I loved talking with him; he was the first man I ever talked much with on serious subjects. He stimulated me, and I enjoyed being with him.
Only, it never occurred to me that he could be the Real Man.
"You"ve often heard of women refusing men because of their poverty.
Well, the chief thing that prejudiced me against Milton Leffert was his wealth. He happened to possess a large fortune made and left to him by his father, and he didn"t do much except take care of it, together with that of his sister Jane. He was president of the one concern his father had not sold out before he died, but that was the sort of thing that ran itself; he didn"t spend an hour a day at it. That wasn"t much of a career, according to the way I thought at that time, and when he first began asking me to marry him I laughed outright.
""You can"t know me very well, Milton," I said, "if you suppose I could be content with a ready-made man. I like you very much, but you"re not the husband for me."
""What do you mean by a ready-made man?" he asked, looking at me out of his quiet gray eyes.
""I should say it was sufficiently obvious," I said. "There"s nothing the matter with you, and I hate to hurt you, but--well, you"re not dynamic."
"I stopped to see how he would take that. He was silent for a while, then at last he said: "I don"t think that"s a very good reason for refusing a man."
"I laughed; the grave way he said it was so characteristic of him. "Oh, Milton," I said, "I really think that"s the only reason in the world to make me refuse a man. I don"t much believe I shall ever marry, but if I do it will be to a man that I can help win his fight in the world; somebody with whom I can march side by side through life, whom I alone can help and encourage and inspire! He"s got to be the kind that will start at the bottom and work his way up to the top, and who couldn"t do it without me! That"s not you, Milton. You have no fight to make--your father made it for you. You start in at the top, the wrong end. Of course there are still higher summits you could aim for, but you never will, Milton. You"re not that kind; you"ll hold on to what you have, and no more. I"m not blaming you; you were made that way. And there must be a great many people like you in the world. And I _like_ you none the less. Only I can"t marry you."
""But I don"t see what difference all this would make," he said, "if you only loved me."
""My dear man," said I, "don"t you see that it"s only that sort of a man who could make me love him? If you had it in you, I suppose I should love you. You don"t suppose I could love you without that, do you? I"m afraid you don"t understand me very well, Milton!"
""I"m learning all the time," he answered, and that was the nearest thing to a witty or humorous remark that I ever heard him make.
""Then again," I went on, "our ages are too far apart. Even if you were the sort I mean, we shouldn"t be starting even. The fight would be half won when I came in, and that would never do. I shouldn"t feel as if I were part of your life. A marriage like that wouldn"t be a marriage, it would be a sweet little middle-aged idyll!"
"He flushed at that. "A man can"t change his age, Selina; you have no right to taunt me with that."
""I didn"t mean to taunt you--I only wanted to explain," said I. "And the last thing in the world I want to do is to hurt you."
""But that"s the only thing a man can"t change," he went on after a moment, paying no attention to my apology. After another pause he added: "I shan"t give you up, mind," and when we talked again it was of other things.
"I went on seeing him as before, though not quite so often. Then presently I went away on some long visits and did not see him for several months. When I came back I noticed that his manner was more animated than before, and that somehow he looked younger. I remember being quite pleased.--He was thirty-four at the time, and I not quite twenty-three.
"It was perfectly evident, even to me, that he was working to win me. I saw it, but I did not pay any attention to it; when I thought about it at all it was with a sort of amus.e.m.e.nt. One day he came to me apparently very much pleased about something.
""Congratulate me, Selina," he said; "I"ve just got my appointment."
""Appointment?" said I. I truthfully had no idea what he was talking about.
""Yes," he went on, "I begin work on the board next week."
""What board?"
""Why, the tax board--the city tax board. Surely you knew?"
"Then I laughed--I remember it so distinctly. "Good gracious, Milton," I said, "I thought it must be the Cabinet of the United States, at the very least!" Then I saw his face, and knew that I had hurt him.
""It"s splendid, of course," I added. "I do congratulate you, indeed, most heartily. Only--only Milton, you were so serious!"
"I laughed again. He stared at me and after a moment laughed himself, a little. I suppose that laugh was the greatest effort he had made yet. I know I liked him better at that moment than ever before. If he had let it go at that who knows what might have happened?
"But he changed again after a few seconds; he scowled and became more serious than ever. "No!" he said angrily, "why should I laugh with you over the most serious thing in my life? Why should you want to make me?
First you blame me for not making anything of myself, and now, when I am trying my best to do it, you laugh at me for being serious! Of course I"m serious about my work--I shan"t pretend to be anything else."
"Of course that was all wrong, too. Every one admires a man who can laugh a little about his work. But I felt a sort of hopelessness in trying to explain it to him; I was afraid he would never really understand. So instead I drew him out on the new work he had taken up and tried to make him talk about the plans he had in mind, of which the tax board was only the first step. He seemed rather shy about talking of the future.
""It"s a case for actions, not words," he said. "I don"t want to give you the impression that I"m only a talker. You"ll see, in time, what you"ve made of me," and he smiled at me in a way that rather went to my heart.
""Milton," I said, "I"m more than glad if I can be of help to you, in any way, but I should be deceiving you if I let you think there"s any hope--any more hope, even, than there was."
"But that was the kind of talk he understood best. "Selina," he said, "don"t you bother about caring for me. The time hasn"t come for that yet. I"m not even ready for it myself--there"s a lot to be done first.
The time will come, at last; I"m sure of it. A woman can"t have such a power over a man as you have over me without coming to have some feeling for him in the end, if it"s only pride in her own handiwork. But even if it never should come, do you think I could regret what I"ve done, what I"m going to do? You"ve made a man of me, Selina. That stands, no matter what happens!"
"Of course that sort of thing can"t help but make an impression on a woman, and it had its effect on me. It made me a little nervous; it was like raising a Frankenstein. I began to wonder if I should come to be swallowed up in this new life I had unwillingly created. Once or twice I caught myself wondering how it would feel to be the wife of Milton Leffert....
"But about that time my stepmother began talking to me about it and trying to persuade me to marry him, and that had the effect of making me like the thought less. Somehow she made it seem almost like a duty, and if there was one thing I couldn"t abide it was the idea of marrying from a sense of duty. Then other things came into my life and for a time I ceased to think of him almost entirely.
"We went abroad for several months, my stepmother and the two boys and I. Hilary had been seriously ill, and we thought the change would do him good. And as he had a good deal of study to make up--he was fourteen at the time--my stepmother engaged a young man to go with us and tutor him and be a companion to the boys generally.
"You might almost guess the rest. I saw my stepmother wince when he met us at the steamer--we had engaged him by letter and had no idea what he looked like. I suppose it had never occurred to her before that there might be danger in placing me in daily companionship with a man of about my own age. It certainly occurred to her then.
"James, I know I can"t make it sound plausible to you, but even now I don"t wonder I fell in love with him. I don"t suppose a more attractive man was ever born. He was thin and brown and had a pure aquiline profile--but it"s no use describing him. Think of the most attractive person you ever knew and make him ten times more so and perhaps you"ll get some idea.
"He was quite poor--that also took my fancy. He was trying to earn money enough to put himself through law school. Those who knew him said he was a brilliant student and that a great career lay before him, and I believed it. He certainly was as bright and keen as they make "em, and very witty and amusing. Occasionally Harry reminds me of him, and that makes me worry about Harry.... Of course I was tremendously taken with his mental qualities, and I had all sorts of romantic notions about helping him to make a great place for himself in the world, and all the rest of it. But as a matter of fact what drew me to him chiefly was simple animal attraction. It wasn"t wrong and it wasn"t unnatural, but--well, it was unfortunate.
"Even my stepmother felt it. I don"t know how long it was before she knew what was going on, but she never made any effort to stop it. Like a sensible woman she kept her mouth shut and determined to let things take their course. But she never talked to me any more about Milton Leffert, and as a matter of fact I know she would have been perfectly willing that I should marry Adrian. Yes, that was his first name. I shan"t tell you his last, because he"s still alive.
"I remember telling myself when I first saw him that such an absurdly handsome person could not have much to him, but he appeared better and better as time went on. He was thoughtful and tactful and knew how to efface himself. He was splendid with the boys; Hilary in particular took a tremendous fancy to him and would do anything he said. He was the greatest influence in Hilary"s life up to that time, and I really think the best. He was an extraordinary person. By the end of the first month I suspected he was the Real Man. By the end of the second I was convinced of it, and by the end of the third I would willingly have placed my head under his foot any time he gave the word. By the end of the sixth month I wouldn"t have touched him with my foot--I"m sure of it. But there never was any sixth month.
"In the month of June we were on the Lake of Como. There happened to be a full moon. Como in the moonlight is not the safest place in the world for young people, under any circ.u.mstances. In our case it was sure to lead to something.
"We had strolled up to a terrace high above the lake and stood for a long time leaning over the bal.u.s.trade drinking in the beauty of the scene. For a long time we said nothing, and apparently the same thought struck us both--that it was all too beautiful to be true. At any rate after a time Adrian sighed and said: "Oh, this d.a.m.nable moonlight!"
""Why?"I asked.
""Because it makes everything seem so unreal--the lake, the mountains, the nightingales, everything. It"s like a poem by Lamartine. But I don"t mind that--I like Lamartine. The trouble is it makes you seem unreal too. Oh, I know that you"re where you are and are flesh and blood and that if I pinched you you"d probably scream and all that--"
""No, I shouldn"t," said I. "I wouldn"t be real if I did."
"He sighed. "That shows it," he said; "that proves exactly what I say.
You"re not really living this; your soul isn"t really here. I"m not really in your life. I"m just a pretty little episode, a stage property, a part of the lake and the moonlight, a part of every summer vacation!"
""If you"re not really in my life," said I, "doesn"t it occur to you that it"s because of your unreality, not mine?"
""You admit that I"m not real to you, then?"
""No," said I, "but it would be your own fault if you weren"t."
""What about that man in New Haven, is he real?" he asked suddenly. I only flushed, and he went on: "That"s it--he"s the real man in your life. You"re willing to play about with me in the summertime, but when the winter comes you"ll go straight back and marry him. I"m all right for the moonlight, but you want him in the cold gray light of the dawn!
He"s the Old and New Testaments to you, and I"m only--a poem by Lamartine! And with me--oh, Lord!" He buried his face in his hands.