Youth Challenges Part 43

The house was unbearably lonely. As evening approached she found herself more than once listening for Bonbright's step on the stairs and his hand on the door.... At such times she cried. She puzzled herself.

She did not understand why she should be so lonely, nor why the expectation of Bonbright's step--with quick awakening to the knowledge that no foot of his would ever sound at her door again--should bring her tears.... She knew she should have been glad, relieved. With Bonbright she had lived in daily dread. She had not loved him, and the fear that his restraint would break, that he would force his love upon her, had made her days a ghastly dream.... She should be crying out with the joy and relief of his removal. But she felt no relief, felt no joy.... She could not understand it.

If Hilda Lightener, who came often and stayed long, had asked her if she missed Bonbright or were lonely without him, she would have denied it hotly. But Hilda did not ask.... Ruth did not ask that question of herself. She knew she was lonely, miserable, and she thought she knew why--but Bonbright's absence had nothing to do with it.

Hilda watched, she did not talk about Bonbright, for she saw her task was to help Ruth over these first few days. Her suspicions were her own, but, being a woman, she understood the baffling psychology of another woman and what harm a premature word might work.... If the thing she believed were true, then time would bring its realization to Ruth. Ruth must discover the truth for herself....

"I can't stand this," Ruth said one evening. "I can't bear to stay here alone in these rooms. If there were work enough to keep me busy--but there's nothing."

"If you'd only go the places I ask you to," said Hilda.

"I don't want to meet people--your sort of people. They must know what has happened.... I couldn't have them looking at me with their catty, curious eyes."

"Most of them would be very kind," Hilda said.

"No.... I'm going to work. I'm going to find a place and work...."

"But--" Hilda wondered what Bonbright would think of that. She imagined he would not like it.

"I know what you were going to say. He wouldn't want me to. Maybe he wouldn't--but if he knew he'd let me do it. I tell you I've got to, Hilda."

"You've got to decide for yourself," Hilda admitted, so Ruth became a job hunter, and because intelligent stenographers are by no means as plentiful as daisies in a July field, she was not long in finding employment.... From that day life was easier. She found her wages were ample to support herself and pay the rent of her apartment. Ample, in that they sufficed. There was no surplus. So she folded and put away the weekly checks she received from Bonbright. She did not send them back to him because, to her mind, that would have been a weekly slap in his face. But she would not cash them. There was a difference to her; probably there was a real difference.

Of a Sunday Ruth often went driving with Hilda, and Hilda noticed how closely her companion watched the sidewalks, how she scrutinized the pa.s.sing crowds. It was as though Ruth were trying to catch sight of somebody.... While daylight lasted Hilda saw that Ruth was drawn to her windows to sit looking down at the street. Once Hilda ventured dangerously.

"Why do you always sit there watching folks go by?" she asked.

Ruth turned and looked at her strangely. "I--why, I don't know," she said.

Of herself Ruth rarely mentioned Bonbright; never unless in some recollection of him, or if Hilda meddled with some portion of the household that had been peculiarly Bonbright's. As, for instance:

"Why don't you move that leather chair out of the other bedroom?" Hilda asked. "It's doing no good there and it looks mighty comfortable."

"That was HIS chair," Ruth said, quickly. "He used to sit there and read after--after I had gone to bed."

Once Ruth asked for news of Bonbright. After that Hilda brought her news voluntarily. Not too frequently, but often enough according to her notion. Betweentimes she gave Ruth plenty of time to wonder what was happening to her husband. Ruth knew Hilda saw him often. She wondered if they talked about her, and what they said, but that she never asked, nor did Hilda refer to such conversations. Indeed, these were few and sparing, for Bonbright could not be made to talk about his wife--even to her. But she gave Bonbright news of Ruth just as she gave Ruth news of Bonbright.

Sometimes Hilda tormented Ruth with set purpose.

"Bonbright looks mighty thin," she said. "I think he's working too hard. If he keeps it up he'll make himself sick."

"Oh..." said Ruth--nothing more, but for the rest of that Sunday she was quiet--very quiet.

Once Hilda found Ruth in a pa.s.sion of tears, and when she sought the reason she learned that Ruth had met Dulac on the street, face to face, and that he had spoken to her. He had told Ruth that he was staying in the city because of her; that he would not go without her. ... He had been careless of listening ears, not concealing his emotions.

"Well, he didn't hurt you, did he?"

"No," said Ruth.

"You weren't afraid of him?"

"No."

"You--didn't want to go away with him?"

"No.... No...."

"Then what are you making all the fuss about? He can't carry you off"

'HE might have seen us together," said Ruth. "And--and it made me--remember--that horrid afternoon."

"What if Bonbright did see you together? Don't you suppose Bonbright thinks you are seeing him? Of course he does. What else would he think?

Naturally he supposes you are going to have your divorce when the year is up, and marry Mr. Dulac." Hilda was merciless.

"Does he think that? Are you sure?"

Hilda shrugged her shoulders.

"He mustn't think it," Ruth said, affrightedly. "Why, he--If he thought that--"

"If he thought that--what?"

Ruth bit her lips and turned away. "Nothing," she said. Then: "Can't you let him know?... Not tell him, you know, but--sort of let him understand."

"If I can see a good chance," Hilda said; but in her mind was the resolution that she would never see the chance.

"Does he--seem cheerful?" Ruth asked. "It's been quite a long time now--months.... He--must have gotten over--caring for me now. Do you think so?" Her voice was anxious, pleading.

Hilda could not hold out against that appeal. "No, silly, he hasn't. He isn't that sort.... It's too bad."

"Yes--it's too bad," said Ruth, but it was not sympathy that put the tiny thrill into her voice.

"He's just a boy.... He can't go on all his life loving a girl that doesn't want him. Some day he's going to fall in love again. It's natural he should."

"Has he--Do you think--"

"No, I haven't seen any signs of it yet.... And I'd be jealous if he did. I think I could manage to fall in love with him myself if--"

"--he wasn't tied to me," interrupted Ruth, with a little whimper.

"I--I wish he knew--about Mr. Dulac.... He wouldn't think so--hard of me, maybe... if he knew I didn't--never did--love Mr. Dulac...."

"The only thing that would make any difference to him would be to know that you loved him," said Hilda.

Ruth had no answer, but she was saying to herself, with a sort of secret surprise: "If I loved him.... If I loved him...." Presently she spoke aloud: "You won't be angry with me, Hilda?... You won't misunderstand, but--but won't you please--go away?... Please.... I--I don't want to see anybody. I want to be alone."

"Well, of all things!" said Hilda. But she was not offended. Her resemblance to her father was very faint indeed, at that moment. She looked more like her mother, softer, more motherly. She put on her hat and went away quietly. "Poor Bonbright!" she was thinking. Then: "It's come to her.... She's got a hint of it. It will come now with a rush...."

Ruth sat in her chair without movement. "If I loved him..." she said, aloud, and then repeated it, "... loved him...." She was questioning herself now, asking herself the meaning of things, of why she had been lonely, of why she had sat in her window peering down into the street--and she found the answer. As Hilda had said in her thoughts, it was coming with a rush.... She was frightened by it, dared not admit it.... She dared not admit that the biggest, weightiest of her woes was that she no longer had Bonbright with her; that she was lonesome for him; that her heart had been crying out for him; that she loved him!

She dared not admit that. It would be too bitter, too ironically bitter.... If she loved him now she had loved him then! Was her life to be filled with such ironies--? Was she forever to eat of Dead Sea fruit?