"What do you want? Perfection?"
"--or nothing. So, you see, I take the nothing."
"That doesn't make sense."
"I take the only desire one can really permit oneself. Freedom, Alvah, freedom."
"You call that freedom?"
"To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing."
"What if you found something you wanted?"
"I won't find it. I won't choose to see it. It would be part of that lovely world of yours. I'd have to share it with all the rest of you--and I wouldn't. You know, I never open again any great book I've read and loved. It hurts me to think of the other eyes that have read it and of what they were. Things like that can't be shared. Not with people like that."
"Dominique, it's abnormal to feel so strongly about anything."
"That's the only way I can feel. Or not at all."
"Dominique, my dear," he said, with earnest, sincere concern, "I wish I'd been your father. What kind of a tragedy did you have in your childhood?"
"Why, none at all. I had a wonderful childhood. Free and peaceful and not bothered too much by anybody. Well, yes, I did feel bored very often. But I'm used to that."
"I suppose you're just an unfortunate product of our times. That's what I've always said. We're too cynical, too decadent. If we went back in all humility to the simple virtues ..."
"Alvah, how can you start on that stuff? That's only for your editorials and ..." She stopped, seeing his eyes; they looked puzzled and a little hurt. Then she laughed. "I'm wrong. You really do believe all that. If it's actually believing, or whatever it is you do that takes its place. Oh, Alvah! That's why I love you. That's why I'm doing again right now what I did tonight at the meeting."
"What?" he asked, bewildered.
"Talking as I am talking--to you as you are. It's nice, talking to you about such things. Do you know, Alvah, that primitive people made statues of their gods in man's likeness? Just think of what a statue of you would look like--of you nude, your stomach and all."
"Now what's that in relation to?"
"To nothing at all, darling. Forgive me." She added: "You know, I love statues of naked men. Don't look so silly. I said statues. I had one in particular. It was supposed to be Helios. I got it out of a museum in Europe. I had a terrible time getting it--it wasn't for sale, of course. I think I was in love with it, Alvah. I brought it home with me."
"Where is it? I'd like to see something you like, for a change."
"It's broken."
"Broken? A museum piece? How did that happen?"
"I broke it."
"How?"
"I threw it down the air shaft. There's a concrete floor below."
"Are you totally crazy? Why?"
"So that no one else would ever see it."
"Dominique!"
She jerked her head, as if to shake off the subject; the straight mass of her hair stirred in a heavy ripple, like a wave through a half-liquid pool of mercury. She said:
"I'm sorry, darling. I didn't want to shock you. I thought I could speak to you because you're the one person who's impervious to any sort of shock. I shouldn't have. It's no use, I guess."
She jumped lightly off the table.
"Run on home, Alvah," she said. "It's getting late. I'm tired. See you tomorrow."
Guy Francon read his daughter's articles; he heard of the remarks she had made at the reception and at the meeting of social workers. He understood nothing of it, but he understood that it had been precisely the sequence of events to expect from his daughter. It preyed on his mind, with the bewildered feeling of apprehension which the thought of her always brought him. He asked himself whether he actually hated his daughter.
But one picture came back to his mind, irrelevantly, whenever he asked himself that question. It was a picture of her childhood, of a day from some forgotten summer on his country estate in Connecticut long ago. He had forgotten the rest of that day and what had led to the one moment he remembered. But he remembered how he stood on the terrace and saw her leaping over a high green hedge at the end of the lawn. The hedge seemed too high for her little body; he had time to think that she could not make it, in the very moment when he saw her flying triumphantly over the green barrier. He could not remember the beginning nor the end of that leap; but he still saw, clearly and sharply, as on a square of movie film cut out and held motionless forever, the one instant when her body hung in space, her long legs flung wide, her thin arms thrown up, hands braced against the air, her white dress and blond hair spread in two broad, flat mats on the wind, a single moment, the flash of a small body in the greatest burst of ecstatic freedom he had ever witnessed in his life.
He did not know why that moment remained with him, what significance, unheeded at the time, had preserved it for him when so much else of greater import had been lost. He did not know why he had to see that moment again whenever he felt bitterness for his daughter, nor why, seeing it, he felt that unbearable twinge of tenderness. He told himself merely that his paternal affection was asserting itself quite against his will. But in an awkward, unthinking way he wanted to help her, not knowing, not wanting to know what she had to be helped against.
So he began to look more frequently at Peter Keating. He began to accept the solution which he never quite admitted to himself. He found comfort in the person of Peter Keating, and he felt that Keating's simple, stable wholesomeness was just the support needed by the unhealthy inconstancy of his daughter.
Keating would not admit that he had tried to see Dominique again, persistently and without results. He had obtained her telephone number from Francon long ago, and he had called her often. She had answered, and laughed gaily, and told him that of course she'd see him, she knew she wouldn't be able to escape it, but she was so busy for weeks to come and would he give her a ring by the first of next month?
Francon guessed it. He told Keating he would ask Dominique to lunch and bring them together again. "That is," he added, "I'll try to ask her. She'll refuse, of course." Dominique surprised him again: she accepted, promptly and cheerfully.
She met them at a restaurant, and she smiled as if this were a reunion she welcomed. She talked gaily, and Keating felt enchanted, at ease, wondering why he had ever feared her. At the end of a half hour she looked at Francon and said:
"It was wonderful of you to take time off to see me, Father. Particularly when you're so busy and have so many appointments."
Francon's face assumed a look of consternation.
"My God, Dominique, that reminds me!"
"You have an appointment you forgot?" she asked gently.
"Confound it, yes! It slipped my mind entirely. Old Andrew Colson phoned this morning and I forgot to make a note of it and he insisted on seeing me at two o'clock, you know how it is, I just simply can't refuse to see Andrew Colson, confound it!--today of all ..." He added, suspiciously: "How did you know it?"
"Why, I didn't know it at all. It's perfectly all right, Father. Mr. Keating and I will excuse you, and we'll have a lovely luncheon together, and I have no appointments at all for the day, so you don't have to be afraid that I'll escape from him."
Francon wondered whether she knew that that had been the excuse he'd prepared in advance in order to leave her alone with Keating. He could not be sure. She was looking straight at him; her eyes seemed just a bit too candid. He was glad to escape.
Dominique turned to Keating with a glance so gentle that it could mean nothing but contempt.
"Now let's relax," she said. "We both know what Father is after, so it's perfectly all right. Don't let it embarrass you. It doesn't embarrass me. It's nice that you've got Father on a leash. But I know it's not helpful to you to have him pulling ahead of the leash. So let's forget it and eat our lunch."
He wanted to rise and walk out; and knew, in furious helplessness, that he wouldn't. She said:
"Don't frown, Peter. You might as well call me Dominique, because we'll come to that anyway, sooner or later.
I'll probably see a great deal of you, I see so many people, and if it will please Father to have you as one of them--why not?"
For the rest of the luncheon she spoke to him as to an old friend, gaily and openly; with a disquieting candor which seemed to show that there was nothing to conceal, but showed that it was best to attempt no probe. The exquisite kindliness of her manner suggested that their relationship was of no possible consequence, that she could not pay him the tribute of hostility. He knew that he disliked her violently. But he watched the shape of her mouth, the movements of her lips framing words; he watched the way she crossed her legs, a gesture smooth and exact, like an expensive instrument being folded; and he could not escape the feeling of incredulous admiration he had experienced when he had seen her for the first time.
When they were leaving, she said:
"Will you take me to the theater tonight, Peter? I don't care what play, any one of them. Call for me after dinner. Tell Father about it. It will please him."
"Though, of course, he should know better than to be pleased," said Keating, "and so should I, but I'll be delighted just the same, Dominique."
"Why should you know better?"
"Because you have no desire to go to a theater or to see me tonight."
"None whatever. I'm beginning to like you, Peter. Call for me at half past eight."
When Keating returned to the office, Francon called him upstairs at once.
"Well?" Francon asked anxiously.
"What's the matter, Guy?" said Keating, his voice innocent. "Why are you so concerned?"
"Well, I ... I'm just... frankly, I'm interested to see whether you two could get together at all. I think you'd be a good influence for her. What happened?"
"Nothing at all. We had a lovely time. You know your restaurants--the food was wonderful... Oh, yes, I'm taking your daughter to a show tonight."
"No!"
"Why, yes."
"How did you ever manage that?"
Keating shrugged. "I told you one mustn't be afraid of Dominique."
"I'm not afraid, but ... Oh, is it 'Dominique' already? My congratulations, Peter.... I'm not afraid, it's only that I can't figure her out. No one can approach her. She's never had a single girl friend, not even in kindergarten. There's always a mob around her, but never a friend. I don't know what to think. There she is now, living all alone, always with a crowd of men around and ..."
"Now, Guy, you mustn't think anything dishonorable about your own daughter."
"I don't! That's just the trouble--that I don't. I wish I could. But she's twenty-four, Peter, and she's a virgin--I know, I'm sure of it. Can't you tell just by looking at a woman? I'm no moralist, Peter, and I think that's abnormal. It's unnatural at her age, with her looks, with the kind of utterly unrestricted existence that she leads. I wish to God she'd get married. I honestly do.... Well, now, don't repeat that, of course, and don't misinterpret it, I didn't mean it as an invitation."
"Of course not."
"By the way, Peter, the hospital called while you were out. They said poor Lucius is much better. They think he'll pull through." Lucius N. Heyer had had a stroke, and Keating had exhibited a great deal of concern for his progress, but had not gone to visit him at the hospital.
"I'm so glad," said Keating.
"But I don't think he'll ever be able to come back to work. He's getting old, Peter.... Yes, he's getting old.... One reaches an age when one can't be burdened with business any longer." He let a paper knife hang between two fingers and tapped it pensively against the edge of a desk calendar. "It happens to all of us, Peter, sooner or later.... One must look ahead...."
Keating sat on the floor by the imitation logs in the fireplace of his living room, his hands clasped about his knees, and listened to his mother's questions on what did Dominique look like, what did she wear, what had she said to him and how much money did he suppose her mother had actually left her.
He was meeting Dominique frequently now. He had just returned from an evening spent with her on a round of night clubs. She always accepted his invitations. He wondered whether her attitude was deliberate proof that she could ignore him more completely by seeing him often than by refusing to see him. But each time he met her, he planned eagerly for the next meeting. He had not seen Catherine for a month. She was busy with research work which her uncle had entrusted to her, in preparation for a series of his lectures.
Mrs. Keating sat under a lamp, mending a slight tear in the lining of Peter's dinner jacket, reproaching him, between questions, for sitting on the floor in his dress trousers and best formal shirt. He paid no attention to the reproaches or the questions. But under his bored annoyance he felt an odd sense of relief; as if the stubborn stream of her words were pushing him on and justifying him. He answered once in a while: "Yes.... No.... I don't know.... Oh, yes, she's lovely. She's very lovely.... It's awfully late, Mother. I'm tired. I think I'll go to bed...."
The doorbell rang.
"Well," said Mrs. Keating. "What can that be, at this hour?"
Keating rose, shrugging, and ambled to the door.
It was Catherine. She stood, her two hands clasped on a large, old, shapeless pocketbook. She looked determined and hesitant at once. She drew back a little. She said: "Good evening, Peter. Can I come in? I've got to speak to you."
"Katie! Of course! How nice of you! Come right in. Mother, it's Katie."
Mrs. Keating looked at the girl's feet which stepped as if moving on the rolling deck of a ship; she looked at her son, and she knew that something had happened, to be handled with great caution.
"Good evening, Catherine," she said softly.
Keating was conscious of nothing save the sudden stab of joy he had felt on seeing her; the joy told him that nothing had changed, that he was safe in certainty, that her presence resolved all doubts. He forgot to wonder about the lateness of the hour, about her first, uninvited appearance in his apartment.
"Good evening, Mrs. Keating," she said, her voice bright and hollow. "I hope I'm not disturbing you, it's late probably, is it?"
"Why, not at all, child," said Mrs. Keating.
Catherine hurried to speak, senselessly, hanging on to the sound of words:
"I'll just take my hat off.... Where can I put it, Mrs. Keating? Here on the table? Would that be all right? ... No, maybe I'd better put it on this bureau, though it's a little damp from the street, the hat is, it might hurt the varnish, it's a nice bureau, I hope it doesn't hurt the varnish...."
"What's the matter, Katie?" Keating asked, noticing at last.
She looked at him and he saw that her eyes were terrified. Her lips parted; she was trying to smile.
"Katie!" he gasped.
She said nothing.
"Take your coat off. Come here, get yourself warm by the fire."
He pushed a low bench to the fireplace, he made her sit down. She was wearing a black sweater and an old black skirt, schoolgirlish house garments which she had not changed for her visit. She sat hunched, her knees drawn tight together. She said, her voice lower and more natural, with the first released sound of pain in it:
"You have such a nice place.... So warm and roomy.... Can you open the windows any time you want to?"
"Katie darling," he said gently, "what happened?"
"Nothing. It's not that anything really happened. Only I had to speak to you. Now. Tonight."
He looked at Mrs. Keating. "If you'd rather ..."
"No. It's perfectly all right. Mrs. Keating can hear it. Maybe it's better if she hears it." She turned to his mother and said very simply: "You see, Mrs. Keating, Peter and I are engaged." She turned to him and added, her voice breaking: "Peter, I want to be married now, tomorrow, as soon as possible."
Mrs. Keating's hand descended slowly to her lap. She looked at Catherine, her eyes expressionless. She said quietly, with a dignity Keating had never expected of her:
"I didn't know it. I am very happy, my dear."
"You don't mind? You really don
't mind at all?" Catherine asked desperately.
"Why, child, such things are to be decided only by you and my son."
"Katie!" he gasped, regaining his voice. "What happened? Why as soon as possible?"
"Oh! oh, it did sound as if... as if I were in the kind of trouble girls are supposed to ..." She blushed furiously. "Oh, my God! No! It's not that! You know it couldn't be! Oh, you couldn't think, Peter, that I ... that ..."
"No, of course not," he laughed, sitting down on the floor by her side, slipping an arm around her. "But pull yourself together. What is it? You know I'd marry you tonight if you wanted me to. Only what happened?"
"Nothing. I'm all right now. I'll tell you. You'll think I'm crazy. I just suddenly had the feeling that I'd never marry you, that something dreadful was happening to me and I had to escape from it."
"What was happening to you?"
"I don't know. Not a thing. I was working on my research notes all day, and nothing had happened at all. No calls or visitors. And then suddenly tonight, I had that feeling, it was like a nightmare, you know, the kind of horror that you can't describe, that's not like anything normal at all. Just the feeling that I was in mortal danger, that something was closing in on me, that I'd never escape it, because it wouldn't let me and it was too late."
"That you'd never escape what?"
"I don't know exactly. Everything. My whole life. You know, like quicksand. Smooth and natural. With not a thing that you can notice about it or suspect. And you walk on it easily. When you've noticed, it's too late.... And I felt that it would get me, that I'd never marry you, that I had to run, now, now or never. Haven't you ever had a feeling like that, just fear that you couldn't explain?"
"Yes," he whispered.
"You don't think I'm crazy?"
"No, Katie. Only what was it exactly that started it? Anything in particular?"
"Well ... it seems so silly now." She giggled apologetically. "It was like this: I was sitting in my room and it was a little chilly, so I didn't open the window. I had so many papers and books on the table, I hardly had room to write and every time I made a note my elbow'd push something off. There were piles of things on the floor all around me, all paper, and it rustled a little, because I had the door to the living room half open and there was a little draft, I guess. Uncle was working too, in the living room. I was getting along fine, I'd been at it for hours, didn't even know what time it was. And then suddenly it got me. I don't know why. Maybe the room was stuffy, or maybe it was the silence. I couldn't hear a thing, not a sound in the living room, and there was that paper rustling, so softly, like somebody being choked to death. And then I looked around and... and I couldn't see Uncle in the living room, but I saw his shadow on the wall, a huge shadow, all hunched, and it didn't move, only it was so huge!"