"I intend to learn as soon as I"ve finished my fall shopping."
"You are not coming back to America?"
"Not for a long time."
"Then you will find my friends useful."
She turned her eyes upon his. "You are very kind," said she.
"But I"d rather--we"d rather--not meet anyone just yet."
His eyes met hers calmly. It was impossible to tell whether he understood or not. After a few seconds he glanced out over the house. "That is a beautiful dress," said he. "You have real taste, if you"ll permit me to say so. I was one of those who were struck dumb with admiration at the Ritz tonight."
"It"s the first grand dress I ever possessed," said she.
"You love dresses--and jewels--and luxury?"
"As a starving man loves food."
"Then you are happy?"
"Perfectly so--for the first time in my life."
"It is a kind of ecstasy--isn"t it? I remember how it was with me. I had always been poor--I worked my way through prep school and college. And I wanted _all_ the luxuries. The more I had to endure--the worse food and clothing and lodgings--the madder I became about them, until I couldn"t think of anything but getting the money to buy them. When I got it, I gorged myself. . . . It"s a pity the starving man can"t keep on loving food--keep on being always starving and always having his hunger satisfied."
"Ah, but he can."
He smiled mysteriously. "You think so, now. Wait till you are gorged."
She laughed. "You don"t know! I could never get enough--never!"
His smile became even more mysterious. As he looked away, his profile presented itself to her view--an outline of sheer strength, of tragic sadness--the profile of those who have dreamed and dared and suffered. But the smile, saying no to her confident a.s.sertion, still lingered.
"Never!" she repeated. She must compel that smile to take away its disquieting negation, its relentless prophecy of the end of her happiness. She must convince him that he had come back in vain, that he could not disturb her.
"You don"t suggest to me the woman who can be content with just people and just things. You will always insist on luxury. But you will demand more." He looked at her again.
"And you will get it," he added, in a tone that sent a wave through her nerves.
Her glance fell. Palmer came in, bringing an odor of cologne and of fresh cigarette fumes. Brent rose. Palmer laid a detaining hand on his shoulder. "Do stay on, Brent, and go to supper with us."
"I was about to ask you to supper with me. Have you been to the Abbaye?"
"No. We haven"t got round to that yet. Is it lively?"
"And the food"s the best in Paris. You"ll come?"
Brent was looking at Susan. Palmer, not yet educated in the smaller--and important--refinements of politeness, did not wait for her reply or think that she should be consulted.
"Certainly," said he. "On condition that you dine with us tomorrow night."
"Very well," agreed Brent. And he excused himself to take leave of his friends. "Just tell your chauffeur to go to the Abbaye--he"ll know," he said as he bowed over Susan"s hand.
"I"ll be waiting. I wish to be there ahead and make sure of a table."
As the door of the box closed upon him Freddie burst out with that enthusiasm we feel for one who is in a position to render us good service and is showing a disposition to do so. "I"ve known him for years," said he, "and he"s the real thing. He used to spend a lot of time in a saloon I used to keep in Allen Street."
"Allen Street?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Susan, shivering.
"I was twenty-two then. He used to want to study types, as he called it. And I gathered in types for him--though really my place was for the swell crooks and their ladies. How long ago that seems--and how far away!"
"Another life," said Susan.
"That"s a fact. This is my second time on earth. _Our_ second time.
I tell you it"s fighting for a foothold that makes men and women the wretches they are. Nowadays, I couldn"t hurt a fly--could you?
But then you never were cruel. That"s why you stayed down so long."
Susan smiled into the darkness of the auditorium--the curtain was up, and they were talking in undertones. She said, as she smiled:
"I"ll never go down and stay down for that reason again."
Her tone arrested his attention; but he could make nothing of it or of her expression, though her face was clear enough in the reflection from the footlights.
"Anyhow, Brent and I are old pals," continued he, "though we haven"t seen so much of each other since he made a hit with the plays. He always used to predict I"d get to the top and be respectable. Now that it"s come true, he"ll help me.
He"ll introduce us, if we work it right."
"But we don"t want that yet," protested Susan.
"You"re ready and so am I," declared Palmer in the tone she knew had the full strength of his will back of it.
Faint angry hissing from the stalls silenced them, but as soon as they were in the auto Susan resumed. "I have told Mr.
Brent we don"t want to meet his friends yet."
"Now what the h.e.l.l did you do that for?" demanded Freddie. It was the first time she had crossed him; it was the first time he had been reminiscent of the Freddie she used to know.
"Because," said she evenly, "I will not meet people under false pretenses."
"What rot!"
"I will not do it," replied she in the same quiet way.
He a.s.sumed that she meant only one of the false pretenses--the one that seemed the least to her. He said:
"Then we"ll draw up and sign a marriage contract and date it a couple of years ago, before the new marriage law was pa.s.sed to save rich men"s drunken sons from common law wives."
"I am already married," said Susan. "To a farmer out in Indiana."
Freddie laughed. "Well, I"ll be d.a.m.ned! You! You!" He looked at her ermine-lined cloak and laughed again. "An Indiana farmer!" Then he suddenly sobered. "Come to think of it," said he, "that"s the first thing you ever told me about your past."
"Or anybody else," said Susan. Her body was quivering, for we remember the past events with the sensations they made upon us at the time. She could smell that little room in the farmhouse. Allen Street and all the rest of her life in the underworld had for her something of the vagueness of dreams--not only now but also while she was living that life.
But not Ferguson, not the night when her innocent soul was ravished as a wolf rips up and munches a bleating lamb. No vagueness of dreams about that, but a reality to make her shudder and reel whenever she thought of it--a reality vivider now that she was a woman grown in experiences and understanding.