Chapter 7

No boy with the ordinary sources of pleasurable activity open to him can realize the gloom and despondency I felt at times when cut off from the healthful energies of other men. I was no longer morbid; I would not allow myself to feel that my infirmity was a bar to the enjoyment of life; yet, all the same, I dreaded society and shrank from the fresh conviction of inferiority I was certain to experience in going out with Harry, who was strongest where I was so weak. He was the most delightful fellow in society that I have ever seen. He comprehended everybody and everything with the grasp of an ardent and sympathetic spirit. He was happy in possessing a natural facility for pleasing women of all ages and all degrees. The professors' wives and daughters were all in love with him: his rooms were full of the work of white hands. He had as many smoking-caps as there are days in the week, and might have fitted out the entire class with slippers. But nobody wondered: he was so handsome and tall and godlike that every woman believed in him, and felt the charm of his grand manner, which put romance and chivalry into the act of helping her over a puddle.

I probably felt more reverence for the meanest woman we met in the street than he did for his grandest friend in society; but, nevertheless, his splendid courtesy illuminated the slightest social duty, whereas I stood rayless beside him. He had been unlucky where his mother was concerned: she was a weak woman to begin with, had never loved her husband, and had left him for another man, whom she married after the disgrace and sorrow she caused had killed her boy's father. Harry never spoke of this, but, perhaps unconsciously to himself, it had changed the feeling he might have had toward women into something defiant and cynical; and the attraction they possessed for him was in danger of becoming debased, since he admired them, old and young, with too scanty a respect, and believed too little in the worth of any emotion they awoke in his heart or mind.

It had been a matter of discussion between Harry and myself whether we should attend Mrs. Dwight's party. But Jack had peremptory orders to bring us both, and of course when the evening came we went. I had not seen Georgy Lenox since the visit she had paid me a few months after my accident, and I had often told myself that I wished never to see her any more. Yet now that I was again near her I was eager to meet and talk with her. I had often felt myself superior to other fellows of my age on account of this very experience of living down a passion; but since I had received her note I might have known that my experience had done little for me--that I had merely been removed from temptation; for, school myself as I might, my blood was leaping in my veins at the thought of looking into her eyes again. One cannot be twenty and be wise at the same time. But then in some matters a man is never wise, let his age be what it may.

Mrs. Dwight's parlors were long and spacious and splendidly furnished. They were well filled too before we entered, for we were so anxious to do the most truly elegant thing to-night that we had put off making our appearance until long past ten o'clock. Whatever expectations we may have had of making a sensation in the rooms were considerably damped by the awkwardness of our début. Jack knew the house, and at once skirted the crowd to find what he wanted, but Harry and I were obliged to stand still in a corner, ignorant of everything save the name of our hostess, waiting for something to turn up. The ordeal was not so disagreeable as it might seem. The band played in the alcove, the women were well dressed and, to our eyes, radiantly beautiful, while the men appealed to our critical curiosity. Plenty of our college dons were there, and many of the leading men of the day, but more interesting to us were the perfectly-dressed, graceful society-men a little beyond our own age: these we watched carefully, with the superior air of contempt with which every man of every age views the social success of others; yet we envied them nevertheless. In one of these we simultaneously recognized an old friend, and exclaimed together, "If there isn't Thorpe!"

And Thorpe indeed it was, better dressed, handsomer, more consummately the finished man of the world, than ever. He was conversing with a stout, elderly lady with gray puffs stiffly fixed on her temples and white feathers in her braids, who was discoursing fluently to him on some subject in which he seemed profoundly interested. Suddenly, however, his eyes dilated and his face gained expression: he had met my eyes and nodded with a half smile, and within five minutes he had adroitly bestowed the old lady in an easy-chair and planted three professors before her, and was shaking hands with us. We were rather proud of the exhibition of pleasure he made at the encounter. True, it was languid and there was an air of amused condescension in the way he accepted our cordial greetings; but we were still boyish enough to like to feel him above and beyond us, although not unattainable.

"Well, old fellow," he remarked presently to Harry, "why are you penned up here? Is it as sheep or wolves that you are kept out of the fold? Why aren't you dancing?"

"We only just came in," returned Harry, "and we don't know the hostess by sight, and have nobody to speak to."

"Why, that was Mrs. Dwight I was talking with just now.--A terrible old woman, Floyd: I will introduce you presently, as soon as that crowd clears away. I understand you came by invitation from Miss Lenox. Seen her?"

We had seen nobody, we were obliged to confess.

"Miss Georgy is having a good time. I put in my claim as an old Belfield friend for a couple of waltzes. She has the best pace of any woman here. Handsome girl, but dangerous: devilish amusing, though. Wonder where she got her ideas in that cramped, puritanical little place? Pity she's going to marry such a slow coach as Jack Holt! Beg your pardon--nothing derogatory intended. You must yourself admit that he is rather slow.--By the by, Floyd, how's the heiress?"

I knew whom he meant, but did not like his tone, and asked him squarely to whom he referred.

He laughed, and looked at me with close scrutiny. "I alluded to Miss Floyd," said he, twisting his long moustache with his gloved fingers. "I don't know many heiresses myself, unlucky dog that I am! and she is such a tremendous one--she is _the_ heiress _par éminence_. She must be fifteen by this time. Remember me to her when you see her, Floyd; or perhaps you write to her?"

"Not at all," I answered.

"Is she as pretty as ever?" he pursued.

"Pretty? She never seemed to me pretty."

"Oh, you are too young to recognize beauty when you see it. She was the loveliest child I ever knew, with her pale complexion, her brilliant eyes and aristocratic profile. Georgy Lenox is a gaudy transparency beside her. But I forgot: I must come out and see you at your rooms. Only don't bore me: it is the fashion at universities to talk of subjects never discussed anywhere else by civilized beings, and I can't abide such rubbish. I hear you're quite the pride of your class, Floyd?"

"Oh, what wretched nonsense!"

"Your modesty pleases me.--Come on, boys: Mrs. Dwight is looking at us."

And we were introduced to our hostess at last, who received us in a manner expressive of our social insignificance. "Dear me!" said she placidly, "have you just come in? You're very late. I supposed everybody was here long ago. Georgy asked my permission to invite some students: I never do that sort of thing myself. There is really no end to it, you know. Besides, I suppose your time is quite taken up with your studies and your boating and your flirtations. Do you dance?--There's Georgy Lenox beckoning to you, Mr. Dart." Harry darted off, and was lost in the crowd before I had a chance to follow him with my eyes, for Mrs. Dwight, feeling the need of support or wishing to be guided into another room, had put her arm within mine, thus compelling my attention. Her conversation still continued in a steady stream. It had occurred to her that I was in some way connected with Mr. Floyd, whose reputation was national, and she went on reviving reminiscences of him while we strolled about. She addressed me with such unhesitating talkativeness that I succumbed at once, and became an easy prey. What she said was quite uninteresting, besides being rambling in a degree which hindered my getting the smallest idea of her meaning; but her own enjoyment of her loquaciousness never once faltered, and she discoursed as fluently as an eighteenth-century poet, and without any more idea of the grace of finishing within a reasonable time. How I envied Thorpe's easy method of withdrawing from her attack! how I longed for some flank movement to draw off her attention! I was weaving futile plans of escape, when suddenly a radiant creature in blue and white gauze, the swirl of whose long skirts I had watched as I listened to Mrs. Dwight, paused in the waltz close beside me, turned, looked me in the face and patted my arm with her fan. "Floyd!" she cried, "Floyd Randolph! don't you know me?"

Mrs. Dwight vanished, I do not remember how or where. Everybody vanished: I seemed to be alone in the world staring into Georgy Lenox's face.

"Cousin Maria had fastened upon you like the Ancient Mariner," prattled Georgy, laughing. "That is her way. If she fancies a young man, she bears down upon him, and with one fell swoop carries him off. How melancholy you looked! But you are as grave as ever now. Aren't you glad to see me?"

"Oh yes, I am glad," I told her, but felt a weight upon my tongue, and could not find expression for any thoughts which moved me. For, let it be understood, I was powerfully impressed by her, and in a moment had changed from what I was before I met her. She talked on rapidly, looking at me kindly, and doubtless by this time sufficiently understood her power over our sex to realize that under certain conditions words mean little on a man's tongue, while silence confesses much. But, counting time by minutes, I was with her but a very little while before half a dozen partners came toward her claiming her for a new waltz.

"Ask me to dance, Floyd," she whispered.

"I do not dance, Georgy," I returned gravely, and drew back; and presently she was whirling about again, her flower-crowned head gyrating against first one black-coated shoulder and then another.

I saw Jack Holt leaning against a pillar, and went up to him. "How do you get on, Floyd?" he asked in his slow, easy way. "Rather heavy work, eh?"

"Not at all," said I, feeling all the keen joy of youth: "I think it delightful. Miss Lenox spoke to me, Jack. Of course you have seen her."

"Oh yes," Jack laughed good-naturedly. "She at once told me I looked countrified and old-fashioned--that my hair was too long and my gloves were outrageous. In fact, she was ashamed to own me, and declared that nothing should induce her to confess she was engaged to me until I looked less seedy."

We both laughed at this. Jack had a handsome allowance, which he spent almost entirely upon the girl he loved. She was quite used to his generosity toward her and self-denial toward himself, and gave him no more credit for it than the rest of us award to the blessings we count on assuredly.

"You don't mind her nonsense, Jack?"

"Not at all. She has such spirits she must chatter. You haven't seen her for ages, Floyd: do you think her improved? Has she grown handsomer?"

I was conscious of a dulness and thickness in my voice as I replied, "She is much handsomer."

"She is more womanly," pursued Jack: "I think her manner has softened a little. There is more tenderness about it: as a girl she was sometimes a trifle--hard. Now--But you see how she is, Floyd: there is nobody like her. Good God! I ask myself sometimes what that perfect creature can see in me."

"A good deal apparently, since she is to be your wife." I said it without faltering, and felt better after it. Something seemed to clear away from my brain, and I could look at Georgy now with less emotion. She was all that was bright and beautiful and winning, but--she was engaged to Jack Holt. She showed slight consciousness of any restraint on her perfect freedom, however, and gave away Jack's roses, purchased that day at a high figure, before his eyes. Once or twice, when she passed us, she smiled and nodded in the gayest good spirits; and at last, when she was tired of dancing and wanted an ice, she beckoned to Jack, put her hand inside his arm and led him into the conservatory.

"How well she does it!" said Harry Dart, coming up to me. "Quite the brilliant belle! By Jove! how she dances! I despise the girl with her greedy maw, and deuced airs of high gentility when she is a perfect beggar, but it is a second heaven to dance with her. She has the _go_ of a wild animal in her. She is a little like a panther--so round, so sleek, so agile in her spring. I told her just now I should like to paint her--yellow eyes, hair like an aureole, supple form and satin coat--lying on a panther-skin."

"Her eyes are not yellow."

"By Jove! they are. When she's dancing her whole face changes: she looks dangerous."

"I don't like your tone when you speak of her, Harry."

"Oh! don't you? One of these days both you and Jack will be wiser where that girl is concerned."

But Jack came back to us presently, quite contented to look at her successes and not to speak to her again that evening. At supper-time we watched her from a distance, and a more brilliant young coquette than Miss Georgy showed herself to be I have never seen. She looked more and more beautiful as the night wore on, the flush deepening in her cheeks, her eyes dilating, her hair loosening. Men full fledged though we considered ourselves now in our senior year, we felt like boys before her. Every man in the room seemed proud of her slightest mark of attention. Tall dandies with ineffable composure and a consummate air of worldly knowledge; tranquil, dreamy-eyed literary men; solid citizens with stiff white side-whiskers and red faces,--all were in her train. Harry withdrew from her at last, becoming, as I was, quite oppressed with a sense of his youth and worthlessness.

Thorpe good-naturedly came up to us as we three stood leaning against the wall, tired and depressed, yet feeling no wish to get away until everybody else had gone, and asked us how we liked it, if we had been introduced, and all that. It came out then that Jack and I had not once thought of any woman in the rooms except Georgy; and until Thorpe questioned me it had not occurred to my mind that there was anything to do at the party but to speak to Georgy if possible, or, failing that bliss, to watch her from a distance. Harry laughed at me, and discussed the beauties of the ball with Thorpe, who was fastidious and considered few girls handsome--in fact, was so minute in his criticisms that Jack, always more than chivalrous in his thoughts of women, left us, and with his hands crossed behind him looked at the pictures on the walls of an inner room quite deserted now. The conversation turned on Miss Lenox at once, and Thorpe said he was amazed to find the girl so capable of achieving an easy success and bearing it so well. "Where," he pursued with his graceful air, "did she learn those enchanting prettinesses, those wonderful little caprices of manner? Could they have been acquired in the genteel dreariness of Belfield?"

"I should like to know," rejoined Harry with disdain, "if she has not been practising them for twenty years? She flirted with Jack and Floyd here when they used to buy her a penny's worth of peppermint, before they were out of petticoats themselves. I dare say she made eyes at old Lenox when he rocked her in the cradle."

"And she is going to marry Holt? I suppose she makes the sacrifice on account of his money. He takes it quietly and doesn't mind her flirting. Is he cold, insensible, or has he such complete belief in her regard for him?"

Harry laughed: "Jack is too good himself not to believe in the goodness of others. It is just as well. Nobody sees the Devil but those who have faith in the Devil. I dare say she'll make him as good a wife as he wants: her aspirations are all for wealth, and her extravagance will be her chief fault."

Thorpe shrugged his shoulders. "She will have several faults," said he with a cynical air. "But I can forgive them all in so pretty a woman, and admire her immensely as another man's wife."

Harry declared he saw nothing particular about the girl except her beauty, and a more unscrupulous resolve to make the most of it and its effect upon men than other young women had the nerve to adhere to. "But look there!" he cried: "see old Applegate" (one of our professors) "simpering over her bouquet and smiling into her eyes. Wretched old mummy! what does he want to go to parties for?" For we all held the ingenuous opinion that anybody, man or woman, ten years or more older than ourselves, ought to stay at home, eschew pleasure and devote their highest powers to keeping out of the way of the young people to whom the world rightfully belonged.

But the sight of old Applegate emboldened me. If she would talk so kindly to him, why might she not give me one more word? I had no awe of the professor, and had taken an æsthetic tea at his dismal house, and seen a weak-eyed, sallow Mrs. Applegate and five lank little Applegates. Accordingly, I limped across the room to the spot where Miss Lenox stood, and was rewarded by a bright smile and an immediate air of attention. "I want to talk to Mr. Randolph," said she, claiming her bouquet from the professor, who regarded me with a bland smile. "He and I are the oldest friends, but we have not seen each other for years. You won't mind, professor?"

He heaved a sigh. "Randolph gets all the prizes," said he good-naturedly: "it is never of any use competing with him;" and he left us alone.

I had but five minutes to speak to Georgina, but when I left her she had made me promise to call on her next day at twelve o'clock.