This Side of Paradise

A very confused, very juvenile moment of awkward backings and bumpings followed, and everyone found himself talking to the person he least desired to. Isabelle maneuverd herself and Froggy Parker, freshman at Harvard, with whom she had once played hopscotch, to a seat on the stairs. A humorous reference to the past was all she needed. The things Isabelle could do socially with one idea were remarkable. First, she repeated it rapturously in an enthusiastic contralto with a soupçon of Southern accent; then she held it off at a distance and smiled at it⁠—her wonderful smile; then she delivered it in variations and played a sort of mental catch with it, all this in the nominal form of dialogue. Froggy was fascinated and quite unconscious that this was being done, not for him, but for the green eyes that glistened under the shining carefully watered hair, a little to her left, for Isabelle had discovered Amory. As an actress even in the fullest flush of her own conscious magnetism gets a deep impression of most of the people in the front row, so Isabelle sized up her antagonist. First, he had auburn hair, and from her feeling of disappointment she knew that she had expected him to be dark and of garter-advertisement slenderness.⁠ ⁠… For the rest, a faint flush and a straight, romantic profile; the effect set off by a close-fitting dress suit and a silk ruffled shirt of the kind that women still delight to see men wear, but men were just beginning to get tired of.

During this inspection Amory was quietly watching.

“Don’t you think so?” she said suddenly, turning to him, innocent-eyed.

There was a stir, and Sally led the way over to their table. Amory struggled to Isabelle’s side, and whispered:

“You’re my dinner partner, you know. We’re all coached for each other.”

Isabelle gasped⁠—this was rather right in line. But really she felt as if a good speech had been taken from the star and given to a minor character.⁠ ⁠… She mustn’t lose the leadership a bit. The dinner-table glittered with laughter at the confusion of getting places and then curious eyes were turned on her, sitting near the head. She was enjoying this immensely, and Froggy Parker was so engrossed with the added sparkle of her rising color that he forgot to pull out Sally’s chair, and fell into a dim confusion. Amory was on the other side, full of confidence and vanity, gazing at her in open admiration. He began directly, and so did Froggy:

“I’ve heard a lot about you since you wore braids⁠—”

“Wasn’t it funny this afternoon⁠—”

Both stopped. Isabelle turned to Amory shyly. Her face was always enough answer for anyone, but she decided to speak.

“How⁠—from whom?”

“From everybody⁠—for all the years since you’ve been away.” She blushed appropriately. On her right Froggy was hors de combat already, although he hadn’t quite realized it.

“I’ll tell you what I remembered about you all these years,” Amory continued. She leaned slightly toward him and looked modestly at the celery before her. Froggy sighed⁠—he knew Amory, and the situations that Amory seemed born to handle. He turned to Sally and asked her if she was going away to school next year. Amory opened with grapeshot.

“I’ve got an adjective that just fits you.” This was one of his favorite starts⁠—he seldom had a word in mind, but it was a curiosity provoker, and he could always produce something complimentary if he got in a tight corner.

“Oh⁠—what?” Isabelle’s face was a study in enraptured curiosity.

Amory shook his head.

“I don’t know you very well yet.”

“Will you tell me⁠—afterward?” she half whispered.

He nodded.

“We’ll sit out.”

Isabelle nodded.

“Did anyone ever tell you, you have keen eyes?” she said.

Amory attempted to make them look even keener. He fancied, but he was not sure, that her foot had just touched his under the table. But it might possibly have been only the table leg. It was so hard to tell. Still it thrilled him. He wondered quickly if there would be any difficulty in securing the little den upstairs.

Babes in the Woods

Isabelle and Amory were distinctly not innocent, nor were they particularly brazen. Moreover, amateur standing had very little value in the game they were playing, a game that would presumably be her principal study for years to come. She had begun as he had, with good looks and an excitable temperament, and the rest was the result of accessible popular novels and dressing-room conversation culled from a slightly older set. Isabelle had walked with an artificial gait at nine and a half, and when her eyes, wide and starry, proclaimed the ingenue most, Amory was proportionately less deceived. He waited for the mask to drop off, but at the same time he did not question her right to wear it. She, on her part, was not impressed by his studied air of blasé sophistication. She had lived in a larger city and had slightly an advantage in range. But she accepted his pose⁠—it was one of the dozen little conventions of this kind of affair. He was aware that he was getting this particular favor now because she had been coached; he knew that he stood for merely the best game in sight, and that he would have to improve his opportunity before he lost his advantage. So they proceeded with an infinite guile that would have horrified her parents.

After the dinner the dance began⁠ ⁠… smoothly. Smoothly?⁠—boys cut in on Isabelle every few feet and then squabbled in the corners with: “You might let me get more than an inch!” and “She didn’t like it either⁠—she told me so next time I cut in.” It was true⁠—she told everyone so, and gave every hand a parting pressure that said: “You know that your dances are making my evening.”

But time passed, two hours of it, and the less subtle beaux had better learned to focus their pseudo-passionate glances elsewhere, for eleven o’clock found Isabelle and Amory sitting on the couch in the little den