Zane Grey - The Day of the Beast

“Bessy, can you understand that it is hard for a soldier to talk of what has happened to him?”

“I'll say I can,” she replied.

“You're sorry for me?” he went on, gently.

“Sorry!... Give me a chance to prove what I am, Daren Lane.”

“Very well, then. I will. We'll make a fifty-fifty bargain. Do you regard a promise sacred?”

“I think I do. Some of the girls quarrel with me because I get sore, and swear they're not square, as I try to be. I hate a liar and a quitter.”

“Come then—shake hands on our bargain.”

She seemed thrilled, excited. The clasp of her little hand showed force of character. She looked wonderingly up at him. Her appeal then was one of exquisite youth and beauty. Something of the baffling suggestion of an amorous expectation and response left her. This child would give what she received.

“First, then, it's for me to know a lot about you,” went on Lane. “Will you tell me?”

“Sure. I'd trust you with anything,” she replied, impulsively.

“How long have you been going with boys?”

“Oh, for two years, I guess. I had a passionate love affair when I was thirteen,” she replied, with the nonchalance and sophistication of experience.

It was impossible for Lane to take this latter remark for anything but the glib boldness of an erotic child. But he was not making any assurances to himself that he was right. Bessy Bell was fifteen years old, according to time. But she had the physical development of eighteen, and a mental range beyond his ken. The lawlessness unleashed by the war seemed embodied in this girl.

“With an older boy?” queried Lane.

“No. He was a kid of my own age. I guess I outgrew Ted,” she replied, dreamily. “But he still tries to rush me.”

“With whom do you go to the secret club-rooms—above White's ice cream parlor?” asked Lane, abruptly.

Bessy never flicked an eyelash. “Hot dog! So you're wise to that? I thought it was a secret. I told Rose Clymer those fellows weren't on the level. Who told you I was there? Your sister Lorna?”

“No. No one told me. Never mind that. Who took you there? You needn't be afraid to trust me . I'm going to entrust my secrets to you by and bye.”

“I went with Roy Vancey, the boy who was with me at Helen's the day I met you.”

“Bessy, how often have you been to those club-rooms?”

“Three times.”

“Were you ever there alone without any girls?”

“No. I had my chance. Dick Swann tried his damnedest to get me to go. But I've no use for him.”

“Why?”

“I just don't like him, Daren,” she replied, evasively. “I love to have fun. But I haven't yet been so hard up I had to go out with some one I didn't like.”

“Has Swann had my sister Lorna at the club?”

Her replies had been prompt and frank. At this sudden query she seemed checked. Lane read in Bessy Bell then more of the truth of her than he had yet divined. Falsehood was naturally abhorrent to her. To lie to her parents or teachers savored of fun, and was part of the game. She did not want to lie to Lane, but in her code she could not betray another girl, especially to that girl's brother.

“Daren, I promised I'd tell you all about myself,” she said.

“I shouldn't have asked you to give away one of your friends,” he returned. “Some other time I'll talk to you about Lorna. Tell you what I know, and ask you to help me save her——”

“ Save her! What do you mean, Daren?” she interrupted, with surprise.

“Bessy, I've paid you the compliment of believing you have intelligence. Hasn't it occurred to you that Lorna—or other of her friends or yours—might be going straight to ruin?”

“Ruin! No, that hadn't occurred to me. I heard Doctor Wallace make a crack like yours. Mother hauled me to church the Sunday after you broke up Fanchon Smith's dance. Doctor Wallace didn't impress me. These old people make me sick anyhow. They don't understand.... But Daren, I think I get your drift. So snow some more.”

All in a moment, it seemed to Lane, this girl passed from surprise to gravity, then to contempt, and finally to humor. She was fascinating.

“To go back to the club,” resumed Lane. “Bessy, what did you do there?”

“Oh, we toddled and shimmied. Cut up! Had an immense time, I'll say.”

“What do you mean by cut up?”

“Why, we just ran wild, you know. Fool stunts!... Once Roy was sore because I kicked cigarettes out of Bob's mouth. But the boob was tickled stiff when I kicked for him . Jealous! It's all right with any one of the boys what you do for him . But if you do the same for another boy—good night!”

Bessy had no divination of the fact that her words for Lane had a clarifying significance.

“I suppose you played what we used to call kissing games?” queried Lane.

A sweet, high trill of laughter escaped Bessy's red lips.

“Daren, you are funny. Those games are as dead as Caesar.... This bunch of boys and girls paired off by themselves to spoon.... As for myself, I don't mind spooning if I like the fellow—and he hasn't been drinking. But otherwise I hate it. All the same I got what was coming to me from some of the boys of the Strong Arm Club.”

“Why do they give it that name?” asked Lane, remembering Colonel Pepper's remarks.

“Why, if a girl doesn't come across she gets the strong arm.... I had to fight like the devil that last afternoon I went there.”

“ Did you fight, Bessy?”

“I'll say I did.... Roy Vancey is sore as a pup. He hasn't been near me or called me up since.”

“Bessy, will you promise to stay away from that place—and not to go joy-riding with any of those boys—day or night—if I meet you, and tell you all about my experience in the war? I'll do my best to keep the time you spend with me from being tedious.”

“It's another bargain,” she returned deliberately, “if you just don't spend enough time with me to make me stuck on you—then throw me down. On the level, now, Daren?”

“I'll meet you as often as you want. And I'll be your friend as long as you prove to me I can be of any help, or pleasure, or good to you.”

“Hot dog, but you're taking some job, Daren. Won't it be just spiffy? We'll meet here, afternoons, and evenings when mother's out. She's nutty on bridge. She makes me promise I won't leave the yard. So I'll not have to lie to meet you.... Daren, that day at Helen's, the minute I saw you I knew you were going to have something to do with my future.”

“Bessy, a little while ago I made sure you had no romance in you,” replied Lane, with a smile. “Now as we've gotten serious, let's think hard about the future. What do you want most? Do you care for study, for books? Have you any gift for music? Do you ever think of fitting yourself for useful work?... Or is your mind full of this jazz stuff? Do you just want to go from day to day, like a butterfly from flower to flower? Just this boy and that one—not caring much which—all this frivolity you hinted of, and worse, living this precious time of your youth all for excitement? What is it you want most?”

She responded with a thoughtfulness that inspired Lane's hope for her. This girl could be reached. She was like Lorna in many ways, but different in mentality. Bessy watched the gyrations of her shapely little foot. She could not keep still even in abstraction.

“A girl must have a good time,” she replied presently. “I've done things I hated because I couldn't bear to be left out of the fun.... But I like most to read and dream. Music makes me strange inside, and to want to do great things. Only there are no great things to do. I've never been nutty about a career, like Helen is. And I always hated work.... I guess—to tell on the level—what I want most is to be loved.”