The Goddess Abides: A Novel (12 page)

The morning slipped away in silence. The chauffeur drove smoothly and swiftly. Arnold had trained him to a controlled speed but she had increased the speed to the limit in recent months and without sign of protest or surprise he had accepted the change as though he understood why she wanted now to be driven faster. What he thought she did not know, a silent man, still young in her terms, at least—perhaps forty? She knew nothing about him and it never occurred to her to ask. Now, however, shut in by the snow, she felt the silence oppressive and broke it.

“William, are you married—children and so on?”

“No, ma’am. I live with my old mother.”

“Old? How old?”

“Sixty-three, ma’am.”

“In Philadelphia?”

“At present, ma’am. We used to live in North Jersey. My mother was housekeeper in one of them big old houses. That’s how I know where to go now, ma’am. I grew up in those parts.”

“Oh? And did you know the Medhursts?”

“Yes, ma’am. That’s where my mother worked.”

“How strange! I’ve bought some of the Medhurst land.”

“So I’ve heard, ma’am.”

She fell into surprised silence. Nothing in her life could be really private, she supposed, for Arnold had been well known in financial circles. But why should she care? She was herself the daughter of a famous man, the widow of a prosperous one. She had no need of secrets, and would have none, she decided firmly. To have no secrets was to be truly free. And so in this mood of freedom she arrived at her destination where she found Wilton Senior waiting in his car. He came to her at once.

“I brought the necessary papers for you to sign, Mrs. Chardman. I think everything is in order, provided you’re satisfied.”

“Let me just look at my view and see if it is all I remembered.”

The snow had momentarily ceased and she walked to the edge of the cliff and looked over the heaving gray sea. There was no wind to drive the waves to whitecaps, but far below her the surf broke heavily against the rocks that surrounded the beach. The chauffeur came to her side, also.

“I used to run down them steps, ma’am, when I was a kid, that is, and in the early morning before the family was up—all except Master Robert—Bob they called him. He wasn’t so much older than me. There’s good crabbing on that beach when the tide goes out.”

“The steps don’t look very safe now,” she observed.

“No, ma’am. But I could put them into shape easily enough. I’m handy that way.”

“Perhaps I’ll ask you to do it for me.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

He went away when she said no more, and she continued to look out over the sea. Whether she ever built the house, this land was now hers. The house could be or could never be, but she stood firmly on her own land. The snow was beginning to fall again. She felt the flakes cold against her face, like the touch of cold fingertips, and she turned to Wilton Senior.

“I am ready to sign the papers,” she said.

…“Whatever became of that house you were going to build?” Amelia inquired over the dinner table.

She had been absorbed in the lobster and until now she had asked no questions. Indeed, there had been no time, for Edith had been late. The snow had increased into a quiet storm, so that when Weston opened the heavy door it was to inform her immediately that Miss Darwent had already arrived and was waiting in the library, the drawing room being too chilly for her, since the north wind had begun to blow on that side of the house.

“Tell her I’ll be down in five minutes—I’ll just change—and dinner can be served at once.”

“Yes, madame”" He hesitated and then went on, “I did tell the chauffeur when you were to be back, madame.”

She paused at the foot of the stairs to smile, remembering the jealous hostility between these two faithful servants. “It wasn’t his fault. The snow is already deep.”

“Very well, madame.”

In a few minutes she and Amelia were at the table in the dining room, where a fire blazed under the marble chimney piece. Amelia had drunk her clear soup promptly and was now busy with broiled lobster and melted butter, her napkin tucked into her collar.

“It’s still only in the mind,” Edith replied.

“You’ll never find a more comfortable house than this,” Amelia said. She was cracking a huge claw in a pair of pincers, and it gave way suddenly with a loud report.

“It will have a different sort of comfort,” Edith said, and then smiling at her old friend, she went on, “If I had anything to tell you, I would tell you, Amelia. The truth is, I am in a curious state of mind, not confused really, but searching. I haven’t quite found myself, I don’t quite know what I want, or where it can be found. I’m just—enjoying life in a queer sort of way, perhaps not really facing anything—I don’t know.”

Amelia put down claw and pincers. “You’re idle, that’s what. You need something to do. Why don’t you find a charity or something?”

“I don’t want or need busy work,” Edith replied. “I have my music—and books I haven’t read and—”

“And what?” Amelia demanded when she paused.

“And friends. That’s why I asked you to come here tonight. I haven’t seen you—”

Amelia interrupted. “Who is that long-legged fellow who has been here a couple of times?”

“He’s someone I happened to meet last whiter in Vermont. He is an admirer of my father—”

“Not of you?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Amelia!”

“Well, you’re ripe for it. I know—I’ve watched my friends when they’ve become widows after having faithful husbands like Arnold, especially pretty widows!”

“Please, Amelia!”

“Oh, very well, Edith! Don’t tell me anything you don’t want to tell me.”

“Amelia, there’s nothing to tell.”

“Then why did you suddenly invite me to dinner?”

“Because I was lonely. I dreaded coming back to this great dark old house. And—and—”

“Be careful,” Amelia said. “You’re getting in the mood for anything. I’ll have some more of the asparagus, Weston.”

…“So why don’t you come with me?” Jared asked.

His voice came clear and strong over the telephone. It was a crisp fine morning, the day before Christmas, and she had been wondering how she would spend the holiday. Millicent and her family had already moved to San Francisco, they had made telephone exchanges. The children were enchanted with the beautiful playgrounds, the beaches, the parks.

“And you?” Edith inquired.

“I’m going to have a maid,” Millicent cried, “and of course I’m enchanted. Tom has a good raise.”

“Then he’s on his way up and all is well,” she had said.

With this she had not forgotten her daughter exactly, but she was at ease about her and could forget her if she liked, very much as she habitually forgot Tony because really she was not needed any more, and so was free this morning to linger over breakfast, answer the telephone when it rang, and hear Jared’s clear voice at her ear. She gazed out the wide French windows meanwhile. The sky was cloudlessly blue, but the last leaves were fluttering down from the big oak tree by the east terrace. She had finished breakfast, and was deciding what to do with the day, something vigorous, she had thought, for she was feeling unusually well, and awake, impatient for physical exercise, perhaps a canter alone along the edge of the woods.

“But when?” she asked, uncertain.

“I’ll pick you up this afternoon and we’ll motor down the eastern coast. Have pity on me. My old uncle is in the Virgin Islands—he hates the cold. And I can’t think of anyone I’d rather spend Christmas with than you.”

“You don’t want to go to Vermont?”

“No. I want to take you to strange places where neither of us has ever been. Let’s just wander.”

She considered for a moment. On the inside pane of the wide window a late bee buzzed frantically, lost from its fellows, and she let herself be diverted.

“There’s a bee buzzing on the window. If I let it out will it freeze?”

“No,” he said. “It will find its way home.”

“Then wait a minute,” she said.

She opened the window and brushed the bee outdoors with her handkerchief. It flew away instantly, but the cold sweet air rushed into the room and she let it blow upon her face. The sharp chill stung her flesh and stirred her blood, she had not realized how close the air in this old house was, a scent not unpleasant, of leatherbound books and many Oriental rugs and hothouse flowers. A rush of impetuous desire for freshness and new vigor swept over her and she closed the window.

“I’ll be ready,” she called into the telephone.

“Good—at half past two,” he said.

…The road wound in and out along the coast. For miles the sea was hidden, the road entering the forest and then as suddenly emerging again to the curve of a bay or a beach. The sun slipped slowly downward in the western sky and they stopped at twilight at an inn, an old mansion, its pillared portico reaching to the roof. Jared pulled up at the entrance.

“We’ve been very quiet,” he said.

“Yes,” she replied.

Neither of them had felt like talking, it seemed. He had driven the small convertible in concentrated thought and she had not interrupted. A few times he had noticed the landscape.

“Those rocks down there by the sea—” he said.

“As though they had been tumbled there by a giant—” she replied.

The air had been golden with sunlight through the afternoon, turning at sunset to rose and crimson. Evening star and a crescent moon hung over the trees and a beneficent calm pervaded her—and him, too, she felt, a relaxed mood which was in itself communication between them. She was happy in his presence, she now realized, happier than she had been for a long time, happier perhaps than she had ever been. Certainly with no one had she felt this conviction of life and its goodness, this ease of presence with another human being. She turned to him impulsively and found him looking at her, dark eyes questioning.

“Shall we stop here? Dine and then walk on the beach?”

“Yes,” she said. “In this air—what is that scent? Fines, I think. It is too late in the year for flowers, though it’s still warm in this climate.”

“Pines warmed by the day’s sun,” he said. “And shall we stay here for the night? At this season the inn will be nearly empty, I daresay—people at home for Christmas, but you and I are making our own Christmas.”

“Let us stay,” she said.

He gave her a look, passionate and deep, and for an instant she wondered what it meant. There could be no question, surely there could be no question about rooms, separate rooms. She was startled to discover in herself the question answered, hidden in her own being a reluctant yearning to forget her years and her reserves. She was no longer any man’s wife. She was free to be what she wished to be, to do what she wanted to do. There was no need to refuse herself—or him—anything that pleased them. She had fulfilled all duties to others.

“Then I will engage our rooms,” he said.

He left her in the car while he entered the office of the inn and she sat alone, a sweet intoxication pervading her. She recognized it without ever having felt it before, a powerful attraction to this man, an attraction of mind first, but so complete that it flowed through her body in a warm current. She tried to stay it, to control it, to analyze it. Let her remember herself. Let her ask herself what she truly wanted—no complications, she told herself, no foolish complications of emotion. Above all, no heartbreak at this time of her life.

He came back in a moment, very cheerful, very composed.

“I got adjoining rooms,” he said. “If you want anything you can call me.”

…She woke in the night as usual after five hours of sleep. That was her habit—five hours of deep dreamless sleep and then she woke absolutely, her mind clear and aware. Moonlight streamed through the open window and the air was crisply chill. She pulled the covers about her shoulders and breathed deeply. There was a smell of the sea, the softly rushing sound of distant surf. This was how it would be in her house on the cliff when she slept there alone. Only now she was not alone. That is to say, Jared was on the other side of the closed door, not locked, only closed. She was suddenly acutely aware that it was not locked, only closed.

“There’s no telephone between rooms in an old inn like this,” Jared had said. “I’ll not lock the door in case of—anything.”

She had not replied. Instead she had stood quite still in the center of this big square room with its four-poster double bed.

“I hate to say good night,” Jared said.

“It was a delightful dinner,” she said. “I didn’t know how hungry I was.”

“Oh, I’m always a hungry beast.” He twisted his handsome mouth in a wry smile as he spoke.

“You should be to cover that big skeleton of yours,” she said.

He had not replied to this. Instead, after an instant of looking at her intently, he had put his arms about her and kissed her full on her lips.

“Good night, you darling,” he said, and opening the door between the rooms, he closed it firmly.

…Now, lying in the big bed, she thought of the kiss. He had simply given it, taken it, without asking and without comment. She felt again the young warmth of his lips against hers as she remembered the moment. But was she not being ridiculous? What was a kiss nowadays? Women kissed men, men kissed women, with no feeling beyond a cheerful friendliness. Ah, but not she! She had never been one to give kisses easily or to welcome them. Even with Arnold they had seemed—unnecessary. As for Edwin, his kisses had been those of a child—or an old, old man, tender but pure. So what had this kiss been, this kiss which she still felt upon her lips? Then she rebuked herself again. The truth was that no one kissed her nowadays and she kissed no one. This one kiss lingered in her memory now merely because it was unaccustomed.

Then at this moment, as though to refute this self-deception, her body rose to defy her. She was suddenly seized by a surge of physical longing such as she had not known for years. No, let her be honest with herself. She had never known such longing, perhaps because she had always before this had the means of satisfaction. Now a door stood between and it was only closed, not locked. Suppose the impossible, suppose she got up from this alien bed, suppose she wrapped her rose silk negligée about her—it lay there on the chair—and suppose that she opened the door softly into that other room and then went in, even if it were only to stand and look at him as he slept. And if he woke and saw her standing there—