FOR a month which was one moment of she saw Erik only casually, at an Eastern Star dance, at the shop, where, in the presence of Nat Hicks, they with on the of having one or two on the of Kennicott's New Suit. For the of they were vacuous.
Thus from him, in the of Fern, Carol was and for the time that she loved Erik.
She told herself a thousand which he would say if he had the opportunity; for them she him, loved him. But she was to him. He understood, he did not come. She her every of him, and her in his background. Each day it to through the of not him. Each morning, each afternoon, each was a from all other of time, by a “Oh! I want to see Erik!” which was as as though she had said it before.
There were when she not picture him. Usually he out in her mind in some little moment—glancing up from his pressing-iron, or on the beach with Dave Dyer. But sometimes he had vanished; he was only an opinion. She then about his appearance: Weren't his too large and red? Wasn't his nose a snub, like so many Scandinavians? Was he at all the thing she had fancied? When she him on the she was as much herself as in his presence. More than being unable to him was the of some aspect: his as they had walked to the together at the picnic; the light on his temples, neck-cords, cheeks.
On a November when Kennicott was in the country she answered the and was to Erik at the door, stooped, imploring, his hands in the pockets of his topcoat. As though he had been his speech he besought:
“Saw your husband away. I've got to see you. I can't it. Come for a walk. I know! People might see us. But they won't if we into the country. I'll wait for you by the elevator. Take as long as you want to—oh, come quick!”
“In a minutes,” she promised.
She murmured, “I'll just talk to him for a of an hour and come home.” She put an her and overshoes, how and are rubbers, how their proved that she wasn't going to a lovers' tryst.
She him in the of the grain-elevator, kicking at a rail of the side-track. As she came toward him she that his whole expanded. But he said nothing, she; he her sleeve, she returned the pat, and they the tracks, a road, toward open country.
“Chilly night, but I like this gray,” he said.
“Yes.”
They passed a of trees and along the wet road. He her hand into the side-pocket of his overcoat. She his thumb and, sighing, it as Hugh hers when they walking. She about Hugh. The was in for the evening, but was it safe to the with her? The was and elusive.
Erik to talk, slowly, revealingly. He for her a picture of his work in a large tailor shop in Minneapolis: the steam and heat, and the drudgery; the men in and trousers, men who “rushed of beer” and were about women, who laughed at him and played on him. “But I didn't mind, I keep away from them outside. I used to go to the Art Institute and the Walker Gallery, and clear around Lake Harriet, or out to the Gates house and it was a in Italy and I in it. I was a and tapestries—that was after I was in Padua. The only time was when a tailor named Finkelfarb a I was trying to keep and he read it in the shop—it was a fight.” He laughed. “I got five dollars. But that's all gone now. Seems as though you me and the stoves—the long with edges, up around the and making that all day—aaaaah!”
Her about his thumb as she the low room, the of pressing-irons, the of cloth, and Erik among gnomes. His through the opening of her and her palm. She her hand away, off her glove, her hand into his.
He was saying something about a “wonderful person.” In her she let the by and only the of his voice.
She was that he was for speech.
“Say, uh—Carol, I've a about you.”
“That's nice. Let's it.”
“Damn it, don't be so about it! Can't you take me seriously?”
“My dear boy, if I took you seriously——! I don't want us to be more than—more than we will be. Tell me the poem. I've had a about me!”
“It isn't a poem. It's just some that I love it to me they catch what you are. Of they won't so to else, but——Well——
Little and and and wise
With that meet my eyes.
Do you the idea the way I do?”
“Yes! I'm grateful!” And she was grateful—while she noted how a it was.
She was aware of the in the night. Monstrous clouds a moon; and with light. They were a of poplars, by day but now like a wall. She stopped. They the dripping, the wet on the earth.
“Waiting—waiting—everything is waiting,” she whispered. She her hand from his, pressed her against her lips. She was in the somberness. “I am happy—so we must go home, we have time to unhappy. But can't we on a for a minute and just listen?”
“No. Too wet. But I wish we a fire, and you on my overcoat it. I'm a fire-builder! My Lars and me a week one time in a way up in the Big Woods, in. The was with a of ice when we got there, but we it out, and the thing full of pine-boughs. Couldn't we a fire here in the and by it for a while?”
She pondered, half-way and refusal. Her faintly. She was in abeyance. Everything, the night, his silhouette, the cautious-treading future, was as as though she were in a Fourth Dimension. While her mind groped, the lights of a car a in the road, and they apart. “What ought I to do?” she mused. “I think——Oh, I won't be robbed! I AM good! If I'm so that I can't by the fire with a man and talk, then I'd be dead!”
The lights of the car magically; were upon them; stopped. From the of the a voice, annoyed, sharp: “Hello there!”
She that it was Kennicott.
The in his voice out. “Having a walk?”
They of assent.
“Pretty wet, isn't it? Better back. Jump up in here, Valborg.”
His manner of open the door was a command. Carol was that Erik was in, that she was to in the back, and that she had been left to open the door for herself. Instantly the wonder which had to the was quenched, and she was Mrs. W. P. Kennicott of Gopher Prairie, in a old car, and likely to be by her husband.
She what Kennicott would say to Erik. She toward them. Kennicott was observing, “Going to have some rain the night 's over, all right.”
“Yes,” said Erik.
“Been season this year, anyway. Never saw it with such a cold October and such a November. 'Member we had a way on October ninth! But it was up to the twenty-first, this month—as I it, not a of in November so far, has there been? But I shouldn't wonder if we'd be having some 'most any time now.”
“Yes, good of it,” said Erik.
“Wish I'd had more time to go after the this fall. By golly, what do you think?” Kennicott appealing. “Fellow me from Man Trap Lake that he seven and of canvas-back in one hour!”
“That must have been fine,” said Erik.
Carol was ignored. But Kennicott was cheerful. He to a farmer, as he up to pass the team, “There we are—schon gut!” She sat back, neglected, frozen, in a undramatic. She a and enduring. She would tell Kennicott——What would she tell him? She not say that she loved Erik. DID she love him? But she would have it out. She was not sure it was for Kennicott's blindness, or at his that he was to any woman's life, which her, but she that she was out of the trap, that she be frank; and she was with the of it . . . while in he was Erik:
“Nothing like an hour on a duck-pass to make you your and——Gosh, this machine hasn't got the power of a pen. Guess the are jam-cram-full of again. Don't know but what maybe I'll have to put in another set of piston-rings.”
He stopped on Main Street and hospitably, “There, that'll give you just a to walk. G' night.”
Carol was in suspense. Would Erik away?
He moved to the of the car, in his hand, muttered, “Good night—Carol. I'm we had our walk.” She pressed his hand. The car was on. He was from her—by a store on Main Street!
Kennicott did not her till he up the house. Then he condescended, “Better jump out here and I'll take the around back. Say, see if the door is unlocked, will you?” She the door for him. She that she still the she had off for Erik. She it on. She in the center of the living-room, unmoving, in and rubbers. Kennicott was as as ever. Her wouldn't be anything so as having to a scolding, but only an to his attention so that he would the she had to tell him, of her by yawning, the clock, and going up to bed. She him into the furnace. He came through the energetically, but he spoke to her he did stop in the hall, did wind the clock.
He into the living-room and his passed from her to her rubbers. She hear—she hear, see, taste, smell, touch—his “Better take your off, Carrie; looks of wet.” Yes, there it was:
“Well, Carrie, you better——” He his own on a chair, to her, on with a voice, “——you cut it out now. I'm not going to do the out-raged husband stunt. I like you and I respect you, and I'd look like a if I to be dramatic. But I think it's about time for you and Valborg to call a you in Dutch, like Fern Mullins did.”
“Do you——”
“Course. I know all about it. What d' you in a town that's as with busybodies, that have of time to their into other folks' business, as this is? Not that they've had the nerve to do much to me, but they've around a lot, and anyway, I see for myself that you liked him. But of I how cold you were, I you wouldn't it if Valborg did try to your hand or you, so I didn't worry. But same time, I you don't this Swede farmer is as and Platonic and all that as you are! Wait now, don't sore! I'm not him. He isn't a sort. And he's and to about books. Course you like him. That isn't the rub. But haven't you just what this town can do, once it goes and on you, like it did with Fern? You think that two making love are alone if is, but there's nothing in this town that you don't do in company with a whole of but guests. Don't you that if Ma Westlake and a others got started they'd drive you up a tree, and you'd so well as being in love with this Valborg that you'd HAVE to be, just to 'em!”
“Let me down,” was all Carol say. She on the couch, wearily, without elasticity.
He yawned, “Gimme your and rubbers,” and while she them off he his watch-chain, the radiator, at the thermometer. He out her in the hall, them up with his care. He pushed a chair near to her and sat up. He looked like a physician about to give and advice.
Before he into his she got in, “Please! I want you to know that I was going to tell you everything, tonight.”
“Well, I don't there's much to tell.”
“But there is. I'm of Erik. He to something in here.” She touched her breast. “And I him. He isn't just a 'young Swede farmer.' He's an artist——”
“Wait now! He's had a all to tell you what a of a he is. Now it's my turn. I can't talk artistic, but——Carrie, do you my work?” He forward, thick hands on thick thighs, and slow, yet beseeching. “No if you are cold, I like you than in the world. One time I said that you were my soul. And that still goes. You're all the that I see in a when I'm in from the country, the that I like but can't make of. Do you what my job is? I go twenty-four hours a day, in and blizzard, trying my to everybody, rich or poor. You—that 're always about how scientists ought to the world, of a of spread-eagle politicians—can't you see that I'm all the science there is here? And I can the cold and the and the at night. All I need is to have you here at home to welcome me. I don't you to be passionate—not any more I don't—but I do you to my work. I into the world, and save lives, and make husbands being to their wives. And then you go and moon over a Swede tailor he can talk about how to put on a skirt! Hell of a thing for a man to over!”
She out at him: “You make your clear. Let me give mine. I admit all you say—except about Erik. But is it only you, and the baby, that want me to you up, that from me? They're all on me, the whole town! I can their on my neck! Aunt Bessie and that old Uncle Whittier and Juanita and Mrs. Westlake and Mrs. Bogart and all of them. And you welcome them, you them to me into their cave! I won't it! Do you hear? Now, right now, I'm done. And it's Erik who me the courage. You say he just thinks about (which do not go on skirts, by the way!). I tell you he thinks about God, the God that Mrs. Bogart up with wrappers! Erik will be a great man some day, and if I one to his success——”
“Wait, wait, wait now! Hold up! You're that your Erik will make good. As a of fact, at my age he'll be a one-man tailor shop in some about the size of Schoenstrom.”
“He will not!”
“That's what he's for now all right, and he's twenty-five or -six and——What's he done to make you think he'll be anything but a pants-presser?”
“He has and talent——”
“Wait now! What has he actually done in the art line? Has he done one first-class picture or—sketch, d' you call it? Or one poem, or played the piano, or anything about what he's going to do?”
She looked thoughtful.
“Then it's a hundred to one that he will. Way I it, these that do something good at home and to go to art school, there ain't more than one out of ten of 'em, maybe one out of a hundred, that above out a living—about as as plumbing. And when it comes to this tailor, why, can't you see—you that take on so about psychology—can't you see that it's just by with like Doc McGanum or Lym Cass that this artistic? Suppose you'd met up with him in one of these reg'lar New York studios! You wouldn't notice him any more 'n a rabbit!”
She over hands like a temple on her the thin of a brazier. She not answer.
Kennicott rose quickly, sat on the couch, took her hands. “Suppose he fails—as he will! Suppose he goes to tailoring, and you're his wife. Is that going to be this life you've been about? He's in some shack, pressing all day, or over sewing, and having to be to any that in and a dirty old in his and says, 'Here you, this, and be quick about it.' He won't have to him a big shop. He'll along doing his own work—unless you, his wife, go help him, go help him in the shop, and over a table all day, pushing a big iron. Your will look after about fifteen years of that way, won't it! And you'll be over like an old hag. And you'll live in one room of the shop. And then at night—oh, you'll have your artist—sure! He'll come in of gasoline, and from hard work, and around that if it hadn't been for you, he'd of gone East and been a great artist. Sure! And you'll be his relatives——Talk about Uncle Whit! You'll be having some old Axel Axelberg in with on his and to supper in his and at you, 'Hurry up now, you make me sick!' Yes, and you'll have a every year, at you while you press clothes, and you won't love 'em like you do Hugh up-stairs, all and asleep——”
“Please! Not any more!”
Her was on his knee.
He to her neck. “I don't want to be unfair. I love is a great thing, all right. But think it would much of that of stuff? Oh, honey, am I so bad? Can't you like me at all? I've—I've been so of you!”
She up his hand, she it. Presently she sobbed, “I won't see him again. I can't, now. The living-room the tailor shop——I don't love him for that. And you are——Even if I were sure of him, sure he was the thing, I don't think I actually you. This marriage, it people together. It's not easy to break, when it ought to be broken.”
“And do you want to it?”
“No!”
He her, her up-stairs, her on her bed, to the door.
“Come me,” she whimpered.
He her and away. For an hour she him moving about his room, a cigar, with his on a chair. She that he was a her and the that as the came in sleet.
II
He was and more than at breakfast. All day she to a way of Erik up. Telephone? The village would “listen in.” A letter? It might be found. Go to see him? Impossible. That Kennicott gave her, without comment, an envelope. The was “E. V.”
I know I can't do anything but make trouble for you, I think. I am going to Minneapolis tonight and from there as soon as I can either to New York or Chicago. I will do as big as I can. I—I can't I love you too much—God keep you.
Until she the which told her that the Minneapolis train was town, she herself from thinking, from moving. Then it was all over. She had no plan for anything.
When she Kennicott looking at her over his newspaper she to his arms, the paper aside, and for the time in years they were lovers. But she that she still had no plan in life, save always to go along the same streets, past the same people, to the same shops.
III
A week after Erik's going the her by announcing, “There's a Mr. Valborg down-stairs say he to see you.”
She was of the maid's stare, angry at this of the in which she had hidden. She down, into the living-room. It was not Erik Valborg who there; it was a small, gray-bearded, yellow-faced man in boots, jacket, and red mittens. He at her with red eyes.
“You de doc's wife?”
“Yes.”
“I'm Adolph Valborg, from up by Jefferson. I'm Erik's father.”
“Oh!” He was a monkey-faced little man, and not gentle.
“What you done wit' my son?”
“I don't think I you.”
“I t'ink you're going to I t'rough! Where is he?”
“Why, really——I that he's in Minneapolis.”
“You presume!” He looked through her with a such as she not have imagined. Only an of his whine, his consonants. He clamored, “Presume! Dot's a word! I don't want no and I don't want no more lies! I want to know what you KNOW!”
“See here, Mr. Valborg, you may stop this right now. I'm not one of your farmwomen. I don't know where your son is, and there's no why I should know.” Her ran out in of his stolidity. He his fist, up his anger with the gesture, and sneered:
“You dirty city wit' your and dresses! A father come here trying to save his boy from wickedness, and you call him a bully! By God, I don't have to take nothin' off you your husband! I ain't one of your men. For one time a woman like you is going to de trut' about what you are, and no city to it, needer.”
“Really, Mr. Valborg——”
“What you done wit' him? Heh? I'll tell you what you done! He was a good boy, if he was a fool. I want him on de farm. He don't make money tailoring. And I can't me no man! I want to take him on de farm. And you in and wit' him and make love wit' him, and him to away!”
“You are lying! It's not true that——It's not true, and if it were, you would have no right to speak like this.”
“Don't talk foolish. I know. Ain't I from a live right here in town how you been acting wit' de boy? I know what you done! Walking wit' him in de country! Hiding in de wit' him! Yes and I you talk about religion in de woods! Sure! Women like you—you're street-walkers! Rich like you, wit' husbands and no work to do—and me, look at my hands, look how I work, look at those hands! But you, oh God no, you mustn't work, you're too to do work. You got to play wit' fellows, as you are, laughing and around and acting like de animals! You let my son alone, d' you hear?” He was his in her face. She the and sweat. “It ain't no use talkin' to like you. Get no trut' out of you. But next time I go by your husband!”
He was into the hall. Carol herself on him, her hand on his hayseed-dusty shoulder. “You old man, you've always to turn Erik into a slave, to your pocketbook! You've at him, and him, and you've succeeded in his above your muck-heap! And now you can't him back, you come here to vent——Go tell my husband, go tell him, and don't me when he kills you, when my husband kills you—he will kill you——”
The man grunted, looked at her impassively, said one word, and walked out.
She the word very plainly.
She did not the couch. Her gave way, she forward. She her mind saying, “You haven't fainted. This is ridiculous. You're yourself. Get up.” But she not move. When Kennicott she was on the couch. His step quickened. “What's happened, Carrie? You haven't got a of blood in your face.”
She his arm. “You've got to be sweet to me, and kind! I'm going to California—mountains, sea. Please don't argue about it, I'm going.”
Quietly, “All right. We'll go. You and I. Leave the kid here with Aunt Bessie.”
“Now!”
“Well yes, just as soon as we can away. Now don't talk any more. Just you've already started.” He her hair, and not till after supper did he continue: “I meant it about California. But I think we wait three or so, till I of some from the medical to take my practice. And if people are gossiping, you don't want to give them a by away. Can you it and 'em for three or so?”
“Yes,” she said emptily.
IV
People at her on the street. Aunt Bessie to her about Erik's disappearance, and it was Kennicott who the woman with a savage, “Say, are you that Carrie had anything to do with that fellow's it? Then let me tell you, and you can go right out and tell the whole bloomin' town, that Carrie and I took Val—took Erik riding, and he asked me about a job in Minneapolis, and I him to go to it. . . . Getting much sugar in at the store now?”
Guy Pollock the to be of California and new novels. Vida Sherwin her to the Jolly Seventeen. There, with every one listening, Maud Dyer at Carol, “I Erik has left town.”
Carol was amiable. “Yes, so I hear. In fact, he called me up—told me he had been offered a job in the city. So sorry he's gone. He would have been valuable if we'd to start the again. Still, I wouldn't be here for the myself, Will is all in from work, and I'm of taking him to California. Juanita—you know the Coast so well—tell me: would you start in at Los Angeles or San Francisco, and what are the best hotels?”
The Jolly Seventeen looked disappointed, but the Jolly Seventeen liked to give advice, the Jolly Seventeen liked to mention the at which they had stayed. (A as a stay.) Before they question her again Carol in with and the of Raymie Wutherspoon. Vida had news from her husband. He had been in the trenches, had been in a hospital for two weeks, had been promoted to major, was learning French.
She left Hugh with Aunt Bessie.
But for Kennicott she would have taken him. She that in some way yet she might it possible to in California. She did not want to see Gopher Prairie again.
The Smails were to the Kennicott house, and the thing to in the month of waiting was the series of Kennicott and Uncle Whittier in to the and having the cleaned.
Did Carol, Kennicott inquired, wish to stop in Minneapolis to new clothes?
“No! I want to as away as I can as soon as I can. Let's wait till Los Angeles.”
“Sure, sure! Just as you like. Cheer up! We're going to have a large wide time, and 'll be different when we come back.”
VI
Dusk on a December afternoon. The which would at Kansas City with the California train rolled out of St. Paul with a chick-a-chick, chick-a-chick, chick-a-chick as it the other tracks. It through the belt, speed. Carol see nothing but fields, which had closed in on her all the way from Gopher Prairie. Ahead was darkness.
“For an hour, in Minneapolis, I must have been near Erik. He's still there, somewhere. He'll be gone when I come back. I'll know where he has gone.”
As Kennicott on the seat-light she to the in a motion-picture magazine.
