Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise, by David Graham Phillips

neck. Her slim nose departed enough from the classic line toprevent the suggestion of monotony that is in all purely classicfaces. Her nostrils had the sensitiveness that more than any otheroutward sign indicates the imaginative temperament. Her chin andthroat–to look at them was to know where her lover would chooseto kiss her first. When she smiled her large even teeth weredazzling. And the smile itself was exceedingly sweet and winning,with the violet-gray eyes casting over it that seriousness verging onsadness which is the natural outlook of a highly intelligent nature.For while stupid vain people are suspicious and easily offended,only the intelligent are truly sensitive–keenly susceptible to allsensations. The dull ear is suspicious; the acute ear is sensitive.The intense red of her lips, at times so vivid that it seemedartificial, and their sinuous, sensitive curve indicated atemperament that was frankly proclaimed in her figure–sensuous,graceful, slender–the figure of girlhood in its perfection and ofperfect womanhood, too–like those tropical flowers that lookinnocent and young and fresh, yet stir in the beholder passionatelongings and visions. Her walk was worthy of face and figure–freeand firm and graceful, the small head carried proudly withouthaughtiness.This physical beauty had as an aureole to illuminate it and toset it off a manner that was wholly devoid of mannerisms–of thosethat men and women think out and exhibit to give added charm tothemselves–tricks of cuteness, as lisp and baby stare; tricks ofdignity, as grave brow and body always carried rigidly erect; tricksof sweetness and kindliness, as the ever ready smile and the warmhandclasp. Susan, the interested in the world about her, Susan,the self-unconscious, had none of these tricks. She was at all timesher own self. Beauty is anything but rare, likewise intelligence. Butthis quality of naturalness is the greatest of all qualities. It madeSusan Lenox unique.It was not strange–nor inexcusable that the girls and theirparents had begun to pity Susan as soon as this beauty developedand this personality had begun to exhale its delicious perfume. Itwas but natural that they should start the whole town to "being kindto the poor thing." And it was equally the matter of course that theyshould have achieved their object–should have impressed theconventional masculine mind of the town with such a sense of the"poor thing's" social isolation and "impossibility" that the boysceased to be her eagerly admiring friends, were afraid to be alonewith her, to ask her to dance. Women are conventional as abusiness; but with men conventionality is a groveling superstition.The youths of Sutherland longed for, sighed for the alluring, sweet,bright Susan; but they dared not, with all the women saying "Poorthing! What a pity a nice man can't afford to have anything to dowith her!" It was an interesting typical example of the profoundsnobbishness of the male character. Rarely, after Susan wassixteen, did any of the boys venture to ask her to dance and sogive himself the joy of encircling that lovely form of hers; yet frombabyhood her fascination for the male sex, regardless of age ortemperament, had been uncanny–"naturally, she being a lovechild,"said the old women. And from fourteen on, it grew steadily.It would be difficult for one who has not lived in a small town tounderstand exactly the kind of isolation to which Sutherlandconsigned the girl without her realizing it, without their fullyrealizing it themselves. Everyone was friendly with her. A strangerwould not have noticed any difference in the treatment of her andof her cousin Ruth. Yet not one of the young men would havethought of marrying her, would have regarded her as his equal orthe equal of his sisters. She went to all the general entertainments.She was invited to all the houses when failure to invite her wouldhave seemed pointed–but only then. She did not think much aboutherself; she was fond of study–fonder of reading–fondest, perhaps,of making dresses and hats, especially for Ruth, whom she thoughtmuch prettier than herself. Thus, she was only vaguely,subconsciously conscious of there being something peculiar andmysterious in her lot.This isolation, rather than her dominant quality of self-effacingconsideration for others, was the chief cause of the extraordinaryinnocence of her mind. No servant, no girl, no audacious boy everventured to raise with her any question remotely touching on sex.