Chapter X: Part TWO: I (6)

He did not answer, so full he was of looking at her. She seemed older. The drawn skin below her eyes was flushed and feverish. Her eyes were immeasurably deep and soft--as if some psychic lance had pierced them. Her body was strained forward. It seemed to tremble as does a delicate blade of steel when it resounds. Surely, this was an ineffably lovely thing that he had lost! For he had lost her. Her lips showed that, in their quivering strength; ere she had spoken. And her hands showed that, in their calm mastery,--and the backward jerk of her shoulders and the cold fullness of her hair. This was no lover; this was a creature without his ken, whom he had wounded. For every vibrance of her voice and form seemed a response, not to his need, not to his love, not even to his weakness, but to his hurt.

He stood there, forgetful of himself. And all of the words that were spoken came from her.

“I thought,” she said, “after your so plainly-speaking silence, that you would understand, without inflicting this upon us both.”

Then, she smiled. There was no rancor. But she could not keep her hurt from speaking.

“Dear, poor, Quincy,” she went on, almost as if he had been the messenger of the dead boy, her lover, “don’t you see, that after what you have done, after what you have failed to do, the one thing left that will not be altogether horrible, is to have an end? There are times in life, boy, when an end is the one salvation.” She smiled again, as if at her idea. “Of course, the final one of these times is death. But we have had no difficulty, have we, to put an end to this--without that?”

Quincy shuddered. He wished to ask her if she loved him, had ever loved him. But he could say nothing. She went on:

“I idealized you, Quincy. I do not regret it. As long as I dared hope--as long, that is, as I could keep from seeing you as you really are, I was so happy! I needed you. You were kind--for a little while. And then, you, also, could not bear my kindness. So it was, was it not? That was the reason why you stayed away? Well--there are women like me, whose kindness is unbearable. I often think--it is a little game of mine that brings me solace--that men who yearn have a better chance. The poet can create a universe to serve. This is wide enough to stem his aching. But a woman--all she can have is a mate and a child, to cover up her wound. Her intensity is equal to the poet’s. I am sure of that. But what she has is not equal to what he has. That is unfair, is it not?”

Quincy was hushed before the spectacle of his loss. Why could he not still throw himself at her feet? Did his unworthiness at length shame him from even hoping? How rich and full was this living beauty before the bloodless, craven things in his mind--ideals, conscience, aspirations--for which he had cast her out!

Again, respecting his silence, she spoke to him:

“There is one thing, Quincy, I still hope for. One thing I am still so humble as to ask of you. You remember what I once said to you:--that what I needed was the feeling that I would live on, in some way, in your own life. Quincy dear, do not let that part of me that stays in you turn bitter! Keep it pure, dear boy. Let it make you happy, once in a while. Cherish it! Oh, I beg this of you!” She stopped and her hands clenched before her.

“I ask this, not selfishly. I know you so well! If you can keep this part of me happy and clean within you, it may save you some day. I know that--and I fear, I fear what may come, if you do not.”

Now tears were there, glistening down her cheeks.

She seemed to be waiting for his promise--waiting for him to give her the hope she had been humble enough to ask. But Quincy stood there silent; full of, and measuring, his loss. And as her glance sought out his eyes, it came back from them, unrefreshed and undiminished.

Slowly, she closed her eyes as if thereby shutting in the last effort of her soul to venture forth.

And then, with a faint tremble, she turned away.

“Good-bye,” she said softly, and so left the room.

XVI

The rest of the year was a shadow under which he walked.

He abandoned himself completely. He let his life slip utterly from his hands. It was as if it had been a thing so strange and so repugnant, that it was useless, even as it was loathsome, to keep it with him. So he allowed himself, without effort or regret, to slip away.

He did not go back to the Deering house, nor did he ever again shake Professor Deering’s hand. These were things that had gone from him with his dreams. He did his work. He spoke more affably than before, to his comrades. He even joined them a little in their activities. But it was vacant intercourse.

The woods were redolent of bitter memories, so he avoided them. When he walked through them their rebuke prompted him to run. And when he ran, as of old, their rich suggestion held him back. So he abandoned both.

He joined the track-team in the spring. But he ran badly, now that he strained so to win his race. The students had not forgiven him. They saw him come, and when he failed to prove his worth, they dropped him without a glimmer of regret.

His dreams he turned savagely against, and against all that nurtured them, or harbored them or swung in tune with them. He gave up reading. He proved to himself that art was a mockery, and culture a delusion. He turned toward science, about which--knowing nothing of it--he could find no ancient landmark of himself to hate. He came to disapprove of college. He decided to lead a useful life and to obey his mother. He believed that at last he had found a way to gain his family’s respect and that their past evaluation of his merits had come very near the truth. But now, he was done with the clouds of fancy. He knew he had a good mind. He would set it to some concrete plow and make, at last, a concrete furrow for his life.

He told his father that he had had enough of college. He asked him, after a short vacation, to find a place for him in business--that he might enter in the fall. His father agreed, looking at him queerly, asking no question. His mother said: “Well, you lasted longer than Jonas.” Rhoda congratulated him and Adelaide seemed hurt. But none of these typical reactions worried Quincy. He had known what to expect.

He decided that he must cultivate his brother, Marsden. He sensed the cripple’s flinty empiricism, and this seemed to him the proper weapon to beat away, once and for all time, the residue of dream that clogged his life.

And so, the year came to an end.

He had turned away his face from it--from all that it contained--from Julia. He thought that by so doing, he was turning his face forward.