The Plastic Age · Chapter 22 (1/3)

XXII

Prom came early in May, and Hugh looked forward to it joyously, partly because it would be his first Prom and partly because Cynthia was coming. Cynthia! He thought of her constantly, dreamed of her, wrote poems about her and to her. At times his longing for her swelled into an ecstasy of desire that racked and tore him. He was lost in love, his moods sweeping him from lyric happiness to black despair. He wrote to her several times a week, and between letters he took long walks composing dithyrambic epistles that fortunately were never written.

When he received her letter saying that she would come to Prom, he yelled like a lunatic, pounded the astonished Vinton on the back, and raced downstairs to the living-room.

“She’s coming!” he shouted.

There were several men in the room, and they all turned and looked at him, some of them grinning broadly.

“What th’ hell, Hugh?” Leonard Gates asked amiably. “Who’s coming? Who’s she?”

Hugh blushed and shuffled his feet. He knew that he had laid himself open to a “royal razzing,” but he proceeded to bluff himself out of the dilemma.

“She? Oh, yes, she. Well, she is she. Altogether divine, Len.” He was trying hard to be casual and flippant, but his eyes were dancing and his lips trembled with smiles.

Gates grinned at him. “A poor bluff, old man⁠—a darn poor bluff. You’re in love, pauvre enfant, and I’m afraid that you’re in a very bad way. Come on, tell us the lady’s name, her pedigree, and list of charms.”

Hugh grinned back at Gates. “Chase yourself,” he said gaily. “I won’t tell you a blamed thing about her.”

“You’d better,” said Jim Saunders from the depths of a leather chair. “Is she the jane whose picture adorns your desk?”

“Yeah,” Hugh admitted. “How do you like her?”

“Very fair, very fair.” Saunders was magnificently lofty. “I’ve seen better, of course, but I’ve seen worse, too. Not bad⁠—um, not very bad.”

The “razzing” had started, and Hugh lost his nerve.

“Jim, you can go to hell,” he said definitely, prepared to rush upstairs before Saunders could reply. “You don’t know a queen when you see one. Why, Cynthia⁠—”

“Cynthia!” four of the boys shouted. “So her name’s Cynthia. That’s⁠—”

But Hugh was halfway upstairs, embarrassed and delighted.

The girls arrived on Thursday, the train which brought most of them reaching Haydensville early in the afternoon. Hugh paced up and down the station, trying to keep up a pretense of a conversation with two or three others. He gave the wrong reply twice and then decided to say nothing more. He listened with his whole body for the first whistle of the train, and so great was the chatter of the hundreds of waiting youths that he never heard it. Suddenly the engine rounded a curve, and a minute later the train stopped before the station. Immediately the boys began to mill around the platform like cattle about to stampede, standing on their toes to look over the heads of their comrades, shoving, shouting, dancing in their impatience.

Girls began to descend the steps of the cars. The stampede broke. A youth would see “his girl” and start through the crowd for her. Dozens spotted their girls at the same time and tried to run through the crowd. They bumped into one another, laughed joyously, bumped into somebody else, and finally reached the girl.

When Hugh eventually saw Cynthia standing on a car platform near him, he shouted to her and held his hand high in greeting. She saw him and waved back, at the same time starting down the steps.

She had a little scarlet hat pulled down over her curly brown hair, and she wore a simple blue traveling-suit that set off her slender figure perfectly. Her eyes seemed bigger and browner than ever, her nose more impudently tilted, her mouth more supremely irresistible. Her cheeks were daintily rouged, her eyebrows plucked into a thin arch. She was New York from her small pumps to the expensively simple scarlet hat.

Hugh dashed several people aside and grabbed her hand, squeezing it unmercifully.

“Oh, gee, Cynthia, I’m glad to see you. I thought the darn train was never going to get here. How are you? Gee, you’re looking great, wonderful. Where’s your suitcase?” He fairly stuttered in his excitement, his words toppling over each other.

“I’m full of pep. You look wonderful. There’s my suitcase, the big black one. Give the porter two bits or something. I haven’t any change.” Hugh tipped the porter, picked up the suitcase with one hand, and took Cynthia by the arm with the other, carefully piloting her through the noisy, surging crowd of boys and girls, all of them talking at top speed and in high, excited voices.

Once Hugh and Cynthia were off the platform they could talk without shouting.

“We’ve got to walk up the hill,” Hugh explained miserably. “I couldn’t get a car for love nor money. I’m awfully sorry.”

Cynthia did a dance-step and petted his arm happily. “What do I care? I’m so⁠—so damn glad to see you, Hugh. You look nicer’n ever⁠—just as clean and washed and sweet. Ooooh, look at him blush! Stop it or I’ll have to kiss you right here. Stop it, I say.”

But Hugh went right on blushing. “Go ahead,” he said bravely. “I wish you would.”

Cynthia laughed. “Like fun you do. You’d die of embarrassment. But your mouth is an awful temptation. You have the sweetest mouth, Hugh. It’s so damn kissable.”

She continued to banter him until they reached the fraternity house. “Where do I live?” she demanded. “In your room, I hope.”

“Yep. I’m staying down in Keller Hall with Norry Parker. His roommate’s sick in the hospital; so he’s got room for me. Norry’s going to see you later.”

“Right-o. What do we do when I get six pounds of dirt washed off and some powder on my nose?”

“Well, we’re having a tea-dance here at the house at four-thirty; but we’ve got an hour till then, and I thought we’d take a walk. I want to show you the college.”

After Cynthia had repaired the damages of travel and had been introduced to Hugh’s fraternity brothers and their girls, she and Hugh departed for a tour of the campus. The lawns were so green that the grass seemed to be bursting with color; the elms waved tiny new leaves in a faint breeze; the walls of the buildings were speckled with green patches of ivy. Cynthia was properly awed by the chapel and enthusiastic over the other buildings. She assured Hugh that Sanford men looked awfully smooth in their knickers and white flannels; in fact, she said the whole college seemed jake to her.

They wandered past the lake and into the woods as if by common consent. Once they were out of sight of passersby, Hugh paused and turned to Cynthia. Without a word she stepped into his arms and lifted her face to his, Hugh’s heart seemed to stop; he was so hungry for that kiss, he had waited so long for it.

When he finally took his lips from hers, Cynthia whispered softly, “You’re such a good egg, Hugh honey, such a damn good egg.”

Hugh could say nothing; he just held her close, his mind swimming dizzily, his whole being atingle. For a long time he held her, kissing her, now tenderly, now almost brutally, lost in a thrill of passion.

Finally she whispered faintly: “No more, Hugh. Not now, dear.”

Hugh released her reluctantly. “I love you so damned hard, Cynthia,” he said huskily. “I⁠—I can’t keep my hands off of you.”

“I know,” she replied. “But we’ve got to go back. Wait a minute, though. I must look like the devil.” She straightened her hat, powdered her nose, and then tucked her arm in his.

After the tea-dance and dinner, Hugh left her to dress for the Dramatic Society musical comedy that was to be performed that evening. He returned to Norry Parker’s room and prepared to put on his tuxedo.

“You look as if somebody had left you a million dollars,” Norry said to Hugh. “I don’t think I ever saw anybody look so happy. You⁠—you shine.”

Hugh laughed. “I am happy, Norry, happy as hell. I’m so happy I ache. Oh, God, Cynthia’s wonderful. I’m crazy about her, Norry⁠—plumb crazy.”

Norry had known Cynthia for years, and despite his ingenuousness, he had noticed some of her characteristics.

“I never expected you to fall in love with Cynthia, Hugh,” he said in his gentle way. “I’m awfully surprised.”

Hugh was humming a strain from “Say it with Music” while he undressed. He pulled off his trousers and then turned to Norry, who was sitting on the bed. “What did you say? You said something, didn’t you?”

Norry smiled. For some quite inexplicable reason, he suddenly felt older than Hugh.

“Yes, I said something. I said that I never expected you to fall in love with Cynthia.”

Hugh paused in taking off his socks. “Why not?” he demanded. “She’s wonderful.”

“You’re so different.”

“How different? We understand each other perfectly. Of course, we only saw each other for a week when I was down at your place, but we understood each other from the first. I was crazy about her as soon as I saw her.”

Norry was troubled. “I don’t think I can explain exactly,” he said slowly. “Cynthia runs with a fast crowd, and she smokes and drinks⁠—and you’re⁠—well, you’re idealistic.”

Hugh pulled off his underclothes and laughed as he stuck his feet into slippers and drew on a bathrobe. “Of course, she does. All the girls do now. She’s just as idealistic as I am.”

He wrapped the bathrobe around him and departed for the showers, singing gaily:

“Say it with music,

Beautiful music;

Somehow they’d rather be kissed

To the strains of Chopin or Liszt.

A melody mellow played on a cello

Helps Mister Cupid along⁠—

So say it with a beautiful song.”

Shortly he returned, still singing the same song, his voice full and happy. He continued to sing as he dressed, paying no attention to Norry, completely lost in his own Elysian thoughts.

To Hugh and Cynthia the musical comedy was a complete success, although the music, written by an undergraduate, was strangely reminiscent of several recent Broadway song successes, and the plot of the comedy got lost after the first ten minutes and was never recovered until the last two. It was amusing to watch men try to act like women, and two of the “ladies” of the chorus were patently drunk. Cleopatra, the leading lady, was a wrestler and looked it, his biceps swelling magnificently every time he raised his arms to embrace the comic Antony. It was glorious nonsense badly enough done to be really funny. Hugh and Cynthia, along with the rest of the audience, laughed joyously⁠—and held hands.

After the play was over, they returned to the Nu Delta house and danced until two in the morning. During one dance Cynthia whispered to him, “Hugh, get me a drink or I’ll pass out.”

Hugh, forgetting his indignation of the year before, went in search of Vinton and deprived that young man of a pint of gin without a scruple. He and Cynthia then sneaked behind the house and did away with the liquor. Other couples were drinking, all of them surreptitiously, Leonard Gates having laid down the law in no uncertain manner, and all of the brothers were a little afraid of Gates.

Cynthia slept until noon the next day, and Hugh went to his classes. In the afternoon they attended a baseball game, and then returned to the fraternity house for another tea-dance. The Prom was to be that night. Hugh assured Cynthia that it was going to be a “wet party,” and that Vinton had sold him a good supply of Scotch.

The campus was rife with stories: this was the wettest Prom on record, the girls were drinking as much as the men, some of the fraternities had made the sky the limit, the dormitories were being invaded by couples in the small hours of the night, and so on. Hugh heard numerous stories but paid no attention to them. He was supremely happy, and that was all that mattered. True, several men had advised him to bring plenty of liquor along to the Prom if he wanted to have a good time, and he was careful to act on their advice, especially as Cynthia had assured him that she would dance until doomsday if he kept her “well oiled with hooch.”

The gymnasium was gaily decorated for the Prom, the walls hidden with greenery, the rafters twined with the college colors and almost lost behind hundreds of small Japanese lanterns. The fraternity booths were made of fir boughs, and the orchestra platform in the middle of the floor looked like a small forest of saplings.

The girls were beautiful in the soft glow of the lanterns, their arms and shoulders smooth and white; the men were trim and neat in their tuxedos, the dark suits emphasizing the brilliant colors of the girls’ gowns.

It was soon apparent that some of the couples had got at least half “oiled” before the dance began, and before an hour had passed many more couples gave evidence of imbibing more freely than wisely. Occasionally a hysterical laugh burst shrilly above the pounding of the drums and the moaning of the saxophones. A couple would stagger awkwardly against another couple and then continue unevenly on an uncertain way.

The stags seemed to be the worst offenders. Many of them were joyously drunk, dashing dizzily across the floor to find a partner, and once having taken her from a friend, dragging her about, happily unconscious of anything but the girl and the insistent rhythm of the music.

The musicians played as if in a frenzy, the drums pound-pounding a terrible tom-tom, the saxophones moaning and wailing, the violins singing sensuously, shrilly as if in pain, an exquisite searing pain.

Boom, boom, boom, boom. “Stumbling all around, stumbling all around, stumbling all around so funny⁠—” Close-packed the couples moved slowly about the gymnasium, body pressed tight to body, swaying in place⁠—boom, boom, boom, boom⁠—“Stumbling here and there, stumbling everywhere⁠—” Six dowagers, the chaperons, sat in a corner, gossiped, and idly watched the young couples.⁠ ⁠… A man suddenly released his girl and raced clumsily for the door, one hand pressed to his mouth, the other stretched uncertainly in front of him.

Always the drums beating their terrible tom-tom, their primitive, blood-maddening tom-tom.⁠ ⁠… Boom, boom, boom, boom⁠—“I like it just a little bit, just a little bit, quite a little bit.” The music ceased, and some of the couples disentangled themselves; others waited in frank embrace for the orchestra to begin the encore.⁠ ⁠… A boy slumped in a chair, his head in his hands. His partner sought two friends. They helped the boy out of the gymnasium.

The orchestra leader lifted his bow. The stags waited in a broken line, looking for certain girls. The music began, turning a song with comic words into something weirdly sensuous⁠—strange syncopations, uneven, startling drumbeats⁠—a mad tom-tom. The couples pressed close together again, swaying, barely moving in place⁠—boom, boom, boom, boom⁠—“Secondhand hats, secondhand clothes⁠—That’s why they call me secondhand Rose.⁠ ⁠…” The saxophones sang the melody with passionate despair; the violins played tricks with a broken heart; the clarinets rose shrill in pain; the drums beat on⁠—boom, boom, boom, boom.⁠ ⁠… A boy and girl sought a dark corner. He shielded her with his body while she took a drink from a flask. Then he turned his face to the corner and drank. A moment later they were back on the floor, holding each other tight, drunkenly swaying.⁠ ⁠… Finally the last strains, a wall of agony⁠—“Ev-’ry one knows that I’m just Secondhand Rose⁠—from Second Av-en-ue.”