Complete Works of Kate Chopin

by Kate Chopin

  “Go on,” he said, when they were ready to start.

  “Come,” said Suzima, making room for him in the wagon.

  “Go on,” he told her again. She thought that he would follow, taking a cut through the woods, as he often did. The wagon moved slowly away; the boy stayed leaning on his elbow, picking at the grass.

  He had always supposed that he could live in the world a blameless life. He took no merit for he could not recognize within himself a propensity toward evil. He had never dreamed of a devil lurking unknown to him, in his blood, that would some day blind him, disable his will and direct his hands to deeds of violence. For he could not remember that he had willed. He knew that he had seen black and scarlet flashes before his eyes and he was conscious of an impulse which directed him to kill. He had as good as committed a crime for which they hang men. He stayed picking at the grass. An overwhelming confusion of thoughts, fears, intentions crowded upon him. He felt as if he had encountered some hideous being with whom he was not acquainted and who had said to him: “I am yourself.” He shrank from trusting himself with this being alone. His soul turned toward the refuge of spiritual help, and he prayed to God and the saints and the Virgin Mary to save him and to direct him.

  A mile or more back on the road they had passed an imposing structure built upon a hill. A gilded cross surmounted the pile. There were vineyards covering the slope, gardens and flowers and vegetables, highly and skillfully cultivated. The boy had noticed, when he passed, black-robed figures at work among the vines and in the meadow down along the fence.

  The boy arose from the ground and walked away. He did not follow in the direction of the wagon. He turned and walked toward the building on the hill surmounted by a gilded cross.

  X

  Brother Ludovic was so strong, so stalwart, that the boys of the institution often wished he might be permitted to give an exhibition of his prowess or to enter a contest of some sort whereby they might shine in the reflected honor of his achievements. Some said it all came of sleeping with open windows, winter and summer, because he could not abide the confinement of four walls. Others thought it came of chopping trees. For when he wielded his axe, which was twice the size of any other man’s, the forest resounded with the blows. He was not one to dilly-dally about the grape vines or the flower beds, like a woman, mincing with a hoe. He had begun that way, they told each other, but he was soon away in the forest felling trees and out in the fields breaking the stubborn lands. So he had grown to be the young marvel of strength who now excited their youthful imaginations and commanded their respect. He had no mind for books, so they had heard — but what of that! He knew by name every bird and bush and tree, and all the rocks that are buried in the earth and all the soil that covered them. He was a friend of all the seasons and all the elements. He was a hero of the wood, to the vivid imagination of the young.

  In reality he was still a youth, hardly past the age when men are permitted to have a voice and a will in the direction of government of the state. There was a stubborn growth of beard upon his face, which he shaved clean every morning and which wore the purple shadow again before night.

  He often felt that he had been born anew, the day whereupon he had entered the gate of this holy refuge. That hideous, evil spectre of himself lurking outside, ready at any moment to claim him should he venture within its reach, was, for a long time, a menace to him. But he had come to dread it no longer, secure in the promise of peace which his present life held out to him.

  The dreams of the youth found their object among the saintly and celestial beings presented to his imagination constantly, and to his pious contemplation. The bodily energy of youth spent itself in physical labor that taxed his endurance to the utmost. By day he worked, he studied, he assisted in the guidance and instruction of boys.

  At night he slept a sleep of exhaustion, complete oblivion. Sometimes, at the approach of dawn, when his slumber lightened, some disturbing vision would weave itself into a dream to fool his fancy. Half asleep, half waking, he roamed the woods again, following, following, never overtaking a woman — that one woman he had known — who lured him.

  “Come, come on!” she would say while the white-topped wagon drew her always further and further away, out of his reach. But he knew a prayer — a dozen prayers — which could dispel any trick that a dream might put upon him.

  XI

  Brother Ludovic had a great fancy, all his own, and one whose execution he was permitted to undertake. It was to build, with his own hands, a solid stone wall around the “Refuge.” The idea had come to him like an inspiration, and it took hold of his imagination with the fixedness of a settled purpose in life. He was in a fever till he had begun his work: hauling the stones, laying them in position, binding them firm with sand and mortar. He liked to speculate upon the number of years that it would take him to complete the task. He liked to picture himself an old man, grown feeble with age, living upon this peaceful summit all enclosed by the solid stone wall built with the strength of his youth and manhood.

  The Brothers were greatly interested and at the outset would collect together during the hours of recess, in small bands, and crossing vineyard and meadow, would repair to the scene of his labor.

  “You’ll not be telling me it’s yourself that lifted the stone, Brother Ludovic?” and each would take turn in vain attempt to heave some monster which the younger man had laid in position. What would Brother Ludovic have done by the end of the year? was a never failing source of amiable controversy among them all. He worked on like the ant.

  XII

  It was a spring day, just such another day as when he had first entered at the gate. The breeze lashed his gown about his legs as he quitted the group that had assembled after dinner to take their customary exercise around the brick-paved walk.

  “It’s a prison he’ll be putting us in, with his stone wall!” called out a little jovial Brother in spectacles. Brother Ludovic laughed as he walked away, clutching at his hat. He descended the slope, taking long strides. So nearly perfect was his bodily condition that he was never conscious of the motion of limb or the movement of muscle that propelled him.

  The wheat was already high in the meadow. He touched it with his finger-tips as he walked through, gathering up his narrow skirt as far as the knees. There were yellow butterflies floating on ahead, and grasshoppers sprang aside in noisy confusion.

  He had obtained permission to work the whole afternoon and the prospect elated him. He often wondered whether it were really the work which he enjoyed or the opportunity to be out in the open air, close to the earth and the things growing thereon.

  There was a good bit of wall well started. Brother Ludovic stood for a while contemplating with satisfaction the result of his labor; then he set to work with stone and mortar and trowel. There was ease in his every movement and energy in the steady glow of his dark eyes.

  Suddenly Brother Ludovic stopped, lifting his head with the mute quivering attention of some animal in the forest, startled at the scent of approaching danger. What had come over him? Was there some invisible, malicious spirit abroad, that for pure wantonness had touched him, floating by, and transported him to other times and scenes? The air was hot and heavy, the leaves were motionless upon the trees. He was walking with aching limbs down a grassy incline, leading the mules to water. He could hear soft splashing at the pool. An image that had once been branded into his soul, that had grown faint and blurred, unfolded before his vision with the poignancy of life. Was he mad?

  The moon was shining, and there was a valley that lay in peaceful slumber all bathed in its soft radiance. A white-topped wagon was creeping along a white, stony road, in and out of the shadows. An iron pot scraped as it swung beneath.

  He knew now that he had pulses, for they were clamoring, and flesh, for it tingled and burned as if pricked with nettles.

  He had heard the voice of a woman singing the catchy refrain from an opera; the voice and song that he heard sometimes in dreams, w
hich vanished at the first holy exhortation. The sound was faint and distant, but it was approaching, coming nearer and nearer. The trowel fell from Brother Ludovic’s hand and he leaned upon the wall and listened; not now like a frightened animal at the approach of danger.

  The voice drew nearer and nearer; the woman drew nearer and nearer. She was coming; she was here. She was there, passing in the road beneath, leading by the bridle a horse attached to a small, light wagon. She was alone, walking with uplifted throat, singing her song.

  He watched her as she passed. He sprang upon the bit of wall he had built and stood there, the breeze lashing his black frock. He was conscious of nothing in the world but the voice that was calling him and the cry of his own being that responded. Brother Ludovic bounded down from the wall and followed the voice of the woman.

  A MENTAL SUGGESTION

  I

  “When you meet Pauline this morning she will be charming; she will be quite the most attractive woman in the room and the only one worthy of your attention and consideration.”

  This was the mental suggestion which Don Graham brought to bear upon his friend Faverham as the two were making their morning toilet together. Graham was a college professor, a hard working young fellow with a penchant for psychic research. He attended hypnotic seances and thereby had acquired a hypnotic power by no means trifling, which he sometimes exercised with marked success, especially upon his friend Faverham. When Faverham, getting up in the morning discovered that his black sack coat had assumed a vivid scarlet hue, he did not lament the fact or hesitate to put it on and present himself in public wearing so conspicuous a garment. He simply went to the telephone and rang up Graham:

  “Hello! there — you blamed idiot! Stop monkeying with my coat!” Sometimes the message ran:

  “Hello! This is the second morning I have n’t been able to stand my bath— “ or “here’s my coffee spoiled again! By thunder! I want this thing to stop right here!” Whereupon a little group of professors at the other end of the “phone” would be moved by a current of gratification hardly to be understood by those who have never known the success of a scientific demonstration.

  Faverham himself was not a hard worker. With plenty of money and a good deal of charm, he dispensed both lavishly and was a great favorite with both women and men. There was one privilege which he assumed at all times; he persistently avoided people, places and things which bored him. One being among others on earth who thoroughly bored Faverham, was Pauline, the fiancée of his friend Graham. Pauline was a brown little body with fluffy hair and eye glasses, possessed of an investigating turn of mind and much energy of manner in the pursuit of mental problems. She “went in” for art which she studied with a scientific spirit and acquired by mathematical tabulation. She was the type of woman that Faverham detested. Her mental poise was a rebuke to him; there was constant rebuff in her lack of the coquettish, the captivating, the feminine. He supposed she and Graham were born for each other and he could not help feeling sorry for his friend. Needless to say Faverham avoided Pauline and, so far as his instinctive courtesy permitted, snubbed her.

  He and his friend were down at Cedar Branch where a number of pleasant and interesting people were spending the month of October.

  On that particular October Monday morning, Graham was returning to his engagements in the city and Faverham meant to stay on at the Branch so long as he could do so without being bored. There were a number of jolly, congenial girls who contributed somewhat to his entertainment, and beside the fishing was good; so were the bathing and driving.

  As Graham stood before the mirror tying his cravat, the disturbing thought came to him that his little Pauline would have a dreary time during his two weeks’ absence. With the exception of a German lady who collected butterflies and stuck pins through them, there was not a thoroughly congenial soul to keep her company. Graham thought of the driving, the sailing, the dancing in all of which Faverham was the leading and moving spirit and the temptation came to him to silently utter the suggestion which would convert Pauline from an object of indifference in Faverham’s eyes to a captivating young woman. Under some pretext he approached and laid his hand upon Faverham who was lacing his boot. “When you meet Pauline this morning at breakfast she will be charming; she will be quite the most attractive woman in the room and the only one worthy of your attention and consideration.”

  There were a number of people assembled in the large dining room when Graham and Faverham entered. Some were already seated while others were standing chatting in small groups. Pauline was near a window reading a letter, absorbed in its contents which she hastened to communicate to her friend, after a hurried and absent-minded greeting. The letter was from an art-dealer, and all about a certain “example of Early Flemish” which he had obtained for her. Pauline was collecting facsimiles of the various “schools” and “periods” of painting with the precision and exactitude which characterized all her efforts. The acquisition of this bit of “Early Flemish” which she had been pursuing with unusual activity, settled her into a comfortable condition of mind.

  Graham sat beside her and they brought their heads together and chatted psychology and art over their oatmeal. Faverham sat opposite. He kept looking at her. He was talking to the Tennis-Girl next to him and listening to Pauline.

  “Miss Edmonds,” he said abruptly, leaning forward so as to arrest her attention, “you must have Graham bring you around to my apartments when we’re all in town again. I have a few pieces by the Glasgow men which I picked up last summer in Scotland and a bit of Persian tapestry that seems like a Hornel with the color toned down. Perhaps you would like to look at them.”

  Pauline flushed with surprise and pleasure. The Tennis-Girl drew back and stared at him. The Golf-Girl threw a pellet of bread at him from the far end of the table and Graham smiled and chuckled inwardly and took some mental notes.

  Faverham maintained a lively conversation with Pauline across the table during the entire repast, while inwardly he was thinking:

  “How wonderfully that soft brown suits her complexion and eyes! And what very sweet eyes she has behind those glasses. What depth! what animation! Could any thing be more captivating than that unstudied, spontaneous manner? and what a bright intelligence! By Jove! it puts a fellow on his mettle.” Graham had reason to congratulate himself upon the success of his experiment.

  Great was his astonishment however upon leaving table to see Faverham saunter away in company with the Tennis-Girl, evincing no particle of further interest in Pauline.

  “How is this?” thinks Graham. “Ah-ha! to be sure! I suggested that he should think Pauline charming and captivating when he met her at breakfast. I must renew and qualify the suggestion.”

  When he went away, carrying his valise and things, Pauline accompanied him to the gate which was a good stretch from the big, rambling house. He maintained a peculiar and rigid silence as they strolled down the gravel path that was already covered with fallen leaves. Pauline looked questioningly up at him.

  “I wish, dear,” he said, “you would abandon your thought to me; project all your mental energy into mine and let it follow and help the direction of my suggestion.” The Golf-Girl might have doubted the sanity of such a speech; not Pauline; she was used to him. As he withdrew to go and shake hands with Faverham who was near-by, she converted her mind, so far as she was able, into a vacuous blank, abandoning it to his intention. The mental suggestion which Graham rapidly formulated as he held Faverham’s hand, ran somewhat in this wise:

  “Pauline is charming, intelligent, honest, sincere. She has depths in her nature that are worth sounding.” He and the girl then walked silently together down to the gate and parted there with a mute pressure of hands.

  He looked back as he went down the road. Pauline had turned and was regaining the house. Faverham had abandoned the tennis group and was crossing the lawn to join her. Graham took some fresh mental notes and patted himself metaphorically upon the back.

  I
I

  In a letter which Pauline wrote a few days later to Graham, she said: “I have not yet begun my notes on the Renaissance and I should have finished them by now! I deserve a scolding and hope you will not spare me. The truth is, I have been an idle girl and am quite ashamed of myself. You must have asked your friend Mr. Faverham to pay me a little attention. Were you afraid I should be bored? It was a misdirected kindness, dear, for he causes me to waste much time; he wanted to read Tennyson to me this morning out under the big maple when I had gone to begin those everlasting notes! I prevailed upon him to substitute Browning. I had to save something from this wreck of time! He is a delightful reader; his voice is mellow and withal intelligent, not merely musical. He was amazed at the beauty, the insight, the philosophy of our dear Browning. ‘Where have you been?’ I asked him in some surprise. ‘Oh! in good company,’ he avowed, ‘but will you take me on a voyage of discovery and make me acquainted with the immortals?’ But enough — If you have not yet seen Lilienthal about the Tintoretto” &c &c.

  After a short interval she wrote:

  “I am growing frivolous. I positively danced last night! You did not know I could dance? Oh! but I can; for I learned some pretty steps two winters ago when our ‘Manners and Customs’ class took up the history of dancing.”

  It was a week later that she said in a letter:

  “I am distrustful of pleasures and emotions which reach one through other than intellectual channels. I received a singular impression a night or two ago. The evening was warm for October, and as there was a big, bright moon shining, Mr. Faverham, who had taken me for a sail, ventured to remain out longer than his usual hour for turning in. It was very late and very still. There was not a sound but the lapping of the little wavelets as the boat cut through the water, and the occasional flapping of the sail. The aromatic odor of the pines and firs wafted to us from the shore was very acute. I someway felt as if I were some other one, living in some other age and some other place. All that has heretofore made up the substance of my life seemed far away and unreal. All thought, ambition, energy had left me. I wanted to stay there forever upon the water, drifting, drifting along, not caring — I recognize that the whole experience was sensuous and therefore to be mistrusted.”