Part 9

"This is my case!" she cried, "If you take it up I'll never speak to you again as long as I live! I'll go over to French! I'll go over to the other side! And if you promise me now--that you won't--not say a word to him till we think it over, I tell you I'll never let Martha marry Johnnie! I'll get him to go back to college! I'll persuade him! Honestly, Cora! Bob, go and stop Johnnie! Find out where he is! Don't let him do anything!"

He obeyed. Standing at the screen door, the two women watched him hurry down the street. Emily turned her head suddenly, hearing a strange noise. Could Mrs. Benton be sniffling? Yes. Into those kingly black eyes suddenly tears came springing.

"Emily--I feel--bad about this! I'm sorry for you! I know how I felt when I saw--about Johnnie--in that paper. And it's worse for a girl!"

"Cora, honestly, I don't think Martha intends marrying Johnnie. I only wish she did!"

"You aren't worried about her, Emily?"

"Oh _yes_! I'm worried. I'm--sick--about this, Cora. Don't say a word to anyone yet! I'll tell you all about it. I'll tell you what to say to people for me--as soon as I can! I haven't had time--even to talk to her yet--since I saw it in the paper! Martha'll apologize to you, Cora; I'm sure she will!"

"Oh, don't worry about that, Emily! I know just how you feel! Haven't I cried myself to sleep often enough about that boy to understand!"

Emily had opened her red eyes in astonishment at this statement.

"You might be thankful she's a girl. I'll tell you now, Emily, since this has happened--that I've told Johnnie plainly if he doesn't settle down and do some work next term, I'll never leave him a cent. I'll leave my money to charity. I'd rather leave it to the town council to manage. When I think of the man my father was----" She spoke sniffling, wiping her eyes angrily. Emily had to comfort her.

"Oh, well, Cora, he's young yet."

"No, he isn't young. He's at least two years behind most boys. He ought to have finished college two years ago. Look at Jim Black. Look at Wilton! I tried to have a serious talk with him when he came home. If only he'd take something seriously. Why can't he take up medicine? I asked him why he wouldn't take up law and go into politics. And he said maybe he would. He said, Emily, 'Look where Landis got to by being a lawyer!'" She almost sobbed. "He meant that horrid federation of baseball clubs. He was serious about that."

"But, Cora, he is a good boy. He has a nice disposition."

"Oh yes. I know what people say. He needs it, they say, to live with me. But they never think what patience _I_ need. Emily, I'd be ashamed to tell you how much he spent last year. I don't know what to do with him. I can't threaten to take him out of college--he doesn't want to go back, anyway. He'll _have_ to go back! He's just _got_ to get his degree. And now Bob goes and encourages him. He says he'll support him!"

"Cora, Bob was just excited. He didn't mean that. He wouldn't support him a minute, really. He lost his head, really."

"Well, so did I. I acknowledge that. But it's a nice thing to have him telling me not to interfere. As if it was none of my business when my own boy married. I've got a headache, Emily. I had a bad night. He brought me my breakfast himself and was so nice about everything. And then--I was napping--he tore into the room with the paper in his hand and said he was going to get married right away--the first I'd heard of it. And he wouldn't listen to me. He acted awful. I just got up and dressed and came over this way." She made a gesture towards the old blue foulard she had slipped on. Her hair wasn't so brushed and shining as usual, and her face was lined now, and her eyes red. "I thought I ought to tell you."

"Cora, why don't you go and see a doctor in Chicago? You aren't well. You are tired out, and he oughtn't to have excited you this way. I think you ought to go home and go to bed, and I'll come over and tell you later everything Bob says to French. I'll talk to Johnnie, too. I think Bob will be sorry he said such things, Cora, when he cools down."

"He'd better cool down. The idea of him speaking to Martha that way! I felt sorry for her, and for you too, Emily. It's bad enough to have to try to raise a child without a father to interfere all the time. You've got them both on your hands to manage."

"I don't know about that!" Emily started to protest, loyally. They were standing face to face in front of the screen door, and they saw Eve drive up and come towards them. She had been crying, too. She spoke to them quietly, going into the living room. Mrs. Benton went away, and Emily came in and sat down by her, and almost at once Eve had insinuated herself into Emily's arms, crying:

"Oh, don't blame _me_ for this, Mrs. Kenworthy. I _told_ Martha this would happen. I told her as sure as she lived something like this would happen."

"Something like what? Don't cry, child!"

Bob was coming in.

"We----, I've settled Johnnie," he announced. And then he saw Eve, and the sight displeased him.

"What do you know about this?" he demanded, shortly.

"Don't blame _me_! I _did_ tell her! I told her it would happen. Maybe I didn't tell her enough."

"Enough what?"

"I mean--I didn't tell her, really, it had happened before."

"What had?" Bob scorned vagueness.

"I told her my sister was--jealous. I told her she couldn't stand that pig even looking at a woman. I told her if he did, she was sure to make a row. She's done this before."

"What has she done before?"

"Once before she got jealous--of a girl--and she threatened to--divorce him."

"You mean--she named her--as a corespondent?" Bob had no scruples about cross-examining this witness.

"She threatened to. She hadn't any case, really. Oh!" Eve cried to Emily. "You didn't like me for not liking her. You thought I--said--nasty things about her--because she was my sister. If you knew what I might have said, you wouldn't have always been looking at me that way--as if I was a sort of underbred scrub! I tell you she's despicable!"

"Oh, Eve!" Emily protested.

"What's she done?" cried Bob, eagerly.

"Oh, she's awful! Look at this dirty work. Dad'll make her apologize. I know he will, Mrs. Kenworthy. I've telegraphed for him to come home. He'll come right away. He'll think grandma's dying."

"What?" cried Bob. "What'll he do, Eve?"

"I know dad'll settle it. I know he will. She never meant to divorce him. She just wants to frighten Martha because she's got money."

"You mean---- Isn't she going to divorce him?" Bob insisted.

"No. Don't you ever think she is! Oh----" cried Eve, in bitter humiliation, as if now she was compelled to confess the worst, "Mrs. Kenworthy, she--she LOVES that pig! You Wouldn't believe it, maybe. She cries herself sick if he looks at anybody! And ever since she heard that Martha's got money she's been just wild."

"What's that got to do with it?"

An outraged parent on either side of Eve was trying to grasp the situation.

"She knows he won't--leave her, or anything, for anybody without any money. She thinks Martha's going to be awfully rich. I didn't know how much she was going to have. _I_ couldn't tell her."

Emily sat silenced by the very vileness of life. To think of Martha's money, her great-grandfather's hard-earned money, lying there accumulating through those years of her sweet childhood, to become now a factor in this--pollution of her. Pollution, pollution, said Emily to herself.

Bob demanded, suddenly, "Has she got a lot of money?"

"Only what she squeezes out of dad. She gets a lot. I don't know how much he gives her. She just bleeds him," she cried, angrily. "Look here, Mrs. Kenworthy, YOU know dad. You know what a darling he is! I get so mad at her I could just kill her, the way she treats him. You wouldn't believe it. Didn't you ever read 'King Lear'? Didn't you read _Père Goriot_? You wouldn't think there were such men in the world. But dad's just like them. He's worse. Look how he lives. He was rich when I was a little girl; he had a great business exporting flour. My grandfather had had it, and it went bust after the war. He hadn't a cent. And now look at him starting all over, knocking around from town to town, buying grain and elevators, in these filthy hotels. He never has one comfort! He never spends one cent on himself. He keeps that house--an asylum it is, for grandma. He keeps me, but I don't spend a lot of money. I'm going to work the very minute I get out of school. SHE spends it all; she comes home with a new lie whenever she's hard up. He brought her up to have a lot of money, he says. He's sorry for her. She hadn't a mother and she didn't get started right, he says. She divorced her first husband."

"She did, did she!" Bob cried.

"Yes. Of course, dad took her part in that, too. I don't know the truth of it; I was a little girl!"

"Eve," said Emily, hesitating, "I wish--you'd tell us what happened--how this happened before, if you don't mind."

"Oh, I don't mind. It was after the war. We didn't have any home at all. I was in a boarding school, and my aunt asked me there for the vacation summer. She wasn't my own aunt; she was the wife of my mother's brother. Oh, they had the loveliest house, and all just full of fun; and they were so gentle and so kind--just like you, Mrs. Kenworthy. My cousins were all grown up, and they were just lovely to me. And then my sister turned up, for a week or two, with HIM. And of course she couldn't stand one of the girls even looking at her precious pig. And there was one of those girls, the one I liked best of all, of course. And she--sort of named her--just like this, so she wouldn't get into trouble---didn't mention her name. And of course dad came and denied it--but what good did that do? All of them were furious, naturally. It's a little old town of Friends. It wasn't my fault. I've never been invited back since. People like me when they don't know my sister. But I can't get away from her any place. This'll be all over school. It'll get back to that town. I know the girls from there at college. I tell you honestly--poor dad'll feel just sick about this. And the next time she turns up with a hard-luck story he'll take it all in again. He bought them a house--a good one--because she hadn't any home--in Philadelphia. And she sold it--and went to Paris. He told me they wouldn't be here this summer, if I came out to him. He's so sentimental. He just begins talking about mother when I try to get him to kick them out I'm never going to speak to her again, or stay one night in the same house with her. You mark my words, he'll have to choose between having her or me."

"Don't you worry, Eve. Nobody's going to blame you for anything." Bob spoke kindly because her sincere little tribute to Emily had, of course, touched him. "I'll see your father about this. What time will he be here?"

"Oh, you don't need to see him. He'll do it himself. I know he will. We'll come down and see you about it. Don't say anything to hurt his feelings, will you, Mr. Kenworthy? Because it isn't his fault. He's a good, good man. I mean--he'll feel worse about this than anyone"----she looked at Emily--and added, "almost."

After she had gone, Emily roused herself.

"It doesn't seem as if that could be true, does it, Bob? How would a woman DARE to do a thing like that? She might get into trouble--sued."

"She didn't use anybody's name. If Martha hadn't--been running around with that man, this couldn't have hurt her."

"But--why, maybe she doesn't intend to divorce him at all! Eve said she didn't, didn't she?" And then Emily remembered Martha's exalted announcement. "Suppose she doesn't divorce him!" she moaned.

"Well, that'd settle it. I think I'll go downtown--as if nothing had happened. As if I didn't know who was meant. I'll go and see what Mrs. Benton's doing. I better make sure she isn't--balling it all up."

"Let her alone, Bob. She promised me not to do anything; not ANYthing. I'm sure she won't. She isn't feeling well enough to do anything. She's sick, for one thing. She isn't well enough to go downtown."

"Well, that's one piece of luck!"

"You were hard on her, Bob."

"Well, what did she want to walk in here for? Why can't she mind her own business?"

"It _is_ her business. As she said Johnnie's _her_ boy."

"I haven't got anything against that kid, Emily. But I'd hate to have her for my mother-in-law. My God! What would the boy do between those two--Martha and that woman?"

"You needn't worry about that. Martha'll never marry him now."

"What you going to do with her now, Emily?"

"I don't know."

"'Tisn't as if she had good sense!"

"Well, maybe she hasn't. But I'll tell you one thing, Bob. We're not going to have any more melodrama about turning anybody out of this house. If Martha goes out of it, I go with her. You might as well understand that. She needs me more than you do. And she's going to have me, no matter what she does. No matter who she marries. If people talk about her, they've got to talk about me."

"You don't mean that, Emily. You'd never leave me. You're just talking wild."

"I'll never leave her! That's sure."

"I guess I got sort of excited, Emily. I know this is your home. I didn't mean anything--much. I'm going to see Fairbanks. I'll do all I can, Emily. It's a dirty mess for you, that she's got herself in."

"But the worst of it is--she's in love, Bob!"

"She'll have to get over it; that's all there is to it."

It seemed so simple to Bob. Emily sat still for a minute, thinking batteredly, after he went. She was thinking that she must be careful. She would think it all over, all this sickening confusion, before she went up to talk to Martha. But Martha apparently had been listening for her father's departure. For no sooner had his car started away than she called down, eagerly:

"Mammie! Come up here."

And she met her at the top of the stairs, and they went together into Emily's room, the nearer one. Inside the door Martha came close to her mother, taking her hand, and saying, gently:

"I'm sorry I was so nasty to Mrs. Benton, mammie. I'll go and tell her so, if you want me to. You aren't really ashamed of me, are you? Mammie, now that everything's settled, will you do something for me? Will you ask him down here? Won't you try to get acquainted with him, mother? Won't you stop crying about it? You'll just love him, mother!"

They had sat down together on the bed. Emily was dazed by this beginning.

"Don't look at me that way; it isn't fair, mammie. I'll even-- Look here! I'll apologize to Johnnie, if you want me to. I suppose he meant well." And when Emily still said nothing: "Mother, if you make me, I'll even tell dad I'm sorry. But you heard what he said! You heard him tell me I HAD to marry Johnnie. You see _now_ what sort of a man he is! But if you really want me to, of course, I'll--forgive him. I don't want to make you--miserable. You'd understand, if you knew him--if you'd ask him to come down here so you could get to know him."

The child WAS crazy! To ask a thing like that! To suppose for a moment that her mother---- What shall I say to her? Emily wondered. What's the use of trying to talk to her? The gulf between them seemed to be widening every minute.

"You don't know what you're saying, child! Why, Martha----!"

"Well, what, mammie?"

"Why, he--is _married_! He isn't divorced. I don't know that he ever will be! And you ask me--NOW--to invite him----" Emily was unable to go on.

"Yes, of course he is married--in a way, mother. But that isn't anything. If you knew how unhappy he'd been with her, mammie! She isn't a nice woman. You don't call THAT any marriage, do you? Why, it's nothing but a legal contract!"

"But, Martha, a legal contract is SOMETHING--if it is only that."

"It's only the law of marriage, mother. There's no heart in it. It isn't real! It--isn't--mother--when they don't love each other."

"Eve says she does love him! _Her_ heart may be in it."

"Eve!"

"Eve doesn't think she intends to divorce him at all, Martha."

"She doesn't know anything about it." Martha lifted her head proudly again.

"Martha, tell me what you know about it. Did he tell you your name was going to be mentioned?"

"No. He didn't know that. But you needn't worry about that, mother. I consider it an honor. I don't mind it, if it gets him his freedom--if it makes him happy."

"He must have known this was liable to happen. Eve says it has happened before."

"What business is it of Eve's? She's trying to make trouble. What did she come down here for, anyway now, mother?"

What was the use of talking to this undone child?

"She says her father will stop it. He'll make her apologize."

"Stop what?"

"The divorce. Having your name in it."

"Mother!" Martha cried out, poignantly. And then she recovered herself instantly. "It doesn't matter; he'll have his freedom. He can divorce her, if she won't divorce him. Maybe she won't; it would be just like her. But, look here, mother, why can't Eve let it alone? What's she got against him? She has it in for him. She's got to let this alone."

"She was thinking of you--of us all."

"Why doesn't some one think of him? You never think of him. You never care what happens to him. You're just afraid of people talking!"

"Yes, I'm afraid of it--of people talking--about you."

"But you always understood before. You always said--Oh, I can't make you understand!" she cried, and was silent.

"Martha, if it was any other man, any unmarried man--you were--your name was--connected with, I wouldn't mind. If it was even a--married man--I--could--have any respect for, I wouldn't have cared so much. Not even if it had been the Legion! But I don't want you to--_think_ about this man, even. I don't care how much he's divorced and single! If he was a decent man, he would have come to us about this first--if he had to speak to anybody about it while he's still--bound to his wife. If he was a straightforward man, or honest, he would have asked us!"

"Mother, that's bunk! That's not fair. Whoever asks a girl's people first now? That's Victorian. You didn't even do it yourself, when you were young. You told me you went to Chicago and married dad when your aunt didn't even know where you were! Did dad ever ask your aunt first if he could marry you?"

"That's different."

"Did he, now?"

"No, he didn't. But I knew him; I knew his mother; I knew his family, and everything."

"Well, come with me to Chicago and ask him about his family," Martha pleaded. "If you think there's anything disgraceful about it, we could go to some place--some hotel--on the west side--where nobody'd have to know anything about it."

"Why, Martha Kenworthy!"

"Look here, mammie! I'm not going to quarrel with you! I've quarreled with everybody else. If you'll just try to be reasonable. I'm not asking you to promise you'll like him, or anything; I just ask you to get acquainted with him. I know you'd like him. Just hear his side of it once. You said you felt sorry for people that were unhappy--with their wives. You said you thought Mrs. Green ought to get a divorce, mother. That night Helen was here, when we were sitting on the porch. You said yourself that such a marriage wasn't anything. Mother, you always said that. You pitied other people."

"I pity Eve's sister, too."

"Yes, but why don't you pity HIM? Because you don't know him! You won't even try to get to know him. It isn't fair, mother!"

"How can I think of him? I'm thinking of you!"

"I suppose that's natural." Martha was determined to be conciliatory. She searched about for some effective argument. "Mammie," she said, lovingly, "you just look tired out. I just hate to see you worrying this way. Especially when you don't really need to. Mammie, do you want me to go now to Mrs. Benton's?"

"No, no! Wait a little; wait till--Mr. Fairbanks gets home."

"What's he got to do with it?"

"Eve says--he'll take your name out of it."

"My name wasn't in the paper."

"Eve said--if she really meant to--go on with it--she could name some one else--if she needed to."

"That's just like Eve to say that." Martha left the room with dignity.

And Emily sat on her bed, too stunned to change her position. All her life her lazy body had turned away from emotional necessities. She had never been able to get really angry without feeling physically exhausted afterwards. And now she couldn't think clearly. She was conscious only of horror--of the pain of fear. Martha wasn't going to be happy. Martha was going to suffer over this. Martha was running eagerly, irrevocably, into the arms of tragedy. Surely this couldn't have happened to HER child--to that good little, sweet, dear child who had always been just pure joy. She sat there crying out against the truth--she sat there, not moving--groping about---praying to Fate.

She sat there till Martha came in again, fresh and beautiful from her bath. She gave a little cry of protest, catching sight of her mother.

"Don't sit there that way. Don't look that way, mammie. The world isn't coming to an end because of any old dirty newspaper." She stroked her mother's head entreatingly. And then she said--the foolish child--"It's really beginning, if you look at it right." Again her voice quivered with its ecstasy. She stood trying to coax Emily. "You lie down awhile, mother. And go and wash your face. Shall I bring you some water? Do you mind, mammie, if I go and play golf?"

"Yes, I do. Wait, Martha, until Mr. Fairbanks comes back--until it's settled."

"All right, if you'd rather. Is there anything you want me to do for supper?"

Supper! What was supper? The details of ordinary life seemed to have faded into nothing.

"I think everything is--ready," Emily murmured, getting up.

Martha came upstairs after a little while.

"Mr. Fairbanks is downstairs, mammie. He wants to see us all. Mammie, don't!" She thought better of protesting against her mother's expression. "Go and wash up; put on something. I'll 'phone dad."

Emily, bestirring herself, heard Martha at the upper 'phone saying to Bob that her mother wanted to see him a minute. She refrained from mentioning Mr. Fairbanks' name. Her voice suggested anything but scandal and tears. She waited in her mother's room, and when Emily would have gone down she urged her to wait till Bob came. Emily was too tired to protest, and went down with Martha only when they heard the car arrive.

She looked at Eve's father with intensified curiosity, since he was the man who seemed to hold Martha's destiny carelessly in his hand. His appearance flatly denied his daughter's account of him. Could a red-faced, hawk-nosed, round-chinned, jovial-looking bald-head be a cursing Lear or a bleeding Goriot? He was extremely well dressed. His rotundity suggested pleasure in steaks and chops. His voice belied his appearance as surprisingly as his daughter had. For when he began to speak--he remained standing, and he kept stroking the back of his shiny head---Emily immediately thought he must be a man of extraordinary reserve, of powerful self-control. "Martha must respect what he says!" she thought. "He CAN help us."