Part Two - TWO

by Willa Cather

　　The next afternoon Niel found Captain Forrester in the bushy littleplot he called his rose garden, seated in a stout hickory chairthat could be left out in all weather, his two canes beside him.His attention was fixed upon a red block of Colorado sandstone, seton a granite boulder in the middle of the gravel space around whichthe roses grew. He showed Niel that this was a sun-dial, andexplained it with great pride. Last summer, he said, he sat outhere a great deal, with a square board mounted on a post, andmarked the length of the shadows by his watch. His friend, CyrusDalzell, on one of his visits, took this board away, had thediagram exactly copied on sandstone, and sent it to him, with thecolumn-like boulder that formed its base.

　　"I think it's likely Mr. Dalzell hunted around among the mountainsa good many mornings before he found a natural formation likethat," said the Captain. "A pillar, such as they had in Bibletimes. It's from the Garden of the Gods. Mr. Dalzell has hissummer home up there."

　　The Captain sat with the soles of his boots together, his legsbowed out. Everything about him seemed to have grown heavier andweaker. His face was fatter and smoother; as if the features wererunning into each other, as when a wax face melts in the heat. Anold Panama hat, burned yellow by the sun, shaded his eyes. Hisbrown hands lay on his knees, the fingers well apart, nerveless.His moustache was the same straw colour; Niel remarked to him thatit had grown no greyer. The Captain touched his cheek with hispalm. "Mrs. Forrester shaved me for awhile. She did it verynicely, but I didn't like to have her do it. Now I use one ofthese safety razors. I can manage, if I take my time. The barbercomes over once a week. Mrs. Forrester is expecting you, Niel.She's down in the grove. She goes down there to rest in thehammock."

　　Niel went round the house to the gate that gave into the grove.From the top of the hill he could see the hammock slung between twocottonwoods, in the low glade at the farther end, where he hadfallen the time he broke his arm. The slender white figure wasstill, and as he hurried across the grass he saw that a whitegarden hat lay over her face. He approached quietly and was justwondering if she were asleep, when he heard a soft, delightedlaugh, and with a quick movement she threw off the lace hat throughwhich she had been watching him. He stepped forward and caught hersuspended figure, hammock and all, in his arms. How light andalive she was! like a bird caught in a net. If only he couldrescue her and carry her off like this,--off the earth of sad,inevitable periods, away from age, weariness, adverse fortune!

　　She showed no impatience to be released, but lay laughing up at himwith that gleam of something elegantly wild, something fantasticand tantalizing,--seemingly so artless, really the most finishedartifice! She put her hand under his chin as if he were still aboy.

　　"And how handsome he's grown! Isn't the old Judge proud of you!He called me up last night and began sputtering, 'It's only fair towarn you, Ma'm, that I've a very handsome boy over here.' As if Ihadn't known you would be! And now you're a man, and have seen theworld! Well, what have you found in it?"

　　"Nothing so nice as you, Mrs. Forrester."

　　"Nonsense! You have sweethearts?"

　　"Perhaps."

　　"Are they pretty?"

　　"Why they? Isn't one enough?"

　　"One is too many. I want you to have half a dozen,--and still savethe best for us! One would take everything. If you had her, youwould not have come home at all. I wonder if you know how we'velooked for you?" She took his hand and turned a seal ring about onhis little finger absently. "Every night for weeks, when thelights of the train came swinging in down below the meadows, I'vesaid to myself, 'Niel is coming home; there's that to look forwardto.'" She caught herself as she always did when she found that shewas telling too much, and finished in a playful tone. "So, yousee, you mean a great deal to all of us. Did you find Mr.Forrester?"

　　"Oh, yes! I had to stop and look at his sun-dial."

　　She raised herself on her elbow and lowered her voice. "Niel, canyou understand it? He isn't childish, as some people say, but hewill sit and watch that thing hour after hour. How can anybodylike to see time visibly devoured? We are all used to seeingclocks go round, but why does he want to see that shadow creep onthat stone? Has he changed much? No? I'm glad you feel so. Nowtell me about the Adamses and what George is like."

　　Niel dropped on the turf and sat with his back against a treetrunk, answering her rapid questions and watching her while hetalked. Of course, she was older. In the brilliant sun of theafternoon one saw that her skin was no longer like white lilacs,--it had the ivory tint of gardenias that have just begun to fade.The coil of blue-black hair seemed more than ever too heavy for herhead. There were lines,--something strained about the corners ofher mouth that used not to be there. But the astonishing thing washow these changes could vanish in a moment, be utterly wiped out ina flash of personality, and one forgot everything about her exceptherself.

　　"And tell me, Niel, do women really smoke after dinner now with themen, nice women? I shouldn't like it. It's all very well foractresses, but women can't be attractive if they do everything thatmen do."

　　"I think just now it's the fashion for women to make themselvescomfortable, before anything else."

　　Mrs. Forrester glanced at him as if he had said something shocking."Ah, that's just it! The two things don't go together. Athleticsand going to college and smoking after dinner--Do you like it?Don't men like women to be different from themselves? They usedto."

　　Niel laughed. Yes, that was certainly the idea of Mrs. Forrester'sgeneration.

　　"Uncle Judge says you don't come to see him any more as you usedto, Mrs. Forrester. He misses it."

　　"My dear boy, I haven't been over to the town for six weeks. I'malways too tired. We have no horse now, and when I do go I have towalk. That house! Nothing is ever done there unless I do it, andnothing ever moves unless I move it. That's why I come down herein the afternoon,--to get where I can't see the house. I can'tkeep it up as it should be kept, I'm not strong enough. Oh, yes,Ben helps me; he sweeps and beats the rugs and washes windows, butthat doesn't get a house very far." Mrs. Forrester sat up suddenlyand pinned on her white hat. "We went all the way to Chicago,Niel, to buy that walnut furniture, couldn't find anything at homebig and heavy enough. If I'd known that one day I'd have to pushit about, I would have been more easily satisfied!" She rose andshook out her rumpled skirts.

　　They started toward the house, going slowly up the long, grassyundulation between the trees.

　　"Don't you miss the marsh?" Niel asked suddenly.

　　She glanced away evasively. "Not much. I would never have time togo there, and we need the money it pays us. And you haven't timeto play any more either, Niel. You must hurry and become asuccessful man. Your uncle is terribly involved. He has been socareless that he's not much better off than we are. Money is avery important thing. Realize that in the beginning; face it, anddon't be ridiculous in the end, like so many of us." They stoppedby the gate at the top of the hill and looked back at the greenalleys and sharp shadows, at the quivering fans of light thatseemed to push the trees farther apart and made Elysian fieldsunderneath them. Mrs. Forrester put her white hand, with all itsrings, on Niel's arm.

　　"Do you really find a kind of pleasure in coming back to us?That's very unusual, I think. At your age I wanted to be with theyoung and gay. It's nice for us, though." She looked at him withher rarest smile, one he had seldom seen on her face, but alwaysremembered,--a smile without archness, without gaiety, full ofaffection and wistfully sad. And the same thing was in her voicewhen she spoke those quiet words,--the sudden quietness of deepfeeling. She turned quickly away. They went through the gate andaround the house to where the Captain sat watching the sunset gloryon his roses. His wife touched his shoulder.

　　"Will you go in, now, Mr. Forrester, or shall I bring your coat?"

　　"I'll go in. Isn't Niel going to stay for dinner?"

　　"Not this time. He'll come soon, and we'll have a real dinner forhim. Will you wait for Mr. Forrester, Niel? I must hurry in andstart the fire."

　　Niel tarried behind and accompanied the Captain's slow progresstoward the front of the house. He leaned upon two canes, liftinghis feet slowly and putting them down firmly and carefully. Helooked like an old tree walking.

　　Once up the steps and into the parlour, he sank into his big chairand panted heavily. The first whiff of a fresh cigar seemed torestore him. "Can I trouble you to mail some letters for me, Niel,as you go by the post-office?" He produced them from the breastpocket of his summer coat. "Let me see whether Mrs. Forrester hasanything to go." Rising, the Captain went into the little hall.There, by the front door, on a table under the hat rack, was ascantily draped figure, an Arab or Egyptian slave girl, holding inher hands a large flat shell from the California coast. Nielremembered noticing that figure the first time he was ever in thehouse, when Dr. Dennison carried him out through this hallway withhis arm in splints. In the days when the Forresters had servantsand were sending over to the town several times a day, the lettersfor the post were always left in this shell. The Captain found onenow, and handed it to Niel. It was addressed to Mr. FrancisBosworth Ellinger, Glenwood Springs, Colorado.

　　For some reason Niel felt embarrassed and tried to slip the letterquickly into his pocket. The Captain, his two canes in one hand,prevented him. He took the pale blue envelope again, and held itout at arm's length, regarding it.

　　"Mrs. Forrester is a fine penman; have you ever noticed? Alwayswas. If she made me a list of articles to get at the store, Inever had to hide it. It was like copper plate. That'sexceptional in a woman, Niel."

　　Niel remembered her hand well enough, he had never seen another inthe least like it; long, thin, angular letters, curiously delicateand curiously bold, looped and laced with strokes fine as a hairand perfectly distinct. Her script looked as if it had been doneat a high pitch of speed, the pen driven by a perfectly confidentdexterity.

　　"Oh, yes, Captain! I'm never able to take any letters for Mrs.Forrester without looking at them. No one could forget herwriting."

　　"Yes. It's very exceptional." The Captain gave him the envelope,and with his canes went slowly toward his big chair.

　　Niel had often wondered just how much the Captain knew. Now, as hewent down the hill, he felt sure that he knew everything; more thananyone else; all there was to know about Marian Forrester.