Robert Chambers - Athalie

"Don't be a fool," snapped Catharine.

Athalie glanced at the alarm clock, passed her hands wearily across her eyes, and rose: "It's after six, Doris. You haven't time for anything very much." And she went into the kitchenette.

Once or twice during the preparation of the meal Doris swore in her soft girlish voice, which made the contrast peculiarly shocking; and finally Athalie said bluntly: "If I didn't know you were straight I wouldn't think so from the way you behave."

Doris turned on her a flushed and angry face: "Will you kindly stop knocking me?"

"I'm not. I'm only saying that your talk is loose. And so it is."

"What's the difference as long as I'm not on the loose myself?"

"The difference is that men will think you are; that's all."

"Men mistake any girl who works for a living."

"Then see that the mistake is their fault not yours. I don't understand why a girl can't keep her self-respect even if she's a stenographer, as I am, or works in a shop as Catharine does, or in the theatre as you do. And if a girl talks loosely, she'll think loosely, sooner or later."

"Hurry up that supper!" called Catharine. "I'm going to a show with Genevieve, and I want time to dress."

Athalie, scrambling the eggs, which same eggs would endure no other mode of preparation, leaned over sideways and kissed Doris on her lovely neck.

"Darling," she said, "I'm not trying to be disagreeable; I only want us all to keep up."

"I know it, ducky. I guess you're right. I'll cut out that rough stuff if you like."

Athalie said: "It's only too easy to let down when you're thrown with careless and uneducated people as we are. I have to struggle against it all the while. For, somehow I seem to know that a girl who keeps up her grammar keeps up her self-respect, too. If you slouch mentally you slouch physically. And then it's not so difficult to slouch morally."

Doris laughed: "You funny thing! You certainly have educated yourself a lot since school, – you use such dandy English."

"I read good English."

"I know you do. I can't. If somebody would only write a rattling story in good English! – but I've got to have the story first of all or I can't read it. All those branch-library books you lug in are too slow for me. If it wasn't for hearing you talk every day I'd be talking like the rest of the chorus at the Egyptian Garden; – 'Sa-ay, ain't you done with my make-up box? Yaas, you did swipe it! I seen you. Who's a liar? All right, if you want to mix it – '"

"Don't!" pleaded Athalie. "Oh, Doris, I don't see why you can't find some other business – "

Doris began to strut about the kitchenette.

"Please don't! It makes me actually ill!"

"When I learn how to use my voice and my legs you'll see me playing leads. Here, ducky, I'll take the eggs – "

Athalie, her arms also full, followed her out to the table which Catharine had set very carelessly.

They drank Croton water and strong tea, and gravely discussed how, from their several limited wardrobes sufficient finery might be extracted to clothe Catharine suitably for her evening's entertainment.

"It's rotten to be poor," remarked the latter. "You're only young once, and this gosh-dinged poverty spoils everything for me."

"Quit kicking," said Doris. "I don't like these eggs but I'm eating them. If I were wealthy I'd be eating terrapin, wouldn't I?"

"Genevieve has a new gown for to-night," pouted Catharine. "How can I help feeling shabby and unhappy?"

"Genevieve seems to have a number of unaccountable things," remarked Doris, partly closing her velvet eyes. "She has a fur coat, too."

"Doris! That isn't square of you!"

"That isn't the question. Is Genevieve on the square? That's what worries me, Kit!"

"What a perfectly rotten thing to say!" insisted Catharine resentfully. "You know she's on the level!"

"Well then, where does she get it? You know what her salary is?"

Athalie said, coolly: "Every girl ought to believe every other girl on the square until the contrary is proven. It's shameful not to."

"Come over to the Egyptian Garden and try it!" laughed Doris. "If you can believe that bunch of pet cats is on the square you can believe anything, Athalie."

Catharine, still very deeply offended, rose and went into the bedroom which she shared with Doris. Presently she called for somebody to assist her in dressing.

Doris, being due at the theatre by seven o'clock, put on her rusty coat and hat, and, nodding to Athalie, walked out; and the latter went away to aid Catharine.

"You do look pretty," she insisted after Catharine had powdered her face and neck and had wiped off her silky skin with the chamois rag.

The girl gazed at her comely, regular features in the mirror, patted her hair, moistened her red lips, then turned her profile and gazed at it with the aid of a hand-glass.

"Who else is going?" inquired Athalie.

"Some friends of Genevieve's."

"Men?"

"I believe so."

"Two, I suppose."

Catharine nodded.

"Don't you know their names?"

"No. Genevieve says that one of them is crazy to meet me."

"Where did he see you?"

"At Winton's. I put on some evening gowns for his sister."

Athalie watched her pin on her hat, then held her coat for her. "They'll all bear watching," she remarked quietly. "If it's merely society they want you know as well as I that they seek it in their own circles, not in ours."

Catharine made no audible response. She began to re-pin her hat, then, pettishly: "I wish I had a taxi to call for me so I needn't wear a hat!"

"Why not wish for an automobile?" suggested Athalie, laughing. "Women who have them don't wear hats to the theatre."

"It is tough to be poor!" insisted Catharine fiercely. "It drives me almost frantic to see what I see in all those limousines, – and then walk home, or take a car if I'm flush."

"How are you going to help it, dear?" inquired Athalie in that gently humorous voice which usually subdued and shamed her sisters.

But Catharine only mumbled something rebellious, turned, stared at herself in the glass, and walked quickly toward the door.

"As for me," she muttered. "I don't blame any girl – "

"What?"

But Catharine marched out with a twitch of her narrow skirts, still muttering incoherencies.

Athalie, thoughtful, but not really disturbed, went into the empty sitting-room, picked up the evening paper, glanced absently at the head-lines, dropped it, and stood motionless in the centre of the room, one narrow hand bracketed on her hip, the other pinching her under lip.

For a few minutes she mused, then sighing, she walked into the kitchenette, unhooked a blue-checked apron, rolled up her sleeves as far as her white, rounded arms permitted, and started in on the dishes.

Occasionally she whistled at her task – the clear, soft, melodious whistle of a bullfinch – carolling some light, ephemeral air from the "Review" at the Egyptian Garden.

When the crockery was done, dried and replaced, she retired to her bedroom and turned her attention to her hands and nails, minutely solicitous, always in dread of the effects of housework.

There was an array of bottles, vials, jars, lotions, creams, scents on her bureau. She seated herself there and started her nightly grooming, interrupting it only to exchange her street gown and shoes for a dainty negligée and slippers.

Her face, now, as she bent over her slender, white fingers, took on a seriousness and gravity more mature; and there was in its pure, fresh beauty something almost austere.

The care of her hands took her a long time; and they were not finished then, for she had yet her bath to take and her hair to do before the cream-of-something-or-other was applied to hands and feet so that they should remain snowy and satin smooth.