AT PINNEY'S RANCH By Edward Bellamy 1898 John Lansing first met Mary Hollister at the house of his friend Pinney, whose wife was her sister. She had soft gray eyes, a pretty color in hercheeks, rosy lips, and a charming figure. In the course of the eveningsomebody suggested mind-reading as a pastime, and Lansing, who had somepowers, or supposed powers, in that direction, although he laughedat them himself, experimented in turn with the ladies. He failed withnearly every subject until it came Mary Hollister's turn. As she placedher soft palm in his, closed her eyes, and gave herself up to hisinfluence, he knew that he should succeed with her, and so he did. She proved a remarkably sympathetic subject, and Lansing was himselfsurprised, and the spectators fairly thrilled, by the feats he was ableto perform by her aid. After that evening he met her often, and therewas more equally remarkable mind-reading; and then mind-reading wasdropped for heart-reading, and the old, old story they read in eachother's hearts had more fascination for them than the new science. Having once discovered that their hearts beat in unison, they took nomore interest in the relation of their minds. The action proper of this story begins four years after their marriage, with a very shocking event, --nothing less than the murder of AustinFlint, who was found dead one morning in the house in which he livedalone. Lansing had no hand in the deed, but he might almost as well havehad; for, while absolutely guiltless, he was caught in one of those netsof circumstance which no foresight can avoid, whereby innocent men aresometimes snared helplessly, and delivered over to a horrid death. Therehad been a misunderstanding between him and the dead man, and onlya couple of days before the murder, they had exchanged blows on thestreet. When Flint was found dead, in the lack of any other clue, peoplethought of Lansing. He realized that this was so, and remained silent asto a fact which otherwise he would have testified to at the inquest, but which he feared might now imperil him. He had been at Austin Flint'shouse the night of the murder, and might have committed it, so faras opportunity was concerned. In reality, the motive of his visit wasanything but murderous. Deeply chagrined by the scandal of the fight, he had gone to Flint to apologize, and to make up their quarrel. But heknew very well that nobody would believe that this was his true objectin seeking his enemy secretly by night, while the admission of the visitwould complete a circumstantial evidence against him stronger than hadoften hanged men. He believed that no one but the dead man knew of thecall, and that it would never be found out. He had not told his wife ofit at the time, and still less afterward, on account of the anxiety shewould feel at his position. Two weeks passed, and he was beginning to breathe freely in theassurance of safety, when, like a thunderbolt from a cloud that seems tohave passed over, the catastrophe came. A friend met him on the streetone day, and warned him to escape while he could. It appeared that hehad been seen to enter Flint's house that night. His concealment of thefact had been accepted as corroborating evidence of his guilt, and thepolice, who had shadowed him from the first, might arrest him at anymoment. The conviction that he was guilty, which the friend who told himthis evidently had, was a terrible comment on the desperateness ofhis position. He walked home as in a dream. His wife had gone out toa neighbor's. His little boy came to him, and clambered on his knee. "Papa, what makes your face so wet?" he asked, for there were greatdrops on his forehead. Then his wife came in, her face white, her eyesfull of horror. "Oh, John!" she exclaimed. "They say you were at Mr. Flint's that night, and they are going to arrest you. Oh, John, whatdoes it mean? Why don't you speak? I shall go mad, if you do not speak. You were not there! Tell me that you were not there!" The ghastly facehe raised to hers might well have seemed to confess everything. At least she seemed to take it so, and in a fit of hysterical weepingsank to the floor, and buried her face in her hands upon a chair. Thechildren, alarmed at the scene, began to cry. It was growing dark, andas he looked out of the window, Lansing saw an officer and a number ofother persons approaching the house. They were coming to arrest him. Animal terror, the instinct of self-preservation, seized upon hisfaculties, stunned and demoralized as he was by the suddenness withwhich this calamity had come upon him. He opened the door and fled, with a score of men and boys yelling in pursuit. He ran wildly, blindly, making incredible leaps and bounds over obstacles. As men sometimes doin nightmares, he argued with himself, as he ran, whether this couldpossibly be a waking experience, and inclined to think that it couldnot. It must be a dream. It was too fantastically horrible to beanything else. Presently he saw just before him the eddying, swirling current of theriver, swollen by a freshet. Still half convinced that he was in anightmare, and, if he could but shake it off, should awake in his warmbed, he plunged headlong in, and was at once swirled out of sight of hispursuers beneath the darkening sky. A blow from a floating object causedhim to throw up his arms, and, clutching something solid, he clamberedupon a shed carried away by the freshet from an up-river farm. All nighthe drifted with the swift current, and in the morning landed in safetythirty miles below the village from which he had fled for life. So John Lansing, for no fault whatever except an error of judgment, ifeven it was that, was banished from home, and separated from his familyalmost as hopelessly as if he were dead. To return would be to meet anaccusation of murder to which his flight had added overwhelming weight. To write to his wife might be to put the officers of the law, whodoubtless watched her closely, upon his scent. Under an assumed name he made his way to the far West, and, joining therush to the silver mines of Colorado, was among the lucky ones. At theend of three years he was a rich man. What he had made the money for, hecould not tell, except that the engrossment of the struggle had helpedhim to forget his wretchedness. Not that he ever did forget it. Hiswife and babies, from whose embraces he had been so suddenly torn, were always in his thoughts. Above all, he could not forget the look ofhorror in his wife's eyes in that last terrible scene. To see her again, and convince her, if not others, that he was innocent, was a need whichso grew upon him that, at the end of three years, he determined to takehis life in his hand and return home openly. This life of exile was notworth living. One day, in the course of setting his affairs in order for his return, he was visiting a mining camp remote from the settlements, when a voiceaddressed him by his old name, and looking around he saw Pinney. Thelatter's first words, as soon as his astonishment and delight had foundsome expression, assured Lansing that he was no longer in danger. Themurderer of Austin' Flint had been discovered, convicted, and hanged twoyears previous. As for Lansing, it had been taken for granted that hewas drowned when he leaped into the river, and there had been no furthersearch for him. His wife had been broken-hearted ever since, but she andthe children were otherwise well, according to the last lettersreceived by Pinney, who, with his wife, had moved out to Colorado a yearprevious. Of course Lansing's only idea now was to get home as fast as steam couldcarry him; but they were one hundred miles from the railroad, and theonly communication was by stage. It would get up from the railroad thenext day, and go back the following morning. Pinney took Lansing out tohis ranch, some miles from the mining camp, to pass the interval. Thefirst thing he asked Mrs. Pinney was if she had a photograph of hiswife. When she brought him one, he durst not look at it before hishosts. Not till he had gone to his room and locked the door did he trusthimself to see again the face of his beloved Mary. That evening Mrs. Pinney told him how his wife and children had faredin his absence. Her father had helped them at first, but after his deathMary had depended upon needlework for support, finding it hard to makethe two ends meet. Lansing groaned at hearing this, but Mrs. Pinney comforted him. It waswell worth while having troubles, she said, if they could be made up toone, as all Mary's would be to her when she saw her husband. The upcoming stage brought the mail, and next day Pinney rode into campto get his weekly newspaper, and engage a passage down the next morningfor Lansing. The day dragged terribly to the latter, who stayed at theranch. He was quite unfit for any social purpose, as Mrs. Pinney, towhom a guest in that lonely place was a rare treat, found to her sorrow, though indeed she could not blame him for being poor company. He passedhours, locked in his room, brooding over Mary's picture. The rest of theday he spent wandering about the place, smiling and talking to himselflike an imbecile, as he dreamed of the happiness so soon to crown histrials. If he could have put himself in communication with Mary bytelegraph during this period of waiting, it would have been easier toget through, but the nearest telegraph station was at the railroad. In the afternoon he saddled a horse and rode about the country, thusdisposing of a couple of hours. When he came back to the house, he saw that Pinney had returned, for hishorse was tethered to a post of the front piazza. The doors and windowsof the living-room were open, and as he reached the front door, he heardPinney and his wife talking in agitated tones. "Oh, how could God let such an awful thing happen?" she was exclaiming, in a voice broken by hysterical sobbing. "I 'm sure there was neveranything half so horrible before. Just as John was coming home to her, and she worshiping him so, and he her! Oh, it will kill him! Who isgoing to tell him? Who can tell him?" "He must not be told to-day, " said Pinney's voice. "We must keep it fromhim at least for to-day. " Lansing entered the room. "Is she dead?" he asked quietly. He could notdoubt, from what he had overheard, that she was. "God help him! He 'll have to know it now, " exclaimed Pinney. "Is she dead?" repeated Lansing. "No, she is n't dead. " "Is she dying, then?" "No, she is well. " "It's the children, then?" "No, " answered Pinney. "They are all right. " "Then, in God's name, what is it?" demanded Lansing, unable to conceivewhat serious evil could have happened to him, if nothing had befallenhis wife and babies. "We can't keep it from him now, " said Pinney to his wife. "You 'll haveto give him her letter. " "Can't you tell me what it is? Why do you keep me in suspense?" askedLansing, in a voice husky with a dread he knew not of what. "I can't, man. Don't ask me!" groaned Finney. "It's better that youshould read it. " Mrs. Finney's face expressed an agony of compassion as, still halfclutching it, she held out a letter to Lansing. "John, oh, John, " shesobbed; "remember, she's not to blame! She doesn't know. " The letter, was in his wife's handwriting, addressed to Mrs. Pinney, andread as follows:-- You will be surprised by what I am going to tell you. You, who know how I loved John, must have taken it for granted that I would never marry again. Not that it could matter to him. Too well I feel the gulf between the dead and living to fancy that his peace could be troubled by any of the weaknesses of mortal hearts. Indeed, he often used to tell me that, if he died, he wanted me to marry again, if ever I felt like doing so; but in those happy days I was always sure that I should be taken first. It was he who was to go first, though, and now it is for the sake of his children that I am going to do what I never thought I could. I am going to marry again. As they grow older and need more, I find it impossible for me to support them, though I do not mind how hard I work, and would wear my fingers to the bone rather than take any other man's name after being John's wife. But I cannot care for them as they should be cared for. Johnny is now six, and ought to go to school, but I cannot dress him decently enough to send him. Mary has outgrown all her clothes, and I cannot get her more. Her feet are too tender to go bare, and I cannot buy her shoes. I get less and less sewing since the new dressmaker came to the village, and soon shall have none. We live, oh so plainly! For myself I should not care, but the children are growing and need better food. They are John's children, and for their sake I have brought myself to do what I never could have done but for them. I have promised to marry Mr. Whitcomb. I have not deceived him as to why alone I marry him. He has promised to care for the children as his own, and to send Johnny to college, for I know his father would have wanted him to go. It will be a very quiet wedding, of course. Mr. Whitcomb has had some cards printed to send to a few friends, and I inclose one to you. I cannot say that I wish you could be present, for it will be anything but a joyful day to me. But when I meet John in heaven, he will hold me to account for the children he left me, and this is the only way by which I can provide for them. So long as it is well with them, I ought not to care for myself. Your sister, Maky Lansing. The card announced that the wedding would take place at the home of thebride, at six o'clock on the afternoon of the 27th of June. It was June 27 that day, and it was nearly five o'clock. "The Lord helpyou!" ejaculated Pinney, as he saw, by the ashen hue which overspreadLansing's face, that the full realization of his situation had comehome to him. "We meant to keep it from you till to-morrow. It might be alittle easier not to know it till it was over than now, when it is goingon, and you not able to lift a finger to stop it. " "Oh, John, " cried Mrs. Pinney once more; "remember, she does n't know!"and, sobbing hysterically, she fled from the room, unable to endure thesight of Lansing's face. He had fallen into a chair, and was motionless, save for the slow andlabored breathing which shook his body. As he sat there in Pinney'sranch this pleasant afternoon, the wife whom he worshiped never sopassionately as now, at their home one thousand miles away, was holdinganother man by the hand, and promising to be his wife. It was five minutes to five by the clock on the wall before him. Ittherefore wanted but five minutes of six, the hour of the wedding, athome, the difference in time being just an hour. In the years of hisexile, by way of enhancing the vividness of his dreams of home, hehad calculated exactly the difference in time from various points inColorado, so that he could say to himself, "Now Mary is putting thebabies to bed;" "Now it is her own bedtime;" "Now she is waking up;" or"Now the church-bells are ringing, and she is walking to church. " Hewas accustomed to carry these two standards of time always in hishead, reading one by the other, and it was this habit, bred of dotingfondness, which now would compel him to follow, as if he were aspectator, minute by minute, each step of the scene being enacted so faraway. People were prompt at weddings. No doubt already the few guests werearriving, stared at by the neighbors from their windows. The complacentbridegroom was by this time on his way to the home of the bride, or perhaps knocking at the door. Lansing knew him well, an elderly, well-to-do furniture-maker, who had been used to express a fatherlyadmiration for Mary. The bride was upstairs in her chamber, putting thefinishing touches to her toilet; or, at this very moment, it might be, was descending the stairs to take the bridegroom's arm and go in to bemarried. Lansing gasped. The mountain wind was blowing through the room, but hewas suffocating. Pinney's voice, seeming to come from very far away, was in his ears. "Rouse yourself, for God's sake! Don't give it all up that way. Ibelieve there's a chance yet. Remember the mind-reading you used to dowith her. You could put almost anything into her mind by just willingit there. That's what I mean. Will her to stop what she is doing now. Perhaps you may save her yet. There's a chance you may do it. I don'tsay there's more than a chance, but there 's that There's a bare chance. That's better than giving up. I 've heard of such things being done. I've read of them. Try it, for God's sake I Don't give up. " At any previous moment of his life the suggestion that he could, by merewill power, move the mind of a person a thousand miles away, so as toreverse a deliberate decision, would have appeared to Lansing as whollypreposterous as no doubt it does to any who read these lines. But a man, however logical he may be on land, will grasp at a straw when drowning, as if it were a log. Pinney had no need to use arguments or adjurationsto induce Lansing to adopt his suggestion. The man before him was inno mood to balance probabilities against improbabilities. It was enoughthat the project offered a chance of success, albeit infinitesimal; foron the other hand there was nothing but an intolerable despair, and afate that truly seemed more than flesh and blood could bear. Lansing had sprung to his feet while Pinney was speaking. "I 'm going totry it, and may God Almighty help me!" he cried, in a terrible voice. "Amen!" echoed Pinney. Lansing sank into his chair again, and sat leaning slightly forward, ina rigid attitude. The expression of his eyes at once became fixed. Hisfeatures grew tense, and the muscles of his face stood out. As if tosteady the mental strain by a physical one, he had taken from the tablea horseshoe which had lain there, and held it in a convulsive grip. Pinney had made this extraordinary suggestion in the hope of divertingLansing's mind for a moment from his terrible situation, and with not somuch faith even as he feigned that it would be of any practical avail. But now, as he looked upon the ghastly face before him, and realizedthe tremendous concentration of purpose, the agony of will, which itexpressed, he was impressed that it would not be marvelous if somemarvel should be the issue. Certainly, if the will really had any suchpower as Lansing was trying to exert, as so many theorists maintained, there could never arise circumstances better calculated than these tocall forth a supreme assertion of the faculty. He went out of the roomon tiptoe, and left his friend alone to fight this strange and terriblebattle with the powers of the air for the honor of his wife and his own. There was little enough need of any preliminary effort on Lansing'spart to fix his thoughts upon Mary. It was only requisite that to theintensity of the mental vision, with which he had before imagined her, should be added the activity of the will, turning the former mood ofdespair into one of resistance. He knew in what room of their house thewedding party must now be gathered, and was able to represent tohimself the scene there as vividly as if he had been present. He sawthe relatives assembled; he saw Mr. Davenport, the minister, and, facinghim, the bridal couple, in the only spot where they could well stand, before the fireplace. But from all the others, from the guests, from theminister, from the bridegroom, he turned his thoughts, to fix them onthe bride alone. He saw her as if through the small end of an immenselylong telescope, distinctly, but at an immeasurable distance. On thisface his mental gaze was riveted, as by conclusive efforts his willstrove to reach and move hers against the thing that she was doing. Although his former experiments in mental phenomena had in a measurefamiliarized him with the mode of addressing his powers to such anundertaking as this, yet the present effort was on a scale so muchvaster that his will for a time seemed appalled, and refused to go outfrom him, as a bird put forth from a ship at sea returns again and againbefore daring to essay the distant flight to land. He felt that he wasgaining nothing. He was as one who beats the air. It was all he could doto struggle against the influences that tended to deflect and dissipatehis thoughts. Again and again a conviction of the uselessness of theattempt, of the madness of imagining that a mere man could send a wish, like a voice, across a continent, laid its paralyzing touch upon hiswill, and nothing but a sense of the black horror which failure meantenabled him to throw it off. If he but once admitted the idea offailing, all was lost. He must believe that he could do this thing, or he surely could not. To question it was to surrender his wife;to despair was to abandon her to her fate. So, as a wrestler strainsagainst a mighty antagonist, his will strained and tugged in supremestress against the impalpable obstruction of space, and, fightingdespair with despair, doggedly held to its purpose, and sought to keephis faculties unremittingly streaming to one end. Finally, as thistremendous effort, which made minutes seem hours, went on, there camea sense of efficiency, the feeling of achieving something. From thisconsciousness was first born a faith, no longer desperate, but rational, that he might succeed, and with faith came an instantaneous tenfoldmultiplication of force. The overflow of energy lost the tendency todissipation and became steady. The will appeared to be getting themental faculties more perfectly in hand, if the expression may be used, not only concentrating but fairly fusing them together by the intensitywith which it drove them to their object. It was time. Already, perhaps, Mary was about to utter the vows that would give her to another. Lansing's lips moved. As if he were standing at her side, he murmuredwith strained and labored utterance ejaculations of appeal andadjuration. Then came the climax of the stupendous struggle. He became aware of asensation so amazing that I know not if it can be described at all, --asensation comparable to that which comes up the mile-long sounding-line, telling that it touches bottom. Fainter far, as much finer as is mindthan matter, yet not less unmistakable, was the thrill which told theman, agonizing on that lonely mountain of Colorado, that the will whichhe had sent forth to touch the mind of another, a thousand miles away, had found its resting-place, and the chain between them was complete. No longer projected at random into the void, but as if it sent along anestablished medium of communication, his will now seemed to work uponhers, not uncertainly and with difficulty, but as if in immediatecontact. Simultaneously, also, its mood changed. No more appealing, agonizing, desperate, it became insistent, imperious, dominating. Foronly a few moments it remained at this pitch, and then, the mentaltension suddenly relaxing, he aroused to a perception of hissurroundings, of which toward the last he had become oblivious. He wasdrenched with perspiration and completely exhausted. The iron horseshoewhich he had held in his hands was drawn halfway out. Thirty-six hours later, Lansing, accompanied by Pinney, climbed downfrom the stage at the railroad station. During the interval Lansinghad neither eaten nor slept. If at moments in that time he was able toindulge the hope that his tremendous experiment had been successful, forthe main part the overwhelming presumption of common sense and commonexperience against such a notion made it seem childish folly toentertain it. At the station was to be sent the dispatch, the reply to which woulddetermine Mary's fate and his own. Pinney signed it, so that, if theworst were true, Lansing's existence might still remain a secret; for ofgoing back to her in that case, to make her a sharer of his shame, therewas no thought on his part. The dispatch was addressed to Mr. Davenport, Mary's minister, and merely asked if the wedding had taken place. They had to wait two hours for the answer. When it came, Lansing waswithout on the platform, and Pinney was in the office. The operatormercifully shortened his suspense by reading the purport of the messagefrom the tape: "The dispatch in answer to yours says that the weddingdid not take place. " Pinney sprang out upon the platform. At sight of Lansing's look ofghastly questioning, the tears blinded him, and he could not speak, butthe wild exultation of his face and gestures was speech enough. The second day following, Lansing clasped his wife to his breast, and this is the story she told him, interrupted with weepings andshudderings and ecstatic embraces of reassurance. The reasons which haddetermined her, in disregard of the dictates of her own heart, to marryagain, have been sufficiently intimated in her letter to Mrs. Pinney. For the rest, Mr. Whitcomb was a highly respectable man, whom sheesteemed and believed to be good and worthy. When the hour set for themarriage arrived, and she took her place by his side before the ministerand the guests, her heart indeed was like lead, but her mind calm andresolved. The preliminary prayer was long, and it was natural, as itwent on, that her thoughts should go back to the day when she had thusstood by another's side. She had ado to crowd back the scalding tears, as she contrasted her present mood of resignation with the mingling ofvirginal timidity and the abandon of love in her heart that other day. Suddenly, seeming to rise out of this painful contrast of the pastand the present, a feeling of abhorrence for the act to which she wascommitted possessed her mind. She had all along shrunk from it, as anysensitive woman might from a marriage without love, but there hadbeen nothing in that shrinking to compare in intensity with thisuncontrollable aversion which now seized upon her to the idea of holdinga wife's relation to the man by her side. It had all at once comeoyer her that she could not do it. Nevertheless she was a sensible andrational woman as well as a sweet and lovely one. Whatever might be theorigin of this sudden repugnance, she knew it had none in reason. Shewas fulfilling a promise which she had maturely considered, and neitherin justice to herself nor the man to whom she had given it could shelet a purely hysterical attack like this prevent its consummation. Shecalled reason and common sense to her aid, and resolutely struggled tobanish the distressing fancies that assailed her. The moisture stood outupon her forehead with the severity of the conflict, which momentarilyincreased. At last the minister ended his prayer, of which she had notheard a word. The bridal pair were bidden to take each other by thehand. As the bridegroom's fingers closed around hers, she could notavoid a shudder as at a loathsome contact. It was only by a supremeeffort of self-control that she restrained from snatching her hand awaywith a scream. She did not hear what the minister went on to say. Everyfaculty was concentrated on the struggle, which had now become one ofdesperation, to repress an outbreak of the storm that was raging within. For, despite the shuddering protest of every instinct and the wildrepulsion with which every nerve tingled, she was determined to gothrough the ceremony. But though the will in its citadel still held out, she knew that it could not be for long. Each wave of emotion that itwithstood was higher, stronger, than the last. She felt that it wasgoing, going. She prayed that the minister might be quick, while yetshe retained a little self-command, and give her an opportunity to uttersome binding vow which should make good her solemn engagement, and avertthe scandal of the outbreak on the verge of which she was trembling. "Doyou, " said the minister to Mr. Whitcomb, "take this woman whom youhold by the hand to be your wife, to honor, protect, and love whileyou live?" "I do, " replied the bridegroom promptly. "Do you, " said theminister, looking at Mary, "take the man whom you hold by the hand tobe your husband, to love and honor while you live?" Mary tried to say"Yes, " but at the effort there surged up against it an oppositionthat was almost tangible in its overpowering force. No longer merelyoperating upon her sensibilities, the inexplicable influence thatwas conquering her now seized on her physical functions, and laid itsinterdict upon her tongue. Three times she strove to throw off theincubus, to speak, but in vain. Great drops were on her forehead;she was deadly pale, and her eyes were wild and staring; her featurestwitched as in a spasm, while she stood there struggling with theinvisible power that sealed her lips. There was a sudden movement amongthe spectators; they were whispering together. They saw that somethingwas wrong. "Do you thus promise?" repeated the minister, after a pause. "Nod, if you can't speak, " murmured the bridegroom. His words were thehiss of a serpent in her ears. Her will resisted no longer; her soulwas wholly possessed by unreasoning terror of the man and horror of themarriage. "No! no! no!" she screamed in piercing tones, and snatchingher hand from the bridegroom, she threw herself upon the breast of theastonished minister, sobbing wildly as she clung to him, "Save me, saveme! Take me away! I can't marry him, --I can't! Oh, I can't!" The wedding broke up in confusion, and that is the way, if you chooseto think so, that John Lansing, one thousand miles away, saved his wifefrom marrying another man. "If you choose to think so, " I say, for it is perfectly competent toargue that the influence to which Mary Lansing yielded was merely anhysterical attack, not wholly strange at such a moment in the case of awoman devoted to her first husband, and reluctantly consenting to secondnuptials. On this theory, Lansing's simultaneous agony at Pinnersranch in Colorado was merely a coincidence; interesting, perhaps, butunnecessary to account for his wife's behavior. That John and MaryLansing should reject with indignation this simple method of accountingfor their great deliverance is not at all surprising in view of thecommon proclivity of people to be impressed with the extraordinary sideof circumstances which affect themselves; nor is there any reason whytheir opinion of the true explanation of the facts should be given moreweight than another's. The writer, who has merely endeavored to putthis story into narrative form, has formed no opinion on it which issatisfactory to himself, and therefore abstains from any effort toinfluence the reader's judgment.