“How did you escape, Mrs. McAlpin? And why did you undertake this journey?”
“Mr. McAlpin was called away to England last year, to inherit an additional estate. Mamma was too ill to go, so I stayed to nurse her. I had been his body vassal for four years, and was at last a woman grown. One taste of liberty was enough. I will never be his vassal again. I decided to make this very unusual journey to elude pursuit. He’d not think of searching for me outside of the United States or Canada; least of all in the Great American Desert, whither we are bound. I mean to lose myself for good and all in Oregon.”
“And so now you are seeking a divorce?”
“Yes, sir; that is, when I reach Oregon.”
“Thousands of other women have borne far worse conjugal conditions all their lives, and died, making no outward sign, Mrs. McAlpin. Men also have their full share of these afflictions, which they bear in silence to the bitter end.”
“That is their own affair, sir. If other people choose to wear a ball and chain through life, that is their privilege. I would not do their choosing for them if I could.”
“What course would you pursue if you had children?”
“Then I suppose I should be compelled to die with my feet in the stocks. Children might have diverted my mind and helped to save my sanity, though. I’ve prayed for them without ceasing, but in vain. I’m going to a remote country, a new country, where new environments make newer and more plastic conditions. The laws of men, one-sided as they are, will divorce me after seven years.”
“And what is Scotty going to do during all this time?”