The Wide House

  Then, without warning, she began to weep. The tears dashed down her cheeks. She still held his stiff arm. She moved so close to him that their bodies touched.

  He moved his head as if strangling. He said: “Laurie. You don’t know what you are saying. I am nearly twenty-two years older than you, old enough to be your father. You are only a young girl. You think you love me, but it’s only gratitude. Laurie,” he added, and now his voice was stifled, “don’t talk to me like that. You don’t know me, Laurie. You don’t know to what you are exposing yourself, out of your ignorance and immature romanticism. Don’t tempt me, Laurie,” he cried, with sudden violent roughness, pushing her from him with his elbow. His black eyes were leaping. “You don’t know what you are doing.”

  But she followed his one retreating step. He lifted his arm again, as if to protect, rather than repudiate her. She pressed her body to his, and put her arms under his coat, beneath his arms. Her lips were close to his, parted and trembling.

  “Stuart,” she whispered, with ferbid earnestness. “I love you. I’ve always loved you. Why do you think I’ve returned here? There was nothing to come to, but you. My studies in New York, my singing in Europe, were only a winding path that led back to you.” She looked at his congested and still obdurate face. “Oh, Stuart! Kiss me.”

  He took her hands away from him. She felt their heat and dampness. All his movements were gentle. But he was trembling strongly. He loomed above her in the darkening light, and it seemed to her that her heart melted, flowed out to him on an irresistible wave of desire. Her ears hummed and roared with discordant sounds. She heard him say: “Don’t, Laurie. Don’t, for God’s sake. Laurie, you must listen to me. I have nothing to give you, or offer you. I’m a ruined man, Laurie. I can’t even marry you.”

  She cried out, loudly: “Do you think I am a child? Who spoke of marriage? I’m a woman, Stuart, and I love you. I came back to you, Stuart. I won’t leave you again. I’ll be with you always.”

  His eyes welled, dilated, then narrowed on her. A kind of wonder, unbelieving, lustful and overwhelmingly hot, flashed into them. He was silent, looking at her as if for the first time. This was no longer the young Laurie he had known, and he believed her now. Her uplifted face floated before his, ardent, and desirous, wild and lighted, and her eyes were glowing and soft as the morning sky. She had placed her hands on his shoulders; it seemed to him that their touch burned through the cloth that covered them.

  Yet some decency in him still made him pause. What did she know of anything, this nineteen-year-old girl? How could she know what she was doing to him, he a man past forty, dirtied by the years and by noxious experiences and lusts? It was fantastic, frightful. He could take her, easily, and with ecstasy and ferocity and mad pleasure to himself. But, he thought to himself, dazedly, he loved her. Yes, he had always loved her. For the first time in his life he loved a woman, and it was too late.

  All his life had been without control. He had done everything he wished, with violence and lustfulness and brutality; he had grasped at everything he had desired, and had taken it. If sometimes this had resulted in disaster, it had always satisfied him. He had never known mercy, been halted by decent hesitancy, when he had desired a thing, whether it had been a woman or money or any luxury.

  But this was Laurie, little Laurie, and he loved her. She was not only a woman, but something tender and deeply beloved and defenseless. He saw now that he had always loved her, from the very beginning, from her very childhood. She was infinitely dear to him, and precious and too lovely. He was overcome with his longing and his despair, even though his blood rushed and crashed in his ears, and his heart labored heavily.

  She did not know what she was doing, or what it would mean! He must, show her, make her recoil with loathing and disgust. He looked into her eyes, almost on a level with his. But he did not look at her mouth. He dared not look at it. With deliberate roughness he suddenly caught her to him, and grasped her left breast in a brutal hand. He pushed back her head with his free hand and pressed his mouth to hers with considered brutishness, forcing her lips apart. He tasted the tears that had wet them; for a moment, before his own terrible passion struck him, he felt a pang of gentleness and sweetness and pity. And then, he was no longer acting in order to disgust and terrify her.

  It was a long time before, in his demented delirium, he became aware that Laurie had not recoiled from him, had not cried out, had not struggled or protested or shrunk away. Even in his madness, he felt that her arms were about his neck, that she was returning his kisses with equal frenzy and recklessness, that she was murmuring strange and incoherent things, that she was clinging to him fiercely, laughing deeply in her bare throat.

  He thrust her away from him, then, still holding her by the arms. They looked into each other’s eyes. His were reddened and suffused, hers were flaming.

  Then he lifted her in his arms and turned towards the house. Her head lay on his shoulder. He kicked open the door and entered the hallway. She looked about her, swimmingly. No longer was this a desolate and abandoned place, full of gloom and threat, ominous with the future. It was lovely and warm, enchanted, bright with a hundred dancing colors.

  When Stuart mounted the beautiful winding stairway, a stairway of white marble in the dusk, she put her arms about his neck again, and drew down his mouth to hers in ecstatic desire and triumphant joy.

  CHAPTER 55

  Janie knocked sharply on Laurie’s bedroom door, then entered without further courtesy, not awaiting Laurie’s permission.

  It had turned quite warm for April during the night, and now a flood of dazzling sunlight fell through the windows upon Laurie’s bed. She sat up as her mother bounced in grimly. Janie’s mouth opened on a burst of vituperative words, then remained open, in silence. For Laurie, sitting upright against her pillows, was naked, and quite unashamed of her nakedness, even apparently unaware of it. She said: “Yes, what is it?”

  Janie, stupefied, stared at her daughter, whose golden shoulders and veined pointed breasts were only partly concealed by her long masses of bright hair. She had not seen Laurie naked since the girl had been six years old, and it was the sudden reality confronting her of a full and voluptuous woman that made her understand at last what a stranger was this in her house. Bawdy and disingenuous though she was, Janie was shocked, and oddly frightened.

  She finally caught her breath. She pointed at her daughter. “What is this disgraceful exhibition, ma’am? Why this—this nudeness, in bed?”

  Laurie looked down at herself, undisturbed, and slightly surprised. Then she smiled, though she made no effort to draw up the coverlets. “Oh? I always sleep like this, Ma. I can’t endure the confinement of a nightshift.

  She stretched out her long and beautiful arm and pulled the bell-rope. She leaned back against her pillows, and yawned as openly and as indolently as a cat. She shook out her yellow hair, ran her hands through it, let the heavy masses of it fall as they might. Her lips were blooming. Her eyes were softly blue. She regarded Janie with amusement, but without cynicism.

  Janie, quite “gone,” sank on a chair. She had become so pale that her brown freckles stood out on her sallow face. Her shock increased. She avoided gazing at Laurie’s bare shoulders and breasts, but could not meet her eyes either. She did not know where to look, so fastened her virulent gaze on Laurie’s calm forehead.

  “I presume,” she said, in a hoarse and shaking tone, “that you find nothing indecent, nothing shameful, in this? But, certainly, it is all a proper part of your general behavior.”

  Laurie laughed. “Shameful? Indecent? Why? I sleep alone.” Her eyes twinkled. “And, when I do not sleep alone, I am convinced that my bed companion will not object.”

  Janie gaped, aghast. “What are you saying, miss?”

  But Laurie was impatient. “Ma, what does it matter how I sleep? I find this comfortable. That is all that is pertinent.” She paused. “You wished to talk to me this morning?”

  In a voice trembling
with hatred and fury, Janie answered: “You’ve rung for your breakfast, I opine? Do you wish the maid to see you in this—this condition? Pray, if it is not too arduous an effort, cover yourself. This has always been a respectable house, and I want no tales carried beyond its walls.”

  Laurie shrugged. She swung her long and perfect legs out of bed. Fascinated, Janie was unable to look away. She watched Laurie negligently pull a blue silk peignoir over the splendor of her nakedness. Laurie picked up a brush from her bureau and rapidly ran it through the hanging richness of her hair; she did not glance in the mirror. She was as unaware of her beauty, or as indifferent to it, as a flowering tree. She began to hum to herself, and her voice, full and powerful, filled the room and joined in the fresh and boisterous wind that pervaded it. Janie felt a peculiar bursting sensation in her meager chest; all her nerves prickled with unendurable malignance. How hideously unfair was the world, and fate! To give all this to one disinterested and shameless woman, and to give nothing to others!

  She shouted, out of the torment of her malevolence and envy: “Will you stop that yowling, you minx, and listen to me?”

  Laurie glanced at her over her shoulder with unaffected surprise. She had forgotten her mother. “I’m sorry, Ma. What is it, please?”

  Trembling with her efforts at self-control, Janie almost shrieked with brutal sarcasm: “If I may ask your ladyship, is your ladyship aware of the hour?”

  Laurie found this question baffling. She stared at Janie, her golden lashes blinking. “No. What time is it?” She glanced at the sky, and laughed. “Why, I should think it is almost noon!”

  “I should think it is almost noon,’ eh?” cried Janie. “And that is all that means to you? Well, let me tell you, you minx, it means much more to me. It means that you did not enter this respectable house until almost dawn. It means that I spent a sleepless night of worry, in the company of your fine friends, one of whom, at least, paced the floor in great anxiety for you, though why, God only knows. Men are such damnable fools! When they finally left me, I waited alone. And then,” she paused in furious and dramatic significance, “I heard the wheels of a carriage, far down the street, almost in the wake of the milk wagon. I heard that carriage stop. It came no further. Shortly after that, you appeared, skulking in the lamplight like a trollop, letting yourself in stealthily at the back door.”

  She sprang to her feet, her sallow face burning with crimson. “Will you condescend, miss, to enlighten me as to these disgraceful events?”

  Laurie laid down her brushes. She shook back her hair. She looked at her mother thoughtfully. She said, very quietly: “What I do is my own concern. In the last six months I have sent you two thousand dollars, and numerous presents. If you wish, I shall leave this house at once.”

  Janie was appalled, stricken speechless at this effrontery. She was not acting any longer. She caught the back of a chair. It slipped from her grasp, overturned. She looked about her, blindly, swaying a little. Then, she sank on the warm perfumed bed which Laurie had vacated. And Laurie watched her all through this, hard and calm and expressionless. She regarded Janie’s twitching face without pity or interest. She said: “I am nothing to you, or you to me. You must understand that.”

  Janie did not know it was desolation that swept over her then, mingled with wild self-pity and helplessness.

  “How can you say these things to me, Laurie, me, your Ma?” she asked, and her voice was weak and quivering. “What have I done to deserve such cruelty? Cruelty,” she repeated, in bitter surprise that she had never known before that Laurie was cruel. Her fear sharpened, and with it, her desolation.

  “I was merely pointing out to you, Ma, that you must not interfere with me,” said Laurie. “I do not mean to be insolent or without sensibility. But I am not a child. I am a woman, and have had the experience of a woman. I am not without some fame, nor am I dependent upon you for my shelter and protection, nor upon my brothers.”

  “Why did you return here, Laurie, then, if your mother, and your brothers, are nothing to you?” Janie was still overcome.

  Laurie raised her eyebrows. “My words were badly chosen. I ought not to have said, perhaps, that you are nothing to me, nor should I have implied that I so regard my brothers, either. I have my attachments. I would not have returned to Grandeville had there been nothing here for me. I am never impelled by sentimentality, nor by those who have set up standards of sentimentality to be followed by other human beings.” Her lips curved. The lines of her mouth were less sharp and bold this morning. She even regarded Janie with sudden humor and tolerance.

  But Janie stared inflexibly and piercingly at her daughter, and Laurie grudgingly admitted to herself that Janie was no fool, and not to be deceived by smooth words. Janie repeated: “Why did you return here, Laurie?”

  This was becoming tiresome. It was also dangerous. Laurie was secretly exasperated and impatient. Her position was too impregnable to be injured by gossip, but there was Stuart to consider. She said: “I thought I told you, Ma. I am even willing to admit, now, that I am not free from a little sentimentality of my own.”

  “You came to flaunt your triumphs in our faces, then?” exclaimed Janie viciously, forgetting in the extremity of her gall her reason for entering this room this morning.

  Laurie laughed slightly. “Perhaps I am only human after all,” she said, with lightness.

  There came a discreet knock on the door, and the little maid to whom Laurie had given the overwhelming gold-piece entered with a breakfast tray. Laurie graciously directed her to lay the tray on the bedside table. She seated herself indolently on the edge of the bed and examined the steaming porridge and eggs and bacon with healthy interest. Her blue silk dressing gown fell open, revealing her round and perfect thighs. The little maid blushed but could not look away.

  But, as Janie looked at the little maid, she was reminded of something else. Here was one upon whom she could pour the vitriol of her rage, humiliation and helpless hurt without rebuff or defeat to herself. She shouted: “Bertha! I have just learned that you absented yourself without leave from the housekeeper on Thursday night, though it was dinner time and the other housemaid was ill, and that you did not return until dinner was almost ready for serving. What is the explanation of this, you wench? Was it your evening off, perchance, or were you under the delusion that it was?”

  Bertha, terrified, wrung her hands in her apron, and shot a pleading glance at Laurie. Laurie lifted a silver dish-cover and looked with pleasure at the hot crumpets. She said amiably: “Don’t scold Bertha, Ma. It was my fault. I had some legal business to discuss with Robbie, and sent Alice a little note by Bertha asking if I could see the two of them last night for a long business and friendly consultation.” She put a buttered crumpet to her lips and tasted it with evident appreciation. “It seems I have disturbed this household unpardonably. First, I take Bertha from her duties, and then I cause my dear Ma to remain up half the night watching for my return. I have learned cosmopolitan ways, I am afraid, not quite fitted for Grandeville and the code of Godey’s Lady’s Book.”

  Her expression was amiable, but she was secretly irritated. All this nonsense of lying and conniving and plotting which was so necessary in a small city, and among one’s kin! It was odious, humiliating. She could not endure it.

  Janie stared at her daughter. Now some of the pinched look left her mouth, the virulence, her eyes. Then she glowered at Bertha, but her voice was less harsh when she said: “Go about your work, wench. I see it was no fault of yours, after all. You are to obey Miss Cauder whenever she wishes, naturally, but try no tricks of your own.”

  Laurie frowned faintly. Just then her own maid entered, lamenting that she had not heard her mistress’ bell, and prepared for Laurie’s ill temper. But to Laurette’s surprise, Laurie greeted her affably.

  “Please replenish the teapot for me, Laurette,” said Laurie. “I think Mrs. Cauder might like to join me in a cup.”

  The two maids departed, and Janie and Laurie
were alone again. Laurie ate with relish, though her annoyance was still sharp, and Janie watched her, in narrow-eyed silence. Laurette returned with fresh tea, and hovered with servility over Janie as she filled the latter’s cup. Her air of solicitude, her excellent service, mollified Janie, who finally dismissed her with a grand gesture. Ah, these New York maids had a touch and a way with them that could never be duplicated in rustic Grandeville. She envied Laurie such a maid. Laurette discreetly retired to Laurie’s dressing room, where she prepared her mistress’ clothes for the day.

  Janie sipped her tea. Laurie demolished all the bacon, the crumpets, and eggs, with gusto. How unrefined it was to have such an appetite, and be so unashamed of it, thought Janie, sipping daintily at her cup. Laurie reminded her, continued Janie’s thoughts, of a buxom milkmaid, all coarseness and zest and bouncing vitality. These thoughts placated her.

  Laurie leaned back against her pillows and yawned voluptuously. “A wonderful breakfast,” she commented. “Even in New York, or London, such fresh eggs are almost unobtainable. As for Paris!” She rolled back her head and revealed her strong young throat. “They give you a hard roll and a cup of abominable coffee for breakfast. Ma, I congratulate you on your cook.”

  Janie bridled with pride. “Gordon is invaluable. Hearty food, and no nonsense, but the best.”

  Laurie, still lying on her back across the bed, surveyed the pleasant and boisterous sunshine that poured in through her window. “Imagine such a perfect day, for April in Grandeville,” she mused. “Tomorrow, doubtless, we shall have snow again.” She swung herself up lithely, and looked at her mother. Laurie’s eyes were smiling now, as well as her mouth. Her face became thoughtful.

  “I am always ill-natured before breakfast, Ma. I must ask your pardon. I am so accustomed to coming and going as I please that it never occurred to me that I owed you an explanation. I regret that I caused you anxiety.”