the next day after shippen’s visit helen went into shannon to make some purchases and to make sure of the amount of her balance at the bank.
when she stepped from the car in front of brim’s general merchandise store, it was as if she had stepped into a foreign land. the street, all things about her, were so familiar that she only remembered afterwards the strangeness of familiar faces. two men whom she knew passed her with their eyes down. a woman regarded her with furtive curiosity and returned her salutation with the briefest bow, as if she did not really know her. all this happened so quickly that she was not yet aware that something very personal to her was happening.
she was still off her guard when mrs. flitch sailed by her between the lace and stocking counter, merely giving her an eye-for-an-eye look, but with no further recognition, although helen had wished her a “good afternoon, mrs. flitch.” she disposed of this hint by wondering what she had done to mrs. flitch, because this lady was notoriously[226] sensitive. she had a turgid temper and reserved the right to show her poverty and independence on the slightest provocation by ceasing to speak to you.
half an hour later when she came out to her car, a cold rain was beginning. she saw mrs. shaw approaching with no umbrella to protect her new spring hat. she waited, meaning to pick her up and take her wherever she should be going. but when she hailed her, this lady affected not to understand. she bowed coldly with the rain in her face and said, “good afternoon, mrs. cutter,” although she had always called her “helen,” and passed on.
it is depressing to find yourself suddenly outlawed by the people whom you have always known. helen was never popular in shannon. unhappy people rarely ever are. they have so little to contribute to the common fund of human animation. but she had a certain standing in the good will of her neighbors.
it was not until she reached the bank that the explanation of what was going on really dawned upon her. she had known that it must come, this news of her abandonment by her husband, but she had not expected it to fall upon her like a curse.
arnold, who occupied the chair at the president’s[227] desk inside the doorway of the bank, having resumed this custom of the elder cutter, had always risen to meet her when she came in. he would conduct her to the chair near his desk and attend personally to her affairs, if it was no more than the cashing of a check. this morning he was at his desk as usual. so was the extra chair, and nobody in it, but beyond a glance and a bow he took no notice of her. she went on to the cashier’s window and presented a check. she was startled to see him glance at it, then step swiftly back to the bookkeeper and make eye sure of her balance before he cashed it.
she took the bills, thrust under the wicket and stared about her confused. she had lost prestige here. why? she wondered. she had spent the money left from her mother’s estate on the house, and a few thousands besides. but she was amply supplied with funds. she had never overdrawn her account.
silly reflections! childish defense against this financial coldness! if arnold had known that she still had securities to the amount of considerably more than one hundred thousand dollars in her safety deposit box, his manner would have continued balmy. but he did not know this. he only knew that she was spending a great deal of[228] money. and he had dined with shippen the previous evening.
shippen had told him that she was separated from her husband. when he expressed surprise, shippen expressed regret that he had “let the thing out”; he supposed the facts were already known in shannon, he said.
arnold assured him to the contrary. he said that he had had a “hunch,” because he was subject to hunches as a financial man; but he had rather expected cutter himself to fail. he had never entertained the slightest suspicion of mrs. cutter. how long had she been separated from her husband?
shippen replied that he did not know; but he had thought probably some time before cutter resigned from the presidency of the shannon bank and took up his residence in new york.
arnold said he thought it must have occurred quite recently, because mrs. cutter had been with her husband in new york for at least five months. in fact, she had only returned to shannon late in january.
“i am associated with cutter. i see him every day. i am constantly in his home, a bachelor apartment, and i positively know that his wife has never been in the place,” shippen replied.
[229]“but i tell you she left here soon after cutter did, and she did not return until about two months ago,” arnold insisted, round-eyed with amazement.
shippen closed his lips grimly, implying that these were the lips of a gentlemen. a woman scorned may be dangerous, but a man defeated can be meanly revengeful. shippen was reacting, after the manner of his kind, from the disgust he now felt toward this innocent woman.
no, he answered in reply to arnold’s next question, there had been no divorce yet, though he had reason to believe cutter would be glad to get one.
“cutter!” arnold exclaimed.
shippen nodded; then after a pause he added: “my impression is that mrs. cutter will not be the one to bring the suit, if it is ever brought.”
“but he—man, do you know what you are saying about that woman?” arnold exclaimed.
“i am saying nothing about her. i have seen something of her. i paid her a visit this afternoon, in fact; but—”
“you know her?”
“since 1914,” he nodded.
a silence followed this news. men know one another. arnold knew shippen. he sat now staring at the tablecloth. it was his duty, but he[230] would be sorry to tell his wife. she liked mrs. cutter. also, it was his duty to see that the bank was secure in its dealings with her. until this moment he would have advanced her any reasonable sum. he would warn lambkin in the morning to keep an eye on her balance. a woman like that had very few financial scruples, and no sense of the future. they usually lived by the day. still, this fellow shippen might be mistaken. arnold had been a resident of shannon only a few years, but he had inferred that mrs. cutter was devoted to her home and husband, an ordinary woman, good looking but not attractive. he would have sworn she was not attractive. she had never attracted him and in a discreet way he had a man’s eye.
he accompanied shippen to his train; then he went home and told mrs. arnold.
she was indignant. she said she did not believe a word of it. later, mrs. shaw came in to borrow some yarn for a sweater she wished to finish that evening. she got the yarn, and this story about mrs. cutter.
she agreed with mrs. arnold that in her opinion there was not a word of truth in it. still they speculated about how and where helen had spent[231] those five months when she was not in shannon nor with her husband in new york.
we may live above reproach, but few of us live above suspicion of one sort or another. it is the active character-sketching faculty we all have for drawing real or imaginary likenesses of each other’s secret faces. women are especially felicitous in this art, once they get the suggestion. they rarely originate the idea. the most damaging gossip we ever hear descends to us almost invariably from men. they whisper it to us; we tell it and get more credit for authorship than we deserve.
thus mr. arnold had repeated to his wife what shippen had told and intimated about the cutters. it is not in the nature of any woman to retain such stuff. she must expel it. therefore mrs. arnold told mrs. shaw.
and so the news flew, until the town was posted with it by the time helen descended into it the next afternoon.
it is one thing to suffer a great humiliation in secret, and quite another thing to read it in the eyes of every familiar face. helen understood that her secret was out at last. nothing else could account for the manner of the various[232] people whom she met. she had known, of course, that it could not be kept; but she had hoped she might have had a little more time to protect herself with the one defense she had planned.
her lips were trembling when she came out of the bank and entered the car. “drive out the river road,” she said.
buck glanced back, startled by some emotional quality in her voice, which was usually a smooth and literal-speaking voice. he was much more surprised by the order she had given, for the rain was coming in rattling gusts on the march winds and the river road would be “slick as glass.” still, he took it, the big limousine reeling and sliding.
helen sat as if she had been flung into the corner of the seat. she stared through the streaming window at the turgid river. she remembered every tree and slope of its banks, although years had passed since she had been on this road. sometimes, when all is ready, when we have survived and are about to live, the power of hope fails and the vision fades. helen passed into this coma of defeat. how was she to face these looks, this knowledge, this judgment in the eyes of the people of shannon for years and years? could anything ease this pain? what could she[233] love enough to make her indifferent to this perpetual publicity? after all, would it not be wiser to give up everything and go away?
the old foundry loomed desolately in the distance, drenched in rain, the bare boughs of the trees whipping against it. the great doorway seemed to yawn darkness. nothing green now, no brightness! how long ago since in the shadow of this door she had said her prayers to love and listened to george’s vows. she remembered everything—the yellow primroses at their feet, the blue wings of a bird suddenly spread in flight over their heads, the fresh, sweet smell of thyme and george’s face bent above her in passionate tenderness.
the world had passed away since then! how could she bear this? it was loneliness. she had been dying of loneliness for months. she had never been out of pain, not for a moment; she knew this now. she wanted her husband—nothing else! tears filled her eyes; she caught back a sob. for an instant her mind held one image, that of the man whom she had loved and married; one thought, the whole thought of him, a reeling picture of the years filled with only her devotion to him.
then the wind and tide in her breast died away.[234] the color faded from her cheeks. all that had failed. she shivered, sat up, astounded that she could suffer like this for a man who had abandoned her.
we are not the only ones who fail, my masters. sometimes the very will of god fails too. a world slips, waggles in its orbit, and goes rocketing, catching the light of a thousand suns as it falls and falls forever through space.
when they were directly below the foundry, buck halted.
“why do you stop here? go on,” she commanded sharply.
“miss helen, we can’t,” he protested. “they ain’t no bottom to this road out yonder. folks don’t go no farther’n where we is now.”
there was a moment’s suspense while the motor purred and he waited, by no means enthusiastic about driving in this storm.
“very well; we will turn back,” she said in a queer voice. she was thinking about this road with no bottom in it beyond the place where so many lovers came to plight their troth.
half an hour later, the disgruntled buck had taken his mud-spattered car to the garage, and helen was still standing on the veranda of her house, looking out over her small world.
[235]the rain had passed like a silver veil over the hills. the clouds, split by this march wind, were rolling back like huge wagon covers. the grass was beginning to show a misty green on the lawn. pink petals of peach blossoms, blown from the orchard behind the house, lay in rifts above it. the flowering shrubs, massed on either side of the driveway, were budding. the elm trees were shaking their beards of bloom. the last rays of the setting sun made all the windows of her house flame with golden light.
she could not leave this place; this was her house and her world. every bloom to be was so sweetly foretold to her in this warm air. she could not give it up. there must be something to live for and love. she suffered most from the breaking of this habit of loving. and the shock she had of discovering that she still loved her husband disturbed her more than the possible attitude shannon might assume toward her. she was that far from suspecting, you understand, the imaginary activities of gossips who are never contented with the bare facts, but must invent explanations of these facts according to their fancies.
well, she decided, she would not go away. she would hold to her original plan for happiness.[236] surely there must be peace and joy in love you nurtured yourself.
then she turned and paced slowly the length of the veranda. her step changed to increasing swiftness as she came back from the far end, her face also. she looked as she might have looked if flames enveloped her, and she was flying through the wind, a wildness and horror in her eyes.
she dashed into the house, caught sight of the maid in coming up the hall, who halted abruptly at this sudden vision of her mistress.
“charlotte, get my things ready. pack my trunk. i am leaving on the early morning train,” helen exclaimed as she brushed past her and disappeared into her room.
