Plays by Susan Glaspell Part 50

Something from long ago. Rare. Why can't Uncle Felix talk about her? Why can't you? Wouldn't she want me to know her? Tell me about her. It's my birthday and I need my mother.

IRA: (_as if afraid he is going to do it_) How can you touch--what you've not touched in nineteen years? Just once--in nineteen years--and that did no good.

MADELINE: Try. Even though it hurts. Didn't you use to talk to her?

Well, I'm her daughter. Talk to me. What has she to do with Emil Johnson?

IRA: (_the pent-up thing loosed_) What has she to do with him? She died so he could live. He lives because she's dead, (_in anguish_) And what is _he_ alongside her? Yes. Something from far away. Something from long ago. Rare. How'd you know that? Finding in me--what I didn't know was there. Then _she_ came--that ignorant Swede--Emil Johnson's mother--running through the cornfield like a crazy woman--'Miss Morton!

Miss Morton! Come help me! My children are choking!' Diphtheria they had--the whole of 'em--but out of this house she ran--my Madeline, leaving you--her own baby--running as fast as she could through the cornfield after that immigrant woman. She stumbled in the rough field--fell to her knees. That was the last I saw of her. She choked to death in that Swede's house. They lived.

MADELINE: (_going to him_) Oh--father, (_voice rich_) But how lovely of her.

IRA: Lovely? Lovely to leave you without a mother--leave me without her after I'd had her? Wasn't she worth more than them.

MADELINE: (_proudly_) Yes. She was worth so much that she never stopped to think how much she was worth.

IRA: Ah, if you'd known her you couldn't take it like that. And now you cry about the world! That's what the world is--all coming to nothing. My father used to sit there at the table and talk about the world--my father and her father. They thought 'twas all for something--that what you were went on into something more than you. That's the talk I always heard in this house. But it's just talk. The rare thing that came here was killed by the common thing that came here. Just happens--and happens cruel. Look at your brother! Gone--(_snaps his fingers_) like that. I told him not to go to war. He didn't have to go--they'd been glad enough to have him stay here on the farm. But no,--he must--make the world safe for democracy! Well, you see how safe he made it, don't you? Now I'm alone on the farm and he--buried on some Frenchman's farm. That is, I hope they buried him--I hope they didn't just--(_tormented_)

MADELINE: Oh, father--of course not. I know they did.

IRA: How do you know? What do you care--once they got him? _He_ talked about the world--better world--end war. Now he's in his grave--I hope he is--and look at the front page of the paper! No such thing--war to end war!

MADELINE: But he thought there was, father. Fred believed that--so what else could he do?

IRA: He could 'a' minded his own business.

MADELINE: No--oh, no. It was fine of him to give his life to what he believed should be.

IRA: The light in his eyes as he talked of it, now--eyes gone--and the world he died for all hate and war. Waste. Waste. Nothin' but waste--the life of this house. Why, folks to-day'd laugh to hear my father talk. He gave his best land for ideas to live. Thought was going to make us a better people. What was his word? (_waits_) Aspiration. (_says it as if it is a far-off thing_) Well, look at your friend, young Jordan. Kicked from the college to prison for ideas of a better world. (_laughs_) His 'aspiration' puts him in a hole on bread and water! So--mind your own business, that's all that's so in this country. (_constantly tormented anew_) Oh, I told your brother all that--the night I tried to keep him.

Told him about his mother--to show what come of running to other folks.

And he said--standing right there--(_pointing_) eyes all bright, he said, 'Golly, I think that's great!' And then _he_--walked out of this house. (_fear takes him_) Madeline! (_she stoops over him, her arm around him_) Don't you leave me--all alone in this house--where so many was once. What's Hindus--alongside your own father--and him needing you?

It won't be long. After a little I'll be dead--or crazy--or something.

But not here alone where so many was once.

MADELINE: Oh--father. I don't know what to do.

IRA: Nothing stays at home. Not even the corn stays at home. If only the wind wouldn't blow! Why can't I have my field to myself? Why can't I keep what's mine? All these years I've worked to make it better. I wanted it to be--the most that it could be. My father used to talk about the Indians--how our land was their land, and how we must be more than them. He had his own ideas of bein' more--well, what's that come to? The Indians lived happier than we--wars, strikes, prisons. But I've made the corn more! This land that was once Indian maize now grows corn--I'd like to have the Indians see my corn! I'd like to see them side by side!--their Indian maize, my corn. And how'd I get it? Ah, by thinkin'--always tryin', changin', carin'. Plant this corn by that corn, and the pollen blows from corn to corn--the golden dust it blows, in the sunshine and of nights--blows from corn to corn like a--(_the word hurts_) gift. No, you don't understand it, but (_proudly_) corn don't stay what it is! You can make it anything--according to what you do, 'cording to the corn it's alongside. (_changing_) But that's it. I want it to stay in my field. It goes away. The prevailin' wind takes it on to the Johnsons--them Swedes that took my Madeline! I hear it! Oh, nights when I can't help myself--and in the sunshine I can see it--pollen--soft golden dust to make new life--goin' on to _them_,--and them too ignorant to know what's makin' their corn better! I want my field to myself.

What'd I work all my life for? Work that's had to take the place o' what I lost--is that to go to Emil Johnson? No! The wind shall stand still!

I'll make it. I'll find a way. Let me alone and I--I'll think it out.

Let me alone, I say.

(_A mind burned to one idea, with greedy haste he shuts himself in the room at left_. MADELINE _has been standing there as if mist is parting and letting her see. And as the vision grows power grows in her. She is thus flooded with richer life when her_ AUNT _and Professor_ HOLDEN _come back. Feeling something new, for a moment they do not speak_.)

AUNT ISABEL: Ready, dear? It's time for us to go now.

MADELINE: (_with the quiet of plent.i.tude_) I'm going in with Emil Johnson.

AUNT ISABEL: Why--Madeline. (_falteringly_) We thought you'd go with us.

MADELINE: No. I have to be--the most I can be. I want the wind to have something to carry.

AUNT ISABEL: (_after a look at Professor_ HOLDEN, _who is looking intensely at_ MADELINE) I don't understand.

MADELINE: The world is all a--moving field. (_her hands move, voice too is of a moving field_) Nothing is to itself. If America thinks so--America is like father. I don't feel alone any more. The wind has come through--wind rich from lives now gone. Grandfather Fejevary, gift from a field far off. Silas Morton. No, not alone any more. And afraid?

I'm not even afraid of being absurd!

AUNT ISABEL: But Madeline--you're leaving your father?

MADELINE: (_after thinking it out_) I'm not leaving--what's greater in him than he knows.

AUNT ISABEL: You're leaving Morton College?

MADELINE: That runt on a high hill? Yes, I'm leaving grandfather's college--then maybe I can one day lie under the same sod with him, and not be ashamed. Though I must tell you (_a little laugh_) under the sod is my idea of no place to be. I want to be a long time--where the wind blows.

AUNT ISABEL: (_who is trying not to cry_) I'm afraid it won't blow in prison, dear.

MADELINE: I don't know. Might be the only place it would blow. (EMIL _pa.s.ses the window, hesitates at the door_) I'll be ready in just a moment, Emil.

(_He waits outside_.)

AUNT ISABEL: Madeline, I didn't tell you--I hoped it wouldn't be necessary, but your uncle said--if you refused to do it his way, he could do absolutely nothing for you, not even--bail.

MADELINE: Of course not. I wouldn't expect him to.

AUNT ISABEL: He feels so deeply about these things--America--loyalty, he said if you didn't come with us it would be final, Madeline.

Even--(_breaks_) between you and me.

MADELINE: I'm sorry, auntie. You know how I love you. (_and her voice tells it_) But father has been telling me about the corn. It gives itself away all the time--the best corn a gift to other corn. What you are--that doesn't stay with you. Then--(_not with a.s.surance, but feeling her way_) be the most you can be, so life will be more because you were.

(_freed by the truth she has found_) Oh--do that! Why do we three go apart? Professor Holden, his beautiful trained mind; Aunt Isabel--her beautiful love, love that could save the world if only you'd--throw it to the winds. (_moving nearer_ HOLDEN, _hands out to him_) Why do--(_seeing it is not to be, she turns away. Low, with sorrow for that great beauty lost_) Oh, have we brought mind, have we brought heart, up to this place--only to turn them against mind and heart?

HOLDEN: (_unable to bear more_) I think we--must go. (_going to_ MADELINE, _holding out his hand and speaking from his sterile life to her fullness of life_) Good-bye, Madeline. Good luck.

MADELINE: Good-bye, Professor Holden. (_hesitates_) Luck to you.

(_Shaking his head, stooped, he hurries out_.)

MADELINE: (_after a moment when neither can speak_) Good-bye--auntie dearest. Thank you--for the birthday present--the cake--everything.

Everything--all the years.

(_There is something_ AUNT ISABEL _would say, but she can only hold tight to_ MADELINE_'s hands. At last, with a smile that speaks for love, a little nod, she goes_. EMIL _comes in_.)

EMIL: You better go with them, Madeline. It'd make it better for you.

MADELINE: Oh no, it wouldn't. I'll be with you in an instant, Emil. I want to--say good-bye to my father.

(_But she waits before that door, a door hard to go through. Alone_, EMIL _looks around the room. Sees the bag of corn, takes a couple of ears and is looking at them as_ MADELINE _returns. She remains by the door, shaken with sobs, turns, as if pulled back to the pain she has left_.)

EMIL: Gee. This is great corn.

MADELINE: (_turning now to him_) It is, isn't it, Emil?