A CYCLE OF MANHATTAN (continued 2)

Outside of business he had little. His family still seemed apart, yet he would have done anything to have saved them trouble or pain. He liked Yvette because she was frank and lively, but these last years he liked Dorothea, too, though there was nothing against Carolyn, a fine girl, if she did like to spend money. Minnie was all right—the boys would be, too, when they got a little older and settled down.

Mr. Ross didn’t mind listening to the mechanical piano or the Victrola at home, but he did not care for other kinds of music. Concerts made him miserable and fidgety. He saw nothing in them and after several for charity and one visit to the opera he refused to partake of music outside of the home. He had never learned to like reading. He was still content with the daily papers and glanced, occasionally, at a weekly devoted to current events. He knew nothing about art and said so. He didn’t want to be bothered with “such notions.” Drama of all kinds bored him and even musical comedies entertained him only for a little while. Usually he got to thinking of business in the midst of things and lost all consciousness of what was going on.

Mr. Ross had no social ambitions, so, with no business worries and no outside interests, his days began to drag unpleasantly. He thought often of other days, of “the other side”; when he had been planning to come to America—he was glad that was over—of MacDougal Street, the hard work he had done there, the long hours, the over-time, the little economies so both ends would meet, then the newer tenement, with things a little easier, the beginnings of the factory—those had been real days—staying awake planning to meet bills, figuring to the dollar how to get money to pay the “help” and have enough left for living expenses, then Harlem and now Riverside. It was good to have planned and worked. Still, now he was used to his comforts. He liked space and quiet and the car—but, with nothing to do—

Mrs. Ross had long since relaxed her anxiety over her husband. He had never talked business and he seemed just like always, willing to listen to her stories of how she had spent the day. Mrs. Ross was quite content with the Drive. The aloofness of the neighbours, that had been disagreeable to her in Harlem, became one of her own characteristics now. She became more and more aware of her own importance. She had disliked the way “outsiders” and Gentiles had treated her, years before. Now, her last vestige of humbleness gone, she felt herself more than “as good as any one.” Wasn’t she Mrs. A. Lincoln Ross, wife of Ross of the Rex Suit Company, a real figure in New York? Didn’t she get her picture in the paper when she gave money to charity? Didn’t people treat her with respect as soon as they found out who she was? She was frankly fat, but she didn’t mind. She had expensive dressmakers and tailors and she thought the results of her toilet satisfactory. After all, she was nearly fifty.

Her voice had toned down, during the years, as had Yvette’s. When talking with those she considered important, she even tried to put an elegant swing into her sentences. Usually, though, her voice was accented, ordinary, uninteresting. She still made errors and sometimes quite a lot of sing-song crept in.

In the morning Mrs. Ross attended to her household affairs, giving directions to the servants, ordering her own provisions over the telephone, even planning meals. She looked into the ice-box to see what provisions remained, rubbed fingers across furniture for dust, examined linens. She was a good housekeeper. In the afternoon, with Yvette, whom she found most congenial, or an acquaintance, she went for a drive or shopped. She dropped most of her old friends who had not progressed and she had no sentimental regrets concerning them. A few earlier friends she kept up with, asking them for luncheon or for a drive, with a hint of patronage. Through her daughters she met other women of her own age and circumstances. To these she tried to be pleasant, using her best language and manners. She had no intimacies with these women.

During the second year of the family’s residence on the Drive, Mrs. Ross was asked to belong to several committees of important charitable organizations. She joined these gladly and gave generous sums. She liked the society of her own race. She did not feel at home with “outsiders” nor know what to say to them—she felt that they were constantly criticizing her. She had decided social ambitions, however, and wanted Mr. Ross to join a well-known club composed of members of his people. She was proud to know women who, a few years ago, or even now, were she less wealthy, would have ignored her. To the arts she was as indifferent as her husband.

XII

Irving was a lawyer now. He had a nice office in one of the newer buildings devoted to professional men, but not much practice. His father found it just as convenient to give him some of the smaller business of the firm as to increase his allowance. When anything important came up Mr. Ross agreed with his partners that it was best to let a better-established lawyer handle the case.

Irving—who became Irwin about this time—could have joined a large firm as a junior member, but he preferred independence. He didn’t like to work hard or long and he had heard of the tasks performed by the younger members of big firms. He liked to waste time, browsing around book-stores, walking through the lobbies of hotels, calling on friends. He had a large acquaintance with women and had as many dinner invitations as he could accept. Wasn’t he a great catch, a young lawyer with a rich father? And good company.

At twenty-five, Irwin still loved an argument. Although never a great reader, he liked to pose as one, quoting well-known authorities, reading and talking about authors unknown to his hearers. His hair was always immaculately sleeked, though it had just a perceptible wave. He had his favourite manicurist at one of the larger hotels. He smoked an expensive brand of cigarettes, carrying them in an elaborate silver and gold case and fitting each one carefully into an extremely long amber cigarette holder before smoking it. He used affected gestures, pounding on a table to emphasize a point he was making. He still wore nose-glasses, now large lensed and tortoise rimmed, and from habit he held his head too high.

Irwin was proud of his acquaintance with half a dozen actresses of minor importance. These he took to teas, dinners and suppers, talking later as if the engagement had had special significance. He was careful about his acquaintance with other women, choosing those that were, to him, of social importance. He had the same distrust his parents had for those outside of his own race. He never attended services at a synagogue, but to him religion and race were intermingled and he did not attempt to differentiate between them. Since boyhood he had suffered from prejudice far more than his sisters. He was proud to associate with “outsiders,” liked to think he looked and spoke and acted like one of them. But he would never have married a Gentile.

Carolyn was now the liveliest member of the Riverside Drive household. She didn’t think much of race and creed. She envied other women in some things, but she thought herself all that was desirable and attractive. She liked best the people of her own race, but she preferred them with American or English accents, appearance and accomplishments. She liked to associate only with people of great wealth. Always gowned a bit ahead of fashion, perfectly groomed, silky, smooth, crisp, she went to the theatre, evenings and matinées, to luncheons and to parties, giggling and laughing, quite moderately, of course, and had a gay time. She loved musical comedy and after-theatre suppers. She didn’t care for the opera, but even the most serious drama could give her something to giggle about afterwards. Her hair and eyes were dark with something of the Orient about them, but her skin was fairer and clearer than her mother’s or Yvette’s, her round little nose was always white with powder and her eyebrows narrow and smooth, her lips and cheeks pinkly attractive.

You could see Carolyn almost any fair afternoon on the Avenue with Eloise or Helen or Mary Louise, stopping in at one little shop for a bit of lingerie, at another for flowers. They spent money with no thought of its value. Most of them could not remember poverty. Those who could found spending the best method of forgetting. Occasionally they met several of “the boys” for tea. When they didn’t they bought tea for themselves at Maillard’s, usually, or the Plaza. There was always a car waiting and they wore low pumps or slippers and the thinnest of stockings even when the snow was on the ground.

Carolyn “went with” Jack Morton, Eloise’s brother. She had met Eloise at the Riverside Drive School. Jack was at Harvard, then, but he was graduated a year later and was “catching on” nicely in his father’s box factory. The Mortons thought the Rosses a step below them socially, for the Mortons were a little farther removed from “the old country.” Outside of that, they liked Carolyn. So no one was surprised, when, in 1914, when Carolyn was twenty-three, she announced her engagement to Jack. The Rosses thought Carolyn had “done well,” as indeed she had, for Jack Morton was a likeable fellow, full of practical jokes and fond of poker playing, but on the whole quite a desirable husband.

Ross gave his daughter a diamond lavalliere for an engagement present, and as Carolyn picked it out herself it was quite glittering. He promised her the furniture for her new apartment as a wedding present. The Mortons gave Carolyn a small car, green, with cushions to match, which she pronounced “a young wonder.” They had an engagement “at home” and were married a few months later at one of the newer hotels. Carolyn hoped that it was quite evident to the friends of both families that they were both very wealthy.

The young couple took a three weeks’ trip to Florida—Jack couldn’t stay away from the business longer than that. Then they went to the Astor, but Carolyn wanted to entertain her friends and a hotel does keep you cooped up so. She and Jack finally decided on a small apartment in a high-priced new building in Park Avenue. They had only one maid to start with for they both preferred eating at restaurants. With the car you could eat at a different place and go to a show or some place every night.

Without Carolyn the Riverside Drive apartment seemed quiet. Manning went to Harvard for a year, dissatisfied with the unexclusiveness of Columbia.

Dorothea liked school, too, and was now taking a few harmless courses which gave her something to do, though they didn’t satisfy her. Nothing quite pleased Dorothea. She hadn’t been satisfied with Carolyn’s school—girls of only one creed went there, so narrow. Dorothea said that school was a joke. She had chosen a more expensive school, patronized by daughters of rich men generally. Her new study courses were at Columbia and with private teachers. Mr. Ross didn’t like them.

“It isn’t as if she had to be a teacher,” he said. “A girl can have too much book-learning.”

But Dorothea went. She had always been different. Her clothes, for one thing. Couldn’t she have had anything she wanted? Look at Carolyn—always dressed like a picture—the family had to admit that, themselves. Even Yvette, though she liked bright colours, was a good dresser. It wasn’t as if Dorothea was economical. She spent as much as Carolyn did. Carolyn wore things that “looked expensive,” rich broadcloth, elaborate furs—Dorothea preferred rough tweeds. She paid extraordinary sums for little suits that Mrs. Ross thought looked as if she’d got them for twenty dollars in Third Avenue. They were of mixed weaves, in grey or tan, and she wore big tailored collars over her coats, not mannish looking or freakish, just plain. She paid fifty dollars for her little round velour hats. She wore heavy gloves and shoes, even when she went out with Carolyn, sleek in white gloves, thin pumps and furs. Dorothea paid huge prices for plain little evening frocks which she bought at exclusive little places. Even then she was not satisfied.

Dorothea wore a perpetual little pout—something had always just gone wrong. She spent her time wondering what to do, dipping in “courses” on a variety of subjects, at settlement work, “going with people she didn’t have to associate with,” her mother thought. Clad in a trim-fitting habit she rode whole mornings in Central Park. She exhibited funny little Belgian Griffins at shows. She went to benefits and tournaments. Yet she was always a trifle “put out,” a bit bored. Things weren’t ever good enough, or quite what she had expected.

For her twentieth birthday Dorothea asked for and received a new car, a good-looking foreign-made roadster. About time the family had more than one car! She didn’t want a chauffeur. Hadn’t she been driving as long as she could remember, learning on the old red one? She liked driving the car best of all.

The family, the family’s friends, what any one said or did—all displeased Dorothea. She made sport of Irwin’s pet affectations to his face, to her mother’s horror. She called Yvette’s things “impossible” and made fun of Carolyn’s diamonds. She treated her mother as a person of no consequence, never asking her opinion about things. Although she had nothing in common with her father, she made a great fuss over him and he grew to like her better than any other member of his family. She took him out in her car, though he didn’t quite enjoy the rides, expecting to be tipped over at every corner. Dorothea drove perfectly, with the recklessness of a racer.

Dorothea went with “outsiders.” She seemed as much at home with members of other races as with her own. She’d bring in unexpected guests, making the family feel ill at ease. While guests were there she’d bring up bits of family history the rest were trying their hardest to keep out of sight.

“Dad,” she’d say, “here’s some one that wants to meet you. He’s heard a lot about you.... Can you believe that less than twenty-five years ago Dad came to America with no money at all?” then, with a little gesture and a smile, “and now look at him.” She’d throw an arm around her father, who, ill at ease, would greet the stranger.

If Mr. Ross had been unsuccessful, he would have looked like any of a thousand of his race whom you can see leaving the shops any evening at the closing hour. But his wealth haloed him. It was impossible to separate him from his money. Thin, stoop-shouldered, solemn, quiet and accented of speech, he stood for success. To Dorothea her father was immensely important. She was the first who had ever made much of him. It embarrassed him—he was a simple old fellow in many ways—but he liked it.

Mrs. Ross thought Dorothea didn’t appreciate her.

“It’s always her Dad, her Dad,” she’d say, “never a word about how I worked when she was small or all I do for her—just Dad this, Dad that—and Irwin don’t like it—that you’re always bringing up old times, about Papa being a cutter. The other night when that fine Miss Tannenheim was here, you said it, when you was talking to that big blond fellow you brought in....”

“You’re a dear, Mother,” Dorothea would give her mother the tiniest touch of a kiss on her broad cheek, “but Irv’s a mess and he knows it. The Tannenheim person is a cheap old thing with a mean eye and she’ll marry him some day, if he isn’t watching.”

“Dad,” said Dorothea, one day, “let’s move. You can’t guess how sick I am of Riverside Drive.”

“What’s the matter? Haven’t you got things nice here?”

“Nice—on the Drive?”

“We’re always moving, it seems. Only four years ago....”

“I know, Dad. That’s just it. A man of your position ought to have a home. Apartments are nothing. This one is simply awful. Riverside Drive is fearfully ordinary, vulgar—don’t you think so? Such a cheap collection of the newly rich. Dad, you ought to have your own home in town, anyhow, and something permanent in the country.”

XIII

The idea of a home appealed to Mr. Ross. He felt, now, that he had always wanted a real home. Dorothea called for him in the car and they explored the streets east of Fifth Avenue. Finally, without consulting the rest of the family, Ross bought a five-story house in East Sixty-fifth Street, just off Fifth Avenue.

“Mother will think this is terrible,” Dorothea said as she kissed him, “but you and I like it, don’t we? I know it cost an awful lot, Dad, but you can see it’s really an investment. After it’s made over a bit inside it will do for a family home for years. Imagine you—after all you’ve done—not having a family home.”

Ross really liked the house. It seemed almost—home-like. The rest of the family were not pleased. The married daughters—of course it was not their affair—but, they wondered if it was just the right thing. Of course nice people lived in houses, but none of their friends.

“That’s why we bought it,” said Dorothea.

Irwin “guessed it was all right.” Manning was indifferent.

Mrs. Ross held up bejewelled hands and wailed.

“Oh, Dorothea, just as I’m beginning to get into things and can ask people here to a fine apartment on the Drive—an address I can be proud of—and here you buy an old house—I thought a young girl like you would want things swell—here we’ve got servants and all—”

“Don’t you worry,” said Dorothea, “it will be ‘swell’ enough—awful word. And as for servants—”

The family moved to the East Sixty-fifth Street house a few months later. Dorothea didn’t run around after furniture as those of her family who had chosen furniture before her had done. She turned the whole house over to Miss Lessing, in Madison Avenue. Miss Lessing’s corps of exquisitely minded young men came in, looked around, made sketches, brought drapery material and wood finishes, all of which Dorothea examined critically.

“At last we’ll have some place we can ask our friends,” she said.

The house in East Sixty-fifth Street was rather nice. It was done in English things, mostly, painted walls and rather soft taffetas. There were some big easy chairs that could be pulled around, comfortably, in front of the fireplace. Perhaps because of its seeming simplicity and the plainness of the walls and carpets Mr. Ross liked it more than any home he had ever had. He felt it belonged to him. Mrs. Ross never liked it.

“It’s too plain,” she said, “nothing to it. No one would believe how much it cost you, Papa. Mrs. Sinsheimer has got an apartment on Park Avenue, just a block from Carolyn. Fourteen rooms. She had a decorator, too, but he got different things than this—gold furniture. It looks like something. We had a fine place on Riverside Drive and Dorothea drags us here, where there ain’t even lights enough to see by, at night.”

Still, Mrs. Ross found out, from what people said, that there must be something desirable about the new home. She even acquired a bit of the patter Dorothea used, pointing, with something like pride, to “a real Chippendale escritoire, one of the nicest examples in America,” and “some Wedgewood plaques, three, from an original set of four, you know,” and “of course, we are getting old and it’s nice we can have a home where we can gather the sort of things we like, as a background.”

Irwin didn’t “think much of the place, myself,” but it was a good idea, the old folks having a home ... he was glad he didn’t have to be ashamed of it, though, for his part ... now, that country place Dorothea was talking about....

Yes, Dorothea had been talking about a country place. After they were settled in the new home, she continued to talk. They had five servants now—they wouldn’t even need two sets—Dad could see how it took that many to run any kind of a house—and they could just shut up the town house in Spring and open it in Fall. All the family could be there, too, Yvette and the new baby, and Carolyn and their husbands ... “a real family together. Dad, a permanent family like ours ought to have a decent country place.”

The country place was on Long Island, finally. Dorothea picked it out and put the decorations in the hands of the same firm of decorators, who did rather startling things with coloured wicker, chintz and tiled floors.

It was near a famous country club and Dorothea knew, as did the rest of them, that none of the men of her family could ever be admitted. It didn’t seem fair to her, of course, and yet ... Dad was a great one—there oughtn’t to be any place Dad couldn’t get into. But Dad didn’t care. Though, from things he said, Dorothea knew he had felt things ... expected them. He hadn’t even hoped this much of life. Irwin didn’t like being left out of things ... and yet, Dorothea, looking at Irwin, hearing him argue in his rather nasal tone, gesturing with his long amber cigarette holder, couldn’t blame members of the club, exactly.... It wasn’t because of Irwin’s race ... maybe the members, themselves, weren’t so wonderful ... and yet there were her two brothers-in-law, one rather fat, both slow-minded, card-playing, a bit loud and blatant, always bringing money into the conversation ... Yvette, loud, laughing, so heavy, mentally, Carolyn, with her cheap talk of money and spending ... her mother ... it wasn’t fair to criticize her, her mother’d had a hard time of it when she was young, and yet....

Dorothea knew that, somehow, the men she liked didn’t belong to her race. Hamilton Fournier, now ... of course, if she’d marry him, there would be an awful talk, lots of crying and going on about religion ... that sort of thing. She could hear her mother ... she remembered when Freda Moss married,—“He’ll throw it up to you.” Yet, if you are proud of your race ... doesn’t that ... can you have a thing “thrown up to you” that you are proud of? It was a big problem, too big for Dorothea. She felt that she’d always had everything she wanted ... she could keep on having....

The family settled down comfortably in the new home, Manning with them. He was going to school in town, now.

Mrs. Ross was getting to like the new home better ... it wasn’t Riverside Drive, of course, but people didn’t look down on her here. She was even getting in with Mrs. Rosenblatt—now that she lived near her. That crowd—she didn’t have their education, but what of it, she was richer than most of them. Who were they, to be so exclusive? Maybe, by next year, if she donated to their Orphans’ Nursery Fund....

Mr. Ross’s indigestion seemed a little worse. The doctor came to see him several times each week and he had to be more careful with his diet. There seemed to be less to do at the office. He could retire, of course, but that would take away the only interesting thing he had—the few hours at the office. He even tried outdoor exercise, but after one attempt, he gave up golf as impossible. He gave to organized charities rather liberally and was even appointed on a committee which he never attended—he knew it was his money they wanted. He would sit, as he had always sat in the evening, falling asleep over his paper, or, bundled up beyond the necessity of the weather, he would climb into the car and spend a few hours with an old friend, or some one would come to see him, playing cards, as always. But a few of the old friends had died, another had moved away ... there had never been many of them. He was just an old man, and lonesome, with nothing interesting to do or think about....

XIV

Manning stopped school the year after the family moved into their new home. He had had a year at Harvard and a year or so at art school. Now, at twenty-two, he felt that he was a sculptor. His father was disappointed—Manning had started out a nice boy—it did seem that one of the boys....

But Manning shrugged sensitive shoulders at anything as crude as the clothing business, even wholesale. His soul was not in such things. And Mr. Ross had to admit that the position of model was about the only one in the establishment that Manning could have filled. Manning went in, rather heavily, for the arts that the rest of the family had neglected. Of course Dorothea read, but Manning thought she skimmed too lightly over real literature. And Irwin—an impossible, material fellow.

Manning wore his hair a trifle long. He talked knowingly of Byzantine enamels and the School of Troyes. He knew Della Robbia and the Della-Cruscans. There was nothing he didn’t know about French ivories. He knew how champlevé enamelling differed from other methods ... there were few mysteries for Manning. His personal contributions to Wanty consisted of fantastic heads, influenced slightly by the French of the Fourteenth Century, in bas-relief—very flat relief, of course.

Manning’s friends felt they formed a real part of New York’s “new serious Bohemia.” They ate in “unexploited” Greenwich Village restaurants, never complaining about the poorly cooked food, sitting for hours at the bare, painted tables, talking eagerly in the dim candle or lamp light. They expressed disgust when “uptowners” discovered their retreats and sometimes moved elsewhere. You could find them every Saturday and Sunday night in parties of from four to ten, at the Brevoort, sometimes with pretty girls who didn’t listen to what they were saying, sometimes with homely little “artistic” ones, hung with soiled embroidered smocks, who listened too eagerly, talking of life and art, revolution and undiscovered genius.

There was no question that Manning’s father should continue his allowance—there is no money in sincere art these days. Manning knew that even his father must recognize that. Manning spent his summer with the family on Long Island—it was hot in town. But, when one’s family is of the bourgeoisie, it does draw one’s energy so. In the autumn Manning decided he must have a real studio, some place he could work and expand, going to “the town house” for week-ends. Having one’s family uptown was quite all right, of course—but you couldn’t expect an artist to live with them.

Mr. Ross agreed to the studio. He was getting accustomed to Dorothea’s friends, unbelievers though they were. He found he could not accept the artistic friends that Manning thought so delightful.

Manning found his studio, finally. The rent was terrific, of course, but the building had been rebuilt at great expense and was absolutely desirable in location, construction, everything. He furnished it himself in Italian and Spanish Renaissance things. Rather nice! When it was furnished—though they probably couldn’t “get it” he’d let the family see it.

One Sunday, after a family reunion dinner, Manning announced that his studio was done. If the family liked they might all run down that way—a sort of informal reception ... of course, they probably couldn’t understand it all....

It was in the Village, of course, but not “of” it. Did they think the Village was slumming? Uptown people did. But that’s where you’d find real thought, people who accomplished things....

“Why, my new studio has real atmosphere”—Manning ran his fingers through his hair as he spoke. “It’s in a wonderful old building, magnificent lines and the architect left them all—it’s just inside he’s remodelled. I’ve the third floor front, two magnificent rooms, a huge fireplace, some lovely Italian things ... and the view from the window is so quaint and artistic ... of course you may not understand it ... this family ... it’s just a block from Washington Square.”

“Why, that’s where....” began Mrs. Ross.

Irwin silenced her.

“Don’t begin old times, Mamma. Most of us haven’t as long memories as you,” he said.

“Come on, now that we’re all here, let’s go down,” Manning went on, “I want you to see something really artistic. A friend of mine, DuBroil—I think you’ve met him—did me a stunning name plate in copper, just my name, Manning Cuyler Ross. I’m so glad I took Cuyler for a middle name last year. And there is just the single word, ‘masks.’ I thought it was—rather good. And I’ve a stunning bit of tapestry on the south wall. Come on—you’ve got your cars here, we’d better get started—”

It was a pleasant drive. The three cars drew up, almost at once, in front of Manning’s studio, as he, in the front car, pointed it out to them.

They made quite a party as they turned out in front of the building—a prosperous American family—Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln Ross, well-dressed, commanding, in their fifties, which isn’t old, these days; MacDougal Adams, plump, pompous; Yvette Ross Adams, in handsome furs and silks; Jack Morton, sleek, black-haired; his always exquisitely gowned wife, Carolyn Ross Morton; Irwin Ross, in a well-fitting cutaway, eyebrows raised inquiringly, chatting alertly; Dorothea Ross, attractive and girlish in rough tan homespun, and Manning Cuyler Ross, their host, pleasantly artistic.

“Here’s the place,” said Manning. “No elevator, real Bohemia, three flights up, uncarpeted stairs. Come on, Mother.”

Mrs. Ross was strangely pale, and on the faces of Yvette and Irwin and MacDougal Adams there were curious shadows. The rest, save for Mr. Ross, were too young to remember. As for him he broke, for the first time in years, into a broad smile. Manning went rattling on.

“This,” he proclaimed, “is the way to live! None of your middle-class fripperies. Plain living, high thinking—this is the life!”

They came to the studio at last, and all stood about in silence while Manning explained its charms—the clear light, the plain old woodwork, the lovely view of the square, the remote, old-world atmosphere. In the midst of his oratory Mr. Ross sidled up to Mamma Ross and reached stealthily for her hand.

“Do you remember, Minnie,” he whispered, “this room—this old place—those old days—”

“Hush,” said Mamma Ross, “the children will hear you.”