Poor White: A Novel Page 18
CHAPTER XVIII
Jim Priest was very drunk, but insisted on hitching a team to theButterworth carriage and driving it loaded with guests to town. Everyone laughed at him, but he drove up to the farmhouse door and in aloud voice declared he knew what he was doing. Three men got into thecarriage and beating the horses furiously Jim sent them galloping away.
When an opportunity offered, Clara went silently out of the hotdining-room and through a door to a porch at the back of the house.The kitchen door was open and the waitresses and cooks from town werepreparing to depart. One of the young women came out into the darknessaccompanied by a man, evidently one of the guests. They had both beendrinking and stood for a moment in the darkness with their bodiespressed together. "I wish it were our wedding night," the man's voicewhispered, and the woman laughed. After a long kiss they went back intothe kitchen.
A farm dog appeared and going up to Clara licked her hand. She wentaround the house and stood back of a bush in the darkness near where thecarriages were being loaded. Her father with Steve Hunter and his wifecame and got into a carriage. Tom was in an expansive, generous mood."You know, Steve, I told you and several others my Clara was engaged toAlfred Buckley," he said. "Well, I was mistaken. The whole thing was alie. The truth is I shot off my mouth without talking to Clara. I hadseen them together and now and then Buckley used to come out here to thehouse in the evening, although he never came except when I was here.He told me Clara had promised to marry him, and like a fool I took hisword. I never even asked. That's the kind of a fool I was and I was abigger fool to go telling the story. All the time Clara and Hugh wereengaged and I never suspected. They told me about it to-night."
Clara stood by the bush until she thought the last of the guests hadgone. The lie her father had told seemed only a part of the evening'svulgarity. Near the kitchen door the waitresses, cooks and musicianswere being loaded into the bus that had been driven out from the BidwellHouse. She went into the dining-room. Sadness had taken the place of theanger in her, but when she saw Hugh the anger came back. Piles of dishesfilled with food lay all about the room and the air was heavy withthe smell of food. Hugh stood by a window looking out into the darkfarmyard. He held his hat in his hand. "You might put your hat away,"she said sharply. "Have you forgotten you're married to me and that younow live here in this house?" She laughed nervously and walked to thekitchen door.
Her mind still clung to the past and to the days when she was a childand had spent so many hours in the big, silent kitchen. Something wasabout to happen that would take her past away--destroy it, and thethought frightened her. "I have not been very happy in this housebut there have been certain moments, certain feelings I've had," shethought. Stepping through the doorway she stood for a moment in thekitchen with her back to the wall and with her eyes closed. Throughher mind went a troop of figures, the stout determined figure of KateChanceller who had known how to love in silence; the wavering, hurryingfigure of her mother; her father as a young man coming in after a longdrive to warm his hands by the kitchen fire; a strong, hard-faced womanfrom town who had once worked for Tom as cook and who was reported tohave been the mother of two illegitimate children; and the figuresof her childhood fancy walking over the bridge toward her, clad inbeautiful raiment.
Back of these figures were other figures, long forgotten but now sharplyremembered--farm girls who had come to work by the day; tramps who hadbeen fed at the kitchen door; young farm hands who suddenly disappearedfrom the routine of the farm's life and were never seen again, a youngman with a red bandana handkerchief about his neck who had thrown her akiss as she stood with her face pressed against a window.
Once a high school girl from town had come to spend the night withClara. After the evening meal the two girls walked into the kitchenand stood by a window, looking out. Something had happened within them.Moved by a common impulse they went outside and walked for a long wayunder the stars along the silent country roads. They came to a fieldwhere men were burning brush. Where there had been a forest there wasnow only a stump field and the figures of the men carrying armloads ofthe dry branches of trees and throwing them on the fire. The fire madea great splash of color in the gathering darkness and for some obscurereason both girls were deeply moved by the sight, sound, and perfume ofthe night. The figures of the men seemed to dance back and forth inthe light. Instinctively Clara turned her face upward and looked atthe stars. She was conscious of them and of their beauty and the widesweeping beauty of night as she had never been before. A wind beganto sing in the trees of a distant forest, dimly seen far away acrossfields. The sound was soft and insistent and crept into her soul. Inthe grass at her feet insects sang an accompaniment to the soft, distantmusic.
How vividly Clara now remembered that night! It came sharply back asshe stood with closed eyes in the farm kitchen and waited for theconsummation of the adventure on which she had set out. With it cameother memories. "How many fleeting dreams and half visions of beauty Ihave had!" she thought.
Everything in life that she had thought might in some way lead towardbeauty now seemed to Clara to lead to ugliness. "What a lot I'vemissed," she muttered, and opening her eyes went back into thedining-room and spoke to Hugh, still standing and staring out into thedarkness.
"Come," she said sharply, and led the way up a stairway. The two wentsilently up the stairs, leaving the lights burning brightly in the roomsbelow. They came to a door leading to a bedroom, and Clara opened it."It's time for a man and his wife to go to bed," she said in a low,husky voice. Hugh followed her into the room. He walked to a chair by awindow and sitting down, took off his shoes and sat holding them in hishand. He did not look at Clara but into the darkness outside the window.Clara let down her hair and began to unfasten her dress. She took offan outer dress and threw it over a chair. Then she went to a drawerand pulling it out looked for a night dress. She became angry and threwseveral garments on the floor. "Damn!" she said explosively, and wentout of the room.
Hugh sprang to his feet. The wine he had drunk had not taken effect andSteve Hunter had been forced to go home disappointed. All the eveningsomething stronger than wine had been gripping him. Now he knew what itwas. All through the evening thoughts and desires had whirled throughhis brain. Now they were all gone. "I won't let her do it," he muttered,and running quickly to the door closed it softly. With the shoes stillheld in his hand he crawled through a window. He had expected to leapinto the darkness, but by chance his stocking feet alighted on the roofof the farm kitchen that extended out from the rear of the house. He ranquickly down the roof and jumped, alighting in a clump of bushes thattore long scratches on his cheeks.
For five minutes Hugh ran toward the town of Bidwell, then turned, andclimbing a fence, walked across a field. The shoes were still grippedtightly in his hand and the field was stony, but he did not notice andwas unconscious of pain from his bruised feet or from the torn placeson his cheeks. Standing in the field he heard Jim Priest drive homewardalong the road.
"My bonny lies over the ocean, My bonny lies over the sea, My bonny lies over the ocean, O, bring back my bonny to me."
sang the farm hand.
Hugh walked across several fields, and when he came to a small stream,sat down on the bank and put on his shoes. "I've had my chance andmissed it," he thought bitterly. Several times he repeated the words."I've had my chance and I've missed," he said again as he stopped bya fence that separated the fields in which he had been walking. At thewords he stopped and put his hand to his throat. A half-stifled sobbroke from him. "I've had my chance and missed," he said again.