THE NEXT TIME HE brought her home, Jed didn’t kiss her good night, nor the next, nor the next—
For the first time in her life Emily wished urgently for a confidante. She wanted to talk with some girl she could trust—or with her mother.
“It would be wonderful to talk to you,” she said, staring at her mother’s picture with her hand clasped around the locket. “The whole thing is so—puzzling.”
She wondered about it continually as she went her daily round. Had he been offended at her response? Or had the kiss been a casual gesture? But he didn’t seem the kind to be casual with a girl of her kind. Perhaps he was like Cab Edwards, afraid to get serious.
“After all, he’s going back to college next year. He may not want to fall in love.”
And when she went that far in her thoughts it sounded absurd. Was she the same Emily Webster who had been so humble and adoring with Don? Could it be she seriously thought it possible that anyone so desirable as Jed Wakeman could be in love with her? The truth was that she did.
Something else puzzled her—her continued interest in Don. Jed, in two months, had come to fill her life so that she couldn’t bear to think of his ever going out of it. Yet Don’s picture, when she caught a glimpse of it at the back of her chest, the brown and gold volume of Browning, still had magic. When Don’s name came into the conversation or when she thought of him, she felt a little inward shiver.
“Can you be in love with two men at once?” she wondered. That was another thing she wished she could ask her mother.
Gradually the snows were melting. There were days of wild rain-filled wind, swaying the trees, pommeling the windows of the little house. When they ended, the world was as cold as jelly. But the green shoots of the bulbs were up. Fat robin redbreasts were scouting in the bare trees, and down in the slough the blue-winged teals were back, and the mallards; she heard them quacking in the night.
There would be more snow, of course. But that didn’t matter when you knew the pasque flower was in bloom.
“Probably we have some pasque flowers right on our own lot,” she said to Jed.
They climbed the slope which was mushily green with patches of snow on the north side of the trees. And sure enough, among the matted leaves, they found three pasque flowers looking up in pale surprise.
“Let’s not pick them,” Emily said.
They turned and looked down to the roof of the little house.
“This seemed like a long way from home when I was a little girl. I used to bring picnics up here.”
“Alone?”
“Oh, yes! Unless I brought a doll along.”
She had never, she realized, talked about herself with Don. Don had never thought of her or her problems. Jed liked to hear about her childhood and her growing up. Little by little she had told him almost all there was to tell—about her parents, and her grandmother; her differentness in school; even the great pain of not being able to go to college. But she had not told him about Don.
Woodrow Wilson had been inaugurated president of the United States. Jed liked him. He actually preferred him to Teddy.
Easter was approaching. Over at Aunt Sophie’s, Miss Mix was making Emily new clothes—a smoke-blue silk with lace frills around the wrists, and a navy blue suit with a cutaway coat and side-draped skirt. Emily bought a new white blouse and a blue straw hat with flowers. It fitted her head so closely that she hardly needed hatpins.
She took these purchases to Aunt Sophie’s to try on with the suit, and she was pleased with her reflection in the tier-glass. Her dark-lashed blue eyes looked alive and happy, as though she were expecting something wonderful to happen.
“You look very up to date,” Aunt Sophie said approvingly. “It’s too bad Easter comes so early. It will be too cold for suits. But you can wear your new hat.”
For Aunt Sophie, Easter meant two things—hats and Annette’s return. But in spite of the fact that she had heard so much about it, Emily forgot the day that the crowd was coming home.
One morning she thought, “I believe the University crowd got in last night,” and a little later she heard light steps on the porch, the door pushed open and there was Annette smiling below a green tam.
Emily pulled her in happily and kissed her. As soon as Emily had taken her coat, Annette began to dance about.
“See something new?”
“No. I’ve seen that shirt waist before…”
“Yes! But look what’s on it!”
Beneath Annette’s sorority pin was a second small jeweled emblem.
“It’s Don’s fraternity pin! Do you know what it means?”
“It means you’re engaged, doesn’t it? Or practically.”
“That’s exactly what it means! Engaged—practically!”
“Well!” thought Emily, staring above Annette’s head as she hugged her. “That settles that!” Annette was engaged to Don, so she would have to put him out of her mind. She was glad of it. She heard herself saying to Annette, “That’s wonderful, Annette! I’m so pleased!”
“I knew you would be. That’s why I was anxious to tell you. Not everyone likes Don. Some people think he shows off. They think he’s putting on when he is really just being himself. But you always appreciated him.”
“Yes, I did,” said Emily slowly. “What do Aunt Sophie and Uncle Chester think?”
“They’re not too happy about it. Of course, the Walkers are very well-fixed people. But Don has moods. You know that, Em! And Papa and Mamma have seen him when he was pretty glum. But they’ll get to like him. He’s so nice when he is nice! I’m terribly in love.”
They sat down by the fire, holding hands.
“When are you going to get married?”
“Heaven knows! He’s going to Yale, you know. But I may not finish college. I may stay right here in Deep Valley next year and keep you company.” Her tone changed. “You’re looking awfully well, Em!”
“Oh, I feel marvelously. I wish Grandpa were better. He doesn’t seem to have the strength he used to have.”
“Well, that’s natural at his age! Getting back to you, you do look marvelously. Still going out with Cab?”
“Sometimes.”
“Mamma said she saw you at Peter Pan with that new good-looking high school teacher.”
Emily smiled.
“Is he nice? Nicer than Cab?”
“Annette, I’ve told you that Cab and I are just friends. And Jed…”
“Jed?”
“Jed Wakeman. He’s a very nice person whom I thoroughly enjoy.”
Annette pounced at her, ruffling Emily’s curly hair. “You’re as close-mouthed as ever, I see. I’m having the crowd tomorrow. Can you come?”
“I’m terribly sorry. I have a date.” Amused pride at being included so casually in a man-and-girl party was drowned out by her relief in not having to see Don. And yet she ought to see him—get over him completely—get adjusted to the fact that he was engaged to Annette.
“Oh dear!” Annette was saying. “What are you doing?”
“Well, you won’t understand, but Jed and I are going calling—down in Little Syria.”
“Whatever is the charm down there?”
“We have friends there.”
“Friends?”
“Yes, friends,” answered Emily with a prick of irritation. “Jed and Gwen Fowler and I have been working up some Americanization courses. Jed is working toward his sociology Master’s.”
Annette jumped up. “Oh, I understand!” she said. “You do have a crush on this Jed. I think it’s awfully exciting, Em.”
“We’re just friends,” Emily insisted.
“Just friends! That’s what you say about Cab. And yet instead of being with your own crowd you go trailing off to Little Syria with him on Easter day. Well, my party is a supper. Can’t you come after your Syrian expedition—and bring him?”
“Perhaps I can,” said Emily slowly. Perhaps she ought to go. But she didn’t want to take Jed—not yet—not until she had had a chance to settle her feelings about Don. “If you don’t mind, I won’t bring Jed this time. It would—it would be nice just to be with the old crowd.”
“I know just how you feel!” Annette said.
Emily had asked Jed for Easter dinner, and before going to church she set the table with her grandmother’s damask and the Haviland dishes, and smiled to herself to think that once she had been afraid to have Gwen Fowler to supper. Jed had removed completely the old sensitiveness about her house. She was entertaining the Browning Club for their final meeting next week—without a qualm.
How Jed had built up her confidence—in her house, herself, everything!
“Don always tried to pull me down. He liked to make me feel inferior.”
Uncle Chester drove her and her grandfather to church. It was indeed too cold for suits, but the church bobbed with new hats.
Across the aisle she glimpsed square military shoulders, and her heart quivered in the old familiar way.
“That’s just an involuntary reaction! It’s just force of habit! Anyhow, I’ll get over it,” she thought.
At the end of the service Annette darted over to Don.
“They’ll probably walk home together,” Aunt Sophie said. “Would you like us to take you and Grandpa on?”
“Yes, I would,” Emily said. “I have company coming for dinner.”
“Anyone I know?” Aunt Sophie asked coyly.
“Jed Wakeman.”
Aunt Sophie squeezed her arm. “All this romancing!” she said. “What do you think about Annette and Don? We hope it won’t last. Thank goodness, he has three more years in college!”
Jed, coming from the Episcopal church, brought daffodils for the table and he praised the chicken dinner. He tried to persuade Grandpa Webster to go along with them to Little Syria.
“Easter is the most important holiday among the Syrians, Mr. Webster. Yusef has a new suit and Kalil has a new shirt and tie. He says the men go from house to house wishing everyone Happy Easter.”
“Only instead of ‘Happy Easter,’” said Emily, “they say ‘Christ is risen!’”
“Emily,” said Jed, “how could I ever write my thesis without you?”
“Well, you kids can tell me all about it,” Grandpa Webster replied. “The Judge is coming over. We thought we’d have a little chess.”
The melting snows, which left woodpiles, chicken houses and shabby houses bare, made Little Syria even less attractive than it had been in the winter. But the sun had come out; song sparrows were singing. And like the Syrian men, Emily and Jed went from house to house calling.
The rigorously observed Lenten season was over. “Christ is risen!” everyone said joyously to everyone else. And the wives passed Easter sweet cakes which were buttery, like doughnuts, and spicy. Kahiks, they were called.
There were bowls of beautifully colored eggs—purple, yellow, scarlet, and eggs colored by onion skins, a rich brown. The Syrians challenged one another to break eggs. One would hold his egg forward and another would joke, “A little more room, please! I can’t get to it.” They hit them tip to tip, each one trying not to break his own. The winner went on to challenge another winner until there was one final winner. He proved to be Mr. Tabbit.
“Now, he’ll save his egg,” Kalil explained to Jed and Emily. “The strongest egg is always saved, sometimes for years. We have an orange-colored egg we have saved for three years because it was the strongest.”
At every house Jed and Emily were offered coffee, in little cups on a tray. They were offered pastries, candies, figs and raisins, and there was rose water for the children. Emily loved watching Jed. He was having such a good time. And he was just as charming with the humble people of Little Syria as he was with majestic Miss Bangeter.
Leaving the Mohannas, they passed the Bobbys entering.
“Charley said they would have baklawa,” Bobby Sibley called.
“Did you know that Mr. Sibley took the Wrestling Champs on a hike and picnic yesterday?” asked Jed.
“Oh, Jed!” said Emily. “What you did when you taught Kalil to wrestle!”
She had already broken their casual engagement for the evening. Jed had been most understanding of her wish to be with her crowd.
“I believe he’s the most unselfish person I ever knew,” Emily thought.
The Syrians had sent Grandpa Webster sweet cakes, and Emily gave them to him with his supper. Then she changed to the new silk dress and her pearl earrings and went across the slough to Annette’s.
“Alone!” she thought. “No Jim Baxter!” She joked with herself to hold down an inward trepidation about seeing Don again. Now, at least, she was sure of her self-possession. She couldn’t imagine ever losing that precious confidence which Jed had helped her to gain.
“I’ll see Annette and Don together, and that will end my feeling for him; then maybe I’ll fall in love with Jed. Maybe I’m in love with him already?”
It was a typical Sunday night party. The chafing dish was on the table. Annette, in an organdy apron, was pretending to make rarebit which Minnie dashed out from the kitchen to supervise. Gladys was banging the piano and different groups formed behind her to sing “When It’s Apple Blossom Time in Normandy” and “Oh, You Beautiful Doll” and, of course, “The Sweetheart of Sigma Chi.” Emily left her wraps in Annette’s room and came in smiling. She knew that she looked well in the smoke-blue dress and the pearl earrings. And Jed had told her that she had distinction! She greeted the girls affectionately and Gladys jumped up from the piano.
“What’s this I hear about you and the high school faculty?”
She found herself extremely happy to be there, and she was at ease, even when Don came to greet her. He took her hand in his long, slender brown fingers, smiling his most vivid smile.
“I’m awfully happy about you and Annette,” Emily said.
“Think I’m good enough for her?”
“I feel like Aunt Sophie does about Annette.”
“Oh, well then! I have to improve fast.”
Jim Baxter was there. Testing her new skills, Emily went over to her burly Nemesis and asked about his chances for the first team next year. To her amused amazement he seemed embarrassed but enormously pleased and launched into an explanation of the competition that he faced from the other players.
Fred Muller came up to ask about her dancing. “Have you learned the Boston yet?”
The evening was fun, but at ten o’clock Emily began to think about home.
Aunt Sophie didn’t have to mention Jim Baxter tonight. Don spoke so quickly that he must have been waiting for this moment.
“I’ll walk over with you, Emily.”
“Oh, please don’t! I wouldn’t like to take you away from the party.”
“I’ll come back!” he said, turning to smile at Annette, who called, “Don’t steal him, Em!”
They started over the slough, which sounded like spring with a quack of ducks now and then. The day had grown progressively milder and the evening had the softness of spring. You could hear the sound of melting snow running and trickling.
He told her about the Masquers production of Arms and the Man, and about the Junior Ball which was coming up next week. It was late this year; they had held it off until after Lent. He was taking Annette, he said, and it was costing him a pretty penny.
“Flowers and a carriage and all that sort of thing. The J.B. counts up.”
At the door Emily held out her hand but he didn’t take it.
“I need to rest before the journey back. Do you have any cookies, Emily?”
“But the party is expecting you.”
“And it won’t be a thing without me; will it?” he asked, and followed her inside. The lamplight shone on Jed’s daffodils. Don walked over to touch them.
“They’re certainly hot house; aren’t they?” She nodded. “I didn’t think the spring had come that far along.”
Although she didn’t ask him to, he took off his coat. She took off her own and they sat down. She didn’t go in by the fire. She sat in the parlor, pleased to think that she could sit in her parlor with Don and not feel embarrassed now. She loved it all, even the wax flowers. She sat in what Jed called the “lady’s chair” and Don sat on the sofa.
He took out his pipe and filled it, and a cloud gathered over his brow as he tamped the tobacco into the bowl of the pipe.
“Do you know, Emily,” he said, “I’ve never forgotten my visits to this house last summer.”
“Is that so?”
“They were different from other calls on other girls. That locust tree with you underneath it! It stands out like a cameo.”
“Me in a hair ribbon,” she said.
“Yes.” He looked up quickly. “Lord, how you’ve changed! I heard before I saw you that you had turned into a stunner.”
Emily laughed.
“But you are!”
She seemed to be listening to a conversation which two other people were making. Don Walker was flattering some girl, and she didn’t even care.
Suddenly she thought, “But he shouldn’t be flattering a girl. Even me. He’s engaged to Annette.” She said abruptly. “You’re very lucky, Don, to have persuaded Annette to take that pin.”
He flushed. “I note, Miss Webster, that you’re changing the subject.”
“I know you have to hurry back, and I want you to know I’m happy about your engagement.”
“It isn’t exactly an engagement.”
“Well, practically,” she said and rose. “I really think you had better go back now.”
He emptied his pipe and put it in his pocket, stood up and pulled on his coat, looking tragic. Emily wanted to laugh.
He couldn’t bear it, she thought, because she wasn’t tortured by his engagement. He was probably in love with Annette, and he was most certainly not in love with her. But it was more than he could bear to have her take the matter so calmly.
She was smiling so perceptively that he asked with annoyance, “May I know the joke?”
“There isn’t any joke.”
“I meant to tell you, speaking of this so-called engagement, to read your Browning. Remember ‘The Lost Duchess?’” He quoted:
“Had you, with these the same, but brought a mind! Some women do so…”
Emily interrupted.
“Don,” she said. “Would you mind going home?”
He pulled his soft hat violently down over his forehead. “I suppose you think that I’m a cad.”
“I just don’t think about you. Good-by,” Emily said, and closed the door firmly behind him.