The next morning Jane did not come out to breakfast. Virginia had it
ready on the table and went to her mother's room to call her. There was
no response. Opening the door, she saw Jane, fully dressed, standing at
the window looking out, but she refused to speak when gently informed
that breakfast was ready. Then Virginia went back to the kitchen, and,
arranging some delicacies, a cup of coffee, and other things on a tray,
she took it in and left it on her mother's table and retired, closing
the door after her.
For a week Jane refused to leave her room or speak to her daughter.
Three times a day Virginia took her mother's food to her, always finding
the window-shade drawn and the chamber dark.
One morning, about this time, Virginia happened to see Ann in her
peanut-patch, a rich spot of ground below the old woman's barn-yard,
and, seeing that she would be quite unobserved, she put on her bonnet
and shawl and joined Ann, who, with a long, narrow hoe, was carefully
digging the peanuts from the hills, and pulling them out by the brown,
frost-bitten vines, and shaking the earth from their roots and leaving
them to dry and season in the open air.
"I never saw goobers to beat these," Ann said, proudly, as she held up a
weighty bunch. "I reckon this patch will turn out a good hundred bushel.
I hit it just right; they tell me in town that they are bringing a fine
price. I've been wondering what was the matter with you, child. You've
been keeping powerful close in-doors."
Then, as Ann leaned on her smooth hoe-handle, Virginia told her frankly
all that had taken place, leaving out nothing, and ending with her
mother's self-incarceration and sullen mood.
"Well," Ann exclaimed, her brow ruffled with pained perplexity, "I
hardly know what to say in the matter. I don't blame you for letting out
the whole business after you once got started. That was just natural.
But don't worry about her. She'll pull through; she's tough as
whitleather; her trouble's not of the body, but the mind. I know; I've
been through enough of it. Mark my prophecy, she'll come out one of
these days feeling better. She'll crawl out of her darkness like a
butterfly from its dead and useless husk. She'll see clearer out in the
open light when once she strikes it. Look here, child. I don't want to
look like a sniffling fool after all the hard rubs I've had in this life
to toughen me, but I'm a changed woman. Reading Luke's wonderful
articles every week, and remembering the things the boy has said to me
off and on, had something to do with it, I reckon, and then this
experience of yours on top of it all helped. Yes, I'm altered; I'm
altered and against my natural inclination. That very woman is _the_ one
particular human thorn in my flesh, and yet, yet, child, as the Lord is
my Master, I mighty nigh feel sorry for her. I mighty nigh pity the
poor, old, sin-slashed creature housed up there in solitary darkness
with her bleeding pride and envy and hate. I pity her now, I reckon,
because the way this has turned out hurts her more than any open fight
she could have with me. I'd 'a' died long ago under all the slush and
mire that was dabbed on me if I hadn't amused myself making money. I
didn't have the social standing of some of these folks, but I had the
hard cash, and the clink of my coin has been almost as loud as their
taunts. But your ma--she's had very little substance all along, and that
little has been dwindling day by day, till she finds herself without a
dollar and owing her very life to a woman she hates. Yes, her lot is a
hard one, and I'm sorry for her. I pity your mammy, child."