Before Women Had Wings

By Dorothy B. Schweitzer

Women Without Wings is a study of the lives of three young women and their mothers who lived out their lives in a time when Vietnam standards of gentility dictated the conduct of all classes.

These standards did indeed insure that women had clipped wings.

Myra, Anne, and "Pet" are of marriageable age the summer they received invitations to a house party, the social event of the season.

This event took the happy thoughtless days of the three teenagers to the realization they were caught within the structured world that defined their behavior and had the power to choose their life partner.

As the story unfolds against the background of upper-class life in the years following the civil war, we see how circumstances begin to shape the lives of the three girls whose wings are symbolically clipped.

We see each girl handling the situation differently. Myra defies, Anne manipulates the system, and "Pet" succumbs and in deteriorating health; dies.

This message of mothers and daughters still resonate in a powerful way for women who, today, have wings.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 27, 2010
• ISBN: 9781453526941

Dorothy B. Schweitzer

Dorothy B. Schweitzer was born in Missouri in 1916. She grew up in the quiescent Southern corridor along the Mississippi flowing down to Saint Louis and beyond. She graduated from the University of Iowa, received an MFA from the Writer's Workshop University of Guanajuato, and did post-graduate work in art history. Her articles and short stories appeared in Quarterlies and other Publications during the twenty years the Author lived in Florida. The Author is a member of the National League of American Pen Women. She now lives in Nevada with her son and his family.

Book preview

Prologue

Women with clipped wings, she called them.

Why?—because they couldn’t fly.

MOST OF THE stories I’ve woven together to create this novel were first written in a tablet with an Indian chief on the cover about seventy-five years ago, soon after my Aunt Mira began telling me about her life and the lives of other women she knew and loved. Women with clipped wings, she called them. Why?—because they couldn’t fly.

All this occurred one hundred and thirty years ago, a few years after the War Between the States. The book is not about the war; it is about women, ordinary women, caught in an age that allowed women no freedom to make choices of their own. Therefore, lives were often filled with tragedy that, perhaps, could have been avoided if society at that time had not been bound by the dictates of the Victorian Age—an age named for a woman, but dominated by men.

Mira began the storytelling one Sunday when I was nine years old. There was a family dinner at a relative’s house in the country. After dinner, while we were strolling around the grounds, my aunt said, "Come walk across this green pasture with me.

"I think you’ll want to when you know that I’m going to show you something very special. Do you see that clump of trees in the distance? See the sun shining on them? Look closely now. Can you see the steps through the trees? That is all that’s left of a wonderful house that had its home in that pasture. I want to tell you something that happened at this house, something you can remember when you are old like me.

"Oh, yes, you’ll grow old, but I hope you’ll understand why I want to tell you about this day long before you are that old!

"Why, this spot is still beautiful! I wish you could have seen how it looked fifty years ago. There was a wide avenue, shaded by trees that swept up to a door—right here. Look across the pasture . . . . The trees are gone, and the avenue, but can’t you feel the beauty? It is still here. How strange . . . here are the wide front steps. Well, time can’t destroy stone . . . or memory. Let’s sit here on this step.

"This was such a happy house, and today I want to tell you about a wonderful weekend spent here. It was June, just like now. It was a very special weekend, for your grandmother and I were to attend a grand house party here.

"Well, I want to tell you because it had to do with all the rest of her life, and mine; others’, too. So let me tell you the story—and if you sit and listen, you and I will forever share a very special memory. Do you like that idea?

I do, too.

As she spun the tale about that house party, that magical weekend, and how it shaped so many lives, I began to get caught up in imagining that long ago time. I began to feel the warmth of the sunshine; I could see how it shone through the trees and dappled the avenue and terrace that special day. I looked out over the pasture and imagined the high-stepping horses coming up the avenue; I could sense the excitement as the guests rode up and dismounted. And I became enmeshed forever in the lore about the lives of those beautiful young people gathered there; I wanted to know more about the bright riding habits, the ball gowns, the buffs and blues of the mens’ clothes, the hats they wore, and the hopes and tragedies set in motion because of the house party.

All of the young girls at the house party had clipped wings, my aunt added.

What do you mean by clipped wings? I asked.

She thought awhile, then explained it so a little girl could understand. "You have seen the chickens in the chicken yard with clipped wings, haven’t you? Their wings are clipped because they might fly over the fence and be free to roam, free to go away and lay eggs any place they wished. ‘This won’t do,’ say the caretakers of the chicken yard. ‘These chickens must be protected. They must stay in the chicken yard and lay eggs safely in the nests we have designated. It is the correct place for chickens to lay eggs and supply more chickens.’

Now, chickens have strong wings when they hatch and while they are little, but as soon as they became pullets their wings are clipped, she continued. "Roosters’ wings are never clipped; they are free to fly up on the fence and crow, or fly down into the grass on the other side and wander around looking for fat worms. Not so for pullets; they lay the eggs, you see, so they must be kept from flying over the fence.

As the pullets grow older and become old hens, they become used to having clipped wings. They want to stay safely in the chicken yard. Most have forgotten they ever wanted to fly. I suppose even if the feathers grew out and became full wings again, only a few would fly over the fence. The rest would be afraid to use their wings. They would cluck in loud protest if one of their numbers did fly over.

Why don’t they want to be free? I asked. I didn’t like chickens much, but there was something interesting about this!

"Well, they’ve never been free, you see; their wings were clipped before they were old enough to fly over the fence. For that reason, most chickens didn’t know about any other place except their safe enclosed yard. In payment for such protection they were subject to someone else’s wishes. That could mean having their head chopped off; or their eggs might be taken away if the caretaker didn’t wish certain hens to hatch any children of their own. They just lived on day by day having no say about their lives at all.

"Women were a great deal like that when I was growing up; our wings were clipped just as surely as the chickens. And, like the pullets and the hens, we endured many things without being able to do a thing about it. The difference between the chickens and us was we had a brain; we knew our wings were clipped and we couldn’t fly. So many wanted to fly. But this was an age before wings, so the women in these stories endured like the chickens. Do you understand now?

I thought you would, Mira said.

As the years went by and I became a teenager, I transferred my stories from the yellowing tablet into a journal; then, in my college years I began to weave them into a book. But in the busy middle years of my life, I put that skeletal manuscript away until it, too, was dim and yellow.

Now, at eighty-four my desire to share these stories with other women can no longer be denied. With my yellowed notes and my intuition, I’ve finally woven into a book the tragic story of five women who lived without wings. These women stand in memoriam to women through the ages—for women have had clipped wings in every age since recorded history began five thousand years ago.

It is only now that women in Western civilization can fly over the fence and choose their own fat worm.

Chapter One

The house stood peacefully

Beyond the canopy of oaks,

In the moonlight

SUDDENLY JIM LET out a wild rebel yell. He galloped ahead, bent forward as if riding into battle with a saber. Sam came along beside him, and they struck out at life, lashing with imaginary swords at the hurt the house party was causing in their lives.

They whooped along for half a mile or so, startling the quiet animals in the pastures along the way. Finally they grew tired and slowed to a trot. Riding along, without speaking, they approached the avenue leading up to the Taylor’s house. Wordlessly they turned their horses and started up the wide avenue.

The two men rode along quietly, then reined in their horses, and sat motionless under the overhanging trees. They gazed down the dark avenue at the house standing peacefully in the moonlight beyond the canopy of oaks.

The delicate and subtle air of the moonlit spring night was filled with odors; the crisp, moist smells of newly planted gardens, the loamy smell of the sweet earth, the sharp scent of new grass. These were carried along on the breeze blowing in the cool of the night.

It’s not so grand, the two young men thought as they looked at the house. Yet there it was, tall and substantial, serene and secure, representing a world from which they were excluded. They were jolted into facing this fact because neither had received an invitation to the house party the Taylors, whose home this was, were giving that summer of 1876.

Sitting on his horse under the oaks, Sam shifted uneasily in the saddle. Always took for granted I was friends with the Taylor girls, he thought. Yet he understood with a new knowledge, born at such a moment, that the intangible cannot be touched, the ungraspable cannot be grasped. He bent over and patted his horse’s neck, as a rush of humiliation flowed over him. I’m a nobody, Sam McFall thought.

Sam was twenty-two. An Irishman, not quite six feet tall, with brown hair and blue eyes, he wore a full moustache fashionable in that era. The rest of his face was clean-shaven and always wore a happy expression as if he’d just laughed at a good joke. His left eyebrow went up when he said something witty, and his eyes twinkled with the joy of living that boiled up in him and intersected the energies that made up his life. Women loved him; he pursued them diligently, left them laughing, and forgot their names the next day.

Unlike his present life, Sam’s early childhood had been full of woe. He was begotten without beauty and lived in a world without tenderness, magic, or nobleness of spirit. His parents were beaten down by poverty long before he was born.

Hattie and Seth McFall came to Missouri from Kentucky in a wagon pulled by one mule; part of a group escaping the scars and squalor of a deposited inheritance. They settled on a scrubby 20 acres north of Grant Gilman’s land. The area was known as The Ridge. Somehow these lonely hill people seemed to find solace in the rolling greenness of these Missouri hills that reminded them of Ireland.

Sam’s parents, worn out from hard work and little food, died from a strange malady that swept The Ridge in the ten years following the War. Perhaps the returning weary and malnourished soldiers carried the deadly germs home, no one knew. Grant Gilman heard the talk among his men about the fever and listened as they spoke of a boy left orphaned. He asked them to repeat the story. They shouted, for Grant was deaf, how this little boy was left alone. Day after day he was seen sitting in the front door; no one knew if he had food, no one had any extra to share with him, anyway.

Grant, who had been an orphan, couldn’t get the boy out of his mind. One day he saddled his horse, rode the many miles over to The Ridge, notified the authorities he was taking responsibility for the boy, and went in search of the falling down shack. When he entered and saw Sam sitting forlornly on an unmade cot in the bare room, his heart went out to the boy. He picked Sam up in his arms and carried him out of that squalor forever.

Sam’s starved little heart responded, from that day on his life was framed and staged for Grant’s approval. His desire to be like Grant, who was markedly self-assured and known for his joviality, became the living aspiration that carried him through childhood into manhood. He even adopted Grant’s mode of dressing: riding pants and boots. His open-necked shirt, revealing the red kerchief he always wore as a scarf around his neck, was his own affectation.

Now Sam was farm manager, trusted and respected by Grant Gilman, who in turn was so respected in the community, they named the new town, Gilman, in his honor. The community, however, knowing Sam’s background, did not look upon him in the same manner. They felt his background was questionable, just a little beyond the pale. Perhaps because he felt this, he struck up a friendship with Jim Young, a stranger in this part of Missouri. It was rumored that perhaps this stranger rode with Jesse James. It was only a rumor; but in fact Jim Young was an intrinsic part of the James Gang.

Jim Young was thirteen when he stood by the well in his father’s barnyard and listened to the neighbor boys talk as they watered their horses. They were going to fight in the war. They were going to find Quantrell and ride with him to get supplies for the Southern army. They bragged about how they would shoot and kill Yankees. One of the boys had a pistol in his belt. Jim was filled with desire to ride away with them. He dreamed of nothing else for months. He wanted a pistol, too. He could shoot a rifle, but could he shoot a pistol? He wanted a pistol in the worst way. One day he stole the neighbor’s handgun and ammunition to see if he could hit a target. For days he hid the gun and practiced in the woods when he had spare time. He found he was a good shot. He began to swagger around; he, too could kill a Yankee.

The swaggering ended when the neighbor told Jim’s father about the theft. Punishment was swift and final You’re a thief, his father said. If you’d done anything else I could’ve forgiven you. But a thief! So he beat Jim across the back with a horsewhip until his shirt tore and the blood seeped through.

When the father threw down the whip he said, Never come back here. I’ll kill you if you do.

With the sound of his mother’s wails in the background, and a slab of cornbread in his pocket, Jim walked away. He eventually found Quantrell’s men and became a part of that group. When the war ended he just went on with the only life he’d known since he was thirteen. He had ridden with the group during the war when they were raiding for supplies for the Confederacy. Now, he rode with Jesse because he had no family bonds stronger than the ones he’d formed with these few desperate men.

Between bank robberies and the atrocities that occurred because of them, Jesse’s men often disbanded and lived quiet respectable lives, hoping the public would be lulled into complacency by the absence of new outrages to discuss. In the late summer of 1875 Jesse announced such a plan. Some of the gang went west, some to the Black Hills in South Dakota to continue their riotous lifestyle; others spread out to various places where they were unknown and could live quietly and normally. Jim decided to take his share of the loot and come to northeast Missouri. With plenty of money he could buy the correct clothes and fine horses that would enable him to play the part of a gentleman.

Jim was a handsome man, over six feet tall. He had a lazy grace, smiled a crooked smile, walked with a cat-like elegance, and, although he was older than most, he was liked and accepted by all the young people. He quickly became part of the community life in Gilman. No real suspicion was entertained; there was rumor, of course, but no family had expressly forbidden their sons to associate with him. However, there was a vague uneasiness when their sons became too friendly with this stranger, and an unspoken watchfulness followed. Where the daughters were concerned it was a different matter; they were forbidden to accept or extend any invitation to this newcomer.

Sam had the same problem with acceptance into the social life of the area. Neither had been invited to any parties. Neither had realized it before for they did go to the church socials.

Jim had seen Anne Gilman at one of these socials. One night, during the Christmas season of 1875, he walked into the church and noticed her immediately. He stopped, and leaning against the wall away from the crowd, he watched Anne as she moved about in her vibrant way. Her small body slim, but rounded and voluptuous, gave her a physical sensuousness that stirred him in a way he’d never felt before. As he watched this dark, rather Spanish looking, black-eyed girl across the room, she laughed with a vital quality of joy unknown to him. At that moment he knew without a doubt the greatest happiness he would ever know was impending in this meeting.

Anne turned and their eyes met across the room. For a moment she looked boldly at him, then she dropped her eyes, but her awareness of him continued. The graceful, carefree way he lounged against the wall intrigued her. The light and shadow from the flicker of a nearby lamp played over his handsome face and caught his crooked smile. In that instant she loved him. From that moment she never again was able to lose that image of Jim in the lamplight, or the love that had forever settled in her heart. Neither of them realized at that moment of meeting they both had lost the free unfettered days of youth and would never again be able to retrieve them.

He moved across the room to meet her.

Anne didn’t resist seeing Jim. They arranged secret trysts, month after month.

As for Sam, there were many Irish girls who acquiesced easily. He played no favorites; he slept with them all. He began to be dissatisfied with this life when he could no longer deny his growing feelings for Mira Davis, Anne Gilman’s best friend. Suddenly it seemed his whole life had being turned upside down. He wanted Mira in a way that made him ashamed of his casual lovemaking with the cheery Irish girls. He began thinking of marriage.

He never really knew how Mira had gotten into the pulse of his blood as she had. He only knew she had quietly entered the conduits of his heart like the phantom wisp of white fog he had often seen while hunting. She twined around his mind and began to inhabit the lone dwelling place of his life. She stole into the sanctuary of his soul and became a part of all he did or said. Of course, he hadn’t voiced this to anyone; nor did he let it show in any action.

If he had shown his interest in Mira, he might have learned quickly the wide social gap that existed. For as long as he kept his place he was treated as a member of the family in the Gilman home. The equality among peers had not been questioned. At church socials he was part of the Gilman group.

Since Sam and Jim had been accepted at the socials, neither boy had thought parties were all that important until this house party. Tonight, they began to understand what being accepted meant. They sat their horses in silence. Their self-esteem badly bruised.

The horses stomped their impatience at the standing; they nodded their heads up and down, side to side, and as they did the bridles jingled loudly. Still the men sat, continuing to stare at the house. Neither spoke.

The object of their scrutiny had been built by slave labor that had molded the red clay into bricks, then laid them to form the house that lit up with a rosy glow when the sun shone on it. There were no tall pillars, only brick balustrades around a wide porch. Leading to the porch were steps of solid rock, cut and carried there from outcropping along the riverbed. The stones would long endure, but man made the bricks. They would crumble and disappear someday; but tonight they seemed to be a solid, indestructible obstacle to a young man’s desires. Jim and Sam wanted to go to the house party more than they had ever wanted anything before.

Jim turned in the saddle and leaned toward Sam. I’m going. He spoke in a defiant voice, What you say to that? Both men knew the invasion love had made in the life of the other. It was an unspoken knowledge.

Sam took off his hat and ran his hand through his hair to gain time to phrase his answer. Don’t know. What if Taylor throws us out? He might, you know. The girls wouldn’t like that. Never speak to us again.

Jim nodded. It was a possibility. The moon sailed behind a cloud, and the sudden darkness obscured both faces so Jim didn’t need to look away as he said, We could meet the girls outside, after dinner. They could slip away. Sam, we’ve got to do something. He moved his horse until he bumped into Sam’s mount. Reaching out in the pitch blackness, he touched Sam’s arm, We’ve got to do something. There’s Jeff Bennett and God knows who else after Anne. You know Wilson is calling on Mira.

Sam knew. He pulled at the scarf around his neck, straightened his hat. Well, I guess—, he began in an uncertain voice. Then he turned toward Jim, and, very firmly said, but I won’t cause any trouble. I won’t do that, Jim.

Jim nodded. He didn’t want trouble; he just wanted Anne.

They had been whispering there under the trees. As their voices stopped, a sudden breeze blew through the branches and the moon came sailing out from behind the cloud. Sam’s horse shied at the moving shadows, hit Jim’s mount, and almost unseated him.

Even the horses are spooked. Jim’s laugh sounded more like a growl.

They turned their horses and walked them back to the public road. In the moonlight the well-trodden byway seemed to lengthen and stretch out to an incalculable world. Their man-boy hearts felt fear of this world as they cantered silently along.

Jim was thinking of Anne. I love her, I want her, and I’m going to have her. If I can’t have her here, I’ll take her to Kansas. Thinking this his spirits rose. Anne would go; she’d love galloping across Missouri with me.

Anne . . . she danced through his mind arousing desires that brought frustrated anger. Anne . . . bubbling, laughing Anne. Jim kicked his horse into a full gallop.

Sam followed, his mind filled with thoughts of Mira. He thought of her dark hair, soft eyes, and her little figure small and square. He liked the way she looked life squarely in the face; the fact that she wasn’t even pretty escaped him. Sam felt no frustrated anger as Jim did; he just longed to share with Mira all that he might feel, or make, or see. He wanted to share beauty, even grief if it came. Oh, he longed for the release that having Mira could bring to his lonely heart. Sam had never thought about not being good enough for Mira before. Why here he had gone along loving Mira, and he didn’t even know how she felt!

They slowed to a trot, cutting across fields and jumping fences to hasten their trip home.

When they approached the lane leading to the Gilmans’ house, Sam turned in without pausing.

Wait, Jim called after him. Tell Anne to meet me at two o’clock tomorrow. She’s going to Mira’s anyway, so she’ll be alone. Will you have a chance to tell her?

Sure, Sam answered. This is no game, Jim.

This is no game to me, either. Jim was grim as he answered. He kicked his horse into a gallop and rode on. He would take Anne away before anyone knew he’d been at the house party. Let Sam make his own plans. He didn’t intend to confide in Sam or anyone else, only Anne.

Sam walked his horse up the lane. Damn me for thinking I could marry a girl like Mira! Me a hired hand! No money, no way of getting any either. He wondered again how Mira felt about him. They had really never talked. No matter, he intended to find out, and then he’d work out something before that house party.

He reached over, opened the gate, and rode into the stable yard. He dismounted, led his horse in, and unsaddled in the dark. Sleepily he turned toward the back door, entered, and went through the kitchen and up the back stairs into the big airy room he shared with the two Gilman boys. This part of the second story was divided from the rest of the house. A private world for the young men of the family.

In this private world Sam felt safe again; problems seemed to retreat. He quickly undressed, slipped into bed, and drifted into the heavy sleep of the young.

Chapter Two

The bell chimed in the quiet morning air.

Gentle mares in the stable lifted their heads.

Robins flew away from the sheltering arbor.

THE BELL, CHIMING outside the kitchen door, awakened Sam with a start. It signaled Sarah and Jane had breakfast ready. Sam knew if the bell was ringing they had already carried wood and kindling to start the roaring fire in the big cook stove, had gone to the well for water, to the chicken house for fresh eggs, and to the ice house for milk and cream. They had baked biscuits, made pancakes, fried ham and eggs, and set the table. All this while he slept! He felt all the more guilty because he knew the girls had left the tenant houses before dawn, walked up the steep hill behind the complex of barns, and crossed the pasture before entering the back garden of the Gilman house.

Across the grassy pasture, Sarah and Jane lived in one of the four cottages that had been built at the foot of a hill. The families living there worked for Grant Gilman. They planted, sowed, reaped, harvested, fed cattle, tended sheep, and slopped hogs. For this they received the use of a house and each received a small salary. They were given twenty-five acres to plant or pasture as they pleased. Grant furnished them with a milk cow and fresh meat at butchering time.

Lois Gilman hired Sarah and Jane on a regular basis. Bright rosy Irish girls, they were the daughters of Tim McCole who took care of Grant Gilman’s beloved gray horses, the first of which was brought from Virginia as breeding stock to be the start of his own stable of grays.

As the bell chimed in the quiet morning the gentle mares lifted their heads from eating their oats. A robin fluttered hurriedly out of the arbor, startled by the noise.

Sam jumped out of bed. Morning, and he’d just gotten asleep! He looked across the big room at the other tumbled bed; it was empty. Tom, the only Gilman son at home, was already up and gone. Only the sun kept Sam company. It streamed in and lit a path across the red rag carpeting. It touched the polished furniture, the indigo blue spread of Tom’s empty bed.

It was a strict rule to be on time for meals. Sleepily, Sam fumbled as he dressed. He splashed water on his face and head. Why didn’t he ride in earlier last night? Too late now, he thought, as he ran down the stairs into the kitchen. Sarah and Jane looked up, ready for a risqué drollery, perhaps a pinch on the derriere, or a swing around the kitchen in Sam’s arms. But Sam didn’t have time for any jesting this morning. Not speaking, he straightened and walked stiffly into the dining room. Grant Gilman was his friend, like a father to him, but Lois Gilman was the one who made the rules in this house. Sam had no intention of being late for breakfast.

Lois Gilman, at the head of the table, sat stiffly upright, so she did not touch her chair’s back. She was a handsome woman, even in middle age. Her hair was still black, but where a looser style might have softened and aided her beauty, the severe chignon she wore only accentuated the gauntness of her face. Her eyes were steely gray, instead of soft and warm as gray eyes often are. There was exquisite Irish lace at the neck of her blue calico dress, and gold earrings dangled from her ears revealing a vanity she never acknowledged.

Grant sat at her right. Fifty-seven, still handsome and virile, he moved through his days with the energy of a much younger man who loved life and intended to enjoy it. He was deaf now and dependent on his wife to repeat the conversations. She would lean near and speak distinctly into his ear. He could hear nothing of any conversation without her help; the voices all became jumbled: some tinkling glass, others booming cymbals, sometimes both together—sounds that confused and frustrated him in the beginning. He had conquered the frustration. He lived in a silent world for the most part and had developed a deep pool of patience to sustain himself when the tinkling and booming of conversations shut him out. He waited until the talking seemed to be finished and it could be repeated to him. Because he could not gauge his own voice, he spoke in a whisper. He did not realize it was very difficult to understand him. The tenant farmers avoided conversation. They spoke a sign language that seemed to serve its purpose. They pointed, pantomimed, and moved in ways that made Grant laugh. Seeing him laugh, they ceased to be self-conscious about their efforts to communicate and enjoyed their attempts as thespians.

In the days of silence, Grant felt peace. He studied every face; he tried to read the expressions he saw there, and reflect on each one. During the day he watched the birds’ flight, noted the flash of an orange wing or breast against the sky. His heart raced across the pasture with the colts as they played. He stood and marveled as the wind bent the wild flowers in the field. What beauty, he thought, when the poppy swayed red and vibrant in the tall grass. He noted every happy sight so he might live patiently and contentedly in this quiet world. He touched the velvet noses of his mares. He felt the muscles of the stallion he rode. He smelled the good leather of the harness and the sour odor of the mens’ sweat. He walked the land, and felt it secure under his feet. His cheerful smile sprang from his deep joy at being granted the privilege of borrowing this land for a little while.

He smiled now as he watched Sam hurry to take his place at the foot of the table, winked to show he knew and shared Sam’s concern at being late. Sun, flooding the back parlor, overflowed into the dining room. It seemed to be a white room; the walls were white, the curtains, and the snowy linens. The highly polished, mahogany pieces gleamed in the sunlight.

Mr. and Mrs. Gilman and Sam sat in silence. They waited for the rest of the family, the four grown children of Lois and Grant Gilman.

Kate came first, with Tom carrying her through the door from the back parlor. Kate had been crippled since birth and had never achieved normal health, or growth. She was twenty-two and quite small. Her eyes were sunken, her cheeks hollow. Her soft brown hair had been cut short because the weight of long hair gave her headaches. She slid into her place beside her father. He smiled down at this little one, patted her on the head gently.

Good morning, Mother, Father, Sam, Tom said. Tom was twenty-four, very dark, not tall. He must have been like some distant ancestor, for he didn’t feel at home in the fields; they brought him no challenge or peace of mind. The other son, Heath, had some of that distant ancestor also; he didn’t care for the farm either. He was in medical school in St. Louis. Tom had gone into business in Gilman, the new town named after his father. Gilman was established after the War when the railroad was being built. The steam engines must have water, and fuel to create the steam that provided the energy needed to drive the pistons and turn the wheels of this iron horse. So new towns were started about every five miles or so to provide wood and water. Station masters, overseers, minor executives, and immigrant gangs came to the new towns to work for the railroad. To service these workmen, businesses sprang up: lumberyards, barber shops, livery stables, and dry goods stores. Tom was in the dry goods business and was showing a profit; he had become a merchant.

The two daughters, Anne and Pet, could be heard coming noisily down the front stairs. Chattering and laughing, they ran through the parlor, and burst into the dining room. Everyone looked up and smiled as the two of them rushed over, kissed their mother, dropped a curtsy to their father, and quickly slid into their places across the table from Tom. They put their napkins in their laps, and settled down to wait for the food to be served. Anne was dark and vivacious. Pet was also dark, but demure, without the vibrant quality of Anne, and also without the quality called beauty which Anne possessed.

Sarah and Jane bustled around putting the food on the table.

When the two girls had placed the steaming platter of ham covered in its rich gravy, and eggs in their big platter on the table, they brought the stacks of pancakes, and a covered basket of biscuits. The coffeepot came next, placed near Lois so she might pour. Then quietness settled on the bright room. All at the table bowed their heads; Sarah and Jane stood behind Lois’ chair as Grant rose to begin the day with his thanks to God.

As he said, Amen, the chatter began again as food was passed. Sarah took the coffee cups for Lois to fill. Voices began. Please pass the cream. Could I have the butter? "Please pass the syrup.’’ But Grant continued to stand lost in thought as he looked at the picture hanging on the paneled wall: George Washington standing at his table giving his thanks to God. Grant liked the picture. He never looked at it without silently thanking the Good Lord for giving him children. George Washington had no children. The two who sat at Washington’s table were not his. Grant looked at the group around his table; pride swelled in his breast. His eyes saw the colors as he sat down: the red of Anne’s shirtwaist she wore with her riding habit, blue of Sam’s work shirt, the pale yellow Pet wore, the white of the bright room. Smells of the rich food arose. He looked down the table and felt wealth in a deeper sense than he felt when he thought of his land, and the material wealth it had brought.

Tom said something to Anne as he passed the biscuits to her, and laughter rang out.

What did he say? Grant touched his wife’s arm. She ignored him. As the conversation continued Grant strained to hear. They seemed so happy, laughing as they bantered back and forth. He touched his wife’s arm several times. What did he say? What did she say? he asked.

Each time the children stopped speaking. They waited for their mother to answer. When she did not, they asked for more coffee, more ham, or another biscuit, and continued their conversation as they ate.

Grant sat bewildered in spite of himself. He continued his breakfast in silence.

Let him wonder, Lois thought as she filled the coffee cups brought to her by Sarah for refills. She remembered how she had longed to talk to Grant in the past when she was a bride, when the children were small, all those years when she was young. He didn’t want to talk to her then; he didn’t care. He rode away across the fields and left her alone. Watching him go, it seemed joy rode away with him, and she was alone without substance; only a vacuum was left. She watched for his return. He would ride up, toss the reins to a waiting hired man. As Lois watched, he’d throw back his head and laugh at something one of the men said. Eagerly she waited for him to come into the house. When he did come she watched the laughter die out of his face as he came near her. She saw indifference replace excitement.

She loved him, but he didn’t ask for her love. Lois always had a wailing sorrow that stopped at her throat, for she knew no outward scream would express the hurt she felt. This hurt went on for years. As she grew older, her days filled with hopelessness, and that turned to bitterness. This bitterness kept her from recognizing joy or excitement anymore. Her capacity to give and receive love was so diminished that this morning she could sit here and be glad Grant couldn’t hear. Yes, she was glad, glad he was shut out. Her capacity to understand love had so shrunken she was coldly planning her daughters’ lives with no thought that their feelings were involved in any way.

Grant glanced at her as she poured his coffee. When she handed him his cup, she looked directly at him, and Grant stared into her cold, empty eyes. It would be useless to ask about the conversation again, he decided. He was being ignored. I started all this, he thought. He chuckled. What a trick I’ve played on myself! He had yet to realize the full extent of that statement.

Lois Stuckey was eighteen when Grant Gilman stopped at her father’s home in Paris, Kentucky, with a letter of introduction from his uncle in Virginia. Grant was on the way to Missouri to look at land he had bought. If it proved to be what he had been led to believe, he intended to settle there, carve out a place for himself. He wanted to establish himself as a respected landowner, have children that would be the beginning of a distinguished family. His model was his uncle and the plantation he owned in Virginia.

Grant had been orphaned when he was six and went to live with his mother’s brother. He had grown up a lonesome boy, for he was unloved by the aunt. A poor relation was not a good match for the daughters on neighboring plantations, so pride kept him from calling on any one of these girls. Instead he had dreamed a dream, always the same: land, a wife like one of those arrogant girls he admired from a distance, children who would be accepted as he never was. He never grew bitter about the slights he endured, nor allowed reality to hinder his dream. He steadily waited for the day when he could realize his desires.

The land in Missouri was the first glimmer that he could quit dreaming and start creating his reality. After he had seen the land in Missouri and was returning to Kentucky, he was filled with the memory of the green rolling hills in Missouri, and the determination to marry Lois Stuckey grew. Lois was a tall girl, rather beautiful, and, more importantly, she certainly was as arrogant as the girls in Virginia. This filled the first qualification of Grant’s idea of a lady. He thought her bloodlines as good as the gray horses he was taking to Missouri. It never occurred to him to love her. She was the final triumph of his dream.

Lois fell in love with him. She loved this joyous man brimming over with ideas for their future. She mistakenly thought this happy enthusiasm meant he loved her, too.

They were married, traveled to Missouri, built the house with money given Grant by his uncle. The uncle explained this money was Grant’s inheritance. He would not be in the will. Grant was satisfied.

After awhile Lois began to wonder. She began to feel that maybe Grant didn’t love her. He didn’t show any of the passion she had read about in novels, hidden and read by lamplight in Kentucky. He was always just quietly gentle and polite. She felt frustration. Her unsatisfied longing for Grant grew. She watched him, this happy man. She began to suspect he rode away to laugh with and make love to other woman some place, but why? She watched as he rode away, laughing, always laughing. There had been no time for laughter and love with her. So her hurt increased, and with it her arrogance.

As the years went by she became more and more the haughty lady Grant had married. She was Mrs. Gilman, and he was proud of her, but