CHAPTER XI
During his first year of wedded bliss, Gatewood cut the club. When Kernswanted to see him he had to call like other people or, like otherpeople, accept young Mrs. Gatewood's invitations.
"Why," said Gatewood scornfully, "should I, thirty-four years of age andsafely married, go to a club? Why should I, at my age, idle with a lotof idlers and listen to stuffy stories from stuffier individuals? Do youthink that stale tobacco smoke, and the idiotically reiterated click ofbilliard balls, and the vacant stare of the fashionably brainless, andthe meaningless exchange of banalities with the intellectually aimlesshave any attractions for me?"
Mrs. Gatewood raised her pretty eyes in silence; Kerns returned heramused gaze rather blankly.
"Clubs!" sniffed Gatewood. "What are clubs but pretexts for wastingtime? What mental, what spiritual stimulus can a man expect to find in aclub? Why, Kerns, when I look back a year and think what I was, and whenI look at you and think what you still are--"
"John," said Mrs. Gatewood softly.
"Oh, he knows it!" insisted her husband, "don't you, Tommy? You know thesort of life you're leading, don't you? You know what a miserable,aimless, selfish, unambitious, pitiable existence an unmarried man leadswho lives at his club; don't you?"
"Certainly," said Kerns, blinking into the smiling gaze of Mrs.Gatewood.
"Then why don't you marry?"
But Kerns had risen and was making his adieus with cheerful decision;and Mrs. Gatewood was laughing as she gave him her slender hand.
"Now I know a girl--" began Gatewood; but his wife was still speaking toKerns, so he circled around them, politely suppressing the excitement ofa sudden idea struggling for utterance.
Mrs. Gatewood was saying: "I do wish John would go to his clubsoccasionally. Because a man is married is no reason for his losing touchwith his clubs--"
"I know a girl," broke in Gatewood excitedly, laying his arm on Kerns'sto detain him; but Kerns slid sideways through the door with a smile sononcommittal that Mrs. Gatewood laughed again and, linking her arm inher husband's, faced partly toward him. This maneuver, and theslightest pressure of her shoulder, obliged her husband to begin aturning movement, so that Kerns might reasonably make his escape in themiddle of Gatewood's sentence; which he did with nimble and circumspectagility.
"I--I know a--" began Gatewood desperately, twisting his head over hisshoulder, only to hear the deadened patter of his friend's feet over thevelvet stair carpet and the subdued clang of the front door.
"Isn't it extraordinary?" he said to his wife. "I've been trying to tellTommy, every time he comes here, about a girl I know--just the very girlhe ought to marry; and something prevents him from listening everytime."
The attractive young matron beside him turned her face so that her eyeswere directly in line with his.
"Did you ever know any people named Manners?" she asked.
"No. Why?"
"You never knew a girl named Marjorie Manners, did you, John?"
"No. What about her?"
"You never heard Mr. Kerns speak of her, did you, dear?"
"No, never. Tommy doesn't talk about girls."
"You never heard him speak of a Mrs. Stanley?"
"Never. Who are these two women?"
"One and the same, dear. Marjorie Manners married an Englishman namedStanley six years ago. Do you happen to recollect that Mr. Kerns tookhis vacation in England six years ago?"
"Yes. What of it?"
"He crossed to Southampton with Marjorie and her mother. He didn't knowshe was going over to be married, and she didn't tell him. She wrote tome about it, though. I was in school at Farmington; she left school tomarry--a mere child of eighteen, undeveloped for her age, thin, almostscrawny, with pipe-stem arms and neck, red hair, a very sweet,full-lipped mouth, and gray eyes that were too big for her face."
"Well," said Gatewood with a short laugh, "what about it? You don'tthink Kerns fell in love with an insect of that genus, do you?"
"Yes, I do," smiled Mrs. Gatewood.
"Nonsense. Besides, what of it? She's married, you say."
"Her husband died of enteric at Ladysmith. She wrote me. She has neverremarried. Think of it, John--in all these years she has neverremarried!"
"Oh!" said Gatewood pityingly; "do you really suppose that Tommy Kernshas been nursing a blighted affection all these years without evergiving _me_ an inkling? Besides, men don't do that; men don't curl upand blight. Besides, men don't take any stock in big-eyed, flat-chested,red-headed pipe stems. Why do you think that Kerns ever cared for her?"
"I know he did."
"How do you know it?"
"From Marjorie's letters."
"The conceited kid! Well, of all insufferable nerve! A man like Kerns--aman--one of the finest, noblest characters--spiritually, intellectually,physically--a practically faultless specimen of manhood! And ared-headed, spindle-legged--Oh, my! Oh, fizz! Dearest, men don't worshipa cage of bones with an eighteen-year-old soul in it--like a nervouscanary pecking out at the world!"
"She created a furor in England," observed his wife, smiling.
"Oh, I dare say she might over there. Besides, she's doubtless fattenedup since then. But if you suppose for one moment that Tommy could evenremember a girl like that--"
Mrs. Gatewood smiled again--the wise, sweet smile of a young matron inwhom her husband's closest friend had confided. And after a moment ortwo the wise smile became more thoughtful and less assured; for thatvery day the Tracer of Lost Persons had called on her to inquire about aMrs. Stanley--a new client of his who had recently bought a town housein East Eighty-third Street and a country house on Long Island; and whohad applied to him to find her fugitive butler and a pint or two offamily jewels. And, after her talk with the Tracer of Lost Persons, Mrs.Gatewood knew that her favorite among all her husband's friends, Mr.Kerns, would never of his own volition go near that same MarjorieManners who had flirted with him to the very perilous verge before shetold him why she was going to England--and who, now a widow, hadreturned with her five-year-old daughter to dwell once more in the cityof her ancestors.
Kerns had said very simply: "She has spoiled women for me--all exceptyou, Mrs. Gatewood. And if Jack hadn't married you--"
"I understand, Mr. Kerns. I'm awfully sorry."
"Don't feel sorry; only, if you can, call Jack off. He's been perfectlypossessed to marry me to somebody ever since he married you. And if Itold him why I don't care to consider the matter he wouldn't believeme--he'd spend his life in trying to bring me around. Besides, Icouldn't ever tell him about--Marjorie Manners. Anyhow, nothing on earthcould ever induce me to look at her again. . . . You say she is now awidow?"
"Yes, Mr. Kerns, and very beautiful."
"Never again," muttered Kerns. "Never! She was homely enough when Iasked her to marry me. I don't want to see her; I don't want to knowwhat she looks like. I'm glad she has changed so I wouldn't recognizeher, for that means the end of it all--the final elimination of the girlI remember on the ship. . . . It was probably a sort of diseasedinfatuation, wasn't it, Mrs. Gatewood? Think of it! A few days onshipboard and--and I asked her to marry me! . . . I don't blame her,after all, for letting me dangle. It was an excellent opportunity forher to study a rare species of idiot. She was justified and I amsatisfied. Only, do call Jack off with a hint or two."
"I shall try," said young Mrs. Gatewood thoughtfully--very thoughtfully,for already every atom and fiber of her femininity was aroused in behalfof these two estranged young people whom Providence certainly had notmeant to put asunder.