So Little Time (41 page)

Marianna was lying on the couch in her sitting room. The bedroom door was open and the bed was covered with dresses.

“Darling,” Marianna said, “thank God you've come. There's something you must promise me.”

“What?” Jeffrey asked.

“Promise me I don't have to set eyes on Jesse Fineman before I go on. I can stand anything, if I just don't have to see Jesse, and promise me you'll stay and take me over yourself. Stay with me, Jeff, please.”

Marianna was always like that before an opening, but now, familiar though her words were, they had a possessive note. It seemed to Jeffrey that they were lovers when she held out her hands to him. She was not only asking, she was taking it for granted that he would stay, and she spoke again before he had a chance to answer.

“Darling,” she asked him, “what's the matter? You have your worried look.”

“It's only the crowd,” Jeffrey said, “I'm never used to them.” And he smiled at her, while she lay there looking up at him.

“I always know when you're worried,” she said, “it's in your eyes. It's in the corners of your mouth.”

“It's like Jesse,” Jeffrey answered, “just nervous indigestion, sweet.”

“I like to know what you're thinking,” she said. “I nearly always know.”

“That's fine,” Jeffrey said, “keep your mind on me. Don't think about yourself.”

“I don't,” she said, “when I see you, I never do. Don't look so worried. You're glad to see me, aren't you?”

“Yes,” he answered, “awfully glad.”

“Then sit down, and we'll have supper. Sit down, and don't let anybody in.”

“I can't,” Jeffrey answered, “I'll see you before the curtain. I've got to go out and see Jim.”

Marianna sat up and leaned toward him.

“I wouldn't ordinarily,” he said, “I've been thinking about Jim quite a lot. You see—it's this damned war.”

“The war?” she repeated.

“Yes,” he said, “the war.”

“Darling,” she said, “I know what you mean. Don't look so worried.”

“I just want to see him,” Jeffrey answered. “I don't see him very often.”

“Of course, you have to go,” she said. “There may not be much time.”

“I didn't say that,” he answered.

“No,” she said, “I know you didn't.”

She stopped. He was still surprised that she had guessed what he was thinking.

“You see, I love you, dear,” she said.

Just by the steps that led to the revolving door on Arlington Street were two tables side by side with two pretty girls behind them. One was selling buttons for the British War Relief, and the other was selling handkerchiefs and cigarette cases for the Free French. He should have bought something as he went by, but he did not. It was a quarter past six already.

There had never been any places like Lowell House when Jeffrey had lived in Cambridge and yet all sorts of attitudes which he had outgrown remained. When he knocked on Jim's door, he could not entirely get away from an impression that he was calling on himself—so many of his wishes were there, and so much that he had left behind him.

Still he knew that Jim was not like him. He had never even lived in a room like Jim's. There were black wooden chairs in it with the Harvard seal upon their backs, a desk, a bookcase, and the rug that Madge had given him, and photographs on the wall of boys in rows, one row standing up and the other row sitting down in front. When he saw Jim again he saw a good deal of himself. It was what Minot Roberts had said. He had the same eyes and the same posture, but Jeffrey had never worn a tweed coat and gray slacks and those shoes that looked like slippers.

There were two other boys in the room to whom Jim introduced him. This is So-and-so, my father, and So-and-so, my father—Jeffrey did not listen to their names, when they called him “sir” and shook hands. He knew that he should say something to put them all at their ease, until he realized that they were more at ease than he was. He was pleased that they were there because it meant that Jim was not keeping his friends from him.

“Well,” Jeffrey said, “it's comfortable up here,” and the boys said, Yes, sir, the rooms were very nice; and then in a few minutes they said they must be going and that they were very glad to have met him, sir.

“Jim,” he said. “I get on pretty well with most people, but I don't know what to say to boys.”

“It's all right,” Jim said, “they didn't expect you to say anything. It's all right, as long as you didn't pretend to be a boy yourself.”

“I know,” Jeffrey said, “I know what you mean.”

“Besides,” Jim said, “they wanted to see you. When I told them you were coming, they had plenty of time to go.”

It was surprising how grateful and relieved it made him feel. Everything was just the way it always had been between himself and Jim.

“It's funny coming here,” he said, “and seeing you the way you are, and thinking of the way I used to be.”

“How's everything at home?” Jim asked. “How's Ma?”

“She's fine,” Jeffrey said. “We spent the other week end at your Aunt Beckie's and your Uncle Fred's.”

“You did, did you?” Jim said. “How did she ever get you there?”

Jeffrey laughed. It still amazed him that Jim was old enough to see things that way.

“Where did you get that coat?” Jeffrey asked. “You look like a golf professional.”

Jim looked down at his coat. It had yellow stripes and woven leather buttons.

“It's quite a number,” Jim said, “what's the matter with it?”

“It's too yellow,” Jeffrey said. Never in his life would he have worn such a coat, but it looked all right on Jim.

“Don't come here and tear me to pieces,” Jim said, “it isn't fair. Here's your milk and sandwich, or maybe you'd like a drink.”

“You mean you keep liquor here?” Jeffrey asked, and then he supposed that everyone did and that Jim was old enough.

It was hard to see Jim in perspective, for Jim seemed to have grown up suddenly, without his knowing it, and Jeffrey still kept thinking of Jim in short trousers and of Jim when he used to take him on Sunday to see the animals in Central Park and to sail toy boats in the boat pond. He had seen more of Jim than he had of the other children because there had not been so much money when Jim was a little boy. He remembered Jim's nurses, and taking Jim to school, and now there Jim was with his hands in his pockets asking if he wanted a drink. It was confusing, thinking of him as entirely grown-up, but that was the way Jeffrey wanted to consider him—as someone who had tastes and ideas of his own and with a personality which one must respect. Jeffrey tried to see him as he might see someone whom he had just met, and he had very much the same glow of satisfaction which he experienced, very rarely, when he had written something he had liked.

“I didn't come here to pull you to pieces,” he said. “I like to talk to people I like. I've always liked you.”

He had never said so much before, and now he felt embarrassed and he knew that Jim did, too.

“I've always liked you, too,” Jim said.

There was a confused silence, but it was not the sort of silence that he minded. They seemed to be saying in that silence all sorts of things that they probably never would say. When he looked at Jim, he felt a lump rising in his throat. He had never thought of him before as being so physically perfect, or so close to being beautiful, although he supposed he was not thinking of Jim as much as he was thinking of youth. There was that perfect co-ordination and that queer fearlessness. Then suddenly he wanted to skip it, because if he did not skip it, if he did not think of something else, he would make a fool of himself. He could not imagine what had put him in such a mood. He poured his milk from the little cardboard container into the glass.

“Oh, hell!” he said. “Well, it's great to be young.”

“You think so?” Jim said. “Did you used to think so?”

“No,” Jeffrey answered, “you only think so later.”

“Listen,” Jim said, “there's something I want to ask you.”

Jeffrey wished that he did not instinctively assume a defensive, careful attitude when Jim wanted to ask him anything. His first thought was what it always was, that Jim was in some sort of trouble, probably about money.

“Well,” Jeffrey said, “don't stand there. Go ahead and ask me.”

“How old were you when you got married?” Jim asked.

Jeffrey put his hands carefully on the arms of the black wooden chair.

“What makes you ask?” he said.

“Oh, nothing much,” Jim said. “I was just wondering, that's all.”

Jim was half sitting, half leaning against the desk, swinging one leg carelessly in front of him. Jeffrey remembered noticing Jim's heavy knitted sock.

“Jim,” he said, “is it that girl? The one you told me about last spring? What's her name—Sally Sales?”

It was not fair. When you were old, you knew too much and you guessed too quickly. He saw Jim's expression of surprise and he saw it had been a secret which Jim had not intended to tell him.

“Don't tell Mother,” Jim said. “I was just thinking. I know it's silly.”

“That's all right,” Jeffrey said, “I won't tell anyone.”

It was pathetic that Jim knew it sounded silly. It stopped him from saying all sorts of things he might have. When Jeffrey looked at him, when he thought of all the rest of it, it was not silly.

“It's a pretty serious thing, getting married, Jim,” he said.

It was not entirely what he had meant to say.

“I know,” Jim said, “you don't have to tell me, but you can't help thinking, can you?”

“No,” Jeffrey said, “of course you can't.” He felt a certain respect for Jim, a furtive sort of sympathy.

“If you feel that way,” he said, “she must be quite a girl. I'd like to see her, Jim.”

“You'd like her,” Jim said. His voice was suddenly warm and his words came faster. “Of course, I was just thinking. You're not laughing at me, are you?”

“No,” Jeffrey said, “of course not.”

“I'll tell you why I was thinking about it,” Jim said. “Of course I couldn't do anything about it. I'm not as crazy as all that, but maybe we'll be in the war. I was just thinking if I got through it and we felt the same way we feel now—”

Jeffrey found himself sitting up straighter. Something seemed to be in the room, just behind him.

“There's a lot of talk around here about whether we ought to get in it or keep out of it,” Jim said, “but it looks as though we won't have much to say about it. Of course, if we get into it, I want to do what you did. I don't want to wait to be drafted. I'm keeping on with Military Science.”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, “I know, you told me you were going to.”

“You like it, don't you?” Jim asked him. “What's the matter? I thought you'd like it.”

“Yes,” Jeffrey said, “I approve of it. I'd be doing it myself.”

It was back with him, as though he were living it again, only Jim was living it now, and there was not much time. It filled him with a sort of panic. No Americans were going abroad … there would never be another Expeditionary Force.… He could remember all the phrases, but they had a hollow note.

“Just remember,” Jeffrey said, “we're not in this show yet. Maybe it'll be all over without our being in it, I don't know.” The words did not help it, and he knew that no reasoning would. “The main thing to remember is not to take this too seriously.”

Then he found himself looking at Jim in the cool appraising way that he had looked at troops long ago, as though Jim were already in uniform and not his son. He was wondering whether Jim would make a good soldier, whether he was physically sound, whether he had too much imagination.

“I didn't know you'd take it this way,” Jim said.

“I'm not taking it any way,” Jeffrey answered.

“Why,” Jim said, “the way you act, you'd think that I was dead.”

“I'd just as soon you wouldn't say that,” Jeffrey said. He did not know that his voice would sound so loud and he saw that Jim looked startled. He was not behaving in a way that Jim would understand. He looked at his watch.

“I've got to get back to town,” he said. “If you want to have dinner tomorrow night, I'll take you to the show, but it's quite a mess, just now.”

“I should think it would drive you nuts,” Jim said. “It would drive me nuts.”

“Well,” Jeffrey answered, “it's one way to earn your living. Maybe I wouldn't be doing it, if it hadn't been for you.”

That was true enough. If it had not been for Madge and for Jim and Gwen and Charley, he would not have been rewriting other people's plays.

“I've been a lot of trouble to you, I guess,” Jim said. “I guess we all have.”

Jeffrey smiled at him and held out his hand.

“Let it be a lesson to you. Don't get married young,” he said. “Jim, have you got enough money?”

“It's near the end of the month. I could do with a little more,” Jim said, “but I don't like to keep taking it out of you.”

“That's all right,” Jeffrey answered. Everything was better, the way it had always been. “Call for me in town tomorrow, and I'll write you out a check. And Jim—” He paused and cleared his throat. “I think it's nice about that girl. I'd like to see her.”

“I'll tell her,” Jim said. “She'd like to see you, too. Why don't you ask her out to lunch sometime?”

26

We Were Young Ourselves Once

It was seven o'clock in the morning—the most uncomfortable hour of the day to Jeffrey—when he walked up the ramp from the somnolent row of Pullmans into the lights of the Grand Central Station. The station seemed to be rising out of a sullen sort of slumber. New York was always closer to being asleep at seven in the morning than at any other time. The faces of the Pullman porters and of the gate guards and of the few travelers crossing the deserted expanse by the information booth all bore a look of resentment. They all seemed to be saying that it was too early for them or for anyone else to be up. It was too early for the clothing shops and the bookstores and for most of the magazine and paper booths to be open. Nearly all the ticket windows were closed and so was the newsreel theater and so was the refreshment stand near the entrance to the subway. Outside the station on Lexington Avenue the sun was out, but the street looked bleak because it was too early. The taxicabs had a living, drooping air of cab horses standing in a rank.