CHAPTER XXXVIII
Immediately upon leaving Folly, Leighton called on Lady Derl, byappointment. He had already been to Helene with his trouble over Lewis.It was she that had told him to see Folly. "In a case of even thesimplest subtraction," Helene had said, "you've got to know what you'retrying to subtract from."
As usual, Leighton was shown into Helene's intimate room. He closed thedoor after him quickly.
"Helene," he said, "where's the key?"
"The key? What key?"
"The key to this door. I want to lock myself in here."
"Poor frightened thing!" laughed Helene. "Turn around and let me look atyou. Is your face scratched?"
Leighton pulled out a handkerchief and mopped his brow. He stared ateach familiar object in the room as though he were trying to recall atruant mind. Finally his eyes came around to Helene, and with a quicksmile and the old toss of the head with which he was wont to throw off amood, he brought himself back to the present.
"With time and patience," he said, as he sat down, "anybody can get agrip on a personality, but a mighty impersonality is like the Delugeor--or a steam-roller. Do I look flattened out?"
"You do, rather, for you," said Helene. "Tell me about it from thebeginning." And Leighton did. It took him half an hour. When he gotthrough, she said, still smiling, "I'd like to meet this Folly person."
"I see I've talked for nothing," said Leighton. "It isn't the Follyperson that flattened me out. It's what's around her, outside of her."
"That's what you think," said Helene. "But, still, it's she I'd like tosee."
"That's lucky," said Leighton, "because you 're going to."
"When?"
"To-morrow. Lunch."
"What's the idea?"
"The idea is this. I've been looking her up, viewing her cradle and hermother's cradle and that sort of thing. I'd have liked to have viewedher father's as well, but it's a case of _cherchez l'homme_."
"Well?"
"Well, the young lady's an emanation from sub-Cockneydom. My idea isthat that kind can't stand the table and _grande-dame_ test. I'll supplythe table, with fixtures, and you're going to be the _grande-dame_."Leighton's face suddenly became boyishly pleading. "Will you, Helene?It's more than an imposition to ask; it's an impertinence."
For a moment Helene was serious and looked it.
"Glen," she said, "you and I don't have to ask that sort of thing--notwith each other. We take it. Of course I'll come. I'll enjoy it. But--doyou think she's really raw enough to give herself away?"
"I don't know," said Leighton, gloomily. "I couldn't think of anythingelse. Lunch begins to look a bit thin for the job. At first I'd thoughtof one of those green-eyed Barbadian cocktails, followed by thatpale-eyed Swiss wine of mine that Ivory calls the Amber Witch with thehidden punch. But I've given them up. You see, I told her I'd play fairif she did."
"Yes, I see," said Helene.
A psychologist would have liked an hour to study the lightning changethat came over Folly when, on the following day, she suddenly realizedLady Derl. Folly had blown into the flat like a bit of gay thistledown.For her, to lunch with one man was the stop this side of boredom; but tolunch with two was a delight. If she was allowed to pick the otherwoman, she could just put up with a _partie carree_. But she hadn'tpicked out Lady Derl. Lady Derl was something that had never touched herworld except from a box across the footlights on an occasional premiere.
One flash of Folly's eyes took in Lady Derl, and then her long lashesdrooped before Lady Derl had time to take in Folly. Folly's whole selfdrooped. She was still a bit of thistle-down, but its pal, the breeze,was gone. She crossed the room, barely touched Helene's hand, and thenfluttered down to stillness on the edge of a big chair.
At lunch Leighton made desperate efforts to start a breeze and failed.Folly said "Yes" and Folly said "No,"--very softly, too,--and that wasall. Leighton stepped on Helene's foot several times, but to no avail.Lady Derl was watching Folly. "Could she keep it up? Yes, she could."Lady Derl couldn't talk; she wanted to laugh.
Throughout that interminable lunch, Helene, Leighton, and Lewis sawnothing, thought nothing, but Folly, and, for all any one of them couldsee, Folly didn't know it. "Oh, you adorable _cat!_" thought Lady Derl."Oh, you _adorable!_" sighed Lewis to himself, and, inwardly, Leightongroaned, "Oh, you _you!_"
Within twenty minutes of leaving the table, Folly rose from the edge ofher chair and crossed to Lady Derl.
"Good-by," she breathed shyly, holding out her hand. "I must go now."Lewis sprang up to accompany her. They could see he was aching to getaway somewhere where he could put his arms around her. Leighton crossedto the door and held it open. "Good-by," said Folly to him, holding outher hand. "I've had _such_ a good time."
At the word "such," Leighton winced and flushed. Then he grinned.
"Good-by, Folly," he said. "I hope you'll come again when you're feelingmore like yourself."
He closed the door and then rang for Nelton. Nelton came.
"Bring me the iodine," said Leighton, as with his handkerchief hestanched the blood from a bad scratch on his right wrist.
"Heavens! Glen," cried Helene, "how did you get that?
"Didn't you see me jump when she said '_such_'?" asked Leighton. Thenthey sat down, and Helene laughed for a long time, while Leighton triednot to. "Oh," he said at last, "I wish we didn't have to think of Lew!"
"You may ask for my advice now," said Helene, a little breathlessly."I've got it ready."
"Thank God!" said Leighton. "What is it?"
"It's only a plan to gain time, after all," said Helene; "but that'swhat you want--time for Lew to get his puppy eyes opened. You canelaborate the idea. I'll just give you the skeleton."
She did, and, soon after, Leighton saw her into a cab. He went back tothe flat and waited. He knew that Lewis would not be gone long. He wouldbe too keen to hear his father's and Lady Derl's verdict.
Leighton had just settled down to a book and a second cigar when Lewiscame into the room like a breeze that had only a moment to stay.
"Well, Dad," he cried, "what have you got to say now? What has Lady Derlgot to say?"
Lewis flung himself into a chair, crossed his arms, and stretched hislegs straight out before him. His head hung to one side, and he was soconfident of his father's verdict that he was laughing at him out ofbright eyes.
Leighton laid his book aside and took his cigar from his mouth. Heleaned toward his son, his elbows on his knees.
"Every time I see Miss Delaires," he said slowly, "my opinion of hercharms and her accomplishments goes up with a leap."
Lewis nodded, and scarcely refrained from saying, "I told you so."
Leighton's face remained impassive. "She has a much larger repertoirethan I thought," he continued; "but there's one role she can't play."
"What's that?" asked Lewis.
"Marriage."
"Why?" asked Lewis, his face setting. Then he blurted out: "I might asWell tell you, she says she doesn't believe in marriage. She's tooadvanced."
"Too advanced!" exclaimed Leighton. "Why, my dear boy, she hasn'tadvanced an inch from the time the strongest man with the biggest clubhad a God-given right to the fairest woman in the tribe and exercisedit. That was the time for Folly to marry."
"Go easy, Dad," warned Lewis.
"I'm going to, Boy," said Leighton. "You hear a lot of talk to-day onthe shortcomings of marriage as an institution. The socialists and thesuffragists and a lot of other near-sighted people have got it intotheir heads that we've outgrown marriage." Leighton puffed at his cigar."Once I was invited out to dinner, and had to eat cabbage because therewas nothing else. That night I had the most terrible dream of my life. Idreamed that instead of growing up, I was growing down, and that bymorning I had grown down so far that, when I tried to put them on, Ionly reached to the crotch of my trousers. I'll never forget thoseflapping, empty legs."
Lewis smiled.
"You can smile," went on Leighton. "I can't, even now
. That's what'shappened to this age. We've outgrown marriage downward. Yournear-sighted people talk of contractual agreements, parity of the sexes,and of a lot of other drugged panaceas, with the enthusiasm of a hawkerselling tainted bloaters. They don't see that marriage is founded on arock set deeper than the laws of man. It's a rock upon which theirjerry-rigged ships of the married state are bound to strike as long asthere's any Old Guard left standing above the surge of leveledhumanity."
"And what's the rock?" asked Lewis.
"A woman's devotion," said Leighton, and paused. "Devotion," he went on,"is an act of worship, and of prayer as well as of consecration, only,with a woman, it isn't an act at all. Sometime perhaps H lne will talkto you. If she does, you'll see in her eyes what I'm trying to tell youin words."
"And--Folly?" said Lewis. His own pause astounded him.
"Yes, Folly," said Leighton. "Well, that's what Folly lacks--the key,the rock, the foundation. The only person Folly has a right to marry isherself, and she knows it."
Lewis sighed with disappointment. He had been so sure. Leighton spokeagain.
"One thing more. Don't forget that to-day you and I--and H lne,received Folly here as one of us."
Lewis looked up. Leighton rose, and laid one hand on his shoulder.
"Boy," he said, "don't make a mistress out of anything that has touchedH lne. You owe that to me."
"I won't, Dad," gulped Lewis. He snatched up his hat and stick andhurried out into the open.