CHAPTER II
It was as if Birdaline and Josie had slipped a knife under Deborah'sleft slipped a knife under Deborah's left shoulder-blade and pushed itinto her heart. She felt a mortal wound. She clung to the piano andremembered something she had overheard Birdaline say in exactly thattone far back in that primeval epoch when Debby had been sixteen-assweetless a sixteen as a girl ever endured.
Deborah had not been pretty then, or ever before, or since. But she hadbeen a girl, and had expected to have lovers to select a husband from.
Yet lovers were denied to Deborah. The boys had been fond of her andnice to her. For Deborah was a good fellow; she was never jealous orexacting. She was jolly, understood a joke, laughed a lot, and dancedwell enough. She never whined or threatened if a fellow neglected heror forgot to call for his dance or pay a party-call-or anything. Sheaccepted attentions as compliments, not as taxes. Consequently shecollected fewer than she might have had. The boys respected her somuch, too, that none of them insulted her with flirtatiousness. But howher hungry heart had longed to be insulted! How she had yearned tofight her way out from a strong man's audacious arms and to writhe awayfrom his daring lips!
On that memorable night Josie had given a party and Deborah had gone. Nofellow had taken her; but, then, Josie lived just across the street fromthe Larrabees, and Debby could run right over unnoticed and run homealone safely afterward. Debby was safe anywhere where it was not toodark to see her. Her face was her chaperon.
Asaph Shillaber took Birdaline to Josie's party that night, and hedanced three times with Debby. Each time-as she knew and pretended notto know-he had come to her because of a mix-up in the program or becauseshe was the only girl left without a partner. But a dance was a dance,and Asaph was awful light on his feet, for all he was so big.
After she had danced the third time with him he led her hastily to achair against the stairway, deposited her like an umbrella, and lefther. She did not mind his desertion, but sat panting with thebreathlessness of the dance and with the joy of having been in Asaph'sarms. Then she heard low voices on the stairway, voices back of her,just above her head. She knew them perfectly.
Asaph was quarreling with Birdaline. Birdaline was attacking Asaphbecause he had danced three times with Josie.
"But she's the hostess!" Asaph had retorted, and Birdaline snapped back:
"Then why don't she dance with some of the other fellas, then?Everybody's noticing how you honey-pie round her."
"Well, I danced with Deb Larrabee three times, too," Asaph pleaded."Why don't you fuss about that?"
Deborah perked an anxious ear to hear how Birdaline would accept thisrivalry, and Birdaline's answer fell into her ear like poison:
"Deb Larrabee! Humph! You can dance with that old thing till the cowscome home, and I won't mind. But you can't take me to a party and dancethree times with Josie Barlow. You can't, and that's all. So there!"
Asaph had a fierce way with women. He talked back to them as if theywere men. And now he rounded on Birdaline: "I'll take who I please, andI'll dance with who I please after I get there, and if you don't like ityou can lump it!"
Deborah did not linger to hear the result of the war that was sure to bewaged. There was no strength for curiosity in her hurt soul. Shewanted to crawl off into a cellar and cower in the rubbish like a sickcat. Birdaline's opinion of her was a ferocious condemnation for anywoman-thing to hear. It was her epitaph. It damned her, past, present,and future. She sneaked home without telling anybody good-by.
She had the next dance booked with Phineas Duddy, but she felt that hewould not remember her if he did not see her. And since on the next daynobody-not even Phineas-ever mentioned her flight, she knew that she hadnot been missed.
She cried and cried and cried. She told her mother that she had a badcold, to excuse her eyes that would not stop streaming. She criedherself out, as mourners do; then gradually accepted life, as mournersdo.
That was long ago, and now, after all these years-years that had provedthe truth of Birdaline's estimate of her; years in which Birdaline hadmarried Asaph out of Josie's arms, and Josie had married Phineas out ofBirdaline's private graveyard, and both of them had borne children andendured their consequences-even now Deborah must hear again the samerelentless verdict as before. Time had not improved her or brought herluck or lover, husband or child.
She had thought that she had grown used to herself and her charmlesslot, but the wound began to bleed afresh. She had the same impulse totake flight-to play the cat in the cellar-again. But her escape waschecked by a little excitement.
Close upon the heels of Birdaline's unconscious affront to Deborah,Birdaline herself received an unconscious affront.
Asaph, desiring to be hospitable and to pay beauty its due, came forwardat the end of the song to where little Pamela stood, receivingCarthage's homage with all the gracious condescension of Peoria. AndAsaph roared out in the easy hearing of both his own wife and ofPamela's mother:
"Well, Miss Pamela, you sang grand. I got no ear for music, but you suitme right down to the ground. And you're so dog-on pretty! I wouldn'tcare if you sang like all-get-out. You look like your mother did whenshe was your age. You might not think it to look at your ma now, but inher day she was one of the best lookers in this whole town; same coloreyes as you-and hair-and, oh, a regular heart-breaker."
Asaph's memory of Birdaline's eyes and hair was wrong, as a man'susually is. His praise was a two-edged sword of tactlessness.
He slashed Birdaline by forgetting her color and by implying that sheretained no traces of her beauty, and he gashed Josie because he implieda livelier memory of Birdaline's early graces than a husband has anyright to cherish.
Asaph had counted on doing a very gracious thing. When he had finishedhis little oration he glanced at Birdaline for recompense and received aglare of anger; he turned away to Josie and received from her eyes abuffet of wrath. He felt that he had made a fool of himself again, andhis ready temper was up at once. He crossed glares with his wife, andeverybody in eye-shot instantly felt a duel begun. It was not going tobe so dull an evening, after all. Even Debby lingered to see what theresult of the Shillaber conflict would be. She was also checked by theevidences that refreshments were about to be served. Chicken-salad andice-cream were not frequent enough in her life to be overlooked.Disparagement and derision were her every-day porridge. Ice-cream was aparty. So she lingered.
The Shillabers' hired girl, in a clean apron and a complete armor ofblushes, appeared at the dining-room door and beckoned. Josie summonedher more than willing children to pass the plates. She nodded to Asaphto come and roll the ice-cream freezer into place and scrape off thesalty ice. Then she waylaid him in the kitchen, and their wranglereached the speedily overcrowded dining-room in little tantalizingslices as the swinging door opened to admit or emit one of the children.But it always swung shut at once. It was like an exciting serial withmost of the instalments omitted.