Paradise Garden Part 25

"Good-night, Jerry."

The boy was changed. It may not seem a serious thing to you, my precocious reader, who number your flirtations among the trivial affairs of life. Calf love, you will say, is not a matter worth bothering one's brains about. You will cla.s.s that ailment perhaps with the whooping cough and the measles and sneer it out of existence. But I would remind you that Jerry's mind and character were quite mature.

I had schooled them myself and I know. If Jerry had fallen in love with Marcia Van Wyck who proposed to play at her game of "pitch-farthing" with so fine a soul as Jerry's, the thing was serious, serious for both of them. His att.i.tude toward the girl in his conversation tonight reminded me that affairs had already progressed a long way. She had come to Briar Hills, flattering Jerry, of course, that they could be alone, intriguing meanwhile with Channing Lloyd, a wild fellow, according to Jack Ballard, who at thirty could have unprofitably shared his omniscience with the devil. A fine foil for Jerry!

At dinner, the following night, we made a curious party. Marcia Van Wyck, radiant in pale green, with her admirers one at either hand; Channing Lloyd, dark, ma.s.sive, well-groomed, with a narrow smile and an air of complete domination of the table; Jerry at the other side, rolling bread-pills and forcing humor rather awkwardly; Miss Gore, solemn in black satin--all of them elegant and correct in evening clothes, while I in my rather shabby serge sat awkwardly trying to hide the s.h.i.+niness of my elbows. From my position at one end of the table I had an excellent opportunity to study the company. I saw in Lloyd, I think, the attraction for Marcia. His looks, his topics, his appet.i.tes were animal and gross. He drank continuously, smoked after his salad, and monopolized the guest of the evening to the complete exclusion of the others. Fragments of their talk reached me, of which I understood a little--Greek to Jerry. Miss Gore sat calmly through it all, leading Jerry into the conversation at propitious moments and out of it when it threatened incomprehension.

There is a kind of charity of the dinner table and ballroom finer, I think, than the mere kindness of giving, finer because it requires discretion, n.o.bler because it requires self-elimination. The more I saw of Miss Gore the more deeply was I impressed by her many amiable qualities. She had an ear for Jerry, but aware of my complete elimination by the rowdy upon my left, found time to relieve the awkwardness of my situation and contribute something to the pleasure of what for me would otherwise have been a very unenjoyable repast.

But when dinner was over, to my great surprise, I found myself alone with the girl Marcia. I have no very distinct notion of the means by which she accomplished this feat, remembering only hazily that we all ambled over to the conservatory, where a particular variety of orchid seemed to interest the girl. And there we were, I explaining and she listening, the others off somewhere near the entrance to the gymnasium, where I heard Lloyd's voice in bored monotone. I was quite sure in a moment that she hadn't managed to get me there to talk orchids, and I felt a vague sense of discomfort at her nearness. I have given the impression that her eyes were cold. As I looked into them I saw that I had been mistaken. In the dim light they seemed illumined at their greater depth by a hidden fire. She fixed her gaze upon my face and moved ever so slightly toward me. You may think it strange after what I have written when I say that at this moment I felt a doubt rising in me as to whether or not I might have done this girl an injustice, for her smile was frank, her air gracious, her tone friendly.

"Oh, Mr. Canby," she said in her even voice, "I've wanted to tell you what a wonderful thing it is that you have created--to thank you for Jerry. He's a gift, Mr. Canby, refres.h.i.+ng like the rain to thirsty flowers. You can't know what meeting a man like Jerry means to a woman like me. I don't think you possibly can."

"What does it mean to you?" I asked.

"It means a new point of view on life, a thing scarce enough in this day when all existence is either sordid or vicious. I had reached a Slough of Despond, Mr. Canby, weary of the attainable, not strong enough or clever enough or courageous enough to defy criticism and obey the small voice that urged. I was sick with self-a.n.a.lysis, filled to the brim with modern philosophies--"

"I understand," I broke in with a smile, which seemed to come in spite of me. "There's no medicine for that."

"Yes, Jerry. I--I think he's cured me--or at least Pm well on the road to recovery. n.o.body could be mind-sick long with Jerry letting daylight in."

"Daylight, yes. You found it startling?"

"A little, at first. I felt the way I look sometimes at dawn after dancing all night, my tinsel tarnished, my color faded. All my effects are planned for artificial light, you see."

Her frankness disarmed me.

"I'm thanking you for Jerry," she went on, "but I can't help knowing that Jerry is what you've made him; that his ideals, his simplicity, his purity are yours also."

If she had baited her hook with flattery there was no sign of premeditation in the gentleness of her accents or in the friendly look she gave me. Could it be possible that this was the person in whom I had seen such a menace to Jerry's happiness?

"I have merely taught Jerry to be honest, Miss Van Wyck," I replied.

"I ask no credit of him or of you."

"But if it pleases me to give it to you," she said softly, "you surely can't object."

"No, but I don't ask laurels I don't deserve. Jerry is--merely himself."

"Plus, Mr. Roger Canby--purist and pedagogue," she laughed. "No, you can't get out of it. Jerry reflects you; I think I actually recognize inflections of the voice. You ought to be very glad to have laid so strong an impress on so fine a thing."

Just then I heard the raucous laugh of Channing Lloyd from the distant lawn, which reminded me with a startling suddenness that this slender creature who spoke softly of ideals and purity could choose a man like this fellow for an intimate. I noticed, too, the delicate odor which rose from her corsage of which Jack Ballard had spoken, something subtle and unfamiliar.

I straightened and looked out through the open window, steeling myself against her.

"I am glad you think him fine," I said dryly. "No doubt he compares very favorably with other young men of your acquaintance."

"You mean Mr. Lloyd, of course," she said quickly.

I was silent, avoiding her gaze and her perfume.

"I'm afraid you don't understand me, Mr. Canby," she said softly. "I'm sorry. Any friend of Jerry's ought to be a friend of mine."

"I should like to be, of course, but--"

I paused. This woman, against my will, was making me lie to her.

"But what--? Am I so--so unpleasant to you? What have I done to earn your displeasure?"

"Nothing," I stammered. "Nothing."

"Is it that you fear the contamination of the kind of culture I've been bred and born in? Or the effect of my familiarity with doctrines with which you're not in sympathy?"

Was she mocking? Her voice was still gentle, but I had a notion that inside of her she was laughing. It was as though, having failed to win me, she was beginning to unmask. I peered into her face. It was guileless and wore the appealing expression of a reproachful child.

"You do not understand," I said. "I fear nothing for Jerry. He is strong enough to stand alone. I hope you know just how strong he is, that's all."

She was a little puzzled--and interested.

"I hope I do; but I wish you would explain."

I turned toward her quickly.

"I mean this. You and he are very different. He cares for you, of course. It was to be expected, because you're everything that he is not. Whatever you are, Jerry will be serious. And you can't bind the characters of two strong people together without mutilating one or the other, or perhaps both. Jerry will believe everything you tell him and continue to believe it unless you deceive him. He's ingenuous, but I hope you won't underestimate him."

She fingered the leaves of a rose, but her eyes under their lids were looking elsewhere.

"How should I deceive him, Mr. Canby?" she asked, her voice still unchanging.

"Perhaps I put it too baldly. But I'm not in the habit; of mincing words. Jerry is no plaything. I'll give you an instance of how much in earnest he is." And then briefly, but with some sense of the color of the thing, I gave her a description of Jerry's bout with Sagorski. She listened without looking at me, while her slender fingers caressed the rose leaf, but beneath their lids I saw; her eyes flas.h.i.+ng. When I had finished I turned to her with a smile.

"That's the kind of man that Jerry is--harmless, docile and most agreeable, but let him be aroused--"

I paused, letting the paralipsis finish my suggestion.

She was silent a moment, finally turning to me with a laugh that rang a little discordantly against the softness of her speech.

"Jerry wouldn't beat _me_, would he, Mr. Canby?"

"I'm sure I haven't the least means of knowing," I replied.

"You are merely warning me, I see. Thanks. But I'm afraid you give me credit for greater hardihood than I possess. On the whole I think I'm flattered."

She snipped a bud and put it to her lips as though to conceal a smile, and then pa.s.sed me slowly.

"Come, Mr. Canby," she said. "I think it's time we joined the others."

It was. The night was cool, but I was perspiring profusely.