The Strange Woman

by Ben Ames Williams

  ‘Why, if it had, I guess it’d have killed him.’

  ‘Mashed him?’

  ‘Yes,’ Tim began to shiver at her tone.

  ‘Mashed his insides out?’

  ‘Guess so, if they hadn’t got him away.’

  She lay down beside him, her head on his shoulder, her finger tracing the outlines of his jaw. ‘Did you ever see a man mashed that way?’ Tim was trembling at her touch, yet he was sick too with a sort of terror as he answered her. ‘Saw a tree fall on a man once, a man named Frohock, over’t Norridgewock. He tried to jump out of the way, and tripped up and fell and it caught him.’ He coughed. ‘Caught him across the shoulders,’ he said. ‘Time we got to him he was dead. You could pretty near have picked him up in two pieces.’

  ‘What did he look like?’ she insisted.

  ‘His eyes popped out. I got sick. I couldn’t look at him after I saw that.’ He added unwillingly: ‘There was a piece of his shoulder blade stuck into the tree when we came to bark it. We had to dig it out.’ He sat up suddenly, brushing her away. ‘God damn it, Jenny, what do you want to hear about things like that for? Makes me sick, just remembering!’ He stepped out of bed on the farther side, staring down at her.

  She lay still, her arm across her forehead shadowing her eyes, smiling up at him with that smile which suggested tears. ‘I like to hear about things like that,’ she said in her still, slow tones.

  Tim made an explosive sound. ‘Go get some clothes on you!’ he told her. And when she did not move: ‘Get up. Go on!’

  She obeyed him. But after that day Tim was always afraid of her, half- dreading to come home. He drank more and more. For a time, the rum had seemed not greatly to affect him, but now when he rose in the morning his hands were apt to shake so violently that he could not button his elothes, could not hold a cup without spilling the contents. Also he lost his appetite, eating less and less, and the flesh melted off his bones, and his skin sagged emptily. So day by day his destruction sped.

  V

  There was the yeast of growth in Bangor in these years of Jenny’s girlhood, and many changes. The growing lumber business meant that every spring troops of lusty woodsmen came down-river, and that for the whole summer the harbor was crowded with ships, and sailors filled the town. For the entertainment of these men, an increasing number of establishments began to arise along the waterfront; and since Tim Hager’s house was on Poplar Street near the river and the Stream, Jenny sometimes saw sights which puzzled her. She and Tim might be wakened by shouting laughter in the dark hours of the night, and sometimes sailors came pounding on the door, though Tim’s giant figure appearing in the doorway was enough to scatter them.

  On the night after one of the annual musters of the militia there was something like a riot that centred around a house which had been built on the Point beyond John Barker’s store, and Jenny heard the shouts of brawling men, and the crash of a breaking door, and the screams of women; and she came from her room to the front window to see what was happening. The street outside the house was full of people, shadows in the darkness, running to and fro. She stayed there till Tim too awoke, and called to her to go back to bed.

  ‘But I want to watch,’ she urged. ‘What are they doing? What are they fighting about? What are the women scrceching for?’

  ‘It’s nought for you—or for any decent folk,’ he assured her. ‘Go on back to bed.’

  She yielded for the moment; but her curiosity drove her next morning before Tim was awake to walk down past the store to the house which had been the focus of the disturbance. The house was closed and shuttered, and except that she saw a man with a bruised and battered countenance asleep or dead in a clump of alders below the road, she found no answer to the riddle of the night.

  Then one day Doctor Rich, next door sold his house and moved to Main Street, and she asked Tim why the doctor had moved away. Tim said evasively:

  ‘Why, I sh’d fudge he didn’t like the neighborhood.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘It’s getting to be mostly stores and wharves and shipyards down here.’ She pressed him, but he would tell her no more than this till a month later, when the empty house found occupants and she questioned him again.

  ‘Some women have moved in,’ she said. ‘Four anyway, because I’ve seen them. And they had a party there last night. I’m going over and borrow some tea, sometime, and get acquainted.’

  Tim said harshly: ‘No and you’re not! You stay away from them.’ After a moment she asked: ‘Why do you act so secret about it?’ Then she said, laughing a little: ‘I know it must all be wickedness, or you’d tell me! You might as well tell me. I’ll find out for myself, somehow!’

  Her word provoked him to a blind and choking rage. ‘It’s nothing to you!’ he said fiercely. ‘Leave them be.’

  ‘I’ll find someone to tell me,’ she warned him.

  ‘Any man that does, I’ll break his neck for him,’ he declared. ‘And yours too! Now shut up your mouth or I’ll handle you.’

  She said, laughing again: ‘You haven’t beat me since the night Elder Loomis died. You can’t scare me. I’m not afraid of you.’

  Tim, remembering that night, remembering her slim body writhing under his blows, could not speak, and she said no more.

  VI

  Jenny had that liking for a uniform which is common to most women; but Tim, remembering her mother and Lieutenant Carruthers, saw this trait in her with a sullen misgiving. Uniforms appeared in Bangor at the annual muster of the militia, or at the drills three times a year. Since militiamen had broken in disgraceful flight at Hampden, the service was unpopular with everyone except those who nursed political ambitions and took this easy road to public notice. Yet some military duty was required from every man, and the volunteer companies offered an attractive and fashionable substitute. Captain Zebediah Rogers organized the Independent Volunteers, and Jenny made Tim take her to see the presentation of their standard. The company marched through the streets to Judge Dutton’s house where Miss Julia Dutton, representing the young ladies who had devised the standard and arranged to have it painted by the artist, Mr. Hardy of Hampden, made what seemed to Jenny an elegant address. ‘The young ladies of Bangor,’ she said, ‘yet retaining a fresh recollection of the horrors excited by an invading enemy in war . . Tim moved uneasily at that reference, and Jenny’s hand tightened on his arm and she smiled up at him reassuringly, while Miss Dutton went on to speak of ‘That sex upon whom we must at all times depend for protection,’ and summoned the members of the company, not to careers of war and destruction, but to ‘practise the principles and enjoy the pleasures of virtuous peace.’ Ensign David Nye, accepting the standard, gallantly vowed that ‘the enemy shall find that we strike our colors only to those by whom they were presented!’ Everyone cheered, and Jenny, clinging to Tim’s arm, jumped up and down and cried that the Ensign was wonderful. Tim was glad when the occasion was over and glad to point out to her a day or two later the young Ensign, no longer in uniform, driving one of his father’s teams and completely stripped of martial glamour.

  But Jenny’s delight in uniforms persisted, and when she was eighteen, she had a chance to fill her eyes with them. The northeastern boundary disputes, provoking talk of a new war with England, revived a martial spirit in Bangor town. When Mr. Baker of Madawaska was carried off to Fredericton and charged with stirring up sedition and insurrection, there were shouts for vengeance; and when the Provincial authorities seized for debt a cow owned by a man named Arnold, who lived on the Aroostook River forty miles within the claimed American line, the loud patriotic fervor waxed. Fourteen militia regiments in the eastern counties were mustered and reviewed as proof that Maine was prepared to fight for what she deemed her rights; and the Government at Washington ordered four companies of infantry of the regular army to move to Houlton.

  Early in May the first of these companies reached Bangor by schooner. They stayed only overnight before starting the long march north, and Jenny had
the scantiest glimpse of them; but when late in July three more companies arrived, their officers were persuaded to spend some days in Bangor. The soldiers pitched their camp in the open land between Penobscot and Somerset Streets, out Broadway; and Captain Staniford good- humoredly put them through a series of drills and parades, while the band played for an hour or two every evening to entertain all comers.

  Jenny insisted on going every day to watch the drills, and in the evening to hear the band; and Tim jealously went with her. He was uneasy with so many uniforms about, and he shook with rage because she attracted every masculine eye. When during the band concert Thursday evening Lieutenant Bloodgood, commanding one of the companies, ventured to pay his compliments to her and invited her to promenade, Tim harshly bade him take himself away.

  The Lieutenant looked at this unkempt giant of a man with a beautiful girl upon his arm. ‘Sir,’ he protested, ‘may I not offer so lovely a lady this small courtesy?’

  ‘No, you mayn’t,’ Tim told him flatly. ‘Be off with you! She’ll have no truck with Lieutenants.’

  He led Jenny away, bidding her come home; and she looked up at him, smiling teasingly. ‘You want me all to yourself, don’t you, poppy?’ she said in her warm, low tones.

  ‘I’ll have no Lieutenant dandling you!’

  ‘Mommy went away with a Lieutenant, didn’t she?’

  He was often startled to see how she read his thoughts, and he flinched at her word now, and said sullenly: ‘She was never better than a hedge sparrow, ready for the first man that’d have her!’

  ‘Was she like the women in Doctor Rich’s house?’ Her tone was grave, inquiring.

  ‘Full as bad, or worse,’ he agreed; but then in sudden anger, realizing what knowledge her word implied: ‘What do you know about such? I told you to keep away from them!’

  ‘But when mommy went away,’ she reminded him, not answering his question, ‘you felt sad! So I guess you loved her, anyway.’ She laughed softly. ‘Even if she was a sparrow!’ She linked her arm in his, pressing his arm against her side affectionately. ‘But I’ve made it up to you, haven’t I? Do you love me as much as you loved mommy?’

  He said hoarsely: ‘I’ve forgot her long ago, Jen.’

  She nodded with pleasure. ‘I liked it when you were so mad at the Lieutenant tonight. I knew it was because you love me so much yourself that you were sort of jealous of him.’ They were at home, turned indoors; and she lighted the candle and told him smilingly: ‘I know the way you feel about me.’

  She kissed him, on the mouth. Her mouth was always faintly moist at the corners; and when she had gone into her room, Tim brushed his lips with his hand, trembling where he stood. That kiss had roused him beyond endurance; and he knew he could not go to bed, could not stay in the same house with her so near. He turned hurriedly out of doors. The night was still and humid, with scarce any breeze; and he went up to Isaiah’s store. The store was dark, but Tim made into the cellar and tapped a rum barrel there to still the tumult in him. Later, his pulse shaking him, he went down to the river and took his boat. Tide and river were running out, but it was cooler on the water, and Tim let his oars trail and finally lifted them inboard and drifted with the current; and he sprawled in the bottom of the boat and presently fell asleep.

  He woke at dawn far down-river, and cursed his own folly and set out to row back upstream; but the way was long. When he came up to Hampden he put ashore for meat and drink there; and he saw the wharf where Moll had flouted him, fourteen years ago, and bitter old memories made him drink more than he ate.

  It was past sunset when he came laggard home. Jenny was not there, but in the fuddled confusion of his senses he ignored this, seeking water to quench his raging thirst. When he found it, his hand shook so that he spilled half the cup, and held it at last with both hands to bring it to his lips. The draft cooled his raw throat, but it was sour and nauseous in his poisoned stomach and the taste in his mouth offended him. Nevertheless, the water a little cleared his head, and he remembered the night before, and the dapper young Lieutenant; and his blood thickened with a murderous and choking passion. It was as though the expanding jaws of a vise were tearing his breast apart, and he caught at his throat like a man strangling.

  Then he heard far away the sound of the band, and knew Jenny must have gone to listen again; and he came out into the dusk and stumbled blindly up Poplar Street to hunt for her; but the thirst which tormented him, and the terrible need of more and more alcohol to steady his quivering nerves and his spasmodically shaking hands, made him forget her again. There was rum in Isaiah’s store. He turned that way.

  The door was barred, but Tim, as though it were the young Lieutenant who denied him admittance, smashed at the panels with his fist. Although he broke the skin across his knuckles he felt no pain, and the door yielded and he went in.

  He drew a noggin of rum and spilled half of it, slopping it on the floor. He gulped what was left and repeated the dram, waiting for his hands to stop shaking; but they did not, and he sat down on the floor beside the barrel and drank deep. He forgot time, and when Isaiah came home and discovered the broken door and fetched a candle to see what had happened, Tim was still sitting on the floor, his head lolling stupidly.

  Tim stared at the candle flame with wide owl’s eyes, the whites darkly congested; and Isaiah snorted with disgust.

  ‘You, is it?’ he cried. And then, as though at a sharp memory, and in a shrill rage: ‘Well, it’s a fine time for you to sit there stiff with drink, and Jenny carrying on the way she is!’

  Tim’s eyes fixed on him unwinkingly; and Isaiah’s voice like a file rasped through the silence. ‘Slipping off into the trees with one of the officers!’ he said. ‘Oh, I had my eye on her. I saw him kissing her, back where they thought they were out of sight, and her laughing and pushing him away.’

  Then he fell back in a sudden alarm, for Tim’s face was terrible. The big man climbed to his feet with a careful precision, stiff as rods. He walked toward Isaiah, as deliberately as though each step were a conscious and planned action, calling for all his powers. Isaiah moved hurriedly to one side; but Tim passed him as though he did not exist. He reached the door and went out. He walked off the top step like a somnambulist, and Isaiah heard him fall to the ground with a clattering thump; and then Tim laboriously pulled himself to his feet and stalked away.

  His mind, he would have said, was clear enough. Jenny had been needing a lesson for a long time. Well, she should have it! She was his, not for any other man at all. He forgot the Lieutenant’s part in Jenny’s offense. The officer was nothing, an impersonal figure, vague and unimportant. It was Jenny with whom Tim meant to deal.

  His mind controlled his body. He stayed erect by a profound effort of will. He moved up Exchange Street, and along Main to Stetson Square and out Broadway to the encampment. The band was still playing, and there were torches and bonfires for illumination; and though the crowd had thinned and the more conservative townsfolk were long since gone to their homes, the throng had at the same time become noisier, decorum long since forgotten. Tim pushed through the laughing groups, disregarding whoever stood in his path.

  He looked everywhere for Jenny without finding her; and he arrived at last at the dull conclusion that she had gone home, so he turned down Broadway again, implacable and deadly. When he came to his own door and entered, a candle was burning on the mantel, so he knew she was here and had left it to light him in. He took it and moved slowly to the bedroom door.

  Jenny was in her bed, asleep, curled in a ball, her dark hair loose upon the pillow. The night was warm and she slept without covering, one leg drawn under her, the other extended. Her thin shift, open at the throat, fell away from one white shoulder.

  Tim stared at her for a long moment; and then the light waked her, and she looked up and saw him. She turned on her back and stretched like a cat, yawning sleepily, smiling at him.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, in her low, half-whispering tones.

  The
word and her husky voice acted on Tim like sparks on powder. In an abrupt, explosive violence, he flung the candle blindly across the room. The flame was blown out before it struck the wall, leaving all in darkness. He lunged toward where she lay and caught Jenny’s arm, dragging her off the bed; and he cried in a hoarse and blasting madness: ‘God damn you, letting them soldiers tumble you!’

  She was on her knees, trying to rise; but he held her arm with a hard grip, shaking her to and fro so that she could get no footing. He jerked her clear of the floor and twitched her to him, gripping both her arms, shaking her so that her head was flung back and forth as though her neck were broken.

  ‘You’re no better than your ma!’ he said through grating teeth. ‘You God damned doxy, I’ll show you!’

  He set her on her feet, shifting his grip on her arms; and she found her voice in a fury to match his own. ‘I’ll kill you, saying so! Let go of me!’ ‘Men after you like dogs—and you kissing them behind every tree!’ ‘You’re after me yourself!’ she cried in a strident bitterness. Her word paralyzed him for a moment, and she laughed in his face, ‘Oh, I’ve seen you, always watching me, peeking to see what you could see, licking your lips at the sight of me! You’re worse than any of them!’

  What she said was true, and he knew it, and the knowledge drove him mad with hunger and with shame. His teeth grated. He slapped her, hard, yet still holding her with one hand.

  ‘I’ll learn you!’ he cried. She wrenched free and he plunged after her and struck at her blindly in the darkness, his hand smashing into her face. ‘I’ll flog the skin off your back!’ he said thickly. ‘You God damned whoring bitch!’ He caught her arm and leg and lifted her, carrying her through the kitchen door. She tried to cling to the jamb and he jerked her away, and holding her arm, dragging her along the floor behind him, he sprang across the room. There was an ox goad in the comer, and he found it and lashed at her with it. She scrambled to her feet, still in his grasp. The night was dark, and no light shone in the room. In that blackness she twisted to evade him, fighting in a sobbing silence, tirelessly; and under each blow her body arched as tensely as a bow, rigid with pain. He held her arm with his left hand, turning as she circled around him; and she pressed close to him to get inside the arc of his blows, and so at last she set her teeth in his hand.