 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. The Age of Innocence, a novel by Edith Wharton. Read for LibriVox by Brenda Dane. Chapter 26 Every year on the 15th of October, Fifth Avenue opened its shutters, unrolled its carpets, and hung up its triple layer of window curtains. By the first of November, this household ritual was over and society had begun to look about and take stock of itself. By the 15th, the season was in full blast. Opera and theatres were putting forth their new attractions. Dinner engagements were accumulating and dates for dances being fixed. And punctually, at about this time, Mrs. Archer always said that New York was very much changed. Observing it from the lofty standpoint of a non-participant, she was able, with the help of Mr. Sillerton Jackson and Miss Sophie, to trace each new crack in its surface and all the strange weeds pushing up between the ordered rows of social vegetables. It had been one of the amusements of Archer's youth to wait for this annual pronouncement of his mother's and to hear her enumerate the minute signs of disintegration that his careless gaze had overlooked. For New York, to Mrs. Archer's mind, never changed without changing for the worse. And in this view Miss Sophie Jackson heartily concurred. Mr. Sillerton Jackson, as became a man of the world, suspended his judgment and listened with an amused impartiality to the lamentations of the ladies. But even he never denied that New York had changed. And Newland Archer, in the winter of the second year of his marriage, was himself obliged to admit that, if it had not actually changed, it was certainly changing. These points had been raised, as usual, at Mrs. Archer's Thanksgiving dinner. At the date when she was officially enjoined to give thanks for the blessings of the year, it was her habit to take a mournful, though not embittered, stalk of her world and wonder what there was to be thankful for. At any rate, not the state of society. Society, if it could be said to exist, was rather a spectacle on which to call down biblical implications. And in fact everyone knew what the Reverend Dr. Ashmore meant when he chose a text from Jeremiah. Chapter 2, verse 25, for his Thanksgiving sermon. Dr. Ashmore, the new rector of St. Matthew's had been chosen because he was very advanced. His sermons were considered bold in thought and novel in language. When he fulminated against fashionable society he always spoke of its trend. And to Mrs. Archer it was terrifying and yet fascinating to feel herself part of a community that was trending. There's no doubt that Dr. Ashmore is right, there is a marked trend, she said, as if it were something visible and measurable, like a crack in a house. It was odd, though, to preach about it on Thanksgiving, Miss Jackson opened, and her hostess dryly rejoined, oh, he means us to give thanks for what's left. Archer had been want to smile at these annual vatassinations of his mothers. But this year even he was obliged to acknowledge, as he listened to an enumeration of the changes, that the trend was visible. The extravagance in dress, Miss Jackson began. Sillerton took me to the first night of the opera and I can only tell you that Jane Mary's dress was the only one I recognized from last year. And even that had had the front panel changed. Yet I know she got it out from Worth only two years ago because my seamstress always goes in to make over her pair of dresses before she wears them. Ah, Jane Mary is one of us, said Mrs. Archer, sighing. As if it were not such an enviable thing to be in an age when ladies were beginning to flaunt abroad their Paris dresses as soon as they were out of the custom house, instead of letting them mellow under lock and key in the manner of Mrs. Archer's contemporaries. Yes, she's one of the few. In my youth, Mrs. Jackson rejoined, it was considered vulgar to dress in the newest fashions. And Amy Sillerton has always told me that in Boston the rule was to put away one's Paris dresses for two years. Old Mrs. Baxter Penelow, who did everything handsomely, used to import twelve a year, two velvet, two satin, two silk, and the other six of poplin and the finest cashmere. It was a standing order, and as she was ill for two years before she died they found forty-eight worth dresses that had never been taken out of tissue paper. And when the girls left off their morning they were able to wear the first lot at the symphony concerts without looking in advance of the fashion. Ah, well, Boston is more conservative than New York, but I always think it's a safe rule for a lady to lay aside her French dresses for one season, Mrs. Archer conceded. It was Beaufort who started the new fashion by making his wife clap her new clothes on her back as soon as they arrived. I must say at times it takes all Regina's distinction not to look like—like—Miss Jackson glanced around the table, caught Janey's bulging gaze, and took refuge in an unintelligible murmur. Like her rivals, said Mr. Sillerton Jackson, with the air of producing an epigram. Oh—oh! the ladies murmured, and Mrs. Archer added, partly to distract her daughter's attention from forbidden topics. Poor Regina! Her thanksgiving hasn't been a very cheerful one, I'm afraid. Have you heard the rumours about Beaufort's speculation, Sillerton? Mr. Jackson nodded carelessly. Everyone had heard the rumours in question, and he scorned to confirm a tale that was already common property. A gloomy silence fell upon the party. No one really liked Beaufort, and it was not wholly unpleasant to think the worst of his private life, but the idea of his having brought financial dishonour on his wife's family was too shocking to be enjoyed even by his enemies. Archer's New York tolerated hypocrisy in private relations, but in business matters it exacted a limp and impeccable honesty. It was a long time since any well-known banker had failed discreditably, but everyone remembered the social extinction visited on the heads of the firm when the last event of the kind had happened. It would be the same with the Beaufort's, in spite of his power, and her popularity. Not all the leaked strength of the Dallas connection would save poor Regina if there were any truth in the reports of her husband's unlawful speculations. The talk took refuge in less ominous topics, but everything they touched on seemed to confirm Mrs. Archer's sense of an accelerated trend. Of course, Newland, I know you let dear May go to Mrs. Struthers Sunday evenings, she began. And May interposed gaily, oh, you know everybody goes to Mrs. Struthers's now, and she was invited to Granny's last reception. It was thus Archer reflected that New York managed its transitions, conspiring to ignore them till they were well over, and then, in all good faith, imagining that they had taken place in a preceding age. There was always a traitor in the citadel, and after he, or generally she, had surrendered the keys, what was the use of pretending that it was impregnable? Once people had tasted of Mrs. Struthers' easy Sunday hospitality, they were not likely to sit at home, remembering that her champagne was transmuted shoe polish. I know, dear, I know, Mrs. Archer's side, such things have to be, I suppose, as long as amusement is what people go out for, but I've never quite forgiven your cousin, Madame Olenska, for being the first person to countenance Mrs. Struthers. A sudden blush rose to young Mrs. Archer's face. It surprised her husband as much as the other guests about the table. Oh, Ellen, she murmured, much in the same accusing, yet deprecating tone in which her parents might have said, oh, the blinkers! It was the note on which the family had taken to sounding on the mention of Countess Olenska, since she had surprised, and inconvenienced them, by remaining obdurate to her husband's advances. But on May's lips it gave food for thought, and Archer looked at her with a sense of strangeness that sometimes came over him when she was most in the tone of her environment. His mother, with less than her usual sensitiveness to atmosphere, still insisted, I've always thought that people like the Countess Olenska, who have lived in aristocratic societies, ought to help us keep up our social distinctions instead of ignoring them. May's blush remained permanently vivid. It seemed to have a significance beyond that implied by the recognition of Madame Olenska's social bad faith. I've no doubt we all seem alike to foreigners, said Miss Jackson tartly. I don't think Ellen cares for society. But nobody knows exactly what she does care for, May continued, as if she had been groping for something noncommittal. Ah, well, Mrs. Archer sighed again. Everybody knew that the Countess Olenska was no longer in the good graces of her family. Even her devoted champion, old Mrs. Manson Mingott, had been unable to defend her refusal to return to her husband. The Mingottes had not proclaimed their disapproval aloud. Their sense of solidarity was too strong. They had simply, as Mrs. Welland said, let poor Ellen find her own level. And that, mortifyingly and incomprehensibly, was in the dim depths where the blankers prevailed, and people who wrote celebrated their untidy rights. It was incredible, but it was a fact that Ellen, in spite of all her opportunities and her privileges, had become simply bohemian. The fact enforced the contention that she had made a fatal mistake in not returning to Count Olensky. After all, a young woman's place was under her husband's roof, especially when she had left it in circumstances that, well, if one had cared to look into them. Madam Olenska is a great favourite with the gentleman, said Miss Sophie, with her air of wishing to put forth something conciliatory when she knew that she was planting a dart. Oh, that's the danger that a young woman like Madam Olenska is always exposed to, Mrs. Archer mournfully agreed. And the ladies on this conclusion gathered up their trains to seek the carceral globes of the drawing-room, while Archer and Mr. Sillerton Jackson withdrew to the Gothic library. Once established before the great, and consoling himself for the inadequacy of the dinner, by the perfection of his cigar, Mr. Jackson became portentious and communicable. If the Beaufort smash comes, he announced, there are going to be disclosures. Archer raised his head quickly. He could never hear the name without the sharp vision of Beaufort's heavy figure, opulently furred and shod, advancing through a snow at Scoitre Cliff. There's bound to be, Mr. Jackson continued, the nastiest kind of cleaning up. He hasn't spent all his money on Regina. Oh, well, that's discounted, isn't it? My belief is he'll pull out yet, said the young man, wanting to change the subject. Perhaps, perhaps. I know he was to see some of the influential people today. Of course, Mr. Jackson reluctantly conceded. It's to be hoped that they can tide him over. This time anyhow. I shouldn't like to think of poor Regina spending the rest of her life in some shabby, foreign, watering place for bankrupts. Archer said nothing. It seemed to him so natural, however tragic, that money ill-gotten should be cruelly expiated, and that his mind, hardly lingering over Mrs. Beaufort's doom, wandered back to closer questions. What was the meaning of May's blush, when the Countess Olenska had been mentioned? Four months had passed, since the Midsummer Day that he and Madam Olenska had spent together. And since then he had not seen her. He knew that she had returned to Washington. To the little house which she and Madora Manson had taken there. He had written to her once a few words, asking when they were to meet again. And she had even more briefly replied, not yet. Since then there had been no further communication between them, and he had built up within himself a kind of sanctuary in which she throned among his secret thoughts and longings. Little by little it became the scene of his real life, of his only rational activities. Thither he brought the books he read, the ideas and feelings which nourished him, his judgments and visions. Outside it, in the scene of his actual life, he moved with a growing sense of unreality and insufficiency, blundering against familiar prejudices and traditional points of view, as an absent-minded man goes on bumping into the furniture of his own room. Absent. That was what he was. So absent from everything most densely real and near to those about him, that it sometimes startled him to find they still imagined he was there. He became aware that Mr. Jackson was clearing his throat, preparatory to further revelations. I don't know, of course, how far your wife's family are aware of what people say about—well, about Madame Olenska's refusal to accept her husband's latest offer. Archer was silent, and Mr. Jackson obliquely continued. It's a pity. It's certainly a pity that she refused it. A pity? In God's name, why? Mr. Jackson looked down his leg to the unwrinkled sock that joined it to a glossy pump. Well, to put it on the lowest ground, what's she going to live on now? Now? If Beaufort—Archer sprang up his fist banging down on the black walnut edge of the writing-table, the wells of the brass double ink-stand danced in their sockets. What the devil do you mean, sir? Mr. Jackson, shifting himself slightly in his chair, turned a tranquil gaze on the young man's burning face. Well, I have it on pretty good authority—in fact, on old Catherine's herself—that the family reduced Countess Olenska's allowance considerably, when she definitely refused to go back to her husband. And as, by this refusal, she also forfeits the money settled on her when she married—which Olenski was ready to make over to her if she returned—why, what the devil do you mean, my dear boy, by asking me what I mean? Mr. Jackson good-humoredly retorted. Archer moved towards the mantelpiece and bent over to knock his ashes into the grate. I don't know anything of Madame Olenska's private affairs, but I don't need to, to be certain that what you insinuate—oh, I don't—it's Lefferts for one, Mr. Jackson interposed. Lefferts, who made love to her and got snubbed for it, Archer broke out contemptuously. Oh, did he, snapped the other, as if this were exactly the fact that he'd been laying a trap for. He still sat sideways from the fire, so that his hard old gaze held Archer's face as if in a spring of steel. Well, well, it's a pity she didn't go back before Beaufort's cropper, he repeated. If she goes now, and if he fails, it will only confirm the general impression, which isn't by any means peculiar to Lefferts, by the way. Oh, she won't go back now, less than ever. Archer had no sooner said it than he had once more the feeling that it was exactly what Mr. Jackson had been waiting for. The old gentleman considered him attentively. That's your opinion, eh? Well, no doubt you know. But everybody will tell you that the few pennies Madora Manson has left are all in Beaufort's hands. And how the two women are to keep their heads above water unless he does, I can't imagine. Of course, Madame Olenska may still soften old Catherine, who's been the most inexorably opposed to her staying. Catherine could make her any allowance she chooses, but we all know she hates parting with good money. And the rest of the family have no particular interest in keeping Madame Olenska here. Archer was burning with unavailing wrath. He was exactly in the state when a man is sure to do something stupid, knowing all the while that he is doing it. He saw that Mr. Jackson had been instantly struck by the fact that Madame Olenska's indifference with her grandmother and her other relations were not known to him. And that the old gentleman had drawn his own conclusions as to the reasons for Archer's exclusion from the family councils. This fact warned Archer to go warily, but the insinuations about Beaufort made him reckless. He was mindful, however, if not of his own danger, at least of the fact that Mr. Jackson was under his mother's roof and consequently his guest. Old New York scrupulously observed the etiquette of hospitality and no discussion with a guest was ever allowed to degenerate into a disagreement. Shall we go up and join my mother, he suggested curtly, as Mr. Jackson's last cone of ashes dropped into the brass ashtray at his elbow. On the drive homeward May remained oddly silent. Through the darkness he still felt enveloped in her menacing blush. What its menace meant he could not guess, but he was sufficiently warned by the fact that Madame Olenska's name had evoked it. They went upstairs and he turned into the library. She usually followed him but he heard her passing down the passage to her bedroom. May, he called out impatiently and she came back with a slight glance of surprise at his tone. This lamp is smoking again. I should think the servants might see that it's kept properly trimmed. He grumbled nervously. I'm so sorry, it shan't happen again, she answered, in the firm, bright tone she had learned from her mother. And it exasperated Archer to feel that she was already beginning to humour him, like a younger Mr. Welland. She bent over to lower the wick and as the light struck upon her white shoulders and the clear curves of her face he thought, how young she is. For what endless years this life will have to go on? He felt with a kind of horror, his own strong youth and the bounding blood in his veins. Look here, he said suddenly, I may have to go to Washington for a few days, soon, next week perhaps. Her hand remained on the key of the lamp as she turned to him slowly. The heat from its flame had brought back a glow to her face but it paled as she looked up. On business? She asked, in a tone which implied that there could be no other conceivable reason and that she had put the question automatically as if merely to finish his own sentence. On business, naturally, there's a patent case coming up before the Supreme Court. He gave the name of the inventor and went on furnishing details with all Lawrence Leffert's practised glibness, while she listened attentively, saying at intervals, yes, I see. The change will do you good, she said simply, when he had finished, and you must be sure to go and see Ellen. She added, looking him straight in the eyes with her cloudless smile and speaking in a tone she might have employed in urging him not to neglect some irksome family duty. It was the only word that passed between them on the subject. But in the code in which they had both been trained it meant, of course you understand that I know all that people have been saying about Ellen and I heartily sympathise with my family in their effort to get her to return to her husband. I also know that, for some reason, you have not chosen to tell me. You have advised her against this course, which all the older men of the family as well as our grandmother agree in approving. And that it is owing to your encouragement that Ellen defies us all and exposes herself to the kind of criticism which Mr. Sillerton Jackson probably gave you this evening. The hint that has made you so irritable. Hints have indeed not been wanting, but since you appear unwilling to take them from others I offer you this one myself in the only form in which well-bred people of our kind can communicate unpleasant things to each other. By letting you understand that I know you mean to see Ellen when you are in Washington and are perhaps going there expressly for that purpose. And that since you are sure to see her I wish you to do so with my full and explicit approval and take the opportunity of letting her know what the course of conduct you have encouraged her in is likely to lead to. Her hand was still on the key of the lamp when the last word of this mute message reached him. She turned the wick down, lifted off the globe and breathed on the sulky flame. They smell less if one blows them out, she explained, with her bright housekeeping air. On the threshold she turned and paused for his kiss. End of Chapter 26 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer visit www.librivox.org The Age of Innocence A novel by Edith Wharton Read for LibriVox by Brenda Dane Chapter 27 Wall Street, the next day, had more reassuring reports of Beaufort's situation. They were not definite, but they were hopeful. It was generally understood that he could call on powerful influences in case of emergency and that he had done so with success. And that evening, when Mrs. Beaufort appeared at the opera, wearing her old smile and a new emerald necklace, society drew a breath of relief. New York was inexorable in its condemnation of business irregularities. So far there had been no exception to its tacit rule that those who broke the law of property must pay. And everyone was aware that even Beaufort and Beaufort's wife would be offered up unflinchingly to this principle. But to be obliged to offer them up would be not only painful but inconvenient. The disappearance of the Beauforts would leave a considerable void in their compact little circle. And those who were too ignorant or too careless to shudder at the moral catastrophe bewailed in advance the loss of the best ballroom in New York. Archer had definitely made up his mind to go to Washington. He was waiting only for the opening of the lawsuit of which he had spoken to May so that its date might coincide with that of his visit. But on the following Tuesday he learned from Mr. Letterblair that the case might be postponed for several weeks. Nevertheless he went home that afternoon determined in any event to leave the next evening. The chances were that May, who knew nothing of his professional life and had never shown any interest in it, would not learn of the postponement, should it take place, nor remember the names of the litigants if they were mentioned before her. And at any rate he could no longer put off seeing Madame Olenska. There were too many things that he must say to her. On the Wednesday morning when he reached his office Mr. Letterblair met him with a troubled face. Beaufort, after all, had not managed to tide over. But by setting afloat the rumor that he had done so he had reassured his depositors and heavy payments had poured into the bank till the previous evening when disturbing reports again began to predominate. In consequence a run on the bank had begun and its doors were likely to close before the day was over. The ugliest things were being said of Beaufort's dastardly maneuver and his failure promised to be one of the most discreditable in the history of Wall Street. The extent of the calamity left Mr. Letterblair white and incapacitated. I've seen bad things in my time but nothing as bad as this. Everybody we know will be hit, one way or another. And what can be done about Mrs. Beaufort? What can be done about her? I pity Mrs. Manson-Mingot as much as anybody. Coming at her age there's no knowing what effect this affair may have on her. She always believed in Beaufort. She made a friend of him. And then there's the whole Dallas connection. Poor Mrs. Beaufort is related to every one of you. Her only chance would be to leave her husband yet. How can anyone tell her so? Her duty is at his side and luckily she seems always to have been blind to his private weaknesses. There was a knock and Mr. Letterblair turned his head sharply. What is it? I can't be disturbed. A clerk brought in a letter for Archer and withdrew. Recognizing his wife's hand, the young man opened the envelope and read, Won't you please come uptown as early as you can? Granny had a slight stroke last night. In some mysterious way she found out before anyone else this awful news about the bank. Uncle Lovell is away shooting and the idea of disgrace has made poor Papa so nervous that he has a temperature and can't leave his room. Mama needs you dreadfully and I do hope you can get away at once and go straight to Granny's. Archer handed the note to his senior partner and a few minutes later was crawling northward in a crowded horse car, which he exchanged at 14th Avenue for one of the high staggering omnibuses of the 5th Avenue line. It was after 12 o'clock when this laborious vehicle dropped him at Old Catherine's. The sitting room window on the ground floor where she usually throned was tenanted by the inadequate figure of her daughter, Mrs. Welland, who signed a haggard welcome as she caught sight of Archer and at the door he was met by May. The hall wore the unnatural appearance peculiar to well-kept houses suddenly invaded by illness. Wraps and furs lay in heaps on the chairs, a doctor's bag and overcoat were on the table, and beside them letters and cards already piled up unheeded. May looked pale but smiling. Dr. Bencombe, who had just come for the second time, took a more hopeful view and Mrs. Mingott's dauntless determination to live and get well was already having an effect on her family. May led Archer into the old lady's sitting room where the sliding doors opening into the bedroom had been drawn shut and the heavy yellow damask portiers dropped over them. And here Mrs. Welland communicated to him in horrified undertones the details of the catastrophe. It appeared that the evening before something dreadful and mysterious had happened at about eight o'clock just after Mrs. Mingott had finished the game of solitaire that she always played after dinner the doorbell had rung and a lady so thickly veiled that the servants did not immediately recognize her had asked to be received. The butler hearing a familiar voice had thrown open the sitting room door announcing Mrs. Julius Beaufort and had then closed it again on the two ladies. They must have been together, he thought, about an hour. When Mrs. Mingott's bell rang Mrs. Beaufort had already slipped away unseen and the old lady, white and vast and terrible, sat alone in her great chair and signed to the butler to help her into her room. She seemed at that time, though obviously distressed, in complete control of her body and brain. The mulatto maid put her to bed, brought her a cup of tea as usual, laid everything straight in the room and went away. But at three in the morning the bell rang again and the two servants, hastening in at this unwanted summons, for old Catherine usually slept like a baby, had found their mistress sitting up against her pillows with a crooked smile on her face and one little hand hanging limp from its huge arm. The stroke had clearly been a slight one, for she was able to articulate and to make her wishes known and soon after the doctor's first visit she had begun to regain control of her facial muscles. But the alarm had been great. And proportionately great was the indignation, when it was gathered from Mrs. Mingott's fragmentary phrases, that Regina Beaufort had come to ask her, incredible effrontery, to back up her husband, see them through, not to desert them, as she called it, in fact to induce the whole family to cover and condone their monstrous dishonor. I said to her, honours always been honour and honesty, honesty in Manson Mingott's house and will be till I'm carried out of it feet first, the old woman had stammered into her daughter's ear, in the thick voice of the partly paralysed. And when she said, but my name, Auntie, my name's Regina Dallas, I said it was Beaufort when he covered you with jewels and it's got to stay Beaufort now that he's covered you with shame. So much, with tears and gasps of horror, Mrs. Welland imparted, blanched and demolished by the unwanted obligation of having it last to fix her eyes on the unpleasant and the discreditable. If only I could keep it from your father-in-law, he always says Augusta, for pity's sake don't destroy my last illusions. And how am I to prevent his knowing these horrors? The poor lady wailed. After all, Mama, he won't have seen them, her daughter suggested, and Mrs. Welland sighed. Oh no, thank heaven he's safe in bed. And Dr. Bencombe has promised to keep him there till poor Mama is better and Regina has been got away somewhere. Archer had seated himself near the window and was gazing out blankly at the deserted thoroughfare. It was evident that he had been summoned rather for the moral support of the stricken ladies than because of any specific aid that he could render. Mr. Lovell Mingott had been telegraphed for and messages were being dispatched by hand to the members of the family living in New York. And meanwhile there was nothing to do but to discuss in hushed tones the consequences of Beaufort's dishonour and of his wife's unjustifiable action. Mrs. Lovell Mingott, who had been in another room writing notes, presently reappeared and added her voice to the discussion. In their day, the elder ladies agreed, the wife of a man who had done anything disgraceful in business had only one idea—to efface herself, to disappear with him. There was the case of poor Grandma Ma Spicer, your great-grandmother, May. Of course, Mrs. Welland hastened to add, your great-grandfather's money difficulties were private. Losses at cards or signing a note for somebody I never quite knew because Mama would never speak of it. But she was brought up in the country because her mother had to leave New York after the disgrace, whatever it was. They lived in the Hudson alone winter and summer, till Mama was sixteen. And it would never have occurred to Grandma Ma Spicer to ask the family to countenance her, as I understand Regina calls it. Though a private disgrace is nothing compared to the scandal of ruining hundreds of innocent people. Yes, it would be more becoming in Regina to hide her own countenance than to talk about other peoples, Mrs. Lovell Mingott agreed. I understand that the emerald necklace she wore at the opera last Friday had been sent on approval from Ball and Blacks in the afternoon. I wonder if they'll ever get it back. Archer listened, unmoved, to the relentless chorus. The idea of absolute financial probity as the first law of a gentleman's code was too deeply ingrained in him for sentimental considerations to weaken it. An adventurer, like Lemuel Struthers, might build up the millions of his shoe polish on any number of shady dealings. But unblemished honesty was the noblesse oblige of old financial New York. Nor did Mrs. Beaufort's face greatly move Archer. He felt, no doubt, more sorry for her than her indignant relatives. But it seemed to him that the tie between husband and wife, even if breakable in prosperity, should be indissoluble in misfortune. As Mr. Letterblair had said, a wife's place was at her husband's side when he was in trouble. But society's place was not at his side. And Mrs. Beaufort's cool assumption that it was seemed almost to make her his accomplice. The mere idea of a woman's appealing to her family to screen her husband's business dishonor was inadmissible, since it was the one thing that the family, as an institution, could not do. The mulatto maid called Mrs. Lovell Mingid into the hall, and the latter came back in a moment with a frowning brow. She wants me to telegraph for Ellen Olenska. I had written to Ellen, of course, and to Madura, but now it seems that's not enough. I'm to telegraph to her immediately and to tell her that she's to come alone. The announcement was received in silence. Mrs. Welland sighed, resignedly. And May rose from her seat and went to gather up some newspapers that had been scattered on the floor. I suppose it must be done, Mrs. Lovell Mingid continued, as if hoping to be contradicted. And May turned back towards the middle of the room. Of course it must be done, she said. Granny knows what she wants and we must all carry out her wishes. Shall I write the telegram for you, Auntie? If it goes at once, Ellen can probably catch tomorrow morning's train. She pronounced the syllables of the name with peculiar clearness, as if she had tapped on two silver bells. Well, it can't go at once. Jasper and the pantry boys are both out with notes and telegrams. May turned to her husband with a smile. But here's Newland, ready to do anything. Will you take the telegram, Newland? There'll be just time before luncheon. Archer rose with a murmur of readiness. And she seated herself at Old Catherine's rosewood on her des sure and wrote out the message in her large, immature hand. When it was written, she plodded it neatly and handed it to Archer. What a pity, she said, that you and Ellen will cross each other on the way. Newland, she added, turning to her mother and aunt, is obliged to go to Washington about a patent lawsuit that is coming up before the Supreme Court. I suppose Uncle Lovell will be back by tomorrow night, and with Granny improving so much it doesn't seem right to ask Newland to give up an important engagement for the firm, does it? She paused as if for an answer, and Mrs. Welland hastily declared, Oh, of course not, darling, your Granny would be the last person to wish it. As Archer left the room with the telegram, he heard his mother-in-law add, presumably to Mrs. Lovell Mingott, But why on earth should she make you telegraph for Ellen Olenska? And may his clear voice rejoin, perhaps it's to urge on her again that, after all, her duty is with her husband. The outer door closed on Archer. And he walked hastily away towards the telegraph office. End of Chapter 27 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.LibriVox.org. The Age of Innocence, a novel by Edith Wharton. Read for LibriVox by Brenda Dane. Chapter 28 Alllll—Allll... How'd you spell it any-ow?—asked the tart young lady, to whom Archer had pushed his wife's telegram across the brass ledge of the western union office. Olensk. O—Län—skah~! he repeated. Drawing back the message in order to print out the foreign syllables above May's rambling script. It's an unlikely name for a New York telegraph office—at least in this quarter—an unexpected voice observed. And turning around, Archer saw Lawrence Lefferts at his elbow, pulling an imperturbable mustache, and effecting not to glance at the message. "'Hello, Newland, I thought I'd catch you here. I've just heard of old Mrs. Minkett's stroke, and as I was on my way to the house, I saw you turning down this street and nipped after you. I suppose you've come from there.'" Archer nodded and pushed his telegram under Velladis. "'Very bad, eh?' Lefferts continued. Wiring to the family, I suppose. I gather it is bad if you're including Countess Alenska.' Archer's lips stiffened. He felt a savage impulse to dash his fist into the long, vain, handsome face at his side. "'Why?' he questioned. Lefferts, who was known to shrink from discussion, raised his eyebrows with an ironic grimace. that warned the other of the watching damsel behind Velladis. Nothing could be worse form, the look reminded Archer, than any display of temper in a public place. Archer had never been more indifferent to the requirements of form, but his impulse to do Lawrence Lefferts a physical injury was only momentary. The idea of bandying Ellen Alenska's name with him at such a time, and on what soever provocation, was unthinkable. He paid for his telegram, and the two young men went out together into the street. There, Archer, having regained his self-control, went on, "'Mrs. Mingid is much better. The doctor feels no anxiety whatever.' And Lefferts, with profuse expressions of relief, asked him if he had heard that there were beastly bad rumors again about Beaufort. That afternoon the announcement of the Beaufort failure was in all the papers. It overshadowed the report of Mrs. Manson Mingid's stroke, and only the few who had heard of the mysterious connection between the two events thought of ascribing old Catherine's illness to anything but the accumulation of flesh and ears. The whole of New York was darkened by the tale of Beaufort's dishonor. There had never, as Mr. Letterblair said, been a worse case in his memory nor for that matter in the memory of the far-off Letterblair who had given his name to the firm. The bank had continued to take in money for a whole day after its failure was inevitable. And as many of its clients belonged to one or another of the ruling clans, Beaufort's duplicity seemed doubly cynical. If Mrs. Beaufort had not taken the tone that such misfortunes, the word was her own, were the test of friendship, compassion for her might have tempered the general indignations against her husband. As it was, and especially after the object of her nocturnal visit to Mrs. Manson Mingid had become known, her cynicism was held to exceed his, and she had not the excuse nor her detractors the satisfaction of pleading that she was a foreigner. It was some comfort to those whose securities were not in jeopardy, to be able to remind themselves that Beaufort was. But, after all, if a Dallas of South Carolina took his view of the case, and glibly talked of his soon being on his feet again, the argument lost its edge, and there was nothing to do but accept this awful evidence of the indissolubility of marriage. Society must manage to get on without the Beaufort's, and there was an end of it. Except, indeed, for such hapless victims of the disaster as Medora Manson, the poor old Miss Lannings, and certain other misguided ladies of good family who, if they had only listened to Mr. Henry van der Leuden. The best thing the Beauforts can do, said Mrs. Archer, summing it up as if she were pronouncing a diagnosis and prescribing a course of treatment, is to go and live at Regina's little place in North Carolina. Beaufort has always kept her racing stable, and he had better breed trotting horses. I should say he had all the qualities of a successful horse dealer. Everyone agreed with her, but no one condescended to inquire what the Beauforts really meant to do. The next day Mrs. Manson Mingot was much better. She recovered her voice sufficiently to give orders that no one should mention the Beauforts to her again, and asked, when Dr. Bencombe appeared, what in the world her family meant by making such a fuss about her health? If people my age will eat chicken salad in the evening, what are they to expect? She inquired. And the doctor, having opportunely modified her dietary, the stroke was transformed into an attack of indigestion. But in spite of her firm tone, old Catherine did not wholly recover her former attitude towards life. The growing remoteness of old age, though it had not diminished her curiosity about her neighbors, had blunted her never very lively compassion for their troubles, and she seemed to have no difficulty in putting the Beaufort disaster out of her mind. But for the first time she became absorbed in her own symptoms and began to take a sentimental interest in certain members of her family to whom she had hitherto been contemptuously indifferent. Mr. Welland, in particular, had the privilege of attracting her notice. Of her sons-in-law he was the one she had most consistently ignored, and all his wife's efforts to represent him as a man of forceful character and market intellectual ability, if he had only chosen, had been met with a derisive chuckle. But his eminence, as a valitudinarian, now made him an object of engrossing interest, and Mrs. Mingott issued an imperial summons to him to come and compare diets as soon as his temperature permitted. For old Catherine was now the first to recognize that one could not be too careful about temperatures. Twenty-four hours after Madame Olenska's summons, a telegram announced that she would arrive from Washington on the evening of the following day. At the Wellands, where the Newland archers chanced to be lunching, the question as to who should meet her at Jersey City was immediately raised, and the material difficulties amid which the Welland household struggled, as if it had been a frontier outpost, lent animation to the debate. It was agreed that Mrs. Welland could not possibly go to Jersey City, because she was to accompany her husband to old Catherine's that afternoon, and the broom could not be spared since, if Mr. Welland were upset by seeing his mother-in-law for the first time after her attack, he might have to be taken home at a moment's notice. The Welland's sons would, of course, be downtown. Mr. Lovell Mingott would be just hurrying back from his shooting, and the Mingott carriage engaged in meeting him, and one could not ask May, at the close of a winter afternoon, to go alone across the ferry to Jersey City, even in her own carriage. Nevertheless it might appear inhospitable, and contrary to old Catherine's express wishes, if Madame Olenska were allowed to arrive without any of the family being at the station to receive her. It was just like Ellen, Mrs. Welland's tired voice implied, to place the family in such a dilemma. It's always one thing after another the poor lady grieved in one of her rare revolts against fate. The only thing that makes me think Mama must be less well than Dr. Bencombe will admit is this morbid desire to have Ellen come at once, however inconvenient it is to meet her. The words had been thoughtless, as the utterances of impatience often are, and Mr. Welland was upon them with a pounce. Augusta, he said, turning pale and laying down his fork, have you any other reason to think that Bencombe is less to be relied on than he was? Have you noticed that he has been less conscientious than usual in following up my case, or your mother's? It was Mrs. Welland's turn to grow pale, as the endless consequences of her blunder unrolled themselves before her. But she managed to laugh, and take a second helping of scalloped oysters, before she said, struggling back into her old armour of cheerfulness. My dear, how could you imagine such a thing? I only meant that, after a decided stand Mama took about its being Ellen's duty to go back to her husband, it seems strange that she should be seized with this sudden whim to see her, when there are half a dozen other grandchildren she might have asked for. But we must never forget that Mama, in spite of her wonderful vitality, is a very old woman. Mr. Welland's brow remained clouded, and it was evident that his perturbed imagination had fastened at once on this last remark. Yes, your mother is a very old woman, and for all we know Bencombe may not be as successful with very old people. As you say, my dear, it's always one thing after another, and in another ten or fifteen years I suppose, I shall have the pleasing duty of looking about for a new doctor. It's always better to make such a change, before it's absolutely necessary. And having arrived at this Spartan decision, Mr. Welland firmly took up his fork. But all the while Mrs. Welland began again, as she rose from the luncheon table, and led the way into the wilderness of Purple Satin and Malachite, known as the back drawing-room. I don't see how Ellen's to be got here to-morrow evening, and I do like to have things settled for at least twenty-four hours ahead. Archer turned from the fascinated contemplation of a small painting representing two cardinals carousing in an octagonal ebony frame set with medallions of onyx. Shall I fetch her, he proposed? I can easily get away from the office in time to meet the broom at the ferry, if May will send it there. His heart was beating excitedly as he spoke. Mrs. Welland heaved a sigh of gratitude, and May, who had moved away to the window, turned to shed on him a beam of approval. So you see, Mama, everything will be settled twenty-four hours in advance, she said, stooping over to kiss her mother's troubled forehead. His broom awaited her at the door, and she was to drive Archer to Union Square, where he could pick up a Broadway car to carry him to the office. As she settled herself in her corner she said, I didn't want to worry Mama by raising fresh obstacles, but how can you meet Ellen to-morrow and bring her back to New York when you're going to Washington? Oh, I'm not going, Archer answered. Not going? Why, what's happened? Her voice was as clear as a bell, and full of wifely solicitude. The case is off. Postponed. Postponed? How odd! I saw a note this morning from Mr. Letterblair to Mama, saying that he was going to Washington to-morrow for the big patent case that he was to argue before the Supreme Court. You said it was a patent case, didn't you? Well, that's it. The whole office can't go. Letterblair decided to go this morning. Then it's not, postponed, she continued, with an insistence so unlike her that he felt the blood rising to his face, as if he were blushing for her unwanted laps from all the traditional delicacies. No, but my going is, he answered, cursing the unnecessary explanations that he had given when he had announced his intention of going to Washington, and wondering where he had read that clever liars give details, but that the cleverest do not. It did not hurt him half as much to tell may an untruth, as to see her trying to pretend that she had not detected him. I'm not going till later on, luckily, for the convenience of your family, he continued, taking base refuge in sarcasm. As he spoke, he felt that she was looking at him, and he turned his eyes to hers in order not to appear to be avoiding them. Their glances met for a second, and perhaps let them into each other's meanings more deeply than either cared to go. Yes, it is awfully convenient, may brightly agreed, that you should be able to meet Ellen after all. You saw how much mama appreciated your offering to do it. Oh, I'm delighted to do it! The carriage stopped, and as he jumped out she leaned to him and laid her hands on his. Goodbye, dearest, she said. Her eyes so blue that he wondered afterwards if they had shown on him through tears. He turned and hurried away across Union Square, repeating to himself in a sort of inward chant, It's all of two hours from Jersey City to old Catherine's. It's all of two hours, and it may be more. End of Chapter 28 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. The Age of Innocence, a novel by Edith Wharton. Red for LibriVox by Brenda Dain. Chapter 29 His wife's dark blue broom, with the wedding varnish still on it, met Archer at the ferry, and conveyed him luxuriously to the Pennsylvania terminus in Jersey City. It was a somber, snowy afternoon, and the gas lamps were lit in the big reverberating station. As he paced the platform, waiting for the Washington Express, he remembered that there were people who thought there would one day be a tunnel under the Hudson, through which the trains of the Pennsylvania Railway would run straight into New York. They were of the brotherhood of visionaries who likewise predicted the building of ships that would cross the Atlantic in five days, the invention of a flying machine, lighting by electricity, telephonic communication without wires, and other Arabian night's marvels. I don't care which of their visions comes true, Archer mused, as long as the tunnel isn't built yet. In his senseless schoolboy happiness, he pictured Madame Olenska's descent from the train, his discovery of her, a long way off, among the throngs of meaningless faces, her clinging to his arm as he guided her into the carriage, their slow approach to the wharf among slipping horses, laden carts, vociferating teamsters, and then the startling quiet of the ferryboat, where they would sit, side by side, under the snow, in the motionless carriage, while the earth seemed to glide away under them, rolling to the other side of the sun. It was incredible the number of things he had to say to her and in what eloquent order they were forming themselves on his lips. The clanging and groaning of the train came nearer, and it staggered slowly into the station like a pre-laden monster into its lair. Archer pushed forward, elbowing through the crowd, and staring blindly into window after window of the high-hung carriages. And then, suddenly, he saw Madame Olenska's pale and surprised face close at hand, and had again the mortified sensation of having forgotten what she looked like. They reached each other, their hands met, and he drew her arm through his. This way I have the carriage, he said. After that it all happened as he had dreamed. He helped her into the broom with her bags, and had afterwards the vague recollection of having properly reassured her about her grandmother, and given her a summary of the Beaufort situation. He was struck by the softness of her poor Regina. Meanwhile the carriage had worked its way out of the coil about the station, and they were crawling down the slippery incline to the wharf, menaced by swaying coal carts, bewildered horses, disheveled express wagons, and an empty hearse, oh, that hearse! She shut her eyes as it passed and clutched Archer's hand. If only it doesn't mean, poor Granny. Oh, no, no, she's much better. She's all right, really. There, we've passed it, he exclaimed, as if that made all the difference. Her hand remained in his, and as the carriage lurched across the gang-plank, onto the ferry, he bent over, unbuttoned her tight brown glove, and kissed her palm as if he had kissed a relic. She disengaged herself with a faint smile and he said, You didn't expect me today? Oh, no. I meant to go to Washington to see you. I've made all my arrangements. I very nearly crossed you in the train. Oh, she exclaimed, as if terrified by the narrowness of their escape. Do you know, I hardly remembered you. Hardly remembered me. I mean, how shall I explain? I, it's always so. Each time you happen to me all over again. Oh, yes, I know, I know. Does it? Do I too, to you? He insisted. She nodded, looking out of the window. Ellen. Ellen, Ellen. She made no answer. And he sat in silence, watching her profile grow indistinct against the snow-streaked dusk beyond the window. What had she been doing in all those four long months, he wondered? How little they knew of each other after all. The precious moments were slipping away. But he had forgotten everything he had meant to say to her and could only helplessly brood on the mystery of their remoteness and their proximity, which seemed to be symbolized by the fact of their sitting so close to each other and yet being unable to see each other's faces. What a pretty carriage. Is it May's? She asked, suddenly turning her face from the window. Yes. It was May who sent you to fetch me then. How kind of her. He made no answer for a moment. Then he said explosively, your husband's secretary came to see me the day after we met in Boston. In his brief letter to her he had made an allusion to Monsieur Riviere's visit and his intention had been to bury the incident in his bosom. But her reminder that they were in his wife's carriage provoked him to an impulse of retaliation. He would see if she liked his reference to Riviere any better than he liked hers to May. As on certain other occasions, when he had expected to shake her out of her usual composure, she betrayed no sign of surprise. And at once he concluded he writes to her then, Monsieur Riviere went to see you. Yes, didn't you know? No, she answered simply. And you're not surprised. She hesitated. Why should I be? He told me in Boston that he knew you, that he met you in England, I think. Ellen, I must ask you one thing. Yes. I wanted to ask it after I saw him, but I couldn't put it in a letter. It was Riviere who helped you to get away when you left your husband. His heart was beating suffocatingly. Would she meet this question with the same composure? Yes, I owe him a great debt, she answered, without the least tremor in her quiet voice. Her tone was so natural, so almost indifferent that archers turmoil subsided. Once more she had managed by her sheer simplicity to make him feel stupidly conventional, just when he thought he was flinging convention to the winds. I think you're the most honest woman I ever met, he exclaimed. Oh, no, but probably one of the least fussy, she answered a smile in her voice. Call it what you like. You look at things as they are. Oh, I've had to. I've had to look at the gorgon. Well, it hasn't blinded you. You've seen that she's just an old bogey like all the others. She doesn't blind one. But she dries up one's tears. The answer checked the pleading on archers lips. It seemed to come from depths of experience beyond his reach. The slow advance of the ferryboat had ceased. And her bows bumped against the piles of slip with a violence that made the broom stagger and flung archer and Madame Olenska against each other. The young man, trembling, felt the pressure of her shoulder and passed his arm about her. If you're not blind, then you must see that this can't last. What can't? Our being together and not together. No, you should not have come today, she said in an altered voice. And suddenly she turned, flung her arms about him and pressed her lips to his. At the same moment the carriage began to move and a gas lamp at the head of the slip flashed its light into the window. She drew away and they sat silent and motionless while the broom struggled through the congestion of carriages about the ferry landing as they gained the street. Archer began to speak hurriedly. Don't be afraid of me. You needn't squeeze yourself back into your corner like that. A stolen kiss isn't what I want. Look, I'm not even trying to touch the sleeve of your jacket. Don't suppose that I don't understand your reasons for not wanting to let this feeling between us dwindle into an ordinary, whole and corner love affair. I couldn't have spoken like this yesterday because I'm looking forward to seeing you every thought is burnt up in a great flame. But then you've come and you're so much more than I remembered. And what I want of you is so much more than an hour or two every now and then with wastes of thirsty waiting between that I can sit perfectly still beside you like this with that other vision in my mind, just as I was waiting for just quietly trusting to it to come true. For a moment she made no reply and then she asked, hardly above a whisper, what do you mean by trusting it to come true? Why, you know it will, don't you? Your vision of you and me together, she burst into a sudden hard laugh. You choose your place well to put it to me. Do you mean because we're in my wife's room? Shall we get out and walk then? I don't suppose you mind a little snow. She laughed again more gently. No, I shan't get out and walk because my business is to get to granny's as quickly as I can and you'll sit beside me and we'll look not at visions, but at realities. I don't know what you mean by realities. The only reality to me is this. She met the words with a long silence, during which the carriage rolled down an obscure side street and then turned into the searching illumination of Fifth Avenue. Is it your idea then that I should live with you as your mistress since I can't be your wife? She asked the crudeness of the question startled him. The word was one that women of his class fought shy of even when their talk flooded closest about the topic. He noticed that Madame Olenska pronounced it as if it had a recognized place in her vocabulary. And he wondered if it had been used familiarly in her presence in the horrible life she had fled from. Her question pulled him up with a jerk and he floundered. I want, I want somehow to get away with you into a world where words like that, categories like that won't exist where we shall be simply two human beings who love each other, who are the whole of life to each other and nothing else on earth will matter. She drew a deep sigh that ended in another laugh. Oh, my dear, where is that country? Have you ever been there? She asked. And as he remained sullenly dumb, she went on. I know so many who've tried to find it. And believe me, they all got out by mistake at wayside stations, at places like Balone or Pisa or Monte Carlo. And it wasn't at all different from the old world they'd left, but only rather smaller and dingier and more promiscuous. He had never heard her speak in such a tone. And he remembered the phrase she had used a little while before. Yes, the Gorgon has dried your tears, he said. Well, she opened my eyes too. It's a delusion to say that she blinds people. What she does is just the contrary. She fastens their eyelids open so that they're never again in the blessed darkness. Isn't there a Chinese torture like that there ought to be? Oh, believe me, it's a miserable little country. The carriage had crossed 42nd Street. May's sturdy broom horse was carrying them northward as if he had been a Kentucky trotter. Archer choked with a sense of wasted minutes and vain words. Then what exactly is your plan for us? He asked for us, but there's no us in that sense. We're near each other only if we stay far from each other. Then we can be ourselves. Otherwise we're only Newland Archer, the husband of Ellen Olenska's cousin and Ellen Olenska, the cousin of Newland Archer's wife, trying to be happy behind the backs of the people who trust them. Oh, I'm beyond that, he groaned. No, you're not. You've never been beyond and I have, she said in a strange voice, and I know what it looks like there. He sat silent, dazed with inarticulate pain. Then he groped in the darkness of the carriage for the little bell that signaled orders to the coachman. He remembered that May rang twice when she wished to stop. He pressed the bell and the carriage drew up beside the curb stone. Why are we stopping? This is not Granny's, Madam Olenska exclaimed. No. I shall get out here, he stammered, opening the door and jumping to the pavement. By the light of a street lamp he saw her startled face and the instinctive motion she made to detain him. He closed the door and leaned for a moment in the window. You're right. I ought not to have come today, he said. Lowering his voice so that the coachman should not hear. She bent forward and seemed about to speak, but he had already called out the order to drive on and the carriage rolled away while he stood on the corner. The snow was over. And a tingling wind had sprung up that lashed his face as he stood gazing. Suddenly he felt something stiff and cold on his lashes and perceived that he had been crying and that the wind had frozen his tears. He thrust his hands in his pockets and walked at a sharp pace down Fifth Avenue to his own house. End of Chapter 29. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.LibriVox.org. The Age of Innocence, a novel by Edith Wharton. Read for LibriVox by Brenda Dane. Chapter 30. That evening when Archer came down before dinner, he found the drawing room empty. He and May were dining alone, all the family engagements having been postponed since Mrs. Manson Mingid's illness. And as May was the more punctual of the two, he was surprised that she had not preceded him. He knew that she was at home. For while he dressed, he had heard her moving about in her room and he wondered what had delayed her. He had fallen into the way of dwelling on such conjectures as a means of tying his thoughts fast to reality. Sometimes he felt as if he had found the clue to his father in law's absorption in trifles. Perhaps even Mr. Welland, long ago, had escapes and visions and had conjured up all the hosts of domesticity to defend himself against them. When May appeared, he thought she looked tired. She had put on the low necked and tightly laced dinner dress, which the Mingid ceremonial exacted on the most informal occasions, and had built her fair hair into its usual accumulated coils. And her face, in contrast, was wan and almost faded. But she shone on him with her usual tenderness. And her eyes had kept the blue dazzle of the day before. What became of you, dear, she asked, I was waiting at Granny's and Ellen came alone and said she had dropped you on the way because you had to rush off on business. There's nothing wrong. Only some letters I'd forgotten and wanted to get off before dinner. Oh, she said, and a moment afterwards. I'm sorry you didn't come to Granny's unless the letters were urgent. They were, he rejoined, surprised at her insistence. Besides, I don't see why I should have gone to your grandmothers. I didn't know you were there. She turned and moved to the looking glass above the mantelpiece. As she stood there, lifting her long arm to fasten a puff that had slipped from its place in her intricate hair, Archer was struck by something languid and inelastic in her attitude and wondered if the deadly monotony of their lives had laid its weight on her also. Then he remembered that as he had left the house that morning she had called over the stairs that she would meet him at her grandmothers so that they might drive home together. He had called back a cheery, yes, and then absorbed in other visions had forgotten his promise. Now he was smitten with compunction yet irritated that so trifling and omission should be stored up against him after nearly two years of marriage. He was weary of living in a perpetual tepid honeymoon without the temperature of passion yet with all its exactions. If May had spoken out her grievances, he suspected her of many. He might have laughed them away, but she was trained to conceal imaginary wounds under a Spartan smile. To disguise his own annoyance, he asked how her grandmother was, and she answered that Mrs. Mingid was still improving, but had been rather disturbed by the last news about the Beauforts. What news? It seems they're going to stay in New York. I believe he's going into an insurance business or something. They're looking about for a small house. The preposterousness of the case was beyond discussion, and they went into dinner. During dinner their talk moved in its usual limited circle. But Archer noticed that his wife made no allusion to Madame Olenska nor to old Catherine's reception of her. He was thankful for the fact, yet felt it to be vaguely ominous. They went up to the library for coffee and Archer lit a cigar and took down a volume of Michelette. He had taken to history in the evenings, since May had shown a tendency to ask him to read aloud whenever she saw him with a volume of poetry. Not that he disliked the sound of his own voice, but because he could always foresee her comments on what he read. In the days of their engagement, she had simply, as he now perceived, echoed what he told her. But since he had ceased to provide her with opinions, she had begun to hazard her own, with results destructive to his enjoyment of the works commented on. Seeing that he had chosen history, she fetched her workbasket, drew up an armchair to the green shaded student lamp, and uncovered a cushion she was embroidering for his sofa. She was not a clever needlewoman. Her large, capable hands were made for writing, rowing and open-air activities, but since other wives embroidered cushions for their husbands, she did not wish to omit this last link in her devotion. She was so placed that Archer, by merely raising his eyes, could see her bent above her work frame, her ruffled elbow sleeves slipping back from her firm round arms, the betrothal sapphire shining on her left hand above her broad gold wedding ring, and the right hand slowly and laboriously stabbing the canvas. As she sat thus, the lamp light, full on her clear brow, he said to himself with a secret dismay that he would always know the thoughts behind it, that never in all the years to come would she surprise him by an unexpected mood, by a new idea, a weakness, a cruelty, or an emotion. She had spent her poetry and romance on their short courting. The function was exhausted because the need was passed. Now she was simply ripening into a copy of her mother, and mysteriously, by the very process, trying to turn him into a Mr. Welland. He laid down his book and stood up impatiently, and at once she raised her head. What's the matter? The room is stifling, I want a little air. He had insisted that the library curtains should draw backward and forward on a rod, so that they might be closed in the evening instead of remaining nailed to a gilt cornice and immovably looped up over layers of lace, as in the drawing room. And he pulled them back and pushed up the sash, leaning out into the icy night. The mere fact of not looking at May, seated beside his table, under his lamp, the fact of seeing other houses, roofs, chimneys, of getting the sense of other lives outside his own, other cities beyond New York, and a whole world beyond his world cleared his brain and made it easier to breathe. After he had leaned out into the darkness for a few minutes, he heard her say, Newland, do shut the window, you'll catch your death. He pulled the sash down and turned back. Catch my death, he echoed. And he felt like adding, but I've caught it already. I am dead. I have been dead for months and months. And suddenly the play of the word flashed up in a wild suggestion. What if it were she who was dead? What if she were going to die, to die soon and leave him free? The sensation of standing there in that warm, familiar room and looking at her and wishing her dead was so strange, so fascinating and overmastering that its enormity did not immediately strike him. He simply felt that chance had given him a new possibility to which his sick soul might cling. Yes, may might die, people did, young people, healthy people like herself, she might die and set him suddenly free. She glanced up and he saw by her widening eyes that there must be something strange in his own. Newland, are you ill? He shook his head and turned toward his armchair. She bent over her work frame and as he passed he laid his hand on her hair. Poor me, he said. Poor? Why poor? She echoed with a strained laugh. Because I shall never be able to open a window without worrying you. He rejoined, laughing also. For a moment she was silent. Then she said very low. Her head bowed over her work. I shall never worry if you're happy. Oh, my dear, and I shall never be happy unless I can open the windows. In this weather, she remonstrated, and with a sigh he buried his head in his book. Six or seven days passed. Archer heard nothing from Madame Olenska and became aware that her name would not be mentioned in his presence by any member of the family. He did not try to see her. To do so while she was at old Catherine's guarded bedside would have been almost impossible. In the uncertainty of the situation, he let himself drift, conscious, somewhere below the surface of his thoughts, of a resolve which had come to him when he had leaned out from his library window into the icy night. The strength of that resolve made it easy to wait and make no sign. Then one day May told him that he had no idea what to do. May told him that Mrs. Manson Mingid had asked to see him. There was nothing surprising in the request, for the old lady was steadily recovering, and she had always openly declared that she preferred Archer to any of her other grandsons-in-law. May gave the message with evident pleasure. She was proud of old Catherine's appreciation of her husband. There was a moment's pause, and then Archer felt it incumbent on him to say, All right, shall we go together this afternoon? His wife's face brightened, but she instantly answered, Oh, you'd much better go alone. It bores Granny to see the same people too often. Archer's heart was beating violently when he rang old Mrs. Mingid's bell. He had wanted, above all things, to go alone, for he felt sure the visit would give him the chance of saying a word in private to the Countess Olenska. He had determined to wait until the chance presented itself naturally. And here it was. And here he was on the doorstep. Behind the curtains of the yellow damask room next to the hall, she was surely awaiting him. In another moment, he should see her and be able to speak to her before she led him to the sick room. He wanted only to put one question. After that, his course would be clear. What he wished to ask was simply the date of her return to Washington, and that question she could hardly refuse to answer. But in the yellow sitting room, it was the mulatto maid who waited. Her white teeth shining like a keyboard, she pushed back the sliding doors and ushered him into old Catherine's presence. The woman sat in a vast, throne-like armchair near her bed. Beside her was a mahogany stand bearing a cast bronze lamp with an engraved globe over which a green paper shade had been balanced. There was not a book or newspaper in reach, nor any evidence of feminine employment. Conversation had always been Mrs. Mingid's sole pursuit, and she would have scorned to feign an interest in fancy work. Archer saw no trace of the slight distortion left by her stroke. She merely looked, paler, with darker shadows in the folds and recesses of her obesity, and in the fluted mobcap tied by a starched bow between her first two chins and the muslin kerchief crossed over her billowing purple dressing-gown. She seemed like some shrewd and kindly ancestors of her own who might have yielded too freely to the pleasures of the table. She held out one of the little hands that nestled in the hollow of her huge lap, like pet animals, and called to the maid, Don't let in anyone else. If my daughters call, say I'm asleep. The maid disappeared, and the old lady turned to her grandson. My dear, my perfectly hideous, she asked gaily, launching out one hand in search of the folds of muslin on her inaccessible bosom. My daughters tell me it doesn't matter at my age, as if hideousness didn't matter all the more the harder it gets to conceal. My dear, you're handsomer than ever. Archer rejoined in the same tone, and she threw back her head and laughed. Ah, but not as handsome as Ellen, she jerked out, twinkling at him maliciously. Before he could answer, she added, Was she so awfully handsome the day you drove her up from the ferry? He laughed, and she continued, Was it because you told her so that she had to put you out on the way? In my youth, young men didn't desert pretty women unless they were made to. She gave another chuckle, and interrupted it to say almost quarellously, It's a pity she didn't marry you. I always told her so. It would have spared me all this worry. But who ever thought of sparing their grandmother worry? Archer wondered if her illness had blurred her faculties. But suddenly she broke out, Well, it's settled anyhow. She's going to stay with me, whatever the rest of the family say. She hadn't been here five minutes before I'd have gone down on my knees to keep her. If only for the last 20 years I'd been able to see where the floor was. Archer listened in silence and she went on. They'd talked me over, as no doubt you know. Persuaded me, Lovell and Letter Blair and Augusta Welland and all the rest of them, that I must hold out and cut off her allowance till she was made to see that it was her duty to go back to Olensky. They thought they'd convinced me when the secretary or whatever he was came out with the last proposals, handsome proposals I confess they were. After all, marriage is marriage and money's money, both useful things in their way. And I didn't know what to answer. She broke off and drew a long breath, as if speaking had become an effort. But the minute I laid eyes on her I said, you sweet bird, you shut you up in that cage again, never. And now it's settled that she's to stay here and nurse her granny as long as there's a granny to nurse. It's not a gay prospect, but she doesn't mind. And of course I've told Letter Blair that she's to be given her proper allowance. The young man heard her with veins aglow. But in his confusion of mind he hardly knew whether her news brought joy or pain. He had so definitely decided on the course he meant to pursue that for the moment he could not readjust his thoughts. But gradually there stole over him the delicious sense of difficulties deferred and opportunities miraculously provided. If Ellen had consented to come and live with her grandmother, it must surely be because she had recognized the impossibility of giving him up. This was her answer to his final appeal of the other day. If she would not take the extreme step he had urged, she had at last yielded to half measures. He sank back into the thought with the involuntary relief of a man who has been ready to risk everything and suddenly tastes the dangerous sweetness of security. She couldn't have gone back. It was impossible, he exclaimed. Oh, my dear, I always knew you were on her side. And that's why I sent for you today. And why I said to your pretty wife when she proposed to come with you, no, my dear, I'm pining to see Newland and I don't want anybody to share our transports. For you see, my dear, she drew her head back as far as its tethering chains permitted and looked him full in the eyes. You see, we shall have a fight yet. The family don't want her here. And they'll say it's because I've been ill because I'm a weak old woman and that she's persuaded me. I'm not well enough yet to fight them one by one and you've got to do it for me. I, he stammered, you, why not? She jerked back at him. Her round eyes suddenly as sharp as pen knives. Her hand fluttered from its chair arm and lit on his with a clutch of little pale nails like bird claws. Why not? She searchingly repeated. Archer under the exposure of her gaze had recovered his self-possession. Oh, I don't count. I'm too insignificant. Well, your letter Blair's partner, ain't you? You've got to get at them through letter Blair. Unless you've got a reason, she insisted. Oh, my dear, I back you to hold your own against them all without my help, but you shall have it if you need it. He reassured her. Then we're safe, she sighed and smiling on him with all her ancient cunning she added as she settled her head among the cushions. I always knew you'd back us up because they never quote you when they talk about its being her duty to go home. He wins to little at her terrifying perspicacity and long to ask, and may do they quote her? But he judged it safer to turn the question. And Madam Alenska, when am I to see her? He said. The old lady chuckled, crumpled her lids and went through the pantomime of Archnus, not today. One at a time, please. Madam Alenska's gone out. He flushed with disappointment and she went on. She's gone out, my child. Gone away in my carriage to see Regina Beaufort. She paused for this announcement to produce its effect. That's what she's reduced me to already. The day after she got here she put on her best monitor and told me as cool as a cucumber that she was going to call on Regina Beaufort. I don't know her. Who is she? Says I. She's your grand niece and the most unhappy woman, she says. She's the wife of a scoundrel, I answered. Well, she says, and so am I. And yet all my family want me to go back to him. Well, that floored me and I let her go. And finally one day she said it was raining too hard to go out on foot and she wanted me to lend her my carriage. What for, I asked her. And she said to go and see cousin Regina. Cousin. Now, my dear, I looked out of the window and saw it wasn't raining a drop. But I understood her and I let her have the carriage. After all, Regina's a brave woman and so is she. And I've always liked courage above everything. Archer bent down and pressed his lips on the little hand that still lay on his. Hey, whose hand did you think you were kissing young man? Your wife's, I hope. The old lady snapped with her mocking cackle. And as he rose to go, she called out after him. Give her her granny's love. But you better not say anything about our talk. End of chapter 30.