The Golden Vanity Read Online Free Page A

remark was offered with the measured gravity of a butler presenting a letter on a silver tray. None called for any specific reply. They were like clearing house certificates, balancing accounts. They depended for their validity on the name attached. . . .
    She mustn't stay here. Nobody used this room except Arthur. But he couldn't come now; nobody would come. ... He had paid twenty thousand dollars for one book. Which was it? There were rows of small shabby volumes with dim titles behind the glass cases. More likely the manuscript lying open on the table: The Legend of Good Women. An initial was illumined with an aureoled angel, delicately drawn in its minute proportions, with grave rapt features and clear eyelids. Gina could hear the dance music, flowing through the talk in the next room.
    She did not hear Arthur enter; he moved quietly, because he did not wish to be heard.
    He had stolen five minutes. Long enough to smoke a cigarette in peace. A birthday party, he thought, was ridiculous at twenty-three, but he couldn't object if it pleased his grandmother. His world revolved around her; he accepted this as the natural order. He was strongly attached to her, being of an affectionate nature, with no one else belonging to him. . . . He did not know what to say to girls. He had no "line," and he danced badly. He respected girls. His mother was only a girl when she died; he thought he remembered her, and he owned a miniature of her. Very fair, with a gay proud flyaway expression. In college, he had been incautious enough to admit he'd never had a woman; it was turned into a joke against him. Some of the other fellows had got him tight. And took him somewhere, a drunken party; he didn't back out because he was ashamed of being ashamed. The liquor was bad and they mixed his drinks too. There had been several such occasions. Then he quit; he couldn't stand the next day. The girls had been drunk too; that was somehow the worst. . . .
    He crossed over cautiously and closed the door to the library. In his whole life, he had never been really alone. Not without someone in the next room at furthest, aware of him, waiting for him. So he had never been really near anyone, on the intimate terms of equality.
    Gina heard the shutting of the door. She stood up; they were both startled. Arthur said: "Oh, please don't let me disturb you." She answered at random: "I only came in to hide for a minute."
    "So did I." They both glanced about as if for pursuers; the absurd shared impulse mysteriously put them at ease. "Don't go," he said.
    "I must," confusion had reduced her to naturalness. "I didn't touch anything," she looked down at the manuscript. "I suppose this is medieval?"
    "Not exactly," his collector's enthusiasm gave him confidence. "Fifteenth century." Stupid, she told herself, of course Chaucer couldn't be earlier than the fourteenth. Arthur was opening a cabinet drawer eagerly. "Some of the finest manuscripts were produced just after printing was invented," he explained. "The scriveners tried to compete. But the earlier ones have more character. Here is the Ancren Riwle, thirteenth century; this copy is thought to be nuns' work, rather rare—it's a discipline for convents, you know."
    "I don't, I wish I did. How bright the colors are, those tiny bluets and daisies." She pored over the thick black lettering, and murmured: "It says the anchoress mustn't wear rings or brooches or keep cows or any kind of beast, except only a cat. I'm glad she could have a cat. No, I must go now," she walked to the farther door, with a wistful and flattering air of regret. ... He thought, her face is shaped like the angel's, when she looks down. . . .
    "I'll show you some other time," he offered.
    "Will you? I'd like to. Good night—I'm not going down again."
    While he smoked his cigarette, he retained the image of her, in a white gown, bending over the manuscript, with those clear eyelids lowered. And when he had returned to his duty, he looked for her