"But," I said, "I cannot understand such a condition of things. Was there no law in the land? no succor in the society about you? How could other women hold still, and know that a young creature like you was being tortured in that way?"
"The inertia of women in each other's defense is immense," returned Mrs. Greyfield, in her most incisive tone. "You must not forget that Portland was then almost a wilderness, and families were few, and often 'far between.' Among the few, my acquaintances were still fewer; for I had come among them poor and alone, and with all I could do to support myself, without time or disposition to visit. The peculiar circumstances I have related to you broke my spirit and inclined me to seclusion. However, I did carry my evidence, and my story together, to two or three women that I knew, and what do you suppose they said? That I 'should have thought of all that before I married!' They treated it exactly as if, having gone through the marriage ceremony, I was bound, no matter how many wives Mr. Seabrook had back in Ohio."
"They could not have believed your story," I said; not being able to take in such inferior morality.
"What they believed I do not know: what they said I have told you. I incline to the opinion that they thought I might be a little daft—I am sure I must have looked so at times, from sheer sleeplessness and exhaustion. Or they thought I had no chance of establishing the truth, and would be better off to submit quietly. At all events, not one encouraged me to resist Mr. Seabrook; and to overflow my cup of misery, he contrived to find the important letter, which I had hidden, and destroy it."
"Did you never go to men about your case, and ask for assistance?"
"At first I was afraid to appeal to them, having had so many unpleasant experiences; and when I at last was driven to seek counsel, I was too late, as I before explained."
"Too late?"
"Yes; I mean that the idea of my being Mr. Seabrook's wife was so firmly seated in their minds that they could not see it in any other light. The fact of my having written and received a letter did not impress them as of any consequence. You will find this to be a truth among men; they respect the sense of ownership in women, entertained by each other; and they respect it so much that they would as soon be caught stealing, as seeming in any way to interfere with it. That is the reason that, although there is nothing in the wording of the marriage contract converting the woman into a bond-slave or a chattel, the man who practices any outrage or wrong on his wife is so seldom called to account. In the eyes of these men, having entered into marriage with Mr. Seabrook, I belonged to him, and there was no help for me. For life and until death, I was his, to do what he pleased with, so long as he did not bruise my flesh nor break my bones. Is not that an awful power to be lodged with any human being?"
"But," I said, "if they were told the whole truth, that the marriage had never been consummated, and why, would they not have been moved by a feeling of chivalry to interfere? Your view of their sentiments pre-supposes the non-existence of what I should call chivalry."
"There may be in men such a sentiment as you would call chivalry; but I never yet have seen the occasion where they were pleased to exercise it. I would not advise any other young woman to tell one of them that she had lived alone in the same house with a man reputed to be her husband, for seven months, without the marriage having been consummated. She would find, as I did, that his chivalry would be exhibited by an ineffectual effort to suppress a smile of incredulity."