A story teller's story

by Sherwood Anderson

And then, as we waited and shook with dread, there was a stir in the silence. Feet, not running but walking steadily, were heard on the bridge that led into the road that passed the field and four men appeared. Somewhere in the town, in the dark night streets of the town, the two brothers had caught the lover but it was evident there had been an explanation. The three had gone together to a doctor, the cut cheek had been patched, they had got a marriage license and a preacher and were now coming home for a marriage.

The marriage took place at once, there before me on the steps of the house, and after the marriage, and after some sort of heavy joke on the part of the preacher, a joke at which no one laughed, the lover with his sweetheart, accompanied by the third woman, the one from the house across the field and who was evidently the lover’s mother, went off across the field. Presently the field where I lay was all dark and silent again.

* * * * *

And that had been the scene playing itself out in my fancy as I sat in the advertising office in Chicago, pretending to listen to the man who spoke of agricultural conditions in Texas and looking at the man with the scar on his cheek, the scar that had been partly hidden from the sight of others by growing the beard. I remembered that the plow company, now wanting to sell its plows in greater numbers in the southwest, was located in an Indiana town. How fine it would be if I could speak to the man of the beard and ask him if by any chance he was the lover of the field. In fancy I saw all the men in the room suddenly talking with the greatest intimacy. Experiences in life were exchanged, everyone laughed. There had been something in the air of the room. The men who had come to us were from a small city in Indiana while we all lived in the great city. They were somewhat suspicious of us while we were compelled to try to allay their suspicions. After the conference there would be a dinner, perhaps at some club, and afterward drinks—but there would still be suspicion. I fancied a scene in which no man suspected another. What tales might then be told! How much we might find out of each other!

And now in fancy the bearded man and I were walking and talking together and I was telling him of the scene in the field and of what I had seen and he had told me of what I had not seen. He told me of how during the running he had become exhausted and had stopped in a dark little alleyway behind stores in the town and of how the brothers had found him there. One of them came toward him threateningly but he began to talk and an explanation followed. Then they had gone to arouse a doctor and a small official who gave them the marriage license.

“Do you know,” he said, “neither her mother nor my own knew just what had happened and didn’t dare ask. Her mother never asked her and my mother never asked me. We went along later as though nothing had happened at all except that with all of us, her brothers and myself, and even our two mothers, there was a kind of formality. They did not come to our house without being invited and we did not go freely to their house as we always had done before the brothers saw us together in the field that night.”

“It was all a little strange and as soon as I could I grew the beard to hide the scar on my face that I thought embarrassed all the others.

“As for Molly and myself—well, you see it was somewhat strange to find ourselves suddenly man and wife but she has been a good wife to me. After the ceremony that night on the porch of the house and after the preacher went away we all stood for a little time together, saying nothing, then my mother started for our house across the field and I took my wife’s arm and followed. When we got to our house I took my Molly into my bedroom and we sat on the edge of the bed. There was a window that looked over across the field to the house where she had always lived and after a while the lights went out over there. My own mother kept moving about in our house and, although she made no noise, I knew she was crying. Was she crying because she was glad or sad? Had Molly and I married in the regular way I suppose there would have been rejoicing in both houses and I think there is no doubt we would inevitably have married. Anyway, my mother did things about the house she had already done once that night, opened the door to let out the cat that was already out, tried to wind the clock that was already wound. Then she went off upstairs and our house was dark and silent too.

“We just sat like that, on the edge of the bed, Molly and me, I don’t know for how long. Then she did something. The doctor in town had sewed up the wound in my cheek and had covered the place with a soft cloth held in place by pieces of tape. What she did was to reach up and touch the end of the wound, timidly, with the tips of her fingers. She did it several times, and each time a soft little moan came from her lips.

“She did that, as I say six or eight times and then we both lay down on the bed and took each other’s hands. We didn’t undress. What we did was to lie there, all night, just as I have described, with our clothes on and holding fast to each other’s hands.”