters of the bay were furrowed by a +light coming and going of pleasure-craft, through which, just at the +culminating moment of luncheon, the majestic advance of a great +steam-yacht drew the company’s attention from the peas.</p> + +<p>“By Jove, I believe that’s the Dorsets back!” Stepney exclaimed; and Lord +Hubert, dropping his single eye-glass, corroborated: “It’s the +Sabrina—yes.”</p> + +<p>“So soon? They were to spend a month in Sicily,” Mrs. Fisher observed.</p> + +<p>“I guess they feel as if they had: there’s only one up-to-date hotel in +the whole place,” said Mr. Bry disparagingly.</p> + +<p>“It was Ned Silverton’s idea—but poor Dorset and Lily Bart must have +been horribly bored.” Mrs. Fisher added in an undertone to Selden: “I do +hope there hasn’t been a row.”</p> + +<p>“It’s most awfully jolly having Miss Bart back,” said Lord Hubert, in his +mild deliberate voice; and Mrs. Bry added ingenuously: “I daresay the +Duchess will dine with us, now that Lily’s here.”</p> + +<p>“The Duchess admires her immensely: I’m sure she’d be charmed to have it +arranged,” Lord Hubert agreed, with the professional promptness of the +man accustomed to draw his profit from facilitating social contacts: +Selden was struck by the businesslike change in his manner.</p> + +<p>“Lily has been a tremendous success here,” Mrs. Fisher continued, still +addressing herself confidentially to Selden. “She looks ten years +younger—I never saw her so handsome. Lady Skiddaw took her everywhere in +Cannes, and the Crown Princess of Macedonia had her to stop for a week at +Cimiez. People say that was one reason why Bertha whisked the yacht off +to Sicily: the Crown Princess didn’t take much notice of her, and she +couldn’t bear to look on at Lily’s triumph.”</p> + +<p>Selden made no reply. He was vaguely aware that Miss Bart was cruising in +the Mediterranean with the Dorsets, but it had not occurred to him that +there was any chance of running across her on the Riviera, where the +season was virtually at an end. As he leaned back, silently contemplating +his filigree cup of Turkish coffee, he was trying to put some order in +his thoughts, to tell himself how the news of her nearness was really +affecting him. He had a personal detachment enabling him, even in moments +of emotional high-pressure, to get a fairly clear view of his feelings, +and he was sincerely surprised by the disturbance which the sight of the +Sabrina had produced in him. He had reason to think that his three months +of engrossing professional work, following on the sharp shock of his +disillusionment, had cleared his mind of its sentimental vapours. The +feeling he had nourished and given prominence to was one of thankfulness +for his escape: he was like a traveller so grateful for rescue from a +dangerous accident that at first he is hardly conscious of his bruises. +Now he suddenly felt the latent ache, and realized that after all he had +not come off unhurt.</p> + +<p>An hour later, at Mrs. Fisher’s side in the Casino gardens, he was trying +to find fresh reasons for forgetting the injury received in the +contemplation of the peril avoided. The party had dispersed with the +loitering indecision characteristic of social movements at Monte Carlo, +where the whole place, and the long gilded hours of the day, seem to +offer an infinity of ways of being idle. Lord Hubert Dacey had finally +gone off in quest of the Duchess of Beltshire, charged by Mrs. Bry with +the delicate negotiation of securing that lady’s presence at dinner, the +Stepneys had left for Nice in their motor-car, and Mr. Bry had departed +to take his place in the pigeon shooting match which was at the moment +engaging his highest faculties.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bry, who had a tendency to grow red and stertorous after luncheon, +had been judiciously prevailed upon by Carry Fisher to withdraw to her +hotel for an hour’s repose; and Selden and his companion were thus left +to a stroll propitious to confidences. The stroll soon resolved itself +into a tranquil session on a bench overhung with laurel and Banksian +roses, from which they caught a dazzle of blue sea between marble +balusters, and the fiery shafts of cactus-blossoms shooting meteor-like +from the rock. The soft shade of their niche, and the adjacent glitter of +the air, were conducive to an easy lounging mood, and to the smoking of +many cigarettes; and Selden, yielding to these influences, suffered Mrs. +Fisher to unfold to him the history of her recent experiences. She had +come abroad with the Welly Brys at the moment when fashion flees the +inclemency of the New York spring. The Brys, intoxicated by their first +success, already thirsted for new kingdoms, and Mrs. Fisher, viewing the +Riviera as an easy introduction to London society, had guided their +course thither. She had affiliations of her own in every capital, and a +facility for picking them up again after long absences; and the carefully +disseminated rumour of the Brys’ wealth had at once gathered about them a +group of cosmopolitan pleasure-seekers.</p> + +<p>“But things are not going as well as I expected,” Mrs. Fisher frankly +admitted. “It’s all very well to say that every body with money can get +into society; but it would be truer to say that NEARLY everybody can. +And the London market is so glutted with new Americans that, to succeed +there now, they must be either very clever or awfully queer. The Brys are +neither. HE would get on well enough if she’d let him alone; they like +his slang and his brag and his blunders. But Louisa spoils it all by +trying to repress him and put herself forward. If she’d be natural +herself—fat and vulgar and bouncing—it would be all right; but as soon +as she meets anybody smart she tries to be slender and queenly. She +tried it with the Duchess of Beltshire and Lady Skiddaw, and they fled. +I’ve done my best to make her see her mistake—I’ve said to her again and +again: ‘Just let yourself go, Louisa’; but she keeps up the humbug even +with me—I believe she keeps on being queenly in her own room, with the +door shut.</p> + +<p>“The worst of it is,” Mrs. Fisher went on, “that she thinks it’s all MY +fault. When the Dorsets turned up here six weeks ago, and everybody began +to make a fuss about Lily Bart, I could see Louisa thought that if she’d +had Lily in tow instead of me she would have been hob-nobbing with all +the royalties by this time. She doesn’t realize that it’s Lily’s beauty +that does it: Lord Hubert tells me Lily is thought even handsomer than +when he knew her at Aix ten years ago. It seems she was tremendously +admired there. An Italian Prince, rich and the real thing, wanted to +marry her; but just at the critical moment a good-looking step-son turned +up, and Lily was silly enough to flirt with him while her +marriage-settlements with the step-father were being drawn up. Some +people said the young man did it on purpose. You can fancy the scandal: +there was an awful row between the men, and people began to look at Lily +so queerly that Mrs. Peniston had to pack up and finish her cure +elsewhere. Not that SHE ever understood: to this day she thinks that Aix +didn’t suit her, and mentions her having been sent there as proof of the +incompetence of French doctors. That’s Lily all over, you know: she works +like a slave preparing the ground and sowing her seed; but the day she +ought to be reaping the harvest she over-sleeps herself or goes off on a +picnic.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher paused and looked reflectively at the deep shimmer of sea +between the cactus-flowers. “Sometimes,” she added, “I think it’s just +flightiness—and sometimes I think it’s because, at heart, she despises +the things she’s trying for. And it’s the difficulty of deciding that +makes her such an interesting study.” She glanced tentatively at Selden’s +motionless profile, and resumed with a slight sigh: “Well, all I can say +is, I wish she’d give ME some of her discarded opportunities. I wish we +could change places now, for instance. She could make a very good thing +out of the Brys if she managed them properly, and I should know just how +to look after George Dorset while Bertha is reading Verlaine with Neddy +Silverton.”</p> + +<p>She met Selden’s sound of protest with a sharp derisive glance. “Well, +what’s the use of mincing matters? We all know that’s what Bertha brought +her abroad for. When Bertha wants to have a good time she has to provide +occupation for George. At first I thought Lily was going to play her +cards well THIS time, but there are rumours that Bertha is jealous of her +success here and at Cannes, and I shouldn’t be surprised if there were a +break any day. Lily’s only safeguard is that Bertha needs her badly—oh, +very badly. The Silverton affair is in the acute stage: it’s necessary +that George’s attention should be pretty continuously distracted. And I’m +bound to say Lily DOES distract it: I believe he’d marry her tomorrow if +he found out there was anything wrong with Bertha. But you know him—he’s +as blind as he’s jealous; and of course Lily’s present business is to +keep him blind. A clever woman might know just the right moment to tear +off the bandage: but Lily isn’t clever in that way, and when George does +open his eyes she’ll probably contrive not to be in his line of vision.”</p> + +<p>Selden tossed away his cigarette. “By Jove—it’s time for my train,” he +exclaimed, with a glance at his watch; adding, in reply to Mrs. Fisher’s +surprised comment—“Why, I thought of course you were at Monte!”—a +murmured word to the effect that he was making Nice his head-quarters.</p> + +<p>“The worst of it is, she snubs the Brys now,” he heard irrelevantly flung +after him.</p> + +<p>Ten minutes later, in the high-perched bedroom of an hotel overlooking +the Casino, he was tossing his effects into a couple of gaping +portmanteaux, while the porter waited outside to transport them to the +cab at the door. It took but a brief plunge down the steep white road to +the station to land him safely in the afternoon express for Nice; and not +till he was installed in the corner of an empty carriage, did he exclaim +to himself, with a reaction of self-contempt: “What the deuce am I +running away from?”</p> + +<p>The pertinence of the question checked Selden’s fugitive impulse before +the train had started. It was ridiculous to be flying like an emotional +coward from an infatuation his reason had conquered. He had instructed +his bankers to forward some important business letters to Nice, and at +Nice he would quietly await them. He was already annoyed with himself for +having left Monte Carlo, where he had intended to pass the week which +remained to him before sailing; but it would now be difficult to return +on his steps without an appearance of inconsistency from which his pride +recoiled. In his inmost heart he was not sorry to put himself beyond the +probability of meeting Miss Bart. Completely as he had detached himself +from her, he could not yet regard her merely as a social instance; and +viewed in a more personal ways she was not likely to be a reassuring +object of study. Chance encounters, or even the repeated mention of her +name, would send his thoughts back into grooves from which he had +resolutely detached them; whereas, if she could be entirely excluded from +his life, the pressure of new and varied impressions, with which no +thought of her was connected, would soon complete the work of separation. +Mrs. Fisher’s conversation had, indeed, operated to that end; but the +treatment was too painful to be voluntarily chosen while milder remedies +were untried; and Selden thought he could trust himself to return +gradually to a reasonable view of Miss Bart, if only he did not see her.</p> + +<p>Having reached the station early, he had arrived at this point in his +reflections before the increasing throng on the platform warned him that +he could not hope to preserve his privacy; the next moment there was a +hand on the door, and he turned to confront the very face he was fleeing.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart, glowing with the haste of a precipitate descent upon the +train, headed a group composed of the Dorsets, young Silverton and Lord +Hubert Dacey, who had barely time to spring into the carriage, and +envelop Selden in ejaculations of surprise and welcome, before the +whistle of departure sounded. The party, it appeared, were hastening to +Nice in response to a sudden summons to dine with the Duchess of +Beltshire and to see the water-fete in the bay; a plan evidently +improvised—in spite of Lord Hubert’s protesting “Oh, I say, you +know,”—for the express purpose of defeating Mrs. Bry’s endeavour to +capture the Duchess.</p> + +<p>During the laughing relation of this manoeuvre, Selden had time for a +rapid impression of Miss Bart, who had seated herself opposite to him in +the golden afternoon light. Scarcely three months had elapsed since he +had parted from her on the threshold of the Brys’ conservatory; but a +subtle change had passed over the quality of her beauty. Then it had had +a transparency through which the fluctuations of the spirit were +sometimes tragically visible; now its impenetrable surface suggested a +process of crystallization which had fused her whole being into one hard +brilliant substance. The change had struck Mrs. Fisher as a rejuvenation: +to Selden it seemed like that moment of pause and arrest when the warm +fluidity of youth is chilled into its final shape.</p> + +<p>He felt it in the way she smiled on him, and in the readiness and +competence with which, flung unexpectedly into his presence, she took up +the thread of their intercourse as though that thread had not been +snapped with a violence from which he still reeled. Such facility +sickened him—but he told himself that it was with the pang which +precedes recovery. Now he would really get well—would eject the last +drop of poison from his blood. Already he felt himself calmer in her +presence than he had learned to be in the thought of her. Her assumptions +and elisions, her short-cuts and long DETOURS, the skill with which she +contrived to meet him at a point from which no inconvenient glimpses of +the past were visible, suggested what opportunities she had had for +practising such arts since their last meeting. He felt that she had at +last arrived at an understanding with herself: had made a pact with her +rebellious impulses, and achieved a uniform system of self-government, +under which all vagrant tendencies were either held captive or forced +into the service of the state.</p> + +<p>And he saw other things too in her manner: saw how it had adjusted itself +to the hidden intricacies of a situation in which, even after Mrs. +Fisher’s elucidating flashes, he still felt himself agrope. Surely Mrs. +Fisher could no longer charge Miss Bart with neglecting her +opportunities! To Selden’s exasperated observation she was only too +completely alive to them. She was “perfect” to every one: subservient to +Bertha’s anxious predominance, good-naturedly watchful of Dorset’s moods, +brightly companionable to Silverton and Dacey, the latter of whom met her +on an evident footing of old admiration, while young Silverton, +portentously self-absorbed, seemed conscious of her only as of something +vaguely obstructive. And suddenly, as Selden noted the fine shades of +manner by which she harmonized herself with her surroundings, it flashed +on him that, to need such adroit handling, the situation must indeed be +desperate. She was on the edge of something—that was the impression left +with him. He seemed to see her poised on the brink of a chasm, with one +graceful foot advanced to assert her unconsciousness that the ground was +failing her.</p> + +<p>On the Promenade des Anglais, where Ned Silverton hung on him for the +half hour before dinner, he received a deeper impression of the general +insecurity. Silverton was in a mood of Titanic pessimism. How any one +could come to such a damned hole as the Riviera—any one with a grain of +imagination—with the whole Mediterranean to choose from: but then, if +one’s estimate of a place depended on the way they broiled a spring +chicken! Gad! what a study might be made of the tyranny of the +stomach—the way a sluggish liver or insufficient gastric juices might +affect the whole course of the universe, overshadow everything in +reach—chronic dyspepsia ought to be among the “statutory causes”; a +woman’s life might be ruined by a man’s inability to digest fresh bread. +Grotesque? Yes—and tragic—like most absurdities. There’s nothing +grimmer than the tragedy that wears a comic mask.... Where was he? +Oh—the reason they chucked Sicily and rushed back? Well—partly, no +doubt, Miss Bart’s desire to get back to bridge and smartness. Dead as a +stone to art and poetry—the light never WAS on sea or land for her! And +of course she persuaded Dorset that the Italian food was bad for him. Oh, +she could make him believe anything—ANYTHING! Mrs. Dorset was aware of +it—oh, perfectly: nothing SHE didn’t see! But she could hold her +tongue—she’d had to, often enough. Miss Bart was an intimate friend—she +wouldn’t hear a word against her. Only it hurts a woman’s pride—there +are some things one doesn’t get used to.... All this in confidence, of +course? Ah—and there were the ladies signalling from the balcony of the +hotel.... He plunged across the Promenade, leaving Selden to a meditative +cigar.</p> + +<p>The conclusions it led him to were fortified, later in the evening, by +some of those faint corroborative hints that generate a light of their +own in the dusk of a doubting mind. Selden, stumbling on a chance +acquaintance, had dined with him, and adjourned, still in his company, to +the brightly lit Promenade, where a line of crowded stands commanded the +glittering darkness of the waters. The night was soft and persuasive. +Overhead hung a summer sky furrowed with the rush of rockets; and from +the east a late moon, pushing up beyond the lofty bend of the coast, sent +across the bay a shaft of brightness which paled to ashes in the red +glitter of the illuminated boats. Down the lantern-hung Promenade, +snatches of band-music floated above the hum of the crowd and the soft +tossing of boughs in dusky gardens; and between these gardens and the +backs of the stands there flowed a stream of people in whom the +vociferous carnival mood seemed tempered by the growing languor of the +season.</p> + +<p>Selden and his companion, unable to get seats on one of the stands facing +the bay, had wandered for a while with the throng, and then found a point +of vantage on a high garden-parapet above the Promenade. Thence they +caught but a triangular glimpse of the water, and of the flashing play of +boats across its surface; but the crowd in the street was under their +immediate view, and seemed to Selden, on the whole, of more interest than +the show itself. After a while, however, he wearied of his perch and, +dropping alone to the pavement, pushed his way to the first corner and +turned into the moonlit silence of a side street. Long garden-walls +overhung by trees made a dark boundary to the pavement; an empty cab +trailed along the deserted thoroughfare, and presently Selden saw two +persons emerge from the opposite shadows, signal to the cab, and drive +off in it toward the centre of the town. The moonlight touched them as +they paused to enter the carriage, and he recognized Mrs. Dorset and +young Silverton.</p> + +<p>Beneath the nearest lamp-post he glanced at his watch and saw that the +time was close on eleven. He took another cross street, and without +breasting the throng on the Promenade, made his way to the fashionable +club which overlooks that thoroughfare. Here, amid the blaze of crowded +baccarat tables, he caught sight of Lord Hubert Dacey, seated with his +habitual worn smile behind a rapidly dwindling heap of gold. The heap +being in due course wiped out, Lord Hubert rose with a shrug, and joining +Selden, adjourned with him to the deserted terrace of the club. It was +now past midnight, and the throng on the stands was dispersing, while the +long trails of red-lit boats scattered and faded beneath a sky +repossessed by the tranquil splendour of the moon.</p> + +<p>Lord Hubert looked at his watch. “By Jove, I promised to join the Duchess +for supper at the LONDON HOUSE; but it’s past twelve, and I suppose +they’ve all scattered. The fact is, I lost them in the crowd soon after +dinner, and took refuge here, for my sins. They had seats on one of the +stands, but of course they couldn’t stop quiet: the Duchess never can. +She and Miss Bart went off in quest of what they call adventures—gad, it +ain’t their fault if they don’t have some queer ones!” He added +tentatively, after pausing to grope for a cigarette: “Miss Bart’s an old +friend of yours, I believe? So she told me.—Ah, thanks—I don’t seem to +have one left.” He lit Selden’s proffered cigarette, and continued, in +his high-pitched drawling tone: “None of my business, of course, but I +didn’t introduce her to the Duchess. Charming woman, the Duchess, you +understand; and a very good friend of mine; but RATHER a liberal +education.”</p> + +<p>Selden received this in silence, and after a few puffs Lord Hubert broke +out again: “Sort of thing one can’t communicate to the young lady—though +young ladies nowadays are so competent to judge for themselves; but in +this case—I’m an old friend too, you know . . . and there seemed no one +else to speak to. The whole situation’s a little mixed, as I see it—but +there used to be an aunt somewhere, a diffuse and innocent person, who +was great at bridging over chasms she didn’t see.... Ah, in New York, +is she? Pity New York’s such a long way off!”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_2a">Chapter 2</h2> + +<p>Miss Bart, emerging late the next morning from her cabin, found herself +alone on the deck of the Sabrina.</p> + +<p>The cushioned chairs, disposed +expectantly under the wide awning, showed no signs of recent occupancy, +and she presently learned from a steward that Mrs. Dorset had not yet +appeared, and that the gentlemen—separately—had gone ashore as soon as +they had breakfasted. Supplied with these facts, Lily leaned awhile over +the side, giving herself up to a leisurely enjoyment of the spectacle +before her. Unclouded sunlight enveloped sea and shore in a bath of +purest radiancy. The purpling waters drew a sharp white line of foam at +the base of the shore; against its irregular eminences, hotels and villas +flashed from the greyish verdure of olive and eucalyptus; and the +background of bare and finely-pencilled mountains quivered in a pale +intensity of light.</p> + +<p>How beautiful it was—and how she loved beauty! She had always felt that +her sensibility in this direction made up for certain obtusenesses of +feeling of which she was less proud; and during the last three months she +had indulged it passionately. The Dorsets’ invitation to go abroad with +them had come as an almost miraculous release from crushing difficulties; +and her faculty for renewing herself in new scenes, and casting off +problems of conduct as easily as the surroundings in which they had +arisen, made the mere change from one place to another seem, not merely a +postponement, but a solution of her troubles. Moral complications existed +for her only in the environment that had produced them; she did not mean +to slight or ignore them, but they lost their reality when they changed +their background. She could not have remained in New York without +repaying the money she owed to Trenor; to acquit herself of that odious +debt she might even have faced a marriage with Rosedale; but the accident +of placing the Atlantic between herself and her obligations made them +dwindle out of sight as if they had been milestones and she had travelled +past them.</p> + +<p>Her two months on the Sabrina had been especially calculated to aid this +illusion of distance. She had been plunged into new scenes, and had found +in them a renewal of old hopes and ambitions. The cruise itself charmed +her as a romantic adventure. She was vaguely touched by the names and +scenes amid which she moved, and had listened to Ned Silverton reading +Theocritus by moonlight, as the yacht rounded the Sicilian promontories, +with a thrill of the nerves that confirmed her belief in her intellectual +superiority. But the weeks at Cannes and Nice had really given her more +pleasure. The gratification of being welcomed in high company, and of +making her own ascendency felt there, so that she found herself figuring +once more as the “beautiful Miss Bart” in the interesting journal devoted +to recording the least movements of her cosmopolitan companions—all +these experiences tended to throw into the extreme background of memory +the prosaic and sordid difficulties from which she had escaped.</p> + +<p>If she was faintly aware of fresh difficulties ahead, she was sure of her +ability to meet them: it was characteristic of her to feel that the only +problems she could not solve were those with which she was familiar. +Meanwhile she could honestly be proud of the skill with which she had +adapted herself to somewhat delicate conditions. She had reason to think +that she had made herself equally necessary to her host and hostess; and +if only she had seen any perfectly irreproachable means of drawing a +financial profit from the situation, there would have been no cloud on +her horizon. The truth was that her funds, as usual, were inconveniently +low; and to neither Dorset nor his wife could this vulgar embarrassment +be safely hinted. Still, the need was not a pressing one; she could worry +along, as she had so often done before, with the hope of some happy +change of fortune to sustain her; and meanwhile life was gay and +beautiful and easy, and she was conscious of figuring not unworthily in +such a setting.</p> + +<p>She was engaged to breakfast that morning with the Duchess of Beltshire, +and at twelve o’clock she asked to be set ashore in the gig. Before this +she had sent her maid to enquire if she might see Mrs. Dorset; but the +reply came back that the latter was tired, and trying to sleep. Lily +thought she understood the reason of the rebuff. Her hostess had not been +included in the Duchess’s invitation, though she herself had made the +most loyal efforts in that direction. But her grace was impervious to +hints, and invited or omitted as she chose. It was not Lily’s fault if +Mrs. Dorset’s complicated attitudes did not fall in with the Duchess’s +easy gait. The Duchess, who seldom explained herself, had not formulated +her objection beyond saying: “She’s rather a bore, you know. The only one +of your friends I like is that little Mr. Bry—HE’S funny—” but Lily +knew enough not to press the point, and was not altogether sorry to be +thus distinguished at her friend’s expense. Bertha certainly HAD grown +tiresome since she had taken to poetry and Ned Silverton.</p> + +<p>On the whole, it was a relief to break away now and then from the +Sabrina; and the Duchess’s little breakfast, organized by Lord Hubert +with all his usual virtuosity, was the pleasanter to Lily for not +including her travelling-companions. Dorset, of late, had grown more than +usually morose and incalculable, and Ned Silverton went about with an air +that seemed to challenge the universe. The freedom and lightness of the +ducal intercourse made an agreeable change from these complications, and +Lily was tempted, after luncheon, to adjourn in the wake of her +companions to the hectic atmosphere of the Casino. She did not mean to +play; her diminished pocket-money offered small scope for the adventure; +but it amused her to sit on a divan, under the doubtful protection of the +Duchess’s back, while the latter hung above her stakes at a neighbouring +table.</p> + +<p>The rooms were packed with the gazing throng which, in the afternoon +hours, trickles heavily between the tables, like the Sunday crowd in a +lion-house. In the stagnant flow of the mass, identities were hardly +distinguishable; but Lily presently saw Mrs. Bry cleaving her determined +way through the doors, and, in the broad wake she left, the light figure +of Mrs. Fisher bobbing after her like a row-boat at the stern of a tug. +Mrs. Bry pressed on, evidently animated by the resolve to reach a certain +point in the rooms; but Mrs. Fisher, as she passed Lily, broke from her +towing-line, and let herself float to the girl’s side.</p> + +<p>“Lose her?” she echoed the latter’s query, with an indifferent glance at +Mrs. Bry’s retreating back. “I daresay—it doesn’t matter: I HAVE lost +her already.” And, as Lily exclaimed, she added: “We had an awful row +this morning. You know, of course, that the Duchess chucked her at dinner +last night, and she thinks it was my fault—my want of management. The +worst of it is, the message—just a mere word by telephone—came so late +that the dinner HAD to be paid for; and Becassin HAD run it up—it had +been so drummed into him that the Duchess was coming!” Mrs. Fisher +indulged in a faint laugh at the remembrance. “Paying for what she +doesn’t get rankles so dreadfully with Louisa: I can’t make her see that +it’s one of the preliminary steps to getting what you haven’t paid +for—and as I was the nearest thing to smash, she smashed me to atoms, +poor dear!”</p> + +<p>Lily murmured her commiseration. Impulses of sympathy came naturally to +her, and it was instinctive to proffer her help to Mrs. Fisher.</p> + +<p>“If there’s anything I can do—if it’s only a question of meeting the +Duchess! I heard her say she thought Mr. Bry amusing——”</p> + +<p>But Mrs. Fisher interposed with a decisive gesture. “My dear, I have my +pride: the pride of my trade. I couldn’t manage the Duchess, and I can’t +palm off your arts on Louisa Bry as mine. I’ve taken the final step: I +go to Paris tonight with the Sam Gormers. THEY’RE still in the elementary +stage; an Italian Prince is a great deal more than a Prince to them, and +they’re always on the brink of taking a courier for one. To save them +from that is my present mission.” She laughed again at the picture. “But +before I go I want to make my last will and testament—I want to leave +you the Brys.”</p> + +<p>“Me?” Miss Bart joined in her amusement. “It’s charming of you to +remember me, dear; but really——”</p> + +<p>“You’re already so well provided for?” Mrs. Fisher flashed a sharp glance +at her. “ARE you, though, Lily—to the point of rejecting my offer?”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart coloured slowly. “What I really meant was, that the Brys +wouldn’t in the least care to be so disposed of.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher continued to probe her embarrassment with an unflinching eye. +“What you really meant was that you’ve snubbed the Brys horribly; and you +know that they know——”</p> + +<p>“Carry!”</p> + +<p>“Oh, on certain sides Louisa bristles with perceptions. If you’d even +managed to have them asked once on the Sabrina—especially when royalties +were coming! But it’s not too late,” she ended earnestly, “it’s not too +late for either of you.”</p> + +<p>Lily smiled. “Stay over, and I’ll get the Duchess to dine with them.”</p> + +<p>“I shan’t stay over—the Gormers have paid for my SALON-LIT,” said Mrs. +Fisher with simplicity. “But get the Duchess to dine with them all the +same.”</p> + +<p>Lily’s smile again flowed into a slight laugh: her friend’s importunity +was beginning to strike her as irrelevant. “I’m sorry I have been +negligent about the Brys——” she began.</p> + +<p>“Oh, as to the Brys—it’s you I’m thinking of,” said Mrs. Fisher +abruptly. She paused, and then, bending forward, with a lowered voice: +“You know we all went on to Nice last night when the Duchess chucked us. +It was Louisa’s idea—I told her what I thought of it.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart assented. “Yes—I caught sight of you on the way back, at the +station.”</p> + +<p>“Well, the man who was in the carriage with you and George Dorset—that +horrid little Dabham who does ‘Society Notes from the Riviera’—had been +dining with us at Nice. And he’s telling everybody that you and Dorset +came back alone after midnight.”</p> + +<p>“Alone—? When he was with us?” Lily laughed, but her laugh faded into +gravity under the prolonged implication of Mrs. Fisher’s look. “We DID +come back alone—if that’s so very dreadful! But whose fault was it? The +Duchess was spending the night at Cimiez with the Crown Princess; Bertha +got bored with the show, and went off early, promising to meet us at the +station. We turned up on time, but she didn’t—she didn’t turn up at all!”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart made this announcement in the tone of one who presents, with +careless assurance, a complete vindication; but Mrs. Fisher received it +in a manner almost inconsequent. She seemed to have lost sight of her +friend’s part in the incident: her inward vision had taken another slant.</p> + +<p>“Bertha never turned up at all? Then how on earth did she get back?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, by the next train, I suppose; there were two extra ones for the +FETE. At any rate, I know she’s safe on the yacht, though I haven’t yet +seen her; but you see it was not my fault,” Lily summed up.</p> + +<p>“Not your fault that Bertha didn’t turn up? My poor child, if only you +don’t have to pay for it!” Mrs. Fisher rose—she had seen Mrs. Bry +surging back in her direction. “There’s Louisa, and I must be off—oh, +we’re on the best of terms externally; we’re lunching together; but at +heart it’s ME she’s lunching on,” she explained; and with a last +hand-clasp and a last look, she added: “Remember, I leave her to you; +she’s hovering now, ready to take you in.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Lily carried the impression of Mrs. Fisher’s leave-taking away with her +from the Casino doors. She had accomplished, before leaving, the first +step toward her reinstatement in Mrs. Bry’s good graces. An affable +advance—a vague murmur that they must see more of each other—an +allusive glance to a near future that was felt to include the Duchess as +well as the Sabrina—how easily it was all done, if one possessed the +knack of doing it! She wondered at herself, as she had so often +wondered, that, possessing the knack, she did not more consistently +exercise it. But sometimes she was forgetful—and sometimes, could it be +that she was proud? Today, at any rate, she had been vaguely conscious of +a reason for sinking her pride, had in fact even sunk it to the point of +suggesting to Lord Hubert Dacey, whom she ran across on the Casino steps, +that he might really get the Duchess to dine with the Brys, if SHE +undertook to have them asked on the Sabrina. Lord Hubert had promised his +help, with the readiness on which she could always count: it was his only +way of ever reminding her that he had once been ready to do so much more +for her. Her path, in short, seemed to smooth itself before her as she +advanced; yet the faint stir of uneasiness persisted. Had it been +produced, she wondered, by her chance meeting with Selden? She thought +not—time and change seemed so completely to have relegated him to his +proper distance. The sudden and exquisite reaction from her anxieties had +had the effect of throwing the recent past so far back that even Selden, +as part of it, retained a certain air of unreality. And he had made it so +clear that they were not to meet again; that he had merely dropped down +to Nice for a day or two, and had almost his foot on the next steamer. +No—that part of the past had merely surged up for a moment on the +fleeing surface of events; and now that it was submerged again, the +uncertainty, the apprehension persisted.</p> + +<p>They grew to sudden acuteness as she caught sight of George Dorset +descending the steps of the Hotel de Paris and making for her across the +square. She had meant to drive down to the quay and regain the yacht; but +she now had the immediate impression that something more was to happen +first.</p> + +<p>“Which way are you going? Shall we walk a bit?” he began, putting the +second question before the first was answered, and not waiting for a +reply to either before he directed her silently toward the comparative +seclusion of the lower gardens.</p> + +<p>She detected in him at once all the signs of extreme nervous tension. +The skin was puffed out under his sunken eyes, and its sallowness had +paled to a leaden white against which his irregular eyebrows and long +reddish moustache were relieved with a saturnine effect. His appearance, +in short, presented an odd mixture of the bedraggled and the ferocious.</p> + +<p>He walked beside her in silence, with quick precipitate steps, till they +reached the embowered slopes to the east of the Casino; then, pulling up +abruptly, he said: “Have you seen Bertha?”</p> + +<p>“No—when I left the yacht she was not yet up.”</p> + +<p>He received this with a laugh like the whirring sound in a disabled +clock. “Not yet up? Had she gone to bed? Do you know at what time she +came on board? This morning at seven!” he exclaimed.</p> + +<p>“At seven?” Lily started. “What happened—an accident to the train?”</p> + +<p>He laughed again. “They missed the train—all the trains—they had to +drive back.”</p> + +<p>“Well——?” She hesitated, feeling at once how little even this necessity +accounted for the fatal lapse of hours.</p> + +<p>“Well, they couldn’t get a carriage at once—at that time of night, you +know—” the explanatory note made it almost seem as though he were +putting the case for his wife—“and when they finally did, it was only a +one-horse cab, and the horse was lame!”</p> + +<p>“How tiresome! I see,” she affirmed, with the more earnestness because +she was so nervously conscious that she did not; and after a pause she +added: “I’m so sorry—but ought we to have waited?”</p> + +<p>“Waited for the one-horse cab? It would scarcely have carried the four of +us, do you think?”</p> + +<p>She took this in what seemed the only possible way, with a laugh intended +to sink the question itself in his humorous treatment of it. “Well, it +would have been difficult; we should have had to walk by turns. But it +would have been jolly to see the sunrise.”</p> + +<p>“Yes: the sunrise WAS jolly,” he agreed.</p> + +<p>“Was it? You saw it, then?”</p> + +<p>“I saw it, yes; from the deck. I waited up for them.”</p> + +<p>“Naturally—I suppose you were worried. Why didn’t you call on me to +share your vigil?”</p> + +<p>He stood still, dragging at his moustache with a lean weak hand. “I +don’t think you would have cared for its DENOUEMENT,” he said with sudden +grimness.</p> + +<p>Again she was disconcerted by the abrupt change in his tone, and as in +one flash she saw the peril of the moment, and the need of keeping her +sense of it out of her eyes.</p> + +<p>“DENOUEMENT—isn’t that too big a word for such a small incident? The +worst of it, after all, is the fatigue which Bertha has probably slept +off by this time.”</p> + +<p>She clung to the note bravely, though its futility was now plain to her +in the glare of his miserable eyes.</p> + +<p>“Don’t—don’t——!” he broke out, with the hurt cry of a child; and while +she tried to merge her sympathy, and her resolve to ignore any cause for +it, in one ambiguous murmur of deprecation, he dropped down on the bench +near which they had paused, and poured out the wretchedness of his soul.</p> + +<p>It was a dreadful hour—an hour from which she emerged shrinking and +seared, as though her lids had been scorched by its actual glare. It was +not that she had never had premonitory glimpses of such an outbreak; but +rather because, here and there throughout the three months, the surface +of life had shown such ominous cracks and vapours that her fears had +always been on the alert for an upheaval. There had been moments when the +situation had presented itself under a homelier yet more vivid +image—that of a shaky vehicle, dashed by unbroken steeds over a bumping +road, while she cowered within, aware that the harness wanted mending, +and wondering what would give way first. Well—everything had given way +now; and the wonder was that the crazy outfit had held together so long. +Her sense of being involved in the crash, instead of merely witnessing it +from the road, was intensified by the way in which Dorset, through his +furies of denunciation and wild reactions of self-contempt, made her feel +the need he had of her, the place she had taken in his life. But for her, +what ear would have been open to his cries? And what hand but hers could +drag him up again to a footing of sanity and self-respect? All through +the stress of the struggle with him, she had been conscious of something +faintly maternal in her efforts to guide and uplift him. But for the +present, if he clung to her, it was not in order to be dragged up, but to +feel some one floundering in the depths with him: he wanted her to suffer +with him, not to help him to suffer less.</p> + +<p>Happily for both, there was little physical strength to sustain his +frenzy. It left him, collapsed and breathing heavily, to an apathy so +deep and prolonged that Lily almost feared the passers-by would think it +the result of a seizure, and stop to offer their aid. But Monte Carlo is, +of all places, the one where the human bond is least close, and odd +sights are the least arresting. If a glance or two lingered on the +couple, no intrusive sympathy disturbed them; and it was Lily herself who +broke the silence by rising from her seat. With the clearing of her +vision the sweep of peril had extended, and she saw that the post of +danger was no longer at Dorset’s side.</p> + +<p>“If you won’t go back, I must—don’t make me leave you!” she urged.</p> + +<p>But he remained mutely resistant, and she added: “What are you going to +do? You really can’t sit here all night.”</p> + +<p>“I can go to an hotel. I can telegraph my lawyers.” He sat up, roused by +a new thought. “By Jove, Selden’s at Nice—I’ll send for Selden!”</p> + +<p>Lily, at this, reseated herself with a cry of alarm. “No, no, NO!” she +protested.</p> + +<p>He swung round on her distrustfully. “Why not Selden? He’s a lawyer isn’t +he? One will do as well as another in a case like this.”</p> + +<p>“As badly as another, you mean. I thought you relied on ME to help you.”</p> + +<p>“You do—by being so sweet and patient with me. If it hadn’t been for you +I’d have ended the thing long ago. But now it’s got to end.” He rose +suddenly, straightening himself with an effort. “You can’t want to see +me ridiculous.”</p> + +<p>She looked at him kindly. “That’s just it.” Then, after a moment’s +pondering, almost to her own surprise she broke out with a flash of +inspiration: “Well, go over and see Mr. Selden. You’ll have time to do it +before dinner.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, DINNER——” he mocked her; but she left him with the smiling +rejoinder: “Dinner on board, remember; we’ll put it off till nine if you +like.”</p> + +<p>It was past four already; and when a cab had dropped her at the quay, and +she stood waiting for the gig to put off for her, she began to wonder +what had been happening on the yacht. Of Silverton’s whereabouts there +had been no mention. Had he returned to the Sabrina? Or could Bertha—the +dread alternative sprang on her suddenly—could Bertha, left to herself, +have gone ashore to rejoin him? Lily’s heart stood still at the thought. +All her concern had hitherto been for young Silverton, not only because, +in such affairs, the woman’s instinct is to side with the man, but +because his case made a peculiar appeal to her sympathies. He was so +desperately in earnest, poor youth, and his earnestness was of so +different a quality from Bertha’s, though hers too was desperate enough. +The difference was that Bertha was in earnest only about herself, while +he was in earnest about her. But now, at the actual crisis, this +difference seemed to throw the weight of destitution on Bertha’s side, +since at least he had her to suffer for, and she had only herself. At any +rate, viewed less ideally, all the disadvantages of such a situation were +for the woman; and it was to Bertha that Lily’s sympathies now went out. +She was not fond of Bertha Dorset, but neither was she without a sense of +obligation, the heavier for having so little personal liking to sustain +it. Bertha had been kind to her, they had lived together, during the last +months, on terms of easy friendship, and the sense of friction of which +Lily had recently become aware seemed to make it the more urgent that she +should work undividedly in her friend’s interest.</p> + +<p>It was in Bertha’s interest, certainly, that she had despatched Dorset to +consult with Lawrence Selden. Once the grotesqueness of the situation +accepted, she had seen at a glance that it was the safest in which Dorset +could find himself. Who but Selden could thus miraculously combine the +skill to save Bertha with the obligation of doing so? The consciousness +that much skill would be required made Lily rest thankfully in the +greatness of the obligation. Since he would HAVE to pull Bertha through +she could trust him to find a way; and she put the fulness of her trust +in the telegram she managed to send him on her way to the quay.</p> + +<p>Thus far, then, Lily felt that she had done well; and the conviction +strengthened her for the task that remained. She and Bertha had never +been on confidential terms, but at such a crisis the barriers of reserve +must surely fall: Dorset’s wild allusions to the scene of the morning +made Lily feel that they were down already, and that any attempt to +rebuild them would be beyond Bertha’s strength. She pictured the poor +creature shivering behind her fallen defences and awaiting with suspense +the moment when she could take refuge in the first shelter that offered. +If only that shelter had not already offered itself elsewhere! As the gig +traversed the short distance between the quay and the yacht, Lily grew +more than ever alarmed at the possible consequences of her long absence. +What if the wretched Bertha, finding in all the long hours no soul to +turn to—but by this time Lily’s eager foot was on the side-ladder, and +her first step on the Sabrina showed the worst of her apprehensions to be +unfounded; for there, in the luxurious shade of the after-deck, the +wretched Bertha, in full command of her usual attenuated elegance, sat +dispensing tea to the Duchess of Beltshire and Lord Hubert.</p> + +<p>The sight filled Lily with such surprise that she felt that Bertha, at +least, must read its meaning in her look, and she was proportionately +disconcerted by the blankness of the look returned. But in an instant she +saw that Mrs. Dorset had, of necessity, to look blank before the others, +and that, to mitigate the effect of her own surprise, she must at once +produce some simple reason for it. The long habit of rapid transitions +made it easy for her to exclaim to the Duchess: “Why, I thought you’d +gone back to the Princess!” and this sufficed for the lady she addressed, +if it was hardly enough for Lord Hubert.</p> + +<p>At least it opened the way to a lively explanation of how the Duchess +was, in fact, going back the next moment, but had first rushed out to the +yacht for a word with Mrs. Dorset on the subject of tomorrow’s +dinner—the dinner with the Brys, to which Lord Hubert had finally +insisted on dragging them.</p> + +<p>“To save my neck, you know!” he explained, with a glance that appealed to +Lily for some recognition of his promptness; and the Duchess added, with +her noble candour: “Mr. Bry has promised him a tip, and he says if we go +he’ll pass it onto us.”</p> + +<p>This led to some final pleasantries, in which, as it seemed to Lily, Mrs. +Dorset bore her part with astounding bravery, and at the close of which +Lord Hubert, from half way down the side-ladder, called back, with an air +of numbering heads: “And of course we may count on Dorset too?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, count on him,” his wife assented gaily. She was keeping up well to +the last—but as she turned back from waving her adieux over the side, +Lily said to herself that the mask must drop and the soul of fear look +out.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dorset turned back slowly; perhaps she wanted time to steady her +muscles; at any rate, they were still under perfect control when, +dropping once more into her seat behind the tea-table, she remarked to +Miss Bart with a faint touch of irony: “I suppose I ought to say good +morning.”</p> + +<p>If it was a cue, Lily was ready to take it, though with only the vaguest +sense of what was expected of her in return. There was something +unnerving in the contemplation of Mrs. Dorset’s composure, and she had to +force the light tone in which she answered: “I tried to see you this +morning, but you were not yet up.”</p> + +<p>“No—I got to bed late. After we missed you at the station I thought we +ought to wait for you till the last train.” She spoke very gently, but +with just the least tinge of reproach.</p> + +<p>“You missed us? You waited for us at the station?” Now indeed Lily was +too far adrift in bewilderment to measure the other’s words or keep watch +on her own. “But I thought you didn’t get to the station till after the +last train had left!”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dorset, examining her between lowered lids, met this with the +immediate query: “Who told you that?”</p> + +<p>“George—I saw him just now in the gardens.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, is that George’s version? Poor George—he was in no state to +remember what I told him. He had one of his worst attacks this morning, +and I packed him off to see the doctor. Do you know if he found him?”</p> + +<p>Lily, still lost in conjecture, made no reply, and Mrs. Dorset settled +herself indolently in her seat. “He’ll wait to see him; he was horribly +frightened about himself. It’s very bad for him to be worried, and +whenever anything upsetting happens, it always brings on an attack.”</p> + +<p>This time Lily felt sure that a cue was being pressed on her; but it was +put forth with such startling suddenness, and with so incredible an air +of ignoring what it led up to, that she could only falter out doubtfully: +“Anything upsetting?”</p> + +<p>“Yes—such as having you so conspicuously on his hands in the small +hours. You know, my dear, you’re rather a big responsibility in such a +scandalous place after midnight.”</p> + +<p>At that—at the complete unexpectedness and the inconceivable audacity of +it—Lily could not restrain the tribute of an astonished laugh.</p> + +<p>“Well, really—considering it was you who burdened him with the +responsibility!”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dorset took this with an exquisite mildness. “By not having the +superhuman cleverness to discover you in that frightful rush for the +train? Or the imagination to believe that you’d take it without us—you +and he all alone—instead of waiting quietly in the station till we DID +manage to meet you?”</p> + +<p>Lily’s colour rose: it was growing clear to her that Bertha was pursuing +an object, following a line she had marked out for herself. Only, with +such a doom impending, why waste time in these childish efforts to avert +it? The puerility of the attempt disarmed Lily’s indignation: did it not +prove how horribly the poor creature was frightened?</p> + +<p>“No; by our simply all keeping together at Nice,” she returned.</p> + +<p>“Keeping together? When it was you who seized the first opportunity to +rush off with the Duchess and her friends? My dear Lily, you are not a +child to be led by the hand!”</p> + +<p>“No—nor to be lectured, Bertha, really; if that’s what you are doing to +me now.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dorset smiled on her reproachfully. “Lecture you—I? Heaven forbid! +I was merely trying to give you a friendly hint. But it’s usually the +other way round, isn’t it? I’m expected to take hints, not to give them: +I’ve positively lived on them all these last months.”</p> + +<p>“Hints—from me to you?” Lily repeated.</p> + +<p>“Oh, negative ones merely—what not to be and to do and to see. And I +think I’ve taken them to admiration. Only, my dear, if you’ll let me say +so, I didn’t understand that one of my negative duties was NOT to warn +you when you carried your imprudence too far.”</p> + +<p>A chill of fear passed over Miss Bart: a sense of remembered treachery +that was like the gleam of a knife in the dusk. But compassion, in a +moment, got the better of her instinctive recoil. What was this +outpouring of senseless bitterness but the tracked creature’s attempt to +cloud the medium through which it was fleeing? It was on Lily’s lips to +exclaim: “You poor soul, don’t double and turn—come straight back to me, +and we’ll find a way out!” But the words died under the impenetrable +insolence of Bertha’s smile. Lily sat silent, taking the brunt of it +quietly, letting it spend itself on her to the last drop of its +accumulated falseness; then, without a word, she rose and went down to +her cabin.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_3a">Chapter 3</h2> + +<p>Miss Bart’s telegram caught Lawrence Selden at the door of his hotel; and +having read it, he turned back to wait for Dorset. The message +necessarily left large gaps for conjecture; but all that he had recently +heard and seen made these but too easy to fill in. On the whole he was +surprised; for though he had perceived that the situation contained all +the elements of an explosion, he had often enough, in the range of his +personal experience, seen just such combinations subside into +harmlessness. Still, Dorset’s spasmodic temper, and his wife’s reckless +disregard of appearances, gave the situation a peculiar insecurity; and +it was less from the sense of any special relation to the case than from +a purely professional zeal, that Selden resolved to guide the pair to +safety. Whether, in the present instance, safety for either lay in +repairing so damaged a tie, it was no business of his to consider: he had +only, on general principles, to think of averting a scandal, and his +desire to avert it was increased by his fear of its involving Miss Bart. +There was nothing specific in this apprehension; he merely wished to +spare her the embarrassment of being ever so remotely connected with the +public washing of the Dorset linen.</p> + +<p>How exhaustive and unpleasant such a process would be, he saw even more +vividly after his two hours’ talk with poor Dorset. If anything came out +at all, it would be such a vast unpacking of accumulated moral rags as +left him, after his visitor had gone, with the feeling that he must fling +open the windows and have his room swept out. But nothing should come +out; and happily for his side of the case, the dirty rags, however pieced +together, could not, without considerable difficulty, be turned into a +homogeneous grievance. The torn edges did not always fit—there were +missing bits, there were disparities of size and colour, all of which it +was naturally Selden’s business to make the most of in putting them under +his client’s eye. But to a man in Dorset’s mood the completest +demonstration could not carry conviction, and Selden saw that for the +moment all he could do was to soothe and temporize, to offer sympathy and +to counsel prudence. He let Dorset depart charged to the brim with the +sense that, till their next meeting, he must maintain a strictly +noncommittal attitude; that, in short, his share in the game consisted +for the present in looking on. Selden knew, however, that he could not +long keep such violences in equilibrium; and he promised to meet Dorset, +the next morning, at an hotel in Monte Carlo. Meanwhile he counted not a +little on the reaction of weakness and self-distrust that, in such +natures, follows on every unwonted expenditure of moral force; and his +telegraphic reply to Miss Bart consisted simply in the injunction: +“Assume that everything is as usual.”</p> + +<p>On this assumption, in fact, the early part of the following day was +lived through. Dorset, as if in obedience to Lily’s imperative bidding, +had actually returned in time for a late dinner on the yacht. The repast +had been the most difficult moment of the day. Dorset was sunk in one of +the abysmal silences which so commonly followed on what his wife called +his “attacks” that it was easy, before the servants, to refer it to this +cause; but Bertha herself seemed, perversely enough, little disposed to +make use of this obvious means of protection. She simply left the brunt +of the situation on her husband’s hands, as if too absorbed in a +grievance of her own to suspect that she might be the object of one +herself. To Lily this attitude was the most ominous, because the most +perplexing, element in the situation. As she tried to fan the weak +flicker of talk, to build up, again and again, the crumbling structure of +“appearances,” her own attention was perpetually distracted by the +question: “What on earth can she be driving at?” There was something +positively exasperating in Bertha’s attitude of isolated defiance. If +only she would have given her friend a hint they might still have worked +together successfully; but how could Lily be of use, while she was thus +obstinately shut out from participation? To be of use was what she +honestly wanted; and not for her own sake but for the Dorsets’. She had +not thought of her own situation at all: she was simply engrossed in +trying to put a little order in theirs. But the close of the short dreary +evening left her with a sense of effort hopelessly wasted. She had not +tried to see Dorset alone: she had positively shrunk from a renewal of +his confidences. It was Bertha whose confidence she sought, and who +should as eagerly have invited her own; and Bertha, as if in the +infatuation of self-destruction, was actually pushing away her rescuing +hand.</p> + +<p>Lily, going to bed early, had left the couple to themselves; and it +seemed part of the general mystery in which she moved that more than an +hour should elapse before she heard Bertha walk down the silent passage +and regain her room. The morrow, rising on an apparent continuance of the +same conditions, revealed nothing of what had occurred between the +confronted pair. One fact alone outwardly proclaimed the change they were +all conspiring to ignore; and that was the non-appearance of Ned +Silverton. No one referred to it, and this tacit avoidance of the subject +kept it in the immediate foreground of consciousness. But there was +another change, perceptible only to Lily; and that was that Dorset now +avoided her almost as pointedly as his wife. Perhaps he was repenting his +rash outpourings of the previous day; perhaps only trying, in his clumsy +way, to conform to Selden’s counsel to behave “as usual.” Such +instructions no more make for easiness of attitude than the +photographer’s behest to “look natural”; and in a creature as unconscious +as poor Dorset of the appearance he habitually presented, the struggle to +maintain a pose was sure to result in queer contortions.</p> + +<p>It resulted, at any rate, in throwing Lily strangely on her own +resources. She had learned, on leaving her room, that Mrs. Dorset was +still invisible, and that Dorset had left the yacht early; and feeling +too restless to remain alone, she too had herself ferried ashore. +Straying toward the Casino, she attached herself to a group of +acquaintances from Nice, with whom she lunched, and in whose company she +was returning to the rooms when she encountered Selden crossing the +square. She could not, at the moment, separate herself definitely from +her party, who had hospitably assumed that she would remain with them +till they took their departure; but she found time for a momentary pause +of enquiry, to which he promptly returned: “I’ve seen him again—he’s +just left me.”</p> + +<p>She waited before him anxiously. “Well? what has happened? What WILL +happen?”</p> + +<p>“Nothing as yet—and nothing in the future, I think.”</p> + +<p>“It’s over, then? It’s settled? You’re sure?”</p> + +<p>He smiled. “Give me time. I’m not sure—but I’m a good deal surer.” And +with that she had to content herself, and hasten on to the expectant +group on the steps.</p> + +<p>Selden had in fact given her the utmost measure of his sureness, had even +stretched it a shade to meet the anxiety in her eyes. And now, as he +turned away, strolling down the hill toward the station, that anxiety +remained with him as the visible justification of his own. It was not, +indeed, anything specific that he feared: there had been a literal truth +in his declaration that he did not think anything would happen. What +troubled him was that, though Dorset’s attitude had perceptibly changed, +the change was not clearly to be accounted for. It had certainly not been +produced by Selden’s arguments, or by the action of his own soberer +reason. Five minutes’ talk sufficed to show that some alien influence had +been at work, and that it had not so much subdued his resentment as +weakened his will, so that he moved under it in a state of apathy, like a +dangerous lunatic who has been drugged. Temporarily, no doubt, however +exerted, it worked for the general safety: the question was how long it +would last, and by what kind of reaction it was likely to be followed. On +these points Selden could gain no light; for he saw that one effect of +the transformation had been to shut him off from free communion with +Dorset. The latter, indeed, was still moved by the irresistible desire to +discuss his wrong; but, though he revolved about it with the same forlorn +tenacity, Selden was aware that something always restrained him from full +expression. His state was one to produce first weariness and then +impatience in his hearer; and when their talk was over, Selden began to +feel that he had done his utmost, and might justifiably wash his hands of +the sequel.</p> + +<p>It was in this mind that he had been making his way back to the station +when Miss Bart crossed his path; but though, after his brief word with +her, he kept mechanically on his course, he was conscious of a gradual +change in his purpose. The change had been produced by the look in her +eyes; and in his eagerness to define the nature of that look, he dropped +into a seat in the gardens, and sat brooding upon the question. It was +natural enough, in all conscience, that she should appear anxious: a +young woman placed, in the close intimacy of a yachting-cruise, between a +couple on the verge of disaster, could hardly, aside from her concern for +her friends, be insensible to the awkwardness of her own position. The +worst of it was that, in interpreting Miss Bart’s state of mind, so many +alternative readings were possible; and one of these, in Selden’s +troubled mind, took the ugly form suggested by Mrs. Fisher. If the girl +was afraid, was she afraid for herself or for her friends? And to what +degree was her dread of a catastrophe intensified by the sense of being +fatally involved in it? The burden of offence lying manifestly with Mrs. +Dorset, this conjecture seemed on the face of it gratuitously unkind; but +Selden knew that in the most one-sided matrimonial quarrel there are +generally counter-charges to be brought, and that they are brought with +the greater audacity where the original grievance is so emphatic. Mrs. +Fisher had not hesitated to suggest the likelihood of Dorset’s marrying +Miss Bart if “anything happened”; and though Mrs. Fisher’s conclusions +were notoriously rash, she was shrewd enough in reading the signs from +which they were drawn. Dorset had apparently shown marked interest in the +girl, and this interest might be used to cruel advantage in his wife’s +struggle for rehabilitation. Selden knew that Bertha would fight to the +last round of powder: the rashness of her conduct was illogically +combined with a cold determination to escape its consequences. She could +be as unscrupulous in fighting for herself as she was reckless in +courting danger, and whatever came to her hand at such moments was likely +to be used as a defensive missile. He did not, as yet, see clearly just +what course she was likely to take, but his perplexity increased his +apprehension, and with it the sense that, before leaving, he must speak +again with Miss Bart. Whatever her share in the situation—and he had +always honestly tried to resist judging her by her surroundings—however +free she might be from any personal connection with it, she would be +better out of the way of a possible crash; and since she had appealed to +him for help, it was clearly his business to tell her so.</p> + +<p>This decision at last brought him to his feet, and carried him back to +the gambling rooms, within whose doors he had seen her disappearing; but +a prolonged exploration of the crowd failed to put him on her traces. He +saw instead, to his surprise, Ned Silverton loitering somewhat +ostentatiously about the tables; and the discovery that this actor in the +drama was not only hovering in the wings, but actually inviting the +exposure of the footlights, though it might have seemed to imply that all +peril was over, served rather to deepen Selden’s sense of foreboding. +Charged with this impression he returned to the square, hoping to see +Miss Bart move across it, as every one in Monte Carlo seemed inevitably +to do at least a dozen times a day; but here again he waited vainly for a +glimpse of her, and the conclusion was slowly forced on him that she had +gone back to the Sabrina. It would be difficult to follow her there, and +still more difficult, should he do so, to contrive the opportunity for a +private word; and he had almost decided on the unsatisfactory alternative +of writing, when the ceaseless diorama of the square suddenly unrolled +before him the figures of Lord Hubert and Mrs. Bry.</p> + +<p>Hailing them at once with his question, he learned from Lord Hubert that +Miss Bart had just returned to the Sabrina in Dorset’s company; an +announcement so evidently disconcerting to him that Mrs. Bry, after a +glance from her companion, which seemed to act like the pressure on a +spring, brought forth the prompt proposal that he should come and meet +his friends at dinner that evening—“At Becassin’s—a little dinner to +the Duchess,” she flashed out before Lord Hubert had time to remove the +pressure.</p> + +<p>Selden’s sense of the privilege of being included in such company brought +him early in the evening to the door of the restaurant, where he paused +to scan the ranks of diners approaching down the brightly lit terrace. +There, while the Brys hovered within over the last agitating alternatives +of the MENU, he kept watch for the guests from the Sabrina, who at length +rose on the horizon in company with the Duchess, Lord and Lady Skiddaw +and the Stepneys. From this group it was easy for him to detach Miss +Bart on the pretext of a moment’s glance into one of the brilliant shops +along the terrace, and to say to her, while they lingered together in the +white dazzle of a jeweller’s window: “I stopped over to see you—to beg +of you to leave the yacht.”</p> + +<p>The eyes she turned on him showed a quick gleam of her former fear. “To +leave—? What do you mean? What has happened?”</p> + +<p>“Nothing. But if anything should, why be in the way of it?”</p> + +<p>The glare from the jeweller’s window, deepening the pallor of her face, +gave to its delicate lines the sharpness of a tragic mask. “Nothing +will, I am sure; but while there’s even a doubt left, how can you think I +would leave Bertha?”</p> + +<p>The words rang out on a note of contempt—was it possibly of contempt for +himself? Well, he was willing to risk its renewal to the extent of +insisting, with an undeniable throb of added interest: “You have yourself +to think of, you know—” to which, with a strange fall of sadness in her +voice, she answered, meeting his eyes: “If you knew how little difference +that makes!”</p> + +<p>“Oh, well, nothing WILL happen,” he said, more for his own reassurance +than for hers; and “Nothing, nothing, of course!” she valiantly assented, +as they turned to overtake their companions.</p> + +<p>In the thronged restaurant, taking their places about Mrs. Bry’s +illuminated board, their confidence seemed to gain support from the +familiarity of their surroundings. Here were Dorset and his wife once +more presenting their customary faces to the world, she engrossed in +establishing her relation with an intensely new gown, he shrinking with +dyspeptic dread from the multiplied solicitations of the MENU. The mere +fact that they thus showed themselves together, with the utmost openness +the place afforded, seemed to declare beyond a doubt that their +differences were composed. How this end had been attained was still +matter for wonder, but it was clear that for the moment Miss Bart rested +confidently in the result; and Selden tried to achieve the same view by +telling himself that her opportunities for observation had been ampler +than his own.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, as the dinner advanced through a labyrinth of courses, in +which it became clear that Mrs. Bry had occasionally broken away from +Lord Hubert’s restraining hand, Selden’s general watchfulness began to +lose itself in a particular study of Miss Bart. It was one of the days +when she was so handsome that to be handsome was enough, and all the +rest—her grace, her quickness, her social felicities—seemed the +overflow of a bounteous nature. But what especially struck him was the +way in which she detached herself, by a hundred undefinable shades, from +the persons who most abounded in her own style. It was in just such +company, the fine flower and complete expression of the state she aspired +to, that the differences came out with special poignancy, her grace +cheapening the other women’s smartness as her finely-discriminated +silences made their chatter dull. The strain of the last hours had +restored to her face the deeper eloquence which Selden had lately missed +in it, and the bravery of her words to him still fluttered in her voice +and eyes. Yes, she was matchless—it was the one word for her; and he +could give his admiration the freer play because so little personal +feeling remained in it. His real detachment from her had taken place, not +at the lurid moment of disenchantment, but now, in the sober after-light +of discrimination, where he saw her definitely divided from him by the +crudeness of a choice which seemed to deny the very differences he felt +in her. It was before him again in its completeness—the choice in which +she was content to rest: in the stupid costliness of the food and the +showy dulness of the talk, in the freedom of speech which never arrived +at wit and the freedom of act which never made for romance. The strident +setting of the restaurant, in which their table seemed set apart in a +special glare of publicity, and the presence at it of little Dabham of +the “Riviera Notes,” emphasized the ideals of a world where +conspicuousness passed for distinction, and the society column had become +the roll of fame.</p> + +<p>It was as the immortalizer of such occasions that little Dabham, wedged +in modest watchfulness between two brilliant neighbours, suddenly became +the centre of Selden’s scrutiny. How much did he know of what was going +on, and how much, for his purpose, was still worth finding out? His +little eyes were like tentacles thrown out to catch the floating +intimations with which, to Selden, the air at moments seemed thick; then +again it cleared to its normal emptiness, and he could see nothing in it +for the journalist but leisure to note the elegance of the ladies’ gowns. +Mrs. Dorset’s, in particular, challenged all the wealth of Mr. Dabham’s +vocabulary: it had surprises and subtleties worthy of what he would have +called “the literary style.” At first, as Selden had noticed, it had been +almost too preoccupying to its wearer; but now she was in full command of +it, and was even producing her effects with unwonted freedom. Was she +not, indeed, too free, too fluent, for perfect naturalness? And was not +Dorset, to whom his glance had passed by a natural transition, too +jerkily wavering between the same extremes? Dorset indeed was always +jerky; but it seemed to Selden that tonight each vibration swung him +farther from his centre.</p> + +<p>The dinner, meanwhile, was moving to its triumphant close, to the evident +satisfaction of Mrs. Bry, who, throned in apoplectic majesty between Lord +Skiddaw and Lord Hubert, seemed in spirit to be calling on Mrs. Fisher to +witness her achievement. Short of Mrs. Fisher her audience might have +been called complete; for the restaurant was crowded with persons mainly +gathered there for the purpose of spectatorship, and accurately posted as +to the names and faces of the celebrities they had come to see. Mrs. Bry, +conscious that all her feminine guests came under that heading, and that +each one looked her part to admiration, shone on Lily with all the +pent-up gratitude that Mrs. Fisher had failed to deserve. Selden, +catching the glance, wondered what part Miss Bart had played in +organizing the entertainment. She did, at least, a great deal to adorn +it; and as he watched the bright security with which she bore herself, he +smiled to think that he should have fancied her in need of help. Never +had she appeared more serenely mistress of the situation than when, at +the moment of dispersal, detaching herself a little from the group about +the table, she turned with a smile and a graceful slant of the shoulders +to receive her cloak from Dorset.</p> + +<p>The dinner had been protracted over Mr. Bry’s exceptional cigars and a +bewildering array of liqueurs, and many of the other tables were empty; +but a sufficient number of diners still lingered to give relief to the +leave-taking of Mrs. Bry’s distinguished guests. This ceremony was drawn +out and complicated by the fact that it involved, on the part of the +Duchess and Lady Skiddaw, definite farewells, and pledges of speedy +reunion in Paris, where they were to pause and replenish their wardrobes +on the way to England. The quality of Mrs. Bry’s hospitality, and of the +tips her husband had presumably imparted, lent to the manner of the +English ladies a general effusiveness which shed the rosiest light over +their hostess’s future. In its glow Mrs. Dorset and the Stepneys were +also visibly included, and the whole scene had touches of intimacy worth +their weight in gold to the watchful pen of Mr. Dabham.</p> + +<p>A glance at her watch caused the Duchess to exclaim to her sister that +they had just time to dash for their train, and the flurry of this +departure over, the Stepneys, who had their motor at the door, offered to +convey the Dorsets and Miss Bart to the quay. The offer was accepted, +and Mrs. Dorset moved away with her husband in attendance. Miss Bart had +lingered for a last word with Lord Hubert, and Stepney, on whom Mr. Bry +was pressing a final, and still more expensive, cigar, called out: “Come +on, Lily, if you’re going back to the yacht.”</p> + +<p>Lily turned to obey; but as she did so, Mrs. Dorset, who had paused on +her way out, moved a few steps back toward the table.</p> + +<p>“Miss Bart is not going back to the yacht,” she said in a voice of +singular distinctness.</p> + +<p>A startled look ran from eye to eye; Mrs. Bry crimsoned to the verge of +congestion, Mrs. Stepney slipped nervously behind her husband, and +Selden, in the general turmoil of his sensations, was mainly conscious of +a longing to grip Dabham by the collar and fling him out into the street.</p> + +<p>Dorset, meanwhile, had stepped back to his wife’s side. His face was +white, and he looked about him with cowed angry eyes. “Bertha!—Miss +Bart . . . this is some misunderstanding . . . some mistake....”</p> + +<p>“Miss Bart remains here,” his wife rejoined incisively. “And, I think, +George, we had better not detain Mrs. Stepney any longer.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart, during this brief exchange of words, remained in admirable +erectness, slightly isolated from the embarrassed group about her. She +had paled a little under the shock of the insult, but the discomposure of +the surrounding faces was not reflected in her own. The faint disdain of +her smile seemed to lift her high above her antagonist’s reach, and it +was not till she had given Mrs. Dorset the full measure of the distance +between them that she turned and extended her hand to her hostess.</p> + +<p>“I am joining the Duchess tomorrow,” she explained, “and it seemed easier +for me to remain on shore for the night.”</p> + +<p>She held firmly to Mrs. Bry’s wavering eye while she gave this +explanation, but when it was over Selden saw her send a tentative glance +from one to another of the women’s faces. She read their incredulity in +their averted looks, and in the mute wretchedness of the men behind them, +and for a miserable half-second he thought she quivered on the brink of +failure. Then, turning to him with an easy gesture, and the pale bravery +of her recovered smile—“Dear Mr. Selden,” she said, “you promised to see +me to my cab.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Outside, the sky was gusty and overcast, and as Lily and Selden moved +toward the deserted gardens below the restaurant, spurts of warm rain +blew fitfully against their faces. The fiction of the cab had been +tacitly abandoned; they walked on in silence, her hand on his arm, till +the deeper shade of the gardens received them, and pausing beside a +bench, he said: “Sit down a moment.”</p> + +<p>She dropped to the seat without answering, but the electric lamp at the +bend of the path shed a gleam on the struggling misery of her face. +Selden sat down beside her, waiting for her to speak, fearful lest any +word he chose should touch too roughly on her wound, and kept also from +free utterance by the wretched doubt which had slowly renewed itself +within him. What had brought her to this pass? What weakness had placed +her so abominably at her enemy’s mercy? And why should Bertha Dorset have +turned into an enemy at the very moment when she so obviously needed the +support of her sex? Even while his nerves raged at the subjection of +husbands to their wives, and at the cruelty of women to their kind, +reason obstinately harped on the proverbial relation between smoke and +fire. The memory of Mrs. Fisher’s hints, and the corroboration of his own +impressions, while they deepened his pity also increased his constraint, +since, whichever way he sought a free outlet for sympathy, it was blocked +by the fear of committing a blunder.</p> + +<p>Suddenly it struck him that his silence must seem almost as accusatory as +that of the men he had despised for turning from her; but before he could +find the fitting word she had cut him short with a question.</p> + +<p>“Do you know of a quiet hotel? I can send for my maid in the morning.”</p> + +<p>“An hotel—HERE—that you can go to alone? It’s not possible.”</p> + +<p>She met this with a pale gleam of her old playfulness. “What IS, then? +It’s too wet to sleep in the gardens.”</p> + +<p>“But there must be some one——”</p> + +<p>“Some one to whom I can go? Of course—any number—but at THIS hour? You +see my change of plan was rather sudden——”</p> + +<p>“Good God—if you’d listened to me!” he cried, venting his helplessness +in a burst of anger.</p> + +<p>She still held him off with the gentle mockery of her smile. “But haven’t +I?” she rejoined. “You advised me to leave the yacht, and I’m leaving it.”</p> + +<p>He saw then, with a pang of self-reproach, that she meant neither to +explain nor to defend herself; that by his miserable silence he had +forfeited all chance of helping her, and that the decisive hour was past.</p> + +<p>She had risen, and stood before him in a kind of clouded majesty, like +some deposed princess moving tranquilly to exile.</p> + +<p>“Lily!” he exclaimed, with a note of despairing appeal; but—“Oh, not +now,” she gently admonished him; and then, in all the sweetness of her +recovered composure: “Since I must find shelter somewhere, and since +you’re so kindly here to help me——”</p> + +<p>He gathered himself up at the challenge. “You will do as I tell you? +There’s but one thing, then; you must go straight to your cousins, the +Stepneys.”</p> + +<p>“Oh—” broke from her with a movement of instinctive resistance; but he +insisted: “Come—it’s late, and you must appear to have gone there +directly.”</p> + +<p>He had drawn her hand into his arm, but she held him back with a last +gesture of protest. “I can’t—I can’t—not that—you don’t know Gwen: you +mustn’t ask me!”</p> + +<p>“I MUST ask you—you must obey me,” he persisted, though infected at +heart by her own fear.</p> + +<p>Her voice sank to a whisper: “And if she refuses?”—but, “Oh, trust +me—trust me!” he could only insist in return; and yielding to his touch, +she let him lead her back in silence to the edge of the square.</p> + +<p>In the cab they continued to remain silent through the brief drive which +carried them to the illuminated portals of the Stepneys’ hotel. Here he +left her outside, in the darkness of the raised hood, while his name was +sent up to Stepney, and he paced the showy hall, awaiting the latter’s +descent. Ten minutes later the two men passed out together between the +gold-laced custodians of the threshold; but in the vestibule Stepney drew +up with a last flare of reluctance.</p> + +<p>“It’s understood, then?” he stipulated nervously, with his hand on +Selden’s arm. “She leaves tomorrow by the early train—and my wife’s +asleep, and can’t be disturbed.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_4a">Chapter 4</h2> + +<p>The blinds of Mrs. Peniston’s drawing-room were drawn down against the +oppressive June sun, and in the sultry twilight the faces of her +assembled relatives took on a fitting shadow of bereavement. They were +all there: Van Alstynes, Stepneys and Melsons—even a stray Peniston or +two, indicating, by a greater latitude in dress and manner, the fact of +remoter relationship and more settled hopes. The Peniston side was, in +fact, secure in the knowledge that the bulk of Mr. Peniston’s property +“went back”; while the direct connection hung suspended on the disposal +of his widow’s private fortune and on the uncertainty of its extent. +Jack Stepney, in his new character as the richest nephew, tacitly took +the lead, emphasizing his importance by the deeper gloss of his mourning +and the subdued authority of his manner; while his wife’s bored attitude +and frivolous gown proclaimed the heiress’s disregard of the +insignificant interests at stake. Old Ned Van Alstyne, seated next to her +in a coat that made affliction dapper, twirled his white moustache to +conceal the eager twitch of his lips; and Grace Stepney, red-nosed and +smelling of crape, whispered emotionally to Mrs. Herbert Melson: “I +couldn’t BEAR to see the Niagara anywhere else!”</p> + +<p>A rustle of weeds and quick turning of heads hailed the opening of the +door, and Lily Bart appeared, tall and noble in her black dress, with +Gerty Farish at her side. The women’s faces, as she paused +interrogatively on the threshold, were a study in hesitation. One or two +made faint motions of recognition, which might have been subdued either +by the solemnity of the scene, or by the doubt as to how far the others +meant to go; Mrs. Jack Stepney gave a careless nod, and Grace Stepney, +with a sepulchral gesture, indicated a seat at her side. But Lily, +ignoring the invitation, as well as Jack Stepney’s official attempt to +direct her, moved across the room with her smooth free gait, and seated +herself in a chair which seemed to have been purposely placed apart from +the others.</p> + +<p>It was the first time that she had faced her family since her return from +Europe, two weeks earlier; but if she perceived any uncertainty in their +welcome, it served only to add a tinge of irony to the usual composure of +her bearing. The shock of dismay with which, on the dock, she had heard +from Gerty Farish of Mrs. Peniston’s sudden death, had been mitigated, +almost at once, by the irrepressible thought that now, at last, she would +be able to pay her debts. She had looked forward with considerable +uneasiness to her first encounter with her aunt. Mrs. Peniston had +vehemently opposed her niece’s departure with the Dorsets, and had marked +her continued disapproval by not writing during Lily’s absence. The +certainty that she had heard of the rupture with the Dorsets made the +prospect of the meeting more formidable; and how should Lily have +repressed a quick sense of relief at the thought that, instead of +undergoing the anticipated ordeal, she had only to enter gracefully on a +long-assured inheritance? It had been, in the consecrated phrase, “always +understood” that Mrs. Peniston was to provide handsomely for her niece; +and in the latter’s mind the understanding had long since crystallized +into fact.</p> + +<p>“She gets everything, of course—I don’t see what we’re here for,” Mrs. +Jack Stepney remarked with careless loudness to Ned Van Alstyne; and the +latter’s deprecating murmur—“Julia was always a just woman”—might have +been interpreted as signifying either acquiescence or doubt.</p> + +<p>“Well, it’s only about four hundred thousand,” Mrs. Stepney rejoined with +a yawn; and Grace Stepney, in the silence produced by the lawyer’s +preliminary cough, was heard to sob out: “They won’t find a towel +missing—I went over them with her the very day——”</p> + +<p>Lily, oppressed by the close atmosphere, and the stifling odour of fresh +mourning, felt her attention straying as Mrs. Peniston’s lawyer, solemnly +erect behind the Buhl table at the end of the room, began to rattle +through the preamble of the will.</p> + +<p>“It’s like being in church,” she reflected, wondering vaguely where Gwen +Stepney had got such an awful hat. Then she noticed how stout Jack had +grown—he would soon be almost as plethoric as Herbert Melson, who sat a +few feet off, breathing puffily as he leaned his black-gloved hands on +his stick.</p> + +<p>“I wonder why rich people always grow fat—I suppose it’s because there’s +nothing to worry them. If I inherit, I shall have to be careful of my +figure,” she mused, while the lawyer droned on through a labyrinth of +legacies. The servants came first, then a few charitable institutions, +then several remoter Melsons and Stepneys, who stirred consciously as +their names rang out, and then subsided into a state of impassiveness +befitting the solemnity of the occasion. Ned Van Alstyne, Jack Stepney, +and a cousin or two followed, each coupled with the mention of a few +thousands: Lily wondered that Grace Stepney was not among them. Then she +heard her own name—“to my niece Lily Bart ten thousand dollars—” and +after that the lawyer again lost himself in a coil of unintelligible +periods, from which the concluding phrase flashed out with startling +distinctness: “and the residue of my estate to my dear cousin and +name-sake, Grace Julia Stepney.”</p> + +<p>There was a subdued gasp of surprise, a rapid turning of heads, and a +surging of sable figures toward the corner in which Miss Stepney wailed +out her sense of unworthiness through the crumpled ball of a black-edged +handkerchief.</p> + +<p>Lily stood apart from the general movement, feeling herself for the first +time utterly alone. No one looked at her, no one seemed aware of her +presence; she was probing the very depths of insignificance. And under +her sense of the collective indifference came the acuter pang of hopes +deceived. Disinherited—she had been disinherited—and for Grace +Stepney! She met Gerty’s lamentable eyes, fixed on her in a despairing +effort at consolation, and the look brought her to herself. There was +something to be done before she left the house: to be done with all the +nobility she knew how to put into such gestures. She advanced to the +group about Miss Stepney, and holding out her hand said simply: “Dear +Grace, I am so glad.”</p> + +<p>The other ladies had fallen back at her approach, and a space created +itself about her. It widened as she turned to go, and no one advanced to +fill it up. She paused a moment, glancing about her, calmly taking the +measure of her situation. She heard some one ask a question about the +date of the will; she caught a fragment of the lawyer’s answer—something +about a sudden summons, and an “earlier instrument.” Then the tide of +dispersal began to drift past her; Mrs. Jack Stepney and Mrs. Herbert +Melson stood on the doorstep awaiting their motor; a sympathizing group +escorted Grace Stepney to the cab it was felt to be fitting she should +take, though she lived but a street or two away; and Miss Bart and Gerty +found themselves almost alone in the purple drawing-room, which more than +ever, in its stuffy dimness, resembled a well-kept family vault, in which +the last corpse had just been decently deposited.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>In Gerty Farish’s sitting-room, whither a hansom had carried the two +friends, Lily dropped into a chair with a faint sound of laughter: it +struck her as a humorous coincidence that her aunt’s legacy should so +nearly represent the amount of her debt to Trenor. The need of +discharging that debt had reasserted itself with increased urgency since +her return to America, and she spoke her first thought in saying to the +anxiously hovering Gerty: “I wonder when the legacies will be paid.”</p> + +<p>But Miss Farish could not pause over the legacies; she broke into a +larger indignation. “Oh, Lily, it’s unjust; it’s cruel—Grace Stepney +must FEEL she has no right to all that money!”</p> + +<p>“Any one who knew how to please Aunt Julia has a right to her money,” +Miss Bart rejoined philosophically.</p> + +<p>“But she was devoted to you—she led every one to think—” Gerty checked +herself in evident embarrassment, and Miss Bart turned to her with a +direct look. “Gerty, be honest: this will was made only six weeks ago. +She had heard of my break with the Dorsets?”</p> + +<p>“Every one heard, of course, that there had been some disagreement—some +misunderstanding——”</p> + +<p>“Did she hear that Bertha turned me off the yacht?”</p> + +<p>“Lily!”</p> + +<p>“That was what happened, you know. She said I was trying to marry George +Dorset. She did it to make him think she was jealous. Isn’t that what +she told Gwen Stepney?”</p> + +<p>“I don’t know—I don’t listen to such horrors.”</p> + +<p>“I MUST listen to them—I must know where I stand.” She paused, and again +sounded a faint note of derision. “Did you notice the women? They were +afraid to snub me while they thought I was going to get the +money—afterward they scuttled off as if I had the plague.” Gerty +remained silent, and she continued: “I stayed on to see what would +happen. They took their cue from Gwen Stepney and Lulu Melson—I saw them +watching to see what Gwen would do.—Gerty, I must know just what is +being said of me.”</p> + +<p>“I tell you I don’t listen——”</p> + +<p>“One hears such things without listening.” She rose and laid her resolute +hands on Miss Farish’s shoulders. “Gerty, are people going to cut me?”</p> + +<p>“Your FRIENDS, Lily—how can you think it?”</p> + +<p>“Who are one’s friends at such a time? Who, but you, you poor trustful +darling? And heaven knows what YOU suspect me of!” She kissed Gerty with +a whimsical murmur. “You’d never let it make any difference—but then +you’re fond of criminals, Gerty! How about the irreclaimable ones, +though? For I’m absolutely impenitent, you know.”</p> + +<p>She drew herself up to the full height of her slender majesty, towering +like some dark angel of defiance above the troubled Gerty, who could only +falter out: “Lily, Lily—how can you laugh about such things?”</p> + +<p>“So as not to weep, perhaps. But no—I’m not of the tearful order. I +discovered early that crying makes my nose red, and the knowledge has +helped me through several painful episodes.” She took a restless turn +about the room, and then, reseating herself, lifted the bright mockery of +her eyes to Gerty’s anxious countenance.</p> + +<p>“I shouldn’t have minded, you know, if I’d got the money—” and at Miss +Farish’s protesting “Oh!” she repeated calmly: “Not a straw, my dear; +for, in the first place, they wouldn’t have quite dared to ignore me; and +if they had, it wouldn’t have mattered, because I should have been +independent of them. But now—!” The irony faded from her eyes, and she +bent a clouded face upon her friend.</p> + +<p>“How can you talk so, Lily? Of course the money ought to have been yours, +but after all that makes no difference. The important thing——” Gerty +paused, and then continued firmly: “The important thing is that you +should clear yourself—should tell your friends the whole truth.”</p> + +<p>“The whole truth?” Miss Bart laughed. “What is truth? Where a woman is +concerned, it’s the story that’s easiest to believe. In this case it’s a +great deal easier to believe Bertha Dorset’s story than mine, because she +has a big house and an opera box, and it’s convenient to be on good terms +with her.”</p> + +<p>Miss Farish still fixed her with an anxious gaze. “But what IS your +story, Lily? I don’t believe any one knows it yet.”</p> + +<p>“My story?—I don’t believe I know it myself. You see I never thought of +preparing a version in advance as Bertha did—and if I had, I don’t think +I should take the trouble to use it now.”</p> + +<p>But Gerty continued with her quiet reasonableness: “I don’t want a +version prepared in advance—but I want you to tell me exactly what +happened from the beginning.”</p> + +<p>“From the beginning?” Miss Bart gently mimicked her. “Dear Gerty, how +little imagination you good people have! Why, the beginning was in my +cradle, I suppose—in the way I was brought up, and the things I was +taught to care for. Or no—I won’t blame anybody for my faults: I’ll say +it was in my blood, that I got it from some wicked pleasure-loving +ancestress, who reacted against the homely virtues of New Amsterdam, and +wanted to be back at the court of the Charleses!” And as Miss Farish +continued to press her with troubled eyes, she went on impatiently: “You +asked me just now for the truth—well, the truth about any girl is that +once she’s talked about she’s done for; and the more she explains her +case the worse it looks.—My good Gerty, you don’t happen to have a +cigarette about you?”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>In her stuffy room at the hotel to which she had gone on landing, Lily +Bart that evening reviewed her situation. It was the last week in June, +and none of her friends were in town. The few relatives who had stayed +on, or returned, for the reading of Mrs. Peniston’s will, had taken +flight again that afternoon to Newport or Long Island; and not one of +them had made any proffer of hospitality to Lily. For the first time in +her life she found herself utterly alone except for Gerty Farish. Even at +the actual moment of her break with the Dorsets she had not had so keen a +sense of its consequences, for the Duchess of Beltshire, hearing of the +catastrophe from Lord Hubert, had instantly offered her protection, and +under her sheltering wing Lily had made an almost triumphant progress to +London. There she had been sorely tempted to linger on in a society which +asked of her only to amuse and charm it, without enquiring too curiously +how she had acquired her gift for doing so; but Selden, before they +parted, had pressed on her the urgent need of returning at once to her +aunt, and Lord Hubert, when he presently reappeared in London, abounded +in the same counsel. Lily did not need to be told that the Duchess’s +championship was not the best road to social rehabilitation, and as she +was besides aware that her noble defender might at any moment drop her in +favour of a new PROTEGEE, she reluctantly decided to return to America. +But she had not been ten minutes on her native shore before she realized +that she had delayed too long to regain it. The Dorsets, the Stepneys, +the Brys—all the actors and witnesses in the miserable drama—had +preceded her with their version of the case; and, even had she seen the +least chance of gaining a hearing for her own, some obscure disdain and +reluctance would have restrained her. She knew it was not by +explanations and counter-charges that she could ever hope to recover her +lost standing; but even had she felt the least trust in their efficacy, +she would still have been held back by the feeling which had kept her +from defending herself to Gerty Farish—a feeling that was half pride and +half humiliation. For though she knew she had been ruthlessly sacrificed +to Bertha Dorset’s determination to win back her husband, and though her +own relation to Dorset had been that of the merest good-fellowship, yet +she had been perfectly aware from the outset that her part in the affair +was, as Carry Fisher brutally put it, to distract Dorset’s attention from +his wife. That was what she was “there for”: it was the price she had +chosen to pay for three months of luxury and freedom from care. Her +habit of resolutely facing the facts, in her rare moments of +introspection, did not now allow her to put any false gloss on the +situation. She had suffered for the very faithfulness with which she had +carried out her part of the tacit compact, but the part was not a +handsome one at best, and she saw it now in all the ugliness of failure.</p> + +<p>She saw, too, in the same uncompromising light, the train of consequences +resulting from that failure; and these became clearer to her with every +day of her weary lingering in town. She stayed on partly for the comfort +of Gerty Farish’s nearness, and partly for lack of knowing where to go. +She understood well enough the nature of the task before her. She must +set out to regain, little by little, the position she had lost; and the +first step in the tedious task was to find out, as soon as possible, on +how many of her friends she could count. Her hopes were mainly centred on +Mrs. Trenor, who had treasures of easy-going tolerance for those who were +amusing or useful to her, and in the noisy rush of whose existence the +still small voice of detraction was slow to make itself heard. But Judy, +though she must have been apprised of Miss Bart’s return, had not even +recognized it by the formal note of condolence which her friend’s +bereavement demanded. Any advance on Lily’s side might have been +perilous: there was nothing to do but to trust to the happy chance of an +accidental meeting, and Lily knew that, even so late in the season, there +was always a hope of running across her friends in their frequent +passages through town.</p> + +<p>To this end she assiduously showed herself at the restaurants they +frequented, where, attended by the troubled Gerty, she lunched +luxuriously, as she said, on her expectations.</p> + +<p>“My dear Gerty, you wouldn’t have me let the head-waiter see that I’ve +nothing to live on but Aunt Julia’s legacy? Think of Grace Stepney’s +satisfaction if she came in and found us lunching on cold mutton and tea! +What sweet shall we have today, dear—COUPE JACQUES or PECHES A LA MELBA?”</p> + +<p>She dropped the MENU abruptly, with a quick heightening of colour, and +Gerty, following her glance, was aware of the advance, from an inner +room, of a party headed by Mrs. Trenor and Carry Fisher. It was +impossible for these ladies and their companions—among whom Lily had at +once distinguished both Trenor and Rosedale—not to pass, in going out, +the table at which the two girls were seated; and Gerty’s sense of the +fact betrayed itself in the helpless trepidation of her manner. Miss +Bart, on the contrary, borne forward on the wave of her buoyant grace, +and neither shrinking from her friends nor appearing to lie in wait for +them, gave to the encounter the touch of naturalness which she could +impart to the most strained situations. Such embarrassment as was shown +was on Mrs. Trenor’s side, and manifested itself in the mingling of +exaggerated warmth with imperceptible reservations. Her loudly affirmed +pleasure at seeing Miss Bart took the form of a nebulous generalization, +which included neither enquiries as to her future nor the expression of a +definite wish to see her again. Lily, well-versed in the language of +these omissions, knew that they were equally intelligible to the other +members of the party: even Rosedale, flushed as he was with the +importance of keeping such company, at once took the temperature of Mrs. +Trenor’s cordiality, and reflected it in his off-hand greeting of Miss +Bart. Trenor, red and uncomfortable, had cut short his salutations on the +pretext of a word to say to the head-waiter; and the rest of the group +soon melted away in Mrs. Trenor’s wake.</p> + +<p>It was over in a moment—the waiter, MENU in hand, still hung on the +result of the choice between COUPE JACQUES and PECHES A LA MELBA—but +Miss Bart, in the interval, had taken the measure of her fate. Where Judy +Trenor led, all the world would follow; and Lily had the doomed sense of +the castaway who has signalled in vain to fleeing sails.</p> + +<p>In a flash she remembered Mrs. Trenor’s complaints of Carry Fisher’s +rapacity, and saw that they denoted an unexpected acquaintance with her +husband’s private affairs. In the large tumultuous disorder of the life +at Bellomont, where no one seemed to have time to observe any one else, +and private aims and personal interests were swept along unheeded in the +rush of collective activities, Lily had fancied herself sheltered from +inconvenient scrutiny; but if Judy knew when Mrs. Fisher borrowed money +of her husband, was she likely to ignore the same transaction on Lily’s +part? If she was careless of his affections she was plainly jealous of +his pocket; and in that fact Lily read the explanation of her rebuff. The +immediate result of these conclusions was the passionate resolve to pay +back her debt to Trenor. That obligation discharged, she would have but a +thousand dollars of Mrs. Peniston’s legacy left, and nothing to live on +but her own small income, which was considerably less than Gerty Farish’s +wretched pittance; but this consideration gave way to the imperative +claim of her wounded pride. She must be quits with the Trenors first; +after that she would take thought for the future.</p> + +<p>In her ignorance of legal procrastinations she had supposed that her +legacy would be paid over within a few days of the reading of her aunt’s +will; and after an interval of anxious suspense, she wrote to enquire the +cause of the delay. There was another interval before Mrs. Peniston’s +lawyer, who was also one of the executors, replied to the effect that, +some questions having arisen relative to the interpretation of the will, +he and his associates might not be in a position to pay the legacies till +the close of the twelvemonth legally allotted for their settlement. +Bewildered and indignant, Lily resolved to try the effect of a personal +appeal; but she returned from her expedition with a sense of the +powerlessness of beauty and charm against the unfeeling processes of the +law. It seemed intolerable to live on for another year under the weight +of her debt; and in her extremity she decided to turn to Miss Stepney, +who still lingered in town, immersed in the delectable duty of “going +over” her benefactress’s effects. It was bitter enough for Lily to ask a +favour of Grace Stepney, but the alternative was bitterer still; and one +morning she presented herself at Mrs. Peniston’s, where Grace, for the +facilitation of her pious task, had taken up a provisional abode.</p> + +<p>The strangeness of entering as a suppliant the house where she had so +long commanded, increased Lily’s desire to shorten the ordeal; and when +Miss Stepney entered the darkened drawing-room, rustling with the best +quality of crape, her visitor went straight to the point: would she be +willing to advance the amount of the expected legacy?</p> + +<p>Grace, in reply, wept and wondered at the request, bemoaned the +inexorableness of the law, and was astonished that Lily had not realized +the exact similarity of their positions. Did she think that only the +payment of the legacies had been delayed? Why, Miss Stepney herself had +not received a penny of her inheritance, and was paying rent—yes, +actually!—for the privilege of living in a house that belonged to her. +She was sure it was not what poor dear cousin Julia would have +wished—she had told the executors so to their faces; but they were +inaccessible to reason, and there was nothing to do but to wait. Let Lily +take example by her, and be patient—let them both remember how +beautifully patient cousin Julia had always been.</p> + +<p>Lily made a movement which showed her imperfect assimilation of this +example. “But you will have everything, Grace—it would be easy for you +to borrow ten times the amount I am asking for.”</p> + +<p>“Borrow—easy for me to borrow?” Grace Stepney rose up before her in +sable wrath. “Do you imagine for a moment that I would raise money on my +expectations from cousin Julia, when I know so well her unspeakable +horror of every transaction of the sort? Why, Lily, if you must know the +truth, it was the idea of your being in debt that brought on her +illness—you remember she had a slight attack before you sailed. Oh, I +don’t know the particulars, of course—I don’t WANT to know them—but +there were rumours about your affairs that made her most unhappy—no one +could be with her without seeing that. I can’t help it if you are +offended by my telling you this now—if I can do anything to make you +realize the folly of your course, and how deeply SHE disapproved of it, I +shall feel it is the truest way of making up to you for her loss.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_5a">Chapter 5</h2> + +<p>It seemed to Lily, as Mrs. Peniston’s door closed on her, that she was +taking a final leave of her old life. The future stretched before her +dull and bare as the deserted length of Fifth Avenue, and opportunities +showed as meagrely as the few cabs trailing in quest of fares that did +not come. The completeness of the analogy was, however, disturbed as she +reached the sidewalk by the rapid approach of a hansom which pulled up at +sight of her.</p> + +<p>From beneath its luggage-laden top, she caught the wave of a signalling +hand; and the next moment Mrs. Fisher, springing to the street, had +folded her in a demonstrative embrace.</p> + +<p>“My dear, you don’t mean to say you’re still in town? When I saw you the +other day at Sherry’s I didn’t have time to ask——” She broke off, and +added with a burst of frankness: “The truth is I was HORRID, Lily, and +I’ve wanted to tell you so ever since.”</p> + +<p>“Oh——” Miss Bart protested, drawing back from her penitent clasp; but +Mrs. Fisher went on with her usual directness: “Look here, Lily, don’t +let’s beat about the bush: half the trouble in life is caused by +pretending there isn’t any. That’s not my way, and I can only say I’m +thoroughly ashamed of myself for following the other women’s lead. But +we’ll talk of that by and bye—tell me now where you’re staying and what +your plans are. I don’t suppose you’re keeping house in there with Grace +Stepney, eh?—and it struck me you might be rather at loose ends.”</p> + +<p>In Lily’s present mood there was no resisting the honest friendliness of +this appeal, and she said with a smile: “I am at loose ends for the +moment, but Gerty Farish is still in town, and she’s good enough to let +me be with her whenever she can spare the time.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher made a slight grimace. “H’m—that’s a temperate joy. Oh, I +know—Gerty’s a trump, and worth all the rest of us put together; but A +LA LONGUE you’re used to a little higher seasoning, aren’t you, dear? +And besides, I suppose she’ll be off herself before long—the first of +August, you say? Well, look here, you can’t spend your summer in town; +we’ll talk of that later too. But meanwhile, what do you say to putting a +few things in a trunk and coming down with me to the Sam Gormers’ +tonight?”</p> + +<p>And as Lily stared at the breathless suddenness of the suggestion, she +continued with her easy laugh: “You don’t know them and they don’t know +you; but that don’t make a rap of difference. They’ve taken the Van +Alstyne place at Roslyn, and I’ve got CARTE BLANCHE to bring my friends +down there—the more the merrier. They do things awfully well, and +there’s to be rather a jolly party there this week——” she broke off, +checked by an undefinable change in Miss Bart’s expression. “Oh, I don’t +mean YOUR particular set, you know: rather a different crowd, but very +good fun. The fact is, the Gormers have struck out on a line of their +own: what they want is to have a good time, and to have it in their own +way. They gave the other thing a few months’ trial, under my +distinguished auspices, and they were really doing extremely +well—getting on a good deal faster than the Brys, just because they +didn’t care as much—but suddenly they decided that the whole business +bored them, and that what they wanted was a crowd they could really feel +at home with. Rather original of them, don’t you think so? Mattie Gormer +HAS got aspirations still; women always have; but she’s awfully +easy-going, and Sam won’t be bothered, and they both like to be the most +important people in sight, so they’ve started a sort of continuous +performance of their own, a kind of social Coney Island, where everybody +is welcome who can make noise enough and doesn’t put on airs. I think +it’s awfully good fun myself—some of the artistic set, you know, any +pretty actress that’s going, and so on. This week, for instance, they +have Audrey Anstell, who made such a hit last spring in ‘The Winning of +Winny’; and Paul Morpeth—he’s painting Mattie Gormer—and the Dick +Bellingers, and Kate Corby—well, every one you can think of who’s jolly +and makes a row. Now don’t stand there with your nose in the air, my +dear—it will be a good deal better than a broiling Sunday in town, and +you’ll find clever people as well as noisy ones—Morpeth, who admires +Mattie enormously, always brings one or two of his set.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher drew Lily toward the hansom with friendly authority. “Jump +in now, there’s a dear, and we’ll drive round to your hotel and have your +things packed, and then we’ll have tea, and the two maids can meet us at +the train.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>It was a good deal better than a broiling Sunday in town—of that no +doubt remained to Lily as, reclining in the shade of a leafy verandah, +she looked seaward across a stretch of greensward picturesquely dotted +with groups of ladies in lace raiment and men in tennis flannels. The +huge Van Alstyne house and its rambling dependencies were packed to their +fullest capacity with the Gormers’ week-end guests, who now, in the +radiance of the Sunday forenoon, were dispersing themselves over the +grounds in quest of the various distractions the place afforded: +distractions ranging from tennis-courts to shooting-galleries, from +bridge and whiskey within doors to motors and steam-launches without. +Lily had the odd sense of having been caught up into the crowd as +carelessly as a passenger is gathered in by an express train. The blonde +and genial Mrs. Gormer might, indeed, have figured the conductor, calmly +assigning seats to the rush of travellers, while Carry Fisher represented +the porter pushing their bags into place, giving them their numbers for +the dining-car, and warning them when their station was at hand. The +train, meanwhile, had scarcely slackened speed—life whizzed on with a +deafening’ rattle and roar, in which one traveller at least found a +welcome refuge from the sound of her own thoughts. The Gormer MILIEU +represented a social out-skirt which Lily had always fastidiously +avoided; but it struck her, now that she was in it, as only a flamboyant +copy of her own world, a caricature approximating the real thing as the +“society play” approaches the manners of the drawing-room. The people +about her were doing the same things as the Trenors, the Van Osburghs and +the Dorsets: the difference lay in a hundred shades of aspect and manner, +from the pattern of the men’s waistcoats to the inflexion of the women’s +voices. Everything was pitched in a higher key, and there was more of +each thing: more noise, more colour, more champagne, more +familiarity—but also greater good-nature, less rivalry, and a fresher +capacity for enjoyment.</p> + +<p>Miss Bart’s arrival had been welcomed with an uncritical friendliness +that first irritated her pride and then brought her to a sharp sense of +her own situation—of the place in life which, for the moment, she must +accept and make the best of. These people knew her story—of that her +first long talk with Carry Fisher had left no doubt: she was publicly +branded as the heroine of a “queer” episode—but instead of shrinking +from her as her own friends had done, they received her without question +into the easy promiscuity of their lives. They swallowed her past as +easily as they did Miss Anstell’s, and with no apparent sense of any +difference in the size of the mouthful: all they asked was that she +should—in her own way, for they recognized a diversity of +gifts—contribute as much to the general amusement as that graceful +actress, whose talents, when off the stage, were of the most varied +order. Lily felt at once that any tendency to be “stuck-up,” to mark a +sense of differences and distinctions, would be fatal to her continuance +in the Gormer set. To be taken in on such terms—and into such a +world!—was hard enough to the lingering pride in her; but she realized, +with a pang of self-contempt, that to be excluded from it would, after +all, be harder still. For, almost at once, she had felt the insidious +charm of slipping back into a life where every material difficulty was +smoothed away. The sudden escape from a stifling hotel in a dusty +deserted city to the space and luxury of a great country-house fanned by +sea breezes, had produced a state of moral lassitude agreeable enough +after the nervous tension and physical discomfort of the past weeks. For +the moment she must yield to the refreshment her senses craved—after +that she would reconsider her situation, and take counsel with her +dignity. Her enjoyment of her surroundings was, indeed, tinged by the +unpleasant consideration that she was accepting the hospitality and +courting the approval of people she had disdained under other conditions. +But she was growing less sensitive on such points: a hard glaze of +indifference was fast forming over her delicacies and susceptibilities, +and each concession to expediency hardened the surface a little more.</p> + +<p>On the Monday, when the party disbanded with uproarious adieux, the +return to town threw into stronger relief the charms of the life she was +leaving. The other guests were dispersing to take up the same existence +in a different setting: some at Newport, some at Bar Harbour, some in the +elaborate rusticity of an Adirondack camp. Even Gerty Farish, who +welcomed Lily’s return with tender solicitude, would soon be preparing to +join the aunt with whom she spent her summers on Lake George: only Lily +herself remained without plan or purpose, stranded in a backwater of the +great current of pleasure. But Carry Fisher, who had insisted on +transporting her to her own house, where she herself was to perch for a +day or two on the way to the Brys’ camp, came to the rescue with a new +suggestion.</p> + +<p>“Look here, Lily—I’ll tell you what it is: I want you to take my place +with Mattie Gormer this summer. They’re taking a party out to Alaska next +month in their private car, and Mattie, who is the laziest woman alive, +wants me to go with them, and relieve her of the bother of arranging +things; but the Brys want me too—oh, yes, we’ve made it up: didn’t I +tell you?—and, to put it frankly, though I like the Gormers best, +there’s more profit for me in the Brys. The fact is, they want to try +Newport this summer, and if I can make it a success for them they—well, +they’ll make it a success for me.” Mrs. Fisher clasped her hands +enthusiastically. “Do you know, Lily, the more I think of my idea the +better I like it—quite as much for you as for myself. The Gormers have +both taken a tremendous fancy to you, and the trip to Alaska +is—well—the very thing I should want for you just at present.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart lifted her eyes with a keen glance. “To take me out of my +friends’ way, you mean?” she said quietly; and Mrs. Fisher responded with +a deprecating kiss: “To keep you out of their sight till they realize how +much they miss you.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Miss Bart went with the Gormers to Alaska; and the expedition, if it did +not produce the effect anticipated by her friend, had at least the +negative advantage of removing her from the fiery centre of criticism and +discussion. Gerty Farish had opposed the plan with all the energy of her +somewhat inarticulate nature. She had even offered to give up her visit +to Lake George, and remain in town with Miss Bart, if the latter would +renounce her journey; but Lily could disguise her real distaste for this +plan under a sufficiently valid reason.</p> + +<p>“You dear innocent, don’t you see,” she protested, “that Carry is quite +right, and that I must take up my usual life, and go about among people +as much as possible? If my old friends choose to believe lies about me I +shall have to make new ones, that’s all; and you know beggars mustn’t be +choosers. Not that I don’t like Mattie Gormer—I DO like her: she’s kind +and honest and unaffected; and don’t you suppose I feel grateful to her +for making me welcome at a time when, as you’ve yourself seen, my own +family have unanimously washed their hands of me?”</p> + +<p>Gerty shook her head, mutely unconvinced. She felt not only that Lily was +cheapening herself by making use of an intimacy she would never have +cultivated from choice, but that, in drifting back now to her former +manner of life, she was forfeiting her last chance of ever escaping from +it. Gerty had but an obscure conception of what Lily’s actual experience +had been: but its consequences had established a lasting hold on her pity +since the memorable night when she had offered up her own secret hope to +her friend’s extremity. To characters like Gerty’s such a sacrifice +constitutes a moral claim on the part of the person in whose behalf it +has been made. Having once helped Lily, she must continue to help her; +and helping her, must believe in her, because faith is the main-spring of +such natures. But even if Miss Bart, after her renewed taste of the +amenities of life, could have returned to the barrenness of a New York +August, mitigated only by poor Gerty’s presence, her worldly wisdom would +have counselled her against such an act of abnegation. She knew that +Carry Fisher was right: that an opportune absence might be the first step +toward rehabilitation, and that, at any rate, to linger on in town out of +season was a fatal admission of defeat. From the Gormers’ tumultuous +progress across their native continent, she returned with an altered view +of her situation. The renewed habit of luxury—the daily waking to an +assured absence of care and presence of material ease—gradually blunted +her appreciation of these values, and left her more conscious of the void +they could not fill. Mattie Gormer’s undiscriminating good-nature, and +the slap-dash sociability of her friends, who treated Lily precisely as +they treated each other—all these characteristic notes of difference +began to wear upon her endurance; and the more she saw to criticize in +her companions, the less justification she found for making use of them. +The longing to get back to her former surroundings hardened to a fixed +idea; but with the strengthening of her purpose came the inevitable +perception that, to attain it, she must exact fresh concessions from her +pride. These, for the moment, took the unpleasant form of continuing to +cling to her hosts after their return from Alaska. Little as she was in +the key of their MILIEU, her immense social facility, her long habit of +adapting herself to others without suffering her own outline to be +blurred, the skilled manipulation of all the polished implements of her +craft, had won for her an important place in the Gormer group. If their +resonant hilarity could never be hers, she contributed a note of easy +elegance more valuable to Mattie Gormer than the louder passages of the +band. Sam Gormer and his special cronies stood indeed a little in awe of +her; but Mattie’s following, headed by Paul Morpeth, made her feel that +they prized her for the very qualities they most conspicuously lacked. If +Morpeth, whose social indolence was as great as his artistic activity, +had abandoned himself to the easy current of the Gormer existence, where +the minor exactions of politeness were unknown or ignored, and a man +could either break his engagements, or keep them in a painting-jacket and +slippers, he still preserved his sense of differences, and his +appreciation of graces he had no time to cultivate. During the +preparations for the Brys’ TABLEAUX he had been immensely struck by +Lily’s plastic possibilities—“not the face: too self-controlled for +expression; but the rest of her—gad, what a model she’d make!”—and +though his abhorrence of the world in which he had seen her was too great +for him to think of seeking her there, he was fully alive to the +privilege of having her to look at and listen to while he lounged in +Mattie Gormer’s dishevelled drawing-room.</p> + +<p>Lily had thus formed, in the tumult of her surroundings, a little nucleus +of friendly relations which mitigated the crudeness of her course in +lingering with the Gormers after their return. Nor was she without pale +glimpses of her own world, especially since the breaking up of the +Newport season had set the social current once more toward Long Island. +Kate Corby, whose tastes made her as promiscuous as Carry Fisher was +rendered by her necessities, occasionally descended on the Gormers, +where, after a first stare of surprise, she took Lily’s presence almost +too much as a matter of course. Mrs. Fisher, too, appearing frequently in +the neighbourhood, drove over to impart her experiences and give Lily +what she called the latest report from the weather-bureau; and the +latter, who had never directly invited her confidence, could yet talk +with her more freely than with Gerty Farish, in whose presence it was +impossible even to admit the existence of much that Mrs. Fisher +conveniently took for granted.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher, moreover, had no embarrassing curiosity. She did not wish to +probe the inwardness of Lily’s situation, but simply to view it from the +outside, and draw her conclusions accordingly; and these conclusions, at +the end of a confidential talk, she summed up to her friend in the +succinct remark: “You must marry as soon as you can.”</p> + +<p>Lily uttered a faint laugh—for once Mrs. Fisher lacked originality. “Do +you mean, like Gerty Farish, to recommend the unfailing panacea of ‘a +good man’s love’?”</p> + +<p>“No—I don’t think either of my candidates would answer to that +description,” said Mrs. Fisher after a pause of reflection.</p> + +<p>“Either? Are there actually two?”</p> + +<p>“Well, perhaps I ought to say one and a half—for the moment.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart received this with increasing amusement. “Other things being +equal, I think I should prefer a half-husband: who is he?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t fly out at me till you hear my reasons—George Dorset.”</p> + +<p>“Oh——” Lily murmured reproachfully; but Mrs. Fisher pressed on +unrebuffed. “Well, why not? They had a few weeks’ honeymoon when they +first got back from Europe, but now things are going badly with them +again. Bertha has been behaving more than ever like a madwoman, and +George’s powers of credulity are very nearly exhausted. They’re at their +place here, you know, and I spent last Sunday with them. It was a ghastly +party—no one else but poor Neddy Silverton, who looks like a +galley-slave (they used to talk of my making that poor boy unhappy!)—and +after luncheon George carried me off on a long walk, and told me the end +would have to come soon.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart made an incredulous gesture. “As far as that goes, the end will +never come—Bertha will always know how to get him back when she wants +him.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher continued to observe her tentatively. “Not if he has any one +else to turn to! Yes—that’s just what it comes to: the poor creature +can’t stand alone. And I remember him such a good fellow, full of life +and enthusiasm.” She paused, and went on, dropping her glance from +Lily’s: “He wouldn’t stay with her ten minutes if he KNEW——”</p> + +<p>“Knew——?” Miss Bart repeated.</p> + +<p>“What YOU must, for instance—with the opportunities you’ve had! If he +had positive proof, I mean——”</p> + +<p>Lily interrupted her with a deep blush of displeasure. “Please let us +drop the subject, Carry: it’s too odious to me.” And to divert her +companion’s attention she added, with an attempt at lightness: “And your +second candidate? We must not forget him.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher echoed her laugh. “I wonder if you’ll cry out just as loud if +I say—Sim Rosedale?”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart did not cry out: she sat silent, gazing thoughtfully at her +friend. The suggestion, in truth, gave expression to a possibility which, +in the last weeks, had more than once recurred to her; but after a moment +she said carelessly: “Mr. Rosedale wants a wife who can establish him in +the bosom of the Van Osburghs and Trenors.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher caught her up eagerly. “And so YOU could—with his money! +Don’t you see how beautifully it would work out for you both?”</p> + +<p>“I don’t see any way of making him see it,” Lily returned, with a laugh +intended to dismiss the subject.</p> + +<p>But in reality it lingered with her long after Mrs. Fisher had taken +leave. She had seen very little of Rosedale since her annexation by the +Gormers, for he was still steadily bent on penetrating to the inner +Paradise from which she was now excluded; but once or twice, when nothing +better offered, he had turned up for a Sunday, and on these occasions he +had left her in no doubt as to his view of her situation. That he still +admired her was, more than ever, offensively evident; for in the Gormer +circle, where he expanded as in his native element, there were no +puzzling conventions to check the full expression of his approval. But it +was in the quality of his admiration that she read his shrewd estimate of +her case. He enjoyed letting the Gormers see that he had known “Miss +Lily”—she was “Miss Lily” to him now—before they had had the faintest +social existence: enjoyed more especially impressing Paul Morpeth with +the distance to which their intimacy dated back. But he let it be felt +that that intimacy was a mere ripple on the surface of a rushing social +current, the kind of relaxation which a man of large interests and +manifold preoccupations permits himself in his hours of ease.</p> + +<p>The necessity of accepting this view of their past relation, and of +meeting it in the key of pleasantry prevalent among her new friends, was +deeply humiliating to Lily. But she dared less than ever to quarrel with +Rosedale. She suspected that her rejection rankled among the most +unforgettable of his rebuffs, and the fact that he knew something of her +wretched transaction with Trenor, and was sure to put the basest +construction on it, seemed to place her hopelessly in his power. Yet at +Carry Fisher’s suggestion a new hope had stirred in her. Much as she +disliked Rosedale, she no longer absolutely despised him. For he was +gradually attaining his object in life, and that, to Lily, was always +less despicable than to miss it. With the slow unalterable persistency +which she had always felt in him, he was making his way through the dense +mass of social antagonisms. Already his wealth, and the masterly use he +had made of it, were giving him an enviable prominence in the world of +affairs, and placing Wall Street under obligations which only Fifth +Avenue could repay. In response to these claims, his name began to figure +on municipal committees and charitable boards; he appeared at banquets to +distinguished strangers, and his candidacy at one of the fashionable +clubs was discussed with diminishing opposition. He had figured once or +twice at the Trenor dinners, and had learned to speak with just the right +note of disdain of the big Van Osburgh crushes; and all he now needed was +a wife whose affiliations would shorten the last tedious steps of his +ascent. It was with that object that, a year earlier, he had fixed his +affections on Miss Bart; but in the interval he had mounted nearer to the +goal, while she had lost the power to abbreviate the remaining steps of +the way. All this she saw with the clearness of vision that came to her +in moments of despondency. It was success that dazzled her—she could +distinguish facts plainly enough in the twilight of failure. And the +twilight, as she now sought to pierce it, was gradually lighted by a +faint spark of reassurance. Under the utilitarian motive of Rosedale’s +wooing she had felt, clearly enough, the heat of personal inclination. +She would not have detested him so heartily had she not known that he +dared to admire her. What, then, if the passion persisted, though the +other motive had ceased to sustain it? She had never even tried to please +him—he had been drawn to her in spite of her manifest disdain. What if +she now chose to exert the power which, even in its passive state, he had +felt so strongly? What if she made him marry her for love, now that he +had no other reason for marrying her?</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_6a">Chapter 6</h2> + +<p>As became persons of their rising consequence, the Gormers were engaged +in building a country-house on Long Island; and it was a part of Miss +Bart’s duty to attend her hostess on frequent visits of inspection to the +new estate. There, while Mrs. Gormer plunged into problems of lighting +and sanitation, Lily had leisure to wander, in the bright autumn air, +along the tree-fringed bay to which the land declined. Little as she was +addicted to solitude, there had come to be moments when it seemed a +welcome escape from the empty noises of her life. She was weary of being +swept passively along a current of pleasure and business in which she had +no share; weary of seeing other people pursue amusement and squander +money, while she felt herself of no more account among them than an +expensive toy in the hands of a spoiled child.</p> + +<p>It was in this frame of mind that, striking back from the shore one +morning into the windings of an unfamiliar lane, she came suddenly upon +the figure of George Dorset. The Dorset place was in the immediate +neighbourhood of the Gormers’ newly-acquired estate, and in her +motor-flights thither with Mrs. Gormer, Lily had caught one or two +passing glimpses of the couple; but they moved in so different an orbit +that she had not considered the possibility of a direct encounter.</p> + +<p>Dorset, swinging along with bent head, in moody abstraction, did not see +Miss Bart till he was close upon her; but the sight, instead of bringing +him to a halt, as she had half-expected, sent him toward her with an +eagerness which found expression in his opening words.</p> + +<p>“Miss Bart!—You’ll shake hands, won’t you? I’ve been hoping to meet +you—I should have written to you if I’d dared.” His face, with its +tossed red hair and straggling moustache, had a driven uneasy look, as +though life had become an unceasing race between himself and the thoughts +at his heels.</p> + +<p>The look drew a word of compassionate greeting from Lily, and he pressed +on, as if encouraged by her tone: “I wanted to apologize—to ask you to +forgive me for the miserable part I played——”</p> + +<p>She checked him with a quick gesture. “Don’t let us speak of it: I was +very sorry for you,” she said, with a tinge of disdain which, as she +instantly perceived, was not lost on him.</p> + +<p>He flushed to his haggard eyes, flushed so cruelly that she repented the +thrust. “You might well be; you don’t know—you must let me explain. I +was deceived: abominably deceived——”</p> + +<p>“I am still more sorry for you, then,” she interposed, without irony; +“but you must see that I am not exactly the person with whom the subject +can be discussed.”</p> + +<p>He met this with a look of genuine wonder. “Why not? Isn’t it to you, of +all people, that I owe an explanation——”</p> + +<p>“No explanation is necessary: the situation was perfectly clear to me.”</p> + +<p>“Ah——” he murmured, his head drooping again, and his irresolute hand +switching at the underbrush along the lane. But as Lily made a movement +to pass on, he broke out with fresh vehemence: “Miss Bart, for God’s sake +don’t turn from me! We used to be good friends—you were always kind to +me—and you don’t know how I need a friend now.”</p> + +<p>The lamentable weakness of the words roused a motion of pity in Lily’s +breast. She too needed friends—she had tasted the pang of loneliness; +and her resentment of Bertha Dorset’s cruelty softened her heart to the +poor wretch who was after all the chief of Bertha’s victims.</p> + +<p>“I still wish to be kind; I feel no ill-will toward you,” she said. “But +you must understand that after what has happened we can’t be friends +again—we can’t see each other.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, you ARE kind—you’re merciful—you always were!” He fixed his +miserable gaze on her. “But why can’t we be friends—why not, when I’ve +repented in dust and ashes? Isn’t it hard that you should condemn me to +suffer for the falseness, the treachery of others? I was punished enough +at the time—is there to be no respite for me?”</p> + +<p>“I should have thought you had found complete respite in the +reconciliation which was effected at my expense,” Lily began, with +renewed impatience; but he broke in imploringly: “Don’t put it in that +way—when that’s been the worst of my punishment. My God! what could I +do—wasn’t I powerless? You were singled out as a sacrifice: any word I +might have said would have been turned against you——”</p> + +<p>“I have told you I don’t blame you; all I ask you to understand is that, +after the use Bertha chose to make of me—after all that her behaviour +has since implied—it’s impossible that you and I should meet.”</p> + +<p>He continued to stand before her, in his dogged weakness. “Is it—need it +be? Mightn’t there be circumstances——?” he checked himself, slashing at +the wayside weeds in a wider radius. Then he began again: “Miss Bart, +listen—give me a minute. If we’re not to meet again, at least let me +have a hearing now. You say we can’t be friends after—after what has +happened. But can’t I at least appeal to your pity? Can’t I move you if I +ask you to think of me as a prisoner—a prisoner you alone can set free?”</p> + +<p>Lily’s inward start betrayed itself in a quick blush: was it possible +that this was really the sense of Carry Fisher’s adumbrations?</p> + +<p>“I can’t see how I can possibly be of any help to you,” she murmured, +drawing back a little from the mounting excitement of his look.</p> + +<p>Her tone seemed to sober him, as it had so often done in his stormiest +moments. The stubborn lines of his face relaxed, and he said, with an +abrupt drop to docility: “You WOULD see, if you’d be as merciful as you +used to be: and heaven knows I’ve never needed it more!”</p> + +<p>She paused a moment, moved in spite of herself by this reminder of her +influence over him. Her fibres had been softened by suffering, and the +sudden glimpse into his mocked and broken life disarmed her contempt for +his weakness.</p> + +<p>“I am very sorry for you—I would help you willingly; but you must have +other friends, other advisers.”</p> + +<p>“I never had a friend like you,” he answered simply. “And besides—can’t +you see?—you’re the only person”—his voice dropped to a whisper—“the +only person who knows.”</p> + +<p>Again she felt her colour change; again her heart rose in precipitate +throbs to meet what she felt was coming. He lifted his eyes to her +entreatingly. “You do see, don’t you? You understand? I’m desperate—I’m +at the end of my tether. I want to be free, and you can free me. I know +you can. You don’t want to keep me bound fast in hell, do you? You can’t +want to take such a vengeance as that. You were always kind—your eyes +are kind now. You say you’re sorry for me. Well, it rests with you to +show it; and heaven knows there’s nothing to keep you back. You +understand, of course—there wouldn’t be a hint of publicity—not a sound +or a syllable to connect you with the thing. It would never come to that, +you know: all I need is to be able to say definitely: ‘I know this—and +this—and this’—and the fight would drop, and the way be cleared, and +the whole abominable business swept out of sight in a second.”</p> + +<p>He spoke pantingly, like a tired runner, with breaks of exhaustion +between his words; and through the breaks she caught, as through the +shifting rents of a fog, great golden vistas of peace and safety. For +there was no mistaking the definite intention behind his vague appeal; +she could have filled up the blanks without the help of Mrs. Fisher’s +insinuations. Here was a man who turned to her in the extremity of his +loneliness and his humiliation: if she came to him at such a moment he +would be hers with all the force of his deluded faith. And the power to +make him so lay in her hand—lay there in a completeness he could not +even remotely conjecture. Revenge and rehabilitation might be hers at a +stroke—there was something dazzling in the completeness of the +opportunity.</p> + +<p>She stood silent, gazing away from him down the autumnal stretch of the +deserted lane. And suddenly fear possessed her—fear of herself, and of +the terrible force of the temptation. All her past weaknesses were like +so many eager accomplices drawing her toward the path their feet had +already smoothed. She turned quickly, and held out her hand to Dorset.</p> + +<p>“Goodbye—I’m sorry; there’s nothing in the world that I can do.”</p> + +<p>“Nothing? Ah, don’t say that,” he cried; “say what’s true: that you +abandon me like the others. You, the only creature who could have saved +me!”</p> + +<p>“Goodbye—goodbye,” she repeated hurriedly; and as she moved away she +heard him cry out on a last note of entreaty: “At least you’ll let me see +you once more?”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Lily, on regaining the Gormer grounds, struck rapidly across the lawn +toward the unfinished house, where she fancied that her hostess might be +speculating, not too resignedly, on the cause of her delay; for, like +many unpunctual persons, Mrs. Gormer disliked to be kept waiting.</p> + +<p>As Miss Bart reached the avenue, however, she saw a smart phaeton with a +high-stepping pair disappear behind the shrubbery in the direction of the +gate; and on the doorstep stood Mrs. Gormer, with a glow of retrospective +pleasure on her open countenance. At sight of Lily the glow deepened to +an embarrassed red, and she said with a slight laugh: “Did you see my +visitor? Oh, I thought you came back by the avenue. It was Mrs. George +Dorset—she said she’d dropped in to make a neighbourly call.”</p> + +<p>Lily met the announcement with her usual composure, though her experience +of Bertha’s idiosyncrasies would not have led her to include the +neighbourly instinct among them; and Mrs. Gormer, relieved to see that +she gave no sign of surprise, went on with a deprecating laugh: “Of +course what really brought her was curiosity—she made me take her all +over the house. But no one could have been nicer—no airs, you know, and +so good-natured: I can quite see why people think her so fascinating.”</p> + +<p>This surprising event, coinciding too completely with her meeting with +Dorset to be regarded as contingent upon it, had yet immediately struck +Lily with a vague sense of foreboding. It was not in Bertha’s habits to +be neighbourly, much less to make advances to any one outside the +immediate circle of her affinities. She had always consistently ignored +the world of outer aspirants, or had recognized its individual members +only when prompted by motives of self-interest; and the very +capriciousness of her condescensions had, as Lily was aware, given them +special value in the eyes of the persons she distinguished. Lily saw this +now in Mrs. Gormer’s unconcealable complacency, and in the happy +irrelevance with which, for the next day or two, she quoted Bertha’s +opinions and speculated on the origin of her gown. All the secret +ambitions which Mrs. Gormer’s native indolence, and the attitude of her +companions, kept in habitual abeyance, were now germinating afresh in the +glow of Bertha’s advances; and whatever the cause of the latter, Lily saw +that, if they were followed up, they were likely to have a disturbing +effect upon her own future.</p> + +<p>She had arranged to break the length of her stay with her new friends by +one or two visits to other acquaintances as recent; and on her return +from this somewhat depressing excursion she was immediately conscious +that Mrs. Dorset’s influence was still in the air. There had been another +exchange of visits, a tea at a country-club, an encounter at a hunt ball; +there was even a rumour of an approaching dinner, which Mattie Gormer, +with an unnatural effort at discretion, tried to smuggle out of the +conversation whenever Miss Bart took part in it.</p> + +<p>The latter had already planned to return to town after a farewell Sunday +with her friends; and, with Gerty Farish’s aid, had discovered a small +private hotel where she might establish herself for the winter. The +hotel being on the edge of a fashionable neighbourhood, the price of the +few square feet she was to occupy was considerably in excess of her +means; but she found a justification for her dislike of poorer quarters +in the argument that, at this particular juncture, it was of the utmost +importance to keep up a show of prosperity. In reality, it was impossible +for her, while she had the means to pay her way for a week ahead, to +lapse into a form of existence like Gerty Farish’s. She had never been so +near the brink of insolvency; but she could at least manage to meet her +weekly hotel bill, and having settled the heaviest of her previous debts +out of the money she had received from Trenor, she had a still fair +margin of credit to go upon. The situation, however, was not agreeable +enough to lull her to complete unconsciousness of its insecurity. Her +rooms, with their cramped outlook down a sallow vista of brick walls and +fire-escapes, her lonely meals in the dark restaurant with its surcharged +ceiling and haunting smell of coffee—all these material discomforts, +which were yet to be accounted as so many privileges soon to be +withdrawn, kept constantly before her the disadvantages of her state; and +her mind reverted the more insistently to Mrs. Fisher’s counsels. Beat +about the question as she would, she knew the outcome of it was that she +must try to marry Rosedale; and in this conviction she was fortified by +an unexpected visit from George Dorset.</p> + +<p>She found him, on the first Sunday after her return to town, pacing her +narrow sitting-room to the imminent peril of the few knick-knacks with +which she had tried to disguise its plush exuberances; but the sight of +her seemed to quiet him, and he said meekly that he hadn’t come to bother +her—that he asked only to be allowed to sit for half an hour and talk of +anything she liked. In reality, as she knew, he had but one subject: +himself and his wretchedness; and it was the need of her sympathy that +had drawn him back. But he began with a pretence of questioning her about +herself, and as she replied, she saw that, for the first time, a faint +realization of her plight penetrated the dense surface of his +self-absorption. Was it possible that her old beast of an aunt had +actually cut her off? That she was living alone like this because there +was no one else for her to go to, and that she really hadn’t more than +enough to keep alive on till the wretched little legacy was paid? The +fibres of sympathy were nearly atrophied in him, but he was suffering so +intensely that he had a faint glimpse of what other sufferings might +mean—and, as she perceived, an almost simultaneous perception of the way +in which her particular misfortunes might serve him.</p> + +<p>When at length she dismissed him, on the pretext that she must dress for +dinner, he lingered entreatingly on the threshold to blurt out: “It’s +been such a comfort—do say you’ll let me see you again—” But to this +direct appeal it was impossible to give an assent; and she said with +friendly decisiveness: “I’m sorry—but you know why I can’t.”</p> + +<p>He coloured to the eyes, pushed the door shut, and stood before her +embarrassed but insistent. “I know how you might, if you would—if things +were different—and it lies with you to make them so. It’s just a word to +say, and you put me out of my misery!”</p> + +<p>Their eyes met, and for a second she trembled again with the nearness of +the temptation. “You’re mistaken; I know nothing; I saw nothing,” she +exclaimed, striving, by sheer force of reiteration, to build a barrier +between herself and her peril; and as he turned away, groaning out “You +sacrifice us both,” she continued to repeat, as if it were a charm: “I +know nothing—absolutely nothing.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Lily had seen little of Rosedale since her illuminating talk with Mrs. +Fisher, but on the two or three occasions when they had met she was +conscious of having distinctly advanced in his favour. There could be no +doubt that he admired her as much as ever, and she believed it rested +with herself to raise his admiration to the point where it should bear +down the lingering counsels of expediency. The task was not an easy one; +but neither was it easy, in her long sleepless nights, to face the +thought of what George Dorset was so clearly ready to offer. Baseness +for baseness, she hated the other least: there were even moments when a +marriage with Rosedale seemed the only honourable solution of her +difficulties. She did not indeed let her imagination range beyond the day +of plighting: after that everything faded into a haze of material +well-being, in which the personality of her benefactor remained +mercifully vague. She had learned, in her long vigils, that there were +certain things not good to think of, certain midnight images that must at +any cost be exorcised—and one of these was the image of herself as +Rosedale’s wife.</p> + +<p>Carry Fisher, on the strength, as she frankly owned, of the Brys’ Newport +success, had taken for the autumn months a small house at Tuxedo; and +thither Lily was bound on the Sunday after Dorset’s visit. Though it was +nearly dinner-time when she arrived, her hostess was still out, and the +firelit quiet of the small silent house descended on her spirit with a +sense of peace and familiarity. It may be doubted if such an emotion had +ever before been evoked by Carry Fisher’s surroundings; but, contrasted +to the world in which Lily had lately lived, there was an air of repose +and stability in the very placing of the furniture, and in the quiet +competence of the parlour-maid who led her up to her room. Mrs. Fisher’s +unconventionality was, after all, a merely superficial divergence from an +inherited social creed, while the manners of the Gormer circle +represented their first attempt to formulate such a creed for themselves.</p> + +<p>It was the first time since her return from Europe that Lily had found +herself in a congenial atmosphere, and the stirring of familiar +associations had almost prepared her, as she descended the stairs before +dinner, to enter upon a group of her old acquaintances. But this +expectation was instantly checked by the reflection that the friends who +remained loyal were precisely those who would be least willing to expose +her to such encounters; and it was hardly with surprise that she found, +instead, Mr. Rosedale kneeling domestically on the drawing-room hearth +before his hostess’s little girl.</p> + +<p>Rosedale in the paternal role was hardly a figure to soften Lily; yet she +could not but notice a quality of homely goodness in his advances to the +child. They were not, at any rate, the premeditated and perfunctory +endearments of the guest under his hostess’s eye, for he and the little +girl had the room to themselves; and something in his attitude made him +seem a simple and kindly being compared to the small critical creature +who endured his homage. Yes, he would be kind—Lily, from the threshold, +had time to feel—kind in his gross, unscrupulous, rapacious way, the way +of the predatory creature with his mate. She had but a moment in which +to consider whether this glimpse of the fireside man mitigated her +repugnance, or gave it, rather, a more concrete and intimate form; for at +sight of her he was immediately on his feet again, the florid and +dominant Rosedale of Mattie Gormer’s drawing-room.</p> + +<p>It was no surprise to Lily to find that he had been selected as her only +fellow-guest. Though she and her hostess had not met since the latter’s +tentative discussion of her future, Lily knew that the acuteness which +enabled Mrs. Fisher to lay a safe and pleasant course through a world of +antagonistic forces was not infrequently exercised for the benefit of her +friends. It was, in fact, characteristic of Carry that, while she +actively gleaned her own stores from the fields of affluence, her real +sympathies were on the other side—with the unlucky, the unpopular, the +unsuccessful, with all her hungry fellow-toilers in the shorn stubble of +success.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher’s experience guarded her against the mistake of exposing +Lily, for the first evening, to the unmitigated impression of Rosedale’s +personality. Kate Corby and two or three men dropped in to dinner, and +Lily, alive to every detail of her friend’s method, saw that such +opportunities as had been contrived for her were to be deferred till she +had, as it were, gained courage to make effectual use of them. She had a +sense of acquiescing in this plan with the passiveness of a sufferer +resigned to the surgeon’s touch; and this feeling of almost lethargic +helplessness continued when, after the departure of the guests, Mrs. +Fisher followed her upstairs.</p> + +<p>“May I come in and smoke a cigarette over your fire? If we talk in my +room we shall disturb the child.” Mrs. Fisher looked about her with the +eye of the solicitous hostess. “I hope you’ve managed to make yourself +comfortable, dear? Isn’t it a jolly little house? It’s such a blessing to +have a few quiet weeks with the baby.”</p> + +<p>Carry, in her rare moments of prosperity, became so expansively maternal +that Miss Bart sometimes wondered whether, if she could ever get time and +money enough, she would not end by devoting them both to her daughter.</p> + +<p>“It’s a well-earned rest: I’ll say that for myself,” she continued, +sinking down with a sigh of content on the pillowed lounge near the fire. +“Louisa Bry is a stern task-master: I often used to wish myself back with +the Gormers. Talk of love making people jealous and suspicious—it’s +nothing to social ambition! Louisa used to lie awake at night wondering +whether the women who called on us called on ME because I was with her, +or on HER because she was with me; and she was always laying traps to +find out what I thought. Of course I had to disown my oldest friends, +rather than let her suspect she owed me the chance of making a single +acquaintance—when, all the while, that was what she had me there for, +and what she wrote me a handsome cheque for when the season was over!”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher was not a woman who talked of herself without cause, and the +practice of direct speech, far from precluding in her an occasional +resort to circuitous methods, served rather, at crucial moments, the +purpose of the juggler’s chatter while he shifts the contents of his +sleeves. Through the haze of her cigarette-smoke she continued to gaze +meditatively at Miss Bart, who, having dismissed her maid, sat before the +toilet table shaking out over her shoulders the loosened undulations of +her hair.</p> + +<p>“Your hair’s wonderful, Lily. Thinner—? What does that matter, when it’s +so light and alive? So many women’s worries seem to go straight to their +hair—but yours looks as if there had never been an anxious thought under +it. I never saw you look better than you did this evening. Mattie Gormer +told me that Morpeth wanted to paint you—why don’t you let him?”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart’s immediate answer was to address a critical glance to the +reflection of the countenance under discussion. Then she said, with a +slight touch of irritation: “I don’t care to accept a portrait from Paul +Morpeth.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher mused. “N—no. And just now, especially—well, he can do you +after you’re married.” She waited a moment, and then went on: “By the +way, I had a visit from Mattie the other day. She turned up here last +Sunday—and with Bertha Dorset, of all people in the world!”</p> + +<p>She paused again to measure the effect of this announcement on her +hearer, but the brush in Miss Bart’s lifted hand maintained its +unwavering stroke from brow to nape.</p> + +<p>“I never was more astonished,” Mrs. Fisher pursued. “I don’t know two +women less predestined to intimacy—from Bertha’s standpoint, that is; +for of course poor Mattie thinks it natural enough that she should be +singled out—I’ve no doubt the rabbit always thinks it is fascinating the +anaconda. Well, you know I’ve always told you that Mattie secretly longed +to bore herself with the really fashionable; and now that the chance has +come, I see that she’s capable of sacrificing all her old friends to it.”</p> + +<p>Lily laid aside her brush and turned a penetrating glance upon her +friend. “Including ME?” she suggested.</p> + +<p>“Ah, my dear,” murmured Mrs. Fisher, rising to push back a log from the +hearth.</p> + +<p>“That’s what Bertha means, isn’t it?” Miss Bart went on steadily. “For +of course she always means something; and before I left Long Island I saw +that she was beginning to lay her toils for Mattie.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fisher sighed evasively. “She has her fast now, at any rate. To +think of that loud independence of Mattie’s being only a subtler form of +snobbishness! Bertha can already make her believe anything she +pleases—and I’m afraid she’s begun, my poor child, by insinuating +horrors about you.”</p> + +<p>Lily flushed under the shadow of her drooping hair. “The world is too +vile,” she murmured, averting herself from Mrs. Fisher’s anxious scrutiny.</p> + +<p>“It’s not a pretty place; and the only way to keep a footing in it is to +fight it on its own terms—and above all, my dear, not alone!” Mrs. +Fisher gathered up her floating implications in a resolute grasp. +“You’ve told me so little that I can only guess what has been happening; +but in the rush we all live in there’s no time to keep on hating any one +without a cause, and if Bertha is still nasty enough to want to injure +you with other people it must be because she’s still afraid of you. From +her standpoint there’s only one reason for being afraid of you; and my +own idea is that, if you want to punish her, you hold the means in your +hand. I believe you can marry George Dorset tomorrow; but if you don’t +care for that particular form of retaliation, the only thing to save you +from Bertha is to marry somebody else.”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_7a">Chapter 7</h2> + +<p>The light projected on the situation by Mrs. Fisher had the cheerless +distinctness of a winter dawn. It outlined the facts with a cold +precision unmodified by shade or colour, and refracted, as it were, from +the blank walls of the surrounding limitations: she had opened windows +from which no sky was ever visible. But the idealist subdued to vulgar +necessities must employ vulgar minds to draw the inferences to which he +cannot stoop; and it was easier for Lily to let Mrs. Fisher formulate her +case than to put it plainly to herself. Once confronted with it, however, +she went the full length of its consequences; and these had never been +more clearly present to her than when, the next afternoon, she set out +for a walk with Rosedale.</p> + +<p>It was one of those still November days when the air is haunted with the +light of summer, and something in the lines of the landscape, and in the +golden haze which bathed them, recalled to Miss Bart the September +afternoon when she had climbed the slopes of Bellomont with Selden. The +importunate memory was kept before her by its ironic contrast to her +present situation, since her walk with Selden had represented an +irresistible flight from just such a climax as the present excursion was +designed to bring about. But other memories importuned her also; the +recollection of similar situations, as skillfully led up to, but through +some malice of fortune, or her own unsteadiness of purpose, always +failing of the intended result. Well, her purpose was steady enough now. +She saw that the whole weary work of rehabilitation must begin again, and +against far greater odds, if Bertha Dorset should succeed in breaking up +her friendship with the Gormers; and her longing for shelter and security +was intensified by the passionate desire to triumph over Bertha, as only +wealth and predominance could triumph over her. As the wife of +Rosedale—the Rosedale she felt it in her power to create—she would at +least present an invulnerable front to her enemy.</p> + +<p>She had to draw upon this thought, as upon some fiery stimulant, to keep +up her part in the scene toward which Rosedale was too frankly tending. +As she walked beside him, shrinking in every nerve from the way in which +his look and tone made free of her, yet telling herself that this +momentary endurance of his mood was the price she must pay for her +ultimate power over him, she tried to calculate the exact point at which +concession must turn to resistance, and the price HE would have to pay be +made equally clear to him. But his dapper self-confidence seemed +impenetrable to such hints, and she had a sense of something hard and +self-contained behind the superficial warmth of his manner.</p> + +<p>They had been seated for some time in the seclusion of a rocky glen above +the lake, when she suddenly cut short the culmination of an impassioned +period by turning upon him the grave loveliness of her gaze.</p> + +<p>“I DO believe what you say, Mr. Rosedale,” she said quietly; “and I am +ready to marry you whenever you wish.”</p> + +<p>Rosedale, reddening to the roots of his glossy hair, received this +announcement with a recoil which carried him to his feet, where he halted +before her in an attitude of almost comic discomfiture.</p> + +<p>“For I suppose that is what you do wish,” she continued, in the same +quiet tone. “And, though I was unable to consent when you spoke to me in +this way before, I am ready, now that I know you so much better, to trust +my happiness to your hands.”</p> + +<p>She spoke with the noble directness which she could command on such +occasions, and which was like a large steady light thrown across the +tortuous darkness of the situation. In its inconvenient brightness +Rosedale seemed to waver a moment, as though conscious that every avenue +of escape was unpleasantly illuminated.</p> + +<p>Then he gave a short laugh, and drew out a gold cigarette-case, in which, +with plump jewelled fingers, he groped for a gold-tipped cigarette. +Selecting one, he paused to contemplate it a moment before saying: “My +dear Miss Lily, I’m sorry if there’s been any little misapprehension +between us—but you made me feel my suit was so hopeless that I had really +no intention of renewing it.”</p> + +<p>Lily’s blood tingled with the grossness of the rebuff; but she checked +the first leap of her anger, and said in a tone of gentle dignity: “I +have no one but myself to blame if I gave you the impression that my +decision was final.”</p> + +<p>Her word-play was always too quick for him, and this reply held him in +puzzled silence while she extended her hand and added, with the faintest +inflection of sadness in her voice: “Before we bid each other goodbye, I +want at least to thank you for having once thought of me as you did.”</p> + +<p>The touch of her hand, the moving softness of her look, thrilled a +vulnerable fibre in Rosedale. It was her exquisite inaccessibleness, the +sense of distance she could convey without a hint of disdain, that made +it most difficult for him to give her up.</p> + +<p>“Why do you talk of saying goodbye? Ain’t we going to be good friends all +the same?” he urged, without releasing her hand.</p> + +<p>She drew it away quietly. “What is your idea of being good friends?” she +returned with a slight smile. “Making love to me without asking me to +marry you?” Rosedale laughed with a recovered sense of ease.</p> + +<p>“Well, that’s about the size of it, I suppose. I can’t help making love +to you—I don’t see how any man could; but I don’t mean to ask you to +marry me as long as I can keep out of it.”</p> + +<p>She continued to smile. “I like your frankness; but I am afraid our +friendship can hardly continue on those terms.” She turned away, as +though to mark that its final term had in fact been reached, and he +followed her for a few steps with a baffled sense of her having after all +kept the game in her own hands.</p> + +<p>“Miss Lily——” he began impulsively; but she walked on without seeming +to hear him.</p> + +<p>He overtook her in a few quick strides, and laid an entreating hand on +her arm. “Miss Lily—don’t hurry away like that. You’re beastly hard on a +fellow; but if you don’t mind speaking the truth I don’t see why you +shouldn’t allow me to do the same.”</p> + +<p>She had paused a moment with raised brows, drawing away instinctively +from his touch, though she made no effort to evade his words.</p> + +<p>“I was under the impression,” she rejoined, “that you had done so without +waiting for my permission.”</p> + +<p>“Well—why shouldn’t you hear my reasons for doing it, then? We’re +neither of us such new hands that a little plain speaking is going to +hurt us. I’m all broken up on you: there’s nothing new in that. I’m more +in love with you than I was this time last year; but I’ve got to face the +fact that the situation is changed.”</p> + +<p>She continued to confront him with the same air of ironic composure. +“You mean to say that I’m not as desirable a match as you thought me?”</p> + +<p>“Yes; that’s what I do mean,” he answered resolutely. “I won’t go into +what’s happened. I don’t believe the stories about you—I don’t WANT to +believe them. But they’re there, and my not believing them ain’t going to +alter the situation.”</p> + +<p>She flushed to her temples, but the extremity of her need checked the +retort on her lip and she continued to face him composedly. “If they are +not true,” she said, “doesn’t THAT alter the situation?”</p> + +<p>He met this with a steady gaze of his small stock-taking eyes, which made +her feel herself no more than some superfine human merchandise. “I +believe it does in novels; but I’m certain it don’t in real life. You +know that as well as I do: if we’re speaking the truth, let’s speak the +whole truth. Last year I was wild to marry you, and you wouldn’t look at +me: this year—well, you appear to be willing. Now, what has changed in +the interval? Your situation, that’s all. Then you thought you could do +better; now——”</p> + +<p>“You think you can?” broke from her ironically.</p> + +<p>“Why, yes, I do: in one way, that is.” He stood before her, his hands in +his pockets, his chest sturdily expanded under its vivid waistcoat. +“It’s this way, you see: I’ve had a pretty steady grind of it these last +years, working up my social position. Think it’s funny I should say +that? Why should I mind saying I want to get into society? A man ain’t +ashamed to say he wants to own a racing stable or a picture gallery. +Well, a taste for society’s just another kind of hobby. Perhaps I want +to get even with some of the people who cold-shouldered me last year—put +it that way if it sounds better. Anyhow, I want to have the run of the +best houses; and I’m getting it too, little by little. But I know the +quickest way to queer yourself with the right people is to be seen with +the wrong ones; and that’s the reason I want to avoid mistakes.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart continued to stand before him in a silence that might have +expressed either mockery or a half-reluctant respect for his candour, and +after a moment’s pause he went on: “There it is, you see. I’m more in +love with you than ever, but if I married you now I’d queer myself for +good and all, and everything I’ve worked for all these years would be +wasted.”</p> + +<p>She received this with a look from which all tinge of resentment had +faded. After the tissue of social falsehoods in which she had so long +moved it was refreshing to step into the open daylight of an avowed +expediency.</p> + +<p>“I understand you,” she said. “A year ago I should have been of use to +you, and now I should be an encumbrance; and I like you for telling me so +quite honestly.” She extended her hand with a smile.</p> + +<p>Again the gesture had a disturbing effect upon Mr. Rosedale’s +self-command. “By George, you’re a dead game sport, you are!” he +exclaimed; and as she began once more to move away, he broke out +suddenly—“Miss Lily—stop. You know I don’t believe those stories—I +believe they were all got up by a woman who didn’t hesitate to sacrifice +you to her own convenience——”</p> + +<p>Lily drew away with a movement of quick disdain: it was easier to endure +his insolence than his commiseration.</p> + +<p>“You are very kind; but I don’t think we need discuss the matter farther.”</p> + +<p>But Rosedale’s natural imperviousness to hints made it easy for him to +brush such resistance aside. “I don’t want to discuss anything; I just +want to put a plain case before you,” he persisted.</p> + +<p>She paused in spite of herself, held by the note of a new purpose in his +look and tone; and he went on, keeping his eyes firmly upon her: “The +wonder to me is that you’ve waited so long to get square with that woman, +when you’ve had the power in your hands.” She continued silent under the +rush of astonishment that his words produced, and he moved a step closer +to ask with low-toned directness: “Why don’t you use those letters of +hers you bought last year?”</p> + +<p>Lily stood speechless under the shock of the interrogation. In the words +preceding it she had conjectured, at most, an allusion to her supposed +influence over George Dorset; nor did the astonishing indelicacy of the +reference diminish the likelihood of Rosedale’s resorting to it. But now +she saw how far short of the mark she had fallen; and the surprise of +learning that he had discovered the secret of the letters left her, for +the moment, unconscious of the special use to which he was in the act of +putting his knowledge.</p> + +<p>Her temporary loss of self-possession gave him time to press his point; +and he went on quickly, as though to secure completer control of the +situation: “You see I know where you stand—I know how completely she’s +in your power. That sounds like stage-talk, don’t it?—but there’s a lot +of truth in some of those old gags; and I don’t suppose you bought those +letters simply because you’re collecting autographs.”</p> + +<p>She continued to look at him with a deepening bewilderment: her only +clear impression resolved itself into a scared sense of his power.</p> + +<p>“You’re wondering how I found out about ’em?” he went on, answering her +look with a note of conscious pride. “Perhaps you’ve forgotten that I’m +the owner of the Benedick—but never mind about that now. Getting on to +things is a mighty useful accomplishment in business, and I’ve simply +extended it to my private affairs. For this IS partly my affair, you +see—at least, it depends on you to make it so. Let’s look the situation +straight in the eye. Mrs. Dorset, for reasons we needn’t go into, did you +a beastly bad turn last spring. Everybody knows what Mrs. Dorset is, and +her best friends wouldn’t believe her on oath where their own interests +were concerned; but as long as they’re out of the row it’s much easier to +follow her lead than to set themselves against it, and you’ve simply been +sacrificed to their laziness and selfishness. Isn’t that a pretty fair +statement of the case?—Well, some people say you’ve got the neatest kind +of an answer in your hands: that George Dorset would marry you tomorrow, +if you’d tell him all you know, and give him the chance to show the lady +the door. I daresay he would; but you don’t seem to care for that +particular form of getting even, and, taking a purely business view of +the question, I think you’re right. In a deal like that, nobody comes out +with perfectly clean hands, and the only way for you to start fresh is to +get Bertha Dorset to back you up, instead of trying to fight her.”</p> + +<p>He paused long enough to draw breath, but not to give her time for the +expression of her gathering resistance; and as he pressed on, expounding +and elucidating his idea with the directness of the man who has no doubts +of his cause, she found the indignation gradually freezing on her lip, +found herself held fast in the grasp of his argument by the mere cold +strength of its presentation. There was no time now to wonder how he had +heard of her obtaining the letters: all her world was dark outside the +monstrous glare of his scheme for using them. And it was not, after the +first moment, the horror of the idea that held her spell-bound, subdued +to his will; it was rather its subtle affinity to her own inmost +cravings. He would marry her tomorrow if she could regain Bertha Dorset’s +friendship; and to induce the open resumption of that friendship, and the +tacit retractation of all that had caused its withdrawal, she had only to +put to the lady the latent menace contained in the packet so miraculously +delivered into her hands. Lily saw in a flash the advantage of this +course over that which poor Dorset had pressed upon her. The other plan +depended for its success on the infliction of an open injury, while this +reduced the transaction to a private understanding, of which no third +person need have the remotest hint. Put by Rosedale in terms of +businesslike give-and-take, this understanding took on the harmless air +of a mutual accommodation, like a transfer of property or a revision of +boundary lines. It certainly simplified life to view it as a perpetual +adjustment, a play of party politics, in which every concession had its +recognized equivalent: Lily’s tired mind was fascinated by this escape +from fluctuating ethical estimates into a region of concrete weights and +measures.</p> + +<p>Rosedale, as she listened, seemed to read in her silence not only a +gradual acquiescence in his plan, but a dangerously far-reaching +perception of the chances it offered; for as she continued to stand +before him without speaking, he broke out, with a quick return upon +himself: “You see how simple it is, don’t you? Well, don’t be carried +away by the idea that it’s TOO simple. It isn’t exactly as if you’d +started in with a clean bill of health. Now we’re talking let’s call +things by their right names, and clear the whole business up. You know +well enough that Bertha Dorset couldn’t have touched you if there hadn’t +been—well—questions asked before—little points of interrogation, eh? +Bound to happen to a good-looking girl with stingy relatives, I suppose; +anyhow, they DID happen, and she found the ground prepared for her. Do +you see where I’m coming out? You don’t want these little questions +cropping up again. It’s one thing to get Bertha Dorset into line—but +what you want is to keep her there. You can frighten her fast enough—but +how are you going to keep her frightened? By showing her that you’re as +powerful as she is. All the letters in the world won’t do that for you as +you are now; but with a big backing behind you, you’ll keep her just +where you want her to be. That’s MY share in the business—that’s what +I’m offering you. You can’t put the thing through without me—don’t run +away with any idea that you can. In six months you’d be back again among +your old worries, or worse ones; and here I am, ready to lift you out of +’em tomorrow if you say so. DO you say so, Miss Lily?” he added, moving +suddenly nearer.</p> + +<p>The words, and the movement which accompanied them, combined to startle +Lily out of the state of tranced subservience into which she had +insensibly slipped. Light comes in devious ways to the groping +consciousness, and it came to her now through the disgusted perception +that her would-be accomplice assumed, as a matter of course, the +likelihood of her distrusting him and perhaps trying to cheat him of his +share of the spoils. This glimpse of his inner mind seemed to present the +whole transaction in a new aspect, and she saw that the essential +baseness of the act lay in its freedom from risk.</p> + +<p>She drew back with a quick gesture of rejection, saying, in a voice that +was a surprise to her own ears: “You are mistaken—quite mistaken—both +in the facts and in what you infer from them.”</p> + +<p>Rosedale stared a moment, puzzled by her sudden dash in a direction so +different from that toward which she had appeared to be letting him guide +her.</p> + +<p>“Now what on earth does that mean? I thought we understood each other!” +he exclaimed; and to her murmur of “Ah, we do NOW,” he retorted with a +sudden burst of violence: “I suppose it’s because the letters are to HIM, +then? Well, I’ll be damned if I see what thanks you’ve got from him!”</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_8a">Chapter 8</h2> + +<p>The autumn days declined to winter. Once more the leisure world was in +transition between country and town, and Fifth Avenue, still deserted at +the week-end, showed from Monday to Friday a broadening stream of +carriages between house-fronts gradually restored to consciousness.</p> + +<p>The Horse Show, some two weeks earlier, had produced a passing semblance +of reanimation, filling the theatres and restaurants with a human display +of the same costly and high-stepping kind as circled daily about its +ring. In Miss Bart’s world the Horse Show, and the public it attracted, +had ostensibly come to be classed among the spectacles disdained of the +elect; but, as the feudal lord might sally forth to join in the dance on +his village green, so society, unofficially and incidentally, still +condescended to look in upon the scene. Mrs. Gormer, among the rest, was +not above seizing such an occasion for the display of herself and her +horses; and Lily was given one or two opportunities of appearing at her +friend’s side in the most conspicuous box the house afforded. But this +lingering semblance of intimacy made her only the more conscious of a +change in the relation between Mattie and herself, of a dawning +discrimination, a gradually formed social standard, emerging from Mrs. +Gormer’s chaotic view of life. It was inevitable that Lily herself should +constitute the first sacrifice to this new ideal, and she knew that, once +the Gormers were established in town, the whole drift of fashionable life +would facilitate Mattie’s detachment from her. She had, in short, failed +to make herself indispensable; or rather, her attempt to do so had been +thwarted by an influence stronger than any she could exert. That +influence, in its last analysis, was simply the power of money: Bertha +Dorset’s social credit was based on an impregnable bank-account.</p> + +<p>Lily knew that Rosedale had overstated neither the difficulty of her own +position nor the completeness of the vindication he offered: once +Bertha’s match in material resources, her superior gifts would make it +easy for her to dominate her adversary. An understanding of what such +domination would mean, and of the disadvantages accruing from her +rejection of it, was brought home to Lily with increasing clearness +during the early weeks of the winter. Hitherto, she had kept up a +semblance of movement outside the main flow of the social current; but +with the return to town, and the concentrating of scattered activities, +the mere fact of not slipping back naturally into her old habits of life +marked her as being unmistakably excluded from them. If one were not a +part of the season’s fixed routine, one swung unsphered in a void of +social non-existence. Lily, for all her dissatisfied dreaming, had never +really conceived the possibility of revolving about a different centre: +it was easy enough to despise the world, but decidedly difficult to find +any other habitable region. Her sense of irony never quite deserted her, +and she could still note, with self-directed derision, the abnormal value +suddenly acquired by the most tiresome and insignificant details of her +former life. Its very drudgeries had a charm now that she was +involuntarily released from them: card-leaving, note-writing, enforced +civilities to the dull and elderly, and the smiling endurance of tedious +dinners—how pleasantly such obligations would have filled the emptiness +of her days! She did indeed leave cards in plenty; she kept herself, with +a smiling and valiant persistence, well in the eye of her world; nor did +she suffer any of those gross rebuffs which sometimes produce a wholesome +reaction of contempt in their victim. Society did not turn away from her, +it simply drifted by, preoccupied and inattentive, letting her feel, to +the full measure of her humbled pride, how completely she had been the +creature of its favour.</p> + +<p>She had rejected Rosedale’s suggestion with a promptness of scorn almost +surprising to herself: she had not lost her capacity for high flashes of +indignation. But she could not breathe long on the heights; there had +been nothing in her training to develop any continuity of moral strength: +what she craved, and really felt herself entitled to, was a situation in +which the noblest attitude should also be the easiest. Hitherto her +intermittent impulses of resistance had sufficed to maintain her +self-respect. If she slipped she recovered her footing, and it was only +afterward that she was aware of having recovered it each time on a +slightly lower level. She had rejected Rosedale’s offer without conscious +effort; her whole being had risen against it; and she did not yet +perceive that, by the mere act of listening to him, she had learned to +live with ideas which would once have been intolerable to her.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>To Gerty Farish, keeping watch over her with a tenderer if less +discerning eye than Mrs. Fisher’s, the results of the struggle were +already distinctly visible. She did not, indeed, know what hostages Lily +had already given to expediency; but she saw her passionately and +irretrievably pledged to the ruinous policy of “keeping up.” Gerty could +smile now at her own early dream of her friend’s renovation through +adversity: she understood clearly enough that Lily was not of those to +whom privation teaches the unimportance of what they have lost. But this +very fact, to Gerty, made her friend the more piteously in want of aid, +the more exposed to the claims of a tenderness she was so little +conscious of needing.</p> + +<p>Lily, since her return to town, had not often climbed Miss Farish’s +stairs. There was something irritating to her in the mute interrogation +of Gerty’s sympathy: she felt the real difficulties of her situation to +be incommunicable to any one whose theory of values was so different from +her own, and the restrictions of Gerty’s life, which had once had the +charm of contrast, now reminded her too painfully of the limits to which +her own existence was shrinking. When at length, one afternoon, she put +into execution the belated resolve to visit her friend, this sense of +shrunken opportunities possessed her with unusual intensity. The walk up +Fifth Avenue, unfolding before her, in the brilliance of the hard winter +sunlight, an interminable procession of fastidiously-equipped +carriages—giving her, through the little squares of brougham-windows, +peeps of familiar profiles bent above visiting-lists, of hurried hands +dispensing notes and cards to attendant footmen—this glimpse of the +ever-revolving wheels of the great social machine made Lily more than +ever conscious of the steepness and narrowness of Gerty’s stairs, and of +the cramped blind alley of life to which they led. Dull stairs destined +to be mounted by dull people: how many thousands of insignificant figures +were going up and down such stairs all over the world at that very +moment—figures as shabby and uninteresting as that of the middle-aged +lady in limp black who descended Gerty’s flight as Lily climbed to it!</p> + +<p>“That was poor Miss Jane Silverton—she came to talk things over with me: +she and her sister want to do something to support themselves,” Gerty +explained, as Lily followed her into the sitting-room.</p> + +<p>“To support themselves? Are they so hard up?” Miss Bart asked with a +touch of irritation: she had not come to listen to the woes of other +people.</p> + +<p>“I’m afraid they have nothing left: Ned’s debts have swallowed up +everything. They had such hopes, you know, when he broke away from Carry +Fisher; they thought Bertha Dorset would be such a good influence, +because she doesn’t care for cards, and—well, she talked quite +beautifully to poor Miss Jane about feeling as if Ned were her younger +brother, and wanting to carry him off on the yacht, so that he might have +a chance to drop cards and racing, and take up his literary work again.”</p> + +<p>Miss Farish paused with a sigh which reflected the perplexity of her +departing visitor. “But that isn’t all; it isn’t even the worst. It seems +that Ned has quarrelled with the Dorsets; or at least Bertha won’t allow +him to see her, and he is so unhappy about it that he has taken to +gambling again, and going about with all sorts of queer people. And +cousin Grace Van Osburgh accuses him of having had a very bad influence +on Freddy, who left Harvard last spring, and has been a great deal with +Ned ever since. She sent for Miss Jane, and made a dreadful scene; and +Jack Stepney and Herbert Melson, who were there too, told Miss Jane that +Freddy was threatening to marry some dreadful woman to whom Ned had +introduced him, and that they could do nothing with him because now he’s +of age he has his own money. You can fancy how poor Miss Jane felt—she +came to me at once, and seemed to think that if I could get her something +to do she could earn enough to pay Ned’s debts and send him away—I’m +afraid she has no idea how long it would take her to pay for one of his +evenings at bridge. And he was horribly in debt when he came back from +the cruise—I can’t see why he should have spent so much more money under +Bertha’s influence than Carry’s: can you?”</p> + +<p>Lily met this query with an impatient gesture. “My dear Gerty, I always +understand how people can spend much more money—never how they can spend +any less!”</p> + +<p>She loosened her furs and settled herself in Gerty’s easy-chair, while +her friend busied herself with the tea-cups.</p> + +<p>“But what can they do—the Miss Silvertons? How do they mean to support +themselves?” she asked, conscious that the note of irritation still +persisted in her voice. It was the very last topic she had meant to +discuss—it really did not interest her in the least—but she was seized +by a sudden perverse curiosity to know how the two colourless shrinking +victims of young Silverton’s sentimental experiments meant to cope with +the grim necessity which lurked so close to her own threshold.</p> + +<p>“I don’t know—I am trying to find something for them. Miss Jane reads +aloud very nicely—but it’s so hard to find any one who is willing to be +read to. And Miss Annie paints a little——”</p> + +<p>“Oh, I know—apple-blossoms on blotting-paper; just the kind of thing I +shall be doing myself before long!” exclaimed Lily, starting up with a +vehemence of movement that threatened destruction to Miss Farish’s +fragile tea-table.</p> + +<p>Lily bent over to steady the cups; then she sank back into her seat. +“I’d forgotten there was no room to dash about in—how beautifully one +does have to behave in a small flat! Oh, Gerty, I wasn’t meant to be +good,” she sighed out incoherently.</p> + +<p>Gerty lifted an apprehensive look to her pale face, in which the eyes +shone with a peculiar sleepless lustre.</p> + +<p>“You look horribly tired, Lily; take your tea, and let me give you this +cushion to lean against.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart accepted the cup of tea, but put back the cushion with an +impatient hand.</p> + +<p>“Don’t give me that! I don’t want to lean back—I shall go to sleep if I +do.”</p> + +<p>“Well, why not, dear? I’ll be as quiet as a mouse,” Gerty urged +affectionately.</p> + +<p>“No—no; don’t be quiet; talk to me—keep me awake! I don’t sleep at +night, and in the afternoon a dreadful drowsiness creeps over me.”</p> + +<p>“You don’t sleep at night? Since when?”</p> + +<p>“I don’t know—I can’t remember.” She rose and put the empty cup on the +tea-tray. “Another, and stronger, please; if I don’t keep awake now I +shall see horrors tonight—perfect horrors!”</p> + +<p>“But they’ll be worse if you drink too much tea.”</p> + +<p>“No, no—give it to me; and don’t preach, please,” Lily returned +imperiously. Her voice had a dangerous edge, and Gerty noticed that her +hand shook as she held it out to receive the second cup.</p> + +<p>“But you look so tired: I’m sure you must be ill——”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart set down her cup with a start. “Do I look ill? Does my face +show it?” She rose and walked quickly toward the little mirror above the +writing-table. “What a horrid looking-glass—it’s all blotched and +discoloured. Any one would look ghastly in it!” She turned back, fixing +her plaintive eyes on Gerty. “You stupid dear, why do you say such odious +things to me? It’s enough to make one ill to be told one looks so! And +looking ill means looking ugly.” She caught Gerty’s wrists, and drew her +close to the window. “After all, I’d rather know the truth. Look me +straight in the face, Gerty, and tell me: am I perfectly frightful?”</p> + +<p>“You’re perfectly beautiful now, Lily: your eyes are shining, and your +cheeks have grown so pink all of a sudden——”</p> + +<p>“Ah, they WERE pale, then—ghastly pale, when I came in? Why don’t you +tell me frankly that I’m a wreck? My eyes are bright now because I’m so +nervous—but in the mornings they look like lead. And I can see the lines +coming in my face—the lines of worry and disappointment and failure! +Every sleepless night leaves a new one—and how can I sleep, when I have +such dreadful things to think about?”</p> + +<p>“Dreadful things—what things?” asked Gerty, gently detaching her wrists +from her friend’s feverish fingers.</p> + +<p>“What things? Well, poverty, for one—and I don’t know any that’s more +dreadful.” Lily turned away and sank with sudden weariness into the +easy-chair near the tea-table. “You asked me just now if I could +understand why Ned Silverton spent so much money. Of course I +understand—he spends it on living with the rich. You think we live ON +the rich, rather than with them: and so we do, in a sense—but it’s a +privilege we have to pay for! We eat their dinners, and drink their wine, +and smoke their cigarettes, and use their carriages and their opera-boxes +and their private cars—yes, but there’s a tax to pay on every one of +those luxuries. The man pays it by big tips to the servants, by playing +cards beyond his means, by flowers and presents—and—and—lots of other +things that cost; the girl pays it by tips and cards too—oh, yes, I’ve +had to take up bridge again—and by going to the best dress-makers, and +having just the right dress for every occasion, and always keeping +herself fresh and exquisite and amusing!”</p> + +<p>She leaned back for a moment, closing her eyes, and as she sat there, her +pale lips slightly parted, and the lids dropped above her fagged +brilliant gaze, Gerty had a startled perception of the change in her +face—of the way in which an ashen daylight seemed suddenly to extinguish +its artificial brightness. She looked up, and the vision vanished.</p> + +<p>“It doesn’t sound very amusing, does it? And it isn’t—I’m sick to death +of it! And yet the thought of giving it all up nearly kills me—it’s what +keeps me awake at night, and makes me so crazy for your strong tea. For I +can’t go on in this way much longer, you know—I’m nearly at the end of +my tether. And then what can I do—how on earth am I to keep myself +alive? I see myself reduced to the fate of that poor Silverton +woman—slinking about to employment agencies, and trying to sell painted +blotting-pads to Women’s Exchanges! And there are thousands and thousands +of women trying to do the same thing already, and not one of the number +who has less idea how to earn a dollar than I have!”</p> + +<p>She rose again with a hurried glance at the clock. “It’s late, and I must +be off—I have an appointment with Carry Fisher. Don’t look so worried, +you dear thing—don’t think too much about the nonsense I’ve been +talking.” She was before the mirror again, adjusting her hair with a +light hand, drawing down her veil, and giving a dexterous touch to her +furs. “Of course, you know, it hasn’t come to the employment agencies and +the painted blotting-pads yet; but I’m rather hard up just for the +moment, and if I could find something to do—notes to write and +visiting-lists to make up, or that kind of thing—it would tide me over +till the legacy is paid. And Carry has promised to find somebody who +wants a kind of social secretary—you know she makes a specialty of the +helpless rich.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Miss Bart had not revealed to Gerty the full extent of her anxiety. She +was in fact in urgent and immediate need of money: money to meet the +vulgar weekly claims which could neither be deferred nor evaded. To give +up her apartment, and shrink to the obscurity of a boarding-house, or the +provisional hospitality of a bed in Gerty Farish’s sitting-room, was an +expedient which could only postpone the problem confronting her; and it +seemed wiser as well as more agreeable to remain where she was and find +some means of earning her living. The possibility of having to do this +was one which she had never before seriously considered, and the +discovery that, as a bread-winner, she was likely to prove as helpless +and ineffectual as poor Miss Silverton, was a severe shock to her +self-confidence.</p> + +<p>Having been accustomed to take herself at the popular valuation, as a +person of energy and resource, naturally fitted to dominate any situation +in which she found herself, she vaguely imagined that such gifts would be +of value to seekers after social guidance; but there was unfortunately no +specific head under which the art of saying and doing the right thing +could be offered in the market, and even Mrs. Fisher’s resourcefulness +failed before the difficulty of discovering a workable vein in the vague +wealth of Lily’s graces. Mrs. Fisher was full of indirect expedients for +enabling her friends to earn a living, and could conscientiously assert +that she had put several opportunities of this kind before Lily; but more +legitimate methods of bread-winning were as much out of her line as they +were beyond the capacity of the sufferers she was generally called upon +to assist. Lily’s failure to profit by the chances already afforded her +might, moreover, have justified the abandonment of farther effort on her +behalf; but Mrs. Fisher’s inexhaustible good-nature made her an adept at +creating artificial demands in response to an actual supply. In the +pursuance of this end she at once started on a voyage of discovery in +Miss Bart’s behalf; and as the result of her explorations she now +summoned the latter with the announcement that she had “found something.”</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Left to herself, Gerty mused distressfully upon her friend’s plight, and +her own inability to relieve it. It was clear to her that Lily, for the +present, had no wish for the kind of help she could give. Miss Farish +could see no hope for her friend but in a life completely reorganized and +detached from its old associations; whereas all Lily’s energies were +centred in the determined effort to hold fast to those associations, to +keep herself visibly identified with them, as long as the illusion could +be maintained. Pitiable as such an attitude seemed to Gerty, she could +not judge it as harshly as Selden, for instance, might have done. She had +not forgotten the night of emotion when she and Lily had lain in each +other’s arms, and she had seemed to feel her very heart’s blood passing +into her friend. The sacrifice she had made had seemed unavailing enough; +no trace remained in Lily of the subduing influences of that hour; but +Gerty’s tenderness, disciplined by long years of contact with obscure and +inarticulate suffering, could wait on its object with a silent +forbearance which took no account of time. She could not, however, deny +herself the solace of taking anxious counsel with Lawrence Selden, with +whom, since his return from Europe, she had renewed her old relation of +cousinly confidence.</p> + +<p>Selden himself had never been aware of any change in their relation. He +found Gerty as he had left her, simple, undemanding and devoted, but with +a quickened intelligence of the heart which he recognized without seeking +to explain it. To Gerty herself it would once have seemed impossible that +she should ever again talk freely with him of Lily Bart; but what had +passed in the secrecy of her own breast seemed to resolve itself, when +the mist of the struggle cleared, into a breaking down of the bounds of +self, a deflecting of the wasted personal emotion into the general +current of human understanding.</p> + +<p>It was not till some two weeks after her visit from Lily that Gerty had +the opportunity of communicating her fears to Selden. The latter, having +presented himself on a Sunday afternoon, had lingered on through the +dowdy animation of his cousin’s tea-hour, conscious of something in her +voice and eye which solicited a word apart; and as soon as the last +visitor was gone Gerty opened her case by asking how lately he had seen +Miss Bart.</p> + +<p>Selden’s perceptible pause gave her time for a slight stir of surprise.</p> + +<p>“I haven’t seen her at all—I’ve perpetually missed seeing her since she +came back.”</p> + +<p>This unexpected admission made Gerty pause too; and she was still +hesitating on the brink of her subject when he relieved her by adding: +“I’ve wanted to see her—but she seems to have been absorbed by the +Gormer set since her return from Europe.”</p> + +<p>“That’s all the more reason: she’s been very unhappy.”</p> + +<p>“Unhappy at being with the Gormers?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, I don’t defend her intimacy with the Gormers; but that too is at an +end now, I think. You know people have been very unkind since Bertha +Dorset quarrelled with her.”</p> + +<p>“Ah——” Selden exclaimed, rising abruptly to walk to the window, where +he remained with his eyes on the darkening street while his cousin +continued to explain: “Judy Trenor and her own family have deserted her +too—and all because Bertha Dorset has said such horrible things. And she +is very poor—you know Mrs. Peniston cut her off with a small legacy, +after giving her to understand that she was to have everything.”</p> + +<p>“Yes—I know,” Selden assented curtly, turning back into the room, but +only to stir about with restless steps in the circumscribed space between +door and window. “Yes—she’s been abominably treated; but it’s +unfortunately the precise thing that a man who wants to show his sympathy +can’t say to her.”</p> + +<p>His words caused Gerty a slight chill of disappointment. “There would be +other ways of showing your sympathy,” she suggested.</p> + +<p>Selden, with a slight laugh, sat down beside her on the little sofa which +projected from the hearth. “What are you thinking of, you incorrigible +missionary?” he asked.</p> + +<p>Gerty’s colour rose, and her blush was for a moment her only answer. +Then she made it more explicit by saying: “I am thinking of the fact that +you and she used to be great friends—that she used to care immensely for +what you thought of her—and that, if she takes your staying away as a +sign of what you think now, I can imagine its adding a great deal to her +unhappiness.”</p> + +<p>“My dear child, don’t add to it still more—at least to your conception +of it—by attributing to her all sorts of susceptibilities of your own.” +Selden, for his life, could not keep a note of dryness out of his voice; +but he met Gerty’s look of perplexity by saying more mildly: “But, though +you immensely exaggerate the importance of anything I could do for Miss +Bart, you can’t exaggerate my readiness to do it—if you ask me to.” He +laid his hand for a moment on hers, and there passed between them, on the +current of the rare contact, one of those exchanges of meaning which fill +the hidden reservoirs of affection. Gerty had the feeling that he +measured the cost of her request as plainly as she read the significance +of his reply; and the sense of all that was suddenly clear between them +made her next words easier to find.</p> + +<p>“I do ask you, then; I ask you because she once told me that you had been +a help to her, and because she needs help now as she has never needed it +before. You know how dependent she has always been on ease and +luxury—how she has hated what was shabby and ugly and uncomfortable. She +can’t help it—she was brought up with those ideas, and has never been +able to find her way out of them. But now all the things she cared for +have been taken from her, and the people who taught her to care for them +have abandoned her too; and it seems to me that if some one could reach +out a hand and show her the other side—show her how much is left in life +and in herself——” Gerty broke off, abashed at the sound of her own +eloquence, and impeded by the difficulty of giving precise expression to +her vague yearning for her friend’s retrieval. “I can’t help her myself: +she’s passed out of my reach,” she continued. “I think she’s afraid of +being a burden to me. When she was last here, two weeks ago, she seemed +dreadfully worried about her future: she said Carry Fisher was trying to +find something for her to do. A few days later she wrote me that she had +taken a position as private secretary, and that I was not to be anxious, +for everything was all right, and she would come in and tell me about it +when she had time; but she has never come, and I don’t like to go to her, +because I am afraid of forcing myself on her when I’m not wanted. Once, +when we were children, and I had rushed up after a long separation, and +thrown my arms about her, she said: ‘Please don’t kiss me unless I ask +you to, Gerty’—and she DID ask me, a minute later; but since then I’ve +always waited to be asked.”</p> + +<p>Selden had listened in silence, with the concentrated look which his thin +dark face could assume when he wished to guard it against any involuntary +change of expression. When his cousin ended, he said with a slight smile: +“Since you’ve learned the wisdom of waiting, I don’t see why you urge me +to rush in—” but the troubled appeal of her eyes made him add, as he +rose to take leave: “Still, I’ll do what you wish, and not hold you +responsible for my failure.”</p> + +<p>Selden’s avoidance of Miss Bart had not been as unintentional as he had +allowed his cousin to think. At first, indeed, while the memory of their +last hour at Monte Carlo still held the full heat of his indignation, he +had anxiously watched for her return; but she had disappointed him by +lingering in England, and when she finally reappeared it happened that +business had called him to the West, whence he came back only to learn +that she was starting for Alaska with the Gormers. The revelation of this +suddenly-established intimacy effectually chilled his desire to see her. +If, at a moment when her whole life seemed to be breaking up, she could +cheerfully commit its reconstruction to the Gormers, there was no reason +why such accidents should ever strike her as irreparable. Every step she +took seemed in fact to carry her farther from the region where, once or +twice, he and she had met for an illumined moment; and the recognition of +this fact, when its first pang had been surmounted, produced in him a +sense of negative relief. It was much simpler for him to judge Miss Bart +by her habitual conduct than by the rare deviations from it which had +thrown her so disturbingly in his way; and every act of hers which made +the recurrence of such deviations more unlikely, confirmed the sense of +relief with which he returned to the conventional view of her.</p> + +<p>But Gerty Farish’s words had sufficed to make him see how little this +view was really his, and how impossible it was for him to live quietly +with the thought of Lily Bart. To hear that she was in need of help—even +such vague help as he could offer—was to be at once repossessed by that +thought; and by the time he reached the street he had sufficiently +convinced himself of the urgency of his cousin’s appeal to turn his steps +directly toward Lily’s hotel.</p> + +<p>There his zeal met a check in the unforeseen news that Miss Bart had +moved away; but, on his pressing his enquiries, the clerk remembered that +she had left an address, for which he presently began to search through +his books.</p> + +<p>It was certainly strange that she should have taken this step without +letting Gerty Farish know of her decision; and Selden waited with a vague +sense of uneasiness while the address was sought for. The process lasted +long enough for uneasiness to turn to apprehension; but when at length a +slip of paper was handed him, and he read on it: “Care of Mrs. Norma +Hatch, Emporium Hotel,” his apprehension passed into an incredulous +stare, and this into the gesture of disgust with which he tore the paper +in two, and turned to walk quickly homeward.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_9a">Chapter 9</h2> + +<p>When Lily woke on the morning after her translation to the Emporium +Hotel, her first feeling was one of purely physical satisfaction. The +force of contrast gave an added keenness to the luxury of lying once more +in a soft-pillowed bed, and looking across a spacious sunlit room at a +breakfast-table set invitingly near the fire. Analysis and introspection +might come later; but for the moment she was not even troubled by the +excesses of the upholstery or the restless convolutions of the furniture. +The sense of being once more lapped and folded in ease, as in some dense +mild medium impenetrable to discomfort, effectually stilled the faintest +note of criticism.</p> + +<p>When, the afternoon before, she had presented herself to the lady to whom +Carry Fisher had directed her, she had been conscious of entering a new +world. Carry’s vague presentment of Mrs. Norma Hatch (whose reversion to +her Christian name was explained as the result of her latest divorce), +left her under the implication of coming “from the West,” with the not +unusual extenuation of having brought a great deal of money with her. She +was, in short, rich, helpless, unplaced: the very subject for Lily’s +hand. Mrs. Fisher had not specified the line her friend was to take; she +owned herself unacquainted with Mrs. Hatch, whom she “knew about” through +Melville Stancy, a lawyer in his leisure moments, and the Falstaff of a +certain section of festive club life. Socially, Mr. Stancy might have +been said to form a connecting link between the Gormer world and the more +dimly-lit region on which Miss Bart now found herself entering. It was, +however, only figuratively that the illumination of Mrs. Hatch’s world +could be described as dim: in actual fact, Lily found her seated in a +blaze of electric light, impartially projected from various ornamental +excrescences on a vast concavity of pink damask and gilding, from which +she rose like Venus from her shell. The analogy was justified by the +appearance of the lady, whose large-eyed prettiness had the fixity of +something impaled and shown under glass. This did not preclude the +immediate discovery that she was some years younger than her visitor, and +that under her showiness, her ease, the aggression of her dress and +voice, there persisted that ineradicable innocence which, in ladies of +her nationality, so curiously coexists with startling extremes of +experience.</p> + +<p>The environment in which Lily found herself was as strange to her as its +inhabitants. She was unacquainted with the world of the fashionable New +York hotel—a world over-heated, over-upholstered, and over-fitted with +mechanical appliances for the gratification of fantastic requirements, +while the comforts of a civilized life were as unattainable as in a +desert. Through this atmosphere of torrid splendour moved wan beings as +richly upholstered as the furniture, beings without definite pursuits or +permanent relations, who drifted on a languid tide of curiosity from +restaurant to concert-hall, from palm-garden to music-room, from “art +exhibit” to dress-maker’s opening. High-stepping horses or elaborately +equipped motors waited to carry these ladies into vague metropolitan +distances, whence they returned, still more wan from the weight of their +sables, to be sucked back into the stifling inertia of the hotel routine. +Somewhere behind them, in the background of their lives, there was +doubtless a real past, peopled by real human activities: they themselves +were probably the product of strong ambitions, persistent energies, +diversified contacts with the wholesome roughness of life; yet they had +no more real existence than the poet’s shades in limbo.</p> + +<p>Lily had not been long in this pallid world without discovering that Mrs. +Hatch was its most substantial figure. That lady, though still floating +in the void, showed faint symptoms of developing an outline; and in this +endeavour she was actively seconded by Mr. Melville Stancy. It was Mr. +Stancy, a man of large resounding presence, suggestive of convivial +occasions and of a chivalry finding expression in “first-night” boxes and +thousand dollar bonbonnieres, who had transplanted Mrs. Hatch from the +scene of her first development to the higher stage of hotel life in the +metropolis. It was he who had selected the horses with which she had +taken the blue ribbon at the Show, had introduced her to the photographer +whose portraits of her formed the recurring ornament of “Sunday +Supplements,” and had got together the group which constituted her social +world. It was a small group still, with heterogeneous figures suspended +in large unpeopled spaces; but Lily did not take long to learn that its +regulation was no longer in Mr. Stancy’s hands. As often happens, the +pupil had outstripped the teacher, and Mrs. Hatch was already aware of +heights of elegance as well as depths of luxury beyond the world of the +Emporium. This discovery at once produced in her a craving for higher +guidance, for the adroit feminine hand which should give the right turn +to her correspondence, the right “look” to her hats, the right succession +to the items of her MENUS. It was, in short, as the regulator of a +germinating social life that Miss Bart’s guidance was required; her +ostensible duties as secretary being restricted by the fact that Mrs. +Hatch, as yet, knew hardly any one to write to.</p> + +<p>The daily details of Mrs. Hatch’s existence were as strange to Lily as +its general tenor. The lady’s habits were marked by an Oriental indolence +and disorder peculiarly trying to her companion. Mrs. Hatch and her +friends seemed to float together outside the bounds of time and space. No +definite hours were kept; no fixed obligations existed: night and day +flowed into one another in a blur of confused and retarded engagements, +so that one had the impression of lunching at the tea-hour, while dinner +was often merged in the noisy after-theatre supper which prolonged Mrs. +Hatch’s vigil till daylight.</p> + +<p>Through this jumble of futile activities came and went a strange throng +of hangers-on—manicures, beauty-doctors, hair-dressers, teachers of +bridge, of French, of “physical development”: figures sometimes +indistinguishable, by their appearance, or by Mrs. Hatch’s relation to +them, from the visitors constituting her recognized society. But +strangest of all to Lily was the encounter, in this latter group, of +several of her acquaintances. She had supposed, and not without relief, +that she was passing, for the moment, completely out of her own circle; +but she found that Mr. Stancy, one side of whose sprawling existence +overlapped the edge of Mrs. Fisher’s world, had drawn several of its +brightest ornaments into the circle of the Emporium. To find Ned +Silverton among the habitual frequenters of Mrs. Hatch’s drawing-room was +one of Lily’s first astonishments; but she soon discovered that he was +not Mr. Stancy’s most important recruit. It was on little Freddy Van +Osburgh, the small slim heir of the Van Osburgh millions, that the +attention of Mrs. Hatch’s group was centred. Freddy, barely out of +college, had risen above the horizon since Lily’s eclipse, and she now +saw with surprise what an effulgence he shed on the outer twilight of +Mrs. Hatch’s existence. This, then, was one of the things that young men +“went in” for when released from the official social routine; this was +the kind of “previous engagement” that so frequently caused them to +disappoint the hopes of anxious hostesses. Lily had an odd sense of being +behind the social tapestry, on the side where the threads were knotted +and the loose ends hung. For a moment she found a certain amusement in +the show, and in her own share of it: the situation had an ease and +unconventionality distinctly refreshing after her experience of the irony +of conventions. But these flashes of amusement were but brief reactions +from the long disgust of her days. Compared with the vast gilded void of +Mrs. Hatch’s existence, the life of Lily’s former friends seemed packed +with ordered activities. Even the most irresponsible pretty woman of her +acquaintance had her inherited obligations, her conventional +benevolences, her share in the working of the great civic machine; and +all hung together in the solidarity of these traditional functions. The +performance of specific duties would have simplified Miss Bart’s +position; but the vague attendance on Mrs. Hatch was not without its +perplexities.</p> + +<p>It was not her employer who created these perplexities. Mrs. Hatch showed +from the first an almost touching desire for Lily’s approval. Far from +asserting the superiority of wealth, her beautiful eyes seemed to urge +the plea of inexperience: she wanted to do what was “nice,” to be taught +how to be “lovely.” The difficulty was to find any point of contact +between her ideals and Lily’s.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Hatch swam in a haze of indeterminate enthusiasms, of aspirations +culled from the stage, the newspapers, the fashion journals, and a gaudy +world of sport still more completely beyond her companion’s ken. To +separate from these confused conceptions those most likely to advance the +lady on her way, was Lily’s obvious duty; but its performance was +hampered by rapidly-growing doubts. Lily was in fact becoming more and +more aware of a certain ambiguity in her situation. It was not that she +had, in the conventional sense, any doubt of Mrs. Hatch’s +irreproachableness. The lady’s offences were always against taste rather +than conduct; her divorce record seemed due to geographical rather than +ethical conditions; and her worst laxities were likely to proceed from a +wandering and extravagant good-nature. But if Lily did not mind her +detaining her manicure for luncheon, or offering the “Beauty-Doctor” a +seat in Freddy Van Osburgh’s box at the play, she was not equally at ease +in regard to some less apparent lapses from convention. Ned Silverton’s +relation to Stancy seemed, for instance, closer and less clear than any +natural affinities would warrant; and both appeared united in the effort +to cultivate Freddy Van Osburgh’s growing taste for Mrs. Hatch. There was +as yet nothing definable in the situation, which might well resolve +itself into a huge joke on the part of the other two; but Lily had a +vague sense that the subject of their experiment was too young, too rich +and too credulous. Her embarrassment was increased by the fact that +Freddy seemed to regard her as cooperating with himself in the social +development of Mrs. Hatch: a view that suggested, on his part, a +permanent interest in the lady’s future. There were moments when Lily +found an ironic amusement in this aspect of the case. The thought of +launching such a missile as Mrs. Hatch at the perfidious bosom of society +was not without its charm: Miss Bart had even beguiled her leisure with +visions of the fair Norma introduced for the first time to a family +banquet at the Van Osburghs’. But the thought of being personally +connected with the transaction was less agreeable; and her momentary +flashes of amusement were followed by increasing periods of doubt.</p> + +<p>The sense of these doubts was uppermost when, late one afternoon, she was +surprised by a visit from Lawrence Selden. He found her alone in the +wilderness of pink damask, for in Mrs. Hatch’s world the tea-hour was not +dedicated to social rites, and the lady was in the hands of her masseuse.</p> + +<p>Selden’s entrance had caused Lily an inward start of embarrassment; but +his air of constraint had the effect of restoring her self-possession, +and she took at once the tone of surprise and pleasure, wondering frankly +that he should have traced her to so unlikely a place, and asking what +had inspired him to make the search.</p> + +<p>Selden met this with an unusual seriousness: she had never seen him so +little master of the situation, so plainly at the mercy of any +obstructions she might put in his way. “I wanted to see you,” he said; +and she could not resist observing in reply that he had kept his wishes +under remarkable control. She had in truth felt his long absence as one +of the chief bitternesses of the last months: his desertion had wounded +sensibilities far below the surface of her pride.</p> + +<p>Selden met the challenge with directness. “Why should I have come, unless +I thought I could be of use to you? It is my only excuse for imagining +you could want me.”</p> + +<p>This struck her as a clumsy evasion, and the thought gave a flash of +keenness to her answer. “Then you have come now because you think you can +be of use to me?”</p> + +<p>He hesitated again. “Yes: in the modest capacity of a person to talk +things over with.”</p> + +<p>For a clever man it was certainly a stupid beginning; and the idea that +his awkwardness was due to the fear of her attaching a personal +significance to his visit, chilled her pleasure in seeing him. Even under +the most adverse conditions, that pleasure always made itself felt: she +might hate him, but she had never been able to wish him out of the room. +She was very near hating him now; yet the sound of his voice, the way the +light fell on his thin dark hair, the way he sat and moved and wore his +clothes—she was conscious that even these trivial things were inwoven +with her deepest life. In his presence a sudden stillness came upon her, +and the turmoil of her spirit ceased; but an impulse of resistance to +this stealing influence now prompted her to say: “It’s very good of you +to present yourself in that capacity; but what makes you think I have +anything particular to talk about?”</p> + +<p>Though she kept the even tone of light intercourse, the question was +framed in a way to remind him that his good offices were unsought; and +for a moment Selden was checked by it. The situation between them was one +which could have been cleared up only by a sudden explosion of feeling; +and their whole training and habit of mind were against the chances of +such an explosion. Selden’s calmness seemed rather to harden into +resistance, and Miss Bart’s into a surface of glittering irony, as they +faced each other from the opposite corners of one of Mrs. Hatch’s +elephantine sofas. The sofa in question, and the apartment peopled by its +monstrous mates, served at length to suggest the turn of Selden’s reply.</p> + +<p>“Gerty told me that you were acting as Mrs. Hatch’s secretary; and I knew +she was anxious to hear how you were getting on.”</p> + +<p>Miss Bart received this explanation without perceptible softening. “Why +didn’t she look me up herself, then?” she asked.</p> + +<p>“Because, as you didn’t send her your address, she was afraid of being +importunate.” Selden continued with a smile: “You see no such scruples +restrained me; but then I haven’t as much to risk if I incur your +displeasure.”</p> + +<p>Lily answered his smile. “You haven’t incurred it as yet; but I have an +idea that you are going to.”</p> + +<p>“That rests with you, doesn’t it? You see my initiative doesn’t go beyond +putting myself at your disposal.”</p> + +<p>“But in what capacity? What am I to do with you?” she asked in the same +light tone.</p> + +<p>Selden again glanced about Mrs. Hatch’s drawing-room; then he said, with +a decision which he seemed to have gathered from this final inspection: +“You are to let me take you away from here.”</p> + +<p>Lily flushed at the suddenness of the attack; then she stiffened under it +and said coldly: “And may I ask where you mean me to go?”</p> + +<p>“Back to Gerty in the first place, if you will; the essential thing is +that it should be away from here.”</p> + +<p>The unusual harshness of his tone might have shown her how much the words +cost him; but she was in no state to measure his feelings while her own +were in a flame of revolt. To neglect her, perhaps even to avoid her, at +a time when she had most need of her friends, and then suddenly and +unwarrantably to break into her life with this strange assumption of +authority, was to rouse in her every instinct of pride and self-defence.</p> + +<p>“I am very much obliged to you,” she said, “for taking such an interest +in my plans; but I am quite contented where I am, and have no intention +of leaving.”</p> + +<p>Selden had risen, and was standing before her in an attitude of +uncontrollable expectancy.</p> + +<p>“That simply means that you don’t know where you are!” he exclaimed.</p> + +<p>Lily rose also, with a quick flash of anger. “If you have come here to +say disagreeable things about Mrs. Hatch——”</p> + +<p>“It is only with your relation to Mrs. Hatch that I am concerned.”</p> + +<p>“My relation to Mrs. Hatch is one I have no reason to be ashamed of. She +has helped me to earn a living when my old friends were quite resigned to +seeing me starve.”</p> + +<p>“Nonsense! Starvation is not the only alternative. You know you can +always find a home with Gerty till you are independent again.”</p> + +<p>“You show such an intimate acquaintance with my affairs that I suppose +you mean—till my aunt’s legacy is paid?”</p> + +<p>“I do mean that; Gerty told me of it,” Selden acknowledged without +embarrassment. He was too much in earnest now to feel any false +constraint in speaking his mind.</p> + +<p>“But Gerty does not happen to know,” Miss Bart rejoined, “that I owe +every penny of that legacy.”</p> + +<p>“Good God!” Selden exclaimed, startled out of his composure by the +abruptness of the statement.</p> + +<p>“Every penny of it, and more too,” Lily repeated; “and you now perhaps +see why I prefer to remain with Mrs. Hatch rather than take advantage of +Gerty’s kindness. I have no money left, except my small income, and I +must earn something more to keep myself alive.”</p> + +<p>Selden hesitated a moment; then he rejoined in a quieter tone: “But with +your income and Gerty’s—since you allow me to go so far into the details +of the situation—you and she could surely contrive a life together which +would put you beyond the need of having to support yourself. Gerty, I +know, is eager to make such an arrangement, and would be quite happy in +it——”</p> + +<p>“But I should not,” Miss Bart interposed. “There are many reasons why it +would be neither kind to Gerty nor wise for myself.” She paused a moment, +and as he seemed to await a farther explanation, added with a quick lift +of her head: “You will perhaps excuse me from giving you these reasons.”</p> + +<p>“I have no claim to know them,” Selden answered, ignoring her tone; “no +claim to offer any comment or suggestion beyond the one I have already +made. And my right to make that is simply the universal right of a man to +enlighten a woman when he sees her unconsciously placed in a false +position.”</p> + +<p>Lily smiled. “I suppose,” she rejoined, “that by a false position you +mean one outside of what we call society; but you must remember that I +had been excluded from those sacred precincts long before I met Mrs. +Hatch. As far as I can see, there is very little real difference in being +inside or out, and I remember your once telling me that it was only those +inside who took the difference seriously.”</p> + +<p>She had not been without intention in making this allusion to their +memorable talk at Bellomont, and she waited with an odd tremor of the +nerves to see what response it would bring; but the result of the +experiment was disappointing. Selden did not allow the allusion to +deflect him from his point; he merely said with completer fulness of +emphasis: “The question of being inside or out is, as you say, a small +one, and it happens to have nothing to do with the case, except in so far +as Mrs. Hatch’s desire to be inside may put you in the position I call +false.”</p> + +<p>In spite of the moderation of his tone, each word he spoke had the effect +of confirming Lily’s resistance. The very apprehensions he aroused +hardened her against him: she had been on the alert for the note of +personal sympathy, for any sign of recovered power over him; and his +attitude of sober impartiality, the absence of all response to her +appeal, turned her hurt pride to blind resentment of his interference. +The conviction that he had been sent by Gerty, and that, whatever straits +he conceived her to be in, he would never voluntarily have come to her +aid, strengthened her resolve not to admit him a hair’s breadth farther +into her confidence. However doubtful she might feel her situation to be, +she would rather persist in darkness than owe her enlightenment to Selden.</p> + +<p>“I don’t know,” she said, when he had ceased to speak, “why you imagine +me to be situated as you describe; but as you have always told me that +the sole object of a bringing-up like mine was to teach a girl to get +what she wants, why not assume that that is precisely what I am doing?”</p> + +<p>The smile with which she summed up her case was like a clear barrier +raised against farther confidences: its brightness held him at such a +distance that he had a sense of being almost out of hearing as he +rejoined: “I am not sure that I have ever called you a successful example +of that kind of bringing-up.”</p> + +<p>Her colour rose a little at the implication, but she steeled herself with +a light laugh. “Ah, wait a little longer—give me a little more time +before you decide!” And as he wavered before her, still watching for a +break in the impenetrable front she presented: “Don’t give me up; I may +still do credit to my training!” she affirmed.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_10a">Chapter 10</h2> + +<p>“Look at those spangles, Miss Bart—every one of ’em sewed on crooked.”</p> + +<p>The tall forewoman, a pinched perpendicular figure, dropped the condemned +structure of wire and net on the table at Lily’s side, and passed on to +the next figure in the line.</p> + +<p>There were twenty of them in the work-room, their fagged profiles, under +exaggerated hair, bowed in the harsh north light above the utensils of +their art; for it was something more than an industry, surely, this +creation of ever-varied settings for the face of fortunate womanhood. +Their own faces were sallow with the unwholesomeness of hot air and +sedentary toil, rather than with any actual signs of want: they were +employed in a fashionable millinery establishment, and were fairly well +clothed and well paid; but the youngest among them was as dull and +colourless as the middle-aged. In the whole work-room there was only one +skin beneath which the blood still visibly played; and that now burned +with vexation as Miss Bart, under the lash of the forewoman’s comment, +began to strip the hat-frame of its over-lapping spangles.</p> + +<p>To Gerty Farish’s hopeful spirit a solution appeared to have been reached +when she remembered how beautifully Lily could trim hats. Instances of +young lady-milliners establishing themselves under fashionable patronage, +and imparting to their “creations” that indefinable touch which the +professional hand can never give, had flattered Gerty’s visions of the +future, and convinced even Lily that her separation from Mrs. Norma Hatch +need not reduce her to dependence on her friends.</p> + +<p>The parting had occurred a few weeks after Selden’s visit, and would have +taken place sooner had it not been for the resistance set up in Lily by +his ill-starred offer of advice. The sense of being involved in a +transaction she would not have cared to examine too closely had soon +afterward defined itself in the light of a hint from Mr. Stancy that, if +she “saw them through,” she would have no reason to be sorry. The +implication that such loyalty would meet with a direct reward had +hastened her flight, and flung her back, ashamed and penitent, on the +broad bosom of Gerty’s sympathy. She did not, however, propose to lie +there prone, and Gerty’s inspiration about the hats at once revived her +hopes of profitable activity. Here was, after all, something that her +charming listless hands could really do; she had no doubt of their +capacity for knotting a ribbon or placing a flower to advantage. And of +course only these finishing touches would be expected of her: subordinate +fingers, blunt, grey, needle-pricked fingers, would prepare the shapes +and stitch the linings, while she presided over the charming little front +shop—a shop all white panels, mirrors, and moss-green hangings—where +her finished creations, hats, wreaths, aigrettes and the rest, perched on +their stands like birds just poising for flight.</p> + +<p>But at the very outset of Gerty’s campaign this vision of the +green-and-white shop had been dispelled. Other young ladies of fashion +had been thus “set up,” selling their hats by the mere attraction of a +name and the reputed knack of tying a bow; but these privileged beings +could command a faith in their powers materially expressed by the +readiness to pay their shop-rent and advance a handsome sum for current +expenses. Where was Lily to find such support? And even could it have +been found, how were the ladies on whose approval she depended to be +induced to give her their patronage? Gerty learned that whatever sympathy +her friend’s case might have excited a few months since had been +imperilled, if not lost, by her association with Mrs. Hatch. Once again, +Lily had withdrawn from an ambiguous situation in time to save her +self-respect, but too late for public vindication. Freddy Van Osburgh +was not to marry Mrs. Hatch; he had been rescued at the eleventh +hour—some said by the efforts of Gus Trenor and Rosedale—and despatched +to Europe with old Ned Van Alstyne; but the risk he had run would always +be ascribed to Miss Bart’s connivance, and would somehow serve as a +summing-up and corroboration of the vague general distrust of her. It was +a relief to those who had hung back from her to find themselves thus +justified, and they were inclined to insist a little on her connection +with the Hatch case in order to show that they had been right.</p> + +<p>Gerty’s quest, at any rate, brought up against a solid wall of +resistance; and even when Carry Fisher, momentarily penitent for her +share in the Hatch affair, joined her efforts to Miss Farish’s, they met +with no better success. Gerty had tried to veil her failure in tender +ambiguities; but Carry, always the soul of candour, put the case squarely +to her friend.</p> + +<p>“I went straight to Judy Trenor; she has fewer prejudices than the +others, and besides she’s always hated Bertha Dorset. But what HAVE you +done to her, Lily? At the very first word about giving you a start she +flamed out about some money you’d got from Gus; I never knew her so hot +before. You know she’ll let him do anything but spend money on his +friends: the only reason she’s decent to me now is that she knows I’m not +hard up.—He speculated for you, you say? Well, what’s the harm? He had +no business to lose. He DIDN’T lose? Then what on earth—but I never +COULD understand you, Lily!”</p> + +<p>The end of it was that, after anxious enquiry and much deliberation, Mrs. +Fisher and Gerty, for once oddly united in their effort to help their +friend, decided on placing her in the work-room of Mme. Regina’s renowned +millinery establishment. Even this arrangement was not effected without +considerable negotiation, for Mme. Regina had a strong prejudice against +untrained assistance, and was induced to yield only by the fact that she +owed the patronage of Mrs. Bry and Mrs. Gormer to Carry Fisher’s +influence. She had been willing from the first to employ Lily in the +show-room: as a displayer of hats, a fashionable beauty might be a +valuable asset. But to this suggestion Miss Bart opposed a negative which +Gerty emphatically supported, while Mrs. Fisher, inwardly unconvinced, +but resigned to this latest proof of Lily’s unreason, agreed that perhaps +in the end it would be more useful that she should learn the trade. To +Regina’s work-room Lily was therefore committed by her friends, and there +Mrs. Fisher left her with a sigh of relief, while Gerty’s watchfulness +continued to hover over her at a distance.</p> + +<p>Lily had taken up her work early in January: it was now two months later, +and she was still being rebuked for her inability to sew spangles on a +hat-frame. As she returned to her work she heard a titter pass down the +tables. She knew she was an object of criticism and amusement to the +other work-women. They were, of course, aware of her history—the exact +situation of every girl in the room was known and freely discussed by all +the others—but the knowledge did not produce in them any awkward sense +of class distinction: it merely explained why her untutored fingers were +still blundering over the rudiments of the trade. Lily had no desire +that they should recognize any social difference in her; but she had +hoped to be received as their equal, and perhaps before long to show +herself their superior by a special deftness of touch, and it was +humiliating to find that, after two months of drudgery, she still +betrayed her lack of early training. Remote was the day when she might +aspire to exercise the talents she felt confident of possessing; only +experienced workers were entrusted with the delicate art of shaping and +trimming the hat, and the forewoman still held her inexorably to the +routine of preparatory work.</p> + +<p>She began to rip the spangles from the frame, listening absently to the +buzz of talk which rose and fell with the coming and going of Miss +Haines’s active figure. The air was closer than usual, because Miss +Haines, who had a cold, had not allowed a window to be opened even during +the noon recess; and Lily’s head was so heavy with the weight of a +sleepless night that the chatter of her companions had the incoherence of +a dream.</p> + +<p>“I TOLD her he’d never look at her again; and he didn’t. I wouldn’t have, +either—I think she acted real mean to him. He took her to the Arion +Ball, and had a hack for her both ways.... She’s taken ten bottles, and +her headaches don’t seem no better—but she’s written a testimonial to +say the first bottle cured her, and she got five dollars and her picture +in the paper.... Mrs. Trenor’s hat? The one with the green Paradise? +Here, Miss Haines—it’ll be ready right off.... That was one of the +Trenor girls here yesterday with Mrs. George Dorset. How’d I know? Why, +Madam sent for me to alter the flower in that Virot hat—the blue tulle: +she’s tall and slight, with her hair fuzzed out—a good deal like Mamie +Leach, on’y thinner....”</p> + +<p>On and on it flowed, a current of meaningless sound, on which, +startlingly enough, a familiar name now and then floated to the surface. +It was the strangest part of Lily’s strange experience, the hearing of +these names, the seeing the fragmentary and distorted image of the world +she had lived in reflected in the mirror of the working-girls’ minds. She +had never before suspected the mixture of insatiable curiosity and +contemptuous freedom with which she and her kind were discussed in this +underworld of toilers who lived on their vanity and self-indulgence. +Every girl in Mme. Regina’s work-room knew to whom the headgear in her +hands was destined, and had her opinion of its future wearer, and a +definite knowledge of the latter’s place in the social system. That Lily +was a star fallen from that sky did not, after the first stir of +curiosity had subsided, materially add to their interest in her. She had +fallen, she had “gone under,” and true to the ideal of their race, they +were awed only by success—by the gross tangible image of material +achievement. The consciousness of her different point of view merely kept +them at a little distance from her, as though she were a foreigner with +whom it was an effort to talk.</p> + +<p>“Miss Bart, if you can’t sew those spangles on more regular I guess you’d +better give the hat to Miss Kilroy.”</p> + +<p>Lily looked down ruefully at her handiwork. The forewoman was right: the +sewing on of the spangles was inexcusably bad. What made her so much more +clumsy than usual? Was it a growing distaste for her task, or actual +physical disability? She felt tired and confused: it was an effort to put +her thoughts together. She rose and handed the hat to Miss Kilroy, who +took it with a suppressed smile.</p> + +<p>“I’m sorry; I’m afraid I am not well,” she said to the forewoman.</p> + +<p>Miss Haines offered no comment. From the first she had augured ill of +Mme. Regina’s consenting to include a fashionable apprentice among her +workers. In that temple of art no raw beginners were wanted, and Miss +Haines would have been more than human had she not taken a certain +pleasure in seeing her forebodings confirmed.</p> + +<p>“You’d better go back to binding edges,” she said drily. Lily slipped out +last among the band of liberated work-women. She did not care to be +mingled in their noisy dispersal: once in the street, she always felt an +irresistible return to her old standpoint, an instinctive shrinking from +all that was unpolished and promiscuous. In the days—how distant they +now seemed!—when she had visited the Girls’ Club with Gerty Farish, she +had felt an enlightened interest in the working-classes; but that was +because she looked down on them from above, from the happy altitude of +her grace and her beneficence. Now that she was on a level with them, the +point of view was less interesting.</p> + +<p>She felt a touch on her arm, and met the penitent eye of Miss Kilroy. +“Miss Bart, I guess you can sew those spangles on as well as I can when +you’re feeling right. Miss Haines didn’t act fair to you.”</p> + +<p>Lily’s colour rose at the unexpected advance: it was a long time since +real kindness had looked at her from any eyes but Gerty’s.</p> + +<p>“Oh, thank you: I’m not particularly well, but Miss Haines was right. I +AM clumsy.”</p> + +<p>“Well, it’s mean work for anybody with a headache.” Miss Kilroy paused +irresolutely. “You ought to go right home and lay down. Ever try +orangeine?”</p> + +<p>“Thank you.” Lily held out her hand. “It’s very kind of you—I mean to go +home.”</p> + +<p>She looked gratefully at Miss Kilroy, but neither knew what more to say. +Lily was aware that the other was on the point of offering to go home +with her, but she wanted to be alone and silent—even kindness, the sort +of kindness that Miss Kilroy could give, would have jarred on her just +then.</p> + +<p>“Thank you,” she repeated as she turned away.</p> + +<p>She struck westward through the dreary March twilight, toward the street +where her boarding-house stood. She had resolutely refused Gerty’s offer +of hospitality. Something of her mother’s fierce shrinking from +observation and sympathy was beginning to develop in her, and the +promiscuity of small quarters and close intimacy seemed, on the whole, +less endurable than the solitude of a hall bedroom in a house where she +could come and go unremarked among other workers. For a while she had +been sustained by this desire for privacy and independence; but now, +perhaps from increasing physical weariness, the lassitude brought about +by hours of unwonted confinement, she was beginning to feel acutely the +ugliness and discomfort of her surroundings. The day’s task done, she +dreaded to return to her narrow room, with its blotched wall-paper and +shabby paint; and she hated every step of the walk thither, through the +degradation of a New York street in the last stages of decline from +fashion to commerce.</p> + +<p>But what she dreaded most of all was having to pass the chemist’s at the +corner of Sixth Avenue. She had meant to take another street: she had +usually done so of late. But today her steps were irresistibly drawn +toward the flaring plate-glass corner; she tried to take the lower +crossing, but a laden dray crowded her back, and she struck across the +street obliquely, reaching the sidewalk just opposite the chemist’s door.</p> + +<p>Over the counter she caught the eye of the clerk who had waited on her +before, and slipped the prescription into his hand. There could be no +question about the prescription: it was a copy of one of Mrs. Hatch’s, +obligingly furnished by that lady’s chemist. Lily was confident that the +clerk would fill it without hesitation; yet the nervous dread of a +refusal, or even of an expression of doubt, communicated itself to her +restless hands as she affected to examine the bottles of perfume stacked +on the glass case before her.</p> + +<p>The clerk had read the prescription without comment; but in the act of +handing out the bottle he paused.</p> + +<p>“You don’t want to increase the dose, you know,” he remarked. Lily’s +heart contracted.</p> + +<p>What did he mean by looking at her in that way?</p> + +<p>“Of course not,” she murmured, holding out her hand.</p> + +<p>“That’s all right: it’s a queer-acting drug. A drop or two more, and off +you go—the doctors don’t know why.”</p> + +<p>The dread lest he should question her, or keep the bottle back, choked +the murmur of acquiescence in her throat; and when at length she emerged +safely from the shop she was almost dizzy with the intensity of her +relief. The mere touch of the packet thrilled her tired nerves with the +delicious promise of a night of sleep, and in the reaction from her +momentary fear she felt as if the first fumes of drowsiness were already +stealing over her.</p> + +<p>In her confusion she stumbled against a man who was hurrying down the +last steps of the elevated station. He drew back, and she heard her name +uttered with surprise. It was Rosedale, fur-coated, glossy and +prosperous—but why did she seem to see him so far off, and as if through +a mist of splintered crystals? Before she could account for the +phenomenon she found herself shaking hands with him. They had parted with +scorn on her side and anger upon his; but all trace of these emotions +seemed to vanish as their hands met, and she was only aware of a confused +wish that she might continue to hold fast to him.</p> + +<p>“Why, what’s the matter, Miss Lily? You’re not well!” he exclaimed; and +she forced her lips into a pallid smile of reassurance.</p> + +<p>“I’m a little tired—it’s nothing. Stay with me a moment, please,” she +faltered. That she should be asking this service of Rosedale!</p> + +<p>He glanced at the dirty and unpropitious corner on which they stood, with +the shriek of the “elevated” and the tumult of trams and waggons +contending hideously in their ears.</p> + +<p>“We can’t stay here; but let me take you somewhere for a cup of tea. The +LONGWORTH is only a few yards off, and there’ll be no one there at this +hour.”</p> + +<p>A cup of tea in quiet, somewhere out of the noise and ugliness, seemed +for the moment the one solace she could bear. A few steps brought them to +the ladies’ door of the hotel he had named, and a moment later he was +seated opposite to her, and the waiter had placed the tea-tray between +them.</p> + +<p>“Not a drop of brandy or whiskey first? You look regularly done up, Miss +Lily. Well, take your tea strong, then; and, waiter, get a cushion for +the lady’s back.”</p> + +<p>Lily smiled faintly at the injunction to take her tea strong. It was the +temptation she was always struggling to resist. Her craving for the keen +stimulant was forever conflicting with that other craving for sleep—the +midnight craving which only the little phial in her hand could still. But +today, at any rate, the tea could hardly be too strong: she counted on it +to pour warmth and resolution into her empty veins.</p> + +<p>As she leaned back before him, her lids drooping in utter lassitude, +though the first warm draught already tinged her face with returning +life, Rosedale was seized afresh by the poignant surprise of her beauty. +The dark pencilling of fatigue under her eyes, the morbid blue-veined +pallor of the temples, brought out the brightness of her hair and lips, +as though all her ebbing vitality were centred there. Against the dull +chocolate-coloured background of the restaurant, the purity of her head +stood out as it had never done in the most brightly lit ball-room. He +looked at her with a startled uncomfortable feeling, as though her beauty +were a forgotten enemy that had lain in ambush and now sprang out on him +unawares.</p> + +<p>To clear the air he tried to take an easy tone with her. “Why, Miss Lily, +I haven’t seen you for an age. I didn’t know what had become of you.”</p> + +<p>As he spoke, he was checked by an embarrassing sense of the complications +to which this might lead. Though he had not seen her he had heard of her; +he knew of her connection with Mrs. Hatch, and of the talk resulting from +it. Mrs. Hatch’s MILIEU was one which he had once assiduously frequented, +and now as devoutly shunned.</p> + +<p>Lily, to whom the tea had restored her usual clearness of mind, saw what +was in his thoughts and said with a slight smile: “You would not be +likely to know about me. I have joined the working-classes.”</p> + +<p>He stared in genuine wonder. “You don’t mean—? Why, what on earth are +you doing?”</p> + +<p>“Learning to be a milliner—at least TRYING to learn,” she hastily +qualified the statement.</p> + +<p>Rosedale suppressed a low whistle of surprise. “Come off—you ain’t +serious, are you?”</p> + +<p>“Perfectly serious. I’m obliged to work for my living.”</p> + +<p>“But I understood—I thought you were with Norma Hatch.”</p> + +<p>“You heard I had gone to her as her secretary?”</p> + +<p>“Something of the kind, I believe.” He leaned forward to refill her cup.</p> + +<p>Lily guessed the possibilities of embarrassment which the topic held for +him, and raising her eyes to his, she said suddenly: “I left her two +months ago.”</p> + +<p>Rosedale continued to fumble awkwardly with the tea-pot, and she felt +sure that he had heard what had been said of her. But what was there that +Rosedale did not hear?</p> + +<p>“Wasn’t it a soft berth?” he enquired, with an attempt at lightness.</p> + +<p>“Too soft—one might have sunk in too deep.” Lily rested one arm on the +edge of the table, and sat looking at him more intently than she had ever +looked before. An uncontrollable impulse was urging her to put her case +to this man, from whose curiosity she had always so fiercely defended +herself.</p> + +<p>“You know Mrs. Hatch, I think? Well, perhaps you can understand that she +might make things too easy for one.”</p> + +<p>Rosedale looked faintly puzzled, and she remembered that allusiveness was +lost on him.</p> + +<p>“It was no place for you, anyhow,” he agreed, so suffused and immersed in +the light of her full gaze that he found himself being drawn into strange +depths of intimacy. He who had had to subsist on mere fugitive glances, +looks winged in flight and swiftly lost under covert, now found her eyes +settling on him with a brooding intensity that fairly dazzled him.</p> + +<p>“I left,” Lily continued, “lest people should say I was helping Mrs. +Hatch to marry Freddy Van Osburgh—who is not in the least too good for +her—and as they still continue to say it, I see that I might as well +have stayed where I was.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, Freddy——” Rosedale brushed aside the topic with an air of its +unimportance which gave a sense of the immense perspective he had +acquired. “Freddy don’t count—but I knew YOU weren’t mixed up in that. +It ain’t your style.”</p> + +<p>Lily coloured slightly: she could not conceal from herself that the words +gave her pleasure. She would have liked to sit there, drinking more tea, +and continuing to talk of herself to Rosedale. But the old habit of +observing the conventions reminded her that it was time to bring their +colloquy to an end, and she made a faint motion to push back her chair.</p> + +<p>Rosedale stopped her with a protesting gesture. “Wait a minute—don’t go +yet; sit quiet and rest a little longer. You look thoroughly played out. +And you haven’t told me——” He broke off, conscious of going farther +than he had meant. She saw the struggle and understood it; understood +also the nature of the spell to which he yielded as, with his eyes on her +face, he began again abruptly: “What on earth did you mean by saying just +now that you were learning to be a milliner?”</p> + +<p>“Just what I said. I am an apprentice at Regina’s.”</p> + +<p>“Good Lord—YOU? But what for? I knew your aunt had turned you down: Mrs. +Fisher told me about it. But I understood you got a legacy from her——”</p> + +<p>“I got ten thousand dollars; but the legacy is not to be paid till next +summer.”</p> + +<p>“Well, but—look here: you could BORROW on it any time you wanted.”</p> + +<p>She shook her head gravely. “No; for I owe it already.”</p> + +<p>“Owe it? The whole ten thousand?”</p> + +<p>“Every penny.” She paused, and then continued abruptly, with her eyes on +his face: “I think Gus Trenor spoke to you once about having made some +money for me in stocks.”</p> + +<p>She waited, and Rosedale, congested with embarrassment, muttered that he +remembered something of the kind.</p> + +<p>“He made about nine thousand dollars,” Lily pursued, in the same tone of +eager communicativeness. “At the time, I understood that he was +speculating with my own money: it was incredibly stupid of me, but I knew +nothing of business. Afterward I found out that he had NOT used my +money—that what he said he had made for me he had really given me. It +was meant in kindness, of course; but it was not the sort of obligation +one could remain under. Unfortunately I had spent the money before I +discovered my mistake; and so my legacy will have to go to pay it back. +That is the reason why I am trying to learn a trade.”</p> + +<p>She made the statement clearly, deliberately, with pauses between the +sentences, so that each should have time to sink deeply into her hearer’s +mind. She had a passionate desire that some one should know the truth +about this transaction, and also that the rumour of her intention to +repay the money should reach Judy Trenor’s ears. And it had suddenly +occurred to her that Rosedale, who had surprised Trenor’s confidence, was +the fitting person to receive and transmit her version of the facts. She +had even felt a momentary exhilaration at the thought of thus relieving +herself of her detested secret; but the sensation gradually faded in the +telling, and as she ended her pallor was suffused with a deep blush of +misery.</p> + +<p>Rosedale continued to stare at her in wonder; but the wonder took the +turn she had least expected.</p> + +<p>“But see here—if that’s the case, it cleans you out altogether?”</p> + +<p>He put it to her as if she had not grasped the consequences of her act; +as if her incorrigible ignorance of business were about to precipitate +her into a fresh act of folly.</p> + +<p>“Altogether—yes,” she calmly agreed.</p> + +<p>He sat silent, his thick hands clasped on the table, his little puzzled +eyes exploring the recesses of the deserted restaurant.</p> + +<p>“See here—that’s fine,” he exclaimed abruptly.</p> + +<p>Lily rose from her seat with a deprecating laugh. “Oh, no—it’s merely a +bore,” she asserted, gathering together the ends of her feather scarf.</p> + +<p>Rosedale remained seated, too intent on his thoughts to notice her +movement. “Miss Lily, if you want any backing—I like pluck——” broke +from him disconnectedly.</p> + +<p>“Thank you.” She held out her hand. “Your tea has given me a tremendous +backing. I feel equal to anything now.”</p> + +<p>Her gesture seemed to show a definite intention of dismissal, but her +companion had tossed a bill to the waiter, and was slipping his short +arms into his expensive overcoat.</p> + +<p>“Wait a minute—you’ve got to let me walk home with you,” he said.</p> + +<p>Lily uttered no protest, and when he had paused to make sure of his +change they emerged from the hotel and crossed Sixth Avenue again. As she +led the way westward past a long line of areas which, through the +distortion of their paintless rails, revealed with increasing candour the +DISJECTA MEMBRA of bygone dinners, Lily felt that Rosedale was taking +contemptuous note of the neighbourhood; and before the doorstep at which +she finally paused he looked up with an air of incredulous disgust.</p> + +<p>“This isn’t the place? Some one told me you were living with Miss Farish.”</p> + +<p>“No: I am boarding here. I have lived too long on my friends.”</p> + +<p>He continued to scan the blistered brown stone front, the windows draped +with discoloured lace, and the Pompeian decoration of the muddy +vestibule; then he looked back at her face and said with a visible +effort: “You’ll let me come and see you some day?”</p> + +<p>She smiled, recognizing the heroism of the offer to the point of being +frankly touched by it. “Thank you—I shall be very glad,” she made +answer, in the first sincere words she had ever spoken to him.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>That evening in her own room Miss Bart—who had fled early from the heavy +fumes of the basement dinner-table—sat musing upon the impulse which had +led her to unbosom herself to Rosedale. Beneath it she discovered an +increasing sense of loneliness—a dread of returning to the solitude of +her room, while she could be anywhere else, or in any company but her +own. Circumstances, of late, had combined to cut her off more and more +from her few remaining friends. On Carry Fisher’s part the withdrawal was +perhaps not quite involuntary. Having made her final effort on Lily’s +behalf, and landed her safely in Mme. Regina’s work-room, Mrs. Fisher +seemed disposed to rest from her labours; and Lily, understanding the +reason, could not condemn her. Carry had in fact come dangerously near to +being involved in the episode of Mrs. Norma Hatch, and it had taken some +verbal ingenuity to extricate herself. She frankly owned to having +brought Lily and Mrs. Hatch together, but then she did not know Mrs. +Hatch—she had expressly warned Lily that she did not know Mrs. +Hatch—and besides, she was not Lily’s keeper, and really the girl was +old enough to take care of herself. Carry did not put her own case so +brutally, but she allowed it to be thus put for her by her latest bosom +friend, Mrs. Jack Stepney: Mrs. Stepney, trembling over the narrowness of +her only brother’s escape, but eager to vindicate Mrs. Fisher, at whose +house she could count on the “jolly parties” which had become a necessity +to her since marriage had emancipated her from the Van Osburgh point of +view.</p> + +<p>Lily understood the situation and could make allowances for it. Carry +had been a good friend to her in difficult days, and perhaps only a +friendship like Gerty’s could be proof against such an increasing strain. +Gerty’s friendship did indeed hold fast; yet Lily was beginning to avoid +her also. For she could not go to Gerty’s without risk of meeting Selden; +and to meet him now would be pure pain. It was pain enough even to think +of him, whether she considered him in the distinctness of her waking +thoughts, or felt the obsession of his presence through the blur of her +tormented nights. That was one of the reasons why she had turned again to +Mrs. Hatch’s prescription. In the uneasy snatches of her natural dreams +he came to her sometimes in the old guise of fellowship and tenderness; +and she would rise from the sweet delusion mocked and emptied of her +courage. But in the sleep which the phial procured she sank far below +such half-waking visitations, sank into depths of dreamless annihilation +from which she woke each morning with an obliterated past.</p> + +<p>Gradually, to be sure, the stress of the old thoughts would return; but +at least they did not importune her waking hour. The drug gave her a +momentary illusion of complete renewal, from which she drew strength to +take up her daily work. The strength was more and more needed as the +perplexities of her future increased. She knew that to Gerty and Mrs. +Fisher she was only passing through a temporary period of probation, +since they believed that the apprenticeship she was serving at Mme. +Regina’s would enable her, when Mrs. Peniston’s legacy was paid, to +realize the vision of the green-and-white shop with the fuller competence +acquired by her preliminary training. But to Lily herself, aware that the +legacy could not be put to such a use, the preliminary training seemed a +wasted effort. She understood clearly enough that, even if she could ever +learn to compete with hands formed from childhood for their special work, +the small pay she received would not be a sufficient addition to her +income to compensate her for such drudgery. And the realization of this +fact brought her recurringly face to face with the temptation to use the +legacy in establishing her business. Once installed, and in command of +her own work-women, she believed she had sufficient tact and ability to +attract a fashionable CLIENTELE; and if the business succeeded she could +gradually lay aside money enough to discharge her debt to Trenor. But the +task might take years to accomplish, even if she continued to stint +herself to the utmost; and meanwhile her pride would be crushed under the +weight of an intolerable obligation.</p> + +<p>These were her superficial considerations; but under them lurked the +secret dread that the obligation might not always remain intolerable. +She knew she could not count on her continuity of purpose, and what +really frightened her was the thought that she might gradually +accommodate herself to remaining indefinitely in Trenor’s debt, as she +had accommodated herself to the part allotted her on the Sabrina, and as +she had so nearly drifted into acquiescing with Stancy’s scheme for the +advancement of Mrs. Hatch. Her danger lay, as she knew, in her old +incurable dread of discomfort and poverty; in the fear of that mounting +tide of dinginess against which her mother had so passionately warned +her. And now a new vista of peril opened before her. She understood that +Rosedale was ready to lend her money; and the longing to take advantage +of his offer began to haunt her insidiously. It was of course impossible +to accept a loan from Rosedale; but proximate possibilities hovered +temptingly before her. She was quite sure that he would come and see her +again, and almost sure that, if he did, she could bring him to the point +of offering to marry her on the terms she had previously rejected. Would +she still reject them if they were offered? More and more, with every +fresh mischance befalling her, did the pursuing furies seem to take the +shape of Bertha Dorset; and close at hand, safely locked among her +papers, lay the means of ending their pursuit. The temptation, which her +scorn of Rosedale had once enabled her to reject, now insistently +returned upon her; and how much strength was left her to oppose it?</p> + +<p>What little there was must at any rate be husbanded to the utmost; she +could not trust herself again to the perils of a sleepless night. +Through the long hours of silence the dark spirit of fatigue and +loneliness crouched upon her breast, leaving her so drained of bodily +strength that her morning thoughts swam in a haze of weakness. The only +hope of renewal lay in the little bottle at her bed-side; and how much +longer that hope would last she dared not conjecture.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_11a">Chapter 11</h2> + +<p>Lily, lingering for a moment on the corner, looked out on the afternoon +spectacle of Fifth Avenue. It was a day in late April, and the sweetness +of spring was in the air. It mitigated the ugliness of the long crowded +thoroughfare, blurred the gaunt roof-lines, threw a mauve veil over the +discouraging perspective of the side streets, and gave a touch of poetry +to the delicate haze of green that marked the entrance to the Park.</p> + +<p>As Lily stood there, she recognized several familiar faces in the passing +carriages. The season was over, and its ruling forces had disbanded; but +a few still lingered, delaying their departure for Europe, or passing +through town on their return from the South. Among them was Mrs. Van +Osburgh, swaying majestically in her C-spring barouche, with Mrs. Percy +Gryce at her side, and the new heir to the Gryce millions enthroned +before them on his nurse’s knees. They were succeeded by Mrs. Hatch’s +electric victoria, in which that lady reclined in the lonely splendour of +a spring toilet obviously designed for company; and a moment or two later +came Judy Trenor, accompanied by Lady Skiddaw, who had come over for her +annual tarpon fishing and a dip into “the street.”</p> + +<p>This fleeting glimpse of her past served to emphasize the sense of +aimlessness with which Lily at length turned toward home. She had nothing +to do for the rest of the day, nor for the days to come; for the season +was over in millinery as well as in society, and a week earlier Mme. +Regina had notified her that her services were no longer required. Mme. +Regina always reduced her staff on the first of May, and Miss Bart’s +attendance had of late been so irregular—she had so often been unwell, +and had done so little work when she came—that it was only as a favour +that her dismissal had hitherto been deferred.</p> + +<p>Lily did not question the justice of the decision. She was conscious of +having been forgetful, awkward and slow to learn. It was bitter to +acknowledge her inferiority even to herself, but the fact had been +brought home to her that as a bread-winner she could never compete with +professional ability. Since she had been brought up to be ornamental, +she could hardly blame herself for failing to serve any practical +purpose; but the discovery put an end to her consoling sense of universal +efficiency.</p> + +<p>As she turned homeward her thoughts shrank in anticipation from the fact +that there would be nothing to get up for the next morning. The luxury of +lying late in bed was a pleasure belonging to the life of ease; it had no +part in the utilitarian existence of the boarding-house. She liked to +leave her room early, and to return to it as late as possible; and she +was walking slowly now in order to postpone the detested approach to her +doorstep.</p> + +<p>But the doorstep, as she drew near it, acquired a sudden interest from +the fact that it was occupied—and indeed filled—by the conspicuous +figure of Mr. Rosedale, whose presence seemed to take on an added +amplitude from the meanness of his surroundings.</p> + +<p>The sight stirred Lily with an irresistible sense of triumph. Rosedale, +a day or two after their chance meeting, had called to enquire if she had +recovered from her indisposition; but since then she had not seen or +heard from him, and his absence seemed to betoken a struggle to keep +away, to let her pass once more out of his life. If this were the case, +his return showed that the struggle had been unsuccessful, for Lily knew +he was not the man to waste his time in an ineffectual sentimental +dalliance. He was too busy, too practical, and above all too much +preoccupied with his own advancement, to indulge in such unprofitable +asides.</p> + +<p>In the peacock-blue parlour, with its bunches of dried pampas grass, and +discoloured steel engravings of sentimental episodes, he looked about him +with unconcealed disgust, laying his hat distrustfully on the dusty +console adorned with a Rogers statuette.</p> + +<p>Lily sat down on one of the plush and rosewood sofas, and he deposited +himself in a rocking-chair draped with a starched antimacassar which +scraped unpleasantly against the pink fold of skin above his collar.</p> + +<p>“My goodness—you can’t go on living here!” he exclaimed.</p> + +<p>Lily smiled at his tone. “I am not sure that I can; but I have gone over +my expenses very carefully, and I rather think I shall be able to manage +it.”</p> + +<p>“Be able to manage it? That’s not what I mean—it’s no place for you!”</p> + +<p>“It’s what I mean; for I have been out of work for the last week.”</p> + +<p>“Out of work—out of work! What a way for you to talk! The idea of your +having to work—it’s preposterous.” He brought out his sentences in short +violent jerks, as though they were forced up from a deep inner crater of +indignation. “It’s a farce—a crazy farce,” he repeated, his eyes fixed +on the long vista of the room reflected in the blotched glass between the +windows.</p> + +<p>Lily continued to meet his expostulations with a smile. “I don’t know why +I should regard myself as an exception——” she began.</p> + +<p>“Because you ARE; that’s why; and your being in a place like this is a +damnable outrage. I can’t talk of it calmly.”</p> + +<p>She had in truth never seen him so shaken out of his usual glibness; and +there was something almost moving to her in his inarticulate struggle +with his emotions.</p> + +<p>He rose with a start which left the rocking-chair quivering on its beam +ends, and placed himself squarely before her.</p> + +<p>“Look here, Miss Lily, I’m going to Europe next week: going over to Paris +and London for a couple of months—and I can’t leave you like this. I +can’t do it. I know it’s none of my business—you’ve let me understand +that often enough; but things are worse with you now than they have been +before, and you must see that you’ve got to accept help from somebody. +You spoke to me the other day about some debt to Trenor. I know what you +mean—and I respect you for feeling as you do about it.”</p> + +<p>A blush of surprise rose to Lily’s pale face, but before she could +interrupt him he had continued eagerly: “Well, I’ll lend you the money to +pay Trenor; and I won’t—I—see here, don’t take me up till I’ve +finished. What I mean is, it’ll be a plain business arrangement, such as +one man would make with another. Now, what have you got to say against +that?”</p> + +<p>Lily’s blush deepened to a glow in which humiliation and gratitude were +mingled; and both sentiments revealed themselves in the unexpected +gentleness of her reply.</p> + +<p>“Only this: that it is exactly what Gus Trenor proposed; and that I can +never again be sure of understanding the plainest business arrangement.” +Then, realizing that this answer contained a germ of injustice, she +added, even more kindly: “Not that I don’t appreciate your kindness—that +I’m not grateful for it. But a business arrangement between us would in +any case be impossible, because I shall have no security to give when my +debt to Gus Trenor has been paid.”</p> + +<p>Rosedale received this statement in silence: he seemed to feel the note +of finality in her voice, yet to be unable to accept it as closing the +question between them.</p> + +<p>In the silence Lily had a clear perception of what was passing through +his mind. Whatever perplexity he felt as to the inexorableness of her +course—however little he penetrated its motive—she saw that it +unmistakably tended to strengthen her hold over him. It was as though the +sense in her of unexplained scruples and resistances had the same +attraction as the delicacy of feature, the fastidiousness of manner, +which gave her an external rarity, an air of being impossible to match. +As he advanced in social experience this uniqueness had acquired a +greater value for him, as though he were a collector who had learned to +distinguish minor differences of design and quality in some long-coveted +object.</p> + +<p>Lily, perceiving all this, understood that he would marry her at once, on +the sole condition of a reconciliation with Mrs. Dorset; and the +temptation was the less easy to put aside because, little by little, +circumstances were breaking down her dislike for Rosedale. The dislike, +indeed, still subsisted; but it was penetrated here and there by the +perception of mitigating qualities in him: of a certain gross kindliness, +a rather helpless fidelity of sentiment, which seemed to be struggling +through the hard surface of his material ambitions.</p> + +<p>Reading his dismissal in her eyes, he held out his hand with a gesture +which conveyed something of this inarticulate conflict.</p> + +<p>“If you’d only let me, I’d set you up over them all—I’d put you where +you could wipe your feet on ’em!” he declared; and it touched her oddly +to see that his new passion had not altered his old standard of values.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>Lily took no sleeping-drops that night. She lay awake viewing her +situation in the crude light which Rosedale’s visit had shed on it. In +fending off the offer he was so plainly ready to renew, had she not +sacrificed to one of those abstract notions of honour that might be +called the conventionalities of the moral life? What debt did she owe to +a social order which had condemned and banished her without trial? She +had never been heard in her own defence; she was innocent of the charge +on which she had been found guilty; and the irregularity of her +conviction might seem to justify the use of methods as irregular in +recovering her lost rights. Bertha Dorset, to save herself, had not +scrupled to ruin her by an open falsehood; why should she hesitate to +make private use of the facts that chance had put in her way? After all, +half the opprobrium of such an act lies in the name attached to it. Call +it blackmail and it becomes unthinkable; but explain that it injures no +one, and that the rights regained by it were unjustly forfeited, and he +must be a formalist indeed who can find no plea in its defence.</p> + +<p>The arguments pleading for it with Lily were the old unanswerable ones of +the personal situation: the sense of injury, the sense of failure, the +passionate craving for a fair chance against the selfish despotism of +society. She had learned by experience that she had neither the aptitude +nor the moral constancy to remake her life on new lines; to become a +worker among workers, and let the world of luxury and pleasure sweep by +her unregarded. She could not hold herself much to blame for this +ineffectiveness, and she was perhaps less to blame than she believed. +Inherited tendencies had combined with early training to make her the +highly specialized product she was: an organism as helpless out of its +narrow range as the sea-anemone torn from the rock. She had been +fashioned to adorn and delight; to what other end does nature round the +rose-leaf and paint the humming-bird’s breast? And was it her fault that +the purely decorative mission is less easily and harmoniously fulfilled +among social beings than in the world of nature? That it is apt to be +hampered by material necessities or complicated by moral scruples?</p> + +<p>These last were the two antagonistic forces which fought out their battle +in her breast during the long watches of the night; and when she rose the +next morning she hardly knew where the victory lay. She was exhausted by +the reaction of a night without sleep, coming after many nights of rest +artificially obtained; and in the distorting light of fatigue the future +stretched out before her grey, interminable and desolate.</p> + +<p>She lay late in bed, refusing the coffee and fried eggs which the +friendly Irish servant thrust through her door, and hating the intimate +domestic noises of the house and the cries and rumblings of the street. +Her week of idleness had brought home to her with exaggerated force these +small aggravations of the boarding-house world, and she yearned for that +other luxurious world, whose machinery is so carefully concealed that one +scene flows into another without perceptible agency.</p> + +<p>At length she rose and dressed. Since she had left Mme. Regina’s she had +spent her days in the streets, partly to escape from the uncongenial +promiscuities of the boarding-house, and partly in the hope that physical +fatigue would help her to sleep. But once out of the house, she could not +decide where to go; for she had avoided Gerty since her dismissal from +the milliner’s, and she was not sure of a welcome anywhere else.</p> + +<p>The morning was in harsh contrast to the previous day. A cold grey sky +threatened rain, and a high wind drove the dust in wild spirals up and +down the streets. Lily walked up Fifth Avenue toward the Park, hoping to +find a sheltered nook where she might sit; but the wind chilled her, and +after an hour’s wandering under the tossing boughs she yielded to her +increasing weariness, and took refuge in a little restaurant in +Fifty-ninth Street. She was not hungry, and had meant to go without +luncheon; but she was too tired to return home, and the long perspective +of white tables showed alluringly through the windows.</p> + +<p>The room was full of women and girls, all too much engaged in the rapid +absorption of tea and pie to remark her entrance. A hum of shrill voices +reverberated against the low ceiling, leaving Lily shut out in a little +circle of silence. She felt a sudden pang of profound loneliness. She had +lost the sense of time, and it seemed to her as though she had not spoken +to any one for days. Her eyes sought the faces about her, craving a +responsive glance, some sign of an intuition of her trouble. But the +sallow preoccupied women, with their bags and note-books and rolls of +music, were all engrossed in their own affairs, and even those who sat by +themselves were busy running over proof-sheets or devouring magazines +between their hurried gulps of tea. Lily alone was stranded in a great +waste of disoccupation.</p> + +<p>She drank several cups of the tea which was served with her portion of +stewed oysters, and her brain felt clearer and livelier when she emerged +once more into the street. She realized now that, as she sat in the +restaurant, she had unconsciously arrived at a final decision. The +discovery gave her an immediate illusion of activity: it was exhilarating +to think that she had actually a reason for hurrying home. To prolong +her enjoyment of the sensation she decided to walk; but the distance was +so great that she found herself glancing nervously at the clocks on the +way. One of the surprises of her unoccupied state was the discovery that +time, when it is left to itself and no definite demands are made on it, +cannot be trusted to move at any recognized pace. Usually it loiters; +but just when one has come to count upon its slowness, it may suddenly +break into a wild irrational gallop.</p> + +<p>She found, however, on reaching home, that the hour was still early +enough for her to sit down and rest a few minutes before putting her plan +into execution. The delay did not perceptibly weaken her resolve. She +was frightened and yet stimulated by the reserved force of resolution +which she felt within herself: she saw it was going to be easier, a great +deal easier, than she had imagined.</p> + +<p>At five o’clock she rose, unlocked her trunk, and took out a sealed +packet which she slipped into the bosom of her dress. Even the contact +with the packet did not shake her nerves as she had half-expected it +would. She seemed encased in a strong armour of indifference, as though +the vigorous exertion of her will had finally benumbed her finer +sensibilities.</p> + +<p>She dressed herself once more for the street, locked her door and went +out. When she emerged on the pavement, the day was still high, but a +threat of rain darkened the sky and cold gusts shook the signs projecting +from the basement shops along the street. She reached Fifth Avenue and +began to walk slowly northward. She was sufficiently familiar with Mrs. +Dorset’s habits to know that she could always be found at home after +five. She might not, indeed, be accessible to visitors, especially to a +visitor so unwelcome, and against whom it was quite possible that she had +guarded herself by special orders; but Lily had written a note which she +meant to send up with her name, and which she thought would secure her +admission.</p> + +<p>She had allowed herself time to walk to Mrs. Dorset’s, thinking that the +quick movement through the cold evening air would help to steady her +nerves; but she really felt no need of being tranquillized. Her survey of +the situation remained calm and unwavering.</p> + +<p>As she reached Fiftieth Street the clouds broke abruptly, and a rush of +cold rain slanted into her face. She had no umbrella and the moisture +quickly penetrated her thin spring dress. She was still half a mile from +her destination, and she decided to walk across to Madison Avenue and +take the electric car. As she turned into the side street, a vague memory +stirred in her. The row of budding trees, the new brick and limestone +house-fronts, the Georgian flat-house with flower-boxes on its balconies, +were merged together into the setting of a familiar scene. It was down +this street that she had walked with Selden, that September day two years +ago; a few yards ahead was the doorway they had entered together. The +recollection loosened a throng of benumbed sensations—longings, regrets, +imaginings, the throbbing brood of the only spring her heart had ever +known. It was strange to find herself passing his house on such an +errand. She seemed suddenly to see her action as he would see it—and the +fact of his own connection with it, the fact that, to attain her end, she +must trade on his name, and profit by a secret of his past, chilled her +blood with shame. What a long way she had travelled since the day of +their first talk together! Even then her feet had been set in the path +she was now following—even then she had resisted the hand he had held +out.</p> + +<p>All her resentment of his fancied coldness was swept away in this +overwhelming rush of recollection. Twice he had been ready to help +her—to help her by loving her, as he had said—and if, the third time, +he had seemed to fail her, whom but herself could she accuse?... +Well, that part of her life was over; she did not know why her thoughts +still clung to it. But the sudden longing to see him remained; it grew to +hunger as she paused on the pavement opposite his door. The street was +dark and empty, swept by the rain. She had a vision of his quiet room, of +the bookshelves, and the fire on the hearth. She looked up and saw a +light in his window; then she crossed the street and entered the house.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_12a">Chapter 12</h2> + +<p>The library looked as she had pictured it. The green-shaded lamps made +tranquil circles of light in the gathering dusk, a little fire flickered +on the hearth, and Selden’s easy-chair, which stood near it, had been +pushed aside when he rose to admit her.</p> + +<p>He had checked his first movement of surprise, and stood silent, waiting +for her to speak, while she paused a moment on the threshold, assailed by +a rush of memories.</p> + +<p>The scene was unchanged. She recognized the row of shelves from which he +had taken down his La Bruyere, and the worn arm of the chair he had +leaned against while she examined the precious volume. But then the wide +September light had filled the room, making it seem a part of the outer +world: now the shaded lamps and the warm hearth, detaching it from the +gathering darkness of the street, gave it a sweeter touch of intimacy.</p> + +<p>Becoming gradually aware of the surprise under Selden’s silence, Lily +turned to him and said simply: “I came to tell you that I was sorry for +the way we parted—for what I said to you that day at Mrs. Hatch’s.”</p> + +<p>The words rose to her lips spontaneously. Even on her way up the stairs, +she had not thought of preparing a pretext for her visit, but she now +felt an intense longing to dispel the cloud of misunderstanding that hung +between them.</p> + +<p>Selden returned her look with a smile. “I was sorry too that we should +have parted in that way; but I am not sure I didn’t bring it on myself. +Luckily I had foreseen the risk I was taking——”</p> + +<p>“So that you really didn’t care——?” broke from her with a flash of her +old irony.</p> + +<p>“So that I was prepared for the consequences,” he corrected +good-humouredly. “But we’ll talk of all this later. Do come and sit by +the fire. I can recommend that arm-chair, if you’ll let me put a cushion +behind you.”</p> + +<p>While he spoke she had moved slowly to the middle of the room, and paused +near his writing-table, where the lamp, striking upward, cast exaggerated +shadows on the pallor of her delicately-hollowed face.</p> + +<p>“You look tired—do sit down,” he repeated gently.</p> + +<p>She did not seem to hear the request. “I wanted you to know that I left +Mrs. Hatch immediately after I saw you,” she said, as though continuing +her confession.</p> + +<p>“Yes—yes; I know,” he assented, with a rising tinge of embarrassment.</p> + +<p>“And that I did so because you told me to. Before you came I had already +begun to see that it would be impossible to remain with her—for the +reasons you gave me; but I wouldn’t admit it—I wouldn’t let you see that +I understood what you meant.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, I might have trusted you to find your own way out—don’t overwhelm +me with the sense of my officiousness!”</p> + +<p>His light tone, in which, had her nerves been steadier, she would have +recognized the mere effort to bridge over an awkward moment, jarred on +her passionate desire to be understood. In her strange state of +extra-lucidity, which gave her the sense of being already at the heart of +the situation, it seemed incredible that any one should think it +necessary to linger in the conventional outskirts of word-play and +evasion.</p> + +<p>“It was not that—I was not ungrateful,” she insisted. But the power of +expression failed her suddenly; she felt a tremor in her throat, and two +tears gathered and fell slowly from her eyes.</p> + +<p>Selden moved forward and took her hand. “You are very tired. Why won’t +you sit down and let me make you comfortable?”</p> + +<p>He drew her to the arm-chair near the fire, and placed a cushion behind +her shoulders.</p> + +<p>“And now you must let me make you some tea: you know I always have that +amount of hospitality at my command.”</p> + +<p>She shook her head, and two more tears ran over. But she did not weep +easily, and the long habit of self-control reasserted itself, though she +was still too tremulous to speak.</p> + +<p>“You know I can coax the water to boil in five minutes,” Selden +continued, speaking as though she were a troubled child.</p> + +<p>His words recalled the vision of that other afternoon when they had sat +together over his tea-table and talked jestingly of her future. There +were moments when that day seemed more remote than any other event in her +life; and yet she could always relive it in its minutest detail.</p> + +<p>She made a gesture of refusal. “No: I drink too much tea. I would rather +sit quiet—I must go in a moment,” she added confusedly.</p> + +<p>Selden continued to stand near her, leaning against the mantelpiece. The +tinge of constraint was beginning to be more distinctly perceptible under +the friendly ease of his manner. Her self-absorption had not allowed her +to perceive it at first; but now that her consciousness was once more +putting forth its eager feelers, she saw that her presence was becoming +an embarrassment to him. Such a situation can be saved only by an +immediate outrush of feeling; and on Selden’s side the determining +impulse was still lacking.</p> + +<p>The discovery did not disturb Lily as it might once have done. She had +passed beyond the phase of well-bred reciprocity, in which every +demonstration must be scrupulously proportioned to the emotion it +elicits, and generosity of feeling is the only ostentation condemned. +But the sense of loneliness returned with redoubled force as she saw +herself forever shut out from Selden’s inmost self. She had come to him +with no definite purpose; the mere longing to see him had directed her; +but the secret hope she had carried with her suddenly revealed itself in +its death-pang.</p> + +<p>“I must go,” she repeated, making a motion to rise from her chair. “But I +may not see you again for a long time, and I wanted to tell you that I +have never forgotten the things you said to me at Bellomont, and that +sometimes—sometimes when I seemed farthest from remembering them—they +have helped me, and kept me from mistakes; kept me from really becoming +what many people have thought me.”</p> + +<p>Strive as she would to put some order in her thoughts, the words would +not come more clearly; yet she felt that she could not leave him without +trying to make him understand that she had saved herself whole from the +seeming ruin of her life.</p> + +<p>A change had come over Selden’s face as she spoke. Its guarded look had +yielded to an expression still untinged by personal emotion, but full of +a gentle understanding.</p> + +<p>“I am glad to have you tell me that; but nothing I have said has really +made the difference. The difference is in yourself—it will always be +there. And since it IS there, it can’t really matter to you what people +think: you are so sure that your friends will always understand you.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, don’t say that—don’t say that what you have told me has made no +difference. It seems to shut me out—to leave me all alone with the other +people.” She had risen and stood before him, once more completely +mastered by the inner urgency of the moment. The consciousness of his +half-divined reluctance had vanished. Whether he wished it or not, he +must see her wholly for once before they parted.</p> + +<p>Her voice had gathered strength, and she looked him gravely in the eyes +as she continued. “Once—twice—you gave me the chance to escape from my +life, and I refused it: refused it because I was a coward. Afterward I +saw my mistake—I saw I could never be happy with what had contented me +before. But it was too late: you had judged me—I understood. It was too +late for happiness—but not too late to be helped by the thought of what +I had missed. That is all I have lived on—don’t take it from me now! +Even in my worst moments it has been like a little light in the darkness. +Some women are strong enough to be good by themselves, but I needed the +help of your belief in me. Perhaps I might have resisted a great +temptation, but the little ones would have pulled me down. And then I +remembered—I remembered your saying that such a life could never satisfy +me; and I was ashamed to admit to myself that it could. That is what you +did for me—that is what I wanted to thank you for. I wanted to tell you +that I have always remembered; and that I have tried—tried hard....”</p> + +<p>She broke off suddenly. Her tears had risen again, and in drawing out her +handkerchief her fingers touched the packet in the folds of her dress. A +wave of colour suffused her, and the words died on her lips. Then she +lifted her eyes to his and went on in an altered voice.</p> + +<p>“I have tried hard—but life is difficult, and I am a very useless +person. I can hardly be said to have an independent existence. I was just +a screw or a cog in the great machine I called life, and when I dropped +out of it I found I was of no use anywhere else. What can one do when one +finds that one only fits into one hole? One must get back to it or be +thrown out into the rubbish heap—and you don’t know what it’s like in +the rubbish heap!”</p> + +<p>Her lips wavered into a smile—she had been distracted by the whimsical +remembrance of the confidences she had made to him, two years earlier, in +that very room. Then she had been planning to marry Percy Gryce—what was +it she was planning now?</p> + +<p>The blood had risen strongly under Selden’s dark skin, but his emotion +showed itself only in an added seriousness of manner.</p> + +<p>“You have something to tell me—do you mean to marry?” he said abruptly.</p> + +<p>Lily’s eyes did not falter, but a look of wonder, of puzzled +self-interrogation, formed itself slowly in their depths. In the light of +his question, she had paused to ask herself if her decision had really +been taken when she entered the room.</p> + +<p>“You always told me I should have to come to it sooner or later!” she +said with a faint smile.</p> + +<p>“And you have come to it now?”</p> + +<p>“I shall have to come to it—presently. But there is something else I +must come to first.” She paused again, trying to transmit to her voice +the steadiness of her recovered smile. “There is some one I must say +goodbye to. Oh, not YOU—we are sure to see each other again—but the +Lily Bart you knew. I have kept her with me all this time, but now we are +going to part, and I have brought her back to you—I am going to leave +her here. When I go out presently she will not go with me. I shall like +to think that she has stayed with you—and she’ll be no trouble, she’ll +take up no room.”</p> + +<p>She went toward him, and put out her hand, still smiling. “Will you let +her stay with you?” she asked.</p> + +<p>He caught her hand, and she felt in his the vibration of feeling that had +not yet risen to his lips. “Lily—can’t I help you?” he exclaimed.</p> + +<p>She looked at him gently. “Do you remember what you said to me once? +That you could help me only by loving me? Well—you did love me for a +moment; and it helped me. It has always helped me. But the moment is +gone—it was I who let it go. And one must go on living. Goodbye.”</p> + +<p>She laid her other hand on his, and they looked at each other with a kind +of solemnity, as though they stood in the presence of death. Something +in truth lay dead between them—the love she had killed in him and could +no longer call to life. But something lived between them also, and leaped +up in her like an imperishable flame: it was the love his love had +kindled, the passion of her soul for his.</p> + +<p>In its light everything else dwindled and fell away from her. She +understood now that she could not go forth and leave her old self with +him: that self must indeed live on in his presence, but it must still +continue to be hers.</p> + +<p>Selden had retained her hand, and continued to scrutinize her with a +strange sense of foreboding. The external aspect of the situation had +vanished for him as completely as for her: he felt it only as one of +those rare moments which lift the veil from their faces as they pass.</p> + +<p>“Lily,” he said in a low voice, “you mustn’t speak in this way. I can’t +let you go without knowing what you mean to do. Things may change—but +they don’t pass. You can never go out of my life.”</p> + +<p>She met his eyes with an illumined look. “No,” she said. “I see that now. +Let us always be friends. Then I shall feel safe, whatever happens.”</p> + +<p>“Whatever happens? What do you mean? What is going to happen?”</p> + +<p>She turned away quietly and walked toward the hearth.</p> + +<p>“Nothing at present—except that I am very cold, and that before I go you +must make up the fire for me.”</p> + +<p>She knelt on the hearth-rug, stretching her hands to the embers. Puzzled +by the sudden change in her tone, he mechanically gathered a handful of +wood from the basket and tossed it on the fire. As he did so, he noticed +how thin her hands looked against the rising light of the flames. He saw +too, under the loose lines of her dress, how the curves of her figure had +shrunk to angularity; he remembered long afterward how the red play of +the flame sharpened the depression of her nostrils, and intensified the +blackness of the shadows which struck up from her cheekbones to her eyes. +She knelt there for a few moments in silence; a silence which he dared +not break. When she rose he fancied that he saw her draw something from +her dress and drop it into the fire; but he hardly noticed the gesture at +the time. His faculties seemed tranced, and he was still groping for the +word to break the spell. She went up to him and laid her hands on his +shoulders. “Goodbye,” she said, and as he bent over her she touched his +forehead with her lips.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_13a">Chapter 13</h2> + +<p>The street-lamps were lit, but the rain had ceased, and there was a +momentary revival of light in the upper sky. Lily walked on unconscious +of her surroundings. She was still treading the buoyant ether which +emanates from the high moments of life. But gradually it shrank away from +her and she felt the dull pavement beneath her feet. The sense of +weariness returned with accumulated force, and for a moment she felt that +she could walk no farther. She had reached the corner of Forty-first +Street and Fifth Avenue, and she remembered that in Bryant Park there +were seats where she might rest.</p> + +<p>That melancholy pleasure-ground was almost deserted when she entered it, +and she sank down on an empty bench in the glare of an electric +street-lamp. The warmth of the fire had passed out of her veins, and she +told herself that she must not sit long in the penetrating dampness which +struck up from the wet asphalt. But her will-power seemed to have spent +itself in a last great effort, and she was lost in the blank reaction +which follows on an unwonted expenditure of energy. And besides, what was +there to go home to? Nothing but the silence of her cheerless room—that +silence of the night which may be more racking to tired nerves than the +most discordant noises: that, and the bottle of chloral by her bed. The +thought of the chloral was the only spot of light in the dark prospect: +she could feel its lulling influence stealing over her already. But she +was troubled by the thought that it was losing its power—she dared not +go back to it too soon. Of late the sleep it had brought her had been +more broken and less profound; there had been nights when she was +perpetually floating up through it to consciousness. What if the effect +of the drug should gradually fail, as all narcotics were said to fail? +She remembered the chemist’s warning against increasing the dose; and she +had heard before of the capricious and incalculable action of the drug. +Her dread of returning to a sleepless night was so great that she +lingered on, hoping that excessive weariness would reinforce the waning +power of the chloral.</p> + +<p>Night had now closed in, and the roar of traffic in Forty-second Street +was dying out. As complete darkness fell on the square the lingering +occupants of the benches rose and dispersed; but now and then a stray +figure, hurrying homeward, struck across the path where Lily sat, looming +black for a moment in the white circle of electric light. One or two of +these passers-by slackened their pace to glance curiously at her lonely +figure; but she was hardly conscious of their scrutiny.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, however, she became aware that one of the passing shadows +remained stationary between her line of vision and the gleaming asphalt; +and raising her eyes she saw a young woman bending over her.</p> + +<p>“Excuse me—are you sick?—Why, it’s Miss Bart!” a half-familiar voice +exclaimed.</p> + +<p>Lily looked up. The speaker was a poorly-dressed young woman with a +bundle under her arm. Her face had the air of unwholesome refinement +which ill-health and over-work may produce, but its common prettiness was +redeemed by the strong and generous curve of the lips.</p> + +<p>“You don’t remember me,” she continued, brightening with the pleasure of +recognition, “but I’d know you anywhere, I’ve thought of you such a lot. +I guess my folks all know your name by heart. I was one of the girls at +Miss Farish’s club—you helped me to go to the country that time I had +lung-trouble. My name’s Nettie Struther. It was Nettie Crane then—but I +daresay you don’t remember that either.”</p> + +<p>Yes: Lily was beginning to remember. The episode of Nettie Crane’s timely +rescue from disease had been one of the most satisfying incidents of her +connection with Gerty’s charitable work. She had furnished the girl with +the means to go to a sanatorium in the mountains: it struck her now with +a peculiar irony that the money she had used had been Gus Trenor’s.</p> + +<p>She tried to reply, to assure the speaker that she had not forgotten; but +her voice failed in the effort, and she felt herself sinking under a +great wave of physical weakness. Nettie Struther, with a startled +exclamation, sat down and slipped a shabbily-clad arm behind her back.</p> + +<p>“Why, Miss Bart, you ARE sick. Just lean on me a little till you feel +better.”</p> + +<p>A faint glow of returning strength seemed to pass into Lily from the +pressure of the supporting arm.</p> + +<p>“I’m only tired—it is nothing,” she found voice to say in a moment; and +then, as she met the timid appeal of her companion’s eyes, she added +involuntarily: “I have been unhappy—in great trouble.”</p> + +<p>“YOU in trouble? I’ve always thought of you as being so high up, where +everything was just grand. Sometimes, when I felt real mean, and got to +wondering why things were so queerly fixed in the world, I used to +remember that you were having a lovely time, anyhow, and that seemed to +show there was a kind of justice somewhere. But you mustn’t sit here too +long—it’s fearfully damp. Don’t you feel strong enough to walk on a +little ways now?” she broke off.</p> + +<p>“Yes—yes; I must go home,” Lily murmured, rising.</p> + +<p>Her eyes rested wonderingly on the thin shabby figure at her side. She +had known Nettie Crane as one of the discouraged victims of over-work and +anaemic parentage: one of the superfluous fragments of life destined to +be swept prematurely into that social refuse-heap of which Lily had so +lately expressed her dread. But Nettie Struther’s frail envelope was now +alive with hope and energy: whatever fate the future reserved for her, +she would not be cast into the refuse-heap without a struggle.</p> + +<p>“I am very glad to have seen you,” Lily continued, summoning a smile to +her unsteady lips. “It’ll be my turn to think of you as happy—and the +world will seem a less unjust place to me too.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, but I can’t leave you like this—you’re not fit to go home alone. +And I can’t go with you either!” Nettie Struther wailed with a start of +recollection. “You see, it’s my husband’s night-shift—he’s a +motor-man—and the friend I leave the baby with has to step upstairs to +get HER husband’s supper at seven. I didn’t tell you I had a baby, did I? +She’ll be four months old day after tomorrow, and to look at her you +wouldn’t think I’d ever had a sick day. I’d give anything to show you the +baby, Miss Bart, and we live right down the street here—it’s only three +blocks off.” She lifted her eyes tentatively to Lily’s face, and then +added with a burst of courage: “Why won’t you get right into the cars and +come home with me while I get baby’s supper? It’s real warm in our +kitchen, and you can rest there, and I’ll take YOU home as soon as ever +she drops off to sleep.”</p> + +<p>It WAS warm in the kitchen, which, when Nettie Struther’s match had made +a flame leap from the gas-jet above the table, revealed itself to Lily as +extraordinarily small and almost miraculously clean. A fire shone through +the polished flanks of the iron stove, and near it stood a crib in which +a baby was sitting upright, with incipient anxiety struggling for +expression on a countenance still placid with sleep.</p> + +<p>Having passionately celebrated her reunion with her offspring, and +excused herself in cryptic language for the lateness of her return, +Nettie restored the baby to the crib and shyly invited Miss Bart to the +rocking-chair near the stove.</p> + +<p>“We’ve got a parlour too,” she explained with pardonable pride; “but I +guess it’s warmer in here, and I don’t want to leave you alone while I’m +getting baby’s supper.”</p> + +<p>On receiving Lily’s assurance that she much preferred the friendly +proximity of the kitchen fire, Mrs. Struther proceeded to prepare a +bottle of infantile food, which she tenderly applied to the baby’s +impatient lips; and while the ensuing degustation went on, she seated +herself with a beaming countenance beside her visitor.</p> + +<p>“You’re sure you won’t let me warm up a drop of coffee for you, Miss +Bart? There’s some of baby’s fresh milk left over—well, maybe you’d +rather just sit quiet and rest a little while. It’s too lovely having you +here. I’ve thought of it so often that I can’t believe it’s really come +true. I’ve said to George again and again: ‘I just wish Miss Bart could +see me NOW—’ and I used to watch for your name in the papers, and we’d +talk over what you were doing, and read the descriptions of the dresses +you wore. I haven’t seen your name for a long time, though, and I began +to be afraid you were sick, and it worried me so that George said I’d get +sick myself, fretting about it.” Her lips broke into a reminiscent smile. +“Well, I can’t afford to be sick again, that’s a fact: the last spell +nearly finished me. When you sent me off that time I never thought I’d +come back alive, and I didn’t much care if I did. You see I didn’t know +about George and the baby then.”</p> + +<p>She paused to readjust the bottle to the child’s bubbling mouth.</p> + +<p>“You precious—don’t you be in too much of a hurry! Was it mad with +mommer for getting its supper so late? Marry Anto’nette—that’s what we +call her: after the French queen in that play at the Garden—I told +George the actress reminded me of you, and that made me fancy the +name.... I never thought I’d get married, you know, and I’d never have +had the heart to go on working just for myself.”</p> + +<p>She broke off again, and meeting the encouragement in Lily’s eyes, went +on, with a flush rising under her anaemic skin: “You see I wasn’t only +just SICK that time you sent me off—I was dreadfully unhappy too. I’d +known a gentleman where I was employed—I don’t know as you remember I +did type-writing in a big importing firm—and—well—I thought we were to +be married: he’d gone steady with me six months and given me his mother’s +wedding ring. But I presume he was too stylish for me—he travelled for +the firm, and had seen a great deal of society. Work girls aren’t looked +after the way you are, and they don’t always know how to look after +themselves. I didn’t . . . and it pretty near killed me when he went away +and left off writing....</p> + +<p>“It was then I came down sick—I thought it was the end of everything. I +guess it would have been if you hadn’t sent me off. But when I found I +was getting well I began to take heart in spite of myself. And then, +when I got back home, George came round and asked me to marry him. At +first I thought I couldn’t, because we’d been brought up together, and I +knew he knew about me. But after a while I began to see that that made it +easier. I never could have told another man, and I’d never have married +without telling; but if George cared for me enough to have me as I was, I +didn’t see why I shouldn’t begin over again—and I did.”</p> + +<p>The strength of the victory shone forth from her as she lifted her +irradiated face from the child on her knees. “But, mercy, I didn’t mean +to go on like this about myself, with you sitting there looking so fagged +out. Only it’s so lovely having you here, and letting you see just how +you’ve helped me.” The baby had sunk back blissfully replete, and Mrs. +Struther softly rose to lay the bottle aside. Then she paused before Miss +Bart.</p> + +<p>“I only wish I could help YOU—but I suppose there’s nothing on earth I +could do,” she murmured wistfully.</p> + +<p>Lily, instead of answering, rose with a smile and held out her arms; and +the mother, understanding the gesture, laid her child in them.</p> + +<p>The baby, feeling herself detached from her habitual anchorage, made an +instinctive motion of resistance; but the soothing influences of +digestion prevailed, and Lily felt the soft weight sink trustfully +against her breast. The child’s confidence in its safety thrilled her +with a sense of warmth and returning life, and she bent over, wondering +at the rosy blur of the little face, the empty clearness of the eyes, the +vague tendrilly motions of the folding and unfolding fingers. At first +the burden in her arms seemed as light as a pink cloud or a heap of down, +but as she continued to hold it the weight increased, sinking deeper, and +penetrating her with a strange sense of weakness, as though the child +entered into her and became a part of herself.</p> + +<p>She looked up, and saw Nettie’s eyes resting on her with tenderness and +exultation.</p> + +<p>“Wouldn’t it be too lovely for anything if she could grow up to be just +like you? Of course I know she never COULD—but mothers are always +dreaming the craziest things for their children.”</p> + +<p>Lily clasped the child close for a moment and laid her back in her +mother’s arms.</p> + +<p>“Oh, she must not do that—I should be afraid to come and see her too +often!” she said with a smile; and then, resisting Mrs. Struther’s +anxious offer of companionship, and reiterating the promise that of +course she would come back soon, and make George’s acquaintance, and see +the baby in her bath, she passed out of the kitchen and went alone down +the tenement stairs.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>As she reached the street she realized that she felt stronger and +happier: the little episode had done her good. It was the first time she +had ever come across the results of her spasmodic benevolence, and the +surprised sense of human fellowship took the mortal chill from her heart.</p> + +<p>It was not till she entered her own door that she felt the reaction of a +deeper loneliness. It was long after seven o’clock, and the light and +odours proceeding from the basement made it manifest that the +boarding-house dinner had begun. She hastened up to her room, lit the +gas, and began to dress. She did not mean to pamper herself any longer, +to go without food because her surroundings made it unpalatable. Since it +was her fate to live in a boarding-house, she must learn to fall in with +the conditions of the life. Nevertheless she was glad that, when she +descended to the heat and glare of the dining-room, the repast was nearly +over.</p> + +<hr class="tb" /> + +<p>In her own room again, she was seized with a sudden fever of activity. +For weeks past she had been too listless and indifferent to set her +possessions in order, but now she began to examine systematically the +contents of her drawers and cupboard. She had a few handsome dresses +left—survivals of her last phase of splendour, on the Sabrina and in +London—but when she had been obliged to part with her maid she had given +the woman a generous share of her cast-off apparel. The remaining +dresses, though they had lost their freshness, still kept the long +unerring lines, the sweep and amplitude of the great artist’s stroke, and +as she spread them out on the bed the scenes in which they had been worn +rose vividly before her. An association lurked in every fold: each fall +of lace and gleam of embroidery was like a letter in the record of her +past. She was startled to find how the atmosphere of her old life +enveloped her. But, after all, it was the life she had been made for: +every dawning tendency in her had been carefully directed toward it, all +her interests and activities had been taught to centre around it. She +was like some rare flower grown for exhibition, a flower from which every +bud had been nipped except the crowning blossom of her beauty.</p> + +<p>Last of all, she drew forth from the bottom of her trunk a heap of white +drapery which fell shapelessly across her arm. It was the Reynolds dress +she had worn in the Bry TABLEAUX. It had been impossible for her to give +it away, but she had never seen it since that night, and the long +flexible folds, as she shook them out, gave forth an odour of violets +which came to her like a breath from the flower-edged fountain where she +had stood with Lawrence Selden and disowned her fate. She put back the +dresses one by one, laying away with each some gleam of light, some note +of laughter, some stray waft from the rosy shores of pleasure. She was +still in a state of highly-wrought impressionability, and every hint of +the past sent a lingering tremor along her nerves.</p> + +<p>She had just closed her trunk on the white folds of the Reynolds dress +when she heard a tap at her door, and the red fist of the Irish +maid-servant thrust in a belated letter. Carrying it to the light, Lily +read with surprise the address stamped on the upper corner of the +envelope. It was a business communication from the office of her aunt’s +executors, and she wondered what unexpected development had caused them +to break silence before the appointed time. She opened the envelope and a +cheque fluttered to the floor. As she stooped to pick it up the blood +rushed to her face. The cheque represented the full amount of Mrs. +Peniston’s legacy, and the letter accompanying it explained that the +executors, having adjusted the business of the estate with less delay +than they had expected, had decided to anticipate the date fixed for the +payment of the bequests.</p> + +<p>Lily sat down beside the desk at the foot of her bed, and spreading out +the cheque, read over and over the TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS written across it +in a steely business hand. Ten months earlier the amount it stood for had +represented the depths of penury; but her standard of values had changed +in the interval, and now visions of wealth lurked in every flourish of +the pen. As she continued to gaze at it, she felt the glitter of the +visions mounting to her brain, and after a while she lifted the lid of +the desk and slipped the magic formula out of sight. It was easier to +think without those five figures dancing before her eyes; and she had a +great deal of thinking to do before she slept.</p> + +<p>She opened her cheque-book, and plunged into such anxious calculations as +had prolonged her vigil at Bellomont on the night when she had decided to +marry Percy Gryce. Poverty simplifies book-keeping, and her financial +situation was easier to ascertain than it had been then; but she had not +yet learned the control of money, and during her transient phase of +luxury at the Emporium she had slipped back into habits of extravagance +which still impaired her slender balance. A careful examination of her +cheque-book, and of the unpaid bills in her desk, showed that, when the +latter had been settled, she would have barely enough to live on for the +next three or four months; and even after that, if she were to continue +her present way of living, without earning any additional money, all +incidental expenses must be reduced to the vanishing point. She hid her +eyes with a shudder, beholding herself at the entrance of that +ever-narrowing perspective down which she had seen Miss Silverton’s dowdy +figure take its despondent way.</p> + +<p>It was no longer, however, from the vision of material poverty that she +turned with the greatest shrinking. She had a sense of deeper +empoverishment—of an inner destitution compared to which outward +conditions dwindled into insignificance. It was indeed miserable to be +poor—to look forward to a shabby, anxious middle-age, leading by dreary +degrees of economy and self-denial to gradual absorption in the dingy +communal existence of the boarding-house. But there was something more +miserable still—it was the clutch of solitude at her heart, the sense of +being swept like a stray uprooted growth down the heedless current of the +years. That was the feeling which possessed her now—the feeling of being +something rootless and ephemeral, mere spin-drift of the whirling surface +of existence, without anything to which the poor little tentacles of self +could cling before the awful flood submerged them. And as she looked back +she saw that there had never been a time when she had had any real +relation to life. Her parents too had been rootless, blown hither and +thither on every wind of fashion, without any personal existence to +shelter them from its shifting gusts. She herself had grown up without +any one spot of earth being dearer to her than another: there was no +centre of early pieties, of grave endearing traditions, to which her +heart could revert and from which it could draw strength for itself and +tenderness for others. In whatever form a slowly-accumulated past lives +in the blood—whether in the concrete image of the old house stored with +visual memories, or in the conception of the house not built with hands, +but made up of inherited passions and loyalties—it has the same power of +broadening and deepening the individual existence, of attaching it by +mysterious links of kinship to all the mighty sum of human striving.</p> + +<p>Such a vision of the solidarity of life had never before come to Lily. +She had had a premonition of it in the blind motions of her +mating-instinct; but they had been checked by the disintegrating +influences of the life about her. All the men and women she knew were +like atoms whirling away from each other in some wild centrifugal dance: +her first glimpse of the continuity of life had come to her that evening +in Nettie Struther’s kitchen.</p> + +<p>The poor little working-girl who had found strength to gather up the +fragments of her life, and build herself a shelter with them, seemed to +Lily to have reached the central truth of existence. It was a meagre +enough life, on the grim edge of poverty, with scant margin for +possibilities of sickness or mischance, but it had the frail audacious +permanence of a bird’s nest built on the edge of a cliff—a mere wisp of +leaves and straw, yet so put together that the lives entrusted to it may +hang safely over the abyss.</p> + +<p>Yes—but it had taken two to build the nest; the man’s faith as well as +the woman’s courage. Lily remembered Nettie’s words: I KNEW HE KNEW ABOUT +ME. Her husband’s faith in her had made her renewal possible—it is so +easy for a woman to become what the man she loves believes her to be! +Well—Selden had twice been ready to stake his faith on Lily Bart; but +the third trial had been too severe for his endurance. The very quality +of his love had made it the more impossible to recall to life. If it had +been a simple instinct of the blood, the power of her beauty might have +revived it. But the fact that it struck deeper, that it was inextricably +wound up with inherited habits of thought and feeling, made it as +impossible to restore to growth as a deep-rooted plant torn from its bed. +Selden had given her of his best; but he was as incapable as herself of +an uncritical return to former states of feeling.</p> + +<p>There remained to her, as she had told him, the uplifting memory of his +faith in her; but she had not reached the age when a woman can live on +her memories. As she held Nettie Struther’s child in her arms the frozen +currents of youth had loosed themselves and run warm in her veins: the +old life-hunger possessed her, and all her being clamoured for its share +of personal happiness. Yes—it was happiness she still wanted, and the +glimpse she had caught of it made everything else of no account. One by +one she had detached herself from the baser possibilities, and she saw +that nothing now remained to her but the emptiness of renunciation.</p> + +<p>It was growing late, and an immense weariness once more possessed her. +It was not the stealing sense of sleep, but a vivid wakeful fatigue, a +wan lucidity of mind against which all the possibilities of the future +were shadowed forth gigantically. She was appalled by the intense +cleanness of the vision; she seemed to have broken through the merciful +veil which intervenes between intention and action, and to see exactly +what she would do in all the long days to come. There was the cheque in +her desk, for instance—she meant to use it in paying her debt to Trenor; +but she foresaw that when the morning came she would put off doing so, +would slip into gradual tolerance of the debt. The thought terrified +her—she dreaded to fall from the height of her last moment with Lawrence +Selden. But how could she trust herself to keep her footing? She knew the +strength of the opposing impulses—she could feel the countless hands of +habit dragging her back into some fresh compromise with fate. She felt an +intense longing to prolong, to perpetuate, the momentary exaltation of +her spirit. If only life could end now—end on this tragic yet sweet +vision of lost possibilities, which gave her a sense of kinship with all +the loving and foregoing in the world!</p> + +<p>She reached out suddenly and, drawing the cheque from her writing-desk, +enclosed it in an envelope which she addressed to her bank. She then +wrote out a cheque for Trenor, and placing it, without an accompanying +word, in an envelope inscribed with his name, laid the two letters side +by side on her desk. After that she continued to sit at the table, +sorting her papers and writing, till the intense silence of the house +reminded her of the lateness of the hour. In the street the noise of +wheels had ceased, and the rumble of the “elevated” came only at long +intervals through the deep unnatural hush. In the mysterious nocturnal +separation from all outward signs of life, she felt herself more +strangely confronted with her fate. The sensation made her brain reel, +and she tried to shut out consciousness by pressing her hands against her +eyes. But the terrible silence and emptiness seemed to symbolize her +future—she felt as though the house, the street, the world were all +empty, and she alone left sentient in a lifeless universe.</p> + +<p>But this was the verge of delirium . . . she had never hung so near the +dizzy brink of the unreal. Sleep was what she wanted—she remembered that +she had not closed her eyes for two nights. The little bottle was at her +bed-side, waiting to lay its spell upon her. She rose and undressed +hastily, hungering now for the touch of her pillow. She felt so +profoundly tired that she thought she must fall asleep at once; but as +soon as she had lain down every nerve started once more into separate +wakefulness. It was as though a great blaze of electric light had been +turned on in her head, and her poor little anguished self shrank and +cowered in it, without knowing where to take refuge.</p> + +<p>She had not imagined that such a multiplication of wakefulness was +possible: her whole past was reenacting itself at a hundred different +points of consciousness. Where was the drug that could still this legion +of insurgent nerves? The sense of exhaustion would have been sweet +compared to this shrill beat of activities; but weariness had dropped +from her as though some cruel stimulant had been forced into her veins.</p> + +<p>She could bear it—yes, she could bear it; but what strength would be +left her the next day? Perspective had disappeared—the next day pressed +close upon her, and on its heels came the days that were to follow—they +swarmed about her like a shrieking mob. She must shut them out for a few +hours; she must take a brief bath of oblivion. She put out her hand, and +measured the soothing drops into a glass; but as she did so, she knew +they would be powerless against the supernatural lucidity of her brain. +She had long since raised the dose to its highest limit, but tonight she +felt she must increase it. She knew she took a slight risk in doing +so—she remembered the chemist’s warning. If sleep came at all, it might +be a sleep without waking. But after all that was but one chance in a +hundred: the action of the drug was incalculable, and the addition of a +few drops to the regular dose would probably do no more than procure for +her the rest she so desperately needed....</p> + +<p>She did not, in truth, consider the question very closely—the physical +craving for sleep was her only sustained sensation. Her mind shrank from +the glare of thought as instinctively as eyes contract in a blaze of +light—darkness, darkness was what she must have at any cost. She raised +herself in bed and swallowed the contents of the glass; then she blew out +her candle and lay down.</p> + +<p>She lay very still, waiting with a sensuous pleasure for the first +effects of the soporific. She knew in advance what form they would +take—the gradual cessation of the inner throb, the soft approach of +passiveness, as though an invisible hand made magic passes over her in +the darkness. The very slowness and hesitancy of the effect increased its +fascination: it was delicious to lean over and look down into the dim +abysses of unconsciousness. Tonight the drug seemed to work more slowly +than usual: each passionate pulse had to be stilled in turn, and it was +long before she felt them dropping into abeyance, like sentinels falling +asleep at their posts. But gradually the sense of complete subjugation +came over her, and she wondered languidly what had made her feel so +uneasy and excited. She saw now that there was nothing to be excited +about—she had returned to her normal view of life. Tomorrow would not be +so difficult after all: she felt sure that she would have the strength to +meet it. She did not quite remember what it was that she had been afraid +to meet, but the uncertainty no longer troubled her. She had been +unhappy, and now she was happy—she had felt herself alone, and now the +sense of loneliness had vanished.</p> + +<p>She stirred once, and turned on her side, and as she did so, she suddenly +understood why she did not feel herself alone. It was odd—but Nettie +Struther’s child was lying on her arm: she felt the pressure of its +little head against her shoulder. She did not know how it had come there, +but she felt no great surprise at the fact, only a gentle penetrating +thrill of warmth and pleasure. She settled herself into an easier +position, hollowing her arm to pillow the round downy head, and holding +her breath lest a sound should disturb the sleeping child.</p> + +<p>As she lay there she said to herself that there was something she must +tell Selden, some word she had found that should make life clear between +them. She tried to repeat the word, which lingered vague and luminous on +the far edge of thought—she was afraid of not remembering it when she +woke; and if she could only remember it and say it to him, she felt that +everything would be well.</p> + +<p>Slowly the thought of the word faded, and sleep began to enfold her. She +struggled faintly against it, feeling that she ought to keep awake on +account of the baby; but even this feeling was gradually lost in an +indistinct sense of drowsy peace, through which, of a sudden, a dark +flash of loneliness and terror tore its way.</p> + +<p>She started up again, cold and trembling with the shock: for a moment she +seemed to have lost her hold of the child. But no—she was mistaken—the +tender pressure of its body was still close to hers: the recovered warmth +flowed through her once more, she yielded to it, sank into it, and slept.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="Chapter_14a">Chapter 14</h2> + +<p>The next morning rose mild and bright, with a promise of summer in the +air. The sunlight slanted joyously down Lily’s street, mellowed the +blistered house-front, gilded the paintless railings of the doorstep, +and struck prismatic glories from the panes of her darkened window.</p> + +<p>When such a day coincides with the inner mood there is intoxication in +its breath; and Selden, hastening along the street through the squalor of +its morning confidences, felt himself thrilling with a youthful sense of +adventure. He had cut loose from the familiar shores of habit, and +launched himself on uncharted seas of emotion; all the old tests and +measures were left behind, and his course was to be shaped by new stars.</p> + +<p>That course, for the moment, led merely to Miss Bart’s boarding-house; +but its shabby doorstep had suddenly become the threshold of the +untried. As he approached he looked up at the triple row of windows, +wondering boyishly which one of them was hers. It was nine o’clock, and +the house, being tenanted by workers, already showed an awakened front to +the street. He remembered afterward having noticed that only one blind +was down. He noticed too that there was a pot of pansies on one of the +window sills, and at once concluded that the window must be hers: it was +inevitable that he should connect her with the one touch of beauty in the +dingy scene.</p> + +<p>Nine o’clock was an early hour for a visit, but Selden had passed beyond +all such conventional observances. He only knew that he must see Lily +Bart at once—he had found the word he meant to say to her, and it could +not wait another moment to be said. It was strange that it had not come +to his lips sooner—that he had let her pass from him the evening before +without being able to speak it. But what did that matter, now that a new +day had come? It was not a word for twilight, but for the morning.</p> + +<p>Selden ran eagerly up the steps and pulled the bell; and even in his +state of self-absorption it came as a sharp surprise to him that the door +should open so promptly. It was still more of a surprise to see, as he +entered, that it had been opened by Gerty Farish—and that behind her, in +an agitated blur, several other figures ominously loomed.</p> + +<p>“Lawrence!” Gerty cried in a strange voice, “how could you get here so +quickly?”—and the trembling hand she laid on him seemed instantly to +close about his heart.</p> + +<p>He noticed the other faces, vague with fear and conjecture—he saw the +landlady’s imposing bulk sway professionally toward him; but he shrank +back, putting up his hand, while his eyes mechanically mounted the steep +black walnut stairs, up which he was immediately aware that his cousin +was about to lead him.</p> + +<p>A voice in the background said that the doctor might be back at any +minute—and that nothing, upstairs, was to be disturbed. Some one else +exclaimed: “It was the greatest mercy—” then Selden felt that Gerty had +taken him gently by the hand, and that they were to be suffered to go up +alone.</p> + +<p>In silence they mounted the three flights, and walked along the passage +to a closed door. Gerty opened the door, and Selden went in after her. +Though the blind was down, the irresistible sunlight poured a tempered +golden flood into the room, and in its light Selden saw a narrow bed +along the wall, and on the bed, with motionless hands and calm +unrecognizing face, the semblance of Lily Bart.</p> + +<p>That it was her real self, every pulse in him ardently denied. Her real +self had lain warm on his heart but a few hours earlier—what had he to +do with this estranged and tranquil face which, for the first time, +neither paled nor brightened at his coming?</p> + +<p>Gerty, strangely tranquil too, with the conscious self-control of one who +has ministered to much pain, stood by the bed, speaking gently, as if +transmitting a final message.</p> + +<p>“The doctor found a bottle of chloral—she had been sleeping badly for a +long time, and she must have taken an overdose by mistake.... There is no +doubt of that—no doubt—there will be no question—he has been very +kind. I told him that you and I would like to be left alone with her—to +go over her things before any one else comes. I know it is what she would +have wished.”</p> + +<p>Selden was hardly conscious of what she said. He stood looking down on +the sleeping face which seemed to lie like a delicate impalpable mask +over the living lineaments he had known. He felt that the real Lily was +still there, close to him, yet invisible and inaccessible; and the +tenuity of the barrier between them mocked him with a sense of +helplessness. There had never been more than a little impalpable barrier +between them—and yet he had suffered it to keep them apart! And now, +though it seemed slighter and frailer than ever, it had suddenly hardened +to adamant, and he might beat his life out against it in vain.</p> + +<p>He had dropped on his knees beside the bed, but a touch from Gerty +aroused him. He stood up, and as their eyes met he was struck by the +extraordinary light in his cousin’s face.</p> + +<p>“You understand what the doctor has gone for? He has promised that there +shall be no trouble—but of course the formalities must be gone through. +And I asked him to give us time to look through her things first——”</p> + +<p>He nodded, and she glanced about the small bare room. “It won’t take +long,” she concluded.</p> + +<p>“No—it won’t take long,” he agreed.</p> + +<p>She held his hand in hers a moment longer, and then, with a last look at +the bed, moved silently toward the door. On the threshold she paused to +add: “You will find me downstairs if you want me.”</p> + +<p>Selden roused himself to detain her. “But why are you going? She would +have wished——”</p> + +<p>Gerty shook her head with a smile. “No: this is what she would have +wished——” and as she spoke a light broke through Selden’s stony misery, +and he saw deep into the hidden things of love.</p> + +<p>The door closed on Gerty, and he stood alone with the motionless sleeper +on the bed. His impulse was to return to her side, to fall on his knees, +and rest his throbbing head against the peaceful cheek on the pillow. +They had never been at peace together, they two; and now he felt himself +drawn downward into the strange mysterious depths of her tranquillity.</p> + +<p>But he remembered Gerty’s warning words—he knew that, though time had +ceased in this room, its feet were hastening relentlessly toward the +door. Gerty had given him this supreme half hour, and he must use it as +she willed.</p> + +<p>He turned and looked about him, sternly compelling himself to regain his +consciousness of outward things. There was very little furniture in the +room. The shabby chest of drawers was spread with a lace cover, and set +out with a few gold-topped boxes and bottles, a rose-coloured +pin-cushion, a glass tray strewn with tortoise-shell hair-pins—he shrank +from the poignant intimacy of these trifles, and from the blank surface +of the toilet-mirror above them.</p> + +<p>These were the only traces of luxury, of that clinging to the minute +observance of personal seemliness, which showed what her other +renunciations must have cost. There was no other token of her personality +about the room, unless it showed itself in the scrupulous neatness of the +scant articles of furniture: a washing-stand, two chairs, a small +writing-desk, and the little table near the bed. On this table stood the +empty bottle and glass, and from these also he averted his eyes.</p> + +<p>The desk was closed, but on its slanting lid lay two letters which he +took up. One bore the address of a bank, and as it was stamped and +sealed, Selden, after a moment’s hesitation, laid it aside. On the other +letter he read Gus Trenor’s name; and the flap of the envelope was still +ungummed.</p> + +<p>Temptation leapt on him like the stab of a knife. He staggered under it, +steadying himself against the desk. Why had she been writing to +Trenor—writing, presumably, just after their parting of the previous +evening? The thought unhallowed the memory of that last hour, made a mock +of the word he had come to speak, and defiled even the reconciling +silence upon which it fell. He felt himself flung back on all the ugly +uncertainties from which he thought he had cast loose forever. After all, +what did he know of her life? Only as much as she had chosen to show him, +and measured by the world’s estimate, how little that was! By what +right—the letter in his hand seemed to ask—by what right was it he who +now passed into her confidence through the gate which death had left +unbarred? His heart cried out that it was by right of their last hour +together, the hour when she herself had placed the key in his hand. +Yes—but what if the letter to Trenor had been written afterward?</p> + +<p>He put it from him with sudden loathing, and setting his lips, addressed +himself resolutely to what remained of his task. After all, that task +would be easier to perform, now that his personal stake in it was +annulled.</p> + +<p>He raised the lid of the desk, and saw within it a cheque-book and a few +packets of bills and letters, arranged with the orderly precision which +characterized all her personal habits. He looked through the letters +first, because it was the most difficult part of the work. They proved to +be few and unimportant, but among them he found, with a strange commotion +of the heart, the note he had written her the day after the Brys’ +entertainment.</p> + +<p>“When may I come to you?”—his words overwhelmed him with a realization +of the cowardice which had driven him from her at the very moment of +attainment. Yes—he had always feared his fate, and he was too honest to +disown his cowardice now; for had not all his old doubts started to life +again at the mere sight of Trenor’s name?</p> + +<p>He laid the note in his card-case, folding it away carefully, as +something made precious by the fact that she had held it so; then, +growing once more aware of the lapse of time, he continued his +examination of the papers.</p> + +<p>To his surprise, he found that all the bills were receipted; there was +not an unpaid account among them. He opened the cheque-book, and saw +that, the very night before, a cheque of ten thousand dollars from Mrs. +Peniston’s executors had been entered in it. The legacy, then, had been +paid sooner than Gerty had led him to expect. But, turning another page +or two, he discovered with astonishment that, in spite of this recent +accession of funds, the balance had already declined to a few dollars. A +rapid glance at the stubs of the last cheques, all of which bore the date +of the previous day, showed that between four or five hundred dollars of +the legacy had been spent in the settlement of bills, while the remaining +thousands were comprehended in one cheque, made out, at the same time, to +Charles Augustus Trenor.</p> + +<p>Selden laid the book aside, and sank into the chair beside the desk. He +leaned his elbows on it, and hid his face in his hands. The bitter waters +of life surged high about him, their sterile taste was on his lips. Did +the cheque to Trenor explain the mystery or deepen it? At first his mind +refused to act—he felt only the taint of such a transaction between a +man like Trenor and a girl like Lily Bart. Then, gradually, his troubled +vision cleared, old hints and rumours came back to him, and out of the +very insinuations he had feared to probe, he constructed an explanation +of the mystery. It was true, then, that she had taken money from Trenor; +but true also, as the contents of the little desk declared, that the +obligation had been intolerable to her, and that at the first opportunity +she had freed herself from it, though the act left her face to face with +bare unmitigated poverty.</p> + +<p>That was all he knew—all he could hope to unravel of the story. The +mute lips on the pillow refused him more than this—unless indeed they +had told him the rest in the kiss they had left upon his forehead. Yes, +he could now read into that farewell all that his heart craved to find +there; he could even draw from it courage not to accuse himself for +having failed to reach the height of his opportunity.</p> + +<p>He saw that all the conditions of life had conspired to keep them apart; +since his very detachment from the external influences which swayed her +had increased his spiritual fastidiousness, and made it more difficult +for him to live and love uncritically. But at least he HAD loved her—had +been willing to stake his future on his faith in her—and if the moment +had been fated to pass from them before they could seize it, he saw now +that, for both, it had been saved whole out of the ruin of their lives.</p> + +<p>It was this moment of love, this fleeting victory over themselves, which +had kept them from atrophy and extinction; which, in her, had reached out +to him in every struggle against the influence of her surroundings, and +in him, had kept alive the faith that now drew him penitent and +reconciled to her side.</p> + +<p>He knelt by the bed and bent over her, draining their last moment to its +lees; and in the silence there passed between them the word which made +all clear.</p> + +<p class="center fs80 p2">THE END</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> +<div class="chapter"></div> +<div class="transnote"> +<p><b>Transcriber’s Note</b>:</p> + +<p>1. I have modernized this text by modernizing the contractions: do n’t +becomes don’t, etc.</p> + +<p>2. I have retained the British spelling of words like favour and colour.</p> + +<p>3. I found and corrected one instance of the name “Gertie,” which I +changed to “Gerty” to be consistent with rest of the book.</p> + +<p>Linda Ruoff</p> +</div> + + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOUSE OF MIRTH ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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