The Jewish girl, Rachel Salting, who lived on the floor above, took to calling on Angela. “We’re young and here by ourselves,” she said smiling, “it’s stupid for us not to get acquainted, don’t you think so?” Hers was a charming smile and a charming manner. Indeed she was a very pretty girl, Angela thought critically. Her skin was very, very pale, almost pearly, her hair jet black and curling, her eyes large and almond-shaped. Her figure was straight and slender but bore none the less some faint hint of an exotic voluptuousness. Her interests, she informed her new friend, were all with the stage, her ideal being Raquel Meller.
Angela welcomed her friendliness. A strange apathy, an unusual experience for her, had invaded her being; her painting claimed, it is true, a great deal of time and concentration; her hours with Virginia, while not always satisfactory, were at least absorbing; but for the first time in her knowledge, her whole life was hanging on the words, the moods, the actions of someone else—Roger. Without him she was quite lost; not only was she unable to order her days without him in mind, she was even unable to go in quest of new adventures in living as was once her wont. Consequently she received with outstretched arms anything beyond the ordinary which might break the threatening monotony of her life.
Rachel Salting was like a fresh breeze, a curious mixture of Jewish conservatism and modernity. Hers was a keen, clear mind, well trained in the New York schools and colleges with many branching interests. She spoke of psychiatry, housing problems, Zionism, child welfare, with a knowledge and zest which astounded Angela, whose training had been rather superficial and who had begun to adopt Paulette’s cleverness and Martha Burden’s slightly professional, didactic attitude toward things in general as norms for herself. Rachel, except when dwelling on the Jewish problem, seemed to have no particular views to set forth. Her discussions, based on her wide reading, were purely academic, she had no desire to proselyte, she was no reformer. She was merely a “nice,” rather jolly, healthy young woman, an onlooker at life which she had to get through with and which she was finding for the moment at any rate, extremely pleasant.
She was very happy; happy like Virginia with a happiness vastly different from what Angela was calling by that name; a breathless, constant, smiling happiness, palpable, transparent, for all the world to see. Within a few weeks after their acquaintanceship had started, Rachel with smiles and blushes revealed her great secret. She was going to be married.
“To the very best man in the world, Angèle.”
“Yes, I’m sure of it.”
“He’s very good-looking, tall—”
“As though I didn’t know that.”
“How could you know?”
“Darling child, haven’t I seen him, at least the outline of him, often enough in the hall when I’d come in and turn on that wretched light? I didn’t think you’d ever forgive me for it. It did seem as though I were doing it on purpose.”
“Oh, I knew you weren’t. Then you have seen him?”
“Yes, he’s tall and blond. Quite a nice foil for your darkness. See, I’m always the artist.”
“Yes,” Rachel said slowly, “he is blond.”
Angela thought she detected a faint undertone of worry in her hitherto triumphant voice but decided that that was unlikely.
But Rachel confirmed this impression by her next words: “If only everything will turn out all right.”
Angel’s rather material mind prompted her to ask: “What’s the matter, is he very poor?”
Rachel stared. “Poor? As though that mattered. Yes, he’s poor, but I don’t care about that.”
“Well, if you don’t care about that, what’s the trouble then? He’s free, white and twenty-one, isn’t he?”
“Yes, yes, it’s only—oh you wouldn’t understand, you lucky girl! It’s nothing you’d ever have to bother about. You see we’ve got to get our parents’ consent first. We haven’t spoken of it yet. When we do, I’m afraid there’ll be a row.”
Some ritual inherent in her racial connections, Angela decided, and asked no further questions. Indeed, she had small chance, for Rachel, once launched, had begun to expound her gospel of marriage. It was an old, old story. Angela could have closed her eyes and imagined her own mother rhapsodizing over her future with Junius. They would be poor, very poor at first but only at first, and they would not mind poverty a bit. It would be fun together. There were little frame houses in the Bronx that rented comparatively cheap. Perhaps Angela knew of them.
Angela shuddering inwardly, acknowledged that she had seen them, dull brown, high-shouldered affairs, perched perilously on stoops. The rooms would be small, square, ugly—
Rachel would help her John in every way. They would economize. “I won’t wash and iron, for that is heartbreaking work, and I want to keep myself dainty and pretty for him, so that when we do become better off he won’t have to be ashamed of me. And all the time even in our hardest days I’ll be trying my luck at play-writing.” She spoke with the unquenchable ambition which was her racial dowry. “I’ll be attending lectures and sitting up in the galleries of theatres where they have the most successful plays. And some day I’ll land.” Her fanciful imagination carried her years ahead. “On our First Night, Angela, you must be in our box and I’ll have an ermine coat. Won’t it be wonderful? But nothing will be more wonderful than those first few years when we’ll be absolutely
