Part 4

Johnnie had arrived home from college two days after the headline appeared, and his mother had been ready to receive him. She said he had to apologize to the whole club publicly. He refused. And Emily was trying to arbitrate between them. "Honestly, Mrs. Kenworthy," he said, "it never entered my mind that you'd ever hear of it in this town. Mother ought to believe me when I say I wouldn't have done it for anything if I'd known that man French was ever going to get hold of it. I was in bad with the dean, sitting there in his office waiting to get hauled over the coals about my work, as usual, and I couldn't help hearing what he was saying. He was raving. He told the class committee that if they couldn't get something better than the drivel they had submitted, the annual play was off. I was feeling low when he got through with me, believe me. And I knew what I'd get at this end if I came home flunking again. And that night when I was lying in bed it all came to me at once, and I got right up and wrote it down." Johnnie spoke now without awe of his inspiration. "There was the chorus of high-brow old maids singing about the need of the poor for garden manure. It isn't my fault they rhyme, is it, now? I might have said that, Mrs. Kenworthy, but you know I never would have poked fun publicly at old Miss Sisson. I'd never have put in about land dressing. Would I, now?" And Emily, considering the shyness of the poor elegant old thing, believed that Johnnie would have had more mercy. "And then," he went on, "I had that chorus of farmers, regular stage hayseeds, with long gray beards and pitchforks, resisting them. And the Bolshevists singing." Johnnie hummed:

"'Tis the lack of horse litter Makes poverty bitter.

"It just all does rhyme. And I had a hero like me, refusing to drive a truck, and eloping with a farmer's daughter in a manure spreader. And every farmer in the chorus was leading a calf or a pig with him as he danced. I told them not to have those kids as animals. And when the audience began to applaud, one of the little fiends rose up on his hind legs and began to dance. And then they all did, of course. The people nearly went into spasms, they laughed so. Oh, boy! It was a hot show! I was popular for a while. The skirts just clung to me at the dance afterwards. And everybody was wondering what else might be in me. And I was going to strike mother for a new car the minute I got home. Now, oh, Lordie, what a life I lead!"

And Emily, standing as usual, between mother and son, had maintained to Mrs. Benton that Johnnie might have been deplorably thoughtless, but he certainly hadn't been deliberately malicious. How could he suppose that that man French could get hold of it? It was simply brutal, as Emily realized, for that horrid person to entitle his derision "Scholastic Honors." It was rubbing salt into the deep wound of Cora Benton's soul. For Johnnie most conspicuously lacked not only scholastic honors, but even mediocre class attainments of common town children. He had been pulled and shoved along from one grade to another by the skin of his teeth. He had always been the most careless boy in every class. Mrs. Benton was right when she said it was because of his health. When he was nine he had had infantile paralysis, and, recovering, had been sent South. Mrs. Benton, a passionate mother, had thrown down her Red Cross work and taken him to a Southern town in which a cousin of hers was living. And that choice had changed, she averred, the course of the boy's life.

For the White Sox had been wintering there. And the weary little boy, too uninterested in life to turn his thin hand over, was carried out into the sun and coaxed into watching them. Some of them noticed the pale child and spoke to him. Presently Johnnie was no longer a pitiful invalid; he had become an active humble little mortal peeping up at the great gods who strode about this Parnassus upon which he had been thrown. Like an eager disciple he watched their ways. He knew what blessed street cars they took and at what hours. He knew the hallowed spot they had their hair cut. Lying in his bed at night, he could identify their manager's car by the sound. In his dreams he was steadying his arm to send a terrible curve. His nightmares were missed bases. Books and reading were forbidden him. But at the end of that year he knew the names and the positions of practically all the players in the League.

It took a woman like his mother to get him into the schoolhouse the next year. But even she could not induce his mind to consider text-books. By the time he was sixteen he was in a class with thirteen-year-old boys, and he looked small and delicate among them. And then he began growing. His heart was weak. He got pneumonia. The doctor said he would never be well unless he was taken out of school again and let "run wild." The year Bronson came to his Aunt Emily, Mrs. Benton spent part of the winter in New Mexico and moved from there because she couldn't endure the sight of her son playing ball with lazy Mexicans whom he had inspired to the game. She went to a vineyard in California, and there she had to see him rally enough young Japs for his nine. She left him that summer on a ranch in Arizona, safe from a baseball atmosphere, she supposed. He found a camp of Boy Scouts by riding not too many score of miles, and played with them till he came back in the autumn, less inclined to sit at a desk than ever before, and much stronger physically. And if people said truly that only Mrs. Benton's incorrigible determination had kept that boy alive to grow into a strong man, they might also have said the same force finally got him into college. And all he had ever done there, as she remarked bitterly to Emily, who condoned his accidental operatic career, was to short-stop for the second nine, and make his mother ridiculous in that disgusting "opera."

And now, Johnnie, having put in a good word for himself, having diplomatically repeated every complimentary remark he had heard all the evening about the extraordinary superiority of the floor, intended going back to his play. Mrs. Benton kept him standing there, however. Emily wondered if she had determined to have the whole town see mother and son chatting pleasantly together. For the whole town, like Emily Kenworthy, often wondered, too curiously, exactly what the relationship between the two was. Mrs. Benton kept her own counsel like the proverbially close-lipped male. People could only imagine what she thought of Johnnie's dancing every evening at the country club from which she had withdrawn in rage. The elders were known to have welcomed her withdrawal like a gift from heaven. The young fry, it was commonly said, couldn't have a single dance without Johnnie, who danced "divinely." (Martha Kenworthy had said once, holding a long-legged columbine swaying in her hand, that it looked exactly like Johnnie Benton.) He was hail-fellow-well-met to most of his mother's sworn enemies. Emily sometimes thought I that must require determination almost equal to his mother's. He just simply was a "nice boy," the town said. He had a good disposition, and Bob Kenworthy was not the only one who, saying that, added, "And the Lord knows he needed it!"

"Whoever could have believed it?" Emily was saying. "Where have they all come from?" they were thinking together. You could count the faces you knew. The youth of the town had been pushed aside by the youth of the whole state, apparently. In a way, the very success was failure, for the committee had enlarged their plans time after time to provide against this indecent modern crowding. And now people were simply wriggling about like fishing worms thick in a can. Suddenly:

"EMILY!" exclaimed Cora Benton. "WHAT'S MARTHA DOING?" Sharply she had spoken, commandingly.

"Martha?" exclaimed Emily, shocked. "Where? I don't see her." She had scarcely seen her all evening.

"Over there. Look!" She pointed with her eye to the farther side of the crowd, where it was overflowing to the veranda.

Johnnie said--he spoke shortly, "She's dancing!"

"Well! Well! Maybe she is." Mrs. Benton was condoning already her tone of reproof.

But Emily had at first sight thought it appropriate, because--well, what in the world WAS Martha doing? Emily had fairly started with annoyance when she saw her. To her first glance it was disgusting. And then, as she looked, chagrined, perplexed,--well--it wasn't disgusting. Really, perhaps, the position in which Martha and her partner were obviously worming their way about was not one which, after long deliberations on the subject, the committee had thought best to forbid on the floor. It was that man--his face--the way he was bending down, being tall, to look at her. It was, most of all, Emily realized in a flash, angrily, the way Martha was holding her sweet little face, entranced, up to him. What in the world were those two talking about?

"Who is that man?" Emily asked Johnnie. She was too annoyed to observe how keenly Johnnie was watching the sight.

"I don't know. Never saw him before."

"There's nothing we can take exception to in THAT!" Mrs. Benton seemed almost to regret the fact.

Johnnie looked at her indignantly and ineffectively.

Emily resented the suggestion sharply. The very idea that anyone might take exception to her daughter, that the committee might disapprove of her child's attitude, hurt her deeply. For Martha Kenworthy was distinctly a nice girl. Everybody had always known that she was a very superior, quiet, well-behaved, dear child. Mothers consulted her mother about their naughty children. And now Cora Benton--but just the same, it did look as if Martha in that little flesh-colored frock, was almost cuddling up against--that--somebody--whom Emily at first shocked sight heartily disliked.

"Go and tell her I want to see her." Emily spoke to Johnnie and regretted it. Mrs. Benton let no one know when she corrected her son. But Emily Kenworthy's intention of reproving her daughter was revealed to the world.

"I wouldn't say anything to her. Look, there's a couple--lots of them are dancing that way. It does leave something to be desired," Cora Benton counseled.

"I hadn't thought of saying anything about that to her," Emily said, carelessly. She was surprised at the sharpness of her resentment. After all, hadn't she often told even Cora Benton how to manage her child!

It seemed a long time before Johnnie came back, more or less dutifully. She suspected him of having had several dances in the meantime.

"I can't find her," he reported. "It's like a needle in a haystack. The river is as crowded as the floor. Pete McGill says this is the largest crowd that was ever in this town. He says there are five hundred more cars than there were on Armistice Day. I'll keep my eye open for her. They're not allowing any more cars across the bridge. Would I do--for what you wanted her for?"

"It doesn't matter," said Emily. "It wasn't anything, really, thank you."

But it was something, when presently she saw Martha again, dancing that same way, with that same man, listening with her face tilted up to him exactly as before. It made Emily think of the time Martha had sat absorbed before some story that Jim Kenworthy wove fantastically for her. That man--he must be an old friend. Emily racked her memory. Some girl's older brother, would it be, or some household where Martha had stayed? She tried to fit him in, and as she watched the two, she saw Martha suddenly sort of double down with amusement, shrugging her shoulders, chuckling, while the man, encouraged, peered more boldly into her face.

"I'll put an end to that!" Emily said. And she hurried down and sought out a place from which she might catch Martha's eye. It was difficult to catch an eye so intent upon its interest. She waited persistently till she had got her attention, and signified to her that she wanted to speak to her at once.

Martha came to her presently--alone--on to the platform, flushed, shining, unashamed.

"Oh, mother!" she ejaculated. She sighed with unspeakable satisfaction. "What a night! Could you have believed it!"

But Emily said, "Martha, who was that awful man you were dancing with?"

Her tone surprised Martha.

"Oh," she said, "that was Sandy. You know Sandy Powers. I had to dance with him. He was in my high school----"

"I don't mean _him_! I know Sandy! I mean that dark person you had this last dance with!"

Martha gave a giggle of amusement.

"Don't you know who _that_ was?" she demanded. She seemed to think it a great joke. "Why, mother, that's Eve's brother-in-law!"

"I didn't know her brother-in-law was here. When did he come?"

"He just came to-day. I thought, of course, she would have introduced him. Oh, mother, he's an interesting man. He's been everywhere. I'll bring him over to you."

"I don't like him!"

Emily ruffled was so rare a sight that Martha seemed to enjoy it.

"Well, you will when you've seen him. You don't know him," she assured her mother, critically, and adjusted a little lock of hair.

"Is his wife here?"

"I don't know. I don't suppose so."

"Well," grumbled Emily, "don't be dancing with him all evening. Where's Johnnie?"

"I haven't danced with him all evening! We've had two dances." Martha was really surprised.

Emily felt she had been foolish. "Oh, all right," she said, lightly. "I thought I didn't know----"

Martha studied her.

"I promised him another. Oh, he dances divinely! You're tired out, mother. Have you been working every minute? Why don't you go home?"

"No. I'm staying till the end to-night. I'm not going home." She might have added, "I'm not going to leave you."

But the evening had wilted for her. The hours dragged on. Bob came to her at one. Even Bob was full of congratulations. "You ought to be satisfied, old girl," he said. "I heard Wilkinson say that you ought to have credit for the whole thing. He said really if it hadn't been for you----"

"Where's Martha? Have you seen her?"

"I saw her a while ago, up at the house. She had a new Johnnie in tow."

"Who? A large dark man?"

And Bob, struck with an idea, said, "Well, if he's Eve's brother-in-law, he must be a married man."

"He certainly must!"

Bob turned and looked at her.

"He wasn't acting particularly married."

"What do you mean?"

"Where's his wife?"

"I don't know. I don't even know whether she's here or not. I told Martha not to dance with him again!"

"She's minding as she usually does!" Bob commented.

"Why didn't you stay at the house?"

"They didn't seem to want me. Let's go home, Emily. Cut out the rest of it."

"No. I'm staying to-night until the end. We all are."

They were home again, finally, towards morning, sinking down deeply into the living-room cushions, spreading themselves out, breathing out great sighs of contentment. Emily, on the sofa, was adjusting hairpins in the coils of her brown hair. Eve sat beside her, resting in the position she had fallen into, her legs stretched out, her skirts up to her knees, her thin arms extended limply, with dark little frail-looking shadows beneath her eyes. Martha had paused to adjust her color before the hall mirror, and then seated herself, fresh as a morning flower, erect in an easy chair, her hands crossed in her lap, her shoulders tilted slightly, light from the hall on the smoothness of her black hair, dreaming, slight, detached. When her father, who had insisted on going to the kitchen to make lemonade, called out to Emily to know where the sugar had been put, Martha, realizing, as it were, the group, joined them without excitement.

"Sit still, Eve. Don't go and get it for him. It's sitting just where it has sat ever since I was born, and he can't help seeing it. Well, anyway, you ought to be content, mother. It's really your hall, and everyone knows it. Where'd Mrs. Benton been, everybody wants to know, if it hadn't been for you? Johnnie's just like her. He makes me tired. He went about saying he'd got all that crowd there by his old posters. I told him it would have been a lot nicer party if he hadn't got so many to come."

Bob came in just then, Martha's prophecy having been fulfilled about the sugar. He heard Eve's remark: "I think the Legion was by far the most interesting man there. I offered to dance with him. He takes himself seriously, of course."

Bob was feeling facetious.

"You needn't set your heart on that man, Eve. What he wants is a wife that'll do the midnight milking. Yes, midnight! Didn't you even know the farmers around here milk four times a day? To get more milk, of course. Twice at twelve, and twice at six. That's the kind he is. And say, Martha, can't you get a single man to lead around? Eve's sister will be pulling your hair the next thing you know."

Emily spoke up hastily.

"Was your sister there, Eve? I didn't see her. Where do they live?"

"No. She isn't well. They're like the rest of us. They don't live any place." She spoke reluctantly, and then, as if she felt that something more was expected of her, she added: "They have been abroad awhile. In Paris, mostly."

But Martha took up Bob's challenge. "He's so distinguished," she drawled. "Doesn't he dance divinely, Eve?"

"I don't know," Eve replied, shortly. "I don't dance with him." And then she added, abruptly, "Look here, Martha, you needn't dance with him to please me!"

"Don't worry about that. I dance with him to please myself. You ought to hear him talk, mother. He's got the loveliest foreign accent, hasn't he?"

"Hasn't he! And he was brought up in Indiana!" Eve murmured.

"He's been everywhere. I'm going abroad myself next summer. He knew Tchekhoff. He was telling me about him."

Eve sat up. Her eyes narrowed shrewdly. "That's a new one to me," she commented. "I don't believe it." The silence became awkward. She broke it abruptly. "He's a four-flusher, Martha. Take it from me. From the ground up. If he ever saw a Russian in Paris, he'd have known Tolstoy himself, and been bosom friend with Dostoieffsky. He's a journalist, to put it mildly."

It was painful, this way Eve had of saying nasty things about her relations, as if it were a noble duty. She had spoken so doggedly that her face was flushed an unbecoming dark red. Martha grew pinker. The silence grew longer. Emily said, carelessly, rising:

"What pests these in-laws are! Let's go to bed. You've ripped your hem, Martha. Did you know it? You're both to sleep till noon."

"Don't you worry about that!" Bob jeered.

But Eve replied: "I've got to be home for lunch. Dad's going to be home."

If Emily didn't sleep at once, it wasn't because from the painted room came those stifled whispers and gigglings which so often annoyed Bob after dances. The girls seemed to have gone to sleep at once. But Emily kept thinking about Martha, and Mrs. Benton's sharp voice. The man, of course, would be leaving town at once. What would a journalist from Paris, a friend of Tchekhoff find to amuse him in a little Illinois city? And supposing he chose to stay all the summer, Martha could be trusted. She had such common sense. And such good taste, always. "It's just silly of me to worry about Martha," Emily thought, not once only but many times, till she was thoroughly tired of her foolish, wide-awake mind. "Thank goodness it's over!" she said to herself again and again. "Thank goodness that chapter's ended!"

A long interesting chapter had indeed ended that evening, more suddenly than Emily realized.

_Chapter Three_

The next day at first seemed like any other morning of the year, for Emily didn't get up as early as she had intended. There still was heavy dew lying on the thick greenness of the lawn when she sat down on the veranda to finish pitting the cherries. Afterwards she pattered about in the kitchen, tending the ruby mixture in the kettle till her cheeks were rosy red. And then she had filled the Mason jars, and screwed on the lids, and tested their inverted security, one by one, and put them in rows on the shelf to cool, interrupted from time to time by friends at the 'phone who must count over one by one the evening's triumphs. She was busy thinking that she really must take those fresh sash curtains up to the bathroom--it was scandalous, the condition of those hanging there--when the boy brought the raspberries she had ordered--far the best ones she had seen all the season. The girls, she thought, would love them for their breakfast. She prepared two saucerfuls, and got the pitcher of cream ready on the tray, and went up towards their room. Of course that was the way, Bob said, she spoiled Martha, always waiting on her, carrying something delicious up to her in the middle of the morning, when the girl ought to have been up and doing all the housework herself. Bob couldn't understand what a child Martha was, how unfit yet for responsibility. Wait till she had a house of her own. Just think of that painted room of hers, for instance. That showed what the child could do when she wanted to.

Emily opened the painted door quietly. On a day bed at one end of the room Eve was lying on her back reading, in sea-green figured silk pajamas which must have cost a good deal, one knee crossed over the other. Books were piled on the floor beside her, nearly as high as her low pillow.

She turned her head, and caught sight of the tray, and gave a shriek of delight. She called to Martha, who lay asleep on her bed-like device at the other end of the room, curled up like a child, not even a sheet over her. And Martha, sitting up in flesh-colored voile pajamas on the edge of the bed, stretching, yawning, pink and sweet, began:

"Oh, you rare lamb, mother! Isn't she a gem, Eve? No wonder dad says she spoils me! Where did you get them?" Eve had put a low table at Martha's side, and seated herself on the other side of it. But Emily maturely sought out the chair that was kept in the room as a concession to her dislike of floor cushions. She sat watching them gobble daintily, chattering away. Martha, who had made herself comfortable against a pile of cushions, her knees drawn up, and the saucer balancing on them, began wiggling her toes. She hadn't outgrown that infant habit yet, Emily enjoyed noticing. How she had watched this child's awakening with an impulse of delight every day, almost from her first week, till this morning, when she woke even yet delicately rosy and vividly red-lipped. Poor old Bob never got any fun out of it. Martha had disturbed him by waking too early, for years, and now she annoyed him by sleeping too late. But Emily wouldn't stop to sigh long over that, not these few summer mornings when she could enjoy it, now that the child was grown, and away months together. And just then Martha almost unconsciously bestirred herself and with the saucer in one hand and the spoon in the other, almost without ceasing to feed herself, went and pulled down a blind to shut the glare of the sunshine away from that rug of hers that tended to look too violently cerise. The girl, it seemed, couldn't sit up in bed eating berries for breakfast without thinking how the room might look if she should change it just a little.