Possession (Bromfield)/Chapter 5
WHEN Ellen arrived at the Setons' on the night following the visit of Jimmy, she found that the family had not yet finished supper. They sat about the table, Seton père at the head, thin, bloodless, bearded, looking like one of the more austere of the saints, rather than a corset manufacturer. Seton mère, fat, fleshy, good-natured, occupied a seat at the far end. Between them sat disposed little Jimmy, anemic and insignificant, May plump and pale, and last of all, a stranger.
"This," said May Seton, giggling and indicating the young man at her left, "is Mr. Clarence Murdock. I've been wanting you to meet him, Ellen. I'm sure you'll like each other. He's from New York . . . here to see Papa on business."
The young man rose and bowed a little stiffly but with a flattering deference.
"May has told me so much about you . . . I'm delighted to know you."
"Sit down until we finish," said May. "We're just eating the last of our dessert."
Now May's introduction of Mr. Clarence Murdock was not altogether straightforward. From the phrases she chose, it could be gathered that it was the first time she had ever seen Mr. Murdock and that Ellen had never heard of him before. In this there was no truth for he had seen May many times. They even called each other by their Christian names. And May had given Ellen elaborately detailed descriptions of the young man, having gone even so far as to hint that there was more between them than mere friendship. But May could not resist doing things of this sort where a man was concerned. It was impossible for her to be honest. The mere shadow of a man upon the horizon goaded her into a display of dimples and coquetry. She bridled, grew arch and mysterious. She was taught by an aspiring mother that these things were a part of a game. Ellen might have replied, "Yes. I've heard a great deal concerning you, Mr. Murdock," but she did not. She said, "I'm so glad to know you," gave him a faint smile and a look which seemed not so much concerned with Mr. Murdock as with the dead fish and boiled lobsters in the ornamental print on the wall behind him. All the same she began quietly examining the points of the stranger.
He was not bad looking and he had nice manners. To be sure he might have been taller. He was not quite so tall as Ellen. He had nice brown hair sleekly brushed back from a high forehead, and he wore a starched collar of the high, ungainly sort which was the fashion in those days. His eyes were brown and gentle and near-sighted, his face well-shaped and his nose straight, though a trifle thin so that it gave his countenance a look of insignificance which one might expect in a perpetual clerk. He was not, Ellen decided, the sort of romantic figure which could sweep her off her feet. Still, he came from New York. That was something. He had lived in the world.
"My, what a rain we've been having," observed Mrs. Seton. "I suppose it's what you'd call the equinoctial storms."
Yes, her spouse replied, it was just that. And he launched into a dissertation upon equinoctial storms, their origin, their effect, their endurance, their manifestations in various quarters of the globe,—in short all about them. Fifteen precious minutes passed beyond recall into eternity while Harvey Seton discussed equinoctial storms. No one else spoke, for it was the edict of this father that no one should interrupt him until he had exhausted his subject. He was indeed a King among Bores. And when he had finished, his wife, instead of going further with this topic or one of similar profundity, struck out in the exasperating fashion of women upon some new and trivial tangent.
"Herman Biggs is coming in, Ellen," she observed brightly. "Right after supper." And she beamed on Ellen with the air of a great benefactress. Her thoughts were not uttered, yet to one of Ellen's shrewdness they were clear. The smile said, "Of course a poor girl like you could not aspire to a New Yorker like Mr. Murdock, but I am doing my best to see that you get a good husband. Herman Biggs is respectable and honest. He'll make a good husband. We must look higher for May. She must have something like Mr. Murdock."
And even as she spoke the doorbell rang and the anemic Jimmy sped away to open it as if on the doorstep outside stood not the freckled Herman Biggs but some wild adventure in the form of a romantic stranger.
It was Herman Biggs. He came in as he had come in a thousand times before, and stood with his dripping hat in his hand, awkwardly, while he was introduced to Mr. Clarence Murdock. But he did not sit down. The lecture upon equinoctial storms had claimed the remainder of the time allotted to dessert. The little group rose and distributed itself through the house. Mr. Seton went into a room known as his den. Mrs. Seton went into the kitchen and the young people disappeared into the cavernous parlor, followed by Jimmy, still filled with the same expectancy of stupendous adventure, intent upon harassing the little party for the rest of the evening by the sort of guerilla warfare in which he excelled.
It was a gaunt house constructed in a bad period when houses broke out into cupolas, unusual bay windows and variations of the mansard roof. Outside it was painted a liverish brown; inside the effect was the same. In the parlor there was an enormous bronze chandelier with burners constructed in imitation of the lamps found during the excavation of Pompeii, an event which considerably agitated the world of the eighties. The walls were covered with deep red paper of a very complicated design of arabesques upon which was superimposed a second design in very elegant gold, even more complicated. Against this hung engravings of Dignity and Impudence, The Monarch of the Forest, and The Trial of Effie Deans. Pampas grass in vases ornamented with realistic pink porcelain roses, waved its dusty plumes above a bronze clock surmounted by a bronze chariot driver and horses which rushed headlong toward a collision with a porcelain rosebud. By the side of the clock stood a large conch shell bearing in gilt lettering the legend, "Souvenir of Los Angeles, Cal."
"Shall we play hearts?" asked May, with appropriate glances, "or shall we just talk? . . . There's no moon and the piazza is all wet."
Ellen said nothing; she continued to regard Mr. Murdock with a curious, speculative air.
"Let's play hearts," said the anemic Jimmy, fidgeting and climbing over the sofa. "I kin play, Mr. Murdock," he added proudly.
Upon the pride of the Seton family, Ellen turned a withering glance, charged with homicidal meaning. It said, "What are you doing here? . . . If you were my brother you'd be in bed where you belong."
"Ellen wants to play hearts! . . . Ellen wants to play hearts!" sang out Jimmy, pulling awry the shade of the imitation bronze lamp.
Herman Biggs blushed and stammered that it made no difference to him. Mr. Murdock was gentle and polite. "Let's talk," he suggested mildly, "we might as well get acquainted." As the oldest by nearly ten years and the most sophisticated by virtue of his residence in New York, he took the lead.
"I think so too," replied Ellen and a curious flash of understanding passed between them, a glance which implied a mutual superiority founded upon something deep in Ellen's nature and upon Mr. Murdock's superior age and metropolitan bearing.
So they talked, rather stupid talk, punctuated by May's giggles, the guffaws of Herman Biggs, and the pinches of the anemic Jimmy, who was never still. Now this pale pest swung himself from the curtains, now he climbed the back of a chair, now he sought the top of the oak piano, menacing lamps and vases and pictures. And after a while Ellen was induced to sit at the piano and play for the party. It was ragtime they wanted, so she played "I'm afraid to go home in the dark" and "Bon-bon Buddy" and other favorites which Mr. Murdock sang in a pleasant baritone voice. After that he gave imitations of various vaudeville artists singing these same ballads.
At length May and Herman Biggs retired, accompanied by Jimmy, to bring in the refreshments, and Ellen was left alone with the stranger.
"I suppose," she began, "you find it dull here after New York."
Mr. Murdock coughed. "No, it's pleasant enough. . . . Mr. Seton has been very kind to me. . . . I'll be here another week or two installing the electrical equipment."
Ellen raised her head proudly. "I'm going to New York myself soon . . . probably this winter. . . . I'm going to study music."
Mr. Murdock was very ready. "Well, we must meet again there. . . . It's a lonely place for a girl without family or friends."
"But I don't get homesick," said Ellen, with the sophisticated air of an experienced traveler. "I certainly wouldn't be homesick in New York."
From that moment Mr. Murdock began to regard her with a deeper interest. Perhaps he saw that by her side May had no points to be compared with Ellen's air of quiet assurance, her youthful dignity, her curiously apparent respect for herself as an individual. She sat in the plush rocker within the glow from the bronze lamp. At the moment she was not awkward at all; she was tall, graceful, dark, even a little imposing. The essence of her individuality rose triumphant above the plush rocker, the engravings that hung against the elaborate wall paper, above even the cheap dress which concealed her young slenderness. She stirred the imagination. Certainly her face was interesting.
"I didn't know," began Mr. Murdock, "that you were a professional musician. . . . I don't suppose you like playing ragtime. . . . Maybe you'd play me something good . . . something classical, really good, I mean like Nevin or MacDowell."
And Mr. Murdock, growing communicative, went on to say that his sister played too. She lived in Ogdensburg, New York. He had come from Ogdensburg to make his fortune in the city. That was the reason, he said, that he understood how lonely a person could be.
"Of course, it's different now," he continued, "I have lots of friends. . . . Homer Bunce and Herbert Wyck. . . . But you'll meet them when you come to New York."
He was very pleasant, Mr. Murdock. And he was nice looking in a rather spiritless way. His eyes were kind and his hands nice. To Ellen hands were important features. Shrewd beyond her years, she saw people by their hands and their mouths. Mr. Murdock's mouth was a trifle small and compressed, but otherwise all right. He might be a prig, but underneath the priggishness there lay a character nice enough.
"And now won't you play for me?" he persisted, "something of Nevin or MacDowell?"
Ellen went to the piano and played a Venetian Sketch and To a Waterlily. She and Miss Ogilvie considered such music pap. From choice she would not have played it, but she understood at once that Mr. Murdock would like this music. Indeed he had asked for it. She knew he would like what the people in the Town liked. Mr. Murdock listened with his eyes closed and when she had finished he said, "My, that's fine. . . . I like soft, sweet music."
She was still playing when May and Herman returned bearing the hot chocolate and plates of cakes, followed closely by the simian Jimmy, his mouth stuffed to overflowing. Mr. Murdock still listened, lying back in his chair with closed eyes.
It was Mr. Murdock who outmaneuvered the gauche Herman Biggs and escorted her home. They talked stiffly, walking very close to each other through the pouring rain beneath the Tolliver family umbrella.
On the steps of the porch, Ellen bade him good-night.
"We must meet again before I go away."
"Certainly," said Ellen; but in her heart she had resolved against it, for she considered Mr. Murdock slightly boring. It was possible, she could see now, for people to live in a city and still never leave their home towns.
It was like Mr. Seton, thought Ellen. Every two years he went to Europe to visit the Junoform Reinforced Corset branch factory at St. Denis near Paris, but he really never left the Town at all. He carried it with him.
If only she could go to Paris. . . .