Complete Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald (Illustrated) (400 page)

And he couldn’t look at her, because when he did his face seemed to him to be working idiotically — like someone else’s face. He got in, they drove off and he made a mighty effort to compose himself; but as her hand left the steering wheel to fall lightly on his, a perverse instinct made him jerk his hand away. Noel perceived the embarrassment and was puzzled and — sorry.

They went to the tennis tournament at the Culpepper Club. He was so little aware of anything except Noel that later he told Cousin Cora they hadn’t seen the tennis, and believed it himself.

Afterwards they loitered about the grounds, stopped by innumerable people who welcomed Noel home. Two men made him uneasy — one a small handsome youth of his own age with shining brown eyes that were bright as the glass eyes of a stuffed owl; the other a tall, languid dandy of twenty-five who was introduced to her, Juan rightly deduced, at his own request.

When they were in a group of girls he was more comfortable. He was able to talk, because being with Noel gave him confidence before these others, and his confidence before the others made him more confident with Noel. The situation improved.

There was one girl, a sharp, pretty blonde named Holly Morgan, with . whom he had spent some facetiously sentimental hours the day before, and in order to show Noel that he had been able to take care of himself before her return he made a point of talking aside to Holly Morgan. Holly was not responsive. Juan was Noel’s property, and though Holly liked him, she did not like him nearly well enough to annoy Noel.

“What time do you want me for dinner, Noel?” she asked.

“Eight o’clock,” said Noel. “Billy Harper’ll call for you.”

Juan felt a twinge of disappointment. He had thought that he and Noel were to be alone for dinner; that afterwards they would have a long talk on the dark veranda and he would kiss her lips as he had upon that never-to-be-forgotten Montana night, and give her his DKE pin to wear. Perhaps the others would leave early — he had told Holly Morgan of his love for Noel; she should have sense enough to know.

At twilight Noel dropped him at Miss Chandler’s gate, lingered for a moment with the engine cut off. The promise of the evening — the first lights in the houses along the bay, the sound of a remote piano, the little coolness in the wind — swung them both up suddenly into that paradise which Juan, drunk with ecstasy and terror, had been unable to evoke.

“Are you glad to see me?” she whispered.

“Am I glad?” The words trembled on his tongue. Miserably he struggled to bend his emotion into a phrase, a look, a gesture, but his mind chilled at the thought that nothing, nothing, nothing could express what he felt in his heart.

“You embarrass me,” he said wretchedly. “I don’t know what to say.” Noel waited, attuned to what she expected, sympathetic, but too young quite to see that behind the mask of egotism, of moody childishness, which the intensity of Juan’s devotion compelled him to wear, there was a tremendous emotion.

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Noel said. She was listening to the music now a tune they had danced to in the Adirondacks. The wings of a trance folded about her and the inscrutable someone who waited always in the middle distance loomed down over her with passionate words and dark romantic eyes. Almost mechanically, she started the engine and slipped the gear into first.

“At eight o’clock,” she said, almost abstractedly. “Good-bye, Juan.” The car moved off down the road. At the corner she turned and waved her hand and Juan waved back, happier than he had ever been in his life, his soul dissolved to a sweet gas that buoyed up his body like a balloon. Then the roadster was out of sight and, all unaware, he had lost her.

II

Cousin Cora’s chauffeur took him to Noel’s door. The other male guest, Billy Harper, was, he discovered, the young man with the bright brown eyes whom he had met that afternoon. Juan was afraid of him; he was on such familiar, facetious terms with the two girls — towards Noel his attitude seemed almost irreverent — that Juan was slighted during the conversation at dinner. They talked of the Adirondacks and they all seemed to know the group who had been there. Noel and Holly spoke of boys at Cambridge and New Haven and of how wonderful it was that they were going to school in New York this whiter. Juan meant to invite Noel to the autumn dance at his college, but he thought that he had better wait and do it in a letter, later on. He was glad when dinner was over.

The girls went upstairs. Juan and Billy Harper smoked.

“She certainly is attractive,” broke out Juan suddenly, his repression bursting into words.

“Who? Noel?”

“Yes.”

“She’s a nice girl,” agreed Harper gravely.

Juan fingered the DKE pin in his pocket.

“She’s wonderful,” he said. “I like Holly Morgan pretty well — I was handing her a sort of line yesterday afternoon — but Noel’s really the most attractive girl I ever knew.”

Harper looked at him curiously, but Juan, released from the enforced and artificial smile of dinner, continued enthusiastically: “Of course it’s silly to fool with two girls. I mean, you’ve got to be careful not to get in too deep.”

Billy Harper didn’t answer. Noel and Holly came downstairs. Holly suggested bridge, but Juan didn’t play bridge, so they sat talking by the fire. In some fashion Noel and Billy Harper became involved in a conversation about dates and friends, and Juan began boasting to Holly Morgan, who sat beside him on the sofa.

“You must come to a prom at college,” he said suddenly. “Why don’t you? It’s a small college, but we have the best bunch in our house and the proms are fun.”

“I’d love it.”

“You’d only have to meet the people in our house.”

“What’s that?”

“DKE.” He drew the pin from his pocket. “See?”

Holly examined it, laughed and handed it back.

“I wanted to go to Yale,” he went on, “but my family always go to the same place.”

“I love Yale,” said Holly.

“Yes,” he agreed vaguely, half hearing her, his mind moving between himself and Noel. “You must come up. I’ll write you about it.”

Time passed. Holly played the piano. Noel took a ukulele from the top of the piano, strummed it and hummed. Billy Harper turned the pages of the music. Juan listened, restless, unamused. Then they sauntered out into the dark garden, and finding himself beside Noel at last, Juan walked her quickly ahead until they were alone.

“Noel,” he whispered, “here’s my Deke pin. I want you to have it.”

She looked at him expressionlessly.

“I saw you offering it to Holly Morgan,” she said.

“Noel,” he cried in alarm, “I wasn’t offering it to her. I just showed it to her. Why, Noel, do you think —  — “

“You invited her to the prom.”

“I didn’t. I was just being nice to her.”

The others were close behind. She took the Deke pin quickly and put her finger to his lips in a facile gesture of caress.

He did not realize that she had not been really angry about the pin or the prom, and that his unfortunate egotism was forfeiting her interest.

At eleven o’clock Holly said she must go, and Billy Harper drove his car to the front door.

“I’m going to stay a few minutes if you don’t mind,” said Juan, standing in the door with Noel. “I can walk home.”

Holly and Billy Harper drove away. Noel and Juan strolled back into the drawing-room, where she avoided the couch and sat down in a chair.

“Let’s go out on the veranda,” suggested Juan uncertainly.

“Why?”

“Please, Noel.”

Unwillingly she obeyed. They sat side by side on a canvas settee and he put his arm around her.

“Kiss me,” he whispered. She had never seemed so desirable to him before.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to. I don’t kiss people any more.”

“But — me?” he demanded incredulously.

“I’ve kissed too many people. I’ll have nothing left if I keep on kissing people.”

“But you’ll kiss me, Noel?”

“Why?”

He could not even say, “Because I love you.” But he could say it, he knew that he could say it, when she was in his arms.

“If I kiss you once, will you go home?”

“Why, do you want me to go home?”

“I’m tired. I was travelling last night and I can never sleep on a train. Can you? I can never —  — “

Her tendency to leave the subject willingly made him frantic.

“Then kiss me once,” he insisted.

“You promise?”

“You kiss me first.”

“No, Juan, you promise first.”

“Don’t you want to kiss me?”

“Oh-h-h!” she groaned.

With gathering anxiety Juan promised and took her in his arms. For one moment at the touch of her lips, the feeling of her, of Noel, close to him, he forgot the evening, forgot himself — rather became the inspired, romantic self that she had known. But it was too late. Her hands were on his shoulders, pushing him away.

“You promised.”

“Noel —  — “

She got up. Confused and unsatisfied, he followed her to the door.

“Noel —  — “

“Good night, Juan.”

As they stood on the doorstep her eyes rose over the line of dark trees towards the ripe harvest moon. Some glowing thing would happen to her soon, she thought, her mind far away. Something that would dominate her, snatch her up out of life, helpless, ecstatic, exalted.

“Good night, Noel. Noel, please —  — “

“Good night, Juan. Remember we’re going swimming tomorrow. It’s wonderful to see you again. Good night.”

She dosed the door.

III

Towards morning he awoke from a broken sleep, wondering if she had not kissed him because of the three spots on his cheek. He turned on the light and looked at them. Two were almost invisible. He went into the bathroom, doused all three with the black ointment and crept back into bed.

Cousin Cora greeted him stiffly at breakfast next morning.

“You kept your great-uncle awake last night,” she said. “He heard you moving around in your room.”

“I only moved twice,” he said unhappily. “I’m terribly sorry.”

“He has to have his sleep, you know. We all have to be more considerate when there’s someone sick. Young people don’t always think of that. And he was so unusually well when you came.”

It was Sunday, and they were to go swimming at Holly Morgan’s house, where a crowd always collected on the bright easy beach. Noel called for him, but they arrived before any of his half-humble remarks about the night before had managed to attract her attention. He spoke to those he knew and was introduced to others, made ill at ease again by their cheerful familiarity with one another, by the correct informality of their clothes. He

was sure they noticed that he had worn only one suit during his visit to Culpepper Bay, varying it with white flannel trousers. Both pairs of trousers were out of press now, and after keeping his great-uncle awake he had not felt like bothering Cousin Cora about it at breakfast.

Again he tried to talk to Holly, with the vague idea of making Noel jealous, but Holly was busy and she eluded him. It was ten minutes before he extricated himself from a conversation with the obnoxious Miss Holyoke. At the moment he managed this he perceived to his horror that Noel was gone.

When he last saw her she had been engaged in a light but somehow intent conversation with the tall well-dressed stranger she had met yesterday. Now she wasn’t in sight. Miserable and horribly alone, he strolled up and down the beach, trying to look as if he were having a good time, seeming to watch the bathers, but keeping a sharp eye out for Noel. He felt that his self-conscious perambulations were attracting unbearable attention and sat down unhappily on a sand dune beside Billy Harper. But Billy Harper was neither cordial nor communicative, and after a minute hailed a man across the beach and went to talk to him.

Juan was desperate. When, suddenly, he spied Noel coming down from the house with the tall man, he stood up with a jerk, convinced that his features were working wildly.

She waved at him.

“A buckle came off my shoe,” she called. “I went to have it put on. I thought you’d gone in swimming.”

He stood perfectly still, not trusting his voice to answer. He understood that she was through with him; there was someone else. Immediately he wanted above all things to be away. As they came nearer, the tall man glanced at him negligently and resumed his vivacious, intimate conversation with Noel. A group suddenly closed around them.

Keeping the group in the corner of his eye, Juan began to move carefully and steadily towards the gate that led to the road. He started when the casual voice of a man behind him said, “Going?” and he answered, “Got to” with what purported to be a reluctant nod. Once behind the shelter of the parked cars, he began to run, slowed down as several chauffeurs looked at him curiously. It was a mile and a half to the Chandler house and the day was broiling, but he walked fast lest Noel, leaving the party — “With that man,” he thought bitterly — should overtake him trudging along the road. That would be more than he could bear.

There was the sound of a car behind him. Immediately Juan left the road and sought concealment behind a convenient hedge. It was no one from the party, but thereafter he kept an eye out for available cover, walking fast, or even running, over unpromising open spaces.

He was within sight of his cousin’s house when it happened. Hot and dishevelled, he had scarcely flattened himself against the back of a tree when Noel’s roadster, with the tall man at the wheel, flashed by down the road. Juan stepped out and looked after them. Then, blind with sweat and misery, he continued on towards home.

IV

At luncheon, Cousin Cora looked at him closely.

“What’s the trouble?” she inquired. “Did something go wrong at the beach this morning?”

“Why, no,” he exclaimed in simulated astonishment. “What made you think that?”

“You have such a funny look. I thought perhaps you’d had some trouble with the little Garneau girl.”

He hated her.

“No, not at all.”

“You don’t want to get any idea in your head about her,” said Cousin Cora.