Chiffon Scarf (2 page)

The second cocktail came and Noel drank it promptly and put down the glass.

“Who’s the man Averill’s to marry?”

“Jim Cady. He’s in the plant.” Noel paused and said: “Lucky devil.”

“Lucky? Because of Averill, of course.”

“Averill and—the Blaine plant. We’re getting to be enormously successful, you know, with the manufacturing of airplane engines. And Averill’s giving him a large block of Blaine stock as a wedding present.”

Nice for him, thought Eden.

“Won’t that make rather a lot of family in the company, Noel? I mean—you are the only outside stockholder, aren’t you?”

“Yes. But it doesn’t matter. Bill and Averill, since Averill’s father’s death, have owned so much of the stock that my voice is purely moral.” He stopped there and laughed a little. “How do you like that? My voice being purely moral?”

“Creda owns stock, too, doesn’t she?”

“Oh yes. But not enough for much voting power. Anyway she’s Bill’s wife—difficult as it is for Creda to remember that.”

“I don’t know Creda much. Tell me about this Jim Cady. What’s he like?”

“Jim? Well—he’s a tall fellow; blond originally but always brown and sort of—weathered-looking in a nice way. Looks like a soldier somehow but isn’t.”

“I means what’s he like? He sounds a little calculating.”

“Well, Jim knows enough to come in out of the rain. He’s doing a pretty good job of feathering his own nest. But that’s all right. He’s an engineer; crazy about airplanes—always has been, I guess. He’s been working on this engine for three years. We’re going to make a lot of money out of her. That is, if Jim—” He stopped abruptly.

“If Jim what?”

“Oh—if things go right.” He frowned, stared into space for a thoughtful moment, shrugged and said: “Putting on your gloves? I suppose we’ll have to make a start. You look sweet—what a nice little hat. Are you pulling it at just the right angle for me? I hope so. The car will be this way.”

I
T WAS AVERILL’S CAR
waiting for them—long and black and sleek with the smartly uniformed chauffeur driving it smoothly. It was the kind of car Eden had been accustomed to in her childhood, had taken for granted.

The way from the airport to the Blaine house in Forest Park was new to her, however; years ago, when she’d spent vacations with Averill because Averill’s home was so near the school, they had come into the Union Station by train.

It was a longish drive. She remembered the gates into the private road which led, among others, to the Blaine house.

She remembered the house when they reached it: huge, a little gloomy, very ugly but extremely comfortable. Velvet lawns, bordered with shrubs, sloped upward toward its wide terraces.

Averill was waiting for them.

It had been two years since Eden had seen Averill. Involuntarily she touched her hair and straightened her hat and hoped she didn’t look as tired as she felt.

And stopped on the threshold, as she perceived that Averill stood there, at the foot of the stairs, waiting.

There was a moment of utter silence while they looked at each other.

It was a long look, measuring, instinctively and deeply guarded.

She’s not changed, thought Eden swiftly. She’s beautiful and poised and certain of herself. Powerful.

The first thought was followed by another, swift, too, and curiously poignant. Averill’s eyes had become a little fixed: her white eyelids lowered—then she came forward, smiling. And she was not glad to see Eden.

She said, “There you are,” and put out her hands.

She was already dressed for dinner. To Eden in that first glimpse every detail was as sharp and clear as if it were etched in black and white with a steel point. She was as always almost incredibly small and neat and sleek, with her soft dark hair parted precisely in the middle so you saw the white, regular part and folded demurely and neatly upon her small skull into a smooth roll at the back of her long slender neck. She wasn’t pretty but she was indubitably chic and so well articulated physically that every attitude and every motion she made seemed carefully planned, part of a pattern. Her face was slender with the flesh stretched rather tightly over a somewhat prominent and high forehead and cheekbones; sometimes her nose and chin would be angular and a little sharp, now they merely gave her small, extraordinarily demure face a certain character. She was always dressed with extreme smartness, liking styles that set off her long neck and slenderness. She wore that night a gown of white dull silk, with a great splash of scarlet across the front; it was almost arrogant in its simplicity of cut and in its daring of design. Only a woman as perfectly poised and as slender as Averill could have appeared with a great scarlet—lobster, was it? Eden wondered, dragon?—splashed upon her diaphragm.

“Eden, my dear,” she said and offered her cheek to Eden. Since Eden offered her own cheek simultaneously, the result was not exactly a gesture of affection. “You were dear to come. I hoped you would. Your room is ready, darling. Celeste will unpack for you—I hate to hurry you but dinner will be in another half-hour or so. I expected you rather sooner.”

“She lured me into three cocktails,” said Noel. “She’s learned bad ways in the city.”

“I don’t imagine you needed much luring,” said Averill. Her eyes were brown—a shallow brown, with gray and amber lights, and remote, even at her most friendly moments.

“I’ll come with you, Eden dear. Noel—there isn’t much time.”

“She means hurry up and get dressed. And sober. I am sober, my sweet.” He took Averill’s hand and kissed it. “If I must drown my troubles in drink, it’s you that have brought me to this, Averill,” he said. “All right—all right, don’t frown. I’ll go. Excuse me, Eden. See you both at dinner. Averill, if Pace hasn’t yet agreed to buy the engine, he will when you persuade him in that outfit.”

“Sh.” Averill glanced quickly up the wide stairway. “He’s here. He’s just arrived—ten minutes ago.”

Noel’s face sobered instantly. “Up there? Oh my God. Well, here’s hoping.” He ran up the stairway ahead of them, Averill put her arm through Eden’s; it was a light, indescribably remote touch, as if there were distance between them, They followed, more slowly.

“Noel’s staying here just now,” said Averill. “So is Jim. We’ll live here, of course, after the wedding. You’ll—like Jim. He’ll go far. You remember Uncle Bill, of course.”

“Of course.”

“And Creda. They’ll move into a small house after the wedding. Everything is done; all the arrangements have gone wonderfully so far. Now if only this Pace—” Averill’s voice never shared the vivacity of her words; it was remote, shallow, unrevealing. It became still more remote when she said: “He’ll be stopping here tonight too, and tomorrow. He arrived a few moments ago. Eden, perhaps Noel told you, it’s really awfully important to please Pace. I’m putting him between you and me tonight at dinner.” She broke off abruptly as footsteps came along the hall above. They reached the top of the steps just as Bill Blaine, big, ruddy-faced, smiling so his cheeks made mere slits of his eyes, loomed up before them—huge and bulky in his dinner jacket.

“My God, it’s going to be hot tonight, Averill,” he said. “My collar will be gone in five minutes—” He perceived Eden and stopped. “Good heavens,” he said, peering. “It’s little Eden Shore. Grown up. Kiss me, my dear—or are you too old for that? You used to, you know; and I’d take you and Averill to the movies and feed you on ice-cream sodas.”

“How are you, Uncle Bill?” She put up her face dutifully for his kiss and patted his fat shoulder affectionately. And thought, in spite of herself, I would scarcely have known him if I’d met him on the street. Has he changed so much—or have I?

Yet she remembered his extravagant, bluff good humor.

And she thought how intensely alive he seemed—alive, and full of energy and vitality. As if he would go on forever; as if nothing could stop him.

He said then, gayly, as if there were no such thing as mortality, as fate, “Come downstairs when you’ve changed, dearie, and I’ll give you the best cocktail this side the Mississippi. Did you see the old lady as you flew over?”

“She could scarcely miss the river. We’ll hurry,” said Averill coolly. “I imagine Major Pace will be down soon, Uncle Bill.”

“Oh. All right, my dear. All right.”

He went down the wide stairs, puffing and singing to himself.

“This way, Eden, the room you always had. Remember it?”

How well she remembered! It was like coming, home to a place of luxury and beauty. A maid, fluttering white organdy apron strings above trim black, was already deftly unpacking. A soft green evening gown—a good one, selected with care from the store’s French-import room but sold to Eden at cost—lay on the bed. Water was running in the adjoining bathroom and there was the scent of lavender and geranium—clean and clear and sweet.

Averill followed her inside the room and the maid went out, closing the door. Her departure left a sudden, rather strained silence. Eden walked to the mirror, took off her hat and put it down.

“How good it seem to be here,” she said. It was a little unnerving to discover that in the sudden silence of the room her voice sounded hollow and false.

Averill said nothing; she was looking at Eden thoughtfully. As if probing again—measuring.

Regretting? Was that it? Did Averill regret having invited her to come, having sent her tickets, having made the trip possible?

But Averill had done it voluntarily, had urged Eden’s acceptance.

The thought was not reassuring. Eden was uneasy. She pushed her hands through her hair, watching herself in the mirror, loosening the flattened waves. Conscious of Averill’s still regard.

“You’ve not changed much,” said Averill suddenly.

She came nearer Eden, walking as always smoothly but quickly in her white silk, and put out a white small hand and jerked on a dressing-table light so the glow fell directly upon Eden’s face.

“You’ve not changed at all,” she said.

Eden smiled a little nervously.

“What did you expect in two years, Averill? Crow’s feet? Gray hair?”

Averill didn’t smile at all.

“Your job must not be a very hard one.”

“Why, really, Averill!” Eden checked her rising irritation. “It’s hard enough,” she said. “But it hasn’t exactly made a physical wreck of me yet.”

“It doesn’t seem very long,” said Averill slowly, “since you were here last. Remember?”

Eden wanted to move away from the mirror—away from Averill. But Averill took a step or two nearer so she stood directly beside Eden, adding her own cool, poised reflection to what the mirror already held. Eden was aware of her own image—her trim gray traveling suit; the jacket long and buttoned in front like a basque, the wide-shouldered gray sleeves faintly leg-o’-mutton; a narrow white band tight around her throat at the collar, her brown hair brushed upward like an old-fashioned print. She was aware of Averill’s figure beside her—of her white gown and slender white shoulders and the fantastic scarlet dragon across Averill’s incredibly slender body—of her smooth dark hair and the neat white part in it; of a faint odor of lilies—a perfume Averill had always used. She was aware of the glimpses of the room behind then mahogany and yellow chintz and a green dress carefully laid across the bed.

But the eyes of the two women met in the mirror. An all the rest was only a frame for Averill’s small, white fact her shallow, enigmatic brown eyes, holding Eden’s fixedly.

“You do remember, don’t you?” said Averill.

“I—yes.”

“It was a Christmas party. We came on from school.”

“Yes.”

“You had a crimson skirt and a little moleskin coat an cap and you pinned a sprig of mistletoe on your cap.”

“I don’t remember that,” said Eden—and did remember perfectly and wondered why she had said she hadn’t.

“Noel was here,” said Averill, her eyes unwavering, holding Eden’s in the mirror. “He was waiting for me. We were engaged. Don’t you remember? He was waiting for us a the steps and took me in his arms and kissed me and then said, ‘This is Eden, Noel, come to spend the holidays’; am he took your hands and then saw the mistletoe in your cap and kissed you, too.”

“That was so long ago.”

“Before the Christmas holidays were over—you were engaged to Noel and I had been quite neatly jilted.”

“Averill—you were twenty; I was eighteen. And an insufferable eighteen at that,” said Eden, striving for lightness

After a moment Averill smiled, too, quite deliberately and painstakingly.

“Yes, of course,” she said. “It’s odd how one does remember. I was so proud of showing off Noel to you—you had just won the leading role in the class play. I wanted it. Noel—a Prince Charming in those days and with that fantastic amount of money—seemed to even up the score between us.”

“It was Rosalind,” said Eden uncomfortably. “Oh, Averill do you remember the English teacher; the one with the nose?”

“Miss Beecham.” Averill’s mouth continued to smile; he eyes did not move from Eden’s. “Yes. But you got on top again—taking Noel away from me.”

With a ridiculous effort, Eden took a long breath and wrenched her eyes away from the reflection and turned face to face with Averill.

“We were children,” she said, laughing a little nervously. And added, again striving for lightness, “You know you said in your letter that if it hadn’t been for me you wouldn’t be marrying your Jim now. You ought to thank me, then.”

Her sudden and inexplicably frantic clutch for lightness merely achieved a kind of nervous flippancy.

Yes,” said Averill, still smiling. “My Jim—I must go and see to the table. If you want anything, you’ll ring. I’ll send Celeste in.”

She went away abruptly, except that Averill’s motions were never abrupt but always graceful and tidy as a cat’s.

The door closed neatly, precisely, behind her. “Ouch,” thought Eden. But she was perplexed and uncomfortable, too. She thought back to the affectionate terms of Averill’s letter; certainly there was no affection in her greeting. Yet Averill wouldn’t have asked her to come if she hadn’t wanted her. She shrugged her shoulders and opened her dressing case.