Sickness came, of course. Whether you were rich or poor in America in those days, you were subject to colds and sore throats, because you knew nothing about diet, and ate denatured foods out of packages and cans. Corydon had obscure pains, and doctors gave obscure opinions about “womb trouble.” She paid a dollar a bottle for Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound, which was supposed to remedy “female complaints,” and did so—by the method of dulling the victim’s sensations with opium. The time came when Thyrsis awakened one winter night and heard his wife sobbing, and found her sitting up in bed in the moonlight, with a revolver in her hand, something she kept for protection while her husband was working in the college library. She had been trying for hours to get up courage to put a bullet into her head, but did not have that courage.
XIII
The grip of dreadful winter was broken, and it was possible to walk once more. Flowers blossomed in the woods, and also in the two tormented souls. For the great novel had been completed, and this time it was promptly accepted. The great firm of Macmillan called it a distinguished piece of fiction, paid five hundred dollars advance upon it, and agreed to publish it in the autumn. So it was possible for the little family to buy a turkey-red table cover, and also a vase to fill with woodland flowers, and to get the horse and buggy more frequently—one dollar per afternoon—and drive to town and ramble about the campus and listen to the students singing their songs at twilight.
A town full of handsome young college men was a not disagreeable place of residence for the girl-wife of a solitary genius, condemned by grim fate to celibacy. It was not long before Corydon had met a young instructor of science who lived only a mile or two away on the ridge. He came to call; having horse and buggy, he took Corydon driving, and she would come back from these drives refreshed and enlivened. Life became still more promising.
Presently the time came when she told her preoccupied husband a quaint and naïve story of what had happened. The young instructor had admitted, shyly and humbly, that he was falling somewhat in love with her. It was innocent and idyllic, quite touching; and Thyrsis was moved—he could understand easily how anyone might fall in love with Corydon, for he had done so himself. He was glad it was so noble and high-minded; but he suggested, very gently, that it would be the part of wisdom not to go driving with the young man any more. Corydon was surprised and pained by this; but after a few more drives she admitted that it might indeed be wiser.
So again she was lonely for a while; until it happened that in the course of her search for health, she encountered a high-minded and handsome young surgeon, a Scotchman. Strangely enough, the same thing happened again; the surgeon admitted, shyly and humbly, that he was falling somewhat in love with his patient; this time he himself suggested that it would be wiser if he did not see her any more. Corydon told Thyrsis all about it, and it was excellent material for a would-be novelist who lived a retired life and had few experiences of romantic emotions. But in the end, the novelty wore off—it happened too many times.
5
Revolt
I
Floyd Dell, contemplating his biography of myself, which was published in 1927, asked me to explain the appearance of a social rebel in a conventional Southern family. I thought the problem over and reported my psychology as that of a “poor relation.” It had been my fate from earliest childhood to live in the presence of wealth that belonged to others.