Part 3

Clarinda did not answer his question. It struck her mind as frivolous. She continued as if no interruption had taken place. “Do you know, Father, Peter is cruel? I’ve been very happy here. A great change has come about I find, and many many times I’ve sat here in this corner and tried to analyze the reason for the change. I wonder whether it is my fault or whether it is just the ordinary course of human feeling. I ask myself whether I have failed, or has he failed? Is love only a satisfaction of a certain kind of natural law or is it a thing that can be sustained, I mean carried on forever? I wonder to myself whether there is really such a thing as love, and if not, what is it that produces such wonderful sensations? If after all it is only a myth. Why should people be sorry, or glad, or pleased at the approach of any one person? Why should I not be as happy, if love does not exist, with John Jones or John Smith or any other person? Anyway there is a great change. Peter has changed, I have changed. Everything is different. I can’t understand.”

Her father still smiled. He did not grasp how deeply she felt, nor could he understand precisely the conclusion she was drawing. He thought her a trifle incoherent. He was still satisfied, however, if she were given time he would find out. He remained silent and kept his eyes fastened upon her.

“Listen, Father! Follow me with care. It is very difficult for me to explain exactly.” Clarinda wept and bent over in her grief, then murmured with intensity. “Can’t you understand? Can’t you understand?”

Her father saw her body shaken with emotion and the tears steal between her fingers. He was terribly oppressed.

He advanced a few steps and laid his hand gently upon her head, his touch was sympathetic. She looked up at him with her tear-stained face, and hope entered her heart.

“Poor little Clarinda,” he began with tenderness in his voice. “I know your difficulty. Let’s talk it over.” He sat down in the corner of the divan by her side.

Clarinda fixed the stool again under his feet and replaced the pillow under his head, then she tucked herself into the bend of his arm and Clarinda’s golden head lay in comfort on his shoulder, a feeling of bliss and security in her heart. She waited for him to speak.

“Now let’s see if I can analyze this terrible condition. You would be surprised how observant I am,” he began. “You think Peter doesn’t love you as he did. You, in your silly mind have let your imagination get the better of you. This is probably what happened: Peter in the press of his duties has neglected you, or you think he has, which is about the same thing in the end. This neglect was not in itself a great matter nor of much importance, but was probably in some little attention he gave you.”

Clarinda listened intently.

“Let’s say for example, that he broke some custom that he had built up—a custom that had come to be part of your life, and that you looked forward to as much as you do, for instance, to your fruit in the morning. You have deduced from this infraction that he doesn’t love you as in the beginning.”

Clarinda opened her eyes in astonishment. He was placing before her clearly, exactly what she had wanted to tell, but could not. With a few words he arrived at the bottom of her trouble. Clarinda shook her head and tucked herself closer to his side.

“How wonderful you are, Father,” she whispered. “How exactly you tell me what I wanted to explain.”

“Clarinda,” he went on, “you probably don’t know that as a rule men love intensely. Their love is a curious stable condition of mind. It consumes them. It becomes part of their fibre. You’ll find out later in life, when you’ve had greater experience, that men are monogamous, with polygamous inclinations. That statement is a bit involved. More than likely you don’t get what I mean quite clearly. Of course, Clarinda, I am speaking about ordinary men, the right-thinking and the right-doing sort.” He stopped for an instant as if deliberating, and finally went on:

“Still, Clarinda, even with the sort I have in mind, they are curious, because they are human. They build the foundations of their lives with no uncertainty. After it is done, they arrive at the idea that what they have built is stable. They forget. Men, my dear child, are essentially constructionists. It doesn’t follow because they are complacent that they love any the less. It might be advanced really that they love with fiercer intensity. The reason for this is that men are removed only a slight degree from the animal. It is true they are covered with a slight veneer which is called civilization. Just like animals, anything that comes into their lives becomes part of them. As I have indicated, love gets into their blood, bone and sinew. Peter loves you just the same. Disabuse your mind of this idea that he doesn’t love you. It is all foolishness. All your fears are founded on sand. This condition is not your fault. It is the natural course that love always follows and nearly all men arrive at the same end.”

Clarinda sat very still and listened intently. In her heart as she had always done she felt her father was the greatest being in the world. Even at times greater than Peter. This admission cost her much, but for years he had been her bulwark. Upon his judgment her life had been founded. During her young days she had looked upon him as an oracle. And now in this crisis, after he had spoken she was sure he was just as she thought.

“Your situation is clear to me,” he continued. “Suppose I draw you a picture of your position.” He paused for a moment. “I have in mind what occurred. Let us suppose for example, that every morning when Peter left you before he went out of the door he kissed you. You lived on that kiss until he came back in the evening. It might be before he went away he held you for an instant in his arms and patted your lovely head. And then after he had gone and had gotten out on the street, you ran to the window and waved your hand to him as he went around the corner. You treasured that final wave. Peter is only a man. Peter is not a bad sort. Now, how is that for the first part of my picture?”

“Father! Father!” she exclaimed. “How wonderful you are.”

“Let’s go further with our picture,” he began again. “Now what did you do? Being inexpressibly foolish, on that very first day this terrible thing happened here is what I see. In this picture you are a stricken thing. Slowly you go back into the room, with the weight of the world upon you. The house is all drab. You don’t rush to the window. Oh, no, not you, instead you weep and the tears roll down your face. You feel right then as if all the world has fallen apart, and there is only a great void.

“In your misery you felt, for this was real to you, sick at heart. You threw yourself down upon the divan and sank into a terrible condition. This lasted throughout the day, until Peter came home. When he saw you, so sad and dreary and your face be-streaked with tears, he took you in his arms—and right then—the sun came back. Your heart beat with joy. How’s that, Clarinda?”

“But why should it happen?” Clarinda burst forth. “Why should Peter change? I am just the same. I am just as young. Just as beautiful. Peter always says I am beautiful. My physical self is just the same. I don’t believe I am any the less attractive or less appealing to his man’s side. Peter forgets. He forgets often. Why should he feel that he can go out and leave me as he does? Why should he not kiss me every morning? I don’t forget.”

“All that is true, Clarinda,” her father went on. “The reason for its happening, I have explained. But there is something else. It is a curious psychological fact. Women are different from men, for the reason that nature has so provided. I can’t answer this question. It would take too long, and even if I did, you might not understand the fine distinction I would wish to draw. There are so many shades, so many complexes, so many difficulties in the way of an understandable explanation. The question is too deep for me to discuss. You don’t have a proper grasp of the human factor as it is applied to me. The shadows, Clarinda, upon your life are all imaginary. They don’t exist really.”

The conversation died, and Clarinda sat with her father in complete silence. She endeavored to make him say more, but he would not. He looked into the fire and watched the flame go up the chimney. The clock on the mantel struck the hours musically, and the wind without blew with an angry insistence. But Clarinda was at peace. Her head was clear and she saw distinctly into the future. The seconds of time went into minutes and the minutes grew into hours. The persistent ticking of the clock was at last broken by the sound of rapidly approaching footsteps, as if they bore someone in great haste. Then the door opened and Peter bounded into the room and filled it completely.

“It is late,” said Peter breathlessly. “But I’ve a good excuse. I’ve done well tonight and it is all for you, Clarinda.”

Clarinda arose quickly from the divan, and Peter took her gently in his arms. Her father winked at her knowingly and smiled.

“What have you done, Peter?” she asked, as she struggled to release herself from him.

“Wait until I get my breath,” he replied as he pushed her gently back upon the divan. He sat down between them.

Carefully he arranged himself, stretching his long legs comfortably out in front of him; then he folded his arms complacently over his chest.

“Tell us, Peter?” Clarinda asked again, as she drew herself close to him. “Isn’t it nice?” she added. “Just we three together. Father, you, and I?”

Her father laughed and Peter put his arm around her.

“You’re a nice little person, Clarinda,” he said.

“But think, Peter, why shouldn’t I be happy? What more could I want?”

“That brings me to exactly what I wanted to tell you. What more could you want? I can think of lots of things. For example—a larger place. It might be the house on the Park Way. A car you could drive. A larger divan, with a bigger lamp behind it. Probably new clothes—a fur coat. Maybe a husband who would really accomplish something.” Peter stopped and contracted his brows. “Then further you might have a new father who would think more of you, one who might be more proud of you. I admit that is drawing a long bow; but he might be found.”

“Peter, you are foolish,” she answered with wonderful pleasure in her voice. She loved to hear Peter talk, even if she thought what he said was foolish. “I want nothing. I was just telling father how pleased I was.”

“You were also telling me how unhappy you were,” her father interjected.

Clarinda sprang from the divan and stood directly in front of her father. “You know that isn’t true. I never said I was anything but happy. Father, I don’t see how you can imagine such things. Tell Peter it isn’t so.”

“All right, all right!” her father answered. “Oh, woman! Oh, woman! Now listen, you two. Since I have made such a grievous mistake, let’s speculate. Listen to the oracle: you, Peter, and you, Clarinda. I have a plan, which I think would do you both good. Ahem!” he cleared his throat, “I find after due consideration of your situation, that your lives are too prosaic. Too much the same thing. Suppose you had a plot, some deep and sinister thing. I admit that the average persons don’t have plots in their lives, but that does not matter, some few do, and why not you? You two should have some deep compelling motive, and there should be some other factor that would probably lead to some horrible situation, a murder, or a great theft, or a dual existence, something that would lead to a tragedy, mixed with blood and gore.”

“Horrible!” exclaimed Clarinda, and Peter shook his head in disagreement.

“But think of the interest you would have!” he added. “Peter could shoot you, or you could shoot Peter. You would have your picture in the papers, with splashing headlines. Instead of leading normal lives you would then undergo a great change, and when you died, people would remember you long enough to go to your funerals.”

“The subject is changed. If you can’t be more cheerful you may go home,” broke in Clarinda.

“I agree with Clarinda,” put in Peter.

“Now, father, you are properly squelched. Let Peter tell us what he did today. That’s more interesting than plots, murders and thefts. I don’t care how prosaic my life is so long as I have you two to take care of me. What did you do, Peter?”

“First of all, I bought the house on the Park Way,” he began. “I had the deed made out in the name of Mrs. Clarinda Thorbald. Second, I had put in the garage a nice little car. The license is made out in the name of Mrs. Clarinda Thorbald. Third, I had hung in one of the closets the coat Mrs. Clarinda Thorbald admired so much the other day. Fourth, I have had placed in the house—let’s see?” Peter told off on his fingers. “A housekeeper of the pickled kind, who has never smiled; this quality has been guaranteed by her last employers. A butler of austere mien, a door man, a first-floor maid, a chef, a chauffeur, a hall boy, two cooks—these are in addition to the chef. Then there is a gardener, a furnace man—Lord! I think it is an army. And that’s not all—” Peter stopped for a moment. “Upstairs off the main hall I have had furnished a room precisely like this one. In it is a very tall lamp, with a pink shade. A divan like this one that we are sitting on. But the greatest of all and the thing that was the most difficult to get—I found for her a father—just the kind I suggested.”

“Peter!—Peter!” Clarinda exclaimed.

“Oh, there is something else. Another thing that I found. You might imagine I had difficulty in finding a new father for you, but that was not a circumstance to this thing I accomplished. I spent days in the search. I wandered from one end of the town to the other. I hunted with infinite care. At times I became completely discouraged and almost gave up in despair; but persistency is not a jewel, it is a diadem.”

Clarinda’s father was amused and Clarinda was consumed with impatience.

“As I have said,” he went on, “this last effort caused me great trouble, but I found it. And now, Clarinda, what do you think it was?”

“I don’t know,” she answered. “Tell us? It must have been important if you went to all that trouble.”

“Listen carefully, both of you. It is a matter vital to your happiness, Clarinda. I—found—for Mrs. Clarinda Thorbald—a husband—who would think more of her and love her more and would fill her life with greater content—and—”

Clarinda sprang from the divan. Her face was flushed, and she turned upon Peter. She put her hand over his mouth, and Peter struggled for an instant and then laughed loudly.

“Peter—Peter!” she exclaimed. “You are perfectly horrid. I don’t believe anything is sacred to you. Every bit of pleasure I might have had is destroyed. I hate your old house.”

Clarinda went out of the room and closed the door with a crash behind her.

The two men looked at each other; after a few moments the old man said laconically:

“You ought to know, Peter, that the spirit of jest is not a component part of the female make-up.”

He arose from the divan, put on his coat and hat and went painfully out of the door.

Peter left alone shrugged his shoulders and lit a cigarette, and with a sigh he fell back into the corner of the divan and looked pensively into the fire.

V

Several days went by before Clarinda recovered from the shock she had sustained during the conversation with her father and with Peter.

Clarinda made it a point never to disagree with Peter. She wanted to submerge herself in his moods and thoughts, to absorb his point of view. It was true that she often found Peter bombastic and egotistical and even foolish, but that did not alter her determination. Her observation of combative women, and to what end they came, was sure, and it meant always mental separation, so she determined to avoid this condition at whatever cost it might be to her own individuality. As he should go, so would she go.

When she had thought the matter over, she saw that she had been small, and decided that when they went to inspect the house she would assent to anything he would suggest.

Clarinda knew the house, and had often envied the people who had lived in it. It stood upon one of the most fashionable streets of the city. Surrounded by large gardens it stood alone on the top of a hill, with a wall running around its borders that kept away the gaze of the public.

It had been built but a few years, by a man who had made progress in his undertakings. He built it after plans he had long thought of, and in it he had placed his hopes. Within its four walls he wanted to pass a wonderful life and a long existence.

The forces that control, however, took no interest in his plans, and he and his family moved in, and in only a short time he was smitten with an illness and all that he had hoped for was buried in a few feet of earth.

This man who built the house was filled with ambition. He imagined as he walked through the halls and its decorated rooms, with his wife, that they would live long and he would have the opportunity of showing those whom he knew what the proper condition of life should be. These two sat in the marvelous rooms and wandered in its gardens and made their futile plans.

Success had twisted their perspective; and the woman’s perspective was even more badly twisted than the man’s.

Fate stood back of them in the shadows and laughed at them and their vain imaginings.

The servants whom they hired to do their bidding, grinned at their stupidity. They worked with secret grudgings in their hearts and stole from them with perfect equanimity. The man knew these things, but felt it was part of the price he had to pay.

In the world he was bowed down to and people he knew pointed their fingers at him and envied him his wealth and his big house. But fate came and crushed him. When he was gone fate went out of the doors to look for others to come into the house, and the place he had made for himself, and swept into its walls and gardens Clarinda and Peter.

Peter and Clarinda went in the front doors of the house of sorrow. The servants bowed and grinned. The clocks struck the hours with indifference, but Peter gloated. The automobile he had bought stood on the paved way. As they entered he handed Clarinda a deed for the place, and Clarinda smiled and kissed him. All the anger she had felt went from her heart. The newness of the place, its size compared with the flat, gave her pride just as it had Peter.

Peter took her through the rooms, and they passed from the hall into the parlors, then up the stairs into Clarinda’s apartments. In the middle of the room stood Clarinda’s little maid who gave assurance that all had not been swept away, that there was something to hold to. Peter’s joy was great. He babbled on without hindrance, and with pleasure took her into a tiny room just off the one they were in. There he had placed a divan, with a tall lamp behind it. In front of which was a fireplace, and on the irons lay wood ready to be lit.

Clarinda was pleased and she turned to Peter.

“It is very nice. Only, Peter, I am afraid it is too large. I don’t think I am going to like it as much as I did the flat.”

“Then you are not pleased that I bought it? Or is it because I joked with you?”

“I don’t know,” she replied. “I hate jokes, and I hate people who try them on me.”

“I am sorry, but try to be happy if you can. Forgive me this time, for I only wanted it to be a surprise.”

“I hate surprises,” she said slowly.

“All right, never again,” he said finally.

The little maid rushed about the place, for she liked the grandeur of the fittings, and the extent of the spaces.

Clarinda examined the arrangements with care. She went into the rooms Peter had fixed for himself, and found that they were quite far from her own. She could not decide whether she liked this or not. Peter had always occupied the same room she had and it had worked very nicely.

She feared that a hiatus had come, and it would grow into a tolerance. Something new was creeping into her life, but she did not know whether it appealed to her or not in view of the dangers it concealed.

It was true in her father’s house that her father and mother occupied separate rooms, and when she thought it over she remembered that it had worked well. They had managed to be very comfortable, physically and mentally. It might after all be much nicer. Probably with this arrangement she could collect about her things she liked and Peter could do likewise. Then it was conceded to be more civilized, and it would redound to her comfort in the mornings as she could have the maid help her to dress.

Peter kept her moving from one part of the house to the other, then he led her into the kitchen. It was as big as the rest of the place. There were all kinds of contrivances just as her mother had them. As she entered she was greeted by a big person in a white apron and a cap on his square ill-looking head, who announced he was the chef.

Clarinda smiled as he bowed low before her, but it chilled her, for she knew her one delight was gone. No more would she be allowed to supervise what Peter ate. Never would she be allowed to dictate to the vegetable man, or the meat man, or the man who brought the eggs and the butter. Then a large person loomed out of the distance. A queer hard-faced person, who carried command in her manner, just such a person as Peter had described, who announced that she was the housekeeper.

Clarinda shrank back from all these, and a queer feeling went down her back. All these elaborate things that hung in festoons from the walls and hooks and this crowd of powerful servants scared her. She felt she had receded into the position of a marionette.

Quickly she drew Peter from the kitchen and went back by a hidden staircase to the little room with the tall lamp and the divan; for here Clarinda felt more at home.

Peter sat down in the corner of the divan and stretched his legs out in front of him. He was filled with a great complacency, as he pulled Clarinda down beside him. The tall lamp glowed behind them. The maid had lit the fire and the flames went up the chimney, just as they did in the flat.

“Well,” he asked, “how do you like the new nest I have got for you?”

Clarinda sat for a long time and made no answer. Her face was drawn into a knot. She was thinking seriously. However, she tucked herself into her place beside him and took his hand in hers and her eyes were half closed as she gazed steadily into the fire.

“Father is coming presently,” she said at last, without answering his question. “I want him to look the place over, for he knows so much more than we do.”

“You’ve great faith in the judgment of your father—and apparently little in your husband,” Peter replied with a peeved tone in his voice.

“No—not—exactly—that,” she hesitated. “Ring the bell for the maid, Peter.”

Peter rang the bell, and the maid came in and stood inquiringly at the door.

“I want to do something, Peter,” she said.

“All right,” he answered.

Clarinda turned to the maid. “Bring some coffee for Mr. Peter and me. Don’t make it, but bring hot water and just the coffee and some toast.”

The maid curtsied and went out.

“Why that?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I am worried, Peter. I am all upset. I am trying to find out if I shall like this place. I feel as if something had given me a turn.”

Clarinda arose from the divan, and pulled a small table from the center of the room. When the maid came in she told her to go down and get some cups and saucers, then to fix the table as she used to have it.

The maid soon had the things as Clarinda wanted them, and Peter looked on in astonishment.