Edith Wharton - SSC 09 (8 page)

 
          
“Dreadful?
How?”

 
          
“Telling
her he was old enough to shift for himself—that he refused to sell his
independence any longer; perfect madness.”

 
          
“Atrocious
cruelty—”

 
          
“Yes;
that too. I told him so. But do you realise the result?” The lashes, suddenly
lifted, gave me the full appeal of wide, transparent eyes. “Steve’s
starving—voluntarily starving himself. Or would be, if Boy and I hadn’t scraped
together our last pennies …”

 
          
“If
independence is what he wants, why should he take your pennies when he won’t
take his mother’s?”

 
          
“Ah—there’s
the point. He will.” She looked down again, fretting her rings. “Ill as he is,
how could he live if he didn’t take somebody’s pennies? If I could sell my
brown diamond without Catherine’s missing it I’d have done it long ago, and you
need never have known of all this. But she’s so sensitive—and she notices
everything. She literally spies on me. I’m at my wits’ end.
If
you’d only help me!”

 
          
“How
in the world can I?”

 
          
“You’re
the only person who can. If you’d persuade her, as long as this queer mood of
Stephen’s lasts, to draw his monthly cheque in my name, I’d see that he gets
it—and that he uses it. He would, you know
,
if he
thought it came from Boy and me.”

 
          
I
looked at her quickly. “That’s why you want me to see her. To get her to give
you her son’s allowance?”

 
          
Her
lips parted as if she were about to return an irritated answer; but she twisted
them into a smile. “If you like to describe it in that way—I can’t help
your
putting an unkind interpretation on whatever I do. I
was prepared for that when I came here.” She turned her bright inclement face
on me. “If you think I enjoy humiliating myself] After all, it’s not so much
for Stephen that I ask it as for his mother. Have you thought of that? If she
knew that in his crazy pride he was depriving himself of the most necessary
things, wouldn’t she do anything on earth to prevent it? She’s his
real
mother … I’m nothing …”

 
          
“You’re
everything, if he sees you and listens to you.”

 
          
She
received this with the air of secret triumph that met every allusion to her
power over Stephen. Was she right, I wondered, in saying that she loved him
even more than his mother did? “Everything?” she murmured deprecatingly. “It’s
you who are everything, who can help us all. What can I do?”

 
          
I
pondered a moment, and then said: “You can let me see Stephen.”

 
          
The
colour rushed up under her powder.
“Much good that would
do—if I could!
But I’m afraid you’ll find his door barricaded.”

 
          
“That’s
a pity,” I said coldly.

 
          
“It’s
very foolish of him,” she assented.

 
          
Our
conversation had reached a deadlock, and I saw that she was distinctly
disappointed—perhaps even more than I was. I suspected that while I could
afford to wait for a solution she could not.

 
          
“Of
course, if Catherine is willing to sit by and see the boy starve”—she began.

 
          
“What
else can she do? Shall we go over to the Nouveau Luxe bar and study the problem
from the cock-tail angle?” I suggested.

 
          
Mrs.
Brown’s delicately pencilled brows gathered over her transparent eyes. “You’re
laughing at me—and at Steve. It’s rather heartless of you, you know,” she said,
making a movement to rise from the deep armchair in which I had installed her.
Her movements, as always, were quick and smooth; she got up and sat down with
the ease of youth. But her face star-tied me—it had suddenly shrunk and
withered, so that the glitter of cosmetics hung before it like a veil. A pang
of compunction shot through me. I felt that it
was
heartless to make her look like that. I could no longer endure
the part I was playing. “I’ll—I’ll see what I can do to arrange things,” I
stammered. “If only she’s not too servile,” I thought, feeling that my next
move hung on the way in which she received my reassurance.

 
          
She
stood up with a quick smile. “Ogre!” she just breathed, her lashes dancing. She
was laughing at me under her breath—the one thing she could have done just then
without offending me. “Come; we
do
need refreshment, don’t we?” She slipped her arm through mine as we crossed the
lounge and emerged on the wet pavement.

 
          
  

 
          
The
cosy evening with which Mrs. Brown had tempted me was not productive of much
enlightenment. I found Catherine Glenn tired and pale, but happy at my coming,
with a sort of furtive school-girl happiness which suggested the same secret
apprehension as I had seen in Mrs. Brown’s face when she found I would not help
her to capture Stephen’s allowance. I had already perceived my mistake in
letting Mrs. Brown see
this,
and during our cock-tail
epilogue at the Nouveau Luxe had tried to restore her confidence; but her
distrust had been aroused, and in spite of her recovered good-humour I felt
that I should not be allowed to see Stephen.

 
          
In
this respect poor Mrs. Glenn could not help me. She could only repeat the
lesson which had evidently been drilled into her.
“Why should
I deny what’s so evident—and so natural?
When Stevie’s ill and unhappy
it’s not to me he turns. During so many years he knew nothing of me, never even
suspected my existence; and all the while
they
were there, watching over him, loving him, slaving for him. If he concealed his
real feelings now it might be only on account of the—the financial inducements;
and I like to think my boy’s too proud for that.
If you see
him, you’ll tell him so, won’t you?
You’ll tell him that, unhappy as he’s
making me, mistaken as he is, I enter into his feelings as—as only his mother
can.” She broke down, and hid her face from me.

 
          
When
she regained her composure she rose and went over to the writing-table. From
the blotting-book she drew an envelope. “I’ve drawn this cheque in your name—it
may be easier for you to get Stevie to accept a few bank-notes than a cheque.
You must try to persuade him—tell him his behaviour is making the Browns just
as unhappy as it is me, and that he has no right to be cruel to them, at any
rate.” She lifted her head and looked into my eyes heroically.

 
          
I
went home perplexed, and pondering on my next move; but (not wholly to my
surprise) the question was settled for me the following morning by a telephone
call from Mrs. Brown. Her voice rang out cheerfully.

 
          
“Good
news! I’ve had a talk with Steve’s doctor—on the sly, of course. Steve would
kill me if he knew! The doctor says he’s really better; you can see him today
if you’ll promise to stay only a few minutes. Of course I must first persuade
Steve himself, the silly boy. You can’t think what a savage mood he’s in. But
I’m sure I can bring him round—he’s so fond of you. Only before that I want to
see you myself—” (“Of course,” I commented inwardly, feeling that here at last was
the gist of the communication.) “Can I come presently—before you go out? All
right; I’ll turn up in an hour.”

 
          
Within
the hour she was at my hotel; but before her arrival I had decided on my
course, and she on her side had probably guessed what it would be. Our first
phrases, however, were non-committal. As we exchanged them I saw that Mrs.
Brown’s self-confidence was weakening, and this incited me to prolong the
exchange. Stephen’s doctor, she assured me, was most encouraging; one lung only
was affected, and that slightly; his recovery now depended on careful nursing,
good food, cheerful company—all the things of which, in his foolish obstinacy,
he had chosen to deprive himself. She paused, expectant—

 
          
“And
if Mrs. Glenn handed over his allowance to you, you could ensure his accepting
what he’s too obstinate to take from his mother?”

 
          
Under
her carefully prepared complexion the blood rushed to her temples. “I always
knew you were Steve’s best friend!” She looked away quickly, as if to hide the
triumph in her eyes.

 
          
“Well,
if I am, he’s first got to recognise it by seeing me.”

 
          
“Of course—of course!”
She corrected her impetuosity. “I’ll
do all I can …”

 
          
“That’s
a great deal, as we know.” Under their lowered lashes her eyes followed my
movements as I turned my coat back to reach an inner pocket. She pressed her
lips tight to control their twitching. “There, then!” I said.

 
          
“Oh, you angel, you!
I should never have dared to ask
Catherine,” she stammered with a faint laugh as the banknotes passed from my hand
to her bag.

 
          
“Mrs.
Glenn understood—she always understands.”

 
          
“She
understands when
you
ask,” Mrs. Brown
insinuated, flashing her lifted gaze on mine. The sense of what was in the bag
had already given her a draught of courage, and she added quickly: “Of course I
needn’t warn you not to speak of all this to Steve. If he knew of our talk it
would wreck everything.”

 
          
“I
can see that,” I remarked, and she dropped her lids again, as though I had
caught her in a blunder.

 
          
“Well,
I must go; I’ll tell him his best friend’s coming … I’ll reason with him …” she
murmured, trying to disguise her embarrassment in emotion. I saw her to the
door, and into Mrs. Glenn’s motor, from the interior of which she called back:
“You know you’re going to make Catherine as happy as I am.”

 
          
Stephen
Glenn’s new habitation was in a narrow and unsavoury street, and the building
itself contrasted mournfully with the quarters in which he had last received
me. As I climbed the greasy stairs I felt as much perplexed as ever. I could not
yet see why Stephen’s quarrel with Mrs. Glenn should, even partially, have
included the Browns, nor, if it had, why he should be willing to accept from
their depleted purse the funds he was too proud to receive from his mother. It
gave me a feeling of uneasy excitement to know that behind the door at which I
stood the answer to these problems awaited me.

 
          
No
one answered my knock, so I opened the door and went in. The studio was empty,
but from the room beyond Stephen’s voice called out irritably: “Who is it?” and
then, in answer to my name: “Oh, Norcutt—come in.”

 
          
Stephen
Glenn lay in bed, in a small room with a window opening on a dimly-lit inner
courtyard. The room was bare and untidy, the bed-clothes were tumbled, and he
looked at me with the sick man’s instinctive resentfulness at any intrusion on
his lonely pain. “Above all,” the look seemed to say, “don’t try to be kind.”

 
          
Seeing
that moral pillow-smoothing would be resented I sat down beside him without any
comment on the dismalness of the scene, or on his own aspect, much as it
disquieted me.

 
          
“Well,
old man—” I began, wondering how to go on; but he cut short my hesitation.
“I’ve
been wanting
to see you for ever so long,” he
said.

 
          
In
my surprise I had nearly replied: “That’s not what I’d been told”—but, resolved
to go warily, I rejoined with a sham gaiety: “Well, here I am!”

 
          
Stephen
gave me the remote look which the sick turn on those arch-aliens, the healthy.
“Only,” he pursued, “I was afraid if you did come you’d begin and lecture me;
and I couldn’t stand that—I can’t stand anything. I’m raw!” he burst out.