From the Improvement Era, August 1933 –

How Lovely Youth

By Ardyth Kennelly

The tall boy knotting his blue silk tie at the mirror did not look happy.

“Robin,” a voice came to him from another room, “before you go will you come out here on the sun porch?”

“Yes, Mother.”

“Carol called twice while you were down to see Grandfather.”

“Did she?”

“You haven’t called her yet, have you?”

“I’m going over right now.” He ran his hand over his dark hair.

“Did you want to use the car, Son?”

“No thanks. Mom. I thought I’d walk.”

There was a little, two little lines, on the boy’s smooth forehead. He leaned and looked, for a brief minute, out of the window, then he gathered his overcoat and hat and went out to the sun porch.

His mother looked up from her book.

“Carol is a very sweet girl, Robin,” she said softly. “I hope she’s the girl for you.” And then, “How does it feel to be home again after so long?”

“Sometimes I think it’s perfect, and sometimes — well, I don’t know. I don’t know what’s the matter with me. I feel like a gypsy must feel inside. I want to go and go and go. I want to sleep and wake in queer places.” He flung himself down in a chair. “The last two years have been among the happiest in my life. I loved the work, and meeting new faces, and getting new ideas. An absence does something to you. Mom, whether you want it to or not. It affects different people different ways. But I know one thing — you’re never the same again.”

“I know, Robin.”

“You always know, don’t you?”

Her eyes were wistful. “You look bigger to me. You seem, actually, to have grown half a head, and your shoulders are so broad, and you’re so brown. Honestly, Robin, you’re brown as an Indian. I had an idea, you know, that you’d have a bookkeeperish look when you came home, I don’t know why, but all pale, with your shoulders a little stooped, and your chest hollow, and maybe a sort of racking cough.” She laughed. “But you’ve been cared for beautifully.”

He laughed, too.

“You look, my dear lad, like a young god, the one you used to tell me about when you took Greek. What was his name? Apollo. What color were his eyes?”

“Maybe kind of gold-colored.”

“Yours are blue, so you’re the best looking.” She twinkled at him. “I’ve never seen any gold-colored ones. Have you?” Queer sort of conversation — .

“I did once. They were lovely.”

His mother looked up quickly. “I suppose, Robin, that the eyes you saw belonged to a very old man with white whiskers?”

He smiled. “They belonged to a red-headed girl in bright blue pajamas. I might tell you about her when I come home, and I might not. Will you be up?”

“Yes,” she said, “I’ll be up. Tell Carol hello for me, won’t you?”

He bent and kissed her.

Outside it was colder than he had thought. The dry leaves rustled and blew, and the skeletons of trees scraped and rattled in the smoky-colored wind. The moon was a broken white china saucer on the dark floor of sky, with bits of it swept carelessly about to make the stars.

Carol was a fine girl, he meditated, as he walked along. She’d be a fine wife. She was almost as tall as himself, and all white and gold, except for her blue eyes and black eyelashes and pink fingernails and pinkish mouth. Carol was a fine girl, all right, a lovely girl, and he thought a great deal of her. She’d been the nicest kind of person to be engaged to while one was away from home. There hadn’t been a week that she didn’t write, or send him some little thing that he needed. Her letters had been sweet and encouraging.

She’d be a fine wife, “simply swell,” the boys had said when he’d shown them her picture. His life would be neatly, wisely managed, neatly, wisely tucked into a big white house with green shades at the windows. He thought, queerly, that he would probably have to eat a good deal of spinach, because that was good for him. When a woman loved a man she always saw to it that he got what was good for him. Carol did love him.

He walked faster, with his head down in the cold wind that had sprung up. That girl had a silly name. Jennifer. Only when you thought about it and thought about it, it got very pretty. That late afternoon in May when he’d found their place she’d been asleep on the porch, in wide blue things, with funny little blue slippers on her feet. He’d been astonished at all her red hair that went in curls and heaped-up waves, and at her brown skin, and at her incredible brown-gold eyelashes. When she’d sat up and looked at him, he’d been amazed at the gold color of her eyes.

“I’m lost,” he said.

“That’s very nice.” Her voice made you think of ripe fruit and very clear cold water and a little girl singing.

“It’s not nice at all. It gives you an odd feeling.”

“I’ve been lost often, in all kinds of places. It doesn’t,” she said, “give me an odd feeling.”

“Doesn’t it?”

“No. I just find somebody and say, ‘Hi, there, can you tell me where I am?’ and they do, and then I get straight again very fast,”

“Hi, there,” he said, “can you tell me where I am?”

She laughed up at him, which did something very lovely to her eyes and mouth. “You’re at Green Towers, and everything around for miles and miles belongs to my father. Except me. I belong to myself. And you. You belong to yourself, too, I guess.”

She pushed a small bench toward him and he sat down. “I don’t belong to myself at all,” he said, “because nobody does, really. You don’t.”

“You must be,” she said, looking hard at him, “something quite wonderful. You’re too very much, good-looking to be an Insurance Agent.”

“I’m a kind of Insurance Agent.”

She tucked her hair back of her ears with two little hands and leaned back. “Are you?”

“Yes, in a way.”

“How nice. Looks are deceiving. What do I look like?

“Oh — a savage, I think.”

“A cannibal, perhaps. A devourer of people.”

“If you were very hungry and they were small and sweet.” He smiled at her.

“Would you, then,” she said, “like to civilize me?”

“I’d like it more than anything in the world, if you wanted to be civilized.”

“It shouldn’t be very difficult. I want most awfully to believe in something. I already believe in you — and God.”

There never had been eyes like hers before in the world.

Suddenly he found himself telling her, though he felt all the time that she must know anyway, “I am Robin.”

And she answered, “I am Jennifer.” And they looked at each other, and both felt that they had been waiting a million years to meet again after having met before. And it was a strange, beautiful feeling.

With Carol it had been different. They had been interested in each other because they liked the same things. She was lovely and tall and straight. He remembered her nice smile when her Aunt Vonnie had said, “This is Robin Bohn. My niece, Robin — Carol Keats.”

Carol’s hands, he remembered, were capable looking, her hair neatly golden, her eyes very clear and blue. He liked to dance with her.

The night he’d sat on the steps with Jennifer the moon had been daffodil yellow. They’d laughed a great deal, and the words had tumbled a bit, there was so much to say.

He hadn’t talked to anyone about Jennifer. He was a sensible young man. He had asked Carol to be his wife. She loved him, and she must be the one he loved. This other — this thin little wide-eyed girl — this love — well, it probably wasn’t real love. It was an infatuation. Anyway, why had he thought she loved him? It might have been because he hadn’t seen any really pretty girls for so long. Maybe her blue clothes and her red hair and her bewildering eyes had dazzled him. Carol was the girl for him. And small, comfortable living in a big white house with green shades, and spinach, because Carol loved him so.

Maybe it was the way Jennifer laughed, and the way the stars looked like candle flames, and the color of the moon. If he saw her now, everything might be different. It was her funny little voice that sounded like ripe fruit and very clear cold water and a little girl singing, and the things she had said.

“My dear Robin, do you not always feel like walking straight to Bangkok, or to Paris, or to Nome, or to Jerusalem, on these summer-colored nights?”

“My dear Jennifer,” he had said, “yes. With great easy strides, breathing moonlight and shadows deep as deep.”

“In seven-league boots, with the wind whirling over your head, and water, and sometimes mud, and squashy green grass under your feet.”

Her hands had been so little and square and brown.

Carol had said, in her letters, “Mr. Kennedy says you’re to have your old job back. I know you’ll get ahead, and we’ll be awfully happy.”

He had not even touched Jennifer. Her hair must smell of flowers and her eyelids would be very soft.

There had been two people walking in the park that afternoon, the girl in dark blue, very tall and slim, the man tall and slim, too, with a grey hat that dipped a little on one side. If you had been behind them as they walked through the leaves, you would have heard their voices, and, liking the pleasantness of them you might have stopped to hear what they were saying.

“He has come back now, hasn’t he? And you’re very glad,” the man said.

“Yes. He has come back and I haven’t seen him yet. It will be good to see him.”

“Tonight you will, won’t you?”

“He is such a dear boy. I wish you could know him.” The girl turned her head and for a minute stared at the sky. “He isn’t like you. You’re so quiet and dependable. Oh, he’s dependable, too, but you’re – different.”

“If you love him, he must be a wonderful lad.” You sensed pain in his voice.

“He is wonderful.”

“You know how glad I am for you. But it makes me feel so sick and lost and empty to think of these walks of ours being over, and our talks by the firelight.”

“They don’t have to be over.”

“This is the last. It has been so lovely, my dear girl. Nothing in my life has ever been so lovely — nothing in my life will ever be so lovely again. I came here, you remember, discouraged, ill, sick of futile wandering. You’ve made me better. You’ve made me want to stay here, to stay always — home. And make a garden. With radishes and lettuce and La France roses.”

She caught her breath. “Richard, I — .”

“I understand all you would say to me. All the time I’ve known. ‘This, too,’ kept pounding in my head, ‘must pass away!’ Must everything lovely pass away?”

“Oh, Richard, no.”

“But it does.”

“I wish you wouldn’t say that, Richard. It makes me feel so hopeless.”

And they walked for awhile in silence through the blowing leaves.

And then the man said, “I’m going away tomorrow.”

“You can’t go tomorrow,” she said. “We were going to read Francis Thompson — we were going to hear Paderewski — you haven’t seen my white dress — .” She put her hand out, touched his arm, let it lie there. “Dear friend,” she said. “I’ll miss you unbelievably.”

“I’ll write to you sometimes.”

She gave a sorrowful little laugh. “But I’ll want to hear your voice. Maybe I’ll forget how you parted your hair, and how your eyes crinkle when you laugh.”

“Look at me,” he said, with a sort of little sob in his throat. “I want to see your nose, and your chin, and your eyebrows — .”

She was a sensible young woman. She had promised to be another man’s wife, and so she must love that man, as he loved her. This other — this tall whimsical young man — this love — well, it probably wasn’t real love. It was an infatuation. Anyway, there wasn’t any real reason for her to think he loved her. She hated herself for hoping that he did.

“You like your job so well, Richard. You’ve been so happy here. You said you were going to be manager one of these days. You will be, too. I wish — you wouldn’t go away.”

“I have to go.”

“Where will you go?”

He didn’t answer.

“I thought you didn’t want to wander any more. I thought you wanted to stay — home. And make a garden.”

They stared at each other in the autumn wind.

Aunt Vonnie was glad to see Robin. She said he looked very well indeed. She said that Carol was upstairs and that if he’d sit down for a minute in the front room, why, Carol would be down. She asked him about his travels. She talked about her sinus trouble.

Carol came down, and he kissed her.

She said, “You are looking marvelous, Robin!”

“You’re looking fine, too, Carol.” How tall she was, and how pale in that dark blue. But how lovely, how awfully lovely.

“Do you like to be home?” What a nice brown youngster he was!

“It’s perfect.”

“I’ll bet you never want to go away again, do you?”

How awfully lovely — but Jennifer — why, she hadn’t gone away at all — there she was, laughing, under the daffodil moon, “My dear Robin, do you not always feel like walking straight to Bangkok or to Paris — ” with her hair blowing, her little hands folded, her little blue slipper thrust out before her.

“I’m sorry, Carol. What did you say?”

“I said you probably never want to go away again, do you?”

“Home is nice after so long,” he answered her.

“My dear Jennifer,” he had said, “yes. With great easy strides, breathing moonlight and shadows deep as deep.”

“Home, after all, is best. Isn’t it, Robin?”

When you hadn’t seen Bangkok, or Paris, or Nome, or Jerusalem? “Why, I guess so. Yes. Yes, of course, home is best.” He laughed a little, but his throat ached. “Why, homes are what — ” he said foolishly, a little desperately, “why, there couldn’t be great nations without little homes!” But the sky was a roof, wasn’t it? He felt her staring at him.

“You’re different, Robin.”

He couldn’t think of anything to say. He looked at her neat dark blue skirt and her pink fingernails.

Suddenly, in her pleasant voice, she laughed. “Look at me, Robin.”

“I am looking at you.” He raised his eyes.

“Why, dearest boy,” she said, “if you don’t love me, it’s all right.”

“I asked you to be my wife, didn’t I?”

A radio being tuned next door sent forth queer sounds, then roared merrily, loudly, light-heartedly, vulgarly, “But a red-headed woman can make a boy slap his papa down!” He knew a — why, he knew a flame-haired, golden-eyed girl — .

“That was two years ago, you must remember. You still love me?

“Look here, Carol, You’ve been so good to me. Look at those wonderful letters you wrote me when I needed them so much, and the books. Why, you’ve been wonderful, you’ve been — .”

“I thought, Robin, that you were in love with someone else,” she said, not looking at him, “because your — your letter sounded like it. You know — a little incoherent. They were restless letters. I sensed a wild new sweet joy. Women know things like that. See, Robin?”

“Why, I guess so.”

“I was almost sure.”

Uncertainly he touched his blue tie.

“Aren’t you, Robin?” she asked apologetically.

“Carol, listen — .”

“I won’t know what to do if you aren’t. I’ve — ” she gave a rueful little laugh, “depended on my woman’s intuition. But whether you are or not — I’m afraid I love somebody else rather awfully.”

“Maybe if—.”

“Oh, Robin, it’s a different, more comfortable love than ours was. Robin, if you want to keep a man from going away from you because you’re afraid you’ll forget how he parted his hair and the way his eyes crinkle when he laughs, if you want to live with him in a white house and help him plant a garden, if you care terribly whether he likes your eyebrows and your chin — well, that’s love isn’t it?”

He felt strange and lost. “I guess that’s love all right, Carol.”

Oh, Carol, Carol. Dear, lovely, loving Carol. He guessed, with the puzzled imaginings of youth, that she was the girl for him after all. Maybe he’d never love anybody at all, really. That girl in blue pajamas with all those red curls and heaped-up waves and incredible brown-gold eyelashes — why, he’d only seen her once, in the new dusk, and under a daffodil moon. When he saw her she wouldn’t look the same at all. Maybe he would never see her again. Maybe she’d be — why, quite ugly. It was the moon and the way she laughed — oh, Carol, Carol.

He walked and walked, his head down, hands in pockets.

There was a light in the living room. That meant that Mom had waited up for him after all. He’d have to tell her about Carol, and about Jennifer. He’d said he would.

Mom was in the hall. Mom said, “Go in the front room, darling.”

And he said, “Somebody here?”

“Yes,” she said. “A sort of little kitten, with big eyes.”

He walked listlessly through the doorway.

He could see her hair shining under the light. It was more beautiful than he had remembered. It was so bright it hurt his eyes.

“I was lost at first,” her voice said.

“But you’re home now, aren’t you?” He stood, staring down at her.

“Not home yet. I will be, some day, I suppose.” Her voice sounded like ripe fruit and very clear cold water and a little girl singing.

He came and sat down beside her.

“I came,” she said, “to tell you that my father wants someone very intellectual and capable and all the rest of the things that you are, to go practically every place in the world. You will have to add up things, and subtract. You will have to talk to men about rubber and silks and land.”

Her face was round and sweet. Her lashes were so long they made little fringed shadows on her cheeks. Her hands were little and square and brown, and lovelier, lovelier than he had thought they could be. He took one of them in his own. It was the first time he had touched her. His heart began to do queer tumblings. He shut his eyes to the brightness of her hair and the glow of her golden-colored eyes. “How can I go?” he asked. Her throat was like cream above the amber velvet of her frock. “Home is best. Someone told me so. I must get my old job back, and become quite rich, and be useful to my neighbors.”

“Yes,” she said. “You must.”

He felt a strange, deep disappointment. “But I will not be very happy,” he said. “On summer-colored nights I will want to walk to Bangkok or Paris — .”

She was smiling at him. “Or Nome,” she said softly, “or Jerusalem.”

He wanted to touch her hair and smooth his finger over her silky curved eyebrows. “Breathing moonlight deep as deep, with the wind whirling overhead, and water, and sometimes mud, and squashy green grass underfoot.”

They sat in silence, she with the little smile still lingering about her lips. Suddenly he knew that he could never live without her, that he loved her more than anything in the world, that he would always love her. “You will marry me and we will go together,” he said.

And “Yes,” she answered. Then she laughed a little. “I had to come tonight, my dear Robin,” she said. “I was afraid I would forget how black your hair was and your nice wrists.”

He had never been so happy. “And I could carry you some of the time. You’re so little.”

“I wouldn’t need ever to be carried. I never get tired.”

“But you don’t know how fast and how far I walk — .”

Mother was standing in the doorway. She said, “Jennifer can have Janet’s room. You mustn’t keep her up too late, Robin.” And Mother smiled. When Mother smiled like that she was pleased and satisfied.

He looked hard at the little hand that lay in his own, touched the little bright fingernails. “They’ve always told me,” he repeated, with a frown between his eyebrows, “always, mind you, that home is best.”

“Oh, it is,” she said, “it is! Home is best when you’ve seen a Chinese temple at dusk with a small rosy moon at its highest tip, when you’ve walked in the blue-white snow of St. Petersburg, when you’ve stood very still to see scarlet macaws go through the thick purple shade above your head, when you’ve dipped your fingers in the Sea of Galile — .”

He knew, he knew!

“But some day, my dear Robin,” she went on, “we will come back to a safe white house, with a garden and trees, and maybe a brook for our red-headed children to bathe in. Some of them, I’m afraid,” she said sorrowfully, “will have very red hair.”

He bent and kissed her suddenly and found that her hair did, as he had thought, smell of flowers, and that her eyelids were very smooth and soft — .

And at that moment, somewhere in the darkness, a man called Richard was going swiftly to meet a tall pale girl in dark blue who waited for him with love in her heart and shining through her eyes.