Jennie Gerhardt: A Novel

by Theodore Dreiser

  CHAPTER XLVI

  That night after dinner the music was already sounding in theball-room of the great hotel adjacent to the palm-gardens when Mrs.Gerald found Lester smoking on one of the verandas with Jennie by hisside. The latter was in white satin and white slippers, her hair lyinga heavy, enticing mass about her forehead and ears. Lester wasbrooding over the history of Egypt, its successive tides or waves ofrather weak-bodied people; the thin, narrow strip of soil along eitherside of the Nile that had given these successive waves of populationsustenance; the wonder of heat and tropic life, and this hotel withits modern conveniences and fashionable crowd set down among ancient,soul-weary, almost despairing conditions. He and Jennie had lookedthis morning on the pyramids. They had taken a trolley to the Sphinx!They had watched swarms of ragged, half-clad, curiously costumed menand boys moving through narrow, smelly, albeit brightly colored, lanesand alleys.

  "It all seems such a mess to me," Jennie had said at one place."They are so dirty and oily. I like it, but somehow they seem tangledup, like a lot of worms."

  Lester chuckled, "You're almost right. But climate does it. Heat.The tropics. Life is always mushy and sensual under these conditions.They can't help it."

  "Oh, I know that. I don't blame them. They're just queer."

  To-night he was brooding over this, the moon shining down into thegrounds with an exuberant, sensuous luster.

  "Well, at last I've found you!" Mrs. Gerald exclaimed. "I couldn'tget down to dinner, after all. Our party was so late getting back.I've made your husband agree to dance with me, Mrs. Kane," she went onsmilingly. She, like Lester and Jennie, was under the sensuousinfluence of the warmth, the spring, the moonlight. There were richodors abroad, floating subtly from groves and gardens; from the remotedistance camel-bells were sounding and exotic cries, "Ayah!"and "oosh! oosh!" as though a drove of strange animals werebeing rounded up and driven through the crowded streets.

  "You're welcome to him," replied Jennie pleasantly. "He ought todance. I sometimes wish I did."

  "You ought to take lessons right away then," replied Lestergenially. "I'll do my best to keep you company. I'm not as light on myfeet as I was once, but I guess I can get around."

  "Oh, I don't want to dance that badly," smiled Jennie. "But you twogo on, I'm going up-stairs in a little while, anyway."

  "Why don't you come sit in the ball-room? I can't do more than afew rounds. Then we can watch the others," said Lester rising.

  "No. I think I'll stay here. It's so pleasant. You go. Take him,Mrs. Gerald."

  Lester and Letty strolled away. They made a strikingpair--Mrs. Gerald in dark wine-colored silk, covered withglistening black beads, her shapely arms and neck bare, and a flashingdiamond of great size set just above her forehead in her dark hair.Her lips were red, and she had an engaging smile, showing an even rowof white teeth between wide, full, friendly lips. Lester's strong,vigorous figure was well set off by his evening clothes, he lookeddistinguished.

  "That is the woman he should have married," said Jennie to herselfas he disappeared. She fell into a reverie, going over the steps ofher past life. Sometimes it seemed to her now as if she had beenliving in a dream. At other times she felt as though she were in thatdream yet. Life sounded in her ears much as this night did. She heardits cries. She knew its large-mass features. But back of it weresubtleties that shaded and changed one into the other like theshifting of dreams. Why had she been so attractive to men? Why hadLester been so eager to follow her? Could she have prevented him? Shethought of her life in Columbus, when she carried coal; to-night shewas in Egypt, at this great hotel, the chatelaine of a suite of rooms,surrounded by every luxury, Lester still devoted to her. He hadendured so many things for her! Why? Was she so wonderful? Brander hadsaid so. Lester had told her so. Still she felt humble, out of place,holding handfuls of jewels that did not belong to her. Again sheexperienced that peculiar feeling which had come over her the firsttime she went to New York with Lester--namely, that this fairyexistence could not endure. Her life was fated. Something wouldhappen. She would go back to simple things, to a side street, a poorcottage, to old clothes.

  And then as she thought of her home in Chicago, and the attitude ofhis friends, she knew it must be so. She would never be received, evenif he married her. And she could understand why. She could look intothe charming, smiling face of this woman who was now with Lester, andsee that she considered her very nice, perhaps, but not of Lester'sclass. She was saying to herself now no doubt as she danced withLester that he needed some one like her. He needed some one who hadbeen raised in the atmosphere of the things to which he had beenaccustomed. He couldn't very well expect to find in her, Jennie, thefamiliarity with, the appreciation of the niceties to, which he hadalways been accustomed. She understood what they were. Her mind hadawakened rapidly to details of furniture, clothing, arrangement,decorations, manner, forms, customs, but--she was not to themanner born.

  If she went away Lester would return to his old world, the world ofthe attractive, well-bred, clever woman who now hung upon his arm. Thetears came into Jennie's eyes; she wished, for the moment, that shemight die. It would be better so. Meanwhile Lester was dancing withMrs. Gerald, or sitting out between the waltzes talking over oldtimes, old places, and old friends. As he looked at Letty he marveledat her youth and beauty. She was more developed than formerly, butstill as slender and shapely as Diana. She had strength, too, in thissmooth body of hers, and her black eyes were liquid and lusterful.

  "I swear, Letty," he said impulsively, "you're really morebeautiful than ever. You're exquisite. You've grown younger instead ofolder."

  "You think so?" she smiled, looking up into his face.

  "You know I do, or I wouldn't say so. I'm not much onphilandering."

  "Oh, Lester, you bear, can't you allow a woman just a littlecoyness? Don't you know we all love to sip our praise, and not becompelled to swallow it in one great mouthful?"

  "What's the point?" he asked. "What did I say?"

  "Oh, nothing. You're such a bear. You're such a big, determined,straightforward boy. But never mind. I like you. That's enough, isn'tit?"

  "It surely is," he said.

  They strolled into the garden as the music ceased, and he squeezedher arm softly. He couldn't help it; she made him feel as if he ownedher. She wanted him to feel that way. She said to herself, as they satlooking at the lanterns in the gardens, that if ever he were free, andwould come to her, she would take him. She was almost ready to takehim anyhow--only he probably wouldn't. He was so straight-laced,so considerate. He wouldn't, like so many other men she knew, do amean thing. He couldn't. Finally Lester rose and excused himself. Heand Jennie were going farther up the Nile in the morning--towardKarnak and Thebes and the water-washed temples at Phylae. Theywould have to start at an unearthly early hour, and he must get tobed.

  "When are you going home?" asked Mrs. Gerald, ruefully.

  "In September."

  "Have you engaged your passage?"

  "Yes; we sail from Hamburg on the ninth--theFulda."

  "I may be going back in the fall," laughed Letty. "Don't besurprised if I crowd in on the same boat with you. I'm very unsettledin my mind."

  "Come along, for goodness sake," replied Lester. "I hope you do....I'll see you to-morrow before we leave." He paused, and she looked athim wistfully.

  "Cheer up," he said, taking her hand. "You never can tell what lifewill do. We sometimes find ourselves right when we thought we were allwrong."

  He was thinking that she was sorry to lose him, and he was sorrythat she was not in a position to have what she wanted. As forhimself, he was saying that here was one solution that probably hewould never accept; yet it was a solution. Why had he not seen thisyears before?

  "And yet she wasn't as beautiful then as she is now, nor as wise,nor as wealthy." Maybe! Maybe! But he couldn't be unfaithful to Jennienor wish her any bad luck. She had had enough without his willing, andhad borne it bravely.