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.That night upon arriving home at midnightshe stepped out of the taxi, and involuntarily, without thought, looked up tosee the stars.But there were no stars.A murky yellow-tinged blackness hunglow over the city.Carley recollected that stars, and sunrises and sunsets,and untainted air, and silence were not for city dwellers.She checked anycontinuation of the thought.A few days sufficed to swing her into the old life.Many of Carley's friendshad neither the leisure nor the means to go away from the city during thesummer.Some there were who might have afforded that if they had seen fit tolive in less showy apartments, or to dispense with cars.Other of her bestfriends were on their summer outings in the Adirondacks.Carley decided to gowith her aunt to Lake Placid about the first of August.Meanwhile she wouldPage 83ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlkeep going and doing.She had been a week in town before Morrison telephoned her and added hiswelcome.Despite the gay gladness of his voice, it irritated her.Really, shescarcely wanted to see him.But a meeting was inevitable, and besides, goingout with him was in accordance with the plan she had adopted.So she made anengagement to meet him at the Plaza for dinner.When with slow and ponderingaction she hung up the receiver it occurred to her that she resented the ideaof going to the Plaza.She did not dwell on the reason why.When Carley went into the reception room of the Plaza that night Morrison waswaiting for her--the same slim, fastidious, elegant, sallow-faced Morrisonwhose image she had in mind, yet somehow different.He had what Carley calledthe New York masculine face, blase and lined, with eyes that gleamed, yet hadno fire.But at sight of her his face lighted up."By Jove I but you've come back a peach!" he exclaimed, clasping her extendedhand."Eleanor told me you looked great.It's worth missing you to see youlike this.""Thanks, Larry," she replied."I must look pretty well to win that complimentfrom you.And how are you feeling? You don't seem robust for a golfer andhorseman.But then I'm used to husky Westerners.""Oh, I'm fagged with the daily grind," he said."I'll be glad to get up inthe mountains next month.Let's go down to dinner."They descended the spiral stairway to the grillroom, where an orchestra wasplaying jazz, and dancers gyrated on a polished floor, and diners in eveningdress looked on over their cigarettes."Well, Carley, are you still finicky about the eats?" he queried, consultingthe menu."No.But I prefer plain food," she replied."Have a cigarette," he said, holding out his silver monogrammed case."Thanks, Larry.I--I guess I'll not take up smoking again.You see, while Iwas West I got out of the habit.""Yes, they told me you had changed," he returned."How about drinking?""Why, I thought New York had gone dry!" she said, forcing a laugh."Only on the surface.Underneath it's wetter than ever.""Well, I'll obey the law."He ordered a rather elaborate dinner, and then turning his attention toCarley, gave her closer scrutiny.Carley knew then that he had becomeacquainted with the fact of her broken engagement.It was a relief not to needto tell him."How's that big stiff, Kilbourne?" asked Morrison, suddenly."Is it true hegot well?""Oh--yes! He's fine," replied Carley with eyes cast down.A hot knot seemedto form deep within her and threatened to break and steal along her veins."But if you please--I do not care to talk of him."Page 84ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html"Naturally.But I must tell you that one man's loss is another's gain."Carley had rather expected renewed courtship from Morrison.She had not,however, been prepared for the beat of her pulse, the quiver of her nerves,the uprising of hot resentment at the mere mention of Kilbourne.It was onlynatural that Glenn's former rivals should speak of him, and perhapsdisparagingly.But from this man Carley could not bear even a casualreference.Morrison had escaped the army service.He had been given ahigh-salaried post at the ship-yards--the duties of which, if there had beenany, he performed wherever he happened to be.Morrison's father had made afortune in leather during the war.And Carley remembered Glenn telling her hehad seen two whole blocks in Paris piled twenty feet deep with leather armygoods that were never used and probably had never been intended to be used.Morrison represented the not inconsiderable number of young men in New Yorkwho had gained at the expense of the valiant legion who had lost.But what hadMorrison gained? Carley raised her eyes to gaze steadily at him.He lookedwell-fed, indolent, rich, effete, and supremely self-satisfied.She could notwe that he had gained anything.She would rather have been a crippled ruinedsoldier."Larry, I fear gain and loss are mere words, she said."The thing that countswith me is what you are."He stared in well-bred surprise, and presently talked of a new dance whichhad lately come into vogue.And from that he passed on to gossip of thetheatres.Once between courses of the dinner he asked Carley to dance, and shecomplied.The music would have stimulated an Egyptian mummy, Carley thought,and the subdued rose lights, the murmur of gay voices, the glide and grace anddistortion of the dancers, were exciting and pleasurable.Morrison had thesuppleness and skill of a dancing-master.But he held Carley too tightly, andso she told him, and added, "I imbibed some fresh pure air while I was outWest--something you haven't here--and I don't want it all squeezed out of me."The latter days of July Carley made busy--so busy that she lost her tan andappetite, and something of her splendid resistance to the dragging heat andlate hours.Seldom was she without some of her friends.She accepted almostany kind of an invitation, and went even to Coney Island, to baseball games,to the motion pictures, which were three forms of amusement not customary withher.At Coney Island, which she visited with two of her younger girl friends,she had the best time since her arrival home.What had put her in accord withordinary people? The baseball games, likewise pleased her.The running of theplayers and the screaming of the spectators amused and excited her.But shehated the motion pictures with their salacious and absurd misrepresentationsof life, in some cases capably acted by skillful actors, and in others a sillyseries of scenes featuring some doll-faced girl.But she refused to go horseback riding in Central Park.She refused to go tothe Plaza.And these refusals she made deliberately, without asking herselfwhy [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]