It is frequently a chain of sequences whose beginnings are lost in
obscurity which lead to events. The principal of the Normal School in
Westbridge, which Evelyn attended and in which Maria taught, had been
a certain Professor Lane. If he had not gone to Boston one morning
when the weather was unusually sultry for the season, and if an east
wind had not come up, causing him, being thinly clad, to take cold,
which cold meant the beginning of a rapid consumption which hurried
him off to Colorado, and a year later to death; if these east winds
had not made it impossible for Wollaston Lee's mother, now widowed,
to live with him in the college town where he had been stationed, a
great deal which happened might not have come to pass at all. It was
"the wind which bloweth where it listeth, and no man knoweth whence
it cometh and whither it goeth," which precipitated the small tragedy
of a human life.
The Saturday before the fall term commenced, Evelyn came home from
Westbridge, where she had been for some shopping, and she had a piece
of news. She did not wait to remove her hat, but stood before Maria
and her aunt, who were sewing in the sitting-room, with the roses
nestling against the soft flying tendrils of her black hair. It was
still so warm that she wore her summer hat.
"What do you think!" said she. "I have such a piece of news!"
"What is it, dear?" asked Maria. Aunt Maria looked up curiously.
"Why, Professor Lane has had to give up. He starts for Colorado
Monday. He kept hoping he could stay here, but he went to a
specialist, who told him he could not live six months in this
climate, so he is starting right off. And we are to have a new
principal."
"Who is he?" asked Maria. She felt herself trembling, for no reason
that she could define.
"Addie Hemingway says he is a handsome young man. He has been a
professor in some college, but his mother lives with him, and the
climate didn't agree with her, and so he had resigned and was out of
a position, and they have sent right away for him, and he is coming.
In fact, Addie says she thinks he has come, and that he and his
mother are at Mrs. Land's boarding-house; but they are going to keep
house. Addie says she has heard he is a young man and very handsome."
"What is his name?" asked Maria, faintly.
Evelyn looked at her and laughed. "The funniest thing about it all
is," said she, "that he comes originally from Edgham, and you must
have known him, Maria. I don't remember him at all, but I guess you
must. His name is Lee, and his first name--I can't remember his first
name. Did you know a young man about your age in Edgham named Lee?"
"Wollaston?" asked Maria. She hardly knew her own voice.
"Yes; that is it--Wollaston. It is an odd name. How queer it will
seem to have a handsome young man for principal instead of poor old
Professor Lane. I am sorry, for my part; I liked Professor Lane. I
went to the book-store in Westbridge and bought a book for him to
read on the journey, and left it at the door. I sent in my
remembrances, and told the girl how sorry I was that Professor Lane
was not well."
"That was a good girl," said Maria. "I am glad you did." She was as
white as death, but she continued sewing steadily.
Evelyn went to the looking-glass and removed her hat, and readjusted
her flying hair around her glowing face. She did not notice her
sister's pallor and expression of shock, almost of horror, but Aunt
Maria did. Finally she spoke.
"What on earth ails you, Maria Edgham?" she said, harshly. When Aunt
Maria was anxious, she was always harsh, and seemed to regard the
object of her solicitude as a culprit.
Evelyn turned abruptly and saw her sister's face, then she ran to her
and threw her arms around her neck and pulled her head against her
shoulder. "What is it? What is it?" she cried, in her sobbing,
emotional voice, which any stress aroused.
Maria raised her head and pushed Evelyn gently away. "Nothing
whatever is the matter, dear," she said, firmly, and took up her work
again.
"Folks don't turn as white as sheets if nothing is the matter," said
Aunt Maria, still in her harsh, accusing voice. "I want to know what
is the matter. Did your dinner hurt you? You ate that lemon-pie."
"I feel perfectly well, Aunt Maria," replied Maria, making one of her
tremendous efforts of will, which actually sent the color back to her
face. She smiled as she spoke.
"You do look better," said Aunt Maria doubtfully.
"Yes, you do," said Evelyn.
"Maybe it was the light," said Aunt Maria in a reassured tone.
"There isn't much light to see to sew by, I know that," Maria said in
an off-hand tone. "I believe I will take a little run down to the
post-office for the night mail. Evelyn, you can help Aunt Maria get
supper, can't you, dear?"
"Of course I can," said Evelyn. "But are you sure you are well enough
to go alone?"
"Nonsense!" said Maria, rising and folding her work.
"Do you think anything is the matter with sister?" Evelyn asked Aunt
Maria after Maria had gone.
"Don't ask me," replied Aunt Maria curtly.
"Aunt Maria!"
"Well?"
"Professor Lane isn't married. You don't suppose sister--"
"What a little goose you are, Evelyn Edgham!" cried Aunt Maria,
almost fiercely turning upon her. "Do you suppose if Maria Edgham had
wanted any man she couldn't have got him?"
"I suppose she could," said Evelyn meekly. "And I know Professor Lane
is so much older, but he always seemed to like sister, and I didn't
know but she felt badly because he was so ill."
"Stuff!" said Aunt Maria. "Come, you had better set the table. I have
got to make some biscuits for supper. They won't be any more than
done by the time Maria gets back."
"Did you think she looked so very pale?" asked Evelyn, following her
aunt out of the room.
"No, I didn't think she looked pale at all when I came to look at
her," said Aunt Maria, sharply. "She looked just as she always does.
It was the light."
Aunt Maria unhesitatingly lied. She knew that her niece had been
pale, and she believed that it was on account of Professor Lane. She
thought to herself what fools girls were. There Maria had thrown away
such a chance as George Ramsey, and was very likely breaking her
heart in secret over this consumptive, old enough to be her father.
Evelyn also believed, in her heart of hearts, that her sister was in
love with Professor Lane, but she took a more sentimental view of the
matter. She was of the firm opinion that love has no age, and then
Professor Lane had never seemed exactly old to her, and he was a very
handsome man. She thought of poor Maria with the tenderest pity and
sympathy. It almost seemed to her that she herself was in love with
Professor Lane, and that his going so far away to recover his health
was a cruel blow to her. She thought of poor Maria walking to the
post-office and brooding over her trouble, and her tender heart ached
so hard that it might have been Maria's own.
But Maria, walking to the post-office, realized not so much an ache
in her heart as utter horror and terror. She asked herself how could
she possibly continue teaching in that school if Wollaston Lee were
principal; how could she endure the daily contact with him which
would be inevitable. She wondered if he could possibly have known
that she was teaching in that school when he accepted the position.
Such a deadly fear was over her that her class-room and the great
pile of school buildings seemed to her fancy as horrible as a cage of
wild beasts. She felt such a loathing of the man who was legally,
although not really, her husband, that the loathing itself filled her
with shame and disgust at herself. She told herself that it was
horrible, horrible, that she could not endure it, that it was
impossible. She was in a fairly desperate mood. She had a sudden
impulse to run away and leave everybody and everything, even Evelyn
and her aunt, whom she loved so well. She felt pitiless towards
everybody except herself. She took out her pocket-book and counted
the money which it contained. There were fifteen dollars and some
loose change. The railroad station was on a road parallel to the one
on which she was walking. An express train flashed by as she stood
there. Suddenly Maria became possessed of one of those impulses which
come to everybody, but to which comparatively few yield in lifetimes.
The girl gathered up her skirts and broke into a run for the railroad
station. She knew that there was an accommodation train due soon
after the express. She reached the dusty platform, in fact, just as
the train came in. There were no other passengers from Amity except a
woman whom she did not know, dragging a stout child by the arm. The
child was enveloped in clothing to such an extent that it could
scarcely walk. It stumbled over its voluminous white coat. Nobody
could have told its sex. It cast a look of stupid discomfort at
Maria, then its rasped little face opened for a wail. "Shet up!" said
the mother, and she dragged more forcibly at the podgy little arm,
and the child broke into a lop-sided run towards the cars.
Maria had no time to get a ticket. She only had time for that one
glance at the helpless, miserable child, before she climbed up the
steep car-steps. She found an empty seat, and shrugged close to the
window. She did not think very much of what she was doing. She
thought more of the absurdly uncomfortable child, over-swathed in
clothing, and over-disciplined with mother-love, she could not have
told why. She wondered what it would be like to have an ugly,
uninteresting, viciously expostulating little one dragging at her
hand. The mother, although stout and mature-looking, was not much
older than she. It seemed to her that the being fond of such a child,
and being happy under such circumstances, would involve as much of a
vital change in herself as death itself. And yet she wondered if such
a change were possible with all women, herself included. She gazed
absently at the pale landscape past which the train was flying. The
conductor had to touch her arm before he could arouse her attention,
when he asked for her ticket. Then she looked at him vacantly, and he
had to repeat his "Ticket, please."
Maria opened her pocket-book and said, mechanically, the name of the
first station which came into her head, "Ridgewood." Ridgewood was a
small city about fifteen miles distant. She had sometimes been there
shopping. She gave the conductor a five-dollar bill, and he went
away, murmuring something about the change. When he returned with the
rebate-slip and the change, he had to touch her shoulder again to
arrest her attention.
"Change, miss," said the conductor, and "you can get ten cents back
on this at the station."
Maria took the change and the slip and put them in her pocket-book,
and the conductor passed on with a quick, almost imperceptible
backward glance at her. Maria sat very still. The child who had got
on at Amity began to wail again, and its outcries filled the whole
car. To Maria it seemed like the natural outburst of an atmosphere
overcharged with woe, and the impotent rage and regret of the whole
race, as a cloud is charged with electricity. She felt that she
herself would like to burst into a wild wail, and struggle and
wrestle against fate with futile members, as the child fought against
its mother with its fat legs in shoes too large, and its bemittened
hands. However, she began to get a certain comfort from the rapid
motion. She continued to stare out of the window at the landscape,
which fast disappeared under the gathering shadows. The car lamps
were lit. Maria still looked, however, out of the window; the lights
in the house windows, and red and green signal-lights, gave her a
childish interest. She forgot entirely about herself. She turned her
back upon herself and her complex situation of life with infinite
relief. She did not wonder what she would do when she reached
Ridgewood. She did not think any more of herself. It was as if she
had come into a room of life without any looking-glasses, and she was
no longer visible to her own consciousness. She did not look at the
other passengers. All that was evident to her of the existence of any
in the car besides herself was the unceasing wail of the child, and
its mother's half-soothing, half-scolding voice. She did not see the
passengers who boarded the train at the next station beyond Amity,
and that Wollaston Lee was one of them. Indeed, she might not at
once have recognized him, although the man retained in a marked
degree the features of the boy. Wollaston had grown both tall and
broad-shouldered, and had a mustache. He was a handsome fellow, well
dressed, and with an easy carriage, and he had an expression of
intelligent good-humor which made more than one woman in the car look
at him. Although Maria did not see him, he saw her at once, and
recognized her, and his handsome face paled. The ridiculous
complexity of his position towards her had not tended to make him
very happy. He had kept the secret as well as Maria; for him, as for
her, a secret was a heavy burden, almost amounting to guilt. He
continued to glance furtively at her from time to time. He thought
that she was very pretty, and also that there was something amiss
with her. He, as well as the girl, had entirely gotten over his
boyish romance, but the impulse to honorable dealing and duty towards
her had not in the least weakened.
When the train stopped at Ridgewood he rose. Maria did not stir.
Wollaston stopped, and saw the conductor touch Maria, and heard him
say, "This is your station, lady."
Maria rose mechanically and followed the conductor through the car.
When she had descended the steps Wollaston, who had gotten off just
in advance, stood aside and waited. He felt uneasy without just
knowing why. It seemed to him that there was something strange about
the girl's bearing. He thought so the more when she stood motionless
on the platform and remained there a moment or more after the train
had moved out; then she went towards a bench outside the station and
sat down. Wollaston made up his mind that there was something
strange, and that he must speak to her.
He approached her, and he could hear his heart beat. He stood in
front of her, and raised his hat. Maria did not look up. Her eyes
seemed fixed on a fringe of wood across the track in which some
katydids were calling, late as it was. That wood, with its persistent
voices of unseen things, served to turn her thought from herself,
just as the cry of the child had done.
"Miss Edgham," said Wollaston, in a strained voice. It suddenly
occurred to him that that was not the girl's name at all, that she
was in reality Mrs. Lee, not Miss Edgham.
Maria did not seem to see him until he had repeated her name again.
Then she gave a sudden start and looked up. An electric light on the
platform made his face quite plain. She knew him at once. She did not
make a sound, but rose with a sudden stealthy motion like that of a
wild, hunted thing who leaves its covert for farther flight. But
Wollaston laid his hand on her shoulder and forced her gently back to
her seat. There was no one besides themselves on the platform. They
were quite alone.
"Don't be afraid," he said. But Maria, looking up at him, fairly
chattered with terror. Her lips were open, she made inarticulate
noises like a frightened little monkey. Her eyes dilated. This seemed
to her incredibly monstrous, that in fleeing she should have come to
that from which she fled. All at once the species of mental coma in
which she had been cleared away, and she saw herself and the horrible
situation in which her flight had placed her. The man looked down at
her with the utmost kindness, concern, and pity.
"Don't be afraid," he said again; but Maria continued to look at him
with that cowering, hunted look.
"Where are you going?" asked Wollaston, and suddenly his voice became
masterful. He realized that there was something strange, undoubtedly,
about all this.
"I don't know," Maria said, dully.
"You don't know?"
"No, I don't."
Maria raised her head and looked down the track. "I am going on the
train," said she, with another wild impulse.
"What train?"
"The next train."
"The next train to where?"
"The next train to Springfield," said Maria, mentioning the first
city which came into her mind.
"What are you going to Springfield for so late? Have you friends
there?"
"No," said Maria, in a hopeless voice.
Wollaston sat down beside her. He took one of her little, cold hands,
and held it in spite of a feeble struggle on her part to draw it
away. "Now, see here, Maria," he said, "I know there is something
wrong. What is it?"
His tone was compelling. Maria looked straight ahead at the gloomy
fringe of woods, and answered, in a lifeless voice, "I heard you were
coming."
"And that is the reason you were going away?"
"Yes."
"See here, Maria," said Wollaston, eagerly, "upon my honor I did not
know myself until this very afternoon that you were one of the
teachers in the Westbridge Academy. If I had known I would have
refused the position, although my mother was very anxious for me to
accept it. I would refuse it now if it were not too late, but I
promise you to resign very soon if you wish it."
"I don't care," said Maria, still in the same lifeless tone. "I am
going away."
"Going where?"
"To Springfield. I don't know. Anywhere."
Wollaston leaned over her and spoke in a whisper. "Maria, do you want
me to take steps to have it annulled?" he asked. "It could be very
easily done. There was, after all, no marriage. It is simply a
question of legality. No moral question is involved."
A burning blush spread over Maria's face. She snatched her hand away
from his. "Do you think I could bear it?" she whispered back,
fiercely.
"Bear what?" asked the young man, in a puzzled tone.
"The publicity, the--newspapers. Nobody has known, not one of my
relatives. Do you think I could bear it?"
"I will keep the secret as long as you desire," said Wollaston. "I
only wish to act honorably and for your happiness."
"There is only one reason which could induce me to give my consent to
the terrible publicity," said Maria.
"What is that?"
"If--you wished to marry anybody else."
"I do not," said Wollaston, with a half-bitter laugh. "You can have
your mind easy on that score. I have not thought of such a thing as
possible for me."
Maria cast a look of quick interest at him. Suddenly she saw his
possible view of the matter, that it might be hard for him to forego
the happiness which other young men had.
"I would not shrink at all," she said, gently, "if at any time you
saw anybody whom you wished to marry. You need not hesitate. I am not
so selfish as that. I do not wish your life spoiled."
Wollaston laughed pleasantly. "My life is not to be spoiled because
of any such reason as that," he said, "and I have not seen anybody
whom I wished to marry. You know I have mother to look out for, and
she makes a pleasant home for me. You need not worry about me, but
sometimes I have worried a little about you, poor child."
"You need not, so far as that is concerned," cried Maria, almost
angrily. A sense of shame and humiliation was over her. She did not
love Wollaston Lee. She felt the same old terror and disgust at him,
but it mortified her to have him think that she might wish to marry
anybody else.
"Well, I am glad of that," said Wollaston. "I suppose you like your
work."
"Yes."
"After all, work is the main thing," said Wollaston.
"Yes," assented Maria, eagerly.
Wollaston returned suddenly to the original topic. "Were you actually
running away because you heard I was coming?" he said.
"Yes, I suppose I was," Maria replied, in a hopeless, defiant sort of
fashion.
"Do you actually know anybody in Springfield?"
"No."
"Have you much money with you?"
"I had fifteen dollars and a few cents before I paid my fare here."
"Good God!" cried Wollaston. Then he added, after a pause of dismay,
almost of terror, during which he looked at the pale little figure
beside him, "Do you realize what might have happened to you?"
"I don't think I realized much of anything except to get away,"
replied Maria.
Wollaston took her hand again and held it firmly. "Now listen to me,
Maria," he said. "On Monday I shall have to begin teaching in the
Westbridge Academy. I don't see how I can do anything else. But now
listen. I give you my word of honor, I will not show by word or deed
that you are anything to me except a young lady who used to live in
the same village with me. I shall have to admit that."
"I am not anything else to you," Maria flashed out.
"Of course not," Wollaston responded, quietly. "But I give you my
word of honor that I will make no claim upon you, that I will resign
my position when you say the word, that I will keep the wretched,
absurd secret until you yourself tell me that you wish for--an
annulment of the fictitious tie between us."
Maria sat still.
"You will not think of running away now, will you?" Wollaston said,
and there was a caressing tone in his voice, as if he were addressing
a child.
Maria did not reply at once.
"Tell me, Maria," said Wollaston. "You will not think of doing such a
desperate thing, which might ruin your whole life, when I have
promised you that there is no reason?"
"No, I will not," Maria said.
Wollaston rose and went nearer the electric light and looked at his
watch. Then he came back. "Now, Maria, listen to me again," he said.
"I have some business in Ridgewood. I would not attend to it to-night
but I have made an appointment with a man and I don't see my way out
of breaking it. It is about a house which I want to rent. Mother
doesn't like the boarding-house at Westbridge, and in fact our
furniture is on the road and I have no place to store it, and I am
afraid there are other parties who want to rent this house, that I
shall lose it if I do not keep the appointment. But I have only a
little way to go, and it will not keep me long. I can be back easily
inside of half an hour. The next train to Amity stops here in about
thirty-seven minutes. Now I want you to go into the waiting-room, and
sit there until I come back. Can I trust you?"
"Yes," said Maria, with a curious docility. She rose.
"You had better buy your ticket back to Amity, and when I come into
the station, I think it is better that I should only bow to you,
especially if others should happen to be there. Can I trust you to
stay there and not get on board any train but the one which goes to
Amity?"
"Yes, you can," said Maria, with the same docility which was born of
utter weariness and the subjection to a stronger will.
She went into the waiting-room and bought her ticket, then sat down
on a settee in the dusty, desolate place and waited. There were two
women there besides herself, and they conversed very audibly about
their family affairs. Maria listened absently to astonishing
disclosures. The man in the ticket-office was busy at the telegraph,
whose important tick made an accompaniment to the chatter of the
women, both middle-aged, and both stout, and both with grievances
which they aired with a certain delight. One had bought a damaged
dress-pattern in Ridgewood, and had gone that afternoon to obtain
satisfaction. "I set there in Yates & Upham's four mortal hours,"
said she, in a triumphant tone, "and they kep' comin' and askin' me
things, and sayin' would I do this and that, but I jest stuck to what
I said I would do in the first place, and finally they give in."
"What did you want?" asked the other woman.
"Well, I wanted my money back that I had paid for the dress, and I
wanted the dressmaker paid for cuttin' it--it was all cut an'
fitted--and I wanted my fares back and forth paid, too."
"You don't mean to say they did all that?" said the other woman, in a
tone of admiration.
"Yes, sir, they did. Finally Mr. Upham himself came and talked with
me, and he said he would allow me what I asked. I tell you I marched
out of that store, when I'd got my money back, feelin' pretty well
set up."
"I should think you would have," said the other woman, in an admiring
tone. "You do beat the Dutch!"
Then the women fell to talking about the niece of one of them who had
been jilted by her lover. "He treated her as mean as pusley," one
woman said. "There he'd been keepin' company with poor Aggie three
mortal years, comin' regular every Wednesday and Sunday night, and
settin' up with her, and keepin' off other fellers."
"I think he treated her awful mean," assented the other woman. "I
don't know what I would have said if it had been my Mamie."
Maria detected a covert tone of delight in this woman's voice. She
realized instinctively that the woman had been jealous that her
companion's niece had been preferred to her daughter, and was
secretly glad that she was jilted. "How does she take it?" she asked.
"She just cries her eyes out, poor child," her friend answered. "She
sets and cries all day, and I guess she don't sleep much. Her mother
is thinkin' of sendin' her to visit her married sister Lizzie down in
Hartford, and see if that won't divert her mind a little."
"I should think that would be a very good idea," said the other
woman. Maria, listening listlessly, whirled about herself in the
current of her own affairs, thought what a cat that woman was, and
how she did not in the least care if she was a cat.
Wollaston Lee was not gone very long. He bowed and said good-evening
to Maria, then seated himself at a little distance. The two women
looked at him with sharp curiosity. "It would be the best thing for
poor Aggie if she could get her mind set on another young man," said
the woman whose niece had been jilted.
"That is so," assented the other woman.
"There's as good fish in the sea as has ever been caught, as I told
her," said the first woman, with speculative eyes upon Wollaston Lee.
It was not long before the train for Amity arrived. Wollaston, with
an almost imperceptible gesture, looked at Maria, who immediately
arose. Wollaston sat behind her on the train. Just before they
reached Amity he came forward and spoke to her in a low voice. "I
have to go on to Westbridge," he said. "Will there be a carriage at
the station?"
"There always is," Maria replied.
"Don't think of walking up at this hour. It is too late. What--"
Wollaston hesitated a second, then he continued, in a whisper, "What
are you going to tell your aunt?" he said.
"Nothing," replied Maria.
"Can you?"
"I must. I don't see any other way, unless I tell lies."
Wollaston lifted his hat, with an audible remark about the beauty of
the evening, and passed through into the next car, which was a
smoker. The two women of the station were seated a little in the rear
across the aisle from Maria. She heard one of them say to the other,
"I wonder who that girl was he spoke to?" and the other's muttered
answer that she didn't know.
Contrary to her expectations, Maria did not find a carriage at the
Amity station, and she walked home. It was late, and the village
houses were dark. The electric lights still burned at wide intervals,
lighting up golden boughs of maples until they looked like veritable
branches of precious metal. Maria hurried along. She had a half-mile
to walk. She did not feel afraid; a sense of confusion and relief was
over her, with another dawning sense which she did not acknowledge to
herself. An enormous load had been lifted from her mind; there was no
doubt about that. A feeling of gratitude and confidence in the young
man who had just left her warmed her through and through. When she
reached her aunt's house she saw a light in the sitting-room windows,
and immediately she turned into the path the door opened and her aunt
stood there.
"Maria Edgham, where have you been?" asked Aunt Maria.
"I have been to walk," replied Maria.
"Been to walk! Do you know what time it is? It is 'most midnight.
I've been 'most crazy. I was just goin' in to get Henry up and have
him hunt for you."
"I am glad you didn't," said Maria, entering and removing her hat.
She smiled at her aunt, who continued to gaze at her with the
sharpest curiosity.
"Where have you been to walk this time of night?" she demanded.
Maria looked at her aunt, and said, quite gravely, "Aunt Maria, you
trust me, don't you?"
"Of course I do; but I want to know. I have a right to know."
"Yes, you have," said Maria, "but I shall never tell you as long as I
live where I have been to-night."
"What?"
"I shall never tell you were I have been, only you can rest assured
that there is no harm--that there has been no harm."
"You don't mean to ever tell?"
"No." Maria took a lamp from the sitting-room table, lighted it, and
went up-stairs.
"You are just like your mother--just as set," Aunt Maria called after
her, in subdued tones. "Here I've been watchin' till I was 'most
crazy."
"I am real sorry," Maria called back. "Good-night, Aunt Maria. Such a
thing will never happen again."
Directly Maria was in her own room she pulled down her window-shades.
She did not see a man, who had followed at a long distance all the
way from the station, moving rapidly up the street. It was Wollaston
Lee. He had seen, from the window of the smoker, that there was no
carriage waiting, had jumped off the train, entered the station, then
stolen out and followed Maria until he saw her safely in her home.
Then the last trolley had gone, and he walked the rest of the way to
Westbridge.