How Like a God

VI

He stopped, and again stood still, and his lips moved as though he were talking to the little parchment-shaded lamp, and pronouncing Jane’s name.

He turned and looked behind him, downstairs, and started at sight of a dark form against the wall in the hall below, but saw at once that it was the side of the high black frame of the mirror and coat rack. He had avoided looking into the mirror as he passed, and he wished now that he hadn’t; he wanted to know what his face looked like; in the street he had felt that people were staring at him.

There were still sounds of Mrs. Jordan in the basement, but now he thought he heard another noise, above, and he turned quickly to look at the door facing the first landing. It was closed; there was no light under it. Those girls, he reflected, were always out at night. That was one of the things he had counted on.

You counted on, a bitter voice said to him; yes, you might count on that; you might count on anything except yourself...

You have always betrayed yourself, most miserably at those moments when you most needed the kind of fortitude that can neither be borrowed nor simulated. Yet it was not fear, exactly; more an avoidance and a denial. Certainly you weren’t afraid of Lucy, nor were you afraid of the delights she gave and promised.

You felt pretty sure you were going to marry Lucy, that day while the train roared its way through the flat fields towards Dayton, where she was to meet you. She had left Cleveland twelve days before, and they had been empty days for you.

She, alone, met you at the Dayton station, and in a little dark blue roadster drove you west, into the setting sun, some fifteen miles from the city. You were surprised at the extent of the farmhouse and buildings; you knew that Lucy’s father, publisher and editor of a newspaper somewhere, had at middle age suddenly given it up and purchased a farm and begun raising thoroughbred stock, but you hadn’t expected to see anything so elaborate.

Of all the people you have known, you have understood Lucy’s father and mother least. They were obviously healthy and happy, on excellent terms with life, yet they gave the impression of having no contact with it. Their attitude towards Lucy had none of that rubbing intimacy which is always associated with parenthood. She might have been a privileged summer boarder. You were courteously made welcome; beyond that you were strictly Lucy’s business, it seemed no affair of theirs.

You rode a great deal, you on her little mare Babe, Lucy on one of the more unmanageable beasts from the general stables; you played tennis, read, picked berries, went fishing once or twice. The fishing was no good.

“I don’t understand it,” said Lucy. “Just last summer it was full of sunfish as big as your hand. This is all on our land, and no one ever comes here.”

You sat beside her on the bank, idly throwing pebbles into the pool. “Does your father own clear down to here?”

She nodded. After a silence she said:

“I read a book last summer that said that nobody ought to own any land.”

“Do you believe that?”

“I don’t know,” she frowned. “I don’t see what right anybody has to tell us what we ought to do.”

“I’ve got a right to tell you oughtn’t to pull my hair, haven’t I?”

“You have not. You only have a right to pull mine back — if you can.”

Quickly she reached down and grabbed a handful of your thick brown hair and gave it a sharp tug. You yelled and seized her wrist, and straightened up, and struggled and clinched. You ended sitting on top of her, holding her down, dipping your hand into the water and trickling it onto her face from the ends of your fingers, and demanding surrender.

“I like that, it’s nice and cool,” she said, lying quietly; but for some reason you got up and moved a little off and sat down again on the grass. She too sat up and patted at her hair and pulled her dress down, and then got on her knees and dabbled in the water with her hands.

There followed a couple of rainy days; you drove into Dayton and back, and in the evening you tried a game of chess with Mr. Crofts but found him much too good for you.

A few days later, on the last day of July, Lucy drove you to Dayton to catch the afternoon train for Cleveland. Her father came along, having some errands in town. You were expected back at the office the following morning.

Nothing had happened, and you couldn’t understand it. What did you want, what were you waiting for? You said to yourself that Lucy was interested in her music, that what she wanted was a career, but you knew that was twaddle.

Was Lucy in love with you? Yes. No. What would you say if you asked her, do you love me? Probably that she didn’t know, and then if you asked her to marry you she would say at once, yes, of course I will. You decided you would write and ask her, and have it done.

At the office next day Dick’s secretary entered and handed you a letter.

“I’ve attended to most of Mr. Carr’s private mail,” she said, “but there didn’t seem to be anything I could do about this. I’ve sent a wire to Mr. Carr, but he may not get it for a week.”

The letter was from Erma, mailed in Vienna. She said she was leaving for America, and after spending a week in New York would continue to Cleveland and probably spend the fall and winter there. Would Dick, like a good brother, give the necessary orders to have the house got in readiness?

The next morning there was a telegram, saying that she would arrive on Thursday. You immediately drove out to Wooton Avenue to see that your instructions of the day before were being executed.

One of your most vivid memories of Erma from the early days is that August morning in the dingy old Cleveland railroad station. She came down the board platform like a fairy princess in lace and flowers borne on a breeze, surrounded by porters loaded with bags and parcels.

“Bill — how nice of you!”

You explained that Dick was out of town. She kissed you on the cheek, and you felt yourself blushing.

“I’ve got to kiss someone,” she declared, “do you mind? Anyway, you look so nice you should be kissed. I think Americans are better-shaved than Europeans, they always look a bit stubby.”

She was gorgeous, distracting, overwhelming. You rode out to the house with her and spent some time explaining the arrangements you had made, regretting that the time had been too short to see them all carried out, and finally you stayed and lunched with her before returning to the office.

Late one afternoon, about a week after Erma’s return, called to the telephone, you heard her voice. It was raining, she was lonely, she needed intelligent conversation, would you come out for a tête-à-tête dinner?

You would.

It is difficult to recapture the impression that Erma made upon you then. Certainly you were flattered by any attention she gave you; just as certainly you were not in love with her. You always tell yourself that, with Mrs. Davis, with Millicent, with Lucy — then you have never been in love? No, has anyone?

She was very nice to you that evening; she can be nicer than anyone else when she wants to. The dinner was perfect, and you both drank enough wine — just enough. Afterward you sat in the little room beyond the library and talked, and listened, and admired Erma’s fine white arms and graceful neck and her pretty fluttering nervous gestures, when all at once she stopped and looked at you and said:

“There’s one thing I’ve admired you for a lot. Do you remember that we were once engaged to be married?”

It was without warning, but you managed a smile.

“No,” you said, “were we?”

“And you’ve never even told Dick, at least I don’t suppose you have—”

“I haven’t.”

She kissed her finger and touched your lips with it.

“You’re a darling. I hate explanations. Of course, it may be that you were glad to be out of it.”

“Unspeakably. I was going to be a great writer and was afraid it would take my mind off my work.”

She pretended to shiver a little. “Ugh. Don’t. That sounds as if it were decades ago. Good heavens you’re only twenty-five, and I’m twenty-seven. We were both too young.”

“Twenty-six next month.”

“Yes? We’ll have a party and make everybody bring you a present.”

After that you received many invitations from Erma — teas, dinners, dances — and you accepted most of them, but you were careful; you had been scorched once by that tricky flame and were shy of it. Then one afternoon she telephoned to ask you to come to dinner, early; she emphasized it, early; and when you arrived and had been shown into the library she entered almost at once and explained:

“Dick’s coming. He phoned and especially wanted to come, so I suppose he intends to talk about business. I regard you as my business adviser, and I confess I’m a little overpowered by darling Dick’s Napoleonic dash, so I want you to be here too.”

You were aghast.

“Good god, Erma, I can’t do it. Don’t you see how impertinent and impudent it would seem to him?”

Her eyes tightened a little; that was the first time you saw them do it.

“Impudent!” she exclaimed. Then she laughed. “I don’t need you to withstand Napoleon, Bill dear; it won’t be necessary and if it is I’ll attend to it. But I’m ignorant, and you know things. Really I insist.”

When Dick arrived a little later he didn’t bother to conceal his surprise and annoyance at seeing you. Nor did he trouble to lower his voice when he said to Erma:

“I thought you said you’d be alone.”

“I’d forgotten about Bill,” she said carelessly. “He often comes out to relieve my loneliness. If it’s really so confidential—”

No, Dick said, it didn’t matter.

It was the first time the three of you had been alone together since the summer of your second visit. At dinner you talked of that, and of Dick’s fishing trip, and of other inconsequential things. You were relieved that Dick had speedily forgotten his annoyance at your presence.

“I’m surprised that you can get Bill out to this end of town so often,” he said to Erma. “Who does he leave to guard his shepherdess? Not that she needs it.”

Erma glanced at him, and at you. “Have you got a shepherdess?”

“What, haven’t you met her?” asked Dick. “I don’t know where he found her, but he brought her to a couple of dances last spring, and she darned near started a riot.” He turned to you. “You haven’t fried and eaten her?”

You explained that Lucy had remained at the farm for the rest of the summer and wouldn’t return to Cleveland for another week or so.

“I thought you told me all your secrets,” said Erma reproachfully, “and here you’ve got a beautiful shepherdess that I never even heard of.”

“It’s no secret,” you said shortly, “and I haven’t got her.”

“The hell you haven’t,” said Dick.

After dinner you wanted to leave and were busy devising a suitable excuse, when you caught a glance from Erma which said plainly that she read your intention and that you might as well discard it. Dick moved to a chair next to Erma and began telling her his errand.

The recent death of old Meynell, the lawyer, he explained, made necessary a new arrangement regarding Erma’s stock. “The stock should be represented at the next annual stockholders’ meeting,” Dick went on, “and that’s really the point. Of course, you can attend the meeting yourself if you want to, there isn’t anything technical about it, electing directors and so on. What I wondered was if you would give me a proxy and let me vote your stock along with mine. That would be simplest.”

Erma sat comfortably sipping black coffee. “If I give you my proxy you’ll vote the whole thing, won’t you?” she asked.

“Of course. I own the other half.”

“How long is a proxy good for?”

“As long as you want to make it. Usually there is no stated term. You can recall it whenever you want to, or make a new one.”

“Then I guess I’ll make a proxy, it sounds important. Only I think it would be piggish for you to vote the whole thing, so I’ll give my proxy to Bill, if he’ll promise not to elect the shepherdess a director.”

You were flustered; you felt yourself blushing.

“Really, Erma,” you protested, “you’re putting me in a false position—”

“I don’t see anything false about it,” she declared. “It seems to me very sensible. You two can run things just as you want to, and two heads are better than one. Anyway, this just happens to appeal to me.”

“You’re a damn fool,” said Dick.

But you really did mean it; she stuck to it, airily but inexorably. You walked all the way home, in the mild September night, feeling alternately humiliated and elated.

But one thing was a fact; at twenty-six, not quite twenty-six, you held the voting power for one-half the stock of a ten-million-dollar corporation. You would be on equal terms with Dick — but even your fancy balked at that. You would scarcely be on even terms with Dick, not if you had a hundred proxies.