The Sisters In Law Part 30

Kirkpatrick liked Mrs. Hunter, regarding her as "an honest plain-spoken dame without any frills." This estimate applied not only to her temperament but to her costumes. He admired her severe tailored suits (although he sensed their cost) and her smart, plain, hard, little hats.

The "frills and furbelows" of the younger "spenders" irritated the group of nerves appropriated by his cla.s.s-consciousness almost beyond endurance; but he managed to stand it by reminding himself that irritation of all such was a healthy sign and vastly preferable to insidious tolerance.

Mrs. Hunter was also as regular in her attendance as Mrs. Dwight, Miss Lawton and Mrs. Price Ruyler, and asked fairly intelligent questions.

The others floated in and out, and one by one dropped from the cla.s.s, until toward the middle of the second winter none remained but Alexina, Aileen, Mrs. Hunter and Helene Ruyler, who, like Aileen, found in the "frantic interest" of the materialistic creed which antagonized every instinct in them, a distraction from the excessive gambling which had threatened to wreck their nerves, purses, and peace of mind. They confided this artlessly to Mr. Kirkpatrick, who replied dryly that they were the best argument he had in stock.

But if the major part of his fashionable cla.s.s deserted him in due course he had meanwhile seen the inside of their homes; and in each case, Alexina, who divined his interest, arranged to have him shown over the house from the kitchens and pantries straight up to the servants' quarters.

These he found unexpectedly comfortable and complete. In fact, they were so much more modern and adorned than the little cottage in the Mission where he lived with his mother that he longed for the immediate installation of a system that would teach these workers what real work was. What enraged him further was their "airs." They too obviously looked upon him as an alien intruder, whereas their mistresses, until socialism bored them, were, for the most part, as charmingly courteous as his one reliable friend, Mrs. Mortimer Dwight.

IV

During the first winter and spring while his pupils were still fairly regular in their attendance, he was both incensed and grimly amused by their various idiosyncrasies. He soon became accustomed to their vanity boxes and their public application of powder and lip stick, the frank crossing of their knees that exhibited more diaphanous silk than he had ever seen in his life before, the polite excitement that any new article of attire worn by one seemed to induce in all, the wicked but on the whole good-natured baiting of Aileen Lawton and Polly Roberts, the alternate insolence and Circean glances of Mrs. Bascom, who amused herself "practicing on him," and the constant smoking of most of them.

But what he could neither understand nor accept was their att.i.tude toward one another. They would all rush at the hostess of the day as they entered, or at late comers, with the excited enthusiasm of loved and loving intimates who had not met for months; and Kirkpatrick, who missed nothing, knew that they met once a day if not oftener.

In spite of their intimacy their warm enraptured greetings carried a patent measure of admiration and even respect. It was always at least fifteen minutes before they would settle down for "work" and meanwhile they chattered about their common interests, but always with the air of relating long-delayed information and a frank desire to give of their best. He could have understood "gush," and sentimentalism, but this att.i.tude of which he had neither heard nor read bothered him until one day he had a sudden, flash of enlightenment.

V

"Is it cla.s.s-consciousness?"

He asked the question of Gora, who dropped in upon a cla.s.s at Alexina's or Aileen's sometimes on a free afternoon, and with whom he was walking down to the trolley car.

"Something like that. Caste they would call it if they thought about it at all, which to do them justice they don't.... It used to be the fashion in San Francisco for everybody to 'knock' everybody else. Then came a revulsion and everybody began to praise and boost. You see it in all circles, but the way it has taken that crowd is to show their intense loyalty to one another by a constant reminder of it in manner, and in refraining from criticism of one another, no matter how much they may gossip about others outside of their particular set. Once, just to try my sister-in-law, I told her that in my nursing I had stumbled across evidence of an illicit love affair going on between one of her friends and a married man, the husband of my patient. My sister became so remote that I had the impression for a few moments that she really wasn't there. Once it would have infuriated me, but I have improved my sense of humor and developed my philosophy, so I merely turned the conversation, as she wouldn't speak at all. She had quite withdrawn--still further into the sacred preserves, I suppose....

"They are not only loyal but really seem to have the most exalted admiration for one another because they are all of the same heaven-born stock.... That is not all, however. The truth of the matter is that they get so bored out here they would go frantic if they did not cultivate as many kinds of excitement and indigenous admirations as their wits are equal to. When they can, they vary the monotony of life with summers in Europe and winters in New York--or Santa Barbara, where they meet many interesting people from the East or England; but some of them won't leave their busy husbands or the husbands won't be left; or parents are not amenable; so they try to create an atmosphere of high spirits and sheer delight in youth and one another, and the result is almost a work of art. I rather respect them, but I envy them a good deal less than before I knew them so well."

"Oh, you envied them? They should envy you."

"Well, they don't! Yes, I envied them because it is my natural right to be one of them and fate slammed the door before I was born. It embittered my first youth, and it might have become an obsession after my brother married into society if I had not found the right kind of work. That and the boring Sundays I've spent at Rincona, and the experiences I have had with that young set, who are always at Mrs.

Dwight's more or less; besides a profound satisfaction in accomplishing literary work that not one of them could do to save their lives--all this has routed a good deal of my old bitterness of spirit. I am not sorry that I had it and indulged it, however. Discontent and resentment put spurs on the soul. Anything is better than smugness."

"It's made you different enough from these others, all right. Even from Mrs. Dwight, who is different herself.... I'd rather you'd stayed discontented. The whole scheme's all wrong and you know it. You've suffered from it. You should be the last to tolerate it. When they're jabbering away about their ninny affairs they pay as little attention to you as they do to me. They forget our existence. We don't belong, as they say. There isn't, one of them except Mrs. Dwight that I wouldn't give my eye teeth to see hanging out the wash or running a machine in a factory."'

Gora turned to him with a smile. At this time she was as nearly happy as was possible for that insurgent too aspiring spirit.

"Nevertheless, they've made you over in a way--Oh, don't flame! I don't mean your principles ... other ways that won't hurt you in the least.

You cut your hair differently. You wear better shoes. You have your clothes pressed--the suit you wear up here anyhow. You've reformed your speech somewhat, and you know a good deal more about many things than you did a few months ago. I am expecting any day to see you wearing a 'boiled' shirt."

"Oh, no, not that! It'd never do. It's true enough I got to feeling self-conscious about my rough clothes and boots, especially after I met that dude brother of yours one day in the hall and he gave me a once-over that made me feel like a tramp."

"Oh! ... But he was snubbed himself not so very long ago, and I suppose it gives him a certain pleasure to snub some one else, I am ashamed of him.... But tell me, don't you like them rather better than you expected? Find them rather a better sort? You must see that there is practically no leisure cla.s.s as far as the men are concerned--"

"They have time enough to go chicken chasing--"

"Well, aside from that? At least they do work. And the younger women?

You knew before that they were frivolous because they had too much money and too few responsibilities. Many of the older women have a serious and useful side, even if they do waste an unholy amount of time at cards."

"Well, if you ask me, their manners, when they remember to use 'em, are better than I expected. Only that Miss Thornd.y.k.e is cold and haughty, but perhaps that's because she's poor (for her), or is covering up something, or is just plain stupid.... Mrs. Dwight's manners are always perfect. She's my idea of a lady--just! And in the new system there'll be a long sight more ladies than is possible now, only no aristocrats.... Yes, they're decent enough considering they're rotten poisoned by money and thinkin' themselves better'n the ma.s.s; and I like their affection for one another. But they could be all that in the socialist state and more too. They'd have to cut out drink and gambling, and a few other diversions some of 'em'll drift into, if one or two of 'em haven't already--just through being bored to death."

"Do you honestly think socialism means universal virtue?"

"No, I don't. I'm no such greenhorn; though there's some that does, or pretends to.... But I mean there'd be no _drifting_ into vice like there is now, no indulgence of any old weakness because temptation was always following them about or just round the corner. That's the trouble now.... But in the most perfect state some would be watching out for their chance, just because the old Adam was too strong in spite of the fact that all the old reminders had disappeared."

"More likely they'd all murder one another because they were some ten thousand times more bored than that poor little group whose brains you are addling."

"I don't like to hear you talk like that, Miss Gora. You ought to give that pen of yours to socialism. There would be all the revenge you could want--and it's what you're ent.i.tled to. Then I could call you Comrade Gora."

"Call me Comarade by all means if it hurts you to say Miss to a fellow worker.... You admit then that envy of a society you were not born into and which refuses to acknowledge you as an equal, is the secret of your desire to pull it down?"

"Partly that." he admitted cooly. "Not that I'd change places with any of those fat millionaires I see shuffling down the steps of the Pacific-Union Club--although I'll admit to you what I wouldn't to these young devils in my cla.s.s, that I know some socialists who would. I hate the sight of 'em. But I want to do away with cla.s.s-rights and cla.s.s-distinctions, not only because I just naturally have no use for them but because I want to put an end to the misery of the world."

"You mean the material misery. What would you do with the other seven hundred different varieties?"

"Well.... I guess each case would have to take care of itself. Perhaps we'd get round to it after a while. Get power and cla.s.s-envy out of the world, and some genius, like as not, would invent a post-graduate course of colleges for human nature. All things are possible."

"You are an optimist! Here's our car. Come home with me and share the supper that I pay for with the tainted money of a plutocrat. Only we haven't any real plutocrats in San Francisco. Only modest millionaires.

Will you?"

"Yes." said Mr. Kirkpatrick. "And thank you kindly." He even smiled, for he was developing a latent heavily overlain seed of humor; inherited from the full bay tree that had flourished in his grandfather, born in County Clare, where men sometimes indulged in rebellion but did not take themselves too seriously withal.

CHAPTER II

I

That winter and the following seasons for the next few years pa.s.sed very rapidly for Alexina. Besides her cla.s.ses and the constant companionship of her friends (to say nothing of the excitement of helping one or two of them out of not infrequent sc.r.a.pes), she had for a time the absorbing interest of refurnishing the best part of her house.

The square lower hall which had been scantily furnished with the grandfather's clock, a hat-rack, and a settee, and whose walls were covered with "marble paper," was painted, walls and wood, a deep ivory white, and refurnished with light wicker furniture, palms, and growing plants. The hat-rack was abolished, and the small library on the left of the entrance turned into a men's dressing-room. The folding doors were removed from the great double parlors, the "body brussels"

replaced by hardwood floors, the walls tinted a pale gray as a background for the really valuable pictures (including the proud and gracious and beautiful Alexina Ballinger, dust long since in Lone Mountain), and the splendid pieces of Italian furniture which had always seemed to sulk and bulge against the dull brown walls. The rep and walnut sets were sent to the auction room and replaced by comfortable chairs and sofas whose colors varied, but harmonized not only with one another but with the rugs that Alexina under Gora's direction had bought at auction. In fact she bought many of her new pieces at auction and with Aileen found it vastly exciting to pore over the advertis.e.m.e.nts and then go down to the crowded rooms and bid.

The billiard room behind the former library she left as it was. Her mother's large bedroom upstairs she turned into a library with bookcases to the ceiling on three sides, and one of the carved oaken tables against an expanse of Pompeiian red relieved by one painting (a wedding gift from Judge Lawton, who believed in patronizing local art) that had despoiled a desert of its gorgeous yellow sunrise.

The carpet and curtains were red without pattern. The coal grate had been removed and a fireplace built for logs. It was to be her own den for long rainy winter afternoons, or the cold and foggy days of summer when she remained in the city.

The dining-room was also given a hardwood floor and a j.a.panese red and gold wall paper as a compliment to her martial ancestors; but as the sideboards were built into the wails end could be replaced only at great cost; they remained as a brooding reminder of the solid sixties, and no doubt exchanged resentful reminiscences at night with the chairs which had been merely recovered.