The Window-Gazer

CHAPTER VI

Luncheon, for which Li Ho had provided eggs both boiled and fried, was eaten alone. His hostess did not honor him with her company, nor did her father return. Li Ho was attentive but silent And outside the rain still rained.

Professor Spence lay and counted the drops as they fell from a knot hole in the veranda roof—one small drop—two medium-sized drops—one big drop—as if some unseen djinn were measuring them out in ruthless monotony. He counted the drops until his brain felt soggy and he began to speculate upon what Aunt Caroline would think of fried eggs for luncheon. He wondered why there were no special dishes for special meals in Li Ho's domestic calendar; why all things, to Li Ho, were good (or bad) at all times? Would he give them porridge and bacon for dinner? Spence decided that he didn't mind. He was ready to like anything which was strikingly different from Aunt Caroline....

One small drop—two medium-sized drops—one big drop.... He wondered when he would know his young nurse well enough to call her by her first name? (Prefixed by "miss," perhaps.) "Desire"—it was a rather charming name. How old would she be, he wondered; twenty? There were times when she looked even younger than twenty. But he had to confess that she never acted like it. At least she did not act as he had believed girls of twenty are accustomed to act. Very differently indeed.... One small drop—two medium-sized—oh, bother the drops! Where was she, anyway? Did she intend to stay out all afternoon? Was that the way she treated an invalid? ... He couldn't see why people go out in the rain, anyway. People are apt to take their deaths of cold. People may get pneumonia. It would serve people right—almost.... One drop—oh, confound the drops!

The professor tried to read. The book he opened had been a famous novel, a best-seller, some five years ago. It had been thought "advanced." Advanced!—but now how inconceivably flat and stale! How on earth had anyone ever praised it, called it "epoch-marking," bought it by the thousand thousand? Why, the thing was dead—a dead book, than which there is nothing deader. This reflection gave him something to think of for a while. Instead of counting drops he amused himself by strolling back through the years, a critical stretcher-bearer, picking up literary corpses by the wayside. They were thickly strewn. He was appalled to find how faintly beat the pulse of life even in the living. Would not another generation see the burial of them all? Was there no new Immortal anywhere?

"When I write a novel," thought the professor solemnly, "which, please God, I shall never do, I will write about people and not about things. Things change always; people never." It was a wise conclusion but it did not help the afternoon to pass.

Desire, that is to say Miss Farr, had passed the window twice already. He might have called her. But he hadn't. If people forget one's very existence it is not prideful to call them. And the Spences are a prideful race. Desire (he decided it didn't matter if he called her Desire to himself, she was such a child) was wearing—an old tweed coat and was carrying wood. She wore no hat and her hair was glossy with rain.... People take such silly risks—And where was Li Ho? Why wasn't he carrying the wood? Not that the wood seemed to bother Desire in the least.

The captive on the sofa sighed. It was no use trying to hide from himself his longing to be out there with her in that heavenly Spring-pierced air, revelling in its bloomy wetness; strong and fit in muscle and nerve, carrying wood, getting his head soaked, doing all the foolish things which youth does with impunity and careless joy. The new restlessness, which he had come so far to quiet, broke over him in miserable, taunting waves.

Why was he here on the sofa instead of out there in the rain? The war? But he was too inherently honest to blame the war. It was, perhaps, responsible for the present state of his sciatic nerve but not for the selling of his birthright of sturdy youth. The causes of that lay far behind the war. Had he not refused himself to youth when youth had called? Had he not shut himself behind study doors while Spring crept in at the window? The war had come and dragged him out. Across his quiet, ordered path its red trail had stretched and to go forward it had been necessary to go through. The Spences always went through. But Nature, every inch a woman, had made him pay for scorning her. She had killed no fatted calf for her prodigal.

So here he was, at thirty-five, envying a girl who could carry wood without weariness. The envy had become acute irritation by the time the wood was stacked and the wood-carrier brought her shining hair and rain-tinted cheeks into the living-room.

"Leg bad again?" asked Desire casually.

"No—temper."

"It's time for tea. I'll see about it."

"You'll take your wet things off first. You must be wet through. Do you want to come down with pneumonia?"

The girl's eyebrows lifted. "That's silly," she said. And indeed
the remark was absurd enough addressed to one on whom the wonder and mystery of budding life rested so visibly. "I'm not wet at all," she went on. "Only my coat." She slipped out of the old tweed ulster, scattering bright drops about the room. "And my hair," she added as if by an afterthought. "I'll dry it presently. But I don't wonder you're cross. The fire is almost out. We'll have something to eat when the kettle boils. Father's gone up trail. He probably won't be back." For an instant she stood with a considering air as if intending to add something. Then turned and went into the kitchen without doing it. She came back with a handful of pine-knots with which she deftly mended the fire.

The professor moved restlessly.

"I'll be around soon now," he said, "and then you shan't do that."

"Shan't do what?"

"Carry wood."

"That's funny." Desire placed a crackling pine-knot on the apex of her pyramid and sat back on her heels to watch it blaze. Her tone was ruminative. "There's no real sense in that, you know. Why shouldn't I carry wood when I am perfectly able to do it? Your objection is purely an acquired one—a manifestation of the herd instinct."

There was a slight pause. Professor Spence was wondering if he had really heard this.

"W—what was that you said?" he asked cautiously.

Desire laughed. He had observed with wonder, amounting almost to awe, that she never giggled.

"Score one for me!" She turned grey, mirthful eyes on his. "Amn't I learned? I read it in an article in an old Sociological Review—a copy left here by a man whom father—well, we needn't bother about that part of it. But the article was wonderful. I can't remember who wrote it."

"Trotter, perhaps,—yes, it would be Trotter," murmured the professor.

Desire swung round upon her heels, regarding him a trifle wistfully.

"I should like to know all that you know," she said. "All the strange things inside our minds."

"Would you? But if you knew what I know you would only know that you knew nothing at all."

"Yes, it's all very well to say that," shrewdly, "but you don't mean it. Besides, even if you don't know anything, you have glimpses of all sorts of wonderful things which might be known. You can go on, and it's the going on that matters."

"But I can't carry wood."

A little smile curled the corners of Desire's lips. He did not see it because she had turned to the fire again and, with that deliberate unself-consciousness which characterized her, was proceeding to unpin and dry her hair. Spence had not seen it undone before and was astonished at its length and lustre. The girl shook it as a young colt shakes its mane, spreading it out to the blaze upon her hands.

"I know what you mean, though," admitted Spence, "there is nothing like the fascination of the unknown. It very nearly did for me."

Desire looked up long enough to allow her slanting brows to ask their eternal question.

"Too much inside, not enough outside," he answered. "I ought to have made myself a man first and a student afterward. Then I might have been out in the rain you."

She considered this, as she considered most things, gravely. Then
met it in her downright way.

"There's nothing very wrong with you, is there? Nothing but what can be put right."

"No."

"Well then, you can begin again. And begin properly."

"I am thirty-five."

"In that case you have no time to waste."

It was a thoroughly sensible remark. But somehow the professor did not like it. After all, thirty-five is not so terribly old. He decided to change the subject. But there was no immediate hurry. It was pleasant to lie there in the firelight watching this enigma of girl-hood dry her hair. Perhaps she would notice his silence and ask him what he was thinking about.

"You really ought to offer me a penny for my thoughts," he observed plaintively.

"Oh, were you thinking? So was I."

"I'll give you a penny for yours!"

Desire shook her head.

"No? Then I'll give you mine for nothing. I was thinking what a pity it is that you are only an amateur nurse."

"I hate nursing."

"How unwomanly! Lots of women hate it—but few admit it. However, it wasn't a nurse's duties I was thinking of, but a patient's privileges. You see, if you were a professional nurse I could call you 'Nurse Desire.'"

"Do you mean that you want to call me by my first name?"

"Since you put it more bluntly than I should dare to,—yes. It is a charming name. But perhaps—"

"Oh, you may use it if you like," said the owner of the name indifferently. "It sounds more natural. I am not accustomed to 'Miss Fair.'"

This ought to have been satisfactory. But it wasn't. And after he had led up to it so tactfully, too! Not for the first time did it occur to our psychologist that tact was wasted upon this downright young person. He decided not to be tactful any longer.

"I'm getting well so rapidly," he said, "that I shall have to admit it soon."

The girl nodded.

"Are you glad?"

"Of course I am glad."

"I shall walk with a cane almost in no time. And when I can walk, I shall have to go away."

"Yes." There was no hesitation in her prompt agreement. Neither did she add any polite regrets. The professor felt unduly irritated. He had never become used to her ungirlish taciturnity. It always excited him. The women he had known, especially the younger women, had all been chatterers. They had talked and he had not listened. This girl said little and her silences seemed to clamour in his ears. Well, she would have to answer this time.

"Do you want me to go?" he asked plainly.

"I don't want you to go." Her tone was thoughtful. "But I know you can't stay. One has to accept things."

"One doesn't. One can make things happen."

"How?"

"By willing."

"Do you honestly believe that?" He was astonished at the depth of mockery in her tone.

"I certainly do believe it. I'll prove it if you like."

"How?"

"By staying."

Again she was silent.

He went on eagerly. "Why shouldn't I stay—for a time at least? I have plenty of work to go on with. Indeed it was with the definite intention of doing this work that I came. If you want me, I'll stay right enough. The bargain that was made with your father was a straight, fair business arrangement. I have no scruples about requiring him to carry out his part of it The trouble was that it seemed as if insistence would be unfair to you. But if you and I can arrange that—if you will agree to let me do what I can to help, chores, you know, carrying wood and so on, then I should not need to feel myself a burden."

"You have not been a burden."

"Thanks. You have been extraordinarily kind. As for the rest of it—I mentioned the matter to Dr. Farr this morning."

She was interested now. He could see her eyes, intent, through the falling shadow of her hair.

"I reminded him that he had offered me the services of a secretary and explained that I was ready to avail myself of his offer."

"And what did he say to that?"

"Well—er—we agreed to leave the decision to you."

"Was that all?"

"Practically all."

"Practically, but not quite. You quarreled, didn't you? Frankly, I do not understand father's attitude but I know what his attitude is. He does not want you here. Neither you nor anyone else. The secretarial work you offer would be—I can't tell you exactly what it would be to me. It would teach me something—and I am so hungry to know! But he will find some way to make it impossible. You will have to go."

"Nonsense! He cannot go back on his agreement."

"You mean he has accepted money? That," bitterly, "means nothing to him."

"Nevertheless it gives me ground to stand on. And you, too. You have done secretarial work before?"

"Yes. I have certain qualifications. At intervals I have tried to make myself independent. Several times I have secured office positions in Vancouver. But father has always made the holding of them impossible."

"How?"

"I would rather not go into it." There was weary disgust in her voice.

"But what reason does he give?"

"That his daughter's place is in her father's house—funny, isn't it?"

"You do not think that affection has anything to do with it?"

"Not even remotely. Whatever his reason may be for keeping me with him, it is not that. Affection is something of which one knows by instinct, don't you think? Even Li Ho—I know instinctively that Li Ho is fond of me. I am absolutely certain that my father is not."

"It is no life for a young girl."

"It has been my life."

The professor felt uncomfortable. There was that in her tone which forbade all comment. She had given him this tiny glimpse and quite evidently intended to give no more. But Spence, upon occasion, could be a persistent man.

"Miss Desire," he said gravely, "do you absolutely decline my friendship?" If she wanted directness, she was getting it now.

"How can I do otherwise?" Her face was turned from him and her low voice was muffled by her hair. But for the first time she had cast away her guard of light indifference. "Friendship is impossible for me. I thought you would see—and go away. Nothing that you can do would be any real help. I have tried before to free myself. But I could not. Nor, in the little flights of freedom which I had, did I find anything that I wanted. I am as well here as anywhere. Unless—"

She was silent, looking into the fire.

"Unless I were really free," she added softly.

He could not see her face. But she looked very young sitting there with her unbound hair and hands clasped childishly about her knees.

"You have wondered about me—in a psychological way—ever since you came." She went on, her voice taking on a harsher note. "You have been trying to 'place' me. Well, since you are curious I will tell you what I am. When I was younger and we lived in towns I used to wander off by myself down the main streets to gaze in the windows. I never went into any of the stores. The things I wanted were inside and for sale—but I could not buy them. I was just a window-gazer. That's what I am still. Life is for sale somewhere. But I cannot buy it."

The throb of her voice was like the beating of caged wings through the quiet room.

"But—" began Spence, and then he paused. It wasn't at all easy to know what to say. "You are mistaken," he went on finally. "Life isn't for sale anywhere. Life is inside, not outside. And no one ever really wants the things they see in other people's windows."

"I do," said Desire coldly.

She was certainty very young! Spence felt suddenly indulgent.

"What, then—for instance?" he asked.

The girl shook back her hair and arose.

"Freedom, money, leisure, books, travel, people!"

"I thought you were going to leave out people altogether," said Spence, whimsically. "But otherwise your wants are fairly comprehensive. You have neglected only two important things—health and love."

"I have health—and I don't want love."

"Not yet—of course—" began the professor, still fatherly indulgent. But she turned on him with a white face.

"Never!" she said. "That one thing I envy no one. You are wondering why I have never considered marriage as a possible way out? Well, it isn't a possible way—for me. Marriage is a hideous thing—hideous!"

She wasn't young now, that was certain. It was no child who stood there with a face of sick distaste. The professor's mood of indulgent maturity melted into dismay before the half-seen horror in her eyes.

But the moment of revelation passed as quickly as it had come. The girl's face settled again into its grave placidity.

"I'll get the tea," she said. "The kettle will be boiling dry."