Chapter 23
There came another Fourth of July, one year from the time of the visit to the Gibbses. Doc French was a member of the Cohasset Beach Yacht Club, as well as of the Family Yacht Club. There was to be a wonderful party at the former on the evening of the 4th. It was the club's annual show. A dinner was to be followed by a vaudeville entertainment,
provided by a number of talented actors from the Lambs Club, and after that a dance which would probably last all night. Doc French invited Martin Devlin and his wife to be his guests. He was giving a little dinner party for his sister-in-law, Lou, and her cousin, Mrs. Edith Prentiss, who were spending the holiday with him. Jeanette was overjoyed at the prospect.
She spent a day shopping in New York and bought herself silver satin slippers, a pair of gray silk stockings to wear with a silver dress, part of her trousseau, which she had had no occasion to put on since she moved to the country. It promised to be a delightful affair, and Martin shared her excitement. It turned out to be all she expected. The spacious dining room, the dancing floor, even the awninged porches were crowded with tables, gay with flowers and patriotic decorations.
There was a beguiling atmosphere of soft lights, color and music, smart and lovely women, elaborate costumes, attractive men. Jeanette felt that she herself bloomed with beauty, that she appeared tall, statuesque, superb. People at other tables threw appraising glances, and occasionally she saw a lornette leveled in her direction. Doc French was admiring and attentive. She liked his sister-in-law,
and particularly Mrs. Prentiss. The vaudeville show, on an improvised stage, at one end of the long room, was one of the best she had ever witnessed. Some of the actors were headliners in their profession. With songs and stories, they kept the audience rocking with laughter and stirred it to roars of applause. One of the entertainers particularly drew Jeanette's interest, a young actor named Michael Carr, an unusually attractive youth, renowned for his good looks. A matinee
idol, he had held the boards on Broadway all winter as the leading attraction in a Viennese opera. Jeanette thought he sang delightfully and had a most charming personality. Towards midnight, the chairs and tables were cleared away, and the dancing began. Doc French did not dance himself, but he had no difficulty in securing partners for his guests, and Jeanette floated around the gaily decorated ballroom through the soft colors of calcium lights thrown upon the dancers in an
intoxication of pleasure. Men, young and old, seemed anxious to know her and ask her to dance. She was in demand every moment, and in one of these dizzying worlds she was interrupted by Doc French to introduce Michael Carr. The actor had asked to be presented. Could he have a dance? The next was promised, but he could have it just the same, she said with shining eyes. She drifted away in his arms presently, a sweet giddiness enveloping her senses,
rocking her in sensuous delight. They glided from the dance and wandered out upon the long pier over the water. The lisping waves lapped the piles and rhythmically beat upon the pebbled shore. the music of the dance reached them plaintively. Yachts, white and ghostly, stood sentinels at their moorings, their cabins pinpricked with lights, their starboard lanterns glowing green. The night air was caressing. Gay voices floated toward them. There was smothered laughter from
hidden corners. The heavens were a myriad of golden stars. Quite simply, Michael Carr took the slim silver figure in his arms. She melted into his embrace, and their lips clung to one another's long and lovingly. It was a night of love, a night for lovers. The brilliantly lit ballroom, the music drew them back. Jeanette had no sense of guilt. The mood of the hour still wrapped her. For the moment, she loved this man wholeheartedly. He was divine, a superman, a god.
No thought of Martin came to distress her. She was supremely content, supremely happy. It was rapture, bliss, enchantment. In her ear he kept whispering, You are wonderful.
You are beautiful. You are adorable. Doc French was beckoning to her, but she only smiled amiably at him as she passed and floated on in Michael's arms, bending and undulating with him in perfect symmetry of motion. There was no such thing as time or space.
She shut her eyes and seemed to be floating, floating, floating. Doc French stopped them with a hand on the actor's arm. Sorry to interrupt, he said, but I fear I must. Your husband, Mrs. Devlin. May I speak to you a moment? Carr said, oh, I beg pardon, and stepped aside, but Jeanette's thoughts followed him. What is it, Doc? Martin had better go home, Mrs. Devlin. and he's been downstairs at the bar, and I guess he's had a bit too much.
I was going to take him home myself, but I didn't know how to get into your house. Martin? He's been downstairs at the bar, and I'm afraid the fellows there wouldn't let him get away. Martin?
Reality came blindingly upon her with a glare of hideous white light. Her dreams shattered, ugliness obtruded, things naked and angular, harshness and cold cruelty. She felt as if she were being jerked from enchanted slumber by a rude and horrid hand. She clutched at her heart as if to tear out the pain that had already stabbed her there.
Martin! She breathed again, gasping a little, the blood draining from her face. He's all right, Mrs. Devlin, quite all right, I assure you. Nothing's happened to him, nothing wrong. There's been no accident.
Accident? Her eyes widened with sudden fear. No, no, it's all right. He's just drunk a little too much, and I thought he'd better go home. Oh, surely. Right away. Where is he?
Well, we've got him out in my car. Let's go, let's go then. Let's go quickly. I'll get my wraps. She started for the dressing room. Good night. Michael's voice called after her, but she did not turn her head. Doc French led her to the motor car. Martin lay huddled in the back, insensate a long string of saliva trailing from his underlip, a strange man supported him.
A trembling, whispered exclamation escaped Jeanette. Her companion kept on reassuring her. There's nothing, nothing the matter, he repeated. He's had too much to drink, that's all. Get in the front seat with me, and I'll drive you straight home, and we'll put him to bed. They bumped over the car tracks in Washington Street and the dusty, uneven ground in front of the station. the dawn was coming up angry and on fire in the east. Before the bungalow, Jeanette jumped from
the motor car and struggled to insert the twisted latch key in the lock, but her fingers shook so much it took her some time to manage it. Behind her, Doc French and the strange man were lifting Martin from the car. As they wrenched him free, he groaned painfully. Jeanette flew into the house, flung on the lights, tore back the gay-figured Cretone cover of the bed. Her underclothes lay upon the chair where she had tossed them when she had been so happily dressing. She gathered these
with one swift reach and threw them to the floor of a closet. The stumbling feet were coming, the men were carrying Martin head and feet. With a concerted effort they heaved him upon the bed, and he lay there inertly, sprawling, just as he had fallen. Can I help you, Miss Devlin? asked the doctor, dusting off his hands. Oh, no. Thank you very much, Jeanette answered in a strained voice.
Don't you think we'd better undress him? He's pretty heavy for you to manage alone. Jeanette looked at the helpless figure flung out across the bed, ungainly postured like a child's discarded doll, purple lips parting with each breath, the hair damp and tousled. One of his garters had loosened and dangled now from the wrinkled hose that covered a patent-leathered pump. No, she said again slowly. Thank you very much for
all your kindness, Doc. But it's my—my job. He belongs to me. I'll take care of him. Three hours later she walked out on the back porch. The heat of the Sunday morning was moist and tropical, giving promise of a scorching day. The bells of the Catholic Church on the Point Road were ringing sweetly for the children's mass. Her eyes felt burnt out from lack of sleep, two black holes in her head. Hilda was making a small fuss in the kitchen, rattling pans,
droning hoarsely to herself. Jeanette stood at the porch railing and looked off across the quiet country, misty with the early heat. Emotions were at war in her heart, and there was pain, pain, pain. She had not been to bed. She had not even lain down. The silver gown had been put away. her finery discarded, and now she wore the striped velveteen wrapper in which she usually did her morning's work. She had undressed her husband, removed his shoes, drawn off his dress
suit tugging at its arms, rolling him from one side to another to free the clothing. She had washed his face with a cold wet rag and brushed the rumpled hair from his eyes. Then she had put the room in order, opened the casement windows, drawn the shades, closed the door and left him to peace and sleep. The house had needed straightening, and to this she had turned her attention, adjusting rugs, pushing chairs into position, emptying ash
receivers, carrying away newspapers, arranging magazines and books in neat piles, using broom and dustpan wiping the furniture with a dustcloth. Hilda had given her some coffee at eight o'clock, and she had drunk it black and crunched some thin slices of buttered toast. Now nothing remained to be done, and the thoughts to which she had resolutely shut her mind clamored for admittance to her weary brain. Remorse and reproach, censure and repugnance, disillusionment, humiliation,
grief, and regret, they swarmed upon her like so many black flies. The hours of the morning ticked themselves away. She could not sleep. She could not rest. Over and over her thoughts turned to the incident of the night, giving her no peace, no surcease. Every little while she would go softly to Martin's door and silently look in upon him. He lay as she had left him. In spite of the open windows, the room reeked of alcohol. Towards noon she fell asleep on the couch
in the living room, and the afternoon light was waning when she opened her eyes. The sound of water woke her. Martin was running a bath, and when presently she entered the bedroom, she found him shaving. She was shocked at his appearance, his face was dead white, the eyes bloodshot, and his hand trembled as he held the razor, but it was Martin, restored to life and sanity. They avoided one another's glance, and constraint held them silent.
She could see that physically he was weak, his nerves still shattered, and that his mind was sick with remorse and fear of her displeasure. He could not guess she wanted only to take him in her arms, to kiss and comfort him, wanted only to be kind and good to him, to restore him to health and strength, wanted to utter no word of reproach, but to give him all the love she could, and so ease the pain and shame within herself. Three weeks later, Doc French drove up in front
of the bungalow door in his lumbering motor car. It was late in the afternoon. There had been a heavy thunderstorm about two o'clock, but now the sun was glittering on all the dripping trees and drenched shrubbery, and the air was fragrant with sweet grassy and woodland smells. There was to be another dance at the Cohasset Beach Yacht Club the following Saturday night. Doc's sister-in-law and Mrs. Prentice were coming down for it and would stay with him over the weekend. It happened
to be Lou's birthday, and he wanted Martin and Jeanette to help celebrate the event at a small dinner he was arranging at the Cohasset Beach Clubhouse before the dance. Jeanette thanked him and said that no, she was sorry, but she and Martin had another engagement. Doc was very kind to think of them, but it would have to be another time. When her husband came home on the 5.20, she told him about it. Oh, you betcha, he agreed. No more of that kind of stuff for this young
fellow. We're out of our class at that club, Jan. I thought, suggested Jeanette, we might go to the other club that night. There's always a dance there, and it would be our excuse to dock French. It occurred to me that perhaps after we got to know those people a little better, we might like it. Martin's face beamed with pleasure. Would you? Would you really go? he asked eagerly. Say, Jan, that'll be fine. Say, if you only wouldn't be so standoffish and proud,
you'd learn to like that gang and they'd learn to like you. They're awfully good-hearted. Well, I'll try, said his wife. End of Book Two, Chapter Five, Sections Seven through Nine
