Chapter XXIII The Hotel Dance
It was Gorham Page’s habit to drop in at the Van Tassel house before making his nearly daily visit to the Fair.
One morning, as he ascended the steps, his sister met him. “I hoped you would come,” she said. “I want to be condoled with. Robert’s foot has descended. We are going home.”
“Oh, I am sorry,” replied Gorham, taking the chair she offered him; “but can’t some arrangement be made?”
“No. Robert has said ‘positively;’ and when he says ‘positively,’ I never waste any more nervous force. Poor, dear boy, he wants to stay as badly as I do, but we have been here longer than we expected already, and after all I would rather go back than to give up the apartment and go to the poorhouse, which he says is the alternative.”
“I must go to Boston before long,” said Page. “Wouldn’t you like to stay and go back with me?”
“Let Robert go home alone?”
“Yes.”
“No, I thank you,” with a firm shake of the head. “I shouldn’t care for the Fair without Robert.”
“That is nice,” remarked Gorham, regarding her attentively. “I think I should like my wife to feel like that.”
Hilda laughed. “Oh, that vague and shadowy wife of yours! Once I believed in her. Too bad that such a good-natured match-maker as I would have been should be burdened with such an impossible brother as you. I have lost all my interest in you, and have transferred it to Jack.”
Gorham smiled pensively, and struck the palm of one of his hands with the knuckles of the other. “You think yourself very clever about Jack, don’t you?”
“It goes without saying that I am clever, of course, but this occasion does not demand much insight. If they were a trifle more secret in their chats in corners and their exchange of masonic signals, I should think, perhaps, I was a treacherous guest to mention them; but they enjoy their little comedy, and are perfectly willing others should. I think it is unkind in them not to come out openly and allow me to give them my blessing before I go.”
“I must say, Hilda, I don’t enjoy hearing you use that tone about Mrs. Van Tassel.”
“What is the matter with my tone?” asked Hilda.
“It is light,” answered Page, with grave simplicity.
His sister stared a moment, then burst into laughter. “What crotchet have you taken now?” she asked. “Doesn’t the match please you?”
“It is not a match. You are laboring under a false idea. If Mrs. Van Tassel should ever distinguish a man in the way you are speaking of, it will come to our knowledge in a different manner from the one you describe. We are talking in low tones in a corner now; but we are not sentimentally interested in one another.”
“An unanswerable argument,” said Hilda good-naturedly. “You needn’t take the matter au grand sérieux. I am profoundly grateful to Mrs. Van Tassel, and think her one of the most charming women I ever knew.”
Page’s countenance, which had been grave to sternness, relaxed until, slowly smiling, he looked into his companion’s eyes and beamed mutely upon her.
Hilda noted the change with private astonishment, and determined to experiment.
“She is so refined,” she added after a pause.
“The perfection of refinement,” said Page.
“And very graceful.”
Gorham nodded. “It is a pleasure to see her move, is it not?”
“She has plenty of spirit too, and wit.”
“Yes, indeed. In whatever company she is, she makes her mark.”
“And it is never a black and blue one either,” responded Hilda, passing her handkerchief over her lips as she returned the rapt gaze of the earnest face drinking in her words. “There is so much in that. Her wit could never hurt. Her uniform, considerate kindness is her most prominent trait.”
“Yes,” responded Page, faithfully antiphonal. “Only a pure, true heart like hers could prompt such behavior.”
“There is a subtle charm and stimulus in her society.”
“And a restfulness, a satisfaction. It is hard to word it, but you have felt it; you recognize it. One can only say, it is good to be in her presence.”
Hilda pushed back her chair so suddenly that her companion started. “Gorham Page,” she said, gazing at him with sparkling eyes, and rising, “don’t you see what has happened?”
“No,” he answered, removing his fixed gaze and pushing aside the vines, the better to peer about.
“Not out there!” exclaimed his sister.
“Oh,” he answered mildly. “I thought perhaps Blitzen had killed Electra.”
Mrs. Page burst into laughter. Peal after peal broke from her, and she clasped her hand to her side.
Robert appeared on the scene.
“It is time you arrived,” said Gorham, vaguely smiling. “I haven’t the least idea what ails Hilda.”
Mrs. Page dropped her head on her husband’s shoulder.
“Gorham thought—thought that—that perhaps Blitzen—had killed Electra,” she gasped.
“How intensely amusing,” remarked Robert. “This girl is tired to death, Gorham,” he went on, patting his wife’s convulsed shoulder. “She thinks she doesn’t want to go home, but I know it is time. Mrs. Van Tassel urges our remaining. What a spirit of sunshine she is! If ever there was an angel in a house, she is one.”
Hilda lifted her head, to look at Gorham’s face. She found it beaming upon his brother with tender delight, and falling back she relapsed into another spasm of laughter.
“Stop this, stop this,” said her husband, giving her a little shake.
“I am really afraid Hilda isn’t well,” said Gorham with concern. “I am sorry if she is too tired, for I wanted to see if you all wouldn’t like to come over to the dance at the hotel to-night.”
“That is sensible, profoundly sensible,” remarked his brother. “What could finish off a day at the Fair more appropriately than a dancing party!”
“You’ve got to go, Robert,” said Hilda, wiping her eyes. “It will be lovely. We will smoke on the piazza, and watch the others through the windows.”
“Yes, I know how you enjoy looking on at a dancing party.”
“Yes, thank you, Gorham, we will come,” continued Mrs. Page relentlessly. “I shall just go down to the Court of Honor for one last look,” she added, sighing. “I will go up in that little balcony at the corner of the Electrical Building, and gaze once more down the stately, spacious square. I shall see the peacock-blue lake through the columns of the Peristyle, look up into the Italian sky roofing all, and say my prayers or sing the doxology; then I shall come home and pack. Oh, Robert, how can we leave it all!”
That evening Jack entered the parlor and found Clover leaning back in an armchair. He dropped into a seat beside her.
“You look fitter to adorn some marble shrine in the White City than to decorate a humdrum, mortal home,” he remarked, regarding her thin gown approvingly.
“I believe I never saw you before in a dress-suit,” she answered lazily. “You look very neat, my dear. That is what mother used to say to us to suppress our vanity, when we were in festive array. It is rather amusing to see Fair pilgrims in evening dress, isn’t it?”
“Where is Mildred?” asked Van Tassel, looking about.
“She will be here directly. If my sister were entirely costumed at any appointed time, I should be anxious about her.”
“I haven’t had a chance to confess before,” went on Jack, low and hastily. “I spoke to her too soon, after all. I need a keeper.”
“Oh, Jack! I’m sorry.”
Clover looked dismayed, and her tone was heart-felt.
“The milk is spilled, though; there is no going back. Didn’t she tell you?”
“No, indeed. When did it happen?”
“The night we took the gondola ride.”
“Days since, then. You are a wonder, Jack. Are you going to stay here and live it down?”
“I am going to stay here if you will let me.”
“Let you? It is your home. Oh Jack, I am afraid of your tone. You haven’t given up. I must tell you, though, that Mildred would be honest, uncompromisingly honest, in a serious matter like that. She is not a coquette.”
“I know it.”
“If she doesn’t love you, you do not want her.”
“I don’t know whether she loves me or not, and I don’t believe she knows any better.”
As his handsome, frank eyes looked up at her, Clover’s heart swelled with the approval and admiration she felt.
“We must relax to it,” she said involuntarily.
“Or brace up to it,” he replied, with his brilliant smile; “but it is too late now for the Petruchio act, Clover. I have literally and figuratively given myself away.”
“Yes,” said the other simply; “what you have to do now is to leave her in freedom. The Lord loves you both alike. If He does not give you Mildred, it will be because that marriage would stand in the way of your real advancement.”
“Do you really believe that?” Van Tassel regarded her in curiosity and surprise.
“Why, Jack, think it out some time. How can it be any other way?” she answered, speaking hastily, for she heard a rustle on the stairs; and a moment after her voice ceased, Mildred came into the room.
She was dressed in a pale violet gown, which revealed her superb neck, and she pulled long gloves up over her bare arms as she came.
Jack sprang to his feet. How could she help liking the homage in his eyes?
“I know I haven’t kept you waiting,” she said brightly, “for Mrs. Page’s light is still burning, and of course it will take her some little time to wake up Mr. Page.”
Hilda’s feet, in their little black satin slippers, came flying down the stairs as she spoke.
“Is Robert in a hammock?” she exclaimed apprehensively. “I meant to stick them both full of pins, but I haven’t had time. That poor dear man has done a lot to-day, in spite of all my warnings. I expect he will sleep from here to Boston, when we get started. You two girls look perfectly lovely. I shall wake him up with that information.”
As they were all finally setting out, Gorham Page came up the walk.
“I thought I would wander down and make sure of you,” he said to Clover, as he turned back beside her.
“You were sure of us,” she returned. “I have not danced for five years. It seems to me I should never have thought of it again but for your invitation.”
“You do not care for the amusement, then?”
“Clover Bryant used to care greatly,” she said, smiling; “but perhaps Mrs. Van Tassel has forgotten how to dance.”
They found the long, spacious piazza of the hotel gay with promenaders.
Robert Page groaned. “How marvelous is the endurance of man and woman kind,” he remarked. “How many of these people do you suppose have been doing the Fair to-day?”
“You mustn’t talk about the Fair,” returned his wife. “It is fortunate for you that the diversion came up, else I should have spent this evening weeping because I have said good-by.”
“Have you come over here with the notion that I am going to dance?” asked Page mildly.
“No, I haven’t the least idea you will. I wouldn’t ask it, since you were foolish enough to tramp miles to-day.”
“How could I help that, my dear, with the awful ‘last chance’ sensation hanging over me?”
The orchestra in the hotel parlor began to play. Jack Van Tassel came up to where the husband and wife were sitting.
“Are you going to dance, Hilda?”
“Apparently not,” she answered gayly.
“Give me this, won’t you?”
“Oh, you don’t need to. Why, where are Mildred and Clover?”
“They are sitting over yonder. They have many friends here. It seems to me this is rather a peculiar way for you to treat my invitation.”
“No, Jack,” said Page, with a heart-rending sigh. “The old man will have to dance once. ‘Let it be soon,’ as the song says. Come, my love, weary and footsore, let us tread the dreamy maze together.”
“Robert really wants to dance,” said Hilda to Van Tassel confidentially. “The music inspires him. I haven’t the heart to refuse. Thank you. Perhaps later we can have a turn.”
“Now, wasn’t that sweet of Jack and exactly like him?” asked Hilda, when they had drifted in among the floating couples. “He was afraid you were going to be immovable; and the very first dance, when of course you would suppose he would ask Mildred”—
“Or Mrs. Van Tassel, according to your theories.”
“My dear, I am shaken on my theories. I may have been wrong. I hope I have been. What do you think, Robert?”
“I can’t tell any of my thoughts while I am dancing, Hilda. Don’t ask it. If you do, I shall probably step on your foot. I have the greatest sympathy with the man who, when his partner insisted on talking to him in a round dance, replied as follows: Yes, two, three; one, no, three; one, two, yes; and so forth.”
“What a goose you are, dear; but you dance as well as you ever did, if you have forgotten how to say sweet nothings during a waltz.”
“Pray remember how much more breath I used to have. The spirit is willing still, but the flesh is too many for me.”
“There go Gorham and Clover,” said Mrs. Page with some excitement, pausing in the dance, and taking her husband’s willing arm. “Robert, I want you to watch Gorham to-night,” she added impressively.
“More mysteries?” returned Page plaintively. “I don’t see anything out of the way about him. He is rather stunning in a dress-suit.”
“I wonder if Clover thinks so,” responded Hilda significantly.
“Oh, you are only marrying him again,” remarked her husband, with an air of enlightenment. “If all your plans succeeded, I don’t know what would become of Gorham. He couldn’t even take refuge in Utah, for I understand the Mormons are discouraging plural marriages.”
“You can chaff, Robert; but mark my words, some day you will look back to this evening and exclaim over my cleverness. I haven’t told you all I know. I have proofs, if I chose to”—
“Yes, my dear, your fate is the common one of those who cry ‘Wolf’ too often. I’ve heard your proofs before.” Then squeezing his wife’s hand against his side, he added, “There isn’t another Hilda for poor Gorham, so how can I take a breathless interest in his prospects?”
Mrs. Page was mollified, of course; but she shrugged her shoulder. “I don’t understand how you can see those four people together and not weave romances. Now, for instance, I am burning to know why Mildred and Jack are not dancing this first dance together, instead of with Lieutenant Eames and his cousin. I dare say poor Jack lost his chance by coming to take care of me.”
But Hilda was wrong. A little circle of friends had gathered about Clover and Mildred as soon as they appeared on the hotel piazza, and Mildred saw at once in Jack’s quiet withdrawal that he did not intend to ask any favor for himself. She liked this in theory, but it half-vexed her to find herself alertly cognizant of his every movement even while she chatted and laughed with her other friends. She saw him approach Hilda, and wondered if he were asking her to dance; then, when the latter moved away into the hotel with her husband, Mildred talked volubly to Eames in order to prevent his having an opportunity to offer himself for her partner. These dances were informal. There were no printed programmes. She wished to give Jack time to return to their group and claim her before the lieutenant should.
How exasperatingly deliberate his motions seemed to her, as he sauntered along!
“I can easily believe what you say, Mr. Eames,” she said glibly. “The papers print a great many of the amusing blunders that are made, and I am sure they are not exaggerated, by my own experience. There were two women standing near me in front of the Manufactures Building the other day, and one said to the other: ‘Oh, look at that big statute of Liberty; do you suppose it’s solid gold?’ ‘No!’ replied the other scornfully, ‘it’s holler. If that was solid gold it would be worth ten thousand dollars.’ Then this sophisticated one turned to me. ‘Can you tell me where the Court of Honor is? Is it in the Administration Building?’ I answered that this was the Court of Honor, and I suppose I gestured generally, for she looked down at the Basin and then at me with a pitying smile. ‘Oh no,’ she said, ‘that is the lagoon.’”
Why would Jack stop to look in at the window? How slow he was! “Oh yes, and, Mr. Eames, was there any truth in that story I read about the battle-ship? Somebody says, you know, that although it looks so solid and impressive, an angry man could do it considerable damage with a crowbar, and I read lately about some country people who were visiting it. While they were exploring, the ship’s bells rang, and coincidently the whistle of a neighboring tug began to blow. The story said those poor people thought the boat was going to start and rushed for the gang-plank, panic-stricken. One man fell into the water, and a woman broke her ankle. It ought not to be amusing, but it is.”
“Ha, ha,” responded Eames, “there is a grain of truth in it;” (Jack was drawing near) “the rest is the reporter’s imagination. I can tell you what was the foundation of that yarn.” (Jack approached and stood near the speaker.) “Won’t you dance this with me, Miss Bryant, and I will initiate you into some of the methods of newspaper men as discovered by the officer-of-the-day at Jackson Park.”
They moved away, and Helen Eames, who had audaciously escaped a would-be partner in the hope of this very event, fell to Jack’s lot.
She was a vivacious, jolly girl, and a man was not obliged to talk much while with her, so Van Tassel yielded to her determination to detain him at her side as long as was feasible.
Mildred, promenading with her partner on the piazza after the dance, passed them sitting near the water where one could see, down the curve of the lake, the fireworks of the White City bursting in starry brilliance. Far out upon Michigan’s breast shone a row of steady lights, beside which, as on a liquid boulevard, the illuminated passenger-boats plied up and down.
Van Tassel was playing with his companion’s fan, and laughing as though he were well entertained, at the moment Mildred passed by.
The sight did not please her.
“It is all my monumental vanity,” she thought. “I am glad Jack isn’t one of the sort of men who stand around in corners and watch one tragically.”
She had danced several times when Clover, left near her by Gorham Page while he went to bring her a glass of water, addressed her.
“You haven’t danced with Jack once,” she said, with hasty reproach.
“Haven’t I?” Mildred raised her eyebrows.
“But aren’t you going to, dear?”
“Not unless he asks me, darling.”
Clover stared, then turned away to smile. She had not often seen Mildred in such an ill-humor.
“Poor, dear, unconscious Petruchio,” she reflected. “I wonder if he is building better than he knows.”
Here Page returned with the water, and she could say no more, even if she wished. Moreover, Gorham now addressed Mildred, to claim the dance for which the strains of the Washington Post March were already sounding assertively.
Jack had this two-step with Hilda, and when it was over he brought her to a seat near those which Mildred and Gorham had taken on the piazza.
“Mildred,” remarked Hilda, “this young man does know how to dance.”
Van Tassel bowed until the parting in his hair was visible.
“That is nice,” returned Miss Bryant languidly.
“The fireworks are over,” continued Hilda. “That awful word ‘nevermore’ is hanging over everything for me to-night. I meant to be out here to see the last piece, but I wasn’t,—that superb volcano, or mine, or whatever name they try to describe it by. I want you all to think of me with compassion every time you see it hereafter. Where do you suppose Robert is?”
“Perhaps I ought to know,” suggested Gorham. “I will hunt him up if you will allow me, Miss Mildred.”
“I’ll go with you,” said Mrs. Page. “It is rather cool here to sit still after dancing. You will excuse me, Jack? I think I ought to let poor Robert off now, and take him home.”
It was the first time Mildred and Jack had been alone together since the memorable evening.
“May I have the next dance?” asked Van Tassel abruptly.
“If you like,” answered the girl carelessly. “Haven’t you had enough dancing?”
“I haven’t had any,” he answered briefly; and Mildred told herself that the demon of her vanity had received what it craved, so warm a sensation of satisfaction stole around her heart.
“I thought I would make myself safe before one of your other friends espied you here; but if you are tired”—
“I am never tired—physically,” said the girl, with a slow smile.
“I was only going to say that I would be content to sit out the next with you; although we have not danced together since that night in the boathouse.” Jack smiled. “Do you remember what you told me?”
“Oh yes. You made that child very happy. She owes you a dance.”
“These surroundings are strange. Have you been thinking of it?”
“Yes. Only last year this ground was a tangle of goldenrod and willow-trees. How many times we have gone bathing on that beach! It was as good a playground for jolly youngsters as could be imagined; and now”—
She paused.
“Now, the music has commenced,” suggested Jack, rising. “In consideration of the manner in which I have effaced myself so far, you should allow our dance to begin promptly.”
They entered the parlor by the door which leads from the east piazza. She put her hand in his, and they glided away over the polished floor among the pillars with their vine-like wreaths of electric lights.
Amid the scattering groups which, outside, watched the dancers through the windows, was one spectator who was seeing a conventional dancing party for the first time in her life. It had suddenly occurred to Robert Page that it would be worth the exertion of going after Aunt Love to see her view this pretty scene; and when Hilda and Gorham reached the front entrance of the hotel in their search for Robert, they found him ascending the steps with Miss Berry.
“The young ladies did ask me if I didn’t want to come over, and I thought I should feel out o’ place,” she said; “but Mr. Page, he just made me, so here I am.”
“Now, come to this window,” said Robert, “and tell me what you think of that.”
The others clustered around Miss Lovina, as she murmured and exclaimed in her surprise.
“I never approved o’ dancin’,” she said. “I never saw any before. Mr. Gorham, do you remember that hall in the New York Buildin’? That must be temptin’ to young critters when it’s lighted up, and the music’s a-playin’. Why,” eagerly, “see Miss Mildred and Mr. Jack. My, don’t they go pretty! And there’s Mrs. Van Tassel herself and some feller. Why,” turning suddenly upon Gorham, “why ain’t you in there dancin’ with her?”
“I have danced with her twice,” he answered. “I mustn’t be a monopolist, although it is a temptation. She is by far the best dancer here.”
Upon this Hilda pressed her small satin shoe against her husband’s foot, and he obtusely moved it out of her way.
“Well, I declare,” exclaimed Miss Berry, gazing in ever-warming admiration, “if it ain’t enough to make a body want to be young and pretty. To think this is the real, wicked thing itself, and I ain’t shocked. What’s the matter with me, Mr. Gorham?”
“Considering your prejudices and traditions, it is a little odd. Perhaps it is because you cannot associate an idea of evil with anything you see Mrs. Van Tassel engaging in.”
Here Mrs. Page again endeavored to gain her lord’s sympathy, with the result that he ejaculated: “Where would you like to have me put my feet, Hilda?”
“Why don’t you go in there and dance, Mr. Gorham?” pursued Miss Berry.
“Am I so young and pretty that you want to see me? Well, if Hilda is willing to favor me.”
“Oh certainly, so long as Robert doesn’t care to go home. Au revoir, dears.”
“Now, then,” Aunt Love turned upon her companion argumentatively, “are you perfectly willin’ a man should put his arm around your wife’s waist?”
“On the contrary, I should object seriously.”
“How about that, then?” Miss Berry gestured toward the hall.
“For a man to place his hand on a woman’s waist to steady and support her is not to put his arm around her. There are too many other things for a couple to think of in guiding themselves successfully through a crowd of dancers to allow of their usually being conscious of the intimacy of their position. Don’t be afraid to admire the dancing, Aunt Love. It can be abused, like everything else; but it is an excellent exercise, inculcating grace, strength, and good manners.”
“Well, now, I’m goin’ to tell some folks I know what you say. Ain’t your wife just as light as a fairy, and don’t your brother look handsome to-night? No, sir, there ain’t any folks here as good-lookin’ as ours.”
When the waltz was finished, Gorham Page and Hilda approached Clover and told her that Aunt Love was without. She excused herself from her partner to go with them, and soon afterward Gorham walked home with her.
“Thank you so much for coming,” he said, when he was bidding her good-night.
“I am sure we have all to thank you,” she answered. “Isn’t it hard to be reconciled to letting your brother and Hilda go? We have been such a pleasant party.”
“Yes,” returned Page, looking down at her as she stood in her white wrap, an unconsciously adoring expression in his eyes; “this summer is an experience that one could wish would never end. Going away,” he smiled vaguely, “leaving you, having these weeks come to an end, is almost as difficult to grasp in prospect as the thought of death.”
Clover laughed softly. “We won’t borrow trouble,” she said. “Good-night.”