"Oh, dear, Robert, what can I do with such people?"
"Go see 'em. I like her. She's shrewd. You'll like her, too."
"But what can I say to such people? Did you hear her say 'we fellers' to
me?"
Robert laughed. "That's nothing. She feels as much of a man, or 'feller,'
as any one. Why shouldn't she?"
"But she's so vulgar."
"I admit she isn't elegant, but I think she's a good wife and mother."
"I wonder if they're all like that?"
"Now, Mate, we must try not to offend them. We must try to be one of
them."
But this was easier said than done. As he went down to the post-office
and stood waiting for his mail like the rest he tried to enter into
conversation with them, but mainly they moved away from him. William
McTurg nodded at him and said, "How de do?" and McLane asked how he liked
his new place, and that was about all.
He couldn't reach them. They suspected him. They had only the estimate of
the men who had worked for him; and, while they were civil, they plainly
didn't need him in the slightest degree, except as a topic of
conversation.
He did not improve as he had hoped to do. The spring was wet and cold,
the most rainy and depressing the valley had seen in many years. Day
after day the rain-clouds sailed in over the northern hills and deluged
the flat little town with water, till the frogs sang in every street,
till the main street mired down every team that drove into it.
The corn rotted in the earth, but the grass grew tall and yellow-green,
the trees glistened through the gray air, and the hills were like green
jewels of incalculable worth, when the sun shone, at sweet infrequent
intervals.
The cold and damp struck through into the alien's heart. It seemed to
prophesy his dark future. He sat at his desk and looked out into the gray
rain with gloomy eyes--a prisoner when he had expected to be free.
He had failed in his last venture. He had not gained any power--he was
really weaker than ever. The rain had kept him confined to the house. The
joy he had anticipated of tracing out all his boyish pleasure haunts was
cut off. He had relied, too, upon that as a source of literary power.
He could not do much more than walk down to the post-office and back on
the pleasantest days. A few people called, but he could not talk to them,
and they did not call again.
In the mean while his little bank-account was vanishing. The boys were
strong and happy; that was his only comfort. And his wife seemed strong,
too. She had little time to get lonesome.
He grew morbid. His weakness and insecurity made him jealous of the
security and health of others.
He grew almost to hate the people as he saw them coming and going in the
mud, or heard their loud hearty voices sounding from the street. He hated
their gossip, their dull jokes. The flat little town grew vulgar and low
and desolate to him.
Every little thing which had amused him now annoyed him. The cut of their
beards worried him. Their voices jarred upon him. Every day or two he
broke forth to his wife in long tirades of abuse.
"Oh, I can't stand these people! They don't know anything. They talk
every rag of gossip into shreds. 'Taters, fish, hops; hops, fish, and
'taters. They've saved and pinched and toiled till their souls are
pinched and ground away. You're right. They are caricatures. They don't
read or think about anything in which I'm interested. This life is
nerve-destroying. Talk about the health of the village life! it destroys
body and soul. It debilitates me. It will warp us both down to the level
of these people."
She tried to stop him, but he went on, a flush of fever on his cheek:
"They degrade the nature they have touched. Their squat little town is a
caricature like themselves. Everything they touch they belittle. Here
they sit while sidewalks rot and teams mire in the streets."
He raged on like one demented--bitter, accusing, rebellious. In such a
mood he could not write. In place of inspiring him, the little town and
its people seemed to undermine his power and turn his sweetness of spirit
into gall and acid. He only bowed to them now as he walked feebly among
them, and they excused it by referring to his sickness. They eyed him
each time with pitying eyes. "He's failin' fast," they said among
themselves.
One day, as he was returning from the post-office, he felt blind for a
moment and put his hand to his head. The world of vivid green grew gray,
and life receded from him into illimitable distance. He had one dim
fading glimpse of a shaggy-bearded face looking down at him, and felt the
clutch of an iron-hard strong arm under him, and then he lost hold even
on so much consciousness.
He came back slowly, rising out of immeasurable deeps toward a distant
light which was like the mouth of a well filled with clouds of misty
vapor. Occasionally he saw a brown big hairy face floating in over this
lighted horizon, to smile kindly and go away again. Others came with
shaggy beards. He heard a cheery tenor voice which he recognized, and
then another face, a big brown smiling face; very lovely it looked now to
him--almost as lovely as his wife's, which floated in from the other
side.
"He's all right now," said the cheery tenor voice from the big bearded
face.
"Oh, Mr. McTurg, do you think so?"
"Ye-e-s, sir. He's all right. The fever's left him. Brace up, old man. We
need ye yit awhile." Then all was silent again.
The well-mouth cleared away its mist again, and he saw more clearly. Part
of the time he knew he was in bed staring at the ceiling. Part of the
time the well-mouth remained closed in with clouds.
Gaunt old women put spoons of delicious broth to his lips, and their
toothless mouths had kindly lines about them. He heard their high voices
sounding faintly.
"Now, Mis' Bloom, jest let Mis' Folsom an' me attend to things out here.
We'll get supper for the boys, an' you jest go an' lay down. We'll take
care of him. Don't worry. Bell's a good hand with sick."
Then the light came again, and he heard a robin singing, and a cat-bird
squalled softly, pitifully. He could see the ceiling again. He lay on his
back, with his hands on his breast. He felt as if he had been dead. He
seemed to feel his body as if it were an alien thing.
"How are you, sir?" called the laughing, thrillingly hearty voice of
William McTurg.
He tried to turn his head, but it wouldn't move. He tried to speak, but
his dry throat made no noise.