Was she being sarcastic? No, her expression didn’t show it. It was just blank. Like she’d never been to New York.
Where did you live? he asked.
West Forties, she said.
He waited for her to continue, but she didn’t. That, apparently, was it. Real chatterbox. She was worse than the Indians.
What a change from last night. No illumination today. Just this kind of dull face staring ahead not looking at anything in particular.
He watched her for a while.
It certainly wasn’t an evil face, though. Not low quality. You could see it as pretty if you wanted to.
Her whole head is wide, he thought. Brachycephalic, a physical anthropologist would call it. A Saxon head, probably, judging from her name. A commoner’s head, a medieval yeoman’s head, good for cudgeling, with the lower lip ready to curl. But not evil.
The eyes were out of place somehow. Her whole face and body and style of talking and action were all tough and ready for anything, but those eyes when she looked right at you were something else, like some frightened child looking up from the bottom of a well. They didn’t fit at all.
This was a beautiful valley, spectacular valley, the day was great, but she wasn’t even noticing it. He wondered why she had come sailing in the first place. He supposed all that break-up with those people on the previous boat was depressing her but he didn’t want to get into it.
He asked, How well do you get along with Richard Rigel?
She seemed a little startled. What makes you think I don’t get along with him? she said.
Last night when you first came in the bar he told you to shut the door, remember? And you slammed it and said "Does that suit you?" and I got the impression you knew each other and were both angry.
I know him, Lila said. We know some of the same people.
Well, why was he mad at you?
He wasn’t mad at me. He just talks that way.
Why?
I don’t know, she said.
She finally said, He’s very moody. One moment he’s very friendly and the next moment he acts like that. That’s just the way he is.
To know that much about him she had to know him very well, Phædrus thought. Obviously she wasn’t telling everything, but what she said certainly rang true. It explained Rigel’s attack this morning in a way that had never occurred to him. Rigel was just cranky and quixotic and attacked people without any explanation.
But something in him didn’t buy that explanation either. There was a better one. He just hadn’t heard it yet. All this didn’t explain why Rigel was attacking her and why she seemed to defend him. Usually when one person hates another the feeling is mutual.
How is Rigel regarded back in Rochester? he asked.
How do you mean? Lila said.
Do people like him?
Yes, he’s popular, Lila said.
Even though he’s moody and turns on people who haven’t done anything to him?
Lila frowned.
Would you say he’s a very "moral" person? Phædrus continued.
No, not particularly, Lila said. Like anyone else. She looked really annoyed. Why are you asking all these questions? Why don’t you ask him? He’s your friend, isn’t he?
Phædrus answered, He seemed to act awfully stuffy and moral and preachy this morning, and I thought that if you knew him you might be able to tell me why.
Richard?
He seemed to object to my being with you last night.
When did you talk to him?
This morning. We had some conversation before the boat got off.
It’s none of his business what I do, Lila said.
Well, why should he make such a fuss?
I told you, that’s the way he gets sometimes. He’s moody. Also he likes to tell other people what to do.
But you said he was not especially moral. Why would he pick on morals?
I don’t know. He gets it from his mother. He gets everything from his mother. That’s the way he talks sometimes. But he doesn’t really mean it. He’s just moody.
Well, what…
A really angry glare came into Lila’s blue eyes. Why do you want to know about him so much? she said. It sounds like you’re trying to get something on him. I don’t like your questions. I don’t want to hear about it. I thought he was your friend.
Her jaw clamped shut and her cheek muscles were tense. She turned away from him and stared down over the boat’s bulwark at the passing water.
A railroad train came along the shore, on its way to Albany probably. There was a roar as it went by and then disappeared to the north. He hadn’t even known that the track was there.
What else hadn’t he noticed? He had a feeling there were a lot of things. Secrets, Rigel had said. Forbidden things. This was the Atlantic Seaboard starting up now: a whole other culture.
Back from the shore stood another mansion like the one Phædrus had noticed earlier. This one was of gray stone, so bleak and oppressive it looked like a setting for some great historic tragedy. Another old Eastern robber-baron, Phædrus thought. Or his descendants… or maybe their creditors.
He studied the mansion for a while. It was set back above a huge lawn. Everything was in its place. All the leaves were raked and the grass was mowed. Even the trees were carefully spaced and carefully trimmed. It looked like the work of some obedient caretaker who had been at it, patiently, all his life.
Lila got up and said she needed to wash. She looked angry but Phædrus didn’t know exactly what to do about it. He told her how to pump the water to wash with, and she picked up the empty box of cheese crackers and her cup and stepped into the hatchway.
Halfway down the ladder she turned and said, Give me your cup, and I’ll wash it. No expression. He gave her his cup and then she disappeared.
He kept looking back again at the mansion rising back of the trees, as the boat moved away from it. It was huge and gray and shabby, and somewhat frightening. They sure knew how to dominate the spirit.
He picked up the binoculars for a closer look. Under one small grove of oak trees by the shore were empty white-painted chairs around a white table. From their curlicued shapes he guessed they were made of ornamental cast-iron. Something about them seemed to convey the mood of the whole place. Brittle, cold and uncomfortable. That was the Victorian spirit: a whole attitude toward life. Quality, they called it. European quality. Full of status and protocol.
It had the same feeling as Rigel’s sermon this morning. The social pattern that created that sermon on morality and the one that created these mansions were the same. It wasn’t just Eastern; it was Victorian. Phædrus hadn’t thought about that factor so much, but these mansions, and lawns and ornamental iron furniture made it unmistakable.