Dirk McArthur
1919Dirk McArthur enters Eveline Hutchins’s life on the return voyage from Europe and becomes the focus of a courtship that is at once physically intense and emotionally uncommitted. Their attraction shapes Eveline’s choices long after they leave the ship, but Dirk’s eventual admission that he is not the marrying kind makes clear that the future she hopes for is not one he intends to offer.
Background and First Meeting
Dirk is an American from Chicago who has been studying in Munich for a year. When he meets Eveline aboard the Kroonland, he says he is getting out before they throw him out; the brief explanation establishes his irreverent manner without clarifying what has gone wrong at the university. They meet at dinner, where Eveline’s mother is absent and Eveline has begun her soup before noticing the handsome young man opposite her is American. Learning that he is from Chicago makes the encounter especially exciting to her.
They become friends quickly and, in Eveline’s account, take possession of the social world of the ship. On the balmy April crossing they play shuffleboard and deck tennis, and spend time in the bow watching the Atlantic waves curl and break beneath the ship. Their companionship turns a passage between continents into a shared interval, distinct from the family and social expectations waiting for Eveline back home.
The Crow’s Nest and Eveline’s Expectations
One moonlit night they climb to the crow’s nest. There is no watch, and they are alone in the canvas enclosure as the Kroonland moves through a restless swell. Eveline is frightened but does not want Dirk to see it. When he puts an arm around her shoulders, she feels dizzy; after he kisses her, she pushes him away. He laughs and asks for a small kiss to show there are no hard feelings. Eveline kisses him on the chin, but when he hugs her tightly and tries to open her lips, she pulls her mouth away and asks him to stop.
Dirk regrets taking her up there. Eveline tells him she is glad he did, then hurries down to the stateroom, where she has prepared an explanation for her mother about her torn stocking. The encounter leaves her awake in her bunk, listening to the engines, the ship’s creaking, and the sea through the porthole. She remembers Dirk’s cheek and the pressure of his arms, recognizes that she is in love with him, and wishes he would propose. Her hope is therefore rooted not only in their affectionate moments but also in what she imagines those moments might promise.
Courtship, Jealousy, and the Crash
Back in Chicago, Dirk continues to kiss Eveline when he brings her home, hold her close while dancing, and take her hand as he tells her she is a nice girl. Yet he does not speak of marriage. Eveline’s attention to him competes with her artistic ambitions: after seeing Sally Emerson at a dance, she feels ashamed that she has not been painting, but thoughts of Sally and her hopes for Eveline are soon swept aside by the excitement of driving home with Dirk.
On a hot night he drives west through the suburbs and out onto the prairie. Eveline knows they ought to go home, but says nothing. When Dirk stops by a white barn, she realizes he is very drunk and refuses the drink he offers from a flask. She asks whether he loves her. Dirk says that he loves her better than anybody except himself, adding that he loves himself best. When it begins to rain, he turns the car toward Chicago. The exchange gives Eveline a direct glimpse of the limit in his attachment: affection is present, but he puts himself first.
They crash on the return drive. Eveline crawls out from beneath the seat with her dress ruined but without injury. Dirk is bleeding from a cut on his forehead and holds his injured arm against his body. The ensuing rush includes calling Eveline’s father, getting Dirk to the hospital, avoiding reporters, and asking Mr. McArthur to keep the incident out of the morning papers. Eveline returns home at eight in the morning in a nurse’s raincoat over her ruined evening dress. Her father rebukes her, and she goes upstairs sobbing. The crash thus carries consequences beyond the couple: it brings family judgment and public exposure close enough that the families act to contain the story.
The Meeting at the Drake
After Eveline is sent away to Santa Fé, she continues to think about Dirk and later returns to Chicago for Adelaide’s wedding. Her father has forbidden Dirk to come to the house, so the two meet in the lobby of the Drake after a telephone quarrel between him and Eveline’s father. Dirk has been drinking; Eveline sees that he has been hitting it up since she last saw him, though his sheepish, boyish expression makes her feel like crying.
He proposes going to The Follies of 1914 and orders the most expensive food he can find, along with champagne. Eveline, unable to swallow, raises the question the courtship has left unresolved: how much does he like her, given how he behaved the previous spring? Dirk turns red, puts down his glass, and tells her he is not the marrying kind, describing himself as someone who loves them and leaves them. Eveline insists that she is not asking him to marry her, then laughs and says they should forget the subject. Dirk again calls her a good sport. The meeting replaces her earlier wishful interpretation of his attentions with his own plain statement that he will not offer marriage.
Narrative Role
Dirk’s importance lies in the contrast between the intimacy he readily gives and the commitment Eveline hopes it signifies. On the ship, the physical closeness begins with a boundary Eveline asserts; back in Chicago, affection persists alongside his silence about marriage; after the crash, her desire for him survives the danger and family reprimand. At the Drake, his admission finally names the mismatch. The available episodes end not with a shared future but with Eveline laughing off the question and Dirk repeating the flattering label that has accompanied their relationship. His charm and physical attentiveness are real within the story, but they do not amount to the promise Eveline wants.
