_ PART II. MYRTLE
CHAPTER X
Meantime, Joe had written his name at the top of a new sheet. He drew up to the curb on Broadway just below Fourth and stopped the motor. He leaned back against the tufted arm and stretched himself. Then he idly viewed the passing show before him. It was past mid-afternoon and dry and dusty. The keen edge of the sun had slightly dulled, but a Negro, seated high up on a pile of shabby furniture on a moving van, mopped a shining black face with the end of a very dirty undershirt sleeve. A boy came wavering along on a bicycle, swerved in to the curbing across the street, stopped, got off and went in to the Baptist Seminary, leaving the bicycle sprawling in the gutter. An old woman came out of nowhere; he heard her uncertain steps before he saw her as she approached him; the wide pavement the moment before had been entirely deserted. She walked as though she had no definite destination, not straight ahead in a plumb line. She had an old-fashioned bonnet with dangles on her head and a straw basket over one arm. Somehow he thought of his aunt Lorry. She came peering up at him from under her lashes. She seemed drawn by the brightness of the car. And her dim eyes seemed searching in the shadow of the top for a definite assurance. As she drew near, Joe smiled, a little absently; the rusty steel aigrette perched on top of the bonnet like the horn of a unicorn was nodding so gravely. The old thing caught the smile. Her face brightened. Her mouth spread in a toothless grin. She reached out a hand and touched the car lightly with a withered finger on the fender.
"Such a pretty buggy," she said. The voice was tremulous and high-pitched and the articulation thick and indistinct.
Then she looked at Joe; her rheumy gaze passed over him from the tips of his shiny new shoes to the crown of his hat. Admiration now spoke from her with perhaps greater eloquence even though her lips were still, parted a little. The pause had been but momentary.
Joe reached over and threw the door open.
"Climb in," he said. "I'll take you for a ride."
The old woman shrank back from the car, wide-eyed in alarm.
"Come on," he urged, quite gently, "I'm not a masher. I'll bring you right back here, all safe and right side up."
The old face wrinkled in a shrewd, crafty grin. She lingered on the pavement for a moment in indecision, then came slowly forward and paused at the running board, peering upward into Joe's face.
"Take me for a ride?" she lisped, tremulously eager.
"Sure," said Joe. "I'm selling 'em." He held the door open invitingly. "Maybe you'll buy one some day."
Again the swift flash of a smile passed over the slack mouth and there was a gathering in the wrinkles in the corners of her eyes. Painfully she pulled herself up into the car and sank into the seat beside him.
He switched on the motor, threw out the clutch, engaged the starting gear, and paused with his hand on the lever.
"We'll go around this way. It's not so crowded and I think the air's better."
She smiled at him confidently.
They started. At the corner he swung around in a wide sweep. He caught a glance at her and saw her sitting with eyes glued intently on the street before them, her hands gripping the edge of the seat. Then the block ahead was straight and smooth and free of traffic.
He patted the chest of his coat.
"I've just put an order away in here," he said. "It's very easy. They're scrambling over each other to buy these cars."
She gave him a fleeting glance and returned to her desperate business of watching the road.
For a moment he was silent. They rounded another corner.
"I'm not really expecting you to buy a car--merely speak a good word for it with your friends. That is, if you like it. It is all right, isn't it?"
At his questioning tone she again ventured a look at him and smiled again uncertainly, still gripping the edges of the seat.
One more corner and they were on the return trip. Directly they were rolling up toward the curb from whence they had started. They stopped and Joe reached over and opened the door again. The old woman caught the import of the movement and clambered stiffly out, stooping low with her head to avoid the top brace. She stood on the curbing, bewildered and blinking, apparently lost.
Joe reached out and handed her a card.
"You're headed just the same way you were when I picked you up," he said. "And in the same spot." And as she made no move and apparently did not hear him, "Call on me if I can serve you. I can do other things besides sell motor cars.
"Good-bye," he said, tipping his hat and slamming the door shut. Then he moved away. He left her standing there, watching.
He turned in Fourth Street and slowed down to about six miles an hour. The lengthening shadows were bringing out the ephemeral creatures that might otherwise wither in the heat. The west pavement was already crowded and there was a stream of motors idling along in a sluggish tide, southward. It was the time of day when the city, as it were, stretches itself after its siesta and takes long, lazy, satisfied looks at itself.
Joe slumped in the seat. This lazy panorama had not begun to pall on him. He luxuriated in it. It was something of a holiday to him. The change that had come over his life was inexplicable; without effort he had lifted himself. The selection of an occupation had been haphazard; he had merely taken the first thing that had offered itself--selling automobiles. And there had been no difficulty in selling them, none whatever. The very first month his commissions had amounted to considerably more than twice the sum Bromley's had paid him.
The motor was thrumming along slowly and regularly, giving out soft little ticks like a clock. Everything about it was shining and new. Everything about Joe was shining and new. He felt sleek, lazy, and comfortable. He made no effort to analyze the change that had come over him, merely accepted it as a matter of course. At times would come vague wonderings why he had been such a "chump" as to hang on in that treadmill of an office as long as he had.
He thought about the old woman and her grenadier bonnet and her bewildered pleasure, and chuckled to himself. The old soul had probably never been in an automobile before. He had raised the standard of her desires. She might not be satisfied again until she had another ride, maybe many more. It might even stir her up. That was what it was. Ignorance was what kept most people down. They did not know what they were missing. And so they just plugged along taking things as they came, most of them. That was what had been the matter with him. Hard work never got a man anywhere, just hard work. He shut his mind resolutely on the thought and turned again to the inspection of the evening parade.
As he came in sight of the windows of Bessire's Department Store he remembered that there was something there that he needed. And there was no need of his hurrying back to the office. He had done enough for the day. So he turned the corner and squeezed into an opening on the side street. He stepped out on to the pavement and indulged in a luxurious stretch of the arms. The sudden glare of the sun on the pavement made him sneeze. It was delightful. He walked lazily through the revolving doors of the department store.
As he gained the interior a woman brushed past him so that he had to stop in his tracks. As she passed she looked into his eyes. Something in him stopped with a click like a notch on a reel.
He gazed after her, trying to remember. But all there was was a faint lingering scent that was difficult and alluring. There was something familiar about the curve of the neck, something about the tilt of the hat, he had seen before. It disturbed him. All he had caught was a flicker of her eyes, as though she had thought to recognize him and then had changed her mind. She turned a corner into a distant aisle and was gone.
He had a momentary impulse to follow to the end of that aisle and see where it led to, but he checked it. He gathered himself together and lazily strolled along in search of the counter he wanted. Quiet had descended upon the store. It was almost deserted of shoppers and the yellow light came streaming down the cross aisles heavy laden with dust particles. The little bundle girls leaned from their stalls behind the counters and chatted. There was a pleasant buzz in the air.
He made his purchase and lingered for a moment at a counter of notions. Then he strolled back toward the door, steeped in the feeling of well being. A girl at a curved counter was tucking in a wisp of hair and taking off her paper sleeve protectors. Over beyond, there by the west entrance, they were already shutting the doors. He paused and watched the day's closing pleasantly settle down. Then he reached out a hand to push open the door before him. Somebody jostled against him. A small collection of paper bundles spilled out on to the floor at his feet and he mechanically stooped to pick them up. They were manifestly feminine. There were four of them, all small; he gathered them all up in one hand.
Then he rose to his feet and turned to restore them to their owner.
He looked into a pair of limpid violet eyes.
They dropped and long lashes shaded them. A delicate colour rose and splashed the softest of cheeks.
Joe stood, holding the bundles.
Directly she looked at him again. It was a very timid, gentle, apologetic look. She seemed to be gathering courage.
"Oh," she burst out in a sudden sweet abandonment to friendliness. "I'm so sorry." She paused then, uncertain what next to do or say.
Joe held the door open for her, keeping tight hold of the packages. He felt a little warm behind the ears.
She preceded him to the pavement. He got a good look at her as she passed through the door. Still the baffling resemblance!
Then she turned and faced him on the pavement. Again she looked at him shyly, and there were little dimples in her cheeks as she tried hard not to smile.
"I knew I'd get into trouble when I loaded myself down with all these bundles," she explained, reaching out for them.
Confidence was returning to him. He felt the old lazy relaxation of being amused.
"Can't I help you out of your difficulty--see that you get safely home with them?" he asked quietly. "I've my car here."
She raised her eyebrows, looked startled a moment, and then flushed slightly. "Oh, don't bother. I can get a taxi."
She made no further resistance and directly he was slamming the door behind her. He had caught a glimpse of black-silk stocking above a white buckskin pump that somehow disturbed his poise. As he walked around to the other side of the car he was wondering where it was he had seen her before. He could not remember.
He climbed into his place behind the steering wheel and observed her again. It was a setting that became her. Her shyness seemed to have all vanished. She was powdering her nose as he climbed in; a silver vanity case lay open on her lap. He noticed it, saw a hairpin and two nickles and a card or two. She had said she might take a taxi.
Directly she was smiling into his eyes. It made him just a little bit giddy in spite of himself. How old was she, he wondered? For a moment he busied himself with the car. There was nothing made up about her; it was a clear case of good looks. And she knew how to wear her clothes.
"I think I'm terrible," she was saying.
"How?" he answered, hardly hearing her.
"Letting you take me up this way." She finished her renovation to her evident satisfaction and packed away the puff with a snap.
"You couldn't expect to manage those bundles any other way," he assured confidently and quietly. It was an amusing game.
She gazed off toward the corner and wetted her lips.
He started the car. They turned the corner into Fourth Street and moved south. As if sensing the need of further explanation here on the esplanade, where all seemed acquainted, she began in a slightly more animated tone:
"Of course, it's not like we had never met."
He felt she was looking at him, but being busy with the car he was silent.
"I really believe you've forgotten."
He caught a glance at her. She looked charmingly provoked. The fact that she was centring her attention on him was in itself flattering. "Not at all," he assured her and wondered to what she referred.
"It was at the American Legion Ball," she reminded him.
And then he remembered. It all came back to him. It had been a dismal evening, way back in April. He had noticed her that evening. She had worn a weird thing of silver and black. She had even sat beside him on a sofa by the door--she and her partner. But he had not met her; he was sure of that. He had remarked, he remembered now, how curiously alert her eyes were, how alive, taking everything in.
"You were in uniform," she continued.
"Yes," he replied. Nearly every man present had been.
For a few moments silence. Then reaching Broadway and less traffic they rolled along a little more easily, with less tension.
"I'm Myrtle Macomber," she at length essayed. "In case you had forgotten."
Joe grinned. Then he turned to her, "And my name's Hooper."
She gave him another one of her roguish glances through her lashes.
"I was trying to remember," she laughed.
Then he asked her the way home and she told him. After that she chatted more freely, made comments on some of the people they passed. The evening had turned out fine. Broad orange pennons streamed out of the west. The little fountain in the city park tinkled delightfully as they passed.
"It's a pretty car," she said once; "so roomy and comfortable."
He made no reply and wondered if his silence were reprehensible.
Under her direction they turned into a quiet side street and stopped before a grayish frame house with a fancy bulbous tower at one corner and bilious green outside shutters. A woman was stooped over a flower bed in the centre of the yard. She arose stiffly at their approach.
Miss Macomber turned to Joe, but he had already alighted from the car and gone around to help her out. As he held the door open for her she seemed a bit distrait. Slowly they walked across the pavement to the gate. The woman in the yard came forward to meet them.
There was a moment's pause. And then: "This is Mr. Hooper, mama."
The woman gave him an appraising look, glanced at the car, then smiled and held out her hand. It was damp and flabby.
"Please excuse my appearance, Mr. Hooper," she smirked. "I was getting some flowers for the table, dearie," she added to the girl.
Joe wondered vaguely at the contrast. Here was another of nature's paradoxes. Mrs. Macomber looked worn and quite untidy. She was fat; her figure looked as though it had been allowed to run wild. Her face was heavily lined with wrinkles and was not too clean. And her eyes were tired. The house dress that she wore open at the neck and held together by a bleak-looking cameo pin might have been destined for dust rags in some families, and not extravagantly, either.
She gazed at her daughter with open admiration.
"Thank you so much, Mr. Hooper," said the latter, and as she spoke she barred the entrance through the wooden gate with a dainty arm in a long, white-silk glove. But she smiled at him archly. "Call me up sometime."
And then she turned and, gently pushing the drab creature before her, went up the walk and into the house.
Joe looked back over his shoulder at them as he drove away. _