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@@ -0,0 +1,5252 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Dust, by Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + + +Title: Dust + +Author: Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius + +Posting Date: July 26, 2008 [EBook #945] +Release Date: June, 1997 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DUST *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Keller + + + + + +DUST + +By Mr. And Mrs. Haldeman-Julius + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. THE DUST IS STIRRED + II. OUT OF THE DUST + III. DUST IN HER HEART + IV. A ROSE-BUD IN THE DUST + V. DUST BEGETS DUST + VI. DUST IN HIS EYES + VII. MARTIN BATTLES WITH DUST + VIII. THE DUST SMOTHERS + IX. MARTIN'S SON SHAKES OFF THE DUST + X. INTO THE DUST-BIN + XI. THE DUST SETTLES + + + + +I. THE DUST IS STIRRED + +DUST was piled in thick, velvety folds on the weeds and grass of the +open Kansas prairie; it lay, a thin veil on the scrawny black horses and +the sharp-boned cow picketed near a covered wagon; it showered to the +ground in little clouds as Mrs. Wade, a tall, spare woman, moved about a +camp-fire, preparing supper in a sizzling skillet, huge iron kettle and +blackened coffee-pot. + +Her husband, pale and gaunt, the shadow of death in his weary face +and the droop of his body, sat leaning against one of the wagon +wheels trying to quiet a wailing, emaciated year-old baby while little +tow-headed Nellie, a vigorous child of seven, frolicked undaunted by the +August heat. + +"Does beat all how she kin do it," thought Wade, listlessly. + +"Ma," she shouted suddenly, in her shrill, strident treble, "I see +Martin comin'." + +The mother made no answer until the strapping, fourteen-year-old boy, +tall and powerful for his age, had deposited his bucket of water at her +side. As he drew the back of a tanned muscular hand across his dripping +forehead she asked shortly: + +"What kept you so long?" + +"The creek's near dry. I had to follow it half a mile to find anything +fit to drink. This ain't no time of year to start farmin'," he added, +glum and sullen. + +"I s'pose you know more'n your father and mother," suggested Wade. + +"I know who'll have to do all the work," the boy retorted, bitterness +and rebellion in his tone. + +"Oh, quit your arguin'," commanded the mother. "We got enough to do to +move nearer that water tonight, without wastin' time talkin'. Supper's +ready." + +Martin and Nellie sat down beside the red-and-white-checkered cloth +spread on the ground, and Wade, after passing the still fretting baby to +his wife, took his place with them. + +"Seems like he gets thinner every day," he commented, anxiously. + +With a swift gesture of fierce tenderness, Mrs. Wade gathered little +Benny to her. "Oh, God!" she gasped. "I know I'm goin' to lose him. That +cow's milk don't set right on his stomach." + +"It won't set any better after old Brindle fills up on this dust," +observed Martin, belligerency in his brassy voice. + +"That'll do," came sharply from his father. "I don't think this is +paradise no more'n you do, but we wouldn't be the first who've come with +nothing but a team and made a living. You mark what I tell you, Martin, +land ain't always goin' to be had so cheap and I won't be living this +time another year. Before I die, I'm goin' to see your mother and you +children settled. Some day, when you've got a fine farm here, you'll see +the sense of what I'm doin' now and thank me for it." + +The boy's cold, blue eyes became the color of ice, as he retorted: "If I +ever make a farm out o' this dust, I'll sure 'ave earned it." + +"I guess your mother'll be doin' her share of that, all right. And don't +you forget it." + +As he intoned in even accents, Wade's eyes, so deep in their somber +sockets, dwelt with a strange, wistful compassion on his faded wife. +The rays of the setting sun brought out the drabness of her. Already, +at thirty-five, grey streaked the scanty, dull hair, wrinkles lined +the worn olive-brown face, and the tendons of the thin neck stood out. +Chaotically, he compared her to the happy young girl--round of cheek and +laughing of eye--he had married back in Ohio, fifteen years before. It +comforted him a little to remember he hadn't done so badly by her until +the war had torn him from his rented farm and she had been forced to do +a man's work in field and barn. Exposure and a lung wound from a rebel +bullet had sent Wade home an invalid, and during the five years which +had followed, he had realized only too well how little help he had been +to her. + +It is not likely he would have had the iron persistency of purpose to +drag her through this new stern trial if he had not known that in her +heart, as in his, there gnawed ever an all-devouring hunger to work +land of their own, a fervent aspiration to establish a solid basis of +self-sustentation upon which their children might build. From the day a +letter had come from Peter Mall, an ex-comrade in Wade's old regiment, +saying the quarter-section next his own could be bought by paying +annually a dollar and twenty-five cents an acre for seven years, their +hopes had risen into determination that had become unshakable. Before +the eyes of Jacob and Sarah Wade there had hovered, like a promise, the +picture of the snug farm that could be evolved from this virgin soil. +Strengthened by this vision and stimulated by the fact of Wade's +increasing weakness, they had sold their few possessions, except the +simplest necessities for camping, had made a canvas cover for their +wagon, stocked up with smoked meat, corn meal and coffee, tied old +Brindle behind, fastened a coop of chickens against the wagon-box and, +without faltering, had made the long pilgrimage. Their indomitable +courage and faith, Martin's physical strength and the pulling power of +their two ring-boned horses--this was their capital. + +It seemed pitifully meager to Wade at that despondent moment, exhausted +as he was by the long, hard journey and the sultry heat. Never had he +been so taunted by a sense of failure, so torn by the haunting knowledge +that he must soon leave his family. To die--that was nothing; but the +fears of what his death might mean to this group, gripped his heart and +shook his soul. + +If only Martin were more tender! There was something so ruthless in the +boy, so overbearing and heartless. Not that he was ever deliberately +cruel, but there was an insensibility to the feelings of others, a +capacity placidly to ignore them, that made Wade tremble for the future. +Martin would work, and work hard; he was no shirk, but would he ever +feel any responsibility toward his younger brother and sister? Would +he be loyal to his mother? Wade wondered if his wife ever felt as he +did--almost afraid of this son of theirs. He had a way of making his +father seem foolishly inexperienced and ineffectual. + +"I reckon," Wade analysed laboriously, "it's because I'm gettin' less +able all the time and he's growing so fast--him limber an' quick, and me +all thumbs. There ain't nothing like just plain muscle and size to make +a fellow feel as if he know'd it all." + +Martin had never seemed more competent than this evening as, supper +over, he harnessed the horses and helped his mother set the little +caravan in motion. It was Martin who guided them to the creek, Martin +who decided just where to locate their camp, Martin who, early the next +morning, unloaded the wagon and made a temporary tent from its cover, +and Martin who set forth on a saddleless horse in search of Peter Mall. +When he returned, the big, kindly man came with him, and in Martin's +arms there squealed and wriggled a shoat. + +"A smart boy you've got, Jacob," chuckled Peter, jovially, after the +first heart-warming greetings. "See that critter! Blame me if Martin, +here, didn't speak right up and ask me to lend 'er to you!" And he +collapsed into gargantuan laughter. + +"I promised when she'd growed up and brought pigs, we'd give him back +two for one," Martin hastily explained. + +"That's what he said," nodded Peter, carefully switching his navy plug +to the opposite cheek before settling down to reply, "and sez I, 'Why, +Martin, what d'ye want o' that there shoat? You ain't got nothin' to +keep her on!' 'If I can borrow the pig,' sez he, 'I reckon I can borrow +the feed somewheres.' God knows, he'll find that ain't so plentiful, +but he's got the right idea. A new country's a poor man's country and +fellows like us have to stand together. It's borrow and lend out here. I +know where you can get some seed wheat if you want to try puttin' it +in this fall. There's a man by the name of Perry--lives just across the +Missouri line--who has thrashed fifteen hundred bushel and he'll lend +you three hundred or so. He's willing to take a chance, but if you get a +crop he wants you should give him back an extra three hundred." + +It was a hard bargain, but one that Wade could afford to take up, for if +the wheat were to freeze out, or if the grasshoppers should eat it, or +the chinch bugs ruin it, or a hail storm beat it down into the mud, +or if any of the many hatreds Stepmother Nature holds out toward those +trusting souls who would squeeze a living from her hard hands--if any of +these misfortunes should transpire, he would be out nothing but labor, +and that was the one thing he and Martin could afford to risk. + +The seed deal was arranged, and Martin made the trip six times back and +forth, for the wagon could hold only fifty bushels. Perry lived twenty +miles from the Wades and a whole day was consumed with each load. It was +evening when Martin, hungry and tired, reached home with the last one; +and, as he stopped beside the tent, he noticed with surprise that there +was no sign of cooking. Nellie was huddled against her mother, who sat, +idle, with little Benny in her arms. The tragic yearning her whole body +expressed, as she held the baby close, arrested the boy's attention, +filled him with clamoring uneasiness. His father came to help him +unhitch. + +"What's the matter with Benny?" + +Wade looked at Martin queerly. "He's dead. Died this mornin' and your +ma's been holding him just like that. I want you should ride over to +Peter's and see if you can fetch his woman." + +"No!" came from Mrs. Wade, brokenly, "I don't want no one. Just let me +alone." + +The shattering anguish in his mother's voice startled Martin, stirred +within him tumultuous, veiled sensations. He was unaccustomed to seeing +her show suffering, and it embarrassed him. Restless and uncomfortable, +he was glad when his father called him to help decide where to dig the +grave, and fell the timber from which to make a rough box. From time to +time, through the long night, he could not avoid observing his mother. +In the white moonlight, she and Benny looked as if they had been carved +from stone. Dawn was breaking over them when Wade, surrendering to a +surge of pity, put his arms around her with awkward gentleness. "Ma, we +got to bury 'im." + +A low, half-suppressed sob broke from Mrs. Wade's tight lips as she +clasped the tiny figure and pressed her cheek against the little head. + +"I can't give him up," she moaned, "I can't! It wasn't so hard with the +others. Their sickness was the hand of God, but Benny just ain't had +enough to eat. Seems like it'll kill me." + +With deepened discomfort, Martin hurried to the creek to water the +horses. It was good, he felt, to have chores to do. This knowledge shot +through him with the same thrill of discovery that a man enjoys when he +first finds what an escape from the solidity of fact lies in liquor. If +one worked hard and fast one could forget. That was what work did. It +made one forget--that moan, that note of agony in his mother's voice, +that hurt look in her eyes, that bronze group in the moonlight. By the +time he had finished his chores, his mother was getting breakfast as +usual. With unspeakable relief, Martin noticed that though pain haunted +her face, she was not crying. + +"I heard while I was over in Missouri, yesterday," he ventured, "of a +one-room house down in the Indian Territory. The fellow who built it's +give up and gone back East. Maybe we could fix a sledge and haul it up +here." + +"I ain't got the strength to help," said Wade. + +Martin's eyes involuntarily sought his mother's. He knew the power in +her lean, muscular arms, the strength in her narrow shoulders. + +"We'd better fetch it," she agreed. + +The pair made the trip down on horseback and brought back the shack that +was to be home for many years. Eighteen miles off a man had some extra +hand-cut shingles which he was willing to trade for a horse-collar. +While Mrs. Wade took the long drive Martin, under his father's guidance, +chopped down enough trees to build a little lean-to kitchen and +make-shift stable. Sixteen miles south another neighbor had some +potatoes to exchange for a hatching of chickens. Martin rode over with +the hen and her downy brood. The long rides, consuming hours, were +trying, for Martin was needed every moment on a farm where everything +was still to be done. + +Day by day Wade was growing weaker, and it was Mrs. Wade who helped put +in the crop, borrowing a plow, harrow, and extra team, and repaying the +loan with the use of their own horses and wagon. Luck was with their +wheat, which soon waved green. It seemed one of life's harsh jests +that now, when the tired, ill-nourished baby had fretted his last, old +Brindle, waxing fat and sleek on the wheat pasture, should give more +rich cream than the Wades could use. "He could have lived on the skimmed +milk we feed to the pigs," thought Martin. + +In the Spring he went with his father into Fallon, the nearest trading +point, to see David Robinson, the owner of the local bank. By giving a +chattel mortgage on their growing wheat, they borrowed enough, at twenty +per cent, to buy seed corn and a plow. It was Wade's last effort. Before +the corn was in tassel, he had been laid beside Benny. + +Martin, who already had been doing a man's work, now assumed a man's +responsibilities. Mrs. Wade consulted more and more with him, relied +more and more upon his judgment. She was immensely proud of him, of his +steadiness and dependability, but at rare moments, remembering her own +normal childhood, she would think with compunction: "It ain't right. +Young 'uns ought to have some fun. Seems like it's makin' him too old +for his age." She never spoke of these feelings, however. There were no +expressions of tenderness in the Wade household. She was doing her +best by her children and they knew it. Even Nellie, child that she was, +understood the grimness of the battle before them. + +They were able to thresh enough wheat to repay their debt of six hundred +bushels and keep an additional three hundred of seed for the following +year. The remaining seven hundred and fifty they sold at twenty-five +cents a bushel by hauling them to Fort Scott--thirty miles distant. Each +trip meant ten dollars, but to the Wades, to whom this one hundred and +eighty-seven dollars--the first actual money they had seen in over a +year--was a fortune, these journeys were rides of triumph, fugitive +flashes of glory in the long, gray struggle. + +That Fall they paid the first installment of two hundred dollars on +their land and Martin persuaded his mother to give and Robinson to take +a chattel on their two horses, old Brindle, her calf and the pigs, that +other much-needed implements might be bought. Mrs. Wade toiled early +and late, doing part of the chores and double her share of the Spring +plowing that Martin, as well as Nellie, could attend school in Fallon. + +"I don't care about goin'," he had protested squirmingly. + +But on this matter his mother was without compromise. "Don't say +that," she had commanded, her voice shaken and her eyes bright with the +intensity of her emotion; "you're goin' to get an education." + +And Martin, surprised and embarrassed by his mother's unusual exhibition +of feeling, had answered, roughly: "Aw, well, all right then. Don't take +on. I didn't say I wouldn't, did I?" + +He was twenty-three and Nellie sixteen when, worn out and broken down +before her time, her resistance completely undermined, Mrs. Wade died +suddenly of pneumonia. Within the year Nellie married Bert Mall, Peter's +eldest son, and Martin, at once, bought out her half interest in the +farm, stock and implements, giving a first mortgage to Robinson in order +to pay cash. + +"I'm making it thirty dollars an acre," he explained. + +"That's fair," conceded the banker, "though the time will come when +it will be cheap at a hundred and a half. There's coal under all this +county, millions of dollars' worth waiting to be mined." + +"Maybe," assented Martin, laconically. + +As he sat in the dingy, little backroom of the bank, while Robinson's +pen scratched busily drawing up the papers, he was conscious of an odd +thrill. The land--it was all his own! But with this thrill welled a wave +of resentment over what he considered a preposterous imposition. Who +had made the land into a farm? What had Nellie ever put into it that it +should be half hers? His mother--now, that was different. She and he had +toiled side by side like real partners; her efforts had been real and +unstinted. If he were buying her out, for instance--but Nellie! +Well, that was the way, he noticed, with many women--doing little and +demanding much. He didn't care for them; not he. From the day Nellie +left, Martin managed alone in the shack, "baching it," and putting his +whole heart and soul into the development of his quarter-section. + + + + +II. OUT OF THE DUST + +AT thirty-four, Martin was still unmarried, and though he had not +travelled far on that strange road to affluence which for some seems a +macadamized boulevard, but for so many, like himself, a rough cow-path, +he had done better than the average farmer of Fallon County. To be sure, +this was nothing over which to gloat. A man who received forty cents a +bushel for wheat was satisfied; corn sold at twenty-eight cents, and +the hogs it fattened in proportion. But his hundred and sixty acres were +clear from debt, four thousand dollars were on deposit drawing three per +cent in The First State Bank--the old Bank of Fallon, now incorporated +with Robinson as its president. In the pasture, fourteen sows with +their seventy-five spring pigs rooted beside the sleek herd of steers +fattening for market; the granary bulged with corn; two hundred bushels +of seed wheat were ready for sowing; his machinery was in excellent +condition; his four Percheron mares brought him, each, a fine mule colt +once a year; and the well never went dry, even in August. Martin was--if +one discounted the harshness of the life, the dirt, the endless duties +and the ever-pressing chores--a Kansas plutocrat. + +One fiery July day, David Robinson drew up before Martin's shack. The +little old box-house was still unpainted without and unpapered within. +Two chairs, a home-made table with a Kansas City Star as a cloth, +a sheetless bed, a rough cupboard, a stove and floors carpeted with +accumulations of untidiness completed the furnishings. + +"Chris-to-pher Columbus!" exploded Robinson, "why don't you fix yourself +up a bit, Martin? The Lord knows you're going to be able to afford it. +What you need is a wife--someone to look after you." And as Martin, +observing him calmly, made no response, he added, "I suppose you know +what I want. You've been watching for this day, eh, Martin? All Fallon +County's sitting on its haunches--waiting." + +"Oh, I haven't been worrying. A fellow situated like me, with a +hundred and sixty right in the way of a coal company, can afford to be +independent." + +"You understand our procedure, Martin," Robinson continued. "We are +frank and aboveboard. We set the price, and if you can't see your way +clear to take it there are no hard feelings. We simply call it off--for +good." + +Wade knew how true this was. When the mining first began, several rebels +toward the East had tried profitlessly to buck this irrefragable game +and had found they had battered their unyielding heads against +an equally unyielding stone wall. These men had demanded more and +Robinson's company, true to its threat, had urbanely gone around their +farms, travelled on and left them behind, their coal untouched and +certain to so remain. Such inelastic lessons, given time to soak in, +were sobering. + +"Now," said Robinson, in his amiable matter-of-fact manner, "as I happen +to know the history of this quarter, backwards and forwards, we can do +up this deal in short order. You sign this contract, which is exactly +like all the others we use, and I'll hand over your check. We get the +bottom; you keep the top; I give you the sixteen thousand, and the thing +is done." + +"Well, Martin," he added, genially, as Wade signed his name, "it's a +long day since you came in with your father to make that first loan +to buy seed corn. Wouldn't he have opened his eyes if any one had +prophesied this? It's a pity your mother couldn't have lived to enjoy +your good fortune. A fine, plucky woman, your mother. They don't make +many like her." + +Long after Robinson's buggy was out of sight, Martin stood in his +doorway and stared at the five handsome figures, spelled out the even +more convincing words and admired the excellent reproduction of The +First State Bank. + +"This is a whole lot of money," his thoughts ran. "I'm rich. All this +land still mine--practically as much mine as ever--all this stock and +twenty thousand dollars in money--in cash. It's a fact. I, Martin Wade, +am rich." + +He remembered how he had exulted, how jubilant, even intoxicated, he had +felt when he had received the ten dollars for the first load of wheat +he had hauled to Fort Scott. Now, with a check for sixteen +thousand--SIXTEEN THOUSAND DOLLARS!--in his hand, he stood dumbly, +curiously unmoved. + +Slowly, the first bitter months on this land, little Benny's death from +lack of nourishment, his father's desperate efforts to establish +his family, the years of his mother's slow crucifixion, his own +long struggle--all floated before him in a fog of reverie. Years of +deprivation, of bending toil and then, suddenly, this had come--this +miracle symbolized by this piece of paper. Martin moistened his +lips. Mentally, he realized all the dramatic significance of what had +happened, but it gave him none of the elation he had expected. + +This bewildered and angered him. Sixteen thousand dollars and with it no +thrill. What was lacking? As he pondered, puzzled and disappointed, it +came to him that he needed something by which to measure his wealth, +someone whose appreciation of it would make it real to him, give him +a genuine sense of its possession. What if he were to take Robinson's +advice: fix up a bit and--marry? + +Nellie had often urged the advantages of this, but he had never had much +to do with women; they did not belong in his world and he had not +missed them; he had never before felt a need of marriage. Upon the +few occasions when, driven by his sister's persistence, he had vaguely +considered it, he had shrunk away quickly from the thought of the +unavoidable changes which would be ushered in by such a step. This +shack, itself--no one whom he would want would, in this day, consent to +live in it, and, if he should marry, his wife must be a superior woman, +good looking, and with the push and energy of his mother. He thought of +all she had meant to his father; and there was Nellie, not to be spoken +of in the same breath, yet making Bert Mall a good wife. What a cook she +was! Memories of her hot, fluffy biscuits, baked chicken, apple pies +and delicious coffee, carried trailing aromas that set his nostrils +twitching. It would be pleasant to have satisfying meals once more, to +be relieved, too, of the bother of the three hundred chickens, to have +some one about in the evenings. True, there would be expense, oh, such +expense--the courting, the presents, the wedding, the building, the +furniture, and, later, innumerable new kinds of bills. But weren't all +the men around him married? Surely, if they, not nearly as well off as +himself, could afford it, so could he. + +Besides, wasn't it all different now that he held this check in his +hand? These sixteen thousand dollars were not the same dollars which he +had extorted from close-fisted Nature. Each of those had come so lamely, +was such a symbol of sweat and aching muscles, that to spend one was +like parting with a portion of himself, but this new, almost incredible +fortune, had come without a turn of his hand, without an hour's labor. +To Martin, the distinction was sharp and actual. + +He figured quickly. Five thousand dollars would do wonders. With that +amount, he would build so substantially that his neighbors could no +longer feel the disapprobation in which, according to Nellie, he was +beginning to be held, because of his sordid, hermit-like life. That five +thousand could buy many cows and additional acreage--but just now a home +and a wife would be better investments. Yes, he would marry and a house +should be his bait. That was settled. He would drive into Fallon at once +to see the carpenter and deposit the check. + +He was already out of the house when a thought struck him. Suppose +he were to meet just the woman he might want? These soiled, once-blue +overalls, these heavy, manure-spotted shoes, this greasy, shapeless +straw hat, with its dozen matches showing their red heads over the band, +the good soils and fertilizers of Kansas resting placidly in his ears +and the lines of his neck--such a Romeo might not tempt his Juliet; he +must spruce up. + +On an aged soap-box behind the house, several inches of grey water in +a battered tin-pan indicated a previous effort. He tossed the greasy +liquid to the ground and from the well, near the large, home-built +barn, refilled the make-shift basin. Martin's ablutions were always a +strenuous affair. In his cupped hands he brought the water toward +his face and, at the moment he was about to apply it, made pointless +attempts to blow it away. This blowing and sputtering indicated the +especial importance of an occasion--the more important, the more +vigorously he blew. Today, the cold water gave a healthy glow to his +face, which, after much stropping of his razor, he shaved of a week's +growth of beard, tawny as his thick, crisp hair where the sun had not +yet bleached it. This, he soaked thoroughly, in lieu of brushing, before +using a crippled piece of comb. The dividing line between washed and +unwashed was one inch above his neckband and two above his wrists. Even +when fresh from a scrubbing, his hands were not entirely clean. They had +been so long in contact with the earth that it had become absorbed into +the very pores of his skin; but they were powerful hands, interesting, +with long palms and spatulate fingers. The black strips at the end of +each nail, Martin pared off with his jackknife. + +He entered the house a trifle nervously, positive that his only clean +shirt, at present spread over his precious shot-gun, had been worn once +more than he could have wished, but, after all, how much of one's shirt +showed? It would pass. The coat-shirt not yet introduced, a man had +to slip the old-fashioned kind over his head, drag it down past his +shoulders and poke blindly for the sleeve openings. Martin was thankful +when he felt the collar buttons in their holes. His salt and pepper suit +was of a stiff, unyielding material, and the first time he had worn +it the creases had vanished never to return. Before putting on his +celluloid collar, he spat on it and smeared it off with the tail of his +shirt. A recalcitrant metal shaper insisted on peeking from under his +lapels, and his ready-made tie with its two grey satin-covered +cardboard wings pushed out of sight, see-sawed, necessitating frequent +adjustments. His brown derby, the rim of which made almost three +quarters of a circle at each side, seemed to want to get as far as +possible from his ears and, at the same time, remain perched on his +head. The yellow shoes looked as though each had half a billiard ball in +the toe, and the entire tops were perforated with many diverging lines +in an attempt for the decorative. Those were the days of sore feet +and corns! Hart Schaffner and Marx had not yet become rural America's +tailor. Sartorial magicians in Chicago had not yet won over the young +men of the great corn belt, with their snappy lines and style for the +millions. In 1890, when a suit served merely as contrast to a pair of +overalls, the Martin Wades who would clothe themselves pulled their +garments from the piles on long tables. It was for the next generation +to patronize clothiers who kept each suit on its separate hanger. A +moving-picture of the tall, broad-shouldered fellow, as, with creaking +steps, he walked from the house, might bring a laugh from the young +farmers of this more fastidious day, but Martin was dressed no worse +than any of his neighbors and far better than many. Health, vigor, +sturdiness, self-reliance shone from him, and once his make-up had +ceased to obtrude its clumsiness, he struck one as handsome. His was a +commanding physique, hard as the grim plains from which he wrested his +living. + +As Martin drove into Fallon, his attention was directed toward the +architecture and the women. He observed that the average homes were +merely a little larger than his own--four, six, or eight rooms instead +of one, made a little trimmer with neat porches and surrounded by +well-cut lawns, instead of weeds. He, with his new budget, could do +better. Even Robinson's well-constructed residence had probably +cost only three thousand more than he himself planned to spend. Its +suggestion of originality had been all but submerged by carpenters +spoiled through constant work on commonplace buildings. But to Martin it +was a marvellous mansion. He told himself that with such a place moved +out to his quarter-section, he could have stood on his door-step and +chosen whomever he wished for a wife. + +It was an elemental materialism, difficult to understand, but it was a +language very clear to Martin. Marriage with the men and women of his +world was a practical business, arranged and conducted by practical +people, who lived practical lives, and died practical deaths. The women +who might pass his way could deny their lust for concrete possessions, +but their actions, however concealed their motives, would give the lie +to any ineffectual glamour of romance they might attempt to fling over +their carefully measured adventures of the heart. + +Martin smiled cynically as he let his thoughts drift along this channel. +"What a lot of bosh is talked about lovers," his comment ran. "As if +everyone didn't really know how much like drunken men they are--saying +things which in a month they'll have forgotten. Folks pretend to approve +of 'em and all the while they're laughing at 'em up their sleeves. But +how they respect a man who's got the root they're all grubbing for! It +may be the root of all evil, but it's a fact that everything people want +grows from it. They hate a man for having it, but they'd like to be +him. Their hearts have all got strings dangling from 'em, especially +the women's. A house tied onto the other end ought to be hefty enough to +fetch the best of the lot." + +Who could she be, anyway? Was she someone in Fallon? He drove slowly, +thinking over the families in the different houses--four to each side +of the block. The street, even yet, was little more than a country road. +There was no indication of the six miles of pavement which later were +to be Fallon's pride. It had rained earlier in the week and Martin was +obliged to be careful of the chuck-holes in the sticky, heavy gumbo soon +to be the bane of pioneers venturing forth in what were to be known for +a few short years as "horseless carriages." + +Bumping along he recalled to his mind the various girls with whom he had +gone to school. As if the sight of the building, itself, would sharpen +his memory, he turned north and drove past it. Like its south, east and +west counterparts, it was a solid two-story brick affair. In time it +would be demolished to make way for what would be known as the "Emerson +School," in which, to be worthy of this high title, the huge stoves +would be supplanted with hot-water pipes, oil lamps with soft, indirect +lighting, and unsightly out-buildings with modern plumbing. The South +building would become the "Whittier School," the East, the "Longfellow," +and the West, not to be neglected by culture's invasion, the "Oliver +Wendell Holmes." But these changes were still to be effected. Many +a school board meeting was first to be split into stormy factions of +conservatives fighting to hold the old, and of anarchists threatening +civilization with their clamors for experimentation. Many a bond +election was yet to rip the town in two, with the retired farmers, whose +children were grown and through school, satisfied with things as they +were and parents of the new generation demanding gymnasiums, tennis +courts, victrolas, domestic science laboratories, a public health nurse +and individual lockers. Yes, and the faddists were to win despite +the other side's incontrovertible evidence that Fallon was headed for +bankruptcy and that the proposed bonds and outstanding ones could never +be met. + +Martin drove, meditatively, around the school-house and was still +engrossed in the problem of "Who?" when he reached the Square. The neat +canvas drops of later years had not yet replaced the wooden awnings +which gave to the town such a decidedly western appearance and which +threw the sidewalks and sheltered windows into deep pools of shadow. The +old brick store-building which housed The First State Bank was like +a cool cavern. He brought out the check quietly but with a full +consciousness that with one gesture he was shoving enough over that +scratched and worn walnut counter to buy out half the bank. + +James Osborne, the youthful cashier, feigned complete paralysis. + +"Why don't you give a poor fellow some warning?" he beamed +good-naturedly, "or maybe you think you've strayed into Wall Street. +This is Fallon. Fallon, Kansas. So you've had your merry little session +with Robinson? Put it here!" and he extended a cordial hand. + +"Oh, considering the wait, it isn't so wonderful. Sixteen thousand is an +awful lot when it's coming, but it just seems about half as big when it +gets here." + +Martin was talking not so much for Osborne's benefit as to impress a +woman who had entered behind him and was awaiting her turn. He wondered +why, in his mental quest, he had not thought of her. Here was the very +person for whom he was looking. Rose Conroy, the editor of the better +local weekly, a year or so younger than himself, pleasant, capable. Here +was a real woman, one above the average in character and brains. + +With a quick glance he took in her well-built figure. Everything +about Rose--every line, every tone of her coloring suggested warmth, +generosity, bigness. She was as much above medium height for a woman as +Martin for a man. About her temples the line of her bright golden-brown +hair had an oddly pleasing irregularity. The rosy color in her cheeks +brought out the rich creamy whiteness of her skin. Warm, gray-blue eyes +were set far apart beneath a kind, broad forehead and her wide, generous +mouth seemed made to smile. The impression of good temper and fun +was accented by her nose, ever so slightly up-tilted. Some might have +thought Rose too large, her hips too rounded, the soft deep bosom too +full, but Martin's eyes were approving. Even her hands, plump, with +broad palms, square fingers and well-kept nails, suggested decision. +He felt the quiet distinction of her simple white dress. She was like a +full-blown, luxuriant white and gold flower--like a rose, a full-blown +white rose, Martin realized, suddenly. One couldn't call her pretty, but +there was something about her that gave the impression of sumptuous +good looks. He liked, too, the spirited carriage of her head. "Healthy, +good-sense, sound all through," was his final appraisement. + +Pocketing his bank-book, he gave her a sharp nod, a colorless +"how-de-do, Miss Rose," and a tip of the hat that might have been a +little less stiff had he been more accustomed to greeting the ladies. +"Right well, thank you, Martin," was her cordial response, and her +friendly smile told him she had heard and understood the remarks about +the big deal. He was curious to know how it had impressed her. + +Hurrying out, he asked himself how he could begin advances. Either he +must do something quickly in time to get home for the evening chores +or he must wait until another day. He must think out a plan, at once. +Passing the bakery, half way down the block, he dropped in, ordered a +chocolate ice-cream soda, and chose a seat near the window. As he had +expected, it was not long before he saw Rose go across the courthouse +yard toward her office on the north side of the square. He liked the +swift, easy way in which she walked. She had been walking the first time +he had ever seen her, thirteen years before, when her father had led his +family uptown from the station, the day of their arrival in Fallon. + +Patrick Conroy had come from Sharon, Illinois, to perform the thankless +task of starting a weekly newspaper in a town already undernourishing +one. By sheer stubbornness he had at last established it. Twelve hundred +subscribers, their little printing jobs, advertisers who bought liberal +portions of space at ten cents an inch--all had enabled him to give his +children a living that was a shade better than an existence. He had died +less than a year ago, and Martin, like the rest of the community, had +supposed the Fallon Independent would be sold or suspended. Instead, as +quietly and matter-of-factly as she had filled her dead mother's place +in the home while her brothers and sisters were growing up, Rose stepped +into her father's business, took over the editorship and with a boy to +do the typesetting and presswork, continued the paper without missing +an issue. It even paid a little better than before, partly because it +flattered Fallon's sense of Christian helpfulness to throw whatever +it could in Rose's way, but chiefly because she made the Independent a +livelier sheet with double the usual number of "Personals." + +Yes, decidedly, Rose had force and push. Martin's mind was made up. He +would drop into the Independent ostensibly to extend his subscription, +but really to get on more intimate terms with the woman whom he had +now firmly determined should become his wife. He drew a deep breath +of relaxation and finished the glass of sweetness with that sense of +self-conscious sheepishness which most men feel when they surrender to +the sticky charms of an ice-cream soda. A few minutes later he stood +beside Rose's worn desk. + +"How-do-you-do, once more, Miss Rose of Sharon. You're not the Bible's +Rose of Sharon, are you?" he joshed a bit awkwardly. + +"If I were a rose of anywhere, I'd soon wilt in this stuffy little +office of inky smells," she answered pleasantly. "A rose would need +petals of leather to get by here." + +"A rose, by rights, belongs out of doors,"--Martin indicated the +direction of his farm--"out there where the sun shines and there's no +smells except the rich, healthy smells of nature." + +A merry twinkle appeared in Rose's eyes. "Aren't roses out there"--and +her gesture was in the same direction--"rather apt to be crowded down by +the weeds?" + +"Not if there was a good strong man about--a man who wanted to cultivate +the soil and give the rose a pretty place in which to bloom." + +"Why, Martin," Rose laughed lightly, "the way you're fixed out there +with that shack, the only thing that ever blooms is a fine crop of +rag-weeds." + +At this gratuitous thrust a flood of crimson surged up Martin's +magnificent, column-like throat and broke in hot waves over his cheeks. +"Well, it's not going to be that way for long," he announced evenly. +"I'm going to plant a rose--a real rose there soon and everything is +going to be right--garden, house and all." + +"Is this your way of telling me you're going to be married?" + +"Kinda. The only trouble is, I haven't got my rose yet." + +"Well, if I can't have that item, at least I can print something about +the selling of your coal rights. People will be interested because it +shows the operators are coming in our direction. Here in Fallon, we can +hardly realize all that this sudden new promotion may mean. From that +conversation I heard at the bank I guess you got the regulation hundred +an acre." + +"Yes, and a good part of it is going into a first-class modern house +with a heating plant and running hot and cold water in a tiled-floor +bath-room, and a concrete cellar for the woman's preserved things and +built-in cupboards, lots of closets, a big garret, and hardwood floors +and fancy paper on the walls, and the prettiest polished golden oak +furniture you can buy in Kansas City, not to mention a big fireplace +and wide, sunny porches. A rose ought to be happy in a garden like that, +don't you think? Folks'll say I've gone crazy when they see my building +spree, but I know what I'm about. It's time I married and the woman who +decides to be my wife is going to be glad to stay with me--" + +"See here, Martin Wade, what ARE you driving at? What does all this talk +mean anyway? Do you want me to give you a boost with someone?" + +"You've hit it." + +"Who is she?" Rose asked, with genuine curiosity. + +"You," he said bluntly. + +"Well, of all the proposals!" + +"There's nothing to beat around the bush about. I'm only thirty-four, a +hard worker, with a tidy sum to boot--not that I'm boasting about it." + +"But, Martin, what makes you think I could make you happy?" + +Martin felt embarrassed. He was not looking for happiness but merely +for more of the physical comforts, and an escape from loneliness. He +was practical; he fancied he knew about what could be expected from +marriage, just as he knew exactly how many steers and hogs his farm +could support. This was a new idea--happiness. It had never entered into +his calculations. Life as he knew it was hard. There was no happiness in +those fields when burned by the hot August winds, the soil breaking into +cakes that left crevices which seemed to groan for water. That sky with +its clouds that gave no rain was a hard sky. The people he knew were +sometimes contented, but he could not remember ever having known any to +whom the word "happy" could be applied. His father and mother--they had +been a good husband and wife. But happy? They had been far too absorbed +in the bitter struggle for a livelihood to have time to think of +happiness. This had been equally true of the elder Malls, was true today +of Nellie and her husband. A man and a woman needed each other's help, +could make a more successful fight, go farther together than either +could alone. To Martin that was the whole matter in a nutshell, and +Rose's gentle question threw him into momentary confusion. + +"I don't know," he answered uneasily. "We both like to make a success of +things and we'd have plenty to do with. We'd make a pretty good pulling +team." + +Rose considered this thoughtfully. "Perhaps the people who work together +best are the happiest. But somehow I'd never pictured myself on a farm." + +"Of course, I don't expect you to make up your mind right away," Martin +conceded. "It's something to study over. I'll come around to your place +tomorrow evening after I get the chores done up and we can talk some +more." + +So far as Martin was concerned, the matter was clinched. He felt not the +slightest doubt but that it was merely a question of time before Rose +would consent to his proposition. + +After he had left, she reviewed it a little sadly. It wasn't the kind +of marriage of which she had always dreamed. She realized that she was +capable of profound devotion, of responding with her whole being to +a deep love. But was it probable that this love would ever come? She +thought over the men of Fallon and its neighborhood. There were few as +handsome as Martin--not one with such generous plans. She knew her own +domestic talents. She was a born housekeeper and home-maker. It had been +a curious destiny that had driven her into a newspaper office, and at +that very moment, there lay on her desk, like a whisper from Fate, the +written offer from the rival paper to buy her out for fifteen hundred +dollars, giving herself a position on the consolidated staff. She had +been pondering over this proposal when Martin interrupted her. + +It wasn't as if she were younger or likely to start somewhere else. +She would live out her life in Fallon, that she knew. There was little +chance of her meeting new men, and those established enough to make +marriage with them desirable were already married. Candidly, she +admitted that if she turned Martin Wade down now, she might never have +another such opportunity. If only she could feel that he cared for +her--loved her. But wasn't the fact that he was asking her to be his +wife proof of that? It was very strange. She had never suspected that +Martin had ever felt drawn to her. With a sigh she pressed her large, +capable hands to her heart. Its deep piercing ache brought tears to her +eyes. She felt, bitterly, that she was being cheated of too much that +was sweet and precious--it was all wrong--she would be making a mistake. +For a moment, she was overwhelmed. Then the practical common sense that +had been instilled into her from her earliest consciousness, even as it +had been instilled into Martin, reasserted itself. After all, perhaps he +was right--the busy people were the happy people. Many couples who began +marriage madly in love ended in the divorce courts. Martin was kind and +it would be wonderful to have the home he had described. She imagined +herself mistress of it, thrilled with the warm hospitality she would +radiate, entertained already at missionary meetings and at club. At +least, she would be less lonely. It would be a fuller life than now. +What was she getting, really getting, alone, out of this world? She and +Martin would be good partners. Poor boy! What a long, hard, cheerless +existence he had led. Tenderness welled in her heart and stilled its +pain. Perhaps his emotions were far deeper than he could express in +words. His way was to plan for her comfort. Wasn't there something big +about his simple cards-on-the-table wooing? And he had called her his +rose, his Rose of Sharon. The new house was to be the garden in which +she should blossom. To be sure, he had said it all awkwardly, but Rose, +who was devout, knew the stately Song of Solomon and as she recalled the +magnificent outburst of passion she almost let herself be convinced that +Martin was a poet-lover in the rough. + +And all the while, giving pattern to her flying thoughts, the contents +of a letter, received the day before, echoed through her mind. Her +sister, Norah, the youngest of the family, had told of her first baby. +"We have named her for you, darling," she wrote. "Oh, Rose, she has +brought me such deep happiness. I wonder if this ecstasy can last. Her +little hand against my breast--it is so warm and soft--like a flower's +curling petal, as delicate and as beautiful as a butterfly's wing. +I never knew until now what life really meant." As Rose reread the +throbbing lines and pictured the eager-eyed young mother, her own sweet +face glowed with reflected joy and with the knowledge that this ecstasy, +this deeper understanding could come to her, too--Martin, he was +vigorous, so worthy of being the father of her children. He would love +them, of course, and provide for them better than any other man she +knew. Had not Norah married a plain farmer who was only a tenant? The +new little Rose's father was not to be compared to Martin, and yet he +had brought the supreme experience to her sister. So Rose sat dreaming, +the arid level of monotonous days which, one short hour ago, had +stretched before her, flowering into fragrant, sun-filled fields. + +Meanwhile, Martin congratulated himself upon having found a woman as +sensible, industrious and free from foolish notions, as even he could +wish. + + + + +III. DUST IN HER HEART + +SIX weeks later Martin and Rose were married. Martin had let the +contract for the new house and barn to Silas Fletcher, Fallon's +leading carpenter, who had the science of construction reduced to utter +simplicity. He had listened to Martin's description of what he wished +and, after some rough figuring, had proceeded to draw the plans on the +back of a large envelope. Both Rose and Martin knew that those rude +lines would serve unfailingly. For three thousand dollars Fletcher would +build the very house Martin had pictured to Rose: a two-story one with +four nice rooms and a bath upstairs, four rooms and a pantry downstairs, +a floored garret, concrete cellar, an inviting fireplace and wide +porches. For two thousand dollars he would give a substantial barn +capable of holding a hundred tons of hay and of accommodating twenty +cows and four horses. + +Rose had been deeply touched by the thoroughness of Martin's plans, +by his unfailing consideration for her comfort. True, there had been +moments when her warm, loving nature had been chilled. At such times, +misgivings had clamored and she had, finally, all but made up her mind +to tell him that she could not go on--that it had all been a mistake. +She would say to him, she had decided: "Martin, you are one of the +kindest and best men, and I could be happy with you if only you loved +me, but you don't really care for me and you never will. I feel it. Oh, +I do! and I could not bear it--to live with you day in and day out and +know that." + +But she had reckoned without her own goodness of heart. On the very +evening on which she had quite determined to tell Martin this decision +he also had arrived at one. As soon as he had entered Rose's little +parlor he had exclaimed with an enthusiasm unusual with him: "We broke +the ground for your new garden, today, Rose of Sharon, and Fletcher +wants to see you. There are some more little things you'll have to talk +over with him. He understands that you're the one I want suited." + +Rose had felt suddenly reassured. Why, she had asked herself contritely, +couldn't she let Martin express his love in his own way? Why was she +always trying to measure his feelings for her by set standards? + +"I've been wondering," he had gone on quickly, "what you would think +of putting up with my old shack while the new house is being built? It +wouldn't be as if you were going to live there for long and you'd be +right on hand to direct things." + +"Why, I could do that, of course," she had answered pleasantly. "If +you've lived there all these years, I surely ought to be able to live +there a few months, but Martin--" + +"I know what you're going to say," he had interrupted hastily. "You +think we ought to wait a while longer, but if we're going to pull +together for the rest of our lives why mightn't we just as well begin +now? Why is one time any better than another?" + +There had been a wistfulness, so rarely in Martin's voice, that Rose had +detected it instantly. After all, why should she keep him waiting +when he needed her so much, she had thought tenderly, all the sweet +womanliness in her astir with yearnings to lift the cloud of loneliness +from his life. + +Rose had always believed love a breath of beauty that would hold its +purity even in a hovel, but she had not been prepared for the sordidness +that seemed to envelop her as she crossed the threshold of the first +home of her married life. Martin, held in the clutch of the strained +embarrassment that invariably laid its icy fingers around his heart +whenever he found himself confronted by emotion, had suggested that Rose +go in while he put up the horse and fed the stock. "Don't be scared if +you find it pretty rough," he had warned, to which her light answer had +lilted back, "Oh, I shan't mind." + +And, as she stood in the doorway a moment later, her eyes taking in one +by one, the murky windows, the dirty floor, the unwashed dishes, the +tumbled bed, the rusty, grease bespattered stove choked with cold ashes, +she told herself hotly that it was not the dirt nor even the desperate +crassness that was smothering her joy. It was the fact that there was +nowhere a touch to suggest preparation for her home-coming. Martin had +made not even the crudest attempt to welcome her. It would have been +as easy for Rose to be cheerful in the midst of mere squalor as for +a flower to bloom white in a crowded tenement, but at the swift +realization of the lack of tenderness for her which this indifference to +her first impressions so clearly expressed, her faith in the man she had +married began to wither. He had failed her in the very quality in +which she had put her trust. Already, he had carelessly dropped the +thoughtfulness by which he had won her. She wondered how she could have +made herself believe that Martin loved her. "He has tried so hard +in every way to show me how much I would mean to him," she justified +herself. "But now he has me he just doesn't care what I think." + +As Rose forced herself to face this squarely, something within her +crumpled. Grim truth leered at her, hurling dust on her bright wings of +illusion, poking cruel jests. "This is your wedding day," it taunted, +"that tall figure out there near the dilapidated barn feeding his hogs +is your husband. Oh, first, sweet, most precious hours! How you will +always like to remember them! Here in this dirty shanty you will enter +into love's fulfillment. How romantic! Why doesn't your heart leap and +your arms ache for your new passion?" Tears pushed against her eyelids. +Her new life was not going to be happy. Of this she was suddenly, +irrevocably certain. + +Rose struggled against a complete break-down. This was no time for a +scene. What was the matter with her, anyway? Of course, Martin had not +meant to disappoint her, nor deliberately hurt her. He probably thought +this first home so temporary it didn't count. She simply would not mope. +Of that she was positive, and a brave little smile swimming up from +her troubled heart, she set about, with much energy, to achieve order, +valiantly fighting back her insistent tears as she worked. + +Meanwhile, Martin, totally oblivious of any cause for storm, was making +trips to and from the barrel which contained shorts mixed with water' +skimmed milk and house slops, the screaming, scrambling shoats gulping +the pork-making mixture as rapidly as he could fetch it. He worked +unconsciously, thinking, typically, not of Rose's reaction to this new +life, but of what it held in store for himself. + +He glanced toward the shack. Already the mere fact of a woman's presence +beneath its roof seemed, to him, to give it a different aspect. Through +the open door he observed that Rose was sweeping. How he had always +hated the thought of any one handling what was his! He dumped another +bucket of slops into the home-made trough. Why couldn't she just let +things alone and get supper quietly? Heaven only knew what he had gotten +himself into! But of one thing he was miserably certain; never again +would he have that comfortable seclusion to which he had grown so +accustomed. He had known this would be true, but the sight of Rose and +her broom brought the realization of it home to him with an all too +irritating vividness. Yes, everything was going to be different. There +would be many changes and he would never know what to expect next. Why +had he brought this upon himself; had he not lived alone for years? He +had let the habit of obtaining whatever he started after get the better +of him. Even today he could have drawn back from this marriage. But, he +had sensed that Rose was about to do so herself, and this knowledge had +pushed his determination to the final notch. + +Martin shook his head ruefully. "This is 'The Song of Songs," he smiled, +"and there is my Rose of Sharon. Guess I was never intended for a +Solomon." Now that she was so close to him, in the very core of his +life, this woman frightened him; instead of desire, there was dread. He +wished Rose had been a man that he might go into that shack and eat +ham and eggs with him while they talked crops and politics and animals. +There would be no thrills in this opening chapter and he, if not his +wife, would be shaken. + +Martin was mental, an incurable individualist who found himself +sufficient unto himself. He was different from his neighbors in that +he was always thinking, asking questions and pondering over his +conclusions. He had convinced himself that each demand of the body was +useless except the food that nourished it, the clothes that warmed it +and the sleep that repaired it. He hated soft things and the twist in +his mind that was Martin proved to him their futility. Love? It was an +empty dream, a shell that fooled. Its joys were fleeting. There was but +one thing worth while and that was work. The body was made for it--the +thumb to hold the hammer, the hand to pump the water and drive the +horses, the legs to follow the plow, herd the cattle and chase the +pigs from the cornfield, the ears to listen for strange noises from the +stock, the eyes to watch for weeds and discover the lice on the hens, +the mouth to yell the food call to the calves, the back to carry the +bran. Work meant money, and money meant--what? It was merely a stick +that measured the amount of work done. Then why did he toil so hard and +save so scrupulously? His answer was always another question. What was +there in life that could enable one to forget it faster? That woman +in there waiting for him--oh, she would suffer before she realized the +truth of this lesson he had already learned, and Martin felt a little +pity for her. + +When he went in for supper, Rose was just beginning to prepare it. With +a catch of anger in his manner, he gave her a sharp look and saw that +she had been crying. He couldn't remember ever before having had to deal +with a weeping woman; even when Benny had died and his mother had been +so shaken she had not given way to tears; so this was to be another of +the new experiences which must trot in with marriage. It annoyed him. + +"What's the matter, Rose?" + +"Nothing at all, Martin." + +"Nothing? You don't cry about nothing, do you?" + +"No." Rose felt a sudden fear; she sensed a lack of pity in Martin, an +unwillingness even to try to understand her conflicting emotions. + +"Then you're crying about something. What is it?" There was command in +his question. Martin was losing patience. He knew tears were used as +weapons by women, but why in the world should Rose need any sort of +weapon on the first day of their marriage? He hadn't done anything to +her, said anything unkind. Was she going to be unreasonable? Now he was +sure it was all wrong. + +"What's the matter?" he demanded, his voice rising. + +"Nothing's the matter. I'm just a little nervous." Rose began to cry +afresh. If only Martin had come to her and put his arms around her, she +would have been able to throw off her newly-born fear of him and this +disheartening shattering of her faith in his kindness. But he was going +to the other extreme, growing harder as she was becoming more panicky. + +"Nervous? What's there to be nervous about?" Rose's answer was stifled +sobbing. "You're not sorry you married today, I hope?" She shook her +head. "Then what's this mean, anyway?" + +"I was wondering if we are going to be happy after all--" + +"Happy? You don't like this place. That's the trouble. I was afraid of +this, but I thought you knew what you were about when you said you could +stand it for a while." + +"Oh, it isn't the house itself, Martin," she hastened to correct +truthfully, sure that she had gone too far. "I--I--know we'll be happy." + +Again this talk about happiness. He did not like it. He had never hunted +for happiness, and he was contented. Why should she persist in +this eternal search for this impossible condition? He supposed that +occasionally children found themselves in it, but surely grown-ups could +not expect it. The nearest they could approach it was in forgetting that +there was such a state by finding solace in constant occupation. + +"Let's eat," he announced. "I'm sick of this wrangling. Seems to me +you're not starting off just right." + +Rose hastened to prepare the meal, finding it more difficult to be +cheerful as she realized how indifferent Martin was to her feelings, if +only she presented a smooth surface. He had not seemed even to notice +how orderly and freshened everything was. She thought of the new +experience soon to be hers. Could it make up for all the understanding +and friendly appreciation that she saw only too clearly would be missing +in her daily life? Resolutely, she suppressed her doubts. + +Martin, bothered by an odd feeling of strangeness in the midst of his +own familiar surroundings, smoked his pipe in silence and studied Rose +soberly. Why, he asked himself, was he unmoved by a woman who was so +attractive? He liked the deftness with which her hands worked the pie +dough, the quick way she moved between stove and table, yet mingled with +this admiration was a slight but distinct hostility. How can one like +and have an aversion to a person at the same time? he pondered. "I +suppose," he concluded grimly, "it's because I'm supposed to love and +adore her--to pretend a lot of extravagant feelings." + +His mind travelled to the stock in the pasture. How stolid they were and +how matter of fact and how sensible. They affected no high, nonsensical +sentiments. Weren't they, after all, to be envied, rooted as they were +in their solid simplicity? Why should human beings everlastingly try so +hard to be different? He and Rose would have to get down to a genuine +basis, and the quicker the better. Meanwhile he must remember that, +whether he was glad or sorry, she was there, in his shack, because he +had asked her to come. + +As he ate his second helping of the excellent meal, he said pleasantly: +"You do know how to cook, Rose." + +Her soft gray-blue eyes brightened. "I love to do it," she answered +quickly. "You must tell me the things you like best, Martin. If I had a +real stove with a good oven, I could do much better." + +"Could you? We'll get one tomorrow." + +"That'll be fine!" she smiled, eager to have all serene between them, +and as she passed him to get some coffee her hand touched his in a swift +caress. Instantly, Martin's cordiality vanished; his hostility toward +her surged. Even as a boy he had hated to be "fussed over." Well, he +had married and he would go through with it. If only Rose would be more +matter of fact; not look at him with that expression which made him +think of a confiding child. What business had a grown woman with such +trust in her eyes, anyway? + +It was quite gone, in the early dawn, as Rose sat on the edge of the bed +looking at her husband. Never had she felt so far from him, so certain +that he did not love her, as when she had lain quivering but impassive +in his arms. "I might be just any woman," she had told herself, +astounded and stricken to find how little she was touched by this +experience which she had always believed bound heart to heart and +crowned the sweet transfusion of affection from soul into soul. "It +doesn't make any more difference to him who I am than who cooks for +him." + +Not that Martin had been unkind, except negatively. Intuitively, Rose +understood that their first evening and night foreshadowed their whole +lives. Not in what Martin would do, but in what he would not do, would +lie her heartaches. Yet in her sad reflections there was no bitterness +toward him; he had disappointed her, but perhaps it was only because +she had taught herself to expect something rare, even spiritual, from +marriage. Her idealism had played her a trick. + +With the quiet relinquishment of this long-cherished dream, eagerness +for the realization of an even more precious one took possession of +her. She comforted herself with the thought that maybe life had brought +Martin merely as a door to the citadel which looms, sparkling with +dancing sunlight, in the midst of mysterious shadows. Motherhood--she +would feel as if she were in another world. Out of all this +disappointment would come her ultimate happiness. + +Always struggling toward happiness, she was cheered too as the +foundation for the house progressed. Everything would be so different, +she told herself, once they were in their pretty new home. It was true +she had given up a concrete floor for her cellar, but she had seen at +once the good sense of having the concrete in the barn instead. Martin +was right. While it would have been nice in the house, of course, it +would not have begun to be the constant blessing to herself that it +would now be to him. How much easier it would make keeping the barn +clean! Why, it was almost a duty in a dairy barn to have such a floor +and really she, herself, could manage almost as well with the dirt +bottom. But when Martin began to discuss eliminating the whole upper +story of the house, Rose protested. + +"You won't use it," he had returned reasonably. "I'll keep my word, but +when a body gets to figuring and sees all that can be built with that +same money, it seems mighty foolish to put it into something that you +don't really need." + +As Martin looked at her questioningly, Rose felt suddenly unable to +muster an argument for the additional sleeping-rooms. It was true that +they were not actually necessary for their comfort; but the house as it +had been decided upon was so interwoven with memories of her courtship +and all that was lovable in Martin; it had become so real to her, that +it was as if some dear possession were being torn to pieces before her +eyes. + +"I don't know why, Martin," she had answered, with a choky little laugh, +"but it seems as if I just can't bear to give it up." + +"Why?" + +"I--I--like it all so well the way you planned it." + +"Just liking a thing isn't always good reason for having it. It'll make +lots more for you to take care of. What would you say if I was to prove +to you that it would build a fine chicken-house, one for the herd boar, +a concrete tank down in the pasture that'd save the cows enough trips to +the barn to make 'em give a heap sight more milk, a cooling house for it +and a good tool room?" Rose's eyes opened wide. "I can prove it to you." + +That was all. But the shack filled with his disapproval of her +reluctance to free him from his promise. She remembered one time when +she had come home from school in a pelting rain that had changed, +suddenly, to hail. There had seemed no escape from the hard, little +balls and their cruel bruises. Just so, it seemed to her, from Martin, +outwardly so calm as he read his paper, the harsh, determined thoughts +beat thick and fast. Turn what way she would, they surrounded, enveloped +and pounded down upon her. Her resolution weakened. Wasn't she paying +too big a price for what was, after all, only material? The one time she +and Martin had seemed quite close had been the moment in which she had +agreed so quickly to change the location of the concrete floor. Now she +had utterly lost him. She could scarcely endure the aloofness with which +he had withdrawn into himself. + +"Martin," she said a bit huskily, two evenings later, at supper, "I've +decided that you are right. It is foolish and extravagant of me to want +a second story when there are just the two of us. It will be better to +have all those other things you told me about." + +Martin did not respond; simply continued eating without looking up. This +was a habit of his that nearly drove Rose desperate. In her father's +household meals had always been friendly, sociable affairs. Patrick +Conroy had been loquacious and by way of a wit; sharpened on his, Rose's +own had developed. They had dealt in delicious nonsense, these two, and +had her husband been of a different temperament she might have found it +a refuge in her life with him. But, somehow, from the first, even before +they were married, when with Martin, such chatter had died unuttered on +Rose's tongue. The few remarks which she did venture, nowadays, had the +effect of a disconcerting splash before they sank into the gloomy depths +of the thick silence. Occasionally, in sheer self defense, she carried +on a light monologue, but Martin's lack of interest gave her such an +odd, lonely, stage-struck sensation that she, too, became untalkative, +keeping to herself the ideas which chased through her ever-active mind. +Innately just, she attributed this peculiarity of his to the fact +that he had lived so long alone, and while it fretted her, she usually +forgave him. But tonight, as no answer came, it seemed to her that +if Martin did not at least raise his eyes, she must scream or throw +something. + +"It would be a godsend to be the sort who permits oneself to do such +things," she told herself, a suggestion of a smile touching her lips, +and mentally she sent dish after dish at him, watching them fall +shattered to the floor. Dismay at the relief this gave her brought the +dimples into her cheeks. Her voice was pleasant as she asked: "Martin, +did you hear your spouse just now?" + +Annoyance flitted across his face and crept into his tone as he answered +tersely: "Of course, I heard you." Presently he finished his meal, +pushed back his chair and went out. + +Nothing further was said between them on the subject, but when the +scaffolding went up she saw that it was for only one story. It might +have comforted her a little, had she known what uneasy moments +Martin was having. In spite of himself, he could not shake off the +consciousness that he had broken his word. That was something which, +heretofore, he had never done. But, heretofore, his promises had been of +a strictly business nature. He would deliver so many bushels of wheat at +such and such a time; he would lend such and such a piece of machinery; +he would supply so many men and so many teams at a neighbor's threshing; +he would pay so much per pound for hogs; he would guarantee so many eggs +out of a setting or so many pounds of butter in so many months from +a cow he was selling. A few such guarantees made good at a loss to +himself, a few such loads delivered in adverse weather, a few such +pledges of help kept when he was obliged actually to hire men, had +established for him an enviable reputation, which Martin was of no mind +to lose. Had Rose not released him from his promise he would have kept +it. Even now he was disturbed as to what Fletcher and Fallon might +think. But already he had lived long enough with his wife to understand +something of the quality of her pride. Once having agreed to the change, +she would carry it off with a dash. + +Had Rose stood her ground on this matter, undoubtedly all her after life +might have been different, but she was of those women whose charm and +whose folly lie in their sensitiveness to the moods and contentment of +the people most closely associated with them. They can rise above their +own discomfort or depression, but they are utterly unable to disregard +that of those near them. This gave Martin, who by temperament and habit +considered only his own feelings, an incalculable advantage. His was the +old supremacy of the selfish over the self sacrificing, the hard over +the tender, the mental over the emotional. Add to this, the fact that +with all his faults, perhaps largely because of them, perhaps chiefly +because she cooked, washed, ironed, mended, and baked for him, kept his +home and planned so continually for his pleasure, Martin was dear to +Rose, and it is not difficult to understand how unequal the contest in +which she was matched when her wishes clashed with her husband's. It was +predestined that he, invariably, should win out. + +Rose told her friends she and her husband had decided that the second +story would make her too much work, and Martin noticed with surprise how +easily her convincing statement was accepted. He decided, for his own +peace of mind, that he had nothing with which to reproach himself. +He had put it up to her and she had agreed. This principal concession +obtained, other smaller ones followed logically and rapidly. The running +water and bath in the house were given up for piping to the barn, and +stanchions--then novelties in southeastern Kansas. The money for the +hardwood floors went into lightning rods. Built-in cupboards were +dismissed as luxuries, and the saving paid for an implement shed which +delighted Martin, who had figured how much expensive machinery would be +saved from rust. When it came to papering the walls he decided that the +white plaster was attractive enough and could serve for years. Instead, +he bought a patented litter-carrier that made the job of removing manure +from the barn an easy task. The porches purchased everything from a +brace and bit to a lathe for the new tool-room and put the finishing +touches to the dairy. The result was a four-room house that was the old +one born again, and such well-equipped farm buildings that they were the +pride of the township. + +Rose, who had surrendered long since, let the promises go to naught +without much protest. Martin was so quietly domineering, so stubbornly +persistent--and always so plausible--oh, so plausible!--that there was +no resisting him. Only when it came to the fireplace did she make a last +stand. She felt that it would be such a friendly spirit in the house. +She pictured Martin and herself sitting beside it in the winter +evenings. + +"A house without one is like a place without flowers," she explained to +him. + +"It's a mighty dirty business," he answered tersely. "You would have to +track the coal through the rest of the house and you'd have all those +extra ashes to clean out." + +"But you would never see any of the dirt," she argued with more than +her usual courage, "and if I wouldn't mind the ashes I don't see why you +should." + +"We can't afford it." + +"Martin, I've given in to you on everything else," she asserted firmly. +"I'm not going to give this up. I'll pay for it out of my own money." + +"What do you mean 'out of my own money'?" he asked sternly. "I told +Osborne we'd run one account. If what is mine is going to be yours, what +is yours is going to be mine. I'd think your own sense of fairness would +tell you that." + +As a matter of fact, Martin had no intention of ever touching Rose's +little capital, but he had made up his mind to direct the spending +of its income. He would keep her from putting it into just such +foolishnesses as this fireplace. But Rose, listening, saw the last of +her independence going. She felt tricked, outraged. During the years she +had been at the head of her father's household, she had regulated the +family budget and, no matter how small it had happened to be, she always +had contrived to have a surplus. This notion of Martin's that he, and he +alone, should decide upon expenditures was ridiculous. She told him so +and in spite of himself, he was impressed. + +"All right," he said calmly. "You can do all the buying for the house. +Write a check with my name and sign your own initials. Get what you +think we need. But there isn't going to be any fireplace. You can just +set that down." + +Voice, eyes, the line of his chin, all told Rose that he would not +yield. Nothing could be gained from a quarrel except deeper ill feeling. +With a supreme effort of will she obeyed the dictates of common sense +and ended the argument abruptly. + +But, for months after she was settled in the new little house, her eye +never fell on the space where the fireplace should have been without a +bitter feeling of revolt sweeping over her. She never carried a heavy +bucket in from the pump without thinking cynically of Martin's promises +of running water. As she swept the dust out of her front and back doors +to narrow steps, she remembered the spacious porches that were to have +been; and as she wiped the floors she had painted herself, and polished +her pine furniture, she was taunted by memories of the smooth boards +and the golden oak to which she had once looked forward so happily. This +resentment was seldom expressed, but its flame scorched her soul. + +Her work increased steadily. She did not object to this; it kept her +from thinking and brooding; it helped her to forget all that might have +been, all that was. She milked half the cows, separated the cream, took +charge of the dairy house and washed all the cans. Three times a +week she churned, and her butter became locally famous. She took over +completely both the chickens and the garden. Often, because her feet +ached from being on them such long hours, she worked barefoot in the +soft dirt. According to the season, she canned vegetables, preserved +fruit, rendered lard and put down pork. When she sat at meals now, like +Martin she was too tired for conversation. From the time she arose in +the morning until she dropped off to sleep at night, her thoughts, +like his, were chiefly of immediate duties to be performed. One concept +dominated their household--work. It seemed to offer the only way out of +life's perplexities. + + + + +IV. ROSE-BUD IN THE DUST + +UNDER this rigid regime Martin's prosperity increased. Although he +would not have admitted it, Rose's good cooking and the sweet, fresh +cleanliness with which he was surrounded had their effect, giving him a +new sense of physical well-being, making his mind more alert. Always, he +had been a hard worker, but now he began for the first time to take an +interest in the scientific aspects of farming. He subscribed for farm +journals and put real thought into all he did, with results that were +gratifying. He grew the finest crop of wheat for miles around; in the +season which brought others a yield of fifteen or twenty bushels to the +acre, Martin averaged thirty-three, without buying a ton of commercial +fertilizer. His corn was higher than anybody's else; the ears longer, +the stalks juicier, because of his careful, intelligent cultivating. In +the driest season, it resisted the hot winds; this, he explained, +was the result of his knowing how to prepare his seed bed and when +to plant--moisture could be retained if the soil was handled +scientifically. He bought the spoiled acreage of his neighbors, which he +cut up for the silo--as yet the only one in the county--adding water +to help fermentation. His imported hogs seemed to justify the prices +he paid for them, growing faster and rounder and fatter than any in +the surrounding county. The chinch bugs might bother everyone else, but +Martin seemed to be able to guard against them with fair success. He +took correspondence courses in soils and fertilizers, animal husbandry +and every related subject; kept a steady stream of letters flowing to +and from both Washington and the State Agricultural College. + +Now and then it crossed his mind that with the farm developing into such +an institution it would be more than desirable to pass it on to one of +his own blood, and secretly he was pleased when Rose told him a baby +was coming. A child, a son, might bring with him a little of what was +missing in his marriage with her. She irritated him more and more, not +by what she did but by what she was. Her whole temperament, in so much +as he permitted himself to be aware of it, her whole nature, jarred on +his. + +"When is it due?" + +"October." + +"It's lucky harvest will be over; silo filling, too," was his only +comment. + +In spite of Rose's three long years with Martin his lack of enthusiasm +was like a sharp stab. What had she expected, she asked herself sternly. +To be taken in his arms and rejoiced over as others were at such a +moment? What did he care so long as he wouldn't have to hire extra help +for her in the busy season! It was incredible--his hardness. + +Why couldn't she hate him? He was mean enough to her, surely. "I'm as +foolish as old Rover," she thought bitterly. The faithful dog lived for +his master and yet Rose could not remember ever having seen Martin give +him a pat. "When I once hold my own little baby in my arms, I won't +care like this. I'll have someone else to fill my heart," she consoled +herself, thrilling anew with the conviction that then she would be more +than recompensed for everything. The love she had missed, the house that +had been stolen from her--what were they in comparison to this growing +bit of life? Meanwhile, she longed as never before to feel near to +Martin. She could not help recalling how gallantly her father had +watched over her mother when she carried her last child and how eagerly +they all had waited upon her. At times, the contrast was scarcely to be +borne. + +Rose was troubled with nausea, but Martin pooh-poohed, as childish, the +notion of dropping some of her responsibilities. Didn't his mares work +almost to the day of foaling? It was good for them, keeping them in +shape. And the cows--didn't they go about placidly until within a few +hours of bringing their calves? Even the sows--did they droop as they +neared farrowing? Why should a woman be so different? Her child would be +healthier and she able to bring it into the world with less discomfort +to herself if she went about her ordinary duties in her usual way. Thus +Martin, impersonally, logically. + +"That would be true," Rose agreed, "if the work weren't so heavy and if +I were younger." + +"It's the work you're used to doing all the time, isn't it? Because you +aren't young is all the more reason you need the exercise. You're not +going to hire extra help, so you might just as well get any to-do out of +your mind," he retorted, the dreaded note in his voice. + +She considered leaving him. If she had earned her living before, she +could again. More than once she had thought of doing this, but always +the hope of a child had shone like a tiny bright star through the +midnight of her trials. Since she had endured so much, why not endure a +little longer and reap a dear reward? Then, too, she could never quite +bring herself to face the pictures her imagination conjured of Martin, +struggling along uncared for. Now, as her heart hardened against him, an +inner voice whispered that everyone had a right to a father as well as +a mother, and Martin might be greatly softened by daily contact with a +little son or daughter. In fairness, she must wait. + +Yet, she knew these were not her real reasons. They lay far deeper, in +the very warp and woof of her nature. She did not leave Martin because +she could not. She was incapable of making drastic changes, of tearing +herself from anyone to whom she was tied by habit and affection--no +matter how bitterly the mood of the moment might demand it. Always she +would be bound by circumstances. True, however hard and adverse they +might prove, she could adapt herself to them with rare patience and +dignity, but never would she be able to compel them to her will, rise +superbly above them, toss them aside. Her life had been, and would be, +shaped largely by others. Her mother's death, the particular enterprise +in which her father's little capital had been invested, Martin's +peculiar temperament--these had moulded and were moulding Rose Wade. At +the time she came to Martin's shack, she was potentially any one of a +half dozen women. It was inevitable that the particular one into which +she would evolve should be determined by the type of man she might +happen to marry, inevitable that she would become, to a large degree, +what he wished and expected, that her thoughts would take on the +complexion of his. Lacking in strength of character? In power of +resistance, certainly. Time out of mind, such malleability has been the +cross of the Magdalenes. Yet in what else lies the secret of the harmony +achieved by successful wives? + +And as, her nausea passing, Rose began to feel a glorious sensation +of vigor, she decided that perhaps, after all, Martin had been right. +Child-bearing was a natural function. People probably made far too much +fuss about it. Nellie came to help her cook for the threshers and, for +the rest, she managed very well, even milking her usual eight cows and +carrying her share of the foaming buckets. + +All might have gone smoothly if only she had not overslept one morning +in late September. When she reached the barn, Martin was irritable. She +did not answer him but sat down quietly by her first cow, a fine-blooded +animal which soon showed signs of restlessness under her tense hands. + +"There! There! So Bossy," soothed Rose gently. + +"You never will learn how to manage good stock," Martin criticized +bitingly. + +"Nor you how to treat a wife." + +"Oh, shut up." + +"Don't talk to me that way." + +As she started to rise, a kick from the cow caught her square on the +stomach with such force that it sent her staggering backward, still +clutching the handle of the pail from which a snowy stream cascaded. + +"Now what have you done?" demanded Martin sternly. "Haven't I warned +you time and again that milk cows are sensitive, nervous? Fidgety people +drive them crazy. Why can't you behave simply and directly with them! +Why is it I always get more milk from mine! It's your own fault this +happened--fussing around, taking out your ill temper at me on her. +Shouting at me. What could you expect?" + +For the first time in their life together, Rose was frankly unnerved. It +seemed to her that she would go mad. "You devil!" she burst out, wildly. +"That's what you are, Martin Wade! You're not human. Your child may be +lost and you talk about cows letting down more milk. Oh God! I didn't +know there was any one living who could be so cruel, so cold, so +diabolical. You'll be punished for this some day--you will--you will. +You don't love me--never did, oh, don't I know it. But some time you +will love some one. Then you'll understand what it is to be treated +like this when your whole soul is in need of tenderness. You'll see then +what--" + +"Oh, shut up," growled Martin, somewhat abashed by the violence of her +broken words and gasping sobs. "You're hysterical. You're doing yourself +as much harm right now as that kick did you." + +"Oh, Martin, please be kind," pleaded Rose more quietly. "Please! It's +your baby as much as mine. Be just half as kind as you are to these +cows." + +"They have more sense," he retorted angrily. And when Rose woke him, the +following night, to go for the doctor, his quick exclamation was: "So +now you've done it, have you?" + +As the sound of his horse's hoofs died away, it seemed to her that he +had taken the very heart out of her courage. She thought with anguished +envy of the women whose husbands loved them, for whom the heights and +depths of this ordeal were as real as for their wives. It seemed to her +that even the severest of pain could be wholly bearable if, in the midst +of it, one felt cherished. Well, she would go through it alone as she +had gone through everything else since their marriage. She would try to +forget Martin. She WOULD forget him. She must. She would keep her mind +fixed on the deep joy so soon to be hers. Had she not chosen to suffer +of her own free will, because the little creature that could be won only +through it was worth so much more than anything else the world had to +offer? She imagined the baby already arrived and visualized him as she +hoped her child might be at two years. Suppose he were in a burning +house, would she have the courage to rescue him? What would be the limit +of her endurance in the flames? She laughed to herself at the absurdity +of the question. How well she knew its answer! She wished with +passionate intensity that she could look into the magic depths of some +fairy mirror and see, for just the flash of one instant, exactly how +her boy or girl really would look. How much easier that would make it to +hold fast to the consciousness that she was not merely in pain, but +was laboring to bring forth a warm flesh-and-blood child. There was the +rub--in spite of her eagerness, the little one, so priceless, wasn't as +yet quite definite, real. She recalled the rosy-checked, curly-haired +youngster her fancy had created a moment ago. She would cling to that +picture; yes, even if her pain mounted to agony, it should be of the +body only; she would not let it get into her mind, not into her soul, +not into the welcoming mother-heart of her. + +Meanwhile, as she armored her spirit, she built a fire, put on water to +heat, attended capably to innumerable details. Rose was a woman of sound +experience. She had been with others at such times. It held no goblin +terrors for her. Had it not been for Martin's heartlessness, she would +have felt wholly equal to the occasion. As it was, she made little +commotion. Dr. Bradley, gentle and direct, had been the Conroys' family +physician for years. Nellie, who arrived in an hour, had been through +the experience often herself, and was friendly and helpful. + +She liked Rose, admired her tremendously and the thought--an odd one for +Nellie--crossed her mind that tonight she was downright beautiful. When +at dawn, Dr. Bradley whispered: "She has been so brave, Mrs. Mall, I +can't bear to tell her the child is not alive. Wouldn't it be better for +you to do so?" She shrank from the task. "I can't; I simply can't," she +protested, honest tears pouring down her thin face. + +"Could you, Mr. Wade?" + +Martin strode into Rose's room, all his own disappointment adding +bitterness to his words: "Well, I knew you'd done it and you have. It's +a fine boy, but he came dead." + +Out of the dreariness and the toil, out of the hope, the suffering and +the high courage had come--nothing. As Rose lay, the little still form +clasped against her, she was too broken for tears. Life had played +her another trick. Indignation toward Martin gathered volume with her +returning strength. + +"You don't deserve a child," she told him bitterly. "You might treat him +when he grew up as you treat me." + +"I've never laid hand to you," said Martin gruffly, certain stinging +words of Nellie's still smarting. When she chose, his sister's tongue +could be waspish. She had tormented him with it all the way to her home. +He had been goaded into flaring back and both had been thoroughly angry +when they separated, yet he was conscious that he came nearer a feeling +of affection for her than for any living person. Well, not affection, +precisely, he corrected. It was rather that he relished, with a +quizzical amusement, the completeness of their mutual comprehension. She +was growing to be more like their mother, too. Decidedly, this was the +type of woman he should have married, not someone soft and eager and +full of silly sentiment like Rose. Why didn't she hold her own as +Nellie did? Have more snap and stamina? It was exasperating--the way she +frequently made him feel as if he actually were trampling on something +defenseless. + +He now frankly hated her. There was not dislike merely; there was acute +antipathy. He took a delight in having her work harder and harder. It +used to be "Rose," but now it was always "say" or "you" or "hey." Once +she asked cynically if he had ever heard of a "Rose of Sharon" to which +he maliciously replied: "She turned out to be a Rag-weed." + +Yet such a leveller of emotions and an adjuster of disparate +dispositions is Time that when they rounded their fourth year, Martin +viewed his life, with a few reservations, as fairly satisfactory. He +turned the matter over judicially in his mind and concluded that even +though he cared not a jot for Rose, at least he could think of no other +woman who could carry a larger share of the drudgery in their dusty +lives, help save more and, on the whole, bother him less. He, like his +rag-weed, had settled down to an apathetic jog. + +Rose was convinced that Martin would make too unkind a father; he had no +wish for another taste of the general confusion and disorganized routine +her confinement had entailed. Besides, it would be inconvenient if she +were to die, as Dr. Bradley quite solemnly had warned him she might only +too probably. Without any exchange of words, it was settled there should +not be another child--settled, he dismissed it. In a way, he had come +to appreciate Rose, but it was absurd to compliment anyone, let alone +a wife whom he saw constantly. Physically, she did not interest him; in +fact, the whole business bored him. It was tiresome and got one nowhere. +He decided this state of mind must be rather general among married +people, and reasoned his way to the conclusion that marriage was a good +thing in that it drove out passion and placed human animals on a more +practicable foundation. If there had been the likelihood of children, he +undoubtedly would have sought her from time to time, but with that hope +out of their lives the attraction died completely. + +When he was through with his work, it was late and he was sleepy. When +he woke early in the morning, he had to hurry to his stock. So that +which always had been less than secondary, now became completely +quiescent, and he was satisfied that it should. It never occurred to him +to consider what Rose might be thinking and feeling. She wondered about +it, and would have liked to ask advice from someone--the older Mrs. +Mall or Dr. Bradley--but habitual reserve held her back. After all, she +decided finally, what did it matter? Meanwhile, financially, things were +going better than ever. + +Martin had the most improved farm in the neighborhood; he was looked up +to by everyone as one of the most intelligent men in the county, and +his earnings were swelling, going into better stock and the surplus into +mortgages which he accumulated with surprising rapidity. Occasionally, +he would wonder why he was working so hard, saving so assiduously and +investing so consistently. His growing fortune seemed to mean little now +that his affluence was thoroughly established. For whom was he working? +he would ask himself. For the life of him, he could not answer. Surely +not for his Rag-weed of Sharon. Nellie? She was well enough fixed and he +didn't care a shot for her husband. Then why? Sometimes he pursued this +chain of thought further, "I'll die and probably leave five times as +much as I have now to her and who knows what she'll do with it? I'll +never enjoy any of it myself. I'm not such a fool as to expect it. What +difference can a few thousand dollars more or less make to me from now +on? Then why do I scheme and slave? Pshaw! I've known the answer ever +since I first turned the soil of this farm. The man who thinks about +things knows there's nothing to life. It's all a grinding chase for the +day when someone will pat my cheek with a spade." + +He might have escaped this materialism through the church, but to him +it offered no inducements. He could find nothing spiritual in it. In his +opinion, it was a very carnal institution conducted by very hypocritical +men and women. He smiled at their Hell and despised their Heaven. Their +religion, to him, seemed such a crudely selfish affair. They were always +expecting something from God; always praying for petty favors--begging +and whining for money, or good crops, or better health. Martin would +have none of this nonsense. He was as selfish as they, probably more +so, he conceded, but he hoped he would never reach the point of currying +favor with anyone, even God. With his own good strength he would answer +his own prayers. This farm was the nearest he would ever come to a +paradise and on it he would be his own God. Rose did not share these +feelings. She went to church each Sunday and read her Bible daily with a +simple faith that defied derision. Once, when she was gone, Martin idly +hunted out the Song of Solomon. His lips curled with contempt at the +passionate rhapsody. He knew a thing or two, he allowed, about these +wonderful Roses of Sharon and this Song of Songs. Lies, all lies, every +word of it! Yet, in spite of himself, from time to time, he liked to +reread it. He fancied this was because of the sardonic pleasure its +superlative phrases gave him, but the truth was it held him. He despised +sentiment, tenderness, and, by the strangeness of the human mind, he +went, by way of paradox, to the tenderest, most sublime spot in a book +supreme in tenderness and sublimity. + +At forty, he owned and, with the aid of two hired hands, worked an +entire section of land. The law said it was his and he had the might +to back up the law. On these six hundred and forty broad acres he could +have lived without the rest of the world. Here he was King. Other +farms he regarded as foreign countries, their owners with impersonal +suspicion. Yet he trusted them after a fashion, because he had learned +from many and devious dealings with a large assortment of people that +the average human being is honest, which is to say that he does not +steal his neighbor's stock nor fail to pay his just debts if given +plenty of time and the conditions have the explicitness of black and +white. He knew them to be as mercenary as himself, with this only +difference: Where he was frankly so, they pretended otherwise. +They bothered him with their dinky deals, with their scrimping and +scratching, and their sneaky attempts to hide their ugliness by the +observance of one set day of sanctuary. Because they seemed to him so +two-faced, so trifling, so cowardly, he liked to "stick" them every time +he had a fair chance and could do it within the law. It was his favorite +game. They worked so blindly and went on so stupidly, talking so +foolishly, that it afforded him sport to come along and take the bacon +away from them. + +All held him a little in awe, for he was of a forbidding bearing, tall, +grave and thoughtful; accurate in his facts and sure of himself; slow to +express an opinion, but positive in his conclusions; seeking no favors, +and giving none; careful not to offend, indifferent whether he pleased. +He would deceive, but never insult. The women were afraid of him, +because he never "jollied." He had no jokes or bright remarks for them. +They were such useless creatures out of their particular duties. There +was nothing to take up with them. Everyone rendered him much the same +respectful manner that they kept on tap for the leading citizens of the +town, David Robinson, for instance. Indeed, Martin himself was somewhat +of a banker, for he was a stockholder and director of the First State +Bank, where he was looked up to as a shrewd man who was too big even +for the operation of his magnificent farm. He understood values. When it +came to loans, his judgment on land and livestock was never disputed. If +he wanted to make a purchase he did not go to several stores for prices. +He knew, in the first place, what he should pay, and the business +men, especially the hardware and implement dealers, were afraid of his +knowledge, and still more of his influence. + +About Rose, too, there was a poise, an atmosphere of background which +inspired respect above her station. When Mrs. Wade said anything, her +statement was apt to settle the matter, for on those subjects which she +discussed at all, she was an authority, and on those which she was not, +her training in Martin's household had taught her to maintain a wise +silence. The stern self-control had stolen something of the tenderness +from her lips. There were other changes. The sunlight had faded from +her hair; the once firm white neck was beginning to lose its resilience. +Deep lines furrowed her cheeks from mouth to jaw, and fine wrinkles had +slipped into her forehead. There were delicate webs of them about her +patient eyes, under which lack of sleep and overwork had left their +brown shadows. Since the birth of her baby she had become much heavier +and though she was still neat, her dresses were always of dark colors +and made up by herself of cheap materials. For, while she bought without +consulting Martin, her privilege of discretion was confined within +strict and narrow limits. He kept a meticulous eye on all her cancelled +checks and knew to a penny what she spent. If he felt a respect for her +thrift it was completely unacknowledged. They worked together with as +little liking, as little hatred, as two oxen pulling a plow. + +It had been a wise day for both, thought Fallon, when they had decided +to marry--they were so well mated. What a model and enviable couple they +were! To Rose it seemed the essence of irony that her life with Martin +should be looked upon as a flower of matrimony. Yet, womanlike, she took +an unconfessed comfort in the fact that this was so--that no one, unless +it were Nellie, was sufficiently astute to fathom the truth. To be sure, +the Wades were never spoken of as "happy." They were invariably alluded +to as "good folks," "true blue," "solid people," "ideal husband and +wife," or "salt of the earth." + +Each year they gave a round sum to the church, and Martin took caustic +gratification in the fact that, although his attitude toward it and +religion was well known, he too was counted as one of the fold. To +do its leaders justice, he admitted that this might have been partly +through their hesitancy to hurt Rose who was always to be found in the +thick of its sale-dinners, bazaars and sociables. How she was able to +accomplish so much without neglecting her own heavy duties, which now +included cooking, washing, mending and keeping in order the old shack +for the hired men, was a topic upon which other women feasted with +appreciative gusto, especially at missionary meetings when she was not +present. It really was extraordinary how much she managed to put into a +day. Early as Martin was up to feed his stock, she was up still earlier +that she might lend a hand to a neighbor, harrowed by the fear that +gathered fruit might perish. Late as he plowed, in the hot summer +evenings, her sweaty fingers were busy still later with patching, +brought home to boost along some young wife struggling with a teething +baby. She seemed never too rushed to tuck in an extra baking for someone +even more rushed than herself, or to make delicious broths and tasty +dishes for sick folk. In her quiet way, she became a real power, always +in demand, the first to be entrusted with sweet secrets, the first to be +sent for in paralysing emergencies and moments of sorrow. The warmth +of heart which Martin ridiculed and resented, intensified by its very +repression, bubbled out to others in cheery helpfulness, and blessed her +quick tears. + +Of her deep yearning for love, she never spoke. Just when she would +begin to feel almost self-sufficient it would quicken to a throbbing +ache. Usually, at such times, she buried it determinedly under work. But +one day, yielding to an impulse, she wrote to Norah asking if her little +namesake could come for a month's visit. + +"I know she is only seven," the letter ran, "but I am sure if she were +put in care of the conductor she would come through safely, and I do so +want to see her." After long hesitation, she enclosed a check to cover +expenses. She was half frightened by her own daring and did not tell +Martin until she had received the reply giving the date for the child's +arrival. + +"I earned that, Martin," she returned determinedly to his emphatic +remonstrance. "And when the check comes in it's going to be honored." + +"A Wade check is always honored," was his cryptic assertion. "I merely +say," he added more calmly, "that if we are to board her, and I don't +make any protest over that at all, it seems to me only fair that her +father should have bought the ticket." + +"Maybe you're right--in theory. But then she simply couldn't have come +and I've never seen her. I first knew of her the very day you asked me +to marry you. I've thought of her, often and often. Her mother named her +after me and calls her 'Little Rose of Sharon, Illinois'." + +"Another rag-weed, probably," said Martin, shortly. Yet, to his own +surprise, he was not altogether sorry she was to come--this house of +his had never had a child in it for more than a few hours. He was rather +curious to find out how it would seem. If only her name were not Rose, +and if only she were not coming from Sharon. + +But little Rose, with her dark brown curls, merry expression, roguish +nose and soft radiance swept all his misgivings and prejudices before +her. One might as well hold grudges against a flower, he thought. He +liked the confiding way she had of suddenly slipping her little hand +into his great one. Her prattle amused him, and he was both flattered +and worried by the fearlessness with which she followed him everywhere. +She seemed to bring a veritable shower of song into this home of long +silences. The very chaos made Mrs. Wade's heart beat tumultuously, and +once when Martin came upon the little girl seated solemnly in the +midst of a circle of corncob dolls, his throat contracted with an +extraordinary tightness. + +"You really are a rose--a lovely, sweet brown Rose of Sharon," he had +exclaimed, forgetting his wife's presence and not stopping to think how +strange the words must sound on his lips. "If you'll give me a kiss, +I'll let you ride on old Jettie." + +The child scrambled to her feet and, seated on his broad shoulder, +granted the demand for toll. Her aunt's eyes filled. This was the first +time she had ever heard Martin ask for something as sentimental as a +kiss. She was thoroughly ashamed of herself for it--it was really too +absurd!--but she felt jealousy, an emotion that had never bothered her +since they had been married. And this bit of chattering femininity had +caused it. Mrs. Wade worked faster. + +The kiss was like the touch of silk against Martin's cheek. He felt +inexplicably sad as he put the child down again among her playthings. +There was, he realized with a shock, much that he was missing, things +he was letting work supplant. He wished that boy of theirs could have +lived. All might have been different. He had almost forgotten that +disappointment, had never understood until this moment what a misfortune +it had been, and here he was being gripped by a more poignant sense of +loss than he had ever before felt, even when he had lost his mother. + +Wonderful as little Rose was, she was not his own. But, he wondered +suddenly, wasn't this aching sense of need perhaps something utterly +different from unsatisfied paternal instinct? He turned his head toward +the kitchen where his Rag-weed was working and asked himself if she were +gone and some other woman were here--such as little Rose might be when +she grew up, one to whom he went out spontaneously, would not his life +be more complete and far more worth while? What a fool he was, to bother +his head with such get-nowhere questions! He dismissed them roughly, but +new processes of thought had been opened, new emotions awakened. + +Meanwhile, little Rose's response to his clumsy tenderness taught him +many unsuspected lessons. He never would have believed the pleasure +there could be in simply watching a child's eyes light with glee over a +five-cent bag of candy. It began to be a regular thing for him to bring +one home from Fallon, each trip, and the gay hunts that followed as +she searched for it--sometimes to find the treasure in Martin's hat, +sometimes under the buggy seat, sometimes in a knobby hump under the +table-cloth at her plate--more than once brought his rare smile. For +years afterward, the memory of one evening lingered with him. He was +resting in an old chair tipped back against the house, thinking deeply, +when the little girl, tired from her play, climbed into his lap and, +making a cozy nest for herself in the crook of his arm, fell asleep. He +had finished planning out the work upon which he had been concentrating +and had been about to take her into the house when he suddenly became +aware of the child's loveliness. In the silvery moonlight all the fairy, +flower-like quality of her was enhanced. Martin studied her closely, +reverently. It was his first conscious worship of beauty. Leaning down +to the rosy lips he listened to the almost imperceptible breathing; +he touched the long, sweeping lashes resting on the smooth cheeks and +lifted one of the curls the wind had been ruffling lightly against his +face. With his whole soul, he marvelled at her softness and relaxation. +A profound, pitying rebellion gripped him at the idea that anything so +sweet, so perfect must pass slowly through the defacing furnaces of time +and pain. "Little Rose of Sharon!" he thought gently, conscious of an +actual tearing at his heart, even a startling stinging in his eyes. With +an abruptness that almost awakened her, he carried her in to his wife. + +Mrs. Wade felt an inexplicable hurt at the decidedness of little Rose's +preference for Martin. She could not understand it. She took exquisite +care of her, cooked the things she liked best, let her mess to her +heart's content in the kitchen, made her dolls pretty frocks, cuddled +her, told her stories and stopped her work to play with her on rainy +days--but she could not win the same affection the little girl bestowed +so lavishly on Martin. If left to herself she was always to be found +with the big, silent man. + +As the month's visit lengthened into three, it was astonishing what +good times they had together. If he was pitching hay, her slender little +figure, short dress a-flutter, was to be seen standing on the fragrant +wagonload. At threshing time, she darted lightly all over the separator, +Martin's watchful eye constantly upon her, and his protective hand near +her. She went with him to haul the grain to mill and was fascinated +by the big scales. On the way there and back he let her hold the great +lines in her little fists. In the dewy mornings, she hop-skipped and +jumped by his side into the pasture to bring in the cows. She flitted in +and out among them during milking time. + +"I think she makes them too nervous, Martin," Rose had once remarked. +"Better run out, darling, until we finish and then come help auntie in +the dairy." + +"They might as well get used to her," he had answered tersely. "It'll +hurt her feelings to be sent away." + +Rose could scarcely believe her ears. Memories, bitter, intolerable, +crowded upon her. Had the little girl really changed Martin so +completely? Oh, if only her boy could have lived! Perhaps she had made +a great mistake in being so determined not to have another. Was it too +late now? She looked at her husband. Well as she knew every detail of +his fine, clean cut features, his broad shoulders and rippling muscles, +they gave her a sudden thrill. It was as if she were seeing him again +for the first time in years. If only he could let a shadow of this new +thoughtfulness and kindliness fall on her, they might even yet bring +some joy into each other's lives. They had stepped off on the wrong +foot. Why, they really hadn't been even acquainted. They had been +led into thinking so because of the length of time they had both been +familiar figures in the same community. Beyond a doubt, if they were +being married today, and she understood him as she did now, she could +make a success of their marriage. But, as it was, Martin was so fixed +in the groove of his attitude of utter indifference toward her that she +felt there was little chance of ever jogging him out of it. To Rose, +the very fact that the possibility of happiness seemed so nearly within +reach was what put the cruel edge to their present status. + +She did not comprehend that Martin definitely did not want it changed. +Conscious, at last, that he was slowly starving for a woman's love, +beginning to brood because there was no beauty in his life, he was +looking at her with eyes as newly appraising as her own. He remembered +her as she had been that day in the bank, when he had thought her like +a rose. She had been all white and gold then; now, hair, eyes, skin, and +clothes seemed to him to be of one earthy color. Her clean, dull calico +dress belted in by her checked apron revealed the ungraceful lines of +her figure. She looked middle-aged and unshapely, when he wanted youth +and an exquisite loveliness. Well, he told himself, harshly, he was not +likely to get it. There was no sense in harboring such notions. They +must be crushed. He would work harder, much harder, hard enough to +forget them. There was but one thing worth while--his farm. He would +develop it to its limits. + +Accordingly, when little Rose returned to Sharon, he and his Rag-weed +soon settled themselves to the old formula of endless toil, investing +the profits in sound farm mortgages that were beginning to tax the +capacity of his huge tin box in the vault of the First State Bank. + + + + +V. DUST BEGETS DUST + +YET, through the Wades' busy days the echo of little Rose's visit +lingered persistently. Each now anxiously wanted another child, but both +were careful to keep this longing locked in their separate bosoms. Their +constraint with each other was of far too long a standing to permit +of any sudden exchange of confidences. It was with this hope +half-acknowledged, however, and in her mind the recent memories of a +more approachable Martin, that Rose began to make a greater effort with +her appearance. By dint of the most skillful maneuvering, she contrived +to purchase herself a silk dress--the first since her marriage. It +was of dark blue crepe-de-chine, simply but becomingly made, the very +richness of its folds shedding a new luster over her quiet graciousness +and large proportions. Even her kind, capable hands seemed subtly +ennobled as they emerged from the luscious, well fitting sleeves, and +the high collar, with its narrow edge of lace, stressed the nobility of +her fine head. When she came home from church, she did not, as she would +have heretofore, change at once into calico, but protected by a spick +and span white apron, kept on the best frock through dinner and, +frequently, until chore time in the afternoon. In the winter, too, she +was exposed less to sun and wind and her skin lost much of its +weathered look. She took better care of it and was more careful with the +arrangement of her hair. Gradually a new series of impressions began to +register on Martin's brain. + +One Sunday she came in fresh and ruddy from the drive home in the cold, +crisp air. Martin found it rather pleasant to watch her brisk movements +as she prepared the delayed meal. He observed, with something of a +mental start, that today, at least, she still had more than a little of +the old sumptuous, full-blown quality. It reminded him, together with +the deft way in which she hurried, without haste, without flurry, of +their first evening in the shack, nearly seven years ago. How tense +they both had been, how afraid of each other, how she had irritated +him! Well, he had grown accustomed to her at last, thanks be. Was +he, perhaps, foolish not to get more out of their life--it was not +improbable that a child might come. Why had he been taking it so for +granted that this was out of the question? When one got right down +to it, just what was the imaginary obstacle that was blocking the +realization of this deep wish? Her chance of not pulling through? He'd +get her a hired girl this time and let her have her own head about +things. She'd made it all right once, why not again? The settledness of +their habitual neutrality? What of it? He would ignore that. It wasn't +as if he had to court her, make explanations. She was his wife. He +didn't love her, never had, never would, but life was too short to be +overly fastidious. It was flying, flying--in a few more years he would +be fifty. Fifty! And what had it all been about, anyway? He did have +this farm to show for his work--he had not made a bad job of that, he +and his Rag-weed. In her own fashion she was a good sort, and better +looking than most women past forty. + +Rose felt the closeness of his scrutiny, sensed the unusual cordiality +of his mood, but from the depths of her hardly won wisdom took no +apparent notice of it. She knew well enough how not to annoy him. +If only she had not learned too late! What was it about Martin, she +wondered afresh, that had held her through all these deadening years? +Her love for him was like a stream that, disappearing for long periods +underground, seemed utterly lost, only to emerge again unexpectedly, +cleared of all past murkiness, tranquil and deep. + +This unspoken converging of minds, equivocal though it was on Martin's +part, resulted gradually in a more friendly period. Rose always liked to +remember that winter, with its peace that quenched her thirsty heart and +helped to blur the recollection of old unkindnesses long since forgiven, +but still too vividly recalled. When, a year later, Billy was born, she +was swept up to that dizzy crest of rapture which, to finely attuned +souls, is the recompense and justification of all their valleys. + +Martin watched her deep, almost painful delight, with a profound envy. +He had looked forward, with more anticipation than even he himself had +realized, to the thrill which he had supposed fatherhood would bring, +taking it entirely for granted that he would feel a bond with this small +reincarnation of his own being, but after the first week of attempting +to get interested in the unresponsive bundle that was his son, he +decided the idea of a baby had certainly signified in his mind emotions +which this tiny, troublesome creature, with a voice like a small-sized +foghorn, did not cause to materialize. No doubt when it grew into a +child he would feel very differently toward it--more as he did toward +little Rose, but that was a long time to wait, and meanwhile he could +not shake off a feeling of acute disappointment, of defeated hopes. + +By the end of the second month, he was sure he must have been out of his +senses to bring such a nuisance upon himself and into his well-ordered +house. Not only was his rest disturbed with trying regularity by night, +and his meals served with an equally trying irregularity by day, but he +was obliged to deal with an altogether changed wife. For, yielding as +Rose was in all other matters, where Billy was concerned she was simply +imperturbable. At times, as she held the chubby little fellow to her +breast or caught and kissed a waving pink foot, she would feel a sense +of physical weakness come over her--it seemed as if her breath would +leave her. Martin could be what he might; life, at last, was worth its +price. With the courage of her mother-love she could resist anything and +everyone. + +To her, the relative importance of the farm to Billy was as simple as a +problem in addition. She had lost none of her old knack for turning off +large amounts of work quickly, but she firmly stopped just short of +the point where her milk might be impaired by her exertions. Martin +had insisted that the requirement for hired help was over; however, in +despair over his wife's determined sabotage, it was Martin himself who +commanded that the girl be reinstated for another two months. + +Rose was a methodical mother and not overly fussy. As soon as Billy +could sit in a highchair or an ordinary packing box on the floor, she +kept him with her while she went about her different tasks, cooing and +laughing with him as she worked, but when he needed attention she could +disregard calling dishes, chickens, half-churned butter, unfinished +ironing, unmilked cows or an irate husband with a placidity that was +worthy of the old Greek gods. Martin was dumbfounded to the point of +stupefaction. He was too thoroughly self-centred, however, to let other +than his own preferences long dominate his Rag-weed's actions. Her first +duty was clearly to administer to his comfort, and that was precisely +what she would do. It was ridiculous, the amount of time she gave to +that baby--out of all rhyme and reason. If she wasn't feeding him, +she was changing him; if she wasn't bathing him she was rocking him to +sleep. And there, at last, Martin found a tangible point of resistance, +for he discovered from Nellie that not only was it not necessary to rock +a baby, but that it was contrary to the new ideas currently endorsed. +Reinforced, he argued the matter, adding that he could remember +distinctly his own mother had never rocked Benny. + +"Yes, and Benny died." + +"It wasn't her fault if he did," he retorted, a trifle disconcerted. + +"I don't know about that. She took chances I would never take with +Billy. She sacrificed him, with her eyes open, for you and Nellie--gave +him up so that you could have this farm." + +Martin did not care for this new version. "What has that to do with the +question?" he demanded coldly. + +"Just this--your mother had her ideas and I have mine. I am going to +raise Billy in my own way." But, for weeks thereafter she managed with +an almost miraculous adroitness to have him asleep at meal times. + +At seven months, Billy was the most adorable, smiling, cuddly baby +imaginable, with dimples, four teeth and a tantalizing hint of curl in +his soft, surprisingly thick, fawn-colored hair. Already, it was quite +evident that he had his mother's sensitive, affectionate nature. If only +his father had picked him up, occasionally, had talked to him now and +then, he scarcely could have resisted the little fellow's crowing, +sweet-tempered, responsive charm, but resentment at the annoyance of his +presence was now excessive. For the present, Martin's only concern in +his son consisted in seeing to it that his effacement was as nearly +complete as possible. + +The long-impending clash came one evening after a sultry, dusty day when +Rose, occupied with a large washing in the morning and heavy work in +the dairy in the afternoon, realized with compunction that never had she +come so near to neglecting her boy. Tired and hot from fretting, he had +been slow about going to sleep, and was just dozing off, when Martin +came in, worn out and hungry. + +"Isn't supper ready yet?" + +"All but frying the sausage," Rose answered, achieving a pleasant tone +in spite of her jadedness. "He's almost turning the corner--hear his +little sleepy song? Sit down and cool off. I'll have it ready by the +time you and the boys are washed." + +Under its thick coat of tan, Martin's face went white. "I've had enough +of this," he announced levelly. "You'll put him down and fry that meat." + +"Wait just a minute," she coaxed; "he'll be off for the night and if you +wake him, he'll cry and get all worked up." + +"You heard what I said." His tone was vibrant with determination. "How +am I going to keep hired men if you treat them like this? When they come +in to eat, they want to find their food on the table." + +"This doesn't often happen any more and they know, good and well, I make +it up to them in other ways," returned Rose truthfully. + +For answer, he crossed over to her quickly, reached down and took the +baby from her. + +"What are you going to do with him?" she demanded, a-tremble with rage +and a sense of impotent helplessness, as, avoiding her quick movement, +Martin went into the bedroom. + +"Let him go to sleep as other children do, while you finish getting +supper. Do you want to make a sissy of him?" + +"A lot you care what he becomes!" she flashed, conflicting impulses +contending for mastery, as Billy, now thoroughly awake and seeing +his mother, began to cry, pleading to her with big blue eyes and +out-stretched arms to take him. She started forward, but Martin stepped +between herself and the crib. + +"Martin Wade, let me pass. He's mine." + +"It isn't going to hurt him to cry. He does it often enough." + +"If you had a really cross baby around you'd know how good and +reasonable Billy is," she flamed, torn by the little sobs. + +"You get out to that kitchen," he ordered, more openly angry than Rose +had ever seen him. "I've had enough of this talk, do you hear, and +enough of this way of doing. Don't you set foot in here again till +supper's over. I've had quite enough, too, of jumping up and down to +wait on myself." + +Confusedly, Rose thought of her countless hours of lost sleep, her even +yet unrecovered strength, the enormous readjustment of her own life in +her sincere efforts to do her best by the whole household, her joyous +acceptance of all the perpetual self-denial her new duties to Billy +necessitated. In comparison, the inconveniences to which Martin had been +put seemed trifling. The occasional delays, and the unusual bother of +stepping to the stove, now and then, to pour himself and the men a hot +cup of coffee--this was their sum total. And how injured he really felt! +The injustice of it left her speechless. Nails biting into her hands +in her struggle for self-control, she left the room. With a slam of the +door behind him, Martin followed her. + +Blindly she strove for reason. Billy would simply cry himself to +sleep--it was bad for his whole nervous system, but it would not +actually make him sick. What a chaos must be in that little heart! His +mother had failed him for the first time in his life. It was cruel, the +way Martin had forced her to this, and as she listened, for the next +half hour, to the muffled sound of Billy's crying and saw how impervious +to it Martin was, she knew that never again could things be the same +between her husband and herself. + +But when, supper over, she found the corners of the rosebud mouth still +pathetically down and Billy's breath still quivering in long gasps, she +gathered the snuggly body to her and vowed in little broken love-words +that from now on his father should have no further opportunities for +discipline. Knowing him as she did, she should have trained the baby in +the first place to go to sleep alone, should have denied herself those +added sweet moments. After this she would be on her guard, forestall +Martin, do tenderly what he would do harshly. Never again should her boy +be made to suffer through any such mistaken selfishness of hers. + +And though, after a while, the importance of this episode shrank to its +true proportions, she never forgot or broke this promise. It would +have been literally impossible for her to touch Billy, even when he was +naughtiest and most exasperating, with other than infinite love, but she +had an even firmness of her own. As sensitive as herself, adoring her to +the point of worship, he was easily punished by her displeasure or five +minutes of enforced quiet on a chair. The note of dread in her voice +as she pleaded: "Hush, oh, hush, Billy, be good; quick, darling, papa's +coming," was always effective. By ceaseless vigilance and indefatigable +patience, she evaded further open rupture until the boy was three years +old. + +His shrieks had brought both his father and herself flying to the hog +barn to find him dancing up and down as, frightened and aghast, he +vainly attempted to beat off old Dorcas, a mammoth sow, from one of +her day-old litter on which, having crushed it by accident, she was now +quite deliberately feasting. + +"God Almighty!" stormed Martin, hastily putting the little pigs back +into the next pen. "Who let them in to her? That's her old trick." + +"I opened the door," confessed Billy, troubled, frank eyes looking +straight into his father's. "They were hungry; that one wanted her +most." And, at the thought of the tragedy he had witnessed, he flung +himself heartbroken into his mother's comforting arms. + +"I'll whip you for this," said Martin sternly. + +"Oh, please!" protested Rose, gathering the child closer. "Can't you see +he's had a bitter enough lesson? His little heart is full." + +"He's got to learn, once and for all, not to meddle with the stock. Come +here." + +"No! I won't have it. I'll see to it that he never does a thing like +this again. He's too young to understand. He's never been struck in his +life. You shan't." + +Martin's cold blue eyes looked icily into his wife's blazing gray ones. +"Don't act like a fool. Suppose he had gotten in there himself, and had +fallen down--do you think she'd have waited to kill him? Where'd he be +now--like that?" and he pointed to the half-eaten carcass. + +Rose shuddered. There it was again--the same, familiar, disarming +plausibility of Martin's, the old trick of making her seem to be the one +in the wrong. + +"I wish I had an acre for every good thrashing I got when I was a boy," +he commented drily. "But in those days a father who demanded obedience +wasn't considered a monster." + +"If you only loved him, I wouldn't care," sobbed Rose. "I could stand it +better to have you hit him in anger, but you're so hard, so cruel. You +plan it all out so--how can you?" + +Nevertheless, with a last convulsive hug and a broken "Mother can't help +it, darling," she put Billy on his feet, her tormented heart wrung with +bitterness as Martin took the clinging child from her and carried him +away, hysterical and resisting. + +"What else could I do?" she asked herself miserably, stabbed by the +added fear that Billy might not forgive her. Could he understand how +powerless she had been? + +When once more the child was cuddled against her, she realized that in +some mystical way there was a new bond between them, and as the +days passed, she discovered it was not so much the whipping, but the +unnatural perfidy of Dorcas that had scarred his mind. With his own +eyes he had seen a mother devour her baby. He woke from dreams of it +at night. Even the sight of her in the pasture contentedly suckling the +remaining nine did not reassure him. The modern methods of psychology +were then, to such women as Rose, a sealed book, but love and intuition +taught her to apply them. + +"You see, Billy," she explained, "hogs are meant to eat meat like dogs +or bears or tigers. But they can live on just grain and grass, and that +is what most farmers make them do because there is so much more of it +and it costs so much less. Some of them feed what is called tankage. If +old Dorcas could have had some of that she probably would not have +eaten the little pig. You mustn't blame her too much, for she was just +famishing for flesh, the way you are, sometimes, for a drink of water, +when you've been playing hard." Thus rationalized, the old sow's conduct +lost some of its grewsomeness, and in time, of course, the shock of the +whole experience was submerged under other and newer impressions, +but always the remembrance of it floated near the surface of his +consciousness, his first outstanding memory of his father and the farm. + +Inheriting a splendid physique from both parents, at six little Bill was +as tall as the average child of eight, well set up and sturdy, afraid +of nothing on the place except Martin, who, resenting his attitude, not +unreasonably put the blame for it on his wife. "It's not what I do to +him," he told her, "it's what you teach him to think I might do that +makes him dislike me." To which Rose looked volumes, but made no reply. + +Whatever the reason for the child's distrust, and honestly as he tried +not to let it affect his feeling for his son, Martin found himself as +much repelled by it as he had once been drawn to little Rose by her +sweet faith and affection. Yet, in spite of the only too slightly +veiled enmity between them, he was rather proud of the handsome lad +and determined to give him a thorough stockman's and agriculturist's +training. Some day he would run this farm, and Martin had put too much +of his very blood into it not to make sure that the hands into which it +would fall became competent. With almost impersonal approval he noticed +the perfect co-ordination of the boy's muscles, his insatiable curiosity +about machinery and his fondness for animals; all of which only made his +pronounced distaste for work just that much more aggravating. He was, +his father decided contemptuously, a dreamer. + +Martin reached this conclusion early in his son's life--Bill was +nine--and he determined to grind the objectionable tendency out of him. +The youngster had a way of stopping for no reason whatever and just +standing there. For all his iron self-control, it nearly drove the +energetic man to violence. He would leave Bill in the barn to shovel +the manure into the litter-carrier--a good fifteen-minute job; he would +return in half an hour to find him sitting in the alleyway, staring down +into his idle scoop. + +"God Almighty!" Martin would explode. "How many times must I tell you to +do a thing?" + +The boy would look up slowly, like a frightened colt, expecting a blow, +his non-resistance as angering as his indolence. Gazing at the enormous, +imposing person who was his father, he would simply wait with wide open +eyes--eyes that reminded Martin of a calf begging for a bucket of milk. + +"I'm asking you! Answer when I speak. Have you lost the use of your +tongue? What are you, anyway--a lump of jelly? Didn't I tell you to +clean this barn? It's fly time and no wonder the cows suffer and slack +up on their milk when there is a lazy bones like you around who won't +even help haul away the manure." + +"I was just a-goin' to." + +"You should have been through long ago. What are you good for, is what +I'd like to find out. You eat a big bellyful and what do you give in +return? Do you expect to go through the world like this--having other +people do your work for you? If this job isn't finished in fifteen +minutes, I'll whip you." + +Bill would work swiftly and painfully, for the carrier was high and +hard for him to manipulate. But he would do his best, desperate over the +threat, his whole nature rebelling, not so much at the task, as at the +interruption of the pleasant stream of pictures which had been flowing +so excitingly through his mind. Always it was like this--just when he +was most blissfully happy, he was jerked back to some mean, dirty job by +the stern, driving demands of his tireless father. + +Without regard to the fact that harness is heavy, and a horse's back +high, Martin would order him to hitch up. He was perfectly aware that +it was too much for the child, but lack of affection, and a vague, +extenuating belief that especially trying jobs developed one, made +him merciless. The boy frequently boiled with rage, but he was so +weaponless, so completely in his father's power--there was no escape +from this tyranny. He knew he could not live without him; even his +mother could not do that. His mother! What a sense of rest would +come over him when he sat in her capacious lap, his head on her soft +shoulder. With her cheek against his and her kind hand gently patting +the back of his still chubby one, something hard in him always melted +away. + +"Why do I love you so, mama," he asked once, "and hate papa so?" + +Mrs. Wade realized what was in his sore heart and hers ached for +him, but she answered quietly: "You mustn't hate anybody, dear. You +shouldn't." + +"I don't hate anybody but him. I hate him and I'm afraid of him--just +like you are." + +"Oh, Billy," cried Rose, shocked to the quick. "You must never, never +say I hate your father--when you're older you'll understand. He is a +wonderful man." + +"He's mean," said Billy succinctly. "When I get big I'm going to run +away." + +"From me? Oh, darling, don't think such thoughts. Papa doesn't intend +to be mean. He just doesn't know what fun it is to play. You see, dear, +when he was a boy like you, he had to work, oh, ever and ever so +much more than you do--yes, he did," she nodded solemnly at Bill's +incredulous stare. "And his mother never talked with him or held him +close as I do you. She didn't have time. Aunt Nellie has told me all +about it. He just worked and worked and worked--they all did. That's +all there was in their life--just work. Why, when he was your age, his +father was at war and papa and Grandmother Wade had to do everything. +He did a man's share at fourteen and by the time he was fifteen, he ran +this whole farm. Work has gotten to be a habit with him and it's made +him different from a great many people. But he thinks that is why he's +gone ahead and so he's trying to raise you the same way. If he really +didn't care about you, Billy, it wouldn't bother him what you did." + +In the silence that fell they could hear old Molly bellowing with +pathetic monotony for her calf that had been taken from her. Yesterday +she had been so proud, so happy. She had had such a hard time bringing +it into the world, too. Martin had been obliged to tie a rope to its +protruding legs and pull with all his strength. It didn't seem fair to +think that the trusting-eyed little fellow had been snatched from her so +soon, as if her pain had been an entirely negligible incident. Already, +after six short weeks, he was hanging, drawn and quartered, in one of +Fallon's meat-markets. + +"I hate this place!" burst out the boy passionately. "I hate it!" + +"All farms are cruel," agreed his mother quickly. "But I suppose they +have to be. People must have milk and they must have veal." + +At nine, though his fingers would become cramped and his wrists would +pain him, Bill had three cows to account for twice a day. At five in the +morning, he would be shaken by Martin and told to hurry up. It would be +dark when he stepped out into the chill air, and he would draw back with +a shiver. Somewhere on these six hundred acres was the herd and it was +his chore to find it and bring it in. He would go struggling through the +pasture, unable to see twenty-five feet ahead of him, the cold dew or +snow soaking through his overalls, his shoes becoming wet. Often he +would go a mile north only to have to wander to another end of the farm +before he located them. Other times, when he was lucky, they would be +waiting within a hundred yards of the barn. Oh, how precious the warm +bed was, and how his growing body craved a few more hours of sleep! He +had a trick of pulling the sheet up over his head, as if thus he could +shut out the world, but always his father was there to rout him out from +this nest and set him none too gently on his feet; always there was a +herd to be brought in and udders to be emptied. It made no difference to +Martin that the daily walk to and from the district school was long, +and left no spare time; it made no difference that the long hours at his +lessons left the boy longing for play--always there was the herd, twice +a day, cows and cows without end. + +At twelve, Bill was plowing behind four heavy horses. He could run a +mower, and clean a pasture of weeds in a day. He could cultivate and +handle the manure spreader. In the hot, blazing sun, he could shock +wheat behind Martin, who sat on the binder and cut the beautiful swaying +gold. There wasn't a thing he could not do, but there was not one that +he did with a willing heart. His dreams were all of escape from this +grinding, harsh farm. It seemed to him that it was as ruthless as his +father; that everything it demanded of him was, at best, just a little +beyond his strength. If there was a lever to be pulled on the disk, very +likely it was rusted and refused to give unless he yanked until he was +short of breath and his heart beat fast; four horses were so unruly and +hard to keep in place; the gates were all so heavy--they were not easy +to lift and then drag open. It was such a bitter struggle every step of +the way. It was so hard to plow as deeply as he was commanded. It was so +wearing to make the seed bed smooth enough to measure up to his father's +standard. Never was there a person who saw less to love about a farm +than this son of Martin's. He even ceased to take any interest in the +little colts. + +"You used to be foolish about them," Martin taunted, "cried whenever I +broke one." + +"If I don't get to liking 'em, I don't care what happens to em," Bill +answered with his father's own laconicism. + +This chicken-heartedness, as he dubbed it, disgusted Martin, who +consequently took a satisfaction in compelling the boy to assist him +actively whenever there were cattle to be dehorned, wire rings to be +pushed through bunches of pigs' snouts, calves to be delivered by +force, young stuff to be castrated or butchering to be done. Often +the sensitive lad's nerves were strained to the breaking point by the +inhuman torture he was constantly forced to inflict upon creatures that +had learned to trust him. There was a period when it seemed to him every +hour brought new horrors; with each one, his determination strengthened +to free himself as soon as possible from this life that was one round of +toil and brutality. + +Rose gave him all the sympathy and help her great heart knew. His +rebellion had been her own, but she had allowed it to be ground out of +her, with her soul now in complete surrender. And here was her boy going +through it all over again, for himself, learning the dull religion of +toil from one of its most fanatical priests. What if Bill, too, should +finally have acquiescence to Martin rubbed into his very marrow, should +absorb his father's point of view, grow up and run, with mechanical +obedience, the farm he abhorred? The very possibility made her shudder. +If only she could rescue him in some manner, help him to break free +from this bondage. College--that would be the open avenue. Martin would +insist upon an agricultural course, but she would use all her tact and +rally all her powers that Billy might be given the opportunity to fit +himself for some congenial occupation. Martin might even die, and if she +were to have the farm to sell and the interest from the investments to +live on, how happy she could be with this son of hers, so like her in +temperament. She caught herself up sharply. Well, it was Martin himself +who was driving her to such thoughts. + +"You are like old Dorcas," she once told her husband, driven desperate +by the exhausted, harrowed look that was becoming habitual in Bill's +face. "You're trampling down your own flesh and blood, that's what +you're doing--eating the heart out of your own boy." + +"Go right on," retorted Martin, all his loneliness finding vent in his +bitter sneer, "tell that to Bill. You've turned him against me from the +day he was born. A fine chance I've ever had with my son!" + + + + +VI. DUST IN HIS EYES + +SUCH was the relationship of the Wades when one morning the mail brought +them a letter from Sharon, Illinois. Rose wrote that she was miserably +unhappy with her step-mother. Could she live with them until she found +a job? She had been to business college and was a dandy stenographer. +Maybe Uncle Martin could help her get located in Fallon. + +"Of course I will, if she's got her head set on working," was his +comment. "I'll telegraph her to come right along. Might as well wire the +fare, too, while I'm about it and tell her to let us know exactly when +she can get here." + +Mrs. Wade looked up quickly at this unusual generosity, yet she was, she +realized, more startled than surprised. For had not little Rose been +the one creature Martin had loved and to whom he had enjoyed giving +pleasure? It had been charming--the response of the big, aloof man to +the merry child of seven, but that child was now a woman, and, in +all probability, a beautiful one. Wasn't there danger of far more +complicated emotions which might prove even uprooting in their +consequences? Mrs. Wade blushed. Really, she chided herself sternly, she +wouldn't have believed she could be such an old goose--going out of her +way to borrow trouble. If her husband was moved to be hospitable, she +ought to be wholly glad, not petty enough to resent it. She would put +such thoughts out of her mind, indeed she would, and welcome Rose as +she would have wanted Norah to have welcomed Bill, had the circumstances +been reversed. It would be lovely to have the girl about--she would be +so much company, and the atmosphere of light-hearted youth which she +would bring with her would be just what Billy needed. By the time +Rose's answer came, saying she would arrive in two weeks, her aunt was +genuinely enthusiastic. + +"I wonder," said Martin, "if we could build on an extra room by then. +If she's going to make this her home, she can't be crowded as if she was +just here for a short visit. I'll hunt up Fletcher this afternoon." + +Mrs. Wade's lips shut tight, as she grappled with an altogether new +kind of jealousy. To think that Martin should delight in giving to an +outsider a pleasure he had persistently denied his own son. How often +had she pleaded: "It's a shame to make Billy sleep in the parlor! A +boy ought to have one spot to himself where he can keep his own little +treasures." But always she had been met with a plausible excuse or a +direct refusal. "I suppose I ought to be thankful someone can strike an +unselfish chord in him," she thought, wearily. + +"You'll have to get some furniture," Martin continued placidly. +"Mahogany's the thing nowadays." + +"It's fearfully expensive," she murmured. + +"Oh, I don't know. Might as well get something good while we're buying. +And while you're at it, pick out some of those curtains that have +flowers and birds on 'em and a pretty rug or two. I'll have Fletcher put +down hard oak flooring; and I guess it won't make much more of a mess if +we go ahead and connect up the house with the rest of the Delco system." + +"It's about time," put in Bill, who had been listening round-eyed, until +now actually more than half believing his father to be in cynical jest. +"We're known all over the county as the place that has electric lights +in the barns and lamps in the house." + +"It hasn't been convenient to do it before," was the crisp answer. + +Bill and his mother exchanged expressive glances. When was anything ever +convenient for Martin Wade unless he were to derive a direct, personal +satisfaction from it! Then it became a horse of quite another color. He +could even become lavish; everything must be of the best; nothing else +would do; no expense, as long as full value was received, was too great. +Mrs. Wade found herself searching her memory. She was positive that not +since those occasions upon which he had brought home the sacks of candy +for the sheer sunshine of watching little Rose's glee had anyone's +pleasure been of enough importance to him to become his own. All this +present concern for her comfort talked far more plainly than words. + +This time, Mrs. Wade admitted bravely to herself that her jealousy was +not for Billy. It would have been far easier for her if she had known +that Martin was thinking of their coming guest as he had last seen her +thirteen years before. He realized, thoroughly, that she must have grown +up, but before his mental eyes there still danced the roguish little +girl he had held so tenderly in his arms and had so longed to protect +and cherish. + +He experienced a distinct sense of shock, therefore, when, tall, slender +and smartly dressed, Rose stepped off the train and, throwing her arms +impulsively around his neck, gave him an affectionate kiss. The feel of +those soft, warm lips lingered strangely, setting his heart to pounding +as he guided her down the platform. + +"Uncle Martin, you haven't changed a bit!" she exclaimed joyously. "I +was wondering if I'd recognise you--imagine! Somehow, I thought thirteen +years would make a lot of difference, but you don't look a day older." + +"You little blarney," he smiled, pleased nevertheless. "Well, here we +are," and he stopped before his fine Cadillac. + +"Oh, Uncle Martin," gasped Rose ecstatically. "What a perfectly gorgeous +car! I thought all farmers were supposed to have Fords." + +They laughed happily together. + +"It's the best in these parts," he admitted complacently. + +"It's too wonderful to think that it is really yours. Oh, Uncle Martin, +do you suppose you could ever teach me to drive it?" + +"It takes a good deal of strength to shift the gears, but you can have a +try at it anyway, tomorrow." + +"Oh-h-h!" she exulted, slipping naturally into their old comradeship. + +Martin took her elbow as he helped her into the car. The firm young +flesh felt good--it was hard to let go. His thumb and under finger had +pressed the muscles slightly and they had moved under his touch. His +hand trembled a bit. The grace with which she stepped up gave him +another thrill. He was struck with her trim pump, and the several +inches of silk stocking that flashed before his eyes, so unaccustomed +to noticing dainty details, gave him a mingled sensation of delight +and embarrassment. It had been many a day, many a year, since he had +consciously observed his wife. She was too useful for him to permit +himself to be influenced by questions of beauty into underrating her +value, and he was a respectable husband, if not a kind one. They had +jogged on so long together that he would have said he had ceased to +be conscious of her appearance. But suddenly he felt that he could not +continue to endure, for another day, the sight of the spreading, flat +house-slippers which, because of her two hundred and forty pounds and +frequently rheumatic feet, she wore about her work. Moreover, it was +forcibly borne in upon him just what a source of irritation they had +been. And they were only as a drop in the bucket! Well, such thoughts +did no one any good. Thank heaven, from now on he would have Rose to +look at. + +They settled down beside each other in the front seat and he was aware +that her lovely eyes, so violet-blue and ivory-white, were studying him +admiringly. Here was a man, she was deciding, who for his age was the +physical superior of any she had ever met. He was clearly one of those +whom toil did not bend, and while, she concluded further, he might be +taken for all of his fifty-four years it would be simply because of his +austere manner. + +Martin sustained her scrutiny until they were well out of Fallon and +speeding along on a good level road. Then with a teasing "turn +about's fair play," he, too, took a frank look, oddly stirred by the +sophisticated touches which added so subtly to her natural beauty. From +her soft, thick brown hair done up cleverly in the latest mode and her +narrow eyebrows arched, oh, so carefully, and penciled with such skill, +to that same trim provocative pump and disconcerting flash of +silk-clad ankle, Rose had dash. Hers was that gift of style which is as +unmistakable as the gift of song and which, like it, is sometimes to be +found unexpectedly in any village or small town. + +Martin drank in every detail wonderingly, with a kind of awe. All his +life, it seemed to him, for the last thirteen years positively, he had +known that somewhere there must be just such a woman whose radiance +would set his heart beating with the rapture of this moment and whose +moods would blend so easily with his own that she would seem like a very +part of himself. And here she was, come true, sitting right beside him +in his own car. For the first time in his whole life, Martin understood +the meaning of the word happiness. It gripped and shook him and made his +heart ache with a delicious pain. + +"It's hard to believe," he murmured, "such a very small girl went away +and such a very grown up little woman has come back. Let's see--twenty +is it? My, you make me feel old--but you say I haven't changed much." + +"You haven't. A little bit of gray, a number of tiny wrinkles about your +eyes"--the tips of two dainty fingers touched them lightly--"and you're +a bit thinner--that's all. Why you look so good to me, Uncle Martin, I +could fall in love with you myself, if you weren't auntie's husband." + +It was an innocent remark, and he understood it as such, but its effect +on him was dynamic. + +"You always were as pretty as a picture," he said slowly, his nerves +tingling, "if a farmer's opinion is worth anything in that line." + +This was twaddle, of course, and Martin knew it. Rather it was the +city person's point of view he was inclined to belittle. He had the +confidence in his superiority that comes from complete economic security +and his pride of place was even more deeply rooted. Men of Martin's +class who are able to gaze, in at least one direction, as far as eye can +see over their own land, are shrewd, sharp, intelligent, and far better +informed on current events and phases of thought than the people of +commercial centers even imagine. There is nothing of the peasant about +them. Martin knew quite well that dressed in his best clothes and put +among a crowd of strange business men he would be taken for one of their +own--so easy was his bearing, so naturally correct his speech. + +Something of all this had already registered in Rose's mind. "Come on, +Uncle Martin," she laughed, "flatter me. I just love it!" + +"Very well, then, I'll say that you've come back as pretty a little +woman as ever I've laid eyes on." + +"Is that all? Oh, Uncle Martin, just pretty? The boys usually say I'm +beautiful." + +"You are beautiful--as beautiful as a rose. That's what you are, a red, +red rose of Sharon--with your dove's eyes, your little white teeth +like a flock of even sheep and your sweet, pretty lips like a thread of +scarlet." + +"Why, Uncle Martin!" exclaimed the girl, a trifle puzzled by the +intensity of his quiet tone, and stressing their relationship ever so +lightly. "You're almost a poet." + +"You mean old King Solomon was," he retrieved himself quickly. "Don't +you ever read the Bible?" + +"I didn't know you did!" + +"Oh, your old Uncle reads a little of everything," he returned with +a reassuring commonplaceness of manner. He was thunderstruck at his +outburst. Never had he had occasion to talk in that vein. He remembered +how blunt he had been with the older Rose twenty years before--how he +had jumped to the point at the start and landed safely; clinched his +wooing, as he had since realized, by calling her his Rose of Sharon, and +now he was saying the same thing over again, but, oh, how differently. +If only he were thirty-four today, and unmarried! + +"You always were the most wonderful person," beamed Rose, completely at +her ease once more, "I used to simply adore you, and I'm beginning to +adore you again." + +"That's because you don't know what a glum old grouch I really am." + +"You--a grouch? Oh, Uncle Martin!" Her merry, infectious laugh left no +doubt of how ridiculous such a notion seemed. + +"Oh, yes; I am." + +"Nonsense. You'll have to prove it to me." + +"Ask your aunt or Bill; they'll tell you." The acrimony in his tone did +not escape her. + +"Then they'll have to prove it to me," she corrected, her gaiety now +a trifle forced. Aunt Rose never had appreciated him, was her quick +thought. Even as a child she had sensed that. + +"How are they?" she added quickly. "Bill must be a great boy by this +time." + +"Only a few inches shorter than I am," Martin answered indifferently. +"He's one of the kind who get their growth early--by the time he's +fifteen he'll be six feet." + +"I'm crazy to see them." + +"Well, there's your aunt now," he resumed drily as they drew up before +the little house that contrasted so conspicuously with the fine brick +silos and imposing barns. Gleaming with windows, they loomed out of the +twilight, reminding one, in their slate-colored paint, of magnificent +battleships. + +The bright glare of the auto picked Mrs. Wade out for them as +mercilessly as a searchlight. Where she had been stout thirteen years +before, she was now frankly fat. Four keen eyes noted the soft, cushiony +double chin, the heavy breasts, ample stomach, spreading hips, and thick +shoulders, rounded from many years of bending over her kitchen table. +Kansas wind, Kansas well-water and Kansas sun had played their usual +havoc, giving her skin the dull sand color so common in the Sunflower +State. She had come from her cooking and she was hot, beads of sweat +trickling from the deep folds of her neck. Withal, there was something +so comfortable and motherly about her, the kind, wise eyes behind the +gold-rimmed glasses were so misty with welcome and unspoken thoughts of +the dear mother Rose had lost, that the girl went out to her sincerely +even as she marvelled that the same years on the same farm which had +given one person added polish and had made him even more good looking +than ever, could have changed another so completely and turned her +into such a toil-scarred, frumpy, oldish woman. Why, when she had been +talking with Uncle Martin he had seemed no older than herself--well, +not quite that, of course, but she had just forgotten about his age +altogether--until she saw Aunt Rose. No wonder whenever he spoke of his +wife every intonation told how little he loved her. How could he care +any more--that way? + +Rose's first look of astonishment and her darting glance in his own +direction were not lost on Martin. With an imperceptible smile, he +accepted the unintended compliment, but he felt a pang when he noticed +that to her Aunt went the same affectionate, impetuous embrace that she +had given to him at the station. + +"You're losing your head," he told himself sternly, driving into the +garage, where, stopping his engine, he continued to sit motionless +at the wheel. "That ought to be a lesson to you; she's just naturally +warm-hearted and loving. Always was. You're no more to her than anybody +else. Well, there's no fool like an old fool." Yet, deeper than his +admitted thought was the positive conviction that already something was +up between them. If not, why this excitement and wild happiness? To be +sure, nothing had been said--really. It had all been so light. Rose was +just a bit of a born flirt. But he, having laughed at love all his life, +loved her deeply, desperately. Well, so much the worse for himself--it +couldn't lead anywhere. Yet in spite of all his logic he knew that +something was going to happen. Hang it all--just what? He was afraid to +answer his own question; not because of any dread of what his wife might +do--he was conscious only of a new, cold, impersonal hatred toward her +because she stood between him and his Rose; nor was it qualms about his +ability to win the girl's heart. Already, despite his inexperience with +love technique, he was, in some mysterious manner, making progress. The +community--his position in it? This was food for thought certainly, but +it was not what worried him. Then why this feeling of dismay when he +wanted to be only glad? + +The question was still unanswered when he finally left the garage. With +all his powers of introspection, he had not yet fathomed the fact that +it was a fear of his own, until now utterly unsuspected, capacity for +recklessness. Heretofore, he had been able to count on the certainty +that his best judgment would govern all his actions. Now, he felt +himself clutching, almost frantically, at the hard sense of proportion +that never before had so much as threatened to desert him. He went +about his chores in a grave, automatic way, absorbed in anything but +agriculture. Hardly ever did he pass through his barn without paying +homage to his own progressiveness and oozing approval of the mechanical +milker, driven by his own electrical dynamo, the James Way stanchions +with electric lights above, the individual drinking fountains at the +head of each cow, the cork-brick floors, the scrupulously white-washed +walls, and the absence of odor, with the one exception of sweet, +fermented silage. But, tonight, he was not seeing these symbols of +material superiority. Instead he was thinking of a girl with eyes as +soft as a dove's, lips like a thread of scarlet and small white teeth as +even as a flock of his own Shropshire sheep. What else did that old King +Solomon say? God Almighty, he thought, there was a man who understood! +He'd try to get a chance to reread that Song of Songs that was breaking +his own heart with its joy and its sadness. + +His reverie was broken abruptly by the jangling supper-bell. When he +reached the back door Bill was already at the table and Rose, in a +simple gown that brought out the appealing lines of her slim young body, +was deftly helping his wife in the final dishing up. As Martin stood +a moment, looking in at the bright scene and listening to the happy +chatter, he heard her ask if he had got her a job. At sight of him +she cried excitedly: "Oh, Uncle Martin! You can't think how I adore my +beautiful room! And Bill says it was you who first thought of building +it for me. You old darling! You and Aunt Rose are the best people in the +whole wide world. How can I ever thank you?" + +"I'll tell you," he smiled, "forget all about that job and just stay +around here and make us all young. Time enough to work when you have +to." + +Mrs. Wade noticed how Bill's eyes widened at these words, so unlike +his father, and soon she was acutely aware of her husband's marked +agreeableness whenever he directed his conversation toward Rose. He even +tried to include his son and herself in this new atmosphere, but +with each remark in their direction his manner changed subtly. Toward +herself, in particular, his feelings were too deep for him to succeed in +belying them. + +As the meal progressed, she realized that her dim forebodings were fast +materializing into a certain danger. Unless she acted promptly this slip +of a girl was going to affect, fundamentally, all their lives. Already, +it seemed as though she had been amongst them a long time and had +colored the future of them all. Mrs. Wade understood far better than her +husband would have supposed that, in his own way, his married life had +been as starved as her own; oh, far more so, for she had her boy. And +while it was not at all likely, it was not wholly impossible that he +might seek a readjustment. It seemed far-fetched for her to sit thus and +feel that drama was entering their hard lives when nothing had really +happened, but nevertheless--she knew. As, outwardly so calm, she +speculated with tumbled thoughts on how it might end, she tried to +analyze why it was that the prospect of a shake-up filled her with such +a sense of disaster. Surely, it was not because of any reluctance to +separate from Martin. Her life would be far easier if they went their +own ways. With Bill, she could make a home anywhere, one that was far +more real, in a house from which broken promises did not sound as from a +trumpet. Ashes of resentment still smouldered against Martin because of +that failure of his to play fair. She recalled the years during which +she had helped him to earn with never an unexpected pleasure; reflected +with bitterness that never, since they had cast their lives together, +had he urged her to indulge in any sweet little extravagance, though he +had denied himself nothing that he really wished. It was no riddle to +her, as it had been to her niece earlier in the evening, why the same +hard work had dealt so benignly with Martin and so uncharitably with +herself. She comprehended only too well that it was not that alone which +had crushed her. It was his ceaseless domination over her, the utter +subjugation of her will, her complete lack of freedom. She glanced +across the table at him, astounded by his hearty laugh in response to +one of Rose's sallies. It seemed incredible that it could be really +Martin's. It had such a ring and came out so easily as if he were more +inclined to merriment than to silence. Usually, he seemed made of long +strips of thin steel, but under the inspiration of Rose's presence he +had become animated, brisk, interesting. No wonder she was being drawn +to him. + +It was as if he had withheld from his wife a secret alchemy that had +kept him handsome and attractive, as compelling as when he had come in +search of herself so long ago. And now that the last vestige of her own +bloom was gone, he was laughing at her, inwardly, as a cunning person +does who plays a malicious trick on a simpler, more trusting, soul. Only +it had taken twenty years to spring the point of this one. Hatred welled +in her heart; a sad, weary hatred that knew no tears. She wished that +she might hurt him as he had hurt her. Yet, with her usual honesty, she +presently admitted how easy it would be for this malevolence to melt +away--a word, a look, a gesture from Martin and the heart in her +would flood with forgiveness; but the look did not come, the word was +unuttered. + +He was squandering, she continued to observe, sufficient evidence of his +interest at the feet of this child who never would have missed it, while +she, herself, who could have lifted mountains from her breast with +one tenth of this appreciation, was left, as she always had been left, +without the love her being craved, the love of a mate, rising full and +strong to meet her own. It was a yearning that the most cherished of +children could never satisfy and as she watched Martin and Rose her +position seemed to her to be that of a hungry pauper, brought to the +table of a rich gourmand, there to look on helplessly while the other +toyed carelessly with the precious morsels of which she was in such +extreme need. And what rankled was that these thoughts were futile, that +too much water had run under the bridge, that it was her lot in Martin's +life merely to accept what was offered her. She knew that the marks of +her many hours of suppressed anguish, thousands of days of toil and long +series of disappointments were thick upon her. She realized, too, how +ironical it was that with all her work she should have grown to be so +ungainly although Martin retained the old magnetism of his gorgeous +physique. There was no doubt that if he chose, he could still hold a +woman's devotion. Yes, for him there was an open road from this gray +monotony, if he had the will and the courage to escape. + +Suddenly, she found herself wondering what effect all this would have +on Bill. She stole a surreptitious glance at him, but he, too, seemed to +have been caught up by Rose's gay, good humor. Mrs. Wade sighed as she +remembered how everyone had flocked around Norah. Rose had inherited her +mother's charm. Such women were a race apart. They could no more be +held responsible for trying to please than a flower for exhaling its +fragrance. At what a lovely moment of life she was! Small wonder that +Martin was captivated, but not even the shadow of harm must fall on that +fresh young spirit while she was under their roof. If things went much +further she would have it out with him. And this decision reached, Mrs. +Wade felt her usual composure gradually return, nor did it again desert +her during the long evening through which it seemed to her as if her +husband must be some stranger. + + + + +VII. MARTIN BATTLES WITH DUST + +THE human animal is a strange spectacle to behold, let alone comprehend. +Not infrequently he goes along for years developing a state of mind, a +consistent attitude, and then having got it thoroughly established does +something in distinct contradiction to it. Martin had never cared for +music, but when one evening, a little more than a week after Rose's +arrival, she suggested, with a laughing lilt, her fondness for it, he +agreed that he had missed it in his home and, to Bill's and Mrs. Wade's +unbelieving surprise, dwelt at length upon his enjoyment of Fallon's +band and his longing to blow a cornet. A little later, finding an excuse +to leave, he drove into town on a mission so foreign to his iron-clad +character that it seemed to cry against his every instinct, but which, +for all that, he did with such simplicity as to indicate that it was the +most natural step imaginable. He actually bought a two-hundred-dollar +mahogany Victrola and an assortment of records, bringing both home with +him in his car and, assisted eagerly by Bill, carrying them into the +front room with an air that said it was a purchase he had been intending +to make for a long time. Rose rewarded him with her bubbling delight +and her aunt noticed with an odd constriction about her heart how Bill +revelled at last in the new treasure, until now so hopelessly coveted. +Martin had never shone to better advantage than this evening as he +helped select and put on different pieces, lending himself to the mood +of each. It was while a foot-stirring dance was on that Rose asked +suddenly: + +"Oh, Uncle Martin, do you know how?" + +He shook his head. "You'll have to teach me to square up for learning to +drive the car." + +"That's a bargain; and I'll teach Bill too," she added with native tact. +But Mrs. Wade, ill at ease in her own parlor, caught the afterthought +quality of Rose's tone. There was no question but that it was for Martin +she sparkled, sweet and spontaneous as she was. Decidedly, the time had +come when definite action should not be delayed. + +It was nearly twelve o'clock when they finally broke up and husband and +wife found themselves alone in their own room. As they undressed, Mrs. +Wade acted nervously, confused as to how to begin, while Martin whistled +lightly and kept time by a slight bobbing of his head. She shot a +meaning look in his direction. + +"You seem happy, don't you?" + +He stopped whistling instantly and assumed his more normal look of set +sternness. This was the man she knew and she preferred him that way, +rather than buoyant because of some other woman, even though that other +was as lovable and innocent of any deliberate mischief as her niece. Not +that she was jealous so much as she was hurt. When a woman has fortified +herself, after years of the existence to which Mrs. Wade had submitted, +with the final conviction that undoubtedly her husband's is a nature +that cannot be other than it is, and then learns there are emotional +potentialities not yet plumbed, not to mention a capacity for pleasant +comradeship of which he has never vouchsafed her an inkling, she finds +herself being ground between the millstones of an aching admission of +her own deficiencies and a tattered, but rebellious, pride. + +Martin, when her remark concerning his apparent happiness had +registered, let his answer be a sober inspection of the garment he had +just removed. + +"I don't suppose you can talk to me now after such a strenuous evening," +she went on more emphatically. And as he maintained his silence, she +continued with: "Oh, don't think I'm blind, Martin Wade. I know exactly +how far this has gone and I know how far it can go." + +"What are you driving at?" + +"You know perfectly well what I mean--the way you are behaving toward +Rose." + +"Are you trying to imply that I'm carrying on with her?" + +"I certainly am. I'm not angry, Martin. I never was calmer than I am +right now, and I don't intend to say things just for the sake of saying +them. I only want you to know that I have eyes, and that I don't want to +be made a fool of." + +To her surprise, Martin came over to her and, looking at her steadily, +returned with amazing candidness: "I'm not going to lie to you. You're +perfectly welcome to know what's in my mind. I love her with every +beat of my heart--she has brought something new into my life, something +sacred--you've always thought I cared for nothing but work, that all I +lived for was to plan and scheme how to make money. Haven't you? I don't +blame you. It's what I've always believed, but tonight I've learned +something." Mrs. Wade could see his blood quicken. "She has been in this +house only a few days and already I am alive with a new fire. It +seems as if these hours are the only ones in which I have ever really +lived--nothing else matters. Nothing! If there could be the slightest +chance of my winning her love, of making her feel as I am feeling now, +I'd build my world over again even if I had to tear all of the old +one down." Martin was now talking to himself, oblivious to his wife's +presence, indifferent to her. "Happiness is waiting for me with her, +with my little flower." + +"Your Rose of Sharon?" Her tone was biting. + +"If only I could say that! My Rose of Sharon!" It seemed to Mrs. Wade +that the very room quivered with his low cry that was almost a groan. "I +know what you're thinking," he went on, "but you know I have never loved +you. You knew it when I married you, you must have." The twisting +agony of it--that he could make capital out of the very crux of all her +suffering. "I have never deceived you and I never intend to. My life +with you hasn't been a Song of Solomon, but I'm not complaining." + +"You're not complaining! I hope I won't start complaining, Martin." + +"Well, now you know how I feel. I'll go on with the present arrangement +between us, but I'm playing square with you--it's because there's no +hope for me. If I thought she cared for me, I would go to her, right +now, tonight, and pour out my heart to her, wife or no wife. Oh, Rose, +have pity! It can't do you any harm if I drink a little joy--don't spoil +her faith in me! Don't frighten her away. I can't bear the thought of +her going out into the world to work. She's like a gentle little doe +feeding on lilies--she doesn't dream of the pitfalls ahead of her. And +she will never know--she doesn't even suspect how I feel towards her. +She will meet some young fellow in town and marry. I'm too old for +her--but Rose, you don't understand what it means to me to have her in +the same house, to know that she is sleeping so near, so beautiful, so +ready for love; that when I wake up tomorrow she will still be here." + +Disarmed and partly appeased by the frankness of his confession, Mrs. +Wade sat silently taking in each word, studying him with wet eyes, her +lips almost blue, her breath a little short. The fire in his voice, the +reality of his strange, terrible love, the eyes that gazed so sadly and +so unexpectantly into space, the hands that seemed to have shed their +weight of toil and clutched, too late, for the bright flowers of +happiness--all filled her with compassion. Never had he looked so +splendid. He seemed, in casting off his thongs, to have taken on some of +the Herculean quality of his own magnificent gesture. It was as if their +barnyard well had burst into a mighty, high-shooting geyser. To her +dying day would she remember that surge of passion. To have met it with +anger would have been of as little avail as the stamp of a protesting +foot before the tremors of an earthquake. + +She offered him the comforting directness which she might have given +Bill. "I didn't know you felt so deeply, Martin. Life plays us all +tricks; it's played many with me, and it's playing one of its meanest +with you, for whatever happens you are going to suffer--far more than I +am. You can believe it or not, but I'm sorry." + +Martin felt oddly grateful to her; he had not expected this sense of +understanding. She might have burst into wild tears. Instead, she was +pitying him. More possessed of his usual immobility, he remarked: + +"I must be a fool, a great, pathetic fool. I look into a girl's eyes and +immediately see visions. I say a few words to her and she is kind enough +to say a few to me and I see pictures of new happiness. I should have +more sense. I don't know what is the matter with me." + +Although countless answers leaped to his wife's tongue she made none but +the cryptic: "Well, it's no use to discuss it any more tonight. We both +need rest." But all the while that she was undressing with her usual +sure, swift movements, and after she had finally slipped between the +sheets, her mind was racing. + +She was soon borne so completely out on the current of her own thoughts +that she forgot Martin's actual presence. She remembered as if it were +yesterday, the afternoon he came to the office and asked her to marry +him. She wondered anew, as she had wondered a thousand times, if +anything other than a wish for a housekeeper had prompted him. She +remembered her misgivings--how she had read into him qualities which she +had believed all these years were not there. But hadn't her intuition +been justified, after all, by the very man she had seen tonight? Yes, +her first feeling, that he was something finer, still in the rough, had +been correct. She had thought it was his shyness, his unaccustomedness +to women that had made him such a failure as a lover--and all the while +it had been simply that she was not the right woman. When love touched +him, he became a veritable white light. + +All these years when he had been so cold, so hard toward her, it simply +was because he disliked her. She remembered the day she was hurt, and +the night her first baby came. Martin's brutality even now kindled in +her a dull blazing anger, and as she realized what depths of feeling +were in him, his callousness seemed intensified an hundred-fold. Well, +she was having her revenge. All his life he had thwarted her, stolen +from her, used her as one could not use even a hired hand, worked her +more as a slave-driver hurries his underlings that profits may mount; +now, by her mere existence, she was thwarting him. She saw him again as +he had flashed before her when he had talked of Rose and she admitted +bitterly to herself, what in her heart she had known all along--that if +Martin could have loved her, she could have worshipped him. Instead, +he had slowly smothered her, but she had at least a dignity in the +community. He should not harm that. If they were unhappy, at least no +one knew it. Her pride was her refuge. If that were violated she felt +life would hold no sanctuary, that her soul would be stripped naked +before the world. + +But why was she afraid? Didn't Martin have his own position to think of? +What if he had said nothing was to be compared to his new-found love +for Rose. What stupidity on his part not to realize that it was his very +position, power and money that commanded her respect. Did he command +anything else from her? Mrs. Wade reviewed the evening. Yes, response +had been in Rose's laugh, in every movement. Hadn't she always adored +Martin, even as a tiny girl? Hadn't there always been some mystic bond +between them? How she had envied them then. But if Martin were to go to +her with only his love? From the depths of her observations of people +she took comfort. He might stir his lovely Rose of Sharon to the +uttermost, had he been free he might have won her for his wife--but +would it be possible for fifty-four to hold the attention of twenty for +long if he had nothing but his love to offer? + +Such thoughts were hurrying through her heated mind as Martin slowly +laid himself beside her. He said nothing, but lost himself in a flood of +ceaseless ponderings. After stretching some of the tiredness out of his +throbbing muscles, he relaxed and lay quietly, trying to recall exactly +what he had said. Did his wife suspect that there might be no truth in +the remark that Rose would never know how he felt toward her? At moments +he felt that the girl already divined it, again he was not so sure. It +was hard to be certain, but the more he thought about it the more hope +he began to feel that she would yet be wholly his. Her admiration and +trust belonged to him now, but there might be moral scruples which he +would have to overcome. There would be the difficulty of convincing +her that she would be doing her aunt no wrong. She would gain courage, +however, from his own heedlessness. That same daring which he had just +shown with the older Rose and which had impressed her into silence would +eventually move his flower to him. He had thrown down the bars. Secrecy +was now out of the question and it was well that he was moving thus in +the open. Rose might shrink at first from the plain-spokenness of the +situation, but this phase would soon pass and then the fact that she +knew he was not hiding his love for her even from his wife would make +it far easier to press his suit and possibly to bring it to a swift +consummation. + +He must win her! He must. He had been mad to admit to himself, much less +to his Rag-weed, that there was any doubt of this outcome. It might take +a few more days, a week, not longer than that. But what should he do +when Rose gave the message to him? Could he go away with her? This +bothered him for a while. Of course, he would have to. He could not send +his wife away. The community would not tolerate this. Martin knew +his neighbors. He did not care a snap for their good opinion, but he +realized exactly how much they could hurt him if he violated their +prejudices beyond a certain point. Fortunately, there are millions of +communities in the world. This one would rise against him and denounce, +another would accept them as pleasant strangers. He might be taken for +Rose's father! He would fight this with tireless care. Yes, he would +have to go away. But his business interests--what about his farm, his +cattle, his machinery, his bank stock, his mortgages, his municipal +bonds? How wonderful it would be if he could go with her to the +station--his securities in a grip, his other possessions turned into a +bank draft! But this woman lying at his side--the law gave her such a +large share. + +Cataclysmic changes were taking place in the soul of Martin Wade. The +very thing which, without being able to name, he had dreaded a short +week ago in the garage, was hovering over him, casting its foreboding +shadow of material destruction. His whole system of values was being +upset. He felt an actual revulsion against property. What was it all +compared to his Rose? He would throw it at his wife's feet--his wife's +feet and Bill's. Let them take every penny of it--no, not every penny. +He would need a little--just a thousand or two to start with and then +the rest would come easily, for he knew how to make money. And how +liberal that would be. + +He could see himself as he would go forth with Rose, leaving behind the +woman he had never loved and all that he had toiled so many years +to amass. It seemed fair--the property for which he had lusted so +mercilessly left for the woman with whom he had lived so dully, left +as the ransom to be paid for his liberty. So he and his Rose of Sharon +would walk away--walk, because even the car would be surrendered--and he +would be free with the only woman for whom he had ever yearned. + +Would she be happy for long? His pride answered "yes," but against +his will he pictured himself being dumped ruthlessly into the pitiless +sixties while Rose still lingered in the glorious twenties. This was +a most unpleasant reflection and Martin preferred to dismiss it. That +belonged to tomorrow. He would wait until then to fight tomorrow's +battles. His mind came back to the property again. Wasn't it rather +impetuous to surrender all? Wouldn't it be unfair to Rose to be so +generous to his wife? She had Bill. In a few years he would be old +enough to run the farm. Until then, with his help and good hired hands, +she could do it herself. Why not leave it and the goods on it to her and +take the mortgages and bonds with him? Rose was joy. He could hold her +more securely with comforts added to his great love. Her happiness had +to be thought of, had to be protected. + +He could tell that his wife was still awake. He might begin to talk and +maybe they could arrange a settlement. But he was getting too tired for +a discussion that might invite tears and even a fit of hysterics, like +the one she had gone through before their first child came dead. He +could see her still as she looked that morning in the barn crying: +"You'll be punished for this some day--you will--you will. You don't +love me, but some time you will love some one. Then you'll understand +what it is to be treated like this--" It gave him the creeps now to +remember it. It was like one of those old incantations; almost like a +curse. What if some day his Rose should grow to be as indifferent, feel +as little tenderness toward him as he had felt toward his wife at that +moment. The pain of it made him break out into a fine sweat. But he +hadn't understood. What had he understood until this love had come into +his life! He would never do a thing as cruel as that now. Come to think +of it, the older Rose wasn't acting like a bad sort. But then, when it +came to a show-down she might not be so magnanimous as she had appeared +tonight. + +Mrs. Wade was still thinking. She also was measuring possibilities and +clairvoyantly sensing what was going on in her husband's mind. She, too, +was sure that Rose would capitulate to him. She felt a deep sympathy +for the girl. Martin had said it himself--he was too old for her. Her +happiness lay with youth. And yet, how could one be so certain? Love was +so illusive, so capricious! Did it really bow to the accident of years? +Had she, Rose Wade, the right to snatch from anyone's hands the most +precious gift of life? Wouldn't she have sold her very soul, at one +time, to have had Martin care for her like this? Oh, if the child were +wise she would not hesitate! She would drink her cup of joy while it +was held out to her brimming full. A strange conclusion for a staid +churchwoman like Mrs. Wade, but her rich humanity transcended all her +training. She wondered if there could be anything in the belief that +there was waiting somewhere for each soul just one other. There were +people, she knew, who thought that. Rose had drawn out all that was +finest in Martin--she had transformed him into a lover, and if she +wanted the man, himself, she could have him. But, decided his wife, he +could not take with him the things which her sweat and blood had helped +to create. She would give him a divorce, but her terms would be as +brutal as the Martin with whom she had lived these twenty years, and who +now took it for granted that she would let him do whatever he chose. +She was to be made to step aside, was she, with no weapon with which to +strike back and no armor with which to protect herself? Well, there +was one way she might hit him--one. She would strike him in his weakest +point--his belongings. Yes, Martin Wade might leave her but all his +property must be left behind--every cent of it. There should be a +contract to that effect; otherwise, she would fight as only a frenzied +woman can fight. + +The two of them, lying there side by side as quietly as if in death, +each considered the issue settled. She would let him go without his +property; Martin would leave with half of it. And through all the long +wordless controversy, their little Rose of Sharon, a few yards away, +slept as only a tired child can sleep. + + + + +VIII. THE DUST SMOTHERS + +WHEN Martin opened his eyes, next morning, he realized with a start that +he had overslept, which was a new experience for one whose life had been +devoted so consistently to hard toil; and he saw with a sharper start, +that his wife, who always got up about a half hour earlier than himself, +was not even yet awake. He wondered what had come over him that he +should have committed such a sin, and as his tired mind opened one of +its doors and let the confused impressions flutter out, he countenanced +a luxury as unusual as the impulse that had sent him townward the +evening before to bring home the Victrola. Instead of jumping out +hastily so that he might attend to his hungry, bellowing stock, he lay +quietly marshalling the new incidents of his life into a parade which he +ordered to march across the low ceiling. + +He could not comprehend what the tornado had been about. There had been +so little on which to base the excitement--so little that he was puzzled +as to what had caused the scene with his wife. And as he reflected, it +seemed highly unlikely to him that he would ever permit himself to do +anything that might jeopardize his whole life, topple over the structure +that decades of work had built. Why, it was scarcely less than suicidal +to let a stranger come into his heart and maybe weaken his position. +He remembered his last thought before falling asleep. It appeared +unutterably rash, though when hit upon, it had been a decision that +moderated a more extreme action. Now he realized that it was the +very acme of foolishness deliberately to sacrifice half his fortune, +especially the farm itself, to which he had given so many years of +complete concentration. Certainly, if Rose were ready to be his, he +might not hesitate even a second; but this flower was still to be won by +him, and this morning, aware of what scant grounds he had upon which +to venture any forecasts, he felt as full of doubt as he had been +of confidence last night. It had been a saddening experience, but +fortunate, for all that, inasmuch as nothing serious had come of it, +except that he was greatly sobered. Martin could not understand that +mysterious something which had risen up in his nature and threatened to +wreck a carefully-built life. It was his first meeting with the little +demon that rebels in a man after he thinks his character and his +reactions thoroughly established, and he shuddered as he realized how +close the strange imp had pulled him to the precipice. Yesterday, that +precipice had seemed a new paradise; now it was a yawning chasm--and he +drew back, frightened. + +Cows, horses, sheep, pigs, chickens, turkeys, dogs, barn cats--all do +not remain patient while the man who owns them lies in bed dreaming +dreams. They wait a while and then get nervous. The many messages for +food which they sent to Martin forced him to spring out of bed and hurry +to them, for nothing is as unbearably insistent as a barn and yard full +of living things clamoring their determination to have something to eat. +As Martin ran to stop the bedlam, he saw the world as an enormous, empty +stomach, at the opening of which he stood, hurling in the feed as fast +as his muscles would permit. It was all there was to farming--raising +crops and then shovelling the hay and the grain into these stomachs. +Martin stood back a few feet and with loving eyes watched his animals +enjoy their food. Here were the creatures he loved. The fine herd of +Holstein cows--their big eyes looked at him with such trust! And their +black and white markings--so spick and span with shininess because he +threw salt on them that each cow might lick the other clean--their heavy +milk veins, great udders, and backs as straight as a die--all appealed +to his sense of the beautiful. "God Almighty!" he thought, "but they're +wonders! There's none like them west of Chicago." The mule colts, so +huge and handsome, and oh, so knowing! made him chuckle his pride and +satisfaction in a muttered: "Man's creation, are you, you fine young +devils? Well, you're a credit, the lot of you, to whoever deserves it." +His eyes wandered over the rest of his stock, swept his wide realm. It +was all a very part of himself. Yes, here was his life--here was his +world. It would be the height of folly to leave it. + +At breakfast, his wife ate sullenly, refusing to be drawn into the +conversation, but by a wise compression of her lips and a flicker of +amusement in her eyes, which seemed to say: "Oh, if only you could see +how absurd you appear," she contrived very cleverly to render Martin +miserably self-conscious. Hampered by this new and unexpected feeling, +his attempts to be pleasant fell flat and he lapsed into his old +grimness, while Rose, eating quickly, confined her remarks to her +determination to go to town in search of a job. Had Martin not talked +as he had to his wife he would have been able, undoubtedly, to disregard +her and to continue the line of chatter which he had hit upon so happily +and which he had never suspected was in him. But the fact, not so much +that she knew, but that from this vantage point of knowledge she was +ridiculing him, was too much for even his self-possession. It made the +light banter impossible. Especially, as there was no doubt that Rose did +not seem anxious for it. + +For Martin had not been the only member of that household who had held +early communion with himself. The girl had sat long and dreamily at +her dressing table--the dainty one of rich, dark mahogany that Uncle +Martin's thoughtfulness had provided. It seemed unbelievable, but +there was no use pretending she was mistaken--Uncle Martin, Aunt Rose's +husband, was falling in love with her. She felt a little heady with the +excitement of it. He was so different from the callow youths and dapper +fellows who had heretofore worshipped at her shrine. There was something +so imposing, so important about him. She was conscious that a man so +much older might not appeal to many girls of her age, but it so happened +that he did appeal to her. She would be able to have everything she +wished, too--didn't she know how good, how kind, how tender he could +be. And her heart yearned toward him--he was so clearly misunderstood, +unhappy. But what about Aunt Rose? Well, then, why had she let herself +get to be so ugly? She looked as if the greases of her own kitchen stove +had cooked into her skin, thought the girl, mercilessly. Didn't she know +there was such a thing as a powder puff? Women like that brought their +own troubles upon themselves, that's what they did. And she was an old +prude, too. Anyone could see with half an eye that she didn't like the +idea of Uncle Martin learning to dance--why, she didn't even like his +getting the Victrola--when it was just what both he and Bill had been +wanting. But for all that she was her aunt, her own mother's sister and, +poor dear, she was a good soul. It would probably upset her awfully and +besides, oh well, it just wasn't right. + +Before her mirror Rose blushed furiously, quite ashamed of the light way +in which she had been leading Uncle Martin on. "But I haven't said one +solitary thing auntie couldn't have heard," she justified herself. +Oh, well, no harm had been done. But she mustn't stay here, that was +certain. She wouldn't say so, or hurt their feelings, for she wanted to +be on the best of terms with them always, but she would stop flirting +with Uncle Martin and just turn him back into a dear good friend. She +hoped she was clever enough to do that much. And the dark-brown curls +received a brushing that left no doubt of the vigor of her decisions. + +She insisted that she go to Fallon that morning. + +"I've been here eight whole days, Uncle Martin," she announced firmly, +"eight whole days and haven't tried to get a thing. It's terrible, isn't +it, Aunt Rose, how lazy I am. I'm going to have Bill take me in right +straight after breakfast." + +"If you're so set on it, I'll see about your position this afternoon," +conceded Martin reluctantly. "We'll drive in in the car." + +"Oh, Uncle Martin," she coaxed innocently, "let me try my luck alone +first. Bill can tell me who the different men are and if I know he's +waiting for me outside in the buggy, it will keep me from being scared." +And her young cousin, only too pleased with the proposed arrangement, +chimed in with: "That's the stuff, Rose. Folks have got to go it on +their own, to get anywhere." + +By evening she had a position in an insurance agent's office with wages +upon which she could live with fair decency. As it had rained all day +and her employer wanted her to begin the next morning, she had the best +possible excuse for renting a room in Fallon and asking Bill to ride +in horseback with some things which she would ask Aunt Rose, over the +telephone, to pack. It rained all the next day, too, and Sunday, when +she met Mrs. Wade and Bill at church, she told them she had some extra +typing she had promised to do by Monday. "No, auntie, this week it is +really and truly just impossible, but next week--honest and true!" +she insisted as the older woman seconded rather impersonally her son's +urgent invitation to chicken and noodles. + +Soon winter was upon them in good earnest, and Rose's visits "home," as +she always called it, were naturally infrequent. By Christmas time, she +was receiving attentions from Frank Mall, Nellie's second son, a young +farmer of twenty-five. + +To Mrs. Wade's everlasting credit, she never twitted Martin with this, +although she knew it from Rose's own lips, a month before he heard of +it through Bill. She was too grateful for their narrow escape to feel +vindictive and might have convinced herself they had merely endured a +bad nightmare if it had not been for the shiny Victrola; the sight of it +underscored the whole experience and she wished there were some way +to get rid of the thing, a wish that was echoed even more fervently by +Martin. In the evenings they would sit around the cleared supper table, +she doing odd jobs of mending, Martin reading, checking up the interest +dates on his mortgages or making entries in his account book, while Bill +at his books, would study to the accompaniment of record after record, +blissfully unconscious of what a thorn in the flesh he and his music +were to both his parents. + +It was all so unpleasant. To Mrs. Wade it brought up pictures. And it +made Martin feel sheepish--the way he had felt that afternoon, decades +ago, as he sat in the bakery eating a chocolate ice-cream soda and +watching her walk across the Square. He would have told Bill to quit +playing it--more than once the sharp words were on his tongue--but +memories of the enthusiasm he had evinced the night he brought it home +kept him silent. He was afraid of what the boy might say, afraid he +might put two and two together, so he let it stay, although with his +usual caution he had arranged for a trial and would have felt justified +in packing it back as soon as the roads had permitted. Illogically, he +felt it was all Bill's fault that he must endure this annoyance. + +That fall, the boy started to high school in Fallon, making the long +daily ride to and from town on horseback. He was a good pupil and the +hours he spent with his lessons were precious; they made the farm drift +away. To his mind, which was opening like a bud, it seemed that history +was the recorded romance of men who were everything but farmers. School +books told fascinating stories of conquerors, soldiers, inventors, +writers, engineers, kings, statesmen and orators. He would sit and dream +of the doers of great deeds. When he read of Alexander the Great, Bill +was he. He was Caesar and Napoleon, Washington and Lincoln, Grant and +Edison and Shakespeare. When railroads were built in the pages of his +American History, it was Bill, himself, no less, who was the presiding +genius. His imagination constructed and levelled, and rebuilt and +remade. + +One beautiful November afternoon, in his Junior year, at the sound of +the last bell, which usually found him cantering out of town, he went +instead to the school reading-room, and, sitting down calmly, opened his +book and slowly read. The clock ticked off the seconds he was stealing +from his father; counted the minutes that had never belonged to Bill +before, but which now tasted like old wine on the palate. He cuddled +down, lost to the world until five o'clock, when the building was +closed. He left it only to march down a few blocks to the town's meager +library, where another hour flew past. Gradually an empty feeling in his +middle region became increasingly insistent, and briefly exploring his +pockets, Bill decided upon a restaurant where he bought a stew and rolls +for fifteen cents. Never had a supper tasted so satisfying. After it, +he strolled around the town, feeling a pleasant warmth in his veins, a +springiness to his legs, a new song in his heart. It was so good to be +free to go where he pleased, to be his own master, if only for a stolen +hour, to keep out of sight of a cow or a plow. He wondered why he had +never done this before. + +It was youth daring Fate, without show or bravado or fear; rolling the +honey under his tongue and drawing in its sweetness; youth, that lives +for the moment, that can be blind to the threatening future, that can +forget the mean past; youth slipping along with some chewing-gum between +his teeth and a warm sensation in his stew-crammed stomach, whistling, +dreaming, happy; youth, that can, without premeditation, remain away +from home and leave udders untapped and pigs unfed; sublime enigma; +angering bit of irresponsibility to the Martins of a fiercely practical +world. Bill was that rare kind of boy who could pull away from the +traces just when he seemed most thoroughly broken to the harness. + +It was ten o'clock before he got his pony out of the livery barn and +started for home. Even on the way, he refused to imagine what would +happen. He entered the house quietly, as though to tell his father that +it was his next move, and setting his bundle of books on a chair, he +glanced at his mother. She was at the stove, where an armful of kindling +had been set off to take the chill out of the house. She looked at him +mysteriously, as though he were a ghost of some lost one who had strayed +in from a graveyard, but she said nothing. Bill did not even nod to her. +He fumbled with his books, as though to keep them from slipping to the +floor when, quite obviously, they were not even inclined to leave the +chair. Rose let her eyes fall and then slide, under half-closed lids, +until they had Martin in her view. She looked at him appealingly, but +he was staring at a paper which he was not reading. He had been in this +chair for two hours, without a word, pretending to be studying printed +words which his mind refused to register. Martin had done Bill's share +of the chores, with unbelief in his heart. He had never imagined such a +thing. Who would have thought it could happen--a son of his! + +His wife broke the silence with: + +"What happened, Billy? Were you sick?" + +"No, mother, I wasn't sick." + +Martin was still looking at his paper, which his fists gripped tightly. + +"Then you just couldn't get home sooner, could you? Something you +couldn't help kept you away, didn't it?" + +Bill shook his head slowly. "No," he answered easily. "I could have come +home much sooner." + +"Billy, dear, what DID happen?" She was beginning to feel panicky; he +was courting distress. + +"Nothing, mother. I just felt like staying in the reading-room and +reading--" + +"Oh, you HAD to do some lessons, didn't you! Miss Roberts should have +known better--" + +"I didn't have to stay in--I wanted to." + +Martin still kept silent, his eyes looking over the newspaper wide open, +staring, the muscles of his jaw relaxed. The boy was quick to sense that +he was winning--the simple, non-resistance of the lamb was confounding +his father. + +"I wanted to stay. I read a book, and then I took a walk, and then I +dropped in at the restaurant for a bite, and then I walked around some +more, and then I went to a movie." + +"Billy, what are you saying?" + +Martin, slowly putting down his paper, remarked without stressing a +syllable: + +"You had better go to bed, Bill; at once, without arguing." + +Bill moved towards the parlor, as though to obey. At the door he stopped +a moment and said: "I wasn't arguing; I was just answering mother. She +wanted to know." + +"She does not want to know." + +"Then I wanted her to know that I don't intend to work after school +any more. I'll do my chores in the morning, but that's all. From now on +nobody can MAKE me do anything." + +"I am not asking you to do anything but go to bed." + +"I don't intend to come home tomorrow afternoon until I'm ready. Or any +afternoon. And if you don't like it--" + +"Billy!" his mother cried; "Billy! go to bed!" + +The boy obeyed. + +Bill was fifteen when this took place. The impossible had happened. He +had challenged the master and had won. Even after he had turned in, his +father remained silent, feeling a secret respect for him; mysteriously +he had grown suddenly to manhood. Martin was too mental to let anger +express itself in violence and, besides, strangely enough, he felt no +desire to punish; there was still the dislike he had always felt for +him--his son who was the son of this woman, but though he would never +have confessed aloud the satisfaction it gave him, he began to see there +was in the boy more than a little of himself. + +"Poor Billy," his mother apologized; "he's tired." + +"He didn't say he was tired--" + +"Then he did say he was tired of working evenings." + +"That's different." + +"Yes, it's different, Martin; but can you make him work?" + +"No, I don't intend to try. He isn't my slave." + +With overwhelming pride in her eyes, pride that shook her voice, she +exclaimed: "Not anybody's slave, and not afraid to declare it. Billy is +a different kind of a boy. He doesn't like the farm--he hates it--" + +"I know." + +"He loathes everything about it. Only the other day he told me he wished +he could take it and tear it board from board, and leave it just a piece +of bleak prairie, as it was when your father brought you here, Martin." + +"You actually mean he said he would tear down what took so many years +of work to build? This farm that gives him a home and clothes and feeds +him?" + +"He did, Martin. And he meant it--there was hatred burning in his eyes. +There's that in his heart which can tear and rend; and there's that +which can build. Oh, my unhappy Billy, my boy!" + +"Don't get hysterical. What do you want me to do? Have I said he must +work?" + +"No, but you have tried to rub it into his soul and it just can't be +done. You're not to be blamed for being what you are, nor is Billy--I'll +milk his cows." + +"I'm not asking that." + +"But I will, Martin." + +"And let him stand by and watch you?" + +"Put it that way if you will. Billy must get away from here. I see that +now." + +"I haven't suggested it." + +"But I do. I want him to be happy. We'll let him board in Fallon the +rest of the year. The butter and egg money will be enough to carry him +through. It won't cost much. If we don't send him, he'll run away. I +know him. He's my boy, and your son, Martin. I won't see him suffer in a +strange world, learning his lessons from bitter experiences. I want him +to be taken care of." + +"Very well, have it as you say. I'm not putting anything in the way. I +thought this was his home, but I see it isn't. It isn't a prison. He can +go, and good luck go with him." And after a long silence: "He would tear +down this farm--the best in the county! Tear it down--board from board!" + + + + +IX. MARTIN'S SON SHAKES OFF THE DUST + +THE very next day, Mrs. Wade rented a room for Bill in the same home in +which Rose boarded, and for the rest of the winter she and Martin went +on as before--working as hard as ever and making money even faster, +while peace settled over their household, a peace so profound that, in +her more intuitive moments, Bill's mother felt in it an ominous quality. + +The storm broke with the summer vacation and the boy's point-blank +refusal to return to farm work. His father laid down an ultimatum: until +he came home he should not have a cent even from his mother, and home he +should not come, at all, until he was willing to carry his share of the +farm work willingly, and without further argument. "You see," he pointed +out to his wife, "that's the thanks I get for managing along without +him this winter. The ungrateful young rascal! If he doesn't come to his +senses shortly--" + +"Oh, Martin, don't do anything rash," implored Mrs. Wade. "Nearly all +boys go through this period. Just be patient with him." + +But even she was shaken when his Aunt Nellie, over ostensibly for an +afternoon of sociable carpet-rag sewing, began abruptly: "Do you know +what Bill is doing, Rose?" + +"Working in the mines," returned his mother easily. "Isn't it strange, +Nellie, that he should be digging coal right under this farm, the very +coal that gave Martin his start?" + +"Well, I'm not going to beat about the bush," continued her +sister-in-law abruptly. "He's working in the mines all right, but he +isn't digging coal at all, though that would be bad enough. I wouldn't +say a word about it, but I think you ought to know the truth and put a +stop to such a risky business--he's firing shots." + +Rose's heart jumped, but she continued to wind up her large ball with +the same uninterrupted motion. + +"Are you sure?" + +"I made Frank find out for certain. It's an extra dangerous mine because +gas forms in it unusually often, and he gets fifteen dollars a day +for the one hour he works. There's a contract, but he's told them he's +twenty-one, and when you prove he's under age they'll make him stop." + +Rose still wound and wound, her clear eyes, looking over her glasses, +fixed on Nellie. + +"It's bad enough, I'll say," rapped out the spare, angular woman, "to +have everybody talking about the way Martin has ditched his son, without +having the boy scattered to bits, or burned to a cinder. Already he's +been blown twenty feet by one windy shot, and more than once he's had to +lie flat while those horrible gases burned themselves out right over his +head. His 'buddie,' the Italian who fires in the other part of the mine +at the same time, told Harry Brown, the nightman, and he told Frank, +himself. Why, they say if he'd have moved the least bit it would have +fanned the fire downward and he'd have been in a fine mess. Sooner or +later all shot-firers meet a tragic end. You want to put your foot down, +Rose, and put it down hard--for once in your life--if you can," she +added, half under her breath. + +"It isn't altogether Martin's fault," began Rose, but Nellie cut her off +with a short: "Now, don't you tell me a word about that precious brother +of mine! It's as plain to me as the nose on your face that between his +bull-headed hardness and your wishy-washy softness you're fixing to ruin +one of the best boys God ever put on this earth." + +"I'll talk to Billy," Rose promised. + +It was the first time she ever had found herself definitely in +opposition to her boy, but she felt serene in the confidence of her +own power to dissuade him from anything so perilous. She understood the +general routine of mining, and had been daily picturing him going down +in the cage to the bottom, travelling through a long entry until he +was under his home farm and located in one of the low, three-foot rooms +where a Kansas miner must stoop all day. Oh, how it had hurt--that +thought of those fine young shoulders bending, bending! She had +visualized him filling his car, and mentally had followed his coal as it +was carried up to the surface to be dumped into the hopper, weighed and +dropped down the chute into the flat cars. Of course, there was always +the danger of a loosened rock falling on him, but wasn't there always +the possibility of accidents on a farm, too? Didn't the company's man +always go down, first, into the mine to test the air and make certain +it was all right? Rose had convinced herself that the risk was not so +great, after all, though she could not help sharing a little of her +husband's wonder that the boy could prefer to work underground instead +of in the sweet, fresh sunshine. But she had thought it was because in +the desperation of his complete revolt from Martin's domination +anything else seemed to him preferable. Now, in a lightning flash, she +understood. This reaction from a life whose duties had begun before +sun-up and ended long after sundown, made danger seem as nothing in +comparison with the marvellous chance to earn a comfortable living with +only one hour's work a day. + +Her conversation with Bill proved that she had been only too right. The +boy was intoxicated with his own liberty. "I know I ought to have told +you, mother," he confessed. "I wanted to. Honest, I did, but I was +afraid you'd worry, though you needn't. The man who taught me how to +fire has been doing it over twenty years. A lot of it's up to a fellow, +himself. You can pretty near tell if the air is all right by the way +it blows--the less the better it is. And if you're right careful to see +that the tool-boxes the boys leave are all locked--so's no powder can +catch, you know--and always start lighting against the air, so that if +there's gas and it catches the fire'll blow away from you instead of +following you up--and if you examine the fuses to see they're long +enough and the powder is tamped in just right--each miner does that +before he leaves and lots of firers just give 'em a hasty once-over +instead of a real look--and then shake your heels good and fast after +you do fire--" + +"Billy!" Rose was white. "I can't bear it--to hear you go on so lightly, +when it's your life, your LIFE, you're playing with. For my sake, son, +give it up." + +With an odd sinking of the heart, she observed the expression in his +face which she had seen so often in his father's--the one that said as +plainly as words that nothing could shake his determination. "A fellow's +got a right to some good times in this world," he said very low, "and +I'm getting mine now. I'm not going to grind away and grind away all my +life like father and you've done. If anything did happen I'd have had a +chance to dream and think and read instead of getting to be old without +ever having any fun out of it all. Maybe you won't believe it, but +some days for hours I just lie in the sun like a darky boy, not even +thinking. Gee! it feels great! And sometimes I read all day until I have +to go to the mine. There's one thing I'm going to tell you square," he +went on, a firm ring in his voice, boyish for all its deep, bass note, +"I'm never going back to the farm, never! Mother," he cried, suddenly, +coming over to take her hand in both his. "Will you leave father? We +could rent a little house and you'd have hardly anything to do. I'm +making more than lots of men with families. And I'd give you my envelope +without opening it every pay-day." "Oh, Billy, you don't know what +you're saying! I couldn't leave your father. I couldn't think of it." + +"What I don't see is how you can stand it to stay with him. He's always +been a brute to you. He's never cared a red cent for either of us." + +Rose was abashed before the harsh logic of youth. "Oh, son," she +murmured brokenly, "there are things one can't explain. I suppose it may +seem strange to you--but his life has been so empty. He has missed so +much! Everything, Billy." + +"Then it's his own fault," judged the boy. "If ever anybody's always had +his own way and done just as he darn pleased it's father. I wish he'd +die, that's what I wish." + +"Bill!" His mother's tone was stern. + +"There you are!" he marvelled. "You must have wished it lots of times +yourself. I know you have. Yet you always talk as if you loved him." + +In Rose's eyes, the habitual look of patience and understanding +deepened. How could Bill, as yet scarcely tried by life, comprehend the +purging flames through which she had passed or realize time's power to +reveal unsuspected truths. + +"When you've been married to a man nearly twenty-two years and have +built up a place together, there's bound to be a bond between you," she +eluded. "He just lives for this farm. It's almost as dear to him as +you are to me, son, and it's a wonderful heritage, Bill, a magnificent +heritage. Just think! Two generations have labored to build it out of +the dust. Your father's whole life is in it. Your father's and mine. And +your grandmother's. If only you could ever come to care for it!" + +Bill fidgeted uneasily. "You mean you want me to go on with it?" +he demanded. "You want me to come back to it, settle down to be a +farmer--like father?" + +The tone in which he asked this question made Rose choose her words +carefully. + +"What are your plans, son? What do you want to be--not just now, but +finally?" + +"I can't see what difference it makes what a fellow is--except that in +one business a man makes more than in another. And I can't see either +that it does a person a bit of good to have money. I'm having more fun +right now than father or you ever had--more fun than anybody I know. +Mother," and his face was solemn as if with a great discovery, "I've +figured it out that it's silly to do as most people--just live to work. +I'm going to work just enough to live comfortably. Not one scrap more, +either. You can't think how I hate the very thought of it." + +Rose sighed. Couldn't she, indeed! She understood only too well how +deeply this rebellion was rooted. The hours when he had been dragged up +from the far shores of a dreamful slumber to shiver forth in the +chill darkness to milk and chore, still rankled. Those tangy frosty +afternoons, when he had been forced to clean barns and plow while the +other boys went rabbit and possum hunting or nutting, were afternoons +whose loss he still mourned. Nothing had yet atoned for the evenings +when he had been torn from his reading and sent sternly to bed +because he must get up so early. Always work had stolen from him these +treasures--dreams, recreation and knowledge. He had been obliged to +fight the farm and his father for even a modicum of them--the things +that made life worth living. And the irony of it--that eventually it +would be this farm and Martin's driving methods which, if he became +reconciled to his father, would make it possible for him to drink all +the fullness of leisure. + +It was too tragic that the very thing which should have stood for +opportunity to the boy had been used to embitter him and drive him into +danger. But he must not lose his birthright. An almost passionate desire +welled in Rose's heart to hold on to it for him. True, she too had been +a slave to the farm. Yet not so much a slave to it, she distinguished, +as to Martin's absorption in its development. And of late years there +had been for her, running through all the humdrum days, a satisfaction +in perfecting it. In her mind now floated clearly the ideal toward which +her husband was striving. She had not guessed how much it had become her +own until she felt herself being drawn relentlessly by Bill's quiet, +but implacable determination to have her leave it all behind. If only he +would try again, she felt sure all would be so different! His father +had learned a lesson, of that she was positive, and though he would +not promise it, would not be so hard on the boy. And with this new +independence of Bill's to strengthen her, they could resist Martin more +successfully as different issues came up. She could manage to help her +boy get what he wanted out of life without his having to pay such a +terrible price as, the mine on one hand, and his father's displeasure on +the other, might exact, for she knew that if he persisted too long, the +break with Martin could never be bridged and that in the end his father +would evoke the full powers of the law to disinherit him and tie her own +hands as completely as possible in that direction. + +But she was far too wise to press such arguments in her son's present +mood. They would have to drift for a while, she saw that clearly, until +she could gradually impress upon him how different farming would be if +he were his own master. In time, he might even come to understand how +much Martin needed her. + +"Say you will," Bill, pleading, insistent, broke in on her train of +reflections, "I've always dreamed of this day, when we'd go away, and +now it's come. I can take care of you." + +As he stood there, a glorious figure in his youthful self-confidence, a +turn of his head reminded her a second time of Martin, recalling sharply +the way her husband had looked the night he told her of his love for +the other Rose. He had been bothered by no fine qualms about abandoning +herself. She thought of his final surrender of love to wisdom. It was +only youth that dared pursue happiness--to purchase delicious idleness +by gambling with death. Billy was her boy. His dreams and hopes should +be hers; her way of life, the one that gave him the most joy. She would +follow him, if need be, to the end of the earth. + +"Very well, son," she said simply, her voice breaking over the few +words. "If a year from now you still feel like this, I'll do as you +wish." + +"You don't know how I hate him," muttered the boy. "It's only when I'm +tramping in the woods, or in the middle of some book I like that I can +forgive him for living. No, mother, I don't mean all that," he laughed, +giving her a bear-like hug. + +It was in this more reasonable side, this ability to change his point of +view quickly when he became convinced he was wrong, that Mrs. Wade now +put her faith. She would give him plenty of rope, she decided, not +try to drive him. It would all come right, if she only waited, and she +prayed, nightly, with an increasing tranquillity, that he might be kept +safe from harm, taking deep comfort in the new light of contentment that +was gradually stealing into his face. After all, each one had to work +out his destiny in his own way, she supposed. + +It was less than a month later that her telephone rang, and Rose, calmly +laying aside her sewing and getting up rather stiffly because of her +rheumatism, answered, thinking it probably a call from Martin, who had +left earlier in the evening, to wind up a little matter of a chattel on +some growing wheat. It had just begun to rain and she feared he might be +stuck in the road somewhere, calling to tell her to come for him. But it +was not Martin's voice that answered. + +"Mrs. Wade?" + +"Yes." + +"Why"--there was a forbidding break that made her shudder. A second +later she convinced herself that it seemed a natural halt--people do +such things without any apparent cause; but she could not help shaking a +little. + +"Is it about Mr. Wade?" and as she asked this question she wondered why +she had spoken her husband's name when it was Bill's that really had +rushed through her mind. + +"No, ma'am, it ain't about Martin Wade I'm callin' you up, it ain't him +at all--" + +"I see." She said this calmly and quietly, as though to impress her +informant and reassure him. "What is it?" It was almost unnecessary to +ask, for she knew already what had happened, knew that the boy had flung +his dice and lost. + +"It's your son, Mrs. Wade; it's him I'm a-callin' about. We're about to +bring him home to you--an'--and I thought it'd be better to call you up +first so's you might expect us an' not take on with the suddenness of +it all. This is Brown--Harry Brown--the nightman at the mine down here. +We've got the ambulance here and we're about ready to start." There was +an evenness about the strange voice that she understood better than its +words. If Bill had been hurt the man would have been quick and jerky in +his speaking as though he were feeling the boy's pain with him; but he +was so even about it all--as even as Death. + +"Then I'll phone for Dr. Bradley so he'll be here by the time you come," +said Rose, wondering how she could think of so practical a thing. Her +mind had wrapped itself in a protecting armor, forbidding the shock of +it all to strike with a single blow. She couldn't understand why she was +not screaming. + +"You can--if you want to, but Bill don't need him, Mrs. Wade,--he's +dead." + +Slowly she hung up the receiver, the wall still around her brain, +holding it tight and keeping her nerves taut, afraid to release them +for fear they might snap. She stood there looking at the receiver as her +hands came together. + +As though she were talking to a person instead of the telephone before +her, she gasped: "So--so THIS is what it has all been for--this. Into +the world, into Martin's world--and this way out of it. Burned to +death--Billy." + +The rain had lessened a little and now the wind began to shake the +house, rattle the windows and scream as it tore its way over the plains. +The sky flared white and the world lighted up suddenly, as though the +sun had been turned on from an electric switch. At the same instant she +saw a bolt of lightning strike a young tree by the roadside, heard the +sharp click as it hit and then watched the flash dance about, now on +the road, now along the barbed wire fencing. Then the world went black +again. And a rumble quickly grew to an earth-shaking blast of thunder. +It was as though that tree were Billy--struck by a gush of flying fire. +The next bolt broke above the house, and the light it threw showed +her the stripling split and lying on the ground. In the impenetrable +darkness she realized that the house fuse of their Delco system must +have been blown out, and she groped blindly for a match. She could hear +the rain coming down again, now in rivers. There was unchained wrath in +the downpour, viciousness. It was a madman rushing in to rend and tear. +It frothed, and writhed, and spat hatred. Rose shook as though gripped +by a strong hand. She was afraid--of the rain, the lightning, the +thunder, the darkness; alone there, waiting for them to bring her Billy. +She was too terrified to add her weeping to the wail of the wind--it +would have been too ghastly. Would she never find a match! As she lit +the lamp, like the stab of a needle in the midst of agony, came the +thought of how long it had been after Martin had put in his electrical +system and connected up his barns before she had been permitted to have +this convenience in the house. What would he think now? She wished he +were home. Anyone would be better than this awful waiting alone. She +could only stand there, away from the window, looking out at the sheets +of water running down the panes and shivering with the frightfulness and +savageness of it all. + +Her ears caught a rumble, fainter than thunder, and the splash of +horses' hoofs--"it's too muddy for the motor ambulance," she thought, +mechanically. "They're using the old one," and her heart contracting, +twisting, a queer dryness in her throat, she opened the door as they +stopped, her hand shading the lamp against the sudden inrush of wind and +rain. "In there, through the parlor," she said dully, indicating the +new room and thinking, bitterly, as she followed them, that now, when +it could mean nothing to Billy, Martin would offer no objections to its +being given over to him. + +The scuffling of feet, the low, matter-of-fact orders of a directing +voice: "Easy now, boys--all together, lift. Watch out; pull that +sheet back up over him," and a brawny, work-stooped man saying to her +awkwardly: "I wouldn't look at him if I was you, Mrs. Wade, till the +undertaker fixes him up," and she was once more alone. + +As if transfixed, she continued to stand, looking beyond the lamp, +beyond the bed on which her son's large figure was outlined by the +sheet, beyond the front door which faced her, beyond--into the night, +looking for Martin, waiting for him to come home to his boy. She asked +herself again and again how she had been so restrained when her Billy +had been carried in. After what seemed interminable ages, she heard +heavy steps on the back porch and knew that her husband had returned +at last. He brought in with him a gust of wind that caused the lamp to +smoke. She held it with both hands, afraid that she might drop it, and +carrying it to the dining-room table set it down slowly, looking at him. +He seemed huger than ever with his hulk sinking into the gray darkness +behind him. There was something elephantine about him as he stood there, +soaked to the skin, bending forward a little, breathing slowly and +deeply, his fine nostrils distending with perfect regularity, his face +in the dim light, yellow, with the large lines almost black. He was +hatless and his tawny-gray hair was flat with wetness, coming down +almost to his eyes, so clear and far-seeing. + +"What's the matter with the lights? Fuse blown out?" he asked, spitting +imaginary rain out of his mouth. + +Rose did not answer. + +"Awful night for visiting," Martin announced roughly, as he took off his +coat. "But it was lucky I went, or all would have been pretty bad +for me. Do you know, that rascal was delivering the wheat to the +elevator--wheat on which I held a chattel--and I got to Tom Mayer just +as he was figuring up the weights. You should have seen Johnson's face +when I came in. He knew I had him cornered. 'Here,' I said, 'what's up?' +And that lying rascal turned as white as death and said something about +getting ready to bring me a check. I told him I was much obliged, but +I would take it along with me--and I did. Here it is--fourteen hundred +dollars, plus interest. And I got it by the skin of my teeth. I didn't +stop to argue with him for I saw the storm coming on. I went racing, but +a half mile north I skidded into the ditch. I really feel like leaving +the car there all night, but it would do a lot of damage. I'll have +to get a team and drag it in. I call it a good day's work. What do you +say?" He looked at her closely, for the first time noticing her drawn +face and far-away look. + +"What's the matter? You look goopy--" + +Rose settled herself heavily in the rocker close to the table. + +"You're not sick, are you?" + +She shook her head a few times and answered: "He's in there--" + +"Who?" Martin straightened up ready for anything. + +"Billy--" + +"Oh!" A light flashed into Martin's face. "So he has come back, has he? +Back home? What made him change toward this place? Is he here to stay?" + +"No, Martin--" + +"Then if he hasn't come to his senses, what is he doing here--here in my +house, the home he hates--" + +"He doesn't hate it now," Rose replied, struggling for words that she +might express herself and end this cruel conversation, but all she could +do was to point nervously toward the spare room. + +"What is he doing in there? It's the one spot that Rose can call her +own, poor child." + +"He's on the bed, Martin--" + +"What's the matter with the davenport he's always slept on? Is he sick? +What in heaven's name is going on in this house?" + +As Martin started toward the bedroom, his wife opened her lips to tell +him the truth but the words refused to come; at the same instant it +struck her that not to speak was brutal, yet just. She would let +Martin go to this bed with words of anger on his lips, with feelings of +unkindness in his heart. She would do this. Savage? Yes, but why not? +There seemed to be something fair about it. Then her heart-strings +pulled more strongly than ever. No; it was too hard. She must stop him, +tell him, prepare him. But before the words came, he was out of the room +and when she spoke he did not hear her because of the rain. + +He saw the vague lines of the boy's body, hidden by the sheet, and +thought quickly, "Bill's old ostrich-like trick," and while at the same +instant something told him that a terrible thing had happened, the idea +did not register completely until he had his hand on the linen. Then, +with a short yank, he pulled away the cover and saw the boy's head. Dark +as it was, it was enough to show him the truth. With a quick move he +covered him again. There was a smeary wetness on his fingers, which he +wiped away on the side of his trousers. They were drenched with rain, +but he distinguished the sticky feel of blood leaving his hand as he +rubbed it nervously. + +His first emotion was one of anger with Rose. He was sure she had played +this sinister jest deliberately to torture him and he had fallen into +the trap. He wanted to rush back into the other room and strike her +down. He would show her! But he dismissed this impulse, for he did not +want her to see him like this, no hold on himself and his mind without +direction. Sitting there, she would have the advantage. Without so much +as a sound except for the slight noise he made in walking, Martin went +through the parlor towards the front door and out to the steps, where he +leaned for a moment against the weather-boarding, letting the rain fall +on him as he stared dully down at the ground. It felt good to stand +there. No eyes were on him, and the rain was refreshing. This had +been too much for him. Never had he known himself to be so near to +bewilderment. How fortunate that he had escaped by this simple trick of +leaving the house. Then he thought of the car--a half-mile north--and +the horses in the stable. He must do something. He would bring the car +into the garage. It was relieving to hurry across the dripping grass +toward the barn. How wonderful it was to keep the body doing something +when the breath in him was short, his heart battering like an engine +with burned-out bearings, his brain in insane chaos. As he applied a +match to the lantern he thought of his wife again, and his face regained +its scowl. + +Only when he had his great heavy team in the yard, his lantern hanging +from his arm, the reins in his hands, and was pulling back with all his +strength as he followed the horses--only then did he permit himself to +think about the tragedy that had befallen. + +"He's dead--killed," he groaned. "It had to come. Shot-firers don't last +long. Whoa, there, Lottie; not so fast, Jet, whoa!" His protesting team +in control again, he trudged heavily behind. "It's terrible to die that +way--not a chance in a thousand. And a kid of sixteen didn't have the +judgment--couldn't have. But Bill knew what he was facing every evening. +He didn't go in blindly. They'll blame me, as though it was my fault. +I didn't want him to go there. I wanted him to take a hand here, to run +the place by himself in good time. It was his mother who sent him away +first." He went on like that, justifying himself more positively as +excuse after excuse suggested itself. + +Not until he had convinced himself that he was in no way responsible, +did he allow his heart to beat a little for this boy of his. "Poor +Bill," he thought on, "it has been a tough game for him. Lost in the +shuffle. Born into something he didn't like and trying to escape, only +to get caught. What did he expect out of life, anyway? Why didn't +he learn that it's only a lot of senseless pain? Every moment of it +pain--from coming into the world to going out. Oh, Bill, why didn't you +learn what I know? You had brains, boy, but it would have been better +if you had never used them. I've brains, too, but I've always managed +to keep them tied down--buckled to the farm, to investments, and +work--thinking about things that make us forget life. It's all dust and +dust, with rain once in a while, only the rain steams off and it's dust +again." + +Martin began to review the course of his own past, and smiled bitterly. +Others were able to live the same kind of an existence, but, unlike +himself, took it as a preparation for another day, another existence +which, it seemed to him, was measured and cut to order by professionals +who understood how to fix up the meaning of life so that it would +soothe and satisfy. He thought how much better it was to be a dumb, +unquestioning beast, or a human being conscious of his soul, than to be +as he was--alone, a materialist, who saw the meaninglessness of +matter and whose mind, in some manner which he did not understand, had +developed a slant that made him doubt what others accepted so easily as +facts. Martin knew he was bound to things of substance but he followed +the lure of property and accumulation as he might have followed some +other game had he learned it, knowing all along that it was a delusion +and at the same time acknowledging that for him there was nothing else +as sufficing. + +How simple, if Bill's future could be a settled thing in his mind as +it was to the boy's mother. Or his own future! If only he could +believe--then how different it would be for him. He could go on placidly +and die with a smile. But he could not believe. His atheism was both +mental and instinctive. It was something he could not understand, and +which he knew he could never change, try as he might. Take this very +evening. Here was death in his home. And he was escaping a lot of +anguish, not by praying for Bill's soul or his own forgiveness, but by +the simple process of harnessing a team and dragging a car through the +mud. It was a great game, work was--the one weapon with which to meet +life. This was not a cut and dried philosophy with him, but a glimmer +that, though always suggesting itself but dimly, never failed when put +to the test. Martin felt better. He began to probe a little farther, +albeit with an aimlessness about his questions that almost frightened +him. He asked himself whether he loved Bill, now that he was dead, and +he had to admit that he did not. The boy had always been something other +than he had expected--a disappointment. Did he love anyone? No. Not a +person; not even any longer that lovely Rose of Sharon who had flowered +in his dust for a brief hour. His wife? God Almighty, no. Then who? +Himself? No, his very selfishness had other springs than that. He was +one of those men, not so uncommon either, he surmised, who loved no one +on the whole wide earth. + +When he re-entered the house, he found his wife still seated in the +rocker, softly weeping, the tears flowing down her cheeks and dropping +unheeded into her lap. He pitied her. + +"I feel as though he didn't die tonight," she mourned, looking at Martin +through full eyes. "He died when he was born, like the first one." + +"I know how you feel," said Martin, sympathy in his voice. + +"I made him so many promises before he came, but I wasn't able to keep a +single one of them." + +"I'm sorry; I wish I could help you in some way." + +"Oh, Martin, I know you're not a praying man--but if you could only +learn." + +Martin looked at her respectfully but with profound curiosity. + +"There must be an answer to all this," Rose went on brokenly. "There +must! Billy is lying in the arms of Jesus now--no pain, only sweet rest. +I believe that." + +"I'm glad you have the faith that can put such meaning into it all." + +"Martin, I want to pray for strength to bear it." + +"Yes, Rose." + +"You'll pray with me, won't you?" + +"You just said I wasn't a praying man." + +"Yes, but I can't pray alone, with him in there alone, too, and you here +with me, scoffing." + +"I can't be other than I am, Rose; but you pray, and as you pray I'll +bow my head." + + + + +X. INTO THE DUST-BIN + +WITH the loss of her boy, time ceased to exist for Rose. The days came +and went, lengthening into years, full of duties, leaving her as they +found her, outwardly little changed and habitually calm and kind, but +inwardly sunk in apathy. She moved as if in a dream, seeming to live +in a strange world that would never again seem real--this world without +Billy. Occasionally, she would forget and think he was out in the field +or down in the mine; more rarely still, she would slip even further +backward and wonder what he was about in his play. During these moments +she would feel normal, but some object catching her eye would jerk her +back to the present and the cruel truth. She and Martin had less than +ever to say to each other, though in his own grim way he was more +thoughtful, giving her to understand that there were no longer any +restrictions laid upon her purchasing, and even suggesting that they +remodel the house; as if, she thought impassively, at this late day, it +could matter what she bought or in what she lived. His one interest in +making money, just as if they had some one to leave it to, puzzled +her. Always investing, then reinvesting the interest, and spending +comparatively little of his income, his fortune had now reached the +point where it was growing rapidly of its own momentum and, as there was +nothing to which he looked forward, nothing he particularly wanted to +do, he set himself the task of making it cross the half million mark, +much as a man plays solitaire, to occupy his mind, betting against +himself, to give point to his efforts. + +Yet, it gave him a most disconcerting, uncanny start, when one bright +winter day, he faced the fact that he, too, was about to be shovelled +into the great dust-bin. Death was actually at his side, his long, bony +finger on his shoulder and whispering impersonally, "You're next." "Very +much," thought Martin, "like a barber on a busy Saturday." How odd +that here was something that had never entered into his schemes, his +carefully worked out plans! It seemed so unfair--why, he had been +feeling so well, his business had been going on so profitably, there +was something so substantial to the jog of his life, there seemed to be +something of the eternal about it. He had taken ten-year mortgages but a +few days ago, and had bought two thousand dollars' worth of twenty-year +Oklahoma municipals when he could have taken an earlier issue which he +had rejected as maturing too soon. He had forgotten that there was a +stranger who comes but once, and now that he was here, Martin felt that +a mean trick had been played on him. He cogitated on the journey he +was to take, and it made him not afraid, but angry. It was a shabby +deal--that's what it was--when he was so healthy and contented, only +sixty-one and ready to go on for decades--two or three at least--forced, +instead, to prepare to lay himself in a padded box and be hurriedly +packed away. It had always seemed so vague, this business of dying, and +now it was so personal--he, Martin Wade, himself, not somebody else, +would suffer a little while longer and then grow still forever. + +He would never know how sure a breeder was his new bull--the son of that +fine creature he had imported; two cows he had spotted as not paying +their board could go on for months eating good alfalfa and bran before +a new herdsman might become convinced of their unreadiness to turn the +expensive feed into white gold; he had not written down the dates when +the sows were to farrow, and they might have litters somewhere around +the strawstack and crush half the little pigs. His one hundred and +seventy-five acres of wheat had had north and south dead furrows, but he +had learned that this was a mistake in probably half the acreage, where +they should be east and west. It would make a great difference in the +drainage, but a new plowman might think this finickiness and just go +ahead and plow all of it north and south, or all of it east and west and +this would result in a lower yield--some parts of the field would get +soggy and the wheat might get a rust, and other parts drain too readily, +letting the ground become parched and break into cakes, all of which +might be prevented. And there was all that manure, maker of big crops. +He knew only too well how other farmers let it pile up in the barnyard +to be robbed by the sun of probably twenty per cent of its strength. He +figured quickly how it would hurt the crops that he had made traditional +on Wade land. He considered these things, and they worried him, made +him realize what a serious thing was death, far more serious than the +average person let himself believe. + +Martin had gone to the barn a week before to help a cow which was +aborting. It had enraged him when he thought what an alarming thing +this was--abortion among HIS cows--in Martin Wade's beautiful herd! +"God Almighty!" he had exclaimed, deciding as he took the calf from the +mother to begin doctoring her at once. He would fight this disease +before it could establish a hold. Locking the cow's head in an iron +stanchion, he had shed his coat, rolled up his right sleeve almost to +the shoulder, washed his hand and arm in a solution of carbolic and hot +water, carefully examining them to make sure there was no abrasion +of any kind. But despite his caution, a tiny cut so small that it had +escaped his searching, had come in contact with the infected mucous +membrane and blood poisoning had set in. And here he was, lying in bed, +given up by Doctor Bradley and the younger men the older physician had +called into consultation and who had tried in vain to stem the spread of +poison through his system. Martin was going to die, and no power could +save him. The irony of it! This farm to which he had devoted his life +was taking it from him by a member of its herd. + +Martin made a wry little grimace of amusement as he realized suddenly +that even at the very gate of death it was still on life, his life, +that his thoughts dwelt. In these last moments, it was the tedious, +but stimulating, battle of existence that really occupied his full +attention. He would cling to it until the last snap of the thin string. +This cavern of oblivion that was awaiting him, that he must enter--it +was black and now more than ever his deep, simple irreligion refused +to let fairy tales pacify him with the belief that beyond it was +everlasting daylight. Scepticism was not only in his conscious thought +but in the very tissues of his mind. + +He remembered how his own father had died on this farm--he had had +no possessions to think about; only his loved ones, his wife and his +children; but he had brought them here that they might amass property +out of Martin's sweat and the dust of the prairie. Now he, the son, +dying, had in his mind no thought of people, but of this land and of +stock and of things. And how strangely his mind was reacting to it. His +concern was not who should own them all, but what would actually be +the fate of each individual property child of his. Why, he had not even +written a will. It would all go to his wife, of course, and how little +he cared to whom she left it. He would have liked, perhaps, to have +given Rose Mall twenty-five thousand or so--so she could always be +independent of that young husband of hers--snap her fingers at him if he +got to driving her too hard, and crushing out the flower-like quality of +her--but his wife wouldn't have understood, and he had hurt her enough, +in all conscience. The one thing he might have enjoyed doing, he +couldn't. Outside of that he didn't care who got it. She could leave it +to whomever she liked when her turn came. Not to whom it went, but what +would happen to it--that was what concerned him. + +By his side, Rose, sitting so motionless that he was scarcely conscious +of her presence, was dying with him. With that peculiar gift of +profoundly sympathetic natures she was thinking and feeling much of what +he was experiencing. It seemed to her heart-breaking that Martin must +be forced to abandon the only things for which he cared. He had even +sacrificed his lovely Rose of Sharon for them--she had never been in any +doubt as to the reason for that sudden emotional retreat of his seven +years before. And she knew his one thought now must be for their +successful administration. + +He had worked so hard always and yet had had so little happiness, +so little real brightness out of life. She felt, generously, with a +clutching ache, that with all the disappointments she had suffered +through him--from his first broken promises about the house to his lack +of understanding of their boy which had resulted in Billy's death--with +even that, she had salvaged so much more out of living than he. A great +compassion swelled within her; all the black moments, all the long, gray +hours of their years together, seemed suddenly insignificant. She saw +him again as he had been the day he had proposed marriage to her and for +the first time she was sure that she could interpret the puzzling look +that had come into his eyes when she had asked him why he thought she +could make him happy. What had he understood about happiness? With a +noiseless sob, she remembered that he had answered her in terms of the +only thing he had understood--work. And she saw him again, too, as he +had been the night he had so bluntly told her of his passion for Rose. +It seemed to her now, free of all rancor, unutterably tragic that the +only person Martin had loved should have come into his life too late. + +He was not to be blamed because he had never been able to care for +herself. He should never have asked her to marry him--and yet, they had +not been such bad partners. It would have been so easy for her to love +him. She had loved him until he had killed her boy; since then, all her +old affection had withered. But if it really had done so why was she so +racked now? She felt, desperately, that she could not let him go +until he had had some real joy. To think that she used to plan, +cold-bloodedly, when Billy was little, all she would do if only Martin +should happen to die! The memory of it smote her as with a blow. She +looked down at the powerful hand lying so passively, almost, she would +have said, contentedly, in her own. How she had yearned for the comfort +of it when her children were born. She wondered if Martin realized her +touch, if it helped a little. If it had annoyed him, he would have said +so. It came to her oddly that in all the twenty-seven years she and her +husband had been married this was the very first time he had let her +be tender to him. Oh, his life had been bleak. Bleak! And she with such +tenderness in her heart. It hadn't been right. From the depths of her +rebellion and forgiveness, slow tears rose. Feeling too intensely, too +mentally, to be conscious of them she sat unmoving as they rolled one by +one down her cheeks and dropped unheeded. + +"Rose," he called with a soft hoarseness, "I want to talk to you." + +"Yes, Martin," and she gave his fingers a slight squeeze as though to +convince him that she was there at his side. He felt relieved. It was +good to feel her hand and be sure that if his body were to give its +final sign that life had slipped away someone would be there to know the +very second it had happened. It was a satisfactory way to die; it took a +little of the loneliness away from the experience. + +"Rose," he repeated. It sounded so new, the yearning tone in which he +said it--"Rose!" It hurt. "Isn't it funny, Rose, to go like this--not +sick, no accident--just dying without any real reason except that I +absorbed the poison through a cut so small my eyes couldn't see it." + +"It's a mystery, dear," the little word limped out awkwardly, "but God's +ways are not ours." + +"Not a mystery," he corrected, "just a heap of tricks; funny ones, sad +ones, sensible ones, and crazy ones--and of all the crazy ones this is +the worst. But, what's the use? If there's a God, as you believe, +it doesn't do any good to argue with Him, and if it's as I think and +there's no God, there's no one to argue with. But never mind about that +now--it's no matter. You'll listen carefully, won't you, Rose?" + +"Yes, Martin." + +"This abortion in the herd. You know what a terrible thing it is." + +"I certainly do; it's the cause of your leaving me." + +"Rose, I know you'll be busy during the next few days--me dying, the +things that have to be arranged, the funeral and all that. But when it's +all over, you'll let that be the first thing, won't you?" + +"Yes, the very first thing, if you wish it." + +"I do. Get Dr. Hurton on the job at once, and have him fight it. He +knows his business. Let him come twice a day until he's sure it's out +of the herd. Keep that new bull out of the pasture. And if Hurton can't +clean it up, you'd better get rid of the herd before it gets known +around the country. You know how news of that kind travels. Don't try to +handle the sale yourself. If you do, it'll be a mistake. The prices will +be low if you get only a county crowd." + +"Neighbors usually bid low," she agreed. + +"Run up to Topeka and see Baker--he's the sales manager of the Holstein +Breeders' Association. Let him take charge of it all--he's a straight +fellow. He'll charge you enough--fifteen per cent of the gross receipts, +but then he'll see to it that the people who want good stuff will be +there. He knows how and where to advertise. He's got a big list of +names, and can send out letters to the people that count. He'll bring +buyers from Iowa down to Texas. Remember his name--Baker." + +"Yes, Martin--Baker." + +"I think you ought to sell the herd anyway," he went on. "I know you, +Rose; you'll be careless about the papers--no woman ever realizes how +important it is to have the facts for the certificates of registry +and transfer just right. I'm afraid you'll fall down there and get the +records mixed. You won't get the dates exact and the name and number of +each dam and sire. Women are all alike there--they never seem to realize +that a purebred without papers is just a good grade." + +Rose made no comment, while Martin changed his position slowly and lost +himself in thought. + +"Yes, I guess it's the only thing to do--to get rid of the purebred +stuff. God Almighty! It's taken me long enough to build up that herd, +but a few weeks from now they'll be scattered to the four winds. Well, +it can't be helped. Try to sell them to men who understand something +of their value. And that reminds me, Rose. You always speak of them as +thoroughbreds. It always did get on my nerves. That's right for horses, +but try to remember that cows are purebreds. You'll make that mistake +before men who know. Those little things are important. Remember it, +won't you?" + +"Thoroughbred for a horse, and purebred for a cow," Rose repeated +willingly. + +"When you get your money for the stock put it into mortgages--first +mortgages, not seconds. Let that be a principle with you. Many a holder +of a second mortgage has been left to hold the sack. You must remember +that the first mortgage comes in for the first claim after taxes, and +if the foreclosure doesn't bring enough to satisfy more than that, the +second mortgage is sleeping on its rights." + +"First mortgages, not seconds," said Rose. + +"And while I'm on that, let me warn you about Alex Tracy, four miles +north and a half mile east, on the west side of the road. He's a +slippery cuss and you'll have to watch him." + +"Alex Tracy, four miles north--" + +"You'll find my mortgage for thirty-seven hundred in my box at the bank. +He's two coupons behind in his interest. I made him give me a chattel on +his growing corn. Watch him--he's treacherous. He may think he can sneak +around because you're a woman and stall you. He's just likely to turn +his hogs into that corn. Your chattel is for growing corn, not for corn +in a hog's belly. If he tries any dirty business get the sheriff after +him." + +"It's on the GROWING corn," said Rose. + +"And here's another important point--taxes. Don't pay any taxes on +mortgages. What's the use of giving the politicians more money to waste? +Hold on to your bank stock and arrange to have all mortgages in the +name of the bank, not in your own. They pay taxes on their capital and +surplus, not on their loans. But be sure to get a written acknowledgment +on each mortgage from Osborne. He's square, but you can't ever tell what +changes might take place and then there might be some question about +mortgages in the bank's name." + +"Keep them in the bank's name," said Rose. + +"And a written acknowledgment," Martin stressed. + +"A written acknowledgment," she echoed. + +For probably fifteen minutes he lay without further talk; then, a little +more weariness in his voice than she had ever known before, he began to +speak again. + +"I've been thinking a great deal, Rose." There was still that new +tenderness in the manner in which he pronounced her name, that new +tone she had never heard before and which caused her to feel a little +nervous. "I've been thinking, Rose, about the years we've lived together +here on a Kansas prairie farm--" + +"It lacks just a few months of being twenty-eight years," she added. + +"Yes, it sounds like a long time when you put it that way, but it +doesn't seem any longer than a short sigh to me lying here. I've been +thinking, Rose, how you've always got it over to me that you loved me or +could love me--" + +"I've always loved you, Martin--deeply." + +"Yes, that's what's always made me so hard with you. It would have been +far better for you if you hadn't cared for me at all. I've never loved +anybody, not even my own mother, nor Bill, nor myself for that matter." +Their eyes shifted away from each other quickly as both thought of one +other whom he did not mention. "I wasn't made that way, Rose. Now you +could love anything--lots of women are like that, and men, too. But I +wasn't. Life to me has always been a strange world that I never got over +thinking about and trying to understand, and at the same time hustling +to get through with every day of it as fast as I could by keeping at the +only thing I knew which would make it all more bearable. There's a lot +of pain in work, but it's only of the muscles and my pain has always +been in the things I've thought about. The awful waste and futility of +it all! Take this farm--I came here when this was hardly more than a +desert. You ought to have seen how thick the dust was the first day +we got down here. And I've built up this place. You've helped me. Bill +didn't care for it--even if he had lived, he'd never have stayed here. +But you do, in spite of all that's happened." + +"Yes, Martin, I do," she returned fervently. "It's a wonderful monument +to leave behind you--this farm is." + +His eyes grew somber. "That's what I've always thought it would be," he +answered, very low. "I've felt as if I was building something that would +last. Even the barns--they're ready to stand for generations. But this +minute, when the end is sitting at the foot of this bed, I seem to see +it all crumbling before me. You won't stay here. Why should you--even +if you do for a few years you'll have to leave it sometime, and there's +nothing that goes to rack and ruin as quickly as a farm--even one like +this." + +"Oh, Martin, don't think such thoughts," she begged. "Your fever is +coming up; I can see it." + +"What has it all been about, that's what I want to know," he went on +with quiet cynicism. "What have I been sweating about--nothing. What +is anyone's life? No more than mine. We're all like a lot of hens in a +backyard, scratching so many hours a day. Some scratch a little deeper +than those who aren't so skilled or so strong. And when I stand off +a little, it's all alike. The end is as blind and senseless as the +beginning on this farm--drought and dust." + +Martin closed his eyes wearily and gave a deep sigh. To his wife's +quickened ears, it was charged with lingering regret for frustrated +plans and palpitant with his consciousness of life's evanescence and of +the futility of his own success. + +She waited patiently for him to continue his instructions, but the +opiates had begun to take effect and Martin lapsed into sleep. +Although he lived until the next morning, he never again regained full +consciousness. + + + + +XI. THE DUST SETTLES + +ROSE'S grief was a surprise to herself; there was no blinking the fact +that her life was going to be far more disrupted by Martin's death than +it had been by Bill's. There were other differences. Where that loss +had struck her numb, this quickened every sensibility, drove her into +action; more than that, as she realized how much less there was to +regret in the boy's life than in his father's, how much more he had got +out of his few short years, the edge of the older, more precious sorrow, +dulled. During quite long periods she would be so absorbed in her +thoughts of Martin that Bill would not enter her mind. Was it possible, +that this husband who with his own lips had confessed he had never +loved her, had been a more integral part of herself than the son who had +adored her? What was this bond that had roots deeper than love? Was it +merely because they had grown so used to each other that she felt as +if half of her had been torn away and buried, leaving her crippled and +helpless? Probably it would have been different if Bill had been living. +Was it because when he had died, she still had had Martin, demanding, +vital, to goad her on and give the semblance of a point to her life, +and now she was left alone, adrift? She pondered over these questions, +broodingly. + +"I suppose you'll want to sell out, Rose," Nellie's husband, Bert Mall, +big and cordial as Peter had been before him, suggested a day or two +after the funeral. "I'll try to get you a buyer, or would you rather +rent?" + +"I haven't any plans yet, Bert," Mrs. Wade had evaded adroitly, "it's +all happened so quickly. I have plenty of time and there are lots +of things to be seen to." There had been that in her voice which had +forbidden discussion, and it was a tone to which she was forced to have +recourse more than once during the following days when it seemed to her +that all her friends were in a conspiracy to persuade her to a hasty, +ill-advised upheaval. + +Nothing, she resolved, should push her from this farm or into final +decisions until a year had passed. She must have something to which she +could cling if it were nothing more than a familiar routine. Without +that to sustain and support her, she felt she could never meet the +responsibilities which had suddenly descended, with such a terrific +impact, upon her shoulders. + +In an inexplicable way, these new burdens, her black dress--the first +silk one since the winter before Billy came--and the softening folds of +her veil, all invested her with a new and touching majesty that seemed +to set her a little apart from her neighbors. + +Nellie had been frankly scandalized at the idea of mourning. "Nobody +does that out here--exceptin' during the services," she had said sharply +to her daughter-in-law when Rose had told her of the hasty trip she and +her aunt had made to the largest town in the county. "Folks'll think +it's funny and kind o' silly. You oughtn't to have encouraged it." + +"Oh, Mother Mall, I didn't especially," the younger woman had protested. +"She just said in that quiet, settled way she has, that she was going +to--she thought it would be easier for her. And I believe it will, too," +she added, feeling how pathetic it was that Aunt Rose had never looked +half so well during Uncle Martin's life as she had since his death. + +"Oh, well," Mall commented, "Rose always was sort of sentimental, but +there's not many like her. She's right to take her time, too. It'll be +six or eight months, anyway, before she can get things lined up. She's +got a longer head than a body'd think for. Look at the way she run that +newspaper office when old Conroy died." + +"That was nearly thirty years ago," commented his wife crisply, "and +Rose's got so used to being bossed around by Martin that she'll find it +ain't so easy to go ahead on her own." + +With her usual shrewdness, Nellie had surmised the chief difficulty, +but it dwindled in real importance because of the fact that Rose so +frequently had the feeling that Martin merely had gone on a journey +and would come home some day, expecting an exact accounting of her +stewardship. His instructions were to her living instructions which must +be carried out to the letter. + +She had attended with conscientious promptness to checking the trouble +that had brought about his death. "I promised Mr. Wade it should be the +first thing," she had explained to Dr. Hurton. "'You'll let it be the +first thing, won't you?' Those were his very words. He depended on us, +Doctor." + +When the time came to plan definitely for the disposal of the purebred +herd, she went herself to Topeka to arrange details with Baker. She was +constantly thinking: "Now, what would Martin say to this?" or "Would he +approve of that?" And her conclusions were reached accordingly. The +sale itself was an event that was discussed in Fallon County for years +afterwards. The hotel was crowded with out-of-town buyers. Enthused by +the music from two bands, even the local people bid high, and through +it all, Rose, vigilant, remembered everything Martin would have wanted +remembered. She felt that even he would have been satisfied with +the manner in which the whole transaction was handled, and with the +financial results. + +She began to take a new pleasure in everything, the nervous pleasure one +takes when going through an experience for what may be the last time. +The threshing--how often she had toiled and sweated over those three +days of dinners and suppers for twenty-two men. Now she recalled, +with an aching tightness about her heart, how delicious had been her +relaxation, when, the dinner dishes washed, the table reset and the +kitchen in scrupulous order with the last fly vanquished, she and Nellie +had luxuriated in that exquisite sense of leisure that only women know +who have passed triumphantly through a heavy morning's work and have +everything ready for the evening. Later there had been the stroll down +to the field in the shade of the waning afternoon, to find out what time +the men would be in for supper; and the sheer delight of breathing +in the pungent smell of the straw as it came flying from the funnel, +looking, with the sinking sun shining through it, like a million bees +swarming from a hive, while the red-brown grain gushed, a lush stream, +into the waiting wagon. + +"It always makes me think of a ship sailing into port, Nellie," Rose +had once exclaimed, "the crop coming in. It gives me a queer kind of +giddiness, makes me feel like laughing and crying all at once," to which +her sister-in-law had returned with more than her usual responsiveness: +"Yes, it's the most excitin' time of the year, unless it's Christmas." + +More nebulous were the memories of those early mornings when she had +paused in the midst of getting breakfast to sniff in the clover-laden +air and think how wonderful it would be if only she needn't stay in the +hot, stuffy kitchen but could be free to call Bill and go picnicking or +loaf deliciously under one of the big elms. Most precious of all--the +evenings she and her boy had sat in the yard, with the cool south breeze +blowing up from the pasture, the cows looking on placidly, the frogs +fluting rhythmically in the pond, the birds chirping their good-night +calls, and the dip and swell of the farm land pulling at them like +a haunting tune, almost too lovely to be endured. Oh, there had been +moments all the sweeter and more poignant because they had been so +fleeting. + +As she passed successfully through one whole round of planting, +harvesting and garnering of grain, she began to realize her own ability +and to be tempted more and more seriously to remain on the farm. She +understood it, and Martin would have liked her to run it. If it had not +been for the problem of keeping dependable hired hands and the sight +of the mine-tipple, which, towering on the adjoining farm, reminded her +more and more constantly of Bill, she would not even have considered the +offer of Gordon Hamilton, one of Fallon's leading business men, to buy +her whole section. + +"There's a bunch going into this deal, together, Rose," Bert Mall +explained. "They want to run a new branch of their street car line +straight through here and they're going to plat this quarter into +streets and lots. The rest they'll split up into several farms and rent +for the present. It's a speculation, of course, but the way the mines +are moving north and west it's likely this'll be a thickly settled camp +in another two or three years." + +"But they only offer seventy-five an acre," Rose expostulated, "and it's +worth more than that as farm land. There's none around here as fertile +as Martin made this--and then, all the improvements!" + +"They'll have to dispose of them second-hand. It's a pity they're in +exactly the wrong spot. Well, of course, I'm not advising you, Rose," he +added, "but forty-five thousand ain't to be sneezed at, is it, when it +comes in a lump and you own only the surface? You may wait a long while +before you get another such bid. Seems to me you've worked hard enough. +I'd think you'd want a rest." + +In the end, Mrs. Wade capitulated to what, as Martin had foreseen so +clearly, was sooner or later inevitable. She was a little stunned by +the vast amount of available money now in her possession and at her +disposal. "But it's all dust in my hands," she thought sadly. "What do +I want of so much? It's going to be a terrible worry. I don't even know +who to leave it to," and she sighed deeply, pressing her hands, with her +old, characteristic gesture, to her heart. Everybody would approve, +she supposed, if she left it to Rose and Frank--her niece and Martin's +nephew--but she couldn't quite bring herself to welcome that idea--not +yet. And anyway it might be better to divide it among more people, so +that it would bring more happiness. + +Her own needs were simple. The modest five-room house which she +purchased was set on a pleasant paved street in Fallon and was obviously +ample for her. She hoped that during part of each year she could rent +the extra bed-room to some one, preferably a boy, like Bill, who was +attending high school. There was a barn for her horse and the one cow +she would keep, a neat little chicken-house for the twenty-five hens +that would more than supply her with eggs and summer fries, and a small +garage for Martin's car. It would seem very strange, she thought, to +have so few things to care for and she wondered how she would fill her +time, she whose one problem always had been how to achieve snatches of +leisure. She saw herself jogging on and on, gradually getting to be less +able on her feet, a little more helpless, until she was one of those +feeble old ladies who seem at the very antipodes of the busy mothers +they have been in their prime. How could it be that she who had always +been in such demand, so needed, so driven by real duties, should have +become suddenly such a supernumerary, so footloose, and unattached? + +But when it came to that, wasn't Fallon full of others in the same +circumstances? It was not an uncommon lot. There was Mrs. McMurray. Rose +remembered over what a jolly household she had reigned before she, too, +had lost her husband and three children instead of just one, like Billy. +Two of them had been grown and married. Now she was living in a little +cottage, all alone, doing sewing and nursing, yet always so brave and +cheerful; not only that, but interested, really interested in living. +And Mrs. Nelson. Her children were living and married and happy, but +she had given up her home, sold it--the pretty place with the hospitable +yard that used to seem to be fairly spilling over with wholesome, +boisterous boys and chatty, beribboned little girls. She was rooming +with a family, taking her meals at a restaurant, keeping up her zest +in tomorrow by running a shop. She thought of how her friend, Mrs. +Robinson, gracious, democratic woman of wide sympathies that she was, +had lived alone after David Robinson's death, taking his place as +president of the bank, during the years her only daughter, Janet, had +been off at college and later travelling around the country "on the +stage"--of all things for a daughter of Fallon. When hadn't the town +been full of these widowed, elderly women made childless alike by life +and by death? What others had met successfully, she could also, she +told herself sternly, and still the old Rose, still struggling toward +happiness, she tried to think with a little enthusiasm of her new life, +of the things she would do for others. One recreation she would be able +to enjoy to her heart's content when she moved into town--the movies. +They would tide her over, she felt gratefully. When she was too +lonely, she would go to them and shed her own troubles and problems by +absorption in those of others. She who had been married for years +and had borne two children without ever having had the joy of one +overwhelming kiss, would find romance at last, for an hour, as she +identified herself with the charming heroines of the films. + +She was to surrender the farm and the crops as they stood in June, +but as there was to be no new immediate tenant in her old house it +was easily arranged that she could continue in it until the cottage in +Fallon would be empty in September. + +Meanwhile, preparations were begun for the new car line which would pass +where the big dairy barn was standing. As the latter went down, board +by board, it seemed to Mrs. Wade that this structure which, in the +building, had been the sign and symbol of her surrender and heartbreak, +now in its destruction, typified Martin's life. It was as if Martin, +himself, were being torn limb from limb. All that he had built would +soon be dust. The sound of the cement breaking under the heavy sledges, +was almost more than she could bear. It was a relief to have the smaller +buildings dragged bodily to other parts of the farm. + +Only once before in her memory had there been such a summer and such a +drought. The corn leaves burned to a crisp brown, the ground cracked and +broke into cakes and dust piled high in thick, velvety folds on weeds +and grass. It seemed too strange for words to see others harvest the +wheat and to know that the usual crop could not be put in. + +Rose was thankful when her last evening came. Most of her furniture had +been moved in the morning, her boxes had left in the afternoon, and +the last little accessories were now piled in the car. As, hand on +the wheel, she paused a moment before starting, she was conscious of a +choking sensation. It was over, finished--she, the last of Martin, was +leaving it, for good. Before her rolled the quarter section, except for +the little box-house, as bare of fences and buildings as when the Wades +had first camped on it in their prairie schooner. With what strange +prophetic vision had Martin foreseen so clearly that all the +construction of his life would crumble. Would Jacob and Sarah Wade have +had the courage to make all their sacrifices, she wondered, if they had +known that she and she alone, daughter of a Patrick and Norah Conroy, +whom they had never seen, would some day stand there profiting by it +all? She thought of the mortgages in the bank and the bonds, of the +easier life she seemed to be entering. How strange that she whom +Grandfather and Grandmother Wade had not even known, she whom Martin +had never loved, should be the one to reap the real benefits from their +planning, and that the farm itself, for which her husband had been +willing to sacrifice Billy and herself, should be utterly destroyed. A +sudden breeze caught up some of the dust and whirling it around let +it fall. "Martin's life," thought Rose, "it was like a handful of dust +thrown into God's face and blown back again by the wind to the ground." + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Dust, by Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DUST *** + +***** This file should be named 945.txt or 945.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/9/4/945/ + +Produced by Charles Keller + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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