Joyce of the North Woods. Harriet T. Comstock
common to the shrinking childhood of the poor village.
Down beside the last tree of the thicket the girl crouched with her shabby basket beside her.
The elemental woman in her saw, as clearly as any cultivated sister might have seen, that if she hoped for success in her married life, she must not throw herself upon Jude crushed and downed. A brave front must be the breastwork behind which she was to fight.
When she had told her father she was going to Isa Tate, she had spoken wildly; but the inevitable closed upon her. Every one went to Leon Tate in trouble. Leon, like the old gods, first made mad whom he wished to destroy; for the trust that all St. Angé put in Leon's bland generosity was nothing short of madness. When any difficulty arose, private or public, it was carried to the Black Cat for adjustment and final settlement. By putting every individual under deep obligation to him, Leon controlled money, loyalty and obedience. Every man in St. Angé was in his debt, and every woman had accepted, in some form or other, his wife's services. The difference between Isa and her husband was, however, vital. Tate was a friend to man in order that he might draw his victims into his net. Isa had a woman's soul hidden under her rough exterior and, while she played the part assigned her by her diplomatic lord, she found comfort for her own lonely nature in giving comfort.
Joyce, in going to Isa for protection, would in no wise interfere with her father's welcome at the tavern. Leon would arrange that, and bring about a brilliant climax for himself; at least he always had done so in emergencies.
Crouching under the tree, as the sun went down behind Beacon Hill, Joyce saw the future unfold itself. There was nothing to do but go to Isa. Then Leon would, by his subtlety, make it seem that she had come there to get ready for her marriage to Jude. He'd even arrange, perhaps, the marriage, and so clutch Jude and her closer to his power. He'd smooth the way for her father, too, and hush tongues and smile—oh, how he would smile on them all!—and no one would ever know.
The sun went down and the stars came out. Still the girl sat there; but presently a healthy appetite was the call that roused her. She had not eaten since noon of the day before. She was weak and suffering. She thought with a kind of comfort that perhaps it was hunger alone that was now causing her mental and physical agony. After she had eaten, all would be well with her. She could control Jude and her own fate. She would never let any one think—Gaston above all—that she was not mistress of her own shabby little life.
She got up dizzily, and was shocked to find how heavy the basket was; still, with a constant shifting from hand to hand, she could manage it.
Lola's giddy little lark song sprang to memory out of the ashes of her hurt and pain, and rose and rippled in the fragrant darkness as she entered the Long Meadow.
Beacon Hill stood gloomily to the west, and above it gleamed a particularly bright star. Across Long Meadow the lights in the houses flickered from open windows, and the Black Cat's glare seemed to control her motions. It drew her on and on. It was to play a part in her future as it did in the futures of all—sooner or later.
Wearily she mounted the steps of the tavern and went to the side door that opened into whatever there was of privacy in Leon's establishment. Isa was washing the supper dishes. She was a tall, gaunt woman with a kindly glance that Nature had, for a safeguard, hidden under heavy black brows.
"You, Joyce?" she said, going on with her task. "I thought maybe it was some one else."
"Isa," the girl stepped cautiously forward, "I want to tell you something."
The gathering hilarity in the tavern made this moment secure. Isa put down her dish and faced the girl.
"What?" she asked bluntly.
Quickly, breathlessly the truth, with all its hideous colouring, truth bald, and yet with a saving clause for Gaston, was whispered in Isa's ear.
When the parting with Jared was confided, the woman put her arms about the girl.
"Now you hush, Joyce, I've heard enough. This is a man's world, God help us! Us women, when we can, must cling together. Me and Tate pull in harness because we find it pays—we'll help you out—Tate in his way, me in mine, but, Lord a-mighty, don't I hope there'll be a heaven just for women, some day!
"Sit down, you poor, little haggled thing, I don't believe you've eat a morsel. You look fagged out. They ain't worth it, Joyce, men ain't. Father, husband—not one of them. But since we've got to use them, we must make out some kind of game. Here!"
She set food before the wan girl, and the readjustment of life, in her masterful hands, seemed already begun.
It was comparatively easy, later on, to go into particulars with Isa. With the roar and clatter growing hourly more deafening in the tavern, Isa and Joyce, sitting on the back porch under the calm stars, spoke freely to each other.
Isa, like a dutiful wife, had, while Joyce satisfied her hunger, confided as much of the girl's trouble to Leon as she thought advisable. Leon had recognized the opportunity as one by which to capture what was left of Jared's independence, and rose to the emergency.
"Leave it to me," he said. "Everything will be blooming to-morrow like—like a—garden—er—Eden."
So now Isa had only Joyce's sore little heart to deal with.
"Come, girl," she began at last; "tears never yet unsnarled a knot. Be you, or be you not, going to marry Jude?"
"Yes—I am." There must be no doubt upon that score and Joyce sat up stiffly and faced her helper.
"Well, then, look at the thing sensible. In a place like St. Angé, where there ain't women to spare, you either got to be a decent married woman or you ain't. Long as I've lived in St. Angé, and that's been more'n twenty years, I ain't never yet seen a comfortable, respectable, satisfied, old maid—they ain't permitted here, and you know it. In season, of course, you'd marry—that's to be looked for. It chances to be Jude—and after you get over the strangeness, he'll do as well as any other. They are all powerfully alike when they have their senses. The sameness lies in their having their faculties. The only man as was ever different in St. Angé was Timothy Drake. He got smashed on the head by a falling tree up to Camp 3, and his wits was crushed out of him. But do you know, what was left of Tim was as gentle and decent and perticerlar as you'd want to find in any human. He never drank again, never cussed nor stormed, and I've laid it by as an item, that the badness and sameness of men lies in their wits—if you want a companionable, safe man, you've got to turn to sich as are bereft of their senses—and most women is that foolhardy they prefer wits and diviltry, to senselessness and decency."
Joyce smiled feebly at this philosophy.
"You are the one to decide," Isa went on. "Now see here, girl, I ain't lived fifty years for nothing. I ain't been in and out of my neighbour's houses, in times when all the closets are open, without learning a heap about things. Men is men and there's no getting around that. So long as you can, you better let them think they amounts to something even when you own to yourself they don't. Private opinions ain't going to bring on trouble; it's only when they ain't private. Now granting that man is what we know he is—it's plain common sense to get as much out of him as you can. Make the place you live in the best thing he's got; and just so long as you can, keep yourself a little bit out of his reach—tantalize him. There ain't nothing so diverting to a man as to claw after a woman, when he's got the belief in himself that when he wants to clutch her, he can.
"I know the kind of naked feeling you've got when you sense your power with men first; but that wears off when you get your bearings and find out that it's only a shuffle in the game, anyway. Land of love! if man and woman was all, then when they came face to face with life they would get smashed; but housework tempers the matter powerfully; and man's work out among other men; and then when children come and you have to contrive and pinch, why you just plod along and don't ever get flustered. It's just the first dash of cold water in the face, child; after that all lives is pretty much the same."
Joyce had grown quieter as Isa's words droned on. It was, for all her commotion, a very humdrum thing