The Fourth Side of the Triangle

“The trouble is, of course, that I don’t need a man to support me. I certainly don’t need your money — I have plenty of my own. I don’t hanker after social position; I have a pretty elevated position in my own sector of society. And I certainly couldn’t subordinate myself to your career, because I have my own — what’s worse, mine is made, while yours is still in the making. Marriage is all right for women in a bourgeois society...”

“What about children?” Dane asked her bitterly. “Doesn’t your advanced concept include the little matter of children?”

“Not especially. Let those propagate the race who can’t propagate anything else; Lord knows there are enough of them. I love children as much as the next woman, but in this life we have to make hard choices. I’ve made mine, and motherhood has no place in it. So you see, Dane, what you’ve fallen in love with.”

“I see, yes,” he said.

“We can be happy without marriage. As long as we stay in love. Don’t you see that, darling?”

It seemed to him there was anxiety in her eyes. As for him, the Grand Marnier was gone by now, together with his anger and most of his sickness. Only emptiness was left.

“No, Sheila, I don’t. I don’t say what you propose is immoral — the hell with that; it’s worse. It’s impractical. If marriage without love is hateful, so is love without marriage. It has to creep instead of walk, skulk in dark corners, hide—”

“It has to do no such thing,” Sheila retorted. Her head was cocked, her tone cool. “You’re talking like a schoolboy, darling, do you know that? Last night — satisfied with a kiss in the dark. Really, Dane! And now this goody-goody talk. What’s next? Are you going to tell me you’ve been keeping yourself chaste for your one and only little wifie? The difference between us is that you’re a romantic, and I’m a merchant realist.”

So there it was — the shrew hidden in every woman, the flash of carnivorous teeth, the bite.

He had thought of himself as taking his pleasure when and where he could create it, a reasonably sophisticated man. And here was Sheila, making him feel like a — what had she called him? — a schoolboy! Looking at her, he felt abjectly estranged. No trace of warmth or womanliness seemed left in the symmetrical face before him. It was like a Greek sculpture, smoothly inscrutable with secrets buried in time. Her philosophy was as far beyond him as his was beyond his mother’s. Maybe he was still a Yaley at heart: have fun while you’re unattached, then settle down with a wife — have fun afterward, too, if you could get away with it.

But Sheila’s philosophy seemed contemptuous of any standard. He was sure he could never catch up with her, even surer that he didn’t want to. And yet... a line from a poem he had jeered at came into his head: La Belle Dame sans Merci/ Hath thee in thrall.

It was as if she knew it, for she chuckled; and even this tiny sound from her throat made him hunger.

“Oh, Dane, don’t look so woebegone,” she cried. “Instead of being married lovers, we’ll be lovers, period. Dane... don’t tell me you’ve never had a woman!” She looked at him with absolute horror.

He was glad that she was not smiling when she said it, or he might have leaped at her. The brandy had been a mere stopgap; the beginning of the old feared roaring stirred in his ears. Careful, he warned himself; keep control, as he felt his hands become fists.

“Yes, I’ve had women, but I must seem impossibly old-fashioned to you. Because I’m strictly a one-woman man. Well, I’ve had my share of disappointments. This seems to be another of them.”

“Oh, Dane.” She moved away a little. “You say you’re a one-woman man. Don’t you mean you’re a one-woman-at-a-time man? And that’s just right with me. I shouldn’t want it any other way. I’ve no intention of sharing you with somebody. We’re not far apart at all. Isn’t that true?” When his mouth clamped tighter, Sheila said, “I don’t mean I’d never consider marriage. In a way, it would be up to you to show me that marriage — with you — is what I really want.

“But I don’t want it at this particular time, not even with you. I’m a one-man-at-a-time gal, and right now that man can be you. But you must understand that while I’d be yours and yours only, I don’t know for how long. A week, a month, five years — maybe forever; how can either of us tell? You notify me when you want out, and I’ll do the same.”

Was he, could he really be, in love with her?

Dane began to pace, and Sheila sat back and watched him with that same trace of anxiety. Did this mean she was giving the old man the gate? Or was she playing some sort of game with both of them? Damn this development! It had really fouled everything up. (How could love foul up anything? So maybe he wasn’t in love with her after all.)

He stopped before the ottoman and took her hands in his. “All right, baby, we’ll let the plot write itself. On your terms. Maybe I’ve escaped a fate worse than death. Lovers, is it? Let’s get started.”