Jacky S - Suburban Souls, Book I

My thoughts went back to the date of Lilian's menstruation. It generally began on the twenty-seventh or twenty-eighth. In August, it was all over by the twenty-fifth, and in September also, as she had lunched with Lord and Lady Fontarcy on the twenty-eighth of that month and now we were at the eleventh of a fresh period of thirty days, and she was menstruating freely. She was suffering from anemia or chlorosis, I could plainly diagnose, though my medical knowledge was slight and empirical, and in such a state, sexual excitement and masturbation, alone or in company, would produce irregularity of her periodical loss of blood. She had been to London with Charlotte and had returned with her and Raoul. I did not know when she had left, nor how long she had been back. What had she been doing at the West End? How had they been living? Had she joined her handsome brother and Lolotte between the sheets? Was her friend in the lace trade a little Lesbian? Here was an explanation of Arvel's jealousy and hatred of the lad. Suppose that Lilian loved Raoul too well? Had they ever played carnally together as children, perhaps to amuse Arvel… perhaps at his instigation? That would be quite enough to make him jealous now that he loved Lilian, I imagined, not like a child, whose half-innocent caresses had warmed his blood before he joined Adèle in bed, but like a woman ripening gradually for sensual service at his fireside.

Time would show, I said to myself, and I drove those thoughts from me and wondered, poor fool that I was then, what Lilian meant by sulking with her wretched old Jacky!

Mamma and Papa bought about five hundred francs' worth of trees. Adèle was mad on gardening just then. She thought she could manage to have fruit enough to go into business the next year. I chatted with them all, and tried to be friendly with the brother.

I saw nothing of my charmer until a few moments before dinner, when we were all in the drawing-room. She arrived, nicely tidied up, with a dash of powder on her dark complexion. She immediately went to her Papa and sat on the arm of his chair, after having patted his face and told him how well he looked. She had a box of fancy note-paper in her hand and told me it was to write to her most intimate friends with.

“I am going to write some letters now,” she said saucily. When I don't care for the people, I send them typewritten notes on Pa's business paper. Eh, Papa?”

He did not answer. He never responded to her advances or to her caresses before me. Whenever she rubbed against him, or tickled him, or caressed him in any way, his face grew dull; he frowned, and lost all expression. He loved her and a caress from the loved one was evidently a serious thing for him.

“You should never write letters. Never confess, never write, and never reply. Such are the instructions of an old lawyer, a friend of mine.”

And so we fenced for a quarter of an hour, Lilian chaffing me to please her Pa, I supposed. She admired his clean-shaven chin and cheeks, and coolly told me that she hated men with hair on their faces. I wore my entire natural beard.

Then I was alone with her for a few moments just before we sat down to dinner. I took her in my arms. She struggled and got away. I slapped her face smartly, but she did not take it as usual, and complained I hurt her and was too brutal.

“Look how you have brought the blood into my cheeks, everybody will see.”

She was very pale and my slap had caused a patch of crimson to overspread one cheek. This was a sure sign of poverty of the blood and deficient circulation. I asked her if she was cold. She shivered and said she was always chilly. I told her she ought to wear woolen stockings. She showed me her feet. She wore worsted socks under her black thread stockings. Here was every sign of anemia and I inwardly thought that she must also suffer from that disagreeable affliction, vulgarly called the “whites.” That would account for her occasional coyness with me, and also for her lack of sensual excitement the winter before. Anemic girls are no use in winter; the circulation of the blood is deficient, and there is a discharge from the vagina generally accompanying the menses. At that time, if any attempt is made to worship at the altar of Venus or practice masturbation, there are ovarian pains and stomach cramps, such as Lilian complained about.

I need not say that I kept all these remarks to myself and, being very much in love, I no doubt looked and behaved like a spoony swain, although I tried as I always did to be very gay and make everybody laugh, even if the joke was at my expense.

During the meal, Lilian thawed a little and slipped her foot under mine, letting it remain there all the time.

The Dreyfus affair came on the tapis. As was his wont, Arvel stuck up boldly for the heads of the French army. I ventured to say that whatever had occurred, there was no doubt that the alleged traitor had been illegally condemned, as pressure had been brought to bear on his judges in the council chamber by showing them secret documents, of which the prisoner and his lawyer ignored the existence, against all ideas of justice and fair play.

“But suppose they could not show them?” said Arvel.

At this answer, which I leave to my readers to appreciate, I could do no more than give up talking about the matter and I dropped the subject.

Raoul joined in, saying that he had only read English newspapers and knew very little about the case, and Adèle called across the table to me:

“Is he innocent?”

“Yes,” I retorted.

“Then why don't they deliberate (sic) him?”

“They will in time,” I answered, and Arvel shrugged his shoulders and talked a lot of nonsense about the luck of Dreyfus in being judged by his brother-officers and what more could any man want? — he added.

I did not reply. I amused myself looking at Lilian, who gazed on her Pa with undisguised admiration. Her eyes were fixed on his and her half-open mouth drank in every word he let fall. Once during the dinner, she touched my hand with hers. Usually when I dined at Sonis she never forgot to peel and prepare some fruit for me. This night I was neglected. I remember, too, that the conversation turned-as it always did at Sonis-on some indecency, either in a Parisian newspaper or at a theatre, and Papa denounced the immorality of the Parisians.

“Londoners are no better!” blurted out Lilian, in a passion, “How about the massage establishments?”

I noted this peculiar remark and saw Papa drop his beak into his plate. When Lilian was flooding, Lilian's temper was bad.

Mamma was at the head of the table. On her right, was Papa alone. On her left, Raoul was seated, and next to him Lilian. I was at the bottom of the table, facing Mamma, but luckily there was a big lamp in the middle and I could hardly see her.

I suppose Papa was thinking whether Lilian's “tootsies” were on mine or not, as there was a slight scuffle under the hospitable board and Papa called out to his daughter:

“Hullo! Scraggy longshanks, where have your feet got to? Can't you tuck 'em under your chair?”

“Oh! It's no use you trying to faire le pied with me, you know!”

This is a slang expression, and may be translated as “playing the foot game,” i.e., lovers' wireless telegraphy by means of sly mutual pressures of the lower extremities.

Still more indications for me of the emancipation of my sweetheart. But I was too much concerned with my own troubles to bother about Lilian and her mother's old lover just then.

Having silenced her amorous Papa, she rose and said she was going to take the dogs out with her brother. To my surprise, she turned to me, and asked if I would accompany them and smoke, and digest my dinner. Of course I accepted, and all three, without counting the canine pets, we went out along the road. It was a fine night with a bright moon. Raoul was not troublesome. He knew the part he had to play, and walked on in front teasing Blackamoor, leaving Lilian and me practically alone together.