Never Victorious, Never Defeated

by Caldwell, Taylor;

  Rufus began to laugh. His hand touched her wet throat solicitously. “I don’t mind that it’s a girl, dearest,” he said. “I wanted a boy, yes. But this baby is even better. She looks just like me, Dr. Worth said.” His voice, always rich, became richer with pride. Lydia knew his chest was swelling. Red Rufus! she thought with bitter contempt.

  She turned her head abruptly and looked at him, wanting him to see the hatred that boiled in her, and which had begun to boil in her less than three months after their marriage. She could not help herself now. Her large dark eyes brimmed with the fire of her hatred, and her pale mouth opened, involuntarily. She stared at her husband, her white face shining with the passion of detestation she had concealed for over two years. She did not care if he saw it; she willed him to see it.

  Rufus stepped back. His reddish brows drew together as if he were bewildered. His face took on that anxious young look which was so appealing to women. Mrs. Brunt saw it, and clucked. “Sometimes ladies are disturbed at a time like this,” she said consolingly. “Perhaps I’d better not bring in the baby yet. Mrs. deWitt ought to sleep some more.”

  But husband and wife regarded each other fixedly, and in silence. Then Lydia, looking only at Rufus, said slowly and clearly, “I don’t want to see the baby.”

  “Of course not; not yet,” said Mrs. Brunt soothingly. “We must sleep a little more. …”

  Lydia said, “I want to see Alice and Stephen.”

  Rufus glanced away, and after a moment he said jovially, “Why, of course, my darling! They’re still here. They never went away. And Mama and Papa are waiting up.”

  He took a step toward the fire, and Lydia could see the strong muscles of his back and shoulders. He began to stir up the coals; they shattered and filled the big warm room with yellow light. He stood there then and stared into the fire. He said softly, “What’s the matter, Liddie?” He looked at the closed door through which Mrs. Brunt had vanished.

  Lydia became aware for the first time of the huge pain in her body. She writhed with it, gripping the sheets. Sweat burst out over her face. The hatred in her mind and the pain in her flesh were too much to be borne. She cried out, suffocatingly. Rufus did not turn. He pushed a fallen coal back onto the hearth. His red hair was lighted up by the firelight, and it was like a nimbus over and around his large head.

  “I’ll never have another child!” exclaimed Lydia, and she writhed again in her agony. “Not ever by you, Rufus!”

  He came to her now, apprehensive and genuinely concerned. He did not touch her. He began to frown, and he bit his underlip thoughtfully. He was uncertain and baffled. It could not be possible that Lydia hated him, he thought. It was just imagination, or the lamplight, or the suffering she had endured, which had given such a fierceness to her eyes.

  “Why, Liddie,” he said. “I don’t understand. Of course, you’ve had a dreadful time, and women—”

  Lydia lay on her pillows, panting, looking up at him, her hands tense and white as they pulled the sheet over her in a self-protective and instinctive gesture. She had no more words. The emotion that surged in her was too powerful for speech. It had been there, held down, kept in control, for over two years. Now it rose to her lips in a flood of cold rage and loathing. The habits of twenty-four years of gentle breeding could not be overcome, however, so she was silent.

  Rufus spoke again, almost inaudibly, and as if to himself: “You look at me as if you hate me, Liddie. Why? What have I done? Have I hurt you in any way, my darling? You know how much I love you, don’t you, Liddie? Was the pain too much for you?”

  Lydia said through the hard muscles in her throat, “Yes.”

  He was satisfied, and relieved. Ladies like Lydia, who had always been protected and sheltered, sometimes became emotional after childbirth. Dr. Worth had warned him of this. There might even be a period of “depression” and “melancholy.” It was quite usual. He looked down into Lydia’s eyes, and saw the bright and staring fever of them, the furious concentration. He put his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels, frowning again.

  The firelight leaped and fell over the white walls, touched the crimson velvet curtains to a brighter color, stretched in shadows over the white ceiling with its gold molding. At Lydia’s feet, the carved bedposts with their pineapple-shaped tops rose like the slender trunks of trees. Two blue velvet chairs were drawn near the fire, and there was a gold silk sofa near the windows matching the soft gold of the carpet. A mirror over the fireplace reflected the room and its fine furnishings and the lamp which stood on a distant table.

  “There’s been a storm while you slept, dearest,” said Rufus. “Thunder and lightning. Like summer.” His voice was tentative and troubled.

  Lydia turned away her head again and closed her eyes. Oh, God! she thought. If I never had to see him again! She did not think of her child at all.

  The door opened and Mrs. Brunt appeared. She was a short stout woman with a coarse and friendly face, though her small eyes were fawning and obsequious. She smiled at Rufus archly, and lifted a fat finger in coy warning. “Mr. and Mrs. deWitt, sir. But only for a moment. Please. We must sleep, you know.”

  Lydia turned on her pillows eagerly. There was her sister, her dear sister Alice, and Stephen. They were coming toward her, walking gently. She held out her hand to Alice, and her fingers closed tightly about her sister’s fingers.

  “She’s very tired. It’s been hard,” said Rufus. The handsome and ruddy face had turned cold, though it still smiled. It was impossible for Rufus not to smile. “She mustn’t be disturbed too much.”

  Alice bent over Lydia and her pretty, light blue eyes filled with tears and sympathy. One of her long pale curls touched Lydia’s cheek. She whispered, “Dear Lydia. I’m so glad it’s over. And such a beautiful baby. Hush, dear. Hush, hush.” Lydia was trembling violently, and her fingers clutched Alice’s hand in a kind of desperation.

  “Don’t leave me, Alice, don’t leave me!”

  Alice was alarmed. She stroked her sister’s damp forehead and tried to understand the frantic expression in her eyes. This was not like Lydia, the quiet, the humorous, the steadfast and poised. She had never seen Lydia like this, not even when their parents had died after a long struggle against “lung fever.” There was something frightfully wrong with Lydia. Was it so awful, then, to have a child? With apprehension, she thought of her own child, who would be born in three months.

  Even in her suffering, Lydia at last saw the fear in her gentle sister’s eyes. Alice was only twenty-one, three years younger than herself, and she had always protected her, for Alice was frail. She told herself sternly that she was frightening this young creature, and she despised herself for her emotionalism. She held her body stiff against her trembling, and tried to smile.

  “Don’t mind me,” she said in a stifled voice. “I’m just tired, Alice.” She pressed Alice’s fingers lovingly against her cheek in an old gesture of affectionate protection. Nothing must hurt Alice, who had never known hatred and anger and who had never felt an overpowering detestation for anybody, and who had lived always in trust and under the shelter of the love of parents and sister. Nothing must disturb Alice’s dream of life, in which all mankind was good and heroic, all things lovely and tender, with God in His heaven and war a nightmare which did not exist in reality. The dream had been so strong in this young woman, who in so many ways was only a child, that the war which had ended less than a year ago had not really touched her consciousness. She had been horrified at Mr. Lincoln’s assassination, and had cried a little, and had been comforted by her husband, and everyone had conspired to drive the event from her mind. Within a few weeks she had forgotten. No one spoke of that death in her presence again.

  “You are so white, Lydia,” said Alice, and her voice shook.

  Lydia called on her strength, and patted her sister’s cheek. “It was nothing, dear. Nothing. I’ll be well very shortly. You’ll see.”

  There was no comfort anywhere for her, no consolation,
no courage, no friend. All her life she had had to be the strong one in a family which never faced reality. She thought of her parents, so like Alice, so small and fragile and touching. As a sturdy child, she had known all about them, and had defended them against all ugliness and truth. She could not remember when she had first appointed herself as their protector; to her, it seemed that it had been forever.

  She thought now of that gracious and charming home in which she had been born, and in which her parents had died. She saw the timeless gardens with the fountainlike willows and the white beeches and the tall elm trees which massed their branches together in dark enchantment. She saw the lilacs and the rose gardens, the dial and the moss-covered flagstones; she heard the cheeping and the songs of birds in the misty sunlight. The very mountains which rose far beyond had a purple unreality about them, and even the storms and the winters were dreams.

  The rooms of the house never echoed; the windows always seemed to shine softly. The fires never roared. Even the winds were quiet here, never once drowning out the sound of tinkling teacups, sweet low laughter, and gliding footsteps. Life had muted itself around that house. Nothing had ever caused a book to be dropped abruptly, nor had a voice ever been raised in annoyance or anger. When death came, it came noiselessly, without pain and without distress. Lydia remembered now, and the strange suffocating sensation which she had known for so many years in her parents’ home returned to her overwhelmingly.

  Recalling all this, and seeing her sister’s lovely young face, Lydia demanded more and more of her strength. She kissed Alice’s hand, and weakly tried to laugh.

  “I’m almost well, now, dear Alice,” she said. The sickness in her heart, the pain in her body, the wild hatred in her mind, must not be revealed to her sister again. She murmured lovingly when Alice bent over her even farther and pressed her soft cheek against her own. The pale curls lay across Lydia’s lips, and she kissed them remorsefully. Alice’s scent, as tenuous and as light as herself, filled Lydia’s nostrils. She put her arms about the girl’s shoulders, for Alice had begun to cry.

  Someone was lifting Alice away from her. It was Stephen, brother of Rufus. Lydia looked up at him gratefully. He held Alice to him, while she wept gently, and smiled down at Lydia. She lifted a hand to him and he caught it and held it kindly and warmly. She did not see Rufus standing at a little distance with that cold smirk on his face.

  Stephen deWitt was a tall, thin, and unprepossessing man of thirty-two, his brother’s elder by two years. Nothing glowed or brightened about him. He gave an impression of muted brownness, of faded insignificance. His body was narrow, his face was narrow and without virility, and his eyes were small and light brown. He had a long and crooked nose, a quiet mouth under a large brown mustache, big ears and scanty brownish hair. He was like a shadow beside his brother’s blazing color; when Rufus was present he appeared to retreat, to become entirely inconspicuous, even absent. People always forgot him immediately. If they spoke of him at all they invariably remarked that he was repellent, uninteresting, without conversation or wit or charm, and that he had not much intelligence. It was “well known” that without Rufus’s quick intellect and strength and tireless vitality Stephen would be “nothing.”

  Lydia had often overheard these remarks, and she had burned with anger. What did these fools know about Stephen? If he did not speak, she knew why he did not. If he drifted away from others, his head bent as if in apology, she understood. She was well aware of the contempt in which he was held; she knew of the sneers at his expense. His parents had not discouraged popular depreciation of their older son; in fact, they had encouraged it. Rufus, who might have turned more favor in his brother’s direction, was careful only to hold him up to ridicule, to joke affectionately at his expense, to slap him too solidly on his thin shoulders, to laugh heartily as he rallied him. And this, too, Lydia understood. It was partly because of Stephen, and all that she had learned about the two brothers, that she had come to hate her husband.

  “How are you, Lydia?” Stephen was asking, as he fondled his young wife’s curls and pretty shoulders. His hand tightened on Lydia’s, and his little eyes were shy and sympathetic. He had a hesitating, almost a stammering, way of speaking, as if he were doubtful that his words would be comprehended by others. “Was it—very bad?”

  “No,” Lydia said. The bitterness and hatred subsided in her. Involuntarily she moved a little closer to Stephen and her sister. The tears still shone on Alice’s face, but the girl was smiling like a young child and dabbing at her eyes. Her dark blue velvet dress was molded over her lovely figure, swelling out in deep folds at her hips. She wore a white lace collar about her throat, and white lace cuffs on her sleeves. She looked defenseless and fragile as she stood, one arm about her husband’s shoulder.

  “She mustn’t be tired,” said Rufus, and now he came closer to the bed. Immediately all of them lost color in the fire of his own color. Alice was a puppet, Stephen a vagueness, and Lydia herself a figure in black and white.

  “Why, why, of course,” muttered Stephen. “Mustn’t tire Lydia, must we?” He paused. “A nice baby, Lydia. She looks just like Rufus.”

  Lydia lost control of herself for the last time. “Don’t leave me, please,” she said, her voice breaking.

  Rufus laughed richly and clapped his brother on the shoulder. “They’re staying overnight, dearest. It’s too far for them to go home now. Mama and Papa have insisted that they stay.”

  “Oh, we wouldn’t leave Lydia tonight,” said Alice in her child’s tone, so high and clear. She did not look at Rufus directly, for she was instinctively afraid of him.

  “No, no, not at all,” said Stephen hurriedly.

  “And now,” said Rufus in his loud and jubilant voice, “suppose we leave poor Liddie alone, to sleep and rest?” He bent over Lydia. She did not stir or glance at him. She suffered his warm kiss, the pressure of his lips on hers. She did not even wince now, when he stroked her hair and murmured fondly. She held to her self-control, for Alice was watching them and smiling with innocent tenderness.

  Then she was alone, except for Mrs. Brunt, who officiously straightened the sheets and the quilts and talked inconsequentially and with enthusiasm about the baby. Lydia heard her, but cared nothing for what she said. The nightmare was on her again, and the hatred and rage and pain. She closed her eyes and pretended to sleep, and Mrs. Brunt retreated to the fire.

  The thunder and the lightning had gone, but a savage wind rushed against the windows. The fire leaped in answer. The yellow shadows jumped on the walls and ceilings. Mrs. Brunt snored in her chair.

  2

  They went down the white and gracefully curving stairway, with its deep crimson carpeting, Rufus gallantly assisting Alice, who shrank timidly and unconsciously from his strong grip, and Stephen following.

  Stephen, as usual, was bemused by the charm and beauty of his father’s house. As he walked slowly behind Rufus and Alice, he looked at the gracious paneling of the wall to his left. Gold-colored panels were set into creamy molded wood, and where the staircase curved, there was an arched and leaded window looking out onto the dark and wintry garden. From the high white ceiling fell a magnificent chandelier blazing with candles, throwing its prismed light down onto the wide hall with its polished floor, its scattered Aubusson carpets, its cream-colored sofa and delicate gold, blue, and rose damask chairs and fragile tables. Here, too, were paneled walls and gold wall brackets flickering with candles, and flowers from Aaron deWitt’s conservatory, and a small white fireplace dancing with burning apple-wood logs. Warmth, the scent of the flowers, the odor of wax and fire, filled the quiet midnight air.

  “Careful, my dear,” said Rufus affectionately to Alice, as they neared the end of the stairway. His gestures were exaggeratedly solicitous. He knew that Alice was afraid of him and disliked him in her dreamlike way, and it amused him. Once he had seriously considered marrying Alice, having become fascinated by her pale gold and blue beauty, but Alice, always so gentle, always
so considerate, had shown her guileless horror of him unmistakably. This had not angered or insulted him. He had immediately dismissed her from his mind as a woman without intelligence or discrimination, and had turned his attention to the dark and smiling Lydia who apparently appreciated him.

  At the foot of the stairs Alice shook off his hand, and looked up pleadingly at her absorbed husband, who was trailing behind them. Stephen stopped on the fourth stair and surveyed the hall below as if he had never seen it before, and was enchanted. Alice uncertainly smoothed the flaring folds of her blue gown, and waited for him. He became aware of her then, and the anxious expression in her large eyes, and he hurried down the remaining stairs and took her hand. She smiled as if rescued, and moved closer to him.

  He knew that she was afraid of Rufus and his parents, but he thought this was because she was still only a child in many ways. He, who was so perceptive, was often not very perceptive with regard to Alice, possibly for the reason that she never spoke of his family except with kindness and never criticized any of them, or possibly because his love for her was composed of deep protectiveness and paternal tenderness.

  He held her hand tightly as the three of them moved toward the great drawing room where his parents were waiting to hear the news that Lydia had recovered consciousness. Inwardly, he began to shrink, and the old familiar coldness and aversion returned to him. He knew so much about his parents, as he knew so much about Rufus, but though he had such objective knowledge and clarity of understanding, he could not prevent the vague sense of tiredness and sickness which came to him when about to encounter his father and mother. They despised him, as nearly everyone despised him, and in spite of his intelligence it would come to him that perhaps, in many ways, he deserved it.

  “Don’t be so humble; don’t have such a low opinion of yourself, Stephen!” Lydia had once exclaimed to him with unusual sharpness.

  He was baffled and surprised, and had answered her uncertainly: “But I’m not in the least humble, nor do I have a low opinion of myself.” He had reflected a moment, then had added, “However, how is it possible to know anything about yourself without humiliation? Complete self-knowledge, I think, would lead to suicide.”