The Woman Who Vowed (The Demetrian)

by Ellison Harding

  CHAPTER VI

  NEAERA

  Meanwhile I was becoming acquainted with Lydia's family and theirfriends. They occupied a building extending from Fifth Avenue to LenoxAvenue and from 125th Street to 130th Street. It had a large cloisteredcourt within which was a beautiful garden, consisting of a groveinclosing a lawn bordered by flowers. It was usual for the inmates ofthe building to meet for tea in the grove on the border of the lawn.They divided themselves into groups, each with his own arrangement ofchairs, hammocks, and tables, which reminded me of some of our _feteschampetres_. Within the grove were openings for such games as tennis--ofwhich they had an infinite variety--and also for stages on which theyrehearsed concerts and plays. The hours between five and seven were bycommon consent surrendered to social amusements. At seven there was anadjournment to the swimming bath and gymnasium with which everybuilding was provided. Eight was the usual hour for dinner, this mealbeing usually reserved to the family; and the evening was spent verymuch as with us, either at some theater or at home. The dinner party wasa thing almost unknown. In the first place, the principal meal, and theonly one which required much preparation, was in the middle of the day.The evening meal at eight was never more than our high tea, the objectof this system being to lighten domestic service. In the second place,the unmarried, who did not live with their families, generally dinedtogether in the common hall; and if members of a family wished to dineat the common table they could at any time do so. Members of differentfamilies frequently dined at one another's domestic table but upon termsof intimacy; the conventional dinner party had become ridiculous, no onehaving the means or feeling the necessity to make a display. The morethrifty and the best managers, who were skillful at dressing food andchose to apply their leisure to securing exquisite wines, oftenentertained; but out of the hospitality that enjoys sharing good thingswith others, rather than the pride which seeks to impress a neighbor byostentation of wealth.

  I learned later that, although the conditions I have described stillprevailed, the state was passing out of the pure Collectivism with whichit started; that numerous factories had been started by privateenterprise, partly to supply things not supplied by the state, partlybecause of dissatisfaction at state manufacture. Although privateenterprise could only count on voluntary labor during one-half of everyday it had already assumed vast proportions, had given rise toconsiderable private wealth and was modifying the social conditions thatresulted from primitive Collectivism.

  I also perceived that although many of the problems of life, such aspauperism and prostitution, had been solved by the introduction ofCollectivism, nevertheless it had not brought that total disappearanceof ill feeling which prophets of Collectivism had promised us in mytime. On the contrary, I soon discovered that the inmates of everybuilding were split up into cliques as devoted to gossip as in our day,the only difference being that they were determined by individualpreference and political divisions and not by poverty or wealth; perhapsit might be said, that the absence of the wealth standard raised thelevel of the social struggle, deciding it by personal excellence andattractiveness, rather than along conventional lines. Every man andwoman knew that popularity--and even political influence--could besecured only by these, and this knowledge checked many an angry word andprompted many an act of kindness. Chaff, too, and even sallies of witwith a dash of malice in them were borne with more good humor than inour day; because we all of us love to laugh, and generally the more ifit is at the expense of a neighbor, provided only there be no intentionto wound; so that those who bore banter well were as popular as thosewho best could set it going.

  And yet there were some very foolish and malicious people among them. Iremember a foolish one particularly, Aunt Tiny they called her. She wasan aunt of Lydia and Cleon. Lydia First, as Lydia's mother was called,had married twice. Her first husband had not known how to keep her loveand they had separated after her first child was weaned. Then she hadmarried a second time; her second husband was an excellent man butinferior to her; he had not been able to impress his personality nor hisname upon the family, and so the children of the second marriage as wellas the child of the first had taken the name of the mother. The secondhusband had died some years before the beginning of this story; but asister of his--Aunt Tiny--had remained attached to the family. She wasvery small and plump; her hair was of a sickly yellow color and so thinon the top of her head that the scalp was plainly visible; she wore aperpetual smile of self-satisfaction which expressed the essentialfeature of her character; it was impossible for her to entertain thethought that she was plain or unattractive; her happiness depended, onthe contrary, upon the conviction that no one could resist her charmsdid she only decide to exercise them. Age did not dull this keenself-admiration; on the contrary, as the mirror told her thatlengthening teeth contributed little to an already meaningless mouth, orwrinkles little to browless eyes, she felt the need of faith in herselfgrow the more, and her efforts by seductive glances to elicit fromothers the expression of regard so indispensable to her happinessredoubled.

  I first saw her in Lydia's drawing-room. I had found it empty onentering, but presently there came into it a little body with a handstretched up, in her eagerness to be cordial, at the level of her head,and behind it a smirking face bubbling over with the effort of maidenlyreserve to keep within bounds an overflowing heart.

  "Welcome to New York!" she said. "I'm _so_ glad to see you!"

  She lisped a little, and as she emphasized the word "_tho_" she shookher head in a little confiding way, and the smirk deepened into anervous grin.

  I had been so long in New York that I felt her welcome a littlesuperfluous, but it was part of the doctrine, which kept her happinessalive, that New York had not completed a welcome to a stranger until ithad been expressed by her.

  I was a little confused by her effusiveness, for I did not wish tooffend an aunt of Lydia's, and yet I felt it impossible to respond inproper proportion to her advances.

  "You must be Aunt Tiny," I said. "I have often heard of you."

  I refrained from telling her what I had heard; how she had constitutedone of the favorite types for Ariston's mimicry; how, indeed, Aristonhad gone through the very performance I had just witnessed, in which theuplifted hand, the smirk, and the lisping "_tho_" had lost nothing inAriston's art.

  "Dear Lydia!" she exclaimed; and in the pronunciation of the "d" in"dear" she put exaggerated significance and added a shake of her head.She wore little corkscrew curls; every time she shook her head the curlsquivered with suppressed agitation.

  "Do sit down," she added--with unnecessary emphasis in the "do."

  There was nothing to be done but to resign myself; she drew up a chairquite close to mine and settled down in it as an army might settle downfor a Trojan siege.

  "Do tell me--I am dying to know--how did it happen and what do you thinkof us? You don't look very different from us; you remind me of Chairo,and he is thought _very_ handsome"--her head and curls shook again andshe giggled consciously--"_very, very_ handsome!" She giggled still moreand her eyes assumed a coy meaningfulness that increased my discomfort.

  I have never been able to understand why this poor littlewoman--perfectly innocent of any real ability to harm--should have beenable to cause me so much annoyance; but there was something in herglance that made me wish to throw things at her.

  "And Lydia--isn't Lydia beautiful?" There was something caressing in hertone as she puckered up her lips and dwelt on the word "beautiful" thatexasperated me again.

  "What _do_ you suppose she is going to do? _Is_ she going to accept themission or marry Chairo? She is a great flirt, you know; quite aterrible flirt! But _I_ shouldn't talk of flirting!"--and she giggledagain the same suggestive giggle. "_We_ mustn't be hard on flirts, mustwe?"

  This appeal to me, as though I were already _particeps criminis_, wouldhave led me to protest, but she did not allow me the opportunity, forshe continued:

  "But she has not been fair to Chairo; a girl ought to know when t
o makeup her mind"--she became very serious now--"_I_ always knew where tostop; no man ever had the right to reproach _me_."

  I at last could agree with her and I smiled approval. She seemeddelighted.

  "I am sure we are going to be great friends, and you will nevermisunderstand me, will you?"

  I protested that I never would, and was relieved by the entrance ofLydia First, who suggested our going to tea in the grove.

  On our way there as we passed the main entrance a detachment ofmilitia--some dozen or so--entered, divided into two columns, and stoodat arms while between them passed a woman somewhat more heavily drapedthan usual. I asked the meaning of this, and was told that she was aDemetrian.

  "But why the military escort?" asked I.

  "Demetrians are always attended by an escort unless they particularlydesire to be spared the honor; many would avoid it but the cultdispenses with it only as a special favor and for a limited time."

  "I cannot see the use of it," lisped Aunt Tiny.

  But Lydia First looked sadly at her, and turning to me, said:

  "All of us do not understand the importance of upholding the dignity ofthe cult. It is the very key-stone of social order and we cannot pay toomuch honor to those by whose sacrifice it is preserved."

  We were joined at the grove by quite a party; Ariston came later; andamong others I remarked a young girl with bright black eyes who wasdescribed to me as a journalist. It took me some time to becomeaccustomed to their habit of describing a person's occupation as thatadopted for recreation. The work they did for the state was not regardedas a matter of particular concern; it was the work they selected fortheir leisure hours which marked their character and bent. Neaera hadbeen first attached to the official journal of the state; but she hadjoined Chairo's political party and her work on the journal betrayed herpartisanship, so the state assigned her work in a factory, and shedevoted her leisure therefore to the paper edited by Chairo.

  As leader of the opposition Chairo was, by an established tradition,relieved of all work for the state. Every political party representing adesignated proportion of the voters of the state could elect a certainnumber of representatives upon the plan of minority representation, andthe leaders of the opposition were by virtue of such election releasedfrom working for the state. No law had enacted this, but it had becomethe rule by the operation of the principle of _noblesse oblige_. Therepresentatives who neither belonged to the ministry nor were recognizedas leaders of the opposition did not enjoy this privilege, except duringthe sessions of the legislature. But it was recognized that the minorityparties in opposition had as much work to do as the party in power, andpublic opinion approved the plan which gave to the recognized leaders ofthese parties the greatest opportunity possible for exercisingvigilance. The number of these leaders being small, there was no fearthat the plan would give rise to idleness on a scale to be feared, andthe temptation of the government to annoy leaders of the opposition bythe allotment to them of onerous tasks, or that of ascribing suchmotives to the government, was thereby eliminated.

  So Chairo had his whole time free for the organization of his so-calledRadical party, and he published, with the assistance of his supporters,a paper entitled _Liberty_, to which Neaera devoted all her spare time.She was uncommonly pretty, but like all these women, was capable ofsudden changes of face and manner which, until I became accustomed toit, constantly surprised me; though, indeed, I remember having noticedit in some of the women of my own day whom we described then as"advanced." Neaera was already seated at a small tea table with a youngman called Balbus, also a member of the _Liberty_ staff, when we arrivedand was engaged in earnest conversation with him. She looked at mescrutinizingly when I was presented to her, neither rising nor offeringme her hand, and acknowledged the presentation only by a littleconventional smile. There was something that seemed to me ill-bred inher keeping her seat when Lydia First and the rest of us arrived; but Isoon discovered that Neaera was a person of no small importance, andexpected attention from others which she did not herself concede. Ourparty seated itself about an adjoining table and presently Neaera calledto me:

  "Xenos, are you going to lecture at our hall?"

  I had been invited by the Pater to lecture on the social, political, andeconomic conditions of the twentieth century. He had assumed that such alecture would tend to strengthen the conservative and collectivistgovernment; and Chairo had asked me to lecture at his hall in the hope,on the contrary, that it could be made to serve his own cause. I hadbeen told that these lectures were usually followed by an opendiscussion, and I knew that it was from this discussion that bothparties hoped to draw arguments to sustain their views respectively.Fearing, therefore, to become involved in their political animosities Ihad not yet decided whether I would lecture or not, so I answered:

  "I am not sure; I feel a little the need of understanding your ownconditions better than I do, before undertaking to contrast them withthose of our day."

  "We'll undertake to explain our conditions," she said, with an obliquesmile at Balbus, "if you'll let us."

  "I could wish for no pleasanter instruction," I answered.

  "But I see you have Aunt Tiny," retorted she maliciously.

  "Oh, I haven't taken him in hand yet," said Aunt Tiny, taking thesuggestion _au grand serieux_, "but," she added encouragingly, "I will!I will!"

  Balbus threw his head back and laughed outrageously.

  "What are you laughing at, you goose!" said Neaera.

  "Let him laugh and enjoy himself," answered Aunt Tiny quickly, by way ofdiscarding the thought that there could be in his laughter anythingdisobliging for herself.

  And Balbus, taking the cue, said:

  "We don't want Aunt Tiny to take you in hand for she is terriblypersuasive"--the poor little thing giggled delightedly--"and we want youon our side."

  "I don't mean to be on either side," I answered. "I am your guest, and,as such, must confine myself to stating facts; you will have to drawyour own conclusions."

  "That's right," said Neaera. "All we want are facts; the conclusion willbe clear enough. For example, in your time, every man could choose hisown occupation."

  "Undoubtedly," answered I.

  "And was not subjected to the humiliation of working in a factorybecause he would not be convenient to the party in control!" flashed outNeaera.

  I nodded my head gravely in approval.

  "Imagine any of the writers of your day compelled to work in afactory--Emerson, Browning, Longfellow!--and Tennyson--imagine Tennysonworking in a factory!"

  "Abominable!" responded Balbus. "Abominable and absurd!"

  "Wasn't Burns a plough-boy?" said Ariston, "And Shakespeare aplay-actor?"

  "A second-rate play-actor, too," echoed Lydia First, "and ended bylending money at usurious interest!"

  "He chose to be that," retorted Balbus. "What we are fighting for is theright to choose our calling."

  "But haven't you chosen yours?" asked I. "Isn't journalism of yourchoosing?"

  "But I have to work at the state factory at the bidding of the state,"answered Balbus, "for half of every day."

  I could not help comparing his lot with my own in Boston. I had neverenjoyed the practice of law; indeed, I had adopted the professionbecause my father had a practice to hand down to me. And as I sat dayafter day listening to the often fancied grievances of my clients, theirpetty ambitions, narrow animosities, and, particularly in divorce cases,to the nasty disputes of their domestic life, I often felt as though myprofession converted me into a sort of moral sewer into which everyclient poured his contribution. Had I really been free when I chose todevote my whole life to so pitiful a business!

  "Some part of the day," I answered, thinking aloud, "must, I suppose, bedevoted to the securing of food and clothing. In the savage state--inwhich some people contend liberty is most complete--the whole day ispractically devoted to it. In our state it was much the same, exceptthat a few were exempt because they made the many work for them. Butonly
a very few enjoyed the privilege of idleness--or shall we call it'liberty'?"

  "No," answered Neaera, "it is quite unnecessary to confuse things;liberty is one thing and idleness is another. We want the liberty tochoose our work--not the license to refuse it."

  "Liberty, then," said Ariston, "is _our_ license; and license is otherpeople's liberty!"

  "Ingenious," retorted Neaera, "but not correct. Can't you see thedifference between choosing work and refusing it?"

  "Certainly," answered Ariston. "The work I should _choose_ would belying on my back and 'thinking delicate thoughts,' like Hecate. The workI should refuse would be factory work, like _you_."

  Neaera did not like to find herself without an answer; so she coveredher defeat by taking a flower out of her bosom and throwing it atAriston, who, picking it up, kissed it and fastened it to a fold of hischiton. Just then a strain, that reminded me of our negro melodies,being wafted to us through the trees, Balbus exclaimed, "Now, Neaera, adance!"

  She sprang up at once and began moving rhythmically to the music. It wasa strange and beautiful dance, that had in it some of the quaintmovement of a negro breakdown, and yet the gayety and grace of a Lydianmeasure.

  Balbus clapped his hands to accentuate the broken time, and we alljoined him; Neaera, stimulated by a murmur of applause, gave asignificance to her movements; danced up to Ariston, then flinging herhands out at him in mock aversion, danced away again; next reversing herstep danced back to him, and, snatching the flower out of his chiton,tripped triumphantly off, throwing her head up in elation; and toincrease Ariston's spite she made as though she would give it to Balbus;but upon his holding out his hand for it, danced away from him, andafter raising hopes in others of our group by tentative movements in onedirection and another, finally fixed her bright eyes on me, dancedhither and thither as though uncertain, and then finally brought it tome, and daintily pressing it to her lips, put it with both hands and apretty air of resolution into mine.