"Because I don't, that's why." She stooped and began picking up the
remnants of the lunch, placing spoons and glass bottles swiftly and
thriftily in the lunch box. Nap stepped around behind her.
"Let me help," he said. And then his arm was about her and his face was
close to hers, and Tessie did not like it. He kissed her after a little
wordless struggle. And then she knew. Tessie's lips were not virgin. She
had been kissed before. But not like this. Not like this! She struck at
him furiously. Across her mind flashed the memory of a girl who had
worked in the finishing room. A nice girl, too. But that hadn't helped
her. Nap Ballou was laughing a little as he clasped her.
At that she heard herself saying: "I'll get Chuck Mory after you--you
drunken bum, you! He'll lick you black and blue. He'll ..."
The face, with the ugly, broken brown teeth, was coming close again.
With all the young strength that was in her she freed one hand and
clawed at that face from eyes to chin. A howl of pain rewarded her. His
hold loosened. Like a flash she was off. She ran. It seemed to her that
her feet did not touch the earth. Over brush, through bushes, crashing
against trees, on and on. She heard him following her, but the
broken-down engine that was his heart refused to do the work. She ran
on, though her fear was as great as before. Fear of what might have
happened ... to her, Tessie Golden ... that nobody could even talk fresh
to. She gave a little sob of fury and fatigue. She was stumbling now. It
was growing dark. She ran on again, in fear of the overtaking darkness.
It was easier now. Not so many trees and bushes. She came to a fence,
climbed over it, lurched as she landed, leaned against it weakly for
support, one hand on her aching heart. Before her was the Hatton summer
cottage, dimly outlined in the twilight among the trees. A warm,
flickering light danced in the window.
Tessie stood a moment, breathing painfully, sobbingly. Then, with a
little instinctive gesture, she patted her hair, tidied her blouse, and
walked uncertainly toward the house, up the steps to the door. She stood
there a moment, swaying slightly. Somebody'd be there. The light. The
woman who cooked for them or the man who took care of the place.
Somebody'd--
She knocked at the door feebly. She'd tell 'em she had lost her way and
got scared when it began to get dark. She knocked again, louder now.
Footsteps. She braced herself and even arranged a crooked smile. The
door opened wide. Old Man Hatton!
She looked up at him, terror and relief in her face. He peered over his
glasses at her. "Who is it?" Tessie had not known, somehow, that his
face was so kindly.
Tessie's carefully planned story crumbled into nothingness. "It's me!"
she whimpered. "It's me!"
He reached out and put a hand on her arm and drew her inside.
"Angie! Angie! Here's a poor little kid...."
Tessie clutched frantically at the last crumbs of her pride. She tried
to straighten, to smile with her old bravado. What was that story she
had planned to tell?
"Who is it, dad? Who...?" Angie Hatton came into the hallway. She stared
at Angie. Then: "Why, my dear!" she said. "My dear! Come in here."
Angie Hatton! Tessie began to cry weakly, her face buried in Angie
Hatton's expensive blouse. Tessie remembered later that she had felt no
surprise at the act.
"There, there!" Angie Hatton was saying. "Just poke up the fire, dad.
And get something from the dining room. Oh, I don't know. To drink, you
know. Something...."
Then Old Man Hatton stood over her, holding a small glass to her lips.
Tessie drank it obediently, made a wry little face, coughed, wiped her
eyes, and sat up. She looked from one to the other, like a trapped
little animal. She put a hand to her tousled head.
"That's all right," Angie Hatton assured her. "You can fix it after a
while."
There they were, the three of them: Old Man Hatton with his back to the
fire, looking benignly down upon her; Angie seated, with some knitting
in her hands, as if entertaining bedraggled, tearstained young ladies at
dusk were an everyday occurrence; Tessie, twisting her handkerchief in a
torment of embarrassment. But they asked no questions, these two. They
evinced no curiosity about this dishevelled creature who had flung
herself in upon their decent solitude.
Tessie stared at the fire. She looked up at Old Man Hatton's face and
opened her lips. She looked down and shut them again. Then she flashed a
quick look at Angie, to see if she could detect there some suspicion,
some disdain. None. Angie Hatton looked--well, Tessie put it to herself,
thus: "She looks like she'd cried till she couldn't cry no more--only
inside."
And then, surprisingly, Tessie began to talk. "I wouldn't never have
gone with this fella, only Chuck, he was gone. All the boys're gone.
It's fierce. You get scared, sittin' home, waitin', and they're in
France and everywheres, learnin' French and everything, and meetin'
grand people and havin' a fuss made over 'em. So I got mad and said I
didn't care, I wasn't goin' to squat home all my life, waitin'...."
Angie Hatton had stopped knitting now. Old Man Hatton was looking down
at her very kindly. And so Tessie went on. The pent-up emotions and
thoughts of these past months were finding an outlet at last. These
things which she had never been able to discuss with her mother she now
was laying bare to Angie Hatton and Old Man Hatton! They asked no
questions. They seemed to understand. Once Old Man Hatton interrupted
with: "So that's the kind of fellow they've got as escapement-room
foreman, eh?"
Tessie, whose mind was working very clearly now, put out a quick hand.
"Say, it wasn't his fault. He's a bum, all right, but I knew it, didn't
I? It was me. I didn't care. Seemed to me it didn't make no difference
who I went with, but it does." She looked down at her hands clasped so
tightly in her lap.
"Yes, it makes a whole lot of difference," Angie agreed, and looked up
at her father.
At that Tessie blurted her last desperate problem: "He's learnin' all
kind of new things. Me, I ain't learnin' anything. When Chuck comes home
he'll just think I'm dumb, that's all. He...."
"What kind of thing would you like to learn, Tessie, so that when Chuck
comes home...."
Tessie looked up then, her wide mouth quivering with eagerness. "I'd
like to learn to swim--and row a boat--and play ball--like the rich
girls--like the girls that's makin' such a fuss over the soldiers."
Angie Hatton was not laughing. So, after a moment's hesitation, Tessie
brought out the worst of it. "And French. I'd like to learn to talk
French."
Old Man Hatton had been surveying his shoes, his mouth grim. He looked
at Angie now and smiled a little. "Well, Angie, it looks as if you'd
found your job right here at home, doesn't it? This young lady's just
one of hundreds, I suppose. Hundreds. You can have the whole house for
them, if you want it, Angie, and the grounds, and all the money you
need. I guess we've kind of overlooked the girls. H'm, Angie. What d'you
say?"
But Tessie was not listening. She had scarcely heard. Her face was white
with earnestness.
"C'n you speak French?"
"Yes," Angie answered.
"Well," said Tessie, and gulped once, "well, how do you say in French:
'Give me a piece of bread'? That's what I want to learn first."
Angie Hatton said it correctly.
"That's it! Wait a minute! Say it again, will you?"
Angie said it again.
Tessie wet her lips. Her cheeks were smeared with tears and dirt. Her
hair was wild and her blouse awry. "Donnay-ma-un-morso-doo-pang," she
articulated, painfully. And in that moment, as she put her hand in that
of Chuck Mory, across the ocean, her face was very beautiful to see.