II
"Ah, here you are," said Hosack, scrambling a little stiffly out of ahammock. "Well, have you had a good ride?"
Joan came up the steps with Harry Oldershaw, the nice boy. She was inwhite linen riding kit, with breeches and brown top boots. A man'sstraw hat sat squarely on her little head and there was a brown andwhite spotted tie under her white silk collar. Color danced on hercheeks, health sparkled in her eyes and there was a laugh of sheer highspirits floating behind her like the blown petals of a daisy.
"Perfectly wonderful," she said. "I love the country about here, withthe little oaks and sturdy ferns. It's so springy. And aren't thechestnut trees in the village a sight for the blind? I don't wonder youbuilt a house in Easthampton, Mr. Hosack. Are we too late for tea?"
Hosack ran his eyes over her and blinked a little as though he hadlooked at the sun. "Too late by an hour," he said, with a sulky glanceat young Oldershaw. "I thought you were never coming back." Hisresentment of middle age and jealousy of the towering youth of thesun-tanned lad who had been Joan's companion were a little pitiful.
Harry caught his look and laughed with the sublime audacity of one whobelieves that he ranks among the Immortals. To him forty-nine seemed tobe a colossal sum of years, almost beyond belief. It was pathetic ofthis old fellow to imagine that he had any right to the company of agirl so springlike as Joan. "If we hadn't worn the horses to afrazzle," he said, "we shouldn't have been back till dark. Have adrink, Joan?"
"Yes, water. Buckets of it. Hurry up, Harry."
The boy, triumphant at being in favor, swung away, and Joan flung hercrop on to a cane sofa. "Where's everybody?" she asked.
"What's it matter," said Hosack. "Sit here and talk to me for a change.I've hardly had a word with you all day." He caught her hand and drewher into the swinging hammock. "What a pretty thing you are," he added,with a catch in his breath. "I know," said Joan. "Otherwise, probably,I shouldn't be here, should I?" She forgot all about him, and anirresistible desire to tease, at the sight of the sea which, a stone'sthrow from the house, pounded on the yellow sweep of sand and swoopedup in large half circles of glistening water. "I've a jolly good mindto have another dip before changing. What do you say?"
"No, don't," said Hosack, a martyr to the Forty-nine-feeling."Concentrate on me for ten minutes, if only because, damn it, I'm yourhost."
Joan pushed his hand away. "I've given up concentrating," she said. "Igave it a turn a little while ago, but it led nowhere, so why worry?I'm on the good old Merry-go-round again, and if it doesn't whack up tothe limit of its speed I'll know the reason why. There's a dance at theClub to-night, isn't there?"
"Yes, but we don't go."
She was incredulous. "Don't go,--to a dance? Why?"
"It's rather a mixed business," he said. "The hotel pours its crowdout. It isn't amusing. We can dance here if you want to."
But her attention was caught by young Oldershaw who came out carrying aglass and a jug of iced water. She sprang up and went to meet him, thedance forgotten, Hosack forgotten. Her mood was that of a bird,irresponsible, restless. "Good for you," she said, and drank like athirsty plant. "Nothing like water, is there?" She smiled up at him.
He was as pleased with himself as though he owned the reservoir. "Haveanother?"
"I should think so." And she drank again, put the glass down on thefirst place that came to hand, relieved him of the jug, put it next tothe glass, caught hold of his muscular arm, ran him down the steps, andalong the board path to the beach. "I'll race you to the sea," shecried, and was off like a mountain goat. He was too young to let herbeat him and waited for her with the foam frothing round his ankles anda broad grin on his attractive face.
He was about to cheek her when she held up a finger and with a littleexclamation of delight pointed to the sky behind the house. The sun wassetting among a mass of royal clouds. A golden wand had touched thedunes and the tips of the scrub and all over the green of the golfcourse, still dotted with scattered figures, waves of reflected lustersplayed. To the left of the great red ball one clear star sparkled likean eye. Just for a moment her lips trembled and her young breasts roseand fell, and then she threw her head up and wheeled round and went offat a run. Not for her to think back, or remember similar sights behindthe woods near Marty's place. Life was too short for pain. "Who Cares?"was her motto once more, and this time joy-riding must live up to itsname.
Harry Oldershaw followed, much puzzled at Joan's many quick changes ofmood. Several times during their irresponsible chatter on the beachbetween dips her laughter had fallen suddenly, like a dead bird, andshe had sat for several minutes as far away from himself and the othermen as though they were cut off by a thick wall. Yesterday, in theevening after dinner, during which her high spirits had infected thewhole table, he had walked up and down the board path with her underthe vivid white light of a full moon, and she had whipped out one ortwo such savage things about life that he had been startled. Duringtheir ride that afternoon, too, her bubbling chatter of light stuffabout people and things had several times shifted into comments as tothe conventions that were so careless as to make him ask himselfwhether they could really have come from lips so fresh and young. Andwhy had that queer look of almost childlike grief come into her eyes amoment ago at the sight of ah everyday sunset? He was mightilyintrigued. She was a queer kid, he told himself, as changeable anddifficult to follow as some of the music by men with such weird namesas Rachmaninoff and Tschaikowsky that his sister was so precious fondof playing. But she was unattached and frightfully pretty and alwaysready for any fun that was going, and she liked him more than theothers, and he liked being liked, and although not hopelessly in lovewas ready and willing and even anxious to be walked on if she wouldacknowledge his existence in no other way. It was none of his business,he told himself, to speculate as to what she was trying to hide away inthe back of her mind, from herself as well as from everybody else. Thiswas his last vacation as a Yale man, and he was all out to make themost of it.
As soon as he was at her side she ran her hand through his arm and fellinto step. The shadow had passed, and her eyes were dancing again. "Itappears that the Hosacks turn up their exclusive noses at the clubdances," she said. "What are we going to do about it?"
"There's one to-night, isn't there? Do you want to go?"
"Of course I do. I haven't danced since away back before the greatwind. Let's sneak off after dinner for an hour without a word to a souland get our fill of it. There's to be a special Jazz band to-night, Ihear, and I simply can't keep away. Are you game, Harry?"
"All the way," said young Oldershaw, "and it will be the first time inthe history of the Hosacks that any members of their house parties haveput in an appearance at the club at night. No wonder Easthampton hasnicknamed the place St. James's Palace, eh?"
Joan shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, my dear boy," she said, "life's tooshort for all that stuff, and there's no hobby so painful as cuttingoff one's nose to spite one's face. And, after all, what's the matterwith Easthampton people? I'd go to a chauffeurs' ball if the band wasthe right thing. Wouldn't you?"
"With you," said Harry. "Democracy forever!"
"Oh, I'm not worrying about democracy. I'm out for a good time underany conditions. That's the only thing that matters. Now let's go backand change. It's too late to bathe. I'll wear a new frock to-night,made for fox-trotting, and if Mrs. Hosack wants to know where we'vebeen when we come back as innocent as spring lambs, leave it to me. Mencan't lie as well as women can."
"It won't be Mrs. Hosack who'll ask," said Harry. "Bridge will do itsbest to rivet her ubiquitous mind. It's the old man who'll be peeved.He's crazy about you, you know."
Joan laughed. "He's very nice and means awfully well and all that," shesaid, "but of course he isn't to be taken seriously. No men of middleage ought to be. They all say the same things with the same expressionsas though they got them from the same books, and their gambolling makestheir joints creak. It's all like playing with a fire of damp logs
. Ilike something that can blaze and scorch. The game counts then."
"Then you ought to like me," said Harry, doing his best to look thevery devil of a fellow. Even he had to join in Joan's huge burst ofmerriment. He had humor as well as a sense of the ridiculous, and thefirst made it possible for him to laugh at himself,--a rare anddisconcerting gift which would utterly prevent his ever entering theSenate.
"You might grow a moustache and wax the tips, Harry," she said, whenshe had recovered sufficiently well to be able to speak. "Curl yourhair with tongs and take dancing lessons from a tango lizard or go infor a course of sotto voce sayings from a French portrait painter, butyou'd still remain the Nice Boy. That's why I like you. You're asrefreshing and innocuous as a lettuce salad, and you may glare as muchas you like. I hope you'll never be spoilt. Come on. We shall be latefor dinner." And she made him quicken his step through the dry sand.
Being very young he was not quite sure that he appreciated that type ofapproval. He had liked to imagine that he was distinctly one of thebold bad boys, a regular dog and all that. He had often talked thatsort of thing in the rooms of his best chums whose mantelpieces werecovered with the photographs of little ladies, and he hoarded in hismemory two episodes at least of jealous looks from engaged men. But,after all, with Joan, who was married, although it was difficult tobelieve it, it wouldn't be wise to exert the whole force of the dangerthat was in him. He would let her down lightly, he told himself, andgrinned as he said it. She was right. He was only a nice boy, and thatwas because he had had the inestimable luck to possess a mother who wasone in a million.
The rather pretentious but extremely civilized house that stood alonein all its glory between the sea and the sixth hole was blazing withlights as they returned to it. The color had gone out of the sky andother twinkling eyes had appeared, and the breeze, now off the sea, hada sting to it. Toad soloists were trying their voices for their eveningconcert in near-by water and crickets were at work with all theirwell-known enthusiasm. Bennett, with a sunburned nose, was tidying upthe veranda, and some one with a nice light touch was playing therhythmic jingles of Jerome Kern on the piano in the drawing-room.
Still with her hand on Harry Oldershaw's arm, Joan made her way acrossthe lofty hall, caught sight of Gilbert Palgrave coming eagerly to meether, and waved her hand.
"Oh, hello, Gilbert," she cried out. "Welcome to Easthampton," and ranupstairs.
With a strange contraction of the heart, Palgrave watched her out ofsight. She was his dream come to life. All that he was and hoped to behe had placed forever at her feet. Dignity, individualism, egoism,--allhad fallen before this young thing. She was water in the desert, thenorth star to a man without a compass. He had seen her and come intobeing.
Good God, it was wonderful and awful!
But who was that cursed boy?
Who Cares? A Story of Adolescence Page 21