And we are right, he thought, not to pay attention to the mess in that house; not to give a damn whether it falls apart inside or out. By the time I—here his mouth trembled and he bit his lips and tugged at his moustache—by that time we’ll be gone from there. I won’t want to live in a place with stairs to worry about, with gas lighting to be groped for—you fool, his sharp, cruel mind rebuked him. You fool, will you know whether there is lighting or not? Drop it, cut it. Leave it to—to what? Randall? No. He had been resolved for years that he would not be an incubus on Randall. Then how will you live? God damn, he said half aloud. Why think about this now? Can you do anything about it? Is there any use hurrying to meet it? He shook his head angrily as if to dash these thoughts out of it, and sprang down from his throne. He had a fascinating job planned, something he would delight in doing himself when most people would have hired a mechanic. Inside the doorway of the house stood a wooden crate, and in it a windshield which he had bought last week for his automobile. Seymour laid aside his long duster and changed his coat for an old alpaca jacket. He brought up tools from his workshop and opened the crate and took the windshield out to the street and set to work to mount it on the car. He felt so happy that once he paused in the midst of drilling the holes for the bolts and said to himself, “You’re just a damned fool. You’re acting like a kid on Christmas.”
Just then he heard a sniff and an Irish voice saying something scathing, a few scurvy words ending in “bug-house”. He turned his head and saw Mary McBane flat-footing by with a market basket, her hips flapping.
“Bitch,” he said aloud, and went on with his drilling.
When he thought about it later Randall marvelled at Renata Tosi’s way of fixing the time and place of appointments without appearing to have said much of anything. On Friday evening he picked her up at a florist’s shop a block down Broadway from the opera house. He knew that she must have stopped in to see Baldini in his dressing-room before the performance, and he summoned up the boldness to ask her, “I suppose you said you’d be at home afterwards?”
“No, tonight is a party. I must be back in the teatro before the finale because afterwards we go in the Ristorante Brunetti, many artists, because today is the saint’s day of Giorgio Morosini.”
So there was not much time and he supposed she would not want to dine when she would be going to a supper party afterwards. But she said, “Is necessary to go somewhere, no? Where do you live, Randalo?”
He was startled. Surely she was not suggesting going to his house? He parried the question by saying vaguely, “Oh, downtown. We’d better go and have a bite to eat somewhere, you would be hungry long before your party.”
“Va bene,” she said. Her tone was non-committal.
He was about to say that they would go to the same quiet French restaurant near Madison Square where they had dined on Monday, when he remembered that he knew of this place through Seymour, who sometimes dropped in there. Something warned him away. He decided on the Murray Hill Hotel, a place he had reason to know that Seymour never patronized. They were given a table in a secluded corner, and Renata grimaced a little when he asked what she would like to eat.
“Is Friday,” she sighed. “I don’t like the fish. Is perhaps no fish on the carta?” she asked hopefully.
He laughed. “I’d know better what to answer if I knew how seriously you take this. Are you very devout, Renata?”
“But yes! Is only when exists no fish I make the exception.”
“I’m afraid New York is still a seaport. But perhaps there’s some good American fish you’ve never tried. Maybe you only dislike Italian fish.”
“Fish is fish,” she said. “But I try. Which is good, the American fish?”
“Shad roe?”
“What is that?”
He explained. She squinted disgustedly. “Schifoso! Eggs from fishes. No, no, better I eat the real eggs. Is light. Later they give us meat, nobody care at a party. I am home soon anyway, I confess everything.” She laughed carelessly.
“Everything?”
“Absolutely.” She lifted her chin with bravado.
“My!” he said. “You’ve got more courage than I would have.”
She shrugged. “My sins are like everybody else. Not better, not worse.”
“Are you sure? What about Signor Baldini?”
“Dio santissimo! Once again we have the predica, the how you say, preach, about Baldini? Povero Baldini! You make me sorry for him.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean to do that,” he said hastily.
“Well. Then you must accept the reality. I have decide’ I will not betray him.” Actually she had decided that this statement was the only device likely to precipitate something interesting. But Randall surprised her by asking sharply, “And how sure are you that he doesn’t betray you?”
She sat back and widened her eyes, leaving Randall in silence for a moment. Then she said, “Is not the same thing. Like the fishes, the men are the men. They betray everybody. But a woman only protest when she is innamorata, she is gelosa, is natural, no? Otherwise—” she shrugged. “Is the life, cosa vuoi?”
He looked at her sadly. “It would be wonderful if you could be serious once in a while,” he said. He started to recall her single such moment and then thought better of it.
“It would not be wonderful,” she said, frowning a little. “It would be noioso.”
“Then I suppose you think me ‘noioso’—I take it that means, a bore?”
“No—not entirely. Sometimes yes. But you are beautiful,” she said.
“Please! ” He could have covered his face with his hands. “We don’t use that word the way you do. And one doesn’t say such things to a man, Renata. Haven’t you been in America long enough to realize that?”
“In America is no different the nature from Europe. Is only different the commedia, nobody tell what they think. Mi piaci, tu—I like you—how long you think is necessary make a secret?”
“Suppose I said something of the sort to you?” He looked at her boldly and tried with the weight of real feeling to quell the mischief which sparked from her like electricity from a cat’s fur.
“I would say ‘Benissimo! For what we wait longer?’”
“For you to get rid of Baldini,” said Randall slowly. “And the kind of ideas that go with all that.”
“Then you could wait forever!” Her face was pink with temper and her eyes larger and darker than he had ever seen them. She had been toying with her omelette; now she pushed the plate aside and folded her arms brusquely. Nothing was said for a time, each stared away from the other and Randall waited as long as he could before stealing a sidelong glance at her. Her lips were tightly closed, her perpetual laugh was erased, and the line of her chin was a fine angle of defiance.
“I see you mean what you say,” he said at last. “You will not allow a decent man to have serious feelings about you. My God!” he exclaimed, “I’d have more respect for you if you were even in love with Baldini!”
“Such a view is your misfortune,” she said with a cold shrug. “Is different what I think is honest and what you think. I tell you already, is also different love, amusement, responsibility. Tutti diversi. Some I want, some I not want. So I choose. I am not confuse’. But you—you are like they tell about Americans. Is all confuse’, pleasure, l’amore, il matrimonio—no thank you.” She brushed her hands crosswise before her. Again they fell into silence but this time it was she who looked first at his hurt, baffled face, his mouth set downwards, his eyes fixed on the table. Suddenly she leaned over and put one hand quickly on his and said, “Do not feel so hurt, Randalo, believe me is not that important. I am sorry surprise you in such a way.”
“Oh, I’m not surprised,” he said. “And you don’t know everything about Americans. I’ve got—” he stopped.
“You have what?”
“Nothing.” He had been about to say, “I’ve got a brother just like you.” But as quickly he thought better of it. The truth was
so disconcerting that he saw in clear perspective his real reason for trying to keep Seymour out of Renata’s orbit. He was horrified. Surely one’s own brother was nothing to be afraid of. Then he saw that he would not be afraid of anybody unless his feelings were much deeper than he had admitted up to now. Good God!, he thought, I ought to have the sense to pull out of this. I would be a fool to stake anything on a woman like this even if she weren’t involved as she is. Utterly frivolous, utterly superficial … he raised his head slowly and came back to the reality of the moment, to see Renata Tosi smiling at him, her good humor restored but with it a tinge of wistfulness. Her head was bent a little to one side, and the comic twist of her pretty mouth suggested a disappointed pout.
“Is no use we quarrel,” she said. “We are different, is better we remain like now. Così nobody regret nothing.”
“When do you sail for Italy?” he asked abruptly.
“Monday eight days.”
“The first ship after the opera closes?”
“Yes. Sometimes I don’t feel please’ to go. I like very much New York.”
“Don’t you like Milano?”
“Oh, yes, in some ways is better. But—” she gestured.
“You said you’d tell me about Italy,” he said.
“That was before we agree is better not continue this—this—” She laughed. “For what you want to know about me when we don’t meet not any more?”
“Don’t we?” He leaned forward and overcoming his timidity, he took her hand across the table and looked into her eyes. She saw in his face a sincerity which her realism knew to be a warning; she had better give up the attempt to play with this curiously appealing young man. There was no promise of a game here, there was only the probability of defeat for her or of hurt for him, or of both. “That would make me very unhappy, Renata,” he said.
She did not answer at once. Then she shook her head and sighed, “Why you don’t understand?—I tell you already, is not for me the serious things. I don’t want to repeat any more.”
“I suppose you are right,” he said slowly. She sat watching his face, drooping with disappointment and even still, after all her talk, with bewilderment. He was looking down at the tablecloth, he was resisting the instinct to raise his eyes and meet hers, which so long as he could not see them, were soft with unconscious tenderness. Then he startled her by raising his head suddenly and she saw the glint of unshed tears blurring the clear bright blue of his eyes which, she thought again, were truly beautiful. She was disturbed to discover herself on the verge of some similar feeling, and she took the matter quickly in hand, determined not to be deflected from her views.
“Yes,” she said, gathering up her gloves and her gold mesh bag, “I am right and is better not meet like this to talk many times the same thing. I go in Italy, you make here the life, you have the famiglia, your own—”
“But I haven’t,” he said, with a sense of bleakness as if a cold draught had whistled down a dead chimney.
“No? What you say? How is possible? You have nobody?”
“Just my brother.”
“And he? He is older? He is married?”
“Older, and we live together. There’s nobody else.”
“Pensa! I, invece, we, we have always the many family. Quanti! Everybody in San Bernardo is my parent.”
“What!” He leaned forward, with his mouth open. “What did you say?”
“Ma, niente! For what you look so funny? I say only is everybody in my village, the cousins, the aunts, the uncles, how you say, parenti? What you say here?”
“Relatives. Oh, Renata!” Randall’s dejection was blown away in a gale of laughter. “You are killing. When we say ‘parents’ we mean your mother and father.”
“Oh, i genitori. Well, I see, is funny. But was not funny mine when they die and leave me bambina, I must live with these parenti which make you laugh. But I did not laugh. Basta. Now we understand, we say ‘addio, senza rancor’. I return in Ottobre, maybe then is something different. Who knows?”
“You mean,” he said, as she groaned in mock desperation, “you might have decided to leave Baldini?”
“I mean you will maybe learn should not be always so serious the life. Or you either.”
And on the short drive back towards the opera house she said nothing to mitigate her decision, or to encourage him to come to hear her in Siegfried or in her one other appearance next week. Once as the cab paused on the corner of Fifth Avenue, where the street lamp shone upon her face, he checked himself in a sudden sharp impulse to seize her in his arms and kiss her. Then he wove his fingers together and shut his mouth hard. He would do no such thing. That was what she wanted, and he had already made his decision that he would have nothing more to do with her except on his own terms. He was no longer surprised to find that there were such terms, that he knew all too well just what he wanted.
CHAPTER 11
On Sunday, after Evensong, Randall went from the church to the parish house to put away the music, change his clothes, and lock up. He walked slowly through the linoleum-floored passage that connected the two buildings, staring at the toes of his shoes. He felt despondent beyond endurance; lonely beyond anything he had ever known. During the service the first soprano had sung Bist Du Bei Mir, Randall’s great favorite of all Bach arias, and the noble melody, the clear and trusting words had seemed literally to wring his heart. He had not felt so near to real helplessness in all the time since the bad weeks after his mother’s death.
And why, he thought, should this be so? A man doesn’t really fall in love with a silly flirt like Renata; I don’t honestly think I have done so. She stirs me in some way when I am with her, but perhaps any woman as pretty and amusing would do the same. She doesn’t want anything I could offer her, and wouldn’t know what to do with it if she did want it. She wants what she’s got; she’s quite right that I should forget her. No, he thought, his trouble was sheer loneliness. He shrank at the thought of leaving even a place so austere as this parish house, whose saving grace was that he kept busy here, to go home to that silent emptiness, that mustiness, that knowledge of massed inanimate secrets accumulating only because one could not decide to disperse and dispose of them. Most of the time he did not feel this, he warded off the possibility of feeling it, because the practical reality was Seymour’s intention and his too, to leave the house so soon. Only his unbearable loneliness, whose cause he knew perfectly well to be his own inertia and diffidence, plunged him into desolation like this that he was suffering now.
It was a soft and beautiful April evening, not yet dark; and while changing his clothes he stood looking out the high west window at the pinkish sunset sky. A young maple tree outside was just breaking into leaf, and its sharp delicate outline struck him as personifying the wistful fragility of all new feeling. He stood there, hearing footsteps and voices thin out and fade away as the choir left the building; the light dimmed slowly and presently there was the familiar enclosing silence which told him that he was all alone. He lingered at the window, trying to decide to go somewhere and do something, if only to Seymour’s club, rather than to skulk at home alone. He thought about Renata, imagining her among the rowdy, high-colored companions of her special world, presided over by Baldini; this was what she liked and he had made his last attempt to separate her from it. Probably this evening they would all be holding forth in some Italian restaurant in the West Thirties, drinking chianti and singing and making outrageous jokes, some of them perhaps at his expense if she and Baldini were as capable of cruel wit as he suspected. She was right, she and Randall had nothing in common and it was better that the thing had ended where it had.
He had spent forty-eight hours telling himself this and his reason believed it. But his heart accepted nothing, he was disturbed and hurt and puzzled, and if he must resign himself to eliminating Renata it loomed an appalling impossibility to find anything or anybody to replace her. I ought not to have seen as much of her as I did, he thought, pulling on his coa
t and settling his possessions in his waistcoat pockets. All that foolishness and foreignness has no relation to this. “This” meant emptiness; “this” meant standing as he was standing now, desolate in the face of beauty like the lovely spring evening which was painful when one had nobody with whom to share it. He stood at the window sunken in his unhappiness. Suddenly he jumped. The silent Sunday evening, the quiet Chelsea side street, were shattered by the shrill blast of a motor horn. Randall peered out the window; nobody should do such a thing. Around the corner came Seymour in his Stevens-Duryea, proudly steering with one gauntleted hand while the other squeezed the rubber bulb of the horn. The scarlet car glittered with polish and brilliant brass. Riding beside Seymour in front was a laughing woman in a long duster and a big hat tied down with a chiffon veil; a second one sat alone in the back. Seymour stopped the car in front of the parish house and once again squeezed the horn, looking up at the windows. Randall threw up the sash and called softly, “Hush! I’ll be right down.”
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