George was never more furious; he felt that he was "making a spectacle of himself"; and no young gentleman in the world was more loath than George Amberson Minafer to look a figure of fun. And while he stood there, undeniably such a figure, with Janie and Mary Sharon threatening to burst at any moment, if laughter were longer denied them. Lucy sat looking at him with her eyebrows delicately lifted in casual, polite inquiry. Her own complete composure was what most galled him.
"Nothing of the slightest importance!" he managed to say. "I was just leaving. Good afternoon!" And with long strides he reached the door and hastened through the hall; but before he closed the front door he heard from Janie and Mary Sharon the outburst of wild, irrepressible emotion which his performance had inspired.
He drove home in a tumultuous mood, and almost ran down two ladies who were engaged in absorbing conversation at a crossing. They were his Aunt f.a.n.n.y and the stout Mrs. Johnson; a jerk of the reins at the last instant saved them by a few inches; but their conversation was so interesting that they were unaware of their danger, and did not notice the runabout, nor how close it came to them. George was so furious with himself and with the girl whose unexpected coming into a room could make him look such a fool, that it might have soothed him a little if he had actually run over the two absorbed ladies without injuring them beyond repair. At least, he said to himself that he wished he had; it might have taken his mind off of himself for a few minutes. For, in truth, to be ridiculous (and know it) was one of several things that George was unable to endure. He was savage.
He drove into the Major"s stable too fast, the sagacious Pendennis saving himself from going through a part.i.tion by a swerve which splintered a shaft of the runabout and almost threw the driver to the floor. George swore, and then swore again at the fat old darkey, Tom, for giggling at his swearing.
"Hoopee!" said old Tom. "Mus" been some white lady use Mist" Jawge mighty bad! White lady say, "No, suh, I ain" go"n out ridin" "ith Mist"
Jawge no mo"!" Mist" Jawge drive in. "Dam de dam worl"! Dam de dam hoss!
Dam de dam n.i.g.g.a"! Dam de dam dam!" Hoopee!"
"That"ll do!" George said sternly.
"Yessuh!"
George strode from the stable, crossed the Major"s back yard, then pa.s.sed behind the new houses, on his way home. These structures were now approaching completion, but still in a state of rawness hideous to George--though, for that matter, they were never to be anything except hideous to him. Behind them, stray planks, bricks, refuse of plaster and lath, shingles, straw, empty barrels, strips of twisted tin and broken tiles were strewn everywhere over the dried and pitted gray mud where once the suave lawn had lain like a green lake around those stately islands, the two Amberson houses. And George"s state of mind was not improved by his present view of this repulsive area, nor by his sensations when he kicked an uptilted shingle only to discover that what uptilted it was a brickbat on the other side of it. After that, the whole world seemed to be one solid conspiracy of malevolence.
In this temper he emerged from behind the house nearest to his own, and, glancing toward the street, saw his mother standing with Eugene Morgan upon the cement path that led to the front gate. She was bareheaded, and Eugene held his hat and stick in his hand; evidently he had been calling upon her, and she had come from the house with him, continuing their conversation and delaying their parting.
They had paused in their slow walk from the front door to the gate, yet still stood side by side, their shoulders almost touching, as though neither Isabel nor Eugene quite realized that their feet had ceased to bear them forward; and they were not looking at each other, but at some indefinite point before them, as people do who consider together thoughtfully and in harmony. The conversation was evidently serious; his head was bent, and Isabel"s lifted left hand rested against her cheek; but all the significances of their thoughtful att.i.tude denoted companionableness and a shared understanding. Yet, a stranger, pa.s.sing, would not have thought them married: somewhere about Eugene, not quite to be located, there was a romantic gravity; and Isabel, tall and graceful, with high colour and absorbed eyes, was visibly no wife walking down to the gate with her husband.
George stared at them. A hot dislike struck him at the sight of Eugene; and a vague revulsion, like a strange, unpleasant taste in his mouth, came over him as he looked at his mother: her manner was eloquent of so much thought about her companion and of such reliance upon him. And the picture the two thus made was a vivid one indeed, to George, whose angry eyes, for some reason, fixed themselves most intently upon Isabel"s lifted hand, upon the white ruffle at her wrist, bordering the graceful black sleeve, and upon the little indentations in her cheek where the tips of her fingers rested. She should not have worn white at her wrist, or at the throat either, George felt; and then, strangely, his resentment concentrated upon those tiny indentations at the tips of her fingers--actual changes, however slight and fleeting, in his mother"s face, made because of Mr. Eugene Morgan. For the moment, it seemed to George that Morgan might have claimed the ownership of a face that changed for him.. It was as if he owned Isabel.
The two began to walk on toward the gate, where they stopped again, turning to face each other, and Isabel"s glance, pa.s.sing Eugene, fell upon George. Instantly she smiled and waved her hand to him; while Eugene turned and nodded; but George, standing as in some rigid trance, and staring straight at them, gave these signals of greeting no sign of recognition whatever. Upon this, Isabel called to him, waving her hand again.
"Georgie!" she called, laughing. "Wake up, dear! Georgie, h.e.l.lo!"
George turned away as if he had neither seen nor heard, and stalked into the house by the side door.
Chapter XXI
He went to his room, threw off his coat, waistcoat, collar, and tie, letting them lie where they chanced to fall, and then, having violently enveloped himself in a black velvet dressing-gown, continued this action by lying down with a vehemence that brought a wheeze of protest from his bed. His repose was only a momentary semblance, however, for it lasted no longer than the time it took him to groan "Riffraff!" between his teeth. Then he sat up, swung his feet to the floor, rose, and began to pace up and down the large room.
He had just been consciously rude to his mother for the first time in his life; for, with all his riding down of populace and riffraff, he had never before been either deliberately or impulsively disregardful of her. When he had hurt her it had been accidental; and his remorse for such an accident was always adequate compensation--and more--to Isabel.
But now he had done a rough thing to her; and he did not repent; rather he was the more irritated with her. And when he heard her presently go by his door with a light step, singing cheerfully to herself as she went to her room, he perceived that she had mistaken his intention altogether, or, indeed, had failed to perceive that he had any intention at all. Evidently she had concluded that he refused to speak to her and Morgan out of sheer absent-mindedness, supposing him so immersed in some preoccupation that he had not seen them or heard her calling to him.
Therefore there was nothing of which to repent, even if he had been so minded; and probably Eugene himself was unaware that any disapproval had recently been expressed. George snorted. What sort of a dreamy loon did they take him to be?
There came a delicate, eager tapping at his door, not done with a knuckle but with the tip of a fingernail, which was instantly clarified to George"s mind"s eye as plainly as if he saw it: the long and polished white-mooned pink shield on the end of his Aunt f.a.n.n.y"s right forefinger. But George was in no mood for human communications, and even when things went well he had little pleasure in f.a.n.n.y"s society.
Therefore it is not surprising that at the sound of her tapping, instead of bidding her enter, he immediately crossed the room with the intention of locking the door to keep her out.
f.a.n.n.y was too eager, and, opening the door before he reached it, came quickly in, and closed it behind her. She was in a street dress and a black hat, with a black umbrella in her black-gloved hand--for f.a.n.n.y"s heavy mourning, at least, was nowhere tempered with a glimpse of white, though the anniversary of Wilbur"s death had pa.s.sed. An infinitesimal perspiration gleamed upon her pale skin; she breathed fast, as if she had run up the stairs; and excitement was sharp in her widened eyes. Her look was that of a person who had just seen something extraordinary or heard thrilling news.
"Now, what on earth do you want?" her chilling nephew demanded.
"George," she said hurriedly, "I saw what you did when you wouldn"t speak to them. I was sitting with Mrs. Johnson at her front window, across the street, and I saw it all."
"Well, what of it?"
"You did right!" f.a.n.n.y said with a vehemence not the less spirited because she suppressed her voice almost to a whisper. "You did exactly right! You"re behaving splendidly about the whole thing, and I want to tell you I know your father would thank you if he could see what you"re doing."
"My Lord!" George broke out at her. "You make me dizzy! For heaven"s sake quit the mysterious detective business--at least do quit it around me! Go and try it on somebody else, if you like; but I don"t want to hear it!"
She began to tremble, regarding him with a fixed gaze. "You don"t care to hear then," she said huskily, "that I approve of what you"re doing?"
"Certainly not! Since I haven"t the faintest idea what you think I"m "doing," naturally I don"t care whether you approve of it or not. All I"d like, if you please, is to be alone. I"m not giving a tea here, this afternoon, if you"ll permit me to mention it!"
f.a.n.n.y"s gaze wavered; she began to blink; then suddenly she sank into a chair and wept silently, but with a terrible desolation.
"Oh, for the Lord"s sake!" he moaned. "What in the world is wrong with you?"
"You"re always picking on me," she quavered wretchedly, her voice indistinct with the wetness that bubbled into it from her tears. "You do--you always pick on me! You"ve always done it--always--ever since you were a little boy! Whenever anything goes wrong with you, you take it out on me! You do! You always--"
George flung to heaven a gesture of despair; it seemed to him the last straw that f.a.n.n.y should have chosen this particular time to come and sob in his room over his mistreatment of her!
"Oh, my Lord!" he whispered; then, with a great effort, addressed her in a reasonable tone: "Look here, Aunt f.a.n.n.y; I don"t see what you"re making all this fuss about. Of course I know I"ve teased you sometimes, but--"
"Teased" me?" she wailed. "Teased" me! Oh, it does seem too hard, sometimes--this mean old life of mine does seem too hard! I don"t think I can stand it! Honestly, I don"t think I can! I came in here just to show you I sympathized with you--just to say something pleasant to you, and you treat me as if I were--oh, no, you wouldn"t treat a servant the way you treat me! You wouldn"t treat anybody in the world like this except old f.a.n.n.y! "Old f.a.n.n.y" you say. "It"s n.o.body but old f.a.n.n.y, so I"ll kick her--n.o.body will resent it. I"ll kick her all I want to!" You do! That"s how you think of me-I know it! And you"re right: I haven"t got anything in the world, since my brother died--n.o.body--nothing--nothing!"
"Oh my Lord!" George groaned.
f.a.n.n.y spread out her small, soaked handkerchief, and shook it in the air to dry it a little, crying as damply and as wretchedly during this operation" as before--a sight which gave George a curious shock to add to his other agitations, it seemed so strange. "I ought not to have come," she went on, "because I might have known it would only give you an excuse to pick on me again! I"m sorry enough I came, I can tell you!
I didn"t mean to speak of it again to you, at all; and I wouldn"t have, but I saw how you treated them, and I guess I got excited about it, and couldn"t help following the impulse--but I"ll know better next time, I can tell you! I"ll keep my mouth shut as I meant to, and as I would have, if I hadn"t got excited and if I hadn"t felt sorry for you. But what does it matter to anybody if I"m sorry for them? I"m only old f.a.n.n.y!"
"Oh, good gracious! How can it matter to me who"s sorry for me when I don"t know what they"re sorry about!"
"You"re so proud," she quavered, "and so hard! I tell you I didn"t mean to speak of it to you, and I never, never in the world would have told you about it, nor have made the faintest reference to it, if I hadn"t seen that somebody else had told you, or you"d found out for yourself some way. I--"
In despair of her intelligence, and in some doubt of his own, George struck the palms of his hands together. "Somebody else had told me what?
I"d found what out for myself?"
"How people are talking about your mother."
Except for the incidental teariness of her voice, her tone was casual, as though she mentioned a subject previously discussed and understood; for f.a.n.n.y had no doubt that George had only pretended to be mystified because, in his pride, he would not in words admit that he knew what he knew.
"What did you say?" he asked incredulously.
"Of course I understood what you were doing," f.a.n.n.y went on, drying her handkerchief again. "It puzzled other people when you began to be rude to Eugene, because they couldn"t see how you could treat him as you did when you were so interested in Lucy. But I remembered how you came to me, that other time when there was so much talk about Isabel; and I knew you"d give Lucy up in a minute, if it came to a question of your mother"s reputation, because you said then that--"
"Look here," George interrupted in a shaking voice. "Look here, I"d like--" He stopped, unable to go on, his agitation was so great. His chest heaved as from hard running, and his complexion, pallid at first, had become mottled; fiery splotches appearing at his temples and cheeks.
"What do you mean by telling me--telling me there"s talk about--about--"
He gulped, and began again: "What do you mean by using such words as "reputation"? What do you mean, speaking of a "question" of my--my mother"s reputation?"
f.a.n.n.y looked up at him woefully over the handkerchief which she now applied to her reddened nose. "G.o.d knows I"m sorry for you, George," she murmured. "I wanted to say so, but it"s only old f.a.n.n.y, so whatever she says--even when it"s sympathy--pick on her for it! Hammer her!" She sobbed. "Hammer her! It"s only poor old lonely f.a.n.n.y!"