Our Little Girl/Chapter 3
III
THE STILL SMALL VOICE
Tommy Borge, in one of the little feature articles which he wrote for hospitable editors of evening newspapers, saved himself no little creative effort by setting down Dorothy exactly as she appeared to him a few evenings after her graduation from Miss Blagden’s School. The article bore the caption “Molly’s a Thursday Night Girl—What’s Your Night?” and it was credited in needlessly large type to Thomas A. Borge. Tommy met Dorothy at the dance of the graduating class to which she had invited Arnold, and to which Tommy had been compelled to escort a kinswoman of no importance. It was difficult to schedule this unprepossessing intellectual for dances, but Tommy had known Arnold at college. As it was diplomatically impossible for Arnold to avoid a dance with Tommy’s impedimenta after a suggestive introduction, Tommy found himself temporarily the partner of Dorothy, who, according to her mother, was the prettiest girl in the class. Mrs. Loamford’s contention may not have been law, but it was defensible.
In the course of a fox-trot Tommy managed to inform Dorothy that he wrote pieces for the papers; that he was writing a one-act play; that he knew several big men intimately, and that he’d like to call sometime and ask her to a first night. Hadn’t she ever been to a first night? What a pity! So many interesting people at first nights! Yes, he knew most of them by sight. One of the critics spoke to him frequently at premieres. Certainly, he’d be glad to introduce her. No, he didn’t care much for dancing. Guessed he wasn't built for it. No, he wasn't too stout, but he didn't have time to go about much socially. First nights, you know, newspaper articles, plays...guessed he'd do Dorothy in one of his pieces. Not exactly, of course. Something like...sorry the dance was over...see her later maybe...ring her up sometime? be delighted to...so nice to have met her...
Molly, the Thursday Night Girl, according to Tommy, was the kind of girl the young-men-you-see-with-beauties marry.
"If there were marriage statistics of the right sort available," wrote Tommy, "it would develop that one man out of every one and three-quarters marries the girl with whom he keeps company of Thursday nights. Saturday night's girl is fair of face and an investigation of the budgets of our young lovers would show that Saturday night's girl was responsible for the impecuniousness of youth. But Saturday night's girl is a Wilhelmine of the Wisp-"
Tommy was very proud of that.
"-who vanishes suddenly, leaving only memories of beauty and nothing more. She is the most beautiful girl you know; she is the girl you want to be seen with; she is the girl you never marry. She is the gold-tipped cigarette of young man's existence. He ends up with a collection of ashes-and the waiter literally carries away the gold tip.
"Monday night's girl is a relative whom one must entertain lest one's relations become strained. Tuesday's girl and Wednesday's girl are Platonic friends - so Platonic that one can discuss Plato with them. But Thursday-
"Molly is the Thursday night girl. She is not so regal as the deity of Saturday night, but she is far lovelier than the family skeleton of Monday or the best minds of Tuesday and Wednesday. At first she is only Molly, Later she becomes a power who upsets the best laid plans of calendar makers and brings the week’s climax over to Thursday instead of Saturday. Once you have met Molly, a week-end is merely two or three consecutive days and Thursday becomes a holiday.
“Molly is of medium height, slender, but only sensibly so, not brilliant, but cleverer than she knows. She has grayish blue eyes which seem to say nothing and everything. Her hair is dark brown, with a touch of red in it. Her voice is quiet and her laugh is not too loud—yet there is a song back of the voice and the laugh.
“At first you do not notice Molly particularly. She is always there Thursday night, if you feel like calling. She makes anise cakes and they are always on the table in a little porcelain dish. Molly may not know it, but the anise cakes are subtle. Not long after you have met Molly, you see anise cakes in a bakery—and your thoughts turn to Molly. You wonder whether there are others whose thoughts turn to Molly. If there are, she says little about them. You feel that you can propose to the Thursday Night Girl whenever you please— and so you delay it. It is only when she announces her engagement to some nonentity from out-of-town that you realize how long you have wanted Molly. And she passes into memory as a lost opportunity—unless you have learned the tradition of Thursday night and make the most of your opportunity.
“When the Saturday night girl marries, you count up the hours and dollars you have spent with that dear heart and think of the string of pearls you have cast before that shrine. But when Molly suddenly marries somebody else, there is no resentment, unless it be at yourself. Molly never asked anything, even by implication. She was grateful for whatever you might offer. She invited you to dinner—and it was a good dinner.
“However, the bachelors seem to be growing aware of the potency of Thursday night. A theatrical manager who was asked about that matter admitted that Thursday night had been becoming more popular of recent years than hitherto. An all-night restaurateur noted an increase in his Thursday receipts. Molly is coming into her own.”
This article appeared only in the first edition of the newspaper. In the second edition it was replaced by a disquisition on the early summer habits of bayberry bushes. The hospitable feature editor told Tommy that the article had to be excised to permit a better make-up on the page. Tommy might have understood the explanation had he seen an inter-office memorandum from the managing editor to the feature editor, which read:
“Kill that Thursday night nonsense. Are you running a matrimonial agency?”
Nevertheless, Tommy sent an ostentatiously marked copy to Dorothy, who wondered what its import might be but concluded that Tommy must be very clever to have things printed in the paper and his name signed to them. She mentioned the receipt of the article to Arnold, who commented that he could write newspaper stuff too if business didn’t take up so much time and that Tommy probably didn’t get much for that kind of work anyhow.
Arnold’s deprecating observations, however, didn’t deter Dorothy from permitting Tommy to call on Thursday night. Tommy offered to take her to the first night of “Babies While You Wait,” a new comedy which he assured her was unusually clever, but Dorothy was compelled to obey the Loamford house rule: All young men must spend at least one evening at 137 West 88th Street before they were privileged to take Dorothy to places less directly under the supervision of Mrs. Loamford. He wore a soft shirt—a bit of costuming which signified either a Socialist turn of mind or a savor of impropriety, or most likely both. His features were regular without having any distinction, except that enigmatic smile on the corner of his mouth which belied the frankness of his full lips. His hair was inclined to be curly, but there was no charm about its curliness and Tommy’s trick of passing his hand through it whenever he grew discursive wrecked the part. Neatness, which Mrs. Loamford admired so much, was absent. Arnold Deering always was shaved so cleanly that he looked like a walking advertisement for a barber; Tommy always had the appearance of having shaved hastily that morning and at the same time not being sufficiently bearded to warrant another passage with the razor. He smoked popular-priced cigarettes from their original package and offered them to Dorothy and Mrs. Loamford—a mark of careless breeding, if nothing worse.
The Loamford system demanded that the young man make conversation. If his family were known to Mrs. Loamford, the customary inquiries concerning the physical well-being of mother and father usually served to start an evening of talk. Otherwise, the social explorer was compelled to blaze his own trail, starting at the standard sign-post which was “And what, if I may ask, is your line of business, Mr.-?"
Tommy, having confessed that he wrote newspaper articles and having elicited the comment that such work must be very interesting because one meets so many people, mentioned that he had had a most amusing interview recently with an old Italian singing teacher who told him that American girls had the most wonderful voices in the world but that they went out so much that they rarely made the most of their natural gifts.
“Dorothy sings, you know,” said Mrs. Loamford.
“Professionally?” inquired Tommy.
“Not yet,” answered her mother, “but we have hopes.”
“Studying now?” asked Tommy.
“We expect to start next fall,” said Mrs. Loamford, editorially.
“Concert or opera?” queried Tommy.
“Oh, you must know something about music!” exclaimed Mrs. Loamford. “Are you a music critic, too?”
“I do an occasional piece about music,” he said. “Most of the interviews with singers and so on.”
Here Tommy went out of the category of young men visitors and became an authority.
“You must know how many of them started, then,” suggested Mrs. Loamford.
Tommy nodded.
“I wish you could hear Dorothy sing,” she continued.
“I’d like to,” assented Tommy.
“But I don’t sing—yet,” Dorothy demurred.
She realized that a performance was inevitable, but it wouldn’t do to seem anxious.
“That might be said of a good many Metropolitan stars,” Tommy observed.
Mrs. Loamford was delighted.
“Really, Dorothy, you ought to sing for Mr. Borge,” she urged.
“But I haven’t studied,” objected Dorothy.
This young man probably was critical. Why sing for him?
“My former observation,” said Tommy, “may be extended to say the same of certain Metropolitan artists.”
“You see?” Mrs. Loamford went on. “Mr. Borge understands.”
“But I have no accompanist,” objected Dorothy, by way of erecting an insuperable barrier to any exhibition.
“You really ought to learn to play your own,” said Mrs. Loamford. “Mr. Borge, would you believe that Dorothy took music lessons for eleven years, but that she doesn’t play a note today? I often say it’s a shame for a girl with so much talent to neglect her music that way. Think of it! She studied the piano for eleven years—and she can’t play for herself.”
“Sounds like a pupil of the late Professor Abendschein,” observed Tommy.
Mrs. Loamford beamed.
“Remarkable!” she exclaimed. “The very man! Tell me—is that the talk among musicians?”
“I can’t tell you. But I took lessons from the Professor myself for a little while. But I preferred Irving Berlin to Czerny and after a while we parted company.”
“Oh—you play!”
“Only a little. I pick out what I want to hear.”
Mrs. Loamford opened the piano very dramatically.
“You must accompany Dorothy, Mr. Borge,” she commanded.
“I don’t read much at sight,” Tommy murmured.
“Oh, don’t be modest! I’m sure you’re a wonderful pianist!”
“He doesn’t want to play, mother,” interpolated Dorothy.
Mentally, she was already clearing her throat.
“If you will sing,” said Tommy, “I’ll take a chance of ruining your performance.”
“Sing ‘Kiss Me Again,’ Dorothy,” urged Mrs. Loamford. She placed the music on the rack.
“Now!”
Tommy ploughed through the introduction with several blunders, although the music was no stranger to him, but redeemed himself with a fine gesture as he came to the chords preceding the opening notes for the voice. Dorothy took up the slightly passionate lyric respectably. Her lower tones were shaky, but in the middle register she produced her voice smoothly and sweetly, although the cruelly deep notes at the beginning of the chorus were inaudible. The final high note, taken desperately, and with full voice, resulted in a breathless shriek, harsh and at least half a tone sharp. Tommy tactfully pounded several heavy chords on the piano and almost drowned out Dorothy’s violent efforts. Mrs. Loamford stood by and began to clap her hands encouragingly before the sounds of the piano had died out.
As Tommy, much relieved at the cessation of hostilities, rose from the piano stool, Mr. Loamford looked into the room.
“What seems to be the trouble?” he inquired mildly.
A little gasp of dismay from Dorothy and Mrs. Loamford.
“Why, Samuel,” said Mrs, Loamford, “Mr. Borge has been kind enough to play for Dorothy.”
“Beg your pardon,” commented her husband. “You'll excuse me, Mr. Borge, if I resume some work I’ve brought home with me—very important—sorry——”
“My husband was only joking, Mr. Borge,” explained Mrs. Loamford. “He couldn’t have heard anything in the next room,”
Tommy reflected that he couldn’t have helped hearing the selection as far away as the 86th Street Elevated station, but he smiled.
“Galli-Curci,” he said, “once told me that she had comparatively little sympathy from her parents when she started singing. Miss Dorothy has a very good voice— really.”
“Oh, do you really think so!”
Tommy nodded.
“Of course, training will do wonders for it.”
“That’s what I always tell Dorothy. That’s why I think she ought to start studying as soon as possible.”
“By all means,” Tommy murmured.
“We were planning to have her start with Madame Schneider.”
Dorothy pouted. Madame Schneider was neither fashionable nor inspiring.
“I want to study with Michel Soedlich,” she interrupted. “Isn’t he a big teacher?”
“Very big,” agreed Tommy.
“But I do believe,” said Mrs. Loamford, “that it would be better for Dorothy to start with a woman teacher.”
“I don’t see why,” Dorothy objected.
“Must we go over all that again?" demanded her mother. "Mind you, Mr. Borge, I don't pretend to know anything about this Mr. Soedlich. But, after all one hears about the goings on at studios, all I can say is, one can’t be too careful!”
“There’s a great deal in that, as the monkey said,” agreed Tommy.
“As the monkey said?” asked Mrs. Loamford.
“It’s a new way of saying ‘I agree,” Tommy explained. “Soedlich is a corking musician. He’d probably be one of our greatest men if he had any stability.”
Mrs. Loamford turned triumphantly to her daughter.
“There you have it from a disinterested party! That’s just what I’ve been hearing.”
“Of course,” Tommy continued, “I don’t want to do the man an injustice. He’s very able. He’s turned out some splendid artists.”
Dorothy smiled gratefully. Tommy’s authoritative statement might convince her mother where Dorothy’s had failed.
“That may all be very well,’ responded Mrs. Loamford determinedly, “but it’s my opinion that it’s just as good not to turn out such wonderful artists if—you understand me, I’m sure, Mr. Borge. And Madame Schneider is a very charming and talented woman. She’s a singer herself.”
“A good voice,” suggested Tommy, “is bound to assert itself eventually if the owner doesn’t abandon it.”
“Then you think Dorothy’s voice is worth cultivating?”
“Absolutely.”
“I hope you'll come to hear Dorothy sing again after she’s had some instruction from Madame Schneider.”
“Glad to.”
“I hope it isn’t an imposition on you, Mr. Borge. You must have a great many requests and you must be very busy-"
Tommy assured her that it was always a pleasure to hear charming young singers, that he could always make time, and that he was always glad to be of service to his friends. Mrs. Loamford now placed the seal of approval on Tommy by excusing herself.
The evening then began to take on a social savor. Tommy was not long in getting to his piéce de résistance, which was the story of how he had interviewed a lady novelist whose works were celebrated for their incandescence rather than their brilliance. “There must have been half a dozen reporters there before they let me at her,” Tommy related, “and as the one ahead of me—a famous sob sister—came out, I could see a tiger draped over a couch. It was planted of course. You know what ‘planted’ means ?”
Dorothy thought that it meant placed there for a purpose. She was finding Tommy’s technical jargon simpler to comprehend.
“Exactly,” continued Tommy, who immediately raised Dorothy’s intelligence rating several points. “I figured that she’d put it there to make the reporters ask questions. I knew she wanted to get over the idea that she was the soul of a tiger or something like that. And sure enough—the first thing she did was to ask me to sit on the tiger skin with her.”
Dorothy smiled and drew back a bit.
“Oh, I don’t suppose she had any romantic purpose in mind,” Tommy went on. “I don’t think I appeal to women that way.”
He stopped to light a cigarette. Dorothy had no comment to make on his alleged lack of appeal to women “that way,” and he continued with a little less enthusiasm:
“She asked me if I minded if she held my hand while I interviewed her. She said it created a bond of sympathy between the interviewer and herself. I couldn’t very well refuse, although I’m not generally asked to hold hands. Not by people I interview, anyhow.”
He shifted some ashes to a tray.
“Took in my eyes,’ she said, and I did. What else could I do? ‘Now ask me anything!’ she said. Of course, she expected me to ask her what she thought of New York or American women or something like that, but I threw her out of her routine. I asked her whether she composed on a typewriter or with a pen. She was surprised, as I thought she would be. Finally she said she dictated her novels. ‘But,’ she said, ‘my dear boy, that has nothing to do with art—or I should say love. Love and art are one with me. That is the keynote of my character. Why do you think that hundreds of thousands of my books have been sold in every part of the civilized world?’ Of course, I couldn’t tell her why, because that wouldn’t have been especially discreet, but she——”
Here a loud cough was heard from the next room.
“That’s father,” explained Dorothy.
“I thought as much,” said Tommy. “Your mother wouldn’t be likely to cough like a baritone, and—well, anyhow, we were at the point where she was telling me about the sale of her books, and-"
Again the cough.
Dorothy fidgeted. It wasn’t necessary for her father to behave that way. Was she still a child? Tommy continued.
“then she looked at me very seriously and said, ‘You must believe me when I tell you——”
A door creaked. There was a shuffling sound in the corridor, and a faint voice called “Dorothy.”
“Excuse me.”
Dorothy hurried into the corridor.
Tommy looked about, inspecting the volumes in a bookcase which seemed to be locked permanently. He saw Stoddard’s lectures, a faded cyclopedia of household facts, an incomplete set of Dickens, “Three Men in a Boat,” the poems of Owen Meredith, “Battles of the War of the Rebellion,” the poems of Adelaide Anne Procter-"
Then he heard a whispered colloquy which gradually rose in pitch. He could distinguish “it’s getting late,” “your father can’t sleep,” and “been here long enough.” Presently Dorothy returned.
“Tm going,” announced Tommy.
“Oh, you needn’t,” said Dorothy sweetly, but in a tone that carried no conviction and much relief.
“Getting late.”
She found his hat.
“It’s been most pleasant,” remarked Tommy. “Don’t give up your singing. Go right on. You'll make good.”
“Do you really think so?”
“TI really do. Just stick to it. Most of the girls nowadays begin something—and then they skip off and marry some well-fixed young man—and that’s the end of it.”
“I’m not thinking of anything like that.”
“That speech is usually the sign of a secret engagement——”
Dorothy shook her head.
“Nothing could be further from my thoughts.”
“That’s good,” said Tommy. “For your career, of course.”
He meant to make his exit on this line. But he stopped.
“T’d like to see you again—soon,” he said.
He might be useful, although he wasn’t exactly attractive.
“Ring me up.”
It was a tantalizing command. Dorothy thought it combined remoteness with an elusive cordiality.
He smiled. It wasn’t as good a smile as Arnold’s.
“Thank you.”
“Good night, Mr. Borge.”
“Er—they call me Tommy.”
"May I?" She liked the retort.
“I wouldn’t like it if you didn’t—Dorothy.”
He was a little previous, but he’d call her Dorothy anyhow, eventually. She giggled.
He extended his hand. She took it. He held hers.
“And don’t give up your singing.”
She withdrew her hand.
“T won't.”
A cough in the distance.
“Good night—Dorothy. I’ll see you soon?”
“Ring me up. Good night.”
Tommy encountered Arnold Deering on Broad Street two days later.
“So you’ve heard Dorothy sing,” remarked Arnold.
Tommy nodded. He didn’t like the proprietary air.
“Fine little girl,” continued Arnold. “And she’s got a great voice. What do you think of it?”
“Confidentially,” said Tommy, “she’s got a voice like conscience.”
“What’s that?” demanded Arnold.
“A still small voice,” Tommy replied with a grin.
He had been saving up this definition for twenty-four hours.
Arnold shrugged his shoulders.
“Not so much of a gag,” he said. “Ring me up some time. We'll have lunch.”
He crossed the street to greet a young man who wore a hatband the same color as his.