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Clark's Field, a novel by Robert Herrick |
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Chapter 15 |
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_ CHAPTER XV Adelle Clark was thoroughly infected with the corruption of property by this time, and the coming years merely confirmed the ideas and the habits that had been started. She was now seventeen and an "old girl" at the Hall, privileged to torture less sophisticated girls when they presented themselves, if she had felt the desire to do so. She had not forgotten her Church Street existence: it had been much too definite to be easily forgotten. But she had been removed from it long enough to realize herself thoroughly in her new life and to know that it was not a dream. She would always remember Church Street, her aunt and uncle, and the laborious years of poverty with which it was identified; but gradually that part of her life was becoming the dream, while Herndon Hall and the Aladdin lamp of her fortune were the reality. By means of the latter she had won her position among her mates, and naturally she respected more and more the source of her power. Eveline Glynn "took her up" this year, and quite replaced the gentler Diane Merelda in her affections. There was if anything less study this year than before. The older girls scouted the idea of studying anything. Most of them expected to leave school forever the next spring and under the auspices of their mothers to enter the marriage game. A few intended as a preliminary to travel in Europe, "studying art or music," But the minds of all were much more occupied with love than anything else. Although the sex interest was still entirely dormant in Adelle, she learned a great deal about it from her schoolmates. Those good people who believe in a censorship of literature for the sake of protecting the innocent American girl should become enrolled at Herndon Hall. There they might be occasionally horrified, but they would come out wiser mortals. Adelle knew all about incredible scandals. Divorce, with the reasons for it,--especially the statutory one,--was freely discussed, and a certain base, pandering sheet of fashionable gossip was taken in at the Hall and eagerly devoured each week by the girls, who tried to guess at the thinly disguised persons therein pilloried. Thus Adelle became fully acquainted with the facts of sex in their abnormal as well as more normal aspects. That she got no special personal harm from this irregular education and from the example of "the two Pols" was due solely to her own unawakened temperament. Life had no gloss for her, and it had no poetic appeal. She supposed, when she considered the matter at all, that sometime as a woman she would be submitted to the coil of passion and sex, like all the others about whom her friends talked incessantly. They seemed to regard every man as a possible source of excitement to a woman. But she resolved for her part to put off the interference of this fateful influence as long as possible. Sometime, of course, she must marry and have a child,--that was part of the fate of a girl with money of her own,--and then she should hope to marry a nice man who would not scold or ill-treat her or prefer some other woman--that was all. "Dell is just a lump of ice!" Irene Paul often said, putting her own plump arms about Adelle's thin little body; and while Adelle tried to wriggle out of the embrace she teased her by assuming the man's aggressive role. * * * * * Thus the last months of her formal education slipped by. Adelle went through the easy routine of the Hall like the other girls, riding horseback a good deal during pleasant weather, taking a lively interest in dancing, upon which great stress was laid by Miss Thompson as an accomplishment and healthy exercise. She took a mild share in the escapades of her more lively friends, but for the most part her life was dull, though she did not feel it. The life of the rich, instead of being varied and full of deep experience, is actually in most cases exceedingly monotonous and narrowing. The common belief that wealth is an open sesame to a life of universal human experience is a stupid delusion, frequently used as a gloss to their souls by well-intentioned people. Apart from the strict class limitations imposed by the possession of large property, the object of protected and luxurious people is generally merely pleasure. And pleasure is one of the narrowest fields of human experience conceivable, becoming quickly monotonous, which accounts for many extravagancies and abnormalities among the rich. Moreover, the sensual life of the well-fed and idle deadens imagination to such a degree that even their pleasures are imitative, not original: they do what their kind have found to be pleasurable without the incentive of initiative. If Adelle Clark had not been attached to Clark's Field and had been forced to remain in the Church Street rooming-house, by this time she would have been at work as a clerk or in some other business: in any case she must have touched realities closely and thus been immeasurably ahead of all the Herndon Hall girls. Probably this doctrine would shock not only the managers of Herndon Hall, but also the officers of the trust company, who felt that they were giving their ward the best preparation for "a full life," such as the possession of a large property entitles mortals to expect. And though it may seem that the Washington Trust Company had been somewhat perfunctory in its care of its young ward, merely accepting the routine ideas of the day in regard to her education and preparation for life, they did nothing more nor worse in this than the majority of well-to-do parents who may be supposed to have every incentive of love and family pride in dealing with their young. The trust company in fact was merely an impersonal and legal means of fulfilling the ideals of the average member of our society. Indeed, the trust company, in the person of its president and also of Mr. Ashly Crane, were just now giving some of their valuable time to consideration of the personal fate of their ward. She had been the subject of at least one conference between these officers. She was now on her way towards eighteen, and that was the age, as President West well knew, when properly conditioned young women usually left school, unless they were "queer" enough to seek college, and entered "society" for the unavowed but perfectly understood object of getting husbands for themselves. The trust company was puzzled as to how best to provide this necessary function for its ward. They felt that there existed no suitable machinery for taking this next step. They could order her clothes, or rather hire some one to buy them for her, order her a suitable "education" and pay for it, but they could not "introduce her to society" nor provide her with a good husband. And that was the situation which now confronted them. They had received excellent reports of their ward latterly from Herndon Hall. Although Miss Thompson admitted that Miss Clark was not "intellectually brilliant," she had a "good mind," whatever that might mean, and had developed wonderfully at the Hall in bearing, deportment, manner--in all the essential matters of woman's education. Miss Thompson meant that Adelle spoke fairly correct English, drawled her A's, wore her clothes as if she owned them, had sufficiently good table-manners to dine in public, and could hold her own in the conversation of girls of her kind. Miss Thompson recommended warmly that Adelle join Miss Stevens's "Travel Class," which was going abroad in June to tour the Continent and study the masterpieces of art upon the spot. The suggestion came as a relief to the trust company's officers: it put over their problem with Adelle for another year. But before accepting Miss Thompson's advice, Mr. Ashly Crane thought it wise to make another visit to Herndon Hall and talk the matter over with Adelle herself. He believed always in the "personal touch" method. And so once more he broke a journey westwards at Albany and rolled up the long drive in a motor-car. * * * * * Adelle enjoyed the impression which she was able to make upon the young banker this time. She had seen his approach in the car on her return from her ride, and had kept him waiting half an hour while she took a bath and dressed herself with elaborate care as she had often seen other girls do. Her teeth had at last been released from their harness and were nice little regular teeth. Her dull brown hair, thanks to constant skillful attention, had lately come to a healthy gloss. Her complexion was clear though pale, and her dress was a dream of revealing simplicity. Mr. Ashly Crane took in all these details at a glance, and felt a glow of satisfaction beyond the purely male sense of appreciation: the trust company which he represented had done its duty by the little orphan, and what is more had got what it paid for. Their ward, as she stood before him with a faint smile on her thin lips, was a creditable creation of modern art. A thoroughly unpromising specimen of female clay had been moulded into something agreeable and almost pretty, with a faint, anemonelike bloom and fragrance. Mr. Ashly Crane, who was rather given to generalization about the might and majesty of American achievements, felt that the girl was a triumphant example of modern power,--"what we do when we try to do something,"--like converting the waste land of Clark's Field into a city of brick and mortar, or making a hydrangea out of a field shrub. "Well, Miss Clark," he began as the two seated themselves where they had sat the year before, "I needn't ask you how you are--your looks answer the question." It was a banal remark, but Adelle recognized it for a compliment and smiled prettily. She said nothing. Silence was still the principal method of her social tactics. "You are getting to be a young woman fast," the banker continued quite bluntly. Adelle looked down and possibly blushed. "Mr. West and I have been considering what to do"--he caught himself and tried again;--"that is we have been in consultation with Miss Thompson about--your future." Here Adelle looked the trust officer fully in the eye. On this point she seemed really interested this time. So Mr. Crane proceeded more easily to question her about the plan of joining Miss Stevens's "Travel Class." Adelle listened blankly while Mr. Crane wandered off into generalities about the advantages of travel and the study of "art" under the guidance of a mature woman. Suddenly she said quite positively,-- "I don't want to go with the 'Travel Class.'" This was the first positive expression of any sort that the trust officer had ever heard from the ward. It was one of the very few that Adelle Clark had ever made in the eighteen years of her existence. Under Mr. Crane's inquiries it soon developed that Adelle did not like "Rosy" Stevens,--as nearly hated her as she was capable of hating any one,--nor had she any great fondness for the girls who were to compose this year's "Travel Class." They belonged to the snobbiest element in the school.... What, then, did she wish to do with herself--remain another year at Herndon Hall? Here again the ward amazed Mr. Crane, for she had ready a definite plan of her own--a small plan to be sure and imitative, but a plan. She wished to go with her new friend Eveline Glynn and the California sisters to Paris. Eveline's parents, it seemed, were spending the next season in Europe, and after the manner of their kind they did not propose to be encumbered with a young daughter. So they had arranged to send her to Miss Catherine Comstock at Neuilly, and "the two Pols" had decided to do the same thing. It was not a school,--oh, no, not even a "finishing school,"--but the home of an accomplished and brilliant American woman, who had long lived abroad and who undertook to chaperone in the French capital a very few desirable girls. The banker could not see how Miss Comstock's establishment in Neuilly differed essentially from the "Travel Class," except that it was more permanent, which shows how socially blunt Mr. Crane was. But after an interview with Miss Thompson he satisfied himself that the Glynns were "our very best people"; anything they thought right for their daughter must be fit for the Washington Trust Company's ward. So her guardian's assent to the plan was easily obtained, and the four friends rejoiced in their coming freedom.... Adelle had no clear idea why she preferred Neuilly to the "Travel Class," except to be with Eveline Glynn and the two Paul girls. Paris and Rome were hazily mixed geographically in her ill-furnished mind, and culturally both were blank. Eveline had known girls who had stayed with Miss Comstock and they had given glowing accounts of their experiences. The Neuilly establishment, it appeared, was a place of perfect freedom, where the girls were chaperoned sufficiently to keep them out of serious mischief, but otherwise were allowed to please themselves in their own way. And there was Paris, which, according to Eveline, who had informed herself from many sources, was the best place in the world for a good time. Friends were always coming there, to buy clothes and to make excursions. Adelle could have her own car, in which the four would take motor trips, and there was the opera, etc. And lastly Society--real Society;--for it seemed that this was one of Miss Comstock's strong points. She knew people, and had actually put a number of her girls in the way of marrying titled foreigners. The California girls knew of a compatriot who had thus acquired a Polish title. In short, there was nothing of the boarding-school in Miss Comstock's establishment, except the fees, which were enormous--five thousand dollars to start with. * * * * * Thus Adelle left Herndon Hall in the beautiful month of June, having received her last communion in the little ivy-covered stone chapel from the hands of the bishop himself, smiled upon by Miss Thompson and the other teachers, who had three years before pronounced her "a perfect little fright," and kissed by a few of her schoolmates. She felt that she was coming into her own, thanks to her magic lamp--that life ahead looked promising. Yet she had changed as little fundamentally during these three years as a human being well could. She had passed from the narrowest poverty of the Alton side street to the prodigal ease of Herndon Hall, from the environment of an inferior "rooming-house" to companionship with the rich daughters of "our very best people,"--from an unformed child to the full physical estate of womanhood,--all within three short years; but she had accommodated herself to these great transitions with as little inward change as possible. Her soul was the soul of the Clarks, tricked out with good clothes and the manners and habits of the rich. Addie, it seemed, had at last arrived at her paradise in the person of her daughter, but it was a pale and inexpressive Addie, who made no large drafts upon paradise. Adelle departed in the Glynn motor for the Glynn country-place, where she was to stay until the Glynns sailed for Europe. She was prettily dressed in ecru-colored embroidered linen, with a broad straw hat and suede gloves and boots, according to the style of the day, and she was really happy and almost aware of it. Eveline was glum because her mother--a stern-looking matron who knew exactly what she wanted out of life and how to get it--had refused peremptorily to let her invite Bobby Trenow to accompany them. Bobby was Eveline's darling of the hour, as Adelle knew: Eveline had let him kiss her for the first time the previous evening, and she was "perfectly crazy" about him. To Adelle, Bobby was merely a smooth, downy boy like all the rest, who showed bare brown arms and white flannels in summer, and had as little to say for himself as she had. She was amused at Nelly's fussed state over the loss of Bobby; she could not understand Mother Glynn's objection to the harmless Bobby's occupying the vacant seat in the roomy car;--but then she did not understand many things in the intricate social world in which she found herself. She did not know that there is no one of their possessions that the rich learn more quickly to guard than their women. The aristocrats of all ages have jealously housed and protected their women from entangling sexual relations, while permitting the greatest license to their predatory males. The reasons are obvious enough to the mature intelligence, but difficult for the young to comprehend. Adelle had not yet felt the need of a Bobby Trenow. _ |
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