_ CHAPTER XV
The Pomona, on West ---- Street, was well known among those swell apartment houses of Manhattan which find it profitable to cater to the liberal-spending demi-monde, and therefore are not prone to be too fastidious regarding the morals of their tenants. Many such hostelries were scattered throughout the theatre district of New York, and as a rule they prospered exceedingly well. Invariably they were of the same type. There was the same monotonous sameness in the gaudy decorations and furnishings; the same hilarious crowd in the café downstairs; the same overdressed, over-rouged women in the elevator and halls. They enjoyed in common the same class of patronage--blonde ladies with lengthy visiting-lists of gentlemen callers.
Willard Brockton occupied a suite on the sixth floor, and it was one of the handsomest and most expensive in the hotel. It consisted of ten large rooms and three baths. The large sitting-room in white and gold had two windows overlooking fashionable Fifth Avenue. The furnishings were expensive and rich, but lacked that good taste which would naturally obtain in rooms occupied by people a little more particular concerning their reputation and mode of life. At one end of the room a large archway hung with tapestries led to the sleeping chambers. At the other end a door opened onto a small private hall, which, in turn, had another door communicating with the main corridor. The apartment was expensively and elaborately furnished. The inlaid floors were strewn with handsome Oriental rugs, the chairs and sofas were heavy gilt, upholstered in crimson silk, while here and there were Louis XV writing desks, teakwood curio cabinets, costly bronzes and statuary. The walls were covered with valuable paintings and engravings. Near the window stood a superb full-length Empire cheval glass, the kind that women love to dress by and survey their beauty.
Two months had sped quickly by since that cold, stormy day in February, when Laura, distracted, half-starved, her spirit broken, despairing of aid from Madison or any other decent quarter, threatened with eviction even from Mrs. Farley's miserable lodgings, weakly surrendered, listened to the call which summoned her back to her former life, and once more became Brockton's mistress.
At first the sudden transition from misery and absolute want to all the comforts and extravagant luxuries that unlimited means can command was so gratifying that she saw no reason to repent of the step she had taken. On the contrary, she rejoiced that she was still pretty enough, still young and clever enough to hold a man of Brockton's influence and wealth. Decidedly, she thought to herself, Elfie was right. Virtue was all very well for nice, good girls who did not mind doing chores, practicing painful economy, wearing shabby clothes, and tiring themselves out for small wages in petty, humiliating occupations, but she could never stand it. She would die rather. Life would not be worth living if she were to be always denied the sweets of life, and to her that meant champagne suppers, gorgeous gowns, and all that goes with them. So, banishing from her mind any unpleasant memories or regrets, she plunged headlong into the boiling vortex of gay metropolitan life. Thanks to Brockton, she secured one of the best parts of the expiring theatrical season, and made such a hit that her name was in everybody's mouth. The newspapers interviewed her, society women copied her, toothpaste and perfume manufacturers solicited her testimonials. In a word, she was famous overnight. Burgess, the manager, was now eager to sign for five years, but Laura laughed, and tore up the contract before his face. What did she care now? She had the whip hand. The managers had neglected and despised her long enough; they could do the running after contracts now.
Meantime she drained the cup of pleasure to the very dregs. It was one continual round of gaiety. She seemed insatiable. With Elfie St. Clair and others, she formed an intimate circle of friends, a little coterie of the swiftest men and women in town, and entertained them lavishly, spending wilfully, recklessly. Her extravagances were soon the talk of New York. A thousand dollars for a single midnight supper, $700 for a new gown, $200 for a hat were as nothing. Once more she reigned as the belle of Broadway, Almost each night, after the play, she was the centre of an admiring throng in the pleasure resorts, and none ventured to dispute the claim that she was the prettiest as well as the best-dressed woman in town. Dressmakers, attracted by her matchless figure and eager to profit by her vogue, turned out for her their latest creations; milliners designed for her hats that were the despair of every other woman. She had her carriages, her automobiles, and her saddle horse, her town apartment and her bungalow by the sea, and for a time set a pace so swift that no other woman of her acquaintance could keep up with her. All this cost money, and a lot of it, but Brockton gave her free rein. The broker did not care. He smiled indulgently and footed her enormous bills without protest. On the contrary, he was delighted. Never had she proved so fascinating a companion or attracted so much attention in public. He was getting plenty of other people's money in the Wall Street game, so why should he care if his mistress spent a few thousands a year more or less? It amused him to see her plunging, as he put it. Besides, he was proud of his protégée. It flattered him when they entered a theatre or restaurant, Laura wearing her $200 picture hat, to hear people whisper: "That's Brockton's girl. Isn't she stunning?"
She drank more champagne than was good for her, and when this happened, Brockton himself would chide her. But she only laughed at him, and, disregarding his rebuke, turned to the waiter and imperiously ordered another bottle. Not that she liked the golden, hissing stuff. It made her sick and gave her a bad headache the next morning, but still she must drink it, drink it unceasingly. It was the only way she could deaden that terrible, accusing conscience which persistently demanded an accounting. With her knowledge of her own guilt and her tendency to introspective brooding, it was only natural that her sensitive nature suffered atrociously. All day and all night her conscience tortured her. Incessantly it put the agonizing question: Have you been true, true to yourself and to the man to whom you gave your word? And always came the damning answer: "No--I've been false, miserably false, both to myself and him."
In her quieter moods--the moods she dreaded most--she allowed her mind to dwell on the past. She wondered what John was doing and where he was. Had he succeeded or had he failed? For a long time she had received no word. On leaving Mrs. Farley's, she had left no address and had taken no pains to have her mail forwarded. No doubt his letters had been returned to him. Sometimes she regretted having burned the message of farewell which Brockton had dictated. It would have been fairer, more honest, to have told him the truth frankly. Brockton had wanted to do the right thing, and she had lied, making him believe she had done it.
That was why she despised herself, and that was why she drank champagne--so she might forget. Sometimes she took too much. One night Elfie St. Clair celebrated her birthday by giving a supper in her apartment. It was a jolly gathering, and they made merry until the late hours of the morning. Laura had been particularly high spirited and hilarious until, toward the end, her face grew deathly white. Seized with a sudden dizziness, she had to be wrapped in furs and carried down to her carriage. Brockton, embarrassed, declared it to be due to the heat. Everybody present knew it was the champagne.
But gaiety that is forced and only artificially stimulated cannot be kept up long. One day the reaction inevitably comes, and then the awakening is terrible, disastrous. At times, when, in company of others, she was laughing loudly and appearing to be thoroughly enjoying herself, she would suddenly become serious, talk no more, and go away in the corner by herself. Her companions teased her about it, and called such symptoms "Laura's tantrums." The truth was that each day the girl realized more the hollowness and rottenness of the life she was leading. She was filled with repulsion and disgust, both for herself and her associates. While she was weak and luxury-loving, she was not entirely devoid of character. There was enough sentimentality and emotion in her moral fibre to make her see the impossibility of continuing to live this irregular, vicious kind of existence. Women of Elfie St. Clair's type could do it, because they had no innate refinement of feeling, but she could not, and, in her saner moments, when she thought of what she had lost, when she remembered how she had been regenerated, purified, by her disinterested love for a good man, she looked wistfully back on those weeks at Mrs. Farley's boarding-house. Her attic, miserable as it was, was a haven of happiness and respectability compared with her present degradation.
Then, again, she had an uncomfortable idea that there was an accounting still to be made. In her sleep she saw John Madison approaching, stern, terrible, exacting some awful penalty, like an implacable judge. She had a premonition of an approaching catastrophe, a feeling, vague but nevertheless palpable, that something was going to happen. The idea obsessed her, haunted her; she could not shake it off. She became nervous of her own shadow. Gradually, too, she grew to dislike Brockton. Instead of feeling gratitude for all the luxuries he gave her, she blamed him for having made her what she was. She classed him as the type of man who preys on woman's virtue and exults in the number of souls he is able to destroy. She looked upon him as responsible for all her troubles, for her degradation and sacrifice of her womanhood. He was the eternal enemy of her sex, the arch tempter, the anti-christ. Her mind became obsessed with this idea, and a savage, unreasoning hate for him and all his kind sprang up in her heart.
Meantime, things pursued the even tenor of their way, at least outwardly. Brockton was careless, indifferent, good natured as usual. Laura was seemingly as gay and carefree as ever. None saw the ripples on the apparently serene surface, except, perhaps, one pair of black eyes which, always spying, never missed anything. Annie guessed her mistress' thoughts, but was shrewd enough to hold her tongue. The negress, promoted from the rank of maid of all work at Mrs. Farley's establishment, had been elevated to the dignity of lady's maid. Laura never liked the negress, but well aware of the difficulty she might have in finding a servant, she accepted her voluntary offer to follow when she went with Brockton. The woman knew her ways, and in some respects was a good servant--at least as faithful and honest as any she could expect to get, which was not, of course, saying a great deal. But smart as she was, the negress never quite succeeded in deceiving her young mistress. Laura never trusted her further than she could see her. A hundred times, her patience tried to the limit, she had discharged her.
"You'll go in the morning, Annie."
"Yassum!"
But somehow Annie always stayed. _