Paradise Garden Part 55

He came forward quickly.

"You know I don't mean that. Would you have me less considerate of your reputation, your peace of mind, than I am of Una's? I want you to understand how deeply I respect you--that I want to treat you with tenderness, with delicacy, with gentle devotion."

I heard her sigh. I'm sure if Jerry's back had been turned she must have yawned. She rose and I heard her slow footsteps join his.

"How you disappoint me!" I heard her murmur and then more faintly: "How terribly you disappoint me! To a.n.a.lyze one's feelings! To think of conventions! Now! What _are_ you?"

"Marcia!"

I heard their voices fading into the distance and peered forth. They were walking slowly down the path, away from me. I stirred cautiously, straightened my stiffened legs, rose painfully, and then carefully made my way farther into the forest, through which I plunged headlong, eager to escape the sight of that accursed rock and its harrowing sounds. I had not been far wrong in my estimate of her and of Jerry. I would to G.o.d he had strangled her.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE ENEMY'S COUNTRY

Una and her mother did not come to Horsham Manor during the following week, and it was early in June before Jerry ordered the rooms to be prepared for them. Jack Ballard, too, having at last found Newport irksome, promised to make up the house-party.

It did not seem to me that Jerry was especially overjoyed at the prospect of these guests. During the week or more that followed his encounter with Marcia in the woods, he had reverted to his former habits of strolling aimlessly about when he wasn't at Briar Hills or in town, at times cheerful enough; at others obstinately morose. But he did not drink. Whatever the differences between us, he evidently thought seriously enough of his word to me to make that promise worth keeping. I know he believed me to be meddlesome and with good reason (if he had known all), but he would not let me leave the Manor. I was a habit with him, a bad habit if you like, but it seemed a necessary one. Nevertheless in spite of the apparently pleasant nature of our relations, there was a coolness between us. Much as he loved me, and I was still sure that Marcia had made no real change in that affection, there was a new reserve in his manner, meant, I think, to show me that I had gone too far and that his affair with Marcia was not to be the subject of further discussion between us.

Had he known how thankful I was for that! I knew all that I wanted to know of Marcia Van Wyck and of their curious relations. And unfortunate as my ambush had seemed, demeaning to my honor and painful to my conscience, I had begun to look upon my venture beneath that infernal rock as a kind of mixed blessing. At least I knew!

Of Una, Jerry said much in terms of real friendship and undisguised admiration--of his visits to her in town and the progress of her work, a frankness which, alas! was the surest token of his infatuation elsewhere. And yet I could not believe that the boy was any more certain of the real nature of his feeling for Marcia than he had been a month ago. He was still bewildered, hypnotized, obsessed, his joyous days too joyous, his gloomy ones too hopeless. Like a green log, he burned with much crackling or sullenly simmered. But the fire was still there. Nothing had happened that would put it out, not even Una.

As the hour of the visit of the Habbertons approached, I found myself a prey to some misgivings. It was not difficult for me to imagine that the frank nature of Jerry's visits to Una might have given the girl a false notion of the state of Jerry's mind, for it was like the boy to have told her of Marcia's mellifluous contrition which, as I knew, was no more genuine than any other of her carefully planned emotional crises. I did not know what Marcia thought of Una's approaching visit or whether Jerry had even told her of it, but I had no fancy to see Una Habberton again placed in a false position. A visit to Miss Gore made one morning when Jerry was in town at the office showed me that even if Marcia knew of Una's approaching visit, she had not told Miss Gore of it and also revealed the unpleasant fact of Channing Lloyd's presence in the neighborhood, a guest of the Carews and at the very moment of my visit a companion of Marcia in a daylong drive up to Big Westkill Mountain. This was the way she was keeping her promise to give Lloyd up! What a little liar she was!

Of course, having learned wisdom, I said nothing to Miss Gore, but pa.s.sed a very profitable morning in her society after which she invited me to stay for lunch. I can a.s.sure you that after Jerry's glum looks, Miss Gore's amiable conversation and warm hospitality were balm to my wounded spirit. I had no desire to discuss her intangible relative or she, I presume, the unfortunate Jerry, both of us having washed our hands of the entire affair. She was a prudent person, Miss Gore, and though full of the milk of human kindness, not disposed to waste it where it would do no good. I left with the promise to call upon her another morning and read to her a paper I had written for a philosophical magazine upon the "The Identical Character of Thought and Being."

Jack Ballard arrived upon the morning of the appointed day in his own machine, and since Jerry and his other guests were not expected until evening, we had a long afternoon of it together. We took a tramp across the country, and while Jack listened with great interest to my disclosures, I poured out my heart to him, omitting nothing, not even, to salve my self-esteem, my unfortunate experience in eavesdropping.

I don't really know why I should have expected his sympathy, but he only laughed, laughed so much and so long that the tears ran down his cheeks and he had to sit down.

"Oh, Pope--a chipmunk! He might at least have allowed you the dignity of a bear or a mountain lion!"

"There are no mountain lions in these parts," I said with some dignity.

"Or a duck-billed platypus. Oh, I say, Pope, it's too rich. I can't help picturing it. Did they coo? Oh, Lord!"

"It was nauseating!" I retorted in accents so genuine that he laughed again.

"It's no laughing matter, I tell you, Jack," I said. "The boy is completely bewitched. He thinks he adores her. He doesn't. I know."

And bit by bit, while his expression grew interested, I told him all that I had heard.

"It's animal, purely animal," I concluded. "And he doesn't know it."

"By George! He's awakening, you think?"

"I'm sure of it. She's leading him on, for the mere sport of the thing. It has been going on for four months now, almost every day.

He's pretty desperate. She won't marry him. She doesn't love him. She loves n.o.body--but herself."

"What will be the end of the matter?" he asked.

I shrugged.

"She'll throw him over when she debases him."

"Debase--!"

"Yes," I said wildly. "I tell you he thinks her an angel, Can't you see? A man doesn't learn that sort of thing--_her_ sort of thing--from the woman he loves. It's like hearing impurity from the lips of one's G.o.d! And you ask me if she's debasing him! Why, Jack, he's all ideals still. The world has taught him something, but he still holds fast to his childish faith in everyone."

"Bless him! He does." And then, "What can I do, Pope?"

"Nothing. I'm waiting. But I don't like his temper. It's dangerous. I think he's beginning to suspect her sincerity and when he finds out that she's still playing false with Channing Lloyd--then look out!"

"You're going to tell him?"

"No, he'll discover it. She's quite brazen."

He was silent for a while.

"Pope, you surprise me," he muttered at last. "The modern girls, I give them up. There's a name for this sort, perverted coquettes, '_teasers.'_ The man of the world abominates them, they're beneath contempt; but Jerry--No," he remarked with a shake of the head, "he wouldn't understand that."

"And when he does?"

"H--m!"

His manner added no encouragement.

"It would serve her jolly well right," he muttered cryptically in a moment.

"What?" I asked.

I think he understood Jerry now as well as I did.

"Violence," he blurted out.

"Ah! Then I'm not a fool. You agree with me."

"I'm glad I'm not in Lloyd's shoes, that's all."

We resumed our walk, turning back toward the Manor, and I told him of how matters stood with Jerry and Una. He had not met her, but he knew her history and was, I think, willing to accept her upon her face value.

"But you can't match mere affection with that sort of witchcraft!" he said. "It's like trying to treat the hydrophobia with eau de Cologne.

It can't be done, my boy. Your device does credit to your heart if not to your intelligence. She may come in a pretty bottle which exudes comforting odors but she's not for him."