Usually, they were; they gave out a great deal of themselves in that eternal willingness and enthusiasm which makes a successful guest—it became their profession. Moving through a world that was growing rich with the war in Europe, Stuart had somewhere lost his way. Twice playing brilliant golf in the national amateur, he accepted a job as professional at a club which his father had helped to found. He was restless and unhappy.
This week-end they were visiting a pupil of his. As a consequence of a mixed foursome, the Oldhornes went upstairs to dress for dinner surcharged with the unpleasant accumulation of many unsatisfactory months. In the afternoon, Stuart had played with their hostess and Helen with another man—a situation which Stuart always dreaded, because it forced him into competition with Helen. He had actually tried to miss that putt on the eighteenth—to just miss it. But the ball dropped in the cup. Helen went through the superficial motions of a good loser, but she devoted herself pointedly to her partner for the rest of the afternoon.
Their expressions still counterfeited amusement as they entered their room.
When the door closed, Helen’s pleasant expression faded and she walked toward the dressing table as though her own reflection was the only decent company with which to forgather. Stuart watched her, frowning.
“I know why you’re in a rotten humor,” he said; “though I don’t believe you know yourself.”
“I’m not in a rotten humor,” Helen responded in a clipped voice.
“You are; and I know the real reason—the one you don’t know. It’s because I holed that putt this afternoon.”
She turned slowly, incredulously, from the mirror.
“Oh, so I have a new fault! I’ve suddenly become, of all things, a poor sport!”
“It’s not like you to be a poor sport,” he admitted, “but otherwise why all this interest in other men, and why do you look at me as if I’m—well, slightly gamy?”
“I’m not aware of it.”
“I am.” He was aware, too, that there was always some man in their life now—some man of power and money who paid court to Helen and gave her the sense of solidity which he failed to provide. He had no cause to be jealous of any particular man, but the pressure of many was irritating. It annoyed him that on so slight a grievance, Helen should remind him by her actions that he no longer filled her entire life.
“If Anne can get any satisfaction out of winning, she’s welcome to it,” said Helen suddenly.
“Isn’t that rather petty? She isn’t in your class; she won’t qualify for the third flight in Boston.”
Feeling herself in the wrong, she changed her tone.
“Oh, that isn’t it,” she broke out. “I just keep wishing you and I could play together like we used to. And now you have to play with dubs, and get their wretched shots out of traps. Especially”—she hesitated—“especially when you’re so unnecessarily gallant.”
The faint contempt in her voice, the mock jealousy that covered a growing indifference was apparent to him. There had been a time when, if he danced with another woman, Helen’s stricken eyes followed him around the room.
“My gallantry is simply a matter of business,” he answered. “Lessons have brought in three hundred a month all summer. How could I go to see you play at Boston next week, except that I’m going to coach other women?”
“And you’re going to see me win,” announced Helen. “Do you know that?”
“Naturally, I want nothing more,” Stuart said automatically. But the unnecessary defiance in her voice repelled him, and he suddenly wondered if he really cared whether she won or not.
At the same moment, Helen’s mood changed and for a moment she saw the true situation—that she could play in amateur tournaments and Stuart could not, that the new cups in the rack were all hers now, that he had given up the fiercely competitive sportsmanship that had been the breath of life to him in order to provide necessary money.
“Oh, I’m so sorry for you, Stuart!” There were tears in her eyes. “It seems such a shame that you can’t do the things you love, and I can. Perhaps I oughtn’t to play this summer.”
“Nonsense,” he said. “You can’t sit home and twirl your thumbs.”
She caught at this: “You wouldn’t want me to. I can’t help being good at sports; you taught me nearly all I know. But I wish I could help you.”
“Just try to remember I’m your best friend. Sometimes you act as if we were rivals.”
She hesitated, annoyed by the truth of his words and unwilling to concede an inch; but a wave of memories rushed over her, and she thought how brave he was in his eked-out, pieced-together life; she came and threw her arms around him.
“Darling, darling, things are going to be better. You’ll see.”
Helen won the finals in the tournament at Boston the following week. Following around with the crowd, Stuart was very proud of her. He hoped that instead of feeding her egotism, the actual achievement would make things easier between them. He hated the conflict that had grown out of their wanting the same excellences, the same prizes from life.
Afterward he pursued her progress toward the clubhouse, amused and a little jealous of the pack that fawned around her. He reached the club among the last, and a steward accosted him. “Professionals are served in the lower grill, please,” the man said.
“That’s all right. My name’s Oldhorne.”
He started to walk by, but the man barred his way.
“Sorry, sir. I realize that Mrs. Oldhorne’s playing in the match, but my orders are to direct the professionals to the lower grill, and I understand you are a professional.”
“Why, look here—” Stuart began, wildly angry, and stopped. A group of people were listening. “All right; never mind,” he said gruffly, and turned away.
The memory of the experience rankled; it was the determining factor that drove him, some weeks later, to a momentous decision. For a long time he had been playing with the idea of joining the Canadian Air Force, for service in France. He knew that his absence would have little practical bearing on the lives of Helen and the children; happening on some friends who were also full of the restlessness of 1915, the matter was suddenly decided. But he had not counted on the effect upon Helen; her reaction was not so much one of grief or alarm, but as if she had been somehow outwitted.
“But you might have told me!” she wailed. “You leave me dangling; you simply take yourself away without any warning.”
Once again Helen saw him as the bright and intolerably blinding hero, and her soul winced before him as it had when they first met. He was a warrior; for him, peace was only the interval between wars, and peace was destroying him. Here was the game of games beckoning him—— Without throwing over the whole logic of their lives, there was nothing she could say.
“This is my sort of thing,” he said confidently, younger with his excitement. “A few more years of this life and I’d go to pieces, take to drink. I’ve somehow lost your respect, and I’ve got to have that, even if I’m far away.”
She was proud of him again; she talked to everyone of his impending departure. Then, one September afternoon, she came home from the city, full of the old feeling of comradeship and bursting with news, to find him buried in an utter depression.
“Stuart,” she cried, “I’ve got the—” She broke off. “What’s the matter, darling? Is something the matter?”
He looked at her dully. “They turned me down,” he said.
“What?”
“My left eye.” He laughed bitterly. “Where that dub cracked me with the brassie. I’m nearly blind in it.”
“Isn’t there anything you can do?”
“Nothing.”
“Stuart!” She stared at him aghast. “Stuart, and I was going to tell you! I was saving it for a surprise. Elsa Prentice has organized a Red Cross unit to serve with the French, and I joined it because I thought it would be wonderful if we both went. We’ve been measured for uniforms and bought our outfits, and we’re sailing the end of next week.”
IV
Helen was a blurred figure among other blurred figures on a boat deck, dark against the threat of submarines. When the ship had slid out into the obscure future, Stuart walked eastward along Fifty-seventh Street. His grief at the severance of many ties was a weight he carried in his body, and he walked slowly, as if adjusting himself to it. To balance this there was a curious sensation of lightness in his mind. For the first time in twelve years he was alone, and the feeling came over him that he was alone for good; knowing Helen and knowing war, he could guess at the experiences she would go through, and he could not form any picture of a renewed life together afterward. He was discarded; she had proved the stronger at last. It seemed very strange and sad that his marriage should have such an ending.
He came to Carnegie Hall, dark after a concert, and his eye caught the name of Theodore Van Beck, large on the posted bills. As he stared at it, a green door opened in the side of the building and a
