The Land of Promise: A Comedy in Four Acts (1922)

by W. Somerset Maugham

  When he had them once more in hand, Taylor turned his head slightly.

  "All right back there?" he called, without looking at her.

  She managed a "Yes."

  She had only just recovered her self-control as they drove into Winnipeg. As they drew up in front of the principal hotel, Taylor turned the reins once more over to Reggie, and, vaulting lightly from his seat, held out his hand and helped her to alight.

  "You'd better go into the ladies' parlor for a minute or two. I'm feeling generous and am going to blow Reg to a parting drink. I'll come after you in a minute and take you to the Y. W. C. A."

  "Very well."

  "Here," he called, as she turned toward the door marked Ladies' Entrance, "aren't you going to say good-by to Reg?"

  For a moment she almost lost her hardly regained self-control. To say good-by to Reg was the final wrench. She had known him in those immeasurably far-off days at home. It was saying good-by to England. She held out her hand without speaking.

  "Good-by, Miss Marsh," he said warmly, "and good luck."

  A quarter of an hour later Taylor came to her in the stuffy little parlor of which she was the solitary tenant. In silence they made their way to the building occupied by the Y. W. C. A.

  "You have money?" he asked as they reached the door.

  "Plenty, thanks."

  "Do you want me to come in with you?"

  "It isn't necessary."

  "What time shall I come for you to-morrow?"

  "At whatever time you choose."

  "Shall we say ten, then? Or eleven might be better. I've got to get the license, you know, and look up the parson."

  "Very good; at eleven."

  "Good night, Nora."

  "Good night, Frank."

  Nora's first impulse on being shown to a room was to go at once to bed. Mind and body both cried out for rest. But she remembered that she had eaten nothing since noon. She would need all her strength for the morrow. She supposed they would start at once for Taylor's farm after they were married.

  Good God, since the world began had any woman ever trapped herself so completely as she had done! But she must not think of that.

  She had not the most remote idea where the farm was. All she remembered to have heard was that it was west of Winnipeg, miles farther than her brother's. One couldn't drive to it, it was necessary to take the train. But whether it was a day's journey or a week's journey, she had never been interested enough to ask. After all, what could it possibly matter where it was; the farther away from everybody and everything she had ever known, the better.

  The sound of a gong in the hall below recalled her thoughts to the matter of supper. She went down to a bare little dining-room, only partly filled, and accepted silently the various dishes set before her all at one time. She had never seen a dinner--or supper, they probably called it--served in such a haphazard fashion.

  Even at Gertie's--she smiled wanly at the thought that since the morning she no longer thought of it as her brother's, but as Gertie's--while such a thing as a dinner served in courses had probably never been heard of by anyone but Reggie, her brother and herself, the few simple, well-cooked dishes bore some relation to each other, and the supply was always ample. Gertie was justly proud of her reputation as a good provider.

  But here there was a sort of mockery of abundance. Dabs of vegetables, sauces, preserves, meats, both hot and cold, in cheap little china dishes fairly elbowed each other for room. It would have dulled a keener appetite than poor Nora's.

  Having managed to swallow a cup of weak tea and a piece of heavy bread, she went once more to her room and sat down by the window which looked out on what she took to be one of the principal streets of the town. Tired as she still was, she felt not the slightest inclination for sleep. The thought of lying there, wakeful, in the dark, filled her with terror. For the first time in her life, Nora was frightened. She pressed her face against the window to watch the infrequent passers-by. Surely none of them could be as unhappy as she. Like a hideous refrain, over and over in her head rang the words:

  "Trapped, trapped, trapped, by your own mad temper, trapped!"

  At length, unable to bear it any longer, the now empty street offering no distraction, she undressed and went to bed, hoping for relief in sleep. But sleep would not be wooed. She tossed from side to side, always hearing those maddening words:

  "Trapped, trapped, trapped, by your own mad temper, trapped!"

  All sorts of impractical schemes tormented her feverish brain. She would appeal to the manager of the place. She was a woman. She would understand. She would do any work, anything, for her bare keep. Take care of the rooms, wait on table, anything. Then the thought came to her of how Gertie would gloat to hear--and she would be sure to do so, things always got out--that she was now doing her old work. No, she could not bear that.

  Perhaps, if she started out very early, she could get a position in some shop. There must be plenty of shops in a place the size of Winnipeg. But what would she say when asked what experience she had had? No; that, too, seemed hopeless.

  As a last resort, she thought of throwing herself on Taylor's mercy. She would explain to him that she had been mad with anger; that she hadn't in the least realized what she was doing; that her only thought had been to defy Gertie in the hour of her triumph. Surely no man since the days of the cave-men would prize an unwilling wife. She would humbly confess that she had used him and beg his pardon, if necessary, on her knees.

  But what if he refused to release her from her promise? And what if he did release her? What then? There still remained the unsolvable problem of what she was to do. Her brother had told her that positions in Winnipeg during the winter months were impossible to get. Gertie had taunted her with the same fact. She had less than six dollars in the world. After she had paid her bill she would have little more than four. It was hopeless.

  "Trapped, trapped, trapped, by your own mad temper, trapped!"

  And then more plans; each one kindling fresh hope in her heart only to have it extinguished, like a torch thrown into a pool, when they proved, on analysis, each to be more impracticable than its predecessor. And then, the refrain. And then, more plans.

  It was a haggard and weary-looking bride that presented herself to the expectant bridegroom the next morning. The great circles under her eyes told the story of a sleepless night. But nothing in Taylor's manner betrayed that he noticed that she was looking otherwise than as usual.

  While she was dressing, Nora had come to a final decision. Quite calmly and unemotionally she would explain the situation to him. She would point out the impossibility, the absurdity even, of keeping an agreement entered into, by one of the parties at least, in hot blood, and thoroughly repented of, on later and saner reflection. In the remote event of this unanswerable argument failing to move him, she would appeal to his honor as a man not to hold her, a woman, to so unfair a bargain. She had even prepared the well-balanced sentences with which she would begin.

  But as she stood with her cold hand in his warm one, he forestalled her by exhibiting, not without a certain boyish pride, the marriage license and the plain gold band which was to bind her. If these familiar and rather commonplace objects had been endowed with some evil magic, they could not have deprived her of the power of speech more effectively.

  Without a protest, she permitted herself to be led to the waiting carriage, provided in honor of the occasion. It seemed but a moment later that she found herself being warmly embraced by a motherly looking woman, who, it transpired, was the wife of the clergyman who had just performed the ceremony.

  From the parsonage they drove directly to the station.

  CHAPTER XI

  The journey had seemed endless: it was already nightfall when they arrived at the town of Prentice, where they were to get off and drive some twelve miles farther to her new home. And yet, endless and unspeakably wearying as it was, her heart contracted to find that it was at an end.

  She realized
now how comfortable, even luxurious, her trip across the Continent had been by comparison. Then, she had traveled in a Pullman. This, she learned, was called a day-coach. Her husband did everything in his power to mitigate the rigors of the trip. He made a pillow for her with his coat, bought her fruits, candies and magazines from the train-boy, until she protested. Best of all, he divined and respected her disinclination for conversation. At intervals during the day he left her to go into the smoking-car to enjoy his pipe.

  The view from the window was, on the whole, rather monotonous. But it would have had to be varied indeed to match the mental pictures that Nora's flying thoughts conjured up for her.

  The dead level of her life at Tunbridge Wells had been a curious preparation for the violent changes of the last few months. How often when walking in the old-world garden with Miss Wickham she had had the sensation of stifling, oppressed by those vine-covered walls, and inwardly had likened herself to a prisoner. There were no walls now to confine her. Clear away to the sunset it was open. And yet she was more of a prisoner than she had ever been. And now she wore a fetter, albeit of gold, on her hand.

  It had been her habit to think of herself with pity as friendless in those days; forgetful of the good doctor and his wife, Agnes Pringle and even Mr. Wynne, not to speak of her humbler friends, the gardener's wife and children, and the good Kate. Well, she was being punished for it now. It would be hard, indeed, to imagine a more friendless condition than hers. Rushing onward, farther and farther into the wilderness to make for herself a home miles from any human habitation; no woman, in all probability, to turn to in case of need. And, crowning loneliness, having ever at her side a man with whom she had been on terms of open enmity up to a few short hours before!

  From time to time she stole furtive glances at him as he sat at her side; and once, when he had put his head back against the seat and pulled his broad-brimmed hat over his eyes and was seemingly asleep, she turned her head and gave him a long appraising look.

  How big and strong and self-reliant he was. He was just the type of man who would go out into the wilderness and conquer it. And, although she had scoffed at his statement when he made it, she knew that he had brains. Yes, although his lack of education and refinement must often touch her on the raw, he was a man whom any woman could respect in her heart.

  And when they clashed, as clash they must until she had tamed him a little, she would need every weapon in her woman's arsenal to save her from utter route; she realized that. But then, these big, rough men were always the first to respond to any appeal to their natural chivalry. If she found herself being worsted, there was always that to fall back upon.

  If from some other world Miss Wickham could see her, how she must be smiling! Nora, herself, smiled at the thought. And at the thought of Agnes Pringle's outraged astonishment if she were to meet her husband now, before she had toned him down, as she meant to do. She recalled the chill finality of her friend's tone when in animadverting on the doctor's unfortunate assistant she had said: "But, my dear, of course it would be impossible to marry anyone who wasn't a gentleman."

  If by some Arabian Night's trick she could suddenly transport herself and the sleeping Frank to Miss Pringle's side, she felt that that excellent lady's astonishment at seeing her descend from the Magic Carpet would be as nothing in comparison to her astonishment in being presented to Nora's husband.

  Her mind had grown accustomed already to thinking of him as her husband; not, as yet, to thinking of herself as his wife.

  At supper time they went into a car ahead, where Frank ate with his accustomed appetite and Nora pecked daintily at the cold chicken.

  And now they were at Prentice. For some minutes before arriving, Frank, who had asked her a few moments before to change places with him, had been looking anxiously out of the window, his nose flattened against the glass. As they drew up to the station platform, he gave a shout.

  "Good! There's old man Sharp. Luckily I remembered it was the day he generally drove over and wired him."

  "What for?"

  "So that he could drive us home. He's a near neighbor; lives only about a mile beyond us. He's married, too. So you won't be entirely without a woman to complain to about me."

  "I should hardly be likely to do that," said Nora stiffly.

  "Bless your heart! I know you wouldn't: you're not that sort."

  "I hope she's not much like Gertie."

  "Gosh, no! A different breed of cats altogether."

  "Well, that's something to be thankful for."

  "This is Mr. Sharp; Sid, shake hands with Mrs. Frank Taylor."

  It was the first time that she had heard herself called by her new name. It came as a distinct and not altogether pleasant shock.

  Once again her husband lifted her in his strong arms to the back seat of the rough-looking wagon and saw to it that she was warmly wrapped up, for, although there was little or no snow to be seen at Prentice, the night air was sharply chill. She moved over a little to make room for him at her side; but without appearing to notice her action, he jumped lightly onto the front seat beside his friend.

  "Let 'em go, Sid. Everything all comfortable?" he asked, turning to Nora.

  "Quite, thanks."

  Throughout the long cold drive, they exchanged no further word. Frank and Sid seemed to have much to say to each other about their respective farms. Nora gathered from what she could hear that Sharp had played the part of a good neighbor, during her husband's enforced absence, in having a general oversight of his house.

  "You'll find the fence's down in quite a few places. I allowed to fix it myself when I had the spare time, but when I heard that you was comin' back so soon, I just naturally let her go."

  "Sure, that was right. It'll give me something to do right at home. I don't want to leave Mrs. Taylor too much alone until she gets a little used to it. She's always been used to a lot of company," Nora heard him say.

  She smiled to herself in the darkness and felt a little warm feeling of gratitude. She was right in her estimate. This man would be tractable enough, after all. His attitude toward women, which, had formerly so enraged her, was only on the surface. An affectation assumed to annoy her when they were always quarreling. How foolish she had been not to read him more accurately. For the first time, she felt a little return of self-confidence. She would bring this hazardous experiment to a successful conclusion, after all. It was really failure that she had most feared.

  But her heart sank within her once more when at last they drew up in front of a long, low cabin built of logs. Mr. Sharp had not overstated the dilapidated state of the fence. It sagged in half a dozen places and one hinge of the gate was broken. Altogether it was as dreary a picture as one could well imagine. The little cabin had the utterly forlorn look of a house that has long been unoccupied.

  "Woa there! Stand still, can't you?" said Sharp, tugging at the reins.

  "A tidy pull, that last bit," said Frank. "Trail's very bad."

  "Stand still, you brute! Wait a minute, Mrs. Taylor."

  "I guess she wants to get home."

  Taylor vaulted lightly from his seat and, without waiting to help Nora, ran up the path to the house. As she stood up, trying to disentangle herself from the heavy lap-robe, she could hear a key turn noisily in a lock. With a jerk, he threw the door wide open.

  "Wait a bit and I'll light the lamp, if I can find where the hell it's got to," he called. "This shack's about two foot by three, and I'm blamed if I can ever find a darned thing!"

  Nora smiled to herself in the darkness.

  She got down unassisted this time. Under the bright and starry sky she could see a long stretch of prairie, fading away, without a break into the darkness. A long way off she thought she could distinguish a light, but she could not be certain.

  "I'll give you a hand with the trunk," called Sharp, laboriously climbing out of the wagon. "Woa there," as the mare pawed restlessly on the ground.

  "I'll come and help you if you'll wait a b
it. Come on in, Nora."

  Nora hunted round among the numerous parcels underneath the seat until she found a meshed bag containing some bread, butter and other necessaries they had bought on the way to the station. Then she walked slowly up the path to her home.

  She had the feeling that she was still a free agent as long as she remained outside. Once her foot had crossed the threshold----! It was like getting into an ice-cold bath. She dreaded the plunge. However, it must be taken. He was standing stock-still in the middle of the room as she reached the door, his heavy brows drawn together.

  "I'm quite stiff after that long drive."

  The moment the words were out of her mouth she wished to recall them. This was no way to begin. It was actually as if she had been trying to excuse herself for not coming more quickly when she was called. His whole attitude of frowning impatience showed that he had expected her to come at the sound of his voice. His face cleared at once.

  "Are you cold?" he asked with a certain anxiety.

  "No, not a bit; I was so well wrapped up."

  "Well, it's freezing pretty hard. But, you see, it's your first winter and you won't feel the cold like we do?"

  "How odd," said Nora. "I'll just bring some of the things in." She had an odd feeling that she didn't want to be alone with him just now, and said the first thing that entered her head.

  "Don't touch the trunk, it's too heavy for you."

  "Oh, I'm as strong as a horse."

  "Don't touch it."

  "I won't," she laughed.

  He brushed by her and went on out to the rig, returning almost instantly with an arm full of parcels.

  "We could all do with a cup of tea. Just have a look at the stove. It won't take two shakes to light a fire."

  "It seems hardly worth while; it's so late."

  "Oh, light the fire, my girl, and don't talk about it," he said good-humoredly.

  On her knees before the stove, with her face as flushed as if it were already glowing, Nora raked away at the ashes. Through the open doorway she could see her husband and Mr. Sharp unfasten the trunk from the back of the wagon and start with it toward the house.