The Salamander Part 81

"When?"

"To-night!"

"And after?"

"What?"

"And after?"

"I don't understand!"

"What's he going to do? Give up his wife? Divorce her?"

"No, no!"

"And after!--what's to become of you?"

Dodo was silent. All the fantastic scheme she had imagined--a year, and then each to return--seemed so inadequate an answer now. All at once Snyder, in a sudden rage, bounded to the table, and catching the suit-case, flung it scurrying across the room.

"No, petty! You shan't do it! I won't let him. I'll kill him first!"

"Snyder, Snyder, you don't understand!" she cried.

"Don't I? I know! Honey, I tell you, I know! You're the one who don't understand! Honey, I tell you, it ain't a fair world! No; it's a rotten unfair world! The chances ain't equal! A woman ain't a man! Think of your own security first, honey. You've got to, or G.o.d help you! I know!"

"What do you mean, Snyder?"

"I mean, you shan't do what I did!" said the woman, clutching her arm--"what I did blindly!"

"You weren't--"

"Married? Never! You didn't know it? I thought you guessed. The others did!"

"No, no! I thought, at times--but I didn't know!"

"Do you know where I had my child?" she said, folding her arms across her heart and flinging back her head as if to breast a storm. "I, nineteen years old, a girl? In a charity hospital, between a black woman and a raging shrieking dago with the fear of death in her! The story?

h.e.l.l! Any one's story! What does that matter? Anyhow, I believed! I had ideas, like you: liberty, woman same as man. That suited him! It suits them all! What do they risk? Honey, if I told you what I went through those last months, you'd never look at a man again! You think I'm bitter, hard? Yes, I am hard, through and through! And I believed in him. And proud? G.o.d! how proud I was!"

"Snyder! Snyder!" She put out her hands as if to ward off the picture that rose luridly to her eyes.

"You don't know--no woman knows what the h.e.l.l of suffering is," she continued doggedly, "until they're caught, until they've got to bring into the world another soul, and you stand branded, with every tongue against you! G.o.d! What a world! You marry--you're safe! You can be a fiend incarnate, lower than the gutter. Nothing to say! But the other?

To be a girl, to believe, to love, to bear a child, as G.o.d intended you to, in love--every one against you, your own family cursin' you, closing the doors on you, telling you to go and starve! Don't talk to me! I know! Marry, honey, marry! You've got to, in this world!"

She was weeping now, and the sight of these unwonted tears on the iron countenance of Snyder terrified Dodo more than all she had heard. She felt now very little, very weak, far from the volatile Dodo of dreams and fantasies.

"Oh, Snyder!" she cried brokenly, "why didn't you tell me before? I've misjudged you so!"

"Yes, you've done that!" said Snyder, flinging away the tears and coming back into the steeled att.i.tude again. "You thought I didn't care for the kid--for Betty; didn't you?"

Dodo nodded dumbly, great lumps in her throat.

"Why, honey, I love the ground she walks on! I live for her! Every cent I can sc.r.a.pe together she's to have! She's to go to the finest school, to get an education. She's to marry, have a home!..."

"But then, Snyder, why put her away from you?"

"Why?" She stopped, drew a long breath, crossed her arms with a characteristic brutal motion and said, her face set in hardness: "That's the horror of it! Because, honey,--don't you see?--I'm training myself to do without her, training myself to go on without depending on others, doing for myself. You don't see? Supposin' I had her with me, bless her heart! Supposin' I got to tying up my life to hers, needing her, clinging to her? Then what would come? The day would come when she'd learn the truth, and turn against me. And--G.o.d! I couldn't stand anything more!"

"Oh, no, Snyder, she wouldn't!"

"Yes, she would! I know!" she said, shrugging her shoulders. "No. Better as it is! I'm getting used to myself. It's a rut, but it keeps me going!"

Dodo sank into a chair, shuddering and cold, burying her face in her hands.

"Snyder! Snyder! Why did you tell me?"

"Because I love you, honey! You know I love you! I couldn't see anything hard happen to you! It's not a fair world, petty! You've got to play the game. A woman's got to think of her security first, I tell you! For, when you get on the other side of the wall, it's h.e.l.l! All your arguing about what ought to be don't change it! That's why I say to you, 'And after?' Supposin' you can believe him, suppose he dies in the next months, where'll you turn? It's a rotten world. They're millions and millions, and you're only just yourself!"

"Don't! Don't! No more!" she cried. "Oh, Snyder, what am I going to do?"

Yes, she felt this inequality now. Millions on millions against one, all her courage gone, dismayed, aghast before the ugliness of reality.

Courage? She had none, not the slightest shred of daring left! She drew back against the wall, huddled and little, so weak, so tired, so unable to struggle any longer!

"Ah, what am I going to do?"

"I'll tell you, honey," said Snyder, starting toward her with outstretched arms. But, as she advanced, there came a knock, and answering Dodo's terrified gesture by one of a.s.surance, she went to the door.

"No one--no one! I can see no one!" said Dodo, recoiling.

Snyder received the card from Josephus, said something unintelligible, and came back radiant. One glance at her face made Dodo suspect the truth. She sprang forward with a frightened cry:

"Who is it? Snyder, tell me!"

But the woman, struggling, refused the card.

"It's not Garry? Not he?" she said frantically. "Any one but him! I won't see him! I won't!"

And, as she was still struggling to see the card, the door opened and Garry came powerfully in. Dodo stopped short, caught her throat with an exclamation of terror, her head thrown back against the table, looking at the strong glowing figure with the light of resurrection in his eyes; and as she looked, all at once a beneficent calm seemed to fall about her, clothing her with peace. All the good she had accomplished was there. She looked at him, and she knew!

Snyder, gliding to him, said but three words:

"Now! At once!"

Then, drawing back, she remained by the door to her room, her whole being concentrated on the scene, her hands clasped as if in prayer.

He came directly to Dore, and lifted her up in his arms, clear of the floor, not rapaciously or uncontrolled, as the acquisition of the other men, but cradling her like a child, tender and strong, his lips on the lightest fluttering golden tress of her hair. She felt no pa.s.sion, but a great thankfulness; and she closed her eyes.

"Ah, Dodo, how have I ever lived a day from you!" he said rapidly.

"Child, how I love you! Poor, tired little child, with such a great strength! How have I ever existed a day away from you?"