by Willa Cather
the future so cryptic and unfathomable, as that brief toast uttered
by the massive man, "Happy days!"
Mrs. Ogden turned to the host with her most languishing smile:
"Captain Forrester, I want you to tell Constance"--(She was an East
Virginia woman, and what she really said was, "Cap'n Forrester, Ah
wan' yew to tell, etc." Her vowels seemed to roll about in the
same way her eyes did.)--"I want you to tell Constance about how
you first found this lovely spot, 'way back in Indian times."
The Captain looked down the table between the candles at Mrs.
Forrester, as if to consult her. She smiled and nodded, and her
beautiful earrings swung beside her pale cheeks. She was wearing
her diamonds tonight, and a black velvet gown. Her husband had
archaic ideas about jewels; a man bought them for his wife in
acknowledgment of things he could not gracefully utter. They must
be costly; they must show that he was able to buy them, and that
she was worthy to wear them.
With her approval the Captain began his narrative: a concise
account of how he came West a young boy, after serving in the Civil
War, and took a job as driver for a freighting company that carried
supplies across the plains from Nebraska City to Cherry Creek, as
Denver was then called. The freighters, after embarking in that
sea of grass six hundred miles in width, lost all count of the days
of the week and the month. One day was like another, and all were
glorious; good hunting, plenty of antelope and buffalo, boundless
sunny sky, boundless plains of waving grass, long fresh-water
lagoons yellow with lagoon flowers, where the bison in their
periodic migrations stopped to drink and bathe and wallow.
"An ideal life for a young man," the Captain pronounced. Once,
when he was driven out of the trail by a wash-out, he rode south on
his horse to explore, and found an Indian encampment near the Sweet
Water, on this very hill where his house now stood. He was, he
said, "greatly taken with the location," and made up his mind that
he would one day have a house there. He cut down a young willow
tree and drove the stake into the ground to mark the spot where he
wished to build. He went away and did not come back for many
years; he was helping to lay the first railroad across the plains.
"There were those that were dependent on me," he said. "I had
sickness to contend with, and responsibilities. But in all those
years I expect there was hardly a day passed that I did not
remember the Sweet Water and this hill. When I came here a young
man, I had planned it in my mind, pretty much as it is today; where
I would dig my well, and where I would plant my grove and my
orchard. I planned to build a house that my friends could come to,
with a wife like Mrs. Forrester to make it attractive to them. I
used to promise myself that some day I would manage it." This part
of the story the Captain told not with embarrassment, but with
reserve, choosing his words slowly, absently cracking English
walnuts with his strong fingers and heaping a little hoard of
kernels beside his plate. His friends understood that he was
referring to his first marriage, to the poor invalid wife who had
never been happy and who had kept his nose to the grindstone.
"When things looked most discouraging," he went on, "I came back
here once and bought the place from the railroad company. They
took my note. I found my willow stake,--it had rooted and grown
into a tree,--and I planted three more to mark the corners of my
house. Twelve years later Mrs. Forrester came here with me,
shortly after our marriage, and we built our house." Captain
Forrester puffed from time to time, but his clear account commanded
attention. Something in the way he uttered his unornamented
phrases gave them the impressiveness of inscriptions cut in stone.
Mrs. Forrester nodded at him from her end of the table. "And now,
tell us your philosophy of life,--this is where it comes in," she
laughed teasingly.
The Captain coughed and looked abashed. "I was intending to omit
that tonight. Some of our guests have already heard it."
"No, no. It belongs at the end of the story, and if some of us
have heard it, we can hear it again. Go on!"
"Well, then, my philosophy is that what you think of and plan for
day by day, in spite of yourself, so to speak--you will get. You
will get it more or less. That is, unless you are one of the
people who get nothing in this world. There are such people. I
have lived too much in mining works and construction camps not to
know that." He paused as if, though this was too dark a chapter to
be gone into, it must have its place, its moment of silent
recognition. "If you are not one of those, Constance and Niel, you
will accomplish what you dream of most."
"And why? That's the interesting part of it," his wife prompted
him.
"Because," he roused himself from his abstraction and looked about
at the company, "because a thing that is dreamed of in the way I
mean, is already an accomplished fact. All our great West has been
developed from such dreams; the homesteader's and the prospector's
and the contractor's. We dreamed the railroads across the
mountains, just as I dreamed my place on the Sweet Water. All
these things will be everyday facts to the coming generation, but
to us--" Captain Forrester ended with a sort of grunt. Something
forbidding had come into his voice, the lonely, defiant note that
is so often heard in the voices of old Indians.
Mrs. Ogden had listened to the story with such sympathy that Niel
liked her better than ever, and even the preoccupied Constance
seemed able to give it her attention. They rose from the dessert
and went into the parlour to arrange the card tables. The Captain
still played whist as well as ever. As he brought out a box of his
best cigars, he paused before Mrs. Ogden and said, "Is smoke
offensive to you, Mrs. Ogden?" When she protested that it was not,
he crossed the room to where Constance was talking with Ellinger
and asked with the same grave courtesy, "Is smoke offensive to you,
Constance?" Had there been half a dozen women present, he would
have asked that question of each, probably, and in the same words.
It did not bother him to repeat a phrase. If an expression
answered his purpose, he saw no reason for varying it.
Mrs. Forrester and Mr. Ogden were to play against Mrs. Ogden and
the Captain. "Constance," said Mrs. Forrester as she sat down,
"will you play with Niel? I'm told he's very good."
Miss Ogden's short nose flickered up, the lines on either side of
it deepened, and she again looked injured. Niel was sure she
detested him. He was not going to be done in by her.
"Miss Ogden," he said as he stood beside his chair, deliberately
shuffling a pack of cards, "my uncle and I are used to playing
together, and probably you are used to playing with Mr. Ellinger.
Suppose we try that combination?"
She gave him a quick, suspicious glance from under her yellow
eyelashes and flung herself into a chair without so much as
answering him. Frank Ellinger came in from the dining-room, where
he had been sampling the Captain's French brandy, and took the
vacant seat opposite Miss Ogden. "So it's you and me, Connie?
Good enough!" he exclaimed, cutting the pack Niel pushed toward
him.
Just before midnight Black Tom opened the door and announced that
the egg-nog was ready. The card players went into the dining-room,
where the punchbowl stood smoking on the table.
"Constance," said Captain Forrester, "do you sing? I like to hear
one of the old songs with the egg-nog."
"Ah'm sorry, Cap'n Forrester. Ah really haven't any voice."
Niel noticed that whenever Constance spoke to the Captain she
strained her throat, though he wasn't in the least deaf. He broke
in over her refusal. "Uncle can start a song if you coax him,
sir."
Judge Pommeroy, after smoothing his silver whiskers and coughing,
began "Auld Lang Syne." The others joined in, but they hadn't got
to the end of it when a hollow rumbling down on the bridge made
them laugh, and everyone ran to the front windows to see the
Judge's funeral coach come lurching up the hill, with only one of
the side lanterns lit. Mrs. Forrester sent Tom out with a drink
for the driver. While Niel and his uncle were putting on their
overcoats in the hall, she came up to them and whispered coaxingly
to the boy, "Remember, you are coming over tomorrow, at two? I am
planning a drive, and I want you to amuse Constance for me."
Niel bit his lip and looked down into Mrs. Forrester's laughing,
persuasive eyes. "I'll do it for you, but that's the only reason,"
he said threateningly.
"I understand, for me! I'll credit it to your account."
The Judge and his nephew rolled away on swaying springs. The
Ogdens retired to their rooms upstairs. Mrs. Forrester went to
help the Captain divest himself of his frock coat, and put it away
for him. Ever since he was hurt he had to be propped high on
pillows at night, and he slept in a narrow iron bed, in the alcove
which had formerly been his wife's dressing-room. While he was
undressing he breathed heavily and sighed, as if he were very
tired. He fumbled with his studs, then blew on his fingers and
tried again. His wife came to his aid and quickly unbuttoned
everything. He did not thank her in words, but submitted
gratefully.
When the iron bed creaked at receiving his heavy figure, she called
from the big bedroom, "Good-night, Mr. Forrester," and drew the
heavy curtains that shut off the alcove. She took off her rings
and earrings and was beginning to unfasten her black velvet bodice
when, at a tinkle of glass from without, she stopped short. Re-
hooking the shoulder of her gown, she went to the dining-room, now
faintly lit by the coal fire in the back parlour. Frank Ellinger
was standing at the sideboard, taking a nightcap. The Forrester
French brandy was old, and heavy like a cordial.
"Be careful," she murmured as she approached him, "I have a
distinct impression that there is someone on the enclosed stairway.
There is a wide crack in the door. Ah, but kittens have claws,
these days! Pour me just a little. Thank you. I'll have mine in
by the fire."
He followed her into the next room, where she stood by the grate,
looking at him in the light of the pale blue flames that ran over
the fresh coal, put on to keep the fire.
"You've had a good many brandies, Frank," she said, studying his
flushed, masterful face.
"Not too many. I'll need them . . . to-night," he replied
meaningly.
She nervously brushed back a lock of hair that had come down a
little. "It's not to-night. It's morning. Go to bed and sleep as
late as you please. Take care, I heard silk stockings on the
stairs. Good-night." She put her hand on the sleeve of his coat;
the white fingers clung to the black cloth as bits of paper cling
to magnetized iron. Her touch, soft as it was, went through the
man, all the feet and inches of him. His broad shoulders lifted on
a deep breath. He looked down at her.
Her eyes fell. "Good-night," she said faintly. As she turned
quickly away, the train of her velvet dress caught the leg of his
broadcloth trousers and dragged with a friction that crackled and
threw sparks. Both started. They stood looking at each other for
a moment before she actually slipped through the door. Ellinger
remained by the hearth, his arms folded tight over his chest, his
curly lips compressed, frowning into the fire.
FIVE
Niel went up the hill the next afternoon, just as the cutter with
the two black ponies jingled round the driveway and stopped at the
front door. Mrs. Forrester came out on the porch, dressed for a
sleigh ride. Ellinger followed her, buttoned up in a long fur-
lined coat, showily befrogged down the front, with a glossy
astrachan collar. He looked even more powerful and bursting with
vigour than last night. His highly-coloured, well-visored
countenance shone with a good opinion of himself and of the world.
Mrs. Forrester called to Niel gaily. "We are going down to the
Sweet Water to cut cedar boughs for Christmas. Will you keep
Constance company? She seems a trifle disappointed at being left
behind, but we can't take the big sleigh,--the pole is broken. Be
nice to her, there's a good boy!" She pressed his hand, gave him a
meaning, confidential smile, and stepped into the sleigh. Ellinger
sprang in beside her, and they glided down the hill with a merry
tinkle of sleighbells.
Niel found Miss Ogden in the back parlour, playing solitaire by the
fire. She was clearly out of humour.
"Come in, Mr. Herbert. I think they might have taken us along,
don't you? I want to see the river my own self. I hate bein' shut
up in the house!"
"Let's go out, then. Wouldn't you like to see the town?"
Constance seemed not to hear him. She was wrinkling and unwrinkling
her short nose, and the restless lines about her mouth were
fluttering. "What's to hinder us from getting a sleigh at the
livery barn and going down to the Sweet Water? I don't suppose the
river's private property?" She gave a nervous, angry laugh and
looked hopefully at Niel.
"We couldn't get anything at this hour. The livery teams are all
out," he said with firmness.
Constance glanced at him suspiciously, then sat down at the card
table and leaned over it, drawing her plump shoulders together.
Her fluffy yellow hair was wound round her head like a scarf and
held in place by narrow bands of black velvet.
The ponies had crossed the second creek and were trotting down the
high road toward the river. Mrs. Forrester expressed her feelings
in a laugh full of mischief. "Is she running after us? Where did
she get the idea that she wa
s to come? What a relief to get away!"
She lifted her chin and sniffed the air. The day was grey, without
sun, and the air was still and dry, a warm cold. "Poor Mr. Ogden,"
she went on, "how much livelier he is without his ladies! They
almost extinguish him. Now aren't you glad you never married?"
"I'm certainly glad I never married a homely woman. What does a
man do it for, anyway? She had no money,--and he's always had it,
or been on the way to it."
"Well, they're off tomorrow. And Connie! You've reduced her to a
state of imbecility, really! What an afternoon Niel must be
having!" She laughed as if the idea of his predicament delighted
her.
"Who's this kid, anyway?" Ellinger asked her to take the reins for
a moment while he drew a cigar from his pocket. "He's a trifle
stiff. Does he make himself useful?"
"Oh, he's a nice boy, stranded here like the rest of us. I'm going
to train him to be very useful. He's devoted to Mr. Forrester.
Handsome, don't you think?"
"So-so." They turned into a by-road that wound along the Sweet
Water. Ellinger held the ponies in a little and turned down his
high astrachan collar. "Let's have a look at you, Marian."
Mrs. Forrester was holding her muff before her face, to catch the
flying particles of snow the ponies kicked up. From behind it she
glanced at him sidewise. "Well?" she said teasingly.
He put his arm through hers and settled himself low in the sleigh.
"You ought to look at me better than that. It's been a devil of a
long while since I've seen you."
"Perhaps it's been too long," she murmured. The mocking spark in
her eyes softened perceptibly under the long pressure of his arm.
"Yes, it's been long," she admitted lightly.
"You didn't answer the letter I wrote you on the eleventh."
"Didn't I? Well, at any rate I answered your telegram." She drew
her head away as his face came nearer. "You'll really have to
watch the ponies, my dear, or they'll tumble us out in the snow."
"I don't care. I wish they would!" he said between his teeth.
"Why didn't you answer my letter?"
"Oh, I don't remember! You don't write so many."
"It's no satisfaction. You won't let me write you love letters.
You say it's risky."
"So it is, and foolish. But now you needn't be so careful. Not
too careful!" she laughed softly. "When I'm off in the country for
a whole winter, alone, and growing older, I like to . . ." she put
her hand on his, "to be reminded of pleasanter things."
Ellinger took off his glove with his teeth. His eyes, sweeping the
winding road and the low, snow-covered bluffs, had something
wolfish in them.
"Be careful, Frank. My rings! You hurt me!"
"Then why didn't you take them off? You used to. Are these your
cedars, shall we stop here?"
"No, not here." She spoke very low. "The best ones are farther
on, in a deep ravine that winds back into the hills."
Ellinger glanced at her averted head, and his heavy lips twitched
in a smile at one corner. The quality of her voice had changed,
and he knew the change. They went spinning along the curves of the
winding road, saying not a word. Mrs. Forrester sat with her head
bent forward, her face half hidden in her muff. At last she told
him to stop. To the right of the road he saw a thicket. Behind it
a dry watercourse wound into the bluffs. The tops of the dark,
still cedars, just visible from the road, indicated its windings.
"Sit still," he said, "while I take out the horses."
When the blue shadows of approaching dusk were beginning to fall
over the snow, one of the Blum boys, slipping quietly along through
the timber in search of rabbits, came upon the empty cutter
standing in the brush, and near it the two ponies, stamping
