by Gwen Bristow
Looking again from Isabel’s red face to the gardenias, Kester gave a war-whoop. He laughed and laughed, he shouted, he all but rolled among the flowers. She was ordering, “You boys take those things away at once! Do you hear me?” and meanwhile Kester leaned against the wall, weak with laughter. And still came the gardenias.
Old Mr. Valcour appeared, shouting that he had smelt a nauseating smell upstairs in his room and what on earth did this mean? Isabel tried to explain, stammered, and Mr. Valcour demanded of Kester, “Please tell me, sir, are you responsible for this insulting performance? There’s no excuse for this but a funeral over a stale nigger corpse!”
Between explosions of mirth Kester replied, “One of Miss Isabel’s Northern admirers, sir. Gardenias don’t grow in ditches up there.”
Mr. Valcour gave the florist’s boys five dollars apiece to remove the gardenias, ordered that the porch be scrubbed with strong soap, and retired upstairs still thundering his wrath. Kester had drawn Isabel back into the parlor, where the odor followed them through the open windows, persistent as the smell of moth balls. He was demanding to know who on earth was named Hermann Schimmelpfeng.
“He’s a German,” said Isabel. “And I think you’re horrid.”
“Oh, Herr Schimmelpfeng,” Kester apostrophized, “the fragrance of your memory will be in the curtains for days. Isabel, my dear Isabel, isn’t it enough for you to conquer every American you see without starting on Germany? Who is this fellow?”
“He is a very nice young man,” said Isabel, “and he has millions of dollars.”
She felt like a fool. Kester betrayed no jealousy. He merely thought Herr Schimmelpfeng ridiculous. And so, against her will, did Isabel. At last Kester asked if she would play tennis tomorrow afternoon. She did not like athletics, but glad to promise anything that would keep the conversation away from gardenias Isabel said yes.
For the rest of the summer, the contrast between Kester and Hermann Schimmelpfeng became clearer every day. Kester was merry, adorable, alluring. Kester was almost irresistible. Isabel felt that she was no longer falling in love, she had fallen in love beyond argument. Calling herself several kinds of a goose she was nevertheless unable to say no whenever Kester asked for a date.
She was frightened. Her life was dropping to pieces and she felt unable to resist. September that year was sultry, and the doctor advised Mr. Valcour to go to the Virginia Springs until cooler weather. Isabel, who had never felt or manifested much filial attachment, suddenly became a model daughter. Let her father go to a watering-place alone? Certainly not. She would go with him. She would read to him and bring him drinks of the healing waters. Though old Mr. Valcour, who was a gay soul and perfectly capable of taking care of himself, intimated that she would be a useless impediment to his holiday, Isabel turned deaf and accompanied him. Never dreaming that Isabel was fleeing to the springs as a drunkard desirous of reform would flee to a spot where liquor was unobtainable, Mr. Valcour was puzzled and somewhat annoyed by this excess of devotion. But Isabel adamantly established herself in the hotel among the invalids and elderly vacationers, thanking heaven that there were now five states between herself and Kester Larne.
She forgot that the trains were public conveyances. They had not been at the springs a week before Kester appeared, remarking that he thought the waters might be good for him too. Mr. Valcour mildly observed how nice it was for Isabel to have a youthful companion, and turned in for his nap.
Isabel was half joyful and half angry. It was flattering to be pursued for such a distance by the most attractive man she knew, but it was dreadful to think that he was destroying her future. But there was Kester, who beckoned her by merely being alive. Kester asked her to marry him.
Isabel twisted her hands together and said, “I don’t know. Please give me time to think, Kester!”
Instead of persisting with telling her how lovely she was and how he couldn’t live without her Kester stood up and looked down at her a moment, and then said coolly,
“Americans don’t marry foreigners for their money, Isabel. It’s the other way around.”
She sprang up furiously. “What do you—”
Kester said, “It’s bad form, honey, it might start international complications.”
Then, before she could bring out an angry retort Kester had his arms around her and his mouth on hers, and Isabel felt that in spite of herself the battle was over. After a long time she heard him whisper, “How many millions would you take for this, Isabel?”
At last she made herself let him go. But she hardly slept that night, for though her emotions were convinced her mind was not.
But the next day and the next evening Kester was still there.
The product of a generation that set a mystical value on virginity, Isabel knew it would wreck her fortunes if her reputation became smirched. But she was surrounded by a community of elderly hypochondriacs interested in nothing but their own ailments. Her father was paying her not the slightest attention. She and Kester might almost have been on an island. By evening she had decided that if she could not have a lifetime’s happiness she would at least have what she could. Her conscience, being virtually non-existent, gave her no qualms; the only question that disturbed her was whether or not she would be caught up with, and Kester was discreet.
For several weeks she was divinely happy. Then she and Kester began to quarrel.
He was courtly and full of poetic gallantries, but Isabel was sure that secretly he despised her. Whatever his faults, Kester was not mercenary. He regarded life as a blessed gift to be enjoyed, but he would not have enjoyed selling his personal integrity. He knew Isabel loved him; her tumbling into his arms because she loved him Kester regarded as the most natural and delightful occurrence in the world, but he regarded her intention of marrying a millionaire for no reason except that he was a millionaire as calculated prostitution. She suspected that he felt an amused sense of triumph when he thought of Schimmelpfeng, and chuckled privately at the knowledge that the excellent German would not be getting all he was paying for.
Isabel could stand anything but being laughed at. There came to her the ego-crashing suspicion that instead of considering her with awe like other men Kester had been laughing at her since the first evening they had danced together. In this frame of mind she could hardly be sweet-tempered. She and Kester quarreled about every subject except the one she was constantly thinking of. Finally, in exasperation, Kester packed his grips and went back to Dalroy.
Isabel came home a week later, staying just long enough to get her clothes in order before going to New York. She saw Kester only once. He was riding horseback through town, and seeing her come out of a shop he dismounted and went over to speak to her. He only said, “I didn’t know you were home. I just wanted to tell you I’m frightfully sorry for losing my temper when you criticized my tennis stroke.”
She had forgotten that had been the start of their last quarrel. Wondering if he were merely being polite, Isabel answered, “I was pretty bad-mannered myself. I’m sorry too.”
He smiled. “When are you leaving for New York?”
“Tomorrow.”
“I hope you have a pleasant trip,” said Kester.
“Thank you,” said Isabel.
He mounted again, and as she watched him ride off Isabel saw him glance back at her regretfully, and she thought, “I believe he doesn’t want me to go. If I told him I’d given up the Schimmelpfeng idea I believe he’d marry me still.”
But she threw the idea out of her mind and went to New York. The next time her friends at home heard of her was when her picture appeared in the society section of the New Orleans Picayune, with the caption, “Miss Isabel Valcour, daughter of Mr. Pierre Valcour of Dalroy, whose engagement to Mr. Hermann Schimmelpfeng of Berlin, Germany, is announced today by her father. The wedding is expected to take place in the early spring.”
Isabel cam
e home to get ready, and in Dalroy there was tremendous flurry about her brilliant marriage. Several of her girl friends observed, “We were so surprised, you know we’d always had an idea you were going to marry Kester Larne.” At such remarks Isabel laughed a little and answered, “Why for pity’s sake, I never thought of such a thing! And I’m sure Kester never did.” The girls gave her showers, the older ladies gave parties in her honor, everybody began sending her berry spoons and salad bowls that would cost more than they were worth to transport to Berlin, and the girls and their mammas were alike envious, wondering why heaven should equip some people with angelic faces and golden hair and the chance to meet millionaires from foreign parts. Herr Schimmelpfeng and his brother and his mother were all coming to Dalroy for the wedding, and Violet Purcell asked if Herr Schimmelpfeng traveled with a Man. “Because you can all entertain Mr. What’s-his-name if you want to, but as for me, I’m going to entertain the Man. I’ve seen a millionaire,” she said, “but I’ve never seen a Man.”
Kester’s sister Alice insisted on giving Isabel a boudoir shower. Unable to escape it, Isabel had to go play the guest of honor at Ardeith, where the parlor was strewn with bits of lingerie the girls had embroidered for her trousseau. Gentlemen had been invited to come in for the evening, and after the maidenly flutter of putting away the garments so they would not immodestly greet the gaze of the masculine guests, there was dancing. Of course Kester was there.
As brother of the hostess Kester could hardly avoid asking the guest of honor to dance, and as guest of honor Isabel could hardly refuse. They waltzed. Kester was impeccably courteous. But as she felt his arm around her waist Isabel thought that even now she might weaken if he gave her a chance to do so. She thought how cruel fate had been in giving her two chances to dispose of her future and so arranging circumstances that no matter which of the two she took she would spend her life wishing she had chosen the other. They had been dancing several minutes in silence when Kester said, “That ribbon around your hair is just the right color. Remember the time I told you to wear that shade of violent blue?”
“Yes,” said Isabel.
She bit her lip, afraid she was going to cry out, “Oh Kester, don’t let me go!” She thought of all she would have with her German marriage: a gorgeous house in Berlin, holidays on the Riviera, wealth, splendor, pleasure; for she knew Schimmelpfeng well enough to know he considered possession of her such a miracle he would give her anything his money could buy. She looked up at Kester, and down again, and in spite of herself she asked,
“Kester—tell me—if I should break my engagement now—would you ask me again to marry you?”
He answered, “I honestly don’t know, Isabel. So maybe you’d better not risk it.”
“You needn’t worry,” she retorted. “I shan’t.”
They did not speak again till the dance was over and the couples were breaking up, when in the hearing of half a dozen others Kester said gallantly, “Thank you for a delightful waltz, Miss Isabel. May I take this opportunity of wishing you happiness?”
“Thank you,” said Isabel.
Those were the last words they were destined to exchange until she came home from Germany at the outbreak of the war.
Chapter Eight
1
Eleanor’s opinion of Isabel was scornful and briefly expressed.
“And you asked her to marry you! You’re a very fortunate man, Kester Larne. All right, since you’ve promised to ignore her I’ll do the same.”
“Good,” said Kester. “Then it’s quits all around?”
“Quits,” said Eleanor.
Kester gave her a humorously grateful smile.
Eleanor pushed Isabel into a back pigeonhole of her mind, telling herself that now she could be calm, but she still found no peace. For without the problem of Isabel to occupy them her thoughts leaped back to the torment of cotton. The exchanges reopened on the sixteenth of November, and cotton was salable at five cents a pound.
At such a price Kester and Eleanor could not have repaid what it had cost to grow the cotton, to say nothing of financing the plantation for another crop. They held the cotton desperately. The newspapers were trying to bolster the courage of the planters by reminding them that Europe needed cotton duck for tents and cotton cloth for uniforms, and that the rising cost of living in the United States would force the people to buy more cotton clothes instead of silk and wool, so that the crop would eventually be disposed of at a reasonable price. But they urged that very little cotton be planted in the spring, and the Secretary of Agriculture in Washington publicly demanded that bankers and merchants refuse to extend credit to any planter who did not first promise a sharp reduction in his cotton acreage.
Kester and Eleanor spent the winter studying the possibilities of food crops. Before the Civil War part of Ardeith had been planted in sugarcane, and another part in oranges, but today most cane was grown west of the river and the land nearer the Gulf had been found more suitable for orange trees. “Rice?” Eleanor suggested hopefully. Kester told her they would have to build siphons to bring the water across the levee to flood the fields, and import laborers who knew how to grow rice. “Nobody up here knows rice any more,” he said. “It’s grown in southwest Louisiana. We might try corn, but the country had a bumper corn crop last year and half the cotton planters are already planning to put in corn next spring.”
One day in January Sylvia came in to ask for a subscription to the Belgian Relief Fund. Eleanor told her curtly it was all she could do this winter to feed her own child, let alone feeding the Belgians. If she wouldn’t help the Belgians, Sylvia persisted, would she at least promise that when she served gelatine desserts she would insist on getting Hooper’s gelatine? “You see, dear, they have a yellow label on one side of the box,” she explained, showing a sample package, “and if you cut off the label and send it to the Housewives’ League they’ll send it to the company and the company will redeem the labels for one cent each and give it to the Red Cross—”
“Why don’t they give the Red Cross all the postage that will take?” Eleanor inquired.
“Now, Eleanor, you don’t understand.”
“I understand perfectly. The gelatine company wants to play on public sympathy to sell more gelatine.”
“Eleanor,” said Sylvia, “I’m disappointed in you. Some of us are working so hard!”
When she had finally gone to call on her next prospect Eleanor went upstairs. She found Kester reading a letter from Sebastian, who said cotton was now six cents a pound, and did they want to sell ?
“The cotton is all we’ve got,” said Eleanor. “If we let it go it means utter bankruptcy.”
He agreed. She sat down and took his hands in hers. “Let’s hold it awhile longer, Kester. A lot of people are saying the war will be over this year.”
“A lot of people,” he said moodily, “are saying it won’t be.”
“If I’m wrong, if the bottom drops out of the market again, I can stand it. I’ve learned a lot recently.”
“You’re a great girl, Eleanor.”
She smiled. “I can stand anything, darling, except Sylvia cackling as if she’d laid an egg.”
“What did she want?”
Eleanor told him about Sylvia’s peddling gelatine for the Belgians. He chuckled, but he said,
“You could have told her I gave five dollars to a Belgian fund yesterday.”
“Kester! How could you? When we need it so!”
“I couldn’t stand it. Those children. I kept thinking of Cornelia.”
“If you’d thought of Cornelia you might have remembered that five dollars would buy her two pairs of shoes, and she certainly needs them.”
“Oh, be quiet,” said Kester, and she bit her lip remorsefully. But he was evidently glad to accept when Neal Sheramy called him up a few minutes later inviting him to the movies.
Eleanor w
as doing her best to be cheerful. She went out, and now and then she had their friends in for supper. When she saw Isabel, she said “Hello” politely and then paid her as little attention as possible. Like their acquaintances, she and Kester sang Tipperary and tried to pronounce Ypres and Prysansyz; they laughed ironically at the news that Gavrilo Prinzip had received a sentence of twenty years for starting the holocaust; they argued about the newly announced difference between Kultur and Culture; they learned the new war-game, played on a map of Europe; with armies and navies of Germany, Austria, Belgium, France, Great Britain and Russia carrying on strategic warfare. And meanwhile their creditors were becoming so insistent that they dreaded driving through town. They could buy nothing else at the druggist’s or the grocer’s or the dry goods store. They could not buy nails to mend a loose board on the front gallery. The car was in such need of repair that it was unsafe to drive it. For two months they had been brushing their teeth with salt instead of toothpaste.
In February cotton was eight cents a pound. On the first of March Sebastian wrote urging them to sell. Cotton was being shipped overseas in small quantities now, he said, but the German submarines were getting continually more successful in their attempts to halt Allied commerce and nobody could tell what day the risks of international shipping would send the price down again.
For several successive evenings they sat up late talking it over. At eight cents a pound the crop would cover their immediate bills, but it would not leave a penny over toward the twenty thousand dollars they would be required to pay the bank if they were to keep Ardeith longer than the first of December. There was no chance that the plantation in its first year as an experimental truck-farm could be made to show a profit of twenty thousand dollars. In their extremity they at last confessed to each other that they might have been willing to turn to Fred for aid, but Eleanor knew her father’s business well enough to know that twenty thousand dollars in cash represented an impossible demand. In the present plight of the cotton-stricken banks Fred could have raised such a sum only by mortgaging the machinery that built his levees and the home in which his family lived, a step that would reduce him to a state comparable to the one in which she and Kester found themselves today. After Fred’s long struggle, which nobody understood better than she did, Eleanor felt that she would rather accept any defeat for herself than ask for that.
