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HE saw her
from the bottom of the stairs
Before she saw him. She
was starting down,
Looking back over her shoulder at
some fear.
She took a doubtful step and then undid it
To raise herself and look again. He spoke
Advancing
toward her: "What is it you see
From up there
always--for I want to know."
She turned and sank upon
her skirts at that,
And her face changed from
terrified to dull.
He said to gain time: "What is it
you see,"
Mounting until she cowered under him.
"I
will find out now--you must tell me, dear."
She, in
her place, refused him any help
With the least
stiffening of her neck and silence.
She let him look,
sure that he wouldn't see,
Blind creature; and a
while he didn't see.
But at last he murmured, "Oh,"
and again, "Oh."
"What is it--what?" she said.
"Just that I see."
"You don't," she challenged. "Tell
me what it is."
"The wonder is I didn't see at once.
I never noticed it from here before.
I must be wonted
to it--that's the reason.
The little graveyard where
my people are!
So small the window frames the whole
of it.
Not so much larger than a bedroom, is it?
There are three stones of slate and one of marble,
Broad-shouldered little slabs there in the sunlight
On the sidehill. We haven't to mind those.
But I
understand: it is not the stones,
But the child's
mound----"
"Don't, don't, don't, don't," she cried.
She withdrew shrinking from beneath his arm
That
rested on the banister, and slid downstairs;
And
turned on him with such a daunting look,
He said
twice over before he knew himself:
"Can't a man speak
of his own child he's lost?"
"Not you! Oh, where's my
hat? Oh, I don't need it!
I must get out of here. I
must get air.
I don't know rightly whether any man
can."
"Amy! Don't go to someone else this time.
Listen to me. I won't come down the stairs."
He sat
and fixed his chin between his fists.
"There's
something I should like to ask you, dear."
"You don't
know how to ask it."
"Help me, then."
Her fingers
moved the latch for all reply.
"My words are nearly
always an offence.
I don't know how to speak of
anything
So as to please you. But I might be taught
I should suppose. I can't say I see how.
A man must
partly give up being a man
With women-folk. We could
have some arrangement
By which I'd bind myself to
keep hands off
Anything special you're a-mind to
name.
Though I don't like such things 'twixt those
that love.
Two that don't love can't live together
without them.
But two that do can't live together
with them."
She moved the latch a little.
"Don't--don't go.
Don't carry it to someone else this
time.
Tell me about it if it's something human.
Let me into your grief. I'm not so much
Unlike other
folks as your standing there
Apart would make me out.
Give me my chance.
I do think, though, you overdo it
a little.
What was it brought you up to think it the
thing
To take your mother-loss of a first child
So
inconsolably--in the face of love.
You'd think his
memory might be satisfied----"
"There you go sneering
now!"
"I'm not, I'm not!
You make me angry. I'll
come down to you.
God, what a woman! And it's come to
this,
A man can't speak of his own child that's
dead."
"You can't because you don't know how.
If
you had any feelings, you that dug
With your own
hand--how could you?--his little grave;
I saw you
from that very window there,
Making the gravel leap
and leap in air,
Leap up, like that, like that, and
land so lightly
And roll back down the mound beside
the hole.
I thought, Who is that man? I didn't know
you.
And I crept down the stairs and up the stairs
To look again, and still your spade kept lifting.
Then you came in. I heard your rumbling voice
Out in
the kitchen, and I don't know why,
But I went near to
see with my own eyes.
You could sit there with the
stains on your shoes
Of the fresh earth from your own
baby's grave
And talk about your everyday concerns.
You had stood the spade up against the wall
Outside
there in the entry, for I saw it."
"I shall laugh the
worst laugh I ever laughed.
I'm cursed. God, if I
don't believe I'm cursed."
"I can repeat the very
words you were saying.
'Three foggy mornings and one
rainy day
Will rot the best birch fence a man can
build.'
Think of it, talk like that at such a time!
What had how long it takes a birch to rot
To do with
what was in the darkened parlour.
You couldn't care!
The nearest friends can go
With anyone to death,
comes so far short
They might as well not try to go
at all.
No, from the time when one is sick to death,
One is alone, and he dies more alone.
Friends make
pretence of following to the grave,
But before one is
in it, their minds are turned
And making the best of
their way back to life
And living people, and things
they understand.
But the world's evil. I won't have
grief so
If I can change it. Oh, I won't, I won't!"
"There, you have said it all and you feel better.
You
won't go now. You're crying. Close the door.
The
heart's gone out of it: why keep it up.
Amy! There's
someone coming down the road!"
"You--oh, you think
the talk is all. I must go--
Somewhere out of this
house. How can I make you----"
"If--you--do!" She was
opening the door wider.
Where do you mean to go?
First tell me that.
I'll follow and bring you back by
force. I will!--"
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