Jennie Gerhardt - Драйзер Теодор. Страница 72

good heavens!"

"And what can I do with it? Travel, talk, shoo away silly fortune- hunters.

Oh, dear, sometimes I get so tired!"

Letty looked at Lester. In spite of Jennie, the old feeling came back. Why should she have been cheated of him? They were as comfortable together

as old married people, or young lovers. Jennie had had no better claim.

She looked at him, and her eyes fairly spoke. He smiled a little sadly.

"Here comes my wife," he said. "We'll have to brace up and talk of other things. You'll find her interesting—really."

"Yes, I know," she replied, and turned on Jennie a radiant smile.

Jennie felt a faint sense of misgiving. She thought vaguely that this might be one of Lester's old flames. This was the kind of woman he should have

chosen—not her. She was suited to his station in life, and he would have

been as happy—perhaps happier. Was he beginning to realise it? Then she

put away the uncomfortable thought; pretty soon she would be getting

jealous, and that would be contemptible.

Mrs. Gerald continued to be most agreeable in her attitude toward the

Kanes. She invited them the next day to join her on a drive through

Rotten Row. There was a dinner later at Claridge's, and then she was

compelled to keep some engagement which was taking her to Paris. She

bade them both an affectionate farewell, and hoped that they would soon

meet again. She was envious, in a sad way, of Jennie's good fortune.

Lester had lost none of his charm for her. If anything, he seemed nicer,

more considerate, more wholesome. She wished sincerely that he were

free. And Lester—subconsciously perhaps—was thinking the same thing.

No doubt because of the fact that she was thinking of it, he had been led over mentally all of the things which might have happened if he had

married her. They were so congenial now, philosophically, artistically,

practically. There was a natural flow of conversation between them all the time, like two old comrades among men. She knew everybody in his

social sphere, which was equally hers, but Jennie did not. They could talk of certain subtle characteristics of life in a way which was not possible between him and Jennie, for the latter did not have the vocabulary. Her

ideas did not flow as fast as those of Mrs. Gerald. Jennie had actually the deeper, more comprehensive, sympathetic, and emotional note in her

nature, but she could not show it in light conversation. Actually she was living the thing she was, and that was perhaps the thing which drew

Lester to her. Just now, and often in situations of this kind, she seemed at a disadvantage, and she was. It seemed to Lester for the time being as if Mrs. Gerald would perhaps have been a better choice after all—certainly

as good, and he would not now have this distressing thought as to his

future.

They did not see Mrs. Gerald again until they reached Cairo. In the

gardens about the hotel they suddenly encountered her, or rather Lester

did, for he was alone at the time, strolling and smoking.

"Well, this is good luck," he exclaimed. "Where do you come from?"

"Madrid, if you please. I didn't know I was coming until last Thursday.

The Ellicotts are here. I came over with them. You know I wondered

where you might be. Then I remembered that you said you were going to

Egypt. Where is your wife?"

"In her bath, I fancy, at this moment. This warm weather makes Jennie take to water. I was thinking of a plunge myself."

They strolled about for a time. Letty was in light blue silk, with a blue and white parasol held daintily over her shoulder, and looked very pretty.

"Oh, dear!" she suddenly ejaculated, "I wonder sometimes what I am to do with myself. I can't loaf always this way. I think I'll go back to the States to live."

"Why don't you?"

"What good would it do me? I don't want to get married. I haven't any one to marry now—that I want." She glanced at Lester significantly, then looked away.

"Oh, you'll find some one eventually," he said, somewhat awkwardly.

"You can't escape for long—not with your looks and money."

"Oh, Lester, hush!"

"All right! Have it otherwise, if you want. I'm telling you."

"Do you still dance?" she inquired lightly, thinking of a ball which was to be given at the hotel that evening. He had danced so well a few years

before.

"Do I look it?"

"Now, Lester, you don't mean to say that you have gone and abandoned that last charming art. I still love to dance. Doesn't Mrs. Kane?"

"No, she doesn't care to. At least she hasn't taken it up. Come to think of it, I suppose that is my fault. I haven't thought of dancing in some time."

It occurred to him that he hadn't been going to functions of any kind

much for some time. The opposition his entanglement had generated had

put a stop to that.

"Come and dance with me to-night. Your wife won't object. It's a splendid floor. I saw it this morning."

"I'll have to think about that," replied Lester. "I'm not much in practice.

Dancing will probably go hard with me at my time of life."

"Oh, hush, Lester," replied Mrs. Gerald. "You make me feel old. Don't talk so sedately. Mercy alive, you'd think you were an old man!"

"I am in experience, my dear."

"Pshaw, that simply makes us more attractive," replied his old flame.

CHAPTER XLVI

That night after dinner the music was already sounding in the ball- room

of the great hotel adjacent to the palm-gardens when Mrs. Gerald found

Lester smoking on one of the verandas with Jennie by his side. The latter was in white satin and white slippers, her hair lying a heavy, enticing

mass about her forehead and ears. Lester was brooding over the history of Egypt, its successive tides or waves of rather weak-bodied people; the

thin, narrow strip of soil along either side of the Nile that had given these successive waves of population sustenance; the wonder of heat and tropic

life, and this hotel with its modern conveniences and fashionable crowd

set down among ancient, soul-weary, almost despairing conditions. He

and Jennie had looked this morning on the pyramids. They had taken a

trolley to the Sphinx! They had watched swarms of ragged, half-clad,

curiously costumed men and boys moving through narrow, smelly, albeit

brightly coloured, lanes and alleys.

"It all seems such a mess to me," Jennie had said at one place. "They are so dirty and oily. I like it, but somehow they seem tangled up, like a lot of worms."

Lester chuckled. "You're almost right. But climate does it. Heat. The tropics. Life is always mushy and sensual under these conditions. They

can't help it."

"Oh, I know that. I don't blame them. They're just queer."

To-night he was brooding over this, the moon shining down into the

grounds with an exuberant, sensuous luster.

"Well, at last I've found you!" Mrs. Gerald exclaimed. "I couldn't get down to dinner, after all. Our party was so late getting back. I've made

your husband agree to dance with me, Mrs. Kane," she went on smilingly.

She, like Lester and Jennie, was under the sensuous influence of the

warmth, the spring, the moonlight. There were rich odours abroad,

floating subtly from groves and gardens; from the remote distance camel-

bells were sounding and exotic cries, "Ayah!" and "oosh! oosh!" as though a drove of strange animals were being rounded up and driven