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diff --git a/old/60904-0.txt b/old/60904-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 21026ac..0000000 --- a/old/60904-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6423 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Book, by Djuna Barnes - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll -have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using -this ebook. - - - -Title: A Book - -Author: Djuna Barnes - -Release Date: December 11, 2019 [EBook #60904] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A BOOK *** - - - - -Produced by Richard Tonsing, Tim Lindell, and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -book was produced from images made available by the -HathiTrust Digital Library.) - - - - - - - - - - A BOOK - - -[Illustration] - - - - - A BOOK - - - BY - - DJUNA BARNES - -[Illustration] - - BONI AND LIVERIGHT - - PUBLISHERS NEW YORK - - - - - _Copyright, 1923, by_ - - BONI AND LIVERIGHT, INC. - - - PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - - - - - To - - MOTHER - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - CONTENTS - - - PAGE - - A NIGHT AMONG THE HORSES 1 - - THREE FROM THE EARTH 15 - - THE VALET 31 - - TO THE DOGS 44 - - BEYOND THE END 59 - - PASTORAL 74 - - OSCAR 76 - - ANTIQUE 103 - - KATRINA SILVERSTAFF 104 - - HUSH BEFORE LOVE 116 - - THE ROBIN’S HOUSE 117 - - PARADISE 131 - - NO-MAN’S-MARE 132 - - SIX SONGS OF KHALIDINE 145 - - THE DOVE 147 - - MOTHER 164 - - SONG IN AUTUMN 172 - - THE NIGGER 173 - - LULLABY 179 - - INDIAN SUMMER 180 - - I’D HAVE YOU THINK OF ME 194 - - THE RABBIT 195 - - THE FLOWERING CORPSE 209 - - A BOY ASKS A QUESTION OF A LADY 210 - - FIRST COMMUNION 219 - - FINIS 220 - - - - - ILLUSTRATIONS - - - Study _Frontispiece_ - - _Facing page_ - - Portrait 30 - - Portrait 58 - - Drawing 102 - - Portrait Study 144 - - Portrait 172 - - - - - A BOOK - - - - - A NIGHT AMONG THE HORSES - - -Toward dusk, in the Summer of the year, a man dressed in a frock coat -and top hat, and carrying a cane, crept through the underbrush bordering -the corral of the Buckler farm. - -As he moved, small twigs snapped, fell and were silent. His knees were -green from wounded shrubbery and grass, and his outspread hands tore -unheeded plants. His wrists hurt him and he rested from time to time, -always caring for his hat and knotted yellow cane, blowing through his -moustache. - -Dew had been falling, covering the twilight leaves like myriad faces -damp with the perspiration of the struggle for existence, and half a -mile away, standing out against the darkness of the night, a grove of -white birches shimmered like teeth in a skull. - -He heard the creaking of a gate, and the splashing of late rain into the -depths of a dark cistern. His heart ached with the nearness of the -earth, the faint murmur of it moving upon itself, like a sleeper who -turns to throw an arm about a beloved. - -A frog began moaning among the skunk cabbages, and John thrust his hand -deep into his bosom. - -Something somnolent seemed to be here, and he wondered. It was like a -deep, heavy, yet soft prison where, without sin, one may suffer -intolerable punishment. - -Presently he went on, feeling his way. He reached a high plank fence and -sensing it with his fingers, he lay down, resting his head against the -ground. - -He was tired, he wanted to sleep, but he searched for his hat and cane -and straightened out his coat beneath him before he turned his eyes to -the stars. - -And now he could not sleep, and wondered why he had thought of it; -something quick was moving the earth, it seemed to live, to shake with -sudden immensity. - -He heard a dog barking, and the dim light from a farm window kept -winking as the trees swung against its square of light. The odor of -daisies came to him, and the assuring, powerful smell of the stables; he -opened his mouth and drew in his moustache. - -A faint tumult had begun. A tremor ran under the length of his body and -trembled off into the earth like a shudder of joy—died down and repeated -itself. And presently he began to tremble, answering, throwing out his -hands, curling them up weakly, as if the earth were withholding -something precious, necessary. - -His hat fell off, striking a log with a dull hollow sound, and he -pressed his red moustache against the grass, weeping. - -Again he heard it, felt it; a hundred hoofs beat upon the earth and he -knew the horses had gone wild in the corral on the other side of the -fence, for animals greet the Summer, striking the earth, as friends -strike the back of friends. He knew, he understood; a hail to Summer, to -life, to death. - -He drew himself against the bars, pressing his eyes under them, peering, -waiting. - -He heard them coming up across the heavy turf, rounding the curve in the -Willow Road. He opened his eyes and closed them again. The soft menacing -sound deepened, as heat deepens, strikes through the skin into the very -flesh. Head on, with long legs rising, falling, rising again, striking -the ground insanely, like needles taking terrible, impossible and -purposeless stitches. - -He saw their bellies, fawn-coloured, pitching from side to side, -flashing by, straining the fence, and he rose up on his feet and -silently, swiftly, fled on beside them. - -Something delirious, hysterical, came over him and he fell. Blood -trickled into his eyes down from his forehead. It had a fine feeling for -a moment, like a mane, like that roan mare’s mane that had passed -him—red and long and splendid. - -He lifted his hand, and closed his eyes once more, but the soft pounding -did not cease, though now, in his sitting position, it only jogged him -imperceptibly, as a child on a knee. - -It seemed to him that he was smothering, and he felt along the side of -his face as he had done in youth when they had put a cap on him that was -too large. Twining green things, moist with earth-blood, crept over his -fingers, the hot, impatient leaves pressed in, and the green of the -matted grass was deathly thick. He had heard about the freeness of -nature, thought it was so, and it was not so. - -A trailing ground pine had torn up small blades in its journey across -the hill, and a vine, wrist-thick, twisted about a pale oak, hideously, -gloriously, killing it, dragging it into dust. - -A wax Patrick Pipe leaned against his neck, staring with black eyes, and -John opened his mouth, running his tongue across his lips, snapping it -off, sighing. - -Move as he would, the grass was always under him, and the crackling of -last Autumn’s leaves and last Summer’s twigs—minute dead of the infinite -greatness—troubled him. Something portentous seemed connected with the -patient noises about him. An acorn dropped, striking a thin fine powder -out of a frail oak pod. He took it up, tossing it. He had never liked to -see things fall. - -He sat up, with the dim thunder of the horses far off, but quickening -his heart. - -He went over the scene he had with Freda Buckler, back there in the -house, the long quivering spears of pot-grass standing by the window as -she walked up and down, pulling at them, talking to him. - -Small, with cunning fiery eyes and a pink and pointed chin. A daughter -of a mother who had known too many admirers in her youth; a woman with -an ample lap on which she held a Persian kitten or a trifle of fruit. -Bounty, avarice, desire, intelligence—both of them had always what they -wanted. - -He blew down his moustache again thinking of Freda in her floating -yellow veil that he had called ridiculous. She had not been angry, he -was nothing but a stable boy then. It was the way with those small -intriguing women whose nostrils were made delicate through the pain of -many generations that they might quiver whenever they caught a whiff of -the stables. - -“As near as they can get to the earth,” he had said, and was Freda -angry? She stroked his arm always softly, looking away, an inner -bitterness drawing down her mouth. - -She said, walking up and down quickly, looking ridiculously small: - -“I am always gentle, John”—frowning, trailing her veil, thrusting out -her chin. - -He answered: “I liked it better where I was.” - -“Horses,” she said showing sharp teeth, “are nothing for a man with your -bile—pot-boy—curry comber, smelling of saddle soap—lovely!” She -shrivelled up her nose, touching his arm: “Yes, but better things. I -will show you—you shall be a gentleman—fine clothes, you will like them, -they feel nice.” And laughing she turned on one high heel, sitting down. -“I like horses, they make people better; you are amusing, intelligent, -you will see——” - -“A lackey!” he returned passionately, throwing up his arm. “What is -there in this for you, what are you trying to do to me? The -family—askance—perhaps—I don’t know.” - -He sat down pondering. He was getting used to it, or thought he was, all -but his wordy remonstrances. He knew better when thinking of his horses, -realizing that when he should have married this small, unpleasant and -clever woman, he would know them no more. - -It was a game between them, which was the shrewder, which would win out? -He? A boy of ill breeding, grown from the gutter, fancied by this woman -because he had called her ridiculous, or for some other reason that he -would never know. This kind of person never tells the truth, and this, -more than most things, troubled him. Was he a thing to be played with, -debased into something better than he was—than he knew? - -Partly because he was proud of himself in the costume of a groom, partly -because he was timid, he desired to get away, to go back to the stables. -He walked up to the mirrors as if about to challenge them, peering in. -He knew he would look absurd, and then knew, with shame, that he looked -splendidly better than most of the gentlemen that Freda Buckler knew. He -hated himself. A man who had grown out of the city’s streets, a fine -common thing! - -She saw him looking into the mirrors, one after the other, and drew her -mouth down. She got up, walking beside him in the end, between him and -them, taking his arm. - -“You shall enter the army—you shall rise to General, or Lieutenant at -least—and there are horses there, and the sound of stirrups—with that -physique you will be happy—authority you know,” she said, shaking her -chin, smiling. - -“Very well, but a common soldier——” - -“As you like—afterward.” - -“Afterward?” - -“Very well, a common soldier.” - -He sensed something strange in her voice, a sort of irony, and it took -the patience out of him: - -“I have always been common, I could commit crimes, easily, gladly—I’d -like to!” - -She looked away. “That’s natural,” she said faintly; “it’s an instinct -all strong men have——” - -She knew what was troubling him, thwarted instincts, common beautiful -instincts that he was being robbed of. He wanted to do something final -to prove his lower order; caught himself making faces, idiot faces, and -she laughed. - -“If only your ears stuck out, chin receded,” she said, “you might look -degenerate, common, but as it is——” - -And he would creep away in hat, coat and with his cane, to peer at his -horses, never daring to go in near them. Sometimes, when he wanted to -weep, he would smear one glove with harness grease, but the other one he -held behind his back, pretending one was enough to prove his revolt. - -She would torment him with vases, books, pictures, making a fool of him -gently, persistently, making him doubt by cruel means, the means of -objects he was not used to, eternally taking him out of his sphere. - -“We have the best collection of miniatures,” she would say with one knee -on a low ottoman, bringing them out in her small palm. - -“Here, look.” - -He would put his hands behind him. - -“She was a great woman—Lucrezia Borgia—do you know history——” She put it -back because he did not answer, letting his mind, a curious one, torment -itself. - -“You love things very much, don’t you?” she would question, because she -knew that he had a passion for one thing only. She kept placing new -ladders beneath his feet, only to saw them off at the next rung, making -him nothing more than a nervous, irritable experiment. He was uneasy, -like one given food to smell and not to taste, and for a while he had -not wanted to taste, and then curiosity began, and he wanted to, and he -also wanted to escape, and he could do neither. - -Well, after he had married her, what then? Satisfy her whim and where -would he be? He would be nothing, neither what he had been nor what -other people were. This seemed to him, at times, her wish—a sort of -place between lying down and standing up, a cramped position, a slow -death. A curious woman. - -This same evening he had looked at her attentively for the first time. -Her hair was rather pretty, though too mousy, yet just in the nape of -the neck, where it met the lawn of the collar it was very attractive. -She walked well for a little woman, too. - -Sometimes she would pretend to be lively, would run a little, catch -herself at it, as if she had not intended to do it, and calm down once -more, or creeping up to him, stroking his arm, talking to him, she would -walk beside him softly, slowly, that he might not step out, that he -would have to crawl across the carpet. - -Once he had thought of trying her with honesty, with the truth of the -situation. Perhaps she would give him an honest answer, and he had -tried. - -“Now, Miss Freda—just a word—what are you trying to do? What is it you -want? What is there in me that can interest you? I want you to tell me—I -want to know—I have got to ask someone, and I haven’t anyone to ask but -you.” - -And for a moment she almost relented, only to discover that she could -not if she had wished. She did not know always what she meant herself. - -“I’ll tell you,” she said, hoping that this, somehow, might lead her -into the truth, for herself, if not for him, but it did not, “you are a -little nervous, you will get used to it—you will even grow to like it. -Be patient. You will learn soon enough that there is nothing in the -world so agreeable as climbing, changing.” - -“Well,” he said, trying to read her, “and then?” - -“That’s all, you will regret the stables in the end—that’s all.” Her -nostrils quivered. A light came into her eyes, a desire to defy, to be -defied. - -Then on this last night he had done something terrible, he had made a -blunder. There had been a party. The guests, a lot of them, were mostly -drunk, or touched with drink. And he, too, had too much. He remembered -having thrown his arms about a tall woman, gowned in black with loose -shoulder straps, dragging her through a dance. He had even sung a bit of -a song, madly, wildly, horribly. And suddenly he had been brought up -sharp by the fact that no one thought his behaviour strange, that no one -thought him presumptuous. Freda’s mother had not even moved or dropped -the kitten from her lap where it sat, its loud resolute purr shaking the -satin of her gown. - -And he felt that Freda had got him where she wanted him, between two -rungs. Going directly up to her, he said: - -“You are ridiculous!” and twirled his moustache, spitting into the -garden. - -And he knew nothing about what happened until he found himself in the -shrubbery, crawling toward the corral, through the dusk and the dampness -of the leaves, carrying his cane, making sure of his hat, looking up at -the stars. - -Now he knew why he had come. He was with his horses again. His eyes, -pressed against the bars, stared in. The black stallion in the lead had -been his special pet, a rough animal, but kindly, knowing. And here they -were once more, tearing up the grass, galloping about in the night like -a ball-room full of real people, people who wanted to do things, who did -what they wanted to do. - -He began to crawl through the bars, slowly, deftly, and when half way -through he paused, thinking. - -Presently he went on again, and drawing himself into the corral, his hat -and cane thrown in before him, he lay there mouth to the grass. - -They were still running, but less madly; one of them had gone up the -Willow Road leading into a farther pasture, in a flare of dust, through -which it looked immense and faint. - -On the top of the hill three or four of the horses were standing, -testing the weather. He would mount one, he would ride away, he would -escape. And his horses, the things he knew, would be his escape. - -Bareback, he thought, would be like the days when he had taken what he -could from the rush of the streets, joy, exhilaration, life, and he was -not afraid. He wanted to stand up, to cry aloud. - -And he saw ten or twelve of them rounding the curb, and he did stand up. - -They did not seem to know him, did not seem to know what to make of him, -and he stared at them wondering. He did not think of his white shirt -front, his sudden arising, the darkness, their excitement. Surely they -would know, in a moment more. - -Wheeling, flaring their wet nostrils, throwing up their manes, striking -the earth in a quandary, they came on, whinnied faintly, and he knew -what it was to be afraid. - -He had never been afraid and he went down on his knees. With a new -horror in his heart he damned them. He turned his eyes up, but he could -not open them. He thought rapidly, calling on Freda in his heart, -speaking tenderly, promising. - -A flare of heat passed his throat and descended into his bosom. - -“I want to live. I can do it—damn it—I can do it! I can forge ahead, -make my mark.” - -He forgot where he was for a moment and found new pleasure in this -spoken admission, this new rebellion. He moved with the faint shaking of -the earth, like a child on a woman’s lap. - -The upraised hoofs of the first horse missed him, but the second did -not. - -And presently the horses drew apart, nibbling here and there, switching -their tails, avoiding a patch of tall grass. - - - - - THREE FROM THE EARTH - - - PERSONS: │ - JAMES │CARSON _brothers_ - HENRY │ 〃 - JOHN │ 〃 - - KATE MORLEY—│_An adventuress, a lady of leisure_ - - TIME—_Late afternoon_. - - PLACE—KATE MORLEY’S _boudoir. A long narrow room, with a great many - lacquer screens in various shades of blue, a tastefully - decorated room though rather extreme._ - -_At the rise of the curtain the three_ CARSON _brothers are discovered -sitting together on a couch to the left. They look like peasants of the -most obvious type. They are tall, rather heavy—and range in age from -nineteen to twenty-five. They have sandy, sun-bleached hair that insists -upon sticking straight up—oily, sweaty skins—large hanging lips and -small eyes on which a faint whitish down moves for lashes. They are_ -_clumsy and ill clothed. Russet shoes are on all six feet. They each -wear a purple aster and each has on a tie of the super-stunning -variety—they have evidently done their best to be as one might say “well -dressed.”_ - -_When they speak—aside from their grunts—their voices are rough, nasal -and occasionally crack. They are stoop-shouldered and their hands are -excessively ugly._ - -_Yet in spite of all this, their eyes are intelligent, their smiles -gentle, melancholy, compassionate. And though they have a look of -formidable grossness and stupidity, there is, on second observation, a -something beneath all this in no way in keeping with this first -impression._ - -JOHN, _the youngest, and the smallest, looks around the room carefully_. - - -JOHN—A nice room, eh? [_He tries to whisper, but it comes forth buzzing -and harsh._] - -JAMES—A woman’s room. - -HENRY—How? - -JAMES—A narrow room, John. - -JOHN—Well? - -JAMES—Cats and narrow walls. - -HENRY—[_Grunting._] Ugh. - -JOHN—Hush—I hear her coming! [_The curtains part and_ KATE MORLEY -_enters. She is a woman of about forty. Handsome. Dark. She_ _is -beautifully dressed—in a rather seductive fashion. She has a very -interesting head; she has an air of one used to adulation and the -pleasure of exerting her will. She has a trick of narrowing her eyes. As -she comes forward there is a general commotion among the brothers, but -none manages to stand up._] - -KATE—Good day, gentlemen. - -ALL THREE—Good day. - -KATE—Nice of you to call on me. [_She seats herself, crossing her -legs._] You are the three Carsons, John, James and Henry, aren’t you? I -haven’t seen you for years, yet I think I should have known you. - -ALL THREE—Ah ha. - -KATE—Yes, I presume I should have known you. I have a good memory. Well, -as I said, it’s nice of you to come to see me. Social? - -HENRY—You might call it that. - -KATE—It’s quite nice to get an unexpected visitor or so. I’m the kind of -woman who knows just who is going to call on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday—— - -ALL THREE—Ah ha. - -KATE—How’s the country? - -JOHN—Just the same. - -KATE—It always is.—Don’t you go mad—watching it? - -HENRY—Now and again. - -KATE—And how’s your father? [_Not pausing for an answer—almost to -herself._] I remember—_he_ was always mad. He used to wear a green cloth -suit, and he carried white rats all over his shoulders. [_Remembering -the three._] Ah, yes, your father—he was a barber, wasn’t he? - -HENRY—No, a chemist. - -KATE—[_Laughing uneasily._] I have a bad memory after all. Well, anyway, -in those days he had begun to be queer—everyone noticed it—even that -funny man who had those three flaxen-haired daughters with the thin -ankles who lives at the end of the street—— And your mother—a -prostitute, I believe. - -HENRY—[_Calmly._] At times. - -KATE—A dancing girl without a clean word in her vocabulary, or a whole -shirt to her name—— - -JAMES—But a woman with fancies. - -KATE—[_Sarcastically._] And what ability? - -HENRY—Oh, none, just a burning desire. - -KATE—What’s the use of going into that? How did you get here—what for? - -ALL THREE—On bicycles. - -KATE—[_Bursting into laughter._] How exactly ridiculous and -appropriate—and what else? - -JOHN—To see how the sun falls in a place like this. - -KATE—[_Angrily, rising._] Well, you see, from left to right, and right -to left—— - -HENRY—True. - -JOHN—[_Quietly._] And we wanted to see how you walked, and sat down, and -crossed your legs—— - -HENRY—And to get father’s letters. - -KATE—Well, you see how I walk, sit down, cross my legs. What letters? - -JAMES—Letters to you. - -KATE—[_Uneasily._] So you know about that—well, and what would you -fellows do with them—read them to see how clever they are? - -JAMES—No, we have the clever ones. - -KATE—Mine? - -JOHN _and_ HENRY—[_Nodding._] Exactly. - -KATE—Oh! - -JOHN—You suffer? - -KATE—From time to time—there’s always a reaction. - -HENRY—That’s vulgar, isn’t it? - -KATE—Not unusually. - -JOHN—The letters? - -KATE—[_To herself._] Well, there is malice in me—what of it? We’ve all -been a while with the dogs, we don’t all learn to bark. - -JOHN—Ah ha. - -KATE—See here, what will you do with your father’s letters? - -HENRY—Destroy them, perhaps. - -KATE—And if I give them to you—will your father be as generous with -mine? - -HENRY—Father is undoubtedly a gentleman—even at this moment. - -KATE—Well, we shall see about that—first tell me how you live. - -JOHN—We go down on the earth and find things, tear them up, shaking the -dirt off. [_Making motions to illustrate._] Then there are the cows to -be milked, the horses—a few—to be fed, shod and curried—do you wish me -to continue? - -KATE—Yes, yes, go on. - -HENRY—[_Taking the tale up._] We get up at dawn, and our father turns -over in bed and whispers: “If you meet anyone, say nothing; if you are -asked a question, look stupid——” - -KATE—I believe you. - -JAMES—And he says: “Go about your work as if you had neither sight, -speech nor hearing——” - -KATE—Yes—— - -JOHN—And he adds: “If you should meet a woman in the road——” - -KATE—[_Excited._] Then what? - -HENRY—That’s enough. Then of a Sunday we watch the people going to -church, when we hear the “Amen,” we lift a little and sit back—and then -again—— - -KATE—Religion? - -HENRY—Enough for our simple needs. - -KATE—Poor sheep! - -JAMES—Wise sheep! - -KATE—What! Well perhaps. No one is any longer sure of anything. Then -what? - -JOHN—When we come home he says: “What have you seen and heard today?” He -never asks, “What have you said?” - -KATE—He trusts you? - -JOHN—Undoubtedly. Sometimes we say, “We saw a hawk flying,” or, “A -badger passed,” and sometimes we bring him the best treat of all—— - -KATE—Well? - -JOHN—Something dead. - -KATE—Dead? - -HENRY—Anything that has destroyed the crops—a mole—a field-mouse. - -KATE—And never anything that’s harmless? - -JOHN—Never. - -KATE—Well, see here, I’ll give you those letters. Suddenly my heart says -to me, “Kate, give the oxen the rope, they won’t run away.”—Isn’t it so? -Very well, I put my hand on a certain package and all is over—I’m about -to be married, you know. [_She has risen and gone over to a little box -standing on the desk. Out from this she takes a package of letters tied -with a red ribbon. She turns and walks straight up to_ JOHN.] I’ll give -them to you. You are the youngest, the gentlest, and you have the nicest -hands. [_She sits down, breathing with difficulty._] - -JOHN—[_Putting them into his blouse._] Thank you, Kate Morley. - -KATE—Now, tell me about everything. How is that mother of yours? I -remember her—she was on the stage—she danced as they say, and she sang. -She had a pet monkey—fed it honey out of a jar kept full by her -admirers: grooms, stage hands, what not—— - -HENRY—Yes, and she used to draw pictures of it in the style of -Dürer—almost morbid—and later it caught a disease and died—— - -KATE—I don’t doubt it—and she, she had an under-lip like a balloon—and -your father kissed that mouth, was even tempted—— - -JAMES—My father often saw beyond the flesh. - -KATE—Kissed such a creature! - -HENRY—At such times she was beautiful. - -KATE—[_With a touch of humility._] Yes, I’m sorry—I remember. Once I -passed her, and instead of saying something, something horrible—she -might—she looked down. - -JOHN—She was beautiful, looking down. - -KATE—[_Angry._] And I, I suppose I wasn’t beautiful to look at—— - -HENRY—No, I suppose not, that is, not for her. - -KATE—[_Viciously._] Well, let me tell you, you haven’t inherited her -beauty. Look at your hands—thick, hard, ugly—and the life lines in them -like the life lines in the hands of every laborer digging sewers—— - -JOHN—There’s something in that, but they are just beginning. - -KATE—[_Turning on them._] Look at you! You’re ugly, and clumsy, and -uncouth. You grunt and roar, you wear abominable clothes—and you have no -manners—and all because of your father, your mighty righteous and -original father. You don’t have to be like this. You needn’t have little -pigs’ eyes with bleached lashes, and thick hanging lips—and noses—but I -suppose you’ve got adenoids, and you may suffer from the fact that your -mother had a rupture, and in all probability you have the beginning of -ulcers of the stomach, for God knows your father couldn’t keep a meal -down like a gentleman! - -HENRY—He _was_ delicate. - -KATE—And why was he delicate? He called himself “The little Father,” as -one might say, “The great Emperor.” Well, to have a father to whom you -can go and say, “All is not as it should be”—that would have been -everything. But what could you say to him, and what had he to say to -you? Oh, we all have our pathetic moments of being at our best, but he -wasn’t satisfied with that, he wanted to be at it all the time. And the -result, the life of a mole. “Listen and say nothing.” Then he becomes -the gentleman farmer because he discovers he cannot be the Beloved Fool. -Suddenly he is the father of three creatures for all the world like -Russian peasants—without an idea, a subtlety—it’s wicked, that’s all, -wicked—and as for that, how do you know but that all three of you had a -different mother? Why, great God, I might be the mother of one of you! - -JOHN—[_Significantly._] So I believe, madam. - -KATE—[_Unheeding._] Do you think a man like your father had any right to -bring such children as you into the world—three columns of flesh without -one of the five senses! [_She suddenly buries her head in her hands._] - -JOHN—[_Gently._] You loved our father. - -HENRY—And you also had your pot of honey—— - -KATE—Thank God I had no ideals—I had a religion. - -JOHN—Just what? - -KATE—You wouldn’t understand. - -HENRY—Shoes to the needy? - -KATE—No, I’m not that kind, vicious boy. - -JOHN—Are you quite certain? - -KATE—I’ll admit all my candles are not burning for God. Well, then, blow -them out, still I’ll have a light burning somewhere, for all your great -breaths, you oxen! - -HENRY—You were never a tower builded of ivory—— - -KATE—You’re too stupid to be bitter—your voices are too -undeveloped—you’d say “love” and “hate” the same way. - -JAMES—True, we have been shut away from intonations. - -KATE—You wouldn’t even wish to die. - -JOHN—We shall learn. - -KATE—Why bother? - -John—[_Abruptly rising._] You have posed for the madonna? - -KATE—Every woman has. - -JOHN—You have done it better than most. - -KATE—What do you mean? - -JOHN—I looked at it when I came in. [_He picks up the photograph._] - -KATE—Let it be—I was playing in the “Crown of Thorns,” an amateur -theatrical. - -JOHN—Yes, I presumed it was amateur—— - -JAMES—You were a devoted mother? - -KATE—I have no virtues. - -HENRY—And vices? - -KATE—Weak in one, weak in the other. - -JOHN—However, the baby had nice hands—— - -KATE—[_Looking at him._] That is true. - -JAMES—But then babies only use their hands to lift the breast, and -occasionally to stroke the cheek—— - -KATE—Or throw them up in despair—not a heavy career. - -JOHN—And then? - -KATE—[_In an entirely new tone._] Won’t you have tea?— But no, pay no -attention to me, that’s another of my nasty malicious tricks. Curse -life! - -HENRY—Your life is drawing to a close. - -JAMES—And from time to time you place your finger on a line of Nietzsche -or Schopenhauer, wondering: “How did he say it all in two lines?” Eh? - -KATE—As you say, [_She looks at them slowly, one by one._] You are -strange things. [_Coming back._] But at least I’ve given up -something—look at your mother, what did she give up for your father—a -drunken husband—— - -JAMES—A drunken lover—that’s different. - -KATE—I can’t help thinking of that great gross stomach of hers. - -JAMES—Gross indeed, it won’t trouble him any more. - -KATE—What’s that? - -JOHN—He cut his throat with a knife—— - -KATE—Oh, my God! [_Pause._] How did he look? - -JOHN—You can’t satisfy your æsthetic sense that way—he looked—well, -ugly, played out; yes, played out. Everything had been too much for -him—you—us—you could see that in the way he—— - -KATE—[_In a whisper._] Well, that’s strange—everything seems—I knew him, -you know. [_She begins to laugh._] And the dogs barked? - -JAMES—So I believe. - -KATE—[_Dazed._] And you, what are you three going to do? - -HENRY—We are coming out of the country—we are going abroad—we can listen -there. - -KATE—Abroad—listen—what are you saying? - -HENRY—There are great men abroad. - -JAMES—Anatole France, De Gourmont—— - -KATE—De Gourmont is dead. - -JOHN—There will be others. - -KATE—[_Still dully._] And how did you come to know such names—oh, your -father, of course—— - -JOHN—We needed them. - -KATE—Strange, I’ve been prepared for every hour but this—— - -JAMES—Yet I dare say you’ve never cried out. - -KATE—You are mistaken. I’ve cried: “To the evil of mind all is evil——” - -HENRY—Ah ha, and what happened? - -KATE—Sometimes I found myself on my knees—— - -JAMES—And sometimes? - -KATE—That’s enough, haven’t we about cleared all the shavings out of the -carpenter shop? - -HENRY—You at least will never kill yourself. - -KATE—Not likely, I’ll probably die in bed with my slippers on—you see, I -have a pretty foot. - -HENRY—We understand—you are about to be married. - -KATE—To a supreme court judge—so I’m cleaning house. - -JOHN—[_Standing with the photograph._] But it won’t be quite cleared out -until this goes. [_He takes it out of the frame and turning it over_ -_reads._] “Little John, God bless him.” [_He turns it back._] God bless -him. Well, just for that I’d like to keep it. - -KATE—That’s my affair. - -JOHN—So I see. [_He puts the photo in his blouse with the letters._] - -KATE—Well, perhaps—well, you’re not so stupid after all—— Come, for the -madonna give me back the letters—I’ll burn them I swear, and you can put -the madonna at the foot of the bed. - -JOHN—I shan’t put it at the foot of the bed—I don’t look at the foot of -the bed—— - -HENRY _and_ JAMES—[_Rising._] And now we shall go. - -KATE—[_Her hands to her head._] But, gentlemen, gentlemen—— - -HENRY—We won’t need to bother you again. We are leaving the country and -going elsewhere—and there was only one of us to whom you might have -shown a little generosity—in other words we do not wish to be reminded, -and now we can forget, and in time become quite hilarious—— - -KATE—But, gentlemen, gentlemen, not this way—— - -JOHN—Well? [_Quite suddenly he takes her in his arms, raises her face -and kisses her on the mouth._] - -KATE—[_Crying out._] Not that way! Not that way! - -JAMES—That’s the way you bore him! - - - [_The curtain drops behind them._] - -[Illustration] - - - - - THE VALET - - -The fields about Louis-Georges’ house grew green in early Spring, -leaving the surrounding country in melancholy grey, for Louis-Georges -was the only man who sowed his ground to rye. - -Louis-Georges was of small stature. His face was oblong, too pale. A dry -mouth lay crookedly beneath a nose ending in a slight bulb. His long -animal-like arms swung half a rhythm ahead of his legs. - -He prided himself on his farming, though he knew nothing about it. He -surveyed the tender coming green with kindly good nature, his acres were -always a month ahead of his neighbours’. - -Sometimes standing in the doorway, breathing through the thick hair in -his nostrils, stretching his gloves, he would look at the low-lying -sheds and the stables and the dull brown patches of ploughed earth, and -mutter, “Splendid, splendid!” - -Finally he would stroll in among the cattle where, in dizzy circles, -large coloured flies swayed, emitting a soft insistent drone, like -taffeta rubbed against taffeta. - -He liked to think that he knew a great deal about horses. He would look -solemnly at the trainer and discuss length of neck, thinness and shape -of flank by the hour, stroking the hocks of his pet racer. Sometimes he -would say to Vera Sovna: “There’s more real breeding in the rump of a -mare than in all the crowned heads of England.” - -Sometimes he and Vera Sovna would play in the hay, and about the grain -bins. She in her long flounces, leaping in and out, screaming and -laughing, stamping her high heels, setting up a great commotion among -her ruffles. - -Once Louis-Georges caught a rat, bare-handed, and with such skill that -it could not bite. He disguised his pride in showing it to her by -pretending that he had done so to inform her of the rodent menace to -Winter grain. - -Vera Sovna was a tall creature with thin shoulders; she was always -shrugging them as if her shoulder-blades were heavy. She dressed in -black and laughed a good deal in a very high key. - -She had been a great friend of Louis-Georges’ mother, but since her -death she had fallen into disrepute. It was hinted that she was -“something” to Louis-Georges; and when the townsfolk and neighbouring -landholders saw her enter the house they would not content themselves -until they saw her leave it. - -If she came out holding her skirts crookedly above her thin ankles, they -would find the roofs of their mouths in sudden disapproval, while if she -walked slowly, dragging her dress, they would say: “See what a dust Vera -Sovna brings up in the driveway; she stamps as if she were a mare.” - -If she knew anything of this feeling, she never showed it. She would -drive through the town and turn neither to right nor left until she -passed the markets with their bright yellow gourds and squashes, their -rosy apples and their splendid tomatoes, exhaling an odour of decaying -sunlight. On the rare occasions when Louis-Georges accompanied her, she -would cross her legs at the knee, leaning forward, pointing a finger at -him, shaking her head, laughing. - -Sometimes she would go into the maids’ quarters to play with Leah’s -child, a little creature with weak legs and neck, who always thrust out -his stomach for her to pat. - -The maids, Berthe and Leah, were well-built complacent women with serene -blue eyes, quite far apart, and good mouths in which fine teeth grew -gratefully and upon whom round ample busts flourished like plants. They -went about their work singing or chewing long green salad leaves. - -In her youth Leah had done something for which she prayed at intervals. -Her memory was always taking her hastily away to kneel before the gaudy -wax Christ that hung on a beam in the barn. Resting her head against the -boards she would lift her work-worn hands, bosom-high, sighing, praying, -murmuring. - -Or she would help Berthe with the milking, throwing her thick ankles -under the cow’s udders, bringing down a sudden fury of milk, shining and -splashing over her big clean knuckles, saying quietly, evenly: - -“I think we will have rain before dawn.” - -And her sister would answer: “Yes, before dawn.” - -Leah would spend hours in the garden, her little one crawling after her, -leaving childish smears on the dusty leaves of the growing corn, digging -his hands into the vegetable tops, falling and pretending to have fallen -on purpose; grinning up at the sun foolishly until his eyes watered. - -These two women and Louis-Georges’ valet, Vanka, made up the household, -saving occasional visits from Louis-Georges’ aunts, Myra and Ella. - -This man Vanka was a mixture of Russian and Jew. He bit his nails, -talked of the revolution, moved clumsily. - -His clothes fitted him badly, he pomaded his hair, which was reddish -yellow, pulled out the short hairs that tormented his throat, and from -beneath his white brows distributed a kindly intelligent look. The most -painful thing about him was his attempt to seem alert, his effort to -keep pace with his master. - -Louis-Georges would say, “Well now, Vanka, what did they do to you in -Russia when you were a boy?” - -“They shot my brother for a red,” Vanka would answer, pulling the hairs. -“They threw him into prison, and my sister took him his food. One day -our father was also arrested, then she took two dinner pails instead of -one. Once she heard a noise, it sounded like a shot, and our father -returned her one of the pails. They say he looked up at her like a man -who is gazed at over the shoulder.” He had told the tale often, adding: -“My sister became almost bald later on, yet she was a handsome woman; -the students used to come to her chambers to hear her talk.” - -At such times Louis-Georges would excuse himself and shut himself up to -write, in a large and scrawling hand, letters to his aunts with some of -Vanka’s phrases in them. - -Sometimes Vera Sovna would come in to watch him, lifting her ruffles, -raising her brows. Too, she would turn and look for a long time at Vanka -who returned her look with cold persistence, the way of a man who is -afraid, who does not approve, and yet who likes. - -She would stand with her back to the fireplace, her high heels a little -apart, tapping the stretched silk of her skirt, saying: - -“You will ruin your eyes,” adding: “Vanka, won’t you stop him?” - -She seldom got answers to her remarks. Louis-Georges would continue, -grunting at her, to be sure, and smiling, but never lifting his eyes: -and as for Vanka he would stand there, catching the sheets of paper as -they were finished. - -Finally Louis-Georges would push back his chair, saying: “Come, we will -have tea.” - -In the end he fell into a slow illness. It attacked his limbs, he was -forced to walk with a cane. He complained of his heart, but he persisted -in going out to look at the horses, to the barn to amuse Vera Sovna, -swaying a little as he watched the slow-circling flies, sniffing the -pleasant odours of cow’s milk and dung. - -He still had plans for the haying season, for his crops, but he gave -them over to his farm hands, who, left to themselves, wandered aimlessly -home at odd hours. - -About six months later he took to his bed. - -His aunts came, testing with their withered noses the smell of decaying -wood and paregoric, whispering that “he never used to get like this.” - -Raising their ample shoulders to ease the little black velvet straps -that sunk into their flesh, they sat on either side of his bed. - -They looked at each other in a pitifully surprised way. They had never -seen illness, and death but once—a suicide, and this they understood: -one has impulses, but not maladies. - -They were afraid of meeting Vera Sovna. Their position was a difficult -one; having been on friendly terms while Louis-Georges’ mother lived, -they had nevertheless to maintain a certain dignity and reserve when the -very townsfolk had turned against her. Therefore they left her an hour -in the evening to herself. She would come creeping in, saying: - -“Oh, my dear,” telling him long unheard stories about a week she had -spent in London. A curious week, full of near adventure, with amusing -tales of hotel keepers, nobility. And sometimes leaning close to him, -that he might hear, he saw that she was weeping. - -But in spite of this and of his illness and the new quality in the air, -Vera Sovna was strangely gay. - -During this illness the two girls served as nurses, changing the sheets, -turning him over, rubbing him with alcohol, bringing him his soup, -crossing themselves. - -Vanka stood long hours by the bedside coughing. Sometimes he would fall -off into sleep, at others he would try to talk of the revolution. - -Vera Sovna had taken to dining in the kitchen, a long bare room that -pleased her. From the window one could see the orchards and the pump and -the long slope down to the edge of the meadow. And the room was pleasant -to look upon. The table, like the earth itself, was simple and abundant. -It might have been a meadow that Leah and Berthe browsed in, -red-cheeked, gaining health, strength. - -Great hams, smoked fowl with oddly taut legs hung from the beams, and -under these the girls moved as if there were some bond between them. - -They accepted Vera Sovna’s company cheerfully, uncomplainingly, and when -she went away they cleared up her crumbs, thinking and talking of other -things, forgetting. - -Nothing suffered on account of his illness. The household matters went -smoothly, the crops ripened, the haying season passed, and the sod in -the orchards sounded with the thud of ripe falling fruit. Louis-Georges -suffered alone, detached, as if he had never been. Even about Vera Sovna -there was a strange quiet brilliancy, the brilliancy of one who is about -to receive something. She caressed the medicine bottles, tended the -flowers. - -Leah and Berthe were unperturbed, except from overwork; the face of -Vanka alone changed. - -He bore the expression at once of a man in pain and of a man who is -about to come into peace. The flickering light in Louis-Georges’ face -cast its shadow on that of his valet. - -Myra and Ella became gradually excited. They kept brushing imaginary -specks of dust from their shoulders and bodices, sending each other in -to observe him. They comforted themselves looking at him, pretending -each to the other that he was quite improved. It was not so much that -they were sorry to have him die, as it was that they were not prepared -to have him die. - -When the doctor arrived they shifted their burden of worry. They bought -medicine with great relish, hurriedly. Finally to lessen the torment -they closed their eyes as they sat on either side of his bed, picturing -him already dead, laid out, hands crossed, that they might gain comfort -upon opening them, to find him still alive. - -When they knew that he was really dying they could not keep from -touching him. They tried to cover him up in those parts that exposed too -plainly his illness: the thin throat, the damp pulsing spot in the neck. -They fondled his hands, driving doctor and nurse into a passion. - -At last, in desperation, Myra knelt by his bed, touched his face, -stroked his cheeks, trying to break the monotonous calm of approaching -death. - -Death did not seem to be anywhere in him saving in his face ... it -seemed to Myra that to drive it from his eyes would mean life. It was -then that she and her sister were locked out, to wander up and down the -hall, afraid to speak, afraid to weep, unless by that much they might -hasten his death. - -When he finally died, they had the problem of Vera Sovna. - -But they soon forgot her, trying to follow the orders left by the dead -man. Louis-Georges had been very careful to see to it that things should -go on growing; he had given many orders, planned new seasons, talked of -“next year,” knowing that he would not be there. - -The hens cackled with splendid performances, the stables resounded with -the good spirits of the horses, the fields were all but shedding their -very life on the earth as Vanka moved noiselessly about, folding the -dead man’s clothes. - -When the undertaker arrived Vanka would not let him touch the body. He -washed and dressed it to suit himself. It was he who laid Louis-Georges -in the shiny coffin, it was he who arranged the flowers, and he who -finally left the room on the flat of his whole noisy feet for the first -time in years. He went to his own room overlooking the garden. - -He paced the room. It seemed to him that he had left something undone. -He had loved service and order; he did not know that he also loved -Louis-Georges, who made service necessary and order desirable. - -This distressed him, he rubbed his hands, holding them close to his -mouth, as if by the sound of one hand passing over the other he might -learn some secret in the stoppage of sound. - -Leah had made a scene, he thought of that. A small enough scene, -considering. She had brought her baby in, dropping him beside the body, -giving the flat-voiced: “Now you can play with him a minute.” - -He had not interfered, the child had been too frightened to disturb the -cold excellence of Louis-Georges’ arrangement, and Leah had gone out -soon enough in stolid silence. He could hear them descending the steps, -her heavy slow tread followed by the quick uneven movements of the -child. - -Vanka could hear the rustling of the trees in the garden, the call of an -owl from the barn; one of the mares whinnied and, stamping, fell off -into silence. - -He opened the window. He thought he caught the sound of feet on the -pebbles that bordered the hydrangea bushes; a faint perfume, such as the -flounces of Vera Sovna exhaled, came to him. Irritated, he turned away, -when he heard her calling. - -“Vanka, come, my foot is caught in the vine.” - -Her face, with wide hanging lips, came above the sill, and the same -moment she jumped into the room. - -They stood looking at each other. They had never been alone together -before. He did not know what to do. - -She was a little dishevelled, twigs from the shrubbery clung to the -black flounces of her gown. She raised her thin shoulders once, twice, -and sighed. - -She reached out her arm, whispering: - -“Vanka.” - -He moved away from her, staring at her. - -“Vanka,” she repeated, and came close, leaning a little on him. - -In a voice of command, she said simply, “You must tell me something.” - -“I will tell you,” he answered, automatically. - -“See, look at your hands——” She kissed them suddenly, dropping her wet -lips into the middle of the palms, making him start and shiver. - -“Look at these eyes—ah, fortunate man,” she continued, “most fortunate -Vanka; he would let you touch him, close, near the heart, the skin. You -could know what he looked like, how he stood, how his ankle went into -his foot.” He ceased to hear her. - -“And his shoulders, how they set. You dressed and undressed him, knew -him, all of him, for many years—you see, you understand? Tell me, tell -me what he was like!” - -He turned to her. “I will tell you,” he said, “if you are still, if you -will sit down, if you are quiet.” - -She sat down with another sigh, with a touch of her old gaiety; she -raised her eyes, watching him. - -“His arms were too long, you could tell that—but beautiful, and his back -was thin, tapering—full of breeding——” - - - - - TO THE DOGS - - - PERSONS: │ - HELENA │ - HUCKSTEPPE │ - GHEID STORM—│_Her neighbour_ - - TIME—_Late afternoon_. - - PLACE—_In the mountains of Cornwall-on-Hudson—the_ HUCKSTEPPE _house_. - - SCENE—_The inner room of the_ HUCKSTEPPE _cottage_. - -_To the left, in the back wall, a large window overlooks a garden. Right -centre, a door leads off into a bedroom, and from the bedroom one may -see the woods of the mountain. The door is slightly open, showing a -glimpse of a tall mirror and the polished pole of a bed._ - -_In the right wall there is a fireplace._ - -_A dog lies across the threshold, asleep, head on paws._ - -_About this room there is perhaps just a little too much of a certain -kind of frail beauty of object. Crystal glasses, scent bottles, bowls of -an almost too perfect design, furniture that is too antiquely -beautiful._ - -HELENA HUCKSTEPPE, _a woman of about thirty-five, stands almost back -view to the audience, one arm lying along the mantel. She is rather -under medium in height. Her hair, which is dark and curling, is done -carefully about a small fine head. She is dressed in a dark, long gown, -a gown almost too faithful to the singular sadness of her body._ - -_At about the same moment as the curtain’s rising_, GHEID STORM _vaults -the window-sill. He is a man of few years, a well-to-do man of property, -brought up very carefully by upright women, the son of a conscientious -physician, the kind of man who commutes with an almost religious -fervour, and who keeps his wife and his lawns in the best possible trim, -without any particular personal pleasure._ - -GHEID _is tall, but much too honourable to be jaunty, he is decidedly -masculine. He walks deliberately, getting all the use possible out of -his boot-leather, his belt-strap and hat-bands._ - -_His face is one of those which, for fear of misuse, has not been used -at all._ - -HELENA HUCKSTEPPE _does not appear to be in the least astonished at his -mode of entrance._ - - -GHEID STORM—As you never let me in at the door, I thought of the window. -[HELENA _remains silent_.] I hope I did not startle you. [_Pause._] -Women are better calm, that is, some kinds of calm—— - -HELENA—Yes? - -GHEID—[_Noticing the dog, which has not stirred._] You’ve got funny -dogs, they don’t even bark. [_Pause._] I expected you’d set them on me; -however, perhaps that will come later—— - -HELENA—Perhaps. - -STORM—Are you always going to treat me like this? For days I’ve watched -you walking with your dogs of an evening—that little black bullpup, and -then those three setters—you’ve fine ways with you Helena Hucksteppe, -though there are many tales of how you came by them—— - -HELENA—Yes? - -STORM—Yes. [_Pause._] You know, you surprise me. - -HELENA—Why? Because I do not set my dogs on you? - -STORM—Something like that. - -HELENA—I respect my dogs. - -STORM—What does that mean? - -HELENA—Had I a daughter, would I set her on every man? - -STORM—[_Trying to laugh._] That’s meant for an insult, isn’t it? Well, I -like the little insulting women—— - -HELENA—You are a man of taste. - -STORM—I respect you. - -HELENA—What kind of a feeling is that? - -STORM—A gentleman’s—— - -HELENA—I see. - -STORM—People say of you: “She has a great many ways——” - -HELENA—Yes? - -STORM—[_Sitting on the edge of the table._] “But none of them simple.” - -HELENA—Do they? - -STORM—[_Without attempting to hide his admiration._] I’ve watched your -back: “There goes a fine woman, a fine silent woman; she wears long -skirts, but she knows how to move her feet without kicking up a dust—a -woman who can do that, drives a man mad.” In town there’s a story that -you come through once every Spring, driving a different man ahead of you -with a riding whip; another has it, that you come in the night—— - -HELENA—In other words, the starved women of the town are beginning to -eat. - -STORM—[_Pause._] Well [_laughs_] I like you. - -HELENA—I do not enjoy the spectacle of men ascending. - -STORM—What are you trying to say? - -HELENA—I’m saying it. - -STORM—[_After an awkward pause._] Do—you wish me to—go away? - -HELENA—You will go. - -STORM—Why won’t you let me talk to you? - -HELENA—Any man may accomplish anything he’s capable of. - -STORM—Do you know how I feel about you? - -HELENA—Perfectly. - -STORM—I have heard many things about your—your past—— I believe none of -them—— - -HELENA—Quite right, why should you mix trades? - -STORM—What do you mean by that? - -HELENA—Why confuse incapability with accomplishment—— - -STORM—It’s strange to see a woman like you turning to the merely -bitter—— - -HELENA—I began beyond bitterness. - -STORM—Why do you treat me this way? - -HELENA—How would you have me treat you? - -STORM—There was one night when you seemed to know, have you forgotten? A -storm was coming up, the clouds were rolling overhead—and you, you -yourself started it. You kissed me. - -HELENA—You say it was about to storm? - -STORM—Yes. - -HELENA—It even looked like rain? - -STORM—Yes. - -HELENA—[_Quickly in a different voice._] It was a dark night, and I -ended it. - -STORM—What have I done? - -HELENA—You have neglected to make any beginning in the world—can I help -that? - -STORM—I offer you a clean heart. - -HELENA—Things which have known only one state, do not interest me. - -STORM—Helena! - -HELENA—Gheid Storm. - -STORM—I have a son; I don’t know why I should tell you about him, -perhaps because I want to prove that I have lived, and perhaps not. My -son is a child, I am a man of few years and my son is like what I was at -his age. He is thin, I was thin; he is quiet, I was quiet; he has -delicate flesh, and I had also—well, then his mother died—— - -HELENA—The saddle comes down from the horse. - -STORM—Well, she died—— - -HELENA—And that’s over. - -STORM—Well, there it is, I have a son—— - -HELENA—And that’s not over. Do you resent that? - -STORM—I don’t know, perhaps. Sometimes I say to myself when I’m sitting -by the fire alone—“You should have something to think of while sitting -here——” - -HELENA—In other words, you’re living for the sake of your fire. - -STORM—[_To himself._] Some day I shall be glad I knew you. - -HELENA—You go rather fast. - -STORM—Yes, I shall have you to think of. - -HELENA—When the fire is hot, you’ll be glad to think of me? - -STORM—Yes, all of us like to have a few things to tell to our children, -and I have always shown all that’s in my heart to my son. - -HELENA—How horrible! - -STORM—[_Startled._] Why? - -HELENA—Would you show everything that made your heart? - -STORM—I believe in frankness—— - -HELENA—[_With something like anger._] Well, some day your son will blow -his head off, to be rid of frankness, before his skin is tough. - -STORM—You are not making anything easier. - -HELENA—I’ve never been callous enough to make things easier. - -STORM—You’re a queer woman—— - -HELENA—Yes, that does describe me. - -STORM—[_Taking his leg off the table._] Do you really want to know why I -came? Because I need you—— - -HELENA—I’m not interested in corruption for the many. - -STORM—[_Starting as if he had been struck._] By God! - -HELENA—Nor in misplaced satisfactions—— - -STORM—By God, what a woman! - -HELENA—Nor do I participate in liberations—— - -STORM—[_In a low voice._] I could hate you! - -HELENA—I limit no man, feel what you can. - -STORM—[_Taking a step toward her, the dog lifts its head._] If it were -not for those damned dogs of yours—I’d—I’d—— - -HELENA—Aristocracy of movement never made a dog bite—— - -STORM—That’s a—strange thing to say—just at this moment. - -HELENA—Not for me. - -STORM—[_Sulky._] Well, anyway, a cat may look at a King—— - -HELENA—Oh no, a cat may only look at what it sees. - -STORM—Helena Hucksteppe. - -HELENA—Yes. - -STORM—I’m—attracted—to you. - -HELENA—A magnet does not attract shavings. - -STORM—[_With positive conviction._] I _could_ hate you. - -HELENA—I choose my enemies. - -STORM—[_Without warning, seizing her._] By God, at least I can kiss you! -[_He kisses her full on the mouth—she makes no resistance._] - -HELENA—[_In a calm voice._] And this, I suppose, is what you call the -“great moment of human contact.” - -STORM—[_Dropping his arms—turning pale._] What are you trying to do to -me? - -HELENA—I’m doing it. - -STORM—[_To himself._] Yet it was you that I wanted—— - -HELENA—Mongrels may not dig up buried treasure. - -STORM—[_In a sudden rage._] You can bury your past as deep as you like, -but carrion will out! - -HELENA—[_Softly._] And this is love. - -STORM—[_His head in his arms._] Oh, God, God! - -HELENA—And you who like the taste of new things, come to me? - -STORM—[_In a lost voice._] Shall I have no joy? - -HELENA—Joy? Oh, yes, of a kind. - -STORM—And you—are angry with me? - -HELENA—In the study of science, is the scientist angry when the fly -possesses no amusing phenomena? - -STORM—I wanted—to know—you—— - -HELENA—I am conscious of your failure. - -STORM—I wanted something—some sign—— - -HELENA—Must I, who have spent my whole life in being myself, go out of -my way to change some look in you? - -STORM—That’s why you are so terrible, you have spent all your life on -yourself. - -HELENA—Yes, men do resent that in women. - -STORM—Yes, I suppose so. [_Pause._] I should have liked to talk -of—myself—— - -HELENA—You see I could not listen. - -STORM—You are—intolerant. - -HELENA—No—occupied—— - -STORM—You are probably—playing a game. - -HELENA—[_With a gracious smile._] You will get some personal good out of -it, won’t you? - -STORM—I’m uncomfortable—— - -HELENA—Uncomfortable! - -STORM—[_Beginning to be really uncomfortable._] Who _are_ you? - -HELENA—I am a woman, Gheid Storm, who is _not_ in need. - -STORM—You’re horrible! - -HELENA—Yes, that too. - -STORM—But somewhere you’re vulnerable. - -HELENA—Perhaps. - -STORM—Only I don’t quite know the spot. - -HELENA—Spot? - -STORM—Something, somewhere, hidden—— - -HELENA—Hidden! [_She laughs._] _All_ of me is vulnerable. - -STORM—[_Setting his teeth._] You tempt me. - -HELENA—[_Wearily._] It’s not that kind. - -STORM—I’ve lain awake thinking of you—many nights. - -HELENA—That is too bad. - -STORM—What is too bad? - -HELENA—That you have had—fancies. - -STORM—Why? - -HELENA—Theft of much, makes much to return—— - -STORM—The world allows a man his own thoughts. - -HELENA—Oh, no—— - -STORM—At least my thoughts are my own. - -HELENA—Not one, so far. - -STORM—What does that mean? - -HELENA—You’ll know when you try to think them again. - -STORM—You mean I’m not making headway—well, you’re right, I’m not—— - -HELENA—Now tell me what brought you through the window. - -STORM—[_Relieved._] I’m glad you ask that, it’s the first human thing -that’s happened this afternoon. - -HELENA—You have forgotten our great moment of human contact. - -STORM—[_Nervously._] Well—— - -HELENA—You were about to tell me what brought you? - -STORM—I don’t know—something no one speaks of—some great ease in your -back—the look of a great lover—— - -HELENA—So—you scented a great lover—— - -STORM—I am a man—and I love—— - -HELENA—What have you done for love, Gheid Storm? - -STORM—I’ve—never gone to the dogs—— - -HELENA—So? - -STORM—I’ve always respected women. - -HELENA—In other words: taken the coals out of the fire with the -poker—continue—— - -STORM—That’s all. - -HELENA—And you dared to come to me! [_Her entire manner has changed._] - -STORM—No matter what you’ve been—done—I love you. - -HELENA—Do not come so near. Only those who have helped to make such -death as mine may go a little way toward the ardours of that decay. - -STORM—What have I done? - -HELENA—You have dared to bring to a woman, who has known love, the -whinny of a pauper. - -STORM—What am I? - -HELENA—[_Softly, to herself._] How sensitively the handles cling to the -vase, how delicate is the flesh between the fingers. - -STORM—I—I don’t know you. - -HELENA—[_Dropping her hands to her sides._] Come here, Gheid -Storm—[_Gheid approaches slowly, like a sleep walker_]. Put your hand on -me. [_He does so as if in a dream._] So! [_She looks first at his hand, -then into his face, making it quite plain that he does not even know how -to touch a woman._] Yet you would be my lover, knowing not one touch -that is mine, nor one word that is mine. My house is for men who have -done their stumbling. - -STORM—[_In an inaudible voice._] I am going now—— - -HELENA—I cannot touch new things, nor see beginnings. - -STORM—Helena! Helena! - -HELENA—Do not call my name. There are too many names that must be called -before mine. - -STORM—Shall I die, and never have known you? - -HELENA—Death, for you, will begin where my cradle started rocking—— - -STORM—Shall I have no love like yours? - -HELENA—When I am an old woman, thinking of other things, you will, -perhaps, be kissing a woman like me—— - -STORM—[_Moving blindly toward the door._] Now I am going. - -HELENA—[_In a quiet, level voice._] The fall is almost here. - -STORM—Yes, it’s almost here. - -HELENA—The leaves on the mountain road are turning yellow. - -STORM—Yes, the leaves are turning. - -HELENA—It’s late, your son will be waiting dinner for you. - -STORM—Don’t take everything away. - -HELENA—You will not even recall having seen me. - -STORM—Can memory be taken too? - -HELENA—Only that memory that goes past recollection may be kept. - -STORM—[_At the door._] Good night—— - -HELENA—[_Smiling._] There is the window. - -STORM—I could not lift my legs now. - -HELENA—That’s a memory you may keep. - -STORM—Good night. - -HELENA—Good-bye, Gheid Storm, and as you go down the hill, will you lock -the gate, a dog thief passed in the night, taking my terrier with him. - -STORM—The one with the brown spots? - -HELENA—Yes. - -STORM—That was a fine dog. - -HELENA—Yes, she was a fine dog—restless. - -STORM—They say any dog will follow any man who carries aniseed. - -HELENA—Well, soon I return to the city. - -STORM—You look tired. - -HELENA—Yes, I am tired. - -[_Gheid exits. Helena takes her old position, her back almost square to -the audience._] - - - CURTAIN - -[Illustration] - - - - - BEYOND THE END - - -Behind two spanking horses, in the heat of noon, rode Julie Anspacher. -The air was full of the sound of windlasses and well water, where, from -cool abysses, heavy buckets arose; and, too, the air was full of the -perfect odour of small flowers. And Julie turned her head, gazing at the -familiar line of road that ran away into the still more familiar -distance. - -The driver, a Scandinavian, who remembered one folk-tale involving a -partridge and one popular song involving a woman, sat stiffly on his box -holding the reins gently over the shining and sleek backs of the two -mares. - -He began to whistle the popular song now, swinging a little on his -sturdy base, and drifting back with his tune came the tang of horse -skin, wet beneath tight leather. - -The horses were taking the hill, straining and moving their ears, and -reaching the top, bounded forward in a whirl of dust. Still sitting -rigid, the driver clucked, snapping his whip, and began talking in a dry -deep bass. - -“It’s some time since we have seen you, Mrs. Anspacher.” - -Julie raised her thin long face from her collar and nodded. - -“Yes,” she answered in a short voice, and frowned. - -“Your husband has gathered in the corn already, and the orchards are -hanging heavy.” - -“Are they?” she said, and tried to remember how many trees there were of -apple and of pear. - -The driver took in another foot of reins, and turning slightly around, -so that he could look at her, said: - -“It’s good to see you again, Mrs. Anspacher.” - -She began to laugh. “Is it?” then with deliberation checked herself, and -fixed her angry eyes straight ahead of her. - -The child, loose-limbed with excessive youth, who sat at her side, -lifted a small sharp face on which an aquiline nose perched with comic -boldness. She half held, half dropped an old-fashioned ermine muff, the -tails of which stuck out in all directions. She looked unhappy and -expectant. - -“You remember Mrs. Berling?” he went on. “She is married again.” - -“Is she?” - -“Yes, ma’am.” - -He began to tell her about the local office for outgoing mails, where a -nephew of her husband, Paytor, had taken a job. - -The child sat so still that it was painful and Julie Anspacher moved -away, thinking aloud: - -“All is corruption.” - -The child started, and looked quickly away, as children will at -something that they expect but do not understand. The driver beat the -horses, until long lines of heavy froth appeared at the edges of the -harness. - -“What did you say, ma’am?” - -“Nothing—I said all is lost from the beginning—if we only saw -it—always.” - -The child looked at her slowly, puzzled, and looked down. - -“Ann,” said Julie Anspacher, suddenly lifting the muff over her hands, -“did you ever see two such big horses before?” The child turned its head -with brightness, and bending down tried to see between the driver’s -arms. Then she smiled. - -“Are they yours?” she whispered. - -Julie Anspacher took in a deep breath, stretching the silk of her waist -across her breasts. “No,” she answered, “they are not mine, but we have -two—bigger—blacker.” - -“Can I see them?” - -“Oh, yes, you shall see them. Don’t be ridiculous.” - -The child shrank back into herself, clutching nervously at her muff. -Julie Anspacher returned to her reflections. - - -It was almost five years since she had been home. Five years before in -just such an Autumn the doctors had given her six months to live. One -lung gone and the other going. They called it sometimes the White Death, -and, sometimes, the love disease. She coughed a little, remembering, and -the child at her side coughed too in echo, and the driver, puckering his -forehead, reflected that Mrs. Anspacher was not cured. - -She was thirty-nine—she should have died at thirty-four. In those five -years Paytor had seen her five times, coming in over fourteen hours of -the rails at Christmas. He cursed the doctors, called them fools. - -The house appeared dull white between the locust trees, and the smoke, -the same lazy Autumn smoke, rose in a still column straight into the -obliterating day. - -The driver reined in the horses until their foaming jaws struck against -their harness, and with a quick bound Julie Anspacher jumped the side of -the cart, the short modish tails of her jacket dancing above her hips. -She turned around and thrusting her black gloved hands under the child, -lifted her out. A dog barked. She began walking the ascent toward the -house. - -A maid, in dust cap, put her head out of an upstairs window, clucked, -drew it in and slammed the sash, and Paytor, with slow and deliberate -steps, moved toward the figure of his wife and the child. - -He was a man of middle height, with a close-cropped beard that ended in -a grey wedge on his chin. He was sturdy, a strong man, almost too -pompous, but with kindly blue eyes and a long thin mouth. As he walked -he threw his knees out, which gave him a rocking though substantial -gait. He was slightly surprised and raised the apricot-coloured veil -that covered the keen newness of her face, and leaning down kissed her -twice upon both cheeks. - -“And where does the child come from?” he inquired, touching the little -girl’s chin. - -“Come along, don’t be ridiculous!” Julie said impatiently, and swept on -toward the house. - -He ran after her. “I’m glad to see you,” he went on, warmly, trying to -keep up with her rapid strides, that swung the child half off the -ground, stumbling, trotting. - -“Tell me what the doctors said—cured?” - -There was a note of happiness in his voice. “Not that I really give a -damn what they think, I always told you you would live to a ripe old -age, as they say. What did they do to Marie Bashkirtseff? Locked her up -in a dark room, shut all the windows—and of course she died—that was -their method then—and now it’s Koch’s tuberculin—all nonsense.” - -“It worked well with some people,” she said, going ahead of him into the -living room. “There was one boy there—well—of that later. Will you have -someone put Ann to bed—the trip was bad for her. See how sleepy the -child is—run along, Ann,” she added, pushing her slightly but kindly -toward the maid. Then when they had disappeared, she stood looking about -her, drawing off her gloves. - -“I’m glad you took down the crystals—I always hated them.”—She moved to -the windows. - -“I didn’t, the roof fell in—just after my last visit in December. You’re -looking splendid, Julie.” He coloured. “I’m glad, you know—awfully glad. -I began to think—well, not that the doctors know anything,” he said, -laughing: “but it’s a drop here of about fifteen hundred feet, but your -heart is good—always was.” - -“What do you know about my heart, Paytor?” Julie said, angrily. “You -don’t know what you are talking about at all. The child——” - -“Well, yes——?” - -“Her name is Ann,” she finished sulkily. - -“It’s a sweet name—it was your mother’s, too. Whose is she?” - -“Oh, good heavens!” Julie cried, moving around the room. “Mine, mine, -mine, of course, whose would she be if not mine?” - -He looked at her. “Yours—why, Julie—how absurd!” Slowly the colour left -his face. - -“I know—we have got to talk it over—it’s all got to be arranged, it’s -terrible. But she is nice, a bright child, a good child.” - -“What in the world is all this about?” he demanded, stopping in front of -her. “What are you in this mood for—what have I done?” - -“Good heavens! What have you done? What a ridiculous man you are. Why -nothing, of course, absolutely nothing!” She waved her arm. “That’s not -it—why do you bring yourself in? I’m not blaming you, I’m not asking to -be forgiven. I’ve been down on my knees, I’ve beaten my head on the -ground, abased myself, but,” she said in a terrible voice, “it is not -low enough, the ground is not low enough, to bend is not enough; to ask -forgiveness is not enough, to receive it is nothing. There isn’t the -right kind of misery in the world for me to suffer, nor the right kind -of pity for you to feel, there isn’t the right word in the world to heal -me up. It’s good to forgive, to be forgiven, but that’s for ordinary -things. This is beyond that—it’s something you can experience but never -feel—there are not enough nerves, blood cells, flesh—to feel it. You -suffer insufficiently; it’s like drinking insufficiently, sleeping -insufficiently. I’m not asking anything because there is nothing that I -can receive—how primitive to be able to receive——” - -“But, Julie——” - -“It’s not that,” she said roughly, tears swimming in her eyes. “Of -course I love you. But think of it, a danger to everyone excepting those -like yourself. Curious, involved in a problem affecting only a small per -cent of humanity, sick, frightened, filled with fever and lust -perhaps—with nothing, nothing coming after, whatever you do, but -death—then you go on—it goes on—then the child—and life probably, for a -time.” - -“Well——” - -“I couldn’t tell you. I thought, ‘Well, I’ll die next month,’ and -finally I didn’t want to go off—although I did, you know what I mean. -Then her father died—they say her lungs are weak—death, death -perpetuating itself, that’s funny you see—and the doctors——” She swung -around: “You’re right—they lied, and I lived through—all the way—all the -way!” - -He turned his face from her. - -“The real thing,” she went on in a pained voice, “is to turn our torment -toward the perfect design. I didn’t want to go beyond you—that was not -my purpose. I thought there was not to be any more me. I wanted to leave -nothing behind but you, only you. You must believe this or I can’t bear -it—and still,” she continued, walking around the room impatiently, -“there was a somehow hysterical joy in it too. I thought, if you had -real perception, that ‘something’ that we must possess, that must be at -the bottom of us somewhere—or there wouldn’t be such an almost sensuous -desire for it, that ‘something’ that, at times, is so near us that it -becomes obscene, well, I thought, if Paytor has this—and mind you, I -knew all the time that you didn’t have it—that you would understand. And -when you had been gone a long time I said, ‘Paytor understands’—and I -would say to myself—‘Now, at this moment—at ten-thirty precisely, if I -could be with Paytor he would say “I see,”’ but so soon as I had the -time table in my hand I knew that there was no such feeling in your -bosom—nothing at all.” - -“Don’t you feel horror?” he asked in a loud voice, suddenly. - -“No, I don’t feel horror—horror is conflict—and I have none—I’m alien to -life.” - -“Have you a religion, Julie?” he asked, still in the same loud voice, as -if he were addressing someone a little raised, yet invisible, as one -tries to see a choir. - -“I don’t know—I don’t think so. I’ve tried to believe in something -external, something that might envelop this and carry it beyond—that’s -what we demand of our faiths, isn’t it? But I always return to a fixed -notion that there is something more fitting than a possible release.” - -He put his hands to his head. “You know,” he said, “I’ve always thought -that a woman, because she can have children, ought to know the truth—the -very fact that she can do something so really preposterous ought to make -her equally capable of the other preposterous thing—well——” - -She coughed, her handkerchief before her face—she laughed with -brightness. “One learns to be careful about death—but never, never -about——” She didn’t finish but stared before her. - -“Why did you bring the child here—why did you return at all then—after -so long a time—it seems all so mixed up?” - -“I don’t know—— Perhaps because there is a right and a wrong, and a good -and an evil. I had to find out—and if there’s such a thing as -everlasting mercy—I want to find out about that also—there’s a flavour -of unfamiliar intimacy about it all, though, this Christian treatment——” -She had a way of lifting up the side of her face, closing her eyes. “I -thought—Paytor may know.” - -“Know what?” - -“Will know—well, will be able to divide me against myself—— Personally I -don’t feel divided—I seem to be a sane and balanced whole—a hopelessly -mixed, but perfect design. So I said Paytor will be able to see where -this divides and departs. Though all the time I never for a moment felt -that there was a system working on a this for that basis, but that there -was only this _and_ that—in other words—I wanted to be set wrong.... You -understand?” - -“And you yourself,” he inquired, in the same loud voice, “cannot feel -the war? Well, then, what about me?—you must realize what you have -done—turned everything upside down—oh, I won’t even say betrayed me—it’s -much less than that, what most of us do, we betray circumstances—well, I -can’t do anything for you,” he said sharply. “I can’t do anything at -all—I’m sorry, I’m very sorry—but there it is”—he began to grimace and -twitch his shoulders. - -“The child has it too,” Julie Anspacher said, looking up at him. “I -shall die soon.—It’s ridiculous,” she added, with the tears streaming -down her face. “You are strong, always were—and so were all your family -before you—not one of them in their graves under ninety—it’s all -wrong—it’s quite ridiculous.” - -“I don’t know. Perhaps it’s not ridiculous. One must be very careful not -to come, too hastily, to a conclusion.” He began searching for his pipe. -“Only you know yourself, Julie, how I torment myself, if it’s a big -enough thing, for days, weeks, years; and the reason is, the real reason -is, that I come to my conclusions instantly, and then fight to destroy -them.” He seemed to Julie a little pompous now. “It’s because first I’m -human, and second, logical. Well, I don’t know—perhaps I’ll be able to -tell you something later—give you a beginning at least—later——” He -twitched his shoulders and went out, closing the door after him. She -heard him climbing the familiar creaking stairs, the yellow painted -stairs that led up into the roof—she heard him strike a match—then -silence. - - -The dark had begun, closing in about bushes and barn, and filling the -air with moist joyousness, the joyousness of autumn that trusts itself -to the darkness, and Julie leaned on her hand by the shelf and listened. - -She could hear, far away and faint, the sound of dogs on heavy chains. -She tried to stop, listening to the outside, but her thoughts rotted -away like clouds in a wind. - -The sense of tears came to her, but it was only a sentimental memory of -her early childhood, and it brought a smile to her long face. She had -cried once when they made her kiss a dead priest—“Qui habitare facit -sterilem—matrem filiorum laetantem”—then “Gloria Patri—” and she had -wept then, or thought she had, because he was not only beyond glory and -all mercy, but beyond the dubious comfort of the feeling. - -She heard Paytor walking above, and the smoke of his pipe crept down -between loose boards and uneven plaster and laths. - -She went—quite mechanically—over to a chest in one corner, and opened -the lid. A shirt waist, of striped taffeta, one she had worn years -before, some old Spanish lace—her mother’s—the child—— - -Paytor did not seem to like the child—“How ridiculous!” she thought. -“She is good, quiet, gentle—but that’s not enough now.” She removed her -hat. Living with Paytor and the child—Paytor so strong,—always was, and -so was his family—and she sickly, coughing. Perhaps she had made a -mistake in coming back. She went toward the steps to tell this to Paytor -but thought better of it. That wasn’t what she wanted to say. - -The hours drew out and Julie Anspacher, sitting now at the window -overlooking the garden—nodded without sleep—long dreams—grotesque and -abominable—stupid irrelevances dull and interminable. Somewhere little -Ann coughed in her sleep. Julie Anspacher coughed also, and in between, -the sound of Paytor walking up and down, and the smell of tobacco -growing stronger. - -To take her own life, that was right, if only she had not the habit of -fighting death—“but death is past knowing, and to know is better than to -make right——” She shook her head. “That’s another detour on the wrong -side,” she told herself. “If only I had the power to feel pain as -unbearable, a gust of passion, of impatience, and all would be over—but -I’ve stood so much so long, there is no too long.” She thought what she -would not give for any kind of feeling, anything that was vital and -sudden and determining. “If Paytor will have patience I will get around -to it.” - -Then it seemed that something must happen, must inevitably happen. - -“If I could only think of the right word before it happens,” she said to -herself, over and over, and over. “It’s because I’m cold and I can’t -think, I’ll think soon——” She would take her jacket off, put on her -coat—— - -She got up, running her hand along the wall. Or had she left it on the -chair? “I can’t think of the word,” she said to keep her mind on -something. - -She turned around. All his family—long lives. “And me too, me too,” she -murmured. She became dizzy. “It is because I must get on my knees—but it -isn’t low enough.” She contradicted herself. “Yet if I put my head -down—way down—down——” - -Then she heard the shot. “He has quick warm blood” went through her -mind—and her blood was cold. - -Her forehead had not quite touched the boards, now she touched them, but -she got up immediately, stumbling over her dress. - - - - - PASTORAL - - - A frog leaps out across the lawn, - And crouches there—all heavy and alone, - And like a blossom, pale and over-blown, - Once more the moon turns dim against the dawn. - - Crawling across the straggling panoply - Of little roses, only half in bloom, - It strides within that beamed and lofty room - Where an ebon stallion looms upon the hay. - - The stillness moves, and seems to grow immense, - A shuddering dog starts, dragging at its chain, - Thin, dusty rats slink down within the grain, - And in the vale the first far bells commence. - - Here in the dawn, with mournful doomèd eyes - A cow uprises, moving out to bear - A soft-lipped calf with swarthy birth-swirled hair, - And wide wet mouth, and droll uncertainties. - - The grey fowls fight for places in the sun, - The mushrooms flare, and pass like painted fans: - All the world is patient in its plans— - The seasons move forever, one on one. - - Small birds lie sprawling vaguely in the heat, - And wanly pluck at shadows on their breasts, - And where the heavy grape-vine leans and rests, - White butterflies lift up their furry feet. - - The wheat grows querulous with unseen cats; - A fox strides out in anger through the corn, - Bidding each acre wake and rise to mourn - Beneath its sharps and through its throaty flats. - - And so it is, and will be year on year, - Time in and out of date, and still on time - A billion grapes plunge bleeding into wine - And bursting, fall like music on the ear. - - The snail that marks the girth of night with slime, - The lonely adder hissing in the fern, - The lizard with its ochre eyes aburn— - Each is before, and each behind its time. - - - - - OSCAR - - -Before the house rose two stately pine trees, and all about small firs -and hemlocks. The garden path struggled up to the porch between wild -flowers and weeds, and looming against its ancient bulk the shadows of -out-houses and barns. - -It stood among the hills, and just below around a curve in the road, lay -the placid grey reservoir. - -Sometimes parties would cross the fields, walking slowly toward the -mountains. And sometimes children could be heard murmuring in the -underbrush of things they scarcely knew. - -Strange things had happened in this country town. Murder, theft, and -little girls found weeping, and silent morose boys scowling along in the -ragweed, with half-shut sunburned eyelids. - -The place was wild, deserted and impossible in Winter. In Summer it was -over-run with artists and town folk with wives and babies. Every -Saturday there were fairs on the green, where second-hand articles were -sold for a song, and flirting was formidable and passing. There were -picnics, mountain climbings, speeches in the townhall, on the mark of -the beast, on sin, and democracy, and once in a while a lecture on -something that “everyone should know,” attended by mothers, their -offspring left with servants who knew what everyone shouldn’t. - -Then there were movies, bare legs, deacons, misses in cascades of curls -and on Sunday one could listen to Mr. Widdie, the clergyman, who -suffered from consumption, speak on love of one’s neighbour. - -In this house and in this town had lived, for some fifteen years or so, -Emma Gonsberg. - -She was a little creature, lively, smiling, extremely good-natured. She -had been married twice, divorced once, and was now a widow still in her -thirties. - -Of her two husbands she seldom said anything. Once she made the remark: -“Only fancy, they never did catch on to me at all.” - -She tried to be fashionable, did her hair in the Venetian style, wore -gowns after the manner of Lady de Bath entering her carriage; and tried -to cultivate only those who could tell her “where she stood.” - -Her son Oscar was fourteen or thereabouts. He wore distinctly -over-decorative English clothes, and remembered two words of some -obscure Indian dialect that seemed to mean “fleas,” for whenever he -flung these words defiantly at visitors they would go off into peals of -laughter, headed by his mother. At such times he would lower his eyes -and show a row of too heavy teeth. - -Emma Gonsberg loved flowers, but could not grow them. She admired cats -because there was “nothing servile about them,” but they would not stay -with her; and though she loved horses and longed to be one of those -daring women who could handle them “without being crushed in the -stalls,” they nevertheless ignored her with calm indifference. Of her -loves, passions and efforts, she had managed to raise a few ill-smelling -pheasants, and had to let it go at that. - -In the Winter she led a lonely and discriminating life. In the Summer -her house filled with mixed characters, as one might say. A hot -melancholy Jew, an officer who was always upon the point of depreciating -his medals in a conceited voice, and one other who swore inoffensively. - -Finally she had given this sort of thing up, partly because she had -managed, soon after, to get herself entangled with a man called Ulric -Straussmann. A tall rough fellow, who said he came from the Tyrol; a -fellow without sensibilities but with a certain bitter sensuality. A -good-natured creature as far as he went, with vivid streaks of German -lust, which had at once something sentimental and something careless -about it; the type who can turn the country, with a single gesture, into -a brothel, and makes of children strong enemies. He showed no little -audacity in putting things into people’s minds that he would not do -himself. - -He smelled very strongly of horses, and was proud of it. He pretended a -fondness for all that goes under hide or hair, but a collie bitch, known -for her gentleness, snapped at him and bit him. He invariably carried a -leather thong, braided at the base for a handle, and would stand for -hours talking, with his legs apart, whirling this contrived whip, and, -looking out of the corner of his eyes would pull his moustache, waiting -to see which of the ladies would draw her feet in. - -He talked in a rather even, slightly nasal tone, wetting his lips with a -long outthrust of tongue, like an animal. His teeth were splendid and -his tongue unusually red, and he prided himself on these and on the -calves of his legs. They were large, muscular and rather handsome. - -He liked to boast that there was nothing that he could not do and be -forgiven, because, as he expressed it, “I have always left people -satisfied.” If it were hate or if it were love, he seemed to have come -off with unusual success. “Most people are puny,” he would add, “while I -am large, strong, healthy. Solid flesh through and through,” whereat he -would pound his chest and smile. - -He was new to the town and sufficiently insolent to attract attention. -There was also something childishly naïve in him, as there is in all -tall and robust men who talk about themselves. This probably saved him, -because when he was drinking he often became gross and insulting, but he -soon put the women of the party in a good humour by giving one of them a -hearty and good-natured slap on the rear that she was not likely to -forget. - -Besides this man Emma had a few old friends of the less interesting, -though better-read, type. Among them, however, was an exception, Oliver -Kahn, a married man with several children one heard of and never saw. A -strange, quiet man who was always talking. He had splendid eyes and a -poor mouth—very full lips. In the beginning one surmised that he had -been quite an adventurer. He had an odour about him of the rather recent -cult of the “terribly good.” He seemed to have been unkind to his family -in some way, and was spending the rest of his life in a passion of -regret and remorse. He had become one of those guests who are only -missed when absent. He finally stayed for good, sleeping in an ante-room -with his boots on,—his one royal habit. - -In the beginning Emma had liked him tremendously. He was at once gentle -and furious, but of late, just prior to the Straussmann affair, he had -begun to irritate her. She thought to herself, “He is going mad, that’s -all.” She was angry at herself for saying “that’s all,” as if she had -expected something different, more momentous. - -He had enormous appetites, he ate like a Porthos and drank like a -Pantagruel, and talked hour after hour about the same thing, “Love of -one’s neighbour,” and spent his spare time in standing with his hands -behind him, in front of the pheasants’ cage. He had been a snipe hunter -in his time, and once went on a big game hunt, but now he said he saw -something more significant here. - -He had, like all good sportsmen, even shot himself through the hand, but -of late he pretended that he did not remember what the scar came from. - -He seemed to suffer a good deal. Evil went deep and good went deep and -he suffered the tortures of the damned. He wept and laughed and ate and -drank and slept, and year by year his eyes grew sweeter, tenderer, and -his mouth fuller, more gross. - -The child Oscar did not like Kahn, yet sometimes he would become -extraordinarily excited, talk very fast, almost banteringly, a little -malignly, and once when Kahn had taken his hand he drew it away angrily. -“Don’t,” he said. - -“Why not?” - -“Because it is dirty,” he retorted maliciously. - -“As if you really knew of what I was thinking,” Kahn said, and put his -own hands behind him. - -Emma liked Kahn, was attached to him. He mentioned her faults without -regret or reproval, and this in itself was a divine sort of love. - -He would remark: “We cannot be just because we are bewildered; we ought -to be proud enough to welcome our enemies as judges, but we hate, and to -hate is the act of the incurious. I love with an everlasting but a -changing love, because I know I am the wrong sort of man to be good—and -because I revere the shadow on the threshold.” - -“What shadow, Kahn?” - -“In one man we called it Christ—it is energy; for most of us it is dead, -a phantom. If you have it you _are_ Christ, and if you have only a -little of it you are but the promise of the Messiah.” - -These seemed great words, and she looked at him with a little admiring -smile. - -“You make me uneasy for fear that I have not said ‘I love you with an -everlasting love,’ often enough to make it an act of fanaticism.” - -As for Oscar, he did what he liked, which gave him character, but made -him difficult to live with. - -He was not one of those “weedy” youths, long of leg, and stringy like -“jerked beef, thank God!” as his mother said to visitors. He was rather -too full-grown, thick of calf and hip and rather heavy of feature. His -hands and feet were not out of proportion as is usually the case with -children of his age, but they were too old looking. - -He did not smoke surreptitiously. On the contrary he had taken out a -pipe one day in front of his mother, and filling it, smoked in silence, -not even with a frightened air, and for that matter not even with a -particularly bold air;—he did it quite simply, as something he had -finally decided to do, and Emma Gonsberg had gone off to Kahn with it, -in a rather helpless manner. - -Most children swing in circles about a room, clumsily. Oscar on the -contrary walked into the four corners placidly and officially, looked at -the backs of the books here and a picture there, and even grunted -approvingly at one or two in quite a mature manner. - -He had a sweetheart, and about her and his treatment of her there were -only a few of the usual signs—he was shy, and passionately immersed in -her, there was little of the casual smartness of first calf love about -it, though he did in truth wave her off with a grin if he was -questioned. - -He took himself with seriousness amounting to a lack of humour—and -though he himself knew that he was a youth, and had the earmarks of -adolescence about him—and know it he certainly did—once he said, “Well, -what of it—is that any reason why I should not be serious about -everything?” This remark had so astonished his mother that she had -immediately sent for Kahn to know if he thought the child was -precocious—and Kahn had answered, “If he were, I should be better -pleased.” - -“But what is one to expect?” - -“Children,” he answered, “are never what they are supposed to be, and -they never have been. He may be old for his age, but what child hasn’t -been?” - -In the meantime, she tried to bring Straussmann and Kahn together—“My -house is all at odds,” she thought, but these two never hit it off. -Straussmann always appeared dreadfully superficial and cynical, and Kahn -dull and good about nothing. - -“They have both got abnormal appetites,” she thought wearily. She -listened to them trying to talk together of an evening on the piazza -steps. Kahn was saying: - -“You must, however, warn yourself, in fact I might say arm yourself, -against any sensation of pleasure in doing good; this is very difficult, -I know, but it can be attained. You can give and forgive and tolerate -gently and, as one might say, casually, until it’s a second nature.” - -“There you have it, tolerate—who wants tolerance, or a second nature? -Well, let us drop it. I feel like a child—it’s difficult not to feel -like a child.” - -“Like Oscar—he has transports—even at his age,” Emma added hesitatingly. -“Perhaps that’s not quite as it should be?” - -“The memory of growing up is worse than the fear of death,” Kahn -remarked, and Emma sighed. - -“I don’t know; the country was made for children, they say—I could tell -you a story about that,” Straussmann broke off, whistling to Oscar. -“Shall I tell Oscar about the country—and what it is really like?” he -asked Emma, turning his head. - -“Let the boy alone.” - -“Why, over there in that small village,” Straussmann went on, taking -Oscar by the arm. “It is a pretty tale I could tell you—perhaps I will -when you are older—but don’t let your mother persuade you that the -country is a nice, healthful, clean place, because, my child, it’s -corrupt.” - -“Will you let the boy alone!” Emma cried, turning very red. - -“Ah, eh—I’ll let him alone right enough—but it won’t make much -difference—you’ll see,” he went on. “There is a great deal told to -children that they should not hear, I’ll admit, but there wasn’t a thing -I didn’t know when I was ten. It happened one day in a hotel in -Southampton—a dark place, gloomy, smelling frightfully of mildew, the -walls were damp and stained. A strange place, eh, to learn the delights -of love, but then our parents seldom dwell on the delights,—they are too -taken up with the sordid details, the mere sordid details. My father had -a great beard, and I remember thinking that it would have been better if -he hadn’t said such things. I wasn’t much good afterwards for five or -six years, but my sister was different. She enjoyed it immensely and -forgot all about it almost immediately, excepting when I reminded her.” - -“Go to bed, Oscar,” Emma said abruptly. - -He went, and on going up the steps he did not let his fingers trail -along the spindles of the banisters with his usual “Eeny meeny miny mo,” -etc. - -Emma was a little troubled and watched him going up silently, hardly -moving his arms. - -“Children should be treated very carefully, they should know as much as -possible, but in a less superficial form than they must know later.” - -“I think a child is born corrupt and attains to decency,” Straussmann -said grinning. - -“If you please,” Emma cried gaily, “we will talk about things we -understand.” - -Kahn smiled. “It’s beautiful, really beautiful,” he said, meaning her -gaiety. He always said complimentary things about her lightness of -spirit, and always in an angry voice. - -“Come, come, you are going mad. What’s the good of that?” she said, -abruptly, thinking, “He is a man who discovered himself once too often.” - -“You are wrong, Emma, I am not worthy of madness.” - -“Don’t be on your guard, Kahn,” she retorted. - -Oscar appeared before her suddenly, barefoot. She stared at him. “What -is it?” she at last managed to ask in a faint almost suffocated voice. - -“I want to kiss you,” he whispered. - -She moved toward him slowly, when, half way, he hurried toward her, -seized her hand, kissed it, and went back into the house. - -“My God,” she cried out. “He is beginning to think for himself,” and ran -in after him. - -She remembered how she had talked to him the night before, only the -night before. “You must love with an everlasting but a changing love,” -and he became restless. “With an everlasting but a changing love.” - -“What do you mean by ‘changing’?” His palms were moist, and his feet -twitched. - -“A love that takes in every detail, every element—that can understand -without hating, without distinction, I think.” - -“Why do you say, ‘I think’?” - -“I mean, I know,” she answered, confused. - -“Get that Kahn out, he’s a rascal,” he said, abruptly, grinning. - -“What are you saying, Oscar?” she demanded, turning cold. “I’ll never -come to your bed again, take your hands and say ‘Our Father.’” - -“It will be all right if you send that man packing,” he said, stressing -the word “packing.” - -She was very angry, and half started toward the door. Then she turned -back. “Why do you say that, Oscar?” - -“Because he makes you nervous—well, then—because he crouches”; he saw by -his mother’s face that she was annoyed, puzzled, and he turned red to -his ears. “I don’t mean that, I mean he isn’t good; he’s just watching -for something good to happen, to take place——” His voice trailed off, -and he raised his eyes solemn and full of tears to her face. She leaned -down and kissed him, tucking him in like a “little boy.” - -“But I’m not a little boy,” he called out to her. - -And tonight she did not come down until she thought Kahn and Straussmann -had gone. - -Kahn had disappeared, but Straussmann had taken a turn or two about the -place and was standing in the shadow of the stoop when she came out. - -“Come,” he said. “What is it that you want?” - -“I think it’s religion,” she answered abruptly. “But it’s probably -love.” - -“Let us take a walk,” he suggested. - -They turned in toward the shadows of the great still mountains and the -denser, more arrogant shadows of the out-houses and barns. She looked -away into the silence, and the night, and a warm sensation as of -pleasure or of something expected but intangible came over her, and she -wanted to laugh, to cry, and thinking of it she knew that it was -neither. - -She was almost unconscious of him for a little, thinking of her son. She -raised her long silk skirts about her ankles and tramped off into the -dampness. A whippoorwill was whistling off to the right. It sounded as -if he were on the fence, and Emma stopped and tried to make it out. She -took Ulric’s arm presently, and feeling his muscles swell began to think -of the Bible. “Those who take by the sword shall die by the sword. And -those who live by the flesh shall die by the flesh.” - -She wished that she had someone she could believe in. She saw a door -before her mental eye, and herself opening it and saying, “Now tell me -this, and what it means,—only today I was thinking ‘those who live by -the flesh’”—and as suddenly the door was slammed in her face. She -started back. - -“You are nervous,” he said in a pleased whisper. - -Heavy stagnant shadows sprawled in the path. “So many million leaves and -twigs to make one dark shadow,” she said, and was sorry because it -sounded childishly romantic, quite different from what she had intended, -what she had meant. - -They turned the corner of the carriage-house. Something moved, a toad, -grey and ugly, bounced across her feet and into the darkness of the -hedges. Coming to the entrance of the barn they paused. They could -distinguish sleeping hens, the white films moving on their eyes—and -through a window at the back, steam rising from the dung heap. - -“There don’t seem to be any real farmers left,” she said aloud, thinking -of some book she had read about the troubles of the peasants and -landholders. - -“You’re thinking of my country,” he said smiling. - -“No, I wasn’t,” she said. “I was wondering what it is about the country -that makes it seem so terrible?” - -“It’s your being a Puritan—a tight-laced delightful little Puritan.” - -She winced at the words, and decided to remain silent. - -It was true, Straussmann was in a fever of excitement—he was always this -way with women, especially with Emma. He tried to conceal it for the -time being, thinking, rightly, that a display of it would not please her -just at the moment—“but it would be only a matter of minutes when she -would welcome it,” he promised himself, and waited. - -He reflected that she would laugh at him. “But she would enjoy it just -the same. The way with all women who have had anything to do with more -than one man and are not yet forty,” he reflected. “They like what they -get, but they laugh at you, and know you are lying——” - -“Oh, my God!” Emma said suddenly, drawing her arm away and wiping her -face with her handkerchief. - -“What’s the matter?” - -“Nothing, it’s the heat.” - -“It is warm,” he said dismally. - -“I despise everything, I really despise everything, but you won’t -believe—— I mean everything when I say everything—you’ll think I mean -some one thing—won’t you?” she went on hurriedly. She felt that she was -becoming hysterical. - -“It doesn’t matter,” he rejoined, walking on beside her, his heart -beating violently. “Down, you dog,” he said aloud. - -“What is that?” She raised her eyes and he looked into them, and they -both smiled. - -“That’s better. I wish I were God.” - -“A desire for a vocation.” - -“Not true, and horrid, as usual,” she answered, and she was hot and -angry all at once. - -He pulled at his moustache and sniffed. “I can smell the hedges—ah, the -country is a gay deceiver—it smells pleasant enough, but it’s -treacherous. The country, my dear Emma, has done more to corrupt man, to -drag him down, to turn him loose upon his lower instincts, than -morphine, alcohol and women. That’s why I like it, that’s why it’s the -perfect place for women. They are devils and should be driven out, and -as there’s more room in the country and consequently less likelihood of -driving them out in too much of a hurry, there is more time for -amusement.” He watched her out of the corner of his eye as he said these -things to note if they were ill advised. They seemed to leave her cold, -but tense. - -A little later they passed the barns again. - -“What was that?” Emma asked suddenly. - -“I heard nothing.” - -But she had heard something, and her heart beat fearfully. She -recognized Oscar’s voice. She reached up signing Straussmann to be -quiet. She did not want him to hear; she wished that the ground would -yawn, would swallow him up. - -“See that yellow flower down there,” she said, pointing toward the end -of the path they had just come. “I want it, I must have it, please.” He -did as he was bid, amiably enough. - -She listened—she heard the voice of Oscar’s little sweetheart: - -“It seems as if we were one already.”... It was high, resolute, -unflagging, without emotion, a childish parroting of some novel. Oscar’s -voice came back, half smothered: - -“Do you really care—more than you like Berkeley?” - -“Yes, I do,” she answered in the same false treble, “lots more.” - -“Come here,” he said softly—the hay rustled. - -“I don’t want to—the rye gets into my hair and spoils it.” - -“Dolly, do you like the country?” - -“Yes, I do,”—without conviction. - -“We will go to the city,” he answered. - -“Oh, Oscar, you’re so strong,” she giggled, and it sent a cold shudder -through Emma’s being. - -Then presently, “What’s the matter, Oscar—why, you’re crying.” - -“I’m not—well, then yes, I am—what of it?—you’ll understand, too, some -day.” - -She was evidently frightened, because she said in a somewhat loosened -key, “No one would ever believe that we were as much in love as we are, -would they, Oscar?” - -“No, why do you ask that?” - -“It’s a great pity,” she said again with the false sound, and sighed. - -“Do you care? Why do you care?” - -Straussmann was coming back with the yellow flower between thumb and -forefinger. Emma ran a little way to meet him. - -“Come, let us go home the other way.” - -“Rather, let us not go home,” he said, boldly, and took her wrist, -hurting her. - -“Ah,” she said. “Vous m’avez blessée d’amour”—ironically. - -“Yes, speak French, it helps women like you at such moments,” he said, -brutally, and kissed her. - -But kissing him back, she thought, “The fool, why does Oscar take her so -seriously when they are both children, and she is torturing him.” - -“My love, my sweet, my little love,” he was babbling. - -She tried to quench this, trembling a little. “But tell me, my -friend—no, not so hasty—what do you think of immortality?” He had pushed -her so far back that there was no regaining her composure. “My God, in -other words, what of the will to retribution!” - -But she could not go on. “I’ve tried to,” she thought. - -Later, when the dawn was almost upon them, he said: “How sad to be -drunk, only to die. For the end of all man is Fate, in other words, the -end of all man is vulgar.” - -She felt the need of something that had not been. - -“I’m not God, you see, after all.” - -“So I see, madam,” he said. “But you’re a damned clever little woman.” - -When she came in, she found Kahn lying flat on his back, his eyes wide -open. - -“Couldn’t you sleep?” - -“No, I could not sleep.” - -She was angry. “I’m sorry—you suffer.” - -“Yes, a little.” - -“Kahn,” she cried in anguish, flinging herself on her knees beside him. -“What should I have done, what shall I do?” - -He put his hand on her cheek. “My dear, my dear,” he said, and sighed. -“I perhaps was wrong.” - -She listened. - -“Very wrong, I see it all now; I am an evil man, an old and an evil -being.” - -“No, no!” - -“Yes, yes,” he said gently, softly, contradicting her. “Yes, evil, and -pitiful, and weak”; he seemed to be trying to remember something. “What -is it that I have overlooked?” He asked the question in such a confused -voice that she was startled. - -“Is it hate?” she asked. - -“I guess so, yes, I guess that’s it.” - -“Kahn, try to think—there must be something else.” - -“Madness.” - -She began to shiver. - -“Are you cold?” - -“No, it’s not cold.” - -“No, it’s not cold,” he repeated after her. “You are not cold, Emma, you -are a child.” - -Tears began to roll down her cheeks. - -“Yes,” he continued sadly. “You too will hear: remorse is the medium -through which the evil spirit takes possession.” - -And again he cried out in anguish. “But I’m _not_ superficial—I may have -been wanton, but I’ve not been superficial. I wanted to give up -everything, to abandon myself to whatever IT demanded, to do whatever IT -directed and willed. But the terrible thing is I don’t know what abandon -is. I don’t know when it’s abandon and when it’s just a case of minor -calculation. - -“The real abandon is not to know whether one throws oneself off a cliff -or not, and not to care. But I can’t do it, because I must know, because -I’m afraid if I did cast myself off, I should find that I had thrown -myself off the lesser thing after all, and that,” he said in a horrified -voice, “I could never outlive, I could never have faith again. And so it -is that I shall never know, Emma; only children and the naïve know, and -I am too sophisticated to accomplish the divine descent.” - -“But you must tell me,” she said, hurriedly. “What am I to do, what am I -to think? My whole future depends on that, on your answer—on knowing -whether I do an injustice not to hate, not to strike, not to kill—well, -you must tell me—I swear it is my life—my entire life.” - -“Don’t ask me, I can’t know, I can’t tell. I who could not lead one -small sheep, what could I do with a soul, and what still more could I do -with you? No,” he continued, “I’m so incapable. I am so mystified. Death -would be a release, but it wouldn’t settle anything. It never settles -anything, it simply wipes the slate, it’s merely a way of putting the -sum out of mind, yet I wish I might die. How do I know now but that -everything I have thought, and said, and done, has not been false, a -little abyss from which I shall crawl laughing at the evil of my own -limitation.” - -“But the child—what have I been telling Oscar—to love with an -everlasting love——” - -“That’s true,” he said. - -“Kahn, listen. What have I done to him, what have I done to myself? -What are we all doing here—are we all mad—or are we merely -excited—overwrought, hysterical? I must know, I must know.” She took -his hand and he felt her tears upon it. - -“Kahn, is it an everlasting but a changing love—what kind of love is -that?” - -“Perhaps that’s it,” he cried, jumping up, and with a gesture tore his -shirt open at the throat. “Look, I want you to see, I run upon the world -with a bared breast—but never find the blade—ah, the civility of our own -damnation—that’s the horror. A few years ago, surely this could not have -happened. Do you know,” he said, turning his eyes all hot and burning -upon her, “the most terrible thing in the world is to bare the breast -and never to feel the blade enter!” He buried his face in his hands. - -“But, Kahn, you must think, you must give me an answer. All this -indecision is all very well for us, for all of us who are too old to -change, for all of us who can reach God through some plaything we have -used as a symbol, but there’s my son, what is he to think, to feel, he -has no jester’s stick to shake, nor stool to stand on. Am I responsible -for him? Why,” she cried frantically, “must I be responsible for him? I -tell you I won’t be, I can’t. I won’t take it upon myself. But I have, I -have. Is there something that can make me immune to my own blood? Tell -me—I must wipe the slate—the fingers are driving me mad—can’t he stand -alone now? Oh, Kahn, Kahn!” she cried, kissing his hands. “See, I kiss -your hands, I am doing so much. You must be the prophet—you can’t do -less for the sign I give you—I must know, I must receive an answer, I -_will_ receive it.” - -He shook her off suddenly, a look of fear came into his eyes. - -“Are you trying to frighten me?” he whispered. She went into the hall, -into the dark, and did not know why, or understand anything. Her mind -was on fire, and it was consuming things that were strange and merciful -and precious. - -Finally she went into her son’s room and stood before his bed. He lay -with one feverish cheek against a dirty hand, his knees drawn up; his -mouth had a peculiar look of surprise about it. - -She bent down, called to him, not knowing what she was doing. “Wrong, -wrong,” she whispered, and she shook him by the shoulders. “Listen, -Oscar, get up. Listen to me!” - -He awoke and cried out as one of her tears, forgotten, cold, struck -against his cheek. An ague shook his limbs. She brought her face close -to his. - -“Son, hate too, that is inevitable—irrevocable——” - -He put out his two hands and pushed them against her breast and in a -subdued voice said, “Go away, go away,” and he looked as if he were -about to cry, but he did not cry. - -She turned and fled into the hall. - -However, in the morning, at breakfast, there was nothing unusual about -her, but a tired softness and yielding of spirit; and at dinner, which -was always late, she felt only a weary indifference when she saw -Straussmann coming up the walk. He had a red and white handkerchief -about his throat, and she thought, “How comic he looks.” - -“Good evening,” he said. - -“Good evening,” she answered, and a touch of her old gaiety came into -her voice. Kahn was already seated, and now she motioned Straussmann to -follow. She began slicing the cold potted beef and asked them about -sugar in their tea, adding, “Oscar will be here soon.” To Kahn she -showed only a very little trace of coldness, of indecision. - -“No,” Straussmann said, still standing, legs apart: “If you’ll excuse -me, I’d like a word or two with Kahn.” They stepped off the porch -together. - -“Kahn,” he said, going directly to the point, “listen,” he took hold of -Kahn’s coat by the lapel. “You have known Emma longer than I have, -you’ve got to break it to her.” He flourished a large key under Kahn’s -nose, as he spoke. - -“I’ve got him locked up in the out-house safe enough for the present, -but we must do something immediately.” - -“What’s the matter?” A strange, pleasant but cold sweat broke out upon -Kahn’s forehead. - -“I found Oscar sitting beside the body of his sweetheart, -what’s-her-name; he had cut her throat with a kitchen knife, yes, with a -kitchen knife—he seemed calm, but he would say nothing. What shall we -do?” - -“They’ll say he was a degenerate from the start——” - -“Those who live by the flesh—eh?” - -“No,” Kahn said, in a confused voice, “that’s not it.” - -They stood and stared at each other so long that presently Emma grew -nervous and came down the garden path to hear what it was all about. - -[Illustration] - - - - - ANTIQUE - - - A lady in a cowl of lawn - With straight bound tabs and muted eyes, - And lips fair thin and deftly drawn - And oddly wise. - - A cameo, a ruff of lace, - A neck cut square with corners laid; - A thin Greek nose and near the face - A polished braid. - - Low, sideways looped, of amber stain - The pale ears caught within its snare. - A profile like a dagger lain - Between the hair. - - - - - KATRINA SILVERSTAFF - - -“We have eaten a great deal, my friend, against the day of God.” - -She was a fine woman, hard, magnificent, cold, Russian, married to a -Jew, a doctor on the East Side. - -You know that kind of woman, pale, large, with a heavy oval face. - -A woman of ‘material’—a lasting personality, in other words, a -‘fashionable’ woman, a woman who, had she lived to the age of forty odd, -would have sat for long fine hours by some window, overlooking some -desolate park, thinking of a beautiful but lazy means to an end. - -She always wore large and stylish hats, and beneath them her mouth took -on a look of pain at once proud, aristocratic and lonely. - -She had studied medicine—but medicine in the interest of animals; she -was a good horse doctor—an excellent surgeon on the major injuries to -birds and dogs. - -In fact she and her husband had met in a medical college in Russia—she -had been the only woman in the class, the only one of the lot of them -who smiled in a strange, hurt and sarcastic way when dissecting. - -The men treated her like one of them, that is, they had no cringing -mannerliness about their approach, they lost no poise before her, and -tried no tricks as one might say. - -The Silverstaffs had come to America, they had settled on the East Side, -among ‘their own people’ as he would say; she never said anything when -he talked like this, she sat passive, her hands in her lap, but her -nostrils quivered, and somewhere under the skin of her cheek something -trembled. - -Her husband was the typical Jewish intellectual, a man with stiff, -short, greying hair, prominent intelligent and kindly eyes, rather -short, rather round, always smelling of Greek salad and carbolic acid, -and always intensely interested in new medical journals, theories, -discoveries. - -He was a little dusty, a little careless, a little timid, but always -gentle. - -They had been in America scarcely eight months before the first child -was born, a girl, and then following on her heels a boy, and then no -more children. - -Katrina Silverstaff stopped having her children as abruptly as she had -begun having them; something complicated had entered her mind, and where -there are definite complications of the kind that she suffered, there -are no more children. - -“We have eaten a great deal, my friend, against the day of God,” she had -said that. - -She had said that one night, sitting in the dusk of their office. There -was something inexpressibly funny in their sitting together in this -office, with its globe of the world, its lung charts, its weighing -machine, its surgical chair, and its bowl of ineffectual goldfish. -Something inexpressibly funny and inexpressibly fecund, a fecundity -suppressed by coldness, and a terrible determination—more terrible in -that her husband Otto felt nothing of it. - -He was very fond of her, and had he been a little more sensitive he -would have been very glad to be proud of her. She never became -confidential with him, and he never tried to overstep this, partly -because he was unaware of it, and partly because he felt little need of -a closer companionship. - -She was a fine woman, he knew that; he never thought to question -anything she did, because it was little, nor what she said, because it -was less; there was an economy about her existence that simply forbade -questioning. He felt in some dim way, that to criticize at all would be -to stop everything. - -Their life was typical of the East Side doctor’s life. Patients all day -for him, and the children for her, with an occasional call from someone -who had a sick bird. In the evening they would sit around a table with -just sufficient food, with just sufficient silver and linen, and one -luxury: Katrina’s glass of white wine. - -Or sometimes they would go out to dine, to some kosher place, where -everyone was too friendly and too ugly and too warm, and here he would -talk of the day’s diseases while she listened to the music and tried not -to hear what her daughter was crying for. - -He had always been a ‘liberal,’ from the first turn of the cradle. In -the freedom of the people, in the betterment of conditions, he took the -interest a doctor takes in seeing a wound heal. - -As for Katrina Silverstaff, she never said anything about it, he never -knew what she really thought, if she thought at all; it did not seem -necessary for her to do or say anything, she was fine as she was, where -she was. On the other hand it never occurred to him that she would not -hear, with calmness at least, his long dissertations on capital. - -At the opening of this story, Katrina’s daughter was a little girl of -ten, who was devoted to dancing, and who lay awake at nights worrying -about the shape of her legs, which had already begun to swell with a -dancer’s muscles. - -The boy was nine, thin, and wore spectacles. - -And of course what happened was quite unaccountable. - -A man, calling himself Castillion Rodkin, passed through one Summer, -selling Carlyle’s “French Revolution.” Among the houses where he had -left a copy was the house of Otto Silverstaff. - -Katrina had opened the door, the maid was down with the measles, and the -doctor was busy with a patient, a Jew much revered for his poetry. - -She never bought anything of peddlers, and she seldom said more than -“No, thank you.” In this case she neither said “Thank you,” nor closed -the door—instead she held it open, standing a little aside for him to -pass, and, utterly astonished, he did pass, waiting behind her in the -hall for orders. - -“We will go into the study,” she said, “my husband is busy.” - -“I was selling Bibles last year,” he remarked, “but they do not go down -in this section.” - -“Yes,” she answered, “I see,” and she moved before him into the heavy -damp parlour which was never unshuttered and which was never used. She -reached up and turned on one solitary electric light. - -Castillion Rodkin might have been of any nationality in the world; this -was partly from having travelled in all countries, and also from a fluid -temperament—little was fixed or firm in him, a necessary quality in a -salesman. - -Castillion Rodkin was below medium height, thin and bearded with a pale, -almost white growth of hair. He was peculiarly colourless, his eyes were -only a shade darker than his temples, and very restless. - -She said simply, “We must talk about religion.” - -And with an awkwardness unusual to him he asked “Why?” - -“Because,” she said in a strained voice, making a hurt gesture, “it is -so far from me.” - -He did not know what to say, of course, and lifting one thin leg in its -white trousers he placed it carefully over the other. - -She was sitting opposite him, her head turned a little to one side, not -looking at anything. “You see,” she said presently, “I want religion to -become out of the reach of the few.” - -“Become’s a queer word,” he said. - -“It is the only word,” she answered, and there was a slight irritation -in her voice, “because it is so irrevocably for the many.” - -“Yes,” he said mechanically, and reached up to his beard, leaving his -hand there under a few strands of hair. - -“You see,” she went on simply, “I can come to the point. For me, -everything is a lie—I am not telling this to you because I need your -help, I shall never need help,” she said, turning her eyes on his, -“understand that from the beginning——” - -“Beginning,” he said in a loud voice suddenly. - -“From the beginning,” she repeated calmly, “right from the very start, -not help but hindrance, I need enough hindrance, a total obstacle, -otherwise I cannot accomplish it.” - -“Accomplish what, madame?” he asked and took his hand from under his -beard. - -“That is my affair, mine alone, that you must not question, it has -nothing to do with you, you are only a means to an end.” - -He said, “What can I do for you?” - -She smiled, a sudden smile, and under her cheek something flickered. -“You can do nothing,” she said and stood up. “I must always do it -all—yes, I shall be your mistress—wait,” she said raising her hand, and -there was anger and pride in her. “Do not intrude now by word or sign, -but tomorrow you will come to me—that is enough—that is all you can do,” -and in this word “all” he felt a limit on himself that he had never -known before, and he was frightened and disquieted and unhappy. - -He came the next day, cringing a little, fawning, uneasy, and she would -not see him—she sent word “I do not need you yet,” and he called again -the next day and learned that she was out of town, then one Sunday she -was in to him. - -She said quietly to him, as if she were preparing him for a great -disappointment, “I have deliberately, very deliberately, removed remorse -from the forbidden fruit,” and he was abject suddenly and trembling. - -“There will be no thorns for you,” she went on in a cold abrupt voice. -“You will miss that, but do not presume to show it in my presence.” - -“Also my floor is not the floor on which you may crawl,” she continued, -“and I do not permit you to suffer while I am in the room—and,” she -added, unfastening her brooch slowly and precisely, “I dislike all -spiritual odours.” - -“Are we all strange?” he whispered. - -“It takes more than will to attain to madness.” - -“Yes.” - -Then she was silent for a while, thinking. - -“I want to suffer,” he murmured, and trembled again. - -“We are all gross at times, but this is not your time.” - -“I could follow you into the wilderness.” - -“I would not miss you.” - -And it was said in a terrible forbidding voice. - -“I suffer as a birthright—I want it to be something more my own than -that.” - -“What are you going to do?” he said. - -“Does one ever destroy oneself who is utterly disinterested?” - -“I don’t know.” - -Presently she said, “I love my husband—I want you to know that, it -doesn’t matter, but I want you to know that, and that I am content with -him, and quite happy——” - -“Yes,” Castillion Rodkin answered and began trembling again, holding on -to the sides of the bed. - -“But there is something in me,” she continued, “that is very mournful -because it is being.” - -He could not answer and tears came to his eyes. - -“There is another thing,” she said with abrupt roughness, “that I must -insist on, that is that you will not insult me by your presence while -you are in this room.” - -He tried to stop his weeping now, and his body grew tense, abject. - -“You see,” she continued, “some people drink poison, some take a knife, -and others drown; I take you.” - -In the very early dawn, she sat up with a strange smile. “Will you -smoke?” she said, and lit him a cigarette. Then she withdrew into -herself, sitting on the edge of the mahogany boards, her hands in her -lap. - -And there was a little ease, and a little comfort in Castillion Rodkin, -and he turned, drawing up one foot, thrusting his hand beneath his -beard, slowly smoking his cigarette. - -“Does one regret?” he asked, and the figure of Katrina never moved, nor -did she seem to hear. - -“You know, you frightened me—last night,” he went on, lying on his back -now and looking at the ceiling. “I almost became something—something.” - -There was a long silence. - -“Shall the beasts of the field and the birds of the air forsake thee?” -he said gloomily, then brightly. “Shall any man forsake thee?” - -Katrina Silverstaff remained as she was, but under her cheek something -quivered. - -The dawn was very near and the street lamps had gone out; a milk cart -rattled across the square, and passed up a side street. - -“One out of many, or only one?” - -He put his cigarette out, he was beginning to breathe with difficulty, -he was beginning to shiver. - -“Well——” - -He turned over, got up, stood on the floor. - -“Is there nothing I can say?” he began, and went a little away and put -his things on. - -“When shall I see you again?” - -And now a cold sweat broke out on him, and his chin trembled. - -“Tomorrow?” - -He tried to come toward her, but he found himself near the door instead. - -“I’m nothing,” he said, and turned toward her, bent slightly; he wanted -to kiss her feet—but nothing helped him. - -“You’ve taken everything now, now I cannot feel, I do not suffer——” He -tried to look at her—and succeeded finally after a long time. - -He could see that she did not know he was in the room. - -Then something like horror entered him, and with a soft, swift running -gait he reached the door, turned the handle and was gone. - -A few days later, at dusk, for his heart was the heart of a dog, he came -into Katrina’s street, and looked at the house. - -A single length of crape, bowed, hung at the door. - -From that day he began to drink heavily, he got to be quite a nuisance -in the cafés, he seldom had money to pay, he was a fearless beggar, -almost insolent, and once when he saw Otto Silverstaff sitting alone in -a corner, with his two children, he laughed a loud laugh and burst into -tears. - - - - - HUSH BEFORE LOVE - - - A voice rose in the darkness saying “Love,” - And in the stall the scattered mice grew still, - Where yet the white ox slept, and on the sill - The crowing cock paused, and the grey house dove - Turned twice about upon the ledge above. - - - - - THE ROBIN’S HOUSE - - -In a stately decaying mansion, on the lower end of the Avenue, lived a -woman by the name of Nelly Grissard. - -Two heavy cocks stood on either side of the brownstone steps, looking -out toward the park; and in the back garden a fountain, having poured -out its soul for many a year, still poured, murmuring over the stomachs -of the three cherubim supporting its massive basin. - -Nelly Grissard was fat and lively to the point of excess. She never let -a waxed floor pass under her without proving herself light of foot. -Every ounce of Nelly Grissard was on the jump. Her fingers tapped, her -feet fluttered, her bosom heaved; her entire diaphragm swelled with -little creakings of whale-bone, lace and taffeta. - -She wore feathery things about the throat, had a liking for deep -burgundy silks, and wore six petticoats for the “joy of discovering that -I’m not so fat as they say.” She stained her good square teeth with -tobacco, and cut her hair in a bang. - -Nelly Grissard was fond of saying: “I’m more French than human.” Her -late husband had been French; had dragged his nationality about with him -with the melancholy of a man who had half dropped his cloak and that -cloak his life, and in the end, having wrapped it tightly about him, had -departed as a Frenchman should. - -There had been many “periods” in Nelly Grissard’s life, a Russian, a -Greek, and those privileged to look through her key-hole said, even a -Chinese. - -She believed in “intuition,” but it was always first-hand intuition; she -learned geography by a strict system of love affairs—never two men from -the same part of the country. - -She also liked receiving “spirit messages”—they kept her in touch with -international emotion—she kept many irons in the fire and not the least -of them was the “spiritual” iron. - -Then she had what she called a “healing touch”—she could take away -headaches, and she could tell by one pass of her hand if the bump on -that particular head was a bump of genius or of avarice—or if (and she -used to shudder, closing her eyes and withdrawing her hand with a slow, -poised and expectant manner) it was the bump of the senses. - -Nelly was, in other words, dangerously careful of her sentimentalism. No -one but a sentimental woman would have called her great roomy mansion -“The Robin’s House,” no one but a sentimentalist could possibly have -lived through so many days and nights of saying “yes” breathlessly, or -could have risen so often from her bed with such a magnificent and -knowing air. - -No one looking through the gratings of the basement window would have -guessed at the fermenting mind of Nelly Grissard. Here well-starched -domestics rustled about, laying cool fingers on cool fowls and frosted -bottles. The cook, it is true, was a little untidy; he would come and -stand in the entry, when Spring was approaching, and look over the head -of Nelly Grissard’s old nurse, who sat in a wheel-chair all day, her -feeble hands crossed over a discarded rug of the favourite burgundy -colour, staring away with half-melted eyes into the everlasting -fountain, while below the cook’s steaming face, on a hairy chest, rose -and fell a faded holy amulet. - -Sometimes the world paused to see Nelly Grissard pounce down the steps, -one after another, and with a final swift and high gesture take her -magnificent legs out for a drive, the coachman cracking his whip, the -braided ribbons dancing at the horses’ ears. - -And that was about all—no, if one cared to notice, a man, in the early -forties, who passed every afternoon just at four, swinging a heavy black -cane. - -This man was Nicholas Golwein—half Tartar, half Jew. - -There was something dark, evil and obscure about Nicholas Golwein, and -something bending, kindly, compassionate. Yet he was a very Jew by -nature. He rode little, danced less, but smoked great self-reassuring -cigars, and could out-ponder the average fidgety American by hours. - -He had travelled, he had lived as the “Romans lived,” and had sent many -a hot-eyed girl back across the fields with something to forget or -remember, according to her nature. - -This man had been Nelly Grissard’s lover at the most depraved period of -Nelly’s life. At that moment when she was colouring her drinking water -green, and living on ox liver and “testina en broda,” Nicholas Golwein -had turned her collar back, and kissed her on that intimate portion of -the throat where it has just left daylight, yet has barely passed into -the shadow of the breast. - -To be sure, Nelly Grissard had been depraved at an exceedingly early -age, if depravity is understood to be the ability to enjoy what others -shudder at, and to shudder at what others enjoy. - -Nelly Grissard dreamed “absolutely honestly”—stress on the -absolutely—when it was all the fashion to dream obscurely,—she could -sustain the conversation just long enough not to be annoyingly -brilliant, she loved to talk of ancient crimes, drawing her stomach in, -and bending her fingers slightly, just slightly, but also just enough to -make the guests shiver a little and think how she really should have -been born in the time of the Cenci. And during the craze for Gauguin she -was careful to mention that she had passed over the same South Sea -roads, but where Gauguin had walked, she had been carried by two -astonished donkeys. - -She had been “kind” to Nicholas Golwein just long enough to make the -racial melancholy blossom into a rank tall weed. He loved beautiful -things, and she possessed them. He had become used to her, had -“forgiven” her much (for those who had to forgive at all had to forgive -Nelly in a large way), and the fact that she was too fluid to need one -person’s forgiveness long, drove him into slow bitterness and despair. - -The fact that “her days were on her,” and that she did not feel the -usual woman’s fear of age and dissolution, nay, that she even saw new -measures to take, possessing a fertility that can only come of a -decaying mind, drove him almost into insanity. - -When the Autumn came, and the leaves were falling from the trees, as -nature grew hot and the last flames of the season licked high among the -branches, Nicholas Golwein’s cheeks burned with a dull red, and he -turned his eyes down. - -Life did not exist for Nicholas Golwein as a matter of day and after -day—it was flung at him from time to time as a cloak is flung a flunkey, -and this made him proud, morose, silent. - -Was it not somehow indecent that, after his forgiveness and -understanding, there should be the understanding and forgiveness of -another? - -There was undoubtedly something cruel about Nelly Grissard’s love; she -took at random, and Nicholas Golwein had been the most random, perhaps, -of all. The others, before him, had all been of her own class—the first -had even married her, and when she finally drove him to the knife’s -edge, had left her a fair fortune. Nicholas Golwein had always earned -his own living, he was an artist and lived as artists live. Then Nelly -came—and went—and after him she had again taken one of her own kind, a -wealthy Norwegian—Nord, a friend of Nicholas’. - -Sometimes now Nicholas Golwein would go off into the country, trying to -forget, trying to curb the tastes that Nelly’s love had nourished. He -nosed out small towns, but he always came hurriedly back, smelling of -sassafras, the dull penetrating odour of grass, contact with trees, -half-tamed animals. - -The country made him think of Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony—he would -start running—running seemed a way to complete all that was sketchy and -incomplete about nature, music, love. - -“Would I recognize God if I saw him?” The joy of thinking such thoughts -was not every man’s, and this cheered him. - -Sometimes he would go to see Nord; he was not above visiting Nelly’s -lover—in fact there was that between them. - -He had fancied death lately. There was a tremendously sterile quality -about Nicholas Golwein’s fancies; they were the fancies of a race, and -not of a man. - -He discussed death with Nord—before the end there is something pleasant -in a talk of a means to an end, and Nord had the coldness that makes -death strong. - -“I can hate,” he would say, watching Nord out of the corner of his eye; -“Nelly can’t, she’s too provincial——” - -“Yes, there’s truth in that. Nelly’s good to herself—what more is -there?” - -“There’s understanding.” He meant compassion, and his eyes filled. “Does -she ever speak of me?” - -It was beginning to rain. Large drops struck softly against the café -window and thinning out ran down upon the sill. - -“Oh, yes.” - -“And she says?” - -“Why are you never satisfied with what you have, Nicholas?” - -Nicholas Golwein turned red. “One dish of cream and the cat should lick -his paws into eternity. I suppose one would learn how she felt, if she -feels at all, if one died.” - -“Why, yes, I suppose so.” - -They looked at each other, Nicholas Golwein in a furtive manner, moving -his lips around his cigar—Nord absently, smiling a little. “Yes, that -would amuse her.” - -“What?” Nicholas Golwein paused in his smoking and let his hot eyes rest -on Nord. - -“Well, if you can manage it——” - -Nicholas Golwein made a gesture, shaking his cuff-links like a -harness—“I can manage it,” he said, wondering what Nord was thinking. - -“Of course it’s rather disgusting,” Nord said. - -“I know, I know I should go out like a gentleman, but there’s more in me -than the gentleman, there’s something that understands meanness; a Jew -can only love and be intimate with the thing that’s a little abnormal, -and so I love what’s low and treacherous and cunning, because there’s -nobility and uneasiness in it for me—well,” he flung out his arms—“if -you were to say to Nell, ‘He hung himself in the small hours, with a -sheet’—what then? Everything she had ever said to me, been to me, will -change for her—she won’t be able to read those French journals in the -same way, she won’t be able to swallow water as she has always swallowed -it. I know, you’ll say there’s nature and do you know what I’ll answer: -that I have a contempt for animals—just because they do not have to -include Nelly Grissard’s whims in their means to a living conduct—well, -listen, I’ve made up my mind to something”—he became calm all of a -sudden and looked Nord directly in the face. - -“Well?” - -“I shall follow you up the stairs, stand behind the door, and you shall -say just these words, ‘Nicholas has hung himself.’” - -“And then what?” - -“That’s all, that’s quite sufficient—then I shall know everything.” - -Nord stood up, letting Nicholas open the café door for him. - -“You don’t object?” Nicholas Golwein murmured. - -Nord laughed a cold, insulting laugh. “It will amuse her——” - -Nicholas nodded, “Yes, we’ve held the coarse essentials between our -teeth like good dogs—” he said, trying to be insulting in turn, but it -only sounded pathetic, sentimental. - - * * * * * - -Without a word passing between them, on the following day, they went up -the stairs of Nelly Grissard’s house, together. The door into the inner -room was ajar, and Nicholas crept in behind this, seating himself on a -little table. - -He heard Nord greet Nelly, and Nelly’s voice answering—“Ah, dear”—he -listened no further for a moment, his mind went back, and he seemed to -himself to be peaceful and happy all at once. “A binding up of old -sores,” he thought, a oneness with what was good and simple—with -everything that evil had not contorted. - -“Religion,” he thought to himself, resting his chin on his -hands—thinking what religion had meant to all men at all times, but to -no man in his most need. “Religion is a design for pain—that’s it.” Then -he thought, that, like all art, must be fundamentally against God—God -had made his own plans—well, of that later—— - -Nelly had just said something—there had been a death-like silence, then -her cry, but he had forgotten to listen to what it was that had passed. -He changed hands on his cane. “There is someone in heaven,” he found his -mind saying. The rising of this feeling was pleasant—it seemed to come -from the very centre of his being. “There’s someone in heaven—who?” he -asked himself, “who?” But there was no possible answer that was not -blasphemy. - -“Jews do not kill themselves——” - -Nelly’s voice. He smiled—there was someone in heaven, but no one here. -“I’m coming,” he murmured to himself—and felt a sensuous giving away in -the promise. - -His eyes filled. What was good in death had been used up long ago—now it -was only dull repetition—death had gone beyond the need of death. - -Funnily enough he thought of Nelly as she was that evening when she had -something to forgive. He had pulled her toward him by one end of a -burgundy ribbon, “Forgive, forgive,” and she had been kind enough not to -raise him, not to kiss him, saying, “I forgive”—she just stood there -showing her tobacco-stained teeth in a strong laugh, “Judas eliminated.” -He put his hand to his mouth, “I have been _There_,” and _There_ seemed -like a place where no one had ever been. How cruel, how monstrous! - -Someone was running around the room, heavy, ponderous. “She always -prided herself on her lightness of foot,” and here she was running like -a trapped animal, making little cries, “By the neck!”—strange words, -horrifying—unreal—— - -“To be a little meaner than the others, a little more crafty”—well, he -had accomplished that, too. - -Someone must be leaning on the couch, it groaned. That took him back to -Boulogne; he had loved a girl once in Boulogne, and once in the dark -they had fallen, it was like falling through the sky, through the stars, -finding that the stars were not only one layer thick, but that there -were many layers, millions of layers, a thickness to them, and a -depth—then the floor—that was like a final promise of something sordid, -but lasting—firm. - -Sounds rose from the streets; automobiles going uptown, horses’ hoofs, a -cycle siren,—that must be a child,—long drawn out, and piercing—yes, -only a child would hold on to a sound like that. - -“Life is life,” Nelly had just said, firmly, decisively. After all he -had done this well—he had never been able to think of death long, but -now he had thought of it, made it pretty real—he remembered sparrows, -for some unknown reason, and this worried him. - -“The line of the hips, simply Renoir over again——” - -They were on the familiar subject of art. - -The sounds in the room twittered about him like wings in a close garden, -where there is neither night nor day. “There is a power in death, even -the thought of death, that is very terrible and very beautiful——” His -cane slipped, and struck the floor. - -“What was that?” the voice of Nelly Grissard was high, excited, -startled—— - -“A joke.” - -Nicholas Golwein suddenly walked into the room. - -“A joke,” he said and looked at them both, smiling. - -Nelly Grissard, who was on her knees, and who was holding Nord’s shoe in -one hand, stared at him. It seemed that she must have been about to kiss -Nord’s foot. - -Nicholas Golwein bowed, a magnificent bow, and was about to go. - -“You ought to be ashamed of yourself,” Nelly Grissard cried, angrily, -and got to her feet. - -He began to stammer: “I—I am leaving town—I wanted to pay my respects——” - -“Well, go along with you——” - -Nicholas Golwein went out, shutting the door carefully behind him. - - - - - PARADISE - - - This night I’ve been one hour in Paradise; - There found a feather from the Cock that Crew— - There heard the echo of the Kiss that Slew, - And in the dark, about past agonies - Hummed little flies. - - - - - NO-MAN’S-MARE - - -Pauvla Agrippa had died that afternoon at three; now she lay with quiet -hands crossed a little below her fine breast with its transparent skin -showing the veins as filmy as old lace, purple veins that were now only -a system of charts indicating the pathways where her life once flowed. - -Her small features were angular with that repose which she had often -desired. She had not wanted to live, because she did not mind death. -There were no candles about her where she lay, nor any flowers. She had -said quite logically to her sisters: “Are there any candles and flowers -at a birth?” They saw the point, but regretted the philosophy, for -buying flowers would have connected them with Pauvla Agrippa, in this, -her new adventure. - -Pauvla Agrippa’s hair lay against her cheeks like pats of plated butter; -the long golden ends tucked in and wound about her head and curved -behind her neck. Pauvla Agrippa had once been complimented on her fine -black eyes and this yellow hair of hers, and she had smiled and been -quite pleased, but had drawn attention to the fact that she had also -another quite remarkable set of differences—her small thin arms with -their tiny hands and her rather long narrow feet. - -She said that she was built to remain standing; now she could rest. - -Her sister, Tasha, had been going about all day, praying to different -objects in search of one that would give her comfort, though she was not -so much grieved as she might have been, because Pauvla Agrippa had been -so curious about all this. - -True, Agrippa’s husband seemed lost, and wandered about like a restless -dog, trying to find a spot that would give him relief as he smoked. - -One of Pauvla’s brothers was playing on the floor with Pauvla’s baby. -This baby was small and fat and full of curves. His arms curved above -his head, and his legs curved downward, including his picture book and -rattle in their oval. He shouted from time to time at his uncle, biting -the buttons on his uncle’s jacket. This baby and this boy had one thing -in common—a deep curiosity—a sense that somewhere that curiosity would -be satisfied. They had all accomplished something. Pauvla Agrippa and -her husband and her sister and the boy and Pauvla’s baby, but still -there was incompleteness about everything. - -Nothing was ever done; there wasn’t such a thing as rest, that was -certain, for the sister still felt that her prayers were not definite, -the husband knew he would smoke again after lunch, the boy knew he was -only beginning something, as the baby also felt it, and Pauvla Agrippa -herself, the seemingly most complete, had yet to be buried. Her body was -confronted with the eternal necessity of change. - -It was all very sad and puzzling, and rather nice too. After all, atoms -were the only things that had imperishable existence, and therefore were -the omnipotent quality and quantity—God should be recognized as -something that was everywhere in millions, irrevocable and -ineradicable—one single great thing has always been the prey of the -million little things. The beasts of the jungle are laid low by the -insects. Yes, she agreed that everything was multiple that counted. -Pauvla was multiple now, and some day they would be also. This was the -reason that she wandered from room to room touching things, vases, -candlesticks, tumblers, knives, forks, the holy pictures and statues and -praying to each of them, praying for a great thing, to many presences. - -A neighbour from across the way came to see them while Pauvla’s brother -was still playing with the baby. This man was a farmer, once upon a -time, and liked to remember it, as city-bred men in the country like to -remember New York and its sophistication. - -He spent his Summers, however, in the little fishing village where the -sisters, Pauvla and Tasha, had come to know him. He always spoke of -“going toward the sea.” He said that there was something more than wild -about the ocean; it struck him as being a little unnatural, too. - -He came in now grumbling and wiping his face with a coarse red -handkerchief, remarking on the “catch” and upon the sorrow of the house -of Agrippa, all in the one breath. - -“There’s a touch of damp in the air,” he said, sniffing, his nose held -back so that his small eyes gleamed directly behind it. “The fish have -been bad catching and no-man’s-mare is going up the headlands, her tail -stretched straight out.” - -Tasha came forward with cakes and tea and paused, praying over them -also, still looking for comfort. She was a small woman, with a round, -wrinkled forehead and the dark eyes of her sister; today she felt -inconvenienced because she could not understand her own feelings—once or -twice she had looked upon the corpse with resentment because it had done -something to Pauvla; however, she was glad to see the old man, and she -prayed to him silently also, to see if it would help. Just what she -prayed for she could not tell; the words she used were simple: “What is -it, what is it?” over and over with her own childhood prayers to end -with. - -She had a great deal of the quietness of this village about her, the -quietness that is in the roaring of the sea and the wind, and when she -sighed it was like the sound made of great waters running back to sea -between the narrow sides of little stones. - -It was here that she, as well as her brothers and sisters, had been -born. They fished in the fishing season and sold to the market at -one-eighth of the market price, but when the markets went so low that -selling would put the profits down for months, they turned the nets over -and sent the fish back to sea. - -Today Tasha was dressed in her ball-gown; she had been anticipating a -local gathering that evening and then Pauvla Agrippa got her heart -attack and died. This dress was low about the shoulders, with flounces -of taffeta, and the sea-beaten face of Tasha rose out of its stiff -elegance like a rock from heavy moss. Now that she had brought the cakes -and tea, she sat listening to this neighbour as he spoke French to her -younger brother. - -When they spoke in this strange language she was always surprised to -note that their voices became unfamiliar to her—she could not have told -which was which, or if they were themselves at all. Closing her eyes, -she tried to see if this would make any difference, and it didn’t. Then -she slowly raised her small plump hands and pressed them to her -ears—this was better, because now she could not tell that it was French -that they were speaking, it was sound only and might have been anything, -and again she sighed, and was glad that they were less strange to her; -she could not bear this strangeness today, and wished they would stop -speaking in a foreign tongue. - -“What are you saying?” she enquired, taking the teacup in one hand, -keeping the other over her ear. - -“Talking about the horse,” he said, and went on. - -Again Tasha became thoughtful. This horse that they were speaking about -had been on the sands, it seemed to her, for as long as she could -remember. It was a wild thing belonging to nobody. Sometimes in a coming -storm, she had seen it standing with its head out toward the waters, its -mane flying in the light air, and its thin sides fluttering with the -beating of its heart. - -It was old now, with sunken flanks and knuckled legs; it no longer stood -straight—and the hair about its nose had begun to turn grey. It never -interfered with the beach activities, and on the other hand it never -permitted itself to be touched. Early in her memory of this animal, -Tasha had tried to stroke it, but it had started, arched its neck and -backed away from her with hurried jumping steps. Many of the ignorant -fisherfolk had called it the sea horse and also “no-man’s-mare.” They -began to fear it, and several of them thought it a bad omen. - -Tasha knew better—sometimes it would be down upon the pebbly part of the -shore, its head laid flat as though it were dead, but no one could -approach within fifty feet without its instantly leaping up and standing -with its neck thrust forward and its brown eyes watching from beneath -the coarse lashes. - -In the beginning people had tried to catch it and make it of use. -Gradually everyone in the village had made the attempt; not one of them -had ever succeeded. - -The large black nostrils were always wet, and they shook as though -someone were blowing through them—great nostrils like black flowers. - -This mare was old now and did not get up so often when approached. Tasha -had been as near to it as ten paces, and Pauvla Agrippa had once -approached so near that she could see that its eyes were failing, that a -thin mist lay over its right eyeball, so that it seemed to be flirting -with her, and this made her sad and she hurried away, and she thought, -“The horse had its own defence; when it dies it will be so horrifying -perhaps that not one of us will approach it.” Though many had squabbled -about which of them should have its long beautiful tail. - -Pauvla Agrippa’s husband had finished his cigar and came in now, bending -his head to get through the low casement. He spoke to the neighbour a -few moments and then sat down beside his sister-in-law. - -He began to tell her that something would have to be done with Pauvla, -and added that they would have to manage to get her over to the -undertaker’s at the end of the headland, but that they had no means of -conveyance. Tasha thought of this horse because she had been thinking -about it before he interrupted and she spoke of it timidly, but it was -only an excuse to say something. - -“You can’t catch it,” he said, shaking his head. - -Here the neighbour broke in: “It’s easy enough to catch it; this last -week three children have stroked it—it’s pretty low, I guess; but I -doubt if it would be able to walk that far.” - -He looked over the rim of the teacup to see how this remark would be -taken—he felt excited all of a sudden at the thought that something was -going to be attempted that had not been attempted in many years, and a -feeling of misfortune took hold of him that he had certainly not felt at -Pauvla Agrippa’s death. Everything about the place, and his life that -had seemed to him quite normal and natural, now seemed strange. - -The disrupting of one idea—that the horse could not be caught—put him -into a mood that made all other accustomed things alien. - -However, after this it seemed quite natural that they should make the -effort and Tasha went into the room where Pauvla Agrippa lay. - -The boy had fallen asleep in the corner and Pauvla’s baby was crawling -over him, making for Pauvla, cooing softly and saying “mamma” with -difficulty, because the little under-lip kept reaching to the upper lip -to prevent the saliva from interrupting the call. - -Tasha put her foot in the baby’s way and stood looking down at Pauvla -Agrippa, where her small hands lay beneath her fine breast with its -purple veins, and now Tasha did not feel quite the same resentment that -she had felt earlier. It is true this body had done something -irrevocable to Pauvla Agrippa, but she also realized that she, Tasha, -must now do something to this body; it was the same with everything, -nothing was left as it was, something was always altering something -else. Perhaps it was an unrecognized law. - -Pauvla Agrippa’s husband had gone out to see what could be done with the -mare, and now the neighbour came in, saying that it would not come in -over the sand, but that he—the husband—thought that it would walk toward -the headland, as it was wont. - -“If you could only carry her out to it,” he said. - -Tasha called in two of her brothers and woke up the one on the floor. -“Everything will be arranged for her comfort,” she said, “when we get -her up there.” They lifted Pauvla Agrippa up and her baby began to -laugh, asking to be lifted up also, and holding its little hands high -that it might be lifted, but no one was paying any attention to him, -because now they were moving his mother. - -Pauvla Agrippa looked fine as they carried her, only her small hands -parted and deserted the clef where they had lain, dropping down upon the -shoulders of her brothers. Several children stood hand in hand watching, -and one or two villagers appeared who had heard from the neighbours what -was going on. - -The mare had been induced to stand and someone had slipped a halter over -its neck for the first time in many years; there was a frightened look -in the one eye and the film that covered the other seemed to darken, but -it made no objection when they raised Pauvla Agrippa and placed her on -its back, tying her on with a fish net. - -Then someone laughed, and the neighbour slapped his leg saying, “Look -what the old horse has come to—caught and burdened at last.” And he -watched the mare with small cruel eyes. - -Pauvla Agrippa’s husband took the strap of the halter and began plodding -through the sand, the two boys on either side of the horse holding to -all that was left of Pauvla Agrippa. Tasha came behind, her hands -folded, praying now to this horse, still trying to find peace, but she -noticed with a little apprehension that the horse’s flanks had begun to -quiver, and that this quiver was extending to its ribs and from its ribs -to its forelegs. - -Then she saw it turn a little, lifting its head. She called out to -Pauvla Agrippa’s husband who, startled with the movement and the cry, -dropped the rope. - -The mare had turned toward the sea; for an instant it stood there, -quivering, a great thin, bony thing with crooked legs; its blind eyes -half covered with the black coarse lashes. Pauvla Agrippa with her head -thrown a bit back rested easily, it seemed, the plaits of her yellow -hair lying about her neck, but away from her face, because she was not -supported quite right; still she looked like some strange new sea animal -beneath the net that held her from falling. - -Then without warning, no-man’s-mare jumped forward and plunged neck-deep -into the water. - -A great wave came up, covered it, receded and it could be seen swimming, -its head out of the water, while Pauvla Agrippa’s loosened yellow hair -floated behind. No one moved. Another wave rose high, descended, and -again the horse was seen swimming with head up, and this time Pauvla -Agrippa’s hands were parted and lay along the water as though she were -swimming. - -The most superstitious among them began crossing themselves, and one -woman dropped on her knees, rocking from side to side; and still no one -moved. - -And this time the wave rose, broke and passed on, leaving the surface -smooth. - -That night Tasha picked up Pauvla Agrippa’s sleepy boy and standing in -the doorway prayed to the sea, and this time she found comfort. - -[Illustration] - - - - - SIX SONGS OF KHALIDINE - - _To the Memory of Mary Pyne_ - - - The flame of your red hair does crawl and creep - Upon your body that denies the gloom - And feeds upon your flesh as ’t would consume - The cold precision of your austere sleep— - And all night long I beat it back, and weep. - - It is not gentleness but mad despair - That sets us kissing mouths, O Khalidine, - Your mouth and mine, and one sweet mouth unseen - We call our soul. Yet thick within our hair - The dusty ashes that our days prepare. - - The dark comes up, my little love, and dyes - Your fallen lids with stain of ebony, - And draws a thread of fear ’tween you and me - Pulling thin blindness down across our eyes— - And far within the vale a lost bird cries. - - Does not the wind moan round your painted towers - Like rats within an empty granary? - The clapper lost, and long blown out to sea - Your windy doves. And here the black bat cowers - Against your clock that never strikes the hours. - - And now I say, has not the mountain’s base - Here trembled long ago unto the cry - “I love you, ah, I love you!” Now we die - And lay, all silent, to the earth our face. - Shall that cast out the echo of this place? - - Has not one in the dark funereal - Heard foot-fall fearful, born of no man’s tread, - And felt the wings of death, though no wing spread - And on his cheek a tear, though no tear fell— - And a voice saying without breath “Farewell!” - - - - - THE DOVE - - - PERSONS: │ - AMELIA │_Sisters_ - BURGSON │ - VERA BURGSON│ 〃 - - THE DOVE— │_A young girl living with the_ BURGSONS - - TIME—_Early morning_ - - PLACE—_The_ BURGSON _Apartment, a long, low rambling affair at the top - of a house in the heart of the city_. - -_The decoration is garish, dealing heavily in reds and pinks. There is -an evident attempt to make the place look luxuriously sensual. The -furniture is all of the reclining type._ - -_The walls are covered with a striped paper in red and white. Only two -pictures are evident, one of the Madonna and child, and one of an early -English tandem race._ - -_There are firearms everywhere. Many groups of swords, ancient and -modern, are secured to the walls. A pistol or two lie in chairs, etc._ - -_There is only one door, which leads out into the back hall directly -back centre._ - -AMELIA BURGSON _is a woman rather over the normal in height, with large -braids of very yellow hair, done about a long face. She seems vitally -hysterical_. - -VERA BURGSON _is small, thin and dark_. - -THE DOVE _is a slight girl barely out of her teens; she is as delicate -as china with almost dangerously transparent skin. Her nose is -high-bridged and thin, her hands and feet are also very long and -delicate. She has red hair, very elegantly coiffured. When she moves_ -[_seldom_] _the slightest line runs between her legs, giving her the -expectant waiting air of a deer._ - -_At the rising of the curtain_ THE DOVE, _gowned in white, is seated on -the divan polishing the blade of an immense sword. Half reclining to her -right lies_ VERA _in a thin yellow morning gown. A French novel has half -fallen from her hand. Her eyes are closed._ - - -THE DOVE—Yes, I’m hurrying. - -VERA—That’s best, she will be back soon. - -THE DOVE—She is never gone long. - -VERA—No, never very long—one would grow old waiting for the day on which -she would stay an hour—a whole hour. - -THE DOVE—Yes, that’s true. - -VERA—[_Wearily._] She says we live dangerously; [_laughs_] why, we can’t -even keep the flies out. - -THE DOVE—Yes, there are a great many flies. - -VERA—[_After a pause._] Shall I ever have a lover, do you suppose? - -THE DOVE—[_Turning the sword over._] No, I suppose not. - -VERA—Yet Amelia and I have made it our business to know—everything. - -THE DOVE—Yes? - -VERA—Yes. We say this little thing in French and that little thing in -Spanish, and we collect knives and pistols, but we only shoot our -buttons off with the guns and cut our darning cotton with the knives, -and we’ll never, never be perverse though our entire education has been -about knees and garters and pinches on hindquarters—elegantly bestowed—, -and we keep a few animals—very badly—hoping to see something -first-hand—and our beds are as full of yellow pages and French jokes as -a bird’s nest is full of feathers— God! [_she stands up abruptly_] -little one, why do I wear lace at my elbows? - -THE DOVE—You have pretty arms. - -VERA—Nonsense! Lace swinging back and forth like that, tickling my arms, -well, that’s not beauty—— - -THE DOVE—I know. - -VERA—[_Returning to her couch._] I sometimes wonder what you do know, -you are such a strange happening, anyway. Well then, tell me what you -think of me and what you think of my sister, you have been here long -enough. Why do you stay? Do you love us? - -THE DOVE—I love something that you have. - -VERA—What? - -THE DOVE—Your religious natures. - -VERA—Good heavens! - -THE DOVE—You misunderstand me. I call that imagination that is the -growth of ignorance, religion. - -VERA—And why do you like that? - -THE DOVE—Because it goes farther than knowledge. - -VERA—You know, sometimes I wish—— - -THE DOVE—Yes? - -VERA—That you had lived all we pretend we have. - -THE DOVE—Why? - -VERA—I don’t know, but somehow someone like you should know—everything. - -THE DOVE—Do I seem so young? - -VERA—I know, that’s what’s so odd. [_Impatiently._] For heaven’s sake, -will you stop polishing that infernal weapon! - -THE DOVE—[_Quietly._] She said to me: - -“Take all the blood stains off first, then polish it.” - -VERA—There you are; she is quite mad, there’s no doubt. Blood stains! -Why, she would be afraid to cut her chops with it—and as for the rest of -her manifestations—nonsense! - -THE DOVE—She carries a pistol with her, just to go around the corner for -a pound of butter. - -VERA—It’s wicked! She keeps an enormous blunderbuss in the corner of her -room, but when I make up her bed, all I find is some Parisienne bathing -girl’s picture stuck full of pin holes—— - -THE DOVE—I know, she sits beside me for hours making those pin holes in -the borders of everything in sight. - -VERA—[_With a strange anger._] Why do you stay? - -THE DOVE—Why should I go? - -VERA—I should think this house and two such advanced virgins as Amelia -and myself would drive you to despair—— - -THE DOVE—No, no, I’m not driven to despair—— - -VERA—What do you find here? - -THE DOVE—I love Amelia. - -VERA—Another reason for going away. - -THE DOVE—Is it? - -VERA—Yes, it is. - -THE DOVE—Strange, I don’t feel that way about it. - -VERA—Sometimes I think—— - -THE DOVE—Yes? - -VERA—That you are the mad one, and that we are just eccentric. - -THE DOVE—Yet my story is quite simple. - -VERA—I’m not so certain. - -THE DOVE—Yet you have heard it. - -VERA—There’s more than one hears. - -THE DOVE—I was born on a farm—— - -VERA—So you say. - -THE DOVE—I became very fond of moles—it’s so daring of them to be in the -darkness underground. And then I like the open fields, too—they say -there’s nothing like nature for the simple spirit. - -VERA—Yes, and I’ve long had my suspicions of nature. - -THE DOVE—Be that as it may, my brothers were fond of me—in a way, and my -father in—a way—then I came to New York—— - -VERA—And took up the painting of china—— - -THE DOVE—Exactly. I was at that for three years, then one day I met you -walking through the park, do you remember? You had a parasol, you tipped -it back of your head, you looked at me a long time. Then I met Amelia, -by the same high fence in the same park, and I bowed to her in an almost -military fashion, my heels close together—— - -VERA—And you never did anything wild, insane—— - -THE DOVE—It depends on what you call wild, insane—— - -VERA—[_With great excitement._] Have you ever taken opium or hasheesh? - -THE DOVE—[_As if answering._] There are many kinds of dreams—in one you -laugh, in another you weep—— - -VERA—[_Wringing her hands._] Yes, yes, once I dreamed. A dream in the -day, with my eyes wide open. I dreamt I was a Dresden doll and that I -had been blown down by the wind and that I broke all to pieces—that is, -my arms and my head broke all to pieces—but that I was surprised to find -that my china skirt had become flexible, as if it were made of chiffon -and lace. - -THE DOVE—You see, there are many dreams—— - -VERA—Have you ever felt that your bones were utterly sophisticated but -that your flesh was keeping them from expressing themselves? - -THE DOVE—Or vice versa? - -VERA—Yes, or vice versa. - -THE DOVE—There are many kinds of dreams—— - -VERA—You know, I’m afraid of you! - -THE DOVE—Me? - -VERA—Yes, you seem so gentle—do we not call you the Dove? And you are so -little—so little it’s almost immoral, you make me feel as if—— - -THE DOVE—As if? - -VERA—Well, as if your terrible quality were not one of action, but just -the opposite, as if you wanted to prevent nothing. - -THE DOVE—There are enough people preventing things, aren’t there? - -VERA—Yes—that’s why you frighten me. - -THE DOVE—Because I let everything go on, as far as it can go? - -VERA—Yes, because you disturb nothing. - -THE DOVE—I see. - -VERA—You never meddle—— - -THE DOVE—No, I never meddle. - -VERA—You don’t even observe as other people do, you don’t watch. Why, if -I were to come to you, wringing my hands saying, “Amelia has shot -herself,” I don’t believe you would stand up. - -THE DOVE—No, I don’t suppose I would, but I would do something for all -that. - -VERA—What? - -THE DOVE—I should want to be very sure you wrung your hands as much as -possible, and that Amelia had gotten all there was to get out of the -bullet before she died. - -VERA—It’s all very well, but why don’t you do something? - -THE DOVE—A person who is capable of anything needs no practice. - -VERA—You are probably maligning yourself, you are a gentle creature, a -very girl—— - -THE DOVE—If you were sensitive you would not say that. - -VERA—Well, perhaps. [_She laughs a hard laugh._] What can you expect of -a lumber dealer’s daughter? - -THE DOVE—Why are you so restless, Vera? - -VERA—Because I’m a woman. I leave my life entirely to my imagination and -my imagination is terrific. I can’t even turn to religion for the -_prie-dieu_ inclines me to one thing only—so there you are! - -THE DOVE—You imagine—many things? - -VERA—You know well enough—sitting here day after day, giving my mind -everything to do, the body nothing—— - -THE DOVE—What do you want, Vera? - -VERA—Some people would say a lover, but I don’t say a lover; some people -would say a home, but I don’t say a home. You see I have imagined myself -beyond the need of the usual home and beyond the reach of the usual -lover—— - -THE DOVE—Then? - -VERA—Perhaps what I really want is a reason for using one of these -pistols! [_She laughs and lies back._ THE DOVE, _having risen, goes up -behind_ VERA _and places her hand on her throat_.] - -THE DOVE—Now you may use one of those pistols. - -VERA—[_Startled, but making no attempt to remove the_ DOVE’S _hand_.] -For such a _little_ thing? - -THE DOVE—[_Dropping her hand, once more taking up her old position, -sword on knee._] Ah! - -VERA—Why do you say that? [_She is evidently agitated._] - -THE DOVE—I suppose I shall _always_ wait. - -VERA—What is the matter? - -THE DOVE—Always, always! - -VERA—What _is_ the matter? - -THE DOVE—I suppose I’m waiting for the person who will know that -anything is a reason for using a pistol, unless one is waiting for the -obvious, and the obvious has never been sufficient reason. - -VERA—It’s all hopeless, I am hopeless and Amelia is hopeless, and as for -you—— [_She makes a gesture._] - -THE DOVE—I’ve never held anything against hopelessness. - -VERA—Now what do you mean? - -THE DOVE—It doesn’t matter. - -VERA—[_After a long pause._] I wish you danced. - -THE DOVE—Perhaps I do. - -VERA—It might make me happier. - -THE DOVE—[_Irrelevantly._] Why don’t people get angry at each other, -quite suddenly and without reason? - -VERA—Why should they? - -THE DOVE—Isn’t there something fine and cold and detached about a -causeless anger? - -VERA—I suppose so, it depends—— - -THE DOVE—No, it does not depend, that’s exactly it; to have a reason is -to cheapen rage. I wish every man were beyond the reach of his own -biography. - -VERA—You are either quite an idiot, or a saint. - -THE DOVE—I thought we had discussed that. - -VERA—[_Dashed but not showing it._] Yes, a saint. - -THE DOVE—[_Continuing._] I’m impatient of necessary continuity, I’m too -sensitive, perhaps. I want the beautiful thing to be, how can logic have -anything to do with it, or probable sequence? - -VERA—You make my hair stand on end! - -THE DOVE—Of course, that’s logical! - -VERA—Then how is it you like Amelia? And how do you stand me? - -THE DOVE—Because you are two splendid dams erected about two little -puddles. - -VERA—You’re horrid! - -THE DOVE—Only horrid! - -VERA—Yes, I’m really afraid of you. - -THE DOVE—Afraid? - -VERA—For instance, when you’re out of this room all these weapons might -be a lot of butter knives or pop guns, but let you come in—— - -THE DOVE—Well? - -VERA—It becomes an arsenal. - -THE DOVE—Yet you call me the Dove. - -VERA—Amelia called you the Dove, I’d never have thought of it. It’s just -like Amelia to call the only dangerous thing she ever knew the “Dove.” - -THE DOVE—Yes, there’s something in that. - -VERA—Shall I sing for you? - -THE DOVE—If you like. - -VERA—Or shall I show you the album that no one ever sees? [_She -laughs._] If we had any friends we would have to throw that book in the -fire. - -THE DOVE—And you would have to clear the entry—— - -VERA—True. It’s because of that picture of the Venetian courtesans that -I send Amelia out for the butter, I don’t dare let the grocer call. - -THE DOVE—You have cut yourselves off—just because you’re lonely. - -VERA—Yes, just because we are lonely. - -THE DOVE—It’s quite wonderful. - -VERA—It’s a wonder the neighbours don’t complain of Amelia’s playing -that way on the violin. - -THE DOVE—I had not noticed. - -VERA—No, I presume not, but everyone else in the house has. No nice -woman slurs as many notes as Amelia does! [_At this moment_ AMELIA -_enters the outer room. She is wearing a cloak with three -shoulder-capes, a large plumed hat, and skirt with many flounces._] - -AMELIA—[_From the entry._] You should come and see Carpaccio’s Deux -Courtisanes Vénitiennes now, the sun is shining right in on the head of -the one in the foreground. [_She begins to hum an Italian street song._] -Well, I have brought a little something and a bottle of wine. The wine -is for you, my Dove—and for you, Vera, I’ve a long green feather. -[_Pause in which_ THE DOVE _continues to polish the blade of the sword_. -VERA _has picked up her book_.] - -AMELIA—[_Advancing into the room, shrugging._] It’s damp! [_Seeing_ THE -DOVE _still at work_.] What a sweet, gentle creature, what a little Dove -it is! Ah, God, it’s a sin, truly it’s a sin that I, a woman with -temperament, permit a young girl to stay in the same room with me! - -THE DOVE—[_In a peaceful voice._] I’ve loaded all the pistols—— - -VERA—[_With suppressed anger._] Shined all the swords, ground all the -poniard points! Attack a man now if you dare, he’ll think you’re playing -with him! - -AMELIA—[_In an awful voice._] Vera! [_She begins pacing._] Disaster! -disaster!—wherever I go, disaster! A woman selling fish tried to do me -out of a quarter and when I remonstrated with her, she said with a wink: -“I, too, have been bitten by the fox!” - -THE DOVE—If you’ll sit down I’ll make some tea. - -AMELIA—No, no, we’ll have a little lunch soon, only I never can get the -corks out of bottles. - -THE DOVE—I can. - -VERA—Rubbish! [_She gets up and goes out._] - -AMELIA—Well, has anything happened since I went out? - -THE DOVE—No. - -AMELIA—No, no, it never does. [_She begins to walk about hurriedly._] -Aren’t there a great many flies in here? - -THE DOVE—Yes, the screens should be put up. - -AMELIA—No, no, no, I don’t want anything to be shut out. Flies have a -right to more than life, they have a right to be curious. - -THE DOVE—A bat flew into the room last night. - -AMELIA—[_Shuddering._] Some day I shall look like a bat, having beaten -my wings about every corner of the world, and never having hung over -anything but myself—— - -THE DOVE—And this morning, early, before you got up, the little -seamstress’ monkey walked in through the window—— - -AMELIA—[_Stopping short._] Are we to become infested? - -THE DOVE—Yesterday the mail-man offered me some dancing mice, he’s -raising them. - -AMELIA—[_Throwing up her hands._] There! You see! [_Pause._] Why should -I wear red heels? Why does my heart beat? - -THE DOVE—Red heels are handsome. - -AMELIA—Yes, yes, that’s what I say [_she begins to dance_]. Little one, -were you ever held in the arms of the one you love? - -THE DOVE—Who knows? - -AMELIA—If we had not been left an income we might have been in -danger—well, let us laugh [_she takes a few more dance steps_]. Eating -makes one fat, nothing more, and exercising reduces one, nothing more. -Drink wine—put flesh on the instep, the instep that used to tell such a -sweet story—and then the knees—fit for nothing but prayers! The -hands—too fat to wander! [_she waves her arm_]. Then one exercises, but -it’s never the same; what one has, is always better than what one -regains. Is it not so, my little one? But never mind, don’t answer. I’m -in an excellent humour—I could talk for hours, all about myself—to -myself, for myself. God! I’d like to tear out all the wires in the -house! Destroy all the tunnels in the city, leave nothing underground or -hidden or useful, oh, God, God! [_She has danced until she comes -directly in front of_ THE DOVE. _She drops on her knees and lays her -arms on either side of_ THE DOVE.] I hate the chimneys on the houses, I -hate the doorways, I hate you, I hate Vera, but most of all I hate my -red heels! - -THE DOVE—[_Almost inaudibly._] Now, now! - -AMELIA—[_In high excitement._] Give me the sword! It has been sharpened -long enough, give it to me, give it to me! [_She makes a blind effort to -find the sword; finding_ THE DOVE’S _hand instead, she clutches it -convulsively. Slowly_ THE DOVE _bares Amelia’s left shoulder and breast, -and leaning down, sets her teeth in. Amelia gives a slight, short -stifled cry. At the same moment_ VERA _appears in the doorway with the -uncorked bottle_. THE DOVE _stands up swiftly, holding a pistol. She -turns in the doorway hastily vacated by_ VERA.] - -THE DOVE—So! [_She bows, a deep military bow, and turning goes into the -entry._] - -THE VOICE OF THE DOVE—For the house of Burgson! [_A moment later a shot -is heard._] - -AMELIA—[_Running after her._] Oh, my God! - -VERA—What has she done? - -AMELIA—[_Reappearing in the doorway with the picture of the Venetian -courtesans, through which there is a bullet hole—slowly, but with -emphasis._] _This_ is obscene! - - - CURTAIN - - - - - MOTHER - - -A feeble light flickered in the pawn shop at Twenty-nine. Usually, in -the back of this shop, reading by this light—a rickety lamp with a -common green cover—sat Lydia Passova, the mistress. - -Her long heavy head was divided by straight bound hair. Her high firm -bust was made still higher and still firmer by German corsets. She was -excessively tall, due to extraordinarily long legs. Her eyes were small, -and not well focused. The left was slightly distended from the long use -of a magnifying glass. - -She was middle-aged, and very slow in movement, though well balanced. -She wore coral in her ears, a coral necklace, and many coral finger -rings. - -There was about her jewelry some of the tragedy of all articles that -find themselves in pawn, and she moved among the trays like the -guardians of cemetery grounds, who carry about with them some of the -lugubrious stillness of the earth on which they have been standing. - -She dealt, in most part, in cameos, garnets, and a great many inlaid -bracelets and cuff-links. There were a few watches however, and silver -vessels and fishing tackle and faded slippers—and when, at night, she -lit the lamp, these and the trays of precious and semi-precious stones, -and the little ivory crucifixes, one on either side of the window, -seemed to be leading a swift furtive life of their own, conscious of the -slow pacing woman who was known to the street as Lydia Passova. - -No one knew her, not even her lover—a little nervous fellow, an -Englishman quick in speech with a marked accent, a round-faced youth -with a deep soft cleft in his chin, on which grew two separate tufts of -yellow hair. His eyes were wide and pale, and his eyeteeth prominent. - -He dressed in tweeds, walked with the toes in, seemed sorrowful when not -talking, laughed a great deal and was nearly always to be found in the -café about four of an afternoon. - -When he spoke it was quick and jerky. He had spent a great deal of his -time in Europe, especially the watering places—and had managed to get -himself in trouble in St. Moritz, it was said, with a well-connected -family. - -He liked to seem a little eccentric and managed it simply enough while -in America. He wore no hat, and liked to be found reading the _London -Times_, under a park lamp at three in the morning. - -Lydia Passova was never seen with him. She seldom left her shop, -however, she was always pleased when he wanted to go anywhere: “Go,” she -would say, kissing his hand, “and when you are tired come back.” - -Sometimes she would make him cry. Turning around she would look at him a -little surprised, with lowered lids, and a light tightening of the -mouth. - -“Yes,” he would say, “I know I’m trivial—well then, here I go, I will -leave you, not disturb you any longer!” and darting for the door he -would somehow end by weeping with his head buried in her lap. - -She would say, “There, there—why are you so nervous?” - -And he would laugh again: “My father was a nervous man, and my mother -was high-strung, and as for me——” He would not finish. - -Sometimes he would talk to her for long hours, she seldom answering, -occupied with her magnifying glass and her rings, but in the end she was -sure to send him out with: “That’s all very true, I have no doubt; now -go out by yourself and think it over”—and he would go, with something -like relief, embracing her large hips with his small strong arms. - -They had known each other a very short time, three or four months. He -had gone in to pawn his little gold ring, he was always in financial -straits, though his mother sent him five pounds a week; and examining -the ring, Lydia Passova had been so quiet, inevitable, necessary, that -it seemed as if he must have known her forever—“at some time,” as he -said. - -Yet they had never grown together. They remained detached, and on her -part, quiet, preoccupied. - -He never knew how much she liked him. She never told him; if he asked -she would look at him in that surprised manner, drawing her mouth -together. - -In the beginning he had asked her a great many times, clinging to her, -and she moved about arranging her trays with a slight smile, and in the -end lowered her hand and stroked him gently. - -He immediately became excited. “Let us dance,” he cried, “I have a great -capacity for happiness.” - -“Yes, you are very happy,” she said. - -“You understand, don’t you?” he asked abruptly. - -“What?” - -“That my tears are nothing, have no significance, they are just a -protective fluid—when I see anything happening that is about to affect -my happiness I cry, that’s all.” - -“Yes,” Lydia Passova said, “I understand.” She turned around reaching up -to some shelves, and over her shoulder she asked, “Does it hurt?” - -“No, it only frightens me. You never cry, do you?” - -“No, I never cry.” - -That was all. He never knew where she had come from, what her life had -been, if she had or had not been married, if she had or had not known -lovers; all that she would say was, “Well, you are with me, does that -tell you nothing?” and he had to answer, “No, it tells me nothing.” - -When he was sitting in the café he often thought to himself, “There’s a -great woman”—and he was a little puzzled why he thought this because his -need of her was so entirely different from any need he seemed to -remember having possessed before. - -There was no swagger in him about her, the swagger he had always felt -for his conquests with women. Yet there was not a trace of shame—he was -neither proud nor shy about Lydia Passova, he was something entirely -different. He could not have said himself what his feeling was—but it -was in no way disturbing. - -People had, it is true, begun to tease him: - -“You’re a devil with the ladies.” - -Where this had made him proud, now it made him uneasy. - -“Now, there’s a certain Lydia Passova for instance, who would ever have -thought——” - -Furious he would rise. - -“So, you do feel——” - -He would walk away, stumbling a little among the chairs, putting his -hand on the back of every one on the way to the door. - -Yet he could see that, in her time, Lydia Passova had been a “perverse” -woman—there was, about everything she did, an economy that must once -have been a very sensitive and a very sensuous impatience, and because -of this everyone who saw her felt a personal loss. - -Sometimes, tormented, he would come running to her, stopping abruptly, -putting it to her this way: - -“Somebody has said something to me.” - -“When—where?” - -“Now, in the café.” - -“What?” - -“I don’t know, a reproach——” - -She would say: - -“We are all, unfortunately, only what we are.” - -She had a large and beautiful angora cat, it used to sit in the tray of -amethysts and opals and stare at her from very bright cold eyes. One day -it died, and calling her lover to her she said: - -“Take her out and bury her.” And when he had buried her he came back, -his lips twitching. - -“You loved that cat—this will be a great loss.” - -“Have I a memory?” she inquired. - -“Yes,” he answered. - -“Well,” she said quietly, fixing her magnifying glass firmly in her eye. -“We have looked at each other, that is enough.” - -And then one day she died. - -The caretaker of the furnace came to him, where he was sipping his -liqueur as he talked to his cousin, a pretty little blond girl, who had -a boring and comfortably provincial life, and who was beginning to -chafe. - -He got up, trembling, pale, and hurried out. - -The police were there, and said they thought it had been heart failure. - -She lay on the couch in the inner room. She was fully dressed, even to -her coral ornaments; her shoes were neatly tied—large bows of a ribbed -silk. - -He looked down. Her small eyes were slightly open, the left, that had -used the magnifying glass, was slightly wider than the other. For a -minute she seemed quite natural. She had the look of one who is about to -say: “Sit beside me.” - -Then he felt the change. It was in the peculiar heaviness of the -head—sensed through despair and not touch. The high breasts looked very -still, the hands were half closed, a little helpless, as in life—hands -that were too proud to “hold.” The drawn-up limb exposed a black -petticoat and a yellow stocking. It seemed that she had become hard—set, -as in a mould—that she rejected everything now, but in rejecting had -bruised him with a last terrible pressure. He moved and knelt down. He -shivered. He put his closed hands to his eyes. He could not weep. - -She was an old woman, he could see that. The ceasing of that one thing -that she could still have for anyone made it simple and direct. - -Something oppressed him, weighed him down, bent his shoulders, closed -his throat. He felt as one feels who has become conscious of passion for -the first time, in the presence of a relative. - -He flung himself on his face, like a child. - -That night, however, he wept, lying in bed, his knees drawn up. - - - - - SONG IN AUTUMN - - - The wind comes down before the creeping night - And you, my love, are hid within the green - Long grasses; and the dusk steals up between - Each leaf, as through the shadow quick with fright - The startled hare leaps up and out of sight. - - The hedges whisper in their loaded boughs - Where warm birds slumber, pressing wing to wing, - All pulsing faintly, like a muted string - Above us where we weary of our vows— - And hidden underground the soft moles drowse. - -[Illustration] - - - - - THE NIGGER - - -John Hardaway was dying. That wasn’t what he minded. His small, -well-shaped hands twitched at the soft coverlet which rose and fell -slowly with his breathing, and he breathed hard with mouth open, showing -all his teeth. - -Rabb, the nigger, crouched in the corner. The air about her was heavy -with her odour. She kept blinking her eyes. She was awed at the presence -of her master, but ashamed too, ashamed that he was dying—ashamed as she -would have been had he been caught at his toilet. - -Rabb was a good nigger; she had served John Hardaway’s mother, she had -seen her die—old Mrs. Hardaway fluttered against her lace like a bird -caught in deep foliage—Rabb had been able to do something about Mrs. -Hardaway’s death because Mrs. Hardaway had loved her, in her way. - -Mrs. Hardaway had died understandably—she had breathed hard too, opening -her mouth, but it was gentle and eager, like a child at the breast. - -Rabb had tried to be near her, had put her hands on her. But the thing -she was trying to touch lay in some hidden corner of Mrs. Hardaway, as a -cat hides away under a bed, and Rabb had done nothing after all. - -But it was different with John Hardaway. She watched life playing -coquettishly with him. It played with him as a dog plays with an old -coat. It shook him suddenly in great gusts of merriment. It played with -his eyelids; it twisted his mouth, it went in and out of his body, like -a flame running through a funnel—throwing him utterly aside in the end, -leaving him cold, lonely, and forbidding. - -John Hardaway hated negroes with that hate a master calls love. He was a -Southerner and never forgot it. Rabb had nursed him when he was an -infant, she had seen him grow up into a big boy, and then she had been -there when he broke his mistress’s back by some flaw in his otherwise -flawless passion. - -From time to time John Hardaway called for water. And when Rabb tried to -lift his head, he cursed her for a ‘black bitch’—but in the end he had -to let her hold it. - -John Hardaway was fifty-nine, he had lived well, scornfully, and this -always makes the end easier; he had been a gentleman in the only way a -Southerner has of being one—he never forgot that he was a Hardaway—— - -He called out to her now: - -“When I die—leave the room.” - -“Yes, sah,” she whispered sadly. - -“Bring me the broth.” - -She brought it trembling. She was very tired and very hungry, and she -wanted to whistle but she only whispered: - -“Ain’t there nothing I kin do for you?” - -“Open the window.” - -“It’s night air, sah——” - -“Open it, fool——” - -She went to the window and opened it. She was handsome when she reached -up, and her nose was almost as excellent as certain Jewish noses; her -throat was smooth, and it throbbed. - -Toward ten o’clock that night John Hardaway began to sing to himself. He -was fond of French, but what he learned in French he sang in English. - - “Ah, my little one—I have held you on my knee—— - - “I have kissed your ears and throat—— - - “Now I set you down—— - - “You may do as you will.” - -He tried to turn over—but failed, and so he lay there staring into the -fire. - -At this point in the death of John Hardaway, Rabb, the nigger, came out -of her corner, and ceased trembling. She was hungry and began heating -some soup in a saucepan. - -“What are you doing?” John Hardaway inquired abruptly. - -“I’s hungry, sah.” - -“Then get out of here—get into the kitchen.” - -“Yes, sah,” but she did not move. - -John Hardaway breathed heavily, a mist went over his eyes—presently, -after interminable years, he lifted his lids. Rabb was now slowly -sipping the steaming soup. - -“You damned nigger!” - -She got up from her haunches hurriedly—placing her hand in front of her, -backing toward the door. - -“Little one, I have taken you on my knee——” - -Rabb crept back—she came up to the bed. - -“Massah, don’t you think——?” - -“What?” - -“A priest—maybe?” - -“Fool!” - -“Yes, sah, I only wanted to make safe.” - -He tried to laugh. He pressed his knees together. He had forgotten her. - -Finally toward dawn he began to wander. - -Rabb moistened the roll of red flesh inside her lip and set her teeth. -She began to grin at nothing at all, stroking her hips. - -He called to her. - -“I want to tell you something.” - -She came forward—rolling her eyes. - -“Come closer.” - -She came. - -“Lean down!” She leaned down, but already the saliva began to fill her -mouth. - -“Are you frightened?” - -“No, sah,” she lied. - -He raised his hand but it fell back, feebly. “Keep your place,” he -whispered, and instantly went to sleep. - -He began to rattle in his throat, while Rabb crouched in the corner, -holding her breasts in her folded arms and rocking softly on the balls -of her feet. - -The rattling kept on. Rabb began creeping toward him on hands and knees. - -“Massah!” - -He did not move. - -“John!” - -He felt a strange sensation—he lifted his eyelids with their fringe of -white lashes and almost inaudibly said: - -“Now go!” - -He had closed his eyes a long time, when he was troubled with the -thought that someone was trying to get into his body as he left it. He -opened his eyes and there stood Rabb the nigger very close, looking down -at him. - -A gush of blood sprang from his nose. - -“No, sah!” - -He began to gasp. Rabb the nigger stood up to her full height and looked -down at him. She began to fan him, quickly. He breathed more hurriedly, -his chest falling together like a house of cards. He tried to speak, he -could not. - -Suddenly Rabb bent down and leaning her mouth to his, breathed into him, -one great and powerful breath. His chest rose, he opened his eyes, said -“Ah!” and died. - -Rabb ran her tongue along her lips, and raising her eyes, stared at a -spot on the wall a little higher than she was wont to. After a while she -remembered her unfinished soup. - - - - - LULLABY - - - When I was a young child I slept with a dog, - I lived without trouble and I thought no harm; - I ran with the boys and I played leap-frog; - Now it is a girl’s head that lies on my arm. - - Then I grew a little, picked plantain in the yard; - Now I dwell in Greenwich, and the people do not call; - Then I planted pepper-seed and stamped on them hard. - Now I am very quiet and I hardly plan at all. - - Then I pricked my finger on a thorn, or a thistle, - Put the finger in my mouth, and ran to my mother. - Now I lie here, with my eyes on a pistol. - There will be a morrow, and another, and another. - - - - - INDIAN SUMMER - - -At the age of fifty-three Madame Boliver was young again. She was -suddenly swept away in a mad current of reckless and beautiful youth. -What she had done with those years that had counted up into such a -perfect conclusion, she could not tell—it was a strange, vague dream. -She had been plain, almost ugly, shy, an old maid. She was tall and -awkward—she sat down as if she were going to break when she was in those -new years that girls call early bloom. - -When she was thirty she had been frankly and astonishingly Yankee; she -came toward one with an erect and angular stride. She was severe, silent -and curious. It was probably due to this that she was called Madame. She -dressed in black outlined with white collar and cuffs, her hair was -drawn straight back and showed large lobed and pale ears. The tight -drawn hair exposed her features to that utter and unlovely nakedness -that some clean rooms are exposed to by the catching back of heavy and -melancholy curtains—she looked out upon life with that same unaccustomed -and expectant expression that best rooms wear when thrown open for the -one yearly festivity that proclaims their owners well to do. - -She had no friends and could not keep acquaintances—her speech was -sharp, quick and truthful. She spoke seldom, but with such fierce -strictness and accuracy that those who came into contact with her once, -took precautions not to be thus exposed a second time. - -She grew older steadily and without regret—long before the age of thirty -she had given up all expectations of a usual life or any hopes of that -called “unusual”; she walked in a straight path between the two, and she -was content and speculated little upon this thing in her that had made -her unloved and unlovely. - -Her sisters had married and fallen away about her as blossoms are -carried off, leaving the stalk—their children came like bits of pollen -and she enjoyed them and was mildly happy. Once she, too, had dreamed of -love, but that was before she had attained to the age of seventeen—by -that time she knew that no one could or would ask for her hand—she was -plain and unattractive and she was satisfied. - -She had become at once the drudge and the adviser—all things were laid -upon her both to solve and to produce. She laboured for others easily -and willingly and they let her labour. - -At fifty-three she blazed into a riotous Indian Summer of loveliness. -She was tall and magnificent. She carried with her a flavour of some -exotic flower; she exhaled something that savoured of those excellences -of odour and tone akin to pain and to pleasure; she lent a plastic -embodiment to all hitherto unembodied things. She was like some rare -wood, carved into a melting form—she breathed abruptly as one who has -been dead for half a century. - -Her face, it is true, was not that plump, downy and senseless -countenance of the early young—it was thin and dark and marked with a -few very sensitive wrinkles; about the mouth there were signs of a -humour she had never possessed, of a love she had never known, of a joy -she had never experienced and of a wisdom impossible for her to have -acquired. Her still, curious eyes with their blue-white borders and the -splendid irises were half veiled by strange dusty lids. The hair, that -had once been drawn back, was still drawn back, but no appallingly -severe features were laid bare. Instead the hair seemed to confer a -favour on all those who might look upon its restrained luxury, for it -uncovered a face at once valuable and unusual. - -Her smile was rich in colour—the scarlet of her gums, the strange -whiteness of her teeth, the moisture of the sensitive mouth, all seemed -as if Madame Boliver were something dyed through with perfect and rare -life. - -Now when she entered a room everyone paused, looking up and speaking -together. She was quite conscious of this and it pleased her—not because -she was too unutterably vain, but because it was so new and so -unexpected. - -For a while her very youth satisfied her—she lived with herself as -though she were a second person who had been permitted access to the -presence of some lovely and some longed-for dream. - -She did not know what to do. If she could have found religion newly with -her new youth she would have worshipped and have been profoundly glad of -the kneeling down and the rising up attendant with faith, but this was a -part of her old childhood and it did not serve. - -She had prayed then because she was ugly; she could not pray now because -she was beautiful—she wanted something new to stand before, to speak to. - -One by one the old and awkward things went, leaving in their wake -Venetian glass and bowls of onyx, silks, cushions and perfume. Her books -became magazines with quaint, unsurpassable and daring illustrations. - -Presently she had a salon. She was the rage. Gentlemen in political -whiskers, pomaded and curled, left their coats in the embrace of pompous -and refined footmen. - -Young students with boutonnières and ambitions came; an emissary or two -dropped in, proffered their hearts and departed. Poets and musicians, -littérateurs and artists experimenting in the modern, grouped themselves -about her mantels like butterflies over bonbons and poured sentiment -upon sentiment into her ears. - -Several gentlemen of leisure and millions courted her furiously with -small tears in the corners of their alert eyes. Middle-aged professors -and one deacon were among the crowd that filled her handsome apartment -on those days when she entertained. - -There was something about Madame Boliver that could not quite succumb to -herself. She was still afraid; she would start, draw her hand away and -pale abruptly in the middle of some ardent proposal—she would hurry to -the mirror at such times, though she never turned her head to look in. - -Was it possible that she was beautiful now? And if so, would it remain? -And her heart said, “Yes, it will remain,” until at last she believed -it. - -She put the past behind her and tried to forget it. It hurt her to -remember it, as if it were something that she had done in a moment of -absent-mindedness and of which she had to be ashamed. She remembered it -as one remembers some small wrong deed hidden for years. She thought -about her past unattractiveness as another would have thought of some -cruelty. Her eyes watered when she remembered her way of looking at -herself in her twenties. Her mouth trembled when she thought back to its -severity and its sharp retorts. - -Her very body reproached her for all that had been forced upon it in her -other youth, and a strange passion came upon her, turning her memory of -her sisters into something at times like that hatred felt by the -oppressed who remember the oppression when it has given way to plenty. - -But now she was free. She expanded, she sang, she dreamed for long -hours, her elbows upon the casement, looking out into the garden. She -smiled, remembering the old custom of serenading, and wondered when she, -too, would know it. - -That she was fifty-three never troubled her. It never even occurred to -her. She had been fifty-three long ago at twenty, and now she was twenty -at fifty-three, that was all—this was compensation, and if she had been -through her middle age in youth she could go through her youth in middle -age. - -At times she thought how much more beautiful nature is in its -treacheries than its remedies. - -Those who hovered about her offered, time on time, to marry her, to -carry her away into Italy or to Spain, to lavish money and devotion on -her, and in the beginning she had been almost too ready to accept them -in their assurances, because the very assurances were so new and so -delightful. - -But in spite of it she was, somewhere beneath her youth, old enough to -know that she did not love as she would love, and she waited with a -patience made pleasant by the constant attentions of the multitude. - -And then Petkoff, “the Russian,” had come, accompanied by one of the -younger students. - -A heavy fur cap came down to the borders of his squinting and piercing -eyes. He wore a mixture of clothing that proclaimed him at once foreign -and poor. His small moustache barely covered sensitive and well shaped -lips, and the little line of hair that reached down on each side of his -close-set ears gave him an early period expression as if he, too, in -spite of his few years, might have lived in the time when she was a -girl. - -He could not have been much over thirty, perhaps just thirty—he said -little but never took his eyes off the object of his interest. - -He spoke well enough, with an occasional lapse into Russian, which was -very piquant. He swept aside all other aspirants with his steady and -centred gaze. He ignored the rest of the company so completely as to rob -him of rudeness. If one is ignorant of the very presence of his fellow -beings, at most he can only be called “strange.” - -Petkoff was both an ambitious and a self-centred man—all his qualities -were decisive and not hesitatingly crooked, providing he needed -crookedness to win his point. He was attractive to Madame Boliver -because he was as strange as she was herself, her youth was foreign, and -so was Petkoff. - -He had come to this country to start a venture that promised to be -successful; in the meantime, he had to be careful both in person and in -heart. - -What he felt for Madame Boliver was at first astonishment that such a -woman was still unmarried; he knew nothing of her past, and guessed at -her age much below the real figure. After a while this astonishment gave -way to pleasure and then to real and very sincere love. - -He began to pay court to her, neglecting his business a little and -worrying over that end of it, but persisting, nevertheless. - -He could see that she, on her side, was becoming deeply attached to him. -He would walk about in the park for hours arguing this affair out to -himself. Both the shoulds and should nots. - -It got him nowhere except into a state of impatience. He liked clear-cut -acts and he could not decide to go or stay. As it was, nothing could be -worse for his business than this same feverish indecision. He made up -his mind. - -Madame Boliver was radiantly happy. She began to draw away from a life -of entertainment and, instead, turned most of her energies into the -adoration of her first real love. She accepted him promptly, and with a -touch of her old firm and sharp decisiveness, and a hint of her utter -frankness. He told her that she took him as she would have taken a piece -of cake at a tea party, and they both laughed. - -That was in the Winter. Madame Boliver was fifty-five—he never asked her -how old she was and she never thought to tell him. They set the day for -their wedding early in the following June. - -They were profoundly happy. One by one the younger, more ardent admirers -fell off, but very slowly; they turned their heads a little as they -went, being both too vain and too skeptical to believe that this would -last. - -She still held receptions and still her rooms were flooded, but when -Petkoff entered, a little better dressed but still a bit heedless of the -throng, they hushed their highest hilarities and spoke of the new novels -and the newest trend in art. - -Petkoff had taken notice of them to that degree necessary to a man who -knows what he has won, and from whom and how many. He looked upon them -casually, but with a hint of well-being. - -Madame Boliver grew more beautiful, more radiant, more easeful. Her -movements began to resemble flowing water; she was almost too happy, too -supple, too conscious of her well-being. She became arrogant, but still -splendid; she became vain, but still gracious; she became accustomed to -herself, but still reflective. She could be said to have bloomed at too -auspicious an age; she was old enough to appreciate it, and this is a -very dangerous thing. - -She spent hours at the hair dresser’s and the dressmaker’s. Her dressing -table resembled a battlefield. It supported all the armament for keeping -age at a distance. She rode in the avenue in an open carriage, and -smiled when the society notices mentioned her name and ran her picture. - -She finally gave one the impression of being beautiful, but too -conscious of it; talented, but too vain; easy of carriage, but too -reliant on it; of being strange and rare and wonderful, but a little too -strange, a little too rare, a little too wonderful. She became -magnificently complex to outward appearances, yet in her soul Madame -Boliver still kept her honesty, her frankness and her simplicity. - -And then one day Madame Boliver took to her bed. It began with a -headache and ended with severe chills. She hoped to get up on the -following day, and she remained there a week; she put her party off, -expecting to be able to be about, but instead she gave it sitting in a -chair supported by cushions. - -Petkoff was worried and morose. He had given a good deal of time to -Madame Boliver, and he cared for her in a selfish and all-engrossing -way. When she stood up no longer he broke a Venetian tumbler by throwing -it into the fireplace. When she laughed at this he suddenly burst out -into very heavy weeping. She tried to comfort him, but he would not be -comforted. She promised him that she would walk soon, as a mother -promises a child some longed-for object. When she said, “I will be well, -dear, soon; after all I’m a young woman,” he stopped and looked at her -through a film of painful tears. - -“But are you?” he said, voicing for the first time his inner fear. - -And it was then that the horror of the situation dawned upon her. In -youth, when youth comes rightly, there is old age in which to lose it -complacently, but when it comes in old age there is no time to watch it -go. - -She sat up and stared at him. - -“Why, yes,” she said in a flat and firm voice, “that’s so. I am no -longer of few years.” - -She could not say “no longer young,” because she was young. - -“It will make no difference.” - -“Ah,” she said, “it will make no difference to you, but it will make a -difference to us.” - -She lay back and sighed, and presently she asked him to leave her a -little while. - -When he had gone she summoned the doctor. - -She said: “My friend—am I dying—so soon?” - -He shook his head emphatically. “Of course not,” he assured her; “we -will have you up in a week or so.” - -“What is it, then, that keeps me here now?” - -“You have tired yourself out, that is all. You see, such extensive -entertaining, my dear madame, will tax the youngest of us.” He shook his -head at this and twisted his moustache. She sent him away also. - -The next few days were happy ones. She felt better. She sat up without -fatigue. She was joyful in Petkoff’s renewed affections. He had been -frightened, and he lavished more extravagant praise and endearing terms -on her than ever before. He was like a man who, seeing his fortune go, -found how dear it was to him after all and how necessary when it -returned to him. By almost losing her he appreciated what he should have -felt if he had lost her indeed. - -It got to be a joke between them that they had held any fears at all. At -the club he beat his friends on the back and cried: - -“Gentlemen, a beautiful and young woman.” And they used to beat his -back, exclaiming: “Lucky, by God!” - -She ordered a large stock of wine and cakes for the wedding party, -bought some new Venetian glasses and indulged in a few rare old carpets -for the floor. She had quite a fancy, too, for a new gown offered at a -remarkably low sum, but she began to curb herself, for she had been very -extravagant as it was. - -And then one day she died. - -Petkoff came in a wild, strange mood. Four candles were burning at head -and feet, and Madame Boliver was more lovely than ever. Stamping, so -that he sent up little spirals of dust from the newly acquired carpet, -Petkoff strode up and down beside the bier. He leaned over and lit a -cigarette by one of the flickering flames of the candles. Madame -Boliver’s elderly sister, who was kneeling, coughed and looked -reproachfully upward at the figure of Petkoff, who had once again -forgotten everyone and everything. “Damn it!” he said, putting his -fingers into his vest. - - - - - I’D HAVE YOU THINK OF ME - - - As one who, leaning on the wall, once drew - Thick blossoms down, and hearkened to the hum - Of heavy bees slow rounding the wet plum, - And heard across the fields the patient coo - Of restless birds bewildered with the dew. - - As one whose thoughts were mad in painful May, - With melancholy eyes turned toward her love, - And toward the troubled earth whereunder throve - The chilly rye and coming hawthorn spray— - With one lean, pacing hound, for company. - - - - - THE RABBIT - - -The road was covered with red and yellow leaves. Rugo Amietieve, who -said that he was an Armenian, had wished one of those lingering -good-byes to this rotund and plentiful day that only a man of slow and -methodical mind can bring into being. He bid it adieu with more than the -silence and the love of his heart; he had whispered over it, his square -yellow teeth a little apart and touching the moist curve of his -under-lip with the small round point of flesh that clung to his upper -like a tear. He said good-bye resolutely and quite peacefully, with the -restraint of a man who knows what’s bad for him and why. Rugo did not -want to leave the country, but he had to. He knew why he did not want -to, and he knew why he was being forced to—necessity—that was it, -necessity had been hurrying his people about the world from the -beginning of time and would hurry them. - -Farewell held no piquancy for him, he did not tear out his heart by his -departure; there was nothing in the fact of the sunlight and the blowing -and dying leaves that gave him sweet pain and too heavy sorrow; the red -of the fallen apples sent no pang into the very midst of his being. On -the contrary Rugo Amietieve felt only that sense of loss that a good -housewife feels when she is letting a rich quilt out of her fingers. In -the soil, as Rugo had known it, had been life, hard and fragrant. He had -toiled at the plough grumbling, but sensing, with a slow, precise -pleasure, that the air was warm and good and healthy. He had tended his -geese and his cows with the same stolid satisfaction, and he watched -them moving about, leaning on his two folded and brown hands. The ducks’ -yellow, gaping mouths gave him physical pleasure, he would have liked to -press his hand over them where they were all shining and brittle; it -would have given him as much pleasure as a flower petal—more, because -these living things that cackled and spread their wings and brought -forth young were profitable also—the world lived here and moved, and its -incidental placing of him where he could profit by it was the thing that -amazed and satisfied him. - -Now it was otherwise. He must go away into the city where, they said, -nothing was fresh and new and living. His uncle had died, leaving him -his little tailoring establishment on the East Side. There Rugo was -bound, there from this day forward he would sit and sew interminably as -though he were a machine—as though he had suddenly died and had to work. - -He lifted his straight nose and smelled the September air. Here the -woods dipped over the road, spilling shadows gigantic and restless, with -a speckling of ragged sun patches like flowers. Mosquitoes came up from -the swamp as the night descended and sang about Rugo’s ears and set him -swearing. They got into the long, tangled meshes of his beard and clung -there; they sat in among these thick, ruddy strands and hissed against -the shuddering flesh of his cheeks. He lifted one of his hands and -struck his face on either side, and went on. - -The next morning the East Side, in the early Thirties, saw a stranger -sweeping out what had been old Amietieve’s shop. Rugo looked about him -with sad eyes. The room was twelve feet by twenty-four and the back part -was curtained off by a hanging of dull green, sprinkled over with pink -roses; a small cot bed was thus hidden from the front of the shop. It -was within these four walls that Rugo must live. He turned around in it, -sniffing the air with his long nose, laid back again as he had done in -the last hour in the country. He sneered. “You’re a little fool room,” -he said, “to be so small.” It was as if he were shaking it, as a child -is shaken and held up to learn by another’s larger and more important -example. He held this room up by the scruff of its neck and shook it in -the face of the thirty acres he had known, and he sneered upon it. - -He had learned the trade when still a child, when this same uncle had -been guardian, but his fingers were freedom clumsy and he broke the -needle. - -Work came hesitatingly and painfully. Rugo was a slow man, and at this -task he was still more laborious and backward. He toiled far into the -night seated upon his table, his goose between his knees. People walking -by on their way home sometimes peered in over the top of the cardboard -sign specked by the flies and the open fashion book with its strange, -angular, shiny gentlemen carrying canes and looking over their shoulders -playfully as if they were keeping something very amusing in their minds -to hand out like favours; and such people often said, “That chap will -die of consumption, you see.” - -The butcher’s shop across the way seemed to be vying with the remnants -of silks and serge in Rugo’s window. There were rump ends and flanks and -knuckle bones, remnants of some fine animal, all wonderful and red and -satiny yellow where the layers of fat crept out like frostings, or where -fat spread over kidneys like irregular lace; yet to Rugo they were -somehow painful, they made him think of the cows and the poultry that he -had so often gazed fondly upon, of the animal life he had grown up -among, and he turned his head away and went on stitching. - -Rugo got his own breakfast, lunch, dinner. Behind the curtain there, -beside his bed, was a small gas stove. In the Winter the shop was deadly -with heavy air. He could not open the door or he would have flooded the -place in a moment with cold, piercing and cruel, so he sat in the foul -air of a gas burner, and his eyes grew so dark in the paling face that -the children of the neighbourhood called him “Coal Eye.” - -In the Summer business had picked up, though Rugo seldom had any time to -himself. He worked quicker, but then orders were more plentiful on -patches, turnings and pressings. He had become attached to a small, ill -and very slender Italian girl who came once with her father’s coat. - -Her straight parted dark hair made him think of animals, he thought her -gentle and Madonna-like, not taking into account a small, cruel and -avaricious mouth. It was very red and he was pleased with it. Almost -anything bright pleased him. The very fact that these lips were cruel -pleased him, though he did not know that it was the brightness of -calculation that made them attractive to him. - -Rugo was not a good-looking man, but this did not trouble him; he was as -good-looking as anyone he had ever seen, and therefore he was -unconscious that for so large a head, his body was rather small. - -This girl Addie told him. It hurt him, because he was beginning to like -her. He noticed that when his lip trembled her eyes got very bright. -“Why,” he asked her, puzzled, “do you always look so pretty when you say -things like that?” - -This flattered her, but it only made it worse for Rugo. She was indeed a -very common woman, with a little to make her young and pretty, and she -made the most of it. - -Finally he spoke to her quietly and slowly about love and marriage. Of -course Addie, in her shrewd mind, had calculated on this; his was a -business that threatened to prosper, and she was attracted to him, -anyway. She made her plans accordingly; she acted displeased. - -“You are a poor, common tradesman,” she said bitterly, as if she were -something uncommon and therefore beyond him. He felt this, too, and -instead of discovering her own smallness in the retort, he only got the -point she wanted him to get. He began to think himself below her. He -raised his hand: - -“What do you want that I shall do?” - -She shrugged her narrow shoulders and laughed, showing a red tongue that -seemed to crouch in her mouth in a long, dented line. - -“But I must do something, you say I am only——” - -“You shall never be anything else.” - -“True, but I may be more.” - -“Hardly.” - -“Why do you say ‘hardly’?” - -“You are not the sort of person—now, for instance——” - -“Yes?” he questioned slowly, turning around and looking into her face. - -“Well, for instance, you are hardly a hero.” - -“Are heroes the style?” he asked pitifully. This made her laugh even -harder. - -“Not in your family, I take it.” - -He nodded. “Yes, that’s true—we were always quiet people. You do not -like quiet people?” - -“They are like women,” she answered. - -He pondered awhile over this. He shook his head; after all he knew -better and he was angry because he had been letting Addie lie to him. - -“That is not true.” - -She began to scream at him: - -“So, that’s the way you begin, calling me a liar, is it?” She put her -hands into her hair on either side and tore at it. This had even more of -an effect upon Rugo than she had expected. He beat his hands together. -In spoiling the perfect oval of her head, in ruinously shaking its -smooth and parted hair, she had hurt him as much as if she had shaken a -holy picture. - -“No, no,” he cried. “I will do something, you shall see—it is all -right—it is all right.” He approached her and, touching her shoulder -with his hand, he added: - -“For you I will do it—I will do it.” - -She smiled. “You will do what, Rugo Amietieve?” - -“I shall be less like a woman. You called me like a woman; well, you -shall see.” - -She came close to him, her two thin arms pressed close to her side. - -“You will do something big and grand—Rugo—for me?” - -He looked down at her, puzzled and quiet. The cruel mouth was half open, -showing the shining line of her teeth. He nodded, but this time he moved -away from her and stood staring out into the street. - -She came up behind him, caught both of his hands, and, leaning forward, -kissed him on the back of his neck. He tried to turn, but she held his -two hands a moment longer and then broke out of the shop at a run. - -Presently he set to work again, sitting cross-legged on his table. - -He wondered what he was expected to do. He had often spoken to her of -returning to the country, with a hint in his voice that she would be -there beside him, too. Now it had come to this. - -He pondered. A hero—what was a hero—what made the difference between a -hero and himself, anyway? He remembered tales the gypsies had told him -about their greatest men when he had been in the old land of his birth. -They told a story of a lad who fought and fought, and finding himself -unequal to the task of killing his rival, flung himself off a mountain. - -What would be the use of that—he would die, and then he might as well -not have lived. He thought of all the great people he had read of, or -had heard of, or had known. There was Jean the blacksmith, who had lost -an eye saving his child from a horse. If he lost an eye Addie would not -like him. - -Napoleon—there was a well-known man; he had done so many things, it -seemed, for which people framed him in white enamel and hung him upon -their bedroom walls; but chiefly he had been renowned for his killing. -Rugo thought about that awhile and came to the illuminating conclusion -that all heroes were men who killed or were killed. - -Well, the last was impossible; if he was killed he might just as well -have starved in the country and not have laid eyes on Addie. Therefore, -he must kill—but what—but whom? - -Of course, he might save something or somebody, but they would have to -be in danger first, and there might not be any danger for days and days, -and he was tired of waiting. - -Presently he laid his work aside, lowered the shade, and, lying face -down on his bed, he tried to think it all out clearly. - -Presently he got a vivid picture of killing in his mind. He sat up and -put his hands two or three times over his face. It was damp. He sat on -the edge of the bed and looked at the carpet. His mind wandered. He -thought of the ducks he had longed to stroke, of the gentle, feeding -cows, of the fresh, clean air—then he thought again of Addie and of what -he must do. He tried to picture himself killing someone. He put his two -hands together and looked at them—there, that was the way. Then he -smiled. His hands, set as they were, could not have choked anything -larger than a thrush. He widened them, but he separated them instantly -and rubbed them down his legs, breathing heavily. What a terrible -business a hero’s was! He thought of the throbbing that must stop -beneath such hands as his. He got up, shaking his shoulders from side to -side as if his back hurt him. He pulled up the shade. - -The butcher’s windows opposite attracted his attention. Two gas lights -were burning there vividly. Rugo could see flanks of beef laid out in -pans, little ruddy pools collecting about them like insertion. Fowl hung -by the necks and several hams lured the passer-by as they swung softly -this way and that. - -He opened his door hesitatingly and shutting it carefully stepped out -into the roadway. - -He crossed over and leaned his head against the glass. He looked in very -close now, and he could see the film that shrouded the dead eyes of the -fowl and the hares. Slabs of liver laid out in heaps, flanked by cuts of -tripe, drew his attention. - -A strange sensation had hold of him in the pit of his stomach. It seemed -to him that he was turning pale. He raised his hand to his beard and -tugged at it. - -Two or three red hairs separated and came out. He held them up between -him and the light. Then he darted in the back door of the shop. - -Presently he emerged carrying a box. With the furtive and hurried step -of a man who is being observed he crossed the street. He opened the door -of his own little shop and, locking it quickly, he put the box in the -corner and turned down the light. - -It was very dark and he stumbled. A little reflection came from the meat -shop window and touched the rims of his cardboards, and his pattern book -full of the funny strutting gentlemen. His heart was beating horribly -against his side. He began to question himself and stopped. He could -never do it unless he made his mind a resolute thing. He clenched his -teeth, blinking his eyes as he did so. He began to shiver. - -Presently he threw himself on the ground in the corner near the box, his -arms over his head, his face flat upon the dust and grime of the boards. -He must do it quickly—but he couldn’t do it. - -His mind began to wander again. He thought of the road, red and yellow -with the dying leaves of Autumn, of the great swaying shadows and the -sunlight breaking in between in little jagged spots like flowers. He -remembered the mosquitoes, and he got to his knees and let his hands -hang down at his sides. - -The Summer had always been so pretty; the rains left the fields so -bright and sudden when they came into view over the top of the hill. The -ploughing had been good, he had really enjoyed that after all, only then -he had not known just how much he did enjoy it. What a pity that he had -not known what a good thing it all was then. - -Something moved beside him, breathing softly. He uttered a sharp cry and -the same thing moved back, hitting a board, and was again silent. - -He bent forward, thrust his two hands out, closed them—tighter, tighter -and tighter. A faint cry, a little jerking to and fro—that was all. - -He stood up and turned the light on. He looked at his hands. Then -backing away from the corner, never letting his eyes rest there, he -plunged his hands up to the elbows in a pail of water. He threw a cupful -of it inside his shirt at the neck. He opened the door. Addie was there. - -She came in softly, gently, insinuatingly. She could see by his face -that something very horrible and necessary had been done. She saw by his -face how it had hurt, by his hands what it must have cost him. - -She came close to him. “What have you done, Rugo?” she said. - -“I—I have killed,” he said, almost in a whisper. - -“What—where?” She moved toward the centre of the room and then looked -into the corner. - -“That?” she began to laugh. - -“Take it or leave it,” he said suddenly in a loud and penetrating voice. - -She stooped and lifted it up—a small grey rabbit. - -She laid it down again. She placed her arm about him. - -“Come quickly,” she said. “Comb your hair.” - -She pushed him into the street. She was afraid of him, for there was -something strange and hard in his mouth and he walked putting each foot -down very flat and steady. - -“Where are you going? What are you going to do?” He did not seem to know -that she was there, clinging to him, her arm about his waist. He had -forgotten her. He looked up into the air, sniffing it and smiling. - -“Come,” she said, “we are going to have your boots shined.” - - - - - THE FLOWERING CORPSE - - - So still she lies in this closed place apart, - Her feet grown fragile for the ghostly tryst; - Her pulse no longer striking in her wrist, - Nor does its echo wander through her heart. - - Over the body and the quiet head - Like stately ferns above an austere tomb, - Soft hairs blow; and beneath her armpits bloom - The drowsy passion flowers of the dead. - - - - - A BOY ASKS A QUESTION OF A LADY - - -The days had been very warm and quick. It was Fall now and everything -was drawing to a close. It had been a bad, but somehow pleasant, year. A -great number of people had been disillusioned and were not seen hurrying -from one place to another, as is customary with those of undisturbed -habit. They went slowly, and it was said that Winter with its snow and -frost would be most welcome. - -Carmen la Tosca was in the habit of riding at a swift gallop down the -lane and into the copse beyond. She leaned ever so little in her saddle -as she went under the boughs. The plume of her hat bent and swung -smartly back into place as she rounded the curve. - -Her horse was a clear cascade of white. The shining forelock, the soft -descending plane of the frontal bone melted into a taut nostril. And -where Carmen la Tosca broke the living line of its back with her own, -the spine flowed beneath her as deftly as water, and quivered into -massive alert haunches, which in turn socketed in velvet, a foaming -length of tail. - -Carmen la Tosca rode well. She let more than usual of her pelvis drop -into the saddle. Upon the reins she kept gloved hands in a grip that was -consciously lacking in direction. - -Carmen la Tosca was an actress. She had played in “Fife and Fiddle” and -“Drums of the King.” - -She took parts suggesting a love of danger and intrigue. She was always -handsomely gloved and shod, and her dresses were widely copied. - -She had been in stock, and in the beginning had sung in opera; she had -been the Queen in “Aïda” and she had played a boy’s part in vaudeville. -Now she was resting. - -She was not the kind of woman who usually came to this quiet country -town, snuggled, as they say, among the foothills. The boy who kept the -general store said she was “stunning.” Little children ran backward -ahead of her, crying provokingly, “Red lips, red lips!” But no one -really knew her. - -She had appeared in the Spring of the year with a man-servant and a -maid. For two days she had been seen at the windows hanging curtains. -When they were all hung no one saw her for some time. Then she bought a -white horse and rode it. And after that she always rode on the white -horse, though she had six or seven others before the Fall came. Usually -she rode alone. Now and again a gentleman, with a birth-mark twisting -his face into an unwilling irony, rode beside her. There was a goat path -in the underbrush and here two boys sometimes came and lay and talked of -her and waited for her to pass, riding that smart way on the white mare. -These boys were Brandt and Bailey Wilson, a farmer’s sons. Sometimes -couples, going berrying by the mountain road, came near enough to hear -her laughing behind the casement. - -Sometimes she walked, descending the hill carefully, avoiding the melon -plants, talking brightly to a young man, but paying little attention to -the effect of her words, not through vanity, but simply through lack of -interest in the effect itself. - -There was a great deal of gossip about her of course. She did not court -mystery, but it was all about her. - -People said that she was not exactly beautiful, neither was she ugly. -Her face held the elements of both in perfect control. She was brutally -chic. - -A lean, tall woman of the village, who had come from London, said Carmen -la Tosca’s back was like the Queen’s. This was probably an exaggeration. - -Carmen la Tosca breakfasted in bed and late. She dusted her arms with -talc and she languidly settled into a light lace peignoir. She had tea -and rolls, and the bed stood between two unvarnished cherry-wood ovals, -in which were imprisoned two engravings of officials of the Tower of -London, in its bloodiest hour. - -The double windows faced the orchard. She turned her back to the orchard -and its falling apples, and read St. Francis, or the morning paper which -was, by the time she received it, a day or two old. - -The room was bare and grey and rustic. And in this Carmen la Tosca and -her bed made a strange contrast. She liked to think of it unless she had -other things on her mind. If the morning was chilly she had a quilted -jacket, and if it was raining she had the shades raised that she might -watch the rain falling a long way. - -Early in the morning the boy chose it had been raining, but about eleven -it had stopped and the sun was trying to come out. Carmen la Tosca could -smell how wet everything was. - -The boy was Brandt Wilson, fourteen; he had done rather well at the high -school of the nearest large town. He was short and his head was large -and his face already a little prematurely softened by melancholy. He was -splashed with mud and his red tie stuck out ridiculously at the top of a -vest that was too large for his small, shyly muscular chest. - -He stood before her on the rug, his hat in his hand. - -Carmen la Tosca, with a single movement, rolled over in bed. - -“Who are you? Where did you come from?” - -“I am Brandt Wilson. I came through the window. It was very easy.” - -“Well,” she said. “What is it?” - -The child hesitated, and with a look of distress, managed to say: - -“I have a brother.” - -Carmen la Tosca pushed away the paper and regarded him with amusement, -and a little amazement. - -“He is two years older than I am—and there’s something I don’t -understand—and you know everything.” - -“Who said so?” - -“The neighbours, my father, my mother, my sister, the schoolmaster, the -postman——” - -“That will do.” - -“You are a woman of the world.” The childish sound of his voice became -terribly apparent. - -“My brother is where no one understands—My sister said, ‘I don’t like -Bailey any more, he has lost that cunning little light in his eyes’—and -I said, ‘It’s still there when you give him something he likes, and he -is untying it, with his head bent down——’” - -“How do you come to think of all this?” - -“Once the sun was shining and we had been lying out on the bank with our -arms under our heads and then he said—he confessed”—the child faltered, -then looking at her directly and fixedly, said, “Bailey cried when he -knew it was over——” - -“What was over?” - -“I asked him, and he answered, ‘I am a man now.’ Shall I cry, too, when -I know that? What is it all about?” - -Carmen la Tosca rose on her elbow and looked at him with suffused eyes -as if she had been crying, but it was all an illusion. - -“How many of you are there?” - -“Three. A married brother.” - -“And how old is he?” - -“Twenty-four. He cried once, too, but differently, about his sweetheart. -She died, you know, and when they told him he said, crying out, ‘I could -have saved her.’ We asked him how, but he would not tell us, but he told -mother; he said, ‘I would have said I love you.’ Is there such a power?” - -Carmen la Tosca lay on her back, her hands beside her. - -“That was innocence. We are all waiting for the day when people shall -learn of our innocence, all over again,” she said brightly. - -“And is that suffering?” - -“Yes, a special kind, for everyone,” she said gravely. “But not a -personal torment. You are not to believe in that. Suffering is all -alike, yours, mine, everybody’s. All these distinctions and what people -say about them is nonsense. Suffering is all the same everywhere for -everyone.” She suddenly rose up in bed and said, softly, “Now you do not -want to talk to me any more?” - -He moved his fingers on the foot-board of the bed. - -“I’m sorry,” she said hastily, covered with confusion. “It’s my -indolence that does it.” - -“What?” he asked timidly. - -“Embarrasses you.” - -“It’s all right.” - -“Now see here,” she continued. “Do you ever think of animals?” - -“Why?” - -“Do you?” - -“I don’t know. I notice them——” - -“Capital!” she cried, clapping her hands; “that’s what I wanted to know. -Well then, what would all this, you and I and your great trouble, mean -to them?” - -“I don’t know what you mean.” - -“Your questions, my answers? Nothing.” - -He coloured, and looked down. “What does it mean?” he repeated, and as -he said it he could not remember what he had come for, or what he had -said, and while she was answering he tried desperately to re-establish -himself. - -He said, “And you do not know what I must go through before I feel like -Bailey?” - -“A little evil day by day, that makes everything grow.” - -“Yes, that is what I wanted to know,” he said, breathlessly. - -“Listen then, it’s all that makes the difference between a gentleman and -a fool. Never do evil to good people, they always forgive it, and that -is nasty.” - -“But what about all these things that people talk of and I do not -understand?” - -“The simple story, simply told by simple people—that in the end is all -you will listen to.” - -“And I’m not to try to make anything out of all this?” - -“No,” she said, “nothing at all, leave it alone.” - -“And not to try to understand what made him cry?” - -“Just as it is. The calf is born, she lies in the sun; she waits for the -end. That is dignity.” - -“But sometimes I’m unhappy.” - -“In the end you will know you know nothing. That will be the death of -you.” - -Brandt stood still, though she had taken up her paper. - -“Just that?” - -“Come here,” she said, and he came, quickly. She put her hand out with a -gentle laugh and touched him. “There, that’s all.” - -He went away then. - - - - - FIRST COMMUNION - - - The mortal fruit upon the bough - Hangs above the nuptial bed. - The cat-bird in the tree returns - The forfeit of his mutual vow. - - The hard, untimely apple of - The branch that feeds on watered rain - Takes the place upon her lips - Of her late lamented love. - - Many hands together press - Shaped within a static prayer - Recall to one the chorister - Docile in his sexless dress. - - The temperate winds reclaim the iced - Remorseless vapours of the snow. - The only pattern in the mind - Is the cross behind the Christ. - - - - - FINIS - - - For you, for me? Why then the striking hour, - The wind among the curtains, and the tread - Of some late gardener pulling at the flower - They’ll lay between our hearts when we are dead. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES - - - 1. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling. - 2. Anachronistic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as - printed. - 3. 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