Young Peoples Pride | Page 3

Town'" quotes Oliver, discontentedly. "Well, who ever wanted
to write the description of a small Middle Western Town?" and from
Ricky French, selecting his words like flowers for a boutonniere.
"The trouble with 'Main Street' is not that it isn't the truth but that it
isn't nearly the whole truth. Now Sherwood Anderson--"
"Tennyson. Who was Tennyson? He died young."
"Well, if that is Clara Stratton's idea of how to play a woman who did."
The two sentences seem to come from no one and arrive nowhere. They
are batted out of the conversation like toy balloons.
"Bunny Andrews sailed for Paris Thursday," says Ted Billett longingly.
"Two years at the Beaux Arts," and for an instant the splintering of
lances stops, like the hush in a tournament when the marshal throws
down the warder, at the shine of that single word.
"All the same, New York is the best place to be right now if you're
going to do anything big," says Johnny uncomfortably, too much as if
he felt he just had to believe in it, but the rest are silent, seeing the
Seine wind under its bridges, cool as satin, grey-blue with evening, or
the sawdust of a restaurant near the quais where one can eat
Rabelaisiantly for six francs with wine and talk about anything at all
without having to pose or explain or be defensive, or the chimneypots
of La Cité branch-black against winter sky that is pallor of crimson
when the smell of roast chestnuts drifts idly as a student along
Boulevard St. Germain, or none of these, or all, but for each one
nostalgic aspect of the city where good Americans go when they die
and bad ones while they live--to Montmartre.
"New York is twice as romantic, really," says Johnny firmly.
"If you can't get out of it," adds Oliver with a twisted grin.
Ted Billett turns to Ricky French as if each had no other friend in the
world.
"You were over, weren't you?" he says, a little diffidently, but his voice

is that of Rachel weeping for her children.
"Well, there was a little café on the Rue Bonaparte--I suppose you
wouldn't know--"

III
The party has adjourned to Stovall's dog-kennel-sized apartment on
West Eleventh Street with oranges and ice, Peter Piper having suddenly
remembered a little place he knows where what gin is to be bought is
neither diluted Croton water nor hell-fire. The long drinks gather
pleasantly on the table, are consumed by all but Johnny, gather again.
The talk grows more fluid, franker.
"Phil Sellaby?---oh, the great Phil's just had a child--I mean his wife
has, but Phil's been having a book all winter and it's hard not to get 'em
mixed up. Know the girl he married?"
"Ran Waldo had a necking acquaintance with her at one time or another,
I believe. But now she's turned serious, I hear--_tres serieuse--tres
bonne femme_--"
"I bet his book'll be a cuckoo, then. Trouble with women. Can't do any
art and be married if you're in love with your wife. Instink--instinct of
creation--same thing in both cases--use it one way, not enough left for
other--unless, of course, like Goethe, you--" "Rats! Look at
Rossetti--Browning---Augustus John--William Morris--"
_"Browning!_ Dear man, when the public knows the truth about the
Brownings!"
Ricky French is getting a little drunk but it shows itself only in a desire
to make every sentence unearthly cogent with perfect words.
"Unhappy marriage--ver' good--stimula-shion," he says, carefully but
unsteadily, "other thing--tosh!"
Peter Piper jerks a thumb in Oliver's direction.
"Oh, beg pardon! Engaged, you told me? Beg pardon--sorry--very.
Writes?"
"Uh-huh. Book of poetry three years ago. Novel now he's trying to
sell."
"Oh, yes, yes, yes. Remember. 'Dancers' Holiday'--he wrote that? Good
stuff, damn good. Too bad. Feenee. Why will they get married?"
The conversation veers toward a mortuary discussion of love. Being
young, nearly all of them are anxious for, completely puzzled by and

rather afraid of it, all at the same time. They wish to draw up one
logical code to cover its every variation; they look at it, as it is at
present with the surprised displeasure of florists at a hollyhock that will
come blue when by every law of variation it should be rose. It is only a
good deal later that they will be able to give, not blasphemy because
the rules of the game are always mutually inconsistent, but tempered
thanks that there are any rules at all. Now Ricky French especially has
the air of a demonstrating anatomist over an anesthetized body.
"Observe, gentlemen--the carotid artery lies here. Now, inserting the
scalpel at this point--"
"The trouble with Art is that it doesn't pay a decent living wage unless
you're willing to commercialize--"
"The trouble with Art is that it never