Jane met her daughter’s eyes for a moment in silence. She hoped her own were as enigmatic as those of the Marie Laurencin over the fireplace. She could not bring herself to discuss Stephen, even with Cicily.
“Don’t worry about those inhibitions,” she said presently. “For love creates them. Love and fear, which always go hand in hand. When you love people, you are always really afraid—afraid of hurting them, afraid of disillusioning them, afraid of the spoken word which may upset the apple cart. Respect for the spoken word, Cicily, is the greatest safeguard in life against catastrophe.”
Cicily’s wide blue eyes were rather uncomprehending.
“Just the same I’d like to break down the barriers. I’d like to be with Jack the way I used to be—happy and free and wild. Not thinking, not considering. But I guess you can never feel that way twice—about the same person that is—”
The sound of the front door closing broke in on Cicily’s last perilous words. They were still trembling on the circumambient air when Jack, hat in hand, stood on the threshold.
“Hello, Aunt Jane!” he said. His friendly, pale blue eyes were twinkling cheerfully. “I stopped at the garage in the village, Cicily, to see what was wrong with the Chrysler. They say you stripped those gears again. I wish—”
A faint frown of irritation deepened on Cicily’s white brow.
“Did you call up Field’s about that bill?” she said. Then to Jane, “Aunt Isabel always gets her account mixed up with ours.”
“I did,” said Jack. “But it wasn’t Mother this time. It was your return credits. On the last day of every month. Aunt Jane, Cicily has half the merchandise in the store waiting in our front hall to be called for.”
He advanced to the armchair as he spoke and kissed Cicily’s pink cheek, a trifle absentmindedly.
“Where are the kids?”
“Eating supper,” said Cicily. “We’re dining out.”
Jane rose. She felt incredibly depressed by this little conjugal colloquy. As she walked slowly home over the suburban sidewalks, past rows and rows of little brick and wood and stucco houses, temples of domesticity enshrined, this loveliest, leafy season of the year, in flowering lilacs and apple trees in bloom, she reflected stoically that marriage was, of course, like that. The first fine careless rapture was bound to go. Something else came—something else took its place—something you held as your most priceless possession by the time you were fifty. Nevertheless, it was disconcerting to have seen it so clearly happening to the next generation. It was disconcerting to know, without peradventure of a doubt, that, to cheerfully smiling, subconsciously philosophic Jack, Cicily had come to look only like Cicily.
III
“Muriel,” said Isabel, “looked amazingly young.”
“She certainly did,” said Jane.
“And wasn’t she wonderful with Pearl and Gertie?”
“My heart rather warmed to Gertie,” said Jane. “She was crying all through the ceremony.”
“It’s enough to make anybody cry,” said Isabel, “to see a sixty-year-old father making a fool of himself.”
They were sitting on the old brown sofa in the Pine Street library. An hour before they had seen Muriel depart in a shower of rice for her trip around the world with Ed Brown. The rice had been Albert’s eleventh-hour inspiration. He had foraged for it in the kitchen and thrust it, hilariously, into the hands of the younger generation. His three little daughters had thrown it, delightedly, at their grandmother. The rice, Jane thought, had rather disconcerted Muriel.
The entire family were taking supper with Mrs. Ward. The children and grandchildren were making merry in the yellow drawing-room across the hall. Belle was strumming out Gershwin on the old Steinway upright. The throbbing notes of the jazz melody vibrated incongruously in the little brown library. The Bard of Avon looked a bit bewildered, Jane thought. His wide mahogany eyes stared blankly over the heads of the two sisters.
Mrs. Ward was in the dining-room with Minnie. It was a long time since Mrs. Ward had given so large a dinner-party—fifteen people, not counting Robin Redbreast and Belle’s youngest daughter, who had had their puffed rice in the pantry and were now supposedly asleep in the guestroom upstairs. All family, of course. Still, Mrs. Ward had brought out the cut-glass goblets and the Royal Worcester china and her very best long damask tablecloth. She had had the silver loving-cup polished and had filled it with roses for the centre of the table. Jack had brought her some gin and vermouth and Isabel had lent her her cocktail glasses. Mrs. Ward was just making sure that the nut and candy dishes were placed straight with the candlesticks. Since Minnie had been promoted from the pantry to the role of companion, Mrs. Ward’s confidence in a waitress’s eye for symmetry had wavered.
“Albert was very funny,” said Isabel suddenly, “with that rice.”
“Albert is funny,” said Jane. “Funny and nice, too. He was sweet with Ed Brown, but yet you could see he didn’t miss a trick. He was touched and amused and amusing, all at once. He treats his mother just like a contemporary.”
“Live and let live is always Albert’s policy,” said Isabel. “Belle finds it rather trying. Belle’s like me—she always has an opinion. A completely tolerant husband can be very irritating.”
“I like him,” said Jane. “I like him very much.” She hesitated for a moment toying with the thought of telling Isabel that she found Albert greatly improved, then abandoning it. You could not tell your sister that you found her son-in-law greatly improved, without tacitly implying that you had previously felt that there was room for great improvement.
Jane had never quite been able to overcome her prejudice against Albert because he was his father’s son. Jane’s distrustful dislike for Bert Lancaster was rooted deep in the hidden instincts of her childhood. She had subconsciously transferred it to his boy. That was unfair, Jane reflected honestly. Albert had sowed some wild oats in college. He had been a dangerously beautiful young man. Muriel had adored
