Edith Wharton - Novel 15 (17 page)

 
          
That
evening, when bedtime came, Charlotte and Tina went upstairs together; but
Delia lingered in the drawing-room, on the pretext of having letters to write.
In truth, she dreaded to pass the threshold where, evening after evening, the
fresh laughter of the two girls used to waylay her while Charlotte Lovell
already slept her old-maid sleep on the floor above. A pang went through Delia
at the thought that henceforth she would be cut off from this means of keeping
her hold on Tina.

 
          
An
hour later, when she mounted the stairs in her turn, she was guiltily conscious
of moving as noiselessly as she could along the heavy carpet of the corridor,
and of pausing longer than was necessary over the putting out of the gas-jet on
the landing. As she lingered she strained her ears for the sound of voices from
the adjoining doors behind which Charlotte and Tina slept; she would have been
secretly hurt at hearing talk and laughter from within. But none came, nor was
there any light beneath the doors. Evidently
Charlotte
, in her hard methodical way, had said
goodnight to her daughter, and gone straight to bed as usual. Perhaps she had
never approved of Tina’s vigils, of the long undressing punctuated with mirth
and confidences; she might have asked for the room next to her daughter’s
simply because she did not want the girl to miss her “beauty sleep.”

 
          
Whenever
Delia tried to explore the secret of her cousin’s actions she returned from the
adventure humiliated and abashed by the base motives she found herself
attributing to
Charlotte
. How was it that she, Delia Ralston, whose happiness had been open and
avowed to the world, so often found herself envying poor
Charlotte
the secret of her scanted motherhood? She
hated herself for this movement of envy whenever she detected it, and tried to
atone for it by a softened manner and a more anxious regard for
Charlotte
’s feelings; but the attempt was not always
successful, and Delia sometimes wondered if
Charlotte
did not resent any show of sympathy as an
indirect glance at her misfortune. The worst of suffering such as hers was that
it left one sore to the gentlest touch…

 
          
Delia,
slowly undressing before the same lace-draped toilet-glass which had reflected
her bridal image, was turning over these thoughts when she heard a light knock.
She opened the door, and there stood Tina, in a dressing-gown, her dark curls
falling over her shoulders.

 
          
With
a happy heart-beat Delia held out her arms.

 
          
“I
had to say goodnight, Mamma,” the girl whispered.

 
          
“Of course, dear.”
Delia pressed a long kiss on her lifted
forehead. “Run off now, or you might disturb your aunt. You know she sleeps
badly, and you must be as quiet as a mouse now she’s next to you.”

 
          
“Yes,
I know,” Tina acquiesced, with a grave glance that was almost of complicity.

 
          
She
asked no further question, she did not linger: lifting Delia’s hand she held it
a moment against her cheek, and then stole out as noiselessly as she had come.

 
          
  

 
          
“But
you must see,” Charlotte Lovell insisted, laying aside the Evening Post, “that
Tina has changed. You do see that?”

 
          
The
two women were sitting alone by the drawing-room fire in
Gramercy
Park
. Tina had gone to dine with her cousin,
young Mrs. John Junius Halsey, and was to be taken afterward to a ball at the
Vandergraves’, from which the John Juniuses had promised to see her home. Mrs.
Ralston and Charlotte, their early dinner finished, had the long evening to
themselves
. Their custom on such occasions, was for
Charlotte to read the news aloud to her cousin, while the latter embroidered;
but tonight, all through Charlotte’s conscientious progress from column to
column, without a slip or an omission, Delia had felt her, for some special reason,
alert to take advantage of her daughter’s absence.

 
          
To
gain time before answering, Mrs. Ralston bent over a stitch in her delicate
white embroidery.

 
          
“Tina
changed? Since when?” she questioned.

 
          
The
answer flashed out instantly. “Since Lanning Halsey has been coming here so
much.”

 
          
“Lanning?
I used to think he came for Delia,” Mrs. Ralston
mused, speaking at random to gain still more time.

 
          
“It’s
natural you should suppose that every one came for Delia,”
Charlotte
rejoined dryly; “but as Lanning continues
to seek every chance of being with Tina—”

 
          
Mrs.
Ralston raised her head and stole a swift glance at her cousin. She had in
truth noticed that Tina had changed, as a flower changes at the mysterious
moment when the unopened petals flush from within. The girl had grown
handsomer, shyer, more silent, at times more irrelevantly gay. But Delia had
not associated these variations of mood with the presence of Lanning Halsey,
one of the numerous youths who had haunted the house before young Delia’s marriage.
There had, indeed, been a moment when Mrs. Ralston’s eye had been fixed, with a
certain apprehension, on the handsome Lanning. Among all the sturdy and stolid
Halsey cousins he was the only one to whom a prudent mother might have
hesitated to entrust her daughter; it would have been hard to say why, except
that he was handsomer and more conversable than the rest, chronically
unpunctual, and totally unperturbed by the fact. Clem Spender had been like
that; and what if young Delia—?

 
          
But
young Delia’s mother was speedily reassured. The girl, herself arch and
appetizing, took no interest in the corresponding graces except when backed by
more solid qualities. A Ralston to the core, she demanded the Ralston virtues,
and chose the Halsey most worthy of a Ralston bride.

 
          
Mrs.
Ralston felt that
Charlotte
was waiting for her to speak. “It will be hard to get used to the idea
of Tina’s marrying,” she said gently. “I don’t know what we two old women shall
do, alone in this empty house—for it will be an empty house then. But I suppose
we ought to face the idea.”

 
          
“I
do
face it,” said Charlotte Lovell
gravely.

 
          
“And
you dislike Lanning? I mean, as a husband for Tina?”

 
          
Miss
Lovell folded the evening paper, and stretched out a thin hand for her
knitting. She glanced across the citron-wood work-table at her cousin. “Tina
must not be too difficult—” she began.

 
          
“Oh—”
Delia protested, reddening.

 
          
“Let
us call things by their names,” the other evenly pursued. “That’s my way, when
I speak at all. Usually, as you know, I say nothing.”

 
          
The
widow made a sign of assent, and
Charlotte
went on: “It’s better so. But I’ve always
known a time would come when we should have to talk this thing out.”

 
          
“Talk
this thing out?
You and I?
What thing?”

 
          
“Tina’s future.”

 
          
There
was a silence. Delia Ralston, who always responded instantly to the least
appeal to her sincerity, breathed a deep sigh of relief. At last the ice in
Charlotte
’s breast was breaking up!

 
          
“My
dear,” Delia murmured, “you know how much Tina’s happiness concerns me. If you
disapprove of Lanning Halsey as a husband, have you any other candidate in
mind?”

 
          
Miss
Lovell smiled one of her faint hard smiles. “I am not aware that there is a
queue at the door. Nor do I disapprove of Lanning Halsey as a husband.
Personally, I find him very agreeable; I understand his attraction for Tina.”

 
          
“Ah—Tina
is
attracted?”

 
          
“Yes.”

 
          
Mrs.
Ralston pushed aside her work and thoughtfully considered her cousin’s
sharply-lined face. Never had Charlotte Lovell more completely presented the
typical image of the old maid than as she sat there, upright on her
straight-backed chair, with narrowed elbows and clicking needles, and
imperturbably discussed her daughter’s marriage.

 
          
“I
don’t understand, Chatty. Whatever Lanning’s faults are—and I don’t believe
they’re grave—I share your liking for him. After all—” Mrs. Ralston
paused—“what is it that people find so reprehensible in him? Chiefly, as far as
I can hear, that he can’t decide on the choice of a profession. The
New York
view about that is rather narrow, as we
know. Young men may have other tastes…artistic…literary…they may even have
difficulty in deciding…”

 
          
Both
women coloured slightly, and Delia guessed that the same reminiscence which
shook her own bosom also throbbed under
Charlotte
’s strait bodice.

 
          
Charlotte
spoke. “Yes: I understand that. But
hesitancy about a profession may cause hesitancy about…other decisions…”

 
          
“What
do you mean?
Surely not that Lanning—?”

 
          
“Lanning
has not asked Tina to marry him.”

 
          
“And
you think he’s hesitating?”

 
          
Charlotte
paused. The steady click of her needles
punctuated the silence as once, years before, it had been punctuated by the
tick of the Parisian clock on Delia’s mantel. As Delia’s memory fled back to
the scene she felt its mysterious tension in the air.

 
          
Charlotte
spoke. “Lanning is not hesitating any
longer: he has decided
not
to marry
Tina. But he has also decided not to give up seeing her.”

 
          
Delia
flushed abruptly; she was irritated and bewildered by
Charlotte
’s oracular phrases, doled out between
parsimonious lips.

 
          
“You
don’t mean that he has offered himself and then drawn back? I can’t think him
capable of such an insult to Tina.”

 
          
“He
has not insulted Tina. He has simply told her that he can’t afford to marry.
Until he chooses a profession his father will allow him only a few hundred
dollars a year; and that may be suppressed if—if he marries against his
parents’ wishes.”

 
          
It
was Delia’s turn to be silent. The past was too overwhelmingly resuscitated in
Charlotte
’s words. Clement Spender stood before her,
irresolute, impecunious,
persuasive
. Ah, if only she
had let herself be persuaded!

 
          
“I’m
very sorry that this should have happened to Tina. But as Lanning appears to
have behaved honourably, and withdrawn without raising false expectations, we
must hope…we must hope…” Delia paused, not knowing what they must hope.

 
          
Charlotte
Lovell laid down her knitting. “You know as well as I do, Delia, that every
young man who is inclined to fall in love with Tina will find as good reasons
for not marrying her.”