Kitabı oku: «Paradise Garden: The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment», sayfa 17

I took the bull by the horns. I had wanted to for weeks.

"Freely, unreservedly, the nature of your relations with Marcia Van Wyck—"

He rose suddenly, his face flushing darkly and took up his rod and creel.

"If you don't mind my saying so," he muttered, "that is none of your affair."

I rose, though his reproach stung me bitterly.

"Confidences and advice are inseparable," I said coldly.

"You hate Marcia," he mumbled.

"I do."

"Why?"

"Because she's unsound, unsafe, im—"

"Be careful!" he cried.

I shrugged but was silent, I think, from the fear of Jerry's fists which were clenching his rod and creel ominously.

"She's the woman I love," he declared with pathetic drama.

I braved the fists and laughed.

"Tush!" I said.

He was furious. For a moment I thought he was going to strike me. Had he done so I should have been ended there and then, and this interesting history brought to an untimely conclusion on the very eve of its most interesting disclosures.

But he thought better of it and with a shaking forefinger pointed toward the path downstream. "Go, Roger," he said in a trembling voice, "please go."

CHAPTER XXII
THE CHIPMUNK

I obeyed. There was nothing left for me to do. Our afternoon had ended in disaster, but I was not sorry. I had thought from all Jerry had told me that he was beginning to awaken, to rouse himself and tear asunder the web of enchantment that this girl Marcia had woven about him. I had meant to help him lift the veil to let him see her as she was, a beautiful, selfish little sensualist with a silken voice and an empty heart. But the time was not yet. I sighed, lamenting my failure but not regretting my temerity. If he would not waken at least I had the satisfaction of knowing it was not because I had not tried to wake him.

I made my way down over the rocks, casting a glance over my shoulder toward Jerry as I descended. He was following slowly, his hands behind him, his head down, the pipe hanging bowl downward in his teeth. There was anger in his appearance but there was something of reflection, too. Down on a lower level where the going was easier I paused, deliberating whether I shouldn't put my pride in my pocket and braving rebuffs, wait for him. I had half decided to choose this ignominious course when in the path ahead of me at some distance away I espied a figure walking toward me. I was deep in the shadow and the person, a female, had not espied me, but I could see her quite clearly in the sunlight. There was no mistaking her curious gait. It was Marcia Van Wyck, come at pains which must convince of her contrition, to make peace with Jerry.

I looked again to be sure that my eyes had not deceived me and then jumped into the underbrush beside the path and hid myself under a projection of nearby rock. I disliked the girl intensely and hated the sight of her, and this must, I suppose, account for the sudden impulse which led to my undignified retreat. Had I known in advance of the unfortunate situation in which it would have placed me, I should have faced her boldly or have fled miles away from that spot, to be forever associated in my mind with the one really discreditable experience of my career. I have always been, I think, an honorable man and such a paltry sin as eavesdropping had always been beneath me, save on the one occasion when my duty as Jerry's guardian prompted me to listen for a few moments at the cabin window last year when Una and Jerry were settling between them the affairs of the world. That was a pardonable transgression, this, a different affair, for Jerry was now released from my guardianship, a grown man ostensibly capable of managing his own affairs, which, as he had some moments before taken pains to inform me, were none of mine.

But as luck would have it, the girl walking upstream and Jerry walking down, they met in the path just beside the rock behind which I was so uncomfortably reclining and scarcely daring to breathe. I could not see their faces as they came together, but I heard their voices quite Distinctly.

"Marcia!" said Jerry, it seemed a trifle harshly. "What are you doing here?"

With my vision obstructed, the soft tones of her voice seemed to take an added significance.

"I came," she purred, "because, Jerry, I couldn't stay away."

And then, after a pause, her voice even more silken, "You don't seem very glad to see me."

"I—I—your appearance surprised me."

"But now that the surprise is over—are you glad to see me?" she asked.

A pause and then I heard him mutter.

"I didn't suppose that—after yesterday you would want to see me."

"Yesterday," she sighed, "twenty-four hours—an age! The surest proof that I wanted to see you is that I'm here, that I ran away from a house full of people, just to tell you—"

"Is Channing Lloyd still there?" he broke in harshly.

"Yes, Jerry, he is. But doesn't it mean anything to you that I left him, to come to you?"

"You broke your promise—to give him up—"

"Why, Jerry, I had to invite him to my dance. It would have been a slight."

"But you promised. He's a—"

"But I've known him for ages, Jerry. I can't be impolite."

"He's not polite to you, to me, or anybody. I told you I wanted you to give him up."

"You're fearfully exacting," she said, modulating her voice softly.

"He's a cad. I can't understand your inviting him. His very look is an insult, his touch a desecration. I don't like the way he paws you."

"Of course, he—he means nothing by it," she said soothingly. "It's only his way."

"But I don't like his way and I don't like him. I've told you so a good many times."

"You make it very difficult for me. It would have been insulting not to have asked him. We've been very good friends until you came."

"It's a pity I came, then. You've got to choose between us. I've told you that before."

"Why, Jerry, I have chosen," she said, her voice softening suspiciously. "How could I ever think of anybody else now that I have you? It's so absurd of you to be jealous of Chan. He's not like you, of course, and his manner is a little rough, but he really isn't nearly so terrible a person as you think he is." She sighed. "But if you insist, I suppose I shall have to give him up."

"Is it painful to you?" he muttered.

She laughed. "You silly boy, of course not. I will give him up. There! Does that settle that matter?"

"I thought it was settled before."

"It was—but—" She paused.

"I don't see how you could want to be with a man I don't like—"

"I don't care for him, Jerry, really I don't. Won't you believe me?"

"I'll believe you when you give him up."

She sighed again, her voice breaking effectively.

"Oh, dear! Do you want me to give up all my friends? And is it quite fair?"

"I haven't asked you to give up any of your friends, but Lloyd—"

Well, I've given him up, Jerry. I'll send him home tonight. Don't let's think of him any more. I can't stand having anything come between us again. I can't, Jerry. It makes me so unhappy. I've been wretched since yesterday about Una. That's why I came. I wanted you to know how sorry I am that I spoke to Una the way I did."

"Are you, Marcia?" His voice had softened suddenly and from the shuffling of his feet I think he took a pace toward her.

"Yes, Jerry dear, contrite. I simply couldn't let another hour pass without coming to ask your forgiveness."

He was weakening. Perhaps his arm was around her. I don't know, but his silence was ominous.

"I have been so miserable," she murmured. "My conscience has troubled me terribly. Oh, I can't tell you how I have suffered. All the evening I thought you would come. I waited for you; I went out on the terrace a hundred times, watching for the lights of your car; but you didn't come, you didn't come, Jerry, and I knew how terribly I had offended you."

I couldn't see her but I'm sure she was wringing her pretty white hands. Jerry must have been deeply moved for his voice was shaky.

"It didn't matter about me, but a visitor, a guest at Horsham Manor, Marcia, a friend—!"

"A friend, yes. Oh, I've been so unhappy about it all—so miserably wretched."

Her voice broke and she seemed upon the point of tears.

"Why did you, Marcia? Why did you?" he repeated.

"I—I—" She appeared to break down and weep and Jerry's voice took on a tone of distress.

"Don't, Marcia, please!"

"I—I'm trying not to—but—" and she wept anew.

"Come," said Jerry's voice. "Sit here a moment. I'm sure it can all be explained. It makes me very unhappy to see you so miserable."

They moved nearer and she sat upon the very rock beneath which I lay among the mouldy leaves; so near that I could have reached out and touched the girl's silken ankle with my fingers. Jerry, I think, still stood.

"I don't want to—to make you unhappy," she said in a moment. "And it was all my fault, but I just couldn't—couldn't stand it, Jerry."

"Stand what?"

A pause and then in muffled tones.

"Don't you know? Don't you really understand?"

"No. I—"

"I was mad," she whispered, "mad with jealousy of Una. She was your first love, your first—"

"Marcia! You mustn't. It's absurd."

"No, no," she protested. "I know. Ever since I first learned that she had—had been in here with you, I—I haven't been able to get her out of mind—I may have appeared to, but I'm not one who forgets things easily; and to meet her at the cabin, the very place where I thought I should—should have you all to myself—it was too much. Jerry. I couldn't stand it. Something—something in me rebelled. I grew cold all over and hard against all the world, even you."

"But this was foolish of you. Una, a friend. Surely there was no harm in my seeing her here?"

"It was foolish," there was a slight change in the intonation of her voice here, "but I know the world so much better than you, Jerry. Girls are so designing, so—so untrustworthy."

"You don't know Una if you say that," said Jerry loyally.

"Perhaps I don't. I don't wish to think badly of anyone you call a friend but Una is so—er—so independent—so accustomed to moving with queer people—" She paused a moment again to give her insinuation weight. "I don't know," she sighed. "I thought all sorts of horrible things about you."

"Horrible! How? Why?"

"Oh, Jerry. Think for a moment. It was natural in me, wasn't it? If I hadn't been jealous of you I couldn't have loved you very much, could I?"

"But horrible thoughts! I don't understand. You might think that there was something between Una and me if you chose to be suspicious, but to think unpleasant things of her, I can't see—"

"You're making it very difficult for me—you're so strange," she murmured. "Isn't it something that I've lowered my pride to the earth in coming here to you? That I've given up Chan? That I'm pleading to you for forgiveness?"

"It is, of course. I do forgive you," he murmured

"Oh, Jerry, if you knew how I had longed to hear you say that—if you knew!"

All this while Jerry had been standing beside her in the path while the girl sat on the rock. I could tell this from the sounds of their voices. In spite of her accents of endearment, notes which she played with the deftest touch, I could understand that Master Jerry was still a little upon his dignity.

"I do forgive you," he repeated, "but I don't just know what your insinuations meant, Marcia."

"Insinuations! Oh, Jerry!"

"Well, what were they? You didn't accuse Una of anything, or me. But you meant something—something unpleasant. Una was very much disturbed—"

"Oh, she was?" No self-control could have concealed the tiny note of exultation.

"Yes, disturbed and angry. What did you mean, Marcia?"

There was an effective pause. What grimaces she was making for his benefit I'm sure I can't imagine, but I hope they were worthy of her talents.

"Poor, dear Jerry!" she sighed. "You're so innocent. I sometimes wonder whether you're really as innocent as you seem."

"I'm innocent of wronging Una," he said with some spirit.

She couldn't restrain a short laugh at the ingenuousness of the remark and its tone.

"There are ways and ways of wronging girls, Jerry," she said slowly. I couldn't see her face, of course, but I knew that her eyes must have been searching him sidelong under their lashes with peculiar avidity. "Of course, I don't say that there was anything wrong, but you'll admit that Una's hunting you out the way she did was most imprudent."

"No, I don't admit it," said Jerry. "If Una was imprudent, so are you, here, today."

"Jerry!" The girl started up, one of her tall French heels within reach of my fingers. If her heel had been her vulnerable spot I must have struck it at once, like a viper.

Jerry apparently stood his ground, for the image of Una must have still been fresh in his memory.

"What is the difference, Marcia?" he asked calmly. "Will you tell me? Do you think I could hurt you?"

She sank upon the rock again, her tone almost too plaintive.

"You're hurting me now, Jerry—terribly."

"I can't see—"

"That you can't see any difference, between my being here—and Una's."

His voice fell a little.

"Of course, there's a difference. Una is a friend and you—why Marcia—" and he came near her, "of course there's all the difference in the world in that way. You're the girl I—I love."

"Jerry!" she whispered.

I was miserable. It was nauseating. Fate was surely unkind to me.

"But I want to be just," he went on clearly. "And I want you to be just. I surely couldn't harm Una any more than I could you."

"Oh, Jerry; I'm sure you kissed her."

"No. Why should I?"

"Because, I thought she might have asked you to."

"She didn't. I suppose it hadn't occurred to her. I'm not much at kissing, Marcia. It's rather meaningless if you don't love a person, isn't it? Kissing ought to be a kind of sacrament. It's a symbol. It must mean something. At least that's the way it seems to me. The girl one loves, Marcia, you—"

He was very close to her now and I think his arms encircled her, for I heard her whisper "Kiss me, Jerry! Kiss me!"

I must have deserved this punishment. Aside from the unhappy nature of my feelings, I was suffering severe bodily discomfort from some small object, a stone, I think, pressed against my ribs. I moved slightly and there was a resounding crackle of broken twigs. The silken foot beside me started suddenly.

"What was that?" whispered the girl.

"Oh," said Jerry, "merely a squirrel or—or a chipmunk." And then more convincingly, "Yes, I think it was a chipmunk."

I held my breath in an agony of apprehension, expecting each second to be hauled out of my retreat by Jerry's muscular hand on my collar, and it was therefore with a feeling of manifest relief that I heard their conversation resumed.

"I'm so glad you think a kiss is a sacrament," she murmured. "It should be—shouldn't it?—a pledge," and then, "But that was such a light one, Jerry—"

He kissed her again. There was a long silence—long. She had won.

"Oh, Jerry," she sighed at last, "it is so sweet. You have never kissed me like that before. Why, what is the matter?"

Jerry, it seemed, had risen suddenly. "I—I mustn't, Marcia. I mustn't. It is sweet—but—but terrible. I can't tell you—"

"Terrible, Jerry?"

"Yes, I can't explain. It's a kind of profanation—your sanctity. I don't know. It makes me deliriously happy and—horribly miserable."

"But I am yours, Jerry, yours, do you understand? And if I like you to kiss me—"

"I mustn't, Marcia, not here."

He was very much disturbed. "Marcia!" he said in a suppressed tone as he came quickly to her again. "Was that what you meant—was that why you asked me if I'd kissed Una?"

"I merely wanted—"

"I didn't," he broke in impetuously. "No, no, I didn't. Why, Marcia, it wouldn't have been possible—we were merely friends. Don't think I've ever kissed Una, and don't ever believe she would let me. She wouldn't. She's not in love with me. She wouldn't let me, if I wanted to."

"And you don't want to?"

"No, no. I never think about her in that way. I can't. She's different from you. You allure me. It's subtle. I can't explain. I want to take you in my arms and yet I don't dare, for fear that I may crush you. I might, Marcia. I'm afraid. Just now, the thought of my strength frightened me. Don't let me kiss you like that again, Marcia."

"I'm not afraid," I heard her whisper. "Kiss me again, Jerry."

But he didn't. Apparently he still stood before her at a distance, fearsome of he knew not what.

"Jerry!" she murmured again, in a little tone of petulance.

"Marcia, we—we should be going on," he muttered.

"Ah, Jerry, not yet," she sighed. "Isn't it wonderful that there's no quarrel between us? Just you and I, Jerry, here, alone, like the first man and woman—alone in the world. There's no man in it but you, no woman but me, we're mated, Jerry, like the birds. Don't you hear them singing? The woods are alive with songs of love. And you, Jerry, you stand there staring at me with those great, timid eyes of yours. Why do you stare at me so? Are you frightened? I think that I am stronger than you. It is love that makes me strong. Come to me, Jerry. Kiss me, again."

"Marcia!" he gasped. And then another silence.

"I mustn't."

"I love you, Jerry."

"Will you marry me? Tomorrow!"

"Marriage, Jerry? Yes, some day—"

"Tomorrow—!"

"Aren't you satisfied—with this? The wonder of it."

"But I have no right. I can't explain. It's desecration!"

"A sacrament!" she said.

"A sacrament!"

"You said so."

"Not this, Marcia. A sacrament should be gentle. I want to be gentle in my thoughts of you. But I can't, not now. I could strangle you if you let another man do this, and kill—"

"I love you—when you talk like that. Strangle me if you like, kill me, I'm yours—"

I think that to Marcia, this was the greatest moment of her strange passion. Fear was its dominant motive, Jerry's innocence its inspiration. If he had crushed the breath from her body, I think she would have died rapturously. But Jerry, it seems, tore himself from her and moved some distance away, I think, his head bent into the hollow of his arm, torn between his emotions. I would have given all that I possessed on earth to have caught a glimpse of her face at that moment. Flushed with victory of course—but passion—Bah! I couldn't believe her capable of it. If she had been wholly animal I might have forgiven her everything. But the impression had grown in me with the minutes that all this like everything else she did was false—false penitence, false contrition, false tears, false love and now false passion. She was a mere shell, a beautiful shell in which one hears the faint murmurs of sweet music, echoes of sounds which might have been but were not. These were the sounds that Jerry heard, echoes of some earlier incarnation in which spiritual beauty had been his fetich. And now, he stood apart, broken, miserable.

"Jerry," I heard her call again softly, "I am not afraid."

That was it. I understood now. What she loved was fear. But Jerry would not come back. I heard his voice faintly.

"We must go, Marcia."

"Why?"

"I have learned; we have no right here—alone, you and I. It's what—what you accused Una of."

"But you and I—Jerry! Am I not different from Una? I have rights. She has none. I've given them to you, and you to me."

"You will marry me, soon?"

"Not if you're going to be so—so—er—inhospitable."

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 analyze 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 God he had strangled her.