a rich one doesn't mean she'll accept a poor one."
"You're far from poor, my lad."
"But it's a question of degree. You know that, Ma. You couldn't compare this house, for example, with the Vanderbilt pile at the corner."
"Why should I want to? This is a very fine house. And we were around town when the Vanderbilts were nothing. And that was not so long ago, either. Your father used to say that people were always a good deal richer or a good deal poorer than one thought. That one never got it just right. Well, in the same way we may get their goals wrong. We're only too apt to suppose that a poor girl living in a rich society is looking for a cash box. But it may not be the
only
thing she's looking for. Miss Atwater, I'm told, is a very smart young woman. If that's so, she's plenty smart enough to know there's such a thing as happiness in the world. And such a thing as love!"
"But Kitty's not in love with me, Ma!"
"Have you ever asked her?"
"Why, of course not. What a question!"
"Ask her, then. After first telling her, of course, what
your
feelings are."
"Oh, Ma!"
"Well, there you are. Think about it!"
And think about it he certainly did. Indeed, he thought of little else in the next days and nights. And the more he dwelt on the idea, on the mere possibility of what she had said, the more his whole being was suffused with a kind of creeping joy. The curtains of his future, which he likened in his mind to the great golden ones of the new opera house, were slowly rising, not on a social setting where he was only a timid bystander hoping to pass muster artfully dressed up as an attendant lord, but on the interior of a happily snug home where a man, an impossibly real man, was actually loving and being loved by a beautiful woman with raven black hair and adoring eyes. Did his wise old mother actually know the world better than he did, for all his social gadding? It
could
be so!
He began to calculate how he and Kitty could live on his income. Wouldn't he have as much as his brother Wallace? And hadn't Wallace constructed a large shingle summer villa in Newport? Of course, Julie had some money, but not all that much. They would certainly sell him a patch of their land there to build on, perhaps even give it to him. They would welcome him and Kitty as neighbors. Everyone would!
His fantasies took a suddenly concrete turn on a Sunday afternoon "at home" in the Benson mansion, when he and Kitty were sitting in a far corner of the parlor while the other guests were grouped around their hostess's tea table. This unusual chasm between them and the rest of their world gave him a sudden airy sense of independence.
"Would you ever consider marrying a man with only twenty thousand a year?" he heard himself put to her.
She was at once attentive, oh, very attentive! "Would that be all he had to offer?"
"Oh, no. He would be young, passably attractive, and very much in love."
Her attention was not mitigated by any relaxing smile. "Is this a proposal, Bruce?"
"It certainly would be if there were the slightest chance of its being accepted." In the silence that followed he reached to put a hand on hers. She glanced at the group down the room as she pulled her hand away. But she pulled it; she did not snatch it.
"You must have guessed that I love you," he added, perhaps a touch lamely.
"I've guessed that you think you do" was her guarded reply.
"Doesn't that come to the same thing?"
"I daresay it could."
"Could you possibly imagine your loving me?"
"I could imagine it, yes."
"But you don't know."
"There's no way I'm going to answer that now. There's no way I'm going to commit myself now. I'll be quite frank with you, Bruce. I'm not totally surprised by your offer. I could see you were leading up to it. And I deeply appreciate the honor of it. Truly. But it will need some very careful thought on my part."
"But that sounds so cool!"
"But that's the way it is, my friend. Do you withdraw? You're quite free to do so, and I
"You're far from poor, my lad."
"But it's a question of degree. You know that, Ma. You couldn't compare this house, for example, with the Vanderbilt pile at the corner."
"Why should I want to? This is a very fine house. And we were around town when the Vanderbilts were nothing. And that was not so long ago, either. Your father used to say that people were always a good deal richer or a good deal poorer than one thought. That one never got it just right. Well, in the same way we may get their goals wrong. We're only too apt to suppose that a poor girl living in a rich society is looking for a cash box. But it may not be the
only
thing she's looking for. Miss Atwater, I'm told, is a very smart young woman. If that's so, she's plenty smart enough to know there's such a thing as happiness in the world. And such a thing as love!"
"But Kitty's not in love with me, Ma!"
"Have you ever asked her?"
"Why, of course not. What a question!"
"Ask her, then. After first telling her, of course, what
your
feelings are."
"Oh, Ma!"
"Well, there you are. Think about it!"
And think about it he certainly did. Indeed, he thought of little else in the next days and nights. And the more he dwelt on the idea, on the mere possibility of what she had said, the more his whole being was suffused with a kind of creeping joy. The curtains of his future, which he likened in his mind to the great golden ones of the new opera house, were slowly rising, not on a social setting where he was only a timid bystander hoping to pass muster artfully dressed up as an attendant lord, but on the interior of a happily snug home where a man, an impossibly real man, was actually loving and being loved by a beautiful woman with raven black hair and adoring eyes. Did his wise old mother actually know the world better than he did, for all his social gadding? It
could
be so!
He began to calculate how he and Kitty could live on his income. Wouldn't he have as much as his brother Wallace? And hadn't Wallace constructed a large shingle summer villa in Newport? Of course, Julie had some money, but not all that much. They would certainly sell him a patch of their land there to build on, perhaps even give it to him. They would welcome him and Kitty as neighbors. Everyone would!
His fantasies took a suddenly concrete turn on a Sunday afternoon "at home" in the Benson mansion, when he and Kitty were sitting in a far corner of the parlor while the other guests were grouped around their hostess's tea table. This unusual chasm between them and the rest of their world gave him a sudden airy sense of independence.
"Would you ever consider marrying a man with only twenty thousand a year?" he heard himself put to her.
She was at once attentive, oh, very attentive! "Would that be all he had to offer?"
"Oh, no. He would be young, passably attractive, and very much in love."
Her attention was not mitigated by any relaxing smile. "Is this a proposal, Bruce?"
"It certainly would be if there were the slightest chance of its being accepted." In the silence that followed he reached to put a hand on hers. She glanced at the group down the room as she pulled her hand away. But she pulled it; she did not snatch it.
"You must have guessed that I love you," he added, perhaps a touch lamely.
"I've guessed that you think you do" was her guarded reply.
"Doesn't that come to the same thing?"
"I daresay it could."
"Could you possibly imagine your loving me?"
"I could imagine it, yes."
"But you don't know."
"There's no way I'm going to answer that now. There's no way I'm going to commit myself now. I'll be quite frank with you, Bruce. I'm not totally surprised by your offer. I could see you were leading up to it. And I deeply appreciate the honor of it. Truly. But it will need some very careful thought on my part."
"But that sounds so cool!"
"But that's the way it is, my friend. Do you withdraw? You're quite free to do so, and I
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