Part 15 (1/2)
As Persis was twirled past Forbes now and again, her eyes would meet his with a gaze of deep inquiry.
And he was thinking so earnestly of her that at some indefinitely later period he was almost surprised to find that Mrs. Neff was in his arms, and that they were footing it intricately through a restless maze. He realized, also, that he had not spoken to her yet. He cast about in his mind for a topic of conversation, as one whips a dark trout-pool, and brought up a question:
”That Vacation Savings Fund--may I ask what it is?”
”You may, indeed, young man,” she answered, and talked glibly as she danced, occasionally imitating a strain of music with mocking sounds.
”It's an attempt a lot of us old women have been making to teach the poor woiking goil what we can't learn ourselves; namely, to save up money--_la-de-de-da-de-da!_ The poor things slave like mules and they're paid like slaves--_te-dum-te-dum!_--yet most of them never think of putting a penny by for a rainy day, or what's more important--_ta-ra-rum!_--a sunny day.
”So Willie Enslee's mother, and Mrs. Clifton Ranger, and the Atterby girls, and a gang of other busybodies got ourselves together and cooked up a scheme--_la-de-de-da-de-da!_--to encourage the girls to stay home--_ta-ra-rum!_--from a few moving-picture fetes and cut down their ice-cream-soda orgies a little, and put the pennies into a fund to be used in giving each of them--_te-dum-te-dum_--a little holiday when her chance came--_te-di-do-dee!_”
”Splendid!” said Forbes. ”Did it work out?”
”Rather. We started with forty girls, and now we've got--how many do you suppose?”
”A hundred and fifty.”
”Eight thousand! And they've saved fifty thousand dollars!”
”That's wonderful!” Forbes exclaimed, stopping short with amazement.
Instantly they were as battered and trodden by the other dancers as a planet would be that paused in its...o...b..t.
”Come on, or we'll be murdered!” cried Mrs. Neff, and dragged him into the current again.
Forbes looked down at her with a different feeling. This typical gadabout, light-minded, cynical little old woman with the girlish ways, was after all a big-hearted toiler in the vineyard. She did not dress as a Sister of Charity, and she did not pull a long and philanthropic face, but she was industrious in good works.
He was to learn much more of this phase of New York wealth, its enormous organizations for the relief of wretchedness, and its instant response to the human cry once it makes itself heard above the noise of the cars or the music of the band.
City people have always made a pretense of concealing their sympathetic expressions under a cynical mask. It is this mask that offends so many of the praters against cruelty, irritates them to denunciations more merciless than the lack of mercy they berate, and blinds their nearsighted eyes to the village heart that beats in every city--a huge heart made up of countless village hearts.
So Mrs. Neff, having betrayed an artless Samaritanism, made haste to resume the red domino of burlesque to hide her blushes, as children caught in a pretty action fall to capering. Her motive was not lost on Forbes when she said:
”We've got to do something to get into heaven, you know. That line about the camel and the needle's eye is always with us poor rich, though the Lord knows I'm not rich. I hope you have a lot of money, or we'll starve--unless we loot the Savings Fund.”
He hardly knew what to say to this, so he danced a little harder and swept her off her feet, till she was gasping for breath and pleading:
”Stop, stop! I'm afraid I'm only an old woman after all. And I didn't want you to know.”
He led her to a chair, where she sank exhausted and panting hard. By the time the dance was over and the rest had returned, she was herself again.
”My new husband is the love of a tangoist,” she babbled across her highball. ”If that infernal committee meeting hadn't kept me so late, I could have had more. Are you all going to the Tuesday to-night?”
They all were.
”I was to have taken Alice, but I'm going to put her to bed without any supper. I'll take Mr. Forbes instead. Will you come? Nothing would give you more pleasure. That's right. Sorry I can't accept your invitation to dinner, but I'm booked. What about the opera to-night? It's 'Tristan and Isolde' with Fremstad. Senator Tait was to have taken us, but he can't go; so Alice won't care to go. He sent me his box, and I have all those empty chairs to fill. Mr. Forbes can fill one. You can, can't you?” He nodded helplessly, and she hunted him a ticket out of a handbag as ridiculously crowded as a boy's first pocket. ”It begins at a quarter to eight. I can't possibly be there before nine. You go when you want to.
Who else can come?”
Persis said that she was dining at Winifred's with Willie, and added: ”He hates the opera, but if I can drag him along I'll come. And if I can't I'll come anyway.”
Winifred accepted for Bob. ”I always think I ought to have been a grand-opera singer,” she sighed, ”I've got the build for it.”