Waltz Into Darkness (25 page)

"I
no longer know how," he said in glum parenthesis. "You saw
to that. How long were you there, at this institution ?"

"Until
I was fifteen, I think. Or close onto it. I've never had an exact
birthday, you see. That's another thing I've done without. I made one
up for myself, at one time; just as the name. I chose St. Valentine's
Day, because it was so festive. But then I tired of it after a while,
and no longer kept up with it."

He
gazed at her without speaking.

She
sighed weariedly, to draw fresh breath for continuation.

"Anyway,
I ran away from there when I Was fifteen. They accused me of stealing
something, and they beat me for it. They'd accused me before, and
they'd beaten me before. But at thirteen I knew no better than to
endure it, at fifteen I no longer would. I climbed over the wall at
night. Some of the other girls helped me, but they lacked the courage
to come with me." And then she said with an odd, speculative
sort of detachment, as though she were speaking of someone else:
"That's one thing I've never been, at least: a coward."

"You've
never been a coward," he assented, but as though finding small
cause for satisfaction in the estimate.

"It
was up in Pennsylvania," she went on. "It was bitterly
cold. I remember trudging the roadside for hours, until at last a
drayman gave me a ride in his wagon--"

"You're
from the North?" he said. "I hadn't known. You don't speak
as they do up there."

"North,
South," she shrugged. "It's all one. I speak as they do
wherever I've been last, until I come to a new place."

And
always lies, he thought; never the truth.

"I
came to Philadelphia. An old woman took me in for a while, an old
witch. She found me ready to drop on the cobbles. I thought she was
kind at first, but she wasn't. After she'd fed and rested me for a
few days, she put me into the clothes of a younger child--! was
small, you see--and took me with her to shop in the stores. She said
'Watch me,' and showed me how to filch things from the counters
without being detected. I ran away from her too, finally."

"But
not without having done it yourself, first." He watched her
closely to see if she'd labor with the answer.

She
didn't stop for breath. "Not without having done it myself,
first. She would only give me food when I had."

"And
then what happened?"

"I
worked a little, as a scrub girl, a slavey; I worked in a bakery
kitchen, helping to make the rolls; I even worked as a laundress'
helper. I was homeless more often than I had a place to sleep."
She averted her head for a moment, so that her neck drew into a taut
line. "Mostly, I can no longer remember those days. What's more,
I don't want to."

She
probably sold herself on the streets, he thought, and his heart
sickened at the suggestion, as though she were in actuality someone
to cherish.

With
an almost uncanny clairvoyance, she said just then: "There was
one way I could have got along, but I wouldn't take it."

Lies,
he vowed, lies; but his heart sang wildly.

"I
ran in horror from a woman one night who had coaxed me into stopping
in her house for a cup of tea."

"Admirable,"
he said drily.

"Oh,
don't give me credit for goodness," she said, with a sudden
little flare of candor. "Give me credit for perversity, rather.
I hated every human being in the world, at times, in those days, for
what I was going through; man, woman, and child. I would give no one
what they wanted of me, because no one would give me what I wanted of
them."

He
looked downward mutely, trapped at last into credulity, however
brief; this time even of the mind as well as the heart.

"Well,
I'd best be brief. It's what happened on the river you want to know
of, mainly. I fell in with a troupe of traveling actors, joined up
with them. They didn't even play in regular theatres. They had no
money to afford them. They went about and pitched tents. And from
there I fell in with a man who was a professional gambler on the
river boats. The girl who had been his partner before then had
quitted him to marry a plantation owner--or so he told me-- and he
was looking for someone to take her place. He offered me a share of
his profits, if I would join with him." She waved her hand. "And
it was but a different form of acting, after all. With quarters
preferable to the ones I'd been used to." She stopped.

"He
was the one," she told him.

"What
was his name, what was he called?" he said with a sudden access
of interest.

"What
does it matter? His name was false, like mine was. On every trip it
changed. It had to, as a precaution. Once it was McLarnin. Once it
was Rideau. I doubt that I ever knew his real one, in all the time we
were together. I doubt that he did himself, any more. He's gone now.
Don't ask me to remember."

She's
trying to protect him, he thought. "You must have called him
something."

She
gave a smile of sour reminiscence. "Brother dear.' So that
others could hear me. That was part of my role. We traveled as
brother and sister. I insisted on that. We each had our own cabin."

"And
he agreed." It wasn't a question, it was a statement of
disbelief.

"At
first he objected. His former partner, it seems--well, that's neither
here nor there. I pointed out to him that it was better even for his
own purposes that way, and when I had made him see that, he agreed
readily enough. Business came first with him, always. He had a
sweetheart in every river town, he could forego one more. You see, I
acted as the--attraction, the magnet, for him. My part was to drop my
handkerchief on the deck, or collide with someone in a narrow
passageway, or even lose my bearings and have to seek directions of
someone. There is no harm in gentlemen striking up a respectful
acquaintance with a man's unmarried sister. Whereas had I been
thought his wife--or something else--they would have been deterred.
Then, as propriety dictated, I would introduce my brother to them at
the earliest opportunity. And the game would take place soon
afterward."

"You
played ?"

"Never.
Only a shameless hussy would play cards with men."

"You
were present, though."

"I
replenished their drinks. Flirted a little, to keep them in good
humor. I sided with them against my own brother when there was a
dispute."

"You
signalled."

Her
shoulders tipped slightly, in philosophic resignation. "That's
what I was there for."

His
arms were folded, in the attitude of one passing grim judgment--or
rather having already irrevocably passed it--whom none of the pleas,
the importunities, of the suppliant could any longer sway. He tapped
his fingers restlessly against the sides of his own arms.

"And
what of Julia? The other Julia, the actual one?"

"I've
come to that now," she murmured acquiescently. She drew deep
breath to see her through the cumulative part of her recital. "We
used to go down about once a month, never more often. It wouldn't
have been prudent. Stop a while, and then go up again. We left St.
Louis the eighteenth of May the last time, on the City of New
Orleans."

"As
she did."

She
nodded. "The first night out something went wrong. He met his
match at last. I don't know how it came about. It could not have been
sheer luck on the prospect's part, for he had too many sure ways of
curing that. It must have been that he'd finally come across someone
who had even better tricks than his own up his sleeve. I couldn't see
the man's cards; he seemed to play from memory, keeping them turned
inward to one another face to face. And all my messages to show the
suits, by fondling necklace, bracelet, earring, finger ring, were
worthless, I couldn't send them. The game kept on for half the night,
and my partner lost steadily, until at last he had nothing left to
play with any longer. And since, in these games, the players were
always travelers and strangers to one another, nothing but actual
money was ever used, so the loss was real."

"The
cheaters cheated," he commented.

"But
long before that, hours earlier, the man had already asked me to
leave the two of them to themselves. Pointedly, but in such a polite
way that there was nothing I could do but obey, or risk bringing to
the point of open accusation the certainty that it was obvious he
already felt about me. He pretended he was unused to playing in the
presence of ladies, and wished to remove his coat and waistcoat, and
the instant permission I gave him to do so, he rejected, so I had to
go. My partner tried to forbid it by every urgent signal at his
command, but there was no further use in my remaining there, so I
went. We'd fallen into our own trap, I'm afraid.

"Loitering
on deck, beside the rail, a woman, unaccompanied like myself,
presently stopped beside me and struck up a conversation. I was not
used to chatting with other women, there was no meat in it for my
purpose, so at first I gave her only half an ear.

"She
was a fool. Within the space of minutes she was telling me all her
business, unsolicited. Who she was, where she was bound, what her
purpose in going there was. She was too trustful, she had no
experience of the outside world. Especially the world of the river
boats, and the people you meet on them.

"I
tried to shake her off at first, but without succeeding. She attached
herself to me, followed me around. It was as though she were starving
for a confidante, had to have someone to pour out her heart to, she
was brimming so full of romantic anticipations. She gave me your
name, and, stopping by a lighted doorway, insisted on taking out and
showing me the picture you had sent her, and even reading passages
from the last letter or two you had sent her, as though they were
Holy Gospel.

"At
last, just when I was beginning to feel I could bear no more of it
without revealing my true feelings by a burst of temper that would
have startled her into silence once and for all, she discovered
the-for her--lateness of the hour and fled in the direction of her
own cabin like a tardy child, turning all the way to wave back at me,
she was so taken by me.

"We
had a bitter quarrel later that night, he and I. He accused me of
neglecting our 'business.' Unwisely, in self-defense, I told him
about her. That she was on her way, sight unseen, to marry a man
worth one hundred thousand dollars, who--"

He
straightened alertly. "How could she know that?" he said
sharply. "I only told the 'you' that was supposed to be she
after you'd once arrived and were standing on the dock beside me."

She
laughed humorlessly. "She'd investigated, long before she'd ever
left St. Louis. I may have fooled you in the greater way, but she
fooled you just as surely in the lesser."

He
held silent for a long moment, almost as if finding in this new
revelation of feminine guile some amelioration of her own.

Presently,
unurged, as if gauging to a nicety the length of time he should be
allowed for contemplation, of what she knew him to be contemplating,
she proceeded.

"I
saw him look at me when I told him that. He broke off our quarrel
then and there, and left me, and paced the deck for a while. I can
only tell you what happened as it happened. I did not know then its
meaning as it was happening. Looking back, I can give it meaning now.
I couldn't have then. You must believe me. You must, Lou."

She
clasped her hands, and brought them close before his face, and wrung
them supplicatingly.

"I
must? By what compulsion?"

"This
is the truth I'm telling tonight. Every word the truth, if never
before, if never again."

If
never before, if never again, he caught himself gullibly repeating
after her, unheard in his own mind.

"I
went out again to find him, to ask him if he intended to recoup his
losses any more that night; if he'd have any further need of me, or
if I could shut my door and go to sleep. I found him motionless, in
deep thought, against the rail. The moon was down and the river was
getting dark. We were still coasting the lower Missouri shore, I
think we were to clear it before dawn. I scarcely knew him for sure
until I was at his elbow, he was so indistinct in the gloom.

"He
said to me in a whisper, 'Knock on her door and invite her out for a
walk on deck with you.'