To this Myron bent her footsteps. Pressing into the shrubs some distance below, she won her way through them until she came to the foot of the elm tree, and entered the green tent formed by the grapevine. Between the trunks of the two scrubby oaks was a space of heavy green grass, which, springing up before the vine leaves had shut off the sun, kept green and fresh in their shadow through all the heats of summer. Here she and her child sat down; they were completely shielded from observation—the grape garlands at their backs, before them the masses of shrubs on the other side of the ditch.
Myron took a biscuit from her pocket and gave it to the boy, and then, clasping her hands about her knees, lost herself in dreams. She had cast aside her sun-bonnet, and the light, with difficulty piercing the shade, shone upon her in pearly lights and gleams—a colder radiance than shone elsewhere.
The soft characterless face of the young girl had been frozen into the enforced calm of passionless despair. Her face gave a strange impression, as of features that would remain unchanged no matter how long time endured for their possessor; as if the voice of pain and shame had bade her life stand still, nor evidence its aging in her countenance. No network of wrinkles, no deep marks of care, could have been half so sad as these youthful outlines veiled by such grief. Her eyes were heavy; her mouth would have been bitter, but that the patience of the face belied all bitterness save that of self-contempt. Underneath this mask of arrested life, vivifying it with tragic meaning and rendering it inexpressibly sad, burned an intense suppressed expectancy, as of one who doth
"Espy
A hope beyond the shadow of a dream."
This lent her face the artistic value of motive, and transformed what might, without it, have been but a sad-faced woman, such as the world holds in countless thousands, into a creature of tragic force.
Myron pondered in the shadow, whilst her child played at her side. It was very still. The child's soft breathing as he plucked at the soft grass was the only sound that broke the listening silence; opposite her was a little maple tree; a single leaf near the top was whirling round and round, caught in some miniature tempest that left unmoved the leaves on either side. In the midst of universal calm, this lonely leaf was tossed and troubled, singled out for unrest, as Myron Holder had been set apart for pain. But Myron's thoughts were not upon the leaf, albeit she saw it fluttering. She was struggling against a futile wrath, which welled up in her heart and at times nearly mastered reason—a hot rage against herself—him—the village. Her cheeks flushed—her hands involuntarily closed.
Why had this lot been meted out to her? In what was she different from these other women whose fault had been no less than hers? Why was continual bitterness her portion whilst they dwelt at ease? Simply because, though tardily, their children had been given a name. She felt a bitter wish spring up within her breast that all those jibing at her were such as she; that all those cruel women might feel the touch of shame; that they might be brought low, and taste the bitter bread that was her portion, and drink the cup they held to her lips. And then she sank into an evil dream. In it she beheld herself sitting in the judgment seat of respectability and meting out judgment to those who so lately had been her judges; for, in her dream, he had returned and justified her; she had risen, and all the rest had fallen; and as they toiled along the thorny path her feet had known, she beheld herself pass by on the other side. How she would withdraw from them (her eyes grew cold)! How she would avert her head (her lips were scornful)! How she would look them up and down with contemptuous condemnation, and turn and whisper her verdict into willing ears. That would bring the blood to their cheeks. That would—she paused, arresting her thoughts with a sudden knowledge of their shame; the cold eyes filled with tears, the scornful lips drooped and trembled; she realized the horrible wickedness of her own thoughts—thoughts—no hope, she owned to herself, and crying aloud, "I am wicked, shameless!" she flung herself upon her face in the grass and wept out the bitterness of her soul. The child crept to her side and strove to turn her face toward him; she kept it hidden, but stretched forth her arm and clasped his little form.
My, frightened at the silence with which his overtures were met and at his mother's unusual attitude, and shaken by her sobs, began to cry. Myron roused herself, and taking him in her arms, held him to her breast, rocking back and forth in the abandonment of her grief. The motion soothed and reassured the already drowsy child, and in a few moments he slept, whilst his mother, stilling her sobs that she might not disturb his slumber, bent above him a face wrung by pain.
She mused over her late vision of retaliation. With what cruelty had she hit upon the mode of showing her revenge! Alas, the lesson had been well taught her, for she had known the averted gaze, the scornful lip, the contemptuous regard. She had simply chosen those means from which she herself had suffered moat keenly. There came back to her the memory of an early morning, when, standing in the doorway, she had looked out into the dawn and had seen
"The horizontal sun
Heave his bright shoulders o'er the edge of the world,"