3stalwarts (143 page)

“I’ve heard tell of her,” said Dorothy. “Wasn’t there a law-court case a while ago?”

“Yes. She claimed all the land in Jerusalem was hers. All that her people had done was hers. She was a thrifty woman. And she had queer ideas. Half the time she dressed for a man. She did not hold with swearing, war, or weddens— the three curses of women she used to call them. But just the same there was plenty of children round about. It’s said she died when she was eighteen years old and her body it got repossessed of by a Jesus. She was a pretty girl in her time and men took fancies to her. She did well. It’s a queer thing.” He shook his head. “But she did preach beautifully, too. After she’d won her case in court she preached on the blessings of the faithful.”

“How did you come to win free of her?” Jerry asked curiously.

“I got interested in her niece. She called the girl her niece. A black-haired girl, Eliza. And right away Jemima put me out and married the girl to one of the old men there.”

He shook his head again.

“A queer thing, too. I went back for the girl, but she acted as if she hadn’t ever seen me.”

Dorothy began to hum under her breath to the humming of her wheel. The men’s voices dropped lower. From time to time, Mary turned her eyes on Jerry. He was leaning his elbows on the table, his jaw set in his hands, his dark eyes bright. His hair was long on his neck, in need of cutting. He was saying, “The grubbers have come in sight of Number One. Martin’s gang.”

“They’ve done considerable work west of Rome,” said Melville. “Sixteen miles. Three miles completed. It’s a strange thing to see. The banks all shaped and the towpath waiting for the horses.”

“They’re making quicker progress, Roberts says. Martin’s gang have got a plough— thin-edged and set back like a coulter— cutting the roots. They use a double of oxen. And they’ve got a contraption now that hauls down trees— a winch upon two wheels. They hitch a rope halfway up the trunk and chock the wheels and crank it down. One man cranks down a ten-inch tree.”

Hunter had put the whip on a peg beside the hearth. His eye was on it now.

“It marks the end of six-team hauling. Jerry, I’ve been thinking. I’m going out to see Colonel Rochester when hauling stops. If he will put up money, I’ve been wondering would you come in with me? To build my boats. We could be partners in a business.”

The hands of the women continued their absorption in the spinning, but their ears were alert.

Jerry looked into the fire. He spoke slowly. “I’d thought about it, too. I’d like to, maybe. But I’ve got yet a year to work for Caleb.”

Hunter nodded. “Caleb wants you to stay with him. He’s told me so.”

“It ain’t Caleb,” Jerry said. “I’d like to see this shebang finished.”

“There’s time enough. Boating won’t commence till water’s flowing. It will be some time when it gets west to Rochester.”

“What kind of a place is Rochester?” demanded Dorothy.

“It’s just a village, ma’am. But it’s on the finest water power in the westward country. There’s four mills there already and there’s room for fifty. It’s going to be a city some day.”

Dorothy’s lips compressed. She looked at Mary.

Jerry said, “I’ve planned to settle in a city when I’ve saved up money.”

Hunter laughed.

“When you get out to us, we’ll have the city started.”

Jerry nodded seriously.

“I want money. I want to have a house as fine as any man’s.”

“There’ll be money in boating.”

“I’ve got one hundred dollars in the bank, in Utica.”

The men were silent.

“There’s time enough,” said Dorothy. “There’s other things can happen to a man.”

She got up suddenly and brought a jar of pickled gooseberries. The men went on with their talk.

Then Hunter stretched himself.

“I haven’t had so nice an evening for three years.” He smiled at Mary. “Some day I hope to see you living out in Rochester, Mrs. Fowler. If I can persuade your husband.”

Mary returned the smile. Dorothy was silent. In a moment he had said good-night. Jerry went out to see him to his bed made in the barn loft.

“You ain’t told Jerry yet,” said Dorothy. “Isn’t it time you should?”

Mary seemed preoccupied as she replaced the small wheel in the corner.

“There’s no doubt to you now, is there?”

“No,” said Mary.

“He should know, I think, before he goes on making plans.”

Mary said, “I’ll tell him soon.”

She went to bed in the still warmth of the loft. She left her candle burning on the stool. Her heart was tremulous tonight. She could trace Jerry’s movement entering the house; his boots crunching through the fight, frosty snow, the opening of the door, its closing causing a flicker in the candle flame, his low voice and Dorothy’s as they banked the fire together, and their soft good-nights. He came quietly upstairs.

She watched his head come through the opening, the candle pooling in his eyes. Beyond, on the windowpanes, frost was drawing fern leaves.

“It’s getting cold,” he whispered.

She watched him take his stand beside the chair and undress swiftly. He always stripped as if it were a business to do, like work, quickly and thoroughly. He tossed the clean nightshirt over his head, and stood a mo-ment, luxuriating.

In the past months his dark, pointed face had gained a confidence— it had changed mightily from that of the self-conscious boy who bought her papers, even the eager boy who wedded her. She wondered if her own change showed to him.

He was whispering, “It smells sweet here. There isn’t any smell of men. It’s funny how men living together smell different from a man that lives with a woman. A queer thing.”

His eyes brightened suddenly; and in the instant he stooped to blow the candle out.

Mary always felt the birth of darkness in the loft in a way that she had never felt it before. She knew that wherever time might take her with her husband, darkness would be a different thing. Here it was warm with the fire and sweet with herbs; it came upon her like a downy quilt —comforting, protective, rich in quiet. Here it was full of happiness, where her being had first been opened to her. She had awakened in this darkness from a sleep that all her life had lain like a mist upon her senses.

Jerry was a part of it. The stealth of his opening the blankets; the stir of feathers under her back; the rush of air past her face bearing her own scent; his movement stretching out beside her and searching for the channel underneath her shoulders; and the slow settling down of blankets, like soft hands, on her breast, her knees, her thighs, her ankles, round her neck, until she was completely wrapped and his face came into the hollow on her shoulder.

Outside, the frost was settling on the shingle roof; in the marsh the powdery afternoon snow was fluffed with crystals and the feet of moving shrews made ladder tracks. The new moon was going down, and from it, on their velvet cloth, the facets of the stars caught pricks of light. The strange green northern lights would breathe.

Jerry said, “Do you like Hunter?”

She heard her body saying, “Yes. He’s got an honest face.” But her heart was dwelling deep inside of her, and her real hearing was turned inward.

“It would be better, beginning in a new town, Mary. A man like me would go much farther, I should think.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“It seems more likely.”

“Maybe.”

“Mary, you seem a more unspoken girl all the more I see you. Do you love me?”

“Yes.”

“Really?”

“Yes, Jerry.”

“Sometimes, lately, it seems there’s something on your mind. Is there something?”

“Something, Jerry?”

Now the stillness.

“What is it, Mary?”

“Yes. I’ll tell you, soon.”

“You aren’t unhappy?”

“No.”

She wondered why he couldn’t see, or feel? There must be difference for a hand to trace, she felt so changed.

He leaned on his elbow to kiss her. His face lingered. She felt his breath steal down her face and throat and rest upon her breast.

“Sometimes when I kiss you, Mary, your mouth tastes of milk. That’s a queer thing, isn’t it?”

He stayed half raised, thinking this queer thought. And Mary felt herself sink down in humbleness, and then her body surged and filled and her hands and her breasts and her legs were charged with life. She held her breath.

But he was saying, “Lewis is setting the cap tier tomorrow. One side’s done and I have got the gates built. Caleb’s bringing up the casted waste-gates in the morning.”

She felt his breathing close against her side.

He tried to laugh.

“I’ve got this thing in my head, I guess. I can’t get it out. If I couldn’t come down here to you, every week, I don’t know what would come of me.”

She said nothing.

“You remind me of different things. Of late, I keep remembering the barley field where we got wedded. Do you mind, he was ploughing it for barley? And that little boy fetching us trout? Some way, the minister looked troubled to me.”

His voice was whispering.

“When I go back in the morning the work seems smaller to me. Lifting is an easy thing. And the westward end don’t seem so great a way to reach.”

His hands were trembling. Her outside self became aware of his quest and she knew that she was empowered to fulfill it. But her being was still inward. This was the darkness; and she could not bear to lift it.

The rattle of wheels woke the farmhouse early the next morning. Jerry slid out of bed. The loft had the chill night smell of a sleeping house. Beyond the sash, Mary saw a faint greyness beginning in the east.

Jerry stood still, listening to the sharp slap of the horse’s hoofs.

“That’s Bourbon,” he said suddenly. “Caleb’s come with the castings.”

He reached for his clothes.

“You stay abed, Mary. He’ll want to get right out to the lock. Now he’s got up here at last, he’ll be impatient to get out there. I could have used them castings six days back.”

As he threw his shirt over his head, the wagon rattled into the yard and stopped. There was a complete silence. Then they heard the wheels squeaking slightly as the wagon jerked to the deep breathing of the horse.

“He’s wondering if I’m here,” said Jerry.

Downstairs Dorothy was getting up. At the first sound of her boots across the puncheons a mighty knocking shook the door. Dorothy crossed to the window. Laughter shook her voice.

“Just a minute, Mr. Hammil, while I decent myself a little. Robert’s out.”

“Is Jerry Fowler inside there?” bawled the contractor’s voice.

“Yes. He’s getting up.”

“Tell him to hurry up. Slug-a-bedding this way, and a whole lock to be completed! It’s terrible cold out here, Mrs. Melville. Can’t you let me in? I won’t look nowhere.”

“Just a minute, Mr. Hammil. I’ll just hike on a petticoat.” She opened the door. “There, come in. You do look cold. I’ll boil you up some tea.”

“Can’t wait, thank you.” He blew out a tremendous breath. “That cold has got me breathing like a bellows, Mrs. Melville. Just point me at your fire and I’ll have it blazing up in no time.”

“I’ll do it.”

“Jerry up?”

“Yes. I hear him moving.”

Caleb sat down before the hearth and raked open the bedded coals. Mrs. Melville dropped a stick upon them.

“By daggit! When a man like me gets cold there’s a lot of him to feel it.”

Jerry came back to the bed.

“I’m going. He’s left Bourbon unblanketed out there. Why don’t you come out to the lock this afternoon if it grows warmer? You’ve not seen it now in quite some time.”

“I will, maybe.”

She was glad to be left. She felt miserable again this morning. The cold grey dawns seemed always clutching at her. She lay still, heard Caleb’s greeting, boisterous, full of simulated anger, the door closing in the face of Dorothy’s protests, Caleb saying, in what he took to be a whisper, “Well, if I was you, and you was me, you’d have to wait a danged sight longer, boy.”

Inside Dorothy chuckled.

“The old he-sheep! He considers that he’s lusty.”

The wagon sped away.

When she went down a little later, Mary met Hunter coming from the barn.

His hands and face were ruddy from the icy washing, his leather clothes smelled strong of hay.

“Good morning, Mrs. Fowler.”

“Good morning, Mr. Hunter. It’s a cold morning.”

“It’s snappy.”

She saw his knowing eyes upon her face drop swiftly. In spite of her sickness she colored. He looked away, and let her go in peace; but when she came into the kitchen again, his eyes greeted her with half a smile.

He did not talk much, but, on leaving, his thanks touched the two women. They watched him striding off beside his chunky horses, his boot heels raising clods from the road. The bells twinkled in the sunlight and the notes were clear.

Dorothy said, “He noticed you this morning. He asked me. I told him.”

“Oh,” said Mary.

“Shucks-a-daisy, dearie. You couldn’t hide nothing in that line from that man. He’d notice things a boy like Jerry’d miss. He must have had his own high times.”

“He doesn’t look like that.”

“Why should he? He’s an honest man, and he’s handsome. There’s plenty of girls would visit with him by a fence, I reckon. Withouten even asking. Why shouldn’t he?”

Mary said nothing; and she and Dorothy began their morning tasks.

The sun shone bright all morning; all the swamp was glittering white. A few pinched clouds were hanging in the piercing blue of the sky. After noon, Mary said that she was going to walk out to the lock.

“Do you feel equal to it, dearie?”

Dorothy’s homely face was bent solicitously.

“It’s cold, you know. And I could go out with you, if you’re bound to do it.”

Mary laughed.

“I’m bound. And I feel fine now.”

“Dress warm.”

Dorothy superintended dressing. She stuffed a pair of Melville’s boots with swamp grass dried before the fire and pulled on over Mary’s feet an extra pair of woolen socks. She had forced her to dress in one of Jerry’s heaviest red suits of underwear, both of them giggling at the figure Mary made.

“Good land!” cried Dorothy. “You’re image to a boy! You’ve got no business getting big. It’s scarcely decent.”