Main-Travelled Roads

by Garland, Hamlin

  "It's most time f'r Ed to be gittin' back, ain't it' Pa?"

  "Sh'd say 'twas! He jist went over to Hobkirk's to trade horses. It's dretful tryin' to me to have him go off tradin' horses on Sunday. Seems if he might wait till a rainy day, 'r do it evenin's. I never did believe in horse tradin' anyhow."

  "Have y' come back to stay, Willie?" asked the old lady.

  "Well-it's hard-tellin'," answered Will, looking at Agnes.

  "Well, Agnes, ain't you goin' to get no dinner? I'm 'bout ready fr dinner. We must git to church eariy today. Elder Wheat is goin' to preach an' they'll be a crowd. He's goin' to hold communion."

  "You'll stay to dinner, Will?" asked Agnes.

  "Yes-if you wish it."

  "I do wish it."

  "Thank you; I want to have a good visit with you. I don't know when I'll see you again."

  As she moved about, getting dinner on the table, Will sat with gloomy face, listening to the "clack" of the old man. The room was a poor little sitting room, with furniture worn and shapeless; hardly a touch of pleasant color, save here and there a little bit of Agnes's handiwork. The lounge, covered with calico, was rickety; the rocking chair matched it, and the carpet of rags was patched and darned with twine in twenty places. Everywhere was the influence of the Kinneys. The furniture looked like them, in fact.

  Agnes was outwardly calm, but her real distraction did not escape

  Mrs. Kinney's hawklike eyes.

  "Well, I declare if you hain't put the butter on in one o' my blue chainy saucers! Now you know I don't allow that saucer to be took down by nobody. I don't see what's got into yeh. Anybody'd s'pose you never see any comp'ny b'fore-wouldn't they, Pa?"

  "Sh'd say th' would," said Pa, stopping short in a long story about Ed. "Seems if we couldn't keep anything in this' house sep'rit from the rest. Ed he uses my currycomb-"

  He launched out a long list of grievances, which Will shut his ears to as completely as possible, and was thinking how to stop him, when there was a sudden crash. Agnes had dropped a plate.

  "Good land o' Goshen!" screamed Granny. "If you ain't the worst I ever see. I'll bet that's my grapevine plate. If it is-well, of all the mercies, it ain't! But it naight 'a' ben. I never see your beat-never! That's the third plate since I came to live here."

  "Oh, look-a-here, Granny," said Will desperately. "Don't make so much fuss about the plate. What's it worth, anyway? Here's a dollar."

  Agnes cried quickly:

  "Oh, don't do that, Will! It ain't her pate. It's my plate, and I can break every plate in the house if I want'o," she cried defiantly.

  "'Course you can," Will agreed.

  "Well, she can't! Not while I'm around," put in Daddy. "I've helped to pay f'r them plates, if she does call 'em hern-"

  "What the devul is all this row about? Agg, can't you get along without stirring up the old folks everytime I'm out o' the house?"

  The speaker was Ed, now a tail and slouchily dressed man of thirty-two or -three; his face still handsome in a certain dark, cleanly cut style, but he wore a surly loo'k and lounged along in a sort of hangdog style, in greasy overalls and vest unbuttoned.

  "Hello, Will! I heard you'd got home. John told me as I came along."

  They shook bands, and Ed slouched down on the lounge. Will could have kicked him for laying the blame of the dispute upon Agnes; it showed him in a flash just how he treated her. He disdained to quarrel; he simply silenced and dominated her.

  Will asked a few questions about crops, with such grace as he could show, and Ed, with keen eyes in his face, talked easily and stridently.

  "Dinner ready?" he asked of Agnes. "Where's Pete?"

  "He's asleep."

  "All right. Let 'im sleep. Well, let's go out an' set 'up. Come, Dad, sling away that Bible and come to grub. Mother, what the devul are you sniffling at? Say, now, look here. If I hear any more about this row, I'll simply let you walk down to meeting. Come, Will, set up."

  He led the way out into the little kitchen where the dinner was set.

  "What was the row about? Hain't been breakin' some dish, Agg?"

  "Yes, she has."

  "One o' the blue ones?" winked Ed.

  "No, thank goodness, it was a white one."

  "Well, now, I'll git into that dod-gasted cubberd some day an' break the whole eternal outfit. I ain't goin' to have this damned jawin' goin' on," he ended, brutally unconscious of his own "jawin'."

  After this the dinner proceeded in comparative silence, Agnes sobbing under breath. The room was small and very hot; the table was warped so badly that the dishes had a tendency to slide to the center; the walls were bare plaster grayed with time; the food was poor and scant, and the flies absolutely swarmed upon everything, like bees. Otherwise the room was clean and orderly.

  "They say you've made a pile o' money out West, Bill. I'm glad of it. We fellers back here don't make anything. It's a dam tight squeeze. Agg, it seems to me the flies are devilish thick today. Can't you drive 'em out?"

  Agnes felt that she must vindicate herself a little. "I do drive 'em out, but they come right in again. The screen door is broken, and they come right in."

  "I told Dad to fix that door."

  "But he won't do it for me."

  Ed rested his elbows on the table and fixed his bright black eyes on his father.

  "Say, what d'you mean by actin' like a mule? I swear I'll trade you off f'r a yaller dog. What do I keep you round here. for anyway-to look purty?"

  "I guess I've as good a right here as you have, Ed Kinney."

  "Oh, go soak y'r head, old man. If you don't tend out here a little better, down goes your meat house! I won't drive you down to meetin' till you promise to fix that door. Hear me!"

  Daddy began to snivel. Agnes could not look up for shame. Will felt sick. Ed laughed.

  "I kin bring the old man to terms that way; he can't walk very well late years, an' he can't drive my colt. You know what a cuss I used to be about fast nags? Well, I'm just the same. Hobkirk's got a colt I want. Say, that re-minds me: your team's out there by the fence. I forgot. I'll go and put 'em up."

  "No, never mind; I can't stay but a few minutes."

  "Goin' to be round the country long?"

  "A week-maybe."

  Agnes looked up a moment and then let her eyes fall.

  "Goin' back West, I s'pose?"

  "No. May go East, to Europe mebbe."

  "The devul y' say! You must 'a' made a ten-strike out West."

  "They say it didn't come lawful," piped Daddy over his blackberries and milk.

  "Oh, you shet up. Who wants your put-in? Don't work in any o' your Bible on us."

  Daddy rose to go into the other room.

  "Hold on, old man. You goin' to fix that door?"

  "'Course I be," quavered he.

  "Well see't y' do, that's all. Now git on y'r duds, an'

  I'll go an' hitch up." He rose from the table. "Don't keep me waiting."

  He went out unceremoniously, and Agnes was alone with Will.

  "Do you go to church? "he asked. She shook her head. "No, I don't go anywhere now. I have too much to do; I haven't strength left. And I'm not fit anyway."

  "Agnes, I want to say something to you; not now-after they're gone."

  He went into the other room, leaving her to wash the dinner things. She worked on in a curious, almost dazed way, a dream of something sweet and irrevocable in her eyes. He represented so much to her. His voice brought up times and places that thrilled her like song. He was associated with all that was sweetest and most carefree and most girlish in her life.

  Ever since the boy had handed her that note she had been reliving those days. In the midst of her drudgery she stopped to dream-to let some picture come back into her mind. She was a student again at the seminary, and stood in the recitation room with suffocating beat of the heart. Will was waiting outside-waiting in a tremor like her own, to walk home with her under the maples.

  Then she remembered the painfully s
weet mixture of pride and fear with which she walked up the aisle of the little church behind him. Her pretty new gown rustled, the dim light of the church had something like romance in it, and he was so strong and handsome. Her heart went out in a great silent cry to God-"Oh, let me be a girl again!"

  She did not look forward to happiness. She hadn't power to look forward at all.

  As she worked, she heard the high, shrill voices of the old people as they bustled about and nagged at each other.

  "Ma, where's my specticles?"

  "I ain't seen y'r specticles."

  "You have, too."

  "I ain't neither."

  "You had 'em this forenoon."

  "Didn't no such thing. Them was my own brass-bowed ones. You had yourn jest 'fore goin' to dinner. If you'd put 'em into a proper place you'd find 'em again."

  "I want'o know if I would," the old man snorted'.

  "Wal, you'd orter know."

  "Oh, you're awful smart, ain't yeh? You never have no trouble, and use mine-do yeh?-an' lose 'em so't I can't

  "And if this is the thing that goes on when I'm here, it must be hell when visitors are gone," thought Will.

  "Willy, ain't you goin' to meetin'?"

  "No, not today. I want to visit a little with Agnes, then I've got to drive back to John's."

  "Wal, we must be goin'. Don't you leave them dishes f't me to wash," she screamed at Agnes as she went out the door. "An' if we don't get home by five, them caaves orter be fed."

  As Agnes stood at the door to watch them drive away, Will studied her, a smothering ache in his heart as he saw how thin and bent and weary she was. In his soul he felt that she was a dying woman unless she had rest and tender care.

  As she turned, she saw something in his face-a pity and an agony of self-accusation-that made her weak and white. She sank into a chair, putting her hand on her chest, as if she felt a failing of breath. Then the blood came back to her face, and her eyes filled with tears.

  "Don't-don't look at me like that," she said in a whisper. His pity hurt her.

  At sight of her sitting there pathetic, abashed, bewildered, like some gentle animal, Will's throat contracted so that he could not speak. His voice came at last in one terrible cry-"Oh, Agnes! for God's sake forgive me!" He knelt by her side and put his arm about her shoulders and kissed her bowed head. A curious numbness involved his whole body; his voice was husky, the tears burned in his eyes. His whole soul and body ached with his pity and remorseful, self-accusing wrath.

  "It was all my fault. Lay it all to me. .. I am the one to bear it. . . . Oh, I've dreamed a thousand times of sayin' this to you, Aggie! I thought if I could only see you again and ask your forgiveness, I'd-" He ground his teeth together in his assault upon himself. "I threw my life away an' killed you-that's what I did!"

  He rose and raged up and down the room till he had mastered himself.

  "What did you think I meant that day of the thrashing?" he said, turning suddenly. He spoke of it as if it were but a month or two past.

  She lifted her head and looked at him in a slow way. She seemed to be remembering. The tears lay on her hollow cheeks.

  "I thought you was ashamed of me. I didn't know-why-"

  He uttered a snarl of sell-disgust.

  "You couldn't know. Nobody could tell what I meant. But why didn't you write? I was ready to come back. I only wanted an excuse-only a line."

  "How could I, Will-after your letter?"

  He groaned and turned away.

  "And Will, I-I got mad too. I couldn't write."

  "Oh, that letter-I can see every line of it! F'r God's sake, don't think of it again! But I didn't think, even when I wrote that letter, that I'd find you where you are. I didn't think, I hoped anyhow, Ed Kinney wouldn't-"

  She stopped him with a startled look in her great eyes. "Don't talk about him-it ain't right. I mean it don't do any good. What could I do, after Father died? Mother and I. Besides, I waited three years to hear from you, Will."

  He gave a strange, choking cry. It burst from his throat—that terrible thing, a man's sob of agony. She went on, curiously calm now.

  "Ed was good to me; and he offered a home, anyway, for Mother—"

  "And all the time I was waiting for some line to break down my cussed pride, so I could write to you and explain. But you did go with Ed to the fair," he ended suddenly, seeking a morsel of justification for himself.

  "Yes. But I waited an' waited; and I thought you was mad at me, and so when they came I-no, I didn't really go with Ed. There was a wagonload of them."

  "But I started," he explained, "but the wheel came off. I didn't send word because I thought you'd feel sure I'd come. If you'd only trusted me a little more- No! it was all my fault. I acted like a crazy fool. I didn't stop to reason about anything."

  They sat in silence alter these explanations. The sound of the snapping wings of the grasshoppers came through the~windows, and a locust high in a poplar sent down his ringing whir.

  "It can't be helped now, Will," Agnes said at last, her voice full of the woman's resignation. "We've got to bear it."

  Will straightened up. "Bear it?" He paused. "Yes, I s'pose so. If you hadn't married Ed Kinney! Anybody but him. How did you do it?"

  "Oh' I don't know," she answered, wearily brushing her hair back from her eyes. "It seemed best when I did it-and it can't be helped now." There was infinite, dull despair and resignation in her voice.

  Will went over to the window. He thought how bright and handsome Ed used to be, and he felt after all that it was no wonder that she married him. Life pushes us into such things. Suddenly he turned, something resolute and imperious in his eyes and voice.

  "It can be helped, Aggie," he said. "Now just listen to me. We've made an awful mistake. We've lost seven years o' life, but that's no reason why we should waste the rest of it. Now hold on; don't interrupt me just yet. I come back thinking just as much of you as ever. I ain't going to say a word more about Ed; let the past stay past. I'm going to talk about the future."

  She looked at him in a daze of wonder as he went on. "Now I've got some money, I've got a third interest in a ranch, and I've got a standing offer to go back on the Sante Fee road as conductor. There is a team standing out there. I'd like to make another trip to Cedarville-with you-"

  "Oh, Will, don't!" she cried; "for pity's sake don't talk-"

  "Wait!" he said imperiously. "Now look at it Here you are in hell! Caged up with two old crows picking the life out of you. They'll kill you-I can see it; you're being killed by inches. You can't go anywhere, you can't have anything. Life is just torture for you-"

  She gave a little moan of anguish and despair and turned her face to her chairback. Her shoulders shook with weeping, but she listened. He went to her and stood with his hand on the chairback.

  His voice trembled and broke. "There's just one way to get out of this, Agnes. Come with me. He don't care for you; his whole idea of women is that they are created for his pleasure and to keep house. Your whole life is agony. Come! Don't cry. There's a chance for life yet."

  She didn't speak, but her sobs were less violent; his voice growing stronger reassured her.

  "I'm going East, maybe to Europe; and the woman who goes with me will have nothing to do but get strong and well again. I've made you suffer so, I ought to spend the rest of my life making you happy. Come! My wife will sit with me on the deck of the steamer and see the moon rise, and walk with me by the sea, till she gets strong and happy again-till the dimples get back into her cheeks. I never will rest till I see her eyes laugh again.

  She rose flushed, wide-eyed, breathing hard with the emotion his vibrant voice called up, but she could not speak. He put his hand gently upon her shoulder, and she sank down again. And he went on with hi~s appeal. There was something hypnotic, dominating in his voice and eyes.

  On his part there was no passion of an ignoble sort, only a passion of pity and remorse, and a sweet, tender, reminiscent love. He did not love the woman
before him so much as the girl whose ghost she was-the woman whose promise she was. He held himself responsible for it all, and he throbbed with desire to repair the ravage he had indirectly caused. There was nothing equivocal in his position-nothing to disown. How others might look at it he did not consider and did not care. His impetuous soul was carried to a point where nothing came in to mar or divert.

  "And then after you're well, after our trip, we'll come back to

  Houston, and I'll build my wife a house that'Il make her eyes shine.

  My cattle and my salary will give us a good living, and she can

  have a piano and books, and go to the theater and concerts.

  Come, what do you think of that?"

  Then she heard his words beneath his voice Somehow, and they produced pictures that dazzled her. Luminous shadows moved before her eyes, drifting across the gray background of her poor, starved, work-weary life.

  As his voice ceased the rosy clouds faded, and she realized again the faded, musty little room, the calico~ covered furniture, and looking down at her own cheap and ill-fitting dress, she saw her ugly hands lying there. Then she cried out with a gush of tears:

  "Oh, Will, I'm so old and homely now, I ain't fit to go with you now! Oh, why couldn't we have married then?"

  She was seeing herself as she was then, and so was he; but it deepened his resolution. How beautiful she used to be! He seemed to see her there as if she stood in perpetual sunlight, with a w~arm sheen in her hair and dimples in her cheeks.

  She saw her thin red wrists, her gaunt and knotted hands. There was a pitiful droop in the thin pale lips, and the tears fell slowly from her drooping lashes. He went on:

  "Well, it's no use to cry over what was. We must think of what we're going to do. Don't worry about your looks; you'll be the prettiest woman in the country when we get back. Don't wait, Aggie; make up your mind."

  She hesitated, and was lost.

  "What will people say?"

  "I don't care what they say," he flamed out. "They'd say, stay here and be killed by inches. I say you've had your share of suffering. They'd say-the liberal ones-stay and get a divorce; but how do we know we can get one after you've been dragged through the mud of a trial? We can get one just as well in some other state. Why should you be worn out at thirty? What right or justice is there in making you bear all your life the consequences of our-my schoolboy folly?"