"Well, there's sure to be some married men about, some place." And
Greta had smiled, as if she understood Martha's cause for complaint.
"Don't be silly!" Emily had replied. They had gone swimming.
Afterwards Emily wondered if Martha had known that man would be
there, if she had taken that way of warding off subsequent reproof.
She wondered, but she could reach no conclusion. She could never
make out clearly how it had gone on. She hadn't even known for
certain that Martha was seeing the man. She had thought it better to
trust her.
Eve had returned the next day, and Emily had been glad, feeling that
Eve would be a protection. The girls had gone together to spend the
week-end at Geneva with friends. That had been planned days ago.
Bob had remarked uneasily, looking up from the daily at noon on
Monday:
"That bird's in Geneva, Emily!"
"Who?"
"Quin, that brother-in-law of Eve's."
"Why shouldn't he be?" Emily had asked, carelessly. And she asked
herself the same question, but not so carelessly. What was more
natural than that he should have gone fishing? Didn't everybody go
fishing? Wasn't there a long list in the paper every Monday of all
the men from the town who had gone, even though they went regularly
every Saturday of the season? The editor had to have something to
fill up his columns, and that list, and the list of those who went to
Chicago daily to shop, could always be depended upon. Still----
Afterwards she sometimes thought that she should have said to Martha:
"Did you see Mr. Quin at Geneva? Did you know he was going to be
there?" She might have asked that question the following Wednesday.
Perhaps that was where she had made her great mistake. She should
have asked Martha directly what had happened there.
For Eve came home that day from the links alone, and announced she
was going to Chicago at once to her father; that she had thought when
she came to live in this town that at least she wouldn't have her
sister hanging around, and her brother-in-law. She wasn't going to
come back till they cleared out, she said, angrily red. Afterwards
Emily knew that she ought to have asked her exactly what the quarrel
had been about. She had, however, practically asked Martha later.
Martha had said indifferently she supposed Eve was tired of the
little town. It wasn't good enough for her, perhaps. She had spoken
sarcastically. She didn't regret Eve's departure. She had gone on
her way undisturbed. Perhaps she had spent more time with her
friends than she usually did. At home she was quiet; but she had
always been that. She had always sat excited, as it were, by her
thoughts, chuckling to herself about what was in her mind. Her Uncle
Jim had said of her child that it was _herself_ she seemed always to
be enjoying. She had seemed to have a hidden source of delight to
muse on. Johnnie was no longer about the house. When Emily
commented on this fact, Martha had explained indifferently that he
had an awful case on a De Kalb girl.
One afternoon Emily sat talking to an old, trustworthy friend.
"When's Eve coming back? You know her sister?" Grace Phillips had
asked.
Emily couldn't believe she had asked it in malice. She thought
afterwards it might have been a well-meant warning. Emily had said
she had not even seen the sister. She wasn't receiving callers.
"You see more of him, I suppose?"
Emily had repressed her surprise, and answered, vaguely, "No; that
is, not a great deal. Eve--not when Eve isn't here."
What did Mrs. Phillips mean? Had she seen Martha with that man?
"I hear the old grandmother gets worse all the time," Mrs. Phillips
had innocently continued. Emily had said she didn't know.
It was after four then; soon after that there had come a
long-distance 'phone call: four friends in the next county were
driving up to dance in Chicago. Would Martha go with them? They'd
be along soon after seven. As Emily hung up the receiver she saw a
sort of chance. She would go out to the golf course and bring Martha
home to get ready for the evening, and take occasion to see exactly
who was playing there, and then she would be rid of this uneasiness.
She hated taking the car herself, but it was time she made sure of
what was going on.
So she drove out, inch by inch around by the dusty detour, over the
well-known ruts. She turned the car anxiously through the gates,
which always looked so narrow when she was driving that to miss their
post seemed almost miraculous. She chose her place of stopping very
carefully, a large place easy to turn around in, in case Martha
wasn't there and she had to go back by herself.
She shut off the engine, congratulating herself the more upon the
neatness of her achievement because some other woman had stopped her
car--but not her engine--wrong way about, at some distance, so that
she sat almost facing Emily. A stranger she was. With a swanky
little scarlet hat on, and rouged; waiting for some one, looking
intently towards the path through the trees by which the players came
up to the shack of a clubhouse.
And then it occurred to Emily that that woman must be Eve's sister,
because that must be the car that Eve drove. She looked, naturally,
with renewed interest. The face was in some ways like Eve's. But it
was no wonder Eve didn't like her. She was a discontented woman,
ill-natured, with hollows about her eyes, like Eve, but more
accentuated; altogether hard faced. She was probably waiting for her
husband.
"Shall I go and speak to her, or shall I not?" Emily wondered. The
woman hadn't once looked in her direction. Either she was intent
upon the path and had not heard anyone coming, or purposely avoided
chances of being intruded upon.
Emily had not been sitting there undecided one minute when the woman
leaned suddenly forward, shifting her position to get a better view
of something. Emily's eyes turned, naturally, to see what she was so
eagerly looking at. There were four people walking towards them at a
little distance, two in front, young Mr. and Mrs. Williams, two
behind, little Martha Kenworthy and that man. Martha had on a
pleated white skirt and a belted overblouse of pale yellow crêpe de
Chine, with a square neck, and she was walking along, slight and
young, bareheaded, of course, with her face all flushed pink, looking
up, all smiling and interested, to that man, who seemed, as always,
to be leaning down over her. They came walking towards her. They
were talking about something so amusing, so intimately interesting,
that they paid no attention to the two cars. Emily sitting there,
sickening, saw Mrs. Williams call Martha's attention to her mother.
She saw the absorbed two turn from their topic and look towards her.
She had looked again quickly at the woman. She knew what she had
been waiting for. She saw the discontented face flush angrily, as
Eve's did sometimes; and then, just as that man drew near, when he
had seen his wife sitting there, she started her car and drove
hastily away.
Martha was coming up to her mother. Mrs. Williams was with her. The
men had stopped to talk together about something, a few steps away.
Had the Williamses seen that woman? Would they know who she was?
"Hello, mother!" Martha said, quite naturally. And Emily, she hoped
undismayed, explained to her and Mrs. Williams why she had come. "I
thought I'd better come and get you, so you'd have time enough to get
ready," she said.
Martha jumped in, taking her place at the wheel. She had come out
with Greta, whom Emily saw at some distance, coming towards her. She
asked Mrs. Williams to tell her she had gone home. They whirled away.
"Martha!" Emily said, sternly, "I came out here to get you. And this
is what I find. Do you know who was in that car?"
"What car?"
"That one ahead, that just drove out." Martha looked down the road.
"Eve?" she asked.
"Her sister. She came out here to see if her husband was with you,"
Emily's voice trembled with dismay.
"Why, mother!" Martha was indignant. "What makes you say such a
thing?"
"I saw her expression. She was waiting to catch him with you. Do
the Williamses know her? Oh, I wonder if they saw that--if they
understood? Mr. Jenkinson was sitting on the porch there. Martha,
this is the end of that. I didn't like you being with that man
before; but, now I've seen her, I simply won't have it. She's
jealous. Why, Martha, a girl might get into an awful mess, this way!
That woman--driving away in that way. Quarreling in public--that
way!"
"She quarrels with everybody, Eve says," Martha commented,
indifferently.
"Well, she's not going to have any excuse for quarreling with us.
You hear what I say, Martha? You're not to play golf, or swim or
ride or walk or dance or even smile at that man in public, any place,
where anybody can see you."
"It'll look sort of funny, mother, when he's everywhere I am."
"I don't care how it looks. It'll look a lot better than having his
wife watching him flirting with you."
Martha raised her head proudly.
"I don't know why you should say a thing like that to me! I was NOT
flirting, I was just talking to him, mammie! This seems so--unworthy
of you."
"Very well, then. You aren't to talk to him any more. You've got to
obey me! You've got to do exactly what I say in this, Martha!"
"I don't know why you get so worked up over this! You never talk so
about anybody else!"
"You never look that way at any other man!"
"No. I never find anyone so interesting!"
"It's disgusting. You ought to be spanked!"
"I'm not a child!"
"You certainly are!"
"I'm twenty in April."
"Can she know how that threat--yes, sheer threat of
independence--hurts me?" Emily wondered.
"Oh, Martha, you mustn't be--you _mustn't_! It isn't fair. That
woman is unhappy! She's haggard! She's sick, and she sees him
playing about with you!"
"Am I so dangerous? Can't she even let him talk to a child?"
"I'm not going to argue with you. I've simply laid down the law, for
once. You're not to be seen even talking with that man again. Do
you understand that?"
"Yes."
"Didn't you understand it before?"
"I never thought you'd act this way about it."
"I never thought for a minute you'd go on, after what I said to you."
"Do you want me to tell him I'm not allowed to speak to him?"
"I don't care what you tell him. You're able to make a man
understand when he's not welcome, I hope, at your age."
"A mere child like me, mammie?" Martha asked. But Emily didn't deign
to notice her sarcasm. They rode the rest of the way in silence.
Martha went directly to her room. She came down for supper, and ate
in silence. When it was over she began clearing away the dishes.
Was she going to be a martyr? She passed through the living room,
when she had finished them, on the way to her room.
"If they call for me, you can tell them I'm not going," she told
Emily.
But the girls, when they came, wouldn't take any such answer. They
ran into the house and up to the painted room. They must have
persuaded her, for she came down with them, all dressed and ready,
and, after they had told Emily they were going to keep her till the
next afternoon, she said good-by coolly and departed with them.
And Emily was glad. Anything to get the child's mind away from the
afternoon, from "that man." She wished Martha would stay with those
nice young girls and go playing about with the lads they played with
for a week. Perhaps that man would have left town by that time.
Perhaps Eve would come back. And there was Mary Carr, who was to
come for a visit some time during the holiday, and other girls. If
Martha would only invite them for next week! Emily, sitting on the
dark veranda, clung eagerly to these hopes. Remembering the
expression of that woman's face, she planned almost frantically. She
would take Martha and go--to Estey's Park--or--to Banff; she would go
to Alaska or--Italy--Norway--any place. Home had become--not a
refuge, not a playground of happy security, but a dangerous,
threatening place. She wished devoutly that Eve and her family had
never come to the town.
However, when Emily suggested Colorado, Martha said it was too hot to
travel. Trains would be horrible such nights. And that was true.
"This house," Martha remarked, truly, "is cooler than any place else
is." When Emily asked about the visit Martha had been looking
forward to, she replied: "Dorothy's father has broken his leg. I
don't think they want me now." When Emily asked, after a discreet
interval, when Mary Carr was to be expected, Martha said: "I don't
know yet--exactly. It's such a lot of work for you now, company, in
the heat. It's sort of nice to have a rest, for a change." This was
something new. And there was something new about the atmosphere of
the house. Martha had stopped baiting her father. She had stopped
chattering with her mother. She sat through the meals a well-behaved
and silent child. She offered to help about the house more
thoughtfully than she sometimes had. And when she had finished her
tasks, she withdrew to the painted room.
She had said she wanted a sitting room, and she had got one. But
Emily had never foreseen that she meant to withdraw from the family
altogether. When her friends came now, they went upstairs to her.
Emily felt strangely alone, deprived of their chatter. When she went
up to them, the girls received her as usual. Their tongues wagged on
still. They seemed not to notice Martha's withdrawal, but Emily did.
She told herself that she had been trying always to get Martha to
rest. And now when Martha was going to bed early, when she was lying
on her bed reading, or pretending to, sleeping, or pretending to, all
the afternoons, Emily was uncomfortable. Even Bob said: "What's got
into the kid? Where's the gang?"
Emily wouldn't ask Bob about "that man." She saw him one day on the
street. The next day Martha announced she was going to Chicago. She
had to get something for cushions, and a tray. Emily offered to go
with her. Martha expressed no eagerness for her company, but showed
a desire to go alone. She went, and came back with her purchases.
She went again the next week. Emily was glad to have her away, for a
change. She had never gone to play golf since that afternoon. She
went about with her girl friends when she couldn't avoid going. She
went nearly every evening for a swim with some of them. When she
came back, sometimes she went and sat alone in the boat tied under
the willow until bedtime. Emily's heart smote her when she saw the
girl sitting alone there, in the starlight, a dimmed firefly among
the shining ones. That boat, that willow--were for two. She had to
think soberly about the deserted veranda, where Bob sat now without
blushing. And where were the boys that had been "hanging about"
before? Martha had said more than once that they came just to
"jolly" her mother. They weren't coming now for that purpose.
Johnnie passed back and forth every day up and down the street, but
he never came in, unless his mother had sent him on an errand.
The first week of August Emily met Eve downtown. That was a jolt.
"Have you been back long?" she asked, carelessly. And Eve hurried to
say that she had been back a few days, but she was trying to help at
home. Her grandmother was very bad. The nurses were busy every
minute. But Eve was going to find time to come down. "I meant to
come and see YOU," she asserted, with eager sincerity, with just a
little stress on the "you." "I'm going to be here all the time now.
My sister's gone," she added cheerfully.
When she went on her way, Emily sighed with deep relief. Those
people and their shadow over the Kenworthys had left, finally. Maybe
things would be gay now, as they used to be. But Martha, who had
given no sign and never mentioned either of them again to Emily,
seemed to be unaware of their departure. She was tired, and it was
hot, and she wanted to rest. She stated her case with dignity,
gently. There was nothing Emily could object to in her bearing.
There was nothing they could object to in her manner the next week,
when she refused to drive to Springfield with her father and mother.
Bob would do the driving, and she had never liked riding alone in the
back seat. So the Kenworthys went alone, and spent the day, and came
driving back towards home through the country darkness about midnight.
The day had added to the burden on Emily's mind, instead of
lightening it. She had been visiting a friend while Bob had been
hurrying through his business. They had been silent for miles, when
Emily began talking, wearily:
"Fanny was telling me about her niece, Bob. She wondered if we could
get her a job in town here. Her husband has left her with those two
children. She learned typing, but she hasn't had any experience.
She wants to get some place where she can make a home for them.
She'll have to divorce him. I wondered--if she could get some work
here, maybe I could help her with the children, sometimes. I said
we'd look round and see if we could do anything," Emily sighed.
"She married that Grey, didn't she? Who vamped him?" That was the
way Bob WOULD put it, of course. Everything he thought of as some
woman's fault.
"I don't know. He's no good. They tried every way to get her not to
marry him." Emily sighed again. These daughters--these tragedies.
The rumbling of incredible possibilities on the horizon--Emily fell
silent, sighing sometimes.
The car drew up to the house, and Emily reproved herself for
worrying. It was lighted up; the victrola was playing. It would be
gay with dancing within. But the blinds were down, strange to say.
Never mind that--Martha was happy again. She was having a party of
friends. Bob and Emily went up the walk and into the front hall,
both of them relieved and eager, and through it into the living room,
to put down their parcels on the table.
And there Emily stopped by the table, without unloading her hands.
Bob stopped behind her. They just stood looking for a critical
second--looking at Martha and "that man," who were stopping their
dance, drawing away from each other, returning their gaze.
"You're late," said Martha, quite naturally, unperturbed.
The man spoke to them. Emily murmured something. She didn't know
what to say. Martha went to the victrola and stood there, turning it
off. Bob said nothing. Richard Quin looked at Martha inquiringly.
"It's late," he said. "Really, I'd better be going."
Bob took a step towards the table and divested himself of three large
bottles of choice olives and a long sprayer for roses. He strode
towards the man.
"Yes, you'd better be going," he said. "If you're wise, you'll be
staying away." He stood glaring at him, threateningly.
Emily came and stood close to Bob. And Martha came towards "that
man," with her head held high. She spoke to him with the most gentle
sweetness, looking straight at her father.
"You didn't have a hat, did you?" she asked him. "It was so nice of
you to think of coming in." She was going with him towards the door.
She went with him into the hall. "Good night," they heard her say.
"Good night." She stood in the hall after the door had shut behind
the man. She waited there. Emily called her. And when she came
into the light from the darkness of the hall, it was plain that for
once in his life Bob Kenworthy had "got a rise" out of Martha. She
came straight at him. She was white with anger.
"How dare you do such a thing! How dare you speak to my friends that
way!" Emily had never seen her so furious.
"Martha!" she cried, warningly.
"I won't stand this! I'll never ask another friend to this house as
long as I live!"
"Don't talk that way to _me_!" Bob exclaimed. "Don't say _dare_ to
me!"
And Emily said, soothingly, "Martha, didn't I tell you not to let
that man come here?"
"You did _not_! You told me not to appear in public with him. Is
this public? We've been up in my room till just now. I pulled the
blinds down as soon as we came down!"
"My God!" cried Bob. "You pulled the blinds down! You haven't any
sense at all. Have those blinds been down before all summer? You're
a perfect fool!"
"I'm not going to be cursed, mother." She started towards the stairs
proudly.
"You took him up to your bedroom?" Bob exploded.
"It's _not_ her bedroom, Bob," Emily was saying.