“Oh, just this once,” he’d begged, “I’ll never do it again.” Why, you might have thought she’d already rented him the place. And down they’d gone together through the dining room and into the little flat.
“Nice place you’ve got,” he’d said, and he’d looked around, examined one of her dining-room chairs, taken a glance into the kitchen. “Pleasantest place in the Village,” he’d said, following her through the door and into that neatly decorated front room.
“Quite a place,” he’d looked about, and then he’d gone directly to that small four-poster, felt the mattress carefully. “Good springs,” he’d said. “Comfortable bed. Expressly made for Prossie.” And once more they were laughing both together (playing into her hands like that). “Well,” she’d asked, “isn’t that just what I’ve been telling you? the room, you can see it at a glance, is not for a young man.”
“No, no it isn’t,” he’d acknowledged, “but all the same I want it. What’s your top price?” He’d made it plain enough he knew she was about to soak him.
“Fifty dollars,” she’d said, adding ten to the rent she’d figured on asking and as though to justify the sum opening the door to the bathroom to display the tiling, the porcelain tub and all the shining brass. “Look at this beautiful bathroom” she’d said as she’d opened another door—“Here’s the kitchenette.”
“Splendid!” he’d exclaimed, “a bathroom and a kitchenette! I’m game for it.” He’d fixed her squarely with his eyes.
“But I’m not going to let you have it,” she’d assumed the playful note, tried to be a bit coquettish. “No, my dear young man, you really can’t persuade me.”
Unabashed he’d gone to the bed and begun again to press the mattress and at that she’d turned, and left the room.
Gracious how glad she’d been to get out of there, to precede him through the dining room and up the stairs, talking all the way and with a feeling of defeat already taking possession of her. “You know, my dear young man, I don’t intend to take you. Tell me now, what do I know about you? I’ve seen you round at restaurants, I expect you keep late hours and have expensive habits, most young people do.”
And so there again they’d been, the two of them together in her pleasant room, fencing, bantering, somehow taking pleasure in it, the attraction they’d felt each for the other; and she remembers how she’d fancied that he somewhat resembled Byron. Well, under no consideration would she have him in her basement.
Yes, he’d said, he wrote. He was at work upon a novel. Oh he was a hard worker. He worked terrifically. It seemed his book had been begun in Paris. He hoped to finish it here in New York and afterwards return to France. Examining his mobile, interesting face she’d wondered if the lines of fatigue under the eyes, dragging the flesh down below the cheekbones, could perhaps have been occasioned by hard work—writing took it out of people. Sometimes it left upon the countenance the same kind of marks as those traced by dissipation. Well, well, whatever his habits he was irresistible and she would have to play her hand with the greatest care or there’d be no extricating herself from the net he was casting round her.
Finally he’d looked at his watch and risen briskly. It was getting late. He was due at an appointment. And hadn’t he by this time persuaded her that though his sex might be against him he’d be the best of tenants. To be sure he’d beat the typewriter, but he didn’t believe she’d so much as hear him do it, and he’d drawn out his checkbook. Well, she’d thought, the young man’s got a checking account. That’s more than some of them have. “Do you mind?” he’d asked, and he’d gone to the desk and sat down, taken out his fountain pen. “My check is good,” he’d said. “Here’s an advance, and if I don’t pay my next month’s rent just kick me out.” And back he’d come with that check for fifty dollars, the ink not dried upon it. “There,” he’d said and she had taken it, looked vaguely at the signature. An interesting handwriting, she had thought. Signed by Philip Ropes Jr. Why, of all things in the world. She knew the Philip Ropeses, the stuffiest, positively the stuffiest, most conventional Bostonians. Delighted she’d been in a queer way—there was something so amusing about it, that the Philip Ropeses could have had a son like this. Hard to believe it but then young people these days sprang surprises on one. She’d been on the point of saying she knew his parents but then she hadn’t, she’d never liked opening those old connections.
“Good for fifty dollars, my name is good for that the first of every month,” and then he’d asked with the greatest politeness for the keys.
Weak she’d been, as weak as water. “But it isn’t the first of the month,” she’d protested and she’d got up: she’d gone to the desk, she’d searched for the keys, found them, put the two of them on a ring and conscious that he had risen and was standing beside her she’d turned, she’d given them to him.
How earnestly he’d thanked her. The only reason he’d asked for them he’d explained was so that he could slip in without disturbing her. He intended to be, he’d assured her, as quiet as a mouse. He’d put them in his pocket, he’d smiled; he’d held out his hand and she has to this day the firmest conviction that what he’d really wanted to do was to stoop and give her an impertinent but none the less grateful kiss, for there had been warmth between them—yes, yes she is sure of it—a kind of warmth, a mutual attraction.
“But when are you coming?” she’d inquired holding his hand an instant. “When do you intend to move in?”
“Oh,” he’d said, he hadn’t much to bring, only his typewriter and his manuscripts, some socks and shoes and pants. He’d soon pack up, he’d be along. She could expect him almost any day. “And mind you,” he’d added, going to the door, “we’ve made a deal: the rent is paid.” Then out he’d gone, hatless into the snow.
Well, thought the old woman, why go over it when she’d just finished reading all about it? Ah but wasn’t there she wondered just this difference—letting the memories give it back? There in the novel had been the words carefully arranged, scenes, situations, and she expected she had done them well: but this, she placed her hand against her breast, this flow, this going on with it. Ah she remembered how she’d waited for him to put in an appearance. She’d deposited the check, she had even called up her bank to see if it was good and wondering all the time what had delayed him. It had been almost a week.
And then, gracious what a surprise, looking out the window on that February morning and seeing, why she wasn’t even sure it had been altogether a surprise—seeing him there in the area accompanied by, who in the world but the same girl he’d had with him that night that she and Felix dined at Dante’s Inferno. He’d let her through the gate and off the two of them had walked together in the direction of Seventh Avenue.
Had it been indignation? What was it she had felt? To be sure there’d been nothing illegal. Why she hadn’t even made him sign a lease. Just that check on Philip Ropes the bank assured her had been credited to her account. It had been, as he insisted, a deal and as for leases, you rent an apartment and unless the contrary is stipulated it is yours to do with exactly as you please. You can bring in your girl, your dog, your pet monkey. It was this knowledge she’d had that he had tricked her. Never, never in the world would she have let him come if he’d told her he was planning to bring along that girl.
Little she could do about it. There apparently they were and she’d have to say they had given her but slight annoyance. Sometimes she’d heard his typewriter but not to be sure too often. It had been this uneasy sense she’d had of it, not of him in particular but of the lives of the young, having them there in her basement documenting, as she’d felt they were, the whole irregular and spendthrift era. For of what were they not, she began to wonder, spendthrift, of youth, of time, of money? And of something else she could not so easily put her finger on.
The clicking of that area gate got strangely on her nerves. They came in at all hours and slept, she gathered, the larger part of every day. She seldom heard them stirring till afte
r noon. Well, it was none of her business she’d tell herself. When his month was up she’d have a talk with him. Maybe she’d ask him to move. She dreaded it—encountering him again. There’d been between them a mutual desire to avoid another meeting and after all you didn’t often have to meet the tenants in your basement. And when one evening she had met him emerging from his room and without the girl how blithely he had hailed her. “Hullo, Miss Sylvester,” he’d cried out as though delighted to see her again. Chilly was not the word for it, the way she’d nodded to him. Why she’d not so much as spoken, just that little nod. Well, she’d registered at least her feelings towards him and glad she’d had the chance to do so. Presently she’d have the courage to ask him to get out.
Then when the month was up it had gone on just as she’d expected. They had not paid their rent. Should she go down, knock on their door and ask to speak with them or would she write a note? Cowardly enough to write and besides she had some curiosity about that room, just what they’d done to it. Well well, she’d let it go a fortnight; and then one morning about twelve A.M. she’d heard them stirring, and down with sudden resolution she had gone and knocked peremptorily upon their door. “Come in,” he’d called, his voice quite blithe and casual and she’d heard a protest from the girl. She’d found the door unlocked and opened it and there he was tying his necktie, apparently preparing to go out and the girl lying on the bed smoking. Casual they both of them were, the girl not so much as getting up. “Won’t you have a seat?” he’d said and then seeing there wasn’t a chair in the room unencumbered by some garment or other he’d swept the girl’s pajamas and bed shoes and heaven knows what else from a nearby chair and invited her again to seat herself. She’d come he knew to ask him for the rent but—but, he’d said, embracing with a gesture that untidy room, the girl on the bed, and the dire situation in which she had presumably found them—the whole irregular establishment as though it had been something for which she should by every standard of human decency have felt concern and sympathy, he’d asked her to be patient. He was at the moment waiting to get a check for a story he fully expected to sell. Just give him a week or two he’d pleaded and though he did not say “You simply cannot throw us into the street,” the words were implicit in the demand and the girl lying there smoking leaving it all to him. She had not so much as looked up. Pretty she was even in her dishevelled condition. She had on a bathrobe and had not made up, but her hair which was cropped was the purest gold and seemed to fit her small head like a shining cap. The features were delicate. Yes, there was no mistaking it, the face was sensitive, a little sulky, petulant perhaps at seeing the plight in which life apparently had plunged her. But it was the face, she felt, of a gently born and gently bred young creature. Somehow it had made her heart ache—the whole situation had made her heart ache heavily. She’d wished to turn her back upon it. She’d hated to haggle with them for her rent and so, and so, she’d been quite lenient. She’d said that she would wait, but she had hinted broadly that she wished they would do their very best to find another place. “I had not been prepared for two,” she’d added and she’d taken a good look at that slovenly room. They should see, she’d said, what they were doing to her pretty flat. Yes, yes, he’d agreed, they were a sloppy pair, but they’d try to mend their ways and she had to admit she’d given them no warning she was coming. Not a chance to tidy up.
So she had left. There’d been little else to do, nothing very satisfactory accomplished, she’d reflected. He’d promised to pay as soon as possible and then she had said, but weakly, weakly, that if they hadn’t paid by the end of the month she would be forced to take measures to evict them. She was giving a large party on the first of April and just why she had thought it necessary to tell them that she didn’t know. She hoped they would be out before that date, she’d said, rather as though she’d considered them too disreputable to be in the same house with her while she was entertaining guests. The whole thing had been sickening to her. It had made her heart ache.
And her party; well, what could she say about that party but that it had been the most beautiful occasion? Something extraordinary had occurred, an event—moments passing one into the other, little tableaus of the heart, the desires, the dream images coming suddenly to life, and there in the midst of them she’d been, in them but outside of them, the genius in fact that had conjured them into being and looking around her, saying to herself “Can this actually be true? Have I pulled it off?” Why, it had been exactly what she’d wanted, the evening soft and springlike, the windows open and the fires lighted and all those flowers, yellow, white, pale ivory, and amber. She could see and smell them, daffodils, freesia, white hyacinths, narcissus, Easter lilies, all the Easter constellations clustered and assembled there in her room—her home.
Her dress too had been quite perfect, pale ivory and amber with a touch of young spring green and as she’d walked about she’d had that curious feeling of unreality—the compliments and the perfection. And she had managed to procure what had been the very core of her ambitions, a string quartet, one of the very best in town—there had been music with the fires lighted and all her guests responding to the magic just as she would have wished to have them. Ah, unforgettable, forever unforgettable the “Heiliger Dankgesang” in the Beethoven 132. That music, what was it, she had asked herself, occurring in her heart, feeling it climb, ascending to what celestial heights she did not need to ask, but let it climb, let it continue climbing, let the clouds burst and the effulgence stream behind the breaking clouds while she experienced such joy as never was or could be quite imagined, running as she seemed to be backward into childhood with that music, with those intimations and the remembrance of that day in Siena when she’d found and read the incomparable Ode, and being there again in that grove in Brookline picking those spring flowers, being in the summer fields above the ocean, a part of that great dance of life. And from whence came such music, she had asked herself, from what fount of knowledge and intuition, yielding herself up to it, letting the heart climb higher, higher, and saying to Felix yes, it is enough, it is sufficient.
After that was over, the spell had been cast, shed on all the guests, and she had walked through the rest of the party treading it had seemed to her upon celestial clouds, the pleasantest compliments in her ears and that delicious sense that everything was going as she’d planned. She’d had in a man to serve and a caterer had furnished the refreshments and with her own Daphne Jordan assisting everything went on without a hitch. Champagne, she had thought, looking at her guests, at the daffodils, the freesia, the narcissus—the perfect wine for such a night as this and she had lifted her glass to drink, as someone had suggested, to the spring and there at her side the young cellist who had played, it was the only word for it, like an angel, and she had told him that his performance was perfection and he had bowed and said “My dear lady, it was because you were there with that expression on your face that I performed so well.” A lovely compliment she had thought carrying it with her through the evening while this little tableau melted into the next and the whole airy, fairy dream went floating away from her until the last guest had gone and there she’d been alone in her big room thinking of it all with such extreme delight.
And then because she must find somebody to talk to she’d gone downstairs in search of Daphne Jordan and found her stacking up the dishes on the dining table just as she had ordered, tired, considerate, and more than a trifle tipsy, what with all the glasses she’d emptied. Her lady must sit down and have a cup of coffee for she hadn’t, she’d reminded her, had a bite to eat. “Now there,” she’d said, returning with salad, sandwiches, and coffee, “eat, my lady, eat them sandwiches,” and back she’d gone into her kitchen to finish with the dishes.
Glad enough she’d been of something to sustain her. Pitching into the sandwiches and salad, trying to gather and assemble the various fragments of that lovely dream her party, which for once in a way had been so completely successful, and becoming suddenly aware
that something was going on in the front room she’d felt annoyance, irritation. Why should those two young people disturb this mood of happiness and satisfaction with their ugly quarrels? They were in the midst of a regular fracas. She’d not wanted to listen to them, but as a matter of fact she had done so; she’d listened attentively. She could hear them plainly, for they’d raised their voices and oh, she wished they would not use all those ugly words, throwing them at each other like that, words only associated in her mind with certain passages of the Bible and in the mouths of these young people revolting, revolting. The girl was apparently weeping and what was she telling the young man? That she was going to have a baby. Oh God, oh God, she couldn’t bear it, and she’d put her hands before her face. “All right,” he’d said, “you’re going to have a baby. All right, that’s your responsibility. No reason at all for me to believe it’s mine.” At this the girl had shrieked hysterically. It seemed that she was on the bed. She could hear her moving about and the springs creaking. “But Philip, you liar, you bastard, you know there’s nobody but you.” “How do I know it?” he’d shouted back and he had called her one of those names it had seemed to her she could not tolerate upon his lips and all the while she’d been aware that Daphne Jordan was just behind her listening at the kitchen door. She wanted to command her to go away, but then how could she? The young man was banging about, opening and shutting doors, bureau drawers, making a big racket and the girl continuing to shriek at him. “God knows, I’m crazy about you.” “Shut up,” he’d roared at her. “I’m getting out,” and then the girl must have got up from the bed, for they were having an actual physical tussle. “Philip,” she’d shrieked, “you bastard,” just pelting him with the dreadful word, and there was a great sound of slaps and blows. Maybe she was slapping him, maybe he was hitting her. And then suddenly it seemed that it was over and Philip was talking in a slow thick voice while Daphne listened there behind her, mumbling this and that, and while it seemed to her her blood congealed, her heart stopped beating. “All right,” he’d said, “I am a bastard, and the son of a bastard and the offspring”—he’d used the word which had turned her heart to stone, maybe sitting down on the bed or on a chair, for what she’d needed was to get a physical picture of him. What she’d needed was to have him there, folded in her arms, longing so desperately to rush through that closed door and claim his love and his foregiveness and the word piercing her heart as though he’d aimed an arrow at it, hearing him brutally, rather drunkenly, but obviously with some need upon him to redeem, to excuse himself, telling the girl the secret she had kept so long, how he’d been abandoned by his mother in Fiesole, sold as he’d put it to save her precious chastity. Then their voices growing lower, the anger diminishing, she’d been unable to hear much of what they said. But certainly the quarreling was over, mostly she heard the girl’s voice declaring that she loved him. “Philip, Philip,” she kept saying, and she was crying still and there had been kisses and then again the shutting and the opening of doors and bureau drawers and both of them, it dawned upon her, packing up, preparing to get out.
Many Mansions Page 14
