 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James. Read for LibriVox by Dawn Murphy and Elsa Gundo, California. Chapter 1 During a portion of the first half of the present century, and more particularly, during the latter part of it, they're flourished and practiced in the city of New York, a physician who enjoyed perhaps an exceptional share of the consideration which, in the United States, has always been bestowed upon distinguished members of the medical profession. This profession in America has constantly been held in honor and more successfully than elsewhere has put forward a claim to the epithet of liberal. In a country in which, to play a social part, you must either earn your income or make believe that you earn it. The healing art has appeared in a high degree to combine two recognized sources of credit. It belongs to the realm of the practical, which in the United States is a great recommendation, and it is touched by the light of science, a merit appreciated in a community in which the love of knowledge has not always been accompanied by leisure and opportunity. It was an element in Dr. Sloper's reputation that his learning and his skill were very evenly balanced. He was what you might call a scholarly doctor, and yet there was nothing abstract in his remedies. He always ordered you to take something. Though he was felt to be extremely thorough, he was not uncomfortably theoretic. And if he sometimes explained matters rather more minutely than might seem of use to the patient, he never went so far. Like some practitioners one had heard of, as to trust to the explanation alone, but he always left behind him an inscrutable prescription. There were some doctors that left the prescription without offering any explanation at all, and he did not belong to that class either, which was, after all, the most vulgar. It will be seen that I am describing a clever man, and this is really the reason why Dr. Sloper had become a local celebrity. At the time at which we are chiefly concerned with him, he was some fifty years of age and his popularity was at its height. He was very witty, and he passed in the best society of New York for a man of the world, which indeed he was, in a very sufficient degree. I hasten to add, to anticipate possible misconception, that he was not the least of a charlatan. He was a thoroughly honest man, honest in a degree of which he had perhaps lacked the opportunity to give the complete measure, and putting aside the great good nature of the circle in which he practiced, which was rather fond of boasting that it possessed the brightest doctor in the country. He daily justified his claim to the talents attributed to him by the popular voice. He was an observer, even a philosopher, and to be bright was so natural to him, and as the popular voice said, came so easily that he never aimed at mere effect, and had none of the little tricks and pretensions of second rate reputations. It must be confessed that Fortune had favored him, and that he had found the path to prosperity very soft to his tread. He had married, at the age of twenty-seven, for love a charming girl, Miss Catherine Harlington, of New York, who, in addition to her charms, had brought him a solid gallery. Mrs. Sloper was amiable, graceful, accomplished, elegant, and in 1820 she had been one of the pretty girls of the small but promising capital, which clustered about the battery and overlooked the bay, and of which the uppermost boundary was indicated by the grassy way sides of Canal Street. Even at the age of twenty-seven, Austin Sloper had made his mark sufficiently to mitigate the anomaly of his having been chosen among a dozen suitors by a young woman of high fashion, who had ten thousand dollars of income and the most charming eyes in the island of Manhattan. These eyes and some of their accompaniments were for about five years a source of extreme satisfaction to the young physician, who was both a devoted and a very happy husband. The fact of his having married a rich woman made no difference in the line he had traced for himself, and he cultivated his profession with as definite a purpose as if he still had no other resources than his fraction of the modest patrimony which, on his father's death, he had shared with his brothers and sisters. This purpose had not been preponderantly to make money, it had been rather to learn something and to do something. To learn something interesting and to do something useful, this was, roughly speaking, the programme he had sketched, and of which the accident of his wife having an income appeared to him in no degree to modify the validity. He was fond of his practice and of exercising a skill of which he was agreeably conscious, and it was so patented a truth that if he were not a doctor there was nothing else he could be that a doctor he persisted in being, in the best possible conditions. Of course his easy domestic situation saved him a good deal of drudgery and his wife's affiliation to the best people brought him a good many of those patients whose symptoms are, if not more interesting in themselves, than those of the lower orders, at least more consistently displayed. He desired experience, and in the course of twenty years he got a great deal. It must be added that it came to him in some forms which, whatever might have been their intrinsic value, made it the reverse of welcome. His first child, a little boy of extraordinary promise as the doctor who was not addicted to easy enthusiasm firmly believed, died at three years of age in spite of everything that the mother's tenderness and the father's science could invent to save him. Two years later Mrs. Sloper gave birth to a second infant, an infant of a sex which rendered the poor child to the doctor's sense an inadequate substitute for his lamented first-born, of whom he had promised himself to make an admirable man. The little girl was a disappointment, but this was not the worst. A week after her birth the young mother, who, as the phrase is, had been doing well, suddenly betrayed alarming symptoms and before another week had elapsed, Austin Sloper was a widower. For a man whose trade was to keep people alive he had certainly done poorly in his own family, and a bright doctor who within three years loses his wife and his little boy should perhaps be prepared to see either his skill or his affection impunged. Our friend, however, escaped criticism, that is he escaped all criticism but his own, which was the most competent and most formidable. He walked under the weight of this very private censure for the rest of his days and bore forever the scars of the castigation to which the strongest hand he knew had treated him on the night that followed his wife's death. The world, which I have said, appreciated him, pitted him too much to be ironical. His misfortune made him more interesting and even helped him to be the fashion. It was observed that even medical families cannot escape the more insidious forms of disease, and that, after all, Dr. Sloper had lost other patients besides the two I have mentioned, which constituted an honorable precedent. His little girl remained to him, and though she was not what he had desired, he proposed to himself to make the best of her. He had on hand a stock of unexpected authority by which the child, in its early years, profited largely. She had been named, as a matter of course, after her poor mother, and even in her most diminutive babyhood the doctor never called her anything but Catherine. She grew up a very robust and healthy child, and her father, as he looked at her, often said to himself that, such as she was, he had at least need have no fear of losing her. I say, such as she was, because to tell the truth, but this is a truth of which I will defer the telling. Washington Square, a novel by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California, January 2007. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square, by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California. Chapter 2 When the child was about ten years old, he invited his sister, Mrs. Pennyman, to come and stay with him. The Miss Slopers had been but two in number, and both of them had married early in life. The younger, Mrs. Almond by name, was the wife of a prosperous merchant and the mother of a blooming family. She bloomed herself, indeed, and was a comely, comfortable, reasonable woman, and a favorite with her clever brother, who, in the matter of women, even when they were nearly related to him, was a man of distinct preferences. He preferred Mrs. Almond, to his sister, LaVinia, who had married a poor clergyman of a sickly constitution and a flowery style of eloquence, and then, at the age of thirty-three, had been left a widow, without children, without fortune, with nothing but the memory of Mr. Pennyman's flowers of speech, a certain vague aroma of which hovered about her own conversation. Nevertheless, he had offered her a home under his own roof, which LaVinia accepted with the alacrity of a woman who had spent the ten years of her married life in the town of Poughkeepsie. The doctor had not proposed to Mrs. Pennyman to come and live with him indefinitely. He had suggested that she should make an asylum of his home, while she looked about for unfurnished lodgings. It is uncertain whether Mrs. Pennyman ever instituted a search for unfurnished lodgings, but it is beyond dispute that she never found them. She settled herself with her brother and never went away, and, when Catherine was twenty years old, her Aunt LaVinia was still one of the most striking features of her immediate entourage. Mrs. Pennyman's own account of the matter was that she had remained to take charge of her niece's education. She had given this account at least to everyone but the doctor, who never asked for explanations which he could entertain himself any day with inventing. Mrs. Pennyman, moreover, though she had a good deal of a certain sort of artificial assurance, shrunk for indefinable reasons from presenting herself to her brother as a fountain of instruction. She had not a high sense of humour, but she had enough to prevent her from making this mistake, and her brother, on his side, had enough to excuse her in her situation for laying him under contribution during a considerable part of a lifetime. He, therefore, assented tacitly to the proposition which Mrs. Pennyman had tacitly laid down, that it was of importance that the poor motherless girl should have a brilliant woman near her. His assent could only be tacit, for he had never been dazzled by his sister's intellectual luster. Even when he fell in love with Catherine Harrington, he had never been dazzled, indeed by any feminine characteristics whatever, and though he was to a certain extent what is called a lady's doctor, his private opinion of the more complicated sex was not exalted. He regarded its complications as more curious than edifying, and he had an idea of the beauty of reason which was, on the whole, meagerly gratified by what he observed in his female patients. His wife had been a reasonable woman, but she was a bright exception. Among several things that he was sure of, this was perhaps the principle. Such a conviction, of course, did little either to mitigate or to abbreviate his widowhood, and it set a limit to his recognition at the best of Catherine's possibilities and of Mrs. Pennyman's menstruations. He nevertheless, at the end of six months, accepted his sister's permanent presence as an accomplished fact, and as Catherine grew older, received that there were in effect good reasons why she should have a companion of her own imperfect sex. He was extremely polite to Lavinia, scrupulously, formally polite, and she had never seen him in anger but once in her life when he lost his temper in a theological discussion with her late husband. With her he never discussed theology, nor, indeed, discussed anything. He contented himself, making known, very distinctly, in the form of a lucid ultimatum, his wishes with regard to Catherine. Once, when the girl was about twelve years old, he had said to her, Try and make a clever woman of her, Lavinia. I should like her to be a clever woman. Mrs. Pennyman, at this, looked thoughtful a moment. My dear Austen, she then inquired, do you think it is better to be clever than to be good? Good for what? asked the doctor. You are good for nothing unless you are clever. From this assertion Mrs. Pennyman saw no reason to dissent. She possibly reflected that her own great use in the world was owing to her aptitude for many things. Of course I wish Catherine to be good, the doctor said the next day, but she won't be any less virtuous for not being a fool. I am not afraid of her being wicked. She will never have the salt of malice in her character. She is, as good, as good bread, as the French say. But six years hence I won't want to have to compare her to good bread and butter. Are you afraid she will be insipid? My dear brother, it is I who supplied the butter, so you needn't fear, said Mrs. Pennyman, who had taken in hand the child's accomplishments overlooking her at the piano where Catherine displayed a certain talent and going with her to the dancing class where it must be confessed that she made but a modest figure. Mrs. Pennyman was a tall, thin, fair, rather faded woman with a perfectly amiable disposition, a high standard of gentility, a taste for light literature, and a certain foolish indirectness and obliquity of character. She was romantic, she was sentimental, she had a passion for little secrets and mysteries, a very innocent passion for her secrets had hitherto always been as unpractical as adult eggs. She was not absolutely virtuous, but this defect was of no great consequence, for she had never had anything to conceal. She would have liked to have a lover, and to correspond with him under an assumed name in letters left at a shop. I am bound to say that her imagination never carried the intimacy further than this. Mrs. Pennyman had never had a lover, but her brother, who was very shrewd, understood her turn of mind. When Catherine is about seventeen, he said to himself, Levinia will try and persuade her that some young man with a mustache is in love with her. It will be quite untrue, no young man with a mustache or without will ever be in love with Catherine. But Levinia will take it up and talk to her about it, perhaps even if her taste for clandestine operations doesn't prevail with her, she will talk to me about it. Catherine won't see it and won't believe it. Fortunately for her peace of mind, poor Catherine isn't romantic. She was a healthy, well grown child, without a trace of her mother's beauty. She was not ugly, she had simply a plain, dull, gentle countenance. The most that had ever been said for her was that she had a nice face. And though she was an heiress, no one had ever thought of regarding her as a bell. Her father's opinion of her moral purity was abundantly justified. She was excellently, imperturbably good, affectionate, docile, obedient, and much addicted to speaking the truth. In her younger years she was a good deal of a romp, and though it is an awkward confession to make about one's heroine, I must add that she was something of a glutton. She never, that I know of, stole raisins out of the pantry, but she devoted her pocket money to the purchase of cream-cakes. As regards this, however, a critical attitude would be inconsistent with the candid reference to the early annals of any biographer. Catherine was decidedly not clever. She was not quick with her book, nor indeed with anything else. She was not abnormally deficient, and she mustered learning enough to acquit herself respectively in conversation with her contemporaries, among whom it must be avowed, however, that she occupied a secondary place. It is well known that in New York it is possible for a young girl to occupy a primary one. Catherine, who was extremely modest, had no desire to shine. On those social occasions, as they are called, you would have found her lurking in the background. She was extremely fond of her father, and very much afraid of him. She thought him the cleverest and handsomest and most celebrated of men. The poor girl found her account so completely in the exercise of her affections that the little tremor of fear that mixed itself with her fylile passion gave the thing an extra relish rather than blunted its edge. Her deepest desire was to please him, and her conception of happiness was to know that she had succeeded in pleasing him. She had never succeeded beyond a certain point, though on the whole he was very kind to her. She was perfectly aware of this, and to go beyond the point in question seemed to her really something to live for. What she could not know, of course, was that she disappointed him. Though on three or four occasions the doctor had been almost frank about this, she grew up peacefully and prosperously. But at the age of eighteen Mrs. Peniman had not made a clever woman of her. Dr. Sloper would have liked to be proud of his daughter, but there was nothing to be proud of in poor Catherine. There was nothing, of course, to be ashamed of, but this was not enough for the doctor, who was a proud man, and would have enjoyed being able to think of his daughter as an unusual girl. There would have been a fitness in her being pretty and graceful, intelligent and distinguished. For her mother had been the most charming woman of her little day, and as regards her father, of course he knew his own value. He had moments of irritation at having produced a commonplace child, and he even went so far at times as to take a certain satisfaction in the thought that his wife had not lived to find her out. He was naturally slow in making this discovery himself, and it was not till Catherine had become a young lady grown that he regarded the matter as settled. He gave her the benefit of a great many doubts. He was in no haste to conclude. Mrs. Penningman frequently assured him that his daughter had a delightful nature, but he knew how to interpret this assurance. It meant, to his sense, that Catherine was not wise enough to discover that her aunt was a goose, a limitation of mind that could not fail to be agreeable to Mrs. Penningman. Both she and her brother, however, exaggerated the young girl's limitations. For Catherine, though she was very fond of her aunt and conscious of the gratitude she owed her, regarded her without a particle of that gentle dread which gave its stamp to her admiration of her father. To her mind there was nothing of the infinite about Mrs. Penningman. Catherine saw her all at once, as it were, and was not dazzled by the apparition, whereas her father's great faculties seemed as they stretched away to lose themselves in a sort of luminous vagueness which indicated not that they stopped, but that Catherine's own mind ceased to follow them. It must not be supposed that Dr. Sloper visited his disappointment upon the poor girl, or ever let her suspect that she had played him a trick. On the contrary, for fear of being unjust to her, he did his duty with exemplary zeal, and recognized that she was a faithful and affectionate child. Besides, he was a philosopher, he smoked a good many cigars over his disappointment, and in the fullness of time he got used to it. He satisfied himself that he had expected nothing, though indeed with a certain oddity of reasoning. I expect nothing, he said to himself, so that, if she gives me a surprise, it will be all clear gain. If she doesn't, it will be no loss. This was about the time Catherine had reached her eighteenth year, so that it will be seen her father had not been precipitate. At this time she seemed not only incapable of giving surprises, it was almost a question whether she could have received one. She was so quiet and irresponsive. People who expressed themselves roughly called her stolid, but she was irresponsive because she was shy, uncomfortably, painfully shy. This was not always understood, and she sometimes produced an impression of insensibility. In reality she was the softest creature in the world. This is a LiberVox recording. All LiberVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James. Red for LiberVox by Dawn Murphy and Elsa Gendo, California. Chapter 3 As a child she had promised to be tall. But when she was sixteen, she ceased to grow and her stature, like most other points in her composition, was not unusual. She was strong, however, and properly made, and fortunately her health was excellent. It has been noted that the doctor was a philosopher, but I would not have answered for his philosophy if the poor girl had proved a sickly and suffering person. Her appearance of health constituted her principal claim to beauty, and her clear, fresh complexion in which white and red were very equally distributed was indeed an excellent thing to see. Her eye was small and quiet, her features were rather thick, her tresses brown and smooth. A doll, plain girl she was called by rigorous critics, a quiet, ladylike girl by those of the more imaginative sort. But by neither class was she very elaborately discussed. When it had been duly impressed upon her that she was a young lady, it was a good while before she could believe it. She suddenly developed a lively taste for dress. A lively taste is quite the expression to use. I feel as if I ought to write it very small. Her judgment in this matter was by no means infallible. It was liable to confusions and embarrassments. Her great indulgence of it was really the desire of a rather inarticulate nature to manifest itself. She sought to be eloquent in her garments and to make up for her diffidence of speech by a fine frankness of costume. But if she expressed herself in her clothes it is certain that people were not to blame for not thinking her a witty person. It must be added that, though she had the expectation of a fortune, Dr. Sloper for a long time had been making twenty thousand dollars a year by his profession and laying aside the half of it, the amount of money at her disposal was not greater than the allowance made to many poorer girls. In those days, in New York, there were still a few altar fires flickering in the temple of Republican simplicity and Dr. Sloper would have been glad to see his daughter present herself with a classic grace as a priestess of this mild faith. It made him fairly grimace in private to think that a child of his should be both ugly and overdressed. For himself he was fond of the good things of life and he made a considerable use of them, but he had a dread of vulgarity and even a theory that it was increasing in the society that surrounded him. Moreover, the standard of luxury in the United States thirty years ago was carried by no means so high as at present and Catherine's clever father took the old fashion view of the education of young persons. He had no particular theory on the subject. It had scarcely as yet become a necessity of self-defense to have a collection of theories. It simply appeared to him proper and reasonable that a well-bred young woman should not carry half her fortune on her back. Catherine's back was a broad one and would have carried a good deal, but to the weight of the paternal displeasure she never ventured to expose it. And our heroine was twenty years old before she treated herself for evening wear to a red satin gown trimmed with gold fringe, though this was an article which, for many years, she had coveted in secret. It made her look, when she sported it, like a woman of thirty, but oddly enough, in spite of her taste for fine clothes she had not a grain of coquetry. And her anxiety, when she put them on, was as to whether they and not she would look well. It is a point on which history has not been explicit, but the assumption is warrantable. It was in the royal reignment just mentioned that she presented herself at a little entertainment given by her aunt, Mrs. Almond. The girl was at this time in her twenty-first year and Mrs. Almond's party was the beginning of something very important. Some three or four years before this Dr. Sloper had moved his household goods uptown, as they say in New York. He had been living ever since his marriage in an edifice of red brick, with granite copings, and an enormous fan light over the door, standing in a street within five minutes' walk of the city hall, which saw its best days, from the social point of view, about 1820. After this the tide of fashion began to set subtly northward, as indeed in New York, thanks to the narrow channel in which it flows, it is obliged to do. And the great hum of traffic rolled farther to the right and left of Broadway. By the time the doctor changed his residence the murmur of trade had become a mighty uproar, which was music in the ears of all good citizens interested in the commercial development, as they delighted to call it, of their fortunate aisle. Dr. Sloper's interest in this phenomenon was only indirect, though seeing that, as the years went on, half his patience came to be overworked men of business. It might have been more immediate. And when most of his neighbor's dwellings, also ornamented with granite copings and large fan lights, had been converted to offices, warehouses, and shipping agencies, and otherwise applied to the base uses of commerce, he determined to look out for a quieter home. The ideal of quiet and of genteel retirement in 1835 was found in Washington Square, where the doctor built himself a handsome, modern, wide-fronted house with a big balcony before the drawing-room windows and a flight of white marble steps ascending to a portal which also faced with white marble. This structure and many of its neighbors, which it exactly resembled, were supposed, forty years ago, to embody the last results of architectural science, and they remain to this day very solid and honorable dwellings. In front of them was a square containing a considerable quantity of inexpensive vegetation enclosed by a wooden paling, which increased its rural and accessible appearance, and round the corner was the more August precinct of the Fifth Avenue, taking its origin at this point with a spacious and confident air which already marked it for high destinies. I know not whether it is owning to the tenderness of early associations, but this portion of New York appears to many persons the most delectable. It has a kind of established repose, which is not a frequent occurrence in other quarters of the long, shrill city. It has a riper, richer, more honorable look than any of the upper ramifications of the great longitude null thoroughfare. The look of having had something of a social history. It was here, as you might have been informed on good authority, that you had come into a world which appeared to offer a variety of sources of interest. It was here that your grandmother lived, in venerable solitude, and it dispensed a hospitality which commended itself alike to the infant imagination and the infant palette. It was here that you took your first walks abroad following the nursery maid with unequal step and sniffing up the strange odor of the alenthus trees, which at the time formed the principal umbrage of the square, and diffused an aroma that you were not yet critical enough to dislike as it deserved. It was here, finally, that your first school, kept by a broad bosom, broad-based old lady with a ferrule, who was always having tea in a blue cup with a saucer that didn't match, enlarged the circle, both of your observations and your sensations. It was here at any rate that my heroine spent many years of her life, which is my excuse for this topographical parenthesis. Mrs. Allman lived much further uptown in an embryonic street, with a high number, a region where the extension of the city began to assume a theoretic air, where poplars grew beside the pavement, when there was one, and mingled their shade with the steep roofs of disultory Dutch houses and where pigs and chickens desported themselves in the gutter. These elements of rural picturesqueness have now wholly departed from New York Street scenery, but they were to be found within the memory of middle-aged persons in quarters which now would blush to be reminded of them. Catherine had a great many cousins, and with her and Allman's children, who ended by being nine in number, she lived on terms of considerable intimacy. When she was younger, they had been rather afraid of her, she was believed, as the phrase is, to be highly educated, and a person who lived in the intimacy of their aunt Penningman had something of reflected grandeur. Mrs. Penningman, among the little Allmans, was an object of more admiration than sympathy. Her manners were strange and formidable, and her mourning robes, she dressed in black for twenty years after her husband's death, and then suddenly appeared when mourning with pink roses in her cap, were complicated in odd unexpected places with buckles, bulges, and pins, which discouraged familiarity. She took children too hard, both for good and for evil, and had an oppressive air of expecting subtle things of them, so that going to see her was a good deal like being taken to church and made to sit in a front pew. It was discovered, after a while, however, that Aunt Penningman was but an accident in Catherine's existence, and not a part of its essence, and that when the girl came to spend a Saturday with her cousins, she was available for follow my master, and even for leapfrog. On this basis an understanding was easily arrived at, and for several years Catherine fraternized with her young kinsmen. I say young kinsmen, because seven of the little Allmans were boys, and Catherine had a preference for those games, which were most conveniently played in trousers. By degrees, however, the little Allmans trousers began to lengthen, and the wearers to disperse and settle themselves in life. The elder children were older than Catherine, and the boys were sent to college or placed in counting rooms. Of the girls, one married very punctually, and the other as punctually became engaged. It was to celebrate this latter event that Mrs. Allmans gave the little party I have mentioned. Her daughter was to marry a stout young stockbroker, a boy of twenty. It was thought a very good thing. For more information, or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Dawn Murphy, in El Segundo, California. Chapter 4 Mrs. Pennyman, with more buckles and bangles than ever, came, of course, to the entertainment accompanied by her niece. The doctor, too, had promised to look in later in the evening. There was to be a good deal of dancing, and before it had gone very far, Marian Elmond came up to Catherine, in company with a tall young man. She introduced the young man as a person who had a great desire to make our heroine's acquaintance, and as a cousin of Arthur Townsend, her own intended. Marian Elmond was a pretty little person of seventeen, with a very small figure and a very big sash, to the elegance of whose manners matrimony had nothing to add. She already had all the heirs of a hostess receiving the company, shaking her fan, saying that with so many people to attend to, she should have no time to dance. She made a long speech about Mr. Townsend's cousin, to whom she administered a tap with her fan before turning away to other cares. Catherine had not understood all that she said, her attention was given to enjoying Marian's ease of manner and flow of ideas, until looking at the young man, who was remarkably handsome. She had succeeded, however, as she often failed to do when people were presented to her in catching his name, which appeared to be the same as that of Marian's little stockbroker. Catherine was always agitated by an introduction. It seemed a difficult moment. She wondered that some people, her new acquaintance at this moment for instance, should mind it so little. She wondered what she ought to say, and what would be the consequence of her saying nothing. The consequences at present were very agreeable. Mr. Townsend, leaving her no time for embarrassment, began to talk to her with an easy smile, as if he had known her for a year. What a delightful party! What a charming house! What an interesting family! What a pretty girl your cousin is! These observations in themselves of no great profundity Mr. Townsend seemed to offer for what they were worth, and as a contribution to an acquaintance. He looked straight into Catherine's eyes. She answered nothing. She only listened and looked at him, and he, as if he expected no particular reply, went on to say many other things in the same comfortable and natural manner. Catherine, though she felt tongue-tied, was conscious of no embarrassment. It seemed proper that he should talk, and that she should simply look at him. What made it so natural was that he was so handsome, or rather as she phrased it to herself, so beautiful. The music had been silent for a while, but it suddenly began again, and then he asked her, with a deeper and tenser smile, if she would do him the honour of dancing with him. Even to this inquiry she gave no audible assent. She simply let him put his arm around her waist. As she did so, it occurred to her more vividly than it had ever done before that this was a singular place for a gentleman's arm to be, and in a moment he was guiding her around the room in the harmonious rotation of the polka. When they paused, she felt that she was red, and then for some moments she stopped looking at him. She fanned herself and looked at the flowers that were painted on her fan. He asked her if she would begin again, and she hesitated to answer, still looking at the flowers. Does it make you dizzy? he asked, in a tone of great kindness. Then Catherine looked up at him. He was certainly beautiful, and not at all red. Yes, she said. She hardly knew why, for dancing had never made her dizzy. Ah well, in that case, said Mr. Townsend, we will sit still and talk. I will find a good place to sit. He found a good place, a charming place, a little sofa that seemed meant only for two persons. The rooms by this time were very full, the dancers increased a number, and people stood close in front of them, turning their backs, so that Catherine and her companion seemed secluded and unobserved. We will talk, the young man had said, but he still did all the talking. Catherine leaned back in her place with her eyes fixed upon him, smiling and thinking him very clever. He had features like young men in pictures. Catherine had never seen such features, so delicate, so chiseled and finished, among the young New Yorkers whom she passed in the streets and met at dancing parties. He was tall and slim, but he looked extremely strong. Catherine thought he looked like a statue, but a statue would not talk like that, and above all would not have eyes of so rare a colour. He had never been at Mrs. Almond's before. He felt very much like a stranger, and it was very kind of Catherine to take pity on him. He was Arthur Townsend's cousin, not very near, several times removed, and Arthur had brought him to present him to the family. In fact, he was a great stranger in New York. It was his native place, but he had not been there for many years. He had been knocking about the world and living in queer corners. He had only come back a month or two before. New York was very pleasant, only he felt lonely. You see, people forget you, he said, smiling at Catherine with his delightful gaze, while he leaned forward obliquely, turning toward her with his elbows on his knees. It seemed to Catherine that no one who had once seen him would ever forget him, but though she made this reflection she kept it to herself, almost as you would keep something precious. They sat there for some time. He was very amusing. He asked her about the people that were near them. He tried to guess who some of them were, and he made the most laughable mistakes. He criticized them very freely in a positive, offhand way. Catherine had never heard anyone, especially any young man, talk just like that. It was the way a young man might talk in a novel, or better still, in a play, on the stage, close before the footlights, looking at the audience, and with everyone looking at him, so that you wondered at his presence of mind. And yet Mr. Townsend was not like an actor. He seemed so sincere, so natural. This was very interesting, but in the midst of it Mary and Almond came pushing through the crowd with a little ironical cry when she found these young people still together, which made everyone turn around and cost Catherine a conscious blush. Mary and broke up their talk and told Mr. Townsend, whom she treated as if she were already married, and he had become her cousin, to run away to her mother who had been wishing for the last half hour to introduce him to Mr. Almond. We shall meet again, he said to Catherine as he left her, and Catherine thought it a very original speech. Her cousin took her by the arm and made her walk about. I needn't ask you what you think of Morris, the young girl exclaimed. Is that his name? I don't ask you what you think of his name, but what you think of himself, said Marion. Oh, nothing particular, Catherine answered, dissembling for the first time in her life. I have half a mind to tell him that, cried Marion. It will do him good. He's so terribly conceited. Conceited? said Catherine, staring. So Arthur says, and Arthur knows about him. Oh, don't tell him, Catherine murmured imploringly. Don't tell him he's conceded? I have told him so a dozen times. At this profession of audacity Catherine looked down at her little companion in amazement. She supposed it was because Marion was going to be married that she took so much upon herself. But she wondered too whether, when she herself should become engaged, such exploits would be expected of her. Half an hour later she saw her Aunt Pennyman sitting in the embrasure of a window with her head a little on one side, and her gold eyeglass raised to her eyes which were wandering about the room. In front of her was a gentleman bending forward a little and his back turned to Catherine. She knew his back immediately, though she had never seen it, for when he left her at Marion's instigation he had retreated in the best order without turning round. Morris Townsend, the name had already become very familiar to her as if someone had been repeating it in her ear for the last half hour. Morris Townsend was giving his impressions of the company to her aunt, as he had done to her herself. He was saying clever things and Mrs. Pennyman was smiling as if she approved of them. As soon as Catherine had perceived this she moved away, she would not have liked him to turn around and see her. But it gave her pleasure, the whole thing, that he should talk with Mrs. Pennyman, with whom she lived, and whom she saw and talked with every day. That seemed to keep him near her and to make him easier to contemplate than if she herself had been the object of his civilities, and that Aunt LaVinia should like him, should not be shocked or startled by what he said, this also appeared to the girl a personal gain. For Aunt LaVinia's standard was extremely high, planted as it was over the grave of her late husband, in which, as she had convinced everyone, the very genius of conversation was buried. One of the Almond boys, as Catherine called them, invited our heroine to dance a quadrel, and for a quarter of an hour her feet at least were occupied. This time she was not dizzy, her head was very clear. Just when the dance was over she found herself in the crowd, face to face with her father. Dr. Sloper had usually a little smile, and with this little smile playing in his clear eyes and on his neatly shaved lips he looked at his daughter's crimson gown. Is it possible that this magnificent person is my child, he said? You would have surprised him if you had told him so, but it is a literal fact that he almost never addressed his daughter save in the ironical form. Whenever he addressed her he gave her pleasure, but she had to cut her pleasure out of the peace, as it were. Her portions left over, light remnants, and snippets of irony which she never knew what to do with, which seemed too delicate for her own use, and yet Catherine, lamenting the limitations of her understanding, felt that they were too valuable to waste, and had a belief that if they passed over her head they yet contributed to the general sum of human wisdom. I am not magnificent, she said, mildly, wishing that she had put on another dress. You are sumptuous, opulent, expensive, her father rejoined. You look as if you had eighty thousand a year. Well, so long as I haven't, said Catherine illogically. Her conception of her prospective wealth was at yet very indefinite. So long as you haven't you shouldn't look as if you had. Have you enjoyed your party? Catherine hesitated a moment, and then, looking away, I am rather tired, she murmured. I have said that this entertainment was the beginning of something important for Catherine. For the second time in her life she made an indirect answer, and the beginning of a period of dissimulation is certainly a significant date. Catherine was not so easily tired as that. Nevertheless, in the carriage as they drove home, she was as quiet as if fatigue had been her portion. Dr. Sloper's manner of addressing his sister Lavinia had a good deal of resemblance to the tone he had adopted toward Catherine. Who was that young man that was making love to you? he presently asked. Oh, my good brother! murmured Mrs. Penningman in deprecation. He seemed uncommonly tender. Whenever I looked at you for half an hour, he had the most devoted air. The devotion was not to me, said Mrs. Penningman. It was to Catherine. He talked to me of her. Catherine had been listening with all her ears. Oh, Aunt Penningman, she exclaimed faintly. He is very handsome. He is very clever. He expressed himself with a great deal, a great deal of felicity, her aunt went on. He is in love with this regal creature, then? the doctor inquired humorously. Oh, father! cried the girl, still more faintly. Devoutly thankful the carriage was dark. I don't know that, but he admired her dress. Catherine did not say to herself in the dark, my dress only. Mrs. Penningman's announcement struck her by its richness, not by its meagerness. You see, said her father, he thinks you have eighty thousand a year. I don't believe he thinks of that, said Mrs. Penningman. He is too refined. He must be tremendously refined not to think of that. Well, he is, Catherine exclaimed before she knew it. I thought you'd gone to sleep, her father answered. The hour has come, he added to himself. Lavinia is going to get up a romance for Catherine. It's a shame to play such tricks on the girl. What is the gentleman's name, he went on, aloud. I didn't catch it, and I didn't like to ask him. He asked to be introduced to me, said Mrs. Penningman, with a certain grandeur, but you know how indistinctly Jefferson speaks. Jefferson was Mr. Almond. Catherine, dear, what was the gentleman's name? For a minute. If it had not been for the rumbling of the carriage, you might have heard a pin drop. I don't know, Aunt Lavinia, said Catherine very softly, and with all his irony her father believed her. End of Chapter 4 Washington Square by Henry James Read for LibriVox by Dawn Murphy In El Segundo, California Chapter 5 He learned what he had asked some three or four days later, after Morris Townsend, with his cousin had called in Washington Square. Mrs. Penningman did not tell her brother on the drive home that she had intimated to this agreeable young man, whose name she did not know, that with her niece she should be very glad to see him. But she was greatly pleased, and even a little flattered, when late on Sunday afternoon the two gentlemen made their appearance. His coming with Arthur Townsend made it more natural and easy. The latter young man was on the point of becoming connected with the family, and Mrs. Penningman had remarked to Catherine that, as he was going to marry Marion, it would be polite in him to call. These events came to pass late in the autumn, and Catherine and her aunt had been sitting together in the closing dusk by the firelight in the high back parlor. Arthur Townsend fell to Catherine's portion, while his companion placed himself on the sofa beside Mrs. Penningman. Catherine had hitherto not been a harsh critic. She was easy to please. She liked to talk with young men. But Marion's betrothed this evening made her feel vaguely fastidious. He sat looking at the fire and rubbing his knees with his hands. As for Catherine, she scarcely even pretended to keep up the conversation. Her attention fixed itself on the other side of the room. She was listening to what went on between the other Mr. Townsend and her aunt. Every now and then he looked over at Catherine herself and smiled as if to show that what he said was for her benefit too. Catherine would have liked to change her place, to go and sit near them where she might see and hear him better. But she was afraid of seeming bold, of looking eager, and besides it would not have been polite to Marion's little suitor. She wondered why the other gentleman had picked out her aunt, how he came to have so much to say to Mrs. Penningman, to whom usually young men were not especially devoted. She was not at all jealous of Aunt LaVenia, but she was a little envious, and above all she wondered. For Morris Townsend was an object on which she found that her imagination could exercise itself indefinitely. His cousin had been describing a house that he had taken in view of his union with Marion, and the domestic conveniences he meant to introduce into it. How Marion wanted a larger one, and Mrs. Allman recommended a smaller one, and how he himself was convinced that he had got the neatest house in New York. It doesn't matter, he said, it's only for three or four years. At the end of three or four years we'll move. That's the way to live in New York, to move every three or four years. Then you always get the last thing. It's because the city's growing so quick, you've got to keep up with it. It's going straight uptown. That's where New York's going. If I wasn't afraid Marion would be lonely, I'd go up there, right up to the top, and wait for it. Only have to wait ten years. They'll all come up after you. But Marion says she wants some neighbors. She doesn't want to be a pioneer. She says that if she's got to be the first settler, she had better go out to Minnesota. I guess we'll move up little by little, when we get tired of one street we'll go higher. So you see, we'll always have a new house. It's a great advantage to have a new house, you get all the latest improvements. They invent everything all over again, about every five years, and it's a great thing to keep up with the new things. I always try and keep up with the new things of every kind. Don't you think that's a good motto for a young couple to keep going higher? What's the name of that piece of poetry? What do you call it? Excelsior. Catherine bestowed on her junior visitor only just enough attention to feel that this was not the way Mr. Morris Townshend had talked the other night, or that he was talking now to her fortunate aunt. But suddenly his aspiring kinsmen became more interesting. He seemed to have become conscious that she was affected by his companion's presence, and he thought it proper to explain it. My cousin asked me to bring him, or I shouldn't have taken the liberty. He seemed to want very much to come. You know he's awfully sociable. I told him I wanted to ask you first, but he said Mrs. Pendiman had invited him. He isn't particular what he says when he wants to come somewhere, but Mrs. Pendiman seems to think it's all right. We are very glad to see him, said Catherine, and she wished to talk more about him, but she hardly knew what to say. I never saw him before, she went on presently. Arthur Townshend stared. Why, he told me he talked with you for over half an hour the other night. I mean, before the other night. That was the first time. Oh, he has been away from New York. He has been all around the world. He doesn't know many people here, but he's very sociable, and he wants to know everyone. Everyone? said Catherine. Well, I mean all the good ones. All the pretty young ladies like Mrs. Pendiman. And Arthur Townshend gave a private laugh. My aunt likes him very much, said Catherine. Most people like him. He's so brilliant. He's more like a foreigner, Catherine suggested. Well, I never knew a foreigner, said Young Townshend, in a tone which seemed to indicate that his ignorance had been optional. Neither have I, Catherine confessed, with more humility. They say they are generally brilliant, she added vaguely. Well, the people of this city are clever enough for me. I know some of them that think they are too clever for me, but they ain't. I suppose you can't be too clever, said Catherine, still with humility. I don't know. I know some people that call my cousin too clever. Catherine listened to this statement with extreme interest, and a feeling that if Morris Townshend had a fault it would naturally be that one. But she did not commit herself, and in a moment she asked, Now that he has come back, will he stay here always? Ah, said Arthur, if he can get something to do, something to do, some place or other, some business. Hasn't he got any? said Catherine, who had never heard of Young Man, of the upper class in this situation. No, he's looking round. But he can't find anything. I am very sorry, Catherine permitted herself to observe. Oh, he doesn't mind, said Young Townshend. He takes it easy. He isn't in a hurry. He is very particular. Catherine thought he naturally would be, and gave herself up for some moments to the contemplation of this idea in several of its bearings. Won't his father take him into his business, his office? She at last inquired. He hasn't got any father. He has only got a sister. Your sister can't help you much. It seemed to Catherine that if she were his sister, she would disprove this axiom. Is she, is she pleasant? she asked in a moment. I don't know. I believe she's very respectable, said Young Townshend, and then he looked across to his cousin and began to laugh. I say, we are talking about you, he added. Morris Townshend paused in his conversation with Mrs. Pennyman, and stared with a little smile. Then he got up, as if he were going. As far as you are concerned, I can't return the compliment, he said to Catherine's companion. But as regards Miss Sloper, it's another affair. Catherine thought this little speech wonderfully well turned, but she was embarrassed by it, and she also got up. Morris Townshend stood looking at her and smiling. He put out his hand for farewell. He was going, without having said anything to her, but even on these terms she was glad to have seen him. I will tell her what you have said when you go, said Mrs. Pennyman, with a little significant laugh. Catherine blushed, for she felt almost as if they were making sport of her. What in the world could this beautiful young man have said? He looked at her still in spite of her blush, but very kindly and respectfully. I have had no talk with you, he said, and that was what I came for. But it will be a good reason for coming another time, a little pretext, if I am obliged to give one. I am not afraid of what your aunt will say when I go. With this the two young men took their departure, after which Catherine, with her blush still lingering, directed a serious and interrogative eye to Mrs. Pennyman. She was incapable of elaborate artifice, and she resorted to no jocular device, to no affectation of the belief that she had been maligned, to learn what she desired. What did you say you would tell me, she asked. Mrs. Pennyman came up to her, smiling and nodding a little, looked at her all over, and gave a twist to the knot of ribbon in her neck. It's a great secret, my dear, but he is coming according. Catherine was serious still. Is that what he told you? He didn't say so exactly, but he left me to guess it. I am a good guesser. Do you mean, according me? Not me, certainly, Miss, though I must say. He is a hundred times more polite to a person who has no longer extreme youth to recommend her than most of the young men. He is thinking of someone else, and Mrs. Pennyman gave her niece a delicate kiss. You must be very gracious to him. Catherine stared. She was bewildered. I don't understand you, she said. He doesn't know me. Oh, yes he does, more than you think. I have told him all about you. Oh, Miss Pennyman, murmured Catherine, as if this had been a breach of trust. He is a perfect stranger. We don't know him. There was infinite modesty in the poor girl's we. Aunt Pennyman, however, took no account of it. She spoke even a touch of acrimony. My dear Catherine, you know very well that you admire him. Oh, Miss Pennyman! Catherine could only murmur again. It might very well be that she admired him, though this did not seem to her a thing to talk about. But that this brilliant stranger, this sudden apparition, who had barely heard the sound of her voice, took that sort of interest in her that was expressed by the romantic phrase of which Mrs. Pennyman had just made use. This could only be a figment of the restless brain of Aunt Lavinia, whom everyone knew to be a woman of powerful imagination. End of chapter 5. This has been a LibriVox recording of Washington Square, a novel by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California. Chapter 6. Mrs. Pennyman even took for granted at times that other people had as much imagination as herself, so that when, half an hour later, her brother came in, she addressed him quite on this principle. He has just been here Austin. It's such a pity you missed him. Whom in the world have I missed? asked the doctor. Mr. Morris Townsend. He has made us such a delightful visit. And who in the world is Mr. Morris Townsend? Aunt Pennyman means the gentleman, the gentleman whose name I couldn't remember, said Catherine. The gentleman at Elizabeth's party, who was so struck with Catherine, Mrs. Pennyman added. Oh, his name is Morris Townsend, is it, and did he come here to propose to you? Oh, father, murmured the girl for an answer, turning away to the window where the dusk had deepened to darkness. I hope you won't do that without your permission, said Mrs. Pennyman, very graciously. After all, my dear, he seems to have yours, her brother answered. Lavinia simpered, as if this might not be quite enough, and Catherine, with her forehead touching the window panes, listened to this exchange of epigrams, as reservedly as if they had not each been a pinprick in her own destiny. The next time he comes, the doctor added, you had better call me, he might like to see me. Morris Townsend came again some five days afterward, but Dr. Sloper was not called, as he was absent from home at the time. Catherine was with her aunt, when the young man's name was brought in, and Mrs. Pennyman, a-facing herself and protesting, made a great point of her nieces going into the drawing-room, alone. This time it's for you, for you only, she said. Before when he talked to me it was only preliminary, it was to gain my confidence. Literally, my dear, I should not have the courage to show myself today. And this was perfectly true, Mrs. Pennyman was not a brave woman, and Morris Townsend had struck her as a young man of great force of character, and of remarkable powers of satire, a keen, resolute, brilliant nature with which one must exercise a great deal of tact. She said to herself that he was imperious, and she liked the word and the idea. She was not the least jealous of her niece, and she had been perfectly happy with Mr. Pennyman, but in the bottom of her heart she permitted herself the observation. That's the sort of husband I should have had. He was certainly much more imperious, she added by calling it imperial, than Mr. Pennyman. So Catherine saw Mr. Townsend alone, and her aunt did not come in even at the end of the visit. The visit was a long one, he sat there in the front parlor in the biggest armchair for more than an hour. He seemed more at home this time, more familiar, lounging a little in the chair, slapping a cushion that was near him with his stick, and looking round the room a good deal, and at the objects it contained, as well as at Catherine, whom, however, he also contemplated freely. There was a smile of respectful devotion in his handsome eyes, which seemed to Catherine almost solemnly beautiful. It made her think of a young knight in a poem. His talk, however, was not particularly nightly. It was light and easy and friendly. It took a practical turn, and he asked a number of questions about herself. What were her tastes? If she liked this and that, what were her habits? He said to her, with his charming smile, tell me about yourself, give me a little sketch. Catherine had very little to tell, and she had no talent for sketching. But before he went, she had confided to him that she had a secret passion for the theatre, which had been but scantily gratified, and a taste for operatic music, that of Bellini and Donzanetti in a special—it might be remembered, in extenuation of this primitive young woman, that she held these opinions in an age of general darkness. Which she had rarely had an occasion to hear, except on the hand organ. She confessed that she was not particularly fond of literature. Morris Townsend agreed with her that books were tiresome things. Only, as he said, you had to read a good many before you found it out. He had been to places that people had written books about, and they were not a bit like the descriptions. To see for yourself, that was the great thing. He always tried to see for himself. He had seen all the principal actors. He had been to all the best theatres in London and Paris. But the actors were always like the authors. They always exaggerated. He liked everything to be natural. Suddenly he stopped, looking at Catherine with a smile. That's what I like you for. You are so natural. Excuse me, he added. You see, I'm natural myself. And before she had time to think whether she excused him or not, which afterward, at leisure, she became conscious that she did. He began to talk about music, and to say that it was his greatest pleasure in life. He had heard all the great singers in Paris and London. Pasta and Rubini and Le Blanche. And when you had done that, you could say that you knew what singing was. I sing a little myself, he said. Someday I will show you. Not today, but some other time. And then he got up to go. He had omitted by accident to say that he would sing to her if she would play to him. He thought of this after he got into the street, but he might have spared his compunction, for Catherine had not noticed the lapse. She was thinking only that some other time had a delightful sound. It seemed to spread itself over the future. This was all the more reason, however, though she was ashamed and uncomfortable, why she should tell her father that Mr. Morris Townsend had called again. She announced the fact abruptly, almost violently, as soon as the doctor came into the house, and having done so, it was her duty. She took measures to leave the room. But she could not leave it fast enough. Her father stopped her just as she reached the door. Well, my dear, did he propose to you today? The doctor asked. This was just what she had been afraid he would say, and yet she had no answer ready. Of course she would have liked to take it as a joke, as her father must have meant it, and yet she would have liked also, in denying it, to be a little positive, a little sharp, so that he would perhaps not ask the question again. She didn't like it. It made her unhappy, but Catherine could never be sharp, and for a moment she only stood with her hand on the doorknob, looking at her satiric parent and giving a little laugh. Decidedly, said the doctor to himself, my daughter is not brilliant. But he had no sooner made this reflection than Catherine found something. She had decided on the whole to take the thing as a joke. Perhaps he will do it next time, she exclaimed, with a repetition of her laugh, and she quickly got out of the room. The doctor stood staring. He wondered whether his daughter were serious. Catherine went straight to her own room, and by the time she reached it she bethought herself that there was something else, something better, she might have said. She almost wished now that her father would ask this question again, so that she might reply, oh yes, Mr. Morris Townsend proposed to me, and I refused him. The doctor, however, began to put his questions elsewhere. It naturally having occurred to him that he ought to inform himself properly about this handsome young man, who had formed the habit of running in and out of his house. He addressed himself to the elder of his sisters, Mrs. Almond. Not going to her for this purpose, there was no such hurry as that. But having made a note of the matter for the first opportunity, the doctor was never eager, never impatient or nervous, but he made notes of everything and he regularly consulted his notes. Among them the information he obtained from Mrs. Almond about Morris Townsend took its place. Lavinia has already been to ask me, she said. Lavinia is most excited. I don't understand it. It's not after all Lavinia that the young man is supposed to have designs upon. She is very peculiar. Ah, my dear, the doctor replied, she has not lived with me these twelve years without my finding it out. She has got such an artificial mind, said Mrs. Almond, who always enjoyed an opportunity to discuss Lavinia's peculiarities with her brother. She didn't want me to tell you that she had asked me about Mr. Townsend, but I told her I would. She always wants to conceal everything. And yet at moments no one blurts things out with such crudity. She is like a revolving lighthouse, pitch darkness alternating with dazzling brilliancy. But what did you tell her, the doctor asked? What I tell you, that I know very little of him. Lavinia must have been disappointed at that, said the doctor. She would prefer him to have been guilty of some romantic crime. However, we must make the best of people. They tell me our gentleman is the cousin of the little boy, to whom you are about to entrust the future of your little girl. Arthur is not a little boy. He is a very old man. You and I will never be so old. He is a distant relative of Lavinia's protégé. The name is the same, but I am given to understand that there are Townsends and Townsends. So Arthur's mother tells me. She talked about branches, younger branches, elder branches, inferior branches, as if it were a royal house. Arthur, it appears, is of the reigning line, but poor Lavinia's young man is not. Beyond this Arthur's mother knows very little about him. She has only a vague story that he has been wild. But I know his sister a little, and she is a very nice woman. Her name is Mrs. Montgomery. She is a widow with a little property and five children. She lives in the Second Avenue. What does Mrs. Montgomery say about him? That he has talents by which he might distinguish himself? Only he is lazy, eh? She doesn't say so. That's family pride, said the doctor. What is his profession? He hasn't got any. He is looking for something. I believe he was once in the Navy. Once? What is his age? I suppose he is upward of thirty. He must have gone into the Navy, very young. I think Arthur told me that he inherited a small property, which was perhaps the cause of his leaving the Navy, and then he spent it all in a few years. He traveled all over the world, lived abroad, amused himself. I believe it was a kind of system, a theory he had. He has lately come back to America with the intention, as he tells Arthur, of beginning life in earnest. Is he an earnest about Catherine then? I don't see why you should be incredulous, said Mrs. Almond. It seems to me that you have never done Catherine justice. You must remember that she has the prospect of thirty thousand a year. The doctor looked at his sister a moment, and then with the lightest touch of bitterness, you at least appreciate her, he said. Mrs. Almond blushed, I don't mean that is her only merit, I simply mean that it is a great one. A great many young men think so, and you appear to me never to have been properly aware of that. You have always had a little way of alluding to her as an unmarriageable girl. My allusions are as kind as yours, Elizabeth, said the doctor frankly. How many suitors has Catherine had with all her expectations? How much attention has she ever received? Catherine is not unmarriageable, but she is absolutely unattractive. What other reason is there for Levinia being so charmed with the idea that there is a lover in the house? There has never been one before, and Levinia, with her sensitive, sympathetic nature, is not used to the idea. It affects her imagination. I must do the young men of New York the justice to say that they strike me as very disinterested. They prefer pretty girls, lively girls, girls like your own. Catherine is neither pretty nor lively. Catherine does very well. She has a style of her own, which is more than my poor Marion has, who has no style at all, said Mrs. Almond. The reason Catherine has received so little attention is that she seems to all the young men to be older than themselves. She is so large, and she dresses so richly. They are rather afraid of her, I think. She looks as if she has been married already, and you know they don't like married women. And if our young men appear disinterested, the doctor's wiser sister went on, it is because they marry, as a general thing, so young, before twenty-five, at the age of innocence and sincerity, before the age of calculation. If they only waited a little, Catherine would fare better. As a calculation, thank you very much, said the doctor. Wait till some intelligent man of forty comes along, and he will be delighted with Catherine, Mrs. Almond continued. Mr. Townsend is not old enough then. His motives may be pure. It is very possible that his motives are pure. I should be very sorry to take the contrary for granted. Lavinia is sure of it, and as he is a very prepossessioning youth, you might give him the benefit of the doubt. Dr. Sloper reflected a moment. What are his present means of subsistence? I have no idea. He lives, as I say, with his sister. A widow with five children? Do you mean he lives upon her? Mrs. Almond got up, and with a certain impatience, had you not better ask Mrs. Montgomery herself, she inquired. Perhaps I may come to that, said the doctor. Did you say the Second Avenue? He made a note of the Second Avenue. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James. Read for LibriVox by Dawn Murphy in El Segundo, California. Chapter 7 He was, however, by no means so much in earnest, as this might seem to indicate, and, indeed, he was more than anything else amused with the whole situation. He was not in the least in a state of tension or a vigilance with regard to Catherine's prospects. He was even on his guard against the ridicule that might attach itself to the spectacle of a house thrown into agitation by its daughter and heiress, receiving attentions unprecedented in its annals. More than this, he went so far as to promise himself some entertainment from the little drama, if drama it was, of which Mrs. Pennyman desired to represent the ingenuous Mr. Townsend as the hero. No intention as of yet of regulating the denouement. He was perfectly willing, as Elizabeth had suggested, to give the young man the benefit of every doubt. There was no great danger in it, for Catherine at the age of twenty-two was, after all, a rather mature blossom, such as could be plucked from the stem only by a rigorous jerk. The fact that Morris Townsend was poor was not of necessity against him. The doctor had never made up his mind that his daughter should marry a rich man. The fortune she would inherit struck him as a very sufficient provision for two reasonable persons, and if a penniless swain who could give a good account of himself should enter the lists, he should be judged quite upon his personal merits. There were other things besides. The doctor thought it very vulgar to be precipitate in accusing people of mercenary motives, in as much as his door had not yet been, in the least, besieged by fortune-hunters, and, lastly, he was very curious to see whether Catherine might really be loved for her moral worth. He smiled as he reflected that poor Mr. Townsend had been only twice to the house, and he said to Mrs. Pennyman that the next time he should come, she must ask him to dinner. He came very soon again, and Mrs. Pennyman had, of course, great pleasure in executing this mission. Morris Townsend accepted her invitation with equal good grace, and the dinner took place a few days later. The doctor had said to himself, justly enough, that they must not have the young man alone. This would partake too much of the nature of encouragement. So two or three other persons were invited. But Morris Townsend, though he was by no means the ostensible, was the real occasion of the feast. There is every reason to suppose that he desired to make a good impression, and if he fell short of this result, it was not for want of a good deal of intelligent effort. The doctor talked to him very little during dinner, but he observed him attentively, and after the ladies had gone out, he pushed him the wine and asked him several questions. Morris was not a young man who needed to be pressed, and he found quite enough encouragement in the superior quality of the claret. The doctor's wine was admirable, and it may be communicated to the reader that while he sipped it, Morris reflected that a cellar full of good liquor, there was evidently a cellar full here, would be a most attractive idiosyncrasy in a father-in-law. The doctor was struck with his appreciative guest. He saw that he was not a commonplace young man. He has ability, said Catherine's father, decided ability. He has a good head if he chooses to use it, and he is uncommonly well turned out, quite the sort of figure that pleases the ladies. But I don't think I like him. The doctor, however, kept his reflections to himself, and talked to his visitors about foreign lands concerning which Morris offered him more information than he was ready, as he mentally phrased it, to swallow. Dr. Sloper had traveled but little, and he took the liberty of not believing everything that his talkative guest narrated. He prided himself on being something of a physiognomist, and while the young man, chatting with easy assurance, puffed his cigar and filled his glass again, the doctor sat with his eyes quietly fixed on his bright, expressive face. He has the assurance of the devil himself, said Morris's host. I don't think I ever saw such assurance, and his powers of invention are most remarkable. He is very knowing. They were not so knowing as that in my time. And a good head, did I say? I should think so after a bottle of Madeira and a bottle and a half of Claret. After dinner Morris Townsend went and stood before Catherine, who was standing before the fire in her red satin gown. He doesn't like me. He doesn't like me at all, said the young man. Who doesn't like you? asked Catherine. Your father, extraordinary man. I don't see how you know, said Catherine, blushing. I feel I am very quick to feel. Perhaps you are mistaken. Ah, well. You ask him, and you will see. I would rather not ask him if there is any danger of his saying what you think. Morris looked at her with an air of mock melancholy. It wouldn't give you any pleasure to contradict him. I never contradict him, said Catherine. Will you hear me abused without opening your lips in my defence? My father won't amuse you. He doesn't know you enough. Morris Townsend gave a loud laugh and Catherine began to blush again. I shall never mention you, she said, to take refuge from her confusion. That is very well, but it is not quite what I should have liked you to say. I should have liked you to say, if my father doesn't think well of you, what does it matter? Ah, but it would matter. I couldn't say that, the girl exclaimed. He looked at her for a moment, smiling a little, and the doctor, if he had been watching him just then, would have seen a gleam of fine impatience in the sociable softness of his eye. But there was no impatience in his rejoiner. None, at least, save what was expressed in a little appealing sigh. Ah, well, then. I must not give up the hope of bringing him round. He expressed it more frankly to Mrs. Peniman later in the evening, but before that he sung two or three songs at Catherine's timid request, not that he flattered himself that this would help to bring her father round. He had a sweet, light, tenor voice, and when he had finished, everyone made some exclamation. Everyone, that is, save Catherine, who remained intensely silent. Mrs. Peniman declared that his manner of singing was most artistic, and Dr. Sloper said it was very taking—very taking indeed, speaking loudly and distinctly, but with a certain dryness. He doesn't like me. He doesn't like me at all, said Morris Townsend, addressing the aunt in the same manner he had done the niece. He thinks I am all wrong. Unlike her niece, Mrs. Peniman asked for no explanation. She only smiled very sweetly as if she understood everything, and, unlike Catherine too, she made no attempt to contradict him. Pray, what does it matter? she murmured softly. Oh, you say the right thing, said Morris, greatly to the gratification of Mrs. Peniman, who prided herself on always saying the right thing. The doctor, the next time he saw his sister Elizabeth, let her know that he had made the acquaintance of Levinia's protégé. Physically, he said, he's uncommonly well set up. As an anatomist, it is really a pleasure to me to see such a beautiful structure. Although, if people were all like him, I suppose there would be very little need for doctors. Don't you see anything in people but their bones? Mrs. Almond rejoined. What do you think of him as a father? As a father? Thank heaven, I'm not his father. No, but you are Catherine's. Levinia tells me she's in love. She must get over it. He's not a gentleman. Ah, take care. Remember that he is a branch of the Townsends. He is not what I call a gentleman. He is not the soul of one. He is extremely insinuating. But it's a vulgar nature. I saw through it in a minute. He is altogether too familiar. I hate familiarity. He is a plausible coxcomb. Ah, well, said Mrs. Almond, if you make up your mind so easily, it's a great advantage. I don't make up my mind easily. What I tell you is the result of thirty years of observation, and in order to be able to form that judgment in a single evening, I have had to spend a lifetime in study. Very possibly you are right, but the thing is for Catherine to see it. I will present her with a pair of spectacles, said the doctor. End of chapter 7 This has been a LibriVox recording of Washington Square, a novel by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James, read for LibriVox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California. Chapter 8 If it were true that she was in love, she was certainly very quiet about it, but the doctor was of course prepared to admit that her quietness might mean volumes. She had told Morris Townsend that she would not mention him to her father, and she saw no reason to retract this vow of discretion. It was no more than decently civil, of course, that after having dined in Washington Square, Morris should call there again. And it was no more than natural that, having been kindly received on this occasion, he should continue to present himself. He had had plenty of leisure on his hands, and thirty years ago in New York, a young man of leisure had reason to be thankful for AIDS to self-oblivion. Catherine said nothing to her father about these visits, though they had rapidly become the most important, the most absorbing thing in her life. The girl was very happy. She knew not as yet what would come of it, but the present had suddenly grown rich and solemn. If she had been told she was in love, she would have been a good deal surprised, for she had an idea that love was an eager and exacting passion, and her own heart was filled in these days with the impulse of self-effacement and sacrifice. Whenever Morris Townsend had left the house, her imagination projected itself with all its strength into the idea of his soon coming back. But if she had been told at such a moment that he would not return for a year, or even that he would never return, she would not have complained nor rebelled, but would have humbly accepted the decree, and sought for consolation in thinking over the time she had already seen him. The words he had spoken, the sound of his voice, of his tread, the expression of his face. Love demands certain things as a right, but Catherine had no sense of her rights. She had only a consciousness of immense and unexpected favors. Her very gratitude for these things had hushed itself, for it seemed to her that there would be something of impudence in making a festival of her secret. Her father suspected Morris Townsend's visits, and noted her reserve. She seemed to beg pardon for it. She looked at him constantly in silence, as if to say that she said nothing, because she was afraid of irritating him. But the poor girl's dumb eloquence irritated him more than anything else would have done, and he caught himself murmuring more than once that it was a grievous pity his only child was a simpleton. His murmurs, however, were inaudible, and for a while he said nothing to any one. He would have liked to know exactly how often Young Townsend came, but he had determined to ask no questions of the girl herself. To say nothing more to her, that would show that he watched her. The doctor had a great idea of being largely just. He wished to leave his daughter, her liberty, and interfere only when the danger should be proved. It was not in his manner to obtain information by indirect methods, and it never even occurred to him to question the servants. As for Lavinia, he hated to talk to her about the matter. She annoyed him with her mock romanticism, but he had to come to this. Mrs. Pennyman's convictions as regards the relations of her niece and the clever young visitor, who saved appearances by coming ostensibly for both the ladies. Mrs. Pennyman's convictions had passed into a riper and richer phase. There was to be no crudity in Mrs. Pennyman's treatment of the situation. She had become as uncommunicative as Catherine herself. She was tasting of the sweets of concealment. She had taken up the line of mystery. She would be enchanted to be able to prove to herself that she was persecuted, said the doctor. And when at last he questioned her, he was sure she would contrive to extract from his words a pretext for this belief. Be so good as to let me know what is going on in this house," he said to her in a tone which, under the circumstances, he himself deemed genial. Going on, Austin, Mrs. Pennyman exclaimed, Why, I am sure I don't know. I believe that last night the old gray cat had kittens. At her age, said the doctor, the idea is startling, almost shocking. Be so good as to see that they are all drowned. But what else has happened? Ah, the dear little kittens, cried Mrs. Pennyman, I wouldn't have them drowned for the world. Her brother puffed his cigar a few moments in silence. Your sympathy with kittens, Lavinia, he presently resumed, arises from a feline element in your own character. Cats are very graceful and very clean, said Mrs. Pennyman, smiling, and very stealthy. You are the embodiment of both grace and of neatness, but you are wanting in frankness. You certainly are not, dear brother. I don't pretend to be graceful, though I try to be neat. Why haven't you let me know that Mr. Morris Townsend is coming to the house four times a week? Mrs. Pennyman lifted her eyebrows four times a week. Three times, then, or five times if you prefer it. I am away all day and I see nothing, but when such things happen you should let me know. Mrs. Pennyman, with her eyebrows still raised, reflected intently. Dear Austin, she said at last, I am incapable of betraying a confidence. I would rather suffer anything. Never fear, you shall not suffer. To whose confidence is it you allude? Has Catherine made you take a vow of eternal secrecy? By no means. Catherine has not told me as much as she might. She has not been very trustful. It is the young man, then, who has made you his confidant. Allow me to say that it is extremely indiscreet of you to form secret alliances with young men. You don't know where they may lead you. I don't know what you mean by an alliance, said Mrs. Pennyman. I take a great interest in Mr. Townsend. I don't conceal that. But that's all. Under the circumstances, that is quite enough. What is the source of your interest in Mr. Townsend? Why, said Mrs. Pennyman musing, and then breaking into her smile, that he is so interesting. The doctor felt that he had need of his patience. And what makes him interesting? His good looks? His misfortunes, Austin. Ah, he has had misfortunes. That, of course, is always interesting. Are you at liberty to mention a few of Mr. Townsend's? I don't know that he would like it, said Mrs. Pennyman. He has told me a great deal about himself. He has told me, in fact, his whole history. But I don't think I ought to repeat those things. He would tell them to you, I am sure, if he thought you would listen to him kindly. With kindness you may do anything with him. The doctor gave a laugh. I shall request him very kindly, then to leave Catherine alone. Ah, said Mrs. Pennyman, shaking her forefinger at her brother, with her little finger turned out. Catherine has probably said something to him kinder than that. Said that she loved him? Do you mean that? Mrs. Pennyman fixed her eyes on the floor. As I tell you, Austin, she doesn't confide in me. You have an opinion, I suppose. All the same. It is that, I ask you for, though I don't conceal from you that I shall not regard it as conclusive. Mrs. Pennyman's gaze continued to rest on the carpet, but at last she lifted it and then her brother thought it very expressive. I think Catherine is very happy. That is all I can say. Townsend is trying to marry her. Is that what you mean? He is greatly interested in her. He finds her such an attractive girl. Catherine has a lovely nature, Austin, said Mrs. Pennyman, and Mr. Townsend has had the intelligence to discover that. With a little help from you, I suppose, my dear Lavinia, cried the doctor, you are an admirable aunt. So Mr. Townsend says, observed Lavinia smiling, do you think he is sincere, asked her brother, in saying that? No, that's of course, but in his admiration for Catherine. Deeply sincere, he has said to me the most appreciative, the most charming things about her. He would say them to you if you were sure you would listen to him gently. I doubt whether I can undertake it. He appears to require a great deal of gentleness. He is a sympathetic, sensitive nature, said Mrs. Pennyman. Her brother puffed his cigar again in silence. These delicate qualities have survived his vicissitude, eh? All this while you haven't told me about his misfortunes. It is a long story, said Mrs. Pennyman, and I regard it as a sacred trust, but I suppose there is no objection to my saying that he has been wild. He frankly convessants that, but he has paid for it. That's what has impoverished him, eh? I don't mean simply in money. He is very much alone in the world. Do you mean that he has behaved so badly that his friends have given him up? He has had false friends who have deceived and betrayed him. He seems to have some good ones, too. He has a devoted sister, and half a dozen nephews and nieces. Mrs. Pennyman was silent a minute. The nephews and nieces are children, and the sister is not a very attractive person. I hope he doesn't abuse her to you, said the doctor, for I am told he lives upon her. Lives upon her? Lives with her and does nothing for himself. It is about the same thing. He is looking for a position most earnestly, said Mrs. Pennyman. He hopes every day to find one. Precisely. He is looking for it here, over there in the front parlor. The position of a husband of a weak-minded woman with a large fortune would suit him perfectly. Mrs. Pennyman was truly amiable, but she now gave signs of temper. She rose with much animation and stood for a moment looking at her brother. My dear Austin, she remarked, if you regard Catherine as a weak-minded woman, you are particularly mistaken. And with this she moved majestically away. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit www.librivox.org. Washington Square by Henry James. Read for LibriVox by Dawn Murphy and Elsa Gundo, California. Chapter 9 It was a regular custom with the family in Washington Square to go and spend Sunday evening at Mrs. Almonds. On the Saturday after the conversation I have just narrated, this custom was not intermittent. And on this occasion, toward the middle of the evening, Dr. Sloper found reason to withdraw to the library with his brother-in-law to talk over a matter of business. He was absent some twenty minutes, and when he came back into the circle, which was enlivened by the presence of several friends of the family, he saw that Morris Townsend had come in, and had lost as little time as possible in seating himself on a small sofa beside Catherine. In the large room where several different groups had been formed, the hum of voices and of laughter was loud. These two young persons might confabulate, as Dr. phrased it to himself, without attracting attention. He saw in a moment, however, that his daughter was painfully conscious of his own observation. She sat motionless, with her eyes bent down, staring at her open fan, deeply flushed, shrinking together as if to minimize the indiscretion of which she confessed herself guilty. The doctor almost pitied her. Poor Catherine was not defiant. She had no genius for bravado, and as she felt that her father viewed her companion's attentions with an unsympathizing eye, there was nothing but discomfort for her and the accident of seeming to challenge him. The doctor felt, indeed, so sorry for her that he turned away to spare her the sense of being watched. And he was so intelligent a man, that in his thoughts he rendered a sort of poetic justice to her situation. It must be ducidly pleasant for a plain and adamant girl like that to have a beautiful young fellow come and sit down beside her, and whisper to her that he is her slave, if that is what this one whispers. No wonder she likes it, and that she thinks me a cruel tyrant, which of course she does, though she is afraid, she hasn't the animation necessary to admit it to herself. Poor old Catherine used the doctor. I verily believe she is capable of defending me when Townsend abuses me. And the force of this reflection, for the moment, was such in making him feel the natural opposition between his point of view and that of an infatuated child, that he said to himself that he was perhaps after all taking things too hard and crying out before he was hurt. He must not condemn Morris Townsend unheard. He had a great aversion to taking things too hard. He thought that half the discomfort and many of the disappointments of life come from it. And for an instant he asked himself whether, possibly, he did not appear ridiculous to this intelligent young man, whose private perception of incongruities he suspected of being keen. At the end of a quarter of an hour Catherine had got rid of him and Townsend was now standing before the fireplace in conversation with Mrs. Almond. We will try him again, said the doctor, and he crossed the room and joined his sister and her companion, making her a sign that she should leave the young man to him. She presently did so while Morris looked at him smiling without a sign of evasiveness in his affable eye. He's amazingly conceited, thought the doctor. And then he said aloud, I am told you are looking out for a position. Oh, a position is more than I should presume to call it, Morris Townsend answered. That sounds so fine. I should like some quiet work, something to turn an honest penny. What sort of thing should you prefer? Do you mean what am I fit for? Very little, I am afraid. I have nothing but my good right arm, as they say in the melodramas. You are too modest, said the doctor, in addition to your good right arm, you have your subtle brain. I know nothing of you but what I see, but I see by your physionomy that you are extremely intelligent. Ah, Townsend murmured, I don't know what to answer when you say that. You advise me then not to despair? And he looked at his interlockature as if the question might have a double meaning. The doctor caught the look and waited a moment before he replied. I should be very sorry to admit that a robust and well-disposed young man might ever despair. If he doesn't succeed in one thing, he can try another. Only I should add he should choose his line with discretion. Ah, yes, with discretion, Morris Townsend repeated, sympathetically. Well, I have been indiscreet formally, but I think I have got over it. I am very steady now. And he stood a moment looking down at his remarkably neat shoes. Then at last, were you kindly intending to propose something for my advantage? He inquired, looking up and smiling. Damn his impudence, the doctor exclaimed privately. But in a moment he reflected that he himself had after all touched first upon this delicate point, and that his words might have been construed as an offer of assistance. I have no particular proposal to make, he presently said, but it occurred to me to let you know that I have you in my mind. Sometimes one hears of opportunity. For instance, should you object to leaving New York, to going a distance? I am afraid I shouldn't be able to manage that. I must seek my fortune here or nowhere. You see, added Morris Townsend, I have ties. I have responsibilities here. I have a sister, a widow from whom I have been separated for a long time, and to whom I am almost everything. I shouldn't like to say to her that I must leave her. She rather depends upon me, you see. Ah, that's very proper. Family feeling is very proper, said Dr. Sloper. I often think there is not enough of it in our city. I think I have heard of your sister. It is possible, but I rather doubt it. She lives so very quietly. As quietly you mean, the doctor went on with a short laugh as a lady may do who has several young children. Ah, my little nieces and nephews, that's the very point. I am helping to bring them up, said Morris Townsend. I am kind of an amateur tutor. I give them lessons. That's very proper, as I say, but it is a hardly, but it is hardly a career. I won't make my fortune, the young man confessed. You must not be too bent on a fortune, said the doctor, but I assure you I will keep you in mind. I will not lose sight of you. If my situation becomes desperate, I shall perhaps take the liberty of reminding you, Morris rejoined, raising his voice a little with a brighter smile as his interlocutor turned away. Before he left the house, the doctor had a few words with Mrs. Almond. I should like to see his sister, he said. What do you call her, Mrs. Montgomery? I should like to have a little talk with her. I will try and manage it, Mrs. Almond responded. I will take the first opportunity of inviting her, and you shall come and meet her, unless indeed, Mrs. Almond added, she first takes it into her head to be sick and to send for you. Oh no, not that. She must have trouble enough without that, but it would have its advantages. For then I should see the children. I should like very much to see the children. You are very thorough. Do you want to catatize them about their uncle? Precisely. Their uncle tells me he has charge of their education, that he saves their mother the expense of school bills. I should like to ask them a few questions in the commoner branches. He certainly has not the cut of a schoolmaster, Mrs. Almond said to herself a short time afterward, as she saw Morris Townsend in a corner bending over her niece, seated. And there was indeed nothing in the young man's discourse at this moment that savored of the pedagogue. Will you meet me somewhere to-morrow or next day? He said in a low voice to Catherine. Meet you? She asked, lifting her frightened eyes. I have something particular to say to you, very particular. Can't you come to the house? Can't you say it there? Townsend shook his head gloomily. I can't enter your doors again. Oh, Mr. Townsend, murmured Catherine. She trembled as she wondered what had happened, whether her father had forbidden it. I can't in self-respect, said the young man. Your father has insulted me. Insulted you? He has taunted me with my poverty. Oh, you are mistaken. You misunderstood him. Catherine spoke with energy, getting up from her chair. Perhaps I am too proud, too sensitive. But would you have me otherwise, he asked tenderly. Where my father is concerned, you must not be sure. He is full of goodness, said Catherine. He laughed at me for having no position. I took it quietly, but only because he belongs to you. I don't know, said Catherine. I don't know what he thinks. I am sure he means to be kind. You must be too proud. I will be proud only of you, Morris answered. Will you meet me in the square in the afternoon? A great blush on Catherine's part had been the answer to the declaration I have just quoted. She turned away, heedless of his question. Will you meet me, he repeated. It is very quiet there. No one needs C.S. toward dusk. It is you who are unkind. It is you who laugh when you say such things as that. My dear girl, the young man murmured. You know how little there is in me to be proud of. I am ugly and stupid. Morris greeted this remark with an ardent murmur in which she recognized nothing articulate but an assurance that she was his own dearest. But she went on. I am not even—I am not even—and she paused a moment. You are not what? I am not even brave. Ah, then, if you are afraid, what shall we do? She hesitated a while. Then at last you must come to the house, she said. I am not afraid of that. I would rather it were in the square, the young man urged. You know how empty it is often. No one will see us. I don't care who sees us, but leave me now. He left her resignedly. He had got what he wanted. Fortunately he was ignorant that half an hour later, going home with her father and feeling him near, the poor girl, in spite of her sudden declaration of courage, began to tremble again. Her father said nothing, but she had an idea his eyes were fixed upon her in the darkness. Mrs. Pennyman also was silent. Morris Townsend had told her that her niece preferred, unromantically, an interview in the chints-covered parlor to a sentimental trist beside a fountain, sheeted with dead leaves, and she was lost in wonderment at the oddity, almost the perversity of the choice. Red for Libervox by Don Murphy in El Segundo, California.