She went on despising life. She would not desist from protesting against it. She said, "If only Martha had quarreled with Bob, I could go to her, sometimes. I could live with her in Chicago. I don't suppose she will come back to this house now, if I should die. I never thought she would hate both me and the house. I must do something now, to keep from thinking. I better adopt a child for a while. I ought to write and ask somebody to come and stay with me this summer. There's that old Miss Jenson; but Bob would never stand her. Or we might do over all the rooms downstairs. If Martha would only come and help me. But if she would come and help me, I wouldn't need to do it! I believe I'll try hybridizing hemorocalis. Or what in the world will I do? If only I had had a house full of children! If Bob would only take an hour or two off, now and then! I've got to settle down to this. I mustn't fuss because Martha can't endure the sight of me. It's my own fault. I spoiled her, some way. But I never meant to! ... Thank God, it's time to clean house!"
But now, as always, she entered that festival with no high-hearted challenge to mess and accumulation. She followed Maggie from room to room loyally but without enthusiasm. The idea of leaving the abandoned painted room stagnant never entered the head of the old servant. She attacked it so furiously that Emily hadn't the heart to say to her that all her burnishings would be futile. She shut its door at last with the feeling of spineless hope she had when she looked, for some justifiable reason, at the baby clothes she had folded away. There they were, all ready at hand, in case she ever by some good luck might need them again—not that there was much hope, of course. She loitered along after Maggie into the next battlefield.
And then, when it was all done, when on the newly painted veranda every summer chair had its freshest garments tied on, Emily, being finished with dust, washed her hair one day and dried it in the sun in the garden, remembering how Martha always protested against the waste of time which so much long thick hair took for drying. It seemed almost as if the spring and weather, pleased with the way the brown hair rippled in its dampness, laid a trap to catch the little girl who had played in that garden. For then a shower came up, after noon, and passed over, and the sun came out with a dazzling soft afternoon brilliance. In the blossoming apple trees orioles were calling, and robins were hopping about in the wet petals below them. The grass was all young, and heavenly green, and the air had a soft and glittering cleanness. It was an afternoon to make even the dull feel that to forget its very quality was to have lived in vain. Emily had played about in the garden all the afternoon. She came into the house to get some labels stowed away in a drawer in her desk. She sat down and began sorting them——
And into the living room, bareheaded, laden with coats and bags, walked Miss Martha.
She came in quietly, as if it had been an ordinary coming. She was bringing some one to her mother.
"This is Miss Curtis, mother," she explained. "We drove out. It was such a nice day. I suppose you can put us up? Gee! It smells good here! How long till supper? We're starved, mammie. Sit down, Miss Curtis, I'll bring the things in myself!"
Emily saw a large and flabby-looking woman, in a nondescript tan-colored coat and a small black hat, who might have been fifty. She pulled off her hat and apologized for the untidiness of her stringy hair, and good reason she had for apologizing. She had a rather fine square face; she had kindly eyes. But the most impressive thing about her was her utter weariness.
And Martha came in again, with more bags and parcels.
"Can't we have asparagus for supper, if I go out and cut it?" she asked.
Miss Curtis was eager to get out into the garden. There was not a moment to be lost. The immortal afternoon was wearing away. They would only run up to their rooms.