The Playwright and the Lady/Chapter 7
VII.
Everything had been washed very, very clean—grass, leaves, branches, and even the boles of the beeches, chestnuts and elms. And now the brisk, westerly breeze was shaking off the drops and the sun was slowly drying the freshened foliage. But here at the gate the sunlight scarcely penetrated the green depths, and the grass spears were strung with trembling emeralds, while the gravel was still damp underfoot.
A vireo perched upon the gate’s pinnacle and sang lustily, perhaps in thanksgiving for the plenitude of worms in evidence after the storm. The world was refreshed and fragrant. The sun shone with diminished ardor and the breeze blew moist and cool.
Roger, as he drew near, joined his song of thanksgiving to that of the vireo, and the latter, disconcerted and alarmed, took hasty flight. Judged by the vireo’s standard, Roger’s voice was undoubtedly lacking in quality, but it wasn’t a bad voice for all that; and, besides, quantity often makes up for quality, just as it did in his case.
This morning Roger wore a blue serge suit over a madras shirt, in which tiny blue and black stripes struggled for first honors. He had hesitated long between the attractions of this garment and those of a pink-figured gingham; his mood had sighed for the pink, but discretion had prompted the soberer colors; and in the end discretion had won, as it is quite likely to at thirty-six. The white canvas shoes had been replaced by a pair of tan Russias, immaculate save for a few spots of dew, and—perhaps in deference to the drop in temperature, perhaps because he fancied it more becoming than a straw—a blue serge yachting cap, bearing the blue and white-barred burgee of his yacht club crossed with his private signal, was perched with an air of jauntiness on his head. In short, Roger was attired for conquest.
Having reached the gate, he terminated his song abruptly and glanced at his watch. It was just half-past nine. He looked expectantly toward the Hall, but the long avenue was deserted. And so it remained while twenty long minutes ticked themselves away. For once he begrudged Beauty its privilege of tardiness.
Finally, around the corner by the distant building trotted the dachshund, her sharp nose to the ground and her tail wagging joyously, and a moment later appeared her mistress, gowned in a gray walking skirt and white shirt-waist and bearing—ye Gods! ’Twas a wicker chair! Roger made a frantic dash to her assistance, and was brought up abruptly by the iron barrier.
“Leave it there, please,” he called. “I’ll be over the wall in a second.” He prepared for an assault on the crumbling defenses.
“Please don’t,” she begged. “I assure you I am quite able to carry a chair without fainting. Besides, trespassing is strictly forbidden and will be severely punished.”
She placed the small chair some three yards from the gate, sank into it with a grace of movement that enraptured the beholder, arranged her skirt deftly, loosened the strings of a green silk bag, and brought to view a square of embroidery.
“I am going to put you to shame by my industry,” she announced, smiling up at him through the grating. Roger replaced his cap and then stood and viewed in ill-concealed admiration.
The slender litheness of her form was shown to new advantage by the severe gray skirt and plain blouse waist. A broad-brimmed garden hat of white straw, marvelously adorned with a wreath of pink and mauve poppies and gray-green foliage, drooped above her face, throwing cool shadows over brow and cheek. The eyes, when, all too briefly, they looked up at him, were dark, like violets under a leafy canopy, and held a challenging gleam of merriment. Roger smiled vaguely, far too busy with silent appreciation to think of a retort.
“I’m sorry you can’t share my comfort,” she continued, smoothing the embroidery over her knees and studying it with a little, intent frown. “You lack foresight. Or are there no chairs at your house? Do you live in the Japanese fashion?”
“I plead guilty to the charge,” he answered. “But, if you will excuse me a moment, I’ll remedy the omission.”
She looked up and nodded, and Roger hurried back to The Beeches, returning in an incredibly short space of time with a red porch chair. This he placed as near the gate as was possible. Then he sat down and leaned back, sighing with exaggerated comfort.
“That is nicer,” she said, looking up momentarily from her work. “Now you may smoke.”
He obeyed, lighting a cigarette and flicking the smoking match through the bars, where it proved an object of much interest to Gretchen, until she got the fumes up her nose and backed away sneezing indignantly. She had grown to look upon Roger as a necessary evil, and no longer openly resented his presence. On his part, Roger had fallen back upon studied indifference, trusting to pique her into interest and friendly advances. After the episode with the match, Gretchen wandered away in search of adventure, and was presently heard barking frantically at a gray squirrel.
“Did you find yesterday dull?” asked Roger.
“No, not at all. I wrote dozens of letters, read a novel and—dreamed in front of a comfy open fire. And you?”
“I tried to work and couldn’t, strolled around the place a bit and—dreamed in front of a comfy open fire.”
“Our tastes seem similar,” she said. “What a storm it was!”
“Yes, I—I wondered if you were alarmed.”
“Frightened silly,” she answered, cheerfully. “I always am in a thunderstorm. Are you?”
“Always,” he answered, gravely.
She looked up from under the jealous brim of her hat and laughed merrily.
“Do you never tell the truth?” she asked.
“Only when it is more attractive than fiction.”
“Ah! Why is it, do you suppose, that truth is usually so commonplace?”
“Probably because it’s a virtue.”
“You find the virtues uninteresting, then?”
“In myself, yes.”
“You make it difficult for your friends, I fear.”
“I always select them for their virtues.”
“And yet you rather hinted yesterday that you wanted my friendship,” she said.
“I am sure you have all the virtues in present-day use,” he answered.
“Thank you for inference that I am up-to-date. There is a difference, then, between the olden virtues and those of to-day?”
“There is a different assortment in fashion,” he amended. “Virtues change with the times; only faults remain the same.”
“Do you mean by that that humanity is worse to-day than it was in olden times?”
“Much worse,” he said, cheerfully. She looked up, just as he had meant she should, and viewed him uncertainly.
“Do you mean that?” she asked.
“Not a word of it!” he answered, unblushingly.
“Oh! aren’t you ever serious, either?”
“Never when I am happy.”
She smiled as she bent again over her work,
“Do you know, I fancy you’ve wasted a great deal of most brilliant dialogue on me that might have gone into your play?”
“Not wasted, since you appreciate its brilliancy,” he replied, politely. “Besides, it is still possible to use it in a play; I always memorize my best things for future work.”
“Then you are only using me as a sort of human whetstone to sharpen your wits upon, perhaps?”
“When you really believe that,” he answered, gravely, “I hope you will deny me the privilege of—the whetstone.”
“I will. When I find you are making material out of me for a play I shall whisk myself from sight.”
He stirred uncomfortably.
“You may be sure I shall never let you find it out,” he said, adding to himself: “At least, not until I’m certain of forgiveness.” There followed a silence while she filled in a tiny rose calyx with white silk floss and Roger lighted his second cigarette. Then:
“You threatened a while ago to climb over the wall,” she said. “I fancied traditions forbade such trespass?”
“I suppose they do,” he answered, carelessly. “Fortunately, one is not obliged to be tyrannized over by traditions.”
“How courageous you are!” she sighed. “That’s what it is to be a man instead of a woman. With my sex tradition is everything.”
“When I was a very small youngster,” he went on, “I used to think that this place over here was inhabited by ogres and giants, to say nothing of beings with more picturesque and difficult names met with in the pages of Frank Stockton’s fairy tales, on which I was brought up. In those days no one at The Beeches would have thought of setting foot on Forrest Hall property. I think I was under the impression that the penalty for such indiscretion was to be gobbled alive by some terrible monster. When the leaves were off the trees and the sun shone very brightly I sometimes came as far as the middle of the walk and stood with staring eyes and choking breath looking through the gate. And I saw things, too.”
She nodded.
“One does when a child. I’ve seen things myself.”
“Every child does,” he answered. “It is only ignorant, materialistic grown-ups that deny the existence of—things.”
She dropped her work and leaned toward him confidentially.
“Did you ever see the Little Green Men?”
He shook his head.
“No, I think not. They creep through the grass, don’t they? And one sees them when one is quite alone in the sunlight?”
“Yes; but how did you know, if you never saw them?” she asked, interestedly. Again he shook his head.
“I don’t know; I just—just felt it must be so. I think the Green Men usually appear to girls; but I don’t know how I suspect that, either.”
“Maybe they do,” she answered, thoughtfully. “What did you use to see?”
“Well, things at windows; and tall, dark things that hide in the hallway between daylight and lamplight and run away when you approach; they aren’t dangerous, but they startle you until you get used to them. Once, too, I saw a bear in the dining room. It was broad daylight, and he walked around the further end of the table and disappeared. I ran screaming up to the nursery, and they told me I imagined it. But I didn’t; I saw it; it was there—not a real bear, of course; just a bear thing.”
She nodded again, understandingly, her violet eyes on his.
“And once I stood up there, halfway down the walk, and saw a little child walk down the path and then disappear just behind where you are sitting. It was in the autumn and the leaves were falling. It was all very plain to me. She was a little girl in a short, pale green frock and her hair was clustered thick about her head in short curls, I wasn’t frightened then; I was only sorry she wouldn’t stay and play with me. After that, I used to watch quite frequently, but I never saw her again.”
“Was she a thing, too?” she asked, eagerly.
"Yes.”
“But are you certain? Do things have short green frocks and yellow curls? Don’t you think it might”
“Yellow curls!” he exclaimed. “Yes, but I didn’t tell you they were yellow! How did you know?”
“You didn’t tell me?” she faltered, a slight flush creeping into her cheeks. “Then—then I must have ‘just felt it,’ too.”
“Yes, but it—it’s rather strange, I think.”
“So are lots of things,” she answered, lightly. “Tell me about the—what would you call it?—the feud between your people and the Hall. I heard something of it from Mrs. Leary, but her narrative was a bit involved.”
“I fear I can’t do much better than Mrs. Leary,” he answered. “I never paid much attention to the affair; besides, it was all dark history when I came along. But I’ll do my best.”
“Thank you.” She took up her work again and leaned back in the chair. Gretchen trotted languidly home from the chase and stretched herself out, panting and exhausted, at her mistress’ feet.
“It all began along at the beginning of the century—the last century, of course,” said Roger. “In those days there was only Forrest Hall, and all this land and more besides belonged to it. Old Walford Forrest had been minister to somewhere—Great Britain, I think—and had married a Miss Cicely Breen, who was a great beauty and a reigning belle where he was stationed. When they were married the old gentleman—he was about fifty, I think, at the time—resigned his post and returned to this country and to the Hall. His younger sister, Mary Forrest, had married a man named Hood, and the old gentleman had given them as a wedding present five acres of the land, and Hood had built a house and called his place The Beeches. They had two children, Thurlow Hood and Mary Hood. Thurlow was about eighteen when his uncle came home with his bride and was attending college in New York. A year after the marriage Cicely gave birth to a daughter, who was given her mother’s name.
“Meanwhile old Walford Forrest had wearied of a pastoral life, undoubtedly a great change from the busy existence he had been leading, and had gone again into politics. I believe he was elected a representative; at all events, he spent much of his time in Washington and in Albany. His young wife—she was but nineteen when her daughter was born—probably found life here at the Hall quite as dull as her husband had found it; there were few neighbors in those days and New York wasn’t a matter of only an hour or so by train. Then Thurlow Hood came home from college.
“He was a harum-scarum fellow, who had spent more money than was good for him during his student days and during a trip to Europe after graduation. But he was handsome and had an air; and the—well, not the inevitable, thank Heaven!—but the probable thing happened. He fell in love with Cicely Forrest and she with him.”
“She was but nineteen?” asked his audience.
“About twenty-one by then, I think; and Thurlow was a year older. It was a violent affair. The elderly husband, seldom at home, I fancy, knew nothing of it. And then one day Cicely Forrest left her three-year-old baby in care of the nurse and walked across the grounds, by this very path, and took up her abode with Thurlow Hood. She left a letter for her husband, and Thurlow wrote him another, offering to meet him when and where he wished, but declaring that nothing but his death should separate him from the woman he loved.
“Meanwhile—let me see, now; have I got this right? Yes, meanwhile Thurlow’s sister had married a New York man and moved away. Well, the story goes that old Walford Forrest never made a sign when he learned of his wife’s desertion. He came back here to the Hall, gave up his political career and settled down here quietly. But one thing he did do. He built a high wall between his estate and The Beeches, and here he placed this gate, locking it and bearing off the key. Then he had the underbrush and some of the trees cleared away, so that from his library at the Hall he could look down the avenue and through the gate at The Beeches. And they say that after that he spent most of his time in a great chair at the library window over there, just watching and watching day after day. And they found him there one morning about six years later—his dead eyes fixed on The Beeches.”