Part One - THREE

by Willa Cather

　　For the next few years Niel saw very little of Mrs. Forrester. Shewas an excitement that came and went with summer. She and herhusband always spent the winter in Denver and Colorado Springs,--left Sweet Water soon after Thanksgiving and did not return untilthe first of May. He knew that Mrs. Forrester liked him, but shehadn't much time for growing boys. When she had friends stayingwith her, and gave a picnic supper for them, or a dance in thegrove on a moonlit night, Niel was always invited. Coming andgoing along the road to the marsh with the Blum boys, he sometimesmet the Captain driving visitors over in the democrat wagon, and heheard about these people from Black Tom, Judge Pommeroy's faithfulnegro servant, who went over to wait on the table for Mrs.Forrester when she had a dinner party.

　　Then came the accident which cut short the Captain's career as aroadbuilder. After that fall with his horse, he lay ill at theAntlers, in Colorado Springs, all winter. In the summer, when Mrs.Forrester brought him home to Sweet Water, he still walked with acane. He had grown much heavier, seemed encumbered by his ownbulk, and never suggested taking a contract for the railroad again.He was able to work in his garden, trimmed his snowball bushes andlilac hedges, devoted a great deal of time to growing roses. Heand his wife still went away for the winter, but each year theperiod of their absence grew shorter.

　　All this while the town of Sweet Water was changing. Its future nolonger looked bright. Successive crop failures had broken thespirit of the farmers. George Adams and his family had gone backto Massachusetts, disillusioned about the West. One by one theother gentlemen ranchers followed their example. The Forrestersnow had fewer visitors. The Burlington was "drawing in its horns,"as people said, and the railroad officials were not stopping off atSweet Water so often,--were more inclined to hurry past a townwhere they had sunk money that would never come back.

　　Niel Herbert's father was one of the first failures to be crowdedto the wall. He closed his little house, sent his cousin Sadieback to Kentucky, and went to Denver to accept an office position.He left Niel behind to read law in the office with his uncle. Notthat Niel had any taste for the law, but he liked being with JudgePommeroy, and he might as well stay there as anywhere, for thepresent. The few thousand dollars his mother had left him wouldnot be his until he was twenty-one.

　　Niel fitted up a room for himself behind the suite which the Judgeretained for his law offices, on the second floor of the mostpretentious brick block in town. There he lived with monasticcleanliness and severity, glad to be rid of his cousin and herinconsequential housewifery, and resolved to remain a bachelor,like his uncle. He took care of the offices, which meant that hedid the janitor work, and arranged them exactly to suit his taste,making the rooms so attractive that all the Judge's friends, andespecially Captain Forrester, dropped in there to talk oftener thanever.

　　The Judge was proud of his nephew. Niel was now nineteen, a tall,straight, deliberate boy. His features were clear-cut, his greyeyes, so dark that they looked black under his long lashes, wererather moody and challenging. The world did not seem over-brightto young people just then. His reserve, which did not come fromembarrassment or vanity, but from a critical habit of mind, madehim seem older than he was, and a little cold.

　　One winter afternoon, only a few days before Christmas, Niel satwriting in the back office, at the long table where he usuallyworked or trifled, surrounded by the Judge's fine law library andsolemn steel engravings of statesmen and jurists. His uncle was athis desk in the front office, engaged in a friendly consultationwith one of his country clients. Niel, greatly bored with thenotes he was copying, was trying to invent an excuse for gettingout on the street, when he became aware of light footsteps comingrapidly down the outside corridor. The door of the front officeopened, he heard his uncle rise quickly to his feet, and, at thesame moment, heard a woman's laugh,--a soft, musical laugh whichrose and descended like a suave scale. He turned in his screwchair so that he could look over his shoulder through the doubledoors into the front room. Mrs. Forrester stood there, shaking hermuff at the Judge and the bewildered Swede farmer. Her quick eyelighted upon a bottle of Bourbon and two glasses on the desk amongthe papers.

　　"Is that the way you prepare your cases, Judge? What an examplefor Niel!" She peeped through the door and nodded to the boy as herose.

　　He remained in the back room, however, watching her while shedeclined the chair the Judge pushed toward her and made a sign ofrefusal when he politely pointed to the Bourbon. She stood besidehis desk in her long sealskin coat and cap, a crimson scarf showingabove the collar, a little brown veil with spots tied over hereyes. The veil did not in the least obscure those beautiful eyes,dark and full of light, set under a low white forehead and archingeyebrows. The frosty air had brought no colour to her cheeks,--herskin had always the fragrant, crystalline whiteness of whitelilacs. Mrs. Forrester looked at one, and one knew that she wasbewitching. It was instantaneous, and it pierced the thickesthide. The Swede farmer was now grinning from ear to ear, and he,too, had shuffled to his feet. There could be no negativeencounter, however slight, with Mrs. Forrester. If she merelybowed to you, merely looked at you, it constituted a personalrelation. Something about her took hold of one in a flash; onebecame acutely conscious of her, of her fragility and grace, of hermouth which could say so much without words; of her eyes, lively,laughing, intimate, nearly always a little mocking.

　　"Will you and Niel dine with us tomorrow evening, Judge? And willyou lend me Tom? We've just had a wire. The Ogdens are stoppingover with us. They've been East to bring the girl home fromschool,--she's had mumps or something. They want to get home forChristmas, but they will stop off for two days. Probably FrankEllinger will come on from Denver."

　　"No prospect can afford me such pleasure as that of dining withMrs. Forrester," said the Judge ponderously.

　　"Thank you!" she bowed playfully and turned toward the doubledoors. "Niel, could you leave your work long enough to drive mehome? Mr. Forrester has been detained at the bank."

　　Niel put on his wolfskin coat. Mrs. Forrester took him by hisshaggy sleeve and went with him quickly down the long corridor andthe narrow stairs to the street.

　　At the hitch-bar stood her cutter, looking like a painted toy amongthe country sleds and wagons. Niel tucked the buffalo robes aboutMrs. Forrester, untied the ponies, and sprang in beside her.Without direction the team started down the frozen main street,where few people were abroad, crossed the creek on the ice, andtrotted up the poplar-bordered lane toward the house on the hill.The late afternoon sun burned on the snow-crusted pastures. Thepoplars looked very tall and straight, pinched up and severe intheir winter poverty. Mrs. Forrester chatted to Niel with her faceturned toward him, holding her muff up to break the wind.

　　"I'm counting on you to help me entertain Constance Ogden. Can youtake her off my hands day after tomorrow, come over in theafternoon? Your duties as a lawyer aren't very arduous yet?" Shesmiled teasingly. "What can I do with a miss of nineteen? One whogoes to college? I've no learned conversation for her!"

　　"Surely I haven't!" Niel exclaimed.

　　"Oh, but you're a boy! Perhaps you can interest her in lighterthings. She's considered pretty."

　　"Do you think she is?"

　　"I haven't seen her lately. She was striking,--china blue eyes andheaps of yellow hair, not exactly yellow,--what they call an ashenblond, I believe."

　　Niel had noticed that in describing the charms of other women Mrs.Forrester always made fun of them a little.

　　They drew up in front of the house. Ben Keezer came round from thekitchen to take the team.

　　"You are to go back for Mr. Forrester at six, Ben. Niel, come infor a moment and get warm." She drew him through the little stormentry, which protected the front door in winter, into the hall."Hang up your coat and come along." He followed her through theparlour into the sitting-room, where a little coal grate wasburning under the black mantelpiece, and sat down in the bigleather chair in which Captain Forrester dozed after his mid-daymeal. It was a rather dark room, with walnut bookcases that hadcarved tops and glass doors. The floor was covered by a redcarpet, and the walls were hung with large, old-fashionedengravings; "The House of the Poet on the Last Day of Pompeii,""Shakespeare Reading before Queen Elizabeth."

　　Mrs. Forrester left him and presently returned carrying a tray witha decanter and sherry glasses. She put it down on her husband'ssmoking-table, poured out a glass for Niel and one for herself, andperched on the arm of one of the stuffed chairs, where she satsipping her sherry and stretching her tiny, silver-buckled slippersout toward the glowing coals.

　　"It's so nice to have you staying on until after Christmas," Nielobserved. "You've only been here one other Christmas since I canremember."

　　"I'm afraid we're staying on all winter this year. Mr. Forresterthinks we can't afford to go away. For some reason, we areextraordinarily poor just now."

　　"Like everybody else," the boy commented grimly.

　　"Yes, like everybody else. However, it does no good to be glumabout it, does it?" She refilled the two glasses. "I always takea little sherry at this time in the afternoon. At Colorado Springssome of my friends take tea, like the English. But I should feellike an old woman, drinking tea! Besides, sherry is good for mythroat." Niel remembered some legend about a weak chest andoccasional terrifying hemorrhages. But that seemed doubtful, asone looked at her,--fragile, indeed, but with such light,effervescing vitality. "Perhaps I do seem old to you, Niel, quiteold enough for tea and a cap!"

　　He smiled gravely. "You seem always the same to me, Mrs. Forrester."

　　"Yes? And how is that?"

　　"Lovely. Just lovely."

　　As she bent forward to put down her glass she patted his cheek."Oh, you'll do very well for Constance!" Then, seriously, "I'mglad if I do, though. I want you to like me well enough to come tosee us often this winter. You shall come with your uncle to make afourth at whist. Mr. Forrester must have his whist in the evening.Do you think he is looking any worse, Niel? It frightens me to seehim getting a little uncertain. But there, we must believe in goodluck!" She took up the half-empty glass and held it against thelight.

　　Niel liked to see the firelight sparkle on her earrings, longpendants of garnets and seed-pearls in the shape of fleurs-de-lys.She was the only woman he knew who wore earrings; they hungnaturally against her thin, triangular cheeks. Captain Forrester,although he had given her handsomer ones, liked to see her wearthese, because they had been his mother's. It gratified him tohave his wife wear jewels; it meant something to him. She neverleft off her beautiful rings unless she was in the kitchen.

　　"A winter in the country may do him good," said Mrs. Forrester,after a silence during which she looked intently into the fire, asif she were trying to read the outcome of their difficulties there."He loves this place so much. But you and Judge Pommeroy must keepan eye on him when he is in town, Niel. If he looks tired oruncertain, make some excuse and bring him home. He can't carry adrink or two as he used,"--she glanced over her shoulder to seethat the door into the dining-room was shut. "Once last winter hehad been drinking with some old friends at the Antlers,--nothingunusual, just as he always did, as a man must be able to do,--butit was too much for him. When he came out to join me in thecarriage, coming down that long walk, you know, he fell. There wasno ice, he didn't slip. It was simply because he was unsteady. Hehad trouble getting up. I still shiver to think of it. To me, itwas as if one of the mountains had fallen down."

　　A little later Niel went plunging down the hill, looking exultantlyinto the streak of red sunset. Oh, the winter would not be so bad,this year! How strange that she should be here at all, a womanlike her among common people! Not even in Denver had he ever seenanother woman so elegant. He had sat in the dining-room of theBrown Palace hotel and watched them as they came down to dinner,--fashionable women from "the East," on their way to California. Buthe had never found one so attractive and distinguished as Mrs.Forrester. Compared with her, other women were heavy and dull;even the pretty ones seemed lifeless,--they had not that somethingin their glance that made one's blood tingle. And never elsewherehad he heard anything like her inviting, musical laugh, that waslike the distant measures of dance music, heard through opening andshutting doors.

　　He could remember the very first time he ever saw Mrs. Forrester,when he was a little boy. He had been loitering in front of theEpiscopal church one Sunday morning, when a low carriage drove upto the door. Ben Keezer was on the front seat, and on the backseat was a lady, alone, in a black silk dress all puffs andruffles, and a black hat, carrying a parasol with a carved ivoryhandle. As the carriage stopped she lifted her dress to alight;out of a swirl of foamy white petticoats she thrust a black, shinyslipper. She stepped lightly to the ground and with a nod to thedriver went into the church. The little boy followed her throughthe open door, saw her enter a pew and kneel. He was proud nowthat at the first moment he had recognized her as belonging to adifferent world from any he had ever known.

　　Niel paused for a moment at the end of the lane to look up at thelast skeleton poplar in the long row; just above its pointed tiphung the hollow, silver winter moon.