Eugene, though Angela had suggested it a number of times before, had refused to go to any seaside resort or hotel, even for Saturday and Sunday, his statement being that he did not care to go alone at this time. The truth was he was becoming so interested in Suzanne that he did not care to go anywhere save somewhere that he might see her again.
Mrs. Dale’s offer was welcome enough, but having dissembled so much he had to dissemble more. Mrs. Dale insisted. Angela added her plea. Myrtle thought he ought to go. He finally ordered the car to take him down one Friday afternoon and leave him. Suzanne was out somewhere, but he sat on the veranda and basked in the magnificent view it gave of the lower bay. Kinroy and some young friend, together with two girls, were playing tennis on one of the courts. Eugene went out to watch them, and presently Suzanne returned, ruddy from a walk she had taken to a neighbor’s house. At the sight of her every nerve in Eugene’s body tingled—he felt a great exaltation, and it seemed as though she responded in kind, for she was particularly gay and laughing.
“They have a four,” she called to him, her white duck skirt blowing. “Let’s you and I get rackets and play single.”
“I’m not very good, you know,” he said.
“You couldn’t be worse than I am,” she replied. “I’m so bad Kinroy won’t let me play in any game with him. Ha, ha!”
“Such being the case——” Eugene said lightly, and followed her to get the rackets.
They went to the second court, where they played practically unheeded. Every hit was a signal for congratulation on the part of one or the other, every miss for a burst of laughter or a jest. Eugene devoured Suzanne with his eyes, and she looked at him continually, in wide-eyed sweetness, scarcely knowing what she was doing. Her own hilarity on this occasion was almost inexplicable to her. It seemed as though she was possessed of some spirit of joy which she couldn’t control. She confessed to him afterward that she had been wildly glad, exalted, and played with freedom and abandon, though at the same time she was frightened and nervous. To Eugene she was of course ravishing to behold. She could not play, as she truly said, but it made no difference. Her motions were beautiful.
Mrs. Dale had long admired Eugene’s youthful spirit. She watched him now from one of the windows, and thought of him much as one might of a boy. He and Suzanne looked charming playing together. It occurred to her that if he were single he would not make a bad match for her daughter. Fortunately he was sane, prudent, charming, more like a guardian to Suzanne than anything else. Her friendship for him was rather a healthy sign.
After dinner it was proposed by Kinroy that he and his friends and Suzanne go to a dance which was being given at a club house, near the government fortifications at The Narrows, where they spread out into the lower bay. Mrs. Dale, not wishing to exclude Eugene, who was depressed at the thought of Suzanne’s going and leaving him behind, suggested that they all go. She did not care so much for dancing herself, but Suzanne had no partner and Kinroy and his friend were very much interested in the girls they were taking. A car was called, and they sped to the club to find it dimly lighted with Chinese lanterns, and an orchestra playing softly in the gloom.
“Now you go ahead and dance,” said her mother to Suzanne. “I want to sit out here and look at the water a while. I’ll watch you through the door.”
Eugene held out his hand to Suzanne, who took it, and in a moment they were whirling round. A kind of madness seized them both, for without a word or look they drew close to each other and danced furiously, in a clinging ecstasy of joy.
“Oh, how lovely!” Suzanne exclaimed at one turn of the room, where, passing an open door, they looked out and saw a full lighted ship passing silently by in the distant dark. A sail boat; its one great sail enveloped in a shadowy quiet, floated wraith-like, nearer still.
“Do scenes like that appeal to you so?” asked Eugene.
“Oh, do they!” she pulsated. “They take my breath away. This does, too, it’s so lovely!”
Eugene sighed. He understood now. Never, he said to himself, was the soul of an artist so akin to his own and so enveloped in beauty. This same thirst for beauty that was in him was in her, and it was pulling her to him. Only her soul was so exquisitely set in youth and beauty and maidenhood that it overawed and frightened him. It seemed impossible that she should ever love him. These eyes, this face of hers—how they enchanted him! He was drawn as by a strong cord, and so was she—by an immense, terrible magnetism. He had felt it all the afternoon. Keenly. He was feeling it intensely now. He pressed her to his bosom, and she yielded, yearningly, suiting her motions to his subtlest moods. He wanted to exclaim: “Oh, Suzanne! Oh, Suzanne!” but he was afraid. If he said anything to her it would frighten her. She did not really dream as yet what it all meant.
“You know,” he said, when the music stopped, “I’m quite beside myself. It’s narcotic. I feel like a boy.”
“Oh, if they would only go on!” was all she said. And together they went out on the veranda, where there were no lights but only chairs and the countless stars.
“Well?” said Mrs. Dale.
“I’m afraid you don’t love to dance as well as I do?” observed Eugene calmly, sitting down beside her.
“I’m afraid I don’t, seeing how joyously you do it. I’ve been watching you. You two dance well together. Kinroy, won’t you have them bring us ices?”
Suzanne had slipped away to the side of her brother’s friends. She talked to them cheerily the while Eugene watched her, but she was intensely conscious of his presence and charm. She tried to think what she was doing, but somehow she could not—she could only feel. The music struck up again, and for looks’ sake he let her dance with her brother’s friend. The next was his, and the next, for Kinroy preferred to sit out one, and his friend also. Suzanne and Eugene danced the major portions of the dances together, growing into a wild exaltation, which, however, was wordless except for a certain eagerness which might have been read into what they said. Their hands spoke when they touched and their eyes when they met. Suzanne was intensely shy and fearsome. She was really half terrified by what she was doing—afraid lest some word or thought would escape Eugene, and she wanted to dwell in the joy of this. He went once between two dances, when she was hanging over the rail looking at the dark, gurgling water below, and leaned over beside her.
“How wonderful this night is!” he said.
“Yes, yes!” she exclaimed, and looked away.
“Do you wonder at all at the mystery of life?”
“Oh, yes; oh, yes! All the time.”
“And you are so young!” he said passionately, intensely.
“Sometimes, you know, Mr. Witla,” she sighed, “I do not like to think.”
“Why?”
“Oh, I don’t know; I just can’t tell you! I can’t find words. I don’t know.”
There was an intense pathos in her phrasing which meant everything to his understanding. He understood how voiceless a great soul really might be, new born without an earth-manufactured vocabulary. It gave him a clearer insight into a thought he had had for a long while and that was that we came, as Wordsworth expressed it, “trailing clouds of glory.” But from where? Her soul must be intensely wise—else why his yearning to her? But, oh, the pathos of her voicelessness!
They went home in the car, and late that night, while he was sitting on the veranda smoking to soothe his fevered brain, there was one other scene. The night was intensely warm everywhere except on this hill, where a cool breeze was blowing. The ships on the sea and bay were many—twinkling little lights—and the stars in the sky were as a great army. “See how the floor of heaven is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold,” he quoted to himself. A door opened and Suzanne came out of the library, which opened on to the veranda. He had not expected to see her again, nor she him. The beauty of the night had drawn her.
“Suzanne!” he said, when the door opened.
She looked at him, poised in uncertainty, her lovely white face glowing like a pale phosphorescent light in the dark.