Part 32 (2/2)

Carl looked at her bobbing back (with wrinkles in her cloth jacket over the shoulders) as she melted into the crowd of glossy fur-trimmed New-Yorkers. He comprehended her goodness, her devotion. He sighed, ”If she'd only stop this hinting about Gertie and me----” He was repentant of his irritation, and said to Gertie, who was intimately cuddling her arm into his: ”Adelaide's an awfully good kid. Sorry she had to go.”

Gertie jerked her arm away, averted her profile, grated: ”If you miss her so much, perhaps you'd better run after her. Really, I wouldn't interfere, not for _worlds_!”

”Why, h.e.l.lo, Gertie! What seems to be the matter? Don't I detect a chill in the atmosphere? So sorry you've gone and gotten refined on me. I was just going to suggest some low-brow amus.e.m.e.nt like tea at the Casino.”

”Well, you ought to know a lady doesn't----”

”Oh, now, Gertie dear, not 'lady.'”

”I don't think you're a bit nice, Carl Ericson, I don't, to be making fun of me when I'm serious. And why haven't you been up to see us?

Mamma and Ray have spoken of it, and you've only been up once since my party, and then you were----”

”Oh, please let's not start anything. Sorry I haven't been able to get up oftener, but I've been taking work home. You know how it is--you know when you get busy with your dancing-school----”

”Oh, I meant to tell you. I'm through, just _through_ with Vashkowska and her horrid old school. She's a cat and I don't believe she ever had anything to do with the Russian ballet, either. What do you think she had the effrontery to tell me? She said that I wasn't practising and really trying to learn anything. And I've been working myself into----Really, my nerves were in such a shape, I would have been in danger of a nervous breakdown if I had kept on. Tottykins told me how she had a nervous breakdown, and had me see her doctor, such a dear, Dr. St. Claire, so refined and sympathetic, and he told me I was right in suspecting that n.o.body takes Vashkowska seriously any more, and, besides, I don't think much of all this symbolistic dancing, anyway, and at last I've found out what I really want to do. Oh, Carl, it's so wonderful! I'm studying ceramics with Miss Deitz, she's so wonderful and temperamental and she has the dearest studio on Gramercy Park. Of course I haven't made anything yet, but I know I'm going to like it so much, and Miss Deitz says I have a natural taste for vahzes and----”

”Huh? Oh yes, vases. I get you.”

”(Don't be vulgar.)----I'm going to go down to her studio and work every other day, and she doesn't think you have to work like a scrubwoman to succeed, like that horrid Vashkowska did. Miss Deitz has a temperament herself. And, oh, Carl, she says that 'Gertrude' isn't suited to me (and 'Gertie' certainly isn't!) and she calls me 'Eltruda.' Don't you think that's a sweet name? Would you like to call me 'Eltruda,' sometimes?”

”Look here, Gertie, I don't want to b.u.t.t in, and I'm guessing at it, but looks to me as though one of these artistic grafters was working you. What do you know about this Deitz person? Has she done anything worth while? And honestly, Gertie----By the way, I don't want to be brutal, but I don't think I could stand 'Eltruda.' It sounds like 'Tottykins.'”

”Now really, Carl----”

”Wait a second. How do you know you've got what you call a temperament? Go to it, and good luck, if you can get away with it. But how do you know it isn't simply living in a flat and not having any work to do _except_ developing a temperament? Why don't you try working with Ray in his office? He's a mighty good business man. This is just a sugges----”

”Now really, this is----”

”Look here, Gertie, the thing I've always admired about you is your wholesomeness and----”

”'Wholesome!' Oh, that word! As Miss Deitz was saying just the other day, it's as bad----”

”But you are wholesome, Gertie. That is, if you don't let New York turn your head; and if you'd use your ability on a real job, like helping Ray, or teaching--yes, or really sticking to your ceramics or dancing, and leave the temperament business to those who can get away with it. No, wait. I know I'm b.u.t.ting in; I know that people won't go and change their natures because I ask them to; but you see you--and Ray and Adelaide--you are the friends I depend on, and so I hate to see----”

”Now, Carl dear, you might let me talk,” said Gertie, in tones of maddening sweetness. ”As I think it over, I don't seem to recall that you've been an authority on temperament for so very long. I seem to remember that you weren't so terribly wonderful in Joralemon! I'm glad to be the first to honor what you've done in aviation, but I don't know that that gives you the right to----”

”Never said it did!” Carl insisted, with fict.i.tious good humor.

”----a.s.sume that you are an authority on temperament and art. I'm afraid that your head has been just a little turned by----”

”Oh, h.e.l.l.... Oh, I'm sorry. That just slipped.”

”It _shouldn't_ have slipped, you know. I'm _afraid_ it can't be pa.s.sed over so _easily_.” Gertie might have been a bustling Joralemon school-teacher pleasantly bidding the dirty Ericson boy, ”Now go and wash the little hands.”

Carl said nothing. He was bored. He wished that he had not become entangled in their vague discussion of ”temperament.”

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