Chapter III: Act TWO: Scene: Sitting room of the Jordan homestead some two months later

_This room also shows some traces of a family’s daily life, and to
that extent is less desolate than the “parlor” of the first act,
although the stern faith of the Puritan makes no concession to
the thing we have learned to call “good taste.” The old-fashioned
simplicity seen in such a room as this has resulted from poverty,
both of mind and of purse, and has nothing akin to the simplicity of
the artist; as a matter of fact, your true descendant of the settlers
of 1605 would be the first to resent such an implication; to them the
arts are directly connected with heathen practices, and any incense
burned before the altars of the Graces still smells to them of
brimstone._

_At back center folding doors, now partly open, lead to dining room.
In this room may be seen the dining table, back of the table a window
looking out on to the farm yard, now deep in midwinter snow. At right
is an open fireplace with a log fire. Below fireplace a door to hall.
Up left door to small vestibule in which is the outside door. Down
left a window overlooking a snowbound countryside. The clock above
the fireplace is set for quarter past four. Several straight-backed
chairs and a woodbox by fireplaces. A sewing table and lamp at
center. A sewing machine near window at left. A wall cupboard on the
wall right of the doors to the dining room. An old sofa down left,
two chairs at right. When the door at left, in vestibule, is opened,
one may see a path up to the door, between two walls of snow._

_Discovered: Ella sits right at sewing machine, hemming some rough
towels. Orin and Nettie are by fireplace. Sadie sits right of center.
Sadie and Orin are dressed for outdoors. Nettie’s coat, hat and
overshoes are on a hat-rack by door at left. Orin, as the curtain
goes up, is putting a log on the fire._

SADIE (_acidly to Ella_)

Why shouldn’t he put wood on the fire if he wants to?

ELLA (_at sewing machine_)

Because it ain’t your wood.

SADIE

No, it’s _hers_! Everything is hers!

ELLA

And maybe she just don’t know it.

NETTIE (_at fireplace_)

Ah! (_She bends closer to the fire as the log blazes up_) I do love a
good fire! Oh it’s nice to be warm!

SADIE

There’s somethin’ sensual about it.

NETTIE

Mother told me that the next time you started talkin’ indecent I was
to leave the room.

SADIE

Tell your mother I don’t wonder she’s sort of worried about you. I’d
be if you was _my_ daughter.

ELLA

I don’t see why you can’t let Nettie alone!

NETTIE

She’s always picking on me, Aunt Ella! To hear her talk anybody would
think I was terrible.

SADIE

I know more about what’s going on than some folks think I do.

NETTIE

Then you know a lot. I heard Horace Bevins say a week ago that he
didn’t know as it was any use tryin’ to have a Masonic Lodge in the
same town as you.

SADIE

They never was a Bevins yet didn’t have his tongue hung from the
middle; the day his mother was married she answered both the
responses.

ORIN

Mum! Mum! Shall I take my coat off; are we going to stay, Mum?

SADIE

No, we ain’t going to stay. I just want to see Cousin Jane for a
minute.

ELLA

She’s in the kitchen with Hannah.

SADIE

Watchin’ her, I bet! I wonder Hannah puts up with it.

ELLA

If you was to live with Jane for a spell, I guess you’d find you had
a plenty to put up with.

SADIE

It’s enough to make the Jordans turn in their graves, all of ’em at
once.

ELLA

I guess all she’d say would be, “Let ’em if it seemed to make ’em any
more comfortable.”

[_Jane enters. She has apron on and some towels over her arm._

JANE

Are those towels finished?

ELLA

Some is! Maybe I’d done all of ’em if I’d been a centipede.

JANE

Oh! I didn’t see you, Sadie.

SADIE

Oh! Ha, ha! Well, I ain’t surprised.

JANE (_with Ella, selecting finished towels_) Well, Orin, does the
tooth still hurt you?

ORIN

Naw, it don’t hurt me none now. I got it in a bottle.

[_He takes small bottle from pocket._

NETTIE

Oh you nasty thing. You get away!

SADIE (_angrily_)

What did I tell you about showin’ that tooth to folks!

JANE

Never mind, Orin, just run out to the barn and tell your Uncle Ben
we’ve got to have a path cleared under the clothes-lines.

ORIN

All right.

[_He crosses toward door._

JANE

Hannah’s going to wash to-morrow, tell him. I’ll expect a good wide
path.

ORIN

I’ll tell him.

[_He exits._

SADIE

I must say you keep Ben right at it, don’t you?

JANE

Yes. (_She takes the last finished towel and speaks to Ella_) I’ll
come back for more.

SADIE (_as Jane crosses_)

First I thought he’d go to jail before he’d work, but he didn’t, did
he?

JANE

No.

[_She exits right._

SADIE

Yes. No! Yes. No! Folks that ain’t got no more gift of gab ain’t got
much gift of intellect. I s’pose Hannah’s out there.

ELLA

Yes, she keeps all of us just everlastingly at it.

SADIE

When Jane comes back, I wish you and Nettie would leave me alone with
her, just for a minute.

ELLA (_as she works over sewing machine_)

It won’t do you much good; she won’t lend any more money.

SADIE

Mother always helped me. I’ve got a right to expect it.

ELLA (_as she bites off a thread_)

Expectin’ ain’t gettin’.

SADIE

I don’t know what I’ll do.

ELLA

You had money out of her; so has Henry.

SADIE (_shocked, to Nettie_)

You don’t mean to say your father’s been borrowin’ from her.

[_This to Nettie._

NETTIE

He’s always borrowin’. Didn’t he borrow the hundred dollars grandma
left me? I’m not going to stand it much longer.

ELLA

Henry’s havin’ trouble with his business.

SADIE

We’re fools to put up with it. Everybody says so. We ought to contest
the will.

ELLA

Everybody says so but the lawyers; they won’t none of ’em touch the
case without they get money in advance.

SADIE

How much money? Didn’t your father find out, Nettie?

NETTIE

The least was five hundred dollars.

ELLA

Can you see us raisin’ that?

SADIE

If we was short, we might borrow it from Jane.

ELLA

We’d have to be smarter’n I see any signs of; she’s through lendin’.

SADIE

How do you know?

ELLA

I tried it myself.

SADIE

What do you want money for. Ain’t she takin’ you in to live with her?

ELLA

I don’t call myself beholden for that. She had to have some one, with
Ben here, and her unmarried, and next to no relation to him.

NETTIE

Everybody’s callin’ you the chaperon! (_She laughs_) Not but what
they ought to be one with _him_ around; he’s awful good lookin’.

SADIE

You keep away from him. He’s no blood kin of yours, and he’s a bad
man, if he is a Jordan. Always makes up to everything he sees in
petticoats, and always did.

NETTIE

Thanks for the compliment, but I’m not looking for any jailbirds.

ELLA

It will be awful, Ben in State’s Prison,--and I guess he’ll have to
go, soon as he stands his trial.

SADIE

He got drunk and had a fight with the two Kimbal boys, and they
licked him, and that night he burned down their barn; everybody knows
it.

ELLA

He’s bad, all through, Ben is.

NETTIE

He’ll get about five years, father says. I guess that will take some
of the spunk out of him.

[_A sound in the hall at right._

ELLA

Hush! I think he’s coming.

[_Ben enters at right with a big armful of firewood and crosses
and drops it heavily into woodbox, then turns and looks at them in
silence._

SADIE

Seems kind of funny, your luggin’ in the wood.

BEN (_bitterly_)

Does it?

SADIE

Did you see Orin out there?

BEN

Yes, he went along home.

SADIE

How do you like workin’?

BEN

How do you think I like it? Workin’ a big farm in winter, tendin’ the
stock and milking ten cows. How do I like it?

[_As he stands by fire Nettie looks up at him._

NETTIE

I think it’s just a shame!

SADIE (_turns to Ella_)

Are you going to make towels all the afternoon?

ELLA

I am ’til they’re done, then I expect she’ll find somethin’ else for
me to do.

NETTIE (_to Ben_)

Do you know I’m sorry for you, awful sorry.

[_She speaks low. Ella and Sadie are at the other side of room._

BEN

Then you’re the only one.

NETTIE

Maybe I am, but I’m like that.

BEN

Another month of it, then State’s Prison, I guess. I don’t know as
I’ll be sorry when the time comes.

NETTIE

Oh, Uncle Ben! No, I’m not goin’ to call you _that_. After all,
you’re not really any relation, are you? I mean to me?

BEN

No.

NETTIE (_softly_)

I’m just going to call you Ben!

BEN

You’re a good kid, Nettie.

NETTIE

Oh, it isn’t that, Ben, but it does just seem too awful.

[_As she looks up at him, the outside door opens and Henry and Emma
enter. They see Nettie and Ben together by the fire._

EMMA (_sternly_)

Nettie!

NETTIE (_sweetly_)

Yes, mother?

EMMA

You come away from him.

BEN (_angrily_)

What do you mean by that?

EMMA

You tell him, Henry.

HENRY

I don’t know as it’s any use to----

EMMA (_sternly_)

Tell him what I mean.

HENRY (_to Ben_)

Emma thinks, considerin’ everything, that it’s best Nettie shouldn’t
talk to you.

BEN

Why don’t you keep her at home then? You don’t suppose I want to talk
to her.

EMMA

Oh, we ain’t wanted here, I guess. We know that, not by you, or by
_her_;--and Henry’s the oldest of the Jordans. All this would be his,
if there was any justice in the world.

NETTIE

Father wouldn’t have taken that hundred dollars grandma left me if
there had been any justice in the world. That’s what I came here for,
not to talk to him. To tell Cousin Jane what father did, and to tell
her about Nellie Namlin’s Christmas party, and that I’ve got to have
a new dress. I’ve just got to!

SADIE

A new dress, and my rent ain’t paid. She’s got to pay it. My Orin’s
got to have a roof over his head.

HENRY

I don’t know as you’ve got any call to be pestering Jane all the time.

ELLA

She’s always wantin’ something.

SADIE

What about you? Didn’t you tell me yourself you tried to borrow from
her?

ELLA

I got a chance to set up in business, so as I can be independent. I
can go in with Mary Stanton, dressmakin’. I can do it for two hundred
dollars, and she’s got to give it to me.

HENRY

You ought to be ashamed, all three of you, worryin’ Jane all day
long. It’s more’n flesh and blood can stand!

NETTIE (_to him_)

Didn’t you say at breakfast you was coming here to-day to make Cousin
Jane endorse a note for you? Didn’t you?

EMMA (_fiercely_)

You hush!

BEN (_at back by window_)

Ha! Ha! Ha! Crow buzzards.

HENRY

Endorsing a note ain’t lending money, is it? It’s a matter of
business. I guess my note’s good.

BEN

Take it to the bank without her name on it and see how good it is.

EMMA

You don’t think we want to ask her favors, but Henry’s in bad trouble
and she’ll just have to help us this time.

BEN

There’s one way out of your troubles. One thing you could all do, for
a change, instead of making Jane pay all your bills. I wonder you
haven’t any of you thought of it.

HENRY

What could we do?

BEN

Go to work and earn something for yourselves.

SADIE

Like you do, I suppose.

EMMA

The laughing-stock of all Veazie!

ELLA

Everybody’s talkin’ about it, anywhere you go.

NETTIE

Jane Crosby’s White Slave, that’s what they call you. Jane Crosby’s
White Slave.

BEN (_fiercely_)

They call me that, do they?

ELLA (_to Nettie_)

Why can’t you ever hold your tongue?

BEN (_in cold anger_)

I’ve been a damned fool. I’m through.

[_Hannah enters._

HANNAH

She wants you.

BEN

Jane?

HANNAH

Yes.

BEN

I won’t come.

HANNAH

There’ll be another row.

BEN

Tell her I said I wouldn’t come.

[_He sits._

HANNAH

She’s awful set, you know, when she wants anything.

BEN

You tell her I won’t come.

HANNAH

Well, I don’t say I hanker none to tell her, but I’d rather be in my
shoes than your’n.

[_She exits._

SADIE

Well, I must say I don’t blame you a mite.

EMMA

If the Jordans is a lot of slaves, I guess it’s pretty near time we
knew it.

HENRY (_worried_)

She’ll turn you over to Judge Bradford, Ben; he’ll lock you up. It
ain’t goin’ to help me none with the bank, a brother of mine bein’ in
jail.

BEN

So they’re laughing at me, are they, damn them.

NETTIE (_at door right_)

She’s coming!

[_There is a moment’s pause and Jane enters door right. Hannah
follows to door and looks on eagerly._

JANE

I sent for you, Ben.

BEN

I won’t budge.

JANE (_wearily_)

Must we go through all this again?

BEN

I ain’t going to move out of this chair to-day. You do what you
damned please.

JANE

I am sorry, but you must.

BEN

Send for Jim Jay, have me locked up, do as you please. Oh, I’ve said
it before, but this time I mean it.

JANE

And you won’t come?

BEN

No.

JANE

Then I’ll do the best I can alone.

[_She crosses up to wall closet and opens it and selects a large
bottle, and turns. Ben rises quickly._

BEN

What do you want of that?

JANE

It’s one of the horses. I don’t know what’s the matter with her.
She’s down in her stall, just breathing. She won’t pay any attention
to me.

BEN

Old Nellie?

JANE

Yes.

BEN

What you got? (_He steps to her and takes the bottle from her and
looks at it_) That stuff’s no good. Here! (_He steps to cabinet and
selects another bottle_) If you hadn’t spent five minutes stalling
around, I might have had a better chance.

[_He exits quickly at left._

HANNAH

I allers said ’twas easier to catch flies with honey than ’twas with
vinegar.

HENRY

What’s Ben know about horses?

JANE

A lot.

HENRY

I didn’t know that.

JANE

Neither did Ben, six weeks ago.

[_She exits._

HENRY

Mother was like that, about animals. I guess Ben sort of takes after
her.

EMMA (_shocked_)

Ben! Like your mother!

HANNAH

Of course he is. He’s the “spit and image of her.”

[_She exits._

NETTIE

She made him go! It wouldn’t surprise me a mite if she’d pushed that
old horse over herself.

[_Jane enters._

JANE

He wouldn’t let me in the barn. (_For the first time in the play,
she laughs lightly_) Well--(_She looks about at them_) we have quite
a family gathering here this afternoon. I am wondering if there is
any--special reason for it?

HENRY

I wanted to talk with yer for just a minute, Jane.

SADIE

So do I.

JANE

Anybody else?

[_She looks about._

ELLA

I do.

NETTIE

So do I.

JANE

I’ve a lot to do; suppose I answer you all at once. I’m sorry, but I
won’t lend you any money.

HENRY

Of course, I didn’t think they’d call that note of mine; it’s only
five hundred, and you could just endorse it.

JANE

No!

SADIE

I was going to ask you----

JANE

No!

ELLA

I got a chance to be independent, Jane, and----No. I haven’t any
money. I won’t have before the first of the month.

EMMA

No money!

HENRY

I bet you’re worth as much to-day as you was the day mother died.

JANE

To a penny. I’ve lived, and run this house, and half supported all
of you on what I’ve made the place earn. Yesterday I spent the first
dollar that I didn’t have to spend. I mean, on myself. But that’s no
business of yours. I _am_ worth just as much as the day I took the
property, and I’m not going to run behind, so you see, after all, I’m
a real Jordan.

EMMA

Seems so. I never knew one of ’em yet who didn’t seem to think he
could take it with him.

HENRY

Well, Jane, I don’t know as it’s any use tryin’ to get you to change
your mind?

JANE

I’m sorry.

EMMA

You can leave that for us to be. I guess it’s about the only thing
we’ve got a right to. Get your things on, Nettie!

NETTIE

I’m going to stay a while with Aunt Ella; I won’t be late.

HENRY

I don’t know what I’m goin’ to do about that note. I s’pose I’ll find
some way out of it.

JANE

I hope so.

EMMA

Thank yer. Of course we know there’s always the poorhouse. Come,
Henry.

[_She exits at left, leaving the outside door open._

HENRY

Emma is a little upset. I hope you won’t mind her talk. I guess her
part of it ain’t any too easy.

[_He exits, shutting the door._

ELLA (_to Jane_)

Poor Henry! Of course I s’pose you’re right not to lend it to him.
But I don’t know as _I_ could do it, but I’m sensitive.

JANE

Perhaps it’s harder to say no than you think.

[_Hannah enters._

HANNAH

I got everything ready for to-morrow’s wash, but the sheets off your
bed, Miss Ella.

ELLA

Good Land! I forgot ’em. Nettie will bring ’em right down.

NETTIE (_to Jane_)

After that, I’m going to stay and help Aunt Ella. I was wondering if
you’d be here all the afternoon.

JANE

Yes.

NETTIE (_charmingly_)

Nothing special, you know. I’d just like to have a little visit with
you.

[_She exits at left with Ella._

HANNAH (_looks after her_)

Every time I listen to that girl I get fur on my tongue.

JANE

Fur?

HANNAH

Like when my dyspepsia’s coming. There’s two things I can’t abide,
her and cucumbers.

[_She crosses to door left._

JANE

Hannah!

HANNAH (_stops_)

Well?

JANE (_rather shyly_)

We are going to have rather a special supper to-night.

HANNAH (_doubtfully_)

We are?

JANE

Yes. That’s why I had you roast that turkey yesterday.

HANNAH (_firmly_)

That’s for Sunday!

JANE

No, it’s for to-night.

HANNAH (_angrily_)

Why is it?

JANE

It’s my birthday.

HANNAH

I didn’t know that.

JANE

No, it isn’t exactly a national holiday, but we’ll have the turkey,
and I’ll get some preserves up, and I want you to bake a cake, a
round one. We’ll have candles on it. I got some at the store this
morning.

HANNAH (_shocked_)

Candles?

JANE

Yes.

HANNAH

Who’s going to be to this party?

JANE (_a little self-conscious_)

Why--just--just ourselves.

HANNAH

Just you and Mr. Ben and Miss Ella?

JANE

Yes.

HANNAH

You don’t want candles on that cake, you want crape on it.

[_She exits door left._

[_Jane crosses up and starts to clear the dining-room table of its
red table cover, as Ben enters door left._

BEN (_cheerfully_)

Well, I fixed Old Nellie up. (_He puts his bottle back in its place
in the wall cabinet_) Just got her in time. Thought she was gone for
a minute, but she’s going to be all right.

JANE

That’s good.

[_She folds the tablecloth up and puts it away._

BEN (_in front of fire_)

She knew what I was doin’ for her too; you could tell by the way she
looked at me! She’ll be all right, poor old critter. I remember her
when she was a colt, year before I went to high school.

[_Jane crosses into room, shutting the dining-room door after her._

JANE

You like animals, don’t you, Ben?

BEN (_surprised_)

I don’t know. I don’t like to see ’em suffer.

JANE

Why?

BEN

I guess it’s mostly because they ain’t to blame for it. I mean what
comes to ’em ain’t their fault. If a woman thinks she’s sick, ’til
she gets sick, that’s her business. If a man gets drunk, or eats like
a hog, he’s got to pay for it, and he ought to. Animals live cleaner
than we do anyhow--and when you do anything for ’em they’ve got
gratitude. Folks haven’t.

JANE

Hand me that sewing basket, Ben.

[_She has seated herself at left center by table. Ben at left of
table, hands her the basket as she picks up some sewing._

BEN

It’s funny, but except for a dog or two, I don’t remember carin’
nothin’ for any of the live things, when I lived here I mean.

JANE

I guess that’s because you didn’t do much for them.

BEN

I guess so--Sometimes I kind of think I’d like to be here when spring
comes--and see all the young critters coming into the world--I should
think there’d be a lot a feller could do, to make it easier for ’em.

JANE

Yes.

BEN

Everybody’s always makin’ a fuss over women and their babies. I guess
animals have got some feelings, too.

JANE (_sewing_)

Yes.

BEN

I _know_ it--Yes, sometimes I sort of wish I could be here, in the
spring.

JANE

You’ll be a big help.

BEN

I’ll be in prison. (_He looks at her. She drops her head and goes on
sewing_) You forgot that, didn’t yer?

JANE

Yes.

BEN

What’s the difference? A prison ain’t just a place; it’s bein’
somewheres you don’t want to be, and that’s where I’ve always been.

JANE

You liked the army?

BEN

I s’pose so.

JANE

Why?

BEN

I don’t know, there was things to do, and you did ’em.

JANE

And some one to tell you what to do?

BEN

Maybe that’s it, somebody that knew better’n I did. It galled me at
first, but pretty soon we got over in France, an’ I saw we was really
doin’ something, then I didn’t mind. I just got to doin’ what I was
told, and it worked out all right.

JANE

You liked France, too?

BEN

Yes.

JANE

I’d like to hear you tell about it.

BEN

Maybe I’ll go back there some time. I don’t know as I’d mind farming
a place over there. Most of their farms are awful little, but I don’t
know but what I’d like it.

JANE

Farming is farming. Why not try it here?

BEN

Look out there! (_He points out of the window at the drifted snow_)
It’s like that half the year, froze up, everything, most of all the
people. Just a family by itself, maybe. Just a few folks, good an’
bad, month after month, with nothin’ to think about but just the mean
little things, that really don’t amount to nothin’, but get to be
bigger than all the world outside.

JANE (_sewing_)

Somebody must do the farming, Ben.

BEN

Somebody like the Jordans, that’s been doin’ it generation after
generation. Well, look at us. I heard a feller, in a Y.M.C.A. hut,
tellin’ how nature brought animals into the world, able to face what
they had to face----

JANE

Yes, Ben?

BEN

That’s what nature’s done for us Jordans,--brought us into the world
half froze before we was born. Brought us into the world mean, and
hard, so’s we could live the hard, mean life we have to live.

JANE

I don’t know, Ben, but what you could live it different.

BEN

They _laugh_ over there, and sing, and God knows when I was there
they didn’t have much to sing about. I was at a rest camp, near
Nancy, after I got wounded. I told you about the French lady with all
those children that I got billeted with.

JANE

Yes.

BEN

They used to _sing_, right at the table, and laugh! God! It brought a
lump into my throat mor’n once, lookin’ at them, and rememberin’ the
Jordans!

JANE

I guess there wasn’t much laughing at your family table.

BEN

Summers nobody had much time for it, and winters,--well, I guess you
know.

JANE

Yes.

BEN

Just a few folks together, day after day, and every little thing you
don’t like about the other raspin’ on your nerves ’til it almost
drives you crazy! Most folks quiet, because they’ve said all the
things they’ve got to say a hundred times; other folks talkin’,
talkin’, talkin’ about nothing. Sometimes somebody sort of laughs,
and it scares you; seems like laughter needs the sun, same as flowers
do. Icebound, that’s what we are all of us, inside and out.

[_He stands looking grimly out window._

JANE

Not all. I laughed a lot before I came here to live.

BEN (_turns and looks at her_)

I remember, you were just a little girl.

JANE

I was fourteen. See if there’s a spool of black sewing cotton in that
drawer.

BEN (_looking in drawer_)

You mean thread?

JANE

Yes.

BEN

This it?

[_He holds up a spool of white thread._

JANE

Would you call that black?

BEN (_looks it over_)

No--it ain’t black. (_He searches and finds black thread_) Maybe this
is it!

JANE

Maybe it is! (_She takes it_) You were with that French family quite
a while, weren’t you?

BEN

Most a month; they was well off, you know; I mean, they was, before
the war. It was a nice house.

JANE (_sewing_)

How nice?

BEN (_hesitates_)

I don’t know, things--well--useful, you know, but nice, not like this.

[_He looks about._

JANE (_looks around with a sigh_)

It’s not very pretty, but it could be. I could make it.

BEN

If you did, folks would be sayin’ you wasn’t respectable.

JANE

Tell me about the dinner they gave you the night before you went back
to your company.

BEN

I told you.

JANE

Tell me again.

BEN (_smiles to himself at the remembrance_)

They was all dressed up, the whole family, and there I was with just
my dirty old uniform.

JANE

Yes.

BEN (_lost in his recollections_)

It was a fine dinner, but it wasn’t that. It was their doin’ so much
for me, folks like that--I’ve sort of pictured ’em lots of times
since then.

JANE

Go on.

BEN

All of the young ones laughing and happy, and the mother too,
laughing and tryin’ to talk to me, and neither one of us knowing much
about what the other one was sayin’.

[_He and Jane both laugh._

JANE

And the oldest daughter? The one that was most grown up?

BEN

She was scared of me somehow, but I don’t know as ever I’ve seen a
girl like her, before or since.

JANE

Maybe ’twas that dress you told me about; seems to me you don’t
remember much else about her; not so much as what color her hair was,
only just that that dress was blue.

BEN (_thoughtfully_)

Yes.

JANE (_sewing_)

Sometimes you say dark blue!

[_She is watching him closely through half-shut eyes._

BEN (_absently_)

I guess so.

JANE

And then I say, dark as something I point out to you, that isn’t dark
at all, and you say, “No, lighter than that!”

BEN (_absently_)

Just--sort of blue.

JANE

Yes, sort of blue. It had lace on it, too, didn’t it?

BEN

Lace? Maybe--yes, lace.

JANE

There’s more than one blue dress in the world.

BEN

Like enough. Maybe there’s mor’n one family like that lady’s, but
I’ll be damned if they live in Veazie. (_He crosses and opens
cupboard and selects a bottle_) I might as well run out and see how
the old mare is getting on.

[_He selects bottle from shelf._

JANE

And you’ve got to shovel those paths for the clothes lines yet.

BEN

I know.

JANE

Well, don’t forget.

BEN

It ain’t likely you’ll let me.

[_He exits at door right. Jane laughs softly to herself, and runs
to closet and takes out a large cardboard box and putting it on the
table, she cuts the string and removes the wrapping paper, then
lifts the cover of the box and draws out a dainty light-blue gown
with soft lace on the neck and sleeves. She holds it up joyfully,
then covering her own dress with it, she looks at herself in a mirror
on wall. As she stands smiling at her reflection, there is a sharp
knock on the outside door. Jane hastily returns dress to box and as
the knock is repeated, she puts the box under the sofa at left and
crosses and opens the outside door._

_Judge Bradford enters._

JANE

Oh, it’s you, Judge! Come in.

JUDGE

I thought I’d stop on my way home and see how you were getting on,
Jane.

JANE

I’ll take your coat.

JUDGE

I’ll just put it here. (_He puts coat on chair_) Have you time to sit
down a minute?

JANE

Of course.

[_They sit._

JUDGE (_looks at her_)

That isn’t a smile on your lips, is it, Jane?

JANE

Maybe----

JUDGE (_laughingly_)

I’m glad I came!

JANE

It’s my birthday.

JUDGE

Why, Jane! (_He crosses to her and holds out his hand. She takes it_)
Many happy returns!

JANE (_thoughtfully_)

Many--happy returns--that’s a lot to ask for.

JUDGE

You’re about twenty-two, or twenty-three, aren’t you?

JANE

Twenty-three.

JUDGE

Time enough ahead of you. (_His eye falls on the box, imperfectly
hidden under the sofa; out of it a bit of the blue dress is
sticking_) Hello! What’s all that?

JANE

My birthday present.

JUDGE

Who gave it to you?

JANE

I did.

JUDGE

Good! It’s about time you started to blossom out.

JANE

I ordered a lot of things from Boston; they’ll be here to-morrow.

JUDGE

I suppose that one’s a dress?

JANE

Yes.

JUDGE (_bends over to look_)

Light blue, isn’t it?

JANE (_smiles_)

Just sort of blue--with lace on it.

JUDGE

Oh, you’re going to wear it, I suppose, in honor of your birthday?

JANE (_startled_)

To-night--oh, no--soon maybe, but not to-night.

JUDGE (_smiles_)

How soon?

JANE

Soon as I dare to; not just yet.

JUDGE

You have plenty of money; you ought to have every comfort in the
world, and some of the luxuries.

JANE (_gravely_)

Judge! I want you to do something for me.

JUDGE

And of course I’ll do it.

JANE

I want you to get Ben off. I want you to fix it so he won’t go to
State’s Prison.

JUDGE

But if he’s guilty, Jane?

JANE

I want you to go to old Mr. Kimbal for me and offer to pay him for
that barn of his that Ben burned down. Then I want you to fix it so
he won’t push the case, so’s Ben gets off.

JUDGE

Do you know what you are asking of me?

JANE

To get Ben off.

JUDGE

To compound a felony.

JANE

Those are just words, Judge, and words don’t matter much to me. I
might say I wasn’t asking you to compound a felony. I was askin’ you
to save a sinner, but those would be just words too. There’s nobody
else; you’ve _got_ to help me.

JUDGE (_thoughtfully_)

I’ve always thought a lot could be done for Ben, by a good lawyer.

JANE

It doesn’t matter how, so long as it’s done.

JUDGE

He was drinking, with a crowd of young men; the two Kimbal boys
jumped on him and beat him up rather badly. That’s about all we know,
aside from the fact that Ben was drunk, and that that night the
Kimbals’ barn was set on fire.

JANE

Just so long as you can get him off, Judge.

JUDGE

I think a case of assault could be made against the Kimbal boys, and
I think it would stand.

JANE

What of it?

JUDGE

It is quite possible that the old man, if he knew that action was
to be taken against his sons, and if he could be tactfully assured
of payment for his barn, say by Ben, in a year’s time, might be
persuaded to petition to have the indictment against Ben withdrawn.
In that event, I think the chances would be very much in Ben’s favor.

JANE

I don’t care what names you call it, so long as it’s done. Will you
fix it?

JUDGE

Well, it’s not exactly a proper proceeding for a Judge of the Circuit
Court.

JANE

I knew you’d do it.

JUDGE

Yes, and I think you knew why, didn’t you?

JANE

Ever since she’s died, you’ve helped me about everything. Before she
died you were just as good to me, and nobody else was.

JUDGE

I am glad you said that, because it clears me from the charge of
being what poor Ben calls “one of the crow buzzards,” and I don’t
want you to think me that.

JANE

No, you’re not that.

JUDGE

I love you, Jane.

JANE

No!

JUDGE

Yes--I’ve done that for a long while. Don’t you think you could get
used to the thought of being my wife?

JANE (_gently_)

No.

JUDGE

I think I could make you happy.

JANE

No.

JUDGE

I am afraid being happy is something you don’t know very much about.

JANE

No.

JUDGE

It isn’t a thing that I am going to hurry you over, my dear, but
neither is it a thing that I am going to give up hoping for.

JANE

When you told me, that day, that Mrs. Jordan had left me all her
money, I couldn’t understand; then, afterwards, you gave me the
letter she left for me. I want you to read it.

JUDGE

What has her letter to do with us?

JANE

Maybe, reading it, you’ll get to know something you’ve got a right to
know, better than I could tell it to you.

JUDGE

Very well.

JANE

It’s here. (_She opens drawer, and selects a letter in a woman’s
old-fashioned handwriting, from a large envelope of papers_) She was
a cold woman, Judge. She never let me get close to her, although I
tried. She didn’t love me. I was as sure of it then as I am now.
(_She holds out the letter_) Read it.

JUDGE

If it’s about the thing I’ve been speaking of, I’d rather hear it in
your voice.

JANE (_reads_)

“My dear Jane, the doctor tells me I haven’t long to live, and so
I’m doing this, the meanest thing I think I’ve ever done to you. I’m
leaving you the Jordan money. Since my husband died, there has been
just one person I could get to care about; that’s Ben, who was my
baby so long after all the others had forgotten how to love me. And
Ben’s a bad son, and a bad man. I can’t leave him the money; he’d
squander it, and the Jordans’ money came hard.”

JUDGE

Poor woman! It was a bitter thing for her to have to write like that.

JANE (_reads on_)

“If squandering the money would bring him happiness, I’d face all the
Jordans in the other world and laugh at them, but I know there’s only
just one chance to save my boy,--through a woman who will hold out
her heart to him and let him trample on it, as he has on mine.”

JUDGE (_in sudden fear_)

Jane!

JANE (_reads on_)

“Who’d work, and pray, and live for him, until as age comes on, and
maybe he gets a little tired, he’ll turn to her. And you’re that
woman, Jane; you’ve loved him ever since you came to us. Although he
doesn’t even know it. The Jordan name is his, the money’s yours, and
maybe there’ll be another life for you to guard. God knows it isn’t
much I’m leaving you, but you can’t refuse it, because you love him,
and when he knows the money is yours, he will want to marry you. I’m
a wicked old woman. Maybe you’ll learn to forgive me as time goes
on--It takes a long time to make a Jordan.” (_Jane drops her hand to
her side_) Then she just signed her name.

JUDGE

Is the damnable thing she says there true?

JANE

Yes, Judge.

JUDGE

And you’re going to do this thing for her?

JANE

No, for him.

JUDGE (_bitterly_)

He isn’t worth it.

JANE

I guess you don’t understand.

JUDGE

No.

[_He crosses and picks up his coat._

JANE

You can’t go like that, angry. You have to pay a price for being a
good man, Judge--I need your help.

JUDGE

You mean _he_ needs my help?

JANE

Yes, and you’ll have to give it to him, if what you said a little
while ago was true.

JUDGE (_after a pause_)

It _was_ true, Jane. I’ll help him.

[_He picks up his hat._

JANE

I’ve an errand at the store. I’ll go with you.

[_She takes hat and coat from rack and puts them on._

JUDGE

Is it anything I could have sent up for you?

JANE (_putting on coat_)

I guess not. You see, I’ve got to match a color.

JUDGE

Another new dress?

JANE (_they start toward door_)

Just a ribbon, for my hair.

JUDGE

I didn’t know women still wore ribbons in their hair.

JANE

It seems they do--in France.

[_They exit together at left to the outside door and off._

_Nettie and Ella enter quickly, after a slight pause, Nettie running
in from right, followed more sedately by Ella._

NETTIE

You see! I was right! She went with him.

[_She has run to window left and is looking out._

ELLA

That’s what money does. If mother hadn’t left her everything, he
wouldn’t have touched her with a ten-foot pole.

NETTIE

Well, if she’s fool enough to stay in this place, I guess he’s about
the best there is.

ELLA

Then trust her for gettin’ him; by the time she gets through in
Veazie, this town will be barer than Mother Hubbard’s cupboard by the
time the dog got there. (_Her eye falls on Jane’s box, partly under
sofa._) What’s that?

[_She bends over, looking at it._

NETTIE

What?

ELLA

I never saw it before. (_She draws it out_) Looks like a dress. See!
Blue silk!

NETTIE

Open it.

ELLA (_hesitates_)

Must be hers! Maybe she wouldn’t like it.

NETTIE

Maybe she wouldn’t know it.

ELLA

A cat can look at a king!

[_She opens the box and holds up the blue dress._

NETTIE

Oh! Oh!

ELLA (_really moved_)

Some folks would say a dress like that wasn’t decent, but I wouldn’t
care, not if it was mine, and it might have been mine--but for her.

NETTIE

Yours! Grandma wouldn’t have left her money to you. She hated old
people. Everybody does. She’d have left it to me, but for Jane
Crosby!

ELLA (_looks at dress_)

I always wanted a dress like this; when I was young, I used to dream
about one, but mother only laughed. For years I counted on gettin’ me
what I wanted, when she died; now I never will.

NETTIE (_fiercely_)

I will--somehow!

ELLA

Maybe but not me. Oh, if I could have the feelin’ of a dress like
that on me, if I could wear it once, where folks could see me--Just
once! Oh, I know how they’d laugh--I wouldn’t care----

NETTIE (_almost in tears_)

I can’t stand it if she’s going to wear things like that.

ELLA

I’ll put it back.

[_She starts to do so._

NETTIE (_catches her hand_)

Not yet.

ELLA

I guess the less we look at it, the better off we’ll be.

[_There is a ring at the front door._

NETTIE

Who’s that?

ELLA

Here! (_She hands the box to Nettie_) Shove it back under the sofa.
I’ll go and see. (_She turns and crosses to door left and out to the
vestibule. Nettie, with the box in her arms, hesitates for a moment
then turns and exits at right, taking the box with her. Ella opens
the outside door at left, showing Orin on the doorstep. Ella looks at
him angrily_) For time’s sake, what are _you_ ringing the bell for?

ORIN

Mum says for me not to act like I belonged here.

ELLA

Well, I’m goin’ to shut the door. Git in or git out!

ORIN

I got a note. (_He enters room as Ella shuts door_) It’s for her.

ELLA (_holds out hand_)

Let me see it.

ORIN

Mum said not to let on I had nothin’ if you came nosin’ around.

[_Jane enters from left._

JANE

I just ran across to the store. I haven’t been five minutes.

[_She takes coat off._

ELLA

He’s got a note for you, from Sadie.

JANE

Oh, let me see it, Orin.

ORIN (_gives her note_)

She said, if you said is they an answer, I was to say yes, they is.

JANE

Just a minute.

[_She opens note and reads it._

ELLA

I must say she didn’t lose much time.

JANE (_after reading note_) Poor Sadie! Wait, Orin! (_She sits at
table and takes checkbook from the drawer and writes_) Just take this
to your mother.

ELLA

You don’t mean you’re goin’ to----

JANE

Be quiet, Ella. Here, Orin. (_She hands him check_) Don’t lose it,
and run along.

ORIN

All right. Mum said we was goin’ to have dinner early, and go to a
movie! Good night.

JANE (_again writing in checkbook_)

Good night.

[_Orin exits._

ELLA

So you sent her her rent money, after all?

JANE

Here!

[_She rises and hands a check to Ella._

ELLA

What’s that?

JANE

Two hundred dollars. You can try that dressmaking business if you
want to, Ella.

ELLA

[_Looks at check._

Two hundred dollars!

JANE

You needn’t thank me.

ELLA

That ain’t it. I was just wonderin’ what’s come over you all of a
sudden.

[_Ben enters._

JANE

It’s my birthday, that’s all. Did you know it was my birthday, Ben?

BEN (_carelessly_)

Is it? I shoveled them damned paths!

[_He crosses and sits by fire._

JANE

Ella’s going into the dressmaking business, Ben.

BEN (_moodily_)

What of it?

ELLA

That’s what I say. It ain’t much of a business.

[_She exits at right; outside it grows to dusk._

JANE

Are you tired?

BEN

Maybe.

[_He stretches his feet out toward fire._

JANE

You’ve done a lot of work to-day.

BEN

And every day.

JANE

I don’t suppose you know how much good it’s done you, how well you
look!

BEN

Beauty’s only skin deep.

JANE

Folks change, even in a few weeks, outside and in. Hard work don’t
hurt anybody.

BEN

I got chilblains on my feet. The damned shoes are stiffer than they
ever was.

JANE

Icebound, you said. Maybe it don’t have to be like that. Sometimes,
just lately, it’s seemed to me that if folks would try, things
needn’t be so bad. All of ’em try, I mean, for themselves, and for
everybody else.

BEN

If I was you, I’d go out somewheres and hire a hall.

JANE

If you’d put some pork fat on those shoes to-night, your feet
wouldn’t hurt so bad.

BEN

Maybe.

[_He sits looking moodily into the fire. After a moment’s hesitation,
Jane crosses and sits in the chair beside his, the evening shadows
deepen around them but the glow from the fire lights their faces._

JANE

I’m lonesome to-night. We always made a lot of birthdays when I was a
girl.

BEN

Some do.

JANE

Your mother didn’t. She found me once trying, the day I was fifteen.
I remember how she laughed at me.

BEN

All the Jordans have got a sense of humor.

JANE

She wasn’t a Jordan, not until she married your father.

BEN

When a woman marries into a family, she mostly shuts her eyes and
jumps in all over.

JANE

Your mother was the best of the whole lot of you. Anyway, I think so.

BEN

I _know_ it. I always thought a lot of her, in spite of our being
relations.

JANE

She loved you, Ben.

BEN

She left me without a dollar, knowin’ I was going to State’s Prison,
and what I’d be by the time I get out.

JANE

Maybe some day you’ll understand why she did it.

BEN

Because she thought you’d take better care of the money than any of
the rest of us.

JANE

And you hate me because of that, the way all the rest of the Jordans
do?

BEN

Sometimes.

JANE (_sadly_)

I suppose it’s natural.

BEN

But I ain’t such a fool as Henry, and the women folks. They think
you took advantage and fooled her into what she did. I thought so at
first, now I don’t.

JANE

What do you think now, Ben?

BEN

She’d watched you; she knew you were worth mor’n all of us in a lump.
I know it, too, but some way it riles me worse than if you wasn’t.

JANE

That’s silly!

BEN (_with growing resentment_)

Don’t you suppose I know what you’ve been doin’ to me. Tryin’ to make
a man of me. Tryin’ to help me. Standing up to me and fightin’ me
every day, tryin’ to teach me to be decent. Workin’ over me like I
was a baby, or somethin’, and you was tryin’ to teach me how to walk.
Gettin’ me so upset that every time I don’t do what I ought to do, I
get all het up inside; I never was so damned uncomfortable in all my
life.

JANE

And I never was so happy.

BEN

I s’pose God knew what he was about when he made women.

JANE

Of course he did.

BEN

Anyhow, he gave ’em the best of it, all right.

JANE

You don’t mean that! You _can’t_!

BEN

I do. Let a man get miserable, and he is miserable. A woman ain’t
really happy no other way.

JANE

Maybe you think I’m having an easier time right now than you are.

BEN

I know it.

JANE

They all hate me, and they all want something, all the time. I can’t
say yes, and it’s hard to always say no. Then there’s the farm, big,
and poor, and all worked out. The Jordans have been taking their
living out of this soil for more than a hundred years, and never
putting anything back.

BEN

Just themselves, that’s all.

JANE

Worked right, like they do out West, this place could be what it
ought to be. How can I do that; it needs a man.

BEN

I been thinkin’ lately things could be done a whole lot different.

JANE

By a man, if he loved the old place-- You Jordans robbed this soil
always. Suppose one of you tried to pay it back--it would mean work
and money, for a couple of years maybe, then I guess you’d see what
gratitude meant.

BEN

It could be done; it ought to be.

JANE

By you, Ben!

BEN

No--I guess I ain’t got the judgment.

JANE

You’ve got it, if you’d learn to use it.

BEN

Anyhow, I’ve got just a month, that’s all.

JANE

Maybe you’ll have more.

BEN

I’m as good as convicted as I sit here. I’ve only got a month.

JANE

Then help me for that month. We could plan how to start out in the
spring. I’ve got books that will help us, and I can get more. We
could do a lot!

BEN

I don’t know but what we could!

JANE (_bends toward him_)

Will you shake hands on it?

[_She offers her hand._

BEN (_surprised_)

What for?

JANE

Oh, just because we never have.

BEN

We ain’t goin’ to change _everything_, are we?

JANE

One thing. We’re going to be friends.

BEN (_takes her hand awkwardly_)

You’re a good sport, game as a man, gamer maybe.

JANE

And now for the surprise.

BEN

The what!

JANE (_draws her hand away and rises_)

You’ll see. I want you to sit right here, until I open those doors.

[_She points to doors to dining room._

BEN

I wasn’t thinkin’ of movin’.

JANE

Just sit right there.

BEN

And do what?

JANE

Think.

BEN

What of?

JANE

Oh, anything--so long as it’s pleasant--of the spring that’s
coming----

BEN

In the prison down at Thomaston.

JANE

Of France then, of the family that was so good to you--of the
beautiful lady--of the daughter, if you want to, the one that was
most grown up--and of the wonderful blue dress. Just shut your eyes
and think, ’til I come back!

[_She exits through doors to dining room and closes the doors after
her. Ben sits in glow from the fire, his eyes closed. In a moment the
door at right is thrown open and Nettie stands in the doorway, the
light from the hall falling on her. She has on Jane’s blue dress and
is radiant with youth and excitement._

NETTIE

Ben! Look at me! Look, Ben!

BEN

What?

NETTIE

Look Ben!

[_He looks at her and for a moment sits in stupid wonder, then rises
slowly to his feet._

BEN

It’s--It’s Nettie!

NETTIE

Did you ever see anything so lovely, did you?

BEN

You’re--you’re a woman, Nettie!

NETTIE

Of course I am, you stupid!

BEN (_crosses down to her_)

God! How I’ve starved for somethin’ pretty to look at! God! How I’ve
starved for it!

NETTIE

That’s why I came down, I wanted you to see! I waited there in the
hall till she went out.

BEN

And you’ve been here all the time, and I haven’t so much as looked at
you!

NETTIE (_softly_)

You’ve been in trouble, Ben!

BEN

I’ll get out of that somehow! I’m going to make a fight. I ain’t
goin’ to let ’em take me now.

NETTIE

Honest, Ben?

BEN

Not now. Oh, you pretty kid! You pretty little thing!

[_He catches her fiercely in his arms._

NETTIE

You mustn’t, Ben!

BEN (_triumphant_)

Mustn’t! You don’t know me!

NETTIE

Just one then! (_She holds up her lips, and as he kisses her
ardently, the dining-room doors back of them open and Jane stands
in the doorway, looking at them. She has removed her apron and has
made some poor attempt at dressing up. Back of her we see the table
bravely spread for the festive birthday party. There is a large
turkey and other special dishes, and a round cake on which blaze
twenty-two tiny candles. They turn their heads, startled, as Jane
looks at them, and Ben tightens his arms defiantly about Nettie_) Let
me go!

BEN (_holding her and looking past her to Jane_) No! (_Then to Jane_)
Why are you looking at me like that?

NETTIE

Let me go.

BEN (_to Jane_)

To hell with your dream of grubbing in the dirt. Now I know what I
want, and I’m going to get it.

NETTIE

Let go, dear. (_She draws away_) I’m ashamed about wearin’ your
dress, Cousin Jane. I’ll take it right off.

JANE

You needn’t. I guess I don’t want it any more. (_For the first time
her eyes leave Ben’s face. She turns and steps past them to the door
at right and calls_) Supper’s ready, Ella!

[_Hannah enters at back in dining room with a plate of hot biscuits._

CURTAIN