Chapter II

by Susan Glaspell

　　And now that they were face to face across a tea-table Miss Jones wasbunkered again. How get out of the sand? She did not know. She did noteven know what club to use.

　　For never had she drunk tea under similar circumstances. Life had broughther varied experiences, but sitting across the teacups from one whom shehad interrupted on the brink of suicide did not chance to be among them.She was wholly without precedent, and it was trying for an army girl tobe stripped of precedent.

　　They were sitting at a window which overlooked the river; the river whichwas flowing on so serenely, which was so blue and lazy and lovely thatMay afternoon. She looked to the place where—then back to the girlacross from her—the girl who but for her—

　　She shivered.

　　"Is it coming back?" the girl asked.

　　"N—o; I think not; but I hope you will not go." Then, desperatelyresolved to break through, she asked boldly: "Am I keeping you fromanything important?"

　　A strange gleam, compounded of things she did not understand, shot out ather. To be followed with: "Important? Oh I don't know. That depends onhow you look at it. The only thing I have left to do is to kill myself.I guess it won't take long."

　　Kate met it with a sharp, involuntary cry. For the sullen steadiness,dispassionateness, detachment with which it was said made it more realthan it had been at the water's edge.

　　"But—but you see it's such a lovely day. You know—you know it's such abeautiful place," was what the resourceful Miss Jones found herselfstammering.

　　"Yes," agreed her companion, "pleasant weather, isn't it?" She looked atKatie contemptuously. "You think weather makes any difference? That'slike a girl like you!"

　　Katie laughed. Laughing seemed the only sand club she had just then. "Iam a fool," she agreed. "I've often thought so myself. But like mostother fools I mean well, and this just didn't seem to me the sort of daywhen it would occur to one to kill one's self. Now if it were terriblyhot, the kind of hot that takes your brains away, or so cold you werefreezing, or even if it were raining, not a decent rain, but thatinsulting drizzle that makes you hate everything—why then, yes, I mightunderstand. But to kill one's self in the sunshine!"

　　As she was finishing she had a strange sensation. She saw that the girlwas looking at her compassionately. Katherine Wayneworth Jones was notaccustomed to being viewed with compassion.

　　"It would be foolish to try to make you understand," said the girlsimply, finality in her weariness. "It would be foolish to try to make agirl like you understand that nothing can be so bad as sunshine."

　　Katie leaned across the table. This interested her. "Why I suppose thatmight be true. I suppose—"

　　But the girl was not listening. She was leaning back in the great wickerchair. She seemed actually to be relaxing, resting. That seemed strangeto Kate. How could she be resting in an hour which had just been tackedon to her life? And then it came to her that perhaps it was a long timesince the girl had sat in a chair like that. If she had had a chance,when things were going badly, to sit in such a chair and rest, might theriver have seemed a less desirable place? She had always supposed it wasbig things—queer, abstract, unknowable things like forces and traitsthat made life and death. Did chairs count?

　　As the girl's eyes closed, surrenderingly, Katie was glad that no matterwhat she might decide to do about things she had had that hour in thebig, tenderly cushioned wicker chair. It might be a kinder memory to takewith her from life than anything she had known for a long time.

　　Katherine had grown very still, still both outwardly and inwardly. Peoplespoke of her enviously as having experienced so much; living in all partsof the world, knowing people of all nations and kinds. But it seemed allof that had been mere splashing around on the beach. She was out in thebig waves now.

　　She looked at the girl; looked with the eyes of one who would understand.

　　And what she saw was that some one, something, had, as it were, struck ablow at the center, and the girl, the something that really was her,had gone to pieces. Everything was scattered. Even her features scarcelyseemed to belong to each other, so how must it not be with those otherthings, inner things, oh, things one did not know what to call? Was itbecause she could not get things together it seemed to her she must makethem all stop? Was that it? Did people lose the power to hold themselvesin the one that made you you?

　　What could do that? Something that reached the center; not many thingscould; something, perhaps, that kept battering at it for a long time, andjust shook it at first, and then—

　　It was too dreadful to think of it that way. She tried to makeherself stop.

　　The girl's face was turned to the out-of-doors; to a great tree infront of the window, a tree in which some robins had built their nests.Such a tired face! So many tear marks, and so much less reachable thantear stains.

　　A beautiful face, too. If all were back which the blow at the center hadstruck away, if she had all of her—if lighted—it would be a rarelybeautiful face.

　　The girl was like a flower; a flower, it seemed to Kate, which had notbeen planted in the right place. The gardener had been unwise in hisselection of a place for this flower; perhaps he had not used the rightkind of soil, perhaps he had put it in the full heat of the sun when itwas a flower to have more shade; perhaps too much wind or too muchrain—Katie wondered just what the mistake had been. For the flower wouldhave been so lovely had the gardener not made those mistakes.

　　Even now, it was lovely: lovely with a saddening loveliness, for one sawat a glance how easily a breeze too rough could beat it down. And oneknew there had been those breezes. Every petal drooped.

　　A strange desire entered the heart of Katherine: a desire to see whetherthose petals could take their curves again, whether a color whichblunders had faded could come back to its own. She was like the newgardener eager to see whether he can redeem the mistakes of the old. Andthe new gardener's zeal is not all for the flower; some of it is to showwhat he can do, and much of it the true gardener's passion forexperiment. Katie Jones would have made a good gardener.

　　And yet it was something less cold than the experimenting instincttightened her throat as she looked at the frail figure of the girl forwhom life had been too much.

　　"I must go now," she was saying, with what seemed mighty effort to summonall of herself over which she could get command. "You are all right now.I must go."

　　But she sank back in the chair, as if that one thing left at the centerpulled her back, crying out that if it could but have a little moretime there—

　　The girl in blue linen was sitting at the feet of the girl in pinkorgandie. She had hold of her hand, so slim a hand. Everything about thegirl was slim, built for favoring breezes.

　　"I have one thing more to ask." It was Kate's voice was not wellcontrolled this time.

　　"You may call it a whim, a notion, foolish notion; call it what you like,but I want you to stay here to-night."

　　The girl was looking down at her, down into the upturned face, all lightand strength and purpose as one standing apart and disinterested mightview a spectacle. Slowly, comprehendingly, dispassionately she shook herhead. "It would be—no use."

　　"Perhaps," Katie acquiesced. "Some of the very nicest things in lifeare—no use. But I have something planned. May I tell you what it is Iwant to do?"

　　Still she did not take her eyes from Katie's kindling face, looking at itas at something a long way off and foreign.

　　"I am not a philanthropist, have no fears of that. But I have an idea, atheory, that what seem small things are perhaps the only things in lifeto help the big things. For instance, a hot bath. I can't think of anysorrow in the world that a hot bath wouldn't help, just a little bit."

　　"Now we have such a beautiful bathroom. I loathe hot baths in tinybathrooms, where the air gets all steamy and you can't get your breath.Perhaps one thing the matter with you is that all the bathrooms you'vebeen in lately were too small. Of course, you didn't know that was onething the matter; like once at a dance I thought I was very sad about aman's dancing so much with another girl, a new girl—don't you loathe'new girls'?—but when I got home I found that one of my dress stays wasdigging into me and when I got my dress off I didn't feel half so brokenup about the man."

　　An odd thing happened; one thing struck away came back. There was a lightin the eyes telling that something human and understanding, something tolink her to other things human, would like to come back. She looked andlistened as to something nearer.

　　Seeing it, Katie chattered on, against time, about nothing; foolish talk,heartless talk, it might even seem, to be pouring out to a girl who feltthere was no place for her in life. But it was nonsense carried bytenderness. Nonsense which made for kinship. It reached. Several timesthe girl who thought she must kill herself was not far from a smile andat last there was a tear on the long lashes.

　　"So I'm going to undress you," Katie unfolded her plan, encouraged by thetear, "and then let's just see what hot water can do about it. And maybea little rub. I used to rub my mother's spine. She said life alwaysseemed worth living after I had done that." She patted the hand she heldever so lightly as she said: "How happy I would be if I could make youfeel that way about it, too. Then I've a dear room to take you into, allsoft grays and greens, and oh, such a good bed! Why you know you'retired! That's what's the matter with you, and you're just too tired toknow what's the matter."

　　The girl nodded, tears upon her cheeks, looking like a child that hashad a cruel time and needs to be comforted.

　　Katie's voice was lower, different, as she went on: "Then after I'vebrushed your hair and done all those 'comfy' things I'm going to put youin a certain, a very special gown I have. It was made by the nuns in aconvent in Southern France. As they worked upon it they sat in a gardenon a hillside. They thought serene thoughts, those nuns. You see I knowthem, lived with them. I don't know, one has odd fancies sometimes, andit always seemed to me that something of the peace of things there wasabsorbed in that wonderful bit of linen. It seems far away from thingsthat hurt and harm. Almost as if it might draw back things that hadgone. I was going to keep it—" Katie's eyes deepened, there was alittle catch in her voice. "Well, I was just keeping it. But because youare so tired—oh just because you need it so.—I want you to let me giveit to you."

　　And with a tender strength holding the sobbing girl Katie unfastened hercollar and began taking off her dress.