Part 20

"No, no, Max, I swear to God I won't! Just quiet and no rough stuff. For my sake come home to supper to-night, dearie! I swear. It's my thigh, and I got a fever, dearie, that's eating me. What? Eight! No, that ain't too late. Any time you can come ain't too late. I'll wait. Sure? Good-by, dearie. At eight sharp. Good-by, dearie."

When she replaced the receiver on its hook, points of light had come out in her eyes like water-lilies opening on a lake. The ashen sheaf of anxiety folded back from her, color ran up into her face, and she flung open the door, calling down the length of hallway.

"Loo! Oh, Loo!"

"Huh?"

"Put a couple of bottles of everything on ice before you go, dearie; order a double porterhouse; open a can of them imported sausages he sent up last month, and peel some sweet-potatoes. Hurry, Loo, I wanna candy 'em myself. Hurry, dearie!"

She snatched up her furry trifle of a dog, burying her warming face in his fleece.

"M-m-muvver loves her bow-bow. Muvver loves whole world. Muvver just loves whole world. M-m-m-m, chocolate? Just one ittsie bittsie piece and muvver eat half--m-m-m! La-la! Bow-wow! La! La!"

Along that end of Riverside Drive which is so far up that rents begin to come down, night takes on the aspect of an American Venetian carnival. Steamboats outlined in electric lights pass like phosphorescent phantoms up and down the Hudson River, which reflects with the blurry infidelity of moving waters light for light, deck for deck. Running strings of incandescent bulbs draped up into festoons every so often by equidistant arc-lights follow the course of the well-oiled driveway, which in turn follows the course of the river as truly as a path made by a canal horse. A ledge of park, narrow as a terrace, slants to the water's edge, and of summer nights lovers drag their benches into the shadow of trees and turn their backs to the lampposts and to the world.

From the far side of the river, against the night sky and like an ablutionary message let slip from heaven, a soap-factory spells out its product in terms of electric bulbs, and atop that same industrial palisade rises the dim outline of stack and kiln. Street-cars, reduced by distance to miniature, bob through the blackness. At nine o'clock of October evenings the Knickerbocker River Queen, spangled with light and full of pride, moves up-stream with her bow toward Albany. And from her window and over the waves of intervening roofs Mae Munroe cupped her hands blinker fashion about her eyes and followed its gay excursional passage, even caught a drift of music from its decks.

Motionless she stood there, bare-necked and bare-armed, against the cold window-pane, inclosed from behind with lace curtains and watching with large-pupiled eyes the steamer slip along into the night; the black-topped trees swaying in the ledge of park which slanted to the water's edge; the well-oiled driveway and its darting traffic of two low-sliding lines of motor-cars with acetylene eyes.

At five minutes past eight Max Zincas fitted his key into the door and entered immediately into the front room. On that first click of the lock Mae Munroe stepped out from between the lace curtains, her face carefully powdered and bleached of all its morning inaccuracies, her lips thrust upward and forward.

"Max!"

"Whew!"

He tossed his black derby hat to the red velvet couch and dropped down beside it, his knees far apart and straining his well-pressed trousers to capacity; placed a hand on each well-spread knee, then ran five fingers through his thinning hair; thrust his head well forward, foreshortening his face, and regarded her.

"Well, girl," he said, "here I am."

"I--I--"

"Lied to me, eh? Pretty spry for a sick one, eh? Pretty slick! I knew you was lying, girl."

"I been sick as a dog, Max. Loo can tell you."

"What's got you? Thigh?"

"God! I dun'no'! I dun'no'!"

She paused in the center of the room, her lips trembling and the light from the chandelier raining full upon her. High-hipped and full-busted as Titian loved to paint them, she stood there in a black lace gown draped loosely over a tight foundation of white silk, and trying to compose her lips and her throat, which arched and flexed, revealing the heart-beats of her and the shortness of her breath.

"Is this the way to say hello to--to your Maizie, Max? Is--is this the way?" Then she crossed and leaned to him, printing a kiss on his brow between the eyes. "I been sick as a dog, Max. Ain't you going to--to kiss me?"

"Come, come, now, just cut that, Mae. Let's have supper and get down to brass tacks. What's eating you?"

"Max!"

"Come, come, now, I'm tired, girl, and got to stop off at Lenox Avenue to-night after I leave here. Where's your clock around here, anyways, so a fellow knows where he's at?"

"There it is under the pillow next to you, Max. I smothered it because it gets on my nerves all day. Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock, right into my head like it was saying all the time: 'Oh-Mae! Oh-Mae! Oh-Mae!' till I nearly go crazy, Max. Tick-tock--God! it--it just gets me!"

He reached for the small onyx clock, placing it upright on the mantel, and shrugged his shoulders loosely.

"Gad!" he said, "you wimmin! Crazy as loons, all of you and your kind. Come, come, get down to brass tacks, girl. I'm tired and gotta get home."

"Home, Max?"

"Yes, home!"

"Max, ain't--ain't this home no more, ain't it?"

He leaned forward, an elbow on each knee and striking his left hand solidly into his right palm. "Now if that's the line of talk you got me up here for, girl, you can cut it and cut it quick!"

"No, no, Max, it ain't my line of talk. Here, sit down, dearie, in your own chair and I'll go and dish up."

"Where's Loo?"

"Her night off, poor girl. Four nights straight she's rubbed my head and--"

"Where's my--"

"Right here, dearie, is your box of pills, underneath your napkin. There, dearie! See? Just like always."

She was full of small movements that were quick as grace notes: pinning the black lace train up and about her hips; drawing out his chair; darting with the scarcely perceptible limp down the narrow hall, back with dishes that exuded aromatic steam; placing them with deft, sure fingers. Once she paused in her haste, edged up to where he stood with one arm resting on the mantelpiece, placed an arm on each of his shoulders and let her hands dangle loose-wristed down his back.

"Tired boy, to-night! Huh? Maizie's poor tired boy!"

"Now, now!"

He removed her hands, but gently, and strolled over to where the table lay spread beside the cold, gilded radiator, a potted geranium in its center, a liberal display of showy imitation pearl-handled cutlery carefully laid out, and at each place a long-stemmed wineglass, gold-edged and the color of amber.

"Come," he said, "let's eat and get it over."

She made no sign, but with the corners of her lips propped bravely upward in her too red smile made a last hurried foray into the kitchen, returning with a covered vegetable-dish held outright from her.

"Guess!" she cried.

"Can't," he said, and seated himself.

"Gowan, guess like you used to, dearie."

He fell immediately to sampling with short, quick stabs of his fork the dish of carmine-red pickled beets beside his plate.

"Aw, gowan, Max, give a guess. What did you used to pay for with six big kisses every time I candied them for you? Guess, Max."

"Sit down," he said, and with his foot shoved a small stool before her chair.

"Lordy!" she said, drawing up en tête-à-tête, unpinning and spreading her lacy train in glory about her, "but you're some little sunbeam to have around the house."

"What these beets need is a little sugar."

She passed him the bowl; elevated her left foot in its slightly soiled white slipper to the footstool; fastened her napkin to her florid bosom with one of her numerous display of breastpins; poured some opaque wine into his glass, coming back to flood her own to the brim; smiled at him across the red head of the potted geranium, as if when the heart bleeds the heart grows light.

"Here's _to_ you, Max!"

He raised his glass and drank in through his rather heavy mustache, then flecked it this way and that with his napkin "Ahh-h-h-h, that's the stuff!"

"S'more?"

"Yah-h-h-h-h-h!"

"Such a cotton mouth my bad boy brought home."

"Aha! Fee, fie, fum! Aha!"

"I broiled it under the single burner, Max, slow like you like. Here, you carve it, dearie. Just like always, eh?"

His fleshy, blue-shaved face took on the tenseness of concentrated effort, and he cut deep into the oozing beef, the red juice running out in quick streams.

"Ah-h-h-h-h!"

"No, no, you keep that, Max; it's your rare piece."

"Gravy?"

"Yes, dearie."

The small dog shook himself and rose from sleep and the depths of a pillow, nosing at her bare elbow.

"Was muvver's ittsie Snookie Ookie such a hungry bow-wow?"

He yapped shortly, pawing her.

"Ask big bossie sitting over there carving his din-din if him got chocolate tandy in him pocket like always for Snookie Ookie. No, no, bad red meat no good for ittsie bittsie bow-wow. Go ask big bossie what him got this time in him pocket for Snookie. Aw, look at him, Max; he remembers how you used to bring him--"

"Get down! Get down, I said! For God's sake get that little red-eyed, mangy cur out of here while we're eating, can't you? Good gad! can't a man eat a meal in this joint without having that dirty cur whining around? Get him down off your dress there, Mae. Get out, you little cur! G-e-t out!"

"Max!"

"Chocolate candy in my pocket. Chocolate arsenic, you mean! My damn-fool days are over."

"What's got you, Max? Didn't you buy him for me yourself that day at the races five whole years ago? Wasn't the first things you asked for, when you woke in the hospital with your burns, me and--and Snookie? What's soured you, Max? What? What?"

"I'm soured on seeing a strapping, healthy woman sniveling over a little sick-eyed cur. Ain't that enough to sour any man? Why don't you get up and out and exercise yourself like the right kind of wimmin do? Play tennis or get something in you besides the rotten air of this flat, and mewling over that sick-eyed cur. Get out! Scc-c-c-c-c!"

The animal bellied to the door, tail down, and into the rear darkness of the hallway.

"Max, what's got you? What do I know about tennis or--things like that? You--you never used to want--things like that."

"Aw, what's the use of wasting breath?"

He flecked at his mustache, inserting the napkin between the two top buttons of his slight bay of waistcoat; carved a second helping of meat, masticating with care and strength so that his temples, where the hair thinned and grayed, contracted and expanded with the movements of his jaws.

"What's the use?"

"Max, I--"

"Thigh bother you?"

"A--a little."

"Didn't I tell you not to spare expense on trying new doctors if--"

"That ain't my real trouble, Max; it--"

"Been out to-day?"

"No, Max, I been sick as a dog, I tell you."

"No wonder you're sick, cooped up in this flat with nobody but a servant-girl for company. Gad! ain't you ashamed to get so low that your own servant-girl is your running-mate? Ain't you?"

"Max, she--"

"I know. I know."

"I been so blue, Max. Loo can tell you how I been waiting and wondering. I--Lord, I been so blue, Max. She's good to me, Max, and--and I been so blue."

"Never knew one of you wimmin that wasn't that way half her time. You're a gang of sob sisters, every one of you--whining like you got your foot caught in a machine and can't get it out."

"How you mean, Max?"

"Aw, you're all either in the blues or nagging. Why ain't you sports enough to take the slice of life you get handed you? None of you ain't healthy enough, anyways, I tell you, indoors, eating and sleeping and mewling over poodle-dogs all the time. I'm damn sick of it all. Damn sick, if you want to know it."

"But, Max, what's put this new stuff into your head all of a sudden? You never used to care if--"

"And you got to quit writing me them long-winded letters, Mae, about what's come over me. Sometimes a fellow just comes to his senses, that's all."

"Max!"

"And you got to quit butting in my business hours on the telephone. I don't want to get ugly, but you got to cut it out. Cut it out, Mae, is what I said!"

He quaffed his wine.

"Max dear, if you'll only tell me what's hurting you I'll find a way to make good. I--I can learn lawn-tennis, if that's what you want. I can take off ten pounds in--"

"Aw, I don't want nothing. Nothing, I tell you!"

"If I only knew, Max, what's itching you. This way there's days when I just feel like I can't go on living if you don't tell me what's got you. I just feel like I can't go on living this way, Max."

Tears hot and ever ready flowed over her words and she fumbled for her handkerchief, sobs rumbling up through her.

"I just can't, I--I just can't!"

He pushed back from his half-completed meal, rising, but stooping to rap his fist sharply against the table.

"Now, lemme tell you this much right now, Mae, either you got to cut this sob stuff and get down to brass tacks and tell me what you want, or, by gad! I'll get out of here so quick it'll make your head swim. I ain't going to be let in for no tragedy-queen stuff, and the sooner you know it the better. Business! I'm a business man."

She swallowed her tears, even smiling, and with her hand pat against her bosom as if to suppress its heaving.

"I'm all right now, Max. I'm so full up with worry it--it just slipped out. I'm all right now, Max. Sit down. Sit down and finish, dearie."

But he fell to pacing the red carpet in angry staccato strides. His napkin dropped from his waistcoat to the floor and he kicked it out of his path.

"By gad! I didn't want to come, anyhow. I knew the sniveling I'd be let in for. Gimme a healthy woman with some outdoors in her. Gimme--"

"I ain't going to let out any more, Max; I swear to God I ain't. Sit down, dear, and finish your supper. Looka, your coffee's all cold. Lemme go out and heat it up for you. I--"

"I'm done. I'm done before I begin. Now, Mae, if you can behave yourself and hold in long enough, just say what you got me up here for, and for God's sake let's have it over!"

He planted himself before her, feet well apart, and she rose, pushing back her chair, paling.

"I--I 'ain't got much of anything to say, Max, except I--I thought maybe you'd tell me what's eating you, dearie."

"I--"

"After all these years we been together, Max, so--so happy, all of a sudden, dear, these last two months dropping off from every other night to--to twice a week and then to--to once, and this last week--not at all. I--I--heavens above, Max, I 'ain't got nothing to say except what's got you. Tell me, dearie, is it anything I've done? Is it--"

"You talk like a loon, Mae, honest you do. You 'ain't done nothing. It's just that the--the time's come, that's all. You know it had to. It always has to. If you don't know it, a woman like--like you ought to. Gad! I used to think you was the kind would break as clean as a whistle when the time came to break."

"Break, Max?"

"Yes, break. And don't gimme the baby-stare like that, neither. You know what I mean alrighty. You wasn't born yesterday, old girl!"

The blood ran from her face, blanching it. "You mean, Max--"

"Aw, you know what I mean alrighty, Mae, only you ain't sport enough to take things as they come. You knew all these years it had to come sooner or later. I 'ain't never quizzed into your old life, but if you didn't learn that, you--well you ought to. There never was a New Year came in, Mae, that I didn't tell you that, if you got the chance, for you to go out after better business. I never stood in your light or made no bones about nothing!"

"My God! Max, you--you're kidding!"

"All these years I been preaching to you, even before I joined Forest Park Club out there. 'Don't get soft, Mae. Keep down. Use the dumb-bells. Hustle around and do a little housework even if I do give you a servant. Walk in the park. Keep your looks, girl; you may need 'em,' I used to tell you."

"Oh you--You!--"

She clapped her hands over her mouth as if to stanch hysteria.

"Another let-out like that, Mae, and, by gad! I'll take my hat and--"

"No, no, Max, I--I didn't mean it. I'm all right. I--Only after all these years you wouldn't do it, Max. You wouldn't. You wouldn't throw me over and leave me cold, Max. What can I do after all these years? I--I 'ain't got a show in a chorus no more. You're kidding, Max. You're a white man, Max, and--you--you wouldn't do it, Max. You wouldn't. You--"

"Now, now, you can't say I 'ain't been as white as silk, girl, and I'm going to be just as white as I've been, too. Don't worry, girl. For six years there 'ain't been a better-stocked flat than this in town, has there?"

"No, Max."

"The best none too good, eh?"

"No, Max."

"Just the same stuff comes here that I send up to my mother's flat, eh? All the drinks and all the clothes you want and a servant in the house as good as my mother's own, eh? No kick coming, eh, girl?"

"You--you wouldn't, Max--you wouldn't ditch me. What could I do? Nothing--nothing. I--I can't hire out as a scrubwoman, I--"

"Come, come now, girl, you're pretty slick, but you--you don't quite slide. What about that thirty-five hundred you got down in your jeans--eh? Them thirty-five hundred in the Farmers' Savings Bank--eh? Eh?"

"Max!"

"Hah! Knocked you off your pins that time, didn't I? I found your bank-book one morning, kiddo--found it on the floor right next to the dresser--"

"Max, I--Out of my checks I--I saved--I--"

"Sure! Gad! I ain't kicking about it, girl. Glad for you! Glad you got it, girl, only don't try to tell me you can't take care of yourself in this world alrighty, girl. Any old time you can't! Gad! thirty-five hundred she snitches out of her allowance in six years, lives on the fat of the land, too, and then tries to bamboozle me that she's flat. Thirty-five hundred in six years. Gad! I got to hand it to you there, kiddo; I got to hand it to you!"

"You can have it back, Max. I--I was going to surprise you when I had five thousand. I--"

"Gad! I don't want your money, girl. It's yours. You're fixed for life on it. I'm even going to hand you over a couple of thou extra to show you that I'm no cheap sport. I won't have a woman breathing can say I ain't white as silk with her."

"Max, you--you're killing me! Killing me! Killing me!"

"Now, now, Mae, if I was you I wouldn't show my hand so. I don't want to hurt you, girl. It ain't like I got any but the finest feelings for you. You're all right, you are. You are."

"Then, Max, for God's sake--"

"But what are you going to do about it? What the hell is anybody going to do about it? You ain't no baby. You know what life is. And you know that the seams has got to show on one of the two sides and it ain't your fault you got turned on the under side. But you should worry, girl! You're fixed. And I'm here to tell you I'm going to hand you on top of the two thou this here little flat just as it stands, Mae. Just as it stands, piano and all. I just guess you got a kick coming!"

Her hands flew to her bosom as if the steel of his words had slipped deep into the flesh. "You don't mean what you're saying, Max."

"Sure, I do! Piano and all, girl."

"No, no, you don't. You're just kidding me, Max, like you used to when you wanted to tease me and throw a scare in me that your mother was wise about the flat. Quit your kidding, Max, and take me in your arms and sing me 'Maizie you're a Daisie' like you used to after--after we had a little row. Lemme hear you call me 'Maizie,' dear, so I'll know you're only kidding. I'm a bum sport, dearie. I--I never could stand for guying. Cut the comedy, dear."

She leaned to him with her lips twisted and dried in their frenzy to belie his words, but with little else to indicate that her heart lay ticking against her breast like a clock that makes its hour in half-time.

"Quit guying, Max, for God's sake! You--you got me feeling sick clear down inside of me. Cut it, dear. Too much is enough."

Her dress rustled with the faint swish of scything as she moved toward him, and he withdrew, taking hold of the back of his chair.

"Now, now, Mae; come, come! You're a sensible woman. I ain't stuck on this business any more than you are. You ought to have let me stay away and just let it die out instead of raking up things like this. Come, buck up, old girl! Don't make it any harder than it's got to be. These things happen every day. This is business. There, there! Now! Now!"

The sudden bout of tenderness brought the tears stinging to her eyes and she was for ingratiating herself into his embrace, but he withdrew, edging toward the piano with an entire flattening of tone.

"Now, now, Mae, I tell you that you got to cut it. It would have been better if you had just let the old cat die, You oughtn't to tried that gag to get me here to-night. You'll get a lot more out of me if you do it dry, girl. A crying woman can drive me out of the house quicker 'n plague, and you ought to know it by now."

She sat down suddenly, feeling queasy.

"Now, now, old girl, buck up! Be a sport!"

"Gimme a drink, Max. I--Just a swallow. I--I'm all right." And she squeezed her eyes tight shut to blink out the tears.

He handed her a tumbler from the table, keeping his head averted, and after a bit she fell to sobbing and choking and trembling.

"It's her! It's your old woman. She's been chloroforming you with a lot of dope talk about hitting the altar rail with a bunch of white satin with a good fat wad sewed in the lining. It's your old--"

"Cut that!"

"It's your old woman. She--she don't know you like I do, Max. She--"