PLEASE NOTE: Each paragraph - in each section of the work - is numbered on the right-hand side.
Gertrude Stein (1874–1946). Three Lives. 1909
The Good Anna
Part I
THE TRADESMEN of Bridgepoint learned to dread the sound of “Miss 1
Mathilda”, for with that name the good Anna always conquered.
The strictest of the one price stores found that they could give 2
things for a little less, when the good Anna had fully said that
“Miss Mathilda” could not pay so much and that she could buy it
cheaper “by Lindheims.”
Lindheims was Anna’s favorite store, for there they had bargain 3
days, when flour and sugar were sold for a quarter of a cent less
for a pound, and there the heads of the departments were all her
friends and always managed to give her the bargain prices, even on
other days.
Anna led an arduous and troubled life. 4
Anna managed the whole little house for Miss Mathilda. It was a 5
funny little house, one of a whole row of all the same kind that
made a close pile like a row of dominoes that a child knocks over,
for they were built along a street which at this point came down a
steep hill. They were funny little houses, two stories high, with
red brick fronts and long white steps.
This one little house was always very full with Miss Mathilda, an 6
under servant, stray dogs and cats and Anna’s voice that scolded,
managed, grumbled all day long.
“Sallie! can’t I leave you alone a minute but you must run to the 7
door to see the butcher boy come down the street and there is Miss
Mathilda calling for her shoes. Can I do everything while you go
around always thinking about nothing at all? If I ain’t after you
every minute you would be forgetting all the time, and I take all
this pains, and when you come to me you was as ragged as a buzzard
and as dirty as a dog. Go and find Miss Mathilda her shoes where you
put them this morning.”
“Peter!”, — her voice rose higher, — “Peter!”, — Peter was the 8
youngest and the favorite dog, — “Peter, if you don’t leave Baby
alone,” — Baby was an old, blind terrier that Anna had loved for
many years, — “Peter if you don’t leave Baby alone, I take a rawhide
to you, you bad dog.”
The good Anna had high ideals for canine chastity and discipline. 9
The three regular dogs, the three that always lived with Anna, Peter
and old Baby, and the fluffy little Rags, who was always jumping up
into the air just to show that he was happy, together with the
transients, the many stray ones that Anna always kept until she
found them homes, were all under strict orders never to be bad one
with the other.
A sad disgrace did once happen in the family. A little transient 10
terrier for whom Anna had found a home suddenly produced a crop of
pups. The new owners were certain that this Foxy had known no dog
since she was in their care. The good Anna held to it stoutly that
her Peter and her Rags were guiltless, and she made her statement
with so much heat that Foxy’s owners were at last convinced that
these results were due to their neglect.
“You bad dog,” Anna said to Peter that night, “you bad dog.” 11
“Peter was the father of those pups,” the good Anna explained to 12
Miss Mathilda, “and they look just like him too, and poor little
Foxy, they were so big that she could hardly have them, but Miss
Mathilda, I would never let those people know that Peter was so
bad.”
Periods of evil thinking came very regularly to Peter and to Rags 13
and to the visitors within their gates. At such times Anna would be
very busy and scold hard, and then too she always took great care to
seclude the bad dogs from each other whenever she had to leave the
house. Sometimes just to see how good it was that she had made them,
Anna would leave the room a little while and leave them all
together, and then she would suddenly come back. Back would slink
all the wicked-minded dogs at the sound of her hand upon the knob,
and then they would sit desolate in their corners like a lot of
disappointed children whose stolen sugar has been taken from them.
Innocent blind old Baby was the only one who preserved the dignity 14
becoming in a dog.
You see that Anna led an arduous and troubled life. 15
The good Anna was a small, spare, german woman, at this time about 16
forty years of age. Her face was worn, her cheeks were thin, her
mouth drawn and firm, and her light blue eyes were very bright.
Sometimes they were full of lightning and sometimes full of humor,
but they were always sharp and clear.
Her voice was a pleasant one, when she told the histories of bad 17
Peter and of Baby and of little Rags. Her voice was a high and
piercing one when she called to the teamsters and to the other
wicked men, what she wanted that should come to them, when she saw
them beat a horse or kick a dog. She did not belong to any society
that could stop them and she told them so most frankly, but her
strained voice and her glittering eyes, and her queer piercing
german english first made them afraid and then ashamed. They all
knew too, that all the policemen on the beat were her friends. These
always respected and obeyed Miss Annie, as they called her, and
promptly attended to all of her complaints.
For five years Anna managed the little house for Miss Mathilda. In 18
these five years there were four different under servants.
The one that came first was a pretty, cheerful irish girl. Anna 19
took her with a doubting mind. Lizzie was an obedient, happy
servant, and Anna began to have a little faith. This was not for
long. The pretty, cheerful Lizzie disappeared one day without her
notice and with all her baggage and returned no more.
This pretty, cheerful Lizzie was succeeded by a melancholy Molly. 20
Molly was born in America, of german parents. All her people had 21
been long dead or gone away. Molly had always been alone. She was a
tall, dark, sallow, thin-haired creature, and she was always
troubled with a cough, and she had a bad temper, and always said
ugly dreadful swear words.
Anna found all this very hard to bear, but she kept Molly a long 22
time out of kindness. The kitchen was constantly a battle-ground.
Anna scolded and Molly swore strange oaths, and then Miss Mathilda
would shut her door hard to show that she could hear it all.
At last Anna had to give it up. “Please Miss Mathilda won’t you 23
speak to Molly,” Anna said, “I can’t do a thing with her. I scold
her, and she don’t seem to hear and then she swears so that she
scares me. She loves you Miss Mathilda, and you scold her please
once.”
“But Anna,” cried poor Miss Mathilda, “I don’t want to,” and that 24
large, cheerful, but faint hearted woman looked all aghast at such a
prospect. “But you must, please Miss Mathilda!” Anna said.
Miss Mathilda never wanted to do any scolding. “But you must 25
please Miss Mathilda,” Anna said.
Miss Mathilda every day put off the scolding, hoping always that 26
Anna would learn to manage Molly better. It never did get better and
at last Miss Mathilda saw that the scolding simply had to be.
It was agreed between the good Anna and her Miss Mathilda that 27
Anna should be away when Molly would be scolded. The next evening
that it was Anna’s evening out, Miss Mathilda faced her task and
went down into the kitchen.
Molly was sitting in the little kitchen leaning her elbows on the 28
table. She was a tall, thin, sallow girl, aged twenty-three, by
nature slatternly and careless but trained by Anna into superficial
neatness. Her drab striped cotton dress and gray black checked apron
increased the length and sadness of her melancholy figure. “Oh,
Lord!” groaned Miss Mathilda to herself as she approached her.
“Molly, I want to speak to you about your behaviour to Anna!”, 29
here Molly dropped her head still lower on her arms and began to
cry.
“Oh! Oh!” groaned Miss Mathilda. 30
“It’s all Miss Annie’s fault, all of it,” Molly said at last, in a 31
trembling voice, “I do my best.”
“I know Anna is often hard to please,” began Miss Mathilda, with a 32
twinge of mischief, and then she sobered herself to her task, “but
you must remember, Molly, she means it for your good and she is
really very kind to you.”
“I don’t want her kindness,” Molly cried, “I wish you would tell 33
me what to do, Miss Mathilda, and then I would be all right. I hate
Miss Annie.”
“This will never do Molly,” Miss Mathilda said sternly, in her 34
deepest, firmest tones, “Anna is the head of the kitchen and you
must either obey her or leave.”
“I don’t want to leave you,” whimpered melancholy Molly. “Well 35
Molly then try and do better,” answered Miss Mathilda, keeping a
good stern front, and backing quickly from the kitchen.
“Oh! Oh!” groaned Miss Mathilda, as she went back up the stairs. 36
Miss Mathilda’s attempt to make peace between the constantly 37
contending women in the kitchen had no real effect. They were very
soon as bitter as before.
At last it was decided that Molly was to go away. Molly went away 38
to work in a factory in the town, and she went to live with an old
woman in the slums, a very bad old woman Anna said.
Anna was never easy in her mind about the fate of Molly. Sometimes 39
she would see or hear of her. Molly was not well, her cough was
worse, and the old woman really was a bad one.
After a year of this unwholesome life, Molly was completely broken 40
down. Anna then again took her in charge. She brought her from her
work and from the woman where she lived, and put her in a hospital
to stay till she was well. She found a place for her as nursemaid to
a little girl out in the country, and Molly was at last established
and content.
Molly had had, at first, no regular successor. In a few months it 41
was going to be the summer and Miss Mathilda would be gone away, and
old Katie would do very well to come in every day and help Anna with
her work.
Old Katy was a heavy, ugly, short and rough old german woman, with 42
a strange distorted german-english all her own. Anna was worn out
now with her attempt to make the younger generation do all that it
should and rough old Katy never answered back, and never wanted her
own way. No scolding or abuse could make its mark on her uncouth and
aged peasant hide. She said her “Yes, Miss Annie,” when an answer
had to come, and that was always all that she could say.
“Old Katy is just a rough old woman, Miss Mathilda,” Anna said, 43
“but I think I keep her here with me. She can work and she don’t
give me trouble like I had with Molly all the time.”
Anna always had a humorous sense from this old Katy’s twisted 44
peasant english, from the roughness on her tongue of buzzing s’s and
from the queer ways of her brutish servile humor. Anna could not let
old Katy serve at table—old Katy was too coarsely made from natural
earth for that—and so Anna had all this to do herself and that she
never liked, but even then this simple rough old creature was
pleasanter to her than any of the upstart young.
Life went on very smoothly now in these few months before the 45
summer came. Miss Mathilda every summer went away across the ocean
to be gone for several months. When she went away this summer old
Katy was so sorry, and on the day that Miss Mathilda went, old Katy
cried hard for many hours. An earthy, uncouth, servile peasant
creature old Katy surely was. She stood there on the white stone
steps of the little red brick house, with her bony, square dull head
with its thin, tanned, toughened skin and its sparse and kinky
grizzled hair, and her strong, squat figure a little overmade on the
right side, clothed in her blue striped cotton dress, all clean and
always washed but rough and harsh to see—and she stayed there on the
steps till Anna brought her in, blubbering, her apron to her face,
and making queer guttural broken moans.
When Miss Mathilda early in the fall came to her house again old 46
Katy was not there.
“I never thought old Katy would act so Miss Mathilda,” Anna said, 47
“when she was so sorry when you went away, and I gave her full wages
all the summer, but they are all alike Miss Mathilda, there isn’t
one of them that’s fit to trust. You know how Katy said she liked
you, Miss Mathilda, and went on about it when you went away and then
she was so good and worked all right until the middle of the summer,
when I got sick, and then she went away and left me all alone and
took a place out in the country, where they gave her some more
money. She didn’t say a word, Miss Mathilda, she just went off and
left me there alone when I was sick after that awful hot summer that
we had, and after all we done for her when she had no place to go,
and all summer I gave her better things to eat than I had for
myself. Miss Mathilda, there isn’t one of them has any sense of
what’s the right way for a girl to do, not one of them.”
Old Katy was never heard from any more. 48
No under servant was decided upon now for several months. Many 49
came and many went, and none of them would do. At last Anna heard of
Sallie.
Sallie was the oldest girl in a family of eleven and Sallie was 50
just sixteen years old. From Sallie down they came always littler
and littler in her family, and all of them were always out at work
excepting only the few littlest of them all.
Sallie was a pretty blonde and smiling german girl, and stupid and 51
a little silly. The littler they came in her family the brighter
they all were. The brightest of them all was a little girl of ten.
She did a good day’s work washing dishes for a man and wife in a
saloon, and she earned a fair day’s wage, and then there was one
littler still. She only worked for half the day. She did the house
work for a bachelor doctor. She did it all, all of the housework and
received each week her eight cents for her wage. Anna was always
indignant when she told that story.
“I think he ought to give her ten cents Miss Mathilda any way. 52
Eight cents is so mean when she does all his work and she is such a
bright little thing too, not stupid like our Sallie. Sallie would
never learn to do a thing if I didn’t scold her all the time, but
Sallie is a good girl, and I take care and she will do all right.”
Sallie was a good, obedient german child. She never answered Anna 53
back, no more did Peter, old Baby and little Rags and so though
always Anna’s voice was sharply raised in strong rebuke and worn
expostulation, they were a happy family all there together in the
kitchen.
Anna was a mother now to Sallie, a good incessant german mother 54
who watched and scolded hard to keep the girl from any evil step.
Sallie’s temptations and transgressions were much like those of
naughty Peter and jolly little Rags, and Anna took the same way to
keep all three from doing what was bad.
Sallie’s chief badness besides forgetting all the time and never 55
washing her hands clean to serve at table, was the butcher boy.
He was an unattractive youth enough, that butcher boy. Suspicion 56
began to close in around Sallie that she spent the evenings when
Anna was away, in company with this bad boy.
“Sallie is such a pretty girl, Miss Mathilda,” Anna said, “and she 57
is so dumb and silly, and she puts on that red waist, and she
crinkles up her hair with irons so I have to laugh, and then I tell
her if she only washed her hands clean it would be better than all
that fixing all the time, but you can’t do a thing with the young
girls nowadays Miss Mathilda. Sallie is a good girl but I got to
watch her all the time.”
Suspicion closed in around Sallie more and more, that she spent 58
Anna’s evenings out with this boy sitting in the kitchen. One early
morning Anna’s voice was sharply raised.
“Sallie this ain’t the same banana that I brought home yesterday, 59
for Miss Mathilda, for her breakfast, and you was out early in the
street this morning, what was you doing there?”
“Nothing, Miss Annie, I just went out to see, that’s all and 60
that’s the same banana, ’deed it is Miss Annie.”
“Sallie, how can you say so and after all I do for you, and Miss 61
Mathilda is so good to you. I never brought home no bananas
yesterday with specks on it like that. I know better, it was that
boy was here last night and ate it while I was away, and you was out
to get another this morning. I don’t want no lying Sallie.”
Sallie was stout in her defence but then she gave it up and she 62
said it was the boy who snatched it as he ran away at the sound of
Anna’s key opening the outside door. “But I will never let him in
again, Miss Annie, ’deed I won’t,” said Sallie.
And now it was all peaceful for some weeks and then Sallie with 63
fatuous simplicity began on certain evenings to resume her bright
red waist, her bits of jewels and her crinkly hair.
One pleasant evening in the early spring, Miss Mathilda was 64
standing on the steps beside the open door, feeling cheerful in the
pleasant, gentle night. Anna came down the street, returning from
her evening out. “Don’t shut the door, please, Miss Mathilda,” Anna
said in a low voice, “I don’t want Sallie to know I’m home.”
Anna went softly through the house and reached the kitchen door. 65
At the sound of her hand upon the knob there was a wild scramble and
a bang, and then Sallie sitting there alone when Anna came into the
room, but, alas, the butcher boy forgot his overcoat in his escape.
You see that Anna led an arduous and troubled life. 66
Anna had her troubles, too, with Miss Mathilda. “And I slave and 67
slave to save the money and you go out and spend it all on
foolishness,” the good Anna would complain when her mistress, a
large and careless woman, would come home with a bit of porcelain, a
new etching and sometimes even an oil painting on her arm.
“But Anna,” argued Miss Mathilda, “if you didn’t save this money, 68
don’t you see I could not buy these things,” and then Anna would
soften and look pleased until she learned the price, and then
wringing her hands, “Oh, Miss Mathilda, Miss Mathilda,” she would
cry, “and you gave all that money out for that, when you need a
dress to go out in so bad.” “Well, perhaps I will get one for myself
next year, Anna,” Miss Mathilda would cheerfully concede. “If we
live till then Miss Mathilda, I see that you do,” Anna would then
answer darkly.
Anna had great pride in the knowledge and possessions of her 69
cherished Miss Mathilda, but she did not like her careless way of
wearing always her old clothes. “You can’t go out to dinner in that
dress, Miss Mathilda,” she would say, standing firmly before the
outside door, “You got to go and put on your new dress you always
look so nice in.” “But Anna, there isn’t time.” “Yes there is, I go
up and help you fix it, please Miss Mathilda you can’t go out to
dinner in that dress and next year if we live till then, I make you
get a new hat, too. It’s a shame Miss Mathilda to go out like that.”
The poor mistress sighed and had to yield. It suited her cheerful, 70
lazy temper to be always without care but sometimes it was a burden
to endure, for so often she had it all to do again unless she made a
rapid dash out of the door before Anna had a chance to see.
Life was very easy always for this large and lazy Miss Mathilda, 71
with the good Anna to watch and care for her and all her clothes and
goods. But, alas, this world of ours is after all much what it
should be and cheerful Miss Mathilda had her troubles too with Anna.
It was pleasant that everything for one was done, but annoying 72
often that what one wanted most just then, one could not have when
one had foolishly demanded and not suggested one’s desire. And then
Miss Mathilda loved to go out on joyous, country tramps when,
stretching free and far with cheerful comrades, over rolling hills
and cornfields, glorious in the setting sun, and dogwood white and
shining underneath the moon and clear stars over head, and brilliant
air and tingling blood, it was hard to have to think of Anna’s anger
at the late return, though Miss Mathilda had begged that there might
be no hot supper cooked that night. And then when all the happy crew
of Miss Mathilda and her friends, tried with fullness of good health
and burning winds and glowing sunshine in the eyes, stiffened and
justly worn and wholly ripe for pleasant food and gentle content,
were all come together to the little house—it was hard for all that
tired crew who loved the good things Anna made to eat, to come to
the closed door and wonder there if it was Anna’s evening in or out,
and then the others must wait shivering on their tired feet, while
Miss Mathilda softened Anna’s heart, or if Anna was well out, boldly
ordered youthful Sallie to feed all the hungry lot.
Such things were sometimes hard to bear and often grievously did 73
Miss Mathilda feel herself a rebel with the cheerful Lizzies, the
melancholy Mollies, the rough old Katies and the stupid Sallies.
Miss Mathilda had other troubles too, with the good Anna. Miss 74
Mathilda had to save her Anna from the many friends, who in the
kindly fashion of the poor, used up her savings and then gave her
promises in place of payments.
The good Anna had many curious friends that she had found in the 75
twenty years that she had lived in Bridgepoint, and Miss Mathilda
would often have to save her from them all.
----------
The Good Anna
Part II: The Life of the Good Anna
ANNA FEDERNER, this good Anna, was of solid lower middle-class south 1
german stock.
When she was seventeen years old she went to service in a 2
bourgeois family, in the large city near her native town, but she
did not stay there long. One day her mistress offered her maid—that
was Anna—to a friend, to see her home. Anna felt herself to be a
servant, not a maid, and so she promptly left the place.
Anna had always a firm old world sense of what was the right way 3
for a girl to do.
No argument could bring her to sit an evening in the empty 4
parlour, although the smell of paint when they were fixing up the
kitchen made her very sick, and tired as she always was, she never
would sit down during the long talks she held with Miss Mathilda. A
girl was a girl and should act always like a girl, both as to giving
all respect and as to what she had to eat.
A little time after she left this service, Anna and her mother 5
made the voyage to America. They came second-class, but it was for
them a long and dreary journey. The mother was already ill with
consumption.
They landed in a pleasant town in the far South and there the 6
mother slowly died.
Anna was now alone and she made her way to Bridgepoint where an 7
older half brother was already settled. This brother was a heavy,
lumbering, good natured german man, full of the infirmity that comes
of excess of body.
He was a baker and married and fairly well to do. 8
Anna liked her brother well enough but was never in any way 9
dependent on him.
When she arrived in Bridgepoint, she took service with Miss Mary 10
Wadsmith.
Miss Mary Wadsmith was a large, fair, helpless woman, burdened 11
with the care of two young children. They had been left her by her
brother and his wife who had died within a few months of each other.
Anna soon had the household altogether in her charge. 12
Anna found her place with large, abundant women, for such were 13
always lazy, careless or all helpless, and so the burden of their
lives could fall on Anna, and give her just content. Anna’s
superiors must be always these large helpless women, or be men, for
none others could give themselves to be made so comfortable and
free.
Anna had no strong natural feeling to love children, as she had to 14
love cats and dogs, and a large mistress. She never became deeply
fond of Edgar and Jane Wadsmith. She naturally preferred the boy,
for boys love always better to be done for and made comfortable and
full of eating, while in the little girl she had to meet the
feminine, the subtle opposition, showing so early always in a young
girl’s nature.
For the summer, the Wadsmiths had a pleasant house out in the 15
country, and the winter months they spent in hotel apartments in the
city.
Gradually it came to Anna to take the whole direction of their 16
movements, to make all the decisions as to their journeyings to and
fro, and for the arranging of the places where they were to live.
Anna had been with Miss Mary for three years, when little Jane 17
began to raise her strength in opposition. Jane was a neat, pleasant
little girl, pretty and sweet with a young girl’s charm, and with
two blonde braids carefully plaited down her back.
Miss Mary, like her Anna, had no strong natural feeling to love 18
children, but she was fond of these two young ones of her blood, and
yielded docilely to the stronger power in the really pleasing little
girl. Anna always preferred the rougher handling of the boy, while
Miss Mary found the gentle force and the sweet domination of the
girl to please her better.
In a spring when all the preparations for the moving had been 19
made, Miss Mary and Jane went together to the country home, and
Anna, after finishing up the city matters was to follow them in a
few days with Edgar, whose vacation had not yet begun.
Many times during the preparations for this summer, Jane had met 20
Anna with sharp resistance, in opposition to her ways. It was simple
for little Jane to give unpleasant orders, not from herself but from
Miss Mary, large, docile, helpless Miss Mary Wadsmith who could
never think out any orders to give Anna from herself.
Anna’s eyes grew slowly sharper, harder, and her lower teeth 21
thrust a little forward and pressing strongly up, framed always more
slowly the “Yes, Miss Jane,” to the quick, “Oh Anna! Miss Mary says
she wants you to do it so!”
On the day of their migration, Miss Mary had been already put into 22
the carriage. “Oh, Anna!” cried little Jane running back into the
house, “Miss Mary says that you are to bring along the blue
dressings out of her room and mine.” Anna’s body stiffened, “We
never use them in the summer, Miss Jane,” she said thickly. “Yes
Anna, but Miss Mary thinks it would be nice, and she told me to tell
you not to forget, good-by!” and the little girl skipped lightly
down the steps into the carriage and they drove away.
Anna stood still on the steps, her eyes hard and sharp and 23
shining, and her body and her face stiff with resentment. And then
she went into the house, giving the door a shattering slam.
Anna was very hard to live with in those next three days. Even 24
Baby, the new puppy, the pride of Anna’s heart, a present from her
friend the widow, Mrs. Lehntman — even this pretty little black and
tan felt the heat of Anna’s scorching flame. And Edgar, who had
looked forward to these days, to be for him filled full of freedom
and of things to eat — he could not rest a moment in Anna’s bitter
sight.
On the third day, Anna and Edgar went to the Wadsmith country 25
home. The blue dressings out of the two rooms remained behind.
All the way, Edgar sat in front with the colored man and drove. It 26
was an early spring day in the South. The fields and woods were
heavy from the soaking rains. The horses dragged the carriage slowly
over the long road, sticky with brown clay and rough with masses of
stones thrown here and there to be broken and trodden into place by
passing teams. Over and through the soaking earth was the feathery
new spring growth of little flowers, of young leaves and of ferns.
The tree tops were all bright with reds and yellows, with brilliant
gleaming whites and gorgeous greens. All the lower air was full of
the damp haze rising from heavy soaking water on the earth, mingled
with a warm and pleasant smell from the blue smoke of the spring
fires in all the open fields. And above all this was the clear,
upper air, and the songs of birds and the joy of sunshine and of
lengthening days.
The languor and the stir, the warmth and weight and the strong 27
feel of life from the deep centres of the earth that comes always
with the early, soaking spring, when it is not answered with an
active fervent joy, gives always anger, irritation and unrest.
To Anna alone there in the carriage, drawing always nearer to the 28
struggle with her mistress, the warmth, the slowness, the jolting
over stones, the steaming from the horses, the cries of men and
animals and birds, and the new life all round about were simply
maddening. “Baby! if you don’t lie still, I think I kill you. I
can’t stand it any more like this.”
At this time Anna, about twenty-seven years of age, was not yet 29
all thin and worn. The sharp bony edges and corners of her head and
face were still rounded out with flesh, but already the temper and
the humor showed sharply in her clean blue eyes, and the thinning
was begun about the lower jaw, that was so often strained with the
upward pressure of resolve.
To-day, alone there in the carriage, she was all stiff and yet all 30
trembling with the sore effort of decision and revolt.
As the carriage turned into the Wadsmith gate, little Jane ran out 31
to see. She just looked at Anna’s face; she did not say a word about
blue dressings.
Anna got down from the carriage with little Baby in her arms. She 32
took out all the goods that she had brought and the carriage drove
away. Anna left everything on the porch, and went in to where Miss
Mary Wadsmith was sitting by the fire.
Miss Mary was sitting in a large armchair by the fire. All the 33
nooks and crannies of the chair were filled full of her soft and
spreading body. She was dressed in a black satin morning gown, the
sleeves, great monster things, were heavy with the mass of her soft
flesh. She sat there always, large, helpless, gentle. She had a
fair, soft, regular, good-looking face, with pleasant, empty,
grey-blue eyes, and heavy sleepy lids.
Behind Miss Mary was the little Jane, nervous and jerky with 34
excitement as she saw Anna come into the room.
“Miss Mary,” Anna began. She had stopped just within the door, her 35
body and her face stiff with repression, her teeth closed hard and
the white lights flashing sharply in the pale, clean blue of her
eyes. Her bearing was full of the strange coquetry of anger and of
fear, the stiffness, the bridling, the suggestive movement
underneath the rigidness of forced control, all the queer ways the
passions have to show themselves all one.
“Miss Mary,” the words came slowly with thick utterance and with 36
jerks, but always firm and strong. “Miss Mary, I can’t stand it any
more like this. When you tell me anything to do, I do it. I do
everything I can and you know I work myself sick for you. The blue
dressings in your room makes too much work to have for summer. Miss
Jane don’t know what work is. If you want to do things like that I
go away.”
Anna stopped still. Her words had not the strength of meaning they 37
were meant to have, but the power in the mood of Anna’s soul
frightened and awed Miss Mary through and through.
Like in all large and helpless women, Miss Mary’s heart beat 38
weakly in the soft and helpless mass it had to govern. Little Jane’s
excitements had already tried her strength. Now she grew Dale
fainted quite away.
“Miss Mary!” cried Anna running to her mistress and supporting all 39
her helpless weight back in the chair. Little Jane, distracted, flew
about as Anna ordered, bringing smelling salts and brandy and
vinegar and water and chafing poor Miss Mary’s wrists.
Miss Mary slowly opened her mild eyes. Anna sent the weeping 40
little Jane out of the room. She herself managed to get Miss Mary
quiet on the couch.
There was never a word more said about blue dressings. 41
Anna had conquered, and a few days later little Jane gave her a 42
green parrot to make peace.
For six more years little Jane and Anna lived in the same house. 43
They were careful and respectful to each other to the end.
Anna liked the parrot very well. She was fond of cats too and of 44
horses, but best of all animals she loved the dog and best of all
dogs, little Baby, the first gift from her friend, the widow Mrs.
Lehntman.
The widow Mrs. Lehntman was the romance in Anna’s life. 45
Anna met her first at the house of her half brother, the baker, 46
who had known the late Mr. Lehntman, a small grocer, very well.
Mrs. Lehntman had been for many years a midwife. Since her 47
husband’s death she had herself and two young children to support.
Mrs. Lehntman was a good looking woman. She had a plump well 48
rounded body, clear olive skin, bright dark eyes and crisp black
curling hair. She was pleasant, magnetic, efficient and good. She
was very attractive, very generous and very amiable.
She was a few years older than our good Anna, who was soon 49
entirely subdued by her magnetic, sympathetic charm.
Mrs. Lehntman in her work loved best to deliver young girls who 50
were in trouble. She would take these into her own house and care
for them in secret, till they could guiltlessly go home or back to
work, and then slowly pay her the money for their care. And so
through this new friend Anna led a wider and more entertaining life,
and often she used up her savings in helping Mrs. Lehntman through
those times when she was giving very much more than she got.
It was through Mrs. Lehntman that Anna met Dr. Shonjen who 51
employed her when at last it had to be that she must go away from
her Miss Mary Wadsmith.
During the last years with her Miss Mary, Anna’s health was very 52
bad, as indeed it always was from that time on until the end of her
strong life.
Anna was a medium sized, thin, hard working, worrying woman. 53
She had always had bad headaches and now they came more often and 54
more wearing.
Her face grew thin, more bony and more worn, her skin stained 55
itself pale yellow, as it does with working sickly women, and the
clear blue of her eyes went pale.
Her back troubled her a good deal, too. She was always tired at 56
her work and her temper grew more difficult and fretful.
Miss Mary Wadsmith often tried to make Anna see a little to 57
herself, and get a doctor, and the little Jane, now blossoming into
a pretty, sweet young woman, did her best to make Anna do things for
her good. Anna was stubborn always to Miss Jane, and fearful of
interference in her ways. Miss Mary Wadsmith’s mild advice she
easily could always turn aside.
Mrs. Lehntman was the only one who had any power Over Anna. She 58
induced her to let Dr. Shonjen take her in his care.
No one but a Dr. Shonjen could have brought a good and german Anna 59
first to stop her work and then submit herself to operation, but he
knew so well how to deal with german and poor people. Cheery,
jovial, hearty, full of jokes that made much fun and yet were full
of simple common sense and reasoning courage, he could persuade even
a good Anna to do things that were for her own good.
Edgar had now been for some years away from home, first at a 60
school and then at work to prepare himself to be a civil engineer.
Miss Mary and Jane promised to take a trip for all the time that
Anna was away and so there would be no need for Anna’s work, nor for
a new girl to take Anna’s place.
Anna’s mind was thus a little set at rest. She gave herself to 61
Mrs. Lehntman and the doctor to do what they thought best to make
her well and strong.
Anna endured the operation very well, and was patient, almost 62
docile, in the slow recovery of her working strength. But when she
was once more at work for her Miss Mary Wadsmith, all the good
effect of these several months of rest were soon worked and worried
well away.
For all the rest of her strong working life Anna was never really 63
well. She had bad headaches all the time and she was always thin and
worn.
She worked away her appetite, her health and strength, and always 64
for the sake of those who begged her not to work so hard. To her
thinking, in her stubborn, faithful, german soul, this was the right
way for a girl to do.
Anna’s life With Miss Mary Wadsmith was now drawing to an end. 65
Miss Jane, now altogether a young lady, had come out into the 66
world. Soon she would become engaged and then be married, and then
perhaps Miss Mary Wadsmith would make her home with her.
In such a household Anna was certain that she would never take a 67
place. Miss Jane was always careful and respectful and very good to
Anna, but never could Anna be a girl in a household where Miss Jane
would be the head. This much was very certain in her mind, and so
these last two years with her Miss Mary were not as happy as before.
The change came very soon. 68
Miss Jane became engaged and in a few months was to marry a man 69
from out of town, from Curden, an hour’s railway ride from
Bridgepoint.
Poor Miss Mary Wadsmith did not know the strong resolve Anna had 70
made to live apart from her when this new household should be
formed. Anna found it very hard to speak to her Miss Mary of this
change.
The preparations for the wedding went on day and night. 71
Anna worked and sewed hard to make it all go well. 72
Miss Mary was much fluttered, but content and happy with Anna to 73
make everything so easy for them all.
Anna worked so all the time to drown her sorrow and her conscience 74
too, for somehow it was not right to leave Miss Mary so. But what
else could she do? She could not live as her Miss Mary’s girl, in a
house where Miss Jane would be the head.
The wedding day grew always nearer. At last it came and passed. 75
The young people went on their wedding trip, and Anna and Miss 76
Mary were left behind to pack up all the things.
Even yet poor Anna had not had the strength to tell Miss Mary her 77
resolve, but now it had to be.
Anna every spare minute ran to her friend Mrs. Lehntman for 78
comfort and advice. She begged her friend to be with her when she
told the news to Miss Mary.
Perhaps if Mrs. Lehntman had not been in Bridgepoint, Anna would 79
have tried to live in the new house. Mrs. Lehntman did not urge her
to this thing nor even give her this advice, but feeling for Mrs.
Lehntman as she did made even faithful Anna not quite so strong in
her dependence on Miss Mary’s need as she would other-wise have
been.
Remember, Mrs. Lehntman was the romance in Anna’s life. 80
All the packing was now done and in a few days Miss Mary was to go 81
to the new house, where the young people were ready for her coming.
At last Anna had to speak. 82
Mrs. Lehntman agreed to go with her and help to make the matter 83
clear to poor Miss Mary.
The two women came together to Miss Mary Wadsmith sitting placid 84
by the fire in the empty living room. Miss Mary had seen Mrs.
Lehntman many times before, and so her coming in with Anna raised no
suspicion in her mind.
It was very hard for the two women to begin. 85
It must be very gently done, this telling to Miss Mary of the 86
change. She must not be shocked by suddenness or with excitement.
Anna was all stiff, and inside all a quiver with shame, anxiety 87
and grief. Even courageous Mrs. Lehntman, efficient, impulsive and
complacent as she was and not deeply concerned in the event, felt
awkward, abashed and almost guilty in that large, mild, helpless
presence. And at her side to make her feel the power of it all, was
the intense conviction of poor Anna, struggling to be unfeeling,
self righteous and suppressed.
“Miss Mary”—with Anna when things had to come they came always 88
sharp and short—“Miss Mary, Mrs. Lehntman has come here with me, so
I can tell you about not staying with you there in Curden. Of course
I go help you to get settled and then I think I come back and stay
right here in Bridgepoint. You know my brother he is here and all
his family, and I think it would be not right to go away from them
so far, and you know you don’t want me now so much Miss Mary when
you are all together there in Curden.”
Miss Mary Wadsmith was puzzled. She did not understand what Anna 89
meant by what she said.
“Why Anna of course you can come to see your brother whenever you 90
like to, and I will always pay your fare. I thought you understood
all about that, and we will be very glad to have your nieces come to
stay with you as often as they like. There will always be room
enough in a big house like Mr. Goldthwaite’s.”
It was now for Mrs. Lehntman to begin her work. 91
“Miss Wadsmith does not understand just what you mean Anna,” she 92
began. “Miss Wadsmith, Anna feels how good and kind you are, and she
talks about it all the time, and what you do for her in every way
you can, and she is very grateful and never would want to go away
from you, only she thinks it would be better now that Mrs.
Goldthwaite has this big new house and will want to manage it in her
own way, she thinks perhaps it would be better if Mrs. Goldthwaite
had all new servants with her to begin with, and not a girl like
Anna who knew her when she was a little girl. That is what Anna
feels about it now, and she asked me and I said to her that I
thought it would be better for you all and you knew she liked you so
much and that you were so good to her, and you would understand how
she thought it would be better in the new house if she stayed on
here in Bridgepoint, anyway for a little while until Mrs.
Goldthwaite was used to her new house. Is’nt that it Anna that you
wanted Miss Wadsmith to know?”
“Oh Anna,” Miss Mary Wadsmith said it slowly and in a grieved tone 93
of surprise that was very hard for the good Anna to endure, “Oh
Anna, I didn’t think that you would ever want to leave me after all
these years.”
“Miss Mary!” it came in one tense jerky burst, “Miss Mary it’s 94
only working under Miss Jane now would make me leave you so. I know
how good you are and I work myself sick for you and for Mr. Edgar
and for Miss Jane too, only Miss Jane she will want everything
different from like the way we always did, and you knew Miss Mary I
can’t have Miss Jane watching at me all the time, and every minute
something new. Miss Mary, it would be very bad and Miss Jane don’t
really want me to come with you to the new house, I know that all
the time. Please Miss Mary don’t feel bad about it or think I ever
want to go away from you if I could do things right for you the way
they ought to be.”
Poor Miss Mary. Struggling was not a thing for her to do. Anna 95
would surely yield if she would struggle, but struggling was too
much work and too much worry for peaceful Miss Mary to endure. If
Anna would do so she must. Poor Miss Mary Wadsmith sighed, looked
wistfully at Anna and then gave it up.
“You must do as you think best Anna,” she said at last letting all 96
of her soft self sink back into the chair. “I am very sorry and so I
am sure will be Miss Jane when she hears what you have thought it
best to do. It was very good of Mrs. Lehntman to come with you and I
am sure she does it for you good. I suppose you want to go out a
little now. Come back in an hour Anna and help me go to bed.” Miss
Mary closed her eyes and rested still and placid by the fire.
The two women went away. 97
This was the end of Anna’s service with Miss Mary Wadsmith, and 98
soon her new life taking care of Dr. Shonjen was begun.
Keeping house for a jovial bachelor doctor gave new elements of 99
understanding to Anna’s maiden german mind. Her habits were as firm
fixed as before, but it always was with Anna that things that had
been done once with her enjoyment and consent could always happen
any time again, such as her getting up at any hour of the night to
make a supper and cook hot chops and chicken fry for Dr. Shonjen and
his bachelor friends.
Anna loved to work for men, for they could eat so much and with 100
such joy. And when they were warm and full, they were content, and
let her do whatever she thought best. Not that Anna’s conscience
ever slept, for neither with interference or without would she
strain less to keep on saving every cent and working every hour of
the day. But truly she loved it best when she could scold. Now it
was not only other girls and the colored man, and dogs, and cats,
and horses and her parrot, but her cheery master, jolly Dr. Shonjen,
whom she could guide and constantly rebuke to his own good.
The doctor really loved her scoldings as she loved his 101
wickednesses and his merry joking ways.
These days were happy days with Anna. 102
Her freakish humor now first showed itself, her sense of fun in 103
the queer ways that people had, that made her later find delight in
brutish servile Katy, in Sally’s silly ways and in the badness of
Peter and of Rags. She loved to make sport with the skeletons the
doctor had, to make them move and make strange noises till the negro
boy shook in his shoes and his eyes rolled white in his agony of
fear.
Then Anna would tell these histories to her doctor. Her worn, 104
thin, lined, determined face would form for itself new and humorous
creases, and her pale blue eyes would kindle with humour and with
joy as her doctor burst into his hearty laugh. And the good Anna
full of the coquetry of pleasing would bridle with her angular,
thin, spinster body, straining her stories and herself to please.
These early days with jovial Dr. Shonjen were very happy days with 105
the good Anna.
All of Anna’s spare hours in these early days she spent with her 106
friend, the widow Mrs. Lehntman. Mrs. Lehntman lived with her two
children in a small house in the same part of the town as Dr.
Shonjen. The older of these two children was a girl named Julia and
was now about thirteen years of age. This Julia Lehntman was an
unattractive girl enough, harsh featured, dull and stubborn as had
been her heavy german father. Mrs. Lehntman did not trouble much
with her, but gave her always all she wanted that she had, and let
the girl do as she liked. This was not from indifference or dislike
on the part of Mrs. Lehntman, it was just her usual way.
Her second child was a boy, two years younger than his sister, a 107
bright, pleasant, cheery fellow, who too, did what he liked with his
money and his time. All this was so with Mrs. Lehntman because she
had so much in her head and in her house that clamoured for her
concentration and her time.
This slackness and neglect in the running of the house, and the 108
indifference in this mother for the training of her young was very
hard for our good Anna to endure. Of course she did her best to
scold, to save for Mrs. Lehntman, and to put things in their place
the way they ought to be.
Even in the early days when Anna was first won by the glamour of 109
Mrs. Lehntman’s brilliancy and charm, she had been uneasy in Mrs.
Lehntman’s house with a need of putting things to rights. Now that
the two children growing up were of more importance in the house,
and now that long acquaintance had brushed the dazzle out of Anna’s
eyes, she began to struggle to make things go here as she thought
was right.
She watched and scolded hard these days to make young Julia do the 110
way she should. Not that Julia Lehntman was pleasant in the good
Anna’s sight, but it must never be that a young girl growing up
should have no one to make her learn to do things right.
The boy was easier to scold, for scoldings never sank in very 111
deep, and indeed he liked them very well for they brought with them
new things to eat, and lively teasing, and good jokes.
Julia, the girl, grew very sullen with it all, and very often won 112
her point, for after all Miss Annie was no relative of hers and had
no business coming there and making trouble all the time. Appealing
to the mother was no use. It was wonderful how Mrs. Lehntman could
listen and not hear, could answer and yet not decide, could say and
do what she was asked and yet leave things as they were before.
One day it got almost too bad for even Anna’s friendship to bear 113
out.
“Well, Julia, is your mamma out?” Anna asked, one Sunday summer 114
afternoon, as she came into the Lehntman house.
Anna looked very well this day. She was always careful in her 115
dress and sparing of new clothes. She made herself always fulfill
her own ideal of how a girl should look when she took her Sundays
out. Anna knew so well the kind of ugliness appropriate to each rank
in life.
It was interesting to see how when she bought things for Miss 116
Wadsmith and later for her cherished Miss Mathilda and always
entirely from her own taste and often as cheaply as she bought
things for her friends or for herself, that on the one hand she
chose the things having the right air for a member of the upper
class, and for the others always the things having the awkward
ugliness that we call Dutch. She knew the best thing in each kind,
and she never in the course of her strong life compromised her sense
of what was the right thing for a girl to wear.
On this bright summer Sunday afternoon she came to the Lehntmans’, 117
much dressed up in her new, brick red, silk waist trimmed with broad
black beaded braid, a dark cloth skirt and a new stiff, shiny, black
straw hat, trimmed with colored ribbons and a bird. She had on new
gloves, and a feather boa about her neck.
Her spare, thin, awkward body and her worn, pale yellow face 118
though lit up now with the pleasant summer sun made a queer discord
with the brightness of her clothes.
She came to the Lehntman house, where she had not been for several 119
days, and opening the door that is always left unlatched in the
houses of the lower middle class in the pleasant cities of the
South, she found Julia in the family sitting-room alone.
“Well, Julia, where is your mamma?” Anna asked. “Ma is out but 120
come in, Miss Annie, and look at our new brother.” “What you talk so
foolish for Julia,” said Anna sitting down. “I ain’t talkin’
foolish, Miss Annie. Didn’t you know mamma has just adopted a cute,
nice little baby boy?” “You talk so crazy, Julia, you ought to know
better than to say such things.” Julia turned sullen. “All right
Miss Annie, you don’t need to believe what I say, but the little
baby is in the kitchen and ma will tell you herself when she comes
in.”
It sounded most fantastic, but Julia had an air of truth and Mrs. 121
Lehntman was capable of doing stranger things. Anna was disturbed.
“What you mean Julia,” she said. “I don’t mean nothin’ Miss Annie,
you don’t believe the baby is in there, well you can go and see it
for yourself.”
Anna went into the kitchen. A baby was there all right enough, and 122
a lusty little boy he seemed. He was very tight asleep in a basket
that stood in the corner by the open door.
“You mean your mamma is just letting him stay here a little 123
while,” Anna said to Julia who had followed her into the kitchen to
see Miss Annie get real mad. “No that ain’t it Miss Annie. The
mother was that girl, Lily that came from Bishop’s place out in the
country, and she don’t want no children, and ma liked the little boy
so much, she said she’d keep him here and adopt him for her own
child.”
Anna, for once, was fairly dumb with astonishment and rage. The 124
front door slammed.
“There’s ma now,” cried Julia in an uneasy triumph. for she was 125
not quite certain in her mind which side of the question she was on,
“There’s ma now, and you can ask her for yourself if I ain’t told
you true.”
Mrs. Lehntman came into the kitchen where they were. She was 126
bland, impersonal and pleasant, as it was her wont to be. Still
to-day, through this her usual manner that gave her such success in
her practice as a midwife, there shone an uneasy consciousness of
guilt, for like all who had to do with the good Anna, Mrs. Lehntman
dreaded her firm character, her vigorous judgements and the bitter
fervour of her tongue.
It had been plain to see in the six years these women were 127
together, how Anna gradually had come to lead. Not really lead, of
course, for Mrs. Lehntman never could be led, she was so very
devious in her ways; but Anna had come to have direction whenever
she could learn what Mrs. Lehntman meant to do before the deed was
done. Now it was hard to tell which would win out. Mrs. Lehntman had
her unhearing mind and her happy way of giving a pleasant well
diffused attention, and then she had it on her side that, after all,
this thing was already done.
Anna was, as usual, determined for the right. She was stiff and 128
pale with her anger and her fear, and nervous, and all a tremble as
was her usual way when a bitter fight was near.
Mrs. Lehntman was easy and pleasant as she came into the room. 129
Anna was stiff and silent and very white.
“We haven’t seen you for a long time, Anna,” Mrs. Lehntman 130
cordially began. “I was just gettin’ worried thinking you was sick.
My! but it’s a hot day to-day. Come into the sittin’-room, Anna, and
Julia will make us some ice tea.”
Anna followed Mrs. Lehntman into the other room in a stiff 131
silence, and when there she did not, as invited, take a chair.
As always with Anna when a thing had to come it came very short 132
and sharp. She found it hard to breathe just now, and every word
came with a jerk.
“Mrs. Lehntman, it ain’t true what Julia said about your taking 133
that Lily’s boy to keep. I told Julia when she told me she was crazy
to talk so.”
Anna’s real excitements stopped her breath, and made her words 134
come sharp and with a jerk. Mrs. Lehntman’s feelings spread her
breath, and made her words come slow, but more pleasant and more
easy even than before.
“Why Anna,” she began, “don’t you see Lily couldn’t keep her boy 135
for she is working at the Bishops’ now, and he is such a cute dear
little chap, and you know how fond I am of little fellers, and I
thought it would be nice for Julia and for Willie to have a little
brother. You know Julia always loves to play with babies, and I have
to be away so much, and Willie he is running in the streets every
minute all the time, and you see a baby would be sort of nice
company for Julia, and you know you are always saying Anna, Julia
should not be on the streets so much and the baby will be so good to
keep her in.”
Anna was every minute paler with indignation and with heat. 136
“Mrs. Lehntman, I don’t see what business it is for you to take 137
another baby for your own, when you can’t do what’s right by Julia
and Willie you got here already. There’s Julia, nobody tells her a
thing when I ain’t here, and who is going to tell her now how to do
things for that baby? She ain’t got no sense what’s the right way to
do with children, and you out all the time, and you ain’t got no
time for your own neither, and now you want to be takin’ up with
strangers. I know you was careless, Mrs. Lehntman, but I didn’t
think that you could do this so. No, Mrs. Lehntman, it ain’t your
duty to take up with no others, when you got two children of your
own, that got to get along just any way they can, and you know you
ain’t got any too much money all the time, and you are all so
careless here and spend it all the time, and Julia and Willie
growin’ big. It ain’t right, Mrs. Lehntman, to do so.”
This was as bad as it could be. Anna had never spoken her mind so 138
to her friend before. Now it was too harsh for Mrs. Lehntman to
allow herself to really hear. If she really took the meaning in
these words she could never ask Anna to come into her house again,
and she liked Anna very well, and was used to depend on her savings
and her strength. And then too Mrs. Lehntman could not really take
in harsh ideas. She was too well diffused to catch the feel of any
sharp firm edge.
Now she managed to understand all this in a way that made it easy 139
for her to say, “Why, Anna, I think you feel too bad about seeing
what the children are doing every minute in the day. Julia and
Willie are real good, and they play with all the nicest children in
the square. If you had some, all your own, Anna, you’d see it don’t
do no harm to let them do a little as they like, and Julia likes
this baby so, and sweet dear little boy, it would be so kind of bad
to send him to a ’sylum now, you know it would Anna, when you like
children so yourself, and are so good to my Willie all the time. No
indeed Anna, it’s easy enough to say I should send this poor, cute
little boy to a ’sylum when I could keep him here so nice, but you
know Anna, you wouldn’t like to do it yourself, now you really know
you wouldn’t, Anna, though you talk to me so hard.—My, it’s hot
to-day, what you doin’ with that ice tea in there Julia, when Miss
Annie is waiting all this time for her drink?”
Julia brought in the ice tea. She was so excited with the talk she 140
had been hearing from the kitchen, that she slopped it on the plate
out of the glasses a good deal. But she was safe, for Anna felt this
trouble so deep down that she did not even see those awkward, bony
hands, adorned to-day with a new ring, those stupid, foolish hands
that always did things the wrong way.
“Here Miss Annie,” Julia said, “Here, Miss Annie, is your glass of 141
tea, I know you like it good and strong.”
“No, Julia, I don’t want no ice tea here. Your mamma ain’t able to 142
afford now using her money upon ice tea for her friends. It ain’t
right she should now any more. I go out now to see Mrs. Drehten. She
does all she can, and she is sick now working so hard taking care of
her own children. I go there now. Good by Mrs. Lehntman, I hope you
don’t get no bad luck doin’ what it ain’t right for you to do.”
“My, Miss Annie is real mad now,” Julia said, as the house shook, 143
as the good Anna shut the outside door with a concentrated
shattering slam.
It was some months now that Anna had been intimate with Mrs. 144
Drehten.
Mrs. Drehten had had a tumor and had come to Dr. Shonjen to be 145
treated. During the course of her visits there, she and Anna had
learned to like each other very well. There was no fever in this
friendship, it was just the interchange of two hard working,
worrying women, the one large and motherly, with the pleasant,
patient, soft, worn, tolerant face, that comes with a german husband
to obey, and seven solid girls and boys to bear and rear, and the
other was our good Anna with her spinster body, her firm jaw, her
humorous, light, clean eyes and her lined, worn, thin, pale yellow
face.
Mrs. Drehten lived a patient, homely, hard-working life. Her 146
husband an honest, decent man enough, was a brewer, and somewhat
given to over drinking, and so he was often surly and unpleasant.
The family of seven children was made up of four stalwart, cheery, 147
filial sons, and three hard working obedient simple daughters.
It was a family life the good Anna very much approved and also she 148
was much liked by them all. With a german woman’s feeling for the
masterhood in men, she was docile to the surly father and rarely
rubbed him the wrong way. To the large, worn, patient, sickly mother
she was a sympathetic listener, wise in council and most efficient
in her help. The young ones too, liked her very well. The sons
teased her all the time and roared with boisterous pleasure when she
gave them back sharp hits. The girls were all so good that her
scoldings here were only in the shape of good advice, sweetened with
new trimmings for their hats, and ribbons, and sometimes on their
birthdays, bits of jewels.
It was here that Anna came for comfort after her grievous stroke 149
at her friend the widow, Mrs. Lehntman. Not that Anna would tell
Mrs. Drehten of this trouble. She could never lay bare the wound
that came to her through this idealised affection. Her affair with
Mrs. Lehntman was too sacred and too grievous ever to be told. But
here in this large household, in busy movement and variety in
strife, she could silence the uneasiness and pain of her own wound.
The Drehtens lived out in the country in one of the wooden, ugly 150
houses that lie in groups outside of our large cities.
The father and the sons all had their work here making beer, and 151
the mother and her girls scoured and sewed and cooked.
On Sundays they were all washed very clean, and smelling of 152
kitchen soap. The sons, in their Sunday clothes, loafed around the
house or in the village, and on special days went on picnics with
their girls. The daughters in their awkward, colored finery went to
church most of the day and then walking with their friends.
They always came together for their supper, where Anna always was 153
most welcome, the jolly Sunday evening supper that german people
love. Here Anna and the boys gave it to each other in sharp hits and
hearty boisterous laughter, the girls made things for them to eat,
and waited on them all, the mother loved all her children all the
time, and the father joined in with his occasional unpleasant word
that made a bitter feeling but which they had all learned to pass as
if it were not said.
It was to the comfort of this house that Anna came that Sunday 154
summer afternoon, after she had left Mrs. Lehntman and her careless
ways.
The Drehten house was open all about. No one was there but Mrs. 155
Drehten resting in her rocking chair, out in the pleasant, scented,
summer air.
Anna had had a hot walk from the cars. 156
She went into the kitchen for a cooling drink, and then came out 157
and sat down on the steps near Mrs. Drehten.
Anna’s anger had changed. A sadness had come to her. Now with the 158
patient, friendly, gentle mother talk of Mrs. Drehten, this sadness
changed to resignation and to rest.
As the evening came on the young ones dropped in one by one. Soon 159
the merry Sunday evening supper was begun.
It had not been all comfort for our Anna, these months of knowing 160
Mrs. Drehten. It had made trouble for her with the family of her
half brother, the fat baker.
Her half brother, the fat baker, was a queer kind of a man. He was 161
a huge, unwieldy creature, all puffed out all over, and no longer
able to walk much, with his enormous body and the big, swollen,
bursted veins in his great legs. He did not try to walk much now. He
sat around his place, leaning on his great thick stick, and watching
his workmen at their work.
On holidays, and sometimes of a Sunday, he went out in his bakery 162
wagon. He went then to each customer he had and gave them each a
large, sweet, raisined loaf of caky bread. At every house with many
groans and gasps he would descend his heavy weight out of the wagon,
his good featured, black haired, flat, good natured face shining
with oily perspiration, with pride in labor and with generous
kindness. Up each stoop he hobbled with the help of his big stick,
and into the nearest chair in the kitchen or in the parlour, as the
fashion of the house demanded, and there he sat and puffed, and then
presented to the mistress or the cook the raisined german loaf his
boy supplied him.
Anna had never been a customer of his. She had always lived in 163
another part of the town, but he never left her out in these bakery
progresses of his, and always with his own hand he gave her her
festive loaf.
Anna liked her half brother well enough. She never knew him really 164
well, for he rarely talked at all and least of all to women, but he
seemed to her, honest, and good and kind, and he never tried to
interfere in Anna’s ways. And then Anna liked the loaves of raisined
bread, for in the summer she and the second girl could live on them,
and not be buying bread with the household money all the time.
But things were not so simple with our Anna, with the other 165
members of her half brother’s house.
Her half brother’s family was made up of himself, his wife, and 166
their two daughters.
Anna never liked her brother’s wife. 167
The youngest of two daughters was named after her aunt Anna. 168
Anna never liked her half brother’s wife. This woman had been very 169
good to Anna, never interfering in her ways, always glad to see her
and to make her visits pleasant, but she had not found favour in our
good Anna’s sight.
Anna had too, no real affection for her nieces. She never scolded 170
them or tried to guide them for their good. Anna never criticised or
interfered in the running of her half brother’s house.
Mrs. Federner was a good looking, prosperous woman, a little harsh 171
and cold within her soul perhaps, but trying always to be pleasant,
good and kind. Her daughters were well trained, quiet, obedient,
well dressed girls, and yet our good Anna loved them not, nor their
mother, nor any of their ways.
It was in this house that Anna had first met her friend, the 172
window, Mrs. Lehntman.
The Federners had never seemed to feel it wrong in Anna, her 173
devotion to this friend and her care of her and of her children.
Mrs. Lehntman and Anna and her feelings were all somehow too big for
their attack. But Mrs. Federner had the mind and tongue that blacken
things. Not really to blacken black, of course, but just to roughen
and to rub on a little smut. She could somehow make even the face of
the Almighty seem pimply and a little coarse, and so she always did
this with her friends, though not with the intent to interfere.
This was really true with Mrs. Lehntman that Mrs. Federner did not 174
mean to interfere, but Anna’s friendship with the Drehtens was a
very different matter.
Why should Mrs. Drehten, that poor common working wife of a man 175
who worked for others in a brewery and who always drank too much,
and was not like a thrifty, decent german man, why should that Mrs.
Drehten and her ugly, awkward daughters be getting presents from her
husband’s sister all the time, and her husband always so good to
Anna, and one of the girls having her name too, and those Drehtens
all strangers to her and never going to come to any good? It was not
right for Anna to do so.
Mrs. Federner knew better than to say such things straight out to 176
her husband’s fiery, stubborn sister, but she lost no chance to let
Anna feel and see what they all thought.
It was easy to blacken all the Drehtens, their poverty, the 177
husband’s drinking, the four big sons carrying on and always lazy,
the awkward, ugly daughters dressing up with Anna’s help and trying
to look so fine, and the poor, weak, hard-working sickly mother, so
easy to degrade with large dosings of contemptuous pity.
Anna could not do much with these attacks for Mrs. Federner always 178
ended with, “And you so good to them Anna all the time. I don’t see
how they could get along at all if you didn’t help them all the
time, but you are so good Anna, and got such a feeling heart, just
like your brother, that you give anything away you got to anybody
that will ask you for it, and that’s shameless enough to take it
when they ain’t no relatives of yours. Poor Mrs. Drehten, she is a
good woman. Poor thing it must be awful hard for her to have to take
things from strangers all the time, and her husband spending it on
drink. I was saying to Mrs. Lehntman, Anna, only yesterday, how I
never was so sorry for any one as Mrs. Drehten, and how good it was
for you to help them all the time.”
All this meant a gold watch and chain to her god daughter for her 179
birthday, the next month, and a new silk umbrella for the elder
sister. Poor Anna, and she did not love them very much, these
relatives of hers, and they were the only kin she had.
Mrs. Lehntman never joined in, in these attacks. Mrs. Lehntman was 180
diffuse and careless in her ways, but she never worked such things
for her own ends, and she was too sure of Anna to be jealous of her
other friends.
All this time Anna was leading her happy life with Dr. Shonjen. 181
She had every day her busy time. She cooked and saved and sewed and
scrubbed and scolded. And every night she had her happy time, in
seeing her Doctor like the fine things she bought so cheap and
cooked so good for him to eat. And then he would listen and laugh so
loud, as she told him stories of what had happened on that day.
The Doctor, too, liked it better all the time and several times in 182
these five years he had of his own motion raised her wages.
Anna was content with what she had and grateful for all her doctor 183
did for her.
So Anna’s serving and her giving life went on, each with its 184
varied pleasures and its pains.
The adopting of the little boy did not put an end to Anna’s 185
friendship for the widow Mrs. Lehntman. Neither the good Anna nor
the careless Mrs. Lehntman would give each other up excepting for
the gravest cause.
Mrs. Lehntman was the only romance Anna ever knew. A certain 186
magnetic brilliancy in person and in manner made Mrs. Lehntman a
woman other women loved. Then, too, she was generous and good and
honest, though she was so careless always in her ways. And then she
trusted Anna and liked her better than any of her other friends, and
Anna always felt this very much.
No, Anna could not give up Mrs. Lehntman, and soon she was busier 187
than before making Julia do things right for little Johnny.
And now new schemes were working strong in Mrs. Lehntman’s head, 188
and Anna must listen to her plans and help her make them work.
Mrs. Lehntman always loved best in her work to deliver young girls 189
who were in trouble. She would keep these in her house until they
could go to their homes or to their work, and slowly pay her back
the money for their care.
Anna had always helped her friend to do this thing, for like all 190
the good women of the decent poor, she felt it hard that girls
should not be helped, not girls that were really bad of course,
these she condemned and hated in her heart and with her tongue, but
honest, decent, good, hard working, foolish girls who were in
trouble.
For such as these Anna always liked to give her money and her 191
strength.
Now Mrs. Lehntman thought that it would pay to take a big house 192
for herself to take in girls and to do everything in a big way.
Anna did not like this plan. 193
Anna was never daring in her ways. Save and you will have the 194
money you have saved, was all that she could know.
Not that the good Anna had it so. 195
She saved and saved and always saved, and then here and there, to 196
this friend and to that, to one in her trouble and to the other in
her joy, in sickness, death, and weddings, or to make young people
happy, it always went, the hard earned money she had saved.
Anna could not clearly see how Mrs. Lehntman could make a big 197
house pay. In the small house where she had these girls, it did not
pay, and in a big house there was so much more that she would spend.
Such things were hard for the good Anna to very clearly see. One 198
day she came into the Lehntman house. “Anna,” Mrs. Lehntman said,
“you know that nice big house on the next corner that we saw to
rent. I took it for a year just yesterday. I paid a little down you
know so I could have it sure all right and now you fix it up just
like you want. I let you do just what you like with it.”
Anna knew that it was now too late. However, “But Mrs. Lehntman 199
you said you would not take another house, you said so just last
week. Oh, Mrs. Lehntman I didn’t think that you would do this so!”
Anna knew so well it was too late. 200
“I know, Anna, but it was such a good house, just right you know 201
and some one else was there to see, and you know you said it suited
very well, and if I didn’t take it the others said they would, and I
wanted to ask you only there wasn’t time, and really Anna, I don’t
need much help, it will go so well I know. I just need a little to
begin and to fix up with and that’s all Anna that I need, and I know
it will go awful well. You wait Anna and you’ll see, and I let you
fix it up just like you want, and you will make it look so nice, you
got such sense in all these things. It will be a good place. You see
Anna if I ain’t right in what I say.”
Of course Anna gave the money for this thing though she could not 202
believe that it was best. No, it was very bad. Mrs. Lehntman could
never make it pay and it would cost so much to keep. But what could
our poor Anna do? Remember Mrs. Lehntman was the only romance Anna
ever knew.
Anna’s strength in her control of what was done in Mrs. Lehntman’s 203
house, was not now what it had been before that Lily’s little Johnny
came. That thing had been for Anna a defeat. There had been no
fighting to a finish but Mrs. Lehntman had very surely won.
Mrs. Lehntman needed Anna just as much as Anna needed Mrs. 204
Lehntman, but Mrs. Lehntman was more ready to risk Anna’s loss, and
so the good Anna grew always weaker in her power to control.
In friendship, power always has its downward curve. One’s strength 205
to manage rises always higher until there comes a time one does not
win, and though one may not really lose, still from the time that
victory is not sure, one’s power slowly ceases to be strong. It is
only in a close tie such as marriage, that influence can mount and
grow always stronger with the years and never meet with a decline.
It can only happen so when there is no way to escape.
Friendship goes by favour. There is always danger of a break or of 206
a stronger power coming in between. Influence can only be a steady
march when one can surely never break away.
Anna wanted Mrs. Lehntman very much and Mrs. Lehntman needed Anna, 207
but there were always other ways to do and if Anna had once given up
she might do so again, so why should Mrs. Lehntman have real fear?
No, while the good Anna did not come to open fight she had been 208
stronger. Now Mrs. Lehntman could always hold out longer. She knew
too, that Anna had a feeling heart. Anna could never stop doing all
she could for any one that really needed help. Poor Anna had no
power to say no.
And then, too, Mrs. Lehntman was the only romance Anna ever knew. 209
Romance is the ideal in one’s life and it is very lonely living with
it lost.
So the good Anna gave all her savings for this place, although she 210
knew that this was not the right way for her friend to do.
For some time now they were all very busy fixing up the house. It 211
swallowed all Anna’s savings fixing up this house, for when Anna
once began to make it nice, she could not leave it be until it was
as good as for the purpose it should be.
Somehow it was Anna now that really took the interest in the 212
house. Mrs. Lehntman, now the thing was done seemed very lifeless,
without interest in the house, uneasy in her mind and restless in
her ways, and more diffuse even than before in her attention. She
was good and kind to all the people in her house, and let them do
whatever they thought best.
Anna did not fail to see that Mrs. Lehntman had some thing on her 213
mind that was all new. What was it that disturbed Mrs. Lehntman so?
She kept on saying it was all in Anna’s head. She had no trouble now
at all. Everybody was so good and it was all so nice in the new
house. But surely there was something here that was all wrong.
Anna heard a good deal of all this from her half brother’s wife, 214
the hard speaking Mrs. Federner.
Through the fog of dust and work and furnishing in the new house, 215
and through the disturbed mind of Mrs. Lehntman, and with the dark
hints of Mrs. Federner, there loomed up to Anna’s sight a man, a new
doctor that Mrs. Lehntman knew.
Anna had never met the man but she heard of him very often now. 216
Not from her friend, the widow Mrs. Lehntman. Anna knew that Mrs.
Lehntman made of him a mystery that Anna had not the strength just
then to vigorously break down.
Mrs. Federner gave always dark suggestions and unpleasant hints. 217
Even good Mrs. Drehten talked of it.
Mrs. Lehntman never spoke of the new doctor more than she could 218
help. This was most mysterious and unpleasant and very hard for our
good Anna to endure.
Anna’s troubles came all of them at once. 219
Here in Mrs. Lehntman’s house loomed up dismal and forbidding, a 220
mysterious, perhaps an evil man. In Dr. Shonjen’s house were
beginning signs of interest in the doctor in a woman.
This, too, Mrs. Federner often told to the poor Anna. The doctor 221
surely would be married soon, he liked so much now to go to Mr.
Weingartner’s house where there was a daughter who loved Doctor,
everybody knew.
In these days the living room in her half brother’s house was 222
Anna’s torture chamber. And worst of all there was so much reason
for her half sister’s words. The Doctor certainly did look like
marriage and Mrs. Lehntman acted very queer.
Poor Anna. Dark were these days and much she had to suffer. 223
The Doctor’s trouble came to a head the first. It was true Doctor 224
was engaged and to be married soon. He told Anna so himself.
What was the good Anna now to do? Dr. Shonjen wanted her of course 225
to stay. Anna was so sad with all these troubles. She knew here in
the Doctor’s house it would be bad when he was married, but she had
not the strength now to be firm and go away. She said at last that
she would try and stay.
Doctor got married now very soon. Anna made the house all 226
beautiful and clean and she really hoped that she might stay. But
this was not for long.
Mrs. Shonjen was a proud, unpleasant woman. She wanted constant 227
service and attention and never even a thank you to a servant. Soon
all Doctor’s old people went away. Anna went to Doctor and
explained. She told him what all the servants thought of his new
wife. Anna bade him a sad farewell and went away.
Anna was now most uncertain what to do. She could go to Curden to 228
her Miss Mary Wadsmith who always wrote how much she needed Anna,
but Anna still dreaded Miss Jane’s interfering ways. Then too, she
could not yet go away from Bridgepoint and from Mrs. Lehntman,
unpleasant as it always was now over there.
Through one of Doctor’s friends Anna heard of Miss Mathilda. Anna 229
was very doubtful about working for a Miss Mathilda. She did not
think it would be good working for a woman any more. She had found
it very good with Miss Mary but she did not think that many women
would be so.
Most women were interfering in their ways. 230
Anna heard that Miss Mathilda was a great big woman, not so big 231
perhaps as her Miss Mary, still she was big, and the good Anna liked
them better so. She did not like them thin and small and active and
always looking in and always prying.
Anna could not make up her mind what was the best thing now for 232
her to do. She could sew and this way make a living, but she did not
like such business very well.
Mrs. Lehntman urged the place with Miss Mathilda. She was sure 233
Anna would find it better so. The good Anna did not know.
“Well Anna,” Mrs. Lehntman said, “I tell you what we do. I go with 234
you to that woman that tells fortunes, perhaps she tell us something
that will show us what is the best way for you now to do.”
It was very bad to go to a woman who tells fortunes. Anna was of 235
strong South German Catholic religion and the german priests in the
churches always said that it was very bad to do things so. But what
else now could the good Anna do? She was so mixed and bothered in
her mind, and troubled with this life that was all wrong, though she
did try so hard to do the best she knew. “All right, Mrs. Lehntman,”
Anna said at last, “I think I go there now with you.”
This woman who told fortunes was a medium. She had a house in the 236
lower quarter of the town. Mrs. Lehntman and the good Anna went to
her.
The medium opened the door for them herself. She was a loose made, 237
dusty, dowdy woman with a persuading, conscious and embracing manner
and very greasy hair.
The woman let them come into the house. 238
The street door opened straight into the parlor, as is the way in 239
the small houses of the south. The parlor had a thick and flowered
carpet on the floor. The room was full of dirty things all made by
hand. Some hung upon the wall, some were on the seats and over backs
of chairs and some on tables and on those what-nots that poor people
love. And everywhere were little things that break. Many of these
little things were broken and the place was stuffy and not clean.
No medium uses her parlor for her work. It is always in her eating 240
room that she has her trances.
The eating room in all these houses is the living room in winter. 241
It has a round table in the centre covered with a decorated woolen
cloth, that has soaked in the grease of many dinners, for though it
should be always taken off, it is easier to spread the cloth upon it
than change it for the blanket deadener that one owns. The
upholstered chairs are dark and worn, and dirty. The carpet has
grown dingy with the food that’s fallen from the table, the dirt
that’s scraped from off the shoes, and the dust that settles with
the ages. The sombre greenish colored paper on the walls has been
smoked a dismal dirty grey, and all pervading is the smell of soup
made out of onions and fat chunks of meat.
The medium brought Mrs. Lehntman and our Anna into his eating 242
room, after she had found out what it was they wanted. They all
three sat around the table and then the medium went into her trance.
The medium first closed her eyes and then they opened very wide 243
and lifeless. She took a number of deep breaths, choked several
times and swallowed very hard. She waved her hand back every now and
then, and she began to speak in a monotonous slow, even tone.
“I see—I see—don’t crowd so on me,—I see—I see—too many 244
forms—don’t crowd so on me—I see—I see—you are thinking of
something—you don’t know whether you want to do it now. I see—I
see—don’t crowd so on me—I see—I see—you are not sure,—I see—I see—a
house with trees around it,—it is dark—it is evening—I see—I see—you
go in the house—I see—I see you come out—it will be all right—you go
and do it—do what you are not certain about—it will come out all
right—it is best and you should do it now.”
She stopped, she made deep gulps, her eyes rolled back into her 245
head, she swallowed hard and then she was her former dingy and bland
self again.
“Did you get what you wanted that the spirit should tell you?” the 246
woman asked. Mrs. Lehntman answered yes, it was just what her friend
had wanted so bad to know. Anna was uneasy in this house with
superstition, with fear of her good priest, and with disgust at all
the dirt and grease, but she was most content for now she knew what
it was best for her to do.
Anna paid the woman for her work and then they came away. 247
“There Anna didn’t I tell you how it would all be? You see the 248
spirit says so too. You must take the place with Miss Mathilda, that
is what I told you was the best thing for you to do. We go out and
see her where she lives to-night. Ain’t you glad, Anna, that I took
you to this place, so you know now what you will do?”
Mrs. Lehntman and Anna went that evening to see Miss Mathilda. 249
Miss Mathilda was staying with a friend who lived in a house that
did have trees about. Miss Mathilda was not there herself to talk
with Anna.
If it had not been that it was evening, and so dark, and that this 250
house had trees all round about, and that Anna found herself going
in and coming out just as the woman that day said that she would do,
had it not all been just as the medium said, the good Anna would
never have taken the place with Miss Mathilda.
Anna did not see Miss Mathilda and she did not like the friend who 251
acted in her place.
This friend was a dark, sweet, gentle little mother woman, very 252
easy to be pleased in her own work and very good to servants, but
she felt that acting for her young friend, the careless Miss
Mathilda, she must be very careful to examine well and see that all
was right and that Anna would surely do the best she knew. She asked
Anna all about her ways and her intentions and how much she would
spend, and how often she went out and whether she could wash and
cook and sew.
The good Anna set her teeth fast to endure and would hardly answer 253
anything at all. Mrs. Lehntman made it all go fairly well.
The good Anna was all worked up with her resentment, and Miss 254
Mathilda’s friend did not think that she would do.
However, Miss Mathilda was willing to begin and as for Anna, she 255
knew that the medium said it must be so. Mrs. Lehntman, too, was
sure, and said she knew that this was the best thing for Anna now to
do. So Anna sent word at last to Miss Mathilda, that if she wanted
her, she would try if it would do.
So Anna began a new life taking care of Miss Mathilda. 256
Anna fixed up the little red brick house where Miss Mathilda was 257
going to live and made it very pleasant, clean and nice. She brought
over her dog, Baby, and her parrot. She hired Lizzie for a second
girl to be with her and soon they were all content. All except the
parrot, for Miss Mathilda did not like its scream. Baby was all
right but not the parrot. But then Anna never really loved the
parrot, and so she gave it to the Drehten girls to keep.
Before Anna could really rest content with Miss Mathilda, she had 258
to tell her good german priest what it was that she had done, and
how very bad it was that she had been and how she would never do so
again.
Anna really did believe with all her might. It was her fortune 259
never to live with people who had any faith, but then that never
worried Anna. She prayed for them always as she should, and she was
very sure that they were good. The doctor loved to tease her with
his doubts and Miss Mathilda liked to do so too, but with the
tolerant spirit of her church, Anna never thought that such things
were bad for them to do.
Anna found it hard to always know just why it was that things went 260
wrong. Sometimes her glasses broke and then she knew that she had
not done her duty by the church, just in the way that she should do.
Sometimes she was so hard at work that she would not go to mass. 261
Something always happened then. Anna’s temper grew irritable and her
ways uncertain and distraught. Everybody suffered and then her
glasses broke. That was always very bad because they cost so much to
fix. Still in a way it always ended Anna’s troubles, because she
knew then that all this was because she had been bad. As long as she
could scold it might be just the bad ways of all the thoughtless
careless world, but when her glasses broke that made it clear. That
meant that it was she herself who had been bad.
No, it was no use for Anna not to do the way she should, for 262
things always then went wrong and finally cost money to make whole,
and this was the hardest thing for the good Anna to endure.
Anna almost always did her duty. She made confession and her 263
mission whenever it was right. Of course she did not tell the father
when she deceived people for their good, or when she wanted them to
give something for a little less.
When Anna told such histories to her doctor and later to her 264
cherished Miss Mathilda, her eyes were always full of humor and
enjoyment as she explained that she had said it so, and now she
would not have to tell the father for she had not really made a sin.
But going to a fortune teller Anna knew was really bad. That had 265
to be told to the father just as it was and penance had then to be
done.
Anna did this and now her new life was well begun, making Miss 266
Mathilda and the rest do just the way they should.
Yes, taking care of Miss Mathilda were the happiest days of all 267
the good Anna’s strong hard working life.
With Miss Mathilda Anna did it all. The clothes, the house, the 268
hats, what she should wear and when and what was always best for her
to do. There was nothing Miss Mathilda would not let Anna manage,
and only be too glad if she would do.
Anna scolded and cooked and sewed and saved so well, that Miss 269
Mathilda had so much to spend, that it kept Anna still busier
scolding all the time about the things she bought, that made so much
work for Anna and the other girl to do. But for all the scolding,
Anna was proud almost to bursting of her cherished Miss Mathilda
with all her knowledge and her great possessions, and the good Anna
was always telling of it all to everybody that she knew.
Yes these were the happiest days of all her life with Anna, even 270
though with her friends there were great sorrows. But these sorrows
did not hurt the good Anna now, as they had done in the years that
went before.
Miss Mathilda was not a romance in the good Anna’s life, but Anna 271
gave her so much strong affection that it almost filled her life as
full.
It was well for the good Anna that her life with Miss Mathilda was 272
so happy, for now in these days, Mrs. Lehntman went altogether bad.
The doctor she had learned to know, was too certainly an evil as
well as a mysterious man, and he had power over the widow and
midwife, Mrs. Lehntman.
Anna never saw Mrs. Lehntman at all now any more. 273
Mrs. Lehntman had borrowed some more money and had given Anna a 274
note then for it all, and after that Anna never saw her any more.
Anna now stopped altogether going to the Lehntmans’. Julia, the
tall, gawky, good, blonde, stupid daughter, came often to see Anna,
but she could tell little of her mother.
It certainly did look very much as if Mrs. Lehntman had now gone 275
altogether bad. This was a great grief to the good Anna, but not so
great a grief as it would have been had not Miss Mathilda meant so
much to her now.
Mrs. Lehntman went from bad to worse. The doctor, the mysterious 276
and evil man, got into trouble doing things that were not right to
do.
Mrs. Lehntman was mixed up in this affair. 277
It was just as bad as it could be, but they managed, both the 278
doctor and Mrs. Lehntman, finally to come out safe.
Everybody was so sorry about Mrs. Lehntman. She had been really a 279
good woman before she met this doctor, and even now she certainly
had not been really bad.
For several years now Anna never even saw her friend. 280
But Anna always found new people to befriend, people who, in the 281
kindly fashion of the poor, used up her savings and then gave
promises in place of payments. Anna never really thought that these
people would be good, but when they did not do the way they should,
and when they did not pay her back the money she had loaned, and
never seemed the better for her care, then Anna would grow bitter
with the world.
No, none of them had any sense of what was the right way for them 282
to do. So Anna would repeat in her despair.
The poor are generous with their things. They give always what 283
they have, but with them to give or to receive brings with it no
feeling that they owe the giver for the gift.
Even a thrifty german Anna was ready to give all that she had 284
saved, and so not be sure that she would have enough to take care of
herself if she fell sick, or for old age, when she could not work.
Save and you will have the money you have saved was true only for
the day of saving, even for a thrifty german Anna. There was no
certain way to have it for old age, for it must always be in
strangers’ hands in a bank or in investments by a friend.
And so when any day one might need life and help from others of 285
the working poor, there was no way a woman who had a little saved
could say them no.
So the good Anna gave her all to friends and strangers, to 286
children, dogs and cats, to anything that asked or seemed to need
her care.
It was in this way that Anna came to help the barber and his wife 287
who lived around the corner, and who some-how could never make ends
meet. They worked hard, were thrifty, had no vices, but the barber
was one of them who never can make money. Whoever owed him money did
not pay. Whenever he had a chance at a good job he fell sick and
could not take it. It was never his own fault that he had trouble,
but he never seemed to make things come out right.
His wife was a blonde, thin, pale, german little woman, who bore 288
her children very hard, and worked too soon, and then till she was
sick. She too, always had things that went wrong.
They both needed constant help and patience, and the good Anna 289
gave both to them all the time.
Another woman who needed help from the good Anna, was one who was 290
in trouble from being good to others.
This woman’s husband’s brother, who was very good, worked in a 291
shop where there was a Bohemian, who was getting sick with a
consumption. This man got so much worse he could not do his work,
but he was not so sick that he could stay in a hospital. So this
woman had him living there with her. He was not a nice man, nor was
he thankful for all the woman did for him. He was cross to her two
children and made a great mess always in her house. The doctor said
he must have many things to eat, and the woman and the brother of
the husband got them for him.
There was no friendship, no affection, no liking even for the man 292
this woman cared for, no claim of common country or of kin, but in
the kindly fashion of the poor this woman gave her all and made her
house a nasty place, and for a man who was not even grateful for the
gift.
Then, of course, the woman herself got into trouble. Her husband’s 293
brother was now married. Her husband lost his job. She did not have
the money for the rent. It was the good Anna’s savings that were
handy.
So it went on. Sometimes a little girl, sometimes a big one was in 294
trouble and Anna heard of them and helped them to find places.
Stray dogs and cats Anna always kept until she found them homes. 295
She was always careful to learn whether these people would be good
to animals.
Out of the whole collection of stray creatures, it was the young 296
Peter and the jolly little Rags, Anna could not find it in her heart
to part with. These became part of the household of the good Anna’s
Miss Mathilda.
Peter was a very useless creature, a foolish, silly, cherished, 297
coward male. It was wild to see him rush up and down in the back
yard, barking and bouncing at the wall, when there was some dog out
beyond, but when the very littlest one there was got inside of the
fence and only looked at Peter, Peter would retire to his Anna and
blot himself out between her skirts.
When Peter was left downstairs alone, he howled. “I am all alone,” 298
he wailed, and then the good Anna would have to come and fetch him
up. Once when Anna stayed a few nights in a house not far away, she
had to carry Peter all the way, for Peter was afraid when he found
himself on the street outside his house. Peter was a good sized
creature and he sat there and he howled, and the good Anna carried
him all the way in her own arms. He was a coward was this Peter, but
he had kindly, gentle eyes and a pretty collie head, and his fur was
very thick and white and nice when he was washed. And then Peter
never strayed away, and he looked out of his nice eyes and he liked
it when you rubbed him down, and he forgot you when you went away,
and he barked whenever there was any noise.
When he was a little pup he had one night been put into the yard 299
and that was all of his origin she knew. The good Anna loved him
well and spoiled him as a good german mother always does her son.
Little Rags was very different in his nature. He was a lively 300
creature made out of ends of things, all fluffy and dust color, and
he was always bounding up into the air and darting all about over
and then under silly Peter and often straight into solemn fat,
blind, sleepy Baby, and then in a wild rush after some stray cat.
Rags was a pleasant, jolly little fellow. The good Anna liked him 301
very well, but never with her strength as she loved her good looking
coward, foolish young man, Peter.
Baby was the dog of her past life and she held Anna with old ties 302
of past affection. Peter was the spoiled, good looking young man, of
her middle age, and Rags was always something of a toy. She liked
him but he never struck in very deep. Rags had strayed in somehow
one day and then when no home for him was quickly found, he had just
stayed right there.
It was a very happy family there all together in the kitchen, the 303
good Anna and Sally and old Baby and young Peter and the jolly
little Rags.
The parrot had passed out of Anna’s life. She had really never 304
loved the parrot and now she hardly thought to ask for him, even
when she visited the Drehtens.
Mrs. Drehten was the friend Anna always went to, for her Sundays. 305
She did not get advice from Mrs. Drehten as she used to from the
widow, Mrs. Lehntman, for Mrs. Drehten was a mild, worn,
unaggressive nature that never cared to influence or to lead. But
they could mourn together for the world these two worn, working
german women, for its sadness and its wicked ways of doing. Mrs.
Drehten knew so well what one could suffer.
Things did not go well in these days with the Drehtens. 306
The children were all good, but the father with his temper and his 307
spending kept everything from being what it should.
Poor Mrs. Drehten still had trouble with her tumor. She could 308
hardly do any work now any more. Mrs. Drehten was a large, worn,
patient german woman, with a soft face, lined, yellow brown in color
and the look that comes from a german husband to obey, and many
solid girls and boys to bear and rear, and from being always on
one’s feet and never having any troubles cured.
Mrs. Drehten was always getting worse, and now the doctor thought 309
it would be best to take the tumor out.
It was no longer Dr. Shonjen who treated Mrs. Drehten. They all 310
went now to a good old german doctor they all knew.
“You see, Miss Mathilda,” Anna said, “All the old german patients 311
don’t go no more now to Doctor. I stayed with him just so long as I
could stand it, but now he is moved away up town too far for poor
people, and his wife, she holds her head up so and always is
spending so much money just for show, and so he can’t take right
care of us poor people any more. Poor man, he has got always to be
thinking about making money now. I am awful sorry about Doctor, Miss
Mathilda, but he neglected Mrs. Drehten shameful when she had her
trouble, so now I never see him any more. Doctor Herman is a good,
plain, german doctor and he would never do things so, and Miss
Mathilda, Mrs. Drehten is coming in to-morrow to see you before she
goes to the hospital for her operation. She could not go comfortable
till she had seen you first to see what you would say.”
All Anna’s friends reverenced the good Anna’s cherished Miss 312
Mathilda. How could they not do so and still remain friends with the
good Anna? Miss Mathilda rarely really saw them but they were always
sending flowers and words of admiration through her Anna. Every now
and then Anna would bring one of them to Miss Mathilda for advice.
It is wonderful how poor people love to take advice from people 313
who are friendly and above them, from people who read in books and
who are good.
Miss Mathilda saw Mrs. Drehten and told her she was glad that she 314
was going to the hospital for operation for that surely would be
best, and so good Mrs. Drehten’s mind was set at rest.
Mrs. Drehten’s tumor came out very well. Mrs. Drehten was 315
afterwards never really well, but she could do her work a little
better, and be on her feet and yet not get so tired.
And so Anna’s life went on, taking care of Miss Mathilda and all 316
her clothes and goods, and being good to every one that asked or
seemed to need her help.
Now, slowly, Anna began to make it up with Mrs. Lehntman. They 317
could never be as they had been before. Mrs. Lehntman could never be
again the romance in the good Anna’s life, but they could be friends
again, and Anna could help all the Lehntmans in their need. This
slowly came about.
Mrs. Lehntman had now left the evil and mysterious man who had 318
been the cause of all her trouble. She had given up, too, the new
big house that she had taken. Since her trouble her practice had
been very quiet. Still she managed to do fairly well. She began to
talk of paying the good Anna. This, however, had not gotten very
far.
Anna saw Mrs. Lehntman a good deal now. Mrs. Lehntman’s crisp, 319
black, curly hair had gotten streaked with gray. Her dark, full,
good looking face had lost its firm outline, gone flabby and a
little worn. She had grown stouter and her clothes did not look very
nice. She was as bland as ever in her ways, and as diffuse as always
in her attention, but through it all there was uneasiness and fear
and uncertainty lest some danger might be near.
She never said a word of her past life to the good Anna, but it 320
was very plain to see that her experience had not left her easy, nor
yet altogether free.
It had been hard for this good woman, for Mrs. Lehntman was really 321
a good woman, it had been a very hard thing for this german woman to
do what everybody knew and thought was wrong. Mrs. Lehntman was
strong and she had courage, but it had been very hard to bear. Even
the good Anna did not speak to her with freedom. There always
remained a mystery and a depression in Mrs. Lehntman’s affair.
And now the blonde, foolish, awkward daughter, Julia was in 322
trouble. During the years the mother gave her no attention, Julia
kept company with a young fellow who was a clerk somewhere in a
store down in the city. He was a decent, dull young fellow, who did
not make much money and could never save it for he had an old mother
he supported. He and Julia had been keeping company for several
years and now it was needful that they should be married. But then
how could they marry? He did not make enough to start them and to
keep on supporting his old mother too. Julia was not used to working
much and she said, and she was stubborn, that she would not live
with Charley’s dirty, cross, old mother. Mrs. Lehntman had no money.
She was just beginning to get on her feet. It was of course, the
good Anna’s savings that were handy.
However it paid Anna to bring about this marriage, paid her in 323
scoldings and in managing the dull, long, awkward Julia, and her
good, patient, stupid Charley. Anna loved to buy things cheap, and
fix up a new place.
Julia and Charley were soon married and things went pretty well 324
with them. Anna did not approve their slack, expensive ways of
doing.
“No Miss Mathilda,” she would say, “The young people nowadays have 325
no sense for saving and putting money by so they will have something
to use when they need it. There’s Julia and her Charley. I went in
ther the other day, Miss Mathilda, and they had a new table with a
marble top and on it they had a grand new plush album. ‘Where you
get that album?’ I asked Julia. ‘Oh, Charley he gave it to me for my
birthday,’ she said, and I asked her if it was paid for and she said
not all yet but it would be soon. Now I ask you what business have
they Miss Mathilda, when they ain’t paid for anything they got
already, what business have they to be buying new things for her
birthdays. Julia she don’t do no work, she just sits around and
thinks how she can spend the money, and Charley he never puts one
cent by. I never see anything like the people nowadays Miss
Mathilda, they don’t seem to have any sense of being careful about
money. Julia and Charley when they have any children they won’t have
nothing to bring them up with right. I said that to Julia, Miss
Mathilda, when she showed me those silly things that Charley bought
her, and she just said in her silly, giggling way, perhaps they
don’t have any children, and then Miss Mathilda you know there is
Mrs. Lehntman. You know she regular adopted little Johnny just so
she could pay out some more money just as if she didn’t have trouble
enough taking care of her own children. No Miss Mathilda, I never
see how people can do things so. People don’t seem to have no sense
of right or wrong or anything these days Miss Mathilda, they are
just careless and thinking always of themselves and how they can
always have a happy time. No, Miss Mathilda I don’t see how people
can go on and do things so.”
The good Anna could not understand the careless and bad ways of 326
all the world and always she grew bitter with it all. No, not one of
them had any sense of what was the right way for them to do.
Anna’s past life was now drawing to an end. Her old blind dog, 327
Baby, was sick and like to die. Baby had been the first gift from
her friend the widow, Mrs. Lehntman in the old days when Anna had
been with Miss Mary Wadsmith, and when these two women had first
come together.
Through all the years of change, Baby had stayed with the good 328
Anna, growing old and fat and blind and lazy. Baby had been active
and a ratter when she was young, but that was so long ago it was
forgotten, and for many years now Baby had wanted only her warm
basket and her dinner.
Anna in her active life found need of others, of Peter and the 329
funny little Rags, but always Baby was the eldest and held her with
the ties of old affection. Anna was harsh when the young ones tried
to keep poor Baby out and use her basket. Baby had been blind now
for some years as dogs get, when they are no longer active. She got
weak and fat and breathless and she could not even stand long any
more. Anna had always to see that she got her dinner and that the
young active ones did not deprive her.
Baby did not die with a real sickness. She just got older and more 330
blind and coughed and then more quiet, and then slowly one bright
summer’s day she died.
There is nothing more dreary than old age in animals. Somehow it 331
is all wrong that they should have grey hair and withered skin, and
blind old eyes, and decayed and useless teeth. An old man or an old
woman almost always has some tie that seems to bind them to the
younger, realer life. They have children or the remembrance of old
duties, but a dog that’s old and so cut off from all its world of
struggle, is like a dreary, deathless Struldbrug, the dreary dragger
on of death through life.
And so one day old Baby died. It was dreary, more than sad, for 332
the good Anna. She did not want the poor old beast to linger with
its weary age, and blind old eyes and dismal shaking cough, but this
death left Anna very empty. She had the foolish young man Peter, and
the jolly little Rags for comfort, but Baby had been the only one
that could remember.
The good Anna wanted a real graveyard for her Baby, but this could 333
not be in a Christian country, and so Anna all alone took her old
friend done up in decent wrappings and put her into the ground in
some quiet place that Anna knew of.
The good Anna did not weep for poor old Baby. Nay, she had not 334
time even to feel lonely, for with the good Anna it was sorrow upon
sorrow. She was now no longer to keep house for Miss Mathilda.
When Anna had first come to Miss Mathilda she had known that it 335
might only be for a few years, for Miss Mathilda was given to much
wandering and often changed her home, and found new places where she
went to live. The good Anna did not then think much about this, for
when she first went to Miss Mathilda she had not thought that she
would like it and so she had not worried about staying. Then in
those happy years that they had been together, Anna had made herself
forget it. This last year when she knew that it was coming she had
tried hard to think it would not happen.
“We won’t talk about it now Miss Mathilda, perhaps we all be dead 336
by then,” she would say when Miss Mathilda tried to talk it over.
Or, “If we live till then Miss Mathilda, perhaps you will be staying
on right here.”
No, the good Anna could not talk as if this thing were real, it 337
was too weary to be once more left with strangers.
Both the good Anna and her cherished Miss Mathilda tried hard to 338
think that this would not really happen.
Anna made missions and all kinds of things to keep her Miss 339
Mathilda and Miss Mathilda thought out all the ways to see if the
good Anna could not go with her, but neither the missions nor the
plans had much success. Miss Mathilda would go, and she was going
far away to a new country where Anna could not live, for she would
be too lonesome.
There was nothing that these two could do but part. Perhaps we all 340
be dead by then, the good Anna would repeat, but even that did not
really happen. If we all live till then, Miss Mathilda, came out
truer. They all did live till then, all except poor old blind Baby,
and they simply had to part.
Poor Anna and poor Miss Mathilda. They could not look at each 341
other that last day. Anna could not keep herself busy working. She
just went in and out and sometimes scolded.
Anna could not make up her mind what she should do now for her 342
future. She said that she would for a while keep this little red
brick house that they had lived in. Perhaps she might just take in a
few boarders. She did not know, she would write about it later and
tell it all to Miss Mathilda.
The dreary day dragged out and then all was ready and Miss 343
Mathilda left to take her train. Anna stood strained and pale and
dry eyed on the white stone steps of the little red brick house that
they had lived in. The last thing Miss Mathilda heard was the good
Anna bidding foolish Peter say good bye and be sure to remember Miss
Mathilda.
----------
The Good Anna
Part III: The Death of the Good Anna
EVERY one who had known of Miss Mathilda wanted the good Anna now to 1
take a place with them, for they all knew how well Anna could take
care of people and all their clothes and goods. Anna too could
always go to Curden to Miss Mary Wadsmith, but none of all these
ways seemed very good to Anna.
It was not now any longer that she wanted to stay near Mrs. 2
Lehntman. There was no one now that made anything important, but
Anna was certain that she did not want to take a place where she
would be under some new people. No one could ever be for Anna as had
been her cherished Miss Mathilda. No one could ever again so freely
let her do it all. It would be better Anna thought in her strong
strained weary body, it would be better just to keep on there in the
little red brick house that was all furnished, and make a living
taking in some boarders. Miss Mathilda had let her have the things,
so it would not cost any money to begin. She could perhaps manage to
live on so. She could do all the work and do everything as she
thought best, and she was too weary with the changes to do more than
she just had to, to keep living. So she stayed on in the house where
they had lived, and she found some men, she would not take in women,
who took her rooms and who were her boarders.
Things soon with Anna began to be less dreary. She was very 3
popular with her few boarders. They loved her scoldings and the good
things she made for them to eat.
They made good jokes and laughed loud and always did whatever Anna 4
wanted, and soon the good Anna got so that she liked it very well.
Not that she did not always long for Miss Mathilda. She hoped and
waited and was very certain that sometime, in one year or in another
Miss Mathilda would come back, and then of course would want her,
and then she could take all good care of her again.
Anna kept all Miss Mathilda’s things in the best order. The 5
boarders were well scolded if they ever made a scratch on Miss
Mathilda’s table.
Some of the boarders were hearty good south german fellows and 6
Anna always made them go to mass. One boarder was a lusty german
student who was studying in Bridgepoint to be a doctor. He was
Anna’s special favourite and she scolded him as she used to her old
doctor so that he always would be good. Then, too, this cheery
fellow always sang when he was washing, and that was what Miss
Mathilda always used to do. Anna’s heart grew warm again with this
young fellow who seemed to bring back to her everything she needed.
And so Anna’s life in these days was not all unhappy. She worked 7
and scolded, she had her stray dogs and cats and people, who all
asked and seemed to need her care, and she had hearty german fellows
who loved her scoldings and ate so much of the good things that she
knew so well the way to make.
No, the good Anna’s life in these days was not all unhappy. She 8
did not see her old friends much, she was too busy, but once in a
great while she took a Sunday afternoon and went to see good Mrs.
Drehten.
The only trouble was that Anna hardly made a living. She charged 9
so little for her board and gave her people such good things to eat,
that she could only just make both ends meet. The good german priest
to whom she always told her troubles tried to make her have the
boarders pay a little higher, and Miss Mathilda always in her
letters urged her to this thing, but the good Anna somehow could not
do it. Her boarders were nice men but she knew they did not have
much money, and then she could not raise on those who had been with
her and she could not ask the new ones to pay higher, when those who
were already there were paying just what they had paid before. So
Anna let it go just as she had begun it. She worked and worked all
day and thought all night how she could save, and with all the work
she just managed to keep living. She could not make enough to lay
any mone
PLEASE NOTE: Each paragraph - in each section of the work - is numbered on the right-hand side.