Young Peoples Pride | Page 3

isn't nearly the whole truth. Now Sherwood Anderson--"
"Tennyson. Who was Tennyson? He died young."
"Well, if that is Clara Stratton's idea of how to play a woman who did."
The two sentences seem to come from no one and arrive nowhere. They are batted out of the conversation like toy balloons.
"Bunny Andrews sailed for Paris Thursday," says Ted Billett longingly. "Two years at the Beaux Arts," and for an instant the splintering of lances stops, like the hush in a tournament when the marshal throws down the warder, at the shine of that single word.
"All the same, New York is the best place to be right now if you're going to do anything big," says Johnny uncomfortably, too much as if he felt he just had to believe in it, but the rest are silent, seeing the Seine wind under its bridges, cool as satin, grey-blue with evening, or the sawdust of a restaurant near the quais where one can eat Rabelaisiantly for six francs with wine and talk about anything at all without having to pose or explain or be defensive, or the chimneypots of La Cité branch-black against winter sky that is pallor of crimson when the smell of roast chestnuts drifts idly as a student along Boulevard St. Germain, or none of these, or all, but for each one nostalgic aspect of the city where good Americans go when they die and bad ones while they live--to Montmartre.
"New York is twice as romantic, really," says Johnny firmly.
"If you can't get out of it," adds Oliver with a twisted grin.
Ted Billett turns to Ricky French as if each had no other friend in the world.
"You were over, weren't you?" he says, a little diffidently, but his voice is that of Rachel weeping for her children.
"Well, there was a little café on the Rue Bonaparte--I suppose you wouldn't know--"

III
The party has adjourned to Stovall's dog-kennel-sized apartment on West Eleventh Street with oranges and ice, Peter Piper having suddenly remembered a little place he knows where what gin is to be bought is neither diluted Croton water nor hell-fire. The long drinks gather pleasantly on the table, are consumed by all but Johnny, gather again. The talk grows more fluid, franker.
"Phil Sellaby?---oh, the great Phil's just had a child--I mean his wife has, but Phil's been having a book all winter and it's hard not to get 'em mixed up. Know the girl he married?"
"Ran Waldo had a necking acquaintance with her at one time or another, I believe. But now she's turned serious, I hear--_tres serieuse--tres bonne femme_--"
"I bet his book'll be a cuckoo, then. Trouble with women. Can't do any art and be married if you're in love with your wife. Instink--instinct of creation--same thing in both cases--use it one way, not enough left for other--unless, of course, like Goethe, you--" "Rats! Look at Rossetti--Browning---Augustus John--William Morris--"
_"Browning!_ Dear man, when the public knows the truth about the Brownings!"
Ricky French is getting a little drunk but it shows itself only in a desire to make every sentence unearthly cogent with perfect words.
"Unhappy marriage--ver' good--stimula-shion," he says, carefully but unsteadily, "other thing--tosh!"
Peter Piper jerks a thumb in Oliver's direction.
"Oh, beg pardon! Engaged, you told me? Beg pardon--sorry--very. Writes?"
"Uh-huh. Book of poetry three years ago. Novel now he's trying to sell."
"Oh, yes, yes, yes. Remember. 'Dancers' Holiday'--he wrote that? Good stuff, damn good. Too bad. Feenee. Why will they get married?"
The conversation veers toward a mortuary discussion of love. Being young, nearly all of them are anxious for, completely puzzled by and rather afraid of it, all at the same time. They wish to draw up one logical code to cover its every variation; they look at it, as it is at present with the surprised displeasure of florists at a hollyhock that will come blue when by every law of variation it should be rose. It is only a good deal later that they will be able to give, not blasphemy because the rules of the game are always mutually inconsistent, but tempered thanks that there are any rules at all. Now Ricky French especially has the air of a demonstrating anatomist over an anesthetized body. "Observe, gentlemen--the carotid artery lies here. Now, inserting the scalpel at this point--"
"The trouble with Art is that it doesn't pay a decent living wage unless you're willing to commercialize--"
"The trouble with Art is that it never did, except for a few chance lucky people--"
"The trouble with Art is women."
"The trouble with women is Art."
"The trouble with Art--with women, I mean--change signals! What do I mean?"

IV
Oliver is taking Ted out to Melgrove with him over Sunday for suburban fresh-air and swimming, so the two just manage to catch the 12.53 from the Grand Central, in spite of Slade Wilson's invitation to talk all night and breakfast