Curtain for a Jester by Frances Lockridge Read Free Book Online

in the eyes of the bright-haired woman named Mrs. North. It had been quick and warm and friendly, but that made it no better. Mrs. North had realized that she could not “take a joke” of this kind, although Mrs. North could hardly have realized the full implication of the “joke.” But perhaps she had—perhaps they all had. Certainly, and that mattered most, John Baker had. That was of course what had been intended.
    Probably it had spoiled things, which also probably had been intended. It had made it impossible—and it had all along, of course, been difficult enough for her—to accept this matter of a few years as a matter entirely trivial. It was, certainly; by any reasonable approach, it surely was. John had laughed about it, and she had believed his laughter, believed he thought it ridiculous of her to labor the matter of some three years and seven—no, eight, really—months. He had tried to laugh her out of it, and—part of the time—had almost succeeded. Almost he had persuaded her it was who you were, and how you felt, not a count of the days of your life, which mattered. He had been angry once, and the only time with her, when she had used an old phrase and a tired one—had said she would feel like a “cradle-snatcher.” But he had ended by laughing, making her laugh with him.
    But she had not, finally, been tough enough. A hundred young women—and twenty-nine was young; of course twenty-nine was young—would be tough enough, and good luck to them. She ought to be. She wasn’t. Wilmot had seen that; had based his joke on that. He knew how to hurt, which is a knowledge as useful to the practical joker as to the wit. To the world’s eyes, he said, she was an ancient crone, John Baker a boy in rompers. “Laugh at the fools,” he had said. “Or be sorry for them. Let them see how they look to the rest of us.”
    They should have known; should have refused. But they had hardly thought of it, having expected safety in numbers. Everyone would be in some fashion absurd in costume; they would not be singled out; nobody would notice anything. Oh, it had been well planned enough. And between her and John it would always be an ugly thing. Coming as it had before they had achieved any sureness of each other, it might be an ineradicable thing. If they went on, they would always fear that some moment which should go on wings would flounder, weighted by the grotesque.
    At least, Martha Evitts thought, reaching in her bag for the key she was going to have to use, it would be that way with her. She could never hope again that any part of it might be perfect. Perhaps John would mind less, but even of that she was not sure. There had been an uncharacteristic hardness in him, when he took her home. The hardness underlay all the gentleness he showed toward her. So, no doubt, he realized, as she did, that things were spoiled.… Well, he had taught her to laugh at Wilmot’s heavy, middle-aged approaches; Wilmot’s suggestions of an “arrangement.” They had laughed together, in that equally young together. Mr. Wilmot, however, had laughed last.
    And now, for the last time, she was appearing dutifully at Mr. Wilmot’s apartment to take dictation, provided with a door key for use in the event that Mr. Wilmot had gone out to breakfast and lingered over it. For the last time she would avoid Mr. Wilmot’s words, and Mr. Wilmot’s patting hands. For the last time she would pretend not to notice what he was about. And for the first time, she would tell him she had had enough. That—
    No, she thought again, turning the key. What would be the use? She would tell him she had another offer, was going on to a job with a better future. There was no point in making the issue plain. There was no point, she thought, opening the door, in much of anything.
    As Martha Evitts stepped into the foyer she hesitated, and looked around warily.