Mr. Himes, or “Old Himes,” as he was often, with irreverent
familiarity, designated in the neighborhood, took his seat at the
supper-table in his own kitchen and looked across it with an expression
of mingled contempt and disgust at the woman who sat opposite and
poured his coffee.
Her face, though young and blooming, was hardly clean; her frowzy,
unkempt hair was in curl papers over her forehead; her dress,
originally a gayly colored calico, soiled, faded, and torn—a not
inviting picture for even a rough, hard-working old farmer to see at
the head of his table.
“Things has changed considerable since courtin’ days, B’lindy,” he
remarked in a bitter, sarcastic tone. “You used to slick up real nice
in them times when you knowed I was comin’.”
“Of course I did; but now my fortin’s made, what ud be the use o’ goin’
to all that trouble?” she returned, with a short laugh.
“It’s a kind o’ cheatin’, I think,” he went on, eyeing her with
increasing disgust, “to ’low a man to marry you with the idee that he’s
gettin’ a neat, managin’, orderly woman, and then turn out a slattern
such as you.”
“Not a bit more cheatin’ than fer a man to give a woman the notion that
he’a a goin’ to pet and humor her and give her everything she wants,
and then, when he’s got her fast, turn out mean and stingy and hard,
wantin’ to force her to work mornin’, noon, and night, like a nigger,
and never have nothin’ decent to wear, let alone a cent o’ money to
call her own,” she retorted, angrily.
“I was just objectin’ to your not lookin’ decent. You’ve got clo’es a
plenty if you’d wear ’em.”
“I haven’t. I’d ought to have a new dress this minute, and a handsome
one too. I’m sure I deserve it fer throwin’ myself away on an old
codger like you when there was a plenty o’ likely young fellers as
would a been glad enough to get me, and treat me decent, too!” she
cried, bursting into angry tears.
“That isn’t no way to get nothin’ out o’ me, I kin tell ye!” he growled.
“You’re an old brute! You’re always abusin’ me,” she sobbed. “As if
anybody could keep fixed up and doin’ all the hard, dirty work I have
to do.”
“Some folks kin. There’s Miss Heath, now; no matter what she’s doin’
she’s always neat as a pin—hair done up smooth, dress clean and fresh,
if it ain’t but a cheap calico.”
“Pity you hadn’t married her!”
“Just what I think—if I could a got her. Don’t know about that, seein’
as I never asked her. I was fool enough to be took in with your black
eyes and red cheeks and simperin’ ways. But I wouldn’t a been if I’d
knowed what a poor fist you’d make at housekeepin’ an’ cookin’, lettin’
things run to waste, and how you’d spoil all your good looks by keepin’
yerself more’n half the time so slatternly and dirty. Neatness and
cleanliness are better, to my way o’ thinkin’, than all the finery in
the world.”
They were an ill-assorted couple, of uncongenial disposition and
utterly dissimilar tastes and opinions, as was not surprising in view
of the fact that they had been very differently brought up, and that
she was the younger by some forty years.
She, a penniless, almost friendless orphan, had married for a home and
with the vain expectation of being a petted darling, who would have
little to do but deck herself in finery; he, to gratify a sudden
foolish fancy which had speedily changed to disgust when he became
acquainted with the true character of its object.
Such scenes of mutual anger and recrimination were now by no means of
rare occurrence between them. He presently rose, and with a parting
fling at her untidy appearance and faulty housewifery, went out to
attend to his cattle.
Belinda, springing to her feet, shook her clinched fist at his back as
he disappeared through the doorway, and muttering, “You old tyrant,
I’ll pay you off one o’ these fine days, that I will!” began gathering
up the dishes and clearing the table with angry jerks and a great deal
of clatter.
She smiled a grim smile of satisfaction as, on going to the door an
hour later, she saw her husband walking briskly down the road in the
direction of the nearest neighbor’s.
“There, he’s off for a good long talk with Mr. Harkness, and I’ll have
the house to myself for awhile,” she said, half aloud, having, from
being much alone, fallen into the habit of talking audibly to herself.
The sun had set, and within doors it was growing dark. She lighted a
lamp, swept and otherwise set to rights her dirty, disorderly kitchen,
released her hair from its curl papers, combed, brushed, and arranged
it becomingly before a looking-glass hanging on the wall above a side
table.
Then, lamp in hand, she went into an adjoining bedroom, where she
changed her dingy, dirty dress for a comparatively new and clean one,
adding to her adornment collar, cuffs, and a showy breastpin.
She stood for several minutes smiling and simpering at her reflection
in the glass; then, pulling open a bureau drawer, took from it a
scarlet shawl, which she folded with care and threw over her plump
shoulders. Next, a bonnet of crimson cotton velvet profusely trimmed
with cheap feathers and flowers was taken from a bandbox, turned about
admiringly in her hands, then tried on before the glass with a
repetition of the simpering and smiling.
“It’s just splendid!” she said, aloud, “and the becomingest thing out.
But what on earth was that?” she cried, starting, and turning toward
the window with a frightened look. She had seemed to hear a quick
breath, a muttered curse.
She stood for a moment trembling with fear, gazing at the window with
dilated eyes. There were no shutters, but a short muslin curtain was
drawn across the lower sash, completely obstructing her view of any and
everything that might be upon the outside. “What was there?” She dared
not go nearer to examine and satisfy her doubts by raising curtain or
sash and looking out.
But there was no repetition of the sound, and presently she concluded
she had been mistaken; it was all imagination; and she fell to admiring
herself and her finery as before.
There was a face at the window, pressed close against the glass, where
the parting of the curtain left a slight opening through which a good
view might thus be obtained of all that was transpiring within the
room. It was the face of a tall, stoutly built man, very much younger
than her husband and more comely of feature, but his expression as he
glared upon her was at times almost diabolical.
“Yes, them’s the things she’s sold herself fer,” he muttered, grinding
his teeth with rage. Then, softening a little, “But she is a purty
crayther, an’ it’s mesilf, Phalim O’Rourke, that cud a’most be fool
enough to thry her agin if the ould thafe of a husband was out o’ the
way.”
Then again, as he watched her childish delight in her finery, the
smiling, dancing eyes, the rosy cheeks dimpling, and the red lips
wreathing themselves in smiles, his face darkened with jealous rage,
and muttered curses were on his tongue. She was happy with his rival,
the man who had robbed him of her (the pretty girl who had promised
herself to him before he went away to the war) by the superior
attraction of a well-filled purse.
The terror in her face when she overheard his curse gave him a sort of
fiendish delight for the moment. He would not have cared had she come
to the window and found him there, yet he thought it more prudent not
to make her aware of his presence or further excite her fears.
At length the sound of approaching footsteps crunching the hard, frozen
snow in the road on the other side of the fence sent him from the
window.
He stepped quickly into the shadow of the house, then behind a tree,
whence he could have almost laid his hand on the shoulder of the old
farmer as he passed on his way from the front gate to the kitchen door.
“I moight a blowed his brains out and he’d never a knowed what hurt
him,” the intruder said to himself with a bitter laugh as he turned and
stole away to seek shelter in the barn.
Meanwhile Himes was shaking and pounding the kitchen door. Belinda
heard him, hastily threw aside bonnet and shawl, snatched up the lamp,
and hurried to admit him.
“What are ye locked up fer?” he growled. “Keep a man freezin’ outside
till ye choose to let him in, will ye?”
“’Twasn’t two minutes,” she said; “and I can tell you I’m not a goin’
to stay here alone after dark with the doors unfastened and burglars
about.”
“Fixed up at last!” he remarked, jeeringly, and eyeing her askance as
she set the lamp on the table.
Picking it up, he walked into the bedroom. She had left the door ajar
in her haste, and he seemed to know by intuition that she had been
there, and at something she would prefer to hide from him.
That was the fact; for though he must, of course, learn at some time of
her new purchases, she wished, since it was sure to anger him, to put
off the evil day as long as possible.
She followed him with a half-terrified, half-defiant air.
“What, more finery?” he exclaimed, turning on her, his face flushing
angrily. “Do you intend to ruin me, woman?”
“I’ve earned it—every cent of it—and ten times more!” she said,
straightening herself and regarding him with scornful, flashing eyes.
“Do you suppose I’m a goin’ to cook, bake, wash, scrub, and mend for
you fer nothin’? Not if I know myself, I ain’t!”
“Humph! We’ll see about that!” he grunted. “I’ll go to every store in
Prairieville and Riverside, Frederic and Fairfield, and tell ’em not to
trust you, fer I won’t be responsible fer yer debts.”
“Very well; then you’ll pay good wages to me or somebody else, or do
your work yourself!”
He made no reply in words, but snatching the bonnet, carried it out to
the kitchen, and threw it into the fire. She rushed after him, and made
frantic efforts to save it; but he held her back, and grimly smiling,
watched it slowly burn to ashes.
Then she dried her eyes and vowed vengeance; she would have a divorce
and make him maintain her without work.
“I hain’t the least objection in the world to the first part o’ that,”
he said, “but we’ll see about t’other.”
For hours darkness and silence had reigned supreme in the farm-house.
Belinda had wept herself to sleep by the side of her now detested
spouse, and he, too, was wrapped in slumber most profound.
The door from the kitchen opened with sudden, noiseless movement, and
with equally noiseless step a tall, dark figure drew near the bed.
Slowly and cautiously it turned the light of a dark lantern upon the
face of the sleeping woman and bent over her a darkly scowling face
whose eyes gleamed with concentrated rage and hate.
He held the lantern in his left hand, in the right a dagger. He glanced
at it, at her, and back again at it. Had her eyes opened at that
instant, perhaps she would have died of fright; but she slept on,
breathing softly and regularly, though her face wore a sad and troubled
look, and traces of tears were on her cheeks, her pillow wet with them.
The sight moved him, stern and revengeful as he was; he gazed on, his
face gradually softening, and finally turned away, slipping the dagger
into its sheath, then half withdrawing it as his eye fell on the old
man on the farther side of the bed, soundly sleeping also, with his
face to the wall, and little dreaming that there was but a step between
him and a death of violence and blood. One moment of hesitation, and
the intruder withdrew as stealthily as he had entered, passing on
through the kitchen into the open air.
“I’ll let ’em alone,” he muttered, “and they’ll revinge Phalim O’Rourke
on aich ither better’n he cud do it hisself; an’ that widout anny
danger o’ State prison fer sendin’ ’em aforehand to purgatory, that
mabbe wadn’t be no worse nor what they’re makin’ atween theirselves
now.”