The Beautiful and Damned / Прекрасные и обреченные. Уровень 4

The Radiant Hour

After a fortnight Anthony and Gloria began talk about marriage.

“Tell me all the reasons why you’re going to marry me in June,” said Anthony.

“Well, because you’re so clean, like I am. There are two sorts, you know. One’s like Dick: he’s clean like polished pans. You and I are clean like streams and winds. I can tell whenever I see a person whether he is clean, and if so, which kind of clean he is.”

“We’re twins.”

“Mother says” – she hesitated uncertainly – “mother says that two souls are sometimes created together and – and in love before they’re born.”

He lifted up his head and laughed soundlessly toward the ceiling. When his eyes came back to her he saw that she was angry.

“Why did you laugh?” she cried, “you’ve done that twice before. There’s nothing funny about our relation to each other.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Oh, don’t say you’re sorry! If you can’t think of anything better than that, just keep quiet!”

“I love you.”

“I don’t care.”

There was a pause. Anthony was depressed. At length Gloria murmured:

“I’m sorry I was rude.”

“You weren’t. I was the one.”

Peace was restored: the passion of their pretense created the actuality. But Anthony felt often like a scarcely tolerated guest at a party she was giving.

Mrs. Gilbert must have known everything – for three weeks Gloria had seen no one else – and she must have noticed that this time there was a difference in her daughter’s attitude. So she declared herself immensely pleased; she doubtless was.

But between kisses Anthony and this golden girl quarrelled incessantly.

“Now, Gloria,” he would cry, “please let me explain!”

“Don’t explain. Kiss me.”

“I don’t think that’s right. If I hurt your feelings we ought to discuss it. I don’t like this kiss-and-forget.”

“But I don’t want to argue. I think it’s wonderful that we can kiss and forget, and when we can’t it’ll be time to argue.”

Meanwhile they knew each other, unwillingly, by curious reactions, by distastes and prejudices. The girl was proudly incapable of jealousy and, because he was extremely jealous, this virtue piqued him.

“Oh, Anthony,” she would say, “always when I’m mean to you I’m sorry afterward.”

Yet Anthony knew that there were days when they hurt each other purposely.

“Why do you like Muriel?” he demanded one day.

“I don’t very much.”

“Then why do you go with her?”

“Just for some one to go with. But I rather like Rachael. I think she’s cute – and so clean and slick. I used to have other friends – in Kansas City and at school – casual, all of them. Now they’re mostly married. What does it matter – they were all just people.”

“You like men better, don’t you?”

“Oh, much better. I’ve got a man’s mind.”

“You’ve got a mind like mine.”

Later she told him about the beginnings of her friendship with Bloeckman. One day Gloria and Rachael had come upon Bloeckman. She had liked him. He was a relief from younger men. He humored her and he laughed, whether he understood her or not. She met him several times, despite the disapproval of her parents, and within a month he had asked her to marry him, promising her everything from a villa in Italy to a brilliant career on the screen. She had laughed in his face – and he had laughed too.

She told Bloeckman about the engagement. It was a heavy blow. Gloria had been sorry for him but she had decided not to show it. And Anthony forgot Bloeckman entirely.

Three Digressions

Just before the engagement was announced Anthony had gone up to Tarrytown to see his grandfather, who greeted the news with profound cynicism.

“Oh, you’re going to get married, are you?”

He said this with such a dubious mildness and shook his head up and down so many times that Anthony was depressed. While he was unaware of his grandfather’s intentions he presumed that a large part of the money would come to him. “Are you going to work?”

“Why,” said Anthony, somewhat disconcerted. “I am working. You know…”

“Ah, I mean real work,” said Adam Patch dispassionately.

“I’m not quite sure yet what I’ll do. I’m not exactly a beggar,” he asserted.

The old man almost apologetically asked:

“How much do you save a year?”

“Nothing.”

“And you’ve decided that by some miracle two of you can get along on it.”

“Gloria has some money of her own. Enough to buy clothes.”

“How much?”

“About a hundred a month.”

“That’s altogether about seventy-five hundred a year.” Then he added softly: “Not bad.”

“I suppose it is. I can manage very well. You are convinced that I’m worthless. I came up here simply to tell you that I’m getting married in June. Good-bye, sir.” With this he turned away and headed for the door.

“Wait!” called Adam Patch, “I want to talk to you.”

“Well, sir?”

“Sit down.”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I’m going to see Gloria tonight.”

“What’s her name?”

“Gloria Gilbert.”

“New York girl? Someone you know?”

“She’s from the Middle West.”

“What does her father do?”

“He is in a celluloid corporation or trust or something. They’re from Kansas City.”

“You going to be married out there?”

“Why, no, sir. We thought we’d be married in New York – rather quietly.”

“What about wedding here?”

Anthony hesitated. He was touched.

“That’s very kind of you, grandpa, but wouldn’t it be a lot of trouble?”

“Everything’s a lot of trouble.”

“Well, I’ll speak to Gloria about it. Personally I’d like to, but of course it’s up to the Gilberts, you see.”

His grandfather drew a long sigh, half closed his eyes, and sank back in his chair.

“In a hurry?”

“Not especially.”

“I began thinking,” said Adam Patch, “and it seemed to me that you ought to be steadier, more industrious…Well, good-bye,” added his grandfather suddenly, “you’ll miss your train.”

Richard Caramel, who was one of the ushers, caused Anthony and Gloria much distress in the last few weeks. “The Demon Lover” had been published in April. The book hesitated and then suddenly “went.” The author, indeed, spent his days in a state of pleasant madness. The book was in his conversation three-fourths of the time.

So to Dick’s great annoyance Gloria publicly boasted that she had never read “The Demon Lover,” and didn’t intend to until every one stopped talking about it. As a matter of fact, she had no time to read now, for the presents were pouring in.

The most munificent gift was simultaneously the most disappointing. It was a concession of Adam Patch’s – a check for five thousand dollars.

Mrs. Gilbert arranged and rearranged their hypothetical house, distributing the gifts among the different rooms.

Five days! A platform was erected on the lawn at Tarrytown. Four days! A special train was chartered to convey the guests to and from New York. Three days!

Anthony

In the gray light Anthony found that it was only five o’clock. He regretted nervously that he had awakened so early.

In his bathroom he contemplated himself in the mirror and saw that he was unusually white. On his dressing table were spread a number of articles – their tickets to California, the book of traveller’s checks, his watch, the key to his apartment, which he must not forget to give to Maury, and, most important of all, the ring. It was of platinum set around with small emeralds; Gloria had insisted on this; she had always wanted an emerald wedding ring, she said.

It was the third present he had given her; first had come the engagement ring, and then a little gold cigarette-case. He would be giving her many things now – clothes and jewels and friends and excitement. It seemed absurd that from now on he would pay for all her meals. The question worried him.

Anthony laughed nervously.

“By God!” he muttered to himself, “I’m almost married!”

Mistress Of The Situation

The breathless idyll of their engagement gave way to the intense romance of the more passionate relationship. The breathless idyll left them, fled on to other lovers; they looked around one day and it was gone, how they scarcely knew.

The idyll passed. Came a day when Gloria found that other men no longer bored her; came a day when Anthony discovered that he could sit again late into the evening, talking with Dick.

It was a time of discovery. Anthony found that he was living with a girl of tremendous nervous tension and of the most high-handed selfishness. Gloria knew within a month that her husband was a coward toward any one of a million phantasms created by his imagination. She was unable to understand it.

It was after midnight. Gloria was dozing off, when suddenly she saw her husband raise himself on his elbow and stare at the window.

“What is it, dearest?” she murmured.

“Nothing,” he turned toward her, “nothing, my darling wife.”

“Don’t say ‘wife.’ I’m your mistress. Wife’s such an ugly word. Your ‘permanent mistress’ is so much more tangible and desirable. Come into my arms,” she added in a rush of tenderness; “I can sleep so well, so well with you in my arms. I’ll protect my Anthony. Oh, nobody’s ever going to harm my Anthony!”

He laughed as though it were a jest, but to Gloria it was never a jest. It was a keen disappointment.

The management of Gloria’s temper became almost the primary duty of Anthony’s day. In her angers her inordinate egotism chiefly displayed itself.

“It seems to me,” he said one day, “that you expect me to be some a valet to you.”

Gloria laughed, so infectiously that Anthony was unwise enough to smile. Unfortunate man! His smile made her mistress of the situation.

The Gray House

In six weeks Anthony and Gloria arrived in New York. It was a struggle to keep many of their conversations on the level of discussions. Arguments were fatal to Gloria’s disposition. She had all her life been associated with men who had not dared to contradict her. What Anthony chiefly missed in her mind was the sense of order and accuracy.

It is in the twenties that the actual momentum of life begins to slacken. At thirty an organ-grinder[22] is a more or less moth-eaten man who grinds an organ – and once he was an organ-grinder!

The gray house caught Gloria and Anthony when she was twenty-three; he was twenty-six. They lived impatiently in Anthony’s apartment for the first fortnight after the return from California, in a stifled atmosphere of open trunks, too many callers, and the eternal laundry-bags[23]. They discussed with their friends the stupendous problem of their future. Dick and Maury would sit with them agreeing solemnly, almost thoughtfully, as Anthony ran through his list of what they “ought” to do, and where they “ought” to live.

“I’d like to take Gloria abroad,” he complained, “and then to have a place in the country, somewhere near New York, of course, where I could write – or whatever I decide to do.”

Gloria laughed.

“Isn’t he cute?” she required of Maury. “‘Whatever he decides to do!’ But what am I going to do if he works? Maury, will you entertain me if Anthony works?”

“Anyway, I’m not going to work yet,” said Anthony quickly.

“Why don’t you go out to – out to Greenwich or something?” suggested Richard Caramel.

“I’d like that,” said Gloria, brightening. “Do you think we could get a house there?”

Dick shrugged his shoulders and Maury laughed.

“Well, it seems to me there’re a lot of towns like Rye between New York and Greenwich where you could buy a little gray house,” said Dick.

Gloria leaped at the phrase triumphantly. For the first time since their return she knew what she wanted.

“Oh, yes!” she cried. “Oh, yes! that’s it: a little gray house! Where can we find one?”

As the unfortunate upshot of this conversation, they took Dick’s advice literally, and two days later went out to Rye. They were shown houses at a hundred a month; they were shown isolated houses. They looked at a few really nice houses, aloof, dignified, and cool – at three hundred a month. But they did not like them.

Anthony ran into the living room one afternoon.