Chapter III: “saw Yuh!”

MISS WELLS had other reasons for feeling guilty. Travelling about a foreign city with a man whose name she did not know, suggesting to him the dare-devil possibility of a week’s sight-seeing together, decoying him into a genuinely excitable interest in the scheme--he _had_ been hard to work up to the due pitch; and she had some pride in her art there--and then snubbing him with the reality, these were not the main causes of her uneasiness as she loafed in the steamer-chair and listened very intently to the sound of the voices as each new group of returning tourists struggled up the gang-plank.

Of course she had never a thought of really slipping off with this mild semi-English “Richard.” She would not have dared. It gave her a shiver of joy and a shock of fright to think of the thing: the blessed freedom, the strong sense of being protected and catered to without any sickening atmosphere of male--there is no word for it, but she knew exactly what always disgusted her finally in the best of men companions. A smirk of the eye, a pretence at absorbing interest in the lady’s welfare, a terrific deference to her whims and a plashing of small talk aimed exactly to meet the requirements of the small female mind; all that plus a fluttering about which is so significantly--male.

The worst of it was, she thought as she waited, the environment of that sort of thing had had its frightful effect upon her. She had developed a feminine helplessness exactly in proportion as the masculine helpers had pressed about her. To-day she had felt her lack keenly. Her voice was high and over-confident. Her talk flashed. She held to no topic, but darted here and there. All this had been applauded for years. Men had shown frank amusement at her sallies. They had flattered her into a sense of security.... And they felt no such thing. It was the male joke to treat women like children, give in to them at every unimportant point, offer them absolutely no resistance, so thereby they should never grow. Men insult each other, argue, deny, speak the truth, give the lie, and so thrive. What man would give a woman the chance of growth that lies in insult!

This Richard chap had told her quietly and frankly that she had not let her mind develop, although he assured her that it was struggling to express its native maturity.

“Your mind is really grown up,” he had remarked, after she had uttered a supposedly stinging bit of cleverness, the sort that made other men laugh and pretend fear. “Why don’t you hold your speech back sometimes--that rattling, quick-fire, spoiled child’s speech of yours? Alternate days of silence would give your real self a chance; but you shout it down; you talk it into helplessness. One of these days, if you don’t look out, it will give up, and then you will be like thousands of other women--horribly like.”

In revenge she spoke not a word for a full half-hour as they watched the view from the balcony on the hill. But he--good, unoffending soul!--had matched her with a sample of his own silence. And throughout the interminable half-hour he had seemed to be unaware of aught save the peace and serenity of the moment, while she was torn with violent desire to break forth. Before the time was up, her anger had cooled, she noted; the hot, smart phrases appeared in review and one by one were discarded as cheap; slowly the deep calm of her latest self came near the surface; and when she spoke finally it was not a pent-up burst of words, but a quiet, sensible observation that surprised even herself.

And then he had talked to her, the first time, it seemed, as human adult to human adult. The defences of sex were down and she enjoyed a new sensation. Here was a man who conversed with her mind and not with her eyes and her hair. It is difficult for a girl with extraordinary good looks to get credit for sense. Eyes and hair do intrude. They get on the spectator’s mind. He feels that he must pay constant tribute to them. Few suspected that to this striking young woman the daily and hourly reference to her physical charm had grown to be annoying. It was a relief to discover a man who seemed to ignore it all.

The cause of her worry was not due to her pleasant little adventure in Naples. By itself that was a charming experience, but she knew it would not remain long as an isolated fact. If she had been alone on this homeward journey all would have been well, but she was in the charge of a thoroughly efficient mother. At any moment Mrs. Wells and her son, Walter, might arrive with the small party that had banded together to take advantage of the day in Naples.

Geraldine had pleaded fatigue and sea-sickness to get rid of that “party,” especially of the university instructor who had been piloting them about Europe on a commission; but she had been frank to her mother. The well-oiled voice of the university instructor, his faithfulness, his carefully-studied facts had done their full evil. The mother liked that sort of thing, or, rather, she could use it and ignore it; but she quite understood her daughter’s increasing repugnance to the personally conducted tour and especially to the personal conductor. “Oh, very well, my dear,” she had smiled an easy agreement, “stay on board if you can stand it. You have done your duty nobly so far. We’ll give you a furlough. But it is likely to be my last trip for many years, and I’m the sort of trotter that must nose into every gallery. Mr. Freneau gets on my nerves, too, sometimes. I quite understand. Do just as you please.”

But Geraldine knew her mother well enough to be certain that she would not be at all pleased with the sort of “trotting” her daughter had done. With any other man one could patch up an agreement of what to say and what not to say. Without actually fibbing one can conceal a powerful lot of objectionable truth. “Richard” would not fib. She could fancy his mild, detached stare at the suggestion of an illicit collusion to deceive the mater.

Geraldine had almost dozed off in her chair when she heard Mrs. Wells’ strong voice at the top of the gang-plank. The softer tones of Mr. Freneau were not distinguishable.

“Hel-lo!” Geraldine called, or rather sang, a sol-me family signal.

The indefatigable mother--she was a woman of imposing size, but agile--pushed along among the darkened chairs.

“Well, my girl,” she greeted cheerily, “how is the head? Better?”

If it had not been so dark the mother’s appreciating smile could have been observed.

“Head?” Geraldine was only half out of her nap. It took the sweet smile of university instructor Freneau shining behind a bracket-lamp to recall the voluble excuses given that morning to account for Miss Wells’ stay at home.

“Surely,” the mother poked her jocosely, “you don’t expect us to believe you were shamming just to get rid of us--eh, Mr. Freneau?”

“Oh!” Geraldine remembered. “_Much_ better, thank you, mother. Breakfast seemed to fix me up. I’ve been feeling fine all day.”

Mrs. Wells dropped into a chair beside her daughter. Mr. Freneau, hovering near, was dismissed with many expressions of appreciation for his day’s work. The son, Walter, an excessively thin, bent-over, boy-man, sprawled in a chair. He seemed to be sleeping. Presently the mother tapped him gently on the knee and suggested that he go below and get some rest.

“All right, mother,” the boy spoke up suddenly. In spite of his springy rise to his feet and his attempt at an assured air, one could see at a glance that this son was weak. His deep-set eyes roved restlessly, his body swayed gently or became noticeably rigid, as if a natural balance was an effort.

The mother watched him as he swayed along the deck. He disappeared down a stairway with an extraordinary clatter, as if he had fallen over the first few steps.

“How has Walter been to-day?” Geraldine asked. There was no solicitude in her voice.

“I don’t like his looks lately,” Mrs. Wells replied thoughtfully. “I think he is summoning up courage to rebel, but I am too strong for him. My will has the upper hand and that must be his will for a long time to come. It was a mistake ever to send him to that ‘cure.’ Firm kindness and the constant suggestion of a right attitude towards life is what he needs. This trip has proved it. Except for that outbreak in London we have had weeks of peace. He is stronger, he eats better and he is contented.”

“He seems to be terribly afraid of you.”

“I want him to be. But I don’t think it’s fear, my dear. My stronger will has got hold of him, that is all. He obeys----”

“Like a whipped puppy.”

“Exactly. That’s a good comparison, Geraldine. He needs right habits the same as a good dog. They must fear until the bad habit is driven out and the good habit becomes natural. You don’t think I treat him badly, do you?”

“Oh, no. You are wonderful. You get results which those people up at the ‘cure’ said they got by knocking him down. I am only saying that he looks defeated, beaten. Perhaps it is better that way. I am sure it is more comfortable for us.”

“Decidedly!”

The two women thought of the horrible years when this boy was growing from a tippler to a hardened drinker. He had become an incurable alcoholic almost before they realized that something must be done, something besides scoldings and cutting off his spending money and driving him out of the house to sleep at the neighbours’ or in the barn or, worse, in the puddle at the end of the front lawn. Some men drink heavily all their lives without reaching the condition of this lad. He was twenty-two years old, but he had the slight build of a sickly young boy.

“Did you find the steamer uncomfortably hot?” the mother asked. The other topic was too distressing.

“No; I--I felt so much better that I took a little stroll into the city.”

“Not alone, I hope? I don’t mind London, or certain parts of Paris, but you know how I feel about Italy, especially at the docks. You did not go alone?”

“Mother! Of course not!”

“The steamer seemed deserted when we left. Who went with you?”

“A friend of the Captain--he’s a very unusual----”

“He?”

“Yes, a friend of the Captain. The Captain told him----”

“I don’t like the captain of this boat. I hope his friends are less evil looking. What’s the name of this friend of the Captain?”

Why can’t we have some sense of the future? All day she had lived in the passing hour, and yet a single thought ahead would have assured her that she would have to meet this subtle, inevitable cross-examination in the evening. Mrs. Wells never meant to be unkind or domineering, but she was everlastingly on guard. She permitted the largest kind of liberty, but she always “wanted to know.” Concealment, subterfuge, these were her enemies. It would have been so easy for Geraldine to have discovered the man’s name. Of course the mystery was charming; but at the dinner, say, it would have been a simple matter to lean forward and say, “This incognito is delightful, my dear Richard, but I have a most exacting, scrutinizing mother who will demand precisely who you are. Now let’s call the game off and tell each other our real names.” She remembered now, that part of her own game had been to conceal the existence of mother, to play the part of independent young person. Otherwise how could she have fooled him with that audacious suggestion to stay over until the next steamer? And, by the way, how did she ever get nerve enough to do that! The thing did not seem bold in daylight; but here on this gloomy deck with an alert and expectant mother waiting for particulars it suddenly appeared brazen.

“His name----” Geraldine yawned carefully and at length to gain time. “A peculiar name”--yawn--“If I had my steamer-list here I--ooh! I’m so sleepy. It was”--yawn--“Richard”--yawn.

“Richard?” The mother turned the name over. “That’s peculiar, for a surname, at any rate.”

“Yes,”--Geraldine recovered. “We know a Mr. Dick and a Mr. Richards, but Mr. Richard is singular.”

“Is that a grammatical joke, my dear?” the mother asked.

“I”--yawn--“excuse me!--I don’t see any joke, mother. Really, I must toddle off to bed.”

“Richards, of course, would be plural,” the persistent mother followed. Her mind was never at rest. “Do you mean that this Mr. Richard--without--the--‘s’ was really singular or just grammatically singular?”

“Uh?” Geraldine turned a marvellous imitation of a sleepy face. “I’m afraid I don’t see it, mother. Forgive me for being so”--yawn--“dull. _Good-night!_ I’m off to Shut-eye town. Good-night!”

But the mother was not so easily shaken off. Mrs. Wells was never fatigued. She required only five to six hours’ sleep. At her home on the hills above Lake Keuka she would play bridge until one o’clock and be up at six to superintend the daily distribution of work in the dairy.

“Mr. Freneau began to get on my nerves too, to-day, Geraldine,” she pursued her way into her daughter’s stateroom and disregarded yawns and sleepy disrobings. “He is so patient,” she laughed, “and knows his lessons so well. Of course he is absolutely indispensable for trains, baggage, bills, ‘free days’ and so on, and, as a rule, he is absolutely authoritative. He digests all the books so impartially. But to-day I began to feel the way you do always, repellent. I disputed with him horribly. He was always right, but that made no difference. I suppose it’s the end of the trip. One does get filled up even with ideas and facts. I couldn’t listen to-day. His information flowed over me. He saw it, too. I fear I made him uncomfortable. After all, I suppose he’s just as sick of us. Fancy anybody giving up his time so devotedly. Did you get to the National Museum?”

“No.” Geraldine was putting herself deliberately to bed. Her mother had a species of clairvoyance that inevitably sifted the thoughts out of one. The topic must be kept off the Captain’s friend Mr. Richard until some sort of conspiracy could be arranged. Scruples or no scruples this man would have to do the right thing and stand by a lady.

A list of the other stated attractions of Naples were shot at the reclining figure.

No, these had not been visited.

“Then where on earth did you go?”

“The Museo Borbon--something or other. We--uh----” A perfect imitation of a young woman falling asleep in the middle of a sentence.

“Museo Borbonico? Why, my child, that’s the old name for the National Museum. I _have_ remembered some of the things Mr. Freneau tried to put into my head to-day. Did you see the bronzes, and the head of Cicero, made probably from life?”

No answer from the berth.

“Are you asleep, Geraldine?”

“Uh-huh.”

“H-m,” suspiciously. “Talking in your sleep, eh? Well, I’ll not bore you further. That’s what’s making you fat, so much sleep.” She looked about the room. “You must stop eating chocolates, too. I believe they are a sort of narcotic, if the truth were known. I notice that fat, sleepy girls are pigs on chocolates. Well, good-night. You can tell me about your trip to-morrow. I’ll take a peep at Walter before I retire to see if the absent treatment is working as usual. I have a feeling that if he had not gone straight to bed I should sense it somehow. Good-night.”

There was no response from Geraldine, so Mrs. Wells put out the light, fixed the catch on the lock and slipped quietly into the corridor.

Walter’s room was on the other side of the boat. Geraldine gave her mother time to get to the end of the corridor before she arose, snapped on the light and donned shoes and a kimono and twisted her plaited hair into a shape fit for public view. Then she sat on the edge of the berth and pondered. To-morrow early she would----

What was that? A fumbling of the catch of her door and a hesitant knock. She knew that uneven touch. She drew the door partly open. In the hall-way, shrinking far back, was Walter, grinning, breathing long, deep breaths through his open mouth.

“What is it, Walter?” Geraldine asked. She was firm with her question, as she knew she must be. A touch of the pity she felt for him would have come through her tone, he would have grasped at it and all would be undone. “Mother said you were to go right to bed, you know.”

The word mother shook him. He leaned forward and looked up and down the corridor. Reassured, he grinned again and nodded his head knowingly.

“Saw yuh!” he managed to gasp.

Geraldine understood without further words. Somewhere on that trip with “Richard” Walter had spied them. She knew, too, that the mother had not, and that Walter was keeping the secret for purposes of his own.

“Saw yuh!” he repeated, and wagged his head, a grinning idiot.

“Where?”

“Museum. Saw yuh goin’ in. We were goin’ out.” Abruptly the boy grew mysterious. His lower jaw shot up into the upper, his eyes popped and the nostrils heaved with his heavy breathing. He wagged a finger. “_I_ fixed ’em. I pointed up street. I pointed and said, ‘Looka that.’ An’ then you and him, you went in.”

A startling smile illumined his face. His mouth sprang open again. He leaned against the farther wall and asked her as plainly as pantomime could, “Now, wasn’t that clever of me? And what do you suppose I’m going to get out of it?”

“Yes, Walter, Mr. Richard and I were in the Museum this afternoon. I told mother all about it. Now, don’t you think you’d better run along? It’s late.”

He pondered on this unexpected turn of things.

“Mr. Richard,” he repeated.

“Yes, Mr. Richard.”

“You told mother?” he inquired politely.

“Yes, Walter. Now run along, please.”

“An’ I don’t get my little whack out o’ this?”

“I’m afraid there’s nothing to whack, Walter.”

“Aw-ri’,” he stumbled off. “Aw-ri’.” And farther down the corridor he summoned up a deep voice, the one he used to have, in a thunderous “_Aw-ri’!_”

* * * * *

Mrs. Wells had been too wide awake to stay in her room. It was only midnight. Walter could be looked after later. She arranged herself in a more comfortable attire, donned an easier pair of shoes and wandered to the upper deck.

She had very many comforting thoughts as she reclined and reviewed her European tour. Except for a single outbreak at the beginning of the trip Walter had been docile and willing. Her control of his mind, she congratulated herself, was as simple as running an electric runabout. She had always had a hypnotic influence over her family, but never before had she known its full power. Whatever she had set her mind to she had achieved, and, she was glad to assure herself, the reclaiming of her son was another victory.

To her intense astonishment her reverie was broken by the appearance of Geraldine in slippers and a kimono. To be sure the kimono was an elaborate thing that might have passed as a gown, and the hair had been wound around and around until it could pass for being “up”; and the ship was not lighted as it would be on the sea. But why should she be prowling about--prowling was just the word--and so wide awake after such a painful evidence of somnolency? Could she be looking for her mother?--No. It was a gentleman she nudged and awoke. Mrs. Wells heard the apology and saw Geraldine move on and glance into the face of another man who had found the deck more comfortable than below stairs. Geraldine passed quickly by and merged into a dark group of men forward.

What sort of goings-on was this? Could Geraldine be walking in her sleep? Mrs. Wells half arose as if to follow, but decided that that was not in her rôle. She would not spy; she would wait.

Meanwhile Geraldine had moved quietly from one end of the boat to the other in the hope of finding “Richard.” Ordinarily some sort of explanation could satisfy the mother. There had been nothing extraordinary in her little adventure; but the entrance of Walter spelled trouble. He had a dramatic fashion of causing trouble in unexpected ways. The mother’s calm justice would be disturbed and injustice might easily follow.

Geraldine reached the smoking-room, peered in at the assembled card-players, but just a half-minute too late. If her eyes could have distinguished a quarter length of the deck, she would have observed the tall figure of Richard moving towards bed.

So reluctantly she gave up and went below, promising herself an early promenade and a careful look-out.

Loud voices in her corridor gave her a chill of apprehension. Before her door she found her mother and Walter. The boy was disgustingly drunk; and he was ugly.

“Won’t be bossed any more!” he announced with a string of dirty oaths. “I’m through!” he shouted, “through with naggin’ and bein’ pushed into this and into that.”

With the help of a steward they managed finally to get him to bed in Geraldine’s room, Geraldine sharing with her mother an adjoining compartment. Even with the aid of the ship’s doctor and an able-bodied steward the two women put in an awful night.