AT the hotel they had been Mr.and Mrs.Spenser.When they moved, he tried to devise some way round this; but it was necessary that they have his address at the office, and Mrs.
Pershall with the glistening old-fashioned false teeth who kept the furnished-room house was not one in whose withered bosom it would be wise to raise a suspicion as to respectability.Only in a strenuously respectable house would he live; in the other sort, what might not untrustworthy Susan be up to? So Mr.and Mrs.Spenser they remained, and the truth was suspected by only a few of their acquaintances, was known by two or three of his intimates whom he told in those bursts of confidence to which voluble, careless men are given--and for which they in resolute self-excuse unjustly blame strong drink.
One of his favorite remarks to her--sometimes made laughingly, again ironically, again angrily, again insultingly, was in this strain:
"Your face is demure enough.But you look too damned attractive about those beautiful feet of yours to be respectable at heart--and trustable."That matter of her untrustworthiness had become a fixed idea with him.The more he concentrated upon her physical loveliness, the more he revolved the dangers, the possibilities of unfaithfulness; for a physical infatuation is always jealous.
His work on the _Herald_ made close guarding out of the question.
The best he could do was to pop in unexpectedly upon her from time to time, to rummage through her belongings, to check up her statements as to her goings and comings by questioning the servants and, most important of all, each day to put her through searching and skillfully planned cross-examination.She had to tell him everything she did--every little thing--and he calculated the time, to make sure she had not found half an hour or so in which to deceive him.If she had sewed, he must look at the sewing; if she had read, he must know how many pages and must hear a summary of what those pages contained.As she would not and could not deceive him in any matter, however small, she was compelled to give over a plan quietly to look for work and to fit herself for some occupation that would pay a living wage--if there were such for a beginning woman worker.
At first he was covert in this detective work, being ashamed of his own suspicions.But as he drank, as he associated again with the same sort of people who had wasted his time in Cincinnati, he rapidly became franker and more inquisitorial.And she dreaded to see the look she knew would come into his eyes, the cruel tightening of his mouth, if in her confusion and eagerness she should happen not instantly to satisfy the doubt behind each question.He tormented her; he tormented himself.She suffered from humiliation; but she suffered more because she saw how his suspicions were torturing him.And in her humility and helplessness and inexperience, she felt no sense of right to resist, no impulse to resist.
And she forced herself to look on his spasms of jealousy as the occasional storms which occur even in the best climates.She reminded herself that she was secure of his love, secure in his love; and in her sad mood she reproached herself for not being content when at bottom everything was all right.After what she had been through, to be sad because the man she loved loved her too well! It was absurd, ungrateful.
He pried into every nook and corner of her being with that ingenious and tireless persistence human beings reserve for searches for what they do not wish to find.At last he contrived to find, or to imagine he had found, something that justified his labors and vindicated his disbelief in her.
They were walking in Fifth Avenue one afternoon, at the hour when there is the greatest press of equipages whose expensively and showily dressed occupants are industriously engaged in the occupation of imagining they are doing something when in fact they are doing nothing.What a world! What a grotesque confusing of motion and progress! What fantastic delusions that one is busy when one is merely occupied! They were between Forty-sixth Street and Forty-seventh, on the west side, when a small victoria drew up at the curb and a woman descended and crossed the sidewalk before them to look at the display in a milliner's window.Susan gave her the swift, seeing glance which one woman always gives another--the glance of competitors at each other's offerings.Instead of glancing away, Susan stopped short and gazed.Forgetting Rod, she herself went up to the millinery display that she might have a fuller view of the woman who had fascinated her.
"What's the matter?" cried Spenser."Come on.You don't want any of those hats."But Susan insisted that she must see, made him linger until the woman returned to her carriage and drove away.She said to Rod:
"Did you see her?"
"Yes.Rather pretty--nothing to scream about.""But her _style!_" cried Susan.
"Oh, she was nicely dressed--in a quiet way.You'll see thousands a lot more exciting after you've been about in this town a while.""I've seen scores of beautifully dressed women here--and in Cincinnati, too," replied Susan."But that woman--she was _perfect_.And that's a thing I've never seen before.""I'm glad you have such quiet tastes--quiet and inexpensive.""Inexpensive!" exclaimed Susan."I don't dare think how much that woman's clothes cost.You only glanced at her, Rod, you didn't _look_.If you had, you'd have seen.Everything she wore was just right." Susan's eyes were brilliant."Oh, it was wonderful! The colors--the fit--the style--the making--every big and little thing.She was a work of art, Rod! That's the first woman I've seen in my life that I through and through envied."Rod's look was interested now."You like that sort of thing a lot?" he inquired with affected carelessness.