The Dark Lady by Louis Auchincloss, Thomas Auchincloss Page A

know." Unmarriageable girls of that era were either "horsy" or saints. Clara continued to wait, but she began to consider that the age of miracles might be past. The Clarksons remained complacent about the scheme of things, and New York in 1908 seemed the capital of a prosperous world at peace forever and ever.
    Irving Stein came to the larger Clarkson dinners. He was what Clara's brother called "Daddy's pet Jew." He was a rather splendid man, with flowing black hair and penetrating, unflinching gray eyes, who affected velvet suits and diamond cuff links, a bit of a dandy, with a touch of Disraeli and a fine stentorian voice. If Irving was a "pet Jew," it was only in the eyes of one snotty young Clarkson. He was highly cultivated and immensely well informed: in politics, in finance and in art. And he was rich. When he held forth at the Clarkson board, whether on trustbusting or the glass in Chartres, he spoke with authority and was listened to with respect.
    From the beginning he paid a marked attention to Clara. She had only to mention a current book, and a copy, with a box of roses, was delivered at the door, or a play, and an evening would be arranged with tickets in the first row. And he professed great interest in her charitable activities. He insisted on inspecting her settlement house and auditing her literary class, and his check to the former endowed her there with an embarrassing prestige. But, best of all, he loved to talk about the problems of the world; he impressed her with the gravity of his concern for human misery. At last, when his attentions began to show themselves as romantic, she wondered if this might not be what she had been waiting for: the opportunity to share with another noble soul the task of using imagination and money for the glory of God. The fact that she felt no passion did not have to concern her. She was quite sure that she cared for Irving as much as she would ever care for a man. Besides, he seemed perfectly content with her coolness.
    Her family were neither pleased nor displeased. They evidently thought it was as good as she could do. They declined to have anything to do with Irving's relatives, but they always treated Irving himself as a member of the family. Clara's first hint of how things were going to be was when Irving failed to support her request that his parents be asked for a weekend to the Clarksons in Southampton. He made it very clear that in matters of race and religion he was not going to rock the boat.
    And so it was that the decades of smooth sailing in unrocked boats began. Clara never came wholly to understand the complicated personality of her interesting husband, for the simple reason that she lost her desire to do so at an early date. She knew soon enough that he was not what she had been foolish enough to suppose. Was it his fault that she had been a dreamer? He was a good man, and she owed him her respect and affection. If her failure to respond to his ardor only inflamed him the more, this was something that had to be endured. Time was bound to make her nights more peaceful, and as for her days, they could be devoted to the task of keeping up the appearances of a religion that had suddenly collapsed. For Clara no longer thought of Gothic cathedrals, of Reims or of Amiens. She thought of a ruined abbey by moonlight, beautiful even if its glass and roof and choir and altar were gone and grass filled the stately nave. She began to develop the curious faith that was to dominate her middle years: a faith in the form and appearances which survived the substance.
    This new tranquillity, however, was shattered by Irving's infidelities. Clara was shocked at the vulnerable femininity of her own nature. It seemed unworthy of her to notice such low things, but notice them she did. That her husband should care too much for Clarksons and works of art she could tolerate. She could disdain but overlook his near unctuosity with the older members of her family and his tactile