Mrs. Ogden

“ Colonel Ogden wilted perceptibly but Mrs. Ogden throve. The heat agreed with her, it made her expand. She looked younger and she felt younger and said so constantly, and her family tried to feel pleased. Lessons were a torment in the airless schoolroom; Joan flagged, Milly wept, and Elizabeth grew desperate. There was nowhere to walk except in the glare. The turf on the cliffs was as slippery as glass; on the sea-front the asphalt stuck to your shoes, and the beach was a wilderness peopled by wilting parents and irritable, mosquito-bitten children. ”

“ In 1880 the Ogdens had left India hurriedly on account of Colonel Ogden's health. When Milly was a baby and Joan three years old, the family had turned their backs on the pleasant luxury of Indian life. Home they had come to England and a pension, Colonel Ogden morose and chafing at the useless years ahead; Mrs. Ogden a pretty woman, wide-eyed and melancholy after all the partings, especially after one parting which her virtue would have rendered inevitable in any case. ”

“ But when the Doctor repeated it to Mrs. Ogden, she would not hear of any such violation of the customs and traditions of the family. Her sons had always spent Christmas Eve together; and so long as she lived, she was firmly resolved that they always should. The pertinacity with which a determined woman will uphold a custom that she cherishes is simply irresistible—that is, unless the rebel makes up his mind to incur her perpetual enmity; and Isaac Ogden was less than ever in a condition of mind either to brave the hostility of his mother or wound her tenderer feelings. ”

“ Mrs. Ogden drew herself away. "No, I can't do that," she said. "I've lived here since you and Milly were little children, my husband died here and so did your sister; you mustn't ask me to leave my memories, Joan."
In July the servant left. "No, darling, don't do the housework for me; I must learn to do things for myself," said her mother, as Joan was going into the kitchen as a matter of course.
A period of chaos ensued. Mrs. Ogden struggled with brooms and slop-pails as a mosquito might struggle with Cleopatra's Needle. ”

“ Joan wants something and I don't know what it is, but if it's Mrs. Ogden then it ought not to be, that's all. The child's eating her heart out and it's wrong, wrong, wrong! She dare not be herself because it might not be the self that Mrs. Ogden needs. She wants to go to Cambridge, but will she ever go? Why she's even afraid to be fond of me because Mrs. Ogden is jealous of me." She paused, breathless.
Mrs. Benson looked grave. "My dear," she said very quietly, "I sympathize, and I think I understand; but be careful."
Elizabeth thought: "No, you don't understand ”

“ Mackenzie made friends with her in fifteen minutes, and had learned at the end of half an hour that friend was all he might ever hope to be even if he had come with any warmer notions in his breast. Mary was engaged to be married. She told him so, as one friend to another, pledging him to secrecy, showing a little ring on a white ribbon about her neck. Her Corydon was a sheepman’s son who lived beyond the Sullivan ranch, and could dance like a butterfly and sing songs to the banjo in a way to melt the heart of any maid. So Mary said, but in her own way, with blushes, and wide, serious eyes. ”

“ Ogden. She caught Lawrence's eye and smiled.
Richard blushed to his ears, but he went on doggedly: "No, I don't, because I think it's a shame that women should be shut out of things, bottled up, cramped. Oh, I can't explain, only I think if they've got the brains to go to college, we ought not to mind their going."
"Perhaps when you're older you'll feel quite differently, most men do." Mrs. Ogden's voice was provoking.
Richard felt hot and subsided suddenly, but before he did so his eyes turned to Joan where she sat silent at her mother's side. ”

“ Mrs Ogden smiled. "Yes, but you're Joan and not a son, and you're not married yet, you see, and that makes all the difference."
"Then you won't come to London?"
"No, Joan, I won't leave this house. I have very sacred memories here and I won't leave them."
"Oh, Mother, please try to see my side! I can't give up what's all the world to me; I can't go on living in Seabourne and never doing anything worth while all the rest of my life; you've no right to ask it of me!"
"I don't ask it of you; I've some pride. Take your money and go whenever you like; go to Elizabeth. ”

“ In the midst of this welter of illness and misery Mrs. Ogden flapped like a bird with a broken wing; she reproached Milly, but not as one having authority. All day long the sounds of a violin could be heard all over the house; it was almost as though Milly played loudest when the colonel went upstairs to rest; he would doze, and start up suddenly, wide awake.
"What's that? What's that?" And then, "Oh, it's Milly; will the child never think of anyone but herself!"
The doctor came more often. "I'm not satisfied," he told Mrs. Ogden. "I think you must take him to London for the Nauheim cure. ”

“ Reed to Mrs. Mann when Agnes went in for a wrap as the chill of night began to settle.
Mrs. Mann, charitable and romantic as she was in her mild way, shook her head sadly.
“I’m afraid he wasn’t,” said she.
“I’m sorry that I can’t take June away from here tomorrow,” lamented Mrs. Reed. “There’s something hidden in that woman’s life!”
Agnes had come out silently, as anyone must have come over that velvet-soft earth, which much trampling only made the softer. In the gloom she stood just behind Mrs. Reed. ”

“ Mrs. Benson thought: "A tiresome woman; she's overdoing her bereavement, poor thing."
The door had scarcely closed on the departing guest when Mrs. Ogden turned to her daughter. "Is this true?" she demanded, holding out her hands.
"Is what true?"
"About Elizabeth."
"Oh, for God's sake!" exclaimed Joan gruffly, "don't let's go into all that. Elizabeth has gone away, isn't that enough? Aren't you satisfied?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Ogden, and her voice was wonderfully firm and self-possessed. "I am quite satisfied, Joan." ”

“ Ogden's sister Ann had married the now Bishop of Blumfield, but the Blanes were, or so the Ogdens thought, never quite sincere when they urged them to move nearer to them. They decided not to try crumb-gathering at the rich man's table in Blumfield.
It was her children's education that now worried Mrs. Ogden most. Not that she cared very much what they learnt; her fetish was how and where they learnt it. She had been a Routledge before her marriage, a fact which haunted her day and night. "Poor as rats, and silly proud as peacocks," someone had once described them. ”

“ The scent of them was in his nostrils, stirring memories of his old days of simple poverty, of days in the free fields. Again he turned his face toward the window, the little flowers clutched in his hand. His breast heaved as if he fought in the deep waters of his soul against some ignoble weakness.
She moved a little nearer, and reached timidly through the bars with the breathless quiet of one who offers a caress to a sleeper. Her finger-tips touched his arm.
“Joe,” said she, as if appealing in pity to him for permission to share his agony. ”

“ Van Alstyne and Mrs. Warner canceling my luncheon and dinner engagements, but it doesn’t matter.”
Ethel was quick to detect the discontent in Mrs. Ogden’s voice.
“Certainly I will write them for you,” she announced. “It will take no time at all.”
“I have a better plan,” broke in Norcross who, with Ogden, stood just behind them. “Let me write the notes at your dictation, Mrs. Ogden, and then your cousin can get the sleep she really needs.”
“What’s the matter with writing them yourself, Jane?” demanded Ogden. “You never developed pen paralysis until you found a secretary fashionable.” ”

“ The man at the door had entered, and was jangling his spurs through the hall in hasty stride. Chadron stood as if frozen in his boots, his face growing whiter than wounded, blood-drained Macdonald’s on his cot of pain.
Now the sound of the newcomer’s voice rose in the hall, loud and stern. But harsh as it was, and unfriendly to that house, the sound of it made Frances’ heart jump, and something big and warm rise in her and sweep over her; dimming her eyes with tears.
“Where’s my daughter, Chadron, you cutthroat! Where’s Miss Landcraft? If the lightest hair of her head has suffered, by God! ”

“ Ogden was a thin, pale, pock-marked man, with an upstanding head of gray hair, a very high and retreating forehead, and a long upper lip,—one of those men in whom the face, disproportionately large for the head, always gives the impression of a self-sufficient nature. He had a harsh, sharp voice, with an articulation of a most painful accuracy, even his commonplaces being enunciated with a sort of distinct impressiveness, as though to imply that his copper was of more value than another man's gold. ”

“ There is a curious superstition about carriage-keeping which Mrs. Ogden fully shared. It is thought to be the most extravagant, though the most respectable, way of spending money; and an annual outlay which, if dissipated in eating and drinking, or Continental tours, would excite no remark, is considered extravagance if spent on a comfortable vehicle to drive about in one's own neighborhood. Thus Mrs. Ogden considered her son's proposition as revolutionary—as an act of secession from the simplicity of faith and practice which had been their rule of life and the tradition of their family. ”

“ They were ready at last. Mrs. Ogden had her bag, her umbrella, her fur and two parcels, all safely disposed about her person. She took her daughter's arm for guidance as they threaded through the labyrinth of tea-tables; if she would have put on her glasses this would not have been necessary, but in one respect she refused to submit to the tyranny of old age; she would never wear spectacles in public except for reading.
A cold March wind swept round the corners of the High Street. "Put your fur over your mouth, Mother, this wind is deadly," Joan cautioned. ”

“ Oh, you know what I mean!"
"But Elizabeth is so splendid, isn't she? Cambridge, and I don't know what not; still, perhaps——"
"But surely a woman doesn't need to go to Cambridge to be charming? Personally I think it's a great mistake, this education craze; I don't believe men really care for such things in women; do you, Mrs. Ogden?"
Mrs. Ogden smiled. "That depends on the man, I suppose. Perhaps a really manly man prefers the purely feminine woman——"
He was very young. At twenty-two it is gratifying to be thought a manly man; yes, decidedly he liked Mrs. Ogden. ”

“ Sometimes, according to her ideas, Mrs. Ogden would be found wanting, but this neither shocked nor estranged her, for at other times her mother would give good measure and overflowing. But this weighing process was not romantic; it killed with one blow a vast deal of sentimentality. Joan began to realize that Mrs. Ogden's cough did not necessarily point to delicate lungs, that her headaches were largely the outcome of a worrying disposition, and occasionally a comfortable way out of a difficult situation ”

“ Sheep looked like the solution indeed. So thinking, he blew out his candle and went out to look for Walker.
At the door of the tent he stopped, thinking again of Agnes, and of the moonlight on her face as they stood by the riverside, trembling again when the weight of the temptation which had assailed him in that moment swept over him in a heart-lifting memory. Perhaps Agnes condemned him for refusing the opportunity of her lips. For when a woman expects to be kissed, and is cheated in that expectation, it leaves her in censorious mood. ”

“ On the evening of that day of blasted hopes the two of them walked away in the gloaming toward the river, with few words between them until they left the lights of Comanche behind.
“Mr. Strong is considerably elated over his luck,” said Agnes at last, after many sidling glances at his gloomy profile.
“That’s the way it goes,” Dr. Slavens sighed. “I don’t believe that chance is blind; I think it’s just perverse. I should say, not counting myself, that Strong is the least deserving of any man in the crowd of us. Look at old Horace Bentley, the lawyer. ”

“ I’ve seen proof of that right here in Comanche, and I want to tell you people that doctor wasn’t any man’s coward.”
“Thank you for saying that,” blurted Agnes, wholly unintentionally, a glow of pride on her cheeks. 128
Mrs. Reed and June looked at her, the widow with a severe opening of her mouth, out of which no sound came; June with a smile behind her hand.
Walker shook his head.
“He had the courage,” said he, “but he had too much sense to try to go through that cañon. No white man ever went in there and came out alive. ”

“ They shared the fly as far as the Rodneys' house, and then Joan drove on alone.
Mrs. Ogden opened the front door herself.
"She's gone!" were her words of greeting.
"Who has? You don't mean Ethel?"
Mrs. Ogden sank on to the rim of the elephant pad umbrella stand. "She walked out this morning after the greatest impertinence. Of course I refused to pay her. I'm worn out by all I've been through since you left; I nearly telegraphed for you to come back."
"Wait a minute, Mother dear; I must get my trunk in. Yes, please, cabby—upstairs, if you don't mind; the back room." ”

“ Her hand was on his arm; he turned to her, shaking the fallen locks of his wild hair back from his brow. Then her hand was in his, and there was a warm mist, as of summer clouds, before his eyes. Her face was before him, and near–so near. Not red like the bitter-sweet, but pale as the winter dawn. Her eyes were wide, her chin was lifted, and he was straining her to him with the jail door bars against his breast.
Love comes that way, and death; and the blow of sorrow; and the wrench of life’s last bitter pang. Only life is slow ”