Complete Works of Charlotte Perkins Gilman

by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

  She grew to love the once gloomy house, standing now wide-windowed to the sun and air; most of its handsome furniture still covered and packed away as her mother had left it. She loved the wide, far view — trees, trees, trees; blue curve on blue curve of distant mountain; not another building in sight save the dark house next door. The space, the quiet delighted her; the freedom from all interruption.

  ‘But why no servants?’ wrote her friend and classmate, Miss Jane Cass, of Boston. ‘Surely you cannot keep that great place clean! — and what sort of food to live on! My dear, you’ll break down! It must be unsanitary, and aren’t you afraid?’

  ‘My dear old Jane,’ Diana answered, ‘I don’t suppose you ever were alone — really alone — in your life. It is glorious, simply glorious! My morning bath is a dive into the cleanest lake you ever saw, my meals are largely from the garden. I do employ an old darky to take care of that, his name is Polyphemus, he used to belong to us, or his parents did. My bread is pure wheat biscuit — better than any other kind; meat I get by shooting or fishing — better living you never saw. Also I have plenty of excellent canned goods for emergencies.

  ‘And the comfort — the utter luxury — of having a house of one’s own! You have never known it, my poor old Jane — I fear you never will. You see, I don’t care at all for what my ancestors thought or what my present relatives or other persons think; this house is now arranged exactly to suit me; and I mean to live here, mostly, for the rest of my days. Unless my cousin, Marshall Blair, should come back and prove a disagreeable neighbor.

  ‘Of course I wish I had children. You know how I love them; but not at the price most women pay. I can always adopt, you know. For pure pleasure, I have my music, an excellent resource. Sometimes I wish I had chosen singing instead of writing. But now I have both!

  ‘As to fear — I never knew it. And as to health — you should see me! It was always good, and grows daily better. Come when you can, and we’ll be bachelor maids together.’

  So feeling, proud and happy in her green solitude, with hasty sandals on bare feet and a blue bathrobe about her, she had raced down to the lake one glittering morning, only to see, poised on her favorite diving place, the straight, white body of a man. He leaped, rose, curved, and swept into the water, swimming with easy pride. She returned to the house, furious, and called Polyphemus.

  ‘There is a man in the lake,’ she said; ‘you go and tell him this is private property.’

  Polyphemus seemed at a loss.

  ‘Ya’as, Miss Dina,’ he said, shifting from one foot to the other. ‘Ya’asm! But, Miss Dina — dat man am Mars’ Marshall Blair!’

  Slow rage rose and gathered in her heart. Her lovely lake was no longer hers alone, her solitude was spoiled, and by a man; above all by a Marshall.

  Polyphemus eyed her apologetically. ‘And if you please, Miss Dina,’ he went on, backing a little away from her, ‘I goin’ to bring another nigger to run this yer garden. I’m ‘bleeged to work for Mars’ Marshall now.’

  She paid him on the spot and returned to her room, the day’s work spoiled. That very afternoon, ranging with her gun, well on her side of the estate, she had found a small scared colored child, howling dismally.

  Being interrogated, she told a dismal tale of having no parents and no home; of being beaten and sent off by those who had cared for her. ‘They done tun me loose, Miss Dina, an’ I got no whar to go! an’ I dun bring your milk, Miss Dina!’ Diana had taken her in, finding the diminutive imp quite as useful in most ways as old Polyphemus.

  She avoided the lake thereafter, choosing a small pool in another quarter for her beloved sun-rise bath, and plunged into her work with fresh determination.

  Should she, Diana Marshall, be disturbed by the mere adjacent presence of a man? Indeed, no!

  Polyphemus, who wholly disapproved of his young mistress swimming in that cold and lonely lake, never told his master of the discovery, and Dr Blair continued to monopolize the quiet water.

  He had been educated in England and France, had made his reputation there, and then gradually turned from the practise of medicine to research work. He, too, had remembered the old place in Virginia, with the big comfortable home belonging to him, and the dark empty shell next door, visited once in his youth, when the estate was settled.

  ‘Just the thing,’ he said to himself. ‘I can experiment all I please; no one will be about to bother me. And when I’ve got this thing worked out!—’

  But first he made careful inquiry about the house across the wall. ‘If that female cousin of mine is at home, I won’t live there!’ he determined. But he heard that no one had lived there for ten years, and came home rejoicing. Old Polyphemus presented himself humbly as the natural retainer of the place, and was promptly employed.

  ‘Can you cook? — and clean — really clean, you understand? I’ll have no woman slopping about in my house!’

  ‘O, ya’as, sir — Lawdy, ya’as, sir! I kin cook bettern any woman you eber saw, sir!’ the old nigger assured him. And because of the proven excellence of his cooking many deficiencies were overlooked in other lines.

  Dr Blair settled down enthusiastically in the old house, conscious of pleasant little thrills of race memory and a comfortable feeling of home. Many rooms he kept shut up; those he used, he furnished in a manner suggesting a laboratory or hospital more than a home, and the great garrets he consecrated to his research work — to slow, careful, continuous experiment and observation, requiring the arbitrary matchmaking of many mice, much time and no interruption.

  He lived well, under the ministrations of the old negro. For exercise he rode far and wide, and found his relaxation and deepest pleasure in his violin. He had scarcely been settled three days, and had not unpacked that beloved instrument, when he heard one evening, rising through the magnolia-scented air, the soft, rich tones of a deep contralto voice. He called Polyphemus. ‘Look here — there’s someone in the other house!’

  ‘Ya’as, sir; jes’ so, sir. It are Miss Dina, sir.’

  ‘Name of a pig!’ said Marshall Blair, which was certainly unfair, as pigs are seldom called Diana.

  He meditated upon it. ‘Confound all women,’ said he to himself. ‘Feeble, sickly, sentimental, selfish, shallow, idle, luxurious, empty-headed, useless trash! And confound This One in particular — spoiling my quiet!’ Then he laughed grimly. ‘If she comes over here we’ll let out the mice, Polyphemus,’ he said. ‘Don’t ever let me hear a word about her.’

  But Polyphemus was sorely exercised in his mind.

  ‘Dere dey bof are — juxtacomposed to-gedder — and dere dey stick! An’ bein’ cousins, and bof Blairs an’ Marshalls, and dis yer property needin’ to be looked after and wukked de wust way! Lawdy! Lawdy!’

  But just as young Polly’s guileless praises of ‘Mars Marshall nex’ door’ were met with prompt reproof and tabooed utterly, so were old Polyphemus’ more artful suggestions sharply rebuffed.

  ‘I tell you, I want to hear nothing about that woman!’ said Dr Blair. ‘Not a word. I hope never to set eyes upon her!’

  Polyphemus, taking needed rest at hours when his master was engrossed with mice, revolved matters solemnly in the dark recesses of his mind.

  ‘He ain’t even willin’ to see her,’ he said to himself; ‘an’ she as hansome as a picter. De Lawd must provide some way to bring dem young people togedder!’

  Dr Blair succeeded in not seeing his cousin until the night of the conflagration, an event which he strove utterly to dismiss from his mind.

  ‘Two fool women together,’ he summarized them. ‘Might have burned down both houses by their confounded carelessness. I hope I shall never see her again!’

  None the less, he was glad when he did see her again — one hot, still, summer night, when the broad moonlight and the oppressive heat had tempted him to the lake. He lay too long, perhaps, with arms outstretched, enjoying the spring-fed coldness of the water, for a fierce pain shot through suddenly crippled limbs as he struck out
for the bank.

  He sank, rose, shouted for help with a hopeless thought of Polyphemus’ deafness; sank again, rose struggling weakly, and saw through half-blinded eyes a great white figure shoot down through the moonlight and dive after him.

  She reached him, rose with him, struck out strongly and brought him safe to land, worked over him there, till at last his eyes opened again to a humiliating spectacle. She was holding his tongue out: Polyphemus, summoned by Polly’s frantic cries, was there, pumping his master’s arms up and down. He experienced great distress of body — and more of mind. She disappeared on the instant, her tall white figure shining in the moonlight, sternly Greek in outline under the wet swathing of her nightdress, vanishing through the trees like a veritable nymph.

  ‘I certinly am ashamed of you, Mars’ Marshall,’ said the old negro, when once his charge was safe. ‘Here you might ‘a died without ever wakin’ me up, if it hadn’t been for that lady! And she havin’ to jump out’n her baid and run down yer, bar-footed, to pull you outen de water. Mighty lucky she’s such a good swimmer!’

  In place of that lively gratitude toward one’s preserver which is supposed to move the heart of the rescued, Dr Blair felt only an intense mortification and anger. To be caught like a drowning rat — he, who could swim for miles — and to be dragged to land, pulled out, and laboriously resuscitated — by a woman! He thought of how he must have looked, helpless, sodden, with his tongue forcibly pulled out. It was hideously humiliating.

  Go to her he would not, but he wrote a courteous note, expressing his obligation in decent terms, though not in warm ones, begging her ‘to accept the thanks due for saving a worthless life.’

  She replied with equal courtesy and coldness, also with equal ambiguity. ‘Pray do not speak of it. It will equal, I trust, your attempt to rescue my house. My efforts are wholly unworthy of mention.’

  ‘Women must have the last word,’ he said grimly, and let it go at that, putting the note in the fire. But he remembered every word of it.

  After that the work went on steadily in the two houses. The click of the typewriter resounded faintly on one side of the wall, and the smell of many mice rose like an undesirable incense on the other.

  Polyphemus shook his white head, meditating in the old garden. ‘It did seem like the han’ o’ Providence — dat yer fire, and den dis yer drownin’ upset it all. Hit certainly am a shame! In course, a man don’ like to be beholden to a woman dat a-way; it ain’t natural. Lawdy! Lawdy! What we guine to do? I must go see dat Voodoo woman after all!’

  The hand of Providence soon became strangely active, however, for before many days he approached his master with much timidity, announcing, ‘If you please, sir, dat good-fer-nuffin Polly chile next door say ‘at Miss Dina sick.’

  ‘I dare say,’ replied Dr Blair, coldly, going on with his supper; ‘women are always sick.’

  ‘Yass, sir; but Miss Dina ain’t never been sick in her life before, and she’s takin’ on turrble; she’s clean outn’ her haid — just hear to dat, sir!’

  The deep contralto voice he had heard so often with irresistible pleasure rose now in sudden, reckless melody; stopped short; broke into laughter; began to sing again, a queer, low chant.

  Dr Blair dropped knife and napkin and rushed into his laboratory, bringing out a long-untouched medicine case; then scaled the wall once more.

  He found her standing at the head of the great stairway, brilliantly arrayed in some rich ball dress of a previous generation, with cheeks flaming pink and glittering eyes. She took him for a dangerous assailant, and he was obliged to use all his strength to subdue without hurting her.

  He had her quiet at last, and she lay staring at him with fierce eyes, till the sedative he forcibly administered made the white lids close.

  Polly, under close questioning, showed as much terror as if she were being blamed for her mistress’s condition, and it was only by the exercise of unusual gentleness and the gift of a shining half-dollar that he was able to get any facts in the case.

  It appeared that her mistress had been well as usual up to dinner time; had grown more and more flushed and excited ever since, and had been in considerable pain. ‘She been powerful sick, sir; she sut’nly have!’

  ‘What did she eat for dinner?’

  ‘Some can’ soup, and some fish — fraish dis mornin’, sir; and some green peas — I picked ’em myself.’

  ‘Show me the can.’

  ‘Lawdy, sah, I frowed it away.’

  ‘Go and get it.’

  ‘I can’t, sir. I frowed it down de dry well whar I always frow ‘em.’

  His opinion was clear.

  ‘That deadly canned stuff, I don’t doubt. Serves anybody right who uses it. I think she’s in no danger now.’ But he had sat by her all night, noting the pulse, the temperature, the action of the lungs; trying to make his knowledge of poisons agree with his theories of the malign composition of canned soup.

  She slept heavily most of the following day, and when she opened her eyes he was sitting calmly by her window, reading. She made no sound, no movement, but watched him for a few moments, uncertain whether he was not part of the wild dream which had been drifting through her mind. Then she realized, with a sense of unmeasured amazement, that Marshall Blair was making himself perfectly at home in her house — in her room.

  Lying quite still, she spoke calmly. ‘To what do I owe the honor of this visit, Dr Blair?’

  He rose, looked at his watch, and came to her bedside. ‘To the fact that you have been suddenly and dangerously ill, and I was the only physician within reach. I make no apologies. If you will allow me, I will take your pulse and temperature once more.’

  He popped the little thermometor into her mouth before she could say anything further, and held her wrist with an abstracted air, counting.

  ‘I guess you’ll do,’ he said. ‘It was a case of poison; from eating canned goods I think. You really had a rather close call. I advise your lying still another day, and taking nothing but milk for the rest of the week. Good morning.’

  He was gone.

  She lay still for some time, trying to think, but finding both head and body strangely weak, and presently slept again.

  Small Polly waited upon her with spaniel-like devotion. ‘Don’t look so like a scared mouse, Polly,’ Miss Diana told her. ‘Anybody’d think you were to blame for my being sick.’

  ‘O, Lawdy, no, ma’am — I ain’t! I didn’t! Please ‘scuse me, ma’am,’ said Polly, still wearing an air of dark remorse.

  Diana Marshall remained quiet the next day, as advised, and also lived on milk for a week, her principal entertainment during this time being the melodious sound of her cousin’s violin and his pleasant baritone voice, which rose to her window in the still evenings.

  At the end of that week Dr Blair’s solo was interrupted by the appearance of his recent patient before his door.

  ‘Good evening,’ said she calmly; ‘I’ve come over to thank you for taking care of me when I needed it, and to say that I think we are making melodramatic fools of ourselves.’

  He rose and bowed.

  ‘Thank you for your good opinion. Won’t you be seated?’

  ‘Not till I know if you share the opinion,’ she said. ‘You and I are not children, and we are, I believe, second cousins. I abominate men; but you seem to be a decent sort, and not intrustive.’

  ‘And I abominate women,’ he replied, ‘but I will say you are the least objectionable of the kind I ever knew.’

  ‘You don’t disturb my writing, and I don’t disturb your mice — I hope.’

  ‘Not in the least.’

  ‘But it does seem a pity to miss the music we might have. I want so much to try accompanying your violin.’

  ‘I have been secretly wishing you would, for a month,’ said Dr Blair.

  Evenings of mutual music are a pleasant close to days of diverse toil. They played together, they sang together, they talked together, and each learned a real resp
ect for the other’s character, together with a deep sympathy for their kindred prejudices.

  ‘If you weren’t a woman, Cousin Diana, I really believe I’d ask you to marry me,’ he said one night.

  ‘If you weren’t a man, I might consider it,’ she replied.

  ‘I have taken seven oaths that no woman should ever live in my house,’ said he.

  ‘And I, that no man should ever live in mine,’ she answered.

  ‘I am a scientist, and no family cares must ever interfere with my work,’ he continued.

  ‘I am a writer, and will never be any man’s housekeeper,’ said she.

  ‘Yet these are happy evenings when the day’s work is over,’ he urged.

  ‘They certainly are,’ she agreed.

  ‘It can’t go on this way,’ he said.

  ‘Why can’t it?’ she demanded.

  For answer, he suddenly leaned over and kissed her.

  There was a silence.

  ‘I see that you are not above Shakesperian argument, Dr Blair.’

  ‘I am glad you admit we are lovers, Cousin Diana.’

  ‘But I will not marry you, Cousin Marshall.’

  ‘It is only a formality, Cousin Diana. What you really don’t want to do is to keep house for me, and I assure you I don’t want you to. But suppose — just for the sake of argument — that we went through that little formality and then continued to live as we do now?’

  ‘In two houses?’

  ‘Why not? There is the bridge — we can mend it.’

  ‘Well,’ said Diana, ‘on those conditions — and merely as a formality—’