1899
THE AWAKENING
by Kate Chopin
Electronically Enhanced Text (c) Copyright 1996, World Library(R)
I
A green and yellow parrot, which hung in a cage outside the door,
kept repeating over and over:
«"Allez vous-en! Allez vous-en! Sapristi!» That's all right!"
He could speak a little Spanish, and also a language which nobody
understood, unless it was the mocking bird that hung on the other side
of the door, whistling his fluty notes out upon the breeze with
maddening persistence.
Mr. Pontellier, unable to read his newspaper with any degree of
comfort, arose with an expression and an exclamation of disgust. He
walked down the gallery and across the narrow "bridges" which
connected the Lebrun cottages one with the other. He had been seated
before the door of the main house. The parrot and the mocking bird
were the property of Madame Lebrun, and they had the right to make all
the noise they wished. Mr. Pontellier had the privilege of quitting
their society when they ceased to be entertaining.
He stopped before the door of his own cottage, which was the
fourth one from the main building and next to the last. Seating
himself in a wicker rocker which was there, he once more applied
himself to the task of reading the newspaper. The day was Sunday;
the paper was a day old. The Sunday papers had not yet reached Grand
Isle. He was already acquainted with the market reports, and he
glanced restlessly over the editorials and bits of news which he had
not had time to read before quitting New Orleans the day before.
Mr. Pontellier wore eye glasses. He was a man of forty, of medium
height and rather slender build; he stooped a little. His hair was
brown and straight, parted on one side. His beard was neatly and
closely trimmed.
Once in a while he withdrew his glance from the newspaper and looked
about him. There was more noise than ever over at the house. The
main building was called "the house," to distinguish it from the
cottages. The chattering and whistling birds were still at it. Two
young girls, the Farival twins, were playing a duet from "Zampa"
upon the piano. Madame Lebrun was bustling in and out, giving orders
in a high key to a yard boy whenever she got inside the house, and
directions in an equally high voice to a dining room servant
whenever she got outside. She was a fresh, pretty woman, clad always
in white with elbow sleeves. Her starched skirts crinkled as she
came and went. Farther down, before one of the cottages, a lady in
black was walking demurely up and down, telling her beads. A good many
persons of the «pension» had gone over to the «Cheniere Caminada»
in Beaudelet's lugger to hear mass. Some young people were out under
the water oaks playing croquet. Mr. Pontellier's two children were
there- sturdy little fellows of four and five. A quadroon nurse
followed them about with a far-away, meditative air.
Mr. Pontellier finally lit a cigar and began to smoke, letting the
paper drag idly from his hand. He fixed his gaze upon a white sunshade
that was advancing at snail's pace from the beach. He could see it
plainly between the gaunt trunks of the water oaks and across the
stretch of yellow camomile. The gulf looked far away, melting hazily
into the blue of the horizon. The sunshade continued to approach
slowly. Beneath its pink-lined shelter were his wife, Mrs. Pontellier,
and young Robert Lebrun. When they reached the cottage, the two seated
themselves with some appearance of fatigue upon the upper step of
the porch, facing each other, each leaning against a supporting post.
"What folly! to bathe at such an hour in such heat!" exclaimed Mr.
Pontellier. He himself had taken a plunge at daylight. That was why
the morning seemed long to him.
"You are burnt beyond recognition," he added, looking at his wife as
one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has
suffered some damage. She held up her hands, strong, shapely hands,
and surveyed them critically, drawing up her lawn sleeves above the
wrists. Looking at them reminded her of her rings, which she had given
to her husband before leaving for the beach. She silently reached
out to him, and he, understanding, took the rings from his vest pocket
and dropped them into her open palm. She slipped them upon her
fingers; then clasping her knees, she looked across at Robert and
began to laugh. The rings sparkled upon her fingers. He sent back an
answering smile.
"What is it?" asked Pontellier, looking lazily and amused from one
to the other. It was some utter nonsense; some adventure out there
in the water, and they both tried to relate it at once. It did not
seem half so amusing when told. They realized this, and so did Mr.
Pontellier. He yawned and stretched himself. Then he got up, saying he
had half a mind to go over to Klein's hotel and play a game of
billiards.
"Come go along, Lebrun," he proposed to Robert. But Robert
admitted quite frankly that he preferred to stay where he was and talk
to Mrs. Pontellier.
"Well, send him about his business when he bores you, Edna,"
instructed her husband as he prepared to leave.
"Here, take the umbrella," she exclaimed, holding it out to him.
He accepted the sunshade, and lifting it over his head descended the
steps and walked away.
"Coming back to dinner?" his wife called after him. He halted a
moment and shrugged his shoulders. He felt in his vest pocket; there
was a ten-dollar bill there. He did not know; perhaps he would
return for the early dinner and perhaps he would not. It all
depended upon the company which he found over at Klein's and the
size of "the game." He did not say this, but she understood it, and
laughed, nodding good-by to him.
Both children wanted to follow their father when they saw him
starting out. He kissed them and promised to bring them back bonbons
and peanuts.
II
Mrs. Pontellier's eyes were quick and bright; they were a
yellowish brown, about the color of her hair. She had a way of turning
them swiftly upon an object and holding them there as if lost in
some inward maze of contemplation or thought.
Her eyebrows were a shade darker than her hair. They were thick
and almost horizontal, emphasizing the depth of her eyes. She was
rather handsome than beautiful. Her face was captivating by reason
of a certain frankness of expression and a contradictory subtle play
of features. Her manner was engaging.
Robert rolled a cigarette. He smoked cigarettes because he could not
afford cigars, he said. He had a cigar in his pocket which Mr.
Pontellier had presented him with, and he was saving it for his
after-dinner smoke.
This seemed quite proper and natural on his part. In coloring he was
not unlike his companion. A clean-shaved face made the resemblance
more pronounced than it would otherwise have been. There rested no
shadow of care upon his open countenance. His eyes gathered in and
reflected the light and languor of the summer day.
Mrs. Pontellier reached over for a palm-leaf fan that lay on the
porch and began to fan herself, while Robert sent between his lips
light puffs from his cigarette. They chatted incessantly: about the
things around them; their amusing adventure out in the water- it had
again assumed its entertaining aspect; about the wind, the trees,
the people who had gone to the «Cheniere;» about the children
playing croquet under the oaks, and the Farival twins, who were now
performing the overture to "The Poet and the Peasant."
Robert talked a good deal about himself. He was very young, and
did not know any better. Mrs. Pontellier talked a little about herself
for the same reason. Each was interested in what the other said.
Robert spoke of his intention to go to Mexico in the autumn, where
fortune awaited him. He was always intending to go to Mexico, but some
way never got there. Meanwhile he held on to his modest position in
a mercantile house in New Orleans, where an equal familiarity with
English, French and Spanish gave him no small value as a clerk and
correspondent.
He was spending his summer vacation, as he always did, with his
mother at Grand Isle. In former times, before Robert could remember,
"the house" had been a summer luxury of the Lebruns. Now, flanked by
its dozen or more cottages, which were always filled with exclusive
visitors from the «"Quartier Francais,"» it enabled Madame Lebrun to
maintain the easy and comfortable existence which appeared to be her
birthright.
Mrs. Pontellier talked about her father's Mississippi plantation and
her girlhood home in the old Kentucky bluegrass country. She was an
American woman, with a small infusion of French which seemed to have
been lost in dilution. She read a letter from her sister, who was away
in the East, and who had engaged herself to be married. Robert was
interested, and wanted to know what manner of girls the sisters
were, what the father was like, and how long the mother had been dead.
When Mrs. Pontellier folded the letter it was time for her to
dress for the early dinner.
"I see Leonce isn't coming back," she said, with a glance in the
direction whence her husband had disappeared. Robert supposed he was
not, as there were a good many New Orleans club men over at Klein's.
When Mrs. Pontellier left him to enter her room, the young man
descended the steps and strolled over toward the croquet players,
where, during the half-hour before dinner, he amused himself with
the little Pontellier children, who were very fond of him.
III
It was eleven o'clock that night when Mr. Pontellier returned from
Klein's hotel. He was in an excellent humor, in high spirits, and very
talkative. His entrance awoke his wife, who was in bed and fast asleep
when he came in. He talked to her while he undressed, telling her
anecdotes and bits of news and gossip that he had gathered during
the day. From his trousers pockets he took a fistful of crumpled
bank notes and a good deal of silver coin, which he piled on the
bureau indiscriminately with keys, knife, handkerchief, and whatever
else happened to be in his pockets. She was overcome with sleep, and
answered him with little half utterances.
He thought it very discouraging that his wife, who was the sole
object of his existence, evinced so little interest in things which
concerned him, and valued so little his conversation.
Mr. Pontellier had forgotten the bonbons and peanuts for the boys.
Notwithstanding he loved them very much, and went into the adjoining
room where they slept to take a look at them and make sure that they
were resting comfortably. The result of his investigation was far from
satisfactory. He turned and shifted the youngsters about in bed. One
of them began to kick and talk about a basket full of crabs.
Mr. Pontellier returned to his wife with the information that
Raoul had a high fever and needed looking after. Then he lit a cigar
and went and sat near the open door to smoke it.
Mrs. Pontellier was quite sure Raoul had no fever. He had gone to
bed perfectly well, she said, and nothing had ailed him all day. Mr.
Pontellier was too well acquainted with fever symptoms to be mistaken.
He assured her the child was consuming at that moment in the next
room.
He reproached his wife with her inattention, her habitual neglect of
the children. If it was not a mother's place to look after children,
whose on earth was it? He himself had his hands full with his
brokerage business. He could not be in two places at once; making a
living for his family on the street, and staying at home to see that
no harm befell them. He talked in a monotonous, insistent way.
Mrs. Pontellier sprang out of bed and went into the next room. She
soon came back and sat on the edge of the bed, leaning her head down
on the pillow. She said nothing, and refused to answer her husband
when he questioned her. When his cigar was smoked out he went to
bed, and in half a minute he was fast asleep.
Mrs. Pontellier was by that time thoroughly awake. She began to
cry a little, and wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her «peignoir.»
Blowing out the candle, which her husband had left burning, she
slipped her bare feet into a pair of satin mules at the foot of the
bed and went out on the porch, where she sat down in the wicker
chair and began to rock gently to and fro.
It was then past midnight. The cottages were all dark. A single
faint light gleamed out from the hallway of the house. There was no
sound abroad except the hooting of an old owl in the top of a
water-oak, and the everlasting voice of the sea, that was not uplifted
at that soft hour. It broke like a mournful lullaby upon the night.
The tears came so fast to Mrs. Pontellier's eyes that the damp
sleeve of her «peignoir» no longer served to dry them. She was
holding the back of her chair with one hand; her loose sleeve had
slipped almost to the shoulder of her uplifted arm. Turning, she thrust
her face, steaming and wet, into the bend of her arm, and she went on
crying there, not caring any longer to dry her face, her eyes, her
arms. She could not have told why she was crying. Such experiences
as the foregoing were not uncommon in her married life. They seemed
never before to have weighed much against the abundance of her
husband's kindness and a uniform devotion which had come to be tacit
and self-understood.
An indescribable oppression, which seemed to generate in some
unfamiliar part of her consciousness, filled her whole being with a
vague anguish. It was like a shadow, like a mist passing across her
soul's summer day. It was strange and unfamiliar; it was a mood. She
did not sit there inwardly upbraiding her husband, lamenting at
Fate, which had directed her footsteps to the path which they had
taken. She was just having a good cry all to herself. The mosquitoes
made merry over her, biting her firm, round arms and nipping at her
bare insteps.
The little stinging, buzzing imps succeeded in dispelling a mood
which might have held her there in the darkness half a night longer.
The following morning Mr. Pontellier was up in good time to take the
rockaway which was to convey him to the steamer at the wharf. He was
returning to the city to his business, and they would not see him
again at the Island till the coming Saturday. He had regained his
composure, which seemed to have been somewhat impaired the night
before. He was eager to be gone, as he looked forward to a lively week
in Carondelet Street.
Mr. Pontellier gave his wife half of the money which he had
brought away from Klein's hotel the evening before. She liked money as
well as most women, and accepted it with no little satisfaction.
"It will buy a handsome wedding present for Sister Janet!" she
exclaimed, smoothing out the bills as she counted them one by one.
"Oh! we'll treat Sister Janet better than that, my dear," he
laughed, as he prepared to kiss her good-by.
The boys were tumbling about, clinging to his legs, imploring that
numerous things be brought back to them. Mr. Pontellier was a great
favorite, and ladies, men, children, even nurses, were always on
hand to say good-by to him. His wife stood smiling and waving, the
boys shouting, as he disappeared in the old rockaway down the sandy
road.
A few days later a box arrived for Mrs. Pontellier from New Orleans.
It was from her husband. It was filled with «friandises,» with
luscious and toothsome bits- the finest of fruits, «pates,» a rare
bottle or two, delicious syrups, and bonbons in abundance.
Mrs. Pontellier was always very generous with the contents of such a
box; she was quite used to receiving them when away from home. The
«pates» and fruit were brought to the dining-room; the bonbons were
passed around. And the ladies, selecting with dainty and
discriminating fingers and a little greedily, all declared that Mr.
Pontellier was the best husband in the world. Mrs. Pontellier was
forced to admit that she knew of none better.
IV
It would have been a difficult matter for Mr. Pontellier to define
to his own satisfaction or any one else's wherein his wife failed in
her duty toward their children. It was something which he felt
rather than perceived, and he never voiced the feeling without
subsequent regret and ample atonement.
If one of the little Pontellier boys took a tumble whilst at play,
he was not apt to rush crying to his mother's arms for comfort; he
would more likely pick himself up, wipe the water out of his eyes
and the sand out of his mouth, and go on playing. Tots as they were,
they pulled together and stood their ground in childish battles with
doubled fists and uplifted voices, which usually prevailed against the
other mother-tots. The quadroon nurse was looked upon as a huge
encumbrance, only good to button up waists and panties and to brush
and part hair; since it seemed to be a law of society that hair must
be parted and brushed.
In short, Mrs. Pontellier was not a mother-woman. The mother-women
seemed to prevail that summer at Grand Isle. It was easy to know them,
fluttering about with extended, protecting wings when any harm, real
or imaginary, threatened their precious brood. They were women who
idolized their children, worshiped their husbands, and esteemed it a
holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as
ministering angels.
Many of them were delicious in the role; one of them was the
embodiment of every womanly grace and charm. If her husband did not
adore her, he was a brute, deserving of death by slow torture. Her
name was Adele Ratignolle. There are no words to describe her save the
old ones that have served so often to picture the bygone heroine of
romance and the fair lady of our dreams. There was nothing subtle or
hidden about her charms; her beauty was all there, flaming and
apparent: the spun-gold hair that comb nor confining pin could
restrain; the blue eyes that were like nothing but sapphires; two lips
that pouted, that were so red one could only think of cherries or some
other delicious crimson fruit in looking at them. She was growing a
little stout, but it did not seem to detract an iota from the grace of
every step, pose, gesture. One would not have wanted her white neck
a mite less full or her beautiful arms more slender. Never were
hands more exquisite than hers, and it was a joy to look at them
when she threaded her needle or adjusted her gold thimble to her taper
middle finger as she sewed away on the little night-drawers or
fashioned a bodice or a bib.
Madame Ratignolle was very fond of Mrs. Pontellier, and often she
took her sewing and went over to sit with her in the afternoons. She
was sitting there the afternoon of the day the box arrived from New
Orleans. She had possession of the rocker, and she was busily
engaged in sewing upon a diminutive pair of night drawers.
She had brought the pattern of the drawers for Mrs. Pontellier to
cut out- a marvel of construction, fashioned to enclose a baby's
body so effectually that only two small eyes might look out from the
garment, like an Eskimo's. They were designed for winter wear, when
treacherous drafts came down chimneys and insidious currents of deadly
cold found their way through keyholes.
Mrs. Pontellier's mind was quite at rest concerning the present
material needs of her children, and she could not see the use of
anticipating and making winter night garments the subject of her
summer meditations. But she did not want to appear unamiable and
uninterested, so she had brought forth newspapers, which she spread
upon the floor of the gallery, and under Madame Ratignolle's
directions she had cut a pattern of the impervious garment.
Robert was there, seated as he had been the Sunday before, and
Mrs. Pontellier also occupied her former position on the upper step,
leaning listlessly against the post. Beside her was a box of
bonbons, which she held out at intervals to Madame Ratignolle.
That lady seemed at a loss to make a selection, but finally
settled upon a stick of nougat, wondering if it were not too rich;
whether it could possibly hurt her. Madame Ratignolle had been married
seven years. About every two years she had a baby. At that time she
had three babies, and was beginning to think of a fourth one. She
was always talking about her "condition." Her "condition" was in no
way apparent, and no one would have known a thing about it but for her
persistence in making it the subject of conversation.
Robert started to reassure her, asserting that he had known a lady
who had subsisted upon nougat during the entire- but seeing the
color mount into Mrs. Pontellier's face he checked himself and changed
the subject.
Mrs. Pontellier, though she had married a Creole, was not thoroughly
at home in the society of Creoles; never before had she been thrown so
intimately among them. There were only Creoles that summer at
Lebrun's. They all knew each other, and felt like one large family,
among whom existed the most amicable relations. A characteristic which
distinguished them and which impressed Mrs. Pontellier most forcibly
was their entire absence of prudery. Their freedom of expression was
at first incomprehensible to her, though she had no difficulty in
reconciling it with a lofty chastity which in the Creole woman seems
to be inborn and unmistakable.
Never would Edna Pontellier forget the shock with which she heard
Madame Ratignolle relating to old Monsieur Farival the harrowing story
of one of her «accouchements,» withholding no intimate detail. She
was growing accustomed to like shocks, but she could not keep the
mounting color back from her cheeks. Oftener than once her coming had
interrupted the droll story with which Robert was entertaining some
amused group of married women.
A book had gone the rounds of the «pension.» When it came her turn
to read it, she did so with profound astonishment. She felt moved to
read the book in secret and solitude, though none of the others had
done so- to hide it from view at the sound of approaching footsteps.
It was openly criticised and freely discussed at table. Mrs.
Pontellier gave over being astonished, and concluded that wonders
would never cease.
V
They formed a congenial group sitting there that summer afternoon-
Madame Ratignolle sewing away, often stopping to relate a story or
incident with much expressive gesture of her perfect hands; Robert and
Mrs. Pontellier sitting idle, exchanging occasional words, glances
or smiles which indicated a certain advanced stage of intimacy and
«camaraderie.»
He had lived in her shadow during the past month. No one thought
anything of it. Many had predicted that Robert would devote himself to
Mrs. Pontellier when he arrived. Since the age of fifteen, which was
eleven years before, Robert each summer at Grand Isle had
constituted himself the devoted attendant of some fair dame or damsel.
Sometimes it was a young girl, again a widow; but as often as not it
was some interesting married woman.
For two consecutive seasons he lived in the sunlight of Mademoiselle
Duvigne's presence. But she died between summers; then Robert posed as
an inconsolable, prostrating himself at the feet of Madame
Ratignolle for whatever crumbs of sympathy and comfort she might be
pleased to vouchsafe.
Mrs. Pontellier liked to sit and gaze at her fair companion as she
might look upon a faultless Madonna.
"Could any one fathom the cruelty beneath that fair exterior?"
murmured Robert. "She knew that I adored her once, and she let me
adore her. It was 'Robert, come; go; stand up; sit down; do this; do
that; see if the baby sleeps; my thimble, please, that I left God
knows where. Come and read Daudet to me while I sew.'"
«"Par exemple!» I never had to ask. You were always there under my
feet, like a troublesome cat."
"You mean like an adoring dog. And just as soon as Ratignolle
appeared on the scene, then it «was» like a dog. «'Passez! Adieu!
Allez vous-en!'"»
"Perhaps I feared to make Alphonse jealous," she interjoined, with
excessive naivete. That made them all laugh. The right hand jealous of
the left! The heart jealous of the soul! But for that matter, the
Creole husband is never jealous; with him the gangrene passion is
one which has become dwarfed by disuse.
Meanwhile Robert, addressing Mrs. Pontellier, continued to tell of
his one time hopeless passion for Madame Ratignolle; of sleepless
nights, of consuming flames till the very sea sizzled when he took his
daily plunge. While the lady at the needle kept up a little running,
contemptuous comment:
«"Blagueur- farceur- gros bete, va!"»
He never assumed this serio-comic tone when alone with Mrs.
Pontellier. She never knew precisely what to make of it; at that
moment it was impossible for her to guess how much of it was jest
and what proportion was earnest. It was understood that he had often
spoken words of love to Madame Ratignolle, without any thought of
being taken seriously. Mrs. Pontellier was glad he had not assumed a
similar role toward herself. It would have been unacceptable and
annoying.
Mrs. Pontellier had brought her sketching materials, which she
sometimes dabbled with in an unprofessional way. She liked the
dabbling. She felt in it satisfaction of a kind which no other
employment afforded her.
She had long wished to try herself on Madame Ratignolle. Never had
that lady seemed a more tempting subject than at that moment, seated
there like some sensuous Madonna, with the gleam of the fading day
enriching her splendid color.
Robert crossed over and seated himself upon the step below Mrs.
Pontellier, that he might watch her work. She handled her brushes with
a certain ease and freedom which came, not from long and close
acquaintance with them, but from a natural aptitude. Robert followed
her work with close attention, giving forth little ejaculatory
expressions of appreciation in French, which he addressed to Madame
Ratignolle.
«"Mais ce n'est pas mal! Elle s'y connait, elle a de la force,
oui."»
During his oblivious attention he once quietly rested his head
against Mrs. Pontellier's arm. As gently she repulsed him. Once
again he repeated the offense. She could not but believe it to be
thoughtlessness on his part, yet that was no reason she should
submit to it. She did not remonstrate, except again to repulse him
quietly but firmly. He offered no apology.
The picture completed bore no resemblance to Madame Ratignolle.
She was greatly disappointed to find that it did not look like her.
But it was a fair enough piece of work, and in many respects
satisfying.
Mrs. Pontellier evidently did not think so. After surveying the
sketch critically she drew a broad smudge of paint across its surface,
and crumpled the paper between her hands.
The youngsters came tumbling up the steps, the quadroon following at
the respectful distance which they required her to observe. Mrs.
Pontellier made them carry her paints and things into the house. She
sought to detain them for a little talk and some pleasantry. But
they were greatly in earnest. They had only come to investigate the
contents of the bonbon box. They accepted without murmuring what she
chose to give them, each holding out two chubby hands scoop-like, in
the vain hope that they might be filled; and then away they went.
The sun was low in the west, and the breeze soft and languorous that
came up from the south, charged with the seductive odor of the sea.
Children, freshly befurbelowed, were gathering for their games under
the oaks. Their voices were high and penetrating.
Madame Ratignolle folded her sewing, placing thimble, scissors and
thread all neatly together in the roll, which she pinned securely. She
complained of faintness. Mrs. Pontellier flew for the cologne water
and a fan. She bathed Madame Ratignolle's face with cologne, while
Robert plied the fan with unnecessary vigor.
The spell was soon over, and Mrs. Pontellier could not help
wondering if there were not a little imagination responsible for its
origin, for the rose tint had never faded from her friend's face.
She stood watching the fair woman walk down the long line of
galleries with the grace and majesty which queens are sometimes
supposed to possess. Her little ones ran to meet her. Two of them
clung about her white skirts, the third she took from its nurse and
with a thousand endearments bore it along in her own fond,
encircling arms. Though, as everybody well knew, the doctor had
forbidden her to lift so much as a pin!
"Are you going bathing?" asked Robert of Mrs. Pontellier. It was not
so much a question as a reminder.
"Oh, no," she answered, with a tone of indecision. "I'm tired; I
think not." Her glance wandered from his face away toward the Gulf,
whose sonorous murmur reached her like a loving but imperative
entreaty.
"Oh, come!" he insisted. "You mustn't miss your bath. Come on. The
water must be delicious; it will not hurt you. Come."
He reached up for her big, rough straw hat that hung on a peg
outside the door, and put it on her head. They descended the steps,
and walked away together toward the beach. The sun was low in the west
and the breeze was soft and warm.
VI
Edna Pontellier could not have told why, wishing to go to the
beach with Robert, she should in the first place have declined, and in
the second place have followed in obedience to one of the two
contradictory impulses which impelled her.
A certain light was beginning to dawn dimly within her- the light
which, showing the way, forbids it.
At that early period it served but to bewilder her. It moved her
to dreams, to thoughtfulness, to the shadowy anguish which had
overcome her the midnight when she had abandoned herself to tears.
In short, Mrs. Pontellier was beginning to realize her position in
the universe as a human being, and to recognize her relations as an
individual to the world within and about her. This may seem like a
ponderous weight of wisdom to descend upon the soul of a young woman
of twenty-eight- perhaps more wisdom than the Holy Ghost is usually
pleased to vouchsafe to any woman.
But the beginning of things, of a world especially, is necessarily
vague, tangled, chaotic, and exceedingly disturbing. How few of us
ever emerge from such beginning! How many souls perish in its tumult!
The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering,
clamoring, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in
abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation.
The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is
sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace.
VII
Mrs. Pontellier was not a woman given to confidences, a
characteristic hitherto contrary to her nature. Even as a child she
had lived her own small life all within herself. At a very early
period she had apprehended instinctively the dual life- that outward
existence which conforms, the inward life which questions.
That summer at Grand Isle she began to loosen a little the mantle of
reserve that had always enveloped her. There may have been- there must
have been- influences, both subtle and apparent, working in their
several ways to induce her to do this; but the most obvious was the
influence of Adele Ratignolle. The excessive physical charm of the
Creole had first attracted her, for Edna had a sensuous susceptibility
to beauty. Then the candor of the woman's whole existence, which every
one might read, and which formed so striking a contrast to her own
habitual reserve- this might have furnished a link. Who can tell
what metals the gods use in forging the subtle bond which we call
sympathy, which we might as well call love.
The two women went away one morning to the beach together, arm in
arm, under the huge white sunshade. Edna had prevailed upon Madame
Ratignolle to leave the children behind, though she could not induce
her to relinquish a diminutive roll of needlework, which Adele
begged to be allowed to slip into the depths of her pocket. In some
unaccountable way they had escaped from Robert.
The walk to the beach was no inconsiderable one, consisting as it
did of a long, sandy path, upon which a sporadic and tangled growth
that bordered it on either side made frequent and unexpected
inroads. There were acres of yellow camomile reaching out on either
hand. Further away still, vegetable gardens abounded, with frequent
small plantations of orange or lemon trees intervening. The dark green
clusters glistened from afar in the sun.
The women were both of goodly height, Madame Ratignolle possessing
the more feminine and matronly figure. The charm of Edna
Pontellier's physique stole insensibly upon you. The lines of her body
were long, clean and symmetrical; it was a body which occasionally
fell into splendid poses; there was no suggestion of the trim,
stereotyped fashion-plate about it. A casual and indiscriminating
observer, in passing, might not cast a second glance upon the
figure. But with more feeling and discernment he would have recognized
the noble beauty of its modeling, and the graceful severity of poise
and movement, which made Edna Pontellier different from the crowd.
She wore a cool muslin that morning- white, with a waving vertical
line of brown running through it; also a white linen collar and the
big straw hat which she had taken from the peg outside the door. The
hat rested any way on her yellow-brown hair, that waved a little,
was heavy, and clung close to her head.
Madame Ratignolle, more careful of her complexion, had twined a
gauze veil about her head. She wore dogskin gloves, with gauntlets
that protected her wrists. She was dressed in pure white, with a
fluffiness of ruffles that became her. The draperies and fluttering
things which she wore suited her rich, luxuriant beauty as a greater
severity of line could not have done.
There were a number of bathhouses along the beach, of rough but
solid construction, built with small, protecting galleries facing
the water. Each house consisted of two compartments, and each family
at Lebrun's possessed a compartment for itself, fitted out with all
the essential paraphernalia of the bath and whatever other
conveniences the owners might desire. The two women had no intention
of bathing; they had just strolled down to the beach for a walk and to
be alone and near the water. The Pontellier and Ratignolle
compartments adjoined one another under the same roof.
Mrs. Pontellier had brought down her key through force of habit.
Unlocking the door of her bath-room she went inside, and soon emerged,
bringing a rug, which she spread upon the floor of the gallery, and
two huge hair pillows covered with crash, which she placed against the
front of the building.
The two seated themselves there in the shade of the porch, side by
side, with their backs against the pillows and their feet extended.
Madame Ratignolle removed her veil, wiped her face with a rather
delicate handkerchief, and fanned herself with the fan which she
always carried suspended somewhere about her person by a long,
narrow ribbon. Edna removed her collar and opened her dress at the
throat. She took the fan from Madame Ratignolle and began to fan
both herself and her companion. It was very warm, and for a while they
did nothing but exchange remarks about the heat, the sun, the glare.
But there was a breeze blowing, a choppy, stiff wind that whipped
the water into froth. It fluttered the skirts of the two women and
kept them for a while engaged in adjusting, readjusting, tucking in,
securing hair-pins and hatpins. A few persons were sporting some
distance away in the water. The beach was very still of human sound at
that hour. The lady in black was reading her morning devotions on
the porch of a neighboring bath-house. Two young lovers were
exchanging their hearts' yearnings beneath the children's tent,
which they had found unoccupied.
Edna Pontellier, casting her eyes about, had finally kept them at
rest upon the sea. The day was clear and carried the gaze out as far
as the blue sky went; there were a few white clouds suspended idly
over the horizon. A lateen sail was visible in the direction of Cat
Island, and others to the south seemed almost motionless in the far
distance.
"Of whom- of what are you thinking?" asked Adele of her companion,
whose countenance she had been watching with a little amused
attention, arrested by the absorbed expression which seemed to have
seized and fixed every feature into a statuesque repose.
"Nothing," returned Mrs. Pontellier, with a start, adding at once:
"How stupid! But it seems to me it is the reply we make
instinctively to such a question. Let me see," she went on, throwing
back her head and narrowing her fine eyes till they shone like two
vivid points of light. "Let me see. I was really not conscious of
thinking of anything, but perhaps I can retrace my thoughts."
"Oh! never mind!" laughed Madame Ratignolle. "I am not quite so
exacting. I will let you off this time. It is really too hot to think,
especially to think about thinking."
"But for the fun of it," persisted Edna. "First of all, the sight of
the water stretching so far away, those motionless sails against the
blue sky, made a delicious picture that I just wanted to sit and
look at. The hot wind beating in my face made me think- without any
connection that I can trace- of a summer day in Kentucky, of a
meadow that seemed as big as the ocean to the very little girl walking
through the grass, which was higher than her waist. She threw out
her arms as if swimming when she walked, beating the tall grass as one
strikes out in the water. Oh, I see the connection now!"
"Where were you going that day in Kentucky, walking through the
grass?"
"I don't remember now. I was just walking diagonally across a big
field. My sunbonnet obstructed the view. I could see only the
stretch of green before me, and I felt as if I must walk on forever,
without coming to the end of it. I don't remember whether I was
frightened or pleased. I must have been entertained.
"Likely as not it was Sunday," she laughed; "and I was running
away from prayers, from the Presbyterian service, read in a spirit
of gloom by my father that chills me yet to think of."
"And have you been running away from prayers ever since, «ma
chere?"» asked Madame Ratignolle, amused.
"No! oh, no!" Edna hastened to say. "I was a little unthinking child
in those days, just following a misleading impulse without question.
On the contrary, during one period of my life religion took a firm
hold upon me; after I was twelve and until- until- why, I suppose
until now, though I never thought much about it- just driven along
by habit. But do you know," she broke off, turning her quick eyes upon
Madame Ratignolle and leaning forward a little so as to bring her face
quite close to that of her companion, "sometimes I feel this summer as
if I were walking through the green meadow again, idly, aimlessly,
unthinking and unguided."
Madame Ratignolle laid her hand over that of Mrs. Pontellier,
which was near her. Seeing that the hand was not withdrawn, she
clasped it firmly and warmly. She even stroked it a little, fondly,
with the other hand, murmuring in an undertone, «"Pauvre cherie."»
The action was at first a little confusing to Edna, but she soon
lent herself readily to the Creole's gentle caress. She was not
accustomed to an outward and spoken expression of affection, either in
herself or in others. She and her younger sister, Janet, had quarreled
a good deal through force of unfortunate habit. Her older sister,
Margaret, was matronly and dignified, probably from having assumed
matronly and housewifely responsibilities too early in life, their
mother having died when they were quite young. Margaret was not
effusive; she was practical. Edna had had an occasional girl friend,
but whether accidentally or not, they seemed to have been all of one
type- the self-contained. She never realized that the reserve of her
own character had much, perhaps everything, to do with this. Her
most intimate friend at school had been one of rather exceptional
intellectual gifts, who wrote fine-sounding essays, which Edna admired
and strove to imitate; and with her she talked and glowed over the
English classics, and sometimes held religious and political
controversies.
Edna often wondered at one propensity which sometimes had inwardly
disturbed her without causing any outward show or manifestation on her
part. At a very early age- perhaps it was when she traversed the ocean
of waving grass- she remembered that she had been passionately
enamored of a dignified and sad-eyed cavalry officer who visited her
father in Kentucky. She could not leave his presence when he was
there, nor remove her eyes from his face, which was something like
Napoleon's, with a lock of black hair falling across the forehead. But
the cavalry officer melted imperceptibly out of her existence.
At another time her affections were deeply engaged by a young
gentleman who visited a lady on a neighboring plantation. It was after
they went to Mississippi to live. The young man was engaged to be
married to the young lady, and they sometimes called upon Margaret,
driving over of afternoons in a buggy. Edna was a little miss, just
merging into her teens; and the realization that she herself was
nothing, nothing, nothing to the engaged young man was a bitter
affliction to her. But he, too, went the way of dreams.
She was a grown young woman when she was overtaken by what she
supposed to be the climax of her fate. It was when the face and figure
of a great tragedian began to haunt her imagination and stir her
senses. The persistence of the infatuation lent it an aspect of
genuineness. The hopelessness of it colored it with the lofty tones of
a great passion.
The picture of the tragedian stood enframed upon her desk. Any one
may possess the portrait of a tragedian without exciting suspicion
or comment. (This was a sinister reflection which she cherished.) In
the presence of others she expressed admiration for his exalted gifts,
as she handed the photograph around and dwelt upon the fidelity of the
likeness. When alone she sometimes picked it up and kissed the cold
glass passionately.
Her marriage to Leonce Pontellier was purely an accident, in this
respect resembling many other marriages which masquerade as the
decrees of Fate. It was in the midst of her secret great passion
that she met him. He fell in love, as men are in the habit of doing,
and pressed his suit with an earnestness and an ardor which left
nothing to be desired. He pleased her; his absolute devotion flattered
her. She fancied there was a sympathy of thought and taste between
them, in which fancy she was mistaken. Add to this the violent
opposition of her father and her sister Margaret to her marriage
with a Catholic, and we need seek no further for the motives which led
her to accept Monsieur Pontellier for her husband.
The acme of bliss, which would have been a marriage with the
tragedian, was not for her in this world. As the devoted wife of a man
who worshiped her, she felt she would take her place with a certain
dignity in the world of reality, closing the portals forever behind
her upon the realm of romance and dreams.
But it was not long before the tragedian had gone to join the
cavalry officer and the engaged young man and a few others; and Edna
found herself face to face with the realities. She grew fond of her
husband, realizing with some unaccountable satisfaction that no
trace of passion or excessive and fictitious warmth colored her
affection, thereby threatening its dissolution.
She was fond of her children in an uneven, impulsive way. She
would sometimes gather them passionately to her heart; she would
sometimes forget them. The year before they had spent part of the
summer with their grandmother Pontellier in Iberville. Feeling
secure regarding their happiness and welfare, she did not miss them
except with an occasional intense longing. Their absence was a sort of
relief, though she did not admit this, even to herself. It seemed to
free her of a responsibility which she had blindly assumed and for
which Fate had not fitted her.
Edna did not reveal so much as all this to Madame Ratignolle that
summer day when they sat with faces turned to the sea. But a good part
of it escaped her. She had put her head down on Madame Ratignolle's
shoulder. She was flushed and felt intoxicated with the sound of her
own voice and the unaccustomed taste of candor. It muddled her like
wine, or like a first breath of freedom.
There was the sound of approaching voices. It was Robert, surrounded
by a troop of children, searching for them. The two little Pontelliers
were with him, and he carried Madame Ratignolle's little girl in his
arms. There were other children besides, and two nursemaids
followed, looking disagreeable and resigned.
The women at once rose and began to shake out their draperies and
relax their muscles. Mrs. Pontellier threw the cushions and rug into
the bathhouse. The children all scampered off to the awning, and
they stood there in a line, gazing upon the intruding lovers, still
exchanging their vows and sighs. The lovers got up, with only a silent
protest, and walked slowly away somewhere else.
The children possessed themselves of the tent, and Mrs. Pontellier
went over to join them.
Madame Ratignolle begged Robert to accompany her to the house; she
complained of cramp in her limbs and stiffness of the joints. She
leaned draggingly upon his arm as they walked.
VIII
"Do me a favor, Robert," spoke the pretty woman at his side,
almost as soon as she and Robert had started on their slow, homeward
way. She looked up in his face, leaning on his arm beneath the
encircling shadow of the umbrella which he had lifted.
"Granted; as many as you like," he returned, glancing down into
her eyes that were full of thoughtfulness and some speculation.
"I only ask for one; let Mrs. Pontellier alone."
«"Tiens!"» he exclaimed, with a sudden, boyish laugh. «"Voila que
Madame Ratignolles est jalouse!"»
"Nonsense! I'm in earnest; I mean what I say. Let Mrs. Pontellier
alone."
"Why?" he asked; himself growing serious at his companion's
solicitation.
"She is not one of us; she is not like us. She might make the
unfortunate blunder of taking you seriously."
His face flushed with annoyance, and taking off his soft hat he
began to beat it impatiently against his leg as he walked. "Why
shouldn't she take me seriously?" he demanded sharply. "Am I a
comedian, a clown, a jack-in-the-box? Why shouldn't she? You
Creoles! I have no patience with you! Am I always to be regarded as
a feature of an amusing programme? I hope Mrs. Pontellier does take me
seriously. I hope she has discernment enough to find in me something
besides the «blagueur.» If I thought there was any doubt-"
"Oh, enough, Robert!" she broke into his heated outburst. "You are
not thinking of what you are saying. You speak with about as little
reflection as we might expect from one of those children down there
playing in the sand. If your attentions to any married women here were
ever offered with any intention of being convincing, you would not
be the gentleman we all know you to be, and you would be unfit to
associate with the wives and daughters of the people who trust you."
Madame Ratignolle had spoken what she believed to be the law and the
gospel. The young man shrugged his shoulders impatiently.
"Oh! well! That isn't it," slamming his hat down vehemently upon his
head. "You ought to feel that such things are not flattering to say to
a fellow."
"Should our whole intercourse consist of an exchange of compliments?
«Ma foi!"»
"It isn't pleasant to have a woman tell you-" he went on,
unheedingly, but breaking off suddenly: "Now if I were like Arobin-
you remember Alcee Arobin and that story of the consul's wife at
Biloxi?" And he related the story of Alcee Arobin and the consul's
wife, and another about the tenor of the French Opera, who received
letters which should never have been written, and still other stories,
grave and gay, till Mrs. Pontellier and her possible propensity for
taking young men seriously was apparently forgotten.
Madame Ratignolle, when they had regained her cottage, went in to
take the hour's rest which she considered helpful. Before leaving her,
Robert begged her pardon for the impatience- he called it rudeness-
with which he had received her well-meant caution.
"You made one mistake, Adele," he said, with a light smile; "there
is no earthly possibility of Mrs. Pontellier ever taking me seriously.
You should have warned me against taking myself seriously. Your advice
might then have carried some weight and given me subject for some
reflection. «Au revoir.» But you look tired," he added,
solicitously. "Would you like a cup of bouillon? Shall I stir you a
toddy? Let me mix you a toddy with a drop of Angostura."
She acceded to the suggestion of bouillon, which was grateful and
acceptable. He went himself to the kitchen, which was a building apart
from the cottages and lying to the rear of the house. And he himself
brought her the golden-brown bouillon, in a dainty Sevres cup, with
a flaky cracker or two on the saucer.
She thrust a bare, white arm from the curtain which shielded her
open door, and received the cup from his hands. She told him he was
a «bon garcon,» and she meant it. Robert thanked her and turned away
toward "the house."
The lovers were just entering the grounds of the «pension.» They
were leaning toward each other as the water oaks bent from the sea.
There was not a particle of earth beneath their feet. Their heads
might have been turned upside down, so absolutely did they tread
upon blue ether. The lady in black, creeping behind them, looked a
trifle paler and more jaded than usual. There was no sign of Mrs.
Pontellier and the children. Robert scanned the distance for any
such apparition. They would doubtless remain away till the dinner
hour. The young man ascended to his mother's room. It was situated
at the top of the house, made up of odd angles and a queer, sloping
ceiling. Two broad dormer windows looked out toward the Gulf, and as
far across it as a man's eye might reach. The furnishings of the
room were light, cool, and practical.
Madame Lebrun was busily engaged at the sewing machine. A little
black girl sat on the floor, and with her hands worked the treadle
of the machine. The Creole woman does not take any chances which may
be avoided of imperiling her health.
Robert went over and seated himself on the broad sill of one of
the dormer windows. He took a book from his pocket and began
energetically to read it, judging by the precision and frequency
with which he turned the leaves. The sewing machine made a
resounding clatter in the room; it was of a ponderous, bygone make. In
the lulls, Robert and his mother exchanged bits of desultory
conversation.
"Where is Mrs. Pontellier?"
"Down at the beach with the children."
"I promised to lend her the Goncourt. Don't forget to take it down
when you go; it's there on the bookshelf over the small table."
Clatter, clatter, clatter, bang! for the next five or eight minutes.
"Where is Victor going with the rockaway?"
"The rockaway? Victor?"
"Yes, down there in front. He seems to be getting ready to drive
away somewhere."
"Call him." Clatter, clatter!
Robert uttered a shrill, piercing whistle which might have been
heard back at the wharf.
"He won't look up."
Madame Lebrun flew to the window. She called "Victor!" She waved a
handkerchief and called again. The young fellow below got into the
vehicle and started the horse off at a gallop.
Madame Lebrun went back to the machine, crimson with annoyance.
Victor was the younger son and brother- a «tete montee,» with a
temper which invited violence and a will which no ax could break.
"Whenever you say the word I'm ready to thrash any amount of
reason into him that he's able to hold."
"If your father had only lived!" Clatter, clatter, clatter, clatter,
bang! It was a fixed belief with Madame Lebrun that the conduct of the
universe and all things pertaining thereto would have been
manifestly of a more intelligent and higher order had not Monsieur
Lebrun been removed to other spheres during the early years of their
married life.
"What do you hear from Montel?" Montel was a middle-aged gentleman
whose vain ambition and desire for the past twenty years had been to
fill the void which Monsieur Lebrun's taking off had left in the
Lebrun household. Clatter, clatter, bang, clatter!
"I have a letter somewhere," looking in the machine drawer and
finding the letter in the bottom of the workbasket. "He says to tell
you he will be in Vera Cruz the beginning of next month"- clatter,
clatter!- "and if you still have the intention of joining him"-
bang! clatter, clatter, bang!
"Why didn't you tell me so before, mother? You know I wanted-"
Clatter, clatter, clatter!
"Do you see Mrs. Pontellier starting back with the children? She
will be in late to luncheon again. She never starts to get ready for
luncheon till the last minute." Clatter, clatter! "Where are you
going?"
"Where did you say the Goncourt was?"
IX
Every light in the hall was ablaze, every lamp turned as high as
it could be without smoking the chimney or threatening explosion.
The lamps were fixed at intervals against the wall, encircling the
whole room. Some one had gathered orange and lemon branches, and
with these fashioned graceful festoons between. The dark green of
the branches stood out and glistened against the white muslin curtains
which draped the windows, and which puffed, floated, and flapped at
the capricious will of a stiff breeze that swept up from the Gulf.
It was Saturday night a few weeks after the intimate conversation
held between Robert and Madame Ratignolle on their way from the beach.
An unusual number of husbands, fathers, and friends had come down to
stay over Sunday, and they were being suitably entertained by their
families, with the material help of Madame Lebrun. The dining tables
had all been removed to one end of the hall, and the chairs ranged
about in rows and in clusters. Each little family group had had its
say and exchanged its domestic gossip earlier in the evening. There
was now an apparent disposition to relax, to widen the circle of
confidences and give a more general tone to the conversation.
Many of the children had been permitted to sit up beyond their usual
bedtime. A small band of them were lying on their stomachs on the
floor looking at the colored sheets of the comic papers which Mr.
Pontellier had brought down. The little Pontellier boys were
permitting them to do so, and making their authority felt.
Music, dancing, and a recitation or two were the entertainments
furnished, or rather, offered. But there was nothing systematic
about the programme, no appearance of prearrangement nor even
premeditation.
At an early hour in the evening the Farival twins were prevailed
upon to play the piano. They were girls of fourteen, always clad in
the Virgin's colors, blue and white, having been dedicated to the
Blessed Virgin at their baptism. They played a duet from "Zampa,"
and at the earnest solicitation of every one present followed it
with the overture to "The Poet and the Peasant."
«"Allez vous-en! Sapristi!"» shrieked the parrot outside the door.
He was the only being present who possessed sufficient candor to admit
that he was not listening to these gracious performances for the first
time that summer. Old Monsieur Farival, grandfather of the twins, grew
indignant over the interruption, and insisted upon having the bird
removed and consigned to regions of darkness. Victor Lebrun
objected, and his decrees were as immutable as those of Fate. The
parrot fortunately offered no further interruption to the
entertainment, the whole venom of his nature apparently having been
cherished up and hurled against the twins in that one impetuous
outburst.
Later a young brother and sister gave recitations, which every one
present had heard many times at winter evening entertainments in the
city.
A little girl performed a skirt dance in the center of the floor.
The mother played her accompaniments and at the same time watched
her daughter with greedy admiration and nervous apprehension. She need
have had no apprehension. The child was mistress of the situation. She
had been properly dressed for the occasion in black tulle and black
silk tights. Her little neck and arms were bare, and her hair,
artificially crimped, stood out like fluffy black plumes over her
head. Her poses were full of grace, and her little black-shod toes
twinkled as they shot out and upward with a rapidity and suddenness
which were bewildering.
But there was no reason why every one should not dance. Madame
Ratignolle could not, so it was she who gaily consented to play for
the others. She played very well, keeping excellent waltz time and
infusing an expression into the strains which was indeed inspiring.
She was keeping up her music on account of the children, she said,
because she and her husband both considered it a means of
brightening the home and making it attractive.
Almost every one danced but the twins, who could not be induced to
separate during the brief period when one or the other should be
whirling around the room in the arms of a man. They might have
danced together, but they did not think of it.
The children were sent to bed. Some went submissively; others with
shrieks and protests as they were dragged away. They had been
permitted to sit up till after the ice cream, which naturally marked
the limit of human indulgence.
The ice cream was passed around with cake- gold and silver cake
arranged on platters in alternate slices; it had been made and
frozen during the afternoon back of the kitchen by two black women,
under the supervision of Victor. It was pronounced a great success-
excellent if it had only contained a little less vanilla or a little
more sugar, if it had been frozen a degree harder, and if the salt
might have been kept out of portions of it. Victor was proud of his
achievement, and went about recommending it and urging every one to
partake of it to excess.
After Mrs. Pontellier had danced twice with her husband, once with
Robert, and once with Monsieur Ratignolle, who was thin and tall and
swayed like a reed in the wind when he danced, she went out on the
gallery and seated herself on the low window sill, where she commanded
a view of all that went on in the hall and could look out toward the
Gulf. There was a soft effulgence in the east. The moon was coming up,
and its mystic shimmer was casting a million lights across the
distant, restless water.
"Would you like to hear Mademoiselle Reisz play?" asked Robert,
coming out on the porch where she was. Of course Edna would like to
hear Mademoiselle Reisz play; but she feared it would be useless to
entreat her.
"I'll ask her," he said. "I'll tell her that you want to hear her.
She likes you. She will come." He turned and hurried away to one of
the far cottages, where Mademoiselle Reisz was shuffling away. She was
dragging a chair in and out of her room, and at intervals objecting to
the crying of a baby, which a nurse in the adjoining cottage was
endeavoring to put to sleep. She was a disagreeable little woman, no
longer young, who had quarreled with almost every one, owing to a
temper which was self-assertive and a disposition to trample upon
the rights of others. Robert prevailed upon her without any too
great difficulty.
She entered the hall with him during a lull in the dance. She made
an awkward, imperious little bow as she went in. She was a homely
woman, with a small weazened face and body and eyes that glowed. She
had absolutely no taste in dress, and wore a batch of rusty black lace
with a bunch of artificial violets pinned to the side of her hair.
"Ask Mrs. Pontellier what she would like to hear me play," she
requested of Robert. She sat perfectly still before the piano, not
touching the keys, while Robert carried her message to Edna at the
window. A general air of surprise and genuine satisfaction fell upon
every one as they saw the pianist enter. There was a settling down,
and a prevailing air of expectancy everywhere. Edna was a trifle
embarrassed at being thus signaled out for the imperious little
woman's favor. She would not dare to choose, and begged that
Mademoiselle Reisz would please herself in her selections.
Edna was what she herself called very fond of music. Musical
strains, well rendered, had a way of evoking pictures in her mind. She
sometimes liked to sit in the room of mornings when Madame
Ratignolle played or practiced. One piece which that lady played
Edna had entitled "Solitude." It was a short, plaintive, minor strain.
The name of the piece was something else, but she called it
"Solitude." When she heard it there came before her imagination the
figure of a man standing beside a desolate rock on the seashore. He
was naked. His attitude was one of hopeless resignation as he looked
toward a distant bird winging its flight away from him.
Another piece called to her mind a dainty young woman clad in an
Empire gown, taking mincing dancing steps as she came down a long
avenue between tall hedges. Again, another reminded her of children at
play, and still another of nothing on earth but a demure lady stroking
a cat.
The very first chords which Mademoiselle Reisz struck upon the piano
sent a keen tremor down Mrs. Pontellier's spinal column. It was not
the first time she had heard an artist at the piano. Perhaps it was
the first time she was ready, perhaps the first time her being was
tempered to take an impress of the abiding truth.
She waited for the material pictures which she thought would
gather and blaze before her imagination. She waited in vain. She saw
no pictures of solitude, of hope, of longing, or of despair. But the
very passions themselves were aroused within her soul, swaying it,
lashing it, as the waves daily beat upon her splendid body. She
trembled, she was choking, and the tears blinded her.
Mademoiselle had finished. She arose, and bowing her stiff, lofty
bow, she went away, stopping for neither thanks nor applause. As she
passed along the gallery she patted Edna upon the shoulder.
"Well, how did you like my music?" she asked. The young woman was
unable to answer; she pressed the hand of the pianist convulsively.
Mademoiselle Reisz perceived her agitation and even her tears. She
patted her again upon the shoulder as she said:
"You are the only one worth playing for. Those others? Bah!" and she
went shuffling and sidling on down the gallery toward her room.
But she was mistaken about "those others." Her playing had aroused a
fever of enthusiasm. "What passion!" "What an artist!" "I have
always said no one could play Chopin like Mademoiselle Reisz!" "That
last prelude! Bon Dieu! It shakes a man!"
It was growing late, and there was a general disposition to disband.
But some one, perhaps it was Robert, thought of a bath at that
mystic hour and under that mystic moon.
X
At all events Robert proposed it, and there was not a dissenting
voice. There was not one but was ready to follow when he led the
way. He did not lead the way, however, he directed the way; and he
himself loitered behind with the lovers, who had betrayed a
disposition to linger and hold themselves apart. He walked between
them, whether with malicious or mischievous intent was not wholly
clear, even to himself.
The Pontelliers and Ratignolles walked ahead; the women leaning upon
the arms of their husbands. Edna could hear Robert's voice behind
them, and could sometimes hear what he said. She wondered why he did
not join them. It was unlike him not to. Of late he had sometimes held
away from her for an entire day, redoubling his devotion upon the next
and the next, as though to make up for hours that had been lost. She
missed him the days when some pretext served to take him away from
her, just as one misses the sun on a cloudy day without having thought
much about the sun when it was shining.
The people walked in little groups toward the beach. They talked and
laughed; some of them sang. There was a band playing down at Klein's
hotel, and the strains reached them faintly, tempered by the distance.
There were strange, rare odors abroad- a tangle of the sea smell and
of weeds and damp, new-plowed earth, mingled with the heavy perfume of
a field of white blossoms somewhere near. But the night sat lightly
upon the sea and the land. There was no weight of darkness; there were
no shadows. The white light of the moon had fallen upon the world like
the mystery and the softness of sleep.
Most of them walked into the water as though into a native
element. The sea was quiet now, and swelled lazily in broad billows
that melted into one another and did not break except upon the beach
in little foamy crests that coiled back like slow, white serpents.
Edna had attempted all summer to learn to swim. She had received
instructions from both the men and women, in some instances from the
children. Robert had pursued a system of lessons almost daily, and
he was nearly at the point of discouragement in realizing the futility
of his efforts. A certain ungovernable dread hung about her when in
the water, unless there was a hand near by that might reach out and
reassure her.
But that night she was like the little tottering, stumbling,
clutching child, who of a sudden realizes its powers, and walks for
the first time alone, boldly and with over confidence. She could
have shouted for joy. She did shout for joy, as with a sweeping stroke
or two she lifted her body to the surface of the water.
A feeling of exultation overtook her, as if some power of
significant import had been given her to control the working of her
body and her soul. She grew daring and reckless, overestimating her
strength. She wanted to swim far out, where no woman had swum before.
Her unlooked-for achievement was the subject of wonder, applause,
and admiration. Each one congratulated himself that his special
teachings had accomplished this desired end.
"How easy it is!" she thought. "It is nothing," she said aloud; "why
did I not discover before that it was nothing. Think of the time I
have lost splashing about like a baby!" She would not join the
groups in their sports and bouts, but intoxicated with her newly
conquered power, she swam out alone.
She turned her face seaward to gather in an impression of space
and solitude, which the vast expanse of water, meeting and melting
with the moonlit sky, conveyed to her excited fancy. As she swam she
seemed to be reaching out for the unlimited in which to lose herself.
Once she turned and looked toward the shore, toward the people she
had left there. She had not gone any great distance- that is, what
would have been a great distance for an experienced swimmer. But to
her unaccustomed vision the stretch of water behind her assumed the
aspect of a barrier which her unaided strength would never be able
to overcome.
A quick vision of death smote her soul, and for a second of time
appalled and enfeebled her senses. But by an effort she rallied her
staggering faculties and managed to regain the land.
She made no mention of her encounter with death and her flash of
terror, except to say to her husband, "I thought I should have
perished out there alone."
"You were not so very far, my dear; I was watching you," he told
her.
Edna went at once to the bathhouse, and she had put on her dry
clothes and was ready to return home before the others had left the
water. She started to walk away alone. They all called to her and
shouted to her. She waved a dissenting hand, and went on, paying no
further heed to their renewed cries which sought to detain her.
"Sometimes I am tempted to think that Mrs. Pontellier is
capricious," said Madame Lebrun, who was amusing herself immensely and
feared that Edna's abrupt departure might put an end to the pleasure.
"I know she is," assented Mr. Pontellier, "sometimes, not often."
Edna had not traversed a quarter of the distance on her way home
before she was overtaken by Robert.
"Did you think I was afraid?" she asked him, without a shade of
annoyance.
"No; I knew you weren't afraid."
"Then why did you come? Why didn't you stay out there with the
others?"
"I never thought of it."
"Thought of what?"
"Of anything. What difference does it make?"
"I'm very tired," she uttered, complainingly.
"I know you are."
"You don't know anything about it. Why should you know? I never
was so exhausted in my life. But it isn't unpleasant. A thousand
emotions have swept through me to-night. I don't comprehend half of
them. Don't mind what I'm saying; I am just thinking aloud. I wonder
if I shall ever be stirred again as Mademoiselle Reisz's playing moved
me to-night. I wonder if any night on earth will ever again be like
this one. It is like a night in a dream. The people about me are
like some uncanny, half-human beings. There must be spirits abroad
to-night."
"There are," whispered Robert. "Didn't you know this was the
twenty-eighth of August?"
"The twenty-eighth of August?"
"Yes. On the twenty-eighth of August, at the hour of midnight, and
if the moon is shining- the moon must be shining- a spirit that has
haunted these shores for ages rises up from the Gulf. With its own
penetrating vision the spirit seeks some one mortal worthy to hold him
company, worthy of being exalted for a few hours into realms of the
semicelestials. His search has always hitherto been fruitless, and
he has sunk back, disheartened, into the sea. But tonight he found
Mrs. Pontellier. Perhaps he will never wholly release her from the
spell. Perhaps she will never again suffer a poor, unworthy
earthling to walk in the shadow of her divine presence."
"Don't banter me," she said, wounded at what appeared to be his
flippancy. He did not mind the entreaty, but the tone with its
delicate note of pathos was like a reproach. He could not explain;
he could not tell her that he had penetrated her mood and
understood. He said nothing except to offer her his arm, for, by her
own admission, she was exhausted. She had been walking alone with
her arms hanging limp, letting her white skirts trail along the dewy
path. She took his arm, but she did not lean upon it. She let her hand
lie listlessly, as though her thoughts were elsewhere- somewhere in
advance of her body, and she was striving to overtake them.
Robert assisted her into the hammock which swung from the post
before her door out to the trunk of a tree.
"Will you stay out here and wait for Mr. Pontellier?" he asked.
"I'll stay out here. Goodnight."
"Shall I get you a pillow?"
"There's one here," she said, feeling about, for they were in the
shadow.
"It must be soiled; the children have been tumbling it about."
"No matter." And having discovered the pillow, she adjusted it
beneath her head. She extended herself in the hammock with a deep
breath of relief. She was not a supercilious or an over-dainty
woman. She was not much given to reclining in the hammock, and when
she did so it was with no catlike suggestion of voluptuous ease, but
with a beneficent repose which seemed to invade her whole body.
"Shall I stay with you till Mr. Pontellier comes?" asked Robert,
seating himself on the outer edge of one of the steps and taking
hold of the hammock rope which was fastened to the post.
"If you wish. Don't swing the hammock. Will you get my white shawl
which I left on the window sill over at the house?"
"Are you chilly?"
"No; but I shall be presently."
"Presently?" he laughed. "Do you know what time it is? How long
are you going to stay out here?"
"I don't know. Will you get the shawl?"
"Of course I will," he said, rising. He went over to the house,
walking along the grass. She watched his figure pass in and out of,
the strips of moonlight. It was past midnight. It was very quiet.
When he returned with the shawl she took it and kept it in her hand.
She did not put it around her.
"Did you say I should stay till Mr. Pontellier came back?"
"I said you might if you wished to."
He seated himself again and rolled a cigarette, which he smoked in
silence. Neither did Mrs. Pontellier speak. No multitude of words
could have been more significant than those moments of silence, or
more pregnant with the first-felt throbbings of desire.
When the voices of the bathers were heard approaching, Robert said
goodnight. She did not answer him. He thought she was asleep. Again
she watched his figure pass in and out of the strips of moonlight as
he walked away.
XI
"What are you doing out here, Edna? I thought I should find you in
bed," said her husband, when he discovered her lying there. He had
walked up with Madame Lebrun and left her at the house. His wife did
not reply.
"Are you asleep?" he asked, bending down close to look at her.
"No." Her eyes gleamed bright and intense, with no sleepy shadows,
as they looked into his.
"Do you know it is past one o'clock? Come on," and he mounted the
steps and went into their room.
"Edna!" called Mr. Pontellier from within, after a few moments had
gone by.
"Don't wait for me," she answered. He thrust his head through the
door.
"You will take cold out there," he said, irritably. "What folly is
this? Why don't you come in?"
"It isn't cold; I have my shawl."
"The mosquitoes will devour you."
"There are no mosquitoes."
She heard him moving about the room; every sound indicating
impatience and irritation. Another time she would have gone in at
his request. She would, through habit, have yielded to his desire; not
with any sense of submission or obedience to his compelling wishes,
but unthinkingly, as we walk, move, sit, stand, go through the daily
treadmill of the life which has been portioned out to us.
"Edna, dear, are you not coming in soon?" he asked again, this
time fondly, with a note of entreaty.
"No; I am going to stay out here."
"This is more than folly," he blurted out. "I can't permit you to
stay out there all night. You must come in the house instantly."
With a writhing motion she settled herself more securely in the
hammock. She perceived that her will had blazed up, stubborn and
resistant. She could not at that moment have done other than denied
and resisted. She wondered if her husband had ever spoken to her
like that before, and if she had submitted to his command. Of course
she had; she remembered that she had. But she could not realize why or
how she should have yielded, feeling as she then did.
"Leonce, go to bed," she said. "I mean to stay out here. I don't
wish to go in, and I don't intend to. Don't speak to me like that
again; I shall not answer you."
Mr. Pontellier had prepared for bed, but he slipped on an extra
garment. He opened a bottle of wine, of which he kept a small and
select supply in a buffet of his own. He drank a glass of the wine and
went out on the gallery and offered a glass to his wife. She did not
wish any. He drew up the rocker, hoisted his slippered feet on the
rail, and proceeded to smoke a cigar. He smoked two cigars; then he
went inside and drank another glass of wine. Mrs. Pontellier again
declined to accept a glass when it was offered to her. Mr.
Pontellier once more seated himself with elevated feet, and after a
reasonable interval of time smoked some more cigars.
Edna began to feel like one who awakens gradually out of a dream,
a delicious, grotesque, impossible dream, to feel again the
realities pressing into her soul. The physical need for sleep began to
overtake her; the exuberance which had sustained and exalted her
spirit left her helpless and yielding to the conditions which
crowded her in.
The stillest hour of the night had come, the hour before dawn,
when the world seems to hold its breath. The moon hung low, and had
turned from silver to copper in the sleeping sky. The old owl no
longer hooted, and the wateroaks had ceased to moan as they bent their
heads.
Edna arose, cramped from lying so long and still in the hammock. She
tottered up the steps, clutching feebly at the post before passing
into the house.
"Are you coming in, Leonce?" she asked, turning her face toward
her husband.
"Yes, dear," he answered, with a glance following a misty puff of
smoke. "Just as soon as I have finished my cigar."
XII
She slept but a few hours. They were troubled and feverish hours,
disturbed with dreams that were intangible, that eluded her, leaving
only an impression upon her half-awakened senses of something
unattainable. She was up and dressed in the cool of the early morning.
The air was invigorating and steadied somewhat her faculties. However,
she was not seeking refreshment or help from any source, either
external or from within. She was blindly following whatever impulse
moved her, as if she had placed herself in alien hands for
direction, and freed her soul of responsibility.
Most of the people at that early hour were still in bed and
asleep. A few, who intended to go over to the «Cheniere» for mass,
were moving about. The lovers, who had laid their plans the night
before, were already strolling toward the wharf. The lady in black,
with her Sunday prayerbook, velvet and gold-clasped, and her Sunday
silver beads, was following them at no great distance. Old Monsieur
Farival was up, and was more than half inclined to do anything that
suggested itself. He put on his big straw hat, and taking his umbrella
from the stand in the hall, followed the lady in black, never
overtaking her.
The little negro girl who worked Madame Lebrun's sewing machine
was sweeping the galleries with long, absent-minded strokes of the
broom. Edna sent her up into the house to awaken Robert.
"Tell him I am going to the «Cheniere.» The boat is ready; tell
him to hurry."
He had soon joined her. She had never sent for him before. She had
never asked for him. She had never seemed to want him before. She
did not appear conscious that she had done anything unusual in
commanding his presence. He was apparently equally unconscious of
anything extraordinary in the situation. But his face was suffused
with a quiet glow when he met her.
They went together back to the kitchen to drink coffee. There was no
time to wait for any nicety of service. They stood outside the
window and the cook passed them their coffee and a roll, which they
drank and ate from the window sill. Edna said it tasted good. She
had not thought of coffee nor of anything. He told her he had often
noticed that she lacked forethought.
"Wasn't it enough to think of going to the «Cheniere» and waking
you up?" she laughed. "Do I have to think of everything?- as Leonce
says when he's in a bad humor. I don't blame him; he'd never be in a
bad humor if it weren't for me."
They took a short cut across the sands. At a distance they could see
the curious procession moving toward the wharf- the lovers, shoulder
to shoulder, creeping; the lady in black, gaining steadily upon
them; old Monsieur Farival, losing ground inch by inch, and a young
barefooted Spanish girl, with a red kerchief on her head and a
basket on her arm, bringing up the rear.
Robert knew the girl, and he talked to her a little in the boat.
No one present understood what they said. Her name was Mariequita. She
had a round, sly, piquant face and pretty black eyes. Her hands were
small, and she kept them folded over the handle of her basket. Her
feet were broad and coarse. She did not strive to hide them. Edna
looked at her feet, and noticed the sand and slime between her brown
toes.
Beaudelet grumbled because Mariequita was there, taking up so much
room. In reality he was annoyed at having old Monsieur Farival, who
considered himself the better sailor of the two. But he would not
quarrel with so old a man as Monsieur Farival, so he quarreled with
Mariequita. The girl was deprecatory at one moment, appealing to
Robert. She was saucy the next, moving her head up and down, making
"eyes" at Robert and making "mouths" at Beaudelet.
The lovers were all alone. They saw nothing, they heard nothing. The
lady in black was counting her beads for the third time. Old
Monsieur Farival talked incessantly of what he knew about handling a
boat, and of what Beaudelet did not know on the same subject.
Edna liked it all. She looked Mariequita up and down, from her
ugly brown toes to her pretty black eyes, and back again.
"Why does she look at me like that?" inquired the girl of Robert.
"Maybe she thinks you are pretty. Shall I ask her?"
"No. Is she your sweetheart?"
"She's a married lady, and has two children."
"Oh! well! Francisco ran away with Sylvano's wife, who had four
children. They took all his money and one of the children and stole
his boat."
"Are those two married over there- leaning on each other?"
"Of course not," laughed Robert.
"Of course not," echoed Mariequita, with a serious, confirmatory bob
of the head.
The sun was high up and beginning to bite. The swift breeze seemed
to Edna to bury the sting of it into the pores of her face and
hands. Robert held his umbrella over her.
As they went cutting sidewise through the water, the sails bellied
taut, with the wind filling and overflowing them. Old Monsieur Farival
laughed sardonically at something as he looked at the sails, and
Beaudelet swore at the old man under his breath.
Sailing across the bay to the Cheniere Caminada, Edna felt as if she
were being borne away from some anchorage which had held her fast,
whose chains had been loosening- had snapped the night before when the
mystic spirit was abroad, leaving her free to drift whithersoever
she chose to set her sails. Robert spoke to her incessantly; he no
longer noticed Mariequita. The girl had shrimps in her bamboo
basket. They were covered with Spanish moss. She beat the moss down
impatiently, and muttered to herself sullenly.
"Let us go to Grande Terre tomorrow?" said Robert in a low voice.
"What shall we do there?"
"Climb up the hill to the old fort and look at the little
wriggling gold snakes, and watch the lizards sun themselves."
She gazed away toward Grande Terre and thought she would like to
be alone there with Robert, in the sun, listening to the ocean's
roar and watching the slimy lizards writhe in and out among the
ruins of the old fort.
"And the next day or the next we can sail to the Bayou Brulow," he
went on.
"What shall we do there?"
"Anything- cast bait for fish."
"No; we'll go back to Grande Terre. Let the fish alone."
"We'll go wherever you like," he said. "I'll have Tonie come over
and help me patch and trim my boat. We shall not need Beaudelet nor
any one. Are you afraid of the pirogue?"
"Oh, no."
"Then I'll take you some night in the pirogue when the moon
shines. Maybe your Gulf spirit will whisper to you in which of these
islands the treasures are hidden- direct you to the very spot,
perhaps."
"And in a day we should be rich!" she laughed. "I'd give it all to
you, the pirate gold and every bit of treasure we could dig up. I
think you would know how to spend it. Pirate gold isn't a thing to
be hoarded or utilized. It is something to squander and throw to the
four winds, for the fun of seeing the golden specks fly."
"We'd share it, and scatter it together," he said. His face flushed.
They all went together up to the quaint little Gothic church of
Our Lady of Lourdes, gleaming all brown and yellow with paint in the
sun's glare.
Only Beaudelet remained behind, tinkering at his boat, and
Mariequita walked away with her basket of shrimps, casting a look of
childish ill-humor and reproach at Robert from the corner of her eye.
XIII
A feeling of oppression and drowsiness overcame Edna during the
service. Her head began to ache, and the lights on the altar swayed
before her eyes. Another time she might have made an effort to
regain her composure; but her one thought was to quit the stifling
atmosphere of church and reach the open air. She arose, climbing
over Robert's feet with a muttered apology. Old Monsieur Farival,
flurried, curious, stood up, but upon seeing that Robert had
followed Mrs. Pontellier, he sank back into his seat. He whispered
an anxious inquiry of the lady in black, who did not notice him or
reply, but kept her eyes fastened upon the pages of her velvet
prayer-book.
"I felt giddy and almost overcome," Edna said, lifting her hands
instinctively to her head and pushing her straw hat up from her
forehead. "I couldn't have stayed through the service." They were
outside in the shadow of the church. Robert was full of solicitude.
"It was folly to have thought of going in the first place, let alone
staying. Come over to Madame Antoine's; you can rest there." He took
her arm and led her away, looking anxiously and continuously down into
her face.
How still it was, with only the voice of the sea whispering
through the reeds that grew in the salt-water pools! The long line
of little gray, weather-beaten houses nestled peacefully among the
orange trees. It must always have been God's day on that low, drowsy
island, Edna thought. They stopped, leaning over a jagged fence made
of sea drift, to ask for water. A youth, a mild-faced Acadian, was
drawing water from the cistern, which was nothing more than a rusty
buoy, with an opening on one side, sunk in the ground. The water which
the youth handed to them in a tin pail was not cold to taste, but it
was cool to her heated face, and it greatly revived and refreshed her.
Madame Antoine's cot was at the far end of the village. She welcomed
them with all the native hospitality, as she would have opened her
door to let the sunlight in. She was fat, and walked heavily and
clumsily across the floor. She could speak no English, but when Robert
made her understand that the lady who accompanied him was ill and
desired to rest, she was all eagerness to make Edna feel at home and
to dispose of her comfortably.
The whole place was immaculately clean, and the big, four-posted
bed, snow-white, invited one to repose. It stood in a small side
room which looked out across a narrow grass plot toward the shed,
where there was a disabled boat lying keel upward.
Madame Antoine had not gone to mass. Her son Tonie had, but she
supposed he would soon be back, and she invited Robert to be seated
and wait for him. But he went and sat outside the door and smoked.
Madame Antoine busied herself in the large front room preparing
dinner. She was boiling mullets over a few red coals in the huge
fireplace.
Edna, left alone in the little side room, loosened her clothes,
removing the greater part of them. She bathed her face, her neck and
arms in the basin that stood between the windows. She took off her
shoes and stockings and stretched herself in the very center of the
high, white bed. How luxurious it felt to rest thus in a strange,
quaint bed, with its sweet country odor of laurel lingering about
the sheets and mattress! She stretched her strong limbs that ached a
little. She ran her fingers through her loosened hair for a while. She
looked at her round arms as she held them straight up and rubbed
them one after the other, observing closely, as if it were something
she saw for the first time, the fine, firm quality and texture of
her flesh. She clasped her hands easily above her head, and it was
thus she fell asleep.
She slept lightly at first, half awake and drowsily attentive to the
things about her. She could hear Madame Antoine's heavy, scraping
tread as she walked back and forth on the sanded floor. Some
chickens were clucking outside the windows, scratching for bits of
gravel in the grass. Later she half heard the voices of Robert and
Tonie talking under the shed. She did not stir. Even her eyelids
rested numb and heavily over her sleepy eyes. The voices went on-
Tonie's slow, Acadian drawl, Robert's quick, soft, smooth French.
She understood French imperfectly unless directly addressed, and the
voices were only part of the other drowsy, muffled sounds lulling
her senses.
When Edna awoke it was with the conviction that she had slept long
and soundly. The voices were hushed under the shed. Madame Antoine's
step was no longer to be heard in the adjoining room. Even the
chickens had gone elsewhere to scratch and cluck. The mosquito bar was
drawn over her; the old woman had come in while she slept and let down
the bar. Edna arose quietly from the bed, and looking between the
curtains of the window, she saw by the slanting rays of the sun that
the afternoon was far advanced. Robert was out there under the shed,
reclining in the shade against the sloping keel of the overturned
boat. He was reading from a book. Tonie was no longer with him. She
wondered what had become of the rest of the party. She peeped out at
him two or three times as she stood washing herself in the little
basin between the windows.
Madame Antoine had laid some coarse, clean towels upon a chair,
and had placed a box of «poudre de riz» within easy reach. Edna
dabbed the powder upon her nose and cheeks as she looked at herself
closely in the little distorted mirror which hung on the wall above the
basin. Her eyes were bright and wide awake and her face glowed.
When she had completed her toilet she walked into the adjoining
room. She was very hungry. No one was there. But there was a cloth
spread upon the table that stood against the wall, and a cover was
laid for one, with a crusty brown loaf and a bottle of wine beside the
plate. Edna bit a piece from the brown loaf, tearing it with her
strong, white teeth. She poured some of the wine into the glass and
drank it down. Then she went softly out of doors, and plucking an
orange from the low-hanging bough of a tree, threw it at Robert, who
did not know she was awake and up.
An illumination broke over his whole face when he saw her and joined
her under the orange tree.
"How many years have I slept?" she inquired. "The whole island seems
changed. A new race of beings must have sprung up, leaving only you
and me as past relics. How many ages ago did Madame Antoine and
Tonie die? and when did our people from Grand Isle disappear from
the earth?"
He familiarly adjusted a ruffle upon her shoulder.
"You have slept precisely one hundred years. I was left here to
guard your slumbers; and for one hundred years I have been out under
the shed reading a book. The only evil I couldn't prevent was to
keep a broiled fowl from drying up."
"If it has turned to stone, still will I eat it," said Edna,
moving with him into the house. "But really, what has become of
Monsieur Farival and the others?"
"Gone hours ago. When they found that you were sleeping they thought
it best not to awake you. Any way, I wouldn't have let them. What
was I here for?"
"I wonder if Leonce will be uneasy!" she speculated, as she seated
herself at table.
"Of course not; he knows you are with me," Robert replied, as he
busied himself among sundry pans and covered dishes which had been
left standing on the hearth.
"Where are Madame Antoine and her son?" asked Edna.
"Gone to Vespers, and to visit some friends, I believe. I am to take
you back in Tonie's boat whenever you are ready to go."
He stirred the smoldering ashes till the broiled fowl began to
sizzle afresh. He served her with no mean repast, dripping the
coffee anew and sharing it with her. Madame Antoine had cooked
little else than the mullets, but while Edna slept Robert had
foraged the island. He was childishly gratified to discover her
appetite, and to see the relish with which she ate the food which he
had procured for her.
"Shall we go right away?" she asked, after draining her glass and
brushing together the crumbs of the crusty loaf.
"The sun isn't as low as it will be in two hours," he answered.
"The sun will be gone in two hours."
"Well, let it go; who cares!"
They waited a good while under the orange trees, till Madame Antoine
came back, panting, waddling, with a thousand apologies to explain her
absence. Tonie did not dare to return. He was shy, and would not
willingly face any woman except his mother.
It was very pleasant to stay there under the orange trees, while the
sun dipped lower and lower, turning the western sky to flaming
copper and gold. The shadows lengthened and crept out like stealthy,
grotesque monsters across the grass.
Edna and Robert both sat upon the ground- that is, he lay upon the
ground beside her, occasionally picking at the hem of her muslin gown.
Madame Antoine seated her fat body, broad and squat, upon a bench
beside the door. She had been talking all the afternoon, and had wound
herself up to the story-telling pitch.
And what stories she told them! But twice in her life she had left
the «Cheniere Caminada,» and then for the briefest span. All her
years she had squatted and waddled there upon the island, gathering
legends of the Baratarians and the sea. The night came on, with the
moon to lighten it. Edna could hear the whispering voices of dead
men and the click of muffled gold.
When she and Robert stepped into Tonie's boat, with the red lateen
sail, misty spirit forms were prowling in the shadows and among the
reeds, and upon the water were phantom ships, speeding to cover.
XIV
The youngest boy, Etienne, had been very naughty, Madame
Ratignolle said, as she delivered him into the hands of his mother. He
had been unwilling to go to bed and had made a scene; whereupon she
had taken charge of him and pacified him as well as she could. Raoul
had been in bed and asleep for two hours.
The youngster was in his long white nightgown, that kept tripping
him up as Madame Ratignolle led him along by the hand. With the
other chubby fist he rubbed his eyes, which were heavy with sleep
and ill humor. Edna took him in her arms, and seating herself in the
rocker, began to coddle and caress him, calling him all manner of
tender names, soothing him to sleep.
It was not more than nine o'clock. No one had yet gone to bed but
the children.
Leonce had been very uneasy at first, Madame Ratignolle said, and
had wanted to start at once for the «Cheniere.» But Monsieur Farival
had assured him that his wife was only overcome with sleep and
fatigue, that Tonie would bring her safely back later in the day;
and he had thus been dissuaded from crossing the bay. He had gone over
to Klein's, looking up some cotton broker whom he wished to see in
regard to securities, exchanges, stocks, bonds, or something of the
sort, Madame Ratignolle did not remember what. He said he would not
remain away late. She herself was suffering from heat and
oppression, she said. She carried a bottle of salts and a large fan.
She would not consent to remain with Edna, for Monsieur Ratignolle was
alone, and he detested above all things to be left alone.
When Etienne had fallen asleep Edna bore him into the back room, and
Robert went and lifted the mosquito bar that she might lay the child
comfortably in his bed. The quadroon had vanished. When they emerged
from the cottage Robert bade Edna good-night.
"Do you know we have been together the whole livelong day, Robert-
since early this morning?" she said at parting.
"All but the hundred years when you were sleeping. Good-night."
He pressed her hand and went away in the direction of the beach.
He did not join any of the others, but walked alone toward the Gulf.
Edna stayed outside, awaiting her husband's return. She had no
desire to sleep or to retire; nor did she feel like going over to
sit with the Ratignolles, or to join Madame Lebrun and a group whose
animated voices reached her- as they sat in conversation before the
house. She let her mind wander back over her stay at Grand Isle, and
she tried to discover wherein this summer had been different from
any and every other summer of her life. She could only realize that
she herself- her present self- was in some way different from the
other self. That she was seeing with different eyes and making the
acquaintance of new conditions in herself that colored and changed her
environment, she did not yet suspect.
She wondered why Robert had gone away and left her. It did not occur
to her to think he might have grown tired of being with her the
livelong day. She was not tired, and she felt that he was not. She
regretted that he had gone. It was so much more natural to have him
stay, when he was not absolutely required to leave her.
As Edna waited for her husband she sang low a little song that
Robert had sung as they crossed the bay. It began with "Ah! «Si tu
savais,"» and every verse ended with «"si tu savais."»
Robert's voice was not pretentious. It was musical and true. The
voice, the notes, the whole refrain haunted her memory.
XV
When Edna entered the dining room one evening a little late, as
was her habit, an unusually animated conversation seemed to be going
on. Several persons were talking at once, and Victor's voice was
predominating, even over that of his mother. Edna had returned late
from her bath, had dressed in some haste, and her face was flushed.
Her head, set off by her dainty white gown, suggested a rich, rare
blossom. She took her seat at table between old Monsieur Farival and
Madame Ratignolle.
As she seated herself and was about to begin to eat her soup,
which had been served when she entered the room, several persons
informed her simultaneously that Robert was going to Mexico. She
laid her spoon down and looked about her bewildered. He had been
with her, reading to her all the morning, and had never even mentioned
such a place as Mexico. She had not seen him during the afternoon; she
had heard some one say he was at the house, upstairs with his
mother. This she had thought nothing of, though she was surprised when
he did not join her later in the afternoon, when she went down to
the beach.
She looked across at him, where he sat beside Madame Lebrun, who
presided. Edna's face was a blank picture of bewilderment, which she
never thought of disguising. He lifted his eyebrows with the pretext
of a smile as he returned her glance. He looked embarrassed and
uneasy.
"When is he going?" she asked of everybody in general, as if
Robert were not there to answer for himself.
"Tonight!" "This very evening!" "Did you ever!" "What possesses
him!" were some of the replies she gathered, uttered simultaneously in
French and English.
"Impossible!" she exclaimed. "How can a person start off from
Grand Isle to Mexico at a moment's notice, as if he were going over to
Klein's or to the wharf or down to the beach?"
"I said all along I was going to Mexico; I've been saying so for
years!" cried Robert, in an excited and irritable tone, with the air
of a man defending himself against a swarm of stinging insects.
Madame Lebrun knocked on the table with her knife handle.
"Please let Robert explain why he is going, and why he is going
tonight," she called out. "Really, this table is getting to be more
and more like Bedlam every day, with everybody talking at once.
Sometimes- I hope God will forgive me- but positively, sometimes I
wish Victor would lose the power of speech."
Victor laughed sardonically as he thanked his mother for her holy
wish, of which he failed to see the benefit to anybody, except that it
might afford her a more ample opportunity and license to talk herself.
Monsieur Farival thought that Victor should have been taken out in
mid-ocean in his earliest youth and drowned. Victor thought there
would be more logic in thus disposing of old people with an
established claim for making themselves universally obnoxious.
Madame Lebrun grew a trifle hysterical; Robert called his brother some
sharp, hard names.
"There's nothing much to explain, mother," he said, though he
explained, nevertheless- looking chiefly at Edna- that he could only
meet the gentleman whom he intended to join at Vera Cruz by taking
such and such a steamer, which left New Orleans on such a day; that
Beaudelet was going out with his lugger-load of vegetables that night,
which gave him an opportunity of reaching the city and making his
vessel in time.
"But when did you make up your mind to all this?" demanded
Monsieur Farival.
"This afternoon," returned Robert, with a shade of annoyance.
"At what time this afternoon?" persisted the old gentleman, with
nagging determination, as if he were cross-questioning a criminal in a
court of justice.
"At four o'clock this afternoon, Monsieur Farival," Robert
replied, in a high voice and with a lofty air, which reminded Edna
of some gentleman on the stage.
She had forced herself to eat most of her soup, and now she was
picking the flaky bits of a «court bouillon» with her fork.
The lovers were profiting by the general conversation on Mexico to
speak in whispers of matters which they rightly considered were
interesting to no one but themselves. The lady in black had once
received a pair of prayer-beads of curious workmanship from Mexico,
with very special indulgence attached to them, but she had never
been able to ascertain whether the indulgence extended outside the
Mexican border. Father Fochel of the Cathedral had attempted to
explain it; but he had not done so to her satisfaction. And she begged
that Robert would interest himself, and discover, if possible, whether
she was entitled to the indulgence accompanying the remarkably curious
Mexican prayer-beads.
Madame Ratignolle hoped that Robert would exercise extreme caution
in dealing with the Mexicans, who, she considered, were a
treacherous people, unscrupulous and revengeful. She trusted she did
them no injustice in thus condemning them as a race. She had known
personally but one Mexican, who made and sold excellent tamales, and
whom she would have trusted implicitly, so soft-spoken was he. One day
he was arrested for stabbing his wife. She never knew whether he had
been hanged or not.
Victor had grown hilarious, and was attempting to tell an anecdote
about a Mexican girl who served chocolate one winter in a restaurant
in Dauphine Street. No one would listen to him but old Monsieur
Farival, who went into convulsions over the droll story.
Edna wondered if they had all gone mad, to be talking and
clamoring at that rate. She herself could think of nothing to say
about Mexico or the Mexicans.
"At what time do you leave?" she asked Robert.
"At ten," he told her. "Beaudelet wants to wait for the moon."
"Are you all ready to go?"
"Quite ready. I shall only take a handbag, and shall pack my trunk
in the city."
He turned to answer some question put to him by his mother, and
Edna, having finished her black coffee, left the table.
She went directly to her room. The little cottage was close and
stuffy after leaving the outer air. But she did not mind; there
appeared to be a hundred different things demanding her attention
indoors. She began to set the toilet stand to rights, grumbling at the
negligence of the quadroon, who was in the adjoining room putting
the children to bed. She gathered together stray garments that were
hanging on the backs of chairs, and put each where it belonged in
closet or bureau drawer. She changed her gown for a more comfortable
and commodious wrapper. She rearranged her hair, combing and
brushing it with unusual energy. Then she went in and assisted the
quadroon in getting the boys to bed.
They were very playful and inclined to talk- to do anything but
lie quiet and go to sleep. Edna sent the quadroon away to her supper
and told her she need not return. Then she sat and told the children a
story. Instead of soothing it excited them, and added to their
wakefulness. She left them in heated argument, speculating about the
conclusion of the tale which their mother promised to finish the
following night.
The little black girl came in to say that Madame Lebrun would like
to have Mrs. Pontellier go and sit with them over at the house till
Mr. Robert went away. Edna returned answer that she had already
undressed, that she did not feel quite well, but perhaps she would
go over to the house later. She started to dress again, and got as far
advanced as to remove her peignoir. But changing her mind once more
she resumed the peignoir, and went outside and sat down before her
door. She was overheated and irritable, and fanned herself
energetically for a while. Madame Ratignolle came down to discover
what was the matter.
"All that noise and confusion at the table must have upset me,"
replied Edna, "and moreover, I hate shocks and surprises. The idea
of Robert starting off in such a ridiculously sudden and dramatic way!
As if it were a matter of life and death! Never saying a word about it
all morning when he was with me."
"Yes," agreed Madame Ratignolle. "I think it was showing us all- you
especially- very little consideration. It wouldn't have surprised me
in any of the others; those Lebruns are all given to heroics. But I
must say I should never have expected such a thing from Robert. Are
you not coming down? Come on, dear; it doesn't look friendly."
"No," said Edna, a little sullenly. "I can't go to the trouble of
dressing again; I don't feel like it."
"You needn't dress; you look all right; fasten a belt around your
waist. Just look at me!"
"No," persisted Edna; "but you go on. Madame Lebrun might be
offended if we both stayed away."
Madame Ratignolle kissed Edna goodnight, and went away, being in
truth rather desirous of joining in the general and animated
conversation which was still in progress concerning Mexico and the
Mexicans.
Somewhat later Robert came up, carrying his handbag.
"Aren't you feeling well?" he asked.
"Oh, well enough. Are you going right away?"
He lit a match and looked at his watch. "In twenty minutes," he
said. The sudden and brief flare of the match emphasized the
darkness for a while. He sat down upon a stool which the children
had left out on the porch.
"Get a chair," said Edna.
"This will do," he replied. He put on his soft hat and nervously
took it off again, and wiping his face with his handkerchief,
complained of the heat.
"Take the fan," said Edna, offering it to him.
"Oh, no! Thank you. It does no good; you have to stop fanning
sometime, and feel all the more uncomfortable afterward."
"That's one of the ridiculous things which men always say. I have
never known one to speak otherwise of fanning. How long will you be
gone?"
"Forever, perhaps. I don't know. It depends upon a good many
things."
"Well, in case it shouldn't be forever, how long will it be?"
"I don't know."
"This seems to me perfectly preposterous and uncalled for. I don't
like it. I don't understand your motive for silence and mystery, never
saying a word to me about it this morning." He remained silent, not
offering to defend himself. He only said, after a moment:
"Don't part from me in an ill-humor. I never knew you to be out of
patience with me before."
"I don't want to part in any ill-humor," she said. "But can't you
understand? I've grown used to seeing you, to having you with me all
the time, and your action seems unfriendly, even unkind. You don't
even offer an excuse for it. Why, I was planning to be together,
thinking of how pleasant it would be to see you in the city next
winter."
"So was I," he blurted. "Perhaps that's the-" He stood up suddenly
and held out his hand. "Good-by, my dear Mrs. Pontellier; good-by. You
won't- I hope you won't completely forget me." She clung to his
hand, striving to detain him.
"Write to me when you get there, won't you, Robert?" she entreated.
"I will, thank you. Good-by."
How unlike Robert! The merest acquaintance would have said something
more emphatic than "I will, thank you; good-by," to such a request.
He had evidently already taken leave of the people over at the
house, for he descended the steps and went to join Beaudelet, who
was out there with an oar across his shoulder waiting for Robert. They
walked away in the darkness. She could only hear Beaudelet's voice;
Robert had apparently not even spoken a word of greeting to his
companion.
Edna bit her handkerchief convulsively, striving to hold back and to
hide, even from herself as she would have hidden from another, the
emotion which was troubling- tearing- her. Her eyes were brimming with
tears.
For the first time she recognized anew the symptoms of infatuation
which she had felt incipiently as a child, as a girl in her earliest
teens, and later as a young woman. The recognition did not lessen
the reality, the poignancy of the revelation by any suggestion or
promise of instability. The past was nothing to her; offered no lesson
which she was willing to heed. The future was a mystery which she
never attempted to penetrate. The present alone was significant, was
hers, to torture her as it was doing then with the biting conviction
that she had lost that which she had held, that she had been denied
that which her impassioned, newly awakened being demanded.
XVI
"Do you miss your friend greatly?" asked Mademoiselle Reisz one
morning as she came creeping up behind Edna, who had just left her
cottage on her way to the beach. She spent much of her time in the
water since she had acquired finally the art of swimming. As their
stay at Grand Isle drew near its close, she felt that she could not
give too much time to a diversion which afforded her the only
pleasurable moments that she knew. When Mademoiselle Reisz came and
touched her upon the shoulder and spoke to her, the woman seemed to
echo the thought which was ever in Edna's mind, or, better, the
feeling which constantly possessed her.
Robert's going had some way taken the brightness, the color, the
meaning out of everything. The conditions of her life were in no way
changed, but her whole existence was dulled, like a faded garment
which seems to be no longer worth wearing. She sought him
everywhere- in others whom she induced to talk about him. She went
up in the mornings to Madame Lebrun's room, braving the clatter of the
old sewing-machine. She sat there and chatted at intervals as Robert
had done. She gazed around the room at the pictures and photographs
hanging upon the wall, and discovered in some corner an old family
album, which she examined with the keenest interest, appealing to
Madame Lebrun for enlightenment concerning the many figures and
faces which she discovered between its pages.
There was a picture of Madame Lebrun with Robert as a baby, seated
in her lap, a round-faced infant with a fist in his mouth. The eyes
alone in the baby suggested the man. And that was he also in kilts, at
the age of five, wearing long curls and holding a whip in his hand. It
made Edna laugh, and she laughed, too, at the portrait in his first
long trousers; while another interested her, taken when he left for
college, looking thin, long-faced, with eyes full of fire, ambition
and great intentions. But there was no recent picture, none which
suggested the Robert who had gone away five days ago, leaving a void
and wilderness behind him.
"Oh, Robert stopped having his pictures taken when he had to pay for
them himself! He found wiser use, for his money, he says," explained
Madame Lebrun. She had a letter from him, written before he left New
Orleans. Edna wished to see the letter |
