AS TO THOSE OTHERS.
Time passes, even with an impatient lover, and so there came an end at
last to Grant Harlson's season of probation. There was nothing
dramatic about the wedding.
To him the ceremony was merely the gaining of the human title-deed to
the fortune which was his on earth, and to Jean Cornish it was but the
giving of herself fully to the man--that which she wished to do with
herself. There were few of us present, but we were the two's closest
friends. They were a striking pair as they stood together and plighted
their faith calmly: he big and strong, almost to the point of
burliness, and she slight, sweet and lissom. There was no nervousness
apparent in either, perhaps because there was such earnestness. And
then he carried her away from us.
They had not been long away, this newly wedded couple, when they
returned to the home he had prepared. As he remarked half grimly to
me, in comment on lost years, they had met so late in the nesting
season that time should not be wasted. Of that home more will be told
in other pages, but it is only of the two people I am talking now.
I noted a difference in their way when I first dined with them, which I
did, of course, as soon as they had returned. I had thought them very
close together before in thought and being, but I saw that there was
more. The sweet, sacred intimacy which marriage afforded had given the
greater fullness to what had seemed to me already perfect. But I was
one with much to learn of many things. And yet these two were to come
closer still--closer through a better mutual understanding and new
mutual hopes. It was long afterward when I understood.
It was after dinner one day, and in the sitting-room, which was a
library as well. They were going out that evening, but it was early
still, and he was leaning back in a big chair smoking the post-prandial
cigar, and she coiled upon a lower seat very near him, so near that he
could put his hand upon her head, and they were talking lightly of many
things. She looked up more earnestly at last.
"Will you ever tire of it, Grant?"
He laughed happily.
"Tire of what, Brownie?"
"Of this, of me, and of it all; will you never weary of the quietness
of it and want some change? You must care very much, indeed, if you
will not."
He spoke slowly.
"It seems to me that though we were to live each a thousand years, I
would never tire of this as it is. But, of course, it will not be just
this way. We could not keep it so if we would, and would not if we
could."
"Why should it change?"
He drew her close to him and placed his hand upon her face and kissed
her on the forehead.
"I shall be more in the fray again. I must be. You would not have
your husband a sluggard among men, and that will sometimes take me from
you, though never for long, because I'm afraid I shall be selfish and
have you with me when there are long journeys. And it will change,
too, you know--because you see, dear, there may be the--the others.
You hope so, with me, do you not?"
Her face remained hidden for a little time. When she raised it, there
was a blush upon her cheeks, but her eyes had not the glance he had
anticipated.
"No!" she said.
He did not reply, because he could not comprehend. He looked at her,
astonished, and she broke forth recklessly:
"I love you so, Grant! I love you so! I want you, just you, and no
one else. Are we not happy as we are? Are you not satisfied with me,
just me? You are like all men! You are selfish! You--oh, love! You
love me so--I know that--but you think of me--it seems so, anyhow--as
but part of a scheme of life, of the life which will make you happy.
My love, my husband! why need it be that way? Why am I not enough?
Why may we not be one, just one, and be that way? I want nothing more.
Why should you? Are we not all our own world? I will be everything to
you. Oh, Grant!" And she ceased, sobbingly.
The man said nothing. He could not understand at first; then came upon
him, gradually, a comprehension of how different had been their dreams
in some ways. It was inexplicable. He thought of the mother instinct
which gives even to the little girl a doll. He had supposed that his
own fancies were but weak reflections of what was in the innermost
heart of the woman he loved so. He blurted out, almost roughly:
"'Portia is Brutus' harlot, not his wife.'" Then added, bitterly, "It
is the man who is saying it this time, you see."
A second later, shame-faced and repentant, he had caught the slender
figure in his arms and was holding it close to him.
"I'm a brute, dear," he said, "and there is no excuse for me. I
understand, I think. We dreamed differently. That was all. Had you
loved me less, dear heart, you would have been more like other women.
But it doesn't matter. It shall be as you say, as you may wish or
fancy. We thought unlike, yet you were as much the pivot of my thought
as I of yours. It was of you, for you, and because of you, I had my
visions. That is all. And we will not talk more of it."
She nestled closer to him, and he stroked the brown mass of her hair
and remained silent. Some moments passed that way. Then she roused
herself and sat up squarely, and looked him bravely in the face.
"I have been thinking," she said, "and I can think very well when I am
so close to you, with my head where it is now. I have been thinking,
and it has occurred to me that I was not a wise, good woman, and I want
you to forgive me."
His answer involved no words at all, but it was meet for every purpose.
She pushed him away from her, and spoke gravely:
"Will you do something for me, Grant?"
"Yes."
"Will you do it now?"
"Yes--if it be good for you."
"I want you to do this. I want you to imagine me some one else, some
one you regard, but for whom you do not care particularly. And then I
want you to tell me what you think, what you would think best about
the--'the others'"--blushing more fairly than any rose that ever grew
on stem. "Will you do that?"
His face was very earnest. "I will try," he said, "but it will be
difficult to imagine you someone else. How can I do that when I can
look into your eyes, my little wife? I'll try, though."
"Then talk to me, now."
He was troubled. He did not know how to express himself in the spirit
asked of him, and he did not look at her in the beginning.
"Sweetheart, you are a part of me, and you are the greatest of what
there is of my life. It is about you that all my thoughts converge. I
do not suppose there will be any happier, any dearer time ever than
this we are passing together, with none to molest us, or divert us from
each other. You know me well now. I am what I am, and never was a man
of stronger personal moods or one who so hungered for the one woman.
And you are the one woman, the one physical object in the world, I
worship. There is no need that I tell you anything. And you have
learned, too, how I care for you in all greater, and, it may be, purer
ways. We are happy together. But, love of me, we are a man and wife,
an American man and wife, of the social grade--for there are social
grades, despite all our democracy--where, it seems to me, a family has
come to be esteemed almost a disgrace, as something vulgar and
annoying. And it seems to me this is something unnatural, and all
wrong. Whatever nature indicates is best. To do what nature indicates
is to secure the greatest happiness. Trials may come, new sorrows and
incumbrances be risked, but nature brings her recompense. I want you
the mother of our child, of our children, as it may be. I know what
your thought has been, I understand it now, but how can children
separate us? When a man and woman look together upon a child, another
human being, a part of each of them, a being who would never have
existed had they not found each other, a being with the traits of each
combined, it seems to me as if their souls should blend somehow as
never before. They are one then, to a certainty. They have become a
unit in the great scheme of existence. And so, darling, I have thought
and thought much. I have dreamed of you as the little mother, the one
who would not be of the silly modern type, the one who, with me, would
not be ashamed any more than were our sturdy ancestors of a sturdy
family, should we be blessed so. The one who would be glad with me in
the womanhood and manhood of it. And, as I said, it could never part
us. It would but make me more totally your own, more watchful, if that
were possible, more tender, if that could be, more worshipful of you in
the greater life of us two together, us two more completely. And that
is all. It shall be as you say, and I will not complain, for I know
your impulse in what you said and all its lovingness."
She had listened to each word intently, and her face had flushed and
paled alternately. When he had done she snuggled more closely to him,
and still said nothing. When she did speak, this is what she said, and
she said it earnestly:
"I was wrong, my husband; I was a selfish, infatuated woman, who loved
with one foolish idea which marred its fullness. You have taught me
something, dear. You could not give me the thought I had again, even
were you to try yourself, for I see it now. And----"
She put her arms about his neck and buried her fair face upon the
pillow which afforded her such convenient shelter. As for the man,
there was something like a lump in his throat, but he spoke with an
effort at playfulness, though his voice wavered a little:
"It is right, my love. And we will visit this nature of ours together.
It is the season now, and next week we go camping. I want to show old
friends of mine, the spirits of the forest, how fair a wife I've won."
And, a few days later, there was a pretty little scene down town.
"Sportsmen's Goods," the sign above the doorway said, and in the
windows were numerous wooden ducks and dainty rods of split bamboo, and
glittering German silver reels and gaudy flies, and a thousand things
to delight the heart of a fisherman or hunter. Enter, a
broad-shouldered gentleman and a haughty wisp of a woman, the latter a
trifle embarrassed, despite her stateliness.
"How are you, Jack?"
This to the proprietor of the place, as he comes forward.
"How are you, Harlson?"
"This is Mrs. Harlson." The ceremony takes place. "Now, Jack, here's
a grave matter of business. Have you a private room? And I want you
to send in a lot of light wading-boots--the smallest sizes. And I want
some other things." And the list is given.
And the lady and gentleman disappear into a small room assigned them,
and a lot of wading-boots are taken in, and time elapses. And,
eventually, lady and gentleman emerge again, the man's eyes full of
laughter, and the woman's eyes full of laughter and confusion, and a
package is made up.
"Send it to my house, Jack," says the man, and the couple leave the
place.