Part 9 (2/2)
Jasper Penny ate slowly, partly distracted by the market reports in the _U.S. Gazette_. Ninety-two and a half had been offered for Schuylkill Navigation, only fifteen for the West Chester Railroad, but Philadelphia and Trenton had gone to ninety-eight; while a three and a half dividend had been declared on the French Town Turnpike and Railway Company. He was annoyed afresh by the persistent refusal of the Government to award the mail to the Reading Steam System. His thoughts returned to Eunice, his daughter, the coming scene--it would at least be that--with Essie Scofield.
It was but a short distance from the hotel to where Essie lived, over Fourth Street to Cherry; and almost immediately he turned by the three story brick dwelling at the corner and was at her door. The servant, in an untidy white jacket, stood stupidly blocking the narrow hall, until Jasper Penny with an angry impatience waved him aside. There were other silk hats and coats, and a woman's fringed wrap, on the stand where he left his stick and outer garments; and from above came a peal of mingled laughter. The presence of others, now, was singularly inopportune; it would be no good waiting for their departure--here such gatherings almost invariably drew out until dawn; and he abruptly decided that, after a short interval, he would give Essie to understand that he wished to talk to her privately.
A young woman with a chalk-white face and oleaginous bandeaux of dead black hair, in scarlet and green tartan over an extravagant crinoline, was seated on a sofa between two men, each with an arm about her waist and wine gla.s.ses elevated in their free hands. Essie was facing them from a circular floor ha.s.sock, in a blue satin, informal robe over mussed cambric ruffles, heelless nonchalants, and her hair elaborately dressed with roses, white ribbons and a short ostrich feather. Her body, at once slim and full, was consciously seductive, and her face, slightly swollen and pasty in the shadows, bore the same, heedless unrestraint.
Her dark, widely-opened eyes, an insignificant nose and shortly curved, scarlet lips, held almost the fixed, painted impudence of a cynically debased doll. She turned and surveyed Jasper Penny with a petulant, silent inquiry, and whatever gaiety was in progress abruptly terminated as he advanced into the room.
”You never let me know you'd be here,” Essie complained; ”but I suppose I ought to be glad to see you anyway--after four months without a line.
Jasper, Mr. Daniel Culser.” The younger of the men on the sofa, a stolidly handsome individual with hard, blue eyes, rose with an over-emphasized composure. ”Mr. Penny, extremely pleased.” Jasper Penny was irritated by the other's instant identification, and he nodded bluntly. ”Lambert Babb and Myrtilla Lewis,” Essie continued indifferently. Babb, an individual of inscrutable age, with ashen whiskers and a blinking, weak vision in a silvery face, was audibly delighted. Myrtilla Lewis smiled professionally over her expanse of bewildering silk plaid. ”Wine in the cooler,” Essie added, and Daniel Culser moved to where a silver bucket reposed by a tray of gla.s.ses and broken, sugared rusks. Jasper Penny refused the offered drink, and found a chair apart from the others. A moody silence enveloped him which he found impossible to break, and an increasing uneasiness spread over the room.
”Well,” Essie Scofield commanded, ”say something. You look as black as an Egyptian. What'll my friends think of you? I suppose it doesn't matter any more what it is to me; but you might play at being polite.”
”Don't chip at a man like that,” Myrtilla advised. ”Mr. Penny has a right to talk or not.” She smiled more warmly at him, and he saw that she had had too much champagne. The room reeked with the thin, acrid odour of the wine, and a sickly perfume of vanilla essence. Essie, as usual, had a gla.s.s of her favourite drink--orange juice and French brandy--on the floor beside her, the brandy bottle and fresh oranges conveniently near. His repulsion for her deepened until it seemed as if actual fingers were compressing his throat, stopping his breath. He wondered suddenly how far he was responsible for her possible degeneration. But he had not been the first; her admission of that fact had in the beginning attracted him to an uncommon frankness in her peculiar make-up. He was willing to a.s.sume his fault, to pay for it, whatever payment was possible, and escape.... Not only from her, but from all that she embodied, from himself--what he had been--as much as anything else.
”You are an Ironmaster,” Mr. Babb finally announced; ”in fact, one of our greatest manufacturers. Now, Mr. Penny, what is your personal opinion of engine as against the public coach? Will the railroad survive the experimental stage, and are such gentlemen as yourself behind it?”
”I saw in the _Ledger_ some days back,” Daniel Culser added, ”that your arm had been broken travelling by steam.”
”One had nothing to do with the other,” Jasper stated tersely, ignoring Babb's query, ”but was entirely my own fault.” The conversation lagged painfully again, during which Essie skilfully compounded another mixture of spirits and thick, yellow juice. She grew sullen with resentment at Jasper Penny's att.i.tude, and exchanged enigmatic glances with Culser.
The liquor brought a quick flush to her slightly pendulous cheeks, and she was enveloped in an increasing bravado. ”Penny's a solemn old boy,”
she announced generally. Lambert Babb attempted to embrace Myrtilla, but, her gaze on the newcomer, she pushed him away. ”You got to be a gentleman with me,” she proclaimed with a patently unsteady dignity. ”My grandfather was a French n.o.ble.”
”What I'd like to know,” Essie remarked, ”is what's his granddaughter?”
”Better'n you!” Myrtilla heatedly a.s.serted; ”one who'd appreciate a real man, and not be playing about private with a tailor's dummy.” Daniel Culser's face grew noticeably pinker. ”I'm going,” Myrtilla continued, rising. ”Mr. Penny, I'd be happy to meet you under more social conditions. Here I cannot remain for--for reasons. I might be tempted to--” Mr. Babb caught her arm under his, and, at an imperious gesture from Essie, piloted her from the room. Culser rose.
”Don't go, Dan,” Essie Scofield told him defiantly. But Jasper Penny maintained a silence that forced the younger man to make a stiff exit.
”Well,” Essie demanded, flinging herself on the deserted sofa, ”now you've spoiled my evening. Why did you come at all if you couldn't behave genteel?”
”Where, exactly, is Eunice?” he asked abruptly.
She glanced at him with an instant masking of her resentment. ”I've told you a hundred times--in the house of a very respectable clergyman. My letter was clear enough; she's had bronchitis, and there's the doctor, and--”
”Just where is Eunice?” he repeated, interrupting her aggrieved recital.
”Where I put her,” her voice grew shrill. ”You haven't asked to see her for near a year, you haven't even pretended an interest in--in your own daughter. I've done the best I could; you know I don't like children around; but I have attended to as much of my duty as you. Now you come out and insist on being unpleasant all in an hour. Why didn't you write?
I'd had her here for you. Come back in two or three days.”
”To-morrow,” he replied. ”I am going to see her in the morning.”
”You just ain't. I did the best I knew, but, if it isn't all roses, you'll blame everything on me. I will have Eunice fetched--”
”Where is she?” he asked still again, wearily.
Every instinct revolted against the degradation into which he had blindly walked. His youth had betrayed him, involving him, practically a different man, in a payment which he realized had but commenced.... To escape. He had first thought of that with the unconscious conviction that the mere wish carried its fulfilment. In fact, it would be immensely difficult; a man, he saw, could not sever himself so casually from the past; it reached without visible demarcation into the present, the future. All was a piece, one with another; and Essie Scofield was drawn in a vivid thread through the entire fabric of his being.
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