Chapter XXXII
Cope Takes His Degree
Lemoyne's departure but a fortnight before Cope's small share in the convocation seemed to hint at mutual dissatisfaction; it might even stand for a disagreement, or possibly a quarrel. "It's just as well that he went," said Randoph to himself. "His presence here was no advantage to Bertram—nor to anybody else." And with another fortnight Cope himself would be gone; and who knew in what distant quarter he might take up his autumn work? His ambitions, as Randolph knew, pointed to some important university in the East. Meanwhile, make the most of the flying days.
Medora Phillips took the same view. She let Carolyn Thorpe loose for a week's spring vacation, and sent Cope word that she was alone in a darkened, depopulated home. Amy married. Hortense banished. Carolyn waved aside. With all such varying devotions removed, why should he not look in on her loneliness, during these final days, for dinner or tea? He was still "charming"—however difficult, however recalcitrant. And he was soon to depart. And who could believe that the fall term would bring his equal or his like?
Randolph, still taking his business easily, had gestions for walks and lunches; he had also free time to make his suggestions operative. But Cope, though frequently seen in active movement on the campus and through the town, gave little heed to either of his elderly friends. He met them both, in High Street, on different occasions, and thanked and smiled and promised—and kept away. He was doubtless absorbed in his special work, in the details of the closing year. He may have thought (as young men have been known to think) that, in accepting their invitations, he had done enough for them already. He had shown his good will on several occasions; let that suffice. Or he may have thought (as young men have been found capable of thinking) not at all: other concerns, more pressing and more contemporaneous, may have crowded them out of his mind altogether.
"I wonder if it's sensitiveness?" asked Randolph of Foster. "His chum didn't go away in the best of good odor. . . ."
"Settle it for yourself," returned Foster brusquely. "And recall that you have an office—and might have office-hours. Still, if you insist on asking me——"
"I don't. But you may speak, if you like."
"And if you will consent to be fobbed off with a short-measure answer——"
"That's right. Don't say all you think."
"Then I would put it somewhere between indifference and ingratitude. Nearer the latter. We know the young."
"I don't feel that I've done so very much for him," said Randolph, rather colorlessly.
"You were inclined to."
"H'm, yes. I could have opened up avenues that would have made his year here a very different thing. Perhaps he didn't realize what I could do. And perhaps he found me too old."
"Shall you attend the convocation?"
"I go usually. I'll push him off from shore and waft him good-bye."
"Good-bye? Good riddance!"
"You never liked him."
"I never did. If he leaves town without showing up here, no loss."
"Medora expects him here?"
"I think so."
Randolph descended to the lower floor. Mrs. Phillips was alone, seated behind a tea-service that steamed with expectation.
"Going?" she asked.
"Going. Joe is grouchy and violent today. And he keeps on reminding me that I have an office."
Medora glanced at the clock. Expectation seemed to be simmering down.
"Stay a few moments if you like. Forget the office a little longer. I'll make some fresh."
"Not all these preparations for me?"
"Well, they're here. Take advantage."
"You're all alone?"
"Alone. The house is empty."
Medora tried to look as if at the heart of a tremendous vacuum.
"I can't fill it."
"You can fill fifteen minutes."
"Oh, if you're going to confound time and space . . .!"
He sat down receptively.
Medora rang a bell and harried Helga a little.
She glanced at Randolph. He sat there as if less to fill than to be filled.
"Say something," she said.
"Are you going to the convocation?"
"No."
He sat silent.
"Does that exhaust the subjects of interest?" she asked.
"Pretty nearly. Doesn't it?"
Medora fell silent in turn,—let the light clatter of the tea things speak for her.
"Are you going to the convocation?" he presently asked again.
"Such variety!" she mocked.
"Are you?"
She hesitated.
"Yes," she said.
"That's better. Let's go together—as friends."
"Who would imagine us going as enemies?"
"Who, indeed?" Yet if they went together they went as reconciled competitors,—they went as the result of a truce.
"I should like to see Bertram Cope in cap and gown," he said.
"He has worn them before, he tells me."
"As a——?"
"As a member of the choir, during his undergraduate days."
"I see."
"I never noticed him especially, then," she acknowledged.
"We can notice him now."
Medora made a slight grimace. "Yes, we can notice." He the actor; they the audience. "A farewell performance."
"A final view."
Convocation day came clear, fair, mild. The professors walked in colorful solemnity beneath the elms and up the middle aisle of the chapel, lending both to outdoors and indoors the enlivenment of hoods red, yellow, purple. The marshals led strings of candidates—long strings and short—to the platform where the president sat, and the deans presented in due order their bachelors, masters and doctors. The rapid handing out of the diplomas brought frequent applause—bits, spatters, volleys, as the case might be. There was recognition for a Chinaman, for a negro law-student, for a pair of Filipinos; there was a marked outburst for a husky young man who was assumed by the uninformed to have been a star in the university's athletic life; there was a respectful but emphatic acknowledgment for a determined-looking middle-aged woman with gray hair, who was led on with four men as a little string of five; there was a salvo for a thoughtful, dignified man of thirty-odd, who went up as a group in himself, attended by marshals before and behind; and there was a slight spatter of applause for Bertram Cope (one of a small procession of six), yet rather more for a smiling young man who followed him. . . .
Cope looked somewhat spare, despite his voluminous gown. The trying lights added little color to his face, and brought his cheek-bones into undue prominence. But he took his sheepskin with a bow and a gesture that extinguished several of his companions; and he faced the audience, on descending from the stage, with a composed effect gained by experience in the choir. The lustre in the ceiling lit up his yellow hair and his blue eyes: "He is as charming as ever!" thought Medora Phillips.
"He's had a hard pull of it," commented Randolph.
"I hope his own people will feed him up this summer," said Medora. Her emphasis was wayward; "He wouldn't let me do it," she seemed to mean.
"Nor me," she almost made Randolph say.
There was a recessional, and then the crowds of students flooded the corridors and circulated under the fresh foliage of the campus. Randolph and Medora Phillips passed out with the rest of the assemblage. In the midst of one of the avenues of elms they noticed Cope as the center of a little group: two plain, elderly people (his parents, doubtless) and—and——
Medora Phillips looked twice. Yes, the other figure was Carolyn Thorpe, offering congratulations. Carolyn had returned to her post and her work the day before. "H'm," thought Medora, disposed to be miffed. Still, Carolyn had, after all, the same right to attend as anyone else.
Medora and Basil Randolph added their congratulations to Carolyn's. Cope, still in academic garb, performed the necessary introductions. His air was eager, but cursory; smiling and ready, yet impersonal and cool; above all, expeditious. If his parents passed on with the impression that Medora Phillips and Basil Randolph were but casual acquaintances, worthy of nothing beyond brief formalities, the blame was his own.
"I'm showing father and mother over the campus," he said, with an open smile and a wave with his diploma, as he edged away.
The elders docilely took their cue, and moved away with him.
"Well," said Randolph, "there are buildings, of course; and fountains, and sun-dials, and memorial benches; but . . ."
"They add nothing to him," pronounced Medora, as she looked back on the retiring party.
"Did you expect them to?" he asked. "Charm, like guilt, is personal. Anyhow, there seems to be no brother," he added.
"Well, come, Carolyn," said Medora, to her returned secretary, who was looking after the party too; "let's start for home. Good afternoon, Basil."
"What nice, good, pleasant, friendly people they are!" breathed Carolyn.
Randolph had strolled away, and Medora Phillips turned a studious glance on her companion. Carolyn was conceivably in a state of mind—keyed up to an all-inclusive appreciation. Did that foreshadow further verse?—a rustic rhapsody, a provincial pantoum? But Medora withheld question. Much as she would have enjoyed a well-consolidated impression of the visitors, she did not intend to secure it by interrogating Carolyn Thorpe.