Edith Wharton - SSC 10 (2 page)

 
          
She
was not beautiful; he was certain of that. He was not good at seeing people,
really seeing them, even when they were before his eyes, much less at
visualizing them in absence. When Nadeja was away all he could ever evoke of
her was a pleasant blur. But he wasn’t such a blind bat as not to know when a
woman was beautiful. Beauty, however, was made to look at, not to live with; he
had never wanted to marry a beautiful woman. And Nadeja wasn’t clever, either;
not in talk, that is. (And that, he mused, was certainly one of her qualities.)
With regard to the other social gifts, so-called: cards, for instance? Well, he
knew she and Katinka were not above fishing out an old pack and telling their
fortunes, when they thought he wasn’t noticing; but anything as scientific as
bridge frightened her, and she had the good sense not to try to learn. So much
for society; and as for the home—well, she could hardly be called a good
housekeeper, he supposed. But remembering his mother, who had been accounted a
paragon in that line, he gave thanks for this deficiency of Nadeja’s also.
Finally he said to himself: “I seem to like her for all the things she is
not.”
This was not satisfactory; but he
could do no better. “Well, somehow, she fits into the cracks,” he concluded; and
inadequate as this also sounded, he felt it might turn out to be a clue to the
Kouradjines. Yes, they certainly fitted in; squeezing you a little, overlapping
you a good deal, but never—and there was the point—sticking into you like the
proverbial thorn, or crowding you uncomfortably, or for any reason making you
wish they weren’t there.

 
          
This
fact, of which he had been dimly conscious from the first, arrested his
attention now because he had a sudden glimpse of its business possibilities.
Little Boris had only had to borrow a hundred dollars of him for the trip to
Hollywood
, and behold little Boris was already
affianced to the world’s leading movie-star! In the light of this surprising
event Targatt suddenly recalled that Katinka, not long before, had asked him if
he wouldn’t give Dmitri, who had not been a success at the bank, a letter
recommending him for some sort of employment in the office of a widowed
millionaire who was the highest light on Targatt’s business horizon. Targatt
had received the suggestion without enthusiasm. “Your sister’s crazy,” he said
to Nadeja. “How can I recommend that fellow to a man like Bellamy? Has he ever
had any business training?”

 
          
“Well,
we know Mr. Bellamy’s looking for a book-keeper, because he asked you if you
knew of one,” said Nadeja.

 
          
“Yes;
but what are Dmitri’s qualifications? Does he know anything whatever about
book-keeping?”

 
          
“No; not yet.
But he says perhaps he could buy a little book
about it.”

 
          
“Oh,
Lord—” Targatt groaned.

 
          
“Even
so, you don’t think you could recommend him, darling?”

 
          
“No;
I couldn’t, I’m afraid.”

 
          
Nadeja
did not insist; she never insisted. “I’ve found out a new restaurant, where
they make much better blinys. Shall I tell them all to meet us there tonight at
half-past eight?” she suggested.

 
          
Now,
in the light of Boris’s news, Targatt began to think this conversation over.
Dmitri was an irredeemable fool; but Katinka—what about giving the letter for
old Bellamy to Katinka? Targatt didn’t see exactly how he could word it; but he
had an idea that Nadeja would tell him. Those were the ways in which she was
really clever. A few days later he asked: “Has Dmitri got a job yet?”

 
          
She
looked at him in surprise. “No; as you couldn’t recommend him he didn’t buy the
book.”

 
          
“Oh,
damn the book… See here, Nadeja; supposing I
were
to
give Katinka a letter for old Bellamy?”

 
          
He
had made the suggestion with some
embarrassment,
half
expecting that he would have to explain.
But not to Nadeja.
“Oh, darling, you always think of the right thing,” she answered, kissing him;
and as he had foreseen she told him just how to word the letter.

 
          
“And
I will lend her my silver fox to wear,” she added. Certainly the social
education of the Kouradjines had been far more comprehensive than Targatt’s.

 
          
Katinka
went to see Mr. Bellamy, and when she returned she reported favourably on the
visit. Nothing was as yet decided about Dmitri, as she had been obliged to
confess that he had had no training as an accountant; but Mr. Bellamy had been
very kind, and had invited her to come to his house some afternoon to see his
pictures.

 
          
From
this visit also Katinka came back well-pleased, though she seemed not to have
accomplished anything further with regard to Dmitri. She had, however, been
invited by Mr.

 
          
Bellamy
to dine and go to a play; and a few weeks afterward she said to Targatt and
Nadeja: “I think I will live with Mr. Bellamy. He has an empty flat that I
could have, and he would furnish it beautifully.”

 
          
Though
Targatt prided himself on an unprejudiced mind he winced slightly at this
suggestion. It seemed cruel to
Dmitri,
and decidedly
uncomfortable as far as Targatt and Nadeja were concerned.

 
          
“But,
Katinka, if Bellamy’s so gone on you, he ought to marry you,” he said severely.

 
          
Katinka
nodded her assent. “Certainly he ought. And I think he will, after I have lived
with him a few months.”

 
          
This
upset every single theory of Targatt’s with regard to his own sex. “But, my
poor girl—if you go and live with a man first like … like any woman he could
have for money, why on earth should he want to marry you afterward?”

 
          
Katinka
looked at him calmly. Her eyelashes were not as long as Nadeja’s, but her eyes
were as full of wisdom. “Habit,” she said simply; and in an instant Targatt’s
conventional world was in fragments at his feet. Who knew better than he did
that if you once had the Kouradjine habit you couldn’t be cured of it? He said
nothing more, and sat back to watch what happened to Mr. Bellamy.

 
          
  

 
          
Mr.
Bellamy did not offer Dmitri a position as book-keeper; but soon after his
marriage to Katinka he took him into his house as social secretary. Targatt had
a first movement of surprise and disapproval, but he saw that Nadeja did not
share it. “That’s very nice,” she said. “I was sure Katinka would not desert
Dmitri. And Mr. Bellamy is so generous. He is going to adopt Katinka’s three
children.”

 
          
But
it must not be thought that the fortunes of all the Kouradjines ran as
smoothly. For a brief moment Targatt had imagined that the infatuated Bellamy
was going to assume the charge of the whole tribe; but Wall Street was
beginning to be uneasy, and Mr. Bellamy restricted his hospitality to Katinka’s
children and Dmitri, and, like many of the very rich, manifested no interest in
those whose misfortunes did not immediately interfere with his own comfort.
Thus
vanished
even the dream of a shared
responsibility, and Targatt saw himself facing a business outlook decidedly
less dazzling, and with a still considerable number of Kouradjines to provide
for. Olga, in particular, was a cause of some anxiety. She was less adaptable,
less suited to fitting into cracks, than the others, and her various
experiments in song and dance had all broken down for lack of perseverance. But
she was (at least so Nadeja thought) by far the best-looking of the family; and
finally Targatt decided to pay for her journey to Hollywood, in the hope that
Boris would put her in the way of becoming a screen star. This suggestion, however,
was met by a telegram from Boris ominously dated from Reno: “Don’t send Olga
am
divorcing Halma.”

 
          
For
the first time since his marriage Targatt felt really discouraged. Were there
perhaps too many
Kouradjines,
and might the Kouradjine
habit after all be beginning to wear thin? The
family were
all greatly perturbed by Boris’s news, and when—after the brief interval
required to institute and complete divorce proceedings against his film
star—Boris left Reno and turned up in New York, his air of unperturbed
good-humour was felt to be unsuitable to the occasion. Nadeja, always hopeful,
interpreted it as meaning that he was going to marry another and even richer
star; but Boris said God forbid, and no more Hollywood for him. Katinka and
Bellamy did not invite him to come and stay, and the upshot of it was that his
bed was made up on the Targatts’ drawing-room divan, while he shared the
bathroom with Targatt and Nadeja.

 
          
Things
dragged on in this way for some weeks, till one day Nadeja came privately to
her husband. “He has got three millions,” she whispered with wide eyes. “Only
yesterday was he sure. The cheque has come. Do you think, darling, she ought to
have allowed him more?”

 
          
Targatt
did not think so; he was inarticulate over Boris’s achievement. “What’s he
going to do with it?” he gasped.

 
          
“Well,
I think first he will invest it, and then he will go to the Lido. There is a
young girl there, I believe,
that
he is in love with.
I knew Boris would not divorce for nothing. He is going there to meet her.”

 
          
Targatt
could not disguise an impulse of indignation. Before investing his millions,
was Boris not going to do anything for his family? Nadeja said she had thought
of that too; but Boris said he had invested the money that morning, and of
course there would be no interest coming in till the next quarter. And
meanwhile he was so much in love that he had taken his passage for the
following day on the
Berengaria.
Targatt thought that only natural, didn’t he?

 
          
Targatt
swallowed his ire, and said, yes, he supposed it was natural enough. After all,
if the boy had found a young girl he could really love and respect, and if he
had the money to marry her and settle down, no one could blame him for rushing
off to press his suit. And Boris rushed.

 
          
But
meanwhile the elimination of two Kouradjines had not had the hoped-for effect
of reducing the total number of the tribe. On the contrary, that total had
risen; for suddenly three new members had appeared. One was an elderly and
completely ruined Princess (a distant cousin, Nadeja explained) with whom old
Kouradjine had decided to contract a tardy alliance, now that the rest of the
family were
provided for. (“He could do no less,” Katinka
and Nadeja mysteriously agreed.) And the other, and more sensational, newcomers
were two beautiful young creatures, known respectively to the tribe as Nick and
Mouna, but whose difficulties at the passport office made it seem that there
were legal doubts as to their remaining names. These difficulties, through
Targatt’s efforts, were finally overcome and snatched from the jaws of Ellis
Island, Nick and Mouna joyfully joined the party at another new restaurant,
“The Transcaucasian”, which Nadeja had recently discovered.

 
          
Targatt’s
immensely enlarged experience of human affairs left him in little doubt as to
the parentage of Nick and Mouna, and when Nadeja whispered to him one night
(through the tumult of Boris’s late bath next door): “You see, poor Papa felt
he could not longer fail to provide for them,” Targatt did not dream of asking
why.

 
          
But
he now had no less than seven Kouradjines more or less dependent on him, and
the next night he sat up late and did some figuring and thinking. Even to
Nadeja he could not explain in blunt language the result of this vigil; but he
said to her the following day: “What’s become of that flat of Bellamy’s that
Katinka lived in before—”

 
          
“Why,
he gave the lease to Katinka as a wedding-present; but it seems that people are
no more as rich as they were, and as it’s such a very handsome flat, and the
rent is high, the tenants can no longer afford to keep it—”