A Prologue to Love Page 19

  “Not,” said Tom, one arm dropping from Caroline, “that I like a lot of the mills and foundries and factories, full of poor Hungarians and Poles and Italians brought over by the boatload from Europe to live on compounds like cattle and eat and sleep and die behind the big wood-and-iron fences. And half starved; practically prisoners in this big land of the free! But we already have people in government raising howls about this contract labor. They’re talking in Washington about passing an alien contract labor law, and the big fellows can shout and curse and threaten, and we’ll have the law just the same. If not this year, then the next, or the next.”

  He paused, and his young face became stern and hard as he looked out over the sea, and he muttered something profane under his breath. He did not see Caroline shrink; he did not know that she was remembering that some of her father’s clippers brought hordes of the wretched and the starving to America for service in the monster mills and foundries. They were huddled in the holds, far below decks, and were delivered — for a price — to their new oppressors and exploiters.

  “Well, anyway,” said Tom, “we have all those new smaller merchants and little factory owners buying our snug houses so they can come here from Boston, and even from New York, in the summer and pretend that they are rich with their summer homes, just like the families who go to Newport and Europe and the Mediterranean in the hot months, and their wives and their kids get a little sun. And they’re nice people, too, very ambitious.” Tom chuckled indulgently. “The village doesn’t mind; the shops do good business, and the owners don’t care if they’re patronized by people who have just as many calluses as they have and who only ten years ago worked in shops and mills, themselves.”

  This was a phenomenon that Caroline had not known existed, the rise of a sturdy middle class in America. Her father had never spoken of them; she had confusedly believed that her country was composed exclusively of merchant princes, owners of vast mills and foundries, Wall Street financiers, and then, under them, squirming like a faceless mass of unhuman maggots, the people who worked for them and served them and made their fortunes possible. Now she had a glimpse of the yeomen, the small competitors of the giants, the resolute challengers of mighty fortunes, the unlearned and independent strong who had the power, the character, the innate force and ambition to climb also, if only for a short distance. They were something new in the world. Caroline did not know why she felt a sudden pleasure, a sudden relief. She turned her face to Tom and smiled and said, “I’m glad, Tom. I’m very glad.”

  “What?” said Tom. He was delighted at her smile. “Oh, you mean about the houses Dad and I are building. We ought to clear at least two thousand dollars this summer. Two thousand dollars! We cleared about a thousand last summer; next summer it ought to be three, or perhaps four!”

  Caroline’s smile went away. Just that little bit of money. Again she remembered her promise to her father.

  “What’s the matter, Carrie?” asked Tom. “You look like a thundercloud.”

  Caroline pressed the palms of her hands together and looked at the shingle. Little frills of white foam burst on it. The sun was climbing higher and higher; it was very warm. Then she began to speak, steadily and without intonation:

  “Tom, you keep writing to me about the time when we’ll be married. I told my father some time ago that I was thinking — Tom, he wants me to get married someday. You see, there’s a lot — Tom, I don’t know how to say this, but my father told me that if I married a poor man, a man without a great deal of money, I’d never inherit anything he has.”

  She waited, watching the little bursts of foam near the boulder. Tom was silent for a long time. She felt a beginning wave of sickness climb within her, smothering her, choking her.

  “Carrie,” said Tom at last, “look at me.”

  Reluctantly she turned her face to him. He was smiling. He took her chin in his hand, and the warmth of his brown fingers spread over her flesh.

  “I’m not a poor man, Carrie dear. I’m making money. I’ll make more.”

  His fingers no longer warmed her. She closed her eyes. “Tom, you don’t understand. My father is very rich; he is one of the richest men in America. He wouldn’t consider what you are making to be real money, Tom. And if I married you I would be cut out of his will entirely.”

  Tom stared at her. His hand dropped from her chin. “Oh, Tom!” she cried, and caught his arm between her hands. “Oh, Tom, try to understand what I’m telling you! You hate me now, don’t you, Tom?”

  “No,” he said slowly, without moving. “I love you, Carrie. Why, there isn’t anything else in the world for me but you. And now you’re crying again. Here, blow your nose. Don’t cry like that; you’ll be sick.”

  He was full of rage against John Ames, and disgust. He had never thought of Caroline as a rich man’s daughter. She had been only Carrie to him. Her father! As if his damned money mattered one way or another to him, Tom Sheldon!

  “Listen to me, Carrie,” he said. “I want you to listen very carefully, dear, and I want you to know that I’m speaking only the truth. Are you listening, Carrie?”

  “Yes,” she murmured.

  “This is very important to both of us, Carrie, so be sure you hear everything I say. I won’t speak about your father; you’ll only be offended. Carrie, I never thought about you as having any money, either now or in the future. An intelligent man with guts and hope and health and determination will always be able to make enough money to be comfortable. It doesn’t take a fortune to be happy, just as you can’t be happy unless you have some money. One way or another, it’s bad. Extremes are always bad.

  “Carrie, I’ll never be a very rich man like your father. I’ve heard a lot of rumors about how he made his money and how he is still making it. I never want to see him, Carrie! I mean that. He hasn’t been the right kind of father for you — not like my father. What’s the matter?” he added sharply.

  For Caroline had pulled away from him and had pushed his arm from her waist.

  “Don’t talk about my father that way!” she cried, and her cheeks were red with anger.

  “Carrie!”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about!” she shouted, and made as if to slip down from the boulder. Tom watched her. And then he knew that if she escaped from him and ran off into that damned old house up there beyond the dunes and the tangled and bearded tall grass he would never see her again. So he caught her arm roughly and held her to the boulder.

  “Listen to me!” He shouted louder than she. “You’ve got to listen, Carrie! I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings about your father. Listen, Carrie.”

  She perched on the edge of the boulder, breathing heavily, her eyes staring at him with animus. Then, as she saw his face, both tender and firm and yet outraged, she stopped struggling.

  “I just want to say this, Carrie. You don’t need anyone’s money. I’ll have enough to take care of you comfortably; probably more than comfortably. I can’t promise you a fortune. After all, I’ll make my money honest — I just want you to know that you’ll be safe with me; I’ll take care of you. You don’t need anyone but me. I never thought about you having money of your own, and I swear it solemnly. I only love you.”

  She believed him. She knew he was speaking the truth. She slumped suddenly on the boulder and let him put his arm about her again.

  “You believe me, don’t you?” Tom asked her, rubbing his chin over her velvety braids.

  “Yes, Tom.” She wanted to cry again.

  “So perhaps next summer we’ll be married,” he said, stroking her cheek. “You and I, Carrie, we’ll be married. I’ll build a nice home for us, not too far from the village, and overlooking the ocean. A pretty house, Carrie. Why, I’ll start it this August! There’ll be a garden, and perhaps some chickens, and flowers and vegetables. We’ll be happy, Carrie, just you and I.”

  “I’m going away soon,” said Caroline, her throat full of knots. “Next week. I’m going with Papa all over the world
to see his friends.”

  He turned his head away and looked at the sea, cold and bounding now in the fresh morning light. The sea would take Caroline from him; it would take her away in the custody of her father, his enemy.

  “I’m sorry,” he said slowly. “I looked forward to this summer, Carrie. I thought we’d be together, making plans.” He glanced at her profile. “Don’t worry, darling. It doesn’t matter. I’ll be building our house. It will be ready for us next spring. Carrie?”

  But Caroline was not listening to him. She was thinking of the day her father had taken her to his docks. She was remembering the wild and passionate sense of power she had felt, the power over the Alecks of the world, and not only her safety from them. This power did not come from love, from tidy walls, from little gardens and chickens, from warm kitchens, from the voice of any man, no matter how beloved and how needed. It came only from money.

  She wanted to make him understand, and she was full of desolation again.

  “Tom,” she said, “I’ve listened to you. I want you to listen to me now. A little money isn’t enough for me. I’d always be afraid with just a little money. I can’t bear to think of not having a lot. It frightens me.”

  “Why?” he asked, astounded.

  “I can’t tell you. I can only say that at one time I didn’t have money — I’d lost what I had. And — people — thought I was poor, or something. They treated me as if I weren’t a human being, Tom. That’s what frightens me.”

  “Oh, hell,” said Tom. “The world’s full of bas — I mean, Carrie, the world’s full of all kinds of people. I’m not like that; you aren’t. Millions of us aren’t like that. You don’t have to be frightened, Carrie.”

  No, he’d never understand, thought Caroline with despair. Then in the midst of her despair she smiled. Tom did not want her for her father’s money. He wanted only her, Caroline Ames. Tom, watching her, was surprised at the change in her face, the softening, the growing color. When she leaned against him again he sat very still, afraid that she would inexplicably draw away as she had done before.

  “When I’m with you, Tom, I’m not afraid,” she said.

  “Good. You see, Carrie, that it’s all right?”

  Her head fell on his chest, and she could hear the potent and reassuring beat of his heart and she was filled with love. There was nothing else but love, and with love you had the strength of armies, and the protection of walls. She nestled closer to him, and he held her tenderly.

  “And I’ll build our house,” he said, his lips against her forehead.

  A little house. A house open to the sea. A house open to enemies. A house open to the Alecks of the world. There would not be much money.

  She pulled away from him. “Not yet, Tom,” she said. “Don’t speak of it yet. I knew you wouldn’t understand. I just haven’t any words!”

  He stood up very slowly. He moved away a short distance. He took out a short squat pipe, filled it very carefully with tobacco. He struck a match against the side of its box and lit his pipe. Caroline watched him, blinking and fearful.

  Tom folded his arms on his chest and looked at the brilliant horizon. Caroline crouched on the boulder, her palms pressed against its roughness.

  “What do you want, Carrie?” asked Tom. The smoke from his pipe rose bluely in the clarified air.

  “What do I want?” she stammered.

  “Yes, Carrie. What do you want?” he asked gently. “Your father’s money or me?”

  She rubbed her hands on the roughness of the boulder.

  “Tom,” she said, “I want both.”

  “You can’t have both,” he said, as if reasoning out a very simple problem. “Not while he’s alive. You can’t have both — until your father’s dead.”

  She jumped from the boulder.

  “How can you say that?” she cried. “How dare you say that?”

  “What did I say? I told you the truth. Does the truth hurt you that much, Carrie? And didn’t you tell me as much, that your father will disinherit you if you marry a poor man? What decent man would say that to his only daughter?”

  “You hate my father!”

  Tom turned to her. “Yes, Carrie. I hate what he’s done to you. And so I suppose I hate him. Carrie — ”

  But Caroline was flying away from him, leaping over small dunes, brushing aside the rustling dry grass, her shawl blowing behind her like a forlorn banner.

  “Carrie!” he shouted. “Come back, Carrie!”

  She did not turn. Her arms were flung out under the shawl, propelling her. She was in flight, a winged albatross struggling to rise and leave the earth.

  “Oh, Carrie,” said Tom, and his body felt so weighty that he believed it would sink in the sand.

  When Beth Knowles heard Caroline rush into the house with the crash of a door she came out from the kitchen, her kind and comely face webbed over with smiling wrinkles, a dab of flour on one plump cheek. “Well,” she exclaimed, “I thought you two would never come in for breakfast, and the flapjacks are ready for the skillet — ” She stopped smiling and looked beyond the breathless girl. “But where’s Tom?” she asked.

  Caroline threw the shawl on a rickety chair and looked about the long, wretched room as if desperately searching for something. “He didn’t come. He went away.” Her voice was sullen, and she would not look at Beth.

  “Gone away?” repeated the woman, bewildered. “Why?”

  “I sent him away!” cried Caroline angrily. “That’s all. I sent him away. And I am hungry, Beth. It’s late.”

  Beth stood in silence and stared at the girl. She sat down slowly. “You sent Tom away, Carrie? Tom? Why?”

  Caroline, feeling as if her throat and chest were filled with cutting stones, turned aside. “He said some things about my father. My father!” She swung toward Beth. “Don’t you understand? Why do you look at me like that? I sent him away. He never understands anything. He’s a fool.”

  “Tom,” said Beth. Her eyes filled with tears. “You can say those things about Tom? I don’t believe he’d ever say anything mean about anybody, even your father.”

  “Even my father,” shouted Caroline. “Do you hear how that sounds? ‘Even your father’! How dare you, Beth?”

  Beth clasped her hands tightly together. She gazed at Caroline earnestly. She wondered how she had not seen until now the power and the strength which were Caroline’s, the formidable expression, the rigid pale areas about her mouth. This was not the child she had brought up and had cared for and had loved as her own child. This was not the shy girl who had once cried at leaving her. This was a woman, tall and mature, and the eyes that looked at her, Beth, were not the young Carrie’s eyes.

  “I see,” said Beth, and put the back of her hand wearily against her forehead. “Yes, I think I see.”

  “You don’t see. How could you see? You and Tom, you’re alike. You both hate my father. And why? Because he isn’t like you, soft and weak and not caring about money? He cares for money because it’s the only thing in the world. It protects him from people like you!” The derisive voice lashed at Beth.

  “Everybody hates my father!” Caroline continued ruthlessly. “Because he has force and intelligence and can command what he wants. And do you know what I want? I want to be just like him.”

  Beth dropped her hand, and Caroline saw her eyes and for an instant she was a little girl again, wanting to burst into tears and run to Beth and hide her face in her lap.

  “Yes,” said Beth. “I suppose you do.” She stood up tiredly.

  Caroline’s voice stopped her. “And what’s wrong with that? What do you know about anything?” The stricken look was gone from her; her face appeared congested.

  Beth paused in the doorway with her back to Caroline. “I suppose I should have expected it eventually,” she said. “There’s nothing else I can do for you, Carrie. Now I can go away. I can’t bear staying here and watching what is happening to you and knowing it will get worse.”

  “What
are you talking about?” demanded Caroline roughly. “You — go away? You can’t! You have to take care of my father’s houses; you have to work for him.”

  “No,” said Beth, shaking her head. “I don’t have to do anything, Carrie.” She looked over her shoulder at Caroline and shook her head again. “You think that you can buy people, don’t you, Carrie? Just as your father thinks. But there are some things you can’t buy, and I’m one of them. I have enough money. I have a pension of my own. And so I’m going away when you leave next Thursday with your father. There’s nothing for me here any longer.”

  Caroline was angry and alarmed. “After all these years you’ve worked for my father, taking his money! You’d be that ungrateful?”