Linda Condon Part 7

Her manner, Pansy specially complained, was not intimate and inviting; in her room Linda usually closed the door; the frank community of the sisters was distasteful to her. She demanded an extraordinary amount of personal privacy. Linda never consulted Judith's opinion about her clothes, nor exchanged the more significant aspects of feeling. Alone in a bed-chamber furnished in silvery Hungarian ash, her bed a pale quilted luxury with Madeira linen crusted in monograms, without head or foot boards, and a dressing-table noticeably bare, she would deliberately and delicately prepare for the night.

While Judith's morning bath steamed with the softness and odor of lavender crystals, Linda slipped into water almost cold. This, with her clear muslins and heavy black silk stockings, her narrow unornamented slippers, represented the perfection of niceness.

There were others than Pansy, however, who commented on what they called her superiority--the young men who appeared in the evening. A number of them, cousins of the Feldt dinner parties or more casual, tried to engage her sympathies in their persons and prospects. It was a society of early maturity. But, without apparent effort, she discouraged them, princ.i.p.ally by her serene lack of interest. It was a fundamental part of her understanding of things that younger men were unprofitable; she liked far better the contemporaries of Moses Feldt.

Reynold Chase had ceased his visits, but his place had been taken by another and still another emotionally gifted man. The present one was dark and imperturbable: they knew little of him beyond the facts that he had been a long while in the Orient, that his manner and French were unsurpa.s.sed, and that practically every considerable creative talent in New York was entertained in his rooms.

Judith had been to one of his parties; and, the following morning in bed, she told Pansy and Linda the most remarkable things.

"It would never do for Pansy," she concluded; "but I must get Markue to ask you sometime, Linda. How old are you now? Well, that's practically sixteen, and you are very grown up. You would be quite sensational, in one of your plain white frocks, in his apartment. You'd have to promise not to tell your mother, though. She thinks I'm leading you astray now--the old dear. Does she think I am blind? I met a man last week, a friend of father's, who used to know her. Of course he wouldn't say anything, men are such idiots about that--like ostriches with their pasts buried and all the feathers sticking out--but there was a champagne expression in his smile."

Linda wondered, later, if she'd care to go to a party of Markue's. There was a great deal of drinking at such affairs; and though she rather liked cordials, creme de the and Grand Marnier, even stronger things flavored with limes and an occasional frigid c.o.c.ktail, she disliked--from a slight experience--men affected by drink. Judith had called her a const.i.tutional prude; this, she understood, was a term of reproach; and she wondered if, applied to her, it were just.

Usually it meant a religious person or one fussy about the edge of her skirt; neither of which she ever considered. She didn't like to sit in a corner and be hugged--even that she could now a.s.sert with a degree of knowledge--but it wasn't because she was shocked. Nothing, she told herself gravely, shocked her; only certain acts and moments annoyed her excessively. It was as if her mind were a crisp dress with ribbons which she hated to have mussed or disarranged.

Linda didn't take the trouble to explain this. Now that her mother had withdrawn from her into a perpetual and uncomfortable politeness she confided in no one. She would have been at a loss to put her complicated sensations and thoughts into words. Mr. Moses Feldt, the only one to whom she could possibly talk intimately, would be upset by her feelings.

He would give her a hug and the next day bring up a new present from his pocket.

Her clothes, with the entire support of Lorice, were all delicate in fabric, mostly white with black sashes, and plainly ruffled. She detested the gray crepe de Chine from which Judith's undergarments were made and the colored embroidery of Pansy's; while she ignored scented toilet-waters and extracts. Markue, in finally asking her to a party at his rooms, said that there she would resemble an Athenian marble, of the un-painted epoch, in the ballet of Scheherazade.

XIII

"There's nothing special to say about Markue's parties," Judith, dressing, told Linda. "You will simply have to take what comes your way.

There is always some one serious at them, if you insist, as usual, on dignity." She stood slim and seductive, like a perverse pierrot, before the oppressive depths of a black mirror. Linda had finished her preparations for the evening. There was no departure from her customary blanched exactness. She studied her reflection across Judith's shoulder; her intense blue eyes, under the level blot of her bang, were grave on the delicate pallor of her face.

In the taxi, slipping rapidly down-town, Linda was conscious of a slight unusual disturbance of her indifference. This had nothing to do with whether or not she'd be a success; her own social demands were so small that any considerable recognition of her was unimportant. Her present feeling came from the fact that to-night, practically, she was making her first grown-up appearance in the world, the world from which she must select the materials of her happiness and success. To-night she would have an opportunity to put into being all that--no matter how firmly held--until now had been but convictions.

Her interest was not in whom or what she might meet, but in herself.

Judith, smoking a cigarette in a mist of silver fox, was plainly excited. "I like Markue awfully," she admitted.

"Does he care for you?" Linda asked.

"That," said Judith, "I can't make out--if he likes me or if it's just anonymous woman. I wish it were the first, Linda." Her voice was shadowed; suddenly, in spite of her youth and exhilaration, she seemed haggard and spent. Linda recognized this in a cold scrutiny. Privately she decided that the other was a fool--she didn't watch her complexion at all.

The motor turned west in the low Forties and stopped before a high narrow stone facade with a ma.s.sive griffon-guarded door. Judith led the way directly into the elevator and designated Markue's floor. It was at the top of the building, where he met them with his impenetrable courtesy and took them into a bare room evidently planned for a studio.

There were an empty easel, the high blank dusty expanse of the skylight, and chairs with the somber hats and coats of men and women's wraps like the glistening shed skins of brilliant snakes.

They turned through the hall to an interior more remarkable than anything Linda could have imagined; it seemed to her very high, without windows and peaked like a tent. Draperies of intricate Eastern color hung in long folds. There were no chairs, but low broad divans about the walls, a thick carpet with inlaid stands in the center laden with boxes of cigarettes, sugared exotic sweets and smoking incense. It was so dim and full of thick scent, the shut effect was so complete, that for a moment Linda felt painfully oppressed; it seemed impossible to breathe in the wavering bluish atmosphere.

Markue, who had appeared sufficiently familiar outside, now had a strange portentous air; the gleams of his quick black eyes, the dusky tone of his cheeks, his impa.s.sive grace, startled her. New York was utterly removed: the taxi that had brought Judith and her, the swirling traffic of Columbus Circle and smooth undulations of Fifth Avenue, were lost with a different life. She saw, however, the open door to another room full of clear light, and her self-possession rapidly returned.

Judith--as she had threatened--at once deserted her; and Linda found an inconspicuous corner of a divan.

There were, perhaps, twenty people in the two rooms, and each one engaged her attention. A coffee-colored woman was sitting beyond her, clad in loose red draperies to which were sewed s.h.i.+ning patterns of what she thought was gold. Markue was introducing Judith, and the seated figure smiled pleasantly with a flash of beautiful teeth and the supple gesture of a raised brown palm. That, Linda decided, was the way she shook hands. Two dark-skinned men, one in conventional evening dress, were with her; they had small fine features and hair like carved ebony.

Linda had never before been at an affair with what she was forced to call colored people; instinctively she was antagonistic and superior.

She turned to a solemn masculine presence with a ruffled s.h.i.+rt and high black stock; he was talking in a resonant voice and with dramatic gestures to a woman with a white face and low-drawn hair. Linda was fascinated by the latter, dressed in a soft clinging dull garnet.

It wasn't her clothes, although they were remarkable, that held her attention, but the woman's mouth. Apparently, it had no corners. Like a little band of crimson rubber, or a ring of vivid flame, it s.h.i.+fted and changed in the oddest shapes. It was an unhappy mouth, and made her think of pain; but perhaps not so much that as hunger ... not for food, Linda was certain. What did she want?

There was a light appealing laugh from another seated on the floor in a floating black dinner dress with lovely ankles in delicate Spanish lace stockings; her head was thrown back for the whisper of a heavy man with ashen hair, a heavenly scarf and half-emptied gla.s.s.

Her bare shoulders, Linda saw, were as white as her own, as white but more sloping. The other's hair, though, was the loveliest red possible.

The entire woman, relaxed and laughing in the perfumery and swimming shadows, was irresistible. A man with a huge nose and blank eyes, his hands disfigured with extraordinary rings, momentarily engaged her.

Then, at the moment when she saw an inviting and correctly conventional youth, he crossed and sat at her side.

"Quite a show," he said in the manner she had expected and approved. The glow of his cigarette wavered over firmly cut lips. "We've just come to New York," he continued. "I don't know any one here but Markue, do you?"

Linda explained her own limitations. "The Victory's fine and familiar."

She followed his gaze to where a winged statue with flying drapery was set on a stand. She had seen it before, but without interest. Now it held her attention. It wasn't a large cast, not over three feet high, but suddenly Linda thought that it was the biggest thing in the room; it seemed to expand as she watched it.

Beside the Victory, in a gla.s.s case with an enclosed concealed light, was a statue, greenish gray, a few inches tall, with a sneering placidity of expression as notable as the sweep of the other white fragment. "That's Chinese," her companion decided; "it looks as old as l.u.s.t." There was the stir of new arrivals--a towering heavy man with a slight woman in emerald satin. "There's Pleydon, the sculptor," the youth told her animatedly. "I've seen him at the exhibitions. It must be Susanna Noda, the Russian singer, with him. He's a tremendous swell."

XIV

Linda watched Pleydon as he met Markue in the middle of the room. He was dressed carelessly, improperly for the evening; but she forgave that as the result of indifference. The informal flannels and soft collar, too, suited the largeness of his being and gestures. There was a murmur of meeting, Susanna Noda smiled appealingly; and then, as Pleydon found a place on a divan, she at once contentedly sat on his lap. Watching her, Linda thought of a brilliant parrot; but that was only the effect of her color; for her face, with a tilted nose and wide golden eyes, generous warm lips, was charming. She lighted a cigarette, turned her graceful back on the room and company, and chatted in French to the composed sculptor.

Linda divined that he was the most impressive figure she had encountered; the quality of his indifference was beautiful and could only have come in the security of being a "tremendous swell." That phrase described all for which she had cared most. It included everything that her mother had indicated as desirable and a lot that she, Linda, had added. Money, certainly, was an absolute necessity; but there were other things now that vaguely she desired. She tried to decide what they were.

Only the old inner confusion resulted, the emotion that might have been born in music; however, it was sharper than usual, and bred a new dissatisfaction with the easier accomplishments. Really it was very disturbing, for the pressure of her entire experience, all she had been told, could be exactly weighed and held. The term luxury, too, was revealing; it covered everything--except her present unformed longing.

There were still newcomers, and Linda was aware of a sudden constraint.

A woman volubly French had appeared with a long pinkish-white dog in a blanket, and the three Arabians--she had learned that much--had risen with a concerted expression of surprise and displeasure. Their anxiety, though, was no more dramatic than that of the dog's proprietor. The gesture of her hands and lifted eyebrows were keenly expressive of her impatience with any one who couldn't accept, with her, her dog.

"Markue ought to have it out," some one murmured. "Dogs, to high caste Mohammedans, are unclean animals." Another added, "Worse than that, if it should touch them, they would have to make the pilgrimage to Mecca."

Without any knowledge of the situation of Mecca, Linda yet realized that it must be a very long journey to result from the mere touch of a dog.

She didn't wonder at the restrained excitement of the "colored" people.

The situation was reduced to a sub-acid argument between the Frenchwoman and the Begum; Madame couldn't exist without her "_p't.i.t_." The Oriental lady could not breathe a common air with the beast. The former managed a qualified triumph--the "_p't.i.t_" was caged with a chair in a corner, and the episode, for the moment, dropped.

Soon, however, Linda saw that the dog had wriggled out of captivity. It made a cautious progress to where the candy stood on a low stand and ran an appreciative tongue over the exposed sweet surfaces. Rapidly a sugared fig was snapped up. Linda held her breath; no one had noticed the animal yet--perhaps it would reach one of the objectors and she would have the thrill of witnessing the departure for Mecca.

But, as always, nothing so romantic occurred; the dog was discovered, and the Mohammedans, with a hurried politeness, made their salaams.

Instead, a man with a quizzical scrutiny through gla.s.ses that made him resemble an owl, stopped before her.

"'Here we go 'round the mulberry-bush,'" he chanted. "h.e.l.lo, Kate Greenaway. Have you had a drink?"

"Yes, thank you," she replied sedately.

"Certified milk?"

"It was something with gin," she particularized, "and too sweet." He took the place beside her and solemnly recited a great many nursery rhymes. On the whole she liked him, deciding that he was very wicked.

Soon he was holding her hand in both of his. "I know you're not real,"