The arbiters of social fate in Middleville assembled at Mrs. Maynard's on a Monday afternoon, presumably to partake of tea. Seldom, however, did they meet without adding zest to the occasion by a pricking down of names.
Mrs. Wrapp was the leading spirit of this self-appointed tribunal--a circumstance of expanding, resentment to Mrs. Maynard, who had once held the reins with aristocratic hands. Mrs. Kingsley, the third member of the great triangle, claimed an ancestor on the Mayflower, which was in her estimation a guerdon of blue blood. Her elaborate and exclusive entertainments could never be rivalled by those of Mrs. Wrapp. She was a widow with one child, the daughter Elinor, a girl of nineteen.
Mrs. Maynard was tall, pale, and worldly. Traces of lost beauty flashed in her rare smiles. When Frank Maynard had failed in business she had shrouded her soul in bitterness; and she saw the slow cruel years whiten his head and bend his shoulders with the cold eye of a woman who had no forgiveness for failure. After Mr. Maynard's reverse, all that kept the pair together were the son Blair, and the sweet, fair-haired, delicate Margaret, a girl of eighteen, whom the father loved, and for whom the mother had large ambitions. They still managed, in ways mysterious to the curious, to keep their fine residence in the River Park suburb of Middleville.
On this April afternoon the tea was neglected in the cups, and there was nothing of the usual mild gossip. The discussion involved Daren Lane, and when two of those social arbiters settled back in their chairs the open sesame of Middleville's select affairs had been denied to him.
"Why did he do it?" asked Mrs. Kingsley.
"He must have been under the influence of liquor," replied Mrs. Maynard, who had her own reasons for being relieved at the disgrace of Daren Lane.
"No, Jane, you're wrong," spoke up Mrs. Wrapp, who, whatever else she might be, was blunt and fair-minded. "Lane wasn't drunk. He never drank before the war. I knew him well. He and Helen had a puppy-love affair--they were engaged before Lane went to war. Well, the day after his return he called on us. And if I never liked him before I liked him then. He's come back to die! He was ill for two weeks--and then he crawled out of bed again. I met him down town one day. He really looked better, and told me with a sad smile that he had 'his ups and downs'.... No, Lane wasn't drunk at Fanchon Smith's dance the other night. I was there, and I was with Mrs. Smith when Lane came up to us. If ever I saw a cool, smooth, handsome devil it was Lane.... Well, he said what he said. I thought Mrs. Smith would faint. It is my idea Lane had a deep motive back of his remark about Fanchon's dress and her dancing. The fact is Lane was sick at what he saw--sick and angry. And he wanted Fanchon's mother and me to know what he thought."
"It was an insult," declared Mrs. Maynard, vehemently.
"It made Mrs. Smith ill," added Mrs. Kingsley. "She told me Fanchon tormented the life out of her, trying to learn what Lane said. Mrs. Smith would not tell. But Fanchon came to me and I told her. Such a perfectly furious girl! She'll not wear that dress or dance that dance very soon again. The story is all over town."
"Friends, there are two sides to every question," interposed the forceful Mrs. Wrapp. "If Lane cared to be popular he would have used more tact. But I don't think his remark was an insult. It was pretty raw, I admit. But the dress was indecent and the dance was rotten. Helen told me Fanchon was half shot. So how could she be insulted?"
Mrs. Maynard and Mrs. Kingsley, as usual, received Mrs. Wrapp's caustic and rather crude opinions with as good grace as they could muster. Plain it was that they felt themselves a shade removed from this younger and newer member of society. But they could not show direct antagonism to her influence any more than they could understand the common sense and justice of her arguments.
"No one will ever invite him again," declared Mrs. Maynard.
"He's done in Middleville," echoed Mrs. Kingsley. And that perhaps was a gauntlet thrown.
"Rot!" exclaimed Mrs. Wrapp, with more force than elegance. "I'll invite Daren Lane to my house.... You women don't get the point. Daren Lane is a soldier come home to die. He gave himself. And he returns to find all--all this sickening--oh, what shall I call it? What does he care whether or not we invite him? Can't you see that?"
"There's a good deal in what you say," returned Mrs. Kingsley, influenced by the stronger spirit. "Maybe Lane hated the new styles. I don't blame him much. There's something wrong with our young people. The girls are crazy. The boys are wild. Few of them are marrying--or even getting engaged. They'll do anything. The times are different. And we mothers don't know our daughters."
"Well, I know mine" returned Mrs. Maynard, loftily. "What you say may be true generally, but there are exceptions. My daughter has been too well brought up."
"Yes, Margie is well-bred," retorted Mrs. Wrapp. "We'll admit she hasn't gone to extremes, as most of our girls have. But I want to observe to you that she has been a wall-flower for a year."
"It certainly is a problem," sighed Mrs. Kingsley. "I feel helpless--out of it. Elinor does precisely what she wants to do. She wears outlandish clothes. She smokes and--I'm afraid drinks. And dances--dreadfully. Just like the other girls--no better, no worse. But with all that I think she's good. I feel the same as Jane feels about that. In spite of this--this modern stuff I believe all the girls are fundamentally the same as ten years ago."
"Well, that's where you mothers get in wrong," declared Mrs. Wrapp with her vigorous bluntness. "It's your pride. Just because they're your daughters they are above reproach.... What have you to say about the war babies in town? Did you ever hear of that ten years ago? You bet you didn't. These girls are a speedy set. Some of them are just wild for the sake of wildness. Most of them have to stand for things, or be left out altogether."
"What in the world can we do?" queried Mrs. Maynard, divided between distress and chagrin.
"The good Lord only knows," responded Mrs. Wrapp, herein losing her assurance. "Marriage would save most of them. But Helen doesn't want to marry. She wants to paint pictures and be free."
"Perhaps marriage is a solution," rejoined Mrs. Maynard thoughtfully.
"Whom on earth can we marry them to?" asked Mrs. Kingsley. "Most of the older men, the bachelors who're eligible haven't any use for these girls except to play with them. True, these young boys only think of little but dances, car-rides, and sneaking off alone to spoon--they get engaged to this girl and that one. But nothing comes of it."
"You're wrong. Never in my time have I seen girls find lovers and husbands as easily as now," declared Mrs. Wrapp. "Nor get rid of them so quickly.... Jane, you can marry Margaret. She's pretty and sweet even if you have spoiled her. The years are slipping by. Margaret ought to marry. She's not strong enough to work. Marriage for her would make things so much easier for you."
With that parting dig Mrs. Wrapp rose to go. Whereupon she and Mrs. Kingsley, with gracious words of invitation and farewell, took themselves off leaving Mrs. Maynard contending with an outraged spirit. Certain terse remarks of the crude and practical Mrs. Wrapp had forced to her mind a question that of late had assumed cardinal importance, and now had been brought to an issue by a proposal for Margaret's hand. Her daughter was a great expense, really more than could longer be borne in these times of enormous prices and shrunken income. A husband had been found for Margaret, and the matter could be adjusted easily enough, if the girl did not meet it with the incomprehensible obstinacy peculiar to her of late.
Mrs. Maynard found the fair object of her hopes seated in the middle of her room with the bright contents of numerous boxes and drawers strewn in glittering heaps around her.
"Margaret, what on earth are you doing there?" she demanded.
"I'm looking for a little picture Holt Dalrymple gave me when we went to school together," responded Margaret.
"Aren't you ever going to grow up? You'll be hunting for your dolls next."
"I will if I like," said the daughter, in a tone that did not manifest a seraphic mood.
"Don't you feel well?" inquired the mother, solicitously. Margaret was frail and subject to headaches that made her violent.
"Oh, I'm well enough."
"My dear," rejoined Mrs. Maynard, changing the topic. "I'm sorry to tell you Daren Lane has lost his standing in Middleville."
The hum and the honk of a motor-car sounded in the street.
"Poor Daren! What's he done?... Any old day he'll care!"
Mrs. Maynard was looking out of the window. "Here comes a crowd of girls.... Helen Wrapp has a new suit. Well, I'll go down. And after they leave I want a serious talk with you."
"Not if I see you first!" muttered Margaret, under her breath, as her mother walked out.
Presently, following gay talk and laughter down stairs, a bevy of Margaret's friends entered her boudoir.
"Hello, old socks!" was Helen's greeting. "You look punk."
"Marg, where's the doll? Your mother tipped us off," was Elinor's greeting.
"Where's the eats?" was Flossie Dickerson's greeting. She was a bright-eyed girl, with freckles on her smiling face, and the expression of a daring, vivacious and happy spirit--and acknowledged to be the best dancer and most popular girl in Middleville. Her dress, while not to be compared with her friends' costumes in costliness, yet was extreme in the prevailing style.
"Glad to see you, old dear," was dark-eyed, dark-haired Dorothy Dalrymple's greeting. Her rich color bore no hint of the artificial. She sank down on her knees beside Margaret.
The other girls draped themselves comfortably round the room; and Flossie with a 'Yum Yum' began to dig into a box of candy on Margaret's couch. They all talked at once. "Hear the latest, Marg?"
"Look at Helen's spiffy suit!"
"Oh, money, money, what it will buy!"
"Money'll never buy me, I'll say."
"Marg, who's been fermentin' round lately? Girls, get wise to the flowers."
"Hot dog! See Marg blush! That comes from being so pale. What are rouge and lip-stick and powder for but to hide truth from our masculine pursuers?"
"Floss, you haven't blushed for a million years."
It was Dorothy Dalrymple who silenced the idle badinage.
"Marg, you rummaging in the past?" she cried.
"Yes, and I love it," replied Margaret. "I haven't looked over this stuff for years. Just to remember the things I did!... Here, Dal, is a picture you once drew of our old teacher, Miss Hill."
Dorothy, whom the girls nicknamed "Dal," gazed at the drawing with amaze and regret.
"She was a terror," continued Margaret. "But Dal, you never had any reason to draw such a horrible picture of her. You were her pet."
"I wasn't," declared Dorothy.
"Maybe you never knew Miss Hill adored you, Dal," interposed Elinor. "She was always holding you up as a paragon. Not in your lessons--for you were a bonehead--but for deportment you were the class!"
"Dal, you were too good for this earth then, let alone these days," said Margaret.
"Miss Hill," mused Elinor, gazing at the caricature. "That's not a bad drawing. I remember Miss Hill never had any use for me. Small wonder. She was an honest-to-God teacher. I think she wanted us to be good.... Wonder how she got along with the kids that came after us."
"I saw Amanda Hill the other day," spoke up Flossie. "She looked worn out. She was nice to me. I'll bet my shirt she'd like to have us back, bad as we were.... These kids of to-day! My Gawd! they're the limit. They paralyze me. I thought I was pretty fast. But compared to these youngsters I'm tied to a post. My kid sister Joyce--Rose Clymer--Bessy Bell!... Some kids, believe me. And take it from me, girls, these dimple-kneed chickens are vamping the older boys."
"They're all stuck on Bessy," said Helen.
Margaret squealed in delight. "Girls, look here. Valentines! Did you ever?... Look at them.... And what's this?... 'Wonders of Nature--composition by Margaret Maynard.' Heavens! Did I write that? And what's this sear and yellow document?"
A slivery peal of laughter burst from Margaret.
"Dal, here's one of your masterpieces, composed when you were thirteen, and mooney over Daren Lane."
"I? Never! I didn't write it," denied Dorothy, with color in her dark cheeks.
"Yes you did. It's signed--'Yours forever Dot Dalrymple.' ... Besides I remember now Daren gave it to me. Said he wanted to prove he could have other girls if he couldn't have me."
"How chivalrous!" exclaimed Dorothy, joining in the laugh.
"Ah! here's what I've been hunting," declared Margaret, waving aloft a small picture. "It's a photograph of Holt, taken five years ago. Only the other evening he swore I hadn't kept it--dared me to produce it. He'll want it now--for some other girl. But nix, it's mine.... Dal, isn't he a handsome boy here?"
With sisterly impartiality Dorothy declared she could not in the wildest flight of her imagination see her brother as handsome.
"Holt used to be good-looking," said she. "But he outgrew it. That South Carolina training camp and the flu changed his looks as well as his disposition."
"Holt is changed," mused Margaret, gazing down at the picture, and the glow faded from her face.
"Dare Lane is handsome, even if he is a wreck," said Elinor, with sudden enthusiasm. "Friday night when he beat it from Fanchon's party he sure looked splendid."
Elinor was a staunch admirer of Lane's and she was the inveterate torment of her girl friends. She gave Helen a sly glance. Helen's green eyes narrowed and gleamed.
"Yes, Dare's handsomer than ever," she said. "And to give the devil his due he's finer than ever. Too damn fine for this crowd!... But what's the use--" she broke off.
"Yes, poor Dare Lane!" sighed Elinor. "Dare deserves much from all of us, not to mention you. He has made me think. Thank Heaven, I found I hadn't forgotten how."
"El, no one would notice it," returned Helen, sarcastically.
"It's easy to see where you get off," retorted Elinor.
Then a silence ensued, strange in view of the late banter and quick sallies; a silence breathing of restraint. The color died wholly from Margaret's face, and a subtle, indefinable, almost imperceptible change came over Dorothy.
"You bet Dare is handsome," spoke up Flossie, as if to break the embarrassment. "He's so white since he came home. His eyes are so dark and flashing. Then the way he holds his head--the look of him.... No wonder these damned slackers seem cheap compared to him.... I'd fall for Dare Lane in a minute, even if he is half dead."
The restraint passed, and when Floss Dickerson came out with eulogy for any man his status was settled for good and all. Margaret plunged once more into her treasures of early schooldays. Floss and Elinor made merry over some verses Margaret had handed up with a blush. Helen apparently lapsed into a brooding abstraction. And presently Dorothy excused herself, and kissing Margaret good-bye, left for home.
The instant she had gone Margaret's gay and reminiscent mood underwent a change.
"Girls, I want to know what Daren Lane did or said on Friday night at Fanchon's," spoke up Margaret. "You know mother dragged me home. Said I was tired. But I wasn't. It was only because I'm a wall-flower.... So I missed what happened. But I've heard talk enough to make me crazy to know about this scandal. Kit Benson was here and she hinted things. I met Bessy Bell. She asked me if I knew. She's wild about Daren. That yellow-legged broiler! He doesn't even know her.... My brother Blair would not tell me anything. He's strong for Daren. But mother told me Daren had lost his standing in Middleville. She always hated Daren. Afraid I'd fall in love with him. The idea! I liked him, and I like him better now--poor fellow!... And last, when El mentioned Daren, did you see Dal's face? I never saw Dal look like that."
"Neither did I," replied Elinor.
"Well, I have," spoke up Helen, with all of her mother's bluntness. "Dal always was love-sick over Daren, when she was a mere kid. She never got over it and never will."
"Still water runs deep," sapiently remarked Elinor. "There's a good deal in Dal. She's fine as silk. Of course we all remember how jealous she was of other girls when Daren went with her. But I think now it's because she's sorry for Daren. So am I. He was such a fool. Fanchon swears no nice girl in Middleville will ever dance that new camel-walk dance in public again."
"What did Daren say?" demanded Margaret, with eyes lighting.
"I was standing with Helen, and Fanchon when Daren came up. He looked--I don't know how--just wonderful. We all knew something was doing. Daren bowed to Fanchon and said to her in a perfectly clear voice that everybody heard: 'I'd like to try your camel-walk. I'm out of practice and not strong, but I can go once around, I'm sure. Will you?'"
'You're on, Dare,' replied Fanchon.
Then he asked. 'Do you like it?'
'I'll say so, Dare--crazy about it.'
'Of course you know why it's danced--and how it's interpreted by men,' said Daren.
'What do you mean?' asked Fanchon, growing red and flustered.
"Then Daren said: 'I'll tell your mother. If she lets you dance with that understanding--all right.' He bent over Mrs. Smith and said something. Mrs. Wrapp heard it. And so did Mrs. Mackay, who looked pretty sick. Mrs. Smith nearly fainted!... but she recovered enough to order Daren to leave."
"Do you know what Daren said?" demanded Margaret, in a frenzy of excitement.
"No. None of the girls know. We can only imagine. That makes it worse. If Fanchon knows she won't tell. But it is gossip all over town. We'll hear it soon. All the girls in town are imagining. It's spread like wildfire. And what do you think, Margie? In church--on Sunday--Doctor Wallace spoke of it. He mentioned no names. But he said that as the indecent dress and obscene dance of the young women could no longer be influenced by the home or the church it was well that one young man had the daring to fling the truth into the faces of their mothers."
"Oh, it was rotten of Daren," replied Margaret, with tears in her eyes. She was ashamed, indignant, incredulous. "For him to do a thing like that! He's always been the very prince of gentlemen. What on earth possessed him? Heaven knows the dances are vile, but that doesn't excuse Daren Lane. What do I care what Doctor Wallace said? Never in a thousand years will Mrs. Smith or mother or any one forgive him. Fanchon Smith is a little snob. I always hated her. She's spiteful and catty. She's a flirt all the way. She would dance any old thing. But that's not the point. Daren's disgraced himself. It was rotten--of him. And--I'll never--forgive--him, either."
"Don't cry, Margie," said Elinor. "It always makes your eyes red and gives you a headache. Poor Daren made a blunder. But some of us will stick to him. Don't take it so badly."
"Margie, it was rotten of Daren, one way you look at it--our way," added Flossie. "But you have to hand it to him for that stunt."
Helen Wrapp preserved her sombre mood, silent and brooding.
"Margie," went on Elinor, "there's a lot back of this. If Dare Lane could do that there must be some reason for it. Maybe we all needed a jolt. Well, we've got it. Let's stand by Daren. I will. Helen will. Floss will. You will. And surely Dal will."
"If you ask me I'll say Dare Lane ought to hand something to the men!" burst out Floss Dickerson, with fire in her eyes.
"You said a mouthful, kiddo," responded Helen, with her narrow contracted gaze upon Margaret. "Daren gave me the once over--and then the icepick!"
"Wonder what he gave poor Mel--when he heard about her," murmured Elinor, thoughtfully.
"Mel Iden ought to be roasted," retorted Helen. "She was always so darned superior. And all the time...."
"Helen, don't you say a word against Mel Iden," burst out Margaret, hotly. "She was my dearest friend. She was lovely. Her ruin was a horrible shock. But it wasn't because she was bad.... Mel had some fanatical notion about soldiers giving all--going away to be slaughtered. She said to me, 'A woman's body is so little to give,'"
"Yes, I know Mel was cracked," replied Helen. "But she needn't have been a damn fool. She didn't need to have had that baby!"
"Helen, your idea of sin is to be found out," said Elinor, with satire.
Again Floss Dickerson dropped her trenchant personality into the breach.
"Aw, come off!" she ejaculated. "Let somebody roast the men once, will you? I'm the little Jane that knows, believe me. All this talk about the girls going to hell makes me sick. We may be going--and going in limousines--but it's the men who're stepping on the gas."
"Floss, I love to hear you elocute," drawled Helen. "Go to it! For God's sake, roast the men."
"You always have to horn in," retorted Floss. "Let me get this off my chest, will you?... We girls are getting talked about. There's no use denying it. Any but a blind girl could see it. And it's because we do what the men want. Every girl wants to go out--to be attractive--to have fellows. But the price is getting high. They say in Middleville that I'm rushed more than any other girl. Well, if I am I know what it costs.... If I didn't 'pet'--if I didn't mush, if I didn't park my corsets at dances--if I didn't drink and smoke, and wiggle like a jelly-fish, I'd be a dead one--an egg, and don't you overlook that. If any one says I want to do these things he's a fool. But I do love to have good times, and little by little I've been drawn on and on.... I've had my troubles staving off these fellows. Most of them get half drunk. Some of the girls do, too. I never went that far. I always kept my head. I never went the limit. But you can bet your sweet life it wasn't their fault I didn't fall for them.... I'll say I've had to walk home from more than one auto ride. There's something in the gag, 'I know she's a good girl because I met her walking home from an auto ride.' That's one thing I intend to cut out this summer--the auto rides. Nothing doing for little Flossie!"
"Oh, can't we talk of something else!" complained Margaret, wearily, with her hands pressing against her temples.
