The White Flag

by Gene Stratton-Porter

When the impulse was quite the strongest, there came to Jason the realization that the woman he was watching could not, by any possibility, have been his mother. If his head ever had lain under her heart through the long journey from conception to birth, if his lips ever had mouthed at her breast and his babyhands slid over her face, it would have been impossible for the woman he knew Marcia to be, to have vanished in the night as she had, five long years ago. It was because she had not known these experiences, that even the boy sensed as the life, the heart, and the soul of the experience of women who are mothers, that she could stand there with her head erect and her eyes clear, meeting the world openly and unafraid.

She must know that he was in Ashwater. She must know what he was doing. If she wanted him, she knew where to find him. Since she did not seek him, since she sent no word, why should he thrust himself upon her? He could see that she was happy. He could see that she was respected and prosperous. And he found as he watched her, that there was a feeling of satisfaction growing in his heart concerning her. She was more of a woman than he had thought her. She was one human being who had escaped the power of Martin Moreland and who seemed to have come out unscathed.

As he drove back to Ashwater he was debating in his mind as to whether he would tell Peter Potter about her and he was finding that he was consoled concerning her by the knowledge that she was comfortable and happy.

Jason was right in his conjecture. Marcia was happy. She was happy to such a degree as she never had hoped to experience. Prosperity was written large all over the millinery store on the corner. It was written on Marcia, which made small difference to Bluffport as it had no realization that Marcia might not always have been reasonably prosperous. The concern of Bluffport centred upon Nancy Bodkin, who, following Marcia’s example, had lifted up her head, dressed her hair becomingly, powdered her nose, and exercised her art upon her dry goods as well as her head piece.

These two women, each with her own secret in her own heart, so far as the world knew, formed a combination that was the subject of prideful commendation in Bluffport. There was not an enterprise in the town in which they were not interested. When the Grand Army needed help for an entertainment, they were first class at decorations and resourceful in suggesting programmes. When a campaign was in full blast, they were of great help to their party in the decoration of wagons and the management of parades, and on one occasion, Marcia had stood in the full blaze of the sunlight of late October upon one of these wagons, in streaming robes of white, her gold hair unbound and falling almost to her knees, and shown all Bluffport and the surrounding country what a living, breathing Goddess of Liberty should look like. When an epidemic of diphtheria struck the town and the Presbyterian minister lost his wife and baby, leaving him helpless with another motherless little daughter, Marcia was sent by the church with lace and veiling to prepare the bodies for burial. Moving through the house at her work, she definitely caught the attention of the minister. He noticed her grace and her beauty. His heart was touched with her kindness to his terrified little daughter and her ability to soothe and quiet the frightened child. He carried the thought of her in the back of his head, and when time had healed his wounds and necessity had driven him to think of replacing his wife, the memory of Marcia came first to his thoughts and he began quietly and persistently to seek her company.

Marcia tried to evade him, to escape his attention, but he soon made it apparent to every one that he was deliberately seeking her. One day he entered the millinery store carrying an armful of beautiful flowers that one of his parishioners had given to him. He explained to Marcia that he thought that she might like to have them, and so he had brought them to her.

Peering from behind a case of hats, the little milliner watched with intense interest. If any male person ever had courted her, she never had mentioned the matter to any one. In her heart there was the interest which any woman feels in watching another woman whom she loves being courted by an attractive man. Nancy Bodkin’s lips were parted and her eyes shining as she saw Marcia’s hand reach out to take the flowers, as she heard her graciously thank the minister for his thoughtfulness. Behind them, through the open doorway, she saw the figure of a tall, slender man whom she knew. He had been pointed out to her years before on the streets of Bluffport as Martin Moreland, the richest man of the county seat, the banker, a land holder who had so many farms covered with mortgages that he was not supposed to know the exact number himself.

The minister was acquainted with Martin Moreland and at once introduced him to Marcia. Moreland explained his presence by saying that he wished to be shown a gray hat displayed in the window which he thought might possibly make a suitable gift for his daughter Edith. He spent some time telling the minister in detail what a charming woman his son had married, the delight he found in spending his hard-earned money for her pleasure. Then he began playing with Marcia.

At his first entrance he had merely bowed to her and devoted himself to the minister. After his explanation concerning the hat, he took it in his hands and examined it critically; he asked her personal opinion of it; he described the woman who was to wear it; then he asked Marcia to put it on in order that he could get its effect when worn.

Frightened almost to paralysis, tortured beyond endurance, afraid to refuse, Marcia put on the hat. It was one that had been built in particular reference to the lines of her face and head. As she settled it and turned, her beauty was strikingly enhanced. She was forced to stand before the two men, turning that they might get the full effect of it. Moreland admired the hat extravagantly and ended by purchasing it.