_ It was a good deal better than a broiling Sunday in town--of
that no doubt remained to Lily as, reclining in the shade of a
leafy verandah, she looked seaward across a stretch of greensward
picturesquely dotted with groups of ladies in lace raiment and
men in tennis flannels. The huge Van Alstyne house and its
rambling dependencies were packed to their fullest capacity with
the Gormers' week-end guests, who now, in the radiance of the
Sunday forenoon, were dispersing themselves over the grounds in
quest of the various distractions the place afforded:
distractions ranging from tennis-courts to shooting-galleries,
from bridge and whiskey within doors to motors and steam-launches
without. Lily had the odd sense of having been caught up into the
crowd as carelessly as a passenger is gathered in by an express
train. The blonde and genial Mrs. Gormer might, indeed, have
figured the conductor, calmly assigning seats to the rush of
travellers, while Carry Fisher represented the porter pushing
their bags into place, giving them their numbers for the
dining-car, and warning them when their station was at hand. The
train, meanwhile, had scarcely slackened speed--life whizzed on
with a deafening' rattle and roar, in which one traveller at
least found a welcome refuge from the sound of her own thoughts.
The Gormer MILIEU represented a social out-skirt which Lily had
always fastidiously avoided; but it struck her, now that she was
in it, as only a flamboyant copy of her own world, a caricature
approximating the real thing as the "society play" approaches the
manners of the drawing-room. The people about her were doing the
same things as the Trenors, the Van Osburghs and the Dorsets: the
difference lay in a hundred shades of aspect and manner, from the
pattern of the men's waistcoats to the inflexion of the women's
voices. Everything was pitched in a higher key, and there was
more of each thing: more noise, more colour, more champagne, more
familiarity--but also greater good-nature, less rivalry, and a
fresher capacity for enjoyment.
Miss Bart's arrival had been welcomed with an uncritical
friendliness that first irritated her pride and then brought her
to a sharp sense of her own situation--of the place in life
which, for the moment, she must accept and make the best of.
These people knew her story--of that her first long talk with
Carry Fisher had left no doubt: she was publicly branded as the
heroine of a "queer" episode--but instead of shrinking from her
as her own friends had done, they received her without question
into the easy promiscuity of their lives. They swallowed her past
as easily as they did Miss Anstell's, and with no apparent sense
of any difference in the size of the mouthful: all they asked was
that she should--in her own way, for they recognized a diversity
of gifts--contribute as much to the general amusement as that
graceful actress, whose talents, when off the stage, were of the
most varied order. Lily felt at once that any tendency to be
"stuck-up," to mark a sense of differences and distinctions,
would be fatal to her continuance in the Gormer set. To be taken
in on such terms--and into such a world!--was hard enough to the
lingering pride in her; but she realized, with a pang of
self-contempt, that to be excluded from it would, after all, be
harder still. For, almost at once, she had felt the insidious
charm of slipping back into a life where every material
difficulty was smoothed away. The sudden escape from a stifling
hotel in a dusty deserted city to the space and luxury of a great
country-house fanned by sea breezes, had produced a state of
moral lassitude agreeable enough after the nervous tension and
physical discomfort of the past weeks. For the moment she must
yield to the refreshment her senses craved--after that she would
reconsider her situation, and take counsel with her dignity. Her
enjoyment of her surroundings was, indeed, tinged by the
unpleasant consideration that she was accepting the hospitality
and courting the approval of people she had disdained under other
conditions. But she was growing less sensitive on such points: a
hard glaze of indifference was fast forming over her delicacies
and susceptibilities, and each concession to expediency hardened
the surface a little more.
On the Monday, when the party disbanded with uproarious adieux,
the return to town threw into stronger relief the charms of the
life she was leaving. The other guests were dispersing to
take up the same existence in a different setting: some at
Newport, some at Bar Harbour, some in the elaborate rusticity of
an Adirondack camp. Even Gerty Farish, who welcomed Lily's return
with tender solicitude, would soon be preparing to join the aunt
with whom she spent her summers on Lake George: only Lily herself
remained without plan or purpose, stranded in a backwater of the
great current of pleasure. But Carry Fisher, who had insisted on
transporting her to her own house, where she herself was to perch
for a day or two on the way to the Brys' camp, came to the rescue
with a new suggestion.
"Look here, Lily--I'll tell you what it is: I want you to take my
place with Mattie Gormer this summer. They're taking a party out
to Alaska next month in their private car, and Mattie, who is the
laziest woman alive, wants me to go with them, and relieve her of
the bother of arranging things; but the Brys want me too--oh,
yes, we've made it up: didn't I tell you?--and, to put it
frankly, though I like the Gormers best, there's more profit for
me in the Brys. The fact is, they want to try Newport this
summer, and if I can make it a success for them they--well,
they'll make it a success for me." Mrs. Fisher clasped her hands
enthusiastically. "Do you know, Lily, the more I think of my idea
the better I like it--quite as much for you as for myself. The
Gormers have both taken a tremendous fancy to you, and the trip
to Alaska is--well--the very thing I should want for you just at
present."
Miss Bart lifted her eyes with a keen glance. "To take me out of
my friends' way, you mean?" she said quietly; and Mrs. Fisher
responded with a deprecating kiss: "To keep you out of their
sight till they realize how much they miss you." _