“Suzanne Dale!” exclaimed her mother, rising, a thrill of terror passing along her heartstrings. “What are you talking about? Are you basing these ideas on anything I have said in the past? Then certainly my chickens are coming home to roost early. You are in no position to consider whether you want to get married or not. You have seen practically nothing of men. Why should you reach any such conclusions now? For goodness’ sake, Suzanne, don’t begin so early to meditate on these terrible things. Give yourself a few years in which to see the world. I don’t ask you to marry, but you may meet some man whom you could love very much, and who would love you. If you were to go and throw yourself away under some such silly theory as you entertain now, without stopping to see, or waiting for life to show you what it has in store, what will you have to offer him. Suzanne, Suzanne”—Suzanne was turning impatiently to a window—”you frighten me! There isn’t, there couldn’t be. Oh, Suzanne, I beg of you, be careful what you think, what you say, what you do! I can’t know all your thoughts, no mother can, but, oh, if you will stop and think, and wait a while!”
She looked at Suzanne who walked to a mirror and began to fix a bow in her hair.
“Mama,” she said calmly. “Really, you amuse me. When you are out with people at dinner, you talk one way, and when you are here with me, you talk another. I haven’t done anything desperate yet. I don’t know what I may want to do. I’m not a child any more, mama. Please remember that. I’m a woman grown, and I certainly can lay out my life for myself. I’m sure I don’t want to do what you are doing—talk one thing and do another.”
Mrs. Dale recoiled intensely from this stab. Suzanne had suddenly developed in the line of her argument a note of determination, frank force and serenity of logic which appalled her. Where had the girl got all this? With whom had she been associating? She went over in her mind the girls and men she had met and known. Who were her intimate companions?—Vera Almerding; Lizette Woodworth; Cora TenEyck—a half dozen girls who were smart and clever and socially experienced. Were they talking such things among themselves? Was there some man or men unduly close to them? There was one remedy for all this. It must be acted on quickly if Suzanne were going to fall in with and imbibe any such ideas as these. Travel—two or three years of incessant travel with her, which would cover this dangerous period in which girls were so susceptible to undue influence was the necessary thing. Oh, her own miserable tongue! Her silly ideas! No doubt all she said was true. Generally it was so. But Suzanne! Her Suzanne, never! She would take her away while she had time, to grow older and wiser through experience. Never would she be permitted to stay here where girls and men were talking and advocating any such things. She would scan Suzanne’s literature more closely from now on. She would viser her friendships. What a pity that so lovely a girl must be corrupted by such wretched, unsocial, anarchistic notions. Why, what would become of her girl? Where would she be? Dear Heaven!
She looked down in the social abyss yawning at her feet and recoiled with horror.
Never, never, never! Suzanne should be saved from herself, from all such ideas now and at once.
And she began to think how she could introduce the idea of travel easily and nicely. She must lure Suzanne to go without alarming her—without making her think that she was bringing pressure to bear. But from now on there must be a new order established. She must talk differently; she must act differently. Suzanne and all her children must be protected against themselves and others also. That was the lesson which this conversation taught her.
Chapter 13
Eugene and Angela had been quarreling between themselves most bitterly; at other times Angela was attempting to appeal to his sense of justice and fair play, if not his old-time affection, in the subtlest of ways. She was completely thrown out of her old methods of calculation, and having lost those had really no traditions on which to proceed. Eugene had always heretofore apparently feared her wrath; now he cared nothing for that. He had been subject, in times past, to a certain extent to those alluring blandishments which the married will understand well enough, but these were as ashes. Her charms meant nothing to him. She had hoped that the thought of a coming child would move him, but no, it was apparently without avail. Suzanne seemed a monster to her now since she did not desert him, and Eugene a raving maniac almost, and yet she could see how human and natural it all was. He was hypnotized, possessed. He had one thought, Suzanne, Suzanne, and he would fight her at every turn for that. He told her so. He told her of her letter to Suzanne, and the fact that he had read and destroyed it. It did not help her cause at all. She knew that she had decried him. He stood his ground solidly, awaiting the will of Suzanne, and he saw Suzanne frequently, telling her that he had won completely, and that the fulfilment of their desires now depended upon her.
As has been said, Suzanne was not without passion. The longer she associated with Eugene, the more eager she became for that joyous fulfilment which his words, his looks, his emotions indicated. In her foolish, girlish way, she had built up a fancy which was capable of realization only by the most ruthless and desperate conduct. Her theory of telling her mother and overcoming her by argument or defiance was really vain, for it could not be settled so easily, or so quickly. Because of her mother’s appeal to her in this first conversation, she fancied she had won a substantial victory. Her mother was subject to her control and could not defeat her in argument. By the latter token she felt she was certain to win. Besides, she was counting heavily on her mother’s regard for Eugene and her deep affection for herself. Hitherto, her mother had really refused her nothing.
The fact that Eugene did not take her outright at this time,—postponing until a more imperative occasion an adjustment of the difficulties which must necessarily flow from their attempted union without marriage—was due to the fact that he was not as desperate or as courageous as he appeared to be. He wanted her, but he was a little afraid of Suzanne herself. She was doubtful, anxious to wait, anxious to plan things her own way. He was not truly ruthless ever, but good natured and easy going. He was no subtle schemer and planner, but rather an easy natured soul, who drifted here and there with all the tides and favorable or unfavorable winds of circumstance. He might have been ruthless if he had been eager enough for any one particular thing on this earth, money, fame, affection, but at bottom, he really did not care as much as he thought he did. Anything was really worth fighting for if you had to have it, but it was not worth fighting for to the bitter end, if you could possibly get along without it. Besides, there was nothing really one could not do without, if one were obliged. He might long intensely, but he could survive. He was more absorbed in this desire than in anything else in his history, but he was not willing to be hard and grasping.
On the other hand, Suzanne was willing to be taken, but needed to be pressed or compelled. She imagined in a vague way that she wanted to wait and adjust things in her own way, but she was merely dreaming, procrastinating because he was procrastinating. If he had but compelled her at once she would have been happy, but he was sadly in need of that desperate energy that acts first and thinks afterward. Like Hamlet, he was too fond of cogitating, too anxious to seek the less desperate way, and in doing this was jeopardizing that ideal bliss for which he was willing to toss away all the material advantages which he had thus far gained.
When Mrs. Dale quite casually within a few days began to suggest that they leave New York for the fall and winter, she, Suzanne and Kinroy, and visit first England, then Southern France and then Egypt, Suzanne immediately detected something intentional about it, or at best a very malicious plan on the part of fate to destroy her happiness. She had been conjecturing how, temporarily, she could avoid distant and long drawn out engagements which her mother not infrequently accepted for herself and Suzanne outside New York, but she had not formulated a plan. Mrs. Dale was very popular and much liked. This easy suggestion, made with considerable assurance by her mother, and as though it would be just the thing, frightened and then irritated Suzanne. Why should her mother think of it just at this time?