Chapter XXXI

by Susan Glaspell

　　Katie was back home; or, more accurately, she was back at Wayne'squarters, where they could perhaps remain for a month or two longer.

　　And craving some simple, natural thing, something that could not make theheart ache, she went out that afternoon to play golf. The physical Kate,Katie of the sound body, was delighted to be back playing golf. Everylittle cell sang its song of rejoicing—rejoicing in emancipation fromthe ill-smelling crowds, return to the open air and the good green earth.

　　It seemed a saving thing that they could so rejoice.

　　Katie was reading the little book on man's evolution which the man whowas having much to do with her evolution had—it seemed long ago—senther in the package marked "Danger." She had finished the book about womenand was just looking through the one on evolution on the day CarolineOsborne's car had stopped at her door. That began a swift series ofevents leaving small place for reading. But when, that last day they weretogether in Chicago, she asked him about something to read, he suggesteda return to that book. There seemed wisdom and kindness in thesuggestion. The story of evolution was to the mind what the game of golfwas to the body. With the life about her pressing in too close there wassomething freeing and saving in that glimpse of herself as part of allthe life there had ever been. Because the crowds had seemed the all—weresuffocating her—something in that vastness of vision was as fresh airafter a stifling room. It was not that it did away with the crowds—madeher think they did not matter; they were, after all, the morevital—imperative—but she had more space in which to see them, was givena chance to understand them rather than be blindly smothered by them.

　　For a number of years Katie had known that there was such a thing asevolution. It had something to do with an important man named Darwin. Hegot it up. It was the idea that we came from monkeys. The monkey was notKatie's favorite animal and she would have been none too pleased with theidea had it not been that there was something so delicious about solemnpeople like her Aunt Elizabeth and proper people like Clara having comefrom them. She was willing to stand it herself, just because if she camefrom them they did, too. She had assumed all along that she believed inDarwin and that people who did not believe in him were benighted. But thechief reason she had for believing in him was that the church had notbelieved in him. That was through neither malice nor conviction asregards the church, but merely because it was exciting to have some onedisagreeing with it. It had thrilled her as "fearless," She had alwaysmeant to find out more about evolution, she had a hazy idea that therewas a great deal more to it than just the fact of having come frommonkeys, but she led such a busy life—bridge and things—that there wasnever time and so it remained a thing she believed in and was some daygoing to find out about.

　　Now she was furious with herself and with everybody connectedwith her for having lived so much of her life shut out from theknowledge—vision—that made life so vast and so splendid. It was likehaving lived all one's life in sight of the sea and being so busy walkingaround a silly little lake in a park that there was no time to turn one'sface seaward. She wondered what she would think of a person who said thelittle toy lake kept her so busy there was never a minute to turn aroundand take a good look at the sea!

　　Katie had always loved the great world of living things—the fishes andbirds—all animals—all things that grew. They had always called to herimagination—she used to make up stories about them. She saw now thattheir real story was a thousand-fold more wonderful—more the story—thananything she had been able to invent. She would give much to have knownit long before. She felt that she had missed much. There was somethinghumiliating in the thought of having lived one's life without knowingwhat life was. It made one seem such a dead thing. Now she was on fire toknow all about it.

　　She smiled as it suggested to her what her uncle had said a few daysbefore of the fresh paint. She supposed there was some truth in it, thatone who was conserving the past must find something raw and ludicrous inher state of mind. Her passion to fairly devour knowledge would probablybring to many of them the same amused smile it had brought to her uncle.But it was surprising how little she minded the smile. She was too intenton the things she would devour.

　　Her glimpse into this actual story of life brought the first purelyreligious feeling she had ever known. It even brought the missionaryfervor, which, as they sat down to rest, she exercised upon Worth, whohad been proudly filling the office of caddy. She told him that she wasgoing to tell him the most wonderful fairy story there had ever been inthe world. And the thing that made it most wonderful of all was that,while it was just like a fairy story in being wonderful, it was every bittrue. And then she told him a little of the great story of how one thingbecame another thing, how everything grew out of something else, how ithad been doing that for millions of years, how he was what he was thenbecause through all those years one thing had changed, grown, intosomething else.

　　As she told it it seemed so noble a thing to be telling a child, somuch purer and more dignified—to say nothing of more stimulating—thanthe evasive tales of life employed in the attempt to thwart herchildish mind.

　　Worth was upon her with a hundred questions. How did a worm becomesomething that wasn't a worm? Did it know it was going to do it? And whydid one worm go one way and in a lot of million years be a little boyand another worm go another way and just never be anything but a worm?Did she think in another hundred million years that little bird up therewould be something else? Would they be anything else? And why—?

　　She saw that she had let herself in for a whole new world of whys. Onething was certain: if she were to remain with Worth she would have tofind out more about evolution. Her knowledge was pitifully incommensurateto his whys.

　　But it was beautiful to her the way his mind reached out to it. He waslying on his stomach, head propped up on hands, in an almost prayerfulattitude before an ant hill. Did she think those little ants knew thatthey were alive? Would they ever be anything else? He wanted to be toldmore stories about things becoming other things, seemed intoxicated withthat idea of the constant becoming.

　　"But, Aunt Kate," he cried, "mama told me that God made me!"

　　"Why so He did, Worthie—that is, I suppose He did—but He didn't justmake you out of nothing."

　　He lay there on the grass in silence for a long time, looking at theworld about him—thinking. After a while he was singing a little song.This was the song:

　　"Once I was a little worm—

　　Long—long—ago."

　　Katie smiled in thinking how scandalized Clara would be to have heardthe story just told her son, story moving him to sing a vulgar song abouthaving been a horrid little worm. It would be Clara's notion of proprietyto tell Worth that the doctor brought him in his motor car and expect hismind, that wonderful, plastic little mind of his, to be proper enough torest content with that lucid exposition of the wonder of life.

　　The time was near for Clara's six months of Worth to begin. Katie hadpromised she would bring him to her wherever she was; and Clara was inParis and meaning to remain there. It meant that Worth would spend thewinter in Paris, away from them; from time to time—as the custom of thecity dictated—he would be taken for perfunctory little walks in theBois and would be told to "run and play" if he asked indelicatequestions concerning the things of life.

　　In the light of this story of the ways of growth the arrangement about

　　Worth seemed an unnatural and a brutal thing.

　　She did not believe that, as a matter of fact, Clara wanted Worth. Thematernal passion was less strong in Clara than the passion forlingerie. But she wanted Worth with her for six months because thatkept him from Wayne and Katie for six months and she knew that theydid want him.

　　The poor little fellow's summer had not been what Katie had planned. Partof the time he had been with his father and part of the time withher—that thing of division again, and as neither of them had been happyany of the time Worth had had to suffer for it. He seemed to have tosuffer so much through the fact that grown-up people did not know how tomanage their lives.

　　Suddenly he sat up. "Aunt Kate," he asked, "when's Miss Ann coming back?"

　　"I don't know, dear."

　　"Well where is she?"

　　"She's been—called away."

　　"Well I wish she'd come back. I like Miss Ann, Aunt Kate."

　　"Yes, dear; we all do."

　　"She tells nice stories, too. Only they're about fairies that are justfairies—not worms and things that are really so. Do you suppose Miss Annknows, Aunt Kate, that she used to be a frog?"

　　Katie laughed and tried to elucidate her point about the frog. But shewondered what difference it might not have made had Ann known that, asWorth put it, she used to be a frog. With Ann, fairy stories would haveto be about things not real. All Ann's life it had been so. It suddenlyseemed that it might have made all the difference in the world had Annknown that the things most wonderful were the things that were.

　　Or rather, had the world in which Ann lived cared to know real things forprecious things, the desire for life as the most radiant thing that hadever been upon the earth. Ann would have found the world a differentplace had men known life for the majestic thing it was, seen that back ofwhat her uncle called the "splendid heritage of the country'sinstitutions" was the vastly more splendid heritage of the institution oflife. Letting the former shut them from the latter was being too busywith the toy lake to look out at the sea.

　　Seeing Ann as part of all the life that had ever been upon the earth shebecame, not infinitesimal, but newly significant. Widened outlook broughtdeepened feeling. Newly understanding, she sat there brooding over Annanew, pain in the perfection of her understanding.

　　But new courage. Life had persisted through so much, was so triumphant.The larger conception lent its glow to the paling belief that Ann wouldpersist, triumph.

　　"Aunt Kate," Worth burst forth, "let's take the boat and go up and findthe man that mends the boats."

　　Aunt Kate blushed. "Oh no, dearie, we couldn't do that."

　　"Why we did do it once," argued Worth.

　　"I know, but we can't do it now."

　　"I don't see why not."

　　No, Worth didn't see.

　　"I just want to ask him, Aunt Kate, if he knows that he used to livein a tree."

　　"Oh, he knows it," she laughed.

　　"He knows everything," said Worth.

　　"Worthie, is that why you like him? 'Cause he knows everything? Or do youlike him—just because you like him?"

　　"I like him because he knows everything—but mostly I like him justbecause I like him."

　　"Same here," breathed Aunt Kate.

　　The man who mended the boats was coming to see her that night. Perhapsgolf and evolution should not grow arrogant, after all.

　　He had been strange about coming; when she talked with him over the'phone he had hesitated at the suggestion and finally said, with adefiance she could not see the situation called for, that he would liketo come. In Chicago he had once said to her: "There's too much gloomaround you now for me to contribute the story of my life. But pleaseremember that that was why I didn't tell it."

　　She wondered if the "story of his life" had anything to do with hishesitancy in coming to see her. Surely he would have no commonplacenotions about "different spheres," though he had mentioned them, and withbitterness. He was especially hostile to the army, had more than oncehurt her in his hostility. She would not have resented his attacking itas an institution, that she would expect from his philosophy, but it wasa sort of personal contempt for the army and its people she had resented,almost as she would a contemptuous attitude toward her own family.

　　She had contended that he was unjust; that a lack of sympathy with theends of the army—basis of it—should not bring him to a prejudicedattitude toward its people. She maintained that officers of the army werea higher type than civilians of the same class. He had told her, almostroughly, that he didn't think she knew anything about it, and she hadreplied, heatedly, that she would like to know why she wouldn't know moreabout it than he! In the end he said he was sorry to have hurt her whenthere was so much else to hurt her, but had not retracted what he hadsaid, or even admitted the possibility of mistake.

　　It seemed that one of the worst things about "classes" was that theyinevitably meant misunderstanding. They bred antagonism, and thatprejudice. People didn't know each other.

　　Considering it now, she wondered, though feeling traitorous to him in thewondering, if the man who mended the boats might shrink from anything sodistinctly social as calling upon her.

　　Their meetings theretofore had been on a bigger and a sterner basis; shehad missed a few of the little niceties of consideration, a few of thoseperfunctory and yet curiously vital courtesies to which she had all herlife been accustomed as a matter of course from her army men; but it hadbeen as if they were merely leaving them behind for things larger anddeeper, as if their background was the real world rather than world ofperfunctory things. From him she had a consideration, not perfunctory,but in the mood of the things they were sharing. That sense of sharingbig things, things real and rude, had swept them out of the world ofartificial things. Now did he perhaps hold back in timidity from thatworld of the trivial things?

　　She put it from her, disliking herself as of the trivial things inletting it suggest itself at all. Expecting him to be just like themen she had known would be expecting the sea to behave like that lakein the park.

　　That night she put on her most attractive gown, a dress sometimes grayand sometimes cloudy blues and greens, itself like the sea, and findingin Katie a more mysterious quality than her openness would usuallysuggest. Feeling called upon to make some account to herself for dressingmore than occasion would seem to demand, she told herself that she mustget the poor old thing worn out and get something new.

　　But it was not a poor old thing, and the last thing Katie really wantedwas to succeed in getting it worn out.

　　As she dressed she was thinking of Ann's pleasure in clothes. There weretimes when it had seemed a not altogether likeable vanity. It wasunderstandable—lovable—after having been to Centralia, after knowing.So many things were understandable and lovable after knowing.

　　She wished she might call across the hall and ask Ann to come in andfasten her dress. She would like to chat with her about the way she haddone her hair—all those intimate little things they had countless timestalked about so gayly.

　　She walked over into Ann's room—room in which Ann had taken such prideand pleasure. Ann had loved the things on the dressing-table, she hadmore than once seen her fairly caressing those pretty ivory things. Shewondered if Ann had anything resembling a dressing-table—what shewore—how she managed.

　　Those were the little worries about Ann forever haunting her, as theywould a mother who had a child away from home. New vision of theimmensity of life could save her from giving destroying place to thatsense of the woe of the world, but a conception of the wonders of thecenturies could not keep out the gnawing fear that Ann might not begetting enough to eat.

　　There was a complexity in her mood of that night—happiness and sadnessso close as at times to be indistinguishable—the whole of it making fora sense of the depth of life.

　　But their evening was constrained. Katie blamed the dress for part of it,vexed with herself for having put it on. She had wanted to beattractive—not suggest the unattainable.

　　And that was what something seemed suggesting. He appeared less ill atease than morose. Katie herself, after having been so happy in hiscoming, was, now that he was there, uncontrollably depressed. They talkedof a variety of things—in the main, the things she had been reading—butsomething had happened to that wonderful thing which had grown warm intheir hearts as they walked those last two blocks.

　　Even the things of which they talked had lost their radiance. What did itmatter whether the universe was wonderful or not if the wonderful thingin one's own heart was to be denied life?

　　From the first, it had been as if the things of which they talked werethings sweeping them together, they were in the grip of the power and thewonder of those things, wrung by the tragedy of them, exalted by thehope—in it all, by it all, united. It was as if the whole sea ofexperience and emotion, suffering and aspiration, was driving, holding,them together.

　　So it had been all along.

　　But not tonight. It was now—or at least so it seemed to Katie—as ifthose forces had let them go. What had been as a great sea surging aroundtheir hearts was now just things to talk about.

　　It left her desolate. And as she grew unhappy, she forced her gaiety andthat seemed to put him the farther away.

　　The two different worlds had sent Ann away; was it, in a way she wasunable to cope with, likewise to send him away?

　　Watts passed through the hall. She saw him glance out at the soldierloweringly and after that he grew more morose, almost sullenly so.

　　It seemed foolish to talk of one's being free when held by things onecould not even see.

　　It was just when she was feeling so lonely and miserable she wished hewould go that the telephone rang and central told her that Chicago wastrying to get her.

　　It was in the manner of the old days that she turned to him and askedwhat he thought it could be.

　　The suggestion—possibility—swept them back to the old basis, the oldrelationship. Katie grew excited, unnerved, and he talked to hersoothingly while she waited for central to call again.

　　They spoke of what it probably was; her brother was in Chicago, Katietold him, and of course it was he, and something about his own affairs.Perhaps he had news of when he would be ordered away. Yes, without doubtthat was it.

　　But there was a consciousness of dissembling. They were drawn together bythe possibility they did not mention, drawn together in the very thing ofnot mentioning it.

　　As in those tense moments they tried to talk of other things, they werekeyed high in the consciousness of not talking of the real thing. And inthat there was suggestion of the other thing of which they were nottalking. It was all inexplicably related: the excitement, the tenseness,the waiting, the dissembling.

　　Katie had never been more lovely than as she sat there with her handon the telephone: flushed, stirred, expectant—something stealing backto her eyes, something both pleading and triumphant in Katie's eyesjust then.

　　The man sitting close beside her at the telephone desk scarcely took hiseyes from her face.

　　When the bell rang again and her hand shook as it took down the receiverhe lay a steadying hand upon her arm.

　　At first there was nothing more than a controversy as to who had theline. In her impatience, she rose; he rose, too, standing beside her.

　　"Here's your party," said central at last.

　　Her "party" was Wayne.

　　But something was still the matter on the line; she could not get what

　　Wayne was trying to tell her.

　　As her excitement became more difficult to control the man at her sidekept speaking to her—touching her—soothingly.

　　At last she could hear Wayne. "You hear me, Katie?"

　　"Oh yes—yes—what is it?"

　　"I want to tell you—"

　　It was swallowed up in a buzzing on the line.

　　Then central's voice came clear and crisp. "Your party is trying to tellyou that Ann is found."

　　"Oh—" gasped Katie, and lost all color—"Oh—"

　　"Katie—?" That was Wayne again.

　　"Oh yes, Wayne?"

　　"I have found her. She is well—that is, will be well. She is allright—going to be all right. I'll write it all to-morrow. It's all over,Katie. You don't have to worry any more."

　　The next instant the telephone was upside down on the table and Katie,sobbing, was in his arms. He was holding her close; and as her sobs grewmore violent he kissed her hair, murmured loving things. Suddenly sheraised her head—lifting her face to his. He kissed her; and all thesplendor of those eons of life was Katie's then.